Luke and Riven had just settled into their beds when her eyes snapped open.
Someone was in the apartment.
Luke didn't notice anything. He was still baseline human—just starting to get competent with a handgun, hitting the gym regularly, but nowhere near developing combat instincts. Even if his physical conditioning improved, without proper training, he'd never sense an intruder the way Riven could.
Several shadows slipped through the door.
"You sure this is where you saw her?" A low voice. Male. Careful.
"Yeah, boss. The woman's gorgeous. If we grab her..."
Another voice. Eager. The kind of eager that made Luke's skin crawl when he heard it later.
The words barely left the man's mouth before Riven materialized beside them. The leader had just clicked on his flashlight when a white-haired blur entered his peripheral vision—and then his knee exploded inward with a wet crunch.
Strange thing: he didn't scream. Just crumpled to the floor like his strings had been cut.
The others reacted faster than Riven expected. She'd pegged them as street-level trash based on their clothes and conversation, but their response time said otherwise. Combat-trained. Maybe military. Definitely not amateurs.
Interesting.
One of them threw a punch—heavy, committed, the kind that could crack ribs on a normal person. Riven caught it in her palm like he'd lobbed her a softball. Before he could process the impossibility of that, her leg whipped up in a perfect arc, heel connecting with the underside of his jaw.
Crack.
His neck snapped clean. He dropped.
"Fuck!"
The others saw their friend die and charged anyway. No hesitation. No fear. Just aggression.
Riven stopped holding back.
These weren't normal humans. The strength behind that punch, the speed of their reactions—something was off. Enhanced, maybe. Augmented somehow. She'd been pulling her punches out of habit, but if they could take hits...
Her leg cut through the air with a sound like a blade being drawn. The whistle of displaced atmosphere. The first one she caught folded around her shin like his bones were made of wet cardboard, and his momentum carried him into his buddy, shattering ribs on impact. Both went flying.
Then the impossible happened.
The first guy—the one whose knee she'd turned into paste—stood up.
Riven had felt that impact. She knew exactly how much damage she'd done. His kneecap should have been powder. The joint itself should have been anatomically incapable of supporting weight.
He charged her anyway.
"Look out!"
Luke's shout cut through the chaos, and Riven understood a half-second too late. The standing corpse was a distraction. The real attack came from behind—from the man whose neck she'd definitely broken.
Cold fingers wrapped around her ankle. She looked down to see a mouth full of fangs stretching wide, aiming for her calf.
Bang.
Luke's shot punched a hole through the creature's forehead before its teeth could connect. Not that Riven needed saving—she was already twisting to counter—but the assist was appreciated.
She grabbed the one still rushing her and crushed his skull between her palms like it was an overripe melon.
He kept moving.
Headless. Brain matter leaking between her fingers. Still trying to fight.
"It won't work," Luke said, climbing out of bed with his pistol still raised. His voice was calm. Analytical. "They're vampires. Silver or sunlight. Nothing else puts them down permanently."
He'd seen enough Blade movies to know what he was dealing with. The original film had a scene where Blade set a vampire on fire and it took over ten minutes of sustained burning before the thing finally died. These were those vampires. MCU-adjacent. Absurdly resilient.
Riven processed this, then tilted her head. "Vladimir?"
Luke blinked. Then snorted. "Vladimir's a blood mage. Hemomancy. Completely different thing."
Trust Riven to immediately think of League of Legends lore. He appreciated the instinct, but the Crimson Reaper wasn't going to be relevant here.
"So how do we handle them?" Riven asked, gesturing at the twitching, technically-still-alive bodies scattered around their apartment.
"First, context." Luke looked at the carnage. "They came for you?"
Riven nodded. She'd overheard enough before engaging to piece it together. Pretty woman in a no-questions-asked building. Prime target for the kind of people who preyed on the vulnerable.
"Makes sense," Luke said. "We're in the worst neighborhood in the city. You're stunning. This place doesn't even require ID. Of course someone noticed."
That someone just happened to be vampires instead of regular human traffickers. Lucky them.
Luke's mind was already racing ahead. He'd been struggling to find good farming spots—places with enough enemies to generate meaningful drops without attracting too much attention. Street gangs were finite. Criminals were scattered.
But vampires?
Vampires bred. Vampires clustered. Vampires had nests.
Aside from the Chitauri invasion and Thanos's army—both of which were years away and catastrophically dangerous—he couldn't think of a better source of mob enemies.
"Tell me where your nest is," Luke said, crouching in front of the survivors. They'd been bound with whatever Riven could find—electrical cords, torn sheets, a belt. Improvised but effective.
The vampires said nothing. Defiant. Ready to die for their masters.
Luke reached into his inventory and pulled out a silver dagger.
The weapon gleamed under the apartment's dim lighting. One of countless random drops from countless forgettable games—survival horror titles, RPGs, action games. He'd accumulated a small arsenal of anti-supernatural gear without really meaning to.
He drew the blade lightly across one vampire's arm.
The creature shrieked—a sound that cut off almost immediately as it crumbled to ash, silver burning through its system like acid through paper.
"Silver!" one of the others gasped.
The defiance evaporated. Suddenly they were very, very interested in cooperation.
"I only need one guide," Luke said, running his thumb along the flat of the blade. "Choose."
They chose to talk. All of them. Over each other. Falling over themselves to be useful.
Luke listened carefully and realized they weren't contradicting each other—they were just describing different locations. Multiple nests. Multiple gathering points. The vampire population in New York was apparently massive, and most of them were turned rather than pureblood. Expendable foot soldiers for older, more powerful masters.
This was better than he'd hoped.
"Alright," he said. "You can all guide me."
Riven's hand found his, squeezing gently. Worry in her grip. He was still fragile. Still human. Charging into vampire dens wasn't exactly safe.
Luke patted her hand and smiled.
"Don't worry. This is exactly what we needed."
PLZ THROW POWERSTONES.