Short Story - Death of a Thousand Centuries

[Cody Craig]

Death of a Thousand Centuries

A Short Story by Cody Craig


Trickling warmly down my chest, forcing itself out between my centuries old flesh and the roughly sawn wooden stake, blood. My own blood. Pulsating and oozing with every diminishing throb of my failing heart. Spurt after spurt, blood, bubbling out of my punctured body. A turbulent river of surging and gushing red. The red tide of life, ebbing ever so steadily from my body.

Why am I afraid? I have been expecting this for a very long time. Centuries. Yet I'm not prepared. Why is the sight of my own blood so disturbing? It's not as if I'm unaccustomed to the sight of blood. I thrive on blood; my very existence is dependant on it.

My death will be no more than another drop of blood to add to the centuries of bloodshed of the human race. They have always been afraid of us. Humans, afraid of the very idea of us. Repulsed by the fact that we nurture on blood. Humans, so afraid that over time they'd created stories and myths about us. Intricate threads spun to tear away at the very fabric of our misunderstood existence.

Blood, steadily dripping from my body and pooling on the cold tiled floor below. Drip after drip accumulating in the radiating red puddle. Blood. My Blood.
The sudden pound of the hammer inches the crude stake deeper into my chest. My body shudders with each pummel, a burning sensation exudes from the lesion and my mind has trouble focusing. Drifting, in and out of consciousness.

It's themselves, the human race that they should be afraid of, not us. My eyes have borne witness to centuries of bloodshed. Decade after decade of killing and slaughter, the very existence of the human race is etched into the time parched pages of the history books in red, not in ink but in the blood of numerous martyrs (all of whom died for the so-called good of their species). I have witnessed it all, from the beginning of humanity right up until the terror stricken present day. But the last blood that I'll see will be my own.

Drifting deeper into the unknown. The radiating burning feeling now reaching as far as my outer extremities, fingers and toes aching with pins and needles.

I was there when God gave man the weapons to hunt prey, the tools to feed and nourish himself. It didn't take him long to find another use for them, his brothers and kin didn't even see it coming. Quickly he developed a thirst for blood, not unlike us. The difference is that we feed on blood for our very subsistence, but humans are the real beasts. Bloodthirsty beasts. Not satisfied with killing only what is needed for food but happy to kill for the mere sake of it.

It didn't take me long to become afraid of humans, I was young, no more than a few centuries old (young for our type), I was visiting Egypt during the reign of Rameses II. I witnessed first hand the destructive nature of the human beast. I was scared as I walked among the bodies of the fallen Hittites, their blood soaking into the sun dried Egyptian sand. I wasn't scared for my own safety but was scared for the whole human race. I knew at that instant that the clock was ticking and that it would only be a matter of time until they wiped their entire race from existence.

I saw it again as I sat among the senators in the Coliseum. Man against man, beasts fighting to the end. The arena full of bloodthirsty spectators, cheering frantically as their favorite gladiator swings his heavy sword and dislodges the head of his lesser opponent. Animals.

Blood, my own blood. Escaping from my wound unabated. It'll be over soon. My heart will stop pumping, my blood supply will diminish and it will be all over, for me anyhow. But the blood of the human race will continue to flow freely; it is the nature of the beast.

They, humans, call us creatures of the night. Yet another of their fabricated stories to separate us from them. Of course we hunt at night, the picking is easier when your dinner is asleep, but we can walk in full sun just like you. We enjoy a beautiful sunny day; we relish the feeling of the sun as it warms our cool skin.

I was stunned as I mingled in the crowd of onlookers, shocked as the solid steel blade of the guillotine clapped shut and the head of Marie Antoinette tumbled into the wicker basket. If your leaders can commit such atrocities what chance do the rest of you have?

Fingers and feet have gone numb; coolness is flushing away the burning sensation. I can't stop shivering, yet I’m sweating profusely.

I watched in horror at the Virginian battlefields, the blue clad regiment marching forward as one. Neighbors cut down by musket lead, bodies ripped apart by cannon fire. Blood everywhere, limbs dismembered from their bodies, entrails oozing out of stomach cavities. I have seen it all.

My stomach is churning, I feel sick. I don't think it is because I’m dying, but sick from what I have seen over the centuries.

The surgeon prowling the dark London streets, his black cape flapping in the breeze as he slices and dices another whore with his scalpel. I was there, recording the murders for the London Times, a reporter.

I lived among humans, I lived as one of you. I was a neighbor, a friend, and a lover. They never knew.

Numbness is spreading through my body; I cannot even feel the stake in my chest. Won't be long now.

I held a rifle as boatload after boatload of soldiers scaled the cliffs of Anzac Cove only to be mowed down by Turkish machine gun fire. Rivers of blood cascading onto the beach below. Wave after wave of red froth washing ashore.

It was later that century that I confirmed my suspicions. I watched as thousands of Jews were marched off to concentration camps, only to be herded into gas chambers. Genocide. One dictator's beliefs nearly wiping out an entire religion. It would only be a matter of time. The end of the human race is nigh.

I can feel my soul slipping from my body. Numbness has totally stolen my feelings.

The world stopped as high-jacked planes collide with an American icon. Countless lives destroyed and an imaginary innocence is lost. The world will never be the same. Senseless killing. Why? Because some religious fanatic doesn't like the western culture? He calls them the infidels and indoctrinates thousands of mindless killers to fight for Allah. Jihad.

I have witnessed it all. I will die, but my type will live on. We will live amongst you. Prey on you. You will sustain us, but ultimately you will destroy us, along with the entire human race, the Earth will become a wasteland.

My blood has been spilt, I open my eyes for one last look. He is standing above me, a human, he is grinning. Little does he know?

 

[TerishD]

Reply

I would not call this a story as much as a failed thesis. No plot, and really no character development. The pitiful whining that he does not deserve death, because the SPECIES that is killing him is less noble than he (no comment at all about the persons who are acting), really gets stretched beyond one's tolerance. However true the accusations against the human race might be, there is no justification for the nobleness of vampires (the 'they kill each other while we only feed on them' argument is weak). The nobleness of the speaker compared to the quality of those that killed him (whoever they are) is not set forth at all.

I will give the writer credit for attempting to do a character study at the moment of death. He should have focused on the character however, and not on sermonizing. I read the piece hoping for the non-American ending where the vampire gets back up (for those unaware of horror edits, the American version is normally the most tame). It would have put some 'action' into the scene. As it was, I was glad when it was over.

Of course, such is just me.

 

[F.M.Thompson]

The Origin of the Vampire Legend

I enjoy the energy of your words, albeit, with the inconsistencies and confusion in the thought process. Keep it up, and try to focus completely upon the outcome that you want, and eliminate any future or past associations that muddle those links. If you have a synonym guide, (MS 2000), use it often to give your descriptions more range and be sure your story is saying what you want it to.

“Vampires” (mythical) have no soul…they are automatons, living only to feed and they stay alive through all of their days and nights because they choose not to die, and are in misery because of it. At least the ones in stories that are in popular fiction, from what I can tell.

I found it interesting that you give human emotions to an in-human entity. You also seem to be at odds with their activities, finding them reprehensible, yet your vampire feasts upon their blood.

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

This legend of vampires comes from interesting sources that are “real.” The legend, most recently originated (see info below) from ancient lands, but the genesis comes from ancient Sumerian forefathers, the Annunaki, some say the creators of the human species, and the pre-history of the Bible, and the bloodlines that are still ruling the major nations, (per David Icke, which I believe) and the major corporations of the Earth.

Bloodline is the operative factor here, and who possesses it, possesses eternal life. The origin of the vampire comes from these ruling bloodlines and their ability to live forever, and yes, they do revel in blood sacrifice, ingesting nutrients and hormones that help them stay focused in the human form.

My resources tell an interesting story of the origin of these bloodlines, and the way they survive the great reach of history. They do it by leaving one body and inhabiting another, what we call possession. Possession is achieved when an initiate is traumatized (MK Ultra) to the point that they are open to receiving a new, dominant personality. There are other ways, having to do with ritual ceremony of these bloodlines, which many call Satanism.

There is no Satan…there are only the fourth dimension reptilians (demons) and they dwell mostly there, occasionally here, and their bloodlines rule for them in human form on the planet Earth within the three dimensions (vampires).

(No, Toto, we are not in Kansas, anymore).

What, for me, that is interesting about the whole origin of the vampire myth, is that, per se, it is a myth, but not. It has a long and ancient lineage, and does in fact come from the part of the world that gave us Dracula, Transylvania.

The area, ancient Romania, was the home to Vlad the Impaler. The following from Wikipedia, an online free encyclopedia:

“Vlad III Dracula (November or December, 1431–December 1476), has also been known as Dracula (also Drăculea — see below, or Vlad the Impaler (Vlad Ţepeş IPA: /'tsepeʃ/ in Romanian). Vlad III was the voivode, or prince, of the principality of Wallachia (what is today an informal region in southern Romania). His three reigns were in 1448, from 1456 to 1462, and 1476.
More than anything else, the historical Dracula is known for his exceeding cruelty. Impalement was Dracula's preferred method of torture and execution, which he had learned in his youth as a prisoner of the Turks. Dracula usually had a horse attached to each of the victim's legs as a sharpened stake was gradually forced into the body. The end of the stake was usually oiled and care was taken that the stake not be too sharp; else the victim might die too rapidly from shock.

Normally the stake was inserted into the body through the anus and was often forced through the body until it emerged from the mouth. However, there were many instances where victims were impaled through other bodily orifices or through the abdomen or chest. Infants were sometimes impaled on the stake forced through their mother's chests. The records indicate that victims were sometimes impaled so that they hung upside down on the stake.”

As you may see, the concept of the wooden stake came naturally to Bram Stoker, who wrote his novel, “Dracula,” in 1897. Some have implied that he had first-hand information about the cermomies of the forth-dimesional entities that rule the Earth, unseen to you and I.

Stoker gave them form and called them vampires.