I have lived long enough to know how long five minutes truly are. In five minutes you can run a mile or drive six. You can make a choice that will save a life or a choice that can end one. Time is the one thing we want most but we use the worst, however if you play your cards right five minutes can be just as wonderful five thousand years; or in young Mr. Campell's case just as fatal.

12:00

I had first come across the young boy who sat across from me over a decade ago on a hunting trip. At the time the youthful boy who looked barely of age was merely a child with a curly mop of curls that hung low over his eyes. His father had been standing gruffly right at his side and holding a shotgun contrasting the boy's apparent innocence.

"I'm sorry to hear of your father and your mother's passing, sweetie." I commented almost robotically only because I knew that I was expected to. If I refrained and simply ignored the topic as I had done on countless other occasions to other acquaintances I knew he would think I didn't care. I did care, it was just that I hardly wanted to waste time speaking of the past. Tonight I would make an exception though, Andre deserved to know I did care about his family.

I watched Andre's curl infested head turn to me, his green eyes locking with mine for a second before his face fell and eyes dropped to the ground. "I didn't see you at their funeral."

I sigh crossing my arms and tucking my hands under my shawl uncomfortably. "There is no point to funerals. Your parents are dead, paying my respects wouldn't change that. I was hunting a pack of vampires at the time who were on a killing spree, I had to choose between attending a burial and preventing more."

I watched Andre lift his head and look me in the eye, his face splayed with hurt. "I don't believe that. You could have stopped by after your hunt, but you didn't." He hook his head. "No, I don't think you could face me. You knew that they were going after the alpha. Dad asked you to back them up." I choked laugh forced it's way from his throat. "Yeah. I heard the message he left you."

12:01

I said nothing for a long second and I felt the familiar burden of guilt begin to strangle my heart. "I told them not to do it. I told them they weren't ready." I pursed my lips remembering the last conversation that I had with Mr.Campell. As much as I had tried to forget it I think the pleading in his voice would haunt me until I died. "If I had gone with them it wouldn't have changed anything besides the body count."

Andre's face softened. "I know." He said so softly that my old ears nearly missed it. "I just wish you had been there after they died. Like, I never got to know my grandparents. They died fighting the alpha while I was still young." He looked away letting his hands fall to his side. "There was a time you and my parents hunted together all the time and you were the closest thing to a grandma I ever had. Then suddenly you're just nowhere."

I didn't quite know what I could say. I was known for fighting the monsters that lurked in the shadows of the cities, not for fighting the ones in my head. "I'm sorry, Andre. I didn't handle the situation well. In fact it was downright terrible." It was my turn to gaze down at my shoes, I already knew what the boy was going to say.

"I forgive you."

I looked up again at the little boy who had grown into a strong young man and I felt my eyes water ever so slightly. I had never been able to have a child but Andre was by far the closest anyone had come to it. "I know you are going after the alpha." I stated bluntly, watching him cross his arms over his chest defensively at the sudden shift in conversation. One look into his eyes and I knew he thought I was going to stop him. "I just wanted to let you know that when you do, assuming you are ready, I will back you up. I swear my life on it."

His response took me by surprise as he walked forward and wrapped his arms around me like he used to do when he was young. "Thank you, thank you so much."

12:02

It wasn't until I looked up that I saw him, the curly auburn haired boy who hovered over at the bar speaking with a young man I didn't know. Beyond him another one stood flirting arily with a pretty girl. My heart sunk as I looked at the one that I had my arms around.

"Andre. Look." I commanded sharply pushing him away and pointing at his clones that stood beyond us, mingling. It didn't appear that anyone had noticed them yet besides me as they drank the ends of their drinks and chatted idly.

Andre turned his head and followed my eyes. He blinked for a second in shock and then his green eyes alit with a savageness that I had seen in his eyes far to many times. He was rather like an ocean; calm and beautiful when the sun shone down on him and downright ruthless when thunder boomed and lightning danced across the sky. He began to walk away from me, yanking his silver gun from his beltline. My fingers yanked his arm back though, "Andre Campell, I know how you feel about them but you can't get involved in this, they all are identical to you. If there is a brawl, and there will be a brawl, you will get killed. I need you out of the way so no one mistakes you for one of them and stabs you." I hissed under my breath, not wanting to trigger the response I knew was coming.

Andre glowered at me and twisted out of my grasp. "Bullshit. I'll be fine." I watched him as she shoved a few of his guests out of the way and aimed his gun. "Shapeshifters!" He screamed, his finger squeezing the trigger.

The shot echoed off the walls deafeningly as one of the many shapeshifters cloaked as Andre's head snapped backward and it toppled to the ground dead.

A girl screamed as the door was thrown open and the windows exploded. Hundreds of shapeshifters charged into the small building screaming, each and every one of them was cloaked as Andre. Their voices chorused a savage war cry as the waves of shifters piled into the room. The hunters let out a shrill cry of their own and just like that the small, peaceful restaurant collapsed into utter chaos.

12:03

The shapeshifter quite obviously had a death wish. Nothing had ever attacked me and lived to tell the tale.

The creature who looked so frighteningly like Andre had leapt around me trying to catch me in the back with the sword. I had felt the familiar prickles of hair standing up on my neck and I had turned, trusting the instinct just in time to duck out of the way. My body had whined in protest as it often does in my age as I had yanked my own silver sword from my dragon headed cane and swung it at his head. The shifter had only just regained his balance from his blow but he was too late. My sword barreled into his neck leaving a sizable dent as the shifter collapsed to the ground choking on his own roux blood.

I stared at him for a second, completely sickened. It was like watching Andre die. This was a shadow of what was to come, there was no way Andre could get out of this alive.

I turned away quickly and set to attacking the shifter who was standing over the body of youthful girl with long wavy red hair made redder from the blood that was gushing from her scalp. His back was to me so I simply forced my sword into his fleshy back. The shifter screamed falling to his knees. I daintily placed the heel of my shoe next to my sword and yanked it free from the spasming shapeshifter trying to ignore the cracking of my old bones.

Suddenly a weight barreled into my side sending me crashing into the floor. The sword skidded out of my hands gliding across out of my reach. I looked up to see a shapeshifter glowering down at me, his eyes filled with a crazed vengeance as his clammy hands tightened around my neck.

I didn't even bother trying to tank them free, instead I just reached my shaking hands into my beltline, my finger closing around the hilt of my silver-loaded gun. The shapeshifter grimaced in a way that resembled an attempted smile, "Oh Desmedeia, I've been waiting a while for this. You've killed so many of us."

I cocked the gun, switching the safety off. The shifter's face changed in that long drawn out second before I shot him through the heart. "Funny. I don't remember any of them."

12:04

I was far too old for this job, I decided as I forced my aching body to my feet, leaning against the olive colored wall for support. Ignoring the pain to the best of my ability I lifted the gun and began shooting from my little corner, counting each shot that ricocheted off the blood splattered walls of the Emotional Plantain.

One; it's body jerked to the side and collapsed at the feet of the hunter it was attacking. Two; it's leg went out from under it with a howl of pain. Three; it folded like a ragdoll that had been tossed to the ground by an ornery child. Four; yet another auburn head of curls hit the ground just seconds before he would have stabbed a young girl.

I gritted my teeth and reached into my lacy pocketbook that was now stained with blood and pulled out my spare cartridge of bullets. I tossed the empty one carelessly on the ground, I watch it land in the lifeless hands of a young lady with white blonde hair and dull blue eyes. I found myself pitying her, poor child, she couldn't have reached her twentieth birthday yet. For the perhaps thousandth time I wondered why life was so fair to some and so cruel to others.

I slipped the cartridge into the gun and began shooting relentlessly at the rapidly diminishing hoard of shifters. I watched detachedly as the bodies hit the ground one after another. My chest squeezed as my bullet struck a fellow hunter, missing the shapeshifter by inches. She crashed to the ground as I cocked the gun and just seconds later her attacker fell at her side. Human error was something you never could grow out of, I squared my shoulders and cocked the gun trying to regain my focus, though it was something that never got easier to deal with.

I aimed my gun at one of the few remaining shapeshifters who had not been killed. I watched him look over his shoulder at the door that hung limply off it's hinges. "Fall back. Our mission is complete." He yelled before turning and running.

I squeezed the trigger as he sprinted toward the black abyss that lingered beyond the door. He fell to the ground gasping for air. His allies leapt over him barely sparing a glance to their fallen comrade before disappearing into the night cold embrace of the night.

Just like that everything became hauntingly silent. No one moved, no one breathed and no one dared to ask what we all were thinking; what was the mission?

12:05

The silence was cut short by a strangled gasp, the living turned their heads to see an all too familiar boy sprawled on the ground with a halo of scarlet around his head. I was running before I could even fully process what I was seeing. I felt a dozen footsteps behind me as I knelt over the boy, "Andre." I said looking down at his youthful face wracked with pain, anger and fear.

With my heart clenched in dread I carefully peeled back his bloody shirt to see multiple stab wounds that slashed his otherwise pale skin.

"I'm calling 911!" I heard a girl cry from behind me, I turned to see the youngest lady pulling out a cell phone, her cheeks flushed in horror.

I looked down at Andre and he shook his head weakly. I felt my eyes water but I spoke up, "Don't bother. He is going to die, the ambulance wouldn't get here in time anyway."

The girl looked at me horrified. "He was my friend! We can't just let him die!" She cried turning on her phone definitely. I didn't let my face show the twisted snake of pain and guilt that twisted and churned inside my chest. I wanted to yell at her and tell her that she wasn't the only one who cared about Andre, I held back though.

"Stop fighting." Andre's voice came out forced, the vein in his forehead bursting from the effort. "If you want to something for me kill them! Avenge me and my family because I won't get to." His voice had gotten soft and his eyes had become glossy with tears.

I said nothing. I had no words to say. Andre's bloody hand wrapped itself around my wrinkled one and his young green eyes focused on me. "You promised to back me up, will you promise to hunt the alpha without me too? If anyone can kill him it's you." His eyes were wide and pleading, he knew the graveness of what he was asking me.

I didn't even hesitate. "Of course, sweetie. I will hunt him to the ends of the earth if that is what it takes." I turned my head and looked toward the group of distraught hunters who stood behind me. I looked back at the fading eyes of Andre Campell. "We all will."