"AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"

The blood-curdling scream pierced through the night from Cory's tent as the blood moon rose.

Kasai immediately jumped from her thoughts and instinctively did the stupid act of bolting for his tent.

"Cory—"

"KASAI, RUN!"

Cory barely managed to get the words out. His voice was strained and his body was tense as he fought the creeping streams of insanity starting to flow over him. He needed to control himself. But he couldn't. He couldn't control himself. Not for much longer, anyway.

Kasai slowly took a step towards her, but she was reminded of the danger as Cory shot a glare towards her. His bloodred eyes seemed to glow and boil with rage, hunger, and insanity.

She slowly backed away and made a break for it, screaming for the others to join her.

"WE NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE, NOW!"

Of course, the others were already aware of the danger and were already scattering, bolting to find any kind of hiding place.

It wasn't long before the feeling they were being watched hung in the air.  Kasai looked back to see a dark blur — probably Cory — gaining over the horizon.

What was worse, Breeze was lagging behind, panting.

"BREEZE, YOU HAVE TO GO FASTER!"

"I CAN'T!" Breeze whined.  Usually he was a good runner, but now he felt like all of his energy was drained out of him.  He began regretting playing tag with the others earlier.

"JUST TRY!" Kasai urged, but it was too late.  A startled yelp and a couple of snaps pierced the air as Cory pounced on the weak, tired husky neko, and the two of them tumbled over each other and ended with Cory on top and a terrified Breeze on the bottom.

"BREEZE!" Kasai shrieked, skidding to a halt.  She watched in horror as Cory bit down on poor Breeze's neck.  She could feel her rage boiling in her.  Breeze didn't deserve this!  But she couldn't hurt Cory.  She loved him.

But she knew what she had to do.

Despite knowing it was a stupid move, she drew her sword and raced over, barely cutting Cory's arm on her way past him.

He let out a startled shout of pain, letting go of Breeze's neck.  He clutched the wound and glared over at Kasai.  She gulped in fear and muttered curses under her breath, immediately starting to run again.

She quickly sheathed her sword on the way and forced herself to go faster as Cory chased, faster and faster, gaining.  She quickly went into her phoenix form and soared into the air as well, stopping in a nearby tree to rest and catch her breath.

She panted and stared down as Cory paced at the bottom of the tree, glaring up with her with those menacing, glowing eyes.  It hurt her to see him like this more than any bite could hurt her.  This wasn't him.  This wasn't Cory.

She was snapped out of her thoughts as a second blur pinned Cory to the ground.  Screeches and hisses pierced the air as Cory clawed and snapped at his attacker.

Kasai stared out of the tree to see it was another vampire — one with a mask.  Her face was even paler around her mouth, hinting that something usually was there to cover it.  Could this be one of the gang members?

She felt her blood boil with rage once again as she watched them fight.  She wanted to go in there and slice the attacker to shreds, but she knew that was a very bad idea.

A very, very bad idea.

She was startled by the sound of a gunshot and quickly went back into her human form to hide better.  The two vampires glared over, but the one who had come out of seeming nowhere suddenly shrieked and fell to the ground, followed shortly by Cory.

Kasai's heart skipped a beat, but she soon calmed down when she realized the two of them were only asleep. She quickly hid under the cover of the brances as someone else came and started dragging the two bodies away.

After everyone was gone, Kasai sighed with relief and jumped down, racing back to where she had seen Breeze get pinned.

Thankfully, someone else had found him first — Sasha.  She was tending to his wound(s) and singing to him quietly to calm him down.

"How bad is it?" Kasai asked when she made it over.

Sasha looked back up at her.

"Thankfully, not bad enough to kill him.  He does have a few broken bones, though."

"But he'll be okay?"

"Hopefully."

That was not what Kasai wanted to hear right now.  She had almost grown attatched to Breeze.  She felt like he was her son, though she knew he wasn't.

"... I saw someone take Cory and another vampire away.  I don't know who it was.  The important thing is we're safe now."

"That's good."

Kasai nodded.  "You stay here and take care of Breeze.  I'll round up the others."

Sasha nodded and resumed treating Breeze as Kasai ran off to find everyone else.