Chapter 47 - Gen 2 - Tapestry

Lime is nattering away as she moves around the room and I am not really paying any attention to the words that are coming out of her mouth.  All I know is she is laughing at Shadow who is camped outside with Cosmic and Glimmer impatiently waiting for Tapestry to return from Berry Shores, even though he is not due to arrive in the den for at least another five hours.

I sit on the floor, a little perplexed and head blown, suspiciously watching Lime tidying up Shadow's toys, while I listen, not to her voice but to all the other sounds that her body is projecting.  I am trying to take in all the extra noises that I can suddenly hear coming from Lime's body.  My imagination is running wild and I think somehow I might just be going a little crazy!!

I have heard these noises before and know exactly what they are, and what it means.  I just never imagined or expected to ever hear them coming from Lime!!  Which makes me wander what the hell has she been up to and who with, because this seriously can not and should not be happening!!  I have been listening to her thoughts very closely for a while, and I have not heard her thinking anything untoward, not even in her sleep.

I should have listened to Shadow, he has been trying to tell me that he can hear funny noises coming from Limes stomach and I told him it was nothing to worry about, because I could not hear anything.  I thought maybe he was just picking up on her indigestion system growling because of how sick she has been for a few days.  Obviously his hearing is a lot more acute than mine.

Now I am a little frightened and have a lot of mixed emotions, and I am not sure why!!

I have had to fight damn hard as well as take a hell of a lot of stick, over the past six weeks, to get everyone to accept what is going on with me and Lime, and especially to keep her upstairs with Shadow permanently.  It has been far from easy and now I think ... no I know ... she has gone and blown it all, if those noises that I can hear coming from her body are anything to go by!!  Even with the appearance of Tapestry in Shadow's life, the three of us - we had started to become like a little family me, Lime and Shadow, with us literally playing Mommy and Daddy, and now she has gone and totally wrecked it!!

Omri and Cosmic nearly blew the roof off the place when I was busted for sleeping with Lime the first time, they were far from happy with it, Cosmic more so because of everything we have had to suffer and everything that has happened in the past because of her.  Sunny, River and Mango have been really down with me too.  Tapestry I think was the one that surprised me most, he found it more amusing than anything, even though out of everyone here, his life has probably been wrecked by her the most.  Storm, Maizie and our other two spirits have been very indifferent about the whole situation and Honey, who I hardly ever go down to visit these days, does not have a clue what is going on up here.  At least I don't think so unless she has picked anything out of Sunny's head.

I tried my hardest to keep my distance from Lime and never let a repeat of our sexual encounter happen again, but Lime has made it very hard for me with her dirty mind.  She knows exactly what she does to me when she starts and she does it on purpose to reel me in and I fall for it, not that I am complaining because I fall quite willingly.  The experience is just too good to resist and I have given up even trying to fight it.  She knows she is playing russian roulette with her life, she knows that one of these times I might just lose it, but still she keeps on pushing, and I definitely do not think with my head.  It is not like we have some great love affair going on, intend to get married or turn her into a vampberry, because that isn't it, it is more just a sex thing for both of us ... or so I thought.

Having said that, we have been getting a lot closer as the weeks have passed by.  We are always, kissing, cuddling and touching each other up, we spend a lot of time together laughing, talking and messing about, I even sit for hours sometimes watching her sleeping and listening to her dreams.  I now find myself sitting here, surprisingly, feeling hurt and totally hacked off at the thought of her messing around or sleeping with somebody else ... which makes me wander where my head is at!!

Not that I can even imagine which of our mortal visitors it might be.  It can only be either Mango, Sunny, River or Tapestry, and it has to be one of them for her to be pregnant.  Me and Omri are not capable of Fathering a child in our immortal form.  Trying to work out when she actually would have had the time to do it, and how she has hidden her thoughts, I think is what is puzzling me most.  It scares me if she has been clever enough to completely hide her thoughts from me.   Maybe she has not changed after all, is as sly and conniving as ever and I have gone and been stupid enough to start falling for her again, I have been stupid enough to trust her and give her the freedom of roaming the den freely.  Omri is right, I am seriously not thinking with my head right now!!

"Cheer up Charming, it might never happen!!"  she laughs at me as she stands staring at me watching her through squinted eyes.  "What is with the long face?"

I stand up and wander over to her, she smirks at me as I approach her.

"While the ghost has Shadow outside, we could always take advantage of being alone."  she smirks at me as she puts her arms around me and tries to pull me in close.  I back away from her a little, which makes her frown.

I seriously can not believe she is even suggesting it at this precise moment in time.

   

"Oh, I think it has already happened Soda!!  You have gone and totally blown it haven't you!!"  she frowns at me, she is confused  "How are you feeling, are you still sick?"

"I feel Fine, I have not been sick again today."  she smiles at me  "What do you mean, I've blown it?!"

"Have you missed something?"  she frowns at me  "Your women's monthly thing."  she laughs

"Are you feeling okay Jazz?"  she laughs  "I know we have been getting intimate a lot lately, but it doesn't mean you can get that personal!!"  she laughs then smirks  "Or are you asking because you want to make sure the coast is clear?"

"Just answer my damn question!!"   I snap at her nastily  "Have you missed one? Are you late?"

"Okay keep your shirt on!!"  she frowns at me  "I don't have a clue if I have missed one or even if I'm late.  I have never been regular, they are all over the shop so I don't bother to keep a track of them and especially not now being locked up in this place, where time is irrelevant and with you firing blanks."  she laughs  "Besides, at my age I am due for the menopause soon anyway."

"So WHO have you been sleeping with other than me?"  she frowns at me in the strangest way  "So ... Tapestry, Sunny, Mango, River ... which one is it?"

"Don't be so bloody ridiculous!!  AS IF!!!"  she almost has hysterics  "Don't start getting all paranoid and stupid on me Charming!!  Have you gone mad or are you in one of your wind up moods?"

"I am not joking Soda!!  You are pregnant."  I pull a face at her

"Now I know you are just being damn stupid!!"  she starts laughing

"I am not!!  I can hear the baby in your stomach, it has sprang a heartbeat today.  So is there something you should be telling me ... or should I say someone?!"  I scowl at her  "WHO IS IT LIME!!"

"You are barking mad!!"  she laughs nervously  "If there is a baby in here ..."  she rubs her stomach  "which I highly doubt ... then it can only be yours!!"

"We both know that is impossible!!!"  I snap at her.

"Lets hope so for your sake, because I really don't want a blood sucker chewing up my insides!!"  she tuts  "Charming I'm going to swing for you if I am ... we don't need protection you said!!"

"We don't!!  It is not mine - it is impossible vampires can not reproduce!!"

"You are off your head and if that is the case then there is no way I can be pregnant!!"  she laughs as she picks up a book, puts in on the table then sits down on the couch so I join her.  "Oh berry!!  I can not believe you just accused me of sleeping with either Sunshine, the nerd or one of his two brats!!"  she snaps  "Like any of them would touch me with a barge pole!!"

She sits just stares at me like I have gone mad, but it is not just the faces she is pulling, it is also what she is thinking.  She thinks I have gone completely cuckoo because of what I have just accused her of and she thinks she can not be pregnant and if she is, it is mine!!

I pull her towards me and start kissing her roughly and hungrily as my hand works its way up and inside her top to her breast.  Her mind straight away switches into dirty mode, and starts to rampage, she is so easy to turn on, it is like flicking a switch.  I continue seducing her until her head has gone and she is worked up to the point where she is trying to remove my clothes.  I stop it suddenly and I pull away from her quickly, and while her head is swimming in a mess I hit her with it.

"Does he make you feel like I do?"

"Who?"  she stares at me in confusion 

"Whoever you have been screwing behind my back?"  

I stare into her eyes as I listen to her thoughts.  I don't hear her thinking about anything she has done or anyone that she is trying to hide, like I would expect her to right now.  I have planted it into her mind so it would be impossible for her not to think about 'him' and what she has done at this moment in time.  However, confusingly for me, she is genuinely, totally and utterly confused and annoyed by what I am implying and that I have stopped suddenly when I have wound her up sexually.

"Sod off Jazzberry!!"  she snaps at me, and I know she is angry with me because that is the only time that she calls me by my full name.  "I might be a lot of things, but I am definitely no bike!!"

I snap open my phone, now wandering if I have got this all wrong and am actually going mad.

  "River, I need you in the den with your doctors head on."  I mumble when he answers the phone
   "Is it urgent Jazz?  Only I am just about to get in the shower.  What's up?!"
   "I need you to bring a pregnancy test kit with you."  he starts laughing  "Can you get here quickly, it is pretty urgent, I'll go out of my mind if I have to wait too long," I mumble
   "What's up Jazz have you missed your period?!"  he starts laughing  "Why on earth would you need a pregnancy test kit?"
   "Lime is pregnant."
   "WHAT?!"  he sounds shocked  "Are you messing?"
   "No, I can hear the heartbeat, I just need it proving for my own sanity."

I snap my phone shut when he tells me he will be an hour at the most.  I stare at Lime who is sat there laughing sarcastically as she shakes her head in disbelief.  I hear her wandering if it is April fools day, because this has to be a joke!!

"Who is it Soda?!"  I snap at her now trying not to trust her thoughts, she could just be playing a very clever game and hiding it and thinking this way to fool me into believing her.  "Which one of our four mortal visitors have you been screwing behind my back?!"

"You be careful, you almost sound like a hard done too boyfriend!!  Seriously Jazz, do you know how insulted I feel right now!!  Give me some credit at least!!"  she snaps and the face she pulls at me is Lime of old.  "I AM NOT sleeping around or pregnant and if I am it can ONLY be YOURS!!!"  I can see she is starting to get angry. 

I grab her hand and pull her up off the couch and lead her into the bedroom.  I tell her to lie down on the bed, which she does without arguing.  I can hear that she is starting to get very nervous of me because she can see that I am getting angry and she realizes now that this is not a joke.  This whole situation is confusing the hell out of her and she does not even believe that she is pregnant.

I crawl over her and put my ear to her stomach and listen to the activity going on in there.  There is a definite heartbeat even though it is still very quiet as well as all the other noises coming from the new life growing in her womb.  I crawl up the bed and her body so that our heads are now level and I stare her in the eyes, planning to dive through them into her head.

"One last chance ... who is it Lime?"

"You are seriously having a laugh aren't you Jazzberry!!"  she snaps as she tries to push me off her without success.  "Seriously this is getting very boring!!  Now if you have finished being a twat, get off me, I have got laundry to do!!!"

"You stay right there!!  I am not laughing or messing about!!  I am SERIOUSLY hacked off and want to know who's baby you are having?"  she frowns at me  "Soda you are pregnant, and as it can not be mine, I want to know who you have been shagging!!"

I remain hovering over her as I listen to her thoughts, she is staring at me a little wide eyed, and she is getting very angry.  While her mouth remains tightly shut her head is calling me all sorts of names.

I hold her chin and dive through her eyes, quickly rewinding back five or six weeks to when we first slept together.  When I find it, I slow everything down and start watching everything that happens from there on.

It takes me quite a while because I watched everything carefully.  When I don't find what I am looking for, I skip back further than those six weeks just to make sure that there was nobody before me, I go back quite a way and there is absolutely nothing and nobody. 

I move off her slowly and carefully, a little bewildered, when I have finished looking through her memories.  Now I am highly confused because I have found nothing.  Not a thing.  She has seriously been sleeping with nobody but me, she has not been messing about with anyone either, not even flirting. 

She moans as she comes back to reality and her hands go up to her head because it is hurting.  I cringe knowing that I was maybe in her head for just a little too long, longer than I should have been.  She will probably get a banging headache now. 

"I am really sorry!!"  I mumble as I pull her towards me  "I had to check to see what you have been up to!!  And before you even start having a go at me, I'm sorry for accusing and not believing you.  After everything you have done, you can not really blame me for not trusting you!!"

I start to kiss her while she is still a little dazed and before she can start going off on one.  The Lime of old would probably have been tearing strips off me and beating me up right now, one thing she can not hack which unhinges her, being accused of something that she has not done.  I know that she is back with me when the way she is kissing me changes and she starts to thump me with her free hand.

I am now feeling a little stupid as well as guilty for doubting and not believing her.  She has only been sleeping with me.  Then it hits me - something is still not right here, she is pregnant when she should not be, well at least I think she is, this does not make any sense which is suddenly making me start to doubt myself.

I break the kiss and just lie there listening to Limes heart racing and the solid second heart beat that is beating away steadily along with hers, but at a different pace and is a lot quieter than her own.  This wipes away the doubt again ... she is pregnant!!! 

"So what have I been up to Charming?"  she just lies there staring at me blankly

"Absolutely nothing Soda, which does not make any sense at all when you are pregnant!!"  she quietly laughs at me   

"What is making you think that I am pregnant anyway?"  she frowns at me. 

"I don't think, I know.  I can hear noises along with a second heart beat, a babies heart beat.  Which obviously means you are pregnant."  I frown at her  "So how the hell does that happen!!"

"Not that I believe I am even pregnant ... but hello how thick are you ... isn't it obvious!!  Your blanks obviously can not be so blank after all!!"  she laughs

"Don't be stupid ... vampberrys CAN NOT make babies!!"

 "Who says they can not?"  she frowns

"Everybody knows they can't!!"  I smile at her  "Every single vampberry in existence was turned not born.  Shadow is the only one I've ever known and even he was turned into a vampire not conceived as one.  When a person is turned their reproductive system stops working just like all the other organs in their bodies."

"Well that is all just rubbish, because if I am pregnant like you say - then you Charming HAVE made a baby!!  It can only be your baby you twat!!"

I sit up then.  I think the shock of what she has just said, and the only logical explanation for this situation, finally hits me.  I have not for one single second even considered that it is MY baby, not even as a possibility, so adamant in my mind that vampberrys can not make babies

It can not be mine!!  Could it?

I dive off the bed and snap my phone open again. 

   "Maizie where are you?"  I am irritated by how long it takes her to answer her phone.
   "In the kitchen trying to feed why?"  she snaps
   "Come to Shadow's rooms, it's urgent!!"

My mind now is all over the place and in turmoil.  If it is my baby then I should be the happiest man on the planet right now, however, I know exactly the hell we have ahead of us, and what this is going to do to Lime, exactly what it did to Honey, and this is not good!!  I can not let myself get too carried away with this!!  First I need someone to confirm that they can hear what I am hearing and that she is definitely pregnant.

I sit down on the couch with my head in my hands, not quite believing what is happening here.  Lime gets off the bed and comes and sits down on the couch next to me.

"So is there only one heart beat?"  she asks and I frown at her  "I have already had two sets of twins Fern and Jade, then Storm and Parsley, and I was a twin ..."

"No there is only one."  I laugh at her  "So are you starting to believe you are pregnant."

"I don't know."  she shrugs  "I guess it might answer why I keep throwing up when I don't actually feel ill!!  I did not think it was possible for me now, and it seems a bit stupid at my age!!  I will probably have faded from old age before that kid becomes an adult!!"

I start to kiss her just to shut her up and so I do not have to talk back and explain something that she really is not going to like hearing!!  She does not realize what she is saying or what she has coming to her if by some miracle that baby is mine, which logically it has to be, if I am the only person she has been sleeping with.  If Honey is anything to go by, Lime will be lucky to even live through it, as a mortal, to see that baby born.

I hear the door open when Maizie walks into the room.

"Oh please!!  Pass me a sick bucket!!  Jazz put her down ... "  she stops suddenly as she stares at Lime and frowns for a moment. 

"Woooow!!  Baby on board!!"  she says with a shocked look on her face.

"So you can hear it too, it is not just me?"  I frown at her  "I am not going mad am I, she is pregnant!!"

"No, you definitely are not hearing things!!"  she starts to laugh  "Oh berry!!  Who is responsible for that brat?!"  she smirks at Lime

"Technically it should be me!  I am the only person she has been sleeping with and I have double checked in her head."  I frown at Maizie  "However we both know it being my baby is totally impossible!!"

"Actually it is very possible."  I frown at her  "You know you have broken one of the cardinal sins having a mortal / immortal relationship and if the Original's find out - it is instant disposal for the pair of you."

"Yes I know that!!"  I snap at her as I stand up  "Like we don't already have the noose tightly around our necks with Shadow and all the mortals running around the place!!  Since when have you become all anti rule breaking Maizie?!"  I laugh at her sarcastically  "Vampires can not make babies!!  Why did you just say it is very possible?"

Maizie just stares at me for a moment without saying anything.
 
"Look, I should not be telling you this ... but seeing as though it has happened.  Vampires not being able to reproduce is what the Originals lead everyone to believe, when it is not strictly true ..." 

Maizie starts to explain.  Male vampberry's actually can and do produce fertile sperm and in theory can reproduce, however any resulting pregnancy always ends in disaster.  The Originals have the no mortal / immortal relationship rule in place, purposefully to keep our two worlds apart, because they know exactly what male vampberry's are capable of, while they tell everyone contrary to the fact.

The Originals themselves can not reproduce, male or female.  None of the Orignal males have fertile sperm.  Female vampberry's can not reproduce either, while some vampberry males can, but only with a mortal female.  The Originals know this, and it scares them, because vampberrys in theory have the capability, if perfected, of breeding their numbers large enough to overpower and wipe not only them out but also all mortals.  If vampberry males started to try breeding they would wipe out all the mortal females and eventually our food source.  They are also scared of what kind of babies might be produced by mortal / immortal parents.  A different stronger kind of vampire - day walkers, female vampires that are able to breed, or who have other abilities that out do Originals in strength and capability is what they are most scared of.

"Also the Originals think, that if male vampberries knew they have the capability of reproducing, it will bring our two worlds together and expose our existence, which they want kept hidden, because they themselves are white berries, who were pursicuited and wiped out of existence centuries ago, just like the coded world try to do today with colourless berries."  she starts laughing

"I seriously can't believe it!!"

"I would have thought Shadow would have made you cotton onto something or at least think."  she laughs  "A mortal / vampire baby will grow and develop inside the womb, however, none have ever survived because the mortal Mother always fades, you saw what it did to Honey.  Most mortal Mothers do not get far enough along into the pregnancy for the baby to be fully developed and survive.  Shadow is the only baby I know that has EVER reached full term."

"Why the hell have you never told me this?"  I am angry  "You KNOW we have been sleeping together!!  Why have you just sat back and not warned me about the pregnancy risk we are taking!!  You know I think I am incapable of making babies!!"  I yell at her angrily.  "You know this baby is going to fade Lime and only now are you telling us when it is too late and the damage is done!!"

"You are the one stupid enough to go there, when you shouldn't!!!!"  she says sarcastically which makes me snarl at her teeth showing.  "Okay!!  I thought Lime was passed it, she is at menapause age and only 30% of all the vampberry males tested were still fertile.  Trust you to be one of the 30%!!!"  she rolls her eyes  "The chances of you two getting pregnant were pretty slim in my mind."  I am now glaring at her because she always makes me so angry!!  "Okay I am sorry!!  I should have warned you."

"How the hell do you even know all this anyway?  I was married to an Original for berry's sake and I was never told any of this, especially that she is a white berry!!"  she sniggers  "Why should I even believe you?"

"Deeeer Lime is pregnant isn't that proof enough!!"  she snaps sarcastically  "I can't tell you how I know, just trust me!!"  she looks over her shoulder  "However, I will tell you something else, because you need to realize, this pregnancy is not going to be like Honey's.  Seriously, this is not to leave this room Jazz!!"

"Okay ... go on!!" 

"The Originals ..."  she hesitates  "They ran an experimental breeding program for a while, but it failed miserably so they stopped it.  They wanted to know what kind of vampire would be produce from the union of the two worlds, which they did not succeed in doing.  However it did satisfy them in one way, because they established that producing a living surviving mortal / immortal baby is, in their mind, close to impossible!!" 

"Why do they think that, when we have Shadow?"  I frown at her

"They were taking mortal females off the street, from all over the place a few at a time so that the mass disappearance would not be noticed, and using half a dozen captive fertile male vampberry's to rape those women.  Some were faded during sex, some did not even get pregnant.  One hundred pregnancy's they produced in total, and only ONE Mother and child survived, that child was born totally mortal, there was no sign of vampire in it at all."  she pulls a face.  It all went to waste in the end, because they faded the Mother and tried to turn the baby, which was part of another experiment because they wanted to see how it would grow and develop as a vampire.  The baby faded after two days, it could not even take the transformation. So they did not get one single baby out of the project."

"How the hell do you know all this Maizie?"  I frown at her

"Seriously Jazz I can not tell you - I have already told you more than I should have done, but I think you might guess who was actually responsible for that breeding program."  she raises her eyebrows

"Not Celeste?"  I stare back wide eyed

"Yep!!  That wife of yours kept some serious secrets from you!!"  she smiles at me  "You know how desperate she was to have a baby, and she could not live with herself after because she tried to turn that baby and she wished she had just kept it mortal."  she laughs  "You know if she had been around she would have snapped Shadow up, she would never have hurt him, she would have loved and doted on him!!"  she laughs again  "You could have pulled that knife out of her chest and bought her with Shadow!!  And I know for a fact, if that program had successfully produced surviving babies that she was planning to pick a pink female off the streets and have you father a child so she could get the baby she wanted.  The only reason she kept you was because of your colour."

"Just SHUT UP Maizie!!"  I snap at her angrily

I just stand there staring at Maizie, totally mind blown, as well as angry, at what she has told me.  I don't want to dwell on anything to do with Celeste, my mind is pretty much stuck on the fact that I AM capable of making my own baby after all!!  Lime is carrying MY child.  I seriously can not believe this is happening!!  Never in my wildest dreams did I think this would ever happen!!

"So that baby ..."  I point at Lime  "Oh Fudge!!  It IS mine?!"

"Yes Jazz, you obviously are one of the fertiles ones!!"  she laughs at me  "But Jazz, do not get too excited and especially do not expect that baby or Lime to survive.  The only way both of them are surviving, is if that child is completely mortal ..."

"But Shadow ..."

"You can NOT think Lime's pregnancy is going to be exactly the same as Honey's!!!"   I think Shadow was and is a total one off ... Honey did in one shot what the originals could not do in 100 shots!!  Honey was young, Lime isn't, and there is a difference, Shadow was conceived as a mortal, he started his growth and development as a mortal, I think that child is still partly mortal, possibly a 50/50  mortal/vampire split."

"Yeah I think he is too."  I mumble

"Your baby is just exactly the same as all the ones from those pregnancy's I witnessed on the breeding program, conceived from a vampberry father's sperm.  I doubt this pregnancy will be any different from any of those 100 and they were seriously not pretty."  she pulls a face  "They will both fade Jazz, Lime and the baby!!  Honey went through nothing in comparison to some of the sights I saw and I think that is because Shadow is partly mortal!!  A mortal body is just not strong enough to incubate a baby that is completely vampire!!"

I stand and listen to Limes thoughts for a moment, her head is running wild and she is terrified, and I can't say I blame her.  She has been just sat there quietly listening, and knowing that she is going to start getting upset with this, I had tuned out her thoughts so that I could not hear them to concentrate on what Maizie is saying.  Lime I have to deal with later. 

"You witnessed ..?!"  I raise my eyebrows at her  "You just said you witnessed on the breeding program!!  Were you actually there?"

"Okay, I hold my hands up!!"  she looks at me sheepishly  "Yes. Celeste needed a nurse ...."

"WHAT THE HELL were you two hiding from me Maizie??!!"  I stare at her wide eyed  "You and Celeste, hardly had anything to do with each other when she was here, you both acted like you hated each others guts, now you sound like you have a history together!!"

"I am sorry I am NOT telling you anything else!!  You have already had more out of me than you should have done!!  It is in the past and it needs to stay there."  she snaps

"Yeah that is your answer to everything isn't it Maizie!!  'It's in the past and it needs to stay there.'  Shame you can't apply the same principal to Dad now and stop leching after him!!"  snaps River, who has been stood there for quite a while quietly listening to our conversation, up until now.  "You make him feel so uncomfortable he can not even come here to visit Shadow in peace!! You need to back off him," 

"Shut up Mango!!  He is big enough to fight his own battles!!  He does not need you doing it for him"  she snaps at River who hurls a load of abuse at her from inside his head, especially for calling him Mango, the name she put on his birth certificate, but never used.  She is finally calling him Mango when he has had his name changed officially to River.  Maizie just ignores him. 

To stop Maizie and River from starting one of their slanging matches, which my head really can not take right now, I send Lime off with River, so that he can examine her and do the pregnancy test.  Not that I really need it medically proving now, but I just want to get Lime out the way while I ask Maizie a few questions.  I don't need Lime getting any more upset than she already is, knowing she can blow up at me at any minute, I am actually surprised she has not already.

 

"Maizie how bad did those pregnancy's get?"

"Gruesome sometimes.  Feet and hands kicking and punching literally straight through the skin, broken bones, paralysis, internal damage and bleeding beyond repair, some chewed up inside.  Some had the life literally drained out of them until they were just skin and bone.  The mortal body is just too weak to carry a vampire baby full term. Those women were screaming and riling in total agony most of the time, it almost drove me crazy!!"

"So Lime seriously has got no chance of surviving this."  I close my eyes  "Or my baby!"

"No I'm sorry!!  Other than the mortal baby, most of them did not live past week 24 of the pregnancy."  she rolls her eyes  "If you are so worried about the mortality of your green pet, then you need to get rid of the baby NOW before it does any damage.  Mango can get the pills for Lime to take that will terminate the pregnancy."

"That is easy for you to say!!  That is my baby you are talking about destroying."

"I know all you have ever wanted is a child of your own, but Jazz that baby will destroy Lime, before it is anywhere near developed enough to survive outside of the womb!!   There is no point you even trying to let the pregnancy run through in the hope that it will play out like Honey's pregnancy, because it won't!!  All you will be doing letting this pregnancy continue is put yourself through the agony of watching and losing them both in a gruesome way!!"

I just stand there my head is pounding.

"The baby being a mortal baby ... what chance is there?"

"If the breeding program is anything to go by one in a hundred chance." she pulls a face  "But we only produced one hundred pregnancies, so it could be a one in a million chance for all we know.  The vampire genetics obviously are a lot stronger then the mortal ones, for it to only happen once in one hundred pregnancies."

"That baby has a heartbeat, is that normal for a vampire baby?"  I frown at her

"Yes to start with.  Every conceived baby had a hearable heartbeat at around five weeks, however, every heartbeat bar the mortal one stopped sometime during weeks twelve and fourteen of the pregnancy.  It was almost like the baby's first development takes place as a mortal, then the vampire takes over.  We got to learn that once that heart beat stopped, that is when the Mothers problems began."

"So if my baby still has a beating heart after fourteen weeks it could be completely mortal?"  my eyes widen

"Possibly, but seriously, don't hold your hopes up ... the chances of you creating a mortal child, I would say, are very very slim!!"  she frowns at me  "Would you seriously want to bring up a mortal child in this world knowing the constant danger it will be in?"

While I think I would do and take anything right now to have that baby arrive safely, I could not answer that question, that is something I seriously need to think about.  However, I doubt that will be a worry that I will ever have, from what Maizie is saying the chance of being blessed with a mortal baby is like winning the lottery - we would never be that lucky!!

When River and Lime returned with a positive pregnancy test result, I did not know whether to be overjoyed or downright miserable about it.  In a way, I would rather this had never happened, ignorance was definitely bliss compared to what we now have to face.

I am now getting something I have always wanted but thought impossible  - a child of my own.  Now that the impossible has happened, knowing my child is never going to survive and is going to be cruelly snatched away again, is just total torture.

Lime understandably, being upset and terrified, went totally ballistic at me after we had sat down and talked about all the facts according to Maizie.  She started screaming and shouting and tried to beat me up and I just stood there and let her.  Even though it did not really hurt me very much physically, mentally it did, having to listen to and feel how upset she is, she is feeling just like I am. 

She blames me for letting this pregnancy happen, and I guess it is my fault, ignorantly not knowing the true facts.  I am the idiot who said we did not need to take precautions, because that is what I believed.  After venting out her frustration a little Lime collapsed into a heap on the carpet and started balling her eyes out.

Ironically I found we are sitting in virtually the same spot, in the same situation, that started all this, she is sobbing her heart out and I am trying to comfort her.  However this time it is not broken hearts and marriages we are getting upset over, it is our baby, because while neither of us like the idea of terminating the pregnancy and destroying the life that we have stupidly created, we know it has to be done. 

If only I could roll the clock back six weeks, and do things differently!!

As much as I would love to be selfish and let this pregnancy play out in the hope that I can get the child out of it that I have always wanted.  My mortal emotions are telling me I could never be that cruel to rob Lime of her life on what is most likely a fruitless task.  I also can not afford to let Lime fade for quite a few other reasons.

The main one being, I can not let Lime fade for Shadow's sake if for nothing else.  He is the only 'Mother' that he has, and losing her would devastate him!!  I can not be the one responsible for taking her away from him, because I couldn't keep it in my trousers!!

There is also the fact that Limes fading has always been a heavy weight on my shoulders.  When all this started the only reason we kept her alive was because of the damage that she could do in spirit form.  If she did not pass over, she could have stayed and tormented us all until she had finished every last one of us off.  Even though that threat now I think is very much in the past, it will always niggle at the back of my mind as a possibility.  I am too scared of taking the risk of finding out.  The same goes for her becoming a vampberry, which I can never afford to let happen.  She might be all sweetness and light now, but it only takes her to lose her mortal emotions and I will have the old evil Lime back and another Honey on my hands.  A cold callous vampberry, who if gets lose, will reek total havoc.

All talked out, we are just lying there quietly, and have been for quite a while.  I am holding Lime while she continues to cry and have switched off her thoughts while I am trying to deal with my own.

I am just wandering about how much stick Omri and Cosmic are going to give me over this latest development, when Lime speaks suddenly, snapping me away from my thoughts.

"I should not take those pills, it is not fair ..."

"WHAT!?" 

I cut her sentence off without letting her finish while I frown at her in confusion, now at a disadvantage, which I really hate,  because I was not listening to her thought process, so I don't have a clue what she might be thinking. 

"Please tell me you are not thinking of actually going through with it!!  It is suicide!!"  I stare at her wide eyed. 

"No!!  Didn't you say as long as the babies heart is beating there is a chance that it might be completely mortal."  she mumbles

"Yes, a VERY VERY slim one, do you seriously think we would get that lucky!!  Maizie said even vampire babie's hearts beat, which should stop beating between twelve and fourteen weeks ..."

"Then we should wait."  I frown at her  "We have to wait until it's heart does stop beating.  I can not destroy it not knowing what it is."  she pulls a face  "If it was not going to fade me, I would not be destroying it at all, even if it is your kid Charming!"  she smirks at me and I stick my tongue out at her.  "I don't think I could live with myself not knowing if I have destroyed a mortal baby or not!"

"You seriously baffle my head sometimes Soda!!  She who has faded so many people it's untrue!"

She closes her eyes and shakes her head as she tells me to shut the hell up in her head, because she is sick of me keep reminding her of her evil past.

  

"You are putting your life at risk, what about if the little sprog turns nasty the moment it's heart stops beating and it realizes it is a vampire?"  I roll my eyes  "Plus I am not sure we can actually trust what Maizie says completely, you know what she is like, twisted!!"

"They are risks I have to take!!  You are just scared, if it does all go wrong, that I might come back to haunt you!!"  she laughs at me as I roll my eyes.  "I have already had six kids which I have totally messed up!!  This feels like I have been given another chance to finally do it right."

"You have Shadow to do that with!"

"Yeah I know, but he will always be Tapestry and Honey's child, and while I love him like he is my own, this is our child ..."  she frowns at me  "I thought you wanted a child of your own Charming, and there is a slim chance you still can, so we have to take it!!  It almost sounds like you are trying to talk me out of even trying!!"  she pulls a face at me  "Do you really want to destroy this baby without knowing if it is a vampire or not?"

"Hell no!!  I want that baby probably more than you do, even if it is your kid Soda!"  I smirk at her getting her back for saying the same thing to me earlier.  "It is your body, your life, and your decision, and if you want to wait then I am quite happy to wait.  I too don't want to live with wandering if we have destroyed a mortal baby either, but the second that babies heart stops beating, you are taking those pills!!"  I smile at her  "I am not having you fading on me!!"

"How sweet!!  Anyone would think you cared about me Charming!!"  she laughs at me

"You wished!!"  I smirk at her  "I just don't want Shadow blaming me for fading you!!"

She thumps me before she starts crying again.  She is terrified that this baby is going to be a vampire, she so badly wants it to be mortal, just like I do!!

Now all we can do is count down the days and wait.
 
Hanging onto the flimsy hope that this baby is mortal, is the only thing that we have got at this moment in time, and I know the next eight weeks are going to drag as slowly as hell!!

I seriously wish I still had the ability to cry right now!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter 46 - Gen 2 - Tapestry

Warning = Adult Content


Will you take me to Nirvana .....


Sitting, watching and especially listening to Tapestry and Shadow playing, talking and singing together is quite amusing.  I am pretty surprised by how quickly the boy seems to have become attached to his real Dad in only just a few short days.  Ever since Tapestry's appearance in the den a few days ago, from the moment Shadow wakes up in the morning, the boy does nothing but ask for him, he has nearly driven me crazy this past few days.  I was actually happy when Tapestry did finally arrive today, just so that Shadow would shut up.  I think we are going to have hell with Shadow when Tapestry has to go away to work and is not here every day.

Of course I am jealous!! I hoped that I would be the only Father figure in the little boys life, but that is obviously not happening now that Shadow and Tapestry both know the truth.  Shadow was my only shot at ever being someone's Dad, never being able to ever have any children of my own, because of being a vampberry, and for my own selfish reasons, I hoped Tapestry would never find out the truth.  I have now been demoted to his full time carer, I wander how long it will be before Shadow stops calling me Daddy.

In a way it is good for Shadow to have Tapestry here, at least he knows he has one caring parent around, but in another this whole situation is really not ideal for the boy.  You have to feel sorry for the boy, now that he knows the whole truth, he has to accept the fact that he has to live here with a make shift Mom and Dad, me and Lime, when his real Mother doesn't want anything to do with him and his real Father can not be here for him full time, like they both want, because they both have to live in different worlds.

I am really not looking forward to when Tapestry has to leave today, I think we are going to have waterworks from Shadow again, another mortal thing that he can do ... that boy can cry.

 
Shadow looks over at me suddenly.

"I have got two Daddy's, an orange Dad and a pink Daddy, because me's a special boy."  he grins at me.  He has obviously just been listening to my thoughts, which is taking a lot of getting used to for me, I keep forgetting that he can hear vampberry thoughts just like he hears mortal thoughts.  I have never had anyone listening to what is going on in my head before.  "And two Mommy's, but I only like the green one, the yellow one is naaaaasty!!"  he says dramatically. "And two Gangy's an orange and yellow one ... me seeing my orange Grandad tomorrow"  he grins at me

Tapestry just laughs at him quietly, then I see a sad expression wash over his face.  I know he has been very upset by what Honey has become and the way that she treats Shadow, he pulls pained expressions every time she or her name is mentioned.  He has been down into the basement alone to try and talk to her, but he was only down there for a few minutes, she hurled a load of verbal abuse at him so he just walked out.

Tapestry has had quite a few shocks coming back into the den again.  He is especially highly amused by the 'new' and improved Lime.  The first time he saw her again I think he was ready to go in there all guns blazing and nearly fell through the floor when she smiled at him and said hello to him like he was an old friend.  I catch him from time to time watching her and giggling to himself. 

I see Tapestry glance over in Lime and Sunny's direction, who are deep in conversation talking about Carmine and Ferns up coming wedding.  A scowl washes over his face.  I am not sure who it is aimed at, but I presume Sunny because Tapestry has kicked off at Sunny something chronic over him hiding Shadow from him and all the blatant lies he has stood there and knowingly told him.  We had to separate them at one point because they started having a punch up and now they are hardly speaking.

"Hypocrite!!"  he mumbles, as he stands up, under his breath but loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Hypocrite = a person who pretends to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles etc., that he or she does not actually possess.  A person who feigns some desirable or public approved attitude, especially one whose private life, opinions, or statements belie his or her public statements"

Shadow says, he has a habit of quoting the dictionary out loud to anyone who is listening.  I swear that boy has a photographic memory!!

"Exactly!!"  Tapestry laughs  "Your Granddad Sunny is a hypocrite Shadow!!"

This makes me laugh as Sunny turns to scowl at him, Lime frowns and Shadow starts giggling, probably because of something he is hearing one of us think.  Sunny demands to know what Tapestry's problem is.

"You!!  Standing there banging on about Carmine and Ferns wedding like you are excited about it.  You make me sick!!"  he laughs sarcastically  "I don't want to appear like I am trying to cause trouble, but why don't you tell her the truth Sunny, about how you are STILL trying to get Carmine to ditch Fern because you don't like her due to who her Mother is!!"  he laughs  "Which beggers belief when Parsley has the same Mother and the sun shines out of his backside, so much so you are now trying to push Scarlet towards him!!"  he tuts  "A bit like me really I was never good enough for your daughter, but for your sister, you can't get us down the aisle quick enough!!"  Tapestry laughs sarcastically  "I wonder why that is!!  Hypocrite!!"

"Grow up Tap!!"  Sunny snaps at him

"I think it's you who needs to take a long hard look at yourself as well as grow up, not me!!"   he snaps  "Don't you have other Grandchildren to go and visit.  Maybe you could try helping your sister out by taking Poppy for a few hours!!  You don't have to worry about Vanilla she's spending the day with Saffron and Atlas!!"   he glances at Lime and smiles.  I can hear her fretting over everyone disliking Fern and taking it out on her because of what she has done.  "Don't worry Lime, everyone else loves Fern, even your ex husband, Pine and Jade are accepting their marriage quite happily these days, it's ONLY Sunshine here being the berry hole as usual!!"  Tapestry's face drops suddenly as he swings to face Sunny  "SHUT UP OR GET OUT Sunny!!  I do not want Shadow listening to that homophobic crap that I can hear running through your head!!"  he snaps  "I would much rather she spends time with them than you anyday!!"

"Yes Sunny it is about time you left!!"  I snap at him. "We have Saffy and Storm here remember, the last thing we need is you filling Shadow's head with that rubbish!!"

I frown for a moment, wandering how Tapestry is listening to everyone's thoughts like I am.  I was just about to say something to Sunny about shutting his thoughts up, but Tapestry beat me to it.   I had not noticed Shadow is now stood up next to Tapestry and is holding his hand.  This is just getting freaky if they can make mind contact just through holding hands!!  Tapestry glances at me and smiles, he is obviously listening to my thoughts like he can hear everyone elses.

"Yeah we can."  he laughs then grins at me  "We can also talk to each other in our heads when we are holding hands."  he smirks at me  "I can get into Shadows head too, through his eyes and hand holding, we were playing about with it yesterday when we were outside."

I am pretty shocked!! There seems to be no end to that boys talents and abilities.  Not just Shadow's either, Tapestry too.

 

As I sit and listen to Shadow's screaming and crying, I plonk myself down unceremoniously onto the floor.  He has been upset by Tapestry having to leave again, like I predicted he would be.  Lime has taken Shadow into his room and is trying to calm him down and get him to have a sleep. 

I can not help but wander why this instant, clingy connection with Tapestry and what actually is Shadow?.  Not only is he appearing to be half mortal and half immortal, his abilities are seriously way out there, he alone can do things that I have never heard of or seen before.  I sit with my head in my hands trying to fathom out why Tapestry, a mere mortal can also do things that us vampberry's can not, and combined with Shadow he is capable of doing a whole lot more, which is very scary!!  What have they got that we haven't that makes them different?!

I can hear everything that is going on in the next room, through the wall, not only is the sound audible to my ears but also I can hear what is going through Limes thoughts as she is sat in the rocking chair trying to stop Shadow from crying.  It amuses me, when I hear him call her Mommy, which I have never heard him do before.  Lime is a godsend in these situations, because it is a Mothers love that he needs sometimes more than mine, and Lime seems to have a way with him.  She really loves that boy, almost like he was her own.
 
Moving Lime upstairs into Shadow's rooms, while we sort out the brick wall between the two cages, is working out pretty well, even though I was very nervous about doing it to start with.  Honey and Shadow seriously left me with no other choice.  I now honestly think that we could actually let Lime wandering around the den freely and I do not think she would try to escape.  However, I am not going to take the risk of finding out. 

Shadow played up so much because of the prospect of being separated away from Lime which would have disrupted his normal routine, I could not let him go down to see Lime with Honey and her viscious tongue being down there.   Shadow really did not leave me with a lot of choice but to bring Lime upstairs.   Tapestry's visits really upset him, especially when he has to leave, and since then Shadow has clung to Lime, her being a substitute Mother to him.

Lime being upstairs means that we can keep Honey in her cage where she is best being.  It is not fair on the spirits, if we keep her locked up in the cold room, one of them has to be constantly sat in front of and guarding the door to prevent her from getting out.  All she does is give then constant hell.  Honey with her vampberry strength can quite easily break through the wooden doors upstairs, and given half a chance she would.  She seems to be getting worse as everyday passes, she is becoming very hard to control, and she is so unpredictable.  Her reinforced cage is the only thing that can hold her.

Lime on the other hand being a weak mortal, can not break through the wooden doors, and the doors upstairs are so thick and heavy without a key she has no chance of getting out of them.  Just to be on the safe side, there are now two bolts and pad locks on the outside of the door, just in case she does get a hold of the key.  

Not that I actually think now that Lime would try to escape, she had the perfect opportunity when Honey handed her the key, but she did not take it, she got rid of the key straight away instead.  She is too attached to Shadow and I think she knows her life here is better than the life she would receive in prison.  I think she now see's what she has done and I believe her feeling are genuine ones.  I have sat for hours listening to her thoughts secretly when she thinks none of us are around and listening.  It has been a long time since I have heard anything that I do not like.  Lime is very happy now living upstairs with Shadow, and the bolts and padlocks are only mainly a precaution, which helps to put every ones mind to rest.

Since Lime has been living in Shadow's rooms, which has only been a few days, they have both been a lot happier, they get to spend 24/7 together, which they are both very happy doing.  Shadow gets a full time Mommy so to speak and Lime just loves the company, change of scenery and playing Mommy.  The Tapestry situation has really unsettled Shadow and having Lime living with him is what he really needed to take his mind off it.   

I am very tempted to actually make this, Lime living with Shadow, a permanent arrangement, but I have to sit down with Omri and think it through properly, we need to anticipate any problems that might crop up in the future, especially when he becomes a child, we can no longer keep him locked up in his rooms.  Her actually escaping the den to continue with her reign of terror is what worries me most, even though that seems very much in the past, but you can never say never.   I am also worried about the upset that I know will be coming with Shadow if and when I send Lime back down to live in her cage, which should really be sooner rather than later, before he gets too comfortable with her being up here.

"BOOOO!!"  I shout loudly as Lime comes walking through the archway. 

"Fudge Jazz!!"  she jumps with fright as I laugh at her.  She was not expecting me to be sat on the floor up against the wall when she walked out of Shadows bedroom.  "Do you HAVE to keep sneaking up on me and scaring me half to death?!!

"Just trying to keep you on your toes Soda!!"  I smirk at her  "You only have yourself to blame, I learned that one from you if I remember rightly!"  she just laughs at me 

"I did not hear you sneak back in."  she frowns at me  "How long have you been sat there?"  she laughs in her head and thinks I look like a cute little pink gnome sat on the floor like I am.  She has called me many things over the years, but that is not one of them!

"Probably because I never left."   I chuckle  "Omri walked out with Tapestry."

 I laugh at her as I hear her think that she will be embarrassed if I have heard her while she was trying to sing Shadow to sleep.  I did because I have been sat here secretly listening to her thoughts and the conversation going on between them.   

"Yes you are a little tone deaf!!  I'd quit the singing if I was you!"  I laugh and she just pulls a face at me.  "How is our little man doing?"  I ask her with a smirk on my face which she ignores. 

"He is fast asleep finally, it took a while, he keeps asking for Tapestry."  Lime mumbles quietly as I stand up and start to move away from the wall.  "I told Shadow he is coming to see him to tomorrow."  she frowns at me with concern  "He is isn't he?"

"Yeah, he's bringing our favourite little orange nerd with him.  Mango is not going to believe how much you have changed!!  He has never seen the nice Lime!!"  we both laugh.  

   
For me having Mango back in the den is going to be interesting, but I am actually looking forward to it.  Not only is his thought pattern quite amusing, he will help to keep Sunny under control, Mango is the only one that can ever knock or talk any sense into him!  I can only do it by losing it and raring at him, which I am becoming pretty sick of lately.  Sunny has seriously changed for the worse lately, he's lost his happy spark and seems to have become very bitter and twisted over certain things. 

"DON'T ... "  Lime shouts loudly as she points quickly at my feet "... tread on that car!"

I look down at my foot, which is now suspended in mid air, hovering over one of Shadow's toy cars, which I was just about to tread on.  I laugh at myself, I have always been a clumsy oaf, I never even saw it.  I place my foot down to the side of the toy and bend down to pick it up.

"That is his favourite car!!  He would have been mortified if you broke it!!"  she mumbles quietly   

"Isn't it a tank?"  I laugh "Cars usually have wheels."

"You know what I mean!!"  she laughs at me  "You are still a nit picker aren't you Charming!  Here throw it here and I'll put it away, where it is safe and away from your clumsy feet!"

I laugh at her remembering that I am clumsy, as I stare at the bright yellow tank in my hand, I did not even know it was his favourite car!!  I throw it at Lime, forgetting, my own strength.  The car hits her at high speed and with force.  Lime had absolutely no chance of catching it, it was moving so fast I doubt she could even see it as it hurtled towards her.  

I cringe as I watch pieces of the yellow tank fly around as it shatters and falls to pieces.  Lime lurches backwards and falls on her backside because of the force that it hit her.  She hits her head off the wall.

"SHIT!!"  I flash across the room to help her back up onto her feet  "I'm really sorry!!  I forgot my own strength and that you are just a weak breakable mortal!!"  I apologize as I check the back of her head  

"Hell remind me never to play catch with you!!"  she laughs as she tries to compose herself, I have really knocked the wind out of her, she never even saw it coming until it hit her. 

"This is exactly why mortal and immortal relationships can never work."  I mumble 

"Just because you have moved me into your pad, who said anything about us having a relationship!"  Lime teases as she brushes herself off.  "I don't remember signing up to become the next Mrs Charming, Mr Charm!!"

"Ha funny!!  You know exactly what I meant Soda!!"  she laughs  "You know Lime I think you are actually growing a sense of humour finally!!"  

Lime pulls a face at me as she rubs the back of her head and tries to straighten her hair, she thinks it might be untidy, but it actually isn't.

I smell blood.

"Now you have gone and done it!!  You may as well have trod on that car after all, you probably would have done less damage, you clumsy oaf!!" she mumbles as she bends down and starts to collect the broken pieces together  "You have smashed it to pieces, Shadow will not be impressed!!" 

"Forget the car!!  I'll get Sunshine or Tapestry to buy him another one.  You are bleeding."

Lime has now wandered into the bedroom still picking up car pieces that flew quite a distance.  I follow her and automatically grab for her arm and pull her towards me.  I can see that she has got quite a nasty cut on her arm and move my head towards the blood, without thinking, I suddenly hear the panic racing through her head, which stops me. 

"Jazz DON'T!!" 

Lime tries to snatch her arm away from me, but I don't let her.  I keep a firm hold of her arm and smile at her, trying not to let my fangs show.

"Chill ... I am not about to drain the life out of you just because I can smell and see your blood!  I am quite the expert at self control!!"  I laugh at her  "You are losing that blood anyway, so why let it go to waste when I can clean it up!!  I swear the only thing you will feel is my tongue." 

"Seriously?"  she questions me  "I really do not want to become a blood sucking monster, or have the life drained out of me right now!!"

"Just my lips and tongue ... no teeth!!"

I smirk at her as I hold her arm up and move my mouth slowly to where she is cut.  I can feel how nervous she is getting so I move slowly, keeping eye contact with her, so that she does not panic anymore.  I move my tongue to cover the cut for a moment to soak up the blood that is pouring out of it.  I suck her arm gently just using my lips.

"See that does not hurt you does it!"  I smile at her before my lips return to her skin.

"You are a disgusting creature!"  she laughs nervously as I start to lick the blood off that has run down her arm.  "And you have a very cold tongue!!"  She shudders suddenly and I presume it is from my touch being so cold, although I hear her thinking that she likes the feel of my cold tongue and lips on her skin.

"And who's fault is it that I am a blood sucking creature, Lime?"  I raise my eyebrows

"Okay!!  Don't remind me!!  I am sorry okay!!  If I could turn the clock back ... "

"You really mean that don't you!"  

I frown at her in surprise listening to the thoughts going through her head and feeling her emotions.  She just looks down at her arm.  The blood has started to run down her arm again, so I take it and look closely at the cut before I start to lick the blood off again.

"You taste nice."  she squints at me and I hear exactly what she is thinking.  "Your blood ... tastes nice!!  It's actually quite sweet."  I smile at her trying to put her at ease because she is still a little nervous every time my mouth goes anywhere near her.  "I have always imagined you would be totally sour inside, just like your old self and namesake fruit, even your blood!!"  I laugh at her and she laughs with me. 

"For a minute there I thought you was flirting with me!!"  she teases

"I know I heard exactly what you thought!!"  I raise my eyebrows  "I tried that more than once remember and it didn't really do me a lot of good in the end, did it!"  I smile at her  "You remind me of a Preying Mantis!!  You are the right colour too!!"  I laugh but she does not look amused.  "Forest, Me, Alpine, I am surprised Avocado and Prelude are still alive to tell the tale!!"

"You are so not funny Charming!!  You know I was not responsible for Forest, that was your mate Cosmic!"

"Yeah and you paid him back, didn't you ... by fading him and his baby!!"  she just looks down awkwardly and says nothing.

I frown down at the cut which the blood is still pumping out of.  

"You know that is a deep cut, we might need to get Maizie or River to put a few stitches in it!!  I am sorry!!"  I mumble as I clean her arm off again with my tongue.
 
I glance around thinking I need to wrap something around the cut to put some pressure on it to help it stop bleeding, I doubt me keep sucking on it is helping.  I think about Shadow's outgrown clothes that are still cluttering up his draws and wasting space.  I keep a hold of Limes arm and pull her gently over to open one of Shadow's clothes draws and start rummaging around in it.

"If you get bored, you could always do me a favour if you don't mind and bag up all the clothes he has grown out of.  I keep meaning to do it, but never get round to it."  I mumble as I pull out one of his old baby grows. 

"Not a problem, I'll do it tomorrow."

"I guess he will be needing new clothes soon too."  I mumble  "Which I guess is now Tapestry's job!"  

I laugh thinking about the bust up that Tapestry and Sunny have had over this whole situation.  Tapestry has told Sunny that Shadow is not his responsibility and is to but out of it, he has even kicked off at Sunny for the amount of sweets he is giving Shadow, which amused me.

Lime smiles at me as she sits down on the couch close by.  I fold up the baby grow and give it to her, telling her she needs to apply some pressure to that cut to try and stop it from bleeding.  I leave her to do it because I am heavy handed and she it a weak mortal and easily broken.  I sit down next to her as she sits there holding the material over the cut.

"Why won't anyone tell me anything about Prelude?"  she asks suddenly

"Probably because you haven't asked lately and I doubt you would like what we have to tell you about him anyway." 

I notice she is twirling the wedding ring that she has on her finger around with her thumb, as she raises her eyebrows questioningly.   

"He was permanently paralytic for about eight months, your prison break, your stunt in the cemetery, worrying about Tapestry and your silence almost drove him insane, so Mango told me.  His Dad having liver problems, the Rock boy's alcohol poisoning and Tapestry's return kind of settled him down, that's when he started to get angry with you, especially with your continued silence.  You broke his heart!!"  

"Like I had a choice!!"  she mumbles miserably.

"He had your marriage annulled, on grounds of abandonment, plus the marriage had never been consummated with you being married in prison."  she laughs sarcastically  "Why did you get married anyway?!  It was not like you was ever going to get out to play happy families was it, you got quite a few life sentences!!"  I laugh at her

"It seemed like a good idea at the time."  she frowns  "Storm isn't in here is he?"  I shake my head and tell her that he isn't.   "It was mainly for the boys sake, it was bad enough me being in prison, they struggled enough with that.  We didn't want them to know they were the result of a one off drunken night and I drugged up Prelude just to use him to get at Lilly."  she looks down at her hands.  "Well that back fired on me didn't it!!  Big time!!"  

She laughs mostly at herself.  I just sit quietly and stare at her while I listen to her thoughts.  She got a little more than she bargained for that night in more ways then one, and not just the twins, she never expected to fall in love with Prelude, which she did. 

"I think you know that everyone knows the truth now, I know Storm knows exactly how he was created."  I laugh quietly and Lime just rolls her eyes.  "I am sorry Soda ... but Prelude has somebody else in his life now.  Elderberry, who Mango says has helped to knock a lot of sense into him, apparently he is tea total now and getting on with his life."

"Elderberry?"  she frowns at me

"Yeah, you might know her as Citrus, if he has ever mentioned her to you.  She is Violet's younger Sister." 

"Violet, as in his ex wife Violet?"  she frowns 

"Yeah, Mango said everyone, except Prelude, could see that he had married the wrong sister in the first place.  Elderberry has always had a thing for Prelude apparently."  I laugh for a moment but stop suddenly seeing the look on her face.   "I'm sorry Lime, but Prelude and Elderberry are now married and they have a baby on the way, or I should say babies, Sunny told me the other day they are having twins.  It's his third set and Mango's daughter has just had twins - I don't think the Orchids know how to have one baby at a time like everyone else."  

I laugh, but it it does not amuse her.  I was trying to lead the conversation away from Prelude, by telling her about Poppy, Sunny's newest surprise Grandchild, but I see and hear that she is no longer listening to what I am saying, so I stop talking.

Lime looks angry, her mind starts to go on a rampage and a look that I recognize, all too well, flashes across her face.  That evil look of hers that I have never liked.

Lime suddenly jumps up as she rips off her wedding ring and launches it, as hard as she can, at the wall in anger.  I hear the ring bounce off a few things before it hits the floor, rolls around and then goes quiet.  Then Lime starts to crack up and just collapses into a blubbering heap on the floor.  This makes me look at my own ring, which I have never taken off and I do not really know why.  Probably because I still love Celeste and miss her like crazy, but what is the point of giving myself a constant reminder, when I know she can never come back!!

"Actually, I think I might join you with that one!"  

I half laugh as I pull off my own wedding ring and launch it at the same piece of wall that Lime launched hers at, thinking angrily that Celeste would have so easily and uncareingly disposed of me if I had not had that silver knife of Rivers to stop her.  My ring hit the wall a lot harder and had small pieces of the wall breaking away which fly around with a cloud of dust.  The ring bounced off the wall and hit a glass vase which shattered into millions of pieces.

"Well that smashed it!!"  I mumble

Lime laughs a little but soon switched back to crying.  I can still hear my ring rolling, it rolls into view and ironically hits Limes ring, it spins in circles for a moment before it slowly grinds to a stop, landing centimeters away from Limes and they both lie on the floor together.  We could not have done that if we had tried!!  

Now I feel awkward with Lime sat on the floor infront of me balling her eyes out like a baby!  What am I supposed to do now, get up and walk away and let her get on with it, or put my arm around her?!  

I eventually join her on the floor and put my arm around her and she lies her head on my chest and starts to ball even louder.  I can hear what she is thinking and feel some of what she is feeling and I know she seriously still loves Prelude and it is hurting her like hell!!  Just like Celeste is hurting me, but I don't have the ability to cry anymore, or I probably would be joining her, listening to her she is stirring it up inside me.  I can not help but feel for her, because I know exactly what she is going through!!  Suddenly she shudders.

"Sorry I forget, I am too cold for you."  I say as I start to pull away from her and try to remove my arm from around her, not sure what I am even doing trying to comfort her!!
 

"No don't!!"  she says as she grabs my arm and tries to put it back round her as she carries on crying.  "I need you to hold me!  It's been a long time since anyone has.  I just need a hug and I don't mind you being cold!"  she mumbles  "I live in a cold basement remember, I'm used to it!"

I laugh as I put my arms back around her, finding it a very amusing and unexpected request especially coming from Lime!!  I think we have always thought for many years that Lime is completely void of any feelings or emotion and incapable of love.  It is a little weird finding she isn't after all.  I just sit there patiently, I tune her out of my head so I don't have to listening to her and get lost in my own thoughts while she cries herself out.

"Where is she?"  She says suddenly after she has just lay quietly in my arms for a few minutes, she seems to have no intention of moving away from me. 

"Who?"  I frown at her.

"Celeste, I did not see exactly what happened that day and you lot have not really be forthcoming with anything when I have asked.  I haven't seen her since." 

"No you didn't see anything because you hid in the toilet while the kids copped it!!"  I pull a face at her and she rolls her eyes at me as she tries to wipe her tear streaked face.  "She's gone, she is no more."  she frowns at me  "She had her hand in my chest, she was going to rip my heart out, which is a way to dispose of us vampberry's.  I had a silver knife in my pocket which luckily I managed to get into her heart before she managed to switch me off!"  her eyes widen which makes me laugh seeing as though she herself was the first one to try and extinguish me.  "The silver knife affects original vampires, it solidifies them, a little like a stone statue.  They are still there but frozen in state and stay exactly that way forever or until the silver blade is removed from their body."

"Tell me she is not still a stone statue?!"  she stares at me wide eyed.

"No, although she was up until pretty recently.  We kept her that way, in the cold room, for about nine months or so.  I struggled to let her go."  I roll my eyes  "Cosmic took her up onto the roof to do some sunbathing.  Cos left her body out in the sun to disintegrate.  It would have taken quite a few days for the sun's rays to dispose of her completely.  All that is left of her is her jewellery."

"She was the one who turned you into a vampberry, wasn't she?"  she smiles up at me.

"Yeah, actually you know, you and Ice were pretty lucky, if you had hung around to watch me fade, you would probably both have been dinner for a bunch of vampires that were literally seconds behind you!!"

I remember that day like it was yesterday.  Me and Ice had been stood talking, we had bumped into each other, both of us on our way home after a night out.  After having a bust up with my girlfriend, she had stormed off so I was not in too good a mood.  Suddenly Ice screamed as I felt a horrible horrific pain in my back.  I span round to see Lime stood behind me cackling that evil laugh of hers, a knife in her hand dripping with blood, it took me a few seconds to realize it was my blood and that was the pain that I had just felt and was still feeling in my back.  Without saying anything Lime just lunged at me with the knife again which went straight into my stomach, before I even had a chance to react, not that I could because I was in terrible pain and finding it hard to breath.  I shouted at Ice to run but she just stood there screaming.  As I doubled over I felt the knife go in again before I dropped into the gutter.

I shouted at Ice to run again, which she did this time but I think more so because Lime was then going for her with the knife.  I heard both of their heavy footsteps as they ran away, Lime chasing Ice, and I was just left lying there in the gutter, riling in total agony as the blood poured out of me.  I started to lose consciousness and I knew I was fading.  I think if the vampires had not come along, the last thing on my mind would have been Lime when I took my last breath.  Since leaving school, we had not really had any problems with Lime, we had grown up and even been out socializing together the three of us.  As I lay there feeling myself slipping away I was trying to work out where Lime's attack had come from and why. 

I had suddenly felt something cold touch my face as I heard a male voice saying  "Well that is a damn waste of a good meal, spilt all over the pavement!!"  I felt my head being lifted by cold hands  "This is quite a cute one!  Pink has always been my favourite colour."  a woman's voice said and the man laughed  "Well turn him then Sis, we all know you are on the look out for a new play thing."  It went quiet for a few seconds before the man spoke again  "You better hurry up and decide Celeste, I think you can hear yourself, his lights are about to go out!!"  

That is when Celeste bit me and I felt a horrible pain in my arm. 

Lime is now sat up and staring at me with the strangest expression on her face, that I would not be able to read if I could not hear what she was thinking.  Lime had moved away from me while I was talking and she silently listened.  I stand up and help her up to her feet.

"So it was this damn cute and beautiful face that saved me, along with my sexy hot body."  I smirk at her as I put my hands on my hips.  She just stands there laughing hysterically shaking her head.

"I think I can smell bullshit again Jazz!!  You are still so full of it!!"  she laughs  "So what happened after she bit the oh so irresistible one, besides you becoming her sex toy!!"  we both laugh for a moment before she turns serious  "What does it feel like being turned?"

"Seriously, being turned is not pleasant!!  It was the strangest feeling I have ever felt in my life, it was almost like my veins were on fire and I could feel it creeping around my body and it hurt like hell.  I just blacked out with the pain.  You are out of it so you don't know much about what is happening to you while you are changing.  Personally, I only recall drifting in and out of consciousness a few times and feeling excruciating pain, I did not have the slightest idea about where I was or what was happening to me.  Three days it took my body to change apparently, and I woke up like this."  I hold my arms out  "A blood sucking monster!!"

Lime stands there staring at me, while her mind races and I start to laugh at what she is thinking ... she wants to see the scars left by the knife and she does not know how to ask me because she thinks I might get moody or angry over it!!  She remembers stabbing me twice, but not the third time.  I take off my jacket then my top, which makes her frown at me in confusion as I stand in front of her just wearing my trousers.

"Fill your boots if you really want to see your handy work!!  It's not as pretty as Ice's face so I hear." 

I laugh at her as I watch her cringe, because she actually forgets sometimes that I can hear her thoughts.

She stares at me for a moment and I am surprised that she steps round me and starts to look at my back first.  I feel her finger tracing and drawing a circle around the scar that is between my shoulder blades.  The first place that she stuck the knife into me.  

I am shocked by the feeling of her finger on my skin, it is almost like her finger is leaving a burning trail behind it.   Then I remember she is mortal, it must be her warm body heat reacting against my ice cold skin. 

Strangely then I feel her four fingers on my back as she runs then slowly down my spine and back up again.  This has me closing my eyes, I can not explain how nice the feeling is, as my whole body seems to react to the feel of her touch.  I am pleasantly surprised as my skin is tingling, it feels like all the hairs on my body are stood on end.  I can't tell where this nice feeling begins or ends it just seems to have consumed the whole of me.  It makes me shudder.

"Your skin, it is strange, up close, it almost looks ... transparent and waxy!!"  she mumbles  "And it's so cold!"

She says it quite innocently, she is actually just fascinated with how a vampberry skin looks and feels while she continues to run her fingers over my back, she does not have a damn clue about what she is doing to me - turning me on.  What the hell is wrong with me - this is LIME for berry's sake!!  I got over the thing I used to have for her a hell of a long time ago!!  Her fingers continue to trail around my side, before they suddenly move to my arm.

"When did you get these tattoo's done?  I don't remember seeing them after we left school."  

She mumbles from behind me as her fingers run down my arm before they leave my skin and she steps in front of me.  I have to open my eyes quickly and try to compose myself without her noticing. 

"Why do you have exactly the same tattoo down your spine that you have on your arm?"  

Now I realize why she was running her hand down my spine, she was touching my mark.

"They are not tattoo's exactly, its more like a cattle brand."  I laugh because that is how I have always seen it.  "They were literally burnt into my skin.  That is basically Celeste's mark, all of the originals have one.  It tells all the other vampberry's and originals that I am her property."

"Charming!!"  she laughs  "How exactly did you become her property?"

"She turned me, so I was bound to her.  Just like Omri and Honey are bound to me.  It is like a bond that you get because I have her venom running through my veins.  The originals they treat us vampberry's a little like cattle, we are just their minions, we do as we are told or it's lights out!!"  

I smile at her as she touches the large scar on my stomach, again running her finger a long it before her other fingers join it and start to run over my skin again.  Her hands are now running dangerously close to the rim of my trousers, too close to a part of my body that is showing signs that I am seriously being turned on, and I can not even hide it without her noticing or realizing.  She really is fascinated with the feel of my 'waxy' skin and how she actually likes how the cold burns her skin, she likes the pain, which amuses me, because that is a little kinky.  My whole body is now tingling again from her touch.  

She does not spot my problem, which amuses me, but her thoughts have now totally switched from innocent, they are now running on the same level as mine.  She wants to know what my cold fingers would feel like touch her skin, if I was touching her like she is touching me.  I think she knows I am listening to her thoughts as she smirks at me. 

I hesitate for a moment, and even though I know I should not be encouraging her, more out of curiosity, I want to hear her thoughts while I do it, so I do it.  I run my fingers slowly down her face and neck, letting my fingers play on the skin left exposed on her chest by the v neck in her top, before I run my hand over her short sleeved top and along the rest of her bare skinned arm.

  
I get totally carried away, as well as lost in her thoughts and start to play with her fingers and hand, drawing patterns on the palm of her hand.  Remembering Lime of old, I am half expecting and waiting for her to slap me, however that is the furthest thing from her mind, she actually does not want me to stop. 

She had thrown her head back, when my fingers were running down her neck, and closed her eyes, she has moaned occasionally, because my fingers are having exactly the same effect on her as hers are on me, only she is not trying to hide it, not that she can because I am listening to her every thought.  I have to stop myself from getting swept away by her thoughts by kissing and biting her neck which is now in front of me, which is tempting me and exposed for me to just take.

The thoughts running through her head are far from innocent now as she blatantly starts to run her hands over my chest.  She knows exactly what she is doing to me and that I am listening, to the erotic thoughts running through her head as another smirk creeps across her face.

"Are you enjoying yourself there?"  I laugh at her as I try to snap myself away from the situation.  I seriously should not be doing this or letting this happen!!

"Yes thanks!"  she smirks at me  "I am just wandering where this third scar is?"   her fingers start to travel downwards, across my chest and over the flesh on my stomach, she runs her finger parallel with the top of my trousers as she bites her lip. 

"Somewhere I'm not so sure you should be looking or going, especially if those dirty thoughts running through your head are anything to go by!!"  

I laugh at myself for stupidly let it go this far, as well as saying she could look at the scars, not really thinking about where the third stab wound is, pretty low down in my groin.  She takes me by surprise and pushes me backwards, I just let myself fall knowing the bed is right behind me, which I land on.  

She dives onto the bed and crawls over me, she is seriously planning to go for it and tells me exactly what she wants in her head.

"As I can not see this third scar above your trousers, I am guessing you are hiding it!"  she smirks as she shuffles downwards and her fingers close around the button, opening it quickly before moving to the zip, which she pulls down very slowly while she smirks at me teasing me in her head asking me if I would rather she be pulling it down with her teeth.  

I have to stop her, not because I would not go there, I would, but because we can not afford too, for her sake, it is too dangerous!

"Lime we seriously can not do this!!"  I moan as she obviously has no intention of looking for the scar as she kisses her way down my stomach  "You probably won't even be alive to regret it!"

I can hear myself saying it, my mind is thinking it, but I am not actually doing anything to stop it.  I lie back and let her carry on, not sure I can stop it.  My trousers are removed quickly and I just let it happen. 

"Why?"  she says as she sits back over my now completely naked body and pulls her top up over her head and clean off.  Her bra is off in a flash and flung across the room.  I can not help but let my hands reach upwards and start playing with her breasts.

"Because I know exactly where your mind wants to go with this.  With my vampire strength and your mortal weakness, I'll probably fade you after I've raged you and broken every bone in your body ...." 

I sit up and stop talking now because my mouth is too occupied by her breast, I am listening to her thoughts, which are beginning to drive me crazy.  I have now got her naked body sat grinding against mine which is seriously not helping me in the slightest.  Me saying rag you, got her seriously excited she didn't or couldn't listen to anything else I said, her mind too busy rampaging on a level that I really like!! 
 

"You dirty, kinky bitch!!"  I smirk at her for a second before I throw myself back on the bed and moan out loud in frustration - she is exactly the kind of dirty bitch that seriously turns me on.  "It's all well and good that you like to be slapped and ragged about, but not the kind of rough I will dish out if you get me started, your mortal body won't take it!!"

"Well you will have to apply some of that self control that you told me you are an expert at, earlier."  

she smirks at me as she comes after me, leaning in so close our mouths are inches apart.

"Seriously Soda we can't do this ..."

"Just shut up Charming and do me NOW!!  We both know you've always wanted to!"

She bites my lip before she starts kissing me almost manically, and I'm gone!!  

It is not like this is the first time that I have ever kissed her, but the kissing we did at school was nothing like this!  I think I've faded and gone to heaven when her claws and teeth come out.  This has already gone way too far now for me to stop, so I don't. I just hope for her sake that I can apply some self control, or this might just be the last thing that she ever does.

I seriously don't think she realized the risk that she is taking, I wander why she is not scared anymore or listening to my warnings.  However, from the kinky filth going on in her head I know what turns her on, she basically likes to be violently slapped about tied up and raped, so I think she might well be an adrenaline junkie who is getting a kick out of playing russian roulette with her life, especially in this way.
  
She is damn right, I have always wanted to!! 

So we do!!   

I am not sure if it was Lime herself that drove me to the verge of crazy or if it was just because she is mortal.  I suspect the later, because there is definitely something to be said for having mortal and immortal intimate encounters, after all!!  It is completely on another level!!  If we were both mortal or both vampberrys, it would seriously have been an experience nothing like this.

Our contrasting warm and cold skin temperatures seems to be reacting against each other in the strangest mind blowing way.  I could feel the painful burning heat while she could feel the painful burning cold, it was like a painful explosive chemical reaction.   This being extremely enjoyable to both of us, both being on the kinky side, we liked the pain. 

Hearing her heart racing in my head as well as everything that she was thinking and feeling through out it all just added to it, it was totally crazy!!  Knowing exactly what she wanted, when and how, and knowing for certain that she definitely was getting as crazy as I was and not faking any of it.  That was seriously something else, like nothing I have ever experienced before!!  I am not sure how I manage to keep control of the situation or myself.  

A few times I had to put the brakes on, I had to stop her from going too far with her dirty talk and the kinky shit she wanted and tried to do.  Her thoughts and actions were making me lose it, I think she realized when I really hurt her at one point, and she started to calm her thoughts down and listen to me.  

I could and should really have switched her thoughts off so that they did not affect me so much, but I really didn't want to, hearing it from her point of view, for me was part of the kick.

I just lie there sprawled out on the floor, with my eyes closed, my head is totally wrecked as the adrenaline continues to race around my veins.  Amazed that she is still alive and in once piece.

It is not like I am hot and sweaty, I do not have breathing to try to control, or a beating heart thumping madly away in my chest while I wait for it to slow down and return back to normal, because my immortal body does none of these things anymore.  Lime on the other hand is having all of those problems and more.  I am very amused by her thoughts right now!

Even though that had to be, on my part, very make shift, because I had to restrain myself which nearly drove me insane, but I guess that helped to heighten the pleasure, for me it was almost like one long intensive tease.  It turned out to be totally different to what either of us are used to, or usually like, but that was still the best and one hell of a ride, which I seriously want to take again. 

"Hell!!"  she starts laughing suddenly  "That was definitely off the scales Charming!! 

"See didn't I tell you all those years ago ... your loss, you don't know what you are missing!!"  I smirk at her  "Now you know what you lost out on, too busy knocking me back! Soda!"

"Shut up big head!!  You cheated, you was listening to what was going on in my head!"  she starts laughing  "You was a spotty little teenager back then who probably didn't even know where to put it, let alone know what to do with it!!"

"Don't you be so sure!!  The school bike never complained!!"  I snigger  "I wander if Sunshine thinks about our sharing scheme every time he looks at me and Alpine?"

We both lie there laughing for a while.  She does the strangest thing, she grabs my hand and places it on her breast.  She does not even think about it, it was almost like an automatic habit that she does not realize she is doing.  My automatic reaction is to squeeze, that is when she thinks about my hand being on her breast.  I am finding hearing her thoughts, especially relating to our intimate contact, very intriguing, they are seriously enticing me to want to explore her whole body some more.

"They have grown some since I last had a feel, and I see I am not getting my face slapped or a punch in the balls this time!"  she laughs  "You are still quite fit ... for an old bird!!"  I laugh at her as I squeeze her breast a little on the hard side and she thumps me.

"The violence can be arranged if you like."  she smirks at me  "You are not so bad yourself, for an old guy!!"  she laughs and she goes to punch me where it hurts, but I read her mind, protect myself and rolled out of her way, not that she will hurt me much with her weak mortal punch, but it is where she plans to punch me that bothers me.  "We are the same age remember!!"

"Excuse me ... you are in your late 40's, me, I am still 20, the same age I was when you turned my lights out!!  I will be 20 forever, whereas you, will have to look at your wrinkled up prune face in the mirror in a few years."  I laugh  "I guess there are some advantages to what you did to me after all.  I'll still be 20 when you are just bones and are pushing up the daisy's!!"

"Jazz don't please!!"  she mumbles  "Seriously, do you have to keep reminding me that I was once a crazy evil bitch with a knife!?"

"I'm sorry!!"  I mumble and I don't know why, because I am not the one who should be apologizing, not that her apologies will ever change what she has done to me or any of us who have suffered by her hand.

I lie there staring at her, she is not looking at me she has her head turned away from me and she has her eyes closed.  I quietly listen to everything that races through her head, for a while it flits all over the place, until it settles back to what we have just done.

"We couldn't do any of that kinky stuff you wanted, seriously one slap and I would have faded you!!  You saw what happened with Shadow's tank."  she turns her head to look at me  "Some of those thoughts of yours were seriously way out there, have you always been a kinky bitch?" 

"Hell yeah!!"  she laughs  "That's why Alpine said I was no good at it, he didn't understand it, he's the touchy feeling type.  Mr Freeze didn't understand it half the time either, only Prelude has ever got me."  she raises her eyebrows  "I suspect you do too don't you."

"Oh yeah, I get you because I am exactly the same!!  Neither of my girlfriends got me, the red bike didn't, neither did Celeste and Honey definitely doesn't."  she laughs at me  "I thought there was something wrong with me, I've never met anyone remotely close."  I laugh quietly  "I guess I should have known you would!!"  I roll my eyes  "Hell!!  I wish you had told me back then, or at least let me get past sucking your face and putting my hand up your top!!"  she starts laughing almost hysterically

"Oh yeah, and if you had known, what would you have done about it Charming!!"  she laughs at me 

"Slapped you silly, tied you up and ragged your brains out, what do you think!!  See you blew it Soda and now you will never get that chance again without me fading you doing it!!"  I smirk at her  "You would never have needed to look or go anywhere else!!"

"You have always been full of yourself, haven't you Charming!!  Like you are soooooo irresistible!!"  she laughs  "If my memory serves me rightly, I knocked you back more than once, so you are not that irresistible!!"

"Yeah because you didn't know what you was throwing away!! "  I smirk at her  "and if my memory serves me right Soda ... what was it you said to me again .... "You'll never have me Charming, because I do not colour mix!!"  I laugh at her  "Well I think I just did!!"  she starts laughing hysterically  "Purple and Pink are not exactly green are they, or are you colourblind suddenly like the rest of us?"  She rolls her eyes  "Hell, If I had known you was full of shit I would have tried even harder!  I would have held you down and forced you, which I know now you would have liked"  I smirk at her and she smirks back. 

"Why didn't you anyway?  Try harder?"  she frowns  "You didn't try very hard from where I was standing, when I said no a few times, you just backed right off!!  You couldn't have been that keen!!"

"Oh I was trust me!!"

"Yeah right, all you wanted was to get laid!!"  she laughs  "If you really liked me then you would have tried harder!"

"I thought I was trying at first, I did most of your dirty work remember, you said jump, I jumped twice as high.   When you started playing with me, kissing me then pushing me away, I thought I was getting somewhere, I thought you was teasing me and playing hard to get, but then you went and hooked up with Alpine!!"  I pull a sulky face at her which makes her laugh  "However, it was probably just as well because I doubt you would have had me for very long."

"Oh so I guess you are the shag them and dump them kind of guy!"  she laughs

"No I would have run a mile, you were a piece of work!!"  she frowns at me  "I go for bad girls, which is exactly what you was, you was fiesty and had spunk, and why I liked you, but you changed."  I pull a face at her  "You crossed the line, you took it too far and became evil!!  I might do bad, but not evil!!  That is when I started disliking and hating you instead."

"Nobody ever knew did they?  That you had a thing for me!"  she starts laughing

"Hell no!!  That is something only you and me know!!  Although Celeste did pick it out of my head.  Its a good job she didn't realise you was the one and I had you sat in that cage or it would have been lights out for both of us, even if it was a schoolboy crush many years ago!  I only had to look at another woman in the wrong way and she disposed of them.  Maizie is only still here because she knew I seriously can't stand the bones of her!!"  I roll my eyes  

"You must have told one of your bum chum!"  she laughs 

"No, especially not Cos, after the way I carried on at him for moping over Lilly, he would have crucified me!!  Besides Alpine would have battered me, at the time, if he had known, especially at first, when he was into you, that is why I just kept my mouth shut!"

"Like he had room to talk, when he was shagging the slut behind my back!!"

"You know that red school bike was not that much fun to ride, even Alpine said so ... she was just very easy!!"  I laugh  "When you are a horny teenage boy with raging hormones, you will take anything, we all could have rode that bike, Mango and Cos just chose not to!"  I smirk at Lime.  "I'm surprised that bike is still going, but she is, after eight kids, she's still got Sunny constantly at it, the poor guy is knackered!!  I hear his thoughts on the subject from time to time."

"Don't even start me with that red school bike again!!"  she laughs 

We both lie there laughing hysterically for a while, both thinking about the laugh we had at Sunny's expense, sparked off by Shadow innocently asking for a school bike. 

"Shit!!  What have we just done?!"  she suddenly looks worried

"Well that's charming!!  Have you forgotten already?!"  I laugh at her

"No idiot!!  You mentioned babies ... we didn't use anything ... protections."

"Oh Berry!!"  I start howling with laughter at her  "Vampberry's can not make babies ... I wished!!  I would have half a dozen kids by now otherwise, and the world would be over run with vampires if it was possible for vampires to reproduce."  I carry on laughing  "Besides aren't you getting too old to be worry about getting pregnant?"

"Cheeky berry hole!!"  she laughs  "I still work regularly in that department, I'm not quite over the hill just yet Charming!!"  she starts laughing then  "Unlike you who now appears to fire blanks!!"
  
I am too busy laughing to register at first the strong smell of blood now sneaking into my nostrils.  

When it does register I stop laughing and sit up.  I check the cut on her arm and it is not that, the cut has stopped bleeding and it just looks very open and sore.  I run my hand up her arm when I am distracted because I notice she has some red marks on her skin, that will probably turn into bruises.

I grab her chin gently, seeing she has a split lip and the blood is trickling slowly down her chin slightly.  I don't know how I did not notice it before, I think because I have been more watching her eyes rather than her mouth.  I pull her up onto her feet.  I automatically move to lick the blood.  I laugh reading her thoughts, they start to rampage again, as she starts to get excited, she thinks I have intentions of us going again!!  

Very tempting as that thought is ... I know I have to stop this right now!!

I roar loudly at her suddenly, baring my teeth, and go at her nastily, like the blood sucking creature that I am supposed to be.  My plan is to scare her.  She tries to back away, stumbling backwards so I catch her before she falls.  She was not expecting it and is suddenly a bag of nerves again.

"Scared?"  I ask her but don't give her chance to respond, because I know she is suddenly.  "Well you should be very scared, because that is how easily I can switch if I have a mind too and sometimes I can't control it!!"

She just lies suspended in my arms and frowns at me.

"I am a vampire and you are mortal and that is why we can NEVER do that again!!" 

I listen to her thoughts for a moment, she does not understand and thinks that I might be just messing about for a laugh, she does not realize that I am being serious.

"No Lime!!  It is too dangerous, I seriously nearly lost control a few times!!  Luckily for you I do still have some mortal emotions and didn't want to hurt you so I managed to keep control, berry knows how, and you live to tell the tale!!  Next time you might not be so lucky!!  You are very lucky all you got away with is a load of bruises, a split lip and the bite marks on your shoulder.  I did not hear anything break, so you got off very lightly!!"

"You didn't bite bite me did you?"  she frowns at me as she stares down at her shoulder.

"No, although I did steal a pint of your blood!!  It was kind of turn on for me and you were too busy screaming the place down to even notice me doing it.  See I could quite easily have drained the life out of you right there and then."  I laugh and she rolls her eyes  "If I had bitten you, you would have been screaming the place down in agony by now if I had!!  Your veins would have been on fire."  I laugh at her  "Hell, I could never risk you becoming a vampberry, you are evil enough without removing your mortal emotions, that is if you actually have any to lose!!  You think Honey is bad, I recon you would outdo the devil!!"  

I laugh at her, but she does not find what I have just said amusing. I have actually really hurt her feeling which absolutely kills me, I feel like having hysterics, but don't because I know how upset she is.

"Okay, I'm sorry!!  I know you have become a much nicer person lately, I could even fall for you all over again.  However, you have to admit, after everything you have done, you will be lucky if any of us ever trust that you are being completely genuine right now and this isn't just some clever act you are playing!!"

The blood on her lip is irritating me as she just stares back at me, I lean in to suck it off and I find myself kissing her, which gets a little heated and goes on for way too long, because I, we both like it far too much.

"That has to be an end to it!"  I mumble as I break the kiss, when I realise what I am doing, I am listening to her head starting to get carried away with it again, and she is starting to take me with her.   "And not just because of what I could do to you if I lost control of myself.  If Honey gets wind of this, she will fade you given the slightest chance!!  Which I seriously can not let happen for Shadow's sake."

"What the hell happened to Honey anyway?"  she frowns at me  "I could see she was a really nice kid before you bit her!!"

"I was lucky, I didn't lose much of my mortal emotions, Omri hasn't lost any at all, Honey has lost them all!!  She is what a vampberry should be, totally cold, callous and unfeeling, she is pure evil.  You see how she treats Shadow, it is shocking!!"  I roll my eyes 

"I told you, you are full of shit Charming - you don't do evil but you have been doing Honey!"  she starts laughing.

"Not through choice, and I only put up with it at first.  It is a bond thing, that can happen when we turn somebody, and it is something that us vampberry's have to put up with and suffer sometimes.  I loved Celeste, I suffer Honey, when I don't even like her, for me she is in the same book as Maizie and you know I can not abide that woman!!"

"I'm sorry!"

"I'm not only an expert at self control, I'm also an expert sex dodger!!"  she laughs  "You women have got nothing on me, excuse wise - I've got a book full of them, and I've got a headache is not one of them!!"

"You are a dick Charming - I bet you do too!!"  she starts laughing  "Well don't forget to jot down your newest excuse - I'm a vampire and you are mortal!"

"Unfortunately Soda, that one has got to go right to the top of my list!!"  I laugh at her  

"We can't hang about naked like this all night, we need to get dressed, Omri or one of the spirits could walk in on us anytime, I'm surprised they haven't already, and I think they will probably kick off if they find out what we have just done!!  I doubt it will go down very well, do you, especially if your son comes wandering in here and see's you naked!!"

Lime laughs at me as she watches me getting dressed while she just jumps straight into the bed completely naked.

"You could always join me."  she smirks from under the bed clothes.  "You are freezing, you need warming up!!"

"Funny!!  Sorry, not tonight love, I've got a headache!!"  she starts really laughing

"I know why that excuse is not in that book of yours!!!"  she smirks at me  "Vampires don't actually get headaches do they!!"

"No but I get a nasty feeling, if you don't quit with those sexy smirks and that dirty mind of yours, you are going to be giving me a migraine!!"  I frown at her when she covers her face with the sheet and lies there giggling and I realise why when her mind starts to go on a dirty rampage.

"I can still hear you remember!!"  I tut at her  "Quit the smut Soda!! 

When I have got myself dressed I lie on the bed next to her and we start talking. I ask her what made her so bitter and twisted and she tells me about the hard life she had lived as a child and then the fire that that wiped out all her family except for her and how it affected her, being alone and having nobody.
 
As we lie there and continue to talk, Lime under the covers, me on top of the bed fully dressed.  I suddenly hear the key turning in the door.  Without even thinking, I tell Lime to pretend to be asleep and I grab the book that is lying on the bedside table, open it up and pretend to read it.

Omri walks into the living room area, I can see him through the archway in the wall.  He spots me straight away and walks over to the archway.  I see him start to frown as he just stands there staring at me.

"I wandered where you had got to."  he smiles  

"I'm on pet watching duty tonight remember."  I smile at him over the top of the book

 "So, what are you up to exactly?"  he laughs sarcastically.

"Just reading."  I mumble 

"You reading!!  That's a first!!"  he laughs  "Well this looks very cosy, I must say!!  Suspect even!!"

"I suppose it might!"  I laugh back at him  "I was talking to our pet and she fell asleep.  She was telling me about this book, it sounded interesting, so I picked it up and starting reading, so engrossed I forgot myself."

"Reading, Really?!"  he starts to laugh sarcastically  "So why is the book upside down!!"

Ooops!!!  He stands there now scowling at me, he is not a happy bunny!!  I know he can already guess what has been happening in here.  Lime is daydreaming in her head, which Omri can hear just like I can.

"Jazz you have done some stupid things in your time, but this takes the biscuit!!"  he snaps  "Like I wouldn't find out what you two have been up to ... I think you can hear for yourself, her head is full of it!!"  he laughs sarcastically as I sit cringing listening to Lime's thoughts.  "Like you could ever keep this a secret ... she's mortal for berry's sake!!  How the hell did you not fade her and you forget already that Shadow can hear your thoughts as well as hers, and if the filth flying through her head is also going through yours ... Oh Berry!!"

"Omri it's not what you think .... she's just fantasizing"

"Oh it's exactly what I think!!  Those thoughts of hers are way too realistic and her damn clothes are still scattered all over the bedroom floor, every single piece of it!!"  he snaps  "Lime is very tidy as a rule, she would never throw her clothes about like that!!"

"Okay!!  Okay!!  Keep your shirt on, you busted me!!"  I laugh at him  

"UPSTAIRS JAZZ!!"  he snaps  "You and me need words!!"

I lie and watch Omri storm off out of the room and slam the door behind him with force.  I bite my lip as I turn to stare at Lime.

"I'm Sorry!!"  she looks up at me like she a naughty child.  "I completely forgot for a moment that he can hear my thoughts.  I really didn't think!!"

"Oh, you did plenty of thinking that is the problem!!"  we both start laughing

I forget myself for a moment and lean over and start kissing her, I don't even know why I did it.  When I realize what I am doing, I break the kiss and get up off the bed to go to face the music.   

I know this is not going to be pretty, especially when Cos and Storm find out!!

Why am I so stupid sometimes!!


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Song - Nirvana ~ Sam Smith 
        - Nirvana ~ Sam Smith (acoustic)
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