The Restless Dead Want YOU To Fight Necromancy

[X]Feed lightly. In its way, this is more difficult than just leaving her be.

Your conscious inclination, as far as you thought about it in that moment under the darkening sky, was to leave. The problem was that leaving required more than one step, and planning, and thought, and the song of her heart required no thought, just desire. She was controlling her trembling, now, recovering quickly from your rifling through her mental files. Not a weak mind.

"Could you help me?" you asked, feeling distantly that you should be polite, at least, if you could not be entirely kind.

"With what?" she asked.

"Well, you see," you said, and then you drank.

There is a perfect joy in fulfilling your nature. To be a vampire is to drink the blood of the living, demand respect, and kill necromancers. There are some other details in there, unimportant, but killing necromancers is an essential function. You can still hear the echo of the little twit's mental touch. You were going to strangle him, and you took a moment to picture that in exquisite detail.

Too long a moment. Her heartbeat fluttered, and too much strength flowed into your veins. How long had you been drinking, as the stars faded into the deepening blue above you? How long had you wasted thinking about what a nice night it was, under the starry spring sky, thoughts grown slow and poetic as you savored a warm woman in your arms?

You closed the wound carefully, and pulled away. It was your turn to shudder, as you lowered Lisa to sit dazed against the red and tan bridge stones, her heartbeat fast, too fast. You wasted none of her blood, and only the faintest pink tinge to her skin showed where your fangs had been, but the lack of control-

You hadn't meant to do that, but it's not the first mistake you've made. At least she's not dead.

Now, what to do about it.

[]Take her home with you. You know something about caring for weakened humans. This will only delay you a little.
[]Take her to the hospital. She needs care, and probably a doctor. This will ensure her swiftest recovery, and you will be able to oversee things.
[]Flag down a passerby and bind them to assist her in seeking a doctor. This will not delay you, but you will not be able to control anyone who notices something odd.
[]Leave her here. You're not interested in what happens to her.
[]Write-in

(As moral decisions are made, the presented choices will change. You can still kill her as a write-in, for example.)

It's irresponsible to leave her lying in the street, and not at all in the spirit of secrecy. You've had bad luck being casual with secrecy. Best to take her with you, especially with that urgent beat still pressing against your mind. The hunger has lifted a little, but you're still unsettled. And wearing a tarp, let us remember.

It's the tarp that makes picking Lisa up and carrying her briskly off the main road and into the park shortcut to your home awkward, not her size. You end up with her in a fireman's carry, hunched and feeling like people are watching you. As you head east along the creek, the only minds you actually sense are far away and preoccupied with other things. The trees are reassuringly the same, even if a little older. You follow the hiking path for another five minutes before cutting uphill, south and away from the creek, through a screen of oak and maple and out into a broad green lawn.

Good, someone had been cutting it. Now if only things had gone right-

The house is built of limestone, set away from its neighbors, and is somewhere between a house and a mansion, with three stories, a tower, a carriage house, and far too many rooms for one person. As you approach it, lights switch on, startling you into a jolt backwards four yards, before your new subconscious asserts itself. Motion-activated lights. Normal. This was all normal.

You leave Lisa, semi-conscious, on your back patio, and climb up a trellis to your balcony. Yes, of course you have a balcony. Aside from a brief 100-year interlude, your life had been going well. (Better not to dwell. Hunger makes you testy.) You try the sliding balcony door, and it opens freely under your hand. You slip inside.

Well, Morgan, life doesn't seem to be too bad. Your bedroom is untouched, aside from someone having dusted. To your upgraded sensibilities the furniture seems dreadfully old-fashioned, in polished wood and plush autumnal fabrics, but you can upgrade to something sleek if you feel like it. There's still something to be said for gigantic velvet curtains.

Your drawers, too, are untouched, though they smell a little suspect. A number of things have moths, and you sneeze at dust stirred from the folds as you pull together an outfit, ending up in trousers, a shirt that doesn't fit the era, and a suit jacket that will do. No hat? Your new subconscious says no hat. That can't be right.

You will worry about hats later, Lisa is outside on cold stone in the damp night air. Barefoot, you leave your bedroom.

Hm.

That is a soccer ball in the middle of your hallway. Suspicious. You heft it, and toss it down the hall, where it bounces slowly down the stairs.
No response. No candle-flicker of mortal minds about their business in other rooms. It's just you and Lisa – and, apparently, a dog. It's taking a nap downstairs. You head in down the curving main staircase.

You probably should not eat the dog before meeting the house's current residents. Based on your bedroom's state, you suspect they are descendants of your mortal family, the Hendersons, but it's been long enough that it won't be Jackson or Lily or even little Wyatt.
Even easy-going Lily would have objected to you eating the family dog, you are almost certain.

More signs of the house being lived-in. The wooden paneling hasn't been replaced, but there are electric lights and a… vacuum cleaner… sitting out in the downstairs hall. There are family photos on the wall of a middle-aged black man with two teenage children, an older boy and a younger girl. New bookshelves dot the space, and the furniture is a mind-boggling mix of yours and modern things. There is a very large television. Surely that is excessive. You pass through the kitchen on your way to the back door. It's a mess of papers on the counters, with dishes in the new sink and a bowl of fruit on the new counters.

You can't decide if you are angry or pleased that the house has been lived-in all these years, that there is food for you to feed Lisa and people to help you adjust to the modern world. It's all too much.

You get Lisa settled under a blanket on the new tan couch in what is obviously the family room, which also faces the back yard. It has the TV, the dog, two couches, and a scattering of books – the father? – and sports equipment – the daughter or the son? You practically force-feed her a glass of orange juice, and she falls into a nap directly afterwards.

You sit on the other couch. You have some time, now, before the family presumably comes home. They probably would not leave that many plates and mugs in the sink if they were on vacation. You had no trouble entering the dwelling, so your invitation to be here is at least implicit, but they probably will nonetheless be startled by your arrival. What to do with your time? Home, everything feels a little less pressing. You could just rest.

Choose up to three, and plan vote, please. You may be interrupted.

[]Play with the dog. You've had a stressful evening, you'll feel better.
[]Eat the dog. You're still hungry, and she looks pretty old.
[]Make dinner. Your cooking skills aren't anything to write home about, but you won't poison anyone.
[]Explore the house. See what's changed and what's the same.
[]Check on your library. They'd better not have touched your books.
[]Check on your ritual room. Your ritual objects will mostly have spoiled, but some tools might still be fine. If they're still there.
[]Explore the grounds. There's some woods and the carriage house to check over, and probably new neighbors. You might find someone who won't miss a little blood.
[]Watch television. You only have the vaguest outline of current events.
[]Snoop. See what you can learn about your new housemates from their things.
[]Write-in