Chapter 11: A Creature of Habit

The next few days I followed an extremely strict schedule on what I did throughout the day. I had to make sure that I finished everything I needed to by the end of the night. I would go to school in the morning, see Willow, come home and finish my homework. Then at nighttime, I would end it by astral projecting to Willow first, and then the bar last. Every night once I entered the mad hatters all I would do was hover at his side and continually watch his every movement.

If my plan was going to work, I was going to have to do three things. One, I had to learn his every move. Two, I would have to find a way to convince him to change willow back to normal. Once Willow was herself again the third part of the plan would need to be implemented which would be the most crucial. Because even if I were to convince him to change Willow back there was still a chance that he could hurt either me or her at the end of this. That means that I would need to learn his greatest weaknesses so I could destroy him before he could hurt anyone else. I had seen how brutal he was with Willow and I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

In my free time in between, I found myself on my computer googling the most ridiculous things. Don’t judge me okay, I am curious by nature and can't help myself. The questions varied but here were just a few examples of my questions. How do you kill a vampire? What's a vampire's kryptonite? How often do vampires need to feed? Do vampires have special abilities?

Apparently, I was not the only one who was dumb enough to search these kinds of things. I found that there were literal websites dedicated to those obsessed with everything vampire, and the right mixture of conspiracy theorists. Vampires even had groupies that were referenced as fang bangers. You could guess why they had that name. While researching I even found a ridiculous article on some kinds of vegan vampires that sparkle when exposed to the sunlight. Did they sparkle right before they burned to death? Based on the loads and loads of research over the last few days when vampires get direct contact with the sun they turn to ash. However, how reliable were these resources? I highly doubted a vampire would have written articles exposing their biggest weaknesses to the world. Also, who could have gotten close enough to a vampire and lived through the experience to tell the story?

It was Friday night and as I astral projected from the park to 6th street where Mad Hatters establishment was located, I flew through the door of the business. Immediately, I noticed that it was practically empty inside. I decided to go straight to the bar where he often sat and decided who was his next target for the night. There were several things I learned from observing him.

One he was a creature of habit. Two he never went for the easy choice.  The third thing I noticed was not about him exactly but about girls my age. They are far too trustworthy when they see a guy with a pretty face start to flirt with them. It's like their brain turns to mush and all they can do is sit there in awe of him like they had never seen a hot guy before. It annoyed me. I mean seriously if a guy that hot hits on me I am totally running in the opposite direction. There must be something wrong with him either physically or mentally.

I took my seat to the left of his usual chair and waited for him to arrive. It was the first time I had beaten him to the bar first. That’s strange. I must have been eager, and I didn't look at the time before I went to bed tonight. Impatiently, I looked over at the white rabbit-shaped clock above the bar back in front of me. I could see that it was barely 10:30 P.M. that meant that I had a good 30 minutes before he made his entrance.

I'm not proud of myself but I decided to see if I could correctly identify who his next victim would be. It became like a sick game. Scanning the room, I found myself analyzing girl after girl as they walked through the door one by one. Most of the girls did not walk in alone. About 75 percent of them were either with their girlfriends or significant others. While the other half were alone or of the opposite sex. From my observations, I already knew that the girls that were not alone would never be chosen as his mark. What I could guess why that would never happen is the risk was too high of him being caught or even recognized when the girl went missing if anyone paid close enough attention to care.

I found myself asking a few questions that had been weighing on me recently. What is he doing with them after the feeding? Are they missing? Did he do the unthinkable and kills them once he was done? If this was the case and the last place, they were at was this bar, why hasn’t it been featured on the news yet? Every day, I found myself watching the news right before bed to see if any of the girls I had been a witness to the night before were featured as missing or even if their bodies had been found. But the news had the same old thing which was just more political campaign nonsense and looking on the internet I had no luck either.

Upon walking to the bus on my way home from visiting Willow, I checked the missing board downtown. It was usually always empty with no posters but this time it was filled with mostly women. What was happening to these girls after he attacked them? Let's think about this... Even if there was no camera in the alley there must be a camera in the bar itself that would leave proof that he was hitting on these girls before they were disposed of. This would lead to evidence once these girls are reported as missing or worse. There could even be footage of at least him walking them toward the service door.

I still couldn’t astral project long enough to see past the bite. These last few days have been harder than normal I think because I had been astral projecting more and more each day that I seemed to not be able to astral project throughout the whole night. It's been getting longer and longer but it's never long enough to answer those burning questions. Even though I know that my chances are slim of witnessing it, I can’t seem to stop myself. There are so many questions that I need answers to that it's all just starting to drive me crazy.

Last night I was right there at the peak moment where he was done drinking from her and I was pushed back to my body and woken up before I could see any more. I forced myself to go back to sleep so I could sleepwalk once again, but I ended up just getting pushed back into a dream. See? I told you it was frustrating.

Tonight, was going to be different. I could just feel it. At that moment I could have sworn I knew who the next girl of the night would be. She was at the end of the bar another blonde which seemed to be his preferred color choice for women. Maybe he had something against blondes that he was slowly trying to murder every blonde in the city. Is it all blondes or is it just the unnatural blondes that are off-limits? This girl was incredibly beautiful when it came to the looks department. Her little black dress was just the right amount of revealing in all the right places. It complemented nicely with her thigh-high boots.

What really made her stand out was her ice-blue eyes. I’m just going to call her Blue. There was just something about this girl that made her stand out but also seemed like there was something not right about her and I couldn’t seem to put my finger on it.

My thoughts were interrupted as the bartender asked “Again, here tonight?”.

“Yes, unfortunately,” I answered immediately.

Realizing that they couldn’t hear me I still instinctively covered my mouth. Dave the bartender was looking to the right of me and I knew that the person he was talking to was probably Quintin and not me. I breathed a quick sigh of relief as I turned to my right.

Quintin smirked at Dave and stated, “Looks like I'm not the only one.”

Almost like clockwork, Dave handed him his gin and tonic as he nodded at him, “Looks like it. This one’s on the house.” He answered.

I watched Dave with curiosity throughout the exchange. He looked like a normal guy but the way he interacted with him was with the utmost respect. Did he treat everyone in the same manner? When my eyes were back on Quintin, I could see that he was rubbing his index finger along the rim of his drink and staring at the end of the bar. Damn, he’s fast. I didn’t even have to look to know he was looking at Blue. It was unfolding before my eyes just like with Willow. Their eyes met, she looked away in embarrassment but immediately her eyes came back to him.

A quick lick of her lips and she motioned him to come to join her as she patted the seat next to her. Almost instantly he listened ambling toward her. He didn’t sit down next to her, instead, he grabbed her by the hand and pulled her to the dance floor. This was something he did often the only person he didn’t do that with was Willow. Probably because she gave him such a hassle, to begin with. He was probably running out of time. I watched as she began to grind up against him even when the music changed.

Before I could stop myself, I began shouting at them over the music, “That’s not even dancing! Why don’t you both take it out to the alleyway?”

When there was no answer I continued, “You do realize that neither of you is even dancing along to the music? What's the point when neither of you has any rhythm? It's called dancing not floor play!”