There isn't enough time to collect my jacket or my boots. Wearing them as I fly home might have been a good idea, but getting caught while trying to retrieve them would have been fatal. Daylight is streaming into the thick forest, flooding the surroundings, clearing up last night's fog, and displaying the corpses of multiple humans who had been used as food by hungry vampires. It will not be long before the forest is re-taken by the cleaners - vampire cleaners, to clear up the mess created last night and keep it fresh for another night. But cleaners won't be the only ones who crowd this place up, there will also be an unlimited amount of guards to make sure no humans escape the city and hide here.

When the vampires took over the world, all its greenery and plant-life had already been destroyed, there were only barren wastelands and crumbling buildings in their place, which isn't much of a problem to them, if it weren't for the fact that their own food relies on the very greenery that had been destroyed. When too many humans started dying from lack of food, a small place was cleared away to let plants and trees grow, not only as a food source for us, but also as feeding grounds for them. Every time they need to dispose of a dead body, they simply dump it in this forest, which is then buried by the cleaners. A smart, and efficient way of living. But soon enough, they saw a flaw in this plan - too many humans from the city were trying to escape into the forest in the mornings when vampire senses aren't good enough to track humans down efficiently, and they were running deep and hiding well. So well that it became impossible to catch them.

The leeches solved this problem by over-crowding the forest with guards in the morning - when their senses are so diminished that they even a human could put up a fight against them, and letting things take their course in the nights - when their senses are the sharpest, and no human can escape them.

In the mornings, there are as many vampires in the forest as there are trees; in the evenings, vampires come here either to dump bodies or to satisfy their 'desires' and the thrill of hunting and drinking blood right from a human's throat - because, apparently, drinking directly from a human is considered bad manners in their homes. They only drink it out of glasses, letting their servants do the killing discreetly.

The first of the guards will be trickling in any time now, scrutinizing every root and leaf to take back any runaway humans, and being one of them makes me more determined to reach safety as soon as possible.

At night, I can sneak up on most vampires without much effort because although they their senses are at their highest at night, they are so overconfident and ignorant that they don't bother keeping a good eye on their surroundings. But in the day, knowing how much weaker they are than they are at night, they stay alert and paranoid, taking in every detail and missing nothing. Even if I stay as still as a stone, hidden out of their sight, they will catch me.

I run from tree to tree, hopping over small gaps between two branches when they appear, passing through the centre of the forest in my hurry to reach home. Trees and surprised birds pass by me in a flash of green against brown; the temperature is getting warmer by the second, the sun rising higher, songs of the early birds and squeaks of the morning insects filling the forest along with the sunlight. I push my legs faster, careful not to press my feet too hard on the bark of the trees - I can't risk a cut on my foot which could simultaneously slow me down and lead any lingering vampires towards the blood; having a clothes soaking in their blood is enough to demand their attention, the last thing I need is an open wound with dripping blood.

Stopping at a particularly tall tree, I reach up and swing myself higher on it until I'm balanced precariously on its highest branches which are thick enough to hold my weight. Once I'm satisfied that I won't be hurtling to the ground any time soon, I take some time to catch my breath and get a look at the edge of the forest and the beginning of the city.

Around the forest area, there is a huge, dry plain which stretches from the outskirts of the city, this plain is usually occupied by butchers selling human and vampire food. Most vampires pick up their food from these shops before coming inside to drink blood.

The cleaners and guards have to cross the plain to enter the plain, and I strain my eyes to pierce the left-over fog from last night to see how close they are to me. The moment they come into the premises of the forest, they will get suspicious and aware of spilled vampire blood.

I manage to spot a single, orderly file of humanoid shapes making their way across the plain through the white fog, and let out a small breath of relief. I might have just enough time to change my clothes before going home.

I glance at the plain one last time, then slip back down to the branches which are at a comfortable height for running, and change direction, skipping away from the outskirts.

Faster and faster. Footsteps soft as a feather, and quiet as a butterfly's wing beat, I run with a practiced ease. I follow a path that leads me back to the tree which has my jacket and shoes, glancing at the ground once in every few moments to make sure I'm going the right way. Following a path on trees is not very easy, so I have to look at the ground to know which way I'm going. But it won't be long before I'm accustomed to finding my way around without having to look at the ground. I can nearly manage it even now.

I pass familiar trees and paths, not faltering at any point, ducking and jumping when I need to; my eyes fall on the horizon after every step, calculating the time I have left.

I finally reach the tree holding my clothes, slightly out of breath. Disinclined to lose any more time, I quickly tear off my shirt and leave it in my jacket's place. Goose bumps form on my skin, and my body turns slightly clammy as the leftover fog clings onto my exposed arms. Grabbing the jacket and my warm pants quickly, I pull them on and hop off the tree and onto the ground.

I land on the ground with a soft thump, flinching when the the movement unsettles my bruised ribs. Glancing at my surroundings to make sure there are no vampires in my immediate premises, I fold my jacket sleeves to the forearms, and take off running again. Home is close, and I only need to take a straight path to reach it.

Running on the ground is much more conspicuous than hopping through the trees, but it is also more time-saving, which is essential at this point.

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I come to a sudden stop at my destination - a tiny, circular clearing barely touched by sunlight because of the tightly knit trees overhead. Dead leaves and rotten produce cover every inch of the ground, making it impossible to see if there is any stable place to stand on under all the decaying plant-life . The acrid smell of acid mixed with nature's dying products is suspended over the clearing, and drifting into its surroundings. Taking a deep breath of the bitter smell, I slowly start pushing through all the obstacles - yellowing leaves and the decomposing food - to reach the centre. The centre of the decaying greenery is devoid of any yellowing leaves, except for a few here and there; but in its place is a metal, box-like structure set into the ground, replacing the brown forest floor.

It is sleek and smooth, except for one end, which has a small hook sticking out for pulling it up - a trap door.

I force my way towards the edge of the trap-door and stand on one side and get a hold on the cold hook. Flexing my arms, I clutch it with both my hands, and tug at it. It comes away, free from the ground, bringing the square trap-door along with it to reveal a large gaping hole it its place. The hole is dark and menacing, but I don't hesitate to jump right in. The jump doesn't last more than a second since the hole isn't very high - and I find myself standing in the dark, my feet on smooth ground, and with the open trap-door as my only source of light. I look up through the hole, at the overhead trees one last time, before reaching for the rope hanging from the inside the trap-door and pulling it. The trap-door swings back into its place efficiently, leaving me in complete darkness.

Dark and silent. The threat of hungry vampires gone. Safe.

The underground hole - rather room is not very big, maybe about twice as wide as I'm tall, with sufficient place to hold three people comfortably. I stretch out my hands, letting them brush the rough side-walls. The room is not actually a proper room, it the end of a long tunnel, twisting and turning through a others, creating a catacomb, which will lead me home if I go the right way. My hand stops moving when it isn't touching the wall anymore, but can only feel emptiness - the beginning of the tunnel.

Although I want to reach home as soon as possible, I start walking in a normal pace through the entrance because I don't want to hurt my ribs more.

Mom used to tell me a a lot of stories, but the story of these tunnels was my favourite. They had been built a long time ago, when vampires still weren't aware that humans could escape and hide in the forest in the day time.

The forest has three layers: the trees, the ground and underground.

The underground is the safest place for us.

Under the forest floor, we have an array of tunnels and caves, running through the entire forest, covering every inch, its entrances almost always trap-doors or occasionally holes cleverly hidden under rocks. They are never straight passages which lead to one pre-determined destination; each trap-door or hole grants entrance to a tunnel which twists into others, going right and left, branching off at every corner, merging with others at some point, then separating at another, leading to dead ends and fifteen-feet holes that guarantee certain death, going round and round until you die of exhaustion. The entire thing is an unconquerable maze, and can kill you off in the matter of days or weeks depending on which unfortunate route you take - unless you know which way to go.

The entrances to the tunnels are placed strategically every few hundred meters or so on the forest floor, each one camouflaged in some way, and engulfed in the smell of the only thing that can come close to being a vampire-repellent: acid. Although acid cannot exactly repel them, its smell irritates them and coaxes them to stay away from it, which means that they never come close to these small clearing which are the portals to safety without realizing why. They don't even know why they stay away, they just do unconsciously.

Building tunnels right under the trees which have their roots plunging into the ground should be practically impossible, but mom said that our grandfathers and their grandfathers found the way without destroying plant-life or letting the tunnels collapse - building and digging where the roots aren't too thick, and leaving place for the roots to go deeper - an infrastructural miracle. Even now, they stand strong.

Even if a vampire tries to follow me by tracking down my smell, it might get lost.

As a child, I spent most of my time down here, roaming in and out of tunnels with my mom, learning where each one leads and how to recognize the ones which will land me in a dead end, and the ones which will lead me home. I could find my way home even blindfolded.

Few steps inside the tunnels, I find a small unlit lantern concealed under a dark cloth, along with tools to light it. Although I can find my way home without the help of any light, I don't want to take the risk. The lantern throws a soft yellowish light that is just strong enough to light up the path a few feet in front of me, but I don't need more than that.

Then I start walking through long, winding tunnels. Right, left, left again, straight, over the small hole, and right. On and on, I walk quietly in the dark, touching the sidewalls of the passages, touching the sticky spider webs that cover the walls, walking past the few night-creatures that live here. The lantern is my only source of light, and knowing that I'm the only living being in the infinite never-ending tunnels is an eerie thought, and can be a scary one of I let it. But I don't. And haven't since my mother died protecting its secrets.

As a child, the tunnels were scary and intimidating and dark, but at the end of the tunnels was my solace: the trees. I always climbed like a monkey, higher and higher, until I felt like I was on top of the world. My father used to say that I could climb before I could walk. The love I had for climbing is still alive, when I'm all the way up, and no one can see me, I feel safe. It feels like nothing can harm me, with the cold wind on my face and the night creatures all the way down below. Mother never liked it, she considered it too dangerous, but I think father understood, he was like me, climbing and jumping, sneaking up on vampires and slitting their throats when they least expect it. While mother was good with navigating the tunnels, father was the one who could climb and hunt. They made the perfect team. And both of them didn't want me to end up another hunter like them. Father encouraged me to climb more, but never to risk my life, and mother taught me the routes through the tunnels, only if I needed a quick escape.

When father died, I lost a person close to my heart, someone who could understand me. But when mother died, it felt like I lost my guardian, my lantern which could lead me through the dark. She was the one who kept me brave in the journey through the tunnels, told me that she would fight away any threat. I remember entering the tunnels with shaking hands and tears on my face, convincing myself that the bright sunlight and trees at the end will be worth the dark. I remember my mother holding my hand in her warm ones, walking me in step-by-step, and wiping away the tears caused by the fear. I remember how she used to tell me that I didn't have to go through the ordeal if it hurt me too much.

I lost father when I was just eleven, but my mother was lost only four years ago. It had been a normal day, and I thought she would come back from the hunt. She didn't hunt vampires like father did, she was too sensible and productive to waste her time hunting down those creatures for the sake of revenge, and hunted animals for our food instead. Then when she didn't come back when she should have, I got scared but was too scared to venture into the tunnels all alone, and stayed back hoping she would be alright. Almost a day after her usual returning time, Anna crashed in with cuts on her face and blood all over her body, but she didn't have my mother with her. And I didn't have a mother anymore. Later, Anna told me that mother was caught when she slipped from a branch, and although I knew both my parents didn't want me to have the same fate as they did, I decided to start hunting only because I knew I would never slip from a tree like my mother did.

I don't think I've shed a single tear after her death. And the darkness became as much my friend as the bright trees did, both of them my helpers on my quest to kill as many of the villains who took away my guardian from me as I can.

They are the reasons for my passion for killing the vampires, apart from the money I could steal which would pay for our food.

Not long after, I'm at my destination. A rough wooden wall-like structure - different from the uneven wall that I've walked past - blocks my path, yellow light spilling out from its edges where it is connected to the wall.

I blow out my lantern and set it on the floor, then reach forward, feeling the rough wood, and give it a push. The door swings back smoothly, letting the light flood into the dark tunnel and briefly illuminating the cracks and fissures on the mud-caked walls. The source of the light is another small, bright yellow lantern sitting on a table in the other side of the door against another wall.

I step into the room, and close the door behind me, shutting out the darkness. To my right, there is a dead-end, but to my left, is the place that keeps me safe: home. I stand inside a low-ceilinged, circular mud room, similar to the tunnels but wide enough to hold a hundred people. It has tables and lamps in every corner, making it brighter than day. Bright sofas and a wood table take up the centre of the room, over the dark red carpet covering the floor. Red curtains hang over the other small passages that lead to some rooms, the walls have daggers, white targets to throw daggers at with a red centre and weapons of all kinds litter the floor and are stuck into the wall for easy access in case of an emergency. Standing against the wall are chairs, most of them broken.

And on the sofa, with her back turned towards me, is the reason I don't take too many risks; my sister. Right now, the only thing I can see is her shiny blond hair, flowing freely over her shoulders. Then she turns around at the sound of the door closing. Her small heart-shaped face is long and scrunched up with worry and her blue eyes highlighted by the dark circles under them as she walks around the sofa to make her way over to me.

"I was worried. Why were you away so long?" She says in her soft voice, reaching me quickly and pulling me into a hug, towering over me as she does that. She's much taller than I could ever hope to be, standing almost two heads above mine, her arms are strong and cold like stone, but she's always full of love and selflessness. Being two years older than me, her instinct always led her to try and protect me, while I did rash things that could get me killed. Every night, after I come back from my hunt, she tells me how worried she is that I might slip-up and lose my life, and everytime I have to remind her that I'm more than capable of taking care of myself.

I wince as the sudden hug squeezes my bruised ribs but try not to show it, reluctant to get her more distressed, but she feels it anyway and pulls away immediately, anxiousness lining her pale face. Her forehead wrinkles up with a frown. "What happened? Are you hurt?"

Her eyes roam over my body concernedly, looking for any obvious injury that could cause me to wince. When she doesn't find anything, she starts tugging at my jacket zip. I hold her hands by the wrist and push them away from my body. "You worry too much, Anna. It's just a small bruise."

"How did it happen?"

"I ran into a wall in the tunnels," I lie easily. The last thing I want is for her to find out that I did a one-on- one fight to death with a vampire, she will lose her mind.

She narrows her eyes suspiciously, her rosebud mouth pursed disbelievingly. She knows there's more to my excuse; running into walls isn't something I do frequently, but before she can voice her accusations, the devils enter the room.

The 'devils' are actually my other siblings, my only blood-related siblings. Rose and Jaden stumble out of one of the other passages which leads to a room, laughing and racing each other to get to me. They're both younger to me by more than ten years, at the age of eight, and possibly the worst troublemakers ever. Being twins, it would have been hard to tell them apart, but they're not identical at all. Rose takes after my mother, bright blue eyes and rosy cheeks - which gave her the name - long brown hair that shines at any time of the day and the strongest pair of arms that she could have only been inherited from my mother. Jaden, on the other hand, takes after my father, with his serious grey eyes and black hair that makes him look broody at all times and his passion for reading the old books that we keep in the Book-Tunnel or as it was called earlier, the library. I like to think I have a bit of both, with my dark blue eyes from my mother and jet-black hair from my father. The devils are another reason I don't walk through the catacombs without any light.

Rose gets to me first, her tiny eight-year old legs carrying her faster than her brother, and jumps into my arms, laughing. I laugh along with her, holding her to my chest as she yells, "Kat! You're back! And I came first, so Jade has to do my chores for today!" Jaden joins her soon, jumping into my other arm because one is busy with his sister. "Anna was worried! But we told her you'd be fine! And I'm not doing any chores! Rosie cheated!" he shouts.

Laughing, I adjust them on my arms so as to not hurt my ribs and pull them hard against my chest, letting their the warmth of their little bodies fight away the coldness in mine. They wrap their arms around my neck tightly, bickering over whether or not Rose cheated in the race.

Anna frowns at their behaviour, her lips puckering up in disapproval. "Rose! Jaden!" She snaps at them, trying to pry them away from me. "Kat's hurt! Rosie, stop squeezing her like that!"

I laugh louder, moving backwards quickly to prevent Anna from getting Rose and Jaden away from me. "It's fine. They're not hurting me. You worry too much." I tell her for the second time today.

Anna doesn't listen to me, and lifts first Rose - who is still doing her level best to force her chores on Jaden - and then Jaden - who is still refusing to do them, and puts them on the ground, scolding them for their behaviour. When they don't pay any attention to her, she looks back at me, still worried. "You alright?"

I smile for her benefit, although the devils' attack on me DID worsen the pain. "I'm fine. I told you, it's nothing. But I'm hungry, do we have any food?"

I know she wants to argue, but she thankfully doesn't. "We do," she says, "bread and meat good with you?"

I nod, going down on my knees to kiss Jaden and ruffle Rose's hair. They giggle childishly and plant big, sloppy kisses back on my cheek, all the while competing with each other to get there first. I look up at Anna, and she smiles at me, although I can see that she's still annoyed with me for lying to her about the bruises.

Once I've pacified the twins a little bit and convinced them to not constantly hop around like excited squirrels at my return, I stand up and head over to the other end of the room, where there is a tunnel which will lead me to a room holding some clothes and water. Spending an entire night among the trees and animals and dirt while killing vampires is a dirty job, and I really need to clean myself up.

Author's note: Hey! So I know it's been a long time, but descriptions take forever, and I'm (if it's not totally obvious) not very good at those! I think I wrote this about three times, yet I'm not very proud of it, but since I couldn't figure out what I wasn't proud of, I just decided to publish it! If anyone's reading this, thank you so much! And if you feel you know what's wrong or if you know what's missing in the descriptions, please let me know! :) It will be a great help.

Thanks for reading! :)

And if you find any mistakes/typos, please do not hesitate to point them out! And let me know what you think :)

Cyan