Bored at Night

As a nod soon followed James' offer to help her, he glanced down toward her head, witnessing her eyes closing after she whispered her answer. She appeared to be in a lot of pain, regret, that James did not know what to do, or even how exactly he was going to deal with it when she learned to accept the feelings that had all of a sudden come rushing back into her head. There were atleast a few thoughts shooting through his head, as well: Why did he do this to her, was it his fault that it was happening; how would he solve her problems, being he was the one that caused the levee to break, making her feelings and everything else flood back into her brain; her mind.

His hand continued to be placed on her back, comforting her as it began shaking, he did not know what from: feelings don't usually cause trembling, or seizures for that matter. For one time in his life, he was actually scared - nervous, about what may happen next. Would her body vibrate so much that it would actually tear itself apart? He did not seem to want to find out.

Holding his wrist out toward her mouth, he offered her to bite down. He had done so many things to her that night, caused pain - inflicted it upon her body, that she must have been feeling drained of energy - of blood. "Here, you need to drink, get your strength back up" James told her, holding it right up to her mouth so she would not need to use up any of her already drained stamina to move her head.

A part of Irene, a part was getting weaker by the minute, was telling her to bite down into his wrist. She really needed the blood and he was willing to give it to her. But another part of her, the strongest part, was telling her that she shouldn't do it. She was so exhausted that there was no way of knowing if she would be able to control herself, if she wouldn't drain him dry.

Irene wasn't sure if she could spare any more energy to shake her head, so she decided to just whisper her answer. "No." She whispered.

Tears were still rolling out of her eyes, but she still didn't quite feel anything besides the wetness on her cheeks and the last barriers of her mind falling one after the other, each and every line of defense being washed away by a great wave of emotions. When the last one of them fell, it would be game over. And there was no doubt that they would all eventually fall.

James sat there, his wrist was to Irene's mouth as he awaited her teeth to sink into his flesh and drink his blood. He had been a little surprised when she had denied it, however. Believing that she needed the blood to sustain herself in the state she was about to be in, he stood up and walked over to a table: grabbed a silver knife that another couple had used to eat their dinner with. Reaching it up onto his hand, he pulled the knife across it in a horizontal line, the blood appeared to instantly show through his open wound as he knelt back down to Irene.

"Please, you need to drink. If you want to survive, you need to." He pleaded with her, she had - somewhat, opened up to him that night. She was not dying, not then, not there. Slowly moving his hand to her mouth, he pressed it up against her lips, allowing the blood to drain into her mouth and throat. All he hoped was that she would be able to stop herself, or he would need to stop her, himself.

As James pressed his cut wrist against her mouth, Irene had no choice but to drink his blood. She couldn't back away, she couldn't refuse to drink it. It was just too tempting. So she just let the blood go down her throat, though she made no effort to get more than what was falling into her mouth. She didn't even have the strength to do so.

"Don't." She whispered when she found the strength in herself to speak again. Irene was still afraid that she wouldn't be able to stop. Though she didn't have the stamina to move yet, when she had, if James' blood managed to supply her that much energy, he could be in danger, and she didn't want that to happen.

The cut on his wrist did not seem to bother James at all, although it had a slight stinging sensation as the blood poured out of it and dropped in Irene's mouth, the sound could faintly be heard: *drop drop drop* like a tap dripping water into an empty sink. Her mouth did seem dry, lips although appeared chapped from her hunger that she appeared to be fighting instead of biting down and getting everything she needed.

He heard a feint whisper come from her mouth as the blood continued to drain into her mouth, giving her the energy she needed. "no, you need blood." He had spoke back to her in a rather quiet tone. He just had hoped that when she regained her strength, she would be able to have control.

Though Irene wanted to argue, she just didn't know how much energy she had, so she'd have to choose her words carefully. "I could kill you." She whispered, trying and failing to open her eyelids. Usually, she'd circle around what she wanted to say if it was something like that, but she knew she didn't have the energy to do that. She couldn't even open her eyes, carrying out a conversation was impossible.

"You wouldn't be able to stop me." Irene added, each word harder to get out than the last. The blood was giving her strength, a strength that was quickly drained not only by her speaking but by her unconscious desperate tries to keep her last defenses up against the strong wave of emotions that kept washing over her mind.

His wrist continued to be held at her mouth as the blood slowly dripped in: he could see her lips begin to get their color back, as well as her strength seemed to be returning. He could hear her whisper, but it did not seem to matter to him. She saved his life, and now it appeared to be his turn to save hers, no matter the consequence.

He looked down to her, placing his whole wrist on her mouth now so she could suck it clean from the source. "Well then I guess you'd better control yourself better" He said, with a little bit of a joking attitude hidden amongst them.

Was it possible for her to control herself? Irene wasn't sure, but it seemed like she didn't have a choice but to try, as James had shoved his wrist into her mouth. A part of her wanted her to do all the effort she could to get as much blood as possible, but another part, the same part that had told her not to drink his blood earlier, was telling her to just let the blood drip into her mouth and do nothing to try and get more. As before, she did what that part of her told her to.

Since she couldn't speak anymore, Irene waited until she could manage to send a sole thought to James. "Stop, please. I don't want to hurt you." Her mental voice was weak like her verbal voice was given to her condition, but it showed something that terrified her. It showed her human side, as her mental voice was just like her voice used to be when she was human.

James took a slight glance around, everybody appeared to have left the grill, even the bartender and the cooks. Either they were compelled, or they just did not see them huddled down in a little corner of the area. But, amidst the anguish that Irene looked to be feeling, a thought soon was projected into his mind: asking him to stop, but he was not so easily swayed by empty threats. He was sure that Irene would not harm him, after all, he was saving her life.

Instead of stopping, he actually applied pressure to his wound, making the blood flow somewhat faster into her mouth. He was not going to let up, not when she was like that. "Well then, try not to" He whispered back to her. He had felt a feint feeling when she had sent that thought into his head, however, the voice was soft; caring.

Irene could feel her survival instinct taking over, but she couldn't quite move yet, so James was safe. But she knew that once she could actually do something, she wouldn't be able to control herself. She was too weak, and even all her willpower wouldn't be enough. She had to show that to James somehow while she still could. But that would mean wasting more energy, and she didn't know how much she could spare before her body was completely drained.

"James, please listen to me!" She mentally begged him, more tears rolling down her face, and this time she knew why. She was terrified of what she could do to him. She didn't want him to die. "I won't be able to control myself for much longer, and I won't be able to keep this up for much longer either. Just please stop."

There were many other things Irene wanted to tell James to try and make his stop putting himself at risk, but the last sentence had already been hard to get out. She just couldn't keep the telepathy up any longer.

The amount of blood that James was losing did not appear to be fatal, as it was just slowly dripping into her mouth; even after he applied pressure to allow the blood to flow faster, it was no where near to an artery splitting open. Up until that moment, when Irene had sent thoughts into his head, he was not afraid; not at all. He had thought that she would have been able to control herself, now that her switch was turned on: allowing her feelings to flow throughout.

Slowly, he pulled his wrist away from her mouth as he walked up to the bar and grabbed the glass he had used previously for his whiskey, and the blood began dripping into the bottom. The silky red liquid could be seen mixing with the thin layer of alcohol left on the bottom of the glass as it made a little caramel color, before being completely taken over by the red. He stood at the counter for several minutes before walking back over to Irene, who was still laying on the ground as he knelt down beside her, tipping glass that appeared to be half full of blood toward her mouth. "Here, now atleast you won't be drinking it right from the source"

With that, Irene could work. She felt the liquid splashing in her mouth and flowing down her throat, giving her a little more strength, but she was still too weak to move or speak. There was no way James could safely provide her all the blood she needed. She'd lost too much energy, and she was still losing it fast. All she could do was take advantage of those precious moments when she had more strength to communicate with James. But what could she say? That he should just leave? Irene knew he wouldn't do it, he hadn't done when his own life was at risk. There was nothing she could ask of him that would help her, so she really didn't know what she could say.

"James, there's nothing you can do. Your blood won't be enough, not without putting you at risk." She sent to him, almost sure that he wouldn't give up. But she had to try.

James just looked at her, more of a stare as she replied. He knew what the consequences were for helping her, a Vampire, with his blood. He knew what would happen had she gotten out of control, but he continued doing it anyway because he did not very much like being indebted to someone who had saved his life.

Every few minutes he would pull the glass away and fill it back up, pressing it to Irene's mouth as she continued to drink. Her throat could be seen moving up and down as she swallowed the silky red liquid, and she had appeared to get better.

"I knew the risks, Irene. Did you?" He asked her, in reference to her feeding him her blood to save his life. She should have known he would do something like this.

"I did. But I couldn't let you die, I just couldn't." Irene replied telepathically.

James' blood was helping her, giving her enough energy stay conscious and use her telepathy, but she knew he wouldn't be able to keep on feeding her blood for much longer. Sooner or later, he wouldn't have enough to give her. He should just stop before he lost too much blood, before he passed out, but she knew he wouldn't. There had to be a way to make him stop.

Her mind was getting more unfocused by the second, as her barriers went down one by one and her feelings started to break through. But she knew she had to keep herself focused on not letting James get himself killed because of her. There was no telling when the bleeding would stop. By then, it could be too late.

"It's pointless, James! The best your blood can do is keep me awake for a while. It will never be enough!" Irene telepathically told him, hoping that he would be able to sense the exasperation in her voice.

James did not seem to be listening to her, as he kept filling the glass up half-way each time from his wrist, and pouring the blood down her throat; almost forcing her to swallow. It did seem that hard for him, to keep handing his blood over to Irene: he believed that if you owe someone a favor, you need to pay up before your time is.. well.. done.

He did not understand why Irene had cared about him so, was it because she let her emotions in, or was there some other factor involved? James did not dwell upon those thoughts, but only kept dropping his blood into the glass, and slowly draining it into her. He begun getting woozy, almost falling over from his kneeled state; but he did not seem to care.

"Stop, Irene. You're losing strength just sending those messages. You need to drink to get back, this is my fault; my fault you are laying here on the floor; my fault that you let your emotions back in after so many years. It is just that, my fault."

So that was it. James wanted to help her because he felt guilty. That was something Irene didn't know how to deal with. How could she possibly hope to get James to overcome his guilt when she was just beginning to accept her own guilt? It had been years since she had felt any of that, she really just didn't remember how to deal with it. The sense of owing someone something she could understand and maybe even talk James out of it, but guilt, that was a whole other story.

"You won't do me any good by feeding me your blood until you pass out. I'll just get to watch, well, hear, as you die. And there'll be nothing I'll be able to do about it. So please, James, stop it while there's still time." Irene sent to him, making sure that her words could be clearly heard. Maybe she didn't have energy to spare, but she needed to be positive that he could hear her. That message was important, very important.

His eye sight continued getting worse with the more glasses of blood that he gave to Irene to get her strength back up. Swaying from side to side a little, almost spilling the next glass of blood which he poured down her throat. The red liquid seemed to move down her lips from him unable to keep his balance for much longer.

After the glass was empty, he looked at her as she lay on the floor, "I think I'm going to-" but before James was able to finish the sentence, he toppled over to his left and hit the floor with a thud.

Irene heard as James' body fell on the ground, but there was nothing she could do. She had told him to stop, she'd tried to keep him from draining himself, but he wouldn't hear her, and now he was doomed to die. What could she do? She still didn't have enough energy to even open her eyelids, imagine to crawl over to him. It would be impossible.

But as she went over her head through all her options, she found that it was the best she could do. She had to try, otherwise she would never forgive herself. And watching, rather, hearing as James died, it was just too much for her in the fragile state that she was. She needed to help him, it didn't matter how impossible that seemed.

With a soundless grunt, Irene forced her body to roll over. All her muscles seemed to be on fire, protesting against the effort she was forcing on them, but she knew that had been the easy part. She still needed to crawl over to him. He wasn't very far away, but it still seemed like a long journey for her. Irene cracked her eyelids open just a little bit, wincing as the light penetrated her eyes. It was just a faint light, but she could still feel her pupils painfully contracting.

Using all her courage and willpower, she dragged herself over to James' body, each movement harder and more painful than the last. But each time she managed to crawl a few inches, she was rewarded by the thought that she had even less inches to endure. She'd make, she was sure of that.

After what seemed like hours, she found herself beside James' limp body. But what could she do? She needed to heal him, but the only way she would manage to do that would be by giving him her blood, and she didn't even have enough of it for herself. However, she knew that there was nothing else she could do. She'd made it that far, she wasn't going to back away then.

Without a second thought, Irene bit into her wrist and let her blood slowly fall into James' mouth. Whether it worked or not, Irene didn't know, as she passed out cold just a few seconds after completing her task.

After he had collapsed, James seemed lost, in a daze type of state. Complete blackness filled the void which his eyes could only see, like somebody covered the earth with a black sheet in which no light could penetrate. Which he stood in for several minutes, just standing. He had no idea of what to do, no purpose; nothing.

He looked up, to the ceiling of the blanketed room as it began raining red, thick drops upon him, soon opening his mouth it enveloped the inside, as well as his clothes. What the hell was happening, was that hell? Would he be chained up by the devil and sliced into a million little chunks? He was not thinking about that, putting all of his attention on the blood before a spotlight seemed to appear through the sheet, like heaven shining a light to show him the way, and he followed the pathway.

His body was then wrenched upward so quickly, that he jarred his back out of place and hurt for a minute or two before James actually noticed Irene's unconscious state. Slowly, he moved toward her, noticing her bite mark on her wrist; and coming to the conclusion that she used what she had left, to save his life. There was definitely something about her worth saving.

Even though his body was all healed up, giving Irene his blood never worked out the last time; there needed to be something else he could do, something more then weakening himself to the point of death for a second time. Thoughts went through his skull: bringing in a random person to feed on, no, too harmful; wait, vampire's usually have blood bags in their residence, or Damon and Stefan had. Quickly, he began rummaging through her pockets trying to find something with her address, and came across her phone. Flipping it open, and moving through her information, he finally found it: Her home address, and almost instantly booked it right for the residence.

He soon, however, ran right into a locked door, which was never good: yet another obstacle that he needed to get through. Quickly he fumbled with them, flicking each one so they would unlatch and allow the door to be open, and so it had. Then, James booked it down the highway for several blocks, about 5 or 10 minutes before he arrived and swiftly kicked the door in, grabbing as many bags as he could find before jogging back to the Grill. He was quickly running out of breath, his body was not yet completely healed by the vampire blood, making it harder on him.

Almost as soon as he reached the grill, he held his hand up and pushed the door open, swinging wide as he made his way over to Irene and sat down, trying to catch his breath whist he ripped open the top of a blood bag and pressed his fingers to her lips to get her mouth to open, then pouring it in.

Irene woke up to find herself somewhere she couldn't quite recognize. That wasn't anything new. She was used to traveling and sleeping in different places almost every night, some of which were very strange. But there was something different about this place, something she couldn't quite put her finger on. And then she realized what it was. She was inside her mind. She'd passed out, she guessed, and was unconscious somewhere, just a few drops of blood away from mummifying. Definitely not her definition of a good day.

Stranded somewhere between consciousness and sleep, Irene had no choice but to wait. She knew that once she ran completely out of blood the pain would be almost unbearable, but there was nothing she could do. She had a vague idea of what was happening in the real world. She could just barely hear it as James woke up, and she almost couldn't feel it as he looked through her pockets.

She wondered why he had done that. What was he looking for, and what did he wanted it for? Irene had no idea. She was just happy that he was alive and well. She had accomplished her mission, and that was all what mattered. Of course, she wasn't exactly looking forward to what she knew was going to happen to her, but she was okay with it. She'd known the risks when she decided to help James.

As he left, Irene mentally sighed. She was alone again, and soon she wouldn't want to be alone. Or maybe she would, she wasn't sure. It would depend on what her feelings, which were being held back temporally by her survival instinct, told her. Sometimes, usually during those brief periods when her switch was turned on, she wanted someone around her to help her through the pain, but normally she didn't. She refused to let anyone see her in such a fragile state.

But then, just as she began to feel her veins hurting as if they were on fire, a liquid, a deliciously sweet liquid, made contact with her mouth, and she knew that she wasn't going to mummify just yet. There was still hope. The person who had brought her the blood was James, she realized as she felt his smell. He hadn't abandoned her, he had come back for her, he'd come back with what she needed to survive.

"Thanks." Irene told James telepathically as soon as she could. "I thought you had left me."

He nodded to her slightly, in response to her question; but decided to get her to finish one of the bags before he would talk again. He wanted to make certain that she was going to be okay. It had taken several minutes for him to empty the bag into her mouth: he was very thorough, squeezing every ounce of blood from it took a little more work then he had hoped for, as his fingers pressed against the plastic bag that read something about Mystic Falls General.

He saw her eyes open a little, like little slits of snakes' eyes. Finally, he felt comfortable talking again; breaking the silence that loomed over them. "Why would I leave you? You needed help, and it was because of me that you are in this state." He told her, and sighed a little.

Irene couldn't remember having ever enjoyed a blood bag so much. She could feel as her body started to slowly heal itself, giving her more strength. It would take a while before she was strong enough to even sit, but she wasn't in so much danger anymore.

All the energy she regained was quickly used for healing, depriving her of other functions, such as movement, but she could manage to spare enough energy for telepathy, a fact for which she was grateful. She really wanted to speak to James.

"After what I did to you, I wouldn't blame you for leaving me here. I actually thought you were going to leave the moment I collapsed and never come back. I'm so, so, so sorry for all the terrible things I did to you. I..."

Her thoughts kept changing from her Ripper-like side to her human side, making her mind a complete mess of disconnected and conflicting thoughts, and she couldn't seem to sort out the mess.

"What am I saying, I didn't do anything that terrible! Or did I? Of course I did, and I'm so... No, I'm not!"

James had continued kneeling there, next to Irene's body as blood bags were held to her mouth urging her to drink. He had never felt so out of breath in his life, grasping for oxygen trying to keep from passing out again with only really one thought on his mind: Saving Irene. He appeared a little surprised as messages began popping up in his mind; telepathy. Probably from Irene trying to thank him, which it sounded like.

He did not wait until after she was done the blood bag before replying, "It's not your fault. You weren't acting on your own free will - more like someone who was being controlled by their anger and hatred." He paused slightly, getting a little confused by her constant changing of moods flooding into his head. "just calm down, you need to heal" James told her as he ripped open another blood bag and held it to her mouth.

Even though she wanted to, she really, really wanted to, Irene just couldn't bring herself to calm down. She felt as though she didn't have any control over herself. Usually extremely composed, just making it clear that she wasn't being able to decide whether she was sorry for what she did or not was a big deal to her. She never showed anything like that to anyone.

Had she really not attacked James on her own free will? She'd chosen to lock her feelings away, to flip her emotions switch off. In a way, it was her fault. She knew she wasn't helping herself by thinking of that, but Irene's mind wasn't being rational about the problem that was starting to show through. It didn't want to be rational.

A little bit of her Ripper side peeked through, making it easier for Irene to see what she needed to do. Stop thinking about anything emotions-related. She tried to concentrate on the blood bags she was being fed, on their delicious taste and the great feeling of her energy slowly being returned. But that wasn't enough. Her feelings were way too strong for her to fight them off so easily. Slowly but surely, they began to leak into her conscious mind.

The first thing to show through was regret. Regret for the lives she'd taken, for the lives she'd destroyed and for the people she'd hurt. It all crashed down on her in a matter of seconds, weak at first and easy to ignore, but as the milliseconds ticked by it grew stronger and stronger, until finally she began to allow tears to run down her eyes, tears which soon grew into sobs, causing her to almost choke on the blood she was being fed, spitting out all what was in her mouth.

A small part of her Ripper side was still there, mocking her for how weak she looked, how pathetic it was for her to just break down like that. But she knew it wasn't all that bad, and she knew that the Ripper inside of her was toying with her, trying to make her snap back into the killer vampire she had been just a few hours before.

"I... I can't! I did so many bad things, James, so many of them, and I did it all with cold-blood. I watched as people died, I killed people! And I never even had a good reason for that. So many thing... I just... It was so horrible!" She grew less and less coherent as the feelings became stronger. Still human, but strong nonetheless. When they achieved vampire strength, then things would get bad. Very, very bad.

James' looked pleased that the bags of blood were getting drained - that meant that Irene was healing, getting back to her normal self. But not her usual self - the normal self, the human self. She looked to be in so much pain, would it be worth to stop feeding her blood bags and let her die? No. James was not built that way, he was not taught to let people die - to save them. Soon the blood was shot out of Irene's mouth, like a spitwad - but why? Finally, James looked down to her face to see tears pouring down her cheeks. The feelings appeared to be too much for her to take in all at once. It had saddened him a little, because he knew that he needed to keep feeding Irene blood bags to get her healed and back on her feet.

"But -" He paused slightly as he changed blood bags and pressed the new one to her lips. "That wasn't you, Irene. Not the human you, at least. That was the monster - the darkest parts of you that people tend to keep hidden, even from themselves. You saw a little of mine tonight, all that torture - that was my bad side" He replied back to her, a tear seemed to trickle down from his right eye as it fell to the bloodied floor of the grill.