There are days in this life which simply don't seem to make sense, even to an ageless immortal like myself. You walk around and you see perfectly ordinary people doing things that are absolutely out of character. Even after living on this planet for thousands of years, people continue to surprise me. Yes, human beings never cease to amaze and sometimes frighten me.
My name is Zabrok Tarosh and I am what you would call a vampire. There are many myths surrounding my kind but what I am about to tell you is the absolute truth. If you were to look at me, you would see a tall man in his early twenties with dark brown skin and pale bronze eyes. I've always been quite tall, easily six feet ten inches. It's been both a blessing and a curse over the years. A curse, because my head has gotten acquainted with far too many low ceilings. I was born in central Africa, around 2100 B.C. I was the son of a wealthy noble living in a prosperous kingdom.
A long time ago, I wandered the world, looking for others like myself. Vampires. We're not what you think. The humans have far too many myths and legends surrounding our kind. First of all, we can walk in daylight, though it is certainly not our favorite thing to do. We tend to get sleepy during the daylight hours. We do not grow old as humans do, this is true. Yes, we do need blood to survive. That is the one thing that human mythmaking has managed to always get right. We cannot fly. We cannot turn into animals. We can cross running water. Holy water and crucifixes don't do anything to us. We are a natural race, not a supernatural one. Think of us as another species, rather than anything outside the realm of nature.
There aren't too many of us around anymore. I think this is due to the fact that there are groups of humans which make it their mission to hunt down and kill our kind. The humans have always feared us. I don't know how many of us are around anymore. I've always kept to myself. I have never been a group-oriented person, either as a human or as a vampire. Still, we all get lonely and I am no exception. When people get desperate and lonely, sometimes they make mistakes. I've made a mistake recently and his name is Thomas Luther.
I met Thomas Luther back in 1891. Back then, I was living in the western United States and times were very different. In Texas, it was a time of repression. White folk and black folk did not mix. I lived in a house in the woods and kept to myself even then. That's when I met Thomas Luther. There was a young black man named Russell who was on the run from the law. He was accused of theft. The Texas Rangers were after him, led by a man named William Colt. If Colt had his way, Russell would have been shot and killed on sight. Fortunately for James Russell, a young man named Thomas Luther intervened. Thomas Luther was a young Irishman visiting America for the first time. He was a kind soul and did not think any unarmed man should be killed, lest he be the type of dangerous criminal who had killed someone. Thomas intervened and for his heroic effort, he would have been s hot by the Rangers.
That day, I did something which would have repercussions for decades to come. I decided to intervene in mortal affairs. I came to Russell and Luther's defense. I waded into the Rangers and took them down, but not before one of them shot Thomas Luther. As I looked at the brave young man who lay dying, I found myself faced with a difficult choice. I had seldom met any humans who would put their lives on the line for someone they did not know. I did not feel that such a person deserved to die such a painful death. So, I made a decision. I turned Thomas Luther into one of my kind.
I am quite old, even by the standards of my people. Among my kind, the older one gets, the stronger one gets. When a vampire turns a human into one of our kind, the strength and power of the maker passes onto the fledgling. That's why it is always dangerous when an ancient one such as myself makes a fledgling. Thomas Luther became a vampire. In him, I created a vampire like no other. He was a tall, handsome youth who had a vitality I lacked. He was smart and funny. He was alive in ways I hadn't been in centuries. Thomas Russell is the first vampire whom I sired in ages. He is also the last I made.
An ancient one such as myself is capable of great feats which the others among my kind simply cannot. I possess the physical strength of ten men. I am quite fast, too, when I wish to be. I cannot move as fast as a motor vehicle, obviously but I can run much faster than any athlete who strides in the Olympics. All of my kind possess the ability to regenerate. That's what keeps us young and healthy potentially forever. All of my might I passed onto Thomas Luther. I should have known better than to give such power to such a young one. What I did was the equivalent of handing a very deadly weapon to a potentially unstable child. Yet I did. I should have known better. We'll get to that in a minute. At first, I marveled at my creation. Thomas could do amazing things. Most fledgling vampires aren't much stronger than humans. They possess three times the strength and stamina of an Olympic athlete, that's about it. Thomas was easily five times stronger than the average vampire, and I'm talking about seasoned members of my kind, not the clumsy fledglings I run into sometimes. He was something else, completely out of the ordinary, even back in those days.
I thought I could introduce Thomas to my world. Instead, he introduced me to his. He was fearless. A handsome young man who made the heads of women and men turn everywhere he went. At the time that I met him, Thomas was dating a young woman named Sarah Ellison. She was a schoolteacher at a nearby school.
Thomas introduced me to his lady and I must admit that they made quite a couple. Sarah Ellison was a tall, attractive young woman with long blonde hair and pale green eyes. Thomas himself was tall, broad-shouldered and dark. His eyes were a pale bronze color not unlike mine. His skin was light bronze. He was muscular and athletic-looking. He was simply beautiful to look at. In fact, they both were. Naturally, Thomas kept to himself the secret of his vampirism. I didn't need to instruct him to do this. He naturally sensed that humans wouldn't tolerate our kind if they knew of our existence. He knew something about xenophobia and discrimination. After all, if he didn't, we wouldn't have met.
Thomas was surprising in that we had more in common than I originally thought. I had been a lover to both women and men throughout my existence. Apparently, so was my newest apprentice. His lady, who at first seemed prim and proper was no stranger to the wilder pleasures of the flesh. In fact, one day Thomas and Sarah invited me into their bed. It was an offer I could not decline.
