He dreamed of his father that morning. That was strange for him because he had not thought about him for several years. He was walking towards him, a menacing glint in his eyes, and then he grabbed his arm tightly, pulling him to his knees.

"Drink," he ordered as he pointed to the woman on the floor. "Drink, you son of the devil!" He squeezed his arm tighter.

"F-father..." he stuttered out.

"DRINK!" he screamed at him. The dreamer tried to recoil away from him, but his father pulled him back. "It's what you've become, isn't it? DO IT!" He twisted his arm back and shoved him to the floor. The dreamer cried out and tried to struggle free.

"Do it," a different voice whispered in his ear. It froze his blood with fear. "That is vhy I made you..." He felt a hand creeping up the back of his shoulder and brushing over his neck. His arm twisted tighter and broke, making him scream with pain. The hand slithered down his chest and under his shirt. The dreamer shut his eyes tight and...

Woke up.

Aristaes' head knocked against the lid of his iron coffin. He cursed out loud and slowly brought one of his hands to the aching spot on his forehead.

It was still early outside the coffin, the most dangerous time for Aris to be outside. He groaned and dropped his hand. This was not the first time Aristaes had been awakened by bad dreams.

He rested his head back on the coffin and sighed. Most times he had trouble getting back to sleep and so he would go out for an early hunt. But the sun was high – impossible. He felt his eyelids drooping anyway...

But they shot open when he felt the lid move. Panic shot through his dead veins before fury kicked in.

Suddenly, the lid was thrown off. Aris cringed at the expected sunlight, but there was none. Instead, a stake flew down and stabbed Aris right through his sternum. A jolt of electricity shot through his nerves.

After he was done screaming and twitching, Aris tried to look at whatever it was that was attacking him. A young human of about 20 plus years was standing above him with the most interesting grin plastered to his face. Blood was splattered all over his face and arm – the arm that still held the stake inside Aris' chest. Aris groaned and his eyes teared over from the intense pain.

"Oh! I've caught you!" the human squealed gleefully.

"W-what?" Aris stuttered.

"I wasn't sure this invention of mine would work, but it did! Look at you! You can't move!"

"I can – AUGHHH!" As Aris tried to move, another jolt of electricity went through his body.

"Now we'll have none of that. I really don’t want to shock you again. Must keep you in top notch condition."

"THIS is keeping me in top notch condition?" Aris winced.

"THIS was necessary. How else was I supposed to capture you?" he said seriously.

Aris groaned and tried to sit up, but he was shocked again.

"Stop that," the human ordered. "I told you I didn't want to do that again."

Aris coughed and decided not to try again.

"That's better. What's your name?"

Aris glared at him in response. The human dug the stake deeper into his chest and Aris screamed in pain.

"What's your name?" he repeated.

"A-Aristaes..." he gasped out. He could smell his blood seeping out of the wound and it made his fangs lengthen.

"Aristaes...nice...would you look at those beauties?" The human seemed to be talking to himself as he leaned over Aris' flushed face, still keeping a firm hold on the stake. He reached out to touch the shiny, wet fangs, but Aristaes quickly leaned up and bit at his finger. The human recoiled and, with a sneer, drove the stake all the way through him. Aris' screams echoed inside the tiny mausoleum.

"What did I tell you?" the human said angrily. "Don't move or lash out at me unless I tell you to."

Aris' chest heaved as he rested his head back down, tears of pain streaming down the side of his face.

"I don't see how you could be making such a big deal out of this. You've had worse, haven't you?"

Aris turned his head to the side, feeling a thin layer of sweat forming over his skin. It hurt too much to answer.

"Ah, well. You will go through worse, eventually. I'll make sure of that. Come on." The human indicated that he wanted Aris to sit up. He let go of the stake, but didn't really because there was a chain attached to it that he still grasped, and tugged on it lightly. "Haven't got all morning, let's go."

Aris did his best to breathe normally as his shaking hands gripped the sides of the coffin. He grunted as he slowly sat up and then cried out as he felt the stake move deeper into him, poking out of his back. The smell of his own blood was intoxicating. He reached behind himself to feel the stake jutting out of his skin. It moved again and a kind of hook dug into his back so that it was impossible for it to be pulled out again unless it tore a hole in him.

"Come ON!" the human yelled at him as he tugged harshly on the chain. Aris grunted as he was pulled out of the coffin and dragged on the floor. A trail of blood ran from the coffin to where he was now sprawled out, coughing. "Don't make me drag you out in the sun, Aristaes. Get up." Aris' arms shook as he tried to get to his feet, but his hands and knees kept slipping on his spilled blood. The human finally got impatient and tugged once more roughly on the chain while grabbing him by the scruff of his shirt. Aris would've fought back, but exhaustion, pain, and loss of blood were the dominant feelings over pride right now.

"This way." The human practically dragged him out of the mausoleum. Aris noticed on the way that the windows of the place had been covered by some dark tarp to keep out the expected light. He cringed again when the human opened the mausoleum, but there was still no light. The human had obviously thought ahead and set up a kind of shield against the morning light. Aris groaned and tried again to get to his feet.

"Here. Get in." The human nodded to the empty space before them – the back of a truck. Aris paused, but when the human looked like he was about to shock him again, he stumbled forward.

"That's much better." The man grinned as he kicked Aris from behind. The vampire's head slammed into the wall of the truck and he fell on his back, groaning from the new injury. The human stepped up to him and sat on his waist. Aris squirmed and tried to shove him off with his hands, but the human sent a larger shock than before through his body. Aris screamed with agony and felt his back arch against the human.

"Behave," he ordered. Before he knew it, the human had clamped an iron shackle around Aris' neck. Aris screamed louder as he felt his skin burning from under the metal.

"Hmm...it's effective. That's good," the human said calmly. "Now, I'll need you to be quiet as I pack this stuff up, or else I'll make this much worse and neither of us wants that." Aris managed to muffle his cries by biting on his hand. "That's better." The human stood up and left Aris alone in the back of the truck.

Aristaes bit harder into his hand, making it bleed, but it didn't suppress the strangled moans. He turned onto his side, but it was difficult to move again, as everything...everything hurt.

He wasn't left alone for long. The human returned with an armful of folded tarp which he tossed aside. "Oh, I forgot about that," he mused as he saw Aris biting his hand. It was easy for him to fix that – in a matter of minutes, his arms were tied tightly behind his back. He involuntarily tried to free his wrists and coughed several times.

"You are such a drama queen, aren't you?" the human mused. "If you really can't handle this, I wonder if I should've tried to capture you at all." He reached down and moved the collar in the slightest to expose the badly burned skin on Aris' neck. "Hmm...we'll have to see, won't we?" He grinned and walked back out of the truck, intending to gather up the rest of his trap.

Aris rested the side of his face on the cool floor, his hair a dirty mess and getting in his eyes. He was surprised that the collar hadn't decapitated him yet. His fingers tightened into fists, but the rest of his body relaxed. He could still feel the burn of the metal around his neck and the inch wide stake through his chest. But what bothered him most was that he could not move his hands. He still vainly tried to release them, the cords digging into his flesh. In a few minutes, he was aware of the pool of blood that was forming around his body. He leaned his face over as best he could and tried to lap up whatever was within reach of his mouth. It was the only relief he would get for the time being.

TBC