Jurgen is a monster in many ways. First and foremost he is werewolf, and a particularly brutal vampire hunter whose kills number in the thousands over his two and a half century career. He stands 6’7” tall and his shoulders are almost as wide, not a fat man by any regards, he is a wall of solid muscle adorned with a flaming mane of hair that can only be described as bloodknut ginger, his monstrous size alone makes it no challenge to recognise him as inhuman. He moves with unnerving speed and dexterity for a creature his size, a result of years of training and an improved sense of balance and self awareness.

He stealthily moved across the shadowed alley between two high rise blocks of flats, his sense of smell was almost overwhelmed by the stench of rancid urine that is the trademark of London estates. Nauseating as that particular odour may be it could never mask the most putrefying scent of the tower, the vampire who dwells within. When a vampire fails to feed the very plasma within their veins begins to rot, the very reason they feed upon the blood of the living, to a werewolf this smell is unbearable and enraging which was half the reason Jurgen was in that particularly pungent part of the city he calls home.

He made his way inside the building with no fuss, careful not to be too suspicious; a man of his magnitude wearing such distinct clothes can be remarkably easy to forget with the aid of an angry growl. His battered leather jacket trailed behind him as he moved further up the building, choosing to leap from balcony to balcony rather than use the stairs, that was partially for effect, he knew the story would be in the tabloids in the morning and always liked to leave an interesting tale in his wake.

The stench of decay got stronger as he climbed and eventually it became a sheer wall of fetid odour and it was at this point he knew he was level with his victim. Quietly he sneaked down the corridor, that unnerving dexterity allowing him to move silently despite the raw size of his leather boots, hobnailed as they were. He stopped in his tracks and took a few seconds to analyse the air of the corridor, over the past few days the vampire had not left its apartment and nobody had entered for at least a week. He swore quietly under his breath as the pheromone trail made it increasingly apparent his target was female. Vampiresses always cause trouble. They are blessed with unearthly beauty and charms their male counterparts can only wish for, they’re also just as vicious and manipulative as any male vampire, usually more so. Knowing he could not leave without alerting the vampire to his presence he swore quietly again and readied himself for the attack. Knowing the neighbours would be awoken sooner or later he decided that sooner had a more explosive impact for the headlines.

No headline will ever have quite the explosive impact one of Jurgen’s boots had on the door, it was smashed into smithereens with one strike with an unholy clatter that will have awoken everyone within a thirty or forty feet radius.

“Wakey wakey garlic muncher, doom approaches!”

The girl at the other end of the room was coated in a hail of woodchips which lined her bare arms and face with tiny scratches, her weakness became very apparent when they failed to heal instantly and Jurgen licked his lips relishing the torture to come. She was petit, slim, pale and gorgeous, just as he had expected and he was going to have a lot of fun rending her sexy little body limb from limb. A pathetic squeal was all she could muster before the mammoth form of Jurgen was upon her, one gargantuan hand around her throat and the other delivering a powerful punch to her exposed midriff.

“Take… my life, I…. don’t want… to… be this… anyway” she managed to gasp; Jurgen stopped his second punch in mid flight, confused and slightly disappointed by this target.

“Come on stake and bake, show some backbone or do I have to reach into that well toned body of yours and tear it out? Fight for your life, you’re going to lose it anyway so the least you can do is provide me with some sport” the monstrous lycanthrope growled, in reply the weakened vampiress pathetically clawed at the hand around her throat, when that failed to have any effect she bit down hard on it. Jurgen roared and dropped her. He kicked her as she fell to the floor, the kick struck with such force she was hurled into the wall and laid dazed on the floor.

Jurgen swaggered over, so confident in his impending victory he failed to notice, or perhaps ignored the small blade the vampiress was producing from her corset, he became acutely aware of it when she thrust it deep into his thigh, in reply he lifted her entire body into the air by one leg and smashed her down on the floor hard enough to shatter two floorboards, he pulled the dagger out of his leg and tossed it to one side. He watched the vampire as she pathetically crawled to the couch behind her, he was enjoying her suffering too much to bother finishing her yet, once again he strutted towards her; this time paying attention to her and noticing just how much blood she was losing, he hadn’t even broken her yet and she was already half dead, he was almost upset by this.

She finally managed to pull herself up on the couch, it provided no safety and Jurgen delivered a punishing hammer fist to her lower back just to demonstrate this point, she coughed and weakly spluttered the words “Just… Kill… Me…”

Jurgen was half tempted to comply with her wish, he was half mad with blood lust and very nearly lost himself in the thrill of combat but somewhere deep in the back of his head a stern and commanding voice spoke: “NO!”. He stopped to examine the situation; his foe hadn’t left the apartment or had any human contact in at least a week, meaning she hadn’t fed for as long and the apartment itself bore absolutely no signs of human presence in months, no blood, no lingering scent of death, suddenly it all fell into place and he stopped his onslaught.

“You’re a fucking fledgling aren’t you? Come on, you weren’t even turned a year ago were you? Answer me or I’ll rend you asunder”

“A month” she weakly sighed

“Oh Chrast you’re a fucking baby. How long since you last fed? A week? Two?”

“Two… End me” she coughed fading in and out of consciousness

A sudden wave of conscience passed over Jurgen, a sadistic plan formed in his head, or so he’d like to believe, he would never admit feeling compassion for a garlic muncher. He strode over to the far wall and without a word thrust his hand through it, retracting not only his hand but a rat over a foot long. He took it to the dying girl on the couch and offered it to her.

“It ain’t no olive branch and it sure as hells ain’t human but it’s going to stop you from being dead, eat.”

The vampire managed to shake her head, obviously not a good idea as she went limp afterwards, somehow managing to whisper a defiant “never…”

“Then bleed to death you ungrateful… Chrast you try and do a chick a favour and she’d rather die, at least I know I haven’t lost my charms” He used his thumbnail to puncture the neck of the squirming rat and it flailed for a second before going as limp as the girl. Upon seeing and smelling the fresh blood the vampiress was at the rat sucking madly at the creature draining it in seconds. She slid to the floor holding the rat to her mouth. When she finally cast it’s corpse aside she sat back against the couch letting out a relieved sigh, then she suddenly realised that Jurgen was still very much stood over her and tried to put her arms up to guard against the incoming and enormous hand. Surprisingly when she opened her eyes a second later the hand hadn’t smashed her head into a pulp, it had instead lifted her back onto the couch and the monolithic man it was attached to had sat beside her.

“So let me guess, you met him in a club, he was really hot, you went back to his and woke up in the morgue three days later with a pounding headache and a wicked craving for tomato soup?” Jurgen had put an enormous arm around the tiny girl.

“I was coming home from a party, I was jumped in an alley, I didn’t have a chance to know what was going on before I had become this. I don’t want to be this. Why am I this way?”

“Vampires are cunts basically. Nine out of ten have no idea that they’re going to wake up a member of the garlic lover’s club. That’s the reason I’m here. Your kind is spreading the virus at an alarming rate so my kinsmen and I are doing our part to stem the flow of plague bearers.”

“Virus? But I just bit you, aren’t you infected too now?”

“I’m a lycanthrope; my virus is different to yours, for a start I chose it.”

“You chose to be a lycathrope? What’s that mean?”

“Werewolf to you modern kids, I was made over two centuries ago, I wanted to be strong enough to save someone I loved so I offered myself to the wolf. Didn’t quite work out as planned but I’ve seen some amazing things over the years. You’ll be hanging around for a while yourself so I’d advise you find a new hidey hole, this one ain’t exactly secure anymore, what with someone having kicked your door through.”

“You did that you bastard and what’s with the sudden change? A moment ago I was about to die at your hands and now you’re all fatherly, what’s your damage?” she looked up confused that the raging beast from a moment ago had subsided leaving essentially a huge teddy bear.

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth kiddo; even though you’ve eaten I could still rip you apart. So why is it you hadn’t fed in so long?”

“I don’t want to be this, but after the first week the pain became so intense I could barely move, let alone leave the flat.”

“Yeah that’d be your blood plasma rotting, that’s what your virus does, it gives you enhanced strength, great hair and that damned sexy alabaster skin but it also fucks your immune system. You’re eating yourself slowly and the only way to stop it is to eat someone else basically.”

“I’m not going to. Just kill me now.”

“Don’t be such a fucking drama queen; I’ve just given you a new lease on your hopefully very long life, hunt animals. It’s not as romantic as preying on the denizens of the Soho night scene but it keeps you just as alive and much less in danger.”

“I was a vegetarian before… Danger of what?” she suddenly sat up.

“HIV, drug addiction, making more vampires, monsters like me showing up at the shards that used to be your door. And as for being a veggie that ain’t happening, you have to eat animals and they have to be alive. Might I suggest rats? They’re easy enough to catch and plentiful enough to survive on.”

“There’s got to be a nicer way than that, surely?” she wrinkled her nose and poked out her tongue at the suggestion that she should live on a pest species.

“I go hunting once a month a little bit north of here; I pay a farmer a few grand for one of his cows and indulge my animal. Of course I have much more control over my beasts than you will for a long time.”

“Can’t I just find and kill the guy who turned me? Doesn’t that make me revert like in the films?”

“Wake up kiddo you’re suffering from an infection not a semi religious curse. You’re a carrier now, no way back, believe me,” he turned away “I tried” he mumbled under his breath.

“What do you mean you tried?” she was now sat very attentively and had become quite comfortable snuggled under Jurgen’s enormous arm.

“Never mind. I’ve not told my closest kinsmen, why would I tell some fledgling bat shitter whose name I don’t even know?” he turned to face her; his voice had a growling edge to it.

“Well my name is Liz and I’m probably cuter than they are. That’s why” she puffed out her chest to emphasise her feminine charms

“I’ll admit you’re certainly more attractive than most of my brothers and once you stop being half dead you’re not half bad. That is all beside the point. You do look a lot like she did though…” his voice trailed off as once again he turned away

“Don’t…” Liz stopped in mid plead when she noticed the same sound Jurgen just did, sirens, distant but getting closer, police most likely come to investigate the fight, she did not want to be present when they arrived to see the place looking like Baghdad and a girl who died over a month ago sat it the middle of it.

“We’re leaving, follow me if you wish or fuck off if you don’t” Jurgen growled and leapt to his feet, he was in mid sprint when his feet hit the ground and out of the door a second later

“You aren’t getting away that easy, you owe me a heartfelt story of woe and ouch!” she screamed as she ran into his fist.

“Don’t push it” Jurgen snarled.

The two figures left in much the same way Jurgen had arrived, leaping balcony to balcony in an elegant display of inhuman acrobatics as the monstrous beast was followed by his puny new shadow, when they reach the floor they disappear into the shadows of the night, the police would be unaware of their presence except for the reluctance of the sniffer dogs to enter the vicinity of the flat.