I Can Has Cheezburger?

Canned laughter blared from the speakers of the massive television.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!

“Tone it down, would you?”

The man in the burgundy pinstripe suit turned away from the sofa as an agitated voice yelled through his phone.

“N-no honey, I wasn’t talking to you! I was talking to our daughter.”

HAHAHAHAHAHA!

He lowered the phone.

“For fuck’s sake, Seline, turn that shit down already!”

The teenage girl with the pink ponytail sank deeper into the cushions and made a show of reaching for the remote.

“Get off my back, Dad…”

She lowered the volume by exactly two notches.

On the screen, a sitcom continued playing.

“What do you mean our new roommate is Pureblood?!” a well-dressed man cried in horror, baring a pair of long white fangs.

The next moment, the door on-screen flew open and a Batfolk man walked in.

Dopey expression. Stained clothes. Slouching posture.

“Whoa! This place is way nicer than my tin shack!”

His long ears twitched, his horseshoe nose sniffing around the mansion.

“Doesn’t smell much better, though.”

He sniffed himself.

“Oh. Never mind. That’s me!”

HAHAHAHAHA.

Seline’s finger pressed the remote.

ZAP.

Behind the sofa, her father was still pacing, arguing into the phone.

“I don’t understand why you have to go on a business trip now, of all times! You know I have an important meeting with the governor tomorrow. I really don’t have time to...”

He fell silent.

“O-of course I take your career seriously, honey!”

He crossed the living room and finally stopped beneath the golden chandelier.

“It’s just…”

The light accentuated the dark circles beneath his ruby-red eyes.

His gaze drifted toward the sofa, his voice dropping.

“I simply don’t have time to look after Seline this week...”

Seline heard him.

“I don’t need anyone looking after me!” she snapped.

The TV had switched to a news broadcast.

A reporter stood in front of a burning street.

“…Thank you, Karen. The situation remains unchanged. The street battles between police and insurgents show no sign of dying down. Blood City is certainly living up to its name, and the governor’s fears that the riots could spread to other cities also appear to be...”

ZAP.

“With the new diet BloodSparkling™, I lost ten pounds and reduced my cholesterol significantly!”

ZAP.

“Van Helsing is too strong, Mimiko! We have to use the power of friendship to...”

ZAP.

“Following a recent series of illegal taps into the city’s blood distribution network, prices per gallon have skyrocketed. Experts attribute the increase not only to the heightened security measures required to protect the pipelines, but also to the continuing decline of the human population.”

The broadcast cut to a man wearing a straw hat, standing in front of a fenced-in field.

Behind him, groups of humans sat in the shade of the trees, staring into space with hollow expressions.

“We free-range producers have no choice,” he explained. “Without government subsidies, we simply can’t afford to keep our prices down.”

He gestured toward a barn, into which shackled humans were being led in small groups.

“Besides, we’ve also had to…”

ZAP. ZAP. ZAP.

A laboratory appeared on the screen.

Sighing, Seline let the remote drop onto the cushion.

A white-haired man stepped up to a microphone while a caption appeared at the bottom of the screen.

Dr. Barenboim - Director, Blood Substitute Research Facility.

“Despite some initial setbacks, the progress we’ve made has been remarkable,” the scientist explained.

The microphone edged closer.

“But what about the high attrition rate among your test subjects, most of whom are Purebloods? Vampire-rights organizations have been fiercely critical of your facility over this.”

Dr. Barenboim gave a contemptuous snort.

“We’re trying to find an alternative means of survival for our entire species! If these… Purebloods can, for once, contribute something to society, then I’d call that an honorable sacrifice.”

Before the reporter could ask his next question, a violent crash erupted from the back of the laboratory.

Dr. Barenboim spun around.

“What the hell is going on back there?”

An assistant rushed over.

“It… it’s one of the test subjects! She’s completely out of control!”

Before the doctor could react, the camera was already swinging toward the commotion.

The shaky image steadied on a door just as something slammed into it from the other side.

“Which subject?”

“Test Subject 049, legal name Roxanne Sonicweaver.” 

Barenboim snatched the clipboard from the assistant.

“Blood-requirement trial…”

BOOM!

The assistant swallowed.

“Her need for blood hasn’t merely disappeared. Her body can’t tolerate it at all anymore!”

He looked toward the door.

“She’s… starving.”

Dr. Barenboim raised an eyebrow.

“Other food?”

The assistant shook his head.

“Apparently she can’t tolerate that either…”

Immediately, the microphone slid back into frame.

“Are these precisely the kinds of failures that have brought your facility under fire, Doctor?”

Dr. Barenboim ground his teeth.

Suddenly, another door flew open and a second scientist burst into the room.

Without a word, he stopped beside the others, reached inside a paper bag, and pulled out something round.

Dr. Barenboim blinked.

“Dr. Helgoland? Is that… a hamburger?”

“Cheeseburger…” his colleague replied curtly.

He yanked open the hatch to the test chamber and tossed the cheeseburger inside.

“I thought she couldn’t tolerate any food?” the reporter pressed.

A satisfied smile flickered across Dr. Helgoland’s face.

“See for yourselves…”

The others exchanged quick glances, then crowded around the small observation window.

Beyond it was a bright, sterile room with an examination table in the center.

Torn blood bags and scraps of food littered the floor.

Amid the mess crouched a figure, hunched over the cheeseburger.

She wore a plain, stained T-shirt and loose sweatpants. Tangled dark burgundy hair fell across her face, two large pointed ears jutting up through it.

Her horseshoe nose sniffed at the food for a moment, drool running from the corners of her mouth.

She sank her fangs straight through the bun.

Seconds later, the burger was gone.

Breathing heavily, tears in her eyes, she stared up at the ceiling and licked her lips.

Then her head snapped toward the observation window.

The men instinctively stepped back.

“But… how?” Dr. Barenboim asked.

Dr. Helgoland grinned with satisfaction.

“I had her bloodwork analyzed again. As it turns out, her metabolism has undergone a complete transformation! Instead of the substances she used to obtain through blood, her body now requires a very specific combination of nutrients!”

“Nutrients?”

Helgoland began counting them off on his fingers.

“Creatine, casein, lactucin, lycopene, cucurbitacins, propanethial-S-oxide, and last but not least: starch!”

Dr. Barenboim’s eyes widened.

“That’s... sensational!”

As the scientists nodded approvingly, the reporter stepped closer.

“What is? Could you explain it again in layman’s terms?”

“There happens to be one common food containing all seven substances in the necessary combination,” Dr. Helgoland explained into the camera.

The reporter blinked.

“Which is?”

“A cheeseburger.”

BOOM.

Roxanne pressed herself against the observation window.

Red eyes glowed behind the glass, ears twitching.

“More…”

She drooled against the pane.

“MORE!!!”

ZAP.

The screen went black.

Seline’s head whipped around.

Her father had returned to his phone call, the remote now in his free hand.

“DAD!!! I was watching that!”

“I told you to turn it down! I’m trying to talk to your mother!”

She shot to her feet and stomped up the mahogany spiral staircase.

“I HATE IT HERE!”

Her voice echoed through the living room, followed by the slam of a door upstairs.

BOOM!

“Did you hear that? Blood City is tearing itself apart, the governor wants answers tomorrow, and I’m supposed to deal with a hormonal teenager at the same time?!”

BRRRRRT! BRRRRRT! BRRRRRRRRRRRRT!

Someone leaned on the doorbell.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake...” He sighed. “We’ll discuss this later. I think my driver is at the door…”

He ran a hand over his dark, slicked-back hair and trudged across the red Persian rug toward the entrance.

BRRRRRRRRRRT!

“All right, all right, I’m coming! Jesus...”

“Mayor Douglas Bloodspinner?” a raspy voice called from behind the door.

He opened it.

Cool evening air washed over him.

“Yes. Are you my…”

A small figure stood in front of him, a dark hood pulled low over their face.

He couldn’t make out their features, but the horseshoe nose and the bulges of their ears beneath the fabric were unmistakable.

“…driver?”

The smell of fryer grease clung to them.

Douglas grimaced.

“A Pureblood? How did you get past the neighborhood checkpoint? You’re not getting money or blood from me, so why don’t you just...”

Several hands grabbed him at once and a sack dropped over his head.

“Wha... ARGHH!”

He kicked and thrashed, but a barrage of punches and kicks quickly put an end to his resistance.

“Get him to the car!”

They hauled him through a cut in the fence toward a waiting vehicle.

“Hurry up before somebody sees us,” the raspy voice shouted.

They forced his wrists behind his back, bound them tightly, and shoved him into the trunk.

After they slammed the trunk shut, his muffled screams vanished beneath the roar of the engine.

“Floor it!”

Tires screeching, the car tore down the avenue, clipped a mailbox, and plowed through someone’s garden fence.

“Drive like a fucking normal person, Jimmy! I thought you Ascendants were supposed to know how to drive?” came a voice from the back seat.

It was another Pureblood girl, her long ears pierced and her bangs hanging almost over her eyes. A nose ring bobbed back and forth with every jolt of the car.

“You got a problem with my driving, huh?!” Jimmy snarled over his shoulder.

CRUNCH.

The car flattened a vampire garden gnome.

Jimmy straightened his shirt with one hand, undid a button, and swept his long hair to one side.

“Heather’s right…” said the figure in the passenger seat. “Don’t drive so fast.”

Jimmy clenched his teeth and forced himself to slow down.

“Shouldn’t we get to the industrial park as fast as possible, Roxy?”

“Vampy Burger,” Roxy replied quietly.

Her hood was still pulled low over her face, her feet propped up on the dashboard.

“Again? But…”

Roxy ripped off her hood and glared at Jimmy with red eyes.

“VAMPY BURGER!”

Jimmy flinched.

She slumped back into her seat, fingers trembling.

“I can feel the deficiency kicking in again…”

“Shit. O-okay, don’t worry, we’ll get you something,” Jimmy said, taking the highway on-ramp.

His gaze kept drifting toward Roxy.

When he saw her trembling fingers, Jimmy reached toward her hand.

But when she glanced at him, he immediately pulled back and cleared his throat.

A faint flush crept into his pale cheeks.

She watched him for another second, a confident grin spreading across her face.

“Cheeseburgers first, Jimmy. Revolution second.”