Me and Emma walked towards one of the corners of the soccer field, so we could hold our competition diagonally across it.

“Want to use some starting blocks?” She asked me, motioning towards the athletics storeroom that was conveniently right next to where we were standing.

“Hmm, I don’t need them but we might as well do it properly.”

Emma nodded and hauled a couple out of the storage area, placing them at our starting point. “You ready?” She took the left lane and showed me her phone.

“Mhmm, let’s do it.”

“Allright, I’ll put my stopwatch on a timer, it’ll count down the last 10 seconds. We go on zero.”

I simply nodded and got into my starting blocks too.

Emma entered in the commands on her phone, put her phone next to us and quickly got into position.

-I did promise to give it my all, didn’t I?-

So I took a deep breath and started concentrating. After ten seconds my senses were getting completely primed like the meditative state from earlier today. However, I could feel this situation was completely different as my heart rate dropped like a brick and I felt power surging through my entire body. Simply said, I felt incredibly powerful. And to be completely honest, it also felt incredibly intoxicating.

-Is this how it feels to feel utterly indestructible? Because I could definitely get used to this.-

The stopwatch on Emma’s phone finally started its countdown.

“10.”

“9.”

“8.”

“7.”

“6.”

“5.”

“4.”

I took one final breath.

“3.”

“2.”

“1.”

Emma looked so concentrated when I glanced to my left in the final second.

“I’m sorry Em,” I thought to myself while seeing the look on her face.

“0.”

“But there’s no way in hell you are going to beat me.”

I immediately shot out of the starting blocks and raced towards the imaginary finish line on the opposite end of the field. The air flowed around me while it tried to slow my advance but I just cut through it like a knife through butter. Well... more like an icebreaker through ice because it was more brute force than anything else, but hey.

I neared the finish line with such an immense speed that I had to brake hard the last ten meters, otherwise I’d have gone straight through the wall. Luckily my shoes didn’t leave any noticeable marks behind me. As for Emma... she was only a quarter of the way across the field, looking absolutely stunned by what she just saw. Nonetheless she kept running and reached me shortly after.

“Holy Mother...Auro…” Emma panted while clamping to my shoulder. “Couldn’t you have shown me a little bit of mercy…”

“You told me to give it my all… So I did…”

“That I did… That I did…” She went through her knees but luckily I managed to catch her before she could hit the ground.

“Em, are you okay!?” I put her arm around my shoulder.

“I-I just need to rest for a second…”

“Alright…” I lowered myself and her against the wall, making sure she was leaning on me so she didn’t fall to the floor.

“When you said you thought you had superhuman strength, I didn’t think it would be this bad...you just completely left me in the dust...” She put her head on my shoulder. “Oh shit, d-do you mind?” She quickly took her head off again.

“No, go ahead.” I shook my head and smiled gently at her.

“O-okay…” Em blushed and hesitantly put her head back on my shoulder.

“But I know what you mean… I didn’t expect to be this fast… or feel this powerful either.” I looked down at my hands, opening and closing them a couple of times. My power had largely dissipated already but I still felt like I could easily knock down a wall or two.

“Becoming a vampire is quite something, isn’t it?”

“Mhmm. I don’t think I would recommend it though. Having to drink blood, or even worse, milk, isn’t what I would call a positive turn of events.”

“Fair enough.” Emma giggled softly.

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I let Emma rest on my shoulder for around 5-minutes before a metallic clang from the hallway pulled my attention.

“You heard it too?” Emma looks up to me.

“Yeah. What do you think it was? It sounded metallic to me.”

“I think I have an idea.” She used my shoulder to get herself up and offered me her hand. “Let’s go check it out.” Em bravely stated.

I nodded and pulled myself up on her. “Just let me go first, okay?”

“Obviously, you are the superpowered human.”

“Wait, are vampires human or are we something else?”

“I don’t know, but let’s hold that philosophical discussion at some other time, maybe?” She looked a bit baffled at my question, motioning me forward towards the hallway.

“Yeeeeaaah, you’re right.”

Emma shook her head when I passed her. “Unbelievable.”

We arrived at the hallway and I peeked around the corner to see if anyone was there, but it was just as deserted as when we first got here.

“Looks clear.” I whispered.

Emma peeked her head around the corner too, before walking straight out of cover towards a couple of metal clothing racks, and crouched down next to them.

“You think this is what made the noise?” I followed her.

“I don’t think so, I know so.” She pointed at the markers on the floor. “When we passed these on our way in, they were all well inside of the markers. But now…” The first clothing rack’s wheels had rolled over the line.

“Are you sure?”

“100%, I always look at these when I pass them. It’s a bit of a… habit. I even tend to move them if they aren’t within the lines.”

“Fair enough. Do you think it was the wind?”

“What wind?” She laughed but immediately got serious again. “Nah, it had to be someone. Maybe someone was watching us and accidentally ran into it when they left.”

I put my hands on the rack and moved it a bit. It was definitely too heavy to be moved with a light touch. “That would be bad…”

“Especially if they saw our race.”

“Mhmm.” I nodded. “But you know what I think is strange? I didn’t hear anything at all until the clang...Surely I should’ve heard someone’s footsteps, this hallway isn’t particularly quiet to walk through.” I tapped my foot twice on the stone floor, having it almost echo through the entire hall.

“That’s some serious ninja business.” Emma stood up again.

“Yeah… Em, is there something else you wanted to test? Because I think it’s best to call it now. Since I really don’t want you to get hurt.”

Emma blushed when I made that comment. “I-I kinda wanted to test your physical strength too, but you’re probably right... I just wonder though, why aren’t you going to chase after the person?”

“I could, but for starters, I don’t know where they went, and I’m not just going to chase after someone or something, hoping they make a sound. Secondly, do we even know it was a mistake? What if they tried to lure me away from you, Em? I just can’t risk it. The safest option is me staying with you.”

Em’s blush had deepened even more. “T-thank you for thinking about me.”

“You are my best friend. I wouldn’t forgive myself if anything happened to you..”

“O-oh yeah, of course..” She gave me a quick hug although her voice betrayed a hint of sadness.

We go back into the sports hall and check if we didn’t leave anything behind.

“How did you want to test my strength anyway? Have a wrestling competition?” I winked at her.

She looked at me for a second before she started blushing again. “A-ah, n-no... We have weights...”

“We can do that another time then.”

“Mhmm.” She nodded, and headed towards the door. “I think we’ve got everything.”

“Ok, I’m right behind ya.”

Leaving the sport’s hall behind us we headed back to the locker room, while I kept an eye out for whoever was spying on us. Without success, the building seemed completely empty, but I wasn’t going to let my guard down just because it looked like it.

When we entered the locker room I locked it behind us and put myself in front of the door while dressing back up again.

-If someone wants to come through this door, they’ll have to go through me first.-

Unlike earlier today, we didn’t really speak much while getting dressed, although I did catch her taking a glance at me a couple of times.

“Did you message your driver yet?”

“Not yet, I was going to do so after I got dressed…” She started buttoning up her shirt, covering her well-toned upper body.

“Alright, I’ll stay with you until they arrive.”

Emma simply nodded.

The both of us finished dressing at around the same time, after making sure we didn’t forget anything we left and headed towards the main entrance. Emma shut off the lights as we exited and closed up the building behind us. The sun had already set as the pathways were now only lit up by art deco street lamps. Luckily for us the rain had stopped too so we didn’t have to wait in the rain although it clearly had cooled down considerably as well, a gust of cold wind sent chills through me when it brushed past my legs.

-I should really, really, really invest in those woolen tights-

“I had no clue we were in there for so long.” Emma commented, unfazed by the cold, while looking at the night sky, puffs of fog rising up from her mouth with every breath.

I took out my phone and looked at the time. “21:15… Holy hells, did we enter a time anomaly or something when we went inside?”

“Quite possible… nothing surprises me around you anymore.” Emma sighed.

“Hey, that’s mean.”

She laughed and started walking towards the school’s exit. “You comin’?”

“Yeah.”

Walking through the school grounds at night did have a certain romantic feel to it - the only thing missing to make the scene absolutely perfect was snow. Although that’s more of a personal preference than anything else.

I looked to my right at Emma, which she almost immediately noticed.

“Is something wrong?” She looked back at me.

“Nah, I was just thinking. Don’t you think this scene is kinda romantic?”

“I-I…guess…” Emma blushed a little and looked around. “I think I would prefer a medieval city center over the school grounds though…”

“Mhmm, good point.” I agreed and pictured the both of us walking through the streets of Vienna on a snowy evening, holding hands and…

It was my turn to start blushing now.

-Where did that thought come from?-

“Auro?” Emma’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts as we’d reached the front gate, her driver was already waiting on her.

“Ah. Sorry, was thinking about something…”

“Riiight…” She squinted her eyes. “Anyway, see you tomorrow?”

“Mhmm. Of course.” I nodded as we gave each other a big hug.

“Try to not get yourself in even more paranormal shit, ok?”

“I’ll try.” We both laughed and I let go of Emma.

“See ya.” She entered the car and waved me goodbye.

The driver saluted me and with that they were off.

-What was that salute for?-

I shrugged it off and started walking home, my cheeks still heated with thoughts of that snowy Viennese street...