On the night Steven Jameson became a vampire, he was lurking inside a dark corner of Church Street Station, desperately seeking someone to rob.

Even though it was a Saturday night in July, it might as well have been a Monday or a Wednesday as far as Steven was concerned. Other twenty-five year olds might spend their Saturdays and Sundays grilling burgers or drinking beer on the beach, but Steven spent his getting the money he needed to feed his arm. It was his unfortunate truth that junkies don't get weekends off.

Thirty years ago the shops and restaurants of Church Street Station were a major Orlando tourist attraction, but the arrival of newer venues such as Downtown Disney and Citywalk had rendered them unfashionable and low rent. The only tourists who came there today were those who either didn't have enough cash for the finer spots or didn't know any better. The place was decrepit, the current owners did little in the way of providing security, and the police had better things to do. This made it the ideal place for Steven to find a victim.

It had been eight hours since Steven's last fix, and beads of cold sweat that had nothing to do with the heat or humidity were just beginning to dot his brow. His pale skin clashed with the dirty, disheveled jet-black hair that clung to his bony shoulders. He felt no pain just yet, but knew that he would soon find himself deep in the throes of withdrawals, a condition that must be avoided at all costs.

It didn't take long for Steven to find what he was looking for. Across the street, a middle-aged couple stood arguing outside a tavern that looked like its last renovation had occurred sometime during the first Bush administration. The man was short, bald, and morbidly obese. He wore khaki shorts, Jesus sandals, and a gaudy red and white Hawaiian shirt. The unlit cigar in his mouth was so long and thick that Freud could have written about it for years. His wife was a tall, thin woman who wore a white sundress that clashed with the blaring sunburn that covered her from head to toe. The two of them were Jack Sprat and his wife, only in reverse.

The couple stood in front of the tavern, arguing in an accent that came straight out of New Jersey (or somewhere just as deplorable). "Don't blame me, Ralph," the woman whined. "This place is your fault. It's always your fault."

Watching them, Steven got the idea that even if a mad suicide bomber appeared out of nowhere and blew everyone in the place to hell and back, the woman's last thought would be that somehow it had been Ralph's fault.

"We get two weeks out of the year to take a vacation," she complained. "Two weeks, that's all, and you make the brilliant decision to bring us to this dump. I want to go to Disney, Ralph. Take me to Disney!"

The look Ralph gave his wife suggested that what he wanted to do more than anything else was drive her to Lake Jessup and feed her to the alligators, but he said nothing. Ralph looked like the longsuffering type, if nothing else, and Steven supposed the poor bastard had figured out a long time ago that married life would be much more tolerable if he simply held his tongue.

Steven continued to watch them, and soon things started to look up. Ralph lifted his shirt to scratch his considerable gut, and when he did, a bulging money belt came into view. Steven's eyes locked onto it like heat-seeking missiles, and he reached into his pocket to make sure the switchblade he carried for just such occasions was there. He took out the knife and was just getting ready to pounce when he caught sight of a much more promising prize. It was Mandy Peterson.

Mandy wasn't exactly someone that Steven would call a friend, but he did hang out with her from time to time, when it was beneficial. A couple of weeks ago she had shown up at the abandoned house he called home, dope-sick as hell, and hurting bad. Steven had split a shot with her, but not out of any sense of pity, benevolence, or all-around goodwill. Such concepts are absent from the junkie world.

The real reason Steven had shared his dope with Mandy, the only reason, was because she had agreed to give him head before she shot up. Junkie or not, Mandy could suck a mean dick, and she had performed this particular blowjob with a relentless fervor, knowing that once she'd finished she would get her own reward, one that came from a dirty needle instead of a cock.

Steven vacillated between Mandy and the tourist couple. What if Mandy wasn't holding? He felt sure the fat man and his shrew of a wife had plenty of cash on hand, but it would take time to convert it to dope, and he was feeling sicker by the minute. Still, if he let them get away and it turned out that Mandy didn't have anything, he would really be fucked.

Steven thought some more and was about to abandon Mandy for the tourists when her eyes met his. As soon as they did, she turned and started running away as fast as her skinny legs would carry her. Steven knew then without a doubt that she had something on her, because if she hadn't, she most certainly would have bum rushed him looking for a fix. He changed his mind one last time and took off after Mandy. There would always be a few unsuspecting tourists walking around Church Street on a Saturday night. He could rob one of them after he had gotten high.

That particular evening there wasn't much of a crowd, so it didn't take long for Steven to close the distance between Mandy and himself. She cast frightened glances back at him as she ran, like a slasher movie heroine fleeing Freddy or Jason. Steven got to within an arm's length and raised his hand to grab her, but stopped short when he felt someone lay hands on him instead.

Oh, shit, he thought. Five-O! Thank God I don't have anything on me.

"Hey, man!" Steven said, his voice filled with righteous indignation. He turned, and fully expected to see a cop, but instead came face to face with the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

She stood almost an inch taller than Steven's five feet eleven, yet couldn't have weighed more than a hundred pounds. Her facial features were striking: high, prominent cheekbones, a thin unassuming nose, and tiny dimples that bookended full, pouting Angelina Jolie lips. Long, snow-white hair hung in loose curls along her shoulders and blended seamlessly with the color of her eyes, a sharp shade of blue that resembled icicles drenched in Aqua Velva. All in all, the woman standing before Steven was nothing less than a Norse goddess.

She also had an air about her which was more than a little bit unsettling. Steven gazed into her eyes and felt a strong, undefined power enter him and drill all the way down into his soul. He trembled as he stood before her, inherently understanding that as stunning as the woman might be, she was also someone to be feared. Still, he somehow managed to muster enough courage to speak.

"Look, bitch, get your hands off me," Steven started to say, but only got as far as "Look, biii" because she cut his words off at the quick by lifting him a foot off the ground with one hand. Steven thrashed with the manic resistance of a cat being forced into a bathtub full of water, but his efforts ceased once she tightened her grip on his throat and he could no longer breathe.

Steven looked again into the woman's eyes. If he had been able to scream, he would have. Her icy-blue irises were still there, but now they were joined by dark red and black specks. Steven stood...