The stopwatch pinged in the office, loud like a siren.

Quinn leaped up, jamming his knee into his desk. Pain burst through his leg. He swore and silenced the alarm, hobbling out of his office into the lab. About time, he thought, peering into the hot water bath. Please be a success.

In the bath, ten test tubes sat in two rows, each holding exactly 5 ML of rusty-brown fluid. They looked normal. Full of potential.

Through two decades of research, Quinn had never found a real substitute for human blood. There was always something missing—pig’s liver barely lent him energy, animal blood lacked the right T-cells, and synthetic blood lacked everything.

He had used an expensive silk matrix to synthesize this new batch—he’d implanted bone marrow cells into the sponge-like structure, hoping for them to begin synthesizing white blood cells. If they did, he would have the last component he needed in his artificial blood.

With trembling hands, Quinn pulled out the first tube, uncorking it. The synthesized blood smelled like chemicals and a bit of iron. If it worked... Quinn would never have to drink animal or human blood again. His stomach flipped.

He tipped the blood past his lips, wincing at its mud-like taste. Then he waited.

For ten minutes, nothing happened. He set the test tube down in a plastic rack, returning to his desk. There, he sat for another ten minutes.

The blood settled into his stomach, percolating into his body. Instead of a powerful wave of healing, the energy whispered through his veins like a breeze. Enough for him to walk ten yards. That was it.

He decided to wait another five minutes, but his gut told him what he already knew—it wasn’t working.

For a moment, Quinn didn’t move, his thoughts churning. If he could find no alternative to human blood, then he’d be weak forever, hunting down raw liver in the grocery stores. It would still be month after month of bland pate, or coagulated pig’s blood. He hated animal blood. Hated that he was a vampire at all.

Quinn stalked back to the water bath, pulling out another test tube. He tipped that into his mouth, too, then waited.

Ten minutes. Still nothing. It really is another failure.

Twenty years, and he still couldn’t find a proper substitute for human blood.

On impulse, he emptied the rest of the test tubes into the sink. Then he trudged back to his desk, slumping into his chair.

That silk matrix had cost three thousand dollars—expensive for three sets of experiments. He was glad that he did the accounting for the lab. If he didn’t, well. Someone would ask what these experiments were for. The college didn’t know a vampire taught its students.

Quinn tipped his head back, pushing all his thoughts away. Hunger gnawed in his stomach. The clock read 3:28 AM. The nearest store selling liver opened at 8, and... he had no desire to walk there right now. If only he weren’t a vampire!

He looked at the stacks of printed papers on his desk. Journals, lab findings, expenditure reports. Then he looked at the portraits of past students on his walls, and the rock collection that sat on his shelf.

All he had to do was hide away in his lab. The other professors would forget what he looked like, and he’d pretend his pale skin and auburn hair were all part of an intense beauty regimen.

His phone rang.

Quinn glanced at the name on the screen, sighing. There’s someone else who doesn’t drink. At least, he didn’t use to.

“Seb?” he asked, pressing the phone to his ear.

“Hey.” Seb’s voice was tinny over the line. “Need a favor.”

“You don’t have time for idle conversation, do you?”

Seb laughed. “How’s the research going?”

Quinn winced. He didn’t need a reminder—as though he didn’t already hate himself. “Remarkably bad. At least, for my own purposes. The rest of the Blood Synthesis team is doing well. My students don’t know how little I actually contribute to this field.”

“Good for you. Look, can we come over?”

“‘We’?” Quinn frowned. Seb had mentioned moving to Cambria, a tiny town an hour away from Quinn’s San Luis Obispo college. Two years ago, Seb had been involved in a disaster with the coven and feds—no one Quinn wanted to associate with. “You’re bringing your human along?”

“Yeah. I need you to look at his blood.”

“Call me tomorrow,” Quinn said, rubbing his eyes. He was happy here, in his college with his research students. No one knew who he really was. No one cared, and everything was good. If Seb brought his human here... It carried a risk. The feds could track them somehow. “I don’t want to be dragged into this.”

“C’mon, I need this favor,” Seb said.

A century ago, in a dusty saloon bar out in the Midwest, Seb had propped his feet on a table and declared I’ll never have a bonded human prey. Quinn had laughed, thinking he’d have Seb to commiserate with as they whiled away the centuries.

Now, Seb had a human he wanted to drink from. Quinn still didn’t. It felt like Seb had left their friendship behind, chasing the blood of a human. It was why Quinn never paid Seb a visit, despite Seb moving to Cambria.

“I can’t drink his blood without a guilty conscience,” Seb said. “I don’t want to kill him.”

Quinn hesitated. He understood that feeling too well.

“You know I don’t deal with human blood,” Quinn said. But he remembered the rich warmth of fresh blood, the coppery weight of it on his tongue. He gulped. That blood came with a cost. “You’re asking a big favor. Your bonded human will endanger me.”

Across the line, Seb sighed. “I’m tired of the risk myself. You’re doing the blood research, Quinn. If anyone can find a solution, it’s you.”

Quinn wavered. He thought about the empty test tubes in the racks, the stacks of expenditure reports he had to approve. He had the knowledge and equipment to begin a small experiment. “How will I benefit from this?”

“I owe you a favor, any sort. You name it.”

Quinn didn’t need money—he had plenty. He didn’t need a prey, didn’t need servants. But a friend’s favor could come in handy; drinking animal blood had made Quinn weak. “Fine,” he said. “Only because you’re a friend, Seb.”

“Thanks,” Seb said, relief heavy in his voice.

“Don’t thank me until we’ve got viable results,” Quinn said. It came out more bitter than he intended.

“Either way.”

“Come over in two days. I don’t have classes then.” Quinn reached for the contact lens holder on his desk. Inside, two black, concave discs sat in saline water. Quinn poked at the lenses with his fingertip, watching as they slid around underwater. Maybe it was time he changed these. He’d been wearing them two months.

“Will do. Thanks,” Seb said. The line cut off.

In the office, the remaining silence rang hollow. Quinn glanced at the expenditure reports, then at the empty space around him. What kind of blood bond did Seb have, that would make him reach out to another vampire? How important was this human to him, that he would leave his home, move across the country?

Quinn didn’t have anyone that important. What would it be like, allowing a human that close? To have someone know he was a vampire, and not hate him? He shook his head, setting the contact lens holder down.

If he were to drink from a human... Quinn swallowed. It would be warm and life-giving, filling him with energy. It would gush onto his parched tongue like dewdrops, chasing away his thirst. He shivered, licked his lips.

Two centuries ago, he’d gulped down blood, drunken his fill of it. He hadn’t been able to control himself.

When he’d pulled away from that soft neck, he’d found his sister dead in his arms, her face drained of blood.

Quinn whimpered, twisting his fingers in his hair so hard it hurt. Stop thinking about it. It doesn’t change anything. But the thoughts clamored and swirled in his head, insidious whispers that told him he should die.

With his shoes still on, Quinn curled into a ball in his seat, waiting for the guilt to go away.

It never did.