Before she could respond, an alarm jingled on Nellie’s phone. The ringtone was retro 8-bit style, and the phone she produced was an early 2000s flip phone. Nellie frowned at it.
“That’s time, unfortunately.”
As she spoke, a shadow darkened theStreet Fightermachine and footsteps slowed to a stop a few feet away. Sensing someone’s eyes on him, Brennan turned around.
Dom leaned against a pinball machine across the aisle, most of her hair chopped off into an uneven chin-length cut. Her nails were chipped black and she wore a black hoodie, black jeans, and a beat-up pair of combat boots. She was either in mourning or embracing a Goth aesthetic that didn’t totally fit her.
She offered a nod in greeting, but eyed Brennan warily.
“Dominique! Right on time,” Nellie said asStreet Fighterturned toGAME OVER, and crossed to stand next to Dom, putting a hand on her back. Dom stiffened.
“I said I’d be,” Dom mumbled, studying her fingernails with interest.
“Dom has a one-on-one with me next, so I figured you could hang out for a bit and we could do some group bonding after!”
“Are you serious?” Brennan said. “After everything we just talked about?”
“Yeah, no,” Dom said dryly. “I prefer not to hang out with judgmental assholes.”
“You guys!” Nellie scolded. “We are a clan and we have to sticktogether. If we don’t have each other’s backs, we have nothing. It’s important to set aside our differences and come together. Do you think you can do that?”
Brennan’s eyes bounced between Dom and Nellie. Dom was getting ambushed with this too, judging by her clear discomfort.
“Right,” Brennan said. “Sounds… great.”
He lingered for a second more before nodding an uncertain goodbye and beelining over to Sunny, her fingers still flying over the keyboard with a rhythmic clacking. Brennan pulled out the chair opposite her, and it scraped loudly against the linoleum floor of the cafeteria. He collapsed into the seat and watched Sunny work for a minute.
“What exactly do you do?” Brennan asked.
Sunny didn’t look up, and her typing didn’t waver.
“Instagram, mostly,” she said. “But I dabble in TikTok. Selfies, makeup, fashion, sometimes food—”
“I mean, for the”—he glanced around and dropped his voice, despite him and Sunny being the only people in the cafeteria section—“vampires.”
Sunny rolled her eyes. “Security.”
“What does thatmean,though?”
Sunny stopped typing and turned her attention to Brennan with an exasperated sigh.
“Someone finds out about vampires and tries to plan an attack,” Sunny said, raising her left hand, her pink shimmery polish catching the light. She brought up her right hand as if balancing options on each side, and said, “Security.” She lifted her left hand again. “Someone sees something suspicious and posts on a Reddit forum.” Her right hand went up. “Security. A wannabe investigator thinks they’re on the verge of breaking a big story. Security. A vampire acts against clan law and needs to be put in their place. Security. Make sense?”
She returned her attention to her laptop.
“So you, what, kill them?” He remembered what Nellie had said about powers and added, “Or wipe their memories?”
“I take care of it.”
“Okaaaay.” Then, “You have powers?”
“Yes.”
“Which means you’ve killed people. Or turned them, I guess.”
“Yes.”
“And now you’re leading the clan.”
