A/N: I was looking through some old files on my computer and came across this. I wrote it a few years ago as a thought experiment - a 'what if?' type scenario - not actually with the intention of ever posting it. I haven't been writing much (well, writing my dissertation... not fiction), and so as a compromise to myself, I decided to edit and post this instead. Quite different from my usual stuff. In pacing. Format. Writing style. Sookie is a little different thanks to her circumstances. Eric is the same. 8, maybe 9, chapters (scenes) in total.

FULL DISCLOSURE: This is a bit of a franken-fic (frankenstein-fic?) in that the first 8 chapters have a very different mood and pacing compared to the ones that follow it. The story still follows the course that I feel is natural for these characters in this world, but you will see where the old writing ends and the new begins (hence the frankenstein feel - two different styles of writing sewed together into one story.)

I.

Footfalls echoed down the corridor. I blinked into the dark, watching as the motion-detecting fluorescents flickered and buzzed to life further down the hall. The shaft of light traveled down the hallway, increasing in brightness as the footsteps drew closer and more banks of lights were triggered into turning on.

They were so bright I often wondered if it were on purpose. Another form of torture for the prisoners here. The ultra-sensitive vampire eyesight would become so accustomed to the continual dark only to be blinded by the light when their guards drew close. Except tonight, there were too many sets of feet to only be guards. Four, no, five people. Two distinct sets of high heels pecked out a staccato rhythm against the floor. One set of heels clicked against the damp concrete floors, the other clacked. Following behind them, three other pairs of feet. One set of boots. Two sets of dress shoes. All keeping time like off-kilter bass drums. All vampires.

But that I could tell without hearing.

The bright lights outside my cell burst to life, and I shrank back against the concrete wall beside my cot. I should've closed my eyes, should've pretended to be asleep. I couldn't. Number one, because it was futile, any vampire worth a lick would hear the pattering crescendo of my heartbeat and know without even glancing at me that I was awake; and two, I was incurably curious. Life was boring. Dead boring down in the trenches. It was a sad fact of my life that watching people walk past my cell, an act that took mere seconds, was the highlight of my day. Or night, as it were.

One of the booted-bass drums was a vampire guard I knew, Omar, a honey-skinned Brazilian. He was accompanied by a lithe brunette vampire in the clicking heels, and two other blonde vampires - one male and tall, the other petite and female (she clacked). Trailing behind all four was Andre, Sophie's favored child. The troupe ignored me as they strode past, though the blonde female bared her fangs to me and hissed. Despite the show, her mien was harmless. She was after a reaction for her own amusement. I didn't flinch. Just kept a passive face. Bared fangs were hardly the worst thing I'd seen down here.

I laid back down and closed my eyes after they passed, listening as they interrogated a prisoner further down the hall, somewhere deeper within the trenches. The telltale screams and sounds of fists beating against skin echoed off the concrete floors and walls. A shriek as something was ripped. A limb, maybe? I curled my knees a little closer to my chest and managed to drift back to sleep. No easy feat, when someone is screaming for mercy not thirty feet away from you, but if I wanted to sleep at night this was what I had to put up with. There was one thing I'd come to learn in my time down here: take sleep where you could find it. It was the only escape life offered me.

I roused again with the flickering lights when they turned back on. Footsteps returned up the hall once more. I didn't know how long had passed. Minutes? Hours?

"Who is this tasty morsel?" the petite blonde female asked as they slowed past my cell. They all looked at me; I watched them quietly in return. The pretty blonde's fangs were fully descended, her shirt splattered with blood. Clearly not hers.

"This is the Queen's pet," Andre said with a dismissive wave. The tall, imposing blonde vampire to his right glanced briefly at him before turning his attention back to me. He was also liberally coated in blood. Also liberally arresting in his good looks. But I didn't like either blonde's hungry stares. I hadn't enough blood these days to go around for either of them.

"Someone's been a bad kitty," the blonde female purred, stroking the metal bars.

"You have a bit of schmutz," I said flatly, motioning to the corner of my lip. Her hand lifted automatically to wipe the corner of her mouth. The tall good-looking vampire laughed.

"Don't engage her," Andre said, motioning for them to continue up the hall toward the exit. "Sophie's quite attached."

"I can tell," the tall one deadpanned. I bet he could. After my blood collection earlier that night, my skin had to be as gray as my prison garb. The group moved on. I yawned and settled back down to sleep, curling an arm under my head where a pillow should have been.

It's funny how you can never tell exactly when fate intervenes until much later down the track. At that point, I had no clue.