Born without an expiration date

Forty-eight

LEANDA

Time went very slowly. I felt routed to the spot. I never thought of myself as useless in a crisis. I am always quite hands on. Not today!

Amia flew at Quinn. I was barley conscious of my own voice screaming his name! She landed on top of him. Her teeth in his neck. Concern for him, turned to hatred for her. How dare she touch him!

Demitri was faster than anyone. He leapt across the small room. Pulling Amia off of Quinn and flinging her across the room. He had caught her off guard. When she tried to attack him, Eternal and Achille grabbed her. Dragging her out of the room, and back upstairs. Jesse followed them out.

Demitri put his arm around me. Indifferent to Quinn bleeding on the floor.

"Breathe, stop panicking. Its not his time. Remember. It is all okay." He spoke to me softly until I regained my composure. He then closed up the wounds on Quinn's neck and lifted him onto one of the sofas. I cleaned the blood off his shirt the best I could, sitting on the floor by his head.

Eternal and Jesse came back down after a time. By then Quinn was awake, a little dazed, but fine.

"Achille is still trying to calm down Amia, she's devastated." Eternal began.

"She's devastated?" I snorted! "She should be! She should be horrified! I should go up there and..."

"My love," Quinn interrupted me. "Do not be angry with her. It was my fault dear."

"And how do you figure that out?" Now I was really pissed.

"If there was a gate with a sign saying 'the dog bites' and you put your hand through the bars. Is it your fault or the dogs fault when you are stuck trying to cut your dinner with a hook for a hand?"

Jesse giggled - I was not impressed, but he had a point. And Quinn was not very good at backing down when he knows he is right. I held my hands up, no point arguing.

"Regardless," said Demitri. "I do not think that is what we should be discussing right now, is it Jesse?"

We all looked from Demitri to Jesse and back again. Jesse sighed, Demitri looked smug.

"What?" Said Eternal.

"Amia does not attack Jesse". Demitri stated. It was not a question. Jesse sighed louder.

"I was hoping to avoid this, its embarrassing" he mumbled.

"Avoid what?" Quinn asked.

"See, I refused to let Achille experiment on random people, so part of our agreement was that I would only help him if I chose who we tested theories on. I chose myself first." He explained quietly, shuffling his feet around.

"And the first experiment was?" Enquired Eternal.

"A blood transfusion. We drained most of my blood and replaced it with Achille's".

"Fascinating," said Demitri, "and the results?"

"An annoying bond we cant get rid of," laughed Achille from the door.