Somewhere behind me in the darkness, I hear a tell-tale rattling cough, tubercular sounding, the signal of impending death. I can feel it starting in my own lungs , the barest tickling when I draw a breath. I have months, perhaps, to live. Months. So definite, so...final. And here I thought I had life everlasting. Everlasting night, but it was life, and I enjoyed it. I just never cherished it. I regret that now. But then, how could I have predicted this, the inconceivable? How could I have known that a single viral mutation, passed from victim to predator, passed from human to we who prey upon them, would be the end to us all? It's partly our fault, I realize; we got careless in this time of plenty, int this swell of mortality. We let our numbers grow too large. In the old days....the old days. I sound like an old man sitting before the fire. But it was the old days. Back then, there were few of us. We avoided each other and our territories were large. We had one- perhaps two chosen companions. In the old days, the plague would never have spread as it has now. Curse of the modern world. The end of the modern vampire. And evil thing which has no effect on our human counterparts. It started two years ago, amongst the vagrants of our kind. The ones with out strong blood, without pedigree.

It starts with a cough, starts insignificantly but progresses steadily. The cough gets worse, and a fever sets in. Those who have reached this stage look almost human, the blood is so close to the surface of their skin. Their temperature is almost that of a living person. 98.6 degrees. An unimaginable temperature for a vampire. We generate no body heat of our own normally, we're like mobile blocks of marble. We absorb heat for awhile, from a fire, from the blood we take. But human body temperature? Never. The blood would boil in our veins. Or worse, combust and immolate us from the inside out. I say would because just past where the fever sets in, our bodies stop absorbing the blood. You can always tell a one who is seriously ill by the droplets of blood standing out on their face. At the end, the very end, if you try to feed them to keep them alive just a little longer, the blood pours out of them. Seeps out through their skin as if it were a sieve. I've seen it happen many times. I've presided over many deaths. They now call me "Our blessed Lady of the Darkness."

I never thought it would end like this.

We've been thrown backwards in time, back to the days when the Black Death griped all of Europe in it's terrible fist. I remember those days. My kind fed on whom we wished, heedless of the X's painted on the doors. We were invulnerable. We are now humbled before God. I hurry out of the street, up the creaking stairs to a dark room where another waits for me, for the Angel of Death to release him. But this will not be a routine passing like the many others I have witnessed, for the one who lays dying here is one I have loved for ages. Our love has outlived any other. Our love was truly never ending. He is breathing in gasps now but he smiles when he sees me.

"I waited.....for you." He croaks.

"I know."I speak to him softly, and wipe the blood from his face with a damp cloth. I kiss his brow and he dies, leaving softly with only a sound like angels wings marking his passing. I've really become the dark angel they compare me to. God has decided to call His children home at last. We where His servants, His weapons here on Earth. We were not demons from Hell. We have the faces of angels. We were His chosen. And here, at this dark hour, I am His herald, wielding the sword of God, ushering his long-suffering servants to their place at his side. I have survived the longest with out illness. I know that when the last one passes, only then will my mission be fulfilled. Only then will His will be done. Only then will I be called home. I leave the room, go down the stairs and back out on the street to find the one I heard earlier. He needs the dark angel's comforting touch to send him on his journey home. I will be there for him, whispering reassurance, and waiting for His call.