"Aren't those your brother's clothes?" Mother asked as Kyle pulled clothes out of Christian's closet.
"Ehh, he won't care." Kyle said knowing otherwise.
*Knock Knock* Taking both of their attention.
"Are they-" "Yes." Mother already knew what he was going to ask as she left the room to answer the door.
"I wonder why they didn't kill the Royal family. There must be something stopping them, Mother's memories raised more questions after answering them. I need to get to Queen Aria, she must have the answers." Kyle said as he finally picked out an outfit.
"I'm sorry my lady, we should've held more trust for you." Kyle could hear Somer's voice even from so far.
"Your worry was warranted, I should apologize for making such a selfish plan." Mother said. "Come." She started walking upstairs.
Kyle finally found an outfit to wear and quickly switched his clothes before they could get to the room. Then he went into one of Christian's dressers to find sunglasses.
"Are you done?" Mother asked as she stood at the front of the room with her retainers.
"Yeah I am." Kyle said as he checked if the glasses fit him.
Mother introduced Kyle to her retainers and shared whatever information they could regarding the higher realm and its residents to help Kyle. While also bringing up one of Mother's major issues that they all agreed to answer when Kyle returns. So Kyle left before the retainers as they had to speak with Mother privately.
"They should be around somewhere." Kyle said as he walked through the street with a hoodie over his head to hide his hair. "Fresh air…. Something I've been missing for months." He thought as he took a deep breath.
*Hoooonk* A car's horn went off as it drove by him.
Then the sound of chatter as he walked by people either in groups or talking on the phone, filled his ears.
*thud* "Oh, my bad dude. You okay?" A person accidentally bumped into Kyle.
"It's good, I'm fine. I should've been watching my step." Kyle forgave him with a small smirk before a familiar smell touched his nose.
A feeling of absolute and genuine joy filled his body as he witnessed the amount of people on the street looking happy or enjoying themselves. No matter where he looked, someone was there. That feeling of loneliness began to fade.
*WEEEeeooo* The sirens of a police car flew past him. A Nostalgic feeling welled up inside of him, seeing the lights and people walking by. He nearly forgot he was a vampire as that feeling of hunger no longer lingered. can
Kyle decided to enjoy what he missed and continued to walk at a leisurely pace through Manhattan, going towards the Upper East side.
"I've learned so much in such a short amount of time, I need to get my thoughts in order. I also need to meet with Drey and Melissa, since they've regained their memories as well. Maybe when I explain to them, they will understand." Kyle thought as multiple police cars drove past him with their sirens wailing.
Kyle immediately started walking in the opposite direction, hoping to avoid authorities as much as possible so he could keep a low profile.
"Right now, smelling things will be too confusing because I feel like I can smell almost everything in the city. I can't pick them apart unless I focus-" Kyle thought before he bumped into someone else. "This is the same smell from earlier. "
"What the fuck." Michael said as he dropped something.
"Again? I didn't even notice him." Kyle thought as he backed up. "My bad-" Shock stopped him from finishing his apology as he looked at the person he bumped into. "What are you doing here?"
"Who are you?" Michael didn't realize it was Kyle because of his clothes but he recognized him a little.
"It's me, Kyle." He said while lifting his glasses a little to show his whole face.
"Good, I ain't have to wait that long." Michael said in a surprised tone yet his face remained still. "Come on, we gotta leave this area now." Michael said before he walked away.
"What? Why are we in a hurry-" Unable to finish his sentence because of so many people gathering around them, he just followed him hoping to get out of the crowd quickly.
Finally after pushing their way for about 6 minutes they made it out, to a sports car with four doors. Getting out behind them were two more people a part of Michael's team.
"Who the hell is this?" Agent1 said as they saw a hooded man standing with them.
"He's our objective, get in the car." Michael said as he unlocked the car and got in the driver's seat.
They immediately got into the car, letting Kyle sit in the passenger seat next to Michael. The windows had 45% tints.
"Long time no see. How was prison?" Michael said as he started the car.
"It was like a vacation in Hawaii." Kyle said sarcastically as he put the seat belt on.
"Was it? You look much skinnier, malnourished even. Were you tortured for the past two years for information about us and the vampires?" Michael asked as he drove off, sounding worrisome yet keeping his straight face.
"Everyday after the first night but I didn't tell them anything. I dealt with a lot of them when I was trying to escape though, I couldn't really take much blood. I'll be good." Kyle explained as he felt the muscles in his neck.
"I see, did they have anything we should worry about? They haven't been doing much in a while?" Michael asked.
"Yes, from what I can remember, they have developed anti-vampire equipment and are in the process of developing an Anti-ANM squad. The equipment is the breakthrough of modern Military Engineering, thousands of juggernaut armor suits and high density silver bullets and guns that can fire with power up to at least 4500 joules, strong enough to pierce a vampire's skin." A memory from the deceased S201's memory suddenly popped into Kyle's head.
"I see, did they test it out on you?" Michael asked as he took a glance at him.
"No, they knew how to make it because of me. They knew my body grew stronger everyday but they didn't know it was because of the blood. So they predicted how much they would need to subdue an adult Vampire." Kyle said as he remembered another one of S201 memories.
"How did you find this out. Did you use your eyes to hypnotize them?" Michael asked as he started calling someone through the car's panel.
"You could say that." Kyle didn't know how to explain what happened so he just left it at that.
"Hello?" The phone only rang once before someone answered.
"I just picked up Kyle, he was exactly where Drey said he was. We're heading to the safe house right now." Michael said as he focused on the road.
"Good, Christian and Drey should be heading back from their task right now. Make sure no one is following you." Gabriel said before he hung up.
"Where's Melissa?" Kyle said in a worried tone as he noticed Gabriel didn't mention her.
"She left ANM, after she recovered her memories. The others aren't sure why but I expected that would happen. Are you gonna leave the ANM as well?" Michael asked.
"Yeah, I don't belong here." Kyle said, looking at everyone on the sidewalk as they drove past them.
"I understand that. Almost too well." Michael said as his tone sounded more genuine.
It took about 30 minutes to get to the safe house, arriving before Christian and Drey. They met Gabriel there, who was there with a dozen other agents.
"Welcome back, I didn't expect you to be so thin." Gabriel said as he seemed to be studying Kyle's face.
"Yeah, I missed a few meals." Kyle said as he took the hoodie and glasses off.
"Your hair changed too, just like Melissa and Drey." Gabriel said in a shocked tone.
"It started budding just a few months after I was imprisoned, they turned into a couple nights ago. It's the natural hair of all vampires." Kyle said as he grabbed one of his locs.
"That's interesting. Well, it fits you better, the base should have a large stockpile of blood for you. Might be enough to rebuild your muscle." Gabriel said before one of the exit door's opened.
Christian and Drey walked in with a handful of soldiers with them. Surprised to actually see Kyle, he didn't even say a word. Christian walked up to him, looked at his neck and face closely as if he was examining his body. Then lifted his shirt.
"Your body hasn't fully healed yet, you're malnourished …" Christian looked at the scars left on Kyle's body. "Lack everything up, we're leaving for the base right now." Christian said as he let his shirt down.
"Welp, chop chop everyone. Including you, Drey." Gabriel rushed all of the agents as he started packing everything.
While they started packing, Christian pulled Kyle to a different room so they can speak privately.
"Wassup." Kyle said awkwardly as he didn't know what to say.
"I'm sorry." Christian said as he stared at the ground with his hands balled into fist. Not in anger, it was as if he was tryna hold something with all of his strength.
"What?" Unexpectedly it made Kyle jump, almost in a panic.
"I'm sorry if it wasn't for me, you would've never been caught and tortured, if it wasn't for me being a coward, Jeremy would've lived. I let them scare me, I sent less agents out, I stayed back… I shouldn't have let you join, you're just a kid. My little brother, how could I put you through this…." Christian plopped against the wall "I'm sorry."
Kyle unfortunately didn't understand why his older brother was feeling this way and was more shocked by Christian's apology.
"…. You don't need to apologize, you were only helping me the best way you could. I was warned about the dangers and I still decided to join. Jeremy understood that just as much as you did. Mistakes were made but we've only grown from them." Kyle said as he looked away from him.
"You're right, as a Captain of ANM that shouldn't drag me down... There isn't much I can do it about now but I swear, I will never allow something like that to happen to you again." Christian said as he stood up straight, although the feeling didn't go away and Kyle could smell that hint of regret.
He didn't know how to dispel it.
"You don't have to worry, I don't regret anything you did. I'm grateful to you, you've done more than enough for me. I can never thank you." Unable to say his thoughts out loud Kyle stared awkward and silently.