**Ch 361: Droplets of Liquid

Another week has passed since Zoey shared her memories with me. Since Kai and his cousins were busy observing everyone waking up from their detained healing sleep tonight. I decided to head over to Mr. Collin's Museum, so I could catch up on my geology map project while the college was still closed for the time being. Mr. Collin said I could use whatever broken gems I could find to borrow as long as they weren't out on display or under examination.

"Are you sure you don't mind being here longer than I thought I would be?" I asked Jack.

He was leaning back in a chair with his legs propped up over the table for balance while he was reading a book. For my safety, Kai had him and his guardians, under Jack's command, all came with me tonight. It was already 10:00 at night, and I still had so much to do.

"There is no rush," Jack replied, and he seemed nonchalant about it.

"What about the guardians?" I still wondered since I would see or feel them whisk by unseen.

"They don't mind," he gave a short answer as Larry, the security guard, entered the employee's research room.

"Still here," Larry commented with a smile after he glanced at me gluing the chipped gems on the missing areas from my posters. Everything was labeled. I just had to piece the missing gems or rocks back in their place. Whatever I can't find, I'll have to mold a clay replica in its spot.

"Yeah, I might be here a while," I giggled. 

Larry chuckled. "I'll be here until sunrise." He strolled by as his black leather shoes squeaked along the floor. "Coffee is in the lounge. Feel free to help yourself."

"Will do!"

Larry was human, and he was off-limits for the vampires to feed on him. Not that Kai obeys his father's authority, but I trust Jack and the guardian's will, I hope.

Two hours rolled by, and Kai texted me a few times to check on me. Jack left some time ago to stretch his legs, so I had a feeling he was getting restless. Once he gets back, I'll tell him we can head home. I looked ahead when I heard tramped footsteps walking to the entrance, but then they stopped forth on their tread.

"Victoria." Outside the room, I vividly heard someone whisper my name in this eerie ghost-like voice.

"Jack."

It wasn't like him to try scaring me, and it felt like something wasn't right. Electrical surges started to send these voltage sounds into the high ceiling lights. All the lights began to flicker into a dim glow. In slow steps, I crept into the next room, which was dimming darker than it should have from this power surge. With a shaky hand, I turned on the flashlight setting from on my phone.

"I think someone needs to reset the fuse box," I said rather loudly as I neared my way out of the second research center.

"Hello. Jack! Larry!"

I poked my head out into the dark creepy corridor that looked like a long tunnel for how dark it got. Silence is all I heard, after my voice stopped echoing back to me, but then a faint dripping sound caught my ear. Droplets of what sounded like drips of water were coming from the right, so I ventured in that direction.

"Oooohhhhh..." A spooky groan trailed up the darkness from where I was going. Every hair on my body ascended, and my phone trembled in my hand when I moved the light on the walls.

"H-hello." I stuttered as I was nearing those strange liquid drops. Directly in front of me, another droplet splattered onto the floor, and I lowered my light.

"Oh my gosh." I stepped back when I found a puddle of blood on the floor. Another droplet of blood dripped from the ceiling. With a shaky hand, I moved the light upward.

"Larry!" I exclaimed. He was hanging upside-down from the ceiling light. His left ankle was tied to a rope that looped around a high ceiling light, and his throat had a small wound on it.

"Hang on, Larry! I'm calling for help!" I told him as I started to dial 911.

"Hello, this is 911, what's your emergency?" the lady over the phone answered.

"I need— Ouch!"

My phone sparked an electrical current, and I dropped it on the floor when it sparked flames.

"Aah!"

An airy draft thrashed past my right shoulder, and I caught the mere glimpse of a shadow moving along the wall.

"Hang on, Larry!" I hollered.

I hustled as fast as my legs would carry me back from where I came while I held my round pregnant belly. Seven doorless rooms down, I cut a right and roamed through the storage room, and hurried out the double metal doors. I crept around the dinosaur gallery to reach the front desk for the phone. Moonlight faintly shone from the long rectangular skylight window on the ceiling.

"Ah!" I jumped out of my skin when I came across a tyrannosaurus Rex projecting a large shadow on the wall. Creepy shadows from all these dinosaurs were everywhere as I was striding around them. Another shadow whisked in front of my pathway, and I stopped dead to listen, but I heard nothing. My body quivered, and I sped forward again.

"Aaah!" I shrieked when I ran right into Jack by a raptor display. He was turned into a solid icicle.

"Victoria."

"Rex!" I screeched and aimlessly scurried to find anything to protect myself with. His horrifying laughter emitted within the shadows of these dinosaur skeletons.

"Stay away!" I heaved. "Aaah!"

My shoes hit something slick along the floor after I veered around the skeleton of a stegosaurus. I fell on my back, sliding across what felt like ice before I could reach the exit that led to the main lobby for the phone.

"Got you!" Rex pulled me off the floor, and then he rammed my back into the bones of a triceratops. Bony horns jabbed into my back as he pressed his towering frame into my body. His fangs enlarged, and he thrashed his face into the crook of my neck.

"Aah!" I screamed once his fangs pierced into my flesh. 

Painful venom scorched into my veins, which disabled my movement to fight him, along with my capability to think straight. The pain was so unbearable that I couldn't call for Kai in my head. Blood rolled to my collarbone, and I felt his fangs graze my bone. My babies were jumping and kicking around until their movements stopped, and I felt my stomach shrink some. Once I was feeling woozy, Rex withdrew his fangs with a satisfied hiss.

"I said you were mine the next time I saw you." He chuckled over top of me.

I breathed weakly at the mere sight of Savannah striding up with a satisfied smirk. Rex picked me up like a princess, and my body drooped feebly in his arms. Right when he dashed off, I lost conscience.