I worked at a blood donation clinic before the war started. My co-workers and I managed to turn the plaza into our survival base. More people came. Slowly we managed to build a small community.

Compared to the old world it was awful, but now we were better off than 90% of other survivors. We made a legal system, and a set of rules to live by. One of these was that all who could safely do so, must donate blood. We kept a fresh supply ready in case of an incident. Around 6 months in, we even realized that I fast enough transfusion could stay the effects of a zombie bite

For a while it looked like we would pull through like this indefinitely. Then after the second year, things suddenly took a turn. We thought if we waited long enough the zombies would die out. What we didn't account for was how desperate a creature gets when it's starving. They began laying siege to our city. There were more zombies out there than we had people who could fight. The engineers told us the walls would only hold for a few more weeks.

That's when it happened. We got a report from the western watchtower tower of a single man slicing down a hole hoard. The zombies just ignored him. We brought him inside thinking he had some special repellent, or a transparent armour. In reality, he was a vampire, and his named Adalwin. A few years ago we would laughed, but after what we've seen, it seemed as dead serious as anything else.

Turns out vampires are reasonable people. They avoid human blood whenever they can. For mileania they've most subsisted on livestock, but with the collapse of widescale husbandry, they've started to get desperate. It was tragic to hear what he told us about a man he knew for centuries turning feral, and mascaraing a group of survivors.

Adalwin offered us a deal of protection. Zombies ignore vampires because they can't be infected, but zombie blood is no good for vampires. He would send singles for his 10 friends to come to our city. They would clear out the hoards, but in exchange would have free access to our blood supply.

The problem though is that they would need to drink most of our blood. The mandatory donations weren't popular, but most people knew it was worth it to have the emergency supply. Having to explain to them that they would still have to give just as much, but have less for transfusion would not go over well. What choice do we have though? Either we take this deal on the vampires terms, or Aldwin leaves the hoarde to storm the city, and he has promised that he will not let the blood in our vienes will not go to waste before he leaves