Dear Diary,

It has been quite a busy few nights. Between the sheer number of applicants for the study, the statistical analysis required to formulate a half-decent experimental method, and the time spent getting the guest room ready for Jessica and Helen’s residence, I’ve hardly had time to sip on my acquaintances’ blood between tasks, much less concern myself with the consequences of my own actions. Yet again, so eager to move forward that I don’t need to do anything else.

I have kept my distance from Linda, as any reasonable person would, and she’s returned the favor. We spoke briefly the other day—she needed a form that I had on-hand from previous experiments—but there are no plans to involve her personally in my enthrallment testing. She didn’t inform anyone of what happened, and I find some solace in that, just as I find solace in knowing that there would be no need to, not for her. The smell of her blood just makes me sick at this point. I only hope she can find some solace in all this as well.

I’ve been trying to be careful with who I feed from among Mary’s thralls, as well. I once imagined that thralls like Caitlyn and Mindy who occasionally let slip some dissatisfaction were the most likely to be resentful of my…participation…but I’ve neglected to consider whether a thrall was acting too compliant the way that Jessica once did. The truth may be the opposite of what I’d thought— a thrall who hasn’t been made to do anything they wouldn’t have been willing to do before can remain much closer to their true self than one who has to be dragged along subconsciously through their every action. In light of this, I don’t think I can in good conscience trust the already dubious consent provided by thralls like Vivienne or Patricia. It’s a shame, I rather did love that inimitable B- that Vivienne carries around… but that thought is so obviously irrelevant to the point that it makes me sick having left it any space in my mind at all.

Of course, Jessica is insistent that she doesn’t resent me as such for taking from her back then, as long as I handle myself now… but I must imagine there is some anxiety behind those words. As much as I do not intend to collect rent of any kind from them or insist on being fed in exchange for protecting them, I am sure they will feel a lot more comfortable believing that once it is physically impossible for me to remove them. Jessica’s confession has if nothing else illustrated that I did not seem so different from Mary to her back then.

But enough about that. Moping over my failures was a key precipitating mistake, and I am here to prevent mistakes, not cause them. Case in point, I have just gotten off a call with Geisbert about some proposals for how we will be preventing any malfeasance on my part for enthrallment experiments. Maintaining constant watch, monitoring security cameras, only allowing me one active thrall at a time, ensuring all observers and test subjects carry some silver implement at all times… there is a surreal feeling to it, deciding how I will be restrained and captured in a worst-case scenario, but I cannot say it isn’t warranted. I have proven time and time again that it is.

On the bright side, the restrictions apply to Mary as well. I am sure she will be absolutely squirming as I detail all this to her later tonight, despite insisting that she’s oh-so-eager to go along with my study. She’ll know who’s in control, though. She’ll understand that it would make her a very bad girl to hurt my test subjects, and she’ll submit. Or at least, that’s how I might frame it if I were speaking to her. Or if I were speaking to that Evelyn character, I suppose, assuming she is somehow still oblivious enough to show up.

If only such protection could extend to my new houseguests… but for as predictable as Mary can be at times, I am finding it genuinely difficult to imagine how she would react to their newfound presence. I doubt it would be pleasant, given that I am here effectively cuckolding her in nearly every way that instinctively matters to our kind, but there is also the possibility that it would just break her instead. Keeping this secret is a feeling like masterminding some Machiavellian scheme—despite the actual actions being less a political play and more basic respect—so I can’t begin to imagine that feeling’s opposite. Perhaps it is similar to that fetid resentment her treatment of Caitlyn inspires in me.

Beyond her, though, I frankly harbor some wish for oppressive experimental monitoring on myself, now that they’ve spent their first couple nights here. Having everyone, Natalie, Jessica, Helen, close to me, all around me, under my protection, and after all I did with Helen last night, too—the vicious rough-housing, the primal desires I didn’t even know I had, the brilliant exuberance of Helen’s blood free at last of suppression by another of my kind—it should be enough. It is, I think. My blood lust is satiated, and I don’t need to take Jessica, because she’s under my protection, anyway. It’s enough.

…Until the wrong mood should strike me again, of course. Then, I’ll be surrounded by the intoxicating smells of those I…struggle to think of any term but ‘love’ for, despite its inapplicability…and I must do anything I can to make sure that situation never happens. Even if I will surely be unable to go through with violating my principles and those I care for in the end. Surely, I keep telling myself. Surely never. Surely even if no one had silver to drive me away.

Well, I should make sure those two have silver on hand, anyway. So far, our main defense against Mary is for them to hide in the ‘home’ they’re making of my guest room, call me, and hope that’s enough. I’m not going to be invited into that guest room once it’s a home, either, of course, and I’ll have to see if I can believe that that precaution is unnecessary as well.

It truly is convenient that they happened to be moving in just as I was preparing to run a study involving the onset of ‘home’ status. Helen even informed me that there is apparently some known exploit or other with the ‘chip sets’ in the monitoring devices we were using, and I passed that along. Supposedly it won’t actually end up mattering, but it’s pleasant to have people around who can say anything one way or the other… I can’t tell some of these portable medical devices apart from advanced ‘game boys’ on the best of days.

I’ve even gotten Hunter involved in all this, as of our second ‘meeting’ earlier tonight. I had noticed something off about their apartment as I approached, but it was only once I reached their front door that I realized what it was: their apartment isn’t a ‘home’. It makes sense, given what they told me about being accidentally forced to return to the remote darkness in which they were born, though it certainly raises a lot of questions about the extent to which actually living in a place is at all relevant to whether it can be considered a ‘home’. Thankfully, after an hour or two spent playing out certain fantasies with them and savoring their intense and unique B+, they were more than amicable to offering their data in pursuit of some answer there.

Between that, Jessica and Helen, the email applicant whom I’m assuming to be selfsame with that relentlessly spoony ‘cakegirl’ from my comments’ section, and the handful of other volunteers who happen to be moving or are interested in being temporarily relocated to the housing we’re sourcing from the local Vacation Inn, we may be able to actually gain some insight into this endlessly vexing ‘home’ question. At the very least, those participants will be much easier to follow up with for the other components of the study.

It’s nice having things firmed up there, as well. We’re going to primarily focus on the neurological characteristics of enthrallment, a topic both near-impossible to study without my…particular circumstances…and also of utmost importance for actually helping people. It’s a good thing I’d already started talks with that imaging center to increase GFTU’s capacity… with the current setup, we should be able to run at least 12 test subjects through the process per day.

Of course, the particular matter we are studying will introduce certain disruptions to the blood oxygen flow which fMRI tools rely on, but an EEG is a better choice for measuring something as precisely timed as being bitten, anyway. Besides, it just so happens that new thralls have to spend about 30 minutes to an hour recuperating before they’re coherent enough to be unenthralled (or ‘deprogrammed’, as we’ve been calling it), during which time we have suspected for years that some invisible change is likely taking place. In other words, the most interesting time to gather fMRI data happens to coincide perfectly with the time during which the test subjects can only sit around being sedated. The procedure writes itself:

1. Subjects check in, sign copious release forms, get pre-screened for metal implants, history of heart/blood problems, past familiarity with my works, etc. Ideally most of this happens online beforehand.
2. Run one of those newer Rapid-Sequence MRIs to quickly get a baseline of the subject’s unenthralled state.
3. Subject is sent to either Mary or myself, at random. The EEG electrodes are connected to the head. We’ll be alternating between biting close to the brain (on the neck) and far from the brain (on the leg).
1. Neither of us will be taking too much— with this many people in a day, all but the most parched vampire would get sick of blood if they took a full dose each time.
2. We’ll be noting the flavor of the blood in each case, for future reference.
3. I’d rather not discuss how we must manage the inevitable ejaculate.
4. Send the subject off to one of the MRI machines for an hour. This is the main time blocker, of course.
5. Subject is put into trance by the relevant vampire and deprogrammed using one of the three recordings I put together. They’re not too different, but it should give us some insight onto what general techniques are more effective for this process. All are confirmed to at least hypothetically work.
6. Pending basic medical concerns (drinking water, fainting, etc), subject is released with the failsafe tape relevant to their deprogramming recording.
7. 1 week later: follow up with another MRI, interview regarding failsafe efficacy & usage.

Of course, the particulars of follow-up will vary with the individual, especially as we adapt to the onset of ‘home’ in some of their new residences. Some will need more attention, some less. This is bound to be more than what many of them had bargained for, so it will be paramount to show them compassion, if only professionally. It’s the same reason we’re promising to cover the expenses for any improved deprogramming techniques they may need in the future, a provision Geisbert reminded me was more or less essential.

I can’t believe that I was so recently trying to run in circles doing all this by myself. I suppose that sort of thing has simply been functional enough these past decades, with so little new information to actually uncover, but this collaboration is like nothing else. I will be forever grateful to Linda for not exercising her (entirely warranted) ability to have me cast out entirely, such that I may perhaps in some way atone. In the same breath, I am grateful for the others who have come to me and trusted me despite my mess. If only I could feel the same.

It’s sinking in, now, being a vampire, deeper than I’d realized it could. Something is calcifying in turn. With any luck, I may be able to shape that calcifying mass into something that can actually be trusted, someone who will not fail my principles under any circumstances. If people are willing to trust me despite my mistakes, that must mean I make some progress towards that goal now, and thus the only next step is to… internalize that trust, I suppose. To leave room for error. To take steps to create that room in those around me, with rigor and with hope.

Or, perhaps I just want some wretched excuse for surrounding myself with potential victims of any shame spiral I might fall into, even as I drown myself in the stuff. I don’t know, and in a hundred years I’ll never understand which it is. I suppose all that remains is to act, to feel things out, and to learn.

Sincerely,

Luminita