“Uh, no?”

The figure's gaze sweeps across the whole gang of naked children, some of whom are covered in blood. 

"This situation is incredibly concerning. Can you offer me an explanation?"

“Me and Justin and Eliza made these kids not sick.”

"And this requires running around naked at night without parental knowledge?"

“…Yes.” 

"Why."

Zeke wiggles happily. “It feels nice?” He looks back at his new flock. “What do you guys think?”

"Who are you?" Eliza demands. 

"A responsible adult."

"We don't need one of those."

"You definitely do."

“We’re good. Find a nice cave or a lake to sleep in, we’ll be fine.”

"No," they say, pinching the bridge of their nose, "you are running around, naked, at night, some of you covered in blood. This is extremely concerning. None of you are going anywhere until at the bare minimum I get a satisfactory explanation."

“…We should run now.”

They bolt. 

Or they try to. They smack into an invisible wall like a horde of tiny mimes within a few feet. 

Eliza picks herself up off the ground where she fell after bouncing off the wall, folding her arms and glaring at the grownup. 

"Even if you did manage to get away," they say mildly, "it wouldn't be too difficult for me to find you again."

“Meanie!”

"Leaving aside every other aspect of this situation, several of you are covered in blood. It would be incredibly irresponsible of me to just ignore the situation."

"It's not ours," the girl who won the fight at the hospital offers. She glances at the loser. "...Mostly."

The adult pinches the bridge of their nose. "Words cannot express how much that does not reassure me."

“They needed to eat.”

"Can you explain," they ask levelly, "why they needed to eat such that they ended up fleeing a hospital covered in blood."

“They’re vampires, alright?”

She gets a far-off look in her eye like she's running down a list of things in her head. Then she closes her eyes. 

"Alright, I officially cannot handle this by myself." 

There is a faint smell of fire, and then all of them are somewhere else. 

The somewhere else is a fairly large room, with walls a dusty rose color and a cream carpet so soft and plush you could sink into it, which the girl vampire Eliza turned who wasn't in the fight promptly falls over backwards and does. 

After a moment, the door opens and several other adults file in. 

"I would say 'vampires don't exist,' one of them says, "and yet, here they are." This one is unambiguously female-presenting.

“Duh.” Zeke asks Justin, “Is this… normal here?”

"No," he says.

"It's normal enough," the woman says, crouching down to their level. "Normal is relative. We're Ignited Spirits; we know a lot about what exists and what doesn't, and you are new. Are you okay? Auncle Lu isn't very good with people yet."

"We're better than okay! We're vampires! Right guys?"