".. Lester?" Squeaked the puny, crater-faced kid who took tickets at the booth just in front of the theater. His hands were wringing constantly, and his voice cracked like he was undergoing puberty right then and there. "You wanna know about that guy? Oh, lady, are you sure?"

He looked left and right -- beady little eyes, like gumdrops -- before leaning forward on the stainless steel counter to whisper out the holes poked in the plexi glass. "Man, if he knew I was saying anything, he'd kick my ass. But I've seen you around. You're with that gang, aren't you? You guys like starting shit with the bunch Lester belongs to. You just didn't hear anything from me, okay?"

"Lester's bad news. The only reason I know about him is because he's here every night to check out a showing or two. You wanna know why no one comes to this movie theater anymore? They say it's because the popcorn has roaches in it. As true as that might be, news getting out about the dead bodies and stuff they find inside just isn't cool for business. Funny thing is," the kid leaned forward. "Lester's the one who kills them. One a night, and sometimes two. This is one of his feeding grounds. If we say anything to anyone, Lester would freak. He'd kill us all. .. I'm one of his little henchmen, so I'm sworn to secrecy, right?" He laughed and picked at an old, peeling sticker stuck on the side of the booth. His long fingernail scraped loudly at the metal. "We just get rid of the bodies and he gives us some of their blood. Me, and the kid selling Sour Patch Kids and soda, I mean. So, needless to say, we always try to work the night shift."

He leaned back in his chair. Just beyond the doors to the theater, the sounds of gunshots, screaming, and footsteps echoed. "I guess you guys know about the whole vampire epidemic going on. .. Heh. How can'tyou? Some of those gang members are blood-suckers. Can't hide that from me, but I'm not saying shit. Lester doesn't exactly fit into that whole mold, though. He's a weird one. He's nuts, but he's nowhere near as crazy as some of those Machiavelli vampires, or whatever the hell they call them. No, but he's still got his little quirks. But some of those, he gets from us college kids.

"A few of us were in Theatrics I together. ..At least, the few of us he made as his little bitches. Ghouls, or something like that -- I dunno. I'm not much into the terminology. Anyway, we were in the auditorium when we read on the bulletin board that the previous teacher had been replaced by some professor named P. Chavez. So sure enough, Dr. Chavez eventually showed up, threw his briefcase on the table, and quietly started to introduce himself to us. The first weird thing I noticed was that a magazine was sort of leafing out of the side of his briefcase. And not a nudie mag, or a Hot Rod magazine. It was a copy of Fangoria. You know, that one where they talk about horror movies and gore makeup? Not only that, but I don't think I've ever encountered a professor with dreadlocks. Red ones, that came nearly down to the middle of his back. But who was I to question, right? He was a pretty damn good teacher, except when he'd go off on his tirades about Ed Wood and Bela Lugosi and shit." The kid took a few dollars from a diminutive family and tore a few tickets away from the roll. The child in the family squealed, and threw himself through the doors into the theater. Mother and Father were quick to follow.

"The semester went off without a hitch. Dr. Chavez was pretty cool, and he'd even hang out with us some nights at the dorm rooms. Watching flicks, hell, sometimes even going over drama junk with us. We offered him weed and booze -- what else are college kids going to do? -- but he never accepted. Never ratted, though. And then two days before the end of the spring semester? He disappeared. No one had heard from him, and just to make shit more strange, there were four or five kids of our class found dead all across campus. ..One was just bludgeoned to death, another one had fallen down this killer set of stairs. There was a younger girl who'd been raped, strangled, and literally thrown into a dumpster. And then there was the fat kid they found parts of in the dining hall. I didn't touch the apple crisp for weeks, needless to say." The talkative teen in the ticket booth shuddered, and leaned back into the slightly torn chair he had. Fingers searched through his baggy pockets until they came across a bent, wrinkled cigarette. He stuffed it into his mouth. "Mind if I smoke? You're not supposed to in the booth, but it's a slow night, and I can just hide it if anyone comes." He didn't use a lighter to spark it. Instead, his index finger flared as he pressed it to the brown tip. Smoke curled to hover at the top of the booth with its brash, acrid odor.

"Summer went by, and then we were back into the college frame of mind when late August came around. A few of my friends and I went down to grab some pizza at the local Italian place one night, and that's when all of the crazy stuff started happening. This guy I know? His name's Michael. Pretty smart kid. Got all the honors awards and junk in high school. So we're eating our pizza and drinking our sodas, and he says, 'Hey look! .. Isn't that Dr. Chavez over there?' and he pointed over my shoulder.

"Sure enough, I turn around, and there he is, same dreadlocks and all, eating some pasta, drinking an orange soda, and looking at the newspaper. So I motioned him over and he sat down next to us. We chit-chatted back and forth. Michael asked him where he'd disappeared to, and if he had heard of the death of all of thse kids. .. He just sort of smiled.

"Then he leaned in close. He asked if we could keep a secret. Damn right we could. He told us a few things, like how he really wasn't a college professor. That, and his name wasn't Dr. Chavez. He said he hadn't even been to college. Said he was too smart for it. And then he proceeded to tell Michael, the guys, and I that his name was really Lester... and that he'd killed all four of those kids that night.

"Call it initiation, but the four of us didn't have time to scream, or run, or even stare as he divulged that. Hell, we didn't even have time to figure out what was going on. All I remember was waking up in my dorm room with one helluva headache. My eyes were burning, too. And try as I did to tell someone what happened, I just couldn't. Hell, I didn't even know what had gone on.

The kid put the butt of the smoldering cigarette out on his knuckles and flicked it through the dip underneath the window of the counter towards the street below. "Lester showed up now and then. .. He explained to us what we were; bloodfed creatures he'd made just to do his bitchwork. As much as you hated the idea, you couldn't much go against it. He had control of us, after all. Kids like us started popping up all around the college. Murders happened here and there, too. I guess Lester just found it was one of the easiest places for a feeding ground, no? Couldn't deny the benefits, though. We were having one hell of a good time!"

"So that's about it," he yawned, leaning back into his fake vinyl throne. Arms crossed behind his neck. "I know, it wasn't much, but I don't know everything about Lester. I don't know how old he is, or any of that intricate shit, but if you got ahold of him yourself, maybe you'd find out?" He tore off a few tickets from the roll of receipts next to him and stuffed them under the window. A slight smile came across his face, and there just wasn't something right about the way it looked.

"Good luck, if you do try. But here. Treat yourself to a movie while you're at it. Just remember, you didn't hear anything from me."