The Gift

Kris Chambers is a nobody. A 24-year-old man with a dead-end job and no prospects—and, to top it off, a heart condition that forever keeps him on his toes—he spends his life trapped between apathy, self-doubt, and mortal fear. As he walks down an unfamiliar alleyway, he stumbles upon the lifeless body of a stranger. Unbeknownst to him, this grisly discovery marks the beginning of an entirely new chapter in his life. Upon mysteriously awakening in the hospital, he learns that his heart now functions flawlessly, and he feels… different.

After a cataclysmic end to his time as a freedom fighter, Kris finds himself captured, blindfolded, and awaiting a bullet. He comes to believe this may be it—his end is near—only to discover his kidnappers are fellow Americans. It's soon revealed that the CIA has monitored him for a while, and after quickly learning of his misdeeds in Aljarran, they capture him before the nation's warring factions can, only to throw him in a black site prison. They know nothing of his true powers but find him—and the stories of his heroics—intriguing nonetheless.

Forced onto a shorter leash by his CIA watchers, Kris is taken to Washington DC, but the trip is far from being the rest and relaxation he needs. A chance meeting with a congressperson ensues, a meeting that results in tragic and horrifying consequences. It's soon revealed that Vega has a massive secret—a deadly, terrible secret Kris is only now painfully aware of—along with the troubling realization that there's truly no going back now. He'll learn the reason Vega came here, to this place and to this time, or he'll die trying.

Two years have passed since the costly airport raid, and Kris Chambers just wishes to forget, and be forgotten. Working in deepest Asia, in the most physically punishing, mentally exhausting jobs he can find, he’s dragged out of the shadows by news of an alleged real-life vampire: a serial attacker, praying on victims late at night, and draining their blood.