Friday, January 18, 2008

Last Memory


I'm sitting with the boys and Dingo has the shakes like a junkie with too much fixed. “Need a slurp?” Sunshine asks. He nods and they both look to me. The night has just started and we're all debating the same thing, Dingo just had to go and get worked up about it. “Lets hit the Heights. The meat is always showered this time of night,” Sunshine comments. I give it a shrug and Dingo looks too hungry to argue. We're on our way. We three vampires, we ran across the rooftops and bounded over the skyscrapers. I could hear a few people below me. They were discussing whether they had just seen me jump by. Fucking meat. We're at the Heights faster than a bird can fly and down on the third floor. It has been ages since I had a good bite myself. I pound on a door with a Welcome Mat on the front. “Flower Delivery!” I call. The door is opened moments later and Dingo is on her like a vulture. A light rap on a door several down, “Video game Delivery!” The door swings open and Sunshine hardly makes a sound. I don't even look behind my shoulder, I just keep walking down the hall. Maybe vary it up, go see another floor. I light a cigarette as I enter the stairwell and take a long drag. “You know those things can kill you,” a voice says behind me. I tense and get ready to make the concerned citizen dinner. The red haze comes over me and things get a bit fuzzy. Night comes onto night and suddenly things go darker than usual.

Sunrise


When I wake up, the sun is on my face. My first reaction is to keep my eyes closed and try to struggle, because my skin should be on fire right now. The pleasant temperature stuck around and I was having trouble moving. I hadn’t felt the sun on me in forty years. The reaction to not dying immediately because of it was mixed. When I finally took a peep, I see white walls and a window with the curtains mostly drawn. I kinda half smiled and looked down at my arms just to double check. Yup, still alive, still not minding the sun. A glance to my right explains the curious lack of panic that should be in my head with a curious bag of fluids dripping into me. Drugs hadn’t worked on me for years, but I wasn’t too concerned about it. Must be doping me with the stuff in the bag. I enjoyed sunlight & drugs being back in my life for about thirty seconds. Then the music starts. In walks this guy in a white coat with a couple of nurses and it’s all happy to see I’m doing well. They ask me how I’m feeling, if I’m hungry, will I need a bathroom break, on and on while I give them the silent treatment. There’s nothing like people asking you how you’re doing to make you wonder just what the hell they want. And then the music just starts to roar. I’m a vampire, a grade A slurper with all the trimmings, and I’m enjoying a sunny day in a hospital with drugs and doctors. I decide to assume the guy in the white coat is in charge and ask him what the fuck is going on. “Why, haven’t you realized yet? You’ve been cured! You’re not a vampire anymore,” he replies.

First Meal


The music stops and suddenly breathing sounds like gongs on a subway. The lights are blinking, or maybe I am, and suddenly all I can fixate on is the weird empty sensation in my stomach. I’m hungry. And not wanting a slurp hungry, like I haven’t had a fix in a while and I don’t care about anything else hungry. I’m irritable about it hungry. The doctor starts explaining that there might be an adjustment period as the cure takes effect and the nurse leaves to get me a glass of water. “You might be re-experiencing some biological functions that you haven’t felt in years, decades even,” he says while I start looking around a bit more. I’m not tied or restrained to the bed, which makes me feel better for about a second. I lunge forward to take the doctor hostage only to have all the blood rush to my head and all the energy drain out of me. I haven’t been weak in a long time either. The doctor takes a step back, startled, but he figures out the score pretty fast. “Now, I realize you might not exactly have been expecting this. Our operatives tagged you just before you could take another innocent life. We came upon you quite on accident, Mr. Shade.” I’m all ears as I lay back in bed trying to figure out which the way room isn’t spinning. A knock on the door and the nurse comes back in, a glass of water and a covered dish. “Before we talk more, we’re going to need to get you adjusted back to being human. Perhaps something to eat, something you’re used to?” He pulls back the cover and there’s a barely cooked steak on the plate. For a second I think he’s making a joke.

Days Go By


And it turns out the joke is on me, because I choke the thing down. The doctor gives me a pat on the back and leaves the room. Days go by like this. Eating turned out to be one of the easier things to get re-adjusted to. When you’re a blood sucker a lot of basic issues go out the window. Taking a crap, for instance. Would you believe I actually forgot how to wipe my own ass? Just never came up after I quit ingesting solids. I complained about headaches for days before I realized drinking water was all I needed to do. I’d been a vampire for about forty years, got tagged in the sixties when things were a bit looser. Thirty years is just enough time to forget what it’s like to have to do the little stuff. The place they were keeping me was some kind of hospital, but there seemed to be only one other patient. Whoever it was, they kept them behind locked doors and told me to stay out. Otherwise, I had free reign around the joint but would get stopped at the front door. It was weird, like they weren’t equipped to have a person like me around. They certainly weren’t pumped about a former vampire being there either. One nurse actually covered up her neck when I walked by. I could’ve ripped the joint apart, had a feast and…well, I could’ve done all that back when I was a vampire. Plus I was a lot weaker, not quite mortal, but still weak by my standards. No one really wanted to talk to me and when I asked what was going on they just said the doctor had ordered me to rest. There were also orderlies in case that answer wasn’t good enough.

Where I'm At


The couple of nurses and orderlies I see start loosening up after a while. Mostly because I’m around all the time but I don’t think I was going to be invited for tea anytime soon. The mystery patient is still behind locked doors and I’m still getting stonewalled for even looking at the door. Still, people start to talk after they get used to you. I’d kinda forgotten about how to do that, make friends. You get so used to being around the same, non-aging folks that you just kinda quit bothering to meet new people. That or you kill them after a good slurp. I find out the place I’m staying is run by some sort of Secret Church Organization. They all call themselves the Paladins of the Light. What a dumbass name, right? When one of the orderlies was first explaining it to me, he was kinda gloating and showing me these weird tattoos they all have on their arms. I told him I’d been sucking blood for thirty years and never heard of them in my un-life. He actually got upset, the schmuck. I told him I’d heard about hunters here and there but things were mostly status after the vampires started regulating themselves. He didn’t talk to me so much after that. I got the impression this was a bit of a new operation, some sort of business venture in combating the immortal vampires. Most of the people there had just started their jobs but they were all long time members of the Church. Lots of enthusiasm, not much experience. They always wanted to know if I still wanted to suck blood. “Lady, if that was going to do anything except make me vomit now, I’d probably not bat an eye. Just because I’m used to it doesn’t mean I’m going to keep doing it,” I told one nurse who also quit talking to me. I had meant it to be reassuring. Honestly though, I thought about it a couple of times.

Mood Swings


They kept me cooped up for about three days like that. Just staring at me and letting me wander around. I smoked when one of the orderlies would bum me a cigarette but I didn’t have any cash so there wasn’t much to bargain with. I wasn’t in great shape during that time, physically or mentally. The term ‘moodswing’ comes to mind. At first I’d think everything was cool, I could do this. Then I’d start thinking about…Christ, nothing in particular. Just the hugeness of it all. The worst was when I started thinking about being a vampire though. I dunno, eating meat to stay alive is one thing, but it’s tough to keep that in mind once you’re human again. The justification of it all, once it stops being applicable, things get un-calm. When I was a vampire killing people didn’t really feel like killing…people. I mean, if it had been a vampire I had to slurp, yeah I might’ve gotten choked up before. That was one of my own. That was another immortal being like me. We had eternal life, that’s a helluva thing to rob someone of. That was a dude whose friends, whose family, really expected them to be around forever. Not that I didn’t kill a couple, but I thought about it afterwards. But being human again? Shit man, I’d slurped so many it’d be fair to say I was beyond redemption. I didn’t have to deal with that too much though, it’s not like I could even remember most of the people I’d killed. I tended to black out just before I made the kill, just like I did before I woke up in this goofy hospital. It was a joke that my other immortal friends used to love, that I could never remember sucking blood. They made some good gags out of it, Sunshine and Dingo. Friends forever. Well, that might be different now too.

The Thickening


It shouldn’t be much of a surprise that after a few more days of this screwing around that I decided the suspense would be a lot better if it killed me. Don’t get me wrong, being human again was swell, but it just wasn’t my cup of tea. Something about being mortal just took all the motivation out of me. I figured that if I had to die again there wasn’t much point in putting it off. I smoked a cigarette, looped a noose around my neck, and was about two seconds from knocking the chair from under me when the doctor waltzes in. Behind him is a real knock-out, one of the best looking blondes I’d ever seen. She didn’t even gasp when she saw me on the stool, ready to knock it loose. She just kept her stone face while the doctor rushed over and dragged me down. I heard him assure her that I had been very stable mentally up to this point. I told them I was the only stable person in the room and to let me back on the stool. The blonde gets real close to my face and sniffs me. After a second I realize she’s not enjoying a fetish, that she is actually smelling me. The doctor keeps me pinned still but I’m frozen solid and staring straight at her. “Ah, now I can smell the fear. Let him up. Mr. Shade, it’s time you found out you just why precisely you’re not dead yet,” she gives me a toothy grin but I stay stone faced. What the Hell is a werewolf doing here?

Interviews


They lead me to another room with a table and some chairs. I’m just about to start thinking an interrogation is going down when the doc hands me a slip of paper and the first question on it is for my social security number. “They weren’t kidding when they said this place was new,” I mutter as I sit down and look over the questions. Hometown? Last place of residence? What the fuck was this supposed to be? I must’ve been staring too long because the doctor patiently pulls the paper away, pulls out a pen, and directs my attention to the lovely she-wolf. “Tell me, Mr. Shade, what do you think of the Paladins of Light?” she asked. I tell her I think the name is lousy and ask for a cigarette. To my surprise, she obliges me. The doctor tries out a couple of the resume questions on me instead. “Are you from America, Mr. Shade?” I tell him to write Eastern Transylvania and he’s about to start when I cut him off with a snort. “I’m from Hemingway, South Carolina. It’s about as bumble fuck a town as it gets man,” I explain. “I haven’t been there in decades. It’s just easier to keep the slurps quiet and easy in a bigger city,” I add. The doctor looks at me blankly and I have to explain that it’s slang for murdering a person by sucking out their life force. They all get quiet on that one, but I’m not sure why the she-wolf was so bothered. Her eyes bulged a bit because she keeps that cool face. The more I look at her though, the more I start to notice that she’s a bit too small. A bit too passive for a werewolf, not enough aggression. “I must say, we’re all very pleased with your attitude so far. Most of the other vampires wanted to go out fighting when they realized they’d been cured. It’s nice that you’re a bit more…weak,” she says darkly.

Religous Differences


“I didn’t know dogs could handle subtlety,” I shoot back. That checks her attitude a bit, but I just played my only ace on a whim. She knows I know. “If you’re referring to Ms. Ferris’ former condition, I would appreciate it if the two of you put your differences aside,” the doctor explains. I glance at him and contemplate actually learning his name, just so I can know who to call an idiot. Werewolves and vampires had never been in the habit of getting along, to put it lightly. Ten thousand years of rape, murder, and slavery on both sides left us enemies by default. And that was back during the good days. “I’ve been around long enough to know she’s not my biggest fan. I got pricked up back in the sixties during the Vampire Enlightenment, so all the zealot nonsense never got stuffed into my head. I don’t have a problem with werewolves if she doesn’t have a problem with me. But I’m not your mortal pal either. I don’t get any more worked up about the people I killed than you do over the cows you butcher for dinner,” I explain dryly. The doctor is still as unphased as ever, but Ferris rolls her eyes. “What is a vampire doing living on the streets with two other hoods? Your whole Enlightenment sect went corporate a decade ago. What’s wrong, they got you working up the job ladder?” I take a long drag on my cigarette and contemplate the cards she’s laid down herself. “I deserted. Got sick of their bullshit. The religious folks, the Nod-worshippers, they tell themselves they have a right to kill people because vampires are chosen by the Gods. Supreme beings and all that. The Enlightenment shuffled all that up by isolating the virus that merges with us and really figuring out what the fuck was going on instead of that magic mumbo jumbo. Thing is, they just say we’re the supreme beings because the virus makes us genetically superior. Same bullshit to justify the same thing: staying alive,” I finish my speech and stub out my cigarette. Ferris offers me another and I accept. “So what do you believe justifies your actions to stay alive, Mr. Shade?” she asks. “I never really needed one until now,” I reply.

Friends from Work


The Doc asks me what I mean and I remind him that I was about to do the Hangman shuffle when he interrupted me. “Death wasn’t exactly inevitable before now,” I explain. My eyes catch the Doc checking a box next to ‘Depressed’ and ‘Suicidal’ like it might be relevant and I wait for the conversation to resume. It doesn’t, the Doc just keeps filling stuff out. “So…you used to be a werewolf? How’d they cure you? Hell, how’d they cure me? The virus mutates so rapidly I had thought it could adapt to everything but a sunny breakfast,” I ask. They eye one another and the doctor keeps writing. “Alright, scratch the last question. How’d they cure you? Lycanthropy is a bacteria that grows in the lower intestine and is spread through the bloodstream. Did they invent some su-“ Her hand moves far stronger than it looks like it can and knocks me clean to the floor. Looks like I said the right thing. “The blood of Fenrir may not be sacred to you but it is still better than your own disease. You may disdain your own religion all that you like, but kindly keep mine out of it,” Ferris says coldly. Looks like I found Ferris’ number and called it wrong. Damn but she could pack a wallop, cured or not. “If you intend to remain in our service for much longer, then I ORDER you to control yourself, Ms. Ferris!” the Doc shouts. He then turns around and helps me out, handing me a pen while he goes back to the desk. “The way we cured you will be revealed depending on you, Mr. Shade. Whether you believe in the cure or not is of little concern,” he explains. The Doc hands me the forms he has been filling out and points to a signature at the bottom. It says job application at the top.

Employed


“In exchange for agreeing to work for us, we will provide you with a place to live and a reasonable income to provide for yourself. You’ll be expected to reside in the city, keep regular hours, and be available at all times. Think of yourself as…an extra hand for the Paladins of Light. Someone who can inform us and explain things,” the Doc explains. I almost ask him what’s to keep me from running off before I remember the noose still coiled back in my room. It’s not like I have anywhere to run. “You want me to sell out my own people?” I ask. “You already said you were apathetic towards any philosophical considerations concerning humanity. You’re cured, Mr. Shade. They aren’t your people anymore. What else were you going to do?,” the Doc replies. It’s not like I have anyone to go to either. I can’t even imagine what Sunshine or Dingo would say if they met me as a human. “What’s to keep me from just getting bitten again and going back to it all?” Ferris snorts and pulls out a cigarette for herself on that one. “You’ll find that you are no longer a viable host for the virus, Mr. Shade. I’m afraid the cure is permanent. You’ll understand that soon enough or maybe not, depending,” the Doc answers. A part of me wants to ask what they plan for me to depend on. What the big deal is. But that cold feeling in my stomach isn’t just nausea at needing to eat, it’s real fear. It’s the real idea of choosing between the noose and trying to carve out a living. Trying to be human. I sign the form and hand it back without another word.

Handshakes


After that it’s all smiles and cigarette smoke as we all get up. The Doc sticks out his hand to shake but I only look at him like he just wiped his ass with it. He sighs. “As you may be noticing Mr. Shade, we’re a very young organization. We’ve only just acquired the means to combat the vampire problem. As you yourself noted, the virus is very powerful and can adapt to almost anything. Except sunlight, naturally,” He motions to the door as he talks and I go out first. In two minutes we’re down the stairs, out the lobby, and going out the doors I was blocked from leaving for the past few days. The light blinds me a little but I get over it quick enough. A glance around reveals I’m in a courtyard with a few other buildings connected by pavement. They even put a fountain and garden into their budget. “Didn’t know landscape decorators liked fighting the forces of darkness,” I mutter. Ferris cracks a bit and gives a laugh as we walk towards another building. “Just out of curiosity, are we exclusively fighting vampires or is this an equal opportunity kill job?” I ask. The Doc looks troubled for a moment and I make a motion to the former-werewolf with great tits. “Ah, I see. Well, that happens to be the source of some dispute within the Paladins of Light. Considering the current…social situation between the two factions, we have decided it best to…,” he’s getting nervous as Ferris loses the smile and gives me a stony look. What the Doc is referring to is the fact that the Guild of Nod, the dominant church of Vampirism, decided to enslave werewolves a few decades ago. Some shit in their Bible, I never read the thing and most of the other Enlightened wanted nothing to do with the werewolves. Kidnapped some important people or something that made the werewolves start working for them. I don’t get much of werewolf culture because, quite frankly, it never came up while I was a vampire. Judging by this little revelation though, apparently they aren’t too excited about being enslaved.

The Cure


Rather than finish his sentence the Doc just goes ahead and we enter another building. From the moment I step inside it smells like lab. Sterilized equipment, white walls, and rubber stench are everywhere. My nose wrinkles and Ferris puts her hand up to block the smell. If she still has some of her enhanced abilities from the lycanthropy infection, it starts to make me wonder what I might still have as well. Either way, the dull ache in my eyes tells me that the sun still isn’t doing me any favors. The Doc slides his card through a few locks and waves to some nurses as they walk by. They both step around Ferris and I like we’re made of lava. “We here at the Paladins of Light employ a variety of former police and military officers. Many have combat training and are experts with fire arms. Believe it or not, most of them end up finding us as they search for answers to their own investigations,” the Doc explains. Given the number of people I’ve sucked dry and dumped in rivers, I believe him. We get to wherever we’re going and suddenly the whole scene changes. Sterile lighting, men in body armor (with steel neck shields), and what look like heavy machine guns are suddenly all around us. I almost think about telling the Doc there is no way I’m wearing something like that when a guard grabs me and searches me. He does the same for Ferris. The Doc doesn’t get touched. We’re allowed in and proceed down a long hall that looks like hospital and feels like battle ship. “Some of our military members proposed employing more sophisticated security for this section of the facility. After all, it contains the heart and soul of our organization. Mr. Shade, allow me to present the very means of your cure!” We walk up to a double-paned glass window and inside the room I see a guy with a book waving his arms over a pile of ammo and sub-machine guns. I don’t recognize the language he’s chanting in and there are armed guards watching over him while he works. I don’t exactly know what I’m supposed to say. “Well…it fucking figures,” I reply.

The Book


“How does your science feel now?” Ferris says. I give her a half-glance and roll my eyes. I’d seen vampires grow limbs after missing them for a few days, punch through concrete walls like paper, and even the occasional glowing pair of eyes. There were explanations for it. Not necessarily great ones, but explanations all the same. “It doesn’t feel like anything. Science isn’t a belief. It’s just there,” I shoot back. After blessing the weapons in front of him, the man closes the book and places it in an engraved metal box next to him. “So you’re telling me that those weapons are blessed? As in, unlike a normal bullet, if I shoot a vampire with one of those they die?” The Doc nods but catches himself. “And they can’t regenerate the wound. Frankly, I’m as puzzled by it as you are. Nothing chemically has changed on the weapon, we checked that. And it’s also not a function of the user’s beliefs, because people who have no clue what they’re holding can still use them. The weirdest thing of all, it’s the book itself. You can’t just memorize the words to the prayers, the person has to actually be holding that book,” he says. I consider asking him how they came to all these facts but decide I don’t want to know. They’re not my people anymore. “Mind if I take a look at it?” I ask. Ferris glances at the Doc at that. “No, I’m afraid that’s not possible. That book is the source of the Paladin’s power and the greatest asset we have. Only the highest members are allowed to perform the rituals and blessings. It was a uniquely blessed weapon that cured you, by the way.” The exposition is starting to make my head hurt because of all the bullshit sirens going off. Magic spells? Holy weapons? I was expecting a medical breakthrough, not a read-along from the book mobile. I looked down at my hands and swallowed. Here I was, cured of the uncurable, and pissed off that I didn’t believe in it. How do you argue with what’s right in front of you?

The Vampire Falcon


The Doc keeps jabbering about the irrefutable proof that this book can do everything from kill vampires to part the Red Sea. It’s the source of Ferris’ cure as well, for the same unexplained reasons. “The only thing anyone can say for certain is that it might have something to do with quantum mechanics,” he finally finishes. He’s gesturing at some photo-copies of archaic diagrams and pointing at some energy x-rays. I haven’t really been listening. The Nod worshippers would’ve been all over this but…I’d always been raised that this religious crap was a bunch of nonsense. That vampires weren’t good or bad, we were just wolves living around sheep. Now some book powered by…God? The Light? Christ, what did this make me back then and in whose eyes? What did it make me now? I’m staring at the floor asking questions people should learn to not ask when Ferris gives me a light shove. “The Doctor is talking to you,” she says stiffly. “I said, Mr. Shade, have you ever heard of a Vampire Falcon?” I’m about to say I’ve also heard of the Big Bad Wolf then I catch myself. Fantasy seemed to be coming true today. “It’s a biological conundrum. Since the vampire virus mutates so rapidly, it’s the hypothetical dilemma that if you could weaken it enough or the person’s immune system was sophisticated enough, they could develop some kind of…balance with it? Resilience? Look, all of this was impossible to me up until I woke up human again,” I explain. Ferris sits down and decides to take over. “Very good, Mr. Shade. A Vampire Falcon is a half-human, half-vampire hybrid. And it is part of the reason we have brought you in and decided to hire you on the force. We have one. And we have no idea what is biologically going on with his body,” she says.

Demands


My first reaction is to tell her that I sure as hell don’t have any clue either but then I think better of it. I start remembering the whole reason I even agreed to this tour in the first place. “Well, I definitely can recognize most of the traits, maybe tell him how to develop some of the skills,” I offer. They both nod and we all look like we’re ready to go. “But if you’re going to keep referring to this gig as a job, I have some payment requests I’d like to be considered,” I add. “First, I’m going to need protection. The Guild of Nod already thought of me as a heretic but now the Enlightened are, at the very least, going to want to study me. I want a holy gun. Nothing fancy, just a pistol. Most vampires won’t be expecting it so that’d be enough. It looked like you were mass-blessing them anyways. Second, I need to get out of here. I need my own place. Third, I’ll get your Vampire Falcon up to speed but I’m not exactly fully qualified anymore. And a lot of my advice is going to involve the Falcon killing people. Once the job is done I pla-,” but Ferris cuts me off before I can finish. Honestly, I don’t even really know what I was going to say. I just felt this sudden urge to ask for stuff. “We will see for the first two. But you will learn, just as I did, the being mortal again has a lot of unexpected needs with it. You will not be able to move about as you once did. You will need to eat, stay warm, talk with people, and keep out of trouble. All of these things mean staying put. And as for the Falcon…, I’m afraid you’re somewhat mistaken about what we require from you. He is your new partner. Perhaps you’d like to meet him now?,” Ferris asks.

Introductions


We go back to the hospital wing I’d been confined in and the Doc leaves me in a chair while he goes to collect the Falcon. Ferris stays behind and sits in a chair across from me. She lights another cigarette but seems to have decided she doesn’t need to share anymore. “How did you handle it? When you found out about the book and being human again?” I ask when the silence becomes obnoxious. She pauses to take a drag before answering and I find myself again being impressed with her looks. She catches me staring and gives me a half-smile. “It was hard. It will be hard for you as well. Maybe the book is a punishment sent by the God Fenrir, maybe being human again is meant to remind me of what things should be fought for. I’ve been here for three years. I only stayed because they said they had a way to kill vampires. As long as I do that, perhaps Fenrir will forgive my people and we will be free again,” she says this like she’s got it memorized. She sure as hell hasn’t been saving it for me. I decide it’s my turn to not talk and stay quiet. It’s enough trouble to acknowledge the idea of some divine power existing at all, much less that people can read it out of a book and use it against biological invulnerability. The Doc finally comes back into the room and we both standup. Behind him, a kid that couldn’t have been much older than eighteen walks in with his hands in his pockets. His hair is dyed black and there is an earring in one of his ears. His lower lip is pierced. But none of that really phases me. It’s the crucifix around his neck that I lock onto. “Hi, my name is Jacob,” he says. He sticks out his hand and I shake it numbly. Glancing down, the enormity of the problem finally sinks in all the way. He’s wearing a ‘W.W.J.D’ bracelet.

Awkward Start


“I’m Shade. Sam Shade. You’re…you’re the half-vampire?” I ask. He scowls and jerks his hand back. They go back into his pockets and for a second I catch myself shoving my own hands into mine. “Jacob here was rescued, Mr. Shade. This has been very hard on him and he still hasn’t quite grasped the enormity of his situation. We were hoping you could help with that as well,” the Doc explains. “There’s nothing to help with. If you can cure this guy or Ferris, then there isn’t a reason you can’t cure me as well,” Jacob responds coldly. For some reason it had never occurred to me that someone wouldn’t be overjoyed at the idea of being a mutated powerhouse, but there were suddenly a couple of reasons I could see not being excited about it. If the kid was ga-ga for Jesus then there were would probably be some hang-ups. He would not, for example, be able to mutate the virus into superior strength or speed if he didn’t drink blood. He might not be forced to, if the virus in this form didn’t require it, but he was no better than the average joe without the slurp. The same went for regeneration, eyesight, hearing, and every other reason the Paladins would’ve wanted to keep this kid in this half-vampire state. And that’s when the fucking catch of this gig hits me like a ton of bricks. They want me to convince this kid to follow the lifestyle. I check out and he checks in, Vampire 101 for Jesus Freaks. And if that damn book was any indication, maybe he wasn’t totally off on his protests either. What in the hell had I just agreed to? Ferris and the Doc both look at me with almost pleading eyes, the former wolf half cocks her hips and I feel myself melting just a bit. I shouldn’t have let her catch me ogling, there’ll be trouble for it. “Kid…I think we might need to talk alone for a bit,” I explain.

Mark Twain


“Look, if you’re going to feed me some shit about saving lives and protecting the innocent, you can stuff it. I don’t want to be a vampire and I don’t care what anyone says. I’ve seen enough shit in my life to not need this crap,” the kid barks at me. I raise an eyebrow and find myself a bit impressed. The first thing religious types always seem to lack is critical thinking over authority. But this might just be knee-jerk rejection from the kid. “How…how Christian are you?” I ask. I’m a bit out of touch with the whole concept of faith and I think the look the kid shot me was a final judgment on that fact. “Gosh, I didn’t know we came in sizes. I’m a Medium-sized Christian. I got picked up by a Crisis Youth Ministry after I overdosed on meth. I believe in God and that Jesus Christ has my fucking back. Is that enough for you?” he actually pulls out the crucifix and waves it in my face. “Y’know those didn’t work on me back when I was a vampire. I don’t think anything is going to start happening now, unless you’re feeling funny,” I shoot back. He turns a bit red at that and sits down in a huff. I try a different tactic. “How bad are the pangs?” I ask. He grunts and shrugs. “Is it like being hungry but no matter what you don’t feel satisfied? Do you find yourself drinking water even when you’ve had gallons of it?” That catches his attention and he eyes me for a minute. “Is that what it is? Wanting to drink blood is what’s causing it? It reminds me of when my Mom went on that Atkins Diet thing and made me eat like her. Like I’m missing something,” he says. He fidgets with his hands for a while and doesn’t add anything after that. “Listen kid, I’m going to tell you a story that someone told me when I was first infected. You ever heard of Mark Twain? Funny guy. One time, while he was out in the desert in the Middle East, him and some pals found a line of fossilized oyster shells and fish bones in a Cliffside. One guy says they must be left over from the Great Flood, since they’re in the Holy Land. Another guy says it’s because the Earth is millions of years old and this part of the Earth used to be under water. Twain looks at both of them and just says they probably had a really popular sea food restaurant there,” I say. “The point is, any of them could be right without making the other one wrong. That’s what being a vampire is like.”

Blood Bags


“What, you mean murdering people is the same thing no matter what I call it?” Jacob asks. For a second I’m startled to hear him call it that. I don’t know why. “Some would call it murder, others would call it survival. Considering what they’re asking you to do, I can understand why you might think of it as needless. Do you…understand how big of a deal you are? You’re not possible, as far as I know. Scientifically, the vampire virus mutates so rapidly that most people who’ve studied it said the thing was uncurable. But to actually mutate, in response to an immune system, to a degree that you cut back on half the side-effects? Kid…that’s a miracle,” I explain. He seems to shrug at that, like such things are to be expected. Maybe to him they are. I’m not the one sporting a Jesus bracelet. “It’s also tough to say what exactly is going to happen once you start drinking blood. That’s how the virus grows. I think I’m still a bit stronger than the average guy but you’ll be the opposite. You’ll be punching through walls after a few years. Jumping over cars. And you don’t have to worry about sunlight at all. Jesus kid, aren’t you even the least bit excited or curious? You’re special, you’re being recruited by the Paladins of Light!” I say. He rolls his eyes and replies, “That name is really dumb. What am I supposed to do for them, anyways?” he asks. I don’t have an answer to that one but I tell him we’re probably going to be hunting vampires. “They definitely do kill people, right? And they’re all evil? Do I have to drink blood out of a person or could I just…I dunno, suck it out of a donor bag?” he seems to be perking up a bit now. People always do when you tell them about the perks that come with vampirism. “A donor bag? I guess I’ve heard of people doing it…but it’s like drinking a warm flat beer. It’s terrible, but if you don’t mind doing it then sure,” I answer.

Incessant Questions


The next couple of days I spend waiting around for my apartment to get setup and praying for a few moments away from the kid. As soon as he started trusting me, he asked me about everything under the moon about vampires. How many people had I killed? Which ones were the strongest? I told him I’d lost count and that seemed to upset him for some reason. I could tell I bugged him a lot too. When he asked me if I believed in God I told him no. When he asked me if I was an atheist I told him no. When he asked me what I believed in at all, I didn’t have much of a response. “But… you feel bad about it now, right? Before, you said there wasn’t a cure so you just did it to survive, but now you’re human again and all those people are dead because of you,” he asked me one time. I tell him we’ll argue about it once he’s slurped a few dry himself. I can understand that he was freaked out, but it was like he wasn’t sure if he should piss without asking me. The other problem was it started showing that the blood bags weren’t doing it. They had always been a way to get by for the milder vampires, but if you wanted to start showing a real increase of power you had to get at stuff that was still active. He still wasn’t budging on the issue, even when I proposed we go to the terminal ward of a Nursing Home and Kevorkian someone with a slurp. I think I started rubbing off on him in other ways though. He never quite dropped the Jesus routine but he stopped wearing the bracelet around the hospital. He told me about his own life sometimes. How wild he had been before the church took him in. How he was lucky to be alive. I told him he had bigger problems than meth right now, but he just laughed at that and shook his head. Eventually, they gave us both our ‘Holy weapons’ and I’d drag him out to the firing range if he started yapping too much. I couldn’t hear him over the revolvers blasting away at targets shaped like people.

Training


I finally got my own place and started spending most of my nights with a bottle of bourbon and a Netflix subscription. They tried to give us some training in field work and some of it was alright. They weren’t quit with it though with their planning. The ex-cops and the marines had all these attack plans for invading castles and tombs. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that no one stayed in those things anymore but I held my tongue. But during the basic Vampire Culture course, I finally couldn’t take it. I ended up teaching the course by interrupting the instructor constantly, until he finally just sat down and told me to teach the thing myself. It was in front of a bunch of other ex-cops and you could see them fuming at me. That was when I started to realize just how much most of these guys can and did hate my guts for what I’d used to be. “Let me guess, you want your steak raw, right buddy? Nice and bloody!” they’d ask before walking away laughing. The kid never understood what they were making fun of when they teased him, but I tried to shield him from it anyways. The instructor I’d embarrassed turned out to be the main cop in charge of his ‘Civilian Detachment’ as they called us, a real fucking pill named Mills who had it out for me from day one. You would’ve thought I was the vampire who’d murdered all the friends and family that drove them here. And honestly, a couple of them could’ve been. But they were assholes who didn’t know the first thing about hunting vampires except that they’re guns could burn a hole in them when most couldn’t. They needed my experience and I needed…I needed a reason to not put that noose around my neck again, I guess. “You know what I think, Shade? I think you just got tired of all the bat shit,” Mills barked at me once.

Things Pick Up


Things stay idle and keep going south between me and the rest of the Paladins. One of them convinces himself that I’m the vampire who slurped his wife and takes a swing. Like I said, my strength was still above average and when I swing back I end up doing more damage than is fair. So they send me and the kid to Ferris’s office to think about what we’ve done. The kid asks me when he’s going to be strong enough to hit like that and I finally snap. “When you quit fucking calling it murder and slurp someone, dipshit!” His face turns red and he stares at the floor, Ferris scowls at me and goes back to the paperwork we were doing before we got dumped in her office. For a second I feel like apologizing to the kid, to Jacob, but I’m just too damned angry to do anything but smoke a cigarette. This whole situation, babysitting and teaching people to kill vampires, it was just having an effect on me. I didn’t like it because I didn’t understand it. The phone rings and I’m relieved that the wait for anything is over. Ferris answers and curtly replies that she’s babysitting the both of us at the moment. Then her eyes get wide and I can tell something she isn’t happy about has just gone down. “Fucking military pigs! Tell Mills I said, no, tell Mills that I ORDER THEY HOLD THEIR POSITION! No raids, no gun fights, not a goddamn thing. I don’t want the last fuck-up repeating itself. What for? What the fuck did we start this whole goddamn civilian operation for in the first place?” she’s screaming and pounding her first on the desk like an animal. Which she used to be. The kid looks scared out of his gourd but personally I’m still finding myself a bit turned on by Ferris. My brain again warned me that it was going to get me in trouble one of these days. She slams the phone down and pulls a revolver out from the desk. “You two got your guns?” she asks. We both nod and I pat mine with a growing fondness. “Good. We just got a call that there’s been a sighting. A huge one. Maybe a whole nest. And I need you two there,” she barks before shoving us toward the door.

Mission Planning


Ferris serves us a nice round of explanations on the car ride over. The kid still seems pissed about my yelling and stares out the window the whole time. “There have been a group of vampires that have been near the Paladin’s homebase for the past few weeks. But we always lost them when we tried to follow them back to their nest. So tonight, of all nights, they start acting crazy and don’t bother to lose the people following them. And now Mills and his Paladin troopers want to storm the damn building they’re in,” Ferris is gripping the steering wheel and half snarling during this whole rant. I try to think of something to say when the kid fills the gap for me, “So? Why not? We’re here to kill vampires aren’t we?” I pull out a cigarette and take my turn at staring out the window. The kid still has a thing or two to learn about when to disagree with a woman. I’m glad he’s talking again though. “Because, Jacob, in case you hadn’t noticed we’ve been sitting on our asses for the past three months. We need leads. We need to know what these guys are up to,” Ferris explains. I raise an eyebrow at that one. I’d dropped a hint or two during training that I could lead them to a few hideouts I still remembered but Ferris had never seemed too interested. “Just how close were these guys when you noticed them?” I fish. She sighs and I think I’ve finally caught the gravity she’s been dancing around. Old Ferris might have a security problem on her hands and she wants to know how bad. “Close enough that they probably realized what we are. I need to know who they’ve told. What they saw. I need to know if I’ve got a goddamn war on my hands,” she admits.

Wait Here


We’re in the city now and Ferris is slowing down, checking street signs and getting her bearings on where we are. The radio crackles and it’s Mills, “I can give you an hour to scope this out. My men will try to take one alive but you know how that goes Ferris,” he garbles across the static. She rolls her eyes and parks the car on a street corner. “You see that warehouse? That’s it. That’s where the vampires ran to. Take these binoculars and tell me what you see,” Ferris instructs. I take a glance and say aloud what I see. A warehouse that looks like it has seen better days. If it’s a nest then a guard should be poking his head out every thirty minutes or so. If we wait, I can probably tell you who the guard is with. Ferris pulls out her gun and checks the casing, turning off the safety while she makes sure there is one in the chamber. “Mills and his crew are down two blocks away in a bread truck. I’m going to walk over there and report all this. If I’m in the van with them I can keep them all in check a lot better than sitting here. When you see someone and ID who we’re dealing with, radio it. Gather as much info as you can from here. If they go in and start blazing, try to run down anyone you see fleeing. It’s time for you two to prove you’re not a fucking liability, got it?” she says before opening the door. She drops to a crouch outside the car, gun ready for anything, and then stashes the iron. She moves in the slow walk of a nervous female in a bad part of town, heading down the block towards the bread truck. I reach over, close the door, and slouch down with the binoculars. The kid still doesn’t seem to want to talk to me and it just became a lot more noticeable.

Staking Out


At first I just keep quiet and hope my estimate wasn’t ridiculously off for the guards. An hour goes by. The Enlightened ran a tight ship and would’ve kept a guard checking. But then again, they also wouldn’t be in a warehouse and they probably wouldn’t have been caught in the first place. The Nod worshippers were a bit more casual but even they would’ve posted guards during the night. This whole thing reeked of amateur. I half wanted to radio Mills and tell him to just flatten the place, since the vampires in there seemed like the gang type. I should know, I used to be one. Time keeps going by and the kid’s silence is still pissing me off for some reason. I reach over and turn on the car’s radio to break the tone. Why should I apologize for telling him the fucking truth? He wants all the powers but he doesn’t want to pay the price. He doesn’t want to soil his damned moral beliefs or his Jesus standard. He’s never going to get past the human stage if he keeps believing in that crap, never going to quit being weak if he clings to those beliefs. “Look…kid, you gotta quit being so moral about thi-“ I say. He interrupts me in a flash with what has probably been on the burner for a while. “How can you be so casual about it? How can you act like murdering someone is okay? Even with the nursing home people, you make it sound okay just because they’re going to die soon. So are you. So am I eventually. Does that mean someone should be allowed to murder you? You keep saying it’ll make me stronger, that because I’m a Vampire Falcon I’m superior and I have a right. A right to fucking what?” he snarls. I just don’t have any answers for him not understanding. I want to tell him that after the virus makes you immortal you don’t have to give a shit about all that stuff. That when you don’t have to die if you can avoid the sun it all quits being relevant. I’m the one whose human again. I’m the one who will have to get old and die no matter what I do. I light a cigarette. “You know those things will kill you,” he mutters under his breath.

U2


I keep smoking and we’re back to not talking. More time goes by. Stupid kid, maybe I am just another deadbeat mortal but he’s still got a chance that I don’t have anymore. If he’s going to whine about what it takes to become stronger by slurping then he shouldn’t be so damned pissed when I yell at him for asking. The radio is grinding through commercials and I’m just about to turn it off again when they finally remember to play some music. It’s some sad bastard tune I remember from the 80’s and I reach to turn the station. “Hey, I like this song. U2 is one of my favorite bands, “ he says. I pause at the dial and decide to leave it. It’s a slow song and as I listen to the lyrics I find myself liking it a bit more. “This is U2, huh? It’s kinda preachy. That’s one of those things you believe in, right? That we’re all one despite our differences?” I ask. It was a lame attempt to humor him but I guess I just wanted him to talk again. “It’s about a guy whose gay and infected with AIDs. He’s telling his Dad that he’s going to die,” the kid explains. I listen to the song and see what he’s talking about. He hushes up again and I realize he probably feels patronized. Again. “I like that. I can relate, having a deadly disease. It’s not all heartless. When you’re…I mean back when I first got infected it’s not like there was a cure. I didn’t have a secret organization feeding me blood and I was going to go crazy if I didn’t drink. That happens, y’know. We called it the red haze. I usually black out just before I’m about to bite someone, like going on a bender or smoking too much dope. If you don’t get your fix, your brain just shuts down and you stop remembering anything. You walk around like a zombie till you’ve killed enough people. It wasn’t…I don’t know kid. I don’t know much of anything anymore. Being human again is…,” I trail off. He stays quiet for a while back there but then finally tells me I can change the channel once the commercials start back up. “It’s alright Shade. I don’t really know either,” he admits.

Old Friends


“Do you think these guys might be…might be the ones who bit me?” he asks. It’s my turn to be quiet while I think about the implications of that. “Maybe, I don’t know. Could’ve been anybody I guess. The fact that the Paladins saved you before full infection took place means it must’ve been a casual night. Why, you want a crack at them?” I ask back. “Yeah, maybe. I just…I didn’t ask for this either, man. Just thought it might make me feel better about all this. Just hit the asshole,” he responds. I find myself thinking about which gangs were raging around lately and realize again, it could’ve been anybody. The kid taps my shoulder and suddenly I spot a vampire walking towards the warehouse from down the street. And who should it fucking be but Dingo himself, my old pal? What was that cooze doing screwing around here? He was ex-Enlightenment like me, but he’d never been the sharpest marble in the bag of them. Again I found myself wishing I knew what was going on. Ferris wasn’t being straight with me, Mills hated my guts, and most of the force now knew me as the ex-vampire who punched that guy. They wanted information, now I had a chance to get it. I looked at the kid and picked up the radio. “Ferris? Mills?” I asked. “I know that guy out there. I’m going to go see what he’s up to,” I say. The kid looks at me like I’m nuts. “But you’re human now! He’s still a vampire, won’t he kill you?” he says. I shrug and shake my head. “Naw, me and Dingo go back. I don’t think he’s coming over to Sunday dinner anytime soon, but he’s not going to slurp me right off the bat,” I reply. I wait a couple of minutes for there to be a response on the radio but there isn’t one. Can they hear me? Is it tuned to the right frequency? I glance in the binoculars and see that Dingo is smoking a cigarette. If I don’t go up to him soon I’m going to miss my only chance to see what this whole mess is all about.

Dingo


I know it’s crazy but I just felt like walking up to Dingo and saying hello. It had been months since I had anyone but the kid to talk to and there was an old vampire friend, in the flesh. He’d probably spot that I was human by sight or by scent. But between the cigarette smoke and me holding back maybe I could just look weakened. Fuck it, this was Dingo. We’d been slurping together for years since we quit the Enlightenment. “Kid, you got your cell phone? Good, Mills gave me one too. Here’s the number. Text me if anything comes over the radio. If you see anything weird, I guess go check it out,” I say. Before he can say another word I hand him the digits and step out of the car. I walk straight at Dingo and he spots me in seconds. I’ve started a cigarette and gave a few coughs before waving at him. After getting up to maybe five feet, I stop and just stare. My hand is in my pocket and I grip the holy revolver. I’m not exactly sure how to start. “Shade? Holy shit…it’s you! I thought you were dead! After that night when that squad jumped us, me and Sunshine just assumed they’d dragged you off to finish the job,” he exclaims as he walks towards me. At three feet he stops in his tracks and can tell I’m human again, I grip the revolver even tigher. “Holy….shit,” he says. “I guess you could say they did kinda kill me,” I say half-jokingly. He gives a little laugh himself but just keeps staring. “You and Sunshine made it out alright? Figures, when their heads aren’t shoved up their assholes they can’t tell the difference,” I say. Dingo nods, takes a step back, and lights another cigarette. The first one fell out of his mouth. “I don’t remember much about that night. Either the slurp haze or whatever they cured me with makes it all go blank,” I say again. Dingo seems to have collected himself a bit finally. “Yeah, after Sunshine and I split, we saw them hauling you off and followed them back to that hospital. We figured it was for lab experiments or something. Shade…they have guns that do permanent damage. Sunshine had his arm blown off and it’s not growing back. Do you…how much do you know?”

Hanging With A Bad Crowd


The blood beating in my veins gives a pulsing reminder for why I need to keep my mouth shut and the gun I’m gripping tighter than ever reminds whose buttering my bread now. Before I have to lie to an old friend, we’re interrupted by a voice yelling for Dingo to hurry. His head jerks and quiet as a shadow a vampire dressed in all black appears behind him. I know the uniform and if the light was better I’d bet there was a tattoo of a Sphinx on his neck. What is Dingo doing with a Nod Templar? “Malvolio…hey man. It’s Shade! The guy I told you about,” Dingo says immediately. I know Dingo well enough that he’s scared of this guy. Since he’s still an immortal vampire, I wonder where that leaves me. “Ah…you don’t say. Mr. Shade, such an unexpected surprise,” he rasps at me. I could probably land a bullet in him. Considering Dingo just vouched for their damage, I could probably land a bullet in this Malvolio before he got close. But the thing about Nod Templars is that they’re trained for fighting werewolves and vampires. A blow that could smash a car barely phases them. They were the ‘Fuck-Off’ Religious Warriors of Nod and I had my doubts about how much one bullet would do to protect me. He also knows I’m human now too. Great, just great. The Nod Worshippers are involved, they know I’ve been with the Paladins, and it doesn’t take a genius to guess Malvolio’s next request. “I believe we could be of better assistance if you’d join us inside. Perhaps you could explain your curious condition and how you escaped the Paladins for us,” Malvolio offers. I shrug and try to stop my hand from shaking. The very real possibility of my death is suddenly hard to ignore and for the first time in decades my instinct to run away fills me. But it’s no good. The Templar moves unimaginably fast and locks a hand on my neck, pinching the nerve. Just like I used to do before a good slurp to cripple movement in the victim. “If you please, Mr. Shade. I am very curious to discuss the matter of you how found us, for starters,” he says in my ear.

Playing Games


I’m pushed through the doorway and walking down a dark corridor that opens up into the rest of the warehouse. The walls are sparse and the area is intentionally being kept poorly lit. There could three Templars hiding around there, it could be three hundred. In a touch I would’ve thought a coincidence under better circumstances, a lone chair with a light beaming down from high is over in one section. Predictably, that’s our destination. I sit without being forced and light a cigarette. Malvolio wisps back and all I can see is Dingo looking at me. “So…explain yourself man. What happened? How did you…shit, are you really human again?” he asks. As much as I’d like for this reunion to be emotional, my ambivalence about dying is suddenly becoming much harder to control. I’m really not used to mortality. There are two ways to get a person to believe what you’re telling them. They want it to be true or they’re afraid it is. The trick is knowing which one to use. I lean forward and whisper as lowly as I can knowing full well every Templar around can hear me, “Dingo, listen. If these guys decide to bite me, don’t get involved. They pumped me full of a vaccine, everyone who bites is going to become human. It’s a trap.” His eyes bulge and he hastily backs up a bit. That should buy me some safety and it was certainly better than saying some magic book had cast some spell. “What are you doing with a bunch of Nod freaks anyways?” I say much louder. Malvolio wisps back into view and slaps me across the face. “Your heretic views are now even more disgusting coming from the mouth of a traitor mortal. We will be asking the questions here, not you,” he says. Dingo looks embarrassed and down at the floor. He’d been a reliable guy, a bit thrifty and blood crazed, but an alright guy. After I decided to bail on the Enlightenment, he’d been one of the first to agree to come with me. “Since you seem to have lost a bit of your memory regarding our extra-sensory capacities, I’m going to ask another question. How much do they know and perhaps more importantly, how much do you know?”

Old Memories


Funny, I wanted to ask them the same thing. My best bet at information is some time alone with Dingo and the best shot at that is keeping things unproductive. “Next to nothing. They kept me in some hospital the whole time. I just woke up and was human again. They fed me, walked me to the bathroom, and then just waltzed in saying they were gonna let me go. The whole thing was laughable. Just said they hoped I’d learned my lesson and dropped me off two blocks from here. Never do a slurp again,” I fed him. He looked at me and sneered. “Such a thing is both a sin and untrue, making it all the more disturbing to me, Mr. Shade,” he said. I braced myself for another slap and was rewarded for my efforts. My face was starting to ache. I had to get a few minutes alone with Dingo to figure out what was going on and that didn’t seem likely here. “Allow me to start over with a new question that gets to the same point. How much have you told them about vampires?” Malvolio asks. For some reason, an idea from the back of my head pops forward. It’s a story my grandfather told me about when he was captured during the war. I haven’t thought about my family in decades, ditched them as soon as the virus took effect. Most do. He said that the way he stayed alive in the camp was to feed them a little bit of real information and then get bitchy. To just keep leading them on and buying time. Damn, I suddenly wish my body wasn’t mortal because I get the feeling I’m about to be in pain. “Alright, alright, enough bullshit. They hired me as an informant and advisor to their organization. They’re called the Paladins of the Light. I would’ve told them to go fuck themselves as soon as I woke up but there’s a catch to these guys. They can make guns that hurt vampires. Paint them across the fucking walls. So I did the logical thing, I switched to the winning team. I mean, you guys must be the false religion and they’re the right one, si-“ I manage to say before a fist lands on my face. I vaguely get the impression of flying before things go dark.

Reunion


I wake up to cold water on my face and I see Dingo looking at me with a nervous grin. “Shit Shade, you need to watch that. Your face looks like its been to the butcher shop,” he hands me a cigarette while I check myself. I still have my gun and that bulge in my hip pocket feels like my cell phone. The idiots are so used to being immune to bullets that they still don’t search people for weapons. “Yeah, can’t take them like I used to,” I mutter before taking a drag. My cheek burns from the cuts my teeth made when I got punched, “How long have I been out?”, I ask. “About thirty minutes,” he says flatly. I reach out my hand for some help getting up and he just looks at it. “So…I’ll ask again, what are you doing with a bunch of Nod freaks? I don’t remember you ever being any fonder of them than I was,” I ask. He shrugs and sits down next to me. “It’s complicated. When Sunshine and me saw those guys carry you back to that hospital, we got into a big fight about who to go to. Like you said, those guys are something else. Guns that can hurt a vampire was big info and we couldn’t decide who to go to. I mean, I was all for the Enlightenment but…when we pulled the bullet out of Sunshine, we checked it over. All those fucking science classes they made us take back when we were with the Movement, right? It was lead. No chemical residue. Nothing weird,” he explains. When you’re a member of the Enlightenment you’re required to become a bit of a maverick education-wise. Science, philosophy, art, personal development. “Sunshine said we had to go anyways but I was against it. Like you used to say about their fucking motto over there, ‘Question everything except us’. I wouldn’t be shocked if they decided the reason Sunshine was missing his arm was because he fell asleep with just one part of his arm in the sunlight,” Dingo says. I nod and try to collect the marbles in my head because right now a red light is going off. I’m amazed Dingo was able to get this kind of time with me so easily. “So you went to the guys who were crazy enough to believe you’d been shot by a magic bullet and told them,” I say.

Bold Solution


Dingo nods and finally pops the big question, ”Shade, how do they do it? How do they make those bullets?” I pause mid marble collection. “Some kind of book. I didn’t recognize the language it was in when I saw it, but that was just from hearing a guy read out of it. The whole key is the book. You can’t memorize it, you have to be holding it. Copies don’t work either. They get one of their me-“ I stop mid-sentence and pick up the last marble to my head. The red light’s label suddenly makes sense. This is a trap. A few seconds later I can hear audible sniffing and everything gets confirmed. “He’s telling the truth,” I hear someone growl. A werewolf slave, checking my pheromones and backing up the info Dingo just got me to spill. I hear clapping and Malvolio presents himself. “Thank you Mr. Shade. That wasn’t so bad, was it?” he says. He nods to Dingo, who gives me a hang dog look before fading out. “Oh, and don’t forget to see to that piece of business, if you would. Our offer is now changed appropriately,” Malvolio says to Dingo. “Yeah, no worries. I got it,” he says. Malvolio turns to me and paces for a few moments. I cough and feel a loosened tooth with my tongue. Another cigarette to my lips and the burn picks up a bit more. Malvolio leans down close to my face. “I greatly appreciate that bit of information, Mr. Shade. But there is so much more you could be telling us. Why not just keep going? Floor plans, personnel, training, types of guns. Whatever else I can thi-“ its his turn to stop mid-sentence because my cell phone is suddenly ringing. It wasn’t quite the interruption I had planned but I don’t think Malvolio was used to cell phones going off mid-beating. He stands and curses, grabs me by my bruised cheek and snatches the phone out of my pocket. He squeezes my face and I’m suddenly regretting the cigarettes. Malvolio laughs and shoves the opened screen in my face. All the phone reads is ‘help’. It’s from the kid. Malvolio lets go of my smashed cheek and lifts me up by my shirt. “I suppose you think that was funny?” he asks. “Naw, that was just a giggle. What’s funny is how little of this you’ve thought through, big guy. You didn’t even ask me where the book was,” I say back. He sneers at me and gives me a fanged grin. But I give him a toothy grin right back when the gun barrel touches the bottom of his jaw.

Compromises


All of those shadowy cronies suddenly quit being so well hidden. Out of my peripheral there’s motion, behind Malvolio there’s at least two, and my ears can hear that werewolf snarling. Maybe two, probably more. My grin vanishes at about the same time Malvolio’s does. “Mr. Shade, even if we should choose not to bite you, I do not recall ringing a human’s head off to be particularly hard,” he says harshly. “And pulling the trigger was never easier,” I shoot back. My brain is multi-tasking the options and telling me they’re all sour. Was the kid in trouble? “And they covered that too. You kill me anywhere near here and the cure will taint anyone who touches my blood,” I lie back. It was worth a shot. Malvolio only smiles while a werewolf behind me sniffs and presumably shakes his head. Not to mention the wolf would still be capable of killing me anyways. This whole time Malvolio is slowly lowering me and I’m digging the gun barrel higher into his jaw with every inch I go down. “I hope you don’t intend to keep this up all night,” he says calmly. With the dog fact checking and my survival rate hitting zero it’s time for plan B, mix the truth up a bit. “You want information, right? Fine. I want money. Being mortal has reacquainted me with that vice and suddenly all I can think about is retirement,” I pull the gun down but keep it trained on his face. “Why would you be willing to do that?” Malvolio asks. “I give them all my info on you, they ditch me. I give you all the info on them, I get it worse. Lets just say a former vampire gets a little bit less respect than a real one with the Paladins of Light.” I say. Malvolio blinks and looks blank for a second. “What a terrible name,” he says. I give a short laugh but still keep the gun trained between those black eyes of his. “What I’m proposing, big guy, is the old switch. You pay me, they pay me, and only one side gets decent info,” I explain. “An interesting proposal. Yet why should I trust you?” he asks. “Because there’s a bread truck full of Elite Paladins with machine guns about to storm this place if I don’t step outside smiling,” I reply.

The New Deal


I wish the lights had been a bit brighter so I could see Malvolio’s eyes bulge. The werewolf is sniffing like mad. Damn, why did I have to add the Elite part to that pack of goons? The last ace is on the table and it’s the one most likely to get me killed. Vampires just aren’t used to the idea of having to die, period. Maybe Malvolio figured he was fast enough to at least dodge a fatal wound coming from me. I’m sure the other vampires figured that as well. But pretty much every thing they knew about fighting involved hand to hand combat as the only effective way to kill. And most of that you could grow back. Even in a huge skirmish, only a handful ever died. But guns were a different game for them. The idea of dying without doing anything wrong, of death by just standing there, that was starting to take effect and I could tell it was unsettling them. “Think about it, Malvolio. You know these guys have to be wiped out. But if you barge into that place it’ll be Normandy without the scenic beach. You need me and I need to get out of here,” I say. I’m assuming by now the werewolf has confirmed the trooper part and Malvolio is wondering how to handle a full house. “Lower your gun and we can deal,” he finally says. I shake my head. “By the Book of Nod and the purity of my blood, lower your gun and you will come to no harm, mortal,” he says. I lower the gun. “We shall do as you say. I want maps of the installation, number of troops, guard patterns, everything I’ll need for a full scale assault. When you give me that I’ll give you…how much is enough? One million?” Malvolio asks. The guy wasn’t used to valuing money or material goods. “When do we make this trade?” I ask. He is getting nervous and I can tell he’s in a rush to get out of the place. “I would say…two weeks? We will meet at ‘The Montreat’. Room 176. Midnight, naturally. And I warn you, we have observed this installation a great deal ourselves. Any attempts at false information for us, which I expect you to be giving the Paladins, will be dealt with brutally. There will always be night time, Mr. Shade,” he says. With that, he vanishes in the shadows and I barely hear the air move as he makes his escape. A window clatters, the sound of shoe rubber twisting on concrete, and the whole pack is gone. My mind goes back to the kid immediately and I head for the exit.

The kid


I step outside and the place is deserted. The bread truck is still over on the corner but I try to ignore it. I don’t know if those Nod worshippers can be trusted. Well, I know they can’t, but I don’t know if they’re scared enough to really run away. I start walking towards the car in the hopes of finding the kid. As I get closer though, my stomach gets that sinking feeling. The rear door has been left open and the kid is nowhere in sight. I look around. Nothing down the street, no sign around the car, and nothing but that text message to go on. I’d told the kid to stay out of trouble, but to check out anything strange. Damnit, how could I have been so stupid? Of course that got him in trouble. There was no way he could go toe to toe with a vampire, gun or not. He was just a kid and I’d told him to act like an adult. Maybe Malvolio and his goons had caught his eye and he took off after them. The only ones he could’ve spotted that weren’t on the front were down an alley to the right of the warehouse, so I started walking in that direction. My hands were still shaking, the adrenaline pumping from the past hour inside that warehouse. I just wasn’t used to danger, of actually being in fear of dying. Being scared for someone else wasn’t any better. The whole feeling was like being taken out of a padded room and being told anything could happen. I checked over my shoulder twice as I moved across the street. My hand found the gun in my pocket and once again I was surprised at how reassuring the grip really felt. Death didn’t seem so bad when you could order it around. But only a little. Some garbage cans are were knocked over and I can tell by the smell it happened recently. I pick up my pace and start running down the alley way. The kid needed help.

No Last Words


The alleyway swings into a corner of the warehouse but my guess about the windows is moot. They’re all still open. An old rusty light hangs over the wall and illuminates the dumpsters that are around back. And there I see the kid. There’s Jacob, lying in a pool of blood, stiff as the wall he’s up against. The cell phone is in his hand. I just stop, at first. Just sit and stare. Death. His arms are twisted around something and his face is turned away from me. My grip on the gun goes slack. I lean against the wall across from him and slide to the pavement, still trying not to look at him. No. Please, no. The image of that noose I should’ve been dancing around comes to my head and a part of me wishes I’d gone ahead and saved myself the suspense. I fumble for my cigarettes. I finally look back at the poor kid, the kid who was dead because I had told him to chase anything strange. For some reason, I suddenly think he’s going to get back up. I mean, there he is, dead as can be, and it’s like my mind doesn’t recognize it. He’ll stir and we’ll call the ambulance and everything will be okay. At the very least I could get some last words. He could tell me it was okay, that it wasn’t my fault and that he’d be fine. I could tell him I was sorry for yelling at him. Oh God, I’d never even apologized for yelling at him. Nothing but his stiff corpse and me puffing on a cigarette that are killing anything now. I take a drag. “Along with everything else,” I mutter. I should’ve saved myself the damn suspense.

Empty Box


I get up and put my hand back on the gun in my pocket. Whoever did this could still be around. I roll the kid over and the thing in his arms clatters to the side. The cigarette falls out of my mouth as I recognize a metal box with engravings I’d only seen once and would never forget. An empty, used to contain a very specific Book, metal box. The kid’s blood is on it. And suddenly the whole picture comes into focus. Ferris screaming on the radio. Malvolio not asking about the Book’s location. The death. The Book that’s driving this whole operation is currently on the loose. A check over the body and it’s pretty obvious that the hole in his chest is what did the kid in. It’s too big to be a single bullet, unless holy weapons have some kind of extra kick I don’t know about. Could the kid even survive normal gun shots? A werewolf could’ve punched through him like that, a vampire too. Dingo being sent out early on some errand. Anything, could’ve drawn the kid over here. Maybe speared him with a pipe even. He’d had enough time to text me, maybe even before he got hit. Maybe ten minutes had gone by between that and my arrival. Questions were piling up like blank paper and the only answer I had was that it all had something to do with the empty box lying next to the kid. What to do? Go to Mills and the Paladins? Ask Ferris to sniff around? I only knew one thing for certain at that point. Whatever it took, whatever kind of bullet I needed, I was going to plant it straight in the heart of whoever had done this. The son of a bitch was going to pay.