The Night His Song Shall Be
A Vampire Novella
For Vanessa,
Because you believed when thousands wouldn’t
29th November 2009; West Bromwich, England
His every breath burned his chest as he ran; his heart thudding painfully and legs aching from the unnatural speed he was forcing them to maintain. His mind was whirling with so many thoughts; none of them given enough time to become coherent before another took its place. Everything had gone wrong. Everything had gone so very wrong. Gabe and Luc had gone down. He didn’t know if they were simply knocked out or injured or dead…or worse. There hadn’t been time to find out. Madeline was dead; he’d seen the monster…he’d seen it tear out her throat moments before Evan had shot it through the heart – seen the girl’s blood soaking into the stone at her feet and mingling with the stolen life of her killer...seen the blankness of her eyes. She was so young. She had been so young. At least it was only death. That was some small comfort. And then there was Evangeline…his Angel. Fighting with a righteous, Godly fury in her eyes and showing no sign of stopping, screaming his name as he was disarmed by three of the beasts after dispatching two others, wiping a line of blood from her lip where it had been split during the fight as she yelled at him to run…
A dead end met him and he skidded to a halt; stopping a moment too slowly and thudding into the stone wall painfully, neck jarring, legs still trying to drive him onwards due to adrenaline and fear. England was filled with stone. Stone walls, stone floors; if only they’d favoured stone coffins; perhaps none of it would have happened if the English were more careful with their dead. He pushed off from the wall, seeing a shadowy figure appear in the side street he’d just vacated, and took off again; gasping and muttering prayers under his breath as he ran. He had nothing; his sword, his daggers, Evan’s spare gun, his stake…they were all gone. Just a small vial of holy water, barely enough to half blind one of the creatures, and his silver crucifix remained. He was isolated and without any true way to defend himself. All around him was the sound of traffic; of late night supermarkets blaring out dreadful pop music and the odd drunken lout stumbling out off a pub.
He had only run to draw them from her; to perhaps saver her. He always knew she was too good for him, that he would face something terrible in return for the joy she had brought him. Now here was the answer. She would be the death of him – and he would die gladly in her place. A thousand times over he would…
“Holy Mary…” he rasped; his accent thicker than it had been in a decade as fear and exhaustion and pure adrenaline raged through his body, “Mother…Mother of Gott…”
Another dead end came to face him; a chain link fence twice his height with a barbed wire topping blocked his only chance of escape. In the murky light of a nearby street lamp he thought he saw a silhouette drift past the end of the street which he was separated from by the fence. Skidding to a halt and looking up with desperation, as if searching for some kind of last moment divine intervention, he felt his eyes close involuntarily as realisation dawned. His only chance at escape was gone. He was not going to live out the night.
“Mousey Mouse has run out of places to run and hide?”
The coldly cruel and completely inhuman voice echoed throughout the empty street. It pounded off every surface and surrounded him utterly. The woman was old; older than anyone truly knew, but she sounded young to the uninitiated ear. Slowly, with an acceptance that frightened even him, the man turned around to face her.
“I always knew it would be you.” he stated plainly; looking her in those black, black eyes – the eyes of the devil himself – eyes the devil would be proud to bear.
She looked human for the most part and yet there was an animal, otherworldly, aura about her which caused even his informed heart to skip a beat in abject terror. Keep calm, he told himself, do not give her your dignity. She shook back a coil of straw blonde hair and laughed in a rich voice of one who had seen and done terrible things. The laugh of someone versed in the world and its dark ways. It was undeniably the voice of a demon.
“I knew too, pretty Wilhelm…or do you prefer Wil? She calls you that; doesn’t she?”
“You know she does,” Wil answered.
It smiled.
“So much love…I wonder what it will do to her when she finds you. I wonder how she will feel. Shall she be angry, do you think? Bitter? Lost? Do you think she’ll still believe in Him when you’re gone?”
“Her faith is stronger than anything on this Earth. It is stronger than you can ever dream…”
“Oh Willy…Wil…she is the Angel of your heart, no? No one could blame you; her power alone makes her…intoxicating. One of the few remaining of that blessed hallowed line of…well. We know. Of course we do. She can change her name but she can never change her blood; nor can the boys she defends like a wildcat. Nor the ones my brethren and I killed over the centuries. Oh yes, their blood was something else. And blood, my darling Wilhelm, blood speaks louder than any faith you can conjure or create. One day I shall taste hers. I wonder, when I do…I wonder if I’ll taste you in her?”
The rattle behind him followed by a barely suppressed growl gave Wil a moments’ warning that there was a creature behind him. He levelled his gaze at the she devil stoically and murmured with a voice filled with conviction, which did not shake,
“Gott seigen sie, Juliette.”
He whirled around at the very moment that the beast leaped from the barbed fence; the sharp metal doing nothing to harm him as he fell through the air, so gorged was he on stolen blood. Wil threw the vial upwards, his aim true as the thin glass shattered upon impacting with the head of the creature, and causing it to scream a blood curdling cry into the night as its face smoked and steamed where the water touched flesh.
Wil stiffened as an arm went around his neck and he hefted his weight, flipping the vampire as sharp claws dragged across his chest and caught skin and muscle. He let out a hiss of pain as another monster leapt onto him; knocking him to the ground. Wil forced his knee upwards; using the force behind the motion to drive the creature from him. However two more took its place and Wil was unable to stop himself from being hauled to his feet; his body held up even as hungry eyes glared at the wounds on his chest – seeping blood. The first two he had fought had been deprived of food; weak. The ones holding him had fed recently; like the still smoking creature even now lying on the ground whimpering. Perhaps they had drunk from Madeline or one of the others. Wherever their sustenance had come from their human façade was firmly in place – the stark blue veins, papery yellow skin and hairlessness of their comrades nowhere in sight upon their forms.
“You fight well, Wilhelm. You are perhaps the best of your kind – the best of the ordinary.”
Juliette swept closer to him as she spoke; her Edwardian dress – something she had sported for the last two hundred years, swirling around her feet as she moved with a deceptively gentle grace. How had she avoided detection so long dressed like that; he wondered idly. English people could be so blind sometimes…
“You know,” she breathed once she had come close enough so that he could feel her breath upon his cheek, clearly smell the blood she had gorged herself on for more than half a millennia in that breath, see the pale perfection of her complexion. The faint rose of her lips and deadly blackness of her eyes were the only colours amongst the alabaster, “I hear Hunters make excellent Vampir.”
Cold dread burrowed its way into even the most well protected areas of his heart as her words struck him. Death would be a blessing; death locked in battle with the beasts would be a sacrifice worth making for the rewards which would lie beyond but… becoming one of them…taking the place of the demon in the darkest recess of hell so that the creature could inhabit his body…
“No…” he breathed; unaware that he had spoken. “God, barmherzig vater, bitte, please, no…”
Juliette tilted her head and smiled gently at her captive even as her emerging fangs cut deep into the flesh of her still closed lips. When she opened her mouth a trickle of stolen blood ran from the two piercings and her smile took on a manic edge as her tongue lapped at the lost elixir.
“I knew you would beg; before the end.”
20th November 2011; Oldbury, West Midlands
“Look at this.”
“Oh my…is that?”
“Yeah; it is.”
“Wow. Just…wow.”
Elizabeth looked down at the sweet potato she was holding. Its reddish skin was splitting as great bulging veins ran across its body; creating a knobbly effect which, combined with the length and breadth of the vegetable gave it a…
“Phallic,” Beth murmured; looking at it with a sort of morbid fascination, “It looks like one of those phallic statues they had in ancient times. You know? Worshipping fertility and…or is it phallus?”
“Wouldn’t know babes,” Jane replied; looking up from her gun and raising a brow. “Are you going to send it? I know it’s not out of stock or anything but still…”
“They’ll only boil it and cut it up right? There’s no harm really.” Beth shrugged, tapping the code into her gun and chucking it into one of the totes on her cart.
“Unless some poor old spinster is the recipient and she has a heart attack when she…” Jane stopped speaking and merely gestured in a superfluous motion at the potato.
“Might be exciting for her; spice things up in Chez Cat.” Beth reasoned.
“Oh God,” Jane responded with a grimace, “Don’t say that…”
“Can’t un-think it now.” Beth answered with a smirk as she moved on to the next item on her gun - carrots; 1kg.
Working in a supermarket wasn’t so bad. Especially on the on-line department were work consisted of finding things, scanning them and putting them in a red or blue box; preferably bagged. Yes, she thought as she absently loaded five carrots into a plastic bag, wondering whether she could guess a kilo without having to traipse over to the scales to weigh it, it could be mind-numbing. But that was only if you actually thought about what you were doing and; come on, who in their right mind would do that? Much better to get lost in another world and…
“Have you seen the penis potatoes?” called over Josh as he passed by; arousing the interest of several nearby customers.
“Beth shopped one.” Jane answered; her eyes never leaving the shelf she was examining as she spoke.
“Really? Blimey…you dirty bugger.”
Beth winked as he trundled off towards the chilled section; announcing to any colleagues he came across that there were ‘cock shaped taters in aisle thirty three’.
Yeah, she thought, working in a supermarket wasn’t so bad.
***
Goin 2 cinema ltr. Wanna come?
“See you later Beth!” called Jane from her spot two lockers down.
“Yeah; I’m in tomorrow, you?”
“My day off, mate.”
“Alright for some,” Beth smiled, “Saturday then?”
“Yeah; see you Saturday.”
The door swung shut as Jane left the changing room. Beth once again looked down at her phone and sighed as she typed out,
Learn to spell, dipshit.
She pressed send and closed her locker, hefting her bag over her shoulder as she made her way in Jane’s footsteps out into the employee corridor. A glance out the window told her it was long since dark – not unusual for November. Especially the cold and gloomy one they were currently experiencing. It was late anyway, past six, and she had been going since eight that morning. The run up to Christmas meant long days as people frenziedly bought online and the online shopping department frenziedly tried to keep up.
She looked down at her phone, always kept on silent by a force of habit left over from her school days, and saw a new message had appeared.
Harsh but fair. So…you up for drooling at Rhys Ifans and then discussing his hotness over pizza?
Beth rolled her eyes good naturedly.
10 out of 10 for improvement; and that’s an eleven for taste. See you in half an hour.
She headed down the stairs and out onto the shop floor. There was a steady hum of shoppers and staff milling around but Beth cut through both heading straight for the door. It was so easy to spend a day’s wages whilst browsing round the store. Better to focus on getting out – at least then the money could be blown elsewhere.
The night air was cold on her face; she pulled her hooded jacket more tightly around her as she headed out towards the underground car park. She always favoured it over the upper one; less people used it and there was little chance of anyone parking next to anyone else under there. Her little beat up Ford was barely hanging on as it was – it could do without middle aged mom rage being inflicted on it by the shoppers from hell. The fight in the car park between two seemingly perfectly normal thirty something toddler lugging women hadn’t quite left Beth’s immediate memory. Oh the joys of the Midlands.
She descended the stone steps down to the car park carefully; her work boots tentatively stepping on the slippery surface as she went. Last winter she’d fallen over at a bus stop in front of thirty twelve year olds who’d laughed so much she thought spontaneous combustion was a real possibility. No more falling over; that was her mantra- and so far one hundred percent successful.
The dim overhead strip lights in the car park shone a measly, dim glow onto the scene; a dozen or so cars parked in mostly haphazard ways and widely strewn throughout the large space. One of two of the lights were flickering; maintenance still hadn’t gotten round to fixing them. People didn’t care how they parked when there was no one to see. She spotted her shoddy red number in its usual spot and sighed with relief, as she did every day, to find it was still there. Paranoia wasn’t unhealthy; another mantra to live by.
She fumbled in her bag as she approached the car, frowning as she attempted to use her phone backlight to see through the rubbish she carted around with her everywhere and find her car keys.
“Why do I always do this?” she muttered, fishing out a box of hatpins and a cigarette lighter she had never used, “Why not find them where there is actual light instead of waiting for…”
She trailed off as she heard the sound of harsh coughing coming from somewhere up ahead. Beth paused in her progress toward the car; tilting her head slightly as she looked towards where she thought she heard the coughing. That was the only problem with underground parking; she thought absently, it was well creepy. She bit her lip before letting out a long breath and, deciding she couldn’t very well stand there and wait for someone else to get in their car, continued on towards her Ford.
Another cough, this time when she was within a foot of opening the driver’s door, caused her to stop again. Was it coming from the other side of the car? She frowned. Perhaps a tramp had snuggled up to her hubcaps. Or maybe it was someone who was little and lost, or old and had forgotten where they were…or someone who was hurt. Her eyes went to the keys which she had now found, sitting loosely in her grasp, and then back to the other side of the car. If she just drove off and found out in the morning someone had been found injured or dead in the car park she’d never forgive herself. Damn morals, she internally cursed, rounding the car with a weary sigh and calling softly,
“Hello? Are you alright?”
There was no response but for a sort of shuffling sound. She rounded the front of the car, putting a hand on the bonnet as she leaned around tentatively.
“Hello? Is there…oh – hi there.”
She had been right; there was a tramp snuggled up to her hubcaps. He was wrapped in a thin blanket, blackened in some places as though it had been too close to an open flame one too many times. She couldn’t make much out; the blanket was pulled up to cover the entire figure from head to foot, but what she could see was one pale white hand clutching the blanket closed at the front. Her eyes widened as she saw the brightness of blue veins showing through the parchment like skin of the person; huddled on the ground and seemingly shying away from her. They must be frozen stiff to have veins that prominent. The fingernails were wrong too; sort of yellow with blackened bits at the nail bed. Was that frostbite? How long had the poor sod been outside?
“Hey, it’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you. I was just wondering if you were alright.”
The figure seemed to stiffen as she rounded the front of the car and came to a stop just beyond reaching distance of the crumpled form. She felt sympathy, of course she did, but she’d heard enough horror stories about people playing for sympathy (didn’t Ted Bundy pretend to have a broken arm to lure in victims?) in order to gain trust to be a little wary at least.
She waited a few moments, her eyes roving over the figure several times and learning nothing new with each inspection. She couldn’t even tell if it was a man or a woman; though from the pitch of the coughs she’d have guessed man. Not willing to give up, despite the cold now beginning to make her hands stiff, she tried once again,
“What’s your name?”
This elicited a reaction. She took a cautious step back as the figure jerked, this time forcefully, and seemed to swivel slightly; head raised towards her. She still couldn’t make out his face as it was shrouded in the shadow of the makeshift hood he’d created with the blanket. However she was sure now that he was looking at her. That was an improvement, right?
“..od.” came the croaking response; the voice so raw she almost winced at the sound.
“Od?” she asked, “That’s…interesting. Short for anything?”
The figure moved, shifting slightly towards her, seemingly leaning on her car in order to rise into what she supposed was probably a crouch.
“…ood.” he repeated; voice a little stronger now.
“Oh, sorry, Ood. Still quite unusual, I’ve got to…”
She was interrupted by a heaving gasp from the man as he rose even further, allowing the blanket to fall off him as he rose to face her.
“Holy…” she breathed as she took in his features.
His head was bald and perfectly pale except for a few reddened patches which looked almost as though they could be some severe form of psoriasis. His face was the same deathly shade of white; with a yellow tinge which looked like that of cholera victims from particularly grim BBC docudramas. His eyes were black; so black she couldn’t distinguish pupil from iris; could barely see the whites of his eyes for all the darkness there. The blueness of the veins, standing out blaringly against the paleness of his skin, made him look like an alien. Yes. That was it; a choleric alien with psoriasis. Made perfect sense really…
“Blood…” came the hiss in a voice which was stronger and, she noted with a stab of fear, feral.
Oh shit. She’d found a cannibal.
“Look…” she murmured, taking a step back only for it to be matched by a predatory step of his own, “Whatever’s the matter with you I can help. We can go into the store and I can phone an ambulance. Get you some treatment for…for whatever it is that’s…okay stop. Stop moving; stop coming…”
She took two quick steps backwards in succession and bit back a yelp when she felt her back connect with the car park wall. The man’s eyes seemed to sharpen and she gulped in breath after breath as she began to panic. This was bad. This was very bad. Why had she parked underground? Why had she worked until dark? Why had she tried to help an obvious lunatic instead of getting in her car and going to meet Marie at the cinema?
The man’s face morphed from caved with hunger to gleeful with the aid of a grotesque smile; in one fluid movement. He continued his approach and Beth looked around wildly for a route of escape. He was barely two steps away though; if she ran he’d catch her. But talking wasn’t working; it never worked, not with murderous psychos.
“You don’t have to do this…” she tried, pulling everything she ever remembered from every episode of Criminal Minds she had ever watched
He tilted his head, continuing the motion into a wide circle as the bones clicked and he licked dry, cracked lips in some sort of perverse satisfaction as he did so. Once he was looking at her straight on again he smiled; that same dangerous, terrifying smile he had given her to begin with and answered in a husky croak,
“Yes; I do.”
He snarled and she swore violently as his canines seemed to lengthen and sharpen before her eyes, the snarl turning into a rumbling growl as droplets of blood began to fall from where the fangs had seemingly grown from. Beth found herself completely unable to move as she stared at the creature before her. Not a man, she knew it couldn’t be a man…but then what?
“You wished to help me…” the creature murmured in a darkly dangerous tone; eyes fixing on hers as it came so close she could feel shaking breaths on her face, see every discoloured vein and smell every drop of blood, “…this is your chance.”
He inched closer and, despite every nerve in her body screaming at her to run, to push the…the thing away and run as fast as she could and never look back, there was something about those eyes that held her in place. The black caverns boring into her, drawing her in, telling her that she was safe, that it was alright to just give up…
He jolted against her and she closed her eyes, waiting for whatever was going to happen to happen. Her hoodie had fallen open, revealing her work shirt underneath. It was when she felt something wet against her stomach; a damp sort of feeling which was cold enough to make her suck in a breath of surprise, that her brain once again kicked into gear. With an almighty shove she pushed the man…creature…whatever over and away from her and darted around the fallen thing; racing over to press herself against a nearby pillar. After a moment’s shallow panting; a resultant combination of running and panic all mangled together, Beth dared to flicker a glance around the pillar and toward the man thing. He was slumped where she had left him; seemingly unmoving, and surrounded by…
Her right hand flew down to her stomach and she touched her shirt to see it come away dark red with blood...yet she was not injured. There wasn’t any pain. Holy shit - had she killed him? How? She’d just being standing there whilst he…no. It couldn’t have been her. She didn’t have anything that could…
Her eyes fell to her left hand; bloodied despite the fact that it hadn’t come into contact with her stained shirt, and the set of keys gripped in it. However they keys were not her main focus. No, what gripped her attention was the small Swiss Army Knife key ring she’d nicked from some University fair when she was eighteen. The small nail file which was part of the cheap promotional tool was out and covered in blood. When had that happened? She didn’t remember flicking out the…
“Nice work; though you should know that if he’d eaten in the last twelve hours your little stick ‘em and run act wouldn’t have saved you.”
Beth jerked at the sound of the voice; another man, though this one decidedly less…ravenous sounding, coming from her left. She instantly spun to face him; tiny file like knife before her and pointed at him with a shaking hand. He was tall, pale skinned but without the blue veins and with a healthy head of dark curly hair. His eyes were a startling green and they were set above a nose which had evidently been broken more than once in the past from its less than perfect line. His jeans, check shirt and combat boots were a complete contrast with the dishevelled appearance of the thing. Nevertheless her survival instinct was now in full swing; and it was telling her to trust no one.
“Fuck off,” she warned him in her best scary Midlands voice, “You saw…saw what I did. I’ll do you too.”
“Will you? Well that I admit I would like to see…” he gave her a wink and raised a brow almost simultaneously in a way which confounded her completely.
“Oh stop arsing around will you Gabe? She’s obviously all shaken up – and no wonder. You alright mate? I know you feel a bit…odd right now but trust me you’ll get over it.”
Beth whirled around, turning her back to the first man (Gabe?) to face another.
He was tanned; looked like he could be Spanish or Mexican in descent, with big brown eyes and longish brown hair pulled back in a ponytail. He wore a similar outfit to the other; a white t-shirt, jeans and boots – though he had a hoodie similar to hers over the top of the ensemble which was in track grey. His look was sympathetic as he ignored the knife she was wielding and instead focused on her face.
“Look she’s only a baby…what’s your name?”
She eyed the man incredulously, pathetically small yet heavily bloodied knife still pointed resolutely towards the speaker, and asked,
“Last person I asked that self-same question to tried to…” she stopped, unsure as to what she was going to say.
“Tried to drain you dry?” the man called Gabe interjected, “Yeah…Vamps will do that.”
December 13th 2009
“No one lives for oneself and no one dies for oneself. For if we live we live for the Lord and if we die, we die for the Lord…”
Evan closed her eyes and tightened her fists; the pressure of her ragged fingernails, already cutting deep into her palms, increasing with the action.
Everything had gone so very wrong. One moment he had been there, with her, fighting at her side and the next…the next he had been defenceless; out of wooden bullets, out of stakes and crosses and anything useful – and too far away for her to help. She’d shouted for him to run. He ran.
Now he was gone.
It was her fault. That was what it came down to. She should have gone after him, fought better, fought harder, and gone after him. But she hadn’t. And by the time she’d found him it was too late. He was already one of them.
“Evie?” murmured a voice.
She didn’t look up but she knew who was speaking. John; steadfast, dependable John whose dog collar was firmly in place and Bible was in hand as he stood beside her. She hadn’t noticed him finish the service; hadn’t noticed that people had begun to meander away, talking quietly amongst themselves, clad in the same black as she was but without even half of the grief in their hearts.
“It was a beautiful service, John.” she answered his unspoken question with a wooden voice which she barely recognised as her own, “Thank you.”
His hand came up, as though to touch her arm, but at the last minute it hovered and finally dropped back down to his side. She watched the action avidly; finding it easier to focus on than his eyes; chocolate brown and eternally understanding as they were. She couldn’t bear pity. Not now.
“Evie I am so sorry,” he finally breathed.
“Don’t…” she replied in a tone which shook. She was barely clinging onto her self-control.
“Evan, please…God knows I never…”
“God?” she asked suddenly, hearing the word and latching onto it with a sort of deranged vigour, “What’s God got to do with this, John? God let him die. God took Wil away from me. After everything…after everything Wil ever did in the name of the church, in the name of our Lord all bloody mighty, it was still decided that he didn’t deserve life. Didn’t even death; turn out. After everything he did and gave for this world he got Hell.”
She looked up, tears of anger and pain mingling together in eyes as green as her brother’s as she met the eyes of the Pastor.
“How can there be a God as cruel as that?”
He didn’t react with shock or horror as she had half expected him to. She supposed he was used to seeing people question their religion. He merely stood with her beneath the heatless winter sun looking down at the grave stone which lay before them; planted already in the Earth as there was no casket to be buried. There was no body. Not one they could bury at any rate. Not yet.
In Loving Memory of
Wilhelm Schmidt
Born 3rd March 1978
Died 29th November 2009
Warrior, Brother; Husband
20th November 2011
“Excuse me?” Beth asked faintly; too shell shocked to continue waving around the knife and instead letting the blade fall limply at her side.
“Vamps. Vampir, Vampyre, Vrykolakas, Strigoi…Luc, you got any others?”
“I think some people refer to them as Succubus….ouch!”
The sympathetic man, Luc he had been called, threw a hand up to his ear and tugged something which looked like a plastic in ear headphone out before shouting into it irritably,
“God in heaven Michael will you keep to the indoor voice?!”
“Now, now; no need for blasphemy…” interrupted Gabe in a teasing tone.
“Bugger off,” replied Luc good-naturedly; re inserting the headphone carefully as he spoke, “By the way Mikey insists that Succubi are different things entirely…” he paused for a moment, as though listening intently, before adding, “They’re sex monsters; apparently.”
“Sex monsters? Danny boy never mentioned them…”
“Okay - you two need to hold the fuck up.” Beth interrupted; her eyebrows had risen so high at their casual conversation her forehead hurt, “Are you saying that that…” she pointed over to the body of the thing which had attacked her; still lying where she had left it on the tarmac, “…thing is a vampire?”
“Disappointed that they don’t sparkle?” asked Gabe mock seriously.
“Gabe…” sighed Luke.
“I mean it had fangs…they just sort of appeared and I thought that maybe it was an alien…or a cholera patient or…I don’t know. Am I being Punk’d? Has Ashton gone international?”
“Nope; wouldn’t be here if that wanker were within a hundred yards. Or miles; either works.” Gabe answered in what she was fast beginning to think of as his typical shitty humour, “You’re looking at your first Vampire encounter. Congratulations. You’re not dead. Nice one.”
Beth looked over to the body lying near her car and shuddered involuntarily. She could smell the blood on her; the darkly metallic tang sticking in her throat.
“Isn’t it meant to…well…be all dusty?” she asked quietly of no one in particular.
“That’s not how it works matey – for it to become dust buster fodder you need to stake it through the heart or expose it to sunlight. Or decapitate though once I did that and the head hit Wil straight in the…and then of course with all of those ways that you’d be left behind with the blood. Though with this one there isn’t much to leave I reckon…”
“…okay…” murmured Luc from his position, moving round to join Gabe with a look of concentration on his face, “Yeah, alright…got it. Tell Pastor we’re on route; one potential Vamp snack in tow.”
He looked over to Gabe; the two men’s eyes meeting for a long moment before Luc announced,
“Evan’s coming; she’ll be here in three minutes. Moore’s been hurt – not bad but there’s a bite.”
“So he’s a…he’s one of them?” Beth asked; unable to say the word Vampire. It was too weird; too unbelievable. Her mind was still desperately trying to find another solution.
“You watch too many movies,” Gabe commented, “He’s bit – no better or worse than if Hannibal Lecter took a chunk out of him. Messy, yeah – and mighty painful I’d reckon; nothing more. Luc you take out Nail File Fido there. Evan’ll have our balls if he reappears in a couple of weeks because we didn’t finish him off.”
Luc nodded stoically and strode over to where the body of the thing that attacked Beth lay. She watched with morbid fascination as Luc approached, stuck out a booted foot and pushed the creature onto its back. She jerked instinctively when she heard a weak moan coming from the body. She was too far away to see its face but she knew the features. She feared she’d never forget them. Luc reached to his belt and pulled out a stake of wood – she hadn’t noticed it before but then it wasn’t all that noticeable. Nothing more than a thick splinter really, about as long as her forearm and bearing a razor sharp tip. Without hesitation Luc moved in a fluid, deadly motion – driving the spike downwards and plunging it into the chest of the creature.
She gasped as the thing twitched wildly for a few long moments before going terribly still and then, in a sort of soft, gradual manner, beginning to disintegrate before her eyes; like too much salt in too little water. She didn’t look away, even though the proof of the supernatural story the two men had told her was making her feel decidedly sick, and watched tremulously until there was nothing but a pile of ashy dust and old clothes on the ground where once the body had lain. What little blood she could see was soaked up by the ash and by the time Luc had used his boot to kick the dust out and spread it, hand over his mouth as he did so, there was barely any trace that the monster had ever even existed.
“We should get her back to St. Anthony’s; that blood will draw any survivors from that Nest if she stays here…” Gabe was the first to speak; his voice more neutrally toned than it had been since she had first heard him speak.
“Everything go alright?” asked a voice from behind them; where the footpath based entrance to the car park lay.
They all turned to see a woman approaching; dark hair cut in a just past shoulder length mass and practical jeans, black tank top and hoodie combination along with sturdy looking combat boots marking her as part of the group. Trailing in her wake was another man; chestnut hair a mass of curls atop his head and face a pallid white as he moved much more slowly. One hand was holding a wadded shirt to his neck and, on further inspection, she realised that below the jacket that was fastened across his chest he was probably bare chested.
“This one stabbed it with a bloody nail file,” announced Gabe, gesturing lazily towards Beth. “Luc finished it. But the girl’s covered in Vamp juice – we’ll have to…”
“Have you told Michael?” the woman asked abruptly, cutting him off.
“Yeah; he’s aware that we’re on route to St. Anthony’s plus one. John says it’s all fine so…”
“So let’s go,” she answered; her featured arranging for the first time in something near to a gentle expression. It wasn’t a smile, not quite, but the corners of her mouth definitely lifted slightly, the hardness of her eyes lessening as she spoke to Gabe.
“Yes ma’am. Moore going to make it alright?”
“He’s an idiot but he’ll be fine,” she responded dismissively, looking back to the injured man all the same as if to check that her supposition was correct. “He tried to go all Bruce Lee on a Vamp.”
“You’re right,” Luc broke in as Gabe let out a sharp, bark like laugh, “He is stupid.”
“Am I being kidnapped?” Beth asked in a faint voice.
“No, you’re being rescued,” Gabe answered with a raised brow and sardonic smile, “You stay here, go anywhere that doesn’t require an invite or doesn’t exist on consecrated ground; even driving home or hopping on the bus, and you’re Vamp nibbles. That bastard,” he gestured to where the thing had lain, “Came from a Nest twenty strong and we’ve only taken down seven so far. They smell the blood of their kin on you…well; bad times for you. So we have a church and we intend to take you to it until you’ve reached at least five showers and dawn. Then you’re free to do whatever you like. Until then I suggest you stop being painfully dim and go with the flow.”
There was a pause where everyone seemed to focus their attention on her; the injured man named Moore, the woman referred to as Evan, the spectacularly sarcastic Gabe and sympathetic yet business like Luc – all just staring as she hesitated. Going off with people she didn’t know sounded like a properly stupid idea. However there was no denying that the thing that had attacked her…well – it wasn’t human. And the people arranged before her seemed to know what they were doing so…wasn’t it better to play it safe and go with those who looked vaguely none cannibalistic?
“Alright…” she sighed finally, reasoning that if anything freaky went down she still had her mobile and her thus far trusty Swiss Army key ring, “…but I reserve the right to make a phone call and or leave at any time. And I want answers; about the thing that attacked me and about you; all of you.”
The demand was met with an exchange of glances. Luc and Gabe looked to one another and then simultaneously turned to Evan. Moore hadn’t bothered to focus on anyone but the dark haired woman; his expression dark as he waited for her reaction. She met Beth’s eyes candidly and held the connection for a few moments. Beth did her best to keep her own stare honest and yet stern. She wasn’t sure of the effect but it must have done some good because a moment later the other woman nodded once; a sharp, affirming motion. She then abruptly looked away; as though uncomfortable with such direct contact. Beth ignored the reaction and instead responded by looking to Gabe and announcing,
“Then I’m in - lead on, Macduff.”
“You know that wasn’t actually in Macbeth,” Gabe answered, turning and following after Evan who, at Beth’s concession, had already begun to move off out of the carp park; Moore hot on her heels.
“I know…it’s just something people say though isn’t it?” she answered with just as much sarcasm as he had given. “I mean people don’t actually swing cats to see how much room they’ve got. Or go about literally painting town centres red on a Friday night…”
“You’ve obviously never been to Manchester on a Friday night,” inputted Luc who had fallen into step beside her; forcing Gabe to fall back in line if he wanted to keep in with the conversation.
“…well you know what I mean,” she reasoned, “They’re all just idioms.”
“Who’s been swallowing dictionaries?” asked Gabe as they exited the car park and, to Beth’s innate relief, began to head up onto the main, open air car park above.
“Is that a literal reference?” she answered sharply.
“I think we’ve got a fiery one here, Gabe,” Luc sounded amused as he looked over at the other man. The only response was a grunt which could have been confirming or denying the fact.
She walked with the men across the car park; through the hustle of post nine to five shoppers; all of them parking and leaving and being generally brusque as they contemplated that they had another hour before going home thanks to the necessity of eating. Evan and Moore were already at a vehicle; a battered off white Land Rover that looked like it had barely made it out of the seventies; let alone all the way to two thousand and eleven. Evan shoved a key into the passenger side and pulled herself up into the front seat; Moore pulling the back open and climbing inside.
“It’s a classic,” said Luc, somewhat defensively as he looked at Beth.
“My car once got mistaken for scrap; there will be no judgement here.” was her only answer.
She and the two men reached the car and whilst Gabe climbed into the driver’s side Luc took Beth round the back and held the door whilst she got in. She took her seat, strapping the waist belt around her securely and looking at Moore; seated to her right and still pale as he clutched his neck, and forward to the back of Gabe’s head as he started up the engine. The rumbling of the car was accompanied by the snap of Luc shutting the door and a moment later they were rolling away. She fished her phone out of her bag and sent a text to Marie; who no doubt was already waiting outside the cinema for her;
Sorry; rain check for tonight? See you tomorrow.
She refrained from adding ‘hopefully’ to the end.
February 2010
“I love you.”
She turned over onto her stomach and smiled at the figure laid next to her. His soft blue eyes; warm in their shade, were fixed on her. She loved those eyes; she had always had - even before she’d decided she loved the rest of him just as much. His Scandinavian blondness; the white blonde hair, pale lashes and ivory skin, were a cold outer reflection on a man with a heart as warm as his.
“I know,” she answered with a small smile. He rolled his eyes.
“You could say it back; just a suggestion. Politeness and all…”
“Why?” she answered quietly; her eyes fixing on his as she continued to smile softly, “Don’t you know by now?”
He tilted his head to one side and pouted. She laughed; he always made her laugh, and shuffled up the bed to lay her head on his chest.
“I love you. I will to my last breath; longer. If I know nothing else about myself I know without a shadow of a doubt that you are, and have been, and will always be the best part of me.”
She raised her head again and finished with a crooked smile,
“There; is that good enough for you?”
His kiss was gentle when it came; the soft movement of his lips on hers – his hands moving downwards so one was at the small of her back and the other resting at the nape of her neck. He was so warm and sweet and…
Her eyes opened all but involuntarily and she let out a slow; audible breath as the realisation hit her. He was gone. She had lost him. Evangeline rolled from her back onto her side, pressing the side of her face into the pillow as she did so. It was damp to the touch; damp with tears that she hadn’t realised she had shed – tears that even now fell silently as she remembered what had been taken from her. The sound of movement in the next room passed her by – it wasn’t unusual for Gabe to be wondering around at three in the morning when they had the rare chance to sleep the night through. He often left his room for hours at a time long after they’d all taken to their beds and didn’t return until so late it was early. She would have to talk to him about that; his insomnia would be bad for his reactions and he needed to be fast and alert so that he didn’t…so that he didn’t end up like Wil.
She squeezed her hands into fists at the thought; as though her body was rejecting it. She had already lost a husband and the pain had almost killed her. She would not lose a brother too.
20th November 2011
Thus far no one had spoken. Beth sat uncomfortably in her seat, looking at the various things passing by as Gabe drove and wondering just what she thought she was doing. Sure she had been attacked by a crazy…and yes that crazy had apparently turned to dust when Luc had stabbed it but still…she’d seen the Stranger Danger PSA’s from the nineties. Going solo with a group of randomers didn’t exactly scream mature and responsible action.
The man sat next to her, Moore, grunted slightly as he shifted in his seat. Beth looked at him curiously; taking in the pale skin that almost all members of her new buddy system seemed to share along with that positive mop of tangled brown curls and, from her side view, she could glimpse the grey blue colouring of one eye. It was only when he turned his head to look at her full on that she realised she had been staring.
“Are you alright?” she blurted out; trying to cover the awkwardness of being caught.
“Yeah; it’s nothing,” he murmured; speaking for the first time.
“You’re American?” she half asked and half stated; surprised by the subtle and yet still present hint of an accent so unlike the others in the car.
“No shit Sherlock,” came Gabe’s voice from the front, “Our Danny has been in Blighty for more than a decade now though so he’s lost his twang a lil’” he finished in a very fake and over the top Southern drawl which caused Luc to snort in the back and Moore to merely grimace; though whether that was due to Gabe’s insult or the pain she couldn’t be sure.
“Are you sure you’re alright?” she asked again, “I know I haven’t seen the…you know…”
“Bite.” Luc supplied from behind them.
“Yeah –the…bite,” she agreed uneasily, “But there’s a lot of blood on that shirt and…”
“It’s nothing,” he responded in a soft voice, “John has the stuff I need to be fixed up just fine at St. Anthony’s. Thanks though…for asking.”
She smiled slightly at the insecurity in the man’s voice. He had to be in his late thirties or even early forties; the eldest of the group with, as far as Beth could work out, Evan in her late twenties and Gabe and Luc younger still – Luc maybe twenty three or four and Gabe not much older. However Moore seemed by far the least sure of himself, the whipping boy if she were to put a name to it. In contrast Gabe and Luc seemed tighter than brothers from the banter and few shared glances between the two and Evan seemed…well she seemed detached from the others.
Get me; psychoanalysing the crazies I’ve hitched a ride with, she mused.
“What’s your name?” asked Moore suddenly; breaking the quiet himself for the first time.
“Oh…I’m Elizabeth Pierce. Beth…I mean everyone calls me Beth so…”
“Beth,” Moore repeated with a smile, “I’m Daniel Moore.”
“Nice to meet you Daniel Moore,” she answered with a smile. “So where in…?”
“When you’re done flirting with Yankee Doodle…” came Gabe’s voice – much sterner now than it had been just moments before; laced with a grim turn of humour, “Y’all might want to look at what’s head on and straight at a hundred yards …”
Beth looked up to the front to see Evan had unbuckled her belt and was stood on her seat in a crouched position; a gun in one hand with a finger caressing the trigger as she pointed it at the windshield. Beth hadn’t even noticed the other woman moving; so stealthy had she been. Gabe had slowed the Rover to a crawl and she noted that his hands were clenched so tightly on the steering wheel that his knuckles were white. Breathing at her ear told her Luc had scrambled forward from his seat and was peering into the murky darkness ahead. Which brought her to the strange realisation...it was dark. Looking back there were streetlights lit, buildings ablaze with security lights and houses which were lit from the inside. Yet ahead of them there was no light; every streetlamp, every house and building…they were all swamped in a pitch darkness which the cloudy night did nothing to alleviate.
“What is it?” Beth asked; not ashamed at the fear she could hear in her own voice.
“Vampires,” whispered Luc from beside her.
“How do you know that?” she breathed in return, “I mean it could be a power cut or…”
“You smell of their dead kin and Moore smells like take out. All that blood…of course they’ve tracked us. You need to stay down and stay quiet. You too USA – keep the new girl out of it.”
“Shh,” breathed Evan. Her simple contribution instantly caused the whole car to go deathly silent. By now Gabe had stopped driving; allowing the car to coast to a halt at the edge of the dearth of light.
“Luc, you cover back,” she murmured; her voice deceptively calm as she spoke, “Gabe you’re front cover. Moore can keep the girl safe…” she paused and slid her free hand up to pull at a catch at the back of the gun; the definitive clicking sound of what she knew was the safety being disabled making Beth clench her teeth with a kind of dread.
“What about you?” Gabe asked in an urgent hiss, “Evan you can’t be…”
“It’s him,” Evan replied simply, “I can feel it.”
With that she opened her door, slid out of the car before anyone could say another word and stepped out in front of the Rover without preamble. She raised the gun so that it pointed straight into the centre of the blackness and held her position steadily; as though waiting.
“Fuck…” Gabe cursed, fumbling around before eventually there was a snick as the Rover’s headlights blared into being; casting a light which Beth found blinding for a moment.
She blinked, her eyes adjusting, and she could see Evans’ form silhouetted in front of the car. The headlights led a path of light out into the dark – revealing absolutely nothing except for an eerily quiet and empty street. She felt Daniel move to her side and her eyes widened as he pulled out a wooden cross and handed it to her silently.
“I’m not religious…” she breathed as quietly as she could whilst still making sound.
“Doesn’t matter,” his own deep rumbling tone was nothing more than a soft burr as he spoke; the American accent more pronounced than before, “It’s been blessed – it’ll hold them off if worst…”
“I’ve got movement behind,” Luc interrupted in a quiet yet business like voice.
“I think I can see something moving in the shadows up ahead too. Unless it’s Fledglings we’ll be fine as long as we stay in the light…”
“Will Evan do that though?” asked Moore.
His answer was a stiff silence.
April 2010
“…call upon you in our time of sorrow; that you give us strength and will bear our heavy burdens…”
She stopped abruptly; her eyes opening sharply as she heard footsteps at the back of the church. She looked up from her position; knelt before the altar, and turned to see Gabe standing there watching with an impassive face.
“I thought we weren’t supposed to ask for our burdens to be borne for us,” he announced blithely, “Just for the strength to carry them ourselves.”
“Sometimes that’s not possible.” was her reply.
She rose from the ground, her stiff muscles protesting as she did so, brushing off her jeans from the dust which naturally accumulated in a place such as St. Anthony’s. As she did so he walked down the length of the church; continuing straight for her until he reached the front pew. There he took a seat; his elbows resting on his knees as he looked down at his own interlocked hands.
“You know how I feel about this,” he began suddenly; all joking aside for the first time, as far as she could recall, since Wil’s funeral, “The constant praying, kneeling before the altar all day and night, begging Him for something…” Gabe stopped and sighed; lifting his head to meet her eyes for the first time since he had sat, “Do you even know what you’re asking for?”
Two sets of green eyes, almost identical in shade and shape, locked together as brother and sister looked at one another with despair.
“I want…” she began in a soft whisper, her voice broken as she spoke, “I want…to be numb. I want…no, no I need not have to feel this…this pain; this hole inside my heart, inside my soul. I just want to be free of it. If He cannot do that then…who do I turn to?”
“To me!” Gabe exclaimed fervently, “To your brother, Ev. Or if not me then talk to John – bloody hell you know John loves you more than life itself; worships the ground you walk on. You know he’d do anything for you. If its spiritual guidance you need then…”
“I can’t,” she interrupted; her voice notably stiffer, colder than it had been before.
“Why?” Gabe asked, “You know I can understand you not wanting to talk about this with me. It makes sense really. I’m your little brother; your smart aleck kid brother – but John’s been with us since the beginning. I thought you…”
“Don’t,” she urged him; the hardness in her tone painful in the echoing church, “Just…don’t.”
“You know John got an offer…about three or four years ago now. From somewhere high up…I never really found out all the details; it’s only through eavesdropping that I knew it happened at all. But he turned it down – a chance at escaping the danger of being a contact and finally being safe. He turned it down, Ev – for you. Even though he knew you only had eyes for Wil by then. He still stayed. Because he knew you couldn’t do this without him.”
She was silent for a long time; the only sound the faint pattering of rain hitting the church roof as they sat together; brother and sister. She had been avoiding John since the funeral; something that had not gone unnoticed. They had been friends for years; she’d first met him when she was a slightly caustic fifteen year old that had born more resemblance to Gabe in nature then she ever cared to think of. He had been just shy of twenty one; a very young and serious man of God in training. She had thought him ridiculous for all of five minutes – until she realised that he was something the world was seriously lacking in; a good man.
“It’s the way he looks at me sometimes…” she breathed so quietly she could barely hear her own words. However she knew Gabe was listening; was catching every second of confession; he might have been her idiot kid brother but he understood her better than most.
“It reminds you of Wil?” Gabe asked gently.
“It reminds me that he’s gone.” she replied plainly.
“You’re my sister, Ev,” Gabe answered slowly, “Which means that by law I have to both love and hate you at the same time – not always in equal measure.”
She gave him a watery smile as he continued,
“But you know that we’re here for you. Me and Luc, Mikey, John…we’re here. And we’d take the pain if we could…because we all love you. We’re all family.”
She let out a shaky breath and pressed down the tears which filled her eyes. Standing she moved over to where Gabe sat and moved a lock of hair behind his ear; allowing their eyes to meet in a look of understanding which only could be shared between two people who had experienced as much as they had together.
“When did you get so wise?” she murmured gently.
“Must have taken a class,” he replied sincerely, “Because I sure as hell didn’t get it from you.”
20th November 2011
“I thought Vampires were only susceptible to sun…”
“Look Miss Movie 24 – forget everything you knew about these things. They’re demons, yeah, monsters from the darkest depths of hell. But half the bullshit you’ve ever heard is just that – bull.”
There was quiet after Gabe’s hushed and yet vehement outburst before Moore gently added in a suppressed and yet hurried whisper,
“The older they are the more light hurts them. The demon inhabiting the body of a human causes the body to bond with the monster – genetically. There’s no light in hell. Their pupils are constantly dilated so they can see in even the most pitch of blacks meaning…”
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