When Darkness Comes

by Wilbanks, G. Allen

  The Friends are dangerous and, as I had learned to my regret, not completely trustworthy, but they can be efficient when dirty work needs to be done. Perhaps a little over two hours had passed since I arrived at the warehouse when a knock on the door echoed through the building. I opened the heavy metal door to find six men outside. Two of the men held the arms of one badly beaten, bound and gagged captive. Their support appeared to be the only thing holding him upright. The remaining three arranged themselves in a loose triangle around the middle group, looking nervously about for any signs of approaching threat as they provided their comrades with a security escort.

  The captive they supported was a Hispanic man, perhaps in his mid-thirties. He had shaggy brown hair that fell forward over his forehead and partially covered his thick black eyebrows and dark brown eyes. His deeply sun-burnished skin and broad features indicated an ancestry much closer to the equator than our current location, but beyond that I was unable to place any definitive country of origin. He probably stood close to five feet nine inches tall and weighed no more than one hundred sixty pounds; not terribly imposing for one who had recently instilled such fear in me. He might have at one time been handsome, but now it was difficult to tell. Blood covered his lips and chin, most of it flowing from an obviously broken nose, and there was a darkly bruised lump swelling under his right eye that told me the Friends had been none too gentle while collecting him from the hotel. He was hurt, but conscious, and he stared at me intently. I did not see fear in his face, only careful assessment as though he were sizing me up and estimating his chances of escape. Or perhaps killing me.

  “Bring him in,” I ordered. “Take that rope and bind him to a support beam. I don’t want him getting loose.”

  “Excuse me, sir?” interrupted one of the kidnappers.

  “Yes, Jack?” I asked the man, the same one I had spoken to on the phone earlier. Not coincidentally, also the same man who had rescued me from squalor and despair on these identical city streets three long years ago.

  “Why don’t you use the shackles? They will hold him better than the rope.”

  “Shackles?” I stared at him, confused and feeling slightly stupid.

  “Yes. Over here.” He walked to a light switch set on one of the central building support walls. With a fingernail he pried the plastic faceplate away to reveal two buttons underneath. Jack depressed the top button and a section of the wall swung outward to reveal a shallow concealed booth approximately seven feet tall and four feet deep. Steel shackles hung on chains bolted to the back of the space; shackles designed to attach to ankles, wrists and neck.

  “You see,” continued Jack, “we outfitted this place to meet any needs you, or someone like you, might have. The room is completely soundproofed so you can close it during the day and nobody will hear the person inside if they decide to call for help.”

  I grinned like a child on Christmas morning. After all these years, Jack was still taking care of me like my own personal guardian angel. “Perfect,” I told him, clapping him on the shoulder. “Lock him in. Did you bring his possessions?”

  One of the other men retrieved a military-style, khaki duffel bag from outside, dragged it in and set it down at my feet.

  “Thank you all for your assistance in this matter, gentlemen. Jack, when this is all over, I have to find some way to thank you properly. I might even have to bring you over.”

  Jack smiled broadly and bowed at the waist. “Thank you, sir. But you and I both know I am much more valuable to you as I am.”

  He was right, but I did not respond to the statement. I admit to being a bit nonplussed at his answer. Most of the Friends I knew would have leapt at my offer. Jack, for some reason I could not fathom, did not appear to want to be turned. He willingly assisted me when I needed help, including kidnapping a man he had never before met knowing the likely outcome for the victim, but he did not seem to want anything in return. I wondered why not. Where was the motive to turn on his fellow humans if it wasn’t to become immortal? What did he gain from our relationship?

  I glanced again at the ready-made holding cell in the wall and I shuddered as a slow chill crawled up my spine. The cell was ideal for me to use to hold Victor, but what did the Friends use it for the rest of the time? I was yet again reminded how dangerous these people were and I resolved I would never allow myself to fall back into their hands. Use them, yes. Trust them? No.

  I shook these thoughts away like the distractions they were. This was a riddle to solve another day. Right now I needed answers to a much more important puzzle: who was trying to kill me?

  “Secure him, and leave,” I told the men, focusing once more on the immediate problem. “Go to your homes. I can handle this situation from here. If any one of you returns for any reason, I will kill you then hunt down the others. I want no future discussion of this matter. Do you understand?”

  When all my potential witnesses had indicated understanding and departed – Jack handed me a ring holding a few keys as he walked out – I examined my new prisoner carefully. Although I removed the gag from his mouth, he did not speak right away. Except for a few experimental tugs, he also did not fight against his restraints. Instead, he continued to watch me closely, and I returned his interest. His continued silence finally forced me to begin the conversation. It was a dominance strategy, and by speaking first I was giving up some small measure of control, but ultimately my impatience won out.

  “Why are you after me?” I asked him, quietly. I tried to keep the heat and anger out my tone and posture. I needed to remain calm if I was going to get anything useful out of him.

  “I don’t even know who you are. I think you have made a mistake and grabbed the wrong person.” His voice stayed level and unconcerned. I heard no fear or confusion in his statement, in fact, he spoke as though we were simply discussing trivialities over lunch.

  “That is a possibility,” I conceded. “We shall have to see.” Taking a step back, I turned and located the duffel bag on the floor. I tapped it a few times with my foot experimentally. Nothing moved or spontaneously combusted. With a small intake of breath, I bent over and picked it up. Still nothing. With a glance at Victor, I made a few quick pulls at the nylon cord ties, jerked open the bag and dumped the contents onto the ground between the two of us.

  Most of the items that spilled forth gave me no further clue to his identity: spare clothes, a shaving kit, a couple of novels. A black leather wallet did fall out of the bag onto the ground, but the only items inside were about eight hundred dollars in cash, a California driver’s license for “Victor Daemon,” and a photograph of my captive standing next to a brunette woman and holding a little girl that appeared to be about two years old. They were all smiling, including the child who was flashing the kind of exaggerated grin kids seem to adopt anytime they see a camera pointed in their direction. Interesting, but not much real help.

  I took the photo and slipped it into my shirt pocket. I didn’t really want it, but I was attempting to break into Victor’s calm. To take back the tiny bit of control he had gained when I had broken our silence first and started asking him questions. If the woman and the child meant anything to him, then by keeping the photo I might get him thinking about why I was keeping it. What might I be planning to do with it? To the people in it? He didn’t give any visible reaction, but I knew the ideas I had planted were playing through his mind.

  With the contents of the duffel bag at my feet, I held up the empty bag and realized that it was still much too heavy. Heavy, and lumpy as well. I reached inside and found a square flap of material secured to one side of the bag by Velcro. With a distinctive ripping noise, the Velcro parted to reveal a pocket holding several artifacts of great interest to me.

  I delicately shook the remaining contents out of the bag onto the concrete floor. Among the concealed possessions were a bible, a large metal crucifix, several long wicked-looking daggers, three wooden stakes sharpened to jagged points, and four glass bottles, each about the siz
e of my open palm and filled with some sort of clear liquid. Avoiding contact with the bible and crucifix, I picked up one of the bottles. I tossed the now completely empty duffel bag aside and unscrewed the metal from the bottle. When I held it to my nose it had no odor; it appeared to be nothing more than water. I touched the open top and the same fiery pain I had experienced in my hotel room blossomed from my fingertip. I hurriedly but carefully resealed the bottle and set it back down.

  I faced Victor Daemon once more, wiping my burned finger on my shirt to remove any last traces of the toxic stuff I had touched. “No, Mr. Daemon. There has not been a mistake. You are very much the person I wish to talk to right now. You see, I am the vampire you tried to kill today, and I want to know why you are after me.”

  “I made a huge mistake,” he said, grimacing and shaking his head. All pretense of ignorance was now gone.

  “Trying to kill me?”

  “No. Letting you know I had been in your room. When I found you gone today I should have waited until tomorrow to try again. But I was angry at your luck and I wanted to make a statement. Vanity, I guess. So, I doused your room with holy water. Now that little act of stupidity has gotten me this.” He rattled the chains holding his hands. “I must admit, I expected you to panic and run, and I was preparing for a good chase. I didn’t expect you to come after me. I didn’t think you could.” As he spoke, I detected a slight accent in his speech. English was not his first language, but he had been speaking it since a very young age and the trace of foreign inflection was almost completely gone. I guessed, based on his cadence and a few drawn out vowels, that Spanish was his primary tongue. That really didn’t help me much in pinpointing where he was from, though. There were Spanish speakers from all over the world.

  “How did you find me?” he asked, shaking me out of my contemplation.

  “Mostly luck,” I admitted. “How did you track me?”

  He smiled. “Sorry. I can’t tell you. I’m still hoping somebody else might get you.”

  I did not feel very comfortable with this answer, but for the moment I let it go. “Let’s try an easier one. Why do you want to kill me?”

  “That is an easy one,” he said, grinning wide enough to flash a row of very white, if somewhat bloodstained, teeth. “You’re a devil in human guise that feeds on humanity. You need to be killed. I hunt vampires for a living, so I’m the one who gets to do it.”

  “I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a vampire hunter,” I mused aloud. This little revelation left me a bit unsettled.

  “Of course there are,” he chided. “If vampires are real, doesn’t it stand to reason that somebody is aware of them and wants them wiped out? Granted, the Church prefers not to openly admit the presence of vampires to the public,” he explained with a shrug. His chains clinked softly from the gesture. “Their goal is to quietly eradicate your kind without starting a widespread panic, or worse, be made to look foolish. So they hire people like me to seek you out and destroy you.”

  “Which church is this?”

  “Several, actually. But predominantly the Roman-Catholic Church. For some reason they really want to see your kind wiped out. I mean on a personal, vendetta kind of level. One of your ancestors really must have pissed someone off.”

  This last piece of information scared me more than I cared to admit. What started out as one man trying to kill me had suddenly blossomed into a global conspiracy to destroy me and my kind. I had serious enemies, and until that moment I had not even realized they existed. But I had to be careful not to let this man see how badly he had rattled me. I needed to stay in control of the conversation.

  “You hunt vampires for a living? How did you come across my trail?”

  “I told you I can’t tell you that. Suffice to say, more often than not, you guys blunder into us rather than the other way around.”

  “So you know how to kill a vampire? You know the difference between the facts and the bullshit myths surrounding us?”

  “Absolutely. I wouldn’t last very long in this business if I didn’t. In fact, why don’t you unshackle me and I’ll gladly give you a little demonstration on vampire killing.”

  “No,” I told him without humor. “But I will listen. Tell me everything you know.”

  “No.”

  I swore quietly. This man, this … vampire hunter, had information I needed. I had stumbled across a wealth of vampire lore and I had to find the key to unlock its source.

  “Would you rather die?” I asked, stepping closer and baring my teeth. They were still my teeth, unfortunately. In the months since leaving Niven, I had actually managed to figure out the method of growing my nails to razor points at will, but I still had not been able to mold my teeth into those elegant fangs I envied.

  “What are you going to do? Drink my blood? I don’t think so.” His tone was dismissive, perhaps even a little amused.

  I decided Victor needed a demonstration. Not enough to kill him, but just enough to show him I meant what I said. Besides, I figured I could use a little taste. I had fed the night before and so did not need the blood, but I was always happy to have a bit more. I embraced him in my arms, moving his head to one side with my hand and lowering my lips to his bared neck. As my teeth cut his flesh, his blood flowed warm and wet into my mouth. But rather than the nourishing salty-sweet taste I anticipated, the liquid roared into me on a tide of white-hot fire.

  Acid burned my tongue, my throat, and my stomach as I swallowed too quickly to prevent the poison from flooding into my system. My guts roiled and clenched in agony as they fought to purge themselves of the noxious fluid I had allowed inside me. I pushed away from Victor and vomited violently; the force of the contractions dropping me to my hands and knees as I retched and gagged in repeated uncontrolled spasms. I crouched on the ground, the muscles of my body tightening as my stomach fought to empty itself, the noxious fluid burning its way out as aggressively as it went in.

  Perhaps five minutes passed as I heaved and choked helplessly, struggling without success to regain control of myself. The pain only began to subside when I had at last expelled all traces of his tainted blood from my stomach. Even after the uncontrolled purging had stopped, I remained on the concrete warehouse floor in a pool of my own bloody vomit, shaking and weak. I glared up at the smiling vampire hunter with fear and hatred. Mostly fear.

  “What are you, Victor Daemon?” I managed to ask around a blistered tongue and mouth.

  “I’m very human, unlike you, creature. But four priests blessed my body and soul before I started this mission. My blood holds the fire and vengeance of God in it. It is like holy water coursing in my veins. Would you care for another taste?”

  I shook my head, slowly, as the motion made my stomach clench again. I even managed to laugh, a single bark of resignation. “No. I think one was sufficient.”

  Victor cocked his head in consideration. “You must not have been a vampire for very long. I’d guess less than twenty years. Otherwise you would have been hurt much more seriously. Lucky for you. Too bad for me, I guess.”

  After a few more seconds passed, I climbed to my feet, trying to hide the unsteadiness I still felt. I took a few experimental steps, pleasantly surprised that I didn’t immediately fall back to the ground, then I bent over and retrieved a sharpened stake from Victor’s property. “I suppose this will kill you easily enough. I will just have to be careful not to get any of your blood on me.” I raised the stake, holding the sharpened point up between us. “Last chance, Vampire Hunter. Will you answer my questions?”

  I saw the defiance in his face. His eyes moved from me to the weapon in my hand and stayed fixed on it for several seconds. Then, just as I feared I would have to kill him after all, he shrugged his shoulders lightly as though deciding a very trivial matter.

  “All right.”

  The capitulation came so suddenly and unexpectedly I almost stabbed him anyway, thinking it was another trick. But I resisted my first impulse. I had lived in ignoran
ce too long already, and he had information I desperately wanted. I lowered the stake.

  “I guess it can’t really hurt to tell you a few things,” he continued. I saw him glance once around the room, pausing briefly to examine the items at my feet. I believe he still thought at that moment that he could escape if only I allowed him to buy enough time to plan. “If I explained to a man how a gun works, the bullet would still kill him when I pulled the trigger. So talking to you probably changes nothing in the long run. I will answer what questions I can. But if you want to know anything about me, my family, or the people that hired me, you might as well just kill me now and be done with it.”

  I accepted his conditions. I had no interest in him or his precious Church. At least not at that moment. Only one real question needed immediate answering as far as I was concerned. “How do you kill a vampire?”

  Victor’s eyes once more met my own. “There is only one way. You must destroy his heart. The source of a vampire’s life force is in the heart. It must be burned, exposed to sunlight, or otherwise completely destroyed. Nothing else will work.”

  “What about a wooden stake?” I asked, holding up the weapon in my hand by way of example.

  “Stabbing a vampire through the heart will paralyze him. Wood seems to work best – I don’t know why – but anything will do in an emergency. The problem is once you pull the stake out the monster will recover. It does not kill them.”

  “Cutting off the head?”

  “No. Not fatal,” said Victor. “A vampire will regenerate lost limbs. The same is true for the head. Most vampires don’t survive decapitation simply because they are extremely vulnerable while they can’t see, hear, or feed. But if they are someplace safe from sunlight and any enemies, they will regenerate over time.”

  “What about the brain?” I asked. “If a vampire loses his head, does he lose his memories, his personality? Does he become someone … something else?”