Paranormal Division: Awakening

by Ellie J Duck

  Tara begins to snigger from the back seat when my face turns scarlet but it’s not like I can just pull away. If I don’t retrieve all the bullets, they’ll burn his flesh and contact for long enough can cause the silver to enter his blood stream, poisoning him.

  “Sorry; sorry; sorry,” I mutter, digging my hand between his thighs chasing one of the bullets he has flinched back from.

  “I’m going to take this out of your hide later, little human,” Hilton snarls at me, squirming against my hand when I resort to sticking it up the left leg of his shorts chasing a bullet that has rolled inside. The scent of melting flesh and the way Hilton is hissing in pain is enough to tell me how much it hurts so I grit my teeth against my embarrassment until I can retrieve them all.

  “I’m sorry,” I say again, still blushing furiously and choosing to avoid his gaze for the time being despite the weight of the glare I know he is levelling my way.

  “Don’t let it happen again,” he retorts in a cold voice and I nod my head without meeting his eye, unable to stop my hands from shaking and wanting desperately to get out of the car and far away where none of their super powered senses can pick up on how much I want to put my hands all over Hilton’s scorching flesh.

  After that everyone falls back into a tense silence as Hilton’s flesh starts to heal. I bite my lip to distract myself, recalling that while I’m here thinking inappropriate thoughts, there are vampires running rampant through the city slaughtering people. It’s my job to help put them down for what they’ve done, and I need to be thinking about that, not about how badly I wish Hilton was as interested in me as I am in him. I remind myself that it’s a pointless fantasy that he might’ve been affected by having my hands burrowing around in his lap beyond being annoyed, and maybe a little disgusted.

  The rest of the car ride is far less entertaining than the last and we drive in silence, leaning into the corners with every turn Tobias takes on the road. I try not to have heart failure when we reach the highway and he stomps on the gas so hard that every other car on the road becomes nothing but a blur to my human eyes. The ride to the city is ordinarily almost an hour, but this one takes only a little over thirty minutes and the minute we pull up the whole team scatters from the car, each of them already hooked up to the intercom we’ve all got shoved in our ears.

  “This way, Cane,” Summers says, straightening his suit as he walks toward where the cops are all standing around. “Everyone else, blend in and keep to the shadows when you can. We want to take these bloodsuckers out with as little attention as possible.”

  There are at least ten bodies in the alley and they are all grisly. There’s no remorse showing from any of the vamps this time. No indication that they took anything other than pure enjoyment from their meal and the casual way their victims’ bodies are discarded once drained rubs me the wrong way. It’s obvious from the sight of them that they’ve been cast aside like empty beer cans. A spark of anger forms in my chest over the idea that anyone could do such a thing.

  Don’t get me wrong, I have a deep understanding of killing; of the types of things that might drive a person to kill; of the way it can become an addiction that many can’t resist. I might have yet to take a life myself, but I have a very firm grasp of the types of monsters who can kill like this. In addition to rigorous training in the quiet few weeks leading up to now, Summers has been drilling my head full of information on paranormals and all of their individual quirks and quantifiers based on species. I know well that to be a vampire one must feed on the life force of humans to survive. I imagine that doing so and living forever unless killed in one of the three methods used to expire vamps gives them a skewed and unnatural perspective of the world. After all, as a human I rarely think about the beasts that go in my burger.

  I imagine feeding on the blood of humans whilst possessing heightened strength, speed and senses would make it hard to feel any compassion for a lesser species whose only purpose in my world would be continued existence for me. As such I try to remind myself that vamps are a little twisted at the best of times. It doesn’t help much, especially when I realize that among the ten or so bodies littering this alley, most of the victims are in their teens. Had I been raised in this state and this city like a normal girl instead of the daughter of the world’s best assassin, I’d probably have been at school with some of them. The idea that because of a rogue coven none of them will ever grow to their full potential or reach adulthood fuels the rage growing inside my chest and I find myself silently vowing that I will become the best this position has ever seen when it comes to protecting the innocent.

  I ignore the logistics when Greg begins speaking with the officers on the scene while the elusive clean-up team arrives and begins piling the bodies into cars. My gaze searches the shadows for signs of life that untrained human eyes don’t know to look for. The team is out there somewhere, I can hear them breathing through my intercom. Strange sounds come over the connection lines like muted struggling and I suspect that while I am here uselessly taking in the scene, the rest of the team is out there in the dark expiring vampires.

  When I notice a second, smaller alley leading off the one with the bodies, I wander away from them a little, following a trail of blood I find that leads away from the site of the ten bodies at the first scene.

  “There’s another body here behind the dumpster, Greg,” I say quietly, knowing my intercom will allow him to hear me. Knowing that even if I didn’t have the intercom, he would probably still here me across the alley.

  “Just one?” he asks.

  “I think so… no, wait…. there’s two… Summers one of them is a little girl. God, she can’t be more than seven years old,” I answer, my heart sinking when I realize there are two of them, clearly a mother and daughter. From the way they’ve been discarded I suspect they stumbled on the scene of death and were running away in terror. Their lifeless forms are pale and surprisingly undamaged after the grisly scene further back, making me think this murderous vampire was only interested in drinking them dry rather than killing them for any perverse enjoyment at watching an inferior body break.

  “I’m going to kill these blood-sucking vermin,” Brody’s voice comes through the earpiece, low and dangerous and filled with so much anger and hatred that I can practically feel it in my blood.

  “Anna?” a whispery voice calls out to me from somewhere in the dark and I frown, knowing it’s not the voice of anyone on the team. I draw my guns uneasily. Unholstering them both and clutching them in my hands, I’m more than ready to kill any vampire that tries to turn me into a midnight snack.

  “Anna?” Tara’s voice asks in the intercom. “You alright? You’re breathing just quickened?”

  “Did any of you hear that?” I murmur to the team, feeling the hair on the back of my neck begin to prickle with the sensation of being watched. It makes me uneasy and I begin to back slowly toward the scene where I left Summers. Or I try to. My feet don’t seem to want to co-operate and instead of stepping backwards I find myself involuntarily stepping deeper into the darkness and seclusion of the alley.

  “Hear what, Anna?” Greg asks sharply. “Where are you?”

  “In the alley off the scene….” I mutter. I feel funny, as though I’m not entirely in control of myself despite the way fear and paranoia begin to fester within me. The voice on the breeze calls my name again and despite knowing the danger, I find my feet being drawn toward it.

  “Damn it, Cane! I told you not to leave the sight of the team. Has anyone got eyes on Cane?” Summers asks.

  “I’ve got eyes on her,” an unfamiliar male voice says from behind me and I turn too slow, realizing what they’ve done. Strong hands with long deathly-pale fingers seize my upper arms.

  “Fuck!” Mitch’s voice snarls into my ear. “They lured her, boss. The leeches lured her!”

  “And now she’s all mine,” my attacker’s voice purrs right by my ear. His hold is tight and hurts my arms, but despite how the team have begun to cu
rse and snarl and the way my heart begins to race with the danger, I find myself unable to fight back.

  I feel petrified, as though I can’t move my limbs.

  “What have you done to me?” I demand, my voice sounding distant even to my own ears.

  “I’d be more concerned with what I’m going to do to you, Sweetling,” the vampire purrs before one of his hands leaves my arms and plucks the intercom out of my ear, dropping it to the pavement and crushing it beneath his boot. “Come along now, we can’t have your precious team of beasts stumbling across us before I’ve had my fun with you, can we?”

  I am vaguely aware of the sickly-sweet scent of death that lingers on the vamp as he slings me over his shoulder as though I weigh less than a sack of potatoes and moves so fast that I close my eyes against the nausea.

  “I’ve been so anxious to see you again, Sweetling,” the vampire purrs setting me on my feet again when we are several blocks away and inside an abandoned warehouse. I blink in shock when I look up into his face and see that despite the greyish tinge to his skin, the vampire is devastatingly handsome to look at. His eyes are lit from within and glow with an unnatural light that isn’t quite the sparkle of life. His skin is tinged grey and his hair is an ashy shade of blonde. His eyes are a muddy color I can’t quite describe

  “You’re the vampire who tagged me,” I accuse, my brain feeling sluggish and my limbs refusing to cooperate when I try to lift my hands, so I can shoot him.

  “Irving Novikov, at your service,” the vampire bows like a gentleman from a Jane Austen novel before flashing me a truly wicked smile that shows off the pair of lethal looking fangs inside his mouth. Fear slides down my spine like an icy finger and my heart begins to quicken. I can’t control my actions, I can’t even defend myself and I realize in that moment that the team was right; that I should’ve been much more concerned over being tagged on my last hunt. Had I known it meant he would be able to take my free will away from me I’d have never lied to Dad and the team that I was fine.

  As I stare at the unnervingly grotesque yet handsome vampire, I find a little voice in my subconscious that sounds suspiciously like Hilton’s blabbing at me with words like ‘I told you so’. If I die right now, I bet the smart-mouth werewolf will probably chisel the words ‘ha, ha, Tobias was right’ on my headstone.

  “What do you want with me?” I demand of the vampire - Novikov.

  “Just a little taste,” he murmurs, tonguing the fangs in his mouth as he slowly tilts my head to the side, exposing my neck and giving him full access to my carotid artery. I open my mouth in the hopes of screaming for help, but not a sound comes out.

  “What have you done to me that I can’t…? Urngh!” I begin, finding I can talk but not shout for help before I am cut off as he lunges, plunging his fangs into my skin. The agony of the bite rocks through my body to my core and I scream in pain before he slaps his hand over my mouth to muffle the sound. The feel of him drawing my blood from my veins in long deep draughts that weaken me with every pull is a curious combination of pleasure and pain and when Novikov nuzzles into me, humming with pleasure I realize that I’m totally screwed.

  Even if the team did hear me scream, they won’t get to me in time.

  “My, but you are positively brimming with all this pent-up desire and frustration, Sweetling,” Irving purrs, his voice throaty and hypnotic when he pulls back from me, leaving the wound on my neck to ooze sluggishly. I sway dizzily in his hold.

  “What?” I ask, feeling what little blood I have left rush to my cheeks when I realize he is leering at me.

  “Didn’t they tell you anything about my kind, little one?” he asks, amused now. “One taste of your blood and every thought and emotion in your body is mine to enjoy. It is more than the mere sustenance that drives my kind to the bite, Miss Cane. Through the taste of human blood, we vampires can once again feel all the emotions that belong only to the living, and you are far too sweet to use up in one sitting,” he practically purrs and the lecherous expression on his face combined with the cunning in those oddly glowing greyish-brown eyes sends a shudder through my frame.

  “Yes…” he hums, looking excited, “I think that there is far more fun to be had with you than my Mistress led me to believe. You have a zest for life which so few humans seem to have these days, and I simply cannot pass up the urge to see all that pent-up desire of yours come to fruition, so I can enjoy it for myself.”

  Dread pools in my stomach when he smiles widely, revealing bloodstained teeth to me before he leans in and captures my lips, giving me a sickening blood-flavored kiss.

  “What are you going to do?” I demand several minutes later, still unable to move to defend myself or even shove him away. I can’t even wipe the nasty taste of him from my mouth.

  “Oh, I’m going to do you a favor, Sweetling,” Irving Novikov assures me, moving around me until he is pressed up behind me, making me nervous. “Yes, I’m going to make you so happy you’ll come back to me, begging me to do it again.”

  “If you think I’m into necrophilia, you’re mistaken,” I say through gritted teeth, my skin crawling at the sound of the seductiveness in his tone. The laugh he gives in response is long and loud, and if I’m not mistaken it’s also a laugh of genuine amusement.

  “Don’t be silly, Sweetling, you’re a little too breakable for someone like me,” he tells me, petting my shoulder in a way that I suspect is meant to be reassuring although it only succeeds at making me feel like stabbing him.

  “Then what the hell are you talking about?” I demand before wondering why I’m not just trying to call for help from the team. Curiosity gets the better of me about what he could mean if he’s not planning to force himself on me any more than he already has.

  “I’m talking about the fact that I know what’s in your head. You’re my little plaything, Anna Giselle Cane,” he taunts me, and I try to open my mouth to scream but nothing comes out. “All that pent-up emotion you have; all that sexual-frustration; all that anger and fear and pain. I want that. So, I’m going to give you a gift, and in return you’re going to keep giving me your emotions via your blood.”

  “And what gift might you be giving me?” I demand, not at all intending to honor the deal he is trying to make with me. “I doubt you’re just going to let me go.”

  “I am, actually,” he hums. “I don’t need to kill you now. I don’t even need to do anything else to you. You’re tagged as mine, little girl. I have a hold over you that you’ll never be free of. And now that I’ve had a taste, I can do whatever I want with you. Through you.”

  A shudder rolls through me at the very idea.

  “You’re not going to warn him. You’re not going to tell him what happens between you,” he says, his voice taking on an entrancing quality that tells me he is compelling me to his will now. “The minute he touches you, things will be set into motion that can’t be undone. Things that he’s not going to remember. The second he lays a finger on you, the two of you will live out every fantasy you’ve ever had featuring that werewolf. And come the dawn, he won’t remember a thing.”

  “What are you talking about?” I ask, not really comprehending what he is telling me, “Who?”

  “Him,” Irving purrs to me, his cold hand coming up to caress the line of my jaw and tilting my head toward a door across the room just in time to see Tobias Hilton come charging through it looking ready to murder anything that moves. Dread pools in my stomach as I realize he’s just compelled me so that Hilton and I are in for a wild night.

  Irving presses his mouth to my ear and murmurs, “Have fun, Sweetling.”

  With that said, he disappears from behind me, teleporting away from here, although it doesn’t stop Tobias shooting in my direction. I flinch when my ability to move on my own returns suddenly with the disappearance of Irving Novikov, the psychotic vampire.

  “Are you alright, Cane?” Hilton demands, moving far faster than any human could as he crosses the room toward me. I blink at him s
lowly, before reaching for the stinging wound at my throat

  “I…” I trail off, feeling strangely out of it as I look at him.

  The realization comes to me too late and before I can warn him or stop him, Tobias reaches me, his hand going to my chin and tilting my head to better examine the wound on my throat. As his eyes glaze over, my stomach flips with the knowledge of what the vampire has done. Through me he has compelled every fantasy I’ve ever had about Hilton to become a reality. He means to use the emotion and the life-experience and the gratification that hooking up with Tobias will bring for his own perverted pleasure when he next bites me.

  I open my mouth, trying to warn Tobias. To tell him that no matter what he feels we can’t do this. That it’s wrong, but just as was the case when I tried to scream for help, nothing comes from my mouth.

  “I found her, Greg,” he says into his intercom, his voice is low and husky, making goose bumps prickle across my skin with the desire that crashes over me hotter and sharper than ever. The situation is not helped when I see that heat returned tenfold in the look he gives me. A little whimper escapes me when his hand on my chin moves to caress my jaw and tangle in the hair at the nape of my neck.

  “Get her back to base,” Greg’s voice is tinny and distant through the intercom still in Hilton’s ear and I wonder how Tobias is resisting the compulsion for a brief moment before realizing he’s not, as I spot his triumphant smile. “I and the rest of the team will hunt down as many of these bloodsuckers as we can. Tara’s been bitten, and Brody’s killed five of the leeches already. We’ll stay in the city until dawn hunting them and I’ll have the clean-up crew drop us off. Is Anna okay?”

  The hot gaze Hilton rakes over me is all encompassing and I can’t resist the urge to press myself against him, my hands holstering my guns of their own accord and then pressing against his chest hungrily. Electricity and heat race through me and the last real conscious thought I have before I am taken over completely by the compulsion Novikov has inspired in us both, is the reminder he gave me that come the dawn, no matter what happens, Tobias isn’t going to remember a thing.