by Phil Wohl
then concluded, “First thing is we have to find a way to bring our brethren back from a place that I am all-too-familiar with, the bottom of the ocean.”
“I hear you,” Emily concurred.
It took Cal 15 years to be released from his watery grave on the bottom of the ocean. He initially blamed Hartwell for his plight, but in more recent days had come to grips with his own part of the banishing. Cal knew that crossing the line and going after Sharon Phillips, who was a protector, would infuriate Hartwell. In hindsight, that was part of the reason why he did it in the first place.
Cal initially thought that he had his nephew, Andrew Brewster, to thank for his release. It was Drew who repeatedly banged his shark head into the rocks, which helped free Cal’s limp, water-logged body and send it to shore. But upon further inspection, it was Hartwell who triggered a series of events that led to Drew’s anger and subsequent taking it out on the rocks.
Everything in Cal’s life was an extension of Hartwel, and he spent so many years trying to untangle himself from the vampire, only to finally come to the realization that it wasn’t so bad after all. He had met and fallen in love with Sharon through Hartwell, and now they were happily married. Cal had also come knew that he was at his best when Hartwell was either across from him, or next to him. Simply, Hartwell brought the best out of him and he couldn’t imagine his life without the vampire.
“Is there any way we can get over there without being detected?” Daniel asked Kayla and Maxwell, as he sat down to lunch in town with his wife Nicole.
Maxwell proved to be a master strategist and Kayla had the power of protection.
Nicole could see that her son and his future wife were struggling with the weight of the question. Kayla had been overrun with baby and Max was totally preoccupied with impending fatherhood.
Nicole smiled at her husband, “Might be better to have this conversation tomorrow, or the next day, after Samuel comes out.”
Samuel couldn’t wait to get out and make a difference in the world. He listened to every conversation and would become so excited that he incidentally caused his mother pain.
Kayla grabbed Max’s hand and squeezed it so hard that he lost concentration. Daniel could see that Kayla and his son were in great distress, so he went internal to talk to Sam.
“Samuel. This is grandpa’ Daniel. You have to do me a favor, okay?”
“Of course, grandpa’,” an excited Samuel replied.
“You have to lie completely still for the next two hours until I can get you out of there. Can you do that?”
“I guess so,” a reluctant Samuel replied.
“If you do that, then I will sit down with you and plan our counterattack, together.”
While it would have been more direct to tell Samuel to stop because he was hurting his mother, but the words probably would have had only a short-term impact on the youngster.
“Really?” an excited Samuel exclaimed as his mother entered a new dimension of discomfort.
“Really. Start now. I’ll see you in a few hours, buddy.”
Samuel replied, “Thanks, grandpa.”
The pain stopped and Kayla loosened her death grip on Maxwell’s left hand. Since they were at the Beach Haven Diner, Kayla had a veritable dictionary of food at her disposal to counteract the pain. When she saw the words “Chili Dog,” she knew that it would be only the first of many courses that could divert the pain.
“Are you sure you want to go in that direction?” a sympathetic Nicole asked.
“What difference does it make? If I am going to be miserable the next few hours, I might as well go down swinging,” the usually non-confrontational mother-to-be replied.
She then looked at Max and added, “If I’m going down, you are going down with me.”
Max had no reply for that statement other than “Yes, dear.”
Thaddeus and Garrison wound up at their favorite place, Beach Haven Bagel, for a late lunch. While they had always respected each other over almost a century of battles, their friendship had blossomed in recent months.
“We have to find some women to go dancing with after this is over,” Thaddeus said.
“I know just the ladies,” bird-dog Garrison replied.
He walked up to the front counter and said to the kid behind the counter, “Can you send a couple fat-free, chocolate-chip muffins and some decaffeinated tea to those ladies at the corner table?” Gary peeled off a $20 bill from the wad rolled in a rubber band and gave it to the kid.
“Keep the change,” he said and then walked back to the table to sit with Thaddeus, who was amazed at Gary’s moves.
“I never realized you had it in you, Garrison?”
Gary looked at Thad in the eye, “It’s our time, Thaddeus. If not now, when?”
“Good point. Which one do you fancy?” Thad inquired.
“Well, I know you have a thing for read-heads…”
Thaddeus smiled, “That’s what I love about you Gary, you always do your homework.”
Gary laughed, “Except for the first time when you caught Hartwell by surprise!”
“I wish I could have bottled the look on his face when I impaled him on that huge tree!”
“Ah, the good old days…” Gary said.
“Such fond memories,” Thad added as he gently patted his friend on the back.
TWELVE
Meals were consumed and Samuel managed to remain still through a barrage of chili dogs, stuffed peppers with Tabasco sauce, and the tangiest lemon chiffon pie this side of the Mississippi. Samuel liked the pie, but would have prepared the dish with a little less whipped cream and a little more crust.
It was the night that Samuel was going to be thrust from his warm, yet limiting womb, to an outside world that was about to open its gates to the bowels of hell. Daniel knew that time was of the essence being that Samuel appeared to be growing with each passing moment, increasing the likelihood that the youngster would breach the confines of Kayla’s innards at any moment.
“Are we going to eat dinner before, or after, the birth,” a voracious Cal Brewster asked, speaking for his always-hungry band of hunters.
Hartwell mulled the question, and looked at his wife in the kitchen, “What are we having?”
Maggie replied, “Spaghetti and meatballs!”
Blood and things that concerned the body had absolutely no negative impact on the vampires, so it was probably up to the protectors and the peacekeepers what the order of activities would be.
“What do you think, Gary?” Hartwell asked his protector.
Gary looked over at Joe Winters, who still hadn’t found a comfortable place within this ever-expanding tribe. Being a peace-seeker placed him in a secondary, passive role amidst a wave of aggression. But, it was now his job, as well as his daughter Valerie and Brandon Justice, to try and combat the mass of vampires and protectors only weeks away from trying to end their world.
“How are things going over there,” a concerned Katherine Winters asked her husband on the phone only minutes before the gathering.
Joe wanted to reassure his wife that he could handle whatever was coming his way but, frankly, he had absolutely no idea what was coming his way.
“I think we’ll have a better idea what we’re up against in the next week, or so.”
Katherine was alarmed by the neutrality of the response, because it wasn’t Joe’s way to be overly negative or non-committal in his dialect.
“Just be safe, honey, and come home to us,” she simply said.
Joe knew what his wife was saying, without the words actually coming out of her mouth. They had been together for decades and any shift, no matter how subtle, was easily detected.
“It’s the only place I want to be,” he replied.
And just before Joe was about to answer “We should eat before the birth,” because consuming any food after viewing such an act could prove difficult, Kayla shouted, “NO
W! Get him out NOW, Daniel!”
So, the dinner discussion was tabled for the time being, and it would be spaghetti and meatballs after Samuel made his appearance.
It appeared that Daniel was evolving more and more each day, and now was fully in the role as a new-age midwife. He had discussed the particulars of the birth with the other vampires, and they were all ready to assist with the most obvious of vampire proficiencies, the clean-up.
A ray of light shone from Daniel’s right hand as he focused on Kayla’s stomach.
She again screamed, “NOW!!” as Samuel’s expansion was threatening to split her in two.
Everyone was in a circle of love as Daniel moved his forceful hand and painlessly opened Kayla’s stomach in what amounted to a bloodless c-section; his mind keeping her vital organs intact throughout the procedure to keep her stable.
Daniel was also communicating internally with Samuel.
“Okay Samuel, it’s going to feel cold at first but if you keep moving, then warmth will be waiting for you. Float toward the light right now and you will be with us!”
Samuel couldn’t wait to get out, and floating toward the light and into the welcoming arms of Belinda, who was holding a towel. Hartwell and Maggie joined her giving the boy a full cleaning while Daniel worked to press a virtual reset button and give Kayla back the body she had before she got pregnant. Organs were shifting around so fast that only Maxwell could see what was happening.
Daniel fortified Kayla’s insides and then closed up the opening in her stomach, leaving nary a mark. Max dabbed his father's forehead with a towel, just as an assisting nurse
