by Drew D'Amato
The remaining Crusaders stood at the edge of the Confession next to the burning Baldacchino. Their guns were aimed and they stared through the flames at Vlad. He sat there at the back of the Basilica, in St. Peter’s chair, with his legs folded. He reloaded his guns while he sat. Their weapons were useless, his heart was protected. When Vlad’s guns were loaded he rose above the chair.
The belief was that the Holy Spirit hovered over the chair, but not now. Now there was nothing but a vampire. The seven Crusaders focused on him floating there, and then a little voice inside their heads talked. The voice told them they had pissed off the wrong vampire. The voice told them, run.
“You will all die in the house of your God,” Vlad guaranteed them.
The Crusaders all knew they had no fight left. The group tried to make an escape to the Hall of Ligorio, but they wouldn’t make it that far. Vlad flew at them shooting at the scared mass of red robes as they ran.
Vlad had managed to kill four of them before they even got to leave the Basilica, easy shots to the back of the head. The other three started to make it through the hallway to The Sistine Chapel. Vlad nailed the fifth one before he got a chance to turn the corner of the hall with a bullet in the eye. The murals and artwork on the walls did not register in any of the Crusader’s minds, just death following after them, and death was getting close.
There was just Bandini and another left. The other one fell. Bandini, the great leader and man he was, did not wait for him. Vlad in an instant dropped his guns and grabbed the other Crusader from the back of his neck. He bit his fangs into the back of the top of the Crusader’s skull. The back corner of the skull, which is usually the first part of the head to go bald like it was for this man, Vlad used as a target. With strength he never had before he scalped the man from the back with just his teeth.
Vlad grabbed the brain out of his mouth and ripped the rest of it out of the top of the skull. The eyes fell out of the body when they disconnected from the optic nerve. Vlad held the brain and the spinal cord out in front of him. I’m stronger that I was before, Vlad thought to himself which was the reason he tried such a macabre experiment.
Bandini had seen all of it, the whole act. He just froze there urinating down his leg, but his piss did not smell as bad as the dead Crusader’s feces. Bandini had not even noticed they had just entered The Sistine Chapel.
“Is there anymore Blood, anymore Crusaders?” Vlad asked using his mind control to get an honest answer from Bandini.
“No, I am all that is left, just me, no more Blood. Some Crusaders not as high up as us are around, but they did not know anything about tonight. Please let me live so I can tell the world about you.”
“The world does not need to know about me. There will be no more vampires in a few days.”
“Please, let the world know what happened to Judas, give them the proof they need for their faith.”
“When you have faith you don’t need proof. That was why Judas never came forth all those years. You really don’t understand how this battle of good versus evil works. Men like you will destroy your faith. Make it nothing more than something sure to believe in like gravity. That is not what your Lord wants, it is what you want.”
“Please, have mercy, if you are good, you will be merciful.”
“Again you don’t understand. Good defeats evil, good is not merciful to evil. And you Bandini, are one evil, selfish son of a bitch.”
Vlad grabbed Bandini by his robe. Bandini started to cry. Vlad threw him over the gate wall preventing entry into the Chapel that was about ten feet high. Bandini landed on his back looking up at the ceiling of Sistine Chapel, just like Michelangelo did, but under better circumstances. The bones in his back cracked as he landed. He had broken three of them.
Vlad floated over the fence and landed right in front of Bandini. He grabbed Bandini and the two of them flew to the ceiling of The Sistine Chapel. The ceiling of the chapel had nine paintings from the book of Genesis going in chronological order from the back altar wall of the chapel to the entrance. The paintings rotated in size with the odds ones all a smaller size, and the larger even ones between them—five small, four big. The paintings were also in order from the creation of the heavens up to Noah drunk and disgraced. Vlad held Bandini by his collar and rose to the murals of the ceiling banging Bandini’s head against the sixth painting in the order.
“Let’s start here,” Vlad said. “The Expulsion from Paradise. I know what this is like. I just experienced this. They were kicked out because they were sinners, but that was not why I had to leave my paradise. But your Crusader paradise of doing whatever you want to whoever is over. You are a sinner, and you are expulsed.”
Vlad flew him backward toward the altar wall. He skipped the painting of the creation of Eve and went over to the next big one. He hit Bandini’s head against the painting on the ceiling again, this time leaving a small crack.
“The Creation of Adam, see the way their fingers touch. God made you in paradise, but all you men want to do is sin. I was created by the damned, yet for some reason I’m more righteous than you. Well I guess we’ll let the man upstairs, your God, decide who is the better of us. I just know which one of us is fucked.”
Vlad took him down to the next big painting in the order, skipping the Separation of Land and Water and went to the one after that. He hit the back of Bandini’s head again on the next painting drawing some blood from the back of his skull that stained the artwork.
“The Creation of the Sun, Moon, and Planets. Well I don’t know about the planets, but I sure as shit think that after that hit you’re seeing some stars.”
Vlad flew him back to the last painting at the end of the ceiling, a smaller one. Bandini’s head hit on it and now more blood was painted on Michelangelo’s masterpiece, right on the face of God in this painting. Vlad stuck out his tongue and licked the blood off the painting over the Lord’s face.
“Do you know this painting? ‘And God said let there be light.’ Well you son of a bitch, I’m going to show you the light. The brightest fucking light you’ll ever see.”
Bandini finally got his motor nerves to start to work again in his body. He spoke, “I was only doing the Lord’s work.”
“You don’t even understand His work.”
“You are damned.”
“Trust me Bandini, that is the one thing a God like me and a fuck like you have in common. We are both damned. I’m just better at being a killer. You have been judged.”
Vlad let go of Bandini and he started to fall to ground. Vlad unholstered his gun. He shot Bandini right between his eyes as he fell. The body fell against the back altar wall of the Sistine chapel, the painting called The Last Judgment. A fresco about Jesus coming down to judge all on the last day of existence. Bandini’s body curled in the right corner of the altar wall, underneath the painting. Some of his blood and brains had splattered on the bottom right quadrant of the painting. Some of it landed onto the boat of the ferryman, who appeared to be shipping the damned to hell.
5
Vlad dropped his gun and breathed out. He had the power back, but he no longer had Jasmine. This was his cross to bear, but making this choice might be his salvation. He was a savior, and like any good savior, he accepted his fate.
It took him a while to take everything in. Pacami was dead, but he couldn’t think of leaving his body here. A man who led such a righteous life should not be left to be confused in whatever mess the authorities would believe happened here. He walked back into the Basilica. He could hear sirens in the distance, but he knew he had time. He lifted up the canopy of the Baldacchino and threw it to one side. Roberto’s skull had seen better days. He picked up the Dark Bible that had somehow managed to stay intact and put it in the back of his jeans. He then took off the C-4 vest on Pacami’s body. Looking at his lost friend, he started to cry. He had lost so many close to him recently. It was hard to tell himself that tonight was actually a success, but it could have been far worse.
> He carried Pacami’s body and flew out of the Basilica, through a window at the top, up into the air just as the first sight of cop cars had started to appear. He hovered above the dome of the Basilica with Pacami in his left hand and dug for something in his pocket with his right. It was the real trigger to the C-4 vest. Before the first cop got out of his car, Vlad pressed the button.
A massive explosion roared from inside the Vatican. The police would now have an even tougher time piecing together what had occurred there. Vlad had no remorse for what he did to such a sacred place like the Vatican. The way he felt, the place had it coming. Years of living off corrupt money, giving clemency to war criminals, and sexually abusing children. They needed a reckoning, and Vlad gave it to them.
NINE
1
Vlad called Warburton as he flew back toward England. He was traveling faster in the air than he ever had before. He estimated maybe 300 miles per hour. He concluded this new speed and strength had to be the result that this time he chose to drink the blood. He had the same powers and same tricks—they just had more of a kick to them.
He had to stop flying because the wind made it impossible to hear and speak into the phone. It was close to three in the morning and he was around the coast of France. He could only imagine what was going on at the Vatican right then. But it would only be questions, no answers. Maybe a wave of panic would spread around Western Civilization, maybe a Muslim Extremist faction would take credit for the act. It didn’t matter, as long as no one knew about vampires.
However, he couldn’t escape the fear that Radu would now put two and two together and learn Vlad was up to his old tricks. He didn’t want Radu to feel like he had to rush his plans. He didn’t want Radu to be concerned with Vlad.
Vatican, dead Crusaders, how could he not figure that out? Vlad would worry about that later. His only option, it appeared, was to plead ignorance. Maybe the Crusaders turned on themselves. Maybe they had the real blood all along. Radu would have no problem believing they could be deceitful themselves. He had been in business with them for years. Right now he couldn’t think of Radu or even Jasmine. Now he just thought about the man in his arms.
He wanted to give Pacami a proper burial. He deserved it. He couldn’t let his body be found in that disaster at the Vatican, and his memory tied to some suspicious attack. He concluded his option was to fake both their deaths. He thought about taking two bodies—one of them Pacami’s—and blow them up in a car beyond recognition. Then back home in LA his body, though charred, would get a proper burial and people could grieve for him. He knew he could just drop his body into the ocean and be done what it, but Pacami did not deserve for his fate to be a mystery.
Faking a death would require the help of Warburton. He would know what the cops would and would not find out. They had to not learn of the bullet wound to the head, and the time of death would also be a few hours off. He needed the police to know nothing except the identification in the wallet to explain Pacami’s fate.
But Warburton wasn’t answering. England was approaching and so was the sun. He had to put the body somewhere while he still had his powers. He flew closer to the island and approached London. He could see some acres of grassland to the east of London. It was the Thames Chase Forest Center. It would be empty now, it would have to work.
Vlad found an isolated area and flew down. He dove straight into the ground like a diver into a pool. He buried himself and Pacami’s body deep into the dirt with him. Clouds of dirt rocketed up as he dug himself in. He got down ten feet under the ground. He clawed himself up and left the body in there. He checked his watch—a little past five, the sun would be up soon. Pacami would have to be buried there, at least for now. There were not many trees, just open land, but he knew this place had its share of rangers to look over it. It would go unnoticed and yet protected at the same time.
Dirt found its way into every crease in his clothes. He decided to start walking back to London. Warburton would be up soon. He was a cop, he would know how to fake a death.
2
Gonzalez didn’t make it to the Vatican until 3 in the morning. A direct flight from Berlin to Rome. He was called to the scene because of two words: silver bullets. When he got there the place was still crawling with cops, Interpol agents, and of course the press.
He made his way inside, into the rubble. The domed roof was pretty much intact, except for a hole in one of the windows, but he couldn’t say the same about what was below it. The Baldacchino was destroyed to rubbish. Dead bodies littered everywhere, and silver bullets were found in the bodies and in the walls.
He was briefed on the way over. A C-4 explosion had done the majority of the damage. The bodies that were not burned beyond recognition were found all dressed in a similar red robe. Of course the Vatican had no official explanation for what occurred here, but Gonzalez didn’t believe that. He didn’t trust the church. Some of the bodies had already been identified as cops in some form of police enforcement scattered throughout Europe. Dirty cops and silver bullets, his hunch was right.
When he got there, the Interpol agent first on the scene, Gianni Biancuomo, told him the layout. The bullets were fired before the explosion. The explosion actually happened just when the Gendarmerie of the Vatican first showed up.
“Interestingly though, one of the dead bodies we found here is the Inspector General of the Gendarmerie,” Biancuomo said.
“Bandini?”
“Yes, Silverado Bandini, how did you know?”
“I met the man before, take me to his body.”
“It’s in the Sistine Chapel.”
Biancuomo led him to Bandini’s body laying on its back underneath the painting The Last Judgment. The body was against the right of the altar wall the fresco was painted on, directly below King Minos in the bottom right corner of the painting. The face of King Minos was actually that of Biagio da Cesena, the Pope’s Master of Ceremonies that was appalled to Michaelangelo’s use of naked figures in this work. Michaelangelo in response drew a snake over the King’s genitals and worked Cesena’s face along with donkey ears onto Minos.
Gonzalez leaned over the body and said, “Dirty cops,” under his breath.
“What was that sir?” Biancuomo asked.
“This wasn’t a terrorist act, these men are some kind of dirty cops. Maybe they are in league with some group of terrorists, we can’t rule that out. The Vatican is a possible target for Muslim extremists, but these men are not Arabic.”
“No sir none of them are. They are all cops.”
“Just like the ones found at the airports in Munich and Geneva, also bullets painted silver.”
“Are they hunting werewolves?” Biancuomo said with a laugh.
Gonzalez turned to him, frustrated. “This situation is far too serious to go thinking about impossibilities. The silver has to represent that they are cops. This is some sort of dirty organization and we need to find everything we can about them. Who they are in league with, what their goals are, and how to stop their next attack. I don’t want to hear any talk of werewolves, vampires or anything unholy relating to silver.” He wasn’t sure how the idea of vampires popped into his head. “You tell the press nothing for now. They will want an explanation, but once we tell the Holy See their own Inspector General was involved in this they will push for discretion too. I knew this man was lying to me when I met him. He showed up at that house in Sibiu that also had silver bullets shot inside it. There is something big going on here, and I’m tired of cleaning up messes. I want answers.”
But for all his life Gonzalez would never find any answers. He would go to the grave wondering what the connecting bond was between all of these attacks and the silver bullets. He would find accounts of other gunfights in the past with silver bullets found at the scene—like at a nightclub in England a few weeks previously—but still, he would never get any answers. He would pass this burden onto his son, who would also grow up to be an agent of Interpol, knowing that this was the one
case his father could not put to bed. What had always left him the most unsettled about all of these events was what he noticed the moment he was done lecturing Biancuomo.
Biancuomo left Gonzalez and Gonzalez was alone in the Sistine Chapel. He turned to look back at Bandini, and then he felt it. A drop of blood on his shoulder. He looked up and saw the blood dripping from the painting The Creation of the Sun, Moon and Earth. He also noticed the small crack in the ceiling in the center of the blood. He looked right and saw another pool of blood on the next painting, Seperation of Light from Darkness. He looked to the left and didn’t see any more blood but cracks in the panel for The Creation of Adam.
Gonzalez walked over the the body and checked the back of Bandini’s head. There was a cut and a welt that probably didn’t get a chance to grow to its full potential, because Bandini’s heart stopped beating. It would appear his head was banged against the ceiling moving toward the altar until he was killed. But the ceiling was 20 meters high. It’s just not possible for a human being to do that to someone.
And that enigma would stay with Gonzalez until the cancer would take his life less than twenty years later.
3
A little after noon Vlad met up with Warburton at the The Prospect of Whitby pub off Wapping Wall. When he finally got in touch with Warburton a little after eight in the morning, he told him they got the Blood, he was a vampire, the Vatican was destroyed and Pacami was dead. He wanted to give the man a proper burial. Before he could get any deeper into it, Warburton told him to stop and meet him at the bar in Wapping; it opened at noon. Vlad bought a new set of clothes right off the rack at the first department store he found. Warburton told him when he got there he would start talking about soccer, and wanted Vlad to counter with supporting American football. He stressed to Vlad to act like they were strangers that just mutually started up a discussion.
