Vampires Don't Cry: A Mother's Curse

by Hall, Ian

  “Why, we only wish that you remain here for a day or so. We will do some non-invasive tests, and then we will let you go.”

  “And you expect me to believe that?”

  “Why, my dear, if you are anything like your esteemed mother, you will already know that you are here to keep you from interfering in the business in Philadelphia.”

  “But she needs my help. Our help.”

  He shook his head so condescendingly that I almost lost it then and there.

  “Valérie, your mother has served the Council for a hundred years. The time has come to deal with Tomas Lucescu, once and for all.”

  “By sacrificing herself?”

  “Hopefully that will not be the case.” He swept some tufts of hair from my forehead. “But the world cannot afford to lose both Berthier women in one night. To lose one would be a tragedy; to risk both would be folly.”

  I simply couldn’t believe the words from his mouth. “Who the hell cares about me?”

  But he laughed. “Valérie, my dear, it has taken the Council a hundred years to track you down, they’re not about to lose you after such an effort.”

  “Track me down?” I shook my head. “The bloody Council couldn’t find me? I’ve never done a thing to hide from them!”

  “You may have not, but Amos has kept you under wraps for many years.” He motioned for the others to clear the room. Then, as he left, he lingered at the door. “You, my dear, are the most important person on this planet.”

  Helsing Central

  Theresa Scholes, March 1959, Unknown Helsing Location

  So I lay on the bed while a male doctor took blood every couple of hours.

  I cursed him every time, but he remained impassive to my taunts, and to give them their due, they treated me well enough, considering they’d drugged and kidnapped me in order to tie me to a bed.

  And I knew I had faded slightly; I hadn’t fed in a few days, and with the knock-out stuff the Helsings had dosed us with, I wasn’t a bit surprised that I felt under the weather.

  Helsings. I had even gotten used to the name. I had read Dracula at the end of middle school, and I’d seen Bela Lugosi in the old black-and-white movies.

  And now I was being held by the supposed descendants of fictional Abraham Van Helsing. Great.

  Then the cool old guy came back, still wearing his tweed jacket. He really did look straight out of a movie. The older movies, though, the ones mom liked from before the war.

  “How do you feel, Miss Scholes?” his tone sounded firm, yet his voice seemed little over a whisper.

  “I’m tied to a bed.” I said sarcastically, my wit making an attempt to rise. After hours of captivity, and a dozen bloodlettings, I can squarely say I was pissed. “And my right wrist is a bit sore right now.”

  He approached the bed. “Too tight?”

  “Yeah,” I lied. “Chafing.” I couldn’t believe he was falling for it. I put as much pressure on the strap that I could without making my ruse obvious.

  He unfastened the strap to let it out a notch, and I slipped my hand free.

  I swung for his head, but damn it if he’d darted away, his back hitting the side of the open door. There was more to this guy than met the eye.

  My hand worked fast. Neck strap open. I’d decided the order long ago.

  Then, to my abject surprise the old man hit me, hard on the chin, his fist battering my head back into the bed. Dazed, I couldn’t believe the strength of his strike. I hit him in the chest with the heel of my hand, a trick Valérie had shown me. A cruel thud, I heard bones break, and he hurtled to the door again, this time, falling on the floor and scrambling through, his shoes slipping on the smooth linoleum floor.

  Second hand strap.

  The door slammed closed and I heard electric bolts slide into place.

  Waist strap.

  My fingers flew like lightening over the bonds.

  As I sat up on the bed, and stretched for the leather fastenings at my ankles, the world exploded. Gas surged from a ceiling vent, and with just the slightest of warning, I held my breath.

  The white lights dimmed out, and red flashing lights illuminated the room, alternating between pure darkness and blinding crimson. A nearby siren filled my ears, and echoed beyond my cell walls. Jumping off the bed I smashed my heel into the door, sending it spinning into the corridor beyond, spiraling on one last attached hinge.

  Then I winked invisible. Once I’d gotten outside into the gas-free corridor, I started to hit doors.

  The first one was empty, the next was a classroom.

  Then the next one held Valérie, bound to an examination table. Her eyes held hope, looking at the open door, the red lights beyond, but at least there hadn’t been any gas released in her room.

  “It’s me.” I said, unclasping one belt, then another.

  “I hoped it would be.”

  Once free, invisible, and in the corridor, we plotted our plan of escape.

  Valérie Lidowitz, March 1959, Unknown Location

  I was already sick of the smarmy old guy’s condescending visits, telling me snippets of his loyalty to the Council, of the Helsing bond with vampires and all sorts of junk. When I heard the alarms go off, I prayed Finch was the source. Then, of course, the door opened, and I almost convinced myself that it wasn’t her; that a vampire assassin had come to do what these Helsings had no stomach for.

  “It’s me,” Finch said, her hands working lightning fast on the straps.

  “I hoped it would be,” She worked on my waist, then my feet. Once I had been freed, she grabbed my hand, pulling me into the corridor. As soon as I shimmered, gas bellowed behind us through a grill in the ceiling.

  “Hold your breath.” Finch said, pulling me along the hallway. “This way.”

  Well, making us hold our breath proved to be a pain in the ass, and the milky off-focus view that the invisibility didn’t help either, but we found one end of the corridor, a dead end. We re-traced our steps, then found ourselves at a crossroads. Finch pulled me hand one way, but it ended in a dead-end too. Two options left, and we then got the right one. Third time lucky: an elevator door. But the button didn’t work.

  We ran back to the only corridor we hadn’t tried but found that it too turned out to be a dead end. With no windows of any kind, I assumed we were underground.

  So we sat down near the elevator to wait.

  After a while the alarm stopped, along with the red flashing lights, leaving us with just the hiss of the gas steadily building up in the corridor. I sat crouched at one side of the elevator, my mouth firmly closed and my fingers holding my nose just in case.

  Then after a while the gas noise ceased.

  Silence.

  We must have sat like that for an hour, two little invisible bugs in the basement.

  Then we heard the start of a low-pitched rumble, distant fans clearing the gas from the chamber. Again, we waited for hours. Then the elevator clicked, and behind me I felt it move. I readied myself to jump over the oncoming troops.

  When the door opened, I stood ready, looking for our prospective assailants.

  The elevator compartment looked empty, but then again, we were invisible, so I remained attentive.

  Then a couple of ‘beeps’ and a hum, distracted my attention to ground level, and a little toy buggy thing drove out of the elevator. It had been rigged with a camera on top, tied in place with tape. A long coil of cable lay behind it, plugged into the wall of the elevator compartment, unwinding as it moved forward.

  I watched in awe as it drove somewhat erratically down the corridor.

  Then Finch’s hands were on me, touching, finding my head.

  “It’s a camera.” She whispered. “I have an idea, quick!”

  Ten seconds later, after skirting the moving buggy, and running down the corridor, we lay in two heaps on the floor, visible again, our mouths open, our eyes closed.

  If Finch’s hunch was good, the camera would report back our having succumbed to the
gas.

  I heard the buggy come to ‘visit’ me.

  Then the little buggy moved towards Finch’s position, just outside her room.

  I lay in wait, wondering what the heck would happen next.

  Theresa Scholes, March 1959, Unknown Helsing Location

  I heard the buggy approach and tried my best to suppress a grin. I had lain in the main corridor, just outside my room. Copying Valérie’s lead, I moaned slightly, my hand moving slowly to try and touch the approaching car.

  As I hoped our ruse would prove sufficient, I heard the elevator door close, and my heart surged.

  Moments later, we heard it return. I waited, the camera still watching me. We had to wait until the doors opened, before we sprung our trap.

  As the doors opened, I kicked the camera away from me and winked invisible.

  Four uniformed soldiers emerged from the elevator. I’d hoped for them to be armed, but they just advanced slowly down the corridor, looking beefcake-like. I hit the first one hard on the throat, sending him spinning backwards, landing unconscious on the floor. The guy on the left got his head smashed against the far wall, dropping lifelessly.

  My second guy, although alerted to our presence had no time to do anything. I just gave him a good hard kick between his legs, and watched him fall like a felled tree to the hard corridor floor.

  I got into the elevator, bumping into Valérie as I did so. The floor selector had two options.

  Basement. Floor 1.

  It had to be up. I pressed the button and readied myself. “Good luck,”

  “Thanks,” Valérie replied. “If we get separated where do we meet?”

  “Good Question. We don’t know where we are.” I thought for a second. “The nearest diner.”

  “Why not, sweetie? There’s always a diner.”

  The elevator opened, and crouching low, I crawled out quickly on my hands and knees. Bullets rang over my head, thudding into the shiny metal back of the elevator. They weren’t playing around this time.

  I snaked round the door of the elevator and ran, but thankfully after crossing the threshold, I had plenty of room to my right. In front was a kind of corporate foyer, with bright silver “Unicorps” signs, which the Helsings hid behind, still firing into the elevator. Beyond them lay double doors, which I hoped would lead outside. I dashed past the Helsings, battered the door open with stiff arms, and ran out into darkness.

  More Helsings were running across the adjacent parking lot towards the door, so I took off, soon leaving the building well behind me.

  As I slowed, I noticed the heat, way warmer than New York. Just by the almost burnt, dry smell in the air I could sure tell that we weren’t on the east coast anymore. I shimmered visible, as the un-focused vision made seeing at night really difficult. I soon came upon a dark street, the occasional car, the normality of the scene comforted me.

  A park sat to one side, with a bunch of teenagers playing football under floodlights. They’d piled their cast-off clothes in a heap while they played, so no one noticed when a sweater and cap got snatched. I even got a wallet from a jacket pocket, ten bucks, better than nothing.

  The Go Hawks! motto on the cap gave no means of identifying where I’d landed up. Then I spotted a man standing to one side, watching the ‘game’. Eyeing him up as roughly my size, I pulled the sweater down past my ass and sidled closer.

  “Hi there,” I said, nudging him with my elbow.

  “Hi.” He looked surprised to see anyone, and then glanced at my bare legs.

  “Damn it,” I said under my breath, unable to bring myself to take the time to play games. I needed clothes, and he was wearing them. He also had blood coursing through his system, and I needed some of that too. I grabbed the lapels of his jacket and pulled his head to me and breathed into his nostrils. “I’m a great kisser, you really want to make out with me. Find somewhere nearby before I change my mind.”

  Valérie Lidowitz, March 1959, Unknown Location

  The thuds of the bullets into the back of the elevator made me hold my position for a second, then after the first wave had passed, I shot out of the enclosed space and past the unsuspecting Helsings. The old guy stood behind his cohorts, trying to catch a glimpse of us, but he looked clueless. Then behind me, the doors to the outside opened, and I knew Finch had made it out. That was all I needed.

  But when I reached the doors, I had to wait until six more uniformed figures filed through the doors. Moments later I got out into the blurry parking lot. “Finch!”

  Not a whisper.

  I assessed my priorities. Find out where and when I had been taken to, get some clothes, feed, and find Finch. Not necessarily in that order.

  The first part proved easy. The company next door had a huge sign at the intersection. Even through the blurry vision I could make out Fiskers Homecare, Gregor, Arizona.

  I stood with my hands on my invisible hips, looking frustrated at the sign. Wonderful, we’d been kidnapped to Arizona; so much for the Philadelphia thing. We’d probably even missed it all. I cursed my mother and her machinations.

  By the lack of traffic in the streets, I guessed the time as after ten, and thus the chances of finding a clothing store seemed slight. At last I came to a bar, with more than a few cars parked outside.

  A stone through a window brought a whole crowd of food and clothes out into the parking lot. In the midst of the men’s searching eyes I spotted a girl, maybe mid-twenties, but definitely my size. She looked a bar-fly, her looks were sleazy, and her clothes were simple t shirt and jeans, but they’d do. I planted myself right in front of her. “Invite me inside,” I hissed.

  She looked around startled, but the words came limply from her mouth. “Come in.”

  “Ladies restroom, now,” I pushed her towards the bar door, and she led the way. The bar itself proved smoky and pretty dirty. A deserted pool table sat in one corner, Its balls scattered and lifeless, a blue gray pall of smoke filled the room.

  I followed the girl to the restroom, and told her to strip while I winked back to visible again. Her eyes just about jumped out of their sockets. “Don’t worry, dear, you’ll be fine, forget you saw that. Just get stripped.” Slowly she got the idea, and began to pull the t shirt over her head. “Come on!” I encouraged as I pulled off the surgical gown.

  In moments, I stood in her jeans, not a look I liked, but it was better than the gown on the floor. Pushing my belly against hers, I pinned her to the wall. “Don’t worry, dear, I’m not going to take a lot, just a little drop to keep me going.” I bit into her neck, and tasted blood. Not good, there were far too many additives, alcohol, nicotine, and an illness that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

  She began to pant, her eyes glazing over in lust. She wrapped her hand round my neck and tried to pull me in for a kiss, but I had other plans. I slapped her face, holding her chin tightly. “What day is it?” I asked, regretting not asking before.

  “Friday,” her lips mouthed softly. “Friday night.”

  I donned her t-shirt quickly, and passed invisible across the re-vitalized barroom floor.

  Once outside, I had one last thing to do.

  “Finch!”

  Where is Gregor Arizona Anyway?

  Theresa Scholes, March 1959, Gregor, Arizona

  Leaving him almost naked and comatose on the grass, I quickly donned his trousers and jacket. Along with the sweater and cap, I looked a bit rag-tag, but it was better than nothing. The shoes laced up, and although they were a good two sizes too big, they completed the transformation.

  I set off back to the football, determined to find a diner, and hook up with Valérie.

  I had reached the main road again when I heard her voice.

  Distant, yes, but it had been her. I ran to my left, across parking lots, past some run-down houses. Then I stood still for a moment.

  “Finch!” again, to my left, but nearer. Again I adjusted my position.

  On the third shout, roughly five minutes apart, I trotted to
her side. “I’m here.” I shouted, waving as I ran. “Valérie!” We hugged like schoolgirls, and found a wall to hide behind while we exchanged information, not that I had much.

  Gregor, Arizona, Friday night.

  “So how far are we from Philly?” I asked.

  Valérie shook her head. “A couple of thousand miles, at least.”

  As we crouched behind the wall, I could smell a strong whiff of blood on her breath which meant that she’d fed too. “That’s a heck of a distance. What now?”

  “We get ourselves a car, a map, and find out exactly where Gregor is.”

  So we stood near the road and waited on the next car. Two good-looking girls should find no problem in flagging down unwary men drivers, and we proved the point with the first one that passed.

  “Which way to the main road?” Valérie asked as she bundled him out of the driver’s seat.

  “Just go straight, you’ll hit Route 66 in a mile or so.” He looked a bit pissed off, but the car-jacking had happened so quickly, I couldn’t blame him for being confused.

  We left him by the side of the road, scratching his head. It could have been worse; at least we’d both just recently fed.

  Valérie slipped behind the wheel, and true to the ex-driver’s words, we soon hit the main road.

  Route 66: West, Las Vegas, 240 miles, East, Flagstaff, 15 miles, Albuquerque 340 miles

  “We’ve got to go east. Maybe Flagstaff’s got an airport.” Valérie said, looking across the car at me.

  “Do you still think we can make it back to Philly in time?”

  “We’ve got to try,” She nodded, “I hate being manipulated, I hate being a pawn, and that’s what I feel like right now.”

  I nodded and muttered consent, although I did wonder how the heck we could travel two thousand miles in one day.