Nerves of Steel

by Lee Hayton

  Kids. He was talking about high school kids. I staggered back, bumping into Miss Tiddles and then moving past her. I retreated until I couldn’t see the vampires crowded in the cave anymore. My hands stroked the walls, needing the solidity underneath my fingers to remind me where my body was. Alternating between hot and cold, sickness bubbled in my gut.

  No wonder they thought the plan would work. What parent, faced with a child in the grip of being turned, would revolt against them? Who would raise arms against their neighbor’s daughters or sons?

  By nightfall, the city would be half in tempest and half in mourning. No one would stomach a vampire being a slave when the day before they’d celebrated their graduation or helped them select their prom dress.

  The plan was fiendishly smart. It had to be stopped.

  Norman didn’t talk about his turning. Norman barely spoke about anything in his past. He didn’t need to.

  Nobody chose the curse of vampirism as though it was a selection at a buffet. Even before the enslavement, no one would willingly trade longevity for a life spent hiding from the light, sucking on other people’s blood.

  If the vampires had merely planned a revolt, I could have gotten on board. I was a font of sympathy to anybody who lived their lives in subjugation to another.

  But not this.

  Hundreds of young lives being taken, a curse being placed upon the entire city’s up-and-coming generation.

  Bile rose up the back of my throat, thick and burning. I spat, trying to get rid of the sour taste but there was always more where that came from.

  As I stumbled along the tunnel in the dark, no longer careful, no longer thinking of my own safety, I had one overwhelming need.

  The vampires had to be stopped.

  Miss Tiddles ran ahead of me to exit out from under the stage and run to open the door. While I passed her, she kept an eye back in the hall, but nobody was following us. Even though our exit had been louder than our entrance, everyone who could have heard had other things on their mind.

  I walked out the community center door into the clean outdoors and immediately threw up on the driveway gravel. My legs shook as I wiped my mouth.

  “We need to hurry,” Miss Tiddles said, pushing me forward. She stepped over the rancid puddle I’d left on the ground. “If they’re going to be meeting up during the day, we don’t have much time to get word back to the master. If people are in place already in the camps, then they’re going to have to rely on reinforcements. That takes time.”

  Pete Sinbad had stayed after all. As he drove us back to the city—our city—he didn’t say a word. After one glance at my face, his own expression creased into a state of high anxiety and stayed there.

  If I had to guess, I’d say that his days of picking up strange women in bars were done.

  As we entered the outskirts of midtown, I realized that I didn’t know where to meet the man who’d employed me. I could borrow Pete’s phone, but at that moment, the bother of the arrangement exhausted me.

  “Go down here,” I said, pointing. The route would take us down where Nika hung out during the day. From the quick scan I’d made of her belongings and posture, she lived in the apartment building opposite where she plied her trade.

  “You need me to stay?” Pete offered. Everything about his posture screamed that he wanted to leave and do that now. I could have kissed him for making an effort.

  “No, thanks,” I told him instead. “We should be good from here on out. I owe you one.”

  I didn’t know if Pete heard my final words. His foot hit the floor as soon as I told him no.

  “What are you doing?” Miss Tiddles asked. “I don’t think that you’re going to find what you’re looking for here.”

  I turned to face her, taking in the strange but familiar features. Although she’d rescued me from prison, I didn’t know this woman.

  Still, she was here. That was a point in Miss Tiddles favor.

  “I’m meeting a friend who can get word back.”

  Since Nika had set me up to begin with, it stood to reason she could get in contact with the man again. If not, I had his card. Nika knew what I could do when I put my mind to it. The services I’d dealt out to her “boyfriend” wouldn’t be forgotten in a flash.

  She’d help even if she didn’t want to.

  “You can wait out here if you like,” I said. “I won’t be long.”

  Miss Tiddles raised her eyebrows as she looked around. “Ah, no, thanks,”

  Damn lofty standards for a stray cat.

  It didn’t take long for Nika to grasp the essence of our message and she immediately phoned the details through. Done talking, she handed the phone over to me.

  “You’ve done well,” the man said on the other end. “I’ll make sure your friend is freed and returned to your apartment. I’ll also try my hardest to lift the bounty on your head, but I can’t promise a result. Without the target being nullified, it’ll be a hard sell.”

  He paused, perhaps waiting for me to interject. I stayed quiet. Since I’d failed the assignment, getting Norman back was better than I’d hoped.

  “Either way,” the man continued, “you won’t get any further trouble from me.”

  I hadn’t been aware he had given me any trouble up to now, but I let it go. The night was easing into morning now, and all I wanted was to go home.

  I hungered to walk around the squalid apartment, fidgeting with things and worrying just because I could. I tapped the side plate on my head, behind which my mobility chip was stored. Tap once for reassurance and twice for good luck. If I ever found a locksmith who could keep that sucker closed for good, I’d pay him whatever the hell he asked.

  To get home, I called a driverless Uber and rewrote its program to forget the trip. Now that the immediate danger of being turned in was gone, fiddling with the equipment didn’t fill me with the same level of cautious fear.

  “Fuck it,” I said as we arrived upstairs. “We’re still out of food.”

  Miss Tiddles made a strange humming noise, then said, “Sorry about that.”

  I turned and gave her the evil eye. The cat’s gaze went on an extended trip around the room, looking anywhere that my face wasn’t.

  “You ate my stash?”

  It should have been obvious before, but I’d had other things on my mind. This whole damn thing was Norman’s fault, then. Letting a hungry cat who turned out to be a shapeshifter into our apartment and our lives.

  “Since you got me out of prison, I’ll forgive you,” I said. “But from now on, you can find your own food. Hands off my stuff.”

  “Deal,” the cat said, smiling broadly until her mouth cracked open into a gigantic yawn. “I need a catnap.”

  I managed to issue a grunt at the joke before the contagion from her yawn infected me. Even if Norman were sent back to me today, they’d wait until nightfall to stop the chance of him being injured.

  With nothing to stay up for, the thought of my bed beckoned me to my room.

  I woke as the door closed. For a moment, I was propelled back half a week, to when Norman had snuck out of the apartment one night. I’d never asked him where he went or who he talked to. Now, it didn’t matter. If he wanted to keep his secrets when he came back to the apartment, then I wouldn’t pry.

  Although I held a different hope in my heart, I called out, “Miss Tiddles?”

  Really, we had to get a new name for the cat. Now that she was a grown woman, it seemed inappropriate. Honest truth, it hadn’t been that great a moniker when she was just a cat.

  After a few minutes of hesitation, caught between sleepiness and curiosity, I got out of bed and checked. Although I wanted to see Norman standing there, so badly I hallucinated his shape for a second, the room was empty. All the rooms were empty.

  The door had closed behind Miss Tiddles on her way out.

  I shrugged, but there wasn’t a lot I could do. If she didn’t want to stay with us, now that I knew her secret, then that was her choice.r />
  Just as I had that thought, a car pulled up alongside the apartment building and I walked to the window to look out. Miss Tiddles, still in human form, climbed into the back seat of a dark sedan, which then drove smoothly away.

  Someone rich had sent a car to pick her up. Either that, or she’d stolen food out of my belly when she had access to more money than I’d probably ever see.

  I sloped back to bed. If I still cared in the morning, I could worry about it then. I slumped down, face first, onto the covers. Even the act of clambering between the sheets was too much effort.

  “We don’t have too much time left to get word back to the master.”

  Miss Tiddles words echoed through my mind, and I frowned, becoming more alert, even though I desperately wanted to sleep.

  The master.

  She’d been talking about the man who contracted me to harm the vampires. At the time, her words had gone in one ear and out the other. Now, I sat up, staring into the waking morning light and playing back the scene.

  When had she turned up? The same night that Norman and I had a yelling match about a vampire who shouldn’t be out in public. How long had it taken her to break down Norman’s guard so that he let her walk inside?

  Who kept their secrets to themselves when it was just them and the cat?

  Suddenly, the good feelings I’d had about the day coming up—the welcome return of Norman top of the list—faded into blankness.

  Why would the man who offered me the job need a spy inside our house?

  Because you were always going to turn him down, my mind answered. It didn’t matter what inducement he offered you, Norman would never have let you do that.

  A shiver wracked my body as I thought of the forethought required for that plan of action. Placing a spy well before making the initial offer, knowing I’d reject it. Knowing that my first refusal would just set plan B in motion.

  The man was a stranger but knew me well enough to follow the workings of my mind.

  Remove Norman from that picture, and that left me, my loneliness, and the eternal wish to remove the bounty from my head.

  I walked to the window again, staring down into the alley. I hadn’t been able to do the job, anyway. The information I’d given the man had been the best I could do, but anybody could have gotten that the same way I did. Walking into a cavern and eavesdropping on some plans.

  Rather than going to the trouble of recruiting me, he could have just sent in the damn cat.

  What’s going on?

  I sat down, staring out the window and hoping through the whirling confusion in my head that Norman would still be coming back.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I fell asleep again, waiting. When I next opened my eyes, the midday sun was streaming into the room. Its heat pulsed against my forehead, boiling my brains into mush. For a second, I understood precisely why vampires hated it.

  With a groan, I pushed away from the window with its torturous light and walked into the kitchen. I ran the tap until it cooled enough to offer a refreshing drink. My tongue was rough and rancid. The water didn’t stand a chance against the foul coating that it had grown while I slept. I opened the fridge in the forlorn hope that there’d be something waiting for me in there. Nothing.

  No food. No cat. No Norman.

  Welcome to your new life.

  I ransacked the belongings that I’d packed so hastily the day before. Once I had a shower and a change of clothes, I might feel like a human being. Or the cyborg version of one anyway—the real thing was long forgotten.

  A knock came at the door, and my heart leaped in my chest. Norman? By the time I stepped across to answer it, I realized that he wouldn’t bother to knock. The kid would just bowl right in.

  Earnest, the landlord, stood there, one hand held to his balding pate while he frowned at something in the hall beside him.

  The rent money. Shit. And I’d just opened the door without even looking. It didn’t take long to go from feeling like a hero to a zero.

  “What the fuck is all of this?” Earnest said, turning a gaze of pure accusation on me, full-bore. “I came up here to tell you that your rent’s squared away, but if you’re using the bloody corridor as a storage facility, that’ll cost extra.”

  I stuck my head out, frowning. A cardboard box full of snack items was on the floor. About three times as much as the stash that Miss Tiddles had eaten her way through. I hooked my foot around the side of the container and kicked it into the apartment with a sad smile.

  Just a moment. My rent was paid?

  I stepped toward Earnest, frowning. “Who paid off the arrears?”

  Great skills, Asha. Your subtle line of questioning always leads to the truth.

  My head could shut up if insults were the best it had to offer. I swayed for a second in the doorway, feeling dizzy.

  Earnest shrugged. “A man dropped by earlier and paid it.”

  I waited for a moment, and when he didn’t continue, I raised my eyebrows, shaking my head. “And?”

  “And what?” Earnest sniffed and hitched up the loose sweats he was wearing until they settled just below his man-breasts. “I presumed he was a friend of yours.”

  “Must’ve been a client,” I said. The effort of thinking about who it probably was left me breathless for a second. I sagged against the doorframe. Do not fall asleep in the sun, should be tattooed on my forehead. I felt dreadful.

  “I’ve got several clients who owe me money,” I said, overexplaining instead of covering my tracks. “Just wondering which one stumped up the cash.”

  Earnest shrugged again and pursed his lips. “I don’t know. Didn’t get his name. Just a plain fellow, middle-aged, average height. Nothing remarkable.”

  And while he’d been paying the bills downstairs, Miss Tiddles had snuck into the corridor to return what she owed. All debts paid.

  Except for Norman, and I guessed that there were still a few hours to go before I’d know that one for sure.

  I yawned, suddenly wanting to go back to bed and sleep away whatever meager hours of the day were left. “You came upstairs to tell me about the rent?”

  “Fuck, no,” Earnest said.

  Now, there was the landlord I knew and loved.

  “I came to tell you that next month it’s going up. I can’t keep hanging on the edge of my seat, wondering whether you’re going to pay or not. If you want to stay here, it’ll be double.”

  I let the door swing open wider, hoping that he had the common sense to look behind me and see my bags.

  “I don’t think that will be a problem,” I said, then snagged the box of snacks further inside so I could shut the door. Let Earnest worry about whether I meant that I was moving. Pay double for this fleabag tenement. As if!

  I started to refill my stash in the floor and then stopped. Why bother? If I were moving on shortly, then it would just be double handling to grab all the packets back out. I pushed the box alongside the sofa instead and rooted around for a candy bar. A note was stuck to the top of it. Looking inside, I saw another attached to a packet of corn chips.

  “Don’t believe him.”

  Well, that was as clear as mud. I picked up the other note and saw the same message. Important enough to write it twice, and on the snacks that I loved best. Apparently, the cat hadn’t thought it essential to explain.

  If I could assume that the ‘him’ in question was the average man with OCD who’d promised the return of Norman, was that the part I wasn’t meant to believe? Or, was I not meant to believe the bit that said he’d take care of it, once I told him about the vampires? Or the bit about how I wouldn’t be troubled again, at least not by him?

  There’d been so many things that he’d told me, not believing any of them would make life very hard indeed.

  I stuck the note onto the knee of my jeans where I could stare at it. After polishing off two candy bars and a bag of nuts, I wasn’t any further ahead.

  Damn Miss Tiddles and her puzzles. Why couldn’t any
one just talk plainly anymore?

  I turned on the television and wriggled down into the sofa. I thought of fetching Norman’s tablet from his room so I could curl up in bed to watch instead. Too much walking involved in that scenario.

  The light from the window overpowered the screen. After ten minutes of the TV monitor being so useless that I might as well be listening to the radio, I stood up and wandered to the window. Before I drew the curtain, I couldn’t resist another check of the street. Stupid. If Norman were out there in broad daylight, he’d be screaming in pain and halfway to dead. Still, it didn’t cost anything except my self-respect to check.

  Along with my tumbling thoughts, the beeps and toots from traffic outside filled up my head to bursting. Without the option of human or even animal conversation to distract me, I turned back to the television instead.

  News. Ugh. A subject I tended to avoid, if only because seeing the unvarnished truth about our world day after day made it very hard to believe in fairy tales. And damn it all, I wanted a happy ending. I was the heroine in my own story, and I deserved to skip off into the sunset. Even if I didn’t, if you understand what I mean.

  A woman was onscreen, her face streaked with the sheen of tears from whatever drama currently occupied her world. Something about rising food prices. I glanced at the box of food at my feet. If she’d wanted my sympathy, she was a couple of days late.

  Breaking news, a headline scrolled across the bottom of the screen. Unlikely. If it were that bloody urgent, it wouldn’t be relegated to a banner.

  Wrong again. A second later the banner expanded out to the full screen. Something was happening. Bigger than the weekly food bill. Something important.

  Vampires Stage Mass Escape!

  I stopped chewing, my mouth falling open with a mix of melted chocolate and caramel heavily laced with my spit sitting in the bottom of it. I’d told the man everything he needed to stop them. The fool had assured me that his people would take care of it.

  Or was I the fool?

  I picked up the remote and changed the channel. Whatever program they had on, it wasn’t something that struck my funny bone in the right way.