Journal

by Cat Thomson

Nikolas turned away from the window to contemplate the human Michelle was enjoying. The entire building was now filled with his human slaves, who would do whatever was asked of them in exchange for a few moments of sensual pleasure with a vampire. It wouldn't be long before he had amassed an enviable army of humans to assist them in their war against the last dregs of rebellious humanity. Humans were now living in covens throughout London, their mission being to protect sleeping vampires from attack during the day.

  Nikolas had a special task for Brian, this new slave of his. Michelle had been instructed to seek out the scent of anyone connected with the humans who had slaughtered the fourteen vampires and, at long last, tonight she had found someone who fitted the bill.

  Nikolas approached the engrossed lovers and sat on the sofa's armrest.

  "You're really enjoying this, aren't you, Brian," he said in a gentle voice.

  Brian's eyes had been closed, but he now opened them. Michelle got up and disappeared into the kitchen where she could be heard singing, and Brian crawled away from Nikolas, to the other end of the sofa, where he crouched, once again filled with an irrational dread.

  Nikolas stood up and sauntered over to sit down next to him on the sofa.

  "We're not going to kill you, Brian," he said. "But I have something I would like you to do for me. And if you do what I ask of you, and you do it well, then you'll get to enjoy Michelle's company again. I know you'd like that very much."

  ***

  Location: London

  Monday, 18 January 2027

  Sunrise: 07:57

  Sunset: 16:25

  Nikolas had been so gentle with Charlotte, on the night he had hauled her back to his coven, that it was as though he had forgotten her abandonment of him. But when she had opened her eyes the following sunset, she had understood his cruel objective.

  Nikolas's greatest strength was his ability to remain awake for a short while after the sun had risen and to invoke consciousness just before the sun set, and while Charlotte and the other vampires in his coven were deep in slumber, he had confined her to a coffin in his sleeping chamber. It may be normal for a vampire to choose to sleep in a coffin when the sun is in the sky, but there is no punishment worse for a vampire than to awaken at night to find itself imprisoned within one. Charlotte had screamed and clawed at the coffin's lid, barely centimetres above her body, but only the vicious laughter of Nikolas and Michael had greeted her pleas for release and she had been filled with a sense of hopelessness.

  The interminable night-time hours had dragged on and Charlotte's mind had begun to steadily free-fall into an abyss of black panic, which worsened with each passing night that she remained imprisoned within the bleak confines of the coffin. Her only reprieve was when she first awoke at sunset, when Nikolas would throw off the coffin lid and offer her his wrist for sustenance.

  On one of the nights that Charlotte drank thus, she became aware through the haze of her confinement-darkened mind of a naked human standing with Nikolas. Desire surged through her nectar imbued veins and she stretched out her arm so that the tips of her fingers brushed across the human's torso. Nikolas grabbed her arm and pushed it back into the coffin, slamming the coffin's lid shut.

  Charlotte screamed as she beat her fists against the lid, her unmet desire for the human now mingling with the mental torment of being incarcerated inside the coffin. She began to ache for him, longed to feel his skin against hers, to taste the warm vitality that flowed through his veins, until she found herself at the threshold of a mental anguish that would have rendered a human insane.

  ***

  Location: London

  Tuesday, 19 January 2027

  Sunrise: 07:56

  Sunset: 16:27

  The following night as Charlotte's eyes opened with the advent of darkness, Nikolas pulled up her coffin lid and offered his wrist as had become his ritual, but this time for far longer than he had on any of the previous nights of her confinement. Charlotte clasped his wrist greedily against her mouth with both hands until she was satiated. She became aware that the human was present again and reached out to take his hand in hers.

  "I think you've suffered enough, beloved. I'm going to let you have a little reprieve and enjoy Brian tonight; he's one of my most prized slaves," Nikolas said, before retreating from his sleeping chamber.

  Charlotte climbed awkwardly out of the coffin.

  "He's going to destroy you when he returns," Brian whispered. "I heard him tell Michael that he's planning to annihilate you."

  Charlotte stared at Brian vacantly. She was barely able to appraise his words; her mind was still spinning in its coffin-blackened realm, her senses dulled. But the nectar from Nikolas's wrist that now travelled through her body was gradually physically and mentally rejuvenating her, and as she stood before Brian, she began to increasingly grasp her predicament. She took a clumsy step towards the dug-out aperture that was the door to Nikolas's sleeping chamber.

  "Take me with you," Brian said as he lurched forward to block her path.

  Charlotte unwittingly took his hand, and she and Brian walked through the earthen tunnels of Nikolas's coven, unhindered. She allowed Brian to mount her back once they had exited the coven and were standing on the wet, blustery Heath, then immediately began to run with great speed. Nikolas then came out from behind the trunk of a tree, and stood and watched them disappear, his lips curled into a contemptuous smile. Charlotte had done exactly what he had wanted her to do. She had escaped and taken the human with her. Nikolas had waited a long time for Michelle to locate a human linked to the vampire slayers, through whom they could find and destroy the guilty humans, and in the meantime, he had discovered that Charlotte was evidently closely connected to the human who had installed the camera in his hotel suite, and it was now a simple matter of ensnaring him and the slayers, wherever they transpired to be.

  ***

  After leaving Hampstead Heath with Brian on her back, Charlotte's sense of direction had been confused, and she had flitted through innumerable streets before arriving at the shelter's entrance.

  Down in the shelter, Ed, Jonathan and Tom were observing the security monitors in the Control Room.

  "Take a look at this," said Ed as he watched the two figures now standing at the shelter entrance, one of whom was repeatedly, frantically keying in a code on the entry keypad.

  "It's a good thing we changed the code," said Tom. "Looks like it's Charlotte up there, but who's she got with her?"

  "Go alert the vampires," said Ed.

  Tom ran off, taking the shaft 10 stairs down to the lower level. He no longer took anything like a crucifix with him when he went to the vampire section of the shelter - he would have to learn to trust James and Charlotte and the rest of them if they were going to fight together against Nikolas. As Tom turned into Parry, he was relieved to see James a little further up the tunnel.

  "We've seen two figures up at the door," he called out breathlessly to James. "One of them could be Charlotte, but we need to make sure it isn't a set-up."

  "I'll go check it out," said James. "But warn the other vampires to be prepared for potential conflict."

  Tom knew he didn't have any choice; he would have to go to Oldham sub-shelter to tell Helmut and his coveners about the two figures at the door. He hated going anywhere near Oldham, as the tangible sensual allure of Helmut's coveners always lit a deep, disquieting flame of yearning within him and he had to exercise incredible self-control to not succumb to his desires.

  ***

  James felt the cool rush of wind against his face as he sprinted up the many-stepped spiral staircase leading to the shelter's entrance. Once there, he pressed his body against the door. He could feel Charlotte's presence beyond the door's thick expanse and he shuddered, for there was also an echo of her recent, tormented screams radiating off of her. He released the door lock and stepped out onto the pavement. The door slid shut behind him.

  "Charlotte, you have the reek of Nikolas on you! And I see you've
brought a human with you," he said as he observed Brian.

  "I don't have the reek of Nikolas on me for any other reason than because he held me captive in a coffin for many days and nights. And this is Brian; he warned me that Nikolas planned to destroy me."

  "And you escaped without any resistance?" James asked.

  "None."

  This was an ill omen. But James had already sensed the suffering Charlotte had recently gone through, and he could see from her demeanour that even now the last vestiges of disorientation brought about by her incarceration still dulled her senses. Any poor judgement on her part would be attributable to this. He returned to the door and keyed in the entry code, and down in the Control Room they watched as the two miniscule figures on the monitor followed James into the shelter through the entrance door before it slid shut once again.

  ***

  The fast-flying rumour that Charlotte had returned, bringing a human with her, had reached Mark and he watched as Tom approached, a man walking alongside him. As the man and Tom drew closer to Mark and their features became more discernible, Mark realised with shock that the man was his brother.

  "Brian!" Mark shouted.

  He ran down the tunnel to his brother and bear-hugged him, but recoiled when he realised there were two distinctive small puncture marks on Brian's neck.

  "He's my brother - Brian," Mark explained to Tom.

  "Seriously?" said Tom. "He was being held captive by Nikolas. Charlotte took him with her when she escaped."

  "You must have gone through quite an ordeal," said Mark. "Now do you believe that vampires exist?"

  Brian didn't answer. He seemed cagey.

  "Are you hungry, bruv? Do you need anything?" said Mark.

  Brian shook his head. "No, Mark, I'm okay for now, but I do need to use the toilet."

  Mark showed Brian where the toilets were and returned to Collingwood alone. He couldn't quite figure out what it was, but something about his brother was bothering him.

  ***

  Martin approached Mark with a rapid gait and slammed an object onto the table in front of him.

  "What is that?" Mark asked, taken aback by Martin's anger.

  "It's a camera, Mark. I confronted your brother when I saw him on the lower level - asked him who he was and why he had ventured off on his own. He told me he was your brother and he was just exploring the place. Then I became suspicious when I noticed the imperceptibly different button on his coat."

  Martin's shouting soon brought silence to the rest of Collingwood and drew Ed out of his office.

  "We don't see you up here very often these days, Martin. What's going on?" said Ed.

  "Mark's brother had this affixed to his coat, Ed!" said Martin as he pointed at the camera on the table.

  Martin suddenly walked off, but soon returned with a hammer from the tool chest in his clenched fist. He began to hit the camera with it, the force of his blows causing the flimsy table on which the camera lay to creak as the camera shattered. Mark got up quickly and backed away. Tiny black shards from the camera hurtled through the air in haphazard directions and people nearby covered their faces with their arms to protect their eyes from the light shower of debris. As the last remnant of the camera on the table received the final blow of Martin's hammer, the table groaned then collapsed.

  "He was being held captive by Nikolas so we can only assume that Nikolas has been watching everything. It's only a matter of time now," said Ed with despondency.

  "Brian!" Mark's expression was stupefied as he watched his brother, who at that moment was limping down the tunnel towards them, his nose bloodied, his ripped coat dishevelled.

  "Somebody search him, please. And don't anybody let him have the code to get out of here," said Ed, before adding with emphasis, "ever."

  ***

  Nikolas and Michael had been watching and listening with great relish before the camera was discovered and destroyed.

  "I noticed that the human who caught Brian in the act is a dhampir," said Nikolas. "I suspect it is he who is Charlotte's lover. And he seems to have some knowledge of concealed cameras, so I'd say, Michael, that we've pinpointed both our sets of enemies in that labyrinth of tunnels - the vampire slayers as well as the human who planted the camera in my hotel room. It'll be an easy task to destroy them. After all, we're only dealing with a handful of humans here, and one or two vampires and dhampirs."

  ***

  Location: London

  Thursday, 21 January 2027

  Sunrise: 07:54

  Sunset: 16:30

  The pale face of the Defence Secretary filled the newly installed flat screen in Grenville sub-shelter. She was discussing the urgent need to provide Londoners with more night-time places of refuge.

  "We will also open the deep-level shelter at Clapham South to the citizens of London as soon as is reasonably feasible," she said.

  "Looks like Nikolas may have already worked out where we are," Tom said to Ed. "It didn't take him long at all. Do you still have anyone in government you can trust; someone who could tell you what's being said and done behind the scenes?"

  "I'm no longer in contact with the one person left I was still communicating with; not since December. I felt his safety would be jeopardised if he remained in contact with me. But I had previously had it conveyed to the powers that be that the shelter was in a state of disrepair and thus uninhabitable, and that's been working as a deterrent. Until now."

  The Defence Secretary's voice was suddenly cut off, and Tom and Ed turned to see that the screen was now black and that Matt was standing, holding the remote control.

  "Why'd you turn the news off, Matt?" asked Tom.

  "I can't take any more of the negativity. Can't we just disconnect for a while?" said Matt, before sitting down again and picking up his guitar. He began to play it.

  There was something ludicrous about Matt's actions, considering the shelter's impending peril, now that the government had made it clear that they intended to sequester the place so that it could be used as yet another place of night time refuge for London's citizens. But nobody turned the screen back on and some of Ed's crew got up silently and left. Matt was a talented guitarist and a small crowd stayed on to listen to him play. It seemed that he wasn't the only one amongst them who wanted a reprieve from the relentless, dark vampire threat.

  ***

  At the split-second moment that Charlotte exited the shelter, she sensed that something was amiss. She saw vampires rapidly advancing towards her from the shadows, and she hastened away from the shelter's main entrance door, landing on a drain pipe across the street. She watched as vampires began to swarm through the door before it could slide fully shut, and saw that some amongst them remained there, holding it open. She let out a long, piercing wail before flitting off with great speed. One of the invading vampires began to pursue her, but Charlotte was exceptionally quick and the vampire was soon left behind.

  Down on the shelter's lower level, Helmut, James and the other vampires heard Charlotte's wail and picked up the warning message behind it, and they all, apart from James, flew up the link stairs to Grenville on the upper level. When Matt and the crowd who sat listening to his guitar playing saw them, they screamed, fearing an attack.

  Charlotte's loud wail had been imperceptible to the humans in the shelter, thirty metres below street level, and the blur of swift motion of the vampires entering the shelter was also too quick for the humans watching the Control Room monitors to even notice.

  Leaving his coveners in Grenville, Helmut continued onwards in flight towards the Control Room. When he reached it, he called out, "We're under siege! Nikolas's vampires are entering the shelter!"

  Jonathan leant forward to scrutinise the monitors. Both the main and the second entrance doors were shut. The enemy vampires had evidently all now entered the shelter.

  "What happened?" asked Jonathan.

  "Charlotte was ambushed as she left to go hunting," said Helmut. "They must have acted quickly, to have m
anaged to get to the doors before they had closed."

  "But if Charlotte had been following the protocol, the second entrance door would have been shut already before she opened the main entrance door," said Jonathan.

  A hissing now began, intermingled with the fearful screaming of humans.

  "Clearly, it wasn't. They've reached the crucifixes and can come no further," said Helmut. "It is now time for me and my coveners to attack them."

  ***

  It would not have been possible for James to flit past the crucifixes with Helmut and his coveners and so he and Katie, who lacked a vampire's speed, had remained in their sleeping chamber on the lower level, awaiting the inevitable - they would soon be discovered by the invading vampires.

  The door to their chamber flew open.

  "Daniel!" James and Katie said in unison when they recognised the vampire that now stood before them.

  Sarah suddenly appeared alongside Daniel.

  "Daniel, Sarah, you were once my coveners and I am your maker. To attack me and my mate would be an act of betrayal," said James.

  Daniel responded only with a sneer, revealing bloodied teeth, evidence of his recent gory feeding frenzy. Then he flew across the tiny chamber and attacked James. Sarah and Katie were silent witnesses as Daniel and James repeatedly hit and indented the tunnel's thick metal casing that made up one wall of the chamber as they grappled with each other within the chamber's tight confines.

  James had not yet fed and Daniel soon overpowered him, his hand hovering over James's neck as he prepared to rip his head away from his body.

  "No!" screamed Katie.

  "It would be an abomination to destroy your own maker, Daniel," said James.

  "You would do the same to your own maker if you had a chance," Daniel said in a low voice.

  But as Daniel's hand seized James's neck, his attention was diverted by a tumultuous, shrill screaming which now rose up from the tunnel beyond the sleeping chamber and he withdrew his hand. Through the chamber's open door, they could see Helmut's coveners walking down the tunnel, confronting Nikolas's vampires with the crucifixes they had brought with them from the upper level. The enemy vampires were soon repelled by the crucifixes and rendered into a weakened state, and as they cowered like flies caught in a web, Helmut and his coveners approached each one of them and pressed the crucifixes against their bodies.