For a time Vega and the two vampires simply stared, eying each other defiantly. One vampire appeared to be holding a gun in his coat pocket, unsurprisingly pointed directly at the Spaniard. In his right hand, hanging loosely to his side, the other clutched a small syringe. Vega smiled and reached into his coat. The CN agents stiffened, prepared to spring forward, but then relaxed. The detective had merely pulled out his journal and chewed pencil. He motioned once more for the agents to join him on the bench. Eyes full of suspicion, the two walked up to the bench and sat down, one on each side of Vega. He glanced about quickly. There was little foot traffic here aside from the occasional traveler hurriedly passing by, loaded with luggage, looking carefully at the signs and exit numbers. A dozen feet away a single man sat upon a bench, his face buried in a newspaper.
Impatiently, the vampire with a concealed weapon motioned for Vega to get up. “You can get up quietly,” he hissed in Vega’s ear, “or we can carve a bloody path through this rabble. You’re coming with us either way. On your feet.”
The Spaniard motioned with his hand patiently and began writing on a page of his journal. Vega wrote in large, beautiful, flowing letters, taking his time with each character and adding plenty of artistic embellishments. Once finished he motioned at his writing proudly, while the CN agents looked upon the two words in confusion. “Aeternum Vale.” Before either looked up from the page Vega had played his move. With his left hand he grabbed the vampire by the wrist, shoved the needle into its leg and dispensed the serum. Simultaneously, Vega jammed his pencil precisely into the right vampire’s heart as swiftly and cleanly as an arrow. The drugged vampire gasped, mouth moving wordlessly, anger burning in his eyes before they rolled into the back of his head and he slid onto the Spaniard’s shoulder. The vampire on the right sat rigid, eyes like stone, head pointed toward the journal on Vega’s lap. The inspector glanced about to make sure nobody had noticed, then quickly closed the vampire’s eyes with his fingers and crossed the arms, covering the small bloodstain on its chest. It wouldn’t stand up to close scrutiny, yet it easily made for a convincing traveler catching some desperately needed shuteye. Vega pushed the drugged vampire off his shoulder, letting the agent lean against the bench’s armrest. The mute man looked about him once more, and satisfied that he had not drawn any attention, reached back into his coat, pulled out a fresh pencil and began doodling in his journal.
“Friends of yours?” Hammett walked up to Vega, a bruised and bloodied lip and a tear in the stitching of his coat’s sleeve. It had taken the Cyclops a good fifteen minutes to work his way through the maintenance tunnels and back onto the main hub floor, plus another five to spot and reach his partner. Vega smiled and patted the drugged vampire on the leg playfully. “Yes, I don’t imagine they’re much good for conversation. Me? Only a little trouble. Nothing I couldn’t handle.” Hammett pressed a finger to his neck and checked the tip to verify that he was no longer bleeding. “Child’s play, really. Well, the good news is that I don’t see any other signs of our ‘friends.’ It seems that three happened to be our lucky number today.” The Cyclops panned his head, as though he needed one more visual confirmation to back up his words. “Train boards in ten. I believe we can head over now. It’ll be a while yet before anyone checks on these two.”
Vega nodded, returned the pencil and journal to his coat pocket, and followed his partner into the crowd.
Chapter 22- Patience
For the first time in ages she felt genuinely tested, challenged. Thousands of unique scents mixed together in a chaotic potpourri, impossible to pick out just one in the mix. Shadows had all but been banished from the main hub, providing no cover, no sanctuary. A crowded public place such as Andresholl Station allowed no margin for error. Even the slightest waning of utmost caution and patience could lead to failure. All of her skills were being pushed to the limit, physically and mentally strained to the breaking point. The thrill was intoxicating.
From the very instant Luminita discovered that Necrosia had been secreted away from New Brasov she knew where the Cyclops would go. She felt pleased, even, to find the jail cell empty. Breaking into the police station had been laughably easy. Such trivialities were beneath her. But this, this new stage of the game, was a trial worthy of her superior talent. Almost thirty-six hours had passed since reaching Andresholl Station and not once had the assassin allowed herself a moment of rest, not a second of lax vigilance. It had been exceptionally easy sneaking into the maintenance tunnel system, and from here she could observe all that transpired from a number of vantage points. Like a spider poised motionlessly at the far end of her web, she need only wait and the prey would come to her.
She sensed his presence immediately, could almost taste his overconfident swagger in the air. Luminita could smell Hammett’s exhaustion, the strain placed upon him, the moment he set foot in the tunnel system. The bumbling oaf walked right past her, his ridiculous eye strained on a map displayed on his electronic device. She could have reached out there and then, could have ended their little game and proven herself the victor. But there was no need for haste.
Spotting the rival Cosa Nosferatu agents had been easy. In fact, observing Vasile’s incompetent fools had amused her greatly. If they possessed even an ounce of intelligence they would have waited to make their move after Hammett had boarded the train. The Cyclops and his silent partner would have led them directly to Necrosia, and once aboard there would be no means of escape. And their plan to drug the two detectives and torture information out of them? Laughable. These strong-willed men could endure days of the CN’s most vicious methods, and by then Necrosia would be long gone.
Luminita did nothing to hinder the vampire’s assault on the Cyclops. As the two battled, she ran her fingers along the scar stretching from the left eye down to the chin, remembering that moment when she had Hammett in her clutches. She had won. Necrosia lay at her feet. Hammett was virtually incapacitated. Then that wretched bitch of a hunchback did this to her. Oh yes, the Cyclops wouldn’t be the only one to suffer her wrath. It wasn’t until the vampire had the clear upper hand in the fight unfolding before her that she chose to intervene, to step out of her cruel fantasy. A swift and precise throw induced a geyser of sputtering sparks, and Hammett felled his enemy. The Cyclops would be hers and hers alone. When the time came.
Like a lioness tracking an oblivious kill, Luminita stalked the inspector through the tunnels as he left to regroup with his partner. When he left the darkness and joined the chaos of the central hub, she continued to creep along, tracking his movements through vents and access panels. She watched carefully as the two detectives boarded the train, unaware of her watching eyes. It would be simple to sneak aboard, to hide until the time to strike had come. Luminita had Necrosia in her clutches, and the woman’s associates were as good as dead. A pity this wondrously delicious game would be ending so soon. Alas, all good things must come to an end.
Chapter 23- All Aboard
“So this is what it’s like to travel first class.” Alex set Fabio’s luggage against the wall and marveled at the cabin. Encompassing a lounge area, bathroom (including a tub) and a separate bedroom, it felt more like an apartment. The only thing missing was a kitchen. In fact, the space was twice as large as his old apartment … before it burned to ash. As the train possessed no windows, along the entire length of the far wall stretched a screen displaying imagery of tropical fish and coral. It looked so much like a genuine fish tank that Alex couldn’t help but tap the screen, creating a distortion for a brief moment where his fingertip had landed.
Hammett and Vega had yet to arrive, so the four travelers made themselves comfortable and stretched out on the inviting furniture. After several minutes of relaxing, staring at the virtual fish tank and listening in as other passengers passed through the hallway outside the cabin, Alex became aware of a tremendous sleepiness creeping in. He rubbed his eyes and stretched his neck from side to side, preparing to rise back to his feet. Then he noticed that Serene h
ad already passed out on a couch, and Moody sat with her chin resting in her palm, her large goblin eyelids fighting a losing battle to stay up.
“No worries, Alice-boy. Very safe here. Rest. Sleep. Dream of loverly womens. Fabio wait for inspector-men. Go sleep.”
“Well, if you don’t mind.” Alex closed his eyes and almost immediately fell into a deep slumber.
A sudden lurch brought Alex back to his senses. The fish tank on the wall had now been replaced with an image of a Cyclops woman welcoming all passengers aboard. The stewardess was in the middle of rattling off a list of safety precautions, and on each side of her head various graphics further demonstrated the features built into the train, including numerous emergency exit doors throughout the vehicle. An electric hum grew louder, along with a slight vibration, as their transportation gradually picked up speed.
“Alice-boy have happiness dreams? Dreamings of beauties womens?”
“I don’t know. I can’t remember. I feel better now, though. I was so exhausted. It was really weird.” Alex stretched his legs and arms. “Oh, hey, it’s worn off.” Alex marveled at his hands, which had now returned to its original skin tone.
“The professor’s serum apparently had a much shorter efficacy than predicted.” Hammett sat in a chair nearby. “We’re fortunate that you all didn’t revert until after boarding. Any earlier and things could have turned ill in dramatic fashion.”
“I’ve said it time and again!” Serene stood up and wagged her finger, now back to her female form. “Snotwaddle is outrageously overrated. Paragon of the Millennium my ass! It’s a popularity contest, is what it is. Why, when I altered Alex’s eye color it lasted for days. Days. And there were no ridiculous drowsy side effects, I might add.”
“Then what do you call the searing pain I experienced after you sprayed that crap into my eye?” Alex asked.
“A brief moment of irritation due to your ocular sensitivity. But a trifle, really.”
“Irritation? Yeah, well, next time we’ll spray that crap in your eye and see how irritated you get.” Alex shook his head and rolled his eyes. He gazed across the room and noticed Moody still fast asleep, looking like her old self. Vega sat calmly in a chair, as always, and waved at Alex with a smile. “What happened to you?” he asked, noticing for the first time the swollen lip on the Cyclops and the additional wear on his clothing.
“Vega and I had a small bit of inconvenience with the local riffraff.”
“Are you all right? Is everything all right?” Alex instinctively looked over his shoulder for the millionth time.
“Everything is fine, Alex. They were but a handful, and now many miles behind us. Our train will not stop until arriving at UEL headquarters. There’s nothing more the enemy can do to us now.”
“Time to make happy!” Fabio waddled up with several bottles in his hand.
“You took the words right out of my mouth, dearest.” Serene playfully scratched the goblin’s head and then liberated one of the bottles from his hands.
“What’s the matter?” Hammett asked of Alex, noticing the young man’s confused expression.
“Nothing. I guess nothing’s the matter. I just … I can’t believe that all of this is coming to an end. All of our running and … everything. We get off this train, and that’s it. It’s difficult to believe. Feels like a dream.”
“Here you go dear boy, bottoms up.” Serene handed Alex a glass of bubbling blue liquid and held another out to the Cyclops.
“Thank you, but until you are all safely discharged from my care I am on duty.”
“For heaven’s sake! Don’t be such a stick in the mud. One little glass won’t hurt you a bit. In fact, I reckon it’ll do you a great deal of good. Moreover, I fancy that if you weren’t such an intolerable, overbearing tyrant, you’d still have a full head of hair. Stress will do that to you, you know. And now look at you. Here, take it. Just one. You can leave the heavy drinking to my darling goblin and me.”
Hammett sighed. “And you think I’m the intolerable one? Fine. Just the one.”
“You’re going to be so glad when this is all over and you’ve finally gotten rid of us.” Alex laughed between sips of his drink.
“I cannot deny that this assignment has been one of the most … challenging of my career,” Hammett replied with a nod to Serene, now cheerfully tormenting a grumpy Moody who had just awakened.
“You should try living and working with these nuts.”
“Whatever it is you’re being paid it’s not enough.”
“Damn right.” Alex finished off his glass. “Hey, this is pretty good stuff.”
“I agree. In some things, at least, Fabio has very fine taste.”
Fabio heard his name mentioned from across the room and bowed to Alex and Hammett, waggling his long tongue playfully.
“Seriously, though, maybe you ought to give careful consideration to taking a vacation. A real one …. without anything to do with your work. You know, leave the gun and badge at home and all that. Enjoy a whole week without shooting somebody or beating up the bad guys. After all these years, and especially these last few weeks, I think you’ve earned it.”
“Damn right,” Hammett concurred, finishing off his drink in one long, satisfied sip. “I may have to give serious consideration to that.”
“You really should. You might even have fun, believe it or not. So … we’re like hundreds of feet below the ocean’s floor right now?” Alex changed the subject, looking about the cabin.
“Deeper than that, actually,” Hammett added.
“I always wanted to cross the Atlantic. Never imagined I’d do it underground and without seeing a drop of water. How long have you people had this tunnel system?”
“Several hundred years.”
“That long? Amazing. And this network … it spans the entire globe?”
“Every UEL member nation is connected through the system, one way or another. From headquarters I can reach any continent within hours.”
“Wow. It must have taken ages for you people to dig all these tunnels.”
“It would have, to be sure. Interestingly, though, the vast majority of them were already there to begin with. We merely stumbled upon them and put them to good use.”
“Ah, and here we come upon one of the greatest, most delicious enigmas of all time.” Serene walked up, her eyes alight with excitement.
“So where did they come from?” Alex asked.
“Unfortunately, for the time being, we can do nothing but speculate,” Serene began to lecture, pulling up a seat. “Some believe that great underground rivers stretched around the globe once, like veins and arteries under the skin. Others hypothesize that channels of lava carved their paths across the millennia while the continents formed. There’s also a popular theory, which is absolute rubbish, that now extinct, monstrous, worm-like beasts ate their way through. Bah! That’s as likely as the world being flat and resting atop a tortoise suspended in space. The world is full of morons, dear boy. Sometimes I think we’re still living in the dark ages.”
“And what do you think happened?” Alex asked her.
“So glad you asked. I wrote an astounding thesis on the subject in my younger days. A work of art, really. Brilliant beyond words. You need to read it someday. But to summarize, I am absolutely convinced that these tunnels are remnants of a long lost empire of antediluvian dwarves.” Moody snorted loudly and choked on her drink. “This advanced, mole-like race incessantly burrowed, greedily searching for precious stones that were sacrificed to their heathen elder gods, voracious brutes who traveled space and time. However, at some point these elder gods came to realize that dwarves made for fantastic meals, and quickly brought the poor buggers to extinction. Gorged, these monstrosities left earth in search of a new world to devour.”
“Well … that’s interesting,” Alex said with a smile.
“I’ll say it is.” Hammett laughed.
“And I’ll say it’s an ass-load of crap,” Moody barked.
<
br /> “Shut up, you. As if you know anything about such matters.”
“How did the … scientific people react to your theory?” Alex pressed.
“The damned imbeciles said I was mad and shunned me from that moment forward. Bastards! One day … one day I’ll prove it. Then we’ll see who’s mad!”
“Huh.” Alex did his best to hold back the laughter. “I, uh…I think it’s very … fascinating. I like your theory. Although, I like the humongous worm monster theory, too. They’re both good.”
“Maybe your mole-dwarves rode atop the worms,” Moody added with a snicker. “Sitting atop saddles, cracking whips. Hi-yah! Hi-yah!” The hunchback dramatically flicked her wrist in a whipping motion.
“Nonsense, Quasimoody. I already told you that those subterranean worms never existed. We’d have found evidence of their remains by now.”
“But you have evidence of these dwarf guys?” Alex asked.
“Indeed I do. But I’ll not share such revelations with these undeserving doubting Thomases!” Serene wagged her finger about the room, which was now overcome with laughter. “When you and I have a moment alone, dear boy, I’ll reveal all. The truth will likely shatter your mind and all notions of reality.”
“Whatever.” Moody rolled her eyes. “On to more important things: there’s the reality that I’m starving.”
“Fabio order tastings feast for hunchy-flower.”
“Yeah, you do that goblin boy,” the hunchback affirmed.
“I could eat,” Alex added.
“And don’t forget the libations!” Serene wagged her empty glass above her head.
“Very well,” Hammett began, rising to his feet. “While you do that I’ll take a bit of a stroll and check on our progress. I met the captain earlier, shortly after boarding, and have a few questions I’d like to ask him about our arrival. We should be nearly halfway home. You’re in charge of these lunatics until I get back.” Hammett nodded to Vega with a grin. “And leave some food for me,” he added, winking, and exited the cabin.
The Eville Protection Plan Page 12
