Vampire Trilogy Series (Book 3): Vampire Equinox

by Philip Henry

  ‘It’s never going to happen, Hal.’

  ‘You’ll feel differently when you’re one of us.’

  ‘No, I won’t. Hal, if you ever loved me…’

  ‘I do love you! This new age begins with us, Sarah. I’ve done this all for you. So we can be together.’

  Sarah hung her head. She reached out and took Tom’s hand. She looked up again and faced Hal. ‘I’m sorry. We have to do this.’

  Hal’s blood boiled when he saw them touch. He took a few steps back, behind the line and shouted, ‘Disarm and restrain her. Kill him.’

  The vampires surged forward. Some taking flight, others just running, but all headed towards Tom and Sarah. They released their hands and raised their swords. When the vampires were close enough they both launched themselves into the air and came down in the middle of the swarm, hacking for all they were worth.

  Nicholl wasn’t slowing down as much as she should on the corners. Everyone on the bus was getting thrown across their seats. Dave poked Eileen’s cheek with his screwdriver for the fifth time.

  ‘Sorry, again.’

  The cut healed in seconds. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ she said.

  Dave continued to work at the collar around her neck. He had got it open. Now he just needed to bypass the tamper switch so it wouldn’t explode when she took it off. He twisted two wires together and then nodded to Eileen. Cautiously she pulled the collar apart. It didn’t explode. She took the perimeter marker from her pocket and set them both on the seat beside her. She rubbed her neck, glad to finally be free of it. She smiled at Dave.

  The other Dave walked up and down the corridor of the bus giving basic training in the weapons they had brought. ‘Most of them are ordinary things that have been adapted to be used as weapons. Don’t spend a lot of time wondering if it’s going to work or not. We’ve already done that thinking. You just need to point and fire. Most of the weapons have a trigger and the ones that don’t, don’t take a lot of working out. Also, if you look at the casing of your weapon you’ll notice we’ve included puns and cool things to say after you use them.’ Everyone looked blankly at him. ‘You know, for morale.’

  The bus took a sharp left and Dave had to grab hold of the overhead luggage rack to stop from falling. Nicholl sped through the tiny car-park and smashed through the fence. Some of them saw the sign for Ballinrees Reservoir before the bus flattened it. Nicholl steered the bus through the narrow walkway, the trees on either side slapping the bus. They came out into the clearing and she skidded to a stop.

  The bus doors opened with a hiss. Nicholl ran outside into the night and shouted for Rek. Lynda ran out after her. The surface of the reservoir was still. Nothing moved. No-one answered her cries. Everyone on the bus watched as Nicholl shouted repeatedly for Rek.

  She didn’t understand. The GPS had led her here. Where the hell was he?

  Rek had finished sending all his farewell emails. He set his phone down. The screams and growls outside the door were becoming more and more angered. His door blockade was disintegrating and some of the hybrids were smashing their way through the plasterboard wall. Not long now. He looked around the ceiling of the office. He hadn’t put any C4 in this room. Still, he had put a shitload of it everywhere else. Hopefully it would be quick. Worst-case scenario: he would be trapped in here as the room slowly filled with water and he drowned. He couldn’t think about things like that now. He had to do this. He had to finish this and avenge his sister.

  He lifted the detonator and put his thumb to the button. He took a deep breath. He closed his eyes.

  ‘Maybe he dropped his phone in the reservoir to throw us off,’ Lynda said. ‘You know he didn’t want us to find him.’

  ‘No, wherever he was he said he was trapped. He couldn’t have got out to ditch his phone. Rek!’

  Lynda walked over to her and took her by the shoulders. ‘Nicholl. Amanda. We have to go. Tom and Sarah need our help. We need to get the zeros to them.’

  Nicholl shook her head.

  ‘We can come back,’ Lynda said. ‘We’ll look for him after the night is over. As soon as the sun rises…’

  The ground shook beneath the two women. They put out their arms to keep their balance. A huge section of the reservoir seemed to drop all at once. The water sloshed and splashed around, finding its own level again. The women stared at it. Things started to bob on the surface of the water. Papers. A phone. A chair. Two more chairs. A printer.

  Two arms broke the surface of the water. Lynda and Nicholl both jumped. Then a head appeared. Nicholl recognised the deformations immediately. She had fought one before and it had been very hard to kill. A vampire/Che’al hybrid. It walked towards the shoreline. Two more heads popped up. Then three more. Then more. Nicholl counted ten. Now twelve. And they were still coming.

  Lynda stood, shaking at the sight she was witnessing. ‘Oh, God.’

  Nicholl turned to her. ‘Come on, we don’t have much time.’ Nicholl ran towards the bus and shouted, ‘Everyone off, quickly! Dave, break out the weapons. We can’t let these things loose. If they make more like themselves we don’t stand a chance.’

  Lynda took a step back, watching the creatures emerging from the reservoir. A dark sense of certainty rose up inside her. They wouldn’t be able to stop them. She spoke in barely a whisper, ‘This is it… This is how the world ends.’

  war

  The remaining vampires backed away and formed a rough circle around Tom and Sarah. Their hearts were racing. They were running on adrenaline, their senses sharper and more attuned. Tom did a quick three-hundred and sixty degree scan. He counted eight left. Plus Hal made nine. He and Sarah had hacked their way through twenty-two vampires. Their bodies littered the ground and Tom and Sarah were both heavily stained with their opponents’ blood.

  The remaining vampires looked to Hal, who looked furious that Tom was still alive. ‘Well, what are you waiting for? Kill him!’

  Tom and Sarah put themselves back-to-back, poised to attack the approaching vampires. One of them leapt forward and burst into flames. The vampires looked at each other, confused. Another one burst into flames. Hal looked up and saw the helicopter hovering. He shot up into the air at incredible speed. The rest of the vampires charged at Tom and Sarah as one.

  Hal flew into the back of the helicopter at such speed that he couldn’t stop in time and slammed himself and the sniper against the opposite door. The sniper struggled to free himself but Hal bit into his neck. He screamed as Hal drained him. He managed to fire the rifle. The bullet hit the roof and shattered. A fine mist of holy water sprayed Hal and he jumped back. The sniper raised his hand to his neck and tried to staunch the bleeding. Hal grabbed him by the foot and hurled him out of the helicopter. Chloe looked out and saw him screaming all the way to the ground.

  In a second Hal was at her throat. He bit into her neck. Chloe yelled, then gritted her teeth in anger. She reached backwards and grabbed Hal’s head. She held onto him tightly as he drank from her. She pushed the cyclic stick full forward and the helicopter started to dive towards the ground. Hal stopped drinking. He could see what she was trying to do. He tried to break free of her grasp but couldn’t. The instruments in the cockpit were bleeping and buzzing every kind of alarm.

  The trees were rushing towards them. Chloe closed her eyes and held on tight to the struggling vampire. She smiled as the helicopter hit the tree-line. The rotors first chewed, then smashed on the treetops. Chloe and the vampire were thrown forward and smashed into the glass and the cockpit. The rotor blades were sent shooting in all directions. The forward momentum of the helicopter kept it going forward for a few seconds, then it dropped. The branches smashed and threw the occupants all over the inside of the metal shell until it crashed down on the ground.

  Both occupants lay battered, bruised and bleeding, and perfectly still.

  Tom beheaded the last vampire and followed Sarah up the hill towards the temple. They got there breathing heavily, but took no time to rest. Tom handed
Sarah The Fist of Merlin then knelt down and laced his fingers together. Sarah put her foot into his hands and he launched her onto the domed roof of the temple. Sarah clambered up the smooth surface and put her arm around the apex. She prised the stone from its gold surroundings and held it in her hand. The hole in the apex was exactly the right size. Nicholl needn’t have worried about taking a long time to fit it. She placed the stone into the hole on top of the temple. It was almost as if the temple gripped it. The stone was firmly lodged and not likely to move.

  Tom walked inside Mussenden Temple and looked around. It was amazing how much Dave’s men (and Chloe’s money) had accomplished in one day. He looked up and saw the small circle of night sky disappear as Sarah put the stone in place. The narrow channel was mirrored all the way down. Eight spherical alcoves around the ceiling now contained concave mirrors. Dave had said there were mirrored channels cut through the roof leading to each of the alcoves. Tom walked to the windows and felt the convex glass. The windows were basically huge lenses. Sarah dropped to the ground outside.

  Tom stepped through the door. ‘OK, now we just have to figure out how this…’ Sarah turned and saw what had stopped Tom. The Master was standing on the path before them. The moment of inspiration hit them both at the same time.

  I have a connection to all my children.

  They turned to each other, unable to suppress a smile and said,

  ‘I know what…’

  ‘…we have to do.’

  Joshua climbed out through the skylight on the bus, closely followed by Dave. He checked the rifle and opened the loading chamber. Dave opened the blue box and handed him the glass bullet. Joshua loaded it and took aim on the closest creature. The bullet hit directly over the heart. There was a small flame that lasted about three seconds. Joshua turned to Dave.

  ‘OK, don’t worry. Plan B.’ Dave brought out another box, this time red. He opened it very carefully. ‘Looks like the holy water isn’t making too much of a dent. That’s OK. We’ve heard about these things and we came prepared.’ He very gently handed Joshua another glass bullet.

  ‘How are these different?’ Joshua asked.

  ‘These aren’t holy water. These are Dicyanocetylene. It burns with the hottest flame of any chemical; four thousand, nine-hundred and ninety degrees centigrade. There’s a little igniter in the tip of each bullet. Let’s see if that slows them down.’

  Joshua took aim and fired. The bullet hit the heart again, but this time the whole creature exploded in flames, screaming. Joshua turned to Dave, smiling. ‘That was so fuckin’ cool.’

  Dave patted him on the back and said, ‘Go nuts.’ Dave jumped off the roof of the bus as Joshua reloaded.

  Everyone was holding a weapon. Joshua ignited another hybrid. Dave addressed the crowd. ‘OK, everyone, remember to let them burn for a little while first.’ He thumped his chest with his fist. ‘Gotta destroy the armour before these weapons will do any good.’ Joshua ignited another creature. Everyone readied their weapons. ‘And people,’ Dave added. ‘Let’s not forget the puns.’

  One of the zeros ran forward with a modified nail-gun, which had the cartridge of nails replaced with pencils. He shot several pencils into the hybrid’s heart. The hybrid collapsed and died. The zero read off the side of the nail-gun, ‘2B or not 2B.’

  A female member of Zero Squadron ran forward and fired an arrow from her crossbow. It hit the hybrid dead on the heart, but the creature kept coming. The woman turned to Dave.

  Dave smiled and whispered, ‘There’s a little motor with a wooden drillbit attached inside the arrow.’

  They both turned round and heard the faint sound of whirring. The hybrid started to shake, clutched its chest and dropped to the ground. The woman smiled and read off the side of her crossbow, ‘And people say my work is boring.’

  Another zero stepped forward and threw a wooden ring with a razor-sharp edge at an incoming hybrid. The ring cut through the air like a lethal Frisbee. The hybrid’s still flaming body soon found itself without a head. ‘Stick around,’ the zero said. He turned to Dave. ‘I don’t get that.’

  ‘It’s a stick and it spins around… god damn it.’ Dave shook his head and walked away, feeling unappreciated.

  Nicholl counted fifteen dead hybrids lying on the shore. This wasn’t proving as hard as she thought, thanks to the Daves’ weaponry.

  Another zero stepped forward with bolas. He built up speed, spinning the balls on the end of the thin wire, then flung them at the neck of the nearest hybrid. The three balls magnetized behind the creature’s neck. The motors inside the balls all started drawing the wire back inside the balls. The hybrid stopped, choking. Suddenly the wire heated up to red hot. The creature screamed as the wire was pulled tighter, burning through its neck and eventually cutting its head off. The zero ran and retrieved the bolas and said, ‘Feel the burn,’ to the dead hybrid.

  Kaaliz raised his eyes above the waterline. They were laughing. Those Ministry fuckers were laughing as they killed the hybrids. He moved slowly through the dark water and got out on the opposite side to where all the fighting was going on. He observed their tactics for a few moments and decided the sniper should be the first to go. He hovered into the air and then charged full speed to the other side of the reservoir.

  Joshua smiled and reloaded. He didn’t even see the vampire coming. Kaaliz ripped at his throat. Joshua was screaming. Everyone turned around. No one dared to fire for fear of hitting Joshua. Kaaliz dropped Joshua and lifted his rifle. Before anyone could react, he was firing indiscriminately into the crowd. Zeros were bursting into flames all around Nicholl. She ran towards the bus and drew her sword.

  The rifle was empty. Kaaliz dropped it. He looked down and saw the box of glass bullets. He hurled it at Nicholl. She jumped to the side at the last second. The box exploded when it hit the ground. The blastwave knocked everyone off their feet.

  Dierdre stood at the back of the bus trying to get a foothold on the bumper, but she couldn’t get herself lifted. She turned when she heard screaming. Another wave of hybrids were out of the water and were feasting on the stunned zeros. Deirdre waddled across the smoke-filled battlefield and began hacking at the hybrids. More were emerging from the water, unchallenged. Dierdre saw Nicholl fighting one behind her. Two more were to her left, ripping apart members of Zero Squadron. Dierdre threw her considerable weight behind her sword but couldn’t penetrate the creature’s outer skin.

  ‘Stand back,’ Lynda shouted. Deirdre jumped to the side. Lynda lifted a torch and pointed it at the hybrid’s heart. The ultraviolet beam burned at its flesh slowly. Deirdre walked backwards as the hybrid advanced on her. Thirty seconds cooking looked about right. Deirdre lifted a branch from the ground and drove it into the hybrid’s heart. It stopped, wobbled for a moment, then dropped.

  Lynda had been waiting to say what was written on her torch, so she said it loudly. ‘Ultra-violent, ultraviolet.’ No-one turned. There was probably too much other stuff going on.

  Deirdre ran over to Lynda. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘No problem.’

  ‘I think you’re our best shot now that the sniper’s gone. As soon as they come out of the water take out their eyes first, then go to work on their heart armour, or even better, their necks.’

  Lynda nodded and followed Deirdre towards cover. Something hit her on the way and she dropped. Lynda woke up with one cheek on the ground. The torch was lying beside her, the beam pointed at an approaching hybrid’s ankle. She could see the smoke rising from it. The hybrid was coming for her. Deirdre was behind it shouting her name. Her head was heavy, her thoughts disordered. The beam was still pointing at the hybrid’s ankle but it was much closer now.

  Deirdre ran up behind it and sliced the burning ankle off. The hybrid screamed and turned around, now balancing on one foot and one stump six inches shorter. ‘Lynda,’ Deirdre shouted. Lynda shook her head and managed to get her eyes to focus on Deirdre. ‘Get your shit together. I’ll keep it busy.

  The
hybrid took another faltering step towards Deirdre and screamed when the stump hit the ground. Deirdre held up its missing foot and wiggled it before its face. ‘Got your foot, dude.’

  The hybrid screamed and took off after Deirdre like a pirate with a wooden leg. The fat girl was easily keeping ahead of it.

  Maybe it was the situation, or maybe it was just the concussion, but Lynda started laughing.

  Eileen landed on the roof of the bus and punched Kaaliz. He dropped to his knees, then lunged at her. They rolled around the roof of the bus exchanging punches.

  The hybrid Nicholl was fighting had been burned, though probably not for long enough. Its skin was yielding, but slowly. With one powerful swipe it sent her flying across the grass. Nicholl looked up and saw the nail-gun lying on the ground. She scrambled towards it and grabbed the handle. She turned just as the creature was bearing down on her. ‘Eat lead, you son of a bitch!’ She unloaded the remainder of the clip into its heart. It teetered. Nicholl jumped to the side as it fell forward and hit the ground with a solid thud.

  Unsteadily, she got to her feet and surveyed the fight. They were getting annihilated. The pudgy little Slayer was running around with a foot in her hand while a hybrid chased her. Claire and a zero were attacking a hybrid together but not doing much more than annoying it. From the corner of her eye Nicholl saw something floating on the reservoir. She recognized the jacket. ‘Rek?’ She ran to the water’s edge. He was way too far out. Another hybrid stood up out of the water before her. Nicholl ran back, out of its reach.

  She looked around and saw Eileen and Kaaliz fighting on top of the bus. Eileen grabbed him and hurled him into the trees. ‘Eileen!’ She turned and looked at Nicholl. Nicholl pointed out to the middle of the reservoir. ‘It’s Rek!’