Strange Days (Bill of the Dead Book 1)

by Rick Gualtieri

  As for Bob here...

  I fell upon him, intent on feeding.

  My only solace in doing so was that I somehow managed to have the good graces to at least not suck on his nostrils.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Feeding isn’t a pretty thing, especially when the vamp in question is hungry. There’s no time for table settings or figuring out which one is the salad fork. It’s like being in a contest to see who can scarf down the most hot dogs and the judge has just rung the bell.

  It’s all about eating your fill and getting to the juicy center. Not making a mess is a tertiary concern.

  I’m happy to say I didn’t go quite as nuts as Ed did with that homeless guy the other day. That had been some fucked up shit. However, it wasn’t like Bob ended up any less dead. And I was pretty sure he’d stay that way. Aside from special circumstances – like trying to punch a hole in the universe – Magi couldn’t be turned into vamps.

  That was probably a good thing. In Calibra I’d seen what a lethal combo that could be. It was likely for the best that she was a one-off freak show, no repeat performances.

  My head cleared and I stood up. Looking down at myself, it wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been, but a case of wet wipes would certainly not have gone unappreciated at that moment.

  At that moment...

  Shit!

  There was no telling how long I’d been sucking on Bob’s neck. It couldn’t have been too long, though. Feeding on a victim wasn’t like some Italian family get-together where dinner lasted seven hours and fourteen courses. However, it had apparently been long enough. Taking a moment to wipe the gore off my glasses, I looked around. There was no sign of the second mage.

  Either serious about whatever course of action Komak had set him on, or just a big old pussy, the other wizard hadn’t stopped to help his friend. The fucker had taken off and kept on running while I was busy sucking Bob dry like the last rib on the rack.

  I shook that thought from my mind and scanned the direction I’d last seen him heading in – damn, this cave was big – but he was gone. Nor did I hear Tom cursing up a storm anymore. Either they were out of range, the mage had found a way to mask them, or my friend had run out of insults.

  No, I didn’t consider that last one likely either.

  “Damn it!” I kicked Bob to let off some steam, then turned around to consider my next course of action – stopping dead in my tracks at what I saw.

  Glen, the multi-eyed blob of goo, sat before me. He must have slithered up at some point while I was busy making the mage into my personal Happy Meal. Who knew how long he’d been ... err, pooling there?

  All I knew was that every single eyeball in his gelatinous body was currently staring unblinkingly at me.

  Oh crap.

  TONGUE TIED

  The freaky ass little blob began to quiver all over. Considering the dead body just a few feet away – the one I’d just finished kicking – I had to assume the worst. I no doubt looked ever so slightly to be the aggressor here.

  That meant Glen was either getting ready to scream or fight. Neither was a good option, but that latter kind of freaked me out. In the back of my head I envisioned a vile acid attack melting me into sludge where I stood. Or maybe he planned to shoot his eyeballs at me, like hypersonic golf balls.

  Regardless, I hadn’t faced too many blobs in my day. Hell, even in my D&D game the closest I’d come was the occasional gibbering mouther and those tended to...

  Uh oh. Several air bubbles began to form in Glen’s blobby form. That was it! He was going to unleash a sonic attack meant to confuse and incapacitate me.

  I needed to stop him, but how? It wasn’t like he had a jaw to punch and there were too many eyes for me to try poking before he could...

  “That was so cool!”

  The fuck? I continued to stare at him, dumbfounded. “Um...”

  “Oh, man! I so wish I had a camera on me,” he continued. “Or hands to use a camera. Who would have thought when I woke up in my bucket this morning that I’d have a chance to watch the legendary Freewill in action?”

  “Hold on,” I said. “You’re not freaked out?”

  “Freaked out?” he bubbled. “I’m totally psyched. I swear, if you’re planning to reenact your big fight with the Icon, too, I might just die of happiness.”

  “You do realize I killed this guy, right?”

  Glen bubbled excitedly. “Yep, that’s pretty clear. I only wish I’d been close enough to hear what he’d said to impugn your honor. It was something reprehensibly vile, wasn’t it?”

  “Impugn my honor?”

  “Sure. Why else would the Freewill vent his vicious wrath upon such an undeserving foe?”

  “Um ... yeah. He was an asshole, all right.”

  “Would you mind if I kept a piece as a souvenir?”

  “What?”

  Glen quivered again, more hesitantly this time. “This is kind of embarrassing for me to admit, but I’m a big fan.”

  “Oh,” I replied, still taking this in. “Then, I guess ... help yourself.”

  “Ooh! Thank you.”

  Glen slithered atop the mage’s body. I wasn’t sure what he planned to do ... maybe that acid thing was still on the table. But then he undulated right off again, leaving the mage intact – if still dead. The only difference was ... whoa. He was entirely clean now. All traces of blood and gore were gone from the body. It was as if Glen had hoovered everything up. With the exception of the wounds visible on Bob’s corpse, you could have easily thought he was simply taking a nap, right there in the middle of the floor.

  I was tempted to ask if Glen could do the same to me, but then stopped when I realized how weird that might be. We were already pushing the boundaries of strange with this one. I had to wonder if any other celebrities – outside of maybe Keith Richards – could claim a groupie quite this ... unique.

  “This is definitely going in my scrapbook,” Glen said excitedly before once again turning a dozen eyeballs my way. “So what’s next, mighty Freewill?”

  Next? Oh yeah, I’d almost forgotten I still needed to rescue Tom, stop Komak, and do it all on a very short timetable.

  It was just like old times except Sally was currently sidelined, leaving me with a goopy pile of snot as backup. “You didn’t happen to see another mage dragging a ghost with him, did you?”

  Glen blinked several dozen times. “Excuse me?”

  “Never mind. Was a long shot anyway. So why exactly are you here?

  “I came looking for you because I didn’t want you to miss the ... um ... thing that those people are doing.”

  “The grand reopening?”

  “Yeah, that works.”

  Without any other leads, it was probably the only place to start the search. Besides, whatever evil Komak and his witchy girlfriend had planned was bound to be tied to what Christy was doing. It was either that or run around randomly and hope I got lucky.

  “Let’s not keep them waiting. Lead the way.”

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  Thankfully Glen was faster than he looked, able to tumble along the ground like a water balloon rolling downhill when the need called for it.

  Truth of the matter was, we couldn’t have missed our target had we been blind. It was where nearly all of the mages, vamps, and other thingamabobs in this place had converged. The problem was more finding the specific asshole I wanted – a needle in this haystack of magical beings.

  They gathered in small crowds all along the perimeter of the dried up lakebed that once housed the portal for all of this world’s magic. Bursts of power lit up the cavern in front of us as we approached, causing me to jump a few times. However, I quickly realized they weren’t aimed at me. A few of the Magi were apparently tossing random spells into the air like firecrackers as their friends cheered.

  I can’t say for certain that alcohol was involved, but I wouldn’t have doubted it.

  All in all there was a sense of excitement in the air but, based on what I could
hear in quick snippets, it was colored with a mix of both hope as well as the fear that it wouldn’t work.

  I had to admit, much as I’d been ready to dismiss the masses down here as nothing more than assholes, the sight of so many standing hand in hand, along with the whispers of quiet desperation that caught my newly enhanced ears, brought a lump to my throat.

  I’d previously regarded our course of action to be a minor win for the bad guys, a necessary evil to save Sally. But I began to see that Komak’s group was merely a militant fringe amongst the masses united in the hope of getting their lives back.

  A part of me could understand why Sheila had decided to help them.

  Don’t get me wrong. We did the right thing five years ago. I’d go to my deathbed swearing on that. But I’d never stopped to consider the consequences of those actions. So many of those aligned against us had been utter dick biscuits that giving them all a giant “fuck you” had been my main focus.

  It was one of the oft-forgotten aspects of war – the people caught in the middle, the ones whose lives were left in ruins no matter the outcome.

  I slowed down as we entered the fringes of the crowd, keeping my eyes peeled. Komak was up to no good. Of that I was convinced. He’d already proven himself capable of committing needless atrocities in the name of getting what he wanted. There was a vast difference between stealing a loaf of bread to feed your hungry child versus killing everyone in the store. His excuses to the contrary wore thin indeed.

  But perhaps letting Christy finish her ritual was ultimately the right thing to do. Most here could then get on with their lives again. As for the serpents in this Garden of Eden, well, hopefully we could stomp them out now before they could spread.

  I wasn’t sure what that meant for me, but I guess I’d soon find out. With any luck, Dr. Death would be minimized to nothing more than the occasional bad dream. There was also the fact that Christy, Tom, and I had a lot to discuss ...

  Shit! Tom!

  I’d gotten lost in my thoughts, paying more attention to the shit going on around me than on finding him. Goddamn, I really needed to consider ADD meds at some point.

  Problem was, outside of spotting a transparent guy cursing out his kidnapper, I had no idea how to find him. He didn’t have a scent to track, and so long as the prism remained closed in that backpack, it wasn’t obvious from a distance.

  “Are they almost finished?”

  “Shh, don’t bother them.”

  “Have you ever heard anything like this incantation?”

  The sound of conversation different than what I’d mostly been hearing up until now caught my ear and I followed it to a large group milling about near the shoreline. Glen and I skirted around their periphery to get a better look.

  For a moment I was afraid I’d have to start tossing people to the side, but finally the crowd parted enough for me to catch sight of Christy.

  Sure enough, she was seated in the center of a circle that had been carved into the ground at the very edge of where the orange goop of The Source used to flow. Holding hands and encircling her on three sides were Kelly, Hershel, and – of course – Liz.

  Their eyes were all shut and they were chanting something unintelligible, probably in that Enochian language they liked to use. Or, hell, it could have been French for all I knew. My grasp of most languages outside of English was shitty at best.

  Regardless, based on the paraphernalia around them – burning incense and other shit straight out of The Craft – it was a fair bet they were well along in the process of casting the spell.

  Tempting as it was to interrupt them with news of Tom, I wasn’t sure what that would do ... aside from probably get my ass kicked by the rest of the crowd.

  But if they were in the middle of performing the spell, then where was...

  “Look!” Glen bubbled, “The Icon!”

  I turned toward The Source itself. The flap of the lone tent sitting in the middle of it was pushed open from the inside. Sheila stepped out and, despite everything, my breath caught in my throat.

  Gone was her cave explorer chic. In its place she’d donned her old Templar armor – gleaming chainmail topped with a crimson cape. Far as I was aware, she hadn’t worn it in five years, not even that time I begged her to put it on for a Ren faire we were attending.

  It was quite the sight and – based on the crowd’s reaction – I had a feeling that was purposeful. A collective gasp rose up at her appearance, quickly turning into a cheer as she drew the sword from her side. Almost immediately, like some kind of She-Ra fetish cosplay, her whole body erupted in white flame.

  Despite the display, a small sliver of fear began to worm its way into my gut. It was the memory of what had happened here all those years ago – she and I locked in mortal combat, the prophecy between us fulfilled at last.

  She’d won that battle. I happily admitted that. However, once again – beyond all logic – I was the Freewill of vampire legend. I couldn’t help but feel that us both being here again couldn’t be a coincidence, as if destiny were demanding a rematch.

  Heh. At the very least that would make Glen happy.

  No! That was silly. I pushed that thought aside as nothing but paranoia, my mind playing tricks on me. Komak, asshole that he was, had been right. The past was dead...

  But not as dead as I hoped, as a hand fell upon my shoulder and I turned to find golden eyes staring at me with such intensity that I was certain I’d burst into flames.

  Pity that I didn’t.

  Gan’s nostrils twitched ever so slightly as she took in my undead scent. “How is this possible?” I tried to think of an answer, but she stepped in and whispered, “Fate is indeed kind, my love.”

  Then, before I could so much as blink in protest, she grabbed hold of me and pressed her lips to mine.

  I was wrong. History wasn’t repeating itself.

  No. What was happening now was so much worse.

  GRAND REOPENING

  Gah!

  It was like being Frenched by a hungry cobra. She wasn’t kissing me as much as mapping the inside of my mouth with her tongue.

  Either way, I was stuck fast. My power was nothing compared to hers. Hell, I doubted I could have pried her off with a crowbar. Goddamn, I’d forgotten how much strength she possessed.

  Or how disturbingly into me she was.

  On the upside, she wasn’t twelve anymore. That had to count a little toward keeping me off the sexual predator watch lists. Sadly, she was still Gan, which meant she was a sociopathic nutcase with enough blood on her hands to fill a swimming pool.

  “It’s good to be the king,” Glen bubbled from somewhere beside me. Little asshole. He had no idea how not good this was.

  At last, I managed to pull back enough to excise her creepy little tongue from my mouth and clamp my lips shut.

  She finally got the hint and let go. Eww. Good thing I was a vampire again, because hopefully my constitution was now strong enough to keep me from contracting her crazy.

  I stepped back, only for Glen to sidle up next to me. “High five, buddy!”

  “Oh, shut up.” Then, before Gan could resume her game of full-contact tongue hockey, I said, “Please don’t do that again.”

  “It is quite all right, my love,” she replied. “I don’t mind if everyone watches.”

  Gross! Oh God! She was a murderous psycho and an exhibitionist, too. I could only imagine what other shit she was busy planning in her twisted little mind. “Yeah, well, I kinda do.”

  Jesus Christ, I sounded like a prude. Then again, where she was concerned, I’d have happily joined a monastery and taken as many vows of celibacy as necessary to keep this particular demon at bay.

  “I told you my seers foresaw a glorious future for you, but even I could not dream this would be possible.”

  “Trust me, it wasn’t exactly on my horoscope either.”

  “But how? The old race is dead, gone. Did the Progenitor perhaps feed upon you incorrectly?”

 
“No. Ed and I don’t have a Netflix and chill kind of friendship. We keep our mouths to ourselves, thank you.”

  “Then how can this be?”

  Gan seemed genuinely flummoxed, something rare for her. It made me wonder if maybe she was right about fate choosing me for a second go at this life. After all, I hadn’t been bitten. Strange as magic could be, my turning made zero fucking sense.

  Once again, though, this wasn’t the time or place. I shook those thoughts from my head. We could speculate on how this happened later ... preferably with a lot of people between us. For now, I had more important matters at hand. “Tom’s been kidnapped.”

  “Tom?”

  “The ghost.”

  “Oh, yes. The specter of that annoying human. What of it?”

  “He’s been taken.”

  “He?”

  “The prism. Komak’s people have it. They’re up to something.”

  “Tell me what you suspect, beloved.”

  “I ... don’t know. But we need to do something. Liz is over there with Christy. She’s Komak’s main fuck buddy, so I don’t doubt for a second she’s a part of whatever is going on.”

  “Your fiery words cause my insides to quiver with excitement.”

  “Stow the hormones, Gan. I’m serious.”

  “As am I,” she replied with a devilish grin. “But so be it. I believe I saw Komak and his lieutenant over in this direction. Come with me and we shall confront him.”

  “But Christy...”

  “She must finish her incantation. They are too far along, I’m afraid. Interrupting them could have dire consequences.”

  “Really?”

  “Are you not versed in the ways of magic?”

  “Um, no.”

  “Fortunately, I am. But fear not. If Komak and his so-called Last Coven are indeed planning something nefarious, I have little doubt the two of us can easily best him.”

  “Three,” Glen said, but then quickly added, “Um, can I at least come and watch?”