“Ahead, I saw the thing I’d seen in the courtyard—a huge shape, big as a house. Pointed at the ends, fat in the middle. Dark—maybe dark purple, maybe not—and shiny. The moment it came into view, this surge of . . . I don’t know what to call it. Honestly, I want to say it was a cross between the way you feel when you put your bag down on your old bed and, ‘Mommy,’ that little kid feeling, except that neither of those is completely right. My arms were condensing, growing substantial. I was heading towards the middle. As I drew closer, its surface rippled, like water moving out from where a stone strikes it. At the center of the ripple, a kind of pucker opened into the thing. That was my destination.”
“And?” Lee said.
“Lucy emptied her Gatorade on me and brought me out of it.”
“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” Lee said.
“Afraid not,” Davis said.
“How long was this one?” the Lieutenant asked.
“Almost five minutes.”
“It took her that long to toss her Gatorade on you?” Lee said.
“There was some kind of commotion at the same time, a couple of guys got into a fight. She tried to find help; when she couldn’t, she doused me.”
Lee shook his head.
“And you have since confirmed the existence of this object,” the Lieutenant said.
“Yes, sir,” Davis said. “It took some doing. The thing’s damned near impossible to see, and while no one would come out and say so to me, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t show up on radar, either. The couple of pictures we got were more dumb luck than anything.”
“ ‘We’?” Lee said.
“I . . . ”
The Lieutenant said, “I put Mr. Davis in touch with a friend of mine in Intelligence.”
“Oh,” Lee said. “Wait—shit: you mean the CIA’s involved?”
“Relax,” Davis said.
“Because I swear to God,” Lee said, “those stupid motherfuckers would fuck up getting toast out of the toaster and blame us for their burned fingers.”
“It’s under control,” the Lieutenant said. “This is our party. No one else has been invited.”
“Doesn’t mean they won’t show up,” Lee said. “Stupid assholes with their fucking sunglasses and their, ‘We’re so scary.’ Oooh.” He turned his head and spat.
Davis stole a look at the sky. Stars were winking out and in as something passed in front of them. His heart jumped, his hand was on his stake before he identified the shape as some kind of bird. The Lieutenant had noticed his movement; his hand over his stake, he said, “Everything all right, Davis?”
“Fine,” Davis said. “Bird.”
“What?” Lee said.
“Bird,” Han said.
“Oh,” Lee said. “So. I have a question.”
“Go ahead,” the Lieutenant said.
“The whole daylight thing,” Lee said, “the having to be back in its coffin before sunset—what’s up with that?”
“It does seem . . . atypical, doesn’t it?” the Lieutenant said. “Vampires are traditionally creatures of the night.”
“Actually, sir,” Lee said, “that’s not exactly true. The original Dracula—you know, in the book—he could go out in daylight; he just lost his powers.”
“Lee,” the Lieutenant said, “you are a font of information. Is this what our monster is trying to avoid?”
“I don’t know,” Lee said. “Could be.”
“I don’t think so,” Davis said. “It’s not as if daylight makes its teeth any sharper.”
“Then what is it?” Lee said.
“Beats me,” Davis said. “Don’t we need daylight to make Vitamin D? Maybe it’s the same, uses the sun to manufacture some kind of vital substance.”
“Not bad,” the Lieutenant said.
“For something you pulled out of your ass,” Lee said.
“Hey—you asked,” Davis said.
“Perhaps it’s time for some review,” the Lieutenant said. “Can we agree on that? Good.
“We have this thing—this vampire,” holding up a hand to Davis, “that spends its nights in an orbiting coffin. At dawn or thereabouts, it departs said refuge in search of blood, which it apparently obtains from a single source.”
“Us,” Han said.
“Us,” the Lieutenant said. “It glides down into the atmosphere on the lookout for likely victims—of likely groups of victims, since it prefers to feed on large numbers of people at the same time. Possibly, it burns through its food quickly.”
“It’s always thirsty,” Davis said. “No matter how much it drinks, it’s never enough.”
“Yeah,” Lee said, “I felt it, too.”
“So did we all,” the Lieutenant said. “It looks to satisfy its thirst at locations where its actions will draw little to no attention. These include remote areas such as the U.S.-Mexico border, the Sahara and Gobi, and the Andes. It also likes conflict zones, whether Iraq, Darfur, or the Congo. How it locates these sites is unknown. We estimate that it visits between four and seven of them per day. That we have been able to determine, there does not appear to be an underlying pattern to its selection of either target areas or individuals within those areas. The vampire’s exact level of intelligence is another unknown. It possesses considerable abilities as a predator, not least of them its speed, reaction time, and strength. Nor should we forget its teeth and,” a rap of the artificial leg, “claws.”
“Not to mention that mind thing,” Lee said.
“Yes,” the Lieutenant said. “Whether by accident or design, the vampire’s appearance is accompanied by a telepathic jolt that momentarily disorients its intended victims, rendering them easier prey. For those who survive the meeting,” a nod at them, “a link remains that may be activated by persistent, pronounced stress, whether physical or mental. The result of this activation is a period of clairvoyance, during which the lucky individual rides along for the vampire’s current activities. Whether the vampire usually has equal access to our perceptions during this time is unclear; our combined accounts suggest it does not.
“However, there are exceptions.”
IX
2005
“I know how we can kill it,” Davis said. “At least, I think I do—how we can get it to come to a place where we can kill it.”
Lee put his Big Mac on his tray and looked out the restaurant window. The Lieutenant paused in the act of dipping his fries into a tub of barbecue sauce. Han continued chewing his McNugget but nodded twice.
“The other day—two days ago, Wednesday—I got to it.”
“What do you mean?” the Lieutenant said.
“It was coming in for a landing, and I made it mess up.”
“Bullshit,” Lee said. He did not shift his gaze from the window. His face was flushed.
“How?” the Lieutenant said.
“I was having a bad day, worse than the usual bad day. Things at Home Depot—the manager’s okay, but the assistant manager’s a raging asshole. Anyway, I decided a workout might help. I’d bought these Kung Fu DVDs—”
“Kung Fu,” the Lieutenant said.
Davis shrugged. “Seemed more interesting than running a treadmill.”
Through a mouthful of McNugget, Han said, “Bruce Lee.”
“Yeah,” Davis said. “I put the first disc on. To start with, everything’s fine. I’m taking it easy, staying well below the danger level. My back’s starting to ache, the way it always does, but that’s okay, I can live with it. As long as I keep the situation in low gear, I can continue with my tiger style.”
“Did it help?” the Lieutenant asked.
“My worse-than-bad day? Not really. But it was something to do, you know?”
The Lieutenant nodded. Lee stared at the traffic edging up the road in front of the McDonald’s. Han bit another McNugget.
“This time, there was no warning. My back’s feeling like someone’s stitching it with a hot needle, then I’m dropping out of heavy cloud cover. Below,
a squat hill pushes up from dense jungle. A group of men are sitting around the top of the hill. They’re wearing fatigues, carrying Kalashnikovs. I think I’m somewhere in South America: maybe these guys are FARQ; maybe they’re some of Chavez’s boys.
“I’ve been through the drill enough to know what’s on the way: a ringside seat for blood and carnage. It’s reached the point, when one of these incidents overtakes me, I don’t freak out. The emotion that grips me is dread, sickness at what’s coming. But this happens so fast, there isn’t time for any of that. Instead, anger—the anger that usually shows up a couple of hours later, when I’m still trying to get the taste of blood out of my mouth, still trying to convince myself that I’m not the one who’s so thirsty—for once, that anger arrives on time and loaded for bear. It’s like the fire that’s crackling on my back finds its way into my veins and ignites me.
“What’s funny is, the anger makes my connection to the thing even more intense. The wind is pressing my face, rushing over my arms—my wings—I’m aware of currents in the air, places where it’s thicker, thinner, and I twitch my nerves to adjust for it. There’s one guy standing off from the rest, closer to the treeline, though not so much I—the thing won’t be able to take him. I can practically see the route to him, a steep dive with a sharp turn at the very end that’ll let the thing knife through him. He’s sporting a bush hat, which he’s pushed back on his head. His shirt’s open, T-shirt dark with sweat. He’s holding his weapon self-consciously, trying to looking like a badass, and it’s this, more than the smoothness of his skin, the couple of whiskers on his chin, that makes it clear he isn’t even eighteen. It—I—we jackknife into the dive, and thirsty, Christ, thirsty isn’t the word: this is dryness that reaches right through to your fucking soul. I’ve never understood what makes the thing tick—what drives it—so well.
“At the same time, the anger’s still there. The closer we draw to the kid, the hotter it burns. We’ve reached the bottom of the dive and pulled up; we’re streaking over the underbrush. The kid’s completely oblivious to the fact that his bloody dismemberment is fifty feet away and closing fast. I’m so close to the thing, I can feel the way its fangs push against one another as they jut from its mouth. We’re on top of the kid; the thing’s preparing to retract its wings, slice him open, and drive its face into him. The kid is dead; he’s dead and he just doesn’t know it, yet.
“Only, it’s like—I’m like—I don’t even think, No, or, Stop, or Pull up. It’s more . . . I push; I shove against the thing I’m inside and its arms move. Its fucking arms jerk up as if someone’s passed a current through them. Someone has—I have. I’m the current. The motion throws off the thing’s strike, sends it wide. It flails at the kid as it flies past him, but he’s out of reach. I can sense—the thing’s completely confused. There’s a clump of bushes straight ahead—wham.”
The Lieutenant had adopted his best you’d-better-not-be-bullshitting-me stare. He said, “I take it that severed the connection.”
Davis shook his head. “No, sir. You would expect that—it’s what would have happened in the past—but this time, it was like, I was so close to the thing, it was going to take something more to shake me loose.”
“And?” the Lieutenant said.
Lee shoved his tray back, toppling his super-sized Dr Pepper, whose lid popped off, splashing a wave of soda and ice cubes across the table. While Davis and the Lieutenant grabbed napkins, Lee stood and said, “What the fuck, Davis?”
“What?” Davis said.
“I said: What the fuck, asshole,” Lee said. Several diners at nearby tables turned their heads toward him.
“Inside voices,” the Lieutenant said. “Sit down.”
“I don’t think so,” Lee said. “I don’t have to listen to this shit.” With that, he stalked away from the table, through the men and women swiftly returning their attentions to the meals in front of them, and out the side door.
“What the fuck?” Davis said, dropping his wad of soggy napkins on Lee’s tray.
“That seems to be the question of the moment,” the Lieutenant said.
“Sir—”
“Our friend and fellow is not having the best of months,” the Lieutenant said. “In fact, he is not having the best of years. You remember the snafus with his disability checks.”
“I thought that was taken care of.”
“It was, but it was accompanied by the departure of Lee’s wife and their two-year-old. Compared to what he was, Lee is vastly improved. In terms of the nuances of his emotional health, however, he has miles to go. The shit with his disability did not help; nor did spending all day home with a toddler who didn’t recognize his father.”
“He didn’t—”
“No, but I gather it was a close thing. A generous percentage of the wedding flatware paid the price for Lee’s inability to manage himself. In short order, the situation became too much for Shari, who called her father to come for her and Douglas.”
“Bitch,” Han said.
“Since then,” the Lieutenant said, “Lee’s situation has not improved. A visit to the local bar for a night of drinking alone ended with him in the drunk tank. Shari’s been talking separation, possibly divorce, and while Lee tends to be a bit paranoid about the matter, there may be someone else involved, an old boyfriend. Those members of Lee’s family who’ve visited him, called him, he has rebuffed in a fairly direct way. To top it all off, he’s been subject to the same, intermittent feast of blood as the rest of us.”
“Oh,” Davis said. “I had no—Lee doesn’t talk to me—”
“Never mind. Finish your story.”
“It’s not a story.”
“Sorry. Poor choice of words. Go on, please.”
“All right,” Davis said. “Okay. You have to understand, I was as surprised by all of this as—well, as anyone. I couldn’t believe I’d affected the thing. If it hadn’t been so real, so like all the other times, I would have thought I was hallucinating, on some kind of wish-fulfillment trip. As it was, there I was as the thing picked itself up from the jungle floor. The anger—my anger—I guess it was still there, but . . . on hold.
“The second the thing was upright, someone shouted and the air was hot with bullets. Most of them shredded leaves, chipped bark, but a few of them tagged the thing’s arm, its shoulder. Something was wrong—mixing in with its confusion, there was another emotion, something down the block from fear. I wasn’t doing anything: I was still stunned by what I’d made happen. The thing jumped, and someone—maybe a couple of guys—tracked it, headed it off, hit it in I can’t tell you how many places—it felt as the thing had been punched a dozen times at once. It spun off course, slapped a tree, and went down, snapping branches on its way.
“Now it was pissed. Even before it picked itself up, the place it landed was being subject to intensive defoliation. A shot tore its ear. Its anger—if what I felt was fire, this was lava, thicker, slower-moving, hotter. It retreated, scuttled half a dozen trees deeper into the jungle. Whoever those guys were, they were professionals. They advanced on the spot where the thing fell and, when they saw it wasn’t there anymore, they didn’t rush in after it. Instead, they fell back to a defensive posture while one of them put in a call—for air support, I’m guessing.
“The thing was angry and hurt and the thirst—” Davis shook his head. He sipped his Coke. “What came next—I’m not sure I can describe it. There was this surge in my head—not the thing’s head, this was my brain I’m talking about—and the thing was looking out of my eyes.”
“It turned the tables on you,” the Lieutenant said.
“Not exactly,” Davis said. “I continued watching the soldiers maybe seventy-five feet in front of me, but I was . . . aware of the thing staring at the DVD still playing on the TV. It was as if the scene was on a screen just out of view.” He shook his head. “I’m not describing it right.
“Anyway, that was when the connection broke.”
Davis watched the Li
eutenant evade an immediate response by taking a generous bite of his Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese and chewing it with great care. Han swallowed and said, “Soldiers.”
“What?”
“Soldiers,” Han said.
Through his mouthful of burger, the Lieutenant said, “He wants to know what happened to the soldiers. Right?”
Han nodded.
“Beats the shit out of me,” Davis said. “Maybe their air support showed up and bombed the fucker to hell. Maybe they evac’d out of there.”
“But that isn’t what you think,” the Lieutenant said. “You think it got them.”
“Yes sir,” Davis said. “The minute it was free of me, I think it had those poor bastards for lunch.”
“It seems a bit much to hope otherwise, doesn’t it?”
“Yes sir, it does.”
When the Lieutenant opted for another bite of his sandwich, Davis said, “Well?”
The Lieutenant answered by lifting his eyebrows. Han switched from McNuggets to fries.
“As I see it,” Davis began. He stopped, paused, started again. “We know that the thing fucked with us in Fallujah, linked up with us. So far, this situation has only worked to our disadvantage: whenever one of us is in sufficient discomfort, the connection activates and dumps us behind the thing’s eyes for somewhere in the vicinity of three to five minutes. With all due respect to Lee, this has not been beneficial to anyone’s mental health.
The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror, 2010 Page 33
