Monster Vice

by George P. Saunders

  “Good nap, Dick?” he asks, again in that tone of voice that suggests he is perpetually amused with me.

  “I – what time is it?”

  “It’s close to ten,” Sam says.

  I glance at my own watch. Indeed, nearly five hours have come and gone. And from all indications, it looks as though Curadal and Sam were simply content to sit silently on the sofa, watching me doze.

  “You’ve been here the entire time?” I ask, dismayed.

  They both nod in unison.

  “Ready to go out and collar a Master, Dick?” Curadal grins.

  I do not find the proposition remotely humorous. I stand, with Curadal’s help, and I have a fleeting moment of terror that I am less than one hundred percent.

  But I realize it is too late to back out now.

  I screw my courage to that invisible post within my soul and say a private prayer that I do not end up dead when the night sees its end.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The Crazy Pole Pony is a smarmy, smoke-laden dungeon about five minutes from my apartment. I have been there several times, mainly because the girls are very pretty and though the environment is barf-friendly to only hopeless chimney-smoking alcoholics, there is a certain charm-filled gormlessness to it that lures one again and again to its murky interior. We arrive in my car, though Curadal drives. Samantha rides shotgun, occasionally throwing my way a disarming smile.

  I have the shakes, but have sworn off any more booze for tonight. Too much to do, too much at stake - no pun intended.

  There is a rather large gentleman of indeterminate race and sexual orientation guarding the front entrance tonight. He is bald, though a tattoo runs across the side of his face that reads “Dog Dirty Dude”. I don’t bother even wondering what the fuck that means – the pictures are too painful, too ugly to contemplate in tandem with alcoholic delirium. Oh, and he’s wearing high heel Fuck Me Pumps, and chain-mail panties. I had to mention that … just as an aside.

  While I stare rudely, Curadal and Samantha merely size him up as if he were the milkman.

  “Help you, babies?” the Dog Dirty Dude asks, and bubbles of saliva form at the corner of his mouth. I’m actually not sure if it’s saliva … or sperm. It has a milky quality to it that … oh, well, you get the picture.

  Before I can reply to the query with a newfound sense of professionalism, Curadal speaks in my stead.

  “No. And save your breath – our names are not important and don’t ask us for our reasons in being here,” he says matter of factly.

  “You’re coming down my rabbit-hole, friend,” Dirty Dude says, his smile disappearing. “And I need to know why all visitors are here bunny-hopping.”

  Curadal, in one swift motion, shoves his hand under bald boy’s neck, and throws him into the darkness. I hear the clatter of trash cans and refuse spilling – and I daresay – bones breaking. I wait for Dirty Dude to reappear from the darkness of the nearby alley, but he does not. Down for the count, I assume.

  Curadal looks to Samantha and myself, and extends his hand to the door. “Shall we?”

  I should protest Curadal’s use of excessive force. Dirty Dude looked like an evil, panty-wearing goat-fucker of the first order, and he was clearly threatening, but still. There was protocol, and we were officers of the law. He deserved better.

  As if reading my mind, Samantha grins at me.

  “He’s an apostate of the Master. Don’t feel sorry for him.”

  I look back into the alley, but there is still nothing moving. Samantha gently steers me inside the Crazy Pole Pony.

  It would be safe to say that I am familiar with the cozy interior of the CPP. A long, semi-circular bar occupies one wall, while a stage and two poles stand opposite the bar, with the space in between belonging to a disparate set of chairs and tables. Beyond the stage, there is an adjoining room with velvet sofas attached to the walls. Here is where private lap dances transpire, under the watchful eye of a large bouncer named Jules. Jules always seems to be in the Crazy Pole Pony. Jules seems to have no other life. I personally believe that Jules lives here 24/7, and is in truth, an android from the planet Zartha.

  Tonight, the Crazy Pole Pony is in full force and effect. Two lovelies entwine themselves around the two available poles, topless only, of course, due to the liquor license regulation of No All-Nude booze-serving establishments. One of the dancers has blonde hair and perfectly fake tits that seem not to move as she performs her various contortions around the pole. The other performance artist is well over six feet tall, with a nearly perfectly flat chest and a thong shoved so far up her ass, one would assume she would need microsurgery to extract it without permanent damage being done to contiguous areas of the anatomy.

  The clientele is varied and enthusiastic. More than two dozen girls walk the floor, predatory in their search for eager males willing to scrounge for twenty dollars or more for a muff-grind in the back room. I see some regulars, but don’t bother to nod. Only one table remains open in the place, and it is in a dark corner of the room, adjacent to the puss-grinding Room of Frictional Love.

  “I got a bad feeling,” I mumble mainly to myself, not expecting anyone to really hear me.

  “Yes, I agree,” Curadal says, though how he heard what I said walking four feet ahead, while Old Time Rock n’ Roll blares at eardrum-shattering decibels is beyond me.

  I do a three-sixty of the place, feeling as if I’m being watched. Fuck that. Knowing I’m being watched. Yet all I see are drunks and strippers, along with the occasional hostess dispensing fun-filled beverages to patrons.

  I pull out a chair from the table for Samantha, who looks at me with genuine surprise and gratitude. She gives me a quaint little nod, and Curadel smiles … indulgently. He also sits, and then finally, I do, though I am now suddenly filled with so much terror that my little pee-pee has curled up in my sack and is calling to me from my groin to run and get the hell out of here, ASAP.

  “You think the Master is here?” I whisper to Curadal.

  “Seated right behind you, Dick,” Curadal says easily.

  “What!” I hiss.

  “He’s looking at you, too. Arrogant son of a bitch.”

  I’m not sure at this point if I just shart myself, but everything seems to let loose at once … mainly my sense of hope. I turn slowly, and indeed, see what appears to be a very handsome gentleman, surrounded by three enthusiastic strippers, staring right at me. Or through me, feels more like.

  He smiles. And lifts his glass, as if in toast.

  I slowly turn back to Curadal. “Okay. Are you sure?”

  “Quite sure,” Samantha says. She is watching the Master, and for the first time, I do not see a sense of surety in either Curadal or Samantha.

  My rational mind compels me to relax. Relax because … no way, no how, would any Master worth his blood-sucking oats just be hanging out in broad view for all to see. Not like this. It was unheard of. Then again, I hadn’t run into that many Grand Masters in my day.

  “Alright, what’s the plan,” I say, leaning forward, eyeballing my two partners. “Rush and stake?”

  “You’d be dead before you left the chair, Dick,” Curadal says calmly. “And there’s no need for that.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because,” a voice says directly behind me, “I am here. At your service.”

  I turn, and look up at the Grand Master, who stands a few inches from where I sit. He is smiling. Just folks, really.

  “Officer Dick Pitts,” the Master says. “It is an honor at last to make your acquaintance.”

  * * *

  “Please, don’t get up on my account,” the Grand Master says warmly. “I’ll join you.”

  And with one deft move, he pulls a chair from the other table, and seems to be sitting in it at a speed faster than thought. The three nubiles huddle around him, kissing his ear, playing with his hair, rubbing his shoulder.

  “My friends,” he indicates to the friendly strippers, who are not immediate
ly predisposed to speech.

  The Grand Master looks from me to Curadal, and then to Samantha. Then back to me.

  “So. How is it that you are working with vampires?”

  My mind is filled with little twinkles of synaptic overload. I cannot first believe that I am farting distance from a Grand Master, and then cannot further mentally digest the content of his seemingly absurd question. So, with a customary alacrity of communication of late, I simply grunt.

  “What?”

  “Vampires,” the Grand Master says the word slowly. “Your friends. They – are – vampires.”

  I chance a glance toward Curadal and Samantha, who remain silent, their eyes fixed on the Master.

  “I dunno what you’re talking about,” I mewl. Though there is a fleeting memory of a certain talking werewolf not so long ago who likewise made absurd allegations about my two new partners.

  I force a chuckle of disdain.

  But the Grand Master is now concentrating on my companions. When he speaks, it is with a low growl.

  “Foolish. You are no match for me,” he says. “I am part of a new evolution, a superior evolution. You may be more ancient, but as they say in the television series, I’m better, stronger, faster.”

  I recognize those lines from the Six Million Dollar Man. I feel momentary elation – that my memory has not failed me as yet. And then I consider the circumstances I find myself in … sitting next to arguably the most powerful vampire on the planet. I wonder if moving my chair a few inches further away from the Master might help.

  “You’re a freak,” Curadal says. “A mutation. Nothing more.”

  I am abruptly reminded of the Master’s amazing statements. That I am working with vampires. It still does not register.

  And then it suddenly does.

  I turn to Curadal, then to Samantha.

  Ah. So many questions are suddenly answered for me, so much seems crystalline clear, all in one galvanizing moment of mental acuity.

  My friends – my partners … are vampires. Bloodsuckers. Killers. Enemies to the human race. There werewolf wasn’t lying and neither is the Grand Master now.

  I feel like a kid suddenly needing to go poo-poo.

  I need air. I cannot breathe. I’m surrounded by alien life forms whose sole purpose on the planet is to feed on me like a piece of pork loin.

  The Master again regards me coolly. “You’ve been most troublesome, Inspector Pitts. One of my subordinates suffered at your hand a few nights ago, along with his harem. I was vexed. Vexed to the point of mild annoyance.”

  I say nothing. I can say nothing.

  The Master waves his hand casually into the air, as if to indicate ‘well, these things happen.’ He sighs. “No matter. My family continues to grow, and you will never imagine where it grows most.”

  “Children,” Curadal says, and his eyes, I can tell, are filled with subdued fury.

  The Master smiles. “Yes. Good guess, Old One.” The Master looks to me, and leans forward in what is a fairly game imitation of one trying to courteously explain something of vast complication to a dribbling idiot. “I am communicating my powers, my gifts, to children. As many as possible, Officer Pitts. I am perfectly capable of procreation, as any human, but in addition, I am able to transform children into powerful allies.” He pauses and winks at me. “As I could do for you, my once-bitten friend.”

  My affliction, I adduce, must be obvious to the Master. Fear is being slowly replaced by anger.

  “You’re biting children?” I ask, and my voice sounds like a feeble, puerile whimper of offense that comes off more like a pout.

  “Biting, I like that,” the Master chuckles, his eyes never leaving those of Curadal and Samantha. “Biting. How well you phrase it.”

  The Master sits back and seems to revel in the moment. My hand instinctively finds its way down to my Magnum, tucked in my front holster, but one glance from Curadal makes me freeze.

  “My advice to all of you is simply go home, and allow things to unfold as they will,” the Master says magnanimously. “In this way, you ensure your immediate survival, and save myself and my associates undue exertion in having to destroy you, at least for tonight.”

  With that, the Master glances around at three individuals who approach the table where I am seated with the vampires (all the vampires, that is). One of them, to my astonishment and child-like sense of disappointment, is Jules. Though I have no idea how this present scenario will unfold, I am momentarily depressed that I may soon have to Stake Jules into oblivion.

  “What is it you want?” I suddenly find myself asking.

  “I beg your pardon,” the Master says.

  “What do you want? What do you hope to achieve? Earth is still populated by the dominant race. Hemans, that is. We outnumber you by a million to one. In the end, we’ll stamp you out of existence.”

  “That is like saying a room full of cockroaches outnumber yourself, Mr. Pitts. This does not guarantee that the cockroaches will emerge victorious in the food-chain scheme of things once all out war would to be waged between you and them. They are inferior in mind and body. You would have the advantage by virtue of your intellect, size, strength and resourcefulness, notwithstanding their numbers. So shall we all – monsters, as you call us – one day enjoy dominance over the pathetically weak and venal human race.”

  “Because you’re smarter and stronger, right?” I say.

  “I believe I just said that,” the Master smiles engagingly.

  Curadal and Samantha, meanwhile, have remained curiously silent. Their attention seems more focused on the Master’s entourage of female strippers and the likes of Jules and his tag-team companions. Weighing options, I surmise, calculating risks, etc.

  “But let’s get back to your vampire partners, Mr. Pitts,” the Master says, shifting tone.

  “You seem pretty sure that they’re vampires,” I offer a weak verbal parry.

  “I think you are, too,” the Master says.

  I say nothing, though glance at Samantha, and I know she can see my annoyance. She gives me an apologetic look, but it is brief. I turn my attention back to the Master.

  “You see, Mr. Pitts, they believe that they are no worse than myself. That they are actually helping humanity by hunting down their own kind. They deny their thirst, and their hunger, and latch on to some kind of moral ambiguity – a silly belief that Man and Vampire could live in peaceful co-existence. Why do they do this, you ask?”

  “I didn’t ask,” I reply with a false sense of courage.

  “But of course you’re curious,” the Master says in that damnable voice of sanctimonious certainty. “Then allow me to enlighten you. They’re creatures that feed on your life essence. They are predators. Inhuman. They are no less monstrous than myself, no less terrifying. So why the disparity between them … and me?”

  “Okay, I’ll bite,” I say (no pun intended). “Why?”

  The Master now stops smiling. “Because they are weak. Because they have been contaminated by human hypocrisy and human vulnerability. They feel too much. They fret, like you do. They doubt themselves. They fear they are indeed evil. And that there is ultimately punishment from some nameless and omniscient god for such evil, and they wish to avoid that damnation. Further, they have deluded themselves into believing that they are practically human themselves, based on their civilized and humane approach to life. They are drunk with delusions of morality.”

  I look to Curadal and Samantha. Curadel speaks very softly: “You’re nothing. Just another freak.”

  “A freak that can crush you, Old One.”

  “Oh, please,” Curadal says.

  And then things happen very fast.

  I am suddenly on my ass, against the wall, I think having just been slapped out of the way by my old friend Curadal. He has lunged toward the Master, and tackled the latter, to the effect that both he and the Master have flown half-way across the room from the attack. Samantha, meanwhile, is out of her chair, and seemingly lev
itating, as she slashes at Jules, whose head neatly separates from his body, leaving the trunk on two legs, standing there for a moment frozen, before finally keeling over. The strippers are screaming – and I now see they have fangs.

  I move at a sluggish, human pace, dragging my .357 out of my holster, firing at one of the Master’s male bodyguards. I am dead on with two shots, taking out both eyes of the now-screaming companion to Jules – who I note, also, has fangs. I glance around the Crazy Pole, and see that most of the non-vampiric population are all screaming, and fleeing the place in droves. Some remain frozen at their tables, even the two strippers on stage stare dumbly into the dark.

  “Get the fuck out of here!” I howl, my voice shrill and scared.

  I turn, and see that the Curadal and the Master are slashing at one another near the bar, with the Master getting in some rather impressive blows. He is clearly the stronger of the two, yet Curadal does not appear worn down – even remotely weakened. He delivers slashes and blows as effectively as the Master, and while the Master appears enraged, Curadal seems oddly calm.

  Samantha screams to my left, pulling out the still-beating heart of the third body guard, and shoving it into the creature’s open mouth.

  Jules’ head, rolling on the floor, still looks like it’s alive. His eyes roll around, and his tongue hangs out nearly six inches. It is too absurd to describe. The head stares at me, and I see impotent rage in either eyeball.

  From someplace out of the fucking blue, another fanged stripper throws herself at me, and barring the fangs, on any other occasion, I would be aroused by the frontal assault. However, considering that she has the breath of a rotting carcass, and a gleam in her eye that clearly denotes a lack of interest in my continued well being, I shove the muzzle of the .357 into her face, and pull the trigger.

  I am showered with gore, goo, brains and fuck-all knows what else, some of the shit getting into my mouth. I resist the urge to rolff, and really don’t have time for the luxury, anyway, as Samantha yanks me beside her.

  “Stay close, Dick. This could get hairy,” she whispers.