SUCKERS
Book 1
Living Like A Vampire
Jacky Dahlhaus
Folla Fiction Publishing
The content and title logo of this book are copyrighted © by Jacky Dahlhaus
First publication by Jacky Dahlhaus Publishing: January 2016
Second publication by Jacky Dahlhaus Publishing: October 2016
Third publication by Folla Fiction Publishing: February 2017
ASIN: B01AAV6JOE
Printed Version ISBN: 978-0-9956719-0-4
Book cover design by David Williams, edited by Jacky Dahlhaus
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. The unauthorized reproductions or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded, or distributed via the Internet or any other means, without the author’s permission.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Books written by Jacky Dahlhaus:
Releasing A Vampire
Living Like A Vampire
Raising A Vampire
Killing A Vampire
Short Shockers
Sign up for news on Jacky D.’s writing at
https://jackydahlhaus.com
Contents
Black October
Deciding To Leave
Mrs. Babcock
Leaving
The Campground
First Night at the Cabin
Meeting the Neighbors
Checking Out the Campground
First Shift
Passing Time in the Cabin
Letting Emotions Go
Hunted
Going Back to Bullsbrook
Magnesium
Mr. Finkle
Attacked Again
Chased
Caught
Hooked
Alone?
Explanations
Reflection
On the Move
Getting Teeth
Meeting Duncan
Clothes Shopping
Town Square
Preparations
Decisions
The Dance Hall
Meeting Harry
Marching
Getting to Know Harry Better
Hunting in the Village
Sleeping Arrangements
Memories
Revelations
Ponderings
Good News and Bad News
Disagreement
Involving Rhona
The Escape
The Village
Back to Bullsbrook Again
Reunited with Caleb
Bitten
Realization
Hunger
Offerings
Harry and Rhona’s Story
Conclusions
Vaccination
Out for Blood
An Unfortunate Meeting
Agreement
Goodbyes
Show and Tell
Torn Apart
Clarifications
Getting Out
For Charlie
Finding Julie
War
Saving Julie
Aftermath
Raising a Vampire
Releasing a Vampire
Releasing a Vampire
Review
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Black October
Like everybody else’s, my life changed forever during the 2004 event that became known as Black October. All of a sudden they were there; once normal humans now bitten by the infected and acting like vampires. The infection made them UV-sensitive, giving them an epileptic seizure when they came into contact with sunlight. Most importantly, the infection made them thirsty for human blood. As they swarmed the world in packs, they sank their teeth into as many humans as possible. If they didn’t drain you, you became an infected and would change into a sucker yourself.
That was the name we gave them. Suckers. At first, we called them vampires, and it was funny how the media adopted vampire terms from modern books and movies. If only these monsters glittered in sunlight and were vegan. A bioscientist interviewed on TV had explained that these so-called ‘vampires’ weren’t the living dead at all. He used the Latin term meaning ‘substitutes’ for them; succedaneums. From then on, everybody called those who had been bitten and now sucked blood ‘suckers.’
It was surprising how fast the epidemic spread. As suspected, airplanes transported it around the globe, and once earthbound, it spread like wildfire. Suckers attacked the big cities first, leaving only death behind and taking their ‘newborns’ with them to attack the surrounding countryside. On the news, they compared it to a fast-spreading virus like the common cold. Whatever was causing the infection, it was exponentially worse than any other that anyone had ever seen in history.
The media had little time to give us more information on the outbreak as suckers managed to overrun communication networks within the first week. All information updates ceased. The only form of communication left unaffected was via CB radios. In other words, suckers didn’t seem to be mindless hordes. They were on a mission and had a plan. Unlike the people in my new hometown, Bullsbrook, where I just got a job as a science teacher.
There seemed to be three types of people here. The first type believed the stories they heard and fled as soon as they could and as far away from the cities as possible. The second type believed that something was happening but weren’t ready to leave their homes just yet. They boarded up their houses and raided the food stores as if they were expecting a hurricane to pass through. The third type thought it was just another form of mass hysteria, caused by none other than the media. They continued living their lives as well as they could.
We all became cut off from what happened in the rest of the world. It was as if we were living in the dark ages again with everybody fending for themselves, trying to do what they thought was right. It didn’t take long before the threat of suckers reached us in Bullsbrook, Maine, the town where I now lived, and my life changed forever.
Deciding To Leave
On Friday night, October 15th, 2004, Sue, Charlie and I, three new teachers at the Bullsbrook high school, sat in The Celtic Frog, the local bar. We occupied the corner booth that we had made our own since we arrived in town two months ago. The bar was the only place that appeared to continue as usual since the start of the sucker pandemic a week ago. The bar owners, a couple called Abby and René, still served drinks, and the usual patrons hung off the bar or sat in their usual seats.
There were, however, a large number of new customers. They were refugees escaping the city. The first ones arrived six days ago, but their number had steadily grown. In the beginning, nobody thought anything of it other than just an unusual time of the year to get vacationers. As the news reports became increasingly scary, more and more people arrived, and today the biggest wave hit. The conversations of the newcomers were hushed and anxious. We could hear snippets of horror stories about people being chased, herded, and slaughtered like cattle. My friends and I sat huddled in our corner booth, whispering, discussing what to do next.
Suddenly, we heard a commotion. I had heard a man talk loudly minutes before, but now people shrieked and cried. The three of us raised our heads to find out what was happening. A cluster of people were gathered around one of the newcomers.
&n
bsp; “They’re watching a camcorder,” Sue said.
I pushed her to move as I wanted to know what was on the camcorder that would make people cry like that. “Well, come on,” I said, “get going. I want to see it too.”
She stood up and got out of the booth, followed on her heels by me. Charlie got up as well, and the three of us joined the wailing people.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“Oh my god,” said Abby. She wiped tears from her face with one hand as she grabbed my shoulder with the other. “You’ll have to see it to believe it.”
She pushed me to the front of the crowd. An old man, I guessed in his sixties with a rather saggy build and a haunted look on his face, held a camcorder with its viewing screen out. More people tried to see the recording, but the ones who had already seen it were reluctant to move. Apparently, they needed to see the footage for a second time to convince themselves what they had seen wasn’t a figment of their imagination. The old man backed up the recording and restarted it. What I saw scared the hell out of me.
The movie clip started off with a younger couple in a happy pose at a restaurant. The camera was then handed, I presumed by a waitress, to the man of the couple. He continued filming the woman. It must have been her birthday or some other celebration as the man gave her a present and, after a big hug to the man, she began unwrapping it. I couldn’t hear what was being said.
From that one scene of happiness, it turned into one of chaos and slaughter. Suckers stormed into the restaurant, their fangs clearly visible, grabbing customers and waiters alike. The lucky lady who had been unwrapping the present screamed when one of the suckers grabbed her arm and tried to pull her away. She fought back. The camera movement became erratic, as if it was being used to hit the attacker of the woman. I saw the arm of the sucker move in the direction of the neck of the camera man. The camera then followed the movements of the man’s hand as he fought to get the arm off himself. You could see the sucker laugh, he actually laughed, before pulling the woman he was still holding close to him. Her eyes were now glazed over; she was in shock. The sucker then sank his teeth into her neck, watching the man as he did it. The camera movements became more erratic as the sucker dropped the woman and turned his efforts to the man holding the camera. We couldn’t see what happened next as in the struggle the camera was launched and landed on one of the other tables, in a plate full of pasta. Over the top of spaghetti, I saw the people in the restaurant become the dish of the day.
“Where did you say you found the camera?” someone in the crowd asked.
“Two days ago in a little town halfway down the road to Portland,” said the old man loudly. “I was looking for food and found it lying there, in the pasta. Nobody but dead bodies there anymore. The suckers had already left.”
“Why didn’t you stay there? How did you get past the suckers?” asked someone else.
“With a big, fast car,” he replied. “I was lucky to have missed the sucker attack, working in my cellar and my hearing being bad, but my wife didn’t survive.” Tears filled his eyes. “I’ve come to warn you. I’ve lost my reason to live, but you still have a chance to save yours. I want people to know what’s coming for them. Y’all have to get outta here! They’re coming!” His voice was thick with emotion, his eyes wild as he frantically looked around at the gathered crowd.
I looked over my shoulder at Sue, then at Charlie standing beside me. They seemed as shocked as I was. People called out more questions to the old man, but I wasn’t interested in his answers. I’d heard enough. We returned to our corner booth, too traumatized by the images to speak for a while.
School had been suspended until further notice earlier that day. Most people had taken their children out of Bullsbrook during the past week anyway. So far, the threat had seemed far away, and we had all thought it would be dealt with before it spread. These people and these images told a different story. It wasn’t going to be safe here for much longer.
“We have to get away,” I said. “We have a better chance of survival if we get away from the crowd.”
“Are you sure? Wouldn’t it be better if we stayed here?” Sue’s dreadlocks bounced as she spoke. She shifted in her seat.
I scanned the bar’s customers. There were so many new faces. There was so much fear.
“You saw the tape.”
“I think,” Sue said, “that we have a better chance if we stand with the people from the town. More manpower.” Her southern accent sounded thicker than usual.
My eyes drifted back to Sue as I let her words sink in. I pursed my lips.
“I don’t agree. What do you think, Charlie?”
Sue and I both turned to look at Charlie. Being a dwarf didn’t diminish his presence and, being ten years our senior, I gave his vote more weight. The low lighting cast dark shadows on his face, accentuating his dark mood.
“I agree with Kate. Even if all the people in town worked together, we could never stand up to the numbers that the suckers must have gathered by now. Let the army take that fight. We need to get out of here and hide until this situation is dealt with by the authorities.”
I followed Charlie’s stare and waited for Sue to respond. Finally, she nodded, her dreadlocks bouncing again.
“You sure?” I asked.
“Yeah, he’s right. Better to hide than to fight.”
“Okay, so where do we go?” Charlie asked.
I put my lips on my thumb. I’d bitten off too much skin next to my nail while listening to Charlie. It was bleeding now, and I shut my eyes to deal with the sharp pain. Immediately, the image of my parents and sisters flashed in front of my eyes. I still didn’t know their fate. Last night, I’d hardly slept as I was tormented by nightmares of possibilities, and the resulting tiredness didn’t help me think any clearer. I couldn’t do anything for them at the moment, so I concentrated on deciding where to go. Even though Charlie, Sue and I had lived in Bullsbrook for over two months now, we still didn’t know the town or the surrounding area very well.
“Hey, maybe we can go to the campground,” Sue said. Charlie and I raised our eyebrows at her.
How in heaven’s name did Sue know about a campground? She wasn’t what you’d call ‘the camping type.’
“I’d asked around about where to find an affordable place for my parents to stay as my place is too small to accommodate them. They want to come and visit me over the Christmas break,” she explained. “My neighbors told me about it. They said it’s along the river north of town. It has cabins for rent at reasonable prices, and they said a small cabin could easily sleep the three of us.”
My face lit up.
“That’s a great idea. They might have a camp store too, with long-lasting food supplies.”
My thoughts drifted off to movies with underground fallout bunkers. Heaven only knew how long this sucker pandemic was going to last. When my attention came back to the conversation, I realized both Sue and Charlie didn’t comment on my practicality. They were too excited about the campsite.
“Yeah. Best of all, it’s off the main roads,” Charlie said, staring into his own private universe while rubbing the stubble on his chin. Then his eyes snapped back to us. “We better go there as soon as possible. We probably aren’t the only ones who came up with the idea.”
“Are we going right now or tomorrow morning?” Sue asked. She shifted in her seat.
I hadn’t thought that far ahead yet. A surge of fear gripped me. It was as if a giant hand squeezed my insides, pushing adrenaline into the far corners of my body. This was really happening. It wasn’t a figment of my imagination, nor something happening to someone else. The idea of leaving Bullsbrook, my beautiful new hometown, made the whole dreadful situation suddenly so much more real. However, Sue was waiting for an answer, and a decision had to be made. I shook off the dreadful feeling.
“I’d sleep better if we left tonight,” I said.
Charlie slammed both his hands flat on the table. Sue and I jumped in our seats.
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br /> “Okay,” he said. “Let’s go home, pack our stuff and meet at Kate’s. She’s the only one with a car.” He stared us down until we both agreed. “And only pack the essentials,” he added as he leaned forward toward Sue.
“What?” she asked innocently, shifting her eyes from Charlie to me, seeking back-up against his insinuation.
“Don’t get carried away, Sue,” I said. “My car may have five doors, but that doesn’t mean there’s a lot of space in the trunk.”
Sue opened her mouth in protest but couldn’t find a good excuse. Charlie chuckled.
The two of them hurried to finish their beers while I left mine untouched since I was going to be the driver. We paid our bill and went on our way.
Mrs. Babcock
As I walked back home from the bar, I decided to ask my neighbor and landlady, Mrs. Babcock, to come with us. I couldn’t leave the old woman all on her own. Just before I knocked on her front door, I saw the curtains move.
“Mrs. Babcock, can I talk to you for a second?” I called, trying not to disturb anybody else in the street.
No answer. I took a step toward the living room window.
“Mrs. Babcock, it’s me, Kate, your neighbor. I know you’re there. Please open the door.”
After a few seconds of silence, I heard her shuffling toward the front door, sliding the security chain in place, and opening the deadlocks before the door opened a few inches. Mrs. Babcock wore a pink nightgown, and her long, white hair, which she normally wore in a huge bun on her head, cascaded over the gown like a waterfall in moonlight. Her right hand gripped a wooden baseball bat she tried to hide behind her tiny frame.
“What is it, dearie?” she said, her gaze darting into the street behind me.
“Mrs. Babcock, you must have heard about what’s happening. Suckers will come here soon, and my friends and I are leaving town to hide from them. You can come with us if you’d like.”
Living Like A Vampire Page 1
