by Parker, Des
“But it isn’t, I’m the –.”
“She’s not the only one who can party,” a liquid voice whispered in her ear. Caroline flinched and turned to face one of the young vampires who had leaned down close to her ear. Caroline was momentarily lost in his eyes. I’m Aldaire, by the way, and I really know how to party.” Aldaire let his words hang in the air, they seemed to have the desired effect and as he stood again, Caroline’s gaze followed him.
“No, look. Think this through,” Simon continued. “We don’t know how many survivors are out there, so we need allies. If other people want to become vampires, well that’s their right. I mean, vampires are pretty cool and I don’t want to stand in the way of someone’s right to run with the cool kids. Perhaps, one day, we can all move on from this, but right now, I think we can help each other.”
“What the fuck did they put in your tea?” Caroline said, tension returning to her voice.
“No, seriously. I think this could work.” Simon turned to face Bob.
“Bob, would you and your companions give us a few minutes to discuss this. I think I can convince them, but we need to focus, without distraction.” Simon looked at the vampire cleavage on either side of him and was distracted.
Bob smiled. “How perfectly reasonable of you.” He turned to his coven. “Come children, we shall retire to the belfry for a moment so the cattle - so our guests can discuss our generous offer.” He transformed into a bat and flew out of the room.
“We’ll be back,” Leticia hissed as she and her sisters also transformed and flew after their master.
The two young male vampires followed, with Aldaire the last to leave, a question on his lips. “We have a belfry?”
Five minutes later the vampires returned and the drawing room was empty.
“Oh fuck,” Bob muttered.
Chapter 23
On the Road Again
Travelling at high speed with all the windows closed, the Bushmaster was not particularly comfortable.
This time Simon was driving. The hasty escape from the vampire’s lair was done without time for ceremony or argument. Even Mr Percival was thrown inside as the doors were locked and Caroline and Dick quickly secured every possible point of entry.
This turned out to be a good idea as, within moments of the engine firing into life, they could hear the sound of leathery wings and the unmistakeable thumps of very-annoyed vampires trying desperately to find a way inside, and being flung off by the wind speed and momentum as the troop carrier reached top speed.
Simon and Dick drove in shifts over the next few hours, the sheer speeds of the Bushmaster outrunning even the fastest bat. Caroline and Dick discovered a new respect for Simon, whose cool thinking had saved them from another fight, which could have turned out very badly.
They did not slow down until the sun rose high into the sky. There was one thing they knew about vampires, for sure, was their unhappy relationship with the sun. But, just to be sure, Simon stopped the Bushmaster in a wide-open space.
Dick exited first with a makeshift cross and his gun. He and Simon systematically examined every inch of the outside to make absolutely sure they had no unwelcome passengers while Caroline scrounged around inside and fashioned some webbing to tie her beanie in place so it could not easily be dislodged.
It was time to regroup. Time to figure out the next move but something was troubling Simon, apart from the obvious.
They were all sitting in the front cabin. Dick was constantly scanning the skies for the telltale shape of flying rodents. Caroline was constantly scanning Dick, her eyes blazing into him. She had not forgiven him for so easily forgetting her last night. Dick tried very hard to ignore her.
“Look – I said I’m sorry. I wasn’t myself.” Dick tried to protest but his protests were falling on deaf ears and those eyes kept boring into him.
“And will you keep forgetting yourself every time we come across something else female? What the hell kind of man are you anyway?” Caroline was angry; that kind of really deep, female anger that can melt rocks, and she was trying very hard to turn Dick into a pile of sludge.
“I couldn’t help myself. They had some kind of power over me.”
“Yes, and I saw how you couldn’t keep your eyes off her powers.”
Simon tried to interrupt. “Now look Caroline, to be fair to Dick...”
“Who the fuck asked you - nerd boy?”
Dick tried to calm the situation. He really should have kept quiet. “Oh come on Caroline – give him a break.”
Caroline’s eyes snapped back and sent Dick’s own eyes scuttling to the back of his head, trying desperately to find somewhere to hide.
“Enough!” Simon snapped, more loudly than even he expected.
Caroline turned back to him to stretch his skin on the rack of her rage, but he talked right over the top of her, even before she could take a breath.
“It’s bad enough having to watch you throw yourself at him like some bitch on heat, but this isn’t helping. We’ve got more important problems than your sex life, so shut up about it.”
“How dare you.”
Simon wasn’t having a bar of it. “No. How dare you. I saved all our arses last night and all you can do is whinge. If you want to skin Dick alive, I don’t give a shit, but wait until we find somewhere safe.”
“Hey now, wait just a min - ,” Dick protested but Simon shut him down.
“Trust me, you need to shut up right now.”
Caroline was livid, “Don’t you dare tell me how to treat a man. Who the fuck do you think you are?”
“I am the man who saved both of you from turning into flying rats with appalling teeth – and don’t you forget it.”
“I will not be spoken to like this.”
“Fine. There’s the door, get out. See how long you last. I’m sure either the vamps or the werewolves will find you soon enough – or maybe even the zombies. There’s still a few of them around you know. See how you go, fight all of them off, on your own, because I am just about shot of you.”
Caroline was furious, “You’re shot of me? Don’t you think I’m shot of you too? Why don’t you get out Mister no nuts, second most useless man on Earth. Why don’t you leave and take your chances. We don’t need you. I can manage without you from here on.” Caroline’s anger was very real and very deep and it came from somewhere she didn’t dare acknowledge.
Simon shot a glance at Dick who was still cowering at one end of the cabin. “Do you want me to leave?”
Dick looked at Simon. Caroline spun around to face him and he shouted, “No!”
He almost shat himself. The thought of being left alone with an angry and vengeful woman was not his style and he was panicking a little. Usually women just dropped everything for him. This was an entirely new experience and it scared him to the core. He really needed Simon to stay, to protect him. Every part of his body ducked for cover and his deep voice quivered and rose just a little higher. “No. We need to stick together, and put the past behind us.” His eyes pleaded for understanding and Caroline just stared at him; then a sense of serenity descended over her.
“You’re right. We need to put last night behind us,” as she held the thought for a moment, twirling it between her fingers, before crushing its scrotum. “As long as it never happens again.”
Her words trailed off, hanging there, like something that had just crawled out of a bog in a z-grade movie and was deciding which teenager to eat.
Chapter 24
Axis of Evil
It was daylight now. The Manor House was exposed to the sun. Bob and his coven didn’t get a chance to return to the outbuilding and their makeshift coffins. They would have to endure the daylight hours inside the main house. The drapes were closed to keep out most of the light. They had been arguing amongst themselves since their prey escaped, and everyone was tired and hungry except Leticia, she was feeling something else entirely.
“We should have killed them outright,” Leticia hissed, “especially h
er. When I find her, I will skin her and boil her blood in the kettle. I will make a high tea of her essence and drape her ragged, empty shell over the roof.”
“You do have a way with words, my dear,” Bob whispered.
“Don’t you ‘my dear’ me. Your desire to be reasonable cost us dinner. We live in the middle of nowhere. It’s not like anyone else is going to knock on the door anytime soon.”
There was a knock on the door.
The vampires were surprised. Normally they could smell the blood of a nearby human, hear the heartbeat of a nearby human, feel the warmth of a nearby human; a knock on the door of a nearby human was not something they were expecting, and they were startled, for a moment.
Six sets of hungry eyes snapped around and Leticia licked her lips. She edged towards the door but Bob threw his arm across her path.
“Wait,” he whispered, his voice lowering. “Something’s not right, I didn’t sense the approach of a human heart.”
Leticia curled her lips into a subtle snarl. “It doesn’t matter, that heart will not beat for very much longer.”
“No.” Bob turned on her. There was something in his expression that gave her pause. “We must be cautious.”
“Being cautious has not helped us so far.” Leticia was itching to strike whoever was fool enough to knock on their door, but Bob pushed her back with his forearm, there was a surprising amount of power there and Leticia wilted briefly under that hidden strength.
She followed him out into the entrance hall as he approached the door.
He opened the door slowly. If anyone was expecting the heavy front door to creak menacingly, like the distant howl of a werewolf who had stepped on a prickle, it disappointed them. Instead, the door opened with a slow and friendly swish, completely unravelling any feeling of foreboding that might have made the moment just a little bit more menacing.
There was a man standing there, his face obscured under his robes.
Bob looked the visitor up and down and opened his mouth to speak, “Good even -”
Before he could finish his greeting, Leticia rushed past him and slammed into the stranger, burying her fangs in his neck.
There was a gurgle and a sharp shriek as Leticia fell back immediately, spitting the stranger’s blood on to the floor. Her mouth withered and she screamed at the newcomer, “You taste like death.”
“That’s not really surprising,” Nick said as he pulled down the hood of his robe.
Bob was dumbfounded. “A zombie – you are a zombie.”
“Your powers of observation are truly amazing – did anyone ever tell you that?” Nick surveyed the entrance hall with a quizzical tilt of his head as he walked past Bob.
Bob opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came, so he just stood there, feeling goofy. The rest of the vampires leered at Nick, open-fanged, as if they had just stepped in something rancid that lodged itself stubbornly on their shoes.
Leticia fumed.
Bob closed the door behind him and followed Nick into the drawing room. Nick glanced at Leticia, and wiped his own blood off his neck, smiling lecherously at her, “Was it good for you?”
Leticia scowled, transformed into a bat, and flew off into the darker recesses of the house.
Nick shrugged, put his finger in his mouth, tasted his own blood, scowled and nonchalantly wiped his hand clean on Bob’s shirt.
Bob looked down at the mark on his lovely pressed shirt, tentatively tried to wipe the blood off with his hand, and licked it; because he is a vampire and that’s what they do, but nearly gagged on it because zombie blood tasted like shit on a stick. He furiously tried to get the taste out of his mouth by wiping his tongue off with his shirt, then suddenly realised that he now had two bloody marks on his shirt, and wanted to hide in a hole somewhere.
He tried desperately to recover the situation. “I’m sorry about my companion, we had a major disappointment earlier and she’s a little edgy.”
Nick looked him in the eye as a smile formed on his bloodied lips. It was like the smile of a super-villain about to nuke a city. He only said five words, but those words brought tears to Bob’s eyes.
“You’ve met Simon, haven’t you?”
Chapter 25
Calling Home
Simon was still troubled. He didn’t like being troubled. It was not the kind of trouble one got when fighting off armies of the undead, he had experienced that trouble for the last twenty-eight hours and he was, quite frankly, used to it.
No, this trouble was a mystery. In a world gone to hell, where black and white seemed to be the colours of the day, and any fashion designer who disagreed was probably zombie shit by now, this mystery was even more troubling.
The Bushmaster was stopped on a road in the middle of nowhere, actually still in the middle of the mountains, because the fuckers were everywhere, but Simon needed to think; driving on an empty road with two bickering co-passengers and a duck was not helping.
“What the hell have we stopped for?” Caroline snapped at him, a distinctive edge to her voice.
“I need to think,” Simon replied without thinking, his eyes gazing out at the horizon.
“So typically male,” Caroline snapped back, barely able to contain her anger. “Can’t hold two thoughts at once. God you are a useless lot.”
“Well not all of us,” Dick proffered in a pleading voice.
“And you’re the most useless of all. What the hell do you do with your life?”
“I give women pleasure.”
“Are you sure about that? Have you ever asked any of them?”
Simon snapped out of his thoughts. “Can’t you two just stow it for five fucking minutes.”
“That’s all it usually lasts with most men, before they’re off to bed the flying rat with big tits.” Caroline snapped around in her seat, her back to Dick who was sitting forlornly in the back of the Bushmaster, Mr Percival on his shoulder.
Simon wanted to scream at the pair of them but he realised this would only make it worse, so he squelched his annoyance, lowered his head, and turned directly to face Caroline, forcing his trembling voice to stay calm.
“Listen to me the pair of you.”
Caroline snapped around on him, her eyes boring into him. Simon stayed his ground.
Dick shrunk back; even Mr Percival sensed the danger and disappeared off Dick’s shoulder.
Dick and Simon stole a confused glance at the rapidly departing duck and were both momentarily taken aback. They thought the Duck wasn’t afraid of anything, but anything did not have eyes that could strip paint, and those eyes were lasering-in on Simon, ready to tear the flesh from his bones.
Simon held his ground, his gaze unwavering under the pinpoints of her rage, “How did the vampires know about the mohair?”
“What?” Caroline countered. She had expected a fight. She was ready for a fight. She had Simon’s nuts in her crosshairs and she was going to squeeze. This completely wrong-footed her.
“What the fuck has that got to do with anything?”
“The vampires knew about the mohair. How did they know?”
Caroline stammered, “How the, what the – how is this helping?” She looked over at Dick, a crease in her mouth, desperation rising in her tone.
Dick shrugged. “He’s lost me. I have no idea what he’s talking about.”
Simon rolled his shoulders, raising his hands in front of him in a gesture of genuine frustration, “The vampires knew about the mohair.”
“So?” Caroline snapped.
“So, they live in the middle of nowhere, there’s nobody around for miles. Who told them?”
“They said they had the internet.” Dick offered. “They must have read it there.”
“Yes,” Simon replied, “but who posted it?”
“It must have been your mate, Nick. He knows.”
Simon shook his head. “Nick only ever looks at porn. He’s never posted anything in his life.”
“I still don’t see your poin
t.” Caroline was about ready to strangle everyone, including the duck, but part of her sensed Simon may be on to something.
“Someone else knows about the mohair, and if they know about the mohair, they may be able to help us.”
“Or they may actually be goblins just trying to lure some idiot into their trap,” Caroline added with a dismissive edge.
“Yes – but then why tell their victims about the one thing that can defeat them?”
“I don’t fucking know, maybe they’re just as thick as every other supernatural shit we’ve met?”
“Or maybe there is someone else.” Simon added quietly, letting the point sink in.
Caroline was about to respond, but hesitated as she realised the implication and Dick cut in, “I think Simon might be on to something.”
Caroline’s mind starting working again as her emotions sank back inside. Simon did seem to be making some kind of sense. She was beginning to finally see real leadership rising in him and the wall she had built around him cracked a little.
“If you’re right, how do we find them?”
Simon thought for a moment and an idea formed. “If you were in a natural disaster, and you needed to know what was going on, what would you do?”
“I’d fuck everything with two legs and seriously consider those with four,” Dick added without thinking.
“And you’d probably die with your pants down,” Simon responded.
“Hey – at least I’d die happy,” Dick replied with a smirk.
Caroline shot him a castrating glance and the smirk vanished from his lips. She maintained her control and turned back to Simon, “I’d listen to the radio.”
“Exactly!” Simon said as he turned his gaze to the dashboard and spotted the military-issue communications gear, complete with a hand-held microphone, “and we can talk back.”
After a few seconds of fiddling with switches and knobs, Simon was rewarded with the sound of static. He found the frequency knob and starting dialling up and down the band, listening for any sound other than static.
Ten nervous seconds passed when he was rewarded with something that sounded like a really cheesy radio commercial from the seventies, complete with a really nerdy-sounding voice that was far too intelligent for commercials but still didn’t quite have the trusted tonal quality that could sell butter to cows.
