The Van Helsing Resurgence

by Evelyn Chartres

  * * * *

  When Edith was done, she existed the bathroom feeling very much like herself. Sure, she was a bit of a flour lover, one too liberal with the powder, but that had always been her style.

  On the other side of the door, she saw a map of the city. At the periphery, she found her landing site, surrounded by this neighbourhood. It was a snap to find where she was, considering there was a gold star that served as a point of reference. However, that was not what caught her eye.

  For the first time tonight, she heard whispers, as though they were carried forth on the wind. In the middle of a city of concrete and steel, there was a large expanse of green that took up a huge swath of real estate. Something about that place beckoned and urged Edith to make her way there.

  “Finally,” Edith said.

  Now all that she needed to do was get there. Fortunately, the solution to that particular conundrum had also been solved. Beside the map, there was a phone wired directly to a cab company.

  “Perfect,” Edith said.

  * * * *

  Victoria stepped over the doorman, before making her way to the front door. Just ahead, Evelyn’s footsteps echoed when her heels made contact with the hardwood floors.

  In that moment, Victoria was happy, content with the world and the part she was to play in it. She had a guide, confidant, and friend in Evelyn, a woman that saw great potential in her, something that no one else had ever seen before.

  “Could this moment get any better?” Victoria whispered.

  As though the gods themselves decided to intervene, the scene’s mood changed for the worse. The power cut out, which plunged them into twilight and awoke a fresh set of senses.

  As a mortal, she would have been blind as a bat, but now the world retained a level of detail. To the unaccustomed, her night vision was more like seeing the world represented in a series of blueprints. She saw the outlines of objects and structures, but none of the finer details were present.

  Her hearing had also been enhanced. She heard the compressor in her refrigerator slowing down and had no trouble picking up a deluge of boots stomping up the stairs. At first, the sounds were distant, but they grew in intensity until they were just outside the door.

  “Is that their heart—,” Victoria wondered before a loud thump flooded her senses.

  The sound forced Victoria to cover her ears in response. To the uninitiated, it was comparable to an explosive charge going off nearby.

  Evelyn had no such concerns. Her years of experience taught her to control these heightened senses. Victoria watched the vampire advance at a frightening pace. Her elder knew exactly what was going on, the extent of the incursion, and how much trouble they were in.

  “Run!” Evelyn exclaimed just as a second impact struck the door.

  The shock from the impact caused the door to splinter around the securing mechanism. As the door swung open, the elder ran past the opening with claws extended. Victoria was confused, unsure of what was going on. That second impact left her stunned, her mind muddled, and choices unclear in the midst of so much chaos.

  “Freeze!” the team leader ordered.

  The word hung in the air, like an opera singer holding a note for as long as possible. Victoria opened her eyes just in time to witness Evelyn take the offensive.

  Ahead of the man who barked out orders, there were four others holding a battering ram. The lot of them were dressed in black, wearing night vision goggles, and their heads were adorned with combat helmets. Her night vision did not allow her to see the word SWAT printed on their tactical vests, but she could guess that much.

  Evelyn reached out for the first man on her left. Her claws ripped through the light fabric around his neck and dug into the flesh around his larynx. She then used him as a pivot to propel her knee into the face of the man on her right. That impact drove the night vision goggles into the man’s forehead and tore out the larynx of her first victim.

  With the grace of a dancer, Evelyn straddled the battering ram as it fell towards the floor. Since the last two men were still holding onto the heavy implement, she grabbed the forward handles and waited.

  As soon as her feet touched the floor, she gave it her all. Her strength easily propelled the battering ram away from her and towards what remained of the unsuspecting team. The ram, now a missile, flew towards the team leader and broke the wrists of those who held on.

  By then, Victoria had managed to regain a modicum of coherence, just in time to witness blood gushing out in spurts, while the other man just dropped to his knees and toppled forward like a log.

  The battering ram impacted the team leader’s chest. Even from this distance, Victoria heard the aramid liner stretch and strain, followed by the sound of breaking bones. With her heightened hearing, each break sounded like a branch snapping under strain.

  “Run!” Evelyn screamed.

  The elder swung her clawed hand at the closest man’s leg and severed the femoral artery. Without time to watch her handiwork, she turned towards the fourth man. She sprinted towards him, buried her hands into his midsection and grabbed onto his ribs. The elder pushed through the wall, disappearing behind a cloud of plaster, dust, and splinters. Once she breached the wall, she sent her shield flying towards another team who had their guns at the ready. The sound of shattering bone and ruptured organs made Victoria sick to her stomach.

  Evelyn turned around to face the next wave of assailants, but they anticipated her move. Before her chest was aligned with the group, there came a loud percussive bang. There were limits to maintaining her heightened speeds for long. Had she fed recently, she might have been able to dodge the attack. Instead, the bean bag struck her in the centre of mass, crumpling her midsection as her body absorbed the shock.

  Undeterred, Evelyn bared her fangs. The remnants of this team were not about to lose the initiative, so a spent shell casing sprung through the air while another round was chambered.

  Evelyn pushed away from the wall just in time to take a slug to the shoulder followed by small arms fire that perforated her chest. Even though the individual shots were having little effect, it was clear the combined trauma was slowing her down.

  Victoria witnessed Evelyn hit the wall hard before slumping to the floor. While the team advanced, they maintained a steady stream of fire, never giving this predator the opportunity to renew her attack.

  In that moment, Victoria decided to run. She began to walk backwards, then pivoted into a run while heading towards the master bedroom. From here, she saw the narrow alley and a neighbour’s window across the divide.

  It happened so fast, that her mind barely registered what had happened. She only had a vague recollection of hearing glass breaking in quick succession followed by hitting a wall head first. Then, just like that, the world faded to black.

  FRIENDS AND FOREPLAY

  “What are these called again?” Brett asked before biting down on the flat bread and meat combo that was dripping white sauce.

  Breanna rolled her eyes, pretending to chew her food to avoid answering. After the day they had, she wanted nothing to do with them. Unfortunately, they still needed to restore auxiliary power.

  “It’s called a donair,” Mason said in annoyance, while using his fork to take a bite of his.

  Brett scoffed at his counterpart’s eating habits. With all three on edge, every exchange was like a game of hot potato, except with an unstable grenade. Fortunately, the others were giving Brett’s antics a pass because he was the one who spent hours configuring systems in an attempt to restore power.

  All Breanna could think of was her thirst, so she plunged the straw through the thickly packed ice and settled it against the corner. After rattling the contents of her cup, the syrupy goodness travelled up the straw and onto her tongue. For a brief moment, the sweetness made her smile. Alas no amount of sugar could keep that up for long.

  Without any reason to linger, Breanna returned to her station. Displays were dim, make it difficult to see, so she r
elied on memory to fly through the prompts. This way, her eyes only needed to focus on responses to reduce eyestrain.

  “Hmmm,” Breanna said.

  She repeated the last couple of steps expecting the results to change but they did not waiver. That really got her curious, so she leaned back in her chair and looked up at the ceiling.

  “What’s up?” Mason asked to avoid watching any more of Brett’s so called eating.

  Breanna used the ceiling as a blank slate. Soon, equations filled the void, followed by images and vast amounts of information. Every time she reached a dead end, the white space was restored and another cycle began.

  “Breanna!” Mason called out.

  “What the f—” Breanna said half-distracted.

  Mason had seen this before. This was her way of escaping into the depths of her mind. In many ways, he envied that talent: the ability to tackle complex problems without the aid of technology or meditation.

  “You with us?” Mason asked.

  Eventually, Breanna’s mind ran out of scenarios, so she cleared the board and focused on the workstation. As a precaution, she ran the calculations again and got the same results.

  “The very definition of insanity,” Breanna said. “When can we get main power online?”

  Mason shrugged before he said, “Assuming no more nonsense? I would say days or even weeks. Why?”

  “I noticed that our inertial systems are out of tolerance,” Breanna said.

  “What would cause that?” Mason asked.

  “Normally, a glitch like that will sort itself out. Or a near-Earth object is interfering with our readings,” Breanna replied.

  “Let me get this—,” Mason tried to ask but Breanna beat him to the punch.

  “There are no objects of sufficient mass within range,” Breanna answered. “And this is not a glitch.”

  “So, what’s causing it?” Mason asked, half-expecting her to cut him off again.

  The wide smile and narrow stare Breanna adopted gave her a devilish appearance. Both Mason and Brett subconsciously cringed, worried about the gravity of this information.

  “An increase in Earth’s mass,” Breanna said.

  Mason realised why he had been allowed to ask the question. While her constant interruptions did speed up chatter, Breanna wanted to make sure he got the message.

  “How much?” Mason asked.

  This exchange caused Brett to slow down his gluttonous activity. His eyes trained on his coworkers to catch every detail of what was going on.

  “I’m not sure since I can’t confirm my data using our orbital constellation,” Breanna said.

  “How much?” Mason repeated.

  “Between one and two percent,” Breanna said faintly.

  Brett’s mouth opened wide enough that the contents of his mouth fell back onto the plate. While wholly unappetizing, it did emphasize the severity of this revelation.

  “How?” Mason asked with a quivering voice.

  Breanna’s eyes lingered on Brett before she turned over to Mason, shrugged, and answered, “No clue…”

  * * * *

  After leaving that dive bar, Clara walked for the better part of an hour down desolate streets. Something seemed off about the city. While Clara could not think of the reason why, she knew that any city of this size should be teeming with people. So why was this entire area boarded up? There were no cars other than derelicts stripped bare. Litter covered the streets and some drifted around harmlessly, carried forth by the wind.

  “How could there be any part of this city so sparsely inhabited?” Clara asked.

  She did not expect an answer, nor was one provided. There were other mysteries to solve before the night was done and her musings on population density did nothing to achieve her goal.

  In the distance, she spotted something and initially thought it was nothing more than a trick of the eye. Was that a truck? Clara’s heart rate rose in excitement, prompting her to focus her thoughts to bring it back down to normal. It had been a long time since she last needed to manipulate her heart rate, but Clara needed to remain calm. For now.

  Before she approached the vehicle, Clara kept an eye on her surroundings. All around, there were potential avenues for an ambush or ways to mount an indirect attack. There were plenty of monsters that were smart enough to lay such traps and patient enough to wait for an unassuming victim.

  “Wait till they get on my bad side,” Clara said under her breath.

  Her training left her with the necessary toolset to deal with such eventualities: how to ignore the cold or the heat and put mission before self, even at the cost of her own life.

  “Anything that tries to fuck with me will end up having a bad day,” Clara said casually as she approached the vehicle.

  From this distance, she noted that the headlights were lit and there was a ghostly glow to them. The vehicle was old, or appeared to be at least, when compared to what she saw in modern films.

  Cars had been a rich man’s luxury when Clara was a child. As time progressed, they became more popular and ubiquitous. In the last decade of her life, she even learned to drive, a useful bit of knowledge for disposing of wealthy vampires and their rides.

  She never expected to come across a truck that survived the Dirty Thirties. It was a real piece of work too: bright red paint, chrome buffed to a shine. This vehicle looked better than it would have off the lot.

  “Now why would anyone leave something like this lying around?” Clara asked.

  Clara drew her pistol and swept the truck for any potential threats. She checked the cab, the bed, and the undercarriage, all without finding anything to worry about. Clara paused, furrowed her brow, and looked utterly confused. Simply put, this was too easy.

  She eventually accepted the situation based on nothing more than faith and opened the door. Since the lights were dim, Clara popped the hood latch release and went ahead to have a closer look.

  “Oh my!” Clara said in awe.

  Whatever was crammed into the engine compartment looked nothing like the stock engines from her time. Every square inch of space had been used up to house the engine and supporting systems.

  “Someone was compensating for something,” Clara said before letting out a snicker.

  Despite everything looking shiny and new, the compartment still smelled of lubricants and petrol. It brought back some great memories of having her way with men in the back of these classics. She even learned to appreciate rumble seats.

  With a sigh, she slammed the hood into place. As a final precaution, she scanned the area but again, found nothing. For many, this implied they were alone, but that was rarely true.

  “Too easy,” Clara said.

  Clara slid into the cab as best she could. The leather of her pants clung to the seats. Clara had no choice but to chuckle, since fate managed to save her a little surprise after all.

  She looked over the console and found most of the gauges and dials to be familiar. Since the keys were in the ignition, she turned the key and as expected, nothing happened.

  “Horsefeathers!” Clara swore.

  Thinking back over her days of yore, Clara remembered to check the choke. Her eyes scanned every feature on the console to no avail. There were no plungers or dials for a choke.

  “What now?” Clara asked herself.

  The last thing Clara wanted to do was push this flivver down the road until she reached a hill. While she had no specific time and place to rendezvous, Clara sensed she was needed somewhere, and fast.

  “There must be—,” Clara said but stopped when an idea ran through her mind.

  She pressed down on the clutch and break until both were firmly in place. In this position, her legs were strained so she fumbled around with the seat until she could reach comfortably.

  She then turned the keys and felt the engine roll over. The first pass sounded laboured, as though the engine had been kept out on a frigid winter’s eve, but on the second turn, it roared to life.

&nbs
p; “Yes!” Clara exclaimed.

  When the engine began to grunt, she pressed down on the throttle, and made this engine roar once more. In that moment, Clara knew that she was going to have a lot of fun with this truck.

  She released the brake, eased off on the clutch, and gave it some gas. The truck’s rear wheels squealed releasing a noxious black cloud into the air. Before Clara had a chance to smell her handiwork, the truck was already screaming down the road.

  “Di mi!” Clara exclaimed. “I think I’m in love!”

  * * * *

  Elizabeth sat comfortably at a corner booth, and looked over the expansive park just outside. In the distance, high-rises poked out from above the treeline. There was all sorts of activity going on in between: people jogging, buskers performing, muggers doing their dastardly deeds, and those who spent their days feeding the pigeons. In the background, she heard quiet lounge music and the chitter chatter of people busy with their meals.