by Sloan Archer
However, the VGO weren’t radicals or vigilantes in the traditional sense—at least not what I thought when I heard those terms: rebels hiding out deep in the jungle with machineguns and terrorists bombing subways to send political messages. The VGO were cunning, well funded, and enduring. They were, as Robert concluded, what would happen if the IRA, Yakuza, and Italian mafia merged into a single organization. If a vampire treasured his or her life, they did not tangle with the VGO. Making unruly vampires vanish without a trace was one of their fortes.
I turned to Robert and said, “You’re exaggerating.” But I knew he wasn’t because Leopold hadn’t contradicted him once.
“I’m afraid he’s not, my dear,” Leopold said, confirming what I’d already realized. “But I’m going to repeat myself: So what?”
Robert rubbed his temples. “Okay, so what did the VGO say when they came here?”
“The same sort of malarkey you’ve been spouting: What if the serum gets into the hands of humans? What if it’s weaponized? Etcetera, etcetera. You sound just like them.” Leopold sighed.
“And?” Robert prompted. “Is that all?”
“They did also invite me to shut down my lab. But I declined.”
“They will murder you, Leopold,” Robert said with certainty. “They are going to make you disappear and then find out who Mercy is. It’s only a matter of time. They have methods of getting what they want. They always do.”
“I’d like to see them try to come after me,” Leopold challenged. “I have connections of my own, don’t you forget. And they know it. I made half the VGO members who they are today. They owe me their respect and their allegiance. It was more of a courtesy call on their part. They expressed their . . . disappointment with my new enterprise. Nothing more.”
“And what about my information?” I demanded. “Will they get it, Leopold?”
“No, my dear. I told you, it’s locked away. Safer than Fort Knox, as you Americans say.” Leopold smoothed down his hair. “It’s too late for them to stop production, anyway. My first shipment went out a week before they paid me a visit.”
“Which was when?” Robert enquired.
“Last month. I sent out another shipment yesterday, actually.”
“Where to?”
“All over: Italy, France, Japan, the UK, and America,” Leopold answered. “Perhaps things would have gone differently for the VGO had they arrived with their request a week sooner. But after the serum was out in the world . . . Really, now, what could they do?”
“It didn’t cross your mind to talk to us first before putting the serum out on the market?” Robert fumed. “Twice.” I couldn’t fault Robert for being furious. What an ass Leopold was. “No, of course you didn’t. You knew we’d object.”
Leopold’s small doll hands fluttered to his chest. “Why, Robert, I’m hurt that you think I could be so diabolical.”
“Save it,” Robert snapped. “I know exactly how ruthless you can be, Leopold.”
“Ru . . . Ru . . . Ruthless!” Leopold sputtered, like he’d never been so scandalized in his entire life. He was putting on quite a show.
I wasn’t fooled. I believed Robert over Leopold, not only because Robert was my boyfriend but also because the proof was in the pudding—err, serum. Leopold didn’t ask us permission before charging ahead, which in my opinion was a pretty sneaky thing to do.
“Yes,” Robert said. “Ruthless.”
“I didn’t want to ruin the surprise!”
“And what surprise is that, Leo?” Robert asked, nonplussed.
Leopold’s yellow eyes shifted to my face. “You didn’t think that there was nothing it in for you? Of course there is, Mercy!”
“It never crossed my mind to benefit from . . . whatever it is that you’re doing,” I said. I’d been more concerned with not having my blood drained by penny-pinching vampires . . . And now I had my latest and greatest concern, being murdered by the V-G-fucking-O.
“I’m cutting you in,” Leopold declared. “To the profits.”
I didn’t know what to say. Rather, I didn’t trust myself to speak. Any phrases that would have been directed toward Leopold at that moment would not have been amiable, and we were still guests in his house. Why thank you, Leopold. And thanks to the tenacity of the VGO, I’m probably going to disappear without a trace. But, hey, on the bright side, I’m going to die a very rich woman.
Robert spoke for me. “You think we care about money?”
“Mercy might.”
“I don’t know how I feel,” I said. “And money is the last thing on my mind right now. I’m sick and tired of vampires trying to kill me. I’ve had enough of that to carry me over a thousand human lifetimes. All I want is a nice, normal life.”
“A normal life? There’s no such thing when you choose to be in the company of vampires,” Leopold scoffed. “But I promise you: Nobody is going to kill you. Nor will anyone even try.”
I was too tired to debate. Leopold was missing the point, though I was no longer sure what point I was actually trying to make. “What about Robert’s cure?”
“I’ll explain it all during the tour.” Leopold stood. “Shall we?”
Robert sucked in his cheeks, irritated.
“We’re already here,” I said. “Might as well.”
“Fine.” Robert got to his feet and then extended his hand for me to take. “Lead the way, Leopold. Please.”
Leopold took us through the various rooms in the structure: cold storage, which had samples of my blood and the serum, a fully functioning laboratory, where doctors were eager to stay out of Leopold’s way, and a research space that looked like a classroom. About the last he commented, “The doctors and I meet at the end of each work night to discuss developments or problems they’ve encountered.”
I was curious. “What sort of problems?”
“It’s interesting.” Leopold clasped his hands. “At the beginning, Mercy, we discovered that the effect times of your blood varied.”
“Depending on what?” Robert asked.
“Depending on the vampire it was given to,” Leopold answered.
I asked, “You mean like how it varied with Liz and Marlena’s blood?”
“Precisely.” Leopold directed our attention towards a dry erase board. The board had several layers, all on wheels. He shifted a few around until he hit upon the one he wanted.
On the board was a labeled chart. It featured a series of numbers and corresponding times:
REACTION TIMES TO M.M. SAMPLE #25:
0 - 500: 30 - 60 DAYS
500 - 1000: 14 - 30 DAYS
1000+: INSTANTANEOUS
Leopold pointed at the chart. “M.M. SAMPLE stands for Mercy Montgomery, and this chart was made after our twenty-fifth trial with the serum. The numbers on the left are in reference to vampire ages. As you can see, the vampires under five hundred required a gestation period of thirty to sixty days for the serum to take effect, and those five hundred to a thousand took about two weeks to one month. Any vampire over a thousand, the effect was instantaneous. There was occasionally some overlap, which is why the chart is labeled the way that it is.”
“How many vampires did you test?” Robert asked.
“You’d have to ask the doctors for specifics, but at the time this chart was made, perhaps two hundred. Trust me when I tell you this, we did not have a difficult time finding volunteers.” Leopold furnished us a smug grin.
“That’s what the waiting room out there is for,” I said to Leopold. “For the vampires receiving the serum.”
“Oh yes. We have a fully functioning clinic here.”
“Do you have volunteers here now?” Robert asked.
“A few, but I’ll get to that later.” Turning back to the board, Leopold said, “These were very rough figures—the change times—but they were fairly accurate. Like most things relating to vampirism—our origin, gifts, strengths, weaknesses, etcetera—we had no idea why the changeover times varied.”
“You s
aid that this was a chart from your twenty-fifth trial. How many more trials have you run?” Robert asked.
“I was getting there,” Leopold said. “M.M. SAMPLE #25 was comprised mainly of Mercy’s blood. But the changeover times denoted on this chart no longer apply, which is why I’m speaking about them in the past tense. Through the hundreds and hundreds of trials I—well, my scientists—have run, the serum has been refined. It now takes just a few hours for the serum to take effect. That goes for all ages, whether the vampire is two days or two thousand years old. However, many ancient vampires do change immediately.”
I asked, “Has the potency of my blood become stronger?”
“No. Your blood is the same as it always was,” Leopold said. “These changes came about due to manipulation of the serum. I’m no scientist, so you’ll have to excuse my ignorance, but from what I understand, Mercy, your blood contains an enzyme or protein complex that hinders the instantaneous change of vampires under a thousand years of age. Again, I’m no scientist, so the technical terms I’m using are probably way off. If you like, I can get one of the doctors to explain it to you in greater detail.”
“So this is why it took about two months for me to become human,” Robert mused.
“Yes,” Leopold said. “And why Shelia saw an instantaneous change in Marlena’s blood but not Liz’s.”
I asked, “Have you encountered any vampires immune to my blood?”
I could have been imagining things, but Leopold squirmed. “We did, yes—only one in all the vampires who’ve come to the clinic. But . . .”
Robert and I looked at Leopold expectantly.
“The test subject did not return.” Leopold suddenly seemed awfully interested in his fingernails.
“And why not?” Robert probed.
“I don’t really know,” Leopold replied. “We can’t reach him. We haven’t been able to reach him for a few weeks. This is part of the reason why we’ve encountered some delay with your cure, Robert. Nathaniel was our main test subject. His immunity to Mercy’s blood was extremely rare. Like I said, he was the only one we encountered . . .”
“Suspicious, don’t you think?” Robert asked. “Him vanishing like that?”
Leopold shrugged.
“And your serum, is it permanent?” I said.
“Absolutely. We’ve engineered it that way. My serum is far less forgiving than your blood, Mercy. With the serum, there is no going back. If a vampire takes it, they can never become vampire again—not even if ten million vampires tried to change them over.”
“And what if a vampire bites a recipient of your serum after they’ve become human?” Robert questioned.
“Then nothing,” Leopold said. “That is the one area where the serum is less harsh than Mercy’s blood. The serum will have zero negative consequence on vampires. The blood of a serum recipient may not taste very good to a vampire, but it won’t harm them or change them into a human.”
“Not like my blood,” I remarked.
“I’m sorry, Mercy. I do not wish to make you feel bad. I’m merely stating the facts,” Leopold told me.
“No, I hear you,” I said. “So not much has changed on that front, then? I’m guessing no. I’m talking about my blood, here.”
Leopold paused. “I’m afraid not. And this is why we’re having such a difficult time finding a cure for Robert. Once a vampire takes in your blood, Mercy, and after they’ve become human, any vampire who then bites them will also become human. We’ve tried and tried and tried to render Robert’s human blood susceptible to vampire blood but . . .”
“My blood trumps the power of vampire blood,” I stated.
“Yes. I’m afraid it does.”
“And the VGO know this?” Robert asked.
“The VGO don’t know anything!” Leopold scoffed. “I told you, Mercy is in no danger!”
Robert wasn’t persuaded. Neither was I.
In a calmer voice, Leopold said, “Would you like to see your lab, Robert?”
Robert sighed. “Sure. Why not?”
When we reached Robert’s lab, I was tempted to ask Leopold if he was having a laugh, because of its ludicrousness. If the entire building were a cake, then the portion dedicated to finding Robert a cure wouldn’t have even been a whole slice, but a teeny, tiny crumb that had fallen off the cake only to be forgotten on the floor and mushed by the underside of Leopold’s fancy loafers.
In a word: pathetic.
“This is all for you, Robert,” Leopold said grandly. This is your closet, Robert, would have been more appropriate statement. Because there’s no money to be made from finding you a cure, Robert. Because I have millions—billions—but I’ll always want more, Robert. Because it’s never enough, Robert.
Robert’s silence spoke more than words ever could. He saw it, too—the uneven distribution of efforts given to my serum and his cure.
I understood, then, precisely how strong a maker’s pull was over their ‘child.’ Robert never would have accused Leopold of doing wrong by him, though he plainly was. It couldn’t have felt very nice, knowing that his maker had prioritized turning a profit over his wellbeing.
The doctor in Robert’s lab—the only doctor who was working on Robert’s cure, it seemed—smiled apologetically when he saw us. Robert asked him very few questions, since Leopold had already gone over what little there was to cover. The doctor relayed the same information: Robert’s new human blood attacked all vampire blood, regardless of what age or sex the donor was. And with the one and only test subject missing, the doctor had to virtually start over.
Robert kept a stiff upper lip, but any remaining hope he’d had prior to coming into his lab had disappeared. My heart ached for him.
Our tour ended at a massive chamber at the far end of the building. Its door was marked HATCHING ROOM. Leopold pulled open the door and showed us a space that was enclosed but roofless. I felt another twinge like the one I’d experienced outside. The view was familiar. The floor was grass, like a park. No, not like a park, I realized—like a cemetery.
Spaced out every six feet were dirt mounds. Graves. I didn’t know for certain that the fresh dunes were graves, but at approximately eight-by-four feet in length, I couldn’t imagine what else they could be.
I was right.
Leopold turned to us, grinning like a proud parent. “I call them my hatchlings.”
“Like chickens?” Robert asked.
“Yes. Very much like chickens.”
Leopold led us out onto the wooden deck that squared the grass. At the far right corner of the room was an elevated platform, similar to how box office seats were positioned in a baseball stadium. It was a strange layout, but like everything else Leopold had designed, it probably had a purpose.
Leopold explained, “The changing process goes like this: Vampires come to us wanting to be human. We bury them in the hatching room and then give them the serum intravenously. See the tubes poking out of the dirt? That’s how we get the serum into their system after they’ve been buried.”
I looked toward the fresh graves. “So, there were vampires buried tonight?”
“Yes. Every night, practically.” Leopold directed us up the stairs to the platform. “Anyway, the vampires are in thin polyurethane sacks that are supremely pliable—there have to be easy to tear apart, you see. Think of them like . . . oh, like the casing of a frankfurter. The sacks are buried under a fine layer of dirt.” He pointed to the speakers above, gigantic black cones on metal poles as tall as telephone poles. They looked like alien creatures straight out of War of the Worlds. “Come daybreak, we play the classics: Bach, Stravinsky, Mozart. It not only signals patients that it’s time to wake, but it provides a gentle transition into their new world.”
“And like baby chickens, they break through the sacks and dirt,” Robert commented. “They hatch.”
Leopold nodded. “Now you see why I call this the hatching room. The whole process is very symbolic.”
“Combined with the music,
I bet it’s very moving,” I said. “Imagine what that must be like to witness.” I was trying to keep an open mind, but the whole thing was a little creepy, knowing that there were bodies transforming—coming back to life—under the ground. It was like a cemetery in reverse.
Leopold turned to me. “You won’t have to imagine for much longer.”
“You mean . . . ?”
“Yes. Come dawn, you and Robert will get to see the hatching firsthand. If you want to, of course.” Leopold gestured towards the dark sky. “I’m afraid I won’t be able to join you.”
I nodded. “The sun. Right.”
Robert said to Leopold, “Yes, we want to see. Absolutely.” It would have been nice if Robert had asked me first before answering. It seemed that no matter how many times Leopold told Robert to jump, his answer would always be the same. How high?
I was nervous about the whole thing, though I was baffled as to why I was being such a scaredy cat. It didn’t make sense, fearing newborn humans. Vampires were far more threatening.
But I was afraid. For whatever reason, I was.
At approximately 5:45AM the next morning, my fear came to fruition. As the sun began its ascent, the speakers above crackled to life. Soon bassoons, flutes, and drums grated against my ears like sandpaper. Hector Berlioz’s “Symphonie Fantastique” (a tune I knew well because it had been one of Grams’s favorites) floated out into the atmosphere. It left me feeling anything but fantastic.
Reality was masquerading as a nightmare that morning. The dirt below our elevated viewing point shifted and wriggled. Pale hands plunged through the earth, followed by heads, shoulders, and then whole bodies. Newborn humans crawled from their graves, hardly noticing the blood running down their chins. Some were weeping, while others bore stunned expressions, as if their minds were a few steps behind their bodies and were struggling to catch up. They gaped at the orange ball of flame above. The sun. Like they were synchronized, their hands flew to their crimson lips as their fangs dropped from their mouths.
