Queen Bitch

by Michael Anderle

  What about the Nanocytes that are in me? What will they do to him?

  The usually follow the 3 stages, remember? His body doesn’t need to be made ready like stages two and three, so it should just make him younger. Although I doubt enough in a mug of blood will do too much from the nanocytes. Depending how much Etheric Energy you provide, that would probably do the most good.

  So the nanocytes aren’t going to super-program him?

  Uhhhhh, one second.

  Bethany Anne’s head started to hurt. TOM was accessing the organic computer in her head. One of these fucking weeks she was going to hole up and fix her connections. She wouldn’t allow TOM to access the computer because it hurt so much, but then she couldn’t get information without the computer. It sucked.

  Finally, about 10 seconds later the pain started to recede.

  Ok, I can use some of the etheric energy and reprogram the nanocytes so they don’t make any additional changes.

  Wait! We can ask them to do additional changes?

  Well, possibly. What do you have in mind?

  Can you program them to have a backdoor or something?

  What is a backdoor?

  In this case, something that we can contact through the etheric and have them change routines if we want?

  Another bit of silence from TOM.

  Yes, we can at least get them to communicate their location if you want? I’m not sure how much more, I hadn’t considered that.

  That will have to be good enough. If I can figure out where he is, I should be able to figure out if he is doing what I want.

  Bethany Anne stood up and moved into the kitchen. Stephen watched her with curiosity. Although he was tired physically, his brain was awake. It had been many, many decades since he had talked with anyone who could be safe to share any secrets. The strictures limited him to talking with his siblings who were spread all over the world. He felt bad about what Petre’ had been up to, but it seemed this woman took care of that. He hadn’t wished ill on Petre’, but he had gone against the strictures himself when he shot this woman. His poor judgment in not finding out more about her. Petre’ should never have shot anyone connected with Michael in the first place and had Stephen been informed, he would have been required to kill Petre’ for his actions. She saved him the anguish of killing one of his own children.

  She didn’t seem to have that many hangups. At least where respect for your elders came in. She knocked him on his ass without blinking. He wondered if her generation didn’t appreciate what it took to live this long, or if she would have hit him before she was transformed?

  She looked around the kitchen and in the drawers until she found the type of knife, a filet knife and grabbed a mug from above the sink and took it into the living room. She looked around. She didn’t want to make a mess but she would lose the value of the effort if she didn’t do this right in front of him.

  She sat the knife and the mug down between them on the coffee table. He sat up on the couch and looked at the mug and knife and back up to her.

  “Stephen. I appreciate all that you have shared with me. Know first, I am not Michael. If I make a pact with you, then you can know that I will do what is in my power to make that pact work. I need a powerful Nicht here in Europe. I need you to come back to the living again, Stephen. Come back awake and stay awake. I need you to be my eyes and ears here in Europe. I need you to be strong again, Stephen. For me, For Nicht, and frankly for the world. Will you accept this gift of my blood. Blood that will strengthen you, connect you to me and will you work with me to make this world better for Nicht, for the UnknownWorld and for the Humans as well?

  Stephen looked into her eyes. Those beautiful eyes that he imagined glowed as he told his story through the night. She had become his priestess, his sister, his friend. Would he? Would he be willing to do this? For the humans? No. He didn’t have enough love for any humans or Weres right now. Maybe in the future. But for Bethany Anne? For Bethany Anne he would do this and he would follow her until the grave finally claimed his body.

  He placed his frail arm over his chest. “Yes, my lady. I will do this as you ask. However; I am from centuries past. I know that you don’t ascribe to the old ways. Ways that have been old generations before you were born. But if you would let me drink from your wrist, I will be your servant until the end of my days. Whether they be today or a thousand years in the future.”

  Bethany Anne looked down at the mug and knife and realized that it was a poor substitute for the ritual, for the request of Stephens allegiance. If she was going to be a Queen, the Queen of the UnknownWorld it would not be done with a porcelain mug and a filet knife.

  She stood up, and walked over to the Stephen, who looked up into her eyes as she stood next to him. “Drink, Stephen. Swear your allegiance to me and I will provide you sustenance to come back to me. But, if you don’t stop when I tell you, I will put my fist through your skull, do you understand me?”

  “Yes, my Queen. I understand.”

  She offered her wrist and Stephen lovingly took it and slowly, ever so slowly pierced her veins with his two teeth, making sure that he was beyond careful with this woman who had saved him from a mortality of loneliness and given him a new lease, a new reason to live.

  She gently tapped him on the head about five minutes later. His mind, his body abuzz. The blood was changing him. Changing him again it felt like. Any point of light in the room was bright.

  “Lay down Stephen and sleep. I will protect you while you rest: you have my word on that.”

  Stephen closed his eyes and just leaned over and was comatose. Bethany Anne pulled his legs up on the couch and searched around the house until she found a cover. She wasn’t sure he needed it, but it might be a comfort and she wanted to tuck him in. She then went back to the chair across the coffee table and sat down.

  Michael’s Family was dysfunctional, she thought.

  She had learned that TOM had the ability to pay attention to what was going on around her, even when she wasn't paying attention. For example, when he was able to pinpoint where she had seen Paul Rutherford on the train. She had talked with him later to find out he was constantly ‘paying attention’ to all of her senses and learning more as he went along. He was very smart, if a little ignorant about Earth customs and was constantly pulling in more and more information trying to understand it. Considering that it was becoming more and more dangerous for her should she be caught unawares, she needed TOM to catch what she missed.

  She was missing Nathan’s ‘guard dog’ sensitivities. She hoped he and Ecaterina were doing alright.

  She got up and went to the front door and made sure all of the locks were in place. Going back to the linen closet where she got the first blanket for Stephen, she got another one for herself and sat back down in the chair. She asked TOM to take the first watch. She then had to explain the story how people would break up the nighttime into watches so that some could sleep while others would stay awake to protect them. He told her he would be glad to take the ‘first, second and third watches’. It wasn’t like he slept, anyway.

  She closed her eyes and rested. Emotionally drained, she was out in seconds.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Constanta, Romania

  Bethany Anne, I sense that Stephen is waking up.

  Bethany Anne opened her eyes, quickly assessing the room. Nothing had changed. She was still in the chair and Stephen was still laying down on the couch.

  How?

  His heartbeat just increased by 10%. It is an anomaly that hasn’t happened the entire time he has been out.

  "So, his heartbeat changed and you’re ready to say he is waking up?

  She stood up and went around the coffee table and looked down at Stephen. He was looking a lot better.

  While he still looked old, his face seemed a little less skull and leather skin and more flushed and fuller. His skin had lost all of the sunspots, marks and blemishes he had and generally looked about 10 years younger, maybe.
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  While she was looking down at him, his eyes suddenly opened, startling her.

  “Hey, you’re awake.”

  Stephen looked around and rose up so that he was in the sitting position. Stephen looked at the blanket on his lap and back up to Bethany Anne.

  “I couldn’t let you just lay there like a cord of wood. I didn’t know if you got cold or not so I went searching around your house and found the linen closet and borrowed a couple of blankets.

  “Thank you. It has been a really long time since I have been looked after. Maybe centuries in fact.”

  Bethany Anne smiled. “Trust me, I’m happier to have looked after you sleeping than having to knock some sense into you.” She went back and sat down in her chair.

  “I think you would have done just that, truly.”

  She sighed, “Yes. I had become a little jaded to the fact that it seemed the only thing that vampires understand is violence. Lots and lots of violence. So, I had expected to come here and have to drag you outside to get your attention. I knew you could walk in the sun, but I figured it would have woken you up.”

  “May I ask what you would have done then?”

  “Well, I figured I would have to yank off one of your arms, then beat you with it until I got your attention. Frankly after that I had no ideas. I was rather hoping you would be a reasonable guy. However; from the stories that I was hearing, I wasn’t giving that a very high probability.”

  Stephen just looked at his new Queen for a minute. She was such a dichotomy between gentle on one hand and violent on the other. She would make a very good Queen, he decided. He truly was the happiest he had been in centuries. His time of loneliness, ever since Michael had gone to the new world, was over. For her, he would even get on a plane to go visit. Although he had never flown, he now had a reason to do so.

  “What will you do now, Stephen? I’ve got to get back to America for a while. I will need to come back over here, I’m sure. If for no other reason than to talk with you. How do you keep your grounds up when you hibernate?”

  “I have people.” He left off that they were just an agency he had set up a decade before and hadn’t spoken to since that time.

  “Ok, I see you’re looking better, how are you going to…” Bethany Anne stopped. She never knew what it took to get younger again.

  “Rejuvenate?”

  “Is that what you call it to look young again?”

  “Yes. In order for us to take our bodies and make them young again, we have to consume a significant amount of blood and exchange it with another. This process turns them into a vampire, and turns their parent young again.”

  “Do you force this change on others?” Bethany Anne wasn’t sure she could allow this. In fact, she knew she wouldn’t allow it. There had to be a different way.

  “No, no one in Michael’s family would force a change. He has placed certain rules we adhere to. One of them is that the person must understand their options and another is that…”

  Bethany Anne finished the sentence with him, “they can only have 6 months to live. Yeah, I got that one.” She started biting the inside of her cheek. It was an old habit when she was thinking.

  “You have been asleep pretty long, right? You don’t have anyone that you know wants to go through this process and is ready. Shit, this is going to be a tough nut to crack.” Bethany Anne got up and started pacing. She thought better while she moved.

  TOM, what is the process that really turns the vampires body back young again? Is it the blood, or is it the etheric energy that much blood gives them?

  It would be the energy. The age of a human has to do with the cells decaying. With that much energy, the nanocytes would be able to accomplish stage one again.

  So, if we connected Stephen to an etheric energy battery, he would be able to do the same thing, right? Basically, doing this blood transfusion…” Bethany Anne realized she had an answer, possibly.

  “Stephen, have the vampires ever consumed blood from a blood bank?”

  He looked over at her and thought about it. “I haven’t. Since I don’t talk with my siblings I can’t answer for them. If something like that works, I don’t imagine that they would share the information.”

  “Why not?”

  “We might all be siblings, as in children of Michael. However; we compete with each other and frankly we really guard our secrets. It’s one of the reasons we don’t really talk with each other.

  Bethany Anne started down that path of logic. If one, or more, of the vampires really studied blood they probably were able to pull out the components of blood that connected to the etheric. Maybe they didn’t understand the ‘how’ it worked, but what it accomplished might have been enough. With as much genetic study that had gone on in the past four decades, she imagined a lot of research was available. Since Stephen, and Michael for that matter, had ignored humanity and stayed hibernating they wouldn’t know much of the advances in science.

  “Ok, I think I have an answer. Let me research this a little more.” She got out her smart phone and made sure she had a signal.

  “What is that?”

  “Hmm? Oh, this is a phone that is able to connect to the Internet. From there, I can pull up information, something like books in a library from anywhere in the world.”

  “Really? I’ve been asleep too long. I have no knowledge of this.”

  “I know, trust me. First, I need to get you younger, fast. Then I need to get you up to speed with reality and connect you with the EPC.”

  “EPC?”

  Bethany Anne put the phone to her ear, “European Council of Weres.” She put up a finger to hold his next question.

  “Hi, this is Bethany Anne. I read on a website that Lithuania has four blood donation sites and that you pay about 12 Euros for each donation or about 63,000 donations a year. Is this right? Yes, yes I’m willing to make a donation. No! I don’t want to donate blood, I want to purchase blood for a financial donation. How much? Well, let’s see. There are about 5 liters of blood in a body, right? Ok, how about 5,000 Euro for 25 liters of blood?”

  “Yes, I am looking to make a donation of $5,000 Euro for 25 liters. It has to be flown to me tonight. I’ll pay all of the fee’s necessary if you will get it to,” she put her hand over the phone.

  “Stephen, what’s a good place to get a delivery around here? I don’t want it coming directly to your house.”

  “We can use the hospital. I have a foundation that provides them money every year. They will do this for me.”

  “Really? That’s incredible. Remind me to let you know you’re my new favorite vampire.” She took her hand off of the phone and told them what hospital she wanted it delivered to.

  Twenty minutes later she got a return call. They made a deal with the hospital for the 25 liters of blood out of their stores and they would resupply the hospital within 48 hours. It cut down on the costs of transportation and they could access the blood right away.

  Bethany Anne was smiling. It was nice to have something go right for once. Now, stretching her luck a little, she made another phone call back to Bravos.

  “Hello?” A man’s voice was on the phone.

  “Ivan, this is Bethany Anne.”

  “Hello! How is my favorite… Uh… Lady?” Ivan stammered a little when he realized he couldn’t say some things out loud.

  “I’m good. Hey, do you want to do your favorite ‘lady’ a favor, and get paid?”

  “Probably, but you know you took my negotiator out of the country, right? You wouldn’t take advantage of me knowing my weakness for dimples, would you?” Ivan’s smile could be heard through the phone.

  “Of course not. Tell you what. I’m going to need you to come to the coast and teach my friend how to use technology. Cell phones, Internet, computers. If you could be here by tomorrow morning, that would be fantastic. Can you do that for me? I swear I have dimples showing right now.”

  Ivan laughed. “Even for you, tomorrow morning is a little too soon.
Can it be tomorrow afternoon? I need to meet with a couple of people before I leave. How long will you need me?”

  Bethany Anne looked at Stephen and considered what he told her last night. “Uh, plan on a couple of months, possibly. He is not so up to date.”

  “Is he educated? This isn’t for a female? I could get there even sooner for a female. Well, maybe not. If you need me for that long, I’m going to need to talk with another friend and let my dad know I’m going to be gone.”

  “What about your Mom?”

  “She still isn’t talking to us. I think now she is embarrassed and her pride isn’t allowing her to say ‘I’m sorry’.”