The Dark Messenger

by Milo Spires

  ‘Look!’ Raffious shouted to him. ‘Look where we are, and look who I have as my prisoner!’

  Longinus slowly and reluctantly turned his head to look at him. Raffious had his arm up, and was pointing across to his left. Turning his head again extremely slow and wiping sick from his mouth, his eyes tracked across to where the old man was pointing.

  There, sitting in the center of a small raft, was Rex! It was floating gently some fifty feet out in what looked like to be some sort of huge reservoir. The raft was not moving in any direction, like it was anchored to something below it.

  Rex saw him and snarled, ‘What are you fucking doing here? Are you the traitor who helped get me caught by this fool?’

  Ignoring the old bastard for now, Longinus gazed around, wondering where he was. Had Raffious brought him to this place to prove he had caught Rex, and to let him know it was safe to go into his chamber now? Or was it simply that he has no friends and wanted to show off, to maybe let someone see just how clever he was at catching Rex. He really didn’t care though; he just wanted his time with Raffious to soon be over.

  Meeting Rex had definitely not been one of the high points in his life either. The coven leader was the most evil being that he had ever laid his eyes on. He could honestly say without hesitation that he actually hated him. He knew though, that he himself had done many bad things in the past too, such as ripping apart those four guys in Brighton who had tried to save his new slave when he had turned her by mistake. He had only been defending himself, though. He was not evil like Rex, he told himself. Inside he knew that all he wanted to do was just leave the killings behind, to go forwards as a calm relaxed vampire, who could enjoy the finer things in life. Being evil was starting to annoy him, and he desperately wanted to change.

  As more minutes passed, he finally found his mind beginning to clear. His energy was starting to come back to him, and the deep nausea feeling was subsiding. He pushed himself up with some effort and found he was able to stand.

  ‘You deserve this!’ Longinus shouted at Rex. ‘You didn’t think that killing almost everyone you met and laughing at those whom you tortured would one day result in yourself becoming a prisoner, and preparing for a slow death too?’ Longinus said before adding, ‘You call me a traitor, but why? There was no loyalty to be traitorous of. I only joined your coven to steal from you, you fool!’

  Rex stared for a long moment, unable to speak from disbelief. Then his lips moved slowly mumbling something before finally words that were legible came out. ‘Did you say ‘steal from me’?’

  Longinus glanced at Raffious for a second, hoping for his approval to tell Rex their plans. Raffious nodded his head at him so he continued: ‘We are going forwards in time to your coven. We are going to steal your piece of the Trucale vase and you cannot do anything about it.’

  ‘Ha Ha Ha Ha!’ Rex started laughing when he heard what was going to be stolen from him. The other two exchanged a look of disbelief—had Rex gone completely mad, or did he know some crucial bit of info that they didn’t?

  ‘If you think we can’t, you are far more stupid, you idiot, than I thought you were!’ Longinus shouted back at him and he prepared to spin the old crone a lie. ‘Your coven is in pieces! There’s no order there at all. Did you know that your vampires are fighting one another? Your rule is over, you disgusting, dirty evil, nasty old idiot.’ He wondered for a moment if he could think of any more negative comments to use. He was sure he could, only couldn’t be bothered wasting his breath on this fool.

  Raffious said to Rex, ‘This plan of mine took hundreds of years to catch you out, although it was actually rather quick for me, as I leapt around in time. It was such a brilliant plan too, and I wish I had come up with it before wasting time creating the werewolves—only if I hadn’t been involved with them, I would have never thought about it.

  ‘First, you killed the vampire who told you to keep ten werewolves from the war, and I hoped you would. You said he was a fool, but still you did keep them, and that was just what I wanted. It was actually the only reason that I sent him to you for the interview. Remember him saying that you would need them to use against the overpopulated humans in the future, to save the planet from dying at the end of Dec 2099?’

  Then after a pause to let it sink in to Rex’s thick skull, he said.

  ‘Many years later, you also killed the second vampire that I sent to you for an interview, just as I had also planned I might add. He told you where the silver sword was, in St. Paul’s Cathedral. I had buried it there, after the blacksmith who made it for me died under mysterious circumstances. I was sad about that too, so strange, he just keeled over without any legs as I was paying him. I promise I have no idea how his legs fell off either. Most disturbing that story but anyway.’

  Rex now had an expression of shock and horror passing across his evil face.

  ‘Yes, it was a fake. Just like the myth I created too. Anyway, you foolishly fell for that part of my plan too. I knew you would kill him but I didn’t care because I only sent him to you, so that he would tell you where it was.’

  ‘Anyway, the very next day your warriors arrived and took it, thinking they had actually found the magical silver sword. You must have seen it and been so happy, thinking it could kill my beasts. You really are more stupid than I thought you were. You must have had very stupid parents, is all I can say.’

  ‘I do admit that I was somewhat worried though, when I sent the third vampire to you. There was a slight concern growing within, that you might kill him too. That would have been unfortunate for me, as he was needed for so much more.’ Raffious then gave a little laugh as he glanced across at Longinus who was completely unaware that he had been the third vampire.’

  Raffious then held up a finger, seeming to remember something.

  ‘Oh yes, I almost forgot. I also had to pay a nun to sleep with a priest so that she would become pregnant with his child--a story that, when you heard about it, you would then think that you could blackmail the church over. You thought that, as the myth suggested, they would then lift the spell over the silver sword.’ He chuckled in his beard as he shot a glare of hatred at him.

  ‘You were so bloody stupid! You really thought they were the ones who placed a spell over it. There was no spell! The myth and sword were fake--I made them up!’ he said as he burst out laughing.

  Then after a moment to catch his breath, he continued, ‘Through your desperation for the spell to be lifted, you even left your own coven and came to the reservoir hoping to meet the priest. I knew at some point that you were suspicious of something being wrong though, because I could feel it. I suspect that you ignored your gut feelings because of your greed. All you cared about was that you had to have the spell lifted to release werewolves across the world, and nothing else in your twisted fucking mind, mattered. You probably even cancelled some torture events beforehand too, just so you didn’t miss the boat ride?’

  ‘How are your feet by the way after the acid splashed all over them? I do hope they really fucking hurt.’ He grinned.

  Rex was fuming but said nothing for a moment, so Raffious, still with a mountain of words desperately cueing up to be said, then rambled on again.

  ‘It’s absolutely funny that Lucifer created vampires and never gave any of you a brain. You really are quite dumb as a species, aren’t you?’

  Rex’s fury grew even more as he heard all of this. Suddenly he ripped back his hood, exposing his hideousness. Raffious swallowed as he saw his face, and fell silent. Longinus reacted too; he spun round and started throwing up again.

  Rex spat out, ‘I might be ugly, I might be stupid, and I might have been taken in by your plan, but you will suffer too. Did you not realize that Lucifer will burn you in his Hell for eternity because of this? You will suffer the most terrifying pain for going against him.’

  Pausing for a second he then said, ‘Oh and don’t expect salvation either--that fool God will not come to your aid. You are on your own, Raffious, or
Installis, or whatever your pathetic name is.’

  Then, feeling as if he was on a roll with the abuse himself, he said, ‘When you kill me, I will go back to Hell, and then because I have been evil, Lucifer will give me life again. I will be allowed to roam the planet again as a vampire. But will he do the same for you? No! You will have a boiling hot cell forever after I tell him about you.’

  Rex had a point and Raffious knew it, which was exactly why he needed that holy vase. Death alone couldn’t stop Rex or his kind. However, the blessed waters from the Trucal vase would make vampires cease to exist forever if it were poured into the first coven’s drinking water. They would all die throughout all realms of time and then couldn’t be reborn afterwards either.

  Rex suddenly realized what he had just said: if he killed himself stepping off the raft, he would instantly appear in front of Lucifer and be off the raft too.

  Walking to the edge of the raft, Raffious saw him though and figured out exactly what he was up too. Using his magic, he made a cage appear around him. Rex was trapped inside it, and there was no way for him to commit suicide.

  ‘Hope you like the new cage--wouldn’t want you to go killing yourself now, would we?’ Raffious chuckled.

  Rex screeched in frustration, furious with himself. I really must be stupid, I just told him my fucking plan. he thought to himself. Then he turned his hooded head and gazed across at Longinus. The vampire even though he was still mighty ill inside, was taken back by just how stupid Rex was too. Longinus stood there on the banks of the reservoir shaking his head in disbelief.

  Rex’s face suddenly contorted into an evil grin. He called over to Raffious, ‘So you are clever, are you? Well you weren’t when I slept with your woman before killing her, were you. Where was your cleverness then?’

  He laughed at Raffious’ agonized look. Then he arched his body back and launched black phlegm as hard as he could in the old boys direction. It fell short though and landed in the water.

  Longinus needed air. His body was again starting to feel strange inside. It was then he realized that obviously this was why vampires didn't time-travel forwards. He had only jumped back a few years at a time for Angus and Rex. He was far too scared to commit to longer, knowing that without jumping forwards, he would always have to wait in that time zone until time slowly returned him to his original time at its normal pace.

  ‘I am going for a walk, I feel quite ill,’ he said to Raffious as he started walking away rapidly, thinking he was going to throw up.

  Raffious burst out laughing. ‘Vampires are weak. Lucifer made weak creatures from those who should have rotted in hell for killing my woman,’ he said as he turned and then stared at Rex.

  Longinus overheard what Raffious had just said and began to wonder if he must have thought he wouldn’t have heard him. Otherwise he felt sure that he would never have said it.

  Or would he?

  So he thinks we are stupid, does he? Well, we will see about that, he thought. He obviously has a lot of hatred towards us vampires. He wondered then how he and Raffious were even working together.

  A deeply harrowing thought then crossed his mind as he remembered that soon they would have to jump forwards again, back to Rex’s coven. He really wasn’t ready inside at all for anymore time travel; he actually thought this time it might kill him. Now he was sure, very sure, that he had changed his mind about the time travel deal that Raffious had promised him. He didn’t want it if it made him feel this bad.

  It suddenly dawned on him that Raffious wasn’t to be trusted. Hearing his last comment about vampires, Longinus had a strong feeling, a preminition that Raffious was going to fuck him over on their deal. He now as he thought more into it, felt absolutely sure that he would kill him, just as soon as he got the other piece of the vase for him.

  Was he himself that third vampire maybe that was sent for the interview? He wondered about that, and then started thinking. If he was, there was no way Raffious would have known if Rex wouldn’t have just killed him. He’d heard what Raffious had said moments before, about the others he had sent for interviews having being killed.

  ‘That bastard!’ he thought, realizing that Raffious had tricked him from the very start, giving him his chant and saying that he would protect him. He only wanted one thing—that fucking vase!

  Thinking even more into it, he began to wonder: Why was the vase so important to him anyway? He had gone to so much trouble to get it. Longinus decided that he wanted to find out more about what he was up to before he did anything else for him.

  Maybe I should try to steal the vase off him somehow. Raffious can keep his time travel rubbish. Maybe the vase is much more powerful.

  Longinus knew that it dated back to Christ and would always be filled with magical healing water. But what could the old fool possibly want with it? Could he maybe know someone who was sick and needed help? Possibly someone who was badly injured, and that he wanted to end their suffering with it? Longinus then laughed to himself. How stupid to think Raffious wanted it for any of those reasons. The man was clearly a dark messenger now; he wouldn’t want to do good with it. So what was the reason?

  Then walking back over towards the old boy, he saw Rex holding the bars of his new cage and arguing his best with him.

  He looks so angry, and rightly so, trapped on that bloody old raft. I would be mad too if it were me. He did deserve it though, undisputedly. Longinus thought as a telepathic message surprised him as it was coming in.

  Then he realized who was sending it, it was Rex.

  ‘Do you know that Raffious just said to me why he wants the vase? Probably not, since you were busy spewing your guts up.’

  Wanting to ignore him and just leave this place, Longinus thought he would tell Raffious that he was feeling better inside now and was ready to go. He stopped himself though, realizing that he did want to know more about what Raffious’s plans were, and maybe this was the only chance he would ever truthfully get to find out too. He appreciated that if he asked the old boy himself that he would lie to him, so then who else would there be to ask?

  ‘What is his plan then?’

  ‘Raffious plans to wipe vampires off the face of the earth by traveling back to when we were created by Lucifer. Using the vase, he would then infect our waters so when we drink it, we would be healed of the vampirism curse, and all vampires in the future will never exist too--including you.’

  Not wishing to be tricked, as he was very tired of the double dealings that he had been involved in for some time now, Longinus asked, ‘Can you prove this?’ making sure he didn’t look across at Rex. Longinus had this new horrible feeling inside though, that what he had just been told was undeniably true. It had to be, now everything made perfect sense.

  ‘We are leaving! Come here!’ Raffious said, startling him.

  For a brief, deeply panicked moment, when Longinus had heard his voice, he thought that the old boy just heard their messages and could in fact read telepathic thoughts. Feeling quite on edge now as if he had just been caught with his fingers in the sweet jar, he knew that he had to finish the messaging quickly. If he didn’t, he would most likely get caught.

  Rex suddenly messaged him again.

  ‘I was the leader of the Roman cohort that crucified Christ. I led a legion, sixty-strong. I killed the whore that Raffious thought was his woman. She was paid and instructed by Satan through me to get close to Christ. When she threatened to tell everyone about the pact we had with the prince of darkness, he ordered us to kill her. I remember it well, I even burnt her eyes out with an extremely hot poker. She truly did die an agonizingly painful death. First kill for my dagger too.’ He grinned at the thought.

  ‘Then as our souls were drifting around the empty planes of time, Lucifer who was so pleased with us for killing God’s only son, then gave us life again. He made us into vampires to walk the earth, and never to die. It must have messed with Raffious’s brain that we were never severely punished for killing his woman. From hi
s obvious time-shifting skills, I guess that he was connected to Heaven at some time. However, I’m also pretty sure that Heaven would never have condoned his actions, so he must have run from them and is now in their eyes the dark messenger.’