“What? Why? Is this about last night or about the war?” asked Mandy. She looked at Cain and Oscar with suspicion as if she’d just noticed them standing there.
“Both. You’re going to have to trust me, Mandy. I’m leaving right now and I want you to come with me. We’re going somewhere safe.” Her hands were still on Mandy’s shoulders and she started pushing her back into the apartment.
Mandy looked over Jess’s shoulder at Cain, distrust in her eyes. She allowed Jess to push her back and then took her friend’s hand and led her into the kitchen, out of hearing distance from Cain and Oscar. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked, her voice lowered. “Who’s the old guy? He looks like an old bear.”
Had she not been feeling so anxious to get Mandy moving and get as far away from the city as quickly as they could, Jess would have laughed out loud. Mandy had no idea how close to the truth she was. “That’s Oscar, he’s Cain’s friend. And yes, I’m okay. Please, Mandy, you’ll have to trust me. I don’t have time to explain to you right now. I need you to gather your things together and come with us.”
“Okay, I trust you. Give me two minutes. How long will we be going for?”
“Until the world isn’t fucking crazy anymore,” said Jess.
“I’d better pack extra underwear then,” replied Mandy. She left the kitchen and headed to her bedroom.
While Mandy packed her personal belongings, Jess and Oscar went through her kitchen and packed what supplies they could find. Cain paced between the door to Mandy’s apartment, checking through the peephole, and the window overlooking the parking lot. When they’d finished at Mandy’s place, the four of them filed down the hallway to Jess’s apartment and repeated the process. Once they were both packed and ready, they headed back downstairs to the SUV.
Cain jumped into the driver’s seat and put the key in the ignition. “That took eight minutes. Jaden should be back any minute.”
The four of them sat in silence, looking out the windows, and waited. Jess’s heart continued to beat at the furious pace it had started when they’d pulled into the parking lot.
…
While the others went inside, Jaden climbed the fire escape. The powerful and sinister vampire presence he was sensing was at the top of the building. Stepping up onto the roof, Jaden could see a tall, dark figure standing at the far side, looking out at the city over the edge of the building. He walked over to it. As he drew closer, the dark figure turned and watched Jaden walk towards him.
“Jaden Butler. It’s been a long time,” said Nickoli. His voice was deep and he spoke with an Eastern European accent. There was a breeze blowing across the rooftop, but his dark gray hair remained undisturbed. Cut short and slicked down, every strand was perfectly in place. He wore a suit with a dark shirt and tie and his shoes were expensive leather. Nickoli presented the image of a perfect, cultured gentleman, but Jaden knew he was a perfectly lethal killing machine.
“Not since Vietnam,” replied Jaden. He was prepared for Nickoli to launch an attack at any moment and watched him with a careful eye.
“Ah, I wasn’t sure if that was you or not. Vietnam, now that was a war. Jungles full of vampires, hunting and killing for both sides. It still amuses me that the CIA used vampires. North Korea, sure they have been under control of vampires for years, but the CIA was different. You killed a lot of vampires during that war,” said Nickoli.
“As did you, but I never did figure out which side you were fighting for.”
“I played both sides of the fence. I really didn’t care who won; I was just there for the sport. It was an exciting time. Of course it almost was a very short war for you and I. If it hadn’t been for that grenade going off, one of us wouldn’t be standing here right now.”
Jaden thought back to the first time he’d met Nickoli. He’d been working for the CIA, helping them stop a group of North Vietnamese vampires who were terrorizing the villages on the outskirt of the jungle. Jaden had been sent into the village to hunt the vampires down. When he found them, they were stationed with a troop of human soldiers from the north. Jaden had snuck past the soldiers and was getting ready to sneak into the vampire’s tent to kill them when a dark form walked out, nearly running into Jaden. The dark form saw Jaden and attacked. They fought inside of the soldiers’ camp for several minutes, neither of them able gain an advantage. Their violent activity drew the attention of another soldier and he fired at them. Jaden and the stranger ignored the bullets hitting them. Both knew they needed to finish the other off, and then escape into the jungle. But the soldier must have realized that both of the fighters in the dark did not belong there, or simply did not care. The soldier threw a grenade and it landed between them. Jaden pushed the stranger away and jumped clear. He made it to the edge of the nearby jungle and behind a tree before the grenade exploded and sent shrapnel everywhere. During the flash from the explosion, Jaden saw the strange vampire he had been fighting inside the soldiers’ camp. The vampire grinned at him and disappeared into the jungle as the Vietnamese soldiers started firing at them both. Jaden followed the other vampire’s lead and fled the soldier’s camp.
Jaden had never forgotten the face of the vampire he had faced in the jungle that dark night. He had never known for sure who the vampire was until now. “And now you do the council’s bidding.”
“Spare me the speech,” said Nickoli. “I don’t care at all about Vladimir’s little world domination plan. I enjoy hunting. Killing humans gets boring. The council keeps things interesting for me, sending me on these little missions to clean up their messes.”
“Are you sure you want to do this? You could leave now, tell the council you were too late and ended up following a false trail while we left town.”
“No, I don’t think so. You were lucky the first time. That grenade saved you, but this time nothing can. It’s just you and me.”
“I’m not the same vampire you fought in the jungle, perhaps it would be best if you left,” said Jaden. He didn’t expect Nickoli to take him up on the offer, but Jaden wanted to continue the conversation a little longer, giving Cain more time to get the girl and get back out of the building. If he died fighting Nickoli, it would not be in vain.
“I’m older than you, and stronger. I have been killing vampires for centuries. What makes you think you can defeat me?” asked Nickoli. His agitation was growing by the second. Jaden Butler was too calm, he should be afraid. “When I am done with you, I am going to kill your brother, and then once this little war of Vladimir’s is over, I am going to take your girlfriend Serena and make her my little sex toy. I’ll use and abuse her until she begs me to kill her.”
Jaden knew Nickoli was baiting him, trying to make him angry and not think straight. But Nickoli was making fatal mistake. He assumed that an angry Jaden would be more prone to making mistakes, and that Jaden’s anger would work against him. However, Jaden was not normal in that regard. His anger didn’t make him foolish, it just increased his blood flow, heightened his senses, and narrowed his focus. Jaden had learned at a young age that he was volatile and had to learn to control his temper. Years of training with human soldiers, along with the experiences of war, had allowed him to turn that volatility into a weapon. Jaden was much more dangerous when he was angry, as he was now.
Sensing Jaden’s anger, Nickoli moved to attack. He was sure the younger vampire would do what every other vampire had done when put in the same situation. They would try matching Nickoli strength on strength, matching his attack with a counterattack. When they did, Nickoli would use his superior speed and avoid the attack, leaving his opponent off-balance and moving forward while Nickoli would turn and end up behind his enemy, leaving the back of his opponent's neck open for a bite. Often this one move would be all he needed to defeat an opponent. Vampires, like humans, were predictable creatures. Get them angry and even the strongest opponent would become easy prey. Anger and fear were Nickoli’s favorite weapons.
When Nickoli moved to attack, Jaden did as
he’d expected and lunged forward. Nickoli smiled when he saw Jaden coming towards him and started to sidestep as he had done a thousand times before. He moved out of the way, letting Jaden’s momentum carry him too far forward. Once Jaden was past him, Nickoli turned so that he was behind him. He moved to grab Jaden by the shoulders but then Jaden unexpectedly ducked and spun around. Nickoli’s outstretched arms went right through the air where he had expected to find Jaden. Now Nickoli was the one off-balance, leaning forward and awkwardly grabbing at empty space.
Jaden planted his forward foot and pivoted hard. As he turned, he bent his knees and crouched down. Pulling his knife from his belt, Jaden exploded up off his back foot. As Nickoli tried to pull back his outreached arms, Jaden stabbed his knife into Nickoli’s heart, pulled it out, and plunged it in again. He pushed the knife to the hilt and stepped away.
Nickoli gasped in pain, unable to believe what had just happened. He didn’t understand why Jaden had been able to move that way. Jaden had not fought him like a vampire would; he had fought like a human. As he coughed up blood, the irony didn’t escape him. Nickoli had spent so many decades hunting vampires that he hadn’t paid attention to the evolution of human fighting. He pulled the knife from his chest. “You brought a knife to a vamp fight?”
Jaden watched Nickoli warily. The old vampire was dying, but he was still dangerous. “I also have a gun, but I didn’t want to risk missing a shot.”
Nickoli examined the knife in his hand, covered in his own blood. “A gun would not have helped you. Bullets are only an annoyance, you know that.”
“Wooden bullets,” said Jaden.
“Oak?” asked Nickoli. Wooden stakes were the most famous method of killing vampires, but the reality was that not all wood affected vampires the same. Oak stakes caused a reaction with the vampire DNA. Any wooden stake with a direct blow to the heart would kill a vampire, but with an oak stake, even a non-critical hit would slow and weaken the vampire. Oak bullets would be nasty. “I’m glad you chose the knife then.” Nickoli made one last attempt to attack Jaden, lunging forward while raising Jaden’s knife to stab down towards Jaden’s heart.
Jaden used the same maneuver Nickoli had tried earlier and moved sideways to allow Nickoli to brush past him. He extended his claws and swiped them across the back of Nickoli’s neck, slicing it wide open.
Nickoli fell to his knees. He looked up at the stars, barely distinguishable under the bright city lights. He’d never liked the city. It was a shame to be dying here instead of some jungle. He’d always liked the jungle. Nickoli collapsed to the rooftop.
Jaden’s chest pounded. On the outside, he seemed calm, but the rage and anger still flowed within. Nickoli had threatened Cain and Serena. It was all Jaden could do to not take his time and torture the vampire. Nickoli had preyed on so many, it would have felt good to give him a taste of his own medicine, but Cain and the others would be almost back to the SUV, it was time to go. Nickoli wasn’t the only vampire the council would send. They needed to get moving. Jaden turned and went back down to meet the others.
45
ERICA
“What are Preppers?” asked Dante. He had divided his time the last few days between walking the property, playing with Moira, and learning more about the modern world. Preppers had come up on several of the websites he, under Moira’s tutelage, had been looking at.
The question surprised Erica. “Survivalists, they believe in always being prepared in case of a natural disaster or an event that causes social disruption. They store months’ worth of food, water, and survival gear. Why do you ask?”
“I’ve been spending more time on the Internet. Moira likes to help me learn new things. Someone in her family was a prepper, or something akin to one. She showed me a website about survivalists. I was thinking the same principle might apply to what you are intending to do here.”
“She sure has taken to you,” said Erica. “It’s cute how she follows you around, and I’m glad she feels safe around you. She isn’t the only one.”
“Thank you, I haven’t been around children in … well a very long time, but she’s a special child. I enjoy her company.”
Erica thought about survivalists. Her father, a military man, had been somewhat of a survivalist. He always kept months of rations in their house, and large barrels of water. As a child she had asked him about his strange compulsion to have provisions that no one else’s parents stored in their basements and garages, at least not to any degree like her father stored them. He had simply said, “Better to have extra for when the shit storm hits.” She hadn’t known what a shit storm was at the time, but it made sense. Dante was right. Sanctuary should be self-sufficient and well stocked, just like a prepper would do. Her plans would have to change.
“Dante, you are brilliant, I could kiss you!” said Erica excitedly. The ideas were starting to pop into her brain now, things like solar power, water treatment, dry food storages, were all things they could do to be prepared, in case of an emergency. Some of her plans were already leading that way. She had already planned to grow their own food and depending on how many shifters came to them, they would need large number of supplies on hand.
Dante smiled. Erica’s enthusiasm about the idea was rewarding. It was nice to be able to contribute. Sometimes he felt lost surrounded by modern technology. His grasp of technology was rapidly improving, and funny enough, Moira was the one who made it simple for him. The young girl still wouldn’t talk around others, but had broken out of her shell trying to explain how to navigate webpages to Dante. Now she gladly explained things to Dante, and she had a knack for doing it in a way that he could understand. Learning from a child was helping Dante immensely.
Erica jumped on the computer. Finding solar panels would be easy, but some of the other ideas Dante had inspired would be harder to find. And she would need to research survivalists and preppers more. She didn’t want to think about worse case scenarios, but with all the crazy things happening on the news lately, war in the Middle East, China, and Russia ratcheting up propaganda against each other, she decided to err on the side of caution. Her father no longer seemed like one of those crazies, as she heard them called, the religious preppers for end times called zealots and paranoid fools. Dad, your daughter is now one of the crazies, the thought came with a sympathetic smile for her father.
…
Erica and Dante fell into a routine as the days passed. Each morning when Erica woke, Dante would come down from his stone perch and join her in the kitchen for coffee. They would discuss the itinerary for the day, while waiting for the others to awaken. Erica, an early riser, was usually an hour ahead of the rest of the household. She cherished that time in the mornings when she had Dante all to herself. When Moira woke, she would come down to the kitchen and sit with Dante and have her breakfast, two slices of whole wheat toast smothered in peanut butter and jam.
Dante would tease Moira every morning offering to make her a different breakfast, but each morning she would shake her head, no matter how interesting the breakfast he offered, until he asked if she would like toast. Then she would smile and nod. Jeffery made sure to stock up on the now essential peanut butter and jam. The type of fruit didn’t seem to matter, just as long as she had toast with peanut butter and jam.
After breakfast, Erica would meet with Jeffery and Carrie and discuss their agenda for the day. Carrie and Jeffery were working on renovating the old farm house while Jeffery waited for the new farm equipment to show up. The farm house only needed small repairs, a fresh coat of paint and new furniture to bring it up to date, but Erica had added new features such as security systems and intercoms that connected with the main mansion along with upgrades such as solar panels and a new water system.
Since Erica had started researching self-sufficient farms and Dante had brought up the idea of disaster preparation, she had realized that having their own redundant power supply was a must. Finding a solar installer in the city was not difficult. The state had recently
increased the tax rebate for solar producers and created a small influx of solar distributers. The company had already been out and installed the batteries and roof mounts for both the mansion and the farm house. Tomorrow they would return and install the solar panels, top of the line panels with a twenty-year guarantee. Erica felt confident that between the panels and the new biodiesel backup generators that they would be okay no matter what happened. If the vampires tried a longer assault against them, they would have enough food, water, and power to withstand the attacks.
The two new tractors that were arriving that week were contained biodiesel engines. Erica didn’t think they would ever need to make their own fuel as a necessity, but being able to use the waste products from crop production for fuel seemed like a great idea.
When Erica was done meeting with everyone, she would head back to the library and start checking the Internet. First, she would read more prepper websites, trying to find ideas that she had missed before and then she would check the world news. The vampires were her primary concern and she scoured the news for strange attacks and murders, but getting those stories was becoming harder and harder. The news was focused on war. Not that war was anything new, but it seemed that wars were breaking out everywhere on a scale not seen since World War II. Simple murder and abductions were forgotten, no longer worthy of news. Even America seemed to be getting pulled into the wars, with Russian jets frequently violating American airspace and nuclear subs being chased into international waters. Russia accused America of starting the tensions, saying that America was helping China, who was also in a pissing contest with Russia. The global situation was very scary, something no doubt the vampires were using to their advantage, while they hunted down shifters with loyalty to humans.
Before bed each night, Erica and Dante would sit on her balcony and discuss everything she had learned that day. They had purchased several more laptops since Moira and Carrie had arrived and Dante was still getting lessons from Moira, even though her lessons mostly involved nods and shakes of her fist when he teased her, she was still able to help Dante when he got confused by technology. It was amazing how fast kids absorbed technology. Dante liked to learn about modern history and was rapidly learning the history behind many of the world crises. He now knew more about the Cuba missile crisis and the breakup of the Soviet Union than he ever wanted to know.
The Shadows Awaken (Guardians of the Night Book 1) Page 21
