Infinite Vampire (Book 1): Blood 4 Life

by M. Lorrox

  He looks up in surprise—first at Charlie’s face, and then he looks down to the knife in his hand.

  “We might be able to save her.”

  Everyone looks at Charlie like a herd of deer staring in the headlights of a semi.

  Eddy beams. Yes! Do it already!

  Mike asks what many of the others are also wondering, “What, are you going to cut her leg off? I think that only works in the movies.”

  Sadie glares at him. “Shut up.”

  Charlie turns toward the group. “Here’s the deal, alright. My blood might be able to stop the zombie virus.” He turns to look at Skip. “It’ll turn her into a vampire, like me, Sadie, and Eddy. She could live; she’ll just be…different. This could save her.”

  María trembles, and the .38 Special revolver in her hand shakes. “Excuse me? Did you say you’re vampires? Is that what you just said?”

  Charlie doesn’t turn to face her. Instead, he kneels down and studies Skip’s face. I’ve tried to tell you for so long, buddy, but it’s true. Please let me do this.

  Sadie steps between María and Charlie. “Yes, we’re called vampires, but we’re not monsters like in the stories and movies. We don’t kill people.”

  María takes minuscule steps backward, her late husband’s black boots barely lifting off the ground as she shimmies. Her hand holds his gun tight, and it shakes faster and faster in her grip. She starts chanting prayers to herself.

  Sadie holds her hands and arms out at her side, palms facing the group. “Look, you know us. We’re not monsters.” Sadie turns and points to June, then returns her gaze to the members of the group. “We might be able to save her life.” She drops her hands to her side. “Or do you want her to die?”

  June can’t move. What? Vampires? I don’t have to die?

  Skip looks at his friend and repeats what he had said. “This could save her.”

  Charlie nods. “If it works.”

  “If it doesn’t?”

  He doesn’t answer, only swallows.

  “What will it mean?”

  Charlie shakes his head. “Buddy, there’s really no time to explain it all. If we’re going to try, it has to happen now.”

  June bolts up, sitting as high as she can and faces Charlie. “Do it.”

  Charlie looks at Skip.

  “Do it.”

  Charlie brings the knife in front of him.

  David steps forward and shouts, “Wait! This is nuts!”

  Charlie drags the blade of the knife across his palm as he speaks over his shoulder. “Our blood makes us strong and helps us heal. If I mix my blood into hers, she might be able to fight off the zombie virus.”

  Roger sits down on the ground. Is that how they did those things?

  Tomas looks at Eddy. You…you never told me. Tomas looks away.

  Charlie looks at his hand; he cut deep into his palm, and the slice fills with dark-red blood. He looks at June. “I need to cut your palm, dear.”

  She holds out her hand in a flash.

  Skip’s breathing grows heavier.

  Charlie switches the knife into his cut hand, holding the handle tight between his fingertips. Blood trickles down his wrist. With his free hand, he grabs onto June’s wrist. He brings the blade up and drags it across her flesh in a flash. He drops the knife and presses his bloody palm to hers. Please, please work. Might be superstition, but… He leans in close and whispers the ritual phrase and mantra of the vampires into her ear. “Life in the blood—death in the blood.”

  She whispers back, “Thank you.”

  He doesn’t let her go; their blood drips from their clasped hands onto the ground. “June, if this works, you’re going to pass out. But don’t be afraid; we’ll take care of you. We all love you very much.” He releases her, stands, and takes a step back.

  June freezes and looks at her dad.

  Skip is afraid, but he trusts Charlie. “It’s going to be okay, June.”

  She looks back at Charlie and swallows hard. She involuntarily jolts her head to one side, then to the other. Muscle spasms start traveling through her body, like mini earthquakes traveling outward from an epicenter.

  The dumbstruck audience looks back and forth to one another while she shakes.

  Sadie notices their concern and raises her hands to her shoulders, facing her palms to the group. She pulses them forward as she speaks. “This is normal. Stay calm.”

  Mike and David whisper to each other. María holds Hermix’s arm tight as she murmurs a new set of prayers. Jess, Roger, and Eddy watch the scene intently. Tomas glares over to Craig.

  Craig looks down at the revolver in his hand. I killed my brother. Maybe they could have saved him, but…I killed him.

  June convulses some more and then passes out. Skip catches her, holds her up, and then he looks at Charlie.

  Charlie places his non-bloody hand on Skip’s shoulder. “Now we wait.” He pulls his hand back, bends down, and picks up the bloody knife from the ground. He stands and turns to face the group. He wipes the blood from the blade on his pants, and then closes the knife and clips it back on to his belt. He looks up at everyone. They all stare at him, motionless.

  He clears his throat and takes a step toward Sadie. “Sooo…cat’s out of the bag.”

  María, standing next to Sadie, raises the .38 and points it at Charlie. “Stay back!”

  Sadie slides a foot back and twists to face her. “Put that down. Stay calm.”

  María looks at Sadie, then back to Charlie. “No. I want some answers.”

  Mike raises his shotgun and racks the action. -chick-chick- “Me too.”

  Sadie clenches her fists. Buddy, you’re really not going to like how this turns out for you.

  David, without drawing too much attention, takes his left hand and places it under the barrel of his sawn-off—holding the gun with two hands now.

  Eddy tenses his legs and bends his knees ever so slightly, shifts his weight forward, and is ready to attack. He concentrates and breathes slowly.

  Tomas and Hermix look at each other. Craig and Roger inch their way back from the scene.

  Charlie lifts his palms up to the group as a sign of peace. One palm is facing Mike, and the other one faces María. “Hey now, everybody just relax, okay?”

  David notices Charlie’s hand. “The cut! It’s healing already!”

  Everyone in front of Charlie watches as the wound closes in on itself, leaving a fresh scar where the deep gash was.

  David changes his position. He raises and aims the shotgun from the elbow toward Charlie. “What the hell are you?”

  Charlie frowns. “Calm down. Don’t do anything dumb. I’m just like a regular person, just a little different.”

  Hermix shakes his head and mutters to his mom, “Es un demonio.”

  María musters her will and asks Charlie, “Are you a demon?”

  Charlie drops his hands and looks at her. “Seriously?”

  “Answer me!”

  Charlie looks at Sadie and sees her roll her eyes. He looks back at María and sighs. “No, I’m not a demon. That’s just insane; there’s no such thing.”

  María nods slowly. “Oh yes, there are, Charlie. There are… Prove it.”

  Charlie, in exasperation, tosses his hands up before letting them drop again.

  Everyone with a gun tenses and shivers.

  Sadie looks at Charlie. “Babe, don’t make any sudden movements.”

  María skillfully pulls back the hammer on the .38 Special revolver. -click- “Good idea.”

  Sadie grits her teeth, and Eddy squeezes his fists even tighter.

  Charlie is frustrated. He looks María in the eyes. “María, you’ve known me for years. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  Mike shouts out, “Are you dead?”

  Charlie closes his eyes and shakes his head. You mean, am I undead. You idiot. Charlie blinks at him a couple times before answering. “No, I’m very alive, and I want to stay that way, thank you.”

 
; Victoria wishes she still had her over and under sixteen-gauge. It still has one shell in it. She looks at Charlie. “Will a bullet kill you?”

  “We can die just like you. Please don’t shoot me to find out.”

  Hermix steps forward an inch. “Prove you’re not a demon!”

  Charlie wipes his head with his hand. “Fine. How?”

  María motions to the road with the gun. “¡Corre al coche y toma el rosario!”

  “¡Sí!” Hermix runs off toward the car.

  Victoria points at Sadie. “I still have questions.”

  She nods. “What are they?”

  Can you bring Joey back? Would he be a vampire or whatever then? Are you going to kill us now that we know your secret?

  Sadie raises her eyebrows at Victoria. “Go ahead, ask away.”

  The sound of the car door shutting reaches them in the field. Victoria motions up the hill. “I’ll wait for him to come back.”

  Charlie turns to face Skip. He has June leaned against him. “How are you doing there, buddy?”

  He looks up at Charlie. He opens his mouth and shakes his head. “Wonderful. You?”

  Charlie grimaces and turns back around to face the humans with the guns. Yeah. Me too.

  Hermix returns from the car without the baseball bat but with the rosary that hung from the rearview mirror. He reaches his hand out to give it to his mom.

  María glances at it, then looks at Charlie. “Toss it to him.”

  Hermix tosses it and holds his breath.

  Charlie catches it and holds it up. “What do you want me to do with it?”

  María swallows. “Press the cross into your palm.”

  Charlie nods. Ah, yes, the movies. He holds up his palm, dangles the rosary, and sets the cross on his hand. Nothing happens.

  “Press it in with your other hand.”

  Charlie takes a finger and presses the cross into his palm, to no effect. He turns his hand so he can display it to the group. The cross is pressed firmly against his freshest pink scar. “See! I’m not a demon!” -crack-

  He feels the cross break under his finger. He closes his eyes and groans. Oh, give me a break! “María, I think I pushed too hard on the cross… It broke.”

  She gasps.

  “I’m sorry. You said to press it in.”

  “That was my husband’s rosary!”

  Charlie holds the rosary out in his hand to Tomas, who looks furious, then to Hermix, who looks scared, then to María, who is just shaking her head. “Uh, will someone take this? I didn’t mean to break it.”

  “Oh, Charlie.” Sadie takes the rosary in her hand and looks at the cross. She smiles to María. “It’s a clean break; a little superglue will do the trick.”

  María is horrified. She looks at Sadie and turns the gun to her. “You stay back!”

  “María, wait.” Victoria takes a step forward, past Jess. “Sadie, can you bring Joe back?”

  David lowers his gun and looks at Sadie, awaiting her response.

  Sadie looks back and forth, deep into their pleading eyes. “It doesn’t work like that.”

  David barks, “Why not?”

  Sadie looks at the ground. “We’re just people. We can’t bring back the dead.”

  Victoria looks down to Joe.

  Skip feels June start to shake in his arms. “Hey, guys, something’s wrong!”

  Charlie and Sadie turn to face them. Eddy looks at June and is instantly scared.

  June starts to clamp her teeth down, over and over, and she’s twitching with greater and greater force, straining against Skip’s grip.

  “I’m not sure I can hold her! What’s happening?”

  Charlie takes a step toward them and kneels down. “Thank goodness. I think it’s working. This is part of the process.”

  Eddy exhales. He’s never seen anyone go through the change. He heard that it can be traumatic on the person, though, especially with what they call “the dreams.”

  She starts to utter noises—nonsense words and sounds.

  Mike firms his grip on his gun. “What did you do to her?”

  Sadie turns to face him. “Nothing. Her body is just changing. She’s going to be like this, then she’ll have some pain, then she’ll rest.”

  “Pain?”

  Cazzo. Nobody mentioned that. “Yes, she’ll have some pain, but I hear it’s a lot worse to have your brain melt from the fever that comes with turning into a zombie.”

  Mike narrows his eyes at her. Don’t mess with me, bitch. You…monster-bitch! He curls his lip. “So, tell me, do you drink blood?”

  Oh shit. Charlie stands and turns around.

  Sadie swallows hard. “The blood in our veins is deficient. We need nutrients from blood, but it doesn’t have to be human blood.”

  “Doesn’t have to be?”

  Sadie sighs and closes her eyes.

  Charlie steps forward. “Listen, any blood will keep us alive, so why would we drink other people’s blood?”

  Jess points at June and screams.

  They turn and look at her. Blood is running down from her nose and she’s thrashing her limbs. She groans and her mumbled vocalizations grow louder and louder.

  María cries out, “What language is that?”

  Charlie looks at the panicked woman. “She’s not saying anything; it’s just convulsions, like Tourette’s.”

  Sadie looks at Charlie. Nice.

  June quiets for a moment, then starts screaming in agony.

  Mike shouts, “What did you do to her?”

  Charlie and Sadie both scream back, “Nothing!”

  Eddy looks at June, feeling sorry for the pain she’s going through. But at least she’ll live.

  June’s screams turn into bloodcurdling howls and guttural roars.

  Skip is afraid now, and he lets go.

  Mike points his gun at June. “You’re making her a monster!”

  Charlie and Sadie look at each other. They’ve never heard of a changing that got this crazy. Did we wait too long? Is it like this because the vampirism is fighting the zombie infection? Is something going wrong?

  Charlie and Sadie’s lack of response does not help the situation.

  June quiets down and starts to slump over like a balloon leaking out the last of its air. There’s no movement until her body takes a breath in.

  Charlie and Sadie relax. Thank goodness.

  Suddenly, every muscle in June’s body convulses. She screams out wildly between clenched jaws, and her body jolts itself up in the air as her limbs straighten against the ground. Her eyes flash open—the entirety of them blood red with black centers sucking in the moonlight.

  Mike tenses his body. “Monster!”

  Sadie couldn’t have predicted what June just did, but she does know what Mike is about to do. He’s going to pull the trigger on a shotgun aimed at June. Sadie springs into action like lightning, leaping over Joe’s body—past Jess, Victoria, and David—and is in front of Mike in a flash. As the firing pin strikes the back of the shotgun shell, she grabs the barrel and lifts it up. She can feel the explosion traverse the barrel and vibrate into her arm as she angles the gun toward the air.

  The shotgun shell’s contents leave the barrel and rocket upward at an angle, safely overhead.

  Mike hasn’t realized yet that someone was moving the barrel of the gun.

  At the same time, Sadie uses her other hand with an open palm to strike him on the sternum. He flies backward off his feet and toward a squishy pile of zombie corpses.

  Sadie pauses—her body having moved almost as fast as her thoughts. In front of where Mike was standing only an instant ago, Sadie stands lunged forward, weight on her bent front leg, a shotgun suspended in the air by her grip on the barrel, the muzzle flash shooting upward, and her hair flying past the sides of her face from her forward momentum. Mike flies backward away from her extended arm and open palm.

  María is surprised when she sees Sadie blitz past. She reflexively pulls her trigger when she h
ears the shotgun fire, but she wasn’t aiming at anyone. Before the bullet tears into the steel body of Roger’s upside-down truck, however, another shot is fired.

  It was from David’s gun. When Mike had yelled out at June, alerting Sadie of his intended action, David had started to turn toward his friend. When Sadie flashed by and Mike fired, he was surprised, and he started to tighten his grip on the trigger. Maybe he squeezed just enough to trigger the first firing position of the old double-barrel sawn-off, or maybe he jolted and squeezed harder in shock when he heard the shot from María’s gun, but in either case, the result was the same. Within a single second, he was the third to pull a trigger.

  Sadie was past him by the time he fired, but he was aimed right at June.

  The double-aught buckshot leaves the sawn-off shotgun’s short barrel before Sadie’s hair extends its full length forward.

  When June seized and her eyes opened, Charlie got a good look at what he’s only heard of before. So that’s what “hungry eyes” look like… Creepy. Good thing Skip can’t see; that’d be rough on him.

  When a person is infected with vampirism, every cell in their body changes, starting with their blood. It’s painful, it’s traumatic, and it’s fast; it usually takes only a few hours for most of the changes to be made.

  There’s one thing that takes a new vampire a long time to get used to, though—besides the whole need for blood thing—and it might seem to be rather minor: their eyes change.

  Their new eye color can be a constant reminder of their new nature—that they’re not the same person anymore.

  Charlie has turned others before, but their convulsions were less violent, and they never opened their eyes during the change. I wonder if I opened mine…

  When June jolted up and Eddy looked at her, he had some very different thoughts race through his head. She’s hurting so bad! This is so unfair to her, all because of me. She’s going to hate me.

  Mike yelling “monster” and firing the gun got both Charlie’s and Eddy’s attentions. They turn from June to see Sadie taking Mike out, and María firing her revolver to the side, and then they see David’s gun firing. They realize where the gun is pointed: at June.

  NO!

  Charlie doesn’t pause an instant when he realizes that a shotgun has just been fired at her. He leaps to the side, into the path of the projectiles. The sawn-off’s shortened barrel allows the nine lead pellets—which are each almost as large as a nine-millimeter bullet—to spread out more than they would if fired from a normal barrel. At the range he’s firing from, the pellets will spread out to roughly the size of a beach ball. Each pellet will tear into Charlie’s skin, split and rip through his muscles, and shatter into flesh-pulverizing pieces of shrapnel if any of the buckshot pellets hit a bone.