by Skye Knizley
“That’s right, try to remember who you were. Tell me what you know,” Raven said.
The vampire opened its mouth and started to speak, only to begin choking and gagging on its own tongue. Raven let go and stepped away, but she was too slow. The vampire lunged and impaled itself on her blade, exploding instantly and covering her in a spray of blood and ash.
“It committed suicide,” Levac said.
Raven tried futilely to dust herself off. “No. The Master made it kill itself.”
Levac tried to help then wiped his hand on his coat in disgust. “I didn’t know a Master could do that.”
“I’ve never seen one who could do this. Influence it’s children, sure. Make one die? That’s something new and it takes a special kind of asshole. I’m liking this guy less and less.”
Raven sheathed her blades and used water from the small room’s bath cubicle to wash the ash and blood from her face. When she looked up, it was to see Church behind her in the mirror.
“I heard what you said about the Master. That wasn’t very nice.”
Raven spun, drawing her pistol as she moved. She could hear Levac fighting newdead in the hallway outside and opened herself up, letting him know she was okay and with him.
“Church. I knew sooner or later you would come crawling back out of the sewer. Where’s your Master? Still hiding from me?”
“The Master isn’t hiding from you, Ravenel. He is waiting, patiently,” Church said. “The best things come to those who wait, they say.”
“Whatever. As far as I can tell he’s cowering in a hole and sending his lackey to do his dirty work. Thanks for the scarabs, by the way. I flushed them down the toilet. You’re next.”
Church looked surprised. “You removed them? Oh, Ravenel you are full of surprises, aren’t you? You will make quite a bride once you are broken.”
“Haven’t you heard to be careful what you wish for?” Raven asked. “I’m more than your Master can handle or he’d be here himself. Why don’t the two of you find a nice comfy sewer to stay in so the rest of us can get some sleep?”
Church’s face darkened and she could see the bugs that made up his body moving beneath his skin. “Do not taunt the Master.”
“What’s wrong, bug boy? Can’t your Master take a little taunting? What can I expect from someone who sends a cockroach to do his dirty work. Pathetic.”
Church roared and charged. Raven squeezed the Automag’s trigger and once again the bullets passed through him, vanishing harmlessly into the wall.
Church wrapped one of his worm-like appendages around her throat and picked her off the ground like a doll.
“The Master has lived longer than any single creature on this Earth and he will outlive his next bride. It is an honor to be his,” he said in a voice that sounded like a bunch of angry bees.
He tossed Raven across the room. She hit the wall and bounced off, leaving a trail of blood from the wounds in her back. She rolled when she hit the floor and rose to one knee, again aiming her pistol.
“You were a man once,” she said. “You’re saying you’re honored to have become a collection of cockroaches held together by another man’s rotting skin? Doesn’t say much about your life before, bub.”
Church advanced, insects swarming beneath his skin. “The Master took me as a slave and raised me to be his familiar, his chosen one among men. Giving away my flesh was an easy price to pay for his love.”
“To each his own, I guess, but I think you’re an idiot. Before you take me to your leader can I ask you a question?”
Church stopped, puzzled. “You are surrendering? I’m disappointed, Ravenel. But you may ask.”
“Is it just me or is it cold in here?”
“What?”
Raven aimed not at Church but at the oxygen tank bolted to the wall behind him. She pulled the trigger and ducked behind the bed. As she expected Church’s body flowed out of the way and the bullet struck the side of the tank. Pressurized oxygen streamed out and ignited from the heat of the smoldering wall. Church turned to look at the noise behind him and Raven heard him scream just before the tank exploded and incinerated him. When she rose, coughing from behind the burning bed, all that was left of him were a few smoking cockroaches. She crushed them with her boot just to make sure and opened the door to find Levac pointing his Sig at her. He was covered from head to toe in black ash, but otherwise looked unharmed. More than a dozen piles of ash lay behind him.
“What happened?” they asked in unison.
“Church,” Raven said, jerking a thumb at his remains.
“Vamps,” Levac said.
They collapsed against the wall, exhausted and knowing it was still just the beginning.
RAVEN AND LEVAC CLIMBED THE stairs to the fifth floor, their weapons held in front of them as they moved, covering each other at the corners on the way up three wide flights of stairs. The top flight showed signs of battle, including a handful of bullet holes spread along the upper walls. The top three steps were slick with blood that dripped from a man-sized spot on the wall opposite the door.
Levac checked the door and motioned to Raven that it was safe. He jerked it open and she rolled through to land on one knee, her Automag glittering in the emergency lights.
This was the administration floor and was different from the first four in almost every way. A circular reception desk sat in the middle of the lobby flanked by chrome and leather chairs that had been scattered around the room like old toys.
Beyond the receptionist was a single long corridor that extended over the northern wing. On either side of the hallway was an oblong office filled with cubicles where billing and customer service representatives sat during daylight hours while five offices sat at the end of the hall, home to the hospital’s senior administrative staff.
Raven straightened and started toward the hallway but was stopped by a voice that sounded like nails on a chalkboard.
“Welcome, sister.”
The door behind her slammed shut and she heard Levac yell in surprise as the bolt was thrown.
“Yes, welcome, sister,” said a second voice.
Raven turned to see two figures standing in the shadows, one in the corner the other against the wall where she’d been hidden by the door. Both were, or at least had been female, but gone were most vestiges of sexual characteristics. They had only a small fringe of hair above bloated, bulbous skulls and pasty, skeletal bodies. Their eyes glowed red in the light and she could see their mouths were oddly elongated and full of fangs that would make any feral cat go home with its tail between its legs.
“Oh, look, it’s the vampire twins,” Raven said.
“We are your sisters,” the first one said. She sank to her knees and crawled forward, her legs moving like the joints had been reversed.
“The Master has chosen you,” the second one said. She licked her lips with a forked tongue as long as a snake and squatted, watching Raven with a hunger older than time.
The first sister reached up with clawed hands and tore through Raven’s jeans. “You will become his concubine and we will again be three.”
“Your father killed our sister. The Master was to kill him, but he is already gone. Drakulia has chosen you instead,” said the second.
Raven stepped away from the sister clawing at her legs and covered her with the Automag. “Did you just say Dracula? You know, Bela Lugosi, bad hair days, stupid accent? That Dracula?”
“Not Dracula,” the second one said. “Vlad was a weakling, he did nothing with his power and King cut his heart out. Drakulia, the first vampire, father of our line.”
“Right. Whatever. I have no intention of ending up bald and able to lick my own nipples, thank you.”
“You talk funny, sister,” the first said. “You will obey the Master.”
“I don’t even obey my own mother, what makes you think I’m going to obey someone who sleeps in mold?”
The sisters seemed confused. They both backed away and cocked their
heads as if they’d never seen a woman before.
“You mock the Master?” the first one asked.
“It’s nothing personal,” Raven said. “I mock everyone.”
She screeched, long and loud like some kind of carrion bird. A moment later the second sister joined in, their cries sharp enough to shatter glass. Raven dropped her pistol and covered her ears, trying to keep her eardrums from exploding. She fell to her knees before they stopped and they pounced in the silence that followed, forcing her to the floor.
“The Master will come,” the first said. “And you will see. You will not mock.”
“Where was he when I was fifteen?” Raven asked. “My mother would have paid good money for someone to come and shut me up.”
Raven struggled in their grip, surprised to find they were both as strong as she was. Two against one they were almost impossible to beat. The second straddled her, holding her down while the first rose and picked up her fallen pistol.
“This is the weapon your father used on dear sister,” she said.
“No kidding? Get this harpy off me and I’ll show you how it works,” Raven said.
The first sister took the Automag in her hands and Raven watched in surprise as her precious pistol was twisted like a pretzel and tossed aside.
“I’m going to kill you,” Raven said.
“I do not think so, sister. We are the things of nightmare and you have no weapon. The Master will come and we will be one, forever.”
Raven closed her eyes and gathered her strength. When she opened them her rage had built into a thing unto itself. The world was blue lit with tinges of red and she could see the slow, pathetic beat of the sisters’ hearts. She raised her knees and pushed the sister off of her then rose to her feet, blades drawn.
“I’m the thing that monsters have nightmares about. Welcome to a whole new level of hell.”
Raven attacked with fury, her blades singing through the air like extensions of her body. She spun and dodged and ignored attacks from the sisters, not caring that they tore bloody ribbons from her body. She was getting her own back. When it was all over, the two ancient vampires lay side by side, quivering in pain. Raven knelt and staked them both through the heart with her knives. Unlike most vampires, these burned from the inside out, a slow char that left them nothing but husks. When she pulled her blades free, their bodies collapsed into twin heaps of ash.
Raven knelt there in the stillness trying to catch her breath. After a moment she became aware of a noise, the heavy thud of someone walking. She turned her head to see a massive figure walking down the corridor. He was dressed in armor made of tarnished silver scales. Black hair hung over his shoulders and down his back and his face was hidden behind a silver death mask with glowing yellow eyes. In his hands he carried two swords each as long as Raven’s leg. When he saw her kneeling between the ashes of his concubines the creature swung his blades and trailed them inside the wall. The silver blades cut through electrical conduit and pipes as if they were butter.
“You must be Drakulia,” Raven said. “I don’t suppose it would do any good to tell you I’m Special Agent Raven Storm and you’re under arrest for murder, would it?”
Drakulia didn’t answer. He just kept walking, sparks and flame erupting behind him from the destroyed walls. He glanced back at the carnage then faced Raven and roared a challenge.
Raven shook her head. “Yeah, I didn’t think so.”
She rose and held her blades like an Escrima knife fighter, one in front of her point up, the other angled along her arm like a shield, of sorts. She wasn’t sure that the knife would be strong enough to keep Drakulia from cutting her arm off if she blocked his sword, but it was all she had.
Drakulia charged, his footfalls shaking the room. Raven cartwheeled out of the way and kicked, trying to use Drakulia’s momentum to send him into the wall. It was like kicking plate steel. He staggered, but didn’t fall and his backswing nearly took her head off. She rolled away and rose into a guard position. Drakulia spun, bringing both of his swords around in a blinding display of flickering steel. One blade sliced across Raven’s torso leaving a trail of blood, the second cut open her cheek and sent her dodging backwards out of range.
“You killed my women,” Drakulia growled. “Your father killed Aelfwine while I slept, you killed them while they offered you eternal life. You will die.”
“What they offered wasn’t life,” Raven said. “Come on, you saw them. Is your taste in women that bad?”
Drakulia swung and again Raven dodged. As the blade whistled over her head she rolled forward and rammed one of her knives into the gap at Drakulia’s knee. The blade broke off against the joint and he howled in pain. Raven sprang away before he could regain his footing and backed against the wall. Drakulia turned and she pushed off the wall to flip over his sword. Her knife connected with his mask and sent it spinning away into the gloom. When she landed and turned, it wasn’t to see the face of a man, but the face of some prehistoric demon. A pale white face of armored scales surrounded by tiny metallic protrusions of horn and a mouth that looked like it belonged on a squid with a serious gum disease.
“Ugh, what are you?”
“I am the oldest creature on Earth,” Drakulia replied. “You cannot comprehend what I am.”
Raven shrugged. “I know exactly what you are. Ugly all day. Now I know why the twin hags were all you could get.”
She stood and faced off against Drakulia again, knowing she wouldn’t last. She might have been able to take him if she was fed and not bleeding from fifty some odd wounds. Right now she was running on bravado and fumes.
Suddenly the door burst open and Levac charged through, his Sig Sauer spitting flame and silver that ricocheted off Drakulia’s armor and made him cover his face in surprise. In the confusion Raven leapt onto Drakulia’s back and sank her blade into the junction between his shoulder and neck. Warm blood spurted over her hand and Drakulia screamed in pain. She twisted her blade, seeking his heart, but felt something beneath his skin, some kind of bony ridge.
She didn’t have time to adjust her grip. Drakulia dropped one of his swords and punched her in the face, his claws raking across her delicate flesh and nearly removing her eye. She screamed in pain and let go to fall on her knees beside him, her hands held to her face.
“Die!” Drakulia said.
He kicked Raven and she tumbled backwards into the fire that had once been the administrator’s office.
MERCY HOSPITAL, FIFTH FLOOR
PRESENT DAY
RUPERT LEVAC WATCHED RAVEN TUMBLE backwards into the fire and part of him screamed in anguish and frustration. He’d seen Raven be beaten, bloodied and bruised, but he’d never seen her lose. She couldn’t be losing now.
But she was. He’d realized sometime in the last few months that he could feel her. It wasn’t like she was in his head or doing anything, he just knew she was out there and now that he was used to it he found the sensation comforting.
And now that feeling was gone. Raven was gone.
Levac ejected the spent magazine from his Sig Sauer and rammed another one home. He had sixteen rounds, he had to make them count.
“Rupert Levac, Chicago police,” he said. “You are under arrest for the murder of Special Agent Raven Storm and a bunch of other things I can’t think of right now. Lay down on the ground and put your hands on your head.”
Drakulia turned and looked at Levac with glowing yellow eyes.
“Your Mistress is dead, human thing. Beg for your life and I will take you as my own.”
“No, thank you,” Levac said. “I saw what your familiars turn into. Frankly, I would rather eat my own shoes.”
“Then you will join your Mistress in hell.”
“I never had a Mistress you son of a bitch, she was my partner. And I’m going to make you pay.”
Levac dodged Drakulia’s sword and fired at his exposed face. Three of the silver and white oak rounds punched through his face leaving smoking holes
in the pale white flesh. Drakulia pulled away and clutched at the charred wounds as if he was trying to dig out the slugs, but Levac wasn’t through. He followed, firing shot after shot. Ten millimeter bullets of justice punched through Drakulia’s neck and mouth and black blood flowed forth, drenching his armor.
Drakulia roared in pain and lashed out. His massive fist connected with the side of Levac’s head and he stumbled, falling on his side a few feet away. Drakulia loomed over him, his sword ready. Levac pushed away and raised his head, prepared to face death with his eyes open.
But what he saw wasn’t death. A figure was approaching from behind Drakulia. Raven Storm, her hair blowing in the wind of the raging fire. Injured, bloody and angry as the pits of hell. Levac watched her pick up Drakulia’s discarded sword and raise it like a batter preparing for a home run.
“Hey, you prehistoric bloodsucker. I’m not finished with you yet. Let me show you how we do things in my city.”
Drakulia turned in surprise.
“You!”
“Who were you expecting? Van Helsing? Come on, let’s dance.”
Drakulia attacked, a flurry of wild blows that Levac couldn’t believe Raven could block, but block she did, the muscles in her arms standing out like steel cables as she swung a sword as big as she was. Raven blocked Drakulia’s last attack, a blow that was aimed at her spine and ended up facing away from Drakulia. Steel was still ringing when she spun and kicked Drakulia in the chest. The impact dented his breastplate and made him fall back in astonishment.
Levac stood and backed away from the fight, letting Raven do her thing. From what he saw she was just getting started. Blow after blow was exchanged between Drakulia and Raven with each exchange ending with Drakulia falling back under the strength and fury of her attacks.
He could see what she was doing. She was working to drive Drakulia toward the picture window that overlooked the courtyard. It was a five story drop onto a wrought iron and silver modern art sculpture, guaranteed to send any prehistoric vampires screaming back to hell.
