by Devin Hanson
“Hell.”
“Yes. Lilith had one last trick up her sleeve. She still carried Adam’s seed within her, and gave birth to seven daughters. As they were the daughters of Adam, Lilith’s curse did not affect them. Her daughters are the seven Succubus, the first Nephilim, half human and half angel. One of them for each of the mortal sins. My mother, Mahlat, is the Succubus of Lust.”
“Wow. That puts you as Adam’s granddaughter. So, you’re like… royalty?”
I snorted. “Hardly. But this is not about me. God, furious over having his creations tempted into mortal sin by Lilith’s daughters, condemned humans who abandoned his precepts to Hell. Humans who went to Hell were tormented out of spite. Lucifer was pissed that he was not allowed access to Earth or Heaven, and yet his own plane was being infested with human souls.”
“Huh. That’s a different picture of Revelations, I guess.”
“Remember, humans were in Hell for committing sin. The humans that held on to their guilt remained, to be tortured until the end of time. However, there were those who were sent to Hell who reveled in their sin. Over the years, they became something less than human, or something more, depending on who you asked.”
“Vampires?”
“Not yet. They were the first demons. Eventually, Cain killed his brother, and—”
“Wait. Cain was the first son of Adam. The timelines don’t add up.”
“This is centuries later. There are thousands of humans by this point. Besides, this is the bible we’re talking about. It’s not exactly a reliable historical record. Regardless, Cain kills Abel and God curses Cain to gain no sustenance from food and to be immortal and to ‘hide from his presence’. Loosely, this translates into not being able to stand in the sunlight.”
“Vampires!”
“Exactly. Cain is forced to gain his strength from the life of his fellow man and hide in perpetual darkness for all eternity.”
“Kind of a rough deal.”
“Cain thought so. At first, he was repentant, but as the ages passed, he grew to revel in his forced sin. If God saw fit to force him to consume the blood of man to sustain himself, then it must be God’s will for him to commit mayhem and murder.”
“I see a pattern.”
“Yes. Intentionally or not, God had created a demon on Earth.”
“So, vampires are demons?”
I waggled a hand. “Some say so. Others hold that demons are in hell, and vampires are just vampires.”
“Seems academic.”
“I think so. There’s more.”
“Isn’t there always?”
“Cain couldn’t have children. Every attempt resulted in a stillbirth. Finally, Cain called upon Lucifer, who sent Lilith to possess a human woman’s body.”
“Demons can’t leave hell, though?”
“That’s not exactly correct, and Lilith is not a demon, remember. So long as she hid from the sight of God, she could temporarily reside within the body of a host. It was the first possession. In this fashion, Lilith was able to provide Cain with the first of his children, Enoch. The child was born alive, but without a soul, and Lucifer sent a demon to Earth to reside within the body.”
“Wait, your mother was… what was her name?”
“Mahlat. Or rather, she was possessing my mother when I was born.”
“Yeah, her. How come you were born with a soul?”
I opened my mouth to respond, then shut it again. I hadn’t thought of that. There were some grey areas when it came to identifying Lilith’s children. Were they demons or angels, or something else entirely? I shook my head. “I don’t know. The way my mother explained it, I had inherited half of my father’s soul and half of hers. Maybe Mahlat didn’t finish possessing my mother’s body until after she was already pregnant? I’m just guessing, I…”
“It’s okay.” Sam shifted, uncomfortable. “That’s not important right now. Let’s go back to vampires. So, the devil sends up a demon. How does that work?”
“Um.” I paused, trying to find the trail of my thoughts again. Sam’s question had opened a new mystery for me. Would I ever find out the truth of who I was? “Okay. Demons. So, it’s tricky. If we knew all the answers, vampires would be a lot easier to defeat, let me tell you. As far as anyone knows, a human soul needs a body to stay on Earth. Every human born is supposed to have a soul, so there’s no way for a demon to return from Hell. A descendant of Cain, though, has no soul, and thus acts as a loophole that a demon can exploit.”
“Okay, so wait. Are vampires demons or not?”
“Yes and no. Demons are spirits. Corrupt souls. Vampires are born of man and have a demon residing within them. Like their patriarch, the children of Cain carry God’s curse. They cannot stand in the sunlight and must gain their sustenance from man.”
“They sound like a real fun bunch. So, none of the vampire myths are true? Crosses don’t work?”
“Not really. They never did. Remember, the cross wasn’t used as a holy icon until after the death of Jesus. Vampires cannot stand the scrutiny of God. It was once enough to call upon God to bear witness to a vampire, and that would be that. Poof, pillar of salt. When Jesus of Nazareth was born, God either brought himself to the mortal plane or left to go elsewhere. Then, when Jesus was nailed to a cross, the presence of the Almighty on Earth died with him. For a while, vampires feared the cross, as they thought a human presenting it might draw the attention of God, and so they fled from it.”
“But with God gone…”
“It took a while, but vampires figured out God wasn’t coming back. A priest of particularly strong faith might make a vampire flee, as they are still fearful of His return, but those are few and far between now. The faith isn’t what it once was.”
“I suppose garlic isn’t much of a deterrent either.”
“Only as much as it is considered to be the fruit of the earth. If they get it on them, it causes severe irritation, like hives. If you inject it, it causes short-term anaphylactic shock. It’s never fatal, though, and from what I understand, it only lasts for a few seconds at most. Conflicting curses, see. Forbidden the fruits of the earth, but also immortal.”
“Can they be killed?”
“Sure. Immortal, but not undying. They still have human bodies.” I pursed my lips thoughtfully. “I’m not sure about Cain himself, though. He might be unkillable.”
“What about silver?”
“Wrong myth. Silver is for werewolves.”
“There are werewolves too?”
“Can we focus, please?”
Sam scratched his head. “Fine. That’s a lot to take in. How come nobody has ever seen a vampire?”
“There aren’t that many, for once thing. A bite doesn’t turn a human into a vampire. All it does is open the person up to being possessed by a demon, if they’re susceptible to that in the first place. But since the original soul is still present, the fight over the body usually ends in fatality. For a vampire to reproduce, a victim of its bite must fully succumb to the possession, and then live long enough to carry a child to term. And vampires stay in Europe and to the east. There’s a pact that keeps them there, and out of America.”
“Which brings us back around to our ghoul problem.”
“Yeah. The ghoul is a slave to the vampires, and is trying to weaken Los Angeles to make it possible for vampires to invade without opposition.”
“So.” Sam spread his arms at the arrayed pages in their plastic sleeves. “This is actually kind of important.” He threw a sideways look at me. “Assuming any of what you said is actually true.”
I glared at him and he grinned back.
“Jerk.”
“Hey, I didn’t say I didn’t believe you. But that could simply mean there are two of us who are wrong now instead of just you.”
I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. If you don’t believe me, it’s no skin off my back. Probably better in the long run. But either way, yes. These papers are actually kind of important.”
“Then we better get to work.”
Chapter Twelve
It took until nearly eleven, but we got every journal entry deciphered as best we could and matched them to the news articles where possible. Out of the nearly four hundred entries, we managed to make sense out of just over two dozen of them and find the articles that they most likely referred to.
It was mind-numbing labor, and made me glad I wasn’t a cop. There were probably another thirty or so entries that we had narrowed down the date to the first decimal, but searching through ten days’ worth of articles was more time consuming than either of us were willing to commit to.
Sam entered the last of the entries into the database we were building and closed out of the system. “Well, that’s done with.”
I had pretty miserable cell reception in the basement of the precinct building, but I managed to pull up a traffic map to the Sizzler. If we left now, we’d arrive a few minutes before noon. “You want to grab lunch?”
“Already? I dunno, Alex. I’m still pretty stuffed from breakfast.”
“Oh. Well, consider this an opportunity to learn something, then.”
He brightened up at that. “Where are we going?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. But it’s about thirty minutes away, so we should get going now.”
“Does this have anything to do with the ghoul?”
“I’m not sure. But it’s a possible information source, and right now we need all of those we can get.”
“Can’t argue with that. Let me grab my jacket.”
The Sizzler at Vermont and 4th had a fairly large parking lot, which was completely full. Sam went through the strip mall parking across the street with no luck. Finally, we drove down a block and grabbed one of the only remaining spots left in the Ralphs parking lot on the far side of the bowling alley.
“Is there some kind of convention going on?” Sam asked, puzzled. “Normally there shouldn’t be any problem finding parking.”
I shrugged. All I had to go on was Tovarrah’s cryptic statement that the Nephilim would be “holding court” at the Sizzler. “Maybe.”
We got out of the car and joined the foot traffic on the sidewalk. There seemed to be a lot of people heading in the same direction we were. And… how do I put this? They were almost all large. Not necessarily “Walmart at midnight” large, but it was few and far between to see anyone under two hundred pounds.
It hadn’t been obvious from the street when we had driven by, but once we crossed 4th and got close to the restaurant, I saw a pavilion had been set up in the shade, along with a few hundred chairs. It looked like a wedding reception, or maybe a concert. A sound system had been set up, and as we followed the growing crowd, I saw caterers pulling more folding chairs from a panel truck and expanding the seating area.
“Whatever this is, we’re at the right place,” I said.
“I thought we were getting lunch?”
“And you said you weren’t hungry. Stop complaining.” I had to stand on tip-toe to see over the broad shoulders of the people in front of me. A sign was being put up, and as it unfolded, I was able to read the lettering.
“Sizzler’s fifth annual shrimp taco eating contest,” Sam read aloud. “What are we doing here?”
“Meeting someone.”
Sam did a slow turn, taking in the growing crowd. They had started sitting, but even more people were coming. It would be standing-room only in the parking lot soon. “Let’s get closer, then. Somehow, I expect this will be something worth watching.”
We found a seat at the edge of an aisle, where I could lean out around the hefty frame of the woman in front of me and get a good look at the pavilion. A row of folding tables had been set out, with name placards placed every five feet.
“So, who are we looking for?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know. Only that he will be ‘holding court’ at Sizzler today.”
“Well, if this is a taco-eating contest, that sounds like he’ll be the winner.”
I hoped Sam was right. It was going to be impossible to find anyone in this crowd otherwise. Music started coming from the speakers and the last of the empty seats were taken. There were still nearly a hundred people standing in the back, with even more trailing into the parking lot.
An announcer came out onto the stage and started hyping the crowd up, giving the previous winners and going on a riff about competitive eating. I listened in fascination. I had no idea there even was such a thing. Apparently, this was the fifth anniversary of the taco eating contest at this Sizzler location. The tradition had been started ten years ago at some other Sizzler location and it had caught on like wildfire.
The contestants were called into the pavilion one at a time and introduced, giving a brief synopsis of their past accomplishments, height and weight, and other relevant information. As I expected, these men and women were enormous. The biggest was a massive, seven-foot-tall behemoth who must have weighed nearly four hundred pounds. He looked like a marid, if he wasn’t clearly over fifty-percent fat.
It was a startling contrast when a slender, short Asian guy walked on into position number five. A murmur went through the crowd when his name was announced. I looked around me as contestant number five took his position. The onlookers didn’t have the ridiculing looks I expected. They had wide eyes and excited looks on their faces.
I leaned over to Sam. “I think that’s our guy. Number five.”
“Him?” Sam scoffed. “Hell, I bet I could eat more than that guy. He must weigh what, a buck fifty? I bench more than that.”
“I dunno, Sam. Look around us. These guys are really into him. He’s like a celebrity.”
The next contestant introduced was a taller, but equally thin, with an enormous, bushy beard. The crowd didn’t react nearly as much to him, though there were a few cheers.
“Those two look so out of place,” Sam chuckled quietly. “Someone should tell them that this is a fat person’s challenge.”
That got Sam a few glares and I shushed him quickly. The last of the contestants were introduced and the doors to the Sizzler were thrown open. The smell of shrimp tacos wafted out over the crowd. I had to admit, they smelled pretty good. As a promotional action for Sizzler, it was pretty spot on. They knew their demographic.
Trays of tacos were brought out by uniformed waiters. They didn’t look too big. Little four-inch street tacos, with the ingredients heaped in the middle. They looked uniform enough. For a contest like this, the contents of each taco had probably been weighed out beforehand.
“How many do you think you could eat?” I asked Sam.
“Hmm. They smell pretty good. If I was hungry after working out, I bet I could put away a solid two dozen.”
I nodded, impressed. I had never been a big eater, even during my workout fads. I probably couldn’t eat a single tray of ten tacos by myself.
“Alright, ladies and gentlemen!” the announcer cried, “Give our contestants one last cheer! Eaters, you have five minutes to consume as many tacos as you can! Time begins… now!”
An airhorn sounded and the contestants dove into the tacos with animal ferocity. I watched, stunned and a little disgusted. The big guys on either side of the two skinny contestants grabbed up tacos and slammed them whole into their mouths. Two or three chews and the next taco was fed into their gnashing maws.
There was an iPad propped up in front of each contestant with a digital counter of how many tacos they each had eaten. After the first minute had gone by, most of the contestants had consumed their first tray and were starting in on their second. You could see the strain on their faces already. Even the seven-foot guy hadn’t made it through his second tray.
But it was starting to become clear who were the professionals and who were the gifted amateurs. There were three contestants who were in a dramatic lead. There was a woman, contestant eight, who had already finished her third tray of tacos. She was grabbing them up two at a time and chewing with a mechanical intensity as she
force-fed the tacos into her mouth. She had technique. Chew, chew, swallow, shove, repeat.
The skinny Asian, contestant five, was leading her by four tacos. He had a similar technique, but he just had a bigger mouth and was able to hold tacos in progressive stages of mastication. Right next to him, contestant six, with the beard, was matching him taco for taco.
Two minutes passed. All the big guys had given up hope of winning. They had hit twenty tacos, give or take a few, and had slowed down to carefully considered swallows. The tallest one had reached forty tacos then thrown up, an instant disqualification. The crowd cheered and booed in equal measure, and he took it with good humor, waving and laughing as he stepped away from his seat.
Three minutes. The woman was starting to slow down at fifty tacos. She kept shooting glances to the side at the two skinny guys, defeat growing in her eyes. She was a class above the rest, but no match for contestants five and six.
Four minutes. The woman tapped out at sixty tacos. I got the impression she could have kept eating, but had resigned herself to third place. The two skinny men had each reached eighty tacos. The Asian hadn’t slowed down yet, but you could see the pain he was going through. He kept squirming, bouncing up and down on his toes, and contorting his torso, trying to force the food through his digestive system. Next to him, the bearded man was making the same motions, but without the stress on his face.
Into the final minute, the crowd fell silent, watching in awe as contestants five and six entered the home stretch. One of the big guys at the end of the table threw up, but nobody even noticed. Only the announcer was speaking, chanting encouragement into the mic, extolling them to greater heights.
Ninety tacos. The Asian gagged but didn’t throw up. His next taco was only a single one, and he ate it painfully, chewing and sweating as he struggled to keep from throwing up. Next to him, contestant six kept mechanically eating, two tacos at a time, with a pause every fourth taco to take a swig of water.
The announcer called off the last ten seconds and the crowd joined in on the countdown. The buzzer sounded again and the crowd burst into cheers.
