by Philip Henry
“Where is it?” Lucinda whispered.
“Right here, little lady.” The three women spun and saw…Elvis? He was wearing a white jumpsuit decorated with rhinestones; white shoes and even had a silk scarf around his neck. His hair and sideburns were as black as Elvis’s had ever been but on closer inspection he looked nothing like The King. He took off his big square sunglasses and put them in his pocket. In his best attempt at a Tennessee accent he said, “I don’t remember ordering take-out, but you three will do just fine.”
“What is he?” Lucinda whispered.
“Well, I’ll tell you, red. You are looking at just about the finest Elvis Presley impersonator ever to walk this Earth. The King’s death hit me pretty bad and I went underground for a while, but now I’m up and ready to rock. Maybe you gals would like a verse or two of Love Me Tender before I go and kill y’all?”
Nicholl and Bradley took their stakes in hand. Nicholl stepped forward and raised her stake. “How about Heartbreak Hotel, instead?”
“That’s how it’s gonna be. OK, sweetheart, let’s dance.” Elvis charged at Nicholl, who stood waiting for him to close on her. In one swift movement she stepped to one side and swung the stake into his chest aimed directly at his heart. She timed it perfectly – a quick, forceful stab and then back. Elvis fell flat on the floor. He lay still for a moment and then got up again. “You’re gonna have to do better than that, little…”
A bolt from Bradley’s crossbow ploughed into Elvis’s chest. He looked down and smiled. He yanked the bolt from his chest and held it in front of his mouth like a microphone. “Thank you very much. I’ll be here ‘til the end of time. Please try the buffet.” He tossed the bolt aside. “What else you got, ladies?”
A second later, Nicholl was swinging her sword at Elvis. He ducked, dodged, leaned and jumped every time the blade got close. Nicholl swung with impossible speed and strength. She was starting to tire. Bradley positioned herself behind the fighting pair. Lucinda was slowly edging towards the door. Nicholl, exhausted, finally threw a lunge that was sloppy and Elvis grabbed her sword and flung it across the room. He grabbed Nicholl around the throat and lifted her off the ground. His grip was unbelievably strong. He was choking Nicholl with one hand. He moved her closer and looked at her. “You know, you’re pretty cute, honey. What’s say you and I go to Vegas and get a room?”
Bradley charged at him from behind and drove her stake into his back as hard as she could. It was easily deep enough to go through to his heart. He turned and punched her with his free hand. Bradley skidded across the floor and lay still. Elvis reached around, pulled the stake out and dropped it at his feet. “You girls just don’t get it. The King is going to live forever. Uh-huh-ha.” Nicholl’s face was red and she was struggling to breathe.
As Lucinda approached the door she suddenly felt cowardly. Considering what her plan was, she shouldn’t care about what happened here, but she did. She didn’t want to see Nicholl and Bradley get killed. Acne, cellulite, varicose veins: yes, but not killed. She felt the weight of the sword in her hands and started to walk toward Elvis and Nicholl. This was stupid. Bradley had been knocked out with a casual punch, what chance did she have? She had only had two hours training with a sword. She was ten feet away from them when she decided that a distraction would be more useful than a direct attack. She dropped her sword. She summed up all her courage and spoke: “You know Lisa-Marie married Michael Jackson?”
Elvis dropped Nicholl and spun round. He stared at Lucinda. “You mean that kid from The Jacksons?”
“Yep, he’s the guy she married,” Lucinda said, her voice wavering.
Elvis looked confused. “But he’s…a Negro.”
“Not any more. Anyway, that should be the least of your worries. You don’t know the half of it.”
Just then Nicholl’s blade came through Elvis’s chest. He turned and pushed her out of the way. “Just give me a minute, sweetheart, I want to hear this.”
No sooner had Nicholl hit the floor than she was back on her feet and charging at the faux King. She jumped up on his back and put her arm around his throat and held on tight. Then she jumped and kicked on the length of sword that was sticking out of his back. She thought she had missed his heart – though it would be a first – and was trying to jiggle it by jumping on it.
Elvis was trying to push her off but she was holding fast. “Stop that, it tickles.”
Nicholl was losing her temper now. “God damn it! What have I got to do; prop you up on a toilet before you’ll die?”
Elvis didn’t like that. “Hey! A little respect!” He turned his head to her.
Lucinda saw her chance. She knelt down and took the dagger from her ankle. She ran to the vampire and stabbed him in one eye and then the other. Elvis howled (off key). Blood erupted from his eye sockets. His hand shot out and swept quickly ‘til he found Lucinda. He grabbed her arm tightly and pulled her close. Nicholl climbed around to Elvis’s chest and kicked and jumped on the other end of the sword. Elvis head-butted Nicholl and she dropped on Lucinda. Elvis dropped to his knees and grabbed Nicholl’s throat again. As he kneeled over the two struggling women they noticed that his eyes were repairing themselves. Nicholl had never seen anything like it. All vampires regenerated, but none this quickly. In a matter of seconds he would have 20/20 vision again. They watched his eyes grow from nothing. The cuts around his sockets were knitting back together and would soon be gone.
Elvis was smiling. “Ooh, I’m all shook up, ah-huh-ha. Why don’t you treat me nice? Don’t be cruel. Surrender, hard-headed woman. It’s now or never.”
Nicholl couldn’t struggle free. The only option she had was to try to wriggle the sword again. Maybe she would get lucky and hit his heart. She reached out weakly and could almost grip the tip of the blade when it suddenly shot backwards. Nicholl raised her glance and saw Bradley standing behind Elvis in mid-swing. Elvis turned just as Bradley’s blade hit his neck. He didn’t have time to react. His head bounced solidly when it dropped and then, like the rest of his body, it shrivelled up into a dry husk. Nicholl threw the skeleton off her and got up. She extended her hand and helped Lucinda to her feet. Nicholl looked at Bradley; her face was cut in several places and blood was dripping from her mouth. Bradley was looking at the corpse. She turned to Nicholl and Lucinda and forced a smile, “I’m sorry, ladies. Elvis has left the building.”
Nicholl smiled. “Hey, I wanted to say that.” They both started laughing. Lucinda did not join in because she was still trying to take in what had happened in the last few minutes. “You OK, Sheridan?”
Lucinda broke from her reverie and forced a grin. Nicholl walked over to the body of Elvis. She unzipped the front of his jumpsuit and looked inside. “Hey, look at this,” she said, breaking into a laugh. She took out a pair of rolled up socks from Elvis’s pants. The three of them all laughed at that. Nicholl reached inside his chest and found something she didn’t expect. She looked at Elvis’s arms and noted they were both intact, and then brought it out. She held it up to the other two and asked, “What the hell do you think this is?”
Lucinda and Bradley came closer and examined what Nicholl was holding. The bones had been drilled and were being held together with some kind of wire but it was unmistakably a human hand.
Bradley spoke first, “Do you think he had that around his heart? A kind of shield, maybe?”
Nicholl was looking at it closely. “There’s writing on it. I don’t know what language it is, but there’s definitely something on it.”
A scream rang out behind them. Nicholl dropped the skeletal hand and jumped to her feet. Bradley swung around ready for action. Lucinda stood with a sword driven through a young female vampire. Lucinda had turned from the other two just moments ago, thinking she was going to be sick again and saw the girl approaching them. The girl was obviously recently Made, because she had no grasp of her powers. Lucinda had been able to grab her sword from the floor and impale the girl as she ran at her. The blade had gone thro
ugh the girl’s stomach and now she looked at Lucinda and tears were running from her eyes.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t want this. It’s not my fault.” The girl started crying.
“Finish her quickly, Sheridan.” Lucinda heard the order from behind her but didn’t know who had said it. She was looking into the girl’s eyes, seeing the sorrow of a life cut short. Lucinda knew her pain and she wondered if they might be able to do something to help the girl.
Nicholl drove a stake into the girl’s heart and she fell limp immediately. Lucinda lowered the sword and the girl slid off the blade and hit the floor. Nicholl took Lucinda by the shoulders and turned her from the body. “You can’t let them do that, Sheridan. They can hypnotize you if you stare into their eyes.”
Lucinda nodded quickly. “Yes, sorry, Nicholl.”
“That’s all right. You did great here today. I don’t know if we would have been able to do it without you.” Nicholl patted her shoulder and walked back to Bradley. Lucinda turned and looked at the girl’s body again. She felt so sorry for her. At that moment she honestly didn’t know if she could go through with her plan.
It was a long drive from Wales back to Ministry HQ in the Midlands. Little was said in the van. Lucinda had asked Nicholl to stop once and had squeezed herself into the front of the van with the other two. Lucinda didn’t want to sit in the back of the van with the three body bags destined for the Analysis department. She kept thinking of how cheated that girl had looked as she plunged the sword into her stomach. Nicholl had assured her that the girl’s crocodile tears were just a ploy to gain sympathy. Nicholl said the vampire would have killed her the instant she removed the sword. Lucinda didn’t believe that. Nicholl hadn’t looked into that girl’s eyes. Nicholl hadn’t seen the helpless regret. Lucinda just wanted to go home and take a bath.
As they neared Ministry HQ Lucinda asked for the van to be stopped again. Nicholl pulled over to the grass verge and Lucinda leapt out of the van and was sick on the road. When she was finished she stepped back and leant against the van. Bradley came out and gave her a bottle of water. She rinsed out her mouth.
“Tough day, huh?” Bradley asked with a sympathetic smile.
Lucinda nodded, embarrassed by her constant illness.
“Nicholl and I can drop the bodies into Analysis and do the paperwork. We’ll drop you home and you can make yourself a nice stiff drink and relax.”
Lucinda raised her head, took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Thanks. I’m sorry about this. I think it’s the smell of them.” She nodded at the back of the van.
“It does take some getting used to.” Bradley held the door open for Lucinda. “Come on, you’ll be home in ten minutes.” She gave Lucinda that easy, reassuring smile that she did so well. Lucinda climbed back in the van and once again had doubts about what she was planning to do.
After a long soak in the tub, Lucinda decided she still wouldn’t be able to sleep. She went to the living room and poured herself a vodka. Her apartment was quiet. Her apartment was always quiet. There was no boyfriend watching annoying sports programmes. There were no children running around joyfully screaming as only children can. She didn’t even have a pet. The Ministry had furnished her with this luxurious place as part of her salary. She’d had offers from numerous universities, research facilities and pharmaceutical companies when she left Oxford at the top of her class. She left with PhDs in chemistry, biology and genetics, and all by the time she was twenty-seven. She was also an expert in mathematics, computers and electronics, but she had no qualifications in these – they were just for fun. The word prodigy was not used often at Oxford but all of her tutors fully expected that one day Lucinda Sheridan would be a household name. They thought she was going to change the world. Lucinda had no intention of letting them down either. She believed she could make a difference at the Ministry, albeit a quiet one. And now…
Her eyes were welling-up when the door was knocked. Lucinda wiped away the tears and wondered who could be calling at this hour. She swallowed the remainder of her vodka and set the glass back in the drinks cabinet. She walked to the door, looked through the spyhole and saw Nicholl standing in her hallway. She made sure her eyes were dry and opened the door.
“Hi, Sheridan, I hope you don’t mind me calling round. I saw your light was still on from the street.”
“No, it’s OK,” Lucinda said brightly. “I don’t know if I’ll sleep at all tonight. I welcome the distraction.” As Lucinda showed her in and closed the door she felt something was not quite right. Was Nicholl suspicious? Did she know about her plan somehow? The two women sat down on the sofa after Nicholl had politely refused a drink.
“Today was rough,” Nicholl admitted. “I’ve given you a great write-up in the report. All the nerds from Filing will be looking at you with awe from now on.”
“I’ll practise my autograph.”
Nicholl gave a small grin. “I haven’t handed in the report yet. I left out the stuff about you being sick because I didn’t know…”
“Thanks. Listen, Nicholl, I know the rules say that any sickness is to be reported immediately and I have to go and see the Ministry doctor, but I haven’t reported it and I haven’t seen the doc.”
Nicholl exhaled. She hated being put in this position. “Sheridan, those rules are there for a reason. With all the diseases Med Research has in the building, and the weird mutated viruses that vamps can carry it’s just good sense to error on the side…”
“I’m not sick.” Lucinda had spoken sharply and Nicholl had been shocked into silence. “Nicholl, I’m pregnant. I don’t want anyone to know because I haven’t told the father yet.”
Nicholl looked relieved and her demeanour completely changed. Lucinda could almost see the transformation from Ministry agent to concerned friend. “Sheridan, I’m sorry. Are you going to keep it? The father, is it someone at work?”
Lucinda nodded. “Yes, he works at the Ministry but please don’t ask me any more until I talk to him.”
“Of course. I’ll rewrite the report but I won’t hand it in until you’ve talked to the father. Would two days be enough time?”
Lucinda nodded. “I’ve been putting it off because I really don’t know how he’s going to take it. I’ll do it tomorrow, I promise.”
“Probably best to get it out in the open.” Nicholl stood and Lucinda walked her to the door. “Sheridan, if you need someone to talk to, give me a call.”
“I will,” Lucinda said. Nicholl gave her a soldier on look and left. Lucinda closed the door and poured herself another generous vodka. Pregnant? Nicholl had been easier to fool than she thought. Lucinda hadn’t had sex in two years, so unless the father is battery operated…
Lucinda laughed out loud. She was glad she had anticipated someone confronting her and had prepared the pregnancy story. Nicholl would probably drop by more often now. Lucinda didn’t want Nicholl taking an interest in her personal life because she might discover the truth.
She had to act quickly. The time was now. Tonight she would sneak into the Ministry and put part one of her plan into action. Then, tomorrow night…
subject 16
Ministry HQ is hidden deep in the Pennines. The mountains keep away traffic and 99% of hikers (1% of hikers wake up disoriented and with partial amnesia in some nearby town every year). Most Ministry employees live in Lancaster, which is only a short commute. Lucinda’s penthouse apartment was in Lancaster but it had never felt like home to her. It was sterile; all glass and chrome and no soul. Still, it was the first place she had ever lived that was hers and hers alone. As she left that evening she felt like she was going to miss it.
Lucinda stood with the orange glow of the setting sun behind her and studied the plaque on the wall in the lobby of Ministry HQ. She thought it had been put beside the lifts intentionally so that everyone would have to stare at it at some point in the day. The Ministry liked to remind their people what they were dealing with and the risks involved. She counted the number of a
gents with MPM beside their names and a shiver went up her spine. The lift arrived and she rushed in and pushed the button for six.
Ministry HQ is a small building from the outside. Its real size is hidden by the fact that all the Top Secret activity goes on deep underground. Six levels that go straight down.
Level 1 – Administration and Filing.
Level 2 – Agent Training Facility.
Level 3 – Canteen/ Residential Area.
Level 4 – Medical Research/ Weapons Development.
Level 5 – Analysis/ Morgue.
Level 6 – Observation.
Lucinda had worked in Analysis. In the fifteen months she had been there she had studied every vampire body that arrived in extreme detail. Vampire physiology was incredible. She had been working closely with the team in Med Research. The Ministry had been trying for years to isolate the gene that a vampire possessed that made it immune to illness and gave it such accelerated regenerative abilities. She was almost sorry that she wasn’t going to be able to have a close look at Elvis. She imagined that Med Research would be abuzz today and the scientists would be working until they literally fell over with exhaustion. The Ministry didn’t make you punch a clock in the morning or when you left in the evening. Everyone they hired was so dedicated to their work that they would stay for insanely long stretches if they believed they were on to something. Most of the scientists were single and cared little about ever going home. When tiredness finally got the better of them they would go up to the Residential Area on three and get a few hours sleep, a shower and then back to work. Lucinda had done it before as well, but she couldn’t keep doing it as long as some of the others. Occasionally she needed human contact that didn’t want to discuss dead bodies. On those occasions she would leave and find a bar in Lancaster. She’d pick the perfect seat to sit and listen to the world go by. Sometimes a man would approach her and try to chat her up but she found it hard to relate to them. She was so immersed in science and technology all the time she couldn’t sustain a conversation about current affairs, sport, movies, music, or whatever inane TV show was the fad of the moment. She had faced the truth long ago: by all popular definitions, she was a nerd.