by P. S. Power
Tyler G. : Book One
Among the Living
P.S. Power
Orange Cat Publishing
Copyright 2015
Chapter one
The trick to running, Tyler figured, was in not stopping every ten minutes.
That would have sounded pretty easy, of course. Most people even knew that about long distance foot travel. It was kind of a basic, nearly instinctual thing. Not that he wasn't doing it in a funny fashion at the moment. Really, moving along like he was, being very careful never to let his lead foot fall in front of where his shoulder was while moving, wasn't even jogging. It probably looked a bit like he was skating around the world, his hands sliding almost straight out and back, instead of moving in arcs. It was really low impact though, and nearly as efficient as walking, while letting him go a lot faster. Nearly eight miles an hour.
Still, though it wasn't that hard physically, even having moved up the sidewalk of the hill next to the park, there were reasons to get sidetracked from what he was doing. Like the girl who was lying down on the other side of the hill, actually in the street, next to the community college. She had a cell phone in her hand, and spoke into it loudly enough that he could hear her, now that he was paying attention. She sounded really out of it.
"Help." The word was apathetic, and seemed nearly drugged. It was hard to tell much about her, other than that she wasn't very big. Well, that, and it seemed she needed some aid.
Probably protection from the five seedy people that stood over her.
The sun was just coming up, which the hill and the variety of leafy trees on it had blocked until he went over the top. There were no cars on the road, thankfully, or at least this portion of it, since it was only about four-thirty. Tyler liked to get out early, and get the hard work out of the way for the day. Plus, the way he was running made him look weird, so this way, being out before anyone else got up, no one would notice.
One of the men, who was tall, and had light colored skin, grunted. It was a low, guttural thing that seemed out of place. He was dressed to go out, which probably meant the girl with the cell phone was drunk, and had just been out clubbing with the rest of her friends.
She spoke again, her voice tiny, and scared.
"They'll... Kill me." That was for whoever was on the phone, he bet, still moving that direction.
The gang of people, who were all pretty tall, seemed to be mixed as far as gender went. Race too. Three of them were guys, and two were ladies. As he closed, he understood something else about them. They were all also Vampires. It was the teeth and the solid blood red eyes that gave them away.
His stomach clenched tightly in fear. This gaggle of people weren't regular people, and they had this girl on the ground. Ready to take her life. That was, from what he's read and heard, a bit strange. The lady at the library who'd talked to the public about Vampires, Linda, had mentioned that they all needed to keep their food, animal or Human, alive. It was a kind of energy based magic that let them live.
Then again, the woman had also mentioned that the new ones, the very young, weren't always perfect that way, and would feel a desire to kill when they fed. It was why they were all supposed to eat the bottled blood now. That way there would be no mistakes. Really, Linda, who had been cute and harmless looking, had said it was so there would be fewer. Even the head honchos of the Vamps didn't think it would work all the time. It was what they others were supposed to be doing. Not killing women in the streets.
Pulling a pipe from under his long coat, a thing that was far too warm for late June, even this time of day, the man in front grinned. He looked nearly normal, but had really did have those blood red eyes, with no whites, and the requisite protruding fang teeth. A classic, if Tyler remembered correctly. Like Dracula, except that wasn't a real thing. In fact Vampires kind of hated that story. The library Vampire had clued them into that one nearly first thing.
They were fast, and strong. They didn't have claws though, and while their bites were dangerous, it should only be a bit worse than fighting a person as far as that went. People could bite, but the jaw and face shape wasn't really structured for it. Their flat little faces just weren't up to the task of doing it right. The undead were built the same way, even with the protruding and sharp looking canines, so they weren't a lot better off that way than say, he was. It was a thing that he'd studied, actually. When he was teaching himself how to fight. His mother had suggested that a man should learn how to protect himself, and being that she'd raised him alone, he'd sort of had to work that out for himself. Mainly by using his head, and some books from the library. Not that he hadn't picked Linda's brain on the topic, too. It was a bit weird maybe, but the kind Vampire woman had stayed for nearly an hour, giving him tips.
Just to take the doubt out of the whole thing for Ty, Pipe-Master the Vampire jumped in and hit the downed girl in the head, making her phone fly away. The poor thing skittered on the ground, moving off about ten feet. There was a voice on it, that sounded like a girl, but he couldn't make anything out really. Tyler did notice that the girl that had been hit was a bit older than he thought. Also a Vampire, though different than the others there. She was chalk white, for instance, and while her eyes were also a brilliant red, her teeth were different. There were rows of fangs, when she was hit again, and her mouth opened as she flew back. She was also tiny, which had made him think her age was younger than her face spoke to. The look meant that she was a Manthori, he thought. Though they were normally taller than this.
The man smiled, wickedly.
"That's right, bitch. We will kill you." He took a step forward, raising the pipe, a lead colored thing about two feet long, once again.
Tyler yelled then, closing with them anyway, very quietly as far as his footfalls went. The way he was running wasn't that fast, but it was good as far as not making a lot of unneeded sound went.
"No. You won't. Back away from her. Now." It sounded pretty bold even, with only a small fearful tremor to it. At least he could make that out. What these others thought he had no idea. Probably, if they thought anything at all, it would be about how their early breakfast had already arrived.
That would have to do though, for the moment, since he was nearly certain that any of these beings could kill him in half an instant. The honest truth was that Tyler probably couldn't have taken them all, even if they were Human. Five to one was too much that way for almost anyone. Two of them had knives that he hadn't noticed, and one was armed with a pipe. So even if they'd been middle school kids, they could probably take him. They weren't. All he was armed with was his charm and good looks. Since no one had ever praised either of those things very highly, it did not look good for him.
Not that he could let some woman be killed in front of him. Not alone, at any rate. It was a cultural thing, but one that was pretty strong. Otherwise he would have tried to flee for his life, instead of being a moron.
The voice from the phone went silent for a bit, so he called out, in case anyone could hear him.
"We're just off Fourth Plain, by the Burgerville, up the hill to the left!" At the same time he raised his hands, going extra high with them. His fists were pointed up, which wasn't normally that good for hitting, and he hunched into himself.
The idea was, if he wasn't an idiot, that it would make it a little harder for the Vampires to get at his throat. It meant using hammer blows as a primary weapon, which might throw some people off. For a bit anyway. People in America were used to seeing boxing and traditional Japanese martial arts, so when you did something different, it might just mess with them for a bit. That, using the bottom of his fist like he was wielding a stick or club, was a harder way to hit, compared to jabs
and straight punches, holding greater power... but it was also slower. Hunching like he was made all the sweet looking high kicks too hard to do, so he needed to keep it to low straight and side-kicks, and stomps. Mainly those for the same reason. No one really knew to consider them as a threat. Until they landed. In theory.
He really expected the fierce looking men and women to laugh at him, or perhaps take some time to mock his strange stance. Tyler wasn't even bigger than any of them, or armed. Regular street toughs would have probably soiled themselves, seeing a skinny runner in shorts and a baggy shirt in front of them like that. Not out of fear. The crippling laughter might have done it.
So it was a bit shocking when they left the girl on the ground alone, and came for him, all at once. There had been nearly no pause in what they did, either. They just moved, nearly as fast as he could comprehend. The first man, the one with the pipe tried to hit him in the head with it. Ty knew that he wouldn't survive that, if it hit him. Even taking it on the arm was a risk. That meant jumping in, and trying to get so close to the guy that he couldn't do that very well.
No one was more surprised when it worked than he was. It had been in some of the books that he'd read on fighting, but it seemed so backwards. Everything inside of him screamed that he needed to run away. To get back. Only, he knew that wouldn't allow him to live either.
So he started hammering at them, which really did lack a bit of speed, but actually staggered the man in front of him when he connected with his nose. That was followed by a low stomp, and a shuffle to the right, so that he could try and hit the knife guy too. One of them. That sort of worked, since that man was only about six feet tall, and wiry, which meant his rapid turn to the side while performing a blow to the neck took him all the way down. He didn't even manage to cut Tyler at all.
The other knife man, who was probably the smart one, just walked around behind him and stabbed him in the arm. It wasn't an elegant, or deadly move really, for all it burned like he was on fire. It was tempting to jump back and grab himself, but the ladies, who were both relatively cute, moved at him then. It was harder to hit them, because chivalry wasn't totally dead. Not inside of his head. It should have been, because either one of them could have killed him already if they'd really tried. Still, he managed to batter them in the head a few times, just as their buddies moved in, surrounding him.
Which meant he was, well and truly, about to die.
Pulling the hair of the girl in front of him, who was dressed in a tight skirt and heels that would have had him looking away normally, being shy like he was, let him push her into the blade of the smart knife guy, and move in a spinning motion, trading places with her. Moving back now, even as the others followed.
It hadn't been a long drawn out epic battle, but Ty noticed that two girls had walked up behind them, and were standing there, watching the whole thing. One had long black hair, and looked like she should be modeling someplace, and the other seemed cute, being short, blonde and having slightly chubby face. Not too much, just enough so she looked young.
"Run. Vampires!" There was no need for all of them to die, after all.
That finally got the man with the pipe to speak again, though he glanced over his shoulder at the women before turning back. As soon as he did the younger looking girl went to the downed pale form and started to get her to stand, moving her away.
"What the fuck are you?" This was addressed to him, and Pipe-Man seemed interested, so Ty grinned, not feeling it at all. It probably looked scared, if not panicked, but there was no helping that. After all, he was fighting with five Vampires. At one time. Fear sounded like a pretty reasonable option at the moment.
He was kind of proud that he hadn't wet himself yet.
"I'm Batman." He did the deep movie voice, and got a strange look from the group he was fighting. Then, one by one, they all started to try and stagger away. It was like they were really drunk suddenly, and falling all over themselves.
That got him to attack harder, since it could be a trick, or a ploy to get away from a legendary super hero. Not that anyone had laughed at his clever use of popular culture. He'd even done the voice right, too. All rough and gravelly.
There were punches, kicks, a few hip tosses, and trips, which all suddenly worked really well. It was like they weren't even trying, for some reason. Still, he forced himself to keep to good form, even as he bled from his left arm. That hurt, he thought, especially when he moved, but other than dying, there wasn't a lot he could really do.
Then after a few minutes of this, they all stopped. Dead.
For the day, anyway.
The hot dark haired girl waved at him a bit, smiling, which was a bit out of place. He would have been kind of freaked if he'd witnessed some poor guy being beaten up like that.
"Here... Wait." She walked to the pipe guy, and stole his shirt, ripping it from his body without taking his jacket off first. It was a dark blue, and had been pretty nice, before the total destruction part of things. It was quickly wrapped around his arm, so that he wouldn't bleed to death.
"Thanks. We... Should call the police. Or..." He didn't really know, actually. "The Vampires? These five were going to kill that girl. I tried to fight them, but... Well, you saw." He'd been about to die, and was saved by the rising sun. Luck had really been with him in that.
The prettier one, and they were both better looking than he was really comfortable talking to as a rule, just nodded and looked at the bodies on the ground, then she bent over, picked up the cell phone and turned it off.
"Here, help me get them out of the street? Cars are coming." She moved rapidly, then, and with enough speed and ease that it was confusing. Particularly when he tried to drag some of the men out of the way. They were all heavier than they looked, but she wasn't having any problem with it. Even the smaller girl picked up one of them by the belt and moved him to the sidewalk.
Then she nodded to him, looking like a fourteen year old who was trying to seem important.
"I'm Ginger, and this is Eve. From the Vampire Council? We got your instructions, so ran over." There was an almost glib bit of lilt to the voice. At first he didn't get it. It was playful sounding, which was right out of keeping with what had been going on. Teasing, if he didn't know that no one would do that to him, after being fucking stabbed.
The rest of the information trickled into his awareness slowly. These were the people that the Vampire had been calling. There was no car there either, which meant that they'd literally run to them. Unless they worked out of the Burgerville, then that probably meant they weren't normal young women.
That thought, the young part, got him to shake his head. The one looked about fourteen, but the other seemed older. In her early twenties or so. He wasn't even turning eighteen for a week yet, himself. It was a bit rich for him to go around acting like they were kids or something. He could have dated either of them without getting any comments. At least if he were smoother with the ladies. His mother had mentioned, more than once, that he shouldn't let pretty girls turn his head. Lucy was good that way, trying to make sure he knew what he needed to grow up as a man. That had to have been hard for her, being a single mom.
"Right. We should call the police. Or..." Honestly, he didn't know the law on that one. The older looking girl, the woman, winked at him, and pulled her own cell. It came out of her slacks pocket. The style was a bit strange, and the whole outfit was tan. Not a bad look. A bit warm, considering the time of year. The other girl looked right, being in shorts and a t-shirt that showed off the fact that, round face or not, she worked out.
The dark haired one tilted her head at her phone.
"I know the Chief here. I'm friends with her daughter... Hello? Chief Sims? This is Eve, Benson. We had a small difficulty, over by Burgerville? You probably don't want to let any of your men come out for it. A fight." She smiled a bit and started nodding, looking at the scene. "Five Vampires, Classics, went after Tara the Manthori. Pipes and knives. A jogger intervened."
&n
bsp; There was a swearword from the phone then, and a woman's voice. Before that it hadn't been loud enough for Tyler to hear any of it. That probably meant that the local Chief was a woman. He hadn't known that before, but it didn't seem impossible. After all, being in charge didn't mean she had to wrestle drunk bikers herself every Saturday night or anything. Then, for all he knew, she could.
Maybe that was why she'd been elected. Unless that was an appointed position. The truth was Ty had never really bothered with that kind of political stuff much.
The girl with the long black hair laughed and looked at him.
"Fuck no, Chief. If we bury him now, it will be hard for him to breathe. He kicked their little Vampire tushes. All of them, at once. On his own. Were talking some sweet Bruce Lee moves here. True, it was nearly sun up, but still, it was impressive. He got stabbed once, but I'll cover that. Barely a scratch anyway. I'll get him in to be healed. I think Lyn is going to be in, over at the Candle shop? That's better than a doctor for things like this anyway. I doubt they could handle this one. I need a car." She looked around, for all the world like she was just going to grab one off the street.
There was a bit of noise making, with some sounds that indicated she wasn't all that interested in the topic anymore. At least they were the ones that Tyler used for that kind of thing. Then she nodded, and hung up.
"Good news! We won't have to go to court for this." Looking at him directly she explained, getting that he wouldn't know the real answer. "The truth is, as much as they hate to admit it, the Police can't keep a Vampire yet. Not even overnight, if they want to leave. So we handle that kind of thing for them, most of the time. To be fair, it doesn't really come up very often. Not like this. So, that means that you're with us, Batman. On the good side, I have a friend that works over there, and see her car, so you might not have to run to Westfield."
Why he'd be going there, he didn't know. Before he could ask, the younger looking one, Ginger, smiled at him.