The Collapse

by Claudia Silva

  "Man, do you know how messed up that sounds? Who are you? Why are you here?"

  The same questions echoed in the room. Who are you, why are you here? Perhaps a more appropriate question would be: What are you? Dylan considered different ways to explain. He tried to find the easiest, most convincing way to reveal a truth Reynolds would either not believe or fear. No matter how long he thought about ways to say it, he knew there wouldn't be an easy way. The word vampire needed to be in the sentence.

  "I work for a government branch you've never heard of," Dylan began and Reynolds listened. "We call it NAVSA."

  "What's that?"

  "It's an acronym. It stands for North American Vampire Secret Agency."

  Dylan waited for a reaction but got nothing. After a while, Reynolds asked: "Wait, did you say... vampire?"

  "That's what I said."

  "What vampire?"

  "It's an agency were vampires work, Nick. We get assigned jobs very much like you do, except we go out to hunt werewolves or other vampires."

  Again, Reynolds stared back in confusion, not knowing what to say. "Did you say... we?" Dylan nodded. "You?” Nick Reynolds laughed, the two guns still in his hands in front of him pointing at Dylan. "Are you saying, you... are you...?"

  "A vampire? Yes, I am."

  "There are no such things as vampires, Torrence."

  "You're looking at one."

  "Vampires burn in the daylight."

  "I'm not that kind of vampire."

  "Vampires have fangs."

  "Yes, I have those. I don't want to take them out. You're freaked out as it is."

  "You have fangs?"

  Dylan found the way he asked amusing, he didn't mean to laugh at him. "I'm a vampire, Nick. I have fangs."

  "And you drink blood?"

  "Unfortunately for you today, yes," Dylan exhaled. "I can eat human food. You know? Regular food, but if I don't eat frequently my body looks for something to feed on. At the moment, that would be you."

  Dylan heard the safety go off on both weapons. "You're going to drink my blood?"

  "I don't want to, but if we don't get out soon, my body will."

  Reynolds' heart was beating fast, sweat was rolling down his temples, and it wasn't because the room was getting hot. "Who were the men you came to see?"

  Dyan hadn't expected that question. He'd assumed Reynolds would be a little more interested in what he'd just revealed. "I don't know who they were. I don't know why they had explosives in their bodies, either. I came to make sure they weren't werewolves. They weren't."

  "What do you mean by werewolves?"

  "I mean men who turn into wolves. They're dangerous. You and I can have a conversation, you couldn't do that with a werewolf. We hunt them down. It's what we do. The most common way to finish a werewolf for good is to take out its heart, so whenever we hear a report of a dead man without a heart, we need to go check it out. It's protocol."

  "Oh yeah? So, what do you do? You smell them or something?"

  "That’s exactly what we do."

  Reynolds made a face. “Weird.”

  There was another awkward silence. For a man who'd just been introduced to a world where vampires roamed the earth killing werewolves, Reynolds was taking it rather well. His heartbeat was steady now and Dylan was sure the wheels in his head were turning trying to decide what to do with the information.

  Dylan left him to his thoughts; although, soon he would need to go more into detail about what would happen. The scent of blood was strong and it kept getting stronger. There wasn't enough fresh air making it into the room, which meant the concentration around him grew. For Dylan, it was almost like falling asleep when you're too tired, your eyelids begin to close... except in his case, if he closed his eyes he would yield control of his body to the vampire. If he let that happen, Reynolds would die.

  "I don't get it." Dylan was grateful to Reynolds for waking him up and was happy to answer more questions. It was easier to concentrate in reality when he could hear a voice. "You look like a normal person. Hard to believe you're a vampire. It sounds pretty outrageous."

  "I'm a vampire, and I don't want to wait for my other side to come out to prove it."

  Reynolds shrugged, "Why not kill me now if you're that hungry?"

  "Because I don't want to kill you." Dylan rolled his eyes. "Look, I want your blood, it's not easy being here without tasting it in my mouth. Any minute now, I will attack you. By then it won't be me, but it will be my body and it will suck you dry. When they find us, you'll be dead and you won't ever see your wife or little girl again. So I'll tell you a few rules."

  Nick Reynolds looked awestruck. Perhaps trying to decide if Dylan was making all of this up or if he was crazy. "What rules?"

  "If you shoot me, I'll heal," he explained. "If you shoot me in the head, I may be down for fifteen or twenty minutes. That's what you'll do, shoot me in the head. Use your bullets wisely. And don't wait until I'm healed because then I'll evade the bullets and kill you. I should always be partly unconscious, got it?"

  "How many times do you want me to shoot you in the head?" It was clear Reynolds wasn't taking any of this seriously by the way he asked the question.

  "How many bullets do you have?" Dylan watched as Reynolds pretended to count them. "However many, don't miss. It has to be in the head."

  "I can't kill you, man."

  Dylan moaned, "You won't be killing me, you'll be saving yourself."

  "Sure, yeah, I know." Reynolds scoffed while shaking his head from side to side. "This is crazy, man. You're crazy."

  "I'm not crazy. I'm a vampire but I'm not crazy, and I need you to stay alive. I don't want to kill you, I don't want that in my conscience."

  "Right, right." Reynolds returned his own gun to its holster and held Dylan's gun still unsure of what to believe. "Nice gun, by the way."

  "Thanks."

  "You kill many werewolves with it?"

  "I've shot many werewolves with it." Dylan raised his right arm and showed it to him. "This is what I use to kill them."

  "Your hand?" There was Reynolds’ face again. "You kill them with your hand?"

  “As I said, I need to take the heart out."

  "That's gross."

  Dylan couldn't stop himself from laughing again. It was true. It wasn't pleasant. Or at least it hadn't been pleasant the first few times he'd done it. It became second nature decades ago, but he remembered feeling repelled by it when Anton told him how it was done. Rebecca struggled with it her first time, too. Now she was a natural like he was, but she'd once feared it.

  Dylan liked Nick Reynolds. He was easy to talk to, even for him. He needed him to keep talking. He needed to occupy his mind. It was then he had an idea, "Do you think we could find some sort of sedative in his office?"

  "Whose?"

  "The medical examiner’s, who else?" Dylan said. "I saw several bottles with liquid inside when we were searching for a way out before. I'm not a doctor, but maybe one of them could knock me out. Whatever helps."

  They both ran to the medical examiner's office. It was a small room with a cluttered desk and a dead plant in the corner. No pictures of a family, nothing that made the space personal. Dylan wondered if there was anyone out there who’d miss him now that he'd died. Somehow Cornish reminded him of himself before he found Rebecca, when he was a loner without a connection to humanity. Before they adopted Crystal. Before they became a family. Life had some strange and unexpected twists and turns.

  The small cabinet Dylan had spotted had glass vials containing different liquids. They had long names he didn't find familiar (some he couldn't even read). "Do you know what these are?" he asked his new friend.

  "No idea," Reynolds answered. "I have a terrible memory, I can't even remember phone numbers. Medicine was never something I was interested in. You?"

  "No, neither was I. Perhaps you could inject me with any of these just to see what would happen, but-"

  Reynolds gave a step back. "Shit!"


  "What is it?"

  Taking out his own gun, he aimed to shoot. "What the fuck?"

  Dylan had no idea what had come over Reynolds. A second ago he'd been rational and now it was clear something had scared him out of his mind. It suddenly occurred to him: His eyes. They must've changed color. The man was too close to him, and the scent of blood, so alluring to a hungry vampire, must've triggered his eyes to change to their red iris. Raising his palms as a sign of surrender, Dylan tried to calm him down. "Relax, Nick."

  "What happened to your eyes?"

  "Like I said," Dylan tried to speak slowly, "I'm a vampire."

  "But, why are your eyes red?"

  "Because I'm hungry."

  That had been a mistake. Reacting with fear, Reynolds shot him. He didn't shoot him in the head, instead, he shot him straight in the gut. Dylan fell on one knee but was ready to stand up in a few seconds. This startled Reynolds, made him trip on the trash can behind him and making him fall to the floor, dropping the weapon.

  Reaching for the gun, Dylan offered it back to Reynolds. “Here, take the gun. And if you’re going to shoot me when the time comes, you can’t miss the head. It could be fatal.”

  Reynolds was trembling on the floor, his hand slowly reached for the gun Dylan offered. “Are you really going to kill me?”

  “Not yet,” Dylan stated. “As long as I talk to you, we'll be fine. But I can feel myself losing control. If they don't rescue us soon...”

  A realization came to the human’s face, “I’m dead.”

  Dylan didn't know what to say to that. In fact, he didn't know who had it worse: Nick for dying or him for having to live with the agent’s death. “Stay positive,” he sighed. “It's not over ’til it's over.”

  4

  Dylan paced the room from one side to the other. He kept clenching his hands into fists. He was nervous; he was antsy. He could feel his mind slowly shutting down; it was becoming more difficult to stay awake. It wouldn't be long until his consciousness was taken over by a monster. On the other side of the room, Agent Reynolds sat on the floor, one gun in his hand, the other in its holster. For someone who was about to die, he looked calm and composed. He asked, “You can smell my blood, can’t you?”

  Dylan jumped like when you surprised someone who’d almost fallen asleep. “Yes. Of course, I can.”

  "Is it getting worse?" The vampire nodded. "How much worse?"

  Dylan considered his answer before revealing: "I can't seem to retract the fangs."

  This made Reynolds stand up. Perhaps because he was curious, perhaps because he was getting ready to fight for his life. "How much longer?"

  "I don't know. I-I'm doing the best I can, but I'm losing my grasp on reality."

  "Should I shoot you now?" Dylan didn't answer, his red eyes glimmered under the fluorescent lights still working. Under his lips, Reynolds could see the tip of the long fangs. The vampire's breathing was becoming labored, uneven. Reynolds took out the other gun and prepared for the worst. "Tell me about your wife, Dylan. Tell me about Rebecca?"

  Dylan knew what Reynolds was doing. He knew the poor man was trying to distract him from the hurting hunger; although he doubted it would work. "She's the best thing that's happened to me. She... she saved me."

  "Saved you?" Dylan didn't love to answer questions about his personal life, but he was willing to make an exception. Maybe it would help save a life.

  "I was in a bad place... I was becoming a monster. Becca, she... well, she brought me back to life."

  "How did you meet her?"

  That question made him stop. Dylan pulled his neck back, trying to find an answer in his now muddled brain. "I lied to her."

  "I don't understand."

  Dylan laughed, his fangs now fully exposed and making Reynolds shiver in fright. The vampire felt his fear, which only augmented his desire to feed. For a moment, he dozed off but somehow managed to come back to reality, fighting the beast off. It took all his might to bring back a memory, bring back words. "I never told her why it had to be her... she... still doesn't... Listen!"

  Nick Reynolds stood up straighter, tried to hear what only a super human could hear. "What is it?"

  "They're... coming."

  "What? Is the rescue underway?" Dylan didn't answer. He had stopped walking, his hands were limp on his sides, his head looking down, the pacing gone. "Dylan?"

  The thing that looked up wasn't Dylan Torrence. No. The vampire that looked out through his red eyes - filled with hunger and violence - wasn't the man he'd once been. Raising its upper lip, the vampire snarled, ready to hunt down its prey.

  5

  "Dylan?" Reynolds swallowed hard. He now faced the monster that had replaced his new friend looking straight out of a horror movie. The transformation was unbelievable. The creature staring back at him almost seem to lack emotion; more like a wax figure than a man. Nick hoped he could plead with the thing, make Dylan come out and play. Even a few more minutes could mean the difference between life and death.

  The vampire shook, hearing voices coming from the door's direction. They were coming. The rescue party was near... but, how long would they take? How long would Reynolds need to survive with this monster craving his blood?

  Nick wanted to raise his gun. He wanted to shoot the vampire, yet feared any false movement on his part would trigger an attack. There had to be a reason the monster still stood there. If it was so hungry, why hadn't it come for him?

  "Are you in there, Dylan?" The question had been a mistake. The vampire sprinted in his direction, ready to feed, to kill him; Reynolds had to act. Immediately, he raised his gun to shoot. Bang! The vampire stumbled when the bullet hit its leg. No, you idiot, he said to shoot the head, Reynolds chastised himself. The head!

  With the monster a few feet away, Nick Reynolds aimed and shot a perfect shot, hitting it between the eyes. The vampire dropped like a dead weight - except he wasn't dead. How long had Dylan said it would take? Twenty minutes? Ten? He couldn't remember now, the adrenaline was running and he was afraid.

  Making sure the vampire was stiff as a board, Nick ran to the door. "Help! I'm in here! Help!"

  The rescuers mumbled something he couldn't understand. They were there, they were coming. All they needed to do was get to him before he emptied his clip, and Dylan’s.. And how many bullets were those? Dylan had told him to count, and he hadn't. Nick opened the gun and counted the bullets in his gun. He had three. Dylan's gun was fully loaded. If he used his bullets wisely, then he could make it for a couple of hours.

  It was unnerving to wait with Dylan Torrence's body lying stiff on the floor. Nick walked closer to it, weary. When he looked down on it, he noticed the bullet was now lying next to the head. Somehow, the body had spit the bullet out. Unbelievable. If he stared closely, he could see the wound healing. It was amazing, he had shot him only a couple of minutes before and he was already healing. In a panic, Nick shot Dylan's body twice in the chest. Idiot! He'd wasted his bullets. Losing it, he ran back to the door, yelling: "Get me out of here! Please! I need to get out!"

  But, it was useless. They would come when they could. Nick knew it would be difficult to remove the concrete rocks from the doorway. It could take hours, even. In the meantime, he needed to survive inside that room. He needed to calm down and keep shooting a man in the head. No. Not a man, a vampire.

  6

  Nick Reynolds had no idea how long he'd been there, but every time the body of Dylan Torrence moved an inch, he shot it in the head. Behind the door, he could hear hammering and drilling and hoped that whatever was about to happen would happen soon, or he would die. The guns were now on the floor, empty... useless. He'd used every single bullet, which meant the next time the vampire woke up, he would come at him with a vengeance.

  He knew his rescuers were close, but he feared they were not close enough. He heard the last bullet bounce on the floor after coming out of the vampire's head. The healing ability didn't waver, it didn't stop no matter how many
times he shot the creature.

  Then, something occurred to him.

  Its heart. He could take out its heart. Wasn't that the way Dylan Torrence said he killed werewolves? He’d been specific to say he used his hand to do it. Maybe this was something Reynolds could do, too. He'd no idea how different a vampire and a werewolf were, but if vampires could survive without a heart, then they were an endless nightmare. He couldn't believe he'd thought Dylan was one of the good guys. Or maybe he was... too bad he inhabited a beast's shell.

  Reynolds wasn't sure he could live with himself knowing his body was so terrible, able to take control whenever it wished. It was a good thing he wasn’t a vampire.

  He'd tried to keep his distance from the motionless body, but now he put on his brave face and walked as close as he could next to it. All he had to do was make a hole in the vampire's chest and take its heart out. Or perhaps a stake, like lore, would do the trick. What if he could find something to make a hole with? Anything would do. With the palm of his hand, he touched the vampire's chest. It was cold, unmoving. He couldn't even sense a heart beating underneath. Everything felt so surreal.

  Reynolds was glad to step away from the still body to search for anything that could help him pierce a hole in the vampire's chest. There were many things to choose from, most coming from the ceiling, but he decided on a metal part from one of the metallic beds. It might've been part of one of the table's legs at some point. It was sturdy and light and the perfect knife.

  Walking back to the body, he loosened up his tie to prepare for the deed. While he was used to shooting a gun, he wasn't used to stabbing another person in cold blood. Yet, if he didn't do it, then he'd die. He couldn't see another way to save himself. Nick had to stab Dylan's body and then take his heart out somehow.

  Taking the metal shard with both hands, he raised it and aimed at the vampire's chest. He was sweating; he was afraid and nervous. He never imagined he'd ever been in a situation like the one he was in now. Part of him wished he would just wake up to find out it was only a nightmare - that wouldn't happen. It couldn't. This was real, and it was happening to him. He was facing a vampire, and he needed to slay it.