by J. R. Rain
Now, as he came across new road number six, a beautiful winding road that revealed an incredible world, seemingly for his eyes only, he began to wonder if his assumption that he was beneficial to Earth had been incorrect. What if there was a chance that the Earth wanted to get rid of him? Perhaps the fire had been the first attempt on his life. Perhaps the fallen crucifix had been the second.
And now, as he came across the seventh and eighth and ninth roads, each more beautiful and majestic than the others before them, each pulling him deeper and deeper into the forested land, he was suddenly wondering if he was indeed wrong. Perhaps the Earth was getting rid of him. Well, it would have to try harder than a falling tree branch. Or a fire. Did the Earth not know he was fleet of foot? Did the Earth not know that he possessed a sixth sense to warn him of danger?
Deeper and deeper he went into the forested lands.
He laughed as he came across the tenth and eleventh new roads. Never had he seen such beauty. Jack Hollywood felt alive and alert and excited. Surely this was the greatest night of his life.
And deeper he went into the woods.
Deeper and deeper and deeper.
More and more roads.
And when he had gone down his thirtieth or fortieth road, when he was panting with excitement, and eager for more new roads, he saw something on the horizon, something that at first confused him, then terrified him to his core.
And as his warning bells went off, he then realized that he had made a grave mistake.
Now, for the first time in his undead life, Jack Hollywood made a U-turn. He made a U-turn despite it not being a dead end. He made a U-turn despite not reaching the end of the road. Jack floored it. Jack gunned his Range Rover as fast as it could go. He sped down road after road after road, desperately trying to remember which road he’d taken on the way in. The light, the coming dawn, was clouding his near-perfect memory.
He raced the coming sun, knowing he would lose. He needed to be home. He needed his darkened room. He needed to have no sunlight in any way, shape or form touch him. Already he was feeling weak. Already he was feeling drowsy.
When the first rays of sunlight hit the speeding Range Rover, the vampire inside was already burning from within. The Range Rover ricocheted off a boulder and a tree and, amazingly, its driver found himself briefly on what appeared to be another new road.
Jack Hollywood smiled as he burned...
The End
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Midnight Moon
Four Bonus Scenes
Author’s Note: Up next are four scenes that didn’t quite make the cut in Midnight Moon, my latest Sam Moon novel (as of this writing). Like movie directors who sometimes cut whole scenes, writers have to occasionally do the same thing. (At least, this writer does!) Because I don’t use an outline and often have no clue where the story is going, I can sometimes find myself wandering down the wrong dark alley, so to speak. And like anyone wandering down the wrong alley, you are bound to meet misfits and shady types. On the following pages are my four misfits and shady types (and below you can read why I cut them from them from Midnight Moon).
Scene #1: I felt this was just one consultation too many. But I still like it.
Scene #2: I felt this family dinner slowed down the story. I tried to wedge in some family time, but the pace of story didn’t quite allow for it. But I still like it.
Scene #3: This was the hardest for me to cut because, as you will see, it involves Sam’s first conversation with Danny since Danny met the wrong end of Hanner’s dagger. Again, the scene felt overlong to me. I think, ultimately, I wanted to get to the climax, and felt this scene simply delayed Sam and Allison’s big trip into another world. But I still like it.
Scene #4: Sam was on her way to help Charlie Reed with his “ghost,” and this scene just seemed to throw off the pace of the story. But I still like it.
So there you go. Four cut scenes. Four reasons why. Nothing scientific here. Just my gut feeling, and not much else. I think the scenes still work in and of themselves. I also think some of you might even get a kick out of them! -J.R.
P.S. I’m glad I didn’t delete these!
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Bonus Scene: The Librarian
I stood before the help desk, alone in the little side reading room, a room that was hidden to most observers, but available to those who needed it. A room that housed some of the most dangerous books ever written and published. All of which were overseen by the young man before me, a young man of remarkable gifts. Not to mention, remarkable green eyes too.
“Thank you, Sam. You have a question?”
“I do. I suspect you know it?”
“I know of it. I see it there, trying to formulate.”
“Trying?”
“An unasked question has no life. It has—” He waved his slender fingers in the air, and I could almost imagine the same such gesture as part of a complicated incantation—“no energy. No urgency. No movement. A clearly asked question evokes and invokes a worthwhile response.”
“Okay,” I said. “Here goes: what’s for lunch?”
He threw back his head and laughed, and I might have joined him, too. It was nice to see the young-looking man laugh once in a while. He took his job very seriously. Indeed, it was a serious job.
“Fine,” I said. “Here goes: What happens when my son turns into the Fire Warrior?”
“He switches bodies temporarily, as do you, Sam.”
“But what happens to Elizabeth, your mother, while I am with Talos on his home planet?”
“She is temporarily ejected back to the Void.”
“The Void?”
“The place from which the dark masters have been banished, the place they can return to each day, while your kind sleeps.”
“My kind being vampires?”
“Yes.”
“And this would be the case with Danny?” I asked.
“Yes and no. Your son has atypical vampire traits. When he sleeps, he does so normally. As such, Danny remains trapped within him.”
“Except when my son turns into the Fire Warrior.”
“Except then, yes. Danny would be ejected the instant your son transformed.”
“Because my son temporarily switched places with the Fire Warrior.”
“An aspect of your son, yes. His mind—or an aspect of his mind—stays with the Fire Warrior.”
“Who makes these damn rules?”
“We call him the Writer in the Sky.”
“Really?”
“No.”
I shook my head. Damn I was gullible. I said, “Is there a way to keep Danny in the Void?”
“No. Unless...”
“Unless what?”
“Unless you traveled to the Void and...”
“And what?”
“Severed his ties to your son.”
“How do I do that?”
“I have some thoughts... But Sam, should you be severed yourself...”
I knew what he was going to say, so I said it for him. “Elizabeth would take over my body.”
“Yes, Sam. And you would be exiled forevermore.”
“Unless I returned as a vampire possessing another’s body.”
“Something like that, Sam.”
“But how do I get to the Void?”
“You would have to switch places with Elizabeth.”
“So she would have possession of my body after all?”
“Temporarily, until you return.”
“She could do a lot of havoc in two minutes. Hell, one minute.”
“Of that, you have no idea, Sam. Perhaps it’s better to concede that having Danny around isn’t so bad...”
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Bonus Scene: Dinner
The four of us were eating dinner together as a family again. Myself, Tammy, Anthony... and Danny, of course.
It was later that same day, and Tammy kept stealing glances at me. Although I
couldn’t read her mind—and nor had I heard her thoughts—I knew she could read the hell out of my own, including anyone’s mind within a few hundred yards in every direction. How she managed to not go insane, I didn’t know. She called it “background noise” and seemed to be able to tune it out, even as her range continued to expand.
I had no doubt she had relived everything I had seen and read today, including my visions of heaven. Which might have been why she kept stealing glances at me. Or why her face was so white.
Tammy had recently turned sixteen. Anthony would soon be turning fourteen. Yes, I had two teenagers living in my house. Two super teenagers, with super-sized problems. I never thought I would be left alone to raise them. Then again, I wasn’t really alone now, was I? Danny was in there somewhere, watching from the depths of our son’s own mind, through my son’s own eyes. Thanks to Tammy, I knew that Anthony sometimes let his daddy out; meaning, Danny took control of his own son’s body, even if briefly.
Although this angered and sickened me, I sensed that my son needed his father, needed this ungodly connection. Ripping Danny away from Anthony now didn’t seem the right thing to do. Besides, according to Tammy, the internal conversations between Anthony and Danny were actually kind of sweet. His father, apparently, encouraged him, supported him, loved him, and even seemed to be Anthony’s best friend.
And then the devil came along.
To get to Danny, I knew the host needed to die. The host being Anthony, and that wasn’t going to happen. For now, the devil, having somewhat saved my son, seemed content with knowing that he might have a potential ally in Anthony, which was a terrible thought indeed. What the devil planned on doing with such a bond, I didn’t know. That the devil was intimately aware and felt connected to my son was enough to make anyone vomit.
“I made your favorite, Anthony,” I said. “Breakfast for dinner.”
“Thanks, Ma.”
“You’ve barely touched it.”
“I guess I ain’t hungry.” He cocked his head a little, as if listening to something. I knew the gesture, and I knew it wasn’t something. He was listening to his father. “I mean, I guess I’m not hungry. Ain’t ain’t a word.” He giggled at that.
I gripped my napkin and twisted it a little. We’d been playing this game for a few months—with me pretending that Danny wasn’t right here, too, listening to us all. Except this was too blatant. It was better back when Danny had remained out of sight, out of mind, back before he’d reached out to make a connection with Anthony, back before the devil came knocking. By revealing himself to his son, Danny had also exposed himself to Cerberus, the devil’s hounds, who’d sniffed Danny out.
Tammy was dressing more and more goth these days: thick mascara encircling her eyes, white foundation, black lipstick. The thing was: I thought it looked good on her. I also thought she resembled me a little. Or what I remembered looking like at that age.
She rolled her eyes at that, but what could I say, the look matched my daughter’s quirkiness, and sort of matched our family’s overall strangeness, too. And, I had to admit, I enjoyed watching my children express themselves as individuals. Besides, I thought Tammy looked, well, beautiful.
Now she made a gagging motion with her finger, and Anthony snapped his head around to look at her, then looked at me, then squinted a bit like Clint Eastwood, which, I had to admit, my son was looking a bit like these days: tall, handsome, angular, tough as nails.
“You guys talking about me?”
“No. Mom thinks I look pretty.”
“Gross,” he said, and was about to shovel a heaping pile of eggs into his mouth when he paused and cocked his head. “Dad says you look pretty, too.” And as he said those words, he shuddered. “For the record, I think you look like a big weirdo.”
I mostly missed that last part, for which Anthony surely would have been reprimanded. Except now I was doing all I could to control myself, to keep from wringing Danny’s neck via Anthony’s neck—and realizing what a terrible, no-good, very bad situation Danny had put us all in.
Then again, I had contributed, too, hadn’t I?
Yes, my son had escaped vampirism with the help of the ruby medallion—a medallion that had successfully removed whatever dark entity had briefly inhabited him. But now I was left to wonder: was my son’s great strength the result of his own soul having been removed from heaven? And filling him completely? Was my son now doomed to never experience that jaw-droppingly beautiful place I’d witnessed just hours earlier? Had I denied my son heaven?
I didn’t know, but I did know that I had Tammy’s full attention, who looked from me to Anthony, who seemed to be having an internal dialogue with his father, and giggling at a joke... and now Tammy was smiling, too.
Great, I thought. They can both hear Danny, and I’m the one left out in the cold.
“Relax, Mom. Dad’s just saying that you look pretty, too, except that maybe you gained a little weight.”
Both she and Anthony giggled at that, and I wanted to throw my half-empty plate of food through the living room wall... eggs, toast, hash browns and all.
“Well, you can tell Daddy—”
“Mom...” cautioned Tammy.
“...that I’ve put on a little holiday weight.”
Which may or may not be true. My clothing was fitting a little snug. Now that I could eat, thanks to the alchemy ring on my right hand, I’d been packing away the food. I was pretty sure I no longer had a normal digestive system—or a normal metabolism. This is where, I think, Elizabeth’s own dark persuasion fully took over: in the feeding and maintaining of the physical body, which truly craved and needed blood.
The children were already giggling at this, but they exploded when I added: “So he can just bite me.”
Anthony slapped the table, harder than he probably anticipated. All of our plates, drinks and silverware jumped an inch or two. Tammy’s milk spilled. She called him a butthead, but Anthony only laughed harder, and as he continued to laugh, I saw it, I think for the first time:
His eyes weren’t laughing, not really. Instead, they were watching me.
Danny was watching me.
It was, I think, the first time the bastard had come through.
All the way through.
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Bonus Scene: Danny
We were about ten miles from home, in Huntington Beach, and surely far enough away from my daughter’s considerable range.
Kingsley was with her now, and she wasn’t very happy about it. To his credit, Kingsley hadn’t complained. He’d brought with him a stack of case files he needed to go through. He’d also brought over three large supreme pizzas. Knowing Kingsley, I wondered if I should bring something back for Tammy.
We were in my minivan, in the McDonald’s parking lot on Harbor and Warner. When Anthony started on his third Big Mac, I said, “You understand that your father is hiding inside you, right?”
“Duh, Mom. That’s like all we’ve been talking about for months now. But he tells me he’s been with me ever since his death.”
Anthony took another healthy bite. I waited.
He swallowed and added, “But he kept a low profile, whatever that means, although I think I know what it means.”
“It means he didn’t want to freak you out, or let a certain someone know where he was.”
“The devil.”
Danny had been right about one thing. The moment he’d made his presence known to my son, the devil and his three-headed dog had oriented on Danny—and my son—sniffing them both out, so to speak. It had, indeed, been to Danny’s benefit to lay low. Except, as they say, the cat was out of the bag now.
“Anthony—”
“Will you just call me sweety or something? When you say my name like that I think I’m in trouble.”
He was in trouble. We were all in trouble. I nodded, gave him a weak smile, and said, “Your father did some very bad things.”
“I know, Mom. He told me.”
I felt my brow furrow. “Told you what, exactly?”
Although uncomfortable, Anthony powered through, and told me about the strip club, and the way his father had treated the women there, and the way they had sold drugs, too, and had even sold some of the women. He told me that his father had confessed to being a shady attorney in his final years as well, often cheating the system, and even his own clients. Finally, his father had confessed to trying to lure me to my death, and to working long nights as a dark master in training, unbeknownst to anyone. He and Hanner had had a relationship by then, which shouldn’t have bothered me but it did. I had once considered Hanner a friend. Now both were dead. Well, Hanner was. Her body had returned to wherever vampires go—a one-way trip to God, from my understanding. And Danny was, well, here, sitting across from me, inside our son.
As Anthony spoke, I was hearing Danny’s voice more and more. He was coming through, and I didn’t like it. I never let Elizabeth through—and tried like hell to keep her weak, fearing she would eventually take over me. But I knew Danny wouldn’t do that to his son; at least, I didn’t think he would. Hell, he wouldn’t dare.
“Dad says he regrets trying to hurt you, but that he doesn’t regret it either. He says he agrees with Tammy. You should have left. You should have gone far away and left us alone. But now, Daddy says he is sorry for everything, because he sees that we need you. That you were a good mommy, despite everything. He says he is sorry for everything he did to you. He says he was scared and confused, but that was no excuse. He says he deserved everything that happened to him.”