65 Proof

by Jack Kilborn

  Colin ran, but Jake was fast. Within moments the bigger man caught Colin’s arm and threw him to the ground.

  “Trying to run from me, eh?”

  A swift kick caught Colin in the ribs, searing pain stealing his breath.

  “I hate running. Hate it.”

  Another kick. Colin groaned. Bright spots swirled in his vision.

  “Get up, wanker. Let’s go talk to Willie.”

  Jake grabbed Colin by the ear and tugged him along, dumping him at Willie’s feet.

  “Why didn’t you tell us about your mate, Butts?”

  “I thought he’d gone. I swear it.”

  Jake let loose with another kick. Colin curled up fetal, began to cry.

  “Should we kill him, Willie?”

  “Not yet. We might need an extra body, help take back some of the loot. You hear me, you drug-addled bastard? We’re going to keep you around for awhile, as long as you’re helpful.”

  Butts knelt next to Colin and smiled, brown teeth flashing. “Get up, Colin. They’re not going to kill you.” He helped Colin gain his footing, keeping a steady arm around his shoulders until they arrived at the house.

  In the daylight, the house’s aristocratic appearance was overtaken by the many apparent flaws; peeling paint, cracked foundation, sunken roof. Even the stately iron work covering the windows looked drab and shabby.

  “This place is a dump.” Willie placed a finger on one nostril and blew the contents of his nose onto a patch of clover.

  “It’s better on the inside,” encouraged Butts. “You’ll see.”

  Unfortunately, the inside was even less impressive. The dust-covered furniture Colin had pegged as antique was damaged and rotting.

  “You call this treasure?” Willie punched Butts square in the nose.

  Butts dropped to the floor, bleeding and hysterical.

  “This is good stuff, Willie! It’ll clean up nice! Worth a couple thousand quid, I swear!”

  Willie and Jake walked away from Butts, and he crawled behind them, babbling.

  A moment later, Colin was alone.

  The pain in his ribs sharpened with every intake of breath.

  If he made a run for it, they’d catch him easily. But if he did nothing, he was a dead man.

  He needed a weapon.

  Colin crept into the kitchen, mindful of the creaking floorboards. Perhaps the drawers contained a weapon or some kind.

  “What you doing in here, eh? Nicking silver?” Jake slapped him across the face.

  Colin staggered back, his feet becoming rubber. Then the floor simply ceased to be there. He dropped, straight down, landing on his arse at the bottom of the root cellar.

  Everything went fuzzy, and then black.

  Colin awoke in darkness.

  He felt around, noticed his leg bent at a funny angle.

  The touch made him cry out.

  Broken. Badly, from the size of the swelling.

  Colin peeled his eyes wide, tried to see. There was no light at all. The trap door, leading to the kitchen, was closed. Not that it mattered; he couldn’t have climbed up the ladder anyway.

  He sat up, tears erupting onto his cheeks. There was a creaking sound above him, and then a sudden burst of light.

  “I see you’re still alive, eh?”

  Colin squinted through the glare, made out the bowler hat.

  “No worries, mate. We won’t let you starve to death down there. We’re not barbarians. Willie will be down shortly to finish you off. Promise it’ll be quick. Right Willie?”

  Willie’s laugh was an evil thing.

  “See you in a bit.”

  The trap door closed.

  Fear rippled through Colin, but it was overwhelmed by something greater.

  Anger.

  Colin had ever been the victim. From his boyhood days, being beaten by his alcoholic father, up to his nagging ex-wife, suing him into the recesses of poverty.

  Well, if his miserable life was going to end here, in a foul smelling dirt cellar, then so be it.

  But he wasn’t going without a fight.

  Colin pulled himself along the cold ground, dragging his wounded leg. He wanted the boning knife, the one he’d left curled in Van Helsing’s hand.

  When Jake came down to finish him off, the fat bastard was going to get a nice surprise.

  Colin’s hand touched moisture, blood or some other type of grue, so he knew he was close. He reached into the inky blackness, finding Van Helsing’s body, trailing down over his shoulder…

  “What in the hell?”

  Colin brought his other hand over, groped around.

  It made no sense.

  Van Helsing’s head, which had been practically severed from his shoulders, had reattached itself. The neck was completely intact. No gaping wound, no deep cut.

  “Can’t be him.”

  Perhaps another body had been dumped down there, possibly Butts. Colin touched the face.

  No beard.

  Grazing the mouth with his fingers, Colin winced and stuck a digit past the clammy lips.

  It was cold and slimy inside the mouth. Revolting. But Colin probed around for almost an entire minute, searching for teeth that weren’t there.

  This was Van Helsing. And he had completely healed.

  Which was impossible. Unless —

  “Jesus Christ.” Colin recoiled, scooting away from the body.

  He was trapped in the dark with a vampire.

  When would Van Helsing awake? Damn good thing the bloke was chained down. Who knows what horrors he could commit if he were free?

  Colin repeated that thought, and grinned.

  Perhaps if he helped the poor sod escape, Van Helsing would be so grateful he’d take care of the goons upstairs.

  The idea vanished when Colin remembered Van Helsing’s words. All the poor sod wanted was to die. He didn’t want to kill anyone.

  “Bloody hell. If I were a vampire, I’d do things —”

  Colin halted mid-sentence. His works were in a sardine can, inside his breast pocket. He reached for them, took out the hypo.

  It just might work.

  Crawling back to Van Helsing, Colin probed until he found the bony neck. He pushed the needle in, then eased back the plunger, drawing out blood.

  Vampire blood.

  Tying off his own arm and finding his vein in the dark wasn’t a problem; he’d done it many times before.

  Teeth clenched, eyes shut, he gave himself the shot.

  But there was no rush.

  Only pain.

  The pain seared up his arm, as if someone was yanking out his veins with pliers.

  Colin cried out. When the tainted blood reached his heart, the muscle stopped cold, killing him instantly.

  Colin opened his eyes.

  He was still in the cellar, but he could see perfectly fine. He wondered where the light could be coming from, but a quick look around found no source.

  Colin stood, realizing with a start that the pain in his leg had vanished.

  So, in fact, had all of his other pain. He lifted his shirt, expecting to see bruised ribs, but there wasn’t a mark on them.

  Even the withdrawal symptoms had vanished.

  The hypodermic was still in his hand. Colin stared at it, remembering.

  “It worked. It bloody well worked.”

  Van Helsing still lay sprawled out on the floor, face down.

  Colin looked at him, and he began to drool. Hunger surged through him, an urge so completely overwhelming it dwarfed his addiction to heroin.

  Without resisting the impulse, he fell to the ground and bit into the old man’s neck. His new teeth tore through the skin easily, but when his tongue touched blood, Colin jerked away.

  Rancid. Like spoiled milk.

  A sound, from above. Colin listened, amused at how acute his hearing had become.

  “All right, then. Jake, you go downstairs and mercy kill the junkie, and then we’ll be off.”

  Mercy kill, indeed
.

  Colin forced himself to be patient, standing stock-still, as the trap door opened and a figure descended.

  “Well well well, look who’s up and about. Be brave, I’ll try to make it painless.”

  Jake moved forward. Colin almost grinned. Big, sweating, dirty Jake smelled delicious.

  “You got some fight left in you, eh?”

  Colin lunged.

  His speed was unnatural; he was on Jake in an instant. Even more astounding was his strength. Using almost no effort at all, he pulled the larger man to the ground and pinned down his arms.

  “What the hell?”

  “I’ll try to make it painless,” Colin said.

  But from the sound of Jake’s screams, it wasn’t painless at all.

  This blood wasn’t rancid. This blood was ecstasy.

  Every cell in Colin’s body shuddered with pleasure; an overwhelming rush that dwarfed the feeling of heroin, a full body orgasm so intense he couldn’t control the moan escaping his throat.

  He sucked until Jake stopped moving. Until his stomach distended, the warm liquid sloshing around inside him like a full term embryo.

  But he remained hungry.

  He raced up the ladder, practically floating on his newfound power. Butts stood at the table, piling dishes into a wooden crate.

  “Colin?”

  Butts proved delicious, too. In a slightly different way. Not as sweet, sort of a Bordeaux to Jake’s Cabernet. Colin’s tongue was a wild thing. He lapped up the blood like a mad dog at a water dish, ravenous.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  Colin let Butts drop, whirling to face Willie.

  “Good God!”

  Willie reached into his vest, removed a small Derringer. He fired twice, both shots tearing into Colin’s chest.

  There was pain.

  But more than pain, there was hunger.

  Willie turned to run, but Colin caught him easily.

  “I wonder what you’ll taste like,” he whispered in the screaming man’s ear.

  Honeysuckle mead. The best of the three.

  Colin suckled, gulping down the nectar as it pulsed from Willie’s carotid. He gorged himself until one more swallow would have caused him to burst.

  Then, in an orgiastic stupor, he stumbled from the house and into the glorious night.

  No longer dark and silent and scary, the air now hummed with a bright glow, and animal sounds from miles away were clear and lovely.

  Bats, chasing insects. A wolf, baying the moon. A tree toad, calling out to its mate.

  Such sweet, wonderful music.

  The feeling overwhelmed Colin, and he shuddered and wept. This is what he’d been searching for his entire life. This was euphoria. This was power. This was a fresh start.

  “I see you have been busy.”

  Colin spun around.

  Van Helsing stood at the entrance to the house. His right hand still gripped Colin’s bone knife. His left hand was gone, severed above the wrist where the chain had bound him. The stump dripped gore, jagged white bone poking out.

  Colin studied Van Helsing’s face. Still sunken, still anguished. But there was something new in the eyes. A spark.

  “Happy, old man? You finally have your freedom.”

  “Freedom is not what I seek. I desire only the redemption that comes with death.”

  Colin grinned, baring the sharp tips of his new fangs.

  “I’ll be happy to kill you, if you want.”

  Van Helsing frowned.

  “The lineage of nosferatu ends now, Mr. Willoughby. No more may be allowed to live. I have severed the heads of the ones inside the house. Only you and I remain.”

  Colin laughed, blood dripping from his lips.

  “You mean to kill me? With that tiny knife? Don’t you sense my power, old man? Don’t you see what I have become?” Colin spread out his arms, reaching up into the night. “I have been reborn!”

  Colin opened wide, fangs bared to tear flesh. But something in Van Helsing’s face, some awful fusion of hate and determination, made Colin hesitate.

  Van Helsing closed the distance between them with supernatural speed, plunging the knife deep into Colin’s heart.

  Colin fell, gasping. The agony was exquisite. He tried to speak, and blood — his own rancid blood — bubbled up sour in his throat.

  “Not…not…wood.”

  “No, Mr. Willoughby, this is not a wooden stake. It will not kill you. But the damage should be substantial enough to keep you here for an hour or so.”

  Van Helsing drove the knife further, puncturing the back of Colin’s rib cage, pinning him to the ground.

  “I have been waiting sixty years to end this nightmare, and I am tired. So very tired. With our destruction, my wait shall finally be over. May God have mercy on our souls.”

  Colin tried to rise, but the pain brought tears.

  Van Helsing rolled off, and sat, cross-legged, on the old cobblestone road. He closed his eyes, his thin, colorless lips forming a serene smile.

  “I have not seen a sunrise in sixty years, Mr. Willoughby. I remember them to be very beautiful. This should be the most magnificent of them all.”

  Colin began to scream.

  When sunrise came, it cleansed like fire.

  Prior to being published, I’d often go to open mike night and read stories at a venue called Twilight Tales in Chicago. They sporadically publish short story collections, and for their latest anthology, Tales From The Red Lion, asked me for one. This is what I gave them.

  Horace checked the address he’d written down, then walked left on Fullerton. Chicago was dark, but far from quiet. Summer meant people stayed out late. Though it neared 10pm, the sidewalks remained packed with college kids, bar hoppers, tourists, and the occasional homeless man holding out his filthy Styrofoam change cup.

  Straight ahead he saw the sign; The Red Lion. Horace contemplated walking away, realized he didn’t have any choices left, and entered through the narrow door.

  The bar resembled a traditional English pub, or what Horace assumed one would look like. Dark, smoky, with stools older than he was and a large selection of scotch bottles lining the wall. He scanned the room, saw one man sitting alone, and approached him cautiously, the stained hardwood floor creaking beneath his feet.

  “Are you Dr. Ricardo?”

  The man — old, grizzled, red-eyed — glanced up at Horace over a half-empty rocks glass. He drained the remainder and stared, not saying anything.

  “My name is Horace Gelt. You’re a plastic surgeon, right?”

  Ricardo sniffed the empty glass, looking mournful.

  “I don’t like talking about the past.” The doctor’s voice was rough, as if he didn’t use often.

  Horace looked around, saw that none of the bar’s four customers were paying attention to him, and sat at the table across from the doctor. He leaned forward on his elbows, getting a closer look. The results didn’t impress him. Sallow pallor. Sunken eyes. A fat tongue that protruded between thin lips. The doctor looked like he’d died a month ago but no one had bothered to tell him.

  Again, Horace considered walking away. Then he thought about the record book, about his life’s dream, and forced himself to continue.

  “I was told you might be able to help me.”

  Ricardo’s red eyes squinted. “Help you how?”

  This wasn’t illegal. At least, not on Horace’s end. But he still felt as if he were making a drug deal, or soliciting a prostitute.

  “I need…surgery.”

  “I need whiskey.”

  Horace caught the attention of the bartender and pointed at Ricardo. A moment later, the doctor had a fresh glass in front of him.

  “How about you?” Ricardo asked. “Don’t drink?”

  “I’m training.”

  Ricardo’s shoulders flinched in what might have been a shrug, or a snort. He sipped his new drink and leaned forward. The smell of booze coming off this guy made Horace want to recoil, but he
didn’t move.

  “What are you? Tranny? Want me to lop off the goods, shave the Adam’s apple, give you boobies?”

  Horace made a face. “No.”

  “I’m good at it. Making little boys into little girls. Had talent. A kind of sixth sense. They shouldn’t have revoked my license. I helped a lot of people.”

  Horace had done his research, and didn’t mention the patient that had sued Ricardo out of a license. The guy had gone into surgery expecting a nose job, and had walked out with a vagina. Rhinoplasty on the wrong protrusion.

  “I don’t want to be a woman.” Horace pulled the book page from his pocket, unfolded it carefully. Brett Gantner’s smiling face stared up at him, mocking. Horace showed the doctor.

  “What is that? I don’t have my glasses on.”

  “Page 43 from the Shawley Book of World Records. Brett Gantner is the record holder for pull-ups. Seven-hundred and forty in an hour.”

  “I’m sure it makes his mother proud.” Ricardo leaned back and sipped more booze. The bartender returned with a basket of food — fish and chips — and set it before the doctor. Without bothering to look at it Ricardo stuck his hand in and began to munch.

  “I’m second place. See?” Horace pointed at the printing. “Horace Kellerman. Seven-hundred twenty-five.”

  “Only missed by a few,” Ricardo said, his open mouth displaying half-chewed fish. “Damn shame. Maybe you should work out.”

  Horace bit back his reply. He worked out all the time, eight, sometimes ten hours a day. He ate all the right foods, supplemented with the right products, treated his body like a shrine. But no matter how hard he worked, how much effort he gave, he couldn’t do more than seven-hundred and twenty-five pull ups. It didn’t seem humanly possible.

  The quest to be number one had become such an obsession with Horace that he actually flew to Phoenix to meet Brett Gantner, to see what he had that Horace didn’t.

  As it turned out, it was what Brett didn’t have that made him the World Record holder. Brett was missing his left leg, above the knee.

  “Car accident,” Gantner had told him over wheat germ smoothies. “I get around okay with the prosthesis. It hasn’t slowed me down any. Don’t you agree, Mr. Second Place?”

  Horace felt his bile rise at the memory. Gantner had beaten him not because he was the superior athlete, but because he weighed less. About fifteen pounds less. The weight of one leg.