by J. R. Rain
I knew it was his successes that continued to drive Lichtenstein. Franklin was such a success. And there were, no doubt, others. But for every one success, there seemed to be a dozen who turned out mindless zombies.
Few noticed me or gave me much mind. Most sat or lurched or lay. The smell of decay was everywhere.
In and out I jumped. Room after room: back rooms, balconies, living rooms, even the kitchen. Grand rooms, not so grand rooms. I jumped and jumped, growing dizzier and dizzier with each flame I summoned, each new room, I appeared in.
One thing was certain, Lichtenstein was nowhere to be found. And neither was the boy.
In the master bedroom, as I stood next to what I assumed was Lichtenstein’s rumpled bed, holding a bedpost to steady myself, I scanned the surrounding closets and hallways, and there, just behind a bookcase was a small, dark, hidden room, a room with a single bed inside. Tubes were attached to an elaborate machine of some sort. Refrigeration, I realized. The blood was going from the warm body of a young boy, straight to a cold-storage unit.
The boy. Luke. I held the image of the secret room, saw it in the flame, and jumped.
***
I stumbled, crashing over the small, occupied bed. I braced myself, gasping. One thing was certain, with each jump I was growing weaker... and hungrier. Indeed, I was only now discovering that I seemed to have only so many jumps in me.
Now, as I steadied myself, I found myself highly aware of the sweet scent of fresh blood. Blood that I knew was special and rich, pure and fresh. Magical blood.
The room was small and completely enclosed. No windows, no obvious doors, no light. No doubt, soundproof. A true torture chamber, of sorts.
Yes, I was hungry, but my heart broke for the little boy who had been forced to lay here, bleeding into a refrigeration-storage system, a boy who, upon checking for a pulse was alive, if barely.
I paced the small room, fighting myself, fighting the demon within, too. I knew I was surrounded by rarefied blood, but was it not also the blood of a distant ancestor, too? Were we not all related to the same ancient alchemist?
We were. The boy, however distant, was related to me.
That made him a relative, of sorts.
It did, dammit. It did.
I paced and fought my hunger. I needed to feed. I needed to wash the poison out of me, so to speak. Waves of dizziness washed over me. I quit pacing the small room, to conserve my energy.
Never, never had I been so hungry, so weak, so in obvious need of blood.
Wouldn’t the blood go to waste? I reasoned.
Perhaps. But it was the blood of a relative, however distant. But didn’t relatives give each other their kidneys? Maybe... but they are given. They are not taken.
I pushed my fingers through my hair—and made a decision.
I reached down to his arm. Gripped the tube leading into the vein just inside his elbow... and pulled.
Chapter Fifty-eight
I knew I wasn’t a monster, and I knew I couldn’t feed on a boy, even if his own blood would go to waste or be destroyed later.
There had to be another way, and the demon bitch inside me could go straight to hell.
Blood poured free from the hole in his arm, the blood glowed brightly to my eyes. I plugged the hole with a finger, took his hand, and thought of the only place I knew that could help.
And summoned the single flame.
This would be, I knew, my last jump... unless I could find another source of sustenance.
***
It was a room I was familiar with, a room I had spent many agonizing hours in as I had once watched my own son, Anthony, fight for his life... and ultimately, turn into something far stronger than he had ever been before.
Now, as I stumbled forward, it was all I could do to not topple over the boy in my arms. A freestanding machine took the brunt of my shoulder. Luckily, it held firm and I stayed upright.
When I opened my eyes again, I found myself staring into the very startled face of a young girl, sitting up in a hospital bed. She was covered in tubes as well, her head shaved.
“Hi, sweetie,” I said, gasping, trying not to faint on top of her.
“Are you an angel?” she asked.
I nodded, sucking air, although that did little to help my cause. I needed much, much more than air. “Something like that. Do you mind if I leave Luke here with you? He needs help really, really bad.”
“Sure. I’ll take care of him.”
I smiled—or tried to—and set the boy as gently as I could next to her.
“Can you hit the nurse’s button for me?” I asked.
She nodded eagerly and reached for the nurse call button located directly on the hospital bedrail. I stumbled out of the room, and regained my composure just as I passed a young nurse moving quickly toward the room I had just exited.
***
Gasping and stumbling, I followed the signage all the way to a very different laboratory, one that wasn’t designed to raise the dead. At least, so they thought.
At the desk, I commanded the nurse to allow me into the back rooms. She did so, getting up and moving around and opening the door for me. Once through, I saw a male phlebotomist drawing blood from a young man. Both looked up at me.
“Can I help you?” asked the phlebotomist, and not very nicely.
“As a matter of fact, you can.”
***
I drank deeply from the test tubes.
Not straight from the tap, so to speak, but nearly. Both men watched me, blank expressions in their eyes. Their mouths might have gone slack, too. Both expressions might have been my fault. After all, they’d been told to forget I was ever there.
I tossed the second empty capsule in a nearby trash can, having knocked it back like shots at a nightclub. I proceeded to do the same with the third and fourth capsule samples lined up on the tray. I ordered a fifth to be drawn. Both men complied. Once finished, I drank from that one, too, relishing the warmth, knowing I was activating the demon bitch inside me. In this moment, as my hunger had nearly spun out of control, I didn’t care. A small price to pay, and I would deal with her later.
I ordered one more capsule for good measure, knocked it back, then considered my options. It was still just under two hours before midnight. I had some time before my daughter fulfilled a devilish destiny. I could wait at the intersection where my daughter’s destiny would be fulfilled. Or, I could chase down the monster who preyed upon children. There was, after all, some unfinished business at Frankenstein’s castle.
It didn’t take me long to come to a conclusion. Besides, there had been something nagging at me, something the good doctor had said: “Franklin is a fellow shape-shifter.”
The implication had been subtle. He could have been talking about Kingsley and I, but I suspected he just might have been including himself in the mix.
Sweet Jesus.
With my strength somewhat replenished—I would have needed perhaps ten more vials to be fully restored—I summoned the single flame.
Chapter Fifty-nine
I found myself once again in the arena.
As far as scenes go, this was a terrible one. Terrible and exciting. There was Nigel’s head, stacked neatly on his powerful, if not mismatched body. There was an arm nearby, cleaved clean through just below the elbow. And there was Franklin, squatting down, bracing himself with Nigel’s own sword. Both hands gripped the pommel. His head hung down to his chest. I got the impression that the fight had only just ended. Franklin and the monster executioner had, I suspected, been fighting to the death this entire time.
I came over and squatted next to him. Blood dripped from his sword, oozing down the blade, to spill into the dry earth. All immortals bled, I knew. How important that lifeblood was, I didn’t know. I doubted I could bleed to death, but I didn’t know for sure. How much our blood differed from mortal blood, I didn’t know that either. My own blood—thanks to Danny and one of his stupid schemes to control me—had tested normally y
ears ago, whatever that meant.
“He had been like a brother to me, Sam,” said Franklin, although he did not look up, his forehead still pressed into his hands, themselves holding the pommel of the sword.
I waited. The room was silent. How many creatures had perished in here?
“We had both been successes, as Lichtenstein would call us. He’d had so many failures. Whereas, my intellect developed rapidly, Nigel’s had not. I didn’t care. He was, like I said, a brother to me. Although we emerged into these bodies, fully formed, we had a learning process to complete, a maturation process, if you will. To be blunt, we were like children, experimenting with these new bodies, these powerful bodies. Later, Lichtenstein chose one of us to kill for him, and the natural choice had been Nigel, who’d always been a little stronger, and always a little simpler. Nigel didn’t complain. He took on the role proudly. Anything to please his creator.”
Franklin spit into the earth... a big, bloody wad of the stuff. There might have been a tooth in the mix. He continued: “I grew to hate Lichtenstein. I saw him for the monster he was. How I was able to break my bond with him, I don’t know.”
“And, later, he became bonded with you,” I said.
Franklin glanced at me. “You know your monster history, Sam.”
“I happen to be an ace detective.”
“Indeed. Yes, later, Lichtenstein chose me to bring him back from the dead, using his own patented techniques of monster-making, if you will. Once he drank the arsenic, I considered leaving him for dead. But the bond I had with him at the time, although tenuous at best, was enough for me to fulfill his dying request: to bring him back from the dead. I regret that decision now.”
“Do you remember who you were?” I asked.
“Before Lichtenstein brought me back from the dead? Sometimes. Scattered memories. Incoherent memories. Only Lichtenstein has managed to retain his old memories of his past life, and even then, I suspect he forgets. Like you, there is another in him, fighting for control.”
“You as well?” I asked.
“All of us. But many here are operating at a very base level, not fully functioning. I can hardly imagine a highly evolved dark master showing interest in them.”
“I need to find him,” I said.
“I know, Sam.”
“He can’t keep preying on innocent children.”
“I know that, too.”
“I might have to kill him, Franklin. Will you be okay with that?”
He continued looking at me. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Do you know where I can find him?”
“My guess? He’s waiting for you by the lake.”
“The lake?”
Franklin held my gaze, and I nodded, finally getting it. Of course, it all made sense.
“Thank you, Franklin. Are you going to be okay?”
“Don’t worry about me, Sam. I have work to do here. Work I should have done long ago.” He nodded to himself, and a pained look crossed his face. Finally, he glanced at me. “Just be careful. The doctor hasn’t managed to stay alive this long for nothing.”
For the first time ever, I gave Franklin a hug. He didn’t hug me back, although he leaned in my direction. Good enough.
I dashed off.
Chapter Sixty
I considered teleporting to the lake, but decided to conserve my energy. Besides, with all my jumping, I now knew the layout of the castle like the back of my hand.
As I ran, I checked my new Apple Watch, which flashed on every time I turned my wrist. Handy when you’re running. Not so handy if you’re trying to remain hidden from bad guys, say, in the dark. I wondered if the Apple geniuses had thought of that. Tonight, I had dressed up for my night out with Kingsley. Granted, once in the hotel room, I had changed to jeans and running shoes. But the cool Apple Watch remained. We would see if I ever saw it again. When shape-shifting to Talos, I tended to lose a lot of clothes and jewelry and watches.
I rounded a curve and spotted the bright light at the far end of the tunnel. At least, bright to my eyes. The cave entrance. Or, in my case, the exit. At the mouth of the opening, I nearly gasped at the epic view before me: the lake stretched nearly as far as the eye could see, glittering with life, sparkling with energy, undulating with movement.
The cliff itself was a steep drop into the water. Cool night air buffeted me. It was good to be free, good to be out of the stifling tunnel, which had proved to be hotter than I was comfortable with. Boulders surrounded the opening; indeed, the cave would have been nearly impossible to spot from the lake itself.
It didn’t take very long for me to pick out the single rowboat in the center of the lake, or the two men in it. My eyesight is spectacular—as clear as it could be, in fact—but at this distance, even I couldn’t make out who they were.
But I could guess.
I stripped off my clothes, and, yes, carefully removed my fancy new watch, too. I laid everything over the rocks, easy to spot from the air. Then I stood upon the highest boulder... and prayed like hell I wasn’t too weak to shape-shift.
And I kept praying even as I leaped out into the air... and summoned the single flame, inside of which I saw Talos, waiting and watching me. Arms spread out, I arched up and out over the rocks, then began plummeting down. I didn’t jump nearly as far out as I had hoped, and I was seconds away from dashing face-first into the outcropping below, when the image of Talos rushed towards me. A nanosecond later, I felt the wind catch in my huge, leathery wings. The membrane snapped taut, and instead of crashing into the boulder, I only grazed them. I flapped once, twice, and gained some altitude.
That was close, Talos. I’m sorry.
Rough night?
You have no idea.
Oh, I have some idea. Once Talos and I were united, he had access to all my thoughts and memories. There was literally nothing hidden from the giant flying beast. But there is good news, Sam.
What’s that?
I’m as strong as I ever was.
That’s very, very good news.
I circled the single rowboat which sat adrift in the center of the lake. Rufus sat at the helm, holding an oar in each hand. His job seemed to be Castle Lichtenstein’s official ferryman. The passenger was none other than Lichtenstein himself. Unlike my eyes, Talos’s own pierced the darkness at great distance and with supernatural ease. Lichtenstein stood in the small boat. Surely not advisable. I also noted he wasn’t wearing a life jacket. Tsk, tsk. Neither man gave off an aura. And, like other immortals, neither sparkled with life. Hell, the buzzing mosquitoes around them gave off more light.
The walking dead, I thought.
Lichtenstein’s pale face angled up, following me as I circled the boat. I wasn’t sure what to do next, or what to expect next, but what finally did happen didn’t surprise me very much.
Not one bit.
Lichtenstein gathered himself... and then leaped into the air. The transformation was instant and explosive. Something dark, slithery and monstrous splashed down into the dark water. If my eyes weren’t deceiving me, the creature seemed to be emerging from the air itself, through a rift in time and space, perhaps. I was reminded of a clown car with its dozens of passengers, all emerging from one tiny door. In this case, one fabulously long beast, its rubbery hide gleaming in the moonlight, as it continued to splash down into the water. I noted the thick, undulating muscles rippling along its sleek hide. Finally, its forked, barbed tail came into view, and splashed down last.
There, just beneath the surface, I watched a shadowy, serpentine creature weave deeper and deeper until it nearly disappeared from view. The lake wasn’t quite deep enough for it to truly disappear; indeed, I could just make out its long, undulating form moving slowly over the lake bed, dark against the glittering water. Like its human counterpart, the worm-like creature gave off little auric light. If the creature was anything like Talos, then Lichtenstein had full control of it. He was, I suspected, ready for a fight.
It was time
to give it to him.
Are you ready, Talos? I asked.
As ready as I ever will be, Sam.
We got this, I thought.
Easy for you to say. You’re safe and sound in my world.
I grinned, hesitated for only a moment, then tucked my leathery wings in and dove down...
Down, down...
Down into the black water...
Chapter Sixty-one
It occurred to me, as I splashed down into the lake, that should I kill this massive snake-like thing, Lichtenstein himself wouldn’t die.
No, I thought, but he would be trapped in whatever world he’d currently teleported to, when he’d switched bodies with the beast.
This is true, came Talos’s confirming words.
Is this creature from your world, Talos? I asked, as I oriented underwater.
No, Sam. It is from another.
Have you ever seen anything like it?
I’m afraid not.
I absorbed this information as I flapped Talos’s mighty wings just beneath the lake’s surface. I’d discovered long ago that Talos made for a most excellent underwater conveyance. His massive wings seemed particularly suited to underwater propulsion. I picked up speed, flapping my wings hard, forcing the water down and behind me. Talos gave me complete control over his massive and beautiful and powerful body. I was determined more so than ever that he would make it home, too.
I admire your determination, Sam. But do not forget: like Lichtenstein, should I perish in this world, you would be forever stuck in mine, as well.