by K T Kaye
“What, you mean blood donations?”
“Yeah that! Only rather than going to a hospital, it feeds vampires. Oh I should also tell you that vampires are a very diverse species.”
“What do you mean?”
“Right so not all vampires turn into bats, a lot do but not all. Some aren’t affected by garlic or crucifixes, and some can appear in photos and can cross running water. Vampires are all very different. They don’t all have the same traits.”
“Right,” I muttered. This was a lot of information to take in, and I was starting to get very confused by it all.
“Ah,” Paris continued, “Also vampires have sunlight tattoos. These tattoos are basically spells, that witches attach to their bodies. It allows vampires to walk in the sunlight. Oh and werewolves can transform into large wolves whenever they want, but on a full moon they’re forced to transform into the half-wolf half-man monsters you may have seen in movies. Oh also…”
“Wait, wait just, can we take a break for a minute?” I asked, “This is a lot to process!”
* * * * *
I was laid on the floor in one of the training rooms, staring at the ceiling. While this may not sound fun to you, to me it was the most relaxing moment of what had been one of the most stressful days of my life. If you’re wondering why I was laying on the floor, the answer is that I was actually doing something extremely important…well I wasn’t but Roxy and Willow who were sat next to me were. They were locking my demon self away, deep within my mind, so that it couldn’t escape and take over my body. Whilst I relaxed, the two telepaths were hard at work inside my mind. Or at least that’s what they said they were doing; I couldn’t feel a thing. When they had told me what they were going to do, I had expected it to be a painful process that would emotionally scar me for life, however I couldn’t even tell they were doing it. I didn’t feel any different. I couldn’t even tell they were in my mind. I felt the same way I always did tired, hungry, and confused. As the telepaths continued to work, I found myself falling asleep.
Which was when I was attacked by a rather strange dream.
“Master get down!”
There was a rain of arrows. I raised my hands and a crystal force field covered my body. I pulled Harry under the forcefield, but I was too late. Hit by an arrow, he stumbled to his knees and coughed up blood before falling flat on his face. I knelt and checked his pulse. He was dead.
“Poor soul,” I muttered. Getting up, I ran over the bloody muddy battlefield. There were bodies and limbs all around. I jumped as I heard a roar behind me. Turning I found myself face-to-face with a huge demon. It had white scales, deep red eyes and black fangs that dripped with blood. I pulled out my black crystal staff and pointed it at the demon. The crystal glowed. The demon shuddered and then exploded into tiny pieces, its skin falling like snow onto the battlefield.
“Master Robert!” shouted a vampire. The vampire was tall with flowing brown hair and cold eyes.
“Rose,” I greeted the vampire “We are running out of men. Where is my sister?”
“She’s safe.”
“Yes, but where?”
“She’s at the camp with Edwin.”
“Good. Pull the troops back to the rocks then ah!” I gasped, collapsing to my knees, “What have you done?”
“You have trusted all the wrong people,” Rose smiled, pulling the dagger from my back, and baring her fangs.
“What have you done to my sister?”
“Oh, she’s bleeding to death in a muddy ditch somewhere.”
“You shouldn’t have done that,” I got to my feet and black mist exploded from my hands, hitting Rose in the chest. Rose stumbled backwards and then collapsed to the floor, as her body slowly crumbled to ash.
Blood dripped from where Rose had stabbed me.
I sat up, my head spinning like a disco ball.
I laid back on my pillow as I tried to calm down. Pillow? I sat up once again and looked around. I was no longer in the training room. I was in my bedroom. I found a note on my bedside table. It read:
You fell asleep, so we brought you to your room. Me and Will have locked your demon away so you no longer have to worry about it. Have a nice nap!
Roxy xx
I calmed slightly and got out of bed. I headed to the chair by the fireplace and sat myself down. Now that I had solved the mystery of how I’d got to my room, I could relax and contemplate the strange dream. It hadn’t felt like a dream. It had felt real. The dream didn’t make sense. How had I known that the dead guy was called Harry, and who was this Edwin fella? They hadn’t seemed like random characters I had created; they had seemed real. When Harry had died, I had felt like I had lost a dear friend. There were other things about the dream that kept bugging me. Like why did they call me Robert? Who was this sister they kept talking about? And why had that vampire, Rose, stabbed me? I’m so loveable! How could anyone stab me!?
I took a deep breath and tried to calm my panic. I was overthinking. The dream had just been a very strange nightmare. That was all. And it was no wonder I was having nightmares. My mum had been murdered by a vampire, I was living in a world full of supernatural beings, and I had turned into a demon! Things don’t get much crazier than that! Not unless I found out that I was really Santa in disguise, I think that would top the crazy list! I gazed at one of the pictures on the wall and saw something that sent my insides turning. Under a portrait of a tall man with long black hair was a name plate, which read:
Robert Dragonheart, Master of Darkness.
And that was the moment I began my panicked inner monologue. That man, that couldn’t be the same person who was in my dream, could it? No that would be ridiculous, says the guy who just turned into a demon! Why does he have the same last name as me? Are we related? Am I blood related to my reincarnations? Is that how it works? Hang on that’s not important, what’s important is why have I been dreaming about Robert Dragonheart? Unless it wasn’t a dream, what if it was a memory from my past life! No that couldn’t be the case, could it? No, no, no that would be too creepy! I can’t be dealing with that! It was just a nightmare. I probably saw the name plate earlier and saved it in my subconscious. Yes that sounded like a logical explanation. Okay. Let’s just go with that. Come on Jason, take a deep breath. Take a deep breath and just look at the nice calm fire. The nice fire that’s just crackling away. Burning wood. Having a great time. Just look at the nice flames…
Then my hand set on fire!
Black flames danced around my fingertips. I jumped to my feet and tried to batter the flames down, but the fire didn’t want to move. I hopped around my room trying to put my hand out. However, the flames must have really liked me, as they wouldn’t leave my fingertips. I stopped hopping and tried to calm myself, which wasn’t easy as I was freaking out! My hand had set itself on fire! I took several deep breaths and realised that the flames didn’t actually hurt. In fact it felt like a puppy was licking my fingers. Without meaning to, I closed my hand into a fist, and, to my surprise, the flames disappeared.
I stared at my hand in wonder. What had I done? Could I do it again? How did I do it the first time? I was thinking about fire, and then my hand had burst into flames. Would that work again? I closed my eyes and thought about fire. I thought about the flames dancing around the wood in the fireplace. Then I felt a tingling feeling in my hand. I opened my eyes to see that, once again, my hand was on fire.
“Ha!” I exclaimed, “I can set my hand on fire, that’s awesome!”
After playing around with the flames for a while, I began to wonder if I would be able to set other things on fire. I found a crumpled piece of paper lying on my desk and decided that this would be my target. I looked at the flames in my hand and imagined them moving to the paper. As I did so, the flames left my hand and flew onto the piece of paper, burning it into ashes. But then I lost control. The flames spread across my desk. I swore as I raced to my bathroom and grabbed a glass of water, which I quickly threw onto the fire.
The black flames steamed into nothingness.
* * * * *
A week passed in the blink of an eye, and I was beginning to enjoy my time at the base. My average day was made up of training (usually it was fight training with Alexander, but on occasion I’d be taught by Angel), some tutoring from Paris, and then just hanging around the house. I mainly kept with Paris, Ethan, and Roger. Roger and Ethan were nice guys and fun to be around. Paris was cool, he seemed to know everything about everyone. The other members of the squad were nice, apart from Danny (he was a bit scary!), and they helped me settle in quickly. Roxy and Willow regularly checked on my demon self, to make sure it remained locked up, and Araminta introduced me to other people on the base.
The squad (minus Angel who was in a meeting with the Colonel) were training at the shooting range. I was nervous, I had never held a gun before. It was strange, back in the human world, I had never once thought of becoming a soldier. Wars and battles had always seemed so pointless to me, yet here I was, training to fight in a battle I didn’t even understand. Sue was up. She aimed and fired. The bullet hit the wooden target’s shoulder. Sue exhaled bitterly.
“Stop being a perfectionist,” laughed Araminta, “Okay Jason you’re up.”
Taking a deep breath, I stood in front of the target. Araminta handed me the gun and moved my body into position. She started to explain something to me, but I couldn’t hear her. My mind had gone blank. The gun felt cold against my sweaty palms. I felt strange. I felt calm. Really calm. The gun in my hand felt as though it belonged there. Like it was a part of me. Without even realising it, I pulled the trigger. The bullet seemed to fly in slow motion and then bang!
The wooden target fell as the bullet hit its forehead.
Lightning Squad went silent for a moment, then they began to clap and cheer. I stared at the gun in my hand. What had just happened? How had I been able to do that? To be honest I was shocked, and I don’t just mean a bit shocked, I mean hit in the face with a dead fish shock level! I had never held a gun before yet here I was hitting the target perfectly on my first go!
“Oh my gods! Jason, how did you do that?” cried Willow.
“Well done mate,” Roger nodded impressed.
Fern just smirked as she took the gun from my hands. She fired six times in quick succession, then pulled a knife from her hair and threw it at the target. All six bullets hit the target’s chest and the knife landed in its neck. It was clear that Fern was well trained in the art of knife throwing. I made a mental note not to anger her in a kitchen.
The squad then moved into a different training room. Alexander handed me a sword and told me to repeat some basic moves while the others did hand-to-hand combat training. I practiced the moves for a while, okay so I practiced for about ten seconds before I sat myself down and watched the others fight.
First in the ring were Fern and Roger. Fern punched first. She darted forwards and punched Roger in the stomach. Roger went to kick her, but Fern dropped to the floor and kicked him in the leg. Roger fell to the floor but jumped back to his feet quickly. Fern blocked as Roger went to punch her. Fern raced to the side and picked up a bo staff. Roger did the same. The staffs clanged together. Fern spun the staff, but instead of using it, threw it at Roger who went to catch it- he’s a werewolf (part of the dog species) so he likes to play catch. As he did so, Fern skidded across the floor and kicked Roger in an uncomfortable area. As Roger doubled over, Fern kicked him in the face sending him to the floor. He didn’t manage to get up in ten seconds, so the fight was over. Fern had won.
Next was Elsa verses Sophie. Sophie seemed very small next to the tall vampire. She attacked very little and spent most of the time blocking Elsa. Elsa kicked Sophie in the stomach with such force that the fairy was pushed to the floor. She got to her feet only to be kicked in the face. Sophie slumped to the floor as the ten second count ended. My attention was drawn away from the next fight. From where I was sat, I could clearly hear Clover laughing at Sophie’s misfortune.
“I know she’s good on missions but in training she’s pathetic,” Clover hissed.
“She’s pathetic!? Have you looked at yourself recently?” asked Fern.
“Are you trying to start something?”
“I don’t know, am I?”
To my surprise, Clover suddenly launched forwards and grabbed Fern’s hair. She pulled her sister’s head backwards and shoved her to the floor.
“Ow!” hissed Fern as she sat herself up and pulled out her wand. She flicked it, sending sparks of green in Clover’s direction. The sparks set Clover’s hair on fire. The rest of Lightning Squad turned to stare, including Araminta and Alexander who were in the middle of fighting. Clover’s hair was covered in green fire. Fern was laughing. I just stared at them. I felt awkward. I wasn’t sure whether this was normal, or whether I was meant to try and stop them.
“What the hell happened here!?” asked Alexander.
“Well,” grinned Fern, “Ah nothing, grandpa, don’t you worry about it.”
“Could you put Clover’s hair out?”
“I could, technically, but I won’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t like her.”
“And that’s a good reason?”
“Yep!” and with that Fern left, via the fire exit.
“My hair!” screamed Clover, “Someone get me my wand!”
Roxy handed it to her. Clover waved her wand and the flames died down, but most of her hair had been burnt to a crisp. Clover screamed as she saw her reflection in her pocket mirror.
“What is going on!?” exclaimed Angel as she entered the room.
“Fern set my hair on fire!” Clover cried.
“Grow it back with magic.”
“I can’t. She’s hexed it!”
“Wonderful,” Angel muttered sarcastically, “We don’t have time for this. I need you all in the operations room. We have a mission.”
* * * * *
I had never been in the operations room before. It was cool! It looked like something from a sci-fi movie! It had a large table in the centre, and the walls were covered in computer screens. I was nervous. Although they had talked about their missions, I had never seen one in action before, so I didn’t really understand how they worked.
“The mission is this,” Angel stood in front of the touch screen computer that hung on the wall. On the computer screen flashed up images of six nasty looking men.
“In Rio, two days ago, these six escaped the prison they were being held in, killing everyone,” Angel clicked on a computer folder and pictures of dead prison guards and prisoners appeared onscreen. I felt sick as I looked at the broken bloody bodies. I think Elsa must have sensed my disgust as she quickly covered my eyes with her hand.
“What are we dealing with?” asked Roger.
“At first the pictures didn’t make it very clear until,” Angel then (I was told by Elsa later) dragged one picture into the centre of the screen. It showed a dead prison guard with blood running from a very messy bite on his neck. Angel turned to the squad and said seriously, “We are dealing with six deadly fresh vampires.”
The room went quiet for a moment as everyone took in this information. Elsa dropped her hand from my face. When I opened my eyes, I found that the pictures had been removed from the screen. Whilst the others quickly read through the mission files (that had been placed at each seat round the table), Angel mouthed to me ‘are you okay?’ I nodded back my reply.
“The day before this,” Angel then continued, “These men were injured during an inmate fight. I think they got turned when they were being treated at the prison hospital.”
“What’s the plan then?” asked Ethan, he then sneezed.
“Bless you. I know that most of you have just got back, and with our new member joining us, this mission is very inconvenient. So we’re going to make this as simple as it possibly can be. The Colonel doesn’t want prisoners, he just wants six body bags, so we go in and we take them o
ut.”
“If they’re newly turned then it’s not really their fault,” Araminta pointed out, “Blood lust is uncontrollable. They won’t know what they’re doing, we can’t kill them based on what they’ve done in blood lust.”
“That’s what I said at first, then the Colonel told me why they were in prison. These men were arrested because they have kidnapped, raped, murdered and sold over a hundred young girls aged seven to sixteen.”
“Bloody hell,” Roger muttered “I hate to imagine what these men would do as vampires.”
“Which is why, we have been ordered to take them out before they have a chance to hurt anyone else.”
“Do we know where these guys are?” asked Ethan.
“These vampires don’t really know anything about this world so, my guess is, they’ll end up at the vampire hotel,” Angel showed a picture of a small metal building that looked to me like a warehouse.
“Who’s on this mission?” Paris asked leaning back in his chair.
“Me, Sophie, Danny, Roger, Fern and Ethan. Alexander, you’ll act as captain until I get back. People on the mission you need to be down here and ready to go in 10 minutes. Dismissed!”
4
‘Rio de Janeiro’
The Squad teleported to Rio de Janeiro. They arrived in an empty alleyway which led to a main road. The streets were sticky and filled with people. The midday sun burnt the road as crowds of humans went about their daily business, completely unaware of the fact that six paranormal beings had just entered their world. Angel led the others through the busy streets and down into a dark maze of buildings.
“Question,” Fern announced.
“What?” Angel muttered; a question with Fern always turned into dozens of useless questions and comments that made her feel clever, and everyone else feel like headless chickens.
“Are we going the right way?”