Vampin Box Set (7-9)
Page 22
Chapter 4
The next morning, Starr showered, went for an early breakfast, and went down to the front of the building, with the Fleet members. As usual, the Army men kept to themselves.
Moments later, three trucks drove up. She and the Fleet climbed into the middle one, while everyone else climbed into the others.
Seventeen hours passed before they made it to the onramp into DC; they didn’t stop once, except to change drivers.
They all parked on Pennsylvania Avenue, right in front of the White House South Portico, which the Army wanted to inspect first.
Alin told them to wait.
Seeing the White House was a shock, and not just because it looked smaller, to her, than it looked on television and in history books, but because it was completely trashed.
Many windows that were visible from between the trees were broken. From one window, bloody handprints could be seen on the outer ledge, followed by heavy black smudges right below them; likely shoes from someone trying to slow their fall.
The double doors of the South Portico were busted into bits. On the East Side of the property, a pile of arms, legs, heads, and torsos had been stacked next to a charred out section of the lawn.
“Well, Starr,” said Alin. “This is where you come in.”
Starr’s ability to see in other places, otherwise known as remote viewing, was a power that no one in the Fleet had.
She probed the ground floors, first: Next, the Red, Green, and Blue Rooms, followed by the rest of the West and East Wings.
Then she extended her view to the Executive Residence, where she said, “I see a couple in what appears to be a guest room.”
Steve, from dinner, the night prior, said, “Okay, let’s go.”
“No, wait,” she said strongly, wanting to try something she’d thought of in the night.
She concentrated, hard, on one of them, and it burst into flames.
Starr couldn’t help but be pleased as she went after the others and picked them off, one by one.
“What’s going on?” asked Chanler.
“Shh…” she said, trying to concentrate on the last one, but his incessant talking agitated her, making her accidentally obliterate the last one, sending chunks of meat and blood everywhere.
“Starr, answer me.”
Annoyed by Chanler, yet intrigued by her new abilities, she replied “They’re gone.”
“Gone?” asked Emil.
“Burned the first couple; obliterated the last one, thanks to Chanler. Let me check the rest Executive Residence.”
“Well?” asked Alin, after a moment.
“I hear something; it’s in some sort of storage room, but I’m having a hard time penetrating the walls. I think it’s some sort of panic room.”
“Wait!” commanded an older military man, Sergeant Kale. “You might be viewing the Presidential Shelter; a place that’s supposed to protect them in war times.”
“The president isn’t in there; it’s just a girl.”
“We need to check it out before you do anything.”
He turned around and signaled to the men, who climbed over the wrought iron fence.
Starr and the others leapt over the black metal bars and landed on the grass beside them.
As they walked around to the Executive Residence, Starr observed all the dead bodies along West Executive Avenue, most of which had their cavities eaten clean out.
They forced their way into the president’s residence, and found their way down to the storage rooms. From behind a tapestried wall, they sensed a presence.
“Stand back,” said Alin, who concentrated on the door, but when he couldn’t melt it with pyro-kinesis, he asked Starr to help.
After a few moments, they melted down the door and, from inside, a pubescent teen with pig tails came out.
“It’s too late,” said Starr. “She’s turned.”
Sergeant Kale shouted, “Wait!”
Alin paid no attention, as he pulled a large knife from his belt and hacked off her head in one swipe.
“That was the president’s daughter,” he said somberly.
“Not anymore,” said Chanler.
Back outside, on the lawn, Starr probed buildings, looking for vampires, and it didn’t take long for her to find them. Along the Constitution Avenue, nearly every building had hundreds of them, like cockroaches on a three week old corpse.
“Well,” Starr sighed and walked across the lawn. “We definitely have our work cut out for us.
She leapt over the black metal bars and proceeded across the street, and then headed toward the Federal buildings, followed by the others.
Hours went by with them killing vampires, who often came at them like rabid dogs. Starr found that it was impossible for her to use her mind to obliterate all of them, for it made her extremely weary, so she shot as many as she could, and beheaded them when they got too close.
By nearly midnight, they’d cleaned out almost half of the Avenue; from the National Mall all the way down to the Gatehouse, and then Capitol Hill.
The Army men killed vampires pretty well for their selves, but on the few occasions when they got into trouble, they acted like they would have rather died then be helped by Starr and the Fleet.
“A thank you would be nice,” said Michelle at one point. “We just saved your asses.”
“Yeah, and it’s because of you that we’re in this mess to begin with,” said a blond man, and then he walked off.
Exhausted, they camped on the grounds of the South Portico that night.
There were two large campfires; one in front of the West Wing, where the Army camped, and the Fleet’s fire, in front of the East Wing.
The soldiers ate army meals while Starr and the others roasted a lamb that Emil picked up from a butcher. Despite offers and envious feelings, the soldiers refused to touch any of their meat.
“And look,” he exclaimed to Starr, in his Swiss accent. He rested the lamb on his shoulder, and unraveled a paper bag, but Starr could already smell what was inside, and her inner demon wanted what was wrapped in that white shiny paper, and secured with white tape. “Lamb brains. Americans have good taste, after all. We ate this even when I was human!” he grinned.
Emil, helped by Sari, sliced the bloody, spongy brains and put them on a platter with crackers, sliced goat cheese and sundried tomatoes.
Every once in a while Starr would catch him watching her out of the corner of her eye.
“You know, Starr,” said Emil, as he leaned over and sliced off a large chunk of lamb, placed it on a plate, and handed it to her. “Things aren’t so bad at the Council. There needs to be people in the world, like us, because, otherwise, it would be absolute mayhem. Imagine the world without laws, without police, or military. Despite all the work we do, it’s quite an adventurous job.”
“I would love to work with you, but there are other responsibilities that I’ve got. Also, the kids at the clinic: Who would take care of them?”
“What if you and the kids come to stay in Romania, for a short while? I have a feeling that things are going to get worse, for everyone, before they get better.”
“No, Emil. I appreciate the offer, but what would the kids do while trapped in a castle in the Carpathian Mountains?”
After hours of eating and talking, Starr and the Fleet finally settled into their sacks for a rest.
At dawn, they climbed back inside the trucks and drove through the outer neighborhoods, looking for more vampires.
Meanwhile Sergeant Kale called in a cleanup crew, to come and remove the bodies from the government buildings and burn them.
Luckily, they made it through the neighborhoods of the city fairly quickly, and found themselves headed to New York City by late afternoon.
This made Starr extremely happy, for she wanted to see what her chances were for moving back into the clinic because she missed the city life.
When they came upon a barrage of cars that blocked the entire freeway, the
y decided to go off road. They turned right, onto a slippery, grassy bank and down into what looked like soaked mud, but turned out to be a bog of broken pipes.
The first truck and the Fleet’s managed to get across the mud, but the third truck sank as if the earth disappeared from underneath it.
The men screamed as they were nearly swallowed.
After they got them all out of the truck, they set about trying to tow it out. When nearly an hour of trying passed, they finally managed to drag it out, but not before breaking the other truck’s axel.
The ground too soggy, Starr, the Fleet, and the soldiers made their way to a dry spot, a mile up, where they could camp.
Sergeant Kale and a few of his men rode on into the city, and looked for supplies and didn’t make it back until after dark.
When they realized they’d be there all night, Emil grabbed Starr by the hand and said, “Let’s go look for kindling.”
As they went into the brush, he asked, “So what’s up with you and Chanler?”
“What do you mean?”
“I see the way you two look at each other,” he said as he winked at her.
Starr laughed mildly, “We had a flirtation, but he’s with Michelle.”
“Du bist schon,” he said in German. “Don’t waste your time pining when there are other men out there who would love to be with you.”
She pulled some moss off of a tree and turned.
He was looking back at her, the sun gleaming off his blond head, making his blue eyes look light.
“I loved the way you came into the government building. I could not have done it better myself. The others would not say, but they were just as amused.”
Starr said nothing. Sure, Emil was very good looking, but Starr had never thought of him as a love interest before. Never, had she a clue, and not ever even sensed, that he noticed her.
“Have you ever been to Switzerland?” he said, switching his ‘w’ for a light ‘v’.
“No.”
“I’m from a small town called Grindewald. Lots of tourists, there, but when they aren’t, it’s a lovely little town with snowy peaks. That’s where I was first turned. I have a beautiful home there. You should come visit me this summer; you will love it.”
Not knowing what to say, she turned back to the moss.
“See up there?”
He was pointing to something in the trees: there were ripe cumquats.
She leapt up onto a thick branch to gather as many bunches as she could. As she reached for a particular bushel of healthy untouched by bugs or animals fruits, she felt the branch waver.
Next thing she knew, she was in Emil’s arms. He held onto her as cumquats from the rattled tree broke loose and fell all about them, some hitting them in the head and landing on the ground.
For a moment, their eyes met. His body gave off a highly sweet pheromone. Starr’s inner demon was receptive to it, for every pore in her body suddenly felt alive, and from deep within her womb came a light growl.
Back at the camp, the soldiers had returned with parts to repair the truck, but their lift had broken. A few of the vampires went to help lift the truck while the soldiers fixed it.
Later that evening they sat around the camp fire. Starr stared into the flames, wondering about the kids until Emil came and plopped down with two dead squirrels in his hand.
He sat annoyingly close, and whispered, “You want one?”
Starr’s demon lightly growled at the sight of fresh meat.
With their hands they pulled back the fur and threw it in the fire, and then ate the squirrels raw without discarding their innards.
“Do you have to do that?” asked a young soldier named Dave. His eyes were wide and his lips were peeled back, in disgust.
They hadn’t thought to consider that there were humans who might be offended.
“You don’t like it then leave, Boy!” said Emil with eyes that had turned iridescent.
“You should be put down with the other vampires,” he said, and grabbed a lit log and walked off to find his own spot.
The other soldiers, sickened, grabbed some firewood, from the pile, and followed.
That night she lied in Emil’s arms and fell asleep. She wasn’t crazy about him, but it felt nice to be held. The more she thought about him, and looked at him, the more willing she was, to engage his flirtation.
A relationship was still something she’d never had a real chance to try. There was Antony, before she killed him, but she never had sincere feelings for him, and he certainly didn’t have them for her, not really, anyway.
Deep feelings were something that was hard for vampires to feel, but Starr would have loved to know love, at least once.
Before she drifted off to sleep, she felt someone watching her with disgust. She opened her eyes and it was none other than Chanler who lay with Michelle; her arm on his chest and face in the nook of his shoulder.
Hypocrite, she whispered into his mind.
The next day, they arrived in New York City by eight that morning.
As they made their way to Turtle Bay, Starr took glances into buildings here and there. What she saw made her very sad. She knew it would be awhile before she and the others could return to the city.
They parked right on the plaza.
Sargeant Kale said, “Let’s start with the Conference and Visitor’s Center.”
“Okay,” said Starr. “It seems clear.”
Cautiously, the first of Kale’s men went inside, followed by Starr and the Fleet, and the rest of the men.
“Most of the lower floors are clear, but we should look at the,” Starr paused and looked at the map displayed behind plastic on a stand, “here,” she pointed as she walked up to it, “the Secretariat Building, and there’s a ton in the General Assembly, and of course the Hammskjold Library.”
After a short discussion about who would handle what, Starr and the Fleet went to the General Assembly where the most of them were trapped.
When they stepped off the elevator, Starr heaved; like before, the vampires had taken to eating each other. Normally, rotted corpses didn’t bother her, but the sight of so many together with emptied cavities disgusted her.
It didn’t take long for the vampires, that hadn’t been eaten, to find them. As they walked up either side of the rows, from open doors on both sides of the short podium came a few; they shot accordingly, but more came, and then more. Finally, it was a like a stampede of vampires, and not even they could shoot fast enough.
Within moments, they were completely surrounded by them, Starr, for the first time in a long time, felt panicked.
They were getting too close, and she thought, for a moment, that her end had finally come.
“Starr,” called Emil, but Starr kept fighting and shooting because to let up, even for a second, would mean she would be their next meal.
The vampires closed in even more on her. She heard Michelle screaming on the other side of the room; they must have been surrounded, too.
“Starr,” called Alin from somewhere on the other side of the room. “Burn them up!”
But her emotions were so rattled that instead of setting them aflame, she made them explode, covering them all in blood and guts.
It was still not enough, as the vampires got closer. Emil stepped in front of her, trying to protect her.
Something hot and wet ran down her face.
Am I crying? she asked herself, as vampires rarely could do such things.
That was it; it was the end.
She gave up.
Starr wrapped her arms around his waist and turned her face into his neck, and prepared herself for the pain of being ripped apart while still alive.
Starr could feel their hunger; hear their thoughts. It was suffocating her, as their desires to hunt and kill swallowed her consciousness.
One reached out and touched her. She closed her eyes even tighter, and her mind shouted, NOOOO, STOOOP!!!
But the first bite never c
ame.
“Starr, look,” said Emil.
She opened her eyes and saw hundreds of frozen faces. Starr pulled her head away from the nook of Emil’s neck, and looked around.
All the vampires around them stood stock still.
Suddenly, she had a flash back to the marsh in Louisiana.
The alligator, she reminded herself.
There were shouts from the other side of the room.
Starr spoke to them all, telling them to stop.
“What happened? Why aren’t they moving?” asked James.
“It’s you, isn’t it?” asked Emil, as she looked up into his crystal eyes.
She made a small smile, and he smiled back at her.
It was a long hard day, moving from floor to floor. They’d go into a room, Starr would tell them to freeze, and then they’d go about and kill them one by one. Starr hated to admit to herself, but she was pleased, and so was everyone else – except the soldiers who remained grumpy as usual.
But even more, she was touched by Emil’s willingness to die with her, and how he stayed with her, when he could have run. After that, she looked at him with a new respect and admiration.
After all, she asked of herself, where was Chanler?
Chanler sensed Starr’s change, too. He knew he’d lost Starr to Emil, and instead of being friendly about it, and trying to make it up to Starr, he turned real cold. He was the only one who didn’t congratulate Starr for her work that day. Neither did Michelle, but she had a permanent little smirk on her face.
By the time the sun started to set, everyone was ready to call it a day. They were messy, smelly, and covered in blood and body parts, but they’d managed to kill all the vampires in the entire 39 floor building.
Starr and the Fleet wanted to stay at the Marriott on 42nd, thinking they’d earned it, but the Army insisted they stay at a Ramada Inn in Queens.
Too tired to argue, they agreed.
After inspecting the neighborhood for vampires, they all took rooms on the second floor; the soldiers on the first.
After hot showers, Starr and the others met down in the Ramada’s tiny restaurant and bar. Emil was already in the kitchen, cooking what he could find.
“You call this meat?” he asked James. “Just terrible! The food here is just terrible.”
James rolled his eyes as he sifted through rotted fruits and veggies, and Sari set to thawing frozen bags he’d found in the freezer.
Starr hated the kitchen and, more than anything, she wanted to hang in the dining room and drink, but she wanted to see Emil.
Emil saw right through her, for he said, “Starr, go ahead and wait in the restaurant. We’ve got everything under control, here.”
As she made her way back to the dining area, she pretended not to notice that both Chanler and Michelle’s eyes were following her.
She laughed inwardly, The wheels have turned.
Alin was behind the bar.
“Starr, aperitif?”
“Yeah, you know it, after today,” she sighed. “How about an orange vodka and seven up.”
“Well, just for the record, you were phenomenal. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, you’re cut out for this. Maybe it will take some time, but one day, we’ll get you,” he said with a smile.
Starr smiled back. Inwardly, Starr was starting to agree; she was cut out for the job.
Today felt really good.
“Godfather, please,” Saul came up and sat next to Starr.
“Where are the soldiers?” asked Alin.
“Oh, they’re outside being sour pusses as usual.”
Despite the state of the kitchen, Emil managed to cook a hearty meal. As usual, Michelle kept Chanler to herself, but, not as usual, was the scowl on his face and the constant fleeting glances out of the corners of his eyes, at Starr.
When Alin, Sari, James and Saul finished, they went to the kitchens to clean and find dessert.
“So, Starr, tell me about yourself: How did you come to be a vampire?”
“It’s a long story, but my friend, Michael, turned me.”
“Oh, yes, Mick’s kid.”
After a moment of silence, he asked, “What kind of childhood did you have?”
“A nice normal one that I wish I could return to,” she smiled, as she sipped her drink. “You?”
“Well, as I said, I grew up in the mountain-ski town called Grindewald. My parents had a café, before they retired, and now my brother, Egon, runs it.”
“Your brother is still alive?”
“Well, ja. How old do you think I am?” he grinned. “I’m twenty –five; I was only turned a few years ago. Before that I was a Swiss Guard ‘vorking’ at the Vatican,” he said. “I think that is partly why I like you; not just because you’re hot and kickass, but you’re the only person I can relate to, at least somewhat. Most of these guys can’t even send simple text messages; they’re worse than my grandparents, haha.”
“My Grandparents aren’t much better, either,” she laughed lightly.
“Speaking of, what is your number?”
“I lost my phone in the fire, but I’m sure we’ll see other again soon enough.”
Inwardly, she hoped….
The guys came back with a couple frozen cakes and dishes. Everyone settled at the bar, even Michelle and Chanler, and had dessert.
Later that evening, Starr went to bed feeling quite satisfied: she was clean, full, and now a bed with a fluffy comforter was waiting for her.
She threw her clothes on the floor, with thoughts, like marbles, of Emil rolling around her mind, and climbed into bed.
She was only down an hour when there was an urgent knock at her door, waking her out of a heavy slumber.
“Just a sec,” she called, as she clumsily put her clothes on.
“Yeah,” she said as she opened the door.
No one was there.
From a few doors over, there was knocking on other doors. She stuck her head out and looked right: Alin was trying to rouse everyone from their rooms.
“Okay, everyone,” said Alin. “We need to get out of here, now.”
“Why?” asked Michelle, attitude boiling under her surface as usual.
“The soldiers are gone. I went around to perform security checks, and then to check on the soldiers, and they’re gone.”
“So, what are you saying?” asked Sari.
“I’m saying that something is not right.”
“Wait,” said Starr, who automatically set to sensing the other rooms. “I hear something in the stairwell; there’s something there. I don’t know what it is.”
“I hear it, too,” said James. “A beeping noise, like a digital clock.”
And then Starr’s eyes met James, whose eyes had widened, wildly.
“OUT, NOW! IT COULD BE A BOMB!” he shouted.
And he ran to the hallway, followed by the others.
Instead of taking the stairs or the elevator, he leapt through the window, fell to the ground and ran across the street.
Starr and the others followed.
A moment later, they stood across the street, looking at each other.
“Are you sure it was a bomb?” asked Alin.
“No,” he sighed. “I guess I’ve seen too many movies.”
But then there was an increase of heat, and a sudden brightness that glared in their faces. They looked back at the building: the first floor was massively alight.
One minute later, the sounds of blasts came from within the building, the ground rumbled heavily, and all seven stories caved inward.
“Wow, they really took the time to do us in,” said Sari. “They even professionally wired it so as to implode, which means they must have set this up days ago.”
“What do we do, now?” asked James.
“Well, it’s just as well they should think we’re dead, and that way we remain anonymous. This is a gift unrealized,” said Starr.
“What about our tour?” Emil wondered.
Almost Home