Everyone was silent while I frowned at Chris.
“What?” Chris asked before stating, “It's not like I was cooking up anything illegal... in the chemistry labs... after hours... for, you know... tuition...”
I rolled my eyes, my interest in Chris' alleged illicit past notwithstanding, “Alpha, can you take William somewhere safe?”
Alpha looked at me, “I take it your hotel is no longer an option?”
I shook my head, “Can't risk it. It's a death trap if Dimitri's people catch you there.”
Alpha thought for a moment, “I think we can go back to the farm we stayed at before we entered the city. The family there was prepared to help us further if the need arose.
“Okay,” I said, “take William there and wait for word from me.”
Alpha looked at me, “You are not going with us, Detective?”
“So what's the plan?” Chris asked.
I sighed and shook my head, “I'm going to give one attempt at diplomacy.”
“Wow!” Chris laughed, “now you want to talk to Dimitri? If that isn't the height of stupidity I don't know what is.”
My response came out far more harsh than intended, “It seems clear to me that we are just bumbling around in this city and getting nowhere close to Lei and Pha.”
Alexei regarded me with narrowed eyes, “Dimitri is holding people of yours?”
Alpha answered for me, “He has two of ours,” he then pointed at William, “one is a child, his daughter.”
A mixture of pain, anger, indignation and horror all spread across Alexei's face simultaneously, “Perhaps I should accompany you on this 'diplomatic' journey?”
I quickly shook my head, “I can't risk any harm coming to Dimitri until we have located the girls.”
“I am not here for Dimitri or interested in his ridiculous grab for my family's former claim to the land he seeks. I am only here for the Wolf-killer.”
“The Grand Duke? How do you...?” Chris' face was contorted with thought as he peered at Alexei.
“Yes, the Wolf-killer,” Alexei confirmed, “Grand Duke Nicholas Nickolaevich.
Chris' eyes went wide, “Nicko... Aha! You're Alexei Nickolaevich, aren't you?”
Recognition struck me at the mention of Alexei's full name, “Dimitri called you the Romanov?” I asked, “You're the son of Tsar Nicholas the second? Last Tsar of Russia?”
Alexei sighed and rolled one hand as if it would help the words come out faster, “And the true ruler of Russia, at least from a certain point of view.” Alexei looked abashed, “I haven't been recognized in over eighty years, and now in only a couple hours, you identify me.” Alexei sighed, “I must be getting old.”
I shook my head, “I remember reading about you in world history class, when we were studying Rasputin. You were the Tsar's hemophiliac son who Rasputin managed to cure when no other doctor in Russia could, am I right?'
Alexei laughed, “Father Grigori didn't cure me, so much as recognize that what I suffered from wasn't hemophilia, even though my Mother's family had the hereditary trait that ran toward that condition.”
“Rasputin knew you were like us?” Chris asked before melodramatically adding, “A vampire?”
Alexei nodded, “Rasputin held a great deal of knowledge that assisted in giving him the reputation as the ‘Mad Monk.’ One such bit of information was the knowledge of the existence of Dimitri's people, and the reality of what they truly were. When my mother initially brought me, as an infant, to Rasputin, the monk had seen the truth of my condition and became my physician and mentor years before what has been recorded in the history books.
“You knew Rasputin?” Chris said, awestruck. “Wow, that must have been something.”
Alexei shrugged, “To the world he was either an angel or a devil. A holy man and Starets, what you might call a “mystic” in English, or a madman with Machiavellian intentions for the ruling of Russia by influencing my father's decisions.” Alexei's eyes drifted as if seeing a vision the rest of us were not privy to, “But to me he was simply a teacher and friend.”
“This is all well and good, but can we take the conversation inside?” Igor asked and was clearly getting nervous.
I tended to agree with the man, “Okay, Alpha you take William and Chris back to the farmhouse. I'll contact you as soon as I can. Alexei...”
Alexei cut me off by raising one hand, “My friend, we may share a common enemy, but that does not make me your subordinate.” His words were matter of fact and held no malice, but they also conveyed an air of certainty that brooked no compromise as he said, “I go where my own conscience takes me.”
I frowned at Alexei, “You don't think it would be better if we worked together instead of potentially getting in each other's way?”
Alexei considered for a moment and then said, “I think I have ways of doing things that do not work well with others. Having said that, I feel we will find ourselves working in tandem regardless of our going separate ways for the time being.”
I looked at Alpha, who seemed to be considering Alexei's words before turning to William and lifting his prone form off of the concrete with a heave.
I shrugged, “All right Alexei. I don't like this, but I can't force you to work alongside the rest of us.” I turned to the rest of the group, “Are there any questions, or a need for clarity, from anyone before we split up?”
Silence reigned as everyone looked from one to another.
I turned back to Alexei and held out my hand, “Good hunting.”
Alexei accepted my hand in his, “To you as well.”
We were about to turn away from one another when Chris chimed up, “Oh! Wait! I have a question.”
Alexei and I turned back to Chris.
“Do you know if that enormous penis on display in the Moscow sex museum 'Totchka G' is really Rasputin's?”
Chapter 23
Lei nudged the sleeping child lying next to her. “Wake up Pha, it's time we got out of here.” Pha rubbed the sleep from her eyes and peered back at Lei, fear evident on her face. “Don't worry,” Lei whispered, “we'll sneak out of here before any of those freaks ever know we're gone.”
Lei had been formulating an escape plan ever since Nicholas had moved them into their new holding cell. His only mistake was in not blindfolding her before taking her out of the old location. En route, Lei had studied every aspect of the space within the warehouse that she could. It had taken her nearly two days to process the details of what she had seen, and now she was at a point where the beginnings of a plan had begun to take root. Assuming no drastic changes had been made since that time, Lei was convinced they had a chance to make it out of the building. Once outside, well, that was where the plan fell apart. Still, Lei believed that once they were outside she could hide herself and Pha from Dimitri’s relatively mindless drones.
The problem was Nicholas.
The man seemed extremely capable and he would likely be the determining factor in the success or failure of her plan. She had thought of killing him, which was a possibility if she were fighting him one on one, but with a girl in tow and an unknown number of Dimitri's people in the warehouse, a physical confrontation wasn’t a good idea. Instead, she had noticed that the warehouse had a very different energy, or attitude, about it when Nicholas was on location, as opposed to when he was absent, so it seemed that her best bet was to try to sense when Nicholas was away, before she made her move.
The high-energy bustling of people working outside her cell had diminished to such a degree that it even sounded lethargic, and that was her indication that Nicholas had left the building, so she set her plan into motion.
“Okay,” Lei spoke softly to Pha, “once we're outside stay close to me, but if we get separated, then you run and keep running until your legs won't carry you anymore. You understand?”
Lei had expected Pha to cringe and cling to her, but life on the streets of Bangkok had, while not so much preparing her for this particular moment, taught her
how to survive. A steely resolve morphed onto the formerly teary face, and the determination in her countenance was intense beyond anything a girl of nine years should ever be able to project. It took Lei momentarily aback, but then a smile creased her face as she recognized her own spirit within the child.
“That's my girl. Okay, do as I told you.”
Pha nodded and began calling out in Thai to whoever might have been placed on guard, “Excuse me, we need more water please.”
No sound came from the other side of the door as Lei and Pha waited. The seconds ticked by like minutes, and Lei was about to have Pha call out again when the sound of the locking mechanism unlatching resonated from the door. The door to the locked office space where they were being kept prisoners opened a crack, and a single frightening eye peered in.
At the first sound of the door unlocking Lei had let her body fall slack against the floor and she forced a tremble to shimmy through her whole body, as Pha cradled her head in her small lap.
Pha stroked her forehead as she looked up toward the door, “Please, we need some water or more food or something.” Pha looked down at Lei with concern marking her every feature... just as Lei had instructed her to do. “Please, I don't know what's wrong with her.”
Lei was mimicking the initial stages of what any of her kind began to go through when they hadn't taken in enough blood, or in Lei's case the substitute that she and all of Alpha's community used in lieu of actual blood.
Instead of the usual armed guard, one of Nicholas’ deprived people stared into the room and opened the door wider to consider the scene on the floor of the office space. Supposedly tasked with the wellbeing of the captives, the “guard” should have reacted by going for help or backup, but Nicholas kept those in the warehouse in a deprived state, barely nourished with enough blood to keep them from becoming little more than animals. Lei supposed that it was done intentionally to make the people of the warehouse more akin to guard dogs. A dangerous and ravenous collection of creatures that would ensure anyone imprisoned would either remain so, or be destroyed in the case of an escape attempt.
The “creature” was male, perhaps young although it was hard to tell as his skin had become pock-marked with the tell-tale blisters of moderate deprivation. He started to turn away and close the door, but froze in mid motion and seemed to scan the exterior of the warehouse as if searching for something.
That's right, Lei thought, you remember what Nicholas did to the last person who threatened us. Lei let out a slight moan and went even limper in Pha's hands. Pha, as instructed, let out a little cry of what was supposed to be panic and began whispering urgently to her as she cradled Lei’s head.
The man at the door looked back into the room without making a sound.
Lei squinted through one eye to see the door open wider as she thought, “That's right, come in. You still have enough control to take some blood without killing us. They keep you so hungry that it is hard to think straight. Just a little blood from each of us and you will get your mind clear. Just a little from each, how could that hurt?”
When the man moved it happened with surprising speed. He shut the door and had a hand over Pha's mouth before Lei had even realized he had moved, Pha let out a small squeak in surprise and alarm, but then grabbed onto the man's wrist with both hands. Thinking Lei was unconscious, the man had ignored her. Lei bolted upright grabbing the man's head in her hands, before twisting sharply. There was no audible crack, but the man went limp and fell to the floor in a daze and Lei was immediately on top of him, entwining his arms and legs in her own. The dazed man tried to shake his head to recover from the trauma that, like a knockout punch in a boxing ring, had negatively stimulated the nerve clusters in his neck. Lei released one of the man's wrists and thrust a sharpened thumbnail deep into the hollow of his throat. The man's eyes went wide with shock and horror at the mortal wound and his body convulsed under Lei as she pulled her thumb free. The man tried to punch her off with his free hand, but Lei re-established her grip on that wrist and once again pinned the man to the floor before latching down on with her mouth over the neck wound. Lei didn't drink the blood, it wouldn't fortify her in any case, but she forced any and all blood that pumped from the wound back down in to the man's windpipe both suffocating and silencing him as he thrashed beneath her.
Lei rode his bucking form, as the man sputtered and gurgled pink blood from his mouth, while his body tried to clear his lungs of his own body fluids, which were drowning him. Yet the more the wound bled, the more his lungs filled with his own blood.
Finally, the man's body relaxed as he passed out from lack of oxygen and Lei slowly removed herself from the unconscious form. Raspy, horrible sounds were coming from the dying man as Lei looked to Pha. The girl's expression was a mixture of surprise and uncertainty as she stared at Lei.
“I'm sorry you had to see that,” Lei said as she wiped at her mouth, “are you all right?”
Pha looked down at the man who let out a rattling sigh as his life faded away, then she looked up to Lei and asked in heavily accented English, “He would kill me, wouldn't he?”
Lei nodded her head and Pha turned back to consider the corpse on the floor, as something shifted in her demeanor and her former resolve returned to her small face. Pha stood and made a show of brushing off the sweat clothes she wore for dust that wasn't there.
“I'd like to go now,” Pha said, in a manner that was so matter-of-fact it sounded less like a request and more like a command.
Lei smiled and knelt, hugging the girl, which was returned by Pha, along with light reassuring pats on Lei's back. “Okay honey, time to go,” Lei said as she moved to the door with Pha following to stand behind her..
She cracked the door open and peered out, seeing a few of Dimitri's people shambling around, moving or unpacking boxes, with the majority of the commotion happening near another of the office spaces. In fact, most of the attention was focused in that particular area, which gave Lei and Pha the opportunity they needed.
“Let's go, stay close.”
Lei held Pha's hand as the two of them stayed in the shadows along the wall, while they worked their way around to a stack of shipping containers for additional cover. Lei led Pha to a hiding spot behind the containers as she checked to see if anyone had noticed them. No one looked in their direction, nor seemed the wiser as to what they were doing. The next part of Lei's plan was a little trickier. She had noticed a fork lift near one of the roll-up doors, but had never heard the engine ignite for the entire time she and Pha had been held here. The previous room that she and Pha had been stashed in held a box on the wall with several hanging sets of keys. Those keys had been retrieved, used and replaced by Dimitri's people many times while she and Pha had been locked in the room, yet one single set had never been touched. The keys looked similar to car keys, but were shorter and thicker than one would expect from the keys to an automobile. Lei guessed that these were to the forklift, so her idea was to sneak back into their previous jail cell, retrieve the keys, get to the forklift and drive right through the roll-up door and out of the warehouse. Obviously, they were going to draw a significant amount of attention the moment they started the forklift engine, but Lei hoped that there would be enough confusion to buy them the precious seconds they would need to get outside and lose any pursuers that might follow.
Pha tapped Lei on the shoulder in a warning as one of Dimitri's people, a small woman lazily wandered past in front of the crates. Lei could see the mottled flesh on her face and the glaze in her eyes that was indicative of the woman's need for blood. Lei could only imagine the amount of pain the woman was in, and her hatred for Dimitri twisted in her core, wondering how he could leave his own people in such a state.
Once the woman had walked far enough away, Lei squeezed Pha's hand and the two made it to the next hiding place Lei had chosen, stopping right beside the machine. The forklift was smaller than Lei had remembered, but the controls seemed as though they were more “layman–frie
ndly” than most heavy machinery. A simple gear shift of “drive, neutral and reverse” was evident, along with the steering wheel. Foot pedals, which were likely to be the accelerator and brake, sat reassuringly where they would be expected. There were some other levers that probably controlled the lift, but Lei wasn't really interested in that. She didn't see a choke switch, which was also a good thing as some equipment needed to be started with the choke in a specific position, and she had no idea how this particular machine was supposed to be started other than with the turn of a key. Every moment she had to spend trying to figure out how to make the forklift run would be time for Dimitri's people to catch up with her, so the more she could mentally note about its operation, the better.
Satisfied that she knew as much as she was going to concerning the forklift, Lei turned back to the open area of the warehouse. Pha was still at her side and doing surprisingly well, considering her young age, and that the nature of what they were doing demanded that she be quiet.
Lei said, “Okay, I want you to get into the forklift and lie on the floor. I'm going to get the keys and come right back.”
Panic flashed momentarily in the girl's eyes, but it didn't last, as she wordlessly climbed up and into the operator's cabin, staying low and being as quiet as possible, before coming to a rest on the metallic floor.
Lei cautiously closed the door of the lift, making as little sound as possible and then sprinted for the far wall. Her footfalls were soft, silent, and drowned out by the ambient noise of the work being accomplished inside the warehouse, as she finally came to rest in the shadows next to the office where they had previously been held.
She tried the door. It was unlocked and the knob turned easily in her hand. She didn't open the door fully right away, as much as just cracking it open, in order to listen for the sound of anyone inside. She couldn't see or hear anything, and there was no way of knowing for sure if there was anyone inside until she actually went in and cleared the room. With a quick breath Lei bolted upright, the fingers of her dominant hand with their reinforced nails hooked in a claw shape, ready to rip at any enemy who stood in her way, and she swung the door wide open.
Rasputin's Prodigy Page 21