There was one near disaster when Irene almost opened one of the paper bags in the freezer that contained a couple bags of Scott’s so-called medication, but disaster was averted when he snatched the bag from her hands. “Mom, this stuff is sensitive. Please don’t touch it,” he pleaded. Irene was now doubly mystified by this medication, but she knew that curiosity killed the cat, so to speak, and she didn’t want harm to befall Mr. Buttons.
Speaking of Mr. Buttons, the kitty had not quite warmed up to Scott yet. He kept avoiding Scott, although he no longer hissed at Scott whenever he was around. Scott grudgingly accepted this gradual approval, if you could call it that; it was the best he could get under the circumstance.
Scott began working on the boring, everyday issues that pressed him, primarily that of his damaged car. Dealing with his insurance company was a harrowing experience, almost but not quite as terrifying as meeting an actual vampire for the first time. He dreaded going through the interrogations, the investigations, and the possible litigation. But there was little of that, thankfully. His insurance agent advised Scott that his car was now totaled. Well, of course it is, he fumed. But the agent also felt he could get Scott the full replacement price. Still, after paying off the remainder of his auto loan, he wasn’t sure he’d have enough left over from the settlement to buy another late-model used vehicle. And he didn’t feel like incurring more debt at this point. Oh well, what else could he do?
While Scott was grateful for Irene’s offer to use her Prius, the thought of denying her the use of her own car disturbed him. He hated inconveniencing her. But she would hear none of it, telling him she would get rides from friends at church or neighbors. “Or total strangers!” she said cheerily. “Hey, a stranger is just a friend you haven’t met yet!” Scott really did not appreciate her attempt at humor. Or he hoped it was humor. At least until he got his own car. So he gave in, reluctantly agreeing to use the little hybrid sedan.
Among the other issues he dealt with that week was the replacement of his old cheap blue windbreaker. The responding EMTs had found it necessary to cut the jacket away in order to free Scott from the wreckage and start intravenous medications. He had to have another jacket to replace the one that had been destroyed. Anyway, it would surely be cheaper than buying a new car, he reasoned. Scott knew where he would have to go to get a replacement: the mall. Oh, he hated the mall, with its crowds and its commercialistic pretense. I’ll just go and get it over with, he reasoned. In and out. Won’t take long at all, I’m sure.
Ralph Stevens was not happy.
By not happy, I mean angry. Very angry. A free-floating anger that had no resolution and no apparent cause. Ralph’s life had stalled out, much like Scott’s had. But where Scott sought to live at peace with the nature of his life, pathetic though he may have thought it was, Ralph lashed out at everyone. His neighbors said he was a rather unpleasant fellow who never had a kind word for anyone. But they also said that he kept primarily to himself. In that, they were blessed. Ralph’s tempers were legendary. Long ago, psychologists had diagnosed them as the result of bipolar disorder. They had also noticed his paranoiac tendencies and were somewhat concerned by them. His current clinician had prescribed psychotropic agents in hopes of controlling Ralph’s violent tendencies.
That fucking hack, Dr. Kazantsakis, how dare she emasculate me this way! Can she not hear the voices, the voices that scream at me, that empower me to take action? Ralph hated the side effects of the pills he took, so he more often than not skipped his dosage, preferring to self-medicate with cheap hard alcohol, which only exacerbated his rage. And now his rage was near uncontrollable. This world has fucked me over. I’m gonna get even. I’m mad as hell, and I ain’t gonna take it anymore. His plan was simple. He didn’t care if he came out dead or alive. The entire world would know of his brilliance, his anger, and his rage. Parents would weep for their lost children, cursing his name for generations. And he loved the idea.
One of the few people Ralph actually liked was Brian Carter, a friendly meth head and all-around low life who dealt in drugs and stolen merchandise. About a week previously, a local suburban police department had dealt with what was, at the time, a rather embarrassing blow. One of its unmarked units had been broken into, and the contents of its trunk had disappeared into the night. As images of the white Ford Crown Victoria with its open trunk made it to the news media, the crawl lines read “Local Police Department Loses Assault Rifle.” The Colt M4 carbine had vanished, along with a couple hundred rounds of 5.56-mm ammunition and several standard thirty-round magazines. People were outraged; the department was embarrassed, and the sergeant assigned to the car was suspended with pay. This was the work of Brian Carter. He knew it was a cop car. He was up for a challenge. Besides, he was tripping balls.
Ralph may have liked Brian, but there was no honor among thieves. One night, Ralph met Brian at Brian’s apartment to hang out and party, just the two of them. Ralph had purchased methamphetamine from Brian before, but tonight it was just booze. The Night Train steamrollered into their bloodstreams, eventually causing Brian to pass out while motivating Ralph into action. He looked through closets, eventually finding what he had been looking for. He stuffed the carbine and as much ammo as he could find into a guitar bag, taking with him a couple knives and a 9mm Smith & Wesson Sigma he found in Brian’s nightstand. He then left Brian, who was much too wasted to care about much of anything at that point.
Clackatonic Faire existed just south of the suburban no-man’s-land that was the border between Portland and Clackamas County proper. It was the largest mall in the area, serving as a draw for enthusiastic shoppers from all over the Portland area. Scott arrived there early in the afternoon. Another reason (in a long line of reasons) he hated going to the mall was finding parking. There was none to be had up close, but at least Portland’s ever-present rain had let up a bit, meaning that it was no longer raining cats and dogs. Instead, it was falling as a light mist. Scott would have to park further away, as he refused to use his mother’s handicap parking placard, since he correctly felt that was cheating. Besides, he needed the exercise—well, okay, maybe he didn’t anymore, but it couldn’t hurt him, rain or no rain.
It was Saturday, and the mall was packed, filled with crowds of people intent on their own purposes. Many of them were getting an early start to the cornucopia of avarice they knew as Christmas. Many teenage girls were there, shopping for overpriced trinkets. Many teenage boys were there, hoping to meet some of those girls. Middle-aged women flocked to beauty shops, hoping to find the tonic that would preserve their rapidly retreating youth. Their husbands, bored out of their minds, hoped to relieve their stress at one of the chain pubs that littered the property. In other words, a normal suburban mall on a normal suburban Saturday.
Scott tried to make his visit brief, wanting to avoid the smothering crowds. He used to enjoy visiting the bookstore, a place he could have spent hours poring over the latest in history and science fiction—but not in horror, he’d had quite enough of that lately, thank you. However, today the goal was simple: find a new windbreaker. It took Scott far too long to find what he was looking for, and instead he changed his mind and purchased a black leather jacket. It was considerably more expensive than Scott had initially planned on spending, but since all the vampires on TV seemed to wear leather jackets, he thought he might as well look the part.
As Scott was paying for his new look, he couldn’t help but notice how the attractive olive-skinned young cashier was smiling at him, even flirting with him. She was quite lovely. Scott wondered if the girl was really all that into him. After all, it was Scott Campbell, an absolute loser with the ladies. He was sure she was just being friendly. Really friendly. She was probably on commission and got paid for making sales, so it was in her best interest to be friendly, even flirtatious. But he could swear she was checking him out. Scott Campbell, slightly overweight, balding, pasty, and much older than she. What was up with that? In any event, he told himself he was imagini
ng the whole episode and to just walk it off. He strolled out into the full parking lot, his low spirits lifted by the encounter. A pretty girl was nice to me today. Really nice. Again, what’s up with that?
As he walked toward the Prius, he noticed a white male in his twenties with uncombed, dark hair wearing a dirty olive-drab military surplus jacket and carrying a gig bag that looked like it held something heavier than a guitar.
Something hit Scott. A sensation, a slight twinge. His vision temporarily blurred, which caused him some concern that his eyesight may have been reverting to its old mortal lack of acuity. But soon it returned to vampiric levels. He then feared he was having a stroke but wondered how that was possible since he was a vampire, and vampires never had strokes, at least not that he knew. The twinge subsided, but the dark feeling in his mind did not go away so quickly. He became more aware of this man marching toward the nearest mall entrance, picking up on the various smells he emitted: the sweat, the body odor (ewww!), the cheap wine. And there was another distinctive smell hidden among the others.
Gunpowder.
Scott knew what it was. He’d grown up around guns, having inherited his father’s firearms. So he knew that smell, faint though it was, hidden among the other odors. Very faint, even to his vampiric senses, but there it was.
This guy was up to nothing good, and Scott knew it. He wasn’t completely sure how, but he knew. And he knew he had to do something, which takes us back to the beginning of this tale.
I am here to kill everything I see!
Standing in a corner of the mall on the second floor, in front of a former children’s shoe store that had gone out of business and was now surrounded by a drywall barrier, Ralph Stevens roared his oath as he yanked back the charging handle on the M4, swinging the carbine into action. Some in the herd of shoppers stood still, their basic survival mechanism apparently having been bred out of them, while others dove for the floor, into shops, behind kiosks. The angry young man jerked the trigger of the carbine, sending multiple rounds high and gracefully missing the customers, some of whom still stood there in terrified amazement. The carbine cracked with ear-shattering volume, and the 5.56-mm bullets slammed into marble tiling and the massive wood beams that supported the weight of the roof. Windows cracked and shattered, the sound of breaking glass adding to the cacophony of terrified screams, gunshots, and empty brass hitting the faux marble floors.
Ralph grinned with delight. Now you know my wrath. Now you understand my power. Fear me!
But while most people sought shelter or were immobilized in abject horror, one man actually approached the gunman. A slightly balding, slightly overweight, near middle-aged, pale-skinned, white guy wearing a black leather jacket. Some witnesses wondered to themselves, Does this guy have a death wish? Is he even aware of what’s going on? But he was aware. More aware than anyone could know.
“Please, put that down. Let’s talk about this,” Scott suggested.
Oh, that is the sound of fear, Ralph convinced himself. This is delicious. And now he is mine. I shall make him famous. I shall kill him.
Ralph lifted the rifle to his shoulder and peered through the EOTech holosight, its red laser dot clearly covering the exact middle of Scott’s forehead.
“Now, Mister, you don’t want to do that,” Scott warned.
But yes, he did. Ralph very much wanted to do that. He cackled demonically as he squeezed the trigger of the police carbine. The rifle roared once more as a 55-grain metal-cased bullet cut through the brief distance between the shooter and the victim, hitting Scott directly in his forehead and creating a small entry wound. The bullet then tore through his brain, exiting at an upward trajectory and trailing blood and brain matter. His head involuntarily snapped back. To Scott, it was the oddest feeling. It hurt like the dickens, but even as the bullet passed through his head, he was not particularly impressed or scared. And the horrendous headache soon passed.
Ralph was smiling as if proud of his accomplishment. Now to watch the lifeless body hit the floor, he thought. Except it didn’t. Scott’s body remained upright. He then slapped his right hand to the wound. “Ow!” Scott howled, catching Ralph Stevens completely off guard.
I shot this man directly in the head, a kill shot by any measure, blowing his brains out, and all he does is say “Ow”? No way. No fucking way.
Scott slowly lowered his head, facing Ralph with a grimace, his hand still covering the wound. “Damn! I’ve never had a migraine before, but that’s gotta be how one feels! Man!”
Scott removed his hand. There was no blood. Hell, there wasn’t even a wound. Ralph could only stare in amazement, an amazement that soon turned to abject horror as Scott moved faster than he ever had in his life, faster than anyone or anything Ralph had ever seen. Scott tossed the carbine aside like a broken toy. Ralph tried pulling the Sigma from his waistband, but soon enough it was in Scott’s hands. He dropped the magazine, locked the slide back, and then tossed the pistol aside as well.
Scott once again moved with speed and power as he shoved Ralph back against the drywall that encircled the former shoe store. Ralph hit the drywall with force, causing it to crack, powdery residue flying into the air around them. Scott held Ralph suspended in midair against the temporary wall, pinning him against it.
Scott’s glare was inescapable. Ralph was drawn into his unrelenting stare. Scott’s darkened eyes were windows to horrors unknown, drawing from the most subterranean levels of the soul. Ralph felt—no, knew—he was staring into the very pit of hell itself, where horrors beyond his imagining waited for him. Scott’s eyes searched Ralph, digging deeply into body, mind, and soul. Ralph had come here to cause fear. He had had no idea that this day he would truly know fear, for it was staring him in the face. He could not move. He could not think. He could not speak. He was doomed, a doom that spoke less of mere death and more of eternal torture. The insane anger he felt earlier this day now turned to insane fear. All he could do was empty his bladder, the warm urine dripping down his leg.
“I told you not to do that!” Scott growled in a guttural tone that shocked even himself. He slammed Ralph into the drywall once more for emphasis, his hands gripping Ralph’s throat. Scott’s grip was loose enough to allow Ralph to breathe but tight enough to cause him to struggle for air.
Ralph was only aware of the monster before him. He could not focus on anything else. He couldn’t even try. The consuming darkness in Scott’s eyes kept him there in that terrible moment. On the other hand, Scott was completely aware of everything going on around him. His thoughts were drawn to the people who had stopped hiding and stopped running, who were coming out of the various shops, from behind trash cans and kiosks. Most of them remained in their hiding spots, watching the spectacle. He was aware of loud and congratulatory cheers and applause coming from the crowds. Scott broke his hold on Ralph’s stare to look around at the audience—his eyes now appearing as normal as anyone’s, but his strong grip still around Ralph’s throat.
Moments later, the sheriff’s SWAT team swarmed the mall, camouflaged cops equipped with LBE vests, ballistic helmets, and AR-15s. Scott released Ralph in time for SWAT team members to surround him, force him to the ground, and handcuff him. Not that they needed much force. Ralph gladly allowed these men, these human men, to take him.
CHAPTER 8
Scott sat on a concrete bench outside the mall as uniformed deputy sheriffs escorted shoppers and mall employees into the parking lot, some to be checked by medics, others to give statements to detectives, and others simply to run into the arms of concerned loved ones. As some of the mall customers and employees walked by him, they gazed at Scott with a reverential awe. Such heroism that one would take his life in his hands and risk death for others seemed to be a shared sentiment. It was weird. Scott never before had experienced that kind of adulation, that kind of esteem. It was new territory for him.
Scott was also aware of the news media that had amassed around the area, kept at bay by yellow police tape and uniformed
deputies standing guard. He saw the cameras aimed at him from their far watch and heard the shouted requests for exclusive interviews. He wanted to ignore them. But he knew they would not be satisfied until they had drank their own fill of blood—not in the literal sense, of course, which Scott somehow thought would make them more honest. He felt that comparing them to vampires was appropriate.
A tall Native American man in a trench coat approached Scott. “Hello, Mr. Campbell? I’m Detective Sergeant Mason Bearclaw with the Clackamas County Major Crimes Unit.”
“Bearclaw? Like the pastry?” Scott asked. “Like doughnuts are pastries, right? Cops like doughnuts, so I guess it makes sense.”
Scott’s lame attempt at humor didn’t strike anyone as funny, least of all Scott himself. He knew it was a stupid thing to say, but as he did so often before, he went ahead and said it anyway.
“Wow. I’ve never heard that one before,” Bearclaw lied, trying to remain pleasant. “Anyway, these detectives just have a few questions for you, if you don’t mind.”
Bearclaw motioned to two other conservatively attired detectives, one a midtwenties white man with cropped blond hair, the other a short-haired Hispanic woman who looked older than she was.
“I’m Detective Montoya,” the female detective said. “And this is Detective Ellis.”
“We understand that you’re the hero of the day!” a broadly smiling Ellis said.
Montoya ignored Ellis’s enthusiasm. “Tell us what happened. What did you observe?”
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