by J. X. Evans
“It is going to be ok. I have faith in you.” Marked said once again, smiling at her, while she looked at him crossly. They reached her home, and they stood by the entrance of the white, relatively new building. They were mostly dry, but both of them had gotten a bit wet on their corresponding side the small umbrella could not physically cover.
“That’s me.” Christiana announced.
“Yes, I know. Here.” Mark made to close the umbrella and hand it over.
Christiana put a soft hand on top of his own. “Keep it. No reason getting wet. You bring it next time we meet if you want. I have a bunch of them at home either way.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” Christianna sighed.
“Fine. Thanks a lot.”
“You are welcome, silly.” She smiled and hugged him goodbye, and Mark hugged her back, and her soft curly hair tickled the side of his neck.
Mark waved at her as he left. She giggled as she watched him go. Probably the sight of him walking off with an umbrella covered in little flowers leaning against his shoulder seemed somewhat funny to her.
He had a job to do with Perry and it was almost time, so he picked up the pace. He put his earbuds back on, turned the music up and made for home, looking at store windows along the way to occupy his mind. Most of the items seemed rather uninteresting or untasteful. Or in the instance of this winter’s latest trend in women’s shoes, just plain ridiculous as well as laughably overpriced. He glanced at an interesting t-shirt though as he walked past it, and he took a big step backwards to have a better look at the peculiar design at the front.
‘It’s in the water baby. It’s in the special way we f- BANG’
Needless to say that the loud bang did not originate from the track. Almost in sync with the off-beat sound, the glass window shattered into a million sparkling sharp-edged pieces. Mark jumped and rolled to the right behind a car, dropping the umbrella and reaching for his gun in the holster inside his jacket, his earbuds getting tossed out of his earholes from the sudden change in speed and direction. There was another loud bang and a smoking hole appeared in the t-shirt Mark was considering only half a second earlier; maybe adding something to the queer piece of cloth or maybe ruining it, depending on stylistic preference. Mark turned and stood, drawing the large Magnum, pointing it at the other side of the street and he started moving.
He saw people scattering in a wide circle around a lanky guy, like roaches in the bathroom after the lights suddenly get turned on. The tall man in a black and orange baseball cup and a large blue coat moved towards Mark, holding a handgun, firing at him and missing horribly. Mark aimed and shot at him twice in quick succession but the man moved out of the way, no feat a mere human could perform in the moments it took for a gun barrel to stare them in the face from across a street’s length and a bullet to head over there and greet them up close and personal.
Mark was running sideways, eyes on the gunman across the street and as a result he almost did not see the other guy coming towards him at a ridiculous sprint, swinging a baseball bat towards his head. Mark only saw a blur at the edge of his peripheral vision and he did the only thing he could realistically do in the little time between noticing and his head learning first-hand what it feels like to be a piñata. Mark instantly dropped down to the ground, lifting his feet off the ground and angling his forehead towards it. He felt the baseball bat swishing from the top of his skull just before he hit the pavement. He hit it hard with his brow, tearing it from the impact and the friction as he slid a few centimeters on his face before coming to a halt. But before Mark had even touched the ground, he had managed to empty the rest of his gun’s cylinder into the humanoid creature’s gut. The bullets tearing through its flesh from almost point blank range, easily as a hot knife through butter. Cool red-pink shaded blood splattering over the pavement and Mark’s long ponytail, face and clothes. The man grunted in pain and fell to the ground, clutching at his blown up abdomen.
Before Mark could even start sitting up from his ungraceful and slightly painful fall, the lanky gunman had crossed the now empty road and kicked Mark with full strength on his side. At least Mark hoped that it was his full strength because if it wasn’t, he would be in real trouble. There was a cracking sound from Mark’s ribcage just as hot blinding pain radiated from the site of the blow, his vision blurred to black, his breathing stopped and his body doubled over, even as he was launched up and away through a glass shopfront and right into a bunch of typical anorexic mannequins in wedding gowns and high heels.
Mark dropped his gun from the impact, his side killing him and blood coursing through half the side of his face, forcing him to close his left eye and practically half blinding him. He had to move, he knew he had to, but the pain was too much at that moment. He braced himself for the bullet, but it never came. It appeared that the man in the blue jacket was all out of bullets and he apparently decided that biting Mark’s face off would be a better, more certain way to finish the job than reloading his gun. The vampire, Mark made a wild, educated guess on the species of the monster, jumped in the air, covering the distance in one leap, landing a couple of steps in front of Mark who was at this time only half standing. It grabbed hold of him, one strong hand on his left torso, sharp claws going through the leather of his jacket and his shirt, sinking into his skin easily as if they were all made of paper towels. The vampire’s other hand closing around Mark’s right shoulder, claws driving into the muscle, drawing blood. The vampire opened its jaw at an impossible angle and made to drill its sharp fangs into Mark’s face, its pale mouth moving closer and closer at incredible speed. Mark lifted his left hand, concentrating his energy on the small ruby dangling from the thin golden chain that was hiding under his batman wrist sweatband and brought his open palm right in front of the vampire’s gaping jaw. He felt the ruby emitting a discomforting amount heat, the burning sensation running up and down his left forearm just as a ball of flame manifested inches from Mark’s hand, right into the vampire’s open mouth, burning its palate, its tongue, its larynx, its lungs and esophagus. The excess heat and energy escaping from the ruby creating a little smoking hole in Mark’s sweatband from where the small gem was now protruding from, emitting a vibrant red light. The vampire shrieked, and leaped backwards, all the while letting out something resembling a scream of agony from its destroyed throat and voice box; its nails coming out of Mark’s body and shredding his shoulder even worse on their way out than they did on their way in.
The vampire landed on the pavement on all fours, twisting and turning in pain, awfully blistered, bloody lips and mouth gaping open, long slender tongue rolling out, trickling its pink red blood on the concrete in a small river… ‘Well… I would say that I gave at least as much as I got’ Mark thought. The vampire looked up towards Mark its eyes full of rage, spelling murder, tossing its burned and smoking baseball cap from its torched and smoking black hair, the light rain would probably help with it a bit. Its friend with the baseball bat was slowly rising, using the bat as a cane, clutching at his stomach at the spot where three .500 magnum rounds had made home mere seconds ago from almost point blank range. Even something as resilient as a vampire appears to have some kind of trouble after receiving such a grievous injury. Its clothes were drenched in pink-reddish blood and it looked weakened.
Mark finally managed to get up, pulling a pair of heavy brass knuckles from the inside of his jacket and putting them on, wiping the blood from his left eye and planting his feet sturdily on the ground among destroyed mannequin parts and wedding dresses. He lifted his fists up on a boxer’s stance, getting ready for an attack. He could not raise his right arm all the way to his chin without feeling a sharp stinging pain, his deltoid muscle was hurt and torn from the vampire’s claws, but at least he could still use it if he ignored the feeling… it was only pain after all. Both vampires were moving in front of him, one vampire to his right side and the other to his left, trying to circle around him as best they could so he could not keep hi
s attention on the both of them at the same time, but he was standing inside the shop and that made their plan somewhat inefficient; they could never position themselves in the same line with him and one another.
The burned vampire launched itself forward at the speed of a bullet, aiming a swing with its short, sharp claws at Mark’s face. Mark sidestepped the blow and landed two heavy strikes at the creature’s face, one with his right fist directly on the bridge of the vampire’s long nose, shattering it, its eyes bulging half-way out of their sockets; and a left hook with his full strength straight at the side of its jaw, dislocating and breaking it with a loud crack, sending the vampire crushing right into a wall and destroying some more innocent disheveled mannequins in wedding gowns.
The second vampire reached him at a sprint, swinging its bat in an overhead motion. The creature though was obviously weakened from the bullet wounds, its movements faster than any mortal could manage, but far slower than necessary to threaten Mark and without much power behind them. Mark hopped backwards, easily avoiding the trajectory of the blow, and as soon as his legs touched the floor again, he sprung at the vampire in an explosive rain of blows, turning its head into a broken piñata, just like it had tried to do to him not too long ago, pieces of broken bone and teeth covered in the vampire’s pinkish bloodlike fluid scattering around the floor, instead of pieces of delicious candy.
Before most of the broken vampire’s pieces had even touched the floor, Mark felt a painful pressure as if an angry giant mosquito had sank its proboscis on the back of his injured right shoulder. Mark turned around to see the remaining vampire on the floor leaning against a cracked wall, one eye hanging out of its socket from a tangle of bloody tendons and muscles, its face a mass of blood, burned blistered skin and hard edges, holding the reloaded gun and aiming it towards Mark’s general direction. No doubt the stinging feeling was the result of a bullet being lodged into Mark’s shoulder. The bullet was probably meant for his head, but when one of your eyes hangs out of its socket your perception of depth is sure to suffer somewhat, even for vampires… and from what Mark had gathered the vampire had not been a very good shooter to begin with.
Mark concentrated once again on a small gem hanging from the slim golden chain around his left wrist, at the small citrine this time, hidden under his partly burned Batman sweatband, and moments later, a semi-visible pale yellow dome sprung a couple of centimeters in front of his extended left palm. There was a second BANG and a third and the shield held, absorbing the kinetic energy of the bullets as little sparks of vibrant yellow light appeared in the place of impact. Mark held his ground, his left arm and the small yellow gem stone rattling every time a bullet hit the shield, making him clench his teeth and plant his legs harder on the ground so as not to skid on the floor. On the fifth BANG, the small bullet made a slender crack on the surface of the pale dome and the citrine gem vibrated violently and a thin yellow line appeared on its surface. Mark dropped his shield and rolled, before even the fifth bullet had touched the ground, avoiding the sixth and last bullet from the vampire’s pistol.
Out of breath and out of strength he stood in front of the fallen vampire that was starting to get up once again, ‘Resilient little buggers’. His right shoulder bleeding from the claw tears and the bullet wound, and hurting worse with every passing moment, blood streaming down the length of his arm in thin lines, and slowly dribbling from his slightly extended fingers on the now destroyed and dirtied wedding gowns. The tear on his eyebrow had just now stopped bleeding and his eyelids were still swimming in the hot, sticky substance, forcing him to close his left eye. Head and face injuries are most inconvenient and bloody like that. His ribs and torso aching in every step and every deep breath. He tried not to breathe too hard, but his brain demanded oxygen, and the brain gets what the brain wants. He did not think he could go another round of melee with the vampire and even if the monster seemed standing with one foot already through death’s door…you never know with these things. Rob always told him never to underestimate an opponent, especially a monster and certainly not a vampire, they are unpredictable and this would be a certain way to get you killed. He raised his left hand, giving his palm and fingers the shape of a pistol. He gathered his energy and concentrated once again on the little ruby, and once again bright light painted the trashed store in a vivid red color, giving the wedding gowns a less pure and innocent tint. He felt a wave of extreme heat originating from the red hot ruby, running up and down his arm, even up to his face and body. A lance of too hot, scorching flame shot from the tips of his index and middle fingers, engulfing the wailing vampire and torching the shop around it.
Mark overdid it, putting a little too much effort in gathering the energy inside the small gem and producing the scorching flame, and not even close to enough effort into concentrating and restraining himself. He never did have much fine control over his magic when he was tired, he needed more practice. He lost control and the scorching hot ruby smoked and cracked a bit, a deep crack from the center of the gem, not like the superficial scratch on the citrine. A tongue of fire came out of the ruby’s crack, setting Mark’s favorite sweatband with the Batman symbol on it aflame and coming close to grilling his left wrist and hand. His skin’s temperature and pain receptors had gone into overdrive from the wave of extreme heat that had travelled through his body and it took him a moment or two to understand what exactly was happening. By the time he looked at his hand, the smelly smoke had risen to his nose and the piece of cloth was burning for good on top of his skin. Mark gave a high pitched yell and jumped around a bit in panic, like he used to do if he noticed a cockroach running up his bedroom wall on hot summer nights… only a bit manlier than that. He grabbed the piece of burning cloth between two fingers, pulled and tossed it on the ground before he set himself on shaking his hand and blowing on his burned, slightly blistering skin.
He took a deep breath and let it back out again. He looked around the shop and wished that the owner had insurance. He heard sirens in the distance… “Fuck.”
11. HE KNOWS
Rob was standing over the cornered man, looking menacing as ever. He needed to gain something for all his trouble today. Some kind of lead, a trace, a clue of what was going on! He was certain that the man knew something, but he would not talk… out of fear? Probably. Rob waited in silence, the cars cruising noisily in the nearby street, the calming rhythmical noise of the cold rain tapping on the pavement, and the freezing air current wheezing by Rob’s slightly reddened ears, were the only sounds in the secluded dirty alley; at least since George had stopped his whimpering from Rob’s earlier outburst of emotion.
A couple of seconds passed each of them staring at one another. He did not want to terrorize him anymore, or end up with actually having to hurt the poor idiot. But he was going to, if he needed to. After all, you can get a positive reaction from destroying innocent trash cans only so many times from each person… Something bad was happening right in his neighborhood and he needed to know what that something was. He needed to know and he needed to stop it before it grew to unmanageable dimensions.
George was looking at Rob with eyes wide open. Occasionally, a stray rain drop would trickle down Rob’s beard only to get captured by the howling breeze and set a course for George’s cornea, causing him to blink his wide open, scared eyes. George swallowed audibly, no doubt trying to choose between the danger in front of him, in the form of the big crazy man in the menacing leather duster and the future danger that awaited him, in the form of the wrath of this new gang of vampires and that Duncan fellow. He would be wondering if he could afford to let his tongue flap a bit longer before he would be punished for it… and what if he didn’t flap it? Would the angry man before him believe that he knew no more? Would he be content with what he gave him? Or, would he slide into an even angrier demeanor? He had probably already said enough though, enough to earn himself a violent death… and after all, the problems of now always seem greater than the problems of later, even if they
are actually in completely different orders of magnitude. Rob could practically see the man’s internal monologue playing out in front of him
George’s gaze sifted momentarily from Rob’s hard face to look at a shadow standing a bit higher on the roof of a building, just behind Rob’s right shoulder…only for a second. Rob noticed the shift in George’s gaze and felt a familiar sensation. The hair on the back of his neck stood up as if the air around him was instantly electrified, and a hard shiver begun from the crown of his head, and started working its way down towards the ground, quickly and panicky, as if it was being chased by a squad of rampaging baboons. Before the wave of shivers had even reached Rob’s shoulders he turned his body away from George and towards the inner space of the alley, slightly bending his knees and leaning forward.
Rob jumped and rolled, and he felt something sudden and heavy, hitting the sole of his left work boot, turning him slightly around on his axis so that he landed less gracefully than he had hoped. Rob jumped back up, whirling around to face the cause of his discomfort, while simultaneously retreating backwards, bringing his arms up like a boxer, to protect himself if there was a need to.
There was a man standing in the very same place that Rob had been standing not a second earlier. A huge pale, blonde, beast of a man, almost as big as Rob, both in height and girth, and larger at the shoulders. He was wearing a brown, fur lined leather jacket, sports pants and heavy boots and he seemed harder than stone. The real detail that drew Rob’s attention though was the fact that the man was holding in his grasp a big battle axe, with a bearded sharp edge. The relatively safer end of the weapon, was gripped in the man’s huge right hand, while the considerably deadlier one was displaying its lethal capabilities by forcibly taking residence inside George’s head, and splitting it in half from the top of the poor man’s skull, all the way to the base of his neck, the blade of the axe resting lightly on top of the notch of George’s bloodied and cracked sternum.