"Oh, Gertrude." She pressed her fingers against her overheated cheeks. "What are you doing?"
*~*~*
She shouldn't be doing this research—Gert knew that. That wasn't stopping her from drawing up charts and making sketches in one of her scientific notebooks as she sat at her desk. She'd already reanimated most vital organs, but perhaps she'd want fresh ones. Reanimating the skin would be hardest of all; maybe the best way would be to do it in strips. The creature would need to be smaller than the average person, as she didn't think she'd be able to reanimate enough flesh and muscle for a fully grown human. That meant the skeleton was going to pose its own problems. Although this was all academic, she reminded herself sternly. She was not actually going to build such a being. Of course she wasn't.
With a sigh, she leaned back in her chair, pulling her tie free and letting it coil on the desktop beside her papers. A cup of tea was also among the drawings and notes, and she picked it up and absently took a sip, finding it cold.
If she were to create new life, how would she provide for it? What kind of world would she be bringing into? Not a world that would accept a creature made from parts of the dead, that was for certain. So what right did she have to bring forth this being, knowing full well that it would only know hatred and rejection? Just so she could play God or satisfy a scientific curiosity? Besides, what was there to guarantee that this new life would not end up being just as much of a bloodthirsty monster as the abomination she and Vi hunted?
There were too many issues, too much at stake. She could not seriously contemplate it. Yet she was and she knew it. It would certainly prove to all those fools at Columbia University that a 'lady scientist' was nothing to trifle with.
She'd been eight when she'd first realized she would be the one to overcome death itself. She was brought along to tour a hospital her parents were patrons of. All the patients had been dressed in their best, the children in the children's ward singing hymns as the small group of patrons moved from room to room. She'd lingered in one room of the children's ward though as her parents moved on ahead, her gaze fixed on one patient in particular. The patient had been a little girl who lay still and pale, barely breathing on her bed.
"What's wrong with her?" Most of the patients looked sick, but there had been something different about this little girl.
"She's dying," a young nurse had told her bluntly after a quick glance toward Mr. and Mrs. Bower on the other side of the room.
Gert had stared at the little girl. "One day," she'd told the nurse."I will find a cure for death, so that no one will have to die."
A child's promise, but meant seriously nonetheless.
"You mustn't say such things." The young nurse expression was serious now. "When we die, it is by God's will."
Even at eight, she knew this to be untrue. She'd sworn then that she would be the person to conquer death.
At eighteen she'd attended the Medical College of the New York Infirmary despite her parents' protests. Her studies there had only convinced her that the medical field did not contain the answers she sought, although she did graduate as a fully qualified physician. She'd taught herself chemistry after that, conducting experiments in her small apartment. When sciences failed to provide her with the information she needed, she turned to the occult.
Most those who practiced the otherworldly arts were charlatans—she'd discovered that right away. There were some things, like the alchemic elixirs, she found useful, however. And then one day she'd come across a small article about the Society for the Study of the New Science of Reanimation Through Galvanism in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. It was what she'd been searching for. She'd tracked down the small group of scientists that made up the Society and became its most influential supporter and eventual member.
The use of electricity was the missing link. When combined with her medical knowledge and studies in the occult, it had made her research feasible for the first time. Yet here she was, a few short years later, up against another roadblock.
She set her cup of cold tea aside. She needed to think of something else. Unbidden, Vi came to mind, and she growled at the memory of their near kiss in the carriage. What had Vi been playing at? Next time she'd simply kiss Vi herself and have done with it. Their agreement be damned: she wanted Vi, and if Vi was willing, as she claimed to be, she saw no reason for them to wait until the case was over.
And that brought to mind another problem. She rested her chin on her fist and turned to gaze out her office window at the street below. In the carriage on the way back to her apartment, she had found herself wondering what it would be like to spend more than just one night with Vi. She'd sworn to Vi that she could keep things between them merely physical, simply business. Now, though… she remembered walking side by side with Vi, the feeling of Vi's arm on her own, the way Vi had looked at her when she'd told Gert that she was brave. She was so afraid that was going to make a mess of this and Vi would laugh, or worse, get up on her high horse again.
Different, Vi had called her, but everyone thought Gert was different, to put it politely, and different was not the same as special. She dropped her head into her hands. She was a fool. Vi was a vampire, a creature of the night, dangerous and probably deadly when she wanted to be. They barely knew each other, besides.
Vi didn't want anything lasting anyway, she'd made that clear. She needed to respect that and stick to their agreement. She ran her the tip of her tongue across her lips, remembering the feeling of Vi's fingertips tracing the fragile skin there, the taste of leather in mouth. The heat that burned low in her belly made her impatient. It was so tempting to simply go find Vi and ask her what was waiting for. She was willing, even if it was blood Vi wanted. Even with the memory of how painful it had been still fresh in her mind, she would still be willing to offer it again if Vi wanted it and promised not to permanently damage her. All in all, Vi was just far too tempting.
She turned back to her notes and sketches. She'd never be able to convince anyone in the Society to even consider this. They were all convinced that an entire cadaver could be reanimated. She was beginning to doubt it. There was simply no way to get enough electricity through it to reanimate without destroying the corpse in the process. She tapped her pencil against the desktop and made a note. This new idea might be ethically unfeasible, but it was interesting at a thought experiment at least, and unlike trying to reanimate a whole body, it had the possibility of actually working.
They were both a problem without an answer—Vi and her research. She contemplated throwing her teacup across the room but settled for downing the rest of the cold tea instead.
*~*~*
The papers were full of more reports of mysterious attacks. A child had been dragged off the street. Evidently the police were saying the child had wondered off or been taken, but the papers had statements from the other children swearing the boy had been taken by a monster with many arms and lots of teeth. The papers speculated that the creature was living in the sewers, although some of the more disreputable papers were claiming this was the work of the Dock Dismemberer. Her stomach churned just reading about it.
They needed to find the monster and soon. She laid aside the evening newspaper and looked up in time to see the maid, Marion, push open the door. "Yes?"
"There's a Vi De Luca to see you." Marion said with a slight bob of her head. Her gaze went to the remains dinner still spread out across the table. "Should I have her come back later, or wait in the sitting room?"
"Show her to my study." Gert stood, smoothing her hand down the front of her shirt, and cast about for her jacket. She must have misplaced it again, drat. "We have business to attend to."
"Very good." Marion smartly turned on her heel and went to find Vi again while Gert wondered if she had ink smeared anywhere too noticeable. She hadn't expected company tonight, so she was in her rumbled shirtsleeves, having come straight from the lab. Even though it was probably foolish, she had made an effort to look presentable all the other t
imes she'd met with Vi. Tonight, though, it couldn't be helped. There was indeed ink on her forearms from the charts she'd been drawing up. She licked her thumb and tried to rub the marks away as best she could, but it only made it worse. Giving up, she rolled down her sleeves and refastened her cuffs before heading for the study.
Vi was seated in the chair in front of the desk when she pushed open the study door. At least she'd locked all of the papers regarding her newest line of research, instead of leaving it on the desk. Generally she didn't leave things pertaining to her research lying around—it tended to upset the servants.
"Can I help you?" she asked, tension prickling down her spine at the sight of Vi. She couldn't keep her mind from going back to the last time they'd seen each other, the dark heat in Vi's eyes, the way her fingertips had felt against Gert's tongue. She swallowed hard and looked away, even as arousal curled in her belly.
Vi was dressed in a dark blue suit accented with a gold pocket watch chain. The combination suited her well. She stood smoothly and smiled down at her. "I had a little errand to run, and I thought you might like to once again accompany me."
"Regarding the case?" It was far too easy for her mind to go back to the papers and their gruesome news, and Vi nodded.
"Of course."
Of course, why would Vi want to spend time with her otherwise? She stamped down on such foolish thoughts. It didn't matter if Vi wanted to spend time with her; the case came first, people were dying, and that must be both of their first priorities. Beyond that, their agreement was strictly business. "Give me a moment to collect my jacket and hat."
Vi nodded and Gert hurried out of the study to find a new suit jacket. While in her bedroom, she also picked out a new tie and smoothed out her rumpled shirt as best she could. There was nothing to be done about her wide copper curls or the freckles over her nose, though, not that she should have cared. She frowned at herself in her bedroom mirror before heading out of the bedroom and towards the front hall where Vi already waited.
She plucked her top hat from the hat rack and tucked her cane under one arm. "Shall we?"
Vi only smiled and led the way outside the waiting cab.
"Where are we going?" Her thoughts went to the butcher shop, and her pulse quickened a little. Would they be delving deeper into the occult black market? She was eager to see more of what that world had in store.
"To collect some information," Vi said.
Hopefully that would not mean they were heading back to the asylum. Glancing out the window, she thought it was unlikely; they seemed to be heading towards the eastern part of Manhattan.
As they entered the poorer parts of the city, the roads became narrower and much less well paved. The carriage jolted them back and forth within the carriage and she braced one hand against the wall to stop herself from being flung into Vi's lap. Finally the cab stopped, and Vi swung open the door to reveal a row of shops their glass storefronts displaying everything from furniture to imported foodstuffs. Vi headed straight for the narrow alley that led between two of the tall brick buildings.
There was a small wood door set into one wall of the alley. When Vi rapped on it smartly, it was opened by a round, grey-haired black woman.
"Good evening, Vanessa." Vi tipped her hat. "I need to talk to Mary."
"You'd best come in." Vanessa stepped back from the doorway, and they both ducked inside.
It was a curiosity shop, a small room packed with odds and ends. A glass case with a register on it sat over to the left, to the right a wall filled to bursting with clocks, taxidermied animals, and small paintings of sad-eyed children. There was another glass case which seemed to contain bowls of different colored powders and salts, along with what looked to be a mummified human hand.
"Mary, you have visitors," Vanessa said to a young woman sitting behind the counter were the cash register was. She was strikingly beautiful, dressed all in white with a rosary coiled in her lap, her fingers flying over the beads in a slow, rhythmic, yet endless cycle.
"If you've come for a full séance, I'm afraid you're too late," the woman—Mary—said without looking up at them. "I require three days' notice and a security deposit beforehand."
"I'm not interested in a séance," Vi said, pulling out her billfold, and counted out a small pile of bills onto the glass countertop. "But I do need information."
Mary still didn't look up at either of them. "What do you want to know?"
"There's a creature stalking the street carrying people off," Vi said plainly. "I need to know where it is."
"It was in the sewers over by the Jewish Quarter," Mary said promptly and with complete certainty in her voice. It made Gert wonder. She'd always assumed mystics and psychics were all charlatans, but now she was beginning to question that assumption.
Vi's eyebrow's rose. "Was?"
"I cannot be sure where it is now," Mary said. "But it attacked a man earlier today. His body is in the sewer. Is that all the questions you have?"
"It is, thank you." Vi tipped her hat to both Vanessa and Mary before turning back to the door.
"Miss?" There was a touch on her shoulder and looked up at Vanessa.
"Here." Vanessa said and handed her a porcelain doll. The doll was dressed in a faded satin dresses and bonnet with eyes that blinked open and shut as it was rocked. "For the girl," Vanessa said. "Don't worry about paying for it. It's a gift, for her."
"What…?"
But Vanessa had already turned away, counting the bills Vi had left on the countertop, and Vi tugged at Gert's sleeve.
"She gave me a doll," She said when they were back in the cab. She looked down at the toy in her hands. "I don't understand."
Vi just shrugged, seemingly unconcerned. "We should go see about this sewer."
"Shouldn't we have weapons? If we intend to meet this creature in its lair, as it were?" She thought of the revolver she kept in the drawer of her desk. She'd hardly thought to bring it, though.
Reaching into one of the inner pockets of her coat, Vi pulled out a long knife. The sight of it did not make Gert feel much better.
"Here should do nicely." Vi was looking out of the window and rapped on the roof of the cab to signal the driver to stop. They climbed out and Vi strolled down the street and then around the corner onto another one, her pace unhurried. She wanted to ask what they were going or looking for, but before she could, Vi ducked into a narrow side street and knelt on the dirty stones around a metal manhole cover.
"Aren't we going to need a crowbar—" Gert started, and Vi reached down forcing her fingers into the groove between the metal and stone and pried the cover off with one smooth, inhuman motion.
"Shall we?" Vi gestured to the darkness of the gaping hole. The stench rising from the hole was noxious in the extreme.
"There are probably rats down there." Not that she was afraid of rats per se, but she didn't enjoy them, especially not in large numbers.
"I hope so," Vi said, tone cheerful, and swung herself down into the hole.
Iron spikes that had been hammered between the bricks of the wall allowed them to descend into the sewage tunnel. Finally her feet sunk into frigid liquid up to the ankles. She tried not to think about it and searched her pockets until she found her lighter. The lighter's tiny flame wasn't all that useful, but it was better than nothing.
In the flicker of the flame held in her hand, Vi's eyes seemed to glow with a silver sheen like that of an animal's, and she looked away. She was very aware that they were alone together in this dark space and Vi was far from human, but she shoved such thoughts aside. She trusted Vi, cared about her—she would not think of her in such a away.
"Where do you propose we even begin to look for the creature?" she said, and Vi's lips pulled back from her too-sharp teeth in a smile.
She bent slightly murmuring low. "Get behind me," Vi said when she straightened, and Grert scrambled to do so.
There was a rushing noise, far off but coming closer along with a high, chattering sound. Inst
inctively, she pressed closer to Vi, still clutching her lighter in one hand. She couldn't see what was coming towards them from the dark, but the cold water around her ankles began to slosh as if there was something large pushing its way through the water towards them.
"What is it? What's that sound?" She didn't like how strained her voice sounded. She could deal with anything, she thought, as long as she could see it.
"The rats," Vi said. "I am calling the rats. They will be able to lead us to the creature's last victim."
"Rat?" Gert echoed, trying to understand what Vi had told her. The noise was still far off but by the sound of it there must be hundreds.
"In truth I don't fully understand why they respond to me, to my power, my nature, my stolen blood, but I have always had control over them," Vi said. The rushing noise, along with the high squeaking from hundreds of tiny throats, was closer now. She swallowed hard and pressed her front even closer to Vi's back. She was now almost grateful she could not see the wave of rats bearing down on them.
The squeaking and skittering grew louder, the water slapping up the side of the brick tunnel. Vi's hand slipped into hers, locking their fingers together. "This way."
Stumbling a little in the water, Gert tried to keep up with the pace Vi set. The sewage tunnel twisted and turned; she couldn't keep track of where they were going. Putting out one hand, she sucked in a sharp breath as her palm scraped against rough brick.
They turned another corner and Vi stopped. "It should be here."
"What?" She raised her lighter again as something brushed against her leg, and then the other one, and then again. Looking down, she realized the water around her feet was full of rats. It took all of her will not to cry out or drop the lighter.
The rats began to squeak loudly, and even with just her lighter, Gert could tell by the bloating that the body had been in the water a few days at least. Trying as best she could to ignore the rats, she squatted beside Vi. The body was partly eaten, hunks gouged out of the face and brain, just like the body in her lab. The hands had been eaten too, but she couldn't tell if that had been by the creature or the rats.
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