“It’s always thirsty,” Davis said. “No matter how much it drinks, it’s never enough.”
“Yeah,” Lee said, “I felt it, too.”
“So did we all,” the Lieutenant said. “It looks to satisfy its thirst at locations where its actions will draw little to no attention. These include remote areas such as the U.S.-Mexico border, the Sahara and Gobi, and the Andes. It also likes conflict zones, whether Iraq, Darfur, or the Congo. How it locates these sites is unknown. We estimate that it visits between four and seven of them per day. That we have been able to determine, there does not appear to be an underlying pattern to its selection of either target areas or individuals within those areas. The vampire’s exact level of intelligence is another unknown. It possesses considerable abilities as a predator, not least of them its speed, reaction time, and strength. Nor should we forget its teeth and,” a rap of the artificial leg, “claws.”
“Not to mention that mind thing,” Lee said.
“Yes,” the Lieutenant said. “Whether by accident or design, the vampire’s appearance is accompanied by a telepathic jolt that momentarily disorients its intended victims, rendering them easier prey. For those who survive the meeting,” a nod at them, “a link remains that may be activated by persistent, pronounced stress, whether physical or mental. The result of this activation is a period of clairvoyance, during which the lucky individual rides along for the vampire’s current activities. Whether the vampire usually has equal access to our perceptions during this time is unclear; our combined accounts suggest it does not.
“However, there are exceptions.”
IX
2005
“I know how we can kill it,” Davis said. “At least, I think I do—how we can get it to come to a place where we can kill it.”
Lee put his Big Mac on his tray and looked out the restaurant window. The Lieutenant paused in the act of dipping his fries into a tub of barbecue sauce. Han continued chewing his McNugget but nodded twice.
“The other day—two days ago, Wednesday—I got to it.”
“What do you mean?” the Lieutenant said.
“It was coming in for a landing, and I made it mess up.”
“Bullshit,” Lee said. He did not shift his gaze from the window. His face was flushed.
“How?” the Lieutenant said.
“I was having a bad day, worse than the usual bad day. Things at Home Depot—the manager’s okay, but the assistant manager’s a raging asshole. Anyway, I decided a workout might help. I’d bought these Kung Fu DVDs—”
“Kung Fu,” the Lieutenant said.
Davis shrugged. “Seemed more interesting than running a treadmill.”
Through a mouthful of McNugget, Han said, “Bruce Lee.”
“Yeah,” Davis said. “I put the first disc on. To start with, everything’s fine. I’m taking it easy, staying well below the danger level. My back’s starting to ache, the way it always does, but that’s okay, I can live with it. As long as I keep the situation in low gear, I can continue with my tiger style.”
“Did it help?” the Lieutenant asked.
“My worse-than-bad day? Not really. But it was something to do, you know?”
The Lieutenant nodded. Lee stared at the traffic edging up the road in front of the McDonald’s. Han bit another McNugget.
“This time, there was no warning. My back’s feeling like someone’s stitching it with a hot needle, then I’m dropping out of heavy cloud cover. Below, a squat hill pushes up from dense jungle. A group of men are sitting around the top of the hill. They’re wearing fatigues, carrying Kalashnikovs. I think I’m somewhere in South America: maybe these guys are FARQ; maybe they’re some of Chavez’s boys.
“I’ve been through the drill enough to know what’s on the way: a ringside seat for blood and carnage. It’s reached the point, when one of these incidents overtakes me, I don’t freak out. The emotion that grips me is dread, sickness at what’s coming. But this happens so fast, there isn’t time for any of that. Instead, anger—the anger that usually shows up a couple of hours later, when I’m still trying to get the taste of blood out of my mouth, still trying to convince myself that I’m not the one who’s so thirsty—for once, that anger arrives on time and loaded for bear. It’s like the fire that’s crackling on my back finds its way into my veins and ignites me.
“What’s funny is, the anger makes my connection to the thing even more intense. The wind is pressing my face, rushing over my arms—my wings—I’m aware of currents in the air, places where it’s thicker, thinner, and I twitch my nerves to adjust for it. There’s one guy standing off from the rest, closer to the treeline, though not so much I—the thing won’t be able to take him. I can practically see the route to him, a steep dive with a sharp turn at the very end that’ll let the thing knife through him. He’s sporting a bush hat, which he’s pushed back on his head. His shirt’s open, T-shirt dark with sweat. He’s holding his weapon self-consciously, trying to looking like a badass, and it’s this, more than the smoothness of his skin, the couple of whiskers on his chin, that makes it clear he isn’t even eighteen. It—I—we jackknife into the dive, and thirsty, Christ, thirsty isn’t the word: this is dryness that reaches right through to your fucking soul. I’ve never understood what makes the thing tick—what drives it—so well.
“At the same time, the anger’s still there. The closer we draw to the kid, the hotter it burns. We’ve reached the bottom of the dive and pulled up; we’re streaking over the underbrush. The kid’s completely oblivious to the fact that his bloody dismemberment is fifty feet away and closing fast. I’m so close to the thing, I can feel the way its fangs push against one another as they jut from its mouth. We’re on top of the kid; the thing’s preparing to retract its wings, slice him open, and drive its face into him. The kid is dead; he’s dead and he just doesn’t know it, yet.
“Only, it’s like—I’m like—I don’t even think, No, or, Stop, or Pull up. It’s more . . . I push; I shove against the thing I’m inside and its arms move. Its fucking arms jerk up as if someone’s passed a current through them. Someone has—I have. I’m the current. The motion throws off the thing’s strike, sends it wide. It flails at the kid as it flies past him, but he’s out of reach. I can sense—the thing’s completely confused. There’s a clump of bushes straight ahead—wham.”
The Lieutenant had adopted his best you’d-better-not-be-bullshitting-me stare. He said, “I take it that severed the connection.”
Davis shook his head. “No, sir. You would expect that—it’s what would have happened in the past—but this time, it was like, I was so close to the thing, it was going to take something more to shake me loose.”
“And?” the Lieutenant said.
Lee shoved his tray back, toppling his super-sized Dr Pepper, whose lid popped off, splashing a wave of soda and ice cubes across the table. While Davis and the Lieutenant grabbed napkins, Lee stood and said, “What the fuck, Davis?”
“What?” Davis said.
“I said: What the fuck, asshole,” Lee said. Several diners at nearby tables turned their heads toward him.
“Inside voices,” the Lieutenant said. “Sit down.”
“I don’t think so,” Lee said. “I don’t have to listen to this shit.” With that, he stalked away from the table, through the men and women swiftly returning their attentions to the meals in front of them, and out the side door.
“What the fuck?” Davis said, dropping his wad of soggy napkins on Lee’s tray.
“That seems to be the question of the moment,” the Lieutenant said.
“Sir—”
“Our friend and fellow is not having the best of months,” the Lieutenant said. “In fact, he is not having the best of years. You remember the snafus with his disability checks.”
“I thought that was taken care of.”
“It was, but it was accompanied by the departure of Lee’s wife and their two-year-old. Compared to what he was, Lee is vastly improved. In terms of the
nuances of his emotional health, however, he has miles to go. The shit with his disability did not help; nor did spending all day home with a toddler who didn’t recognize his father.”
“He didn’t—”
“No, but I gather it was a close thing. A generous percentage of the wedding flatware paid the price for Lee’s inability to manage himself. In short order, the situation became too much for Shari, who called her father to come for her and Douglas.”
“Bitch,” Han said.
“Since then,” the Lieutenant said, “Lee’s situation has not improved. A visit to the local bar for a night of drinking alone ended with him in the drunk tank. Shari’s been talking separation, possibly divorce, and while Lee tends to be a bit paranoid about the matter, there may be someone else involved, an old boyfriend. Those members of Lee’s family who’ve visited him, called him, he has rebuffed in a fairly direct way. To top it all off, he’s been subject to the same, intermittent feast of blood as the rest of us.”
“Oh,” Davis said. “I had no—Lee doesn’t talk to me—”
“Never mind. Finish your story.”
“It’s not a story.”
“Sorry. Poor choice of words. Go on, please.”
“All right,” Davis said. “Okay. You have to understand, I was as surprised by all of this as—well, as anyone. I couldn’t believe I’d affected the thing. If it hadn’t been so real, so like all the other times, I would have thought I was hallucinating, on some kind of wish-fulfillment trip. As it was, there I was as the thing picked itself up from the jungle floor. The anger—my anger—I guess it was still there, but . . . on hold.
“The second the thing was upright, someone shouted and the air was hot with bullets. Most of them shredded leaves, chipped bark, but a few of them tagged the thing’s arm, its shoulder. Something was wrong—mixing in with its confusion, there was another emotion, something down the block from fear. I wasn’t doing anything: I was still stunned by what I’d made happen. The thing jumped, and someone—maybe a couple of guys—tracked it, headed it off, hit it in I can’t tell you how many places—it felt as the thing had been punched a dozen times at once. It spun off course, slapped a tree, and went down, snapping branches on its way.
“Now it was pissed. Even before it picked itself up, the place it landed was being subject to intensive defoliation. A shot tore its ear. Its anger—if what I felt was fire, this was lava, thicker, slower-moving, hotter. It retreated, scuttled half a dozen trees deeper into the jungle. Whoever those guys were, they were professionals. They advanced on the spot where the thing fell and, when they saw it wasn’t there anymore, they didn’t rush in after it. Instead, they fell back to a defensive posture while one of them put in a call—for air support, I’m guessing.
“The thing was angry and hurt and the thirst—” Davis shook his head. He sipped his Coke. “What came next—I’m not sure I can describe it. There was this surge in my head—not the thing’s head, this was my brain I’m talking about—and the thing was looking out of my eyes.”
“It turned the tables on you,” the Lieutenant said.
“Not exactly,” Davis said. “I continued watching the soldiers maybe seventy-five feet in front of me, but I was . . . aware of the thing staring at the DVD still playing on the TV. It was as if the scene was on a screen just out of view.” He shook his head. “I’m not describing it right.
“Anyway, that was when the connection broke.”
Davis watched the Lieutenant evade an immediate response by taking a generous bite of his Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese and chewing it with great care. Han swallowed and said, “Soldiers.”
“What?”
“Soldiers,” Han said.
Through his mouthful of burger, the Lieutenant said, “He wants to know what happened to the soldiers. Right?”
Han nodded.
“Beats the shit out of me,” Davis said. “Maybe their air support showed up and bombed the fucker to hell. Maybe they evac’d out of there.”
“But that isn’t what you think,” the Lieutenant said. “You think it got them.”
“Yes sir,” Davis said. “The minute it was free of me, I think it had those poor bastards for lunch.”
“It seems a bit much to hope otherwise, doesn’t it?”
“Yes sir, it does.”
When the Lieutenant opted for another bite of his sandwich, Davis said, “Well?”
The Lieutenant answered by lifting his eyebrows. Han switched from McNuggets to fries.
“As I see it,” Davis began. He stopped, paused, started again. “We know that the thing fucked with us in Fallujah, linked up with us. So far, this situation has only worked to our disadvantage: whenever one of us is in sufficient discomfort, the connection activates and dumps us behind the thing’s eyes for somewhere in the vicinity of three to five minutes. With all due respect to Lee, this has not been beneficial to anyone’s mental health.
“But what if—suppose we could duplicate what happened to me? Not just once, but over and over—even if only for ten or fifteen seconds at a time—interfere with whatever it’s doing, seriously fuck with it.”
“Then what?” the Lieutenant said. “We’re a thorn in its side. So?”
“Sir,” Davis said, “those soldiers hit it. Okay, yes, their fire wasn’t any more effective than ours was, but I’m willing to bet their percentages were significantly higher. That’s what me being on board in an—enhanced way did to the thing. We wouldn’t be a thorn—we’d be the goddamned bayonet Han jammed in its ribs.
“Not that we should wait for someone else to take it down. I’m proposing something more ambitious.”
“All right.”
“If we can disrupt the thing’s routine—especially if we cut into its feeding—
it won’t take very long for it to want to find us. Assuming the second part of my experience—the thing has a look through our eyes—if that happens again, we can arrange it so that we let it know where we’re going to be. We pick a location with a clearing where the thing can land and surrounding tree cover where we can wait to ambush it. Before any of us goes to ruin the thing’s day, he puts pictures, maps, satellite photos of the spot on display, so that when the thing’s staring out of his eyes, that’s what it sees. If the same images keep showing up in front of it, it should get the point.”
The Lieutenant took the rest of his meal to reply. Han offered no comment. When the Lieutenant had settled into his chair after tilting his tray into the garbage and stacking it on top of the can, he said, “I don’t know, Davis. There are an awful lot more ifs than I prefer to hear in a plan. If we can access the thing the same way you did; if that wasn’t a fluke. If the thing does the reverse-vision stuff; if it understands what we’re showing it. If we can find a way to kill it.” He shook his head.
“Granted,” Davis said, “there’s a lot we’d have to figure out, not least how to put it down and keep it down. I have some ideas about that, but nothing developed. It would be nice if we could control our connection to the thing, too. I’m wondering if what activates the jump is some chemical our bodies are releasing when they’re under stress—maybe adrenaline. If we had access to a supply of adrenaline, we could experiment with doses—”
“You’re really serious about this.”
“What’s the alternative?” Davis said. “Lee isn’t the only one whose life is fucked, is he? How many more operations are you scheduled for, Han? Four? Five?”
“Four,” Han said.
“And how’re things in the meantime?”
Han did not answer.
“What about you, sir?” Davis said. “Oh sure, your wife and kids stuck around, but how do they act after you’ve had one of your fits, or spells, or whatever the fuck you call them? Do they rush right up to give Daddy a hug, or do they keep away from you, in case you might do something even worse? Weren’t you coaching your son’s soccer team? How’s that working out for you? I bet it’s a lot of fun every time the ref makes a lousy call.”
“Enough, Davis.”
“It isn’t as if I’m in any better shape. I have to make sure I remember to swallow a couple of tranquilizers before I go to work so I don’t collapse in the middle of trying to help some customer load his fertilizer into his car. Okay, Rochelle had dumped me while I was away, but let me tell you how the dating scene is for a vet who’s prone to seizures should things get a little too exciting. As for returning to college, earning my BS—maybe if I could have stopped worrying about how goddamned exposed I was walking from building to building, I could’ve focused on some of what the professors were saying and not fucking had to withdraw.
“This isn’t the magic bullet,” Davis said. “It isn’t going to make all the bad things go away. It’s . . . it is what it fucking is.”
“All right,” the Lieutenant said. “I’m listening. Han—you listening?”
“Listening,” Han said.
X
4:11 AM
“So where do you think it came from?” Lee said.
“What do you mean?” Davis said. “We know where it comes from.”
“No,” Lee said, “I mean, before.”
“Its secret origin,” the Lieutenant said.
“Yeah,” Lee said.
“How should I know?” Davis said.
“You’re the man with the plan,” Lee said. “Mr. Idea.”
The Lieutenant said, “I take it you have a theory, Lee.”
Lee glanced at the heap of coals that had been the fire. “Nah, not really.”
“That sounds like a yes to me,” the Lieutenant said.
“Yeah,” Han said.
“Come on,” Davis said. “What do you think?”
“Well,” Lee said, then broke off, laughing. “No, no.”
“Talk!” Davis said.
“You tell us your theory,” the Lieutenant said, “I’ll tell you mine.”
“Okay, okay,” Lee said, laughing. “All right. The way I see it, this vampire is like, the advance for an invasion. It flies around in its pod, looking for suitable planets, and when it finds one, it parks itself above the surface, calls its buddies, and waits for them to arrive.”
Vampires: The Recent Undead Page 52