Immortal Blood

by James M. Thompson

  Sally stood up and took off her blouse and unzipped the short miniskirt she was wearing and let it drop to the floor.

  She was wearing neither a bra nor any panties and stood there naked before Michael for a moment before sliding into the bed and lying next to him.

  “Now, put your hand on me while you kiss me,” he commanded.

  Sally’s right hand slid down Michael’s belly to his groin and she wrapped her fingers around his rapidly enlarging penis, which was the only part of his body not ravaged by the fire.

  As she stroked him into full tumescence, she placed her full, pouting lips on his cracked, bleeding ones and stuck her tongue into his mouth.

  Michael moaned, partly from pain and partly from desire, his hips moving in time with her stroking as he bit down on her tongue until he could feel her blood trickling down his throat.

  Sally grunted in pain and tried to pull back, but Michael’s fangs grew and he held her fast, their lips locked together as he willed her hand to move faster and faster.

  Just as he was about to explode, he grabbed her shoulders and pulled her roughly on top of him. Out of long habit, she spread her legs and sat on his groin, groaning as his huge penis impaled her, splitting the tender membranes of her vagina when it entered her.

  Her eyes cleared and lost their vacant stare, the pain overriding his mental commands, and she opened her mouth to scream at the sight of the ruined wreck of burnt and blackened flesh beneath her.

  Michael sunk his claws into her breasts, pulling her down against him and sank his fangs into her jugular vein just as a terrified howl screamed from her mouth.

  Within seconds, the hormones flooding his bloodstream mixed with her blood and she ceased screaming and began to moan and grunt, full with the throes of sexual passion the hormones engendered, the horror in her mind subdued by the chemicals in her veins.

  She bucked and humped, grinding her sex against his groin, her hands wrapping themselves around his back as he sucked her blood from her neck and groped her pendulous breasts, teasing the nipples with his fingertips.

  With her fresh, young blood coursing into his veins, his body began to melt and change, healing itself automatically while he pumped his groin against hers.

  Minutes later, he threw his head back and howled with joy as he exploded inside her, his cries mingling with hers as she came with him . . . for the last time in her life.

  * * *

  Downstairs, Babs lifted her head up from Jean’s groin and cocked her head. “What was that?” she asked, goose bumps appearing on her naked body at the sound of the horrible scream from upstairs.

  Jean grinned as his face began to change, his thin ascetic features becoming coarse and ugly as he began to transform into his vampyre form. “I’d say your friend has just seen the face of her future,” he growled, entwining his claws into her hair and jerking her face down into his lap, forcing his engorged penis into her mouth again.

  Babs grunted and tried to lift her head, but he held her tight, his hips bucking against her, burying his penis so deep she gagged on it.

  Just before he came, he picked her up off him as if she weighed only a few pounds and flipped her onto her back on the couch.

  When she saw what he had become, her face screwed up in terror and she screamed once as he pounced. He buried his face in her neck and began to chew and suck while he forced her legs apart with his knees and rammed into her, splitting her like a log as he impaled her.

  Her scream died just moments before she did, and Jean hissed between his fangs as he came into her while he greedily drank the last vestiges of life from her shrunken corpse.

  * * *

  In the downstairs bedroom, Angela lay reclined against the head of the bed, her legs spread and draped over Peter’s shoulders, and played with her own breasts while Peter lay on his stomach, his face buried in her sex.

  Her eyes popped open at the sound of Babs’s scream and she glanced down the bed at Peter. Her mouth opened but no sound could escape her frozen throat when she saw the monster between her legs.

  “Uh . . . uh . . .” she grunted, trying to yell as he looked up at her through red, bloodshot eyes, fangs protruding from a face she’d only imagined in her nightmares.

  Peter sat up on his haunches, his claws scraping at her nipples and his huge, erect penis throbbing and bobbing at her. He grinned, exposing a mouthful of sharp, pointed teeth, red-tinged drool dripping off his monster’s lips.

  “Now,” he growled in a deep, husky voice, “It’s party time!”

  As she shook her head back and forth and shut her eyes tight, praying she was having some sort of flashback from the LSD she’d taken earlier at the club, he slid his body up hers until the head of his penis was teasing the lips of her sex.

  “Are you ready, Angela, dear?” he asked, his voice so deep and gruff she could barely understand it.

  “No . . . please, no . . .” she managed to squeeze out of her dry mouth.

  “Sorry, wrong answer,” he quipped and jutted his hips forward as he dipped his head to her throat.

  Now the scream came, full bodied and wailing as he rammed himself to her hilt and sank his fangs into her neck.

  Moments later, she was moving in time with him, sweat pouring from her face, moaning and pulling his hips and trying to pull him deeper inside her as she came and came.

  When Peter finally exploded, he grunted with pleasure and sank his fangs deeper into her neck, tearing out chunks of her tender flesh and swallowing them whole, letting her warm, spicy blood spurt into his open mouth until it flowed no longer.

  Twenty-four

  After Ed Slonaker and his wife, Kim, finished their meal with their new friend, Elijah Pike, they strolled back down the gravel path toward their cabin in the lodge at Jasper National Park.

  As they walked, Ed put his arm around Kim’s waist and leaned over to kiss her on the neck. She moaned softly under her breath. “Is that a not-too-subtle message for me or are you just being unusually romantic tonight?” she asked, leaning into the kiss.

  Ed smiled and waggled his eyebrows. “And if I told you I can’t wait to get back to our cabin so I can eat you up, what would you say?” he murmured in a hoarse whisper.

  She turned to him and put her arms around his neck and kissed him full on the mouth. “Then I’d say that we need to go on vacation more often.”

  A nearby elk, grazing on the sweet grass of the lodge grounds, raised his head and stared briefly at the two humans making out in the moonlight. He snorted through his nose as he caught a whiff of their scent on the evening breeze, his eyes widening and his head lowering so that his massive rack of horns would protect him in case of an attack by these strange beings.

  Keeping his head down and his eyes on the pair, he slowly backed away, shaking his horns a bit to show them he wasn’t afraid, until he was back in a nearby copse of trees. Once he was in the shadows, he turned and galloped away, raising his nose and trumpeting a warning to the cows that were also grazing nearby.

  Kim glanced over Ed’s shoulder at the departing elk as Ed’s hands roamed over her breasts, making her breath come in short gasps. “I think we’d better get indoors, dear, we seem to be scaring the wildlife.”

  Once they were in their room, Kim kissed him quickly on the mouth and headed for the bathroom to take a shower. “Don’t start without me,” she called over her shoulder as she slowly shut the door.

  Ed sat on the edge of the bed, his eyes thoughtful. Finally making up his mind, he picked up the phone on the nightstand and made a call to Banff.

  After a couple of rings, a deep voice answered, “Ashby here.”

  “Hey, John,” Ed said to his chief of intelligence and longtime friend.

  “Hello, Ed. What are you doing calling me? I thought you were on vacation.”

  “I am, but I need you to do me a favor before we get back.”

  “Yeah?” Ashby answered.

  “When you get to the office tomorrow, would you get on th
e computer and find out everything you can about a man from the states named Elijah Pike?”

  “Just a minute, let me get a pencil and write this down,” Ashby said. A moment later, he was back on the line. “Okay, Elijah Pike. No middle initial?”

  “If there is I don’t know it,” Ed answered. “He’s supposed to be a medical doctor coming up to Banff to do some research with the wildlife people, so he ought to be pretty easy to check out.”

  “Do you know anything else about him?”

  “Nope, just that he doesn’t smell right, and I’d like to find out if he’s who he says he is.”

  Ashby was quiet for a moment, and then he asked, “What was your initial impression of him?”

  Ed shook his head, even though Ashby couldn’t see it over the phone. “I don’t know. He’s a pretty hard guy to read. At times he seems okay, but there’s something about him that doesn’t fit the picture of a doctor up here to do research. Find out what you can and let me know, all right?”

  “Sure, boss. You still due back day after tomorrow?”

  “Yeah, and I almost forgot, Pike has supposedly rented a cabin up near the border to the park there in Banff. Run it through all the rental agencies and see if you can get a line on just where he’s going to be staying.”

  “Will do. Leave it to me, Ed, and you and Kim enjoy your last couple of nights. Quit worrying about all this stuff. Remember, you’re supposed to be on vacation.”

  “Okay, John. See you in a couple,” Ed said and hung up the phone just as Kim emerged from the bathroom in a pink, see-through nightie.

  As she stood posed in the doorway, the light behind her outlining her beautiful figure, Ed growled and bared his teeth. “Come here you,” he said, his voice husky with lust, “I’ve got something to show you.”

  Her eyes dropped to the bulge in his lap and she grinned. “Oh, I think I see it already.”

  Ed stood up and began to jerk his clothes off as she moved toward him. “How does it look?” he asked as he dropped his pants to the floor.

  Kim licked her lips and reached out for him. “Delicious!”

  * * *

  Matt Carter parked the car in the long-term parking lot of the Austin airport, and the four friends walked into the terminal.

  While he and Shooter went to the airport restaurant to order them all some food, Sam and TJ took seats in the passenger area well away from anyone who might overhear them. TJ took out her cell phone and dialed Elijah’s number.

  When he answered, TJ said, “Elijah, we’re at the destination you directed us to. What do you want us to do now?”

  “Give me a minute while I check out my atlas.” There was silence on the phone for a moment, and then Elijah was back. “I think your best bet is to fly to Spokane, Washington. Pay cash for the tickets.” he said. “I’ll wire nine-thousand dollars to the airport and have it waiting at the customer service counter for you under the name Sally Ford.”

  TJ interrupted to ask, “Why nine-thousand dollars?”

  “Because banks have to report transactions of ten-thousand dollars or more to the feds, and we don’t know how extensive Morpheus’s contacts are.”

  “What do we do then?” she asked.

  “I want you to buy a good, used four-wheel-drive SUV, because you’re going to be driving though some rough country and you’re liable to go through some heavy weather.”

  “Okay, where do we go from Spokane?”

  “You’d better get a pen and write this down, it’s complicated.”

  TJ fumbled in her purse for a few seconds and then she said, “Shoot.”

  “Take US Route 2 north to Sandpoint, Idaho, it’s about 75 miles. From Sandpoint, take US-95 north to the Canadian border. Once you’ve crossed into Canada, take Provincial 95, then Provincial 3 and then head east on the Trans-Canada 1 until you get to Banff, Alberta. Go to the Banff Springs Hotel. It’s very large and will be full of other tourists so you won’t stand out. I’ll have a couple of rooms reserved for you under my name. Contact me when you get there and I’ll give you further directions on how to find me.”

  “But, Elijah, how are we going to get across the border without passports or giving our names?” she asked.

  She could hear Elijah sigh heavily into the phone, as if irritated by her lack of imagination. “TJ, didn’t you tell me that you and Sam have quit taking your treatments?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, then, between the two of you, your mental powers should be strong enough by now to cloud some bored border crossing guard’s mind and get you into the country.”

  “Oh,” she said, “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “And TJ,” he added, his voice becoming softer.

  “Yes, Elijah?”

  “Please be careful. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

  TJ blushed and smiled. “I know, Elijah. We’ll see you soon.”

  * * *

  TJ and Sam went into the small restaurant area and sat at the table with the men.

  “Okay, TJ,” Shooter said, his voice slightly sarcastic. “What did the guru have to say?” It was obvious to all of them that Shooter was having a hard time dealing with Pike and had still not quite forgiven him for getting them all, and TJ especially, into this mess in the first place.

  She recounted her conversation with Pike, wisely leaving out his personal message to her, and then she gave all her attention to the hamburger Shooter had ordered for her.

  “Canada?” Matt asked, frowning. “What the hell is he doing up there?”

  Sam wiped mustard from her own hamburger off the corner of her mouth and answered, “Remember, he told us months ago that he was going to try and work with Dr. Bartholomew Wingate over at McGill University to try and improve the treatments we’ve been taking.”

  “But,” Matt argued, “McGill is in Toronto, as I recall. Why is Pike staying in Banff?”

  Sam shrugged. “I don’t know. Perhaps he thinks it’s safer there since he knows there are still quite a few . . .” she hesitated over the words for a second, and then continued in a lower voice, “vampyres who are against this research. Maybe he’s trying not to draw attention to Wingate to keep him safe, since as far as we know none of the others know who helped Elijah devise the treatment.”

  “That’s probably it,” TJ agreed around a mouthful of her burger. “And like he says, he can do his research just about anywhere as long as he has a phone and a fax to keep in touch with Wingate.”

  Shooter’s eyes narrowed. “And do you girls think Pike is right? Can you really mess with a guy’s mind enough to get us across the border?”

  TJ winked at Sam and patted Shooter’s arm as she gave him her most innocent smile. “Of course, dear. After all, I’ve been messing with yours for weeks now.”

  Shooter’s eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. “What? How . . . ?”

  TJ and Sam both laughed. “Just kidding, sweetheart,” TJ said soothingly.

  Shooter calmed down and glanced at Matt. “Can you believe these two?” he asked.

  Matt laughed. “Actually, I can, Shooter ol’ boy. Messing with your mind would be almost too easy for them since it’s already so screwed up.”

  Twenty-five

  Michael Morpheus opened his eyes, yawned, and tried to stretch, only then noticing the cold, dead body lying across his good right arm. With a grimace of distaste, he rolled the stiffened body off the other side of the bed where it landed with a heavy thump.

  He sat up in the bed and surveyed his naked body. Almost all of the charred, blackened flesh had peeled off and was lying on the sheets next to him. The remainder of his skin was as pink and fresh as a newborn babe’s, and the searing pain he’d experienced since the conflagration at the Silvers’ house was no longer present. The girl’s blood had worked its miracle and he felt as good as he had in months.

  Getting out of bed, he opened the windows in the room to let the stench of his old, dead flesh waft away on the morning breeze while he got dres
sed. It was the first time since his mate and her friend had doused him with gasoline and set him on fire that he could stand the touch of clothes on his body.

  Feeling quite chipper, he made his way down the stairs and found Peter Vardalack still asleep in the bedroom, his pudgy arms wrapped around the corpse of his “date” from the previous night.

  Morpheus shook his shoulder until he was awake. “Get your lazy ass up, Pete,” he said, not unkindly, “we’re burning daylight and it’s time to work the phones and see what our friends have found out for us.”

  Peter rubbed his eyes and yawned. “My, you’re in an unusually good mood for such an ungodly hour of the morning,” he moaned, and then he noticed Morpheus’s appearance. “Jesus, you look pretty good, Mike . . . uh, Michael,” he said, remembering just in time that Morpheus abhorred being called Mike.

  Morpheus smiled evilly. “Yeah, it’s amazing what a good meal will do, isn’t it?”

  Peter stood up, pushing the dead girl away from him as if she were nothing more than a pillow, and began to put on the clothes he’d scattered around the room the night before. “Then I take it the lady we got you was satisfactory?”

  “That was no lady,” Morpheus said, laughing, “but she was very good, Peter—a fine vintage you might say. And how about yours?”

  Peter shrugged and walked out of the bedroom toward the kitchen to make some coffee. “Oh, not too bad, except the bitch fainted when she saw me change, so her adrenaline level didn’t get as high as I would’ve liked.”

  Morpheus shook his head as he moved toward the other downstairs bedroom to wake Jean Horla up. “Ain’t life a bitch,” he said over his shoulder. “There’s nothing worse than blood without a little adrenaline to give it spice.”

  “Nothing, except no blood at all,” Peter answered as he scooped coffee into the machine.

  * * *

  Later, as the three men sat at the breakfast table eating donuts and drinking coffee, Jean asked, “What do you want us to do with the remains of our feast last night?”

  Morpheus shrugged. “There’s a bayou that runs just off the back of this place. I suppose we could just dump the bodies in there and let the turtles and fish enjoy our leftovers.”