Modern Magic
Page 138
“I don’t think we have to worry about Tom turning into Doctor Doom anytime soon,” I said, then turned to my somewhat repentant roommate. “Apology, or lack thereof, accepted.”
“Thank you.” Tom raised his coffee mug to me. “I’d hate to have to endure work burdened with such guilt.”
“Bite me,” I quipped.
“That’s your thing. Not that I wouldn’t make a better vampire than you, anyway.”
“You want to join the party?” I asked.
“Only if that Sally chick is doing the biting,” Tom replied, causing us to all dissolve into laughter.
Once it was over, I decided to broach a slightly less whimsical subject. “Seriously, though, guys, I’m a little worried. What if these HBC assholes figure out where I live?”
Ed nodded. “There’s also the little fact that your buddies in SoHo obviously know how to find us. From what you’ve told me, I wouldn’t put it past that Night Razor dick to rat you out to them. Let them take care of his dirty work.”
Oh, crap, I hadn’t even thought of that. Forget a compulsion, one phone call and my apartment could be turned into Fort Apache…or more likely, the Alamo.
Tom turned to Ed and asked, “Think they’d let the two of us walk out of here?”
“I don’t know. We could always tell them we never liked Bill much, anyway.” Ed grinned.
There was a moment of silence while I just glared at them both and then Ed continued, “Realistically? I doubt it. We’d probably end up as an appetizer.”
Tom sighed. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Not really sure I want to go out like some quesadilla platter. On the other hand, I still have Optimus. He’s vampire kryptonite.”
“Good for you. Doesn’t help Ed much, though,” I replied.
“True enough. But I took a little time to think that one out already,” he said, sharing a quick smile with Tom.
I looked between the two of them for a second before asking, “And are you going to share this little secret with me, or are you just gonna keep making goo-goo eyes at each other?”
Ed shrugged and then said, “Might as well. Remember how I said I took a little road trip this weekend?”
“Yeah. What, did you go to a church and get ordained for the priesthood?”
“Not quite. I took a little drive out to my stepfather.”
“Over in…” I thought for a second, but couldn’t remember the name of the town. “Bumblefuck, Pennsylvania, or wherever?”
“That pretty much sums up where he lives,” Ed agreed. “Out in the backwoods where everything…and more importantly…everyone is relative.”
That elicited a chuckle from us as Ed got to his feet.
“Well, Pop and I had a little talk,” he said to me. “Don’t worry, nothing about vampires. I may have exaggerated a bit about our current living conditions, though. You know, how we all live in fear of being mugged and raped by drug dealers every second of our lives?”
I smiled as he walked into his room. It wouldn’t have taken much. It was ridiculously easy to convince anyone living outside of the immediate area that the city was, and I quote, “a hive of scum and villainy.” Apparently, plenty of people, especially those in rural areas, had seen Escape from New York at some point in their lives and assumed it was a documentary.
However, that knowledge didn’t prepare me for when Ed walked back into the room packing some serious heat.
“What the hell…” was all I could say for a second. “Where did you…” Ed’s look answered that one for me. “Pop?”
“Of course. Old man’s been getting paranoid in his golden years. You should see the small arsenal he owns. He said this one should help dissuade all the bad guys just waiting to violate our young, middle-class selves.” He gave it a quick pump. “Remington 870, police combat twelve gauge,” he said proudly. When he saw the absolutely blank look on my face, he gave an annoyed sniff and added, “The same gun Sarah Connor used in Terminator 2.”
That rang a bell. “Badass,” I said. “But don’t you need a license for something like that?”
“Are you kidding?” he replied. “In Pennsylvania, you can pretty much buy these things on the side of the road next to the fireworks.”
“Yeah, but we don’t live in Pennsylvania,” I countered.
He raised his eyebrows and shrugged. “Well, then let’s just say if you don’t tell anyone, I won’t.”
Tom got up to wash out his coffee mug. As he did so, he gave a mock sad shake of his head. “No idea where I went wrong. One minute I’m just minding my own business, and the next I’m shacking up with Dracula and the Lone Ranger.”
Ed just ignored him. “I figured that by the time the city gave me a license, I’d be long since pushing up daisies. Besides which, I’m pretty sure that they ask you your purpose for owning a gun. Writing protection against vampires on the application might raise a few eyebrows.”
“In New York?” I scoffed.
“I did say might.”
“There is the little problem of actually using it as protection against vampires,” I pointed out. “I’ve seen stakes and sunlight work, but unless that thing shoots solar flares, I’m not sure what good it’ll do.”
“What about silver bullets?” asked Tom, preparing to leave for work.
I thought about it for a second. “Not sure. That’s usually werewolves, but I think it works against vampires in some stories.”
“Do either of you have silver bullets?” Ed asked. When we both shook our heads, he continued, “Well, neither do I. So, who gives a shit if they work against vampires, werewolves, or the goddamned tooth fairy? It might kill them, or it might not. What’s important is that this gun will hurt vampires.”
“How do you know?” I asked.
“Because of you, numbnuts,” he replied. “When you burst into flames, did it hurt? When I stabbed you in the hand, did it hurt? When you jumped out of that freaking window you were telling us about, did it hurt?”
I nodded. Yeah, it had, and in some cases, quite a bit.
“Well, then,” he continued, “that tells me that no matter how strong you are or how fast you heal, your nerve endings still work pretty much the same way as they did before. So, using that logic, a twelve gauge shell in the stomach or maybe the kneecap…”
“Will hurt like a bitch,” I finished.
“Exactly,” he agreed. “Which should give either you,” he indicated Tom, “enough time to run in with your little doll, or you,” he turned back toward me, “enough time to do something vampiric to them.”
“Action figure,” Tom corrected.
“What?”
“It’s an action figure, not a doll.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Ed replied with a sigh. “It could be My Little fucking Pony for all I care. As long as it works.”
“Nah,” Tom said. “Last I checked, the market value for My Little Pony wasn’t all that high.”
Ed pumped the shotgun again. “Don’t you have a job to go to?”
Vampire on Vampire Action
With the exception of Tom’s trips to and from work, the rest of the week was spent with us more or less all acting like shut-ins. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I, and by extension, my roommates, was now a target. Fortunately, Brooklyn is a pretty good place to be a recluse, as almost everyone delivers. The problem, though, with being extra careful, was that it was sometimes hard to tell the difference between reasonable precautions and being outright paranoid.
Friday night came and went with no word from Sally or any other denizens of the night (except maybe this homeless guy who accosted Tom for change on his way home). I was lying awake in my bed during the wee hours of Saturday morning, contemplating my weekly trip back to the coven, and debating whether I should borrow Ed’s shotgun, when someone buzzed to be let in from the downstairs door. I glanced at the clock: 4:28 a.m. Probably some drunken asshole forgetting where they were.
A minute or so passed and the buzzer rang again. May
be one of the other tenants had locked themselves out? Possibly, but it’s not like any of us had a master key. Fat lot of good it would do them. Although I guess they could just hang out in the hallway until the landlord could show up to let them in. Another buzz; this one persistently longer. Okay, now it was sounding deliberate. I was starting to let the paranoia creep back in when I realized that a gang of vampires hell-bent on killing me would probably not bother with such trivial matters as waiting to be buzzed in.
I got up, walked out of my bedroom, and crossed to the door. As I did, I noticed light shining from under the doors of my roommates’ bedrooms. Our early morning caller had succeeded in rousing the entire place. I pressed the button to let them up and waited, hoping that the next thing I heard was not the clomping of lots of angry feet on the stairs running up to exact undeserved revenge upon me. Being taken out by a vengeful street gang was one thing, but being taken out by a vengeful gang that I had purposely buzzed in…well, that would just be sad.
However, no sound of multitudes of running feet drifted to my ears. All I heard, after a minute or so, was one small set of footsteps taking their sweet time coming up. A moment later, I spotted a head of blonde hair rising up toward the landing…Sally.
I stepped back to let her into the apartment and there was Ed, waiting for us, shotgun raised. I looked behind him to see Tom standing near the door to his bedroom, his faith empowered action figure held out in front like a shield. Oh, well, I guess I couldn’t blame him. No matter what we may know to be true, a gun was always going to make someone feel a little braver than a piece of plastic.
Sally entered and after Ed saw she was alone, he lowered the weapon, a look of relief crossing over his face.
“Nice little gun,” she said to him.
He quickly composed himself and replied as nonchalantly as he could (which wasn’t very much, all things considered), “I have a bigger one in my pocket if you want to see it.”
That actually elicited something resembling a smile from her. “I’ll pass. Now, why don’t you go take a shower and freshen up? You reek of desperation.”
He turned a little red, and Tom chuckled at that. As for myself, I closed the door behind her and said, “Since I don’t remember booking a bachelor party, shall I assume this isn’t a social call?”
“Ooh, you’re snippy in the morning,” she cooed.
“I’ve had a hard week…in no small part thanks to you.”
“And, yet, you survive to complain about it,” she countered. “Still, that’s why I’m here. There’s been some weird stuff going on and I wanted to check in with you.”
I batted my eyes at her. “Worried about me?”
“Don’t flatter yourself.”
“Yeah, don’t flatter yourself,” Tom cut in, Transformer still in hand. “She was obviously worried about me.”
“I was, but now I see you have your teddy bear.” She motioned toward the doll…action figure that is, and then back to me, “I swear, Bill, I’ve been around for over fifty years and I’ve never seen an apartment so full of women repellant.”
“All right, enough. Can we cut the foreplay short?” I asked, not really believing that I was the one who was acting like an adult here. “You said ‘weird stuff.’ What’s been happening?”
She looked me in the eye and replied, “I assume you got my message.” I gritted my teeth and nodded. “Like I said, James needed to prune a few hedges over at that other coven.”
“The Howard Beach Coven?” I spat.
“Yeah. How did you…never mind. You can tell me your part when I’m done. He figured he’d kill two birds with one stone and do you a favor while he was taking care of business.”
“His favor almost got me killed,” I complained.
“It’s always about you, isn’t it?” she sniffed. “Now, if you can stop whining for a moment or two, I can tell you what I know.” She stared at me for a few seconds until I mimed zipping my lip, and then she continued, “So, James dusted some of their unauthorized membership and then took out a few of their senior members, just to make it look good.”
“Tito and Big Mike?” I inquired.
“How should I know? This is just what I heard,” she said. “I don’t know if James bothered asking for their autographs before he took them down. However, what I do know is that he went there in disguise and then purposely let a few witnesses escape to spread the word that someone was hunting down other vamps just for sport.”
“Let me guess, this someone was a freewill.” I sat down and began massaging my temples before the migraine could start.
“Exactly,” she confirmed.
“How do we know he wasn’t just setting Bill up to take a fall?” asked Ed.
She must have thought that an exceptionally stupid question, because that earned him one of her famous eye-rolls (should I be jealous?). “Because, if James wanted him dead, Bill would be dead. No need for subterfuge. He’d just do it,” she explained.
I had to admit she had a point. “Agreed. Not much doubt in my mind, there.”
“James has been working behind the scenes to pump up Bill’s reputation,” she continued. “And no, I don’t know too many specifics as to why. All I know is he has an interest in Bill staying alive.”
“Okay, I pretty much got the gist of all this from your message the other night,” I replied.
She nodded and went on. “Yeah, well things got a little crazy after that. He was supposed to take care of any heat that came down on us because of what you had supposedly done. Obviously, there was no point in giving you credit if it just got you killed.”
“That’s only fair,” Ed said.
“Except,” Sally pointed out, “he didn’t. The HBC’s leader, Samuel, went absolutely ape shit. He called us up, screaming and threatening to declare all out war between our covens. Jeff just barely managed to talk him down and agree to mediation on neutral ground.”
“I’m surprised he didn’t just sell me out,” I said.
“You don’t get it.” She spat, sitting down as if she owned the place. “He was going to. He didn’t know of James’ plan, and I wasn’t about to tell him. Jeff didn’t really want to believe it, but based on what was happening, even he had to admit the possibility that perhaps he’d been underestimating you and that maybe you’d actually done this.”
“Isn’t that a good thing?” Tom asked before turning to me. “Bill, didn’t you say you were trying to convince this guy you were more of a threat than you are?”
Leave it to Tom always to help inflate my ego. Before I could chime in with a response, though, Sally answered him, “There’s more bad than good there. Jeff wasn’t exactly a happy camper that Bill brought this down on his head. You have to understand this is not something that happens often. There’s usually an unwritten rule of mutual respect between nearby covens.”
“And Bill fucked that up,” he surmised.
“No, James fucked that up,” I corrected.
Tom shook his head. “Yeah, but he did it in your name. So, as far as anyone else is concerned, it’s on your head.”
“Your boyfriend is right, Bill,” Sally replied (Bitch!). “As far as anyone knows, this was all you. So, yeah, Jeff was planning on handing you over to them. Maybe not physically, but you can be sure as hell they’d have shown up at your doorstep.”
“Guess we were right to be paranoid,” Ed said, still holding the gun. Tom nodded in agreement.
“Except they didn’t show up,” I pointed out. “So what happened?”
Sally raised her eyebrows in response. “No idea. They just backed down.”
“What do you mean ‘backed down’?” I asked.
“Exactly that. Out of nowhere, Samuel cancelled the meeting and told Jeff that they had reconsidered their position. It was abrupt as all hell. Surprised the shit out of all of us.”
“And probably pissed off Jeff even more,” I added.
“Bingo! I thought James must have finally acted, but now I don’t know
. I haven’t been able to get in touch with him all week. So I have no idea what transpired.”
“I don’t know what he did,” I said, “but I just wish he had done it sooner.”
“You mentioned something happened. What went down with you?” she asked.
“Well, thanks to you forgetting to mention this whole thing to me, I found myself unknowingly passing through their territory this week. I met up with two of their goons who were none too happy to see me.”
Sally gave me a sheepish grin. “Oh. Sorry about that.”
I filled her in on my little altercation, telling her of how they accosted me, and describing how I managed to fight back – then luckily somehow scared them off. I was just about to give her the details of my harrowing trip back home when I noticed she had a troubled look on her face.
“What?” I asked.
She stood up and looked me in the eye. “Let me get this straight, you actually bit one of the other vampires?”
“I admit it maybe wasn’t the manliest thing to do, but they kind of had me outnumbered.”
“I don’t give a shit about that,” she said. “You bit him…on the neck?”
“Yeah, I was surprised, too,” cracked Tom. “Normally Bill goes straight for the cock.”
“Put a muzzle on it,” Sally hissed. “This is important.”
“Yes,” I answered, ignoring my roommate’s predictably dickish remark. “I bit him on the neck.”
“And he bled?”
“Yeah. Quite a lot actually. I was freaking soaked in his blood.”
“But did you actually drink any of it?” she asked, rather insistently.
“That wasn’t initially my plan, but yeah, a decent amount.”
“And?”
“And what?” I asked.
“What happened when you drank it?”
“Oh,” I answered. “It was pretty damn intense. It was like…I don’t know how to describe it. Maybe imagine how it would feel if someone shot you up with caffeine-laced meth.”