by AnonYMous
‘What?’
‘We were scoping out the police station earlier for any potential victims and we found a bag of blood with the name Archie Somers on it.’
‘Archie Somers? Where is it now?’
‘We drank it all.’
Vanity eyed them suspiciously. ‘Are you bullshitting me?’
‘No,’ said Dante. ‘It was fucking good stuff.’
Vanity sighed. ‘You know, if I was you, I’d keep quiet about stuff like that,’ he said. ‘Don’t let Jessica or Gaius hear you say shit like that. Gaius will fire fucking laser bolts from his fingertips at you. And Jessica, well, she’ll just rip your fucking insides out!’
‘Who’s Jessica?’ Kacy asked, cautiously.
‘You’ll see her when we get to the Casa de Ville. Now we gotta make a few stops before we get there. See if we can find any more of our clan alive. Safety in numbers an’ all that.’
‘Great,’ said Kacy, unable to mask her lack of enthusiasm.
Vanity slipped his sunglasses back on and nodded towards the exit. Kacy saw Dante slip on a pair of sunglasses too so she followed suit and was surprised to find that she could see just as clearly as before even though it was dark.
Vanity walked past her and jumped over the banister at the top of the stairs. He disappeared out of sight. Kacy rushed over and peered over the banister. Vanity was dropping gently to the ground floor. She looked back at Dante.
‘Can we do that?’ she asked.
Dante grimaced. ‘I guess so. Shall I go first?’
‘You’d fucking better!’
As he was about to hurl himself over the balcony Kacy grabbed his arm. ‘Baby, are we about to go and join a vampire army?’ she asked.
‘I think so.’
‘Are you sure we want to do this?’
‘Well, we are vampires at the moment. I say we go with the flow.’
‘I’m not sure I’m ready to go around killing people just yet.’
Dante pulled her in towards him and planted a kiss on the long dark hair on the top of her head. ‘We’re vampires now, babe,’ he reminded her. ‘Until we find the Eye of the Moon and transform ourselves back into humans I say we go with the flow.’
‘I suppose,’ said Kacy. ‘But Vanity said the vampire army is going to take over the city. Do we really want to be a part of that?’
‘I dunno, babe, but with the Bourbon Kid out of the picture, there’s nothing to stop the undead from taking over the city. At least we’ll be on the winning team.’
‘Yeah, but I still can’t get the image of that little boy being dragged away at the police station out of my head.’
‘Thanks, I’d just about managed to forget about that.’
‘Well I can’t. It’s still bugging me.’
‘Try to think about something else.’
‘Like what?’
‘Baseball.’
Kacy sighed. ‘It’s not just the image of it that’s bothering me. It’s what it represents.’
‘Huh?’
Dante wasn’t getting her point so she spelled it out for him. ‘I could never hurt a child. What if the craving for blood makes us kill kids?’
‘You’d never hurt a kid, Kace, and neither would I.’
‘I know, but what if that changes? I don’t want to hurt anybody’s kids. I think I want to go back to being human again.’
Dante kissed her on the forehead. ‘All right, babe. I’ll tell you what, next time we see a vampire try to kill a kid, I’ll kick that vampire’s head in.’
‘And I’ll help you do it.’
‘Okay, but you know our first priority has to be finding a way to get the Eye of the Moon back.’
‘Have you got a plan?’
‘No. When have I ever had a plan? Plans are for suckers.’
It was at times like this when Dante talked passionately yet with no sense of what danger lay in wait for him that Kacy remembered why she fell in love with him in the first place. He might well be a foolhardy moron, but he was as brave as any man she’d ever met.
‘I love you, you know,’ she said.
Dante grabbed her ass and squeezed it hard. ‘I love you too,’ he said. ‘This vampire shit will just be temporary. Trust me.’
Four
Sanchez hated snow. Until now he’d only ever seen it on television but that was enough to make him hate it. And waking up on November 1st after the previous awful day’s events, the last thing he wanted to see was snow-covered streets. It had fallen thick and fast overnight, settling two inches deep on the roads. The local kids were overjoyed and were busy building snowmen in the streets. And someone (Sanchez suspected his paperboy) had thrown a snowball at him when he was walking to his car. Little fucker. The only good thing about the cold weather was that it had given him the opportunity to wear his replica Top Gun jacket. He’d bought it on the Internet, but it had always been too hot in Santa Mondega to merit wearing it out in public. Up to now it had only ever been worn in his bedroom when he was pretending to be Tom Cruise in front of the mirror.
His drive to the Ole Au Lait for breakfast took a little longer than usual. Partly because the snow made the roads a little more dangerous, but mostly because Sanchez veered off the road a few times in order to knock down some of the snowmen that the local kids had built on the sidewalks.
He arrived at the café at just after nine o’clock in the morning. Experience had taught him to get there early before all the local seniors showed up. The elderly seemed to like nothing more than to sit themselves at the tables next to him and break wind while he tried to eat.
He walked through the door, carrying a black satchel over his shoulder. If he wanted a breakfast this morning, he knew he was going to have to settle a debt he had with Rick the owner of the Ole Au Lait. On the previous day, Rick had called him with some useful information and in return Sanchez had agreed to give him a bottle of liquor. He had the bottle in his satchel, although he secretly hoped Rick wouldn’t be there to accept it. Also in his bag was a book that he had stolen from the library, a book called The Book of Death. It had provided none of the clues he had been hoping for in his quest to find out more about Jessica or The Book With No Name. In fact, the only mention of Jessica in the book had been written in there by Sanchez. Rick had informed him of her full name and also that of an acquaintance of hers named Rameses Gaius. Sanchez had noted their names down on a blank page of the book and carried out an Internet search to see if he could find more about them. He had found nothing.
As he approached the counter he became aware of an unpleasant smell of piss. Slumped over in a table by the window was a drunken Santa Claus impersonator. He looked half asleep, but he still managed to mutter something to Sanchez that sounded like “spare me some change”. Sanchez ignored it and instead forced a fake smile for Rick who was standing behind the counter, counting the notes in the till. Rick looked full of beans. He wasn’t wearing his usual chef outfit. Instead he was dressed to go out in a pair of jeans and, rather annoyingly, a leather Top Gun jacket exactly like Sanchez’s. Bastard. He looked up when Sanchez arrived and forced a fake smile back.
‘Mornin’ Sanchez. Nice jacket,’ he said.
‘Yeah, you too,’ said Sanchez, inwardly seething.
Rick peered over at the satchel. ‘I hope you’ve got that bottle of Jack Daniel’s for me,’ he said his fake smile expanding into a broad grin.
‘I sure have,’ Sanchez replied. ‘It’s in here.’
‘Hand it over then.’
Sanchez reached into his satchel. The bottle of Jack Daniel’s had slipped to the bottom, beneath The Book of Death. He pulled the big black hardback book out first and placed it on the counter.
‘What’s this?’ Rick asked.
‘Just some book I gotta take back to the library later.’
Rick turned the book around to get a look at the title. ‘The Book of Death? What’s it about?’ he asked.
Sanchez pulled the bottle of Jack Daniel’s out and placed it
on top of the book. ‘Not really sure what it’s about,’ he said. ‘Just a list of names, in some sort of diary format.’
‘Oh,’ Rick sounded disappointed. ‘Well, I’m going to the library this morning. I can drop it back for you if you like?’
‘That’d be great,’ said Sanchez. ‘Don’t check it in though, just slip it back on the shelf in the Reference section.’
Rick raised an eyebrow. ‘Why’s that then? Didn’t you check the book out?’
‘Yeah, but I kind of wrote some names on one of the blank pages.’
‘Why?’
‘I didn’t have any other paper to hand at the time.’
‘Well that’s hardly a crime is it?’ said Rick coolly.
‘Actually it is. Defacing a public library book is considered a fairly serious offence.’
‘To whom?’
‘Have you seen the woman that works in the library?’
Rick grinned as he grasped what Sanchez was getting at. ‘Yeah. She’s pretty much a bitch, isn’t she?’
Sanchez despised Ulrika Price and agreed wholeheartedly with Rick’s assessment of her. ‘That’s the nicest thing I’ve ever heard anyone say about her,’ he said.
Rick picked up the bottle of Jack Daniel’s and unscrewed the lid. He took a sniff. ‘Smells like good stuff,’ he commented.
‘What did you expect?’
‘I thought it might be some of your homebrew.’
Sanchez did his best to look offended. ‘I have no idea what you mean.’
‘Sure,’ said Rick. ‘That Santa in the corner smells just like your homebrew.’ He had a point.
‘Anyways,’ said Sanchez. ‘It’s breakfast time and I’m hungry.’
Rick took the hint and shouted out to the back room. ‘Yo, Flake, customer!’
Rick’s head waitress Flake, appeared, complete with a notebook and pen. Her long brown hair was neatly scraped back into a ponytail. And as usual she was wearing the uniform that Rick insisted all his female members of staff wore. Sanchez approved of it too. It consisted of a short black dress and stockings, a look that suited Flake’s petite figure nicely.
‘Good morning, Sanchez,’ she said beaming a bright white smile at him. ‘Twelve item breakfast and a large coffee?’
‘Yes please, Flake.’
She pointed to a table on the opposite side of the café to the piss smelling Santa. She clearly knew Sanchez well. He liked to eat his breakfast as far away from other customers as possible, particularly smelly ones. ‘I’ve just cleaned that table up for you and left a newspaper over there,’ she said with a wink.
‘Thanks.’
Rick picked up The Book of Death, tucked it under his arm and walked around the counter. ‘Right, Flake, I’m off to town. You can go when Sanchez is done with his breakfast.’
‘You closing up early?’ Sanchez asked.
‘Wouldn’t have even opened at all if it wasn’t for the fact I knew you’d be dropping by with my bottle of JD,’ said Rick, flipping the closed sign up on the front door. He pulled the door open and as he walked through it he looked back at Sanchez and winked. ‘Don’t let Flake get you into any trouble.’ With that he closed the door behind him and headed out into the snow.
‘I’ll bring your coffee over in a second,’ said Flake. ‘Make yourself comfortable.’
As he walked over to the unusually clean table in the corner by the window, Sanchez eyed Flake suspiciously. Was she building up to asking him for something? Beneath that fresh faced glow on her pink cheeks and those big inviting brown eyes she could be plotting something. Or hoping for a tip.
‘What’s got you so cheerful today?’ he asked her.
‘I’m just pleased to see you, Sanchez,’ she replied. ‘After all the killing yesterday it’s nice to see that you weren’t one of the victims.’
‘Well, I did have a run in with the Bourbon Kid and some werewolves.’
‘Yes, I heard about that. You survived another shootout. You’re so lucky.’
‘Not that lucky. He killed all my customers again. The bastard.’
‘Was it because you poured piss in his drink again?’
Sanchez sat down and picked up the newspaper to glance over the front page headlines. ‘I didn’t get a chance to this time. I would have, but I’d just served it all to the werewolves.’
The front page, as expected, ran with the story of the latest massacre. The death toll looked like it might even run into the thousands this time. Sanchez tutted to himself as he thought about all the potential customers he must have lost.
When he looked back up he noticed that Flake looked different. She was still stood behind the counter, wearing the same outfit, but she had now removed the white apron from the front of her dress and had also let her hair down. It now hung freely around her shoulders. She had beautiful long brown hair to match her eyes. Sanchez couldn’t help thinking that Flake letting her hair down while working in an establishment that served food seemed somewhat unhygienic. Nevertheless, he knew she cooked a good sausage so he kept his thoughts to himself.
He continued to read the newspaper shaking his head occasionally as he came across details of the demise of more potential customers. Eventually Flake wandered over with his mug of coffee. As she set it down on the table, she spoke again.
‘You’re the only person I know who’s brave enough to serve the Bourbon Kid a glass of piss,’ she said. After saying it she seemed to suck in a deep intake of breath. It made her chest jut out over the top of Sanchez’s newspaper as he lowered it to take a look at his coffee. He couldn’t help but notice that she had a particularly fine pair of boobs. For a few seconds he stared, gawping at them, before remembering she had just spoken to him.
‘Brave?’ he said aloud, failing to hide his confusion at being called such a thing. She was definitely on drugs.
He quickly recovered from the unexpected compliment and attempted to act like he was downplaying it. ‘Yeah well, some people are afraid of the Bourbon Kid,’ he shook his head, ‘…but I’m not. I think he knows not to mess with me. I show no fear when he’s around. Think he respects that.’
‘Wow. You should join the police, Sanchez. They could use someone like you.’
He shrugged. ‘Well, the town would be a safer place. That’s for sure.’
‘So join up!’ Flake sounded genuinely excited at the idea.
‘I would,’ said Sanchez, pretending to read the newspaper while he took another sneaky glance at Flake’s chest. ‘Believe me, if they were recruiting, I’d be first in line. This town needs someone to clean up the streets.’
‘Brilliant!’ her voice went up a few octaves. She slammed a white paper flyer down on to the table by his coffee. ‘Look, you can sign up today!’
Sanchez stopped pretending to read the paper and glanced down at the flyer. His eyes settled on the black bold lettering at the centre of it.
POLICE RECRUITING TODAY
‘I’ll have my eggs sunny side up today please,’ he said, hoping to change the subject.
‘Oh, okay,’ said Flake. ‘But what do you think of the flyer?’
‘And I’d like my sausages burned, please.’
‘Okay, no problem. So what do you think of the…’
‘And an extra piece of bacon.’
‘Okay, anything else?’
‘That should do it.’
Flake was very persistent, much to Sanchez’s irritation. ‘See they’re allowing just about anyone to join the police now,’ she said pointing at the flyer. ‘Just as a temporary measure, until they can get some real cops in from out of town. So, you gonna sign up?’
‘Actually, did I mention I wanted white toast?’
‘You always have white toast.’
‘Just making sure you hadn’t forgotten.’
Flake giggled. ‘You’re so funny,’ she said, gazing at him with big hopeful brown eyes. ‘So are you going to sign up or what?’
Sanchez sighed. ‘I’d love to,’ he said. ‘But I’m
not tall enough. I don’t meet the height restrictions.’
‘There are no height restrictions,’ Flake said, her voice sounding more excited with every syllable.
‘I’m too old then.’
‘No age restrictions either. Great, isn’t it?’
‘I have a criminal record.’
‘Doesn’t matter! Look, read the whole flyer. They’re taking anyone. This is your big chance!’
There was no doubt about it. She had to be on drugs. No one should be that enthusiastic in the morning. Particularly not when they were serving breakfast. Still, Sanchez decided to play along for now. He was willing to tell Flake whatever she wanted to hear, as long as it meant he got to eat his breakfast in peace.
‘Well, that’s great news isn’t it?’ he said disingenuously. ‘I’ll be down there as soon as I’ve finished my breakfast. Just try and stop me.’
‘Brilliant,’ said Flake, clapping her hands together with glee. ‘We can go together. I’m signing up too. I’m so glad I’ll have someone to go with. This will just be the most fun, won’t it?’
‘What?’
‘I’ll drive us there as soon as you’ve finished your breakfast.’
‘Huh?’
‘I’m so excited! My horoscope said this would happen!’
‘Wait, hold on a—’
‘In fact, I’m going to buy your breakfast for you this morning.’ With that, Flake dashed off back to the kitchen to make his breakfast. She sure did seem excited. Sanchez figured he’d let her pay for his breakfast, as it was obviously important to her. But then, once he’d finished eating it, he’d come up with a way of getting out of signing up for the police force.
Five
Dan Harker was having a hell of a day already. In the early hours of the morning he had been summoned to the Mayor’s office and deputized as the new Captain of the Santa Mondega Police Department. His first day wasn’t going to be a gentle bedding-in, either. Most of the city cops had been murdered the previous day so he wasn’t going to have much help dealing with any crimes. The Mayor had done all he could to help by placing advertisements all over town requesting members of the public to sign up, but that just meant Harker would have to spend half the day recruiting.