Brian Helsing: The World's Unlikeliest Vampire Hunter. Mission #3: Howlin' Mad

by Gareth K Pengelly

  “I’ve got a better idea,” she told him, an excited smile on her face.

  A smile that made him absolutely certain before he’d even been told that there was no chance in hell it would be a better idea. Nonetheless, he humoured her.

  “Go on.”

  “Why don’t I come with you?”

  Brian wanted to chuckle, as though her suggestion had been endearing, almost flattering. It came out as a loud bark, that of a man who’d heard something too stupid for real laughter to ever sufficiently convey his disdain. At the look of hurt on her face, he raised his hand apologetically.

  “You know what my work entails, right?”

  “I do; fighting demons and supernatural creatures. Protecting mankind from the unseen threat all about. And what better sidekick to have than someone who’s a supernatural creature herself? I’m as fast and strong as most vampires and suchlike. I could prove useful when it comes to fighting monsters.”

  “Demons and vampires aren’t what I’m worried about,” Brian explained with a sigh. “It’s Heimlich, Friedrick, Otto and… Gertie.” He almost didn’t dare voice the last name, for fear of setting Scylla off on one again. Since the first day the pair of girls had met, the long-legged Nymph and the diminutive, punk-rock kung-fu master, they’d clicked in a way that had made Brian feel ever so uncomfortable, like a rabbit caught between two ridiculously horny lionesses. “If my bosses find out you’re a Nymph, there’ll be hell to pay. Firstly they’ll fire me. Secondly, they’ll fire you; and I mean that in the literal sense.”

  Scylla rolled her eyes.

  “Sometimes I forget that you’re so young and new to this world,” she told him. “Even I know more about being a Helsing than you do.”

  Brian frowned, taken aback by her words.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “You keep calling the Masters your bosses.”

  “Cos… they are?”

  “No, they’re not. Get that out of your head. They’re the masters of their own particular trades, but not masters of you. Even I know that and all I’ve ever learned such things from is the gossip of the Undervine. You don’t have a boss, Brian. The Masters are there to serve Helsing, not the other way round.”

  Brian raised a disbelieving eyebrow.

  “It certainly doesn’t feel like it at times. And by at times, I mean all the time.”

  “Well it wouldn’t do, would it? They’re enjoying the fact you’re still a green rookie. Enjoying the ability to boss you around while it still lasts, before you grow wise to your own authority.”

  “I have… authority?” Never had Brian had any semblance of authority. It didn’t feel right. He felt an imposter enough at times, him being such a geek with no ambition, somehow gifted with powers and wealth that would have been more suited to other more worthy people. Now to be told he had authority too? “How do you know these things? I’m the bloody Helsing and it seems most people, be they humans or spirits, know more about me than I do myself.”

  “The eye of the storm never knows the tale of the destruction all about it,” she answered quite cryptically. “Trust me, I’ve been round the block for several centuries. The Undervine is always abuzz with talk of the Helsings. And it’s always the same; the new Helsing gets almost bullied and bossed about by their own Masters, even as the denizens of the spirit world seek to take advantage of their newness, killing them before they learn the full extent of their powers. Then finally they reach an epiphany, not only becoming rulers of their own destiny, but also immensely powerful warriors in their own right. Same old story, repeated century after century.”

  Brian nodded thoughtfully at her words.

  “What the hell is this Undervine? I keep hearing about it all the time.”

  Scylla shrugged.

  “The whispers of the wind? The haunting echo of damned souls in the night? Hell if I know. I just know what it says and so do all supernatural creatures. Perhaps it has something to do with ley-lines, whatever they are? You probably don’t feel it yet, the lines of power that run through the Earth. I can, like great gushing underground streams of spirit… ness.”

  “So when one vampire or Nymph or whatever finds something out… you all do?”

  “Not quite. But in a way, yes,” she answered.

  “Very illuminating.”

  “I honestly don’t know how to explain it in ways you’ll understand. And I don’t mean that to sound as though you’re thick. Because you’re not.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far. Anyway, back to the topic at hand; no, I don’t think it’s a good idea that you come with me to the Sanctum. You’ll be walking into the lion’s den. Each one of the Masters has a very fervent desire to help me rid the Earth of supernatural threats. And despite you being vegan, I wouldn’t want to risk them lumping you in with that.”

  Scylla pouted.

  “But please, Brian? I’ll be extra careful to not let my disguise slip.”

  “No.”

  “But I’ve only ever heard about the Sanctum. All creatures such as I have only heard rumours and whispers. To see inside it? As no vampire, Nymph, kobold or any other creature ever has? That would be incredible.”

  “No. And stop asking; there’s nothing you can do to change my mind. Not in a million years.”

  Chapter Three:

  A Million Years Later

  He shouldn’t be doing this, Brian knew. It was madness. He glanced to the Nymph in the passenger seat of the Camaro as they pulled into Long Rock, just outside of Penzance. He shouldn’t have let her talk him into this. Well, there hadn’t been much talking, in all honesty. Her lips, however, had definitely been involved. Still, it was too dangerous, too risky; if the Masters found out her true nature, then they’d have her immolated on the spot. Maybe. Maybe they wouldn’t? Who knew? Their ways were as enigmatic and mysterious as they were downright lunatic at times. Still, for a Water Nymph, one of a race well-renowned for their eating of humans, to venture right into the heart of an operation hell-bent on protecting humanity from any supernatural threat?

  Madness.

  Scylla, it seemed, didn’t feel any fear at the prospect of potential spontaneous combustion. As the garage door, a seemingly innocuous and run-down looking portal in the side of what looked no more than a derelict building, began to rise at Bertha’s unspoken command, she clapped her hands in glee.

  “Oh my God,” she gasped. “It’s like the Batcave!”

  “How the hell can you know what the Batcave is, but not an Xbox?” Brian asked, perplexed.

  “The Undervine.”

  “Illuminating as ever.”

  “And the tunnel really leads out to St Michael’s Mount?” she asked, ignoring his confusion. “How can the Order afford such things?”

  “Benefactors,” he grinned, taking advantage of the chance to be equally cryptic.

  It didn’t work, his words falling on happily nodding ears as they pulled into the long dark tunnel, the garage door closing behind them. No doubt that, too, was covered in knacker tears and such to render it impenetrable to any errant trespassers, Brian thought. Down the tunnel they drove, just the light of fluorescent tubes overhead guiding their way under the sea, the howl of Bertha’s exhausts reverberating from the concrete walls as they went. How far the tunnel led, Brian didn’t know for sure, but at least half a mile, maybe more. Finally, the lights before them grew stronger and he braked, the car slowing to a halt in a wider garage-area, all tiled floors and various toolboxes strewn about.

  “Here we are,” Brian told the girl. “The Sanctum.”

  Scylla gazed about at the small square room, with its oil-stained floor, random tools lying about and Frank’s risqué posters of Sun page 3 models bluetacked to the walls.

  “I expected… more,” she admitted.

  “This is just the garage. There’s more inside.”

  “Oh. Good.”

  The pair climbed from the car and began to walk to the sole door from the garage that led to the Sanctum
beyond. Brian paused for an instant as he reached for the handle, knowing that on the other side were gadgets, gizmos, spells and oddly zealous workers, all honed towards the seeking out and extermination of supernatural creatures. He gulped and turned to Scylla.

  “You sure you want to come with me?”

  “Absolutely. What’s the worst that could happen?”

  Brian stared for an instant, as though wondering whether his words of earlier had actually sunken in. Then, with a sigh of resignation, he turned the handle and pulled open the door. To be greeted by a cloud of oily steam.

  “There you are, Helsing. We texted you ages ago, what’s been keeping you? Oh…” Master Friedrick, the Order’s Master of Ordinance, i.e. things that blew shit up, stared at the pair with one good eye, the other a whirring contraption of jade lenses and gossamer thin brass arms that flicked and swapped as they sought to focus on the newcomers. “I see you have a lady friend. You do know what we think of uninvited guests around here, right?”

  Before he could protest further, Scylla reached forth with a slender hand, batting her eyelashes through a train of silky hair as she smiled with lips softer than the most tender rose petal.

  “A pleasure to meet you, Master Friedrick,” she purred. “My name’s Scylla.”

  “Oh,” Friedrick replied, his one good eye glazing over as he stared up at her, shaking her hand. “Yes, yes, quite. And the pleasure is all mine, I’m sure.”

  “That’s a very interesting chair you have there,” Scylla told him, nodding towards the steaming contraption beneath his legless torso.

  “Th… thank you,” he stammered. “It runs on whisky…”

  “Indeed.”

  Brian elbowed the Water Nymph in the ribs.

  “Ixnay on the lamourgay,” he hissed at her.

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” she asked.

  Brian rolled his eyes and turned his attention now to Friedrick.

  “Sorry for springing her on you unannounced,” he apologised. “This is Scylla, my, erm, girlfriend. We met in Newquay on my last mission. She saw me in action, so there was no hiding who I was. Thankfully, we hit it off. If it’s okay, she asked if she could see my base of operations? And, of course, meet you guys.”

  “Well of course!” Friedrick beamed. “Why didn’t you say? Any girlfriend of Helsing’s is an… erm, well I mean, any friend of Helsing’s is a friend of ours! Please, please, come in. Let me give you the tour.”

  With that, the Master played with the brass levers at the side of his chair, the contraption turning about in a puff of steam and rolling away down the long corridor that led towards the Sanctum proper, leaving the two to hurry to keep up.

  “Cool it with the glamour,” Brian whispered to Scylla as they strode behind the rolling geriatric. “They’re pros at this kind of thing; do that too much and one of them is sure to notice. Especially Heimlich. He’s got eyes in the back of his shiny brown head.”

  “I wasn’t even using glamour,” Scylla hissed in reply. “He’s just a lonely old man. And I happen to have the form of a very beautiful young woman, if I do say so myself.”

  Brian had to admit, both of her statements were true enough. Perhaps she hadn’t been using her mystically hypnotising glamour? Even if she had, he wouldn’t know; thanks to the power of the ring combined with his own neuroses, he was oddly immune to the charisma possessed by most such supernatural creatures. Still, it paid to be careful in this place; Brian had almost died several times already in the Sanctum and he was the one who, above all, was actually meant to be here. Down the corridor they strode, the sounds of hubbub and buzzing machinery growing louder, till the hallway branched out into a wide central chamber.

  The Sanctum.

  “Wow,” Scylla gasped, as she spun in circles, her wide eyes taking everything in. “There’s so much… stuff!”

  “Yes, there’s stuff aplenty,” Friedrick told her, beaming in pride. “This is the heart of the Helsing operation. For hundreds of years this is where we’ve studied and honed the arts of fighting the supernatural, making sure that each Helsing is better equipped than their forebears to face the Things That Go Bump In The Night.”

  If Scylla was at all intimidated by the implications of his words, she gave no sign, instead, rushing from table to table, playing with various instruments, taking sniffs of phials of strange liquids that puffed clouds of smoke in myriad colours, all with a smile on her face. Friedrick glanced at Brian, who shrugged.

  “She’s this enthusiastic about everything,” he told the Master.

  “Indeed. As was Neil. Seems as though you’re the only person round here who finds this place a bore.”

  “I don’t find it a bore. I find it confusing and scary. There’s a difference.”

  “Funnily enough, that’s how this place finds you, too,” came a sterner voice from behind him. Always behind him, it seemed. Brian turned to see Heimlich striding towards him, as ever in a dapper grey suit, brogues tippety-tapping on the stone floor. His eyes gleamed like diamonds in his chiselled ebony face as he scrutinised the newcomers. “Please, introduce me to your guest.”

  Brian opened his mouth to speak, but suddenly a fresh voice cut through the hubbub.

  “Scylla!”

  A flurry of brightly-dyed pigtails and Brian groaned as Gertie came flying past, all but barging him out of the way. Scylla looked up from a plasma-globe she was playing with, before smiling, the two of them embracing with a hug that went on far too long for Brian’s comfort, the pair, the long-legged nymph, and the diminutive Master of Combat, both far too shapely and feminine than seemed appropriate, seeming to merge into an amorphous whole.

  “Hi Gertie! Me and Brian were just talking about you earlier on.”

  “All good things I hope?”

  “Of course.”

  Heimlich cleared his throat, everyone turning to look at him. There was no true head of the Order as such, each of the Masters being equal and bringing their expertise to the table. If there was such a thing as first among equals, however, then Heimlich was it. When he spoke, people listened.

  “Well, seeing as everyone’s here, we may as well get started. Your lady-friend sitting in on things breaks all manner of protocols, Helsing, but then when it comes to you most of the rule book has already been torn up, thrown out of the window and eaten by wild dogs, so fuck it, let’s just get on with it shall we?”

  Fuck it indeed, Brian thought, as the little group strode through the busy Sanctum towards the Snug, the myriad nameless functionaries scrabbling to get out of their way. What was it all these people did all day anyway, he wondered? So far he’d only had a mission every few weeks, so why the manpower? It seemed somewhat excessive. That man over there, for example, with the nervous twitch and the half-moon glasses, only ever seemed to be wandering back and forth with a clipboard, ticking off the same ten items of inventory again and again, as though they might suddenly disappear. He shook the thoughts from his head as they entered the Snug, the small room all cosy, with drinks cabinets, luxurious settees and framed pictures of past Masters and Helsings, all lit by the soft, warming glow of an open fireplace. Master Otto, keeper of the Bestiary, sat there in his usual spot by the fire, his frizzy white hair and beard combined with his round glasses lending him the appearance of a particularly studious shower puff.

  Before Heimlich could even tell everyone to ‘please be seated’ Brian raised his hand, the remote control for the projector soaring from Otto’s grasp to land firmly in Brian’s waiting palm. As everyone looked at him in surprise, Brian shrugged.

  “It’s starting to feel like bloody Groundhog Day round here,” he explained. “Show up, get berated by Friedrick, get the shit scared out of me by Heimlich, then dragged in here to be introduced to the monster of the week. If we’re gonna go through the same old routine every time, I’m gonna mix it up a little. I’m controlling the slide show this week.”

  “But I like controlling the slides,” Otto grumbled.


  “Let Helsing have his little victories if it keeps him on board,” Heimlich told the man. “Anyway, please be seated all. And we’ll begin.” As everyone settled down in their couches, Scylla in the middle of a three-seater, between Brian and Gertie, a fact that he noticed and felt somehow uncomfortable about, Heimlich nodded to him. “Lower the screen, if you would, young Helsing.”

  Brian stared down at the controller in his hand; the buttons had all had their writing worn away through years of use.

  “It’s the green one,” Otto whispered over, still looking hurt at having his role usurped.

  “Cheers.”

  Brian depressed the button, the screen winding its way down over the fireplace. At Otto’s pointedly darting eyes, Brian pressed the next button down, the projector above him flaring into life, images appearing on the screen. Images of teeth, of claws, and of mountains of thickly furred muscle.

  “Your next mission, Helsing,” Heimlich drawled, pointing towards the screen. “We’ve had reports of…”

  “Lycanthropes!” Scylla gasped in excitement.

  Heimlich stared at her.

  “Quite. Or in layman’s terms, werewolves.”

  “Werewolves?” Brian ventured incredulously, giving Scylla a surreptitious elbow to the ribs. If she felt it, she didn’t pay it any heed. “In Cornwall?”

  “Aye, very hard to believe, isn’t it?” Heimlich replied dryly. “What, with all the vampires, banshees and Water Nymphs roaming about the place, you’d scarce think there was room. Yes, Helsing, werewolves. Where they are yet, we haven’t quite pinpointed, but the Scryers have ascertained their presence and our feet on the ground have found their spoil.”

  “Spoil?”

  “Their shit.”

  “Oh. And what’s this about feet on the ground? I didn’t know we had scouts.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t know.”

  “So people keep telling me. Anyway, so this spoil of which you speak? Where have they found it?”