Vampire Apocalypse: Descent Into Chaos (Book 2)

by Derek Gunn

  They crashed through the first line of Wentworth’s vampires like a sledgehammer. Von Kruger saw many of his vampires sweep through and past the enemy force as they misjudged their braking in their eagerness to join the attack. He lost sight of them as they continued forward and rode the air currents upward. He lost sight of them as they disappeared into the darkness and then he dismissed about them as he attacked the first vampire he saw.

  They outnumbered Wentworth’s forces three to one, so he wasn’t worried. He laughed as he slashed at a vampire and relished the blood that sprayed over his face. Around him chaos ruled. Many of his vampires fought each other just to get at the enemy, and Von Kruger lost himself to the violence. Talons ripped, teeth tore, and cries filled the air. Blood flowed and cascaded down to the earth like rain as the creatures tore into each other.

  Wentworth’s vampires hidden on the ground could not wait any longer. They had strained against their natures to remain hidden as they saw Von Kruger’s forces plough into their companions. The cries of pain and the sounds of rending flesh seduced them, calling them to battle. But, through it all, their commander held them in place with force of will and their fear of him. As the first drops of blood rained on them there was nothing that could hold them back and they launched into the night and joined the fray.

  Wentworth’s forces high above the mid-air battle watched with growing excitement as the forces collided below them. There were fifty of them riding the air currents, saving their energy for when they would finally be allowed to swoop down. They watched as many of Von Kruger’s inexperienced vampires flew past their mark and traveled some distance beyond as they struggled to slow their momentum and change direction.

  The older vampires smiled at the youths’ inability to control their vast powers and nodded knowingly at each other. A mere bite did not create a vampire, that only gave them power. To be a true vampire took centuries. They had been ordered to stay in place for at least ten minutes, but the sight of the seventy or so vampires struggling against the rising winds, out of their depth and helpless in the cross-winds, was too good an opportunity to ignore. Besides, they would be able to deal with these and still get back in time for their original plan. What could go wrong?

  Wentworth struggled against the enemy vampire behind him as he swooped and turned in midair to avoid the older vampire’s vicious swipes. His opponent had changed into a hawk-like figure the size of a cow but with all the grace and abilities of a bird of prey and none of the four-legged animal’s clumsiness. Wentworth couldn’t match the creature’s amazing ability to change direction with no regard for the laws of physics.

  He felt pain flood through him as the creature’s sharp talons tore his wings, and he realized with a humbling moment of clarity that his opponent was playing with him. He had to get away and signal his own ancient vampires or they would all die.

  Below him a sudden flurry of movement distracted him and he felt another sharp pain as his attention was divided. At first, he thought that he had been hurt far worse than he felt because the ground seemed to be rising up to meet him. Was he falling? Then he saw individual flashes of crazed eyes and teeth glinting in the moonlight. They’re early, he thought with relief as two of his onrushing vampires tore into his adversary.

  Taken by surprise, the creature tried to change to a form more suited to such attack but the two vampires pressed their attack and scored mortal strikes against it in seconds. A third vampire grabbed it by the throat and ripped savagely at the flesh. Blood poured from the wound and the three vampires lost themselves in the frenzy.

  Wentworth swooped through his forces, almost skimming the ground itself, and then he surged upwards to his forces above. He needed their morphing abilities now much more than he did his younger forces if he was to win the day.

  Von Kruger had no interest in the larger battle. All his focus was on the area immediately surrounding him, and he lashed out and tore flesh and broke bone, oblivious to the identity of his victims. He had changed into a compact, armored shape that was slow and difficult to turn easily. However, in such a crush of bodies, this disadvantage was easily outweighed by the longer reach of his four appendages that all ended in wickedly sharp razors.

  He was covered in blood, and he plunged his fangs repeatedly into anything that came close to him. Vampire blood was intoxicating, far more so than human blood. Why had no one told him of the joys of such feeding? He lashed out again at a passing vampire and tore into its soft throat before the startled creature knew what was happening. Already his belly sloshed dangerously as Von Kruger gorged. It was taking more and more energy just to stay in the air but he ignored the tiredness of his wings as he dropped the dead vampire and reached for another one.

  Where are they? Wentworth felt panic grip his cold heart as he flew up into the thin air and still could not find his forces. Had they run? He crushed the thought down. There was no way any vampire would run from such carnage. But he had not passed them on his way up so they had definitely not joined the fighting below.

  If they were gone, he was finished. He stopped pumping his wings as he sought a weak air current and let himself drift as he gathered his thoughts. His keen eyesight could still see the battle below. The vampires moved with incredible speed, swooping and diving and ripping at each other, but it was obvious that his forces were being pressed back. Everything moved in a blur, but his vampire senses were able to see all the action and process what he was seeing so that he could make sense of the blistering speeds. Bodies fell to the ground like meteors, and most of them lay still. The ground was already littered with bodies, and the precious blood oozed into the earth, lost for eternity. Never before had so many vampires died, and never at the hands of other vampires. This was a truly black day. What had driven them to this? He wondered idly if there was any way back.

  The re-enforcements from his hidden forces on the ground had staggered Von Kruger’s forces for a while, but they had soon rallied. Now was the time to strike with his other forces and catch them from above. If he had been able to strike from above while Von Kruger was still focused on the current forces then he could have yet won the day. But the moment was almost gone for the greatest effect.

  An errant current buffeted him and swept him away from the fighting. He was about to angle his wings down and fight the current back towards the battle when he heard distant screams on the air. He straightened his wings and allowed the wind to carry him towards the sound, and he saw a flurry of movement below him. Dark shapes, silhouetted against the low moon, darted and plunged around each other, and he sighed in relief as he recognized his own forces.

  They were winning easily, though they were fewer in number. They had obviously surprised the other vampires as his forces still maintained the advantage of height. They also rode the wind currents far more effectively, and with superior grace. Already the enemy forces were dropping to the ground in vast numbers, and those that remained had been broken and were trying to retreat from the older vampires’ relentless attacks.

  Wentworth angled down towards the fighting. This battle was already won but he could yet lose the war if he did not gather his vampires and rejoin the main battle.

  Steele felt pain shoot through him. It began in his back where he had been shot but quickly flooded through him like fire through his veins. His body arched involuntarily, and then he lost all feeling in his legs. His arms grew numb a second later but the engine continued to drive power into the wheels as his hand froze on the throttle. Pain wracked his entire being, but he could not control any part of his body. His mind was strangely clear and he had an age to watch helplessly as the bike continued to power down the road out of control.

  For a second he thought that he might actually continue on, but then his body slumped forward without anything to hold it up and the shift of weight caused the bike to overbalance. He felt himself flip over the handlebars, and then he hit the ground hard. There was a moment when the pain intensified and then darkness flooded over him.<
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  “Shouldn’t we go back and see if we can help?” Carlos Ortega asked Sherman as they saw another flare of light from the town behind them.

  Dave Sherman shook his head with a deep sadness. “You know we can’t, Carlos. There are over twenty people in the back of this truck relying on us.” And I wouldn’t go back if you fucking paid me, he thought. Jesus, I’m surrounded by fucking kamikaze heroes. Is it something in the water?

  They had left the town with their load of captives five minutes ago and Sherman had driven like a maniac in case Ortega had expressed any thoughts of going back when they were still close enough to do so. Sherman had expected them all to be dead by now and was surprised that they were still fighting back.

  “Pull over!” Ortega suddenly shouted as he heard another explosion in the distance.

  “Listen,” Sherman was fast losing his patience.

  “No, you listen,” Ortega interrupted. “It doesn’t take two of us to do this. You can do it alone and I’ll go back and see if I can help.”

  Sherman had insisted Ortega accompany him so no one would think he had bugged out on the others, but it would be worse if the bastard kept telling everyone that he had wanted to go back and Sherman wouldn’t allow him.

  “Alright,” he sighed and pulled the truck over.

  He was about to remind Ortega to keep the train tracks in view, but when he turned toward him the man he had already moved to the back of the truck where he struggled to pull a small single-load bazooka from the back of the truck.

  “Bloody stupid bastard,” he muttered as he watched Ortega struggle with his burden as he headed back towards the town. Sherman spat out the window and drove on.

  Chapter 26

  Wentworth brought his wings in behind him and allowed his body to cut through the air like an arrow. At this speed he could not turn his head to check on the others but he knew they were there regardless. The sky roiled below him as dark figures swooped and turned and fought. There were so many and they moved with such speed that the light of the moon was too weak for him to make out the figures in any great detail. The snow had started to blizzard about twenty minutes ago and already the countless dead on the ground below were peppered with a light covering of white. The white reflected the pale moonlight as a backdrop and ruined his night vision so they would not be able to choose their targets with much accuracy.

  It was a safe assumption though that the larger and misshapen figures were the older vampires of Von Kruger, so he directed his attack towards them. As they drew nearer he could see his vampires begin to overtake him as they shifted their forms to those more suited to the conditions and better able to cut through the rising winds. Wentworth watched them ease ahead and wished fervently that he could make such changes. No matter how often he had tried though, his dead flesh refused to change. He had assumed at first that it was purely a lack of imagination on his part—surely if he could change into a winged creature easily it would be an easy matter to adapt this change and amend certain elements—but nothing had worked for him.

  He watched, frustrated, as his forces tore into the vampires below. The surprise of their attack seemed to have a huge effect, and a number of Von Kruger’s vampires were already falling motionless to the white carpet of dead below. He grinned as he watched their corpses disrupt the white tapestry below but the snow was already beginning to cover them with the relentless single-mindedness of a spider spinning a web. The scent of blood surged up towards him as he plummeted towards the fighting, and finally he was among them. He lashed out at the first figure in range and reveled in the power he felt as his victim’s blood sprayed into the wind. He pressed his attack and sank his teeth into the creature’s throat.

  Warm blood spurted into his mouth and he felt something surge through him like hot lava through his veins. He had never tasted the blood of another vampire, and the sudden feeling took him by surprise. It was glorious. A talon struck him from behind and he grunted with pain and felt the skin begin to knit almost immediately. He had had many wounds as he had fought his way to the top, but never had they healed so quickly. Power flooded through him and as he stretched for the vampire who had struck him and he felt his arms extending as they reached for the figure. Bones cracked and flesh tore and healed in one motion.

  The other creature slashed at him again but a hard shell had already formed across his shoulders, and the creature’s talon was deflected. Wentworth laughed as he felt the pain of transformation. His body changed, molded without conscious thought, and he relished the fear he saw in his attacker’s eyes as he reached for him. He tore his enemy’s limbs from his body with an ease he had never known before. His mind receded as he let his base nature take over, and he exalted in the carnage around him.

  Consciousness seemed to tease Steele. The darkness was warm and held the pain at bay, the light promised pain beyond imagining, but still he reached for it only the have it dissipate in his grasp.

  He opened his eyes but saw only blackness. Am I dead or blind? His mind felt strangely detached and the lack of pain made him assume that he was dead. Should I still be able to think rationally if I’m dead? Then again, how can I be sure that I’m rational? He tried to move but he couldn’t feel anything. He tried to close his eyes and open them again, but again all he could see was black. Except that there seemed to be a faint blurring to his left.

  He tried to concentrate on the faint light, and suddenly his eye opened with a gooey pop, leaving faint trails of some coagulated fluid at either end. Well looks like I’m alive, then, he thought, and then he began to wonder. There was a strange grey surface that seemed to stretch out from his body in an unbroken line past his vision. Was he dead after all on some strange otherworldly plain of existence, destined to remain where the wounds inflicted from his life hampered him? He closed his left eye again and saw only blackness. Was he blind in his right eye? He opened his left eye again and tried to make sense of where he was. The angle seemed to be askew and it took a moment for his brain to make sense of his surroundings. Then it came to him. He was on the road, face down with one eye in line with the road’s surface and the other buried in the asphalt.

  Great, he thought with a sinking feeling. I’m alive. Alive and paralyzed in the middle of nowhere. At least there’s no pain.

  Just then, as if a cruel God had heard him and was angered by his oversight, pain began to creep through him slowly but relentlessly. His mind began to cloud as the pain became unbearable and he felt consciousness begin to slip away. He relished the oblivion and welcomed the dark again, but suddenly he felt movement in his body and he struggled against the descending darkness. The pain was cruel and terrible but it brought with it something else, something worth fighting for. He used everything he had to keep his grip on consciousness.

  Nausea flooded through him and his body retched, bringing a burning fluid up his throat and spewing it out across the road. The smell assaulted his nose as droplets made their way into his nostrils. He retched again but there was nothing left in his stomach, and he dry-heaved until his body shivered with the effort. He ignored it all as he concentrated on his hand. It lay just in front of him on the road, but he had seen one of the fingers move and now he tried to force it to move again. Nausea and pain flooded his body but he cried with joy as first one finger and then another moved. He felt a tear slide down his face, and then he blacked out.

  Falconi’s whole world was falling apart. Vampires were killing other vampires, and thralls were no longer safe from their masters. The weather was growing worse by the minute and his face felt as if it had already frozen. They had already lost one of their trucks to a hidden bomb on their way to the square, and Falconi had felt very mortal as he realized that his own vehicle had passed too damn close to the same device. He was about to wonder if things could possibly get any worse when Angelo’s man reached him and breathlessly informed him that the human prisoners were gone. He had thought the thrall mad and had ordered his driver to hurry to the square where he c
ould see the empty cage for himself.

  It had taken a few moments for him to believe his own eyes even when he saw it. Slowly, his mind began to cloud with a numbing fear driven by one prevailing thought: If the humans were gone then the vampires would turn on the thralls for food in their current maddened state. He stood in the jeep as his hands grew numb with the cold, and only snapped out of it when his driver tugged at his arm. He looked at the thrall stupidly for a moment, and then a thought slowly began to register on his shocked mind. Whoever had taken the humans would never be able to transport that many easily. Not only were a thousand prisoners difficult to move anywhere, but also the damned weather would slow them down terribly. His forces should be able to catch them if they hurried. He had a hundred thralls with him, and seven vehicles, so he should be able to cover all roads capable of carrying that many vehicles. He could still catch them and save his skin if he acted quickly.

  His driver was still tugging at his sleeve, and he turned viciously on the thrall until he saw that the soldier was directing his attention toward the far side of the square. He reluctantly looked in the indicated direction and saw nothing but the swirling snow. He was about to strike the driver when he saw a dirty grey plume surge into the sky behind the buildings. What the hell is…? His heart suddenly dropped as he made the connection. A train! Shit, they’ve taken the train. His mind worked furiously as he ordered all the vehicles forward. A train would not be slowed by the weather and, once it got up to speed, would easily out-distance his vehicles.