Darkest Night

by Will Hill

  Maybe I’ll have a chance then, he thought. Maybe.

  The van pulled to a halt, and Max was jerked awake. He had drifted back into unconsciousness and dreamt about her again: the blood, the water, the screams. He opened his eye, saw the man with the wolf on his chest still sitting above him, and tried to move the fingers of his hand, silently praying that whatever they had drugged him with had worn off.

  Nothing. Not even the tremble it had managed before.

  Panic flooded through him; he wondered whether they had given him another shot while he was unconscious, but he couldn’t check his neck and he didn’t dare ask, providing he could even form the words to do so.

  “Are we on?” asked the man, looking towards the front of the van.

  “Yep,” replied a voice that presumably belonged to the driver.

  “All right then,” said the man, and looked down at Max. “Let’s get you up.”

  “No,” he managed. He tried to force his limbs into action, but felt not even the slightest flicker in response. “Please …”

  The man ignored him, opened the rear doors of the vehicle, and disappeared. Max lay on the floor, terror pulsing through him, unable to move, barely able to think. Then hands reached under his armpits, and dragged him backwards out of the van.

  His heels scraped uselessly across the ground as, despite the panic that was coursing through him, Max forced himself to look around, to see if there was something, anything he might be able to use to save himself from the fate he knew awaited him. He was being hauled across a barren, weed and pebble-strewn patch of wasteland, a place he didn’t recognise; he had no idea how long he had been unconscious, and therefore no idea how far he might have been taken from his home. A squat industrial building rose up before him, its windows barred and broken, its bricks crumbling and its paint flaking away; it looked long abandoned. Max strained his supernatural hearing, listening for a human voice, the sound of a car engine, anything that might suggest that help could be nearby.

  He heard nothing.

  “That’s far enough,” said a voice from behind him.

  The fingers digging into his armpits disappeared, and Max tumbled to the ground, unable to do anything to break his fall. His head connected sharply with the ground, sending a fresh bolt of pain through his battered system, and he let out a gasping sob as he was pushed over on to his back. The two men with the white wolves on their chests crowded over him, torches in their hands, and his vocal cords dragged themselves into life, galvanised by a terror that was almost overwhelming.

  “Please,” he said, his voice slurred. “Please don’t kill me. Please. It isn’t fair.”

  One of the men tilted his head to one side. “What’s not fair about it?”

  “It’s not my fault,” said Max. “Being a vampire. It’s not fair. Please …”

  “What do you drink?” asked the man.

  Max stared up at him. “What?”

  “You’re a vampire,” said the man. “So you need to drink blood. Where do you get it?”

  “Raw meat,” said Max. He felt tears well in his remaining eye. “Butchers. Stray dogs and cats.”

  “Is that right?” asked the man, and squatted down beside him, his eyes narrow behind his balaclava. “What about Suzanne Fields?”

  “Who?” asked Max.

  “Surely you remember her?” said the man. “Pretty blonde, nineteen years old. You attacked her when she was walking home through Bridgford Park, then you drank her dry and broke her neck when you were done. Divers found her a week ago, at the bottom of the river half a mile from your house.”

  “I don’t know anything about her,” said Max, his voice low. “I never hurt—”

  “Don’t give me that,” said the man. “It’s time to come clean, Max. Time to confess your sins. It’ll be better for your soul, if you still have one.”

  The nightmare burst into his mind: the blonde hair, the screams, the taste of blood in his mouth, the freezing water as he pushed her under the surface. He had suppressed it, buried it as deep as it would go, but it bubbled up when he was at his most vulnerable; she had haunted him every night since he killed her.

  “I didn’t mean it,” he whispered, and let out a low sob. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt her.”

  “That’s good,” said the man. “Admit what you did. Be a man about it.”

  “I never wanted to be a vampire,” said Max, the combination of pain and misery flooding through his mind threatening to unmoor it. “I didn’t want it. I didn’t. You have to believe me.”

  “I do believe you,” said the man. “But that doesn’t change what you did.”

  The tears spilled out of Max’s eye and rolled down his cheek, burning across the ruined flesh like acid.

  “What makes it OK for you to kill me?” he asked. “What gives you the right to sentence me to death?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with rights,” said the man. “This is a war. And in a war you don’t show mercy to your enemies.”

  The black-clad man drew a wooden stake from his belt and held it out; Max stared at it, overcome by horror at the realisation that his life was going to end in this place, far away from his friends and the people he loved.

  “Make your peace with whatever you believe in,” said the man. “You’ve outstayed your welcome in this world.”

  Max closed his eye. He saw the faces of his friends, and felt his heart ache at the thought of never seeing them again. But then, in the depths of his despair, he felt a momentary bloom of relief: he was glad they had never known what he had become, that he had never had to see the disappointment on their faces.

  Because he had told the truth to the man who was about to murder him: he did regret the girl in the park, as he regretted the four others he had killed. He had never meant to hurt any of them; he had lost himself in the hunger, and by the time he had remembered himself, they had been dead.

  He couldn’t change it now.

  Couldn’t change any of it.

  It was too late.

  Jamie sat back in his seat and stared at the screen that had been folded down from the ceiling of the van. The connection to the Surveillance Division was active; all that remained now was to wait for their first alert of the night to come through.

  “What’s your bet?” asked Lizzy Ellison, from her seat opposite him. “Domestic disturbance? False alarm?”

  “Domestic,” said Qiang. “They are always domestic now.”

  Jamie shrugged. “You never know,” he said. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and actually see a real vampire tonight.”

  “Steady on, sir,” said Ellison, smiling broadly at him. “Let’s not get carried away.”

  Qiang let out a grunt of laughter, a sound that never failed to amaze his squad leader. When he had first arrived at the Loop, the Chinese Operator had seemed more like a robot than an actual human being: utterly professional, precise, and not given to conversation beyond what was necessary for the Operation at hand. Now, more than six months later and following a concerted campaign by both Jamie and Ellison, Qiang was a markedly different person. He was still unlikely to ever win the award for most light-hearted member of the Department, but he was now capable of making a limited amount of small talk, of telling his squad mates about the family and friends that he had left behind in China, and, on extremely rare and joyous occasions, making small, bone-dry jokes.

  As the months after Zero Hour had lumbered slowly past, Jamie had come to see his squad as a lone beacon of stability in a world that was becoming ever more uncertain, and when he had thrown himself into his job in an attempt to escape the misery and chaos that had been threatening to drag him down, his squad mates had been right there beside him. Neither Ellison nor Qiang knew the truth about his father, or why he no longer spoke to Frankenstein, but they knew about Larissa; everyone in the Department did.

  Word of her departure had raced through the Loop, causing dismay among those who understood that Blacklight was weaker wit
hout her and relief among the many Operators who had never truly been comfortable with a vampire wearing the black uniform. In the first days after her disappearance, dozens of Jamie’s colleagues had asked him what had happened, if he had any idea where she might have gone, until his patience began to visibly wear thin and people realised that questioning him further would have been unwise.

  The only thing Ellison and Qiang had ever asked was whether he was all right. He had told them that he wasn’t, but that he didn’t want to talk about it, and they had left it at that. It had been a show of respect for which he remained profoundly grateful.

  Ellison had, in fact, been entirely awesome since the day she had joined the Department. Jamie had once told Cal Holmwood that she was going to sit in the Director’s chair one day, and nothing had happened since to make him revise that opinion. She was a brilliant Operator, smart and agile and fearless, but more than that, she had the uncanny ability to drag him out of himself, to cut through the fog of gloom that hung over him and force him to laugh, usually at himself. Jamie knew he was susceptible to self-pity, and Ellison was the perfect antidote: irreverent, kind, funny, and absolutely unwilling to indulge him. He loved Kate and Matt and relied on them more than anyone, even more than his mum, who, for all her empathy and unconditional love, could never really, truly relate to what his life had become. But Ellison was close behind them on his priority list; when he was on Operations with her and Qiang, he felt accepted and valued and appreciated. He felt at peace. As a result, it was not uncommon for his heart to sink when the time came for them to head back to the Loop.

  Jamie was roused from his thoughts by the loud alarm that accompanied a new window opening on the van’s screen.

  ECHELON INTERCEPT REF. 97607/2R

  SOURCE. Emergency call (mobile telephone 07087 904543)

  TIME OF INTERCEPT. 23:45

  OPERATOR: Hello, emergency service operator, which service do you require?

  CALLER: Police.

  OPERATOR: What is the nature of your emergency?

  CALLER: I just got home from work and something’s been painted on my neighbour’s front door.

  OPERATOR: Does this qualify as an emergency, sir?

  CALLER: It’s the same thing that’s been in the papers, that Night Stalker thing. The wolf’s head. It’s right on the front door.

  OPERATOR: You can call your local police station to report vandalism, sir. This line needs to be kept clear for emergencies.

  CALLER: Right. Sorry.

  INTERCEPT REFERENCE LOCATION. Violet Road, West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire. 52.933714, -1.122017

  RISK ASSESSMENT. Priority Level 2

  “All right,” said Ellison, rubbing her hands together. “Let’s go.”

  “Have you got the location, Operator?” asked Jamie.

  “Yes, sir,” replied their driver, his voice sounding through the speakers. “ETA three minutes.”

  “Very close,” said Qiang, as the van accelerated, its engine rumbling beneath them.

  “Weapons and kit check,” said Jamie. Excitement was crackling through him at the prospect of something that might actually be worth the attention of his squad. Ever since V-Day and Gideon and stupid, reckless Kevin McKenna, Patrol Responds had become purgatory: night after night of false alarms, attacks on suspected vampires who turned out to be every bit as human as their assailants, denouncements and accusations that were usually the malicious result of some minor grudge. This, the call they were now racing towards, had the potential to be different. Everyone inside the Department was following the Night Stalker attacks with great interest, although, for once, Blacklight seemed to know little more than the public and the media.

  There had been ten attacks so far, all in the Midlands and East Anglia, all bearing signature similarities, most notably the wolf’s head painted on the doors of the victims’ homes and across their bloody remains. Public opinion seemed to favour the lone crazy theory, that the Night Stalker was a single individual carrying out vigilante executions, but Jamie, along with the majority of his colleagues, thought otherwise. He knew better than anyone how powerful vampires were, how fast and agile, especially when cornered; even allowing for the element of surprise, he didn’t believe that anyone could carry out ten vampire killings on their own, unless they were also a vampire. Which was a possibility, although Jamie subscribed to a simpler solution: that there was no such thing as the Night Stalker, but several Night Stalkers, at least two, perhaps even four or five.

  “Twenty seconds, sir,” said their driver.

  Jamie fastened his helmet into place, flipped up the visor, and looked at his squad mates. “Ready One as soon as we touch the ground,” he said, and felt his eyes bloom with heat. “Non-lethal. Clear?”

  “Clear,” replied his squad mates.

  The van slowed to a halt. Jamie twisted the handle on the rear door and pushed it open. “Go,” he said.

  Ellison and Qiang leapt down on to the tarmac, their weapons at their shoulders, their visors covering their faces. He was beside them in an instant, floating a millimetre or two above the ground; his vampire side, the part of himself that heightened his senses and kept him sharp, was wide awake, and hungry, as he looked around. They were standing in a quiet suburban estate, a long row of square, two-storey houses with neat lawns and mid-range Japanese cars in their driveways.

  “Shall I circle, sir?” asked their driver, his voice loud and clear through the comms plugs in Jamie’s ears.

  “No,” he replied. “We’re not going to be here long. Ask Surveillance to bring up the CCTV grid for a ten-mile radius from this location and leave a line open.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Jamie nodded, and looked at the house standing before them. It was identical to all the others on the estate, with one ghoulish exception; sprayed on its front door, in white paint that had dripped all the way down to the step, was a crude wolf’s head, its teeth huge, its eyes wide and staring.

  “Night Stalker,” he said. “Or a good impression, at least. Check the door.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Ellison, and jogged up the driveway, Qiang close behind her. She moved to one side of the door frame, her back against the front wall of the house, and tried the handle. It turned in her hand, and the door swung open.

  “Sweep the house,” said Jamie. “Both of you. Quick as you can.”

  His squad mates disappeared inside as he took a closer look at the quiet street. The night air was still and cool; his supernatural ears could pick out the low drone of dozens of televisions from inside the identical homes. Jamie spun slowly in the air, until movement on the other side of the road caught his eye; a curtain had fluttered in the window of the house opposite, as though someone had been peering through it until he looked in their direction.

  Nosy neighbour, he thought, and flew slowly towards the house. What would we do without them?

  Jamie rose over the low wall at the front of the garden, crossed the lawn, and waited in front of the window for the curtain to open again. He had absolutely no doubt that it would; the van and his squad’s unusual appearance would prove too tempting. Long seconds passed until the curtains parted, ever so slightly, and the face of an elderly woman peered through them. Her eyes locked with Jamie’s, and he smiled widely as they flew open with fright. The curtains snapped shut again; he waited a moment, then flew along the front of the house and knocked hard on the door.

  “I didn’t do nothing,” called a voice from inside. “Get away with you. I won’t look no more.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I need to ask you some questions.”

  Silence.

  “I’m not opening the door,” shouted the woman, eventually. “I don’t care who you are, I don’t open up after dark and that’s all there is to it.”

  “That’s fine, ma’am,” said Jamie. “That’s a sensible policy. I just need to know if you’ve seen anything unusual in the last hour or so.”

  “Just you lo
t,” said the woman. “What’ve you come back for? Can’t you leave that poor man alone?”

  Jamie frowned. “What do you mean, just you lot?”

  “You lot,” repeated the woman. “All in black, with that big van of yours. Twenty minutes ago it was.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” said Jamie. He turned away, flew towards the house with the wolf on its door, and touched down on the drive as Ellison and Qiang reappeared.

  “Clear,” said Ellison. “Nobody home, no remains.”

  “Signs of a struggle?” asked Jamie.

  “There is a burn mark on the hall carpet,” said Qiang. “A recent one.”

  “And a lot of something that looks like blood,” said Ellison.

  “Shit,” said Jamie. “They’ve taken him, whoever he is. Load up.”

  The three Operators ran down to the kerb and climbed back into the van. Jamie dropped into his seat and took his helmet off.

  “Surveillance?” he said. “Are you there?”

  “Go ahead, Lieutenant Carpenter,” replied a voice from the speakers.

  “We’re looking for a black van that left this location within the last twenty minutes. Anything on CCTV that fits that description?”

  “Hold, please.”

  An agonising silence filled the van’s hold.

  Come on! thought Jamie. Hurry up, for God’s sake!

  “I’ve got a black 2008 Ford Transit leaving your location seventeen minutes ago,” said the Surveillance Operator. “Do you want me to track it?”

  “Yes,” said Jamie.

  “Tracking,” said the voice. “OK. The last camera hit was in Bramcote, four minutes ago. Seven miles west of your location.”

  “Good,” he said. “Keep tracking. Operator?”

  “Yes, sir,” said their driver.

  “Get us there as fast as you can,” said Jamie. “Don’t stop for red lights.”

  The van raced through winding suburban streets, weaving in and out of traffic and raising a cacophony of angry horns in its wake.

  Jamie listened silently to the Surveillance Division updates, trying to ignore the frustration building inside him; he could have got out of the van, leapt into the air, and been on top of their target within a minute, two at the most. But he was the leader of Operational Squad J-5, and they worked as a team; otherwise, he might as well carry out Patrol Responds on his own. The van’s external cameras fed the wide screen, and Jamie watched as the landscape they were speeding through changed; the houses and pubs and rows of shops were disappearing, giving way to dilapidated industrial buildings and bridges and yards.