Blood City: Book Two Of The Monster Keeper Series

by Jeff Seats

  sloppy salute.

  Then Craig tossed the guy a few bills out of his pocket and

  gave him a wink. “Thanks.”

  The cautious walk along the block towards their target was

  met with finger pointing as well as fear with people picking up

  the pace, clearly not wanting to be a part of whatever was going

  on. But a couple came up to them asking curiously, “Where’s the

  camera? Thought they stopped shooting Grimm last year. Oh,

  you’re on The Librarians.”

  Craig gave the two a flustered look. “Just stay the hell—” “You’re ruining the shot. Could you please move away?” Liz

  interceded, accepting the cover thrown at them.

  “Oh, yeah, sorry,” one of them said apologetically, as they

  quickly left the agents to continue their “scene.”

  “What the fuck was that?” Craig asked shaking his head. “That was Portland.”

  “That was weird.”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  Outside the front door of the establishment, they were met

  with a Closed sign hastily slapped on the glass.

  “What do ya think?” Liz asked.

  “Try the handle and see what happens.”

  Liz cautiously reached for it, while Craig stood at the ready.

  She slowly pushed her thumb down on the lever and pulled.

  Her eyebrows shot up slightly surprised the door wasn’t locked

  and continued to pull the door open.

  “Trap?”

  “You said it.”

  They stepped into a small street-level bar, music blaring—the

  volume almost hurt their ears. A youngish guy was working behind the counter, back turned to the door and didn’t—couldn’t

  —hear them enter. And the song continued:

  . . . puzzling you

  Is the nature of my game

  Craig banged the HK on the bar top.

  I stuck around St. Petersburg

  When I saw it was a time for a change

  Killed the czar and his ministers

  Anastasia screamed in vain

  “Hey, the sign says we’re closed,” the annoyed man shouted

  as he turned to confront the intruders but cut short his protest

  when he saw the weapons pointing at him.

  “Stairs?” demanded Craig.

  “What?”

  “Stairs!” Craig said louder.

  Liz yelled. “Turn the fucking music down!”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  . . . you guessed my name . . .

  The barman pulled a cell phone out of its cradle, tapped the

  screen and the music turned off. “Look, man, I don’t know what

  you’re doing.” He put his hands on the bar top in a gesture of

  being in charge. “But we don’t want no trouble.”

  Liz saw two dots tattooed between the webbing of his right

  hand between the thumb and forefinger—the mark of a familiar.

  She gave Craig a nudge and a nod for him to see.

  “Look,” Craig said leaning on the bar moving the barrel of the

  HK closer to the barman. “The silver in this bullet won’t make

  you go all gooey as your body implodes on itself, but it sure as

  shit will kill you the old-fashioned, human way. So point out

  the stairs!”

  “B-b-back down the hall, see the sign?”

  They both looked where the familiar was pointing and saw

  the large sign, TO STAIRS. Before they went down to the basement, Craig grabbed the business phone that was sitting on the

  back bar and ripped it out of the wall. “Cell phone too,” he demanded.

  “Hey! That cost me a bunch. It’s a Ten,” the man protested as

  Craig snatched the new iPhone that had been the source of the

  music out of its cradle and dropped it to the floor.

  “I hope you got the insurance,” Craig said, crushing it under

  his foot.

  “Now stay here and be good,” Liz said as she zip-tied the

  guy’s hands to a brass rail attached to the bar.

  With that, Craig followed Liz through the hall to the stairs to

  the basement. She was halfway down when a loud ringing came

  clanging from the bar behind them.

  “SHIT!” Craig blurted out running back to the entry. The barman, hands still tied, was standing on the tips of his

  toes. He was awkwardly stretching his neck up as far as it could

  reach, teeth firmly clamped onto a knotted lanyard attached to

  the clapper of a brass ship’s bell hanging above his head. He was

  vigorously rocking his head up and down, creating an alarmingly loud racket as he tried to signal anyone in the basement

  trouble was on the way.

  Craig shook his head, almost laughing out loud as he looked

  at the ridiculous site. Drawing a knife, he came close to slicing

  the guy’s lips as he cut the lanyard away from the bell. “Really dude? You could strain something standing like that.

  Now do as the lady asked and, this time, be good!”

  Craig then turned and ran back through the hall and down

  the steps; jumping past the last two in time to see a handful of

  customers making an exit. One, in particular, caught his eye as

  she turned and looked back before escaping. Naomi! “Liz! Naomi in the hall,” Craig yelled out.

  Liz turned from the tattooed bartender she had been focused

  on and bee-lined to where Naomi retreated into the dark passage. A young man wearing a red flannel shirt and stocking

  cap flew towards Liz trying to stop her, fingers curled with a set

  of extended claws ready to dig into the agent. Craig fired one

  round and nailed the kid. The vapor of a dying vamp immediately erupted from his mouth and nose, but Liz didn’t turn or

  respond to the assault as she ran in pursuit of Terry’s killer. “Liz! Wait for me!” Craig yelled uselessly after her. Now there was little doubt as to the coincidence of Terry meeting his niece in this particular bar at night. It was a vampire hangout. He had been lured here with Naomi as bait. The Mas

  ter Sergeant didn’t stand a chance.

  Craig turned his weapon onto the remaining customers before

  another attack, and they quickly raised their hands. “He . . . he was the last one. The rest of them went out the

  back by the bathrooms,” a woman spewed out pointing towards

  the hall Liz had chased Naomi into. “We’re not one of them.”

  She presented her tattooed hand to Craig. “See. We’re all familiars.”

  “Better hope that’s all you are. Up the stairs with the lot of

  you. Let the sun decide.” He fired a burst into the floor to put

  an exclamation point on the statement.

  As the kids headed up the stairs, he heard one ask another,

  “What’s a familiar?”

  Honey trap.

  Then Craig spun back towards the hall and followed Liz. At

  one point he heard her shotgun fire once, twice. He came to

  a bathroom door which was propped open with the body of a

  vampire frothing all over the place and almost slipped in the

  slimy viscera. A second restroom door was closed. Craig tried

  the handle. Locked. He stepped back and kicked the flimsy door

  into the room and was greeted with screams.

  “Stop! Wait!”

  He saw two girls wedged into the single stall and approached

  them, gun at the ready.

  “Don’t move.” He pulled a flashlight from his belt and flashed

  its ultraviolet beam onto their faces. Neither girl reacted violently indicating they weren’t vampires.

&
nbsp; “Let me see your right hands.”

  One complied instantly, hand quivering in fear. No tattoo.

  The other hesitated. And he poked her in the shoulder with the

  rifle barrel.

  “Show me!”

  She did, and he grabbed her hand twisting it to look at the

  webbing next to her thumb.

  “Ow!”

  He saw two inked dots. Like a snake bite.

  “Familiar.” Craig pointed the barrel up to her head. “I should

  kill you.”

  “Familiar? What?” The first girl asked.

  “Both of you get the fuck outta here.” The familiar squeezed

  by Craig and out towards the stairs. As the other moved, Craig

  grabbed her arm.

  “Stay away from her if you want to live.”

  His attention was drawn back down the hall by another shotgun blast.

  Damn it, Liz!

  “Go!” he yelled at the stunned girl who didn’t hesitate any

  further and skedaddled as fast as she could. Then he returned

  to support his partner.

  At the end of the hall, the metal fire door they had watched

  Naomi unlock was open, leading into an incredibly dark void.

  Stepping into the blackness he had to pause to get his bearings.

  He snapped on the flashlight. Immediately, a purplish glow

  flowed out through its lens. The UV function might immobilize a vampire when pointed into its face but was all but useless

  as a means of illumination, except for highlighting things that

  phosphoresced in the violet beam. “Shit!” He clicked the button

  and switched to normal light.

  There was another bang, and then the clatter of fighting up to

  his left. He pointed the bright white beam towards the sounds

  and cautiously moved forward where he found that the tunnel

  branched off to the left and right. He looked right into a blacker

  hole, then left where more noise of a ruckus could be heard and

  saw a faint light from an opening in the tunnel wall. The flash/

  bang from a shotgun blast told him all he needed to know. Shutting off the flashlight, he motivated himself down the passage to

  the door as swiftly as he could before he lost another friend. At

  the opening, he stopped and poked his head around the jamb for a quick look-see into the room to ascertain the situation, and

  then ducked back out of view.

  Okay, two vamps down. One imploding. Another on the verge.

  Two still going after Liz. Was that Steph and Vlad in the shadows

  watching?

  ««« ‡ »»» HOURS AFTER WATCHING the recorded video of Terry being brutally killed, those back in CSC Command were now following Craig and Liz, in real time, driving into town, parking and gearing up in front of a homeless guy. On the big screen, two video images presented slightly different perspectives of the same view. One showed what the camera attached to Craig was seeing while the other showed Liz’s feed. As though this was an episode of NCIS, they watched the agents enter the bar and confront the bartender.

  “What’s that song playing?” Ellie asked.

  “Stones. Sympathy for the Devil.” Cole idly responded. They watched Craig and Liz descend into the basement and

  their pursuit of Terry’s niece into the mysterious tunnels below the city. They heard Craig yell, “Liz! Wait for me!” Before he headed into the dark after her.

  There were several moments where all they could see was darkness highlighted by flashlights or the burst of flame from gun barrels.

  The tension in the room was intense as they watched, unable to do anything but pray as the agent’s individual dramas played out before them. All hoped the next surprise wouldn’t be their friend’s last. Then a cascade of events rapidly followed one another: Liz killing vamps and fighting Naomi, Craig entering the room, Vlad and Steph fleeing, Craig turning to Liz and her struggle with Naomi, Craig turning and leaving Liz to follow Vlad into a pitch-black tunnel.

  “Why didn’t he help Liz? What the fuck is he doing?” Ellie asked, close to panic.

  Commander Cole responded as calmly as she could. “His job.”

  CRAIG STOOD FOR a long moment against the wall outside the room where Liz was fighting. He felt his body begin to seize up. Panic was what he knew it to be. Another of his friends going down and it was going to happen in front of him. What’s wrong with me? This wasn’t like him. But he felt like he did in Utah. Frightened into inaction. If it hadn’t been for Liz, he’d be dead. Now, here he was again, half-convinced he could do nothing to change the outcome of what was turning into a failed mission. But the end of the story didn’t have to be watching another partner, friend, die. Did it? The pressing fact, however, was if he didn’t snap out of it right now, he knew Liz was a goner. And if the other deaths haunting him weren’t his fault, then this time it sure as shit would be.

  Taking a deep breath, he stepped back into the door opening. Liz had her hands full taking on both Naomi and a hipster vamp clutching a laptop and swinging it as a weapon as he attacked triggering the weird thoughts that always seemed to pop into his head at the most inappropriate moments. For example, the words hipster and vampire just didn’t quite fit into his understanding of such things, not that it should have surprised him much. But the vamps he had been dealing with were old—some extremely so. And the idea of them using computers—well, that just didn’t compute (bad puns apparently, were also allowed at these times). What would vampires surf the web for? And just what does vamp porn look like? Shaking his head to clear away that stupidity, he still wondered why a vampire would need to use a weapon, such as a laptop, at all. Didn’t he have claws and fangs? All questions to be answered at a later date, if at all. Questions that had arisen in the fraction of a second between seeing and taking action.

  He made one last assessment of Liz’s situation. She had just inserted a wood stake in the hipster’s heart, who was in the process of imploding; oozing his steaming innards all over the floor. The smell was disgusting. And in this confined space where no fresh air had ever been ventilated into, the stench of bloating vamp combined with the years of stale must and rotting death was all but debilitating.

  Now Liz was fully engaged with Naomi. Craig couldn’t tell whether she saw Vlad morph into his smoky/wispy self and escape through a gaping black hole in the brick wall. But at this moment, he had to make sure that Steph didn’t join in the fray. They’d find the rogue vamp again someday, and hopefully with a stronger force.

  Craig raised his .357 aiming it directly at Steph, a warning not to get involved in the fight. The look that he saw in her eyes was one of calculation. Steph looked at Craig, then at Naomi and Liz. Then, with no further hesitation, she turned and followed Vlad into the void.

  Now Craig had a new decision to make. He wouldn’t have been able to follow Vlad through the dark passage in his amorphous state. But Steph was still too young an immortal to pull that magic trick meaning he had a chance of following her to Vlad’s next hidey-hole. It also meant he’d have to leave Liz behind to handle Naomi on her own. And they both knew stopping the rogue vampire before he could carry out his vile agenda had to take priority. There was no time for feelings and emotions at this stage. Besides, Liz was obviously capable of taking care of herself.

  As if underscoring that thought, Liz brought her left leg up in a round-robin spin; connecting with Naomi’s jaw, and sending her reeling back into a post. The agents made the briefest of eye contact. Craig gave her fancy footwork an appreciative smile and thumbs up gesture and then a more serious look apologizing for having to leave. Before she could blurt out, “Don’t you dare follow them by yourself!” Craig had disappeared into the pitch-dark tunnel leaving her to finish off Naomi.

  Turning in the direction he saw Steph exit, Craig took only a few paces and immediately slammed into a brick wa
ll blocking his path. Thinking that he may have been wrong regarding Steph’s ability to metamorphose into vapor like her master, he reflexively reached for the flashlight and clicked it on. The tunnel had not ended like it seemed but had abruptly made a right turn.

  Projecting the light in front of him, so as not to blindly discover another painful obstacle, Craig saw that this section of tunnel was rather short and ended at an opening in the side wall supported by timbers like you might see in a mine shaft. The floor around it was strewn with rubble—brick, concrete chunks, wood, and dirt. The gap was a rough-cut hole that appeared to have been created by pick and sledgehammer, which explained the debris piled up on the ground.

  He approached the irregular opening and aimed the beam of light into the black emptiness. The light revealed a narrow passageway that wasn’t at all like the brick-lined tunnels behind him, but rather like an overly large cement pipe—similar to a sewage pipe or utility corridor. Whatever it was he had stepped into, the rough-cut hole was an improvised connection from the old Shanghai tunnels to a more contemporary underground system of sewer pipes and service passages.

  Before he proceeded further, Craig paused to listen for Steph.

  Thump, Thump.

  He heard what sounded like a vehicle above his head probably driving over a pothole, then silence, and then—there—footsteps splashing away from him off to the right!

  With light in hand, and gun at the ready, Craig continued the chase and headed down the musty tube. He had to duck several times to avoid low-hanging cables and smacking his head on a rather large metal conduit. The top of the entire length of the interior was filled with various sizes of cast-iron pipes, electrical conduit, gas lines, and some he hoped were for water, because of the strange-colored discharge leaching from around the fittings. Strung in and around the pipes was a tangle of cords, wire and other electrical cables held to the wall with a variety of porcelain insulators. Exposed light bulbs affixed to the ceiling looked like they might have come straight from Edison’s workshop and, of course, weren’t functioning. To Craig’s unstudied eye, this was an old utility conduit and not accessed very often, if not abandoned altogether.

  Further down the passage, he stopped again to listen. There was more muffled traffic noise from a street above, and more silence. Then he caught it! A distinct splash of a foot stepping in a puddle. And not too far in front of him either. The beam from the flashlight revealed the corridor gently curving to the right. Craig extinguished the light and cautiously but swiftly moved in the direction of the sound.