Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Judge of the Damned
By Nick S. Thomas
PUBLISHED BY:
Swordworks Books
Judge of the Damned
Copyright © 2011 by Nick S. Thomas
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Prologue
Nobody knew how long the world had been inhabited by Vampyrs (recently becoming Vampires), though few were unaware of their presence. Like organised crime in the twentieth century, most people, organisations and governments tried their best to brush the issue under the table, a fact that was compounded by corruption.
The Church had known of the existence of Vampires long before the general public, which they kept secret in order to be able to legitimately hunt and control the species without interference of humans or politicians. This sect of hunters became known as Guardians, or the Holy Brotherhood, answerable only to the Cardinals and the Pope himself.
Centuries of inconclusive fighting between the Guardians and the Vampires that they hunted had led to an inevitable stalemate. Gaining power and wealth through business both legitimate and illegal, throughout the last century many Vampires rose to strong positions. Opposed by ever more wealthy and organised foes the Church agreed to an unofficial non-aggression pact with the appointed Lords of the Vampires.
The pact stated that the Church may only hunt those Vampires they could prove hunted humans for sport or to kill them outright. Officially the Vampires were forbidden to convert a human to their species, but it was hard to ever prove if they did or not. Thousands of people go missing every year, many are never found, the Church always suspected that many were turned, but could not prove it or perhaps didn’t want to.
In a world where the Vampires were growing ever more powerful, the Church did everything in its power to keep the peace. The Guardians existed as a police force who both hunted dangerous Vampires who broke the laws of the pact, but also any human who took the law into their own hands.
Chapter 1
It was a dark lonely night in the abandoned docks district of the city. The only sound chugged from the exhausts of Bill’s Harley as he coasted down the dark open road. In the distance, he could just make out the rumbling of a V8, his brothers never far away. His long leather coat fluttered in the wind. His head was shaved bald, and between his coat the clerical collar of a priest could be seen in full view. Bill’s face was ingrained with the tells of a hard life, but an experienced and worthy one.
A throat mic just protruded from his priest’s collar, and a small headphone piece dangled from his ear. Bill turned the bike down a narrower road and brought it to a halt outside a large warehouse. He pushed the kickstand down and casually climbed off the bike. A Kevlar vest was just visible beneath his coat, though there was no deliberate attempt to hide it. His belt buckle glimmered in the moonlight, it was solid silver and oval with a large cross at its centre.
Headlights appeared in the distance as the familiar sound of his brothers’ truck casually coasted towards him. The vehicle was an armoured cash truck, Pegasus Security adorned across its sides, a convenient way to use an armoured vehicle without attracting unwanted attention, and not make much of what they do stand out to the general public. The vehicle trundled in and parked beside Bill’s bike, where he stood calmly awaiting them. The large security door at the back of the vehicle opened and two men jumped out, as well as the driver.
“You’re late,” said Bill.
“You’ll live,” said Tommy.
The three men stood before him, each wearing a Kevlar vest, two hand handguns visible on their belts. Silver crosses hung around each of their necks, they were members of the Holy Brotherhood, sworn to protect the peace among humans and Vampires, and bring to justice either species who dared break the pact. These three men, Tommy, John and Mason were as brothers to Bill.
“This the ghoul we’re after?” asked John.
Bill nodded in agreement. Ghoul was what they referred to as a Vampire who hunted and killed humans, draining their bodies dry. It had long been accepted that Vampires needed human blood, and it was harvested from paid candidates in large quantities. The twentieth century had seen substantial progress in the management of human blood as a business, removing the threat from Vampires themselves. Despite this, a number still chose to follow their primal instincts, hunting humans for sport, or drinking them dry for the sheer pleasure of it.
For many months, Bill’s crew had hunted a single Vampire who had already killed half a dozen humans across two states. They had no idea what Coven this one creature belonged to, for they had a hard enough time tracking the perpetrator himself. It was unusual for a Vampire to move around so much.
“I have it on good authority that our Unsub is currently held up in this shithole,” said Bill.
“Why? Hardly a stylish abode,” said Mason.
“No idea, but right now I don’t care, Tommy, grab the kit, let’s do this,” said Bill.
Tommy pulled two large wooden spears from the back of the vehicle, and handed them to the other two. He reached in and pulled out a shotgun for himself, a Remington 870 with an eight shot tube and silver scattershot loaded. All the men used silver ammunition in their firearms. It would not kill a Vampire, but it hurt them badly, often enough to incapacitate them for long enough to use something more permanent.
Firearms were also useful on other occasions. With the vast mix of terrain that the Brotherhood had to work on, it was not unheard of for them to face off against humans as well through all manner of feuds, territorial conflicts, and also employees of the Vampires. They liked to employ humans as guards, secretaries and other such jobs, as it allowed them a permanent presence day and night.
Vampires were also known to frequently carry guns to defend themselves at range from vigilante humans, the police, and other of their kin. Humans had long thought of the Vampires as one united group, an ‘us and them’ relationship. The reality is there were as many disagreements, feuds and wars among the Vampires as there were in humankind. Some humans also hunted Vampires, some as a challenge, others because they believed that Vampire blood would give them enhanced strength, speed, a high, or any other attribute that naive and stupid people could conjure.
Hunting a Vampire was no easy thing, those who did so without careful preparation, training, assistance and equipment would likely not survive the experience. Many hunters went missing whilst hunting Vampires. Some suggested they were captured and kept as a food source for the creatures, locked away in some disgusting dungeon to be drunk from whenever desired.
What always concerned
Bill is how little they truly new about what went on amongst the undead. He worked at the will of the Church, and much of the history and modern day goings on were kept secret even from the Brotherhood, he frequently wondered if they were as oblivious and uninformed as the rest of the humans.
Bill pulled back the left side of his coat, revealing a huge revolver sitting in a cross draw position on his belt. He pulled the cannon from its holster, a Ruger Super Redhawk. The seven and a half inch barrelled monster was considered excessive by the rest of his crew, but Bill valued its massive hitting power. The .454 Casull was well suited to hunting large game and fending off predators, a marketing strategy which had drawn him to it in the first place.
“What are we expecting here?” asked Mason.
“Everything we know suggests it’s just one ghoul,” replied Bill.
“Suggested?” asked John.
“It’s about as good as we’re gonna get,” said Bill.
“We should have more kit for this shit,” said Tommy.
“What else do we have in the truck?” asked Bill.
“Not a lot. We have regular ammo for the M4s, nothing silver, we haven’t been re-supplied in months.”
“Typical, well we got what we got, let’s make the best of it,” replied Bill.
Tommy shut and locked the rear door of their truck as Bill set off up a metal stairway leading up to the only door in sight. He stepped cautiously, always looking for any sign of trouble. The door was locked, he nodded to John who pulled out a pick set and got to work. Thirty seconds later, he had bypassed the lock and opened the door just an inch before tucking the kit away into his pocket.
Bill nodded to the other men as he turned back to the door and pushed it ajar with his left hand, keeping his revolver close to his body. He always remembered the first time he went through an unknown door with his handgun presented before him, it was ripped from his hands by the Vampire waiting inside. Only his mentor at the time saved him.
The four men stepped quietly through the open doorway and into the cool and eerie warehouse. A few paces forward and they realised they were on a mezzanine floor looking out across the vast shelving units, long empty and with remnants of old stock. It was clearly a distribution warehouse many years before. The docks had been a massive centre of commerce decades before, but the evolving nature of trade in the world, particularly in the Far East had long destroyed much of the equivalent business here.
Bill was not at all comfortable with the situation, despite the abandoned building being as quiet as it should be his gut told him something was out of place. He continued along the metal flooring towards the opposite end of the vast building, the corridor littered with metal drums, desks and all manner of useless junk. He was aware and concerned that they were exposed high up in the building, on view to any villain below.
“Still think it’s the right place?” whispered Tommy.
“Yeah, looks like bullshit to me,” said John.
Bill looked at the men with a serious expression on his face, not at all impressed with their antics, and signalling for them to shut up, without having to say a word. He turned back just as his ear caught a faint metal clicking sound in the distance, the familiar sound of a gun being cocked.
“Down!” shouted Bill.
He leapt behind a large upturned office desk as pistol fire rang out up ahead. The shots rang out around them as they hit or ricocheted of the metal structure of the building. The four men were huddled behind what cover they could find. Mason and John already had their handguns drawn, their spears in their offhands.
“So much for a no hassle operation,” said John.
“If it was going to be easy they wouldn’t send us would they?” asked Bill.
“So you’re saying we get the shit list?” asked Tommy.
“I thought you would have realised that by now.”
“How many do you figure?” asked John.
“Sounds like two shooters so far, we’re only lucky they don’t have rifles. Tommy, got any flashbangs with you?” asked Bill.
He pulled a flashbang grenade from the back of his belt.
“Last one.”
“Seriously, the Bishop needs to pull his finger out and send us some new supplies, we’ll have nothing but hand weapons before long,” said John.
Bill popped his head around the corner carefully, just enough to get a sense of the enemy’s position. He saw two muzzle flashes as bullets peppered their position once more. He ducked quickly behind the cover again.
“Alright, you ready for this?” asked Bill.
“Always,” said Tommy.
“Alright, now!”
Tommy pulled the pin from the one remaining flashbang he had. He looked across to the other three men, making sure they were ready, they all looked at him in readiness. Running towards gunmen was never an appealing idea, and they could never be certain the grenade landed perfectly to disorientate all attackers, but it was the best option he had. He held the grenade out and threw it hard over their barricade. The four men looked down into the darkness of their cover, so not to be affected by the immense explosion of light.
“Go!” shouted Bill.
The four men leapt from their position and ran at their opponents, their guns up and at the ready. They reached the end of the mezzanine level where they could already see the movement of their two attackers stumbling about in confusion. Without waiting for them to recover, Bill fired twice with his Ruger, the hand cannon echoing violently around the warehouse. Mason’s automatic fired simultaneously, but was drowned out by the ear splitting revolver.
The two attackers lay lifelessly on the floor, blood spilled from their bodies in an ever-growing pool. Bill sat down beside his victim, putting his bare hand on the man’s neck, not to feel for a pulse, for if he would not have one now whether he was human or not. The man’s neck was warm and clammy.
“Human,” said Bill.
“This one, too,” said Mason.
“Damn it, this was supposed to be one ghoul, nothing more,” said Bill.
“Sounds like the usual fuck up in information,” Tommy added.
“Reckon they were guards, Bill?” asked Mason.
“Probably, most people would have confronted us before shooting.”
“And we just lost the element of surprise,” said John.
“It happens, let’s move on.”
The four men continued through a doorway at the end of the floor, taking them to a stairwell that led down to the ground floor of the next warehouse section. They continued on, slowly and cautiously, they may have lost the element of surprise but neither could they risk charging in like bulls.
Up ahead they could see that the building took a turn in an L-shape, some moonlight breaking through from windows high in the structure. Bill stepped carefully forwards until he reached the turn and peeked around the turn. His eyes widened at the sight of what he saw. Turning back to his men, he waved for them to go forward. They rush around the corner, the vicious display clear for all to behold.
Tommy and John gagged as they looked up at a woman’s body hung from a chain around her arms. She was naked and gaunt, as if completely starved, the telltale sign of a victim having been drunk dry. Her skin cruelly mutilated, she had died a miserable and painful death at the hands of a ghoul.
“Jesus Christ,” said Tommy.
“I’ve warned you about that blasphemy,” said Bill.
“What else is there to say?”
“This the work of our Unsub?” asked John.
“Sure is,” said Bill.
“I want to kill him,” said Tommy.
“Cannot do, we are authorised to capture only, he will stand trial for his crimes.”
“How can we let a bastard like that live?” asked Tommy.
“Well technically he’s already dead,” said John.
“Very funny, idiot.”
Tommy grabbed John by the collar of his jacket and slammed him against the nearest shelves, them crashi
ng down as they collided. Bill jumped into the middle of them and ripped the men apart. He stood back up straight and holstered his Ruger.
“Enough! We know who the enemy is here, let’s focus on it!”
“Looks like we’re too late anyway,” said Mason.
Just as soon as his words had finished they heard the sound of an engine roar to life outside the building. Bill quickly turned and rushed towards the nearest door he could find, smashing it open in his stride. Before him was a black Cadillac CTS-V, the V8 roared as the car reversed away from him. He charged after it as it spun around in a J-turn to escape. As the driver slammed it into first and stepped on the gear, Bill leapt onto the rooftop. As soon as he had landed, the vehicle was in motion. It wasn’t quite what he had in mind, but it was all he could think of in the heat of the moment.
The car raced around the building towards the road they had come in at, Bill desperately trying to hold on, having little more than window gutters to cling onto with his fingertips. The driver zigzagged the car, trying to throw him off, but he just managed to keep his grip. Bill reached down to the driver’s side, about to put his fist through the window glass when the brakes were hit with full force. The vehicle screeched to a halt and he was thrown from it.
Bill landed hard on the tarmac, rolling several times along the road, his leather coat fortunately saving his skin from being torn from his bones. He quickly go to his feet, but the Cadillac was already storming towards him, knowing he did not have time to draw his pistol he jumped to one side, narrowly missing the bodywork of the car as it rushed by.
Jumping to his feet Bill ran to his bike, which was just fifty feet away, he could feel his bones and muscles aching from the impact on the road, and his hands badly grazed and bloodied, but nothing would stop him. He sprang onto his bike and fired it up. The Harley’s back wheel spun and smoked as the tail swung out and the bike launched off down the road after the Cadillac.
Judge of the Damned (Vampire Storm, Book 1) Page 1