by J. C. Diem
The instructor who had taught me how to fight with a sword wasn’t in any of the cells and I presumed he had fallen already. Grief at the loss of so many of my kin made my body in the stairwell shudder. We were all that was left now. A remnant shall remain, my subconscious whispered. It was my job to protect the few that were left. The humans would rue the decision they had made to turn on us. Death awaited anyone who stood in our way to freedom.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Splitting my consciousness, my detached eye watched the monitors as my body stood and turned to the door. Bearing down on the handle, it gave a groan of protest before something snapped and the handle became compliant. Stepping inside the pristine white hallway, my eye in the control room spotted me on one of the monitors and my body orientated itself. The hallways were confusing and it was difficult to tell where each cell was even while I was watching the monitors.
I could have released the manacles of every vampire one by one but I didn’t want to risk losing anyone. Many of the scientists carried guns and the ones who didn’t have a weapon were accompanied by armed soldiers. Letting Geordie go without warning would most likely end in his death. I could picture him standing there, gaping in confusion until one of the scientists put a bullet in his brain.
Igor’s cell was close so I jogged to it then pushed the button with my eye to unlock it. He was ready to rend the intruder to pieces but relaxed when he saw it was just me. “What kept you?” he asked gruffly then enveloped me in a crushing bear hug.
“Sorry it took me so long. I don’t exactly have Gregor’s knack for formulating plans,” I explained when he let me go.
“Who does?” he replied sardonically. “What is your plan?” was his next question as he surveyed the deserted corridors.
“I have an eye in the monitor room so I can see where all the scientists and soldiers are.” He turned to examine my empty eye socket and nodded in understanding. “I think we’ll have a better chance of getting everyone out alive if we break them out one by one.”
“Good plan,” he said after a short pause while he thought the problem through himself. “How many of us are left?”
I hesitated before breaking the bad news to him. “Twenty-nine, including me.”
He closed his eyes and braced himself. “What is Geordie’s condition?” Unspoken was the question whether his apprentice was even still alive.
“He’s…fine.” A glance at the monitor told me how big a lie that was. Igor’s protégé was trying to claw his way through the wall to get away from the scientists. Bleak eyes met mine in disbelief. “Ok, he’s not fine but at least he’s alive. Do you want to bust him out next?” While I wanted Geordie to be rescued as much as Igor did, I kind of hoped he didn’t want to free his apprentice just yet. It was going to be difficult to calm the teen down when he was finally set loose. It would be smarter to let our kin who would be able to get on board with the plan quickly free first.
Thinking about it, Igor came to the same conclusion and shook his head regretfully. “Geordie will be safer where he is for now. Are Gregor and Lucentio still with us?” I nodded and his relief was palpable. “Which of them is closest to us?”
“Gregor.”
“Let us free him first and then Lucentio,” Igor decided. He was close on my heels as I trotted down the hallway and made a turn.
We only had to back track twice before I found Gregor’s cell. My orb launched itself into the air and landed on the door release button before springing over to the manacle release button.
Igor burst into the room and slammed one of the scientists into the wall. He hit the man with enough force to shatter his skull. Blood and brains splattered across the white paint, leaving a reddish-grey stain. I grabbed the second scientist and copied Igor’s earlier move by snapping his neck. He dropped in a boneless heap, dead before he even felt any pain. It was a far more merciful death than he’d deserved.
Gregor sprang forward with a roar and tackled the soldier to the ground. The terrorized man’s gun went off for a final time as he reflexively pulled the trigger. He screamed shrilly in agony as fangs tore into his throat. Gregor jerked when the bullet ripped through him but he was too busy feeding to be concerned with the gaping hole that had appeared in his back.
When he was full, Gregor gave me a shamed look before turning away. His mouth and chin were covered in blood. His longish hair was a tousled mess and swung forward to hide his eyes. Crouched over his victim, he was far from the usual elegant vampire that I’d known. He had been reduced to a monster and again I felt no pity for the people who had put us here. Maybe one day I would be able to feel for humans again but tonight mercy had taken a back seat to vengeance.
Pulling a handkerchief out of the weakly struggling soldier’s pocket, Gregor wiped his face then stood. A well placed stomp with one foot ended the soldier’s life. Gregor regathered his dignity and pulled it around himself like a tattered coat that might be forever beyond repair. The smile he gave me was pained. I believed he was embarrassed that I had witnessed his regeneration to a primitive state. “I am so very glad to see you, Natalie.”
I stepped over the bodies of his captors and into his hug. “I’m sorry it took me so long to find you guys but I was, um, indisposed for a while.”
He gave me a sharp look but we all knew now wasn’t the time for a question and answer session. “Who are we freeing next?” he asked instead.
“Lucentio,” Igor responded. He made no move to pick up the dead soldier’s gun. I completely identified with his desire to fight with his fangs and bare hands.
Wending our way through the halls, I motioned for my friends to stop. My watchful orb had just noticed a pair of scientists leaving a cell just around the corner from us. Waving the others forward, we converged on the pair silently. I didn’t protest as the men pushed past me to deal with the white coated torturers.
My orb unlocked the door the scientists had just vacated. A European vampire stared at me in surprise when the door swung open. He rubbed his wrists as the manacles suddenly clicked open and his arms and legs were released. His gaze moved past me and fastened on the human that was struggling in Igor’s tight grip. Both scientists were hustled back into the cell and I pushed the door shut. Gregor dropped his lifeless meat sack to the ground. He had squeezed the man’s life away with one hand around his throat.
Needing no invitation, the European yanked the human out of Igor’s hands and drained him to the point of death. After he’d torn the scientist’s throat out, he let the body fall and gave me a formal bow. “I am Cristov. I am in debt to you for saving my life.”
I recognized him as being one of the Europeans that Aventius had brought to Africa. He hadn’t been one of the followers that I had busted sacrificing humans in Russia so he must have been picked up somewhere along the way. “I’m glad to see you’re ok, Cristov.” He smiled when I clapped him on the shoulder, revealing bloody fangs. Deep scars marred his flesh from where he had been burned by acid. Almost ordinary in appearance with sandy brown hair and nondescript features, he was trying to control his rage at being kept prisoner but he was losing the battle. As we stepped out into the hallway, his black eyes sought for more humans to rend.
Stopping just around the corner from Luc’s cell, I pointed at another door. “One of Ishida’s people is in there,” I told my small band of warriors. “You help him out while I set Luc loose.”
Realizing that I needed a private moment with my one true love, Igor and Gregor nodded. Cristov nodded as well and readied himself for action. My orb was busy for the next few seconds releasing the locks and manacles of the first cell before then releasing the lock to Luc’s door.
I pushed the door open and Luc stoped pacing. For a few moments we simply stared at each other in silence. Then I crossed the distance between us without being aware that I was moving. My feet left the ground as Luc hugged me. “I thought you were lost to me forever,” he said. The desolation in his voice was matched by mine at the thought
of losing him.
“I made you a promise,” I reminded him.
He put me down then held my face in his hands. Even with a gaping eye socket he looked at me as if I was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. “Can you still love me knowing that I have betrayed you with many human women?”
My nose scrunched up at the ‘many’ women. “If you’d actually enjoyed yourself, it might have been hard to get over but I could see you had to force yourself to hump that last woman.”
For an instant he looked shocked before his face resumed its usual serenity that I was used to. “You saw me with that human?”
“If it makes you feel any better, my shadows used to watch us when we were getting it on,” I told him. He was momentarily flabbergasted by that news. The arrival of our friends and allies precluded him from asking for more details.
“It is good to see you alive, my old friend,” Gregor said and followed up his pronouncement with a rib creaking hug. Even Igor stepped forward and gave Luc a brief hug.
Nodding a greeting to Cristov, Luc remained at my side as we set out in a group. Working systematically, we freed our allies from their confinement with the aid of my eyeball. Each vampire fed from one of their torturers, replenishing much needed energy after weeks of forced starvation. No matter how brutally the scientists and soldiers died, I made no move to stop my kin. They had earned the right to end the lives of their captors however they saw fit. In their place, I would have been just as savage.
Kokoro gave me a deep bow when her door clicked open. I returned it out of habit. She nodded to the others that she could sense if not see. “Have you freed Ishida yet?” she asked me anxiously.
“Not yet but we’ll get to him soon,” I assured her.
“I have not been able to sense his thoughts for many nights,” she told me in a low voice. The Japanese warriors that we’d freed gave her disturbed glances at the news that their leader might be fairing even more poorly than any of them. All were sporting injuries that would take time to heal.
“He’s still alive,” I told her. “But I think he’s in a coma, which is probably why you can’t read his mind.” My words did little to reassure the Japanese warriors and their seer. Vampires didn’t usually spiral into a coma so they knew his condition had to be fairly precarious.
Geordie was the next to be freed. Igor stepped up beside me and the others crowded around us in the hallway. “Brace yourself,” I told my dour companion before releasing the lock on the door. “He’s in pretty bad shape.”
Lowering his head for a second, Igor made himself as ready as he possibly could without knowing exactly what he would find on the other side of the door. I didn’t release the teen’s manacles. It was too dangerous with a scientist standing right in front of him holding yet another steel rod ready to ram into his body.
When the door suddenly clicked open, the pair of white coated men glanced over their shoulders. Confronted with a pack of furious vampires, they immediately panicked. Dropping the metal rod, the guy on the right reached for the gun at his hip. Igor crossed the room and broke the human’s wrist with a twist of his hand. I slapped the second scientist hard enough to knock him out but not hard enough to kill him. Maybe I was finally getting a handle on my supernatural strength.
The scientist with a newly broken wrist screamed loudly enough to drown out Geordie’s dry sobs until Igor clamped a hand over his mouth to muffle him. The teen didn’t even know he had been rescued yet. His eyes were squeezed shut and his body shuddered with agony. My orb pressed the manacle release button and I caught him before he could hit the ground.
“Geordie.” He didn’t respond to me at all and didn’t seem to realize he wasn’t chained to the wall anymore. “Geordie!” I got through to him that time and his eyes snapped open.
Staring at me in bewilderment, Geordie looked beyond me and spied Igor then Luc and Gregor standing in the doorway. Turning back to me, the teen raised a shaky hand and touched my face with his fingertips. “Chérie? Is it really you?”
“It’s really me,” I replied around the lump that had formed in my throat. Geordie tried to hug me and made a sound of pain as the foot long metal rods dug deeper into his flesh. I knew removing them was necessary but I didn’t want to cause him further suffering. Apparently, neither did Igor. He just stared at his apprentice bleakly so I sent a beseeching look at Luc and Gregor.
Moving behind Geordie, I held him by the shoulders as Luc and his long-time friend yanked the rods free. The teen’s body jerked each time but he didn’t make any sounds of protest. Gaping holes sluggishly oozed black blood when I moved around him to view the damage. More blood had dribbled down his chin from biting his bottom lip.
Geordie’s gaze hardened when it fastened on the human who was still struggling weakly in Igor’s grip. Bending, the teen scooped up two of the rods and stalked forward. Shaking his head frantically, the scientist screamed beneath the Russian’s hand. Geordie ignored his pleas and punched the rods into the man’s stomach. “Now you know what it feels like,” the teen said. He then pulled the man out of his mentor’s grasp and bit savagely into his neck.
Geordie’s wounds had already begun to heal by the time he’d had his fill of blood but it would take hours for them to close completely. Igor gave him a hug that made his apprentice wince then pointed at the unconscious scientist. “What do you want to do with him?” Since Geordie had been his prisoner, it was only fair that he would be allowed to decide the man’s fate.
“Is anyone hungry?” Geordie asked the mob milling in the hallway.
“I could eat,” a European replied. Several more agreed that they wouldn’t mind topping up.
“He’s all yours,” the kid offered. The five of us stepped outside as half a dozen of our kin entered the room and snacked on the human. Drained to death, he was almost as pale as we were when they were done with him. Still unconscious from my slap, his demise was painless. He would wake up in hell wondering what had happened. I hoped an imp spent the next several centuries sticking a spear up his butt.
“Where is Aventius?” Cristov asked. “Is he still alive?” All of the Europeans showed signs of genuine relief when I nodded.
We reached the ex-councillor’s room and angry mutters were exchanged when Aventius’ followers saw the state he was in. Their leader opened his eyes and smiled when he saw us, as if he’d just been waiting to be rescued all along.
It took four of us to break him free from the thick plastic tank. Cristov handed his leader a white coat that he’d stripped off a dead scientist. The ancient ex-Court ruler tugged it on gratefully. “Is this all that remains of our numbers?” he asked after stepping out into the hallway and casting a glance at the mob.
“There’s one more,” I replied.
Seeing Kokoro hovering behind me anxiously, Aventius came to the correct conclusion. “Then let us free Emperor Ishida from his confinement immediately.”
Shaking and traumatized, Geordie clung to me as I led the group through the maze of hallways. The rage I had fought to keep under control slipped from my grasp. The white walls of the hallway as well as the monitors in the control room became bathed in orange light from my eyes.
I was highly disappointed that Colonel Sanderson was in France investigating the disappearance of the Comtesse and her people. If anyone deserved to die for what had been done to my friends, it was him. He’ll pay, I promised myself silently. One way or another, he will be held responsible for the torture and death of my friends.
Chapter Twenty-Four
We moved in almost complete silence towards the cell that contained the emperor of the now almost extinct Japanese vampire nation. For the first time, I was actually glad that Kokoro had lost her sight so long ago. She had been the one to turn Ishida ten thousand years ago and she loved him like a son. To see him in this wizened state would have been heartbreaking for her.
My orb activated the last lock and I pushed the door open. Dead silence continued as Ishida was revealed. T
hen one of the female warriors gave a cry of dismay and rushed forward to free her leader. Igor put his arm around Geordie’s shoulder and gently pried him from my side when Kokoro reached for me. I led her into the cell and held her tightly when she started to shake. Through the minds of her people, she saw Ishida almost as clearly as the rest of us did.
“He needs blood,” one of the male warriors muttered. I kicked myself mentally for not thinking of that myself. None of the scientists or soldiers we had encountered so far had survived our rage. Then I remembered there was a group of humans in the room right next door to the control room where my orb was hiding. I’d missed seeing exactly where the room was but it had to be on level fifty-seven as well, which meant it couldn’t be too far away.
“There are more scientists and soldiers nearby, but I’m not exactly sure where,” I told the warriors as they worked together to free their unconscious leader. The metal bars were strong enough to hold a lone vampire down they weren’t strong enough to stop several of them from prying the bars off.
Gregor took charge of the rest of our group. “Spread out and search for doors. Stay in pairs and be on the lookout for armed soldiers.”
Two of the Japanese warriors stayed behind with Kokoro while the rest of us took to the hallways. “Over here!” one of the Europeans whispered loudly. It echoed through the hallways and drew us to him. We converged on a door near the bathroom where my orb had hitched a ride with the scientist.
“If this is the correct room, we have to be careful. There are half a dozen armed guards inside,” I warned my team. “You’d better let me go in first and take them down.” No one liked the idea much, especially Luc but they knew better than to protest. I’d survived pretty much the worst damage that could be done to our kind and I was still unalive to talk about it. Nothing the soldiers could do would be able to keep me down for long.