Blood Heavy (Blood Heavy Series)

by S. L. J. Shortt

  “Never pegged you for a masochist, Jerry,” Goose chuckled.

  “Oh, you’d be surpri -”

  WHAM!

  The car was struck by what seemed like a freight train. The front seat airbags blasted outwards and the windows shattered, sending glass flying everywhere, as Steve’s Ford was slammed into the line of parked cars on the side of the street. Two or maybe three different alarms started going off and car headlights were flashing up and down the street. Shaken and shocked, the three of them slowly raised their heads.

  “You guys okay?” Steve breathed, mist forming in the cold air that was coming in through the broken windows.

  “Yeah, but are we anywhere near the hospital?” Jerry replied, frustrated. The pain in his hand had subsided from the sudden adrenaline hit.

  “Goose?!” Steve asked worriedly.

  “Yeah, ‘m okay” Goose groaned softly, gingerly brushing glass off of his shoulder. “What the hell happened?”

  He was looking out of the car window. For a second, Steve and Jerry didn’t understand, but then they realized. Where was the car that had hit them? There simply wasn’t one to be seen. The street was empty.

  “What the hell just hit us?” Goose asked, looking puzzled and still a little shaky.

  Before anyone could answer, a sound of screeching metal rang out, loud against the silence, and the door next to Jerry was ripped off its hinges. Jerry stared, paralysed, as a pair of incredibly strong hands reached in and grabbed hold of him.

  “What the fu -”

  His exclamation was drowned out, as he was dragged out of the car and thrown into the street. He hit the ground with a horrible sounding thud. Before Jerry could even register what was happening, a man was crouching down next to him. All but his mouth was hidden by darkness and he seemed to be growling with delight. Jerry eye’s widened in panic as he caught sight of what looked like a pair of nastily sharp fangs. The man grabbed hold of him, spinning him around and twisting his head to the side, exposing his neck to the frigid air. Jerry struggled desperately, but his efforts were puny against the power of the man’s grip. He couldn’t break free.

  Unexpectedly and suddenly, that monstrous grip slackened and Jerry fell to the floor. He turned feebly, in time to see a woman with brown curly hair, wearing knee high army-issue boots laying massive punches and kicks into his attacker. The man was attempting to retaliate, but she easily blocked him.

  In the blink of an eye, two more men came out of nowhere and joined the fight. Now the dark haired woman was taking on all three of them. She spun, flipped and kicked with inhuman agility. Every single one of her movements was so smooth; they flowed from her core as if she weighed less than a feather.

  Spinning, she kicked one of the men in the chest with the power of a wrecking ball. He flew backwards and smashed into one of the busted-up parked cars, a crater of cracked metal haloing his limp form. The alarm on the car stopped abruptly. A scorpion kick followed through with an unbelievable back flip dealt neatly with the second attacker, whose jaw was clearly broken. The force of the blow had lifted the man off of his feet and he had flown straight over the top of Steve’s Ford Focus. He now hung from a nearby tree, a large branch protruding from his chest. A split second later, his body exploded in a mess of sparks and blood, as if someone had set off an almighty firework inside his chest.

  “Jesus Christ!” Goose yelled.

  At the sight of the spontaneous combustion and the sound of Goose’s scream, Jerry, previously frozen in shock, snapped back to life. He rushed toward the now ruined car, but the man who had first attacked him was now back on his feet. He shot towards Jerry and grabbed him, plunging his gaping mouth towards Jerry’s pale white neck.

  There was a split-second, where Jerry saw the man’s human canines extend into monstrously sharp fangs. Then he felt the unbelievable pain of those teeth sinking into his neck. Screaming, he writhed in agony as the man drank from him. And then he was screaming again, as those sharp points were torn viciously from his neck. The curly haired woman had returned. She slammed a fist into the man’s jaw, yet unlike her other opponent, he barely flinched. She tried hitting him again, but it was as if her strength had vanished.

  Jerry fell to the floor, clutching the puncture wounds on his neck, blood spilling down his chest, wetting his t-shirt. He watched as the man laid a single punch into the woman’s chest. It sent her flying backwards, and she hit a car on the other side of the road. The man turned on Jerry again, his eyes manically intense. The women hadn’t lost her strength, Jerry realized, he had somehow, inexplicably, gotten stronger. He reached down to grab Jerry once more, but she was back! Armed with a broken piece of metal from the car, she smashed the fanged man around the face with it, causing him to stumble backwards. She was poised, ready to fight again, but then her head dragged around, her eyes locking onto the blood flowing from his neck.

  Claire pounced, and not on the man. Her own set of fangs buried deep into Jerry’s already gaping wound. He screamed out in agony and fear once more, and then, blessedly, started to lose consciousness. Before he did, he saw a familiar mad intensity mirrored in her eyes.

  Lifting her head from the boy, Claire rose, feeling the surety of the power coursing through her. Punches and kicks rained down on her assailants and a horrible crunch rang out. She had snapped the arm of the original attacker. He roared in pain and sank to his knees, and she charged towards the remaining vampire, who was still slumped against the car over the road. Ripping off the branch that had killed his friend, she staked him with it. As she rolled away, he burst into a shower of golden sparks.

  The engine of the Ford Focus was sputtering halfheartedly. Goose and Steve had dragged Jerry into the car, and Steve was trying his best to restart the engine. A few feet away, the two remaining vampires were standing motionless, squared off against one another .But with his broken arm, it was already over for the man. A final, brutal exchange brought him to his knees in front of the woman. A second later, his head was rolling on the concrete. Both the severed head and the decapitated body exploded in another shower of gold, but this time, the fallout was far more powerful and a grenade-like blast echoed off into the darkness for several heartbeats.

  Claire stood silently in the road, her wounds healing and closing magically fast. The scent of that incredible blood still floated upon the air. Her body was rigid, her mind wild with lust. She wanted more. That smell was so delicious, so powerful. It was life, amplified and refined and packaged in a ruby elixir. Slowly, she turned around, but the busted Ford Focus had gone. She had been so pre-occupied with the fight that she had let the humans get away.

  CHAPTER 3 – BRAIN FREEZE

  St. Cloud Hospital – Minnesota

  Goose and Steve were holding Jerry up between them as they dragged his limp body into the Emergency Room. The blood from Jerry’s neck wound had turned his shirt and left trouser leg dark red, and was now leaving a trail across the cold hospital floor.

  They yelled for help, and immediately a pair of nurses rushed over. Seconds later they were joined by a doctor who helped them lay Jerry down on the floor. The other patients in the Emergency Room withdrew, and looked on in shock as they desperately tried to plug Jerry’s wound. After a few moments, two other nurses rushed over with a gurney, which they carefully lifted him onto. They wheeled him away, presumably towards surgery.

  Goose and Steve tried to follow, but were stopped outside the doors of the Operating Room. Both of them were covered in Jerry’s blood and shaking all over.

  What had happened?

  It hadn’t really entered their minds until this moment. Helping Jerry had been the priority and nothing else had mattered, but now that he was getting professional help, all they could do was to wait and pray: and the events that had brought them to the hospital steadily pushed their way back into both of their minds. Had they really seen what they thought they had?

  They simply stood quietly in the corridor for a while, unsure of what to say or do.
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br />   “We have to call the cops.” Steve finally said.

  “Yeah, and tell them what, exactly? We just got attacked by a group of vampires?! Oh, yeah, I’m sure they’ll start the manhunt right away!” Goose shot back.

  “Vampires don’t exist!” Steve hissed, but he didn’t sound particularly convinced.

  “What else do you know that has fangs, drinks blood, and explodes when they get a freakin’ stake through the heart?! You saw it man! Those things were not human!”

  Steve looked away, unable to respond. Goose was right, crazy though it sounded. Those things had been stronger and faster than any human could possibly be. And they had bitten Jerry! As stories about supernatural creatures went, vampires were currently extremely popular. The world had gone vampire crazy. They were in books and movies and on t-shirts, just about everywhere you looked. Maybe they really did exist.

  Before tonight, Steve would have called all the hype utter bullshit. Just a bunch of little girls’ teenage fantasies gone wild. But this was real. That man had actually rammed their car off the road. And who had that woman been who had arrived in time to save them? And why had she drunk from Jerry too? Were they fighting over him, and why?

  As he stood next to Steve, an unpleasant thought dove into Goose’s head. Those things had completely ignored him and Steve and gone straight for Jerry instead. They hadn’t even looked at the other two boys. Why did they want to kill Jerry?

  Goose and Steve stayed at the hospital for what felt like hours. Time seemed to have double in length as they waited to hear if their friend was dead or not. They ended up moving into a small waiting area and sitting down on the chairs there. The blaring ceiling lights made the place too bright, and the waiting room carried that unique hospital smell, a product of the fluctuating balance between sickness and sterilization. Even though they were the only ones there, they had no desire to talk about what had happened.

  After a while, a nurse found them and gave them a quick once over to check for injuries. They were fine, so she gave them a form to fill out. They managed to write down Jerry’s name, their names and addresses, and that Joe was Jerry’s closest relative, but when it came to the section about how the injury had happened, they were at a loss. Eventually Steve grabbed the pen and wrote ‘car accident’ down. Technically it wasn’t a lie. After that, they were forced to wait around again.

  Finally a doctor found them. Coming up to them, he said, “Hi boys, your friend lost a lot of blood, but we’ve managed to close the wound and he’s going to make it.”

  Goose and Steve breathed a sigh of relief and sank back into their chairs in unison. Jerry was going to be alright.

  The doctor continued. “We’re just finishing up now, and then we’ll take him to a recovery room.”

  “Thanks,” Goose replied. For a moment the whole ‘attacked-by-vampire’s’ problem left his mind, replaced by the shining news that his best friend was still alive.

  Then the doctor went on again. “However, the police are going to want a word; it’s standard procedure for car accidents.” This caused Goose and Steve to stiffen.

  What the hell were they going to tell them? What the hell were they going to tell Joe? That man was like a human polygraph machine. Nobody could lie to him!

  “Hey, when can we see Jerry?” Steve asked.

  “He’s not going to wake up for a while yet - maybe tomorrow. The nurse will let you know then if he’s allowed to see visitors,” the doctor said, and walked away. Even though it meant more waiting, neither of the boys liked the idea of leaving Jerry alone. They were going to stick around, at least until Joe arrived.

  “I’m going to go call Sarah, she’s probably worried sick,” Steve mumbled, and walked away.

  Goose leaned back in his waiting room chair and rubbed his face. He hadn’t realized how tired he was until that moment. The adrenaline had worn off now and his limbs were starting to feel heavy. The world had truly taken a turn for the surreal.

  About a minute later, Steve came rushing back over to Goose.

  “Cops are here, what on earth do we tell them?” he asked frantically.

  “What, you’re asking me?!”

  “Well, you and Jerry have lied your way out of plenty of things!” countered Steve.

  “I’m not exactly feeling my best right now!” Goose snapped back irritably.

  As they argued in hushed voices, two uniformed police officers walked over from around the corner and approached them. Both of them were tall and bulky, making them quite intimidating to look at. They looked to be in their thirties, one had short, receding black hair, while the other had a virtually shaved head.

  “Steve Holden, Greg Gibson?” the one with black hair asked, sounding almost robotic.

  The boys nodded.

  “I’m Officer Benchley, this is Officer Adams. We understand that you were involved in a TA last night?” Had midnight passed already? They had lost track of how long they’d been there. “You mind telling us what happened?” As he spoke, Adams pulled out a small note pad and pen.

  “Err...” that was all Goose managed to say.

  The two cops exchanged a glance before turning back to Goose. “Where exactly did the accident happen?”

  “Umm...Wolfer Street,” Steve answered.

  “Do you remember the make and model of the other cars involved?”

  “Err...there weren’t any...” said Goose, which was actually true.

  “So you collided with a tree, or something?” Adams asked, scribbling stuff onto his pad.

  “Yeah, or something...” Goose nodded nervously. He just couldn’t seem to find anything to say that would sound convincing.

  “So, what was it?”

  They stayed silent and avoided eye contact with the cops, but the two men weren’t going anywhere. They just stood, waiting for an answer.

  “Well?” Adams asked forcefully.

  “It was, um...vampires...” Goose had said the word so quietly that both the cops looked at him in confusion.

  “Could you repeat that?” Benchley asked.

  “We...um...we were attacked by vampires,” Goose said a little louder this time. He couldn’t believe he was actually saying it. And saying it to a pair of cops made it sound even crazier.

  Benchley and Adams looked at each other with raised eyebrows. They looked like they wanted to burst into laughter, but didn’t.

  “Vampires?” Adams repeated.

  “Yeah...three of them,” Steve added, sounding like an ashamed child.

  “Four,” Goose corrected.

  “Yeah, sorry, it was four. This woman showed up and killed the other three,” said Steve, before biting his finger nail.

  “Okay...” Benchley said, straining to keep the grin off of his face. “Were these ‘True Blood’ vampires or ‘Twilight vampires’?” The question caused Adams to look away and let out a gargled cough that was obviously laughter breaking out.

  Goose and Steve looked at each other for a second, wondering how to classify what they’d seen.

  “More like ‘B-Blade’ type vampires,” Goose said, digging himself an even deeper hole.

  “Yeah, like Blade,” Steve agreed.

  Every answer they gave seemed to make them feel like they were shrinking an inch at a time. Soon they’d be small enough to go play in the sand box again. The whole thing was ridiculous: They were actually standing in front of a pair of police officers, claiming to have been attacked by vampires. Worse, they were actually hoping to be taken seriously.

  “That’s the one with Wesley Snipes, right?” Benchley asked. “I think my kid’s got that.”

  “Maybe we should take a look at the DVD extras...for evidence,” Adams said, trying desperately to keep a straight face.

  Goose and Steve looked away. They had never felt more humiliated in their lives.

  Benchley turned back to them with a small grin still on his face. “You kids are tired and you’ve had a rough night. We’ll do this some other time. We’ve got your
contact details, we’ll be in touch.”

  Goose was sure that he could hear the faint sound of giggling as the two cops turned and walked away.

  “Well that went well!” Steve growled.

  “What? My brain froze; I didn’t know what else to say!” Goose said, holding up his hands in innocence.

  Outside the hospital, Benchley and Adams walked over to their patrol car and got in. As soon as they were inside, Adams started typing information into the onboard computer and Benchley pulled out his cell phone. He dialed a number that was picked up after two rings.

  “Well?” a female voice asked.

  “Steve Holden and Greg Gibson, both boys were there with him, they saw the whole thing,” Benchley reported.