Jerry pulled a quarter from his pocket. “Call it.”
“Tails.”
Jerry flipped the coin and caught it checking what side was on top. “Heads.”
“Damnit! Every freakin’ time!” Cass hissed and walked away in annoyance with her sister.
“That’s a trick coin isn’t it?” Eddie asked as soon as the sisters had left the bar.
“Yeah,” Jerry giggled putting the coin back in his pocket. “They still haven’t figured it out.”
“We’ll let you know what we find,” Goose said.
“Good hunting,” Eddie said patting them on the back as they left.
“You too.”
Goose and Jerry walked out of the bar leaving the pounding noise and activity behind. They went past the bouncer that looked like Harvey Kietel and walked down the street to where Goose was parked. As soon as they reached the car Goose's neutral face turned livid.
Douchbags was written in sparkly paint all over his Volvo. It was fairy dust and it would take a power sander to get it off. The mischievous little freaks had taken revenge for being denied potato chips.
Jerry’s face tightened as he fought to keep the laughter in his throat from breaking out. Goose looked around for a second before exploding. “FREAKIN’ FAIRIES!”
Just as he screamed two very camp looking men that were holding hands walked past. “Pig!” one of them hissed with a disgusted look on his face.
“Oh, no, no, no, I didn’t mean...” he said awkwardly realizing he’d just made himself look like a complete homophobe. “I got nothing against...” they weren’t listening.
Jerry’s face was red and he was almost crying from trying so hard not to laugh his ass off.
“Don’t say a word!” Goose warned.
“Dude...you’re a faecist,” he said falling into fits of laughter.
Goose looked ready to punch him. Jerry laughed for most of the drive to Harvey.
Sophinia’s Mansion
Sioux Falls – South Dakota
The following afternoon, Rachel was sat at a desk in Sophinia’s office-like room with a cup of hot chocolate in front of her. It had been about thirty hours since Jerry, Goose, Cass and Claire had left to investigate their cases and apart from a phone call early in the morning to let them know that they’d arrived safely, she and Soph hadn’t heard a peep from them.
Rachel had decided to kill the time by going over Jerry’s family history again and study the fake information about his mother. She didn’t like keeping things from him but Sophinia had convinced her that it was for the best. She was definitely right when she said that Jerry wouldn’t react well to the information that his mother may not be human and that she might even still be alive.
But after three months, they had turned up absolutely no new information about who or what she really was. Apart from the fact that Jerry had been born and the various pieces of forged data, there was almost zero evidence to suggest that she had even existed. Joe had spoken to her over the phone and Jerry had a pendant that used to belong to her so she must be real, but that’s about the only thing they were sure about.
On top of all that, they had made no progress in figuring out Jerry’s blood and how it could possibly cure vampirism. They had pretty much reached an impasse with the whole thing.
A few moments later, Sophinia entered the office.
“I’m guessing nothing new?” she asked.
“Correct,” Rachel sighed and tucked the information into the desk draw.
The two of them left the office and started walking to the library.
“We can’t hide this from him forever,” Rachel said.
“I know, but between his mother and his earliest memories being erased, Daniel’s past could be a very dangerous subject,” Sophinia said.
“Well, his head’s in a much better place than it was. It might be time to tell him,” Rachel suggested.
“Maybe. It’s still going to be hard on him though.”
“Finding out that he might only be half human, it’ll drive him insane,” she said, “but less insane than it would have if we had told him a few months ago.”
“You might be right,” Sophinia sighed.
Her enhanced hearing and Rachel’s psychic abilities alerted both of them to the arrival of Cass and Claire coming through the front door.
“They’re back already?”
They walked in to the library just as the sisters arrived. Both of them were carrying their own dirty boots for some reason.
“That was quick,” Sophinia said.
“Yeah, it was a bust,” Claire said.
Joe walked in a few seconds later looking quite relieved to see Claire okay.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Wendle slug,” Cass said.
“A wendle slug?” he said making sure he’d heard right.
“I thought they stuck to swamp land?” Rachel asked.
“They do, normally. I don’t have a clue what it was doing up here. We found the nest -”
“Which ruined our shoes,” Cass interrupted grumpily.
“But the thing was long gone,” Claire continued. “Left in a hurry too, some of its eggs were still there.”
“Wendle slugs never leave their own eggs behind,” Soph said.
“This one did, like it was chased off or something. Anyway, one of those eggs must have fallen into that poor dude’s breakfast or something because it hatched inside him. We burned the ones that were left.”
“That’s weird,” Rachel nodded.
“What about your end?” Cass asked Joe.
“I’ve checked the whole place. Nobody's tapping the phones and the security is a closed system, can’t be hacked from the outside. Unless they’re using magic to spy on him, I pretty sure nobody else is eavesdropping.”
“Good. Any news from the boys?” Cass asked.
Joe looked away and pushed his lips together.
“What, they haven’t checked in?” she asked looking concerned.
“I’m sure they’re fine Joe,” Claire said rubbing his arm. “They’re tough. You made them that way.”
“I’m going to Harvey,” Joe stated and started walking towards the door.
“Joe, don’t panic. Just because they haven’t called doesn’t mean they’re in trouble,” Rachel tried. “Like it or not, they are good at this...but don’t tell them I said that.”
“You never should have let them go by themselves!” he snapped angrily at Sophinia.
“Joesph,” she tried but he was already walking out.
The only thing that stopped him was when Rachel’s cell phone started ringing. She checked the caller I.D. and smiled. “Oh look, speak of the devil,” she grinned victoriously.
Joe couldn’t hide the relief on his face as Rachel answered it.
“Hey Jerry, find anything?”
“Quick! How do you kill a wyvern?!” Goose’s panicked voice yelled back.
Everybody’s eyes went wide in shock. On the other end of the line something that sounded like a peacock being strangled was shrieking in the background and heavy flapping noises could be heard.
“A wyvern?! What the hell is a wyvern doing up there?!” Rachel yelped.
“Trying to eat Jerry!” Goose blurted back.
“This thing stinks!” Jerry’s angry voice screamed in the distance then gun shots were heard.
“Err...”
Cass and Claire immediately bolted to the bookcases and started speed reading the titles looking for the right book. “Got it!” Claire shouted and threw the worn tome (Creatures of the Old World) to Rachel.
She quickly went through the chapters while holding the phone next to her ear with her shoulder as gun fire erupted from the other end.
“We’ve shot this thing like fifty times, all its doing is pissing it off!” Goose said.
“Wait, wait, I got it!” Rachel said finding the section on wyverns.
Over the phone they heard Jerry yell out then a horrible crash which was
followed by lots and lots of swearing.
“Whenever you’re ready Rachel!” Goose growled.
“Burn it! You gotta burn it!” she relayed.
“Gotcha! Keep it busy Jerry, I’m going for the RPG!” Goose yelled.
“What do you want me to do, sing to it?!” Jerry shrieked back angrily.
There was a crunching sound as Goose obviously put the phone down but didn’t hang up. They heard more obscenities from Jerry in between the horrid screeching and flapping sounds the wyvern was making.
Rachel suddenly freaked as she read the rest of the chapter. “Wait! No! Goose, don’t use the RPG! Wyverns are full of Methane gas! It’s flammable!”
“Jerry!” Goose yelled in the background far away from the phone. “Fire in the hole!”
KABOOM! Beep Beep.
The line went dead. Rachel looked up at the others, her face completely frozen in shock. All she could do was say: “Oops...”
CHAPTER 8 – GIBLETS
Harvey – North Dakota
The door to the abandoned warehouse flew open and Jerry charged out looking like he really wanted to hurt something. He was covered head to toe in blood and chunks of wyvern flesh and smelt like a sewage pipe. That explosion had been just a little bit bigger than it was supposed to be. Behind him, Goose, equally drenched in entrails and carrying the empty RPG launcher followed while trying to get some slimy thing off his hand.
Even worse was that it was hot, humid and the sun was blaring down at them. Not only would the blood and guts dry pretty soon, they’d start to stink even more than they already did.
“'Let’s go hunt a wyvern' you said, 'it’ll look great on the resume!'” Jerry scorned while faking happy excitement.
“What, we killed it didn’t we? Just relax,” Goose tried.
“Relax?!” he roared and rounded on Goose. “I am covered in bat guts! You know who gets covered in bat guts? Amateurs! This is totally unprofessional!”
“It happens,” Goose shrugged.
“Gimmi’ my phone,” Jerry said holding his hand out.
“Oh, err,” Goose said awkwardly as he pulled what was left of the smoldering cell phone from his pocket. “It was an accident.”
Jerry took one look at his destroyed phone, threw it on the floor and stormed off towards a phone booth yelling as many curse words as he could. Goose couldn’t help but giggle a little.
Luckily the warehouse that had served as the wyvern’s temporary lair was right on the outskirts of town and so nobody was around to see the smoke coming out of its broken windows or the two boys that looked like they had been given the Carrie Prom treatment.
They walked back over to where Goose had parked his fairy dust douche-mobile. There was a payphone not too far from it. Jerry stuck a couple of quarters in it and dialed Sophinia’s number.
Sophinia’s Mansion
Sioux Falls – South Dakota
The Library was full of nothing but angry yelling. Joe had exploded into a fit of rage a few seconds after the phone had gone dead and now Claire and Cass were quite literally holding him back from trying to attack Sophinia.
It was so loud that Rachel almost didn’t hear the phone ringing. She picked it up as soon as she did and everyone went silent praying for the best.
“Jerry?” she whispered.
“Thanks for telling us the damn thing explodes Rachel!” Jerry’s angry voice immediately huffed back.
“Thank God,” she breathed. “What the hell happened?!”
“You tell me! We were investigating the farms where the cattle had gone missing and we found some guano,” he reported.
“Guano?”
“Bat poop.”
“Oh, right.”
“We figured it was a wyvern and remembered they like to lair up in caves and stuff but there were none of those around and no sewers so we figured empty buildings would be the next option. Anyway, we thought we’d find the damn thing and make sure it wasn’t eating anybody’s kids and then dipped all our rounds in some blood root.”
“Blood root?” Rachel sighed. “Jerry, that's for harpies, not wyverns.”
“Yes, thank you Rachel, we figured that part out when it didn't die!” Jerry snapped. “First warehouse we checked, we were in there for like five minutes before the freakin’ thing jumped us!”
“Are you alright?”
“No! I look like I was just born!” he hissed.
“I mean are you injured?” she pressed.
“Apart from my pride? No. My ears are ringing, I’ve got a headache and I need punch Goose but other than that we’re fine and the wyvern’s toast.”
Joe looked ready to collapse but he was okay. Claire and Cass let go of him but Claire stayed very close.
“Well, I guess our plan to question the other side didn’t work since both the things we went looking for couldn’t actually speak,” Cass mumbled.
“What about the suck sisters, any news?” Jerry asked.
“What did he just call us?” Claire piped up.
“Wendle slug, but it had already cleared out,” Rachel said.
“Wendle slug? I thought they only like swamp land?”
“They do. And wyvern’s usually stick to rocky mountainous areas. I’ve never heard of one coming up here before,” she admitted. “And with a chupacabra up in Jamestown, this is very strange.”
“What the hell’s going on Rach? Are these freaks playing wife swap or something, why are they moving around?”
“I don’t know, but it's not making me feel all dreamy inside,” she warned.
“Okay, we’ll figure it out. We’re gonna book into the nearest motel and take two dozen showers and then head back to you in the morning,” he said. “That credit card Soph gave us is still good, right?”
“What? The Mr. Bukowski one? Yeah, nobody's caught on yet...Nice work by the way,” she smiled.
“Thanks hun...Joe started biting everybody’s heads off yet?”
“Yeah, he was right in the middle of it when you called,” she said while giving Joe an 'I told you so' look.
“Tell him to relax and have more faith in us. He trained us well, you all did,” Jerry said.
“I will. I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”
“Oh God, is that an eyeball in my hair?!” Jerry suddenly blurted.
“Oh, no, no! No!” Rachel hung up instantly and cringed. She did not want to hear about that. She turned around to Joe who was looking a little ashamed of his behavior. “Tell me we aren’t going to have to go through this every time they work a job?” she said in a way that made her sound like the adult and Joe seem like the child.
“Okay, I’m sorry. I...”
“It’s alright,” Sophinia smiled. She didn't need to forgive him for his outburst because she hadn't blamed him for it in the first place. “I think we’re going to have to get used to this sort of thing from them.”
“Well, I don’t know about you guys but I could use a drink,” Cass said and headed off to the kitchen.
“Agreed,” Sophinia said and followed her with Rachel not far behind. She already had her mind set on a chocolate milkshake.
Only Joe and Claire were left in the library. He fell backwards into a seat, still trying to get his heartbeat down. He was a soldier. Trained to fight and die to protect the people in his charge. Before it had been his fellow soldiers, other times it had been hostages, civilians or some form of VIP. Sometimes it was simply a location or piece of equipment. But none of them compared to his own flesh and blood. That's why it killed him to have know his nephew was in danger when he couldn't protect him.
Claire seemed to scene his unease and came and sat next to him.
“You know he’s right,” she said softly, rubbing his arm. “You did train them well. We all did, and we should have more faith in them.”
“I’m trying,” Joe sighed.
She moved closer and hugged him. It was amazing just how much it calmed him down considering he was in the arms of a four hundred year
old vampire. But then Claire had always seemed to want to support him. The more time they spent together, the less he saw her as a monster and more as a human. And despite her boots being covered in wendle slug slim, she smelt great.
Blood Heavy: Ascension Page 8