At First Sight (Persephonii Waters Book 1)

by Melanie Brown

  It wasn't until she was a few feet inside the doorway that something slid down her spine. Strangely familiar and cold, it pushed at her memory. Not quite the chill of a vampyre but not altogether human, the energy lingered in the air, floating with the dust. Concentrating over the officers' steady commentary, she knew the exact moment he stepped into the room, the energies shifting to accommodate the new presence. She also knew the exact moment he spotted the blood splattered wall and plastic sheets, dark red with what was clearly not paint. He was calling the scene in, and ordering her back outside, as he retreated into the hall. She followed him slowly, trying to feel out as much of the area as she could before it was contaminated with the menagerie of people that would be parading in and out in the next few minutes.

  In the space of a few heartbeats, she looked over her glasses, searching for the lingering echoes, shadows of the auras of those who had entered the apartment. Despite the obvious signs of foul play, the tell tale markings of murder, of death, were conspicuously absent. The faint colors of Ms. Kunhe's aura were present, but nothing that denoted that this was where the human part of her life had met its end, nor the hand of her Maker. How could someone be Turned and the process not leave a lingering trace other than a faint echo and the blood to prove the deed was done?

  It would be a few more days before the scene was released and she was given unhindered access, but Persephonii was by no means going to let that slow her down. Questions needed to be answered and Ms. Kunhe had just added even more to her list. Instead, she focused on similarities, searching out any cases the officers might have missed. It was possible that there were more Chyldren out there for her to find.

  If Ms. Kunhe's Turning had been quiet, contained, than perhaps others had been Turned in a similar fashion. Their deaths marked by violence but swept aside as Para-attacks or freak accidents. At this point any and all leads could mean a break in the case. If these Turnings led back to the Fisher Case, then it was even more important to find these missing links. They might mean finding the Rogue Maker.

  Chapter 9: Turning:

  Refers to the infection and resulting process of converting a human into a vampyre. (*see also Maker and Chylde.)

  Home of Mr. Walter Freedman, Chambers Creek, WA. 7:15pm PST.

  Officially brought in on the Artist’s case by Studwick, Persephonii started on using the P.P.D database, researching links between the recent events that had the coast, from Seattle to Olympia in tension. Finally getting a hold of a few local contacts, she heard of another similar case earlier in the month. The strange occurrence had a similar level of destruction, which lead her to believe the two were connected somehow. She was sure that examining the other case would shed some light on the strange aspects of the more recent one. So she asked to be let in on the case of Mr. Walter Freedman, a retired school teacher, whose crime scene report read eerily similar to Ms. Kunhe’s gallery reception.

  Receiving permission to join the case, which was still ongoing but had been put on a back burner, she logged into the P.P.D. system and brought up the files. Reading them over she knew she would have to walk the scene, photos and the officer’s notes did little for her. Though she had a photographic memory and could gain a good idea of the unfolding of events, she would need to view the area to ‘see’ what the criminalists might have missed. After all she did have a unique view of the world. With her notepad out, she made copious notes about what she wanted to look at once she arrived and questions that both cases presented. It was time to see if Mr. Freedman was linked to Ms. Kunhe and who or what might be connected to them.

  Chambers Creek weaved its way through heavily wooded hills, traversing the edge of the Lakewood district, close to several wildlife reserves. It was a beautiful mix of wilderness and civilization. Close enough to the public spaces that the retired high school teacher could make it to his old haunt, Chambers Creek High School or a number of other places where he had tutored.

  Walter Freedman’s house nestled in the trees, a two story brick colonial, whose charm and history shown through despite the dark surroundings. Montgomery and Fitzhugh had been working the case, though Fitz seemed more than willing to take another look at the scene, Kade Montgomery had bowed out, needing to finish some paperwork. So Fitz had picked up Persephonii from a local coffee shop, where she had bought the older detective his secret vice, a medium salted caramel hot chocolate and a cranberry orange scone. Sipping her Chiai Brewed tea, trailing behind Fitz as he logged their entrance into the scene, Persephonii could make out the echoes of violence even from outside the house.

  “Kade asked for you to be assigned to the case early on, but Argent turned it down, said you were out of town,” his gravelly voice, the result of smoking, probably from in the womb, was somewhat comforting in the silence of the dark house.

  “I was at the time. I was at a cousin’s wedding back east. But he didn’t mention anything to me, which is unusual.” Chase was usually pretty good at keeping her up to date on requests for their services, even those that he declined.

  “Keeps you in the loop?” Fitz took a long sip of his drink, watching Persephonii as she paused in the entry way before moving deeper into the house.

  She motioned for him to go ahead of her. “Usually, I like to know when someone has requested my skills, even if we don’t take the case.”

  “Chase does his own solo work, less than I do... but he tends to get a lot of bodyguard and promotional stuff.” She shrugged, they worked well because they knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses.

  Stepping into a residential crime scene made Persephonii feel like she was intruding on someone’s space, even after all these years. From the case report, Mr. Freedman had retired around twelve or so years ago when his wife had suddenly become ill. Mrs. Freedman hadn’t lasted a year, but despite offers for him to return to teaching at the high school he had stayed at home, keeping up on repairs around the house and tutoring a number of high school and college students. His social security and savings left him well off, as did the life insurance left from his wife’s passing. Neighbors said he tutored because the kids asked him to, it provided pocket money, but wasn’t a necessity. From his rates and the number of students he tutored, he was making a little more than his teaching salary, which sadly wasn’t saying much. With no children or other family left, the house would go to the state. Since it was part of the investigation, it could sit empty for years.

  Fitz let Persephonii do her thing, answering questions and talking through the process. It wasn’t until she had gone through the upper floors that she asked about the basement. Since the house was now state property they didn’t need a warrant to search any areas. Persephonii was surprised to hear the they hadn’t focused on the basement. Then even Fitz was treating this case as a standard Vamp attack. Despite all the evidence that said exactly that, she knew something else was going on.

  For one thing, Vampyres didn’t tend to turn the elderly, anyone past forty tended to be hard to Turn. Persephonii thought it might be because of all the cellular damage. The Turnee rarely survived the virus trying to 'fix' so many problems at once. The Virus repaired damage while converting the cells into nearly immortal elements. It basically perfected the cells as they went, but even for young healthy individuals the process was long and taxing, so much so that without a powerful, skilled Maker, the Chylde could die before the process was complete.

  The perfected cells were young, vibrant and often preserved the Chylde at a ‘perfect age’, somewhere between Twenty-one and Thirty five, depending on the person, but their physical features where enhanced as well. Velvety voices became weapons, soulful eyes became mesmerizing, beauty and grace were marks of the Turn. So how could Mr. Freedman be turned and still look almost exactly the same as before? And Ms. Kunhe for that matter? She had heard the barest of rumors of an incomplete Turning, but the Vampyres, even those who opened up to the Waters for help, didn't speak about such things. The rule was still an all or nothing game, but there were a
lways exceptions to the rules. Could something have gone wrong and the Chylde still survive?

  From the accounts of the neighbors, Mr. Freedman had been a bit reclusive as of late, but they hadn’t noticed anything unusual about his appearance. Tutoring didn’t start until the evenings after school, so his day light hours were his own. There was no one to notice if he shunned the sunlight, which brought up another question. Could Mr. Freedman have been Turned in his home?

  Heading down to the basement Persephonii discussed her thoughts with Fitz and mentioned Fox’s reaction to her revelation. He agreed that something hinky was going on, but the science and magic stuff was more her domain.

  Fitz pulled the old S.L.R camera up from the strap hanging around his neck, leading the way he snapped pictures of the stairs and basement as they made their way down to a dark back corner. Moving aside a fabric, clothing storage unit, they found a nondescript door. Fitz wanted to move around a bit but was concerned by her zeroing in on this back section.

  Opening the door slowly, Persephonii with glow-stone in hand, held high to light their surroundings, followed Fitz into the room. Where they came across a scene she had been both expecting and loathed to find.

  “He was Turned here, in his own home.” Persephonii couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing. Few Vampyres embraced modern technology, let alone leaned toward modern medicine. The scene before her, however, spoke of someone highly knowledgeable with the supplies and skills to match. In the back of the dark room littered with medical supplies and remnants of blood, they found a different sort of crime scene. Someone was Turning people without their consent. By the drugs and restraints on the wood and metal workbench turned gurney, it was definitely against his will.

  “They must have sedated him, then brought him down here to do their work.” She paused looking more intently at the floor and side tables littered with evidence while Fitz continued to snap away, talking to the voice recorder in his breast pocket.

  “I’ll have to call this in,” she nodded her head in acknowledgement as he headed upstairs for better reception to call the new crime scene in. It looked like Montgomery wouldn’t be able to finish his paperwork after all. No more than ten minutes later Fitz was back in the room with her as they discussed what exactly all this meant.

  “Yeah, but where is the heavy-duty medical equipment? The vital sign monitors?” Fitz didn’t feel he knew a lot about the medical field but he had been in the hospital enough throughout the years that he had collected bits and pieces of how things worked.

  “You wouldn’t need that sort of equipment if you were doing a blood transfusion with the goal of slowing or stopping someone’s heart.” Turning toward the detective she continued. “Vampyres have a faint heart beat, maybe one beat every few minutes, just enough to circulate the blood, but for all intents and purposes the heart is stopped. If that’s the goal, then they don’t need E.K.G.s or anything to resuscitate him. There’s no biological need for oxygen, so no O.2.... Someone is trying to....I don’t know speed up the process? Make it less taxing on both parties? At least for the Maker?” Persephonii could only guess at this point. Ms. Kunhe's site had been cleared of all but the blood, splatter. In contrast, this back room was left almost as if those involved had merely walked away. A few drops of blood had been spilled but nothing was chaotic. Perhaps Ms. Kunhe's Turning had called for speed, where Mr. Freedman had been a leisurely endeavor?

  “Look, they have everything here, I.V. Catheters, a three-way stopcock set, syringes, needles, blood transfer device, and more. Can you imagine....” Persephonii trailed off, because she could imagine.

  She could imagine if someone had tried to patent the process, make it easier for both Maker and Chylde, made it faster, smarter. Vampyres tended to wait out technology, staying close to their traditions, set in their ways and letting their human flunkies handle all the modernity. What if a Chylde had decided to become their own Maker, to use technology and science to their advantage, creating their own Kiss? A process at the very least started almost four months ago.

  “They wouldn’t have to worry about blood typing, since the virus would convert the person faster than the body could react to the opposing blood type.” Pointing to the used plasma bags on the nearby counter. Things had just gotten a whole lot bigger, and Persephonii couldn’t help but feel like they had taken a turn for the worse.

  The P.C.S.I. team arrived just after Montgomery, Persephonii had called to formally ask if Dr. Underwood could come out to analyze the scene before the evidence was removed. Crammed into the 10 by 10 room with Madison, Detective Montgomery and a few of the P.C.S.I. team, Persephonii hashed out some theories with Madison, Montgomery and Fitz listening in.

  Persephonii had an idea but wanted to run it by Maddie for consensus. “Let's say we treat this as a blood transfusion. They are convinced it's a success. However, on rare occasions, a reaction might not occur until a week or more afterwards.” She started to lay out the series of events.

  “They would need to watch for a number of adverse symptoms; hemolytic, allergic, Febrile, circulatory overload. Luckily the virus creates a nearly perfect immune systems so bacteria or transmitting something like H.I.V. becomes impossible.” Madison checked off the list of reactions on the fingers of her left hand, alternatively nodding and shaking her head.

  “Hear me out, so the Maker, decides that feeding his Chylde directly through the process is too tiring, too draining. They harvests their own blood, slowly, creating a supply from which they can then pull... samples if you will." There were some nods of understanding, she hoped the rest would catch up. "They start by incapacitating their target, less fight and stress on the victim. Then start transferring the blood into the new Chylde. They can hook up a line to the Chylde and run both Vamp blood and the human blood needed to not only sustain the process but speed it up. No ware, mess or fuss for the Maker.” Persephonii let her ideas sink in and could see the cogs turning in Madison's head.

  “Okay... Okay. I see where you're going...they would also need blood to help, well... feed the Chylde through the process....Which is where the plasma and whole blood come IN!!" Madison was clearly connecting the same dots.

  "Can we take the empty blood bags and see if we can find out what Bank they came from?” She looked at Montgomery to confirm. It would be a start to figuring out who was behind this. He nodded, writing down the information as he motioned for one of the techs to process the bags.

  “I'm assuming you can’t just buy all this stuff off the internet. Some of this needs physician's license numbers and credentials to get this to ship to you.” Montgomery's statement was more a question to Madison, who was marveling at the amount of time, money and forethought that had gone into this sad result. She just nodded in answer to his question.

  “Analyzing the blood in the bags would also give us an idea of what their trying to do and how their doing it... and you're right; it isn’t something you can just pick up from a blood bank.” Madison, in full Dr. Underwood mode, pulled out her phone and started taking notes. Persephonii’s own notebook was full of page after page, even going so far as to sketch the layout and placement of the equipment. Though she would get copies of the pictures later from Fitz, she was still just an onlooker until the paperwork for her official inclusion in the case came through. With the new information she was sure Captain Studwick would fast track it, but she still missed her S.L.R. and film rolls, preferring to document the scene herself.

  Something kept bothering Persephonii about the back room, deep in the basement. How did they know about it? They had set up shop ready for whatever process they were enacting, hidden behind the main rooms, in what was essentially a windowless box. How did they know? There had to be a personal connection between one of these intruders and Mr. Freedman, someone who had come down to the basement and found the workroom before they had decided to use it as their lab. Question was...if it was personal, did the Maker think that he was giving a gift or using Mr. Freedman as a mean
s to an end? Because the results of the Turning and subsequent trails were failing, horribly for both Chyldren and those around them.

  If Mr. Freedman was further back, even before Mr. Fischer, then perhaps there were more people out there. And likely those who were even now being Turned? Was Fischer first, Freedman second, Kunhe third? Or were their more in between? Was the Fischer incident involved in this plan? Were there more people, basically, walking around like ticking bombs waiting to go off. Hopefully, tracking the supplies would lead to some trace as to who was involved. These poor people. It was one thing to knowingly choose this life, it was another to have it forced on you as part of what....a test? An experiment? Finding the site for Ms. Kunhe's Turning was smaller, cleaner, beside this greater source of leads, but they were still missing huge chunks of information. She would have to talk to Fox about some of the details from Mr. Fischer's case.

  They were running out of time as each incident created more tension, both on the West coast, as well as with law makers back east. More and more people were joining the Anti-Para cause; many with their sights set on Lakewood, W.A. Persephonii just hoped someone found a break soon, before another incident occurred. The P.P.D. was already dealing with cases of people taking ‘justice‘ into their own hands. Perhaps it was time to officially call in some back up?

  Already having talked with Clio about the Lamia, she had yet to mention her house guests. The truth was she expected to see someone, Lykos and a contingent of Reveers at the very least, show up any day. Their continued absence despite the large media scene was both confusing and worrisome.