Blood Harvest

by Michael Weinberger

  “Lei? Did you hear me?” Steve repeated.

  Chapter 53

  Kunnert watched as Dr. Whelan loaded the last of the pre-packed boxes into the truck. As he climbed into the driver seat, Kunnert pulled down on the overhead door and latched it closed securing the contents.

  He had just jumped down from the truck’s bumper when Lei casually walked around the corner still wearing only the trench coat Alpha had given her earlier.

  “Going somewhere my darlings?” she breathed heavily to Kunnert and the doctor.

  Kunnert flinched, quite surprised to see her. He quickly regained his composure and shot back, “Yes, as a matter of fact, but it can wait for another minute or two.”

  “Is that all it takes with you? Oh come now studley, you wouldn’t get it off that fast and leave me wanting more, now would you?”

  Dr. Whelan looked in the side view mirror of the truck and saw Kunnert and Lei in a stand-off in the back of the loading dock.

  “Ken, leave her!” The doctor shouted from the driver’s seat.

  Kunnert yelled back, “Get out of here Doctor, I’ll meet up with you later at our destination.”

  As he turned back to Lei he removed a large folding knife from its holder clipped to his belt. “I’ve wanted to get into you all night.”

  Kunnert flicked open the blade and charged at Lei who gracefully danced out of the way. Kunnert attacked again, but this time he feigned right before lunging left. Lei’s reaction was too late; the knife sliced through the leather of the trench coat as easily as if it were made of silk. Fortunately, Lei’s movement had been in time to prevent her flesh from being cut. Kunnert pursued his attack and instead of dodging the knife, Lei blocked the arm wielding the blade and launched a sidekick to Kunnert’s knee. The blow knocked him off balance but it did not hyper extend his knee as she had hoped. Kunnert quickly regained his footing and threw a front kick of his own. His connected solidly into Lei’s abdomen, dropping her off her feet.

  The tie around her waist loosened. As Kunnert lunged for her she flipped the coat open, blocking his view. Lei whisked her hand at an exposed area of Kunnert’s back and slashed her fingertips across his flank. Kunnert winced with surprise and stumbled away from Lei to gather himself. He stood facing her while running his hand along his side. He was feeling pain and discovered his shirt had been sliced and several shallow stinging lacerations were oozing thin streams of blood.

  Looking at the blood now covering his hand Kunnert stated, “Now that was clever.”

  “You’re lucky I wasn’t cleverer. My nails are usually poisoned,” Lei shot back.

  “Indeed. Lucky me, unlucky you,” Kunnert murmured as he charged again, knife flailing as he rushed toward her. Instead of retreating, Lei ran forward meeting his attack head-on with trench coat flying behind her like a cape.

  The vision of her running completely nude with black leather flapping in her wake created Lei’s desired effect. She watched Kunnert’s eyes as the distance between them diminished, Lei clawing her fingers and Kunnert arching his blade at shoulder height. Each was aiming for the other’s neck and the vulnerable structures which lay beneath.

  Lei never took her eyes off Kunnert’s, the world moving in slow motion as her fingers approached his throat and his blade crept closer to hers. Then she saw it. Kunnert’s eyes flickered from the spot on her throat to the lower part of her anatomy as four million years of male instinct took over for the tiniest of moments. All the physical training and the surgical enhancements molding her into the siren she was paid for themselves ten fold as Lei used the moment to shift her weight. The blade passed harmlessly to one side of her neck while her fingers continued on course for the man’s throat. In that split second, Kunnert realized his mistake and desperately tried to correct his body’s trajectory.

  Lei’s fingers penetrated fabric and flesh. Her fingers pierced into Kunnert and the warmth of blood ran down her digits and across her hand. The desperate shift of position on the part of Kunnert caused her fingers to penetrate the muscles of his chest and shoulders, not the throat. Painful as the wounds would be, Lei knew they were neither fatal nor incapacitating.

  Kunnert backhanded her with such force the blow sent her head reeling like a knockout punch in a boxing match. It threw her off her feet and into the air, spiraling backward some five feet before she crashed onto the cement beneath her, resting haplessly on the ground.

  From the shadows where Lei had appeared earlier came the sound of feet approaching. Kunnert turned to see two hunters sprinting toward him. Reaching down he grabbed Lei by the hair and lifted her up enough to slide his blade beside her throat.

  “STOP! Or I’ll slit her throat!” he called out. The men instantly slid to a stop some twenty feet away.

  Dr. Whelan, who had reluctantly waited to see the outcome of the fight, was shifting the truck into first gear as Kunnert dragged Lei back to the vehicle. Her eyes were blinking rapidly in an attempt to regain her senses. Kunnert leapt up the loading step and grabbed hold of the balancing handle outside the overhead door. The truck started to roll out of the loading dock as Kunnert held Lei awkwardly to his chest with knife still at her throat. The hunters began to run for the truck, a gesture that made Kunnert laugh out loud.

  A loud explosion and a cloud of smoke plumed from the loading dock about the same time a fountain of blood erupted from Kunnert’s right leg. His laugh turned into an immense scream and he was rocked off balance. Both he and Lei flew off the truck and into the parking lot just outside of the Pharmanetics building.

  Rolling with the impact, Kunnert controlled his fall then quickly sat up to examine his leg. A large caliber bullet had gone in one side of his thigh and out the other. Ignoring the intense pain Kunnert reached for his knife where it lay on the ground next to him. He remembered the snub nosed revolver in its ankle holster on his left foot. He reached for the gun.

  As he looked up from his ankle toward the loading dock Lei jumped on top of him. She wrapped and intertwined her legs around his body at the waist, then encircled her right arm around his neck and grabbed the inside of her left forearm to lock her grip. She fisted the hair at the crown on Kunnert’s head and wrenched his head back as she pressed her naked body intently against his. With incredible force she drove her head down and sunk her teeth into the center of Kunnert’s throat, crushing and tearing at his Adam’s apple. Kunnert struggled and punched to get the woman off of him, but Lei had locked her body so efficiently he couldn’t find the slightest leverage to remove her as she chewed on his throat.

  With a sickening crunch, bones splintered as Lei ripped at the damaged area. She tore loose a huge chunk of flesh to open Kunnert’s windpipe then spat out the chunk of meat and bone before covered the wound with her mouth. She didn’t drink the blood flowing in a torrent; instead, she sucked on the man’s windpipe, forcing it to remain open to cause Kunnert’s own blood to run down into his lungs. Kunnert’s eyes widened in shock, pain and fear and he began to sputter and gurgle at the realization he was drowning on his own blood. He desperately grabbed hold of Lei’s hair trying to pull her off of him, his efforts too feeble to overpower her.

  Lei pinned him further to the ground and tightened her lock around Kunnert’s body much like a serpent constricting its prey. She mouthed and tongued the inside of the man’s throat to prolong his agony. When Kunnert’s final undulations ceased, Lei removed her mouth from the man’s throat, gazed into his eyes and ground her pelvis into his groin.

  “Come on, give it up baby.” She purred at the dying man who had gone hard under his jeans. She teased her hips in a circle over his hardness, holding his eyelids open as she pleasured herself faster and faster until her body released in climax at the same moment his body released his dark soul.

  Lei ran her hands up and down her body briefly as her muscles contracted and released in post-orgasmic spasm. She rose off the body and glared angrily at the dead man while running her index finger over the stitched incision next to her navel
, Kunnert’s earlier torture on her.

  She didn’t hear Steve approach and jumped at the sight of him standing beside the body pointing Chris’ rifle at Kunnert’s head. Alpha came running to the loading dock as Steve and Lei walked back to the entrance.

  “Kunnert?” Alpha said to Lei as he looked out to the street and the mess she had made of him. Lei smiled, “He’s fucked.”

  Chapter 54

  As Alpha, Steve and Lei returned to the security station on the first floor Alpha announced, “All right, let’s go and tend to our people.”

  Lei headed straight for the elevator along with the rest of the hunters in the lobby. Steve went back over to Chris’ body. He wasn’t sure why but he began to collect all of Chris’ things.

  “Tracker?” Alpha called from the corridor by the elevator.

  “I’ll be right up.” Steve’s voice broke slightly as he furiously collected and packed Chris’ computers into the carrying cases his friend had used to bring them in. Various tools were spread out over the security system panels; Steve snatched them up as if they might be blown away on some strange wind.

  He finished his stuffing and paused. Uncharacteristically, Steve dropped to his knees and began sobbing, covering his face with his hands.

  “Chris, I am so sorry,” he managed between sobs.

  He felt a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “In moments like this boy, there aren’t any words that can truly give us comfort. But I will say I believe your friend has left his pain and worry behind him now. He’s gone to a better place where he will be safe and taken care of. Try to find some comfort in that.”

  Every fiber of his being wanted to grab Alpha, throw him to the ground and start pummeling his face with punches.

  Instead, Steve simply nodded and responded, “I want to believe that. I’ve never been overly religious.”

  “Me either.” Alpha replied with a smile, “but I do believe what I believe.”

  Steve smiled and the two men finished collecting Chris’ belongings and headed for the elevator. As they stepped inside the elevator car an envelope fell out of Chris’ computer carrying case. Steve bent down to pick it up and saw it was addressed to him. Alpha pressed the button for the tenth floor as Steve opened the envelope and read its contents.

  Hey Steve,

  This is a tough one to write. If you are reading this, it means one of two things. Hopefully, it means I was hurt, lost consciousness, and am now on my back heading to the hospital for some, “don’t worry Steve, he’s gonna make it, it’s just a flesh wound” type of emergency medical care. If not…well then… let my ex know the haunting is about to begin. Either way I think I’ve found something which may be of help in the resuscitation of the victims of the “stasis.”

  See, the method of delivery putting them into the stasis condition was a photochemical reaction within the eyes, delivered to the brain via the optic nerve, which in essence short-circuited the normal neuro-electrical signals allowing one portion of the brain to communicate with another.

  I know. I know. He make-um big words. But if the brain was in fact short-circuited maybe it can also be jump-started. I know on the surface this may sound a little crazy, but the method under which the human nervous system operates isn’t really all that different than an electrical system found in a car or a computer. If you could somehow send a jolt into the central nervous system strong enough to accomplish the jump-start, maybe the victim’s neurological pathways would be re-booted into normal operation.

  What kind of jolt or how this jolt can be administered…Well, that I don’t know, but if you and yours can find a way to do it I believe it will be the cure.

  Anyway, I just thought this info may be too important to lose, hence the letter. Also, if this is good-bye…Well, I’m not much for saying good-bye. I’ll say instead “see you again my friend.”

  How’s next Thursday? I’ll look for you! I’ll make sure to haunt you a little after I scare the bee-jesus out of my ex.

  Your friend with much love,

  Chris

  Steve was crying again as the elevator doors opened on the tenth floor.

  Chapter 55

  Alpha and Lei read the letter and began to discuss the “jolt” while Steve wandered into the room where all of the people in stasis were lying in their beds.

  “What do you think the jolt he was talking about might be?” Lei asked.

  Steve said, “I don’t think he knew. I think he was speaking hypothetically.”

  “Well, maybe a search of the computer systems can tell us something,” replied Alpha, “although that could take quite a bit of time.”

  Lei asked, “What about those heart paddles? You know the ones on TV where they yell ‘CLEAR’ then shock the guy and his body bounces in the air?”

  “A defibrillator?” Steve said aloud. “I don’t know, isn’t it only supposed to affect the heart and surrounding muscles?”

  “Do we have a defibrillator?” Alpha asked.

  “I saw one in the lobby.”

  “In the lobby?” Alpha and Lei both commented in unison as their puzzled faces turned to Steve. “Why would there be a defibrillator in the lobby?”

  “It’s not all that unusual for big companies to have emergency defibrillators on the walls of their buildings like fire extinguishers. It’s actually saved quite a few lives since it became a customary practice in Los Angeles. Maybe if we set the device to its lowest setting…”

  Alpha bolted for the stairwell.

  “Wow.” Lei said with genuine incredulity. “Could the answer be that simple?”

  Chapter 56

  Steve and Alpha watched as Lei and some of the hunters began to revive the victims lying in stasis including the LAPD officers who had been taken the night of The Inferno incident. Alpha had found them in a separate area where they had been hooked up to feeding tubes and catheter bags. They were being used as test subjects for the medicines produced from the blood drawn from Alpha’s people. Pharmanetics techs had been infecting them with different strains of the flu and measuring the effectiveness of the drugs and the side effects with various dosages. Fortunately the facility did not appear to have access to the more frightening viruses such as Ebola or AIDS. They would have undoubtedly tested those as well.

  “So is it always like that?” Steve asked Alpha meekly.

  “Is what always like what?”

  “Living blood. I…I had no idea how powerful…”

  Alpha seemed to grow concerned. “How do you feel?”

  “To say I feel completely satisfied for the first time in my life would be a serious understatement. I feel like a literal weight has been taken off my shoulders. My vision is clearer, each breath I take is more satisfying, my body feels nearly weightless and all sorts of small aches and pains I took for granted are simply gone. Poof!”

  “Yes, it can be a very intoxicating first time experience.” Alpha said knowingly. “But part of the sacrifice we make in order to live unmolested from the majority of the world requires our kind to endure certain small ‘uncomfortables’ in exchange for our solitude.”

  “Is that why Lei…”

  Alpha regarded him briefly. ‘You mean the woman from the alleyway?”

  “Yes.”

  Alpha nodded. “The taking of living blood is very addicting. Lei had been in a position where she could act on her desire for living blood against an enemy and saw no reason to hold back.”

  “Where’s that woman from the alleyway now?”

  “She was with our healers when Pharmanetics’ people attacked, so I would imagine she was removed by her comrades. There was no sign of her body when we were searching for survivors. Either way she was one of them and I have little sympathy for her.”

  Steve silently agreed with Alpha’s sentiment toward the people involved in this conspiracy. He looked out over the sea of people still waiting to be revived. He noticed a particularly surly man sitting upright in a chair away from the rest of the victims. When Steve realized
who it was he immediately hustled over to the man.

  “Captain?” Steve asked, “How are you feeling?”

  “How do I look, Jacobs?” the Captain’s gruff response made Steve smile, anything less would have caused him concern.

  “So what is happening around here?”

  ”Quite a bit has happened since you left The Inferno.”

  ”I’m sure. So tell me, what…” the Captain stopped himself mid-sentence as Alpha approached and stood beside Steve.

  Steve saw the Captain reach for his sidearm only to be shocked not to find it at his side. Steve immediately spoke up to reassure the Captain.

  “He’s with us, sir.”

  The Captain’s eyes slowly drifted away from Alpha and fell back on Steve.

  “You vouch for the guy?”

  “Completely,” Steve said with absolute confidence.

  The Captain considered this for mere moments before he spoke again, “Good enough for me, Detective.”

  Steve felt his whole body relax at those words.

  “Now Jacobs, I think I’m gonna need to lie down. Why don’t you start telling me a long, detailed, bedtime story?”

  Chapter 57

  Channel 3 News @ Nine:

  Our top story tonight: Pharmaceutical giant Pharmanetics has been seized by Federal authorities and shut down today after overwhelming evidence of illegal human testing and white slavery surfaced from anonymous sources. Robert Keppler reports.

  Robert Keppler:

  In the past few weeks the Los Angeles Police Department, in combination with a task force from the federal government, has been investigating the corporation Pharmanetics after an anonymous tip led investigators to believe the corporation was conducting illegal drug testing on human beings. What makes this story all the more frightening is that it now appears the test subjects were not volunteers.