Hunter's Kiss

by Niall Teasdale

  ‘Good.’

  ‘I’ve got a far better natural alternative now anyway. So there was something. I’m not sure exactly what, but I heard “Apollo” mentioned, and a couple of people were taking it. Two guys and a girl, I think. They were high, even more lecherous than usual, and a bit pushy. That was the guys. I decided it was time to leave when the girl started inviting anyone who wanted to fuck her on the lounge carpet. Andy, of course, was right in there. Seemed like it was a disinhibitor.’

  ‘Okay, new designer drug. What was weird?’

  ‘Well, there were no vampires at the party, but I felt vampires. I felt vampires after the Apollo was handed out.’

  Pat raised an eyebrow. ‘A drug that turns people into vampires?’

  ‘A drug,’ Dione corrected, ‘which infuses people with some properties of vampires and affects them the way the virus typically affects a live host. It wouldn’t be the first time someone has used vampire “products” to produce a drug.’

  ‘Eros,’ Pat grumbled.

  ‘Yes, but it would be a first for this sensitivity effect.’

  ‘What’s Eros?’ Lisa asked.

  ‘It’s a drug we suspect the CIA manufactured,’ Pat said. ‘They synthesised something from the vapour valentines breathe out when we want someone.’

  Lisa grinned at the memory of its effect on her. ‘Oh, yeah.’

  ‘The effect is more like the scent I give off,’ Dione said, ‘but it was not fit for purpose due to the side effects and it ended up as a street drug. It’s a slightly more subtle form of a date-rape drug with the added benefit that the person taking it becomes highly sensitive to sexual stimulation. That was the problem. Their agents would do just about anything to keep getting the stimuli once they’d taken the drug.’

  ‘Sounds like it’d be more useful to women than men. I mean, a guy on that would be popping like a cork as soon as you touched him.’

  ‘It’s expensive too. One of life’s little ironies. You pay through the nose to get anyone you want, and then you get premature ejaculation on top.’

  Lisa giggled. ‘I’d call that justice, almost. They were handing these little tabs out like they cost a couple of bucks, though. It can’t be that expensive.’

  ‘Maybe someone’s come up with something different and cheap. I’ll look into it. Could be valuable information, so about your reward…’ Dione reached out and hooked a finger into the ring on the front of Lisa’s collar; that and the D-rings on the sides were another reason she had worn it. Dione pulled and Lisa went with it, knowing that her brain was about to go fuzzy again, and really not caring at all.

  2nd January 2015.

  The year’s first event was not a good start. Mike and Leanne stood near Juliana Nails’ family and listened as a priest droned on about young lives with much promise taken too quickly, and how they could take comfort in the fact that their loved one was now in ‘a better place.’

  Leanne did not believe in either Heaven or Hell, and would not have taken comfort in the words even if she had. She had enough of a grounding in psychology, however, to recognise that the family needed this. Leanne had insisted on coming when she had heard about the funeral, and now she was not entirely sure why she had. It was a dismal day, heavily overcast and threatening rain but not delivering, and Leanne was cold and miserable. But, while she would not have considered Juliana a friend, she had been a personable woman and an efficient nurse, and Leanne had more or less watched her die.

  Mike was not sure what he felt about the ceremony, but he had a suspicion that it was not what it seemed, and the words had an extra layer of emptiness. Dione had not actually said anything, but Mike had read up on the vampire conversion process and he had a strong feeling that this was not the end for Juliana Nails. He was not the only representative of the NYPD present, and the hospital had sent someone besides Leanne. Thankfully, the official representatives were heavily outnumbered by the family and friends: Juliana was getting a good send-off. Mike glanced out across the grass of Flushing Cemetery. There were few trees here, but he knew Dione was out there, under one of them, watching.

  Dione watched and listened, and she knew that Juliana was only in a better place if you counted the isolation room at SCU. The coffin contained a weighted dummy which had been swapped out for the real Juliana after the final viewing at the funeral home. Her thoughts on the nature of an afterlife were complex. If Elysium or Tartarus had ever existed, she doubted they did now. She kept up her observances out of tradition and a sense of duty to a long-distant past, and she had never considered the religions which had come after as anything more than interesting philosophies largely suborned by politics. She listened, and her eyes scanned the area through dark glasses: even in the grey light, her eyes were uncomfortable, adapted as they were for moonlight. There had been some chance that the venator or Quade might come to the funeral, but she was seeing no sign of either.

  Where the Hell had they got to?

  ‘You were the doctor hurt trying to help my daughter.’ Leanne blinked, turned her head, and found herself looking at Aryanne Nails.

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ Leanne replied. She felt Mike close in on her right shoulder, just in case. ‘I just wish I could have done more.’

  ‘You did your best. Juliana knows that, in her last moments, you were fighting for her. Thank you for coming.’ Aryanne reached out and gripped Leanne’s hand for a moment, then she turned and walked back to the rest of her family.

  ~~~

  Leanne ducked into Ross’s Groceries with a spring in her step. She would not have admitted it, but the service had been some sort of closure for her, perhaps because of Mrs Nails’ words, and she was feeling happier. The air seemed warmer, the light a little brighter, and the milk in the fridge at home was out of date.

  Eddy Ross noticed her as she pulled a carton from the fridge and started across to him, and he frowned briefly before putting a smile on his face. ‘Doctor Drake, I heard how you were recuperating from some incident at the hospital.’

  ‘I’m pretty much recuperated, and we’re out of milk,’ Leanne responded, smiling back.

  ‘You should be resting. They said someone died.’

  Leanne nodded, her face falling. ‘A nurse. Her funeral was this morning.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear it. You take your milk and get on home. Put your feet up.’

  ‘I will.’ Paying for the milk, Leanne gave Ross another smile and then headed for the door.

  Ross waited a second before coming out from behind the counter and finding Delia. ‘Go after her. Make sure she gets back safely. And keep an eye out. If anyone’s watching her, the Hunter will want to know about it.’

  Outside, Leanne quickened her pace, though she was unsure why. She was not supposed to be out. Mike would likely be annoyed at her for doing it and, now that she was heading home, she had a sudden feeling that maybe it was a bit of a stupid idea. The back of her neck prickled. Was that what being watched felt like? Stupid idea. But she pushed herself a little harder, stretching her legs to cover the distance.

  With the key in the door, she paused and looked around. There were people on the street, certainly, but none of them were watching her. None that she could see anyway. Kicking herself for being stupid, she opened the door and walked inside.

  ~~~

  ‘Thanks, Eddy,’ Dione said into her phone and hung up.

  ‘Leanne left the apartment?’ Mike asked.

  ‘For milk.’

  Mike frowned. ‘Should have known.’

  ‘Eddy sent Delia after her to make sure she got back okay. Delia said Leanne was walking fast enough it was hard to keep up, so I think your wayward girlfriend may not be so wayward again. Delia didn’t see anyone watching either, so…’

  ‘Okay,’ Mike said and turned back to the matter in hand. Through the window of the isolation room, he could see Juliana laid out on the bed, covered by a sheet. She looked like she was sleeping until you noticed that her chest was not moving. ‘What happens to
her?’

  ‘This isn’t the first time someone’s been converted accidentally, and it won’t be the last. We have procedures for handling it. In this case, it’s going to be made more painful by the public nature of her death. If she had been killed somewhere private, we might have been able to insert her back into her life, but as it is, she’ll be given a new identity and a foster creatrix to handle her filia years. It’s going to be hard for her. I’m not sure she’s going to handle it, to be honest, but we’ll do our best.’

  ‘Normally the guy who bit her would be her creator.’

  ‘Yes, but even if the Concilium lets him continue, I doubt he’ll be considered suitable for the mentoring the role involves. If he’d just bitten her… The circumstances were stressful and they might consider leniency, but he’s been hiding. He was badly hurt. He’ll need to top up his live blood supply and he hasn’t been to the Candle. If he kills someone else to get blood…’

  ‘You’ll be ordered to end him,’ Mike completed for her. ‘We haven’t had any bodies turn up since this one.’

  ‘True. Small mercies. It’s possible he crawled down into the subway tunnels, used up his live blood healing himself, and went into diu somno. Uh, “long sleep.”’

  ‘I know. Winthrop mentioned it when we were covering live blood and its effects. Hey, why is it “live blood” and not “livius bloodius” or something?’

  Dione winced at his mangled pseudo-Latin. ‘Cruor. It means “blood from a wound” and it’s kind of gone out of fashion. These days cruor is only used for blood taken by force and we use live blood as the general phrase. Language drift happens to vampires; it just tends to take longer.’

  ‘Huh. Do we know when she’ll wake up?’

  ‘Not really. It’s a slow process, or can be. We’ll get some warning. Her scent will change during the last twenty-four hours, and her fangs will form then. You may be able to sense it if you’re nearby. I assume you can’t now.’

  Mike shrugged. ‘It’s not directional. I can feel something, but it’s likely just you and Mary. One more vampire isn’t going to make much difference.’

  ‘That’s what they all say ’til she sinks her fangs in your throat.’ Mike turned and gave Dione a look. ‘That was a joke,’ she added.

  ~~~

  The body on the slab had definitely seen better days. Mike watched through the autopsy room window as Winthrop worked on it. Winthrop was wearing a biohazard suit, just to be on the cautious side. An autopsy had already been done, but Winthrop was back inside the body, extracting tissue samples.

  Dione emerged from Mary’s office, followed by Mary. Mike looked around to see the wolf girl pausing to look through the medical bay window to the body in the isolation room. Dione continued and Mary hurried forward to catch up: she was not a tall girl, but she could move as fast as Dione.

  ‘Okay,’ Dione said, ‘the prints the ME took at the first autopsy come up as Victor Muld, no fixed abode. He’s been locked up once or twice. B and E about thirty years ago, vagrancy several times since.’

  ‘And two counts of indecent exposure,’ Mary added.

  ‘Okay, not an upright citizen,’ Mike commented. ‘Why’s he here?’

  ‘The ME found bruising on the throat, so he thought strangulation. He also found the right wrist severely lacerated, so exsanguination.’

  ‘But?’

  ‘But no petechial haemorrhaging, and very little blood at the scene, despite the fact that there’s very little blood in the corpse.’

  ‘Body dump?’

  ‘Doubtful, but it’s not impossible. That’s why Winthrop is taking samples. The virus leaves a residue which–’

  ‘Decomposition components of the viral shell,’ Winthrop said as he emerged with his tubes, ‘can be analysed to determine what kind of vampire bit the man, assuming a vampire did bite him, which seems likely.’

  ‘Likely?’ Dione asked.

  ‘I found some deep-tissue punctures on the wrist which were not entirely masked by the lacerations. I’ll have the results on this in a couple of hours.’

  Mike glanced at his watch. ‘I guess we’re waiting then. I’ll let Leanne know I’ll be late.’ He pulled his phone from his pocket and then paused. ‘Where did they find the body? And when?’

  ‘The twenty-eighth,’ Mary replied. ‘Christmas had the morgue backed up and it took them until today to get to this guy. He was down as a homeless person who died in the cold. They found him in Saint Nicholas Park.’

  ‘That’s not far from my place, and from the subway station Quade vanished into.’

  ‘And that,’ Dione said, ‘is why we’re putting a rush on finding out what killed him.’

  ~~~

  Leanne got to her feet as soon as she heard the key in the door and was standing there with her hands clasped in front of her when Mike walked in.

  ‘Hi,’ he said. He had already decided not to berate her about the milk thing, even if Winthrop’s tests had come back positive for carpathian and it almost certainly meant Quade was still around, and around their area. ‘Or should that be “honey, I’m home?” How was your afternoon? I know the morning kind of sucked, but–’

  ‘I went out and got milk,’ Leanne blurted out. Mike just looked at her. It was surprise at the sudden confession, but she took it as reproach and hurried on. ‘I know I wasn’t supposed to go out, but I was feeling so good and it had warmed up a little and the milk was going over so I went to Ross’s Groceries and got milk but then I was kind of scared on the way back like someone was following me and I hurried–’

  Mike stepped forward and put his hands on her shoulders. ‘Breathe,’ he said.

  Leanne realised her lungs were empty and sucked in air like a drowning woman. ‘Sorry,’ she said.

  ‘Nothing happened. You’re all right. You were probably just being paranoid, you know?’

  ‘I… I know. I just had this feeling, like someone was staring at the back of my neck. Yeah, it probably was just paranoia.’

  ‘And I’m here now, so we can settle down, have a drink, and settle your nerves. It kind of looks like you could use one.’

  ‘Won’t say no, but I want cuddles. Lots of them.’

  ‘I’ll cuddle you all night, don’t you worry.’

  ‘You’d better.’

  5th January.

  The latest body lay in Morningside Park. Mike put a handkerchief over his nose as they approached it because the smell of burned flesh was strong. How Dione was coping with it he had no idea. He approached one of the uniforms on the scene while Dione peered at the charred corpse.

  ‘Where’s the lead detective?’ Mike asked.

  ‘I’m looking at him,’ the officer replied. ‘With the stuff that’s been going on around here recently, when we called it in, dispatch said they’d just call you. You’re SCU, right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Mike replied, but he waved a hand at Dione, ‘but she’s the boss.’

  ‘And the boss says get on to the office and tell Winthrop his services are required.’ Dione turned and looked at the officers. ‘Are crime scene coming, or do we have to handle that too?’

  ‘I think they decided to just let you guys run the show,’ the man told her. ‘This shit’s just too weird for me. Behead someone and then burn them? Kind of overkill.’

  Dione nodded. ‘Okay, we’ll handle it, but get on to dispatch and get some more uniforms out here for crowd control. We don’t need this on the morning news.’

  ‘The venator,’ Mike asked when he had called Mary.

  ‘Seems likely,’ Dione replied. ‘Nubian, I think. My nose isn’t so good with this stink. Female.’

  ‘And we’re right beside Columbia.’

  ‘Which tends to confirm your university theory. We’ll run it as a serial killer threat. It’s going to cause problems, but we’ll have everyone on the lookout instead of just the vampires. Okay, you watch the body, and I’ll take a walk around and see if anything springs out at me. When Winthrop gets here, I’ll help him with his kit.
You’re in charge of the uniforms.’

  ‘We’ll want a canvas of the local area. Maybe someone saw something.’

  ‘I’m not holding my breath. And I can do that for a very long time.’

  8th January.

  Leanne emerged from the consultancy room with a slightly bemused smile on her face. Mike waited for her in one of those chairs it was impossible to quite get comfortable in, so he was quite glad to see her and got to his feet immediately.

  ‘Well?’ Mike asked.

  ‘He was surprised, but I’m fit for work,’ Leanne said.

  ‘Surprised?’

  ‘Yeah… He told me the full list of injuries and I’m a little surprised myself. I healed really fast. I’m not to go back to work before Monday, just in case.’

  ‘That sounds like a wise precaution,’ Mike agreed. He followed as Leanne started out of the reception area.

  ‘He was expecting another week, so… Well, I guess it wasn’t as bad as they thought. I want to go out, Mike. Tomorrow. The Candle. It’ll be safe enough there, right? And if I’m going back to work anyway…’

  ‘Yeah… Yeah, okay, we’ll go out to the Candle tomorrow. But you take it easy until then, okay? I don’t want a relapse or something.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ~~~

  Leanne assumed what Lisa called the monkey pose, legs in splits to front and back, arms stretched up as high as possible to extend the torso, and held it. She was naked in the middle of the lounge floor because there was no one to see, she had no exercise gear at Mike’s place, and there was nowhere else to do it. She had had to push Mike’s chair back to make room as it was.

  She might have been declared fit, but she still felt a little stiff, and the yoga exercises were good for that. And Lisa had declared that Leanne was quite good at the exercises. Leanne suspected her friend was being nice, but she could manage the bends fairly easily, and Mike enjoyed it on the rare occasions when she utilised her flexibility in the bedroom. Leanne grinned: Mike would likely have enjoyed the current display to no end.

  Lifting up, Leanne checked on the furniture arrangement and then dropped into a standing forward bend, placing her palms on the floor and holding that for a minute, then she shifted into ‘downward-facing tree,’ which everyone else called a hand-stand. That took some concentration; she held the posture for a slow count of ten and then dropped backwards into ‘wheel,’ arching her back and pushing upwards with her pelvis until she felt the muscles stretch. Oh yeah, that felt good. She dropped into ‘reclining hero’ to relax, closing her eyes and letting the tension drain from her muscles.