"So this is the behemoth that has wreaked such havoc upon my children." His voice was like spring raindrops, pooling around me and rolling off in cool, clear waves. All I wanted at that moment was to hear him say something, anything, again.
"Don't look at his eyes!" Skeeter's voice in my ear, by contrast, was like the sound a cat makes when you tie a half-dozen bottle rockets to its tail and light them all at once. Do not ask me how I know that sound, but accept the fact that it does not ever leave a person. Skeeter's voice snapped me back to reality and the monster in front of me came into sharper focus.
Where a few seconds before the love child between Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt had stood, now a gaunt, twisted, withered creature loomed over me like a sickly sac of walking death. I shuddered at the thought, and focused my eyes on a point just over the vamp's shoulder.
"Yeah, I might have killed a bloodsucking fiend or two tonight. Were they yours?"
His collapsed nostrils flared with rage, and he rasped, "Hold him" to his minions. I hadn't noticed them letting me go, so I thought his instruction a bit unnecessary, but I reckoned that sometimes with minions they need a little reminder now and then. They tightened their grips, and the vampire lurched forward, burying his fangs in the side of my neck.
I felt a hot rush from the spot where he bit me, flowing outward down my arm and up to my face. Numbness followed the flush, and I felt my limbs get heavy. The vampires around me relaxed their grip, and I felt myself drifting further and further down, as if sinking in a warm pool. Just as my eyes started to slide closed, I reached across to my chest, pulled hard on my necklace, and jabbed the silver crucifix into the vampire's ear as hard as I could.
He pulled back, screaming, and dropped me like a piece of dog-crap birthday cake. I flopped to the stage with a wet thwap and lay there for a minute, trying to collect myself and figure out a way not to get dead in the next five minutes. Anything past that I'd count as a blessing. The master vampire writhed on the floor like an electrocuted earthworm as his minions stared at the pair of us, doing nothing. I used those seconds to get my balance back and struggle to one knee.
A female vampire that was a pretty blonde woman in her forties before she was turned moved towards me, glancing back and forth from the master lying on the floor to me clambering to my feet. She got to within a couple feet of me and I reached out to her, doing my best "dying man in the desert" impersonation. Her human instincts took hold for a brief second and she reached down to take my hand.
That was all the opening I needed. I grabbed onto her wrist with all my strength and yanked the stake out of my boot with the other hand. I stood up abruptly, plunging the stake into her chest as I came up. I tossed her corpse aside and slipped a little on the blood as I stepped forward, staking another vamp before the first one landed. Two more fell in rapid succession, and the others drew back enough for me to grab up my fallen sword and barrel my way to the opposite side of the stage. I ducked into a small storage room and tried to catch my breath for a second.
"How many are left?" I panted at Skeeter.
"I think there's a dozen or so still out there."
"Crap."
"Look on the bright side, you killed a dozen vampires single-handedly."
"Yeah, put that on my tombstone."
"Now, Bubba, you don't need no tombstone. You're gonna get out of this just fine."
"And how in the holy hell do you suppose I'm gonna do that?"
"Well, I just triggered the theatre's fire alarm, so the humans oughta be running for the hills right about now."
"That's great for them, but what does it do for me?" My vision had lost those irritating sparkly bits, but I was still feeling like the guest of honor at a blood drive.
"It doesn't kill any vampires, but with their souped-up hearing the fire alarm gives them a helluva case of vertigo. So that oughta level the playing field a little."
"It ain't much but I reckon I'll take it." I took a deep breath and looked around the closet. There was a bunch of technical-looking stuff on shelves, my sword, and a huge paper cutter. I grinned and went over to the paper cutter. It was an old model, with about a two-foot razor sharp cutting arm on a hinge. The base was screwed to a counter, and all these scraps of different colored plastic films were lying around it. I grabbed the handle and gave it a tug. It wiggled, so I planted my feet and gave it a good yank. The screws holding the base groaned and creaked, but after a couple of seconds the bolt holding the cutting arm on gave way, and I staggered back with a gleaming two-foot blade in my hand.
I tucked the prop sword through my belt and snatched the door open. Two surprised vampires stared at me from just outside the storage room, and I charged them, knocking them back a couple feet and giving myself room to swing. The blade whistled through the air as I put my whole arm into my stroke, and two heads fell to the stage with a pair of wet thumps.
"Two down, ten to go." Skeeter said in my ear.
"Yeah, you keep counting, I'll keep killing." I saw another clump of vampires in the middle of the stage, looking around for someone to tell them what to do. One of them spotted me and pointed, then suddenly I was surrounded again. Five of them rushed me from all sides, and I grabbed the paper cutter blade with both hands and turned around in a circle as fast as I could. I did pretty good on the first few, cutting clean through two necks in as many seconds, but the third vamp was shorter, and that presented a little problem.
Where the blade hit the first two in the throat and severed their necks, it caught the third vamp in the side of her head, right above the ear. The blade lodged deep in her skull and stuck fast. The force of my spin carried her into the next vampire, knocking both of them to the stage and pulling the blade from my grip. I staggered on in my circle, stopping face to face with the last monster.
She was a tall chick, stick-thin with her hair pulled back into a tight bun. Her angular features were heightened by the fangs stabbing towards me, and her gaunt arms ended in claw-like fingernails that stabbed at my eyes. I dropped to a knee and she grabbed nothing but a few stray hairs from the top of my head. And contrary to Skeeter's constant statements to the contrary, I am not thinning on top, so it was no great loss on my part. When I was down there, I grabbed my last stake from my right boot where I'd put it back earlier, and stabbed at her heart as I stood back up.
She must have seen me pull that trick earlier, because she jumped back out of the way and hissed at me. Hissed at me, like a snake or something. I drew back, trying to figure out the best way to deal with her, and felt sharp fangs bury themselves in my leg. I looked down to see the vamp with the paper cutter blade sticking out of her head latched onto my leg like some kind of crazy terrier-vampire. I grabbed the handle of the blade and yanked it free of her head with a wet slurping sound, hacking back down to cut her head off as soon as it was free.
When I turned my attention back to the vampire in front of me, she was gone, the vamp I'd knocked over was getting to her feet, and the head of the vamp I'd just killed was still stuck to my leg. "Gimme some good news, Skeet. How many are left?"
"Seven plus the master."
"You mean the master hasn't been in your counts?"
"No. I've just been keeping track of the minions."
"Skeeter, did I ever tell you you're a real asshole?"
"Once or twice."
"Count this as another one of those times." I turned to the vamp that had just staggered to an upright position, and kicked her in the knee. She went back down, I staked her, and went looking for the last half-dozen vamps. And the master, who apparently had skipped the bloodsucker census up 'til now.
I didn't have to look very far. I got to the back dock and saw six vampires in tights being beaten to death by ten or so stagehands. The skinny dancer-types in tights didn't stand a chance against the black-clad burly men and women who were pounding their heads in with crescent wrenches and putting the steel toes to some fanged behinds.
"Make sure you stomp their heads flat, stake the he
arts or break their necks or they'll get back up." I said as I passed them. A couple of the technicians nodded at me and got right back to work stomping, kicking and generally making vampire soup out of the last few dancers.
"All right Skeeter, any idea where the master went?"
"No clue. But there's a tour bus parked on the street. Might start there."
"Good idea." I headed out onto the street, pretty deserted at that time of night for a supposedly bustling downtown, and saw the bus idling outside the theatre. I made my way to the front door or the bus, banged on it, and then found myself lying flat on my back in the street as something heavy and black-clad landed on my head and shoulders out of nowhere. I twisted my way around and tossed the thing off of me, rolling to my feet with the paper cutter at the ready.
The master vamp stood in the middle of the street, glaring at me. "Do you have any idea how long it took me to find humans of the right shape to turn an entire troupe of dancers?"
"Do you think I give the absolute slightest of shits?" I gave him the finger as I leaned against the bus, faking nonchalance.
He snarled and threw himself at me faster than I could blink, much less react. His teeth were almost at my throat by the time I got the blade up, so all I managed to do was slam his mouth shut on empty air and avoid getting bitten again. One hand dug into my throat while the other wrapped itself in my ponytail, yanking my head to the side. I didn't bother to fight against his grip, just concentrated on keeping the steel blade between his teeth and my throat while I frantically scrabbled for a handhold on the bus to pull myself away from the creature.
I shoved with the blade and felt it skitter along his collarbone, peeling a long piece of skin like an apple. The master screeched and pulled away, yanking out even more hair in the process, but giving me a valuable couple of seconds of breathing room. I lashed out with the paper cutter, but his hand flicked out whip-quick and sent my weapon tumbling along the street. He gathered himself for another leap, and as he sprang at me I dove under his leap, rolling forward and coming to my feet in the center lane. A car honked as it swerved to avoid me, but had no trouble changing lanes due to the light traffic. I spun back to the monster, who had gathered himself again and pounced on me once more.
This time I let him land, but grabbed his collar with both hands and rolled backwards, planting my feet in the vampire's stomach. As my butt hit the pavement I rolled backwards, extending my legs and propelling the vampire high into the air and into the side of the building across from the theatre. He hit with a solid thump and slid down the glass onto his face, lying on the sidewalk for a long moment before shaking himself and slowly getting to his feet.
I followed his arc with my eyes, coming to my feet and charging as soon as he landed. By the time he was on his feet and looking around for me, I was only three feet away with a full head of steam behind me. I crashed into him at a dead run, and three hundred-plus pounds of angry redneck smooshed him into the glass building like a June bug on a dump truck windshield. I heard a lot of cracking and popping sounds from his ribcage and figured I'd hurt him at least.
I backed off, stake in hand, and measured the master vampire for inevitable and painful doom. He looked up at me, hatred spilling out of his eyes in a dim red glow, and said "Why? We weren't hurting anyone. We were just entertainers. Why did you have to ruin our show?"
"You mean you weren't hurting anyone except all the people you were drinking from backstage, right?"
"Yes, except for those cattle. But we weren't hurting anyone that wasn't stupid and deserving of death."
"If I killed every person that deserved to die, I'd be knee-deep in corpses."
"You are knee-deep in corpses, human." The vamp coughed, a rattling sound that made me think I might have broken something important to him. Maybe a few somethings.
"Good point. You're an asshole, but you have a good point. But I don't debate with dead people." And with that I charged him again, stake at the ready. He jumped aside, but he wasn't moving near as quickly as he had been. He dove at me, but this time I caught him easily, with one hand at his throat and the other on his belt. I spun him around and slammed him to the sidewalk, following instantly by crushing more of his ribs with my knee.
I didn't let go of his throat, but moved my other hand to his neck and started to twist. He raked my arms with his razor-sharp fingernails, and finally got enough reach to poke at my eyes. I had to let go, and he rolled over onto his stomach and sorta slithered backwards out of my reach. I got to my feet and watched as he did the same, this time moving very slowly.
"Be careful," whispered Skeeter in my ear. "He probably ain't as hurt as he's putting on." As if to prove him right, the master snapped his jaws open and flew along the sidewalk at me. I grinned at the speeding vampire, grabbed a fistful of hair as he got within arm's reach, and slammed his face into a huge concrete piling beside me. He sagged in my grip, and I drove the stake into his back roughly where I thought his heart should be.
As the stake pierced his heart, the vampire's mouth opened in a silent scream and a fountain of blood flew straight up into the air. Before the blood could drench everyone and everything, I stepped back and gaped while the vampire, blood and all, turned to dust before my very eyes. Just a couple of seconds later, there was nothing left of him but a tiny pile of dust on the sidewalk.
"Skeeter?" I panted at the voice in my ear.
"Yeah, Bubba?" came the squeaky reply.
"Why did that one turn to dust?"
"Oh, that happens to really old vampires. If you stake a master vampire, he and all his minions immediately turn to dust. It's only newbies and low-level minions that still bleed."
"Skeeter?"
"Yeah, Bubba?"
"Does that mean that if I'd staked him first I wouldn'ta had to fight all them other vampires?
"Oh, I guess it does, doesn't it? Sorry about that."
"Skeeter I really hate your ass right now."
"I said I was sorry!"
"And as always, I agree. Now I'm getting the hell outta here and going somewhere I can drink." I put the stake back in boot, picked up my paper cutter sword from the sidewalk, and did just that.
Ho-Ho-Homicide
"I told you I hate Christmas, right?" I grumbled as I stepped through the automatic doors into my own version of hell: a mall in December.
Skeeter's voice chirped in my ear like a gay Southern Jiminy Cricket. "You've told me that at least a thousand times, you overgrown hillbilly grinch. But we've got a job to do, so shut up and head to the mall office.
"You realize you ain't told me what the job is yet, right?" I turned a corner between a Bath & Body Works and a Victoria's Secret, paused for a minute in front of the lingerie store window to check out the sales girl, and continued on my way with the lead weight in my stomach just an ounce or two lighter for the good visual.
"I know. You'll see the job in just about six more feet." Skeeter replied. Skeeter is kinda like the Oracle in the comic books, except he ain't in a wheelchair, he ain't a chick and he never was a superhero. Okay, so he's nothing like Oracle, more like an irritating little shit that sits on his butt back at the office and yips at me like a chihuahua on crystal meth while I do all the dangerous work like killing zombies, fighting vampires, tracking down rakshasas, wrestling yeti or...
"You are absolutely shitting me." I said, stopping dead in the middle of the hall. "Oh, hell no!" I said to the air, turning on my heel and heading back the way I came.
"Bubba, you gotta." Skeeter wheedled.
"I ain't gotta do nothin' but pay taxes and die. And we ain't too sure about the whole dying part."
"And you don't pay taxes, but that's beside the point."
"I don't make no money, Skeeter. I'm too busy saving the damn world for your Uncle Father Joe." It's not some kind of Big Love thing, Skeeter's Uncle Joe is a Catholic priest, so he really is Uncle Father Joe. He gets Skeeter and me our assignments, and he and Skeeter do something to make sure the rent gets p
aid and I have beer money. And I drink a lot. Come to think of it, I was headed to the bar right that second when a stone-cold, dead-sexy, knock your jawbone in the dirt and put a whole lotta lead in your pencil hottie came around the corner and gave me a hug like I was her long-lost prom date or something.
"Oh thank goodness you're here!" She squealed, and hugged me again. Since the last women I saw that looked this good was on a stage wearing four-inch platform heels and tassels that spun in opposite directions, I was pretty sure this was a case of mistaken identity.
"Did you forget your glasses, honey?" I put my baseball glove-sized hands on her shoulders and gently pushed her back a little from me. This not only gave her a little more room to look at me and decide I wasn't whoever she thought I was, it gave me a little room to breath before my appreciation of her perkiness became a little too obvious for a hug, if you know what I mean.
"I don't wear glasses, silly. I'd know you anywhere. You're Santa Bubba! Father Joe told me to expect you tonight, and he said I should be your extra-special elf helper." She gave me what I'm sure she thought was a conspiratorial wink, but really looked like she'd had a stroke. Or maybe a palsy.
"Oh, he did, did he?" I asked in that tone of voice I use to make Skeeter leave, but this cutie was stuck to me like glue. She took my right hand on both of hers and started pulling me back down the hallway I'd been trying to escape from. It looked kinda like a speedboat trying to steer an aircraft carrier, but I figured I'd go along with it for a while. After all, she was eight shades of hot.
"What's your name, darling?" I asked, finally giving in and walking down the hall with her.
"Collette. I'm a novice at St. Cecilia's." She saw I was following of my own accord, so she stopped dragging me and skipped ahead of me a few steps. Skipped. Like on the playground, skipped. I did not skip along with her, but I did appreciate the way it made things on her bounce.
Scattered, Smothered and Chunked - Bubba the Monster Hunter Season 1 Page 5