“Very few friends, I’m assuming?”
He frowned. What an odd, personal question. Rude, in fact, and he had half a mind to tell her so. But the way she was biting her painted bottom lip caused words to die in his throat.
“Well… yeah,” he finally told her.
She nodded, still driving, deftly avoiding cars and pedestrians without even glancing out of the windscreen.
“Family?” she pressed further.
“Not anymore,” he said, shaking his head, feeling for all the world like a spider in a bath, trying desperately to climb his way out of the situation yet knowing he didn’t possess the tools to do so.
“Well… isn’t that a shame?” Her tones implied that she felt that it was anything but.
They’d left Lelant now, on the country road towards Carbis Bay, and suddenly, without warning, she veered the car left down a narrow back lane, so typical of this part of the country; single-track, with tall hedges perfect for hiding an errant tractor, just biding its time, waiting to leap round the corner and scare the shit out of you as you drove. She slowed the car to a halt and turned off the engine.
“What are you…?” he managed to stutter, puzzled.
But before he could venture forth with any more pointless utterances, the woman unclipped her seatbelt and drew closer towards him. He gulped, at once completely dumbfounded and yet surprisingly turned on, as her sweet perfume washed over him in a soft, feminine haze.
“I bet you dream of scenarios like this, don’t you?” she asked, a smile on her face as she licked her lips, eyeing him up and down with those hypnotic grey eyes. “Taking a beautiful woman on a test drive, before pulling into a secluded lane and having your wicked way with her, then rocking back up to work as though nothing had happened.”
“Erm, not… not really, no.”
“Oh, but Brian, surely you must. You crave excitement, don’t you? Something to break up the humdrum mundanity of your life?”
“Not exactly,” he stuttered, quite honestly.
Then he frowned; had he even introduced himself? Had he mentioned his name at all in their brief conversation, if conversation her laughs and his terrified whining could have been called? He didn’t think so. But he must have done. He was finding it hard to think, the slim, pale creature drawing closer towards him. Suddenly he felt a pressure on his crotch region, a hand there, for once not his own.
“Oh, wow…” he gasped.
He froze, like a rabbit before the headlights, unsure whether to bolt, whether he even had a choice. Was it still rape even if he was ridiculously turned on? He didn’t know. Did he leg it? Or did he go with the flow? Neil was right, things like this never happened to him. He wasn’t sure they ever happened to anyone.
“No-one will know,” she purred, sidling closer still.
He was surprised that he couldn’t feel her breath on his neck, her lips were that close. Suddenly, a figure standing in the dim light of the country road ahead and Brian gulped.
“Erm, he might,” he told her, nodding forwards out of the window.
The woman, her teeth already bared as though about to nibble his neck, followed his gaze. And hissed. Brian started, the sound having been venomous, bestial almost, not the kind of sound he’d have expected from such a sultry, womanly figure. He paused, unsure what to say, as the woman stared out of the window frowning at the sight of this newcomer. But it was the figure outside who broke the silence, calling out towards the car and its two occupants.
“Cassandra!” the man shouted. “Come on out. No more feasting for you, not this day. Not ever.”
Cassandra? What a name. Even the sound of it conjured up images in Brian’s mind. It suited her, he thought, rolling off the tongue like silk. If that name was a chocolate bar, it’d be a Galaxy. Maybe even one of those Lindt Bunnies.
“You know him?” he enquired, his heart still beating a tattoo in his chest.
“Oh yes,” she replied, wrinkling her pretty nose in distaste.
Who was this man outside, Brian wondered, at once annoyed at the interruption yet also thankful for it. His life was, as Cassandra had rightly pointed out, one of boring, monotonous routine. And he liked it that way. Work, game, sleep, repeat. Random trysts with stunning women in secluded back lanes were absolutely not par for the course. He squinted into the morning gloom, the low sun still not having pierced the clouds above. The man before them was clad in very strange attire; a long, leather coat, a wide-brimmed hat. In his hand, was that… was that a crossbow? Brian blinked, suddenly and acutely aware once more of his mortality. Was this some ex-boyfriend, some jealous jilted lover, tracking her down? What if the man thought Brian was her new boyfriend? What if that crossbow was meant for him? And yet, he also thought, they’d been out on a test drive, spontaneous, a test route only used by their dealership. How could the man have tracked her down? A bug on her phone? Spy satellite? Don’t be stupid, he told himself. This was Cornwall, England’s arse end, not a James Bond movie. Nothing like that ever happened here.
He turned to Cassandra, the woman still staring at the figure that barred the road before them.
“Shall we… shall we get back to the dealership?” he asked with a hopeful gulp.
She shook her head, a smile parting her pretty lips. Once more he noticed her teeth; if anything they seemed sharper now than before.
“Let me deal with him,” she told him, before transfixing him in place once more with those grey eyes. “Then we’ll pick up right where we left off.”
Slowly, with catlike grace and a sure confidence, she opened the door and slunk her way out of the car, striding into the gap twixt vehicle and stranger. A sudden compulsion seized Brian; he should jump over into the driver’s seat right now, he thought. Slam it in reverse and disappear in a cloud of burnt rubber, leaving all this craziness behind. But what of the woman? What if this man truly did have a vendetta? He couldn’t abandon her. Even he wasn’t that spineless. Almost, but not quite.
“Cassandra,” the man called out once more, his face still mostly hidden from view beneath the brim of his wide hat, only a square, stubbled jaw visible. “You’ve led me on a merry chase, demon. But it ends here.”
The woman laughed, the sound at once thrilling and terrifying.
“That it does, Helsing. That it does.”
Helsing, Brian thought? What the hell kind of name was that? The man didn’t sound German. He wracked his mind furiously. Hadn’t Helsing been a Hugh Jackman movie? In fact, he could even see the resemblance now, thinking about it, only older, gruffer. But what would Hugh Jackman be doing here in Cornwall? Was he caught up in some movie scene? Maybe some hidden camera prank show? Before Brian’s confused mind could ponder further, the man leapt into action, raising his crossbow and pulling the trigger in one fluid motion. Brian’s heart stopped in his chest, face pale, as that unmistakable twang filled the Cornish air. He’d just witnessed a murder! He fumbled for his phone, ready to dial 999. And yet… and yet… the woman still stood!
Slowly, nonchalantly, Cassandra raised her hand before her, holding a shape in between finger and thumb. Brian blinked. It was the crossbow bolt… she’d snatched it out of thin air, even as it had flown at invisible speed towards her. But how? The wielder of the crossbow snarled.
“Your tricks shan’t save you today, creature,” he spat, before discarding his weapon and reaching to his back. A flash of silver, a long, razor-edged sword now in his hand. Even as Brian watched, still unable to believe what he was seeing, the man muttered some strange prayer in an archaic tongue and the sword caught light with flickering blue flames. “I shall not rest nor die till Earth is free of your kind,” he told her, his voice low, grim and filled with violence just itching to be unleashed.
Cassandra, to her credit, simply chuckled at his threats, before dropping the crossbow bolt to the road with a clang. And then her smile vanished, to be replaced by an angry stare, that of a hunting wolf. She growled, the sound low, loud and completely unnatural, shakin
g the very windows of the Mini with its bass and sending a shudder of cold primeval dread up Brian’s spine.
“Flee,” the man named Helsing hissed towards him through the car windscreen. “I shall hold off the beast. Today is your lucky day, lad.”
Brian sincerely doubted the man’s sentiment, but did as he was bade, shuffling over the gearstick into the driver’s seat and turning the engine back on. But before he could even slam it into reverse, the battle unfolded before him. And all he could do was watch, enraptured, in a strange mixture of horror and fascination. No-one should be able to move at the speed these two before him did; as though taking part in some grim ballet of death, the pair, the woman and the sword-wielding man, darted back and forth at eye-watering pace, casting strange shadows all about, bathed as they were in the headlights. Cassandra’s outstretched hands lashed out, her long, painted nails aiming to seize and slice, but each time the man wasn’t there. Likewise, Helsing struck out with great sweeps of his flaming blade, the sound of its passage torturing the air, but the woman ducked, dodged and weaved like Jet Li, the fiery edge always missing her by scant inches.
Finally, after long moments of this back and forth, Helsing slipped on wet leaves of all things, one foot sliding out from under him and causing him to lose his balance for an instant. And an instant was all Cassandra needed; lunging forwards, she lashed out with a backhand that knocked the sword from his grasp to fly and skitter over the tarmac, its flames puttering out, before reaching with the other hand about the man’s neck and hoisting him into the air one-handed. Helsing gasped and struggled, feet kicking uselessly, his hat falling from his head to reveal long, grey hair and a lined face that turned red with strain.
“I’ve been looking forward to this,” Cassandra chuckled, no hint of effort on her face at lifting this fifteen stone man in one hand. Before plunging the long, wickedly sharp nails of her other hand clean into the man’s chest, who screamed in pain.
Even in the throes of his agony, the man’s eyes locked onto Brian’s own through the car windscreen.
“Go!” he managed to choke out, blood running in a thin line from the edge of his mouth. “Go, or you’ll be next!”
Terrified, Brian nodded, throwing the idling Mini into reverse with a crunch of rushed gears. Even as he did, Cassandra turned to him, smiling, and dropped the wounded Helsing to the earth with a crunch. Before vanishing. Eyes wide with astonishment and fear both, Brian slammed his foot on the accelerator, the Mini launching backwards. A dull thud, a bump that rocked the car and after several yards he stopped once more, confused.
In front of him, a shape in the road he’d just reversed down. Cassandra, he realised with a start. The woman rose slowly, unsteadily to her feet. Her neck, he noticed with a shiver of horror, was contorted at a right angle.
“For fuck’s sake,” she gasped, lifting her hands to her head and straightening her neck with a sickening click of vertebrae, before fixing him with an angry scowl. “Ever heard of mirrors? You were supposed to see me in your rear view and stop. It was supposed to be all dramatic, like in a horror film.”
“...sorry?” he muttered.
“You will be,” she snarled, slowly striding towards him. “I was going to gift you a bit of pleasure before having my fill. A little joy to light the last minutes of your pathetic, boring existence. Well fuck that and fuck you. No-one runs me over and gets away with it.”
Frantic, Brian flung the car once more into reverse and floored the gas. Before the car could even move, Cassandra lunged towards him, her long, painted nails digging gouges in the bonnet as she grasped it and pinned the car in place, wheels spinning uselessly in clouds of rubber smoke, the supercharged engine contesting with her supernatural strength and coming up short. Finally, realising with dread that he wasn’t about to get away, he lifted his foot off the throttle, the car stalling with a clonk of finality. The woman smiled at him, the smile of an apex predator knowing it was about to feed. But then a metallic thud, a strange device rolling onto the bonnet between them. At the end of the small cylinder, a fuse, already lit.
“Close your eyes!” came Helsing’s hoarse cry.
Brian did as he was told, slamming his eyes shut and just in time; as the device went off, blinding white light bleached his retinas even from behind the safety of his eyelids. When he finally opened them, Cassandra was gone. He gazed about, blinking the bright afterimages from his vision. Nope, she certainly nowhere to be seen. Though that didn’t comfort him; he’d seen how quickly she could vanish and then reappear. He sat there, trembling; what the hell was going on? It had started as such a typical morning. And now this? What manner of woman was that Cassandra? And how in the blue blazes was he going to explain the state of the car to Gordon?
A groan of pain broke him from his reverie; that man, that Helsing, he was still lying there by the hedgerow at the side of the road. Did he go out and check on him? But what if Cassandra came back? Either way, Brian owed the man his life, he realised; whatever Cassandra was, she’d certainly made it clear that she was going to kill him and only Helsing’s intervention had stopped her. Slowly, carefully, gazing all about like a guilty dog as though expecting the woman to reappear at any instant, he opened the door and shuffled his way towards the fallen man.
“Are you… are you alright?”
The man lying on the floor looked pointedly down at his ruined chest, before raising his gaze to Brian’s own.
“Do I look like I’m alright? Are you dense? I’m clearly dying.”
“Oh.” Brian paused, unsure. He’d never had to comfort a man dying of horrendous wounds before. Wasn’t quite sure of the protocol. “Shall I call an ambulance?”
Helsing shook his head.
“They can’t help. She hit my heart, I can feel it. Every beat is painful.” He coughed and winced, fresh blood spurting forth from his mouth to land on Brian’s shoes. “Sorry about that.”
“No biggie,” Brian lied, face pale as he wiped his shoes on the back of his trouser legs.
“You did well, you know,” Helsing told him, eyeing him strangely. “To resist her charms as long as you did. And then running her over like that too. That took balls.”
Brian didn’t feel the need to tell him that sheer panic had been the only reason he’d managed either.
“Well,” he murmured, shuffling uneasily. “I’d best be off then. Got to get the car back to the garage, think up some excuses for my boss.”
Helsing stared at him, incredulous.
“The car? Sod the car, lad. Jesus! You gonna leave a bleeding man at the side of the road without hearing his dying words? What’s wrong with you? Did you not just see what happened? Do you not have any questions? Not wondering what is going on?”
“Well, yes.” Brian shrugged. “But it’s not really any of my business. Don’t want to pry.”
“Pry?” The man’s tone was disbelieving. “You nearly got killed by a vampire and you’re worried about prying? What are you, special?”
“No,” Brian retorted. “I’m not… wait, what? A vampire?”
“Nosferatu,” the man nodded sagely. “Demons of the night. Blood drinkers. Ghouls. Yes, lad. Vampires are real. And that bitch, Cassandra, is one of the worst. I’ve been chasing her a long time. Thought I’d got her this time, but I’m old, have been for a while. And she never ages, her strength and speed staying the same, even as mine lessens by the year. And so it seems this is my final mission. This is where journey ends. And yours begins.”
He stared meaningfully at Brian, who simply stared in return, uncomprehending.
“I… what are you on about? And, not being rude, but shouldn’t you be dead by now?” He gestured to the man’s ruined chest, the great gashes spilling blood out in a torrent onto the street. “You’re doing an awful lot of talking for a dying man.”
“And more talking yet before I pass,” Helsing nodded. “Come closer, lad. What I’m about to tell you will change your life. Forever.”
Brian didn’t like
the sound of that. Not one bit.
Chapter Three:
Gangela Lansbury
It hadn’t come as a surprise when Gordon had fired him on the spot. Getting to work late, slow sales; these things could be worked on, could be forgiven to an extent, his boss had told him. But bringing a car back from a test-drive absolutely mullered? Rear bumper smashed, great tears in the bonnet like it had been attacked by some rabid animal? Then to top it all off, his only excuse had been an outlandish tale of vampires and ancient prophecy? Brian had been thrown out of the door, helmet following shortly behind, along with some sharp words in his ear.
But it wasn’t Gordon’s words he was mulling over as he sat on his couch staring down at the strange ring in the palm of his hand.
I am Helsing, the dying stranger had whispered to him with his last, blood-choked breaths. As was the man before me. And the one before him. And so on. Hunters of Vampires, Demons and all things that go bump in the night. And now you, too, are Helsing. The latest link in a chain that stretches back hundreds of years. Helsing had given him this ring now in his hand, closing his fingers about it with almost fatherly reverence. This ring will gift you the Sight, that you might root out evil wherever you find it. And powers, too, that you might fight such evil on even grounds. Go to St Michael’s Mount; there you will find the masters. And they will teach you our ways. Go now, and do my legacy proud. I have faith in you. Even if you are a… blithering… idiot…
And with those final gasped words, Helsing had passed from this world, his very body, his flaming sword, his crossbow, all turning black and crumbling to ash, stirred away on the fitful Cornish breeze. Brian had got some of it up his nose and sneezed, eyes streaming as he blew his nose on his sleeve, trying to rid himself of the smell of dead vampire hunter.
And now, sat in his house, Brian stared down at the ring in his hand. Had all of that really happened? Had a seductive vampiress really nearly killed him? Had a mystic demon hunter actually passed him his mantle, wanting him to take it up and roam the Earth, searching for evil spirits and ne’er do wells? Well yes, he thought. Obviously, it had happened, he’d seen it with his eyes. The ring was in his hand, the car had been ruined, his job lost. These things were facts. But what to make of them, he had no idea. His poor brain felt fried, couldn’t process what was going on. He needed to clear his mind. A Pot Noodle. A wank. Maybe some Xbox. That’d do.
Brian Helsing: The World's Unlikeliest Vampire Hunter: Mission #1: Just Try Not To Die Page 2