Certain Dark Things

by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

  “Sir, she really needs your help,” Domingo whispered.

  Bernardino lifted a hand dismissively and stepped away. He stroked the cat’s back and shook his head, muttering a couple of words in a language Domingo failed to understand.

  “My apologies. Time and isolation do strange things. Of course, the levels of serotonin do not help,” the vampire said.

  “The what?” Domingo asked.

  “Serotonin. A neurotransmitter. The low levels in our brains make us violent, impulsive, self-destructive. It’s worse in some types than others. We are not very nice creatures. You are foolish to seek the company of vampires. Have you any idea what I am talking about?”

  “Humans are not very nice either,” Domingo said. He thought about the Jackal, who beat him. Domingo didn’t want to say that everyone was an asshole, but many people are assholes when you’re living in the streets.

  “Apples and oranges. Most humans would not look at you and wonder what your bone marrow might taste like, would they?”

  Okay, yes. Maybe. But it wasn’t like you wouldn’t get killed in the streets for your wallet, and sometimes simply for the hell of it. Kids disappeared and they weren’t snatched by vampires. Maybe vampires were bad, but other things were just as bad. Cops could spend the weekend beating you or pimps could decide they needed a new warm body. Atl wasn’t beating him and she wasn’t pimping him.

  “It doesn’t matter what she thinks of me,” Domingo said. “What matters is she sent me and she needs an answer, so stop trying to scare me, I ain’t gonna scare. So, what’s it gonna be?”

  Bernardino chuckled. The way he carried the cat it seemed like he was carrying a baby. Domingo wondered if vampires liked animals. He might ask Atl about that. There were a ton of things he didn’t know about her kind.

  “You are … plucky,” the vampire said. “It amuses me.”

  The vampire’s face had the coldness of an autumn moon yet Domingo sensed he had passed muster.

  “Whatever you say, as long as you help Atl,” he replied with the stubbornness that can only be present in one’s youth, when a boy doesn’t know any better.

  “Ah, Atl. Yes. Very well. I can’t give you exact coordinates. I can give you another name, though.”

  The vampire moved to stand by the curtains, ripping a piece of paper from a pile of notebooks and scribbling on it. He motioned for Domingo to come closer. He rose and walked to the vampire’s side.

  “Elisa Carrera,” Bernardino said in a low voice, handing Domingo the scrap of paper.

  The vampire pulled away the curtain, revealing a bricked window. He smiled. Domingo could see the tracery of dark veins upon his skin.

  “Run along now,” the vampire muttered. “We are done. I’m tired.”

  Domingo moved toward the door. The vampire began to crank the phonograph, stale notes spilling out. The cat meowed.

  CHAPTER

  10

  It took a while, but Ana found what she was looking for after combing through the police’s image database. It was not well organized, which was what caused the delay, but she didn’t want to stamp UNSOLVED on this file without at least giving the investigation some minimal effort.

  And there it was, under the gang and symbols category: the shark tattoo. It belonged, just as she’d thought, to a group of Necros. Northern narcos. The Godoy family. She’d heard of them. The discovery did not make her happy.

  Most countries had taken measures against vampires since the ’70s, measures that grew increasingly hostile. Many vampires, a lot of them from Europe, knowing how these things went, simply underwent a mass migration toward the countries that would take them. Countries with corrupt officials who would issue admission papers for vampires who should have been turned back at the airport. Places where citizenship was easy to purchase or sanitation officials were not too stringent if one could cough up the necessary dough. Mexico, corrupt yet stable, free of wars and political upheavals, was a favorite destination, though Brazil and Argentina also enjoyed a steady influx of vampires.

  By the time Ana was in high school in the ’80s, all ten vampire species were represented in Mexico, in varying degrees. Most numerous were the Necros.

  At first, things remained pretty much the same. This stasis was interrupted in the ’90s. More vampires arrived or expanded their power base, rivalries grew, alliances evaporated. In Mexicali, the Chinese vampires that had controlled the city and much of Baja California for decades suddenly faced encroaching rivals. In other states near the border, Tlahuelpocmimi clans that had commanded respect by their sheer age—they could trace their roots to Pre-Hispanic Mexico—saw their authority undermined by well-armed bloodsuckers fresh off the airplane.

  Ana remembered speaking to an old, toothless Chinese vampire who said that what had really altered the balance of power had not been ease of movement among vampires itself: the Necros changed the game.

  “The Necros, they hold nothing sacred. They threaten the tlacoqualli in monequi,” the old vampire said, using a phrase the Aztec vampires employed that meant “the middling,” a balanced state.

  He had a point. Many of the Necros were shunning the old traditions, discarding concepts like sanctuary or sacred ground. It made sense. The European subspecies was adaptable, perhaps even at a biological rather than just a temperamental level. As with all vampires, it was difficult to trace their origins, mostly because vampires were reluctant to discuss anything to do with themselves, but people suspected the Necros had emerged only recently, perhaps in the early Middle Ages. Perhaps they were an offshoot of the Nachzehrer. Others, however, said such rapid evolution was implausible and the Necros had most likely existed for thousands of years in an isolated corner of Europe before expanding throughout the Old Continent during the fourteenth century.

  Whatever their origins, they had sharp teeth, an aversion to sunlight, superhuman agility, a voracious appetite. None of these traits were necessarily unique to their type. No. Their most notable attribute was their capacity to spread a peculiar disease. A human could be infected via sexual contact or by imbibing the vampire’s blood. The disease would kill the human, but first it would basically turn them into mindless slaves. Although several types of vampires could supposedly influence human thoughts, Necros were notorious for their ability to manipulate and use the humans they came in contact with.

  Ana had once read about a protozoan called Toxoplasma that made infected mice approach cats, the parasite’s ultimate host. It seemed to her that humans who came in contact with Necros suffered a similar fate, their minds and bodies slowly disintegrating until they were nothing but empty husks. A slow, ugly death.

  At least you died quickly, she thought, looking at the pictures of the butchered teenager. She rubbed her hands together and decided to have a smoke outside. Vampires, and then the Godoy clan, were no small matter. This discovery was best addressed with nicotine in her system.

  Ana took the elevator down, walked a block, and bought a coffee at a cafetería that offered a cheap brew rather than fancy caramel mocha bullshit and ambient music, then sat to have a smoke in a corner. Ana patted her pockets, trying to find her matches. She suddenly remembered that she’d tossed them out. She was trying to quit, though it never took.

  “Need a light?”

  Ana glanced at the woman sitting at the table next to her. She was wearing a red overcoat and equally red lipstick, her hair pulled back in a ponytail. The woman extended her arm and handed her a heavy black lighter. Ana lit her cigarette, took a puff, and handed the lighter back.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “You’re welcome.”

  Ana looked down, noticing that the woman was also wearing red high heels.

  “I’m Kika,” said the woman.

  “Hi.”

  “You’re Ana Aguirre.”

  Ana turned to look at her, frowning. The woman smiled and shifted in her seat, leaning back and taking out a cigarette of her own. Ana stood up.

  “Don’t get t
witchy. Finish your coffee. I’m not here to shoot you,” the woman said with a dismissive gesture.

  Ana sat down slowly, her eyes fixed upon Kika.

  “How do you know me?” Ana asked.

  “I’ve been told you’re investigating the death of a girl.”

  Ana looked to the left, toward the barista, who was checking his cell phone. She could hear the sharp sounds of each notification he received. Ping. Ping. Ping.

  Still looking at the barista, she replied. “Yeah, what’s it to you?”

  “They’re saying it looks like a vampire did it.”

  “So?” Ana said with a shrug.

  Kika mimicked her, replying with a shrug of her own. “I don’t like vampires.”

  Ana’s voice lacked any emotion, it was colorless. “Who does?”

  “My dislike of vampires is precisely why I’m here.”

  “Oh?”

  Kika changed seats, pulling a chair and joining Ana at her table. Gang member, very likely, even if she seemed to dabble in unorthodox outfits. Not that Ana wanted that to be the case, but the way this conversation was going there were few other options to consider, though movie extra from a remake of Gilda might fit the bill. She had the femme fatale aura down pat.

  “Vampires in Mexico City are bad for business.”

  “Whose business?” Ana asked.

  “Several people,” Kika replied, looking at her manicured nails. Surprise, they were painted red.

  “Vampires sometimes come here,” Ana replied.

  “Not downtown they don’t.”

  True enough. Maybe they ate people living at the edges of the city, in the more distant quarters. Those were odd excursions, the work of reckless, young creatures. They didn’t venture into the heart of the metropolis.

  “No, not usually.”

  “Have you identified the vampire who is on the loose?” Kika asked.

  “Not yet,” Ana said.

  “It’s Nick Godoy. He’s come down from the border zone. Some major shit went down over there and he’s chased a girl here.”

  “What makes you so sure this Nick Godoy did this?” Ana asked.

  “He’s got more balls than brains. He told everyone in Guadalajara who’d listen to him that he was going to catch up with a Tlāhuihpochtli in Mexico City. And a little birdie who was listening told us about him. Now there’s a dead girl and it looks like a vampire killed her. Can you add one plus one? It’s him. If he’s here, she’s here too.”

  “Case cracked, then,” Ana said. “That still doesn’t tell me who you are. Or why you care about a random dead kid.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “You’re with Deep Crimson,” Ana said, finally voicing her thoughts. It wasn’t like keeping quiet was going to make the woman go away. Might as well call a spade a spade.

  Kika smiled brightly, her silver bangles clicking together as she tapped her cigarette against the edge of the ashtray. Deep Crimson, then, one of the five big human gangs who resided in Mexico City. Crime. It drenched the country. Mexico ran red. But Mexico City was spared the worst of it. Mexico City was squarely under human control, and here the gangs, the criminals, the pimps, they were people, not flesh-eating monsters. Heads didn’t roll in Mexico City, because Deep Crimson, the Tritons, the Maximiles, hell, even the Exorcists and Apando, patrolled the metropolis as much as the cops did. Back in ’92, some vampires had tried to make inroads into Mexico City. The result? Fifteen vampires burned to a crisp, their bound corpses a graphic reminder of what awaited any bloodsucker who wandered into this area.

  But that didn’t make the human gangs buddies with cops.

  “Yeah, I am. I’ve got friends who want to talk to you.”

  “Fuck a meeting,” Ana said. “Piss off before I smash this mug against your face and ruin your makeup, all right?”

  The woman did not seem intimidated. “We want Nick and Atl,” she said.

  Ana was going to keep true to her promise to smash that coffee mug, but the words caught her interest, making her reconsider.

  “Slow down two seconds. Who’s Atl?”

  Kika took out a tablet and slid it across the table. Ana looked through several photos of a young woman. She stood with a Doberman in one photo, alone, and with a group of older women in another.

  “She’s a Tlāhuihpochtli. The Godoys and her family are engaged in an all-out war. Rival factions.”

  “And?”

  “When vampires are busy killing themselves in other parts of the country, it’s a cause for celebration. When they start killing humans in our streets, it’s a problem. If you give these parasites one centimeter, they’ll take a whole kilometer. Vampires heading into Mexico City like they own the place? That’s bad. That’s very bad. It’s disrespectful.”

  “I’ve got the case under control,” Ana said, wrapping both hands around her cup of coffee.

  “You got shit and you know it,” Kika replied. “What are you going to do when you find Nick Godoy? Arrest him and bring him over to police headquarters?”

  Ana sighed and touched the bridge of her nose. “That’s the procedure.”

  “We are willing to offer you support.”

  “If you want to cooperate with the investigation,” Ana said, “you can give me whatever information you want and I’ll take it from there.”

  “I’ll give you what we’ve got, but what we want is them. Nick and Atl, and any other asshole from up North who came with them to Mexico City.”

  “So you can kill them.”

  “That would be for the best, don’t you think?” Kika asked.

  “I’m a detective,” Ana said, though she couldn’t muster any conviction when she spoke.

  Kika raised the corners of her lips in amusement. “You can’t catch them alone. You’ll die if you try. And I sincerely doubt your department is going to send backup.”

  Ana knew it was true. She had been going through the motions with this case, but she was pretty sure that when push came to shove Castillo wasn’t going to give one shit about a vampire who killed nobodies. And if she told him this was part of something bigger, that there were members of two cartels in town, he’d assign it to someone else. Someone else who could claim the glory.

  She was screwed, either way. As usual.

  “I heard you’re a good investigator,” Kika said. “But you don’t have much to show for it, do you?”

  “Who does?”

  “You could have something to show for it. A couple of vampire corpses for your buddies and maybe even a bit of money.”

  Ana shook her head, putting out her cigarette. “You mean help out a nice gang like yours?”

  “I mean we could assist you and you could assist us. We can probably find these leeches, eventually, but we could use professional help and police resources.”

  “I thought you had friends in my department. Don’t they have better resources?”

  “Everyone has a big mouth in your department. But you caught several vampires. Even an Imago. It sounds exciting.”

  Ana raised her cup of coffee to her lips, her hands surprisingly steady as she took a long sip. God, she didn’t want to think about it. The victim’s body … and the vampire, the Imago. When she’d killed it, the flesh had melted off its bones and she’d seen its true face. Dear God.

  “I killed one of those,” Ana said. “But it was a long time ago.”

  It was practically an accident, she thought. A fluke. Maybe it wanted to die.

  “I came to Mexico City to get away from vampires,” Ana said.

  “Exactly. You want them out there, eating more people? First it’ll be these two. Next, who knows? Four? Six? A dozen? Thinking they can just walk in, like this is their damn home?”

  “Catch them by yourself, then,” Ana said, pulling back her chair and standing up.

  She took a step before Kika grabbed her wrist.

  “My friends want someone who knows what she’s dealing with. We’ve never seen a Tlāhuihpochtli,” she said,
and for the first time the young woman’s face grew stony.

  Well, of course not. They were not the most common vampires, especially these days. Humans had the upper hand in terms of numbers, but you could easily find the Necros and Nachzehrers hanging around, partially because disease had decimated a good percentage of the Pre-Hispanic vampire population a few centuries before. There was also the fact that both the Necros and Nachzehrers could reproduce with more ease than other breeds. While a Tlāhuihpochtli might give birth to one or two children during its entire life span, and this life span could be centuries, the Necros could reproduce every few decades, meaning they could potentially have four or even five children. It made a very real difference once you added them up.

  “I’m no Van Helsing,” Ana said, pulling away.

  “You haven’t even heard the monetary offer,” Kika said, her voice chipper once again, her face relaxed. “Look, why don’t you sleep on it? Come on over and pay us a visit. My friends are very rich and they really want to meet you. Let us help you. And … let me hold on to these.”

  Kika grabbed the tablet she had allowed Ana to look at and pulled it away, out of Ana’s reach. The woman then took out a pen and scribbled a phone number on a napkin, depositing it on the table, right by Ana’s hand.

  Ana did not speak. She grabbed the napkin and stuffed it in her pocket.

  CHAPTER

  11

  Rodrigo had a dog that used to piss on his furniture. He tried to train it, he put newspapers down on the kitchen floor, but it would just piss on the couch anyway. Rodrigo was certain the dog knew where to piss, but liked to do it on the couch to vex him.

  It was the same with the boy. Nick probably knew better; he just decided to monumentally ignore Rodrigo. Puberty. It turns vampires and humans into major assholes. Though, to be fair, Nick had been an asshole long before he was a teenager. Now, at twenty-one, Nick fancied himself a fucking rock star, with his sunglasses and his hair dyed blond and about a dozen chips too many on his shoulder. Maybe if his father had reined him in … but no, for all his smarts Mr. Godoy tended to be far too lenient with his precious boy.