by Jim C. Hines
I closed my eyes, listening to the cars rushing past on Grand River Avenue. “Why didn’t anyone hear?”
“It’s easy enough to stop someone from screaming,” Ted offered from the other side of the doorway. “Crush the throat with one hand. If you’re into knives, jab the lungs. Or if you’re lucky enough to have some of that vampire mojo, you can mind-control them.” He took a step back, hands raised. “Hey, you asked, man.”
I stared at Ted, then back at the bloodstains on the walls and ceiling. I dropped to my hands and knees by the table. Faint outlines showed where blood had puddled on the linoleum. Ted could barely enter the room without losing control. “What kind of vampire enters without needing an invitation, kills with no restraint, but doesn’t drink the blood of their victim? ”
“Does that narrow down the possibilities?” asked Lena.
“Too much.” I slammed a fist into the wall. “None of the species living in the Midwest fit.”
“It’s a vampire, all right,” Ted took a single step back toward the kitchen. His eyes turned a vivid red. Lena readied her bokken, and I heard the telltale puff of Smudge’s flame. Ted hissed and backed away, shaking his head.
“What is it?” Lena asked.
Ted rubbed his jaw. “You know how I’ve stayed alive all these years, Isaac?”
“By hiding in a basement?”
He ignored me. “Instinct. Pure, animal instinct. When I step into that room and get a good whiff of the thing that killed your friend, those instincts tell me to get as far away as possible. You’d be wise to do the same.”
“But you can smell it?” I asked. “Which means you can track it.”
His animalistic snarl eased into an expression of disgust. “Aw, shit. I shouldn’t have said that. Yah, I can track it.”
I turned away from the blood, though I doubted I would ever be able to scrape the image from my mind. The vampire would have been drenched in blood. They couldn’t have simply strolled away without attracting notice, but some vampires could move too fast to see, especially at night. “Let’s go.”
“I’ll follow this thing, but once we find it, you’re on your own,” said Ted.
I straightened my jacket, taking comfort from the weight of my books. “You find it. We’ll take it from there.”
Chapter 7
I wasn’t surprised when Ted led us onto campus, directly toward the remains of the MSU main library. A dead Porter and a destroyed archive in the same city? How could they not be connected?
Nightfall had added strength to Ted’s step, making him seem somehow larger. He puffed on a cigarette as he walked. Apparently smoking didn’t interfere with his ability to track the other vampire. “This is a bad idea,” he muttered.
I remembered the MSU library as an imposing four-story fortress of brick and glass, built on the northern bank of the Red Cedar River. As a freshman, I had gotten hopelessly lost on the third floor, trying to track down a journal article about Jacques Derrida’s contribution to literary theory.
The attack had smashed the entire building to rubble.
Roads were blocked off, and the smell of smoke and dust choked the air. A hastily erected chain-link fence circled the ruins. Yellow caution tape was woven through the fence, framing a hill of broken bricks and twisted metal. Intact sections of wall and floor jutted from the pile at random angles. Broken glass glittered in the street, illuminated by enormous halogen lamps set up around the edges. Generators and construction equipment growled like angry metal beasts.
A crew in reflective orange vests and hard hats was working to clear the debris. Others worked with dogs, presumably searching for survivors trapped within the wreckage. A bulldozer was parked a short distance away. I spotted a police car and an ambulance as well.
Ted lit another cigarette and spat the butt of the first onto the street, earning an annoyed look from one of the students who surrounded the site at a safe distance. Many were snapping photos with their cell phones. Others were murmuring to one another, and I saw several people crying. Ruined books and magazines were everywhere, the breeze ripping through their pages.
The trees around the library were gray with dust, but appeared intact. Likewise, the neighboring buildings were dirty but unharmed: not a cracked window anywhere. This had been a deliberate, carefully-controlled attack on the library. On us.
“No vampire did this,” Ted growled. “Not even sparklers are this tough. Whatever busted this place, they’d swat you and me like mosquitoes.”
“We’ll see,” said Lena. She had twisted her bokken into a single thick cane, like a hand-carved double helix. It was a nifty trick, one that allowed her to retain her weapons without drawing much attention. She leaned on the cane and asked, “Can you tell if anyone’s alive in there?”
Ted’s odor and appearance kept the gawkers from getting too close, and the screech of tools and equipment prevented anyone from overhearing our conversation. “I’d have to get closer to be sure,” said Ted, “but I don’t think so.”
I crossed the street and gripped the chain-link fence, staring at the mess. “The attack came fast. There wouldn’t have been time for everyone to get out.” Deb had suggested one of Gutenberg’s automatons might have done this, and I was hard-pressed to think of another option. A dragon, possibly… though there hadn’t been a verified dragon sighting since 1825, and I didn’t see any fire damage.
“Isaac?” Ted stayed a few steps back from the fence, his eyes wide. “Whoever you’re looking for, they’re still in there.”
I spun around. “Are you sure?” If the vampire had come here after Ray’s death, but prior to destruction of the library, they could have been trapped inside. “Maybe the attack on the library was an attempt to stop the killer. They could be injured or even dead.”
“Definitely not dead.” Ted was still staring at the library. “No more than I am, at any rate.”
I rubbed my face. The dust was drying my eyes and throat, and it was about to get worse. I pulled a book from one of my back pockets and, hunching close to Lena to block people’s view, retrieved a folded ID badge. “Let’s go.”
Ted didn’t move. “I told you I’d help find this thing. That’s all.”
“Right,” I said. “And once I’ve laid eyes on the creature that killed Ray Walker, you’re welcome to run all the way back to Marquette.”
“You don’t understand. Whatever’s down there, it’s a hell of a lot stronger than I am.” His eyes were wide, and retained their red tinge. “What are you going to do, genius? Blow me up in the middle of this crowd? I’m not going in. If you’re smart, neither will you. Call your Porters and have them send in the big guns.”
The Porters had already investigated. Why hadn’t they found the vampire hiding out in the rubble? He had a point, though. I called Pallas again, but received the same message as before. I hung up the phone. “With Gutenberg and his automatons gone and the Porters not answering my calls, we are the big guns.”
Ted snorted. “Just do me one favor. Switch off the countdown on the damn bomb in my head before you go down there.”
“If you’ve lied to me-” I began.
Ted bared his teeth. “Why bother? The truth is likely to get you killed a lot faster than any lie.”
I retrieved the control pad and switched off the countdown. Ted took off the instant the timer stopped. He cut through the bushes beside the sidewalk, which momentarily obscured him from view. A lean dark-furred wolf emerged from the far side. He was just as scraggly-looking in this shape. Like most Stokerus vampires, Ted had the ability to shift his form, though he could only do so at night. He loped away, eliciting shouts and screams from passing students.
I strode toward the gate. A man in a heavy jacket and a fire helmet walked over to meet me. Dark bags under his eyes betrayed his fatigue. He folded his arms, blocking our way.
I flashed my ID badge before he could speak. “We’re here to inspect the scene.”
He hesitated, then jumped back. “Sir…
on your hip-”
My jacket had caught on Smudge’s cage when I pocketed that book, exposing him to view. “He’s a bomb-sniffing spider.” I did my best to sound officious and impatient, as if this poor fellow was the only one who hadn’t gotten the memo about the spiders. “It’s a new initiative from the feds. Spiders are even more sensitive to chemicals than dogs. He can detect microscopic amounts of explosive residue by touch alone.”
“I… yes, sir.” He opened the gate and backed away, giving us a wide berth. “You’ll need to sign in.”
I kept my badge open and waited. He bit his lip, scanned my ID again, and backed down.
“I’ll just make a note myself.” He scribbled something onto a clipboard, then hurried to a small trailer parked just inside the fence to retrieve a pair of hard hats. “We haven’t found any evidence of an explosion. The whole thing just collapsed. We’re thinking the water from the river could have seeped out, softening the ground beneath the library to create a sinkhole.”
“How many casualties?” asked Lena, donning her helmet.
“About thirty.” Sweat had painted lines down his dust-covered jowls. “Witnesses say one moment everyone was minding their own business, the next the whole thing was falling down.” He pointed to a second boundary of tape, strung on metal poles in the debris. “That’s the safe line. You’ll want to stay on this side. The whole structure’s still settling.”
“Thank you,” I said. I glanced at the name on his jacket, barely legible through the dirt. “How long have you been here, Akers?”
“Fourteen hours, sir.” He straightened his back and raised his chin, as if consciously trying to throw off the effects of exhaustion.
I wanted to order him home to get some rest. He’d probably obey, but as I had no real authority here, that was likely to create more problems. So I settled for clapping his arm and saying, “You’re doing good work.”
He nodded his thanks, then turned away, leaving Lena and me alone. I started to tuck the ID badge away, but Lena caught my wrist.
“What is that?” She tugged the badge free. “It’s blank.”
“Psychic paper. Works great for getting through airport security, too.” I surveyed the library. Somewhere beneath our feet was the thing that had killed Ray. All we needed to do was sneak inside past the workers and their dogs, not to mention the students with their cameras.
I reached for a copy of Alice in Wonderland. “Give me five minutes, then join me in that port-a-potty over there.”
“We’re sneaking in through the toilet?”
“Not exactly.” In some ways, the toilet would have been preferable to what I had in mind.
Our arrival had drawn a few curious looks from the workers, but most were too intent on finding survivors to care about us. As for the students, how many people were going to pay attention to a guy using the john? Even if they never saw him emerge.
By the time Lena squeezed in beside me, I had created two glass bottles marked “DRINK ME” from the book and set a bit of broken concrete in the bottom of the door to keep it from closing completely. I let Smudge out of his cage, then passed one of the bottles to Lena.
“You know, when most guys try to get a girl alone for drinks, this is not how they do it.” She eyed the bottle warily. “Dare I ask what’s in this?”
“Ask Lewis Carroll. All I know is that it will help us get inside, and that according to Deb, it works great in Jell-O shots.” The potion was an odd blend of flavors, fruity and sweet and surreal. I set Smudge on the plastic seat as I began to shrink, clothes and all. I stabilized at a mere ten inches high.
Lena grinned. “Librarians: now in convenient travel size.” She downed her own potion, and soon stood level with me once more. “So you don’t think someone’s going to notice a pair of animated Barbie dolls scampering over the debris?”
“We’re not done yet.” I flipped to chapter four of the book. As I performed yet another act of magic, a distant whisper raised the hairs on the back of my neck.
“Tut, tut, child! Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.”
“What’s wrong?” Lena raised her bokken, each one now roughly the size of a toothpick.
“Nothing. I’m fine.” I pulled out a small cake, doing my best to block out the voices.
“But I don’t want to go among mad people.”
I closed the book and jammed it back into my pocket.
“You’re sweating,” said Lena.
The first line had come from the Duchess. The second was Alice herself. Alice in Wonderland tended to sneak into your head faster than most books. I had a theory that the surreal, at times psychedelic nature of the story thinned the boundaries between reality and fantasy, lending itself to libriomancy. But the same ease with which I reached into Wonderland made it that much simpler for Wonderland to whisper back.
I slowed my breathing and focused on my surroundings: the foul smell of human waste, the mechanical pounding of the equipment outside, the crease in Lena’s brow as she watched me. The more I anchored myself in this world, the easier it became to shut out those voices… for now.
“I’m all right,” I said quietly. “Here, have some cake.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing serious, as long as I’m careful.”
“You’re doomed,” she said. Her tone was playful, but worry wrinkled her brow and the corners of her eyes.
I ripped the cake in half, stuffing part into my mouth. Every bite shrank me further. I kept eating until I was roughly two inches high.
“Not bad,” said Lena as she ate. “I’m more of a cheesecake girl, myself.”
Smudge crawled down to the floor and studied us, his eight dark eyes taking in our newly diminished size. We were all roughly the same height now, but Smudge significantly outmassed us.
Lena peeked out the door. “Making our way through all that is going to take time.”
I grimaced. “It would if we were walking.”
Lena looked from me to Smudge and back again. “You’re joking.”
“I’ve done it once before. He should remember.” Much as I loved that spider, some primal part of me shuddered as I approached. The bristles on his back appeared to be the size of pencils, every one of them a powerful heating element. “I had to sneak into the Henry Ford Museum. A pair of kids managed to summon up the ghost of Ford himself. Smudge and I crawled in through the vents.” I took her arm, pulling her closer. “You’ll want to stand behind me.”
She slipped her arms around my waist. “Like this?”
“That’s good.” The words came out a bit higher in pitch than I had intended. Her breath tickled my left ear. I could feel her hips and breasts pressing my back, her hands resting on my stomach, just above the button of my jeans.
“What next?” she whispered.
That was when Smudge began spinning several loops of sticky silk around us both.
“This is just to help us stay on his back.” The strands reminded me of strings of rubber cement, flexible and sticky, but strong. I felt Lena tense with each pass. “Did you know spiders could produce different types of silk?” I asked. “They use lines of different strength and stickiness, and in Smudge’s case, flammability.”
“That’s so comforting.” She tightened her arms. “How long did it take to train him to carry a rider?”
“I didn’t, really.” I closed my eyes, thinking back to the report I had sent to Pallas shortly after creating Smudge. “He just… understood. He was written to help the ones he cared about. I think the fact that he’s a product of my magic gives him an added familiarity with my mind, making it easier for him to understand what I need.” Unfortunately, that understanding didn’t work both ways.
Once Smudge finished, he backed away and turned in a circle, tangling more silk onto his own body. When he finished, I stepped up to the narrow part where his thorax met his abdomen. “On three?”
I counted down, and we swung our legs carefully over Smudge’s back. H
ad Smudge been a real tarantula, this would have left us thoroughly perforated, but his bristles were thick and blunt. I tried not to think about what would happen if those bristles heated up.
“Lean forward,” I said, pressing myself down until the silk around us stuck to the lines he had wrapped around himself, gluing us in place. I slid my arms through another line. With our makeshift seat belts ready, I squeezed gently with my legs, sending Smudge scrambling out the door.
“How do you steer?”
I grinned and pulled a small laser pointer from my pants pocket. I projected a green dot onto the floor, and Smudge scrambled forward. “Red lasers don’t work. I think the green reminds him of fireflies.”
Lena rested her chin on my shoulder. Her bokken jabbed my ribs as we made our way through the shadows. “And what happens if something spooks him?”
“I never said it was a perfect plan.” We crawled over broken concrete steps, sneaking through cracks and rubble until we reached the edge of the library’s foundation. Smudge was getting warmer, but so far, it was a low, nervous heat. He didn’t like the idea of going in there any more than I did, where who knew how many tons of broken library waited to crush us. Not to mention a psychotic vampire. “He won’t hurt us, though.”
“I hope you’re right.” Lena’s arms tightened as we crawled along a steel I-beam that had twisted like hot plastic. The sides of the beam created a tight but safe passageway deeper into the darkness. Blood rushed to my head, but the spider silk kept us from falling. I gripped my jacket with one hand to keep my books from tumbling loose. “If he sets my ass on fire, I’m holding you personally responsible.”
“He can’t,” I said, trying to wrench my imagination away from Lena’s perfect posterior. “He’s completely loyal to his companions. It’s how he was written. He might singe us a bit, but he’s incapable of seriously hurting us. Like a computer program, he can’t break those rules.”
As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I wanted to kick myself. Lena was a product of libriomancy, just like Smudge. And her “programming” was far crueler than his. When she finally answered, she sounded distant. “Can you change the program?”