by Ian Hall
My concern was Chris/Norman; I needed one more look in on him before I went anywhere. Getting that done meant another ass-kissing session with Howard Weeks. A couple rounds of “yes, sir/thank you, sirs” did the trick. At eight a.m., he personally escorted me and Lyman to the Helsing’s super-secret sub-basement lab.
A dark-skinned man with a shaven dome and lab coat held down the fort. He smiled broadly at the sight of Howard Weeks.
His accent was pretty thick Jamaican. “Good to see you again, sir.”
“Lenny,” Weeks responded, clasping the man’s hand in a solid shake, “How’s the family?”
“Couldn’t be better.”
Lenny then turned to Lyman, hand still outstretched. “Lyman Bracks – I’ve heard a lot of good things about you. Great to finally put a face to the name; welcome to the Transperian family.”
“Thank you, doctor… uh, doctor…”
“Owusu; but feel free to call me Lenny. Everybody does.”
After the warm introduction with Lyman, Dr. Lenny brushed past me like I wasn’t there and turned to the two occupied beds in the room. In my peripheral vision I could see both Lyman and Weeks glancing at me, waiting for me to spontaneously combust after the doctor’s passive-aggressive slight. I kept my expression blank and my eyes dead ahead – on Chris.
“Where’s the girl?” Lyman asked.
Dr. Lenny him-hawed for a second, then replied as if in confession, “I’m afraid she didn’t make it.”
Weeks looked genuinely distressed. “That’s unfortunate; tragic – she was so young.”
“The truly disturbing news, Mr. Weeks, is that just hours before her death, we’d taken a blood sample that read completely human; no trace of vampire remaining in her system.”
“Had she regained consciousness?”
“No, sir. In fact, as the vampire elements declined, so did her condition.” Dr. Lenny now looked distinctly anguished. “It seems it was the vampire side of Miss Tan that kept her alive.”
I felt a rush of hope rise up in me. Whatever Chris may have been when we met – he was certainly vampire now. I’d seen to it myself. Once the Helsings stopped pumping him with sedative, he’d be awake. And alive – vampire alive.
“What about these two young men?” asked Weeks.
“Mr. Guidelle is following pretty much the same pattern as the girl. Only trace elements of vampire remain in his blood work. However, his vitals have dropped dangerously low, and we’re not expecting him to survive the day.”
I spoke for the first time since entering the lab. “And Chris?”
Dr. Lenny, eyes on a monitor hooked up to the dying adolescent, didn’t seem to hear my question. Howard Weeks stepped up to get my answer.
“Miss Cross is, of course, referring to Norman White. What is his condition, Lenny?”
The doctor broke his fixation on the monitor long enough to slip me an accusatory glance. “His blood work continues to come back consistent: vampire, vampire, and more vampire.”
“No change at all?” Lyman asked, on my behalf, I think.
“None. Condition stable. Vitals strong. Blood work positive for vampire with only trace elements of human components; much the same results we find when a newly-turned vampire is killed. If our conclusions are accurate, it takes about a year before the transformation is complete on the cellular level.”
I turned to Weeks. “So, your research can’t be right then. Chris… Norman… can’t be an old vampire. He’s just been turned.”
“Nothing is certain yet, Miss Cross,” he responded dryly.
“You could always ask him.”
That got everybody’s attention – including Dr. Lenny’s. Since I had the floor, I continued.
“Let him wake up. Stop pumping him full of that junk.”
Dr. Lenny was a condescending ass. “You’re saying this vampire will be forthcoming and willing to spill his entire story to a room full of Helsing doctors?”
“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all,” Dr. Shithead, “but, he’ll talk to me.”
“What makes you so sure?” Lenny pressed.
“Because, if I’m right, I’m the one who turned him.”
Lyman filled in what I had no intention of telling this belligerent Helsing doctor. “There’s a bond between a new vampire and the vampire who changed them. Basically, Norman couldn’t resist Mandy if he tried. She could make him skip down the hallway, naked, while singing Zippity-Doo-Dah if she wanted. Jackson Cole dubbed the phenomenon ‘beholden’.”
I shot Big Mouth the evil eye. He shook me off like water off a duck’s back. Jerk.
Howard Weeks looked at me like he’d just uncovered a diamond from the rough. “I do recall this information coming up in the previous debriefing, Miss Cross. We will have to get your presentation transcribed for all to read.”
“I answered the questions posed to me, Mr. Weeks. That’s all.”
“Howard,” Lenny began diplomatically, “We do find ourselves in a position to discover more information about the inner workings of a full-on vampire than ever before.”
Immediately I did not like where this was going.
“What do you mean, Lenny?”
“Sir, always in the past when we’ve had an actual vampire corpse at our disposal, they’ve always been incredibly young vampires; too closely resembling human physiology to give us any real clues. Of course, older vampires disintegrate at the moment of death, leaving nothing left to autopsy.” He looked at Chris with greedy eyes. “Here we have our first real opportunity to dissect a specimen with real potential for discovery.”
“You’re losing me here,” Lyman piped in. “You heard Mandy – Chris was just turned days ago…”
Doctor Owusu shook his head. “Despite Miss Cross’s claims, the blood work we’re getting back shows a nearly complete transformation. A living autopsy would give us insight we could never have otherwise.”
I could no longer hold my composure. “You can’t carve him up – he’s alive, for god’s sake!”
Weeks stepped in front of me. “Miss Cross, if you please…”
“You’re not actually considering this, are you?”
“If Norman… or Chris… does not survive, then I absolutely will allow Dr. Owusu’s request.”
“But you heard him – right now Chris is fine. He’s only unconscious ‘cause they keep filling him up with their Helsing poisons!” I stabbed a finger at the stiff-jawed doctor. “But, I’m sure as soon as my back’s turned, you’ll make sure he takes a sudden turn for the worse!”
“How dare you!” the doctor scowled.
“How dare you! After everything I’ve done for you Helsings and you’ll gladly kill Chris just because he’s a vampire? I’m a fucking vampire, too!”
“Miss Cross!” Weeks shouted.
“Mister Weeks, there’s one question you have to ask yourself; Am I an example of a vampire working in full cooperation with humans, or am I just a poor, duped girl who’s being used by Helsings? Either way you answer the question, you humans have got to change your way of thinking! Either way, you’ve got to ask your precious Helsings why they treat me like shit!”
I let Lyman pull me towards the door.
“Keep him alive,” I said to Weeks, “and when I return from California – I’ll give you your big opportunity to carve up a vampire. I’ll bring one with me, stuck in a cage like King Kong. But, make no fucking mistake, Leonard, if Chris is dead,” I glared at Dr. Lenny, “you’ll be the one getting ripped open.”
I knew that allowing Mandy to see Chris had been a bad idea, but what could I say? The first few seconds of the encounter with the Jamaican witchdoctor went really well, and then he ignored her.
Crap. Even I know not to do that.
Then he ignored her again.
By the time she was in mid-tirade, I physically dragged her from the room.
Lenny’s expression after Mandy’s last threat looked a picture though. I almost laughed out loud there and then. If I hadn’t been s
ilently pushing Mandy in front of me down the corridor, I would have.
“I’ll tear his cold, black heart out.” Mandy at last relented to my pressure and walked unguided.
“I know you will,” I said, grinning from ear to ear. “Now let’s get to California before Weeks changes his mind and fires our asses.”
With my new pills in my rucksack, we quickly got out of the building to the waiting car. We both got in the backseat, and the vehicle rolled forward.
For the first part of the run through the city suburbs, Mandy sat silent. I leaned back in reflection of the latest part of my transformation. To the outside world, I could be considered vampire-Helsing neutral, with the flexibility to call on whatever end of the spectrum I needed. A big change from my last visit to Chicago.
“So what’s our backstory?” Mandy asked. I turned to see her looking through a manila envelope which contained the basics of her new identity. “Emiline Hume. Age 17.”
I reached inside my rucksack, and extracted my envelope. “Richard Moorcock,” I read. “Age also 17. Man, who thinks up these names?”
“Can I call you Dick?” she smiled, batting her eyelashes at me.
“As long as I can call you Em,” I quipped back. At least she smiled; the first one in a while.
“You can call me Emily, or you’ll get a kick in the shins for every time you don’t.”
We giggled for a bit with details of our new identities, and before we knew it, we were arriving at Chicago O’Hare.
The usual plane, usual drill, usual good service, and out in San Diego, twenty degrees warmer. Again, Howard seemed to have thought of everything. A guy in a suit, carrying a ‘Unicorps’ sign led us to the car rental; I didn’t even need to sign my name. So we dumped our bags in the back of the beige SUV, and soon had it headed out of the airport en route to El Cajon.
“So we’re two friends looking for a suitable school for our last semester before college.” Mandy’s feet were bare and sticking out of the passenger window. She seemed to be in serious vacation mode.
“Friends with benefits?” I asked, a cheeky grin effusing my face.
An elbow hit the center of my ribcage before I could brace for the impact. “Don’t push your luck, ginger.” I half laughed, half choked. I swear I swerved three feet. Despite the pain, it felt good to being back to typical me and Mandy.
In our hotel room we worked out a strategy for the next day; we intended to audition two high schools. We’d hit one in the a.m., do our rounds in the cafeteria in the morning, and the second school at lunchtime. Both were local, and because we were doing nothing more than ‘testing’ our vampire-neutral meds, we had no need for armaments of any kind. It felt kinda cool to be on such a tension-free mission for a change.
The next morning proved simply spectacular. I thought I knew sunrises. I didn’t. We had a view up the foothills, and the sunrise over the peaks looked breathtaking. We both felt invigorated, breakfasting early in the small hotel bar.
We were at the first school before 8:30.
“Hi.” Mandy did her best ‘thank-you-for-allowing-us-to-be-here’ speech, and charmed the lady at Reception. We were given visitors passes and a map of the school, where the kind lady marked out the cafeteria with a big X.
On entering, I felt disappointed. Seems like the kids who did the breakfast bar were the low rent variety, and we knew we were looking for a higher class of victim. Vampires rarely cruised the ghetto for their meat.
We both floated our eyes over the half-empty tables, but Mandy’s head kept shaking. No vampires.
We hit the next high school at 11 a.m. on the button. Despite the security restrictions, we got visitors’ badges real easy, and this time the cafeteria simply buzzed, hardly a seat vacant. I looked on from the periphery, while Mandy went in sniffing.
Before long, she was talking to a table of jocks and cheerleader types. I slowly edged closer, a tray of food in front of me.
“Hey, Dick!” Mandy suddenly stood up. “Come on over.” She waved emphatically. Even my nose could detect the musk around the table. Seems she’d found her vampire cadre.
“Hey, Emily. Who’s your new friends?”
“This is Francis, Dave, Eddie, and Hailey.” She sat back in her seat. There seemed to be no need for subterfuge, these kids seemed as innocent as the lunks at Gregor, but by their mannerisms and musk signature, even I could tell they were all vampires.
“Hey, Emily.” A girl stood up on my left. Hispanic, short, but very cute. She reminded me of Elena from New River, but a bit taller. If she wasn’t on the cheerleading team, she should have been. She worked her way in front of me, and took my tray from my hands. “You got dibs on this one?”
Mandy laughed. “No, Maria, you can try him if you want.”
Maria sidled up real close, rubbing her pelvis against my abdomen. “Oh, you guys should stay at this school. I feel myself already very curious.”
Mandy already relaxed back in Francis’s arms. I had been a victim of her wiles, and Francis, poor kid, didn’t stand a chance.
When we left the cafeteria, and the table disintegrated towards their respective classrooms, we had a double date set up for a coffee shop in town.
Step one had been a success. We had infiltrated a vampire cell unnoticed.
Step two would come later; we would allow two vampires to bite our necks.
It sounded easy, as long as you didn’t say it out loud.
That Francis looked like a tall, cold drink of water; a regular teenage Ashton Kutcher, same mop of brown curls, same chiseled jaw and dazzling eyes. Roughly the same build, but slightly on the scrawnier side. What he lacked in brawn he made up for in pretty. Big time.
Even better: he proved as easy as a dime store trollop. It made for a fun time at the coffee house – his knee pressing up against mine under the table, his arm slung lazily round the back of my chair. Every now and again his thumb would brush my shoulder. After spending so long in sexual limbo, waiting for something real to happen with Chris or even Lyman, I enjoyed every ounce of attention Francis gave me.
Lyman didn’t look like he fared too badly with Maria either. The two of them found an oversized easy chair and snuggled up by some plug-in fireplace in a nook away from the rest of us. I thought about busting out my cell and snapping a pic, something to hold against him at an opportune moment. Considering that the girl who’d popped his cherry was currently on the endangered species list, I figured the guy deserved a night of reckless indiscretion.
Eddie and Dave were in a friendly territorial dispute over Hailey. They flanked her on either side, both eager to keep her giggling (which she did a lot of) and steal her attention from the other. By the look of things, I’d say she’d gladly entertain both of them for the night. She kept both her suitors hopeful with the constant, exaggerated sweeping of her long, red hair as she leaned over one and then the other with witty quips like “you’re sooo funny, Eddie” and “oh, stop, Dave, you’re going to make me pee myself.”
What can I say? The boys obviously liked it. And if I had to guess, I’d go so far as to say something more potent than caffeine and sugar had been slipped into our lattes. But, after all, that’s why we were there in the first place – to get ourselves into a compromising position.
Francis seemed more than willing to help me toward that end.
“You ever seen the Pacific at sunset?” he breathed into my ear.
“This is my first night as a Californian,” I replied with a casual tilt of the head, “I’ve never seen the ocean at all.”
“Oh… a virgin… don’t worry – I’ll go easy on you.”
Francis pushed out his chair and offered me his hand. I took it without objection then suddenly questioned myself; an innocent girl, new in town should probably put up a little bit of a fuss before allowing a stranger to carry her off into the unknown. A token resistance.
“I don’t think I should ditch Ly… Dick… like that…”
Francis smiled over my shoulder.
I turned in time to see Maria’s tongue worm its way into Lyman’s mouth. Gross.
“Looks like he’ll get over it.”
Without further ado, I let myself be led. Francis’s Harley stood parked on the curb; a shiny tin beast, black with red flames painted on the gas tank. It screamed “Mommy and Daddy have money” for all to hear, even over its revving engine as Francis kicked it to life. I climbed on back and hugged his waist; rock-hard six pack. Damn.
It proved a chilly but refreshing ride through the climbing streets of Mission Valley. By the time we reached the beach, the sun already glowed red over ink-blue waters. We took off our shoes and I dug my feet into the warm grains of sands. Right there I wanted to fall backwards and cover myself in a blanket of it. But Francis regained possession of my hand and half-dragged me closer to the edge of the tides.
Compelled by the power of the Pacific, I stepped from dry sand to the outer edge of the water’s reach, squishing the wet, much cooler grit through my wriggling toes. In fascination, I watched as a lazy, white-capped wave did a finger roll over a sand divot and then receded back again, depositing a tiny ecosphere in its wake.
“Check it out,” I cooed. “Starfish.”
Francis couldn’t have looked less impressed at my discovery. He paid only a courtesy smile, circled around front of me, and clasped his arms around my waist, pulling me in for a tight embrace. His arms crushed me; as a vampire, I liked it. As a young girl caught up in a moment of indecision, I squirmed; a token resistance against his hold.
“Oh. You’re not going anywhere, Emily,” he said, capping his mouth over mine.
To my immediate disappointment, his kiss felt firm, dry, and harsh. The damn starfish would have been more sensual. All thoughts of spending my night, naked on the sand under a full moon with the ocean rushing up my legs, fled from my mind.
“Hold on,” I said, pushing away as feebly as my vampire instincts allowed.
Francis clamped me harder in his grips. “I am holding on…”
“I mean…” I pushed a little harder, “knock it off!”
With a heckling laugh, Francis collapsed down to the beach, dragging me along with him. In one, swiftly orchestrated motion, he rolled me under him. His legs worked like wedges, trying to spread mine apart, his hands bound my wrists like shackles, and his sour tongue roved my face in search of my mouth.