by Ian Hall
With Elena never leaving my shoulder, we got into Magdalena at lunchtime, and believe me, there wasn’t really much there to have lunch at. Herded into a Red Cross blood bank didn’t seem to be the best idea for a class of vampires, but to their credit, none seemed to be bothered much.
From studying blood in the classroom, heads bent over books, it felt good to be out in the field, and we worked really freaking hard.
We were shown a dozen times how to get ‘a vein’ on a patient’s arm, and maybe because we were in Mexico, there didn’t seem to be much customer consideration. We got shown how to bag it, stopper it, and label the bags before getting them into the large refrigerated unit on the truck. After about two o’clock, the Red Cross guys scarpered, slinking into their car and high-tailing it back north.
I looked around the class carefully, and it seemed to me that I looked the only one to be paying any attention to what happened around us. Mister Houze got us into pairs; yup, me and the ever-clinging Elena, and we put tube after tube into a vein and filled blood bags. The line at the door never diminished, and we bled teenagers and sixty-year-olds.
The ‘customers’ got a crisp USA ten dollar bill for every pint, and I saw at least five guys come back in the door to give a second donation. In reality we were worked quite hard, and I got too busy to see any more.
There were no cups of coffee or a cookie, just out the door and ‘next.’
We worked till the early evening, then Mister Houze pulled the door closed. “Right, kids – every single item goes into the bus. We leave nothing, not even a scrap of paper.” Between the twenty of us, we soon made short work of clearing up the contents of the whole cabin and ducked into the bus.
About a mile out of town we got flagged down by two guys. The driver gave them a wad of cash, then set off again.
All very hush-hush, but if you’d kept your eyes open, you’d have seen guards on the corners, casually standing around all day. Either the Mexicans liked their vampires, or a crime cartel got paid off.
The next thing seemed to be more in line with a ‘vampire’ school. Seemingly on the quiet, bags were passed amongst us, with most taking either a whole bag, or at least some.
I put mine in my bag. “I’ll eat later,” I grinned at a very cute Elena. “Knock yourself out.”
She snuggled down on the seat, and sucked on the short, clear straw, pretending to be going down on me. The image was clear, unprovoked, and after a long day’s work, it took the edge off my nerves. I grinned and relaxed in her company.
Ribald jokes abounded on the bus as the vampires lightheartedly called out blood types. “What’s yours?” I asked.
“Tastes like George to me,” she said, the plastic teat still in her smiling mouth. “I’ve tasted him before.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt it.” I gave her a huge grin.
“Then maybe I’ll get a chance later?”
Elena had kept away from us as a group, never pushing herself into our evening schedule, and I knew it would do me good to be away from the girls for a while. “Sure. What have you in mind?”
“My place, tonight. All night.”
I quickly pondered the blatant consequences. “Okay. Sounds like a date.”
It had already gone dark by the time we hit the border crossing at Nogales, and fifteen minutes to get us through that.
By the time we reached Phoenix, it proved to be close to eleven o’clock anyway. Elena and I walked arm in arm to her dorm. Every step we neared, I wondered if she’d send me up the wall, and into the window.
“Co-ed?” I asked cautiously.
“Oh, yeah. The best kind.”
We got to the door, and I stopped, determined that I’d play the vampire.
“What’s wrong?” Elena asked.
“What do you think?” I quipped. “I need asked inside, remember?”
She grinned, and did the asking.
When we got to her door on the third floor, a Latino boy got hurriedly to his feet. I recognized the boy from New River. I’d killed his vampire parents.
“Oh.” Elena stopped in her tracks and let my hand go. “You gotta go, Antonio.”
“I waited.” He almost sucked his thumb, the dolt seemed so young.
“I know you waited, but I’m spending the night with George here.”
“But I thought…”
“Antonio!” she snapped. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
Well if looks could’ve killed, I’d be on the butcher’s slab. Antonio walked past me, and tried to brush shoulders with me. I stood my ground, and he recoiled, buffeted against the wall. I gave him my best ‘old vampire’ stare.
Elena’s apartment proved little more than four rooms joined at the center.
She showed no signs of nerves as she walked in front of me. “Wine?”
“Red, if you’ve got it.”
“Of course.”
I lounged on the two-seater sofa, and waited.
“So what’re you really doing here, George?” she asked, coming from the kitchen with two glasses and a bottle. “I mean, we’re all on the same side, so why the secrecy?”
I accepted the glass and held it up to be filled. “Well, there’s a lot of organization that goes into an operation like we’re planning.” I held my hand to stem the flow. “Just because we’re vampires doesn’t mean we can do as we please.”
She sat down beside me, snuggling her butt close. “Explain.”
“Well, there’s the cartel today.” I cut facts with bluff. “They’ve gotta be paid off for guarding us.”
She seemed genuinely shocked. “When were we guarded?”
“Oh, only all day. Men on the corners controlled who came to the hut. The people who gave blood weren’t just random customers.”
“I noticed the men being paid outside the town.”
“Yeah,” I said. “That was the cut of the actual trade. Plus the price of not talking about our blood draw.”
“But surely it was official? We were with the Red Cross.”
I laughed. “We had a couple of uniforms watching us for the first few hours, but after they’d left, we were on our own. And I mean, come on, Elena, open your eyes a bit, honey. We didn’t test any blood for any types or diseases. We didn’t mark blood-types on bags. We weren’t getting blood for experiments. Alucard University was draining a Mexican town for future vampire food. And from the way the operation went, we’ve done it before.”
I almost continued, but my spiel got interrupted by the large window being smashed in. Antonio jumped into the room with the shards of glass. His face held a lover’s rage, and his hand held a huge knife.
“The border between the USA and Mexico is almost two thousand miles long,” Clifford shouted over the noise of the small bus. We’d been driving for an hour, and although the seats weren’t cramped, they didn’t allow much leg room, either. “But the government can’t police a quarter of it. Now, we’re all vampires here, and we’ve all fed before, haven’t we?”
Wow, as I mumbled a ‘yes, sir’, I sat openmouthed that he’d actually address the class as vampires. That hadn’t happened in three whole days.
“Is there anybody here that hasn’t killed a human before?”
All the heads kinda looked around, but of course, no one answered. Maybe they were as dumbstruck as me how fricking blatant he spoke about the subject.
“And we all can run a bit faster than the normal human… right?” He grinned as he spoke. “A couple of times every week we send the bus down to the border to help the government out, so to speak. We pick up a few gallons of blood for the bank, and we rid the country of a few illegals; isn’t that encouraging?”
As some of the class grinned in concert with the teacher, I got caught in two minds. I mean, these Latino students still had families, right? It just didn’t seem fair to be pegging them as food for the vampire masses.
“At any one time, Phoenix Medical University has a blood bank of over two thousand pints of blood. We’ve been adding
to the reserve for two months now, and we rotate the supply so it doesn’t deteriorate. The aim is by the time the new term starts in September, we’ll have almost four thousand blood units.” Clifford swayed as the bus turned off the highway and turned south, kicking up a huge cloud of dust from the rough track. “Anyone remember how long we can store it?”
Hands shot into the air. I knew the answer; six weeks, but didn’t bother to insert my hand into the fray.
“Today you’ll be split into four teams, each led by a local guide. He’ll show you the area, and hopefully we’ll make some arrests. You’ll each be given one of these.” He held up a black cloth bag with a cord drawstring at one end. “This is for putting over your victim’s head. Once back inside the bus, you’ll be responsible for the behavior of your own human prisoner. On the way back, there will be no talking in the bus in any form. No communication. If your human tries to talk, you’ll hit him over the head. The last thing we need is panic.” He held up a pair of handcuffs. “You’ll also pick up a pair of these. The human prisoner will have his hands securely cuffed behind his back.
“On the rack above your seat, is a bag. In it is a jacket and cap. You will wear these at all times until you are back in the bus. Replace them in the bags once we’ve completed our objective.”
I rummaged in my bag and pulled out the bundle, yup, dark Border Patrol jacket and cap. Wasn’t exactly the kind of fashion statement I usually like to make, but whatever. It was all in the line of duty.
Clifford sat back down and we drove in complete silence for half an hour. I don’t think any of the class had anything to say. I mean, I’d killed before, and I knew that since turning vamp, I wasn’t entirely squeaky-clean in the ethics department, but even to me, this sounded kinda dirty pool.
When the bus stopped, and we slowly filed outside, each of us was given our handcuffs. I got pulled to the back of the bus by a young punk-looking guy. He hardly looked fourteen.
When he’d got his group of five students, he looked around, almost conspiratorially. “My name’s Ramirez, I’m the youngest of the jackals you’ll deal with.” He motioned that we gather closer. “Handcuffs folded and in your front pocket, like this, so they don’t make a noise. Okay, you’ve all ran before, but have you ran with a partner, as a group?”
We all shook our heads.
“Right, that’s the first thing we’ll get used to. I’ll keep the pace slow to begin with, then we’ll head to the border.
“Single file!” He waved us on, then ran off, easy to catch to begin with, but once he’d got up to a good speed, the scenery passed in so much of a blur, that I found it difficult to keep focus on both him and the ground.
“That’s good, people,” Ramirez shouted, as he sped up again. “Try to keep in a line.” This time we veered south, and after maybe ten minutes, he slowed and stopped. A couple of the class turned up as much as ten seconds late, but we still had our group in one piece.
“Wait here, I’ll scout ahead.”
Ramirez returned in a matter of a few minutes. He shook his head. “Nothing, we’ll try further west.”
So we repeated the pack run and Ramirez did the solo sortie. We did this six times.
On the seventh run, he came back grinning. “Pack of twelve, three coyotes. We’ll take the first five, and leave the rest for another group.” He grinned again. It seemed to be his permanent facial characteristic. “It’s playtime. You, and you.” He pointed at me and a guy named Roy. “You follow me, you’re gonna have some fun. We get close to the coyotes, real close, and we dash in, we flick their ears, and we say, “Run, Coyote!” right into their ears. They’ve heard us before; they’ll take to the hills in seconds. They’ll leave the rest of the party to us. They know the drill.” He laughed.
Off we all went, then when we’d stopped, Ramirez pointed out ‘my’ personal Coyote, and in we went, running like the wind.
I flicked his ears, and dashed away, leaving him looking around in utter fear. Then I dashed in again. “Run, Coyote!” I cried in my best Latino voice. True to Ramirez’s words, the man just dashed to one side, head down, running for his life. The poor border insurgents were left like lambs.
When the rest of our group arrived and started stripping their backpacks and handcuffing them, they didn’t resist. By the time we’d finished with our five, another two groups from class arrived, and sorted out the others. The poor Mexicans were stripped of all bags and water bottles, they looked a tired, bedraggled bunch.
“Put your bag over their heads and lift them onto your shoulders,” Ramirez said. “Then follow me back to the bus.”
I’d like to be able to say that it had been exciting, but actually I felt a little dismayed by it all. I mean, I’d liked how we’d frightened off the Coyotes, but if we’d really been helping the Government, we’d have ‘arrested’ them, too.
I carried my smelly guy back to the bus and sat next to him, pinning him to the window. I didn’t even need to hit him. He just sat there, still as stone. I dunno. It all just seemed kinda sad.
The Blood Bank
Antonio came right at me, and to be honest, if Elena hadn’t got in the way, smashing the wine bottle into his face, I’m not sure if I’d have been quick enough to stop him.
Once the contest had been joined, though, I got up, ready to get into the fight, but I must admit I felt a bit out of it, hardly able to see them and all. The pair whizzed in front of me, but once every second or so, they’d stop, kinda to see where they were going. I picked up a baseball bat from a corner, and waited above the fray, waiting for the right time.
Antonio stopped, his hands round Elena’s neck, his fangs on full display, and I struck.
Bam, right on the top of his head.
He recoiled against the blow, then slumped to one side. I hit him again for good measure, the bat making a hollow ‘ping’ sound against his skull.
Elena lay panting below him. I lifted him by the back of his collar, and threw him onto the ground, near the door to the kitchen. “You okay?”
Elena got up quickly, but I could see she’d taken a bit of a beating. Her eye looked swollen, and she had cuts on her lips, forehead, and arm. She shook herself down. “Douchebag!” she aimed the slur at Antonio’s inert body.
“Am I in the way here?” I asked, holding my hands up. “I mean…”
“No, George, you’re the good guy.” Elena sat back on the sofa, her hands in her lap, wringing them together. “Antonio was my boyfriend before we were turned. We hadn’t done anything, but of course, once we’d been turned, we got together quite often.”
I popped into the kitchen to get a wet piece of paper towel. I’d seen worse wounds, but I couldn’t just stand there doing nothing. I dabbed lightly on her face as she talked.
“He just can’t get used to the fact that as vampires, we kinda, you know, get around a bit.”
“Well, usually feeding is associated with sex in some way,” I offered. “It’s been that way for hundreds of years.”
“Well, Antonio’s been the reason I’ve not come around to you sooner. He always hung around, after school, everywhere I went. The actual classes here in Phoenix have been the first time he’s left me alone.”
“So he’s not a problem that’s going to go away soon?”
“No. I wish he would.”
“That’s an easy problem to solve.” I leant down and gave her a solemn look. “Now, I’m talking a permanent solution here. Not something he’s coming back from. This is vampire death.”
“But the headmaster would never condone it!”
I hushed her raised tone. “I can get anything done.” I sat down beside her, keeping a watchful eye on Antonio. “Remember, I’m above Steve.” I flushed a quick gasp of pride at remembering the name. “Way above.”
“Well, we can ask him.” Elena surged. “He’s here.”
“Your headmaster’s here, in PMU?”
“We all came,” she said. “Steve’s acting as a janitor or something.”
“Okay,” I began, but I knew I was stalling for time. Time to think. “We could get Steve over to take a look at things, but I’m sure he’d have better things to do.” I gave her a wink. “Hold on.”
I phoned Valérie. “Hi there. Could you vanish a body for me?”
“Hello, Lyman,” she began. I could hear the smile in her voice. “I’m assuming you can’t talk. Are you talking about getting rid of a body, or us shimmering an inert body into invisibility?”
“Yes, exactly. The second option if possible.”
“Where are you?”
I gave her the address, and she said she’d be around in exactly five minutes.
“You got more wine?” I indicated the red mess on the carpet and the wall.
“Yes, I’ve another bottle.”
“Okay then, get two glasses poured. You’re about to witness the best vampire trick I can do.”
When Elena got busy in the kitchen, I went down to the entrance and opened the front door to allow the girls access, then cleared the small coffee table in the middle of the living room. I laid Antonio ceremoniously on the low table, his legs hung off the end, but I thought it’d do for my purposes.
I slugged the wine then handed back the glass.
“Watch. But be patient, this may take a bit of time.”
I began to move my hands above Antonio’s body, waving them back and forward, a deep, concentrated look on my face. I caught Elena’s rapt attention in the corner of my eye. Then after a few minutes, just as I thought my part was beginning to lose its interest, I felt someone blow in my ear.
“We’re here,” Finch whispered, her breath so close I could feel her lips brushing my skin. “Ready when you are.” Then she rimmed my ear with her tongue. Witch.
“By the Order of the Strogoi, arise,” I spoke into the room.
I heard Elena gasp when Antonio’s body rose gracefully from the table. I had to admit, it looked every bit a scene from Caesar’s Palace.
“By the Order of the Strogoi, I command you; be gone.”
Well, the girls did good. Antonio’s body slowly went from full bodied to shadowy, shimmery, to absolutely see-through, then. Pop. Nothing.