Human Revolt 02 - Vampire LA

by Phil Tucker

  Steep white walls rose up before them like the front of a castle, the walkway overhead silent and still. Theo scanned the building. Selah did the same, but saw nobody. “Shouldn’t there be guards?”

  “There might be. Just because we don’t see them don’t mean they’re not there.”

  “Comforting.”

  “You ready?” Theo turned to her. “Once we get going, there’s no stopping.”

  “You don’t have to worry.” Selah’s voice was flat, almost sad. “Once we get going, I won’t want to.”

  “Good.” A beat. “You all right?”

  Selah smiled, but it was tremulous and she couldn’t hold it. “No, not really. I’m not scared. It’s not that. I just don’t feel … myself. It’s weird. I feel … it doesn’t matter. Let’s go.”

  Theo watched her. There was no comfort in his presence beyond understanding. No sympathy, no pity. Instead, he turned back to the wall, and simply exploded into movement, racing forward in silence to leap at the last moment and latch onto the wall some fifteen feet up, a black shadow that surged up effortlessly to the walkway. Selah blinked, taken aback by his speed, and launched herself after. She leaped, the air rushed past her face, and then she was on the wall itself, clinging in an impossible manner to the smooth surface, fingertips digging into the rock, toes scrabbling before they caught and she raced up after Theo.

  He was already over the parapet and onto the walkway. Movement was a form of violence, awakening Sawiskera’s power, and with it came a flood of grim determination that had been missing before. Her sadness fell from her as if she’d left it at the base of the Observatory, and she scaled the wall as quickly as the other vampire. Up over the parapet, and down into a crouch next to him.

  Theo was listening, head cocked to one side. Selah could hear nothing. A silence that throbbed. Nobody was on the walkway. Maybe they were all up front, expecting them to approach from the parking lot?

  Theo moved forward, and Selah came after. She glanced over her shoulder, over the wall and out over the city, and almost tripped. The view was spectacular, a vast panoramic expanse of LA. There weren’t that many electric lights, but she saw now where the fire was, could see it oozing oily black smoke that disappeared into the night air, the flickering tongues of flame. It was huge.

  Theo paused before a door that lead into the great dome. It was cracked open before them. It was almost pitch dark, but she could see within despite that. Cloud was standing in the center of the room, under the apex of the dome, hands tied behind his back and wearing a strange kind of helmet. He wasn’t facing her, but she could tell it was him, knew his angular body immediately. He wasn’t badly hurt, was able to stand upright by himself. Relief flooded her. She slipped past Theo and through the doorway, and scanned the room quickly as she ran forward, ignoring Theo’s hissed words from behind her. Movie theater chairs were arranged in a semicircle, the kind you could lean back in to watch the sky, and the floor was a smooth, rich wood, its varnish glinting in the faint light from the door.

  “Cloud,” said Selah as she reached his side. He turned to her, startled by her voice. He was wearing a gas mask, but through the visor his eyes were alive with emotion – the primary one being anger. Theo was right behind her. The door they’d entered through closed, and though the sound was slight, the snicking of a lock was clear.

  Selah pulled the gas mask off Cloud’s head. “Selah,” he said. “Get out. They’re going to hit you with Blood Dust. Go!”

  “Hello,” said a voice from the back of the room where the dome connected to the rest of the building. “I’m so glad you came.” It was a lazy voice, rich with power, sensual and disturbing. Selah felt Theo stiffen by her side.

  The lights came on. The woman stood behind a great fan set on the ground, the kind janitors used to dry carpets. It was Arachne, it was herself. Selah felt a powerful moment of disorientation. She’d known Arachne looked just like her, but seeing her in person, seeing her own face leering back at her, that dark energy and voluptuous smile on her own lips – it was surreal beyond measure. Arachne was her identical twin, perhaps a little older, but her face was carved with cruel lines, lines that spoke of hardship, of pain, of untold suffering down the long and lonely years of her existence. Her eyes were a vivid black, large and sweeping and wide, her lips parted in a feline smile, small fangs visible between them.

  “I hadn’t thought it would be this easy,” said Arachne. “I almost feel insulted. Hello, Theo. How are you, my love? It’s been so long.”

  Theo let out a groan, as if his whole body were an ancient building whose foundation were giving away, and with a cry he sprang forward. Arachne flicked her finger contemptuously and switched on the fan. A second vampire stepped forward and emptied a large bag of powder before it. Pink dust flew swirling forward to engulf Theo as he charged right into it, a riot of crimson- and white-tinged cloud that span in intricate whorls toward the center of the room, mushrooming out before the gale wind strength of the fan.

  Theo roared as he stumbled and fell to his knees, clawing at his face. The sound awoke Selah who turned back to Cloud. His arms and legs were bound. There was no time to think. If he got hit by that much Dust- she reached out and yanked the gas mask down over his head once more, even as he shook and tried to back away. Other figures had appeared at the doors with fans, and they in turn dumped pink powder before them.

  The first wave of dust hit her just as she secured his gas mask. Ran like filaments of golden fire over her, peeling back the skin, shredding it. Pain ran through her body, starting with her hands and neck and then her face caught fire and she closed her eyes, tears flooding them as her nose began to burn, her sinuses. No. She fell to her knees and covered her face, tried to block the searing pain. Anger flooded her, paralyzed her. The fire sank through her skin, into her body, into her flesh. Her curse, her strength, rose to meet it.

  Shaking, shivering, sweat running off her body in torrents, Selah rose to her feet. She reeled drunkenly, and leaped for the doorway. She misjudged her leap, put far too much strength into it, and crashed into the ceiling of the dome, crumping a dent in it and slamming back down to the ground. The Dust was augmenting her powers beyond belief. She couldn’t see. When she opened her eyes, it felt like they were being washed with acid, the world a miasma of seashell pink and mayonnaise white, forms running together so that she could only detect faint outlines.

  No. Denial rose within her, absolute and towering in its fury. Her shivers had become full body shakes, so that she had to try three times to rise to her feet once more. She didn’t know where he was. Had to get out. She stumbled, staggered forward. There was so much strength coursing through her that her body couldn’t carry it, couldn’t channel it. She swept into a chair, and passed right through it, shattering its body, knocking it free of its moorings. She took it up and hurled it with a scream. A scream of blank, annihilating despair. Threw herself forward and hit the wall, lodged herself into it, almost punched right through. She stepped back, tripped, and fell once more. Rose to her feet, and fell again.

  She lay on her back, shaking and trembling with such violence that she couldn’t even reach up to scratch off her face. Her eyes were melting in their sockets, puddling in her face, and her tongue had swollen till it felt like a great rasping sponge choking her throat. She thrashed in fury, tore great rents in the ground, gouged holes and scars into anything within reach, but her body was no longer hers to control. She couldn’t escape. Even the slender cord of consciousness was slipping from her grasp. Cloud, she thought. Cloud.

  Chapter Twenty

  Selah awoke. Her eyes fluttered open and flooded with tears. She blinked over and over again, but couldn’t raise her hands to rub them. The pain was intense, as if a thousand grains of sand were trapped under her eyelids and scarring them with each blink. The tears brimmed and ran down her cheeks, and Selah felt them carve channels through the powder that lay thick on her face.

  She closed her eyes tight. She’d made o
ut enough to know that she was in a dark room, seated with her back pressed against a metal beam. Her arms were pulled behind her and around it, heavy chains tied around her wrists, with more chains wrapped around her stomach as well. She tested them. They clinked. Her body felt awful, as if she’d received the worst sunburn of her life, her skin tight and painful and blistered. Selah gritted her teeth, anticipating the pain, and then yanked as hard as she could against the chains—but there was no give. Sobbing with the sudden flare of pain, she sank back, her head lolling onto her chest, and fought for breath.

  Her mouth was scalded, her tongue swollen. Breathing through her nose made her sinuses flare with pain, so she fought to restrain herself to slow, slight sips of air. It took an eternity for the pain to lessen. She refused to think about her position. How she and Theo had acted precisely as expected. Refused to try and imagine what might come next. On whether Cloud was still all right, or if he was now in true danger, his utility having been expended. But no – they’d given him a gas mask. If they’d not cared about his fate, they would have left him open to the Dust. Selah took comfort from that, held onto that thought. It was all she had. She licked her cracked lips, and worked on blinking her eyes slowly, clearing them of the wet sludge packed beneath her lids. The need to wipe her eyes was infuriating, to get the gunk out from the corners, but she forced herself to remain calm.

  Finally the door opened and a light switched on. Selah winced and peered up carefully through her left eye. Arachne. Her identical twin. They were in a tiny room, a storeroom of sorts.

  “Hello, child.” Arachne’s voice. It was jarring to hear it coming from those lips. Now that even their eyes were alike, it was the only tangible aspect that was truly different between them. Arachne lowered herself into a smooth crouch and examined Selah’s face. Selah met her eyes and felt her skin crawl, a sensation of surreal disgust. Arachne wore a mockery of her own face, a latex mask pulled over a monster’s soul, so that the eyes and smile and expression were alien and repellant. How had she thought them similar?

  “You really do look just like me, don’t you … Amazing.” Arachne reached out and ran a cold finger along Selah’s cheek.

  “What do you want?”

  “What do I want? To clear my name, Selah. You’ve dragged it through the mud, killing the Colonel like that. What did you think? That I wouldn’t mind?”

  “I—no. I didn’t care what you thought.” There was no bravado in Selah’s voice. She didn’t feel tough. She suddenly just felt tired. “I was doing it because Louis asked me to.”

  “Ah, Louis.” Arachne sat back on her heels. “That naughty boy. Making power plays even at this hour. We’ll have a little talk soon, him and I. This time he may have gone too far. ” She shook her head. “And you. His little puppet. A little puppet dancing on his strings?”

  Selah didn’t answer. She looked stonily at the ground.

  “Poor girl. Strong enough to kill Sawiskera, but too foolish to understand what is going on. It’s true, isn’t it? It was you who killed the godless bastard?”

  Selah looked up. There was a sudden eagerness in Arachne’s tone, an avid look in her eye. Selah nodded. “I did. We did. We cut off his head and killed him.”

  Arachne clapped her hands together and leaped to her feet, laughing with delight. She spun around, unable to control herself, and clasped her hands to her chest. Standing still, she closed her eyes and seemed to vibrate, to almost thrum with an intensity of emotion. “I’ve dreamed of doing it myself for centuries. Sawiskera! If only I could have broken the bond he had over me! Sawiskera, my lord and master! He’s gone! Gone. Did he suffer? Did you make him feel pain?”

  Selah looked up at her. Arachne dropped into a crouch once more right before her. “Did he scream at the end? Tell me that much. Did he scream? No? I bet he didn’t. He was tough, I’ll give him that.” Arachne bit her lower lip and gazed off into space and somewhere deep within herself. Finally, she shook her head and looked back at Selah.

  “Do you know what you’ve done? You don’t, do you. You’ve no idea. You were just killing the big bad man. The nasty vampire king.” Arachne smiled. “But nature abhors a vacuum. I learned that. And Sawiskera’s death has made such a very large vacuum.”

  “Plessy,” said Selah. “He’s taken over Miami.”

  “Plessy?” Arachne’s eyebrows shot up. “Child, don’t be foolish. Plessy. Ha! That boy is less than five years old, smart as a whip but in the end just a bureaucrat. He lacks imagination. He thinks himself human! No. Plessy may have the attention, but his little calculating heart can’t fill the space Sawiskera held. Oh no. It was far too large and grand a space. He was the god-king, child, and now there is no more of him to be had. Oh no. And nature does so abhor a vacuum.”

  Arachne sank back into contemplation, brow furrowed. Selah watched her. It was like watching herself. A beautiful, powerful, uncaring, mad version of herself. It was fascinating, terrifying.

  “Then—what. Are you going to fill Sawiskera’s place?”

  Arachne laughed, a sharp bark. “Me? Oh no. You still don’t understand. No one vampire can. He claimed to be a god. Did you know that? An ancient Indian one. Foolishness. But he might as well have been. Oh yes! A god. A dead god. None of us who walk this earth can make that claim, though some are powerful. Very powerful. None are gods.” Arachne smiled. “Girl, you killed a god. You set us free. Do you understand? You set us free.”

  “What do you mean? You’re not free. You’re trapped in this city. Within the Core.”

  “Are we?” Arachne laughed again, a high spiraling sound that she cut short as if with the slash of a knife. “Are we now? And you know so much about it all, don’t you, little girl? Poor little puppet.”

  Selah stared up into Arachne’s vicious, pleased smile, and felt her anger begin to smolder. She forced herself to stay silent. Arachne waited, obviously hoping for a response, but then shrugged. “I would tease you more, would maybe make you cry, hurt you till there was nothing left, but I won’t. I want to. You look just like me. I would find it very exciting to hurt you and see your pain on my face. See myself beg for mercy. But you have done so much for me, for all of us. You killed Sawiskera. You brought me Theo. I feel almost protective of you. So I won’t hurt you.”

  “What are you going to do then?”

  “Why, child, I told you from the beginning. You’ve ruined my name. So I’m going to let you finish what you started. I’m going to use you to kill myself.” Arachne grinned at her, fangs gleaming.

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “I’m going to hand you over to the military. Those big men with guns want me so bad now, they won’t stop shouting till they get their hands on poor Arachne. So I’m going to give you to them, and let they will kill you in public and make a big show of it. Everybody will be happy.”

  Selah felt a calm descend upon her that had to be shock. “But I’ll tell them. I’ll tell them I’m not you.”

  “And you think they will believe you, child, or care?” Arachne shook her head. “No. Not these men. You see, I will let you in on a little secret. They don’t care who you are. They just need to calm the country down, protect their image, and say to the world, ‘See? We got the naughty, we punished her just like she deserves. Everything is fine now, go back to sleep. Nothing to see here, no dirt or blood on our hands. Everything is OK, let life go on as usual.’ And then they can go back to making money.”

  Selah shook her head. “I don’t believe you.”

  “And you think I care? I’ve been doing business with them now for years! I know their little piggy minds. Show them a million dollars and they will stab their own mothers for you. Greedy men. They think they have a good thing going. They think the Blood Dust is going to come forever, and they’re going to get rich beyond their wildest dreams. Fools.” Arachne rose to her feet. “Everything’s going to change now. But first you go dance for them, and buy me my freedom.”

  “What’s going to change?
What’s going on?” Selah tried to understand, to piece it together. “What are you going to do?”

  “Oh, child.” Arachne looked down at her with pity and amusement. “You think I’m going to tell you? No. Go, die for me, and know that you helped me and mine more than you will ever know.”

  “What about Theo? Cloud?” Selah could sense that Arachne was about to leave. “What’s happened to them?”

  “It’s not your business now. Theo and I have a reckoning. I don’t figure he’s going to like it, but life, it is cruel. Cloud? He’s served his purpose. Maybe I’ll drink him dry, maybe I’ll let him go. He’s a handsome man. Maybe I’ll make him a vampire, take him as my love.” Arachne was smiling once more, the sick smile of a sadistic child tormenting a wounded dog. Selah looked away, refused to give her satisfaction, but her anger was such that she couldn’t help but try the chains around her wrists once more.

  Arachne laughed, and shook her head. “Little puppet! So easy to pull your strings! It was interesting meeting you, meeting myself. Goodbye.” Abruptly, her face went blank, and she turned and stepped out, closing the door behind her.

  Selah let out a cry and threw herself forward with all her unholy strength, surging like the ocean against her bonds. Like the tide she fought the chains, slamming into them over and over again, fighting with the strength of great waves, smashing them against the metal column. But they wouldn’t snap. She felt her own blood slicking her wrists, dripping to the ground, but the massive, ponderous chains around her stomach held her tight. She couldn’t build up enough slack to really snap them. She was trapped.

  The door opened tentatively. A crack, a pause, and then it swung open the rest of the way, just wide enough for somebody to slip in. Selah glared murderously at the newcomer, and felt her face grow hard. Fernanda. The reporter closed the door behind her. A professional camera hung by her side. She pressed her back against the door and looked down in horror at where Selah sat chained.