23 Hours: A Vengeful Vampire Tale

by David Wellington

  She found a few useful things. There was a stab-proof vest hanging on a hook, the standard vest every guard in the prison was supposed to wear whenever in the presence of an inmate. It was made of ultra–tightly woven para-aramid fabric that would stop an ice pick, but not a bullet, and definitely not a vampire’s teeth. She slid it over her jumpsuit and strapped it on tight. There were no boots in the guard post, but there was another box of plastic bullets, sitting under a row of metal clips. “There should be a couple of shotguns right here,” Caxton said, touching the clips.

  “Maybe when the half-deads took over the prison, the guards in here took the shotguns and tried to defend themselves.”

  “Possibly—except there were two shotguns. There’s only one chair in here.” She shrugged. “Maybe the guard took both of them, who knows? And then he locked the door behind him when he went off to fight off the half-deads. Leaving a perfectly defensible position to go alone, on foot, into the middle of a dangerous situation.” Caxton shook her head. “No, I think one of Malvern’s people took those shotguns. I think this place was prepared for us.”

  “What? Like, they knew we were coming?”

  Caxton tilted her head from side to side. “The doors we need are always open, or easily kicked in. We keep running across groups of half-deads, but they aren’t armed properly. Malvern must know exactly where we are,” Caxton said, pointing upward at a camera mounted in the ceiling, “but she hasn’t sent a whole pack of them with good knives after us. It’s like she’s letting us move around the prison—part of the prison, anyway. The part she wants us in.” She narrowed her eyes. “I’m starting to think we’re being led through a maze like a couple of rats. That Malvern wanted us to end up right here.”

  “Sometimes,” Gert said, very slowly, “when I was high? I would start thinking that God was trying to tell me something. Just—-just listen for a sec, okay? I would have like a really crappy day. The kids wouldn’t stop crying. The bitch at the grocery store wouldn’t let me buy cigarettes with my WIC coupons. There would be all kinds of bills in the mail for shit I didn’t even remember buying, and then when I would run in my room and slam the door, it would turn out that my mom had cleaned my room while I was out and got rid of my stash. She would never say anything, never even give me a nasty look. But she would find my crystal and flush it down the toilet, like it was just some trash I left lying around. Days like that, sometimes I felt like a voice was talking just to me. A voice telling me to do something bad. Like cut myself, or maybe burn some old letters and pictures, you know, stuff I’d been keeping for years.”

  “Okay,” Caxton said.

  “I need you to think real hard,” Gert said. “I want to know if this suspicion of yours is anything at all like that voice I used to hear.”

  Caxton held her peace.

  “Because,” Gert went on, “I found in general, doing the things that voice told me to do wasn’t always such a shit hot idea.”

  Caxton took her celly’s point. There was no use worrying about the deeper game unless she could win on the surface. There was a diagram above the control panel that showed the whole of the prison’s yard, all the structures and features of the grounds between the wall and the building itself. It showed in special detail the layered defenses between the loading dock and the main gate. Gert had done a pretty good job describing the gates and tire shredders a truck had to pass through to get back to the kitchens, but she’d missed a few things. The trucks had to make three tight corners before they could reach the main gate, and each corner was watched by a machine-gun position. Then there was the main gate itself. Caxton had seen it on her way into the prison, a big slab of metal thick enough to resist a direct attack by a tank. If that gate was closed, there was no truck in the world that could just smash through it.

  Still. The gate, the exit, was right there—no more than two hundred yards away. There were three trucks sitting in the loading bay, abandoned in place when the prison was taken over by half-deads. It was the best chance she was going to get to break out, to reach safety and help and sanity—

  She was still considering her escape plan when the security monitors over her head switched themselves on. In the dark guard post the white light they blasted over her was difficult to look at, and at first she had no idea what the image on the monitor was supposed to be. It was in color, though there wasn’t much color to see, just a tinge of red in one corner of each screen on an otherwise unbroken field of white.

  Then the view moved backward and showed that the red was the dully glowing pupil of a vampire’s eye. The view pulled back farther to display all of Malvern’s face, horribly ravaged by time. But just as horrible was the fact that it didn’t look as bad as it should. The skin was intact and snowy white. If it was heavily lined, if there were dark pouches under the vampire’s eye and eye sockets, if the ears weren’t quite able to hold themselves up under their own weight, it was still a face of something vibrantly and dangerously alive.

  Caxton had only once in her life seen Malvern look that good, and it had been in one of the vampire’s own memories, transmitted to her via a psychic link they no longer possessed. In the real world Malvern’s flesh had never looked so healthy, so vital, so whole.

  The camera kept moving backward. Soon Caxton could see all of Malvern’s upper body, and what looked like the arm and hip of someone standing next to her. Malvern was quite gently holding the other person by the elbow. Caxton knew that it would take only the slightest muscular pressure on Malvern’s part to turn that soft touch into a bone-snapping vise grip.

  There was no sound to go with the picture, and nothing moved within the frame. Every once in a while Malvern blinked. Then she said something that Caxton couldn’t make out—it was hard to read a vampire’s lips since all those teeth got in the way—and the camera jerked sideways, the entire picture swaying. When it stopped moving, two figures were visible on the screens. Malvern and Clara.

  Someone off camera handed Clara a piece of paper. Written on it in large block letters was

  23 HOURS.

  25.

  They walked Clara, very slowly, to the central command center of the prison, a round room located on the top level of the facility’s main building. Broad windows let in a little light, but far more came from dozens of flickering security monitors, most of them displaying empty hallways and locked doors. Every few seconds the view on each screen would change, or pan back and forth to show another section of the prison. On one screen Clara saw a view of B Dorm. It looked like the prisoners had mostly turned in for the night, though a few were still pacing their cells, obviously concerned about what the next day would bring.

  Around the central command center a skeleton crew of half-deads were bent over control panels and computer terminals, monitoring the prison’s security systems. The largest number of them were gathered around a monitor at the far end of the room, where they pointed at the screen and giggled among themselves.

  On the screen, Laura was standing next to a woman Clara didn’t recognize. They were both staring at something intensely, something just above their heads.

  Clara’s heart sank when she saw her lover there. She had known Laura was at large in the prison, but she’d been able to imagine her crawling through ventilation ducts or hiding in some out-of-the-way spot—she could imagine Laura somewhere safe. From the grainy low-resolution image on the screen, however, she could tell that Laura had been putting herself in danger. As always. Her face was stained with blood or something darker and her clothes were spotted with gore.

  Clara turned away from the screen. She couldn’t look at Laura anymore, or her heart would start breaking all over again.

  In the center of the room a video camera had been mounted on a tripod. Malvern led Clara in front of the camera while the warden stepped over to operate its controls. For a while they just stood there, while the camera’s lens zoomed in and out. The warden cursed and adjusted a lever on the side of the camera.

  “Dawn app
roaches,” Malvern said. “Make haste.”

  “This isn’t my specialty,” the warden explained, and pressed a button near the front of the camera. Then she cursed and tried another. A red light lit up on the front of the camera, which meant it was recording.

  Clara looked out the windows and saw that a smudge of dark blue was fighting with the black night sky. The sun would rise any minute, and when it did she knew that Malvern would have to be back in her coffin. Vampires weren’t burned by the light of the sun, but at the moment of dawn each day they died once again, inevitably, no matter how strong or old or clever they might be. Their bodies liquefied inside their coffins, their tissues breaking down so they could repair any damage taken during the night.

  “Give her the placard,” Malvern insisted.

  The warden leaned around the camera to hand Clara a piece of paper that read 23 HOURS. Clara held it in front of her. Malvern was holding her arm, and Clara knew if she didn’t do as she was bid it would take no effort at all for the vampire to snap her bones like matchsticks.

  “Very well, now end it,” Malvern directed.

  “Yeah, yeah,” the warden said, and flipped a switch. The red light blinked off. “You know, you don’t have to be so cryptic. Twenty-three hours, fine, that’s an hour before dawn tomorrow, but what happens then? You didn’t explain at all. And what use is making a threat if you don’t even tell her what you want? There are loudspeakers in every room of the prison. We can broadcast your terms over and over, make sure Caxton gets the message.”

  “Don’t question me, woman,” Malvern said, her usual convivial tone audibly cooling down. “Laura will know what I expect of her. Some games are best played in silence. Such as—”

  “Fine, I’ve got it,” the warden said. “Whist must be a hell of a game, I’m sure. Listen, there’s still time before dawn, if you wanted to pass the curse on to me. That way I could be by your side tomorrow night, when Caxton comes gunning for you.”

  “Play this message on the screen Laura is watching,” Malvern ordered, ignoring the warden’s plea. The half-deads around the security monitors jumped to attention and started tapping commands onto computer keyboards. “Play it again and again until we’re sure she’s seen it. You lot,” she said, “ready my coffin. The time has come. While I slumber, see ye mind her as you would me.” She gathered herself up and prepared to leave.

  “Wait,” the warden said.

  Malvern turned, a cold, imperious look in her eye.

  “Please,” the warden said. “You made me a promise. I’ve carried out your plan well, haven’t I? I’ve done everything you asked.”

  “And ye shall be rewarded. In due time. When Caxton is mine, ye shall—”

  “Fuck Caxton!” the warden shrieked. “She’s never going to do what you want. She’ll never be what you want her to be. Focusing on her is a ridiculous mistake!”

  What happened next was impossible for the human eye to follow.

  Clara felt as if someone had hit her elbow with a baseball bat. Malvern had run across the room without letting go of Clara’s arm first. The pain was intense. Even worse, as her arm flew up in response, the alarm on her electroshock restraint went off. It blared out a warning tone so loud it made her vision go dim. She froze in place, knowing that if she remained motionless for a second the stun package wouldn’t fire and she wouldn’t be sent into convulsions.

  The camera on its tripod went flying across the room, clanging against a chair and knocking a half-dead to the floor. And then Malvern was standing right next to the warden, holding her by the throat.

  “Ye come to me as a supplicant, begging the greatest gift any of your kind may receive,” Malvern said, very softly. “Ye call me your mistress, and beg to offer me your fealty. And then ye question my decisions.”

  The warden tried to say something, but all that emerged from her throat was a choking gasp.

  “Are ye really so impatient,” Malvern asked, “to come to my favor? To take on my form? Let us see.”

  The vampire needed only one hand to hold the warden in place. She brought up her other hand and laid the ball of her thumb against the warden’s eye. “I am not your friend,” Malvern said, “nor your partner yet. I am your liege.” Then she shoved her thumb into the warden’s eye socket.

  The human woman managed to scream as blood and vitreous fluid ran down her cheek. Malvern kept pressing until the warden’s face turned purple and her remaining eye rolled up in her head. Then she dropped the warden to the floor.

  Clara could only watch, and slowly bring her arm down, careful not to activate the alarm on her restraint. She didn’t want to do anything to draw attention to herself.

  “There will be no rebellion in my lair,” Malvern said. “Cleanse her wound, and pack it with linen.” A half-dead rushed to the door of the command center, where a first-aid kit was clipped to the wall. It brought bandages and antiseptic to treat the warden’s ruined face.

  “You… why?” the warden moaned, clutching her cheek. Her fingers moved up to probe where her eye had been. When she found nothing there she screamed again. “You didn’t have to do that! Now I’ll spend eternity looking like a freak!”

  Malvern glared down at her. “Looking as I do, ye mean. I think it well. But perhaps ye’d like more hurts to remember me by? I could pluck out your tongue, ye who think it best to blare my intentions to every corner of this place. I could tear the ears from your head, or pull your nose into a new shape. Would ye like that?”

  The warden shook her head violently. She fought away the hands of the half-dead who was trying to staunch her bleeding and grabbed the bandages away from it. “No, of course not. No. That is to say… I. I’m sorry. I forgot myself. For a second.” She paused to shriek as she dabbed at her eye with the antiseptic cream. “I won’t make that mistake again.”

  “Not if ye wish to survive ’til morning comes.” Malvern glanced up at the windows. “Now. I really must away. Ye’ll keep our hostage at her ease, I trust.”

  “Of course,” the warden said, slowly rising to her feet.

  26.

  It means,” Caxton said, trying to explain to Gert what the vampire wanted, “that in twenty-three hours she’s going to kill my girlfriend. Unless I go and surrender myself to her. Agree to become a vampire and serve her forever.”

  “That’s your girlfriend?” Gert asked. She looked up at the security monitor where the same piece of video was looping endlessly. “Huh. She’s cute.”

  The video monitors flicked off and Caxton dropped heavily into the guard post’s sole chair. She put her face in her hands and closed her eyes. Let her shoulders fall. This… was bad. Up to that point her main concern had been for her own safety. Her big plan was just to escape, and let someone else deal with the hell that had descended on the prison. Caxton had been prepared well enough for that job. It was easy to keep herself alive—it just took desperation.

  Now things had changed. She had a new duty to fulfill. One that would take brains.

  She looked up, and over at the door they’d used to get into the loading dock. It wasn’t jumping in its frame anymore. The half-deads were making no attempt to get at them. It looked like Caxton was going to be given some time to think over Malvern’s ultimatum. “Okay,” she said, and Gert looked over at her. Gert’s eyes were wide and expectant. Like a kid waiting for her mommy to tell her what to do. “It’s dawn. That’s why she gave me twenty-three hours. Twenty-three hours from now will be one hour before dawn tomorrow—just enough time to pass on her curse to me before she has to go back in her coffin.”

  Gert glanced over at the sky, visible through the gated outer bays of the loading dock. The sky was turning a weak yellow color and a few purple clouds were sailing by overhead. Gert nodded, as if to confirm what Caxton had said. “Okay, that’s not much time. But for right now—it’s daylight! So we’re safe now, right? Vampires can’t do shit during the day. I saw it on the Discovery Channel once.”

  Caxton squinted at her celly
“I didn’t take you as the type to watch the Discovery Channel much.”

  “What, ’cause you think my family couldn’t afford cable?”

  “No,” Caxton said, holding up one weary hand in apology, “I just—”

  “And not just basic. We got six channels of HBO, ’cause Mom liked the Sarah Jessica Parker show.”

  Caxton rubbed her face. “Okay. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply anything.”

  “Discovery has that show about the crab fishermen, I like that one.”

  Caxton went on, hoping that Gert had finally run down. “It is true, as you say, that vampires are harmless during daylight hours,” she said. “But half-deads aren’t affected by the sun at all. So we’re still in trouble. I need to think about what we’re going to do next. I have to have a little while to myself to think about that. Why don’t you find someplace comfortable to curl up and catch some sleep?”

  “Sure,” Gert said. As easy as that. Her mommy was going to take care of everything—she didn’t need to worry. She picked a corner of the guard post and curled up there in a ball and was snoring a few minutes later.

  This left Caxton alone with her thoughts. Which was problematic in itself, because she couldn’t seem to focus on out-thinking Malvern. Her brain was too busy punishing itself.

  She shouldn’t be here, Caxton thought. Clara shouldn’t have been at the prison. Caxton should have broken things off with her long ago, back when it still would have been easy. When a phone call would have been enough. Instead she’d forced Clara to come to visit her. To explain things in person, face-to-face. And then she hadn’t even been able to do that. If Caxton had been a better girlfriend, if she’d recognized that Clara needed to move on—

  It did not strike her as any kind of terrible coincidence that Malvern had taken over the prison at the exact moment that Clara was finishing up her monthly visit. Caxton knew enough about how Malvern’s brain worked. For years now Caxton had outsmarted every vampire she met—except for one. Malvern always planned ahead. Caxton tended to improvise. As a result Malvern had won every single time, or at least, she’d gotten away. Survived. And that was what drove Malvern, her primary goal in all things—to live just one more night.