Graveyard Shift

by Michael F. Haspil

  “Oh shit. Guys, what the hell is going on?”

  Marcus shouted, “Zorzi, get her out of here. We need to make sure we stay in control. There’s fear blood in here. Pure. A lot of it.” That last bit was a warning.

  Zorzi spoke up. “There’s a door back there, Marcus. Some kind of freezer. I pulled it closed before she got down here. I didn’t think she could handle it.” His voice was contrite, but also taking on the slurring affectation that indicated that his fangs were extending as well.

  He stepped toward Constance, but she was already moving toward him, her legs stiff. She seemed to be relaxing a bit.

  “You can smell it, too?”

  Alex could hear the relief in her voice. She was terrified she was going to lose control, and now she knew her body hadn’t been reacting to the scene.

  Zorzi pulled her out of the door and called back, “Are you going to be all right, Marcus?”

  “I will be fine. Besides, Alex is here to keep me in line.”

  Zorzi launched a quick glance at Alex, the skepticism in his expression speaking for him.

  Alex reassured him. “We’ve been through this drill once or twice. I’ll be okay.”

  Zorzi and Constance moved out of view. Alex could hear them going back up the stairs.

  “Okay, what gives? This is bad, but we’ve seen worse. What’s getting to you guys?”

  “It’s intoxicating. It is why some of us choose to stalk and dally with prey, rather than seduce, or take part with willing partners. There is a lot of it here. A lot of the fear blood. It is not affecting me as much as Constance, because, well…” He was beginning to slur a little as his fangs fully extended themselves.

  “When you feed, you’re a seducer, Constance … Oh. Oh, damn. So our Constance wasn’t always so nice, huh? Go figure. I guess there’s more to Constance than I know.”

  Marcus chuckled. “My friend, if you truly understood the extent of that understatement, you could fill volumes.”

  “Yeah? Someday, you’re going to have to let me in on what exactly the deal is between you two.”

  “Of course, I shall do that when you finally enlighten me as to your full history. About this so-called sorceress you’re bound to. Perhaps all the inner workings of live mummification and the spells which reside in the Scroll of Thoth? Perhaps over respective drinks?”

  “Touché.”

  Alex examined the long stainless-steel counter with the sink. The counter was clean, but there were thin scratches in the steel. It had the feel of the familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it.

  “As I was saying, the adrenal content of this blood is abnormally high. You can see it is eliciting a response from me as well. To some, the fear blood is too much to resist. No matter what we tell ourselves, we might go wild and gorge. Depending on various factors, like when one last fed, for instance, it can make one lose self-control.”

  “So what would happen if a vampire drank a bunch of this stuff when they thought they were guzzling Hemo-Synth?”

  Marcus moved over to one of the drains in the floor. He removed the cover and looked down at some sort of catch basin there. He didn’t answer.

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought. The blood frenzy. Are you doing all right?”

  “Really, Alex. This is rather curious, these drains … it reminds me of something.”

  Alex examined the sink. It was deep and could easily hold gallons. It looked like something you’d see in a large restaurant or cafeteria. He didn’t need a vampire’s sense of smell to notice the chemical stink coming from it.

  “This is like a butcher shop or slaughterhouse.” Then he remembered the door Zorzi had mentioned. He looked toward the back wall, where it loomed imposingly—a large freezer door.

  “I don’t even want to look.”

  Alex took hold of the big latched steel handle and yanked. A cloud of frigid air greeted him as he peered into a monstrous walk-in freezer. Immediately, he could see bodies hanging in the back, gutted, and awaiting the butchering process.

  “Oh fuck. Yeah. This is … wow.”

  Alex stepped into the freezer. As cold as it was, he wouldn’t be able to stay here long. His body didn’t handle the cold very well.

  There were pull-out shelves along one side. They were on rollers so a person could slide them in and out for easier access. There were jars, boxes, and empty bags. He grabbed the end of the shelf, the cold steel stinging his hand through the latex, and pulled.

  The shelf bucked forward in a fit of jerks and starts on sticky wheels. Now he could better see the contents in the flickering fluorescent lights. There were jars filled with some sort of yellow fluid. Floating in them were eyes, hearts, and other organs he couldn’t easily identify.

  Alex pulled one of the boxes off the shelf. It was constructed out of a foamy-feeling plastic, something like Styrofoam but harder. He reached for the lid. His hand hovered over the handle.

  Marcus squatted down beside him. “How much worse can it get?”

  Alex opened the lid. Inside, tightly packed against one another were roughly three dozen frozen blood bags. He reached inside the box and grabbed at one of the bags. The latex glove on his hand wanted to stick to the frozen plastic. He wrenched one of the bags out.

  “Well, here’s your fear blood. Zorzi was right. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

  Marcus wasn’t listening. It looked to Alex like he was miles away, in his own little world.

  “Marcus? Stay with me, buddy.”

  Alex hurriedly threw the bag back in the box and closed the lid.

  “Are you all right? You want to take a step outside?”

  Marcus’s eyes finally focused. “I’m sorry, you were saying.”

  Alex considered his options. “I was saying you might want to step outside and get some air. Maybe see how Constance is doing.”

  Marcus waved him off.

  Alex knew he wasn’t going to win this argument. He looked at the remaining boxes on the shelves.

  “Assuming all these are full … Mass production just reached the blood trade, didn’t it?”

  Marcus was shaking his head in disbelief. “They’ve been abducting people off the street, bringing them down here, and keeping them for some time.”

  “Why keep them? Why not just kill them outright and harvest what they need?”

  “They need the fear. More probably, they need an expert. You noted what was left of the chair?” A long string of bloody drool dripped from Marcus’s lower jaw.

  “Yeah.” Alex made a “you’ve got something on your face” gesture to Marcus. “It looks like something out of the Middle Ages.”

  “You are not far from the truth there, my friend.” Marcus wiped the bloody drool away with annoyance. The glazed look was finally starting to leave his eyes. Alex could tell his fangs were receding simply because he wasn’t slurring his words as much. The mystery had him in its grips now, and the urge to solve the puzzle was greater than that of the blood lust.

  “To maximize the fear and the adrenaline, they would want to torture the subject as long as possible. Possibly even attempt to harvest a few organs while the victim was still alive. It takes a measure of skill to do something like that and keep the victim responsive.”

  “I don’t want to know how you know that. What bothers me is that we know that humans did this.”

  “Oh? And how exactly do we know that?”

  “You’re slipping, Marcus. A nocturn, even a youngblood, can smell a thrope. Or at least smell that their blood isn’t like the others.”

  “And yet this lot was caught unawares. Very good. I nearly missed that. They were totally unprepared. And the stress of the situation must have forced the change upon her. It’s been known to happen. Or … No.”

  “What?”

  “I’m just considering possibilities.”

  “That or they were damned unlucky to pick her up and have her be offset from the lunar cycle.” And then they, the police, had killed her. The unspoken wo
rds hung between them. He looked into the freezer again, at the hanging corpses, the shelves, the boxes, the jars.

  “Wow.” That was all he could bring himself to say.

  “You have a penchant for understatement tonight.”

  Alex couldn’t stand to be in the freezer any longer; his body was growing stiff. He walked back into the other room.

  “I’ve seen something like this before.” Marcus followed him.

  “Seriously?”

  “Perhaps thirteen hundred years ago? In Neustria. I was with Charles, son of Pepin, helping him to consolidate his rule. We came upon a charnel house not terribly unlike this one. We did not know what to make of it then either. You understand those were somewhat rougher times. Gods, I thought they’d have died out by now.”

  “Apparently not. We never heard about anything like this.” Despite himself, Alex lowered his voice. “Not even in UMBRA.”

  “They have been at this for some time. A well-funded operation. They cleared out the entire building above us simply to hide this.”

  “I’m willing to bet they started with the tenants, or at least some of them. Then used the usual tricks to drive the rest out. Even in this part of town, folks would notice a whole building going missing.”

  “Would they?”

  Alex considered that. The mind’s capacity to come to terms with the unthinkable and ignore it never ceased to astound him.

  “One thing really bothers me. I mean, thinking this out. The blood makes sense. After seeing the effects it has on you guys, it’s a valuable product. Some vampires will pay top dollar for it. But why save the organs, or store the corpses?”

  “I have no idea.”

  Alex knew Marcus was holding something back. He also knew that there was little point in calling Marcus out on it. He’d tell Alex what he suspected when he was ready. At this point, prodding him would only tighten his lips.

  Zorzi walked back into the room and looked at the freezer door, which still hung open.

  “See what I mean? This is new,” Zorzi said.

  “Not to Marcus. How is Constance?”

  “She is herself again. She is trying to placate the crime scene unit and the press. Something else is going on out there, something big.”

  “Bigger than this? I don’t want to know.”

  “That is what I thought, my friend. She wants all of this destroyed.”

  “Ah. She may have a point. We should keep all this in the strictest confidence. If word got out somehow, with the city the way it has been these last weeks…” Marcus let the sentence hang.

  Zorzi finished the thought: “None of us would be safe.”

  “No, you’re right about that. It’d be open season on nocturns. Shit. There’s no way … Damn it! What a mess. You know, I’m inclined to agree with her.”

  “I’m surprised to hear that coming from you, Alex.” Zorzi’s eyes were taking on that blood-glazed look again.

  “You shouldn’t be. Constance wants it destroyed which means Lelith wants it destroyed. I’m just going with the flow.”

  Marcus huffed and walked back into the freezer.

  “You’re not suggesting we close our eyes and let this go on?”

  “Part of me is. We can’t fight back against an operation like this. Maybe in the old days, but not with our hands tied. This is bigger than we are. Vampires have been preying on humans for all of history.”

  Marcus called out. “This was humans preying on humans, Alex, as you so recently pointed out.”

  “Humans on behalf of vampires. They weren’t saving this blood to use themselves. They’re selling it. It implies major blood trade, the likes of which we have never seen. Think of the experience between us, and this is something new. Shit, I’m feeling like Garza up there. How much are you willing to bet this isn’t the only place they have?”

  “This is a major operation, so far all human. The clout to clean out a whole building, to convert this into this slaughterhouse, we’re talking organized crime. Right?” Alex asked.

  “That follows. That would not be new. The mob started working in the blood trade as soon as they discovered there was a market for it,” Zorzi said.

  “And this product is so good that it’s got you and Marcus drooling, and nearly reduced our most pious and proper lieutenant to a state of animal lust. I mean, I don’t even know what the street value is for this stuff. We have no idea what they used half of this stuff for. We’re in over our heads.”

  “I won’t disagree with you there. It was very sad to see Constance like that. She will be hitting the blood clubs hard in the coming days. And that isn’t good for her.” Zorzi stole a glance at where Marcus was pulling out shelf after shelf and examining the contents. “Or anyone,” he added for Marcus’s benefit.

  Marcus ignored him.

  “So it’s safe to say, if a youngblood got a swig of this, say in a tainted bottle of Sangri…”

  “Yes. They would go wild. It would drive them immediately into a blood frenzy.”

  “But no one would want that, right? I mean, who would want a bunch of vampires to go on a killing spree. Let’s say that was an accident. They’re moving this stuff disguised as legitimate Hemo-Synth. But something went wrong, and some of their bottles made it onto a store shelf somehow.”

  Zorzi stood by quietly, listening to Alex sort it out.

  Marcus called from the freezer, “I saw pallets of blood products at that club. I assumed they were legitimate. I certainly didn’t smell anything out of the ordinary.”

  “Could it be masked somehow?”

  “I do not know.”

  Zorzi stepped to the door of the freezer. “What are you doing?”

  “Me? I am looking for a clue,” Marcus answered. “I have the scent of something familiar. If my suspicions are correct, then it is more bad news.”

  “You know, I liked this job. It was easy. Kick in the doors of a few blood clubs, get some kickbacks to let them keep operating, give Filip some grief over some illicit blood. It was cushy. You said it yourself, Zorzi, this is like nothing we saw at NSA. This is far worse.”

  Zorzi interrupted, “Except Lagos.”

  “Or São Paolo,” Marcus added.

  Alex shook his head, “São Paolo … shit.” Internally he conceded the point.

  “I wonder…” Marcus stepped behind the shelves and dragged something large and heavy to the front of the freezer.

  “Found something?” Zorzi asked, stepping into the freezer.

  That got the better of Alex’s curiosity and he went to see what Marcus had found.

  Alex threw up his arms in vain when he saw the object Zorzi and Marcus dragged from the room. It was a large industrial cooler, exactly the same make and model he had inspected in the back of Filip’s van.

  Marcus opened it and peered inside. After a moment, he reached in and tossed a vacuum-sealed bag of meat at Alex, who snatched it from the air.

  “I think we now know where Filip was getting his meat.”

  “Fucker. I think Filip…” Alex turned the plastic package over in his hand, reflecting on what kind of meat it was. “I think Filip isn’t gonna like our next visit.”

  16

  2:25 A.M.

  Alex raced the Explorer in and out of traffic, dodging from one lane to the other trying to make the best speed. The damn traffic was killing their time. The blaring siren and the flashing lights behind the front grille sent cars leaping out of the way.

  Alex bashed the horn with his hand. “Damn it! Get out of the way!”

  “Lighten up on the rage, Menkaure. We need to arrive in one piece if we are to give Filip a piece of our minds.”

  “That slippery son of a bitch. You realize if we don’t get to him tonight, he’s gone. He’s got to be right in the middle of it. Once he knows that we know … that’s it.”

  “He may not even know what he is dealing with. Consider his behavior on our prior visit. He behaved as he always does.”

  “Yeah, I never woul
d have figured him to be that good an actor.”

  “I detected no untoward nervousness.”

  “You didn’t detect human meat either.”

  Marcus was silent.

  “What about that?”

  “I thought I smelled the human blood. I have no explanation.”

  “So Filip was right when he said the meat masked the scent. It was just a bit vice versa. He’s set to turn his customers into unwitting cannibals. It’s like some kind of weird Sweeney Todd thing.”

  “I am not quite so sure.”

  “Huh?”

  “There is a level of organization, a level of sophistication shown here. Human and vampiric organized crime working together, and if not for a miscalculation on their part, we would not know any of it. I doubt it was all for Filip’s benefit. The quantities of the meat … Surely, a bit more than needed to bake into a few pies, if you catch my meaning.”

  “Except that Filip knows something. He sent us to that club, you know? Supposedly, he doesn’t know anything about it. Just that they might be selling some rare blood products and we’re supposed to take it at face value that he just wants to cause his competition some heat.”

  “Yes. And we investigate and find something we weren’t expecting, a highly sophisticated operation.”

  “And we’re not welcome. We can’t make it in the door.”

  “Because … watch that fellow…”

  Alex swerved and narrowly missed the car Marcus had indicated. “You were recognized.”

  “By another Ancient.” Marcus grew quiet. He began again tentatively, “What if our friend Filip sent us there not to help us in any way, but to hinder them in some way.”

  “Which them? The people behind the club? Or the people behind the torture chamber?”

  “Are they different?”

  “That’s a pretty big damn leap to say they’re the same bunch.”