I heard sobbing behind me, mingling with the shouts. The police shoved the protesters and reporters back. They yelled questions at me. I zoned them out.
I wanted to be alone with my thoughts.
No battle for me tonight. At least, I could rest…
Shouts broke me from my reverie. I spun, just as pain shot up through my chest. It spread, and then dulled.
My vision went blurry. What was that? A man? What was he shouting?
I held my chest and looked at my hands. I didn’t remember putting on red gloves.
Treth was yelling something. And…Brett. He was shouting.
No…don’t fight. Don’t fight for me. I don’t want you to die.
Not for me. Not for anything…
I’m tired.
Too tired.
I just want to sleep…
***GUY***
No one can cage a beast forever. Brett broke free from my grasp as soon as he saw the man break past the police line and charge Kat. I didn’t stop him. I drew my gun. We all did. But it was too late…
Brett let out a roar that was closer to beast than man. The attacker’s face had long since turned into a red paste.
My wife stood over Kat, pale. Tears and sweat streamed down her face. Puke and spittle stained her lips. She’d exploded her spark already. This quickly.
Oh, gods…Kat…
Crusaders pressed into the mob, beating back protesters. The police were lost.
Kat…why did you have to do this…?
I didn’t want to lead these people. I didn’t think I could.
But she had left me with the responsibility. I had to lead. No matter what.
“Form a perimeter around the Commander!” I boomed. The chaotic Crusaders, wrestling with protesters and police, broke away, forming a circle around Kat, Cindy and the enraged Brett.
The circle opened, allowing me to step inside.
“You failed to protect us,” I yelled. “You failed to protect the hero who has saved your lives countless times. For this, we will not comply.”
“You…stand down. There is a warrant to arrest Kat Drummond, and we also need to arrest that man for murder.”
“Fuck off, ticks!” a Crusader shouted. Others shouted in agreement.
The protesters fled as soon as the Crusaders moved into formation. In the chaotic melee, the scum thought they stood a chance. But now, they saw the power behind us. The organisation.
It was just the police and the Crusaders left, on this patch of asphalt, surrounding a bleeding warrior.
Trudie and her pack stood on the other side of the road, staring at the police with golden eyes. Some of the police glanced towards them. They didn’t know where to aim their guns.
More Crusaders stood on the balcony, guns aimed.
Kat wanted to deescalate this. But that was before she’d been stabbed. Before the police let this happen.
They may not have realised it yet, but Kat was more agreeable than I was. And I wasn’t letting them have her.
“How is she, Cins?” I whispered, placing my hand lightly on Cindy’s head. She held it and squeezed, before returning to her work.
“Not good. She needs a hospital. A purifier facility. Make sure we don’t lose the blade. I think it held a curse.”
“This is what’s going to happen,” I yelled to the police. “We’re going to put the Last Light into a van, and we’re taking her to a Heiligeslicht hospital. You will not block us; you will not intervene. You will not stop us from guarding her or caring for her. When she is awake and healthy, then she can decide if she will let you wrongfully arrest her.”
“Those are not my orders…”
“Fuck your orders!”
Faces turned to me. I don’t think they’d ever heard me swear before. Well, tonight was a night for surprises.
“Do you want a war, captain?” I continued, my voice far colder than it had been before. “Do you want to fight us? The hunters who kill immortals? We have fought gods and won. Do you think you can beat us? We are taking her to a hospital. And if you get in our way, you will die as an ingrate who got in the way of the hero who saved the lives of this city’s ungrateful inhabitants. A dozen times!”
Silence. No one moved. I stepped forward, peering over the heads of Kat’s - my men - and into the eyes of terrified police officers. I didn’t care if they were only doing their jobs. I was only doing mine.
“Will you comply?” I yelled.
I heard chattering from the police lines. Then, it opened up.
“We will escort you to the hospital…”
Victory…for now. But darkness had just about descended on the city once again. And that meant the vampires were going to play their hand once more.
Chapter 15. Dusk
***GUY***
By some miracle, we managed to get the convoy and Kat to the hospital. Cindy never stopped incanting, draining herself dry of spark. Pranish joined us, helping as best he could. As soon as we handed Kat over to the healers, my wife and the wizard collapsed.
The police formed a perimeter around the hospital. Probably to make sure Kat didn’t escape. Fine! Meant one more layer for the vamps to kill before getting to us.
“Get that gun on the roof!” a Crusader sergeant ordered, saluting me as I passed. Some recruits carrying definitely illegal LMGs carried them up the stairwell. Purifiers with white tabards and robes paled at the display. I would let Cindy make amends with them. They were her associates, after all.
I was an occupier. A military leader. Uncomfortable healers and purifiers were a small price to pay for reinforcing this place.
Kat made me the leader, but it was still Kat’s Crusaders. The HQ meant nothing without her in it. Which made this hospital, surrounding her room and bed, the new HQ.
Definitely needed more silver plating on the window bars!
But, it would have to do. Even without the need for a hospital, we would have needed to find a temporary base this night. I hadn’t been there for the ghoul attack, but I saw its results. Three armoured buses plunged deep into the walls of the HQ. They opened up from the front, letting ghouls spill out into our home.
Kat had almost died defending her people. Again. I would have wanted to scold her for risking her life so freely. Not for me, but for Brett’s sake. But I let her ghost do the scolding. She seldom realised how loudly they argued. I couldn’t hear what Treff…Trett…Trev was saying but Cindy could, and often chuckled as we eavesdropped through the walls.
I wondered what Kat’s ghost was thinking now. And then I stopped. That thought brought me uncertainty and pain.
Hah. Unlike me to sympathise with a ghost. Well, he was a Crusader. Like me. Dead or not.
The golden light of the setting sun had been replaced by the artificial fluorescent lighting of a hospital. Clean. Clinical. I walked past some harried hospital administrators. A man and woman, both wearing the Heiligeslicht tabards of purifiers. Their power was wasted on clipboards and pens.
“Giles-Mgebe?” I asked. I’d been rushing around the hospital fortifying our position. I didn’t know where Cindy had been taken after her collapse. It was duty that drove me onwards. Knowing that she’d want me to make sure everything was ready. Ready for the darkness…
The purifiers turned administrators looked confused, for a second, but then made an oh with their mouths.
“Cindy is resting in the staff room. She’s fine! Just a bit of burn-out,” the one purifier answered. She said my wife’s name with the familiarity of an old friend. I had met a few of Cindy’s purifier colleagues, but not all of them. And she had colleagues outside of Hope City as well. It filled me with pride that the love of my life was held in such high regard by so many people.
“You are Guy?” the other asked.
I nodded.
“Congratulations!” they both said, smiling, sadly. They were happy for us. And sad for what followed. Perhaps, they should be. But Cindy and I had expected this. Prepared for it. Our life was that of t
he hunt. It was only fitting that our wedding became a battle.
“And the Last Light?” I asked, pointedly using Kat’s title. She might have disliked the pretentiousness of it, but it was important to people. It reminded them of what Kat meant to this city. What she meant to me.
“We have her in our best room. Third floor. First on the left. She’s with her…husband?”
Close enough. I nodded my thanks.
I turned to leave, when the male purifier grabbed my arm. I stopped and cocked my head, waiting.
“Are we going to be safe?” he asked.
“Almost the entire Crusaders are here,” I replied, calmly. “For what may be coming, there are no finer defenders.”
“But will it be enough?” the lady added, face impassive. Clinical. She wanted the facts. She wasn’t afraid to hear the truth.
“I don’t know.”
I couldn’t…wouldn’t lie.
I left the administrators to their work and climbed the stairs to Kat’s room, passing barricades and checkpoints erected by Crusaders. These were good men and women. Courageous, even in the face of death and sheer exhaustion. Any lesser, and they would have fled, abandoned the fight, or fell into a pit of despair they would never rise from again.
But they didn’t. They held the line.
If I knew Kat at all, that’s all she’d want from them.
The third-floor hallway was conspicuously quiet. Not that it was empty. Henri patrolled up and down the hall. He had bandages around his arms. Ghouls had bitten him. Kat had saved him. That was a common theme among all those here. It was the same with me.
I may never have needed Kat to slice a head off a beast for me, but she’d saved me. In her own way.
Other Crusaders set up positions and barracks in empty rooms. All of them were making an extra effort to be quiet. Out of respect? Or out of an ominous feeling that the end was approaching?
I did not know. I was a quiet man. But I wished for some noise now. Just to break this eeriness.
I knocked on Kat’s door. I heard Brett’s growling, deep grunt in response. I opened the door.
My brother sat by Kat’s side. Our commander and friend lay peacefully, her eyes closed, and chest pulsating calmly. Her flaming coat hummed from another chair placed on the other side of the bed from Brett. Flanking her. Her bandages were clean. No more bleeding. Thank Qamata! But why wasn’t she awake? She’d gone through worse scrapes! Well, technically. The blade had gone deep. Just a damn shiv, but it had done the damage it needed.
I voicelessly stood by Kat’s side, facing my brother. He held her hand, tightly, not taking his eyes off her.
He cared too much for her. It was dangerous to love that much. Dangerous to become so reliant on a single person. When Kat had disappeared into the rift, it had broken him. And that was before they had gotten together. Now…I had never seen him like this.
“The fucking bloodsuckers…” he hissed, under his breath, as he used his free hand to push one of Kat’s errant bangs out of her eyes. “They couldn’t do it themselves, so they sent a fucking thug.”
Not that we could even be sure, as Brett had killed the man. He would probably have to answer for that. Or maybe not. This city was changing. We were changing it. My heart was still beating from adrenaline. I’d threatened the police! So much for keeping my head down. I wasn’t even a registered citizen!
“Jane’s contacts in the police say that the man lost his family during the Battle a few weeks back. He’s been posting on forums about his hatred for Kat. He was a disgruntled civ. Not an assassin.”
Brett’s knuckles whitened, somehow without increasing their grip on Kat’s hand. He was gentle with her. Always. But with nothing else. Ironically, she could probably handle it better than most.
“I’m not going to regret what I did, Guy. And you heard Cins – there was a curse on the blade. Vamp fucking magic, probably. They put him up to it.”
He rubbed his eyes and head, as if hiding an emotion, before revealing a face filled with sheer, cold, rage.
“We should have expected it.”
“How could we?” I replied. “How do you predict chaos? A dragon could spawn from a rift right now and devour us all. That is the world we live in. We can’t expect ourselves to make contingency plans for every damn thing.”
“Rich of you to say that. I’m sure you were looking at those windows and measuring them for silver bars.”
I was. Would be ordering them when I left the room!
I sighed. “We prepare as best we can. But you can’t prepare against the unpreparable. We can’t prepare against minds that we cannot understand.”
“I understand them…” Brett growled. “I understand their hunger, their hate, their viciousness. I understand that they all need to die.”
“You understand what you feel about them…” And perhaps not even that. “But none of us truly understands the mind of a vampire.”
And that was the problem…
How do you predict the alien? Unless, you come to understand them truly…
I let the quiet settle, before I softly spoke again.
“Before the police arrived, Kat told me that if anything was to happen to her, I’d be in charge.”
“Nothing has happened to her! She’s going to get better! She has to…”
“She will. You’ve heard her before. Nothing can kill her. Not this, and not vampires. But, while she rests, she put me in charge. I don’t know if that was a good idea, but it is a duty I will fulfil. For her.”
Brett snorted. “We all know Jane and Conrad are actually in charge.”
I smiled, faintly. There was still a bit of Brett in there. Even in this state.
I took a seat, letting Kat’s coat warm my back. Its flames lapped up against me, harmlessly. As if it was a dog licking a welcome visitor.
“I will do what needs to be done, Brett. For Kat, and for the Crusaders. But…”
I looked out, towards the dark sky with the tinge of red and blue from where the police lay in wait.
“I don’t know if we can win this. We’re only reacting. Playing cat and mouse, and we’re the mice. And when we aren’t fighting vamps, they’re turning the city against us.”
“I don’t care about this fucking city,” Brett growled, quietly. “They can hate me. I don’t care. I was raised to be hated. To be scorned. And to protect them anyway. And I was raised to prepare to lose. To know that I will die. That we all will. I know we’re losing. And we may all die. But…”
I saw droplets descend from his eyes, moistening the sheets on Kat’s bed.
“I don’t want her to leave me, Guy. Not again. Not ever.”
“I am married, my friend. I don’t want to lose. I don’t want to die. I have so much more to do. I want to have kids, I want to raise them, I want them see the green hills of my homeland. And I want you to be there with me. And Kat. I am not ready to die. One day, I want this all to end, and then I want peace.”
Brett contemplated the words, I like to think, before whispering his reply.
“There is a long way to go before we can have peace.” He said peace as if it was a joke. A fiction to be scorned. “We can only have it when every bloodsucker is dead. When every abomination is purged. Then…we can have peace.”
“Before the past returned, Brett, we faced our demons. We confronted the vampires of this city. We killed countless of them. And we learnt something…”
It pained me to admit it. I still smelled the ash and burning rubber. The scorched flesh of my mother, a tyre around her neck. Vampires did that. They took away my home, my family…everything.
But I had a new family now. A new home.
And I would do anything to protect them.
“We can’t beat them, Brett,” I finally said, and it stung me to tears. “We can’t beat them because we can’t understand them. And we never will. But they can. A vampire can understand its own…”
Brett finally looked up at me, his expression dark.
>
“Think carefully…my friend…before you go down this path…”
“We need allies!” I argued, as if trying to convince myself as well as my friend.
“Even if it means making a deal with the beasts who took everything from us?”
“You admitted yourself that Victoria Kruger was the lesser evil! She’s not Izingane Zegazi. Sanguineas is neutral. They’re from Hope City. And they may see reason!”
“Lesser, greater…it doesn’t fucking matter. She’s a monster. The only reason I haven’t killed her is because I can’t.”
He looked away from me, back into the still face of the Last Light.
I didn’t speak. I knew it would be pointless. How could I convince Brett when I wasn’t even sure myself?
I left Kat’s room, telling a Crusader to get some bars up on her window. Krieg inclined his head towards me as he stood guard outside Kat’s room. I nodded back, not letting my face betray anything.
Krieg was a product of a different age, I had to tell myself. The problem: he was dragging my friend back to it.
But that didn’t matter. All that mattered was survival. At all costs. Even if it meant making a deal with the very creatures I’d sworn to kill.
Chapter 16. Allegiance
I travelled in darkness, accompanied only by the reassuring chorus of my motorcycle’s engine, and the whispers of my past. Unbidden, the faces of all I’d lost came back to me as I sped through the eerily quiet night, into the dark, wooded lands of Constantia, towards a house I’d stormed years back, and where I’d failed in my final duty. Again.
If only the Izingane Zegazi knew how weak I was! That Kuzalwa had not died by my hand. Graham, that bastard, had played a final joke on me in the end. His destruction of the vampire lord had been so final, that it had muddied the connection he had with the Blood. The last thing they knew, was that Kuzalwa had been fighting me. An errant tokoloshe was the last thing they would believe.
But I’d killed one of them now. For real. Well, Cindy had. What would I do without her?
That battle at my wedding had been deceptive. Sure, in the old days, we would have been slaughtered. But we were powerful now. Even for a true vampire lord. For a moment, I thought we could handle this. That the Crusaders could defeat the inevitable. Together.
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