Blood Street

by Alves, Carl

  Magnus winced as he sat. “I would be willing, if he can exert self-control. That’s how this mess started.”

  “I use self-control,” Alexei said. “You’re just jealous because your life is a flicker and mine is a burning flame.”

  Magnus was about to leap out of his chair, but Gabriella gave him a stern look. She turned to Alexei. “That won’t get us anywhere. We’re your friends, but you have to compromise. Being a creature of the night doesn’t entitle you to do whatever you want. Are you willing, at least temporarily, to stop killing indiscriminately?”

  Alexei sighed. “Yes.”

  She turned to Magnus. “Are you willing to stop casting blame and guide us through this situation as the leader of this brood?”

  “Yes, I will, for the good of the family.”

  “Good. This is the last time I see you two battle it out. The next time it happens, I leave.” She picked up her shopping bag and walked to her room.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Enzo followed Sophie and Andrews into Vito Anastasia’s apartment.

  Andrews’s brow furrowed. “You sure about this?”

  Enzo nodded. “This kid knows his stuff.”

  They stepped through piles of unfolded clothes and electronics parts on the way to his office, which doubled as his living room. They then sat on folding chairs around the Wiz’s desk as he typed on his keyboard. Clutter covered nearly every inch of the room.

  “I spent two whole days at the Drexel library and did a thorough analysis of the history of vampires.” The Wiz stopped and stared at Sophie. “Don’t move.” He flicked a spider that was crawling on her shoulder. It landed on the floor, and he stomped it with his foot. “I keep telling the landlord he’s got to exterminate this place.”

  “Maybe you should clean up every once in a while,” Sophie said.

  The Wiz continued typing. “It’s only temporary until I get a new place.” His printer stirred to life. “Anyway, in order to get any kind of meaningful data, I discarded the information that was obviously crap. Some of the beliefs about vampires were ridiculous. Like in Ghana and India, they suck blood from people’s thumbs and toes when they’re asleep, which would make them a pain in the ass, but not really harmful. In Indonesia, all you got to do is pluck a strand of hair from their head to escape from one. My favorite was in Prussia back in the day, where they thought vampires are into problem-solving, so they left them knots or puzzles in their graves, which kept them occupied for centuries.”

  “I get the picture,” Andrews said. “But how do you know it’s bullshit?”

  The Wiz’s brows creased. “I don’t know for sure, but that’s what this is about. We’re trying to figure out what has the highest chance of succeeding. Am I right?” He stared at Enzo and Sophie.

  “What did you come up with?” Enzo asked.

  “I developed statistical models to analyze the data. I wasn’t satisfied with the results, so I tried something different. I thought vampire mythology had some inherent errors because these people were primitive, so I incorporated vampire literature into the data analysis. I realize these are works of fiction, but I thought it would be pretty useful.”

  Andrews buried his face into his palm.

  “I assigned a lower weight to vampire literature.”

  “Why would you use it at all?” Andrews asked.

  “What these authors wrote had to be based on legend or word of mouth. I’m pretty sure they didn’t pull it out their ass.”

  “How do you know?” Andrews asked.

  “Are you always so negative? Dude, you gotta chill.”

  Andrews glared at the Wiz.

  Enzo glanced at Special Agent Andrews, trying to reassure him. Andrews might be reluctant to believe the Wiz, but he had faith in the kid.

  “Let’s get to the good stuff. The first thing we need to know is how to kill them.” The Wiz handed each of them a set of papers. “As you can see this is a long list. That’s because we’re dealing with vampire mythology from lots of cultures. For instance, the Chinese believe vampires could be contained by a circle of rice since rice is important in their culture.”

  “And he’s a philosopher too,” Andrews said.

  The Wiz's jaw tightened. “Anyway, before I was rudely interrupted, there’s no one thing that has an exceptionally high probability. Instead, there are four or five things that have a higher percentage, so you might want to concentrate on them.”

  “We’ll worry about that,” Andrews said.

  “Some of these results were surprising. To start, there’s a fifty-six percent chance vampires could get killed by beheading.”

  Andrews put his hand in the air. “Hold up. Is that your top thing, beheading?”

  The Wiz scratched his head. “Yeah, that’s right.”

  “Our best option gives us a fifty-fifty chance of killing him. Are you kidding?”

  Enzo lit a cigarette. “At this point I’ll take fifty percent. I know the shit we’ve done gives us zero percent, and fifty is better than nothing.”

  “I don’t think anything we try is going to be a sure thing,” Sophie said. “We just have to do our best with the information we have.”

  “Thank you. I ain’t a miracle worker. Anyway, incineration is next at fifty-one percent. At just under fifty is piercing with a wooden instrument. Sometimes it’s a wooden stake through the heart, sometimes the neck, eyes, or abdomen. I couldn’t really say if it’s the wood that does the trick, or if it’s stabbing in a certain place.”

  “Aren’t vampires supposed to only get around at night?” Enzo asked.

  “I found that there’s a ninety-two percent probability that they are primarily night dwellers, but only a forty-one percent chance that sunlight will injure or kill them.”

  “Shouldn’t those two things mesh?” Enzo asked.

  The Wiz shrugged. “Beats me. I’m not claiming to be a vampire expert.”

  Sophie grinned. “Where’s Van Helsing when you need him?”

  “There’s no Van Helsing,” Enzo said. “It’s just us.”

  “What about garlic?” Andrews asked. “Garlic is supposed to ward off vampires.”

  “Garlic is used against vampires in Germany, Greece and Romania. There’s a twenty-three percent chance that garlic will be useful against them. Poppy seeds, which are said to put vampires to sleep, have a higher probability.”

  Enzo shrugged. “Maybe we’ll have our people carry both. It can’t hurt.”

  “We should recruit a priest or rabbi,” Sophie suggested.

  “There’s little evidence that suggests a religious person or relic has any effect,” the Wiz said.

  “I don’t want to get anyone else involved in this madness, anyway,” Enzo said.

  “I agree,” Andrews said. “We need to operate in secrecy. The last thing we need is people thinking Alexei is a real vampire.”

  “There’s about twenty other things on the list, like boiling their heads in vinegar, putting a nail through their navel, cutting out their hearts, and so on,” the Wiz said.

  Enzo pressed his lips against his folded hands. “I think we have some good ideas. We need to know how to identify vampires in case there are more like him.”

  The Wiz turned around and began typing. A few seconds later the whirring of the printer sounded. He handed them additional pages. “All right, this was tricky since there was less data to work with. People were more interested in killing them or preventing them from attacking rather than figuring out who they were. Maybe they could easily identify vampires back then. A lot of stuff on the list isn’t practical. There’s a forty-six point three percent chance that vampires don’t have a reflection in the mirror. The next best thing is that there’s a thirty-six percent chance that an animal, most likely a horse or a dog, would have an extreme negative reaction to their presence. Once again, pretty impractical. The other thing that comes up is that if you put a female virgin in the middle of a cemetery, they’ll flock to her. Good luck finding a virg
in around here.”

  Andrews put his hand to his forehead. “I’m getting a headache thinking about this.”

  Enzo studied the Wiz’s results, ignoring the chatter. After a few minutes he looked up. “The problem with this list is that it's derived from olden times. Beheading was fine when people carried swords, but we use guns. Why the hell won’t bullets work?”

  “Maybe it has something to do with the materials they used,” Sophie said. “I’m just thinking out loud. Maybe it’s the metal of the sword or the type of wood used for the stake. If poppy seeds or garlic are effective, then something about their chemical reaction harms vampires. Same with the sunlight.”

  “I don’t really give a shit about vampire theory. I want to know how to kill the bastards. We can't go around the city carrying stakes or swords. We know guns with conventional bullets don’t work.” Andrews paced around the room. “What if we shoot him with something that could harm him?” He turned toward Sophie. “If your theory about the wood is accurate, then maybe we could use that.”

  “Wooden bullets?” Enzo asked.

  Andrews shrugged. “Why not?”

  “Never heard of them,” Enzo said.

  “Neither have I. We could use a wood bullet with less gunpowder than a conventional bullet, creating a high-speed wooden projectile.”

  “How in the hell are we going to get wooden bullets?” Enzo asked. “I’m guessing they don’t sell them in gun stores.”

  “I can get the boys at Quantico to work on it. If it’s possible to make them, they can do it.”

  “It can’t hurt,” Sophie said. “Maybe we should also get stakes. Hey, a shotgun with wooden pellets might be interesting.”

  “Sure,” Enzo said. “I have a guy who owns a lumber yard.”

  The Wiz returned from the kitchen with a bottle of Mountain Dew. “What about the whole beheading thing? That’s got a higher percentage.”

  Andrews scowled. “Don’t you have something else to do?”

  “You have a bad attitude. Are the rest of the Feds like you?”

  “Enough already,” Enzo said. “Don’t worry about the swords. I know a guy who can get us samurai swords, ninja swords, the medieval kind, whatever we need.”

  “Do you have a guy for everything?” Andrews asked.

  Enzo shrugged.

  “What about bows?” the Wiz asked. “We can use the same wooden material from the bullets and make arrows out of them.”

  “Not a bad idea,” Andrews said. “We’ll stockpile weapons. This way, the next time we find him, we’ll be ready.”

  Sophie asked, “We know what Alexei looks like, but what about other vampires?”

  “First, we need to find out where he lives,” Enzo said. “If we can track him down, then we can find others of his kind.”

  “Where would a vampire live?” Sophie asked. “Would he live in a house? Or maybe a cave or something like that?”

  They all turned to the Wiz, who had become the resident vampire expert. “I didn’t find out about that, but if he’s roaming around Philadelphia, I doubt he’d live in a cave.”

  “We have to find Alexei and follow him,” Andrews said. “That way we can get him when he’s least expecting it, and we can get his friends while we’re at it.”

  “We have to wait until he gets out of his little rat hole,” Enzo said. “If he doesn’t leave willingly, then we’re going to have to smoke him out.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The Goat coughed uncontrollably when he entered the Russian’s house. It stank of mildew and old people. Still feeling like death from yet another bender last night, he ran to the bathroom, fell to his knees and vomited his breakfast of bacon and scrambled eggs. As he lifted his head, he realized he should have eaten something less abrasive.

  Vladimir stood outside of the bathroom. “You okay?”

  The Goat braced himself on the toilet. “No. How do you fucking live here?”

  Vladimir spoke in Russian to Ksenya. She nodded and walked away.

  “Where’s she going?” The Goat asked.

  “She get grandfather,” Vladimir replied.

  The Goat experienced several unsteady moments and nearly vomited again.

  Fortunately, Ksenya returned soon after with the old Russian. The sooner he talked to him, the sooner he could leave. The man reeked of cigarette smoke and vodka. His speech was slurred and his movements shaky. If he wasn’t able to tell them anything, and The Goat came to this shit hole for no reason, he was going to be pissed.

  The old man began a long narrative. Ksenya translated as Vladimir made coffee.

  The tale began in Georgia eighty years ago. As a young boy, an evil had terrorized Vasilly’s village. Something mysteriously killed farm animals and drained their blood. His father, Dimitri, and neighboring farmers stood guard at night, armed with rifles. After a week, the villagers became the target of these attacks. On several occasions, the men spotted a shadowy figure moving so fast they could barely see it.

  One night, a loud shriek came from the house next to Dimitri’s farm. He grabbed his rifle and ran toward the sound. He circled the house and found a vourdelak with long, dark hair kneeling over his neighbor’s wife, sucking blood from her neck.

  He shot her, but to his astonishment, it had no effect on her. The blood drinker approached him with a crazed look, like a rabid animal. Blood and flesh hung from her mouth. Her narrow eyes shifted. She appeared to have little intelligence.

  He reloaded his rifle and shot her, causing her to fall backward. Just when he thought she was dead, she rose to her feet.

  Dimitri offered a prayer, thinking for sure she would kill him. When the other villagers came in mass, the vourdelak fled.

  They chased the vourdelak for several miles down a valley and backed her into a cave. Before they opened fire, she charged at them with inhuman fury.

  In a flurry of action, the vourdelak grabbed a man’s head and tore it off with inhuman strength. His head fell to the ground and rolled past Dimitri. She grabbed another villager by his left arm and swung him around several times before releasing him. He flew through the air and smashed into a stone wall. Dimitri continued to shoot, but never came close to hitting her. Other villagers shot her, but it only slowed her down.

  Dimitri yelled for his neighbors to escape while they still could. He fled and did not dare look back.

  Vasilly stopped his narrative and asked for a bottle of vodka. Ksenya retrieved it for him. He topped off his half-filled cup of coffee with vodka.

  “Go easy, old man,” The Goat said.

  Vasilly grunted.

  The Goat nodded. “That’s some fucking story. Is any of it true?”

  Ksenya’s face tightened. “It is all true.”

  After drinking his coffee-vodka mixture, Vasilly resumed his narrative.

  The vourdelak continued her night attacks. A week later, the villagers went to the elders for advice, there were stories of these creatures of the night invading the area before. The elders had conflicting opinions on how to deal with them.

  Dimitri and Vasilly rode by donkey thirty miles to see an old woman who was known as a seer. When they arrived at her house, the old woman’s great-granddaughter would not let them talk to her. She was in deep meditation and would not take visitors. They waited for hours, and the great-granddaughter made them dinner. When the seer emerged, Vasilly had fallen asleep. He woke up staring at the oldest woman he had ever seen. Her wrinkled skin sagged. Her mouth was withered and narrow. She was so hunched over that she only reached his chest.

  Her great-granddaughter handed the seer a steaming cup of tea. As the old woman sipped it, Dimitri told her about the vourdelak.

  She appeared to doze during the tale. Vasilly’s head snapped back when she spoke in a clear voice. “To kill the vourdelak, you must penetrate its black heart with a stake from an ash tree.”

  Numerous ash trees grew a few miles down the road, but it was late at night, so they slept in a stable behind the ho
use, barely protected from the biting wind. The next morning, Dimitri and his son chopped down a tree and carved stakes.

  Later, Dimitri met with men from the village. They decided to attack and not retreat until they killed the vourdelak.

  Dimitri forbade his son to accompany them. If he died, Vasilly had to take over the farm and care for his mother and two sisters. Vasilly was adamant that he help fight the vourdelak, but his father would not hear of it. With tears streaming down his eyes, he watched his father leave.

  Vasilly made the decision to disobey his father. His father would beat him with a rawhide strap, but he was willing to face the consequences. He left shortly thereafter, taking an ash stake. He maintained a distance as he followed, hiding behind bushes and trees when possible. The men were intent on their task and did not notice him.

  They walked for over a mile and scaled a tall hill, lighting the night sky with their torches. At the top of the hill, they approached a large cave. After brief deliberation, three men entered the cave. Dimitri was not among them. Overcome by curiosity, Vasilly crept up the hill, no longer concerned about being noticed.

  Vasilly dropped his stake when shrieks followed by the heavy sound of running came from the cave. The vourdelak emerged with unnatural skin that looked like porcelain. With her massive fangs, she tore into the back of a man’s neck. She gulped his blood before ripping the shoulder out of the socket of another fleeing man.

  Vasilly watched in terror as the men made a futile attempt to fight. She spun and fought like a demon. Despite her quickness, they inflicted wounds on her. Still, one by one, they fell. It was an abominable scene of gore, but Vasilly could not stop watching.

  Dimitri charged the vourdelak with his stake raised at shoulder level. With little effort, she sidestepped him. He stumbled over a rock that jutted out of the ground and landed with a thud. Another farmer ran after her. In a fluid motion, she turned and raked her nails across his throat. Blood spurted from gaping wounds in his neck.