The Vampire Club (21 page)

The professor had a hand against Laumer’s torn shirt, the tweezers pointed as if digging for silver bullets. Laumer himself was also slow, eyes glazed, still in a stupor. I considered digging out the bullets myself and getting Laumer to help me, but I have a weak constitution and gouging a guy’s meat isn’t my idea of a good time.

Though I suspected it might be later.

I came upon ten more of the hunters, and, following the same slow, tedious process, removed their guns. I wasn’t sure how long real time would last, or if my virginal vampire powers would cut it shorter than Laumer’s use of it in the basement.

I set out once again, following, I hoped, the circle I had started at the first dozen. I moved just too damned slowly in this real time. At least at this speed I wouldn’t accidentally pass anyone.

And I wondered if this was what time felt like when you were wounded with silver bullets and stuck in a coffin, a coma in which every moment felt like a century. No wonder Laumer would do anything not to return.

The sun was at my back now, warming me enough to sting a little, and I was just completing my circle when I came upon a group of eight hunters. This must be all of them. And as I began stripping fingers and breaking them, I came across Grandmaster.

He had a possessed gleam in his eye that really didn’t look psychologically sound, like a rabid dog whose favorite chew toy had been stolen by another mutt.

Thinking that it was about time to enter normal time, I pulled myself to a relative halt. Grandmaster first noticed his rifle had suddenly fallen from broken fingers. And then he saw me smiling in front of him.

I put my tongue against my teeth just to make sure they were pointy.

They were.

I smiled.

Chapter Fifty-two

Like a man possessed, Grandmaster lashed out at me, hitting me squarely in the jaw and knocking me back on my chess-champ, right-fielder behind. He didn’t even flinch from the broken fingers.

The bastard.

“
Is he a vampire?” asked a VVV minion.

“
Must be. How, I don’t know, but he must be. Could swear he wasn’t before. Just look at his skin. Gawd, that’s disgusting! Rocko, get my gun. Who has the silver bullets? Good.”

Bruce Lee “entered the dragon.” As for me, I “entered the vampire.” I sprang to my feet. Someone immediately pulled my arms back in a wrestling hold. I tried to power up, but the sun must have weakened me more than I imagined.

“
You were a dipshit vampire lover, and now you’re a dipshit vampire,” Grandmaster said. “It will be a pleasure to destroy you.”

Those were fighting words, I believed.

The man-beast who held my arms suddenly experienced what it was like having both your wrists and every finger break at the same time. He crunched like a case of candy bars in an elephant stampede.

Vampire strength, I discovered, was often there when you needed it. And I wondered if vampire stamina would extend to loveplay when dear Janice and I—

But there would be time for that later.

Grandmaster quickly slammed home a silver bullet in his Stallion .43, his twisting fingers still working just fine. I think the old creep had a thing for pain, because he seemed to be enjoying himself.

And when I pulled back my fist ready to slam home a powerful punch, Grandmaster danced away. This obviously wasn’t his first vampire rodeo.

“
By the way,” he taunted. “We’re not afraid of you. You may be a vampire. You may be able to break a few bones, but we’re not afraid. We can all break bones. You’re just some idiot who happens to be a vampire, and, I truly believe you have no idea what to do with it. Because you’re still an idiot.”

I was so focused on Grandmaster’s leering face, and attempting to launch back into real time, that I almost didn’t notice the well-armed VVV Brother to the right.

Almost.

Chapter Fifty-three

I attacked quickly and furiously. I was a vampire on a mission. These guys were starting to annoy me.

I couldn’t enter real time because of the sun’s dulling effect, but I didn’t do too badly for a college-aged vampire. I was at the gunman’s side before he was able to aim his .43 Stallion.

I caught his hand just as it closed around the gun’s handle. But I overran him. Except I never let go of his arm. And the funny thing was I kept holding it, and what was even funnier was he was still standing a half a dozen feet away. And you know what was really funny? I don’t know, but it sure wasn’t that shocked look in his eyes.

What could I do? I mean, I really did feel sort of bad for the guy, you know, taking his arm and everything. On second thought, make that part of his shoulder too, since there seemed to be a chunky portion hanging off the end.

I just dropped it in the dirt. It was getting heavy.

While my would-be killer passed out, I seemed to have gotten the attention of the other vampire hunters.

Maybe Grandmaster was right. Maybe I didn’t know what I was doing, but one thing is and was for sure: Whatever I screwed up, I planned to screw up bad. I didn’t care how much training these guys had.

All I knew was that I wanted out of here and to have time to put my head on straight. I had to revive the Vampire Laumer and get the full scoop on this vampire business.

There were eighteen of them now, and one of me. Poor them.

They had automatically begun to form a tactical circle around me. The guns were at my back, and when one of them moved too close, I was on him faster than a pit bull on a poodle. Actually, quicker than that and with more blood.

And they went berserk after watching me destroy another one of them. I was getting the hang of this bloodthirsty shit, though I wasn’t yet thirsty for real. The blood, however, looked different to me now, rich, vibrant, teeming with life. Good.

Most of the VVV had brandished knives and were coming at me from all directions. I launched myself, first clawing at a knife, then at a face, then at a hairy bronze arm, then a smirk, then a thumb, then an ankle bone—you know how those hurt when you bump them—and finally poking an eye or two, until all the carnage starting blurring together.

What was so incredible was that, though I was moving so quickly, I was in total and absolute control of my body. No limb or digit moved without my being fully aware of it. It wasn’t an instinct thing, because I did have to think about every movement, except that my mind was operating at such a higher speed than any mortal could possibly comprehend, and my body parts responded instantly.

I was in fast forward, moving like lightning, very different than the real time, when I seemed to be almost in another dimension. No, I was in fast forward and these assholes were moving, but now they were the chess champs and I was the schoolyard bully.

Did they possibly think they could take on a vampire? What about all their training in vampire hunting? Maybe the training slackened after conquering so many vampires over all those decades. But I think they mostly felt they could take me, with my being a rookie vampire and all.

But it was like I’d always suspected: even the worst vampire was a little bit better than the best human.

“
Ears looking at you, kid!” I grunted faster than their ears could have picked up the sound, as I punched my finger tips through somebody’s ear cartilage and came away with a fleshy prize, which I promptly spun into the air like a pink Frisbee. No wonder action heroes came up with silly one-liners while killing people—it made the whole thing a lot easier to stomach.

I chopped and sliced and tore and bit and hurt and killed. I was a whirlwind of death. I’m not sure how much time had elapsed, but I discovered sooner than I had expected that there were no more contenders.

Except one.

Grandmaster stood off to the edge of the clearing, the .43 Stallion in his hand and pointed at me.

“
You’ve just slaughtered the pride of the VVV,” he said, with a mixture of disgust and awe.

I stopped, just stopped, and was as motionless as, well, those corpses. My heart hammered hard. I had not been aware of it before, or maybe it had just begun, but I was suddenly very concerned.

Why was my heart beating? I was dead, right?

I took a step then, and my foot sort of staggered. What was wrong?

There was something going on inside me. Something both disturbing and curious. I felt it in my body. The sensation caused a weakness in me, caused my arms and chest to shudder; but there was something else, and how I knew this I couldn’t tell you, but I knew there was a solution to the weakness. It wouldn’t take much, I felt, to solve the weakness. And my body seemed to be waiting impatiently for it.

“
You can kill pretty good, but you’re still an idiot,” Grandmaster said. Then he pulled the trigger.

Chapter Fifty-four

A fistful of fists seemingly punched me pretty much everywhere.

And as if of its on volition, my feet jumped up, and I jumped back, landing hard on my back.

I wanted to black out, but I couldn’t. My fingers clawed at the dirt. I writhed as if somebody far away was twisting a dozen nails in a voodoo doll of me.

I managed to lift my head through all the pain and looked at my chest. My shirt was shredded but dry—no blood. Suddenly my torso jerked upwards. Every muscle in me seemed to contract at once and it felt like I was taking a crap through thirteen or fourteen different holes. Seriously. My body was pushing the bullets out, squeezing them out as if they were passing through many rectums.

I didn’t know if the word “rectum” could be made plural, but I didn’t give a shit at the moment.

I watched my shirt, noticing first that I wasn’t breathing, then bullets rose up from my skin like missiles from silos in the ground. They were clean and glistening in the morning sun. They began tipping over and rolling down my body. It was creepy but kind of cool.

“
Fucking vampire! They gave me regular bullets.”

“
Sucks to be you,” I said. That line was too good not to use every chance you got.

I rolled over as fast as I could manage, which was still pretty damned fast considering I had a bunch of holes in me. The ground exploded with bullets where I had been laying. I rolled and rolled and the bullets followed. But I was picking up speed, and his arm movements could not keep up even with my rolling.

Yeah, sure, I rolled over rocks and branches and bushes, and yes it hurt, in a distant, weird way. Or maybe my mind felt like I ought to feel a sympathetic pain, and the real me was pretty much without feeling.

And then the bullets stopped, and I knew Grandmaster had run out of ammo.

He didn’t see me. He might have sensed me, but I was on top of him before he could react. I hit his shoulders with my palms, and his feet kicked up, and I stood there and watched him crack a tree. He slid down, and I figured I might have killed him. Hell I fucking drilled him!

But he only shook his granite head and looked at me shocked. Maybe even scared. And he did not do it well, probably the first time he’d been scared in a long, long time.

The shaking overcame me again. My knees wobbled and I almost dropped to the ground. Christ. I felt sick. It felt like every nutrient in my body was missing. I felt like I was living on fumes, much like my old Escort ran on most of the time.

I needed, I needed....

Blood.

I closed my eyes. Shit. I had forgotten about this part, or else I had been trying not to think about it.

Maybe I’d been a little numb before, but now an ache settled deep in my gut. In my heart. In my soul, if I still had such a thing.

I took a step toward Grandmaster.

Never in all my life was I so lacking in energy. I was drained. The Vampire Laumer didn’t have much blood to start with, and he had given me what he could spare, just as I’d given to him. I needed more, and I needed it now. Needed like I had never imagined I needed anything before in my life.

I found my self staring at Grandmaster, and my eyes were probably red. They sure felt red. He scooted back against the tree but cringed in pain, probably from all the broken bones. I think he saw something in my eyes he didn’t like.

Ever been really, really hungry and walked into a house with freshly made cookies staring back at you, the aroma permeating your whole being? You needed them.

Let me put it this way. The only difference here was that I couldn’t smell Grandmaster.

My legs shook, my hips protested. It wasn’t that the blood I had, or at least what I thought I had, was old or bad, it was just that it wasn’t enough. I needed more.

And I’d thought my lust for Janice was strong. This was like seeing Janice in a sheer nightgown in a honeymoon suite on a tropical island holding a platter of fresh oven-baked cookies—well, you get my drift.

My legs shook even more as I forced myself to turn away. I didn’t want this bastard’s life substance anywhere near me.

I stumbled through a bush and was not able to catch myself as I fell on my face. But what was amazing was that my gaze never left Grandmaster. I pushed myself up on spaghetti arms and was moving again.