Dark Season: The Complete Box Set (89 page)

Nimrod

Today.

"Down here!" I shout, dragging Sophie along a side-tunnel. We keep running and eventually we pause once it seems that we've shaken him - for now, at least. In the distance, there's the sound of his footsteps echoing through the tunnel and getting closer. He's not hurrying; he's just walking behind us, waiting for us to make a mistake. He knows these sewers well; he knows all the dead-ends and loops. He knows we can't escape, and he's just toying with us. I knew this is how it would end.

"We have to go!" Sophie says, out of breath and trying to pull me along. "He's hunting us!"

"You go. I'll stay to hold him off."

"I need you," she says, almost at the point of tears.

"Not as much as Abigail needs you," I say.

"I
need
you!" she insists, clearly starting to panic. She doesn't believe she can handle Patrick without me. She's right, of course, but we've gone beyond the point of no return. The prophecy is locked in now, and the final moments are counting down. There was never any chance to escape this fate, not for her at least, but I've managed to make a few changes, to sneak through some loopholes in the prophecy. Patrick won't be getting quite what he bargained for.

"You don't need me," I say calmly.

"I do!" she says, almost shouting. She's desperate now. She knows that the prophecy says Patrick will kill her. She knows that time is running out.

"You need me to delay him!" I insist. "That's all I can do for you now. For the sake of Abigail, you have to go! Everything's about her now."

Clutching Abigail, Sophie stares at me with true fear in her eyes. "Go where?" she asks, her voice weak and frail. "There's nowhere
to
go! He's everywhere! Even if we get to the end of the tunnel, he'll find us."

"That's not true," I say, trying to think of a way to give her some hope. She knows Patrick well, and she understands that he'll never, ever stop searching for Abigail. Faced with daunting odds of survival, Sophie is clearly starting to fall apart, but I have to find a way to show her that she can still run, even if ultimately any attempt at escape is futile. "You have to keep a clear head," I say. "You've got a head-start, so use it. Get Abigail as far away from here as possible. You've got a chance. You'll need a little luck, but you've got a real chance. Go. Now!"

She shakes her head, tears brimming in her eyes. Staring down at Abigail, Sophie seems to have given up, even as the child stares up at her mother with wide-eyed wonder.

"Aren't you scared of Patrick?" I ask, fearing that my plans could be ruined by a stupid, scared girl who refuses to fight. I need Sophie to run so that Patrick will chase her down. If she just gives up, he might become suspicious. "Don't you fear what he'll do to you if he ever catches up to you? Remember last time he got hold of you. He threw you down that well and left you to rot. Don't you think he'll do something even worse this time?"

She nods, but she still seems frozen to the spot.

"And think of Abigail," I say. "Think of this poor child, torn from her mother's arms and raised by... by what? What
is
Patrick? A dying vampire. The last of his kind. A relic of a bygone age, doomed and violent and vicious. Can you even begin to imagine the torture that this young girl will go through if she's raised by such a creature? By the time she's old enough to realize what's happening, it'll be too late. She'll be like her father. Worse, even. Do you really want that to happen? Do you really want Patrick to be the one who ends up raising Abigail? Think of the monster she'll become. Look into her innocent little eyes and imagine her being tortured year after year by Patrick's actions."

Sophie nods, but she's sobbing now as she looks down at Abigail's face. For her part, Abigail stares up at her mother with a look of complete adoration. The child recognizes her mother, and she loves her completely.

"You must run," I say. "Every second is valuable. Do you understand?"

Sophie doesn't answer.

"Do you understand?" I shout, grabbing her shoulder and shaking her.

"Yes!" she shouts back through the tears. "I understand!"

"I'll wait here," I say. "This is the only way he can come after you. I'll hold him off. I can't manage it forever, but I can keep him back long enough to help you."

"What'll happen to you?" she asks.

I pause, not wanting to tell her the truth. "I'll be fine," I say, which is kind of true in some respects. "I'll handle him. As long as I know you're going to be okay, I can manage."

"Thank you," she says through her sobs. "I'll tell Abigail all about you."

"Goodbye," I say. "Now run."

She turns and runs off along the sewer tunnel, her feet splashing through the water as she carries Abigail away to safety. She won't make it very far, of course. Patrick will catch up to me and kill me, and Sophie will get lost in the maze of tunnels before Patrick finally tracks her down and kills her as well. At that point, taking Abigail, Patrick will be convinced that he's won. Only at the final moment will he realize that I've tricked him, and by that point it'll be too late for him to do anything to stop me. I'll be dead, killed by his hands, and he'll realize that I still won. Good old Patrick, it's been so long since he spoke a word; I can only imagine the fury in his voice when he finally discovers what I've done. I'm taking all his anger and rage, and I'm using it against him.

"So this is it, huh?" asks a familiar voice next to me.

I turn to find that my brother David has returned. It must be twenty, twenty-five years since I last saw his ghost. He hasn't aged a day, of course; he still looks as young and fresh as he did all those years ago when I killed him.

"This is it," I say, trying to remain calm and focused.

"You're really going to do it?" he asks. "You're really going to sacrifice your life so that Sophie and the child can live?"

I take a deep breath. "It's not quite as simple as that," I say slowly. "I'm going to let Patrick kill me so that I finally get what I want."

"And what is that?" David asks. "I've never understood what you really want, brother. You seem so lost and confused."

"I want Patrick to suffer," I say. "I want him to realize that he came so close to getting the one final thing that he wanted, and I want him to realized that I snatched it away from him just as he snatched my dreams away from me. I want him to suffer the greatest agonies that any creature can suffer, and I want him to know that I'm responsible."

"Can't you just forgive him?" David says. "Can't you just accept that you were never meant to be a vampire?"

I turn to him and bare my fangs. These teeth were human once, but I carved them to create sharp points.

"Yeah yeah," David says, "but beyond getting your fangs out, what can you really do? You're nothing like Patrick. You're just a human."

"I can set him up to fall," I say, "and then I can die knowing that he'll never be able to get the child he wants."

David laughs. "You've really shoe-horned yourself into this prophecy, haven't you?" He stares at me. "Patrick was going to kill Sophie anyway, but you had to make sure you were right in the middle of it, didn't you?"

"I want him to suffer," I say. "The prophecy says he must kill her. It doesn't say why, or how."

"And you have to die as well?" David asks.

"I do."

He smiles. "I suppose it was always going to end like this, wasn't it? With pain and bloodshed and violence."

I nod.

"You know," David continues, "this is the first time I've appeared to you."

I stare at him. "The first time?" I ask, confused.

"All those other times, it wasn't me," he says. "The ghost of David you used to talk to was entirely a figment of your imagination. But I was there too, invisible and watching. Now I've finally decided to let you see me. It seems fitting, somehow, considering what's about to happen to you." He pauses. "So tell me, brother. You tried being angry and passionate like Patrick, and it didn't work. Then you tried being the opposite; you tried being calm and logical. At the end of the day, which of those approaches worked?" He grins. "Which of those was the real Charles Nimrod?"

"I don't know," I say, and it's true. Every personality I've tried has been a failure. I've lived my whole life in Patrick's shadow, first trying to become him and then trying to destroy him. Now, just as I seem to be on the cusp of a great victory, I find myself having to look deep into my soul to try to find the real me. The problem is: there's nothing there. There's no real me. It's as if the real Charles Nimrod died all those years ago.

"Good luck," David says kindly.

"Thank you," I say.

"I hope it doesn't hurt," he says. "When he kills you, I mean. I hope it's quick."

"I hope so too," I reply. "Did it hurt for you?"

"What?" David asks. "When you murdered me?" He smiles. "Yes. Yes, it hurt. It was agony." He looks past me. "He's here," he says.

"Goodbye," I say to my brother, feeling my heart-rate start to increase.

"Goodbye," he says. "See you on the other side."

I turn and see a dark figure in the shadows at the far end of the tunnel. He's walking slowly toward me, determined to get past and chase Sophie. I know that he doesn't give a damn about me. As far as he's concerned, Charles Nimrod is just another human fool who poses a mere distraction. But if he under-estimates me, he'll be sorry. I've waited so long for this moment; I've waited and waited for the day when I'll fight Patrick, and he'll kill me. The day is finally here. There's no chance to avoid it. No more running, no more hiding. No more planning. All the plans have been set into motion. All I can do is try to enjoy my final moments as Patrick rips me apart. The only way I can win this battle is if I die. It will be a painful, but ultimately a glorious, victory, because I know full well that after I'm dead, Patrick will discover the truth about what I've really done to Sophie. His rage is his greatest weakness, and I will use it to destroy him.

Nimrod

1990.

It's raining. It was always going to be raining, wasn't it? A night like this, when several destinies come together and merge as one, was always going to be dark and stormy. It's as if the elements themselves have conspired to ensure that no-one here forgets the momentous nature of what is happening. The final act of the prophecy is ready to begin.

I hurry along the path that leads from the road up to the hospital in Dedston. This whole town is a mess, falling apart as the crime rate rises, unemployment soars and the infrastructure collapses. Why anyone would ever choose to live in such a depraved place is beyond me, but I suppose some of these pathetic fools have no choice. They have to live where they were born, and they have to take the roles that are available to them. Most of them, anyway. Every so often, however, one is born who has a special destiny. Tonight is such a night.

Sophie...

I've waited so long for this moment. To see her, to hear her, to know that she's finally in the world. It's almost unreal. For so long, she has been an abstract proposition, a child who will arrive one day. Tonight she's really coming, and it's as if a clock is starting to tick. It's strange to think that in just over twenty years, she'll have a baby of her own and a trap will be springing shut around them both.

The hospital is grim on the outside and even grimmer on the inside. I enter the foyer and find that it's almost deserted. There's a tired nurse semi-asleep at a desk over in the corner, and a few people scattered about the seating area. The kiosks are shuttered up for the night, and the whole place seems surprisingly dirty. I thought humans were supposed to keep their hospitals clean, but the floor in this place is wet with mud, and the walls are stained yellow. There's a musty smell about the whole area. Humans build hospitals because they hope to cure the sick, but those hopes are quickly dashed as the hospitals run out of money, and as the bright-eyed and ambitious young doctors face the realities of fighting a losing battle. If you want to understand a town, go visit its hospital.

It takes me a while to find the right part of the building, but eventually I reach a small waiting room up on the fourth floor. It's almost empty, but there's an old man asleep in a wheelchair in the corner. I walk past him and only realize at the last moment that I recognize him. Smiling, I pause to watch as old Joe Hart shifts in his sleep. It has been a long time since I last saw him, and the years have not been kind to him. He can never have understood the consequences of that deal he made with me all those years ago, the deal that ensured I could manipulate his family and gain a foothold in their lives. I wonder if Joe will last long enough to see his grand-daughter for the first time?

Continuing along the corridor, I check each room until finally I approach a door and hear a woman's screams. This must be the right place. Peering around the corner, I see people gathered around a bed as the woman painfully gives birth.

This is how it is supposed to be. This is how the Book of Gothos said it would happen, and the Book of Gothos is always right.

It takes a while, but eventually the baby is born and starts to cry. Sophie's first mark in the world. She will scream and cry many more times in her life, of course, but all of that is far, far ahead of her. No-one here - not her father, or her mother, or Sophie herself - has any idea of how important this child is for the future of the vampire race. To them, she's just another little girl.

There's lots of excited talk as the new parents welcome their daughter into the world. I duck out of sight as one of the nurses hurries out of the room.

"Do you still want to call her Sophie?" the child's father asks.

"I think it suits her," the mother says.

"Sophie it is, then," the father replies. "Hi, Sophie."

There. Exactly as the Book of Gothos promised. Sophie Hart has entered the world and the wheels of fate are turning. I'm quite certain that Patrick is here somewhere, watching the birth of the child who will one day become so important to his own quest. First, though, Sophie will have to grow up with her family. She will have a normal, uneventful childhood with no obvious hints of what is to come. Then, one night, she will be out with a friend in Dedston and she will encounter Patrick for the first time.

So it goes.

Sophie's father, Anthony, is a man who interests me very much. I know that in about twenty years, I'll have to kill him, but for now he seems to be a vaguely pathetic creature, fussing over his new-born daughter. Part of me thinks it would be easier to just stick a knife in him now, but I figure I should wait until Sophie's older. That way, his death will really upset her, and she'll be drawn closer to Patrick in the aftermath.

Eventually Anthony goes and fetches old Joe and wheels him along. I have no interest in disturbing this family scene, so I head down to the reception area of the building and try to buy a bottle of water from the vending machine. It accepts my money, of course, but then refuses to spit out the bottle. Cursed human technology, can't even do something simple like give me a bottle of water.

"Machine's broke," says a voice from behind me.

I turn to see a decrepit-looking old man, dressed like a hobo, sitting on one of the plastic benches.

"Thanks," I say, wondering why he couldn't have told me before I inserted the money.

"I can fix it though," the man says, standing up and walking over. He kicks the machine hard on the corner, and the bottle of water is released. "There you go," he says, looking kind of proud of himself, "no charge."

"Thanks," I say again, but this time I mean it. I take the water and open it.

"What're you here for?" the man asks. "Hatching or dispatching?"

"Excuse me?" I ask.

"Someone being born, or someone dying?" he says, with a tone of voice that suggests he considers me a little dumb for not understanding.

"Born," I say, drinking from the bottle. "Someone has just been born."

"Not bad," the man says. "I'm here with my wife. She's dying.

"I see," I say, not sure why he's telling me this. I don't give a damn about him or his wife.

"Cancer," he continues. "Cancer of the stomach. It's bad. I tell you -" He pauses for a moment. "I tell you, she's brave, but she's in a lot of pain. Her guts are dying and the morphine doesn't do any good."

"I'm sure she'll be fine," I say. I still don't give a damn.

"No, she won't," the man says. "She'll be dead by morning. There's nothing anyone can do about it. Just got to hope she stays unconscious until the final moment. Don't want her waking up and having to face it."

"You don't want her to face death?" I ask. Suddenly I'm curious about this man, and about his apparent belief that one can die honorably without ever looking death in the eye. "You don't want her to be awake and aware at the moment of her own death?"

He shakes his head. "Why should she have to do that?" he asks. "Why should she have to be terrified? Better if she just stays asleep and drifts off to the land of Nod. That's how I want to go too."

"Pathetic," I say.

"What?" he asks, staring at me with a look of shock on his face.

"Nothing," I reply, although the truth is that I find this man and his wife to be truly pathetic. Even if she's dying in agony, she should face her fate rather than trying to sleep her way into death. People like this give humanity a bad name, because they seem to glorify weakness and fragility. When the time comes for me to face my own death, I will ensure that I have my eyes wide open, rather than seeking to avoid the final moment. Human or vampire alike, one must always face death and treat that beast for what it really is.

"I should get back," the man says, clearly a little concerned. He obviously heard what I said, but he's too timid even to challenge me. The man is a fool. I hope his wife dies slowly and painfully, and I hope she's awake for every second of it.

I wander back up to find Sophie. When I reach the room where she was born, I see that her parents are both asleep. It takes me a few minutes to find the room where the new-born babies are kept, and I find myself standing in front of a large window with half a dozen babies on the other side. It's easy to spot Sophie; she seems different from the others somehow.

"Hello," I say, staring at her. I'm not quite sure what I should say. She won't remember this moment, of course, but I feel I should warn her that her life is not going to be easy. "You won't see me again for quite some time," I continue, "but my name is Charles Nimrod and I'm going to play a very important role in your -" I pause. This is ridiculous. Watching her little face, I see nothing but innocence. How can a child be destined from the moment of birth to die at the hands of an ancient beast such as Patrick? Surely Sophie should have the right to choose her fate, or at least to try to change it?

But no.

She's doomed. Even from this moment.

"I'm sorry," I say finally. "It shouldn't be like this. You should have your whole life ahead of you. You should succeed or fail based on your own actions, not some prophecy that was written hundreds of years before you were born." I pause. "But I don't write the rules."

Sophie stares at me. Although she's barely an hour old, she seems to understand that I'm important. Or am I just reading far too much into the actions of a child? The other children all have their eyes closed, but Sophie's eyes are open and she seems to be focused on me.

"I have a plan," I say to Sophie. "In just over twenty years, I'm going to have to do something very, very cruel to you. By the time you realize what it is, I'll be dead and I'll no longer be able to apologize to you, so I want to apologize now, even though you can't possibly hear me. I want to tell you that I'm sorry, and I wish there could be another way. Unfortunately, you've been born into something from which you can't escape. It's nothing personal. It's not your fault. It's just the way things are."

I take a deep breath as Sophie stares back at me. It's so tempting to think that somehow she understands, deep down, who I am and what I'm saying, but such notions are foolish. She doesn't know. She can't possibly know.

"The next time we meet," I say quietly, "will be under some very unusual circumstances." I smile at her, but she doesn't smile back. "The world is a cruel place," I continue, "and it will destroy you." I pause for a moment before turning and walking away. It was wrong to come here. I was being foolish and sentimental, but I won't make the same mistake again. The next time I see Sophie, I'll be ready to put my plan into action and crush Patrick forever. This is the beginning. The plan starts here and now.