What Happens in the Darkness (21 page)

“I’m just a little girl. You have to help me protect myself.”

“Something tells me you’re quite a resourceful little girl.” After studying her for a moment, a look of amusement spread on his face. “You’re right. Can’t leave you defenseless.”

“I’ve seen lots of scary movies with my dad.”

“Have you?”

“So I know some stuff about vampires.”

“Really? I suppose that’s good.” Martin squatted beside the small campfire and studied her.

“Are you cold?” She rubbed her hands briskly over the low flames.

“Nah. Vampires don’t get cold.”

“Never?”

“No. Hot neither.”

“Except in sunlight. Right?”

He smiled. “Right.”

“Sunlight can kill you, right?”

His smile faltered. “I’m sorry, Janelle. I’m no longer comfortable with this conversation.”

Standing, she stretched her arms over her head. “Is it true, about garlic and crosses and holy water?”

Martin considered her question but didn’t look at her.

“So is it? Is it true?”

He stood up, somewhat upset by her eager questions and her burning eyes. “I thought we were all supposed to be getting along. We have to learn to live with one another. You can’t plot to kill us. Do you understand?”

She stared at him, not responding.

He sighed. “Wear a crucifix. Avoid enemy troops, because that’s where the vampires are headed. To defeat the enemy.”

“Oh yeah?” She smiled, cocking her head like a puppy.

Suddenly, he didn’t care for the look in her eyes. And just as suddenly, her bloodthirsty and cavalier attitude was pissing him off.

“Look, kid,” he said, moving closer, their faces inches apart. He flashed a partial smile, intentionally exposing the razor-sharp tip of tooth so white it looked bleached. “The vampires are helping your people. Do you understand? I would think you’d show more gratitude. Without us—”

The hand she’d had tucked away in her jeans pocket flew up to her neck, and the small hunk of metal in her fist gleamed in the light of the fire.

Martin stepped back, not knowing why he was suddenly afraid but knowing to trust his primal instincts, to understand his own reaction to things no matter how odd it may feel at the time. Even after all these years he was still reacting. The conditioned response had never fully left him.

She lifted her hand to her lips and kissed the crucifix. “I already have one,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “I’m sorry, Martin. I know you saved my life, and I’m grateful. But I have to protect myself. At least now I know this really works.”

“It works,” he said quietly, but there was anger in his voice. “Why are you doing this? You must understand it isn’t necessary.”

But she didn’t answer. Instead, she grabbed her backpack and ran in the opposite direction.

Martin let her go, watching her disappear down the barely lit streets, swirls of crispy leaves the only sign of movement.

It was time to head back to the army base. The vampires would be returning soon, and he needed to be there waiting for them to learn about their progress. 

*** 

After leading his family to food—a barracks several miles away—Patrick brought them back to the storeroom.

There were hundreds now, packed into the room, and they had turned dozens more that same night.

He addressed the crowd, and they listened raptly, adoringly. “We grow stronger every night, and our numbers continue to grow. You should all be proud!”

Blood-smeared faces peered at him with black, curious eyes. Looks of confusion mingled with looks of pride.

“You’ll all understand soon enough,” he told them. “It’s them against us. Never has vampire gone against vampire. But that’s what we
must
do, if we’re to survive. For now, we bide our time. We wait for the right time to strike, and we will be triumphant. All I ask is that you trust me and obey.”

He stepped back and watched the rippling effect his words had on his family. His tongue licked remnants of his last meal from the corner of his mouth.

“Time to rest now. You’ve earned a good sleep. And when we next wake, we begin the next phase of our plan.”

They huddled together, bodies piled on top of one another for lack of space. The door was shut, closing them in the tomb-like blackness, where they rested, sleeping the dead sleep, dreaming of nothing at all. 

*** 

Rebecca returned to their camp, an old library with a windowless basement used for book archives.

Decades of mildew coated the shelves, dust particles swirling in the sparse candlelight.

Rebecca sauntered in, slammed the heavy door, and bounded down the stairs.

“So what have you been up to?” Dagan asked, a wry grin on his face.

She returned the smile. “Experimenting.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “That so? What was he like?”

“Young. Handsome.”

“Ah.” Dagan leaned back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head. “Am I to assume you din’na bring the laddie?”

“Enemy soldier. Besides, he became useless.”

“I think we’re done here,” he said, changing the subject. “My group and I covered much territory.”

“Now what?” She sat on a wooden chair behind him. “Inland, or coastal?”

“Perimeter, I think. Follow the coast.” He pulled out the map he’d been working with. “We can follow along here, the Gulf of Mexico.”

He chewed his lip and shook his head. “The Twins went north, right? Patrick went south. How did Martin expect us to cover the rest of this whole damned country?”

“I was wondering that myself. I’d forgotten just how big this country is. We don’t have enough help.”

“We have enough.”

“No we don’t. We can’t cover this area in such a concentrated way. Martin’s plan is fine but not far-reaching enough. Did he think the enemy troops wouldn’t head inland? Did he think they’d just sit there and wait for us along the shores?”

“I don’t know,” Dagan said. He studied the vampires resting in the shadows of the room. “We need to spread out. Who else is ready to lead, do you think?”

“Lead?” She looked at the sleeping figures. “Who can we trust? We need one who will have the best interest of the group in mind, and not just look out for himself or herself.”

“I also think we need more than one. Look—” He spread open the map again. “There are about a hundred of us. If we divide into four groups we can go to North Dakota, Nebraska, Texas, and Kansas. I’ve plotted out four routes, and we can all travel across the states at roughly the same time. Cover the same amount of area. And we can all finish with Kansas, meeting there. We travel on a diagonal and close in on that point.”

Rebecca pulled her hair off her neck and studied the map. “Wonderful idea. But who?”

They both looked at the other vampires.

“The one in the corner,” Rebecca said. “I’ve seen him help others. Strangely altruistic for a vampire. And he has a strong personality.”

“But he’s so old,” Dagan said.

“Come on, Dagan. You know very well that age no longer matters.”

“I just meant that he’ll be set in his ways. He may not be cooperative.”

“Do I need to remind you that you’re at least a hundred years older than he is?”

“I know, I know. Who else?”

No one else appealed to her.

Dagan pointed to the teenager in the corner of the room.

“Her? Why her?”

“She put up quite a fight. And she didn’t seem afraid. Not like the others.”

“Fine then,” Rebecca said, dropping to the floor and using a sleeping bag for a pillow. “Later tonight we’ll map out the routes, and then we’ll instruct them.”

“Fine.”

“Get some rest.” She closed her eyes, snuggling her head into the sleeping bag. She felt better having worked out a great plan. After all, their plans had worked out well up to that point, Deadwood aside. What could possibly go wrong now?

*** 

The army base was deserted when Martin returned alone, but he didn’t find this unusual. The remaining humans had long-since fled, and the vampires were on missions and hadn’t yet returned.

But what struck Martin as odd was finding Jeff’s house empty, without any source of candle or flashlight, without any indication at all he’d recently been there.

He wondered if Jeff had been captured, or perhaps killed by the enemy.

Straining to pick up signs of human life, drowned out instead by a steady chorus of crickets and bullfrogs striking up the band in the surrounding grass, Martin cautiously approached the building that had jailed him for so many decades.

“Jeff?” He stepped inside the dark building, his eyes quickly adjusting. Even without a light source he could see perfectly, one of the few advantages of being forcibly nocturnal.

He descended, and numerous staircases later he reached the cavernous sub-subbasement, his former home. There were no sentimental stirrings, not even feelings of revulsion or dread, only curiosity. And caution? His feral instincts were again warning him, and he wondered why. So he moved carefully, always on the defensive, always prepared to protect himself.

The corridors were empty. He sensed no movement, no sounds of life anywhere in this area. Yet there was
something
. Not anything human … he couldn’t detect a human presence, no sounds of breath or of heartbeat, no smell of hot blood running through veins, no scent of musty, musky sweat glistening on terrified skin.

All doors were flung open or hanging off on rusty, busted hinges. Martin crossed through what was once Jeff’s office, passing that hideous mural that had once hidden the door to Martin’s Private Hell.

The living room, the façade hiding the passageway to hell. Yet they had called it home. How quaint. Now it sat empty save for a sofa and a smattering of overstuffed chairs.

Martin peered in, strangely uncomfortable with the idea of crossing the threshold. Unease was not an emotion he was used to. Discomfort, perhaps, when he was annoyed, but this feeling of dread passed through him like tainted blood.

Something was in the room with him.

He knew it wasn’t a
someone
; he could sense no sign of life and knew it wasn’t human.

But it was something angry, something ready to attack and kill.

Martin stepped against a wall to guard his back, and scanned the room.

“You’ve returned,” the shadowy thing in the darkness whispered. He was turned away, so Martin could only see the obscure silhouette, although it was a form familiar to him.

“Patrick?” he asked, knowing the answer was no. The familiarity of this one’s voice was unnerving; he couldn’t place it. This was not a vampire he knew, but he believed it was one he had met before. But when?

The stranger stepped out from the shadows, hatred seething in his undead veins, contempt for Martin filling cold steel pores.

“Jeff.”
Martin rarely was speechless. But this time he had no words, only a stunned expression and a pervading feeling of remorse. He’d failed Jeff somehow, hadn’t managed to protect him. But who—

Jeff moved toward Martin, hands balled into tight, furious fists. Slitted eyes radiated venom.

“How?” Martin finally asked. “I forbade them.”

“I
trusted
you,” Jeff spat.

“I forbade them!” he yelled, his voice exploding in anger. “I
forbade
this, and I have been disobeyed!”

“Disobeyed?” he stammered. “
Disobeyed?
What? That’s what upsets you?”

“No, I didn’t mean—”

“Look what he did to me!”
he screamed, falling to his knees, fists drawn up to his eyes. He sobbed, tipping forward, forehead pressed against the cold dirt.

Martin made no move to comfort him. Thoughts of revenge tore through his mind, but first he needed to discover who the betrayer was.

Jeff sobbed, staring at the ground, his body drawn into himself. He finally lifted his head. Red-rimmed eyes glared at Martin. “That was the last of it,” he said quietly, standing up again. “The last of my humanity. I feel the last of my fluids drying, my organs crumbling … useless in this dead husk of a body.”

“Jeff—”

“No! Goddammit, where were you?” He was calmer, but Martin could sense the anger teeming, well-hidden in his bravado.

“Who was it? Who did this to you?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes! It matters.”

“Why?” Jeff cried, slapping fist against palm. “So you can have your revenge? Because you were wronged? What about
me
, Martin? What about me?”

Licking his lips, Martin regained his composure, sighed once. Thought for a moment. “This was forbidden, and we’ll have justice. But—what’s done is done.”

“What?”

“You’ll learn to live with it. We all have. You have no choice.”

Jeff drew his arms across his chest, revulsion oozing out of his pores. “This was your plan all along. Wasn’t it? You always wanted me to join you!”

Martin shook his head. “You know that’s not true.”

“You planned this!” Jeff growled as he closed the few feet separating them, throwing himself at Martin.

Martin threw his arms up to block the attack.

Jeff grabbed Martin’s throat and landed on top of him, knocking Martin to the ground, mashing his head against the dirt and rocks.

The force of the blow from another vampire was enough to stun Martin, having forgotten the strength they can possess. His vision blackened for a moment, and he felt Jeff’s hand close around his throat.

They fought furiously, Martin defending himself against Jeff’s insane attack, battling against fists of hatred and rage, claw-like nails digging furrows in his flesh, blood just below the dermis running down cold, dead skin.

The more-experienced Martin fought back, wanting to not hurt Jeff but not planning to lose this battle.

Jeff finally seemed to tire and broke away, limping off to lick his wounds.

A staggering Martin fell to his knees, coughing, his fresh wounds hurting. He hadn’t been in a fight with another vampire in hundreds of years. Jeff was strong but was still transforming, hadn’t achieved his full strength yet. Martin was concerned with how powerfully strong Jeff had become so soon in the transformation. A being with so much strength and hatred would make a wonderful ally—or a formidable enemy.