Over the next few years the now slightly larger group had many adventures. They fought off many creatures and adverted the world from countless disasters. But there are few that were more memorable than the Romanian incident when Lexy learned about alchemy and her own abilities for it.
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The mission wasn't that extraordinary, a small town in Romania had been reporting missing person's cases for about five months. Woman and children would suddenly go missing from the streets, backyards or even missing from their beds.
What bodies were found were incredibly anemic. The bodies found were then removed of their heads, had garlic stuffed down their throat and a stake punched through their heart.
It was your average vampire case and the bureau had hoped that the towns people would be able to handle it themselves as they had a long history with vampires. But after another month the body count continued to rise with little hope of stopping.
So the bureau dispatched a team of agents with Abe and Lexy leading the expedition. Hellboy and Liz were already on a mission in South America dealing a creature called the Mokele Mebembe, that had been making a feast out of the locals and their cattle.
The bureau decided that the mission wouldn't be that difficult as Abe had dealt with vampires before.
The town itself would be supplying a team of their most expert vampire hunters to assist with tracking the creature down and eliminating it.
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Lexy, Abe and the team of five agents with them were currently on their way to town by a couple of horse drawn carriages. Since the town was in the undeveloped part of the country there were no true roads and horse power was really the only way to get anywhere.
Lexy was busy reading over the files and checking to make sure their kits carried everything they would need to deal with the creature.
The kits included cloves of garlic, stakes both wooden, silver and iron, crosses of the same material and bottles upon bottles of holy water, including an especially volatile vial that was blessed by pope Alexander of Rome.
She held the small vial carefully in the palm o her hand before setting it back in the velvet lined case and closing the lid.
"Well that's everything. All we're missing now is the vampire." She clicked the locks closed on the case and set the box under her seat.
"Your seem extra prepared, nervous?" Abe asked amused at her constant frisking of all their equipment. Not that he minded, Hellboy was always a bit lax when it came to making sure they had packed everything.
She chuckled and shook her head. "No, but there's no such thing as being to prepared." She pulled out her guns, The Jackal, and her second handgun which Hellboy had given her as a birthday gift, called Harbinger, and loaded them with fresh clips of specialized bullets.
The Jackal being the stronger of the two was given a set of solid iron bullets encased in silver with engraved crosses and prayers, while Harbinger received a case of a special concoction of hollowed bullets imbued with holy water, silver shavings, Rowen, wolfs bane, stuffed with enough enchanted properties to ward off anything they might encounter.
"I've never seen one of those work on a vampire before." Their driver, an aged man named Ivan with a grim face said glancing at her weapons.
"I don't intend to use them." Lexy cocked both guns and placed them in her waist holsters.
"Then why bring them? Only holy weapons work on an un-holy creature." Ivan scoffed and turned back to the road.
"Your right." Lexy agreed with the man. "But I'd rather have them and not need them, rather than need them and not have them."
"Beg my pardon, but you seem a bit young to be hunting monsters." Gregory, Ivan's first born son and inheritor of the carriage business, said as he glanced over from the carriage he was driving, carrying the other agents.
There came a laugh from within his carriage. "Lexy may be young but she's very skilled." Came Clay's voice. "She's already faced many creatures, Kelpies, werewolves, Harpies, trolls, she even fought off a Manticora only months ago." Clay boasted her fights.
Gregory nodded in appreciation. "Perhaps then you can solve our problem."
"Gregory prostule, tu nu ar trebui să fie atât de ușor influențat de cuvinte lăudăroși." Ivan growled scowling at his son.
"Ei vin să ne ajute, și pentru nici o taxă. Nu te uita un cal cadou in gura." Gregory shot back before turning to the others. "Forgive my father, he and the elders were against accepting your offered help. They are set in the old ways."
Ivan grumbled. "We have never needed the help of outsiders."
"We have never faced a vampire like this." Gregory grumbled back.
"What's so different about this vampire?" Abe question curiously.
Gregory's face became grim and ominous, making him look quite like his father. "This one is...different. It's more powerful than any we have ever faced before."
"How so?" Inquired the blue man.
"It's taken many people, sometimes up to three in a single period." Gregory paused to look ominously at the sky. The sun was up that morning, but many grey clouds filled the blue expanse turning it dismal.
"That's not all," He continued. "Some have spotted it during the daylight hours. Never in direct sunlight but during the day none the less. The people are terrified more now then ever before. Without the safety of day to track it down and kill it no one is safe."
"During the day, are your sure about that? Even Erzebet Ondrushko could not survive the light of day."
Ivan cursed in his tongue and crossed himself, Gregory doing the same. "Dammit girl, can't you hold your tongue." Ivan barked.
"That name brings bad luck." Gregory said in more kindly fashion.
"My apologies, I did not mean to bring about misfortune upon you, nor to offend you."
Ivan hmphed again before pointing forward. "The town is up ahead."
They peered out of the cab and saw he was correct.
They entered the 'town', which was little more than a village composed of only six blocks of houses and businesses surrounded by the dense Romanian forests.
"We will leave you at the church. That is where the troop is waiting with fresh cabs." Ivan said and that was the last he spoke on the journey.
The horses rounded a corner and there sat the church at the end of the road. It's steeples were high with the traditional Romanian look that had eventually made it's way to eastern Russia, and at the top stood a weathered iron cross.
As Ivan had said four carriages, each secured to two strong looking Danube Delta horses. Their horses were drawn to a halt and the agents began unpacking their equipment. Most of the boxes of monitoring gear were stacked to the side of the steeple, while the more delicate boxes were kept in hand.
"You will find everyone in there and don't mind them if they seem a little suspicious, we're not accustomed to foreigners." Gregory smiled then his face became serious. He reached into his shirt and pulled something from around his neck and tossed it to her.
She caught it and found it to be a rosary of critine beads and a shining silver cross.
"Lexy, be safe. I will pray that you come back unharmed." Then he and his father flicked their reins and their guided their horses away.
"He likes you." Clay nudged her tauntingly.
Lexy scorned him. "Stay focused, we're here on a mission."
Abe was starring at the closed church doors with his hand out. "They heard the carriages and know we're here, but they're very suspicious of outsiders."
"Then we'll just have to make a good first impression." Lexy turned to the other agents. "Abe and me will go in, you guys wait out here." She paused and looked up. "And keep your eyes on the sky. If this thing can travel during the day then it can be out hunting even now."
She turned and pushed one of the large wooden doors inward. It creaked on it's ancient hinges as it swung open. Lexy took the lead and entered slowly but undaunted.
At the back of the church stood a group of men dressed in rough traveling clothes and carrying weapons from rifles, axes, pitch forks, machetes. But each carried a wooden stake, bottles of holy water and crosses around their wrists, and necks. They were standing around the minister, discussing in their native tongue the current situation.
They saw the strangers and their discussion halted to a few whispers.
"Uite. Ei sunt aici. Acestea arata foarte ciudat." One of them said.
One of them, the youngest looking one, nudged the other to his let. "O femeie. Uită-te la omul albastru. Arată ca un pește de mers pe jos."
His friend snorted and replied. "Ei sunt străini. Nu vă puteți aștepta ca acestea să fie ca noi."
Lexy glanced at Abe and sent him a blip to his mind to follow her lead. She went to the gilded bowl by the door and dipped her fingers in the holy water before crossing herself. Abe followed did the same though he didn't like the idea of sharing public water.
"A se vedea. Ei sunt oameni ai lui Dumnezeu. Nu la fel de diferite ca te-ai gandit." The minister smiled before approaching to greet them.
"Welcome my friends to our church."
Lexy nodded her head in respect and Abe did the same. "Thank you father, we are honored and happy that you have accepted our offered of assistance. We hope we can aid all of you in your time of need. My name is Lexy and this is my friend Abraham."
The minister smiled at her kind and respectful words. "We are glad you came so swiftly. I am father Anatolie. Please forgive us for our bluntness but we have little experience with others and we here are proud of our independence."
Lexy nodded understandingly. "Then please, think of us as a sword to dispel the evil that has come upon this rich land."
This caused the men standing behind the minister to talk and whisper among themselves.
Anatolie turned to the group. "Vino acum, nu fi atât de nepoliticos oaspeților noștri. Introducerea-vă."
The men approached if not cautiously. One by one they gave their names. Anghel, Andrei, Calin, Cezar, Dimetrie, Emil, Horia and Ioan.
Calin looked the two up and down before scoffing. "You are clever with words, but how clever are you at hunting vampires."
Abe jumped in answered for her. "Lexy is one the bureau's finest agents. She has a long history of hunting down monsters."
Calin glared at Abe before turning his attention back to Lexy. "So it's said. But these lands are wild and cruel, not a place for a woman playing hunter."
Both Abe and the minister scowled at his remark, the other men said nothing waiting to see what they would do.
Calin then turned to Abe. "And you, blue man, vampires don't like the water very much. What is it you have come to do."
This time it was Lexy who spoke. "Abraham is perhaps the finest tracker and detective of all things paranormal. If there is a creature he can not find I dare say it does not exist."
Calin eyed them haughtily before he snorted. "And is it common in your land to answer for another?"
Abe nodded. "Lexy and I have worked together for years."
Lexy smiled and continued. "We work well as a team."
This caused the minister and all the men but Calin to laugh, charmed at their strange way of speaking.
When they had quieted again Lexy turned serious. "Now all joking aside we have come here to aid in the slaying of a vampire. What news is there of it?"
The men too became serious, and it was the youngest, Emil, who stepped forward to speak.
"The monster has taken more than fifty lives, including my younger sister." Emil's face became that of mourning, a look Lexy knew well.
Anghel stepped forward to continue for him. "The beast resides at the ruins of Vlad Ţepeş. It used to only come in the night, but in recent months it has grown more powerful and brave and started carrying our people off during the day. It is good that you have come so swiftly. The monster has taken two of our women only a day ago, it will be resting until it needs to feed again. We should leave immediately. The ruins are a half a day's ride by cab."
Lexy and Abe nodded. "The rest of us are outside with our equipment."
Anghel nodded. "Then let us be off."
They left the church for the outside where the others were waiting, their boxes already packed into the cabs. They climbed into either the back or the seat of the carriages and with a flick of the reins the horses began to pull and they were on their way. They went one behind the other until they left the narrow streets of town and entered the dark forests where the road opened up.
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They now journeyed two by two with Anghel and Calin driving the first two and Dimetrie and Ioan driving the two behind. While Andrei, Cezar, father Anatolie and Horia road shotgun up front. Emil sat in back of Andrei's cab with Lexy, Abe, Clay and their equipment.
Emil reached into the folds of his clothes and pulled out a small bundle of fabric, he unwrapped it to reveal a small handmade doll.
"Your sister's?" Lexy asked.
Emil nodded before turning his eyes to the ground. "It was to be a present for her, she was turning eleven."
Lexy placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. "I understand your pain."
He flinched momentarily before eying her suspiciously. "Do you?" It was clear he didn't believe her.
She nodded. "When I was young I lost my family to a monster."
This made Emil's eyes widen. "Your entire family?"
She nodded again. "My parents, my older brother and my infant sister."
Anatolie turned in his seat. "And is that why you've dedicated your life to hunting down such beasts?"
"Yes and no." Lexy said. "The bureau found and took me in, gave me a new home, so I became an agent there."
"I see." The minister said engaged. "So it was a give and take thing. They gave you shelter and you work for them in return." He paused and turned to Abe. "And you Abraham, is that how you came to the bureau as well?"
"No. I was found in a chamber under a hospital in a state of comatose. The bureau found and revived me. And well I had no where else to go." He shrugged.
Father Anatolie smiled. "Când Domnul le-a găsit, el le pune cu bucurie pe umeri și se duce acasă. Apoi el numește prietenii și vecinii săi împreună și spune: "Bucurați-vă cu mine; Am găsit oaia pierdută." He said to himself and Lexy recognized the parable from the bible.
Emil wrapped the doll back up in it's wrappings and stuffed it away.
"I can promise you Emil, we will do all we can to help you and your people."
The young nodded and turned to stare out into the endless forests.
"It never used to be this bad." Anghel said staring out into the endless skies. "In the old days we used to live in relative peace with the creatures as they were many in that time. We used to make weekly sacrifices of our best cattle and sheep."
"But then a stranger came from the west claiming to be a great hunter and said he would slay our monster so that we would no longer have to give up the best of our stock, in return for gold and precious stones." Calin continued. "The elders were wise and told the man not to invoke the monster's wrath, but the younger men of that time thought it would be good to let him rid us of the thing. So in secret they took the stranger to the beast's lair during the day and wished him luck. The night of the sacrifice there came no vampire and we'd thought he'd succeeded. But the man never returned, and the next night we awakened at the chime hour to find that all of our sons and daughters were slain. Messages, threats written upon the walls in their blood. It took three years to finally put an end to the vampires then. And since we have never again trusted foreigners to 'aid' us again."
Lexy listened and now understood their suspicion. Others had come to help but had only caused trouble. In her heart she hoped they wouldn't end up doing the same.
Abe must have sensed her uncertainty as he placed a comforting hand on hers.
Emil watched interested at the act before voicing his curiosity. "Pardon my staring, but may I ask, is Abraham your husband?"
Lexy would have laughed if he'd meant it as a joke but his eyes were filled of sincere curiosity at the strange two.
She smiled and shook her head. "Abe can communicate through touch, primarily through his hands. We've been good friends for many years and easily recognize even the smallest gestures from one and another." She decided it best to leave out his ability at mind reading.
Emil nodded fascinated.
The rest of the journey was passed through quiet conversation between agents and the men and the tellings of previous vampire hunts. Though as the sun rose higher and they drew closer their voices became more hushed and more eyes turned from the road to the sky, looking for sinister shapes.
Finally when the sun was at it's highest in the grey sky did they finally come to the ruins. A large ruined castle of crumbling grey stone stood above the trees. One would wonder they could miss such a thing, though it was well hidden behind a hill and camouflaged by the dense forest that had all but reclaimed the land.
