The Night Watch
I haven't quit my other story but it has only two reviews (both from Sendmeonmyway, thanks so much chica) so I am rewriting it in a different easier to follow format. Meanwhile here is another story I have had bouncing around in my head. Enjoy! :-D
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Chapter One: Night Club
"Eleazar got a tip where Night Club is going to be tonight." Edward looked with a scowl when his brother dropped the huge stack of old and most probably very expensive texts on the table in front of him unceremoniously.
Emmett didn't notice. His excitement about his evening plans were palpable. Night Club was a sort of code the vampires had for big vampire party. Though they usually lived alone or in small groups, when you get right down to it they were essentially human and humans are tribal creatures, social in nature. A few times a month they would meet in what were essentially extremely covert and well planned raves to feed their craving for the contact of others.
The hunters weren't sure exactly how the vampires pulled the things off. They were always in a different place, always at a completely random time and day, and always organized and well attended. Two to five hundred would just all show up at the same farm, or subway train, or gymnasium. Some would bring hangers on, vampire groupies if you will, and the vamps would pretty much just party until the wee hours of the morning. It was a great in theory for the hunters, who could ideally take out a hundred or so vampires in one night, but they were impossible to predict and nearly impossible to find.
"Are we equipped for a raid?" Always practical, Edward didn't see how they could be, with two hunter teams away. Not to mention the only way to kill a vampire short tearing them up and lighting them on fire was with a heartwood stake blessed by a bokor, and those weren't exactly sold at the local market.
Emmett scoffed and turned toward the door to leave which Edward took to mean 'no, but we're going anyway.' Edward sighed as closed the musty tome he had been reading and stretched. If he was going to be up all night killing vampires he would need a nap.
Silently Edward made the signal for the separate teams to spread out and cover all the exits of the warehouse where Night Club sounded like it was in full swing. He took a moment to miss Jasper, his old partner who used to relish these raids. Jasper had been the strategist of the group, always thinking of clever ways to outsmart their enemies, but one night on a much smaller less dangerous raid he had left the group to pursue a vamp that was getting away and never returned.
Edward was the raid leader now, he motioned for Emmett to move out.
Trained killers, the hunters silently approached the building, taking out their respective sentrys quickly and simultaneously so none could sound an alarm. Carefully entering the warehouse, he and Emmett slowly made their way through a narrow hall, taking out the vampires one by one and checking the rooms, until the hallway spat them out into the huge strobe lit room where the party was.
It was kind of a shame they had to crash it, it looked like a great party. There was a stage on one side with a half decent band playing heavy metal, a bar on the other side serving drinks to the unsuspecting mortals who had been brought as snacks, and in the center of the room a huge pulsing mass that was at least two hundred vampires, all swaying and grinding against each other. They outnumbered the hunters three to one, but the vampires were not prepared for the fight, all absorbed in their own pleasure and probably half of them drunk or high on whatever their mortal treats had imbibed before they themselves became the drink of choice.
Edward sidled along the wall toward a wallflower vamp, the strobe light masking his advance he dispatched the vampire quickly and maneuvered him into a nearby chair so he would look less suspicious, before turning to see a petrified mortal.
Fuck why didn't he see her there before.
Edward set his crossbow down and put his hands up in a non-threatening way, hoping to keep her quiet.
She screamed.
And all hell broke loose. Edward snatched his crossbow up as the vampires started running for the doors, killing or carrying away all the mortals they could to eliminate witnesses. Edward saw Emmett and his other fellow hunters frantically running into the fray, stabbing as many vampires as they could, but the vampires were faster and disinclined to fight unprepared so most escaped the warehouse and ran off into the night and there was nothing the hunters could do about it.
After the vampire exodus Edward and five of the other hunters surveyed the carnage. The room was littered with bodies, both of the vampires they killed and the mortal guests, with a few hunters sprinkled in between. Edward frowned as he looked down at the body of the girl who had screamed, her neck broken. He said a quick prayer for her soul.
"Tanya, you and Eleazar separate the vampires from the mortals for burning or burial. Rose and Emmett check upstairs for stragglers, Garret you check around outside and I will go through the rest of the rooms down here." Barking orders was second nature to Edward now that Jasper was gone. Everyone set about their tasks without question, looking grim. Tonight had not gone well at all.
Edward methodically checked every room on the first floor going counterclockwise. He didn't find any vampires, but he found a mortal man in the last one wearing some kind of leather harness with a leash. Edward warned him to be more careful who he associated with and sent him on his way, the man left without a word but cast a funny look at an afghan thrown haphazardly on the floor. Edward held the door for him and watched him scurry past the bodies without looking at them and out the front of the warehouse. Edward shrugged and was just about to leave himself when he looked back at the afghan and on a hunch kicked it away.
Underneath the blanket was an iron ring, set into the floor. Edward investigated and found a very well made trapdoor, laid almost seamlessly into the wooden floorboards. With a sharp tug it came up easily and Edward descended into a root cellar.
He scanned the small room slowly, crossbow ready, until he came upon a vampire cowering in the corner. She was a girl, probably only eighteen or nineteen in human years. She looked so small and delicate. Her skin was pale even for a vampire and a dark cloud of shiny mahogany hair obscured part of her face. Edward looked at her tiny hands clutching the wall behind her and was suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to protect her, ridiculous of course since one need only look at her bright ruby colored eyes to know that she was more than able to protect herself. Edward inched forward keeping his crossbow trained on her and watched her shrink back into the wall. She was really frightened. Edward almost felt ashamed for scaring her.
"Edward? Come on we're ready to go." Emmett's voice drifted down from the main room and Edwards finger tightened slightly on the trigger. The vampire saw this and flinched, turning her head away and closing her eyes. Without those eyes looking at him she looked so angelic and vulnerable.
"Someone will be here in the morning to take care of the bodies, be gone by then because they will probably raze the building. This is a one time deal, if I ever see you again I won't hesitate to kill you. Do you understand?" The girl nodded slightly, still looking terrified.
"Edward?" The voice was closer now, in the room above. Edward whirled around and bounded up the steps and out the trap door.
"Find anything?"
"No, just some rats. Let's go home I'm starving." The mention of food was enough to distract Emmett who grinned and loped out of the room with out a glance back. Edward carefully closed the cellar door, not daring to look down at the girl within.
The raid hadn't gone as poorly as he had thought, he saw when he returned to the main room. The biggest pile by far was the dead vampires, sixty or so piled in a heap. There were only about ten mortals in a slightly tidier heap near them and six hunters laid out side by side and being gingerly covered by Tanya with a large tarp. All and all not a bad night.
Edward helped the others retrieve the stakes and then happily piled into the back of Emmett's jeep, trying hard not to think about the beautiful girl who was still cowering terrified in the root cellar.
A bokor is a voodoo priest who can do good and bad magic.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE review even if it is only to say I read this story, it didn't suck, or even I read this story and it DID suck, or the story was great but you suck. This wasn't beta-ed it probably has some typos, point them out to me. I'm not going to hold chapters hostage for reviews but if I don't get any feedback at all I will probably get bored and move on to something else. Please review!