Author's Note: Sorry it's taken me so long to update. I had a little difficulty finding inspiration. Let me know what you think.


Chapter 2

Kris slowly navigated the wide turns up the mountain road. Within the last hour, the steady drizzle had transformed into a torrential downpour, and the winds had picked up so much that Kris could barely see where she was driving. She still had a half hour to go, and if the weather kept up like this, she would need to pull over soon to wait it out. Just then, Kris heard some music coming from the phone hooked to her jeans.

"Hey sister, go sister, soul sister, go sister…"

Kris pushed a button on her cell phone to transfer the call to the Bluetooth headset on her right ear. "'Lady Marmalade,' Mickey? Really? I still haven't forgiven you from that time you changed my ringtone to 'Let the Bodies Hit the Floor.'" Kris heard a laugh on the other end of the phone. About a month ago, Kris' roommate had thought it would be funny to change her specific ringtone from "Celebration" to the emo heavy metal song. The first time Mickey had called, Kris had been sleeping. She had been just groggy enough to wake up thinking the world had entered some kind of nuclear holocaust. "Do you even know what 'voulez-vous coucher avec moi ce soir' means? The song is about a prostitute."

"So? 'Cotton-Eyed Joe' is a song about some guy who got stoned, but you still dance to it," Mickey reasoned.

"Remind me again why I put up with you."

"Because you love me? Plus, I pay half the rent."

Kris sighed. "I'll buy that last one."

"Thanks, Kris. Really feeling the love here." Mickey said sarcastically.

"Don't give me that, Mickey. You know I love you like a sister. Now, what's up?"

"Well, more than anything else, I wanted to make sure you were all right. I saw you weren't home yet, looked outside and…well…we live in the Pocono Mts. region so you can understand my concern."

"Well, as you can tell, I'm still alive. If this storm gets any worse, though, I may have to pull over somewhere and wait it out. I have virtually no visibility right now. But, considering the angry, frustrated vibes I'm getting, I have to conclude that it's not just the rain making me slow down to 10 miles per hour."

Kris felt some of Mickey's worry seep through their empathic link. "Please tell me you're exaggerating."

"Only a little, Mickey. I can see only one car in front of me and one behind. If I didn't have my empathic gifts, I could almost convince myself this traffic was all in my head."

"Just be careful, okay Kris?"

"Always. Now, what's the other reason you called?"

"I have several actually," Mickey answered.

"You always do," Kris replied. "Go ahead. I'm listening." Kris checked the road for turnoffs. A sign indicated there would be a rest stop in another ten miles.

"Well," Mickey began. "For starters, can you tell me where I can find a flashlight in this place? I want to be prepared in case the power goes out."

Kris smiled. "Believe it or not, there's a small flashlight under the bathroom sink. I put it there because there's no window. It's not very pleasant to have everything go pitch black while you're doing your business."

There was a long pause at the other end of the receiver. Kris could practically see Mickey raising her eyebrows. "Only you would think of that, Kris." Kris heard footsteps followed by the sound of a cupboard door open and close. "Found it."

"Good. Don't lose it. What else?"

In a quiet voice, Mickey said, "My brother called today."

Kris sensed her roommate was trying to hide her feelings. "You sound disappointed. Did something happen? Did Emil have to cancel on you? I know you guys are supposed to get together this week."

Mickey paused before answering. "No. It's nothing like that."

Kris waited for Mickey to continue. When nothing was forthcoming she prompted her. "This was obviously important enough that it couldn't wait until I got home. Don't shut me out now."

After a few moments, Mickey said, "He said he may have found some relatives of our mother still living over in Romania."

"Wow…I don't know what to say."

"Yeah. I'm not sure how I feel about it." Michaela Parker was one of five children born to a young woman of "questionable morals" in Eastern Europe. Despite having spent the first four years of her life in the Carpathian Mountains of Romania, Mickey didn't know much of her origins. She and her older brother Emil were, as far as Mickey knew, all that was left of her mother's children. This included Mickey's twin sister who had died only a few hours after birth. The two of them had been lucky enough to be adopted by families in the United States. They had reconnected ten years ago after a chance encounter. Mickey liked to think of it as fate. After finding out her biological mother had died from disease some time ago, Mickey had laid the past to rest. She had a family here in the states and hadn't felt a need to look any further. It seems her brother wasn't done searching.

"Did you even know he was looking into it? I mean did he tell you before today?" A wave of emotional turmoil slammed into Kris and she struggled to stay on course. "Whoa, Mickey! I know I said not to shut me out, but I'm trying to drive on a wet mountain road here. Do you think you can rein it in a little?"

Kris heard her friend sniffle as if holding back tears. "Sorry, Kris. I'm just…I don't know. I'm just having a hard time with this right now."

Kris tried to send her friend some comfort along their link. "It's ok Mickey. You're entitled to be a little freaked out right now." Kris saw a light up ahead. "Hey, Mickey?"

"Yeah?"

"Can we talk about this later? I'm about to enter a tunnel."

"The dead zone tunnel?" Mickey asked.

"That's the one. I still can't figure out why we get service in this storm, but not in that tunnel."

"Life rarely makes sense, Kris—especially our lives."

Kris chuckled. "Ain't that the truth? Can you call me back?"

"Will do." Mickey hung up just as Kris entered the tunnel.


"I know you're here dark one!" Jayden called out into the storm. "It's time to face justice!"

Sinister laughter echoed among the trees. "Justice?" mocked the unseen voice. "You, justice? Ha! I happen to know for a fact that your own brother joined our ranks centuries ago and has yet to meet this so called 'justice.' How do you plan to kill me if you can't even find and destroy one to whom you're bonded by blood?"

Jayden grit his teeth. Had he still been able to feel emotions he suspected the vampire's words would have enraged him. "Show yourself, you coward!" Jayden laced his words with a strong compulsion. "If you think me so weak, then prove it! Come out and face me!" The air shimmered. Moments later, not one, but ten vampires stood before him, all identical. Vincent had decided to clone his image to buy more time. "Oh no," Jayden began sarcastically. "Whatever shall I do? How will I know which undead corpse to send off to the next world?"

The woods echoed with the clones' simultaneous laughs. "Sarcasm does not become you hunter. Or should I say 'gem caller?' You were never very good at hunting, Jayden. You should have just stuck to making jewelry and playing dress-up with all the other little girls in the village."

Jayden hadn't missed that little implication about his gender. "It is true. Gem calling is my true talent. Unfortunately, all the jewels in the world couldn't make your rotting body look decent. In fact, your kind somehow always finds a way to tarnish all the natural beauty in the world. So you see, by acting as a hunter, I'm really protecting my assets."

"Enough talk, hunter," the Vincents said. "It is time to…'protect your assets.'" The vampire and his clones charged Jayden, only to have him move out of the way at super speed. The Vincents came at him from all sides, but every time they threw a blow of any nature, he managed to evade them. The frustration must have been getting to the vampire, for several clones began to vanish.

As the heavy rain pelted them from above, Jayden pushed the storm to new heights. Lightning streaked across the sky, bouncing from cloud to cloud. He directed the lightning to the ground, near but never quite on Vincent or his clones. The sparks fell in a carefully choreographed pattern, forcing the vampire into a dark dance, taking him closer and closer to his own doom. Only four Vincents remained. They surrounded the hunter from all sides.

Time for the big finale, Jayden thought. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the lightning. He built a sphere of pure electrical energy around himself and the Vincents. Just as they were about to jump him, the energy sphere imploded, leaving only the real Vincent.

The vampire screamed in agony as his skin burned and his toxic blood poisoned the ground. He looked up, but Jayden was nowhere in sight. Then he felt himself being lifted off the ground by an unseen force.

"Did you really think your pathetic parlor tricks would fool me?" Jayden's voice echoed loudly across the forest as well as inside Vincent's head. The air shimmered to reveal Jayden staring at the vampire just as he plunged his fist inside its chest cavity. "I'm a master of illusions," he said as he gripped the heart. "It sort of runs in the family." Jayden sent another jolt of electricity into the vampire's body as he yanked out the heart. The vampire fell to the muddy ground and screamed in horror as Jayden directed the lightning to its blackened heart. The heart combusted and the flames jumped to what was left of the vampire's crispy carcass. In moments, the body was ash. Jayden finished the job, cleansing himself and the earth of his battle with the vampire. They turn so young these days," He thought. Vincent was barely in his third century. When he was fully satisfied that he had removed all signs of the battle, Jayden left the scene to feed.


"Hey sister, soul sister…" Kris turned on the Bluetooth. "Hello, Michaela."

"Uh oh," Mickey said. "You only call me by my full name when I'm in trouble. Are you still mad about the ring tone?"

Kris smiled. "Not if you change it back to "Celebration" when I get home."

"Celebrate good times, come on!" Mickey sang.

"Yeah. Well, I gotta tell you, I'm certainly not celebrating these times. They must be doing maintenance on the Lehigh Tunnel again. Only one side was open. No wonder we were moving at a snail's pace. They had us down to one lane! At least the speed has picked up a little since we left the tunnel and switched to two lanes."

"Well what did you expect, Kris? This is Pennsylvania! Home of constant, never-ending construction and roads that never get any better!"

Kris sighed. "Why can't Pennsylvania have carpool lanes like California?"

Mickey groaned on the other end of the phone. "What would it matter, Kris? You wouldn't be able to drive them right now anyway."

"No, but other people could drive them. Then there would be less people in my lane and I'd get home faster. Instead, I'm stuck here in literally bumper-to-bumper traffic on a slick mountain road that could mean a ten-car pileup at any freaking moment!"

Kris felt Mickey's wave of concern. "Kris, remember your happy place. Lying in bed at home curled up next to your precious kitty Marty and your big stuffed panther. Reading a good book. You won't get there if you don't calm down. Happy place."

Kris took a few deep breaths. "Better now?" Mickey asked.

"A little, emotionally anyway. I think."

Kris sensed Mickey trying to delve deeper. She reinforced her blocks. "What are you trying to hide from me, Kris? Please, don't keep me out of the loop. Did something happen at your sister's house today?"

A few moments went by in silence. Kris knew her friend wouldn't force the issue, but she also knew she couldn't hide the truth from her best friend. "I linked with Danny tonight."

Kris struggled to keep focused on the road as a myriad of emotions slammed into her. Confusion, worry, disappointment, anger, hurt, and even a little bit of excitement. "You did what?" Mickey's carefully controlled voice questioned.

"It was Danny, Mickey. It's not the new baby like we thought. It's always been Danny. I don't know why I didn't see it before."

A few seconds of silence passed then Mickey broke in with, "how could you link with him?"

"I don't know, Mickey. He was reaching for me. I tried to hold it off at first, but…he needed me, Mickey. I couldn't not help him."

Kris felt deep concern and a fair amount of fear radiate from her friend. "You do realize, of course, that by forging an empathic link with your nephew, you may have done more harm than good," Mickey told her. "What if he starts feeling your emotional stress, or worse, your physical pains?"

Kris groaned. Another headache was coming on. "Why did you have to mention physical pains?"

"Because of what happened between us. Because I know you have a headache right now and I feel it every bit as strongly as you do. And because I know how very little time it took for us to get to this point. We knew each other only two weeks before we could feel each other's pain. I hope you have some really strong blocks in place because your nephew may be in for a tough time."

"I did think of that Mickey, but I still couldn't keep from pouring my heart out to him. It's instinctive. You know how hard it is to keep from helping someone when you feel that strongly. He needs to know he's not alone. He needs to know I'll be there for him no matter what. He needs to know he's not some freak with a mental illness!" Kris sniffed. Tears were starting to form. "He needs to have a better childhood than I did. Can't you understand that?"

"Of course I understand that Kris. I probably would have done the same thing. I'm just worried about both of you. I couldn't bear it if anything were to happen to you."

"Thanks, Mickey. I feel the same way." Kris smiled through her tears.

CRACK! Just then, a huge bolt of lightning hit a transformer not two miles away. Kris struggled to breathe with her heart racing so fast. "You okay, Mickey? Power out?"

Kris heard some heavy breathing on the other end and Mickey's fight-or-flight response was reading loud and clear on her empath radar. "I'll live. I got the flashlight. I think you better pull over at the next exit and find a shop or someplace where you'll be safe until the storm blows over."

"My thoughts exactly."

Suddenly Mickey screamed and a wave of pure terror and agonizing pain flowed through the phone and slammed right into Kris. Kris struggled to stay focused, but her vision of the wet roads and heavy traffic soon blurred to be replaced by something else. Kris knew instinctively that she was somehow sharing one of Mickey's psychic visions. Pure darkness was everywhere, the world devoid of feeling, ready to suck the spirit right out of whatever it touched. Fear and despair touched briefly and a drop of blood broke the darkness. The void swallowed it and up from the depths arose a creature of pure evil. Perhaps once resembling a human, the creature had skin so grey and taut, its body seemed a rotting corpse. It smiled, baring sharp, yellowed fangs now bathed in the blood from which it had formed. Licking its lips, the creature, which could only be described as a vampire, forced his blood-red gaze upon her, and Kris began to drown in its darkness.

A loud honk sounded and Kris returned to the real world only to find her car had veered into the wrong lane. She yanked the wheel to the right, but it was too late. Her sub-compact got bumped by an oncoming car and she started down the side of the cliff. The only thing running through her mind was a prayer. "Dear God, please don't let me die. Not when I've only just begun to live."


MWAHAHAHA. How evil am I leaving it there? I'll try and get chapter 3 up as quickly as possible. Perhaps if I get lots of reviews I'll update sooner.