Author's Note: Sorry it has been so long since I posted for this! I tried to make this one a little longer for you. I'll finish the note at the end and let you get to the story now.
Hellfire
Chapter Four: Crimson Stains
"Shit!" Morgan yelled and Reid rushed to the banister. It was only then, after they had been drawn away from dealing with their own problems, that they all realized they could hear the muffled sounds of battle and screams from below.
Nicollet slashed the restraint on Morgan's wrist quickly before standing to look at the chaos below. Turning she ran into the room and was back in a few seconds, before Morgan even had time to stand all the way up, carrying both her and Morgan's jackets and the two stakes the men had lost during their struggles. Throwing Morgan his jacked and each hunter their stake, she didn't miss a step as she caught hold of the banister and launched herself over the edge.
Both men watched for a second as she landed on the balcony below and went to repeat the process to get to street level. Then they flew into action, Morgan pulling on his jacket as they started down latters on the fire escape reaching the ground faster than a normal human would have.
Nicollet had her jacked on and she handed a cross-bow to each man as they joined her. "Found these the other day and stashed them for this very evening." She gave them each a small clip of arrows. "These are alder. Through the heart will do it." And with that she spun on her heals and was running towards the mess faster than the hunters could keep up with and soon she was lost in the crowd.
"Let's do this, kid." Morgan nodded to his partner as they reached the hysteria.
Morgan took aim and shot an arrow straight through the heart of a woman who was baring her fangs at them and the men watched as she tumbled to the ground, a small patch of crimson spreading out from the wound, giving a few gargled screams before she stopped moving completely, dead on the ground. "Nicollet was right. Effective." Morgan nodded before they both plunged further into the battle.
Within a minute Reid had dropped three men and a woman with his cross-bow but was now down to one arrow. Thinking about it for a second he decided to save it in case he really needed it so he used the strap on the bottom to sling it across his back. Looking around he found Morgan had emptied all of his arrows and was also resorting to hand-to-hand combat.
As Morgan fought with a burly man with glowing red eyes Reid was attacked by a woman. Quickly he spun into her grip, surprising her and using his new position and the momentum from the movement to drive a stake through her ribcage and directly into her heart. Her scream echoed in his ear as she fell to the ground, Reid extracting the stake as she fell, leaving deep crimson streaks on his hands and weapon. As the man fell away from Morgan the both noticed the immediate area was cleared of all opponents.
"You ok, Kid?" Morgan was panting a little.
Reid nodded. "Great. Let's keep moving."
As they took off in the same direction they assessed the scene before them. Ahead they noticed Prentiss and JJ surrounded but holding their own, Prentiss with crimson stained curved blades in both hands and JJ with long bladed, deep red coated daggers, slicing through the air and opponents around them.
Morgan picked up the pace of his running, jumping up on a small wall of a planter box and used the new vantage point to gain the upper hand on a tall woman who seemed to be headed for Prentiss's blind spot. He launched himself into the air and came down with incredible force, driving the stake through her back into the heart. As Prentiss heard the commotion she spun to face the spot where Morgan now stood over the crumbled up body and gave him a quick nod of thanks.
Suddenly JJ screamed as a tall man with red eyes and dark hair landed a kick in the center of her back, sending her flying. She fell to the ground rolling over onto her side to face her opponent with empty hands, having lost her grip on her daggers as she was launched into the air. The man towered over her as she lay there, defenseless and too far away for the others to help. Spencer was just about to draw the cross- bow and hope that he had time to aim and fire when the sound of a metal broad sword leaving it's sheath filled the air and everyone noticed it hadn't come from the man.
Instead the man's head went flying, severed from his body which crumpled to the ground near JJ, leaving Nicollet standing right behind where he had been, holding the bloody sword she had drawn from another vampire, fire burning in her red eyes.
JJ was panting and looked up at the woman with a mix of wonder and fear. Nicollet lowered the sword and offered a hand to JJ, who just continued to stare at the woman. "Nicollet…" She breathed out, confused about how she should feel.
When JJ still didn't take her hand Nicollet stepped forward and grabbed her by the arm, dragging her to her feet. Without a word she handed the daggers JJ had dropped back to her and took off deeper into the battle.
The others rushed JJ to make sure she was ok, and apart from a small split on her cheek and blood splatter from her attacker she was unmarked. Without much more hesitation they all turned back to the fight, gaining the upper hand now that Morgan and Reid had joined ranks, staking, decapitating, or throwing into the fire any they met. Soon they found Rossi and Hotch fighting off a few remaining vampires with grace, both bearing small cuts and bruises to their faces. The battle quickly concluded, some vampires having fled when the tides had turned and the team stood together, all panting for breath.
"Where the hell where you two? We were almost slaughtered out here because you didn't hold your side." Hotch fumed at Morgan and Reid, knuckles turning white from how tightly he griped the handle of his broad sword.
"We, um…" Reid didn't know how to go forward without revealing to his superiors they had let Nicollet go but he could see the unit chief growing angrier by the second.
"It was Nicollet wasn't it?" Prentiss said, having seen the whole exchange with JJ.
"What?" Rossi looked between the others. "Nicollet was here?"
"She…" JJ shook her head. "She saved my life."
The two older men looked at the blond woman in disbelief.
"I didn't mean to keep them from the battle." Nicollet was suddenly standing a ways off, apparently unarmed now and out of the reach of any of the other weapons, her clothes splattered with blood and grime. All eyes snapped to her, Hotch and Rossi both raising their weapons to the ready position.
"I'm sorry." She said softly.
"What are you doing here?" Rossi asked, deep down not wanting to hurt his old teammate and secretly wishing she had simply stayed hidden.
"I… I couldn't stay away." She gave a half smile. "I missed you all."
The whole team new they should strike her down on the spot but their history with her prevented it from being that simple. "That's impossible." Hotch said factually, his weapon still held at the ready.
"Not as much as we thought. There are actually a fair amount of… us… who can still feel. And not just blood-hunger, hate, and lust. I, like some others, still feel love, compassion, empathy."
"You could just be saying that. How could we know for sure? It might just be a new and clever hunting tactic." Hotch shook his head at her.
"If I wanted to kill any of you, I've had plenty of opportunities. JJ, in the battle, Morgan, when I had him restrained back in the loft, Spencer, when he kissed me…" everyone but Morgan shot Reid a quick look, the girl's full of sadness, Rossi's full of empathy, and Hotch's full of disapproval.
"But I didn't. I know it's a lot to take in but there are those like me who hate what the others are like. It's hell to watch people hunted like animals when I can remember fully well what being human feels like. When most of the time I still feel that way."
"You did save my life. You didn't have to do anything but you stepped in." JJ looked deep into her brown eyes, something of a resolve forming in the depths of the blue ones.
Morgan spoke up. "And she's right Hotch. She had me beet up in the loft. If she had wanted to, she could have gutted me like a fish, but instead she went to Reid's aid. He had a huge gash on his head and he was barely conscious but she healed him whi-"
"Healed him? How is that possible?" Hotch interrupted.
"Distilled Vampire blood. Well any Vampire blood works but distilled is the strongest and most effective. It turns out that something in the chemical compounds of… our… blood actually speeds up a hunter's healing process." As she spoke she noticed Rossi slowly lowering his weapon. "It all comes down to some kind of bond in the molecular make up of both types of blood; hunter's being genetically different from normal humans, and Vampires as well."
"How could you possibly know all of this?" Hotch hadn't bugged from holding his weapon at the ready.
"Research." Nicollet took a chance and took one step closer to the team and watched as Hotch was the only one to match her step back. "See, the Bureau views Vampires as a new and immediate threat, something that needs to be annihilated now as quickly as possible before it spreads. They don't care about learning anything more than how to kill… us. Vampires, however, have actually been around far longer than the Bureau thinks, centuries. Turns out the fables of immortality are completely true. So Vampires have taken an interest in learning all about the advisory they face. There is actually a lot of… testing… going on." At the word testing her face darkened and she looked sickened by memories.
Reid had thought of something. "Nicollet, why did you choose to lead us here?"
"She what?" Hotch looked at the man and now lowered his weapon.
"She led us here." Reid said. "But I can't figure out why. At first I thought she just wanted to confront us, but she could have done that before now. Why here? Why now?"
"This pack was planning a massive hunt tomorrow night. That's why they were celebrating tonight."
"No, we knew that. That was Intel you fed us." Reid continued. "But why stick around to see it all? What about this made you stay and actually be a part of it?"
"I think I can answer that." Morgan said. "You wanted to make sure we took out the leader, right?"
Nicollet was silent for a moment before nodding. "Yes, I had a vested interest in making sure she went down."
"How could you know that?" Reid looked to Morgan.
"Garcia called me with some information right before I walked in on the two of you making out." Morgan almost smiled at the memory but remembered how complicated the situation was and knew that wasn't as amusing as it once would have been. His eyes were locked on Nicollet as he continued. "The leader of this pack… she's your-"
There was a loud bang near where they stood and everyone spun to face it, weapons at the ready. A young blond girl, appearing as if she was somewhere in her early teens, with blazing red eyes stared back at them all in terror. Prentiss, who was closest to her moved into action, headed to take her out.
Author's note continued: Like I said sorry, guys. I was right to say my life has just gotten crazy with school and many other things. My brother was in a motorcycle accident February 24th which was an already crazy busy weekend. He is ok, just a badly broken leg they had to put a steal rod in, so now he is back at home living on our couch. Normally I use that living room at night as my writing center so that has been put on hold and I just found time to read over and do a quick edit of this chapter that I already had ready to go up. I hope you guys will stick with me and I will try to write more and post more often. Thanks for reading!
