The call came at midday. Nikola was home alone; Sarah was at the museum doing her volunteer work. When the voice on the other end mangled his name and began saying he was so sorry, Nikola instantly knew- Peter was gone.

It took a while for the voice, a police sergeant in Chicago, to get around to telling him what happened. It was a freakish accident. Peter and some of the other young employees had been on the observation floor of his brokerage building eating lunch. They had started horsing around, Peter had been accidently bumped and stumbled into one of the big plate windows. It broke and he fell forty-two stories to the pavement below.

Nikola felt numb when he hung up. He had to tell Sarah; he didn't want to, but she would never forgive him if he didn't tell her immediately. He put on his jacket, made sure he had his wallet, and then went to the basement and picked up his vampire-creator. It fit neatly in his hand and in the inside pocket of his jacket; he had designed it that way. It was unlikely to be of use considering how long it would be before he could reach Peter, but maybe he could try it. He drove to the museum.

When he found her he told her there was an emergency and she needed to come with him. He wanted to tell her in private, but she saw it in his face.

"Peter?" she asked fearfully.

Nikola nodded. Sarah continued with a tiny thread of hope in her voice "He's hurt?"

Nikola didn't answer, he just took her elbow and said "Let's get your purse and I'll tell you in the car."

Once in the car he couldn't avoid it any longer and told her what had happened. Sarah just shook her head and said "That's wrong, Niko, that can't be right. It's not possible, things like that just don't happen."

Nikola just drove to the freeway and started south. "It's what I was told on the phone."

"But there would be safety glass, or a railing or something. Peter couldn't have just fallen against a window and . . ."

"I don't know, you would think someone would have the sense to use unbreakable glass, but people do stupid things all the time. And it's not a new building, I suppose no one thought about the glass."

Sarah wept softly for a few miles. Nikola just drove; there was nothing that he could say that would help. Sarah gradually quieted and just stared out the window at the passing scenery.

After a while Nikola asked "How are you doing?"

"I keep thinking about it. About his last few seconds, falling, knowing he only had a moment left to live. It must have been horrible, Niko, just horrible."

"He was probably in shock and he wouldn't have felt much of anything when . . . well it would have been very quick. Try not to dwell on it."

Sarah nodded, but from the way she just continued to stare at the passing scenery Nikola suspected she couldn't help herself. "Remember the good times, Sarah" Nikola said quietly. She nodded again, but there was an increasing amount of traffic as they neared the city and he had to concentrate on his driving.

They finally arrived at the police station, but there was little more anyone there could tell them. The police wanted someone to identify the body, and Nikola volunteered. He had a fairly good idea of the damage that kind of fall would do to a human, and he didn't want Sarah to see it. Let her remember Peter as he had been, happy and eager the day he had left.

At the morgue, the attendant tried to warn him about what he would see, but Nikola waived his words away. The sheet was pulled back, and Nikola forced himself to look. He kept his face neutral. He could see Peter had landed on his back, his head . . .

In a rough voice Nikola said "Yes, that is my grandson Peter Richards. May I have some time alone?"

"Of course" the attendant said sympathetically and left.

There was no point in trying to turn Peter into a vampire, considering his condition. Nikola was very angry, but outwardly remained calm. Stupid humans, they just killed each other through inattention, taking a life that could have done so much good. Peter had been so bright, and now his brains were . . .

Nikola cut that thought off, and noticed he had his vampire-maker in his hand and he was alone in a roomful of corpses. He wandered among the tables and found two likely subjects on tables next to each other. Nikola cut his hand, dribbled blood into their mouths, and applied his electrical energy to his single-pointed device.

He had to use the vampire-maker several times on each, but finally both awakened and opened their eyes properly black ringed with red, and fangs protruding from their mouths. They hissed angrily and sat up, but neither seemed to actually see him.

Nikola slapped one, but it didn't react. He ordered "Get up" and both got off of the table and stood, toe tags scratching on the floor. He ordered them to do things- walk, jog in place, stop breathing, breathe, and they obeyed him blindly. They became less angry as he calmed down. He peered into their eyes, but neither showed a trace of personality or intelligence.

Nikola knew he didn't have an infinite amount of time, and he'd found out what he wanted to know. He couldn't have saved Peter even if he had arrived immediately, even if Peter's body hadn't been so badly damaged. His technology still wasn't ready to create a true vampire. He ordered the two zombie vampires back on their tables and told them to die.

The struggle in each was disturbing. The vampire blood, the cells that had already changed, tried to live while the bodies as a whole tried to obey him and die. Finally Nikola helped and broke their necks. He arranged the bodies neatly and covered them with the sheets that had fallen to the floor. He had no idea what the coroner or the police would make of his addition to cause of death, and didn't care.

He put his vampire-maker back in his pocket and went back to Peter, gently touching a relatively undamaged part of the body and silently saying goodbye. Then he pulled the sheet over his grandson and walked out of the morgue.

Nikola just nodded to Sarah when he joined her. He could see her last hope, the possibility that it wasn't really Peter, die in her eyes. He took her to a hotel and checked in. They had no luggage but they wouldn't be staying long, just overnight and they could purchase the few necessities they would need. Nikola made phone calls from their room cancelling all their engagements for the next two weeks.

He ordered room service for Sarah, but she couldn't force herself to eat. She just drank coffee and paced. Finally she said "There has to be an accounting Niko. The people who own that building are responsible for Peter's death, and they have to pay."

"Revenge?" Nikola asked.

"Maybe a little bit" Sarah admitted, "But also they and everyone else who owns an old building need to pay attention to safety hazards and do upgrades to make their buildings safer as new products come on the market."

"A big money settlement would get their attention, certainly."

"That's the point."

"And the money?"

"I don't know, we can figure out what to do with it later. Give it to charity, perhaps."

"All right" Nikola agreed. He had no interest in pursuing a lawsuit, but Sarah was focused on it and it would give her something to do besides mourn. Angry Sarah was better than weeping Sarah, especially when the anger was directed at someone he wasn't overly fond of either.

They made preliminary contact with a law office in the morning and made arrangements for Peter to be taken to a funeral parlor near their home when the body was released. They stopped at Peter's office and took his personal things to his apartment where they sorted through his possessions and took a few mementos. The rest they left with Peter's roommate to dispose of as he wished.

At home they made funeral arrangements and notified friends and relatives. Nikola took his vampire-maker in the basement and examined it. He decided it would be more effective with two prongs and he began redesigning it. Perhaps a slightly different type of jolt would produce vampires that were intelligent, although he liked the fact that he had been obeyed by his creations. Well, he probably couldn't have it both ways and while an army of zombie vampires might be useful, it wouldn't achieve his purpose.

They got through the funeral. It had to be a closed casket ceremony, and Sarah was mostly all right until they reached the cemetery. When the graveside service was over and the casket was lowered, she completely broke down. Nikola just held her; there was nothing else he could do. When she had regained some measure of control, he took her home.

Sarah seemed obsessed about the lawsuit, consulting with the lawyers more than was necessary. Nikola let her do as she would, assuming the legal firm would draw a line if they needed to; but they had dealt with distraught people before and were patient with her.

The building owners settled out of court for the very large sum that Sarah had insisted on asking for. Nikola thought she would be pleased, but instead she was disappointed. She had wanted the publicity that would have gone along with a trial.

Sarah withdrew after that, dropping her activities. She had some interest in giving away money to charities, supporting mostly long established children-focused groups like Easter Seals and March of Dimes. Nikola tried to encourage her to go back to tutoring or her clubs, but she wasn't interested.

Nikola decided to retire. His research into creating vampires was nearly complete so he wasn't using the university facilities any more, and he felt Sarah needed him. When he was home he could interest her in doing little projects around the house or going out to a movie. Alone, Sarah didn't seem to want to do much of anything but she would accompany him if he asked.

He was so close to success. He could bring a corpse back to life and turn it into a vampire, but why wasn't his creation intelligent? He didn't know, maybe he needed some help but who could he trust with his secret, and who had even the remotest chance of being useful?

Helen, perhaps, although he wasn't sure how she would react if he told her. She certainly wouldn't be overly enthusiastic about helping him turn his wife into a vampire, so maybe contacting her was a bad idea. Or maybe contacting her was a good idea, but he needed a better cover story, something that would get her to help. Unfortunately, the only other reason he could think of to recreate the vampire race was to rule the world, not a convincing argument unless he could make a case for world peace or something.

Nikola assumed she was still running her Sanctuary network, but he had been out of touch so long, perhaps it was time to find out what was happening in her life. The Sanctuary didn't exactly have a public website or a Facebook page, but surely it must be connected to the internet. He began some careful exploration that very soon turned into late night sophisticated hacking after Sarah was asleep.

He found out a great deal of interesting information from quite a few well-protected sites, but did nothing but look. He didn't want to alert anyone that he could penetrate their computer security; he liked having covert access with no one being the wiser.

Eventually he found a number of sites that seemed impenetrable. One he quickly decided belonged to the Cabal, and he withdrew quickly, creating numerous red herrings and firewalls as he went. He definitely did not want to be traced and he had no need of information from them. He knew who they were and what they wanted, details were unnecessary and it was far too dangerous to go anywhere near them electronically as well as physically.

He finally located the site he thought was the Sanctuary. It had so many peculiar protections that could only be in place to defend against Abnormals, he was sure he was in the right place. But it was very well protected and he didn't want to set off any alarms. This was going to be delicate work, and it would take time to find out what he wanted to know, perhaps a great deal of time.

But Sarah was starting to decline physically, not surprising since she had passed age eighty. The time he had to succeed was getting short. He needed to complete Plan A- getting his vampire-maker to work correctly on his own. Plan B, contacting Helen and convincing her to assist him would take time too. And maybe he needed a plan C; he would have to think about that.

During the day he pretended more happiness than he felt to encourage Sarah, at night he worked on the computer and on upgrading his vampire-maker. It was a difficult schedule, but working eighteen to twenty hours a day wasn't new to him. He was Nikola Tesla, he would make it work.

A/N: Peter's accident is loosely based on an actual occurrence in Chicago some years back.