One
'David.'
… That voice.
'I know you can hear me.'
… It's been so long.
'David, you have to wake up.'
… I can't.
'Yes, you can. Try.'
For the first time in more than a century, I felt myself rise above the velvet sea of nothingness that overtook me every dawn. Propelled into partial consciousness, I opened my eyes and found myself standing alone, enveloped by a darkness the likes of which I had never seen. No matter which way I turned, the blackness stretched on interminably, the completeness of it both familiar and unsettling. And while no light seemed to exist here, I felt as if I was cast under a spotlight, singled out against the encroaching void. In the absence of sound, a ravenous and heavy silence pressed on me from all sides, the completeness of it swallowing anything that dared to disturb it. As I stood, stalk still at the nexus of nowhere, I felt the urge to call out against the vast emptiness. But just as I inhaled to speak, another voice broke the quiet.
"David," a painfully familiar voice whispered from behind me, the sound of my name on her lips a siren's song.
Turning instinctually towards the sound, I found only darkness.
"I'm here, David," the voice said gently again from out of sight, though this time I could feel a presence hovering nearby—almost close enough to touch. Suddenly fearful I would find myself alone again, I spun around to confront the phantom at my back.
And there she was, looking up at me as she'd done so many times before, her bright, turquoise eyes shining with the innocent expectancy that never failed to make me fall in love with her over and over again. It took all of my will not to reach out and touch her for fear of breaking whatever delusion I was under. "How?" I murmured, my voice laden with awe and longing.
"You're dreaming, my love," she answered with a smile—a sad smile, the kind that didn't touch her eyes. The last kind of smile I had ever seen her make.
"Vampires don't dream," I said ruefully. "You know that."
"Yes," she agreed, the word a sigh, "but she will, so you will, too."
Inexplicably, that simple statement hit like a slap across my face. "What do you mean—who…?" I floundered, lost.
Without hesitation, she reached out to bridge the insurmountable distance between us and lay her hand tenderly against my cheek. In spite of myself, I shivered under the unexpected touch, her flesh colder than my own. Colder than death. "Patience, my love," she cooed, the softness of her tone echoed in her eyes.
"Even after all these years, you'll find I'm still not very good at waiting," I joked mournfully, falling easily back into the naturalness of being we had once shared. I couldn't stop myself from leaning into her hand, pushing down the instinctual repulsion I felt at being so near a corpse.
Seeming to sense my conflict, she withdrew as if to reproach herself for being so carelessly wanton. "It won't be long," she breathed, suddenly on the verge of tears that would never come. She had always been easy to cry.
Reflexively, as I had done so many times before in life, I went to remove the nonexistent wetness from her face, only to have her shy away from me. Stunned at the rejection, I withdrew. "Why?" I asked, the one-word question charged with all of the hurt that now stabbed at my long-silent heart.
She simply shook her head dolefully before glancing off into the distance, focussing on something beyond the abounding darkness. For a long moment, she seemed to slip away, more unreachable than ever. "I'm out of time," she finally murmured, her voice detached and hollow.
"No, stay. Please," I said, the unbidden plea flying out of me before I could reign it in.
Looking back to the here-and-now, she fixed me with the same sad smile as before. "I can't stay. You know that," she said apologetically, the echo of my earlier words not lost on me.
"When will I see you again?" I begged, a frantic sort of desperation overtaking me.
"Who I was?" She asked cryptically. "Never. But you will see me again—I promise you that."
"I don't understand," I besought hysterically.
"You will. Soon."
o-o-o-o
"All I'm saying is that it doesn't make any sense," Paul countered as he threw a pebble directly at Marko's head. The smaller, quicker vampire easily caught it instead of falling victim to the projectile, much to Paul's dissatisfaction. "How can Warlock be considered a mutant? Being able to 'feel' isn't a superpower," he reiterated from on high, preaching.
"Like I've said a hundred times: because 'feelings' are an anomaly to his race. Just because you don't think it makes sense doesn't mean it's not canon," Marko fired back—figuratively and literally. With a quick flick of his wrist, he sent the rock he had been passed whizzing squarely into Paul's forehead.
"Ow! What the fuck, man?" Paul cursed before jumping down to the cavern floor from his preferred spot atop one of the more intact pillars.
Marko shrugged ambivalently, not budging from where he was reclining on the threadbare love seat that occupied one of the farther corners of our 'home'. "Don't whine: you started it… Besides, your aim sucks balls," he muttered as he buried his nose back in the comic book he was reading.
"Just because you're older than me doesn't mean I can't kick your ass," Paul growled as he advanced purposely around the fountain and crashed chandelier at the centre of the room.
The automatic response was to roll my eyes, if not somewhat indulgently. Paul was practically still 'new' after all: he'd barely been with us three years. "Save it for later, Paul. You need to feed," I dictated flatly as I sunk farther into the dilapidated wheelchair-turned-power-seat that was mine and mine alone.
"Well, then let's go!" Paul half-demanded, half-pled with only the desire and enthusiasm a new vampire could. "What are we waiting for?" He pushed exasperatedly when no one moved.
"It's barely two hours after sundown," Dwayne groaned from the salvaged sofa to my immediate right. "How many times do I have to tell you: the—"
"'—The easy pickings don't come out until at least eleven,' I fucking know," Paul spouted off, his tone a (surprisingly accurate) mockery of Dwayne's. "But my throat is on fire," he continued, now complaining as only a petulant child could.
"Deal with it," both Marko and Dwayne reprimanded in unison, their voices echoing against the cavern walls.
Even though I was at least fifteen decades his senior, I still remembered how it felt to be new. How simply existing could feel like torture when your throat ached and burned with want for moisture that only human blood could satisfy. But what was worse was the desire that came with the pain: how the mere thought of killing was enough to drive you mad with not only want but need. I didn't envy him. "Just relax," I offered calmly, the evenness of my voice seeming to cut through the bloodlust that was overtaking Paul's mind. "We'll find you something soon."
Paul considered that for a moment, his lack of experience, control, and sustenance opening the floodgates to his thoughts. 'Just wait. You can fucking wait. You're better than this. You're better than this,' he intoned repeatedly, the silent words making their way to me as if through a cheap motel wall. I could only snicker knowing that Dwayne and Marko could hear Paul's thoughts a thousand times more clearly.
"Dude, shut up," Marko said flatly as he tapped his temple. "If I have to listen to you go on all night like this, I'll kill you myself."
"Sorry," Paul apologised with a modicum of sincerity. "I just... It's—"
"—Hard to keep tabs on so many things at once. We know: we've all been there," Dwayne pacified, the mother hen in him appearing in tandem with the short fuse on his patience. "Just… Cool it, man," he offered sagely as he waved his (partially finished for the nth time) Rubik's Cube about.
"Right. Right," Paul agreed as he ran his hands through the wild mane of his hair to try and steady himself. When that didn't quite do the trick, he took to pacing in circles around the ruins of the fountain, balancing deftly on the cracked and crumbling basin's edge.
A small sigh escaped me then, the useless gesture a habitual release value for the unusual feeling of tension that had settled in my chest. I had awoken as normal just as the sun went down, but unlike every other night for the past century and a half (give or take), I came to with a violent start. As if I had been roused from a nightmare, I was awash with panic I hadn't felt in years—the kind of mind-numbing fear that makes you flinch at the sight of your own shadow. And even though the sensation passed as quickly as it had overtaken me, I was left with a lingering sense of unease that sat in my lungs as if I were holding my breath.
Something was going to happen. I just didn't know what or when.
"What's bothering you?" Dwayne asked offhandedly as he continued to manipulate the puzzle in his hands, the tiny plastic mechanisms within click-clacking sporadically.
I sighed again in spite of myself. "I'm not sure," I admitted quietly.
"That's a first," Marko teased. He flipped me off impishly from behind the copy of New Mutants #64 he was reading, using it as a shield when I glared at him.
Dwayne tore himself away from his toy to look at me over his shoulder. "How long has it been?" He asked pointedly, the insinuation not lost on me.
"Two—maybe three—days," I answered with an audible shrug. It was a small fib: it had been at least eight, if not more. I tried not to keep count: it made the thirst easier to ignore if I didn't think about it.
"Well, there's your fucking problem," my oldest and closest friend grumbled as he returned his full attention to his play-thing. "Paul's not the only one who needs to feed."
"Thank you, mother," I droned, knowing full well there was no quantity of blood in the world that could ease my apprehension.
'You have to stop putting the rest of us before yourself,' Dwayne continued, reprimanding me privately. Even after all of the years we had spent together, I still had to focus on his thoughts to hear him more clearly.
'I'll keep that in mind,' I equivocated flatly.
'Liar,' Dwayne shot back. I couldn't help but crack a small smile: he knew me a little too well.
"Let's go for a ride," Paul offered eagerly, pacing obviously not enough of a distraction from his thirst. "At least it would be something to do for an hour."
"The 'genius' sometimes has good ideas," Marko chimed in as he set down his comic atop a nearby pile of the things. "We could go out just to have some fun… Maybe sneak in an early look at tonight's menu for Pauly-boy," He tacked on suggestively, clearly trying to antagonize his best friend.
"C'mon, David," Paul practically begged. "Let's go."
'I mean, it's not a terrible idea,' Dwayne silently drawled as he made the final click needed for this iteration of his puzzle. 'We won't make it into town for a while and by then… Well, it's going to take some time to find enough blood to go around,' he continued as he loudly set down his toy with the overt intention of highlighting his own boredom. 'Getting an early start on tonight's hunt wouldn't hurt.'
He wasn't wrong. And perhaps I, too, needed a better distraction from my own troubles. "Sure," I agreed with a subtle, assenting nod.
"Woo-hoo!" Paul cheered as he jumped down from the fountain and raced towards the top of the bluff like a bat out of Hell, hooping and hollering all the while. Marko was close on his tail, though with significantly less noise.
Dwayne, meanwhile, sighed heavily before he slowly pulled himself to his feet and strode towards me. "Get up, old man. You can't change your mind now," he smiled as he gently kicked the bottom of my boot.
"Said the pot to the kettle," I observed before rising out of my chair. "I'm only forty-eight years older than you," I pointed out slyly as Dwayne and I leisurely began to make our way towards the surface.
"And yet you never let me forget it," Dwayne grinned as he clapped me on the shoulder.
"Someone has to put you in your place," I chuckled back as we passed through the short passageway to the outdoors. "Can you imagine how crazy things would be if I wasn't orchestrating this three-ring circus?" Dwayne laughed heartily in reply as we jumped easily from the small, rocky beach outside our hideout to the sandy blufftop above. Paul and Marko were already waiting for us astride their bikes and looking quite impatient.
"Took you long enough," Paul grumbled before pointedly kicking his Honda to life. Even though he was being especially salty, he (and Marko) had done Dwayne and me the courtesy of pulling our motorcycles out into the open.
I didn't rise to the provocation; I knew Paul didn't mean it. It was hard to be new: thirst could drive even the oldest of us to act regretfully. Instead, I smiled and shook my head as I hopped on the back of my custom T100 and roused her from slumber. Awake and brimming with Hellfire, she snarled and purred between my legs like the wildcat she was, the familiar sensation of her thrumming beneath me a salve to my worries. Dwayne and Marko were quick to follow suit, the rising harmony of rumbling engines against the constant song of the ocean a familiar hymn. Aggressively revving my Triumph, I sped off into the night, heading towards town as I had thousands of times before, the exhilaration of the journey never failing to fill my long-dead heart with pure, unbridled joy.
It was the closest I could get to flying without leaving the ground.
The miles flew past in minutes and before I had really started to enjoy myself, we were inside Santa Carla proper. Humans abounded on all sides, the very sight and smell of them intoxicating. Even after all the years we had been forced to spend together, I still couldn't understand how Max could stomach living within arm's reach of so many sources of temptation. I could barely handle the hired help milling about when we had lived together… But I guess that's one of the perks of being well over four hundred years old: you have more self-control. More skill to 'play the game' as Max always put it. One of the few eventualities I had to look forward to, I supposed.
Rolling onto the boardwalk through our usual back-channel means, I quickly killed the ignition of my bike and dismounted. Dwayne, Marko, and Paul quickly did the same, the four of us making quite the imposing sight as we started stalking our primary haunt. Although we were by no means the only vampires in Santa Carla, we had staked out the boardwalk as 'ours'. Which didn't mean we wouldn't occasionally run into others of our ilk encroaching on prey they shouldn't have been, but, conversely, it did mean that we—or I, specifically—had the final say in what was and wasn't allowed to happen. I fancied myself rather magnanimous in that regard: although I retained the 'right of first refusal' as it were, I let most of the poaching that happened on the boardwalk slide. It was the best place in all of S.C. to hunt, after all… But my generosity didn't come without reparations. In exchange for turning a blind eye on the boardwalk, Dwayne, Paul, Mako, and I had pretty well what amounted to free rein over all of Monterey Bay. It probably helped slightly that we had Max in our corner, but at the end of the day, that was neither here nor there. He barely showed his face beyond the confines of his ridiculous house and even more preposterous business anymore. In fact, it was exceedingly rare for his actual 'children'—let alone me—to see him face-to-face.
Which is why I found what happened next so bizarre.
'Where are you, David?' Max asked me suddenly, the silent intrusion still slightly muffled even given the magnitude of my mentor's power.
Even though I was taken aback by the unexpected and highly unusual intrusion, I continued strolling along with the river of bodies that always flowed throughout the boardwalk. 'Well, this is a surprise,' I cheeked back, ignoring Max's question. 'It's been, what? Three months without seeing neither hide nor hair of you?'
'Don't take that tone with me, boy,' Max barked, his temper more volatile than usual.
'I'm sorry,' I drawled, the biting insincerity of my thoughts not reflected in the impish smirk I was wearing. 'I suppose I should feel honoured to be hearing from you at all… You'll have to forgive me for not falling to my knees—'
'—Save your attitude for someone who cares,' Max snapped, cutting me off mid-snark. I couldn't help but flinch, astonished. Usually, Max enjoyed (in a twisted sense of the word) exchanging unpleasantries.
"What's up?" Marko asked subtly, his situational awareness always the keenest out of the others.
"Max," I said quietly, the single word speaking volumes. There was a collective eye-roll from my compatriots.
'Are you finished?' Max demanded after a pause.
'Fine. I'll bite: why do you suddenly have the incentive to care where I am?' I asked back, perhaps a little too acerbically. I could feel the others watching me closely as I drifted off of the main thoroughfare towards a quieter spot. Leaning nonchalantly against the side of a nondescript carnival-style game booth, I silently awaited Max's explanation for behaving so abnormally.
'Because two extremely important developments have occurred of which you need to be apprised,' Max smarmed flatly, the thinly-veiled urgency in his tone ever more uncharacteristic than the hair-trigger he currently had affixed to his ire.
'Alright, I'm listening,' I answered, suddenly filled once again to the brim with the heavy feeling of unease that had plagued me earlier.
'We need to talk—in person,' Max pressed. 'I can't properly explain what's happened like this.'
Of course. 'My schedule's a bit tight,' I winced mentally, the words hollow. 'I might be able to fit you in closer to three—if that's not too late for someone of your… Advanced age.' Sue me: I can't help myself sometimes. Max has always made it too easy to lip him off.
'Goddamnit, David, this is important!' Max practically screamed.
'Let me try, Max,' a second voice I hadn't had the misfortune of hearing in decades cut in, the crystal-clear sound of it reverberating through me with a shiver.
"David?" Dwayne asked cautiously, my shock clearly more apparent than I had hoped. I could barely manage to shake my head to try and put a pause to his concerns. The gesture didn't work as intended: curious apprehension now ruled in the three acute stares trained on me.
"Something bad's happened," Marko hissed nervously. On tenterhooks, he began to worry his nails on his teeth, the decades-old habit as natural to him as breathing had once been.
"Spill, David," Paul urged in tandem with an annoyed prod to the meat of my shoulder.
I smacked his hand away, my own temper now strung perilously high. "I'm working on it," I snapped.
'Do I have your undivided attention?' The other voice purred maliciously, the second conversation I was navigating not missing a beat.
'What do you want?' I asked icily of the mental intruder. Feeling bad for taking my frustrations out on Paul, I gave him a quick yet sympathetic pat on the arm by way of apology. As always, he nodded understandingly, my outburst bouncing off of him without effect.
'Really now, David,' the nuisance voice admonished, his false hurt filling me with disgust. 'Is that how you greet me after all these years apart?'
'Yes, Gideon,' I hissed, the name a curse I preferred not to utter.
'You wound me to the core,' Gideon bemoaned dramatically, making me roll my eyes. 'I find myself missing family lately, so here I am,' he protested disingenuously. I could practically see the smug grin on his face.
'Don't try to ram your shit down my throat. What do you want?' I repeated more forcefully, the fear that had been malingering in my chest now well and truly substantiated.
There was a brief pause before Gideon responded, carefully choosing his next words. 'As Max said,' he drawled boredly, 'an extremely important development has—how shall I put it? 'Manifested itself'? Yes, that seems appropriate. It's quite a delightful surprise, actually. Regardless, I want you to deal with it. Though I'd much rather discuss the particulars in person: this way is so… Dissatisfying.'
'Why me?' I hedged, instantly suspicious. 'If whatever you're scheming is so important, I'd think you'd want to take care of it yourself.'
'I'm sorry,' Gideon laughed incredulously. 'I didn't think I needed to provide reasoning beyond merely telling you to do something.'
'I'm not your errand boy.'
'Funny you should say that because the last time I checked, you are whatever I say you are.'
I had no rebuff for that and Gideon knew it. Instead of giving him the satisfaction of admitting he had me cornered, I remained silent and instead spoke aloud to Dwayne. "We have a visitor," I growled, knowing he wouldn't need more of an explanation.
"Fuck," Dwayne cursed as he impulsively slammed his fist into the wall, cracking the stucco. "What is that bastard here for?"
I laughed sardonically. "No clue yet. He's being purposefully vague—as usual."
"Of course," Dwayne scoffed knowingly.
"Would one of you dorks care to share what's happening?" Paul asked impatiently. Glancing over, I could see that he and, to a somewhat lesser extent, Marko were quite confused. Neither of them had been subjected to the need for this introduction yet and, truthfully, I had hoped they never would be. I should have known better.
"Well?" Marko pushed when I didn't immediately elaborate.
'Please, David,' Max placated calmly after the brief pause, reentering the fray as the mediator (his usual role). 'Cooperate and get it over with. And believe me: you're not the only one unhappy with this… Unexpected predicament.'
"Just hang tight; I'll explain in a minute," I stalled, much to Paul's displeasure. As I spoke he tossed his head back, groaning loudly over the gentle melody of the myriad of chains and medallions on his jacket.
"Keep your pants on—we've waited this long," Mark grumbled in response to Paul's tantrum, playing the level-headed 'adult' even though it was easy to see he was also unimpressed for being made to wait.
'Fine. Where?' I relented.
'Come to the house. There are fewer prying eyes.'
'We'll be there in twenty.'
'No,' Max said quickly. 'Just you. Twenty minutes.'
The resounding silence thereafter was even more unsettling than the initial trespass.
I looked to Dwayne first, fixing him for a fraction of a second with the full weight of my trepidations. At that moment, I could feel that he understood me—one of the benefits of our long and close history together. Before Marko or Paul could notice how deeply unsettled I was, I arranged my expression into something more confident. "Max wants to see me—alone," I clarified pointedly when Paul's eyes lit up with excitement. On any other occasion, I would have rued his resulting crestfallen-yet-frustrated pout, but I knew it was for the best that I handled this inconvenience on my own. Gideon was ruthless: there was no telling what new low he might stoop to in order to satisfy his over-inflated sense of self-righteousness. Adding a relatively new and extremely impulsive vampire into that mix was a recipe for disaster.
"What about?" Marko asked astutely, always hunting for as many details as possible. I hated to disappoint him, but—for now—it was in everyone's best interest to keep some things to myself. I'd let Paul and Marko in on the secret which had haunted me for more than a century once I had a better inclining of what Gideon was after this time.
"l was serious about having 'a visitor'," l said, strategically. "I'd say he's a 'friend' of mine, but—"
"—He's a bastard," Dwayne explained acrimoniously (again), decades of forgotten anger bubbling back to his surface to simmer, fresh and raw.
"To put it nicely," I finished with a wry grin.
Marko considered that for a quick moment before he eyed me suspiciously. "If this guy—whoever he is—is such a piece of shit, why are you even bothering to deal with him?"
You know, sometimes you're too shrewd for your own good, bud. "Trust me: if I had a choice, I wouldn't be," I muttered blackly. That gave both Paul and Marko pause; I could feel them eyeing me, concern heavy in their stares, as I also took a moment to disinterestedly watch the crowd as it flowed past. It always amazed me that humans could be so oblivious to the predators in their midst. We were—what? Five, maybe six feet, away from them at most? And yet there they were, continuing on as if they weren't being watched by four of the most dangerous predators on the planet. I mean, there was always the odd ones who gave us a wider berth than normal, but I knew they had no idea why they were suspicious of us. Maybe they chalked it up to the way we dressed or our piercings or our motorcycles, but they never really understood. Instead, they'd write us off as good-for-nothing rebel punks without anything better to do than cause trouble and then they'd turn a blind eye. Sure, they'd keep a closer watch on their wallets, but that was it. Too wrapped up in their own simple worlds and senses of importance, they never realised how close they always were to dying. In a way, I supposed I envied their ignorance… But, at the same time, I (we) depended on it. Ignorance—the illusion of 'normalcy' in a world filled with literal monsters—was what made them such easy prey.
And it would be so easy to kill them all.
"When I know more about what our 'friend' wants, I'll tell you," I promised, the morbid tangent my thoughts had wandered down not interrupting the conversation. "But," I sighed, dreading what was to come next, "I have to go. I'll be back as soon as I can; don't have too much fun without me."
"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?" Dwayne asked seriously, always ready to fight for his friends—his family—at a moment's notice. But while I appreciated his loyalty and honestly wouldn't have minded the support, I didn't want to piss in Gideon's Cheerios right at the off. It made more sense to go along with whatever distorted plan that the devil was orchestrating for now. The rules of engagement could be broken later, once I knew what they were.
"Thanks, but—for now—I should at least pretend to be cooperative," I admitted, the words rising in my throat like bile.
Dwayne shook his head in disagreement but didn't push the issue. "Alright," he sighed ambivalently, clearly not sold on my reasoning. 'Punch first, ask questions later' had always been his default M.O.
Not wanting to linger and give cause for debate to begin, I nodded a silent farewell to my friends and leisurely began making my way back to my motorcycle. I was in no hurry: Max didn't live too far from the boardwalk; twenty minutes was more than enough time to get there. My intention was to use all of the time I had bought for myself, perhaps even being so brash as to waltz in a minute or five late. As anxious as I was to get Gideon's nonsense done and over with, the last thing I needed was to seem overeager. That was just an invitation to go through the motions again in the near future. So even though I couldn't refuse to deal with Gideon outright, it was within my power to vex him as much as possible. And that was exactly what I intended to do.
As I casually backtracked down the main thoroughfare, I made sure to stop whenever I had a chance to people-watch—but not in the usual definition of the word. Far from it, actually. 'Stalking' or 'hunting' are more appropriate terms, but using them in casual conversation tends to illicit undesirable reactions. So instead, we vampires 'people-watch': carefully taking in the crowd, searching for those humans who are the easiest to pick off. True to nature, sometimes those humans are old and sometimes they're sick and sometimes they're young—the easy ones to physically overpower. But more importantly and most often, a vampire can sense which humans are weak-willed. In other words, we can feel which people are extremely susceptible to manipulation—to illusion and suggestion. We can tell, just from a look, which human out of a crowd will be easiest to lure away to some dark corner from which they'll never return. All that said, no one, in particular, was catching my eye at the moment, but that was probably for the best. Although I was in no rush to ask Gideon 'how high?', l couldn't afford to push the envelope too far: I may have had leeway to dawdle, but I didn't have enough time to get rid of a body. My own thirst would have to wait.
Too quickly, I found myself staring at my Triumph, dreading turning her over. Because the sooner I did, the sooner I would make it to Max's. And the sooner I made it to that ridiculous house, the sooner I would have to see him. It had been almost exactly eighty years to the day that I had last seen Gideon's face. In my opinion, eighty years wasn't yet long enough between 'visits'. In fact, I could probably go the whole of my immortality before feeling the inkling of a desire to see him again—regardless if he was family or not. But I knew that, as much as it would have pleased me for Gideon to fall out of my life forever, it wasn't possible. He'd made sure of that.
Resignedly, I swung astride my T100 and kicked her engine to life, the act bringing none of the joy it had earlier. Winding purposefully through Santa Carla's sleepy suburban streets, I lost myself somewhere between leaving the boardwalk and arriving near Max's house. Killing the engine about a block away, I quietly walked my bike to park it behind the garage and made my way through the front (and only) gate. Perched on a cliff overlooking the sea, Max's house occupied a rather grandiose spot in a very wealthy area of town. Divided from his neighbours and the main road on a peninsula of sorts, you had to pass over a small bridge to even reach the lot proper. After that, the house itself was hidden behind a wall of trees and manicured shrubs at the end of a winding garden path. Max always maintained that he designed this house to keep unwanted visitors out, but it wasn't hard for those who knew him to read between the architectural lines. This house was nothing more than a fortified castle disguised as a luxury bungalow, the monstrosity of it built with the sole purpose of stroking his despotic ego.
I hated coming here.
Finally at the absurd double front doors, I hesitated. It wasn't too late to just… Walk away. Max and Gideon hadn't even noticed my presence yet: I could hear them whispering in furtive tones, deep in some secret conversation that had them completely preoccupied. They didn't even seem aware that I was arriving fashionably late which, normally, would have been enough to get Gideon ranting about the nature of respect and punctuality. It would be so easy to leave; I didn't want to be here, anyway. So why couldn't I move?
Because you're a coward. You're afraid of what retribution he'II exact this time for such a slight.
'… I'm here,' I announced lazily to both Max and Gideon, the two small words embedding themselves like splinters in my pride.
'Come in. We're in the living room,' Max replied offhandedly, clearly distracted.
Annoyed, I rolled my eyes before slipping quietly inside. As the heavy door closed behind me with a foreboding snap, I took a pointless breath to steel myself for what was to come. The inside of Max's house wasn't exactly what you'd expect for someone who'd been around since the reign of Elizabeth I. In all the time I'd known him, he'd always been a little overzealous about 'experiencing the spirit of the age' as he put it. Where Dwayne and I (and Marko, too) had grown accustomed to melding with the current trends, Max lived them. Completely. Currently, his house was a shining example of life in the '80s: bold patterns, neon lights, crazy statement pieces of art—the weirdest being a gigantic, red toothbrush leaning against the wall in the entryway. His commitment (or rather 'overcommitment') to looking like he belonged was almost a dead (ha) giveaway of how much of an imposter he was. But, then again, he wasn't doing it for the benefit of those who knew him: he was doing it for those who didn't. It was a larger-than-life show put on daily to lure the humans he surrounded himself with into a false sense of security and familiarity. In that regard, perhaps he was smarter than he looked… Entering the living room, I found Max standing at the large patio doors along the far wall, solemnly lost in his own thoughts as he stared out into the dark. Gideon, meanwhile, was lounging regally on the farther of the two sofas flanking the massive fireplace with his usual self-satisfied, repugnant smirk on his face.
Even though he only stood about two inches taller than I did, Gideon always seemed to occupy more space. He was no more muscular than I was, nor any worse or better looking, but even so, he nevertheless commanded more attention than I ever had… Maybe it was because he was older than I was (if again only just) or maybe it was because of his wheat-gold hair, or his thin nose, or his bow-like lips, or his perfectly-sculpted cheekbones and jawline. Or, maybe, it was that he radiated a certain sense of 'not giving a fuck' about anyone or anything beyond himself. And, in that regard, I honestly never understood why people found that so magnetic about him. From the outside looking in, it was easy to see from Gideon's gem-like eyes that he didn't care. I was never surprised when he tossed aside yet another woman like a used, broken, and defiled plaything. I was never shocked to hear he had gone through his new 'friend' like a napkin, letting them serve as a mop for his bullshit until he got exactly what he wanted from them. Where no one else could, I had always been able to see the cold that lived in his artificial smiles and his fake laughs… But the rest of the world ate up his mistreatment like starving dogs, never seeing beyond the show of his 'charm' or 'wit' or whichever other nonsense was applied to his barely-disguised contempt.
"How nice of you to finally join us," Gideon said pointedly, his narrow eyes flashing maliciously as I paused just inside the massive space. "Sit," he half commanded, half invited, motioning to the sofa across from him as if he owned the place. Contrary to the last time I had seen him, Gideon's hair was now cropped in a sort of short-but-shaggy way that fell into his eyes. He was wearing an acid-washed denim jacket over a turquoise henley with black jeans and an immaculate set of white sneakers. If I didn't know how long ago he had died, I would have said he was just as much a child of the 'cute decade' as Max appeared to be.
I made no move to take the offer; I didn't intend on staying long. "Cut the crap," I growled. "What do you want?"
Gideon chuckled, the deep and thunderous sound grating on my nerves. "Sit," he demanded, a cruel sort of pleasure and humour driving the tiny word.
He was ordering me around like a dog.
Hackles raised, I fixed the smug vampire across the room with the blackest glare I could muster and remained where I was. In response, Gideon smiled pleasantly, the gesture insidious. And even though I knew what was coming, I flinched as Hell was silently unleashed upon me.
'SIT!' Gideon's voice screamed mercilessly inside my head, the harsh command repeatedly biting at my will like an endless swarm of wasps. Simultaneously, a horrible compulsion to obey coursed through my body with the intensity of a flashover, the agony of resisting it enough to make me want to cry out. As the seconds ticked by, I struggled to hold myself where I stood, silently praying to be released from the torture before I broke. But I knew relief would only come one of two ways: either I would fold under the pressure of Gideon's demands or he would release me. The cold glint in Gideon's eyes told me which option was more likely to happen first.
"David, please have a seat," Max asked calmly in immediate response to Gideon's last audible demand, unaware of the mental assault I was under. Turning to face me, he fixed me with a subtle, imploring gaze before positioning himself between Gideon and me on the padded leather ottoman directly facing the fireplace. At that exact moment, the terrible feeling of compulsion and the ceaseless screaming in my head ended, leaving no trace behind. Freed, I exhaled deeply and reluctantly went to join my hosts, purposefully choosing the farthest seat away from Gideon as I could.
"Now, was that so hard?" Gideon asked slyly, his eyes shining with twisted glee. I glared at him again, loathing how much he was enjoying seeing me brought to heel, but didn't answer.
"You said there were two things we needed to talk about, Max. What are they?" I asked stiffly, turning my attention to the lesser of the two evils in the room. "I have better things to do than sit here and be insulted by him."
"As for the first matter of import, it's lounging with its dirty shoes on my sofa," Max drawled. Gideon made no effort to change his position and instead chuckled quietly to himself, pleased with his own impudence. "Regarding the second major development," Max continued with a weary sigh, "my tongue's tied on the subject." The stare he then fixed Gideon with was unusually cold. Even though Gideon was more trouble for more people than any one vampire was worth, Max still had a soft spot for the villain. I knew it was mainly because Gideon was one of Max's 'children', but I also liked to think it was because he felt an obligation to mitigate the damage caused by the monster he had unchained.
I should have known… "Well?" I asked blandly, fixing the 'first matter of import' with an accusatory look.
Gideon grinned at me, satisfaction radiating off of him. Whatever game he was playing must have been moving along exactly as he had planned. "I need you to find someone for me," he purred, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly like they always did when he was being devious. I was instantly on high alert.
"Find them yourself," I snapped, the limited reserves of my patience already running dry.
"Tut-tut," Gideon patronized, his slimy smile broadening. "This is how you repay me for trying to do you a favour?"
"'Do me a favour'," I repeated sardonically. "The last time you 'did me a favour', you killed twelve people. And the time before that, you nearly burnt down half of Fort Benton. I don't want any more of your 'favours'," I spat finally before standing up from my seat with every intention of leaving.
"David, please," Max entreated, the sincerity in his voice catching my attention. When our eyes met, he seemed to be pleading, silently, for me to stay, which made me pause. Max never begged for anything. "Please," he said again in earnest, "it's in both of our best interests if you stay."
"Don't breathe another word, Max," Gideon threatened kindly. "You know I always keep my promises: the one I made you earlier is no exception." Wisely, Max remained quiet, but that didn't stop him from mustering the most repugnant glare I had ever seen him make. What was more shocking still was that it wasn't directed at me.
Now, I may be guilty of being prideful, but I'm definitely not guilty of being stupid. At that moment, I realised that Gideon wasn't just here to cause me suffering: he was Hell-bent on enacting some revenge on Max as well. And as much as I disliked Max, I also had respect for the man. That'll happen when you spend more than a century on the run with someone, trying to outpace your mutual demons.
Reluctantly, I sat back down.
"I knew you'd come around," Gideon enthused, sitting upright as if excited to finally be getting down to brass tacks.
My next words pained me. "Who is it, then?"
"I can't tell you that," Gideon laughed. "That'd ruin the game entirely."
"This is ridiculous," I protested. "How am I supposed to find this person if I don't know who they are?"
When Gideon snickered quietly at my expense, I knew the information he was withholding was dearer than he was letting on. "Trust me when I say: you'll know who it is when you see them."
"That doesn't help," I barked.
Gideon's responding Cheshire cat grin was repulsive. "Alright, I'll give you one hint: it's a woman."
I rolled my eyes, exasperated. "So half of the humans in Santa Carla. Thanks, that's really helped to narrow things down."
"For Christ's sake, you utter simpleton! Do I have to spell everything out for you?" Gideon spat, the switch on his moods tripping as easily as ever. "Really, how have you survived this long? Don't answer that," he quickly snapped when I drew breath to retort. "It's a woman," he repeated, visibly annoyed. "Late twenties. Pretty. Dark hair. Are you happy now? I've practically given it away," he bemoaned for the dramatic finale of his childish tantrum.
"And what am I supposed to do once I find this… Mystery woman?" I demanded, desperate for more details to lessen the burden of such an impossible task.
"We'll cross that bridge when we get there, but you have to find her first," Gideon winked, his mercurial temper cooling as quickly as it had flared. "And I have the utmost confidence you will," he smarmed in conclusion as he reclined back on the sofa, satisfied.
At a loss for words, I looked to Max for help but found none. In fact, Max wouldn't even look at me. Instead, he pulled off his false glasses with one hand and massaged the bridge of his nose with the other, exhausted. I had never seen him so defeated before. "I think you'd best be going, David," Max muttered after a brief hesitation, the offer in no way unkind.
In this instance, I didn't need to be asked twice. Without so much as a backward glance, I rose from my seat and briskly left the room. Just as I was about to open the front door, I heard Gideon speak, loud enough so that even a human could easily hear him.
"You know, Max," he said with every intention of being obnoxious, "I think I'll take you up on that glass of wine you offered earlier. I suddenly feel like celebrating."
Disgusted, I didn't linger to hear more.
I drove on auto-pilot all the way back to the boardwalk, my mind stuck in a loop of 'Why? How? Who?', one question always leading cyclically to the next. Why had Gideon suddenly shown up? How did he find us again? Who is he looking for? Why is it so important I find them? How am I going to accomplish this impossible task? Who could possibly be so fucking important to him? How—
'—Is everything okay?' Dwayne asked suddenly, his voice, however muted, slicing the tumult of my thoughts. 'You've been gone a while.'
'I'm fine,' I assured him as I parked my Tiger back in its place beside Paul, Marko, and Dwayne's bikes. 'Where are you?' I pressed, trying to downplay the urgency that kept trying to creep into my voice as I dove back into the late-night crowds. Even though I had no clue who I was looking for, I carefully stole glances at every woman I passed, praying one of them would somehow stand out. But face after face after face—green eyes, black hair, fair skin, brown eyes—were just that: faces. Nothing about them affected me in any way beyond the occasional lure of being easy prey. It was infuriating.
'We're on the far east side—you know the spot,' Dwayne said nonchalantly. 'Want us to wait for you?'
'Yeah,' I replied, slightly distracted when a beautiful Hispanic woman with dark, almond-shaped eyes caught me looking and winked at me. 'I'm already heading that way, so just sit tight and I'll meet up with you guys,' I instructed as I smiled roguishly back at her and kept moving. Although she would have made an easy snack, she wasn't who I was looking for.
Taking a moment to pause, I found myself standing outside the boardwalk's oldest and probably most famous attraction: its carousel. I hadn't had the privilege of seeing the thing when it was new back in 1911, but it was still pretty impressive nearly three-quarters of a century later. People came from all over just to see the damn thing and, in a sense, I could understand why. Although it wasn't the flashiest ride on the boardwalk, it did exude a sort of irresistible charm—an aura of nostalgia. For humans, I suppose it reminded them of the carefree innocence of childhood: of fewer cares and easy joy. It also must have been fascinating for them to have the chance to touch a vestige of the past, especially in a time when everyone was so preoccupied with their own pointless relevancy. But, for me… For me, the hand-carved beasts, the intricately painted scenery panels overhead, and the organ music were an ode to simpler times. It reminded me of candle smoke and hardwood floors; steamships and travel by train; and of the advent of electricity and the magic of automation.
Filtering in with the crowd, I passed leisurely through the viewing area just inside the carousel house proper. Even though it was useless, I continued scrutinizing every female face that crossed my path. And although I had no better an idea of who I was looking for as I did almost an hour ago, I had a sneaking suspicion that I might notice something important here. The place was packed and there was, as always, a long line for the attraction itself, but that didn't bother me in the slightest. It was all too easy to slip around to the back of the cavernous space, away from the less-than-observant eyes of the ride attendant, and, completely unnoticed, vault the pitiful barrier meant to keep ruffians (such as myself) out. And besides, even if someone had noticed I was riding for free, it would be all too easy to convince them otherwise.
As the carousel turned, mid-run, I gracefully hopped astride the one-time mechanical wonder and began to move my way between the posts. Swinging gently from stag to stork, I made sure to look at every woman I passed, hoping that one of them might spark some kind of inspiration in me. But, exactly as before, each face I saw was as unassuming and uninteresting as the next, leaving me with little hope for getting out from under Gideon's thumb. Nevertheless, I rode the merry-go-round until it finished and disembarked with the paying riders as if nothing was amiss. As I moved along with the tide of exiting bodies, I caught the strangest scent on the air—an eerily familiar perfume that I had nearly forgotten after so many years in its absence. A fleeting whisper of sage mixed with yarrow and fern wafted past me, the unusual harmony of scents light against the heaviness of the summer air. Deeply perturbed, I froze where I stood, gaping frantically at the humans who passed me by in hopes of finding the source of such a distinctive smell. For in all of the long, sordid history of my existence, there was only one person who—
"—Taking a break for some fun, are we?" A familiarly loathsome voice chastised from behind me. Wheeling around, I saw Gideon leaning against a wall within arm's reach, grinning smugly. "Please forgive my intrusion, but I just had to come to see what all the fuss was about. To be honest, though, this… Place," he sighed here with contempt, "isn't as fantastic as advertised."
"Then take a hike," I hissed as I blew past him and headed for the door, still desperately scanning the crowd. Gideon followed close at my heels like an oppressive shadow; I could feel him watching me.
Gideon chuckled dryly, not rising to the insult. "Come now, your mother didn't raise you to be so uncouth," he scolded.
"'Your mother'," I scoffed bitterly as we casually rejoined the constant flow of people on the boardwalk's main drag. Regardless of the unwanted company that tailed me, I went back to searching the crowd, but now with purpose. I had to find the source of that perfume. "Why are you really here?" I asked blandly to cover up the subtle taste I took of the air. The faintest hint of herbs and flowers danced illusively on my tongue and in my nose, the trace of it now more memory than sense. And, suddenly, I wasn't quite sure if the ghost I was chasing was real in the first place. It had been so long since I'd even had cause to remember her face, let alone something as intimate as the scent of her skin, her hair…
I must have imagined it.
"Aside from the fact that I find Max's company oppressive?" Gideon asked rhetorically, his voice caustic with disgust. "Because I want to have a little chat with you before I truly leave you to your own devices."
That caught my attention. Wary, I turned to face Gideon and found him analysing me, his stare cold to match his unfriendly posture. "Well, it must be something good if you were too afraid to say it in front of your old man," l prodded with a sneer, finally eliciting the flash of anger I had been looking for. A human would have missed it: the brief narrowing of Gideon's eyes, the slight downturn at the corners of his mouth, the subtle crease of his brow. Although it only lasted less than half a second, I revelled in the small victory.
"Listen very carefully, David," Gideon whispered just loud enough for my ears alone, the placid smile on his face belying the malice in his eyes. "You asked earlier why I was willing to delegate such an important task to someone like you… Well, just between us, let me be more clear: I'm not entrusting you with anything. I'm merely giving you a head start."
"A head start to what?" I demanded, inexplicably apprehensive as another impossible trace of that incorporeal perfume teased my senses.
Instead of answering, Gideon closed his eyes dramatically and took a deep breath in through his nose. Holding the air in his lungs, he hesitated reverently before letting out a wistful sigh. "To think, after all these years," he mused, the excitement in his voice warped, "I remember that scent as if it were just yesterday—"
"—A head start to what, Gideon?" I repeated forcefully, closing the space between us to get within inches of his smirking mug. Irrationally, I was now filled with competing feelings of dread and fury as though something very precious to me was being threatened. So suddenly desperate was I that, if we weren't out in the open (as I'm sure Gideon had planned), I would have tried to beat the information I wanted out of him then and there. But there were too many witnesses and I were already pushing the boundaries of projecting a 'civil' conversation between acquaintances. It took every ounce of my self-control to keep my hands from flying at Gideon's pompous face.
Gideon laughed, no doubt viewing my restraint as weakness. "To get to her before I do," he enthused sadistically, topping off the taunt with a patronizing clap on my shoulder. When I thought he was about to release me, Gideon instead tightened his grip and wrenched me close. "If I noticed it—that once-in-a-lifetime perfume—I know you did, too," he whispered directly into my ear, sending a chill down my spine.
Forcefully sloughing off Gideon's hand, I took two fist-fulls of his denim jacket in return and shook him once, hard. Gideon only smiled more broadly, delighting in my rage. "What aren't you telling me?" I growled, the thoughts that picked at my surety dizzying. If Gideon could smell what I had, then it must have been real. Unless he was lying, which was far more likely. Yet there was no way he could have known what I had sensed, so he must have noticed it, too. And even if it was real and Gideon was telling the truth, that didn't mean anything—it could have been anyone… But it wasn't. Gideon had said it himself: there's never been anyone else, not in nearly one hundred and thirty years. So that meant it had to be her—even though it couldn't be her. It couldn't be. I'd seen her, lying there. I'd…
… I'd seen her body
"I've always wondered, David," he mused instead of answering, the smile on his face depraved, "did she taste as sweet as she—"
"—Answer me!" I hissed as I gave him another shake, though this time with much more violence.
In the split second of silence that followed between us, Gideon regarded me carefully, his sickening grin softening into a sort of general mask of gloating amusement. "Remember when I said I was doing you a favour?" He asked pleasantly as he then threw off my hands, the jarring shove bringing me back to myself. Even so, I could merely glare blackly at him, frozen somewhere at the intersection of infuriated, confused, and astonished. Satisfied I was paying him close enough attention, Gideon continued taunting me. "This is that favour," he hissed while meticulously smoothing the lapels of his coat, "so don't waste it." Having decided he'd sown enough mayhem for one evening, Gideon fixed me with one last haughty look before abruptly taking his leave. And as much as I wanted to chase after him and demand a straight answer, I knew the effort would be wasted. All I could do was watch Gideon saunter off in the opposite direction until I lost sight of him in the crowd.
'Dude, what's the holdup?' Paul then asked impatiently, his thoughts shared between Dwayne, Marko, and myself.
'Shut the fuck up, man!' Marko snapped at the same time that Dwayne hissed: 'I thought I told you to keep quiet?' Their thoughts overlapped raucously, the din a refreshing change of gears. There was a brief pause, no doubt time enough for both Paul and Marko to get told to shove it, before Dwayne spoke again. 'Seriously, though… Are you on your way or what?'
Casting one last suspicious stare in the direction Gideon had went, I turned eastward and kept heading back towards my friends. 'Yeah, I'm coming,' I said to the group before focussing on speaking to Dwayne alone. 'We've got a big problem,' I hedged, still trying to figure out how best to explain what was going on since I wasn't one hundred per cent sure myself.
There was another pause as I weaved my way through the crowds, going as quickly as I could without attracting attention. 'I fucking knew it,' Dwayne eventually moaned. 'What is that roach up to this time?'
'I'm not sure yet, but Gideon's already making threats,' I answered truthfully as I took a quick scan of the crowd to make sure I wasn't being followed. The coast was clear, so I slipped off the main boardwalk drag around the back of the arcade. It didn't take long after that to flit between shadows and quickly make it over to where I wanted to be. It was a secluded spot hidden in the void between rides where most people—even the security guards—didn't bother going. There wasn't much over here: a stage that never saw use and the remnant pilings from a long-forgotten attraction, hemmed in by a lonely stretch of the railing which separated the beach from the boardwalk. The lighting over in this corner of the park was sparse and the background noise from the nearby loudspeakers was pervasive, making it an ideal spot for clandestine discussions between vampires.
"Finally," Paul groaned as I approached, rocking perilously far back on his perch on the railing.
"What took you so long?" Marko asked sharply, his tone not quite irritated yet not quite concerned. He was leaning against the railing on Paul's far side, worrying his nails as usual.
Dwayne, who was standing as a bulwark kitty-corner before Paul, turned to greet me as I approached. I could tell by the stern set of his brow that he was worried. "Hey," he grunted, trying to maintain an unaffected façade for Marko and Paul's sakes.
Stopping next to Dwayne on his left, I nodded a casual 'hello'. "We've got a problem," I sighed, still trying to figure out how to best explain what was going on.
"What kind of problem?" Marko asked, switching into tactician mode.
I looked from Marko to Paul, and lastly to Dwayne, debating how to answer. I could either tell them everything or I could tell them only what was currently essential… I wanted to make sure my friends grasped the gravity of the situation I had been forced into, but in the interest of time, keeping things simple seemed best. I could fill in the gaps for the others (Paul and Marko especially) later once I understood what they were. "I need to find someone and fast," I equivocated.
Marko scoffed, confident, his worries fading visibly. "Easy," he assured me. "Who is it?"
"That's the problem," I said, fully aware of how ridiculous I was about to sound, "I don't know exactly."
Paul and Marko shared a dubious glance before scrutinizing me. "What do you mean 'you don't know exactly'?" Paul asked pointedly.
"He means exactly what he said, idiot," Dwayne reprimanded, even though I could hear the uncertainty in his voice.
I admired Dwayne's faith more than he could ever understand. "I mean," I clarified, "I don't know exactly who it is. All I know is that I need to find a... A woman." A beautiful woman who smells like Heaven and should be buried across the country, thirty-one-hundred miles away.
"Okay," Paul enthused, taking his turn to sound audibly relieved, "well at least that narrows it down by half. So just take your pick, man: there are plenty of chicks here who are easy enough to single out. One and fucking done."
"It's not just anyone," I groaned quietly, hating that I couldn't be more specific. "I need to find one woman out of thousands. I just don't know which one."
"But… That's impossible," Marko chuckled nervously. "It could literally be anyone."
"I know," I smiled, pained. "The only saving grace is that 'I'll know who it is when I see them'. But that's all I've got to go on right now." As ludicrous as that is.
'And Gideon put you up to this?' Dwayne asked sceptically, reaching out to me privately. 'That sounds more like a demand Max would make.'
'I know,' I laughed as the absurdity of the situation hit me once again. 'I'm not sure what he's scheming this time, but the worst part is that I'm on a strict timeline.'
'What?'
'I told you it was a big problem.'
'But why? What does that prick have to rush for?'
'Fuck if I know,' I feigned. Instantly, I felt Dwayne glance sharply at me out of the corner of his eye: he knew I was holding information back.
"Why does this person—whoever she is—matter so much?" Dwayne asked, falling into the one habit of his that I abhorred. Whenever he deemed a conversation we were having important enough to be shared with everyone he would just start talking aloud. Without any warning, he would usually pose a difficult question, leaving me on the hook to elaborate.
'There are times when I hate you, and this is one of them,' I grumbled directly at Dwayne in tandem with my answer. Dwayne smiled mischievously as I spoke. "I wish I knew exactly why, but I don't," I muttered, still not being completely truthful. "And it's not like it matters, anyway: it's probably just some random chick… But, regardless, the sooner we get this over with, the better."
"Who put you up to this—that 'friend' you mentioned earlier?" Marko asked suspiciously, his eyes narrowing. Again: sometimes he was too sharp for his own good.
I debated answering that for half a second. 'No' was what I wanted to say—it would be so much easier to blame this fool's errand on Max—but a quick jab in my ribs from Dwayne convinced me otherwise. "Yes," I admitted tersely, the word bitter. "And before you ask," I growled when Marko opened his mouth to pester me further, "if I had any other choice, I wouldn't have agreed to this."
"Whoever this guy is, he really is a rat," Paul muttered bleakly, his perpetually easy-going attitude momentarily dampened.
"It's fine," I said, trying to sound convincing despite the frustration that was chewing at my every thought. "This flea-bitten-shit-hole is only so big; we just have to keep looking."
"Okay, dude. Whatever you say," Paul chuckled nonchalantly, back to his normal self, "I just don't think it really matters if we find this one particular skirt."
"Nobody asked for your opinion, numbnuts," Dwayne chastised flatly, earning a retaliatory flip of the bird from Paul.
"I just don't see what the point is," Paul fired back with an overly dramatic groan. "This asshole is just looking for 'some chick'," he continued, ranting. "We could find a hundred broads just by walking down the goddamn street and I have a million better things to be doing right now, so let's just hurry the fuck up and get this over with!"
"That's the point, you dipshit," Marko shot back, "it's not just 'anyone'. If it didn't matter, we'd be out of here by now. For someone who's supposed to be a 'genius'—" cue the air quotes "—you're fucking stupid sometimes."
"Fuck you," Paul cursed as he gave his best friend an aggressively playful shove. "I bet this jerk—whoever he is—doesn't even know who he's after," he concluded with childish obstinance.
"Shit!" A new yet eerily familiar voice cursed unexpectedly, drawing all of our attention.
For a moment, time stopped.
Standing less than thirty feet away and looking directly at me was a shade, plucked directly from my dearest and most painful memories. True to form, she looked as if she had literally stumbled into our midst, her stance awkward yet graceful as though she had spent her life recovering from unexpected trips and falls. Her long, rosewood hair was swept organically over one shoulder, the natural waves of it cascading forth like a waterfall—just as I remembered it. But what struck me most was her eyes: impossibly deep yet bright with innocent expectancy, those glacial pools seemed to hold me, frozen. In their depths, I could easily overlook the inconsistencies that nagged at my better judgement: the gem nestled dead-centre in the cupid's bow of her upper lip; the delicate ring hanging from her septum; the plethora of jewellery dripping from her ears. Even the way her bangs hung in her eyes like a sweeping birdcage veil and the vaguely counter-culture slant of her black leather jacket, red high tops, and dark indigo jeans seemed minor enough deviances to ignore if only to believe that she was alive.
For what felt like forever, we all just... hesitated, no one daring to so much as blink, until her delicate cheeks flushed a brilliant shade of red. The sweet scent of blood, pumped forth by her frantically beating heart, permeated the air, rousing us from our stupor like sharks. We all jolted back to our senses just as the only human amongst us turned tail and bolted like a startled rabbit.
And without thinking, I followed after her.
It should have been easy for me to catch up to a feeling human, but no matter how hard I chased, she always seemed to be just out of my grasp. "Wait!" I yelled stupidly, hoping that pleading might somehow convince her—whoever she was—to stop. With every step she took, a fresh wave of her scent washed over me, the impossibly unique botanical fragrance nearly driving me mad as she gradually slipped away.
'Run. Run! Just a little further... Just a little further!' She repeated over and over again, the mantra of her thoughts resounding in my head like a clarion call as we raced back toward the crowds. With the threat of so many prying eyes looming, I knew I had to stop her now or lose this chance to talk to her—and I had so many questions. If I could just get her to slow down so I could close the space between us… "Stop!" I called out with purpose, confident I would be able to make her listen. For a split second, I felt her hesitate as her will yielded to my own, but just as quickly as she seemed to buckle the inclination passed, replaced by a renewed drive to flee.
That hit me like a slap in the face. Both shocked and vexed, I continued to follow, my own motivation to succeed redoubled. My chance was slipping away. It wouldn't be long now—just a few short yards—until I would be forced to fall back. As badly as I wanted to continue the chase to success, I knew that I couldn't: pursuing any quarry into a crowd was a fast way to get into serious trouble. 'Run to the crowd! HIDE!' She told herself over and over again, the panic that drove her tangible. I could hear her heart pounding, her lungs heaving, with exertion, the vital sounds of her life both terrible and reassuring. She wasn't a ghost; she was real. I just had to reach out a little further…"STOP!" I demanded with enough conviction to make even the most resolute human fold under my power. Inexplicably, she remained unaffected as if I hadn't even spoken.
And that was it. My last chance wasted with a word, I had no choice but to relent.
Ending the chase, I ducked out of sight and watched as she dove into the river of bodies that coursed down the boardwalk's main thoroughfare. Only when shielded on all sides by unobservant sheep did she draw to a stop and dare to look back the way she came. The mask of bewilderment that overtook her then was so pure that I was also left perplexed. It was as if she had no idea what had just happened—which made no sense. Only humans who knew a vampire when they saw one (and there are some who can pick us out) ran when they had such a chance. So how was it that this woman—whoever she was—knew to flee, but didn't know why? As I watched her frantically scan the crowd, it became clear to me that she was looking for signs of human pursuers, which was why she was so shocked to find herself suddenly alone.
She had no clue she had somehow managed to outrun a vampire.
"I need some fucking sleep," the echo from my past groaned with a sigh, the uncharacteristically coarse self-admonishment barely audible beneath the surrounding din. I watched intently as she took one last quick and cautious scan of the crowd before shaking her head wearily and just… walking away.
She vanished into the crowd faster and more completely than I would have liked.
"What the Hell, man?!" Dwayne barked as he, Paul, and Marko came skidding around the back end of the small alley I had found cover in. Turning to face them, I was met by a trio of unimpressed glares, one of which softened immediately on seeing my face.
I wanted to say I was sorry for launching into such a rash chase without an explanation, but that would have been a lie.
"Dude, are you okay?" Marko asked, concerned, before I could draw breath to explain myself. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
… Did I look that startled?
"Who was that?" Paul piled on, his voice sharp with annoyance despite the curiosity that drove him. He had always been a bit of a gossip so his need for a juicy story outweighed his current frustrations with me.
I hesitated for a moment, unsure of what to say. I knew her face, her smell, her mannerisms, but… I didn't know who that was. It was the strangest feeling—almost like a sort of weird déjà vu. I knew her face, but at the same time, I didn't. "I don't know," I finally admitted, unable to keep the disconcerted wonderment that was washing over me from seeping into my voice.
Dwayne, Paul, and Mako all shared an uneasy look. I didn't blame them: I knew I was acting oddly, but I couldn't help myself. I was feeling lost, cut adrift from whatever understanding I had held of the world. "If you don't know who she is, why did you run after her? It's not like she heard anything important," Dwayne rationalized accusatorially. "And how the fuck did she get away from you!?"
"I don't know," I chuckled again in disbelief, answering both of Dwayne's questions at once.
"This is going nowhere," Marko stage-whispered to Paul.
"Well, what do you know?" Dwayne asked, exasperated.
I paused before answering, both afraid of and relieved by what I was going to say next. My luck wasn't usually so rosy and I worried that drawing attention to such a stroke of good fortune might sour it. "That was her," I murmured simply before meeting Dwayne's stare. When he saw the candid bafflement in my eyes, his irritation with me vanished, replaced by a look of mild shock.
"Come again?" Paul said flatly.
"That was her," I repeated, still not fully grasping the words coming out of my own mouth.
"Well, why didn't you say something?" He thrilled, his attitude flip-flopping instantly. "That makes way more sense; we all thought you'd finally jumped off the deep end."
"We were all calling out to you as you ran off, but you never responded," Marko added, minimizing Paul's overexuberance by shoving him back a step or two. Paul retaliated by trying to aggressively ruffle Marko's hair.
"Really?" I asked, surprised.
"Yeah," Marko confirmed hesitantly as he absently warded off Paul's attempts to dishevel him. "We were practically screaming at you, but you didn't even seem to notice. Couldn't you hear us?"
Looking to Dwayne for confirmation, he nodded easily in agreement. "It was like trying to talk to a brick wall—I mean, more so than usual," he gibed in an attempt to lighten the mood.
Thinking back on the last few minutes, I found myself at a loss to remember much beyond the chase and the sound of her voice in my head. "No, I didn't hear you," I admitted slowly, my mind immediately wandering off through the crowd after those beautiful blue-green eyes…
"Aaand he's gone," Marko sighed with an audible eye-roll.
"Earth to David," Paul laughed as he jostled between Marko and Dwayne to wave his hand dramatically in front of my face.
"Piss off," I protested, annoyed, as I batted him away.
"What's the plan then?" Dwayne asked, steering the derailing conversation back on track.
I chewed on that for a moment. As badly as I wanted to scour every inch of the boardwalk—no, the whole of Santa Carla—for even another hint of her, I knew it would be pointless right now. It had been pure luck that we'd even been made aware of each other in the first place and something told me that a person who could evade a vampire (especially a hungry one) and then seemingly vanish was a more difficult quarry than the average human. Something bigger than what Gideon had let on was at play here, so perhaps it was time for me to finally call in a long-standing favour in order to get the upper hand… "The plan is: we find something to eat," I said definitively.
Paul and Mario celebrated boisterously as they darted around Dwayne and exploded back into the open. As Dwayne and I followed casually behind (but not far away), I secretly joined in their excitement. I was feeling mentally spent after so much drama in one night, not to mention physically exhausted; I would never tell Dwayne he was right, but I knew now that I had neglected myself for too long. And the more I thought about that, the stronger the burning irritation and tightness in my throat became. Until now, my thirst had lingered in my throat as a minor annoyance—like the ignorable tenderness of a superficial cut or trivial sprain—but now… Now, my entire body was being ravaged by a dry, throbbing sort of agony that radiated from the pit of my guts, consuming me to the point where it was becoming difficult to focus on anything else.
'But what about the woman?' Dwayne asked sceptically as he strolled beside me, scanning the crowd with predatory intent.
'She can wait,' I replied stiffly, even though the idea of even temporarily letting up on such a chase pained me.
'I thought you said we needed to deal with Gideon's bullshit sooner rather than later?'
'This is more important.'
'More important than—'
'—Yes,' I said simply, trying to keep my responses short as not to let the strain I was suddenly feeling come through in my thoughts.
Dwayne eyed me closely before dropping the issue. He fell quiet for a long moment as we carefully picked our way through the flowing crowd, watching the faces that passed us by for any hint of weakness. "How long has it really been?" He asked finally as we both intently took note of a group of five 'Til Tuesday wannabes (three men and two women) as they sauntered past us in the opposite direction.
It was now my turn to fix Dwayne with a trenchant sideways glance, but he didn't seem to notice or care: he was too busy stealing another glance at the poor excuse for an Aimee Mann look-alike. "A week or more," I muttered absently as I then, too, took another quick backwards glance at the new wave standouts—particularly one of the males in the group with a ridiculous quiff haircut. I could tell by the way he was always playing catch-up to be with his friends that he was prone to distraction. It wouldn't take much effort to get him separated from the rest of those airheads… They were all deliciously easy targets.
"Well, in that case, I say it's chow time," Dwayne suggested nonchalantly, gallows humour darkening his grin. "What do you think?"
"I think you should tell Marko and Paul to double back," I said with a crooked sort of excitement as I clapped my original partner in crime on the shoulder, "because it's time to have some fun."