*Disclaimer - The characters in this story belong to Orson Scott Card who authored the book "The Lost Boys" and Joel Schumacher who directed "The Lost Boys" Movie. I only own the storyline to The Street Rat and the original characters. *
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Chapter 3
Maya and Laddie had wandered the boardwalk looking for Sam. Maya was lucky she caught the scent by Max's store. She tensed as she saw Max watching her. Maya nodded her head at him and waited for him to nod back at her. Max stared deep in her eyes before nodding his head. Maya took a deep breath before moving down the boardwalk following Sam's scent. Laddie trailed behind her wondering what was going on.
"Maya, I thought we were going to get Fairy Floss?" Laddie asked.
Maya smiled down at the boy. "Soon Laddie. We have a job first."
Laddie scrunched up his nose. "We do?"
Maya stopped and stared at Frog's Comic Shop. "Yeah. We do. Come on. Let's go get you a new comic book."
Laddie glanced at her and back at the store. "Dwayne said not to go there. It's dangerous."
Maya closed her eyes and breathed deeply. "Yes, you are not supposed to go in there but you're with me and David needs you to do this. I am stronger than those two and there is nothing they can do to me."
Laddie glanced at it and turned to her. "I want to ride on the Farris wheel and fairy floss."
Maya rolled her eyes. "If you do what you are supposed to, I will talk to David about taking a day off and taking you on the Farris wheel and getting you one fairy floss."
Laddie smirked "10."
Maya smirked "2."
"8"
"3"
"5"
"4 and that's my final offer. Anymore and Dwayne will have my head" Maya said.
Laddie made a face and finally agreed. Maya laughed. She could not believe she was bargaining the kid with cotton candy and a ride on the Farris wheel.
Maya took a deep breath and nodded. "Do you remember what you are supposed to do Laddie? What Dwayne spoke to you about before we left the cave?"
The little boy nodded his head "Dwayne said that I had to act like I've lost you. Go to the boy with the weird jacket and ask him for help".
Maya nodded her head "and if the frog brothers mess with you act like they scare you."
Maya squeezed Laddie's hand before releasing it and pushing him forward.
Laddie walked into the comic store and started looking around. Dwayne said to stay away from the frogs, but David and Maya said he had to go in there for Sam.
Laddie spotted the older boy looking at a comic with batman on it. Laddie closed his eyes and thought about his mother's death. Slowly tears fell down his face. He walked over and pulled on Sam's sleeve.
Sam was annoyed at the Frog Bothers. They kept trying to push that horror comic on him and say vampires were roaming Santa Carla. So far, he had only glanced at the comics before dumping them into the box by his bed. He did not like horror comics.
Sam was reading Batman fighting Joker when someone pulled on his sleeve. He glanced down to see a small boy crying. "I can't find my sister. Can you help me find my sister? Please! I want my sister."
Laddie reached up and ran his hand over his eyes. Sam placed the comic down and turned toward the kid. "Come on. I'll help you find your sister. My name's Sam. What's your name?"
"Laddie"
Sam smiled "Hello Laddie. Let's go find your sister."
Sam took Laddie's hand and started to leave the store when the frog brothers jumped in front of them.
Edgar snarled "It's one of them bloodsuckers. Get out of the way Sam. We have to stake it right through the heart."
Edgar raised a wooden stake in his hand preparing to drive it at the little vampire.
Laddie's eyes opened wide and he hid behind Sam. He glanced around Sam to stare at the frog brothers. "L…Leave me...e…alone."
Alan frowned and raised the water gun filled with holy water toward the boy. "Only good bloodsucker is a dead one."
Sam looked at both as if they had gone crazy "ARE YOU GUYS NUTS? HE'S JUST A KID."
Edgar frowned "He's a bloodsucking vampire. We've seen all of them together."
Alan squirted Laddie in the face "Take that bloodsucker."
Laddie started crying when the water hit his face. It did not hurt him, but he hated water in his eyes.
Edgar and Alan frowned when nothing happened to the boy. He should have screamed in agony or something. The frog brothers were sure the kid was a vampire.
"The holy water is not working. The comic said it worked on vampires." Alan stated.
Edgar snorted. "He must be half vampire. It only works on full vampires. Get away from him Sam. He could turn on you any second."
Sam's eyes widened. "YOU GUYS ARE NUTS? HE'S AS MUCH A VAMPIRE AS I AM."
Edgar and Alan turned to look at Sam tilting their heads. Alan raised the squirt gun up and pointed it at Sam.
Sam took a step back shaking his head. 'These guys are nuts.
"Look we are leaving, and you guys are going to back off" Sam stated.
Edgar and Alan shifted to block the doorway.
Sam pushed Laddie further behind him. He was not sure what was about to happen, but he needed to protect Laddie from these two. He glanced around trying to find another exit but the only exit was between these two idiots.
Suddenly a brown-haired girl ran into the store "LADDIE THERE YOU ARE?"
"Maya" Laddie cried out.
Maya shoved between the frogs and dropped down to her knees pulling Laddie to her.
"Do you know how worried I've been? Santa Carla is dangerous. Do you not see all the missing posters? I don't want to put posters up if you go missing."
Maya hugged him and whispered in his ear. "Good Job."
Sam watched the girl as she hugged Laddie. She was beautiful. She pulled away from Laddie, stood up to look at him and, the minute she smiled, everything faded around Sam.
Maya smiled at the boy. He was clearly dazed by her. "Hi. I'm Maya."
Sam smiled. "Sam. Your beautiful."
Sam's face went bright red.
Maya laughed. "Thank you. Thank you for finding my little brother. He means the world to me. I don't know what I would have done if something would have happened to him."
Sam smiled "sure…um…I mean you're welcome. Glad I could help."
Maya took Laddie's hand and turned toward the door.
Edgar and Alan were still standing in front of the door. "Are you going to move so we can leave or what?"
"Get lost bloodsucker. We don't want your kind here." Edgar exclaimed.
Maya faked a look of confusion "bloodsucker?"
Edgar moved forward toward the girl. "We know what you are vampire."
Maya took a step back and pushed Laddie behind her. 'This is not good. If they think I am a vampire than they are too close to the truth. I will have to tell David.'
"Have you guys been sniffing old ink cartridges again, Edgar?" Maya asked.
The frog brothers lost all the color in their faces. 'The vampire knows my/his name?!"
Maya rolled her eyes while listening into their thoughts. 'How dumb are these two? It's not that hard to learn who is who on the boardwalk when there are only so many legit businesses.'
May took a step forward toward the two brothers. "You know it makes you see things that are not there. Vampires, really? Next you will be saying Werewolves are running the government."
Edgar snarled and was about to say something until Maya pointed to the front.
"You may want to pay more attention to your store than hunting imaginary vampires. I believe those are your things being taken." She said with a smirk.
Edgar and Allen turned to see some surf Nazis grabbing stuff off the table.
"Hey!" Allen yelled.
"Put those back unless you plan to buy them." Edgar snarled.
The gang members laughed at the two and took off. Edgar and Allan glanced between the three people standing there and the surf Nazis who ran off. They couldn't chase after them and leave a vampire in their store.
"Is there a problem here?" A voice said.
Everyone turned to see one of the security guard standing there.
Maya smirked. "No officer. We are just leaving and I believe the Frog Brothers were going to get their comics back."
Maya raised an eyebrow at the two boys. Edgar snarled and took a step forward. Alan grabbed Edgar's arm when he noticed the cop's stare harder at Edgar. Edgar huffed and glanced at the security guard.
"This isn't over, Vampire." He snarled. The frog brothers turned and ran off after the surf Nazis. The security guard shook his head before turning away. He did not get paid enough to deal with this.
Maya smile grew. 'I knew it was a good idea to plant ideas in those idiots' heads. It was also a good idea to plant the idea for the security guard to come this way. These two are a lot more observant than what we thought.'
Maya walked to the door of the comic book shop and stopped. She turned and smiled at Sam "We're going to get some ice cream…. if you'd like to join us"
Sam's eyes widened. He could not believe this was happening to him. "yeah…yeah I'd like that. These guys are weird."
Sam followed the two as they walked to the Ice Cream vender. As they were walking Maya could feel Sam's eyes on her. She turned toward him. "Sorry about that back there. The frog brothers have always been that way."
Sam frowned "Why are they that way?"
Maya made a sad face appear "You saw their parents', right?"
Sam nodded.
"Their parents do drugs, and the brothers experiment with it too. There is also the fact that Edgar, the older brother, liked me but he kept making me go through all these tests to see if I was a vampire. It just got too much, and I wanted nothing to do with him. He claims the only reason I would not want to go out with him is because of vampires so I must be one."
Sam nodded again. It made since why the boys were so hard on her and her brother. They ordered their ice cream and moved to one of the covered tables. Maya let Sam take a few bites of his strawberry ice cream before starting to ask him questions. "SOOO, how are you liking Santa Carla?"
Sam glanced up at her and smiled. "Better now." He blushed and glanced down at the table.
Maya smiled at him and placed a hand on his. "I'm glad."
Sam's face blushed even more.
"Maya, can I have more ice cream?" Laddie called out.
Maya and Sam turned to Laddie only to stare in shock. He had chocolate all over his face.
"Did you get any of it in your mouth?" Sam asked.
Laddie shrugged before sticking out his tongue and tried to lick the ice cream around his mouth. The two teens burst out laughing as they watched him scrunch his face up. Maya grabbed some paper napkins and started wiping his face.
"Sam"
Both teens glanced up as Lucy walked up to them.
Sam smiled "Hey mom."
Lucy smiled at Maya "Hi. Who's this?"
Sam gestured to Maya "Mom this is Maya and her brother Laddie"
Maya smiled "Hello. It's nice to meet you." She held her hand out to shake the woman's hand.
Lucy smiled and took the girl's hand. "Hello, it's very nice to meet you too. I'm Lucy or mom in his case."
Maya laughed as Sam blushed.
Lucy placed a hand on Sam's shoulder "Honey, it's time to head home. Sweetheart, do you and your brother need a ride?"
Maya smiled again "Thank you ma'am but our older brothers are going to pick us up in a few minutes."
Lucy smiled "ok. I'll meet you at the car, honey."
Lucy turned and walked away 'what a sweet girl and such a good girl taking care of her brother like that.'
Maya turned to Sam "your mom's nice."
Sam smiled while scratching his head. "Thanks. She's pretty cool for a mom."
The three kids stood up and dumped their trash into the dumpster.
Maya and Laddie walked Sam to where his mom had parked her car right behind Max's Videos.
Maya reached out and touched Sam's shoulder "Sam, be careful around the Frog Brothers. They have hurt people who they thought were movie monsters. I don't want to see you hurt."
Sam nodded his head before joining his mom in the car.
Maya watched the car drive away before turning to lead Laddie back to the Boardwalk.
She glanced over to Max's Videos to see Max watching her with a smile.
'How is it going with Sam?' Max asked.
'I'm working on it. He distrusts the frog brothers after they squirted Laddie with a squirt gun filled with HOLY WATER. Max, they know what we are. They accused me of being a vampire in front of Sam" Maya stated
Maya replayed the whole conversation to Max.
'I know how you feel about the shop owners of Santa Carla but if they are willing to scream this stuff on the boardwalk, what's stopping them from trying to hunt us? Please let the boys take care of this. David will make it look like an accident. Everyone knows the parents are high 24/7. Accidents happen when drugs are involved" Maya begged.
"I will take your concern into consideration. Keep up the good work on Sam."
Max turned away from the window to help a customer.
Maya sighed. It was so difficult dealing with Max. She hoped this plan of his worked. Maybe then he would be happy and leave them alone.
Maya and Laddie wandered around looking at the different games. Eventually Maya sat on a bench and rocked Laddie in her arms as he fell asleep. Maya watched as the crowds started getting scarcer as it got later in the night. A security guard had been watching her for 10 minutes now as business started to close. Just when it looked like he was fixing to walk up to her David and Dwayne showed up.
Dwayne took Laddie from her arms and sat him in front of him on the motorcycle. Maya took David's hand and climbed on behind him.
David turned to glance at Maya 'how did it go?'
Maya rolled her eyes. 'According to plan.'
She quickly played out everything that happened in her mind to the two vampires with Paul and Marko listening in.
All four hissed at Max's orders regarding the frog brothers. They all hoped that getting Lucy to change would make Max chill. He was driving all of them nuts. The four were soon joined by Paul and Marko. The bikes sped over the sand before slowing as a glow of a bonfire appeared.
Dwayne and Marko slipped off their jackets. Dwayne made a bed for Laddie telling him to get some sleep.
The five vampires walked over the hill and watched the Surf Nazi's partying. If there was one way to get rid of their frustration it was feeding.
David gave the signal and all of them zoomed down on their food. It was by far the bloodiest meal the boys had ever had so far. Their clothes were stained and would need to be replaced.
Maya was glad she had grabbed her meal and pulled it away from the rest. She would not have wanted to be close while the boys let out some of their aggression on the humans. She was lucky to not get her clothes covered in blood like the boys.
They washed off in the ocean before heading back to the bikes. It was time for them to go home. The sun would be up soon and there was nothing more they could do tonight.
