Acherontia Atropos Part 13
Carmen didn't keep us waiting long. She came up the rickety little
basement steps so fast that she was almost running while trying to
tie the cord of her familiar, ratty green bathrobe. Her boobs
bounced up and down as she thumped up the steps in her bare feet.
I tried not to wince. Obviously, I don't have much in the chest
area myself, but all I can think when I see something like that is
it's gotta be as uncomfortable as hell. Carmen stopped several
feet in front of me, eyeing me warily. Hara was conspicuously not
behind her. I had a feeling I wouldn't be seeing her again any
time soon, which was more than fine with me.
"Hi Carmen," I said with a friendly smile. "I have a little job
for you."
"Hara told me." Carmen didn't return my smile. "I don't know what
you did, but she's scared now." Suddenly, she grinned. I had a
feeling that she'd liked Hara's discomfort.
"So you'll help us?"
"I don't have much of a choice, do I?" She pulled her robe a
little more tightly around herself. Was she scared too? What an
intriguing thought. And she hadn't even seen me do anything.
"Nope." I grinned. "Mind if we take this somewhere else? The
atmosphere is really getting to me."
"That's fine. I need to be outside for this, anyway," she
hesitated. "Can I go grab my clothes?"
"Sure thing. We'll be waiting." I leaned back against the counter
with a lot more nonchalance than I actually felt. I had absolutely
no problem with Carmen getting dressed. I didn't want to attract
any more attention than I had to, frankly, and it was already bad
enough that Wufei was looking like an oriental junior Guido in
that trench coat of his, though it was still better than the
alternative. A good looking woman in a tattered, truncated green
bathrobe would definitely catch some eyes.
She disappeared in the back of the store. Wufei and I continued to
stand at the front desk. Wufei did his best not to look at
anything. I kept my eyes focused on a set of handcuffs. Still not
the most innocent of objects, but a damn sight better than the
other things Carmelita's had to offer. A couple of minutes later,
she appeared again, dressed in a pair of tight jeans and a dark
green dress shirt that was half unbuttoned, revealing a very tight
white t-shirt underneath. Most of her makeup had been scraped away,
and she looked almost, well...normal. It was kind of shocking. She
was wearing Reeboks, for God's sake!
"Ready to go?" I asked. I had to shout to be heard over the music.
A new song had just started up. I was half tempted to ask Carmen
if she knew what it was. I have a certain fondness for early
history metal. Still, I had to stay on task.
Carmen nodded, and we walked out. My eyes started watering as soon
as we got out into the sunlight; it was a bright day, and I'd
forgotten my sunglasses. It wouldn't usually bother me, but my
eyes were having a hard time adjusting from the extreme dark of
the happy hentai hut. We all stood in the doorway for a minute,
blinking stupidly.
When I could finally see again, I looked up at Carmen. Damnit, I
hate being short sometimes. "Where to now?"
"Back to my place." She took off walking at a ground eating pace.
Wufei and I had to hurry to catch up with her; her legs were a lot
longer than ours. It was kind of annoying. I felt like a little
kid hurrying after his big sister or something...except no way
could Carmen ever be mistaken as any big sister of mine. At least
I hoped not.
"Forgive me if the idea makes me nervous, Carmen." Come in to my
parlor, said the spider to the fly...
Carmen shrugged easily. Cars on the street were slowing down, and
I could see drivers craning their necks so that they could look at
her. So much for not attracting attention. "If it makes you feel
any better, we won't actually be going up to my apartment. What
we're interested in is in the back plaza."
"And that is?"
"The apartment building belongs to my coven. It's built over our
place of power." She said.
Place of power. Great. What a lovely day to get stuck in the
middle of an RPG.
* * *
I had to say one thing--the place of power that Carmen had been
talking about didn't quite fit my expectations. It was a tiny
courtyard with one tree, a cherry tree that was just turning
green with leaves. Under it sat a stone picnic table. The table
had a brown-stained yellow and white beach umbrella sticking out
of its center. There was a plastic bird bath, filled with slimy
green algae.
I admit it, I've read too many fantasy manga. I'd been expecting
something a lot more, well...grand. Maybe a grove of trees. Or a
big stone alter. At the least, no cheesy umbrellas. Welcome to the
world of the supernatural, Duo. Expect the unexpected.
"Sit down." Carmen pointed at the picnic table. "I've got to grab
a couple things from my apartment. I'll be right back." She didn't
wait to see if we had any objections.
I looked at Wufei. Wufei looked at me. I shrugged and sat down at
the table, and he sat next to me. The stone bench was very chilly.
I wished that my coat was as long as Wufei's; it would look pretty
silly on me, but at least my butt would be warm. I hate being
skinny, almost as much as I hate being short.
For a long moment, Wufei and I silently contemplated the top of
the stone table. At first glance, I'd thought it was smooth and
highly polished, but after closer examination, I could see scrape
marks, little pits, and thin gashes on its surface. It was an old
table.
Wufei gently ran his fingers over the surface. "These were caused
by knives," he said.
I raised my eyebrows and touched the table top as well. It felt
strange under my fingers, very warm and welcoming in its own way.
The hair on my arms stood on end. I had a feeling that the table
was what Carmen had been talking about when she'd said "place of
power." Stranger things had happened.
"I see you've made friends."
I snatched my hand away and glanced back at Carmen, suddenly
feeling like a kid that's been caught with his hand in someone
else's pocket. This wasn't an uncommon occurrence for me. "Made
friends with who?"
"Fenoko Asztal." Carmen sat down.
"Uh huh." I nodded like I actually had a clue.
Carmen just raised an eyebrow. "Fenoko Asztal is the power base
for this coven." She sat down at the table opposite from us,
setting a light blue duffel bag on top of it, and patted the table
top affectionately with one hand. "If a coven's power base is old
enough, it acquires a personality and
sentience all its own. It must like you, because otherwise, you
wouldn't look nearly as comfortable."
So the table liked me. Thrilling.
Carmen unzipped the duffel bag and pulled out a few things that
I'd never seen stored in a duffel bag before; a stone bowl, a jar
of something that looked like potpourri and smelled kind of like a
pizza, a green plastic bottle of what looked like water, and an
eight inch long butcher knife. I raised my eyebrows at that one,
suddenly feeling a tad more nervous. Carmen favored me with a
dazzling smile. I wasn't impressed.
"What are you doing?" I asked. She didn't answer me.
Carmen picked up the knife and sliced her palm open. Wufei and I
sat in stunned silence for a moment. We hadn't been expecting that.
Finally, Wufei said, "Woman, what are you DOING?"
"What you wanted me to do. Power costs. I'm paying the price." The
knife made a faint chiming noise when she set it down. Blood
flowed up quickly through the large cut and pooled quickly in her
palm before she turned it over and slapped her hand down on the
table. I winced. That was kind of gross.
Not that I had a lot of room to talk, considering last night I'd
been letting a corpse lick off my fingers. Who knew how many germs
there had been in his mouth...
Wufei managed to maintain expressionless, but he did twitch when
she picked her hand back up. There was a perfect hand print on the
table, and her hand was crimson with blood. But there wasn't a cut
on her palm any more. I blinked. No. Wasn't going to ask. Waaaay
to weird for this little Gundam Pilot. The blood soaked into the
table like water into parched dirt.
Okay, I asked anyway. "What the hell?" I couldn't help myself.
She raised an eyebrow at me. "Magic."
Oh. Of course. Silly me. Yeah.
"Do you have a focus for me?" she asked.
"A what?" I asked right back. She let out a long suffering sigh. I
didn't feel in the least bit sympathetic. "I must have been absent
the day they taught that in school."
Wufei kicked me under the table. I ignored him.
"A focus," Carmen explained with exaggerated patience, "is an
object belonging to one of the vampire's victims that I can get an
impression from."
"Yeah, right here." I pulled the nasty, bloody little bundle of
hair out of my pocket and handed it to her. She raised an eyebrow,
and I shrugged with carelessness I didn't feel. "There's hair from
three people in there. Will that work?"
"Definitely. It's much easier to get a psychic impression from
objects that were once a part of the victim's body... or objects
that are still attached to the body."
Wufei coughed softly. I let it lie. Wisely, so did she.
She untied the white ribbon and separated the locks of hair with
her fingernails, combing through them as best she could, her
efforts a little hampered by the dried blood that coated them.
"These are friends of yours. Close friends," she said, "perhaps
even lovers."
I didn't see the need to answer.
Carmen nodded to herself and picked up the plastic bottle of water.
It took about half the container to fill up the stone bowl. Some
of the potpourri stuff got sprinkled on the water, and on top of
the handprint, and we were set to go. At least I thought so. "Do
you have a particular preference as to who I look for?"
"No," I said. "I imagine they'll all be in the same place...and
the vampires will, as well."
"Very good." Her long fingernails ran over the hair, until she
stopped on her chosen pilot. The hair was blonde. "I get the best
impression from this one. The other two are well hidden,
especially the boy that the brown hair came from. I can barely
feel him at all." For some reason, I wasn't surprised. She stroked
the hair gently. "This one is very beautiful. Loving, deeply
feeling," Carmen smirked, "sensual...I bet he would be a good lay.
Perhaps he'd like handcuffs. A more... dominant one."
I really did NOT need to be hearing this about Quatre. Wufei
coughed again, and I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. He
was looking a little...tense.
"Is he?" Carmen asked.
"What?" I was caught a little off guard.
"Good in bed."
"WHAT?"
Carmen laughed throatily. Great. She was going all creepy again.
"Is he good in bed?"
I gaped. "What makes you think I'D know that?"
"You're very close." She smirked. "I remember him now. He was the
other one you brought when you came to see me. He IS very pretty."
I was NOT liking the way this line of conversation was going. "Hey,
can we just get on with this? Please?" I glanced at Wufei again. A
muscle in his cheek was starting to twitch.
"As you please. I'm going to begin looking now. He is very strong,
so I should be able to find him quickly." She picked up the blonde
hair in one hand, and then stared into the bowl of water. That was
it. No chanting. No sacrificing poultry. No more innuendo. Thank
you God.
Watching Carmen communicate with a bowl of water that had some
bits of greenery floating in it lost its charm very quickly. Wufei
sat by my side, calm now that Carmen had stopped talking about
Quatre's possible sexual habits, and appeared to be half-asleep. I
knew that was deceptive, though. He was alert and ready to go.
An eternity passed. Then another. The third eternity was about
halfway over when Carmen finally moved, sitting up straight and
blinking her eyes rapidly as if she'd just woken up from a nap. "I
found this one," she said without preamble.
"Really? Great. Where?"
Carmen raised her eyebrows. "You want an exact location?"
"That would be nice., I said dryly. "But even a general would
help."
"Northwest."
"A LITTLE more specific would be nice," I said immediately.
Carmen stood up and stretched. Her little teeny t-shirt rode up
and exposed a generous expanse of skinny, smooth stomach. I wasn't
impressed. I had her beat in the abs department, I was sure of it.
"I can't get more specific. What I did gave me a line to the boy
with the blonde hair. I can home in on him, but I don't have a
specific location that I can write on a map, if that's what you
want. I couldn't see well enough. I told you that I'm not that
powerful." She sighed. "I'm going to have to come with you."
None of us were all that thrilled. "Great," I said. "Do you have a
gun or anything you can defend yourself with?"
She shook her head.
Double great. Another back for Wufei and I to watch. Sometimes I
wonder what I did to God to piss him off so much. "Okay, this is
how it's going to work. You're going to stay safely between Wufei
and I, and as soon as we've narrowed it down to a small area,
you're going to go home and let us handle it." I waited for her to
raise objections. She didn't, surprisingly enough. I guess she had
a good self-preservation instinct too. "Are you SURE you can't
just draw us a map or something?"
She shook her head.
Damn.
* * *
About an hour later, we were at the edge of the woods, about a
kilometer south of the cemetery. Carmen had driven us there. We
were just waiting for her to get her bearings so she could lead us
to the vampires. I was really hoping that they'd be close to the
edge of the forest, since we only had about an hour and a half
until full dark. Hell, if I'd had the option, I would have just
put things off until the next day, so we'd have a full day's worth
of light that we could hunt during. I wasn't going to leave the
guys in the clutches of the vampires a moment longer than I had to,
though, and I knew Wufei felt the same. So it was now or never.
Carmen was standing out of earshot, doing some mystical witch crap.
I glanced at Wufei. "You ready for this?"
He nodded. "Yes."
"Think we're going to find them?"
"I hope so."
Silence stretched. I cleared my throat. I was getting nervous.
"And we're going to kill them all, right?"
"If at all possible."
I laughed. "Oh man, we're going to die, aren't we."
Wufei raised an eyebrow. "That's a very probable outcome."
"Wufei! Geeze man, can't you just LIE to me and make me feel
better?" I demanded, exasperated.
"You'd know I was lying, so it wouldn't do any good." Wufei sighed.
"Calm down. Stop thinking about your nervousness and concentrate
on your anger." He seemed to have achieved a state of before
battle calm.
Carmen started waving to us, and we both loped toward her. It
wouldn't do to keep the nice witch waiting. Yeah. The minute we
caught up to her, she turned and started walking through the woods.
Wufei and I came up on either side of her, then slowed to match
her pace. "I've got a direction," was all she said.
We didn't interrupt her. It took her long enough to figure out
which way to go the first time around. God only knew how long it
would take the second time. The woods, to quote one of my favorite
poets, were "quiet dark and deep" and we definitely had miles to
go before we could sleep. Hopefully, it would be the good kind of
sleep, not the eternal kind. The trees were just budding, but the
bare branches above tangled together and formed a canopy so thick
that very little light came through. It smelled like leaf mould
left over from last year, and wet dirt even though the path was
dry. Not really an unpleasant place to take a walk, when you came
down to it. It was too bad we couldn't enjoy it.
We walked and walked, then walked some more. Then did a bit MORE
walking. For what felt like hours, we headed more deeply into the
woods. Carmen would occasionally change direction at times, but we
never slowed. I memorized the way we were going, though I didn't
have a lot of confidence that I'd be able to recognize it if it
were dark and I was being pursued by vampires.
Then again, if I was being chased by vampires, I probably wouldn't
have a chance to make it out of the woods anyway. So I wouldn't
worry about it.
It was full dark and we'd been walking for nearly three hours
before Carmen slowed, then stopped. As far as I could see, there
was nothing special about the section of forest we had stopped in.
There was a tiny, partial clearing where the light of the stars
seeped through. Of course, if the vampires were around, I wasn't
expecting them to have out a welcome mat to let me know.
"This is the area," Carmen said.
"Can you find your way back?" I asked. I took her silence for
assent. "Then head back. We'll search the area ourselves."
That was when they attacked. The hair on the back of my neck stood
on end as I felt a surge of cold, electric power, and that was all
the warning we had. I didn't even have enough time to pull my
cross out. I slammed my shoulder into Carmen, knocking her out of
the way while I went for the Browning with my other hand, just as
a vampire rushed out from between two trees and clotheslined me. I
was turned to the side and off balance, and that was the only
thing that saved me; it hit my shoulder instead of my neck and
sent me flying. I went flying into a tree and my ribs, which still
weren't anywhere near healed, screamed in protest. My arm went
numb. Thank God it wasn't my shooting arm.
Wufei yelled something, and then there was a shriek, but I really
didn't even try to see what was going on. I was too busy trying to
stand up, because I could feel the vampire closing in again. I
launched myself off of the tree. Air rushed by where it barely
missed me with its fist. A hand grabbed my braid and jerked me
back, and I yelped. That HURT! I spun with the pull and brought my
gun to bear, right into the face of one of the female vampires I
recognizedfrom the night Yan died. I didn't stop to think. I
pulled the trigger.
Everything retreated until it seemed far away, slowing down. The
gun kicked in my hands and the vampire's head almost exploded,
black blood and thicker things spraying out the back and across
the waning white disc of the moon. I took a step back, my gun
automatically aiming lower, and I pulled the trigger again,
turning her chest into a ruin of shiny bone splinters and blood.
She fell to her knees, then to the ground, not moving.
Something grabbed me from behind and threw me at the tree again,
and time sped back up. I hit the tree right arm first and both my
arm and the tree let out a loud crack, the branches above me
tilting at a crazy angle. I screamed as everything fuzzed out in a
haze of pain.
When you get hurt, truly hurt badly, like a gunshot wound or a bad
compound fracture (I'm talking blood spurting and bone sticking
out, here) there is a moment of shock while your body tries to
cope with the sudden flood of screaming pain messages from your
nerves, where you can't quite
believe you've been injured. For that instant, everything is
completely colorless and still, and you can't hear anything over
the sound of your own blood in your ears. While I was caught up in
that moment, the vampire that had grabbed me before had me again
and shoved me down against the ground, hard.
My right arm hit the ground and everything resumed its normal pace
as I let out a scream of pure agony.
I'd somehow managed to retain hold on my gun with my left hand,
but unfortunately, my left hand was held against the damp,
clinging leaves by the vampire. It straddled my stomach. I was
well and truly pinned. It reared its head up, and smiled at me.
Victoria.
Wufei yelled again, but the sound retreated from my attention as
Victoria reached her free hand over to my broken arm, grabbed, and
squeezed. My vision whited out for a moment, and I came back to
reality a couple seconds later with my harsh screams echoing in my
ears. Victoria brought her hand up. There was blood shining on it,
and she giggled, smearing the blood on her face and on her nearly
bare chest. She was barely wearing what looked like it had been a
vinyl teddy before it got cut down.
Not that I cared at that point. I was too focused on the fact that
I thought I was going to never stop screaming. Victoria grabbed my
chin and kissed me, and the taste of my own blood was thick in my
mouth. She rolled her hips against mine.
She wasn't going to get a response, I thought happily in a tiny
corner of my mind. My senses were already to overloaded by pain to
be able to feel anything else at all. She seemed to sense this as
well, because she let up and wrenched my head to the side and tore
my shirt open to expose my neck and shoulder. She'd had enough
foreplay, I guess.
I really didn't want to think on what was about to happen. I could
see two blurs in the distance. I idly thought that the light
colored one must be Wufei, which was great since that mean he was
still alive, and then Victoria struck. I'd been expecting her to
go after my neck. Instead, she came down on my collarbone, tearing
my shoulder wide open and snapping the bone like it was a brittle
twig. I screamed again.
Two broken bones, well, actually more than that if you counted the
ribs, in under five minutes. I had a new record.
Victoria sat back up. Her face was covered with blood. She laughed
and shoved her fingers into the tear she'd just made in my
shoulder. I was starting to lose my voice; my screams were getting
very raw. For one blissful moment, she pulled back and the
messages from my nerves quieted to a dull roar. I began sinking
away into shock...
Something rolled into my vision. It was a severed head. It had
fangs.
That was the only warning I had before Victoria threw herself off
of me. She rolled around on the ground, shrieking loudly and
clawing at her chest. Part of a huge knife blade was sticking out
from between her breasts. I saw Wufei, bleeding profusely from a
head wound and from a long, deep gash on his chest pull a knife
out of his sleeve and go after her while I struggled slowly to my
feet. The vampire managed to get to her feet as well, and she
grabbed Wufei as he lunged at her, pulling him tightly against her.
She was a good 15 centimeters taller than him, which is all that
saved his life. The blade when through the upper side of his chest
instead of his heart. He managed to drive his knife into her
stomach before she shoved him away, sending him flying.
I was on my feet by then, and I brought my gun to bear. I could
feel blood running freely down my right arm and side, and the pain
was still jangling through my brain. My blood soaked into the
earth and cold energy surged through me. The pain retreated into
cool, chill calm as the Other I had felt before seemed to roll
over in its sleep, giving me the ghost of its strength. I pulled
the trigger, aiming for Victoria. Three bullets later, there
wasn't anything left that could be identified as a head, and she
was dead.
Score...Wufei one, Duo two, vampires zero. Go us.
I made my way over to where Wufei was laying. We didn't have time
to feel pain. We were still missing two vampires and the master,
not to mention the guys. Wufei was already struggling to his feet,
filling the air with lyrical, pain-filled curses by the time I
made it to him.
I let out a careful sigh of relief that set my ribs off into
another round of shrieks. We only had to find Carmen, who had
gotten out of the way if she was smart, before continuing on. I
looked around. "Carmen?" My voice was barely a whisper. Too much
screaming will do that to you.
"Right here, Duo," she said. She was behind me. "I'm impressed.
You two fight a lot better than we'd anticipated."
"What...?" I was slow, too goddamn slow... Something dark reared
up behind Wufei and grabbed him, stabbing one hand into his
profusely bleeding shoulder. He screamed. I just started to bring
my gun up when someone grabbed me, his - no, her arm snaking
around me.
"Not so fast, honey." Carmen's voice whispered in my ear.
I made a barely audible croaking sound with all that was left of
my voice. Sharp pain lanced through me as a cold knife slid
effortlessly into my back and between my ribs. It quenched the
power coursing through me, shorting it like a wire shoved in an
electrical outlet.
Then there was only darkness.
Carmen didn't keep us waiting long. She came up the rickety little
basement steps so fast that she was almost running while trying to
tie the cord of her familiar, ratty green bathrobe. Her boobs
bounced up and down as she thumped up the steps in her bare feet.
I tried not to wince. Obviously, I don't have much in the chest
area myself, but all I can think when I see something like that is
it's gotta be as uncomfortable as hell. Carmen stopped several
feet in front of me, eyeing me warily. Hara was conspicuously not
behind her. I had a feeling I wouldn't be seeing her again any
time soon, which was more than fine with me.
"Hi Carmen," I said with a friendly smile. "I have a little job
for you."
"Hara told me." Carmen didn't return my smile. "I don't know what
you did, but she's scared now." Suddenly, she grinned. I had a
feeling that she'd liked Hara's discomfort.
"So you'll help us?"
"I don't have much of a choice, do I?" She pulled her robe a
little more tightly around herself. Was she scared too? What an
intriguing thought. And she hadn't even seen me do anything.
"Nope." I grinned. "Mind if we take this somewhere else? The
atmosphere is really getting to me."
"That's fine. I need to be outside for this, anyway," she
hesitated. "Can I go grab my clothes?"
"Sure thing. We'll be waiting." I leaned back against the counter
with a lot more nonchalance than I actually felt. I had absolutely
no problem with Carmen getting dressed. I didn't want to attract
any more attention than I had to, frankly, and it was already bad
enough that Wufei was looking like an oriental junior Guido in
that trench coat of his, though it was still better than the
alternative. A good looking woman in a tattered, truncated green
bathrobe would definitely catch some eyes.
She disappeared in the back of the store. Wufei and I continued to
stand at the front desk. Wufei did his best not to look at
anything. I kept my eyes focused on a set of handcuffs. Still not
the most innocent of objects, but a damn sight better than the
other things Carmelita's had to offer. A couple of minutes later,
she appeared again, dressed in a pair of tight jeans and a dark
green dress shirt that was half unbuttoned, revealing a very tight
white t-shirt underneath. Most of her makeup had been scraped away,
and she looked almost, well...normal. It was kind of shocking. She
was wearing Reeboks, for God's sake!
"Ready to go?" I asked. I had to shout to be heard over the music.
A new song had just started up. I was half tempted to ask Carmen
if she knew what it was. I have a certain fondness for early
history metal. Still, I had to stay on task.
Carmen nodded, and we walked out. My eyes started watering as soon
as we got out into the sunlight; it was a bright day, and I'd
forgotten my sunglasses. It wouldn't usually bother me, but my
eyes were having a hard time adjusting from the extreme dark of
the happy hentai hut. We all stood in the doorway for a minute,
blinking stupidly.
When I could finally see again, I looked up at Carmen. Damnit, I
hate being short sometimes. "Where to now?"
"Back to my place." She took off walking at a ground eating pace.
Wufei and I had to hurry to catch up with her; her legs were a lot
longer than ours. It was kind of annoying. I felt like a little
kid hurrying after his big sister or something...except no way
could Carmen ever be mistaken as any big sister of mine. At least
I hoped not.
"Forgive me if the idea makes me nervous, Carmen." Come in to my
parlor, said the spider to the fly...
Carmen shrugged easily. Cars on the street were slowing down, and
I could see drivers craning their necks so that they could look at
her. So much for not attracting attention. "If it makes you feel
any better, we won't actually be going up to my apartment. What
we're interested in is in the back plaza."
"And that is?"
"The apartment building belongs to my coven. It's built over our
place of power." She said.
Place of power. Great. What a lovely day to get stuck in the
middle of an RPG.
* * *
I had to say one thing--the place of power that Carmen had been
talking about didn't quite fit my expectations. It was a tiny
courtyard with one tree, a cherry tree that was just turning
green with leaves. Under it sat a stone picnic table. The table
had a brown-stained yellow and white beach umbrella sticking out
of its center. There was a plastic bird bath, filled with slimy
green algae.
I admit it, I've read too many fantasy manga. I'd been expecting
something a lot more, well...grand. Maybe a grove of trees. Or a
big stone alter. At the least, no cheesy umbrellas. Welcome to the
world of the supernatural, Duo. Expect the unexpected.
"Sit down." Carmen pointed at the picnic table. "I've got to grab
a couple things from my apartment. I'll be right back." She didn't
wait to see if we had any objections.
I looked at Wufei. Wufei looked at me. I shrugged and sat down at
the table, and he sat next to me. The stone bench was very chilly.
I wished that my coat was as long as Wufei's; it would look pretty
silly on me, but at least my butt would be warm. I hate being
skinny, almost as much as I hate being short.
For a long moment, Wufei and I silently contemplated the top of
the stone table. At first glance, I'd thought it was smooth and
highly polished, but after closer examination, I could see scrape
marks, little pits, and thin gashes on its surface. It was an old
table.
Wufei gently ran his fingers over the surface. "These were caused
by knives," he said.
I raised my eyebrows and touched the table top as well. It felt
strange under my fingers, very warm and welcoming in its own way.
The hair on my arms stood on end. I had a feeling that the table
was what Carmen had been talking about when she'd said "place of
power." Stranger things had happened.
"I see you've made friends."
I snatched my hand away and glanced back at Carmen, suddenly
feeling like a kid that's been caught with his hand in someone
else's pocket. This wasn't an uncommon occurrence for me. "Made
friends with who?"
"Fenoko Asztal." Carmen sat down.
"Uh huh." I nodded like I actually had a clue.
Carmen just raised an eyebrow. "Fenoko Asztal is the power base
for this coven." She sat down at the table opposite from us,
setting a light blue duffel bag on top of it, and patted the table
top affectionately with one hand. "If a coven's power base is old
enough, it acquires a personality and
sentience all its own. It must like you, because otherwise, you
wouldn't look nearly as comfortable."
So the table liked me. Thrilling.
Carmen unzipped the duffel bag and pulled out a few things that
I'd never seen stored in a duffel bag before; a stone bowl, a jar
of something that looked like potpourri and smelled kind of like a
pizza, a green plastic bottle of what looked like water, and an
eight inch long butcher knife. I raised my eyebrows at that one,
suddenly feeling a tad more nervous. Carmen favored me with a
dazzling smile. I wasn't impressed.
"What are you doing?" I asked. She didn't answer me.
Carmen picked up the knife and sliced her palm open. Wufei and I
sat in stunned silence for a moment. We hadn't been expecting that.
Finally, Wufei said, "Woman, what are you DOING?"
"What you wanted me to do. Power costs. I'm paying the price." The
knife made a faint chiming noise when she set it down. Blood
flowed up quickly through the large cut and pooled quickly in her
palm before she turned it over and slapped her hand down on the
table. I winced. That was kind of gross.
Not that I had a lot of room to talk, considering last night I'd
been letting a corpse lick off my fingers. Who knew how many germs
there had been in his mouth...
Wufei managed to maintain expressionless, but he did twitch when
she picked her hand back up. There was a perfect hand print on the
table, and her hand was crimson with blood. But there wasn't a cut
on her palm any more. I blinked. No. Wasn't going to ask. Waaaay
to weird for this little Gundam Pilot. The blood soaked into the
table like water into parched dirt.
Okay, I asked anyway. "What the hell?" I couldn't help myself.
She raised an eyebrow at me. "Magic."
Oh. Of course. Silly me. Yeah.
"Do you have a focus for me?" she asked.
"A what?" I asked right back. She let out a long suffering sigh. I
didn't feel in the least bit sympathetic. "I must have been absent
the day they taught that in school."
Wufei kicked me under the table. I ignored him.
"A focus," Carmen explained with exaggerated patience, "is an
object belonging to one of the vampire's victims that I can get an
impression from."
"Yeah, right here." I pulled the nasty, bloody little bundle of
hair out of my pocket and handed it to her. She raised an eyebrow,
and I shrugged with carelessness I didn't feel. "There's hair from
three people in there. Will that work?"
"Definitely. It's much easier to get a psychic impression from
objects that were once a part of the victim's body... or objects
that are still attached to the body."
Wufei coughed softly. I let it lie. Wisely, so did she.
She untied the white ribbon and separated the locks of hair with
her fingernails, combing through them as best she could, her
efforts a little hampered by the dried blood that coated them.
"These are friends of yours. Close friends," she said, "perhaps
even lovers."
I didn't see the need to answer.
Carmen nodded to herself and picked up the plastic bottle of water.
It took about half the container to fill up the stone bowl. Some
of the potpourri stuff got sprinkled on the water, and on top of
the handprint, and we were set to go. At least I thought so. "Do
you have a particular preference as to who I look for?"
"No," I said. "I imagine they'll all be in the same place...and
the vampires will, as well."
"Very good." Her long fingernails ran over the hair, until she
stopped on her chosen pilot. The hair was blonde. "I get the best
impression from this one. The other two are well hidden,
especially the boy that the brown hair came from. I can barely
feel him at all." For some reason, I wasn't surprised. She stroked
the hair gently. "This one is very beautiful. Loving, deeply
feeling," Carmen smirked, "sensual...I bet he would be a good lay.
Perhaps he'd like handcuffs. A more... dominant one."
I really did NOT need to be hearing this about Quatre. Wufei
coughed again, and I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. He
was looking a little...tense.
"Is he?" Carmen asked.
"What?" I was caught a little off guard.
"Good in bed."
"WHAT?"
Carmen laughed throatily. Great. She was going all creepy again.
"Is he good in bed?"
I gaped. "What makes you think I'D know that?"
"You're very close." She smirked. "I remember him now. He was the
other one you brought when you came to see me. He IS very pretty."
I was NOT liking the way this line of conversation was going. "Hey,
can we just get on with this? Please?" I glanced at Wufei again. A
muscle in his cheek was starting to twitch.
"As you please. I'm going to begin looking now. He is very strong,
so I should be able to find him quickly." She picked up the blonde
hair in one hand, and then stared into the bowl of water. That was
it. No chanting. No sacrificing poultry. No more innuendo. Thank
you God.
Watching Carmen communicate with a bowl of water that had some
bits of greenery floating in it lost its charm very quickly. Wufei
sat by my side, calm now that Carmen had stopped talking about
Quatre's possible sexual habits, and appeared to be half-asleep. I
knew that was deceptive, though. He was alert and ready to go.
An eternity passed. Then another. The third eternity was about
halfway over when Carmen finally moved, sitting up straight and
blinking her eyes rapidly as if she'd just woken up from a nap. "I
found this one," she said without preamble.
"Really? Great. Where?"
Carmen raised her eyebrows. "You want an exact location?"
"That would be nice., I said dryly. "But even a general would
help."
"Northwest."
"A LITTLE more specific would be nice," I said immediately.
Carmen stood up and stretched. Her little teeny t-shirt rode up
and exposed a generous expanse of skinny, smooth stomach. I wasn't
impressed. I had her beat in the abs department, I was sure of it.
"I can't get more specific. What I did gave me a line to the boy
with the blonde hair. I can home in on him, but I don't have a
specific location that I can write on a map, if that's what you
want. I couldn't see well enough. I told you that I'm not that
powerful." She sighed. "I'm going to have to come with you."
None of us were all that thrilled. "Great," I said. "Do you have a
gun or anything you can defend yourself with?"
She shook her head.
Double great. Another back for Wufei and I to watch. Sometimes I
wonder what I did to God to piss him off so much. "Okay, this is
how it's going to work. You're going to stay safely between Wufei
and I, and as soon as we've narrowed it down to a small area,
you're going to go home and let us handle it." I waited for her to
raise objections. She didn't, surprisingly enough. I guess she had
a good self-preservation instinct too. "Are you SURE you can't
just draw us a map or something?"
She shook her head.
Damn.
* * *
About an hour later, we were at the edge of the woods, about a
kilometer south of the cemetery. Carmen had driven us there. We
were just waiting for her to get her bearings so she could lead us
to the vampires. I was really hoping that they'd be close to the
edge of the forest, since we only had about an hour and a half
until full dark. Hell, if I'd had the option, I would have just
put things off until the next day, so we'd have a full day's worth
of light that we could hunt during. I wasn't going to leave the
guys in the clutches of the vampires a moment longer than I had to,
though, and I knew Wufei felt the same. So it was now or never.
Carmen was standing out of earshot, doing some mystical witch crap.
I glanced at Wufei. "You ready for this?"
He nodded. "Yes."
"Think we're going to find them?"
"I hope so."
Silence stretched. I cleared my throat. I was getting nervous.
"And we're going to kill them all, right?"
"If at all possible."
I laughed. "Oh man, we're going to die, aren't we."
Wufei raised an eyebrow. "That's a very probable outcome."
"Wufei! Geeze man, can't you just LIE to me and make me feel
better?" I demanded, exasperated.
"You'd know I was lying, so it wouldn't do any good." Wufei sighed.
"Calm down. Stop thinking about your nervousness and concentrate
on your anger." He seemed to have achieved a state of before
battle calm.
Carmen started waving to us, and we both loped toward her. It
wouldn't do to keep the nice witch waiting. Yeah. The minute we
caught up to her, she turned and started walking through the woods.
Wufei and I came up on either side of her, then slowed to match
her pace. "I've got a direction," was all she said.
We didn't interrupt her. It took her long enough to figure out
which way to go the first time around. God only knew how long it
would take the second time. The woods, to quote one of my favorite
poets, were "quiet dark and deep" and we definitely had miles to
go before we could sleep. Hopefully, it would be the good kind of
sleep, not the eternal kind. The trees were just budding, but the
bare branches above tangled together and formed a canopy so thick
that very little light came through. It smelled like leaf mould
left over from last year, and wet dirt even though the path was
dry. Not really an unpleasant place to take a walk, when you came
down to it. It was too bad we couldn't enjoy it.
We walked and walked, then walked some more. Then did a bit MORE
walking. For what felt like hours, we headed more deeply into the
woods. Carmen would occasionally change direction at times, but we
never slowed. I memorized the way we were going, though I didn't
have a lot of confidence that I'd be able to recognize it if it
were dark and I was being pursued by vampires.
Then again, if I was being chased by vampires, I probably wouldn't
have a chance to make it out of the woods anyway. So I wouldn't
worry about it.
It was full dark and we'd been walking for nearly three hours
before Carmen slowed, then stopped. As far as I could see, there
was nothing special about the section of forest we had stopped in.
There was a tiny, partial clearing where the light of the stars
seeped through. Of course, if the vampires were around, I wasn't
expecting them to have out a welcome mat to let me know.
"This is the area," Carmen said.
"Can you find your way back?" I asked. I took her silence for
assent. "Then head back. We'll search the area ourselves."
That was when they attacked. The hair on the back of my neck stood
on end as I felt a surge of cold, electric power, and that was all
the warning we had. I didn't even have enough time to pull my
cross out. I slammed my shoulder into Carmen, knocking her out of
the way while I went for the Browning with my other hand, just as
a vampire rushed out from between two trees and clotheslined me. I
was turned to the side and off balance, and that was the only
thing that saved me; it hit my shoulder instead of my neck and
sent me flying. I went flying into a tree and my ribs, which still
weren't anywhere near healed, screamed in protest. My arm went
numb. Thank God it wasn't my shooting arm.
Wufei yelled something, and then there was a shriek, but I really
didn't even try to see what was going on. I was too busy trying to
stand up, because I could feel the vampire closing in again. I
launched myself off of the tree. Air rushed by where it barely
missed me with its fist. A hand grabbed my braid and jerked me
back, and I yelped. That HURT! I spun with the pull and brought my
gun to bear, right into the face of one of the female vampires I
recognizedfrom the night Yan died. I didn't stop to think. I
pulled the trigger.
Everything retreated until it seemed far away, slowing down. The
gun kicked in my hands and the vampire's head almost exploded,
black blood and thicker things spraying out the back and across
the waning white disc of the moon. I took a step back, my gun
automatically aiming lower, and I pulled the trigger again,
turning her chest into a ruin of shiny bone splinters and blood.
She fell to her knees, then to the ground, not moving.
Something grabbed me from behind and threw me at the tree again,
and time sped back up. I hit the tree right arm first and both my
arm and the tree let out a loud crack, the branches above me
tilting at a crazy angle. I screamed as everything fuzzed out in a
haze of pain.
When you get hurt, truly hurt badly, like a gunshot wound or a bad
compound fracture (I'm talking blood spurting and bone sticking
out, here) there is a moment of shock while your body tries to
cope with the sudden flood of screaming pain messages from your
nerves, where you can't quite
believe you've been injured. For that instant, everything is
completely colorless and still, and you can't hear anything over
the sound of your own blood in your ears. While I was caught up in
that moment, the vampire that had grabbed me before had me again
and shoved me down against the ground, hard.
My right arm hit the ground and everything resumed its normal pace
as I let out a scream of pure agony.
I'd somehow managed to retain hold on my gun with my left hand,
but unfortunately, my left hand was held against the damp,
clinging leaves by the vampire. It straddled my stomach. I was
well and truly pinned. It reared its head up, and smiled at me.
Victoria.
Wufei yelled again, but the sound retreated from my attention as
Victoria reached her free hand over to my broken arm, grabbed, and
squeezed. My vision whited out for a moment, and I came back to
reality a couple seconds later with my harsh screams echoing in my
ears. Victoria brought her hand up. There was blood shining on it,
and she giggled, smearing the blood on her face and on her nearly
bare chest. She was barely wearing what looked like it had been a
vinyl teddy before it got cut down.
Not that I cared at that point. I was too focused on the fact that
I thought I was going to never stop screaming. Victoria grabbed my
chin and kissed me, and the taste of my own blood was thick in my
mouth. She rolled her hips against mine.
She wasn't going to get a response, I thought happily in a tiny
corner of my mind. My senses were already to overloaded by pain to
be able to feel anything else at all. She seemed to sense this as
well, because she let up and wrenched my head to the side and tore
my shirt open to expose my neck and shoulder. She'd had enough
foreplay, I guess.
I really didn't want to think on what was about to happen. I could
see two blurs in the distance. I idly thought that the light
colored one must be Wufei, which was great since that mean he was
still alive, and then Victoria struck. I'd been expecting her to
go after my neck. Instead, she came down on my collarbone, tearing
my shoulder wide open and snapping the bone like it was a brittle
twig. I screamed again.
Two broken bones, well, actually more than that if you counted the
ribs, in under five minutes. I had a new record.
Victoria sat back up. Her face was covered with blood. She laughed
and shoved her fingers into the tear she'd just made in my
shoulder. I was starting to lose my voice; my screams were getting
very raw. For one blissful moment, she pulled back and the
messages from my nerves quieted to a dull roar. I began sinking
away into shock...
Something rolled into my vision. It was a severed head. It had
fangs.
That was the only warning I had before Victoria threw herself off
of me. She rolled around on the ground, shrieking loudly and
clawing at her chest. Part of a huge knife blade was sticking out
from between her breasts. I saw Wufei, bleeding profusely from a
head wound and from a long, deep gash on his chest pull a knife
out of his sleeve and go after her while I struggled slowly to my
feet. The vampire managed to get to her feet as well, and she
grabbed Wufei as he lunged at her, pulling him tightly against her.
She was a good 15 centimeters taller than him, which is all that
saved his life. The blade when through the upper side of his chest
instead of his heart. He managed to drive his knife into her
stomach before she shoved him away, sending him flying.
I was on my feet by then, and I brought my gun to bear. I could
feel blood running freely down my right arm and side, and the pain
was still jangling through my brain. My blood soaked into the
earth and cold energy surged through me. The pain retreated into
cool, chill calm as the Other I had felt before seemed to roll
over in its sleep, giving me the ghost of its strength. I pulled
the trigger, aiming for Victoria. Three bullets later, there
wasn't anything left that could be identified as a head, and she
was dead.
Score...Wufei one, Duo two, vampires zero. Go us.
I made my way over to where Wufei was laying. We didn't have time
to feel pain. We were still missing two vampires and the master,
not to mention the guys. Wufei was already struggling to his feet,
filling the air with lyrical, pain-filled curses by the time I
made it to him.
I let out a careful sigh of relief that set my ribs off into
another round of shrieks. We only had to find Carmen, who had
gotten out of the way if she was smart, before continuing on. I
looked around. "Carmen?" My voice was barely a whisper. Too much
screaming will do that to you.
"Right here, Duo," she said. She was behind me. "I'm impressed.
You two fight a lot better than we'd anticipated."
"What...?" I was slow, too goddamn slow... Something dark reared
up behind Wufei and grabbed him, stabbing one hand into his
profusely bleeding shoulder. He screamed. I just started to bring
my gun up when someone grabbed me, his - no, her arm snaking
around me.
"Not so fast, honey." Carmen's voice whispered in my ear.
I made a barely audible croaking sound with all that was left of
my voice. Sharp pain lanced through me as a cold knife slid
effortlessly into my back and between my ribs. It quenched the
power coursing through me, shorting it like a wire shoved in an
electrical outlet.
Then there was only darkness.
