Old Loves, Old Lies

-by Baron Karza von Karnstein

-dedicated to Diane Neal

N.B. I do not own any of these characters. Dan Curtis owns all the Dark Shadows Characters. Joel Soissons and Patrick Lußier own all the Dracula II: Ascension Characters

VI

"LOWELL!" Before the last "L" had left her lips, Liz had burst forth from the door towards Lowell's unmoving body, grasping his left wrist in her left hand, fore-and middle finger feeling for a pulse, as her eyes looked to his chest to see if he was breathing.

"He's got a faint pulse…what happened?"

"He injected himself with that thing's blood!" blurted out Eric in a high pitch "Then, he started shaking and his eyes rolled up and..."

Liz ignored him. "Kenny!" she barked out, reaching into the left hip pocket of her jeans and yanking out her car keys, tossing them to Kenny "There's an atropine kit in the trunk of my car. Go get it!"

"Atropine? How do you…"

"Just GET IT, Kenny! NOW!"

Kenny darted off towards the exit.

"W-what's going on?" whimpered Eric.

"His pulse is shallow and slow. I want to be prepared if he goes into cardiac arrest."

"Are you sure you know what y-you're doing?"

"Do you want to call and ambulance and wait?"

"N-no! NO!"

"Then shut up and stay out of the way! Tanya, gimme an empty Petri dish!"

Tanya grabbed up an empty Petri dish and handed it to Liz, who held it half an inch away from Lowell's nose and mouth. Slowly, a small cloud of condensation built on the underside of the dish, and faded away as Lowell inspired. A little over five seconds later, another cloud began to form.

"Breathing is shallow and slow!"

"Is tha—is that good?" asked Eric.

"Better than no breathing, but not normal." replied Liz. "Lowell! Lowell! Can you hear me, baby? It's Liz! Talk to me honey! Talk to me!"

Lowell's breaths became deeper and more rapid. Seconds later, his eyelids began to twitch.

"Lowell! That's it, baby! Come back to me!"

Lowell's eyes opened tentatively at first, as if they were adjusting anew to the brightness of the lights. Then, they opened to their normal width and stayed open.

"Lowell!" Eric's outcry as he knelt to the right of the wheelchair was almost a keen.

"Give him room, to breathe Eric!" ordered Liz.

Eric backed away slightly.

"Thaa-That's…quite alright…Liz!" responded Lowell.

"Lowell! Baby!" Liz cried out in sudden joy. Then, the professional in her took over "Take it easy…slowly"

"Thank you, Liz. I'm sure you'd make a fine doctor." answered Lowell, who moved his own legs for the first time in years.

"My God…it's working! It's WORKING!"

Lowell grasped both sides of his wheelchair, and pushed himself up. Eric, Liz and Tanya looked on in amazement.

Lowell stood upright, looking down at his forearms as he rotated them and flexed his wrists.

"My God…It's WORKING!" he repeated.

"Lowell!" The name came out of Liz as a shriek of joy. "Oh, baby! I never thought this day would come!"

"Neither did I, Lizzie, neither did I!"

Lizzie stepped forward to embrace Lowell. At that moment, both Luke and Kenny burst through the outer door and into the room. Kenny had what looked to be four large, black, heavy-duty sleeping bags, holding the edges of two in each hand. Luke was holding a Heckler&Koch G36 Rifle with two 100-round drum magazines in place. What looked like a large tissue box was pinioned between his right upper arm and his rib cage. Both Kenny and Luke had very dark looks on their faces.

"I wouldn't go celebrating just yet, Liz!" declared Luke angrily.

"Luke! What's wrong?"

"I go into his minivan to get the agar plates he wanted, and I find like fifty of THESE!"

Luke took his left hand off the G36, pulled the large tissue box from between his right upper arm and ribcage, and tossed it to the front of the table, so all there could see.

Liz stepped forward, and picked up the box, looking at its side.

"Vacutainers?"

"Not just any vacuntainers, Liz! Look at the small, plain font under the title!"

"KCN—potassium cyanate—Luke, that's normal, if you want to preserve a blood sample."

"He's got fifty boxes in his minivan, Liz! That make's for a helluva lot of samples!"

"What…?" Liz looked down on the box, confused, but slowly beginning to understand.

"And there are these!" Kenny tossed two of the large, zippered bags to the head of the table. "Luke bumped into me with those boxes, and we figured something wasn't right. So, I jimmied open the trunk of Eric's car, and we see four of these!"

Tanya picked up one of the bags. "Are these…body bags?"

"Damn straight, that's what they are girl! And if that weren't bad enough, under them we find that big-ass gat Luke's holding. That's a drum magazine, ain't it Eric? Tell me, man, who d'y'all plan on filling them bags with? Huh?"

"Lowell…do you want to tell us what's going on?" Liz was still looking down at the box of vacutainers. Her voice was steady, and had an edge to it that said she wanted a straight answer.

Before he could answer, Eric moved towards Luke.

"Stay where you are, and let's see some hands!" shouted Luke.

"Oh, really, dear boy!" responded Eric, his voice full of contempt and dismissal. "You've seen to many movies. A little punk like you wouldn't have the bollocks to shoot another man!"

"Don't come any closer!" warned Luke, his eyes full of anger.

This brought a chuckle from Eric.

"Did you even release the safety catch of that 'gat?' " A smirk began to form on Eric's mouth as he mocked Luke.

Luke looked frantically down at the rifle in his hands. That he looked at the carrying, and not the fire selector above his thumb told Eric that Luke had not a clue where the 'safety catch' was. That was all the notice Eric needed. "Now!" he shouted.

In one fluid motion, Lowell snared up the nearest test-tube rack, and flung it at Luke, who instinctively dropped the G36 to protect his face. Eric was fast on the heels of the test tube rack, and tackled Luke.

Kenny turned to jump on top of Eric and rain a hail of fists upon him. Before he could move, Lowell, with one leg, kicked the rectangular table, which caught Kenny hard on the side. Kenny gave out a loud groan of pain, and fell.

"Lowell NO!" Liz threw herself at Lowell, as if her body would stop him. With one hand, Lowell shoved her against the concrete wall with such force that all the air wheezed out of her. Liz then collapsed in a heap. Tanya dashed to help her.

Eric had grabbed the G-36, and was standing above a Luke downed by a tornado of his well-aimed fists. He stepped back until he was far enough to cover both Luke and Kenny.

"Uuuuuhhhh…Lowell, you bastard! You broke my ribs!" moaned Kenny.

"It won't kill you Kenny. Now get your pathetic ass up. ALL OF YOU!"

"I…can't…" moaned Luke.

Eric thumbed the selector of the G36 from "safe" down to "full automatic" and let loose a burst which elicited cries of fright from Tanya and a recovering Liz.

"You heard the man! Now MOVE!"