I know, it's been forever since I published. But the next chapter is mostly written, since I decided to do a short one at the natural breaking point. I've written beyond this.
Recap: Ranger gets a clue to where Ramirez might have gone, but there's still a lot of ground to cover. Stephanie tries to get loose, but Ramirez bites her, and feeds her his blood as she falls unconscious.
Ranger
We had searched 3 timeshare communities. They were massive complexes with curving roads. We saw no signs of life, aside from what looked like a caretaker's cottage. And it was always possible that she was here, but the car was hidden and the lights were off. Or that we were on the wrong track altogether. Still, it was our best hope, and we had to start somewhere.
My eyes were starting to ache and I was getting tired. I can operate for a long time without sleep, but I'd had basically none yesterday night, not that I regretted a moment of my magical time with Stephanie. But I was fast approaching 48 with no sleep, and that was pushing even my limits. The sun was starting to lighten the edges of the sky as the clock crept closer to dawn.
We'd had the receiver on the whole time, but had gotten nothing but static. I'd once heard that about 1% of static was radiation left over from the Big Bang. Oddly, I found that slightly comforting, listening to the sounds of the universe being created as we drove like madmen through our part of it.
Suddenly, there was a word. Not the constant buzzing, but actual words. I turned up the volume.
"Time is an abyss...profound as a thousand nights...Centuries come and go...To be unable to grow old is terrible...Death is not the worst...Can you imagine enduring centuries, experiencing each day the same futilities?"
"That sounds like an old movie," Lester said. He was a sucker for AMC. "One of the old…." He looked at me. "Nospheratu, classic vampire film. It's her, it's got to be. I don't know how, but she's sending us a message."
I slammed my foot on the gas, hurtling off the highway at far above the recommended speed limit for the exit. "How do I get there?"
Lester started giving directions. I could almost smell her, I was getting so close. We found the complex, dozens of houses in narrow lots. We carrenned through the 15 mile per hour streets, trying to cover as much of the grid as possible. It was almost day now, the wan light making the headlights from the truck superfluous.
"There!" Lester pointed. "There's a car in that driveway, looks like a beater, something that would be parked on Stark Street."
I wanted to rush in, but we knew better. I parked a few doors down, opening the door silently and not closing them. I pointed, communicating to Lester that he should take the front door, I would take the rear. Silent as the creeping sunbeams, we surrounded the house.
Lester
The front door wasn't locked, which allowed me to slip in quietly. There was noise in one of the front rooms. Leading with my gun, I scanned the house, keeping an eye out for Ramirez. The sky had lightened, but I wasn't sure if it was actually sunrise yet. Or if any of this vampire shit was true at all.
The bedroom on the first floor was painted an eye-straining yellow that was probably supposed to look cheery, but most just looked like you were trapped in the inside of a lemon. But the TV was on. Sure enough, Nosferatu was playing. I looked around, trying to find the transmitter. I found it plugged into a small alarm clock that had a USB port, probably intended for a guest to charge their phone overnight. She was clever that one. Ranger had picked well, I hoped to meet her soon.
I hoped she was still alive to meet.
Transmitter in hand, I swept further back in the house, wondering why I hadn't heard Ranger yet. The staircase upstairs was close enough to where I had been that he couldn't have gotten upstairs without me seeing him. Which meant he wasn't in the house. Worried he might have been attacked before he even got in, I sprinted to the back of the house, bursting out of a kitchen door into the backyard.
Ranger wasn't hurt, at least I didn't think so. He was just staring. Staring at a lump of dirt in the middle of the yard. Dirt that had a characteristic shape. The shape of a freshly filled grave.
