Mortal Angel Chapter 9. Death

2001

Set two years before the movie.

The mission was all that mattered to Gabriella right now. She wouldn't return to the lair empty handed. Gabriella looked over to make sure her fellow lycans were still following

"Any sign of the human?" One of them Pierce asked.

Gabriella shook her head and studied her companions. Pierce was tall with shoulder length, tangled black hair, Taylor was shorter with copper hair and Raze was tall, muscular and black.

Raze and Gabriella had clashed many times over the centuries but Gabriella was older and though she didn't look it she was stronger and always put the other lycan in his place. Raze was jealous of Gabriella since she was Lucian's second in command and the most important lycan after Lucian.

The four lycans were on the most important mission to Lucian. They were hunting down members of the Corvinus strain.

Legend told that Alexander Corvinus was a Hungarian warlord who came into power during the fifth century just in time to watch a plague ravage his village he was the only survivor. However his body changed the disease and molded it to his benefit. He was the first true immortal. Legend had it that he fathered three children at least two of the children inherited the same trait. One became the first lycan and the other became the first vampire. The third child remained mortal.

Gabriella was sure the legend was true. It mattered so much to Lucian. So for years Gabriella had been working her way through the mortals who were related to Corvinus. She had captured hundreds of humans but none were right. From what Lucian told Gabriella when she found the right human their blood would allow for a perfect union between vampires and lycans. Lucian would inject the mortal's blood along with vampire blood into his body and become the first ever hybrid, like his unborn child was supposed to, centuries ago. Gabriella could not wait for that moment.

Concealed in the darkness of an alley they waited for their victim when suddenly a human scent came to Gabriella. It was the human they were after.

"There" whispered Gabriella, pointing to the human.

The three male lycans nodded. They knew what to do. They backed into the shadows as the human passed by them. Gabriella however stepped out into the light and looked at the human's retreating back

"Nathaniel Corvin?" she asked.

The man turned around and looked at Gabriella

"Yes? Do I know you?"

"No. But I could use your help" Gabriella said walking around him.

The man tried to back away but Gabriella was too fast. She viciously back handed him and knocked him out. She caught his limp body before he hit the ground and tossed him to the hidden lycans as though he were made of paper. Suddenly another scent came to her and the lycans growled, 'Vampires' she thought.

"Take him back to Lucian now!" Gabriella commanded, "I will stay here and distract the vampires! Go Now!"

Quickly the three males slipped into the car hidden in the alley. They screeched out of the alley and drove away.

Gabriella turned tail and fled. The vampires would know she was there by now. She had to deceive them somehow. 'Hmmm...I wonder if this will work' Gabriella thought. She stopped in the doorway of an abandoned building and bit her hand. Fresh blood dribbled from the wound and Gabriella wiped the blood all over the doorway and kicked the door open. That tactic should at least trick the vampires for a moment.

She ran away from the building, jumped a fence and ran through a timber yard. She slipped through a hole in the fence when she saw a figure up ahead. It was a vampire. Gabriella stopped moving and gasped 'No, it can't be!" she thought wildly.

She didn't have time to react when the vampire raised a gun. Bang! Bang! Bang! Hot silver bullets hit Gabriella and she dropped to the ground, growling in agony.

The vampire walked over too her and knelt down. Despite her peril Gabriella gasped, 'It is' she thought sadly. It was Selene. Her sister stared down at her and Gabriella knew she was done for but she couldn't help smiling sadly

"Selene! Oh Selene! You have changed so much." She said as tears dribbled from her emerald eyes.

"I am so sorry Gabriella." Selene said.

Gabriella smiled despite the pain, "Shh... don't be upset Selene. I have been waiting for this moment for almost six hundred years. I am so sorry for that night and I want you to know I love you more then anything in this world."

Selene smiled, "You don't have to be sorry. You saved my life. That lycan would have killed me. I will always know that you love me. You have changed so much as well." She touched Gabriella's hair, which was now straight. After living for so long Gabriella's ringlets were gone.

Gabriella laughed softly, " That's from centuries of living" she whispered.

Selene closed her eyes. She knew what she had to do. She opened her eyes and picked up the gun. She looked at her sister, "I'm sorry".

Gabriella nodded, "Before you shoot me I want you to have this." Ignoring the pain she slipped off the stone ring Fabio had given her all those centuries ago.

Selene shook her head, "I couldn't. That was your marriage ring".

"Please Selene. I want you to have it so you'll always remember how much I care for you."

"I always will," Selene said, " I hope you are reunited with our family and Fabio in paradise." She took the ring in her hand.

Gabriella smiled and closed her eyes. Selene pressed the gun to Gabriella's temple. "Goodbye" she whispered.

Selene squeezed the trigger. Bang! Gabriella's body instantly stopped moving. After 598 years, Lucian's second in command, Selene's sister, Gabriella was dead. Selene held Gabriella's body to her cheek.

She picked up her body and slipped through the hole into the timber yard. She laid Gabriella's body on a pile of timber and stared at the stone ring in her hand. "I'll treasure it forever" she whispered. For the first time since Gabriella left the vampires coven and became a lycan, Selene cried. Then she strode towards an office. She opened the door and looked around. She found a packet of matches and closed her eyes. She smiled to herself and nodded. With that she strode out and returned to Gabriella's body. She leaned down to Gabriella's ear and whispered, "I love you too."

She lit one of the matches and dropped it onto the timber her sister's body was lying on. The pile of timber and Gabriella's body went up in flames. Selene smiled and turned and walked out of the timber yard, clutching Gabriella's stone ring in her hand. Several Death Dealers came running over to her, breathing hard

"Where is the lycan?"

Selene looked back at the timber yard and smiled sadly, "I took care of it".

Selene was unaware that three more people had witnessed Gabriella's death. Pierce, Taylor and Raze sat in the car dumbfounded. They couldn't believe Gabriella, Lucian's second in command was gone. Sadly Taylor turned on the car's engine and drove away. By the time the fire brigade arrived at the timber yard. It was too late. Everything had been burnt, Gabriella's body had been burnt and her ashes were caught in the breeze and gently blew away.

Lucian's lair.

Pierce, Taylor and Raze entered the laboratory where the Corvinus humans were kept and where Singe, the lycan scientist, conducted his sanguinary experiments. Both Lucian and Singe were inside, already waiting. Raze dropped the unconscious mortal on a metal table and backed away. Singe and Lucian frowned, the three males looked oddly upset. None of them met his gaze. Suddenly Lucian had a terrifying thought, 'What if she isn't coming back?'

"Where's Gabriella?" He asked, 'Please, please let her be alive! His pleas went unanswered.

Pierce looked at him, "She's dead" he announced sadly.

'No!' Lucian thought in agony, grief and guilt stabbed through his heart like a silver dagger. He turned away from the other lycans. 'First Sonja, now my second in command!' he thought, 'I promised her I would protect her! 'She was a loyal soldier, accompanying him when he visited the exiled vampire historian Tanis and when he met with Kraven.

"How did this happen?" Asked Singe.

"A vampiress, a Death Dealer. We smelt them coming and Gabriella said that she would hold them off. She didn't want us coming back empty handed I guess" Taylor said sadly.

Grief continued to consume Lucian. Gabriella had been a loyal friend for over five hundred years. 'That's it!' he thought venomously, 'I will smite down every vampire when the time comes. Gabriella's courageous death will not be in vain!' He turned back to the lycans. He looked at Singe, "Test this human, see if his blood is what we need." "Pierce, Taylor, Raze I want you to train up the troops. When the time comes for us to over-through the vampires they will regret the day they started the war with us!" He snarled, 'Gabriella and my wife and child's deaths will be avenged!' Lucian thought, 'We lycans will win this war for them!'