The last drop of whiskey evaporated into thin air the moment it dripped out of the flask and landed on the priest's tongue. It barely felt like anything, and despite this gruesome heat, Father Drakul still for some reason refused to take his cumbersome robe off to cool himself. But miraculously not a single drop of sweat was dripping down his tanned skin. His forehead was as dry as a rock, too dry in fact.

And the reason for this was simple – the man was less concerned about the heat and more concerned for his sanity. The endless desert stretching into the horizon as the two horses rode endlessly was definitely taunting him with its wagging finger. Or so he thought at least.

But if Juri and Drakul were really on the train, then how come neither of them even noticed boarding it? The question tortured his mind endlessly, and yet for some reason his traveling companion didn't seem to be the least worried.

"Aaaand that's how you shuffle the cards around so you can pull out a seven of diamonds every single time," said Juri as she sat on her horse backwards. There she laid out a bunch of cards on the horse's bum as if she were setting up a game of poker. It was incredible how none of the cards slid off the metallic surface of the horse and flew all over the place.

"Hey, hey, I told you to check the map, why didn't you do what I said? I specifically requested it."

"You told me to do that thirty minutes ago, dumb-dumb," said Juri, "we're heading further east until we reach the Rocky Mountains. You're being delirious."

Drakul mumbled to himself, before his eyes lit up.

"Wait a minute… I thought I suggested we head down south to Nevada? To avoid tribal conflict with the natives."

"Wait… you did?"

"I did!" He cried, only now just realizing, "I definitely did. You're the one being delirious here."

"No you are! Don't you delirious me!"

"No you!"

"No, you!"

"AAAAHHHHHH!"

"UREEEEEEE"

"ENOUGH!"

The Cat hissed at the two idiots arguing as she hung off the back of Drakul's horse, still being tied up by the bear trap Juri put her in. The bumpy ride was definitely taking a toll on her mood, and the heat was eating away at her patience. Her yellow eyes sharpened, exhausted from the chaos.

"Oh, look at that," Juri grinned, "I forgot you were still with us."

"Where else would I be?" She snapped back, "It's not like I can go anywhere, not with you two dunderheads LITERALLY RIDING IN CIRCLES!"

"WHAT?"

"Look around fools! Over there is the train station where we met and where those vampires were. You two have been going around and around without even noticing."

And lo and behold, the Cat was actually right. Over there was the ticket booth and the wooden platform they left behind long ago. Even the ashes and traces of the vampires' remains alongside the grave of the deceased priest was still there. Fresh as if they had just left the station mere seconds ago.

"This is what you get for horsing around with your stupid cards," Drakul pointed his finger.

"Excellent pun, Father," said Juri, "but please, I swear to God, I really thought we were going in the right direction. It's programmed right here on my horse," Juri opened up a metal panel on the back of the horse's neck to check the keypad inside. There, on the black screen of the computer was the status of the machinery she was riding on. "Oh wait, never mind, I had the horse set to following you, Father."

"WHAT? You weren't leading this whole time? I was just following you!"

"I'm sorry, but I swear, I was looking at the compass and it clearly said North is that way," Juri pointed to her left. "Oh wait, no, no. That's not right. North is the other way? What the f… why is this thing spinning around? Alright, who here has a magnet on them? It's disrupting the compass here."

"You have got to be kidding me," Drakul threw his hands in the air. "First we were going in a circle, and now we have a broken compass? What's next? We all get dysentery?"

"Now, now, let's not panic. Things aren't so grim," Juri smiled.

"This is it," the Cat muttered, with her voice trembling, "I am going to die here today. In the middle of nowhere while two buffoons argue like… like… buffoons."

"Hey, hey, hey, don't be like that," Juri clapped her hands together. "Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, you want to see a magic trick?"

Both Drakul and the Cat stared at her, unblinking.

As the girl proceeded to hold her right hand out horizontally, with the back of her palm facing forth. Then bent the right thumb down before attaching her other thumb, covered with her two fingers before sliding it back and forth.

The finger pulling magic trick.

There was no response from the other two outside their stone-cold poker face, blankly staring at Juri who was smiling from ear to ear like an idiot.

"Now you are all thoroughly distracted. My work here is done. Father, I need a drink, do you have anything?"

Drakul generously handed her his flask, to which Juri immediately gulped down without a second thought.

Because that second thought only came after a good few seconds or so, after a long good sip. She halted immediately, tasting something strange in the liquid which also smelled bizarre as well when she poked her nose into the flask.

"Father… what the hell is this?"

The priest stayed silent, staring at her with his poker face. To which Juri responded by lifting her goggles above her eyes.

"Did… did you just poison me? Right here? Right now?"

"I mean…" Drakul hesitated somewhat, "You didn't really think I would forget, did you? I said I was going to kill the Devil, and that's exactly what I'm going to do."

"Y… you're trying to kill your traveling companion there?" The Cat stared up in disbelief. "What's the matter with you?"

"I don't really have time to explain to you, little kitty," said Drakul, "it's a complicated relationship we have. And I don't think you realize the magnitude of my duty, of what I have to do. The oath I took to cleanse this land, this country of evil. And at that root is the source of all things wicked, the fallen one, the former archangel, the one destined to be the enemy and Devil to all things good and…"

"… and she's gone," said the Cat.

"What?"

"I said she's gone, got off her horse and skedaddled off there."

Drakul spun his head, blinking his eyes rapidly at the sight of the empty saddle. He did not even hear any footsteps or sound of the girl getting off her ride. And yet there she was, running at max speed into the distance, with the sweat covering her entire face, dripping like a fountain of water. Whatever poison the priest fed her, it was already kicking in.

"Hey, hey, hey! What the hell, Juri?" Drakul grabbed the leash on Juri's horse and pulled along as his own ride sped up after her, they caught up after a few seconds. "Whoa, seriously, how the hell are you running without making any sound?"

"Yeah, like I would tell you and give away my advantage," Juri panted, somehow running nearly as fast as the two horses' trotting. "Of all the times you choose to challenge me, it has to be now."

"What are you talking about?"

"I know what poison you gave me, I could taste it. Holy acetylsalicylic acid, or holy aspirin poison. Travels through the bloodstream and sweat pores, if I don't work it out of my system I'm going to die. And because of this stupid poison I can't stop running."

"Juri, where the hell are you even running?" Drakul asked.

"We're being attacked by a train passenger, Father!" Juri snapped. "My sense of direction is out of sync. I can't turn to where I want, and when I do turn it's towards the direction I didn't intend to turn to. That must be why we were just going around in circles."

"Mon Dieu," the Cat cried aloud at the back of Drakul's horse. "She's right, that is a passenger's special ability alright, no mistake about it."

"Time to spill the beans, Cat! How do I beat this ability?" Juri shouted, with her breath getting heavier by the second.

"The abilities are called Numbers," the Cat explained. "And no two Numbers are ever the same. Usually the most certain way to defeat a Number is to defeat the passenger themselves."

"That's too vague!" Juri snapped. "Be more specific!"

"JURI, up ahead!" Drakul pointed his finger, "A cliff up ahead!"

"Shoot!"

There in front of them was a large chasm spanning miles upon miles of dead desert land. A crack in the earth, in mother nature. Where Juri was running towards was a narrow sharp edge pointing towards like an arrow, shaping into this rocky cliffside where no matter where she turned, either left or right, she would still be heading straight towards the bottom of this chasm, which looked to be a deep dark pit that stretched on to an infinity into a pitch black depth of nothingness. Falling at this height would certainly kill an ordinary human being.

"Turn around now!" Drakul urged as he slowed the horses to a screeching halt.

"I… I can't!" She shouted.

And because she could not stop due to the poison coursing through her veins, she had no other choice – but to step off into the vast emptiness, letting herself go at the mercy of gravity, to be toyed with like a helpless doll. This wasn't like any of her usual magical stunts or escape acts where most things were calculated and planned to be in her favor. This was a new uncharted territory, a height no man had ever attempted, higher than even when she strapped herself in a straitjacket before allowing herself to be hoisted up on a three-story building.

There in her heart was the fear, and peculiarly the craving for this new thrill.

All around her in the darkness of the cliffside were the eyes, they stared at her when she fell, unblinking with their pitch-black pupils. Even when she was already on the ground, biting the dust, struggling to even get up on her feet, the eyes on the walls continued to stare with a disturbing aura piling upon her.

How long was she out? The girl wondered. Puzzling over the bizarre fact that she was still alive somehow by some alien miracle of God. She was sure that she had fallen from a height no human could have possibly survived. So what made her special? Why was she chosen by Destiny to live on another day? Or was she merely the byproduct of something much larger than herself, something she could not possibly comprehend there and then.

Juri scrambled to her feet to dust herself off, before quickly realizing her deck of playing cards were scattered throughout all the dirt at the bottom of this deep chasm. They must have fallen out of her sleeves when she fell.

The girl was getting thirsty, more so with every passing second. This must have been the result of the poison Father Drakul fed to her. The poison was potent, one small dose could possibly even fell an entire rhinoceros. If she couldn't find any water to rehydrate herself in the next couple hours, she would surely be biting the dust for real.

The girl did not remember much of the trip from the top to the bottom, she closed her eyes during the descent. Which all just played into this deep confusion, questioning how she survived. There were gaps in her memories… just like – before.

The girl then spun her head around trying to catch her bearings, desperately looking for a way out of this dark place. But everywhere she looked she was met with the eerie gaze of the eyes on the cliffside. They were numerous, too many to even count and they were everywhere. Each eye was slightly larger or slightly smaller than the last, and each eye was slightly more deformed and imperfect compared to each other. Some were in wide oval shapes, some were perfect circles. Others were obscured behind large rocks and cracks on these walls.

But all of them were inexplicably staring down at Juri, no matter where they were on the wall, no matter what angle, no matter how far away they were. All glaring down, converging to a single point where Juri stood.

But most horrifyingly of all, however, was when she turned around facing the opposite direction, her eyes caught a sight of a man looming over a large rock, standing just a few yards away from her, also staring at her intently.

The man's mere presence was enough to make Juri jump backwards in a defensive manner, forcing her heart to skip a beat. It was not helped by his ghoulish appearance as well. A tall slim man with a pale complexion, who looked as if he had not seen the sun in days, if not months. The man had a very peculiar shade of blonde for his long shoulder length hair, it was so bright that one could easily mistake it for white hair. That same shade also grew rapidly and wild on his face, forming scraggly patches of beard that seemed to almost refuse to grow into a full bush, making his face look a lot more rugged and rustic.

Over his shoulders draped down a long black hooded cloak which was tattered beyond repair. And underneath that was a grey shirt with the sleeves pulled up to reveal the man's hairy forearms. The steel spurs on his heavy boots were rusting away intensely, it almost looked as if it hadn't been maintained for a whole decade. Which was bizarre because glancing over the man's chest, Juri could clearly spot a golden sheriff badge pinned on the fabric of his shirt. And it looked as good as new, no degradation of any kind, no rust, not even a scratch chipping off the edge of the golden star.

"Don't be afraid of me," said the man, reaching his hand out, "have no fear. I'm not going to hurt you."

"Who are you?" Juri said with a quiet voice and a dry throat.

"My name… is Alrick – Alrick Timmens. Are you… a passenger, too? Of the train?"

A light struck inside Juri's head the moment he made that mention. She immediately began to suspect that perhaps this man was the true culprit behind the strange Number ability she had just encountered just mere moments ago. There were still things she did not really understand, like the fact that she somehow survived the fall, which she wondered if it had anything to do with the man's Number.

Regardless of the truth, I need to stay calm and be cautious, she told herself. If the man truly could manipulate a person's internal sense of direction somehow, then that could be very dangerous. So she needed to get in close to deal a killing blow before he had the chance to work the Number on her again.

"My name is Juri, Juri Van Helsing. And… no, I'm not a passenger or whatever it was you just said. What was this about a train?"

Alrick's facial expression remained the same, unresponsive to her answer.

"Forget what I said," he waved his hand dismissively. "I'm trying to get out of this place. I heard a scream from afar, and decided to check it out. And here you are, saw you go face first onto the ground. Did you fall off the cliff up there by any chance?"

"Hm… yes," she nodded her head.

"And you survived? From way up there? That's quite the great fall there, Lucy."

Juri chuckled:

"I'm no fallen angel, so it didn't hurt that much to be quite honest."

"Oh, are you a member of the church?"

Juri shook her head:

"Nope. I read the bible, went to Sunday school when I was little, and I've been keeping up with sabbath. But I'm not a priest. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing, nothing. It's just… I feel a lot safer with a priest by my side. I have Sanguivoriphobia you see."

"Fear of vampires."

"You know of it?" Alrick's eyes lit up.

"I've read a few books, yeah."

"You see all these eyes on the walls here," he pointed his finger all around, with the other hand still clinging to his cloak. "I'm sure that at least one of these eyes here belong to a vampire, or at the very least one of them isn't human. They haven't stopped staring since I got here."

"How did you get here?"

"I… I don't quite remember. The last thing I remember was my wife Amelia and I tending to our horses on our farm. Then this massive door manifested out of thin air, with no building behind it. And here I am. I'm not even sure if we're still in Wisconsin."

"We're not," Juri said bluntly. "You're in Oregon, just bordering on Nevada. That's where I'm headed, just before I fell down here."

"That's strange… I've traveled so far. How did this happen?"

And there, Juri saw an opportunity to pry:

"You… mentioned a train earlier. What was that about?"

Alrick glanced back at the girl with a stone-cold unblinking gaze, seemingly trying his absolutely best to not emote, or even flinch ever so slightly.

"Not entirely sure you would believe me," he said. "But… it's a long story."

"Go on," she insisted. "I have time."

He paused briefly.

"Well… you may think we have time, but I don't think we do. I'll just cover the important part. Long story short, there's somebody around here at the bottom of this canyon with a… unique skill shall we call it? They can invert a person's sense of direction, disorient them in strange ways."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah. I don't know what they want, but I have a feeling they're following us."

And without another moment of hesitation, within less than a blink of an eye, Alrick turned to look down his right shoulder to find a razor-sharp card stuck into his flesh. Shocked by the sudden pain he fell backwards onto his rear, screaming in agony.

Juri had just chucked a card out of her sleeves, so fast Alrick didn't even see her move.

"Now," Juri's eyes darkened, just as she pulled forth in her palm a few more cards, slotted between her fingers. "I suggest you take a seat and start spilling the beans before I cut you right where you breathe."

"AHHH, what the… what the hell!" He shouted. "What did you do that for?"

"You be quiet now!" Juri snapped. "I'm asking the question here. Now show me your right hand. Show me your Number!"

"What are you talking about? What number?"

Instantly, without giving him any room to breathe, Juri lodged another card straight onto his other shoulder. This time the card was sparkling with powerful plasma energy, crackling as the blood trickled out from his flesh. Alrick bit his own lip as he groaned and rolled around on the ground.

"I'm going to repeat this one more time. Show – me – your – hand."

Whimpering as tears began welling up in his eyes, he pulled forth his right hand from underneath the cloak and revealed to Juri the palm of his hand. His arm and shoulder trembled immensely with the pain coursing through his veins.

But the most shocking thing to Juri was the bizarre fact that his palm was absolutely empty. There was nothing on the surface of his skin.

Where was the Number?

Juri then felt a light rustling noise rumbling behind her. Spinning her head around facing the glaring eyes on the wall – she saw it.

The eyes began to blink, ever so slowly.

As the green glowing number 15 was pasted on the rough surface of this stone wall. It traveled across the surface, over each closing eye, like that of a snail slowly crawling with endless delight and ignorant bliss.