Chapter 84
The whole group minus the vampires, gathered in Chuck's lair. The first number they had traced, the one belonging to Danny, belonged to a burn phone, but Cameron and Garcia were still stressing their laptops trying to find anything else they could using the akka's phone.
While the techs worked, the rest of them theorized and planned, but Kahlan abruptly stood up. "I need some air," she muttered when most of them looked at her and she left room without another word.
Chuck shot Rossi a look and he nodded and followed her out. "Kiddo?" he asked when he found her pacing on the sidewalk.
She shook her head.
He noticed she was trembling, so he moved closer and pulled her into a hug. "We're going to find him."
When she broke down and started crying against his shoulder, he hugged her even tighter. "Calm down, Kahlan. We may have hit one dead end, but we haven't even started digging yet. We'll find something."
She took a shaky breath. "Their hurting him," she breathed out.
He moved her away and looked at her face. He almost asked her if she was sure, but it was obvious from the miserable look on her face that she was. He took a deep breath. "He's tough. He can handle it," he told her, and he tried to sound reassuring, but he wasn't sure he was pulling it off as well as he wanted to.
She pulled away from him. "But I don't understand!"
"What?"
"If they were hunters, why didn't they just kill him. Even you said that back at the alley! Why are they doing this to him?" He inhaled deeply, and she studied him. "Unless there's something you're not telling me!"
He sighed. "Those hunters we ran into in Hawaii, they. . . well, Schewel said they were twisted because they hadn't come right out and tried to kill the shifter they had attacked."
"They were torturing her first, weren't they?"
He ran his hand along the back of his neck. "Yes."
She huffed and turned away from him.
"I don't know if all hunters are like that, or if. . . Hell, I don't know anything about any of this, Kiddo," he admitted and then sulked over to the curb and sank down.
She winced and went and sat down next to him. "I'm sorry, Dave, I didn't mean for it to sound like I was. . ."
He shook his head and put his arm around her. "I know, Kiddo, it's just were all out of our element." He sighed. "I honestly don't know where to go from here." He shook his head dejectedly.
She sighed as her mind raced to try and come up with something, anything, that would help them find the love of her life. After a couple minutes, her eyes narrowed as she looked at him. "Who do you all talk to when you want information on your unsubs?"
He frowned for a moment as he wondered why she'd asked that. "We talk to the victims, if there are any alive."
She nodded as a smile started to spread across her face. "Yep."
He frowned even more. "Why do I get the feeling I'm not going to like what just entered that brilliant mind of yours?"
She giggled and then stood up and held out a hand to him. "Because it's probably the craziest thing I have ever come up with."
He winced. "And I'm not going to like it, am I?"
She giggled again. "Nope."
XXXXX
The men carried Hotch into a massive room, but he couldn't make any sense of what he saw. When they started up a short metal staircase and onto a short bridge, he mentally cringed. At the end, where they took him, was a tall ancient looking 'X' shaped apparatus. Memories from Green and her 'X' came flooding back to him, and he had to wonder if he was going to get whipped. What the hell good would it do them to beat me? It wouldn't even really hurt me now.
"Strip him," a man with short black hair told the others, and they moved in and removed all of Hotch's clothes and he couldn't even resist because he still couldn't make his body respond.
His breathing quickened with fear. Why do they want me naked? What the hell are they going to do to me?
Once all of his clothes were thrown into a pile, the black-haired man motioned to the men and they pulled Hotch up and shoved him onto the 'X' back first and shackled his wrists and ankles to it. The black-haired man moved back in front of Hotch and smiled a vile smile. "And don't think that once you recover that you'll be able to break out of those," he started as he motioned to the ancient looking shackles. "That's enchanted iron; not even the strongest species in the world can break it, and a vamp isn't close to that!" he told him and then laughed because he knew by the look on Hotch's face that was exactly what Hotch was planning on trying. He looked to one of his buddies. "Get him ready and then get back to the pits."
The young, blonde man nodded and then picked up a bottle and started spraying Hotch.
Hotch flinched when the cold liquid hit him and he half expected it to have been holy water, but it didn't burn and it smelled like rubbing alcohol. What the hell?
Once Hotch was thoroughly wet, the man picked up a sponge and went about washing Hotch's whole body.
Hotch mentally cringed. How embarrassing is this? He looked at the young man. After trying to swallow and realizing that he actually could, he decided to try speaking. "Why are you all doing this?" he was only able to manage a breathy whisper, but at least it was something.
The man just went about his duty as if he couldn't even hear him, and when he bent down to wash Hotch's legs, Hotch winced. There were long scars behind both of the man's ears. Maybe he can't hear me. Shit!
Once the man had Hotch scrubbed down, he put away his tools and headed out of the room without so much as looking at the man chained to the 'X', and once the door shut behind him, Hotch focused on the rest of the room, and he winced when he saw some sort of barrel below him. What the hell? His slow beating heart sped up. Shit! Is that more holy water and they're going to dunk me into it?
XXX
He wasn't sure how long he hung there, alone, in the big room, but his strength did finally return. He looked at the shackles and took a deep breath. He may have just said that to stop me from trying, so. . . He tensed his hands and arms and pulled down with all of his might; the metal shackles didn't even creak, and he sighed. I had to try. As he studied the room a little more closely, the door opened and in walked Alucious. Hotch swallowed. Oh shi!t You are not who I wanted to see.
The warlock chuckled as he climbed the stairs and walked closer to the vampire. "Feeling better?"
Hotch stared the man down. "Release me and you can see exactly how I feel."
Alucious laughed. "We'll see if you're still that cocky after your little stint in here," he told him and pulled an ancient looking knife from his belt. He noticed Hotch eyeing the blade and held it up in front of his face. "This, Aaron, is a blade actually used during the First Crusade," he instructed and then ran the tip of it down the inside of Hotch's upper left arm.
Hotch screamed as the blade dug deeper, and by the amount of blood that came pouring out of the wound, Hotch knew he had lacerated his brachial artery.
Alucious watched the blood run down Hotch's armpit and onto his torso with a smile. "And, normally, a cut would heal itself in seconds on a vampire." He locked eyes with Hotch and showed him the bloody knife again. "But this blade, Aaron. . . This blade was blessed by Pope Urban II at the end of the Crusades thereby investing it with very powerful Christian magic."
He moved and cut Hotch's right arm the same way and Hotch screamed again, and that made Alucious laugh. "Of course, that's why it hurts you so much, too." He laid the flat of the blade on Hotch's stomach, and Hotch shrieked as smoke wafted out from under the blade as it burned the vampire. He pulled the blade away and once Hotch stopped screaming, Alucious smiled again. "I have many artifacts that come in rather handy when dealing with monsters like you," he told him and then leaned down.
Hotch figured he was going to go for his femoral arties next, and he was right. After sliding the sharp blade down the inside of Hotch's right thigh, he moved down by Hotch's foot and used the tip of the blade in stab into him. "If I vent the dorsal pedal artery, it helps the blood drain that much more quickly," he explained as Hotch yelled again.
Once he finished with Hotch's other leg, he stood up and appraised the heavily breathing vampire. "Don't worry, it'll only take about half an hour to drain you completely."
"Why?" Hotch asked him. Blood was running all the way down his body and dripping down into the barrel below him so he knew they were collecting the blood, but he couldn't think of why the warlock would want to.
The warlock tisked as he shook his head slowly at Hotch. "You don't even know what vampire blood can do on an everyday basis, do you?" Hotch just stared at him and the man shrugged. "Although, I guess you wouldn't." He smiled. "The healing properties, alone, make it worth its weight in gold, but it is also a very sought after ingredient for spells and rituals. With you being an alpha, that actually makes it worth ten times more." He laughed again. "You are going to make me a lot of money, Aaron."
Hotch swallowed as he felt himself already getting weaker.
"But, not to worry, it won't kill you," Alucious offered with a grin. He started to turn away but then turned back. "Course, you may wish it would by the time you're done," he insisted with a sinister laugh and then left the room.
Hotch's breathing took a rapid turn as he hung there listening to his blood drip into the barrel. Maybe being immortal isn't quite such a good thing.
He started sliding down the cross as his body got weaker and weaker, and the more blood that left him, the hungrier he got. After a few minutes, he couldn't hold the vampire within him back any more, and he roared as anger over the whole thing came roaring to the surface with it.
XXX
He wasn't even sure how long he hung there, but eventually he heard the door open again. He tried to raise his head to see who it was, but he was too weak to lift it where it had hung down to his chest listlessly.
Footfalls across the floor, up the steps, and over the bridge brought whoever it was right in front of him. "I think you're done, vamp," Tyrese said as he pulled up Hotch's head by his hair to look him in the eyes. He studied him a few moments. "Hungry?"
Hotch could hardly keep his eyes open to look at the man he was so weak and tired but his stomach rumbled loudly.
The man laughed. "I guess you are." He let go of Hotch's head and bent and released the shackles at Hotch's feet and then pulled something out of his back pocket. "This is going to keep your vampire powers at bay but it won't curb your hunger completely," he instructed and then placed a thin metal ring around Hotch's neck.
No, not another collar! A tear dripped down his cheek as Tyrese reached up and undid Hotch's wrists. Once the last one snapped open, Hotch fell forward but the strong man caught him and lowered him to the ground. "But don't worry. We'll get you to your cage and then feed you. You're no good to us like this."
Cage? Son of a bitch!
"And don't worry about the bloodletting; it can only happen once a week if we want it at its purest." He knelt down next to Hotch. "Course, that's only if you last that long," he explained with a grin.
"What else are you going to do to me?" Hotch asked in a weak murmur because that was all the force that he could summon.
The man laughed again. "I'd tell you, but I wouldn't want to spoil the surprise."
Hotch closed his eyes. Great!
Two other men came into the room and Tyrese stood up. "He's ready."
They moved in, grabbed Hotch by the shoulders, and drug him out of the room with Tyrese following. When they finally stopped after taking him through several hallways and rooms, Tyrese unlocked a door and moved back and they took Hotch in and dropped him. Tyrese followed them in and threw down some clothes. "When you're strong enough, you can get dressed and your dinner's over in that corner," he instructed as he pointed to the far corner.
Hotch just laid where he'd fallen and they left but not until after locking the barred door. How and the hell are you going to get out of this, Hotchner?
*This has been a very nice winter break for me, and I hope you all have enjoyed the chapters I have been able to get out. I know I've had a lot fun writing them, but sadly, break is coming to an end. This will be my last daily chapter. I will try my hardest to post more regularly than I did before the break, but I won't be posting daily. Sorry, but work must take precedent because bills do not wait.
I also want to thank all of you who have stuck by me through the irregular updates! Your reviews have made my holiday season even more wonderful! And there is still a lot more story left, so I hope you all will keep reading.
Also, check out the website: the tales of .com – no spaces and a period in place of.– I have added a couple pictures to this story's page, and with what's coming, there will be a lot more added. Hehehehe You may want to bookmark it – just saying.
I wish you all a wonderful New Year – May it be a thousand times better than 2016!
