CHAPTER 12
Coming at Jaden was exactly what she had been warned about: an airplane.
She dived, managing to miss it but the drag caught her, sending her spiraling out of control.
Screaming, Jaden fought to regain her bearings, her panic increasing tenfold when she discovered a skyscraper coming up rapidly.
The sound of her body hitting the steel and glass building she would later liken to the sound of dropping a piece of liver on a linoleum floor.
Amplified by ten.
It took five minutes of just breathing for Jaden to realize she wasn't dead. Add another ten minutes and she was ready to peel herself off the building.
"Where's Jaden?" John demanded, both impatient and worried when she hadn't shown up.
Isis frowned. [Tink, where ya at?]
[Oh… just straightening myself out.] Jaden replied, trying to untangle her legs without having to break them again.
[John is freaking out down here.]
[Tell him I'm on my way, just give me… ten minutes.] Jaden winced as she snapped her left leg. [Go in without me, I'll catch up.]
"She said to start, she'll meet up with us in ten." Isis said aloud.
"All right, let's get this party started." John rubbed his hands together. "Ready Mark?"
"You two go on ahead, I'll wait here for Jaden, just incase."
Isis and John, both looking more demonic by the second, headed inside.
"This way." Isis murmured, her voice to low for mortals to hear, leading the way up a flight of stairs.
John's blue eyes gleamed in anticipation when Isis halted in front of a door. "Well?"
"They're all awake wondering where Martha has gotten off too."
"Poor Martha…" John grinned, revealing his canines. "Shall we go enlighten them?"
"Lets."
Jaden alighted in front of Mark, twenty minutes later, healing taking longer than she had thought. "What're you doing?"
"Waiting for you." He said solemnly.
"Putting off seeing Isis in her 'let's pretend I'm Glenn' mode?" Jaden asked shrewdly.
He nodded.
"Let's go take inventory then."
When Mark and Jaden reached the motel room, they were horrified by what they saw.
There were seven bodies in the room, not counting John and Isis. Two people were alive yet, totally silent, blank faced. Apparently they were in shock or mad from what they had seen.
Scattered about the room were body parts, viciously ripped from the torso, withered looking as if having been sucked dry. Which, from the looks of John and Isis, they had been.
John and Isis were coated in blood, their faces smeared with it, their heads bent over as they each fed off an older man, an old man who was still alive, though he wasn't speaking, he was making odd noises. His discarded tongue lay a few feet away, obviously having been ripped out.
"Help us."
Jaden's head spun towards the two that were left, frowning when she seen a small slip of a woman crawling towards her, her eyes filled with unshed tears.
"Help us please…" The woman gasped, reaching a trembling hand towards Jaden. "Please…"
Jaden started reaching towards the woman only to jerk back when John lunged forward, grabbing the woman by her short blonde hair and yanking her back.
John started laughing when he yanked her scalp clean off, wrapping an arm around the woman's waist and holding her to him while he licked the blood off her head.
Jaden shrank back by Mark, unable to tear her eyes away from the man she loved, hardly believing this monster was the same person.
"Mmmm…" John moaned, his eyes closed, tongue darting out like a cat's.
Isis was completely gone as well, her eyes nothing but red, you couldn't even see the iris' anymore. She snatched up the final person, another woman and ripped into her throat viciously, swallowing her victims screams as her hand groped around the woman's chest before plunging into, ribs bones cracking, the sound was sickening. Isis removed the heart, holding in front of the woman's face to let her glimpse it still beating before crushing it in her fist.
"I can't watch this." Jaden murmured, shoving past Mark and rushing out the door, fairly certain she was going to start heaving out her own organs any second.
Mark remained where he was, watching as the two finished their feasting, idly picking through the bodies and dismembering them, purely for entertainment it seemed.
When John and Isis finally collapsed ontop of the bodies, sated, he cleared his throat.
They both looked up, their eyes slowly changing back to their normal colors.
"What took you so long babe?" Isis asked, licking the blood off her fingers, shifting into a more comfortable postion, seemingly not bothered at all by the sounds of bones breaking underneath her.
"Where's Jaden?" John looked around as if she were hiding somewhere.
"She left." Mark said slowly, stepping back towards the door.
Isis frowned. "What's wrong darlin'? Are you mad cause we didn't save you any?" Her eyebrows drew together.
Mark shook his head, honestly having a hard time believing that she thought he was mad over not getting to join this… bloodbath. "You two behaved like monsters tonight." He stated, his voice dropping down to a low, deadly tone. "You could have just killed them quickly with mercy, instead you proved they were right about us, that we are evil."
"You're angry because we enjoyed ourselves?" She stood up. "Mark, maybe you haven't noticed, but bein' vicious is in our nature, are we any less cruel to the evildoers we feast on?"
"You know it's not the same as this slaughter. Those people truly deserved to die, these were mere zealots… doing what they thought right. Mercy should have been shown tonight."
Isis hissed at him.
John was just glaring at Mark, not caring much for the lecture.
Mark shook his head, stepping out of the room, his parting words floating back to them: "You resemble Glen more and more each day… Stay away…"
Jaden was waiting in front of the motel when Mark appeared, she looked at him, her pale face even more whiter, if it were possible. "Well?"
"Come on," He gently took her arm. "Let's get out of here."
She nodded, letting him lead her away. "What made them like that Mark? That's not Isis or John."
"I know… but look what happened to Glen, they could be going mad, just like him."
Jaden almost crumpled right then and there but he held her up. "No…"
"It's… possible." His voice was strained, heart breaking over the thought of losing his love to the madness that had condemned Glen.
"It is more than possible."
They looked up to find Amaranta standing in front of them, a sorrowful expression on her face.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Mark demanded angrily.
"I came to find you… to warn you about these people… but it seems you found out before I could caution." Amaranta's rich voice throbbed with emotion.
Jaden was half listening, peering behind Amaranta in the shadows, something or someone was standing there.
"They… decimated those people." Mark admitted. "What they did… it was savage…"
"Madness strikes those who are young," Amaranta said softly, hesitantly laying a hand on Mark's shoulder. "Sometimes it passes, sometimes it doesn't. Most often, those who go mad must be destroyed, for their own sake as well as ours."
"I'm not killing Isis." Mark said firmly, moving away from her.
"Or John." Jaden added. "It could pass."
"It could." Amaranta gestured her companion forward. "We're leaving tomorrow evening for New York, you both are more than welcome to travel with us."
Mark nodded, his emerald eyes straying to the man besides her.
"Oh… this is Batista," Amaranta gestured at him dismissively. "He often travels with me."
Batista inclined his head towards Mark before offering a small smile to Jaden.
Jaden felt a reluctant pull towards him, quickly taking in his dark hair and dark eyes, her gaze traveling over his silk shirt and dress pants. When she looked back up she found the slightest hint of amusement on those sensuous lips and quickly looked away, angry for this man being here when her heart was breaking over John.
***
Isis and John slowly made their way home, neither feeling any regret for the things they had done, infact they were both pretty pissed off with Mark and Jaden for the way they had reacted. When they got inside, Mark and Jaden were in the kitchen, siting at the table with an atlas opened before them.
"What're you doin'?" Isis demanded, her hands on her hips.
Mark was staring at them, hardly believing that they hadn't taken the time to clean themselves, instead they still looked like they had just got done bathing in blood. "We're leaving." He said softly, hoping against hope that she would say or do just one thing that would prove she was still the Isis he loved.
John was glaring at Jaden. "You're leaving me? With him?"
"John, this isn't you." Jaden began, drawing in a shaky breath. "You've never acted like this before, ever. What's come over you?"
"I was just having a bit of fun." He shrugged. "They deserved it, or did you forget that they came here to kill us?"
"I didn't forget John, but there was no need to be that cruel."
He rolled his eyes.
Isis was still staring at Mark. "So this is what it comes down too? Yer leavin' me fer enjoyin' mahself? Fer bein' what I am?" Her accent began thickening with her anger. "Yer gonna run off with another woman cause you got a moral streak? Yer a vampire Mark! Yeh better get used to that idea right quick cause there ain't no goin' back!"
"Have you listened to yourself at all tonight Isis?" Mark demanded, rising from the table. "You sound just like Glen did!"
"Mebbe he had the right idea."
"You don't mean that."
Isis sneered at him, her cold gaze moving onto Jaden. "What's it matter? Yer sittin' hear makin' plans to leave me… with mah best friend I might add."
Jaden shook her head. "Isis, it's not like that…"
"The hell it's not!" John interrupted. "Look at you, you're already dressed for traveling! What, you were going to leave without saying a word to me?"
"John, listen to me baby…" Jaden hesitated, seeing the way his eyes were glazed over. "Nevermind, it's pointless… you're both mad."
"I keep hearin' that." Isis spat, folding her arms across her chest and looking at John. "You've heard this story a'fore, Glen went nuts and we hacked him and his psycho bitch girlfriend's asses up… Looks like we're next."
"Now Isis, we never said that." Mark said firmly, trying not to let his temper get the better of him.
"Ain't that how it goes?" Isis shot back. "If a vampire goes mad it should be knocked off immediately, not only for itself but for other vamps as well?"
Mark and Jaden both blanched, practically having Amaranta's words thrown back at them.
"We're leaving, and we're leaving you two in peace," Mark finally said, looking defeated. "All we ask is that you do the same for us, let us go."
Isis and John stepped away from the kitchen go, both looking blank faced though their eyes were full of barely suppressed rage.
Jaden stared at John, her heart in her eyes, tears of blood rolling down her pale cheeks. "John…" She whispered.
He ignored her, pointedly looking at her already packed duffel bag.
"Ya know what John?" Isis faced him, a wicked smile on her face. "I coulda sworn I seen a group of kids down the street, how bout we go introduce?"
John nodded, shooting one last icy stare at Mark before following.
Jaden crumpled.