"Neat..." whispered Ashley.
She probably should have gone for something a little more epic, but as she clambered over the low wall of lights and onto the paved streets of the city, words refused to form in her throat.
The Sanctuary of the Moon was empty, deserted long ago by whatever creatures had chosen to make their homes here in this underground world. There were, however, remnants of them. Ashley had stumbled across a pile of bleached bones cluttered in a corner where two buildings didn't quite meet. The sad skeleton was the first of many as she progressed up the main street.
There was a steady trail of rats ambling along the gutter, scratching against the stone floor as they headed toward the pool of water Ashley had climbed out of earlier. She avoided them, keeping to the centre of the road where her torchlight mingled with the occasional glowing shapes on the dwellings.
It was more like a hive than a city, with its buildings scrunched together, rising and falling with the uneven floor underneath the sinister dome of the cave. Some of these had crumbled, bleeding onto the streets with rivers of rubble and dust.
Very soon, she found her eye drawn to claw marks etched into the walls and ripped bodies with scattered weapons. The procession of time could not conceal the violence of their deaths.
Ashley stopped at three intertwined remains, tilting her head from side to side as she circled them like some wandering bird of prey that had missed the feast.
"Unpleasant," she commented, nudging one of the outlying bones with her boot. The trio had killed each other in some kind of brutal fever. Bony fingers could still be seen clasped around the neck of one, locked in an embrace even through death while the victim had plunged a short dagger through the chest of a hacked skeleton which, to her surprise, sported a sizable tail.
The extra limb was a collection of naturally duplicated vertebra, tapering toward a softly curved tip. The last few bones had been pulled out of line, no doubt by hungry rats.
Ashley retrieved her gun and then secured the backpack around her waist with several of its buckles. This place gave her the creeps and it was a long, lonely walk through it to the back wall. She didn't know quite what she would find up there, but all the roads trailed off in that direction – it was the rats fleeing from it that made her worry.
*~*~*
Bigfoot's gentle breathing was interrupted by a snore. Not quite stirred from sleep, he rolled over on the uncomfortable lab floor and curled into his coat. He couldn't see Will, crouched at the glass in front of him, deciding how best to escape from the glass cage.
The restraints that had held him to the bed were now lying, chewed through, on the floor. His transformation into a sand creature was complete. When Will looked down at his skin he saw it ripple with uncertainty as it adjusted to the changing background. There was a strange dryness to the back of his throat that made it difficult to do anything but grunt at things while the lights of the room glowed especially bright. The details of the world had become intense; feeling – smell, touch – everything was a thousand times stronger.
Will sized up the sleeping creature on the other side of the glass. He rocked forward and touched the glass with an extended finger. The surface was cool – fragile even...
Bigfoot woke to the sound of shattered glass raining over him. He opened his eyes and saw a thousand scatterings of light reflected off the tumbling beads of glass as the window of the observation room fell forward with Will flying through its centre. Bigfoot had just enough time to roll before the larger shards of glass stabbed into the floor around him.
"Argh!" he groaned, as two jagged pieces cut through his fur.
Will hit the ground with the glass. Sensing the first whiff of freedom, he straightened and surveyed the room with golden eyes slit through the middle. His original abnormality – the gift of observation, had now become a serious weapon. Will could pick out every tiny detail of an environment in one turn of his head. Possible escapes leapt out at him while he kept a watchful eye on the figure writhing in pain on the ground.
"Will..." said Bigfoot, trying to stand. He clasped his paw over his arm to stop the bleeding, but the brilliant red dribbled around his fingers and onto the floor. "Will," he repeated, pleading at the creature who was presently eyeing the door to the lab.
Will's lips curled into a sinister grin as his body flickered in and out of camouflage.
"Listen to me," continued Bigfoot, stumbling to his feet. He made it three laboured steps before he had to fall against one of the tables for support. "You've got to fight it."
Will felt that he should know this hairy creature struggling to stand so he closed his eyes for a moment and tried to think. There was a flicker of something. A memory? A thought – he didn't know. He wanted to be free and that desire overwhelmed everything else.
Instead of finishing off the creature, Will simply turned and pushed through the lab doors – throwing his head back in the sudden escape.
Bigfoot let himself crumble back to the floor where he crawled through the scattered glass to the other side of the room. He pried open the cabinet and dug out a set of bandages, wrapping several layers of them tightly around his arm until he could feel neither the pain nor the seeping of sticky blood.
He had to warn the detective sleeping down the hallway before Will got to him and somehow protect the other Abnormals but first, he had to lock the Sanctuary down and prevent Will from escaping into the city where he would no doubt begin picking out prey.
The computer in the lab did not have security access, so Bigfoot injected himself with a large dose of painkillers and made for the door. He paused at their ajar surfaces, sniffing the air for any sign of Will before gently pushing them open.
The hallway was empty save for a broken vase that had been knocked off a hallway table. Bigfoot, barely able to walk, threw himself at the opposite wall of the hallway, fumbling for the door to Ashley's office. As someone mostly unaware of their office, she had not bothered to lock it.
It was a room neglected, ignored by its reluctant owner and left to sit in solitude most of the year. Its desk was bare save a lamp and computer with a wandering screensaver. The bookshelf on the opposing wall was not Ashley's but her mother's, built to house a special collection of bound letters written by her many associates over the years.
Bigfoot woke the computer, which, overjoyed by the attention, jolted into life with a cheerful beep.
A few minutes later, Bigfoot heard the bars on the windows clang shut and the double bolts on the doors lock firmly into place. Steel doors were sliding over the larger areas and coded doors between levels locking into place. The Sanctuary had turned itself into a prison, with him and Will locked inside.
Will, already on the ground floor, dropped to all fours and hurtled along the ground toward the main entrance. The carpet beneath him folded and slid off to the side as he rounded the corner and ploughed into the solid door as the large steel bolt slipped into place. The door shook with the impact, but remained resolutely closed.
Trapped, Will snarled, baring several rows of razor teeth to the security camera above. Bigfoot watched on, busily wrapping his wounds tighter.
*~*~*
"Do you trust me?" whispered Nikola, taking her free hand within his clawed paw. His skin was freezing, sending unpleasant shivers over her skin whenever his claws grazed her.
"Is that a trick question," she replied softly, still holding her gun firmly to the darkness in front.
"Whatever happened to us, Helen?" he said, as they edged very slowly deeper into the cave. The light of the entrance behind them had almost vanished and now it was his torch and the electrical currents over the walls that lit the way. "You used to like me."
"I do like you," she hissed back. "I would have shot you already if I felt anything less than affection – as perverted as it may be. Incidentally," she continued, "I believe it was you who last tried to kill me. This little expedition of yours may well end both of us."
"Oh please... this wasn't my idea. You have that 'detective' to thank for all this."
That caused Helen to come to an abrupt halt, ripping her hand away from him. "What on earth are you going on about?"
Nikola's black eyes gleamed in the torchlight which he pointed directly at her. She ducked away from the glare.
"Seriously?" he said, almost unable to grasp Helen's naivety. "You don't see it? Vampires – even that bastardised sand creature you tried to keep as a pet, are not animals. They are highly intelligent beings that don't waste time. If the detective was bait, then he had already served his purpose. I for instance, would have killed him once I reached the tunnels but instead, what do we find? He is safe and well after half the night spent alone with it. There was a reason for that, Helen."
"He wouldn't..." but, she realised, then again Joe had more to gain than any from the sand creature. This was personal for him. He spoke ancient Egyptian, he was not afraid of the creature and after she had refused to disclose the location of the tomb, he had become especially curious. "I," she sighed heartily, truly unimpressed with herself, "never learn."
"An endearing quality," Nikola grinned. "You still haven't answered my question."
"For the sake of argument, then," she flinched as he took her sharply by the arm, anticipating her answer.
"Close your eyes..." he said darkly, leaning toward her.
For the last five minutes, Nikola had sensed a presence hunting them through the caves, scant feet from them at any given moment. Despite his considerable observation skills, he was yet to catch a glimpse of his pursuer. Something had changed though. The assailant had gone from observer to assassin, more than once he had felt something brush over the back of his neck, considering how to sever his spine. Nikola Tesla may be hard to kill, but he had a sneaking suspicion that 'beheading' might just do it.
He didn't want her to see what had to happen next.
With considerable force, Nikola knocked Helen to the ground. She stayed down, flattened against the cave floor perfectly still with her eyes slammed shut.
Nikola's ears twitched as he heard fabric swish to his right and a shadow turn out of sight. He reached out with his clawed hand and ripped a strip free – the first tangible proof that there was, indeed, something else with them.
The rippling of electricity intensified, flickering and flashing in the air accompanied by a continuous crackle.
He bowed his head, and when he lifted it, his transformation into 'vampire' was absolute. Barely recognisable as this creature of the myths and fear, he leapt up to the roof, lingering on the cold rock amidst a few sleeping bats, before falling on top of a tall, slender figure.
Nikola had not expected the frailness. The creature crumbled beneath him, groaning as Nikola's hands tightened around their body. Layers of cloak and a muddle of movement rolled down the slight incline of the cave until they hit a wall in a huge flash of light. Electricity poured from the cave wall through them in a shower of light.
Helen, unable to resist, opened her eyes a crack to see two heads glare at each other, encircled by shards of artificial lightning. One was Nikola as she remembered him – true and frightening in his vampire form. The other was an older man with twisted features and a permanent snarl. As she looked closer Helen saw that the other man's features had sunk toward his bones in a horrid venture between life and death.
The two vampires rolled off the wall and the cave fell back into darkness. For a moment, Nikola though he had the pursuer beat.
"We don't want to –" he started to say, but found himself thrown off in a sudden surge of power. Nikola yelped as he slammed into the wall next to Helen and hit the ground in a shower of glittering dust. "Hurt you..." he finished to himself.
"Look out..." whispered Helen, as she saw the other creature straighten and turn to face them.
Nikola pealed himself off the ground.
"You should not be here..." the creature hissed. Its voice was cluttered with age, scratching through his throat. The ancient vampire blinked its sharp eyes and then disappeared from sight.
Nikola swore.
"This is bad, isn't it?" said Helen, moving to get up.
"Stay down," he snapped sharply. "The only reason I'm not dead is because he's curious."
Swirls of dust kept kicking in the air, disturbed by the vampire's feet as he teleported from corner to corner to unsettle his uninvited guests.
Maybe, thought Nikola, it was time that he tried Helen's approach. "This is a Sanctuary?" he asked the darkness, not sure if he should expect a reply. "We come here only to search for a missing friend. We mean you no harm."
Silence. More crackling from the walls.
"We know what you are," Nikola continued. "We desire your help. This isn't working..." he shot at Helen.
Helen sat up, but didn't go so far as to stand. "For your help we can trade information on the history of your people."
Though they couldn't see it, the vampire's interest peaked.
"And what of them?" said the disembodied voice, bouncing off the uneven surface of the cave.
"Grant us safe passage, and we will tell you all we know."
"Safe passage?" the voice scratched and died off with amusement. "You have intruded into sacred ground, we are now negotiating the manner of your demise."
"Please," Helen said, "a friend of ours has inadvertently trespassed. We are here only to find them and return safely home. We mean you no harm."
"Harm?" the vampire hissed darkly. "Do not speak to me of harm." In the cave ahead, they saw a faint outline of movement as the ancient vampire slowly paced toward them. "For thousands of years I have watched my people die – cut down, tortured," it paused to take another laboured breath, "hacked apart in fields as they fled. You cannot know what it's like to watch children burn, smouldering into the dusk while the skeleton of your empire blackens." They could see the creature now, standing tall with its full length cloak dragging on the ground. "You may forgive me then, if I grow wary of human promises."
A tear steadied in Helen's eye. "I have seen such carnage," she replied. "But please, she is my daughter."
This seemed to stir a memory – and a distant smile. Not so long ago there had been another like herself bravely venturing into this cave. "There was a man here once before, on behalf of his daughter. You remind me of him..."