The Strain: Another Season
Episode 9

Creatures of the Twilight
Chapter Six


Caffa – 1357

Quintus' reminiscences over Sexta's early life are interrupted by a handsome young man in his late teens bursting through the door.

'I know what's going on…' pants Gerolamo Piambo.

'Gero,' exclaims Hostia Sexta, surprised but also evidently pleased by his sudden appearance.

'What is it that you believe you know, Gerolamo?' It shouldn't be possible to pronounce the boy's name to rhyme with "libidinous interloper who I am only not killing out of deference to Sexta's feelings", but somehow Quintus manages it.

'I know what's happening here, Dr Sertorius.' Gero says. 'And I want to be a part of it.'

He continues, nervous but resolute. 'I know that when I come in to be treated... That is, when all your patients consult with you and you prescribe bleeding… I know that it is Sexta biting us…'

Quintus and Sexta both gasp.

'…and I want to let her.' He finishes with a sigh, as if he's been practising the monologue and wouldn't take a breath until he'd reached the end of the script.

Sexta moves to his side, which only makes Quintus' demeanour towards him even colder.

'All my patients leave here in good health and my bleeding methods are the most benign in the city,' he says tightly.

'Oh yes,' agrees Gerolamo eagerly, 'everyone says so. But I know that it is Sexta. I've been coming twice a month since I was eight, sir. I know that it's her teeth that mark me and I know that it's your blood, Dr Sertorius, that is the potent elixir you give us a drop of, at the end of the cure. I believe that it is that, rather than the bleed itself, that gives us the feeling of wellbeing and has rendered your patients resistant to the Black Death and other agues.

'And, sir, I want to volunteer. I don't want the blindfold any longer.'

There are more gasps.

'And I don't need your blood, sir. I've been well for a year – I know it's your daughter, doctor, please don't try to convince me otherwise. I'm not stupid. I just want to help her. There's no need to pretend with me anymore. I haven't told anyone else, sir, not even Claudia and I won't. I'd never put Sexta in danger. I want to help.'

By the time he finishes this, more spontaneous, speech, Sexta is standing in front of him and holding his hand in grateful adoration.

Quintus growls softly.


The Master's New Lair - Present

The hideously sun-burnt Master oozes along a corridor alone and, almost surreptitiously, enters an unmarked door.

Inside, his coffin lies on a dais. It has been remade after Setrakian's violent smashing of it, the shards now classily encased in solid gold. The giant Sardu-Master climbs into the soil with a weary sigh and glances into a dark corner.

A slender strigoi trips lightly out of the shadows and goes to him.

The girl (because the build cannot be that of a man) caresses his wounds solicitously. 'Papa, why have you not transmuted yet. You are too badly damaged to continue in this body. Why do you not take Thomas' form? Or mine?'

You would willingly lay down all that is truly you for my sake, Sura.

It isn't a question.

She smiles and kisses a ravaged cheek.

Sura, Quintus Sertorius' adopted Berber daughter, is physically very similar to an Ancient now, but clothed as the Master. She has no nose, no hair and very pointed ears and any sign of her gender or what had been impending womanhood has been erased by the viral transformation. She and the Master converse in a curious amalgam of Ancient Berber, Greek and Latin mixed with modern Polish, German and English. He, of course, communicates telepathically but she speaks aloud.

My Secret Child. You love me sincerely... You and you only. Your patience and devotion shall be rewarded.

She purrs.

Do you recall my mentioning some new targets?

She nods.

The boy's mother is closing in on her Loved Ones as we speak. My Chosen Daughter, soon you will have a friend your own age, a companion, a playfellow.

She seems to be pleased by that announcement.

And I will wait until my next host has matured sufficiently to survive the subsumption.

'And the boy's father?' she asks. 'Is he food or a strategic acquisition?'

The Master shakes his head. Entertainment!


Water Street, Brooklyn, New York

The Force stroll around the cobbled streets of DUMBO led by Captain Lena Bartoli. Most of the men are trying to distract themselves from the danger by either engaging in inane banter or discussing the Big Fight they've just watched on television.

Unfortunately for the entertainment-starved cops of NYC, the latter option means the debacle at the end of the FinchTV Broadcast of Eldritch Palmer's birthday ball.

'Looks like that Goodweather guy is off the "Most Wanted" list…'

'Yeah, cos he's obviously pals with a billionaire, Don. D'ya think if that was one of us, we'd get off so easy?' Goes one exchange.

'Damn, but that hot ffinch-Myles bitch likes her men old and creepy,' is another popular line of conversation.

'D'ya think that means the sarge has a chance?'

'Well…He's ugly enough but I reckon a bit too young for her.'

'Yeah, plus Sarge doesn't have that whole "Well Dressed Man" hero vibe going on.'

'Suck on my fat one, both of you.'

Lena has been silently ignoring the raillery, leading, as it is usually best to do, from the front and checking every alley opening and darkened doorway for threats living and dead.

'That "Well Dressed Man" is what the old pawnbroker in Red Hook would call a strigoi,' she says definitely.

'Shut the fuck up!' exclaims someone who forgot who he was talking to.

Lena glances round at him and he follows his own advice.

'But he looks like a man, Captain,' says Stephen Collins. 'Like a real person.'

'C'mon Steve,' says another, 'anyone who's worked nights has seen those extreme makeovers on daytime TV. Spray tan, contacts, wigs… and plastic surgeons can do fucking anything now.'

'Yeah, they could prob'ly make Benny a real dick.'

'He already is a real dick.'

'Hah de fucking hah, boys,' retorts Benny. 'Your mommas never complained.'

Nobody's really putting their backs (or brains) into it, perhaps because of anxiety about their families and city.

Collins' phone rings and he stops to answer it, dropping back from Lena's heels and being overtaken by the rest of the Force. He gets more and more concerned by the call until he pushes his way back to the Captain's side.

She catches his alarm and signals O'Keefe to take point while she listens to her old partner.

'That was Loretta…'

'Your wife?

Collins nods. 'It's Katie...'

'Your daughter?'

'Yeah. Listen, Loretta didn't take the kids to her sister's like I told her and now Katie's gone missing. I told Loretta to stay put until I can get home but she's never liked taking orders. Least, not from me.'

Lena nods without smiling or offering sympathy to poor Steve who is ruffling, almost tearing at his red hair in anxiety. Instead, she's all business.

'Huertas, Kim,' she calls. Her voice isn't particularly loud; she isn't strident or bossy like Sandra, she simply seems to be one of nature's commanders. 'Go with Collins. Help him find his daughter.'

To Steve she says simply, 'Keep in touch.'


Fet's place, Richards Street, Red Hook, Brooklyn

Sandra manages to get the computer back on just in time for a blackout in Manhattan and Brooklyn. She seems destined to miss the good bits of The Naughty Eichhorst Show.

She screams her frustration and bellows, 'Where's your back-up generator?'

'My what now?' says Fet.

Sandra snarls some rude words at Fet and Setrakian and the entire American electricity generating industry until Dutch interjects sarcastically. 'Erm hellooo!' She taps the laptop's "on" light. 'Battereeee!'

Her face falls as she realises that, in her smug eagerness to demonstrate her superior technical knowledge, she has facilitated her mother's voyeurism.

Sandra snatches the computer back and watches avidly. She rejoins the action in Eichhorst's living room a second before the Stoneheart back-up generator kicks into life.

Eichhorst's living room, Stoneheart building, Manhattan

In the blackout, the naked musician notices the lights go out through his bow tie blindfold. Eichhorst has already made him nervous by giving him wine that tasted odd (because the vampire has spiked it with Eph's silver solution) and this tips him over the edge. He removes his blindfold exactly as the lights come back on and exactly as Eichhorst is trying to stick his stinger out.

It's an even more disgusting picture than usual. Because of the burning caused by Sandra's silver tongue-stud, Eichhorst's tongue doesn't dehisce properly. The trumpet-player opens his eyes on the fang-stalks protruding asymmetrically and horrifically misshapen. One is even bent completely backwards and both palps writhe as if in pain. Certainly, Eichhorst is pawing at his mouth and almost squealing in distress.

The naked boy panics and fires himself backwards off the chair, screaming incoherently. Love time is clearly over and Eichhorst growls in pain and frustration.

Viewing on a laptop back at Fet's, Sandra leaps up in triumph. 'Hah!' she jeers, pointing at the screen. 'You see, Eichhorst, you still needme.'

She receives looks of revulsion from everyone else but she either doesn't notice or doesn't care.

In his apartment, Eichhorst leaps on his prey and tries again to extend his stinger. The split in his ravaged tongue is simply not wide enough to squeeze the stinger through and he's now having difficulties retracting it as well.

At Fet's, Gus laughs, 'Look, he can't get it up.'

Angel is still having trouble keeping pace with the conversation. 'Hot Bitch made him impotent?' he asks, looking Sandra up and down as if he believes she could be the cause of one bedroom issue but it definitely isn't erectile dysfunction.

Back at Stoneheart's, the enraged Eichhorst tears open the terrified boy's ribcage, reaches inside and squeezes the heartblood directly into his mouth, snarling like a beast.

Sandra gives a little 'Ooh!' of surprise but everyone else, even Setrakian, is shocked and disgusted.


F Train - Somewhere beneath the East River, New York

The power cut across the two boroughs has stopped the train. Back-up batteries power emergency lighting inside the car and the public announcement is advising everyone to sit tight because they anticipate the halt will be temporary. Kelly Goodweather and the vampire-child Lucille sit side by side on the F service subway train. They are the only beings in this car but there is the noise of a group of young men in the next car moving along the train towards them. Kelly and the Feeler sit rigidly upright staring blankly ahead.

The door to the next car opens and the gang roll in - inked, pierced and dressed to announce that bad news has just turned up and that the words, "Well, lookee what we have here," or "Hello, my pretty," will surely follow.

However, this leader is an innovator.

He sits beside Kelly and coils a strand of wig around his finger, showing that his approach isn't that ground-breaking, and his friends snigger and nudge each other.

'Are you lonely here, Duchess?' he purrs. 'Clad in all your finery. You got any valuables you'd like to exchange for a bit of my…undivided attention?

'Nope, guess not, where'd you hide it in that dress?' He extends a hand towards Kelly's expertly made-up cleavage.

She had been ignoring him but this intrusion makes her slowly turn her head and look deep into his eyes. She blinks her nictitating membranes and he leaps back, almost falling over.

'What the fuck's wrong with your eyes, lady?' he yells. His mates haven't seen her eyes and are still laughing and calling out profane encouragement. The beta male shoves him back into the fray telling him to hurry up because he wants his turn. The leader stumbles and falls into Kelly's lap.


Platform Level York Street Station, Brooklyn

A little while later, the train pulls into York Street station and Kelly Goodweather and the Feeler disembark unscathed. There is a little patch of blood on Kelly's cheek but she licks it off.

Two women get into the carriage Kelly has just vacated and start screaming hysterically.

The scene is one of total carnage. There are body parts (and blood) everywhere, including a pair of testicles, connected by a sliver of hairy skin, dangling from an overhead handrail.

That ringleader must really have pissed Kelly off.


Street Level Outside York Street Station

Lena Bartoli's leadership has fortuitously brought The Force to this location just as Kelly Goodweather and her Feeler companion exit the subway system. The train has got the two vampires under the otherwise insurmountable obstacle of the East River and they now prepare to complete the journey to Richards Street on foot.

The officer who'd been affronted by Ephraim Goodweather's elevation from fugitive to Eldritch Palmer's guest, notices the elegantly-dressed brunette.

'Look!' he calls out to his partner. 'That's Goodweather's squeeze. You know… from the Stoneheart party.'

Kelly's strigoi hearing detects her married name, making her turn to see the source. Captain Bartoli follows the officer's pointing finger too, and she and Kelly lock eyes for a microsecond, before Kelly's eyes flash red and she and the Feeler disappear.

Bartoli reacts instantly, ordering O'Keefe to take charge and follow her to the exterminator's place on Richards Street, before she sprints off, pulling out her phone.

Lena Bartoli isn't as fast as a strigoi, but she is easily the fastest cop on the streets tonight and she is dialling as she goes.


Eichhorst's Living Room, Stoneheart Building, Manhattan

Eichhorst drops to his knees, looking shocked. Then he falls forwards onto his hands, apparently choking.


Fet's Place, Richards Street, Red Hook, Brooklyn

Back at Fet's, Sandra watches Eichhorst on the laptop. He retches and heaves. She is highly satisfied with this self-induced suffering.

'That looks painful, doesn't it?' She turns round to her audience for confirmation.

Gus and Angel look at each other and turn back to her with nods and shrugs.

'Painful. Yuh.'

'Very painful, I'd say.'

She turns back to admire her handiwork. 'He's not going to want to do that again in a hurry. I shall have to give him some sort of incentive.'

Setrakian and Fet are still disgusted but they are both extremely interested in this piece of the action, peering over Sandra's shoulders either side of her.

'He's trying to vomit,' exclaims Setrakian excitedly. 'But he can't!'

'Ohhh,' breathes Fet. 'Just like little rat munchers.'

Now Eichhorst is lying on the floor, clutching his stomach and rolling around groaning.

'He's not going to die, is he?' asks Sandra, sounding concerned.

Everyone looks at her in disbelief.

'I doubt it,' sneers Eph. 'He's had a miniscule dose compared to my first test subject.' He looks at her scornfully and adds, 'Your boyfriend's just drama queening.'

Sandra's head snaps round but her angry retort (and hopefully denial) is cut off by Dutch snatching the laptop out of her hands and closing it with a glare of finality.

Sandra is furious and tries again to get hold of the computer.

Then Setrakian's trousers start to buzz.

He looks about, puzzled, before Nora nods towards his pocket and says quietly, 'Your cell…'


Richards Street - Outside Fet's Place, Red Hook

Kelly Goodweather and the Feeler arrive at Fet's. She sees the whole crowd inside. Or rather, she senses their circulatory systems and smells those who are most familiar to her.

In the basement workshop/storage area she instantly recognises her husband Eph's scent and that of his mistress... no, now she's his ex-mistress… Nora Martinez.

There are others here who were also at the Stoneheart dance: the unadulterated alpha-bitch scent of Mr Eichhorst's partner, the old Jew who was dancing with Nora and someone whose personal aroma is masked with heavy perfume. There are some large but subordinate males there too - Ukrainian, Mexican and African American plus a smaller vibrant male scent tainted with excrement.

But Kelly is less concerned with Eph, Nora, Sandra, Setrakian, Dutch, Fet, Angel Guzman Hurtado, Reggie Fitzwilliam and Gus, than she is with the smell of her son Zak, lying in bed two floors up.

She scrambles up the outside wall to listen to his heartbeat and take in his beloved aroma.

She breathes one word, infused with an aching desire, 'Zak!' and searches for a way in to her Loved One.

Even without the manpower on the inside, security is tight. There's a single heavily-barred entrance/exit door and solid metal grids on all the windows. To cap it all, Kelly hears Setrakian get Bartoli's warning call.

She throws her head back and, eyes glowing red, shrieks for reinforcements before looking about her for a way in.

As hordes of strigoi appear out of every shadow, her eyes light on Gus' Ancients-sponsored ride.


Fet's Place, Richards Street, Red Hook, Brooklyn

Setrakian relays Captain Lena Bartoli's message with a glint in his eye. He gets one order out – to bring Zak Goodweather downstairs and circle the wagons around him – before Sandra assumes command.

Her primary objective is to get Dutch, or "Cornelia", as she persists in calling her, out of the action, in order to keep her kinship with Sandra a secret from the Master's strain, but she barks other commands too, commandeering everyone but Eph, Nora and Setrakian for Dutch-protection detail and telling everyone to select their weapons of choice.

'Professor,' she calls across to Setrakian, 'where's your panic room?'

'Don't have one,' Fet answers for him, apparently slightly annoyed that she assumes Setrakian has been in charge.

'Secret escape route?' she asks, more in hope than in expectation.

There are shrugs and shaken heads all round.

Sandra is exasperated. 'No induction course into strigoi basics, no back-up generator, no panic room, no emergency escape route!' she rages. 'What have you people been doing here?'

She tells Eph and Dutch to shut up when they protest and orders the Mexicans into position by the heavily fortified front door.

Angel nudges Gus and sniggers, 'Looks like we all on Team Hot Bitch now, eh Gusto?'

'You must have a safe,' she tells Fet, and he does but it's far too small to serve as Dutch's sanctuary.

Dutch continues to object, mostly in four letters, but is ignored.

'What about somewhere to lock up the poisons?'

'No,' Fet shakes his head, making Sandra tut and roll her eyes. 'Oh, well, yeah, there's a lockable cabinet for the cart. The cat, y'know… didn't want him eating what he shouldn't…'

'I'm not getting in there!' Dutch protests hotly, as Fet hurriedly clears the space, smelly rags and rotten poison cartons flying past his ears.

A brief argument with her mother ensues, which ends when Sandra knocks her out with halothane, pours a little over her to further disguise her Edwards scent and, with Fet's muscular help, locks her inside.

Nora clocks this and yells, 'No, that's irritant! Especially to her eyes! Get her out and wash it o…'

Unfortunately, at this point, the wall opposite the sole entrance door explodes into rubble and noise, and Gus' Hummer, with Kelly Goodweather at the wheel, bursts through.

Because the building is built on a slope, the vehicle actually ends up in the living space, or rather, because of momentum, through the living space without touching the floor, down the stairs with a screech of metal on metal and into the basement to the surprise of all. Including Kelly.