"Is my armour still in your car?" he asked her over breakfast.
She nodded. "You plan on taking it with you?"
"I plan to take it and use it."
"Is that wise?"
"Wiser than relying on whatever equipment they have. You saw how that bruxa slashed through that woman's chest. They could have dressed her in paper for all the good it did. My armour is reinforced leather with silver chain mail. Tougher to get through, even for a bruxa."
"I'm just concerned they might find it odd. It's unlike anything law enforcement or the army uses. Not to mention the sword. I fear it will raise more suspicions about your origin."
"I cast Igni in front of them. It's a little late to worry about them being suspicious."
"True. Frankly, I'm surprised they didn't ask more questions. And relieved they didn't land on anything too sensitive with the ones they posed."
"I'm quite sure they'll ask plenty more. Maybe they haven't figured out yet which are the proper questions to ask. Or they'll try to be more subtle about it. I'll have to pay attention to everything I say. Can't have anything slip out by accident."
"I trust you, and I'm sure you'll be wise with your words. You navigated that interrogation brilliantly. But if they pry deeper, give them whatever answers keep you safe. Even if they are regarding me. We just need to make it by for a few weeks and then I can take you home."
"And then what? Just leave you or your family to deal with the fallout of me disappearing on them? That's not something I want on my conscience. No, we'll have to find a way to end this deal amicably before then."
"We'll see how things evolve, but this can't keep you from helping Ciri. If push comes to shove, we can stage an accident..." Her voice trailed off, but the implications were obvious; she meant to make them think he died. It wasn't a bad idea, and he felt easier of heart knowing she already thought of a way out of the situation.
After a pause, she changed the subject.
"I'll have to ask Elly how the party ended. Maybe she'll be able to tell me something about the redhead."
"What use is that to anyone? She's probably already dead. You'll just put a name to her face, that's all."
"You may be right, but I need to know for sure what happened to her."
He still disagreed, but kept silent. There was no point in arguing with her. Once she satisfied her morbid curiosity, he just had to make sure to be around to comfort her in case she broke down again.
She provided him with a duffel bag for his things and a key card to the apartment in case he made it home ahead of her. Then they descended into the parking garage, to her car. He had been relaxed until that moment, but now a trace of anxiety made its way to the surface. He could deal with vampires of all sorts, but could he deal with the men of this world? The steady fire that burned in her kiss reassured him that all would be fine. Her fingers traced the side of his face and then moved down his neck until they finally rested on his chest. Energy infused him; he felt it through every cell in his body. He was now prepared to face an army if he had to.
"Take care of yourself." Those were her last words to him before she detached herself from his embrace. With a final smile, she got into her car and drove away, leaving him to wait for his ride to work. As her car moved out of sight and left the building entirely, for the first time in weeks, he felt the tether break and a feeling of loneliness overcame him. In the past, he would have relished the solitude. It was his normal state, after all. All he knew, aside from the brief periods when Dandelion would accompany his travels.
He moved to the side of the main lane and waited with the bag resting at his feet. A few cars moved past him, carrying various tenants on their way to work - though their work was probably far more vanilla than his. Most of the drivers didn't even waste a glance on him, all preoccupied with their own worries.
It wasn't long before a dark van pulled up in front of him and the door opened to let him in. Inside it were only two people. One was the driver, who was a fair-haired man with a sickly pallor. The other one was a dark and stocky curly-haired man; he was occupying one of six chairs in the back of the van. The driver didn't say a thing, but the curly-haired man grinned at him. Geralt recognized him; he had been present during his questioning.
"Hop on in and take a seat. I'm Terry. You'll meet the rest soon enough. Put your phone in that box over there, you'll get it back at the end." He extended a hand in greeting and nodded towards a metal box next to the door.
"Geralt," he said, more out of reflex than necessity; the man already knew his name, as did all present during the interrogation.
He shook the man's hand, put his phone away, and sat down beside him. As soon as the door of the van closed, the car set out. The van had tinted windows, same as the previous one, and an opaque screen separated the rest from the driver's area. A dim white light washed over the interior. This was going to be a long, dull ride.
"Hmm, a professional." He nodded toward the bag. "I see you brought your own gear. What weapons do you sport?"
"A sword."
"A sword?" His eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Just a sword? You must have some balls on you to get within sword length of a healthy vampire!"
"You all use guns?"
"Most do. I do. Adam and Asim use swords for the kill, but only after they're riddled with bullets first."
"Hmm..."
An awkward silence fell and Geralt kept his eyes trained on the opaque screen in front.
"You don't say much, do you?"
"Do you want to swap childhood stories? Brag about kills or conquests?"
The man burst out in hoarse laughter.
"I'll take childhood stories for a 100."
He continued to laugh, but Geralt didn't get his joke and continued to look at him coldly. Working with the people who were in the room during the questioning wasn't something he expected. He held out hope Terry would be the only one he'd recognize. But his hopes were crushed as soon as the car stopped and the door opened. The next person to get in the car was Lisa. Her movements were awkward and accompanied by a pained face that told him her wounds were still very much troubling her.
"Morning, Terry! Geralt... Welcome."
He just nodded in response and looked at her with unmitigated hate in his eyes. Her involvement in his questioning had left a bitter taste, and he still wasn't sure he made the right decision when he helped save her life. She had been the one to point a finger in Criss's direction, and he had yet to forgive her for it. Lisa ignored his gaze and simply sat in the chair behind him.
Terry turned to look at her through the gap between the seats.
"How are you healing? Doing alright?"
"Better than expected. Doctors don't understand why I lost so much blood despite the wounds being so shallow. They're probably going to run more tests on me today. I know I felt those fucking claws go through to my spine because I couldn't move my legs at all... But, as it turned out, she barely scratched me." Geralt shuddered at the implications in her voice and at the thought that she might have figured something out.
"You couldn't move cause you shit yourself when that foul thing bared her teeth. It'd be enough to make any man freeze in fear."
"Maybe..."
"Anyway, that should teach you not to go off rogue. Next time you should wait for us."
"I have a feeling that if I had waited, the only thing we would've found would've been the charred remains of one vampire. We might have missed out on a rare opportunity..."
Geralt clenched his jaw and lazily blinked, trying to keep his mouth shut. All her words were rubbing him the wrong way.
The van door opened again but, even before he could see the newcomer, Terry's powerful grip on his arm pinned him to the chair, while Lisa held his shoulders flush against the backrest. He didn't have to see his face to guess who it would be. Anger boiled inside him and it took all his willpower to resist the urge to smash the man's face in as soon as he came into view.
"To the back of the car! Now!" Lisa shouted at the man and tightened her grip on Geralt's shoulders; she was unusually strong for a woman. The man quickly moved past them and sat at the back, as far as possible from Geralt.
"That's Adam, erm, he's... well..." Terry began fumbling through an explanation, still not loosening his hold on Geralt's arm.
"He was just following orders," Lisa completed his sentence. "He's not a bad guy. None of us took any pleasure in doing that to your friend. We're just doing our jobs. And if this arrangement is going to work for anyone, you two will have to make nice... and soon." She looked over her shoulder. "Apologize! Quickly! And mean it!"
"She kicked me! I have nothing to apologize for!" the man angrily retorted.
"Do it anyway! Don't make me ask a second time!" Her voice foretold of danger and Geralt rightly guessed that she was the one in charge of their group. The man grimaced, but obeyed.
"I'm sorry about hitting your friend..." he begrudgingly said in the end. "If it's any consolation, she kicks like a mule. She gave me one hell of a bruise."
"It's not, and it's too bad she didn't kick your teeth in," he retorted spitefully. "However, I choose to accept your apology, despite its insincerity. But make no mistake, if you cross me or her in any way, I'll make use of the first opportunity to detach your limbs from your body in the most painful way I see fit." He dripped so much venom and bile into his words that no one doubted the truth of his threat. Terry shuddered beside him. His words had hit their mark. The hands that gripped him loosened, then let go and his muscles relaxed.
After the tense exchange, there was only silence in the van. Then the door opened again to let in the fifth person. The man was nothing short of a giant or some distant cousin to a mountain troll. He was so tall that he had to take care not to hit the ceiling whenever the car ran over a pothole. He introduced himself as Asim and sat down next to Adam, with whom he proceeded to make small talk. Again, Geralt recognized him as one of the men who brought Criss into the room. A pattern was already forming and he could easily guess who the sixth member would be.
Geralt felt a light touch on his arm. He turned his head to see Lisa peering over the side of the chair.
"Listen, I know none of this got off to a great start, but I hope you'll be able to put aside your grudge when it matters," she whispered to him. "We need to trust that you'll watch our backs on the field and you can trust we'll watch yours in turn."
"You can trust that if I have a problem, I won't let a vampire settle it for me."
"I..." she broke off because the van door opened again. "Morning, C," she greeted the man.
"Hey, Lisa, guys..." He looked at Geralt for a second before extending a hand. "Welcome! Hope there are no hard feelings, Geralt."
Geralt shook his hand but gave no reply.
"There are some feelings," Adam quietly muttered under his breath, but not quietly enough for Lisa's ears.
"Shut it or there'll be even more feelings floating around," she warned him.
As the car drove off, Geralt correctly assumed its next stop would be the end of their ride. He had counted the turns and stops; he listened to the sounds coming from outside for any clues to his whereabouts, but all he could say for sure was that they had crossed the same river twice. One of these days, he'd need to find the time to study a local map more thoroughly. The van finally stopped, and he heard a garage door opening and then closing behind them.
Geralt stepped out into a large hall. On one side, several cars and vans were parked, other than that, it was empty. The others got out and headed straight for the only door in sight, so he followed. It took them to a wide corridor. The walls were painted bright white, no decor hung anywhere, no windows either. He drew a large breath. Although it looked identical to the building where they were held after his scuffle with the vampire, he was sure it wasn't the same one. This one smelled of bleach or some other cleaning substance, whilst the other had a more lived-in distinctive scent to it.
They walked the length of the corridor, past two doors and through a third, into a small room filled with metal cupboards and a few benches.
"This is the locker room," Terry explained, and dropped his own backpack on the nearest bench. He pointed toward a locker. "That one is yours. You'll find your new equipment inside."
"I prefer to use my own."
The man simply shrugged and continued about his business. They all began undressing and changing into their combat gear. None seemed to care that there was a woman in the room, including the woman. She unabashedly stripped down to her underwear just like the rest of them. He did the same and saw them all steal glances at his scars, discreetly studying him while appearing to be minding their own business. Some of them had scars of their own, but none looked like they came from monsters; most were small and circular, the kind a bullet would make. They had seen battles, just not the same kind he did.
Each one of them put on their combat gear, so Geralt followed suit and donned his viper-scaled leather jerkin and light chain mail over a t-shirt, exchanged his normal jeans for the lightly padded trousers in his bag, put on his metal-reinforced boots and finally his silver-studded gloves. It all felt like a second skin and instantly he was more at ease. All that was missing was his sword.
Once they were all dressed, Lisa came to his side.
"Come on, let's go see the boss. He'll be expecting you."
She led him into a room that looked more like an impromptu surveillance office than anything. There were a few desks and many monitors on top of them, and the room had no windows. All the light was artificial. It was the kind of room where it would be easy to forget what time of day it was. It was clear they had put together the setup in a rush. His eyes noticed the patches of dust nobody had wiped down in ages, telling him that this wasn't a location they often used. All he was seeing was what they wanted him to see. They didn't trust him, but that was perfectly fine because he didn't expect them to, and he didn't trust them either.
From behind the many monitors, two heads peeked out, giving them all a cursory glance that lingered a second longer over his figure. The two shouted a cheerful "Good morning!" before returning their eyes to the screens. The rest of the team replied with enthusiasm, then crowded around a machine in a corner. He felt the bitter smell of coffee wafting from it. All of them had fallen into what looked to be their normal morning routine, and none of them were paying any special attention to him. At least so he thought at first. The man the courier had called "the Director" was sitting at a desk reading the daily paper. He looked at Geralt, folded the paper tactfully, and gestured towards a chair opposite his desk. Geralt approached but didn't sit.
"That's just not polite, Mr Rivia. Please sit."
"I'd rather stand. The sooner you point me in the direction of the monster I need to kill today, the sooner I can be on my way. No need for politeness to slow us down."
"Why the rush?" The man laughed. "Look around, Mr Rivia. Do you see any monsters here?"
Maybe. I have yet to decide, Geralt thought, but kept silent. His eyes remained fixed on the grey-haired man's face.
"Your silence is very loud, Mr. Rivia." His eyes narrowed. "If you won't sit, then I'll stand as well. After all, I should give you a brief tour." He stood up and walked him over to the two men watching the monitors. "This is how we find our little monsters." He gestured towards the screens.
"That's all? Two guys watching images from a few cameras throughout the city?" It seemed utterly ridiculous. "You're insulting my intelligence if you expect me to believe that."
"Of course not!" The Director laughed and sized him up before continuing with a more reasonable explanation. "The system does the work for us. An AI with a built-in algorithm that recognizes the traits we feed it. For example, it can look for the trademark features of the… bruxa, I believe you called it. As for the cameras, there are more than just a few. We have at least one on every street in the city. There is little that escapes us. But of course, human supervision is needed. Although a thermal scan correlates the traits with unnaturally low body temperature, someone has to double-check to ensure that no mistakes get made. Can't go fully trusting a machine when the stakes are this high or we might end up accidentally killing an eerie-looking human woman instead."
Half of the man's explanations sounded like gibberish to him. Criss had taught him the basics as far as technology was concerned, but she never mentioned anything similar to whatever the hell this system was. All this could have been pure bullshit, and he had no way of knowing. He'd have to take the man's word for it.
"And does your system yield many results?" he asked, acting like he wasn't completely ignorant on the matter.
"A fair amount. We don't find them each day, but often enough they'll appear. And when they do, it's your job to eliminate them."
He looked at the screens. Large squares, smaller streets lined with shops, shopping malls, playgrounds, all filled with people bustling in every direction, going about their day. He avoided fighting in populated areas like the plague. It was an accident waiting to happen. Not to mention it was a spectacle few had the stomach to witness and one of the reasons witchers were so hated. How the hell was he going to manage hunting anything in places overfilled with humans?
"A bit hard to fight a vampire inconspicuously in such large crowded places. Six people armed to the teeth are bound to stand out. Might even cause panic and some headlines. Civilians might get hurt."
"Glad to see you care about the public's welfare." He patted Geralt's shoulder and gave him the first honest smile. It was so unexpected that the witcher had difficulty hiding his astonishment. "Don't act so surprised, Geralt! After all, our job is to protect the public from these monsters. We take all necessary precautions to ensure that there will be no innocent bystanders around. Once we identify a vampire, we track it until we can safely secure it in an area sealed off from the public."
"The roadblock on the evening of the banquet. That was where you planned to kill it."
The man nodded with a wry smile.
"How were you planning on drawing the vampire to that place?"
"We have... bait, let's call it. It's a synthetic compound engineered to be the epitome of taste and potency in terms of what vampires like. They can smell it a mile away and can never resist it. Usually, we douse an animal in the compound and leave it for the beast to find. It hasn't failed us yet."
"Resourceful, but it makes me wonder how you could know what a vampire would consider most... delicious." Now he was genuinely impressed.
"Like with all good things, the answer is always science. It was a gruelling testing process, but, we got it in the end."
The man was skilled at answering a question without giving out any valuable information. It made Geralt even more curious to see how he would answer his next one.
"You already have your technology and techniques. Your bait and your bullets. Why hire me? The way you present it, you don't seem to need any help."
"Oh, but we do! We do, Mr Rivia! See, few people can stand up to a vampire and not shit themselves - pardon my frankness - let alone fight it and win. Even fewer can do that without a gun and even with a gun - you've seen yourself - they're not so easy to kill. Recruiting is a hard task, and it's even harder to keep the recruits alive long enough for them to learn the ropes."
"So your bullets are not enough. Is that it?"
"Indeed, you're very perceptive. We've tried pure silver bullets, but the metal is so malleable that it loses its shape, causing it to misfire or even jam the gun. We've had to settle for normal bullets coated in silver, but the problem is, sometimes the coating flies off the bullet and that makes it substantially less effective. Unfortunately, this has led to many deaths. It would have probably led to Lisa's too. Bullets can only do so much, and we need swordsmen to deal the last blow." He looked furtively at Lisa, who was listening in on their conversation along with the rest of the team. "We've studied your sword. It's most interesting. The metal underneath the silver is very durable, and it's as sharp as can be. I wonder, do the etchings on it have any meaning?"
"My shimmer shall pierce the night, my light shall scatter the darkness. It's an old language."
"Hmm, fitting, considering its purpose."
"Anything else? Or can we move on to more practical matters?"
"More practical?"
"Yes. Your... tour was most interesting, but seems that now it's over and we are just standing around doing nothing. To put it simply... Do you have a vampire you need my help in dispatching? The quicker we get this over with, the faster I can go on about my business."
The Director's eyes narrowed; he looked curiously at Geralt.
"Yes, we have a target, but we haven't yet secured a location for the kill. You'll have to be patient. There will be days when you'll do nothing but wait. Nonetheless, you will be expected to show up with the rest of the team and... kill time."
"Kill time?" His eyebrows went up. "You're paying me to do nothing?"
"We're paying you to be available when we need you. Meanwhile, you can get to know your teammates. We have a training room, a shooting range. Use them if you want. If not, sit on your rump, sharpen your sword, whatever you see fit."
"And how long am I expected to wait?"
"Usually the teams work in eight-hour shifts to have someone on hand at all times, so... you have about seven more hours of waiting to go if we don't corner that vampire first."
If his mutation hadn't made the blood vessels in his skin permanently contract, causing his eternal pallor, he would have gone white. If it took them too long to kill the vampire, he could be significantly weakened. He had no way of knowing how affected he'd be by then. His heart sunk, thinking he could die like an idiot. He cursed his luck, chased the thought away and prayed to all the gods he knew.
"Where's my sword and where's the training room?"
"Right through there. Lisa will show you." The Director went back to his desk and his paper and Geralt followed Lisa to what looked like an armoury. His silver sword laid on a table, its sheath beside it. Whoever handled it hadn't the good sense to put it away once they were finished. He picked it up and moved to what was supposed to be the training room. In reality, it was a wide hall with gym equipment on one side, mirrors on some walls, and mattresses sprawled out on the floor. For the first time in decades, he missed the pendulum, the comb, the windmill.
He moved to an empty area, pulled his sword from its scabbard, and began running through drills. He imagined opponents, visualized obstacles, his body twisted and moved, his sword swung as if it was an extension of himself. The constant weaving, twisting and slashing focused his mind and didn't let it wander. He didn't wish to think of anything. Not of death, not of love, not of fear, not of hope, only the next strike and the next step mattered.