The Perfect One

by choejhulkp9

SHIELD. The Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division protects the world from a much weirder one. But they soon meet someone with a unique ability set that makes him a force of nature. One of Earth's mightiest heroes will turn into its last hope from total annihilation. You don't mess with Inhuman perfection.

7. Hominus Nocturna

Here is Chapter 7 of the Perfect One. Will investigates an odd situation at an old meatpacking factory that turns into something much stranger. He learns of an old, evil enemy that has been hidden from plain sight for years. SHIELD thought they were gone but they're back and Will gets thrown into the middle of this ancient war but gains a new ally in the Daywalker. Enjoy!

The Perfect One: Hominus Nocturna

May 2012: Bronx, New York City

It was a regular night in the Bronx as a beautiful red-headed woman led a blissfully unaware man into a secret nightclub residing within a meat-packing warehouse. Once they were inside the nightclub, it was standard techno/dance music, flickering lights, and drugs. There were maybe about a hundred people there and at first, there didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary until sprinklers began raining down blood, soaking everyone in the party. Dennis, the unaware man who thought this was a regular club began to freak out while everyone else was having the time of their lives. He pushed through the crowd to get out when he saw his date walk up to him.

"What's wrong, baby?" She asked, before snarling at him and showing the elongated fangs of a vampire. He shouted in fear and frantically tried to make it to an exit and saw everyone else was like her and began looking at him like he was food. He rushed past them only to get punched in the face and hit the ground hard. He crawled away, getting kicked in the side and finally made it to the exit to see someone in his path. The music and blood shower stopped as he looked up and saw a black man wearing a black trench coated outfitted with a Kevlar vest, sunglasses and was wielding a shotgun. (1)

"Is that him? Jesus that's him. It's Blade. It's the Daywalker." All the vampires slowly backed away and snarled at him, doing their best to act strong but they were outmatched. Blade smirked and slowly walked forward, waiting for the right moment to strike.

"Come on, Daywalker!" One brave vampire rushed him only to get a shotgun blast to the chest and burn away into ash. Shit hit the fan after that, and several vampires made a run for the other exits while Blade killed the other vampires with shotgun blasts. One female vampire grabbed meat hooks and charged at him only to get a shotgun blast to the face. Blade gun butted a vampire behind him and stomped his right boot onto the ground, revealing a silver blade that extended from his heel and stabbed a vampire in the gut from behind before shooting another vampire in the face. He shot one of the vampire guards dead when the female vampire who led the human to the slaughter stepped forward.

"Hey! I'm gonna rip your fucking head off!" She shouted only for Blade to spin kick her in the face and fire another shotgun blast, killing another guard. He turned his gun at the woman only to hear an empty click, so he quickly hit her in the stomach causing her to double over. Blade loaded one spare cartridge into his shotgun and blew her head off. He spun his shot gun and threw it low to the ground, tripping a vampire and sent his gun skidding towards the far showers. A vampire grabbed him from behind only for Blade to punch him in the face, the throat, break his wrist and throw him to the ground. He grabbed a silver stake from his thigh holster and stabbed the vampire in the heart, reducing him to a pile of ash and bones.

Another vampire tried to rush him, but Blade kicked out his legs and then stomach, knocking him to the ground before taking out another silver stake and impaling it up through the jaw and head of another vampire. He spun and punched another vampire in the face before taking a silver stake and stabbing it in the heart before kicking its head into the light, giving it a shock before it burned away as well. Several of the vampire guards and a vampire girl fired at Blade but their bullets hit his armor. He quickly ducked and fired his modified Mac-10 submachine gun at them, killing the guards and the vampire girl. He loaded another clip into his gun and killed the DJ vampire. He saw more guards and their boss Quinn arrive so he holstered his gun.

"That's him! That's him! Get him! Fuck him up! We're gonna jack you up. Make him hurt bad! Whoo!" Quinn boasted while Blade unsheathed his sword and the guards armed themselves with meat hooks or knives.

The first guard charged at him only for Blade to slice him upward across the belly and he sliced the second one horizontally, reducing both to ash. He flipped into the shower area and blocked a meat hook from one of the guards before stabbing him in the face and then impaled another in the gut. He sliced one across the neck before kicking another in the face and stabbing a vampire behind him. He sliced and diced the others with ease before impaling one more in the gut. He jumped up and hugged the wall before pulling out his serrated boomerang glaive. He smirked at Quinn and threw it around the room. It returned to his hand with blood on the blade from three vampires it slashed in the throat.

Quinn jumped towards Blade only for Blade to do the same and kick him in the back of the head. Blade sheathed his sword and grabbed his shotgun off the floor and holding it right at Quinn's chest, firing the stake launcher attachment and pinning him to the wall by his right shoulder. Blade fired the other stake and impaled his left shoulder before smirking in delight. Quinn began screaming and mumbling in some kind of Slavic ancient vampire language as Blade walked up to him and the human Dennis watched in fear from the corner.

"Quinn…I'm getting a little tired of chopping you up." Blade said, taking out and arming a kerosene thermal bomb. "Thought I might try fire for a change. Give my regards to Frost."

He lit Quinn on fire and turned to leave when Dennis ran past him. Blade grabbed him and checked his neck for any bite marks as Dennis begged for his life. Once he saw the human was clean, he quickly left just as the police and fire department arrived.

20 minutes later, Will arrived on the scene still dressed in his regular clothes but with his pistol holstered around his right hip. His tactical SHIELD Gear was in the car and he was only going to get changed if he needed it and judging by the area it seemed like he would because it confused the hell out of him. One of the detectives saw him and walked over. "You're the specialist?" He asked as Will took out his SHIELD badge. "Right, follow me. I know the whole governmental policy is a bit of a change up for us but if it means you guys deals with all the weird then I'm all for it. Besides, this is a doozy even for me."

"Jesus Christ." Will looked around and was confused at what he saw. He saw blood all over the place, dozens of bullets casings of various calibers, bullet holes in the walls, broken light fixtures but then it got weird with silver metal stakes and charred bones and ashes. The odd part was that there were no other bodies around. With the blood and bullet casings all over the place you'd think you see dozens of bodies but none and the bones looked they had been charred over.

Will grabbed a cotton swab from the CSU team and dabbed the blood so he could get a closer look and smell. "Blood came back as animal, most likely cow." One of the detectives told him. "We responded to shots fired but when my guys showed up all they saw was some poor sap in the showers and one of the victims stapled to the wall. He was still burning when the fire department put him out."

"Did the victim say anything?" Will asked.

"He was pretty shaken up when we got here. He wasn't making a lot of sense and said something about fangs. The paramedic is looking for answers, but I don't know how helpful he's gonna be." The detective said. Will took out his phone and dialed in to a SHIELD communication hub.

"This is Agent Detmer, Serial number November-Echo-Six-One-Six-India-November requesting SHIELD containment crew at my location. Possible situation." Will reported in.

"Roger that, Agent Detmer. ETA, 5 minutes." The SHIELD operator replied.

Will walked over to see the witness being looked after by the paramedics. His face had been cleaned up, but his clothes were still soaked in blood and looked like he had just been through a war zone. "Dennis…" Will said and Dennis looked up at him. "I'm Agent Detmer with SHIELD. I'm here to figure out what happened so can you tell me what you know? I promise you that you'll get the best protection and treatment SHIELD can get you."

"It was…I met this girl at a bar. She seemed awesome and really hot." Dennis said, managing to talk but was still shaken up over what happened. "She told me she had the hook up at a secret club, so we came here. Everything seemed fine until…until it started to rain blood."

"It rained blood?" Will asked.

"Yeah. It came down from the sprinklers…and they just went crazy. I tried to make it out of here and they started to attack me…" Dennis said. "I thought that they were just crazy but…they…they're monsters."

"Dennis, what happened after?" Will asked.

"Crazy shit, man." He told him.

"You can tell me the truth, Dennis. I'm here to help."

"You won't believe me, man. You'll think I'm crazy." Dennis said.

"Trust me, I deal with crazy on a regular basis. Not to mention that just a few weeks ago, we dealt with an alien invasion. There's nothing you could say that would make me think you're crazy." Will pointed out.

"They…they were vampires." Dennis told him.

"Vampires?" Will asked.

"Yeah, dude. Vampires, sharp fangs and everything, man. I'm telling you the truth. They nearly killed me before he walked in." Dennis said.

"Before who walked in?" Will asked.

"Some black guy in a trench coat." Dennis said in a more relaxed tone, indicating that the individual he was talking about didn't harm him. "They called him Blade. Once he showed up, they all got scared."

"What did Blade do?" Will asked.

"He killed the fuckers." Dennis told him. "I mean, shot gun, machine gun and then he took a fucking samurai sword and sliced a bunch of them to pieces."

Honestly the entire thing sounded like something out of a comic book, but he could tell Dennis was telling truth. "Ok, if they were vampires and all that happened, what happened to the bodies?" Will asked as Dennis pointed to one of the piles of ash that the CSU team was analyzing. "They turned into ash?"

"Yeah, I was in the washroom hiding in the corner when the shooting started. Blade staked one of them on the wall over there." Dennis pointed to the blood and scorch marks on the wall where the CSU teams were marking off the area.

"The burning corpse? He was a vampire?" Will asked and Dennis nodded.

"Yeah, Blade called him Quinn." Dennis told him. "After that, he let me go."

"Just like that. He didn't hurt you?" Will questioned but Dennis shook his head no.

"He did this thing and checked my neck but then the cops showed up." Dennis said. Will used his telepathy and checked Dennis's memories of what happened, and he was telling the truth. He looked through his memories and saw that this was set up as a club and everyone here had fangs and nearly did kill him before this Blade showed up. From how the memories played out, it was like Blade knew they were vampires and everything before heading in. No wasted movements or actions during the fight, he was in complete control.

"Ok, Dennis. I believe you. Once the medic gives you a check over, another agent is going to want to talk to you. Don't worry, you're gonna be fine. I promise." Will assured him and Dennis nodded. He stepped to the side and right on time the SHIELD containment crew arrived, so he addressed the police. "All right, Gentlemen. I appreciate your cooperation so please step aside. This is officially a SHIELD operation until further notice. Your departments will be made aware and the correct fee for your jobs will be deposited. Thank you."

The police stepped aside while a SHIELD containment crew got to work on bagging all evidence and surveying the entire area. Will walked over to some of the agents in charge of the field teams to coordinate the process. "I want this entire area bagged and tagged within the hour and start up a perimeter on this entire side of the island. I want CCTV and security camera footage from within a 20-block radius for anything out of the ordinary and find out who owns this building." Will ordered and the agents got to work. He took out his phone and contacted SHIELD operator command.

"Status report, Agent Detmer?" The operator asked.

"Situation contained for the moment but something definitely bizarre is going on. Run the name Blade through SHIELD's database, codenames included. And send an additional containment team to the Winhurst hospital." Will told her.

"Roger that. Can I ask why you need an additional team at the Winhurst hospital? We've gotten no report of any unusual activity there." They questioned as Will walked out of the factory and over to his SHIELD transport which was a black BWM M3.

"They just sent a vampire to the hospital." Will told her before hanging up and driving there as fast as he could. If his gut feeling was right, that vampire was not dead and would go on a rampage.

Line Break xxxxx

At the hospital, Quinn's body was pulled into the morgue where doctors did their usual examination when they noticed something odd about it. Hematologist Dr. Karen Jenson was baffled by the sample she was given by Doctor Curtis Webb and he escorted her to see the body. They were in the morgue lab and Curtis began the Y-incision to check the internal organs. Will arrived in a hurry and rushed down to the morgue when he heard screaming and pulled out his gun. He rushed through some double doors and saw a bunch of doctors, nurses, and other hospital workers running away from a charred and burnt man biting a doctor on the neck. Blood was coming down her neck and Will figured the vampire was feeding on her, so he fired a bullet and nailed a headshot. The vampire hit the wall and slid down to the floor while he rushed over to check on Doctor Karen Jenson.

"Hang on. You're gonna be ok." He grabbed some gauze from a hospital cart and applied pressure to the wound to try and stop the bleeding. He pressed down as blood ran down his hands and soaked the gauze. Despite the wounds being small from teeth fangs a lot of blood was coming out meaning he nicked an artery. Before Will could do anything else to try and help, he was pulled away with a good amount of force and thrown up against a wall by the burnt vampire corpse he just shot. He saw the bullet wound had some blood dripping out only for the bullet to actually be pushed out and clink on the floor, cracked and flattened. The vampire pushed Will into the wall and tried to bite him on the neck. He pushed back but the vampire had some impressive strength and inched forward, growling and snapping with his mouth. Will kneed him in the groin, grabbed his charred head and slammed him into the wall before kicking him back.

"Ugh, gross." He shook his hands to get the charred skin and pus off when the vampire got back up and growled at him. He charged forward only to get a roundhouse kick to the face and knocked through the air. The double doors down the hall were kicked open and in strode Blade. Will recognized him from Dennis's memories and knew he was a vampire killer. He walked up to the charred vampire and punched him in the face.

"Came back to finish you off." Blade said.

"Get out of my way, you freak!" Quinn shouted, charging only to get punched in the face and knocked into a sink. He grabbed a fire extinguisher and tried to use it as a weapon only for Blade to unsheathe his sword and slice his left arm off. It hit the ground as the doctor and Will saw it turn to ash.

Two officers showed up and aimed their guns at Blade. "Wait, hold your fire!" Will shouted but it was too late. They fired their bullets and hit Blade's body armor, pissing him off.

"Motherfucker, are you out of your damn mind?!"

"Get out of here, now!" Will ordered and they ran. Quinn took off down the hall so Will quickly emptied his pistol clip and loaded a special tracking dart bullet in the slide before rushing after the fleeing vampire. He took aim and slowed his breathing like Barton taught him before firing the bullet. Quinn dove out the window but before he fell to the ground, the tracking dart hit him in the back of the leg. Will rushed to the window to see an ambulance with a caved in roof.

He heard some movement and saw a dozen police officers enter the floor, opening fire at Blade. "Hold your fire!" Will shouted, rushing over to stop them. He held up his badge and some of them stopped but two trigger happy officers rushed over to stop Blade. He had thrown the doctor across the street to the roof of a building before jumping himself. The two officers fired when Will knocked their guns away. "I said hold your fire!"

Will quickly loaded another tracking dart into his gun when Blade fired back at them, scaring the officers away. Will quickly fired the dart as Blade ran away with the Doctor and hit the tail end of his trench coat. "Drop your weapon!" One of the officers shouted at him only for Will to flash his badge.

"Stand down." Will ordered and the officer lowered his weapon.

"Sorry, sir." The officer replied.

"Secure the entire hospital. Get medical attention for anyone hurt but no one leaves or enters. Is that understood?" The officer quickly nodded and got to work just as the SHIELD containment team arrived. Will spoke with the other SHIELD agents and told them what he wanted them to do. Secure all evidence and get the first victim stabilized and looked after by a scientist so they knew what they were dealing with. Once everything was secured, he began tracking down the vampire. He drove through the city and traced the tracking dart's signal on his phone. The vampire was fast and made it over ten blocks away in a hurry.

He stopped in the alley and got out, seeing the signal was nearby. He held his pistol out in front of him and slowly moved into the darkness. He used his telekinetic/psychic sense to check everything around him. It acted like a radar sense, allowing him to use his telekinesis/telepathy to scan a desired area close to him. It mapped out the entire area he wanted and fed the information back to his mind so it was like having an active and detailed map in his head so he could find whatever he wanted. All he found were rats, crows, insects, a whole lot of garbage and a dead body. He walked over and saw the dead body of a homeless man on the ground. He saw gross charred skin on the ground, probably having been molted or shed by the vampire. If his knowledge of vampires in pop culture were any indicator and how the one from the hospital pushed the bullet out of its head, healing fast was likely one of its abilities. Given the lack of blood and how emaciated the body looked, the vampire must have sucked him dry in order to heal.

Will checked the body and found the tracking dart on the body's coat. It must have gotten snagged when he was feeding. That's when he noticed the dog tags around his neck that read Corporal Adam Watson, draft date March 13th, 1965…a Vietnam Veteran. "Rest in peace soldier." Will put the dog tags down and saluted him in respect before calling the police. He stuck around to talk to the police and the paramedics who took the body to the morgue. Will even told them that he'd personally take care of the funeral arrangements and made some calls. He watched the ambulance drive away with the body sighing in sadness at what he saw, no one deserved that. He needed to find this vampire and the others in the city.

He was pulled out of his thoughts when he got a phone call and checked it to see it was from Deputy Director Hill, so he answered. "Detmer."

"Agent Detmer, report into the Manhattan base now." Hill ordered.

"But Ma'am I'm not finished. There's still another lead I need to run down." He told her.

"Report to the Manhattan base now. Director Fury's orders." Hill told him before ending the call.

"Of course, Fury knows what's going on. What fresh hell does he have for me now?" Will got into the car and drove away. He drove as fast as he could to the Manhattan SHIELD base and managed to get there before morning gridlock traffic. He parked the car on the street and walked into the same building where his parents died and where Cap was brought after his deepfreeze. He walked in and scanned his badge at the reader by the front desk where he was then escorted to special meeting room where Deputy Director Hill was waiting for him.

"That'll be all." Hill told the agents escorting him. They nodded and left, leaving the two of them in the meeting room alone. Hill pressed a few buttons on her tablet which caused the door's triple lock and soundproofing to engage along with closing the blinds and securing the entire area so no one could eavesdrop on the conversation.

"What's going on?" Will asked.

"The director will explain." Hill pressed a few more buttons and the wall moved apart to reveal a high-tech monitor and webcam. It turned on and an encrypted communications line activated before Director Fury appeared via video chat.

"Director." Will and Hill greeted him.

"Agent Detmer, your personal opinion on the situation in the Bronx?" Fury asked.

"Definitely abnormal, sir. Especially given eye witness testimony and the follow-up situation at the hospital." Will replied, acting like an agent. He would have given a sarcastic answer but noticed the grimace on Fury's face was extra today. "Vampires, if you believe the eye witness."

"And do you?" Hill asked.

"I do. He had no reason to lie and the evidence at both scenes seem to support that." Will replied. He noticed Fury give Hill a subtle nod and she brought up two security camera image stills of two people. One was a white male, probably in his fifties but had the grizzled aura of a veteran whereas the other picture was of Blade only maybe as a teenager.

"Did you see either of these two at the hospital?" Hill asked.

"Him but he's older." Will said when he noticed the look Fury and Hill shared. "Sir, what is going on?"

"Something we thought was settled has come back to bite us, both literally and figuratively." Fury told him. "Vampires."

"So, I'm right We are dealing with vampires." Will said. "Where the hell did they come from? I mean, is this weird disease or virus or what?"

"We don't know for sure. We though they were extinct." Hill said.

"Extinct, ok, hold on for one second. Director, you actually said Vampires and didn't break down laughing. I looked over SHIELD's files in my downtime and never once saw any mention of vampires or anything like this before." Will told him.

"Because it's been locked away in a highly classified file in SHIELD's archives that was buried years ago. And the reason we buried it is because we thought we killed every last vampire over two decades ago." Fury told him.

"What happened?" Will asked.

"This was before I was even an agent. Around the 60s, SHIELD began investigating odd circumstances and deaths around the world and the further we dug into them we realized that something was very wrong with the world." Fury told him. "We discovered a secret: The Hominus Nocturna. Vampires are real and they exist."

"So, how come I've never encountered something like this before?" Will asked.

"Because as of 20 years ago we thought they were extinct. Once SHIELD realized that vampires were real, they began using every measure they could to track them down and kill them, but it was not easy." Hill told him.

"So, what? Everything Braham Stroker wrote was true?" Will questioned.

"Not all of it. To be honest, we were only able to scratch the surface of their background. SHIELD had a specialized taskforce and department to deal with Vampires and the supernatural which often contracted vampire hunters for help. They provided us with intel, cooperation and we kept the police and media off their backs. Vampires got smart over the years and had to adapt to a changing world. They changed their hunting tactics and began blackmailing or paying off people of note for their own purposes. Police forces, politicians, anyone in a position of authority or power was likely visited by a vampire. It made tracking them down difficult but not impossible." Fury explained. "20 years ago, a large worldwide operation was conducted with vampire hunters that took down entire nests and groups all over the world. We wiped out millions of vampires along with their leaders and after that we considered the matter closed and everything about their existence was put under lock and key."

"Then what changed?" Will asked.

"We don't know but the past year we've getting whispers and chatter from their old network but nothing definitive. Until recently we've been getting reports of disappearances and attacks at meat packing factories or slaughterhouses all over the country, usually in highly populated cities." Hill explained.

"Like the factory in the Bronx that was set up like a rave club. It was a vampire hangout." Will said as both of them nodded.

"Tonight, was the proof that we needed to confirm our suspicions that we didn't obliterate all the vampires and instead sent them into hiding. They're back now and that means so are we." Fury told him. He nodded to Hill who brought over a small briefcase. Will opened it to see it contained over two hundred silver colored .45 caliber pistol rounds and a combat knife with a weird metal blade.

"What is this?" Will asked.

"Silver nitrate bullets laced with garlic extract and a silver/carbon steel combat knife. Leftover from the last vampire operation. We're getting the rest out of storage as we speak. Vampires are dangerous but they're not unkillable, especially to a super soldier like you. You just need to know how." Hill told him.

"All right, anything else? Holy water? Crosses?" Will asked.

"No. Silver, garlic and sunlight. Those are the only ways to kill a vampire." Hill corrected him.

"Good to know." Will began loading one of the pistol mags with the silver bullets. "How does Blade fit into all this?"

"He was an apprentice to a vampire hunter we worked with in the past, Abraham Whistler. If they're on this then something big must be going on. Find Blade and Whistler and get to the bottom of all of this. Get as much intel as you can and take down any vampires you come across." Fury ordered as Will finished filling the magazine and loaded it into his pistol.

"Roger that." He replied.

Line Break xxxxx

In a secret underground area of Manhattan, hidden away from the rest of the city by miles of tunnels and bricks sat the vampire elders. They were purebloods and leaders of their kind in this hemisphere of the world. The elders had gathered to go over the recent distresses to their kind dealing with the ramping attacks by Blade. After the attack on their kind 20 years ago that nearly wiped them all out, they had spent all this time in hiding and slowly growing their strength back. They had to adapt their hunting strategies and slowly regain their influence and it was working. They weren't as powerful as they were before but were slowly becoming a force to be reckoned except for the vampire hunters around the world. Especially Blade…he was a problem.

One of the elders, Gitano Dragonetti was looking over pictures of the recent attacks by Blade. He had been tracking their kind all over the country and his most recent attacks in New York were distressing. "Blade…" Dragonetti sighed, seeing the charred remains of his kind and of their familiars. "The Daywalker…still pursuing this ridiculous crusade. How many died?"

"We don't have an exact count. Apparently, he used a lot of silver." Another elder told him. "We're having difficulty—"

"Send in Frost." Dragonetti ordered so one of the attendants walked out of the meeting room to get him. He was escorted into the room and sat at the table to explain himself.

"You are a disgrace to the vampire nation, Frost. If we expose ourselves like this and gather in numbers that risk breaking the treaty, then the human politicians will make our lives very difficult." One of the elders told him in some ancient Slavic/vampire language. "You would understand this if your blood were pure. Don't we have enough trouble with Blade?"

Frost paid him no mind and kept smoking his cigarette like nothing was wrong. "These nightclubs of yours are dangerous." Another elder told him.

"Are they?" Frost asked.

"They draw needless attention to our kind. Your latest attempt even brought SHIELD sniffing at our heels. You know our policy."

"Your policy, not mine." Frost replied.

"Our livelihood…depends on our ability to blend in and our discretion. For the last twenty years we have come back from extinction and have prospered because all of our kind understands that hiding in plain sight is the only way for us to live." Dragonetti told him.

"Well maybe it's time we forgot about discretion and hiding. We should be ruling the humans and not running from them, making back alley treaties with them and hiding. For fuck's sake, these people are our food, not our allies." Frost told them.

"You're out of line, Frost." An elder told him.

"Am I? Or maybe I'm just the first to say out loud what we've all been thinking." Frost said, standing up from his seat. "The humans are too busy looking to space for the next attack when they don't know we're right under their noses. We attack them now and then we rule the world."

"You think you know any better, Frost? Many of our kind thought as you did, most of them were half-breed abominations like you were and their actions led us to near extinction. They got careless, thinking themselves as above the humans when it was the humans who killed them. SHIELD was made aware of our existence because of vampires like you and nearly wiped us out. I saw hundreds of my kin slaughtered and it was only by sheer luck and will that we are still alive today. What do you know of the struggle everyone in this room has been through? Who are you to question us? You're not even a pure blood." Dragonetti insulted him.

"Like it matters." Frost told him.

"I was born a vampire, as was every other member of this house, but you Frost…you were merely turned." Dragonetti said, enjoying the satisfaction with the insult.

"The world belongs to us. Not the humans. You know that, we all know that." Frost told him only for Dragonetti to disregard that comment.

"Do we have any other business matters to discuss?" Dragonetti asked.

"Uh, there's the matter of our offshore accounts. We're having difficulty in— "Frost just scoffed and stood up to leave but stopped to say one last thing.

"Gitano. You may wake up one day and find yourself extinct."

Will was driving through the city, following the coordinates he got from the tracker on Blade's trench coat. It cut out a few hours ago but he might be able to figure out a rough estimate of where he was from his last known location. According to Fury's files on the vampire hunters, they tended to stay away from heavy populated areas for safety purposes and places where they could hide their scent. Will ended up driving someplace in the outskirts of Queens nearby some old factories. The factories were abandoned which meant that no one would be around, and they were old chemical factories so the lingering smell would keep the vampires off their backs. Will parked his car some place close by and used his telekinetic sense to feel out for Blade and found him in one of the old factories.

Will walked into the old factory and heard some music which meant he was on the right track. He made his way through the factory and noticed some equipment when his danger sense went off, so he rolled forward to avoid a sneak attack from above. He quickly moved into a touchdown raiz and butterfly spin to avoid a spinning glaive before landing in a crouch and engaging in a fight with his mystery assailant. He blocked, parried, and dodged punches and kicks and whoever he was fighting was very skilled and strong. He ducked under a roundhouse kick and followed up with his own spin kick. Another duck and spin before pulling out his silver combat knife with his left hand and his gun with his right. He got back to his feet and held his knife at the heart of his attacker and pointed his gun to his right while he felt a blade at his neck and a saw the glint of a laser sight on his forehead.

Will got a good look at Blade and kept his combat knife aimed at his heart while Blade had a knife of his own right at his throat. He saw Whistler off to the side with an assault rifle's laser sight aimed at his head while his own pistol was set on him. A little Mexican standoff between the three. You could feel the tension in the air and hear a pin drop it was so quiet. "So, the information on you wasn't exaggerated at all." Will spoke, breaking the silence in the room.

"I don't like to be followed." Blade told him.

"You've got five seconds to tell us who you are and why we shouldn't kill you?" Whistler warned him, ready to shoot him then and there.

"Someone on your side." Will replied.

"And what side would that be?" Blade asked.

"The side that understands how dangerous that walking charred corpse at the hospital is and others like him." Will replied. He slowly lowered his pistol and eventually holstered it while Blade and Whistler kept their weapons trained on him. He reached into his pocket and flashed them his SHIELD badge. "Will Detmer of SHIELD."

Once they saw the badge, they both began to relax. Whistler lowered his rifle a little bit while Blade kept his knife at his throat. "Why are you here?" Whistler asked.

"To figure out what the hell is going on and kill any vampires in the way. And judging by the fact that SHIELD thought they were extinct my boss wants to know what they've been doing." Will told him. "He sent me."

"You? SHIELD must really be desperate if they sent a kid." Blade commented.

"This kid fought you to a standstill, Blade. And I'm not a regular agent." Will corrected him. "No regular agent could tag you with a tracking dart. Besides, if the vampires really are back then you'll need SHIELD's help to keep the police off your back. Like it or not, this is no longer your problem and considering that meat warehouse was used as a club, you're gonna need all the help you can get."

Whistler finally lowered his rifle and Blade reluctantly did the same. Will sheathed his combat knife and put his badge away. "I don't know what you were told, kid but this kind of shit is something that will get you killed."

"I have experience with that already. Besides, they wouldn't have sent me if he didn't think I could handle it. I've dealt with serial killers, drug traffickers, pirates, human traffickers, terrorists and enemy agents along with aliens from the battle of New York, I can handle this. Besides…" Will ejected the magazine from his pistol to show the silver bullets. "I'm armed."

Whistler and Blade shared a look before the half-vampire finally lowered his guard completely and sheathed his knife. "Fine, but don't expect me to come save your ass when you can't handle the real work." Blade warned him.

"Relax, Blade I can handle myself." Will told him. "So, besides the fact that the vampire race isn't extinct, what are we dealing with?"

"A lot." Whistler told him as they walked over to his work station. "We've been taking down vampire cells all over the country for the past few years. They've cropped up and we've managed to track down a lot of them hoping we'd get a lead on the elders."

"Elders?" Will asked.

"Leaders of the vampires for the country. Last of their kind to survive the attacks over 20 years ago, in this part of the world, at least. They have say over everything that goes on with their little rats. You see, most of the vampires we tend to deal with were people that were turned. A vamp's fangs have a virus in it that will either kill you or turn you and once that happens, you're one of them. But the elders…they were born vampires meaning they're stronger than the one you met at the hospital." Whistler told him.

"Quinn, little errand boy for a vampire we've been hunting, Deacon Frost." Blade said, and Will noticed the trace of anger and distaste in his voice.

"Frost is a little punk but controls most of the turned vampires in the city." Whistler told him.

"How many of them are there in the city?" Will asked.

"Probably a few hundred thousand but more come and go every day. They blend in like normal people and in a city like this, they thrive in the nightlife. Besides, with how many people die a day on the planet, it'll take a lot to get people's attention." Whistler said, walking over to the refrigerator to get a small vial of liquid. He went back to his station and began mixing it with stuff. "We've taken down the cells in other parts of the country and New York is the last one, but it's been a lot harder to operate here. They pay off police and politicians and anyone else they need to in order to do what they do."

"Like that meat warehouse in the Bronx." Will added and Whistler nodded. "They may be vampires, but they also operate like normal criminals or organized crime groups and I know how they operate. And if they are paying off people, I think I have a way to make this search a lot easier."

"How?" Blade asked as Will took out his phone and pressed EDI's AI icon.

"EDI run down every single name from the warehouse club and back trace every single deed and money payment along with every single piece of evidence from the attack. Plus, run Deacon Frost name through your database to find anything." Will told her.

"Sure thing. I'll run it through SHIELD, FBI, and local police databases and let you know what I find." EDI replied. Will put his phone away and saw the looks he was getting.

"Another plus to having myself and SHIELD help you is that we'll be able to track down other leads for you." Will told them.

"How lucky do you think you'll actually get with that search?" Whistler asked, finishing whatever mixture he was working on and loaded it into a high-powered serum injector.

"I've been known to be unlucky, but this isn't luck, it's tactics. If these vampires have their hands in the pockets of politicians and other important people like you say they do, then that can be tracked. This day and age, if you want to be in control like you say they are then you can be tracked down. If not them directly then someone who's working for them." Will explained. "Besides, taking down criminals and evil people, this is what I do best."

"Whatever." Blade said, sitting down in a medical chair. Will just let it go when he remembered something from the hospital.

"Where's the woman you took from the hospital? Dr. Jenson?" He asked.

"The doctor? She's either dead and if not, she's turned by now. She's sleeping off an injection of garlic extract." Whistler told him. "She's smart, that's for sure. Working on some advanced hematologist work."

"Dr. Karen Jenson, viral hematologist with a background in epidemiology. Well, she's going to be in for a shock if she wakes up." Will replied when he saw Blade get strapped into the medical chair and Whistler walk over with the serum. "Do you need any help?"

"We're ok, kid." Whistler told him before looking at Blade. Blade got comfortable in the chair as his arms were strapped into place to keep him from lashing out. Will was a little concerned about what was going on, but Whistler and Blade seemed completely fine as if it was normal. "I had to increase the dose. It's over 50 milligrams now and that's getting dangerous."

"Just do it, old man." Blade told him. Whistler put a mouth guard in his mouth and when he got a nod of approval, he injected the serum into Blade's neck. Once it was done, Whistler held Blade's hand as he seemed to have a violent reaction to whatever was in that serum. Will was ready to help but after about 15 more seconds it seemed to settle, and Blade was fine.

"I'm not even sure what just happened." Will said to them.

"It's a long story, kid." Whistler replied when he noticed something. Will turned and they saw the doctor standing there. She made a break for the exit, so Will and Whistler quickly rushed over to stop and talk to her.

"Dr. Jenson, stop! We're here to help." Will quickly got in front of her. "Please, we're not here to hurt or harm you in anyway. We're here to help.

"Who are you people?" She asked.

"My name is Will Detmer, I'm with SHIELD." Will flashed her his badge. "This is Abraham Whistler and you've already met Blade."

She turned and saw Blade standing behind her with his glaive ready to use. "Where am I?"

"Someplace safe. Suffice it to say your world just got a whole lot more interesting." Will told her. "Just take a breath and we'll explain everything."

Dr. Jenson managed to calm down a bit which was a good thing. I guess seeing Will's badge made her feel a little more at ease. Blade had gotten changed and was looking over some information for his next hunt. Whistler turned on a nearby gas pump and began fueling Blade's black Dodge Charger before lightning a cigarette.

"So, am I a prisoner here?" She asked.

"Not at all. We just had to take certain precautions before we let you go." Whistler told her. "You have to understand, they're everywhere. Vampires—The Hominus Nocturna. We hunt them, you see. Me and Blade hunt them, and the kid belongs to an agency that nearly wiped them all out years ago. Unfortunately, they're like rats and tend to stick around. We move from one city to the next by tracking their migrations. They're hard to kill. They tend to regenerate."

"And I'm supposed to believe all this?" She asked.

"Well, you already met Mr. Crispy at the hospital." Blade told her. "What do you think?"

"That and aliens invaded New York less than a month ago so weird is kind of the new normal. And considering that vampire was able to shrug off a .45 caliber bullet to the head means Whistler's telling the truth." Will added.

"So, what do you use then? Stakes? Crosses?" She asked.

"Crosses don't do squat. Some of the legends are true, though. Vampires are severely allergic to silver. Feed them garlic and they go into anaphylactic shock. Then, of course there's always sunlight, ultraviolet rays." Whistler walked over and pulled out a bag from a cabinet. He opened it to reveal it was a large UV lamp. He turned it on and shined Dr. Jenson in the face which she quickly turned to avoid, Will in the face which he just blocked with his hand and Blade who didn't react at all. "I got this sucker running. You want to give it a try tonight?"

Blade walked over and took the large UV lamp. "It's still heavy." He said as Whistler looked him over.

"Well, you're so big." Whistler told him.

Blade grabbed the rest of his gear and weapons and walked over to his car. "If you want to live to see another day you'll be out of town by nightfall."

"So where am I supposed to go?" She asked.

"You've been exposed to them. One way or another someone's gonna take you out." Blade told her before getting in his car to leave.

"Well, he's just touch of sunshine, isn't he?" Will asked sarcastically. "Don't worry, Dr. Jenson. I'll take you someplace safe."

"Thank you. Would it be possible for me to get some things from my apartment?" She asked and he nodded.

"Sure, but we'll have to be quick. Blade might be right, and someone could be waiting for us so just stay close to me and I promise you'll be fine." He swore to her. Whistler walked over and handed the doctor a pepper spray bottle.

"Here. It's Vampire Mace. Silver nitrate with essence of garlic. You keep your eyes open and be careful." He told her.

"So, that's it. You just patch me up and that's it?" She asked.

"There's a war going on out there. Blade, I, and the organization the kid works for try to keep it from spilling out onto the streets. Unfortunately, sometimes people like you get caught in the crossfire." Whistler told her.

"Why not tell people the truth?" She asked.

"Who would believe us?" Will questioned. "And if we did then it'd only cause chaos."

"The kid's right." Whistler added. "They've been around for centuries, possibly millennia. You probably have met a few of them on the street, subway or a bar. We thought we got rid of them all years ago but only sent them into hiding. They've spent years biding their time and buying the police and people in power so things like this go unnoticed. With SHIELD back in the know hopefully that will change."

"Let's go, Dr. Jenson. We'll figure out something for you." Will told her as they walked to the exit.

"One more thing." Whistler took out a cigarette and lit it. "Buy yourself a gun. If you start getting sensitive to daylight, if your find you're thirsty regardless of how much you had to drink, then I suggest you take that gun and use it on yourself. Better that than the alternative."

"Both of you are just cheery, aren't you?" Will escorted Dr. Jenson over to his SHIELD BMW and drove her to her apartment near Chinatown. After some driving and moving through traffic, Will parked his car on the street and grabbed a few extra things before escorting Dr. Jenson inside her building. While they were waiting for an elevator, they noticed odd tattoo marks on the back of the necks of a man and woman, probably a couple. He got an odd feeling in his stomach, so he did a quick mental mind read on them and they were following the doctor on the orders of a vampire. Once the elevator arrived and the little awkward silence they arrived on her floor and walked to her apartment.

Just before the elevator closed, one of the two people with the mark stopped it and followed them. "Head to your apartment and get packed. I'll be right there." He whispered to her. She sped up her walk while he slowed down. Once she was out of view he quickly turned and roundhouse kicked both in the face, knocking them unconscious. He dragged them into the stairwell before pulling out some zip cuffs he had in his pocket and tying them up. A little searching and he found two knives and two small caliber pistols. He took the sim cards out of their phones before doing a mental search on both and they worked for the vampire named Gitano. Apparently, Gitano ordered one of his lower level guys to order them to watch over the Doctor after what happened at the hospital. He called in a SHIELD team to secure and send them to Hill for questions before walking into the Doctor's apartment where she was packing up as quickly as she could.

"Everything ok?" She asked.

"Fine. Just a rodent problem. I took care of it." He told her when they heard a knock at the door. He motioned her to stay quiet as he took out his pistol and quietly walked over to the door. He looked through the peephole to see it was uniformed police officer.

"Who is it?" She asked.

"Uh, NYPD. Officer Krieger. Is this the home of Dr. Karen Jenson?" He asked. She looked at Will and he nodded for her to answer.

"Yes, this is her." Dr. Jenson replied.

"Um, would it be possible for you to answer some questions?" He asked. Will took a few steps back behind an adjacent doorway, so he was out of sight before motioning her to continue.

"Sure, hang on." She walked over and unlocked the door to see the officer. "Can I help you?"

"Hi. I'm Officer Krieger with the 42nd precinct. I'm here on a routine check. May I come in?" He asked and she nodded, stepping back so he could walk in. They walked into her living room to talk. "I spoke with some of your colleagues at the hospital where you worked, and they said you were kidnapped last night. Are you ok?"

"What happened to the other doctor I was with?" She asked.

"Curtis Webb?" He clarified and she nodded. "Um, he died. But don't worry about that right now."

"Why?" she asked.

"Because you're dead too bitch." But before he could even grab his weapon, he felt something press against the back of his head and the click of a pistol hammer that made him freeze in place.

"I'd like to disagree with you on that." Will told him before grabbing the officer's gun, his radio, and cell phone. He handed the radio and phone over to the doctor before pushing Krieger back towards the middle of the room. "Dr. Jenson do you still have the vampire mace?"

She quickly handed him the bottle and he sprayed Krieger in the face with it. He recoiled from the burn and stumbled into some furniture. "You son of a bitch!"

"Why isn't it working?" She asked.

"Because he's not a vampire. He's human. I just wanted to do it because he deserved it." Will told her. "Besides, I think Blade over there would like to ask you some questions."

Blade was right behind Krieger who he sent to the ground with a leg trip and a swift kick to the gut that knocked him into a table. Blade pulled him up and slapped him hard in the face. "He's a familiar—a vampire wannabe." Krieger got another punch to the face and then the gut. "If he's loyal enough and he proves himself maybe his master will turn him."

Blade threw Krieger into Will who slammed his head into the wall two more times before throwing him to the ground. "Wait a second, how did you know he was there?" She asked Will.

"He was following us since we left. He wanted to use us as bait." Will told her. "Don't worry, you were safe with me the entire time."

Blade yanked Krieger over to them and pulled the back of his shirt down to reveal another strange mark like the one on the two strangers from the elevator. "That's a glyph—a vampire cattle brand. It means that Officer Krieger is somebody's property. Another vampire tries to bleed this little hooker, then they have to answer to his owner. Deacon Frost. We've been tracking him for a long time." Blade pulled him onto his feet and began taking his wallet and watch. "All right, Officer Krieger are you going to be a good little bloodhound, huh? Tell us what your master's been up to?"

"Oh, great you're robbing him. Are you going to rob me too?" She asked.

"How do you think we fund this organization, huh? We're not exactly the march of dimes." Blade took off Krieger's watch only to punch him in the face and knock him out. "Fake."

"Well, if you want some easy money, I tied two other familiars in the stairwell. They were tailing the doctor. Work for some vampire named Gitano. Does that name sound familiar?" Will asked.

"It does. He's one of the elders. Must be covering all loose ends. I'll deal with him later. For now, let's see what Officer Krieger has hidden from us." Blade led them and a beaten-up Krieger down to his patrol car. They popped the trunk to find a medical case of blood bags. "Well, it appears our friend here has been blood running."

Dr. Jenson opened the box to see the pouches of blood being kept cool and recognized the name of the clinic. "Hillburn clinic. I know this place, it's a blood bank."

"Owned by vampires. There's one in every major city and they always deliver." Blade said.

"Good. Another name to add to the list of things SHIELD can investigate. Where was this going?" Will asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about—AAH!" Blade slammed his head onto the trunk of the car.

"My friend is a little nicer than I am. I'm going to say this one last time. Where were you taking it?" Blade warned him with his hand set on his Mac-10 machine pistol.

"Go fuck yourself." Krieger told him.

"Fuck me? No, you fuck this." He pulled out his gun only for Will to grab his arm and stop him. Krieger took his change to escape into the crowd and run away. Blade would have shot but couldn't get a clear view and could have injured a civilian. Blade growled in anger and put his gun away before walking up to Will. "You better wake up, kid. The world you live in is a just a sugar-coated topping. There is another world beneath it—the real world. And if you want to survive you better learn to pull the trigger."

"Are you done?" Will asked, pulling out his phone that was currently tracking a GPS signal. "The reason I didn't want you to shoot him in broad daylight in front of civilians is because there's an easier way. I tagged him with the same tracer I tagged you with when I disarmed him. Now, we can follow him back to wherever he's going. I'm not an idiot and I'm not ignorant to the world I live in. I may not be as experienced with the whole vampire thing as you and Whistler are but I'm a quick study."

"Egh…rookie." Blade said to himself before they walked over to his car.

Line Break xxxxx

The SHIELD team took the two familiars Will subdued for interrogation. Will wanted Dr. Jenson to go with them and to get looked over by SHIELD doctors there but she said she was going to stick with him and Blade instead. She felt safer with them and knowing more about vampires would probably be the only way she could find a cure for the whole vampire thing. Blade felt that was idiotic, but the doctor was tough. They were sitting in Blade's Dodge Charger around the block from Krieger's police car. Will was sitting in the passenger seat up front while Dr. Jenson sat in the back next to Will's duffel bag that held his gear. A couple hours had passed, and it was night time. Will and Dr. Jenson were eating Chinese takeout while they waited for Krieger to come back.

Dr. Jenson ate her Lo Mein while Will finished his dumplings. Blade silently sat in the driver's seat waiting for Krieger to come back. "This is ridiculous. There's no way he's coming back. Nobody is that stupid." Dr. Jenson told him.

"When you understand the nature of a thing, you know what it's capable of." Blade told her.

"I, on the other hand have the belief that all opportunists and weasels like him are ignorant and predictable. That blood was going somewhere, and he was going to deliver it. Leaving it behind is going to piss off his vampire handler so he knows he has to come back for it." Will added. "The one thing you can count on with criminals is that unless you're dealing with a serial killer or a master con artist, they think they're smarter than they really are."

They waited about a minute more and the local bus stop at its regular stop with Officer Krieger rushing off and heading to the car. Blade gave them a smirk as he started the car. "Amen to stupid criminals." Will said to himself. Krieger took off and Blade followed him. Will took out his phone that was tracking the GPS signal and decided to listen in. "Let's see what Krieger is saying right now."

He activated the audio feed and they heard Krieger call into police dispatch. "This is Officer Krieger, I'm at 16-0-0-9. Go ahead, this is Dispatch. Get me through. I got a delivery in progress here and I just had a run-in with Blade and SHIELD. We've got to clear out that clinic on Hillhurst, now!"

"A little too late for that, now." Will said to himself because he knew SHIELD already raided it. "EDI figure out his cohorts in the police department then send the information to SHIELD. Time to remove a few more pieces off the boards."

"Of course." She replied.

After about 20 minutes of crazy driving, Krieger pulled up to a Japanese club/sake bar in downtown. Blade pulled up in the alley across the way and saw the Vampire mark. "Looks like we hit pay dirt. That's a vampire mark. Means there's a safe house around here somewhere. A place they can go when dawn's coming." Blade told them.

They got out of the car and peaked out of the alley to see the club where Krieger was parked. Will took out his duffel bag and suited up, putting on his combat gloves and forearm guards along with his shoulder strap pellet holders. He tightened the strap of his leg holster and belt before fitting his HKP30L pistol with a suppressor and putting his Glock 17 into the hostler in the back of his jeans. He strapped his silver knife around his left ankle and grabbed a pair of the high-tech glasses he leant Arkin a few days ago when stopped the Collector.

"EDI, synch up to visual output and relay the information straight to Hill." Will told her.

"Signal strength is strong, and she is receiving." Edi replied before a message from Hill came in video the digital display on his glasses that read: Good luck and Happy Hunting, back up is twenty minutes out.

"Send reply, move in, secure area, and make sure they're packing silver. Also reply, thanks." Will told her.

While he suited up and got ready, Blade was inspecting the club and everything out front. "See that valets over there, they're vampires. So is the Doorman and the whore on the corner." He told them before walking over to his car to get ready.

"How can you tell?" Dr. Jenson asked as Will's video feed from his glasses was sending everything over to Hill.

"By the way they move, the way they smell. Psst." Blade tossed Dr. Jenson the UV lamp bag before ditching his coat and grabbing his sword.

"This is all like a bad dream." She said.

"They're worse things out tonight than vampires." He told her.

"Like what?" She asked.

"Like me." He told her before sheathing his sword behind his back and they walked over to the club. "Ok, Vampire antonym 101: crosses and running water don't do dick so forget what you've seen in the movies. You use a stake, silver, or sunlight. You know how to use one of these?"

Blade pulled out a Glock 17 and handed it to Dr. Jenson who hid it in her belt. "Nope, but I'll damn sure learn quick."

"The safety's off round's already chambered—silver hollow point filled with garlic. You aim for the head or the heart. Anything else is your ass." He told her as they got to the door when the bouncer stopped them.

"Do you have an invitation card?" He asked.

"Vampires?" Will asked for clarification and Blade nodded. "All right, I'll take care of the three behind us you take them."

"On your move kid." Blade said so Will quickly pulled out his pistol and fired a bullet into the head of the two valets with a third going into the heart of the vampire whore on the corner and all three bursts into flames and charred bones. Blade stabbed the bouncer's girl in the head with a silver knife before kicking the bouncer into the club. Blade and Dr. Jenson walked in followed by Will who shot a bullet into the head of the vampire bouncer, killing him. They walked into the club and got hit with flashing lights, bad music, crappy singing by women dressed in Japanese schoolgirl uniforms and an entire club filled with creepy looking Japanese men in suits.

"Are they vampires?" Will asked as they walked through club.

"No." Blade replied. They walked over to the bar and saw Officer Krieger head their way when he spotted them. Blade walked forward when one of the club's hidden bouncers got up to stop him only to get a punch to the face and nuts. Another grabbed Will's shoulder but got an elbow to the teeth.

"Kenji! Kenji!" Krieger shouted, running back into the kitchen. The bartender quickly knelt to grab a weapon from behind the bar only for Will to grab a serving tray and throw it at his face, knocking him into a shelf. Blade vaulted over the counter and round house kicked him in the head before grabbing Krieger and throwing him into the kitchen. Krieger hit a shelf before Blade grabbed him by the jacket. Will walked in and saw the chef at the stove.

"Out." He said in Japanese and the chef quickly left.

"Where's the entrance?" Blade asked Krieger.

"I can't tell you that, man." Krieger begged him only to get thrown into a shelf.

"This is only starting and we're in a kitchen with a lot of things that can hurt. I'd start talking before he takes you over to the deep fryer." Will told him, stepping over the clutter on the ground. "Where's the entrance?"

"Ok. Ok. It's in the freezer." Krieger pointed to the professional grade refrigerator/freezer in the corner. Blade looked at him funny before punching him in the face and gut one more time. "Come on, man I already told you in it's the fridge!"

Will opened the fridge door and saw a passageway. Blade yanked around Krieger to give him one final warning. "You give Frost a message from me. You tell him it's open season on all suck heads." Blade pushed him away and he booked it out of there as quickly as he could. Dr. Jenson walked in to see the mess that was made.

"You really have mastered interrogation into an artform, haven't you?" Will joked before unholstering his pistol and going first followed by Blade and the doctor. He followed the hallway and was met by an elevator. "EDI, send word to Hill I'm heading underground so signal may cut out."

"Understood. I'll do my best to circumvent this but record everything as a precaution." She replied as Will, Blade, and Dr. Jenson took the elevator down.

Line Break xxxxx

After about a minute of taking the elevator down to wherever it was going it stopped, and the doors opened to reveal rows of data storage devices like you would see at a tech company. Will stepped out and checked his corners and periphery to see they were clear. Blade walked into the area and began making his way through the room with Will and Dr. Jenson following him.

"What is this place?" Will asked.

"Some kind of archive." Blade told him, walking through the area like he was looking for someone. "This must be where they keep most of their records."

"This seems a little too high-tech for vampires." Dr. Jenson pointed out.

"They've got their claws into everything. Politics, finance, technology, real estate. They already own parts of downtown." Blade told her.

"Good for me." Will took out a small electronic sniffer/hacking bug and placed it into one of the free USB slots in one of the massive computers. "Soon, I'll learn everything that's in here. That should make finding them a lot easier."

Blade kept leading them through the massive archive section when they were hit with an odd and disgusting smell along with the sound of a high-pitched voice and keyboard clacking. "What's that smell?" Dr. Jenson asked.

"More importantly, I think we're not alone down here." Will said as they came upon a dark corner of the floor littered with dozens of monitors, screens, and computers along with a large bed and a very bad smelling, morbidly obese pale vampire.

"You will need 12 pure bloods for the ritual to work. Krieger is that you. He's here! He's here!" The vampire shouted.

"This must be Pearl, the record keeper." Blade said only for Pearl to let out a loud fart which made them cover their noses.

"Egh, I just lost my appetite for the next few days." Will commented.

"He's going to kill me. You need me Frost!" Pearl shouted. Will was confused when he saw one of the screens on the laptops was aimed right at him for the best view and it was a video conference. He signaled Blade who turned the laptop around to see Frost cleaning his face of blood.

"Pearl, your history. Have the good grace to die with some fucking dignity. Congratulations, Blade." Frost told him. "I hear you've been looking for me. I'm honored."

"It'll pass." Blade told him. Will put another electronic sniffer bug into one of Pearl's computers to copy the research he was doing while Blade snapped his fingers which signaled Dr. Jenson to take out the UV lamp.

"What is that?" Pearl asked.

"That biscuit boy is a UV lamp. We're going to play a little game of twenty questions. Depending on how you answer, you may walk out of here with a tan. First question, what's that?" Blade pointed to the screen that showed a digital simulation of some kind of ceremony.

"Oh that, it's nothing. It's routine research. Actually, it's a video game." Pearl replied only for Blade to signal Dr. Jenson who began to burn him all over with the UV lamp. "ARRGGHH!"

Pearl let out a loud shrill shriek and was now sporting some serious burns and blood blisters. "That looked like it hurt." Will commented. "Honestly, if you care about yourself at all you might just want to answer the questions. Just, FYI."

"It's a fragment, a piece of the prophecy!" Pearl shouted.

"What prophecy?" Blade asked.

"Oh, I'm not really sure—AARGGHGGGG!" Pearl began shouting once again as Dr. Jenson turned the lamp back on. "LA MAGRA IS COMING! THE SPIRITS OF THE 12—WILL AWAKEN THE BLOOD GOD! And there is nothing you can do about it, Daywalker!"

"Is that so?" Blade asked.

"Well, that's what Frost says." Pearl sheepishly replied.

"Then you won't mind me borrowing this for a while, will you?" Blade pulled out the hard drive of the computer that ran the simulation. "If he moves, fry him."

Dr. Jenson kept the UV lamp set on Pearl while Blade walked over to the large vault door on the far wall. Blade knocked his knuckles against the high-strength steel door. "What's behind here?"

"Nothing. It's—it's a storeroom. But you're wasting your time. There's nothing of importance to anyone." Pearl told him in a very nervous tone. Whatever was behind that door was important.

"Then I guess you won't mind if we take a look." Will said, walking over to the door. He took out a USB cable from his belt and plugged it into the touchpad computer on his left forearm guard. Normally to enter this security door you would need a special key card, but he circumvented that by easily ripping off the panel and plugging in the cable. Edi connected to the door's security system and began deactivating the security system. "Give it a few seconds and we'll be through."

"NO! ARGH!" Pearl screamed in agony and pain as Dr. Jenson burned him all over with the UV lamp. The shrill screaks of pain filled the room along with the smoke of Pearl's burning body. She shut the lamp off after about 30 seconds and Pearl was now a whimpering bloody, charred mess. Blade glanced over at the doctor who seemed perfectly calm.

"He moved." She told him.

A distinct high-pitched beep got their attention. "We're through." Will told them, putting the cable away and opening the large security door. They walked in to see a white room with a computer terminal but the true treasure trove was behind the set of glass doors. Will, Blade, and Dr. Jenson walked past the glass doors to see a large room with ancient vampiric scrolls/pages encased in glass panes like you would see with ancient documents at the Smithsonian or the Natural History Museum. "What the hell are these pages?"

"These are the pages from the Book of Erebus, the Vampire Bible. It contains everything…their entire history." Blade replied. "La Magra must be one of their legends."

Will looked over various pages on the display with the video camera in his glasses recording everything and sending it over to Hill along with having Edi record it to his personal storage. "They must be up to something big if Pearl was so dead set on keeping us away from here." Will said when he noticed Blade was on alert. He activated his telekinetic sense and realized why Blade was on alert. They were going to be having some company.

"Why is Frost so interested in La Magra?" Dr. Jenson asked.

"Shhh…" Blade shushed her as he and Will looked around. Will grabbed an explosive charge from his belt and tossed it to the side. It flew through the air and landed with an arming beep on the far wall. Blade walked through the rows of hung glassed documents hearing the faint wisp of air and glimmer of color that signified someone else was here. He followed the footsteps to the far side of the room where he found a young girl sitting against a pillar, afraid. "Give me your hand."

"Blade, we've got company!" Will shouted, ducking under a punch before spin kicking a goon in the face when he was blindsided by two from the side and tackled to the ground.

"Hola amigo! Do you remember me?!" Quinn walked into the room with Frost's errand girl by his side and a group of vampire thugs and armed familiars. Dr. Jenson was restrained, and the UV lamp was destroyed.

The no-longer frightened girl got up and landed a spinning back kick to Blade's chest and judging by the strength she was a vampire. She threw out a series of high kicks that he managed to block before getting kicked into a glass display. Several more high kicks aimed at his head came his way before he managed to grab her leg and knocked her out with a backhand to the face. He quickly broke the arms of a goon behind him and tossed him into another display before knocking out several more with strikes to the face and chest.

One highly skilled fighter managed to prove an equal to Blade with three others hitting him from the side and behind. He was thrown up against a pillar, his arms were restrained, his sword was taken, and a steel cable was wrapped around his neck.

"Nice one, man." Quinn patted one of his men on the back as he walked up to Blade with the captive doctor right by his side. "You took my arm, man. Remember. But it's cool. I got a new one." Quinn removed his glove to reveal the weird hand that had grown in on his left arm. "You think I'll ever play piano again? You can slice him, you can dice him, but the Quinn man just keeps coming!"

"Check it out! I've got his pig sticker!" One of Quinn's guys said, holding up Blade's sword only for two flaming skeletons come from behind and knock him to the ground. Will rolled forward and grabbed the sword, flicked a switch on the hilt so it didn't cut his hand and stabbed Quinn's vampire goon in the heart.

"No, I've got it." He tossed down four small pellets and pressed a button on his wrist computer that activated the explosive charge. It blew up and blasted a massive hole into the wall with a shockwave that destroyed most of the glass panels in the room. The shockwave knocked them all to the ground which freed Blade and Dr. Jenson. The four pellets on the ground exploded in a flash of loud ear-ringing noise and eye blinding flash with the flashbang and UV flash pellets providing the perfect combination to deal with the large group. The UV flash from the pellets burned a dozen vampires from the bright light and killed one, reducing him to a pile of smoldering ashes and charred bones. Will closed the distance and decapitated another vampire before cutting the steel cable around Blade's neck and grabbing Dr. Jenson. Blade took his sword back and the three ran as fast as they could to the hole made by Will's explosive.

"Get him!" Quinn shouted, holding his face which was now charred in parts because of the UV flash pellet. Several of his goons and familiars that weren't charred by the UV light grabbed their guns only for Will to fire his pistol and kill 12 of them with head or heart shots. The vampires who weren't hit fired their guns at the heroes, but they managed to duck into the hole and avoided the gunfire when Quinn stopped them. "NO! NO! NO GUNS! DROP THE GUNS! I NEED HIM! HE NEEDS BLADE ALIVE! GO!"

Will quickly reloaded his pistol and fired a few more shots before tossing another explosive charge into the room and heading down the tunnel with Blade and Dr. Jenson. The hole they went through led them into a side service tunnel in the subway. They kept moving when a passing subway made them stop for risk of getting squished. Dr. Jenson carefully shimmed out into the tunnel on the small ridge only a few feet away from the racing train. Will fired a few more shots and killed a few more familiars while making the others scurry back for cover. Blade followed along the small ridge and then Will came along when the second explosive charge went off. The explosion shook the ridge a little bit and killed more vampires and familiars. Luckily the speeding train finally passed so the heroes could land on the ground.

They quickly crossed the tracks when Quinn and his goons rushed out of the tunnel, so Will and Blade opened fire. Dr. Jenson kept moving when they heard the squeaking sounds of train wheels and the rumble of the tunnel, so they quickly got onto the walkway before the train arrived. Quinn took his chance and jumped across, barely making it past the train but the two lackeys who came behind him weren't so lucky and got squashed like bugs. Quinn charged forward only for Will to punch him across the face, but he bounced right back and tackled him into the wall. Quinn quickly pushed him aside to rush at Blade only to get grabbed him behind and thrown up into a wall. A knee to the gut, a punch to the throat, a chop to the collar bone, and then a swift kick to the groin. He raised his gun only for Quinn to knocked it away, so he slammed the vampires head into the speeding train which ended up breaking his neck and dragging the vampire's body down to the tracks. He'd probably need a lot of blood to heal from that.

"We need to go!" Blade shouted, grabbing the doctor while Will picked up his gun. Blade got close to the train and once Dr. Jenson made the connection, she instantly wanted to unknow what they were going to do.

"Oh, I have a bad feeling about this!" She shouted. Will unhook a small grapple hook from his belt and tossed it onto the train. It managed to hook on and yanked him with it while Blade had grabbed onto a train railing. The force dislocated his arm, but he and the Doctor were safely aboard. They rushed into the subway car which was conveniently empty. Blade sat down and clutched his arm in pain.

"It's dislocated." Will holstered his gun and grabbed Blade's shoulder. "This is gonna hurt."

"Just do it." Blade told him.

"All right, on three. One…" Will quickly shoved Blade's shoulder back into its socket in a sickening crunch that made the vampire hunter scream in pain. Blade reached into his belt and took out a vial of red liquid. "Let me help—"

"NO!" Blade moved away from both of them before pulling out a mini serum injector and managed to put the vial in before injecting it into his neck right into a vein. Blade's eyes seemed to gloss over and judging by the grunts, whatever that was seemed to make him better. Dr. Jenson saw enough to know what that was and what Blade really is.

"You're one of them, aren't you? A vampire?"

"No…I'm something much worse." He told her.

Line Break xxxxx

Blade, Dr. Jenson, and Will returned to Whistler with the information they had but the second they returned Blade excused himself to his private quarters. Figuring what happened, Whistler informed them of what Blade really was.

"I found him when he was 13. He'd been living on the streets, feeding off the homeless. His need for blood had taken over at puberty. I took him for a vampire at first and I almost killed him too. Then I realized what he was." Whistler explained while fixing his leg brace. "Blade's mother was attacked by a vampire while she was pregnant. She died but he lived. Unfortunately, he'd undergone certain genetic changes. He can withstand garlic, silver, even sunlight, and he's got their strength and enhanced speed. This time tomorrow all those wounds of his will be healed. He still ages like a human though. You see, vampires age slower than us. Unfortunately, he also inherited their thirst."

"Isn't that serum you made supposed to suppress that?" Will asked.

"Time's running out. His body's starting to reject it. So far, all my efforts to find a cure have failed."

"Well, you didn't have me. Give me a sample of his blood and if you have any vials of vampire blood, I'll take those too. I have someone who's a specialist. Maybe they can find something you can't." Will told him.

"I've been at this a long-time kid but I'm not hoping for a prayer." Whistler told him, walking over to the medical fridge and taking out a small vial of Blade's blood and another vial of vampire blood. "You really think you can cure him?"

Will took the vials and looked them over. "Me? No. But there are people who could do the impossible. Perhaps they can solve this too. If not at least make a better serum."

"Here's hoping." Whistler replied, drinking some whiskey.

"Why do you hunt them?" Dr. Jenson asked.

"I had a family once—a wife and two daughters. Then a drifter came calling one evening, a vampire. He toyed with them first, trying to make me decide which order they'd die in." Whistler replied. "We kill as many of them as we can find but it's not getting any easier."

"Because of Frost?"

"There's something happening in the vampire ranks. It's something big that has to do with what you found…and I'd stake my life that son of a bitch is at the center of it." Whistler said.

Will grabbed his gear and was heading out to deliver Blade's blood sample to someone who could figure out a cure but wanted to stop in and see Blade first. He walked in to Blade's room and saw the hunter sitting at his desk in silence.

"Blade…I wanted to see how you were doing before I head out." Will said only for Blade to not answer. "Whistler told me what happened to you…and what you are."

"You don't know me. You don't know anything about me. I'm not human." Blade told him.

"Neither am I." Will replied. "But from what I've experienced…humanity has just as much to do with philosophy as it does biology. And you're more human than some of the killers and monsters I've put down over the year."

"Humans don't drink blood." Blade said.

"That was years ago. You can't hold yourself accountable for that. It wasn't your fault." Will told him. "When are you gonna let that go?"

"I've spent years trying to find the thing that murdered my mother…it made me what I am. And every time I kill one of them, it gives me a little piece of that life back so don't you tell me about forgetting."

"You know…I understand." Will said. "I know you don't think I do but I can understand better than most. I was normal kid in college before this happened and pretty much every single part of my old life died the day my parents did. I'm not saying to let go of the past or what happened…I sure as hell won't. All I'm saying…the more you linger on what makes you monster the less you focus on what makes you human."

Will raised his hand and using his powers, telekinetically ripped out a brick from the wall before levitating it over so Blade could see. He clenched his fist and the brick exploded into dust before quickly reforming into a perfect ball. "Monsters come in all shapes and sizes. But just because some may call us monsters doesn't mean we are."

Will left soon after with Dr. Jenson and drove them over to the one place he was sure he could get help. Driving to Manhattan, he arrived at the STARK tower that was currently in the process of being refurbished as Avengers tower. Will grabbed his gear and escorted the doctor into the building where he made his way through the lobby to a secret side elevator. They got in and two light beams scanned them over. A palm scanner appeared so Will placed his palm and it scanned.

"Welcome, voice authentication required." A robot voice spoke.

"Will Detmer." He spoke and the computer let out a confirmative beep.

"Access granted, Aegis." The computer spoke back.

"Take me to see Dr. Banner." Will said the elevator went up to the top floors.

Dr. Jenson looked at Will who just winked at her and she smiled. Guess she was safe with a superhero by her side this entire time. The elevator eventually stopped on floor 90. Floors 90 and above were restricted to Tony Stark's personal floors and as the quarters for the Avengers. At the moment it was just Dr. Banner staying here who is exactly Will needed to see right now. The once destroyed floor that was spectacle to Will's beating of Loki and where he surrendered was now completely fixed and refurbished into the desired living quarters of the wealthy. Fancy furniture, a wide-open floor design with a custom bar and kitchen on the far side and various stairs leading to other floors and special rooms like a library, training area, engineering lab, medical ward and biomedical lab along with an armory and weapons room.

"Good early morning, Mr. Detmer. It's good to see you again." Jarvis greeted him.

"Good to see you too, Jarvis. Is Dr. Banner here?"

"Yes, he's in the medical lab at the moment. Is there anything I can do to help?" Jarvis asked.

"Actually yeah. Can you and Edi go over the data I compiled along with whatever's on this hard drive." Will walked over to a nearby smart table and placed the hard drive he took from Pearl's data room along with the USB sniffer device he used to copy all the information. "And try and do it as fast as you can. It's important."

"Of course."

"Don't worry, Will. Jarvis and I will work as fast as we can." Edi replied, leaving the two AI's to their job while Will led Dr. Jenson upstairs to the medical lab where Dr. Banner was.

Dr. Banner was doing good at Avengers towers without a bounty on his head by General Ross and the Hulk now being a hero. He was dressed in some nice clean clothes, was clean shaven and with the lab coat and glasses on he was back in his element. "Dr. Banner?" Will knocked on the glass and once Bruce saw Will he smiled.

"Will, good to see." Bruce walked over and hugged him, and he hugged back.

"Good to see you too, Dr. Banner. You look good. Glad to know this high-rise techno-apartment is doing you good." Will joked. "Is Tony here?"

"No, he's back in Malibu. Busy building armors last time we spoke. So, what brings you by?" Dr. Banner asked when he noticed the guest.

"We need your help. This is Dr. Karen Jenson. Dr. Jenson meet Dr. Bruce Banner." Will took out two vials of blood and handed them to Bruce.

"What's the problem?" Bruce asked, looking over the vials.

"Well you're not going to believe me, but I'll tell you anyway. I hope you've read Bram Stocker's Dracula because apparently Vampires are real." Will told him.

"You're kidding." Bruce couldn't believe what he was hearing so Will explained everything he knew.

While Will worked on the vampire problem, said vampire problem was making moves of his own. Frost and his minions made a move to solidify his power and advance his plans of La Magra by taking Dragonetti out of the equation. He was kidnapped and hauled out of the city at a deserted beach where Frost planned to remove him from the equation and take his place on the council. Once that was done, his plans could move forward.

Frost and all his minions were wearing heavy black clothing and a lot of sunblock which prevented the coming sunrise from burning them but Dragonetti wasn't lucky. He was being dragged out by the water onto some rocks before the bag on his head was ripped off so he could see Frost had taken him. Even though the sun hadn't yet risen over the horizon just yet, the early sun rays were starting to burn him, and he was in immense pain. Frost was just enjoying himself. He put his arm around Dragonetti who was keeping his mouth shut to prevent Frost from hearing any grunts or shouts of pain.

"Good morning. Would you look at that?" Frost pointed to the horizon over the ocean and the tell-tale signs of sunrise. "Whew, getting a little toasty out there. Heh-heh. When was the last time you stopped to appreciate a good sunrise? Oh, that's right. You were born a vampire, so you never had the pleasure, have you? That's ok. It's all right. At least we're here together. To share the moment, which means a lot to me by the way, really. I mean that. Cause actually, you know, when you get to know me, I'm a fairly sentimental kind of guy. Bit of an innocent you might say."

Frost opened up Dragonetti's shirt to let the smoke from his burning flesh air out and to make it more painful and quicker. Blood blisters had already formed on his face and exposed skin but Dragonetti was staying strong. "Do what you want, Frost. Doesn't make any difference."

"You just don't fucking get it!" Frost ripped his shirt and jacket off in anger, so his torso began to burn as well.

"You're never gonna be a pureblood. You will never rule us!" Dragonetti shouted as Frost's minions held him so he could rip out his fangs with a pair of plyers. It was painful but Frost loved every minute of it. Once the last fang was out, they sat him on the sand to leave him to burn.

"Have a nice day." Frost bid him his final goodbye.

"Sorry old dog. You just got a bit too long in the tooth." Quinn joked only to get rolled eyes and groans in response.

Frost and his men put on bike helmets to cover their heads and shield their eyes as the sun finally peaked over the horizon and burned Dragonetti to a crisp before he exploded into chunky goo. With that taken care of, Frost called a meeting of the vampire council which he strolled into like he owned the place.

"What have you done to Dragonetti?"

The only response they got were his fangs being tossed onto the table. He was dead. "Let's get down to business. I need 12 volunteers for a special project I'm working on. And trust me when I say…it'll change the world."

"With all due respect Frost, shouldn't our concern be on Blade and SHIELD. They raided one of your establishments last night, killing everyone and absconding with who knows what."

"Don't worry about SHIELD. Or about Blade. I have a plan for them." Frost assured the council.

Line Break xxxxx

Back at Avenger's tower, Dr. Jenson and Dr. Banner were quick at work in the medical lab on the blood samples from Whistler along with analyzing Dr. Jenson herself to figure out a cure or at least something to stop the vampire virus. Will was in the armory because Jarvis said Tony had finished the upgrades to his suit when he took it a few weeks ago.

He walked into the armory room with weapons and equipment and saw there were six man-size lockers each ordained with a unique symbol on the center. The symbols were a blue, white, and red shield, a hammer, a green fist, a purple arrowhead in a circle, a black and red hourglass, and finally a blue glowing meteor. "Wow, Tony really went all out. Not sure about the glowing meteor as my symbol though."

He put his hand on the symbol which scanned it before unlocking with a hiss and opened. Inside was his full Aegis combat gear with hood and mask. The design was a little more refined and streamlined. It was still black with streaks of blue popping against the black. The lenses on his mask were more circular so they weren't as intimidated but other than that it was essentially the same. Strung up on the walls of the locker were various new weapons from different guns of various calibers with special bullets and a special black Oneida Kestrel Compound bow and quiver with blue colored arrows. "Huh, guess Tony took my training with Barton to it's likely conclusion. Or remembers my story from the island and figured I'd want one eventually."

He took the compound bow out and gave it a once over. It looked custom made and felt good in his hand. He brought the string back and the tension of the bow felt perfect. "There isn't anything Tony can't do, is there?"

"I assume that you are enjoying the new weapon. Tony commented that perhaps you should change your name from Aegis to the Arrow." Jarvis commented.

"Yeah, that's not gonna happen. Aegis has kind of grown on me." Will put the bow back. "So, what else has he done?"

"Mr. Stark has improved the micro-weave Vibranium mesh under your suit by reinforcing it with a new steel alloy known as Carbonadium." Jarvis informed him.

"Never heard of Carbonadium."

"It's a rather obscure yet very powerful metal alloy. Carbonadium was designed by the US government as an improved version of the substance known as Adamantium however the process instead created a more malleable and unstable metal. While its tensile strength and durability outclass every element on this planet except for Vibranium and Adamantium, it is far less durable then the two previously mentioned metals. However, it is an excellent bonding agent and Mr. Stark replaced the previous polymers with this metal to improve its strength and durability while not adding in additional weight or restrictions to your body. The new design is even capable to resisting deep sea and certain atmospheric pressure although he did caution against space travel until he refined the design. As he put it, your previous suit was good, this one is better. He's also improved your mask with new advanced vision modes and an improved recyclable oxygen supply that lasts over an hour should you require it." Jarvis explained. "And your new mask retracts and folds much smaller than before and fits within the collar of your jacket for deployment. Simply press your left collar button or bring up your hood and it will deploy."

"Tony certainly never slacks, does he." Will grabbed his suit and put it away in a spare duffel bag. He didn't need to draw attention yet but did get the feeling that he'd be taking this out on a test drive later. "Any luck on the data I had you go over."

"Some luck, yes. Please direct your attention to the monitor." Part of the wall split apart to reveal a monitor. "Edi, if you would like to start."

"Thank you, Jarvis. The images we scanned from the Book of Erebus were written in a language with roots in both Latin and Ancient Slavic numeric, so it took a while to translate but we eventually managed it. The pages spoke of a prophecy about an ancient vampiric blood god known as La Magra who ruled the ancient world before being banished by sorcerers if you believe the legends. According to the translations, he is an important deity in the ancient world as he created the first vampire." Edi explained.

"Dracula if that's what we're going with. Ok, what about La Magra?" Will asked.

"The pages detailed a prophecy that La Magra could return through a vessel after a certain ritual was performed. This ritual involves the blood of pureblood vampires in a special temple although that's all we were able to decipher. After analyzing the digital data, you gave us, it would appear that Frost was having Pearl translate and research everything he could on how to complete this ritual including where it needs to take place. We're still working on that at the moment as components of it were deleted the second your hack was detected." Jarvis said.

"All right but do the best you can and hurry. Something tells me Frost is close on this. And what about the other information from Pearl's library?"

"That was information on all the vampire dealings Frost and his followers dabble in along the eastern seaboard. Underground clubs for Vampires to assemble, shell companies and stocks they control to fund their activities, along with the people they control and fronts they use." Edi replied.

"Excellent. Send it all to SHIELD and let's start taking them off the chessboard. Keep working on the data for La Magra." Will finished packing up his suit and taking a few extra weapons including the bow and quiver. "Also, see if you can assemble some enhanced UV flash pellets."

"Of course. Now I believe Dr. Banner has some information to tell you on the blood you brought him." Jarvis informed him.

Will made his way over to the lab where Dr. Banner and Dr. Jenson were analyzing the blood and running tests. "How's it going?"

"We've learned a lot so far. This vampire blood is very fascinating. Not too dissimilar from human blood only the Hemoglobin production is non-existent and once it's introduced it can't be sustained. Probably explains why they need blood to survive." Dr. Banner explained from his analysis of the blood. "It's a viral genetic defect not unlike hemophilia or hemolytic anemia but it's base cause seems to be a virus in the DNA. Probably from the vampire fangs. That's where Dr. Jenson and I came up with a possible way to treat it."

"We might be able to treat vampires with genetic therapy. A retrovirus to expunge the virus and allow normal biological process to continue. Not unlike how we've been treating sickle cell anemia patients." Dr. Jenson showed him a digital analysis of what they were proposing, and the initial computer results seem very positive.

"Is it safe?" Will asked.

"We're not sure but it's the only option at the moment if I'm going to find a cure for myself." Dr. Jenson replied.

"The results seem very positive and unlike a traditional case with the risk of mutation to a healthy subject, the mutation would actually destroy the virus and turn the vampire into a healthy subject so there is less risk." Dr. Banner informed him. "Give me a couple hours and I might have an early prototype we can test."

"So this could actually work as a cure for vampires? For Blade as well?" He asked but Dr. Banner wasn't entirely optimistic.

"If Blade is the person who the other blood sample belongs too…not entirely. His blood is vastly different. True it can't sustain Hemoglobin but the vampire sample you showed me were changed by an underlying virus in the DNA. The DNA was changed with a virus that can be removed. With Blade's sample, there's no viral cause, it's genetic. He was born with it. To cure him we would need a vastly different cure all together and even then, it could have some side effects." Dr. Banners told him.

"What kind of side effects?" Will asked.

"If we do manage to make a cure there's a chance that it'll take away his speed, strength and his accelerated healing. It'll make him human." She explained.

"But Dr. Jenson informed me of Whistler's serum to circumvent Blade's need for blood. I'll be able to work out a better serum for him." Dr. Banner assured him.

"Thanks, Dr. Banner. I just hope we can figure this out before Frost actually starts moving forward with his plan."

"What's his plan?" Dr. Jenson asked.

"Not sure on everything but what I know so far isn't good." Will told her.

"Well, maybe this could tip the odds in your favor." Dr. Jenson led him over to a table with a large bottle of blue liquid. "This is E.D.T.A, it's an anti-coagulant we use to treat blood clots. Watch it does when I introduce it to a sample of vampire blood."

She placed a tiny sample on a small sample of vampire blood that was under a digital microscope. Once the anti-coagulant was introduced, the blood cells had a negative reaction and the result was an explosion that destroyed the blood sample and microscope. "Jesus."

"Think of it as another arsenal to add to your war chest." She said, handing him a large bottle of it.

"Thanks." Will replied.

Line Break xxxxx

Blade was walking through Chinatown during the day to get some serum from an associate when his nose picked up a peculiar scent and heard his name being called. That turned out to be Frost standing in a park across the street with a young girl as a hostage. Blade made his way over to the park and finally met his adversary in the flesh. Frost removed his glasses and put them in his jacket like nothing was wrong.

"How you doing, chief?" Frost asked as Blade reached for his gun only to stop when he placed his hand on the girls' neck and elongated his nails. "Easy. We wouldn't want our little friend here to wind up on the back of a milk carton, now would we?"

Blade saw the girl was terrified and there wasn't anything he could do now without her getting hurt, so he put his hand down.

"Ah, it's nice to finally meet you, man. I've had my eye on you for years. I know all about you—your serum, Whistler, everything." Frost said when Blade noticed his slightly paler skin and realized how he was standing outside in the day.

"Sunblock."

"Hey, it's a start, right? The goal, of course, is to be like you, the Daywalker. You got the best of both worlds, don't you? All our strengths…none of our weaknesses." Frost said.

"Well, maybe I don't see it that way."

"Oh, so it's back to pretending we're human again? Come on, spare me the Uncle Tom routine, ok? You can't keep denying what you are, man. Heh, you think the humans will accept a half-bred like you? They can't. They're afraid of you. And they should be. You're an animal. You're a fucking maniac." Frost said as some humans walked by, completely unaware of what was going on. "Look at them. They're cattle. Just pieces of meat. What difference does it make how their world ends? Plague…war…famine…what does it matter. Morality doesn't even entire into it. We're just a function of natural selection, man, the new race. While they have their heads in the clouds looking for the next invasion, they have no idea we're right here waiting for them…to take them off the chessboard once and for all."

Blade was undeterred by his little speech. "Looks like your mascara's running.

Frost touched the side of his face and saw his sunblock was starting to sweat off. He couldn't risk being out in the open for much longer. "I'm offering you a truce. I want you with us. Your little SHIELD agent is going to be taken care of and by the time the rest of them try to retaliate it'll be too late."

"What? Do you think I'm stupid?" Blade asked. "The spirits of the twelve—will awaken La Magra."

"You're familiar with the Blood God."

"Frost…you're nothing to me but another dead vampire." Blade told him.

"You're an idiot, you know that? I came down here offering you an easy way out, and you spit it right back in my fucking face." Frost said as Blade reached for his gun, so he yanked the girl into the air by the neck. "Careful.

"What do I care? They're nothing but cattle, just like you said." Blade told him.

"If you wanna take the hard road, be my guest pal. But I promise you by the time this is over, you're gonna wish they never cut you from our mother's—" Blade quickly pulled out his MAC-10 and fired three bullets that Frost side stepped. The vampire tossed the human girl past Blade and into the street where she crashed into a hotdog cart. Frost turned tail and ran with Blade firing at him but couldn't land a hit. The girl was about to be run over by a bus, but Blade swooped in and carried her out of the way just in time.

The girl was terrified but there was a smidge of thanks in her eyes. "Go home." He told her and she ran as fast as she could away. Frost must either be cocky as hell or scared as hell to meet with Blade and discuss a truce. And if he was going after Will he needed to move quickly.

Will was still in Avengers tower, doing some adjustments to his weapons with some special attachments Jarvis managed to fabricate in the armory. Among them were the new and improved UV flash pellets which were twice as powerful as the previous ones and more silver bullets which were already placed in spare pistol magazines. He was currently screwing on silver/titanium broadhead tips to the arrow shafts before placing them in his quiver. His phone rang and saw it was a SHIELD operator, so he answered. "Agent Detmer."

"Agent Detmer. Reports of suspicious activity related to your case were sighted at a warehouse near the Red Hook Channel. Exact coordinates will be sent to your vehicle and backup will meet you there." The operator told him.

"Roger that. I'm on my way." Will replied before packing his gear up to leave. He dropped in the lab to see Dr. Banner and Dr. Jenson hard at work. "I need to head out. I might have another lead so stay here for now and keep working. I'll come back when I'm done."

"Don't worry, Will. She'll be safe here. We're close to a cure, for sure." Dr. Banner told him before he left.

He took his duffel bag of gear, weapons, and his suit with him when he left the tower. He put it in the trunk and drove to the coordinates that were sent to the monitor in the car. It took a while with traffic, but he eventually arrived by the water near the Red Hook Channel where it was mostly warehouses and docks.

Once he arrived, he got suited up in his tactical SHIELD gear with his pistol holstered on his thigh. The reinforcements were in the form a six-man SHIELD team dressed in black tactical gear and wielding assault rifles. "Sir." One of the agents handed him an assault rifle which he happily took.

"All right, men. Keep your eyes and ears open. Shoot the chest or head and watch your back in there." Will told them as they moved over to the warehouse. They stacked up at the door in standard tactical formation as the breacher placed a breaching charge on the door handle. The charge beep accelerated before it blew off the handle and lock then Will kicked the door in and moved in first with his rifle ready. The rest of the team followed behind and were greeted to the sight of a warehouse with large cases and shelves of boxes…like an actual warehouse still in use.

The SHIELD team aimed their guns at Will's back and were about to pull the trigger only for several pellets to hit the ground and erupt in a flash of light and loud ringing. The agents closed their eyes and turned their heads. One managed to open fire and emptied his entire magazine but hit nothing but the air. The empty gun was knocked into the air and the agent was taken out by a strike to the throat and an elbow to the collar bone. The second and third agent were quickly disarmed and taken out with swift strikes to the groin, legs, and face while the fourth and fifth agent were shot in the leg and a knife knocked the gun out of the hands of the sixth agent. The light finally dimmed, and Will was standing over the bodies of the five agents. The sixth one quickly reached for his pistol only for a fist to quickly hit him in the face and knock him out. That fist belonged to Blade.

"You missed one, kid."

"I knew you were there." Will assured him, before knocking out one of the guards with a kick to the face before moving their guns out of their reach. "How did you know where to find me? Better yet, how did you know about this?"

"Picked up your scent in the city. And Frost said he had people to take care of you." Blade knelt to one of the unconscious agents and pulled his shirt back to reveal a vampire familiar mark on the back of his neck…Frost's mark. "Frost want's you out of the picture."

Will checked the necks of the other agents and they all had the same mark which he promptly took a photo of. "Frost has men in SHIELD. Perfect." He said sarcastically before stomping on the neck of the agent still conscious and pointing his pistol at his head. "Move and you get a bullet in each eye."

"Easy, don't kill me." The agent begged, struggling to breathe with the boot on his neck.

"I won't but I can't say the same about my friend here. He's made killing vampires and familiars an art form and trust me when I say that he's a lot less forgiving then I am." Will said before looking at Blade. "Think you can find out where Frost is?"

"Give me a few seconds with him." Blade replied as Will stepped away to make a call. That call was an encrypted one to Hill.

"This is Deputy Director Hill.

"Go secure." He told her and waited a few seconds while she took care of that.

"Secured. Agent Detmer, what's going on?"

"We have a new problem. I was nearly ambushed by six SHIELD agents working for the vampire I've been tracking down. Deacon Frost. They all have familiar marks on them. I'm sending you the photo now." He quickly sent it via encrypted line. "Frost is on to us. You and Fury need to do a serious check on all the communications that have gone in and out within the last 48 hours. I doubt Frost or other vampires have just six familiars."

"Right, we'll get to work on it. Do you need additional backup? I can get Barton and Romanoff in the city within a few hours." She said when a scream filled the warehouse, probably from the interrogation Blade was conducted.

"No, I'll be fine. It's best I handle this on my own. Besides, I have backup already. Just send a recovery team to my location to pick up the traitors." Will said before hanging up. He walked back over to Blade and saw the agent had passed out. "Anything?"

"He didn't know much. Frost gave the order. He's moving up his time table."

"About La Magra. What the hell is he planning?" Will asked.

"Whatever it is it's not good." Blade said as Will took out some zip cuffs and tied up the agents. "Let's go."

Blade and Will drove back to his hideout as quickly as they could but once they arrived, they could tell something was wrong. Will and Blade unholstered their guns as they moved forward. "Whistler!" Blade shouted when they came across a dead body sprawl against a tipped shelf. Will checked his neck and found a familiar mark. They kept moving inward and saw another body and a bloody sheet on the medical chair with a DVD next to it with the words play me.

Will felt his gut sink as Blade walked forward and removed the sheet to reveal Whistler's bloody and beaten body. Will came over and looked at the wounds which were severe. Besides the cuts and bruises, he sensed broken bones, a collapsed lung and a lot of internal bleed. That combined with the two fang marks on his neck weren't good. Blade removed his glasses as he walked closer to his mentor and father figure.

"Frost was here. Listen to me…the data…Frost is trying to trigger a fucking vampire apocalypse…" Whistler manage to utter out despite his collapsed lung and holes in his neck. "There's some kind of vampire god he's trying to resurrect."

Blade was stoic as can be but you could tell in his eyes that seeing Whistler like this hurt more than any injury ever. He tried to wipe up some of the blood but it wouldn't do any good. "La Magra."

"You're the key. He needs your blood…the blood of the Daywalker. You're the chosen one. Listen to me Blade, you can't go after him."

"Bullshit." Blade told him.

"If Frost gets his hands on you it's all over. There'll be armies of those motherfuckers. Not even those assholes in capes can stop them." Whistler groaned in pain but managed to tough it out as best as he could. "You're gonna have to finish me off. Don't want me coming back."

"Let's get him out of here. I know someone who can help." Will told Blade.

"It's too far gone, kid. Thanks for trying kid but Blade knows better." Whistler took a pained breath before looking at Blade. "Give me your gun."

"No."

"Give me your gun, god dammit."

Blade unholstered his gun and seemed to freeze, not wanting to kill Whistler or let this happen but he knew it needed to be done so he put it in the old man's hand. "Now walk away, both of you. Walk the fuck away."

Blade took off first and Will followed but not before grabbing the DVD. They kept moving until they heard a gunshot. Blade stopped momentarily before he kept moving. They went to Blade's room and played the DVD to see Frost's message.

"Hello, Blade. Bet you're starting to wish you took me up on my offer, aren't you? By the time you watch this that old man Whistler will be dead. If it makes any difference to you, he put up quite a fight. You can find me at the Edgewood Towers. So, better hurry up." The message ended after that.

"You know it's a trap, right?" Will asked.

"I know…but I don't really care." Blade replied.

"Fair enough. But I'm not letting you go in alone. I'll get ready." Will left to get suited up. Blade quickly made as many silver bullets as fast as he could, loaded them into clips for his pistol and put in fresh stakes in his shotgun. He put on his armor, jacket and glasses before eventually stepping out of his room to see Will waiting for him by his car.

Will had gotten changed into his Aegis gear but his hood was down and his mask wasn't deployed. His pistol was strapped to his thigh and his quiver filled with silver and explosive arrows was hooked onto his back with his bow in his hand and two bandoliers of blue serum vials.

"Last chance to walk away, kid." Blade told him.

"Not gonna happen. You don't let a friend walk into a trap alone." Will pat him on the shoulder before handing him one of the vial bandoliers.

"What's this?" Blade asked, looking it over.

"Gift from Dr. Jenson. The liquid is an anti-coagulant. We tested it against vampire blood and it pretty much turned them into walking blood bombs. It could tip the odds in your favor if you need it." Will explained.

"Thanks." Blade said before wrapped it around his left arm.

"Don't mention it. Let's go." Will said as he got in his car while Blade drove on a motorcycle. It was now up to the two of them to stop an ancient Blood God from being awakened.

Line Break xxxxx

At the Edgewood Towers, Will and Blade arrived just as it started to get dark. Will took the lead heading in because both were armed with weapons which would have immediately gotten them arrested had he not flashed his SHIELD Badge. One of the Familiars who was stationed as a guard on the ground floor saw them and ran away only for Will to fire a grapple arrow at his legs and trip him up. Blade walked over and slammed him against the wall. "Where's Frost?"

"Top three floors. He owns all of it. You take the private elevator." The guard said as Blade knocked him out with a punch to the face before taking his keycard. They walked over to the private elevator and swiped in using the keycard before heading up.

Will took three arrows with heavy metallic tips from his quiver and placed them on the drawstring as the two patiently waited in the elevator. All that could be heard was the shitting elevator music and ding of passing floors. After going through floors 2-75 they eventually stopped at floor 76. Will's telekinetic sense picked up over twenty people waiting for them with guns. He pulled the arrows back and the second the elevator doors split open he released them.

All the guards saw when the elevator doors opened were three arrows that quickly erupted in small explosions that killed several of them and destroyed all the glass paneling in the room. Blade then stepped in and fired his MAC-10, killing several of the familiar guards while Will fired his pistol. Both of them took out over a dozen guards who weren't even able to fire back. Blade holstered his MAC-10 and unslung his shotgun before unleashing hell on the remaining guards with shotgun slugs. Will tossed an explosive pellet down the hallway before reloading his pistol and killing the last two guards.

One of the guards was still alive despite three bullets to the chest. Blade walked over with his shotgun and the guard begged for his live. "Please! Please, don't do this! I just work for them!"

His begging did nothing as Blade lowered his shotgun down and blasted a hole in his chest, ending him. With the initial guards dealt with, they made their way into Frost's sanctum. Blade ditched his trench coat and took point as the two turned a hallway and saw two vampire guards armed with taser sticks. They charged forward as Blade pushed one away so Will dealt with him. He blocked the taser and various strikes before punching him across the face and throwing up into the wall. Blade spin kicked his vampire in the face before parrying attacks and stabbed the E.D.T.A syringe in her eye. Will dodged all the taser swings before locking his arm and breaking it. He topped it off with an E.D.T.A syringe to the chest. Blade and Will resumed their trek as the two vampires screamed in pain and horror, their bodies expanding like balloons until they eventually burst like going water balloons filled with blood.

Will and Blade split up and took different paths throughout the floor. Will went left while Blade went right. He eventually made his way through the floor and came to a large living area with an indoor pool/lounge area. "Leave it to Frost to show that real Vampires can be just as bad as that Twilight vampire." He said to himself when he noticed the reinforced window shades were locked shut.

A vampire stealthy made their way behind him and was ready to latch onto his neck only for Will to turn and stab him in the heart with his silver knife. He slit his throat for good measure and the vampire turned to ash. Will's hearing picked up fighting, so he quickly rushed in that direction. He saw Frost and whole bunch of familiars in a white room and they were tasing Blade all over. Will pulled out an arrow and placed it on his bow, taking aim and ready to fire when Blade looked right at him and shook his head no.

Will quickly took a mini-tracker and tossed it at the jacket of one of the guards before making his exit while Frost took Blade away. He grits his teeth as he watched them take him, but Blade told him not to fight. Maybe this was part of a plan? Whistler did say they needed Blade's blood so perhaps letting them take him would lead him to the others. With that tracker he'd be able to follow so that's what he'd do but first he went back to Avenger's tower to get something.

Blade was taken to the outskirts of Jackson Heights where Frost's familiars had been hard at work for months in an excavation dig. He was dragged underground where flood lights revealed an ancient temple like the one in Frost's data on La Magra. Frost was there along with his entire army of minions, the remaining vampire elders and Blade's mother who was Frost's prize possession and a turned vampire working for him. It was her appearance that allowed Frost to get the jump on him.

Blade was dragged before Frost with his arms bound and by the flop sweat and weakness he was exhibiting, he needed his serum or blood and soon. "Blade, so glad you could be here to see this. I would have liked for your little buddy to be here, but we'll find him when we're done." Frost said as Quinn smirked at Blade while wearing his sunglasses.

"Our ancestors called his place the Temple of Eternal Night. Nice, isn't it? Apparently, these geniuses forgot it ever existed. Fortunately for us, I'm what you might call a student of history." Frost walked up to the elders and smirked. They would be taken out soon enough and he would enjoy it. "Why are we here? This temple was built for one glorious moment—this night, for the Blood God."

Quinn then punched Blade in the face out of anger and probably idiocy ruining Frost's moment. "Let's see this sword of yours." Frost said as his girlfriend tossed it to him. "Well. Titanium, right? Acid-edged? Whew. I'll get used to a weapon like this." Frost then flicked the switch by the hilt off which drew a momentarily surprised look from Blade. "What? You look surprised. I told you, Blade. I know everything about you. You don't look so good, do you?"

Quinn then handed him the bandolier of E.D.T.A vials. "What do we have here? Your precious serum. Mm, how long has it been since you shot up? Twelve, thirteen hours, maybe? I bet you're just dying for a drink, aren't you? What's it feel like? Is your blood on fire?"

"Try some. You might like it."

"Thanks, but I prefer the real thing. In any event, I don't think you'll be needing these anymore." Frost threw them down to the lower level of the temple and they shattered. "It's a shame, you know? When I think of what you've become, what you should have become. I guess I don't blame you. I mean, with everything that's happened, it's the human side of you that's made you weak. You should have listened to your blood."

"Say what you want, but I promise you you'll be dead by dawn." Blade swore.

"Get him out of here." Frost ordered as they took him to a special chamber while the elders were taken down below.

Line Break xxxxx

Back above ground, several familiars were standing guard as they were ordered to. Mostly to keep anyone and the police away. One of the guards was texting away on his phone when an arrow pierced through his heart and came out the back. He managed to utter out a few guttural sounds before falling to the ground dead. One of the guards noticed they were one short only to get an arrow through the neck. The four remaining familiars were alerted before they even call for help or even move, they all got an arrow in the heart. They dropped to the ground one by one as Will walked past their bodies. He pressed a button on his bow handle, which made the limbs and bow string retract into the handle for easy carrying. He put his collapsed bow in his pocket before jumping down the excavation hole into the temple.

He pulled out his knife and quietly made his way through the halls. He hugged a corner as a vampire walked over. Once he was close enough, he yanked the vampire out of sight and stabbed him in the back of the head. The knife hit right in the brain and the vampire burned away into ash. He closed his eyes and used his telekinetic sense to find Blade and found him in some kind of chamber about 50 yards away. He quietly made his way through while Frost and his minions kept doing what they were doing which was draining Blade's blood and moving each of the 12 elders underneath a tome and standing on a vampire glyph. One of the elders bad talked Frost's girlfriend so she killed him with Blade's sword and kick it and his burning body into the wall. They were now short one which would come to bite Frost in the ass with all of this. They needed 12 not 11.

Most the familiars and guards had made their way to ground floor where Frost and the elders were, so it made sneaking around a little easier. Will eventually came upon the chamber Blade was in and saw him in some kind large stone sarcophagus with vampire glyphs on them. He quickly turned it counter-clock wise, so the front opened up and saw Blade strung up and his wrists were bleeding profusely.

"Shit, Blade what did they do to you." He quickly undid the straps and Blade's body slumped to the ground.

"What took you…so long…kid?" Blade managed to gutter out.

"I stopped to get you something." Will took a high-powered vial injector and placed a slightly yellow colored liquid vial in it. "It's a new serum. It's twice as effective but not completely tested."

"Do it…" Blade uttered out so Will stabbed the injector into his heart. The Daywalker gasped in pain as the serum was injected into his body right into the heart so it could pump its way through his body quicker. Will took a few steps back when he was done and watched Blade writhe in pain. "ARGHH!"

Fortunately for them, Blade's screams of agony were drowned out by the La Magra ritual as a bolt of lighting struck sarcophagus that held Blade's body and it lit up like a Christmas tree. It lit up the other tomes and glyphs in a cascading effect down to the ground floor until bolts of lighting struck each of the 11 vampire elders.

Blade writhed and groaned in pain before he got on all floors and took a few deep breaths, having come down from the violent reaction of the serum. "Blade…" Will slowly walked forward only for his danger sense to go off. He turned and a woman punched him in the face. The impact sent him crashing into the sarcophagus and spinning through the air until he slammed into a wall and hit the ground with a thud.

Blade glanced up at his mother and glared at her. "You disappoint me." She said, baring her fangs and charging at him. She scratched and lunged but Blade easily avoided all of her attacks. He grabbed her by the neck and slammed her into the wall. "Eric…I'm your mother. You wouldn't hurt your mother, would you? Come here."

She pulled him close like a mother would her son but unbeknownst to her it would be the last move she ever made. "I must release you." Will quickly tossed his silver dagger at Blade who caught it and stabbed her in the gut. Her screams of pain echoed out into the ritual chamber where the bolts of lightning ripped out the vampiric souls of the elders. The large bat-like souls sprawled out of their vessels which withered away into dust before flying around the chamber like actual bats. Frost's minions and familiars were beyond freaked out at what was happening while Frost himself couldn't be happier. Eventually all the elders were piles of dust and their vampire souls flew around the room and began to fly through Frost's body before they all piled in. His eyes turned red and he was flung across the room.

Blade's mother's body withered away into ash and with it was the small smidge of sorrow for the person she used to be. Now he was focused on Frost, so he grabbed his jacket and ran through the chamber, flipping through the air and landing on the ground floor in a crouch.

"FROST!" Blade shouted in anger and glared at his enemy with soul-searing hatred.

"Kill him!" the possessed Frost ordered.

"Wait! I owe you man. I got two new hands, Blade. I don't know which one to use to kill you with!" Quinn charged only for Blade to pull out silver garrote wire and slice his head off. Quinn turned to ash and Blade caught his glasses before putting them on and the fight began.

A familiar lunged at him only to get kicked into a wall. He ducked and leg swept another guy before stomping on his gut. "FROST!" Blade was grabbed from behind only to throw out an elbow to the familiar and quickly take out another with a kick to the gut.

Will raced out to the ledge and saw Blade taking down the guards with ease. He would be fine. That's when his danger sense kicked off and quickly spun and hugged a wall to avoid a hail of gunfire from a guard across the room. He took out his bow handle and pressed a button, causing it to un-collapse. A deep breath to concentrate and he stepped out of cover and fired an arrow, nailing the guard in the heart with one shot. Two more came into view and shot at him so he quickly took them out with two rapid fire arrows to the head. He saw Frost's girlfriend come into view, so he fired an arrow only for her to dodge it. She rushed towards him down the curved hallway as he fired arrow after arrow and only barely missing. She charged straight at him and caught an arrow aimed at her head only to throw it back. He moved his head out of the way which allowed her to close the distance and knock his bow to the ground floor and kick him in to the wall.

"I'm really going to enjoy this now. RAH!" She bared her fangs and tried to bite him only for Will to pull out his gun right into her mouth.

"Don't think so." He pulled the trigger and blasted her head off with her body withering away into ash. "Not really that bright, were you?"

Blade took down the last two vampires with powerful strikes and kicks to the face and chest before pulling his sword out of the wall with a spin and their bodies withered away into ash. "Hey, Blade!" Frost shouted, brandishing his own katana. "Let's dance."

Blade charged forward and flipped onto the platform Frost was on. He cracked his neck and rolled his shoulders before the two engaged in a sword fight. Blade had the skill, but Frost's speed made it so he kept up. Frost did his best but had no skill. Blade picked up the speed of his strikes before managing to slash Frost's right arm off at the elbow and then slice him in half at the waist. Normally that would be the end of it, but Frost's blood pooled out like it had a mind of its own and connect his two halves back together. Not only that but it sealed the wound like nothing happened. Blade looked at Frost and mouthed what the fuck. Never had he seen anything like that.

Frost just smirked as he held up his blood stump of an arm. "You're too late Blade…" His blood came to life and formed a new hand for him. Blade's response was a side flip kick to the head and multiple quick slashes with his sword that would have diced him into pieces but that wasn't the case. Frost's speed shot up dramatically and was able to outpace him at every attack, so he hit nothing. "My turn."

Frost blurred out before reappearing in front of Blade in a burst of super speed and punched him into a pillar. The vampire hunter hit the ground with a thud as Frost flipped through the air and landed next to him. He reared his fist back and was ready to drive it through Blade's body when bullets hit him all over the back. Frost turned to see Will shooting his gun at his chest with a final bullet at his forehead, but it did nothing. Frost's blood pushed out the bullets and they fell to the ground with a clink and clack. Blade took this chance and thrust his sword through Frost's back. It came out the front but even with a titanium silver sword straight through his chest Frost was fine. Frost elbowed Blade in the face and sent him flying back before pulling the sword out and throwing it at Will who managed to dodge it just in time.

Frost super sped forward and grabbed Will by the neck before hoisting him up and squeezing. He struggled to breath, so he grabbed a UV flash pellet and shoved it into Frost's mouth. It blew up in a flash of light that burned his face and causing Frost to throw him through the air and into Blade.

"Ugh, shit." Will groaned in pain while rubbing his throat to try and alleviate the pain. Blade saw the E.D.T.A bandolier on Will's belt and took it. Frost's grunts and groans of pain died out as his body healed astronomically fast even from the intense UV burns and it was back to normal.

"Nothing can help you two now. I'm a god and gods can't be killed." Frost said before charging. Blade quickly threw one of the syringes and hit Frost in the chest. The liquid went into his body, but it seemed to do nothing as he flicked it off and leapt forward ready for the kill. Blade threw five more vials and each one hit Frost's body and while it did nothing before now it seemed to make him scream in pain.

"Some motherfuckers are always trying to ice skate up hill." Blade said before throwing up the last vial and spin kicking it right into Frost's forehead. The anti-coagulant seemed to be doing its job as Frost's body morphed into a grotesque, bloody lump before exploding into a chunky and bloody mess. Will took some thermal explosive pellets and tossed them onto the bloody bits, so they burned.

"He's not getting up from that." Will said, picking his bow up from the ground. "Is it over?"

"It is." Blade told him.

"Good." Will took out some explosive charges from his belt and placed them on some structural pillars. "Let's get out of here."

Blade grabbed his sword and anything else of his before they went back topside. Will placed his last explosive charge by the entrance before they climbed up the ladder and made it out of the ground. He activated the charges which destroyed the ritual chamber and collapsed the entrance, sending a small puff of dust and smoke from the hole they climbed out of. The sun had just risen over the horizon and ushered in a new day. They prevented the Vampire apocalypse as Whistler put it.

Will's phone went off with a text from Dr. Jenson that the cure they were developing worked on her. They had a cure for vampirism and a potential one for Blade. "Some more good news. Dr. Jenson just let me know she and a friend of mine finished a vampire cure. They have one for you as well if you want it."

Blade looked at the sun before looking back at him. "No. Keep it for now and help whoever you can. There's still a war going on and I have a job to do. All I need is a better serum."

"I can help you with that." Will took out a piece of paper and quickly wrote his number down. "Here. I'll let you know where to pick it up. And if you ever need help then let me know."

"Thanks kid." Blade shook his hand and the two parted ways.

Will took care of some last-minute things, which just entailed eliminating all trace of anyone having been here which meant dealing with the bodies and vehicles. After that, he got in his car and used his phone to call Hill.

"This is Hill." She answered.

"Go secure." He said, securing his own communication line while she did the same.

"We're secured. What's the situation?" Hill asked.

"Let Fury know that the vampire threat has been dealt with. Deacon Frost is dead with along with the major vampire players in the city. All sites have been secured but there are likely to be thousands of stragglers still in the city. Where are we on the familiars in SHIELD?" Will asked.

"We're still tracking them down but most of them have been apprehended. I imagine it'll be easier to take them down with their leaders dealt with." Hill said.

"Or they'll go underground. Log me in for overtime. I'm heading into the city to transport Dr. Karen Jenson to the Manhattan Base. She's developed a vampire cure which we'll need." He told her. "After that, I'm heading back out into the city to track down more of them."

"Roger that. We'll be waiting for you when you arrive. What about Blade?" Hill asked.

"He's alive…and he'll continue doing what he does best. Something tells me we'll be running into him again. Detmer out." Will hung up and drove back to Manhattan.

Hill ended the call and turned to reveal she was in Director Fury's office. "Another disaster situation avoided, sir. Agent Detmer did what would have taken several teams to accomplish with ease. You were right about him."

"We've tipped the tide in our favor, but something tells me they'll be back." Fury told her.

"Then it's a good thing we have a cure too if Will's word is to be taken." Hill replied when she saw Fury take out an old phonebook size file with a SHIELD Logo on it but another symbol as well. This one was a fist holding a sword. "Project BPRD?"

"I'm reactivating it. Inform Dr. Bruttenholm that they're to resume covert work again and make sure its covert. I don't want to deal with seeing news footage of their actions. The Avengers are one thing, but this is another." Fury told her but Hill could tell there was something else concerning him.

"What's wrong, sir?" Hill asked as Fury opened a drawer in his desk and took out an old business card. It was worn and tattered meaning it had been there a while. "Are you worried we won't be able to contain them?"

"It's not that. Detmer's our deterrent. I'm more worried that we just rang the dinner bell and now we have no idea what else is waiting for us. If what Detmer said is true and that Loki was working for someone else, the Battle of New York is just the beginning and soon more threats will rise. The World Security Council already set up Project Insight. Contact the Triskelion and make sure they're on track." Fury said and she nodded. "How's Coulson's recovery?"

"Progressing as can be expected. The memory augmentation seems to have helped." She replied. "Sir, should we inform Agent Detmer about Project Tahiti. Given his knowledge on the G.H. should we loop him in?"

"It's need to know and above his clearance level." Fury told her. "Agent Detmer isn't ready to learn of this yet."

"How long do you think you'll be able to keep this from him?" Hill asked.

"As long as I can. Something tells me there'll be other distractions to take its place. Task our spare satellites to keep an eye on Genosha. Something tells me Magnus won't stay in exile for much longer." Fury said, getting up from his desk to leave. "There are a lot of threats out there and it's our job to keep them contained.

"Yes, sir." She replied.

The business card on his desk was worn and tattered but still legible. It read:

Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters

Charles Xavier Professor

1407 Graymalkin Lane, Salem Center Westchester County, New York

End of Chapter 7

1). Wesley Snipes Blade

Hoped you guys liked this chapter. Sorry it took so long but it accidently got erased and I had to start from scratch so that's why it took a while. I apologize but hope you guys liked it. Blade's been introduced and while I can't wait for what the MCU version of Blade will be, Wesley Snipe's version is my favorite movie growing up. The first R-rated, black led superhero movie. Black Panther fans and critics seem to forget this one for some reason. We'll be seeing him again soon. I hope you guys like the little Easter eggs I've set up for future chapters and plot points. They won't show up next chapter but in the future for sure.

Next chapter, Will gets a call by his friend Grant to help clear the name of an old military friend who has been wrongfully accused of killing five innocent people. During his investigation he gets caught up in a much bigger conspiracy that he wasn't expecting. Plus we get to see him take part in what he does when he's not on a mission…that's tracking down potential leads on strange disappearances and killings and killing those responsible. In other words, he hunts down serial killers when he's not on the clock and this one takes him to Texas to deal with a crazy family and chainsaws. Why is it always chainsaws? Until next time.

William Alexander Detmer/Birthname: William Alexander Danvers

· Moniker= Aegis (means something under protection from a benevolent source/Shield of Zeus and Athena)

· SHIELD Status: Level 7 Agent / Special Operations, Tactics and Defense Specialist (SOTD) Serial number: NE616IN

o Member of the Avengers

· Appearance: Stephen Amell from Arrow, Season 1 build.

o Aegis Combat gear: Earth X's Dark Arrow Vibranium jacket and pants with retractable full-face mask colored Black and Blue. Eye covers in mask are colored blue as well. Improved design resists more damage and certain atmospheric pressures.

o Shoulder strap pellet holders. Combat gloves and forearm guards with weapons and equipment.

o SHIELD gear: Combat boots, black combat pants, with form fitting dark blue long sleeve athletic shirt. SHIELD Tactical combat vest.

o Shoulder strap pellet holders. Combat gloves and forearm guards with weapons and equipment.

o Casual Outfit: dark blue or black sneakers, jeans, blue or black t-shirt and either a zip-up hoodie, jacket, or button up over.

o Weapons:

§ Signature Guns:

· Modified Heckler & Koch P30L handgun with custom grip and compensator or suppressor attachment. Spare firearm Glock 17.

· Modified Knight's Armament SR-25 Sniper rifle with modified scope, bipod, and suppressor.

· Modified M249 Mk46 Light Machine gun with a modified barrel, magazine insertion well. Equipped with adjustable buttstock, 100-round magazine drum, deployable bipod, red dot sight, flashlight, and laser sight attachment.

· Modified TDI/KRISS Vector-.45 ACP with modified barrel, stock, grip, extended magazine, red-dot sight, flashlight, laser sight, and silencer attachment.

· Modified Remington 879 MSC Masterkey 12-gauge compact shotgun.

· Custom collapsible Oneida Kestrel Compound Bow and quiver of special arrows.

§ Others:

· Right forearm guard wrist mounted retractable Vibranium/alloy blades.

· Left forearm guard wrist mounted small retractable Vibranium Shield & touchpad computer.

· 10 dark blue flechettes/throwing arrows wrapped around his ankles.

· 2 Vibranium orbs that Will is able to manipulate.

· Natural Language Modified Artificial Intelligence program EDI.

· Predator Combi stick/spear

· 2 Predator Shuriken

· 4 Laser net devices

· Predator knife

· Born: September 8th, 1988-Currently 23

· Notable talents: Genius level intellect potential, self-defense military training from Harold Detmer, knowledge, and training in 15 types of martial arts, gun knowledge and expert marksman trained by Clint Barton, espionage and spy skills trained by Natasha Romanoff, SHIELD tactics and medical training from Coulson and SHIELD trainers, well-crafted knowledge and understanding of psychology, knowledge, and experience with engineering both mechanical and electrical, fluent in dozens of languages.

· Personality: Kind, caring, composed, attentive, intelligent, and driven. Can be a bit of a smartass.

o When insulted, angered, or in a serious situation, focused and relentless. Considered dangerous and unforgiving in these types of situations.

o Uses powers sparingly in the field unless absolutely needs to.

· Pairing: Will x Skye/Daisy Johnson x Crystal

Powers: (If in bold, capable of doing now)

· Rakyat Tatau: Mystical tattoo that enhances speed, strength, stamina, intelligence, instincts, healing speed ad metabolic function to absolute human peak potential. (Captain America Level Super Soldier)

· Telekinesis, the ability to impact objects through the direct influence of mental power or other non-physical means

· Power Level=Advanced: level 4 out of 5

o Binding-to keep an object/being from moving

o Levitation-to lift an object

o Orbital Field-to makes objects and energy orbit around user

o Telekinetic Shield-to create a shield of telekinetic energy around user or others/strength of shield depends on mental strength and focus of user

o Psionic Speed-to augment user's physical speed

o Psionic Strength-to augment user's physical strength

o Telekinetic Bullet Projection-projecting telekinetic energy as bullets

o Telekinetic Choking-to strangle someone with telekinesis

o Telekinetic Grip-To grasp an object firmly in place

o Telekinetic Maneuver-to alter an object's directional course

o Telekinetic Pull & Push-to pull or push objects away from user

o Molecular Manipulation-to manipulate matter at molecular level. Can accelerate, slow down and adjust spacing of molecules.

§ Limited in use.ie. manipulating Vibranium orbs and reshaping them

o Telekinetic Aura/Sense-To sense one's surroundings with telekinesis

o Telekinetic Compression-to crush or compact an object

o Telekinetic Blast-to emit telekinetic energy as a blast of blue energy

o Telekinetic Destruction-to make an object explode into dust

o Telekinetic Flight-using telekinesis to fly

o Psionic Explosion-to create/discharge psychic energy across a wide range

· Telepathy, mentally receive or transmit information

· Power Level=Advanced: level 4 out of 5

o Mind Reading-ability to read the thoughts of others

o Memory Reading-the ability to read the target's memories

o Psychic Communication-the ability to secretly converse with others

o Telepathic Speaking-to speak aloud using the mind

o Telepathic Projection-to project images or memories into the physical plane

o Download-the ability to process/download information of another person (If used in a violent or angry mood, can harm the victim)

o Knowledge Replication-the ability to replicate learned knowledge and skills

o Knowledge Projection-the ability to project knowledge to another

o Rapid brain activity-the ability to process and understand information at incredible rates

o Mental Inducement-The ability to put the targets mind into the wanted state

o Mental Hallucination-the ability to cause mental hallucinations

o Mind Link-the ability to develop a permanent mental bond with any person

o Mind Walking/Melding-to enter another's consciousness

o Precognition awareness-six sense awareness of imminent danger

o Telepathic Prediction-the ability to know a person's moves by reading their brain waves

o Astral Projection-to separate one's mind from their body and explore physical plane

§ Cannot use telekinesis in this state. If separated from body too long, very dangerous.

o Telepathic Surgery-the ability to perform neuropsychic surgery, healing and/or damaging the mind

o Memory/Mental Manipulation-the ability to manipulate a target's memories and mind

o Clairvoyance-the ability to gain direct visual information through non-physical means

§ Triggered only by serious events

o Foresight-the ability to foresee possible future events and observe what may happen

§ Needs certain triggers to activate

Disclaimer: I don't own Agents of SHIELD or any Marvel Properties, they belong to their respective owners, I'm just a fan.