Chapter 58

The day slowly morphed into night and before long we were simply walking the streets. Kalvin was walking the perimeter. He was proving useful in helping find items. Ki had gone into the bigger city called Waco to talk with the Sheriff's department and get more information. Nick was walking beside me, hands in his jacket pockets. We had gone into each house, finding similar things, uneaten meals on tables, cloths in the midst of being folded, dead dogs on chains long since turned to bone, and even grocery lists half written as if the occupant had simply gotten up and walked away from what they were doing.

The beam of flashlights came from ahead as Jerry and Beck busily went down the street ahead to take the houses on the left. Nick growls, 'Why are we doing this?'

'Clues.'

'We could get more information from the tunnels in Kita than here. This feels like a waste of time.'

'Maybe, but why would the Sheriff's department forget that this town even exists?'

'It is simpler than projecting people in France.'

He had a point as suddenly the beam of light hits me full in the face nad I blink against it as Jerry says, 'Look what Beck found.'

They had run up to us and he points his flashlight down at the playing card. Nick says, 'So we find another.'

It looked worn and I ask, 'Where did you find this?'

Jerry points to an old colonial house on the corner and says, 'Found it stuck in a doorjam off the entrance.'

My heart skips a beat as I feel as if I know something and I say, 'Show me.'

--D--

We sat in the abandoned police station as Nick growls, 'A tunnel in a basement, lovely.'

Jerry was looking at the card under a magnifying glass saying, 'Remind me why we didn't go down in it again?'

'Lets just say we have learned from experience it isn't a pleasant place to be,' I reply, flipping through another missing persons file over the past year.

Just then Ki comes into the office. He looked irritated as I ask, 'So how did it go at the Sheriff's office?'

'Simply put, Mart doesn't exist.'

We all stare at him and Nick asks, 'Explain?'

'I went and asked them about the missing persons files in Mart. They said there was no such town and no missing files.'

'That makes no sense, the families of the people in this town must be worried,' Beck says, worry etching her small face.

'But if they have been glamoured,' Nick growls, sliding his file away.

He probably wasn't used to having to dig for information, having his subordinates doing it for him. Beck looks at him with a frown, asking, 'Glamour?'

'They can influence peoples minds,' Jerry replies, not even looking up from his file.

Beck looked at me with wide uncertain eyes and I reply, 'We don't use it unless absolutely necessary. But it feels like too much work to glamour that many people.'

Ki strides over, and picks up a file. He flips it open and then replies, 'What if, by chance they keep the town projected for a time until they can completely erase all the minds of their victims families, like the sheriff's in Waco.'

'But even locals will know about Mart. there have to be history books, people that come here, there is a vets office, grocery store, and several taverns,' I reply.

'Taverns?' Beck asks with a frown.

'Bars,' Jerry explains and continues, 'Its a British thing.'

I glare at Jerry and return to the conversation as Nick stands and replies, 'It wouldn't take much to simply drive down the roads, pick up on minds and alter memories. Its done by the Night Hunter's all the time. Like back in Boston.'

'Boston?' I ask looking at these two Purebloods.

'He's talking about the Boston Bombing. It was with regards to a radical human group that knew about us,' Ki replies.

'Wait are you talking about the Boston bombing during the marathon?!' Beck asks with shock.

Ki nods and says, 'They were at a coffee shop where vampires frequent for specialty coffee. Two vampire died from sun exposure once the glass broke.'

'But the marathon? Those people,' she says horror and pain filling her face.

'Unfortunately it is a fact of life, they kill those they want and those they consider casualties of war. Anyhow to prevent knowledge of vampires becoming wide spread, we went in and wiped the memory of vampires turning to dust from the people who saw them that night.'

Beck looked exhausted by this as Jerry murmurs, 'We definitely need more coffee for this.'

Beck nods dumbly before saying, 'The coffees out. We ran out earlier.'

I slowly come over to her and put a hand on her shoulder saying, 'I bet the gas station still has coffee available.'

She nods and I follow her out, lipping to Jerry to be quiet for once. We walk down the empty streets towards the lone gas station, its florescent bulbs the only light in the town. We walk in, door dinging and I find myself looking at the cashier's stand. Of course no one was there, but old habits died hard.

We walk over to the coffee machines and Beck gets under the cabinet to find the grounds. We had walked silently next to each other and I could tell she just needed time to process all of this. Finally she asks, 'What is it like?'

'Hmm.'

'What is it like to be... a vampire?'

'I'm a predator for starters. But I wasn't always that way. I used to be human like you.'

She looks up at me with a questioning face and I nod in answer to it continuing, 'It was terrible and still is. You always have a burning hunger that's never truly satisfied, you never sleep, and you have abilites that leave you breathlessly unprepared.'

Beck hands me a couple bags of coffee grounds and filters asking, 'But what is your society like? The big guy, with the black hair and bad temper... Nick? He is a prince?'

'To tell you the truth I'm ignorant to the vampire society. You could call me a clanless.'

'Clanless?'

'Yes. Nick is a royal from a very powerful clan. There are five great clans that rule over the smaller clans and finally groups. I have never joined a clan and thus I'm rather rutterless when it comes to the society I have been thrown into.'

'Can I ask how old you are?'

'A little over 250 years.'

'Wow that's old,' she says as we walk outside.

A cold breeze hits us and she shivers as I reply, 'I'm a child to many.'

'I forgot my jacket. One second. I have more questions when I get back,' she says, running back inside the convenience store attached to the gas pumps.

I smile. Beck was so sweet, though she had a fiery tempter on her, she was taking this better than I ever expected. Nick thought humans were just a food source, but I saw them differently. They were just like us, intelligent and ruthless, but the only difference was, we are harder to kill.

I look at the abandoned car at the gas pump. The gas nozzle was still in the cars tank, the door of the car still open and dust on its covers. This place was so much like the French town it was eerie. However everything was much more worn, this had happened longer ago. The roads were cracked and grass grew in them. Windows of houses and businesses broken and fallen trees in roadways. It felt so post apocalyptic that it made my skin crawl.

Blinking, a thought strikes me and I look up. Sure enough I see them, cameras.