Chapter 5

Col could hardly keep from smiling as he passed Kandais’s apartment building. Orange and yellow lights from four police cars reflected off its tinted glass face. The sidewalk lane of the road was completely police-taped off; with good reason. A large crowd gathered in the adjacent lane to watch the detectives and homicide agents peer and calculate. More than half the crowd were reporters; Some scribbling in PDAs and electronic stenos with breakneck speed, some with full crews and cameras running thick wires from open vans. Col wondered if the on-lookers were there for the chance to be seen on television rather than for concern over what had happened.

“Killer behind you,” said Col through a mocking smirk. An officer stood in the lane directly ahead, keeping an eye on the traffic moving north and south in the southbound lanes. Though he didn’t quite catch Col’s taunt, he moved out of the way and looked sternly at him as he passed. Col continued on for a block then hid his bike in shadows.

As Col walked back toward the spectacle, he couldn’t shake the feeling of being led along by some unknown force. How had the ghoul come to posess the ID badge, and how had it known to hold onto it? The badge was something anyone could divine a path with. It would be easy for an enemy to bait him with such a clue and set for him a particularly nasty trap. He could have questioned the ghoul, but since the half-dead are not very good at remembering things it probably had little recollection of what had happened. Col would have to move forward regardless of his misgivings, mindful of the danger.

He slowed to ponder this as he approached the police barrier. Col put on a show of mock curiosity, jostled gently against the others, and generally inched his way through the crowd. The other onlookers gave him only passing glances and jostled right back, each one searching for the perfect place to stand. Col could see that the other end of the busy alleyway was in just as much tumult as the end he passed through. Meanwhile, forensic investigators neatly went about their task of cataloguing all the tiny bits of flesh and cloth. It was impossible for the casual onlooker to determine which bit belonged to which body, or even how many bodies there’d been to start with. None of this registered to Col as being significant. Had he been less preoccupied, Col may have had time to ponder whether the Rokkiteers from the night before could have been so finely masticated. He didn’t even notice that they had been converted from mischevous to minced.

All the while, Col could not shake the memory of the ancient weathered station wagon. The driver had looked directly at him and made sure that Col saw the robes lying in the passenger seat. Then he had smiled a smile of knowing and of anticipation, with fangs the color of evil deeds. Could it have been the Master himself? Col could remember times when he came home in the dead of night and found his master sitting all alone in the dar. He could recall the odd crimson glimmer in the dark when the Master would smile and ask him if he had fed well that night. Col had learned to accept it and stop asking questions. Now the queries jostled against him and waved like annoying neighbors.

He frowned against the confusion. The illusion forced onto him by the grinning driver had shown him brutal carnage amassing in a prodigious pile, and atop it all stood the Master, more like a Lord than a victim.

Then there were the questions of the Serfs. His master had given them computers, and said they were to help. This was not particularly surprising in theory. The Master often advocated human technology, reasoning that it was often the simplest and quietest way to gather information. Otherworldly or magical means usually involved too many unseen and unknown forces, and left the user completely visible to anyone with the knowledge to espy their traces. The Master either knew or assumed something was going to happen, and had warned the serfs. Only Col was left with no inkling of trouble on the rise.

The more he thought about it, the more Col decided that his Master had to be involved in this caper, to whatever end.

‘So could the Master be testing me again?’ He thought, reminiscing on the rat-grots; little hairy men with long snouts and beady little eyes. Suerfyur, the Rattie leader had lead the Master astray and demanded that Col bring him mounds of riches in exchange for his master’s life. Col had responded by twisting Suerfyur’s foot off at the ankle, which was just enough persuasion for the truculent Rattie honcho to release the Master.

Col pushed his way through the last clumps of gawkers and passed a young police man. The officer stared at him with forced authority. Col could feel the man’s heart beating as he neared; slow thuds increasing to rapid flutters. He was afraid. Col smirked at him defiantly and walked up to the building.

The building where Kandais lived was modern enough. It had an electronic lock at the main entrance that looked like a pay phone with a small screen to one side. This system, however, had long since ceased to matter, for the heavy glass and steel door no longer latched properly when closed.

Col climbed the first set of stairs and turned to climb the next. There were four doors on each floor, one on each side and two in the middle, and a small landing dividing each flight of stairs in half. Col’s footsteps echoed off of the hollow metal doors, and squeaked as he turned to climb another half flight. After four floors, he stopped and knocked on the door to the left-and-center.

Oddly, there was no answer. Kandais mostly stayed at home, preferring her evenings in comfort. Col had forgotten to call her as he had sort-of promised through memory modification, but still assumed she’d be glad to see him. He contemplated simply going hunting for prey, but something drew him back to her. He knocked again, harder. Someone came to the door this time; Col could feel a heart beating, first slow then suddenly racing. He grinned, thinking of the effect his presence must have on Kandais to make her heart palpitate with such excitement. But still the door did not open. The heartbeat lingered on its side of the door for a half a moment then quickly retreated. Col glowered angrily at the gilded numbers nailed above the peep-hole, then banged on the door once more in frustration.

His master had once told him that shadows had eyes for those keen enough to use them. This once seemed like a silly riddle, but with enough practice he’d learned to use these eyes. Col stared through his eyelids, through darkness upon darkness and tried to focus on the shadows of Kandais’s living room.

The vision was a swimming reflection off a pool of dark ichor. He caught a murky wisp that looked like an end-table, one that he recalled sitting against a wall under a fat-bottomed lamp. Dimly he could make out a form on a couch, something thin nestled between its head and shoulder. It was definitely not Kandais. A single word filtered through - Vampire.

Col wasted no time in ripping the door off its hinges.

He carried the door into the living room and sent it flying onto the coffee table. The diorama of porcelain figurines that once littered the dark wooden surface exploded in a shower of colored shards.

The well muscled man standing between the coffee table and a soft beige couch hardly flinched as the fragments fell about his bare legs and feet, or even when the door bounced swiftly off the table and landed on his toes. The man wore a dark green vest with three horizontal slits to each side. The vest was parted all the way down to the very bottom where a silver zipper held it together. He wore also a pair of baggy black sweatpants rolled up to the knee as makeshift shorts. The man stared directly at Col behind a pair of square, mirrored shades and furrowed his brow deeply.

Col hesitated when he noticed the man’s unhealthy pallor. The man’s skin was pale with a subtle green tinge, and latticed with scores of dark-green, raised scars. Col could not see his eyes but could tell he was surveying him from behind those shades, waiting for Col to make the first move.

“Where is the Girl?” asked Col finally. The man merely smiled a thin smile. Col shifted his gaze past the man into the dining room beyond, and noticed a broken window. Shards of its glass hung like tale-tell talons. Col looked back at that smile, decided he wanted very much to remove the man’s expression, and lunged forward.

Col kept himself low to the ground and brought his right arm up to protect his face. The bonesword erupted through his palm and he nearly dropped it in surprise.

When Col had crossed half of the distance between the entryway and the couch, the man kicked the horizontal door to vertical and thrust it forward. Col sliced the door in half, flicking the top half of the whining metal off into the dining room where it spun into a cabinet full of china. The corner of the door cracked through the cabinet’s glass pane sending the tiny cups and plates skittering. The second half of the door Col sent flying into the wall above the television with a blow from his fist. His next step had him with his sword against the man’s greenish neck.

“Tell me where the girl is, NOW!” commanded Col.

The man’s grin widened. He pressed tighter against the sword and dragged his neck down its pinkish blade. His eyelids fluttered as it opened his throat, his lips trembled over brownish gums. Viscous green fluid bubbled out with each wet, choking laugh, and within seconds the wound had become another thick green scar. The man sneered and delivered a blow to Col’s face, the force of which caused Col’s head to turn weakly to the side.

“Well, you’re not strong…” began Col from within his surprise. He wasn’t sure what to make of this foe. A thin bruise blossomed across his cheek, rippled, then faded as fast as it had appeared.

The man reared back for another strike. Before his fist began to move forward, Col caught it and twisted the man’s arm behind him. The sound of the man’s elbow snapping out of place gave Col a giddy feeling.

“... Nor are you fast; or smart for that matter,” continued Col, retracting his sword and slamming his forearm on the back of the man’s neck, forcing him down.

The man ducked even lower, and wheeled in place, causing his shoulder to dislocate as well. As the man turned, he whipped a silver, cross-shaped dagger from one of the slits lining his vest and stabbed toward Col. Col grasped the man’s wrist in his free hand, yanked the arm savagely, and it too dislocated. The man howled in rage.

Col released three low chuckles and pumped blood energy into his right arm. The blow Col delivered to the man’s face lifted him clear off his feet and sent him sprawling onto the arm of the couch. The man’s head slammed against the surface of an end-table and knocked a lamp to the floor .

Col whipped out his sword and flipped the man’s shades from his face. The man’s lips had folded over each other quite unnaturally, causing him some trouble as he sat up slowly and tried to spit. Thick streams of greenish blood speckled with fragments of yellowed teeth spilled messily from between his languid lips. He looked up, caught Col’s gaze, and froze.

“Ha!” laughed Col as their eyes met. He caught the man’s soul with his mind and shook it. “So you are human. Ok then, tell me who and what are you, mortal?”

The man’s head quivered and his lips trembled. Col reminded him who was in control by wrenching his soul savagely. This man obviously was not strong of will either, and probably got by with his little healing trick alone. He said with much difficulty, “I am Batzuga... a... Child of the Scion.”

“Let me guess… you fight monsters… keep the humans safe from us damned creatures of the night?? Great… what next… a Zealchare?” Col kept hold of the man’s soul. The Children of the Scion were one of the more popular names taken by bands of freakish humans more commonly referred to as Hunters. Hunters were generally few in numbers but extremely unpredictable. One Hunter was a mere annoyance, but a group of them could be disastrous even for an old and powerful Vampire. It was they, who ages ago had freed the Shifters from Vampiric control. No small feat indeed. No one was quite sure how they gained their freakish abilities, as they were generally exterminated on contact. “Ok, you ugly trollish thing, tell me, where the girl is and I’ll let you live… for now.”

This time Batzuga did not hesitate. “Ten blocks north, four blocks east. Abandoned building by the train tracks.”

“Not too far… good,” said Col, then he motioned for the man to stand. As Batzuga rose from his prone position, Col grasped him by the neck and plunged his fangs into him. Batzuga’s blood was thick and sappy, and made Col feel strong and tough. Batzuga passed out from the shock of it. When the rapture had passed him, Col pulled the man’s limbs out of joint at the shoulders, hips, knees and elbows then folded them all up behind him so they would not re-knit. He then reached into one of the lower cargo pockets of his pants, pulled out a large draw stringed trash bag and stuffed Batzuga snugly inside.

---

Downstairs, officer Elwist stood brooding at a corner of the barricade. Like all the other brown-clad officers on the scene, he had been standing guard all day with hardly a break to piss or eat. Normally he’d at least have Olssin or Konner to chuckle around with, but just last night Konner was found dead of gunshots, and Olssin had had some sort of nervous breakdown. Konner had chased a speeder into a garage on the north-east quad, and called for backup. When Olssin had arrived with his flank-men, he found Konner stuffed in the back of the car, shot in the chest, forehead, and base of the skull, and oddly enough missing all of his teeth. After the fan-out and search of the garage, Olssin was found by his flank-men in a bush, shivering and raving about giant, blood-sucking bat-men.

The officer had a strange feeling like there was a handful of fluff where his brain used to be. It had to be exhaustion. He kept thinking about the grinning stranger that passed him earlier; thinking about how much he wanted to take that man down a peg, shove him in a dank cell with a few dozen Lifers.

‘Yea,’ he thought, ’bet he wouldn’t be grinnin' so wide then. He’d be beggin'; Beggin' me to let him out. And me and those ‘Holer’s ‘d be laughin’.” His expression waxed satisfied for a moment, then he checked himself. That was no way for an Officer of the law to think. ‘Still though, that’d be mad funny.’

The people hanging around had not ceased to be annoying. Times used to be a cop could clear a crime scene in minutes, back when people gave a damn, when officers had power. Too bad, cop couldn’t touch a man who wasn’t a perp, and those news cameras kept them from circumventing that minor statute.

Most the crews had left, but the major ones stuck around, taking footage for other nights, or maybe broadcasting around the clock coverage. Millions of people probably watched expressionless as police went about their task of clue sniffing; eyed the dried blobs of blood and the places were the many pieces had lain. Too many pieces for there to be much use for chalk. There had only been photographs and a few spectral images taken then in came the cleanup crews.

Somewhere above Elwist rang a crystalline shattering, then a tinkling scattering of glass. His eyes snapped up toward the building on the left. He noticed something funny about one of the windows on the fourth floor. The fuzz of his brain fluffed outward, filling empty space. He’d looked there many times during the day and everything seemed fine, but now the window fragmented and broke all at once. No one else seemed to have noticed it. In a wash of heroic anticipations, the officer set off to find out what had happened, into the building and up the tiled flights.

---

Col threw the bag over his shoulder and was turning to leave the apartment when he heard:

“Freeze!” from the young cop brandishing a sleek black pistol (standard issue Megawatt Stun/Shock). “You make a lot of noise for a burglar. Heard yah from downstairs. What you got in the bag that was worth bustin’ this port open?”

Col contemplated showing him Batzuga’s green, scarred body, but decided against it. He instead grasped the man’s soul through his eyes and made him lower his gun. The cop’s jaw went slack and his eyes glazed over. A thin line of drool escaped his lips.

“Good work.. umm…” Col looked at his badge, “Officer Elwist. You got here just in time. Open and shut case- Kidnapping. I’m gonna go set a search down at the old vacuum tube factory. If you don’t hear from me in an hour send back up.” The Officer smiled a firm, dutiful smile. “Oh, and I want you to personally watch this apartment tonight, you understand?”

“Y- Yes.. Captain Greiczowitz,” replied Elwist softly as Col walked past and down the stairs. He pushed hurriedly through the crowd and down the dimly lit block to his motorcycle. He looped the drawstring of the bag over neck and under his arm, then sped off.

‘Just what I needed,’ thought Col, ‘more complications. She had better be alive, Batzuga, for it would take a long time for you to die, and I would make a point of it.’ He laughed as he sped toward the factory. He would be in and out before the cops arrived, so any trouble these Hunters had waiting for him would have to be dealt with quickly. Something inside him was enjoying this caper, and Col let its joy cover his concern.