Part Two: Chapter Forty-One

Part Two

Ten years Later

Remember The Prologue?

That happened.

Chapter Forty-One

I stand in a miserable grey alleyway in Soho, watching the gutter-water slowly creep around my boots.

The door in front of me is appealing and disgusting in one dirty, seedy hit. I know what I will find in there, and I’m fascinated, while trying to remember to be appalled.

I walk through this area of London a lot, almost every day, and I have never seen this door before. I’ve become used to noticing things other people don’t. I’ve become used to realising there are a lot of places which people ignore, places that people are supposed to ignore.

The narrow alley gives me a little shelter from the rain, but I still feel the droplets that have escaped the cracked guttering overhead. The dirty water forms a puddle against the pavement where the drains are blocked. It’s collecting London’s scraps and leftovers, a perfect analogy for that plain black door.

There are only two things to distinguish it from any other door. The door knob is brass, tarnished and antique looking. It’s in the shape of a tiny bat, baring sharp fangs. A tiny sign above the knocker is written on white with black ink, it reads ‘exotic massage.’

Anyone else would walk straight past without a second glance. Unfortunately, the days when I can throw myself in with ‘everyone else,’ are long gone. I’m slightly rattled when a clang sounds my entrance, one short, sharp ding like a bicycle bell. I duck inside to escape the rain and the grey skies.

The room I enter is wallpapered in smutty pictures torn from porn magazines. They cover the entire room from floor to ceiling, mostly depicting Goth girls performing sex acts or pushing their breasts together, smirking seductively. I allow myself quick glances at them. Other than a single black desk there is nothing in the room. A black phone sits on the polished surface, its long cord extended against the wall.

I get the creeping sensation that I’m being watched, and the hairs on the back of my neck prick at me while a shiver snakes down my back. I turn slowly, one hand reaches into my pocket for the silver chain.

She is ‘teen Goth’ from head to toe, right down to the heavy boots reaching her knees. Bright orange flames have been painted up the side. She wears stocking under the boots, the tops disappearing under her leather mini skirt. Her breasts are spilling out of a tight leather corset, a red and orange Chinese dragon tattoo disappearing into her cleavage. Her hair is black Victorian ringlets and her eyes are heavy with black paint.

‘Yes?’ She lazily parts deep red lips. The effect of her is Snow White lost in the forest, my mouth actually waters at the sight of her. She must be twenty or twenty-one, but the gothic make-up makes her look like a teenager, and strangely ageless at the same time. I can’t tell yet what she is. If she is anything more than human, she’s not using it against me, yet.

I almost leap backwards, in-between her legs emerges an enormous black lizard. Its gait and face are prehistoric, steely, emotionless eyes fixed on me. It’s a monitor lizard, grown to almost four foot long. I knew someone once who had a much smaller one, though it was so aggressive no one could go near it.

The girl follows my eyes, ‘That’s Ghost.’ She smiles slowly. I have always been a sucker for a slow smile, maybe she already knew that, I turn up the volume on my discreet earphones. She walks across the room and the Lizard follows, like some grotesque puppy, it’s tail swishing dangerously. I will have to divide my attention between both monsters.

‘He won’t hurt you,’ she smiles again and my insides begin to melt. ‘unless I tell him to.’ She has a poison apple smile, and it’s beautiful.

‘You’re looking for someone to spend your time with?’ Coming from those red lips it sounds like the dirtiest line I’ve ever heard, a promise of debauchery. Her thick London accent makes it so much worse.

‘I want you,’ the words spill out of me in a rush, before I can stop them.

She grins boyishly at me, ‘I’m expensive.’

‘I’ll pay,’ again, the words tumble over themselves fighting to get out of me. I fumble to find my wallet.

That’s when I realise what she is. For ten years, I’ve been unable to think of a beautiful woman, been unable to see anyone attractive without them becoming Elizabeth. If I looked into a beautiful pair of eyes, they would turn pale blue and Elizabeth’s face would burn over their features. If I ever got close with a woman, which had been rare these past ten years, I would feel her push me from her like it was yesterday, feel the shame destroy me again. I looked down at the scars on my fingers and all down my arm, remembering.

This hasn’t happened with my Snow White. She’s still the only woman I see. I want to savour the moment, to feel like every other man she had seduced in this place, everyone who had paid a fortune for her company.

‘What’s your name?’

‘Black rose,’ a pout and another heart-stopping smile.

What’s your real name?’

A girlish giggle, ‘Sophie,’ she shrugs almost sympathetically. I laugh along with her. I am overcome with the need to touch her, stepping closer I run a hand through her soft dark hair. She doesn’t seen to mind, lips parted and eyes half closed. I can’t help but imagine those full lips wrapped around my cock. It’s beautiful to feel no shame or guilt, not to see Elizabeth. I know it can’t last, I’m here to do my job. I breathed in slowly to regain control. I turn the volume up as much as I dare without her hearing.

‘Your touch is very powerful,’ I say after what feels like an age. She doesn’t look suspicious or concerned, but the Lizard has its unwavering gaze fixed on me, a long black tongue flicking back and forth. ‘That’s what I’ve heard doctors call it,’ I explain to her confused face. ‘You might call it something else.’

I smile warmly, but she is beginning to understand, her eyes dart toward the door. ‘It’s okay,’ I say gently, ‘I know what you are.’

She laughs sweetly, ‘you know what I am?’ her eyelashes flutter and my body arches toward her in simple lust. I sigh, it’s so blissful, her turning her powers up to max.

I consider taking out the lizard first, afraid it will attack me if I go for her first. I meet it’s old gaze and see so much wisdom there. I could feel that she was new, it would be easy for me to trap her. I had learned not to show them too much respect, after all, they had a choice, Mark had proven that to me. I had learnt to be quick, I circle her wrist with the silver chain. It comes as such a shock to her that she doesn’t try to fight back at first, surprised by the sudden pain. She cries out in and rage, lunging wildly, with inexperience.

I use the advantage of her youth to move quickly, I slip in the syringe, a garlic concentrate. Sophie makes wild snarls, noises which betray the animal that she is. I allow myself to breath in the sweet smell of her perfume while she lays unconscious in my arms, this angel hiding the evil behind. Then the shame creeps over me, her influence is gone.

She opens her eyes slowly, too slowly, perhaps the garlic was too strong. Her first act is to scream out in pain, as her hands are bound to the chair with a silver chain. The monitor lizard has done nothing to defend its mistress, it is now sitting on the desk, watching me with its suffocating gaze.

‘Let me go you bastard,’ she spits at my feet, trying to wriggle her hands from the chain, wincing with every movement.

‘You need to answer a few questions first,’ I lean back in my own chair, wondering how to play this.

She glances nervously at the door, ‘my boss will be here very soon,’ she snarls, ‘and he’ll kill you.’

‘He’ll have to get through the locked door first,’ I say calmly.

‘Why couldn’t I make you stop?’ All tenderness and sweet smiles have evaporated, left only with revulsion and hatred.

I tap my ear with a smile, ‘Napalm death,’ I explain, ‘aggressive music is the only thing I’ve found which works for me, keeps my mind too tense to let you in.’ I don’t think it’s right to tell her that she still got to me.

‘You’re new to this aren’t you,’ she’s still struggling and biting her lip as the silver cuts her deeper. ‘You’re giving away secrets, so you’ll be of no use to me and my boss. I bet this silver chain is the only weapon you bought.’ She laughs, ‘I’ll be picking pieces of your flesh from between my teeth.’ Despite her threat her eyes dart wildly to the door, I realise she must be afraid of her boss.

‘Just when we were getting on so well,’ I say. The bare light bulb above us casts heavy bright light, I have to be good cop and bad cop if she’s going to tell me anything, but I have to leave before her boss manages to knock the door down, if she’s afraid of him I should be too. That damn lizard watches me calmly all the while.

‘Who is your boss?’

She spits at me again, and laughs. ‘As if I’d tell you that.’

I reach into my sleeve and draw out a short wooden cross. ‘You wouldn’t,’ I hope I gave her an evil smile. ‘But this might loosen your tongue.’ I draw closer to her with the cross and she backs away, baring her teeth. Just before the cross touches her milk white cheek she screams and I feel a full hit of blissful lust for her, I turn up the music a fraction.

I can’t help but laugh, ‘there are so many things which hurt you,’ I say, ‘how can your kind ever be described as immortal?’ She glares at me. ‘Let’s start with an easier one. What do you do here?’

‘You already know that.’ She looks brave but her eyes are still fixed on the cross in my hand.

‘You feed on the men who pay for your services?’

‘We don’t kill anyone.’

I snort, ‘I don’t believe you.’

‘It’s true,’ she nods wildly, ‘we slip a sleeping pill into their drink and take the blood, we harvest it, no one kills. The men wake in a few hours assuming they’ve gotten drunk.’

I snort again, ‘no vampire I’ve ever met has that sort of self-control.’ Well, there was one, I think silently to myself, the one that haunts my dreams.

‘We’re not all Vampires, some of the girls think they’re working for the an illegal medical supplies company.’

I resist the urge to snort a third time. ‘Equally amoral.’

‘What would you have us do?’ She snarls, ‘kill and destroy everything without a backwards glance, like so many do. This is a better way.’ She paused to let me breathe in the significance of her words. ‘I was taught to resist,’ she carries on, ‘I was wild before, but he taught me to control it, it’s all we can do.’

‘It’s still wrong.’

‘Wrong!’ She screeches, ‘who are you to say what’s wrong? You’d rather these men were ripped apart? Let me tell you about right and wrong.’ She intakes a breath harshly as I fold my arms across from her, I know she’s going to feed me some sob story. ‘I didn’t ask for this. Two years ago I was grabbed in the street and dragged into an alleyway, I counted five people watching, they did nothing. The pain was like nothing I’d ever experienced, I never saw his face, but I heard him laugh. He made me beg for my life, and this is the life he gave me. So why don’t you tell me about what’s wrong?’ It was her turn to snort angrily at me, ‘not all of us are evil, some of us are just trying to survive.’

‘I only knew one of your kind who wasn’t evil, and the guilt led him to kill himself.’

She shrugs, ‘then he was braver than me, I’m only trying to live with the hand I was dealt.’

A moment of silence passes between us while I process what she’s said. ‘Who taught you self-control?’

‘I’ll never tell you that. That man saved me, and I’ll never betray him.’

I know there’s no use in trying, I can see it in her fierce eyes. ‘This is the third brothel I’ve been to,’ I explain, ‘they all operate a similar system.’

‘Then that proves it works,’ she nods.

‘But it’s not the bigger picture.’

She laughs, ‘I took you for an amateur.’

‘You’re going public.’ It’s not a question, all accounts I’ve followed add up.

‘I for one am sick of hiding in the shadows,’ she explains, eyes sparkling. ‘The world has changed. It’s not pitchforks and angry mobs anymore, the P.V.R has been active for almost twenty years.’

‘You think a bunch of Anne Rice nerds is going to be of any use to you?’

‘Do you know how much money the Twilight movies made? Have you considered the hordes of teenagers who lap up this paranormal romance crap? We would be worshipped.’

‘There would be those who would oppose you, kill you.’ I point out, but part of me is terrified she’s right. This is the same story that’s been fed to me everywhere I’ve gone.

‘The churches? The morally righteous?’ She laughs again, ‘that only makes it more delicious, society has fallen into chaos. People want sex and temptation more than they want God.’

‘I will try to stop you at every turn,’ I say, and I mean it.

‘Go ahead.’ Her eyes twinkle and I want her again. She’s has one of the most powerful Touches I’ve ever experienced.

I’m too busy trying to shut out the powerful urges to grab her and fuck her to notice that she has slipped free of her silver chain. She shows me her hands with a sly smile.

‘I’m going to rip you open,’ she says sweetly.

Sophie lunges at me, quick as a striking panther, but I’m no stranger to death anymore. The stake is buried in her heart just as her teeth graze my shoulder, cutting through fabric and drawing blood. I manage to get her off me as her body turns grey and stiff, the sweet smooth skin giving way to thick ash. She falls apart as she hits the ground. The Lizard shifts position, the only grief show for his dead mistress. I needn’t have asked her who her boss was, he was in this country hiding from me, but I could feel his eyes on me everywhere I went. Sooner or later, I would have to face Jarl.

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty

Nobody spoke for what felt like a century. We didn’t even look at each other, just sat there with the presence of Doctor Stewart’s body hanging heavy in the room. I couldn’t bring myself to look at him yet, I could only stare at the floor trying to make sense of everything. I heard hellish screams all around, echoing through the building, but they were distant to me now.

‘He was right,’ Lisa said, ‘we need to get people out of here.’ She got to her feet steadily, but I could tell she was avoiding looking at the body too. I didn’t make an attempt to follow her, my legs had turned to cement.

‘Please,’ Lisa’s eyes were wet and she was biting her lip, she looked terrified just for a moment. ‘We can deal with this mess later.’

‘Do you think he was lying, or mistaken,’ my heavy tongue found the words.’

‘No,’ Lisa said firmly, ‘thirty years is a long time. You have to forget that now, people are counting on us.’

‘Teresa,’ I whispered.

It came out of nowhere, Lisa grabbed the collar of my t-shirt with one hand, stretching the material, and with the other hand she slapped me hard across the face.

‘I’m not carrying you through this,’ she snapped at me, ‘I can’t protect you and everyone else by myself.’

It did work to some extent, I felt ashamed that people were dying all around me and I was lacking so much courage. I buried my face in my hands, she was right of course, the only way out was to fight, but I just couldn’t bring myself to even stand up.

‘It’s just,’ I tried to find the right words, ‘I still love her.’

‘I understand,’ she said, ‘and if I find that bitch now I’ll rip her in half.’ She gave me the shadow of a dangerous smile. ‘But you have to help me, or we’ll die in here.’ She took my hand and helped me up, her palm was slick with sweat and I lost her a few times, but eventually I was on my trembling feet again.

I spared the Doctor a glance as we left the relatively peaceful corridor to face whatever lay beyond. I wasn’t scared or disgusted by the sight of him, I just felt saddened. When this facility opened thirty years ago, Doctor Stewart met Jarl and Elizabeth, and believed vampires could be trained. Now the belief he had clung to was drowning in blood. We walked back into the world, closing the door on the doctor and his foolish dreams.

Everything was soaked in blood, the corridors seemed flooded with blood. The building was so sodden in blood that the messes of human organs and bodies on the floor were unrecognisable as anything except mounds of red. I tried hard to keep my vomit in, flies had begun to descend on the dead and the smell had begun to gain the sweet edge of decay. Lisa’s skin looked green as she surveyed the death.

We rarely found a live human, we found a few that were close to death, but beyond help. This was hard, Lisa took their bloodied hands in hers and promised them it would be okay. If they could speak it was mindless babble, I couldn’t watch much of it, turning away from the desperation and pain. Surprisingly, it was the intact bodies that were harder to look at than the pieces torn apart, many bodies still had faces fixed in pain and hands curled into claws.

One horrible moment we came across a woman moaning softly, she indicated downwards, cautiously Lisa lifted up her dress and whatever she saw made her skin turn the colour of those dead vampire ash piles. The woman had a small silver knife, and despite my sudden shocked cry, Lisa slid the knife silently into the woman’s heart.

‘Kill me,’ Lisa whispered, ‘that’s what she was saying.’

‘How bad was her injury?’ I asked, my hands shaking and my throat drying.

Lisa simply shook her head, clearly she didn’t want to discuss it any further. We passed the woman without a backwards glance, but Lisa was shaking a lot more than me. I placed a hand on hers and she turned to face me, her face still ash grey.

‘We could run away,’ I said, ‘leave all this.’

‘No,’ she said, we have to help.

Many corridors were silent and only filled with the dead or dying. On several occasions we encountered a live vampire, feeding so greedily on a corpse that they were easy to kill. A young porter ran straight into Lisa clutching a stake, luckily they buried it in the air just above her shoulder and not through her flesh.

The young man stared wearily at Lisa for a few moments and she did the same thing, not lowering her weapon. The boy was probably about twenty, and he was mostly covered in blood, a wild reckless look in his eyes. When he had realised that Lisa and I were human, he did this mostly from looking at my broken arm; he called out in French. There were about seven of them, it was hard to tell because they too were all covered in blood, but they were all workers and all carrying weapons.

Lisa began to talk rapidly in relief to them, and they shared her enthusiasm. For one woman the presence of another capable human had driven her to silent bloody tears. A vampire approached the group, teeth barred ready to strike, I cried out, but they were ahead of me, working as a team they had reduced the creature to dust in a hazy blur of movement.

This was definitely the team we wanted to be with, as we stuck with them, I began to see a way out of this. They were capable and smart, we moved in a circle, so that everyone was protected. Every time we met a vampire, it was dead within minutes. The group had a steely determination, they had seen so much death tonight and they were now ready to kill every vampire they saw until there were none left. To my joy, there were also still people left to save, and we worked on clearing the passages that led to the main door.

Several people in the group had injuries themselves, one woman had a broken arm which hadn’t been fixed by a professional doctor like mine, just strung up with some found bandages, when she collapsed through, warm caring hands pulled her back onto her feet. Very few words were spoken in the group, we were just focused on getting everyone out safely, or maybe, like me, they felt the screams of death had said it all.    

The doors opened wide and we spilled out onto a field of burning cars, hot and stifling. Surviving nurses and doctors were walking through the injured, handing out saved medicines and bottles of water. It felt for a moment like we were recovering, like everything was over and I could breathe again. I felt sighs all all around me, and I imagined for a moment that they were all dead.

That’s when I saw Elizabeth. She was smiling, no, grinning, widely. I had never seen her face stretched like that, like a Cheshire cat. For a moment it made her ugly, wild and crazy. She was still wearing that thin dress, crouched beneath the ivy which decorated the outside walls of the building, her hands grasped around fragile vines. In that moment I hated her so much, I wanted to kill her myself. I didn’t want her to be just another victory for the humans.

I broke away from the group, and I hear Lisa shouting at me before, my arm had begun to itch with pain as I hadn’t taken my prescribed painkillers, I was reminded that she gave me this wound and my hatred increased. Before I could reach her she disappeared behind the wall, I cried out in frustration but as I ran to follow her strong arms pulled me back. I heard screams echo through the survivor’s camp.

Fingers closed around the cast on my arm, I could hear the plaster crack and tear before my whole body went rigid with searing pain. I heard myself screaming, as if it were someone else, the felt the bone crack all over again, in a hundred different places.

Laughter echoed in my ears, cruel hard mocking laughter. ‘What did she do to you?’ Alex’s voice was cracked with holding back the laughter, my vision went blurry from the pain and I retched, my throat on fire. I begged for an end, if it meant death, I would’ve welcomed it in that moment.

An inhuman howl made my head spin, so close it was to my ear that it repeated itself over and over. He had let go of me, but the pain remained, it hadn’t even dulled, I felt the heat of the fire and smoke deep in my shattered arm. I crawled over onto my side, spitting and retching and biting my tongue so hard blood spilled over my lips.

It was bright as daylight, everything around me a high wall of fire, the flames cut into the night, turning the world into a vision of hell, impossible to tell where the black smoke ended and the black sky began. Nothing else was visible beyond the fire. Tears streamed down my face and ash seemed to crush my throat.

Standing in front of me was Lisa, hatred etched into every line of her troubled face, the fame reflecting on her skin made her look like a demon, her eyes grotesque and pulsing at the creature before her. Behind Lisa stood her comrades, burnt and bloodied, and each brandishing a wooden stake.

Alex pulled the steak out of his chest with barely a whimper. It had been really close, but not close enough. He saw that he was trapped, trapped by the fire of his own making and trapped by angry faces armed with weapons. He started laughing again, wildly giggling like a naughty child. I could barely make out shapes now, my vision failing with the smoke and pain. Everyone was a gargoyle to me, features twisted.

‘He warned you,’ Alex continued to laugh, ‘Jarl, warned you. We can’t be controlled, or tamed, and now you see what you’ve done.’ He laughed again, ‘look at how many people you’ve killed.’ He clutched his chest. ‘I’ll be skipping to hell with a song in my heart.’

Lisa didn’t say anything, she just stared, that pain and sorrow and hatred changing her face forever. The laughter went on, and on, until it lost all meaning, until it was animal gibberish. It was devoid of everything which makes laughter what it is, no understanding of humanity remained.

They carried him, high on their shoulders. He hadn’t even attacked them, he had just laughed. As they threw him into the fire his laughed died with him, fading into the smoke.

I remember nothing of the next few hours, I gave in to the pain and for a moment I was resigned to die, when my eyes closed I thought they would never open again.

But they did.

I opened my eyes to another white hospital ceiling, morphine making my head heavy and my thoughts laborious. Lisa was there, her fingers were intertwined with mine and a hollow smile stretched across her face. I understood then, there was no winning or losing, nothing had changed.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Thirty-nine

Half the cars parked outside the building were on fire, employee’s cars blazing up in the dull starless sky, people who would suffer tonight. The sparks were licking at the old stone, I prayed for a moment that the whole building would go down, until I remembered Elizabeth, and with some shame, the innocents, the humans.

‘You’d better have this,’ Lisa tossed me a wooden stake, I caught it clumsily with the only hand I had to work with.

‘How long have you been carrying these?’ I asked, examining the sharp wood, turning it over in my hands.

‘Since I found out that this kills them,’ she said, her eyes dark. ‘It works too, this is what I hurt Alex with.’ Then she turned to stroll across the burning car park, no sign of fear.

‘Wait!’ I called out, stumbling after her, ‘we’re just going to walk straight in there, no plan?’

‘That is the plan,’ and she just carried on across the car park, teeth gritted.  

I had no choice but to follow her, I also gritted my teeth, adrenaline coursed through me, but it was mostly fear. Fear making my feet heavy and my instinct to run scream at me internally. I had contemplated the idea that I might die tonight, but in an offhand macho way, not seriously. Now I realised that this could be it, and I realised the foolishness of walking into this building filled with vampires, armed only with sticks of wood. I told myself to hold it together, maybe this was the whole point to our journey. Maybe something inside me believed everything so far had led me to this point. I don’t remember what I felt, except afraid.

Lisa shouted to me and pointed out three figures running towards us, one was instantly recognisable as Jacqueline Beauclerc, though she wasn’t her usual perfectly neat self. Her hair was falling haphazardly from her tight bun and her make-up was smudged, her clothes and face were covered with soot. I yelled out and rushed to help her as I saw her dress was on fire.

‘Lisa help me!’ I shouted, I didn’t think Jacqueline was aware that she was on fire, and she was running so fast I could barely catch her, when I did she screeched loudly as I grabbed her dress, holding half in my hand and half with my teeth I ripped, the material tore and I stamped wildly on the flames, Lisa helping.

Jacqueline was eyeing me with hatred. ‘That was vintage Chanel.’ She sneered, the other two workers just carried on running.

‘I was trying to save your life,’ I breathed in disbelief.

‘If you wanted to save our lives,’ she hissed, ‘you never should’ve come here.’ And with that she followed her colleagues.

‘Ungrateful bi-’

Lisa held up a hand to silence me. ‘You understand,’ she said, ‘the fire, it’s so no one can leave. They all have to stay and fight for him or die out here.’

It was a good plan to keep the Vampires from leaving, I had to admit that, a gloomy voice at the back of my head told me that he probably got the idea when I set fire to him. It seemed that me and Lisa had no choice either. She breathed in heavily, and then she flung the doors wide open.

At first all seemed quiet, then a wild-eyed banshee ran screaming towards me. I held the stake up and tried to remember from first aid training where the heart was. It was on the right of the chest, yes? But that’s my left. Too late, the crazed Vampire, kept from live pray for so long, ran right into my stake.

I looked straight into her shocked eyes as I was pinned in position, numb and unable to breathe. The stake going into her iron flesh had felt like a knife sliding into butter, she fell to the floor in one fluid motion. I watched, still pinned to the floor as her skin began to turn grey and flaky, the colours changing before my eyes, the flushed pink dulling instantly.

Flakes of her skin peeled, looking like grey autumn leaves. The colours in her eyes faded until they were milky white with no pupils. Her body shrank, deep lines converging over her once youthful face.

After what seemed like an age I let my hand go limp, then I let my whole body go limp, but that bought me face to face with the grey corpse. I let out a shriek.

‘Pull yourself together,’ Lisa hissed at me, ‘that was only the first.’ She was standing over an equally mutated body, but she was surveying the rest of the area with narrowed eyes and sharp jerky movements.

I nodded and pulled my shaky body from the ground, my brain screaming at my legs to turn and run. My foot pressed against the dead vampire’s leg and it fell apart, it was made from some sort of compressed ashes now. I gulped hard and fought my urge to run with everything I had, my feet were stiff as I moved forwards.

We moved with no incident for a few minutes, it was far too quiet. ‘They must’ve been guards,’ Lisa whispered. Every step made my heart beat a little faster, every corner we turned bought an anticipation of terror. My tongue felt like sandpaper in my mouth, I couldn’t speak if I had wanted to, I just kept relying on Lisa’s cautious movements, my brain too erratic to judge for myself where we might be going or to be ready to fight. I had killed someone, I knew that would take a lifetime to deal with, and my hands kept shaking when I remembered.

Just when I thought that the whole thing had been a trap, and that there was nothing here, we walked into a vision of hell.

This was the main very wide corridor, and all of the doors to the cells were open, every single one. The white walls were stained with dark blood, in some cases from top to bottom. Smeared handprints ran everywhere, even on the ceiling, and fearful screams rang out.

There were body parts, a bloodied arm, half a mangled leg, someone’s head still fixed in a scream. There were grotesque slabs of flesh, things that were once organs, livers with the bile and blood drained. All wrapped in project 45 uniforms so red they might have been strips of skin, some of them probably were.

There were several of those grey vampire corpses through the corridor, though some were just smears of grey ash now. There were far more human bodies though, some looked barely touched, some had their throats or ribcages torn out, some were still bleeding, many were still alive, babbling in French. Some were merely blinking softly, too close to death to speak. We couldn’t save them all.

Lisa, taking command, spoke loudly in French, she was pale as snow, but if she felt as sick as I did, her voice didn’t betray her. People started to limp towards her, some tried to move but couldn’t. She repeated the words again in English. ‘This way is clear, the entrance is unguarded.’ Then the English speaking workers followed, I was surprised at how many of them could still stand. Their injuries looked so severe, a man dragged a broken leg behind him, clutching the thigh, the other hand tried to hold his intestines in this stomach. I swallowed down my vomit, this would be a pretty bad time to lose control, I had to keep myself together.

A vampire rushed at one of the stumbling survivors, but Lisa was almost as quick, her stake was in his back just as his fists missed the woman. But it wasn’t the heart, she pulled the stake out as the vampire turned on her, his foul smelling blood dripping over the already blood sodden floor, Lisa slipped and the Vampire lunged at her, I ran forward to help her, without thinking I plunged my stake next to the ragged hole Lisa had made, and the vampire fell onto her, crumbling into dust.

Lisa coughed heavily, brushing the remains frantically away from her clothes and hair. The people tried to rush towards to exit but there was a panicked built up. ‘ONE AT A TIME!’ Lisa shouted at them, but they were deaf to her command, so desperate to get out. The man with his guts hanging out was lying dead on the ground, his hands still stretched towards the door.

Another vampire rushed at me, this one stopped abruptly, two feet away from me, his eyes were dark, he crouched like an athlete, like a lion about to pounce, I held the stake out and hoped for the best. He struck, quick as a snake, but, like the other, foolish and desperately hungry, he landed on my stake.

Lisa was fighting her own creature, he was so covered in blood he blended with the walls, he was growling barring his teeth as Lisa tried to push him away, but he was too strong and she was exhausted, sweat was beading on her forehead. The vampire’s teeth fixed Lisa’s shoulder. I screamed out her name and rushed to her, my useless arm stuck out awkwardly, I had no other defense apart from surprise, but he had seen me, his teeth stained with Lisa’s blood, a hole in the flesh of her shoulder.

Behind me I heard more growls and inhuman screeching, there were more coming. Lisa screamed along with them as the vampire moved in for another bite, before it crumpled before her, it’s head separated from its body, falling into grey dust. Doctor Stewart loomed over the body, wielding an enormous machete.

He fell to the ground, at first I thought he was shocked, like I had been, but he was bleeding from his neck, at an alarming rate.

‘This way,’ he said feebly, barely audible over the growls and grunts of the creatures. He got to his unsteady feet, one hand trying to stem the flow of blood at his neck and the other offered to Lisa. When he moved, no matter what I thought of him, I followed him blindly, we both did.

Mercifully, he lead us into an empty corridor. There, he slumped down against a wall, Lisa ripped off her trouser leg and tied it tight around her shoulder, wincing as she did.

‘How’s your arm?’ Doctor Stewart asked in his fading voice, he was looking at me. I shrugged, now was hardly the time. Mine was a wound fixed by medical professionals, he was bleeding to death.

‘Thank-you for saving my life,’ Lisa gushed, ‘I’m so grateful I-’

‘No, no,’ he waved her words away, his breathing was hard, every intake of air seemed more difficult to make. ‘I don’t have any time, I’m going to die.’

‘We can get you to a hospital we can-’

‘Stop it,’ he hissed through gritted teeth, ‘I just want you to get anyone you can out of here,’ he stopped to breathe harshly. ‘There are people still dying, I’m just glad I…I…’

‘Please take your time,’ Lisa crouched to him and held the cloth to his neck, it was now completely soaked in blood.

‘I’m glad I won’t be alive to hear them scream anymore.’

Lisa and I exchanged terrified looks, her eyes were wet and her hands were shaking.

‘Elizabeth,’ Doctor Stewart began, my brain snapped awake.

‘Where is she?’ the words crowded each other

‘NO!’ The effort it took him to scream seemed to knock the remaining life from him. ‘No, you don’t understand, she did this to me.’

I put two and two together and came up with five thousand. ‘What did you do to her?’ I growled.

‘Pease,’ Lisa whispered, ‘he saved my life.’

‘Listen,’ Doctor Stewart croaked, ‘I’ve been in love with Elizabeth for thirty years, from the day she arrived here. I was so much younger then, so ready to believe one of them was good and pure. I spilled all my secrets to her, told her things I would never say to anyone. She was everything to me, for so long.’ He paused to take a shuddering breath, ‘I never touched her, I wanted to, oh God I wanted to, but I didn’t.’ Another ragged breath.

‘I let her touch me.’

Lisa put her hand to her mouth. ‘She fed on you?’

‘I loved her,’ he whined, ‘I couldn’t let her live off stale blood bags like everyone else. I wanted to help her, it made me feel good to feed her, special, wanted. In exchange, I spend hours with her, sometimes just looking at her. She couldn’t speak but those eyes, they showed such love, I knew as a young man I would never have a real relationship like this, she was the love of my life. It went on, for three decades it went on, and I hid it from everyone. Then you two came along.

‘I followed you sometimes Lawrence, I saw you watching her, and I saw the way she looked at you, with fresh eyes. It was the way she had looked at me thirty years ago. I was jealous beyond belief, thinking she wanted someone younger, someone new. I was wrong, as I went to her tonight, as this building rang out with dying screams, I needed to look into her eyes and gain strength.

‘I saw there such hatred. I had never seen anything like it on any face, I saw thirty years of anger and revulsion stretched across those features I loved so much. She wanted me dead, and she would have killed me, she would’ve sucked me dry but I injured her and I ran away. The anger Lawrence, the hatred, she’s… she’s evil.’ He stopped, his breathing fading.

‘Maybe she-’

‘NO!’ The shout was less impressive than last time. ‘I found out something about Elizabeth, she’s over four hundred years old. History is littered with stories of her wrongdoings, men convicted of things they had no choice over. I was too in love with her to look into her story, I was so trusting of her, because of the way she looked at me. She’s made men kill Lawrence, she’s made chaos, she-’

He stopped breathing. ‘Doctor!’ Lisa wailed.

With his eyes closed he whispered his last words. ‘I lied to you, Teresa, she’s Elizabeth’s sister. She’s real.’

‘What!’ I shook his blooded collar, ‘Doctor Stewart!’

‘Caleb, my name is Caleb.’

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Thirty-Eight

It was not the sort of place you would take a hostage. On the busy high street of this small town was a small popular wine bar, and that was apparently when Alex was holding Lisa. Everyone in the bar look liked they were having fun, relaxed piano music played over the laughter and small talk. Everything in the bar was blue, promoting a relaxed atmosphere. Dim lights glimmered over blue bar stools, French voices gave the whole thing more romance than it should’ve done.

I searched for Lisa, but as I imagined her angry eyes I wished I had gone after Elizabeth. Lisa could handle herself, Elizabeth, I guess, could handle herself too. But I kept remembering that she didn’t push me away until the last moment, she was sweet and trusting. I would never forgive myself if Doctor Stewart was hurting her, or experimenting on her, because she was so capable, unlike the others. From what Lisa had described, it sounded like he treated her as some kind of pet.

So, there was a plan, as I pushed through happy couples and groups of friends I looked out for Lisa, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to fight Alex, I would take the cowards way out and run. Hopefully, I could persuade Lisa to help Elizabeth, Lisa wouldn’t like this, but if the Doctor was hurting her, we had no choice. Then again, Alex might have lied to me, Elizabeth might be in no danger at all, or Lisa might be in no danger, she might not even be here.

The people around kept bumping into my cast and apologising, it was getting irritating and the bar was hot and stuffy. I was about to give up finding Lisa when I spotted a long sheet of dark hair sitting by the bar. Lisa hardly ever wore her hair down, so that’s why I missed her. She was always wearing that tight pony tail which meant she was ready for action.

Her chair was directly parallel with the door, so why wasn’t she running? She was just sitting there, she had a drink in front of her, some pink cocktail, and she was idly turning a straw through it. She looked gorgeous, she was wearing a blue dress with some kind of glittery sparkles that caught the light dazzlingly, she also had dark eye make up on, which made her face look exotic and dramatic. At her ears big crystals sparkled.

‘Lisa,’ I placed my hand on her shoulder and she jumped.

‘What are you doing here?’ She was smiling broadly at me as she spoke, something I had only seen when she was about to cause trouble.

‘Coming to rescue you?’ I said it as a question, because she looked so happy. Maybe Alex had lied to me, Lisa didn’t seem to be in any danger at all.

She giggled, it was shocking, not Lisa at all. ‘It’s not going that badly,’ she said through her strange laughter. Her eyes looked blank.

‘Lisa,’ I breathed, ‘what are you doing here?’ Things were starting to slide into place in my mind.

‘I’m on a date!’ More of that blank laughter, school girl giggles that made me cold.

‘Who are you on a date with,’ I said, I tried to stay calm, I began surveying the room, he had to be here somewhere.

‘His name is Alex, I just met him today.’ This laughter and her breathy tones were creepy, she was acting like a bimbo valley girl. I knew if she could see herself she’d be disgusted, and I knew Lisa was in here somewhere screaming at herself. My eyes darted madly wherever they could reach, if he was controlling her right now, he had to be really close.

‘Lisa,’ I breathed, ‘we have to get out of here.’ I tried to take her hand, determined to stick to my get out and run plan.

‘But I’m in the middle of a date.’ Her eyes narrowed in shallow frustration. She pushed my hand away and pouted. ‘You leave.’

‘No Lisa please you’re not-’

‘The lady asked you to leave.’

Too late for get out and run.

Alex was blocking my way to the exit, Lisa giggled and blushed when she saw him, I felt sick. He looked relaxed, lazy, there was nothing to separate him from anyone else in the bar. He clutching a beer, just another person out for the evening. His eyes sparkled maliciously, he knew we were trapped.

‘You made the right choice,’ he smiled, ‘or did you?’ Then he tossed his head back and laughed. I positioned myself between him and Lisa, the real Lisa would hate me for that.

‘Tell me,’ he leaned in closer, resting casually against the bar. ‘Was it jealousy? You realised she’s been opening her legs for him all this time, but she wouldn’t fuck you.’ He shook his head, laughing. My hand tightened on the back of the bar stool, I gritted my teeth.

‘You sure you don’t want to save Elizabeth?’ he smiled again, as if we were having a nice chat, as if we were friends. ‘She’s strong, but he’s got all kinds of sedatives to play with, all those medical instruments-’

‘Shut up!’ My knuckles had gone white on the leather, my hand numb I was clutching it so hard.

Alex looked almost shocked, ‘you really care so much about one of us?’ Lisa had started to blow bubbles in her drink, it seemed as if her IQ were dropping by the minute. ‘You know what she is don’t you? She plays innocent, but I’ve seen inside her mind, and it’s dark. Just like the rest of us.’

I found courage from somewhere, ‘you don’t know anything.’ I sneered, changing position so I could cover Lisa, who was twirling on the bar stool.

He laughed again, ‘when I was born into this new life,’ he sighed, ‘everything changed, I can do this,’ he pointed to Lisa, ‘and I can see inside your head, and I know what you want.’ My thoughts flickered back to my dream before I could stop them, then they sent me straight to my moment of shame ad regret, Elizabeth crawling away from me. He smiled, had he seen what I had seen?

‘I know it made you feel good,’ he carried on despite the screaming in my ears trying to block out his words. ‘They panicked when you entered the room with her, a wild animal that could destroy you, and just for a moment she was helpless under you. Doesn’t matter how much guilt you heap on yourself, you know that’s true.’

‘No,’ my defiance was wavering.

‘Yes,’ his smile deepened, ‘you know what you are.’

Lisa was gargling her drink and spinning on her stool, every one in the bar was avoiding staring at her. ‘Please,’ I asked, ‘stop it.’

‘That’s not very gallant of you,’ he smiled, ‘you were supposed to charge in and stop the baddie, save the fair maiden.’ Just below his t-shirt sleeve was a long bloody gash. I smiled, Lisa had taken on a Vampire and managed to injure him, this calmed me and reassured me.

I felt in my pocket and grabbed my lighter, without thinking I threw the flame at Alex, it caught his t-shirt and he let out a very unvampireish yelp. Someone in the bar screamed as he ran with lighting speed towards the door, his movements fast and fluid I stumbled after him as people shrieked and jumped out of the way.

It was raining outside, the smell of singed material permeated the air, the hole under his t-shirt was black, it looked like cracked tarmac. Fire, fire killed them.

‘YOU THINK THAT’S ENOUGH TO KILL ME,’ he shouted at me from across the street, laughing, and then he was gone, swallowed up by the rain and wind, still with a touch of maniacal laugher ringing through my ears.

I knew where he was going. It was the same place I wanted to be. Before this moment I had to choose whether to save Lisa or Elizabeth, and now I had to save everyone. I reached into my pocket, at least now I had a weapon.

* * *

‘Lisa,’ I tried shaking her again, but she was just sat on the curb, staring into space, getting soaked in rain ‘Lisa.’ I took her left shoulder in my one working arm and shook her harshly. Her blank eyes blinked twice before all the pain and weight rushed back through her expression, her shoulders sagged and her brow dropped.

‘Lawrence,’ she stared at me, ‘how did-’

‘Don’t worry,’ I said, brushing her hair off her face, it was such a relief to see her sullen worried face again.

‘But I do worry,’ she frowned. ‘I remember Alex, I managed to hurt him,’ a ghost of a smile, ‘but then he hurt me,’ she pointed to a fresh bruise on her forehead, ‘and then…’ her face screwed up in concentration, ‘then I don’t really remember.’

‘He used the touch on you,’ I explained. ‘He made you… well it wasn’t pretty.’

‘I want to know.’

‘You were stupid,’ I winced, ‘he just kept making you more stupid. I had no idea they could control you like that. The way Doctor Stewart described it, it sounded like science, but this-’

Lisa shuddered, ‘I don’t remember any of it.’ She said, ‘and I’m happy. How’s your arm?’

‘Okay,’ I shrugged, ‘I thought you didn’t want to be around me.’

‘I don’t’ she said honestly, looking me in the eye, ‘but I ended up with you. I always seem to end up with you.’

‘I came here to save you.’

‘So where’s the vanquished demon?’ She asked, with that promising ghostly smile.

‘He ran away,’ I answered pathetically. Lisa snorted. ‘Look,’ I felt the snort was a gateway. ‘I hate what I did okay, but it happened and I’m dealing with it. If you want to help me then you’ll have to deal with it too.’

‘What am I helping you with?’

‘You were right about fire, it kills them,’ I said, ‘and we know wooden stakes do, sunlight is out of the question at the moment, anything else?’

‘Beheading,’ Lisa said with her eyebrows raised, ‘silver hurts them, maybe crosses and holy water, garlic. Why are you asking this?’

‘Alex is about to attack Project 45,’ I said grimly, set on my path. ‘We’re going into battle.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Seven

When I woke up and saw the sterile white I groaned. Elizabeth, the name popped into my head with fury, I knew I was weakened with painkillers and I could only connect the name to something terrible, I just couldn’t remember what. I was scared, and I had never wished more that I was somewhere else, even when I was being chased in Norway, even when project 45 found us in Cuba. I wished, not for the first time, that I had never heard about any of this, that I was still safe believing vampires were fantasy.

As my groggy eyes opened further I saw the room wasn’t so white, it was a pale blue. Elizabeth’s eyes. I had that awful cramping feeling of regret that that comes with a hangover, I only knew what I had done was bad, I didn’t know how bad. I looked to the right, there was a hospital machine beeping, and a window, a big double window that let in a soft glowing sunlight.

I knew then, in the most beautiful sweep of relief, that I wasn’t in Project 45, I was in a hospital. A real, human hospital, my heart leapt. I wanted to touch that beautiful sunlight, but my left arm was numb, it wouldn’t move. Details flashed in blurred slow motion. She broke my arm, I saw the bone sticking out through the skin, surrounded by dark blood.

Blood. She could’ve killed me but she didn’t, she only stopped me. Then I remembered what I had done and I sat up so quickly that my head span at what felt like a hundred miles a second. I grabbed hold of the bed rails and vomited onto the floor.

When I had recovered I looked up and now, finally focused, with the weight of everything sliding into place, I saw a furious Lisa with her finger resting on the help button. Her face bought a whole new shame to me and I felt like retching again. All her warnings and hints rushed over me, my head felt ready to burst through my skull.

‘I hope you’re proud of yourself.’ She hissed, though she did seem a little relieved to see me awake.

‘Can you help me sit up?’ My voice felt heavy and disused.

She sighed, and moving cautiously around the sick she helped me into a sitting position, it might have been my imagination, but she seemed to flinch at my touch, as if I were unclean. She was also avoiding my eyes. After a few moments of slow breathing I felt almost normal again, just a little spaced out and still confused. My left forearm was encased in a rigid white cast. I carried on breathing slowly, staring at it and trying to put the pieces together.

‘Mark died,’ Lisa said simply. ‘He escaped.’

I bought several disconnected thoughts together, ‘that’s good.’ I smiled, relaxed with painkillers, I realised it was a good thing that Mark was gone.

‘It is?’ Lisa raised an eyebrow. ‘Doctor Stewart thinks you convinced him to kill himself somehow.’ I said nothing, I definitely didn’t remember persuading him otherwise. ‘It doesn’t matter now,’ Lisa went on, ‘we’re both banned from Project 45 forever, the Doctor is trying to find something in your past which will incriminate you. He’s thinking the break in to the school in Glasgow, if he can prove it, he’ll try and make you out to be some kind of kiddy-fiddler.’

I knew it was going to take a while for me to process everything I had just heard, I wanted to speak, but a muffled yelp just came out, there were so many details I couldn’t figure out.

‘I’ve never seen anyone so upset,’ Lisa said, she avoided my eyes, nervously biting her lip. ‘It was like she had died, he just kept crying and clutching her against him, calling her an angel. “My Angel, my Angel,” he just kept saying over and over.’

‘I don’t understand,’ I managed to squeeze out of my dry lips.

‘I followed you,’ Lisa whispered, her eyes looked wet and she still couldn’t look at me. ‘I knew you wouldn’t listen to me so I followed you, and I saw…’ she trailed off.

‘Lisa please,’ I felt bile rise up in my throat. ‘I wasn’t me.’

‘I know,’ she said, a single tear fell from her eye and she wiped it away. ‘But I tried to warn you, again and again, I told you what happened to me, I’ve never told anyone, but I thought it would help you. I should’ve watched you more closely, I let her turn you into this, this monster.’

The word hit me hard. ‘But Lisa listen to me,’ I tried, ‘she could’ve easily killed me, but she didn’t. She let me live, that proves she still cares about me I-’

‘No,’ Lisa whispered, ‘this is over.’ And she left the room, left me with the smell of vomit creeping towards my nostrils.

* * *

I don’t know if they induced my sleep or if I just fell back into it, but I don’t remember much after I saw a blank faced nurse enter the room. When I woke the smell of vomit was gone and the room was immaculate again, it could’ve been hours later, or weeks later. It was dark outside though now, so I guessed it was the same day, though my body felt so stiff, still full of foreign chemicals, and that horrible guilt that returned to me with my other senses.

A gap in the curtains betrayed the harsh yellow of streetlamps, and the hospital was quiet, the interrupting French voices strangely comforting. I was glad to be here, the machines bleeped dully and my head felt heavy on the pillows. I was not ready to deal with what I had done yet, I was happy to relax in denial.

One thing was certain, that I missed her, that I still saw a way out of this. I couldn’t go back to Project 45, Doctor Stewart would make sure of that, but there had to be a way I could see her again. I couldn’t leave things like this with Elizabeth, my guilt and shame started to burn within me again.

There was a note on the small bedside table, I recognised the neat handwriting. ‘I’ve booked a hotel,’ it said, followed by an address and phone number. Then there were a couple of scribbled out lines underneath that, before she went on. ‘I know none of this is your fault, it’s just hard to be around you. I need to deal with what happened.’ Then another phone number. ‘You might need this for legal advice, Lisa.’

I stared at her words for what felt like an hour. I mashed my eyes with my palms, groaning. How did I mess up so badly? Of all  the terrible things I had seen, I never thought I would be the cause of one. I had noticed that she didn’t look me in the eye, and she couldn’t be around me because I disgusted her, what I had done disgusted me too. I felt myself crying hopeless tears, vaguely aware of them, no apology would be enough now. Elizabeth was lost to me, and the tears fell thicker.

I felt dirty and contaminated, I wouldn’t know myself now, if I was seeing this situation from the past. I tried to recall how I had felt in those moments, but nothing came except a lust filled haze. I couldn’t remember anything past that because my thoughts became clogged with guilt. It didn’t matter how guilty I felt though, I couldn’t help myself picturing her again, the thin dress and her smooth skin. I couldn’t help picturing her helpless, her skin so soft I felt my hand would fall right through it.

I was still trying to make sense of everything as the taxi rolled away from the hospital. We meandered through a small town lit brightly, with people rushing to get home and shops closing up. I let my thoughts drift, watching the human lives, wishing I was still a part of normality.

One thing was certain through all this, Elizabeth could’ve killed me, and she didn’t. Elizabeth had superhuman strength, like them all. Mark had looked like a gust of wind might kill him, but when I ran into him he was solid as a brick wall. Elizabeth was a slight girl, but she had broken my arm with her bare hands. She was also a vampire, living off blood bags, in need of human prey. The fact that she spared me had to mean something, it had to mean that she wanted me alive.

The hotel was very basic, utilitarian and strangely cold. There were no personal touches or design features. Everything looked like it came from a kit, shipped out from a factory brick by brick. It was the sort of place lonely businessmen are forced to circulate in. You could almost hear the walls sighing with repressed frustration.   

My room was no different, white sheets, flat screen TV, basic tea and coffee making equipment, complete with the sad little kettle, stained with lime scale. As I moved around the room, I noticed there was an adjoining door into the next room, this must be Lisa’s room. This gave me instant relief, and then took it away as I realised this meant she didn’t mind being near me, just in the same room as me. I remembered again how she avoided looking directly in my eyes.

She might have been in there right now, I wished I could open the door, but she had made her feelings towards me clear. I couldn’t blame her, that guilt was burning a hole in me. A clear tiredness came over me as I sat on the bed, a healthy exhaustion. Beyond this small town, the outside world was fields and farms, not another set of bright lights for miles.

Getting into pyjamas with one hand was too difficult so I ended up falling into bed naked, trying to cleanse myself with yet more sleep, more blissful hours of oblivion.

Elizabeth was transported to this drab hotel room, her beauty such a contrast to the harsh normality. I had often wondered what she would look like naked, imagined in acute detail. Finally there she was there, in all her natural splendour. She was more radiant than I had imagined, her small perfect breasts ending in sweet points, a small waist and expanses of that smooth feather soft skin.

She moved on top of me, creating a perfect rhythm, with my hands on her waist and her thrusting me in deeper with the movements of her writhing hips, it was hard to hold on. Her full lips were slightly parted in a small ‘o’ and her blue gaze was locked onto mine as we moved together, those hypnotic eyes half opened in silent ecstasy.

I came inside her as I fell hard on the carpet. I landed on the cast as the jolt of pain bought me crashing back into the real world. I screamed in sleep before I woke. My arm still twitching with pain, I lay breathing harshly in the darkness, entangled in the sticky sheets. I almost laughed, the first time I’ve had a wet dream in about fifteen years. Well, if I was now a sex offender, might as well get it right. I tried to shake the image of naked Elizabeth from my head, but she wouldn’t go. I tried to drown her in shame and embarrassment but she wouldn’t go away.

Scowling, I kicked the sheets away from me and clambered to my feet. Looking for a bathroom I noticed the door to Lisa’s room was opened. Horrified, I tried to cover myself, but something was wrong, the room was silent. There was also a chill coming from there, Lisa wasn’t back yet. I fought with the pyjamas for several minutes before entering the room.

Yes, this was definitely Lisa’s room. I recognised her smell, her beauty products, the bed had been slept in and unmade.  The window was wide open, the curtains billowing around it. Where was she? As if to answer my question, I saw a letter in the mess of Lisa’s unmade sheets. My heart began to beat faster, this was a messy childish hand, not Lisa’s.

‘I have your friend.’ It was hard to decipher, so I watched the letters as if they might change. ‘Now I give you a choice, I always wanted to play the villain. If you want, you can come and rescue her, at the bottom of this letter I’ve told you exactly where she is, no tricks. If you want to be a hero and prove your worth, come and fight me single handed (pun intended).  The other problem is Elizabeth, I know things about your friend Doctor Stewart, things that would make you sick. I know what he’s doing to your sweet virgin right now, punishing her for what you did. You can’t save both of them. Alex.’

I crumpled up the letter in my hands. Either way I was dead, it was a question of who I would die trying to save.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Six

‘How did you know silver would hurt him?’

‘I didn’t.’

‘So you lied when you said you’d been doing research?’

She shrugged, she still wasn’t looking me in the eye. ‘Everything else from the myths works doesn’t it? I figured that would too.’

‘Clever,’ I said conversationally, ‘he really seems to idolise Jarl-’

‘Shut-up,’ and this time she looked me straight in the eye. ‘I told you we would deal with what I saw later, now is later.’

‘What do you mean?’ I felt my defensive shutters going up like armour.

‘What do you think you were doing?’ She hissed at me like an angry goose, my armour making me numb to her. ‘You could’ve been killed, or worse.’

‘She would never hurt me,’ I said, ‘remember, I’ve been in the same room as her before.’

‘She’s been manipulating you all this time,’ Lisa went on shrilly, ‘maybe she controls the lock on the door and she’s been playing with you, ever thought of that?’

‘She’s not like them.’

‘Yes she is!’ Lisa yelled at me, ‘they’re all the same, there’s nothing special about you, about her, you’re just another victim.’

‘It doesn’t feel like that.’

‘It didn’t feel like that for me,’ Lisa said in a calmer voice, ‘I’m sure it didn’t feel like that for Angelica and Tony Callister and everyone else.’

‘You don’t understand.’

‘I do,’ Lisa wailed, head in hands, ‘didn’t you listen to me? I do understand, I’m trying so hard to help you.’

I turned my back on her, the logical part of my head was filled up with images of Elizabeth, and it was as if I could see myself from above, knowing Lisa might be right. The rational part of my brain was a separate being, trying to crack their way into my thoughts.

Lisa touched me softly on the shoulder. ‘We have all the information we need now,’ she said, ‘maybe it’s time for me to grieve, to let go of this whole thing.’

‘No,’ I whispered. I whispered it because my throat was numb, the thought of leaving left me cold and slightly panicked.

‘You don’t want to leave?’

‘There’s still so much we don’t know.’

‘I know what happened to Angelica,’ Lisa smiled calmly, ‘and that’s all I wanted to know, really. We let this place deal with Vampires, you heard Alex, there aren’t many of them, they’re no real threat to us.’

‘We shouldn’t leave,’ I croaked, ‘don’t you want revenge? Justice?’

‘I said if Alex ever escapes I’ll find him,’ Lisa said, stony faced, ‘but until that happens, I want nothing to do with these creatures.’

Words had left me, I merely shook my head.

‘You don’t want to go because of her,’ Lisa’s voice was cold. ‘isn’t that it?’

‘Yes.’ I said simply. ‘I can’t not see her.’

‘Do you still not understand?’ She said desperately.

‘I love her,’ I shrugged, it was pathetic I know, but it was all I had, ‘and I think she cares about me.’

‘She doesn’t,’ Lisa was looking so weak and desperate, I suppose she really did care about me, that only strengthened my resolve to be with Elizabeth. ‘I just want you to realise before it’s too late.’

‘She’s not going to hurt me.’ I knew so strongly, I was more certain than that than I was of my own name.

 ‘Very well,’ Lisa sighed, ‘you don’t leave me a choice. I’m going to tell Doctor Stewart, and I’m going to get her taken away.’

‘Tell Doctor Stewart what?’ My heart sank as the Doctor sneaked up on me. How much had he heard? I pleaded with Lisa through my eyes.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Lisa shrugged, but her eyes were also begging.

The big grin had returned to the Doctor’s face, he seemed his old self again, I wondered what had happened to calm him down. ‘Lisa,’ he smiled, ‘what you found out about Jarl’s involvement will help us greatly.’ So that’s why he was happy again, Lisa had done his dirty work, ‘would you please follow my colleagues to discuss further?’ Two bored looking men seemed to pop out of nowhere. Lisa stared at me, her eyes wide as dinner plates, I could tell she was desperate. I didn’t care, I knew what I wanted.’

‘It’s part of the deal isn’t it?’ Lisa said sarcastically.

‘I’m afraid it is,’ Doctor Stewart grinned, the sarcasm lost on him.

Lisa scowled and left with the two men. I went to leave and the Doctor clamped a hand on my shoulder to stop me, ‘walk with me won’t you?’ He said still grinning widely. Immediately I panicked, he knew everything and he was going to put an end to it. ‘Don’t look so scared, I just want a chat.’

My heart rate lowered somewhat, but I was still cautious. ‘What do you want?’

He chortled, ‘is it always about wanting something from you?’ he said through his grin, ‘walk with me.’

His hand was firmly on my back and I didn’t see a way out of it, so I let myself be led along. It was a wide corridor, distinguishable from the others by this, and only that, the white still hurt my eyes. It led off from the maid doors and seemed to run the entire length of the building. Doctor Stewart droned on white my thoughts concentrated around Elizabeth.

‘I really wanted to show you this,’ he said leading into a door. It was the conference room I had slept in the first day here, when I was nearly killed as the sun set. There were rows of desks set out facing a blank wall, and a projector above the chairs gave out glittery light. The film started up, it was a sun rising. It blasted out over the entire wall. I had to admit it was quite beautiful, and the light illuminated the whole room.

‘This is our new rehabilitation programme,’ Doctor Stewart explained. ‘We show them the beauty of the day time world, the human world, show them why they should respect humans rather than think of them as cattle.’

‘Is it working?’ I asked, slightly transfixed by the projection.

‘We’re beginning next week,’ Doctor Stewart said, also looking at the sunrise, with a rather greedy look on his face. ‘I have good feelings about it.’ He closed the door and I was momentarily dazzled. I thought about what Jarl had said, what Alex had said, that they couldn’t be controlled.

Not for the first time, I wondered if Project forty-five really knew what they were doing. Looking at beautiful sunsets was one thing, but these creatures were something else, in many ways they were stronger than us, why would they want to be like us. They were supposedly immortal, wasn’t that the ultimate goal? It hurt my head to think of it too long, but I did wonder whether Doctor Stewart had thought about it, whether it kept him awake at night.

‘Now let me show you something else you won’t have seen before,’ he pushed me by the shoulder again, his hand clamped firmly on it, there was no escape from him, I assumed he was doing this on purpose, that Lisa had told him where I was going.

There was a chapel in the building, Doctor Stewart led me into a large white room with an altar at the front. A white angel figure holding candles in outstretched arms. Benches were set up around the altar and several workers were seated on them in silent prayer.

‘I assume Lisa told you my theories on religion,’ Doctor Stewart said.

‘Fascinating,’ I said, half genuinely.

‘I know you went to the church in the town,’ Doctor Stewart went on enthusiastically, ‘so you didn’t know about the chapel here. I set it up after exploring my theories. I can monitor which workers have been spending time with certain Vampires and then follow how much time they spend here.’

I stared at him, I had never had faith, but a religious person would use his theories as proof of a God. ‘Do the Vampires fear this place?’ I asked.

‘Strangely, yes,’ The Doctor went on. He seemed to read my mind, ‘all about evolution my dear friend,’ he said, ‘I know what you’re thinking but science backs everything up, they only fear this place because it’s wired into their systems. Of course there are workers here who believe differently.’ He pointed to the people praying, ‘there are those who haven’t been affected, and they still find much comfort here.’ He looked around with a somewhat wistful look, as if religious people were beneath him.

‘I know you’ve been going through a lot,’ he was obviously trying to sound like a friendly uncle. ‘So you might want to stay here a while and think.’ He smiled sympathetically, then my heart leapt, as he turned away, looking at his pager, he was leaving me alone.

I waited until his coat had disappeared around the corner, and then I ran. I ran as if I were fleeing from something that would kill me, that would catch up with me the second I stopped. I crashed into several workers on the way, they shouted at me in French, but I kept running.

There was only that one goal, and through I ran blindly my feet took me there, my lungs burnt from the effort. Until I ran into someone who wouldn’t move out of my way, my whole left side hurt from the impact. The slight smell of something rotten hit me, I had ran into Mark.

The first thing I did was take a step back and make sure I wasn’t alone with him. He was still so skinny he looked like he would break, but it had felt like running into steel. There were two harassed looking workers standing next to him, I breathed a sigh of relief.

‘I’m sorry about the last time we met,’ the words spilled over each other as though he had to get them out as fast as he could. ‘I was in a dark place.’

I glanced at the workers next to him. ‘And now?’

He shrugged, ‘they caught me trying to escape,’ he said blank faced, ‘doesn’t mean I won’t try again.’

‘Why would you try to escape?’

‘I want to walk into the sun,’ he was still blank faced. Then he leaned in closer and the two workers flinched. ‘I know where you’re going,’ he said, ‘don’t go.’

‘I could say the same thing to you,’ I raised an eyebrow, he looked so ill, like his skin was disappearing back into his skull, sticking so tightly to the bones.

‘I killed someone I loved,’ Mark said, ‘why doesn’t anyone else recognise I should be punished.’

I stared at him, he was right of course, an eye for an eye, it was just so strange to see it his way. ‘Everyone thinks you’re different,’ I said, ‘but there have been others like you.’

‘Probably,’ Mark said. He shrugged. He was still blank faced as he was led back to his room, strangely I wished him luck, he was killing himself by starving anyway. I wondered how he knew where I was going, and that’s when I remembered, and all other thoughts crashed out of my mind.

I rushed through the familiar corridors, only thinking of her, only imagining walking through that door and touching her skin. Wild images flooded through me, her skin against mine, my hands on her. I felt her calling me like a siren, sitting there in her cage, ready.

I shoved angry workers away from me, crashed through doors, not caring, only focused on that one moment, only remembering my hand opening the door. I had never felt so much adrenaline course through me, it was terrifying and exhilarating. My heart began to sting and burn as I ran.

 Eventually I banged through the door into my viewing room, as I had come to call it. I landed in a heap on the floor in front of the glass. I could see her from there, just slightly. She was so still, with her hands against the glass, watching me so closely, lips lightly parted. In that moment, I thought I’d died, I felt my heart stop for just a moment.

Scrambling to my feet, all my tired aches melted away, looking into her soft blue eyes, it all vanished, all my memories and pain. I forgot where I was, looking at her. This room became the only thing in the universe, and her the only person within it.

Still holding her eyes on mine, I grabbed the doorknob with such force I nearly pulled the whole thing off. The door swung open with a bang on the opposite wall. I think I ran to her, I don’t remember much after the bang of the door. It’s strange when we do terrible things, we always find a way to block them out, or to make them seem less terrible in our own minds. We try to rationalise, to blame something else, someone else.

Deep down I probably do remember, but when I try and think only a few facts come to be clearly. I remember touching her, her skin like the most perfect silk. I remember I wanted so much more, my hands ran over her face, my mind delirious knowing I had finally achieved this thing I had wanted so long. I pressed my lips on hers just for a moment and she kissed me back. All those thoughts seemed confirmed with that small sweet peck on the lips.

Her lips wouldn’t open to me, and I suddenly became confused, I pushed harder and she pushed back. She didn’t want this? But she had been trying to get me here all along. Suddenly I was angry, I moved my hands to her waist, trying to get a response from her. I’ve never been an expert on women but those eyes, the way we sat watching each other, how could I have been wrong?

She was so strong, stronger than a normal girl her size ever would’ve been. That only made me angrier, only made me push harder. She toppled off the chair with a crash, actively crawling away from me. My confused and angry mind passed the next few seconds in a haze until a powerful crack stopped me. Numb, I looked down and saw the bone sticking out of my arm. Then I blacked out