Chapter 87

~~Damien~~

He looked at the picture again, then put the phone away. Gulping, he pulled the phone out again, and looked at the picture. She was so beautiful, and fun, and joyful, and overwhelmingly sexual. The frizzy red hair, bouncy and big, her soft face and pale skin, her golden eyes, it was all gorgeous. Of course, she knew she had large breasts, and in classic Dolareido fashion, had no issue using them to get what she wanted; in this case, him. Lucky him.

He was damn glad she left her cozy little town, and came to Slut City. Apparently she was a city girl to the bone, despite where she grew up, and came to Dolareido to both feed her horror, but also indulge her more human desires. The internet had corrupted her. He was glad it did. He shouldn’t have been, but he was.

He stared at how she cupped one of her breasts, grip gently milking, and how its heavier bottom half filled and overflowed her hand. The pink, large nipple, milky white skin, and—

“Mister Burksen?”

He snapped his head up, and Maria raised a brow as she met his gaze. He must have had a strange look on his face, with the way she showed confusion on hers.

“Uh, yes, Madam Turio?” Putting the phone away, he looked down at the table, the computer it held, and the books beside it. Old books, written by various people throughout history. They were in English, but old English was difficult to read, with dead words, a lack of words, strange symbols, and a host of nuance that he didn’t get. But it was his job to try and digitize the old world into the new world.

Lucas would have balked at that. Recording the words of Sanctified Kindred on a computer? Madness. A true sin against the Lord himself. If they continued, the wrath of God would rain upon them, and the ten plagues of Egypt would destroy them. Locusts would scour the land, and people’s skin would blister with boils.

The man’s words had enraptured Damien, at the time. His impressive control of voice was moving, enthralling, and the man moved Damien to action in his name, and His name, like guiding a fish with a shiny, shimmering hook.

The memory was bitter, now.

“You look distracted.”

“Ah, I am sorry, Madam Turio. My personal life has thrown some twists my way.” Nodding, grimacing, he tried to focus on the task at hand. The Invictus lived in the new world more than the other covenants, at least in Dolareido. They digitized things, recorded them, as long as specific words weren’t used. ‘Kindred’ and ‘Masquerade’ were no-go words, or any obvious use of ‘vampire’ that would implicate their kind. Talk of paranormal content was to be adjusted, and works that could not be adjusted were to be marked for storage. The journal of a powerful Ventrue discussing how his long age had allowed him to chronicle the growth of a society, could be adjusted and digitized. The almost prophetic words of a vampire infected with Malkavia, that the vampire had been sane — or insane — enough to write down, were too dangerous and problematic to alter. Such words were invaluable though, and were to be stored, left as paper books only, and placed inside a vault.

“Personal life?” She smiled, and Damien froze. Maria never smiled. “Do tell.”

Do tell. She cut through the ‘personal life’ barrier with as much tact as a nuke, and now he was left helpless to deny her, unless he upset her. More so, he couldn’t lie, lest she eventually find out and punish him.

He hoped he hadn’t traded Lucas for Maria. The two were similar in a way, and of the faith. There was a definite possibility that both of them had similar dispositions, and Lucas’s hidden totalitarian motivations could exist within her as well. Lucas also considered the personal lives of his flock to be his business, as the Lancea et Sanctum and the Sanctified devoted every part of themselves to the faith. Was Maria pursuing more knowledge about him in pursuit of that, or was she simply being curious ... forcefully?

In either regard, she was an elder, his boss, and was the building block he’d use to rebirth the Lancea et Sanctum in Dolareido. He had to appease her.

“I ... seem to have entered a ... relationship, I think, with Fiona.”

“Oh.” A hint of anger crossed her face, before vanishing. She was reading her tablet, and was delving into some old, forgotten words of languages few could read. Secret scriptures from the Lancea et Sanctum’s storage, stories of dead worlds, letters long beyond mosts ability to decipher. “Tell me more.”

“Are ... are you sure?”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Because probably the only man to ever love you is dead, and it no doubt weighed on you like no pain anyone could ever understand?

“We’re just younglings, going through ... juvenile feelings. I didn’t think that’d interest you.”

“It does.”

“ ... very well.” Ok, how to talk about this. “Fiona is ... a silly girl, and—”

“Woman, Damien. She’s a woman. She may be a young woman, but a woman nonetheless.”

“Woman. She seems to be attracted to ... tormented types.” Far as Damien could tell, Eric was a bitter man, though for far different reasons.

Maria chuckled, and turned the page. “Ah yes, that sort. Many young women are. Such a motif has been known for many for centuries. Bram Stoker’s Dracula painted the vampire as a tormented soul, broken by his pain, and overwhelmed with passion for his obsession. Or Erik in the Phantom of the Opera. A man with drive, with grit and determination, moved to commit heinous acts in the name of his obsession.”

“And ... women are attracted to this?”

“Women are attracted to powerful men, Damien. Many mistake this for simple things like money, or status, and while there is truth to that, it is also proxy to the personality trait that is so alluring. The ability to play an instrument is an example. Yes, there is attraction to the status that comes with someone being a musician. But, a man proving he has the grit and determination to master — or at least learn — a skill that most cannot, is alluring. A man in uniform garners similar reactions for similar reasons; not only is his life in order, but he has shown he can pursue something to completion, and bear fruit. A man who is not passive, but active, determined to acquire what he wants, and has the mental fortitude to push through barriers to acquire it, is beguiling to any woman.”

He stroked his chin as he looked at Maria. She didn’t lift her head, eyes still on her tablet, but he doubted she was reading it. Doubtless her mind was on her relationship with Lucas now, and that made every word he said now dangerous.

“I hadn’t thought of it like that. I just assumed women ... uh...”

“Desire money, and drama?”

“Well, yes, that.”

The corpse woman chuckled, and scrolled to another page. “There is that, as well,” she said. His turn to chuckle. Maria, making a joke. This was progress in their strange relationship. “It is the combination of that grit in personality, and the darkness that comes with tormented characters, the drama, that is enthralling to young women like Fiona. In older women, they find the dark, tormented characters juvenile. Erik compared to Raoul, in Phantom of the Opera, for example. The tormented soul versus the stable man? With maturity comes understanding that the drama of a dark, brooding man, is not healthy, and a relationship with such a soul is doomed to failure.”

He sighed at that, and sat up straight, looking at Maria with more obvious body language. “Then what hope is there for any Kindred?” Vampires, overwhelmingly so, were tormented to some degree or another, ripped in two by the struggle of their human side, and their new Beastly side.

“Touché.” That got her. She nodded, and set the tablet down on her table as she turned her chair to look at him. “But we have an advantage. We live for centuries, and while our minds may be trapped, unchanging, wisdom can still be learned. Perhaps a dark, tormented soul can also be stable and reliable? Julias is an example of such a man. He has grown considerably in the century I’ve known him, but still, he is a tormented man.”

“He seems a lot happier now that he has Beatrice. But, also weighed down with his new responsibilities.”

“And yet, he not only bears his burdens, but engages Miss Damor in both emotional and sexual gratification. He is a rare breed.”

Damien nodded. If there was a Kindred in Dolareido people could consider a success story, it was Julias Mire. The great Viktor Honors, replaced by his rising childe and prodigy Julias Mire, who had sired a childe fit to someday replace him, the star Jack Terry. And like Honors, Mire had a dark side, something that used to torment him from his past.

“What about Mister Terry?” His relationship with Antoinette didn’t fit Maria’s descriptions, as far as he could tell.

“I did not think of Mister Terry as a tormented soul, young as he is, with as boring a first life he had.”

If only she knew how untrue that was. The kid was plenty tormented, by Viktor’s ghost, by Angela’s face, by his kills, by his first life’s mistakes, by many things. Like sire like childe, Jack would go through pains similar to Julias, and his torment had only just begun, if it took Julias a century to overcome his pain.

Better to not tarnish the boy’s image for Maria, though. Damien smiled and nodded. “I meant, in regards to the dynamic between him and the Prince.” If Maria was willing to educate him on more aspects of romance and whatnot, he’d take her up on her offer. Zero personal experience was a terrifying problem to have; fear of the unknown was universal.

Not that the corpse woman was going to have an unbiased view on romance, women, men, or anything in that realm, but her wisdom was valuable nonetheless.

“The Prince is unique, but there are women who prefer their men to be less ... rigid, in their pursuits. If the man is happy to let the woman drive, so to speak, and the woman has the desire to be the one driving, then there is no issue. Jack does not feel the need to press his desires on others, unlike most men, and Antoinette does not feel a need to try and minimize conflict, unlike most women. She is content to be the...” The elder set the tablet down, raised her hands, and air quoted. “The ‘man’ in the relationship.”

Damien choked, doing his best to suppress the laughter that struggled to free itself. Seeing the small corpse woman, her cracked pale skin, her ancient white dress, her long black hair that forever had some knots and twists to it, seeing her air quote was too much. And it earned a small smile from her in return.

“But,” she continued, “make no mistake. If Mister Terry did not possess a drive, a will, to pursue the things he considered important to him, he would hold no attraction to the Prince. Such weak, flaccid men, with no drive of their own, are nothing more than children, to be spoon fed and protected, not be drawn to sexually.”

That made sense, he supposed. While Jack and Antoinette’s relationship was a bit unique, and the elder vampire was the ‘man’ in that relationship, dare he use the word, Jack did not lack drive. He was simply comfortable, and perhaps happier, to let Antoinette be the dominant one. But, what did dominant entail? The term seemed antiquated, in a modern context. Perhaps it wasn’t though, and he, spending fifty years living under rocks, simply didn’t understand how the gender dynamics applied in the new world.

“I—” He jerked in place as Maria’s phone began to ring. Someone had to be daring to call Maria an hour before sunrise, when she had already retired to her chamber for the oncoming day.

She answered it, offering a quiet snarl as she did. “This better be important. It ... I see. Are—oh. Then ... yes, we must take care of this immediately. Send every thrall in the area to either the hospital, or to investigate the possible causes of the power loss. We do not have long.” She put down the phone, stood up, and turned to him. “Damien, a messenger crow has arrived at the Invictus headquarters. Eight minutes before that, a massive blackout struck South Side, and three city blocks are without power. The South Center Hospital is within the center.”

“The hunters are attacking the hospital.”

“Yes, in all likelihood. The crow was sent by Mister Terry. We have attempted to contact our thralls in the area, but none of them are responding. And since Mister Terry has not called us himself, I can only assume the hunters have somehow blocked cell reception, and other digital communication methods as well.”

Oh no. Oh shit. After what the hunters accomplished in the tunnels tonight, he could only assume they’d managed to use similar methods to disrupt power and communications on such a large scale. He’d told Maria about the barriers the hunters had used already, but none of that information had been circulated yet, having only told her half an hour ago. There was only an hour until sunrise, and they hadn’t expected anything to happen in the single hour he’d been at the Cathedral. Mistake.

“What do Mister MacDonald and Mister Mire say?”

“MacDonald is currently in North Side, punishing some Uratha and Kindred for being uppity. Mire is with Terry, at the hospital, most likely.”

“That ... is a problem.” The night had gone from bad to worse in a very small amount of time. The high of his time with Fiona, the thrill of her body, the joy in the picture she’d sent him, all gone in a flash as he realized hunters were attacking the hospital, likely in a bid to either kill Jack’s mother, or capture the boy who sat with her. If they went during the night, now, it had to be because of Jack’s presence, and Mire being there made it all the more problematic. If one of the Invictus council was captured, the fallout would be catastrophic.

“I am calling MacDonald now, and we will see what can be done, but with so short a time before sunrise, I am hesitant to send Kindred.” Maria stood up and began pacing, phone to her ear. “But...” Her eyes fell for a second before looking to him.

Damien nodded, got up, tested his busted, wrapped ankle, tested his aching hand, and found them functional. He grabbed his sword, one of the pistols Maria kept in her personal chamber, and started for the gate.

~~Julias~~

The dark hall awaited them. The patient’s rooms leaked light from under their doors and small, vertical windows, but most of them provided only the small light of the low-light mode, or the small amount of light from the machinery within. It meant the hallway was pretty damn dark from end to end and around the turn. The switches he flicked where the hallway looped and connected to, the main room where elevator opened up to and where the staff rooms were, had turned all the hallway’s lights off in the East Wing. Perfect for vampires.

Lights in the distance flickered, moving with the telltale snap speed of flashlights. There they were. Julias moved forward slowly, staying half crouched, gun down and held in both hands. The moment one of the hunters poked their head out, he’d shoot. No, wait, it might not be a hunter. He had to at least put half a second into identifying the target first. If they had a gun, that put the chances it was one of the hunters up to ninety-nine percent. If they didn’t have a gun, who the fuck were they and what were they doing in the East Wing? Maybe a nurse or orderly hadn’t heard about the raid, found an emergency flashlight after the lights in the hallway went out, and were walking around inspecting the patients.

He kept his shoulder to the wall, and whenever he came to a door, he used the indent it provided to create some cover. Maybe three inches deep into the wall wasn’t exactly enough cover for a gunfight, but it was something. And if it did turn into a gunfight, he could open the door and step into the room. With a patient room opposite of him, Jack did the same thing, and small as he was, he could fit a lot better into the three inch groove. But would the kid know to not shoot until they at least confirmed it was the hunters? It might have been Miss Jez Tummer, the thrall orderly.

They moved quickly. Into a doorway slot, then the next one, then the next one, always prepared to swing it open if they needed to dive in. Samantha was at the end of the hall, and based on how the flashlight was moving, the hunters were coming toward it, having entered the U-shaped hallway from the other entrance. They would run into each other, face to face eventually, and when that happened the bullets were going to fly.

“How long?” a voice said, a woman. A glance Jack’s way showed the boy tense horribly, and his gun hand trembled for a few seconds before it steeled itself. Angela’s voice, then.

“Two minutes,” another said.

“You have one.”

“Why ask if you already know the limit. The fuck is this, Star Trek?” The man’s voice sparked some rage from Jack as well, but nothing nearly as visceral. It wasn’t Jeremiah, then.

“Just get to it. They’re coming.”

“We don’t know who’s coming. Could just be—”

“Someone turned off the lights. Who the fuck else would do that except for them? They’re coming.”

Sounded like Angela knew Jack and Julias were in the building, then. They must have decided to raid the hospital at night, knowing that, and because of that. Cocky mother fuckers.

“Think the woman will get through the portal alive?”

“Machine’s working her lungs. We can do that ourselves with a manual ventilator.”

“Ever rip a ventilator out of a person before?”

“No. Worst case scenario, she dies, and we continue with the original plan. Now shut up and get this done.” The click of someone checking the slide on their pistol echoed through the quiet hall. Angela was just around the corner, and from the sounds of it, she’d already found Samantha. Shit.

He had to act, and act quickly. Jack no doubt heard the woman’s words, and if Julias guessed right, the kid was going to respond in the next five seconds. The hunters were doing something, something involving a portal and Jack’s mother. That wasn’t enough information to act on, but they had to act anyway.

So, Julias nodded to Jack, and the boy nodded in return. Now or never.

Jack slid up to the end of hall, back to the wall, and he didn’t poke his head out or expose himself. He waited, and Julias moved forward along with him, still on the outside wall of the hall. If Jack stuck his head out first, Julias would be in a weird position where he’d have to use the inside wall, the corner Jack was using, for cover, while he was still on the outside wall. It’d be better to use the door at the end of the hall, where the hall turned on the end of the U shape.

He nodded to Jack, pointed to himself, the door at the end, and waited for kid’s return nod. Jack confirmed, and readied himself, gun up, waiting, and Julias readied a dash. He was going to be both a distraction, and the following fire when the hunters left themselves open to Jack’s attack.

What a fun way to spend a night with his childe, murdering people.

Time came to a near standstill, everything slowing down, as Kindred reflexes kicked into overdrive. Human adrenaline had nothing on the power of vitae, and while Julias was no Mekhet or Daeva, he could use Celerity enough to manage some speed and inhuman reflexes. He drove his weight forward, and came down on the side of his leg and hip, a sliding kick aimed for the door. Facing the hunters, he scanned the group of them as best he could in the fraction of a second it took him to reach the door, foot smashing into it, momentum driving his torso back upward, and hand slamming the handle down and open so the door swung open with the momentum.

Six hunters, in the hallway, and the door to Samantha’s room was open. One of them had an assault rifle, one of them had a shotgun, the rest had pistols, and while one of them was down on their knees by the floor, Angela stood over him, pistol in right hand, and her fake eye glinting with reflections of the flashlights.

The thrall Jez was on her knees, hair held by Angela’s free hand, and she looked battered, beaten. One of her arms was broken, and she looked almost unconscious, dazed and listing. Fucking assholes.

The hunters managed to look his way as he slammed open the door, only for Jack to poke his head around the corner, crouched, and begin to unload his weapon. If there was ever any hope for this to not escalate, Jack crushed it. But the kid saw the opening, six hunters standing around, and Julias had already told Jack they were going to kill them. It was how he expected this to go, but, seeing his childe not hesitate, not flinch, not even say a word, just unload bullets at the humans, with every intent of killing them then and there, was a painful thing to see.

The bullets crashed into the air with a loud crunch, and fell to the floor. Jack reloaded his next magazine and sank every bullet he could at the standing hunters, taking less than a second to reload, and only two more to empty the gun once again. And again, each bullet slammed into the air in front of the kneeling hunter. The hunter’s eyes were wide, blatant shock painted there, and he breathed deep a sigh of relief as he put away a small, black bag.

A trail of black soot ran across the floor from wall to wall, a line that separated the two Kindred and the seven humans. The bullets fell on that line, beside it, on the side closer to the vampires.

“Holy shit,” the man said, standing up. A small man, for a hunter, with a shag of red hair, and a scar across his cheek. “A second sooner and we’d be splattered.”

Laughing, Angela came over to the black line, dragging the thrall behind her. Jez didn’t struggle, and if she wasn’t unconscious before, she was drifting into it now.

“Jack,” she said, “how nice to see you again.”

Growling, Jack kept his back to the corner, and stuck his head out for longer than was safe. The hunters didn’t take the opportunity to shoot at him; the barrier was likely blocking them as well. Julias stuck his head out from the room he hid within, and stood up as he realized his hunch was correct. But he wasn’t willing to bet his life on it yet, and he kept most of his body inside the room he’d opened. The room was empty thankfully, sparing him having to worry about a patient, unconscious or otherwise.

“Angela,” Jack said, the venom in his voice palpable.

“And you are Julias Mire, childe of Viktor Honors the murderer.” And, like Jack, the venom in her voice could fill a swimming pool. “I’ve met a few hunters that have tried to take a shot at him, you know.”

Ah yes, the history of his sire coming to light, bringing all the pain expected with it. Wonderful.

“Considering the things I’ve heard, you’re the monster in the room, Angela.” He nodded past her, toward the woman she was dragging.

“I’m not going to waste my sympathy on a thrall, vampire.”

Why? The Vinculum wasn’t permanent, and neither was vitae addiction. If they threw a thrall into a cell for a few months, or a year at most, both could likely be broken. He almost told her that, but giving the hunters new tools they could use to kill Kindred was not a good idea, even if it could possibly endear them to the hunters a bit more.

“You killed my sister,” Jack said through clenched teeth.

“What? I didn’t touch your sister, or your mother.” She nodded toward the door. “I heard about it on the news, same as you did, I imagine. I’m taking advantage of an opportunity someone else created.”

Julias ground his teeth, as did Jack. She was lying. He’d been playing poker for too many decades to not recognize a bluff, a confident one, but a bluff nonetheless.

Did she know they wouldn’t believe her? Probably, which meant she wasn’t lying for them, she was lying for her troupe, to keep them in the dark about her activities. A possible opportunity, a way to show these hunters their leader wasn’t the beacon of trust they probably thought of her as, if they were willing to go to war, and fight for her.

Take advantage of it later, handle the immediate situation now. There was black soot on the floor, and it was probably erecting some sort of magical barrier, invisible but hard as stone. If any sweeper team ran into something like this, he didn’t get to hear about it, having left to go find Jack before the reports were circulated. And knowing his luck, or rather, Jack’s luck as of late, that probably did happen.

“Assuming,” Julias said, “that you didn’t kill Mary or hurt Samantha”—an evil glare from Jack forced a pause from him—”what are you doing here, and with Samantha?”

“I thought that would be obvious. We’re taking her, and either she’ll tell us a way to force Jack to tell us what we want to know, oooorrrr...” She laughed, and reached out to press her gun hand against the invisible barrier. A lot of trust for an invisible wall. “Jack comes with us now, and tells us what we want to know about Azamel.”

“All this for a Begotten,” Julias said, sighing as he stuck his head out a little more. At this point it was pretty clear that the invisible barrier wasn’t going to burst any time soon. “Azamel hasn’t hurt a soul since she’s been here.”

“She’s brought villages, towns, and cities to ruin, vampire. She’ll do it to this one, too, given time. Millions of innocent people here, and they’ll die because you continue to house a monster.”

This time, she wasn’t lying. Julias blinked, and managed a quick glance at Jack to see what his reaction was, but the boy was too busy oozing rage from every pore to notice Julias anymore.

“Has my mom told you yet?” Angela said, grinning at Jack like a hungry hyena. “She tell you what her boss did to mine?”

“ ... Azamel told me.”

“From the mouth of the bitch herself. That’s just the tip of the iceberg, fuckwit. She’s ruined many lives, destroyed so many homes. And I bet you’ve seen her, the real her, the fucking monstrosity she is. You have the god damn nerve to defend her? A fucking twisted, evil re-imagining of a god? You’re all monsters.”

“Angela,” the hunter with the red hair said, “it’s time.”

“Finally. Let’s get this over with.” Angela put her pistol into the holster on her hip, pulled out a knife, and with all the grace of a butcher, slit Jez’s throat.

Julias stood up straight, stepped out of the patient room, and walked up to the barrier. Pistol in hand, he reached out with his other, and pressed fingers against the odd surface. He glared at Angela, met her one good eye with his, and then looked down at the corpse of Jez lying on the cold surface floor of the hospital hall. Angela had cut deep, two inches into the poor woman’s throat. In her dazed state, Jez probably hadn’t even felt it, just faded away in five seconds as all the blood of her body poured out of her.

The other hunters winced. Angela didn’t. She put the knife in her other hand, and redrew her pistol into her right. She didn’t back away from Julias; if anything, she came in closer, and glared up at him.

“We’re going to kill all of you if we have to,” she said. “Or, help us kill Azamel, and you vamps get to live. Viktor’s dead, so Tony’s, so the worst of your kind are off the list. We didn’t come here for vamps from Slut City, we came here to kill a true horror, a monster you can’t possibly understand. We can compromise. Tell us what we want to know about Azamel, help us kill her, and we’ll move on.”

A lie. She smiled when she lied. Subtle, a fidget of the corner of her mouth where she tried to suppress the desire to smile, but it was there. People often had issues suppressing those muscles when they bluffed, especially if they got a thrill out of it. This psychopath of a woman was that sort. She got off on lying, and on being a menace. One look in her eyes, glass one included, was enough to tell him plenty about her, about how she felt about vampires, and how she would get off on seeing them all burn.

She wasn’t a hunter. Hunters often married their job, and many even took it into the pleasure realm, enjoying killing monsters, but there was something else in this woman’s eyes, something insane, something inhuman.

“You killed her.” He nodded down at Jez’s body.

“I did. A thrall’s a thrall, another of your devoted servants. And we need blood.” She nodded toward the redhead. “Get to it, Bill.”

Bill sighed, nodded, and pulled out a small paintbrush. Squatting down by the wall opposite of Samantha’s open door, he dabbed the paintbrush into the blood around his feet, and started painting on the wall.

“Angela, you should get away from them,” Bill said, as he began to paint a circle on the wall. “Ventrue, right? You—”

“I’ll be fine, Bill.” The woman glared at Julias, stared him straight in the eyes, and licked her lips, the hunger for violence blatant on her face. “No Ventrue is dominating my mind. No Daeva or Nos or whateverthefuck who tries is going to get anywhere. Not me.” Like a striking snake, she brought up her blade and stabbed it at his face. His eyes went wide, and every reflex he had demanded he move out of the way. He almost did, before the blade crashed against the barrier, tip slamming into it as if she’d just stabbed rock. “Made you flinch.”

“ ... my childe is right. You are a deranged, sad woman, with a mountain of woes.” And she was right, that he couldn’t dominate her, not with a simple glance at least. Something in her was blocking him, a wall between him and her, and it wasn’t the physical barrier.