Vampires: The Recent Undead Part 19

I was hoping it would be Jerome.

"Of everybody who died in the last couple of years, who was the strongest?"

I blinked, not sure it was a trick question. "Jerome?"

"Besides Jerome."

"I guess-probably Tommy Barnes." Tommy was no teenager; he'd been in his thirties when he'd kicked it, and he'd been a big, mean, tough dude even the other big, mean, tough dudes had given a wide berth. He'd died in a bar fight, I'd heard. Knifed from behind. He'd have snapped the neck off of anybody who'd tried it to his face.

"Big Tom? Yeah, he'd do." Dad nodded thoughtfully. "All right, then. We're bringing him back."

The last person on Earth I'd want to bring back from the grave would be Big Tommy Barnes. He'd been crazy-bada.s.s alive. I could only imagine death wouldn't have improved his temper.

But I nodded. "Show me."

Dad took off his leather jacket, and then stripped off his s.h.i.+rt. In contrast to the sun-weathered skin of his arms, face, and neck, his chest was fish-belly white, and it was covered with tattoos. I remembered some of them, but not all the ink was old.

He'd recently had our family portrait tattooed over his heart.

I forgot to breathe for a second, staring at it. Yeah, it was crude, but those were the lines of Mom's face, and Alyssa's. I didn't realize, until I saw them, that I'd nearly forgotten how they looked.

Dad looked down at the tat. "I needed to remind myself," he said.

My throat was so dry that it clicked when I swallowed. "Yeah." My own face was there, frozen in indigo blue at the age of maybe sixteen. I looked thinner, and even in tattoo form I looked more hopeful. More sure.

Dad held out his right arm, and I realized that there was more new ink.

And this stuff was moving.

I took a step back. There were dense, strange symbols on his arm, all in standard tattoo ink, but there was nothing standard about what the tats were doing-namely, they were revolving slowly like a DNA helix up and down the axis of his arm, under the skin. "Christ, Dad-"

"Had it done in Mexico," he said. "There was an old priest there, he knew things from the Aztecs. They had a way to bring back the dead, so long as they hadn't been gone for more than two years, and were in decent condition otherwise. They used them as ceremonial warriors." Dad flexed his arm, and the tattoos flexed with him. "This is part of what does it."

I felt sick and cold now. This had moved way past what I knew. I wished wildly that I could show this to Claire; she'd probably be fascinated, full of theories and research.

She'd know what to do about it.

I swallowed hard and said, "And the other part?"

"That's where you come in," Dad said. He pulled his T-s.h.i.+rt on again, hiding the portrait of our family. "I need you to prove you're up for this, Shane. Can you do that?"

I gulped air and finally, convulsively nodded. Play for time. I was telling myself. Play for time, think of something you can do. Short of chopping off my own father's arm, though. . . .

"This way," Dad said. He went to the back of the room. There was a door there, and he'd added a new, st.u.r.dy lock to it that he opened with a key from his jacket.

Jerome gave me that creepy laugh again, and I felt my skin s.h.i.+ver into gooseflesh.

"Right. This might be a shock," Dad said. "But trust me, it's for a good cause."

He swung open the door and flipped on a harsh overhead light.

It was a windowless cell, and inside, chained to the floor with thick silver-plated links, was a vampire.

Not just any vampire. Oh no, that would have been too easy for my father.

It was Michael Gla.s.s, my best friend.

Michael looked-white. Paler than pale. I'd never seen him look like that. There were burns on his arms, big raised welts where the silver was touching, and there were cuts. He was leaking slow trickles of blood on the floor.

His eyes were usually blue, but now they were red, bright red. Scary monster red, like nothing human.

But it was still my best friend's voice whispering, "Help."

I couldn't answer him. I backed up and slammed the door.

Jerome was laughing again, so I turned around, picked up a chair, and smashed him in the face with it. I could have hit him with a powder puff, for all the good it did. He grabbed the chair, broke the thick wood with a snap of his hands, and threw it back at me. I stumbled, and would have gone down except for the handy placement of a wall.

"Stop. Don't touch my son," my father said. Jerome froze like he'd run into a brick wall, hands working like he still wanted to rip out my throat.

I turned on my dad and snarled, "That's my friend!"

"No, that's a vampire," he said. "The youngest one. The weakest one. The one most of them won't come running to rescue."

I wanted to scream. I wanted to punch somebody. I felt pressure building up inside, and my hands were shaking. "What the h.e.l.l are you doing to him?"

I didn't know who he was, this guy in the leather jacket looking at me. He looked like a tired, middle-aged biker, with his straggly graying hair, his sallow, seamed face, his scars and tats. Only his eyes seemed like they belonged to my dad, and even then, only for a second.

"It's a vampire," he said. "It's not your friend, Shane. You need to be real clear about that-your friend is dead, just like Jerome here, and you can't let that get in the way of what needs to be done. When we go to war, we get them all. All. No exceptions."

Michael had played at our house. My dad had tossed a ball around with him and pushed his swing and served him cake at birthday parties.

And my dad didn't care about any of that anymore.

"How?" My jaw felt tight. I was grinding my teeth, and my hands were shaking. "How did you do this? What are you doing to him?"

"I'm bleeding it and storing the blood, just like they do us humans," Dad said. "It's a two-part spell-the tattoo, and the blood of a vampire. It's just a creature, Shane. Remember that."

Michael wasn't a creature. Not just a creature, anyway; neither was what Dad had pulled out of Jerome's grave, for that matter. Jerome wasn't just a mindless killing machine. Mindless killing machines didn't fill their spare time with the adventures of Dorothy and Toto. They didn't even know they had spare time. I could see it in Jerome's wide, yellowed eyes now. The pain. The terror. The anger.

"Do you want to be here?" I asked him, straight out.

For just that second, Jerome looked like a boy. A scared, angry, hurt little boy. "No," he said. "Hurts."

I wasn't going to let this happen. Not to Michael, oh h.e.l.l no. And not even to Jerome.

"Don't you go all soft on me, Shane. I've done what needed doing," Dad said. "Same as always. You used to be weak. I thought you'd manned up."

Once, that would have made me try to prove it by fighting something. Jerome, maybe. Or him.

I turned and looked at him and said, "I really would be weak, if I fell for that tired bulls.h.i.+t, Dad." I raised my hands, closed them into fists, and then opened them again and let them fall. "I don't need to prove anything to you. Not anymore."

I walked out the front door, out to the dust-filmed black car. I popped the trunk and took out a crowbar.

Dad watched me from the door, blocking my way back into the house. "What the h.e.l.l are you doing?"

"Stopping you."

He threw a punch as I walked up the steps toward him. This time, I saw it coming, saw it telegraphed clearly in his face before the impulse ever reached his fist.

I stepped out of the way, grabbed his arm, and shoved him face-first into the wall. "Don't." I held him there, pinned like a bug on a board, until I felt his muscles stop fighting me. The rest of him never would. "We're done, Dad. Over. This is over. Don't make me hurt you, because G.o.d, I really want to."

I should have known he wouldn't just give up.

The second I let him go, he twisted, jammed an elbow into my abused stomach, and forced me backward. I knew his moves by now, and sidestepped an attempt to hook my feet out from under me.

"Jerome!" Dad yelled. "Stop my-"

The end of that sentence was going to be son, and I couldn't let him put Jerome back in the game or this was over before it started.

So I punched my father full in the face. Hard. With all the rage and resentment that I'd stored up over the years, and all the anguish, and all the fear. The shock rattled every bone in my body, and my whole hand sent up a red flare of distress. My knuckles split open.

Dad hit the floor, eyes rolling back in his head. I stood there for a second, feeling oddly cold and empty, and saw his eyelids flutter.

He wouldn't be out for long.

I moved quickly across the room, past Jerome, who was still frozen in place, and opened the door to the cell. "Michael?" I crouched down across from him, and my friend shook gold hair back from his white face and stared at me with eerie, hungry eyes.

I held up my wrist, showing him the bracelet. "Promise me, man. I get you out of here, no biting. I love you, but no."

Michael laughed hoa.r.s.ely. "Love you too, bro. Get me the h.e.l.l out of here."

I set to work with the crowbar, pulling up floorboards and gouging the eyebolts out for each set of chains. I'd been right; my dad was too smart to make chains out of solid silver. Too soft, too easy to break. These were silver-plated-good enough to do the job on Michael, if not one of the older vamps.

I only had to pull up the first two; Michael's vampire strength took care of yanking the others from the floor.

Michael's eyes flared red when I leaned closer, trying to help him up, and before I knew what was happening, he'd wrapped a hand around my throat and slammed me down, on my back, on the floor. I felt the sting of sharp nails in my skin, and saw his eyes fixed on the cut on my head.

"No biting," I said again, faintly. "Right?"

"Right," Michael said, from somewhere out beyond Mars. His eyes were glowing like storm lanterns, and I could feel every muscle in his body trembling. "Better get that cut looked at. Looks bad."

He let me up, and moved with about half his usual vampire speed to the door. Dad might not let Jerome have at me, but he wasn't going to hold back with Michael, and Michael was-at best-half his normal strength right now. Not exactly a fair fight.

"Michael," I said, and put my back against the wall next to him. "We go together, straight to the window. You get out, don't wait for me. The sun should be down far enough that you can make it to the car." I gathered up a handful of silver chain and wrapped it around my hand. "Don't even think about arguing right now."

He sent me an are-you-kidding look, and nodded.

We moved fast, and together. I got in Jerome's way and delivered a punch straight from the shoulder right between his teeth, reinforced with silver-plated metal.

I only intended to knock him back, but Jerome howled and stumbled, hands up to ward me off. It was like years fell away, and all of a sudden we were back in junior high again-him the most popular bully in school, me finally getting enough size and muscle to stand up to him. Jerome had made that same girly gesture the first time I'd hit back.

It threw me off.

A crossbow bolt fired from the far corner of the living room hissed right over my head and slammed to a vibrating stop in the wooden wall. "Stop!" Dad ordered hoa.r.s.ely. He was on his knees, but he was up and very, very angry. He was also reloading, and the next shot wouldn't be a warning.

"Get out!" I screamed at Michael, and if he was thinking about staging a reenactment of the gunfight at the OK Corral, he finally saw sense. He jumped through the nearest window in a hail of gla.s.s and hit the ground running. I'd been right. (The sun was down, or close enough that it wouldn't hurt him too badly.

He made it to the car, opened the driver's side door, and slid inside. I heard the roar as the engine started. "Shane!" he yelled. "Come on!"

"In a second," I yelled back. I stared at my father, and the moving tattoo. He had the crossbow aimed right at my chest. I twirled the crowbar in one hand, the silver chain in the other. "So," I said, watching my father. "Your move, Dad. What now? You want me to do a cage match with Dead Jerome? Would that make you happy?"

My dad was staring not at me, but at Dead Jerome, who was cowering in the corner. I'd hurt him, or the silver had; half his face was burned and rotting, and he was weeping in slow, retching sobs.

I knew the look Dad was giving him. I'd seen it on my father's face more times than I could count. Disappointment.

"My son," Dad said in disgust. "You ruin everything."

"I guess Jerome's more your son than I am," I said. I walked toward the front door. I wasn't going to give my father the satisfaction of making me run. I knew he had the crossbow in his hands, and I knew it was loaded.

I knew he was sighting on my back.

I heard the trigger release, and the ripped-silk hiss of wood traveling through air. I didn't have time to be afraid, only-like my dad-bitterly disappointed.

The crossbow bolt didn't hit me. Didn't even miss me.

When I turned, at the door, I saw that he'd put the crossbow bolt, tipped with silver, through Jerome's skull. Jerome slid silently down to the floor. Dead. Finally, mercifully dead.

The Wizard of Oz fell face down next to his hand.

"Son," my dad said, and put the crossbow aside. "Please, don't go. I need you. I really do."

I shook my head.

"This thing-it'll only last another few days," he said. "The tattoo. It's already fading. I don't have time for this, Shane. It has to be now."

"Then I guess you're out of luck."

He snapped the crossbow up again.

I ducked to the right, into the parlor, jumped the wreckage of a couch, and landed on the cracked, curling floor of the old kitchen. It smelled foul and chemical in here, and I spotted a fish tank on the counter, filled with cloudy liquid. Next to it was a car battery.

DIY silver plating equipment, for the chains.

There was also a 1950s-era round-shouldered fridge, rattling and humming.

I opened it.

Dad had stored Michael's blood in bottles, old dirty milk bottles likely scavenged from the trash heap in the corner. I grabbed all five bottles and threw them one at a time out the window, aiming for a big upthrusting rock next to a tree.