Critical Failures II (Caverns and Creatures Book 2) (19 page)

“I’m sorry,” said Julian as diplomatically as he could. “This is –”

“What is the meaning of this?” roared Millard.

Julian found it odd that Millard wasn’t shouting at him and Cooper. His anger seemed to be directed at Katherine. The look on Katherine’s face suggested that she found it just as odd.

Millard’s voice dropped down to a whimper. “You told them, didn’t you?”

It took Katherine a moment to work out Millard’s accusation, but finally the light of understanding shone in her eyes. “Is that what this is about?” She turned on Tim. “Real fucking mature, Tim!” she said. “I told you that in confidence, so that you wouldn’t worry about me!”

Tim looked as confused as his sister had until the implications finally clicked for him as well. “Hang on a second!” said Tim, standing up. “This didn’t have anything to do with your erectile dysfunction! If you must know, we were going to –”

“It’s ours!” Julian said. “Cooper and I are gay for each other. There, I’ve said it.”

All eyes in the room shifted from Julian to Cooper.

“It’s true,” said Cooper. “We’re total queers.” Julian elbowed him in the leg, but it seemed to have no effect. “Nothing I love more than elf man-ass. Isn’t that right, um… Honey?”

Julian buried his face in his hands, too embarrassed to be scared.

Millard fell back into his chair. “I’ve never been so humiliated.”

“Millard, sweety,” Katherine said in as comforting a tone as Julian had ever heard her speak. “These guys are insensitive jerks, but –”

“Silence!” Millard pointed at Katherine. “I’ll deal with you once I’ve dealt with your friends.”

His voice was changing. Something between human and the growl of a bear. His eyes turned red, and his upper and lower canine teeth grew long and sharp. He turned his head slowly toward Julian and Cooper, all the while dragging his elongated fingernails across the tabletop, leaving deep grooves in the wood.

“You think it’s funny?” Millard growled at them. “You come into a man’s house. The man feeds you.” He stepped out from his place at the head of the table, counter-clockwise, toward the other end, where Julian and Cooper stood. “Gives you drink.” He grabbed Stuart’s goblet, still half full of wine, and threw it against the wall. “Extends you every courtesy!”

Snot shot out of Cooper’s nostrils as he failed to suppress a giggle. Everyone looked at him.

“What?” Cooper said defensively. “Come on. Considering the circumstances, it was a poor choice of –”

“Shut up, damn you!” shouted Millard, grabbing a hefty iron candlestick. “For once, I wish you would just… shut… up!” He hurled the candlestick at Cooper’s head. Cooper raised his arms to block it, but it flew right between them and hit him in the face. The dildo clattered to the floor.

“Ow,” said Cooper, rubbing his cheek. “Not cool, man. That could have gone in my eye.”

The candlestick had left a nasty mark on Cooper’s face. Julian guessed that it might have amounted to at least six or seven Hit Points’ worth of damage.

Millard stepped back and gasped. He wrapped his cape tightly around his chest. His eyes were focused on the dildo on the floor, but no longer at the penis end.

“You sneaking little cowards,” he said. “It’s not enough you come into my house and mock me. But you sought to murder me in my sleep as well.”

“In his sleep!” Julian said to himself. “Why didn’t that occur to any of us?

The horror on Millard’s face slowly changed into an evil grin as he turned his head to Katherine. “Oh, sweet Katherine. We shall feast well tonight.” He lunged forward at Cooper.

“Millard!” Katherine cried. “No!”

Millard hit Cooper like a truck, and the two of them flew about six feet through the air before tumbling to the stone floor together. When they stopped rolling, Millard straddled Cooper’s chest, pinning his massive arms to the floor. Vampires must be stronger than they look, because Cooper appeared to be losing the struggle against what appeared to be a relatively weak-looking man. Millard’s irises flashed yellow as he moved his mouth toward the pulsing arteries in Cooper’s neck.

Julian picked up the dildo and clubbed Millard over the head with the penis end. Millard hissed in pain.

“Julian!” Tim shouted. “What are you doing? Use the –”

Whatever else Tim said after that was lost to Julian, as Millard backhanded him in the chest, sending him in a full backflip to belly flop on the floor.
Damn, that was stupid.

The next couple of seconds were just a blur of vision and noise. The first comprehensible thing Julian heard was –

“I’m… really… angry!”

Julian forced his eyes to focus. The battle seemed to have taken a turn. Cooper had hulked out, and he and Millard slowly circled one another. Julian hadn’t expected to do a whole lot of damage to a vampire by clubbing him in the head, but he’d hit the guy pretty hard, and was sure he’d seen a small splatter of blood and heard the crack of breaking skull. But now, with Millard’s back to him, Julian couldn’t make out that even a follicle of hair was out of place on the vampire’s head. 

Dave and Tim stood back helplessly, their eyes darting back and forth between the two combatants and Katherine. Katherine appeared to be suffering from some kind of headache. Her eyes were closed, and she had one hand clapped over her mouth. Chaz stood well back from everyone else and began to strum the first few notes of ‘Holly Holy’. Stuart was…
where was Stuart?

The answer came flying in from Julian’s right periphery.

“Yaaaaaaaaa!” Stuart screamed as he ran. That bald bastard could move. He flew through the air, his arms and legs flailing around too fast to keep up with. He might have had six of each from what Julian could tell. He assaulted Millard with a flurry of elbows, knees, and fists.

Katherine dropped to one knee, cradling her head in her hands. Her canine teeth grew sharp and pointed. Her tongue ran down them and across her lips. Julian had seen enough vampire movies to recognize her struggle between loyalties, and her thirst.

He couldn’t do anything about her choosing between her brother or her sire, but he might be able to use her thirst to their advantage. Keep her from having to pick a side.

Julian pointed a finger at Katherine. “Horse!” he shouted over the sounds of Stuart beating the shit out of Millard. A white pony appeared before Katherine. Its coat shimmered like a beacon in the gloom. It offered a friendly whinny as if to say ‘Thank you for calling me into existence. How may I be of service?’. Without the slightest hesitation, Katherine wrapped her arms around its neck and bit deep into its throat.

Stuart actually had Millard on the retreat. The vampire backed away slowly as the monk continued his bare-handed assault. When there was nowhere to back up to, Millard made his move. He grabbed Stuart by the throat, slammed him against the stone wall, and threw his stunned, limp body out the window.

Dave gasped.

“Fuck me,” said Tim. “He just killed Stuart.”

Cooper had taken the opportunity to pick up the dildo-stake. His right hand was wrapped around the penis end, and he brandished the pointy end at Millard.

“Finish this!” Tim shouted at Cooper. “The rules say that a wooden stake through the heart will instantly slay a vampire!”

That would have been a nice piece of information to be privy to a few minutes ago.

Millard spat in Tim’s direction, but didn’t take his eyes off of Cooper. The vampire’s hair was disheveled, and his face was bruised. He was even bleeding from the lip a little. Stuart’s bare-handed assault had apparently done more real damage than Julian clubbing him over the head.

“Fuck you!” Cooper roared as he closed the distance between himself and Millard. He grabbed the vampire by the throat and plunged the stake deep into his gut. Millard hissed and coughed up a gob of dark red blood.

“His heart, stupid!” said Tim.

“Do I look like a fucking doctor to you?” Cooper shouted back.

Millard reached under Cooper’s arms and pulled himself up to his neck. He bit down hard.

“Raaaaauuuurrrrggghh!” Cooper screamed as Millard’s fingernails tore deep gashes into his back. “Look, I’m sorry your dick doesn’t work, but I – Fuck, that hurts!”

Cooper’s skin began to grow paler as sweat poured down his back. His ratty dark hair turned grey. All the while, the cuts and bruises on Millard’s face vanished. The vampire’s own gut seemed to be slowly forcing the stake out.

Cooper pulled the stake all the way out. A heart shot wasn’t going to be possible, as the two were practically hugging one another. He shoved the stake up through the vampire’s left armpit. The tip poked out of Millard’s shoulder and carved a gash from cheek to temple.

Millard screamed and lost his hold on Cooper’s neck. The gash on his face closed itself up, but his left arm went limp.

Cooper broke away from the vampire’s right arm as well and stumbled backward. When Julian got a look at Cooper’s face, he appeared to have aged ten years. His eyes were sunken, his cheeks hollow, his sweaty brow stretched taught against his half-orc skull.

“What happened to you?” asked Julian..

“I’m all right,” said Cooper. “I just…” He panted. “I just need a minute.”

Millard hadn’t appeared to be in any better shape than Cooper. But in the brief moment Julian had taken his eyes off of him, he had recuperated far better. The vampire still leaned against the stone window sill on his good arm, and looked as though it was an effort for him to remain standing. The bottom half of his otherwise pale face was covered in a thick layer of Cooper’s blood. It dripped all over his fine clothes. He bared his fangs at Julian in a wicked grin that sent shivers down his slender elven spine.

Julian’s eyes traveled down the length of the vampire’s crippled arm down to the hand. The fingers started to wiggle.

“Shit!” said Julian. “Cooper! He’s getting his strength back! Hurry and finish him off!”

Cooper shambled forward, looking as if it was all he could do to keep upright and keep the stake in his hand.

Millard smiled as Cooper approached him. His left arm still hung limply at his side, but he opened and closed his left hand a couple of times, as if just to demonstrate that he was able to. Each time he did it, he winced a little less.

Cooper wasn’t in any shape for this. He’d be dead before he even got an attack in. But still he shuffled forward.

“Come on,” taunted Millard. His voice was like a wounded bear shouting through an electric fan. “You filthy pathetic beast! I’ll rip your – Yaaahhh!”

Millard’s head jerked back as he screamed. He had something around his neck. It looked like… It was an elbow. Quick as a wink, the vampire’s left arm disappeared behind him. Millard’s howl of agony wasn’t quite enough to drown out the sound of his shoulder re-snapping.

Stuart poked his head out from behind the writhing vampire. “Come on man!” he shouted. “Finish this bastard!”

Cooper mustered up what little strength he had left and sped up his shuffle. He held the stake up and prepared to strike.

“Make it count!” shouted Tim.

As Cooper shoved the stake at him, Millard’s body exploded into a cloud of red mist. Stuart fell forward into Cooper, catching the stake in his gut. Cooper fell backward, landing hard on the stone floor with Stuart on top of him. Six inches of sharpened wood protruded from Stuart’s back.

“Oh my god!” said Dave. “You killed Stuart!”

Cooper groaned in response. The groan grew louder, as if he were trying to awaken from a bad dream, until it was cut short by a quick gush of vomit.

“He’s not dead,” said Tim.

“How can you be sure?” asked Dave.

“I can’t, but you can. Go fix him.”

Julian, Dave, and Tim pulled Stuart’s body off of Cooper. Julian wrapped the corner of his serape around his hand before gripping the penis end of the stake. With one swift motion, he pulled it out of Stuart. Stuart’s body shuddered, and blood spilled out of his mouth.

“Make it quick,” said Tim.

Dave licked his lips and put his hand on Stuart’s head. “I heal thee.”

For a moment, nothing happened. Then Stuart’s body started to convulse, and he coughed up the remaining blood in his mouth. When his eyes opened, everyone exhaled at once and stood up to let him writhe around on the floor alone.

“He’ll be fine,” said Dave.

Julian helped Cooper to his feet. He was far easier to pull up than he should have been. “You all right?”

“C-c-cold,” said Cooper, hugging himself.

“You look like shit,” said Tim.

“F-f-fuck you,” said Cooper, though there was little spirit in his voice.

Dave laid a hand on Cooper’s unusually bony shoulder. “I heal thee.”

The gaping bite wound on Cooper’s neck closed up, and his shoulders hunched with the ecstasy of being healed, but even all patched up, he appeared far from whole. A tiny mouse fart squeaked out of him.

“What’s wrong with him?” asked Julian.

“Constitution damage,” said Chaz. “I’d bet anything.”

Having left their equipment outside, there was no way to confirm Chaz’s diagnosis, but it seemed reasonable enough. If anyone would know, it would be him.