The Vampire Hunters (Book 2): Vampyrnomicon (3 page)

Patterson looked at the ladder, and dejection washed over his face. “There’s no way… I’m making it… up there.”

Jim heard something approaching from down the sewer. “It’s only a fifteen-foot climb to safety. Or would you rather end up like your friend?”

That galvanized Patterson. He climbed up onto the landing and scaled the rungs. Jim followed right behind. Patterson moved excruciatingly slow, the combination of his weight and his fear making the climb more difficult than usual. Jim wanted to yell at him to move his fat ass, but reasoned making him nervous would not help the situation. Instead, every few seconds he checked the landing to see if the vampire had found them.

They had almost reached the top when Patterson stopped.

“Keep going,” ordered Jim. “We’re almost there.”

“I can’t. Some asshole parked their car over the manhole.” Patterson reached up and banged the underside of the car. “Hey, move this fuckin’ thing!”

Jim looked down again just as a vampire stuck its head up the access tunnel. It flashed a sardonic grin. With the deliberate slowness of a hunter stalking its prey, it crawled onto the landing and slowly climbed the ladder. Reaching into the bag, Jim pressed the five-second-delay detonator cap on one of the bottles of Heaven’s Fire. Sliding the bag off of his shoulder, he dangled it over the access tunnel and dropped it.

Realizing what was about to happen, the vampire let go of the rungs, dropped to the landing, and rolled off into the sewer just as the bag crashed onto the cement. The twin bottles burst. A second later, the detonator cap exploded, igniting the home-made napalm. A blast of hot air shot up the tunnel, followed by a mushroom cloud of smoke, forcing Jim to turn away.

When Jim looked down, he saw the landing awash in flames. Beyond the flames, crouching in the sewer and waiting to pounce, sat the vampire.

“Any luck moving that car?”

“No.” Patterson looked down the tunnel at the flames. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Buying us some time.”

But not enough. The gasoline-detergent mixture burned itself out enough that the flames no longer posed a threat. With an animalistic snarl, the vampire jumped from the sewer onto the landing and began climbing.

Jessica stood with
her hands against the bed of the Ram. She wanted to tell Wilson where he could put his citation book, but knew that doing so would only make things worse. In the past ten minutes he had written her up for illegal parking, driving with an expired license, and failure to have proper registration with the vehicle. She half expected him to smash the headlights with his nightstick then cite her for that. Wilson was in the process of writing her up for some other nonsensical infraction when Jessica heard a commotion from under the squad car. Bending slightly, she saw the top of someone’s head sticking out of the open manhole. The person reached up and banged on the underside of the squad car.

“Hey, move this fuckin’ thing!”

Wilson turned to Jessica, his eyes narrow with anger. “What did you say?”

“That wasn’t me.”

Wilson stared at Jessica, not certain whether to believe her, then looked around the area.

The muffled sound of a small explosion came from underneath the squad car. Seconds later, black smoke poured from underneath the chassis and billowed up the sides. Wilson dropped the citation book and stepped back.

“What the fuck?”

“You have to move your car off the manhole,” said Jessica.

“No way, lady. It’s on fire.”

“No it’s not. The fire’s coming from inside the sewer.”

“How do you know that?” Wilson’s hand moved toward his service revolver as he stared at the smoke coming from underneath his squad car.

Jessica did not have time to argue. She took a step toward Wilson and called his name. When he turned in her direction, she kicked him as hard as she could in the balls. Wilson’s cry of pain degenerated into a tearful gasp. His hands fell to his crotch. He dropped to his knees, muttering something unintelligible through the pain. Not that Jessica listened. She raced past Wilson and slid into the squad car. Thankfully, he had left the engine running. Unable to see because of the smoke, she felt around for the shift, moved it into reverse, and backed up. An overweight man struggled to climb out the manhole, but could not get enough of a grip on the flat pavement to pull himself out. Jessica shifted into park, climbed out of the squad car, and raced over to help.

The vampire had
scurried half-way up the ladder when Patterson called out, “Someone’s moving the car.”

“About time.” Though Jim wondered if he had any left.

The vampire pounced on Jim, its talon-like nails slicing into his flesh as it crawled its way up his back. Jim tried to pull away, but the vampire pinned him to the wall. Its left hand wrapped around Jim’s cheek, pushing his head to one side and exposing his neck. He smelled the thing’s decayed breath and felt the cold exhalation on his skin.

Patterson finally crawled through the manhole and onto the street. The afternoon sun poured into the manhole, bathing the vampire in its rays. It bellowed so loud the noise deafened Jim. The vampire tried to crawl down to escape, but Jim shoved his body back, pinning it against the wall. Its skin began to burn off in small strips that crumbled into ash, the destruction becoming more rapid the longer it stayed in the sunlight. The vampire flailed around, trying to break free, until it eventually disintegrated into a cloud of dust and ash that settled to the landing.

Jim climbed the rest of the way up the ladder. Jessica waited for him and helped him through the manhole. As he stood up, Jessica studied the bloody claw marks on his back. “Oh my God. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” Jim looked beyond Jessica. “Is everything okay up here?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“I just wondered why that cop had a gun trained on us.”

Jessica turned. Patterson stood three feet away with his arms raised above his head. Wilson had struggled to his feet and stumbled over to the Ram. Steadying himself against the bed with his left hand, with his right he aimed his service revolver at Jessica and Jim. Tears still streamed down his face.

“All three of you. Face down on the pavement. Now!”

Drake and Alison
raced along the sanitation sewer as fast as they could. Accumulated layers of human waste encrusted the walkway, making the footing underneath as slippery as ice. They kept a lead on the pursuing vampire by pausing every fifty feet and firing a few rounds into it. Each time they succeeded in stopping it only for a few seconds, barely long enough for them to gain ground. Despite sustaining a score of wounds that would have been fatal to a human, it continued the pursuit, a little slower after each set of wounds, and a hell of a lot more pissed off. Drake and Alison were rapidly running out of ammunition and stamina.

“I have only one magazine left,” Drake panted. “What about you?”

“Two or three rounds at most.”

“Then we better think of something quick.”

“Way ahead of you.”

Alison stopped running, spun around, and crouched. The vampire was only twenty feet behind them and closing fast. Alison aimed the shotgun, lowered the barrel a few inches, and squeezed the trigger. The first round peppered its right leg with buckshot. The second blew off its leg at the knee. With a guttural howl, it crashed to the walkway only a few feet from Alison. Yet without missing a stride, it came after her, crawling on its arms and single good leg.

Standing up, Alison raced off after Drake.

“This way.” Drake stood by the opening to another branch line blocked by a foot-high retainer wall. Alison jumped over the sanitation trough to the opposite walkway, nearly losing her balance. Drake reached out, grabbed her hand, and yanked her into the storm drain line. She regained her footing on the dry floor. The two raced down the drain. After one hundred feet, they came to another landing and access tunnel adjacent to a construction site. An acetylene tank, a jack hammer, and a portable generator sat on either side of the landing. Across from the tunnel sat a storage area recessed into the wall and covered with a chain link fence. The gate stood open, a metal chain and padlock dangling off the handle.

Alison made for the landing, but Drake directed her into the storage area.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Trust me. I have an idea.”

Once inside, Drake pulled the gate shut and secured the chain around the metal supports. He had just secured the padlock between two links when the vampire slammed into the gate in front of him. Drake jumped back, stumbling into a stack of wooden crates.

Decayed tissue and tendons hung from the vampire’s severed leg. Buckshot wounds peppered its face and body, each oozing blood and gore. Smoke swirled from more than a dozen .40 caliber wounds where holy water burned into its body. It snarled at Drake. Then, realizing its victims were trapped, its expression changed. It ran a blackened tongue over its gums, savoring its next meal. Reaching up, the vampire grabbed the corner of the chain links and began ripping it away from the support columns.

Drake took Alison by the arm and led her behind the wooden crates.

“Great plan, Einstein,” she said. “Any more brilliant ideas?”

“Yeah. Take cover.”

Alison sprawled face down between the crates and wall. Drake got onto his back and leaned around the corner of the last crate. By now, the vampire had pulled away an entire corner of the chain link fence. Drake aimed his Glock at the acetylene tank and fired off a round.

It ricocheted off of one of the metal supports.

He fired off a second round.

It struck the cement just to the right of the tank.

The vampire hoisted itself up onto the fence and pushed through the opening.

Drake fired off a third round.

It punctured the acetylene tank.

Drake covered his head with his arms and braced himself as the acetylene ignited. An ear shattering explosion rocked the sewer, flinging the jack hammer and generator down the line and ripping the chain links off of their support. Drake felt something heavy hit his back as the shattered remnants of the crates collapsed upon him. A massive fireball tore through the sewer and storage area, incinerating the vampire. Not even ashes remained.

An eerie silence descended over them. For a moment, Drake thought he was dead. After a few seconds he became aware of the crackling of flames and the clump of falling debris, and smelled the charred odor of burnt wood and leather. Crawling out from under the pile of wood, he checked himself. His jacket had been charred, and he had second-degree burns on his hands. Despite that, and a body that ached all over, he appeared to be all right. Tomorrow he would be in agony. But at least he was alive.

Alison! Stumbling over to where she had taken cover, Drake pulled off the wood that covered her. After what seemed like an eternity of digging, he saw the back of her leather coat. She lay motionless. Drake prayed she was just unconscious. He shook her shoulder, but got no response. Becoming increasingly worried, he removed the rest of the debris, then sat beside Alison and rolled her over. Wrapping one arm around her back, he used his free hand to gently slap her face. “Wake up. You can’t die like this.”

Alison moaned and twisted her neck. Her eyes opened, and she focused on his face. “Are you all right? Say something.”

She looked at him and smiled. “You don’t pay me enough for this shit.”

Drake pulled Alison close and hugged her.

D
rake usually enjoyed
his morning walk from his apartment to his office in a three-story Victorian-house-turned-office-building on 13 Street near Franklin Park. Not today, though. After yesterday’s cluster-fuck in the sewers, most of his body ached. Fortunately, the only serious injuries he had suffered were minor first- and second-degree burns to his hands and face from the acetylene explosion, plus a score of badly bruised muscles. The Emergency Room had given him ointment for the burns, but not even the pain meds did much against the aches. Even after a double dose of pills washed down with a large shot of Baker’s Bourbon, a steaming hot shower, and a full eight hours of sleep, his body screamed at him when he got out of bed this morning. So, instead of his normal routine, Drake opted to take a taxi to the office.

As the taxi turned off of Pennsylvania Avenue onto 13 Street, Drake took a long sip of his Dunkin’ Donuts iced coffee. He had asked the driver to stop and wait for him to pick up one on the way to work. Some routines were too important to break.

The taxi stopped in front of his 13 Street office. After paying the driver, Drake painfully stepped out onto the sidewalk and laboriously climbed the front steps to the entrance. It even hurt to punch in the access code to the security lock and to push open the front door, the one with the glass panel bearing the words DRAKE MATTHEWS, CONSULTANT.

Inside, he found Alison talking with Mr. Smith. At least that was the name by which they referred to him. Smith was just as mercurial as his boss, their anonymous benefactor. He showed up when necessary to finance their operations, or bail them out of jail when those operations failed to turn out as planned, yet he never once revealed his true name or the slightest hint of personal information. Smith wore his typical black Savile Row suit, neatly-pressed white shirt, and expensive silk tie. Drake could not recall seeing Smith dressed in anything different. He wondered if Smith’s closet contained seven identical suits and sets of shirts, with the only variety being in his collection of power ties. He sat in a leather wing-back chair facing Alison’s desk, the two talking amicably.