#you can take halftone from my cold dead hands

[dirtgemini]

🚬📱🪜

[midnightcindy]

The Break of Day: Chapter 7

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Everyone’s favorite vampire returns. 

When his breath returned to him, and his lustful thoughts subsided, Louis knew he needed more answers. He pulled on his coat, running from his cove to follow Grace. What had she done to him? The wave of desire that flooded him minutes ago was unnatural, something he had never experienced before. This was a new power, and after seeing Grace’s shame, Louis knew she had done it on purpose. But why?

Louis wandered street after street, sniffing the air for Grace’s soft scent. He didn’t notice where he was going, only scanning for a sign of her presence. It was a large city after all, and she could have been anywhere. Perhaps, she could have left it altogether. Louis hoped, at least, that this was not the case.

He pulled his coat around his neck, keeping his head down as people passed him on the sidewalk. When the lights around him became brighter, he finally looked up. He found himself at the steps of a hospital, one that Louis had never gone near. His meals were not found in the weak or sick. Pausing with his hands in his pockets, Louis stared up at the modern glass building. It was so vastly different from the world he once knew; even spending years in the city, watching it shift and morph from a bustling settlement to a dirty metropolis, he would never fully grasp the way the buildings changed. The towering, ominous architecture of Wysteria was so impractical, yet served its purpose as a symbol of power, of fear. But this modern work- all shimmering glass and cold metal- for what reason was it designed as such? What was its purpose? Louis stared upward, noting how he could see into each patient’s room, observing both those who bustled about in the fluorescent lights and those who dwelled in the dark as a façade of privacy.

Louis stood still, just watching, wondering, lost in his thoughts and distracted from his mission. Until a particularly old scent caught his attention, one so very much like his own. He turned slowly, and saw an old face, unchanged by time, bounding down the steps of the hospital. His outfit was different than Louis could ever have imagined, the hospital scrubs and gym bag a stark contrast from the nobleman’s attire he had last worn in Louis’ mind. Even his hair, although the same snowy blonde, was a modern cut, with shortened sides and a slicked over top. He barely recognized the other vampire, apart from his scent. Louis didn’t even try to turn away as Leo noticed him.

The look on Leo’s face was something Louis could have expected from the Crawford: a moment of astonishment, and then a slow grin of pure satisfaction. “Mr. Howard,” Leo greeted, turning to walk to the other vampire. “I hadn’t expected to see you here.”

As Leo approached, Louis looked down to the hand that outstretched toward him warily. He took it in silence, giving it a brief shake.

Leo nodded, still smiling. “Nice hair, you look good with length. I wouldn't have picked it myself, but hey, we all have to adapt. I’m not sure how you found me, but I’m glad to see you.”

Louis sniffed, looking back toward the glimmering glass, reflecting city lights. “The feeling is not entirely mutual, unfortunately, Sir Crawford.”

Leo winced, almost laughing. “Wow, time really hasn’t changed you Howard. Didn’t anyone tell you nobody talks like that anymore? Let alone call anyone by that honorific. I see you also kept your accent.”

Louis rolled his eyes, sucking on his cheek and considering just walking away.

Leo seemed to sense this, and leaned in close. “I just got off my shift, snagged a few bags from the bank,” he whispered, shrugging the shoulder that held up the small duffle bag. In a lower voice, Leo asked, “Ți-e foame?”

Louis glanced down to the bag, then quickly back up to Leo’s snarky expression. He thought about Grace, wandering through the city alone. He wondered whether she would be able to find shelter that evening, and if she did, with whom? But Leo’s offer hung in the air, and Louis found his curiosity on the previously suggested matters at hand much easier to sate with Leo Crawford than with Leo’s wife. If there was something important that he needed to know, Louis could get it from the man pleasantly, quietly, without tampering in Irina’s temper. Louis glanced back up to the hospital steps, watching a couple run inside, one crying while clutching a bleeding hand, and one holding the other to their side for comfort. The metallic smell hit his nostrils, turning his senses toward the hunt. Then, gritting his teeth, Louis replied just as quietly, “Presupun.”

Leo grinned proudly, and clasped Louis on the shoulder, which caused him to flinch away from the former’s hand. “Follow me.”

______

The docks were quiet in the dead of night. Leo and Louis watched the ships shutter in the cold water, bumping into their wooden piers. They sat upon a mound of rocks that angled down into the water, creating a slope that could send both men into the frigid waves; but instead they sat comfortably atop a crooked, square boulder, using the flat top like a bench as they ate their lunch. Leo tore open a corner of the bag, carefully pushing away the blood from the top so as not to spill. He then sucked on the bag like a juice pouch, and motioned for Louis to do the same. Louis raised a harsh brow, but followed suit. The two men sat in silence, apart from the crashing of the water on the rocks just below.

Leo naturally broke the quiet first. “For how long have you lived in New York?” He spoke in their mother tongue, making Louis both grateful and uncomfortable.

“For nearly a century, by this time,” Louis replied in the same form.

Leo nodded. “Irina and I have lived for nearly forty years here,” he said. “It has been pleasant. My employment creates an easy life for us.”

“You could not have worked at the same establishment for this amount of time,” Louis said, before taking a drink from his pouch.

“Mm, true,” Leo said, slurping loudly. “It has been some time. No, I create a new person for each career. Hospitals, nursing homes, caretakers, more. And these things called blood drives.”

“Blood… drives?” Louis asked, turning toward Leo.

“Yes,” Leo said, turning as well, “a place where humans can freely give their blood. They believe it carries on to those in poor health, but we immortals tend to use a majority for ourselves.”

Louis frowned, tucking away the knowledge for later use.

“You hunt to feed, then,” Leo said, not quite a question.

Louis nodded. “Yes, I hunt.”

Leo did not press the subject. Unfortunately, he turned it toward something Louis was not necessarily excited to discuss. “Irina has told me that she saw you, already. I am sure you are not surprised by this?”

Louis shook his head. “I am not.”

“Then you know that we believed we were the last Wysterians,” Leo continued.

Louis nodded again.

Leo sighed through his nose, a heavy breath that spilled irritation. “I will not interrogate you, Louis. I believe you had reasons for your isolation, as you have a purpose for all actions. But, I will mask my frustrations with your choice. My wife, however, will not.”

Leo laughed then, and Louis almost snickered. He pictured the princess’ face red and pouting, her words spat into both of their faces in that shrill but commanding voice.

Leo’s face fell, and he took the last gulp of blood from the plastic in his hands. He swallowed, then faced Louis head on. “Listen,” he said, switching to the native language, “there are serious problems in the city, particularly with our kind and the humans.”

Louis licked the corner of his mouth. “Irina mentioned something dangerous. What is happening?”

Leo shook his head. “That’s the problem. We don’t exactly know, yet. Have you been reading the papers at all?”

“I do not concern myself with the current events,” Louis said honestly.

Leo frowned, but didn’t look surprised. “Well here,” he said, reaching into his bag and pulling out a roll of white papers, “this is from today. I just picked it up from the hospital’s news stand.”

Louis took the stack, and unrolled it to reveal the front page. In large, black letters, it read, “MASS SUICIDE: TWELVE DEAD IN DISCOVERED GRAVE.” Beneath it was a gruesome image, a pile of bodies in a pit dug into the floor of some abandoned building.

“This is the third one just this year. The papers think it’s some kind of cultic following that’s starting up,” Leo said. “You know, folks killing themselves in the name of God. Irina and I think it’s something more though. I mean, there were fucking childrenin that pit. And, just look at their necks.”

Louis looked closer at the halftones, noting the deep, black gashes along the victim’s necks, from their clavicle to their shoulders. He narrowed his eyes. “You believe these are vampires killing?”

Leo pointed to the wounds displayed on the page. “Look at the gashes, Louis. A person doesn’t commit suicide by slicing open their necks with this much force. This is how vampires kill, but not just any vampires would do this-”

“These are not the markings of a controlled immortal,” Louis said, his voice rising with Leo’s. “These are wild, animal almost. A child would make these.”

“Exactly,” Leo confirmed. “There’s a newborn vampire on the loose in New York.”

Louis shook his head. “No, no. Even as an infant, I did not sate my hunger like this. Only once, in pure rage, did I dare to take lives as this immortal has. This is not simply rogue actions, this is… controlled.”

Leo took back the paper, staring at the gore once again. “So… you think there is more than one?”

Louis shrugged. “There could be one, or there could be a hundred. It is impossible to say, but I do not believe this vampire is working alone. They left this grave too clean, too easy to find. Even a child would know to cover their tracks, lest they be discovered.”

“They wanted to be discovered,” Leo said slowly, watching the photograph on the page as if it would come to life any moment.

“Yes,” Louis said, staring warily out into the water. “They wanted to send a message.”

“But what could that message be?” Leo asked, staring at Louis now.

Louis watched as the first tinge of light hit the sky. He would have to return to his shelter soon. Standing, he straightened his coat, and looked down to an anxious Leo. “I do not know, but I do not believe it is a message solely meant for humans.”