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Real NaNoWriMo Chapter One |
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Chapter One, as promised:
David stood on the street, watching the sunrise, the way it seemed to light up the world as the sky went from midnight blue, to purple, then through the various shades of blue, each lighter then the next, watching as the stars faded from the sky, watching and standing there as if nothing was happening. Behind him, there was a warehouse completely ablaze, all broken windows and such, as if blown up, and spreading to the other buildings. He wasn’t worried. Why should he? He was the one that started the fire. His sandy-blonde hair moved slightly in the morning breeze, the same breeze blowing the fire towards other buildings. His hair was cut fairly long, to the nape of the neck, and seemed to be layered, his roots darker then the rest of his hair, natural, of course. David didn’t care enough about his appearance to alter it. His eyes were a sky blue, showing a level-headedness laced with a kind of cocky edge. He had the face of a heart-breaker; save for his nose, broken in two places and healed wrong, which might have added to the attraction. He was calm in the face of fire, one of those strong and silent types that act like bad-boys but secretly they have a passion for poetry.
He was tall, about 5’ 11’’, and thin, a look that might have been gawky on anyone else. His nails were perfectly manicured, pianist’s fingers, although his instrument of choice was bass guitar. He was dressed in an untucked long-sleeved sky blue T-shirt, collar open so you could see the gold chain hanging down, with an obscured symbol for a pendent. The shirt was covered up by a charcoal suit jacket, and he wore matching pants. Nike shoes covered his feet, white and light blue with no socks. While he looked sheltered, he had seen as much death and destruction as your average soldier.
A girl drove down the street in a black convertible, top down, up to the corner where he stood calmly, ignoring the fire behind him.
“Did you get them?” asked driver, a girl of about seventeen, only a year younger then David himself.
“See for yourself.” David drawled, his voice a Midwestern accent, that is, no accent to speak of. His voice was a pleasant baritone, almost music to one’s ears, even when he wasn’t singing.
The girl looked around him, the fire reflected in the lenses of her sunglasses. “I see.” She said, her voice an impeccable alto with a hint of an Irish lilt. “Could you have made it any subtler?”
“Well, originally, I was going to use dynamite, but I panicked and couldn’t find a spot to put it. I had to resort to using some Molotov cocktails. They worked alright, not as well as I would have liked, but there you are.” He jumped over the door as he spoke, settling himself into the tan leather seats.
The girl slid the sunglasses down her nose, showing clear hazel eyes, more brown at the moment then green, and raised one perfectly arched eyebrow at him. He continued to look forward, as if ignoring her. She shrugged and put the car into drive.
“I trust the paperwork is in order?” David asked as the girl maneuvered the convertible through the streets and then onto the Beltline.
“Aren’t you supposed to check that, before you blow up the building full of vampires?” She asked him, eyebrows raised.
“Generally, yes. But is it?”
“Yes, David. The warrant clearly reads ‘Use what ever force you deem necessary to take out those sons-of-bitches.”
“Really?”
“Not really, but that’s the gist of it.” He studied her for a long minute, then settled into the seat.
Her name was Lian, and you wouldn’t know it by looking at her, but she was a lycanthrope, of the lion variety. Her hair was a golden-brown, which hung all the way to the small of her back. Her skin was of the milk-and-honey complexion usually found in red-heads, passed down from her mother, and she had a sprinkling of freckles dusting her nose. Her nose and chin were a little strong for her face, but that didn’t take away from her “girl-next-door” good looks.
She was curvy where it counted with child-bearing hips she also got from her mother, a curse in this day and age. She was about 5’ 6’’, a fairly short girl, short enough to give her, not only a mean streak, but enough defenses to get her past anything. She wasn’t particularly fat, but she wasn’t anorexic either. She had her mother’s temper and the training to use it to her advantage.
She was dressed in a backless black dress with a plunging neckline, two full bell sleeves and with an A-line cut that left most of her knees bare, and enough makeup that she looked at least a few years older. All, so not her idea, especially the makeup, as she usually never wore any. She was comfortable enough in her own skin. She had never been self-conscious, but never particularly vain enough to partake in the usual styles of the time, plunging necklines and skirts so short you might as well not wear anything at all. Her pumps were black Nine-West’s that elevated her an extra two inches. And there was a black silk rope with a golden pendent on the end, with an emerald set in. Matching golden earrings sparkled through her hair.
She distained blades and guns, like everyone in the NPIB, called the Agency by all agents; she knew how to use them. While she would rather use her claws, she still had two regulation knives strapped to the insides of her wrists, both made of keen steel. Not silver, like David’s, as, if it cut her, it would poison her blood and make her sick, if not kill her. Like all lycanthropes, she was fatally allergic to silver. Plus, they were useful against the technology-hating fey.
Lian and David had been working together for about a year and a half ago, when they were both new recruits in the NPIB’s program. They started you young, when you were most useful, and learned the easiest. Each team had a partner with superior strength, and the other one had some sort of kinetic or pathic power. David was pathic, meaning his power was more passive then active. He was empathetic, the most common, as well as athiopathic, or a truth finder. He could tell when someone was lying, instinctively, and was excellent with interrogations, as when he used his power, the person in question couldn’t lie, the truth just spilled out. The downside was he found it impossible to tell a direct lie, although he had no problem with sarcasm, in fact, he used it quite frequently. He got his power from his father, as he was a half-demon. His father was a Veritas demon, or virtuous demon, a fallen angel. Which one, he didn’t know.
He also had latent clairvoyance, meaning once and awhile, he would get a vision, just a flash, that wasn’t usually very helpful. But sometimes, he would see something that would help them immensely on their case, and was probably the reason they solved them so quickly. The Agency Council had hypothesized that he had other latent powers, which would come to light in time, thanks to his father’s blood.
He was also an accomplished martial artist, as all Agency trained people are, and had the same weapons training as the rest of them. He was also the one in touch with their handler when they were away.
They worked well together, accentuated each others strengths and covering each others weaknesses. They had steadily worked their way up the ladder, from simple misuse-of-powers cases, illegal charms and the like, to mass murders. Tonight, they took care of a nest of vampires that had been moving around the country, slaughtering innocents, people with no power to speak of. They were rebels, going against the rule of all supernatural communities, whether it be lycanthrope, vampire , fey, or common kitchen witch, the rule being “Don’t draw attention to yourself”, so the vampire Lord of the area wouldn’t protest. They wanted to fit in, to be law-abiding citizens like everyone else.
And so, the burning building.
They had started out that night, undercover at one of the many vampire owned clubs that dotted the city of Madison, Wisconsin. People came from all over the Midwest just to see some vampires, to be able to tell their friends they saw a real live, or real dead, “creature of the night.” They were called day-trippers, and sometimes snacks, by the preternatural community. Surprisingly enough, Madison was one of the top ten places for spotting vamps in the US. The first being, of course, New Orleans, thanks to Ann Rice, followed by New York, San Francisco and Chicago. Vamps tended to live in Northern states, especially during the winter when it got dark really quickly. Which is why there were vamps in Alaska. But it was kind of hard to bite someone through winter gear, hence the nightclubs. All those fresh bodies, flushed and panting from dancing.
They had entered the Nite Mirror, the most popular of such vampire clubs, acting like day-trippers, here to see their first vampire. That’s when Lian caught the scent of one of the vampires they had been tracking, a flunky of the group, only a month or two dead. She followed it, leading David along, dancing through the crowd; close enough to follow the vampire when he left, close enough to stop him should he take a body, but far enough away that he wouldn’t see them or smell them.
Finally, just after midnight, the vampire left. They had waited a few minutes, then left out the same door, Lian tracking him with the ease of a natural predator. They stayed far enough back so he couldn’t hear them over the noise of the city. Their plan was to follow him back to the nest, but he dropped something, and as turned around and bent down to grab it, he spied them in the shadows.
Before he could scream, Lian was on him, pinning him down, stopping him from fleeing or screaming, and David placed his hand on the vampire’s forehead, his eyes glowing silver as they always did when he used his power. The vampire’s eyes rolled into his head in response as he fell into a deep trance. When David spoke, his voice was a rumbling bass, deep and hypnotic.
“Where is the nest?” he asked, and Lian had to stop herself from obliging him, even though she knew nothing. She found herself thinking how cute he looked, with his blonde hair all mussed from the chase, his rumbling voice… she had always liked basses, his irises turned molten silver… She looked down at the vampire’s rat face, blushing and willing David not to see it as the vampire rattled off the address, how many vampires were in the nest, and how powerful their Lord was, his voice a raspy monotone.
As soon as they got everything they needed, Lian took a silver knife from his wrist sheath and expertly found the heart. As soon as the silver touched his dead organ, the vampire gasped as the silver burned through his still veins filled with stolen blood, contaminating him, killing him. A few seconds later, he was ashes in on the street.
Lian had driven them to the nest, an old warehouse near East Washington, and they had waited until dawn, when the vamps would once again fall into their death-like slumber. David went inside while she opted to wait outside, even though she wanted part of the kill. Doubtless, the Master vampire, the leader of them all, their Lord, would smell her and possibly wake up, if they weren’t already awake. And, this Master had a familiar, or animal to control. If his familiar was the lion, then he would possibly turn her against David, and David would have to kill her.
And so, David went inside, armed with silver and fire, to kill the nest, while Lian waited outside in the car.
Now, Lian drove them down the roads at near 60 miles an hour, the sirens ringing in her ears. Did he have to use fire? She asked silently Couldn’t he have… I don’t know… shot them or something? Much less messy. She moved a little faster, wanting to get out of there, knowing that the police wouldn’t stop them. They were the police, or close enough too.
She was taking them to the regional NPIB headquarters, housed downtown near the Capital. David had fallen asleep beside her, and she found herself watching him in between glances at the road. He was so beautiful when he slept, even with that twice broken nose, if anything; it just made him more handsome, even more then his hair shining in the morning light. She felt like Psyche watching Eros sleep, like it was forbidden, but she just couldn’t help herself.
She felt a blush creeping up her face again, and she quickly turned back to the road. Yes, she was a teenager, so, supposedly it was normal. They had been partners at first, tried to be all business like the Agency suggested, but eventually, they became best friends, it was as if they couldn’t help it. It would be really bad if they started dating. But… the more she got to know him; the more she wanted to ask him out, just to a movie or something. They had gone out as friends, and undercover when they had to, but… to ask him out…
Thankfully, they were there, so she didn’t have to think about it anymore. She pulled into their designated parking space and shook David awake. He blearily opened his eyes, and claimed out of the car, yawning. She rolled her eyes at him and grabbed the briefcase with the report she had busied herself with when David was in the nest, having all the fun.
Lian looked up at the large building, like an office building more then anything else. No one would notice anything suspicious or out of the ordinary about it. Nothing to indicate supernatural being inhabited it day and night. And to be accurate, it pretty much was an office building, albeit one with an extensive basement and office hours to match. The basement was where the vampires worked, and incase they worked until after dawn, sun-tight rooms below. Below that were the jail cells, specially made for a certain type of preternatural creature. Silver for the weres, silver hung with symbols of several different faiths for vampires, cold iron for the fey, and so on, all fortified to withstand the preternatural strength of the occupants.
But all of this was below ground, above, it had offices for the agents and officers who could withstand sunlight, lycanthropes, fey, witches, half-demons, even one or two living vampires. But that was inside. From the outside, it was nothing but an office building, or so it would seem, but for the marble sign that proudly declared “NPIB: The National Preternatural Investigations Bureau” in bright shiny gold letters, glinting in the morning light.
The NPIB had started back in 2026, a year after the third Great Awakening. But, this Great Awakening was not a religious revival. This was the time when supernatural creatures, once thought of as faerie tales, were pushed into the light, and the realm of reality.
It started when Senator Charles Lee was attacked by a vampire as he was taking a walk to clear his head one evening. He survived the attack, if it could be called that, for three nights later; he woke up at full-dark, in his coffin, a vampire. Questions came up as to whether or not he could keep his job, whether or not his family could keep his belonging that sort of thing. He was legally dead, he had no pulse, he didn’t breathe, and yet he was moving around, he could walk, talk, and conduct business, just like before, as long as he wasn’t in direct sunlight. And so vampires had no other choice. The revealed themselves, all at once, via Internet, TV and radio, and brought the rest of the preternatural world with them.
Vampirism and lycanthropy were studied, and the government concluded they were diseases, albeit, rare ones, ones that literally modified one’s DNA, making them stronger, faster, makes them able to heal much easier, and in the case of vampirism, makes them almost immortal, as well as giving them other powers, nearly unimaginable.
Vampirism was found to be akin to porphyria, a hereditary blood disease that makes one susceptible to sunlight and allergic to garlic as well as giving them anemia-like symptoms. Vampires, or Homo sapiens sanguis have adapted to the anemia by taking the blood of other beings to replenish their own life. They have not been found to be allergic to garlic, and they can cross over running water just fine, as well as move about freely in all but direct sunlight, as this does harm all but the strongest of them. Articles of faith have been found to harm them as well. The scientists found that the disease transferred through blood, so if one were to have a lot of vampire blood in them, they may become a vampire themselves.
Lycanthropes, or the scientific name being Homo sapiens lunaris and then the name of the animal they change into, on the other hand, is unlike any other disease, and has been described as more of a mutation. It gives one the ability to arrange their cells in such a way that they literally change form into one type of animal or another. Why only one type of animal is still unknown. It also gives them the ability to heal everything, save decapitation, 3rd degree burns, and the removal of vital organs and any wound made by silver. They seem to be able to change whenever they wish, but an overflow of adrenaline seems to start it, and the moon did have an influence. For some reason, the phases of the moon affected their adrenaline levels, most notably, the full moon. On the three days of the full moon, many lycanthropes, especially the weak and/or newly turned ones experienced something called “Moon Madness”, or lunacy, where their Beast sort of took them over. Changing would cure it, as would mating, at least, most of the time.
The fey, or Homo veneficus nympha, and demons and other-worldly creatures were found to be completely different species. Some unlike anything on this plane of existence. It was found that these other species were at least compatible with humans, which is why we get fey with human blood, as well as half-demons.
The Agency had come about as a way to police the other races, to deal with things the human police were not equipped to handle. The took care of things from vampire serial killers, to the more mundane things like hauntings and possessions. And the Lioness and the Angel, as they were called, were some of the NPIB’s top agents. Lian shook herself out of her reverie and started up the glossy steps, wanting to get this over with so she could go home and go to bed.
She was at the door when she realized something was wrong. She turned back, to find David at the bottom of the steps, his hand on the railing. His skin was paler then normal, and his eyes were wide. It was clear he was spooked.
“What’s wrong?” Lian asked him, her concern for her partner coming across in her voice. She went to him when he didn’t answer, and placed her hand on his shoulder. His only response was to shrug her off.
A little hurt, she backed off.
He started to shiver a little, and she noticed his eyes were silver, not just the irises, like when he used his powers, but his whole eye was consumed with silver, so it looked like he was blind. It clicked, he was having a vision. Lian watched and waited with baited breath, anxious. She never knew what to do in times like this. But finally, the silver receded, and his sky blue eyes were staring back at her. “Lian?” he asked, his voice hoarse.
“David? David, what did you see?” she asked, feeling nervous energy pounding through her. She wanted him to direct her to the enemy so she could kill it. That’s the way they worked, usually. He would figure out a plan, find a way to get her in, all the technical stuff, and she would apply the muscle.
“I-I… rapid series of pictures, I couldn’t make most of them out… an overall feeling of dread… danger…” He closed his eyes, trying to remember. “Lian, I don’t think we should go in there.”
Dante Alicheery · Sun Nov 26, 2006 @ 02:44am · 0 Comments |
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