Vampyres, Prt 5.

Hey guys, here's the much-awaited part five of my Vampyre story.

Remeber; Rip it to shreds!

the poem is by Blink, the song lyrics are from Iris, by the Goo Goo Dolls.

***

Peter Jeyren was working at his computer when the phone rang. “What now?” He grumbled as he went to the phone. He picked it up. “Hello, this is Peter Jeyren speaking.”

“Mr. Jeyren, this is officer Larter of the Seattle police department.” Peter groaned quietly. “I suppose you want to take me to the nuthouse.”

“No sir, the sheriff wants to see you right away.”

Peter was rather surprised. “See me? What for?”

“There has been a murder that he needs your expertise on. I’ll come to your house and pick you up. I know where it is.” The line went dead. Peter put the phone down and began packing his tools. What would he want to see a vampirologist for? And what would it have to do with a murder? He thought. He went to his door and opened it. A police cruiser was just pulling in front of his house.

He sighed. If I have to travel, can’t it be inconspicuously? He thought with a humorless laugh. He got inside the car, shutting the door behind him. The officer that was driving was obviously in his twenties, with sandy blonde hair and hazel eyes. “Hey Josh, how are you doing?”

The officer glared at him. “Mr. Jeyren, I’ve told you not to call me Josh.”

“What? I can’t call my own cousin by his first name?”

Josh gritted his teeth. “Not while I’m working.” Peter laughed and the car pulled away from the curb. They drove down a steep incline in the direction of the Puget Sound. A Seattle Duck drove by, and the sounds of laughing people filled the air for a moment. The Seattle Ducks are amphibious vehicles. They can drive on land, and serve as a boat. People go on tours of Seattle with them all the time. After a few minutes of driving, they turned into another street. This one made Peter’s jaw drop. There was caution tape all around the area, and several police cars. The car stopped and he got out.

The police sheriff came over. “Good, you’re here.”

Peter nodded. “What did you want to see me about?”

The sheriff looked grave. “Come and examine this body and tell me what you see.” He handed him a pair of rubber gloves. He put them on and followed the sheriff under the caution tape. In the middle of the street, there was the body of a man. His face was that of someone extremely frightened, and white as a ghost. Peter got onto his knees next to the body and looked at the neck. “My god.” On the side of the neck there were two holes. He heard the sheriff behind him. Peter turned. “I can see why you wanted me to come here sir. Did your people find anything else?”

The sheriff nodded. “There is absolutely no blood in the entire body. We’ve checked and rechecked. We’ve had several attacks like this over the past few months.” Peter sat back heavily. All of the years that I’ve studied vampires, and I’m shocked to find real evidence of one. He thought. “We have a photo.”

Peter started and stood up. “You have a photo of an actual vampire?” The sheriff nodded. “Show me.” The sheriff motioned for him to follow him and walked over to a computer. Peter gazed over his shoulder. In the corner of the screen, barely visible, was a person with long black hair running from the scene, wearing black. “We need to find this vampire and stop it. Murder is something that nobody, supernatural or not, will get away with in this city. I have already phoned the government, and they want you to help them examine it and capture it. You are the most qualified vampirologist in the world.”

Peter nodded. “It would be my pleasure.”

“Good.”

A few hours later they were at police headquarters, inside the sheriff’s office with officer Larter and the sheriff. There were also several people from the government. Peter had gotten out his tools and books, and was looking through them hastily. “If we can somehow lure it into the sunlight we should be able to catch it without too much difficulty. The sun makes them about as strong as a regular human being.”

The sheriff nodded. “What about tranquilizing it?” one of the representatives asked. This representative seemed to be in charge. Her name was Selena Harchy. She was tall, with brown hair that curled tightly down to her elbows. Her face had obviously been the handiwork of a plastic surgeon. She wore a brown business-like skirt and an expensive white t-shirt that looked to be from a designer brand. She also had a cigarette clamped between her long manicured nails. Peter picked up another book and began rifling through it. After a moment he stopped. “We will need to inject it with a tranquilizing fluid, but it will have to be a thousand times more powerful than one that we would use on a human being. We would have to inject it into its upper left arm for it to work though.”

“We will set some people to work on it immediately.” Selena said. Then one of the other representatives spoke up.

“How will we transport it back to DC?” He asked.

“If you use enough tranquilizer liquid it shouldn’t wake up until it is safely in the lab, but you should transport it in a box made from wood coated with nickel.”

He continued giving instructions on how to contain it once it was transported, tests they should run on it, and a number of other things. After a while they were finished. It was getting late, so Peter left shortly after that, getting a ride home with his cousin. He waved as Josh drove off, then went inside his house, stepping over his dog Pojo as he walked. Pojo was a black Labrador retriever, and getting old. He went to his garage, which served as his workroom, closing and locking the door behind him.

He had work to do.

Chapter Four

Sadness

I whisper my words

through the cold paned glass.

No ear can hear them,

no voice replies.

I see men dressed

in the colour of blindness,

they ignore me,

I ignore them.

My hand presses

against the window

in the hope that someone,

somewhere,

in the sea of sighs,

will see me.

I guess – I always guess –

that all eyes will turn away

upon my appearance.

Then

after a few seconds I realise:

I hate being right.

***

I had recovered from my drunkenness, and was sitting on the floor of my home. It was covered in dust, but I didn’t really care. I was amusing myself with drawing things, but my thoughts were elsewhere. It was seven hundred and fifty two years to the day since my father had died and my city destroyed. I felt terribly guilty. I probably could have saved my father and possibly some of the villagers if I hadn’t run. I thought sadly. But dwelling on it wouldn’t help; it would only drive me mad. I looked down at the dust. I saw that I had written how could they? I sat there, staring at the words on the floor. Suddenly a beam of sunlight came through a crack in the board, landing on the words. I got out of the light quickly. I bumped a small table, knocking something to the ground. I turned around. I had knocked a small radio off of the table. A tune began playing. I picked up the radio. The power button had been hit, and it was now playing music. And I don’t want the world to see me, ‘cause I don’t think that they’d understand…I felt the sadness I was feeling strengthen. I listened to it some more. When everything feels like the movies, yeah you bleed just to know you’re alive! I turned it off, a single tear running down my face.

***

Peter had finished it. He had been working all night on it, and it was finally finished. He had decided that vampires probably emitted quite a bit of energy. It would take a lot of energy to animate a corpse. So he created a sensor. It sensed undead energy and would lead you to the source of it. It made no sound at all.

He looked at his handiwork with a smile on his face. It was a black box with a handle with a screen with a red arrow in the center, and a green bar on the right side. It pointed in the direction the energy came from, and the closer you were, the taller the bar became. Once you were within twenty feet of the source, the screen would blink on and off. He picked it up and went to his kitchen.

It was lunchtime, and he was starving. He opened a cupboard and pulled out a can of tomato soup. He poured it into a pan, putting it on a stove. A minute later he was sitting at his dining room table, eating tomato soup. He ate quickly, and hurried out the door without bothering to take care of his dishes. He went down to the police station and went into the sheriff’s office. The representatives, officer Larter, and sheriff were already there. “It’s about time.” Selena said crossly.

“Sorry, I’ve been working all night.”

“On what, may I ask?”

“A way that we can find out where the vampire is hiding.” Suddenly he had everyone’s attention. “And did you figure it out?” She asked sounding excited. Peter nodded.

“Well tell, tell! How will we find it?”

“We’ll find it with this.” Peter put his creation on the sheriff’s desk. Everyone gathered around it. Some seemed disappointed, others curious. But Selena was ecstatic. She clapped her hands. “Excellent! I’m impressed Mr. Jeyren.” He accepted the compliment with a bob of his head.

“We have developed the tranquilizer.” She said. She handed him a large syringe filled with clear liquid. “We’re ready to go.”

“Well then, we’d better go.”

Selena nodded. “We have a limousine; we can go to the scene now.” The sheriff spoke up.

“Miss Harchy, I am going to have to accompany you.” Selena shook her head.

“I’m sorry sheriff, but this is government business now. Forget any of this ever happened.” The sheriff tried to argue, but Selena was already out the door, followed by the other representatives.

Peter picked up the sensor, put the syringe in his front pocket, grabbed his tools, and followed them. They went outside to a black limo. Peter stared. He had never seen a limo before. A chauffer got out of the car and opened a door on the side. Selena got in, and motioned for Peter to do the same. He followed her reluctantly.

The inside was furnished with cream-colored leather, a cooler, and several other things that he didn’t think belonged in a car. The door closed and the car drove off. Peter was glad of the tinted windows. The limo was getting stares from everywhere. They soon arrived at the scene.

The body had been removed sometime during the night, and the street looked almost regular.

At least, it would have looked regular, if there hadn’t been about twenty military soldiers, a large silver colored box, and a man with a camera standing in the street. Not to mention the helicopter flying overhead.

Peter felt rather dizzy. He didn’t like attention. He reached into his bag and pulled out a handful of garlic cloves on shoestrings tied into loops. He handed one to Selena, who took it with a wrinkled nose. “It will prevent the vampire from smelling your blood, put it on.” She did so with obvious distaste. Peter was glad that he had taken several extras. He passed them out to everyone and turned the sensor on. The arrow spun for a moment, and he was afraid that it wouldn’t work. Then it slowed and pointed down the road. Peter began walking down the road, followed by all of the people. Selena was walking on his left side, and one of the soldiers on his right. When they reached the end of the block they could turn left or right. The arrow turned to the left. They followed it for some time, none of them speaking, hardly daring to breathe. Suddenly the screen began to flash, and the arrow pointed to a boarded up door. On the ground, barely big enough to allow a person to squeeze through, was a hole. The military men surrounded the hole, leaving plenty of room. Peter turned to Selena, and said in a voice, barely more than a whisper. “We need blood to get it to come out.” Selena nodded and pointed to a bucket of it with a lid on it being held by one of the soldiers. “We borrowed it from a blood bank.” She whispered. Peter came forward and took the bucket from the soldier, turning back to the hole. He took the lid off of it and set it on the ground.

The trap was set.