Bloodistan // Vampire Thriller

0.24

This room was once sterile. The lights that hung overhead were once cool and white, their tubes not flickering and not casting patterns of spots and stains onto the once clean floor. The air-conditioning once worked perfectly fine. Now, the inhabitants are sweating and dabbing at their foreheads with damp, cotton handkerchiefs.

Before, the crucifix in the middle of the room was unoccupied.

The crucifix is a peculiar object. It is made of clear, smooth sheets of silver and fashioned in the shape of two long, narrow rectangles, crossing in the middle. There is cushioning for lumbar support. There are also spikes that emerge out of the middle of the crossbar, piercing muscle and sinew and then splaying out.

The haemophage rattles against them, making high supersonic keeling noises that deepen into low, barely audible moans. The mental interference is almost as severe. Someone pops open a bottle of Panadol and Aspirin and passes it along and everyone manages to swallow a few. Everyone is wearing earbuds. The smell of garlic hangs pungent and cloying in the air. It is not only the vampire who is uncomfortable.

The door swings open from behind them and two men in suits storm in, flanked on all sides by bigger men in Kevlar. They are both ministers. The one on the left is Muslim League from the Ard. His name is Ali Al-Rashid. He is big, bulky and sweaty, his face a splotched diarrhoea of shades of red. The one on the right is Citru Party. The posters call him Manuel. He is lean and insalubrious looking. Nobody remembers his real name.

"Inspector Tasimov, what a pleasure to finally meet you. I will assure you, for the last few hours it is only your name and the names of your so beautiful students that is on everyone's minds." Al-Rashid speaks loudly, trying to outdo the screaming vampire.

Tasimov bows. "Thank you, sir. That's...good to know."

The two of them arrange themselves beside him, shaking hands with Chief Pamouk who is desultory and surrounded by cigarette smoke. Everyone else are wearing white coats and keying numbers efficiently into their calculators and laptops. "Shall we get started, sirs?" one of them asks the men who are not in white.

Manuel nods and benevolently stretches his hand out. They begin.

Two of them gingerly approach the haemophage in the middle of the room, rubbing two adhesive pads together and placing each behind each of the creature's ears. It is violent and curious. It snaps at their gloved hands and cranes its neck.

"Shall we record this or would one of you like to experience it live, sirs?" The white-suit in charge offers the headset to all of them.

"Tasimov, you give it a look," the chief grunts. "So long as neither of you sirs have a problem with that."

"Of course, not, Pamouk. It should be him. Of course, it should," Al-Rashid says.

Tasimov puts the headset on. The screen in front of his face reads "please stand by" and gentle static hisses into his ears.

"Live in three. Two. One."

He is assailed by sex. Even under considerable duress, the haemophage is thinking primarily about procreation. Tasimov sees titillating, orgasmic dreams of orgies where a tribe of around seven vampires suck on nubile women who suck back from the vampires, impregnating them. He sees the women rotting away, hanging from the ceiling of some dilapidated shack. He sees their wombs hang from them like ripe fruits, foetus-unlife pulsating in amniotic fluid.

"It's horny. Poke it," he grunts. He hears another high scream and for a while, all he can see is flashing red. And then fantasy fades away and he sees flashes of reality. Escape. The vampire is running through a populated maze, crazed by garlic and sunlight. It is afraid. It finds a sewer chute and falls into it. It swims in the muck for a few months, regenerating in the constant darkness. Then, it finds its way out somewhere. He sees these in vignettes, flashing for a second each before fading and cutting away to more sex, blood and violence. It has not fathered any children.

"It's a child," he mutters. "Poke it again. Harder."

He hears a much more agonized scream. He sees a vivid, juddering scarlet. Then, he sees the last time it was poked. Men are experimenting on it. Men in grey, dirty shirts. He sees what it feels. It did not deserve the punishment it was being dealt. That was what it felt. Then, these men had caught the vampire. They were picking it apart.

"Again."

More screams and he must fight now to push the pity away. He must fight to remember that this thing would gladly kill him and suck his blood dry then and there if they let him. It is infantile and idiotic. It cannot even vocalize. It cannot organize its thoughts. And it is Tanin so those thoughts and aspects are strong and short lived. He is having trouble keeping up.

He sees it for only a flash but he screams at them to stop and whips his headset off.

"Yeah, stop all of it. Go back maybe a second and then frame by frame."

Everyone in the room crowds around a whirring monitor as one of them goes back, frame by frame.

"Okay, stop. There. Look."

Tasimov taps on the upper right of the screen. The room in the aspect is very similar to this one. A poster hangs on the wall, pink and cheap.

"It seems this ghost will never stop haunting us, gentlemen," Manuel says.

The image is magnified and cleared up of interference and noise. There is no ambiguity. The poster reads: The Bloodistan Gazette.

I hope you enjoyed that. This one was the most fun to write, so far. Please do leave a comment if you have something to say about the story and how it's shaping up. Or if you just want to say hi. Okay, happy reading and see you tomorrow :)