Katrina: {HUNGRY! That was the only thought she had when she gasped and opened her eyes. Hunger and anger and confusion. She tracked the man that shot her and prepared to kill and feed finally.
There was so much noise and commotion around her though it forced her senses open. Her fogged mind and starved body raged against each other for control.
She could smell all the pulsing veins and arteries. All the beating hearts full of warm, fresh, life giving blood.
Her mind screamed for her to stop and concentrate. To regain some self-control. But there was so much going on she was having sensory overload and the animal side of her was quickly taking over.
She could literally feel herself losing control of her own body as her she crouched and prepared to leap onto this strange man who attacked her. Mostly out of fear she was sure, but he did still shoot her.
I – just – need – to – feed! Was all she could think now as her brain began to go into hunting mode.
I
Can't
Stop
Myself
She screamed in her mind as she lost the battle for control and the beast was all that remained.}
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Katrina leapt to her feet in a crouch ready to pounce on the first person that moved. Fangs bared and black eyes scanning the crowd, she found the one that shot her and bunched her leg muscles as she prepared to bring him down as her first of many kills for the evening. Seeing what was about to happen the crowd, accustomed to fighting vampires all their lives knew it was better to shoot first than to give one of them the chance to feed, all fired at almost the same time.
"NO!" I shouted and jumped in front of her trying to do something, I didn't know what but I couldn't just stand on the sidelines anymore. No more being a frightened little kid for me, if I was going to live this life I was going do it as a man. Or at least as close to one as a sixteen year old that didn't have a single facial hair other than on his head could get.
Time seemed to slow for me but it wasn't anything I was doing it was just that weird effect you get when something bad is about to happen.
There was a sudden flash of brilliant white light and I was temporarily blinded as the first crossbow bolt hit me in the right thigh the second and third struck me in the chest.
Suddenly I was surrounded by the smell of musky male scent mixed with that jasmine like smell, kind of like Katrina's scent but different.
It felt like I had just jumped into a pool filled with cotton balls. My headlong dive halted in mid air and I was suspended by something soft but unyielding. I heard the other gunshots and twang of crossbow strings but I felt nothing else as the room went dark.
I figured I must be dying and started to relax before thinking about Katrina. Fear flooded my thoughts again and it gave me strength as adrenaline pumped into my bloodstream. My senses were now hyper aware and I soon realized Katrina was pressed into my body from behind me. Her scent filled my nose along with the other similar one and I felt her breath on my neck.
She kissed my neck tenderly and said in a whisper, "Thank you for saving me Zach, I could never do anything to hurt you. I hope you know that." She said almost pleadingly, "As hungry as I am right now" she moaned and rested her head on my shoulder as the gaping wound in her chest and her growing thirst overpowered her ability to talk momentarily. "In the capsule before and even now, as much as I want to I would never be able to harm a hair on your cute little head."
"I know" I said, just as quietly back at her not entirely absorbing what she just said yet. As odd as it was, I really did know that she wouldn't have hurt me. I was scared as all get out but I knew deep down that she would never kill me.
"I want you to know that I think you are" she began to say when the light from the fire was suddenly filling my vision and I was being helped to my feet by strong hands. I could hear gasps and quiet murmuring behind me.
"What?" I was shouting to myself in my head. "She thinks I'm what!" Dang it, all this fighting and dying crap was really getting on my nerves. Wait, did she just say she thought I was cute?
Alexei was holding me up as the room came into focus again. There seemed to be a light emanating from him. He stood up straight and unfurled his wings that had been surrounding me and his sister protectively.
Screech! Hold it, wings? Oh yeah, you heard me correctly, wings! Alexei unfolded his wings which were the opposite color of his sister's. Where Katrina's wings were pure white, Alexei's were jet black but they were tinted with gold and silver here and there as the light reflected off them.
He turned to face the awe struck and now silent crowd but not before looking very strangely at me. His eyes went wide and I could have sworn I saw shock and amazement on his face that nearly matched that of the villagers behind him.
His crystal armor shone brightly and the nimbus of light surrounding him added to his majesty and etherealness. His eyes too had changed, they had become almost completely golden in color except for his pupils that were now a brilliant silver.
When he turned around I saw crossbow bolts protruding from his wings and lots of black dots that must be shotgun pellets and bullets all over his feathers and the tanned skin of his back.
He stretched his huge glossy black wings out and they nearly reached from one wall to the other as he flicked them down and up in a quick jerk.
Eighteen quarrels and lots and lots of ammunition clattered and pinged to the floor. The bullets sticking out of his muscled back popped out and fell to the floor along with all the others.
His golden eyes flashed and for a terrifying second I actually though some kind of death beams were gonna shoot out of them and fry all the villagers where they stood. But it was just the flash of anger and fear for his sister's safety. When he spoke however it was as though he had aged a thousand years. His voice still had that melodic soothing tone but there was also a dangerous edge to it.
"Listen to me and listen to me well for I will NOT repeat myself again!" he said and his voice was oddly amplified and somehow I knew that everyone in the entire town could hear him.
"We are not your enemy. True we are part vampire but we were raised by and are also of the Lunar tribe. But more importantly as you can now see" and he spread his wings even further so that they indeed brushed the weathered oaken walls of the tavern.
"My sister and I are of the ancient line called Slayers and as such we have been tasked to rid the world of the vampire scourge by the Archangel Michael himself. These two people with us, we owe a life debt to and they have also been marked by Michael as Shugotenshi."
He gestured to my father who stepped slowly forward. Alexei halted him with a raised hand and his sword arm seemed to twitch.
I didn't see it move but my father's shirt suddenly opened as neatly as an opening book and the black sigil that used to be a gunshot wound was visible to all as it seemed to glow from within as if being near Alexei's shining aura gave it power.
The crowd gasped again pointing and a whisper carried through them and out to the others outside. Many of them made the sign of the cross and a few went to their knees weeping.
I was wondering how he was going to explain me since I didn't have any markings from Michael on me. Lots and lots of other ones now of course but nothing from an angel as far as I knew.
Then he removed his other sword and raised both over his head, the alien metal blazed as if on fire as the light from the fireplace danced along their edges. The mystic symbols etched in their blades flared bright silver.
"Some of you might recognize what these are but most of you are too young to remember what should not have been forgotten." He said in that same amplified voice,
"These are the weapons and armor crafted by Michael within the holy fires of Heaven, given to and only useable by a Slayer as commanded by the Creator himself." Then he stepped aside and beckoned me forward.
Not wanting to leave Katrina's side I hesitated. As though reading my mind the beautiful young woman slid an arm around me and I did the same to her, lending support to each other as we stepped forward.
Her arm around me felt odd and yet natural at the same time like it was supposed to be there. I heard Katrina take a long slow breath in and hold it as she tensed and soon I heard a rustling sound behind us as her beautiful pearly white wings fanned out to either side of me brushing my arm with its soft feathers.
The crowd gasped again and another set of whispers echoed through them, but as I lifted my gaze I noticed that most of them were pointing at me rather than Katrina.
"Son" my Dad said, "How" he began then amended himself, "When did you put that on?" and then "You're injured!" he started over to me but Alexei halted him once again by merely raising his hand slightly.
"What?" I asked looking down at my clothes. I still had on the same shoes, pants and blood stained shirt that I had on through this whole adventure so I wasn't sure what he was, wait a minute. Where did, how the, who?
I had on General Alexander's armor! Looking slowly over the rest of myself a little closer I saw that I also was in possession of not his two great swords but one single sword strapped to my back, the handle sticking up over my shoulder.
Unfortunately that wasn't all that was different as I noticed there was not two but three crossbow bolts sticking out of my chest and another one protruding from my leg about half way above my knee.
"Oww" I said belatedly and touched one of the wooden shafts experimentally. It didn't hurt as much as it should so I was probably in shock and pretty soon I'll just pass out and whack my head on a table or something, split my skull open and really injure myself. I pulled it out slowly and just stared at the bloody thing in my hand dumbfounded.
Each of the wounds was bleeding pretty badly and all of them looked to be in critical locations. At least two of them should have killed me outright I thought in the back of my mind as Katrina reached over and quickly began pulling them out of me as I stood there stupidly holding the one in my hand.
I flinched each time she pulled one of the wooden shafts free and the crowd gasped half expecting me to either faint or drop dead probably. More likely though they saw what I did and that was for every bolt she removed, one of the countless markings on my arms swirled off my skin and up into the air to disappear into the night.
After removing the final bolt piercing my thigh and another tattoo vanished, she tossed it to the ground and looked at her hand which was now covered in my blood.
She was visibly trembling from the effort of restraining herself but at this point that was like standing in front of an avalanche and telling it to halt. I glanced over at her and realized what she was doing.
The effort she was expending to resist her vampire side was heroic and touching but I knew that without blood or food she would surely die.
"Go ahead" I smiled and whispered to her, "its ok."
She looked at me with those darkly beautiful eyes and I saw relief and an apology in them as she slowly licked the blood from her hand then greedily moaned wanting more.
"My God" she said whispering throatily so that only I could hear her, "you taste like liquid gold now. I've never experienced anything like that before."
Her eyes flashed violet and then back to the fire filled obsidian as she pressed her body against me and ran her fingernails through my hair. I wasn't sure exactly why but I wasn't about to complain.
My whole body seemed to have gone all tingly while she was doing that. I think I know how Tesla now feels when you hit that spot scratching him and his leg goes thump, thump, thump on the ground in a one legged race. I didn't want her to stop either, that was for darn sure.
"Ahem" Alexei said and Tesla chuffed, both looking disapprovingly at me.
"Ahh" I said coughing and standing up straight so I could examine my holey body to see if I was about to die from blood loss. But it looked like most of the bleeding had almost stopped already.
Wow I thought, I was usually a quick healer but this was ridiculous.
"Are you ok Kat?" Alexei asked more quietly than before and after she forced a nod in his direction he continued, "This is Zach" he said to the crowd of villagers and the entire town, "as you can see he now wears the armor and weapons of a Slayer.
He has been chosen by Michael to fight alongside my sister and me. He has shown his bravery in battle on more than one occasion along with his father." Glancing back to me he said, "Please pull your sleeves back again my brother." He said smiling at me.
I did as he asked exposing the intricate patterns of "Soul signatures" as I was beginning to think of them. They too, like my father's sigil glowed but mine seemed to be shifting and moving of their own accord. The villagers stared in awe at my marked skin, some of them moved farther away from me as if I was more dangerous than a guy holding two swords with wings and battle armor.
"Zach," Alexei began again and this time he sounded almost amazed at his own words, "single handedly killed a Shinigami, and it was an ancient Soul Reaper on top of it!
That is how he obtained the markings on his body. I do not know how this is possible for as far as I know this has never happened to a human before." This caused a lot more commotion amongst the villagers and most of the people in the room backed even further away from me.
I saw more than a few mothers pull their curious children behind them to shield them. They're probably afraid I'll try to steal their souls too I thought sadly, wondering if this was what I had to look forward to for the rest of my life as Alexei continued.
"He is also not from our world," He said again in that amplified voice, "this is why his technology is in some ways superior to ours. Which is another reason why I believe" and here he paused, looking around and meeting the eyes of all of them individually. Then he shouted so that all heard him clearly, "I believe that he is the great TimeLord of our Elder's prophecies, come to help save our world!"
At this the crowd went wild with shouts, questions and prayers all at the same time. Some people were angry and yelling, some were shouting praises to the heavens. At least I think they were prayers as everyone was speaking Russian, it got difficult to understand them sometimes. One old guy actually fainted and a couple people around him were helping him back to his feet. I felt like fainting myself as he announced this to the entire town. What was he thinking?
The big man stepped forward after the crowd settled down a bit and said, "If what you say is true then I bid you welcome to our humble town but if you do not speak the truth then your very presence here will surely bring the Vampire Lord to our doorsteps and he will slaughter every last one of us with his creatures."
Most of the crown around him rumbled in agreement a few people outside shouted, "He's right" or "You've doomed us all" or "What will we do now".
Alexei put his swords away and raised his hands to quiet everyone, "Please, calm yourselves. We have come bearing good news and bad news." He waited for the crown to settle down again before continuing. "The explosion you all saw up the mountain was indeed caused by us. We were in fact fighting the Vampire Lord with our uncle, General Alexander."
Once again the terrified villager's shouts rose to even higher volumes as some people cried, while some yelled in anger that the Vampire Lord was on his way here now. Others murmured the Generals name in awe and respect.
Alexei continued on trying to relieve their worries, "With the aid of our friends here" he said pointing to my father and I he said, "We were able to defeat the Vampire Lords army."
The crowd began shouting again but he raised his voice above them before they got out of control and said,
"My new brother Zach," pointing to me again, "was the one whom defeated the Vampire Lord himself by using the abilities only possessed by the one our prophecies call the TimeLord. Had it not been for him we would all have surely perished."
He held up his hands to quell the rising shouts of disbelief, "I know that what we destroyed up there was only his main army and there still remains a large force nearby that we will have to deal with but"
"LIES!" someone shrieked behind us and a skinny weasel of a man I recognized as the one that led the Vampire Lord to the cave, rushed from the shadows with a long dagger poised to strike.
He was obviously aiming for my heart and so taken aback was everyone by all that had occurred, no one was prepared for what happened next.
As the sharp knife plunged down toward me Tesla barked a warning and I felt soft feathers fold around me and yank me backwards. I heard someone say,
"Isn't that Thomas?" when suddenly Katrina was standing where I had just been and the long bladed dagger slammed into her chest right above the once gaping hole, which had now somehow almost completely closed.
Was that from the little bit of blood she had gotten from me, I thought as the man gasped seeing what he had just done and the entire crowd behind him did the same thing.
You could have heard a pin drop then as everyone held their breath waiting to see what would happen next.
She smiled at him, but it wasn't the kind of smile your mother gave you before she kissed you goodnight, oh no. This smile promised much pain and suffering as her lips parted and she bared her razor sharp fangs at him hissing a spine chilling warning.
Her kiss would not bring you sweet dreams of sugar plums and teddy bears nope. The man froze in place as he stared at those incredibly long teeth. I think we were all frozen to the spot watching those brilliantly white fangs dripping with saliva in horrific fascination.
"Sis" Alexei said in one long slow word kind of like "Siiiiisssss" raising his tone at the end making it kind of a warning and a question all in one.
Katrina paused and glanced at her brother with a flick of her black eyes. I could have sworn I saw her wink at him and her lips curved up even more almost in a smile but it also had the effect of barring even more sharp ivory teeth.
To this day I truly believe that Katrina would have let that foolish man live had it not been for one small little boy.
One of the young children whose mother had tried hiding him from me raised a tiny hand, pointed out the window suddenly and said, "Look mama more flying monsters."
The weasely man snickered and said, "Hehe you fools! I brought some friends with me. You will all feel the wrath of the Vampires now!"
He didn't know how right he was for as the people outside began shouting warnings and alarms began blaring Katrina opened her mouth wide exposing all those gleaming sharp teeth and fangs. Before he could even take one breath she tore his throat out and began to feed on his red spurting treacherous blood, no longer able to resist her body's natural instinct for survival.
Tesla began barking and growling as we heard the sounds of battle while some people were shouting and screaming in terror as they ran. There was the loud roar of a shotgun blast and something screamed as it fell from the sky, thudded to the ground with a splat and died.
Alexei shouted, "You men there" he pointed to a group of armed men, "Stay here and guard the women and children. We will bring more in as we can the rest of you, arm yourselves and follow me!" Then to me he said, "Are you ready to finish this my friend?"
I gulped and nodded not able to say anything for fear my voice would squeak or I would puke from the sounds Katrina was making as she fed.
"Kat!" he said loud enough to get through her bloodlust.
She raised her blood smeared face and glared those hellfire eyes at her brother.
"There is more outside sister we need to go now! All these people are in danger!" he said in a commanding voice.
She growled deep within her chest and with a quick twist of her now spike covered hands she tore the traitors head from his body, spun and threw it into the face of a winged red and grey creature that came crashing through the window behind her. It was expecting to meet screams of horror and fear but not the bloody head of the human that led it to this miserable little town as it forced its way in.
Just as its clawed feet grasped onto the window sill they started burning and smoking causing it to release its grip and it slipped and fell to the floor with a crash of glass.
In a blur of movement Katrina was on top of the monster. She swung one arm and her four inch talons slicing its head free from its leathery scrawny body before it could get up.
She roared in fury and then she shrieked her blood curdling banshee war cry louder than ever. I had to cover my ears as did everyone else nearby for fear of going deaf and for the fear of what that sound meant.
It was something from the primal memories of all creatures. It was the sound of a true predator. A predator that had no equal, something that hunted everyone and everything alike, nothing was safe from that scream. There was no place you could hide, nothing you could do to protect yourself, nowhere to run.
That sound meant death, plain and simple. Death to you and to your loved ones, death to all that you cared for in life. It echoed from your genetic makeup saying the best thing you could do was to lie down and die because she was near and she would find you soon.
You knew you were going to die but if you were to try and fight back or resist the inevitable? That scream meant you would suffer a fate worse than death.
It was like having your soul torn out of your body and shaken in front of you while you watched yourself being torn to pieces. Hearing, feeling, smelling and experiencing everything as the victim and the witness, watching yourself die and actually dying while you watched.
Every hair on my body stood on end as she howled that terrible sound louder and louder. Tesla tried to cover his own ears with his paws as he whimpered near my feet. Her piercing wail soon reached its peak and just then all the windows of the tavern blew out.
There was an eerie silence that followed and I thought for a minute I had actually gone deaf but for the sound of tinkling glass as it fell to the ground outside.
No one moved as the night passed quietly by, the snowflakes fell and swirled about my feet. It seemed even the vampire warriors outside were afraid of what that sound meant and didn't want to draw attention to themselves.
Then Alexei roared nearly as loud, "For Michael and Alexander!" and ran outside rising into the air with one mighty flap of his ebony wings.
A few cautious heartbeats later the men he ordered to follow charged after him, weapons at the ready. I looked back to Katrina who was standing as still as a statue carved from marble and saw that all of her terrible wounds were now completely healed when she suddenly flexed those powerful wings and shot toward the door the men were all running for.
Just as the first man stepped into the doorway a large reddish shadow filled the entryway blocking the entire exit. It was an enforcer.
Armed to the teeth with weapons arrayed all over its body. It had battle axes hanging at its sides, two enormous swords on its back. Different kinds of knives were strapped all over the place and of course it had on that bullet proof tank armor protecting its vulnerable body parts.
It glared down at the quivering man that cowered in front of it, opened its massive tusk filled jaws and roared. Mucus and saliva flew everywhere nearly covering the unfortunate young man in a pile of steaming green goo. The monster planted its four massive elephant sized legs, grabbed the man by the neck and as I smelt the bitter sweet smell of urine as the man's bladder let go, it raised him three feet into the air and opened its putrid jaws to bite his head off.
Then he was falling to the ground again with the claw filled hand still gripping his throat, blackish blood spurting from the severed elbow where Katrina's sword had deftly removed it from.
With a backwards spinning motion she sliced the enforcer's ugly shocked head from those massive shoulders and flew on past the fountain of black ichor spraying from its neck. Leaving one stunned, terrified, still choking, and incredibly lucky young man in her wake, who if he can get those rapidly cooling claws off his neck and survive the night will have an unbelievable bruise and an even more unbelievable story to tell.
It took four of the larger men several tries to heave the standing corpse of the enforcer out of the doorway so that we could get out. By the time we did I saw that chaos had spread throughout the town.
There were small groups of people all over fighting losing battles with the well-armed vampire army. Katrina and Alexei flew in random tight patterns dodging and striking at the flying vampire creatures.
Many of the small grey monster's bodies were littered across the street and on rooftops. One was hanging by a torn wing on a street sign in the center of the town square. The gas fueled streetlight was casting eerie flickering shadows across its dead face and onto the cobblestones below.
There wasn't much light to see by because the dust and smoke from the mountaintop explosion was blowing over the town now and it was creating a dark haze that nearly blotted out the moons silvery light.
The only light was from the burning streetlights or from the torches hanging from houses along the street. As more and more smoke and ash filled the air I could tell it would soon be nearly pitch black and there was an army of monsters we had to fight in that.
Looking around for something to do or someone to help I saw people fighting enforcers, demons, those small grey flying creatures that darted down clawing them and biting, and what looked like slow moving shambling people. Taking a closer look I saw they weren't exactly people anymore as one went near the light of a burning torch.
"No way, they're zombies!"" I said quietly to myself as the one I saw moaned and stumbled faster toward a group of frightened women its arms raised, boney claws outstretched, reaching for flesh to tear and eat. I could see pieces of its own skin falling off as it moved jerkily forward.
"Oye, Yeah de Vampire Lord, see he raises dem to fights his battles" a young man who was just as awestruck as myself said standing next to me, "they're basically his cannon fodder ya know" he said "Usually there be a crap loads more a dem so I ain't sure why dere ain't more of dem now."
"Stay here!" my Dad shouted to me and ran off towards a group of men grouped together defending a bunch of women and children from a large demon that had trapped them in an alley. As he ran past the walking corpse he shot the thing right between the eyes almost as an afterthought. Its head exploded and it dropped to the ground dead once again.
"Come on" I shouted to the youth and ran toward the cowering group the zombie had been trying to get. We got them up and moving again and hurried them back into the tavern just before something came running up to the door almost too fast to see.
It wasn't as fast as I had seen, or technically not seen, Katrina move but it was faster than a normal human could move that was sure.
It stopped at the door and I could see it was a young woman, very beautiful but wearing a thin almost see through nightie that was covered in so much blood that it looked red even though I could tell it used to be white once upon a time.
She opened her mouth and I could see her vampire fangs flash in the firelight as she hissed at us.
"Don't worry son" one of the older men said to me, "she can't get in so long as no one invites her and that door stays where it is."
"Um" I stammered, "What do you mean if the door stays there?"
"Well" he said and put a crossbow bolt right between her overly large bloody breasts, "we line the door and window frames with salt and garlic when we build the houses making it nearly impossible for those bastards to get in, short of tearing down the house."
"Oh" I said smiling a little sickly looking at the dead girl and thinking what would have happened had she not been stopped, "hence, as long as the door is there."
"Aye lad" he said "that's why they send in those damn enforcers first to create new doors so to speak. Which is what that," he said pointing to the still standing headless enforcer body, "would have done had it not been for your lady friend."
I gulped and said, "that's good to know, thanks" and checked outside to see if the coast was clear before heading back out into the near complete darkness.
I pulled out the pistol I had and took a deep breath readying myself. Looking down to Tesla I said, "you ready boy?"
"Woof" he quietly barked
"Ok" I said a little more calmly knowing he was with me.
We walked back into the dimly lit street the sounds of gunfire, screams, shouts and dying was all around us. You could no longer see the sky it was so dark. Tesla growled and looked to my right.
All I could see was swirling dust and snow but I raised my gun and took up a shooters stance. Lucky for me I listened to my friend because not two seconds later a group of three zombies and another young female vampire materialized out of the darkness.
This one was completely naked however but she too was covered in blood like the other one so it wasn't too hard to tell what she was. I shot her in the head as soon as I saw what she was but when she didn't die I shot her in the chest and then removed my crossbow and shot her with that.
Unfortunately I wasn't a very good shot with the strange weapon yet and missed twice before finally piercing her heart with one of the wooden shafts.
The rotting walking corpses were almost on us as Tesla barked at them but wisely kept his distance. I was able to shoot two of them but we had to dodge the other ones powerful attacks before I finally had a chance to kill that one too.
Tesla began barking again behind me and I swung the gun around only to find a small boy standing there.
"Hey there little guy" I said to him, "are you lost?"
Tesla was growling and baring his teeth so I figured there must be something coming our way so I knew I had to get this kid to safety quickly.
"Where are your parents?" I asked him in Russian but he either couldn't understand me or he was too scared. I reached out my hand to take his but Tesla jumped forward and grabbed my sleeve in his mouth pulling my arm back just as the 'little boy' bared very NOT 'little boy' vampire teeth and tried biting me. Had Tesla not pulled me back he probably would have gotten me too, so surprised was I.
"Whoa!" I yelled and fell backwards reflexively pulling the trigger on the crossbow as I hit the ground. The shot went wide but actually thudded into a zombie behind him that was about to strike an old lady down causing it to spin around and face backwards. The old lady turned around at the sound, pulled out a shotgun and blew the zombies head off before waving her thanks to me laughing maniacally and headed back in the direction she had been going.
The vampire boy hissed at me and began walking in my direction. I noticed that his eyes were black but lacked that hellish fire that I had saw in Katrina's eyes. Tesla growled even louder and stepped in front of me. The kid halted looking at the dog standing in front of it. He grinned, licked his lips and said in a very hungry voice.
"Puppy!"
"Oh crap" I said and fumbled with cold fingers at my belt looking for more ammo for the crossbow.
I heard scraping from behind me. Sparing a quick glance back I saw through the swirling white and black of the snow/dust mixture a group of six zombies heading in my direction. Two of them were missing arms and several others had multiple arrows and crossbow bolts sticking out of them but they were still moving.
One didn't have a lower jaw and its left eye was missing as half its face had been blown off. Then I saw three more of the walking dead turn my way off to the right as they probably heard Tesla barking and growling at the creepy vampire kid.
Two of the gray leathery flying creatures landed on the roof above me and glared down at us with their red eyes. They were probably waiting like vultures for the leftovers the zombies were going to leave and if I couldn't find any more bolts for this crossbow they wouldn't have to wait long.
I blew on my fingers trying to warm them up a bit and finally was able to grab another quarrel from my belt just as the undead kid with a serious overbite lunged forward trying to get Tesla.
He jumped back out of its reach but bumped right into my arm in so doing and made me pull the trigger on accident. The bolt shot up into the air, ricocheted off the lamp post, bounced off the metal gutter of the house behind me and slammed into one of the grey vampire buzzards just under its chin.
The bolt snapped its mouth shut neatly slicing off its lolling tongue the arrow head sticking out the top of its bald head as it toppled backwards off the roof.
"That was cool" I had time to say before the kid ran forward hissing with his fangs dripping trying to bite me.
Tesla growled dangerously, grabbed the kid by the back of the neck and shook him like a ragdoll before flipping him over his shoulder into the closing pack of zombies causing three of them to trip and fall over each other.
"Thanks boy" I said starting to get to me feet when something small ran past Tesla in a blur and slammed into my stomach with such force I flew back and hit the stone wall of the house.
With stars in my vision and ears ringing, I barely heard Tesla barking ferociously. I looked up in time to see that punk vampire kid standing there swinging the arm of one of the zombies like a club right at my head.
I only had time to flinch as the rotting arm hit me so hard I thought my head had become separated from my shoulders. Once again I was flying through the air in a kind of cartwheel, arms and legs flailing.
This time I gonged into the lamppost, literally as my head left an indentation. The sound of the ringing post matched my thrumming head.
Between smashing into the building and getting my skull nearly caved in from the street post I was stumbling around drunkenly not able to see or think straight. Tesla was barking and slashing at the closing zombies trying to keep them at bay while I was getting my butt kicked in an MMA throw down with peewee Dracula.
The crazy vampire kid jumped up grabbed the post I was so recently intimately connected to, swung around it and kicked me in the face. I did a complete summersault landing on my back and hitting my head on the cobblestone road adding another concussion to the previous two.
One more and I win the pot with four of a kind right Timmy? Huh? What did you say Fluffy? Thirteen? Oh ok I'll be right over after Tee time but not without my left tire because the clouds are dancing the Macarena today.
The Vampire Lord's mini me jumped down and began walking over to my confused and bruised body. Somewhere in the back of my mind I heard Tesla barking and zombies moaning amidst all the gunfire, explosions, screams, shouts and blowing wind but none of that registered in my disconnected brain.
I couldn't string together a coherent thought to save my life as the little creep crawled up on my chest smiling his drooling fang filled grin at me the whole time. He was dragging the arm of the zombie with him and I remember that because the fingers of the arm were still moving.
He stood up on my stomach and proceeded to beat the snot out of me with the still moving corpse limb. Hitting me with such force that I felt a rib or two crack along with my nose and a few fingers when I tried unsuccessfully to block the blows reigning down on me.
Tesla leaped at the demon child but it was ready for him this time and swung its undead club at my friend batting him off down the street somewhere. I must have blacked out for a while because the next thing I remember was looking up and being surrounded by decaying corpses looking greedily down at me as Kid Vamp finished beating my face in.
One final bash to the head seemed to satisfy him and he dropped the arm which commenced crawling its own way back up my body not wanting to miss out on the action apparently.
My face and body was covered in my own blood while the kid hissed at me, opening his mouth wide moving in to tear into my exposed throat and drain my life blood. The zombies, which seemed to have multiplied in numbers, crowded in, anticipating being able to eat brains soon I guessed groggily.
I could hardly breathe as my nose was smashed and blood poured from it but I could smell the rot from their decaying bodies like a green vapor surrounding me but the chilly breath of the Fang Brat was worse.
It smelled of blood, rotted meat, and death. His body was completely cold. There wasn't an ounce of warmth in this thing clinging to me. It felt like having a stone garden gnome crawling on top of me. Albeit a garden gnome with three inch fangs, a severe case of halitosis and a complete lack of personal hygiene, phew he stank!
His black eyes flashed and opened wide in excitement as he leaned toward my neck his long fangs dripping cold saliva onto my chest. I tried in vain to concentrate and bring the floating numbers vortex to mind but it was useless.
My vision was spinning and blurry and I could barely think straight. I coughed up bloody phlegm when I tried to shout for help.
It was then that I realized I was about to die and I wasn't scared, I was worried. I was wondering what the rest of the town was going to do against this army of undead monsters.
It made me mad that after all this the Vampire Lord was going to win anyway. I was worried for Katrina's and Alexei's safety, for my Dad and for my Uncle Leo and Aunt Eve back home. She would never know what happened to us.
I felt so helpless and defeated knowing there was nothing I could do to save them.