the morning after/the night before
They get to the bottom floor and they're both staggering a little, but he's staggering more. His backpack feels like an anchor, and he's glad that he's only holding Zoe's hand, that she didn't need to be carried.
When they get to the bikes Abby considers, then looks over at him.
"Oh shit," she says, and he looks down and realizes that the wound on his chest has opened up again. His white undershirt is a gore-fest. His eyes widen a little, because he didn't even feel it.
Abby reaches for her own pack, and he's dreading elastic protein for a second but she gets out a cloth, something she'd wrapped her bolts in maybe. She wads it up and stuffs it over the wound, under the strap of his shirt. Then she fixes it there with electrical tape. Jerry-rigged bandaging. It's a fucking mess.
"We can't ride three to a bike," she mutters, and tears off the tape with her teeth.
He feels light all over, in the head too. Drake is dead. Danica is dead. There is no can't.
"I can ride," he insists.
Abby frowns at him.
'Jesus, King," she says. "Do you always have to be such a fucking alpha?"
He can't call them memories. Memories have depth and substance and texture. They have life. This is more a matter of what he knows, what he can recall. A mechanical awareness.
He recalls the way Danica walked, pinched steps in fetish heels, the curve of her instep. He recalls the cut of Asher's pants at the waist, loose shirt-tails flapping, a bat's wing.
He knows that Abby punched him in the face four times, and that it was Brady who finally tranked him. He knows what it is to be shackled.
He knows mourning. Something was taken, something was ripped away from him, something he could never get back. He recalls the end of the conversation, in the dark, at night, when Abby said:
"So what do we do if he lives? I mean, do we call his family or something?"
And then the long pause, the continuation.
"Jesus, Sommer -- don't tell me you haven't thought that far ahead?"
He knows that it was only after three days that his eyes stopped changing colour, and he stopped snarling, and he recalls that he only stopped puking blood on Day Five.
"That's some aftertaste, huh?" Sommerfield quips.
He gags one last time, wipes his mouth with the back of his manacled hand.
"Yes it is, and thank you so much for mentioning it."
"You want mouthwash?"
And he spits into the basin and whispers, "Got any Clorox?" and only Abby realises that he isn't joking.
Abby rides, with Zoe pillion. And he rides all the way back to the warehouse. In his undershirt. He's frozen meat.
At the warehouse he doesn't know where he is, or who any of the people are. Zoe, at least, is in the same boat.
Abby takes the girl's hand and leads her over to a woman with pulled-back chestnut hair, wearing a labcoat. Zoe can tell the difference. She looks reluctant.
"Zoe, this is Hannah," Abby explains gently. "She's got a room for you, and she's going to give you something to eat. In about fifteen minutes I'm going to come check on you, okay?"
It's not enough, but it will have to do. Zoe ambles off stiltedly, holding Hannah's arm.
"My wife," a sandy-bearded guy with a funny accent says, following their departure with his eyes. He turns back and sticks out his hand. "Lowrens Caulder."
King shakes, realises that he can't feel his fingers.
Caulder looks over at Abby expectantly.
"You come back. Not everyone, but there must be some good news, yes?"
She hands him a small bloody package.
"Got the arrowhead for you -- that's Drake's blood, so you can start sampling."
"And Daystar?"
She just makes a vicious little grin, glancing at King to include him in the victory.
He wants to join in, really, and opens his mouth to say something suitably congratulatory, but all that comes out is:
"I really need a shower."
Hello, my name is: Carol.
The supermarket is weird. Or maybe he just thinks it's weird, having had so little use for supermarkets in nearly five years.
The floor is white, the ceiling is white, and everything just seems so...clean. It's noisy, like your neighbour's too-loud TV, to disguise the fights. People walk around, selecting stuff, making the trolleys squeak. It's weird. He can't put his finger on it.
It's Normal.
And part of it is that he hasn't had much to do with normal for so long. And part of it is that his rhythms haven't changed. It's still night -- nine p.m. -- and he still sleeps part of the day and wakes late in the afternoon, like the rest of the team, in shifts of night and day that have little to do with the natural cycles of the body and everything to do with the best times to stay under the radar.
To go hunting.
He's realized that, after five years of pure predation, he's still the same animal he was before. Only the quarry is about to change.
Carol looks at him expectantly.
"Sir?"
"What?" He's been watching the other customers. A tired-looking woman with a pram. A guy with a bike helmet under his arm. "Sorry?"
"Cash or charge, sir?"
"Uh, cash." He reaches for his back pocket.
It's always cash. Cash leaves no traces. Something else that hasn't altered.
Carol goes through the transaction like she's sleep-walking.
"Here's your change, sir. Have a nice night."
"Uh, yeah. Thanks."
He looks at Carol for a second. Twenty-something, lank hair, bad eyeliner, nice figure under the uniform. Six weeks ago he would have looked at her differently. He would've been able to smell her toothpaste, her fear. He smiles at her.
"You have a nice night too."
Carol grins in wan farewell. Her break is long overdue.
Dex nods at King from the exit. He's been in the liquor store, on the right. Before that, the all-night drugstore, both of them together. King knows that this is their way of getting him used to real life again, getting him to help Dex with the supply run. It's also a way of testing him out. Dex is never more than twenty feet away. King knows this, and doesn't really mind.
Dex hefts his bags.
"All done?"
"Yeah."
"Did you get the rice?"
"Yeah." King checks between the plastic handles. "Sure."
They head back to the van. King catches a glimpse of himself in the liquor store window: the stubble he's been too preoccupied to give a shit about has nearly turned into a full-blown beard.
He thinks maybe he likes it.
The shower is a block row with a concrete floor and he turns on the steaming spray full bore and stands under it in his clothes. And after a while he peels everything off, including the electrical tape and the makeshift bandage, and stands there willing sensation to return.
He knows he feels happy. It's like something he's misplaced -- there, but not there. The Honeycomb is gone, he remembers. Abby would have nuked it after she left -- kinda a waste, but that's hindsight for you.
Grief feels misplaced too.
He drops his head, takes the spray on the back of his neck, feels something shudder out of him. He looks at the floor, notices the swirls at his feet, and only has time to think /'shit, that's a lot of blood'/ before he passes out.
He's being moulded.
Brady and Dex hound him through the weights for two hours, and now Abby's the running machine cardio nazi -- ten minutes of hell-for-leather, jump off for push-ups, ten minutes more, jump off for squats, ten minutes more...
They've been doing this for an hour and a half already. He thinks his lungs are going to explode.
He blinks salty, tries not to start gasping, glances at the seconds counting off on the display.
"Don't look at the monitor," Abby says automatically. "Off and give me twenty."
He can't break stride or he'll fall everywhere -- it's a quick jump onto the mat. His legs are in agony, so working his arms is almost a relief. But by the fifteen count he wishes he was still running. This is his fifth set. He stinks with sweat.
"Run. Go -- move it."
He kicks back onto the running machine, Abby stands in front with the stopwatch, and it burns, god, but he knows he's got nine minutes to go. He's gasping, thinking the EDTA didn't kill him, but this probably will, but he's already died and been reborn twice and he can handle it. Maybe.
He sneaks a peak of eight minutes forty-five seconds, and then there's a crack, like the sound barrier breaking, and he doesn't even falter when he realizes that she's slapped him. Hard. His cheek has a sharp tang.
"I said don't look," she snaps.
He runs faster.
"Off -- crunch twenty."
No time to murder her, no time to think, a short step, and then his abdominals are a giant throb of pain. She's standing on his feet. What a fucking bitch.
"...nineteen...twenty. Run."
His eyes are stinging, mouth gluey. He keeps his gaze straight ahead. Feels his legs trembling. Counts. Perspiration makes everything look like it's underwater, makes his hands slippery -- he shakes his fingers. Runs.
Can't help himself.
Looks.
She lifts her arm again, but she's telegraphing and he's alert for her now, and he's still running when her arm snaps forward - and he grabs her wrist.
"Don't. Do that. Again," he rasps, his voice thick with breath and fatigue and anger.
He's running, body moving, and where his hand circles the joint of her wrist his motion jerks at her. She doesn't overbalance. Maintains eyes contact. He sprints through her comeback.
"Good," she says curtly. Retrieves her arm. Grins. "You're getting faster."
There's the sensation of being rocked.
He's warm, the water is still warm, and her hair sticks to his face in thick wet strands. Her head is bowed low over him, her arms are iron bands around him, and she is sobbing, he can hear it, something so oozing-raw coming from her that it almost shocks him into full consciousness.
And he can hear her, around the thrum of the shower and the gurgle of the drain and the hitching in her throat as the words gasp out, 'oh god no no more no please i can't please not him no oh no not this ah god', and it's such a keening plaintive sound he wants to reach up and reassure her, but his hands don't work, nothing really works, and his mind pinpoints back down to the sole awareness of his head in her lap, and her clothes are all wet, and the sensation of being rocked as he zones out again.
Just out of curiosity, he'd asked everyone whether they believed in God. This was about three months after he'd joined up. The answers were fairly predictable. Dex said yes, emphatically. Brady just drew out the chain around his neck, the crucifix dangling beside the dogtags. Hedges said he wasn't sure, but probably yes, he just hadn't figured out what to call it yet. Sommerfield said 'Don't you mean Goddess?'
Abby was the only one who said no.
"You live, you die, you turn to dirt. That's pretty much it, right?"
He watches her clean her bow. She isn't looking at him, she's looking at her handgrip.
"I gu-ess," he says, dry. "I'm interested in your opinion. Y'know. For the poll."
"Whatever." She glances up distractedly, sees his face and frowns. "Well, that's my opinion, King. Life, death, dirt. Or in a vampire's case, dust. I just can't see why it has to be more complicated than that."
He shrugs. He knows she's a liar.
They had the party in his absence -- bastards. No, actually, he doesn't care. But it would have been nice. It wasn't their fault. He was still unconscious -- concussion, with interest. Caulder came by, left a beer on the nightstand, but King only opened his eyes long enough to see it and remind himself to drink it in the morning. But of course Hannah had already taken it away by then.
He's up three days later, stitches won't come out for another three at least. He wants to go running, wants to expend some energy blasting shit to pieces on the practise range, but he can't stand up and walk around for more than fifteen minutes at a time. His body is like one big bruise. It's such bullshit.
Abby comes in before dinner, as the sun's going down, helps him get a blanket around his shoulders and shows him the way through the warehouse to the outside. He'd almost forgotten there was an outside. The whole facility is parked on the edge of a cliff -- strategic -- and there's a place where you can sit on the grassy verge and watch the valley light up. It's almost picturesque. He still can't get over the feeling that this is the most dangerous time of the day.
He and Abby sit together and knock back their beers -- two apiece -- in silence for a while.
"Now what?" he says finally, because he can't stand it, the not-knowing.
She rubs her eyes with the heel of her palm. She looks tired.
"I think we got 'em, mostly. But there's been a few bunkers located, so..."
"Local mop-up?"
"Looks that way. I don't think it'll be hard, just time-consuming."
"And we'd be better using our time..."
"The farms," she says quietly, and he knows she means the mass-production facilities. She's explained it already. "I just can't get the farms out of my head."
He nods.
"Do it then."
"Waiting to get my energy back," she says, and smiles wanly at something in the middle distance.
"Since when do you need to recharge?" he ribs, clinking his bottle with hers.
"Since when do you stay in bed for three days?"
"Well fuckin' ouch, Whistler. I'm cut."
"Lazy-ass..."
"Jesus."
"...good-for-nothing..."
"Slave driver."
"...damn fucking stupid to let yourself get caught."
The tone of her voice halts him for a second. She's got the remainder of scared on her face. He stops grinning, looks over the cliff at the car headlights way below, thinks of the people they've lost. Pulls them both back.
"So after this, you're thinking..."
"Europe," she says decisively. "Lots of purebloods."
"What about Zoe?"
"She can come with."
"Tough gig."
"Safer that way."
"And what about me?"
Her head jerks around in shock and she looks at him with her mouth open. He can see all her assumptions gaping right there. And now she's reassessing in a split second, until he puts her out of her misery, starts with a small grin that gets wider and wider. She finally gets it.
"God -- you shit!" she exclaims, and punches his bicep.
"Fuck -- that really hurts you know. A lot."
She punches him again for good measure, but more gently.
"Jerk."
"I hate to break stereotype."
"Pain in the ass..." She rocks in her crossed legs, looks away then back to his eyes. "I'm glad."
"Can't get rid of me."
"Just don't screw up."
She was grinning, but it died, and now she looks very serious all of a sudden, like she's just realised what the words mean.
Then she does something that surprises him utterly. She looks out, away, then quite slow and deliberate, lets her head tilt down onto his shoulder. Her voice is very soft.
"Don't screw up, Hannibal."
His stomach feels like he just jumped off the cliff. He pauses, delicate.
"Abby..." he says quietly, conversationally, "...what are you doing?"
There's a long moment before he hears her.
"Weakening," she murmurs.
He doesn't know what to say. Wouldn't be able to say it anyway, considering how his mouth's gone dry.
Then it's gone. She lifts her head, like waking up, and gets to her feet, bottles clinking.
"I gotta put Zoe to bed," she says, in a normal voice.
He blinks at her leaving. A few minutes later Hannah comes out to scold him back to medical.
"King!"
He can't think for a second. He's in shock.
They're at ground level in a disused nightclub, having just made it up from the basement tunnels. They uncovered a coven, a big one -- it wasn't what they were expecting. At all. Not enough troops, and not enough ammo. Maybe a small-scale nuke would have done the trick. They've been fighting, and now just trying to blast their way out, from the underground stairs. Vampires and familiars swarm like hornets.
And Fergus Brady died in his arms.
It's chaos. Someone hit the strobes, which hasn't helped. He feels his pupils dilate and contract, dilate and contract, a pulsebeat. He had to leave Brady's body behind.
This is only his third hunt.
"King!"
Abby sounds desperate. He strafes in the direction of the basement door, sees two vamps explode in a flurry of sparks and ash, vaults the bar and keeps his head down, sliding to rest behind the overturned table where she's taken cover.
"It's me," he says quickly.
She has her bow tucked in beside her, and shoots off a few badly aimed rounds around the side of the table, and when she turns back he can see the problem.
"Christ, Whistler --"
"Fucking vamp threw a bottle at me," she hisses.
She looks like Carrie -- her face is covered in blood, her eyelashes gummed up with it. There's a bad gash near the crown of her head, at the part of her hair. He looks quickly, before firing over the table-edge.
"I can't fucking see!" she exclaims furiously. She's swiping at her eyes, but her hands are just as bloody as her face.
"Here," he says, tries to wipe her face, but there's still a veil of red -- the gash is still flowing. Head wounds bleed a lot. "Ah, fuck," he says, and gives up to shoot again behind them.
When he hunkers back down, she's counting her bullets by feel.
"Where's Brady?" she asks impatiently.
"Brady's dead," he says. He doesn't know any way to make it sound better than it is. He has to keep his attention on firing.
Her forehead gathers up, like she's concentrating hard, and he knows she's concentrating on keeping it together. She swallows and clears her throat.
"Okay. Then it's just us," she says. "Dex is out. He got a graze on the arm, but he should be driving our way any minute."
"We still have to make it to the exit," he notes.
"I know." Abby winces against the blood in her eyes. "What've you got?"
He fires before replying, jerking as shrapnel splinters the wood nearby.
"I got two clips for this, and that's it. I'm empty. What've you got?"
"Six bullets, eleven arrows -- I'm cleaned out."
"Fuck," he says succinctly.
He's listening for movement. The vamps have been sending in a few here, a few there, because the basement door is their only point of entry. But it's too quiet. They would have realised that he's the only one shooting. In a minute they're gonna know what's up. And then he and Abby are gonna be royally screwed.
Abby wipes her eyes on her gauntlets, and only succeeds in making a mess.
"Dex has gotta be close," she says fervently.
"We've got forty-five feet to cover, and then the admission hall." He's thinking aloud, shooting, thinking some more. "Two clips against a cavalcade of fully loaded..."
"This fucking blood!" Abby moans. Desperate and defenceless has never been her forte.
He thinks for a second -- that's all he's got -- and makes a tactical decision.
"Can you shoot?" he asks suddenly.
"I'm pretty much goddamned blind, King," she grinds out.
"No, you're not," he says. "Gimme your clip. You've got eleven arrows, so make 'em count."
"What --"
There's no time for argument. He grabs her gun, snicks out what's left of the clip, and tucks it into his bandolier with his last ammo. He aims four shots over the table in quick succession, then drops down, and grabs her around the waist with his left arm.
"I'm the eyes," he says, their faces very close together, and he knows she thinks he's crazy because her mouth falls open. He's past caring -- he really wants to get out of this alive. "I'll take back and right, you go seven o'clock to one. Just point and shoot when I tell you."
"King..." she mutters, but she has her bow in her hand, and he already has her half-convinced. This is, after all, pretty much their only option.
"Abby, I've seen you shoot blindfolded. We can do this."
He doesn't need to point out that they have to do this. That's a given. Neither of them have enough ammo to make it out individually, and they're not gonna flip a fucking coin. His arm goes right around her, pressing her in to his left side, trying to take the span of the bow and her quiver of arrows into consideration. There's a lull from the basement onslaught. This is going to happen...now.
"Are you ready?" he says against her ear.
"Yes," she says, a whisper.
"Listen -- just listen to my voice," he reassures.
And he's listening too, to the sound of hornet's buzz, as the basement door suddenly implodes, opening a gap for three at a time, four at a time, and there's still a ringing in his ears when he calls /"Now!"/ and he and Abby rise together, him firing, her nocking arrows and letting fly.
She is cleaved in tight, a private Artemis. His eyes go three-hundred-and-sixty-degrees-forever as they turn, and he spits out the hours - eight, nine-thirty, high noon -- and they shoot 'round the clock. And they are multi-armed, a deadly whirlwind, a Kali dancing, slow-spinning as a galaxy, and they will escape with their lives in a fireworks display of death and burning bodies that baptises their union.
Their partnership.
About ten days after he recovers they hit a bunker. It's very clean, except for the seven familiars on guard duty who seem happy to line up and get shot. Vampires scream and gurgle and die, dissolving into glowing gooey piles.
It's very satisfying.
The van on the way back is charged with unexpended energy and elation. Toller drives -- she takes the corners a little fast, she's seeing sunrise and taking the bit in her mouth. Abby grins and bumps on her seat, with her bow on her knees and a crate of Daystar grenades at her feet.
"So, how'd you like that?" he calls from the opposite bench.
She purses her lips to keep herself from laughing.
"Felt like flying," she replies, and she can't keep it off her face, she shines, the buzz is making her cheeks pink, and she laughs anyway.
Thirty minutes later they finish unloading the van, slap hands with Caulder and Zoe having early breakfast in the kitchen, and make their way to the weapons room to disarm.
He's never had to unload so many things he didn't need to use. Starts with the stakes in his front bandolier, then unclips his vest, shakes out of it. Lifts the guns, removes the clips, checks the chambers to ensure they're empty and opens out the stocks.
It's a methodical process, he's been through it so many times he could do it with his eyes closed. He's just never felt overdressed before. And most times there's a high, sure, but it's usually an exhausted high. This isn't like that. He's still bouncing around inside, it's like he's still back in the fight, like he left something of himself behind - his lethargy of the last week, his boredom. Everything is glowing, everything's on fire. Like he's still waiting for something to happen.
He can hear Abby going through the same routine five feet away on the other bench, the shriek of velcro and the sounds of unclipping, unbuckling, unzipping. He looks over as she lays her bow down on the bench, and she looks at him, and he can feel her energy, jolting off her in waves, and something happens all right.
She doesn't look away.
He's crazy. He's imagining it. He breaks first, hoists a boot onto the benchtop, unstrapping two knives.
Glances over.
Locks eyes with her again.
Not crazy. Not imagining it. Holy shit.
And now he can't look away. And she has a look on her face like she doesn't want him to. He feels his breath starting to come in short and tight, like the air in the room has been napalmed.
On automatic now. He peels off his shoulder holster. She eases off her quiver. His other boot, as she watches, as she strips her ammo belt away.
He feels the little shake in his fingers, his waist harness demands some concentration, and he can hear her fumbling off her gauntlets, getting rid of her flicks and her stakes.
And finally weaponless, there's nothing left to do except stare at each other.
Then she swallows hard and moves off, he falls in stride and they break the double doors together. Keep walking. Through the corridors of the warehouse, past occupied zones, and he's got this jittering inside him, in his gut, making his legs tremble.
She keeps moving and his feet are a bare beat behind, and he has no idea where she's going until they get to the stairs that lead to the basement levels. He's never been down here before but she leads unerringly, she knows both direction and destination, which is frighteningly suggestive of the idea that she's given this some thought, and just that whole concept is oh-fucking-Jesus-Christ. If his body gets any tighter he's going to explode.
They stride underneath the heating and ventilation pipes and the plumbing, past two open workshops, and then she reaches out for a door handle, it's a storage area, he can smell vinyl and sweat from old training mats and there's filing cabinets in the corner, but it simply doesn't matter as she closes the door behind him and his arms go around her like water.
They slam into the wall as one, arc-welded, and this can't be fucking real because her mouth is so hot and slick, and he can't keep it together, he's shaking, gasping against her lips. She wants to get closer, climb into his skin, climbing up his body to wrap her legs around his waist, even the height difference. And this is Abby, oh fuck, this is Abby, staring into him, and panting into his neck, and biting down his collarbone, growling when she can't get more, her hand up his shirt, squeezing her thighs around him. He kisses her with something like brutality, tastes the sweat along her jawline with his tongue, hears himself, he's whimpering, he can't stop.
She wrenches off his shirt and his fingers blur on the laces of her bodice, she has to slide down to standing to help him. He wants, oh god he wants to take her nipple in his mouth and make her hum, he wants to lick his way down her body, and eat her out against the wall, and ease inside her with long slow thrusts but he can't stop fucking /shaking/ --
"Hannibal," she groans and whispers, and puts her hand to his cheek, he can feel her fingers trembling but she's forcing him to stare with her, staring down, easing down, evening his breath with her own as they breath together, in-out, in-out, measured and deep.
"Hannibal, slow down...it's okay, slow down...I'm right here. It's okay," she says.
And he can stop gulping, tremors abating, just the little shudders as she smooths his cheek, smiling.
"You okay?" she asks, shy almost, and his heart breaks into pieces for that.
"Yeah," he whispers. "Oh yeah..."
And he leans in and opens her lips with his own, and these kisses, the kisses of beginning, are so sinking-soft and warm-deep that for the first time in forever he wants to be immortal again, just so he can savour this, savour it until the sky turns to dust.
He remembers that The Wizard of Oz was one of his favourite books when he was in school.
Sommerfield reads to Zoe every night at bedtime, and at other times of the day too, because Zoe doesn't go to school, she lives under the radar, same as everyone else.
He finds this unnerving. He remembers the rhythms of school and home from when he was a kid, can't quite get his head around the idea of a child growing up without knowing the realities of the playground or the classroom, or the rosy repletion of after-school milk and cookies. He knows that Sommerfield provides the milk and cookies, but he's pretty sure that they don't mean the same thing to Zoe now that they meant to him back when he was five.
It doesn't matter that he knows why it has to be this way. He just appreciates that it's a hard life.
Zoe is the border. She is the stateline of their world. She is the embodiment of the division between the reality of Nightstalker life, and why they live it, and the promise of Normal Life, with its suburban fences, and Saturday barbeques, and Little League weekends, and children, and office jobs, and mortgages, and all that shit which manages to be both banal and enticing all at the same time.
When Zoe's asleep, Sommer wanders into the kitchen.
"Don't know how you do it," he says quietly.
"What?" Sommer grins, pouring herself a coffee. "Be a mother? Relax, King, it'll never be part of your job description."
"I don't mean that," he says, and grimaces because she can't see his expression anyway. "I mean...Zoe's great. She's a great kid."
"Thanks."
"Sure." He thinks about how to phrase this. "And if she were my kid, I'd want a...a fortress, y'know? A great big impregnable steel fortress, with battlements, and a moat, and I'd spray-paint the walls in garlic and silver three times a month..."
He trails off. Sommerfield isn't grinning anymore.
"Oh. That," she says, and her voice sounds soft and hard together. "Yeah. Well, I got a little something up my sleeve..."
"A little something?" he repeats, frowning, because little somethings and battlements don't appear to have any symmetry.
"Yeah," Sommer says, and sips her coffee, face towards him now. "It's what I've been working on. You take strands of recombinant vampire DNA and splice them with a synthesized virus, and you get a little something."
"And what does that mean in English?"
Sommerfield grins, very different now, brittle and a little nasty, and toasts him with her mug.
"It means, King, that I'm gonna kill every last one of those fuckers."
Daystar isn't impervious. It's a good virus, but it has a radius of only so many square miles.
They go trolling up and down the west coast, looking for survivors, spreading the good news, and playing Rent-a-Helsing at some of the larger cities, where the cells are still working too hard. Caulder and his wife team-travel, and they have two vans, and Zoe sleeps on a pallet in the back of King and Whistler's van when they move on to the next cell. Sometimes, when she's awake, she comes to sit up front between them on the bench seat, where whoever isn't driving can read to her. King decided some time ago that except when they're hunting, he doesn't really want to let her out of his sight.
They cover a lot of distance in this way. They make a lot of contacts, and they kill a lot of vampires, but it's hard, and it's dangerous. And it's true what they say. You work in unfamiliar surroundings, with people you don't know, and after a statistically relevant amount of time, the law of averages kicks in.
Shit happens.
They're just finished a raid in Seattle when Abby gets bit. King hears her yell, sees her throw off a sucker, shoot another in the corner. He glances to his left to kill something, and next time he looks over she's got a leech.
Moving without thinking he shoots two targets as he sprints, and then fires point blank at the head near Abby's shoulder, and again and again and again, even though he's only firing into dust. When his vision clears Abby is reaching for him and her eyes are big and round and shiny, like a pair of silver pennies.
They go like fright up Route 5, back to the local cell's crib, and he carries her into the medical wing. She's already sweating and rolling her eyes, and he worries the inside of his cheek as he watches Caulder and Hannah truss her and swab her and take samples. The major worry is that she's infected, but whether the biggest concern is vampirism or her exposure to Daystar, he isn't really sure. He thinks maybe Hannah isn't sure either. Caulder cleans up the wound while Hannah checks the samples, and Caulder and King don't say anything to each other at all.
Then Hannah calls out to Caulder from the lab, the plastic-sheeted cordonned area next door. King glances over his shoulder, gets a quick eyeful of agitated body language, but he has to look back at Abby, is forced to, can't look away.
Caulder comes back to the bedside and he looks angry, but he just continues tending Abby's wounds. And then a few minutes later Hannah comes out with a clipboard and a sad look on her face, which is about more than King can stand, so he just opens his mouth.
"It's in her, isn't it."
Hannah nods, silent. King nods.
"Well, fine, it's in her. So let's get it the fuck out."
"It's difficult," Hannah says.
King gapes for a moment.
"What's so fucking difficult about it? Just pump her full of EDTA-goodness and she'll puke it out of her system and be dandy by morning - Jesus, guys, come on --"
Caulder and Hannah look at each other, and if he wasn't so absorbed in other issues he'd notice the tell-tale stares and glares. Instead he just gets frustrated by the silence.
"Fuck -- will you just give her the needle already? We're wasting time standing here -- the sooner we give her the shot the --"
"Tell him," Caulder says.
King knows he should be worried now, but he just can't process.
Hannah glares at her husband. Caulder sighs and clenches his jaw.
"Tell him."
King feels like tearing out his hair.
"What? Fuck -- what, tell me what?"
Hannah straightens and puts her clipboard in front of herself.
"She's pregnant."
King stares at her. All sound and heat and vision disappears for a half second interval. Then he hears himself make a noise, a puff of air escaping. Hannah continues quickly.
"The computer told me, from the samples. We have no real options. We give her the EDTA, but...it's an anti-coagulant. She'll be certain to miscarry."
He can't make his breath carry words for a second, then he looks back at Hannah.
"How..." He clears his throat. "...how far along?"
She purses her lips and he can see how this grieves her, to tell him.
"Early. Maybe five, six weeks. She..." Hannah glances down at Abby, fevering on the gurney. "...she may not even have known herself. She never asked me for a test."
Yeah. But the med-centres in all the cells are ultra-hi-tech, dealing with vampire blood and other exotics, and Abby's a practical girl, she would have avoided the gossip and the over-production and gone simple, gone to the drugstore for a test anybody can get for under five bucks...
He closes his eyes then for a second. When he opens them it's like the whole world has gone white with sacrifice, and he hears his own voice, gravelly and thick, like something rising out of a hole in the ground, as he says:
"Hurry up and give her the shot."
A far-away tinkle of glass, and then a shower of it as he and Abby turn to look. It makes a welcome distraction from all the cop cars and flashing blue lights.
And he watches this man tumble from on high, three storeys up and turning like a bird mid-flight, a little twist from the waist to brace all the limbs as he lands, momentum increasing his density, making the pavement crack.
King hears Abby gasp.
The man stands from his cat-crouch, debris dusts down, and his skin is so black you can see the streetlights reflected in it.
"Forgot my sword," Blade says.
King's eyebrows tilt high, it's automatic, but his first thought is still:
I can do that.
Before he remembers. Fuck. Nearly two years now but his brain is still making corrections. TipEx -- rewrite.
I used to be able to do that.
Well, maybe not that. Maybe not three storeys. But two, he's sure. Two, and the fall, and the cat stretches. That grace. That fluidity of movement. That sense of flying, like nothing can get through, pain doesn't exist, muscles and tendons don't burn, skin doesn't bruise, blood has no memory.
It's the only thing he misses. Even though he knows you only feel like that when you're dead.
Dex, the van, their escape. He snaps out of it. The whole getaway is fairly straightforward. Abby shoots Jako, they share names, Dex drives, Blade ignores everyone pretty much. King sits in the back seat with Abby, like they're a pair of recalcitrant teenagers, and there's something on his mind, but he just can't remember what it is. He closes his eyes to try and get it, but he keeps flashing back to Danica screaming 'Fucking Hannibal King!!' right in his face, her expression, that loathing and fear, and it's such a turn-on he gets a shiver and has to open his eyes again.
Streetlights blink past and are extinguished.
He squints over at Abby. She's staring out the window sometimes, glancing at Blade sometimes, checking her bow sometimes. She's tapping her toe -- tap, tap, tap, tap. Keeping metre and rhythm. Maybe she knows she's doing this, he isn't sure.
He wishes she would unplug and then they could hash over what happened in the cop shop. That would be normal procedure. He appreciates why she needs to blank out in a fight, but he likes it better when she's compos. Jurassic 5 is just a coping strategy, like booze or religion or whatever.
"Abby," he says, and when she looks over he touches one ear in reference.
She doesn't say anything, but the look on her face is so...
And he remembers. And it's always Abby who keeps reminding him, that human life is messy. Vamp life is about beautiful falls from three storeys, the spell of style and image, when the inside is hollowed out and needs constant refilling with gory mess to make the whole thing function. Human life is so much less tidy -- your mess outside as well as in, you can't keep your emotions off your face, your guts spill out at the most inappropriate moments.
He remembers. And he closes his eyes for a second, then closes his open mouth, and when he looks over he'd like to squeeze her shoulder or something, but they don't really do that so he can't.
Abby's father is dead, and King realizes that his own nostalgia for physical graces is just residue, and that actually he doesn't miss anything about that life. He doesn't miss anything at all.
This is it. They've given the west coast the better part of six months, and the sweat from their brow, and more besides. It feels like it's time.
In the end, it doesn't take long to prepare. Just the paperwork, and the contacts in Bonn, and there were a few worries about flying through timezones because neither of them wanted to go unarmed. The idea of sitting in a planeful of question marks in the middle of the night with not even a stake between them held no obvious appeal. But Lowrens rigged a few little surprise treats with silver and garlic and Daystar, so everything worked out fine.
The only thing left is for King to shave off his beard.
Incognito -- all that crap. They want to look like Mr and Mrs Normal, with their one-point-two children (Zoe has a big bag) so in the interests of making himself seem less like an obvious security risk, the beard's gotta go.
He's all lathered up, and he's already done the sides when he pokes his head around the bathroom door. Abby is packing the Wal-Mart suitcases to make them look fuller than they actually are. She lifts her eyebrows -- whether because of the shaving cream or because he's only wearing a towel, he's not sure.
"Are you not done yet?"
"You want I should leave the mustache?"
She grins, puts one hand on her jutted hip. The other hand holds socks.
"Well of course I'm curious, but I think you might end up looking like you escaped from a 70's porno."
"So is that a yes or a no?"
She throws the socks at him but he's too quick.
Five minutes later and he's done. He rinses and towels off, wipes the steam off the mirror and...stares.
This is him - the guy from before. He doesn't recognise himself. Last time he looked like this, last time he had this face, his canines were a helluva lot longer. He runs his tongue over them, checking. He lifts his chin, one side then the other, examining the angles, and he's not looking for spots he's missed.
He can feel the tightness in his mouth when he goes back into the bedroom.
"All done."
Abby's still working the suitcase.
"Good," she says, turning. "Me too, except --"
She stops, and her mouth opens a little. She looks shocked, and briefly scared, and in that second he wishes he could take his face off with battery acid or something.
A second after that she masters herself, walks up close.
"You look...younger."
"I'm growing it back," he says tersely. "Tomorrow."
She puts a hand up, touches his cheek tentatively with her fingers, then more confidently, cupping his jaw. Her fingertips are a little cold.
"It's okay," she says, like she's reassuring both of them. "Hannibal, it's okay. It's just facial hair."
"Oh, fine," he counters, eye-rolling melodramatically. "Just, y'know, negate my whole sense of identity."
Because he wants to grin, wants her to grin -- they have to keep a sense of humour about this. God, he wishes he never picked up the razor. But now Abby is starting to smile, scanning him carefully as she steps into his personal space.
"Y'know..." she says softly, and the sultry edge is real, he's not imagining it. Maybe this is distraction therapy. She trails a finger across his collarbone absently. "Y'know, the first time I saw you in that bar, I thought you looked so damn cute..."
King snorts like a gunshot, reins in her wandering hand by grabbing her wrist. This is distraction therapy.
"Oh my god -- Abigail Whistler, you are so full of horseshit," he says with a genial smile. He can hear his voice going all low and playful, in keeping with the general tone, and it never ceases to entertain, this effect she has on him. "When you saw me in that bar you thought I looked like Prize One, on-the-hoof EDTA-test-subject, and don't you try and tell me any different, missy."
She laughs and bites her lip. Then she rubs her palm over his chin once for luck and gives his cheek a good-natured slap, apparently just to see his skin go pink.
"That's true. But still. I thought --" She looks him up and down, and he's suddenly very aware of his state of just-towel-ness. Her eyes are warm, and then serious all of a sudden. "I thought you were wasted as a vampire."
He swallows on this compliment, but can't help being struck by the irony.
"I don't look so different now," he says quietly.
Abby cocks her head.
"You look different. You look different to me." She narrows her gaze. "You look...like you're living up to your potential."
King opens his mouth, but he doesn't know what to say. He's never... No one's ever...
Jesus.
The only reply he can formulate is 'thank you', and he hopes Abby can read it in his face, because Zoe chooses that exact moment to enter the room and stare. She still has that little-girl wide-eyes thing happening, and her mouth makes a cupid 'oh' when she sees them. Then she squnits.
"You look funny," she pronounces.
King turns to Abby and lifts his eyebrows, then looks back at Zoe.
"That's what I said," he agrees.
But the kid's not done yet. She stares at them both limpidly.
"You're hugging," she states.
King watches Abby handle this one, sees her check on how her arms are wrapped around his waist, how his hands balance lightly, one on her shoulder, one in the small of her back.
"That's right," she reports back to Zoe.
Zoe nods, all sagacity and Zen koans, and then she looks at King again.
"You look funny," she repeats.
Then she turns around and leaves.
King's caught, about to speak, blinking, until he raises a hand in the kid's wake.
"Thank you," he says into her backwash.
Abby grins
King sighs, stops looking at the air Zoe's just vacated, glances back to the room, trying to take it all in. The kid, this woman he's holding, the suitcases, the way everything's prepared but not, and it's exactly how he feels.
"Jesus," he breathes out, finally meeting Abby's stare. "We're really doing this, aren't we."
He's not sure what the question is referring to. Abby answers him anyway.
"Yes, we are," she says firmly.
He sighs out again, but it's like a gesture of letting go.
"Good," he says, and he leans so his forehead can rest on her forehead, and he closes his eyes. "Good."
He feels like he's at the top of a rollercoaster. That's okay.
He's flying to a new country, with big responsibilities and a huge task ahead, and the only thing he knows how to say in German is 'vampire', and it really doesn't matter.
She is warm in his arms. He is bare-faced, the guy from before, the guy from after.
She knows him. He isn't even sure of who he ever was.
She loves him. He can do anything, and he has never been so vulnerable.
This is how it is. This is how it will be. He doesn't believe in God. He believes in superior firepower, and his own intuition, and the light of day, and Abby, and Zoe, and the inevitability of it all, and what will come in the end.
Dirt.
Or in a vampire's case, dust.