Midnight at Mart's

  Night had fallen hard and cold outside -- the dry air didn't hold in the day's simmering heat. It was creeping up toward 10 p.m., and I was looking forward to closing up shop and hitting that narrow little cot in the back room at midnight. Ed hadn't taken off like I'd thought he might; maybe he was worried I'd shoplift some Cheerios if he didn't keep an eye on me. Anyway, I didn't resent it. I wouldn't have trusted me, either.

  I wrote down the number of Snickers in the box and looked up, a smile on my lips, to see who was coming in the door, but I couldn't really see. He was hidden by the rack of chips (Lay's, mostly). But what I could see was Ed's face, and I felt something clench up inside of me when I saw that blank, iron-hard expression.

  I stayed very still. He was focused on the door, but I saw his left hand, the one hidden from whoever was standing there, gently motion me back. I swallowed hard and silently took three steps back, to the end of the row, then crouched down and crawled around the rack. I was now between the picnic supplies and the glass-fronted refrigerated beverage case. There was cold beer next to me. I felt a moment's wistful longing, but I needed to figure out what was happening up front. Ed wasn't my best buddy, but he'd been fair to me ... more than fair. And he'd trusted me.

  "Hey, Israel," Ed said. "I wasn't expecting you."

  "Why would you?" said a new voice. Soft, whispery, chilling. Like somebody who'd gargled with acid, or gotten clotheslined in a not-so-friendly game of football. "How's business, Ed? Good?"

  Ed's voice stayed exactly the same temperature. "Tolerable."

  "Doesn't sound all that positive, bro. Free enterprise is supposed to set you free, not make you a slave to the almighty cash register. Or so I hear." The hoarse whisper sounded amused. Not in a good way. I edged cautiously forward, hands and knees, watching out for reflections in the glass. As a precaution, I allowed myself a barely even noticeable violation of the rules, as a non-practicing Warden: I fogged up the glass, just a little, just enough to hide my image. The part that reflected the counter and the door was still perfectly visible.

  But there wasn't anybody standing there. So far as I could tell, anyway ... I could see the door, the rack of potato chips, and Ed standing frozen behind the counter.

  Of the mysterious Israel, not a sign.

  "You buying something?" Ed asked, and deliberately broke his stare to reach for a cloth and wipe down the battered Formica counter. I could sense the effort it took, to be that casual about it. I edged forward again, trying to catch a glimpse around the rack without risking my neck, but again, nothing. Not a sign, not a clue.

  "Yeah," Israel said. "Got any candy bars? I've got a sweet tooth these days. Hungry all the time."

  Ed paused in his wiping down of the counter, but kept his head down. I could have sworn I saw him flinch, but then he deliberately continued. "Sure. Down that aisle." He nodded at the place I'd been working. I heard the heavy thud of boots, but dammit, there was nothing in the mirror.

  Now, I'm a modern girl. I've read Dracula. I've seen Buffy. I'm not totally without a clue. But who in their right mind could possibly expect to run into a vampire at Mart's Texaco in Pine Bluff, Arizona?

  I pulled my head back like a scared turtle when I heard the scrape of footsteps on the other side of the food rack. Thin cover. I wasn't sure how much danger I was in, but I knew one thing: Ed wasn't the kind of guy to protect me unless he really believed it was serious. I held my breath and kept the glass fogged all along the bottom of the refrigerated case, just as insurance. That way, if he glanced that way, he wouldn't be treated to the undignified sight of a Weather Warden cowering on the not-too-clean linoleum floor.

  Israel fumbled around in the Snickers bars I had so recently counted, and I heard his footsteps ambling back up toward the register. Weren't vampires supposed to be stealthy and quick? Not this guy. He was taking his time, and his footsteps sounded like he'd borrowed the Frankenstein monster's boots.

  "Dollar six," Ed said. I risked another look. Love him or hate him, Ed was made of stern stuff; he was staring right at the man who was bellied up against the counter, and holding out his hand. The sale was insignificant, but I had the feeling that Ed was trying to make a point. Maybe if he let Israel take a candy bar, the next thing would be his life.

  Israel himself was smaller than I'd have expected, considering the galumphing boots -- maybe five foot five, and either bald or in the habit of shaving his head. He had an elaborate rose tattooed on the shiny mirrorlike finish of his pale -- I mean pale as sour cream -- skin right at the back of his head, and he was clad, head to foot, in black leather. Including gloves. Sharp-looking sunglasses, from what I could see of the side of his face.

  I'd never seen anybody that pale, including the melanin-deficient. His skin had a cold gray tone to it, as if it was made of clay. No veins showing underneath. Even the palest albino I'd ever met had a flush of veins showing, and a living tone to that alabaster skin; this was downright wrong.

  Israel was staring at Ed. Ed was staring back, hand still extended. After a good, sweaty half a minute, Israel barked a hoarse laugh, reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out two crumpled dollar bills that he dropped in Ed's palm. "Keep the change," Israel said, and smiled. I only saw the edge of it, but that was weird and sinister enough to make me duck my head back again, heart pounding. Could he hear that? God, I hoped not. "And tell your girl I don't eat anybody I haven't been properly introduced to."

  I didn't see Ed's face, but I knew my hands were shaking, and I wasn't easy to scare. I pressed them hard into the floor and stood up slowly. No point in hiding, obviously.

  I regretted it as soon as my head passed the level of the food rack, because Israel had turned to look right at me. Even with the sunglasses hiding his eyes, I felt the pressure of his stare. His face was smooth and regular as marble. I couldn't say he was handsome, or not; there wasn't any human frame of reference that applied to a face that looked that ... dead.

  I could see the trailing leaves of the rose tattoo spilling over around his neck, indigo blue against cold white. His jacket was zipped open, and he was wearing a black t-shirt underneath. A Grateful Dead t-shirt I remembered well, of a skeleton wearing a crown of roses, barely visible through the gap. He was narrowly built, compact, almost frail. I was right about the boots. They looked like they were made of concrete and painted black. Very Goth.

  "Hi," I said in the silence. My voice was a little too high, but he probably wouldn't know that. Probably. "Sorry."

  He inclined his head just a bit, not really a nod, more like he was zeroing in on the target. His smile came back, but it was fifty percent more charming. He didn't show teeth. "My name's Israel," he said. "And you are?"

  "J -- " I choked it off fast, because I remembered what he'd said to Ed. I don't eat anybody I haven't been properly introduced to. "Just passing through."

  He laughed. "Your nametag says different."

  Crap. My heart contracted to a painful little walnut when he laughed, because the teeth that showed in his mouth didn't look right. Not right at all. Not vampiric, exactly, in the classic Christopher Lee sense, but ...

  "Joanne," he nodded, and kept smiling as he purred out my name in that hoarse voice. "Pleased to make your acquaintance." And then he laughed again, lunged forward and formed his pale hands into claws.

  And halted a few inches from my face and yelled, "BOO!"

  I don't know how I managed it, but I didn't flinch, and I didn't scream. I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, he was moving back, clearly disappointed. He shrugged and started to clump away, but then ... he turned back, a slight frown on his face.

  "Israel," Ed warned him.

  "Shhh." Israel took a step toward me. "Something different about you. Right? Ed, don't you feel it?"

  I backed up. My shoulders pressed against glass, and the chill seeped through.

  "Not like the rest at all," he said, and reached up to slide his sunglasses down his nose, and oh God ...

  Djinn eyes.

>   No, my second fast assessment told me; not quite, but close enough. They weren't human eyes, that was for damn sure; they were a dull red, the color of murder in mud. And they flared hot when he looked at me without the intervening Ray Bans.

  "Israel!" Ed banged up the counter's service hatch and stepped out. He was holding what looked like a gigantic cattle prod, and as I watched, lightning zipped cold blue at the tip. Ah. It was a cattle prod. For really dangerous cattle. "Leave her alone."

  "You don't understand, Ed," the vampire said, and took another step toward me. "She knows. She understands what happened to me. I know she does. And she can fix it!"

  He lunged forward, and one gloved hand grabbed my throat. Inhumanly strong. I twisted, got free, and ran backwards away from him, just as Ed stabbed him in the back with his portable lightning rod.

  Israel went rigid, grimaced, and went down to the accompaniment of fast snapping sounds. He twisted and twitched for a second, then went limp. I stayed where I was, pressed against a corner display of Charmin Bathroom Tissue, and looked mutely over at Ed.

  Ed sighed, and said, "Sorry about that. This is my brother, Israel. Help me get him up, will you?"

  ###

  He had a place to put his brother. Well, it was a refrigerated cooler, actually, the walk-in kind, but it was sturdy and he put a lock on the outside once we'd dragged the limp, cold weight inside and slammed the door shut.

  "Won't the cold -- " I asked.

  "He won't feel it," he interrupted, and scowled as if he hadn't wanted to think about that. "Son of a bitch. I thought he was decently -- "

  Dead. I could almost hear it, though Ed didn't come anywhere near the actual word. "What happened?"

  Ed stalked past me to the doors, looked outside, and flipped the sign to CLOSED, then locked up. He turned off the sign and most of the lights, leaving just the few in the back. "Car accident. Israel flipped his truck out on a farm-to-market road about four months back." For the first time, I sensed a failure of courage in Ed; he looked away from me and folded his arms across his chest, staring fiercely at the rack of Cheetos. "You eat your hot dog already?"

  "Never mind the hot dog," I said. "What happened?"

  "He was trapped in the wreck. Don't know if you understand what that's like around here -- sun heats up metal faster than sticking it in a furnace. He must have cooked inside that tangle ..." Ed shook his head, trying to get the image out of his head. Unsuccessfully. "Nobody found him. I started driving around, looking for him. Found the wreck about ten that night."

  "He was dead."

  Ed blinked and darted me a look. "He look dead to you?"

  "Actually ... except for the walking-around part, yes."

  Ed didn't answer. He looked off into that long distance again, arms still folded. "Yeah, well, I identified him. Buried him. Next evening, he walks in here filthy and dressed in his suit, the one they put on him at the funeral home. No shoes. No -- " He stopped. His mouth shut with such a hard snap I heard enamel click.

  I let out a slow, aching breath. "What did you do?"

  "Nothing. I didn't know what the hell to do. Law says he's dead, but he's not, he's ... walking. He talked some, then he left. Next night, he came back. I haven't seen him for a couple of weeks now. I thought -- " Muscles fluttered under the skin as his jaw tightened. "I figured he'd finally died. Or whatever they do. People who come back."

  Clearly, Ed wasn't a fan of vampire fiction. "I don't think they just ... roll over and do that."

  He lowered his chin. Didn't answer directly. Or maybe he did, I realized, as I listened. "I asked him what he remembered. I was thinking -- hell, you know what I was thinking." Yeah, I knew. Some suave European guy in a cape, fangs, scary music. "He said he was dying, bleeding out in the truck, and he started seeing ... fairies."

  "Fairies?" I said. "You're kidding me!"

  "Wish I was. Fairies. Little Tinkerbelle lights. Blue. He said they swarmed all over him. I figure it was some kind of hallucination. He says -- he woke up the next night and came up right out of the ground. Right out of the ground."

  Oh, fuck.

  Little blue sparklies.

  Israel was entirely right after all. I did understand what had happened to him. Not the mechanics, not the how and why, but the basic mechanisms at play. But ... the little blue sparklies were gone, right? Banished back to their own Demon dimension when Patrick and Sara, my Djinn benefactors, had sacrificed themselves to seal up the rift that was tearing our universe apart.

  Maybe they were gone, but they'd left ... wreckage. Israel was something they'd tried to use, probably out of desperation. The Demon Marks invaded Wardens; maybe this was what happened when one invaded a regular human and couldn't find the power needed to twist itself into a full-grown menace. Maybe it sapped life and kept the body moving, hoping to find another shell in which to grow.

  I felt a need to sit down.

  "You okay?" Ed asked, as I plopped my butt down on the nearest uncomfortable stool and bent over to put my head in my hands.

  "I'm fine."

  "Yeah, me too," he said. "He seemed to think you could fix what's going on with him. Can you? Do you know?"

  "I don't know." I wasn't really sure what Israel was. Maybe he wasn't a vampire. Maybe he didn't kill people. Maybe he was just scary as hell, and was a walking corpse.

  But everything that walked the earth consumed something ... and chances were that he wasn't going to live on sunlight and happy Tinkerbelle thoughts.

  "He's probably dangerous," I said. "And he's not going away, is he?"

  Ed sighed and shook his head. "I thought he would. Guess he's going to stick around."

  "Ed. You can't just let him ..."

  "I know," he said, and ran his hands over his balding head. It was the same elegant shape as his brother's, minus the rose tattoo, plus a minor fringe of hair. "But I can't just kill him, either. I'm family."

  I had a sister. I hadn't thought of her for a while, but suddenly I thought about what I'd do, if Sarah came shambling up to me a day after her own funeral, white and ghost-ridden. God. I'd be utterly unable to live with it, or myself. Unable to act.

  That was the hell Ed was in, and would continue to be in, and it was my fault. I needed to do something, but I had no idea what. I was hungry, I was tired, I was scared, and I was badly wishing -- as Rahel no doubt had intended -- that I'd cheerfully complied with her request and not landed myself in this situation to begin with.

  Hungry. As if the idea had triggered it, my stomach loudly rumbled.

  I looked up, embarrassed, but Ed was already reaching out to scoop a rolling hot dog from the rack and fold it into a soft white bun. "Knock yourself out."

  I chewed nitrates and sulfates, mixed in with some meat and carbs. Added some relish and mustard. It was the best hot dog I'd ever eaten, and it smelled heavenly; I devoured it in about three bites. Ed forked over another one. I mumbled a thanks around another bite.

  "I'll deduct it," he said. "Now. Let's talk about you fixing my brother."

  ###

  What killed vampires? I contemplated it in silence, laying on my cot in the dim wash of light from the cracked storage room door. Ed had gone home, at my insistence; I think he understood it wasn't good for him to be there, in case I had to do something radical. Wooden stakes ... garlic ... holy water ... well, I could break off a chair leg to make a stake if I had to, and there was some garlic salt in the condiment section. Holy water was in short supply. I wondered about crosses, but somehow, I didn't think folklore would be quite on the money with this one.

  I put my hand on my purse, thinking about David, curled in his bottle. Sleeping, probably. Dreaming of better things. Maybe ...

  No. I didn't dare open it and summon him. Not when he was so weak. I needed to handle this on my own, without anybody else to back me up.

  That felt ... oddly refreshing. Whatever I did here, there was nobody else involved. It was just me, and the problem.

  I got up in a restless cr
eak of cot springs, put on my shoes, and walked to the storage room door. It was quiet in the store except for the dull hum of fluorescent lights in the corners. The night was so dark outside the glass walls that it might as well have been black paint. I wanted to go outside, breathe the fresh cold air, see the thick haze of stars, but I had work to do.

  I walked to the cooler. The key was hanging from a hook next to the door, but I didn't take it down.

  I knocked. "Israel?" No answer. I put my hand flat against the metal. "Israel, talk to me. It's Joanne. I want to help you. I want to figure out what happened to you."

  From a great, hollow distance, Israel rasped, "Don't think anybody can help me."

  "You said you saw fairies. Blue sparks. That's what changed you."

  He seemed surprised. "Yeah."

  "Israel, do you -- " I couldn't think of a way to phrase it. "Hunger for anything in particular?"

  "Yeah," he said. "But I don't know what it is. Nobody around here has it. Nobody except you."

  He wanted power. Warden power. I swallowed hard and removed my hand from the door. He sounded as if he'd come closer. How strong was he, exactly? Strong enough to batter the door down, if properly motivated?