"Not even an Idiot's Guide?"
"As much as that would suit you, no."
"You're an ass."
"I don't care."
"And not very talkative."
"I don't care."
I threw up my hands. "Come on! There's got to be some way you can help me with these abilities! Can you even tell me what I'm going to get?"
"Flight."
My eyes widened and my mouth split open in a excited smile. "Seriously?"
"No."
I don't know what made me snap. Actually, that's a lie. Vincent made me do it. It was all his fault my hand shot out and smacked him across the face. He didn't see it coming, and to be honest neither did I, but there was the red mark on his pale cheek. There was also the angry glint in his eyes, and I nervously backed up with my hands out in front of me to defend against the indefensible. "I'm so, so sorry about that. I don't usually hit people, but I guess you're not a person," I defended myself. Vincent slowly climbed out of his box and stalked toward me. I stumbled back into the wall beside the apartment door. "Y-you can't kill me, remember? The ring binding us and all that."
Vincent reached me and his hand whipped out. He grabbed my throat and lifted me off the floor. My feet flailed in the air and my hands grasped his to try to pull him off. Didn't work, but at least I tried. He stuck his face close to mine, and one whiff of his breath made me dizzy. "Never strike me in anger," he commanded.
I hated to be ordered about, especially by an undead ass. "Then stop being such an ass and answer my questions!" I snapped back. "It's not like I asked for this! I wish Tim was here so you could bite his head off with your orders, but he's not! We're stuck here together and we may as well at least get along until I figure out a way of getting this damn ring off my finger!" Vincent pursed his lips together, but he let go of me and I dropped to the ground like a bag of potatoes. I stood and rubbed my sore neck while I glared at him. "Does this mean you're going to help me with these abilities I'm supposed to get?" I asked him.
"Yes." I breathed a sigh of relief until it caught in my throat at his next words. "But I am not an easy teacher." He was one teacher I didn't think I could live through.
"I appreciate the offer, but I'm probably only going to need a few pointers," I hurriedly told him. "You know, just tell me how to, um, what am I supposed to be able to do again? And be serious this time."
"Your speed has been improved," he replied.
I furrowed my brow and gave him a disbelieving side-glance. "I said be serious."
"If your speed hadn't improved you would not have been able to hit me," he pointed out.
I raised an eyebrow. "What would you have done if I hadn't been able to hit you?"
"Caught your hand and broken it."
"That's a little extreme."
"But effective."
"You have a twisted way of thinking," I commented. Vincent suddenly turned back to the box and strode toward it. "Hey, wait! You said you'd help me with this stuff! What am I supposed to do with all this speed? How do I control it?" I lunged at him to stop him, and I overestimated my new ability. I flew across the room and would have smacked into him if he hadn't stepped to the side. I sailed by him and landed in a tangled mess of my own limbs on the couch on the other side of the box. The whole world was upside down, or I was, and I watched the upside down Vincent walk up to me. There was an evil grin on his face. "You think this is funny, don't you?" I asked him.
"Hilarious," he replied in a dead-pan voice.
I righted myself and glared at him. "You could have caught me," I scolded him.
"Yes, I could have."
"You don't regret not catching me at all, do you?"
"No."
"I hate you."
"You have already said that."
"Yeah, and you keep reminding me why I hate you."
"Your focus is very poor."
"I'm pretty focused on trying not to kill you right now," I quipped.
"Do you wish for me to train you or not?" he countered.
"I don't know, you're doing such a bang up job already," I replied as I rubbed my twisted limbs.
"You lack focus for training. Tim was much the same way."
My ears and head perked up at his comment. "So he wasn't very good when he started out?"
"He had natural talent that you completely lack," Vincent told me.
My face drooped along with my shoulders. "Thanks," I grumbled.
"Do not mention it."
"I won't, but could we start this training and see how well I actually do? Flying across the room doesn't really count as a start, though smacking you is a great one," I quipped.
"We will start when the sun sets. During the day my powers are weaker than yours, and if you were to create trouble I wouldn't be able to stop you," he replied.
I raised an eyebrow. "What kind of trouble can a little bit of speed get us into?"
He nodded behind me. "Look behind you."
I glanced over my shoulder and saw the dirty windows. My face paled when I realized the only thing that had kept me from practicing my aviation skills had been the couch. "Oh," was my reply.
"With the sun in the sky I couldn't have saved you," he added.
"Um, maybe we will wait until night."
Chapter 10
Vincent went back to bed and I went back to cleaning work, but in a quieter way. The place was scrubbed and dusted, and when he crawled out of the box after sunset he was amazed at the drastic change, or that's what I hoped for. He actually just stared around the place for all of three seconds and strode over to the door. "We have someone we need to meet," he told me.
That made me doubly disappointed. I waited all day for the chance to learn and test my abilities. "But you haven't taught me anything," I protested.
"You will learn on the way."
The only thing I learned was he was an ass, but that was something I already knew. Vincent led me from the decrepit apartment building and into the alley beside the structure. It was cleaner than the apartment building, and with fewer rats. I followed him to a pile of boxes beside a rotting wooden fence that divided the alley in half. Vincent knelt down and pushed aside the boxes to reveal a manhole. He pulled the cover off and slipped inside. I expected to hear his feet splash down in polluted water, but there was just the clack of his heels.
"Quit wasting time," he ordered me.
His voice echoed down a long metallic pipe, and I cringed. "I'm not going down there," I refused.
Vincent burst from the hole and grabbed my leg. He whipped my foot out from under me and dragged me, kicking and screaming, into the depths of a clean sewer pipe. Wait, a clean sewer pipe? I was thoroughly confused about the wide, dry culvert in which we stood. It led off in two directions, and there wasn't any light to see by. I screamed when I was swooped into someone's arms. "God damn it, Vincent, knock it off!"
"That isn't me." I froze and glanced up into the darkness where the person's head should be. Thanks to a faint, unearthly glow from the thing's eyes, I could see it had a head. Unfortunately, looking up at those eyes was like looking into the pits of Hell, and me without a roasting stick and marshmallows. The flesh was rotten and fell off in patches, and the thing's suit was ragged and also falling off in patches.
"Vincent?" I squeaked.
"Yes?" his voice came from behind the creature.
"What is this?"
"A zombie," he replied.
"We prefer the term living-challenged, but zombie will do," the creature spoke in a voice so cultured I had a craving for tea.
"Vincent!" I yelped.
"Yes?"
"The thing talks!"
"I am not a thing. My name is Officer Edward Romero of the Parasquad," the creature corrected me.
I tried to manage the panic rising inside of me and grinned nervously at the, um, officer. "Oh, he he, sorry. Mind putting me down-er, Officer Romero?" I pleaded.
"Certainly, but not until one of you tells me what you're doing down here," Offi
cer Romero insisted.
"Vincent, what are we doing down here?" I asked my guide.
"Merely traveling to the Boo Bar," he replied.
My mouth incredulously dropped open. "Boo Bar?" I repeated. I yelped when Officer Romero set me down on my feet. I stumbled back and another pair of hands settled on my shoulders. They were Vincent's thin, strong ones.
"She new here?" the officer asked Vincent.
"Very new."
"You told her the rules yet?"
I heard Vincent scoff behind me. "I am not her keeper."
I frowned at him. "Technically, you are," I pointed out.
"Then you should tell her the rules," Officer Romero insisted.
"I intend to at a later date."
"Liar," I bit back. He squeezed my shoulders as a warning.
"It seems Vincent won't tell you, so I'll bring you up to speed. Don't kill, murder, bump off, destroy, or poof anyone out of existence," the officer warned me.
"Poof someone out of existence?" I repeated.
"It's for the witches. They're always trying to get around the rules, so we designated a phrase specifically for them," he explained.
I blinked. "Witches?"
Officer Romero's bright eyes held a worried look as he glanced at Vincent. "You sure you should take her to the Boo Bar? She's a little green," he pointed out.
"She will manage," Vincent assured him.
"I-I don't think I will. This is getting a little complicated," I piped up. Vincent didn't give me any further chance to argue when he swept me up into his arms. "I can still walk!" I yelled at him.
"That is what I'm trying to avoid," Vincent strangely replied. He nodded his head at the officer, who nodded back. "Good evening, officer."
Vincent took off down the pipe into the impenetrable darkness. "Couldn't we at least go back for a flashlight?" I pleaded.
"No."
I slumped down in his hold and crossed my arms over my chest. "You're impossible."
"I try."
"You succeed." I glanced over his shoulder at the retreating lights of the zombie's eyes. "Mind explaining what a zombie's doing as an officer?"
"They are nearly impossible to destroy, and they feel no pain when they lose an arm," he explained.
I cringed. "The retirement package must be pretty nice for them to take up that job."
"They are impressed into the service."
"How are they impressed with the service?"
Vincent sighed. "They are forced into being officers, or they will be destroyed."
"What kind of life is that?"
"Sometimes living is worth it."
I was struck by how sentimental that comment sounded. "Even if it means being a vampire?" I guessed.
He didn't deign to reply, and we made the rest of the journey in silence. It was a zig-zag route that ran us through wider and taller culverts until I felt we were in caverns. The angle of the floor led us down, and sometimes Vincent ran through water, but the caverns were relatively dry. Torches appeared on the walls and after a few miles we were joined by other people and creatures. There were a few other zombies dressed like Officer Romero, but most of the people were normal in their clothes and physical appearances. The other occupants appeared out of other tunnels that met at crossroads, and those crossroads met at other crossroads. It was a crossroads-topia that ended at a large terminal.
The terminal looked like one of those old-fashioned subway stations with the painted walls and high ceilings, but there was no natural light from above. We were still below ground, and large chandeliers lit up the space. The station had two levels with the second accessed via stairs on either end of the lower platform. The entire second level of the terminal was a towering business with several double-door entrances and a glass window atop them that reached to the curved ceiling. Shops lined all the walls on the ground floor that weren't open to tunnels, and their windows were filled with everything a ghoul could want from clothing to food.
Vincent let me down and led us up to that large establishment on the second level. Even before we reached the doors I could hear the sounds of slot machines and arguing. It was a giant casino, and the doors led onto the gambling floor. Four levels stood above us, all with balconies where people dressed in fine clothes watched and pointed at those who risked their money on the machines and cards.
Vincent strode through the gambling floor and to the rear where stood another pair of double-doors. Over these was a sign with the name Boo Bar in dripping red letters. "I wonder if they serve Bloody Mary's," I quipped.
"Quiet, or someone will hear you," he whispered.
I scowled at him. "So what? I didn't say anything wrong, did-ah!" Out from the wall to the right of the entrance slithered a giant eyeball complete with lashes and lid. It blinked and peered closely at us. I squeaked and hid behind Vincent. He glared at the eyeball and passed through the doors with me latched onto the back of his coat. When we were inside the dimly lit bar I glanced behind us and saw the eyeball emerge on the side of the wall beside the entrance.
I clung to Vincent's arm and was grateful when he didn't brush me off. My eyes were stuck on the eye. "M-mind explaining that?" I asked him.
"Yes."
With me closely attached to him Vincent wound us through two dozen low, round tables and past the bar that stretched long the left wall. I glanced around at the patrons and their spirits as they made jolly at the bar and at the crowded tables. Most of the bottles were full of the hard stuff. Vodka, bourbon, whiskey, and the like. What surprised me was how fast the customers consumed the alcohol, and all without any chasers. Hell, some of them downed straight vodka like they were taking tea. Any normal and sane person would have at least given a breather between swallows, but I had a feeling these people were neither normal nor sane.
Vincent's focus lay on a short man slumped against the far wall with one arm on the table by his chair. The stranger wore a hat with a large brim that covered his face. Ten yards away I could smell the scent of alcohol that wafted from his clothes. There was also a colorful splattering of dry puke all the way down his shirt. Vincent detached from me and smoothly slid into the chair on the opposite side of the table. That left me standing there like a scared idiot which is how I felt in this strange, terrifying place.
Vincent sat there for a few silent minutes until the drunk stirred. "Whadda ya want?" he slurred without lifting the brim of his hat.
"Information," Vincent
"Information?" The man hiccuped. "Don't got none, unless ya got some nice whiskey to be giving me."
"I have something better."
At Vincent's comment the man raised his head and I could see one attentive eye. "Better? What's better than a nice bottle of whiskey."
"Your life."
The eye didn't show any fear, but rather amusement. "My life? I already got one of those. Come back with a bottle of whiskey and we'll-"
"Tell me what I want to know or I will take your life," Vincent warned. There he went with that special diplomacy of his.
The stranger glanced over Vincent's cool, calm expression and must not have liked what he saw because Vincent was deadly serious. "We can't talk here. The eyes have walls." I frowned. Gone was the slurred speech and begging for whiskey. The man stumbled to his feet and out through a nearby door. We followed him, or at least I followed Vincent, and we stepped out into the rear of the casino. That turned out to be another underground hallway that branched off in a half dozen other passages. "How big is this place?" I asked them.
The evidently fake drunk glanced at Vincent and jerked his head over to me. His hat was raised so I could see he was human in appearance, but very pale. Even worse than Vincent. "Who's the noob?" he asked in the same clear, sober voice.
"No one of consequence, now tell me what I want to know," Vincent insisted.
The guy glanced down at my hand, and his face stretched into a wide grin. "She's your new partner, isn't she?"
"That doesn't matter," Vincent
replied.
"It matters to me, and the rest of the world," the man argued. He jumped forward, grasped my hand and planted a soft hiss on my palm. "The name's Mitch Chaney, but you can call me anytime. A very great pleasure to meet you, and my condolences for your loss."
"Loss?" I repeated.
Chaney jerked a thumb toward Vincent. "If you hang out with him long enough you're going to lose your sanity."
Vincent's arm snapped out and he grabbed the man's collar. The vampire dragged him in front of him and lifted him a foot off the floor. "Tell me what I want to know about those who murdered Tim," Vincent growled.
"Hey, don't be ruffling up the suit!" Chaney yelped. I couldn't see how anything could make it any worse. Vincent didn't either, because he tightened his grip on the collar. The cloth wrapped tighter around the man's throat, and his voice came out in a choked whisper. "I'll tell! I'll tell!" he promised. Vincent dropped him onto his feet, and Chaney brushed off his suit and scowled at Vincent. "Yeesh, you sound like a broken record. Besides, I don't know much myself. Seems whoever knocked off your old partner did it real hush-hush. Don't know who, don't know where and don't know why, but I know his body's at the Third Precinct. Don't know how you're going to get in, but you might want to get that body before they decide he'd be real useful as a zombie."
Vincent's eyes narrow and he stalked off down the hall. I glanced between his back and Chaney. "Um, thanks for the help," I told him.
Chaney smiled and swept his hand over his chest in a bow. "My pleasure, Miss-?"
"Stokes," I replied.
"Miss Stokes. Never say that Mitch Chaney wasn't useful to you."
"I won't." I hurried after Vincent and caught up to him a quarter mile down the passage. Damn him and his speed. "Um, mind explaining why we just talked with a guy who fakes his own sobriety?"
"Because in his act he hears and sees more than anyone would suspect," Vincent explained.
"And now where are we going?"
"To the Third Precinct."
"A police station?" The name sounded familiar.
"No. The Third Precinct is one of the larger warehouses for the Sanguine Syndicate."
Chapter 11
"You mean the people who've been trying to kill me since they killed Tim?" I asked him.
"Yes," Vincent replied. We wound our way through that maze of tunnels and the torches prevented me from eating pavement and sewer rat.
"Um, I may be dense-"