How Not to Vampire - Season 2

8. The Art of Falling

Protip for Vampires #111: Just because you're a vampire doesn't mean you can ignore the laws of gravity.

Yeah, yeah. I know you're all wondering what happened after I had my first taste directly from Suicide Blonde's delectable neck. Did I end up having a massive orgy while bathing in gallons of blood and making a complete ass of myself? Maybe I realized my full vampire potential and became best buds with Harry or some shit. Whatever. I promise we're getting to all of that, since it's kind of a big fucking deal and everything.

Right now, I'd like to reflect on a conversation that Claude and I had sometime in the past year.

Don't look at me like that and whine about flashbacks. This is one of those conversations that popped into my head because it seemed way too coincidental to ignore, and besides: I'm the author, so deal with it.

***

"If anybody is trying to throw you off the roof of a building, you need to fight them like crazy. Get thrown down the stairs or better yet, throw someone else down the stairs. You want to fight those fuckers all the way."

(Stop complaining that there's no way this has anything to do with what happens next. Who's omniscient here, me or you? Right, so where were we?)

Yes, this was the actual-factual conversation Claude and I had, because it's the type that tends to verge on philosophical and ends up in reality. These usually happened while we played Ghost Recon Wildlands or Call of Duty or whatever first-person shooter game was popular at the time. Claude didn't usually talk about his jobs, and I made it a point never to ask, but sometimes, he needed to talk about something that was bothering him, just in a very roundabout way.

"Have you ever been thrown off a roof?" I remember asking, more scoffing than anything else. Claude was somewhere in uptown Manhattan at that moment, so we were chatting on the phone while we played. In the game, my avatar moved stealthily through a factory in a fictional version of Bolivia. Claude's avatar was somewhere off screen.

"Came close once," he replied, "but there was something about the gig I didn't like. Russians are always dodgy. I got the hell out of there as quickly and quietly as I could. The guys who had brought me on weren't so lucky."

"Fuck..." It was literally all I could say.

"If you do get thrown off a roof, you need to find something to slow your fall. Branches, plants, window ledges, whatever you can grab. Spread yourself out so you can offer more wind resistance. Just hope they don't throw you ass first, or you're really screwed."

"Couldn't you just do some ninja shit and do a flip or something—"

"Do me a favour: hold up your hand and slap yourself in the face for me, okay?" I didn't do this of course. "You have about one point five three something seconds if you're thrown off a four storey building. That is not a lot of time to do anything in except scream. If your life flashed in front of your eyes, you wouldn't even have time to graduate kindergarten. There will be no dodgy ninja shit. There will barely be enough time to get your feet under you and for you to bend your knees so you can at least lessen the landing. They say that's one of the best ways to survive a fall like that; just expect an ambulance to carry you away since your legs are going to be shattered."

"So no superhero landing?"

"Wanna slap yourself for me again?"

"So is there any other way to actually survive a fall like that and still walk away?"

"Yeah: be a vampire."

***

See what I mean about coincidental? Oh wait, you don't? Here, let me catch you up.