Vampire Agent (English Version)

Chapter 16

Widow (still  F L A S H B A C K)

From minute to minute I found it harder to filter the sounds and at some point I heard only laughter, heartbeats and, after the buffet was opened, also the unbearably loud chewing noises.
After some time, I went to the terrace and took advantage of the night air to slow down a bit.
There I met briefly Norman's mentioned sister.
However, he had noticed that I had gone out and joined me in time enough, otherwise she probably would have become really pushy, because believe it or not, after only five minutes she had already made several overly obvious advances. Around three in the morning, we said our goodbyes and disappeared again.
Relieved, I sat in the carriage and leaned my head against the interior paneling, exhausted.
I had made it and without having to dance or eat. And I had not killed anyone.
Through and through, then, a success.
"You okay?" asked Norman when we got home and I was glad he hadn't brought it up earlier.
He rocked heavily on alcohol and swayed as we got out of the coach.
"I'm fine, just need to rest," I said and couldn't help but prop him up. Then I helped him up the steps, unlocked and escorted him inside.
"I'm so sorry things went so wrong two weeks ago.", he apologized to me in a drunken stupor.
"I'd say it's not your fault, but I wanted to call for backup," I mumbled and helped him upstairs, but stopped in front of the apartment instead of entering it. I stared at our apartment door, which we had locked.
I had heard Norman turn the key. Three times counterclockwise, as usual.
Now, however, it was open a crack and I smelled a stench I had never smelled before. I screwed up my face.
"Oh shit.", mumbled Norman, who had now seen it too.
"Stay here.", I muttered softly, making sure he stayed on the banister. Then I pushed the door open a bit and peeked inside. A man was standing in our living room, pacing back and forth as if he were waiting for someone. Then he wheeled around to me with a big grin and came toward me.
"Crap," I growled and gestured Norman to leave, but he was too sluggish from the alcohol and took too long to interpret my hand signal.
The man yanked open the door and all I could do was shove protectively in front of my partner.
"Who the hell are you?", I asked coldly, ready for a hand-to-hand fight that was never going to happen.
"Luke Vingate, you killed my brother, remember? The vampire in the alley?" he asked, pulling out a pistol and pointing it at me.
It took me a moment to realize what he had said, but I managed to catch myself in time and managed to throw his arm to the side before the bullet left the barrel.
It hit the railing to our right. Wood splintered and I felt a twinge in my side as he jammed a knife between my ribs.
I hadn't even had time to react. I hadn't even noticed his movement.
I gasped for air and tasted my blood.
"Someone like you doesn't deserve to live this life.", he growled in my ear and at the same moment he threw me down the stairs, giving him a clear path to Norman. I didn't manage to catch myself during the fall and hit my neck on the bottom step. I felt a crack and for a short moment everything went black. A static noise echoed in my ears. Then my vision cleared and I saw the Norman wrestling with the man.
"NORMAN GET AWA-," the gunshot cut me off. I stared at the man. And at Norman, who slumped limply to the side. Everything around me blurred and a pain in my throat made me briefly forget what was going on. He couldn't be dead, he had surely missed. I told myself that, suppressed my fear and the idea of his death, and picked myself up again, just in time to throw myself out of the way of another shot.
The man swung over the railing and landed light-footed in front of me.
Too light on his feet.
A vampire.
That was my thought as I looked at him and noticed his preternaturally twinkling eyes.
I stumbled back a few steps. He had me in his sights. This time I would defend myself.
I couldn't count on being bailed out by Norman.
When the vampire pointed the gun at me again I reacted as fast as I could, used one of the techniques we had learned in the police and fired once at his thigh and once at his shoulder.
He fell to his knees and cursed softly, his face contorted in pain. After the two shots, I paused.
It was a simple revolver.
One bullet had passed upstairs, one he had fired at me on the stairs, and one must have swept past Norman.
Six rounds, five fired, one left.
"Who do you work for?!", I asked.
My voice was shaking, but my hands held the gun steady, giving me back some security.
I needed to get this straightened out quickly.
"Who do I work for?", He laughed out, "Your names were just on a list and a nice sum next to it.", The vampire contorted his face into a ghastly grin. I remembered the legends that vampires died if you jammed something through their heart, but if I was a vampire too.... Then our hearts didn't beat at all. This had to be bullshit. I pointed the gun at his head.
"If you won't give me answers, you're no use to me," I said coldly. This guy had to be a bounty hunter.
"Fuck you.", the vampire muttered and slowly stood back up to stand full size in front of me.
"You don't even have the nuts-"
I pulled the trigger and put a shot right between his eyes.
"Fuck you.", I growled, running up to Norman.
"Norman, I've got hi-," I paused as I reached the top, unable to process what I was seeing there.
Accompanied by a terribly painful sadness that I had never felt like this in my entire life, my knees gave out from under me and everything went black.

* END of  F L A S H B A C K *

The sight of what had happened had been forever imprinted on my memory and no drug in the world had been able to rid me of it until now. I had tried so many things and still I woke up with Norman's body in front of me, still feeling as guilty after all these years as I did that day. There was no one who could help me forget and I had resigned myself to it for decades. It just hurt terribly.
His loss had been more than I could handle at the time and now that I was standing here, in front of his grave, my guilty conscience was shamelessly catching up with me and eating away at me all over again. I took a deep breath and then kicked out the cigarette on the ground.
"Shit.", I then mumbled softly, took one last pain-filled look at his grave, turned around and left the cemetery again to go back to the house before Jonas woke up. But when I got there, I didn't want to go inside. I just stood in the small front yard for a long time and finally leaned against the wall of the house.
I had known exactly why I avoided this town.
With trembling hands, I took another cigarette and lit it, hand raised to protect the small flame from the wind.
Until sunrise, I stood in front of the house trying to sort out my thoughts, but I could not.
Then I heard loud footsteps in the house and how a few doors were frantically opened and slammed shut again. Among others also the front door. Jonas ran out and looked down the street. I leaned right next to the front door and watched as he quietly cursed and then pulled out his cell phone.
He looked around and startled when he saw me.
"Looking for something?", I asked tonelessly, averting my gaze.
"Have you been smoking?", He then wanted to know with a furrowed brow.
"One too?", I replied and took the pack out of my jacket pocket.
He hesitated, but then nodded.
"Except for the fact that they're actually mine," he muttered, taking a cigarette. I threw him the lighter and he caught it a little awkwardly.
After he had lit the cigarette, he gave both back to me and I took one for myself as well.
We stood there in silence for a long time, until Jonas then broke the silence, as he so often does.
"What are you doing out here?" he asked, one hand in his pocket and his shoulders hunched.
I opened my mouth to tell him a lie, but then hesitated and sighed heavily.
"Thinking.", I then answered quietly, looking down at my shoes, "I.... Sorry about yesterday. I can be a bit of an asshole," I then added.
The guy wasn't going to let me out of his sight anytime soon anyway, so I couldn't afford bad cards.
"I'm just not into it when other people pick at old wounds. I have a few of them and I don't go near them on principle," I said a bit more quietly and turned my gaze to the left, in the opposite direction of Jonas.
He didn't answer anything at first. Then I heard him sit down on the steps at the house entrance with a groan.
"I think I'm going about this a little wrong, too," he then said, "I have my orders from above. I don't have a lot of time on my hands, and I'm sure you can imagine that, as a former vampire hunter, I also have my reasons for not trusting your kind too far across the path."
"Too kind," I muttered, and couldn't help smirking.
"I know," he laughed softly too, "Me putting you over without consent was a pretty rotten stunt and then pressuring you was a little.... thoughtless," he had lowered his eyes.
You'd think that would be the beginnings of an apology.
"More like insane.", I muttered when he didn't continue, "Should know as a former vampire hunter though."
"I get it.", he seemed to think for a while, "It might be a little personal, but may I know what you have against humans in general?" he then asked me, and for the first time I could detect a trace of uncertainty in his voice. I fell silent and shifted my gaze from him back to the sunrise in the distance.
"Humans are cruel.", I then said softly, "In another way than vampires are. They don't have the foresight they should. They judge before they have a chance to deal with anything and they love their schoolboy thinking. It's wiser to steer clear of confrontations with you.", I sighed heavily and then stomped out my cigarette.
"Exceptions prove the rule.", Jonas said regretfully and dropped his cigarette on the ground as well to stub it out, "Maybe our prejudices will prove us both wrong.", He stood up and stretched. I shook my head slightly and put my hands in my pants pockets.
"Maybe.", I then said, knowing that a miracle would have to happen for that to change in general.