Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

5

BOOM! A cacophony of rumbles and growls shakes the building. Ronnie stumbles back, and so does Lincoln. The ground shakes everyone off their balance. The elderly couple fall off their chairs, and many also fall to the ground. "The hell..." Lincoln utters. He looks around, the heat of his romance still having him in a haze and was too disoriented to put together what was happening. That's when he finds, looking up to the loud hums, a giant crowd of bats, morphing into men: Vampires. Vampires had stolen their kiss. Go figure. They all hiss like cats to everyone down below, who all look up in terror. "This is it" they were probably thinking. "We're all dead." Lincoln made haste, retrieving the dagger from his pocket and shouting: "Come on down, all of you! I've been waiting for this moment my entire life!" Tens of vampires hurled themselves down in a shadowy blur, creating chaos akin to the center of a black tornado. They were all circling the place and its walls to scare them. Lincoln wasn't fazed, though he'd never seen this happen before. The most he'd ever fought at once was seven vampires. This was uncharted territory for him, but he was confident enough to stay calm. He swung his blade towards the swirling black blur around him, and it caused two red eyes to glow, and a loud painful shriek rang out. Lincoln couldn't take them on when they were so mixed like this. He was skilled at taking vampires down when they all stood before him; not when they were in a massive vampiric tornado!

He waited for the swarming to cease, but it wouldn't relent. It was only getting more intense. He had to think quickly, so looking around, he saw the entrance door. It was still possible that the sun was out. He sprinted to the door and ripped it open. Unfortunately, no light flooded in, as it was only moonlight that now layered inside. The building shook again. These beasts were going to tear the whole place down to a mess of rubble! That's when a shot blasted, and the bang echoed five times. Lincoln turned around and saw an elderly man in a large white Southern hat. He must've been the sheriff, as his badge was practically large enough to read from where Lincoln was standing. He held a six-shooter, blasting one shot after another, which caused everyone to cover their ears and scream. Lincoln ran up to him. "Stop it! You can't kill them with an ordinary gun! You're just scaring people!" Lincoln tried to rip the gun from the man's grasp but he was shoved away. "Get the hell off me before I shoot you too!" Lincoln knew this man was too stubborn to reason with, so with one swift slash, he used his dagger to knock the gun out of his hands and throw it across the room. He pointed the dagger at the southern-brimmed man and said, "Now stay put. You're only making things worse." The man huffed, and Lincoln sprinted up to the swirling wall of vampires. He focused hard, waiting for the right moment. He stood still, his dagger low and inconspicuous, when it finally happened: A vampire lunged outward to try and grab him. That was the perfect opportunity for him to slash its neck, and its body passed by, hit the floor, and slid across the linoleum.

"Bastards," Lincoln said. Angered, three more vampires departed from the eddy and were also cut but Lincoln—he only had to make one fast movement of his dagger, and he'd kill a vampire in a flash. He was the only person who could handle a vampire swarm with such ease. After that, two more were knocked out, which he promptly killed. Then three more, then five more, then six more, and then there were none. The floor was covered in dead vampires, whose bodies, at random, burst into ash. He panted, his grip on the dagger weakening. He stayed on guard for another minute, still scrutinizing the place for any more enemies, but he found none. Slowly, one by one, people started to rise up, and apprehension dissipated. "Are... are they gone?" Ronnie Anne faltered. "My god, what were those things?" asked a younger man. "Vampires," said Lincoln. "None of you've ever seen one before?" They all shook their heads. "Well, now you have. They can only die by either a slash from a blessed dagger—such as I have here—or a stake in the heart. That's why Sheriff over there was being a fool when he thought he could start opening fire with a stupid gun."

The man glared at him. "Vampires?" he scoffed. "You expect us to believe that, boy? May I remind you that not everything you see in the movies is true?" he said. "Yes, sir. But if they weren't vampires, then what, may I ask, do you think those hellions were?" He rolled his eyes. "I don't know, but I do know for damn sure they weren't no vampires!" The rest of the night, everybody cleaned up the place. The mayor, Madam Ronnie Anne, requested nobody speak of what happened. She explained that an outrage or mass hysteria is the last thing we need and that everybody should stay calm as the town looks for a way to prepare against any future attacks. It was hard to believe for Lincoln that nobody had seen a vampire before. But then it all made sense. It's because if a person who couldn't defend themself against one—a normal person—encountered a vampire, then they surely wouldn't survive to tell the tale. Unimaginable pressure was placed on Ronnie Anne, and at a town meeting, someone started screaming at her about that night—the night the vampires attacked the town hall. But, as she requested nobody to speak of it, she ordered him to be removed from the building. Everybody passed the person off as crazy and they moved on. Everybody, however, did find it crazy that their mayor soon required doors and windows to be locked past six o'clock. The town started getting wary of these new regulations and many questioned them, but Ronnie Anne refused to explain. One journalist held an interview with her and asked why she established these new rules on security. She replied: "The people need to be safe. I think that's all I need to say about that."