Antithesis: The Vampire Alliance Book Three - FIRST DRAFT COMPLETED

Antithesis Chapter 21: Tulloch Sullivan July 2013

Tulloch Sullivan, July 2013

Has it been a day or a week? Is it closer to a month? Time, me, my life, all seemed to stop when Johan pulled me into the headquarters. I should have fought him off, I’m strong enough, but I hadn’t expected my colleagues to do as they’d done. How could they sacrifice Eve? How could they let her sacrifice herself without a fight? But the doors had locked as the defences came back online and I had been left to watch in horror as my wife’s execution played out on the small screen on the door control panel which showed the CCTV feed of outside.

I had felt her die. I had felt the stinging, burning sweep of the blade through her neck and then I lost her. The stream of her defiant emotion simply ceased as her life ended and I wish with all my heart that I had ended with her.

Rob held it together longer that I could manage, long enough to obey Eve’s last request and save Robbie. Maybe he managed the task only because it was her last request and not to do so would be to fail her, again. He changed his son, with bloody tears streaming over his cheeks as he did so.

Had I cried then? I can’t remember. I’d tried to get to the door control panel. I’d tried to get out to her. By the time Johan let me take down the defences she was already dead though. Worse than simply dead, she was gone. Tess had taken my wife’s body when she and her team left. Without her body I have no hope of bringing Eve back and no chance to bury her, to say goodbye, if she can’t be brought back. After everything she’s done for Rob and I we failed her.

When Johan had finally let us out Rob and I tried to go after her but we couldn’t follow. Eve’s murderers had been Strix, they’d be fast and Johan had made us wait too long. We had no connection to Eve anymore, no way to track her. She was gone, truly gone, and there was nothing I could do about it.

That realisation came with more pain than I’d ever experienced before. Yes, I felt something close the night Rob was executed. But the blinding, immobilising agony that flowed through me in that moment of comprehension should have destroyed me, it felt like it would. Is that what she’d felt when Rob died? Is that what I’d never understood, the depth of her grief, the insurmountable nature of her desolation in those years following Rob’s execution?

How had she survived?

I need her.

I had yelled in grief, in anger. I had torn apart swathes of the woodland surrounding our headquarters in pure agonised rage. Rob was equally destructive and I don’t suppose having our volatile emotions bounce off each other helped either of us initially.

Eventually we collapsed to the ground, to earth torn up and littered with the broken remnants of trees and woodland plants which we had torn asunder. I had certainly cried then, brokenly, and so had Rob. We begged any God in the cosmos to put this right, to correct this mistake, to erase what had happened.

God is a lie though; there is no God to answer prayers, no God doing what is best for the world. I’m sure of that now. No merciful God would have winked out Eve’s life so viciously. All we have is our own mistakes and the consequences of other’s cruelty. Because of that I am lost. We are lost.

When we eventually returned to the headquarters it was to a building reeking of shock, of concern, of other’s loathsome pity for our loss. As if pity could help. As if pity served any purpose but to re-confirm that the Senate had once again caused the world to crumble, caused a light to go out and left only bitter, anguish filled darkness in its place. How I hate them, how I hate those ‘people’ who take and take and laugh at our suffering as they do so.

In books people say that shock, that loss, leaves numbness. As I had followed Rob back to our room I could only wish to be anaesthetised but the weight of my loss was too crushing for that. It was too much for Rob and perhaps it would’ve been better if he’d become numb.

As we stepped into our room we’d been confronted by the home Eve would no longer share and he had lost control again. The young man who had once thrown a clock against a wall upon learning of his mother’s death returned with all the uncontrollable emotion of a vampire. He tore apart our room and I let him, unable or unwilling to step in. I’m not really sure. If he’d been mortal I may have offered him a drink, even knowing the downward spiral that would cause. I would have poured myself one too. There was no point for us though, not as vampires. Alcohol wouldn’t anaesthetise us, wouldn’t cause us to forget. We can’t escape. 

But as I sit here now, still in the room Rob has dismantled, not sure of the date or how many agony filled days have passed, I remember that I can escape. Isn’t that one of the abilities Eve had granted me? I’m Strix, the void she had found I can fall into as well now. It might not be right, it might not be what she’d want for me, but I can’t bear this. I need to be numb. I need to stop feeling this anguish that has my throat rendered mute by the lump of impotent desperation trapped there. The agony of the merciless band of regret and loss crushing my heart will drive me mad if I can’t find the emptiness which Eve had once sought solace in.

I’ve felt Eve switch off her emotions; I know the path to that vacuum. Following it almost thoughtlessly I find myself on the brink. It would take nothing to step over that edge and then I’d be free. Free from grief, free from worry, free from love so that I might never again feel this.

“Don’t.” Rob’s command is little more than a croak after hours, days spent in silent torment.

Sighing I glance up at him, my vision still red with tears, “I can’t feel like this, I don’t want to feel like this.”

His expression is pleading as he whispers, “Evie wouldn’t want that.” He pauses and I feel his desperation before he begs, “Please Keep, don’t leave me to cope with this on my own.”

He looks so very fragile, so very lost. Here we are back at the start, he’s lost and he needs to rely on me. Here we are back at the start, where Tess has destroyed my dreams. I can’t blame Rob though, hasn’t he been my constant support too? Him and then Eve? I go to him then, perching on the torn remains of our mattress as I rest my forehead against his. “I don’t know how to survive this.”

“We don’t have to survive it,” he replies as his fingers intertwine with mine. “But Eve wouldn’t lie down without a fight. How many times has she done something suicidal in the same of justice, of vengeance, to honour my memory or save us in some way. We don’t have to cope; we don’t even have to live long. I don’t want to live long. But don’t you think we should make them pay for taking her before we give up completely?”

Hadn’t I done exactly what he’s asking in his name? Hadn’t I killed every enforcer who had made him suffer after he was executed? Eve should be given the same. She’d given us strength and we should use it. She’d been determined to do the same for Rob, for Beth too. She’d handed herself over for me, been tortured for me. We need to avenge her. Then we can lie down and give up, if we don’t die in the process.

Nodding slowly I point out, “We’ll need weapons, lots of weapons. It would be better if Johan gave us what we need, although I am willing just to take things if he forces my hand.”

“Let’s go and ask then,” Rob agrees, “then if we need to raid the stores we’ll do that.”

People move aside for us as me make our way to Johan’s office and I have no doubt that we look a sight, still in the clothes we’d been wearing when Eve died. Our faces are still streaked with the war paint of our bloody tears. Yet I don’t care what the people around us think of our appearance, I don’t care about them at all. Not anymore. Not now. I care for Rob and I care for vengeance in Eve’s name, they are my only concerns now.

A voice causes us to pause at the door of Johan’s room, Robbie’s words causing us to halt. “You have infiltrators don’t you? Can’t you find out where her body is? Or if it’s been cremated yet? Don’t you think my father and Sullivan would like to bury their wife? Don’t they deserve that much?”

“We don’t have the resources to go after prisoners, never mind bodies, no matter who those bodies belong to. Why is this so important to you?” Johan’s demand infuriates me and I can feel my grip tighten on the door handle. He’s never valued Eve as he should.

“She died so that I wouldn’t. She did remarkable things for my father, even as a mortal. My mother became the monster that killed her. I feel responsible and if there’s a way to do the decent thing and recover her body then I want to do so.”

Robbie’s honesty surprises me; I hadn’t ever given him the benefit of the doubt. While I forgave Rob a long while ago for what happened with Tess, Robbie still represents something that nettles me. To hear him admit to being on our side is surprising.

As I push open the door to Johan’s office the occupants of the room freeze. They turn to us in surprise, their expressions registering the expected shock, pity and uncertainty.

“We want access to weapons,” I announce. There’s little point in beating about the bush; Johan can agree to hand over an arsenal or he can refuse, we’ll get what we want either way.

“You want vengeance,” he states, knowing how I’d reacted to Rob’s death. “That’s reckless, we need you.”

“If you don’t give us what we want we will just take it,” the defiance in Rob’s tone isn’t lost on Johan. Rob glances at Robbie, “If we can recover her body in the process that’s all the better, though if we can destroy every person who to hurt her that will be enough.”

Johan sighs, taking his seat. “We need Strix, we need you. Even more than that I don’t want to lose you, you two are the closest things I have to sons.”

We both know that, we’ve known it for decades. It doesn’t change anything though. Johan had sired Rob, he’d taught us both about our world and in many ways he’d been like a father to us. He’d also fashioned us into the infiltrators he needed and we’d given him everything we had, right down to our lives and the life of the woman we love. Now we need to do achieve something beyond what Johan has planned.

Shrugging, Rob answers simply, “You’ll still have a Strix,” he indicates to Robbie, “you have my son. But we need to do this. Eve is my life, she is the reason I am alive. The same goes for Keep. We’ve lived our lives and this is the last thing we need to do. It’s the only thing we need to do, Johan. What use do you think we’ll be to you if you don’t allow us this? We won’t fall in line and let her death pass us by, sire. Please, give us what we want and maybe in the process we’ll make your life easier too.”

“Can I at least ask that you develop a plan rather than running straight to Charleston’s house and throwing your lives away in an assault on his well-guarded home?” Brow creased, Johan slumps, he resigns himself to our resolve while still fearing what our first act will be.

“Will you pass any intelligence on the location of her body to us, if you find it?” I enquire before I swear to anything.

Johan meets my gaze steadily, “If I receive any information on what they’ve done with her I’ll tell you. Believe it or not I had come to like Eve and I had promised Lucius and Aemiliana that I would protect her. I’ve failed in my duty to her too and if I can do anything to rectify any aspect of that I will. I can’t ask our teams to chase bodies though, not with the world as it is.”

Reaching into his pocket Rob draws out a torn scrap of paper. “While we were out hunting the last time, with...” he chokes off that sentence. The lump in his throat is painful as he blinks back further tears. “A mortal gave this to her. He used to be a donor at Dominion. Apparently there’s a group of ex-donors, ex-Harkers and so on who want to join the Alliance. They’re willing to donate blood and to fight the Senate. This number is for his girlfriend, you may find she has some recruits for you who could feed your vampires.”

“My vampires?” Johan questions, “Have we divided, Rob, with you pair on one side and me with my Alliance on the other? Are you no longer Alliance?”

Perhaps there is a little guilt our emotions as I answer, “We have our own agenda, currently it meshes with yours but it may not always do so. I’m not sure it would be fair to say we are Alliance now, not when we have only one goal; to avenge Eve. We aren’t going to swear to obey your command grandsire, or necessarily consider your interests before our own goals. If you still consider us Alliance then that is one thing but we don’t request it of you.”

“You are Alliance,” answers Johan with determination, “You are still my second and Rob is still a key member of my team, even if you both need some time. You can have your weapons although I would ask you not to throw your lives away. Eve wouldn’t want that, she didn’t die for that.”

“I don’t consider it throwing my life away,” states Rob, “what we’ll do is no less than she deserves from us.”