Better off Undead

Chapter 50: Love Like Blood

"Man, this show just keeps getting weirder," said Jay.

There were a couple nods of agreement, but while pretty much everyone gathered agreed, nobody felt like saying anything just then.

"We should probably draw some blood from him," Aliyah said after a while, mainly to Eli, who was still kneeling over the body of the monster that had once been Sgt. Moore. Eli didn't answer.

"Hey, Eli," Amber said, her tone unusually soft as she leaned over him. "Come on, we've got work to do."

Eli still did not so much as stir.

"Alright," Aliyah said, nodding her head and turning towards the rest of the group. "Eli has officially checked out. No matter. The rest of us will split up and take the rooms one by one. Find something to draw blood with and get back here as quickly as possible. If you find the vampire, just mark the door in some way but don't go in there alone. We'll deal with him next."

They filed out of the room, leaving Eli alone with his thoughts.

Eli wasn't sure why Sgt. Moore's death was bothering him so much. For some reason, he couldn't shake the feeling that something very bad had happened. Maybe it was the words the tortured man had said. This idea that he was the first of a new species of man. And now, they had just committed genocide on an entire species. Speciocide.

But that wasn't the problem. Not really. The real problem was that, kneeling there, looking at Sgt. Moore, all Eli could think of, all he could see, was Sara. Another person dead because of him. Another forgotten, abandoned corpse left alone, so far from home.

And hers was perhaps the greater tragedy. If Eli was right about his cure hypothesis, then that meant that one day she would have had the chance to live again. Maybe she could have found and rejoined her lost boyfriend, the one who so liked the... what had she called them? Caramellaculas?

Now they were both probably dead. And it was all Eli's fault.

Jay was the first to return with some medical supplies. By the time he made it back to the room, Eli had recovered somewhat, and was sitting with his back up against a table a few feet away from Sgt. Moore's body. Jay offered the other young man a slight nod by way of greeting and then knelt down over the corpse and got to work.

He fumbled around with the supplies for a minute, but before getting anywhere he started doubting himself.

"Um, know how to draw blood from a dead guy?" he called to Eli.

Eli shrugged, and in a weak voice replied, "Sorry. Not my area of expertise. Try putting in a help ticket."

Jay let out a low chuckle and returned to his work. Eli rubbed his head with his hands. After a while he said, "I think I'm beginning to understand why you guys are the way you are."

"Rock stars?" Jay asked flippantly, not looking back.

"Empty," Eli corrected. "Dead. I accused you all of having given up and just accepted that the world was over. Now... now I'm beginning to think that that's really the only way to deal with the pain, the loss, the insanity. Either your brain goes cold or your body does."

Jay went motionless for a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was flat and emotionless. "I told you, Eli. We all have our own ways of dealing with the end of the world. You just happen to have a near endless bounty of optimism. Don't let that go now. Not when we're so close to the end."

"Optimism," Eli echoed scornfully. The word would have made him feel like laughing had he felt like he could laugh right then. Instead he just shook his head. "I don't think I've ever heard me described as optimistic before."