Divine Descent

Chapter Twenty-Three

                                             Elijah

"We are beginning our descent. Please proceed to your seat and buckle up. We will arrive in Rome under the hour."

The intercom crackles unstably in the 4x4 restroom. Ringing through is the grainy sound of an anxious stewardesses' voice while the Boeing reluctantly bows for land, leaving the comfort of the open air. The faulty wiring of the plane would concern any passenger flying thousands of feet above ground. It's a mere distraction, one I drown out, scrubbing blue unscented soap onto my blood-stained fingers.

The child in row D couldn't take her eyes off of the remains of life I'd been too busy to wash before boarding. The vampire the blood belonged to sank to the bottom of the ocean off the coast of Croatia a few hours ago, strapped to a net of stone. A quick execution.

With the shortage of willing donors, the traitors have to do.

The taste of him still lingers on my tongue. O-Positive. Sickening.

The door raps softly. "Excuse me? We're landing. You need to get to your seat now."

"One moment."

Placing my overnight on the seat cover, I extract a glock and rounds, careful not to touch the silver within the magazine. When it's loaded, I tuck it under my belt, concealed under my coat and place the bag on my shoulder, opening the door just as the stewardess begins to knock again impatiently.

She takes a step back upon first glance, the usual reaction. What follows is both fear and visual enchantment. Mesmerized, her mouth wavers open and closed, trying to form words.

"Please... um, please buckle..."

"Yes," I murmur, smirking darkly. "Safety first."  

The door swings loudly behind me as I move through the aisle toward the front of the plane, scanning the passengers intensely. Ever since the ban on firearms dropped for air travel, making the skies as dangerous to fly as the ground is to wander, weapons are carried and even flashed to ensure a higher understanding of the world we have become to others.

Humanity has turned it's back on each other... and this is just the beginning.

I lower into the seat assigned to me, ignoring the lingering looks from passengers.

I already know what they're thinking.

Could he be one of them?

A vampire?

Is he going to kill us?

After the third of our kind publicly made themselves known, it became necessary to accept detection was inevitable. Without Cassandra, even with the districts and the punishments, it's impossible to completely weed out the doubters.

Bodies have begun to turn up around the world, drained, frozen with a look of unnatural fear etched forever into their features. As if the riots, the night curfews weren't bleak enough. The panic that took the world by storm when the first vampire released a poorly-made video violently draining a missing girl... it's damage was irreparable.

It didn't matter how quickly I got there, how quickly I executed him.

The planet saw the truth. And the uproar started there.

The two other traitors were just more confirmation.

The transfer from plane to airport is where I move the gun from the back of my body to the front, walking calmly as the passengers shuffle quickly in huddles for the exits. It's a known fact that the streets are dangerous. As even though it's hardly true, a vampire could be lurking around any corner.