Mystery Noir

Sins and Lies Part 5

The female vampire seemed to be crying, shaking her head even as we watched her fangs extend. The vampire who had not yet spoken stood in place, staring at the two humans cowering on the ground with a look of shock on his face.

I would have loved to have more weapons than a single knife to fight three vampires, though I could only hope that if I took on the one who seemed to be commanding them, the other two wouldn't know what to do.

I motioned to Penny to go for the humans and she nodded, her expression determined despite her level of intoxication.

"Now! We don't have all night!" The asshole snapped at them, prompting me to move before either one of his fledglings could follow through with his commands.

I moved away from where Penny was before I stood fully and stepped into view, drawing the attention of the three vampires. "How about you listen to her, she doesn't want to hurt anyone."

"They are my fledglings." The vampire snarled, his features going predatory as his eyes glinted green in the light and his teeth elongated. "They do what I tell them."

"You know that's bullshit, right? You have no control over them just because you turned them. That Bram Stoker bullshit isn't real." I shook my head and took a couple more steps forward, by now the humans were forgotten as all three non-humans were focused on me.

The two fledglings looked relieved, and neither one of them stopped the two humans from sprinting toward where Penny was. The three of them would hopefully get as far away from here as possible.

I'd love to have my partner with me, but she was also pretty intoxicated. She would be in danger trying to fight against vampires when her reflexes and judgement were impaired by a couple giant boots of margarita slush, combined with the beer and girly drinks from supper and the show.  We had never outright spoke about this kind of situation, but I could only hope that she would put those two in a cab and then meet me back at the hotel. I couldn't worry about protecting my drunk partner while fighting three people faster and stronger than me.

"Jack? You told us that if you died, we died..." The male fledgling spoke up finally, though it earned him a backhand from his 'sire' that sent him stumbling.

"You think a hunter would tell the truth about that?" Jack growled, before grabbing the vampire by the shoulder and shoving the man in my direction. "You'd never get a chance to learn from that mistake. And you let our prey get away, damn it!"

By that time, Penny and the two humans were already out of sight and barely earned glances from the two fledglings, despite Jack's fury.

"One, I'm not a hunter. If I was, I would have far better weapons than this knife with me. Two, There are ways you can survive as a vampire without hurting anyone. There are willing donors, bottled options, it's almost like a vampire Starbucks." I was going to continue but Jack rushed me, arms outstretched as if he were running toward me to give me a hug. 

A hug that involved really sharp fangs and probably a lot of blood.

Vampires move fast and have about a hundred times the strength of a human. The percentage of that last number may be inflated, but it is a notable difference. Even the youngest vampire can manhandle a fit, trained person. And the older the vampire gets, the faster and stronger they end up getting.

I had some fighting training and knew what to expect, but even prepared as I was, the lack of speed displayed by Jack surprised me.

Judging a vampire's age isn't exactly accurate when using such variables as speed and muscle power, but I would guess that Jack had been a vampire for a couple years, tops. And he had very little in the way of combat training.

His lack of fighting skill was what saved me, more than anything else. My muscle memory took over, allowing me to redirect his charge to the side and his speed carried him to football tackle a parking pay station to the ground. Jack went down in a shower of sparks and plastic, though I didn't have the time to celebrate my success, as I was immediately on my heels dodging haymaker punches from the male and a clumsy attempt to grab me from the female. Both fledglings weren't fighting to kill me,  which meant that when I was clipped by a punch, there wasn't much force behind it.

Which meant that it didn't pop my head off. It merely sent me sprawling to the ground, seeing stars.

"Look, kids. The humans are safe, you can go. I know you weren't willing participants in this." I offered, even as I scrambled back to my feet, gripping my long hunting knife tightly as I circled, trying to keep all three of them in my sights.

Jack was standing again, looking furious, covered in dirt and plastic pieces from the destroyed pay station.  In true vampire fashion, he was snarling, with dripping fangs and fingers that were curled into claws. I couldn't fight all three of them at once, and I didn't want to hurt the two fledglings any more than they wanted to hurt me, though their fears of dying with Jack would probably motivate them to kill me.

They glanced at one another, as if debating taking a step back and taking my offer. But fear outweighed their morals, and I saw them bracing themselves to move in. I turned my attention to Jack, smirking at him. "So what are you, like... two years older than them? Afraid to fight a little helpless... what did you call us... cockroaches... you can't fight a cockroach on your own? What kind of sire-"

As planned, my taunts pushed his patience to its breaking point.

"She's mine! I'll show you two how to sort out vermin." Jack cut me off and leapt at me again.

He depended solely on speed as his advantage, not that he was wrong in the assumption, it left me dodging his punches and kicks, deflecting blows more than completely avoiding them. And these punches were hard, meant to put me down and keep me there. When I could, I slashed with my knife, scoring my own hits, though they were only glancing blows that healed with very little blood spilled.

But it was enough that it made him angry, though with him being a vampire that only meant he moved faster and snarled more. As a human, I would tire before he did and the injuries from his glancing blows were going to cause me more damage than my knife caused him.  Still, I couldn't move fast enough to take advantage of his inability to fight, more than to prevent him from murdering me. My body ached, and I was soaked with sweat, covered in dirt and bruises as we scuffled along the parking lot.

It felt like hours, though I know that it was only a few minutes. Logically it could not have been an endless fight. Five to ten minutes maximum. Very few fights ever really last very long, even with training to build stamina, there's a reason why most professional fights have timed rounds. I needed to come up with a way to get out of this fight, whether through incapacitating Jack or distracting them long enough that I could make a run for it. 

Jack flailed at me and I snapped up my hand, grabbing his wrist and pulling it as I spun as I popped my hips, lifting his body up, causing his feet to leave the ground and sending him flying head first toward a pickup truck. Like a good non-human, his reflexes allowed him to react this time, and he flipped mid-air, and kicked off the truck to allow him to land back on the ground unharmed before charging at me again.

A car horn blared in the distance, startling me.

I stumbled over a curb, causing me to turn away from Jack for a moment to catch my balance. That moment was long enough for him to catch up to me and slam me hard into the hood of a nearby car.  I heard the metal dent around me as the air rushed from my lungs, even as one of his hands wrapped tightly around my throat.

"Gotcha, bitch." Jack snarled, grinning in triumph as he grabbed the wrist of the hand holding the knife.

Even as his hand tightened around my wrist, snapping and grinding bones, he lifted me off the hood of the car and slammed me back down again. My vision doubled as my head rebounded off the metal and I fought the smothering realization that he was completely blocking off my airway. My mind wanted to panic, it froze my body and gave me no capacity to think of a way out of my predicament.

The good news out of all of that was, because of the sheer amount of adrenaline coursing through my body from the panic response, I didn't feel the pain of my wrist any more than I could tell if I still held the knife or not.

And I had been having such a good night up until that point.