Dominant Species (17 page)

The
n the figure disappeared and they slowed, searching all around. Then it landed once again, this time directly in front of them and once again they were running, taking a different turn. Jake had a feeling they were being herded, it was a feeling he’d had once before, when he was no more than a small boy.

‘What now?’ screamed Megan.

‘This way,’ yelled Jake. As they ran, behind him Max doubled up in pain, then fell to the floor and threw up. Realizing, Jake shouted to Megan to continue as he ran back to help his brother.

‘Max, are you okay?’

‘You know what, Jake?’ replied Max through gritted teeth, ‘That’s a bloody stupid question.’

Despite the situation both brothers smile
d. Jake helped Max to his feet and they ran on, catching the others up. Up ahead the vampire landed in the street and the four of them dived into an old warehouse, smashing doors open as they made their way through the maze of old, unused corridors. They hit the open air, skidded to a halt, panting hard, their breath clearly visible in the cold air. They scanned the area.

‘It’s clear.’ They broke
cover and darted across the open space.

From the shadows
above, Zidtool watched the four figures as they exploded into view and allowed himself a thin smile.

Jake, Max, Father Matthew and Megan reached the doorway to another warehouse across the open ground, when a shadow flickered across them. They turned just in time to see Zidtool hit the ground ten yards behind them. Max’s eyes closed as an intense pain flooded through his whole body. Jake pulled the shotgun from his shoulder.

Z
idtool smiled and wagged his finger, admonishingly, ‘Now, now.’ He said in his strange high pitched and grating voice.

‘
Choke on this.’ Jake fired the gun, the first round missed Zidtool as he dodged left in a blur, and then he was closing, eight, six, four yards, when the second round hit him in the centre of his chest. It hardly slowed him at all as he leapt into the air hitting Jake and Father Matthew hard, lifting them off their feet, smashing them both through the rotten wooden door.

Inside the
empty warehouse Jake landed awkwardly, pain burning through his shoulder, Zidtool on top of him. Beside him an unconscious Father Matthew crashed awkwardly along the floor and into the wall.

Jake and Zidtool
skidded across the empty floor. Shafts of dull light crisscross the warehouse through the various holes and cracks in the walls and ceiling. Behind them Megan stood in the broken doorway, her eyes wide in terror. In the distance she could hear the vague sounds of battle as they washed over her.

‘Jake!’ She scream
ed.

Pinned to the ground
, Jake could smell the stench of the beast on top of him. Zidtool’s mouth opened, his face contorted, his teeth long and deadly.

‘
I’ve waited a long time for this.’ He hissed ‘and after you, I’ll have fun with her.’ He jerked his thumb over his shoulder, without taking his eyes from Jake.

The baseball bat
actually shattered on contact with the side of Zidtool’s head. He turned, dazed, his vision slightly blurred. Megan stood facing him, breathing hard and holding the remains of the broken bat in her hands.

‘Get off him you bastard.’

Distracted, and still slightly stunned, Zidtool missed the movement below him as Jake brought the ten inch Bowie knife up into Zidtool’s throat. Zidtool slipped backwards, staggered to his feet, the knife sticking out from his throat like some obscene metal tongue.

Despite the pain that coursed through his body,
Jake lunged, trying to take the advantage. He hit Zidtool, driving him to the ground and landed on top of him. Zidtool was still stunned as Jake pulled the knife from the vampire’s throat with a deep sucking sound and severed the top strap securing Zidtool’s body armour. Then grabbing the edge of the armour, Jake wrenched it to one side, raised the knife over his head and struck down with all his force. The knife plunged, but didn’t connect as Zidtool hit him with his open palm, knocking him backwards.

The Vampire
half gurgled, half roared as Jake flew back across the room tumbling end over end across the floor, before his journey was stopped suddenly and decisively by the wall at the far end. Plaster rained down on him like snow.

Megan, terror in her eyes, step
ped back as Zidtool stood. He grabbed the hanging body armour and ripped it off. Throwing it to one side it clattered across the floor.

He
took a step towards Jake who was trying to clear his head and refocus. Megan held the broken bat up helplessly, but was flicked nonchalantly into the wall with hardly any effort from Zidtool.

‘
Why? Why do you bother? Don’t you understand that it’s simply futile?’

Jake trie
d to pull himself up onto all fours but his arms gave way and he crashed back down, his head spinning.

‘
It could at least have been quick…but not now.’ Zidtool hissed, with a strangled gurgle. Jake couldn’t take his eyes off of the loose skin that flapped at Zidtools neck wound when he spoke. Then Zidtool roared again.

Behind him to his right,
Megan looked to the shotgun that lay only a few feet from her.

‘
You want to know why we bother?’ shouted Jake. Unsteadily, he stood, facing his enemy like he had done so many years ago. ‘The fact that you don’t understand, is the reason why you’ll never win.’

In one
smooth motion Megan grabbed the pump action shotgun, racked the next round into the chamber and threw it to Jake. Zidtool charged as Jake caught the weapon and fired once.

The sound was deafening inside the building and a
solid slug ripped into Zidtool’s shoulder as he tried to twist away, too late. BANG another round hit him in the thigh taking him to one knee.

‘
No body armour?’ Jake queried, ‘Does it hurt?’ He racked another round into the shotgun. ‘So let’s see how tough you really are.’

Zidtool look
ed up, evil personified and smiled. Something familiar burned across Jake’s mind and deep into his soul, something resembling recognition.

‘Kar!’

Jake’s finger tightened on the trigger when suddenly a dazed and winded Megan crashed in front of Zidtool, right in the line of fire. Jake relaxed his grip on the trigger as his head span to the left, but it was too late, as Max, saliva dripping from his mouth, hit him hard.

‘No!’ Screamed Megan as t
he shotgun clattered away into the corner. Zidtool grunted as he clambered to his feet.

‘Sen!’ he hissed.

Jake lay pinned to the ground by his brother unable to move. He tried to turn his head away from the drip, drip, drip of the saliva that pattered onto his face. Max’s distended jaw opened as teeth that were much longer than they should have been edged closer.

‘I said, SEN!’
roared Zidtool.

Max, or whatever
was left of him, turned towards his new master.

‘
You know, I was going to take great pleasure in ripping you apart a piece at a time.’ Zidtool said as he absently touched his throat, which was already beginning to heal. ‘But you know what?’

Jake struggle
d under Max, but Max was already far too powerful for him.

‘
In many ways this is even more fitting; being torn apart by your own brother…’ he smiled that uneasy, lopsided smile of his ‘…just like you tore my own brother from me, all those years ago.’

Jake’s face show
ed a flash of confusion, followed almost immediately by recognition, his mind racing back to that fateful night, twenty years ago where a little boy and his brother stood beneath the remains of the Amato Theatre. 

A young Jake stares at the vampire about to leap. Light catches its face, a face with a lopsided smile that resembles Zidtool.

Jake looked at Zidtool in the present and realised the truth. His head felt like it was going to explode and he hardly heard the beast bark another command.

‘
Drakar. But then on the other hand… I’m not sure I could miss all the fun.’

Max pull
ed away from his brother, his head switching left and right, hesitating, confused. He scurried backwards, never taking his eyes from Jake and joined his new master, crouched on all fours.

Zidtool
smiled, and then began to laugh, a maniac blood chilling laugh that seemed to slice through the air. Max’s eyes widened as he anticipated the kill.

‘
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death...’ Jake slowly stood, took a deep breath, ‘...I will fear no evil.’

‘Well perhaps you should
,’ countered Zidtool with a wry smile.

T
he vampire moved so fast he was almost a blur. He lifted Jake with one hand and hurled him across the room. Jake hit the warehouse wall nearly six feet off the ground and tumbled to the floor with a thud. A lump of plaster crashed on top of him, exposing the bricks beneath. Although he was covered in dust and debris Jake again struggled to his feet, defiant.

‘…for thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff the
y comfort me… May the Lord give…’

His sentence
was cut short by the vampire who threw a lump of old timber across the room which hit Jake in the stomach. Jake buckled and fell amongst the splinters of the rotten wood that had shattered on impact.

‘Shut up!’ screamed Zidtool.

Max, blood and saliva dripping from his mouth watched, just waiting for the command.

‘…
us the strength.’

His voice
was drowned out by the vampire, this time roaring with rage. Jake staggered to his feet again, blood trickling from the cuts on his face. In his hand he held hidden a splinter of wood just over eight inches in length.

‘
Come on then you bastard. I saw your brother die and he squealed like a baby.’

Enraged,
Zidtool moved so fast that Jake hardly managed to raise the stake to his shoulder before he was lifted completely off the ground, the make-shift stake torn from his fingers by Zidtool. Jake hung in the air, helpless. He glanced to Max, hardly able to speak and his voice cracked.

‘
Our father...who art in heaven... Max… I need you Bro.’

The vampire squeeze
d. Jake began to choke.
Behind him, as she pulled herself to her knees Megan continued the Lord’s Prayer.

‘Hallowed
be thy name...’

Jake, his
throat screaming in pain, joined in… his voice hoarse, ‘Thy kingdom come, thy will be done…’

‘
No. You can pray to your God, but it will be my will that shall be done. Now bleed for me.’

Max watche
d intently, confused thoughts crashing through what remained of his mind when the cross that hung from Jake’s neck caught a flicker of dull light. Zidtool’s hand moved in a blur, the stake striking down towards Jake’s chest.

Zidtool’s face didn’t have any time to register his surprise as
Max smashed into his side. Zidtool slid across the room as Jake rolled away. Max was on top of the vampire, his eyes mad, head jerking, teeth trying to bite. Zidtool’s hand held him by the throat as they rolled across the floor together.

Outside the
sounds of the vicious fighting had faded. Through a mist of gun-smoke Trent was leading an attack on the small group of turncoats that remained. They tried to surrender, but were cut down in a hail of lead. Unbeknown to Jake and Zidtool and against all the odds the resistance were winning, the tide had turned. Every last half-ling and every last vampires lay dead, their bodies scattered on the ground. It was then that Trent heard the scream of a vampire being killed as it pierced the air from somewhere in the distance. It was a sound that brought back memories form long ago and he smiled.

Inside the abandoned warehouse Zidtool
lay dead on the floor, his throat torn out, and his dead eyes staring into nothingness. Above him Max slowly turned towards Jake and Megan, blood dripped from his mouth, his eyes were glazed. He raised a blood-stained hand to his mouth, looked almost quizzically at it, and then tasted the blood with the tip of his tongue. It was good.

Jake back
ed slowly away, pulling Megan with him. Max, his head on one side, watched them go as he absently licked his fingers clean.

Jake, hardly recognize
d the thing that crouched on all fours in front of him as his younger brother now, but knew that somewhere deep inside Max had fought one last time to save him, to repay a debt more than twenty years old. A moment of sorrow flashed across his reddening eyes. Then Max stood, his back was stooped and he snarled a godforsaken sound. When he began to close on Jake, Megan’s eyes widened in terror. Slowly Jake raised the shotgun. He hesitated. Megan watched on, for a moment frightened that Jake couldn’t do what needed to be done. Then, as the thing that had once been his brother closed, their eyes met and Megan thought she saw a flicker of the old Max, pleading for release from the monster he knew he had become.