Monsterland (3 page)

“Jade, princess of the Dairy Queen.”

Wyatt nodded and smiled at the image of Jade dressed like a princess, dispensing frozen shakes that could be served upside down.

“The pretty girl with long, dark hair?”

“Yeah.”

“So?”

“He slapped my back. I didn’t think anything of it.” Wyatt reached into the trash can removing, the crumpled ball of paper. He flattened it out. The word
desperate
was written in bold magic marker.

“You had this on your back when you spoke to her?”

Wyatt nodded glumly. Wyatt was a sweet kid, but painfully shy. He knew Wyatt was smitten with the elusive Jade; he couldn’t figure out why. She was pretty enough, but was dating the school quarterback and resident bully, which in Carter’s mind didn’t speak well for her character. He didn’t like Nolan Steward; his father owned the car dealership downtown and was known for his aggressiveness as well. Wyatt, on the other hand, had fallen in with the group that other kids rejected. Nice kids, Carter thought, just a bit on the weird side. Well, except for Wyatt. Now that he was turning eighteen, he seemed more settled, a little less geeky.

“She saw?”

“Everybody saw it.”

“Shall I hold him down while you pummel him?” Carter threw the remote on the couch. He had taught Wyatt how to deliver a punishing noogie. He held up a hand, showing a perfect fist with the knuckle of his middle finger slightly protruding. Wyatt smiled in shared amusement.

He shook his head. “Nah, he’s just a kid. I save those for the bullies.”

Carter wrapped his arm around Wyatt’s shoulders affectionately. They were having a moment, and, for a second, Carter felt close to him. Wyatt smiled tentatively up at him. “Let’s get dinner up before your mom comes home.” He still topped his stepson by a few inches, but Wyatt would catch up. “Wait a sec.”

Carter turned around, opening the screen door to peer into the growing dusk. Frogs croaked; fireflies lit up tiny pinpoints of light. The air had turned strangely muggy. In the distance, he heard the wolves start their howling. While the park was five miles outside of town, the wind carried the cries. He shivered involuntarily and then latched the door. Reaching under the couch, he removed his revolver where he had hidden it, holding it loosely in the palm of his hand.

C
HAPTER
3

West Hollywood, LA

“T
he way I
see it, we got no choice.” Raoul slid down onto the floor of the rat-infested apartment.

“We never had a choice,” Sylvie responded. She pulled a tattered cardigan over her white shoulders.

“Cold?” He helped her slide her arm through the sleeve.

“I’m always cold.” She shivered, her purple lips pursed.

“I’m sorry.” Raoul shrugged. He leaned over to kiss her on her lips. He nipped her gently, drawing only a little blood. Sylvie reached over, smearing the red droplets with her thumb suggestively over his lips. His fang pierced her forefinger, impaling it.

“Ow.” She pulled it away, but he captured her hand, taking her finger in his mouth, sucking on the sluggish puncture.

“Pig. Leave some for me.” She pulled away.

“Look at us!” Raoul stood and parted the dusty blinds to gaze at Sunset Boulevard. He made a disgusted noise, and Sylvie rose to peer out the window, spotting Johnny Knoxville running down the strip, his ass exposed to the honking cars.
His film crew following, chasing while they laughed hysterically at his antics.

He took her hand, caressing the puncture mark on her finger. “We’re practically cannibals. I almost drained you of every drop of blood last month.”

Sylvie nodded, her pink hair a matted mess. She examined her pale hand, the nails nearly blue. She was as starved as her lover. She looked at Raoul. It was all his fault. He had turned her into this. It was true she had demanded it, lusted after him for months, even though he tried to avoid the final outcome. He had warned her it was not a great life. Sylvie didn’t care. Back then, the lure of the stage, the road trips, the music had made her frantic to be included. For a time they had nightly gigs, but she barely remembered them between the bloodlust and drugs. They were careful. It was dangerous to turn someone into a full vampire—the punishment: isolation in a camp in Antarctica where the cold eventually wore them out and they died of exhaustion. Or loneliness—vamps were social, loved a party, a crowd. They defined party animals of the free-wheeling eighties. When they stopped recruiting, a euphemism for having sex, they simply started thinning out. Humans only became vampires by having a sexual encounter with one. Diseased blood, sickness, skin cancer, and a host of unglamorous reasons were steadily reducing the vampire population. Stupid assholes, who called themselves vampire hunters, annihilated the Eastern European population. Overzealous religious fanatics wiped out the rest. It wasn’t safe for them anymore, and they had nowhere to turn. They were careful in their hunger for blood. They were watchful not to leave a traceable trail. Raoul taught her well. They drank only from the homeless, or the roadies who followed them, begging to be included, so they made them into drones. They
created armies of these drones, people they fed on, taking just enough blood to sate the demands of their bodies They became their slaves, doing their bidding without question. Drones were not full-out vampires, and, once they stopped feeding off them, within weeks, they reverted to their regular, boring selves. Occasionally, they went all the way, initiating another poor soul into their number, but eventually the music died. The whole thing turned stale. Numbers dwindled. Their act got old, and the new generation laughed at them. The songs seemed silly, the music out of sync with the times. They lost their appeal. They were ridiculed. Where before, they had ruled the night, had been sought after, controlled the club scene, they were now seen as tired, campy, too old to imitate. Their music, their fashion were reviled. Rejected from the venues they once ruled, they were forced onto the streets. Oh, there was talk of a reality show a few years ago, but somehow they couldn’t garner enough interest. Being a vampire was de trop. They were reduced to panhandling, which only brought them in contact with other vampires who were down on their luck and running from the law as well. There were just a few of their kind now. They were almost gone. Broke, dejected, and blood starved, they scurried from town to town, searching for their next fix of blood, hiding in the shadows.

Raoul slid down the wall and held up a creased contract that had been lying abandoned on the floor. “We would have a home,” he said, his voice low. “The other day I read that some kids set fire to a vamp hiding in an abandoned building.”

“We took this way of life to live outside of society. Conrad’s offering us a prison. We’ll be a freak show.”

“We won’t have to hunt. No more drones. We’ll be with others like us. He’s promising us a lot.”

Sylvie faced the wall. “I could go home.”

Raoul cupped her chin, his long nails caressing her cold skin. “They’re all dead, honey. They died a hundred years ago. We have no more home, and we are running out of options.”

“It’s…it’s inhumane what they want to do.”

“I told you…we have no choice.”

Raoul stood, holding his hand out. Sylvie allowed him to haul her up. She was hungry and chilled. Vincent promised them a safe haven, a place to thrive. It was time to come out of the cold.

C
HAPTER
4

W
yatt pulled into
the designated area for employee parking. He was early, but then he always was early. It was his passenger who pressed the boundaries. Melvin Riley pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. Melvin was Wyatt’s first friend in Copper Valley. Most of the kids were wary of the newcomer and did everything in their power to exclude him from the activities. Melvin lived with his grandfather in a rundown ranch and was rarely included in anything. Socially awkward, his preoccupation with space invaders, werewolves, and cult horror movies of the ’60s,
Plan 9 from Outer Space
being his favorite, made him as unpopular as Wyatt. Still, he was kind, honest, and loyal. Wyatt befriended him, and found himself, more often than not, protecting his newfound friend, often the target of the school bullies. Melvin was smart; his interests varied, and he was entertaining. Lately though, their fun had gotten stale. Wyatt might be spending time with Melvin, but he wished he were with Jade instead.

“Take your apron,” Wyatt told him as he got out of the car, admonishing him as if he were a child. It was getting to
be a burden, taking care of him. You had to remind him of everything. He had to admit that Melvin could be off-putting because of his social awkwardness. He made sure to never leave him out, but he was sure being with Melvin prevented a level of acceptance from the other kids. While some did like Wyatt, nobody enjoyed Melvin’s company.

Melvin dropped a notebook, spilling his chemistry worksheets all over the passenger side of the car. He was a hot mess, from his T-shirt hanging over his pants to the mismatched socks he wore. Acne still ravaged his face, and, as if that wasn’t enough, he had been cursed with frizzy auburn hair. He wore a fake gold wolf head with bright emerald glass eyes on a clunky, thick chain around his neck. Wyatt knew it had to be ten years old. He had thrown out a very similar one that he’d had in a box at the bottom of his closet at home. It had gone the way of his Super Mario Brothers game and Hulk Hogan action doll. Everybody wore wolves’ heads when they were younger. He told Melvin it was time to put it away, but it was as much a part of him as his hazel eyes. It would be a miracle if that kid ever got laid, Wyatt thought sadly. Not that Wyatt had, but he was hopeful. He often wondered if Melvin even noticed. He was always buried in his computer, constantly accumulating as much information as his brain could handle. Melvin had made Caltech with a full scholarship, and this would be the last summer they would really be together. He worried if people would accept the odd boy when he moved into the dorms. Wyatt was going to a local community college. His parents couldn’t afford tuition anywhere else. His father, the fancy LA lawyer, had left all his money to a charity, which, while very noble, kind of irritated Wyatt as well. It was a meanspirited thing to do to his own kids, taking out the messy divorce on his offspring. Well, beggars can’t be choosers, he thought to himself.

“Mel…” Wyatt tried hard not to get annoyed. He leaned back in, reaching forward to help his friend pick up the scattered notes. “Gonzales is going to be pissed if she sees your worksheets like this.”

“I was going to organize it at work.”

“When? While you work at the window? You want to get fired?”

Melvin shrugged. “They need us more than we need them. We have a symbiotic relationship. If Instaburger fires us, who’s going to serve—werewolves?”

This was a long-running feud between them. When news broke of the werewolf colony, Melvin made it his mission to promote their superiority to anyone who would listen. Wyatt liked to spar against Melvin’s monster of choice by promoting the value of the zombie population. At least they were human—well, sort of human.

“Impossible. They’d eat all the meat,” Wyatt told him wearily. He was getting tired of this debate. It was time to leave it in the recess of his childhood.

“And a zombie wouldn’t? The vampires would suck it dry. We’ve got them by the balls. They don’t have a choice.”

Wyatt laughed. “Yeah, sure.”

Melvin hiked his notebook, papers trailing behind him, under his arm. “Which brings me back to our discussion. I want to add that the werewolf’s developed sense of smell makes him the sure winner.”

Wyatt shook his head. “What planet are you on? Zombies are like those long-lasting batteries—they keep ticking.”

“Ha.” Melvin laughed. “Until they start dining on their own body parts. They’re mindless, infected, eating machines that can’t tell a ring ding from a ding-a-ling.” He pointed to his crotch.

“Besides, werewolves have a normal nervous system.”

“Big deal.” Wyatt waved his arm in dismissal. “One bite from a zombie and the person is instantly infected. Werewolves have to bite when the moon is full and the mood is right. Like Bublé has to be on or something.”

“Michael Bublé? Are you kidding me? All they need is that full moon and a limb to gnaw on.” Melvin raised his fist in the air. “Werewolves have epic strength. Zombies have a shit grip, and if a zombie’s leg is broken, they’re not catching a werewolf.” He paused, taking Wyatt’s arm. “Listen, Wy, zombies are all defense. Werewolves are offense.”

Wyatt looked at his friend. They had been having this discussion for more than half of twelfth grade. He smiled sadly and then replied, “They’re just plain offensive. Defense always wins the game.”

Melvin rushed ahead of him, pushing through the doors to find Howard Drucker wearing an Instaburger paper hat while wiping the stainless-steel countertops. “Quick…Howard Drucker, werewolves versus zombies versus vampires. Who wins?” Everyone always called Howard by his first and last name. Howard made up the last third of their awkward trio.

“You kidding me? The vampire.” He had curly black hair that hung in a thick mass around his oval head, and he wore heavy horn-rimmed glasses that might have looked good on a tech geek. On Howard, they made him look small, like a cartoon character. He was the shortest of the group, with a skinny concave chest. His small stature could have made Howard a victim of the ever-present bullies in school, but his razor tongue was more deadly than a vampire’s fangs. Howard never backed down from anything.

“I told you he would say that,” Wyatt said confidently. He opened the gate, coming around to his spot behind the counter.

“This simply is not true,” Melvin insisted. He went on, oblivious to the patron waiting for Howard to put her meal together.

“Look, vampires are highly reflexive. Werewolves are intelligent. I’ll give you that,” Howard said as he packed the meal.

Melvin grinned evilly at Wyatt.

“But zombies…” Howard continued. “Barely functional. Vampire wins.”