The Book of Death (41 page)

 
When she reached the huge mansion at the
end of the driveway, she slammed on the brakes. A werewolf who had been
clinging onto the roof of the car went flying off and into a bush at the side of
the entrance. There was a loud thud as his head smashed into the wall behind
the bush.

She had no time to lose
reflecting on what was going on around her though, so she turned off the engine
and pulled out the ignition key. She grabbed the book from the passenger seat
and opened the door to get out. There were a number of vampires near the
entrance, mostly dressed in black. They were backing away from the army of
zombies, most of whom hadn’t made it this far down the drive. As Flake stepped
out of the car, the noise of the on-going battle was brutal. Horrific
high-pitched screams from vampires, howling wolves and groaning zombies filled
the air, punctuated by the sound of snapping limbs and teeth crunching into
flesh. Clutching The Book With No Name tightly to her chest, she kicked the car
door shut and raced up the steps at the front of the building. No one seemed to
pay her much attention. Hardly surprising considering self-preservation was
probably top of everyone else’s agenda. Plus of course she looked like a
vampire and she’d been injected (in the arm, thank you very much) with the
cooling serum. She reached the top step and pressed the doorbell in the wall.
Instead of a ringing sound
,
the song
Saturday Night by Whigfield
began blaring out from inside the building. Hardly the most appropriate
doorbell chime, but Flake had more important things to worry about. She turned
her back on the door to make sure nothing was creeping up on her as she waited
for someone to let her in.

Spotlights from above her shone
down on the fighting undead masses in the courtyard. Blood was spraying in all
directions. Arms and legs were being ripped off. There were quite a few
casualties from her driving too. Someone’s leg was still on the roof of the
Mustang. As she winced at the horrors going on in front of her, she heard the
door open behind her. She turned around, hoping to see someone wave her in.
Standing in the doorway was a woman with the same kind of look as her. It was
one of the Panda vampires. She was wearing a red baseball cap and an all black
outfit. She pulled the door completely open and stared at Flake, frowning.

‘Who the fuck are you?’ she
asked.

‘One of you,’ Flake replied
nervously.

‘No way,’ Panda Girl replied. ‘I
know all the Pandas. You ain’t one of them. And why are you dressed as a cop?’

‘I’m new,’ Flake said attempting
to step inside, keeping the book clutched tightly against her chest. ‘And I
just killed a cop to get this uniform.’

Panda Girl shook her head.
‘You’re not coming in,’ she hissed.

Flake was about to attempt
barging her way in when just in the nick of time, she saw a figure appear
behind Panda Girl. It was the Bourbon Kid. He grabbed the unsuspecting vampire.
One of his hands slid around her waist, the other around her neck. He dragged
her back from the door and in one swift movement snapped her head to one side,
breaking her neck with a loud crack.

Flake dashed inside the door and
slammed it shut behind her. With the sound of the carnage outside closed out,
all that could be heard now was the irritating singing of Whigfield. Flake
turned back to the Bourbon Kid. He had dragged the body of the Panda Girl back
to a door at the far end of the reception area. He kicked the door open and
backed through it.

‘Through here,’ he called to
Flake.

She hurried over and followed
him through into a large dining room. He chucked the body of the Panda Girl
onto the floor by a set of tables and chairs. Flake closed the door shut behind
them again. No one had seen them. At least, she hoped no one had.

‘What now?’ she asked.

‘Take your clothes off,’ said
the Kid.

‘What?’

‘Get your clothes off.’

‘Are you just obsessed with
seeing my ass?’

‘Get your clothes off,’ he
repeated. He pointed at the dead Panda on the floor. ‘Put hers on. You need to
look like her
.
’

‘Oh right,’ said Flake. ‘Sorry.’

‘I’ll see you upstairs when
you’re done. Don’t be too long.’

‘How will I know where to find
you?’

‘I’ll kill everyone I see on my
way there. You can follow the trail of dead bodies.’

With that, the Kid headed over
to a door at the far end of the room and disappeared through it.

Flake placed The Book With No
Name down on the floor and began stripping the clothes off of the dead Panda.
Then she pulled her own clothes off in a hurry, hoping not to be interrupted by
any fleeing vampires that might pass through.

The vampire’s clothes fitted her
almost perfectly. She slipped on the red baseball cap and tucked her hair back
underneath it as the vampire had done. Did she look convincing though? She
really wasn’t sure how she looked, which made her a little nervous. She needed
to check out how she looked, but she had to make her way up to the main hall as
the Bourbon Kid had instructed.

She picked up The Book With No
Name and hurried out of the room through the door that the Bourbon Kid had
disappeared through. The long narrow corridor outside had at least ten doors on
either side. She grabbed the handle on the first door on the right. It opened
easily enough. She just hoped that there was a mirror inside and not a gang of
vampires.

She peered around the door. It
was a fairly small bedroom. In the corner was a door, most likely for a
bathroom. There was no sign of a mirror in the bedroom so the bathroom would be
her best bet, if indeed vampires had mirrors in their homes. She tossed The
Book With No Name onto the bed in the middle of the room and hurried over to
the door. She tried the handle. It was locked. Someone must be inside. Sanchez
possibly?

The sound of a toilet flushing
inside confirmed that it was a bathroom. Flake backed away from the door,
unsure what she was about to be confronted by. She reminded herself that she
looked like a vampire (hopefully), so she had nothing to fear.

‘Who’s in there?’ she called out
tentatively.

A few seconds passed before the
bathroom door opened and Sanchez strolled out nonchalantly.

‘All done,’ he said. Flake
stared amazed at him. He seemed so casual. Before she could speak he began
waving his hand in front of his nose. ‘I wouldn’t go in there for a while if I
was you,’ he added.

Flake was relieved to see him
alive, but noticed that the satchel he was carrying over his shoulder looked
empty. Had he given Jessica The Book of Death already?

‘Your satchel’s empty!’ she
gasped. ‘Where’s the book? What have you done with it?’

Sanchez stared hard at her, a
look of puzzlement on his face. ‘Flake? Is that you?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Are you a vampire?’

‘No, numbnuts. I’ve come here to
save your ass!’

Sanchez frowned. ‘Oh, wow.
Thanks.’ He pointed into the bathroom. ‘The Book of Death is in there,’ he
said. Glancing over her shoulder, he spotted the identical looking black book
on the bed. ‘What’s that book then?’ he asked.

Flake grabbed him by the hand.
‘We’ve got to go help the Bourbon Kid,’ she said, picking up The Book With No
Name in her other hand. ‘Come on, I’ll explain on the way.’

Sanchez held back. ‘Can’t you
explain here?’

Fifty-Three

Sanchez followed Flake back out
into the corridor. Although he was extremely keen to go home, or even lock
himself back in the bathroom, he had a feeling he’d be better off with Flake.
Before leaving the bedroom, she had briefly explained her plan to him, a plan
she claimed to have concocted with the Bourbon Kid who she said was “an all
right guy” in spite of the fact he had shot William Clay in the face when he
had dropped by the police station. Sanchez listened intently until she had
finished explaining the plan and his part in it. He mulled it over for a while
before voicing his thoughts.

‘It’s a shitty plan,’ he
declared as he hurried along the corridor behind her. She stepped over the
decaying corpse of a recently murdered clown and then turned back to face him.

‘You got a better one?’ she
snapped.

‘Yeah. Let’s get the fuck out of
here!’

Flake stepped back over the
clown and slapped Sanchez across the face. Quite hard too. Rather uncalled for,
in his opinion.

‘Man up, Sanchez, for goodness’
sake,’ she barked. ‘We’ve got a chance to kill Jessica. She’s a vampire and by
the sounds of it, she’s the worst one of all. If we can play a part in helping
the Bourbon Kid to kill her then I think it would be pretty silly not to.’

‘Kind of dangerous, though,
isn’t it?’ said Sanchez. ‘Job for the police, I figure.’

‘We
are
the police, you
idiot!’

‘Damn.’

Flake headed back down the corridor
again. ‘Come on, hurry up,’ she called back. ‘You’re either coming with me, or
you can take your chances with the thousands of vampires and zombies outside.’

She had a point, and more
importantly, Sanchez noted, she had The Book With No Name. And that fucking
thing killed vampires. Wherever that book was going, he was going too.

He followed her along the
corridor, occasionally stepping over the remains of a dead vampire or werewolf.
Flake seemed to be following the trail of corpses. She led the way up a flight
of stairs to the next floor. It was similar to the previous floor, all bloody
corridors and corpses. This was not a fun place to be. Flake continued to dash
around, opening doors, peering around them and then closing them again. She
didn’t seem to know exactly where she was going, and although Sanchez was
tempted to point this out, he had a feeling she’d snap at him again, or worse
still slap him around the chops again.

After seeming to check every
single room on the second floor they headed up another flight of stairs that
was strewn with dead bodies. By now Sanchez was breathing heavily. It was bad
enough dashing around everywhere, but hurdling dead bodies and piles of
smouldering ash was making it even more testing. This was a lot more exercise
than he was used to. Fortunately the next floor up was totally different. There
were no more corridors, for starters. At the top of the stairs was a small
landing and a huge set of large wooden double doors with a pair of hideous
statues of naked men on either side.

‘This’ll be it!’ said Flake
pointing at the doors.

‘How can you be so sure?’
Sanchez asked.

‘There’s no more dead bodies.
And these are the only doors on this floor by the looks of it. This must be the
end of the trail. Follow me, and remember, you’re my prisoner.’

Sanchez sighed. ‘I can’t see how
this is going to be believable,’ he moaned. ‘You’d never be able to take me
prisoner.’

‘A
Sunflower Girl
could
take you prisoner. And I look like a vampire, remember,’ said Flake, shaking
her head. ‘Now shut up and just play along!’

She carefully turned the handle
on one of the doors and pulled it open. It creaked slightly as she pulled it
out towards her. Sanchez peered over her shoulder and around the door. There
was a huge hall on the other side. But it was extremely dark. Someone had
obviously forgotten to turn on the lights.

‘Looks like no one’s here,’ said
Sanchez. ‘Maybe we should go home?’

Flake grabbed his arm and pulled
him into the huge hall with her. She pulled the door shut behind them, making
it even darker than before. Sanchez groped around on the wall inside the doors
to see if he could find any lights. His hand quickly settled on some switches
and he flicked them all at once. The room lit up brightly. Several sets of
chandeliers hanging from the ceiling breathed light into the room. And it
immediately became evident that they weren’t alone. Coming down a wide flight
of stairs at the other end of the hall was Jessica and a big soldier guy that
Sanchez recognised as Razor, one of four military guys who had dropped by the
Tapioca on Halloween. Razor had a firm grasp on a rather distraught looking
lady in a blue dress. Sanchez recognised her too. It was Mental Beth.

Flake grabbed Sanchez by the arm
again and pulled him away from the light switches then she shoved him forward
towards the centre of the hall. She really was treating him like a prisoner.
“How
degrading,”
he thought. He was about to tell her to ease up on the shoving
when Jessica called out to them from the far end of the hall.

‘Is that The Book of Death
you’ve got there?’

Flake nodded. ‘Yeah. This guy
brought it with him.’

Jessica reached the bottom of
the stairs and stepped onto the marble floor. She hissed at Sanchez. ‘So, you
found my book. How good of you, Sanchez.’

He shrugged. ‘Well, it was
nothing really. Perhaps you could just give me the reward and I’ll be on my
way?’

‘Why the rush?’ Jessica asked, a
mischievous grin breaking out on her face. ‘Why don’t you stay a while? We’re
having a party. Your friend the Bourbon Kid is here too. He’s about to show
himself to us any second now.’