Transylvania's Most Wanted (5 page)

The realization that it was lunch time
struck Tom like a lightning bolt. “That’s it,” he said realizing
what Pandora was up to just before he grabbed hold of Fixx and
jerked him up onto his feet. “Let’s go,” he shouted, dragging Fixx
toward the door with just his one shoe on.

“Not really in that big a hurry,” Fixx said
as Tom flung open the door.

He let go of Fixx then, until Fixx went to
go back for his hat, so Tom grabbed him again and starting dragging
him down the hallway. Fixx could not have weighed more than a
hundred and ten pounds and Tom mostly dragged him behind him down
the stairs.

“What’s the hurry?” Fixx shouted as his feet
bounced off every step.

“It’s almost lunch time,” Tom explained as
they reached the hotel lobby where he helped Fixx get back on his
feet. “When we get to the TCPD building,” he said shoving him
toward the hotel entrance and throwing the troll his pass key back.
“I want you to run upstairs and pull the fire alarm right by the
booking desk.”

They ran out the doors and on the sidewalk,
Tom pointed at his car and told Fixx to get in as he hurried to the
driver’s side.

“Why do you want me to pull the fire alarm?”
Fixx asked as Tom started the car and then floored the gas pedal.
“And what’s this all go to do with lunch?”

“The fire alarm will cause people to step
out their offices and head for the hallways.”

“Why don’t you pull the fire alarm? Fixx
asked. “Some cop might shoot me.”

Tom thought about that as he honked at the
cars and carriages entering the intersection just ahead of him and
wended his way through them as they moved out of his way. Some
eager constable might actually shoot Fixx if he ran in the TCPD
building and pulled the fire alarm.

“Tell ‘em Inspector Flynn ordered you to and
then start yelling for people to get away from the north
walls.”

“Why?”

“Because a wrecking ball’s going to come
through it just after noon time unless we can stop it.”

“Oh,” Fixx said. “I think I see what’s going
on.”

“Do this right and you might just be in the
papers again,” Tom told him.

“What about a reward?”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

He sped down the street toward the next
intersection and turned. The next corner was Mulberry and looking
ahead, he saw a large crowd gathered behind the wall of barricades
watching the demolition crew. The crowd was twelve deep and Tom
realized he wouldn’t be able to get through them in time because,
looking over the crowd, he saw the wrecking ball had been
delivered, and right then was being drawn back so it could be
released to swing forward. If the crane did not swing around some
before the wrecking ball was released, it would swing right across
Mulberry Street and into the north side of the TCPD building just a
little above street level, right at the spot where the prisoner’s
lunch room was situated. He also noticed that the black wrecking
ball had painted on it a menacing-looking, bone-white skull and
cross bones.

“Change of plans,” he said he shot past the
crowd and drove down the ramp into the TCPD garage.

“What?” Fixx asked.

“I won’t be able to stop them now, but if I
can get to the jail in time. I can keep Stone from escaping,” he
said as he brought the car to a quick stop and Fixx was thrown
against the dashboard.

Tom ran for the door that lead into the
armory. He had to unlock it first, but then Fixx and him ran down
the hallway, past the RCO’s counter, past the locker room and up
the stairs.

“Get up there and pull that fire alarm,” he
told Fixx, pointing up the next flight of stairs, but just then,
the fire alarms throughout the building went off.

The clock in the hallway read one minute
after 12:00 pm and the prisoners, including Stone, were, right
then, entering the lunch room.

Tom yelled at the guard at the entrance to
the jail, to open the door, and then instructed him to grab a
couple of golem guns. The guard handed him one and then they
hurried down the hallway.

As they came into the lunch area, the prison
guards were ordering the prisoners to return to their cell block
since the alarms were ringing, but Stone was sitting calmly at a
table in his heavy chains. He spotted Tom making his way toward him
and smiled, as if Tom were the last person in the room to
understand a joke.

“Move, move” Tom yelled pushing prisoners
out his way and then when a path had been cleared, he stopped to
aim the golem gun. He fired and the steel net shot out and spread
open like a parachute, as Stone ducked under the lunch table and
was able to avoid its barbs. Tom grabbed the other gun from the
guard, and stepped closer, but just before he fired, the wall
exploded.

Bricks flew toward him like a colony of bats
rushing out a cave. Tom shielded his face and head as most of them
sailed over his head, but still a number of them smacked into him,
as well as everyone else in the room. He was knocked down and then
partially buried under a pile of red bricks, and the last thing he
saw - clearly that is - before a cloud of dust and debris filled
the room - was a large skull and cross bones swinging right at
him.

The floor above gave way on one end and
slipped. Ceiling tiles fell and pipes burst, causing water to spray
across the room from several different spots. More bricks tumbled
across the floor and piled up against him. When they stopped, he
lifted up his head and looked around.

There was just too much dust hanging in
front of him to see anything at first, but as the air cleared,
prisoners went to escape out the hole in the wall, and in the
middle of them was Stone. He was moving slowly, shuffling toward
freedom in his heavy irons, pushing tables, kicking bricks and
tossing other prisoners out of his way. Tom got up and ran after
him, but the going was slow because of the bricks, tables and
prisoners in his way. He planned to knock Stone down with the golem
gun still.

Near the hole in the wall, he stopped and
lifted up the bazooka-like gun. When Tom pulled on its trigger, a
spring was released that shot a steel net out of the barrel of the
gun, but just before it would have entangled Stone and stuck to him
like glue – a truck passed behind Stone and the net hit it instead,
breaking out the side window and denting the truck in a number of
spots.

Stone jumped onto the back of the truck then
and it sped off, crashing through the barricades and causing people
to jump out of its way.

Chapter 5

Red and Fixx found Tom among the clutter and
wreckage of the jail’s lunch room. Outside, police and ambulance
sirens blared.

“Doesn’t appear we had any serious
injuries,” Red told him. “A broken arm or two and a few heads given
knots, but luckily someone pulled the main fire alarm before the
wall exploded.”

“Stone escaped,” Tom said.

“I guess the Vampire Council must really
want him back,” Red said looking at the large hole in the side of
the building.

“No,” Tom said. “Pandora is behind
this.”

“
What’d you find
out?”

As they headed upstairs, Tom told Red
everything he’d learned, showing him the picture of Pandora with
Titan and how they had asked Fixx if Stone was allowed to have
visitors.

When they reached the desk sergeant’s desk,
a crowd of reporters and photographers had pushed their way into
the creaking building and were shouting questions and flashing
camera bulbs in people’s faces.

“Can’t believe I’m going to do this,” Red
said when a reporter ran up to him and asked what had happened.
“This fine creature here,” he said grabbing Fixx and pulling him
closer as bulbs flashed in their faces, “saved many lives today
when he ran into the station and pulled the fire alarm so that
people would step out their offices before the wrecking ball
smashed into the building.”

“That’s not exactly true,” Tom leaned
forward and whispered in Red’s ear as reporters started peppering
Fixx with questions - Wasn’t he the same hobgoblin that helped with
the capture of Jack the Ripper? How did he know the wrecking ball
was about to come through the wall?

“Someone pulled the alarm,” Red told Tom as
he stepped away from Fixx. “Nobody else has taken credit for it, so
we might as well let Fixx play the hero. What was he doing with you
anyway?”

“Pandora went to see him, so I went to see
him and that’s when I figured out what she was up to.”

“Why’d she go to see him?”

“She knows Fixx from before. They both are
from the U.R.R.K. She saw his picture in the paper recently, so she
went to him, thinking he could help her find a golem by the name of
Titan.”

“Fixx is from the U.R.R.K.?”

“Sure is.”

The newspaper men were still peppering Fixx
with questions when Red grabbed him and pulled him away. “I got
some questions of my own for you,” he told him, leading Fixx toward
the stairs.

“Your phone’s ringing,” Tom told Red as they
were headed toward the inspectors’ offices.

“Probably some reporter,” Red said, in no
hurry to answer it.

The inspectors’ offices looked like someone
had been in a rage there. The desks had all slid toward the north
wall, pictures and broken glass lay on the floor, one cabinet file
had fallen over spilling its contents across the floor.

Red’s office was likewise a mess, a chair
was tipped over and some items had slid across his desk when this
floor and the one below had slipped about a foot, but overall the
building seemed sturdy enough, although the floor was slanted now
like a funhouse.

“Chief Inspector Meriwether speaking,” Red
said picking the phone up. Tom watched as a puzzled look came
across his face. “Maybe you should turn yourself in,” he said into
the phone. “No, no one was hurt. Why would you help Stone escape?
You have a nice day too, because you’ll be spending the rest of
them never seeing the sun again when I arrest you – Pandora.”

“Pandora?” Tom repeated.

“That was her,” he said hanging up the
phone.

“What’d she want?”

“She wanted to know if anyone was hurt.”

“What did she say when you asked her why she
helped Stone escape?”

“She said she needed him, but that she would
see to it that he never caused any trouble here again.”

“Need him for what?”

“I have the feeling we’re gonna find out,”
Red said. “Maybe you can help with that,” he told Fixx. “Who is
this Pandora? Why did she want to leave the U.R.R.K? And for that
matter if you are from there why did you want to leave there?”

“
I didn’t,” Fixx said.
“None of us did. We were told to leave.”

“That pamphlet says you creatures left there
to avoid persecution.”

“That was just an excuse to get rid of some
of us. They threw me out just cause I had lived in the village
where Anna came from. Afraid we might cause trouble I guess.”

“Huh,” Red said. “Why did they throw this
Pandora out then?”

“She might have wanted to leave. I don’t
think it was safe for her there.”

“Why?”

“Because her name is not Pandora. That’s the
name she chose for herself when she arrived here.”

“What’s her real name then?”

“Anna.”

“Prince Yuri’s wife?”

“That’s right.”

Red looked at Fixx and then at Tom. “Let’s
just keep this to us three for now.”

Chapter 6

The Pawn

That night Red, Rebecca and Tom hung around
the Flying Squad office just in case anything happened. It was a
full moon that night and every detective was either helping with
werewolf duty or searching for Stone and Pandora, so the place was
empty.

Rebecca was sitting at a desk reading out
loud, a book about werewolves. The book, written by Mungo Park, had
been written during his second lifetime, when he lived in
Transylvania City for a time.

She was reading about how werewolves are
capable of swimming across rivers and even lakes, but they rarely
do so as they do not like water and are reluctant to cross even a
bridge if they have no strong reason to do so.

“
They are particularly
attracted to the smell of garlic,” Rebecca read next.

“That’s why none of the restaurants here
serve dishes seasoned with garlic on nights when there is a full
moon,” Red said as he paced the hallway just outside his office.
Right then his phone rang and he rushed to pick it up. He listened
a moment, and then hung up abruptly.

“Time to go,” he said hurrying across the
inspectors’ offices toward a locked cabinet.

“What’s going on?”

“Desk sergeant just called saying a werewolf
was spotted just a little west of Goblin Park,” he said as he
unlocked the cabinet and then threw open the doors. Inside was an
arsenal; machine guns and pistols and several rifles. “Take this,”
he said handing Tom a rifle. He grabbed one for himself as well and
then a box. “Load your rifle,” he said tossing Tom the box.

Tom opened the box, expecting to find silver
bullets inside, but instead found darts. Red then grabbed a box of
silver bullets.

“What are these,” he asked.

“Tranquilizer darts,” Red said. “Slip one in
your rifle, and put the rest in your pocket.”

The three of them hurried down the stairs
and out the front of the building where Red’s car was waiting and
climbed inside.

“Empty your clip,” Red said pulling his own
pistol out of its holster and dropping the clip into his lap as he
pulled away from the curb and Tom flipped the siren on. “Load it
with silver bullets.”

Tom did just as Red had and then began
loading the clip of his gun with silver bullets.

“If we come across the beast, try and take
it down with the darts, but if someone’s life is in danger - use
your pistol. Remember it may be a werewolf now, but the rest of the
time it is an ordinary man or woman, and we don’t want to kill them
unless we absolutely have to.”