Vampire University (Book One in the Vampire University Series) (14 page)

"Excuse me," said Hannah, extending her hand to shake his.

"Mm?" he mumbled, staring at her hand and making no effort to return the gesture.

"Excuse me," Hannah repeated, unfazed. "I'm going to need unrestricted and uninterrupted access to one of your biology labs. Preferably something in the life or medical sciences. Anatomy would be ideal. Or perhaps somewhere where frog dissecting happens?"

"Here you go," the guard said, tossing a ring loaded with a jumble of old-fashioned and new-looking keys across the desk towards her.

"Uh huh," said Hannah. "Well you're a quick one, I see. Let me break it down for you, hon. I need you," she said, pointing at the guard, "to stand up..."

He stood.

"...take the keys,..."

He picked up the key ring.

"...and escort my friend and I to an anatomy lab. That's A-NAT-O-MY. Do you know what that means?"

"Yes, miss," he replied.

"Excellent, now hop to it," she said while clapping her hands lightly.

"Do you have an anatomy lab, sir?" she asked, as they followed him through a side door and down a hall.

"No miss," he replied.

"Then where are we going, hon?" she asked, her impatience creeping into her tone.

"To the frogs, miss. You said you wanted to dissect frogs, right?"

"Not exactly, but we'll go with that for now. Thank you, sir."

Taylor stepped close to Hannah and whispered, "Why is he being so helpful?"

"Oh, he's in thrall, dear," replied Hannah. "He seems to require a bit more... specificity in his instructions than most, but he's getting the job done."

"I thought you had to look into their eyes. He didn't make any eye contact with you until he was already standing."

"Oh no, the eyes have nothing to do with it
. I
t's a common misconception. People place all sorts of importance on the eyes, but it's really just all in your head."

"But I thought you said to pay attention to the eyes."

"You're paying attention. That's good! The eyes will tell you if someone is cursed or not."

"Cursed?"

"Right. Cursed, remember? Vampires, etc."

"Etcetera?"

"Well, there are many more accursed races than humans as I mentioned earlier. Oh and there's gargoyles too. They cannot be cursed, but they have the black eyes of an accursed. Don't worry about them, though, you're not likely to meet any of those. And they'd never let you see their real eyes in any case. They use good old-fashioned shape-shifting to hide their true appearance."

"You have got to be kidding me. First leprechauns, now gargoyles?"

"I know, I know. Too much useless information. Ancient history and trivia, really. You've got a lot to learn about things that actually matter first, like... Oh, it looks like we're here."

"Here you go, miss," said the guard.

"Now when I said uninterrupted, what I meant is that I want you to stand outside and make sure no one interrupts us. Do you follow?"

"Yes miss."

"Uh huh," said Hannah, looking unconvinced. "Let's do this quickly, Taylor, so we don't have to put his understanding to the test."

"Agreed," said Taylor, following Hannah into the room.

"So I guess this is where the frogs are," Hannah said, looking around the room which turned out to be not at all an anatomy lab, but rather a supply closet. "This is probably even better. Maybe that guy isn't quite so dim, after all."

"I don't know if I'd say that," said Taylor, running her hands along the rows of cream-colored bottles that all looked the same except for the various colors of labels. "What are we looking for exactly?

"Definitely this," said Hannah, holding up a scalpel in a sealed plastic pouch.

"Wait, what? What do you need that for?" said Taylor, taking a step back.

"For..." Hannah said and then paused while quietly scanning the room for a minute and then lifting what looked like a bulk-size pickle jar from the corner, "...this!"

Hannah loosened the lid and a pungent odor filled the room. She lifted out a frog corpse and plopped it into a large beaker along with the scalpel.

"Are we really dissecting frogs now? I thought that was just a cover story."

"Why would I need a cover story? He won't remember any of this and clearly we needed to be direct with him. Who knows where we would've ended up otherwise. Now for you we need..."

Hannah was quiet again as she scanned the room.

"Some of these!" she said triumphantly while dumping two packets that looked similar to the scalpel packages into the beaker.

Taylor picked up the beaker and looked inside. Hannah had added two packaged syringes to the collection.

"You are not using these on me," said Taylor, shaking her head as Hannah dropped a small bottle of alcohol in the beaker.

"Would you prefer the scalpel?" Hannah asked while rummaging in the corner. "Ah ha!"

Hannah added a bag of cotton and a roll of tape to the collection.

"I think I'd prefer an explanation before we add any more sharp implements to the collection," said Taylor.

"I told you, we're going to do science! I'm quite good at science. I worked for a scientist around the 19th century."

"That's not that comfort... wait, The 19th century? How old are you, exactly?"

"Old enough," replied Hannah, tossing a few more random smaller supplies in the beaker: tweezers and a few other things that Taylor didn't recognize.

"Dates become sort of trivial after awhile," she continued.

"I didn't think women worked in labs around the turn of the century."

"Sure they did. I was the maid!"

"So, you worked for a scientist by sweeping his floors?"

"You got it! Don't worry, you learn a lot through proximity, especially if you're trying. Now, we just need a... here we go! A microscope. The ones back in my day didn't plug in," said Hannah, fumbling with the cord, "But I'm sure the principle's the same!"

She grabbed the beaker from Taylor and handed her the microscope.

"Here, you carry this," said Hannah.

"So we're just going to carry these around the library?"

"Oh right, the library. Usually I'm the one who's prepared. How embarrassing. Guess we'll have to swing back by the dorms to drop these off. Unless..."

Hannah scanned the closet and then said, "Nope. Don't really see anything to carry these in. Back to the dorms it is. It's only a couple blocks."

They stepped out from the closet and Taylor closed the door lightly behind them. The security guard was still standing outside, though he looked as inattentive as ever, slumped against the wall with his chin resting on his chest and his hat pulled down over his eyes.

"Okay, we're done. You can lock up now," Hannah said to him, but he didn't respond.

"Are you sleeping?" she asked, speaking more loudly now.

He jerked to attention.

"Mm?" he mumbled.

"Goodness," Hannah said to Taylor. "I guess I should have specified that he stay awake. You wouldn't think you'd have to spell these things out to a security guard."

"We are DONE NOW," Hannah said loudly. "You can GO BACK TO WORK."

The guard shrugged and locked the door behind them and then sauntered down the hall.

"Whatever work means to you," Hannah muttered and then followed behind.

—
-

"So, how's your brother doing?" Tom asked Joseph, his mouth full of cereal.

"He's uh... okay. Little bit of a headache, I guess," said Joseph, who was feeling like he wasn't sounding very convincing.

"That's good. I have to say, though, that I've never seen a drunk vampire before."

Joseph dropped his spoon and it hit the floor with a clatter. He quickly picked it up again, trying to act nonchalant about it.

"How did you..."Joseph began.

"Hold on, hold on, please don't enthrall me," insisted Tom, waving his hands defensively. "I'm not going to tell anyone. I just don't like lying and well... I think we both know he wasn't drunk."

"I guess we do," said Joseph slowly.

His impulse was to immediately seize control of the situation using his abilities, but he also felt an immediate sense of relief to have the air clear. Joseph didn't like having to lie either.

"Look, I don't need to know what happened. I just wanted to know that you guys were okay. Genuinely."

"We are," said Joseph, relaxing further. "So how did you...?"

"Know? I've been doing this RA thing for a couple years now and I see you guys all the time. You may not believe it, but I'm a perceptive guy. It's hard not to have your job be to babysit others and not start to notice your students'... idiosyncrasies."

"So, you just kind of... picked up on it?"

"I know what you're thinking, but you can see from my eyes that I'm not a vampire, right?"

Joseph looked closely. Tom's eyes were as green as Joseph's were blue, but Tom was clearly not cheating. Tom had been blessed with two of the most beautiful green eyes he had ever seen, thought Joseph.
Suddenly self-conscious that he was staring, he
turned away slightly.

"See? I'm not a threat to you. And I've got your back. I can tell you're a nice guy and whatever happened to your brother, it's good to see that he's got someone besides his RA to look over him. Because God knows, you guys can be a handful," Tom said, shoveling another heaping spoonful of cereal into his mouth. "No offense."

"None taken," replied Joseph. "Because I really can't disagree with you."

"Good. Because I'm in charge of your floor and disagreeing is not allowed," Tom said with a wink.

Joseph felt his heart race at this gesture and made a point of looking very intently at his food as he ate. He wondered if Tom was perceptive enough to see the effect he was having on Joseph, but when Joseph looked up, Tom was happily digging away at his cereal, probably not noticing his reactions at all. It was nice to not to have to hide from humans for a change and Joseph was grateful.

Just as Joseph was beginning to relax, Eric appeared.

"Anyone sitting here?" Eric asked, gesturing to the seat beside Tom.

"Naw, man. Go right ahead," said Tom.

"Thanks."

"Were you going to get anything to eat?" asked Joseph.

"Already ate," replied Eric. "I was looking for you."

"I have a phone, you know."

"So?"

"So what's up?" asked Joseph.

"We need to talk. Can you... you know?" Eric said while waving his hands at Tom.

"Enthrall me?" Tom suggested.

"Wait, what? But you're... you're not..." Eric stammered.

"A vampire? No. And neither are you, which is strange, because I could've sworn..."

"Joseph," Eric interrupted, "please, can you do something about this... this... RA person? We need to talk."

"I can still hear you, you know," said Tom.

"Yeah, Eric. You don't have to be such a jerk. And unlike you, I don't go around enthralling everyone all the time."

"Oh great. Now I get another sermon from Saint Joseph of Vampiria. If you want me to leave you so that you can make googly eyes at your new boyfriend, have at it. I'll just go take my life crisis elsewhere."

"Dammit, Eric," Joseph said, slamming his fist on the table. "You know he's not my boyfriend. You're just trying to embarrass me."

"And it's not working. You have nothing to be embarrassed about," said Tom. "If you guys want to have a vampire heart to heart, I don't mind. Er... or a vampire to... not vampire?"

"I used to be one," said Eric. "You weren't imagining things. And now I am not one and it's kind of a stressful situation for me and no offense, Tom, but I'd kind of like to talk to my brother privately about it."

"Oh NOW you mean no offense," said Joseph, with a scowl.

"Hey hey, guys. No offense taken. I can imagine whatever happened to make you an... ex-vampire must have been pretty traumatic. Wait, what happened, exactly? I've never heard of an ex-vampire."

"It's a long story," replied Eric.

"Ah, say no more. I'm not trying to pry. I'll give you guys some privacy," Tom said, picking up his food and wandering off to another table.

"Thanks, jerkface," Joseph said once Tom was out of earshot.

"What? Was he really your boyfriend? Go get him, Tiger!"

"No. And it's not likely to happen with you chasing him off like that."

"So you're interested?"

"I didn't say that."

"It would explain why you're blabbing our secrets to him. Why did you tell him that we are... er... and were vampires?"

"I didn't. He figured it out."

"But he's not...?"

"No, he's not. But he's been an RA before and he's had vampire freshm
e
n before and he's smart, so he figured it out."