Nanowrimo 2011 - Day 08

[LI / JAMES / KAT - CROSSING THE FIRST THRESHOLD]

Everyone in the camp was in different stages of shock. The small woman, Li, was out cold. Her brain shut down at the crash site and she’d still not regained conciousness. The older man, James, was hunkered down by the camp fire staring into the flames lost in himself. Kat turned to her usual “go to” to get by, staying busy. She didnt feel the luxury of being able to pass out, nor James’s waking equivilent. For so long it had rested on her shoulders, the voice in her head had made that much clear to her from the beginning. She was “special” - not in the way that parents liked to tell their mediocre children to stroke their egos. No, Kat really was special in ways she was still only just coming to terms with.

First order of the day was to collect more firewood to get them through the night. There wasnt amy possibility of being cold, not in this jungle’s muggy embrace, but the heat and light would serve a deterrent to any of the Feral who might chance on them in the night. Kat busied herself with the task at hand, letting her mind wander, allowing herself not to dwell on the grisly task she had accomplished earlier, or on what might come later in the night as the partner to the Feral vampire came back to wreak whatever havok in the name of “revenge”.

Firewood was plentiful and the relative silence of the forest was welcome. There had been a passing of the baton - daytime creatures retiring and nocturnal creatures taking up the chorus. One thing about the forest was the sheer amount of life that surrounded her. Back in the farm things were austere, the life running in defined channels. Waste wasnt tolerated and anything that didnt contribute toward operating efficiency was weeded out and discarded. Then there was Kat… discarded for entirely dfferent reasons.

Kat had circled back toward the camp, her arms full of firewood, when she became aware of another presence. On the edge of hearing. It sounded like the measured, if heavy footed, walking gait of someone moving through the forest parallel to Kat.

James stared into the fire, feeling the draw of the dancing flames. He allowed his mind to drift from topic to topic, alighting for a time, before flitting on to the next thing. There was an emotional undercurrent carrying him forward - a sense of appropriateness despite the insane circumstances he found himself in. Finally he was able to simply stare into the familiarity of a camp fire and not have to be faced with flying or crashing, or think about where his friend Vincent had been taken to, or why twisting the head off another human being had felt so utterly satisfying to him. That smell. It was the smell. The jungle, and the fire, had its own smell of course, but that particular sephuchure aroma, of walking death, and the horror it always brought. It felt good to eradicate the source. Whatever that had been, it was gone now, and he’d had a hand in its downfall even if it had needed to be beheaded by their bloodthirsty little accomplice.

James’s years as a police officer were screaming. Murder. Even if there was a self-defense plea involved, would see him locked away for a significant number of years. Incarceration seemed so wrong, not that murder was right, but a part deep inside him justified the murder in this case. It argued, convincingly, that there was more evidence to collect before a binding verdict could be rendered, and in the meantime, to avoid judging himself too harshly. He shook his head. Justifying murder? What was his career coming to?

He lost himself in the dancing flames. There were names for people who could justify things like this - sociopath, murderer, psycho - none seemed to fit though. James knew himself to be sane. What had Kat called him? Dhampir. It was new to him and without access to his local lending library he was at a lost to define it. He decided to ask Kat when she returned. He looked up from the fire, his eyes blurred the forest and his night vision utterly unaddapted. He couldnt see beyond the cozy circle of the fire. Something prickled at his neck though. His senses were alert for something, a hint of an aroma on the night breeze, a shadow within shadows moving with cautious stealth. Yes, something was circling the camp outside the reach of the campfire’s heat and light. Something that smelled of death and clearly wanted to mete out more of the same.

James shuddered. Kat was nowhere to be seen. Li was comatose nearby. It fell to him, and he caught a wry smile as it danced across his lips. He had a duty to perform. It was why he joined the force in the first place. A duty, people to protect and serve, and if that meant eliminating threats by force he would do so. He reached down and tugged on a sturdy branch that was burning deep inside the campfires red-hot core. Others shifted but eventually the branch he wanted was out an in his hand. He laid it down, burning atop the pile, at hand if it was needed.

The attack, when it came, was swift. The shadow resolved itself as being human, a young man in his mid-twenties, face set in a snarl of feral rage. James threw himself to the side to avoid the charge and barely made it in time. The kid was fast. James reached for, grabbed hold of, and swung the burning branch catching the snarling kid a solid blow across the right side of his face. It didnt stop his advance. James backed up waving the burning branch between them. The kid stayed back but it wasnt to last. A moment presented itself and the kid leaped in close, impossibly fast, and started landing blow after blow on James. James blocked some but most landed, knocking him backward and breaking ribs. The kid paused in the relentless attack and James tried to suck air into his lungs. Everything hurt and it was getting hard to breath. The kid switched to an open-handed blow, his nails slashing across James’s body, cutting him to ribbons. He went down, his head hitting a sizeable rock as he connected. Lights out.

Kat refused to drop the firewood. After all the time spent collecting it she wasnt about to squander it now. If things turned nasty, then she would think of losing it. She shifted her grip, pulled it close and pressed to close the gap and follow the mysterious strangeer. As she got close Kat noticed more details. The figure looked human enough but appeared to be made of shadow - form fitting black suit, and a bulky backpack. Without warning the figure in black sprinted, a blur, moving at a pace Kat had never seen before.

Kat arrived in the camp moments too late.

The figure in black was standing over the prone body of James.

Kat screamed, tossed the firewood on the ground and leaped at the figure.

The impossible happened. The figure in black moved, just slightly, raising a hand. Kat was powerless, the arc of her jump carried her into the waiting arms of the stranger. The extended hand clamping around Kat’s throat and holding her aloft, legs kicking.

“Observe!” the stranger said.

Kat kicked and wriggled but the stranger held her in a grip of iron. Oddly though, the stranger wasnt attempting to choke the life out of her, merely render her powerless.

“Observe!” the stranger said, with more emphasis.

Kat stopped fighting and looked at what the stranger was point to. Beside James was a headless corpse. The stranger pointed at the campfire, where a large head-shaped lump was now burning furiously. Kat looked back at the body, noting the way the fingers ended in talons. The other vampire! It had attacked James!

Had the stranger beheaded it and saved James? The idea fit what she could see. But that would suggest amazing, inhuman, speed and strength, even beyond that of the enhanced Juveniles. Kat hung limp in the stranger’s grasp and they seemed satisfied, dropping her to the ground.

Kat stood and rubbed her throat. The stranger had been aggressive but, had tried not to kill Kat in the process. She could live with that.