Vampire Babylon - Midnight Reign Part 2

"I'm on it just as soon as you tell us more, Boss."

The Voice laughed, a sound that sc.r.a.ped through the center of Dawn, stripping her from the inside out. Her tummy seized up, moved by the sparked friction between her legs. She crossed them to dull the hunger he always inflicted.

Dawn...

She knew that she was the only one who could hear him, feel him, saying her name.

Pushing the craving away, she ignored his silent supplication and asked, "Are we a.s.suming this is the work of a copycat murderer?"

"It could be." Kiko stood, blue eyes glinting with the thrill of the chase. "Lee Tomlinson's DNA tells us that he's Klara's murderer, but he's locked up awaiting trial. He's been contained ever since the law caught up with him." After Klara's murder, Lee had disappeared. The team had researched him, then tried to track him down for further questioning about the Underground, but to no avail. By then, he'd been found holed up in the very same county, stoned out of his gourd.

"Unless," Dawn said, "Lee wasn't the killer in the first place. Maybe someone planted evidence to frame him?"

"Or maybe a rogue vampire took up on Jessica where Lee left off on Klara," Kiko added.

"We need to lay this out." Breisi paged through the notes on her clipboard.

When The Voice spoke, it was easy to picture him with a finger in the air, now that she sort of knew what he looked like. "Before we start, we need perspective. Remember, our objective is to use this murder to discover an Underground."

"How could I forget," Dawn said. "The good of the many outweighs the good of the few. And if we just happen to solve a crime while we're at it, champagne for us."

"Dawn-" The Voice began, his tone reflecting a weariness she'd encouraged with her eternal arguments.

"I know, I know. We're here to save the world, and that's all the explanation the team requires."

She'd been told the vague, n.o.ble justifications for The Voice's secrecy ad nauseam. Limpet and a.s.sociates didn't exist to find Frank or supply Dawn with the answers she'd been thirsting for. No wonder The Voice generally hired people like Kiko and Breisi: salts of the earth with overdeveloped senses of justice, people who fought for good merely on faith alone.

"Spock. You just quoted Mr. Spock," Kiko said, facing Dawn in his enthusiasm. "Cool."

Then he continued, turning toward the TV as if it contained The Voice, which...it couldn't. Right?

G.o.d, who knew anymore?

"So, technically, we don't have a client this time? No Marla Pennybakers to deal with?"

"Correct." The Voice's pause seemed to stretch into a smile in the dark. "Just the Underground."

He said the last word with a mixture of reverence and vengefulness. She wished she knew why.

d.a.m.n it, if she didn't need to find Frank, she'd be out of here. But The Voice had her by the fine hairs and he knew it.

"All right." Breisi stood and walked beneath the TV. "Are we ready to piece some puzzles together? Maybe something we already know will connect our vampires with this murder."

"Ready," Dawn said.

"Ready." Kiko gave a little hop.

"All right. Let's start at the beginning and work forward. There's our objective: this Underground that Robby and his father, Nathan, mentioned. Robby told us that, as a child actor, Nathan had sent him to this place to 'reinvent' his image or make a comeback."

As the speakers hummed with The Voice's presence, Dawn's body fritzed. "The Underground. We know it contains a 'Dr.

Eternity' Nathan talked about. And, in general, lore tells us that vamps are all about extended life. So maybe Robby would've stayed down there until his comeback, even if it was years away? A long life would've given him enough time to reemerge and wow a future generation. Then, the public wouldn't believe he could possibly still be alive or twelve years old anymore, and common sense would lead them to think he's someone else...?"

"Or maybe something happens Underground that would've made Robby into a bigger star than ever, without the public catching on that he's still actually Robby?" Kiko turned to Breisi, making sure she was writing everything down. "So we need to fill that hole with an explanation, like plastic surgery." He chortled. "Vamps getting plastic surgery, that's..."

His laughter faded as they all just gazed at each other.

Dawn's head began to pound, her breath coming short. Jacqueline Ashley...her resemblance to Eva. But Jac hadn't been like vampire Robby, with the mind screw and crazy-colored eyes. Yeah, Dawn had been exhausted and wigged out when Jac had shown her the makeover, but...

No. G.o.d, it hadn't even been the same as when Robby had looked into her eyes. With Jac, Dawn had been too emotional, too messed up because Kiko was hurt and she'd just chopped a vampire's head off. Jac was only another starlet doing whatever she could to be successful. The Eva/Jac connection was all in Dawn's head, Breisi had even said so....

Across the room, Breisi's eyes had gone wider, like she'd been thinking the same thing. But then she blinked, scanning her clipboard again, making Dawn believe she could be wrong.

Kiko cleared his throat, and The Voice's speakers continued their electric wait.

Finally, Dawn could speak again. "These vamps we met, they were all different, like various races or something, so maybe one of those breeds committed this murder instead of a human Servant like Lee? We know for sure that there're two Underground varieties-the Guards and Robby's death angel. They're tied together since the red-eyes were trying to get Robby back to the Underground. So should we a.s.sume that the silver-eyes and Servants are related, too? I mean, Lee Tomlinson knew some information about Robby, remember? And that's when the silver-eyes showed up, like they needed to shut his mouth. Could the murderer be a silver-eye who already knew Lee?"

Kiko oohed. "That's something I'd like to know. Why are there such different subspecies-ones that seem to coexist-running around in such a relatively small area?"

"Maybe they've found a biome that suits their needs," Breisi said, her speech quickening, as it always did when she got on a tangent. "Maybe they all evolved together and rely on the same environment and each other for survival. The variations can be accounted for through evolution. If humans can differ from continent to continent, race to race, and if we indeed can call a gorilla like Proconsul africa.n.u.s our ancestor, then I see no reason to discount the possibility that vampires have adjusted to the pa.s.sing of years, too, maybe even at an accelerated pace. They would have to adapt to anything that threatened to destroy them or that made surviving easier."

Dawn was still half catching up to the end of Breisi's impromptu professor lecture. It wasn't always easy being on the same wavelength as a girl who'd gone to college on an engineering scholarship. "But the vamps' powers really vary, Breisi. A lot.

You'd think one Underground would hold a specific kind of vamp. The lore we've studied shows that, yeah, different types of vampires have been doc.u.mented in different types of cultures, like that female vamp in Mexico that was reported last year-"

"The tlahuelpuchi," Breisi said.

"Right, or the one that was caught in Greece and destroyed three years ago-"

Kiko almost jumped out of his skin to beat Breisi. "Lamiai!"

Dawn sighed, seeing the beginning of yet another compet.i.tive event between her coworkers. "T-lah-lah-blah or lam-whatever, thank you, Breisi and Kiko. The point I'm trying to make is could all these vamps really exist together in one Underground without stealing each other's food?"

"Maybe they've found a way around that," Breisi said.

"Are you talking about vamps that don't feed on blood?" Kiko asked.

The Voice cleared his throat, sending a jolt through Dawn. He couldn't just stay quiet so she could focus? Yeesh. "Okay, the taskmaster wants us to get back to the objective," she said, still keeping him at bay. "Maybe talking about the vamps'

characteristics will connect this murder and the Underground."

"Excellent," Breisi said. "Let's start with our first set of vampires. The Guards. Red-eyes. We've seen that they can die from decapitation or a silver bullet to the heart. We don't know yet if other vamp lore staples like fire or stakes work. But garlic does repel them, and crucifixes. Silver anywhere else in their body might weaken them-"

Trying to top Breisi, Kiko fired off his own list. "You and Dawn know from experience that Robby's kind of vampire-if there's more than one of him-gets slowly poisoned by silver anywhere in his body. You said that he was begging for blood to cleanse the stuff out."

"So, silver?" Dawn said. "Bad for these vamps. And that means...What? How does this relate to Jessica Reese?"

She could almost feel The Voice's approval. It made her bristle.

"It doesn't relate so much," Kiko said. "But at least I can imagine a Guard tearing out a throat more than I can Robby's type of vamp. Animal wasn't his style-he had to ask Dawn's permission to drink blood, even though he didn't get it."

"Little p.r.i.c.k," she said, recalling how Robby had trespa.s.sed into her mind instead. She still had nightmares about it. "But why would Jessica give permission, and then why would a vamp just leave her body out in the open when secrecy seems to be so vital to their existence?"

Breisi was giving Dawn a measuring gaze, as if she was checking her over for buried Robby wounds. "Good question."

Kiko went on. "Back to Robby-he had two forms, right? In human guise, he could pa.s.s for any Joe Blow walking the street, except for those eyes. He could mind screw you with them, even worse than those red-eyes do. But when Robby went all death- angel vampy...shee-it." Kiko started counting his fingers with every checked-off attribute. "Robby looked like a creature of the Rapture and was stronger than G.o.dzilla. Oh, and the change brought on the fangs."

"As far as similarities to the Guards go," Breisi said, "Dawn killed Robby using decapitation, too, but we don't know if her follow- up silver-bullet shot to the heart was effective. Differences: garlic didn't work on the Robby type and neither did the crucifix-they only gave Robby pause and didn't repel him. And he hinted to us that he could tread on holy ground."

"Also, he can be seen on film," Kiko added. "But does this obviously higher-cla.s.s vamp murder like a rabid wolf?"

"Hmmm." Dawn leaned forward, forearms on thighs. "Nathan Pennybaker ordered those Guards around like he'd captivated them, and he wasn't able to do that with Robby. That gets me to thinking...." Nah, it was a weird idea.

"What, Dawn?" Breisi asked.

Okay, her life was all about weird nowadays. Might as well go for it. "Mind suggestion. Could the weaker vampires be open to some other commanding creature that wanted Jessica dead? Could the other party be, like, a puppeteer?"

"Excellent point," The Voice finally said. "This would leave us with Guards or silver-eyes as the most likely vampire suspects, excluding Servants."

"Silver-eyes," Kiko said. "Robby called them Groupies. We know they can try to mind screw, too, and that crucifixes, at least, fazed them. We haven't killed one, so we can only guess what would work best, if it came down to violence. I could see their type turning almost as feral as the Guards."

Dawn nodded. "But I'd never forget about the possibility of another Servant, like Lee Tomlinson. A human who gets off on being bitten, one with no obvious powers, could resort to using their own teeth to become a vamp. Remember how Lee dressed like he wanted to be one? Maybe this murderer wants to make himself into the real thing by just copying vamp habits?" Kiko looked up at the TV. "You getting any ideas about how we catch the killer, then have them lead us Underground?"

"Not as of yet," The Voice said.

As his tone shuddered through Dawn, they all sat motionless, allowing everything to coalesce. Breisi got out her phone and dialed.

Okay, Dawn thought. Underground. Was it a literal reference to where the vamps lived? Or could they be housed in some old decrepit hotel, or even in plain sight?

She didn't think so, because at one point during Robby's death night, he had tricked his father into revealing too much to Dawn and Breisi. The vamp had been hoping to trap Nathan into coming Underground with him because there was some penalty for saying too much. That spoke of the importance of secrecy, and Dawn imagined vamps needed that to survive. Living in plain sight might be a clever upset of expectation, but she doubted vamps would be that brave. But, again, who knew?

And who knew why The Voice demanded the same secrecy?

As an almost physical invisibility nudged against her, she felt how he was attracted to her questions, how his essence was seething around as if to request entrance.

I need you to do the work I can't do, to uncover them so I can do the dirty work, he whispered, breathing into her. A pulse thudded in her belly, flowing lower, hotter. You know I can't go outside, Dawn, because if I were to expose myself too early, I would never gain the initiative again.

As he swirled inside of her, churning, escalating her hunger, she thought about all the seeds of mistrust that had been planted by The Voice's betrayals: his using Frank to lure her to L.A., his refusal to share information. What he wasn't telling her could even be worse....

Get out, she thought. I'm not giving you permission to come in.

And he left, forming a freezing void that weighed her down, left her feeling abandoned.

But that was nothing new. Her mother had done the same thing, preparing her for times just like this.

Once again, Jac's makeover-from redhead to blonde-smashed into Dawn. Eva, she thought. Dead. Gone. Accept it.

Breisi's voice s.n.a.t.c.hed Dawn back. As she blinked at the other woman, her vision solidified to reveal Breisi talking on the phone, brows drawn together in concern. She was just as invested in this case as Dawn was because she'd fallen in love with Frank before he'd disappeared.

We're going to find him, Dawn thought, repeating a mantra they both clung to.

Breisi got off the phone, tucking it into a pocket of her cargo pants. "My friend at the coroner's is going to let us into the office in a couple of hours. And tomorrow morning, I'll see if Lee Tomlinson is open to talking with us. I suspect his lawyer, Mr. Crockett, has advised him not to, but even a long shot will occasionally pay off."

"We should use fake IDs and disguises for that 'cos Crockett probably knows we'll be around." Kiko rubbed his hands together.

"But tonight, we can go to the Cat's Paw since we have time to do a sweep there before getting to the coroner's. Let's go."

They'd been checking at Frank's favorite bar regularly, taking the chance that someone new would be hanging around with information regarding his last days among the nonmissing.

"Kiko," said The Voice. "I need you here."

It was as if the psychic had been smacked across the face-not hard enough to hurt, but gentle enough to sting. "But I..."

"Your talents are too valuable to send you out at night before you're physically able to defend yourself. Additionally, Jessica Reese is dead, and you've never gotten a reading from a corpse before. It is not worth the chance."

"What about the clothes she was wearing-?"

"Part of the chain of evidence, Kiko. After they are examined by the bloodstain-pattern a.n.a.lyst and a forensic scientist, then we'll see if you can get a hold of them, just like you eventually did with Klara's clothing. We cannot risk contaminating the evidence before it's processed, especially if we've got additional options to explore first."

As Kiko's posture slumped, Dawn wanted to look away, but she couldn't. He seemed so lost, just like she'd felt so many d.a.m.ned times.

The Voice continued. "However, we can arrange for you to visit the crime scene later, when morning breaks."

"Whatever," Kiko said, turning to leave the room. "I've got a million things to do here anyway."

As he exited, Dawn and Breisi looked after him, their gazes connecting. Kiko felt useless, rejected, and neither one of them knew what to do.

"And you," The Voice said, addressing them now, his tone hardened, "report any vampire activity immediately. That's essential."

Callous b.a.s.t.a.r.d. "What about Kiko? Can't he just-"

"He's not ready, Dawn."

"At first, you said I wasn't, either...."

But he was gone, leaving the room in stretched silence.

"Here we go then," Breisi said, already on her way out.

Sure, here they went, off to the Cat's Paw and then to gape at another casualty of a surreal war Dawn couldn't even begin to fathom.

They loaded up on weapons. Vials of holy water, crucifixes, stakes, and Dawn's shuriken throwing blades, among other things.

She also had her.45-caliber revolver with silver bullets, which she carried illegally since she was still waiting for her CCW permit.

Not even Jonah had been able to secure it through his connections yet.

After rubbing themselves down with garlic, the two of them climbed into the 4Runner and hit the road, unaware of another party tailing them.