Vampire Dreams (Bloodscreams #1) (26 page)

“I'll be right back,” Carroll announced to the others before disappearing for his truck and the CB Radio.

Lonnie watched him intently from the window but the darkness seemed to gobble Carroll up. At no time did Lonnie see the light of his cab go on.

Stroud and Ashyer continued with the work of removing Dr. Magaffey's remains to the circular chamber by the most direct route. Stroud was calling for Lonnie and Mrs. Ashyer to gather up some foodstuffs and blankets, saying they must all seek the shelter of the circle. It would act as their “bomb” shelter from the creatures that sought to take them from Stroud Manse.

Mrs. Ashyer raced to comply with Dr. Stroud, but Abe had to scream again at Lonnie who seemed mesmerized at the big bay window beside the entranceway. “Wish we had the bars back up,” he was saying when he turned to look down the hall at Stroud and Ashyer trundling off with Magaffey's body.

“Two more trips,” Stroud told Ashyer.

“Sir?”

“From the freezer to the chamber.”

“The ... the cocoons, sir?”

“Yes, Ashyer. We must keep them in our sight at all times.”

“Mrs. Ashyer, the boy--ahhh, Lonnie, sir--are terribly upset by them, sir.”

“That can't be helped. We must do what we must do, Ashyer.”

“Yes, sir.”

They laid Magaffey across one of the slabs in the torture chamber. “Shout to Lonnie to get the doctor's bag and bring it down, now! I'll meet you at the freezer. Where the hell's Carroll?”

Stroud and Ashyer did the work of removing the other two bodies which had remained draped in their respective pods. These they placed against a wall as far from the chair and ottoman and bookshelves as possible, Stroud feeling that the evidence could simply be ignored by Mrs. Ashyer, Lonnie, and all of them, if covered with blankets. More blankets were brought in for their comfort. It was dank and chilly here, and the rising hurricanelike attack may take hours.

Ray Carroll returned, drenched, the rain having plastered his hair to his scalp. He explained that it was difficult getting anyone out in a storm such as this, and that he dared not attempt to explain the true nature of the problem over the airwaves, primarily because no one would believe him and consequently no one would come. He had, however, reached some of his closest friends who were driving up this moment to assist.

Carroll asked, “Is there anymore I can do, Doctor Stroud?”

“If you care to put your life on the line. They're coming for us, the whole lot of them. I cannot promise you anything beyond that.”

“Surely you have weapons to combat them with.”

“Come along, I'll show you what we have.”

Stroud led Carroll through the twisting maze that led to the central chamber where he balked at entering as he had at the freezer. “Where are we?”

“This is where we will make our stand. If we remain in the rooms upstairs, they'll destroy us all.”

“But if there's no way out...”

“Nor is there any way in, if all goes as I plan.”

Stroud knew of a passageway out along an underground tunnel, but it would seem foolish to place oneself on the bat creature's turf. They seemed to know every cave and every underground passage intimately.

“What's to keep them from diffusing through in a fog, Doctor Stroud?” asked Ashyer.

“Only these walls and my grandfather, I suppose,” he said enigmatically. “Everyone now, into the chamber. Carroll, you as well.”

The moment Carroll stepped into the circular room he became agitated. His eyes fell once more on Magaffey, whose fatal wound now lay open, the bandage spread like an opened handkerchief now over his chest with the odor of blood rising to fill the room. He also saw that the cocoons had been, in his absence, removed from the freezer to here. He was once more so shaken, his body began to quiver as he tried desperately to maintain his manly composure. Stroud understood why he was so uncomfortable and offered a word.

“Trust me, this is all very necessary.”

“Trust you?” he asked, his eyes meeting Stroud's. “Trust you to be like your grandfather, you mean? Maybe Banaker was right about you, all along ... maybe you're--”

He didn't finish his sentence as suddenly Lonnie Wilson, coming up behind him, stabbed Carroll between the shoulder blades with a hypodermic needle he'd fished from Dr. Magaffey's bag. Stroud rushed to snatch Lonnie away and pull out the needle, half drained of the fluid inside. Lonnie had filled the needle with God knew what.

Mr. and Mrs. Ashyer looked on in stunned horror as Ray Carroll wheeled, reaching for the center of pain. He raced from the confines of the room, clawing his way up the stone stairs, Stroud shouting after him.

“He's one of them!” Lonnie was shouting as Stroud raced after Carroll. On the stairway, amid the shadows there, Stroud saw Ray Carroll's form change before his eyes. His human body turned to an elastic outer shell that ripped through his clothing, and from his back burst a pair of thick wings made of dark hair and skin attached to his true limbs, bony arms with extended fingers. His features became ratlike and the eyes went from sight to nonsight as he sent up a silent-to-the-human-ear screech to alert his fellow creatures to his present location. Stroud saw the familiar pucker beneath the snout as the thing that Carroll had become sent out its pealing, high-pitched distress call.

Stroud raced back for the circle where he grabbed a weapon of his grandfather's making, a long standard pole at the tip end of which was a metal stake. The Ashyers and Lonnie Wilson looked on as he took the lance and went out once more in pursuit of Carroll.

He hadn't far to go, however, as Carroll's body came tumbling down to the bottom of the stairwell at Stroud's feet, apparently dead, as it began to wither and age and liquify and finally crumple into dust before the excited stares of everyone in the chamber.

“He's killed him. Lonnie killed him,” said Ashyer in stark amazement.

Stroud heard the thunderous roar of the others as they tore down the door and crashed through the windows upstairs. The others heard the commotion coming from above as well, the Ashyers huddling together like frightened children now, Lonnie staunchly at Stroud's side, taking the lance from him and saying, “I knew when he went to his truck that he was one of them.”

“Good man, Lonnie,” said Stroud. “He was casing the place, and if we'd left the bodies in the freezer upstairs, they'd have gotten them, including Magaffey's.” Stroud then kicked at the dust that was Carroll and shoved the thick, dungeonlike door to the chamber closed.

Stroud rushed to Magaffey's bag, taking Lonnie with him, asking, “What did you put in the hypodermic needle, and how'd you know it would kill Carroll?”

“Doctor Magaffey told me to stay away from it once,” he said, innocently. “Once when I was asked to bring his bag along.” Lonnie brought out a small vial of the stuff marked succinylcholine.

Stroud knew enough about medicines to know that most, given in too great a dose, were poisonous. Succinylcholine apparently was no good to the average vampire, and was perhaps the best hope they had, should they live to use this new knowledge past tonight.

Overhead, the manse sounded overrun by the creatures tearing through it in a rage, unable to find what they'd come for, searching every nook and cranny. Stroud's time had become much too limited for explanations to the Ashyers or to Lonnie for what he was about to do.

Another thunderous crash like a gale force wind overhead made Mrs. Ashyer weep in fear. Her husband saw to her. “All of you,” said Stroud, “must not under any circumstances leave this room, and you must obey me to the letter if we are to survive. You know to what extremes my grandfather had to go to save you from becoming one of them. Now, my friends, I'm here to save you once more, but you must do as I say without hesitation or question. At times I may not be able to speak, and you may see some terrible and frightful sights here tonight, but you must have faith, faith in me, faith in my family, my grandfather, and faith in God that we will beat these demonic creatures. Are you all in agreement on these items?”

“Yes,” said Lonnie, showing that he intended to maintain his newfound courage.

The Ashyers nodded their agreement.

“Good, then take these knives I procured from the kitchen and open Doctor Magaffey's wound further.”

The Ashyers looked at one another, swallowing hard. Lonnie bit his lip. For a long moment no one said anything.

“In order to gain the help of Ananias Stroud, we must sacrifice some blood here. Will it be ours, or Doctor Magaffey's? If it is ours, then it will be too late, and nothing my grandfather's ghost can do to help us can come in time. If we further spill Doctor Magaffey's, if Ananias's spirit is likely to come and we can gain his help in all of this, it will be through the spirit of Magaffey's blood.”

“How do you know this will work?” asked Ashyer.

“I don't.”

Everyone in the room, listening to the approach of the vampires, sensing their presence on all sides, began their own approach toward Magaffey's body.

Stroud began a mantra, using the resonant sound of his grandfather's name, calling for his spirit to be with them in this hour of greatest darkness.

“Ananias, Ananias, Ananias...”

The others chimed in. First Lonnie, then Ashyer, then his wife.

Outside, the walls seemed to be shaking, the stones ballooning in and out, as in an earthquake.

Twenty vampires careened through Stroud Manse, knocking over anything in their way. Like a natural force, the power of the creatures sent them through walls and doors, tearing away hinges, sending chandeliers toppling along with furniture; glass cabinets exploded with the high-frequency sound waves emitted by the creatures. Smaller, scavenger bats raced about wildly along with their hosts like pilot fish accompanying sharks. They stormed everywhere, having learned that the cocooned bodies of Pamela Carr and the Bradley woman were not where Ray Carroll had said they would be. Banaker sent telepathic messages to the others, some of whom were sharp enough to receive, while others, fearful and distrustful of the night's work and the sudden new turn in policy adopted by their master after all these years, flew from the scene and back to the safety of their roosting areas spread around the city of Andover. But most feared Banaker and through this cord of fear, he held them to him.

“Find Carroll,” was his message, “and bring him to me.”

It was Dolph who found Carroll's remains, surmising that Stroud had once again overpowered one of their number there on the stone staircase leading to what seemed nowhere.

Banaker looked over the damage with a mix of fear--the sight of one like him being reduced to ash--and hatred. “He is here, just on the other side of this door,” said Banaker to the others. “We need only break it down, and we have him.”

“I'll beak it down, Father,” Dolph communicated to his father. The others backed a little away as Dolph, his energies fully recharged now, attacked the door. His entire power went at it but Dolph literally bounced off it and hit hard against the stone stairs at his back. He had not even touched the door. Some invisible shield around it had stopped him.

Dolph was stunned no less than his father and the others who witnessed this. Inside the room, they could hear the chanting, and they could make out Stroud's voice.

Stroud had been wise to maneuver himself and the others here. Banaker was frustrated. Even if he could get the legitimate authorities out here now, point to Stroud as a fiend, showing the evidence of Magaffey's mangled body as proof, Stroud still held onto the cocoons which would then expose him and the others. It was a stalemate, unless his people could find a way into the sealed room.

He set his army of vampires to the task of searching for weaknesses in the invisible armor of the place. He sent some to attempt to come in overhead, some from below, others in another direction. It was at this time he realized that he had some defectors in his ranks. These he cursed and noted, in order to deal with later.

Three hours later the vampires continued pounding from all sides, some changing into spiders, frogs, and fog in an attempt to seep into the room in one fashion or another. As rats they failed as well. Banaker finally put all of his effort into gaining entrance by becoming smoke to burn his way through and choke his enemies to death. He felt weaknesses in the walls where he worked, small chinks that allowed particles of him to seep through. He was only partially through the magic circle Stroud had sent around himself and his people when he realized that Stroud and the others were not alone. He did not see it so much as he felt it: the definite presence of Ananias Stroud.

The sensation so shocked him he pulled back as if touching glacial ice. Vampires liked cold, but despised places below a certain temperature for they could be frozen up in such places for eternity, neither wholly alive nor dead. It was for this reason he'd had to rip away the freezer door before the others dared enter it. Carroll himself had come out quivering and blubbering about it when he'd gone in and come out again with the information Banaker requested of him.

Not even the bone marrow elixir had been of any help in combating freezing temperatures on vampires, but not for lack of testing at the Institute.

And now Stroud had gotten in touch with his dead forebears, a thing no vampire, not even he, could ever do. The ghost, or soul of a vampire simply did not exist. All that a vampire might count on in the way of immortality was in this life. It was the one true advantage 
they
 had over 
his
 kind, Banaker believed.

The others sensed Banaker's feelings of hopelessness, and more began to disappear from the scene. Banaker feared Stroud, and they all knew it, and now he had two Strouds to contend with, and they all knew it.

Dolphin had disappeared with the others, and Banaker felt quite alone in the bowels of Stroud Manse, and quite vulnerable as he thought of eternity without a soul, and as he thought of all that he and his father before him had accomplished here that only a Stroud could take from them. For the first time in his life Banaker felt truly afraid. And the others, sensing this, were leaving him. Apparently, even Dolph had gone, Dolph who had promised to give up his life to defend his father's right to lead, the colony.