The streets were thick with 'em that day, the day that I met up with the Hunters of Saint Jude. Now, normally, Hunters and I don't get along very well; what with that whole trying to kill each other and everything, but hey, I never wrote the rules. Anyway, I'm starting to get ahead of myself here; like I started to say, the streets were crawling with the living dead, and I was right out there in the middle of it. It was a Tuesday evening, and I was on my way to my parents' house for our weekly dinner meeting. This was going to be the day that I came out to them; the day that I told them that I was a blood-drinking vampire. Actually, I didn't know what was going to shock them more, the fact that I was a vampire or that I had lost my job at the college due to the lack of attendance. Knowing my mother, probably the latter of the two. I was heading towards their apartment building, and working my way past various checkpoints that the locals had set up, when it started to dawn on me that I should have been challenged by at least several people by now. I mean, the building they were now living in was owned by my buddy, and Pack Ductus, Bill. I had had to beg him for three nights to let me move my folks in there, and he almost said no again before Gabe joined in on my side. You see, Vorare Preadatore had a lot of clout in this neighborhood; we didn't let shit happen to these people at night so long as they kept us safe during the day. All in all, it was a good deal; but this night, something was majorly wrong, and you could almost taste it in the air. Maybe that should have been my first clue to be on guard. If not that, then maybe the burning bus tipped over on it's side, or the barrier just before the KornerMart looking as though it had been tossed aside by a giant foot. Now, I've been a Mafia hitman long enough that I should recognize traps by now. You'd also think that having seen as many zombie- flicks as I have, that I would know more about this kind of thing ... but no, I was too busy concentrating on what I was going to say to my parents to really be paying attention to my surroundings. God, I can be an idiot sometimes. I didn't see the first one until it was almost on top of me. An old man I recognized from down the street, Tom Vaschell; his neck torn out and his arm missing at the elbow. He moved faster than I thought he would, and leaped atop me attempting to sink his teeth into my neck. As I went down, I noticed five others running along with him, and I almost panicked. Keeping in mind that once you panic in a fight, you're as good as dead, I did the only thing I could ... I pulled out my guns and started shooting for the face before panic could fully set in. Now let me explain something to you about shooting zombies: if you've never done it before, be thankful. These were once living people but you have to ignore that, and that's not easy. Also, being that they're now dead, they don't drop like they should and that can be real unnerving. I've found that a shotgun to the head or back of the neck tends to work on most zombies ... most. Thankfully that would work on this type of zombies; unfortunately, I didn't have a shotgun. 9mm ballistics don't work quite the same (even if they are hollow-point), and I was trying to save ammo in my 0.45's for when I faced off against all those punk vampires that kept trying to eat me as of late. Needless to say, it took several shots each to drop them, and gunshots have a bad habit of being loud and drawing attention from unwanted sources. Before I had dropped the third of the six attacking me, I could see from the firelight of the burning barrels and vehicles that at least ten more were shambling or running towards me. Talk about your bad horror movie scenes; all I needed now was a cute female doctor and a rugged cop to back me up as we tried to transport a pregnant lady and some kids to safety. Two taps from my left hand took out one zombie, as two taps from my right hand took out another. I could see them surrounding me, preparing for a rush, and I was caught out in the open with a quickly depleting amount of ammunition. My chances looked grim, and I began to wonder if I'd ever see my parents' faces again. I guess that the thought of my folks being trapped behind this wall of walking corpses, and possibly endangered by them, was enough resolve to get my brain working properly. Falling back on instinct, I allowed the last fourteen months of training that I had received from Adam and Gabe to flow out of me in a fluid dance of death. Oblivious of my own mortality, I swathed into the approaching zombies firing my guns to take out the ones grouped in clusters in front of me, and spun the guns to hold them handle down to be used as clubs once the ammo was spent. Somewhere in the first fray, I lost my 9mm's and grabbed a piece of two-by-four, which broke upon the first head I hit and was subsequently used to impale the zombie of a little girl that tried to latch onto my leg ... like I said, sometimes it's not so easy to ignore that they're no longer living. I must have pushed against the growing horde for almost fifteen minutes before moving more than twenty feet towards my parents' building. In a surge of insight I remembered that Old Leroy, who used to own the KornerMart, sold propane tanks in various sizes. Rushing for the window I grabbed a child's tricycle that had been left out, and threw it through the window, following quickly after it. Running towards the back, I made a quick stop at the counter and searched under it for the old sawed off double-barrel that I knew Leroy used to keep there. Thank God it was still there, and still loaded. Four zombies were quicker than the others, and paid the price for it as I let loose with both barrels; clustered together as they were, they didn't stand a chance. Grabbing the box of shells, I continued hauling ass towards the back of the store, a meager plan forming in my mind. I could hear them clawing their ways over the bodies of their fallen comrades, glass and shelving falling as they forced their ways inside and after me. Those still capable of making vocal noises were attempting to scream, and had I still had normally functioning bowels, I think I would have shit myself from fear of the unnatural noise. Twenty feet from the back door, Leroy jumped from around a corner, and started his own unnatural screaming as he dove for my face. Not having the gun reloaded yet, I could only bash him with it and push him away as I grabbed a bottle of wine to break over his head. Persistent as zombies are, Leroy ran at me again; this time I shoved the broken bottle into his neck and used one of Gabe's moves to push him behind me and into the too close mass of marauders in my wake. Damn I was lucky, before he had died (and become a zombie), Leroy had left the back door unlocked. I broke through it and into the back alley; zombie bums looked my way and started moving towards me. Running straight for the propane locker, I reached it just steps ahead of the first zombie-bum, and snapped off the lock with a single determined strike from the shotgun stock. The zombie grabbed me, and tried to spin me around to get a better bite, but somehow I got loose and smashed it's head in with a propane tank. Tossing the tank at the back door of the KornerMart, I was shocked to see the sheer number of walking dead coming at me. Realizing that time was crucial and running out for me, I threw several more tanks before pulling my 0.45 and acting out every post-apocalypse heroÕs death scene. I shouted something I thought was witty but was probably just stupid, and fired my hand-cannon. I remembered the searing inferno rocking the small alleyway and the gouts of flame lunging towards me, then only the comfortable blackness of unconsciencousness as I was hit full on by a large metal object. ********************************************* I awoke, and was almost sorry that I had; upon awakening, I discovered a whole new level of pain that my former human body would have never survived. As I pushed the Class III fire-rated door off of my bruised and broken body, I couldn't help but wonder if this was some kind of cosmic joke. After all, I had just detonated enough propane tanks to turn the alleyway into a scene from any of the most gruesome war movies. Still smoldering bodies littered the ground and walls; what wasn't mush was barely recognizable from ground-chuck. The doorway to the KornerMart had been blown in wide enough to allow for an elephant to pass through easily, and no immediate signs of movement came from within the wreckage. Knowing that my Disciplines were acting haywire, I wondered if maybe somehow they had worked overtime to compensate for their not having worked at all for the last month; was this some new level of my Fortitude? My questions though, were soon answered. You see, that's when I met them, the Hunters of Saint Jude. "Are you alright," asked the tall man with the dark piercing eyes, as he walked towards me from the far side of the alley. His ebony skin made it almost impossible to tell him from the shadows he stuck to. "Oh yeah, I try to get eaten by zombies and blow myself up at least once a week." Tilting his head as a look of confusion crossed his face, "Really, what an odd hobby. Well then, I'm sorry that we intervened." "Wait! You saved me,Ó I replied. Stopping a safe distance away, he cocked his head and nodded towards the roof behind me. Looking over my shoulder, I saw the silhouettes of several more people standing over me. One of them was holding a military issue sniper rifle, and the little red dot was playing over my left glasses lens forcing me to close that eye. 'Shit,' I thought, 'Hunters. Better play it cool.' Clearing my throat as I began to speak, "Well, thanks for the assist guys. I don't know what you did to help me, but I really do appreciate it. Now if you don't mind, I need to get to my parents' place to make sure that they're okay." "You almost died here tonight, if not for our assistance," came the familiar voice of a young woman floating down from the rooftop. "Do you honestly think that you can make it even another block without our help? Please sir, be rational." I swore I knew that voice. The red dot moved from my eye to my forehead, and I heard a gruff voice say, "Michael, I have a bad feeling about this guy. I say we shoot him now and save ourselves the trouble later." "Let me check him out," said the first man, Michael. He stared at me intently for a brief while, before drawing a large blade and hissing out one word as he moved into a fighting posture, "Nosferatu." "Nos ... huh? Where?" I dropped into a crouch myself and began looking around frantically, hoping to catch sight of the mentioned Nos before he had a chance to Diablorize me. I didn't see anything, so I figured that he was probably Obfuscated. That's when Michael charged at me, his blade almost glowing in the light from the moon and fire. Hearing his approach, I leapt to my left as he swung for my right, and rolled backwards to narrowly avoid the shell from the rifle. Sometimes I can get really lucky ... not often, but sometimes. "Jesus Christ," I screamed, "you just saved me and now you're going to kill me? What kind of fucked up logic is that? Think goddamnit! We're both fighting zombies, why are you trying to kill me? Haven't you ever heard the old phrase, 'The enemy of mine enemy'? Shit! Samantha, that is you right? Talk some sense into these guys!" Michael stopped slashing at me, and holding his hand towards the rooftop he called for a cease of hostilities. "Sammy, you know this ... thing?" "I think I used to; aren't you Mr. Jones?" "Yeah, that's me," master of replies that I am. "You're Samantha Gilbert, you were in my Philosophy 220 class last year. Wrote that paper on Plato and his Cave Allegory, right? The one where you used Peanuts characters to draw an example that children would understand?" "You remember that," she asked. "I try to remember all of my students, especially those that write Masters level papers then just vanish without a word. Whatever happened to you? I mean, this craziness hasn't been going on all that long." Looking to the others for confidence, she cleared her throat and responded, "My mother got sick and I had to drop out of school to care for her. I'd rather not talk about it." "And I'd rather we not waste time here," said the gruff voice holding the rifle. "Let's just kill him before he attempts ta' kill us or make more vampires ta' feed off of good people. Let's stop wasting time." "I've been elected leader here Cody, and I say we hear him out," cut in Michael. " I agree that he's potentially a threat, but I also sense true concern in his voice for Sammy. Besides, we did save his life, let's make it worth our while. Maybe we can learn something from him." "I appreciate that guys, but I'm standing right here. Maybe you could stop talking about me like I wasn't listening, thanks." Damn I'm good with those snappy comments ... that's sarcasm guys. "Well, you'd better make it fast, whatever decision you make," said the last guy, "More of those things are on the way." With that Michael looked at me, nodded for me to follow, and ran back towards where he had come from. It turned out that at the end of the alleyway was a fire ladder, (the kind in all of the action movies that we here in D-Town use as balconies) and we scurried up it just as a small contingent of walking dead made their presence known. Thankfully, these dead weren't too adept at climbing ladders, so we were able to get away long enough to reach the roof and set the barricade at the top. In the partial moonlight and the reflected firelight, I finally got a good look at what I would eventually come to call 'Team Jude.' They were a scraggly and rugged looking bunch, in a beaten-all-to- Hell kind of way. Michael was probably the most noticeable of the crew; standing there in his one-piece coverall and workman's-boots, holding a wicked looking blade with the pose of one who knew how to use it. Cody was possibly the scariest of them; crouched low holding his military-grade sniper rifle, dressed in a patched and torn SWAT uniform, he simultaneously never took his eyes off of me or the ladder we had just ascended. Sammy was the worst for wear; she was wearing an old sweater and jeans with hightop sneakers; her face looked as though she hadn't slept for days, and her body resembled that of a heroine addict. The other kid, who introduced himself as Raj, looked like any University computer geek; that is to say, sickly and frail. They were all armed in various ways, mostly with axes or crowbars. The only guns seemed to belong to Cody and the hunting rifle held by Sammy. Even as Hunters, these guys were probably surviving mostly on luck, and that looked like it had mostly run out. "What's ta' stop him from turnin' on us," argued Cody, after Michael's declaration that I'd be allowed to travel with them that night. "He did give us his word," Raj piped in. "What the Hell good is the word of a Deadling creature? I still say we should just throw him over the edge and let those THINGS have at 'im." "Well, Mr. Cody, if you think that you can take me, you're more than welcome to try. However, seeing as how I already gave you my word; and have been hunting these things myself for several months, I see no reasonable cause for your irrational desire to do me physical harm. Now if you don't FUCKING mind, I'd like to go check on my parents,Ó yeah, I can stick my foot in my mouth when I get angry, it's all those years of working academia. If you think that's bad, Cody's response was even better. He stood there, flabbergasted for several seconds, then charged me. His charge nearly took me off the roof, and him with me. Thankfully though, Raj and Michael were right there, and grabbed us each just seconds before we went over. Let me tell you, the view from that rooftop was not a friendly one; zombies were filling the detonated alleyway, and some were trying to find ways up to the top. "Cody, if you don't learn to keep that damned temper in check, it's going to get us all killed," snapped Michael. "And if you EVER bait him like that again, Nosferatu, I'll help him kill you." "Got'cha," I said, then I mumbled, "... but I'm a Gangrel, not a Nosferatu." ***************************************************** "What was that?" Michael asked, his expression going icy. "I said that I understood." "No, buddy, the other part. The part you obviously didn't want me to hear. What was it you just said,Ó now his voice was getting dangerous. "What? I said that I was a Gangrel, not a Nosferatu. You keep calling me Nosferatu ... we're different breeds of Cainite. It'd be like someone calling Ol'Red a saint-Bernard, when he was obviously an Irish setter." "Who the hell is Ol'Red," asked Cody, venom in his voice. Glancing sideways at him, Michael responded, "He's a character in an old book. Similar to Old Yeller; literary reference, 'eh? Maybe you Nosfer ... ah, vampires, can be reasoned with then ... I mean, if you quote obscure literary references to make a point." Almost frothing, Cody grew even more vehement in his rage, "You ain't gonna trust him 'cause he can quote some old book garbage to you, are you? Damn-it Michael, he's one o'them! He's a blood drinking murderous beast of Hell, and he can't never be trusted!" "We'll see," said Michael, "How long have you been a vampire ... Mr. Jones, wasn't it?" "Yeah, but most folks just call me Perry; and it'll be almost two years next month. Uh, listen, can we continue this little conversation on the move ... those zombies are getting awfully close to us now." It was about then that the first one finally made it over the far edge of the building. Knowing how fight scenes on rooftops go in all of those bad movies, I really wasn't planning on making it out of there alive anymore ... not unless a chopper flew by and started dumping flaming barrels in the next few seconds. What I wasn't expecting, was for Raj to turn and run towards the damned thing while yelling something that sounded like a war cry. I swear he flew the last ten feet towards the damned thing, and cracked it's skull wide with the nine-iron he'd grabbed up; the finishing move was to throw the zombie over the edge with a well placed kick to the sternum. It was like watching Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee's love child go to town ... remind me never to fuck with computer geeks. I could go over the escape; how we jumped from one rooftop to another, ran across two-by-fours or shimmied over on cable wires where we couldn't jump. I could tell you about the cold feeling in the pit of my stomach that arose from being that near to certain death. Hell, I could even explain, in graphic detail, the smell of rotting and burning flesh drifting on the wind and the hungry tireless moans; but I won't. Not because I choose to forget the incident, but because if you weren't there, you truly would never understand. Suffice it to say, we started running, and we didn't stop running until we ran out of buildings that we could easily reach. That's when we fought our way to a gas-station rooftop and sprayed the whole area with gasoline, lighting it and praying for deliverance. The sight of all that flame and burning rubble almost caused me to Frenzy, thankfully Michael's stern gaze held me steady until the worst of it had passed, and we moved on. Now you remember what I said about loud noises attracting things right? Well, so does bright light. It wasn't long after the station fire that we were hauling ass again, being chased by God only knew how many freakin' zombies. You also remember though, that my Pack basically owned this neighborhood, right? We were able to hold enough distance between us and them for me to lead my new little war party of deifically-enhanced refugees to one of the buildings that we were using as a Haven. I knew that Adam and Bill were going to think this was a bad idea; but they had saved my life, what was I supposed to do? I pounded on the door, using the code that we had worked out, and proceeded to wait an unforgiving eternity. I snapped my head around and saw the walking dead stumbling down the street, I pounded the code again. Sammy and Raj began to get worried, Michael gripped his machete in sweating hands, and Cody took sights down the barrel of his rifle. "We're sittin' ducks out here! Our escapes been cut off," yelled Cody. I pounded on the door again. "Come on guys, open the damned door!" "You sure there's even anybody there, Deadling?" "Yeah Cody, I'm sure someone's there," I hoped anyway. "Let's prepare to break," ordered Michael. "Odds aren't in our favor, boss," came Raj. "I'm out of ammo," stated Sammy. That's when I heard it, the most blessed sound that I had heard up to that point of my life. The sound of metal chains being dragged across metal bracings, coming from behind the metal fire door. All I wanted at that very second was to get behind all that metal and away from all that rotting flesh. The next few seconds however, happened way too quickly for any of us to ready for. A fast zombie rounded the corner, yelled in recognition of prey, and charged towards us moving with speeds that resembled Celerity. Caught flat-footed, no one was able to get off a shot until he had crossed over half the distance. Cody's rifle barked once, a perfect hit in the face, and still he came at us. I could hear the door's bolts being thrown, and watched as more of the slower zombies scrambled to reach us faster. Michael stepped forward and flashed a wicked smile as he drew his blade across the fast zombie's chest, still it stayed up. Sammy rushed forward and using her rifle as a club, struck a powerful blow across it's back, still it remained upright. Unable to get off a safe shot, I was forced to stand there and watch. The sound of the door opening should have been enough to revive hope in me, but it seemed that somebody was looking out for either myself or the Hunters, I figured on the Hunters more. As I heard the door bang open, I also heard a sharp intake of breath and a shouted order to, "Get down." I lurched forward, grabbed Raj and Cody, and prayed that Michael and Sammy would listen as well. The next thing that I heard was the audible click of heavy automatics, the whine and thunder of high caliber rounds leaving a muzzle at rapid speeds, and the tinkling sound of brass cartridges raining onto the cement near my head. Daring a glance up, I noticed Adam Gray gleefully firing a heavy machine-gun of some military design tightly into the center mass of the fast zombie, his long jacket flying around him like the wings of some darkly fallen angel. ***************************************************** I don't remember watching the zombie drop, and I don't remember hauling the Hunters inside. What I do remember though, is standing between Cody and Adam once the door was chained and locked again. I remember seeing the instant brimming hate in both of their eyes, and the drawn and cocked guns at both of their temples. Moving as quickly as I naturally could, I wedged myself between them and silently pleaded with Adam to stand down; remarkably, he seemed to listen to me. Now Adam is technically both my Sponsor and Pack Priest, but he seems to run the whole gig more like he was my big brother; complete with public slams and joking put downs. He's always been there to help me out when it came to dealing with being a vampire, but as of late we'd been hanging out a little less than before. I guess that the whole Pack was associating a lot less; hell, we'd even stopped the Vaulderie ritual that was supposed to unite us no matter what. Bill kept saying that it had something to do with the death of the world or some such crap; but Bill's always talking about Death. All I knew was that the people (using the term loosely) that had become my secondary family, were starting to fall apart at the seems, and there was nothing I could do to help them. Right here, it looked as though things might get bad. I don't know why Adam backed down for me, but I'd like to think that it was a matter of Trust. Cody, it seemed, didn't quite catch on to the whole thing though; he kept his gun aimed over my shoulder at Adam, and drew another to aim at my back. I almost laughed when Adam rolled his eyes and let out a bored sigh. Michael must have seen something that Cody didn't though, the fact that Adam had put his gun away without even saying a word to me. Placing his hand on Cody's arm, he told him to holster his weapons. Looking like a fox caught in the hen house, Cody hesitated for only a moment before listening to Michael. Whether it was out of respect and trust for Michael, or just acceptance of whatever fate may befall him, I still have no idea. "Perry, I trust you have a good explanation as to why you've brought our enemies into our safehouse," Adam finally queried. "Umm ... these guys aren't our enemies,Ó we may be friends, but he was using his 'angry quiet' voice. "Are these not Hunters? They certainly act and look like Hunters. We fight Hunters, thus making them our enemy. Therefore, if they aren't Hunters, then what are they,Ó again with that 'angry quite' voice. "Well, Adam, you're not gonna believe this. These guys helped save me from a bunch of zombies that I had a tangle with earlier. This here is Michael, their leader; that's Cody, the guy with the guns...Ó "Indeed," interrupted Adam. "... that's Sammy, a former student of mine; and Raj, a master at ass-kick-fu," I continued. Turning to look me straight in the eyes, Adam said, "You were fighting zombies? And they helped you? Perry, what have you done? Do I have to go over this again with you; people want to kill us, we have to be careful, you can't go off alone anymore. Now what are we supposed to do with these guests of yours; you know that Bill won't be happy about this." "Could we let them stay here a little while, maybe get some sleep? I just needed to stop off and see my parents; I'll only be a few hours. Please, Adam? They helped me out, and aside from Cody's trust issues, they're all a solid group of good people. Please, Adam, we can't turn them away ... where would be the honor in that?" You see, I knew that line worked really well on him, sadly he knew that too. Adam had also been playing the vampire game far longer than I had even been walking on my own, so he knew how to twist things around on me. "Very well, Perry, but since you are asking for them to stay, they will be your responsibility. If they endanger this building or any of it's residents at anytime, they will be killed and you will be banished. Is that understood,Ó heÕd gotten even scarier this time, and used his 'happy angry' tone. Turning on his heel and walking down the hallway towards the stairs, he said to me, "... Perry, they'll have to stay in your room ... most of the other rooms are being used as of now." Ever since joining Vorare Preadatore, my Pack-mate Gabriel, has been crashing in my room from time to time. He keeps claiming that it's because I have more comfortable chairs and better air ventilation than his room. In honesty, I think he just likes to read (and scoff at) the books that he finds hidden throughout my room. You see, to cover my growing finances from being a Mafia-hitman, I started writing some really cheesy trashy romance novels under the penname of 'Petunia Rose.' I just never expected the books to pick up as they had, and especially not to become cult favorites. Well, I should have been expecting Gabe in my room, but I wasn't. Seemed like it was one of those days that I was going to keep on getting surprised by the obvious. As I opened my door and walked in to set my coat down on my chair, I noticed the oil lamp was on and Gabe was sitting on the corner of my bed reading some of my old comics. To say that I almost jumped would be an understatement, what I did do was hurl myself against the wall and level my 0.45 his way. "Whoa, Perry! Calm the hell down. It's just me,Ó said Gabe. "How many of you fricken' Deadlings live in this hole," asked Cody. "Cody, be civil, we're on their territory now," cautioned Michael. "A little wallpaper, maybe some spackle, this place could be alright," joked Raj. Sammy just quietly stood there and prepped to run. "You God-damned bastard," I yelled, "What the hell are you doing in my room?" "Good to see that even vampires have to deal with the same housemate problems that we do," Raj, always the jokester. Standing up to get a better look, Gabe asked, "Who are your friends, Perry?" "We're not his friends," snapped Cody. "Gabe, may I introduce you to...," and I went through the introductions again. This time however, Michael spoke up afterwards. "We are known as, The Hunters of Saint Jude," he said, "and I at least consider your friend to be a potential temporary ally, even if we are not friends." "You're Hunters ... Perry, why'd you bring Hunters to our home," this last part asked while he was looking directly at me. "Arghh, how many times do I have to answer this tonight? Okay, here we go again. These guys helped save my life, in return, I brought them here to give them a safe place to rest up and relax a bit," this story was getting repetitive, I was starting to think of printing out business cards with the whole saying already on it. Guaranteed, it would save me a lot of time, and a lot of breath. After going through the story again, and catching up on what I'd missed while I was gone the past several days zombie hunting, Gabe stood up and headed for the door. Part way out, his hand still on the knob, he turned towards the Hunters and myself. With a slow shake of his head he let out a sigh. "Man, the world's all screwed up. Zombies and monsters running loose, ancient gods wasting whole cities ... and now Perry's kicking ass while teamed up with Hunters," releasing a heartfelt laugh, "Wasn't that somewhere in the 'Book of Revelations'? When Perry kicks ass, the world is so gonna blow up ... or something? I swear they taught us that in Sunday school." You've got to understand, Gabe's sense of humor is rather off at times. To those of us that know him, we'd have been more surprised that he was cracking genuine jokes instead of sarcastic insults. The poor Hunters though, just waited for him to finish his departure, then groaned. Not all the members of my Pack are as socially acceptable as poor Gabe, I'd even hazard a guess to say that he's probably the most socially acceptable of all of us ... and that's saying something. So, with that in mind, maybe I should have been a little more cautious about letting the Hunters wander anywhere in the apartment building on their own. As it was, I just wanted to get cleaned up a bit and go see my parents. Like I said earlier, this was not turning out to be my best night. I was upstairs, on the eighth floor, finally visiting with my parents for our Tuesday night dinner. Granted it wasn't anything glorious; I mean, how glorious can you get when everyone's rationed to canned tuna and vegetables? My mother though, still felt that these meetings were important, if for no other reason than to prove to each other that we were all still alive. My father however, was still just as ignorant of my presence as he always was; his nose buried deep in some spy thriller novel. "Dear, you're not touching your tuna fish sandwich? Is everything all right? You're not coming down with something are you," my mother, the hypochondriac. "Nawh, Mom. I've just got a lot on my mind, and I'm not really hungry tonight," that was a lie. I was hungry, but Mom's cooking wasn't going to satisfy my particular hunger. It had been a few days since I'd been able to feed on anything more than the recently dead or a few rats that I'd caught. "Well dear, would you like to talk about it?" How do moms always get straight to the point like that, without seeming like it's their idea? "Well ... I've got something that I've been wanting to say to you for a while now. Something I've been meaning to tell you....Ó That's when it happened, that's when I heard the scream. Of course, right as I'm about to tell my mother that I'm a blood-sucking fiend from beyond the grave, I hear Sammy scream from the floor below me. "Dear Lord, please don't let it be the room I think it is." "What was that dear? I couldn't hear you over the neighbors' yelling,Ó said my mother as she leaned closer to listen better. "Mom, I'll be right back," and with that I ran out the door and almost flew down the stairs to the floor below. As I reached the last stair, I heard pounding footsteps coming from below, and saw the hall door slam open. Sammy, terrified and shaking violently, ran through the door and threw herself into my arms. Obviously, Sammy standing terrified in my arms, didn't look good to the first Hunter to gain the level. Nor did it help that that first Hunter was Cody, thankfully though, Michael was only a step behind him or he may have proceeded straight to the shooting. I could only just barely see Raj's head poking over the floor divide. "What are you doing to her?! Get away from her you frickin' Deadlings," screamed Cody. "Back off, Mr Jones, and let Sammy go," cautioned Michael, his hand slowly inching towards his knife. About that time, the hall door opened and a small young girl with large innocent eyes came into the stairwell. Blinking at us as she looked about, she slowly took in the whole scene. As her eyes came to rest on Sammy last, a malignant light just touched their deep wells. Sammy let out another high pitched scream and nearly passed out as she slumped even further against me; at this rate we might as well have been sharing the same body space, I mean I'd been intimate with women that hadn't gotten so close before. "Keep ... her ... away ... from me ... keep her ... away," was all that Sammy really seemed able to mutter, although she did repeat it several times. "What the hell is that? Have you Deadlings no morals ... infecting children with your curse," yeah, Cody was starting to really irritate me. "Hiya, Perry, who are your friends? Are they for all of us to play with," asked the little girl in a voice dripping with sugar, "She screams pretty, doesn't she?" This seemed to have an obvious effect upon the still coherent Hunters, as they gripped their weapons tighter. "No, Rhea, these people are guests. You can't play with them, and you can't feed from them." Yeah, like I thought for a minute that she'd listen. Telling Rhea that she couldn't do something was almost the same thing as daring her to do it. Also keep in mind that Rhea is at least triple my actual age, and has been a child (at least physically) for longer than I've been alive. That tends to screw with your perspective of the world, and to say that she was on the scary side of crazy would be like saying that J. Edgar Hoover had only been missing a few days. Lets face it, even Gabe and Bill didn't like getting her peeved at them. "Perry, you didn't tell me that you were having guests. If you had told me, I would have gotten out the comfy chairs for them." By 'comfy chairs', she meant the ones that she had built out of stray dogs from the neighborhood, which are still actually alive. I don't know how she feeds 'em and cares for them, and I don't really want to know. In fact, the less I know of what once when on in Rhea's suite, the happier I'll be. Turning to the Hunters, I gently picked Sammy up and transferred her to Michael's care; Cody never once took his eyes off of me. "Look, guys," I said, "just go back to my room and stay there. I'll bring you some food and extra blankets in a bit. Please ... you've got to trust me on this. Wandering around this building, unsupervised, can be a very dangerous thing ... both physically and emotionally. Please, just wait in my room." Luck must finally have been smiling on me, because Michael nodded and the four Hunters turned to go back to my room. Still standing in the doorway, Rhea just smiled and waved as they disappeared down the stairwell. I watched them until they were gone from sight, then with a sigh, I turned to meet eyes with Rhea. "That was not very smart, Perry, not very smart at all. Do you know that theyÕre Hunters, or are you actually as dumb as we let everyone think you are? How do you know that they won't just wait until daylight, then attack us in our sleep?" For only being physically nine years old, Rhea had somehow mastered the 'Mom look', it was really really creepy. "Look Rhea, please don't start this with me. I've already been given the gist of this from Adam..." I feebly began. "Then you should have listened to him. Adam is, after all, our Pack Priest." "They saved my life, Rhea! How the bloody hell can I leave them to die out there, when we have safety to share here? Jesus Christ on a pogo stick! Their leader agreed to a cease fire in order to help us kill off some of those zombies," man I could angry when I had to, just you watch. "Wait ... they wish to help us? You never said that before..." began Rhea. "Well, I brought them here, so it should have been implied," my turn to interrupt someone for a change. "Never interrupt me again, Perry, or I shall feed you to my window curtains. Now as I was saying; this could be very interesting. Yes, Perry, you always do know how to make things interesting around here." She turned and started walking, "Hmm ... a group of Hunter hunters, and a group of Hunters, working together. I wonder how long before this little experiment blows up,Ó she kept mumbling like that to herself all the way back down the hallway to her suite. Realizing that the whole thing was cleared up, and remembering that I'd rudely left my mother and father upstairs, I climbed the flight once again. Going back to my parents' apartment, I once again went over what I was going to say to them. It just seemed though, that the more I went over the words, the less certain I was of which words to use. Well, it was getting down to crunch time and I only had a few more steps to decide. "Sorry about that, Mom ... Dad," well, it was a start. "Oh, don't worry dear. We're quite used to strange things happening anymore," that was Mom for you, never wanted anybody to feel bad about anything. "Honey, come over here," she said to my father, "Percival wants to tell us something important." "Not now dear, I'm right in the middle of a really good part. Can't the boy wait just a few more minutes,Ó youÕve got to love my dad. "Roger! Roger Jones, you get over here right this instant, or so help me God," well, she sure as hell scarred me. It also seemed to get the desired result from my dad too. He grumbled, marked his page, and with a great groan stood up to join us at the dinner table. "What is it, boy? And it better be good, I've interrupted a really good scene for this,Ó spoke my father. "Roger, you sit down and you shut up; our boy's trying to tell us that he's gay," snapped my mother. "Already knew that, didn't need to be told," responded my father. "His lifestyle and all that. I just don't want to meet any of his boyfriends." "Pfftp," being about all that I could muster. "Oh, I'm sorry dear," cooed my mother, "I know that you wanted to tell us. You think that it's been a secret for so long, but really dear, we're fine with it. So we won't have any grandchildren ... although you could always adopt." Shaking my head, "Uhh, no Mom," shaking my head again. "Mom, I'm not gay. I'm a vampire.... What, you thought I was gay?" "Well, dear ... actually yes," she said, "The whole family has in fact ... for some time." "Some time," I blurted. "Since you were five," my father inserted. "Since I was five ... and you're just now bringing it up," I was almost hyperventilating at this point. "Well, dear," said my mother, "we wanted to respect your privacy. Also I've known that you were a vampire for over a year now, dearie. I'm sorry, but you're not very good at hiding it, dear." Now this one had me flabbergasted. "You've known I was a vampire, and you didn't say anything?" "Like your Ma' said, we didn't want to invade your privacy," said my dad as he picked up his book again. "But ... how? I mean, vampires haven't even been public news until a few months ago," man, I was really being thrown for a loop here. "Well dear, my brother Harold and I were ghouls for about three years, until our Master was killed. I guess I just knew what to look for, don't feel bad," my mother was a ghoul ... and she thought I was gay, this was just too freakin' weird for one night. "Uhh, Ma', you do realize that we don't use ghouls," I said. "It's mostly the Commie Rios that use ghouls ... and they're the bad guys that gave the world over to those cranky old guys that want to see it burn." "Commie Rios? Sounds like a gay biker group to me," shot my dad. "That's what I thought too," I responded. "No dearies, it's the Camarilla ... and I always thought it sounded more like an STD." Yeah, mothers are good at saying things that you never expect them to know about. Placing my head in my hands, I asked my mother, "Mom, why did you never tell me about that? I mean, even while I was writing my thesis on how supernatural creatures couldn't logically exist, you had personal proof that they did. Why didn't you tell me?" "Well sweetheart, would you have listened? Besides, I was young and in it for the nookie; I didn't want you to think poorly of me." Well, that was about all that I could take for the night. Honestly, how much is one guy expected to take in one night? I find out that my family thinks I'm gay, my mother knew that I was a vampire the whole time; and throw on top of all of that, my mother was a horny little vampire pet. This was just too damned much for any guy to reasonably take, so I did the only thing I could ... I excused myself from the table and went back to my room. As I opened the door to my room, I realized two things; the first was that I'd forgotten to tell my mom about losing my job, and the second was that I had forgotten to get the food and extra blankets. ****************************************************** I opened the door to my room expecting to see chaos or the remains of some great battle. Instead I saw Sammy passed out on my bed, sleeping like she hadn't done so in months. Raj was curled up in my Lay-Z-Boy, reading through a pile of old 'Batman' comics. Cody was cleaning his guns and counting his ammunition, and Michael was looking at a stack of novels that I had written. "Rather strange collection of literature you have here, Mr. Jones. I'm seeing a lot of comparative religion books, some of the more obscure philosophy texts, and then this pile of romance novels ... all by the same author. Funny, my wife used to read these same books; always said that this here Ms Rose really knew how to get the spice flowin'." Those last words were said as silent tears welled up in his eyes. Wiping them away, he recomposed himself and forced out a laugh, the other conscious Hunters politely kept their eyes averted. Not certain of the right words to say, I could only say, "I'm sorry." How hollow I always thought those words to sound from the lips of strangers. Michael just nodded, took a book off the shelf, and thumbed through it slowly. "So, do you mind my asking why you have these books," he asked me. "I wrote them," my voice came out weakly. "I wrote them to give me a financial cover." "Financial cover," Cody seemed interested now. "What kind'a financial cover would a Deadling need?" "Well," I said while sizing him up again, "a Cainite doesn't necessarily need a cover. However, a hitman using bank accounts does ... especially when he's trying to pay off his mortal debts and help out his parents." "You were a hitman," scoffed Cody, "yeah right! I'd have heard of a vampire hitman. Try another lie, Deadling." "Well, Lunchable, I'm not surprised that you never heard of me." This guy was really getting on my nerves. "You ever hear of, 'Mr. Clean'? The Russian Mob's top Yakuza killer ... that used to be me." "'Mr. CleanÕ..." that seemed to grab Cody's attention, "I was assigned to the task force that was supposed to bring you down. Only thing is, we never got any of the descriptions to match from any of our informants. There's no way that could'a been you ... no way at all." "So you used to be a mafia hitman; I used to be a garbage man. We've all got a past that we came from," spoke Michael in an attempt to head of the rising conflict. "Mr. Jones, we thank you for your generosity, and we'll be gone in the morning so as not to cause any further problems for you." "Michael, please, call me Perry. Anytime anyone calls me 'Mr. Jones' I start looking for my father." "Alright, then, Perry it is," he said. "Oh yeah, you won't be able to leave until tomorrow night anyway," I said. "Why the hell not," Cody bellowed, almost waking Sammy from her sleep and causing Raj to jump out of the chair. "Because," I said, "Adam's the only one with the key, and he's not going to unlock that door until dark fall ... no matter what the reason. Look guys, just stay here until tomorrow night, eat some food and get a decent rest; and for God's sake," Michael crossed himself, "stay out of any rooms that aren't already open. You don't want to see some of the stuff that's in those rooms ... heck, I don't want to see some of that stuff." The night was long past its midpoint, and I could feel myself getting tired. I didn't want to disturb Sammy, so I fetched them some blankets and excused myself from the room. Before leaving I extracted a promise from Michael that no member of his hunting party would try to leave the building, or harm any of the residents in any way. That done, I went down the hall to Gabe's room, where I fell asleep on his couch. Waking up someplace different is always strange. First you have to remember where you are, why you're there, and whether you said anything foolish while you were asleep. Thankfully being a Cainite, that's another term for vampire if you didn't know, means that we're reasonably safe from things like talking in our sleep or sleepwalking. It'd be pretty unfortunate if a vampire were a sleepwalker, seeing as how daylight kills us and all; sleepwalking vampires might open the front door to fetch the mail and fry themselves before ever knowing what they were doing. Yeah, I'm glad we don't do that. Now, Gabe's couch has got to be the most uncomfortable place to sleep, and believe me, I've fallen asleep on some strange surfaces while doing my Doctorate research. It's also not all that pleasant that Gabe wakes up earlier than I do, and has a tendency to blast his gangster rap at full volume whenever he's awake and in his room. Needless to say, I awoke to a spring digging into my kidney, rap pounding into my ears, and Gabe doing pushups in front of his mirror. A rather disturbing situation to awaken to by most anyone's standards. I grunted a greeting to Gabe, crawled off of the couch and began my meandering trudge back to my room. Some 'mornings' I really missed that first cup of coffee ... damn being undead always looked so much better in the movies. I guess that I shouldn't have been surprised to see Rhea standing outside my door, or the mewling stuffed ladybug that used to be a cat, that she sometimes carried with her. I should have been cautious though, when I saw that both Adam and Bill were with her. Rhea just had her creepy all knowing smile on, Adam looked his usual detached self, and Bill just looked amused. Yeah, nothing to be alarmed about there. "Hey guys, what's this," I mumbled, "staff meeting?" "Perry, we need to have a talk," began Bill. Already I could tell that this was going to be bad, he wasn't calling me, 'Perry, my boy.' "Is this about the Hunters? Look Bill, I only did what was right," I was really getting tired of having to explain myself. "Perry," said Adam, "you must keep in mind that anything you do reflects upon the Pack as a whole. You should have consulted with us before bringing them here." "Adam is right," continued Bill, "You cannot act on your own and expect us to help you just because you need assistance. We are a Pack, and as a Pack, we must act as one. Vorare Preadatore was conceived to kill Hunters, and now you have brought them in as honored guests. Have you forgotten that Hunters killed Desmond?" Ouch, that was hitting low. Desmond had taken me in and taught me more about being a proper vampire than any other single member of the entire Sabbat. He also had died fighting a battle that I should have been there to help with, but he had told me that it was important to finish my education since I'd been working on it for so long. Whenever I thought about Desmond, I had to fight the guilt that maybe I could have saved him had I been there, and not in that damned meeting. "It's alright, guys, they're about to leave. I just need to let them know that Adam's here to open the door, and they'll be on their way out of our lives." Somehow I didn't think that the guys were going to allow that to happen ... but I've been known to be wrong in the past. "Excellent. Then let's get them and send them on their way," said Adam. "And let's hope that they don't come back to kill us all later," stated Rhea. I knocked on the door, waited an appropriate amount of time, then walked into my room. The Hunters of Saint Jude were all packed, cleaned up, and ready to go. They even had a few supplies stashed into a small backpack; one I recognized as being my mother's shopping bag. Go figure, they'd have to wander around and meet my mother; I just kept wondering what stories she'd told them about me, and hoped that she hadn't broken out the baby photos. "We heard your friends talking just there," stated Michael. "Yeah," said Raj, "we're sorry if you've gotten into any trouble because of us." "I'm sorry too, Doctor Jones," Sammy said, "I didn't mean to get anyone mad at you. I was just curious about the noises coming from that room." "Yeah," grunted Cody, "well I never asked you to bring us to this stinkin' rat-hole in the first place. Although ... it was nice to sleep on blankets for a change; and Sammy vouches that you're an okay guy. Now, this doesn't mean that I'm going to trust you ... or even like you, but maybe I can find a way to work with you. You give me just one reason to kill you though, and I swear to God that I will." I was really getting confused here. Did Cody just thank me, and did my Pack just actually allow me to let the Hunters go? Sheesh, this could only happen during the Apocalypse. With signs like these, who could really deny it? We marched out of my room after they had gathered the last of their stuff. My Pack was still standing in the hallway, minus Gabe and Amara, of course. Gabe was probably on the rooftop doing his usual evening work out routine, and although I'd been told that Amara was around, I hadn't actually seen her in almost three months. The rest of the group just watched us with cold calculating eyes, and I was instantly aware of just how the worm feels after it's been put on the hook. I guess that maybe the Hunters felt the same way, because I could sense them behind me gripping their weapons a bit tighter. Without a word, Adam turned to head off towards the stairwell, Bill and Rhea right behind him. I glanced back at the Hunters, then nodded for them to follow. As we retraced our steps from the previous night, I began to think back to my conversation with Father Patience Szdowski over at Saint Leo's. Here I was, a monster standing at the edge of the world, fighting to ensure that this world would endure. I could stay with my Pack, and probably eek out a survival, or I could go with these Hunters and surely die fighting the good fight. As we neared the outside door, I knew that it was decision time. No matter what choice I made, I knew that my life (as short or long as it may be) would forever be changed. **************************************************** We stood in front of that metal fire door, knowing that only two- inches of steel and styrofoam insulation separated us from the roving danger that lie on its other side. Before removing the key, Adam checked his machine-gun and thumbed off the safety with an audible 'click.' Rhea held her pistol and Bill gently placed the military-grade flamethrower he had procured upon his back. This was starting to look like a party. Adam picked up the two-way radio and spoke into it, "Gabe, you on the roof?" Static, followed by Gabe's voice, "Uhh, yeah, Adam. What's up?" "I need you to go check out the alley; see if it's safe to open the door," said Adam. More static, followed by, "Uhh, sure, hold on a second." A brief interlude of static, then, "Only two zombies, and they seem distracted." "Distracted by what," asked Adam. "Well ... they seem to be beating a dead dog against the wall. It's kind'a sick to watch," that's Gabe for you though, loves animals and hates people. Turning to look at us, Adam raised his weapon and readied the key in the lock. The rest of us followed suite. I remember thinking to myself that this must be what the soldiers felt like just before being dropped off on Normandy Beach. "When I open the door, I want you to run out as fast as you can," Adam instructed the Hunters. "No problem," said Michael, "We don't want to cause anymore of an inconvenience than we already have. If you'd just cover us until we're out of sight, we'd be mighty obliged." Adam nodded and threw open the door; Bill moved into covering position. The Hunters surged out of the doorway, and I went with them. Static erupted over the radio-set, and I could clearly hear Gabe yelling for us to get back inside. I didn't need to wait and ask why; the answer was coming towards us. Now, in the last two years, I've fought: crazed gunmen, vicious dogs, murderous vampires, mutated monstrosities, angelically empowered psychotics, military enthusiasts, mafia henchmen, and blood-craving ghouls. None of these however, were quite as horrifying as what was coming towards us. An army of the dead, packed shoulder-to-shoulder as they marched down the alleyway towards us, blocking out the light from the street. What made it truly disquieting though, was that above the moans and shuffling footsteps of the walking dead, I could hear an all too familiar voice crying out orders. The dead seemed to flow upon us and we were barely able to press ourselves back into the safety of the building before Adam slammed shut the door and pounded in the lock. The door was rocked by the pounding of the zombies on the other side, and for a brief second I could tell that I wasn't alone in wondering if it would hold or not. Thankfully, Gabe was on the rooftop and acted quickly by throwing down a bleach-bomb. The damage to the horde outside would be small, but it would clear a few away from the door; and he didn't seem content to stop with just one. "Great ... just freakin' great," shouted Cody. "Now how are we supposed to get out of here?" "We could always throw you from the rooftop," smiled Rhea. "But we'd gain no knowledge in that kind of a death," crooned Bill. "Besides, I'd like to know why they're all moving in a group like that." "I noticed that," said Michael, "but did anybody else hear that woman's voice? Almost like she was giving orders." "Someone's controlling the dead ... interesting," said Bill, as a creepy smile touched his lips. "Gabe, how's it looking up there," Adam asked into the radio-set. Static for a while, then Gabe's voice, "Not good. Not good at all. There must be over a hundred of 'em out here ... and they're all just standing around like they're waiting to be let in, or something." Well, that just sounded creepy. "Well," Adam replied, "throw down a few conflagration barrels and see if you can clean them up a bit." "A few what," shot Gabe, "Speak English, man!" Sighing in exasperation, Adam shrugged his shoulders. "Perry, will you go help Gabe, please? Don't worry, we won't hurt your new playmates." What could I say, Adam had as much as given me his word that the Hunters wouldn't be hurt. I turned to head up the stairs to the rooftop; I wanted to see the owner of that voice as much as I wanted to clear an escape route for the Hunters. If I was right, and that voice belonged to who I thought it did ... well, lets just say that I was going to be in a bit of trouble. I stepped out of the stairwell and into moonlight, and the smell of burning and rotting flesh. It could have been worse, this could have been Jersey. Gabe ushered me over to where he was kneeling at the rooftop's edge, and I joined him. What I saw below brought memories of the previous night's exploits, as well as a series of horror movie clips that I'd rather at that time not have been reminded of. The building was surrounded by walking dead, and standing atop an overturned car was the owner of the voice that I'd heard. She didn't actually look all that bad for having been dead for four months, even though her funeral dress had seen better days. However, where she'd been a power-hungry bitch in life, it seemed that death had rewarded her for her incessant power struggles. "Shit," I mumbled. "Yeah, looks pretty bad," Gabe intoned. I was lost in my own world of thought though, "Goddamnit! This is a test of some kind, isn't it? I mean, why else would you make me deal with her again, Lord?" "Huhn? What the hell are you talking about, Perry? Deal with who," Gabe looked puzzled. "You know one of those walking corpses?" "You could say that," I responded, looking sheepish. "Ohh-hoho," Gabe chortled, "You've got an ex out there, don't'cha? Come on, which one, man? Which one? We can torch her together, bro'!" "She's not an ex," I exclaimed. "Dear Lord, I'd hope that I'd have better sense than that in choosing a woman! She's just an old work colleague." Now Gabe and I have had a lot of conversations about stuff in our time as friends and Pack-mates; so it didn't really surprise me that he caught on to who at work would piss me off that much right away. "Lisa," he asked. "Yeah, she's standing on that car over there," I said, "and giving the orders. Heh, even in death she can't stop bossing people around ... bitch." Gabe scrambled along the roof's edge to get a better look. "You mean the blonde with the great rack and those legs that go on forever? She's pretty hot, man. Why do you think though that the zombies aren't trying to eat her?" "Well," I hazarded, "probably because she's dead." "No way in hell, unless she's only a few minutes dead," argued Gabe. "Look, there's no sign of decay or damage on her body anywhere that I can see." "Look, Gabe," I said a little more forcefully than I'd intended, "I know she's dead. I went to her viewing, I read the obituaries, AND I pushed her down the flippin' stairs thus breaking her goddamned neck!" So yeah, there you have it. Lisa Turner used to work with me at Wayne State University, where she was actually my department head, but only because she was sleeping around with the Dean. After becoming a mafia hitman, I started to feel my morals on killing start to slip, and one night as I was getting ready to leave, she had ordered me to stay late and resubmit a week's worth of paperwork before morning. Obviously this had me rather peeved, as I was supposed to go on Hunter duty with Adam and Amara that night. While I was taking a break in the stairwell to cool down, she walked in talking on her cellphone. I quickly Obfuscated and kept quiet, not wanting her to know I was there. She was talking to some guy, saying that she'd be over later, and laughing about having me do more paperwork that she was just going to ignore anyway. I waited for her to hang up the phone, then I acted without even thinking. I kicked her knee so that it buckled, and watched as she fell an entire flight of stairs, hitting the ground with an audible 'thud' before making even the slightest moan. Watching from the top of the stairs, I saw her look directly at me, then watched as the life fled from her eyes. Shielding myself from the sight of others, I returned to my desk and finished my paperwork, certain that nobody would even think to question me. You know what, the whole thing was passed off as an accidental death; her shoe-heel had broken at the top of the stairs, and the police blamed that as the cause of her fall. For almost two months, none of the women wore heels. Regardless of the fact that she was dead, she was now standing out there giving orders to an army of walking dead. It seemed like she was directing them to form up lines and collect various objects for melee weapons. To the untrained eye, it would appear that she was amassing an army in order to siege a fortress; to the trained eye, it seemed as though she was amassing a small army in order to siege a large building. Not happy times were soon to be upon us. Gabe and I rolled some of the tar barrels over to the side of the roof and I helped him pour the thick black sludge over as many shambling dead as we could. Next we grabbed cans of charcoal fluid and sprayed the tarred area. Following that, you guessed it, logs of burning newspaper and magazines. The end result was forty zombies (give or take a few) bumping into each other and burning like kerosene wicks; it's really nice how flammable preservatives are. The fresher of the dead just pussed and popped as the heat found the reserves of fluid still hiding in their husks. Noticeably, this drew the attention of Lisa, and she walked over to see the problem first hand. Glancing up towards the rooftop, she caught sight of me before I could recover the edge. "Well, well, well," I heard her say, "I'd heard that resistance was to be found in this particular building, but I never expected that resistance to be you, Percy." "It's 'Perry,' you flippin' bitch," I shouted, "How many times do I need to tell you that?" "Shame on you," I heard her say, "So much anger, and you're the one that killed me. Although, I guess it would take a lot of anger to make you want to kill somebody. Tell me Percy, were you that jealous of me?" "Jealous," Gabe asked me, "What the hell is she talking about?" "She's deluded," I said, "I've got no fricken' idea." What the hell was she talking about? "What the hell are you talking about, bitch," I shouted. "Gabe," came Adam's voice over the radio, "what the hell is going on up there? We can feel the heat and hear some woman yelling through the door." "Ahh, Perry's just fighting with an ex up here," he joked back into the radio set. "What is Perry's ex doing up on the roof ... and what are they fighting about," demanded Adam. "She's not my ex," I shouted into the radio. "You killed me because I wouldn't date you, Percy," laughed Lisa, "That's just so pathetic." "I killed you because you were a bitch," I shouted at Lisa; and to Adam over the radio I said, "It's my old Department Head, the one I killed." "You killed your boss," asked Adam. "You never told me that, Perry, and I would not have agreed with it." "It wasn't planned," I pleaded, "It just sort of happened." "Right," I heard Lisa sneer, "and you weren't just waiting in the stairwell to have your way with me." While still holding down the transmitter on the radio, "Shut up you dead whore, or I'll kill you again!" Then the awkward silence of realizing that I'd said that into the radio-set. "So ... how's everyone doing down there?" "Perry," came Bill's voice, "we're coming up there." Ahh, crap, that meant that he was pissed at me, and didn't think I could handle the situation on my own. "Gabe, hose the area down for us, will you?" "Okay," was all that Gabe said before putting down the radio and hosing more zombies in various types of combustible fluids. Gabe and I didn't have long to wait before everyone was assembled on the rooftop. During the waiting time though, I had to endure more of Lisa's ranting about my having had killed her. Sheesh, you'd think some people would get over it by now; it'd been four months already. We all stood up there on that rooftop, either shooting or igniting the hordes of zombies that came near the building, until just a few hours before dawn. It was at that time that Bill called a cease to the festivities, and he and Adam went back into the building. That left Gabe, Rhea, the Hunters, and myself standing out there watching the piles of burning bodies drop and sizzle. The smell was horrible, and I could tell that Sammy and Raj were going to be having some bad dreams because of all of this. To make matters worse, Lisa had been raving insults and accusations at us the entire night, and showed no signs of letting up anytime soon. Confused and perplexed, I followed Rhea and Gabe as they finally grew bored, and went inside to Bill's office. Inside, Bill and Adam were going over what they had seen of the enemiesÕ forces and weaknesses. From what I could gather, they both blamed me for the mob outside; and they noticed that whenever Lisa was fixated on verbally abusing me, the zombies didn't seem as focused as this particular group had shown the capability to be. It seemed like they might be developing a plan, maybe things were looking up for us after all. ********************************************************* I awoke again on Gabe's couch, this time though the music wasn't playing, thank God for small miracles. Moving quickly, I strapped on my weapons, grabbed some extra ammo from the hall closet, and met everyone up on the roof. Looking around, I saw that I was the last one there ... never a good sign. Michael informed me that the zombies had kept pounding on the doors and windows all day, I guess that explained the dream I'd had of being trapped in a giant drum while the drummer from Def Leopard banged away on it. It was apparent that somebody had constructed some sort of barricade across the roads that led to our building. I was also told that Lisa had been yelling for me to come out and make good on my threat, if I wasn't too scarred of her. You see all that you miss while you're sleeping. Our supplies of combustible materials had grown dangerously low after the previous night. Bill had figured that we had really only one chance to get the plan right. During the day, he had some of the residents help Cody set up various dump-traps, involving any variety of nasty things from heavy rocks to sharp pieces of random junk. A sort of bridge had been built to be placed between our roof and the roof of the building just across the way. Guns and boxes of salvaged ammunition lay in piles about the rooftop, manned by various volunteer residents of ours. Taking up a large section of space in one corner of the rooftop, sat a large and ominous looking canvassed object. All in all, we had a small army of about fifteen people; not bad at all considering that the opposing force was roughly ten times that. Bill and Adam kicked off the attack ... literally. They kicked several laundry baskets of sharp glass and debris over the side. It might not have done much damage to the zombies, but at least it was a start. Sammy joined the volunteers shooting at the crowd of zombies, hoping to take a few down at least. Gabe chucked heavy objects at them, almost always hitting a face or head. Rhea jumped up and down laughing, and randomly shot into the crowd. Cody sighted down his scope and waited for a clear shot of Lisa, and I set zombies on fire. I heard Cody's rifle snap twice in rapid succession and quickly glanced to see if he'd hit her. From this distance, I couldn't tell if he had or not, she was still standing at any rate. I don't know if Lisa noticed any order to our zombie slaying, but if she did, she didn't let on. As the zombies closest to her dropped, we moved down the line to the doorway closest to her. John and Kyle, two of the volunteer residents, moved the bridge into place under Bill's orders. As soon as the bridge was in place, Michael, Gabe, and I ran across it to the other rooftop. Once there, we hightailed it down the fire escape and onto the street; this was where I started to have problems with Bill's plan. Our mission was to get as close to Lisa as we could, and do as much damage as we could from up close. Michael had assured us that up close, God gave him the strength to lay low the foes of Humanity; Gabe was just itchin' for a good fight that he could actually participate in, and I was just going along because I was told I had no other choice. Yeah, you had to love this plan. Once we hit the street, Michael's blade was out and glowing in it's strange way, as he hacked into and through the mobile corpses. Gabe's punches split heads and cracked bones, and his kicks knocked bodies a good distance away. I felt horribly outclassed using my 9mm pistols against targets that seemed to barely notice the impact. We did however, manage to make it to Lisa, the fact that she was also coming towards us did seem to help matters a lot. I think I first noticed that Lisa was there when I felt the sudden jarring impact into my abdomen, and another similar one into my face. The last of these impacts almost knocked me from my feet. Looking at my attacker, I saw that Lisa was moving with a speed that rivaled my old record. I also saw that most of Cody's bullets had hit her in the main body area, and that she didn't seem to mind the additional ventilation. I dodged a quick left, and took a shot at her from point blank range. If she felt it, she didn't show it. Gabe and Michael were being kept busy holding the zombies off of us. I knew that Gabe could keep up the workout for a while, but I wasn't sure how long Michael could last in a brawl like this; I had to make this fast, and I was beginning to think that that was no longer a viable option. I emptied my clip into her, and she barely noticed. As I was reaching for my extra clip, she moved even faster than I'd thought she would, and grabbed me by the arm. Hauling me up she began to crush my throat with her free hand, and cackle like the witch in a children's fairytale. All in all, it was rather unnerving. Michael and Gabe were keeping busy doing their job of clearing the area. My job had seemed simple enough in the planning stage; get Lisa to a position where we could use our secret weapon to maximum effect. Seeing that I was getting my butt whomped by a girl though, just didn't fly right with me. I'm all about women's lib and equal rights, but no male wants to get beaten to death by a female ... it just goes back to the school yard, and being a girlie-man to everyone that knows. I guess that's what made me snap a bit there. I drew open my coat, grabbed the sawed-off from it's string around my back, and let her have both barrels right under the chin. If she'd been human or Cainite that kind of damage would have ended her right then and there. I guess though, that super zombies just don't have to play by the same rules that the rest of us do, particularly the one about decapitation being a big 'Game Over.' Granted her head was mostly gone, but her hands still squeezed me where they had a hold of me. Already, I could tell that it was going to be one of those fights; I just prayed that Cody and Bill's secret toy proved out, because if it didn't, we were all gonna be screwed. ******************************************************* Now, in all of the Apocalypse movies where the hero is fighting some great villain, he's always got some really hot half naked chick clinging on to him and just waiting for a chance to bang him. In my situation though, the hot half naked chick happened to be the villain; and the only banging that she wanted to do, was me through the windshield of a car. Which she aptly did, I might add. You know, sometimes it really sucks to be so suave and dashing ... sarcasm guys, I'm great at it. Somehow, in the time that it took for me to arc through the air and penetrate the windshield of a Ford station wagon, she had already regrown most of her face and a good part of her neck. Not only was I impressed, but I was damned impressed. I never had that kind of power before all of our Disciplines started drying up, and vampires are known for their tenacious healing capabilities! It took me a few moments to work my rear end out of the shatter-resistant glass; I was just amazed that I hadn't broken my neck in the whole ordeal, although my right leg was a different matter entirely. Gabe and Michael must have been given the signal, because they scattered out of the way. I saw the tarp being pulled and the glint of metal underneath as the moonlight caught it. Lisa closed upon me, and I made a wild jump back into the vehicle through the now demolished windshield, in hopes of avoiding what I knew was coming. Thankfully, she never knew what was coming until it was too late. During the day, the Hunters had put together one of Cody's designs with a few modifications done by Vorare Preadatore's own 'Master of Death,' Bill. Cody had gotten the idea that if they were ever forced to deal with a large-scale gathering of 'Deadlings,' that it would be nice to have an area covering stake launcher; Bill just modified it to be more of a crowd control device than Cody had planned on it being. The end result was a large slingshot looking device, which fired large spear length sticks and sharp pieces of pointed debris, all intended to turn a small crowd of people into nothing more than cubed steak. Super zombies, again, must not have been given the memo that that is supposed to kill them dead. I really hated Lisa, and I was really beginning to hate 'super zombies'. About twenty stakes must have been piercing through her, one through her newly reformed face, and several through the area that would have housed her heart ... if she'd ever had one, which I didn't believe she had. Still, though, she kept coming at me with this wild gleam in her eyes. It was hard to believe that she hadn't been some psycho serial killer in life; actually it was kind of funny that that role had been filled by me instead, and I actually managed a laugh. My laughing just seemed to piss her off more though, so I quickly stopped; not to mention that it merely aggravated the spikes that were sticking out of me too. When you hang out with most guys, and they try to do that whole 'male bonding' thing with you, you usually go out to the stripclub or bowling. Trying to do that whole thing with Adam though, is quite a different experience; he actually teaches you useful stuff ... like how to hotwire a car. Working quickly, I jumped the engine, prayed to anybody that would listen that the thing still worked, then slammed my foot down hard on the gas. For a second nothing happened, then I took the gear out of Park, and I flew forward. The rushing car must have caught Lisa by surprise, because she didn't even try to dodge it. I caught her straight on onto the hood, yelled something profane, and ran with her trapped on the hood until we collided right through a brick wall on the far side of the street. A quick check showed that it wasn't our building (man would that have just been my luck), and also that Lisa wasn't moving. That seemed to be the good news. The bad news was that I was now separated from my Pack, my escape route, and I was running low enough on ammunition to make me worry. Oh, and did I mention that I was still surrounded by more than a couple hundred zombies? Well, so far this adventure had had its outtakes from popular zombie-movie necessities, maybe this was the part where my character finally went out in one last blaze of glory. The Ford's fuel tank had been at just over three-quarters; if I moved quickly, I could take out a large number before they swarmed me. Damn, if this was a movie, I so wanted a better agent ... and maybe a better writer to boot. Crawling from the shattered rear window, I ripped off my outer- shirt and forced it down into the fuel tank. I did not have long to wait before the zombies were all over me. Bless my friends up there on the rooftop; they tried shooting as many as they could to give me cover. Reloading my weapons as quickly as I could, with what little ammo I still had, I tore into as many zombies as I could drop. It was looking like a good night to die. I lit the fuse, remembering when I'd been given that shirt for Christmas some years ago by an ex-girlfriend of mine. It took a while to catch, but once it did the flame just shot down into the tank. I was completely given over to dying in a glorious blaze, at least consciously that is. Drawing deep down into myself, I drew upon my vampiric powers to heal my leg, and out-and-out ran as fast as I could towards the escape route. The Ford exploded in a fiery blast, knocking me from my feet. The smell of burning petrol and singed flesh accompanying the hot gust of air. Regaining my footing, I grabbed a large piece of rebar from the ground, doubtless some of the rubble fired by the mega-sling. It was a good thing that I did too, because I was about to be neck deep in zombie trouble. Times like those that you really get to know who your friends are, and what a man is made of. Gabe, at great risk to himself and accompanied by Michael, had run back down the fire escape to assist me. They had almost reached me, when I felt a cold prickle run down my spine, and spun around to see the rubble under the burning remains of the Ford start to stir. I clearly remember shouting something along the lines of, "You have got to be kidding me!" It turned out, that the Universe really did hate me after all, or so it appeared. I readied myself for the inevitable. Her body was burned almost beyond recognition. Stakes, poles, and assorted pointy things protruded from her body at odd and grotesque angles. I could see several places where her bones were piercing her flesh, and a large portion of her skull was showing where the skin on her head had been scrapped off. Yet her eyes were glowing from some weird blue energy source that seemed to radiate from inside of her. If someone in Hollywood had had special effects this good, they would have been able to choose their own price. She swiveled her head until her eyes rested on me, then lurched to a standing position. Her mouth thrown open in some twisted parody of a grin, she charged at me once more. I threw the rebar as if it were a spear and watched as she batted it away. That bought me the critical second that I needed though, and pulling out my 0.45, I emptied the last three shells into her from a distance of less than thirty-feet. Those had to be the three most perfect shots that I have ever taken in my life; it felt as though someone else were guiding my hand. The first two bullets took her square in the eyes, and the last one directly above the nose. I saw the lights vanish, and knew for certain that this time she was gone. The funny thing was, it felt as though Raj were standing right there beside me, chanting something the whole time. When I asked him about it later, he just smiled and said that he'd asked God to 'up my favor a bit'. Too bad I didn't meet that kid before Vegas went under, we could've cleaned up the whole town. Somehow, Gabe and Michael reached me. I guess that I was torn up worse than I thought I was. Gabe carried me to the fire escape and Michael covered us. Without Lisa there, the regular zombies didn't have any guiding influence. The ones on the outskirts of the group just started to wander off, leaving only those directly near us to cause us any hindrance. Even in my weakened state, I could tell that Michael was tiring, and tiring quickly. We had to get him back to the apartment building. The three of us fought our way back up to the rooftop, where we yelled for the bridge to be returned. Once safely across, and back on our own rooftop, we finally relaxed. Michael had received some minor injuries, mostly though, he was just exhausted. Gabe had been beaten fairly badly, but he confessed that it wasn't anything that he couldn't deal with. I on the other hand, was told that I looked like a pincushion. It looked as though one of the stakes that was launched missed my heart by only a hairsbreadth. Rhea pulled it out, commenting on how it would be an interesting experiment to see if it could be placed in again without noticeable additional damage. Then Sammy did some DND glowing cleric hand thing, and I felt some of my bruises vanish away, only to see them reappear on her. Bill made some comment on how I was weak now, and it would be a great time to try Diablorizing me. Thankfully, Adam and Gabe heard him say it, and called him on it. It turned out that he was only joking too ... or so he said. Even to this day I don't know about that guy. I spent the night in the basement that night, where we keep the extra food. Before everything went all hectic on us, and hunting to feed became a real problem, Adam and I had collected a large number of foodstuffs for both humans and vampires. Sure the other guys thought I was weak hearted because of it, but I knew that keeping rabbits in cages was a good way to get some emergency rations. Also, I'd tasted zombie blood, and unless you got the recently dead (as in the last hour or two) it was pointless to feed from them. Hospitals were almost completely picked over by now, and not to mention literally crawling with zombies; once I had to fight a zombie nurse in the maternity ward ... talk about bad dreams, I was bitten twice by zombie babies. Anyway, I'm digressing again. Two more nights passed before most of the zombies had cleared out. The Hunters of Saint Jude had gone down into the streets to collect what scant supplies they could to help restock the building. Gabe, Adam, and I provided them an escort for a short ways before saying our goodbyes to them. We left them a radio attuned to our frequency, as a means to get a hold of each other should they ever need us; then vowed that we wouldn't actively hunt each other down ... at least until the zombies were gone. I've seen them a few times since then, heck I've even gone zombie hunting with them a few times. Cody still doesn't trust me, but he also doesn't call me a 'Deadling' anymore; I also think that Raj is sweet on Sammy, but that's another topic. Sometimes they stop by to resupply, or just for a safe place to stay for a night. Once in a while they even bring survivors to us, all fully briefed on what we are ahead of time. Granted I don't think that Bill and Rhea are too keen on the idea of helping others, but the rest of us are honor bound to help the less fortunate; as Adam taught me, the Sabbat are the protectors of Mankind from the monsters that would destroy them. I still think it's funny though, how a group of Hunter hunters and a group of Hunters, came to be working relations ... and maybe even friends? Who knows, maybe after this whole Apocalypse thing is over, any of us that survive can sit around and share a few tales as we grill up some steaks and throw back a few beers. Maybe I'll even see you there.