Aaron’s throat burned and his neck still felt like it was hanging open, even though he was pretty sure the skin had reconnected. It would take a long time before the memory of the pain dissipated, though. Over the years, he’d sustained injuries from Vampires a few times, but this was one for the books. He’d been coming around the corner in the office, headed for the sound of Cassidy’s voice, when Bonnie had come out of nowhere. Before he could even react, she’d ripped into his neck and hurled him through the door. There was no question at this point, whatever had come through that portal, it was going to be hell sending them back to Hell.
The basement was dank and smelled like mildew. Most of the lights were off, save a few blinking bare bulbs on chains, but that didn’t matter since he had X-ray vision. It cut through most everything. Elliott, who strode cautiously beside him, his Glock at the ready, didn’t have that luxury, but with his IAC, he’d be able to see heat signals and movement. Vampires didn’t give off as much as heat as humans, but in this situation, down here in the bowels of a building that had been here longer than Aaron had been a member of the KC team, he was pretty sure Elliott would detect if they were not alone almost as easily as he would.
“How you feelin’?” Elliott asked, his voice a husky whisper. “Been a long ass time since I saw anything like this shit. Can’t believe you got up and walked away.”
“Yeah, me neither,” Aaron whispered back. His voice was also more like a hoarse growl, thanks to the fact that his larynx wasn’t quite put back together properly yet. “It’s also really weird having to talk with our mouths.”
“No shit,” Elliott agreed. He was quiet as they moved passed an old furnace no longer in commission and a few foundational pillars before he said, “What the hell are we going to do about this?”
The same question had been bouncing around Aaron’s head for weeks, but after tonight, the gravity of what they were facing became even more apparent. Assuming Bonnie was not the demonic Vampire herself, whatever it was that had come back through the portal was bound to somehow be even more sinister, and at this point, he had no idea how they would possibly stop a large scale assault with Vampires even a fraction as powerful as the child had turned out to be.
Elliott had been Aaron’s best friend for decades, and even though he’d resigned himself to the fact that he’d have to do this without him months ago, the fact that he was here again now was both surreal and comforting at the same time. When Cadence proposed attempting to bring Elliott back, he’d known the consequences would be dire, but he had no way of knowing it could be something this overwhelming. Now, faced with the question of what to do about it, he didn’t even know where to begin.
There was a narrow hallway that ran past a shadowed storage area in the back of the basement, and they couldn’t walk side by side there, so Aaron let Elliott take the lead, since he was literally more put together, though he wasn’t sure how bad the scratches Bonnie had inflicted on the broader Guardian’s arms might be.
“To answer your question,” he whispered, “I honestly don’t know. It seems… impossible.”
Reflective again, Elliott was silent for several minutes before he said, “I’m sorry, man. I know this is all my fault.”
“What? No it’s not,” Aaron said, forgetting to whisper. Thankfully, it came out that way anyway. “It’s not all your fault. We all have a hand in this.”
“You don’t.” Elliott glanced back over his shoulder.
“Sure I do. If I really wanted to stop her, I’d have found a way.”
“Maybe,” Elliott muttered. “I just… I feel like I need to be doing more to fix it.”
Up ahead of them, Aaron could sense a presence hiding in the shadows behind a pile of old boxes that were stacked nearly to the ceiling. “Well, I’m sure you’ll be instrumental in our quest to rid the world of evil, once we figure out what the hell is going on. For now….” Before he could finish his statement, their IACs clicked on, and Aaron’s mind was flooded with messages from both Guardians and Hunters all over the world.
“Holy hell. It’s alive!” Elliott said in a Dr. Frankenstein-esque voice.
“Yes, it is, and we’ve got company.”
“Aaron—you see him, don’t you?”
Even though Aaron hadn’t granted access to anyone yet, that he knew of, he distinctly heard Cassidy’s voice in his head, which was highly unusual. But then, it fit the other events of the last few days. Using his IAC, he said, “I do.”
“He’s not going to try to hurt you guys. He’s just scared. His name is… Vern.”
Aaron knew Vern well, but he had no idea how Cassidy knew him. He assumed she’d been speaking to him using her telepathy. “Thanks, Cass,” he said. Before shifting his attention back to the room in front of him. “Vern, it’s okay,” Aaron said, as loudly as he could. “We see you, and we’re not going to hurt you. Just come out with your hands up.”
A few moments passed, as if he couldn’t decide whether or not he could trust them, but as the Guardians grew nearer to his hiding place, there was a shuffling of the boxes on top, as if their base had been disturbed, and a second later, a wiry middle-aged looking Vampire with greasy dark hair stepped out in front of them. “Don’t… don’t hurt me,” he mumbled. “It wasn’t my idea.”
“No, we know,” Elliott assured him. Then, over his shoulder, he said, “Damn. I don’t have any cuffs.”
“Yeah, me neither.” They hadn’t had time to grab them under the circumstances.
“All right, Vern, old buddy old pal,” Elliott said, taking a few steps toward the terrified bloodsucker. “This is how this is going to go. I don’t want to shoot you. I’m tired of shooting shit tonight. But I will do it, without hesitation, if you so much as lower your hands a fraction of an inch, okay?”
“Y—yes, sir,” Vern stuttered.
“Great, then you come on out of your hidey hole, and you’re gonna walk in front of the both of us till we get to the elevator, and then we’re gonna take you back to your cell, and lock you up good and tight, and no one’s gonna poof into a pile of fairy dust, ‘kay?”
“Okay,” he agreed.
Slowly, the nervous rail of a man began to move, shuffling around Elliott and passing Aaron as if he was afraid he might change his mind and blow him to bits. Aaron scooted against the damp cement wall as much as he could to let him through. There really wasn’t fear of him taking off, and even if he did Aaron was pretty sure he could catch him. The three of them headed back the way they’d come to the elevator, and once inside, Aaron let out a sigh of relief to at least have caught one of them so he could potentially find out what the hell had happened.
Elliott was already on it. “You wanna tell us what caused everyone else to go berserk-o earlier tonight, Vern?” He still had his Glock trained on the man’s back, and Vern still had his trembling hands held up by his ears.
“I’m not sure,” he began. “I was… in my cell, just reading a book, when I heard some sort of a commotion. The others were all riled up about something, and the next thing I knew, Marcos was standing outside of my cell, a weird look on his face, like he’d gone a little mad. He unlocked it and said, ‘The time is now.’” He swallowed hard and tilted his head to wipe his brow on the sleeve of his white and blue striped button-down shirt.
“I keep hearing that shit. What the hell does it mean?” Elliott asked, waving his gun around a little more than Aaron cared for. “The time is now. What’s that all about?”
Vern looked even more uncomfortable. The bell on the elevator dinged, and the doors opened, buying him a few moments of time. They stepped out amidst more flickering lights, though these were the fluorescent kind, and Vern slowly began to walk toward the portion of the building where the informants were kept. “I, uh, I’m not sure,” he said, glancing over his shoulder. “But… I’ve heard it, too. In my head.”
Everything looked fairly normal until they approached the first security checkpoint. The thick, steel door was standing open, and there was a smattering of blood near the knob. Once they passed through, it was apparent that the Guardians working in this sector had likely suffered similar wounds to the one Aaron had experienced himself. “Shane, did you get the Guardians from the informant area already?”
“Affirmative,” Shane replied. “I believe we’ve got all of the injured in the same room now, except for the Hunter Jamie is working on.”
