your blood sings out

Bill Honchell1,455 Words

223 Center Street

Lehighton PA 18235

(570) 687-5017

Your blood sings out

By Bill Honchell

Wendell sits on a vacant examining table. He uses a large hunting knife to whittle a sharp point on a number of thick, sturdy looking oak stakes.

“Wendell, I have to tell you that I’m against this.” Doctor Pulaski said looking at the stack of sharpened stakes.

“I know doc. I’m not looking forward to this either. I hope to hell I’m wrong, but I know what I saw.” Wendell shrugged.

“What’s the time?” The Doctor asked blotting the sweat on his balding head.

“Time to get ill.” Jessie said as she cocks her crossbow, and loads in a handmade crossbow bolt.

“You don’t need to see this Jessie.” Wendell said touching her shoulder.

“Those things killed my mother and father. If you are going to fight them then so am I.” She said as she pulled away from his hand.

Wendell nods.

“Seriously though what time is it?” He asks.

“12:45, way past curfew.” Jessie looks at her phone.

“Hmp.. Soon now. Doc Lock the door behind you on your way out.” Wendell said.

“Dear god I hope you’re wrong.” The doctor said as he walked out of the exam room and padlocked the door behind him.

“Me too.” Wendell sighed.

“How soon?” Jessie nervously asked looking at the wall of human anatomy posters and workplace regulations.

“Not long. You stand over there, be ready in case I screw up.” Wendell said taking off his jacket, revealing that he’s got on a 357 magnum on a shoulder holster. On his belt are the big knife, and two pouches for speed loaders for the magnum.

“What good is the gun?” She nods.

“Nobody likes to get shot in the head with .357 158 grain hollow points. Living or dead, I so hope anyway.” He said adjusting the bulky leather holster.

“Is this real? We’re not crazy are we?” She asked as she gnawed at her thumbnail.

“No, we’re…”

The body bag very minutely moves.

Wendell holds a finger to his lips asking Jessie to be quiet. She nods, and quietly moves into position.

He takes one of the stakes and a heavy looking spruce mallet and stands over the body. Silently he does a mock pledge of allegiance to remember what side his heart is on. He gently puts the tools down at the head of the exam table and very gently un-zips the bag.

There is the body of Samantha Wilkes. Pale, but young and beautiful, with two barely noticeable wounds on the side of her throat.

He places the tip of the steak approximately where her heart should be, and raises the hammer, poised to strike at the vaguest indication of life.

In less than a breath Samantha’s eyes open. No longer that lovely blue-green color, but the color of a predatory animal. A sickly green color with almost reptilian features, a dark vertical slash now the only indication of a pupil.

Sam opened her mouth revealing long sharp teeth that looked like they belonged inside the mouth of one of the big cats that he’d seen in the mountains once as a boy.

“Oh Jesus.” He said

“Hello Wendell.” Samantha smiled.

He tried to hammer the stake home, but Samantha backhanded him with the strength of three good sized weightlifters.

Wendell is sent sprawling across the room.

Samantha sits up, and peels herself out of the bag.

She picks up the stake from the floor and looks at it.

She smirks with her new smile, and tosses it over her shoulder.

“You’ll need to try harder darling. But A for effort.” The dead woman purred.

She slinks across the room to him and picks him up by his shirt with one hand without showing an ounce of strain.

“You have no idea of what you are dealing with my sweet.” She pulls him in close to sink her fangs into his neck.

“God you smell good Wendell. Your blood sings out.” Samantha kisses his unshaven neck and opens her mouth inhumanly wide.

“Sing to this bitch!” Jessie yelled firing a bolt at Samantha.

Samantha puts up her hand just quickly enough to have the bolt pass halfway through the palm of her pail hand.

“That hurt you little brat.” Samantha snarled.

Jessie rapidly reloads her crossbow from across the room and nearly has a bead on Samantha before through her newly acquired speed and agility she in only a few feet from her.

Jessie fires once more hastily, putting another bolt into Samantha’s stomach.

Samantha hisses painfully as she removes the bolt from her hand, throws it to the ground, and then slowly removes the bolt from her stomach.

The small wounds pinch shut within moments of the projectiles being removed. Samantha does not bleed.

Samantha is an inch away from Jessie, fangs bared. She has the young girl pinned to the wall by her wrists.

“Appetizer first, then the main course…” The vampire smiled.

The room echoes horribly from the gunshot.

A portion of Samantha’s head has been exploded against Jessie and the wall. It’s a dark weird gooey consistency. It’s not from a human.

Samantha drops after a second.

“You okay?” Wendell askes hugging her.

Jessie nods. She’s deafened by the gunshot.

“We gotta finish that thing off!” She rolls the corpse over onto its back.

“You think she’ll heal from that?”

“Your ex is a pain in the ass.”

“True enough.”

Wendell gets a new stake and the mallet, and is over Samantha’s body in a flash.

“Holy shit..” He said looking at the rapidly reforming brain tissue.

“Stake the bitch!” Jessie takes Wendell’s revolver and aims it at the vampires head. She pulls back the hammer.

“I’m sorry Sam.” He puts the stake onto her heart and whams the mallet into her chest hard over and over again.

In a second Sam’s body begins to rapidly take on the consistency of an extremely over ripe banana, and within 2-3 minutes there is a puddle of putrefied gunk.

Wendell can’t believe what’s happened.

“Was that a gunshot?” The doctor unlocks the door, and peers inside.

“Yes it was.”

“God’s ball’s its true...” The doctor looks down at the slimy lump on the floor.

“And that stopped her..It?” The doctor stammered looking at the horrible smelling gunk on his once clean tile floor.

“No, they can regenerate somehow, even from wounds like that.” Wendell said holstering the revolver.

“So how did you..” The doctor draws his finger across this throat.

“It was the stake doc. In the heart, like in the movies.” Jessie said as she handed him the gore smeared spike.

“Wonder why?” The doctor said as he studied the undead goo coating the stake.

“Hell if I know. The stakes were made of Oak if that means anything.” Wendell said wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“I’m sorry Wendell. You two were close.” Pulaski said patting his friends arm.

“That thing wasn’t Samantha. She died earlier tonight, at 12:57 something else entered her body. But it wasn’t the woman I loved.” Wendell said looking out the window.

“Shit I need a cigarette. Do you know what this even means?” The doctor said sitting on his desk.

“Yeah, we’ve got a really big problem.” Jessie said shouldering her small quiver of bolts.

“How many more do you think there are?” The doctor asked lighting a Pal Mal with a strike anywhere match.

“No idea, maybe a dozen? Could be more. No way to tell.” The girl said.

“We call the sheriff’s office maybe?” The doctor said blowing out a lungful of smoke.

“If they’re still even alive. They’ve had more than enough time to isolate the town.” Wendell frowned.

“Oh come on. There can’t be that many, let alone be that organized.” The doctor snorts.

“If it is true than we don’t have a chance in hell of surviving.” Wendell said.

“Hmm, if the stake thing is true, maybe the whole sunlight, cross and holy water thing is true too? Hey is it bad of me that I want to set one of those bloodsucking jerks on fire?” She asked as she took a hit from the doctor’s cigarette and handing it back to him?

“Doc call the police, lock yourself in here. You should be safe.” Wendell said looking around the room.

“I’ll call them now.” The doctor said dialing his office phone.

Wendell starts packing up his gear.

“It’s dead.” The doctor said holding the silent receiver.

“Not that organized huh?” Jessie smirked.

“Okay change of plans doc, you’re coming with us.” Wendell said taking the man by the arm.

“Where are we going?” The old man asked.

“Church.” Jessie said.