Jenny's Gambit
Jenny came to herself on the floor of the room she
had been thrown into. Everything was dark and blurry;
she couldn't see a thing clearly. She could identify
the huddled mass in the corner as something humanoid,
ditto the reclining figure in the center of the room.
There were still no windows or furniture, just the
room.
Who they were she could not say definately, she
reached up and tried to remove whatever covered her
face. She found that her hand's motion was
restrained, she couldn't move it very well. Gripping
the thing that covered herself proved impossible.
Maybe this was something of that vampire's making. A
web to hold Jenny until she was hungry again, but why
not just kill her?
A figure moved silently from out of the wall. Jenny
tried to jump back, but found herself unable. The
blurry figure held out a knife as he approached her.
"Quiet, girl," the figure said in a distorted but
definately male voice. "The Heirarchy will be here
soon; not that you know who the Heirarchy is of
course." The man cut at something, and suddenly the
blurry covering slipped off of Jenny. She could now
identify the reclining figure as her own body, already
decaying and rotten to her new found senses.
The huddled mass in a corner was the vampire, of
course, rocking back and forth and crying out tears of
blood.
"They caught one of the newly dead here only
recently," the man continued. He was wearing a
coonskin cap and a suit of hand-tanned leathers, like
something from a western. "Foolish tyrants almost
allowed the man's shadow to devour him, and leave him
a spectre."
"I'm dead?" she asked. Everything about her seemed
to be decaying, except the vampire. The vampire
merely looked the same fifteen or sixteen she had
before, but now there was something about her that
gave the impression of something stale or stretched.
"Yes, you're dead," the man answered. "Now let's
move before the Heirarchy comes to induct you to the
forges." Jenny didn't have time for a response, the
man merely grabbed her and shoved her through the
outer wall. Jenny felt disconnected for a moment as
she passed through the wall into the outside. The man
followed behind her, moving through the wall as if it
weren't there. "Move, into the surrounding woods,
they won't look there."
Jenny hesitated a moment, considering the way her
life had been so unfairly removed from her. It would
have been considerate if there was at least something
worth going to on the other side.
"You can settle your affairs with the brat later, a
death is expected, someone will be here soon to
collect you." The man passed her into the woods and
Jenny followed swiftly and gracefully behind him.
When they stopped she could just barely make out the
mansion below them.
Of course, everything looked desolate to her now.
Trees appeared hollow and rotting, stones were cracked
and dusty. Animals all appeared to greater or lesser
degrees as walking corpses.
Car lights seemed to appear at the old mansion they
had fled.
"Is that them?" she asked her apparent rescuer.
"Yes, that's them," the man answered. He had an odd
accent, almost Southern, but not quite. "As bad a lot
as them that were in Texas, back in my day. Worse, in
fact."
"What are they here for?" she asked, cautiously.
"To either convince you to join them, or to take you
to the forges and turn you into currency, or weapons,"
the man spoke non-chalantly. "I have to go, other
buisness that needs doing."
"So why'd you stop to help me?"
"I was hiding out there when they brought you in," he
smiled a little. "Sort of ruined my hideout. I
wasn't here for the other, and we can't let them win
any battles, not even small ones."
"What can I do?" She paused, "to affect the living."
"You'll have to find that out for yourself girl.
Talk to the guilds or experiment yourself. We're all
different, and I have affairs elsewhere to put in
order. The Heirarchy won't wait around long, and that
place makes good cover if no one's about to die. "
The man just vanished then. Jenny flinched a little
and began to walk back to the mansion, where the
car-lights were already fading away.
"Self-experimentation then," she told herself. "No
time for anything else." She had always relied on
herself anyway.
"Well, now that that's over with," declared Renfield.
"I believe that it is time to do some hunting." He
rose from his chair and took Lucy's hand as he left
the chamber to head downstairs for his motorcycle. "I
believe that the Shadowspot would make a good hunting
ground, what do you think love?"
"A freakin' good hunting ground, sir," answered
Lucy.
"Varney, back to buisness. Mina, keep an eye on
Carmilla for us. Thanks."
Then they were gone. Mina smiled as she watched them
drive away, Varney in his Buick and Lucy and Renfield
on a Harley. 'Sure,' she thought. 'I'll keep on eye
your precious little Carmilla.' Her eyes drifted to
cabinet containing various tools: scalpels, drills,
vises, salt, and, of course wooden stakes. After 17
years as a follower of Renfield, Mina had developed
quite a few tricks for causing pain, and she loved to
use them.
Jenny had returned in time to see everybody leave on
the junk heaps she saw their vehicles to be. Inside
the house she found only Mina, appearing over thirty
in this new world of Jenny's. She recognized the
ghoul nonetheless, how could she not recognize the
torturer. Even if her corpse was a thousand years
old.
Jenny through herself Mina, the air around her in the
Shadowlands virtually brimming with rage.
A whisper of cold wind seemed to pass through Mina
then and one of her bottles toppled over and fell to
the ground with a crash. Mina looked with annoyance
at the mess.
Jenny Simon was overjoyed; she had discovered the
first of her powers. Next time she would strike the
bitch solid, instead of passing through.
Katrina could hear Mina walking downstairs. Renfield
and Lucy were away, for two or three hours now, and
there was no reason she couldn't practice her skills
on the rather reluctant vampire. For a brief moment
Katrina considered escape, but the thought ended as
soon as it entered and she resigned herself to a night
of suffering.
Why care about her? Jenny's spirit heard. She
looked around to see if anybody was with her, but
found nothing. She dismissed it and turned to the
problem at hand. This girl couldn't seem to hear her,
no matter what. Finally, she just lost her patience
and roared out in frustration.
"Run!" whispered a voice in Katrina's ear. There was
nobody nearby, was she hearing voices now? Jenny
noticed the change and excitedly continued.
"Break through the window! Run away!" All that work
and energy for a few whispered words.
"Its boarded, I can't break it down." The footsteps
were coming up from the second floor now.
Jenny struggled to think of a way to convince the
girl to run. Before she had always stirred people
with her singing and dancing, but she doubted whether
she would be able to do such with merely a whisper.
Still it was worth a try. Jenny thought back over
the songs she knew or had written, looking for a song
of hope and determination. She focused all her heart
into the performance, dancing even when she knew
Katrina could not see her. All the other powers she
had used had manifested while she was in an extreme
state of emotion. She was counting on that, emotion
was something she knew about.
The sluggishly swirling colors around Katrina sped up
tremendously. Jenny watched entranced as red swirled
into dominance over gray and orange, and a stream of
yellow worked its way in the field. All the colors
were pale and subdued, but so was everything else in
this new world.
"You're a vampire, now. Use it." Jenny finished
with that comment, hoping it would serve to funnel the
invoked emotions into something productive. Of course
she had no real idea of what a vampire could do other
than the film mythos every American knows.
"But I'll have to come back, he binded me to him."
The voice was silent, she had said all she really
needed to, and even these small methods of contacting
the living were exhausting.
Katrina waited for a response, receiving none. Had
she ever tried escaping after she had fed? She didn't
believe so, she was usually staked soon afterward.
No, all her failed escapes had been made after torture
sessions when they thought her too weak. Maybe she
could break the boards and escape. Even if she could,
how long would it last? She was bound to Renfield by
his blood, taken over many days when only three days
would have been sufficient. How strong was the bond
truly, she did not know.
All these thoughts faded away with desperation and
fear when she heard Mina calling from the hallway
outside. If not for the words of the mysterious voice
she would still have resigned herself to torture, but
there was something new in the mix, something she
could only vaguely identify as hope.
"Guess what I've got for you, love." There's a pause
and then, "What no guess? Why then I'll have to tell
you. Its a stake, a nice sharp wooden stake. After
all we know how you feel about stakes, don't we love."
Katrina cried in blind fear and ran into the wall
facing outside. The brick held, but some of them
cracked.
"I knew you'd appreciate it." Mina was at the door
now unbarring it and preparing to unlock the
deadbolts. Katrina gave another cry, frenzying in
fear at the thought of facing a stake. The blood she
had just fed on raced through her system as she ran
into the window to the left of the wall she had hit.
For a moment it looked as though the boards would hold
and all of Katrina's efforts would have been for not.
Then they snapped, spilling her out into the
countryside. Katrina was up and running towards the
city proper as Mina cursed at her from above. Mina
rushed downstairs to the remaining car, but it
wouldn't start. Looking under the hood she found the
problem: no battery. She tripped over it as she was
backing up.
Renfield was not going to appreciate this.
The only thing that stopped Katrina's flight was the
tingle of Hunger she felt after traveling three miles
at a near sprint. She wiped the sweat off of her brow
and then recoiled to see blood on her hand. Had she
recieved an injury severe enough jumping out the
window that it hadn't healed yet? Or did she sweat
blood as she drank and cried it? A quick check proved
the latter, as no wounds could be found by her hands.
It was late at night, in three short hours the sun
would be upon her. She needed shelter, something she
hadn't used before. Fortunately, there was plenty to
be had in this area, a deserted industrial complex.
It had once been some sort of factory that had failed
and left its rotting carcass behind to scar the land.
Katrina made a minimal search of the area and found a
small office building that would be ideal for
purposes. It was a three story, brick affair. Across
the street were the remains of a recent crime scene;
she could still smell the dried blood even from where
she was. The whole thing personalized what she
currently thought of the world. Already she could
feel the blood inspired loyalty pulling on her to
return to Renfield. It was almost imperceptible, but
it was there. She had disobeyed her Sire and
regnant's wishes, and like the thrall she still was,
she began to feel ashamed. How long would it take for
that to override her true wishes?
More importantly to her, how long would it be before
she needed to feed again? How long before another
person must die to slake the Beast's...to slake her
thirst?
For the moment she laid these concerns aside as she
slipped into her daysleep, her haven as secure as she
could make it against probing eyes and burning light.
"So she escaped," Renfield commented. "She's done it
before, the blood bond has always brought her back.
It will again." Varney suscpected that some unforseen
factor had come into play. Katrina had never before
tried for the windows, much less the walls. She had
been so involved in trying to remain human that she
couldn't see her way out of the Box and waited to be
let out in order to escape.
"If she doesn't come back, then we kill her and I
find a new Carmilla." Varney doubted that as well.
His master was obsessed with the girl, and would do
anything to keep her.
Bregan couldn't get to the crime scene until late the
next day. He was kept busy filling out forms and
answering questions. Bregan rankled at being kept
back from the investigation, but he knew that this was
more necessary than the killing he had his mind set
on. This could very well keep Mike alive. Then came
his adventure with Lt. Jacobs and a discussion with
other members of his pack. They had offered their
help in his quest, and he had refused it. There was a
vampire involved here somewhere, and as much as he
would love to wipe every leech away from Gaia, the
garou of San Francisco could not afford a war with
them. The vampires held back for the same reasons,
neither side wanted their presence revealed to the
world at large.
He pulled up slowly, cautious in case a curious
passerby should spot him.
He couldn't see anybody nearby and shifted into Lupus
form. Dedicated clothes following the change, taking
the appearance of fur patterns. The grey wolf that
was Bregan sniffed the area out, producing a fairly
accurate picture of how events had taken place here
yesterday.
It was underneath the smells of gunpowder, his
brother, his soon-to-be sister-in-law, her ex-husband,
and fifteen cops that Bregan found what it was he had
been looking for.
The scent was faint, a physically young girl or woman
that smelled of the blood and fear of others. She had
crossed this parking lot and the street beyond to the
tumble down office building of a former industrial
park. She'd been carrying something plastic, a
briefcase containing a rifle maybe? Beneath all of
this was a slightly stale and old sensation that spoke
of tainted blood. The girl was a vampire's ghoul
servant, perhaps this Varney character Mike had
mentioned in his note.
The Garou followed her scent to the office building
and traced her steps, up to the roof and back down.
The animal scents of all the strays in the building
nearly shut it out, but he found it. At a first floor
window he smelled gunpowder residue. This is were the
second cop, the dead one, had been shot from, he knew
it. There was something else in the building as well,
but it seemed as if the rats, cats, and birds were
going out of their way to hide the scent. It was
there, but he couldn't recognize it, for all that it
was more recent than the ghoul assassin's scent.
He decided to search the building, just in case he
wasn't smelling things, to paraphrase.
Jaera saw the report in the paper, she didn't have
any modern conviences in her apartment, that would
give the Technocracy a foothold on her tiny bubble of
reality. She couldn't risk that for minor things like
television when she had books, video games when she
had Do, or temperature control when she had magick to
alter her body to be comfortable at any temperature.
It was unneccesary for her, though her guests found
the apartment somewhat less than pleasant.
The article wrote of how Detective Micheal Rohan, now
revealed as a member of the investigation into the
drug-lord Varney's empire, had been shot by his
fiancee's jealous ex-husband while on duty. The
ex-husband had then been killed, after he killed
another cop. The detective was listed in critical
condition at San Francisco Metropolitian Hospital.
She had an interest in this Varney, like Micheal, she
knew it's connection to vampires in the form of
novel's title. Of course it probably wasn't her
current quarry, but she could always use the
information later.
The dead cop's body was cremeated immeadiatly
following a autopsy by Dr. Emily Grange. Thereby
eradicating any possibility that the "facts" of the
autopsy would be questioned. Some of the other police
officers at the scene thought they had heard a rifle
shot rather than a pistol, but chalked it up to
stress. The fact only made the press because of the
conspiracy theory trend, the media wanted ratings.
For most people, the entire thing would seem to be a
suscpicious circumstance, but on which was easily
looked over. Jaera saw in it the kind of
"coincidence" that mages were skilled in creating
through magick. The kind of thing that could happen,
but was unlikely to actually occur. It was too
tightly wrapped up to be natural, the fiancee's report
that her ex-husband didn't seem to remember they were
divorced only heightened the artificial feeling of the
event.
Jaera knew of only one other group who were as
skilled as the mages were in causing such
coincidences. Maybe they should be called more
skilled. After all they couldn't alter reality as
mages could. Either way this was exactly the sort of
"coincidence" vampires used as well, though they
worked through minions rather than directly.
Maybe Jaera should check out this crime scene before
she went to the Shadowspot.
Jenny had been practicing, there was a splintered
tree a mile into the woods that could attest to that
fact. This time she would give that little monster,
Mina some pain. She walked into the house and
searched for the ghoul. It was Mina more than the
others that Jenny found repugnant. Looking at her was
like looking at a hole in the fabric of reality. An
aura of solid black around a thirty year old body.
Jenny passed the rotting skeleton that was Varney's
image as she went. She found Mina with Lisa near the
basement where she assume Renfield slept.
Screaming as she rammed into Mina's small form. The
ghoul literally had no idea what hit her, she just
crashed to the floor unconcious.
"What the hell is going on here!" Varney demanded as
he entered the room. Mina was sprawled out on the
floor unconcious while Lucy had drawn her gun and was
waving it around trying to find an enemy.
"I don't know!" Lucy shouted. "Mina just fuckin'
crumpled like something hit her." Mina started to
come around then.
"It's daylight, what vampire attacks during the day?"
Mina asked weakly.
"There are creatures other than vampires in the
world," Varney commented, as a teacher to a very young
child. As if on cue, the door he had come through
caught on fire. They quickly put it out, but the
desired effect had been achieved. As they turned from
the door they saw a piece of paper drop from mid-air.
On it was written: "That's enough for now - Jenny
Simon."
"We're being haunted," Lucy said unbelieving. "That
women we fed to the traitor is haunting us."
"Do you think that we have not dealt with ghosts
before?" he asked them. "It can't kill our master if
we keep a close eye out."
"But I can kill you," spoke an ethereal voice seeming
to emanate from the entire room while maintaining the
qualities of whisper. Then it laughed as it faded
out.
In the Shadowlands Jenny was exhausted.
In the physical world Varney was not impressed.
=====
"Caffeinated Kender? What's that, a berserk spell?" -
Tribble, Kender Warrior of the Celestial Kingdom
Signed
He of Too Many Names (Thrythlind/Thryth/Luke/Hyperbole/Pika/Pooka)
http://members.aol.com/thrythlind/snake.html
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