The Fetid, Humid Nights
The boy spread his wings and leapt from his perch atop
the brick and mason building. The rising drafts of heat caught in the leathery
folds of his wings and held up his small, wiry body. His eyes, with slitted
irises, cast about in the gloom of the night, surveying the inner city
landscape. Smells burned into the passages of his sinuses, a cacophony
of noises reverberated in his ears and the lights of the downtown streets
made his eyes water.
He could taste the city as well. That was the worst
part about it and often the best. The city tasted of many different things.
The first thing that came to mind, as the air sizzled on the taste buds
of his tongue, was feces. Stinking, fermenting feces. That smell was everywhere.
He could break down that smell into many different categories as well,
but he did not like to dwell on it, lest it make him sick.
The other smells and tastes were of sweat and smoke,
burnt fuel and rotten eggs, there were also the mixtures of fear, hate,
delirium and sex. The smell of sex often made his nose tickle and he would
sneeze violently in order to clear his head of that cloying, sour smell.
The sounds were always an assault after dark. The
college students didn't just congregate at the bars and dance halls and
dives, but assaulted them as they desperately sought something to do, a
release for their pent up hormones, energies, lusts and frustrations.
They were raucous in their assault, filling the
air between the buildings with noise, echoes bouncing back and forth from
one facade to the next, becoming convoluted and indecipherable.
The boy, who did not know his own name and felt
no loss for the lack of one, had always liked all these unpleasantries
for some reason. He still felt a twinge of awe at the sights and sounds
and smells and tastes. The lights, even though they hurt his eyes, captured
his attention and would tug at it experimentally from time to time.
The noise of the students below him or above him
(depending on where he was at the time) aroused desire for contact with
human flesh, for a contact and closeness that did not involve feeding.
He longed to hear the voices, to swim in the sound
of all those words and laughter and cries and roars. To hear all those
things close to his ear, instead of carried and distorted by the muggy
air.
He didn't like the taste of anything other than
blood and raw flesh. These were the staples that he had lived on for many
years now. Maybe once he had known what cooked meat tasted like, but now
he only knew the taste of warm blood as he lapped at it with his tongue.
There was a swooning experience in the taste of fresh blood that nothing
else could possibly compare to.
He had seen the beefy, loud students who drank from
their cans and bottles. There were smiles on their giddy faces and they
had trouble walking straight. Blood did not do that to the boy. The blood
was an ecstatic wash, a flooding of delight that could only possibly have
a comparison with sex, though the boy had no idea what that was like, either.
The blood drugged him, but no snowflake and no hash could have possibly
produced the same effect in any human being.
Now it was time to feed again. His body was taut
and starved for the warm, wet sustenance. He needed it and he beckoned
to it just as it beckoned to him. His perceptions were slowly becoming
hazed. He could taste blood in the air. Smell blood in the air. His eyes
saw the humid mist which clung to everything as a fine glaze of blood.
He could hear the beating of a thousand hearts. All this made his stomach
turn and it was time to stop that turning, to rest the longing, to fulfill
the desire.
The boy would starve himself from time to time.
This made his body grow weak and his head would become dizzy from hunger.
His stomach would tie itself into knots. But when his teeth finally pierced
the vein of his victim, there would be that rush, that swoon of the blood
pouring into him. It would be even sweeter because his body was starved
for the blood, for the passionate experience of feeding.
In an alleyway between high-reaching buildings walked
a single young man from the college campus. He was alone, although there
were people on the sidewalks. The night was dark and the lights from the
street lamps and the lamps that were hung high above the alley were not
enough to see by. They weren't bright enough to show the scene of the boy
sweeping out of the air behind the young man from the college. The lights
were not bright enough to show the young man falling to his knees or to
illuminate the swing of the boy's fist as he struck the head of his meal,
knocking the young man unconscious. And the lights were not bright enough
to show him dragging his meal into an alcove where they would not be seen.
The boy held up the head of the young man, turning
the face aside so that the neck was clearly exposed. The boy let his teeth
slide forward from their protective sheaths in his gum line, then bent
his own head closer to the young man's neck and opened his mouth wide,
molding his jaws into place over the tight skin of the neck.
Then the needle points of his canines broke the
skin and pushed deeper, penetrating to the vein that ran fast and hot amidst
all the meat. The blood fountained into his mouth, coursed down his throat
and filled his stomach with warmth.
The boy moaned in ecstasy as his body shivered with
the sensations. His eyes rolled up as he sucked at the blood, pulling great
bursts of the crimson joy into his body.
He lifted his head, gasping at the hot, humid air
of the late summer night. His vision was swimming with the swoon. He already
knew that he could not, would not, stop himself from gorging on this healthy
meal. He took a deep breath and prepared to go back to the freely flowing
blood when he heard someone's name being called.
He looked down the alleyway and saw that there was
another young man from the college making his way into the alley and towards
the boy and his meal. Fear and anger rose and mixed in the boy and his
lip pulled back in a quiet snarl. He did not wish to be interrupted. He
wanted to feed.
"Josh!" called the second young college man. "Hey,
Josh!--where are you man?"
Then the newcomer saw the boy and the boy's meal,
the one named Josh. The newcomer saw a hurt and unconscious Josh in the
arms of the boy. The shadows, however, hid the fact that the boy was not
what he appeared to be.
"Hey, is he alright?" asked the newcomer as he approached,
his hands reaching out to take the burden of the boy's meal from him. The
boy let the newcomer place the meal into a sitting position and let the
newcomer examine the bloody wound on the meal's neck in the dim light of
the night.
"How the hell did he get that?" the newcomer asked,
muttering the words and paying no attention to the boy. Then the newcomer
turned to the boy and gave a curt not.
"Thanks for helping my buddy," the young man said,
reaching out his hand. "My name's Rich."
Rich saw the face of the boy. His body, however,
remained cloaked in blackness. All Rich saw was the face of a young boy,
with soft fuzz on the sides of his cheeks. The lips were sensual, but not
overly ripe. A perfection of the mouth even in one so young. The hair was
black and the eyes were bright.
As Rich looked closer at those eyes he realized
that the irises were not those of a human's, but of a cat's. The upper
lip was curled in a combination of sneer and snarl. The teeth inside that
sensual mouth were not natural.
The boy moved faster than Rich thought possible
for any creature as the head and mouth snaked out and struck, biting his
hand and tearing out a gouge of meat.
Rich gave a pained, startled yelp and pulled his
hand back. Shock struck at him just as fast and just as brutally as the
boy had, cementing his body into place, his brain seizing up and refusing
to think coherently.
Then the boy stepped out of the shadows and Rich
saw just exactly what the boy was. A naked creature in a soft coat of fur
that covered him from his neck to his feet and hands; growing thick around
the groin and the crack of the buttocks, a dark stripe of fur running along
the spine of his back.
Stretched between the underside of the boy's arms
and the sides of his upper thighs and along his back, ran leathery wings,
folded to the side. This child was not human, having shed that facade long,
long ago in favor of something much more feral. A molding of human and
beast, the results of which were terrifying.
The boy pounced and aimed straight for the esophagus
of the throat, ripping it out in one fluid motion that left the intruder
choking on air and blood. The boy spit out the meat and went back at the
twitching form. He nibbled and bit and chewed. Taking just a little meat
and blood at a time. He continued to do this long after the intruder had
died; long after the meal had died.
The boy chewed raw flesh and licked at the blood
that seeped through the tissue of the muscles. When his work was finished
the intruder was bare of flesh from the top of his head to his chest, leaving
behind a glistening bust which soon darkened as the muscles dried and the
blood congealed and crusted. The boy left behind the spoiled meal and the
bloodied bust as examples.
They served as warnings to everyone that one should
never interrupt a vampire, no matter how young, no matter how small or
innocent looking, when he is feeding.
*****
Great storm clouds massed in the skies above the city,
resembling august pillars of power. From those majestic clouds sprang forth
burning forks of lightning, a roll of thunder and then the clouds opened
up and released their clean, watery tears upon the city.
The water washed away some of the filth and grime
of the streets and buildings. The rain swept away some of the sins and
fears, baptizing all those in the city, cleaning out fears, hatreds and
dark thoughts.
Even for the nameless boy it was a magical experience.
Atop one of the many roofs of the city he pranced about and grunted in
pleasure as he became wet, the hair of his body matting to his flesh. He
turned his face up to the sky, feeling the pitter patter of water against
his face, stinging his cheeks when the rain hardened and fell faster.
He opened his mouth to receive the gift of the sky,
the water sliding cool and silky down the insides of his throat. He could
digest the water, as blood was itself composed chiefly of water, quickening
the flow of the blood in his veins, invigorating him in a way not unlike
feeding.
He laughed in a grunting bark as he pranced and
was soaked and drank the clean sky water. He grew dizzy after a time and
this only made him more reckless and abandoned.
Then he felt another presence nearby him. He stopped
his prancing and spinning and looked to the side of the roof. There stood
a large figure, seemingly carved from stone. His figure was muscular, expansive
and hard. The face was chiseled and white. The eyes had a bottomless depth
to them. The boy knew that if he looked into those eyes for too long he
would be swallowed by them, that he would be drunk up just as he was now
drinking the rain.
The figure smiled, the smile gruesome in its own
distorted way. The boy felt his body quiver as he cowered away from the
man.
"I saw your handiwork the other night," the man
said. His voice was incredibly low and resonate. The sound of it shook
the boy. The smile tried to appear warm. Tried to appear friendly. But
the boy knew better. He didn't know who this man was. But he knew what
he wanted. Among the vampires there are two desires. Blood and dominance.
All vampires wanted the hot, wet blood. The more
powerful vampires desired control over their weaker kin. There was always
a great satisfaction among vampires to be able to control others of their
kind. It was a byproduct of the power that vampires inherited from the
dark gift of being undead.
"I was impressed," the man continued. He did not
move from his spot at the edge of the roof but the boy felt as though the
world was closing in around him, that the figure was drawing nearer. Near
enough to snatch and hold and imprison him.
"I would like for you to come with me," the figure
said.
Now the boy wasn't even sure if the figure was moving
his lips or if the words were simply resounding in his head, sent there
by the imposing figure's will.
"We could learn much from each other. You could
learn to more greatly appreciate what you are. Find greater relish in the
hunt and the kill and the reward of success. In return you could teach
me your tricks as well. How you can create such beauty out of disfigurement
and death. Come to me."
The words, still low, still resounding, had become
silken. The words were alluring in their own way as well. A glamour, a
charm that tickled the mind of the nameless boy, making him want to go
to the figure and be taken by him.
The figure spread wide his arms, a pale angel waiting
to receive the boy in an embrace of love and companionship. Vampires could
be so lonely, so removed from the rest of the world. But the boy was different.
He didn't mind the loneliness. As much as he might have liked to be a part
of the crowds, of the human congregation which awed and scared and sustained
him so, he had lived all of his known, unnatural life by himself. As far
as he knew, he had been the only one of his kind in the city for years.
He didn't need to be the whipping boy of another, older vampire.
The boy gave a small, almost indiscernible shake
of his head as he backed away from the figure. In the figure lay death,
pain, distrust, fear and destruction. The boy needed none of that in his
simple existence. Only freedom. Only blood.
"Come now," the figure said, taking a step forward,
his voice beginning to cajole. "You have nothing to fear from me, young
one. We will be happy together. Safe together. We belong together, the
only two of our kind in this dark and dirty city of mindless lambs."
The boy shook his head. Lambs. Lambs were dumb,
heedless. A mindless throng which secreted strays and outcasts. Lambs were
slaughtered, butchered, their blood painted over the doors of the Jews'
homes in order to be spared judgement from the Angel of Death.
The boy knew that he was only a little, stray lamb
and the figure before him, slowly advancing upon him, as if floating on
the air with arms outstretched and a double-pointed sword in his mouth,
was the Angel of Death. The angel of dark corruption and evil. An angel
which harbored a powerful thirst for blood and dominion over others of
its kind.
"We are of the same kind, springing from the same
source of darkness and unlife. We belong together, you and I, my little
artist. I can teach you how to be a great artist of the flesh."
The boy shook his head harder, his eyes going wild
with fear. Then his body became still, rigid. He gave a slow shake of his
head back and forth which ended the conversation and which delivered his
answer.
"No," he said. His voice was clear and firm. Not
like the times he had heard that word screamed and whimpered from his food.
Not like the roar that he had heard from time to time as his food fought
for survival.
The smile and the face fell. They hardened on the
man's head, becoming that chiseled stone again, losing all semblance of
animation. The arms descended back to the sides of the figure as his eyes
again tried to drink him up, swallow him whole into an abyss.
"You will be mine, my pretty little artist. My young
lamb. You will be easy to find. You are strange even in our race. A mixture
of the human and the animal. I wonder, who made you that way? I doubt if
you know. But I can find it in the recesses of your memory, of your mind.
I can do great things in another's mind. Now, come to me of your own free
will."
The figure held out his hand, as a stranger does
to a wary dog. But the last thing the boy would do was sniff or lick the
proffered hand. He turned instead and raced across the rooftop, his body
seeming to flow through the air like quicksilver.
In the space of a beat of his frantic heart he was
off, his leathery wings extended and he was pushing against the air of
the night, the rain beating down on him, water running into his eyes, dripping
off of his body. The boy coasted to another building, touched down and
ran. In a moment he was aloft again, flying through the air. He continued
to do this, running through the hot, wet night, until he crossed half of
the city and his heart felt ready to explode. He never saw the figure,
but he still felt the figure's presence.
For the rest of that night he hid, finding his way
under the streets where the cement was cooler and he could smell the earth
and city magnified. The coolness of the cement condensed the humid air
and the walls were slimy with stained water.
He didn't venture out to feed that night or the
next night or for many nights thereafter. He was too afraid to do so. Afraid
of the figure and what that figure of great power would do to him if he
were caught and bent to the strange figure's will.
Slowly the hunger pains knotted his guts as his
body quaked not so much from fear, but the weakness of hunger as he slowly
started to starve.
******
The boy caught the rat in his quick hands, careful not
to squeeze the life out of it. The thirst exciting his actions, he ripped
out the throat of the rat and sucked at the blood. He gagged on the foul
taste. His stomach turned as he threw away the carcass of the animal.
The taste was fetid, just like the air of the city
and of the sewers that he had now come to live in. Nausea washed over him
as he tried to keep his gullet down. This had been the most he had had
to live on in such a long time.
Since the night the strange figure had chased him
into the sewers he had not ventured to return above ground. He had not
fed on human blood or flesh that whole time, trying to content himself
with the creatures of the sewers.
No longer.
He made a dash for the ladder that led up to a manhole.
He pushed the cover aside and sprang back into the night, once again a
member of the world, no longer confined to his exile. He had to feed. Soon.
His body was emaciated from starvation. Running his hand along his side
he could feel each and every rib pushing through his flesh.
He gave a quiet moan at the hunger pangs which now
drove him on. The night had just reached its zenith and in the city there
were always youngsters who cavorted in the settling coolness of night.
Some would find drink and cigarettes and young mates, acting well beyond
their years.
The nameless boy found one of these youngsters,
separated from the herd and struck him down. He carried the body up to
the roofs of the buildings and bent to the neck, the child never waking
from the blow the boy had struck him. The blood was hot and clean and pure
ecstasy.
Even as he drank the child dry he could feel his
ribs sinking back into his flesh, could feel strength surging back into
his arms and legs and a new clearness shining through his mind.
"That's it, my pup, drain him dry. Slaughter the
lamb and fulfill your duties as one of the kin."
The boy turned slowly, blood continuing to trickle
from the wound at the child's throat. But now the blood went unnoticed
by the small hunter. The boy's lip curled in a sneer, the sensuousness
distorted by rage which pounded through his heart.
The figure was back and looking down at the boy
with the pleasure of success on his face. It had been less than an hour
since the boy had returned to the surface world and already he was being
hounded by this "kin."
"I've been waiting for you all these days since
you ran from me. I have kept myself well fed. I see, however, that you
have not. Something romantic in that. Fasting in order to cleanse your
spirit. Have you discovered any insights into your sealed mind? Have you
learned to say anything other than 'no'? Have you realized who your father
is?"
The boy knew what the next words were going to be
and he shook his head, hoping the man would not say them, that he would
not hear the judgement of his own destiny.
"Why do you think you are such a mutant of our race?
Did someone or something make you like this? You were born with it, my
child. Born this way after a I raped a woman, coming to her in the form
of the winged bat. And look at yourself, brown fur and leathery wings.
What else could you be other than mine?"
The boy continued to shake his head and from his
throat came the strangled sound of the single word that he knew, choking
its way past his tongue and teeth. He birthed his defiance out into the
night for his father and all other witnesses to hear.
"Yes," his father soothed as he stepped closer to
the boy. The nameless boy kept his ground over the body of his kill. He
would not run this time.
"Now I claim what is mine by right of siring you.
But first do something for me. You can hear the weak beat of that child
you hunted down. He still lives. Finish him for me. Drain him dry. Kill
for me, my son. Kill the innocence of youth for me."
The figure did not mean the innocence of the child
that the boy had dragged to this rooftop to feed on, but the boy's own
innocence. He had been commanded to take that last step into darkness,
into the evil that festered the heart. The boy would not do this for his
father, for his mother or any other manner of being. He had been free all
these unknown years and he would not sell that freedom even for blood.
He bit into his tongue, again and again. Blood welled
into his mouth and dripped over his lip, which now curled into a smile
of defiance. Defiance against his "father," against his father's commands,
against his nature and kin. He was his own creature, and he had the power
to take and to give.
A fat bead of crimson blood suspended itself on
his lip then tore away, falling between the parted lips of the child that
he had fed upon. The boy followed the bead of blood with his mouth. He
breathed blood and life into the still body, giving back a portion of what
he had taken, returning innocence to the child and to himself.
The "father's" face became hard and mean as he watched
the defiance of his only child. A child of the night world which was nothing
like the rest of his kin or like his father. The only resemblance was in
the strength of will, in the steadfast defiance.
"No matter," the man said. "You will come with me
tonight and for all nights hereafter. I will take that which is mine."
The man lashed out, hoping to swat the boy away
from the body of the child, to beat the reprimand into the small body of
his offspring. The boy was quicker, however, and darted away, his lips
covered in a mingling of both his and the child's blood.
He grinned sadistically at his father and lunged,
his wiry legs launching him through the air. His father sidestepped him,
using the same quickness. The boy landed, turned and lunged again. His
hand swept out as his father sidestepped again and his fingernails cut
into the flesh of the vampire lord.
As he landed and regarded his father he saw the
blood soaking through the fine shirt that his father wore. His father looked
down at the wound and then back at the boy and nodded his head.
"So be it. If I cannot have you, I will destroy
you." Now it was the vampire lord's turn to lunge in attack, taking the
boy down, clasped in the embrace of his arms. His teeth sank into his son's
throat and he sucked life out of his offspring.
The boy squealed in pain and lashed out, a fury
of strikes against his father's head. They were sharp and painful and the
vampire lord relinquished his hold on the boy. Stepping back he wiped the
boy's blood from his mouth and licked it from his fingers.
The boy touched the wound in his neck. He looked
at the blood on his fingers. He could smell it, the smell of it driving
him into frenzy. He licked his fingers clean and prepared to launch another
attack, his legs bending beneath him, the muscles coiling, preparing to
launch his body.
"Come then," his father said in his low voice, spreading
wide his arms. "Come to me or destroy me. They are the same choice."
Feral fury rose in the boy's throat as his body
lunged into the chest of his father. His father tried to grasp him, hold
him. The boy was quick, however, not trying to plant his teeth in the neck
of the man, but lashing out with his fist again.
He beat the face of his father. His fist hurt as
bones in his knuckles cracked and the skin broke, trailing droplets of
blood in the air. Again and again he struck, his father unable to still
him. Finally the vampire lord fell to the cement roof, his head forced
back by his son as he fell. The back of his skull impacted against the
pure hardness and the visions of the stars in the heavens above sank out
of view as his consciousness was eclipsed, swallowed by night.
******
The vampire lord swam slowly and painfully back into
wakefulness. Above, the sky which had been dark and filled with stars when
he had fallen was now growing light, the sun on the eastern horizon threatening
to show itself.
There was a wetness on his neck and at first he
didn't understand what it was. He looked down the length of his body and
saw the eyes of the boy looking back at him. Their faces were so close.
Close enough to fill the vampire lord with fear of his own offspring. Wet
blood glistened on the sensuous lips and a grin of solemn vengeance lighted
across the boy's face.
The boy's father twisted away. He felt weak. How
much had the boy drank of his own blood? How much of his strength was already
in his son?
"We will continue this another night," his father
said, preparing to take his leave from the roof.
Beside him the body of the child his son had hunted
lay, the chest rising and falling rhythmically with life. The vampire lord
reached down to collect the child. He would drain the child to regain some
of his lost blood and strength.
His son, however, would have none of that as he
dashed forward and kicked out his father's legs, splintering the bones
beneath the hard flesh. With a cry the man fell again. His son hauled him
up by the hair, forcing him to sit on his haunches, his legs bent beneath
him. The pain from the fractured bones singed through the vampire lord.
"The sun is rising, you whelp! We'll both die in
the gaze of its fiery eye!"
The father could not see the satisfied grin on his
son's face. The orb of fire crested the horizon, pulling itself upwards
with a speed that seemed impossible. The vampire lord struggled with the
hands that held his hair. He could not tear free. He jerked forward, hoping
to break the grasp, but his son jerked him back, tilting his head back
to receive the supplications of the sun. The boy's father chuckled.
"So be it, then. We will die together in the light
of judgement."
Now the boy laughed at his father. The father realized
with despair that he would be the only one to die with the birth of morning.
His son was, after all, half human. The hair of his body covered his flesh
and his leathery wings were not frail. Only the lord would die with the
coming day. Then the sun stared into him, cleansing the earth of his existence,
sweeping his unnatural life from him in a blaze.
The boy released him as his body burst into flame,
a single last groan of pain and foolhardiness escaping his throat before
he became ashes stirred by the morning breeze.
The boy closed his eyes and tilted back his head,
feeling the clean warmth cascade over him. The orange-tinged fur of his
body brightened and his wings grew harder under the heat. His head swam
with the breath of day. The child that he had hunted stirred and moaned.
Then he opened his eyes and saw the strange boy standing over him, an amused
smile on his lips.
The boy held out his hand to the child and helped
him up. Gathering the child in his arms he jumped down to the ground and
carried the child to the shade of a tree. The boy touched the face of the
child who was his own size, his own age. In return the child touched the
boy's face as they shared in something that neither one of them could understand
but which the strange boy described with a single word.
"Innocence."
Then the boy was gone, moving faster than the eye
could follow. Slipping once more under the streets, he went back into hiding
for the remainder of that day. He slept in the tunnels beneath the streets
with his body curled like that of a fetus, safe and secure in secrecy.
That night he traveled again to the roofs of the
buildings and looked over the throng, there was still longing in his heart
to be a part of them but he was sated for now by the touch of his prey
upon his cheek and his touch upon the child's. For now all he needed was
his freedom, sustenance from time to time and the smell of the fetid, humid
nights.
"The Fetid, Humid Nights" is Copyright © 1997 Jason A. Beineke
and the Jabberwocky Studios
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