Path of the Vampire forum

{OOC note: This thread takes place immediately after The Conversation }


<Deagan> Deagan McNamara had been chatting with the young woman named Dhara at the Voodoo Cybercafe. They had been discussing the existence of vampires. It had been a surreal topic to say the least, in no small part due to the fact that this was not some theoretical what-if conversation, imagining a world where people rose from the dead to suck the blood of the living. No, Dhara had assured him that she had cold hard proof that vampires were real. And now she had just offered to show him things that would cement his belief in the existence of the supernatural. Right now in fact, at this very moment. Deagan would have to think fast. He hadn’t expected the conversation to take this sharp turn from talking to action quite so quickly. Was he ready for this? He had to be. If there were risks involved, they were worth it. It was all worth it to get closer to the truth. He set down his coffee cup on the table, and gathered up his coat. “I’m ready when you are. Lead the way.”

<Dhara> She looked him over, then drained her coffee and set the mug down. Sliding out of her chair, she grabbed her satchel and slung it over her head, adjusting the crossbody strap and resting the bag against her hip. She gazed at her companion and then headed for the door, knowing he would be right behind her. The walk wasn’t far from the cafe to her chosen spot to enter the sewers. The small building was brick, unassuming with a metal door. The lock had been broken years ago. She looked around, and then gave Deagan a tight smile before pulling the door open.

Slipping inside, she tugged her companion in and pulled the door shut. “Even though it’s daylight, it is still better not to draw attention to yourself.” She said softly, letting her eyes adjust to the dim interior. The single bulb that burned barely made a dent in the darkness, but she’d been through this passage so many times it didn’t matter. She could go through here literally blind and still find her way. “There’s a ladder, just there…” she said, pointing to the spot. “I’ll go down first and meet you at the bottom. Try to be as quiet and careful as you can.”

She lead by example, gathering her long skirt in one hand, she moved with wraith like silence to the ladder. Her blue hair slowly disappeared as she descended into the unknown darkness beneath the streets. As soon as she reached the bottom, she moved aside and called up in barely more than a shouted whisper. “Come now, Deagan!”

<Deagan> Where was she leading him? He had followed in silence as she lead him away from the cybercafe. Actions spoke louder than words, and she had chosen to take a chance on him, to take action by showing him the secrets of Harper Rock. He would not slow her down or insult her intelligence right now by harassing her with questions as well. Of course, Deagan knew he was taking as much of a risk as she was. He only knew Dhara from conversations on the internet and one meeting in person, the one that they were still continuing at this moment as they walked down the street to an unknown location. Still, if she meant him harm, it was a rather contrived way to go about it. So he made a choice to trust in her just as she was choosing to trust in him,

They arrived at a nondescript brick building with an unmarked door. It was most definitely a location that Dhara was familiar with, as she passed through the door with the obvious confidence that it would open easily for her. Deagan once again followed with question. He has barely inside before she disappeared again from sight, descending down a ladder in the dimly lit room. From the smell, there was no question where it lead. Good god, they were going down into the sewers! Deagan took a calming breath. There was no sense dwelling on the diseases that might be festering in that tunnel (as well as the fact that he would have to dispose of his shoes and pants when it was over). This is what he had signed on for, and he was going to pursue this lead to the bitter end. When she told him to come, he did, grabbing a cold iron rung and descending to meet her in the tunnel below.

<Dhara> She gave him a small smile, moving a bit to make more room for him. The ledge they stood on kept them both out of the muck floating by in a brown stream. The smell was one she’d become accustomed to, but she imagined it was difficult for Deagan if he’d never come down here. Digging into her bag, she pulled out a small jar of vicks vapor rub and offered it to him. “A little of this just under your nose helps with the smell.” She said softly. Her voice was low as she watched him, then looked around them.

“There are people down here. Harmless to us… if you don’t mind the nudity and tattoo’s…” She chuckled softly at that, mostly because it still made her blush every time she encountered the naked Paladin’s in the murky depths of the sewers. “They claim they are Paladins and they claim they can give you great powers to hunt vampires.”

She began walking away, slowly so he could keep up in the dim light and slippery passageways. And yet confidently, because this was the way she went home every single night. She no longer needed the tiny chalk marks, barely visible on the walls, to guide her way. “Sometimes you will see them… the vampires I mean. They fight the other ones… I’ve never seen them loose. The vampires that is. They kill them…” She trailed off, thinking about the night she witnessed a vampire rip the head clean off one of the Paladins. She never told anyone what she had seen. Even now, she didn’t tell Deagan all that she had seen. She knew that the less he knew the safer he was. And yet, here she was, leading him into the QZ like two lambs to the slaughter.


<Deagan> Deagan was appreciative of the Vicks that Dhara had offered him. He placed a dollop under each nostril. The smell of menthol was vastly superior to the gag-inducing odor of the sewers. As he followed her carefully on the ledge (he did not want to fall in) he continued to marvel at the tales she was telling him. The rhythm of their steps and the water dripping off the walls all seemed be in time with her words as she described naked paladins and vampires duelling in these man-made tunnels underneath Harper Rock. What would he do, he wondered, if a naked man approached him in the sewers and offered to teach him how to fight vampires? Probably call the police, he mused. And yet, if vampires were real, why not also these so-called paladins? Weren’t they, in a sense, allies against the vampires. Then again, he wasn’t even really sure that vampires were real, or that it was a vampire who had killed his wife. Though the evidence certainly seemed to be piling up.

He wanted to ask her how all this could be happening, vampires killing paladins (as that was how she said the battles tended to go, not terribly encouraging that was) and leaving their naked corpses in the sewers, without some sort of police awareness or involvement? But he recalled the look she had given him the last time he had mentioned calling the police, back at the Voodoo Cybercafe, and decided not to bother bringing it up again. Apparently, the police of Harper Rock were either ignorant or powerless or both, when it came to dealing with vampires.

And here he was, following Dhara through what sounded like one of the vampires’ regular hunting grounds. He really hoped she knew what she was doing. He decided to ask a different kind of question:

“Have you ever accepted their offer? The paladins? Don’t you want to be able to defend yourself against the, uh, vampires?”

If he was going to continue having these conversations, he was going to have to get over his hesitation, and simply embrace the fact that, at least as long as he was talking to Dhara, vampires were real.

<Dhara> She shuddered delicately as he mentioned fighting and shook her head. “I don’t fight. At all. Not ever. Just the thought makes me ill.” And true to her word, she looked a little more pale than she had previously. “Besides, would you hand over ten thousand dollars to a strange, naked woman in the sewers? I know I wouldn’t.” She looked over her shoulder at him and smiled a little. “I know it probably seems silly, not wanting to fight, all things considered. But I just can’t….”

She started to say more, but paused and held a hand out to stop him as well. Peering around the corner, she sucked in a breath and looked at him. She placed a finger against her lips and motioned for him to look around the corner. One man and one woman fought, and gunshots rang out, causing her to flinch and her ears to ring. It was almost impossible to hear her when she whispered to him. “The one on the left is a hunter… the one on the right is a vampire… see how she moves to fast you can’t hardly see her?”

She inched back so he could look around her at the fight that was taking place. She didn’t want to watch any more and she was glad that they would be going the other direction. She just hoped that her companion would take her at her word and stay out of it, because it would cost his life if he didn’t.

<Deagan> Ten thousand dollars? Now he knew he would have called the police. And he could certainly relate to Dhara’s pacifism. Deagan was no fighter himself. He wasn’t sure what he would do if he ever encountered his wife’s killer.

However, that thought was interrupted by Dhara coming to a sudden halt, and a sound that was absolutely unmistakable, a loud popping noise that rang out through the echoing walls of the sewers. As Dhara quietly described the scene, Deagan wondered if he was ready for this. He steeled himself for what he was about to see, and edged along the grimy wall to the junction in the sewer line. His eyes widened as he cautiously peered around the corner. Two individuals were indeed fighting. One was wearing a wide brimmed hat and leather duster. He had drawn down on another, a woman with dark hair and kohl eyes . She was dressed stylishly, and, Deagan thought, rather inappropriately for the sewers. And yet, despite the fact that, to the casual observer, this was would be a case of an armed criminal assaulting an unarmed woman, it became obvious very quickly that the “victim” actually had the upper hand. As the man fired his pistol, the other suddenly moved so quickly that Deagan could barely see her, until she reappeared right next to her assailant. With one hand she reached out, grabbed him by the collar and flung him bodily down the tunnel into the darkness. Deagan heard the hunter land with a splash somewhere out of sight. Then the woman, whom he had previously assumed was unarmed, suddenly drew a hand gun from somewhere under her shirt, and began firing down the tunnel as she stalked towards her opponent.

Deagan ducked back around the sewer wall. He realized he was breathing heavily, and there was sweat on his brow. And why not. He had just watched the world go insane right before his eyes. Like something out of a movie. Only, like the zombie he and Nesa had encountered the other night, the stark reality of it put any CGI special effect he had ever seen to shame.

“That...does that happen often? Here in the sewers?” he whispered to his companion. He didn’t know what else to say. He was trying to remain rational, and plying Dhara, who had obviously seen this sort of thing before, with hyperboles like “incredible” and unbelievable” seemed rather redundant and a waste of time. He took another breath, and asked one more question.

“Why do they fight?”

<Dhara> She pressed a finger to her lips again, then wrapped a tiny hand around his wrist. Her fingers didn’t even meet, but it was enough to tug him along in complete silence. The hunter was going to die, and she didn’t want herself or Deagan to be any where near that fight when it was over and the vampire wanted blood to heal. Once they were around the corner, she released him and spoke quietly once more.

“Because vampires and humans are mortal enemies. I mean sure, some of us get along really well. But vampire secrecy is paramount. Top of their list of things you do not tell. And whatever is up with those hunters, they can seem to tell right away when a vampire is around and they just go nuts.”

She blew out a breath with a soft sigh and looked around, relaxing her shoulders slightly when no new noises came to her ears. “Sometimes you just kind of have to wait it out because they are right where you need to be. And not all of them care about having a snack on your nice warm blood. We’re like walking juice boxes and the only thing we’re missing is a straw.”

She fell silent as they walked, her eyes scanning constantly for new threats or anything else that might be useful. “Sometimes you have to even find new ways to get where you need to be. But luckily for us, we’re almost there.”

<Deagan> Deagan absorbed Dhara’s words as they walked through the damp and stinking tunnel. It made a certain amount of sense. Of course, the only way for vampire’s to remain a myth in the eyes of most modern humans would have to be a strict adherence to secrecy. And of course, that meant the sacrifice of any who might risk exposing them. He still did not quite understand why the humans who were aware of the vampires’ existence, these hunters and paladins, did not tell other people, people in a position of authority. But then, he supposed, they themselves were probably those who were considered to be on the fringes of society. He thought of how many vampire conspiracists, UFO sighters, and crypto-zoologogists he had encountered on the internet, and summarily dismissed as nut jobs. Again, he imagined a naked person approaching him and offering to teach him how to kill vampires for ten thousand dollars, and what his reaction would be. It certainly wouldn’t be to call up the president and the marines.

As Dhara told him they were close to their destination, Deagan wondered what horrors they would encounter next. The sewers of Harper Rock had become in his mind, something akin to Dante’s levels of Hell in The Inferno. He considered for the briefest of moments that maybe Emily was better off not having to live in a world in which such creatures existed. He chastised himself immediately for thinking such things. Nothing could make up for the fact that Emily, at least the living, breathing version of her, would never again be by his side. With the steely determination of a man possessed, he trudged on towards the next revelation.

<Dhara> She paused at the base of a ladder and looked up, able to see a small sliver of light. “Wait here…” She said quietly. Once more she gathered her skirt and scampered up the ladder. At the top, she struggled with the manhole cover, sliding it back inch by slow inch until there was enough room for her to get out. Sitting on the ground, she used her feet to shove it further back so he could come through. Checking their surroundings, she looked down and motioned for him to come up. The area was clear of zombies for now.

Moving to the side, she waited for him to join her, finding a kerchief in her bag so he could wipe off the Vick’s when he got topside. The crisp fall air was refreshing and she let it wash over her as she waited, though she was still intently focused on their surroundings. The abandoned quarter where she’d taken him was a spooky place, even in the middle of the day. But the things she had to show him would make even the scariest haunted Halloween house look like child’s play.

<Deagan> As he clambered up the ladder after her, Deagan was more relieved than he could have imagined at the prospect of emerging from the darkened tunnels once more into the sunlight. It was like being reborn. As a folklorist who had read his fair share of works by Frazer and Campbell, the irony was not lost on him. He stood there on the day lit pavement and for the first time in what felt like forever, actually revelled in the simple prospect of being alive.

As he glanced at his companion, he noticed that Dhara seemed cautious. A quick look around at his surroundings confirmed why she would be feeling that way. Though rundown and obviously uninhabited, the buildings around him had an eerie familiarity to him. In fact, he realized, he actually recognized this area, knew it from memories of his own childhood growing up in Harper Rock, from before the horrors had come to his hometown. This was the area of the city formerly known as Gambondale. They were in the Quarantine Zone.

<Dhara> She smiled as he made it to the surface and offered him the kerchief before she started walking. The first place she was heading was to her apartment building. And while she wouldn’t take him upstairs, and infact, they probably wouldn’t go inside, she would have him at least peek through the door to see the zombies and feral vampires lurking about in the lobby. Getting home was always a challenge, and some nights it took hours to creep her way across the lobby to the elevator.

“You are a native, I am sure you recognize this place. We’re heading to Corvidae Flats… that’s the new high rise that was built here. People do live in it. Humans, vampires and… other things. And there’s more things in here… in this area, that I want to show you.”

<Deagan> It was still Harper Rock, but it might as well have been the surface of Mars. As they walked through the streets of Gambondale, familiar sights like the old multiplex were offset by the large and imposing wall off to the east, the one the military had erected after the “outbreak.” And then of course, there was the fact that everything was utterly deserted. An odd smell hit his nose, a different odor than that of the sewers he had just made his way out of, but equally, if not more, unpleasant.

As they passed an abandoned building that might have once been some sort of hospital or asylum, Deagan saw a swarm of flies buzzing around above the high grass of the building’s overgrown front lawn. That and the smell told Deagan everything he needed to know. There was definitely a dead body resting just out of sight in the high weeds. Deagan had no desire to investigate further, and moved on, dutifully following Dhara as she led them to the high rise apartments that had appeared in front of them, growing incrementally larger with each step they took. Within minutes they had reached Corvidae Flats.

<Dhara> She lead him to the doors, then opened one so they could peek in, like naughty children looking where they shouldn’t be. She motioned to the zombies shambling around and the occasional feral vampire. “I live in this building… “ She said as they looked through the doors. “I’m so glad Zombies can’t use the elevator. And those thingies… those are Feral Vampires. A friend once told me that they are like… zombies who ingested vampire blood somehow…” She shivered, she couldn’t help it.

“At least the rent is cheap…” She said jokingly as they looked inside. She moved slightly so he could get a better look at the elegantly done lobby filled with the shambling undead. “I have no idea how they get in here. But I know other vampires come and hunt them. Sometimes there’s only one or two in there, sometimes a lot more. And the smell isn’t exactly roses and sunshine.”


<Deagan> She was right about that. If the smell from outside the abandoned asylum had been bad, then this was infinitesimally worse. The lobby of the apartments was a charnel house. Deagan came close to retching for a few moments, but thankfully held it together. He did not want to risk any noise attracting the attention of the lobby’s occupants.

As he peeked through the opening of the door, Deagan recognized the shuffling and lumbering of the risen dead immediately. Though he had encountered a zombie before, it made it no less difficult to comprehend what he was seeing now, especially as they were now assaulting his senses en masse. That same sick horror crept over him as he watched that which should not be moving move, under what compulsion he could not imagine, though Deagan knew in his guts that if one turned its head towards him and stared him down with lifeless eyes, it would most certainly want to kill him.

As Deagan continued to watch in sick revulsion as the scene unfolded, a zombie walked straight into a plush chair formerly meant for entertaining guests of the residents of Corvidae Flats. It toppled over the piece of furniture, and struggled to right itself, rotting legs kicking in the air, little bits of flesh flying off of them. It appeared to be stuck, and like a dog that wraps its leash around a pole; the simple mechanics of what was left of the zombie’s brain seemed incapable of grasping the physical laws required to untangle itself from the chair. The sight was almost comical, like a Laurel and Hardy bit, if not for the horrifying circumstances surrounding it. Then, without warning, a man appeared from the shadows, dark haired and in a well-cut suit. He walked up to the undead monstrosity, drawing a pistol, and without hesitation, put a bullet in the creature's brain. The stranger knelt down, and with a wicked looking knife, removed the zombie’s ears and placed them in a pouch. Then he moved on, to the next walking corpse, obviously intent on doing the same thing and ending this zombie's sick semblance of life just as he had just done with its compatriot.

Deagan pulled back from the cracked door and huddled against the wall. Despite the fact that the stranger was in the process of dispatching zombies, Deagan was fairly certain that it would be a bad idea to be seen by him. In fact, he strongly suspected the man was another vampire. He quietly hissed to Dhara, “There’s someone else in there!”

<Dhara> “There usually is.” She said calmly, then peered through the door he had abandoned, watching quietly. She recognized the man inside, though she didn’t know him by name. She watched him for a few moments more, then eased the door shut and moved away, taking Deagan by the sleeve and forcing him to come with her. The poor man looked shaken and she felt guilt flare to life. She didn’t want to do this to him. To rip away the veil of safety that most people had.

Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a bottle of water and cracked it open, holding it out for the man who stood before her. The next thing she was going to show him would be even worse than the zombies and for a moment, she doubted she should even take him. “I… do you want to see more?” She asked softly, giving him the chance to back out. He could decide if he wanted to see more. She had already destroyed his reality a little bit at a time tonight, now it was up to him if he wanted to take the plunge all the way into crazy.

<Deagan> Deagan accepted the water gratefully. It seemed to help wash away some of the bitter taste in his mouth, a flavor he would classify as “slowly losing one’s mind.” He wasn’t sure what Dhara meant by “more,” but he knew immediately what his response would be. There was no turning back at this point. Like Macbeth, he was “so far steeped in blood that… returning were as tedious as go o’er.” Apparently the bitter end had not yet been reached.

“Show me,” was all he said, as he put the cap back on the bottle and rose to his feet.

<Dhara> She took a bottle out for herself and cracked it open, drinking deeply as they walked. She was leading him to the ramshackle supermarket. Anything that was lootable had been taken a very long time ago and the smell of rotting milk and meat was mostly gone. She moved carefully, stepping through the broken glass on the door rather than opening it. She moved to the left and pressed herself to the wall, letting her eyes adjust. She could hear Deagan following close by.

Her breathing was shallow and she didn’t speak. Instead, she tugged his sleeve, then pointed when he looked at her. Half way across the market was the singularly most grotesque thing she had ever encountered. Misshapen mouth, too many eyes, a gaping maw of razor sharp teeth. Arms where legs should be, legs where arms went. More appendages than any creature had a right to. It was a thing straight out of nightmares.

<Deagan> He thought perhaps they were going to see more zombies, maybe even another vampire. He could have never predicted the sight that was about to permanently burn itself onto his psyche.

He recognized the building they were approaching as a supermarket, perhaps one he had even stopped into as a child, with his parents, or as a teenager while roaming around town in the restless way that all teenagers do. He suspected that more horrifying undead hijinx awaited inside the building. He imagined a zombie who had become trapped in the frozen food aisle, an icicle hanging from its rotting nose. It was all nonsense of course, a game his brain was playing to help him deal with the waking nightmare he currently found himself trapped within. His own gallows humor.

As the crept through the opening of what had formerly been the supermarket’s automated doors, Deagan cringed as a piece of broken glass cracked under the weight of one of his shoes. Then Dhara tugged at this arm. For a moment he flashed back to the darkened factory, and Nesa tugging at him, trying to pull him away from the horror that waited in the deep shadows, just out of sight. However, this tugging was of a nature that was in complete opposition to that experience. It was not meant to shield him from terror. It was meant to plunge him into it head first.

Deagan looked across the shadowy and decrepit remains of the supermarket. There was something there. At first he felt that perhaps his eyes were having trouble focusing in the dim light. With an awful flash, he realized that what was in his line of sight was being observed with perfect clarity. In that moment, Deagan McNamara almost passed out.

Bracing himself against the store window at his back, he let the unfathomable wash over him in ghastly waves that threatened to beat him senseless. Which, all things considered, might have been a relief. The creature made no logical sense at all. It was a Cubist painting come to nightmarish life, one with deadly fangs and claws protruding at obscene angles. He stared at it for what felt like an eternity, then finally he dared make a sound. “I can’t…” he whispered to Dhara, motioning her towards the exit. He had to get out of this building. Before he lost all reason and ran out screaming. Before he lost his mind.

<Dhara> She felt a wave of sympathy for the man and tucked her hand into his. Human contact had healing benefits, or so ‘they’ claimed. Whoever ‘they’ were. And perhaps it would be some small comfort to have the tiny spot of warmth nestled in his larger hand. Her grip was tight, giving way to a surprising strength. One that most musician’s had, really, but that always caught people off guard given her petite stature.

Firmly, she held his hand and lead him out the way they had come. She was simply thankful the creature hadn’t seen them. It was worse when they spotted you. Chased you. Made your heart feel as if it would burst free from your chest and leave an empty hole. She knew, though, that what she had done was strip away Deagan’s innocence. Perhaps the last little bit of it he had. He couldn’t hide in the shadows, safe from the reality of Harper Rock any more. Like a stone tossed in a river, she had permanently altered Deagan’s life, even if you couldn’t see it from the outside.

“I’m sorry…” She finally said, after they were outside and she had led him to a relatively safe spot, well away from the market. “They say seeing is believing, but I do not think there is any way to prepare for that.” She looked up at him, and in that moment, there was an age and a wisdom in her brilliant amber eyes that belonged to someone much older than her apparent age. There were stories in the honied depths, secrets lurking below the surface. She gave a soft sigh and spoke again, her accented voice seemed to be the harbinger of bad news today. “I am told there are things worse than that. Things seemingly born of shadows and nightmares… I am told they got even worse in recent months.”

<Deagan> Deagan grimaced. If there was worse than that, then he didn’t want to see it. He had reached the extent of his sanity’s elasticity. Anything more would cause it so simply snap. He seemed to notice her hand in his for the first time, and blushed. Of course, with everything else as upside down as it was, it made perfect sense for the seemingly slight young girl to be providing strength and comfort to the older man. If there was one positive about this looking glass universe he had stumbled into, it was that gender and age biases were being tossed to the wind along with any other preconceived notions one had about how the world worked.

Deagan took a deep breath, appreciating being out of the building that housed that nightmare. Even in the midst of the Quarantine Zone, the sunshine had a comforting effect, like an anathema the helped to numb his mind against the incomprehensible horror he had just bore witness to. Turning to Dhara he asked her, “How do you stand this? You said you live here. You must experience this nightmare every day. And yet you seem so calm?”

<Dhara> She kept her hand tucked in his but loosened her death grip on him and shrugged slightly. “Some of it I do, some of it I don’t. Those things in there… those are pretty rare.” She smiled up at him. “Honestly when I first moved to this city, I didn’t know any of it. But after some crazy things happened, I was lucky enough to have some very good, very honest friends to turn to.” She brushed her hair from her eyes with a quiet sigh and looked around. “It’s much more terrifying at night.” She said honestly. “I try to be home before the sun sets.”

She looked around, glad it was still the light of day, though she couldn’t help the shiver that slid down her spine. Living where she lived, knowing what she knew, people would often question her sanity. They often kept telling her to get the hell out of town, and yet here she was. For the first time ever she had friends. She had a second chance at a relationship, and now she was educating someone else on the horrors that lay beneath the surface. Her hand tightened on his without thinking, as they stood there in the heart of the worst part of the city.

<Deagan> Deagan smiled at his new friend. If the shared experience of this nightmare world had not confirmed for him that that was what they now were, then her small hand in his certainly did. So this was the reality they lived in now. Creatures from the darkest depths of hell were real, and had crept out of their noxious holes to invade the natural world.

And yet, there was comfort in the fact that others knew about the things that went bump in the night, and had learned to live with that knowledge. The human race was truly an amazing species, adapting to each new challenge as it came. If Dhara could endure, and even thrive, in this horrorscape, then so could he. Deagan looked to the sun, thankful for the warm rays which kept at least some of the monsters at bay. At the same time, he felt a creeping dread that went down his spine. It was the dread that came from knowing that that same sun would eventually set. It was a dread of the night that was to come. For the first time since he was a child, Deagan McNamara was afraid of the dark.