INDIFFERENCE, Chapter 48
Vamps, finally, sorry for delay. Here it is! Hope you enjoy. The images are the icon is by heather and because I wanted to keep the same "look" for this post all three images are by Sandi. Enjoy.
THIS ENTRY IS INTENDED FOR ADULTS AGED 21 OR OLDER. MAY CONTAIN SCENES OF GRAPHIC VIOLENCE OR EXPLICIT SEX. DO NOT OPEN UNLESS YOU ARE AGED 21 OR OLDER.
***
“Your skin is flawless,” the makeup girl suspends her powder brush above my cheek. “No pores, no wrinkles, no blemishes. I’ve never seen such perfect skin except on children.”
“Clean living,” I say with a smile. She giggles. She wears a tight t-shirt across her ample bosom. The shirt reads, “Bite me!” in letters written in red dripping font above a profile image of…me. I guess I should be used to this, but I am not. I suppose I am something of a pop culture icon at the moment, and I find that terribly amusing.
A year ago, two years after my initial meeting with Will The Senator, I published what became a bestseller called, “I, Vampire”. The book was more or less a sanitized autobiography. Many hated it, some loved it, others were just cynical about it, but it made me a lot of money. I donated most of the proceeds to the SWS, Shadow World Society, a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing those of us on the other side of the supernatural spectrum into the light.
The book didn’t reveal the true structure of our society, the breeders, the slayers, how we reproduce our kind, and it glossed over the aspect of murder with a heavy emphasis on how vampires can survive on the blood of animals. I didn’t reveal how we leave no trace, how the deaths we cause are never attributed to vampirism, or the lyrical beauty of the hunt and the kill.
After all, I am trying to break into your society. If I were honest about things, you’d come after us with weapons of mass destruction. So I played to your fantasies and made us seem like romantic creatures who are deprived of normal relationships since you are so short lived, and are thus doomed to find what comfort we can from our own kind. Living off animals the same way you do makes us seem ever so much less frightening. If only it were true.
The one thing I was very clear about was that a vampire’s bite cannot give you a long life. For the most part that is true, and I didn’t want us to be hunted down for the ability to prolong your life on earth. I said there was an unusual coincidence of factors required to create a new vampire and no one had isolated a winning protocol. A lie, yes, but it quells your terror of the grave and quest for longer lives.
Step by step, we are worming our way into your culture. For the most part, you are letting that happen. We want our rights, equal to yours. We swear no harm will befall you at our hand. We lie, again, of course, but then so do you. The deft legerdemain of my book was but a start.
“You’re very pale,” the makeup girl observes. “You may glow in the harsh lights in the studio. Maybe a little pancake for color?”
I grip her wrist gently to stop her. She doesn’t pull away. I say, “I’d rather not darken my face like a new world minstrel. Let my skin glow, if it must. I’m not trying to be something I am not.”
Slade huffs at that from his safe seat out of view of these well lit mirrors. He knows. He knows this whole persona I project is not who I am, and he also knows you could never tolerate the naked truth, the killer within, the blood worshipper. The monster. The man he loves.
She holds up a pot of translucent powder. “It’s colorless, just cuts the shine in case you should get hot out there.”
“Don’t bother. I never sweat.”
“Never say never,” Slade says. The girl looks nervous when she acknowledges my lover. He is less accessible to humans than am I. They sense the predator in him, the blood lust, the vampire, and they fear it just as much as I savor it.
“He’s the one, isn’t he?” She whispers to me. “Your pairing partner? Like in your book?”
I nod. “He is that, among other things.”
“I guess I’m done,” she says with a smile and then asks me to sign her t-shirt, which I do with a Sharpie she pulls from a pocket.
No need to wear the little tissue necklace to keep my collar clean, I wear no makeup to soil my shirt. I glance in the mirror and smooth my dark hair with my palms.
“Handsome devil,” Slade teases me and I laugh as I look over my shoulder at him.
“Just so you think so.”
I am soon to do my first televised interview. I chose from the many requests, a vastly popular woman who had a slavish following around the world. If I could get her on my side, the cause would make tremendous progress. Of course if she turns on me, we may have a problem. My job is to ensure that does not happen.
“I don’t want you in the audience,” I tell him. “It will make me nervous to know you are sitting there. You can watch it from the green room. Is that good?”
He shrugs. “I dinna like to be that far from ya. What if something happens?”
I smile. “Do you think this woman will suddenly go mad and plunge a stake into my heart on national television?”
He gives me a flat glare. “It might be funny if not for all the hate mail ya receive at your publisher’s office every day.”
“That’s just part of the glare of fame, Slade. For every fan there is a fanatic.”
“They’re all fanatics,” he grumbles. “Just wi’ differing passions.”
He is wise as well as sexy as hell. The sound man mikes me and I notice he wears a very prominent crucifix that catches a gleam of light. He is nervous around me and I rest the golden cross on my palm. “What beautiful workmanship,” I observe, as he freezes in my crosshairs. “Italian?”
Did he expect it to burn an indelible mark in my palm? Obviously he didn’t read the chapter in my book about myths. “You don’t have to touch the mic or speak into it, just ignore it,” he says, as he ignores my inquiry, anxious to get away from me as quickly as he can.
I nod, give my lover a wave and follow one of the assistant directors to the wings of the stage. Seated on the comfortable couches with the larger than life hostess of the show is a medical doctor whom I think of as Dr. Z because his real name is a string of unprounceable consonants.
I agreed, at the request of the hostess, to submit to a bevy of medical tests that were supposed to show I was just like everyone else and my whole vampire story is pure sideshow. I signed a release so he could discuss the results and I reckon the tests didn’t turn out as expected. I agreed to this out of my own curiosity as well as to ensure good television and perhaps spur another printing of my book.
After her introduction, that included the doctor’s flawless credentials, he began his evaluation. There was an MRI, other imaging, even dental x-rays, blood work and various seriology tests, a bone density scan, a stress test, that was a joke as it was anything but stressful, and even a urine sample.
“In a nutshell, doctor, did the tests come out mostly normal?” she cuts to the chase.
“None of it was normal,” he responds, bringing a gasp from the audience.
“In what way?”
“One way of looking at the results would be that Mr. Trueblood is a man who is on the verge of imminent death, if not for the fact he appears to be a remarkably strong and vital young man.”
“How do you mean?”
The doctor shakes his head. “I can’t reconcile the findings. This is new to me. A moribund heartbeat that doesn’t pump often enough to keep his mind and body coursing with blood, suggests imminent death. A body temperature eight degrees below normal for a human being tells me this is someone who has already departed. Yet he demonstrated one hundred per cent or better lung capacity, the ability to undergo either a chemical or active stress test with no apparent effect on his body, no sign of stress or fatigue, very little change in his heartbeat or respiratory levels. While he has a slim physique, he can lift weights a professional bodybuilder would envy, again without any sign of stress or effort. This is not what we would place within normal parameters.”
“You make him sound like Superman!” She gets a laugh from the audience with that remark as the doctor shrugs.
“I don’t know what Superman’s physiology would show, but this man is definitely unique.”
“Same number of fingers, toes…” she gives the camera a salacious look. “Everything?”
The doctor smiles. “For all appearances, externally, he is a healthy young man of thirty or so. His pallor suggests anemia or other progressive blood condition and yet there is no pathology or symptoms. His blood type shows traces of an A positive factor, but it has mutated into a group like none other. He fits none of the known blood classifications. Look at this,” the screen flashes a skeletal version of me, zeroing in on my thigh bones, as he says, “The density of his long bones is more than twice that of a normal adult male. His cartilage shows no sign of wear and tear, which is impossible in an adult, and his bone marrow is double the productive marrow in an adult male.”
“Which means what?”
“Which means it’s as if his body is immune to the usual ravages of time. Double insulated from wear and tear, if you will. His vision and hearing are off the charts. He has no perceptible body fat, rather he has a surplus of heavy muscle. This is perhaps most interesting of all.” The screen flashes my dental x-rays and the doctor explains, “His teeth show no sign of corrosion, but look at this.” He uses a pointer to follow the thin, crescent arc of my razor sharp fangs in retraction. “Do you see this extra set of needle like incisors? They can come down from this position to be revealed right here, much like a cat can retract its claws. And they are hollow and connected to a sac that cannot be explained. The hollow point and sac are not unlike those of a poisonous snake, the method by which venom is dispersed.”
For the first time, the hostess looks a little tense. “Can that be implanted?”
“It’s in the soft tissue and bone and even if such things could be implanted surgically, the retraction factor is impossible to duplicate, and the sac does not exist in humans. Finally, look at his MRI.” The screen shot changes. “All the usual organs are in perfect condition, no sign of disease or aging, but the thermal map of his body shows he is consistently well below a register of body heat sufficient to sustain life.”
“So, doctor, what do you conclude?”
“I would have to say he is a medical marvel and one of a kind.”
“A vampire?”
The doctor smiles. “I’m not saying that. I can only say his medical tests demonstrate he is well outside what the medical community has established as the spectrum of what we accept as defining the human body. Usually we measure deviations from the norm as a pathology, an illness, and the greater the deviation, the more serious the illness. In his case, his deviations are not the result of an illness and instead of endangering his body, they seem to strengthen and improve it.”
“When we come back,” she says to the camera. “You will meet the man himself and draw your own conclusions.”
This is my cue. I am introduced after the commercial break as “Bryant Trueblood, the man who claims to be a vampire”.
There is applause, but also some boos and even a few hisses. The response causes me to smile. I take their negative reaction as proof of their fear and suspicion. I shake hands with Doctor Z, who moves down a slot, and she says. “You are gorgeous! Am I right, ladies? This is no Bela Lugosi!”
There is more applause, and I say nothing as I settle into the glare of lights and the artificial setting. “Thank you for joining us, Bryant.”
“Thank you for having me,” I reply and as soon as I speak there is a gasp from the audience. I’m not sure why. Is it my British rather than Transylvanian accent?
“What do you think of the doctor’s evaluation of your physical condition?”
“I think I’m in pretty good shape for a man who is over three hundred and twenty years old.”
More laughter as she asks, “Doctor, is that possible?”
He shrugs. “Not for what we have traditionally identified as human, no. The oldest living humans have been, perhaps, 120 years old, and they were as frail and elderly as one would expect them to be.”
“I understand that,” I turn my gaze on him. “But then, I am not a traditionally identified human, am I?”
“No, you are not,” he agrees. “But I am not prepared to accept you are over three hundred years old, either.”
“Where were you born, Bryant?” She asks.
“Sidmouth, a coastal town in Devon, England. I provided my lineage in my book, as far as I knew.”
“You said in your book that your mother and brothers died of Black Plague. How did you escape it?”
“Given the symptoms I recall, I think it is more likely that my family died of pneumonic plague. It spread very quickly and they died fast. Why my father and I avoided it, I have no explanation. Why did the plague spare anyone? I can only assume some were immune and others were lucky. Remember, there was virtually no medical care as we would define it today. People think of the Great Plague of the medieval age when they study this dread disease, but there were many pockets of plague for hundreds of years and it still exists today. Living in the country, we were less likely to be exposed than those living in squalid conditions in the cities, and yet it did wipe out my family.”
“You indicated those who had lived through a plague were perhaps the strongest of the vampires. Do you know why?"
“No, but it seems to be true.”
“Your book was very obscure about how you became a vampire, can you tell us more?”
“Such as?”
“You say it happened in Morocco when you were twenty and a member of the British Navy. Who was it? How did it happen? How did it feel?”
“Who it was matters very little as he is no longer living. How? No one can be sure why some become vampire and others do not,” that is a lie, but only a grey one. The fact is we can’t be sure how breeding works or why some survive the conversion while others die. Or why some become breeders while most do not. “The transition is very painful. Most do not survive.”
“Painful? In what way?”
“High fever, convulsions, hallucinations, severe cramping and muscle pain. It’s a long and dangerous process. Few make it. It’s truly excruciating.”
“How long does it last?”
“Days, for some,” I think of breeder fever. “Not so long for others.”
“Did you ask to become a vampire?”
“I had no knowledge of what being a vampire meant, so no.”
“Now that you know, would you seek it?
”
I pause. “Sometimes yes, other times, no. But it is what I am, so I make the best of it.”
“How long can you live?”
“I don’t know. There are many older than I.”
“How many of you are there?”
I smile. “Not nearly so many as there are people in Sandusky, Ohio.”
Laughter and then she says, “How big is Sandusky anyway?”
“Twenty-seven thousand, give or take. We are a fraction of that number.”
“Do you know how many vampires exist?”
“I do. We have our own little census.”
“Where do you live?”
“Me, personally?”
“Yes, and vampires as a whole.”
“I live in London, for the most part, and we vampires are everywhere. Every continent, except Antarctica. Too cold.”
“Can you reproduce?”
“Not the old fashioned way,” I say with a smile. “We’ve gone the way of the mule in that regard. We are all sterile.”
“So sex is out?”
“Oh no. Only reproduction. Sex is most definitely not out.”
Giggles in the audience and then she asks, “You have what you called a pairing partner, what we might call a life partner. Does that mean you are gay?”
“We don’t acknowledge labels such as straight or gay or bisexual. We accept sexuality as a spectrum of pleasures and emotions. Gender is of no importance to us. My pairing partner is male, but there have been others before him, some of whom are female. When you live a very long life, the whole concept of mating for life becomes ludicrous. And before you become too judgmental of us, in your world a fifty year relationship is considered remarkable, especially considering your divorce rates. In my world, that is a courtship.”
She laughs and I can tell I am charming her. This is what I hoped for. “Bryant, you say in your book that your kind can live off of animal blood. Are you suggesting you have never killed a human as food?”
“Food? We don’t eat your flesh and suck your bones. Do we drink your blood? It has happened.”
“Do they die? Or can they survive your bite?”
I fix my gaze on hers. “Not speaking of my bite, personally, but if you mean can a human survive a vampire’s bite, I would say no, not often.” The truth is they do survive in the breeding ritual. Sometimes.
“How many humans….” I reach over and take her hand and her question freezes in her throat as I mesmerize her with my intensity.
“Let us not talk of ancient matters, of deaths as distant as the plague, of brutal necessity. Your ancestors were less than stellar in their treatment of fellow human beings, especially when their victims were of a different skin color or religious affiliation. History was written by the time in which we all existed. But now, we have alternative methods of nutrition. There is no need to seek blood from living things. Thus, there is no need for fear among humans.”
She is so deep under my control, that I have to give her hand a little shake to bring her back. She says, “Why now? Why come out of the shadows now? And are there others in those shadows with you that we have long believed are fable?”
“Now because the world has shrunk. There are few shadows in which to hide. And the world is sick. We have lived long and seen much and can offer suggestions that may not occur to modern man to help heal that illness. As for your other inquiry, if there are others, I can only say…”
“Say yes!” A strong voice from the audience. I look out and smile as I see Alberic stand and walk towards the stage. He is dressed in modern street clothes, grey trousers and a navy jacket, his crisp pale blue shirt worn without a tie. Security guards move towards him and I stand and say,
“Let him through. Don’t try to intervene.”
Alberic takes one levitating leap and he is center stage while the audience emits an audible gasp. “Who are you?” She manages to ask, taking in his handsome face, pixie ears and dangerously beguiling smile. He takes her hand and kisses above her knuckles as he responds,
“I am Alberic, Lord of the Sidhe, King of the Faeries and keeper of the old wisdom. I am an old, old acquaintance of the young vampire, here, and I bring you perspective from the land of dreams and dragons and pixies and gold.”
“In other words,” I say with a wry smile at the interloper. “He’s a fairy.”
Our host can only stare from one of us to the other, and call for a commercial.
THIS ENTRY IS INTENDED FOR ADULTS AGED 21 OR OLDER. MAY CONTAIN SCENES OF GRAPHIC VIOLENCE OR EXPLICIT SEX. DO NOT OPEN UNLESS YOU ARE AGED 21 OR OLDER.
***
“Your skin is flawless,” the makeup girl suspends her powder brush above my cheek. “No pores, no wrinkles, no blemishes. I’ve never seen such perfect skin except on children.”
“Clean living,” I say with a smile. She giggles. She wears a tight t-shirt across her ample bosom. The shirt reads, “Bite me!” in letters written in red dripping font above a profile image of…me. I guess I should be used to this, but I am not. I suppose I am something of a pop culture icon at the moment, and I find that terribly amusing.
A year ago, two years after my initial meeting with Will The Senator, I published what became a bestseller called, “I, Vampire”. The book was more or less a sanitized autobiography. Many hated it, some loved it, others were just cynical about it, but it made me a lot of money. I donated most of the proceeds to the SWS, Shadow World Society, a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing those of us on the other side of the supernatural spectrum into the light.
The book didn’t reveal the true structure of our society, the breeders, the slayers, how we reproduce our kind, and it glossed over the aspect of murder with a heavy emphasis on how vampires can survive on the blood of animals. I didn’t reveal how we leave no trace, how the deaths we cause are never attributed to vampirism, or the lyrical beauty of the hunt and the kill.
After all, I am trying to break into your society. If I were honest about things, you’d come after us with weapons of mass destruction. So I played to your fantasies and made us seem like romantic creatures who are deprived of normal relationships since you are so short lived, and are thus doomed to find what comfort we can from our own kind. Living off animals the same way you do makes us seem ever so much less frightening. If only it were true.
The one thing I was very clear about was that a vampire’s bite cannot give you a long life. For the most part that is true, and I didn’t want us to be hunted down for the ability to prolong your life on earth. I said there was an unusual coincidence of factors required to create a new vampire and no one had isolated a winning protocol. A lie, yes, but it quells your terror of the grave and quest for longer lives.
Step by step, we are worming our way into your culture. For the most part, you are letting that happen. We want our rights, equal to yours. We swear no harm will befall you at our hand. We lie, again, of course, but then so do you. The deft legerdemain of my book was but a start.
“You’re very pale,” the makeup girl observes. “You may glow in the harsh lights in the studio. Maybe a little pancake for color?”
I grip her wrist gently to stop her. She doesn’t pull away. I say, “I’d rather not darken my face like a new world minstrel. Let my skin glow, if it must. I’m not trying to be something I am not.”
Slade huffs at that from his safe seat out of view of these well lit mirrors. He knows. He knows this whole persona I project is not who I am, and he also knows you could never tolerate the naked truth, the killer within, the blood worshipper. The monster. The man he loves.
She holds up a pot of translucent powder. “It’s colorless, just cuts the shine in case you should get hot out there.”
“Don’t bother. I never sweat.”
“Never say never,” Slade says. The girl looks nervous when she acknowledges my lover. He is less accessible to humans than am I. They sense the predator in him, the blood lust, the vampire, and they fear it just as much as I savor it.
“He’s the one, isn’t he?” She whispers to me. “Your pairing partner? Like in your book?”
I nod. “He is that, among other things.”
“I guess I’m done,” she says with a smile and then asks me to sign her t-shirt, which I do with a Sharpie she pulls from a pocket.
No need to wear the little tissue necklace to keep my collar clean, I wear no makeup to soil my shirt. I glance in the mirror and smooth my dark hair with my palms.
“Handsome devil,” Slade teases me and I laugh as I look over my shoulder at him.
“Just so you think so.”
I am soon to do my first televised interview. I chose from the many requests, a vastly popular woman who had a slavish following around the world. If I could get her on my side, the cause would make tremendous progress. Of course if she turns on me, we may have a problem. My job is to ensure that does not happen.
“I don’t want you in the audience,” I tell him. “It will make me nervous to know you are sitting there. You can watch it from the green room. Is that good?”
He shrugs. “I dinna like to be that far from ya. What if something happens?”
I smile. “Do you think this woman will suddenly go mad and plunge a stake into my heart on national television?”
He gives me a flat glare. “It might be funny if not for all the hate mail ya receive at your publisher’s office every day.”
“That’s just part of the glare of fame, Slade. For every fan there is a fanatic.”
“They’re all fanatics,” he grumbles. “Just wi’ differing passions.”
He is wise as well as sexy as hell. The sound man mikes me and I notice he wears a very prominent crucifix that catches a gleam of light. He is nervous around me and I rest the golden cross on my palm. “What beautiful workmanship,” I observe, as he freezes in my crosshairs. “Italian?”
Did he expect it to burn an indelible mark in my palm? Obviously he didn’t read the chapter in my book about myths. “You don’t have to touch the mic or speak into it, just ignore it,” he says, as he ignores my inquiry, anxious to get away from me as quickly as he can.
I nod, give my lover a wave and follow one of the assistant directors to the wings of the stage. Seated on the comfortable couches with the larger than life hostess of the show is a medical doctor whom I think of as Dr. Z because his real name is a string of unprounceable consonants.
I agreed, at the request of the hostess, to submit to a bevy of medical tests that were supposed to show I was just like everyone else and my whole vampire story is pure sideshow. I signed a release so he could discuss the results and I reckon the tests didn’t turn out as expected. I agreed to this out of my own curiosity as well as to ensure good television and perhaps spur another printing of my book.
After her introduction, that included the doctor’s flawless credentials, he began his evaluation. There was an MRI, other imaging, even dental x-rays, blood work and various seriology tests, a bone density scan, a stress test, that was a joke as it was anything but stressful, and even a urine sample.
“In a nutshell, doctor, did the tests come out mostly normal?” she cuts to the chase.
“None of it was normal,” he responds, bringing a gasp from the audience.
“In what way?”
“One way of looking at the results would be that Mr. Trueblood is a man who is on the verge of imminent death, if not for the fact he appears to be a remarkably strong and vital young man.”
“How do you mean?”
The doctor shakes his head. “I can’t reconcile the findings. This is new to me. A moribund heartbeat that doesn’t pump often enough to keep his mind and body coursing with blood, suggests imminent death. A body temperature eight degrees below normal for a human being tells me this is someone who has already departed. Yet he demonstrated one hundred per cent or better lung capacity, the ability to undergo either a chemical or active stress test with no apparent effect on his body, no sign of stress or fatigue, very little change in his heartbeat or respiratory levels. While he has a slim physique, he can lift weights a professional bodybuilder would envy, again without any sign of stress or effort. This is not what we would place within normal parameters.”
“You make him sound like Superman!” She gets a laugh from the audience with that remark as the doctor shrugs.
“I don’t know what Superman’s physiology would show, but this man is definitely unique.”
“Same number of fingers, toes…” she gives the camera a salacious look. “Everything?”
The doctor smiles. “For all appearances, externally, he is a healthy young man of thirty or so. His pallor suggests anemia or other progressive blood condition and yet there is no pathology or symptoms. His blood type shows traces of an A positive factor, but it has mutated into a group like none other. He fits none of the known blood classifications. Look at this,” the screen flashes a skeletal version of me, zeroing in on my thigh bones, as he says, “The density of his long bones is more than twice that of a normal adult male. His cartilage shows no sign of wear and tear, which is impossible in an adult, and his bone marrow is double the productive marrow in an adult male.”
“Which means what?”
“Which means it’s as if his body is immune to the usual ravages of time. Double insulated from wear and tear, if you will. His vision and hearing are off the charts. He has no perceptible body fat, rather he has a surplus of heavy muscle. This is perhaps most interesting of all.” The screen flashes my dental x-rays and the doctor explains, “His teeth show no sign of corrosion, but look at this.” He uses a pointer to follow the thin, crescent arc of my razor sharp fangs in retraction. “Do you see this extra set of needle like incisors? They can come down from this position to be revealed right here, much like a cat can retract its claws. And they are hollow and connected to a sac that cannot be explained. The hollow point and sac are not unlike those of a poisonous snake, the method by which venom is dispersed.”
For the first time, the hostess looks a little tense. “Can that be implanted?”
“It’s in the soft tissue and bone and even if such things could be implanted surgically, the retraction factor is impossible to duplicate, and the sac does not exist in humans. Finally, look at his MRI.” The screen shot changes. “All the usual organs are in perfect condition, no sign of disease or aging, but the thermal map of his body shows he is consistently well below a register of body heat sufficient to sustain life.”
“So, doctor, what do you conclude?”
“I would have to say he is a medical marvel and one of a kind.”
“A vampire?”
The doctor smiles. “I’m not saying that. I can only say his medical tests demonstrate he is well outside what the medical community has established as the spectrum of what we accept as defining the human body. Usually we measure deviations from the norm as a pathology, an illness, and the greater the deviation, the more serious the illness. In his case, his deviations are not the result of an illness and instead of endangering his body, they seem to strengthen and improve it.”
“When we come back,” she says to the camera. “You will meet the man himself and draw your own conclusions.”
This is my cue. I am introduced after the commercial break as “Bryant Trueblood, the man who claims to be a vampire”.
There is applause, but also some boos and even a few hisses. The response causes me to smile. I take their negative reaction as proof of their fear and suspicion. I shake hands with Doctor Z, who moves down a slot, and she says. “You are gorgeous! Am I right, ladies? This is no Bela Lugosi!”
There is more applause, and I say nothing as I settle into the glare of lights and the artificial setting. “Thank you for joining us, Bryant.”
“Thank you for having me,” I reply and as soon as I speak there is a gasp from the audience. I’m not sure why. Is it my British rather than Transylvanian accent?
“What do you think of the doctor’s evaluation of your physical condition?”
“I think I’m in pretty good shape for a man who is over three hundred and twenty years old.”
More laughter as she asks, “Doctor, is that possible?”
He shrugs. “Not for what we have traditionally identified as human, no. The oldest living humans have been, perhaps, 120 years old, and they were as frail and elderly as one would expect them to be.”
“I understand that,” I turn my gaze on him. “But then, I am not a traditionally identified human, am I?”
“No, you are not,” he agrees. “But I am not prepared to accept you are over three hundred years old, either.”
“Where were you born, Bryant?” She asks.
“Sidmouth, a coastal town in Devon, England. I provided my lineage in my book, as far as I knew.”
“You said in your book that your mother and brothers died of Black Plague. How did you escape it?”
“Given the symptoms I recall, I think it is more likely that my family died of pneumonic plague. It spread very quickly and they died fast. Why my father and I avoided it, I have no explanation. Why did the plague spare anyone? I can only assume some were immune and others were lucky. Remember, there was virtually no medical care as we would define it today. People think of the Great Plague of the medieval age when they study this dread disease, but there were many pockets of plague for hundreds of years and it still exists today. Living in the country, we were less likely to be exposed than those living in squalid conditions in the cities, and yet it did wipe out my family.”
“You indicated those who had lived through a plague were perhaps the strongest of the vampires. Do you know why?"
“No, but it seems to be true.”
“Your book was very obscure about how you became a vampire, can you tell us more?”
“Such as?”
“You say it happened in Morocco when you were twenty and a member of the British Navy. Who was it? How did it happen? How did it feel?”
“Who it was matters very little as he is no longer living. How? No one can be sure why some become vampire and others do not,” that is a lie, but only a grey one. The fact is we can’t be sure how breeding works or why some survive the conversion while others die. Or why some become breeders while most do not. “The transition is very painful. Most do not survive.”
“Painful? In what way?”
“High fever, convulsions, hallucinations, severe cramping and muscle pain. It’s a long and dangerous process. Few make it. It’s truly excruciating.”
“How long does it last?”
“Days, for some,” I think of breeder fever. “Not so long for others.”
“Did you ask to become a vampire?”
“I had no knowledge of what being a vampire meant, so no.”
“Now that you know, would you seek it?
”
I pause. “Sometimes yes, other times, no. But it is what I am, so I make the best of it.”
“How long can you live?”
“I don’t know. There are many older than I.”
“How many of you are there?”
I smile. “Not nearly so many as there are people in Sandusky, Ohio.”
Laughter and then she says, “How big is Sandusky anyway?”
“Twenty-seven thousand, give or take. We are a fraction of that number.”
“Do you know how many vampires exist?”
“I do. We have our own little census.”
“Where do you live?”
“Me, personally?”
“Yes, and vampires as a whole.”
“I live in London, for the most part, and we vampires are everywhere. Every continent, except Antarctica. Too cold.”
“Can you reproduce?”
“Not the old fashioned way,” I say with a smile. “We’ve gone the way of the mule in that regard. We are all sterile.”
“So sex is out?”
“Oh no. Only reproduction. Sex is most definitely not out.”
Giggles in the audience and then she asks, “You have what you called a pairing partner, what we might call a life partner. Does that mean you are gay?”
“We don’t acknowledge labels such as straight or gay or bisexual. We accept sexuality as a spectrum of pleasures and emotions. Gender is of no importance to us. My pairing partner is male, but there have been others before him, some of whom are female. When you live a very long life, the whole concept of mating for life becomes ludicrous. And before you become too judgmental of us, in your world a fifty year relationship is considered remarkable, especially considering your divorce rates. In my world, that is a courtship.”
She laughs and I can tell I am charming her. This is what I hoped for. “Bryant, you say in your book that your kind can live off of animal blood. Are you suggesting you have never killed a human as food?”
“Food? We don’t eat your flesh and suck your bones. Do we drink your blood? It has happened.”
“Do they die? Or can they survive your bite?”
I fix my gaze on hers. “Not speaking of my bite, personally, but if you mean can a human survive a vampire’s bite, I would say no, not often.” The truth is they do survive in the breeding ritual. Sometimes.
“How many humans….” I reach over and take her hand and her question freezes in her throat as I mesmerize her with my intensity.
“Let us not talk of ancient matters, of deaths as distant as the plague, of brutal necessity. Your ancestors were less than stellar in their treatment of fellow human beings, especially when their victims were of a different skin color or religious affiliation. History was written by the time in which we all existed. But now, we have alternative methods of nutrition. There is no need to seek blood from living things. Thus, there is no need for fear among humans.”
She is so deep under my control, that I have to give her hand a little shake to bring her back. She says, “Why now? Why come out of the shadows now? And are there others in those shadows with you that we have long believed are fable?”
“Now because the world has shrunk. There are few shadows in which to hide. And the world is sick. We have lived long and seen much and can offer suggestions that may not occur to modern man to help heal that illness. As for your other inquiry, if there are others, I can only say…”
“Say yes!” A strong voice from the audience. I look out and smile as I see Alberic stand and walk towards the stage. He is dressed in modern street clothes, grey trousers and a navy jacket, his crisp pale blue shirt worn without a tie. Security guards move towards him and I stand and say,
“Let him through. Don’t try to intervene.”
Alberic takes one levitating leap and he is center stage while the audience emits an audible gasp. “Who are you?” She manages to ask, taking in his handsome face, pixie ears and dangerously beguiling smile. He takes her hand and kisses above her knuckles as he responds,
“I am Alberic, Lord of the Sidhe, King of the Faeries and keeper of the old wisdom. I am an old, old acquaintance of the young vampire, here, and I bring you perspective from the land of dreams and dragons and pixies and gold.”
“In other words,” I say with a wry smile at the interloper. “He’s a fairy.”
Our host can only stare from one of us to the other, and call for a commercial.