NM--Chapter 5
Chapter 5
“Are you Allison Cameron?” Angel repeated to the dumbstruck doctor. He could feel that she wasn’t a vampire. “We don’t have a lot of time here.”
She blinked. “That depends. Are you planning to kill me?”
He wrinkled his forehead. Saving people was becoming harder and harder. When did everyone become so jaded? “No. I’m here to save you if you’re so inclined.”
She glanced over at where the dead woman was. “I think today’s a good day for a knight in shining armor.” She shrugged. “Or in very expensive leather, I guess.”
She was glib. Sharp. He liked her.
But those deep, brooding thoughts about insecurity would have to wait until later. “My team and your friend Wilson will be here any minute at the front entrance. We’ll wait until I hear them, and then we’ll come out fighting.”
She gulped. “We?”
He handed her a stake. “I can kill most of them, but they will want to protect you from us, so you’re going to have to fight them off.” He took her hand and held it to his chest. He whispered, “If they are close enough, shove this hard right here into their heart.”
She was so close to him that she expected to feel his breath on her face. She didn’t. Looking into his eyes, she said, “I can’t kill anyone.”
He grabbed her by the shoulders. “They aren’t people. And if you’re too afraid to kill, you’ll be killed.”
She nodded. Angel heard a noise. “Here they are.”
He opened the door.
They weren’t in the apartment.
But Drusilla was.
She stood in front of the door. “Hello, Daddy. Have I been a bad girl? Will you spank me?”
Angel took a split second to decide whether he should fight it out now or bide time. He started talking. “Haven’t seen you in a while, Dru. What have you been up to?” he talked to her like he had just run to her in the melons section of the grocery store. He had created her, had made her insane. He knew how to control her. Mostly.
Drusilla smiled, her eyes looking up at the ceiling as if hearing or seeing something no one else did. She rubbed her skin. “I had to heal, Angel, from the burns you gave me. The birdies cried when you set me on fire.”
“I’m sorry about that, Dru. I was rash. You know how Darla always made me.”
She raised her brow in recognition. “Ah, Grandmummy. You always loved her more than me.”
Angel smiled. Internally, he hoped his friends were still alive. “But you were always my favorite girl.”
She giggled, sliding her hands down her blood red dress seductively. “The walls told me you want to save the girl, Angel. She has been saved.”
Cameron hid behind Angel, gripping his jacket sleeve. Screw atheism and intelligence. She was seriously ready to start praying.
“Why do you want this girl, Dru?” Angel stepped closer to her, like a trainer would come to a lion. “You’ve never cared this much before about humans to raid a restaurant before. Unless it was just for fun.”
Drusilla bounced on the balls of her feet like a girl on Christmas morning. “The moon whispers, Angel,” she said secretively. “The moon wants her soul.”
He gripped the sword at his side. “Why?”
She smiled, “No, no silly boy. The moon only tells me. He doesn’t want you to know.”
“You realize you’re a complete wack-job, right?” Faith was standing in the front doorway. Keen, Kate, and Wilson were standing behind her. “Angel, I know you’ve done some pretty messed up crap in your day, but this was beyond necessary.”
“Kill them!” Drusilla shrieked before Angel kicked her hard in the stomach, knocking her across the room.
There were only about a dozen vamps left, but they were willing to die for their master. Most of them charged at Angel first. Angel gave Cameron a hard shove, pushing her back into the bedroom. With one solid movement, he slammed the door shut and then jumped over the group of vampires, beheading two with his sword before they had time to turn back around. One spun, kicking him in the head. Angel fell to the ground. As hard as he could, Angel kicked the vamp in the kneecap, breaking its leg. He jumped up and dusted it, staking another with the stake attached to his wrist.
Drusilla went after Faith. She had slit a Slayer’s throat once with her sharp fingernails and she wanted to do it again. She found Faith’s eyes and made her focus, hypnotizing her. “Come here, little girl.”
Faith froze, entranced in Drusilla’s dark eyes. Dru’s hand went up. Wilson elbowed Drusilla in the kidneys. As she keeled over, Faith hit her between the shoulder blades with the butt of her axe. Dru fell to the ground and as soon as no one notices, slid out of the room crying and mumbling.
Keen and Wilson staked the few remaining vamps. Once the fight was over, they stood in the dust and sweat, breathing hard.
Angel opened the bedroom door. Cameron was sitting by the bed, stake gripped in her hand.
“We’re going to need some place to hide her until we figure out what’s going on,” Keen said.
Kate pulled back her hair. “I’d offer my apartment, but every vamp in town knows where that’s at.”
Wilson put his hands on his hips as he often did. “I know a place.”
……………………………………
“What are you doing here?” Cuddy rested her head on the doorjamb and wrapped her robe tighter around her body.
“I’m stalking you now. Haven’t you heard?” House twirled his cane as he stood there, pretending to wait for an answer.
She sighed. Cuddy wasn’t even going to try to fight him tonight. Turning, she stepped further into her apartment, leaving the door open to let him walk through. “Are you here to sling sexual entendres,” she said then turned to face him in all confidence, “or are you finally going to get the backbone to actually have sex with me like we all know you want to?”
“You know, tonight I finally was going to make you want to play “Stairway to Heaven” all night long, but Wilson went on a date with Cameron and-"
Cuddy laughed, cutting him off. “And you can’t take it that your two favorite puppies are chewing on a new bone.”
House looked at the ceiling in pain. “What does that mean?”
Cuddy put her hands on her hips. “I’m alone on a Friday night. I’m nearly forty years old. I’ve had a few drinks, okay.”
“Wilson said that Cameron has been taken and will probably be killed.”
She swayed from the alcoholic and the shock of the abruptness. “What?”
House nodded. “By vampires.”
She blinked at him in silence. Then she bust out laughing. “Vampires? Cameron was taken and will be killed by Dracula?”
He sat down on the couch. “Dracula was never mentioned.”
Waving her arms in confusion, she asked, “Are you messing with me?”
“This time, I can honestly say that I wish I was.” He rested his chin on his cane and frowned. “Wilson was with a group of people with weapons. And the skanky, hot one in leather told me to get lost.”
Cuddy knew somehow that he was being honest. But nothing made sense. So she stayed quiet and let him go on.
“I don’t know what to do. I can handle rare diseases because there is reasoning in them. There’s no reason in this.”
Cuddy took a deep breath and sat down next to him. “Not everything has reason, House. I know you expect it to, but that’s just not the way it is. That’s just the way you want it to be.”
He saw Cameron’s dead eyes and began shaking. “I just can’t sit here and let her die!” he shouted.
She stayed calm. “Why did you come here?”
He stood and started pacing. He wanted to lie, to hide as he always did, but he didn’t have time to do that now. “Because I’ve lost Wilson. Because I can’t help Cameron. And because even though I give you hell on a daily basis, you know how to deal with a crisis.”
Her draw dropped. She had received a compliment from House. The world must really be crashing down around him. Just as she was about to start rambling a plan, House’s cell phone rang.
“Hello?”
Wilson sounded out of breath on the other line. “House, we’re going to need a safe-house. We need your help.”
TBC