Passing the Baton

[daniel_stacy]

Daniel stood at the foot of the alley and frowned.

His vampire senses were keenly attuned to the difference in the air; that was the word he ascribed to the electric charge and chemical scent of a narrow passage that should smell like piss and garbage. After getting a note at Ragnarok, he felt obliged to show up and at least see what all the fuss was. Daniel understood that some kind of magical door to hell had opened and demons were sporadically coming through. People were needed to stand guard. And do what, Daniel didn’t really know; intervene? Take notes? Roll out a welcome mat?

There was a girl leaning against the wall, arms crossed, legs long and straight.

He pulled on his earlobe and cleared his throat. “I’m Daniel,” he said. “I got a message.” He watched her push away from the concrete block wall and approach him. An unknown chill went down his back and then he saw the stake in her hand and figured out why. He raised his palms. “Whoa… I didn’t come here for that.”

“Relax,” she said. She stowed the weapon in a band around her leg. “I’m Rhiannon. Normally you and I wouldn’t be so friendly, but right now we’ve got bigger concerns.” She straightened up. “For all we know, the creatures that came through that door rip off vampire faces, too, and something tells me you like yours.”

Daniel scowled.

Rhiannon tipped her head. “Am I wrong?”

“No,” he said, on the defense because it sounded like an insult, except that nobody in his right mind would want his face torn off Texas Chainsaw Massacre style. “No argument here.”

“Good.” Rhiannon fiddled with a blocky gadget with a rubber antenna. “Besides, I know your friend Holly. She asked me specifically not to stake you.” She turned a knob and the speaker crackled.

“Oh. Oh!” He brightened and stood up straighter. “Well, um… what do you need? I’m not all that combative.”

“You’re good enough. Here.” She handed him a heavy walky-talky and a pack of extra batteries. “Radio if you see anything weird and one of us will answer. Then pass it to the next person when you’re through. Someone will be here before sunrise. Did you bring a weapon?”

Daniel brandished a tire iron he pulled from his car trunk and a butcher knife from his kitchen.

Rhiannon’s mouth puckered with some kind of humor the vampire didn’t get. “Okay.” She shook her head. “Don’t worry. Probably nothing will happen. I staked a vampire who came sniffing, but that’s it. The portal’s been quiet.”

“Comforting.” Daniel craned his neck and looked at the gap in the wall, the painted line around the border.

“Yeah. Well.” Rhiannon patted her pockets to make sure she had keys. “I think that’s it. So… thanks for showing up.” It felt too weird to thank a vampire, so she cut around him and headed toward the parking lot. “Later, Daniel.”

“Later.” He watched her go, then he settled into the spot Rhiannon had vacated and wished he’d thought to bring a book.

Comments

[daniel_stacy]

It took all of forty-five minutes for Daniel to go stir crazy in the alley. He had paced its length, scaled a wall and observed from on high, sat on the asphalt until his ass went numb, and sang I Wanna Be Sedated to himself in English and rudimentary Spanish. Anything to keep from staring into that black abyss in the wall, a darkness so thick it seemed to move.

The vampire thumbed through a phone book and found the number for Solomon's Scrolls. He fed the phone a quarter and dialed. A feminine voice picked up.

"Hey, is Melody there?"

[melodymagic]

"It's for you," Jazz said, handing the phone to Melody as the older witch headed back to the workbench and continued preparing some things to take to the alley where what sounded like a portal had opened.

She muttered to herself, grey-haired head bobbing up and down as she finished grinding some sage before tipping it into some small hessian bags.

Melody put the phone to her ear, a little puzzled as to who would be calling so late.

"Hello?"

[daniel_stacy]

“Melody! It’s me, Daniel. Stacy.” Like that clarified things. Had he ever told her his surname? Only now did he realize it was odd to call a woman he barely knew at her workplace, especially considering his undead state. He squinted towards the other end of the alley. Still alone.

“You will never guess where I am right now.”

[melodymagic]

Mel recognised his voice and giggled softly when he gave his surname. "Hello Daniel Stacy, and you're right, I probably never will," she replied, glancing across at Jazz whose hearing was excellent for someone of her years.

"Where are you?"

[daniel_stacy]

“I,” he lowered his voice like they were co-conspirators, “am in an alley next to a convenience store.” There was a beer cap under his shoe, crushed flat but still scraping metallically in the quiet. He squatted to pick it up and turned it over in his fingers. Coors. He could use a beer right now, but that meant leaving his post and going into the store. Good guys, bad guys, whatever, Daniel felt halfway useful to somebody right now and he wasn’t planning to fuck it up in the first hour.

"Now ask me what I'm wearing. Kidding, I'm kidding."

[melodymagic]

She couldn't help but giggle again when he said he was kidding. "And why are you in an alley next to a convenience store and calling Solomon's Scrolls?" she asked, actually wondering why he had, but secretly thrilled and trying not to let that show in her voice and trying to mimic his.

[daniel_stacy]

“I’m in the alley because there’s an inter-dimensional portal out here and I’m supposed to watch it and see if anything comes out. I’m calling you because you know magic. And trust me, this is definitely magic. Spooky, too.” Not for the first time, Daniel put up a hand to feel the otherworldly draft coming from the doorway.

[melodymagic]

Melody's eyebrows shot up and she looked across at Jazz, the older woman turning her head slightly when she heard Mel's small gasp.

"Really? That's the one next to the market? A man came in here a little while ago and told us about it, and Jazz and I are coming over. She's just getting some things ready."

[daniel_stacy]

It was Daniel’s turn to look surprised. “Really? That’s good. The girl said somebody would be out to replace me before the sun came up, but given the stake in her hand, I had reason to question.” He hefted the electronic device in his hand and checked to see that the red light was still aglow. “She gave me a walky-talky though. I was just thinking about radioing some truckers when I remembered I had quarters.”

He brushed the pad of his thumb against his chin.

“What do you think about Nine Inch for a call sign? And I’m referring to the length of this antenna, so get your mind out of the gutter.”

[melodymagic]

Now Melody did laugh, her hand pushing her hair behind her ear as she tried to cover up the outburst, and the slight rise of colour she felt around her throat.

"You went there, not me!" she told him rolling her eyes, both at his comment and herself for momentarily going there.

"And do you think truckers are really who you want to be getting into conversations with? Isn't there enough danger just waiting on the other side of that portal for you?"

[daniel_stacy]

“What’s wrong with truckers?” he asked, pretending to be more offended than he actually felt. Daniel scratched at the beer logo and then flicked the cap into the street. “They’re gainfully employed. They’re nocturnal. They can go the distance. We have a lot in common.” The vampire snickered at himself. “God, I can turn anything into a euphemism. I need professional help.”

Not for the first time he heard a skittering sound and cast a paranoid look at the doorway, only to realize the culprit was a piece of windblown trash.