Fred at this moment when he stood behind the bar again on the next night, he didn’t see the writing on the wall – literally. He looked at the three glasses that are on the bar when he coaxed at what they were doing there? He didn’t see anyone bring those glasses up upon the bar when he walked over to that side, looking around before collecting the glasses and setting them in the wash basin that is behind him. The songs came from the digital jukebox that is in the corner when he overheard some conversations that are meaningless as seeing a wallet on the ground with no money tucked inside of it. He kept to himself when vampires came and went, wondering who came in here that is human when he kept his personal matters to himself.
That is before he met a patron that came into the bar looking quite troubled.
He looked at the man that is setting there, looking into his glass when Fred came over with the bar towel that is wrapped over his shoulder and in meaningful mood of talking. He felt the need of talking to him before he noticed that his nails are longer than human with some flecks of dried blood underneath it. His skin is pale, pale and dead when Fred talked to him anyways.
“What is the matter, man?” Fred asked the vampire that is sitting at the stool.
He looked up with tears coming out of his eyes.
“What is happening to me?” He asked Fred into those deep tones before looking down at the bar again.
“I don’t understand.” Fred felt approached on this.
“I feel something when I started to stay up all night and sleep all day. Then the thirst started and my mother is calling me off the hook. Then I saw a girl in the supermarket that is collecting tomatoes and onions and putting in the cart. She was so beautiful when I also realized that I couldn’t look at food anymore. It all happened when I came here when…I met that girl. I don’t know what is happening. The girl – she was so beautiful when all I can think of…What have I done? I feel sick. What is happening to me?” The man raised his hands towards Fred when Fred felt like backing away a little. He didn’t though. He stood his ground.
Fred hesitated before answering this, looking around before speaking to him in a calm manner.
“I think you need to talk to someone. Okay?” Fred pushed the button that is under the bar when the guy looked down at the glass that is in front of him.
He doesn’t know what he is drinking? Maybe it is whiskey. Maybe it is blood that is mixed with something else.
“I just wanted to know her name but when I came up to her something came over me. Then the darkness took over when I neared her, coming closer and closer when she just stood there in amazement. She didn’t run away when it happened. I don’t remember.” He dropped down lower.
Two men came from the stairs that led up when they came over to Fred to wonder what is wrong. The guy looked at all three of them when Fred started to talk to them in silences.
“We have a turn and he doesn’t know what is happening to him.”
The guy looked over in the direction of where he is sitting when he looked at both of the beefy men with sunglasses on their noses. He didn’t feel afraid.
“Come with me, sir.” One of the men with the beefy sunglasses implored him when the man looked at the top of the bar like it is about to go transparent.
“Why?”
“We need to ask you some questions. Then we will give you the answers you seek.” The one man – let’s say the captain of the both of them stretched his hand towards the stairs that leads up when the man that sat at the bar got up with his back stiffed with dread.
He is going to bolt. Fred thought when he grabbed the glass that is in the cove of the bar, cleaning the prints off of it that felt no warmth but cold to the touch. It is always cold in the bar when the night is so long.
“What are you going to do to help me?” The man asked with his fangs showing.
“We will help you – one way or another.” The man in the sunglasses smiled when he brought up a device that looks like a gun but is decked out with transistors. He fired the device when it made a back-compression sound before the violet ray stretched out towards the man that jumped back like touching an electric fence with his back hand. He bounced on the wall behind him when the music still played on. Some of the patrons here didn’t even stop their conversation while some of them are laughing at the violence that is going on.
Such despicable creatures, Fred thought with utter disgust when he brought the glass down on the alcove, wiping the filth from his mouth when something bounced off of his shoulder. He thought it was a cashew when Val Lioncourt stood there with his broadsword on his right and his Colt SAA on his left. He had them both holstered when he looked at the person that is upon the ground before insinuating a mild chuckle out of his fanged mouth.
“Let’s say you come up to the Bird’s Nest and sit awhile, Fred. I need to discuss with The Management with something that I need of your wisdom as of now.” Val looked around the bar when he shrugged, straightening the cross that is around his neck.
“I never saw a cross on a vamp before.” Fred walked to the end of the bar when Val shrugged to that as well.
“We have our reasons for loving the one on the cross.” Val smiled when he came closer. He smelled a lot better tonight than the last night they were out on the town.
“We do think of Him as the one that got royally fucked over.”
“He took everyone’s sins in the cost.”
“And that is a lot of balls if you ask me.” Val smiled and chuckled earnestly.
“Come, brother.” Val patted him on the shoulder.
“We are in need of your assistance.”
“Why?” Fred shook his head.
“It’s about the woman that you went to the bottom to find and mine that is rising up through the ranks to find.” Val led Frank up the steps to the door of The Management when the stairs went up to the door and nothing else.
The wooden door stood before them when Val opened it, revealing a room that is decked out with the mere furnishings that looks more run down than luxurious when Fred looked around the room, seeing the cracked window in the frame that is almost spider cracked when he spied a man in a chair that is surrounded by electronic equipment.
The man saw him when he got up from the chair and went around the large tumor that he has been nursing on ever so close.
The two men that were downstairs came through the same door where Val and Fred entered into, carrying the poor soul under his shoulders with the heels of his shoes dragging. His hair is disheveled when they carried him to a make-shift jail cell with the men letting him up upon a bed that looks to be fairly cleaned.
“Will wait until he wakes up then break the news to him ever so careful? If he was bitten by a pure-blood then we will have a problem on our hands.” Val sighed when he looked around with his eyes looking into the dark, trying to find some answers.
“Welcome. My name is The Accountant.” The Accountant came forward with his long bony hand outstretched.
“My name is… [Fred].” He didn’t give his real name. Val didn’t know Fred’s real name either.
They shook their hands when The Accountant was astounded by the feel of his hand.
“Your hand is warm.” The Accountant turned his hand and looked at his wrist.
“You’re not marked by any warblers.”
Fred knew of the warblers. They infringe on the banter of people to infiltrate some place where the answers are all stored. The only way to control is to break your mind to the point of insanity and then build you back together with their sick tricks of dark magic. The victim doesn’t know when they mark you somewhere on your body. The mind is so fragile that it could take so much or so little time to break.
“I’m glad for that.” Fred felt the eyes peering into the back of his head when he knew it was Val that is looked at him like a cat that is about ready to pounce. He studied him before making a conclusion, backing off with his hand coming off the butt of his gun when Fred felt lighter than air now; feeling like a butter knife will cut the tension in two.
“He doesn’t smell of the sour sweat coming from him. You are still my brother of the lifeblood though.” Val concealed the six-shooter when Fred felt his mind stopping from the racing power of adrenalin that is making his hands shake.
“Okay, The Management is in the next room. They are a bunch of old coots that are running the whole show. I’ll tell them before you come in so they don’t get a little too uncomfortable with the living being in the conference room. I’ll be right back and inform them.” The Accountant patted Fred on the shoulder when he left the scene with Val Lioncourt standing on Fred’s opposite side.
“Did you tell anyone about this place? About the conversation when we had a couple of beers at your place? Or about Clovis that cornered us that one night.” Val stared into Fred’s face, seeing all the reason there when he will know if he is lying or not.
He calculated his pupils when Fred answered with a “no”.
“What do you know about the suitcases?” Val asked.
“I don’t think I want to answer that but I do know that it is some sort of inventory to keep the place going for a little longer.” Fred replied with his life on the line.
Val smiled when The Accountant wondered back into the fold of the two people that formed into a group again. The Accountant looked at Fred and then looked at Val before putting his keys back into his pocket again. He has the keys to this entire place when Fred waited for something to happen. Nothing did until he walks into the conference room when they make an offer that is too good to be true.
“Okay, they are ready. Val, you know what to do.”
Val nodded his head with a red glint in his eyes. He disarmed himself, rolling off the six-gun that is around his waist and the sword buckle and placing it on one of the desolate tables that see a lot of dust on the top. The offices that have been deserted since the Reagan Administration stood in silence with no one sauntering in it when Val finished up, working his hand towards the conference area with Fred following next to him when they walked down the hall that is extremely well lit with the wooden cherry doors standing in front of him.
“Are you going to be okay? The Management is a little scary at first for they been around for eight hundred years or more. Especially the head of The Management by the name of Gracco; that is the only name that he goes by is Gracco. He will be sitting at the head of the table.” Val motioned towards the oblong interface on the side of the double doors when Val placed his hand upon the interface and waited for the Biometric Interface to beep which took one…two…and three seconds. It happened when the doors in front of them unlocked with Val touching the handle of the door before he stopped with his breath coming in and out of his mouth. He turned to Fred when he closed his eyes and opened them again.
“They know that you are ‘The Demon Slayer’ and I took the liberty for them not to kill you. I don’t want you to be surprised.” Val opened the door when Fred felt the nerves on his back get more sensitive.
The room on the other side of the door is cloaked in black with very little light. The room folding into a long table that stretched from the one end to the other when the group of nine people sat around that table with the room being so black that they cannot recognize the suits that they are wearing.
Val motioned him inside when Fred came in with Val closing the door, sealing the only exit out of this black and disturbed room.
“I didn’t know that we had a vampire hunter underneath this occult.” The one at the head of the table spoke with both of his hands clasped together. His hands are long with his nails sharp and the hair on the top of his head all colored in white. He appears the same age as Fred but he has to be about a thousand years old. The others kept their peace when Gracco looked at him like a fly that is about ready to be squashed.
“I’m retired.” That was all Fred can say with his hands raising up and then lowering when Gracco smiled before getting up from his head. He looks to be an okay man when he went from the chair to the light volume switch and turned it up some, casting more light into the room when he came back to the chair and sat down. The nine people all have the same suits when Fred looked at their faces with all of their eyes with red flecks in their eyes. Some of them are serious and some of them are black when Fred shifted a little on his feet, trying not to feel the pressure of defending himself.
“Sit, please.” Gracco motioned at the seat that is in front of Fred. Fred went to that while Val stood like a sentry, looking around with his hands clasps together in front of his crotch. His duster jacket lay over his legs when Gracco came back to the chair and sat down.
“Old age never ceases to amaze me until it happens.” Gracco looked at Fred and smiled when Fred saw that is eyes are normal – just like his.
“Can I ask you something?” Fred looked at the many assortments that are in front of him when he sees the ashtray in front of him.
“Can I smoke in here?”
“Sure” Gracco smiled when Fred went to work, operating the pack out of his crotch pocket.
“Thank you.” Fred lit on up.
“Who did you work for before they found out you had a relationship with a female vampire?” Gracco say with his own cigar burning in his own ashtray on the other side of the table.
“I worked for Cicero that was disbanded after they had an altercation four years ago.”
“Were there deaths?”
“Yes. They got into the whirlwind of the drug trade and Cicero tried to shut it down but his underlings shot him in the back of the head in a diner in front of a lot of people. The shooter didn’t get down the block before he was shot dead.”
“Was it one of the crew?”
No, just a tweeker; I don’t know what happened to the rest of them.” Fred shrugged when Gracco smiled, putting his cigar back into the ashtray.
“You know why you are here?”
Fred didn’t respond when he shrugged.
“If you come in with the wolves, you are sure believed that there is some fear running through you right now.”
“Yes but I don’t think you would organize a meeting just to kill me in an organization that is no longer in service.”
Gracco pointed a finger at him and smiled with his grin turning into a big smile that is almost touching the lobes of his ears.
“You are sharp like a Katana. I like that.” Gracco got up from his seat and pondered down his right side of the table.
“We been around for a very long time – We were called a lot of names before we were called, ‘The Management’. But why we are here is the question.” Gracco stopped talking and proceed to look at him.
“We are offering you a job to weed out someone who is sabotaging what we built.”
Fantasy
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