Just one day later, Arthur got a text from Captain Harry asking him to come in on the weekend. That wasn’t anything unusual, as it typically meant someone had called out at the last minute. And Arthur was happy to oblige, having felt reinvigorated from his sabbatical from his ‘night shift’, so was more than happy to hang out at the precinct for a day. Saint understood that for the time being Arthur had to keep his duties as a detective on the up and up, and never asked when Arthur had to go in. He threw on one of the new coats he’d bought, got in his shiny new car, and then drove off into Longley. This would be the first time he was going back there in his new car, realizing it might be difficult to explain to the others how he was driving such an expensive vehicle. Instead, he parked in a garage two blocks away and walked the remainder. Less explaining, more exercise seemed like a better option.
When he arrived at the station he was one of the only people there. The weekend shift was usually quiet anyway. Especially at midday, when most people were out for lunch. When he got there, Harry was in his office like usual and greeted Arthur. They chatted for a bit before Harry revealed why he’d asked Arthur to come in. As it turned out, Arthur was in fact the best choice for Sergeant. According to Harry, Arthur had been dealing with the ‘stress’ very well lately, and despite his tired demeanor, his and Dot’s latest record showed they had what it took to go above and beyond when needed. Arthur almost laughed out loud at that, considering most of their recent success nothing but luck. So it was unexpected to be sure. Arthur almost declined the promotion, but figured at this point he’d just ride it out and see what happened. There didn’t appear to be any kind of pomp or circumstance, or at least that’s what Arthur thought until the entire precinct had jumped out of hiding to congratulate him and start the surprise party.
A month ago, Arthur had adamantly denied wanting this position and considered it far too much work on his plate to effectively handle. At this point, that was all still true, but it wasn’t what Arthur was thinking about. All he could think of was how finally he was receiving some recognition for all the hard work, long hours and effort he’d put into this job over the years. It took way too long as far as he was concerned, but his talent and work ethic were finally being recognized. But, the irony of it all to Arthur as his co-workers were shooting off streamers and laughing and congratulating him, was that he still didn’t want it. For all of Captain Harry’s great qualities and excellent traits, he just seemed to not really consider what his subordinates wanted. So, Arthur laughed along with his other coworkers, but not for the same reasons.
They drank a lot, went to some bars, drank some more, went to some more bars. They were out all day and night, the ones who actually had to work that day being relegated back to the precinct after a drink or two. The rest of the precinct was out. It’d been a long time since they had a serious promotion, on top of having one of their best years. The night went by as many like it do; fast, blurry, with lots of singing, lots of dancing, stumbling around the streets, with way too much alcohol. All of the coworkers who mattered to Arthur were there. Dot. Donovan. Oscar. Ruben. Coleen. Jeremy. All the guys and girls he’d worked with for years, all there to support him. They weren’t hesitant to remind him he was in fact the best choice, even Dot, which surprised him to a degree. Maybe Dot saw something in Arthur he couldn’t see in himself. But, more likely he thought, she just didn’t know him that well. She sure as hell wouldn’t endorse him if she knew what he did on the side.
Arthur even went as far as saying something along those lines in a drunken stupor, and they all just took it as a stupid joke, laughing it off. He laughed too. He laughed because of how ignorant he thought they all were. How foolish, that someone like him could get away with what he did right underneath their noses. Laughed because they were the ones that had chosen to promote him. The world had to be cruel, or unfair, or ironic, or all of the above. It made Arthur laugh. They were his friends, but…they just didn’t get it.
As the early morning sun rose and people began to filter out one by one, the only one’s that remained in the seedy dive bar were Arthur, Dot and Oscar. Oscar was mumbling on and on about some story they were all supposed to be listening to, his face resting against the counter of the bar. Dot was just staring forward at the wall trying not to pass out, and Arthur was in the middle of ordering another round of drinks. The bartender just stared, unamused, as Arthur slurred out his next order.
“That’s enough,” the bartender said curtly. “You gotta go home pal. Take your friends with you.”
Arthur raised an eyebrow, “As yor sergant, thass an order!” he said.
The bartender didn’t find it funny, although Dot laughed. Arthur continued on, “Cmon, light up…”
“You and your pals need to pay your bill and go home. It’s six in the morning.”
Oscar continued mumbling about whatever story he was telling. Dot laughed, pulling on Arthur’s arm to get him away from the bar. But he resisted.
“Wassa problem?!” Arthur said, “We’re not done yet!”
The bartender just stared again. Dot apologized through a laugh, placing her credit card on the table. Arthur pushed it away, causing it to fall to the floor. “No no, I’m payin,” Arthur said, “I can afford it…” Oscar and Dot took that as a joke, or at least he thought they did because they both laughed. Arthur grinned stupidly, although it wasn’t really a joke, his brain didn’t process anything beyond that his friends laughed, so he should laugh too.
Arthur held the card out to the bartender, only to rudely yank it away at the last moment, “Only after you give ush another!” Arthur said triumphantly.
All three of them laughed again, but the bartenders face just grew even darker. “Look guy, pay the bill, and get out. Or I call the cops.”
“We are the copsh!” Arthur declared.
The bartender just grimaced as he snatched Arthur’s card and began running it through the machine. Oscar and Dot said something again that made Arthur laugh. The bartender handed him back his card, forcefully shoved a pen in his hand and forced him to sign the receipt, before ordering them to get out again.
As the trio stumbled out of the bar, the bartender grumbled, “Asshole.”
Arthur stopped. He slowly turned, struggling to keep his balance as Dot kept him up.
“Whadyou say?” Arthur asked.
“Come on man,” Dot said, trying to turn him back. But Arthur pressed the matter.
“I could fuck you UP!” Arthur shouted, not feeling the liquor bubbling in his gut causing it to stir uncomfortably, “LOCK YOU UP!” he threatened.
The bartenders face went red, “Get the FUCK OUT!” He screamed. Dot dragged Arthur out of the bar as he cursed out the bartender, while Oscar was already outside lighting up another cigarette.
“Arthur what the fuck man, you can’t threaten people like that,” Dot said with a look on her face.
Arthur brushed her off, standing up on his own. “Don’ need you…” he mumbled to himself. At that moment he bent over, hands on knees and puked across the pavement in front of him. There weren’t a whole lot of people on the street this early in the morning thankfully, but he heard the door to the bar lock behind him.
“Christ dude, get your shit together,” Dot said through a burp. “Oscar, uber?”
He nodded. A few minutes later a small white sedan pulled up. The driver made no inclination that he cared, or was bothered by these three completely wasted people about to get into his car. The three of them collapsed into the car as best they could, the only request that Oscar stop smoking. He begrudgingly flicked the cigarette out of the car window as Arthur was doing his best to sit up right and avoid puking again.
They dropped Oscar off first, then the driver turned to the two of them, “Where to next?”
Dot elbowed Arthur, “Arthur, what’s your address again?”
Arthur mumbled something, before Dot asked again. He almost fell over in his seat. She grunted, pulling out her phone. “One sec, it’s in here somewhere.”
“No!” Arthur stopped her, “New address,” he slurred. It took him nearly two minutes to coherently type in his address into the phones navigation app through blurred vision and tumbling senses. Eventually he got it, handing it to the driver who started off again.
“You didn’t tell me you moved,” Dot said. In response, Arthur just made a noise between affirmation and dismissal. Dot rolled her eyes, sinking into the chair and sighing through her own drunken stupor.
Eventually they arrived at Arthur’s new condo, the car stopping on the street outside.
“Holy shit, this is where you live now?” Dot said, staring out the window. “You can afford this?”
Arthur made another indecipherable grunt, trying to avoid puking again.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“How the hell…” Dot said in amazement, staring out at the luxury condo. Arthur fumbled with the handle on the car door before stumbling out of it, barely maintaining his balance.
“Arthur, wait!” Dot said, but he shut the door on her, a little too hard. But he was way too drunk to notice. He stumbled past the car and barely made it into the door, when everything went black.
Not that Arthur ever knew this, but the night shift guard, Marcus,managed to drag him back to his apartment and shut the door behind him. Arthur woke the next day, fortunately not having puked again, unfortunately having pissed himself, the stench causing his nostrils to flare. Marcus had dragged him to the couch and let him black out there. Arthur groaned as he woke up, stomach completely disagreeing with him and head still fuzzy from the night before.
He managed to drag himself to the shower and eat half a bowl of cereal before slouching back down onto his couch, getting prepared to watch some boring television and spend the rest of the Sunday recovering. He didn’t really think about, much less really remember half the things he’d said or done. All he knew was that he was the Sergeant now, and he deserved that. Mid afternoon Arthur finally checked his phone.
He had three missed calls from Saint.
“Fuck.”
-
Saint picked up the phone immediately, despite it only being three in the afternoon. Which meant he’d been up for a while. Apparently vampires did sleep during the same, or went through some sort of fake sleep, but not today. Saint was not happy to the say the least, but explained the situation anyway. Things had come to ahead very rapidly with Persephone. So much so that they finally had an actual lead, and the Soldado’s were mobilizing a team in order to come down on her while they still had the opportunity. Saint had met with Lewis, who knew nothing about Persephone’s involvement with the other Claw, but wanted revenge for her apparent killing of him. Lewis himself had many connections, and some had seen Persephone around town. On top of that, Claudia had managed to deduce some information with her one on one with Persephone at Syndrome, and managed to find and capture another Feral that had been working for her. A little bit on interrogating later, they found where the Feral’s were hiding out. Persephone had been spotted there. Of course, the information from both Lewis and Claudia had come at a price, but it was well worth paying at this point.
Now, they had location. And, according to Claudia, Persephone wanted Arthur specifically, blaming him for the death of her former boss. Which they mostly already knew, but having confirmation helped. Now, Arthur, Saint, and six of their best Soldado’s were situated around a planning table in one of CargoLink’s warehouses. The table had a big map of the city on it and multiple little red pushpins to indicate points of interest. It felt a little archaic, but it’s what Saint preferred. The only issue was that Arthur’s head was still swimming every so often and his body struggling to recover from the night before, but he did his best to not show it.
“Drawing her out won’t be that simple,” one of Saint’s men argued. “Even if we throw her a big fat worm she isn’t going to bite unless she knows it’s guaranteed. Only reason we got what we got now is luck. She isn’t that stupid.”
Saint tapped his chin with a finger, thinking. Nobody disagreed with what was just said. He spoke, “Maybe we don’t do this all at once. Recon first. Get eyes on it, see what’s what.”
All of the men grumbled at that. Arthur agreed with their grumbling. Who knew how long Persephone would stick around a single location. Another one of Saint’s men spoke up. His name was Tej, one of Saint’s most trusted guys that he knew from Mexico. Arthur never got the impression Tej was that smart, just muscle. Probably the reason he wasn’t in charge, like Saint was. Still, The was reliable, and had a mind for this sort of thing.
“This bitch only wants one thing, right?” Silence, although everybody knew where he was going with this. “Why don’t we give it to her? At least long enough to draw her out?”
More silence. Arthur’s half-drunken brain realized everyone in the room was looking at him, waiting for an answer. Fortunately Saint intervened on his behalf.
“Impossible. We barely know what she’s capable of, besides convincing a bunch of lunatics to fight for her. She might kill him on the spot. And we all know Arthur’s a hardened vamp-killer,” Saint said, getting a light chuckle from the group, “But we can’t risk it.”
There was some whispering between Tej and one of the other guys. Saint interrupted, asking them if they wanted to speak so everyone could hear them. Tej shook his head, instead inviting Saint over to talk privately.
As the three of them had their little discussion, the rest of the guys around the table slouched, sighed, or made faces. There wasn’t any obvious way to go about this. Persephone was currently holed up in a half-built apartment building, the entire upper half still just a skeleton of steel and stone. The entire thing was currently abandoned due to some city permitting dispute. They had Ferals on lookout all night on the upper floors, and the bottom floors only had a few entrances. In other words, nobody came in or out that they didn’t know about. Plus, the building was in a big, empty lot right in the middle of town, surrounded by a steel fence. Which meant this wasn’t technically private property, so any kind of fight that got reported or gun shots that were heard would mean police. And if Arthur had learned anything at this point, even Feral’s would rather not involve human cops in their affairs when possible.
Getting arrested not only meant possible major exposure for vampires as a whole, but it was basically a death sentence unless you could convince the cops you needed special treatment away from the sun and a healthy diet of blood.
To the side, Saint said something dismissive to Tej and his friend. Arthur could see a look on their faces…disappointment maybe. Insubordination? Clearly they didn’t like whatever Saint had told them, but as they came back to the table, Saint was trailing off about how he’d ask Bartolome about whatever it is they’d just discussed. As they reached the table again, Saint looked around.
“So, any other suggestions?”
Another one of Saint’s guys spoke. Arthur didn’t know his name. In fact Arthur didn’t even really recognize him.
“Why don’t we just get in quietly and take her out? You know, assassination style.” He made a squeaking sound with his mouth and mimicked teeth with his fingers. Again, it took Arthur a second to realize what he was mimicking, before he remembered. Arthur had seen this guy before, but only briefly, before he’d turned into a rat. A full on rat. It was a strange thing to see happen, but apparently was incredibly useful for and kind of stealth or recon. And the weirdest part was that many other vampires could turn into animals too. Watching a human’s body morph and shift to fit the dimensions of a creature one one-hundredth it’s size was not a pretty sight.
“Because she might not be there, and despite being idiots, the Ferals aren’t stupid. They see a big fucking rat sneaking about looking on every floor you’ll end up dead,” Saint said.
Quiet around the table again. Nobody seemed to have any good ideas. Arthur looked at each one of them, all seemed stumped. For some reason, he felt a level of responsibility here. Just like Persephone blamed him, the Soldado’s probably all looked at Arthur as one of the main reasons they were chasing her around in turn. He felt like he needed to contribute somehow.
“What exactly would me being bait look like?”
Saint gave him a chiding look, but before he could speak Tej laughed with a big smile, “That’s my man! Look at the cajones on this guy!”
“I already said no,” Saint said firmly.
“Come on bro,” Tej replied, “It’s just a question. If Arthur thinks he might be able to do it, we should give it a try! He’s as invested in this as we are. More, probably.”
Arthur nodded, “He’s right. If we don’t take her out it just means she’s going to eventually take me out. And probably hurt the organization in the process.”
Saint stared at him for a few moments, then let out a big sigh. “Fine. We can discuss it, but that’s it. You’re not one of my men, Arthur, remember that. You work for Bartolome, technically, so I’ll need to run it by him.”
Tej might as well have not heard any of that, because he was already drawing on the map and placing pins. “All right so check this out. We know for some reason this chica hasn’t jumped Arthur already, despite keeping tabs on us for a while. I’m thinking she’s afraid we’ll hit her back. So, we put on a big fake show about kicking our boy here out of the organization, leaving him out to dry, whatever. We just have to make sure she’s watching.”
Saint was already making a face, and admittedly it sounded convoluted to Arthur too, but they kept listening.
“So Arthur’s out, we aren’t protecting him, and Arthur decides to go drown his woes in a bar nearby their little hideout. He gets ‘drunk’”, Tej said miming air quotes,
“Then stumbles around nearby until they snatch him up!”
Silence around the table again until Saint spoke. “This might be the stupidest plan you’ve ever had bro. Not only is it complicated as shit, what happens if they don’t just snatch him up like you said? What if they just put a bullet in him?”
Tej rolled his eyes, “Well we’re not gonna let that happen, obviously. We’ll all be hiding nearby.”
“And,” Saint continued, “What if she’s not there? What if her bloodthirsty little freaks decide to kill him on the spot and then we lose out on Arthur and Persephone?”
“Hm…” Tej thought. “Maybe…Arthur sends up some kind of signal?”
Saint just shook his head, “No, no. This is all way too dangerous. Too many unknowns. This plan is half baked and if it goes wrong, Arthur dies and Bartolome has my ass on a platter.”
There was silence around the table again. Arthur felt like Saint was right. There were too many unknowns, too many risks. And Persephone wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t going to expose herself unnecessarily.The only thing that would draw her out would be something drastic.
“I have an idea,” Arthur said. “You said before that Persephone is using the Ferals as a means to an end. She doesn’t really give a shit about them, right?”
Saint nodded.
“But does she know that we know that?” he asked. Saint gave him a look, so Arthur continued, “Let’s pretend that Persephone is actually a Feral too, or whatever. She’s their leader. Actually directing them for a bigger reason, other than revenge. Actually preparing for something…I don’t know, like a vampire war.”
“Uh…a vampire war?” Tej asked.
“Just listen. What if instead of going at this like a hammer, we do it like a needle?”
Now everyone was looking at Arthur with a confused look.
“Ok, ok. I’m explaining this poorly. We pretend like we’re afraid of them. This all is coming to a head very quickly. You guys don’t want to get into a huge fight. But this is all about me. So, I’m the bait. like Tej suggested. But not in a weird, roundabout, confusing way. What if we pretend like you’re giving me over as a gift. A gift to stop anything from getting too out of hand. To stop a war with the Feral’s.”
“You think that’s what she might be doing?” Tej asked.
Arthur made a face, “Who cares. All that matters, is she’s convinced that we believe it. Well, that you believe it. You’re scared. You want to de-escalate. Saint, you told me there’s a shit ton of vampire politics going on all the time. Wouldn’t it be more believable that you want to talk things over first, and give up one lowly mortal in the process?”
Saint shrugged, “Yeah, maybe.”
“Great. So instead of two factions of vampires going at it and causing chaos, you’re just there to talk.”
It took a few seconds, but they started to understand, so Arthur continued. “We go in as a peaceful envoy. I’m your prisoner. That gets us in the door. But you have to play the part. Act like you’re there for peace, just to talk. You can do it right?”
Saint nodded, “Course, just be myself.”
“Sure. Once we’re in the door, with all you guys in hiding, spring the trap. Just, I dunno, put me in cuffs or something.”
The Soldados were nodding to each other warming up to the idea the more that Arthur explained it. Even Saint looked a little impressed, nodding at him with the hint of a smile. But as they started mulling it over, Tej spoke up again.
“Ok, but. What if she wants to kill you on the spot? Before the rest of us can actually get to you?”
Silence again. It hung in the air for a while. Arthur looked around the room. Nobody had an answer.
“Oh come on, none of you can do anything to…I dunno, keep me alive? You can turn into a rat for God’s sake.”
“Come on bro, shape shifting is one thing. Bringing you back from the dead? There’s only one way to do that as far as I know.”
“Which is?” Arthur asked.
They all looked at him. Saint spoke, “Well, to turn you. Make you one of us. But we’ve already had that conversation. I don’t think you want that.”
Arthur sighed. “Then what other option do we have?”
Once again, there was silence around the table. At this point in time, Arthur was less concerned about what might happen to him, and more focused on the fact they had an opportunity to get revenge of Persephone. And he believed in the Soldado’s, he’d seen time and time again what they were capable of. He didn’t want to let this opportunity slip away, and nobody else had a better idea.
“This is our option,” he said firmly. “This is our chance. You know it’s a good plan.”
“And what if you die?” Saint asked bluntly.
Arthur looked him in the eye. “Then bring me back.”
