The Tome of Bill (Book 7): The Wicked Dead (7 page)

“Knights of the dinner table?” I offered with a smirk.

“Pretty much. But now, sure, they’re causing some chaos...”

“Some?”

“Maybe
a bit
more than that,” he conceded dismissively. “But really, can you honestly tell me you would rather them be the appetizers instead of the diners?”

What a fucking asshole. He had me over a barrel with that argument and knew it. Maybe I wasn’t all that close with them, but hell, I’d known Adam since freshman orientation at NJIT.

Mind you, tearing their fucking throats out and turning them into monsters wouldn’t have been my first choice when it came to saving them, but at least Dave’s heart was in the right place.

“Besides,” he added, “I got some awesome data from watching them turn. So much more useful than those mice I infected.”

And by right place, I of course meant he was still an asshole.

* * *

Dave proceeded to start bundling up his supplies. That just left the rest of the group to deal with. I could have compelled them to be obedient henchmen, but that didn’t feel right. Despite trying to act more the hero, there were still some lines of behavior I didn’t care to cross lest they lead to me turning into a total twat.

There was also the little problem of how long such a compulsion would last. Sure, I could order them to stop eating delivery boys, but what happened then? They’d either starve or it would wear off and they’d go right back to being the scourge of guys just trying to earn a buck in this fucked-up world.

There was also the problem of them all being uncovened, despite Dave’s bullshit proclamations. In short, there was only one solution – they needed to come with us too.

But what if they didn’t want to? I could force them, but I had a feeling that would bite me in the ass as surely as any of Vehron’s minions.

I stepped out of the lab, the question still on my mind, when I caught sight of them again. They were seated around the gaming table, two pizzas sitting open in front of them, and no corpses in sight – thank goodness.

“I see dinner arrived,” I said idly.

“Yeah,” Mike replied, taking a bite and then tossing the rest back onto a paper plate. “But it’s not the same. The blood...”

“I know all about the blood,” I interrupted. Vampires could eat regular food, but it lacked the luster it had when we’d been alive. It went in one end and came out the other, with no real benefit to us save the minor joy of how it tasted.

At least I knew one human would make it home tonight because of my actions ... assuming something else didn’t eat him before that happened. Oh well, not my circus, not my monkey. “Just pretend the tomato sauce is blood and...”

Hold on. Pretend!
That was it!
That was how I was going to get them to play ball with me – using the same concept that had brought us back to this apartment week after week.

“You okay, Bill?” Adam asked.

“Dave probably told him what happened to his character,” Carl replied. “The shock is finally catching up.”

“It’s not that,” I said. “I don’t care about what happened to Kelvin.” The fuck? “Well, I do care. Just not right now.”

“Not even about the demon orgy where they passed your corpse around for six days straight?”

“What?!” Oh, Dave was
so
gonna fucking get it when this was all over and done with. “Let’s not worry about that for the moment. You can bring me up to speed on the way.”

“What do you mean, on the way?” Adam asked between bites.

“You’re all coming with me. Dave too.”

“Why are we...”

“Because look at you. You fuckers are wasting your time here. You’re a coven of vampires, top dogs amongst the undead – outside of liches maybe.”

“Don’t forget demi-liches,” Carl added.

“Fuck them. They’re just dumb fucking skulls with magic powers. Trust me. I know one, and he’s an asshole.”

“Really? You know a...”

Not wanting to get distracted again, especially not by the topic of Harry Decker, I kept talking over him. “Bottom line is you ...
we
are too good for this shit. Who gives a fuck about some zero level delivery ... err ... merchants, I guess? We should be out there fucking up kingdoms and claiming them as our own.”

Whereas before the pizza had held their thrall, now their attention was fully on me. Holy fuck, this might actually have a shot at working. I had no idea where to go with it, but I’d figure that out later.

“So what are you suggesting?” Adam asked.

“A real life Ravenloft – an adventure that puts every LARP ever played to shame.” A few dubious eyebrows were raised, but I continued. “I shit you not. I’m talking real monsters. The type that would make your balls shrivel up. There’s magic too.”

“We talking weapons? Like vorpal blades?”

“Um ... maybe. We’ll see.”

“The stakes?”

I inwardly groaned at the vampire pun, but went on. “The world itself. We lose and everyone loses. We win, though, and we will be fucking epic.”

If there was a final carrot that convinced my friends to come along, it was the fact that we still had electricity at my place – courtesy of some witches friendly to our cause. Never discount a geek’s need to charge his electronics.

Unfortunately, by the time I was finished with my tale of grand adventure, it was getting dangerously close to sunrise. There was no way we’d be able to make it back before it was bright and, judging by the clear sky, sunny out. That wouldn’t have necessarily been the end of us. I mean, it’s not like I hadn’t had several forays out during the daylight hours and survived mostly unscathed.

Sadly, though, unlike me, most vampires weren’t acclimated to daytime hours. I guess I was one of the lone fools who had tried to carry on with my normal life postmortem, including a 9-5 job. Hell, Carl was already snoozing by the time I stepped away from the window where I’d been watching the sky lighten.

I shot Ed a text that I was delayed and would be home later. I was sure they’d be pretty pissed by my unscheduled foray into Jersey. There was no point in making it worse for myself by maintaining radio silence.

I wasn’t really worried about my roommates – they were easily ignored – but any of our three female neighbors were perfectly capable of giving me a good tongue lashing. Well, maybe not Sally, considering I was all but a stranger to her at the moment.

As my friends settled down for the day, I reflected upon that part. Sally’s current memories of me and my friends was minimal at best – a few bits and pieces she’d managed to recover herself along with some scattered remembrances that Christy had been able to uncover. It wasn’t much, but it seemed to be enough to prove to her that we weren’t full of shit ... most of us anyway. Tom was really gonna get decked when she remembered everything.

She’s a danger to them, but you’re too stupid to even consider that.

Fuck! I hated when my subconscious pointed out something I really didn’t want to dwell upon. At least, I hoped it was my subconscious. I truly wasn’t sure. I’d been feeling stirrings in my head lately that suggested maybe Dr. Death was waking back up again – violent, sexually aggressive, or overly morose thoughts that seemed to pop into my mind from out of nowhere. It was possible the events of the recent past were just getting to me, but somehow, I didn’t think that was the case.

That made my course of action with Christy more imperative than ever. I needed to find a way to chain up Dr. Death for good before he was back with a vengeance.

That was the fear I really didn’t want to dwell upon. If that monster woke up, I could find myself once again occupying my mental apartment – blissfully unaware of the real world around me as he slaughtered everything he could get his claws on.

Yeah, thinking about Sally was far less disturbing. Well, maybe not really. That thought of her being dangerous might be worth listening to. She was a killer. I wasn’t about to fool myself into thinking otherwise. She’d been a killer before she met me and, despite mellowing out a bit, still didn’t have any problems with taking lives if the need arose. The Sally who was with my friends now was a bizarre mix of the past and present. I had no idea how she’d react if pushed the wrong way. Well, okay, it would probably be with snarky violence, but the real question was, how far would that violence go?

We’d only been living under the same roof for a few days and she hadn’t given me cause to worry about anything other than her sense of self-entitlement, but then again, she was smart. More than smart enough to realize the capabilities the rest of us brought to the table, with maybe the exception of Tom.

This was maddening. I wasn’t Batman; I wasn’t used to distrusting the other members of my personal Justice League and forming contingencies just in case. Although, maybe the new me – the one trying to keep his head out of the sand of blissful ignorance – needed to.

Ugh! This line of thinking was giving me a headache – not helped by the loud snores that had begun to permeate the quiet of the room. Whoever coined the phrase “sleeping like the dead” was full of shit.

I grabbed a pillow from Dave’s couch and threw it at Mike, who snorted once and then turned over – ending the worst of it for the time being.

The thing was, no matter which way I turned, there were potential pitfalls staring me in the face. Sally’s memories were just one. We had prophecies, explosive powers, and more standing in our path. Hell, none of that even counted the big stuff, like the nigh-invincible vampire we were tasked with somehow killing.

“And that doesn’t even scratch the surface about the world ending,” I said to myself. Hah! Forget stepping into shit over my head. I was sinking in the Challenger Deep of latrines.

These thoughts and others haunted me as I closed my eyes and attempted to drift off to sleep.

* * *

An odd sensation, like something crawling on my skin, dragged me back to consciousness. Pity, too. Sally and my third grade teacher, Mrs. Moranisberg, had just asked me to be the judge in a best blowjob contest and were busy arguing over who would go first.

“Hurry up!” a whispered voice commanded.

“You can’t rush art,” came the equally quiet response.

What the?

I cracked my eyes open and found Mike and Carl standing over me. Before they could say a word, I followed their guilty gaze up to Mike’s hand, which was holding a Sharpie right above my forehead.

Oh, you have got to be fucking kidding me!

“Um, hi, Bill,” he said.

“I told you you were taking too long,” Carl muttered.

“You’re probably wondering what...”

I cut off Mike’s pathetic excuse by way of an uppercut to the jaw, which sent him flying across the room.

I grabbed Carl by his shirt and flung him over my body in the same direction my other friend had just gone sailing, cutting short his look of stunned shock.

“The fuck, dude?” Adam sat up quickly. His body tensed, as if he was ready to bolt should I step in his direction.

“Number one rule of being a vampire – we’re super strong and heal really fast, so violence is always an option.”

Dave stepped out of his bedroom wearing a pair of hospital scrubs he’d obviously lifted to use as pajamas. “What the fuck are you assholes doing?” He glanced in the corner where Carl and Mike where busy untangling themselves from each other. “Jeez, get a room.”

“Bill broke my fucking jaw,” Mike complained, getting to his feet. His fangs had descended and his eyes blackened.

As way of response, I simply pointed to my face – which I was certain had been used as a canvas for all sorts of unpleasant things.

Dave’s smirk more or less confirmed that. “Looks like a wash to me,” he said at last. “We heading out soon?”

I nodded my affirmation.

“Good. Mike and Adam, you guys grab the stuff in my lab near the door. Carl, you empty out the freezer. I’ll show you what to take. Bill, I’m gonna need you to grab a few things too.”

“Oh, and what the hell are you carrying?” I asked.

“All my game books and campaign notes,” he replied as if I’d just asked a particularly stupid question. “You think I trust you fuckers to not take a peek?”

* * *

The sun wasn’t fully down yet which, interestingly enough, made me feel a bit more secure about starting our trip. Thankfully, it was low enough in the sky for the long shadows to provide more than adequate cover for us.

We’d lucked out more than I had any reason to hope. Adam’s car was parked in back of the complex and had a full tank of gas. I’d been expecting an hours-long hike back to Brooklyn, loaded down like a pack mule, but I was happy to accept the ride – even if his little hatchback would be packed to the gills with the five of us and all of Dave’s shit.

Dave tried to insist on shotgun, but took a seat in back once I threatened to tie his ass to the roof rack. As much as I was mourning my character, it was kind of liberating to not have that leverage hanging over my head. It wasn’t normally like me to be so aggressive, but I figured if there was one group to test my new outlook on life with, it was these guys. Besides, I was feeling pretty good – oddly recharged having taken a rare daytime snooze. I’d never really stopped to consider how much it cost me to fight against my physical nature.

It seemed I’d been fighting against so much since being turned into a vampire that I never bothered to stop and realize maybe not all of it was a bad thing.

Sadly, it was a little late in the game for that revelation. If I survived the next few days, this tiger could rethink some of his stripes. Until then, I needed to keep my game face on.

With everything packed up, we headed out – the most lethal carload of road-tripping dorks the world had ever seen.

“When we get inside, I want everyone to be cool.”

“We’ve been to your apartment before, Bill,” Adam rightfully pointed out from the driver’s seat.

“Yes, but never as demonic hell-spawn.”

“That’s actually not bad,” Mike said.

“What isn’t?”

“As a name for our group.”

“Our group?”

“Yeah. If we’re gonna follow you on this so-called epic adventure, then we need a name. We can’t just take credit for saving the world as ourselves.”