Muscle and Blood #3
By Merz
Selena hunts a different sort of quarry

The three sat close together, talking in the dark.  They had spent the 
past two hours lifting weights and sparring, but showed no sign of 
sweat or fatigue.  Those things weren't in their nature.  They had just 
reached the time limit where further exertion would provide no benefit.

Suddenly the brunette had the full attention of her two companions.  
"You?  You sent Teddy over?  I heard he was gone, but I assumed he got 
careless on the hunt."  The silver-blonde was leaning toward her, 
studying her impassive face.

"That's the beauty of it.  Everyone assumes that, and there's no 
evidence to say otherwise."  She stretched and flexed her arms and 
frowned as she saw they were lapsing back from hugely muscled to merely 
extremely athletic.  "I took Teddy partly as a test and partly because 
he deserved it.  He was scum.  He made me hate what we are.  I did him 
while Lucy watched, and then I did her as a favor.  Lucy is what really 
convinced me to stake him.  Lucy and all the Lucys who came before 
her.  Teddy would just grab some innocent and bring her over.  They'd 
be his slave and then he'd tire of them without teaching them really 
how to feed themselves safely, how to get along without him.  Lucy 
hated herself for what Teddy made her into and she fought her own need 
to feed longer than anyone I've ever seen.  Teddy thought it was funny 
to see her craving it but refusing to even go out hunting, even for 
enough taste to let her sleep for a day."

The Asian woman nodded her understanding. "God I hate that about the 
males.  They're so self-centered they never give a thought to whom they 
bring across instead of just killing them outright.  If we don't make 
it, if we can't hunt successfully or we run into a slayer, they just 
bring another one or two across to take our place.  You felt it when I 
took down Marius last week?  That was for you, dear Selena and all the 
previous and potential Selenas who couldn't have adapted so well."

"Well, isn't that interesting.  I felt it when Marius' light went out 
and wondered what happened to him.  I guess I owe you for getting him 
out of his dark little corner of my mind."  She smiled at her two 
companions, her teeth gleaming in the darkness.  "Last night I staked 
William van de Water good and proper.  He put up more of a fight than I 
expected him capable of so it was really very satisfying.  I don't 
understand why the males didn't take care of him long ago for 
conspiring with the slayers."

"Because, darling," the brunette offered, "he only gave up us females 
in exchange for his own precious heart so the Council didn't consider 
it a serious offense.  We're just toys to them, things they can count 
on the few times they want real sex or a little company after a 
feeding.  They bring us over without a thought for how we'll get on."

Selena settled back and savored the memory.

  * * *

William van de Water had captured the eyes of the statuesque redhead 
sitting kitty-corner from him at the bar.  She wore a smart business 
suit and displayed manicured hands when she touched her cocktail.  She 
hadn't glanced at her watch since she sat down, so William concluded 
she wasn't waiting for anyone, just having a drink in the bar of an 
expensive downtown hotel.  A lawyer, perhaps, or an executive.  Someone 
who earned her own money and a nice amount at that.  Middle aged, so 
she would be flattered that a trim young man was giving her his 
undivided attention.

In fact William was no longer young, and hadn't been in nearly three 
hundred years.  There were times when circumstances had interfered with 
his feeding and he had awakened looking nearly his proper age.  He 
always liked to keep a docile servant or two nearby for those 
occasions, when he needed to feed but wasn't up to hunting.  The 
redhead might become one of those servants, her willpower sucked out 
through her veins over a few nights in moderated amounts.  But she was 
already at the upper age of his carnal interests.  She wouldn't last 
long with him before her looks deserted her and William would be left 
with an intelligent, formerly beautiful woman who depended on him.  
That was of no use.  He had no taste for conversation with intelligent 
women and her need for his attention would quickly become tiresome.

So perhaps not a servant.  Perhaps he would bring her over, drink so 
much from her that she would lose her real life and cross to his side.  
He would own her body and soul in that case as well, but at least she 
wouldn't age in any normal sense.  He had never brought an intelligent 
woman, a woman accustomed to making up her own mind and making her own 
choices, across to his side.  He wondered how she would react when 
those things had been stripped from her, along with her life.

Such were the problems of the undead, but William van de Water never 
dwelt long on problems.  Tonight he would taste her and decide what to 
do with her later: kill her tonight after a single encounter, let her 
live so he could taste again until he tired of her and put an end to 
her, or move her over through a few nights of sucking away her life 
along with her blood.  It all started the same way, with him moving to 
the seat next to her before leading her to a dark and private place.

"William, what a surprise."  As he started toward the vacant seat by 
the waiting redhead another woman stepped in front of him and placed a 
familiar hand on his chest.  The interloper was of average height, pale 
skinned and white haired.  Her hair was done up in a bun held together 
by a pair of chopsticks.  William had known her casually for some years 
but wasn't pleased to have her in his way now.

"A surprise indeed, Selena.  I had heard you left town abruptly.  
Perhaps we can get together later and talk about old times.  I have 
things to tend to right now, but I should be free shortly."  He 
concealed his shock at meeting her.  He had expected a chance glimpse 
of the distinctive face and hair a couple nights before would be the 
last he would ever see of her.

He tried to sidestep around to reach his objective, but his obstructer 
shifted to block his way again. She dropped her hand but stood quite 
close to him and showed no sign of giving way.  "Really, darling, it's 
just too good to see you.  Can we go somewhere now and catch up?  
Somewhere more private?"  Selena's voice was low but its purring 
quality carried well enough to reach the ears of the redhead behind 
her.  William saw his quarry look up, take note that he was engaged, 
and then begin to cast her gaze elsewhere around the room.

"Now is not a good time," he hissed.  He tried again to step past, and 
when Selena moved with him again he put a hand on her shoulder and 
tried to push her gently out of his way.  To his surprise she stood her 
ground solidly in front of him.  "Please, dear, you're in my way and I 
have something I really want to take care of."  Behind Selena he could 
see that a balding man in a rumpled suit had stepped to the bar and was 
sizing up the redhead.  She in turn glanced back at William and then 
made her own swift survey of the newcomer.

"This won't take more than a couple of minutes.  That other business 
will still be working on her first drink when we finish.  I plan on 
coming straight back here as if we never met."  Selena slipped off the 
fashionable long black coat and draped it over a chair near the bar.  
Under the coat she wore a designer outfit of velvet pants and 
sleeveless top.

"Goodness Selena, you've been feeding well tonight."  William took a 
final glance at his quarry and concluded that shoving the surprisingly 
bulky Selena out of his way would cause too much commotion.  "All 
right, just for a moment.  Where are you taking me?"

"As a matter of fact, I haven't fed at all tonight and am getting quite 
hungry.  I suppose I've just grown.  I'll let you in on my little 
secret.   We're just stepping outside."  She started toward the exit 
onto the alley, paused, and waited until he decided he might as well 
follow her so he could get back to his own business.

"My big news, William, is that you made my top ten list."

William let the metal door bang shut behind him.  The only light coming 
into the alley shone through a couple of windows higher in the hotel 
and from a single bulb above a door at the end of the block.  "Lucky 
me.  Which list is this?  I want to feed quite soon so please make this 
quick."  They could both see perfectly well in the dark and William 
posed with one eyebrow arched to express impatience as he stood in 
front of Selena.

Selena slammed her fist into his midsection.  A normal person would 
have been dropped to the ground, gasping for air, by the force of her 
blow.  William van de Water didn't breathe in any normal sense, but he 
was doubled over as Selena's fist smashed deeply into the muscles and 
organs of his abdomen.

'The list of the ten vampires most in need of staking," she told him in 
a very matter of fact tone as he straightened from her assault.  His 
mind was spinning from the shock and the savagery of the attack, and 
this announcement increased his sense of unreality.  He could think of 
no time he had been attacked since he had passed over and become one of 
the attackers himself.

"What the hell," he started to blurt out when Selena grabbed him by the 
lapels, lifted him off his feet and hurled him five feet backwards to 
crash hard against the brick wall of the hotel.  Even as he flew 
through the air his astonishment increased as he registered the 
imposing muscles that had flared in Selena's thick arms.

"I had a talk last night with the slayer you pointed in my direction.  
I don't appreciate being set up for a stake, Willy."  William had 
lurched toward her, his hands clawing for her neck.  Her fist crashed 
into his jaw and stopped him cold.  She followed with a two punch 
combination that knocked him back down against the wall.

William felt the bestial rage rise up within himself.  The civilized 
mask his kind normally used when hunting in the modern age vanished, 
replaced by the face of primeval horror.  He snarled and bared his 
sharp teeth.  "Outrun a slayer, did you," he growled.  "You won't get 
that sort of luck with me"  

He coiled but did not spring, taking some measure of his adversary.  He 
had five times the strength of a normal man.  The times he had relied 
on brute force to drain the blood from a victim he had found it child's 
play to overpower his target, to beat him into submission before going 
for the throat.  He had never fought one of his own kind but would not 
have expected a female to have been capable of putting up much more of 
a struggle than any of the men he had killed, enslaved or taken across.  
While he was impervious to pain, he was aware that Selena had struck 
him with bone crushing force and had tossed him like a rag doll.

Selena stood waiting for his next move.  William measured the thick, 
muscular arms and the wide shoulders.  She was unlike any vampire he 
had encountered before and shockingly different from her appearance of 
just twenty years before.  "What have you been drinking, bitch?  You're 
reverting to some sort of ape."  When the beast was up in him his own 
musculature swelled, but Selena clearly had not reverted to that stage.  
This was her "civilized" persona.

"Moving in the opposite direction, actually.  And you can be sure I 
don't run from a slayer."  She edged closer toward him, trapping him 
against the wall.

He was having difficulty shifting perspectives from viewing himself as 
a super powered killer to recalling that he had been thrown against 
this wall twice by the obviously strong female who glowered over him.  
The beast within him roared and he slammed himself against her, 
crashing past her hands as she tried to ward him off and slamming into 
her midsection.  His rage and power would have broken through a brick 
wall, but Selena absorbed the force of his smashing body.  

She was forced two paces back before stopping him in his tracks and 
slugging him hard in the back of his head, knocking him to his knees at 
her feet.  He looked up just in time to see her cock her right leg and 
kick him back to the wall one more time. 

She closed on him with her fist raised to smash one more time into his 
face.  He didn't wait.  He sprung to the side before she could strike, 
missed the bludgeoning fist by a fraction on an inch, glanced around 
for an instant and leaped upward.  It might not look like the honorable 
course, but he would get away from her and report Selena's attack.  The 
Council would deal with her and punish her more harshly than he could 
do alone.

William caught the fire escape ten feet above the alley and began 
racing up toward the rooftop.  He had gained one story when he felt the 
steel lattice shudder when Selena mimicked his leap and began her 
pursuit.  She caught him as he started up from the fourth floor.  
Strong hands grabbed his ankle and jerked him back down.  Then she 
simply tossed him into space.

He tried adjusting in midair to minimize the damage his landing would 
do, but he still crashed hard onto the pavement.  Looking up he saw 
Selena spring over the railing of the fire escape and hurtle down 
toward him.  It took every bit of will power he possessed to force 
himself up and onto his feet so that he was standing by the time she 
was upright again, and then he struck.

"You crazy, murderous bitch," he screamed as he threw his fist into her 
face.  "Traitorous, crazy bitch!"  He hit her again, knocking her to 
her knees.  He grabbed her throat and squeezed with all his enormous 
strength.

It took him only a moment to realize that had been a foolish move.  
Selena was not a living, breathing human, she was undead like himself.  
Her neck wasn't a channel for air or blood circulating in her body.  As 
he squeezed he learned her neck was just one more extremely muscular 
appendage, sheathed in hard muscle that refused to compress under his 
fingers.

"Nice try," she spoke directly to him.  Before he could release his 
grip she reached behind her head, grabbed one of the sticks holding her 
coiled silver hair, and plunged it into his chest.

William van de Water's last moments were filled with disbelief.  He 
couldn't believe that three hundred years of hunting the dark streets 
of cities across the world were over.  He couldn't believe the slayer 
he had tipped off to Selena had botched the job.  He couldn't believe a 
vampire would ever turn on one of her own kind, even with the motive he 
may have given her.  He couldn't believe she was strong enough and 
skilled enough to have beaten him so decisively.  The insulating wood 
in his heart dissipated the energy flow that had animated him since he 
crossed to the side of the undead in 1718.  He could actually feel his 
body crumbling to dust and scattering down the alley.  And then he was 
gone.

Selena dusted off her clothes as best she could and made a quick check 
for obvious damage to them or to herself.  Nothing that couldn't be 
hidden under her long coat.  She rubbed her throat and worked a kink 
out of her shoulder before starting back into the hotel.  First she 
would retrieve her coat, freshen her image in the bathroom, and then 
return to the bar.  She prided herself on making a decision more 
quickly than William van de Water had been able to, and she had made up 
her mind at the first glance.  In her estimation the redhead would 
still be seated at the bar, whether with some hopeful suitor or alone.  
She would be there long enough for Selena to step in, lead her off, and 
have a first feeding.  There would be more on other nights because 
Selena had already made up her mind to offer the redhead a choice 
between crossing to her side or joining the dead.

* * * 

Selena broke the silence.  "So we're saying that between us in the last 
two weeks we've killed three vampires?  That's probably a better score 
than all the slayers in this part of the country combined, especially 
if you don't count the females that bastards like wee Willie just 
handed over to them."

"And why shouldn't we have?  First and foremost we are killers.  That 
is who we are, how we were made and the only way we survive.  But we 
may be the first females of our kind who bothered to get good at it, to 
build the muscle and skill to take on those insolent bastards."  The 
brunette, Maria, rose up regally in her chair.

The Asian, Soong, smiled the sharp deadly smile of their kind.  "Any of 
the males could have used the fresh blood they get from feeding to 
build up the muscle they brought with them from the other side, but 
look at us.  We're the only ones really working at it."

"And I say it's time we went further.  We're stronger than those lazy 
bastards.  They just reach out a hand to pluck a mortal when they get 
hungry and then lie down for a nice nap.  We're fighting for it, and 
then we build all these gorgeous muscles out of the blood we win."

"You're right.  There isn't one of them willing to take on a slayer, 
while we've proved that we can.  But instead of hunting slayers let's 
take them on."

"Then it's settled.  The Council is going down.  It's time they met the 
Queens of the Night."

 
 
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