?UNSEEN?
They approached the chapel and stopped above the weed carpeted edge. Big Stan stopped smiling but kept his stare on him, unblinking, silent, almost pensive. He took a step forward. O'Reilly stood behind him. The others seemed to be looking elsewhere, waiting for orders.
After a few seconds, O'Reilly broke the silence.
"You think it'll be here?"
What?
Big Stan kept his eyes grimaced at Jake.
"Yonder," he answered and it took Jake precious seconds to understand the unbelievable. The loutish hunter wasn't looking at him. Big Stan was staring past him, into the darkness of the chapel.
The Mad Prophet couldn't see him? He was right there, sitting before him, unable to move and even if he could, had zilch chances of an escape. Big Stan pointed his crossbow towards the dark of the church.
"Yonder," he repeated. "The laddie's fast but its bloody trail ends here. It's inside. It has to be."
O'Reilly jerked his hand forward and made a back and forth motion with his second and middle finger with an air of superiority. Seven of him men surged forward. Jake counted two crossbows, a rifle and four revolvers. They all held torches.
"Search the inside. Turn it out. I want the vampire found."
A command. An instance. They rushed towards him. Five went around him and into the chapel. The other two jumped over him, actually jumped like he was an obstacle they would sprain their legs if they landed on.
"Malik!!" Big Stan called.
The black brute cleared the smaller guys like they were weightless packs of feather and, majestically walked to the hunter. One hand held a blood-stained lance. The other hand held his other lances. Sweat rained down his muscles.
"Get some guys, marshal to the back. Anything as much as bloody moves and you strike, comprendr??"
Malik grunted. He meant 'okay'.
He disappeared once more into the crowd. Seconds later, he detached himself from the group and a dozen men went with him. They went around the side of the chapel towards the back.
Seven men remained with the big boss hunter, his sheriff counterpart and Joey. Big Stan's breathing came in short snarls. He muttered gibberish beneath his snarls. He'd grown the habit of doing that. Joey flashed occasional glances at the inside of the chapel, at Jake and back at his father. His expression was blank. He waited for instructions.
Of course, none of them could see him. Jake sighed. He mopped at the beads of sweat running down his nose from his forehead. They couldn't see him. He relaxed. Rough noises of pillaging rang inside; wood crashed on wood, metal clanged on wood and glass and glass shattered. Big Stan paced the entire length of the entrance. Joey kept sending occasional glances to Jake and the inside of the church.
A few minutes passed before two of the men returned from the inside of the chapel, disappointment designed on their faces.
"Clear!" One of them reported.
"There's no one inside," the other explained.
"But there's a crypt beneath the storehouse and the men?" the first one added.
"Ladies, all of them I believe," Big Stan finished, his voice somewhere between annoyed and frustrated.
The two men shook their shoulders in agreement but had their faces brought low. It was clear they had no will to see the Mad Prophet's expression. It was good that they kept their faces away too. The wrath displayed wasn't nearly nice to see.
Big Stan kicked at the air in a rage.
"Do I always have to do everything?" he growled. He armed his crossbow and marched towards the chapel, then stopped and turned.
"The rest of you, scour into the woods. You find anything, take it down! Joey, stay here. You see anything?"
"I take it down? got it," Joey finished, abruptly.
Big Stan looked at his boy like he seriously had the desire to knock the back of his head but he turned instead to O'Reilly.
"You coming?"
O'Reilly looked like he was going to say no at first but he instead withdrew his pistol from his holster and went past the huge hunter. Big Stan whistled softly and followed and the two men marched behind them into the chapel. The rest carried out their orders - they scattered into the overgrown bushes around, completely disappearing from sight.
Jake stared at Joey. Joey was left alone. Vulnerable but not defenseless. Joey couldn't see him. From the little he'd studied about the McCulley father-son relationship, he realized there was much to tell. First, the boy was a hunter quite all right and a good one too, but he was nowhere near his father. He was the kind that stopped to think before acting. Big Stan was a straight to the point hunter, brutal. Joey didn't have that brutality. It was probably why the man hid a mighty little of his disappointment of his boy, actually it looked like disdain. The man probably saw the boy as his failure and jumped at every chance to bully him. He never treated the giant negro - Malik - the same way. And yet, the boy was all of the time trying very hard to impress.
Jake looked at him. One quick lunge and he believed he could so easily knock the dude's head off his shoulders. Big Stan and his hunters had killed off his family, everyone of them. He could repay that favor, starting right here, right now. Only, he just wasn't that person. He never believed in vengeance. A numb feeling ran across his stomach. The poison had finally been nullified and his wounds rapidly started the healing process. A jolt of energy sprang up within him. He was beginning to feel his legs. He stared up at the Christ statue. White light glowed. It poured on him, spread around. They couldn't see the light and they couldn't see him.
He looked back and noticed Joey also looking at the statue. Joey returned his gaze to the darkness of the overgrown grasses and before long sighed.
"Finally," Joey muttered, almost whispering, "'bout time they left." He slung his crossbow over his shoulder and walked to the crucifix. He stared into the dark chapel.
They both heard gunshots and loud metallic clangs somewhere beneath them.
"It's gonna take a while," Joey informed.
Who was he talking to? Jake looked at him. And he looked back at Jake and furrowed his brow quizzically.
"I wonder," Joey continued in his quiet voice, just too gentle to belong to any hunter. He walked to Jake. He actually walked to him, dropped his crossbow noiselessly and dropped himself beside Jake. He kept his face straight, plain. Questions tried to form in Jake's mind but it had run dry now, as dry as his throat was.
"One second and you could've taken my life," Joey said matter-of-factly.
There was no hiding the fact. Joey could see him and seemed to be the only one who could. Yet the guy looked cool about it. He did not look like he was ready to give him out. And he wasn't scared or bothered. He didn't look anything particularly. Just sickly and bored.
"It's not me," Jake answered dryly.
Joey nodded in acceptance. Silence.
"I wouldn't even if I tried," Jake continued. "You are the hunter. Why haven't you taken me down already?"
Joey shook his shoulders. "That's dad. Always straight to the point. Once his mind's on something, it's impossible to make him stop."
"Heard you're quite good too," Jake said.
"I used to be," Joey answered. "I wanted to take after the old man. Many a Tuesday ago, me and my boys found a nest, somewhere deep in Corxam. Six vampires, two of 'em babes. Bloody hungry they were. A dismembered ram was propped in a corner. They passed the blood in a large bowl amongst themselves."
"They were my brothers," Jake said. And then a feeling washed over him. It felt weird talking to Joey, especially in this absurdly calm manner. Maybe it was because the guy had not pulled a slug into him yet.
"Well," Joey continued, paying the littlest thoughts to his expression, "we rushed them. Orders were orders. After the massacre, I couldn't help feeling it wasn't right. Those guys stayed like they had no idea we were upon them. Even when we attacked, they didn't retaliate. It got me thinking. They weren't the usual vampires we were used to hunting."
A ball of regret kn
otted in Jake's belly. He regretted telling his brothers to not defend themselves, regretted telling them to not fight back. He wished he could've taken those orders back, turned time's hands back.
"Magnificent light," Joey remarked.
He could see the light too. It was still a question that remained unanswered.
"How can you see the light and the others not?" Jake asked. It felt like the right question.
Joey shrugged. "He that hateth his brother is in darkness and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his eyes. First John two verse eleven."
Jake nodded. A reasonable answer.
"Seems I'm the only one that doesn't want you dead," Joey accentuated.
"You base your belief on a sentence of the scriptures?"
"What do you believe?"
"Second chances," Jake replied, thoughtful. "One of my brothers made me believe. I was resurrected into a life filled with misery, hatred, savagery and blood. He was a reverend. T. Phillips. Black guy, graying hair. He was attacked and bitten. Escaped and left the church before he died and was reborn. Born again."
They both laughed.
"Dammit!!!" They both heard Big Stan's bellow from beneath them. Something foul cried after him, something unearthly.
"He'll find worse demons in there, probably church-grown ghouls," Joey chipped in.
"So T. Philips joined our band. That man spoke a milli about second chances."
"You?"
"I believed him. With him I helped turn our lust for human blood to animal blood. Sucked but we managed. We sacrificed."
Joey licked his lips and looked up. His face was extremely pale in the moonlight. It somehow didn't feel right.
"How did it feel like, when you were reborn?"
Jake thought for a while. "Emptiness," he muttered pitifully. "Void. There was nothing in here and here." He pointed to his head and heart. "It was difficult trying to get used to. Didn't know where I was. Almost didn't know who I was. I cried for help. It was all dark. No one heard me. I was in a coffin. Somehow I broke out. It all became clear.
It started with the loud noises, the softest splat of water, pumping of blood in the heart and nose clearer, reflexes that beat the cat's, speed, eyesight? It was a thrill. I felt free? like there was nothing I couldn't do, like there were no limits to how far I could go. Then the hunger, the thirst. Still I was powerful. Too powerful. It scared the hell out of me."
At the word 'powerful', Joey seemed to flinch.
"Must've felt great," Joey muttered. He looked at Jake and for the first time, Jake saw something in those eyes he hadn't seen before. Hunger? Yes! Hunger seethed within those eyes. They pushed out of Joey's pale face. His skin looked whiter than ever. And then a lot of missing pieces began to fit into an equation that formulated in the subconscious of his mind inadvertently.
How had the hunters kept up with him through the dark forest. Nobody, he believed, had eyes good enough to have seen so well to have followed him all through the night. And Joey was the one he'd seen that had truly successfully tracked him.
Found him, papa!
Joey had shot at him and missed. Twice! A coincidence of errors? Hardly so. Deliberately? Very likely. Joey needed him alive. He could've given him out when he was helpless and they were a full house, only he didn't. Why?
Answers! The answer ignited his mind. For some unique reason(s), Joey was looking for answers and he was the one left to give him those answers. Joey was the only one who could see him when the others couldn't. Scriptures? Yes but much, much more. There was a link, he and Joey, something existed and it wasn't simply ordinary. His senses turned on automatically. The poison inside of him had been completely obliterated, down to the last traces. His eyes brightened. The pain that once hurt him instantly dissipated. Every sound within a mile radius exploded in his brain. Hoots irrupted into his head, chirpings were fifty times magnified. Howls rose up from beneath him. He heard footsteps rushing through the bushes, away from them. Hearts were beating, frantically. In every direction, except?
Yahtzee!
It was difficult to believe at first. Joey had no heartbeat. Nothing sang in his chest. He looked at the paling, sickly face. And he was sure he didn't miss it.
Joey was no longer a hunter. He was a brother. He had also been turned and was in his last stage of rebirth. That was it! He looked at Joey. Joey looked back at him and pressed his lips into a fake smile. He was sure Jake had known. He was becoming a vampire.