CHAPTER 10
When they arrived at the office an hour later, they found the front door ajar. The sight of it made foreboding rise in Reginald’s gut.
There was no good reason for foreboding. The day shift would all be gone by now, and Walker and the custodians would be in the building alone unless someone had decided to work late. Any one of the departing day shift workers could have broken the closer on their way out, and nobody in the company would care enough to close the door when it failed to close on its own. In fact, Reginald would have thought things were more out of place if the closer were broken and someone had closed the door. Courtesy, in Reginald’s workplace, was suspicious in and of itself.
But still, when he noticed the box above the door hanging from its broken mounting, he raised an arm to stop Nikki from going any farther. Something about it bothered him, especially with the hangover from his earlier dark thoughts still swimming in his mind. It reminded him of the door at the top of the Asbury’s basement staircase — also ajar, also dangling an arm from a broken pneumatic closer. The door in that club had said so many troubling things. It said that order and security had ceased to matter. It said that entropy had become a stronger force than paranoia — and according to Maurice, paranoia had been the Council’s hallmark for centuries. The ajar door at the Asbury had symbolized everything within the Nation that was falling apart.
And now here was another ajar door. It was stupid to back away from it, but he did it anyway.
“The door is open,” said Reginald when Nikki gave him a questioning look.
“Yeah?”
“It reminds me of the door at the Council.”
Nikki pushed his hand down gently. The small gesture said that she understood, but that Reginald had been on edge lately and might not be the best judge of what was worth fretting about.
“Many doors are similar,” she said.
Reginald felt a breeze at his back. A second later, Maurice appeared on his other side.
“Are we having a standoff?” he said.
“You came to work!” said Nikki. Maurice hadn’t been bothering with work lately, but he looked as haggard as Reginald felt. Apparently, they felt the same way about the redeeming powers of bureaucracy and pointless paperwork.
“I needed monotony,” said Maurice. “I wanted to spend some time doing something that has utterly no meaning whatsoever. I needed to be somewhere where if I make a huge error, nobody even notices.”
“Something is wrong,” said Reginald, eyeing the door.
He hadn’t put Nikki’s keys into his pocket. She had a tiny Swiss Army knife on the chain — not a very ladylike accessory, he’d always thought. Reginald was holding it as if he planned to open it and do battle. The entire knife was two inches long. Whatever threat he sensed was in for a serious miniature nail-filing.
“See you inside,” said Maurice, slapping Reginald on the back and walking forward. “I feel like having a cup of coffee out of a mug that expresses my dislike for Mondays.”
Nikki rubbed the back of Reginald’s neck and looked into his eyes. “Come on,” she said.
Reginald ignored her, still staring at the office door across the parking lot.
“Maurice,” he said.
Maurice turned, then gave a tiny start as his eyes flicked down.
Reginald had opened the blade of the knife and had driven it through the palm of his hand. Blood ran down his pinky finger and pattered onto the concrete.
“I can’t feel it,” said Reginald.
“What do you mean, you can’t feel it?” said Maurice.
“Something new. I’ll explain later,” said Reginald. “For now, take my word for it that something is wrong here.” He pulled the knife from his palm, stooped to wipe the blade on the grass at the back of his parking spot, and closed it. He pocketed the keys, then began walking slowly toward the door.
They walked into the lobby with Reginald in the lead. There was a second door in front of them that led into the office and an elevator to the right. The elevator was supposed to be for handicapped use, but before becoming a vampire, Reginald had used to use it when he needed to go upstairs. On the doors of the elevator, handwritten in large red letters, were the words ONLY HUMAN.
Maurice leaned forward. Nikki told him not to touch it, but Maurice was only sniffing.
“Blood,” he said.
But of course it was blood, and of course the message wasn’t for just anyone, but for Maurice specifically. Anti-establishment propaganda over the past few months had been dominated by one key phrase where violence against non-vampires was concerned: They’re only human. It had become the slogan of Maurice’s political opposition, who tried to paint Maurice as a leader willing to sacrifice vampire welfare in favor of human welfare. Maurice was willing to destroy them all, they said. And for what? Those he sided with weren’t immortal. They weren’t strong. They weren’t worthy. They didn’t need or deserve protection. They were, in the end, only human.
Maurice’s mouth was open. His fangs were out.
“Try not to touch anything,” said Reginald, but Maurice was already gone. The inner door fluttered closed behind him.
Reginald looked at Nikki and saw that her fangs were out as well. On Nikki, fangs looked both sexy and dangerous. On Reginald, fangs looked pathetic. Unglamoured humans paled when they saw Nikki, but laughed when they saw Reginald.
They pushed into the office to find it covered in blood.
Reginald walked through the aisles between the cubicles slowly, trying to make sense of what he saw. Nikki split off, exploring in gape-mouthed awe. The lights were all on, instead of the smaller set that was usually lit after the day shift left. In the brightness, they could see everything there was to see. Everyone was dead. The entire day shift.
Scott, who was mocked because he was old.
Noel, who was mocked because she was plain.
Along with several of the homogenous males who’d mocked them, all of their bodies severed into sections and thrown haphazardly about — everyone finally equal at the moment of their murder.
In the office at the end of the hall, Reginald found Berger. At the other end, he found several of the frat boy types who looked just like Walker, all with their perfect white teeth stained crimson.
He caught up with Maurice in the break room where, on the break room table, they found five coffee cups. All of the cups were stained and half-filled with blood. Maurice leaned down and sniffed at one of them.
“So much blood that they couldn’t drink it all,” he said. Then he kicked one of the small chairs across the room, where it shattered a full pitcher of orange juice that had been sitting on the counter. Yellow liquid ran onto the floor and mingled with bloody footprints, creating a deep orange. Then Maurice pointed at the table and the mugs as if Reginald and Nikki were to blame. “They bled them into mugs, and they sat here and drank it,” he spat. “Look at the mugs. Mine. Yours, Reginald. Nikki’s. This is my backup mug. This one I don’t know.”
The cup said THICK DICK.
“It’s Walker’s,” said Reginald.
“They did it for us. They set this up for us, directed at us, as a message to me, their powerless leader. They opened people up, they collected their blood, and then they sat here and they laughed. I saw several people out there, missing parts of their bodies, dead at the end of long streaks of gore. They dragged themselves down hallways, trying to get away. The bastards didn’t even glamour them.”
Nikki was starting to cry. It was a strange thing for a vampire to do over death and blood, Reginald thought, but he put his arm around her nonetheless. He felt it too. He didn’t like many of these people, but they’d had friends and families, and they’d been alive just a few hours earlier, blissfully unaware of what was awaiting them.
“This is so stupid,” said Nikki, her voice hitching. “We’ve shed our share of blood.”
“Not like this,” said Reginald.
“We have to do something,” she said.
“What can we do?” said Maurice. “There’s no crime here. They’re… they were… only human, after all.”
Nikki shook her head. There was no way out. The only authorities who would care were human authorities, and the human authorities hadn’t figured out what they were up against. And even if they did figure it out, what power would they have against vampires? Were Reginald, Nikki, and Maurice supposed to ally with humans against their own kind? Were they supposed to turn traitors? And if they did, what would come of the vampires they counted as friends?
“We can’t do a goddamn thing,” said Maurice. “We just have to… to take it.”
But even beyond Maurice and Nikki’s senses of desperation, Reginald felt uneasy. There was more here than what they’d seen so far. He’d known that something was wrong outside, when what he was starting to think of as his Spidey Sense — call it “Reginald Sense” — had started to tingle. But even now, with all of the bloody cards on the table, that new sense was still tingling. His mind still felt hyper-aware. If he were to open the knife and stick himself with it, he was sure he still wouldn’t feel it. There was more here to find. Something else unpleasant to unearth.
“Why is Walker’s coffee cup on the table with ours?” he said.
Maurice shrugged.
Reginald made a slow, pacing circuit of the table. He stepped over the spilled orange juice on the far side, then came around to his own coffee cup. He lowered his head to the cup, paused when the lip was just under his nose, and inhaled deeply.
Then he straightened up, took a few steps forward, leaned toward Maurice’s main coffee cup, and did the same. He repeated the action for Nikki’s cup and Maurice’s backup.
Finally, he stood over Walker’s cup, bent, and inhaled deeply.
“A human used this cup,” he said.
He stood and walked up in front of Maurice.
“Did you find Walker out there?”
“No,” said Maurice.
“Find him,” said Reginald.
They spread out into the office and began to open closets, look under desks, and pound on doors. It was Maurice who eventually found him. Walker was in the coat closet at the end of the hall, his entire front covered in blood. His tie was askew, his hair a matted mess. It looked like he’d crawled through a river of blood, or had laid down in one. He was very much alive, his eyes terrified, his face wet with tears and snot.
Maurice called to Reginald and Nikki. They came over and stood in front of the closet, and all three of them watched Walker snivel and panic. It was hard to believe that this pathetic shell had once tormented all of them.
“Walker,” said Reginald. “What happened here?”
But Walker said nothing. He just shivered and hugged his legs to his chest and continued to stare up as if he’d been beaten.
Reginald squatted in front of him. A few months back, a squat would have thrown him over onto his back, but now he easily balanced on the tops of his toes, his forearms resting on his knees.
“Did you see who did this?” he asked.
“Everyone is dead,” said Walker.
“Yes.”
“I called 911. I called it when I heard them coming back.” There was a cell phone on the floor, its case caked with blood from Walker’s filthy hands. Reginald picked it up and looked through the call history. He’d called 911 just a few minutes ago, when they themselves had come in.
“What did you tell them?”
“There’s so much blood,” said Walker. “It’s everywhere. I didn’t know what to do. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Fluid was dripping from his nose. His face was working, his handsome features becoming ugly and alien.
“It’s not your fault,” said Reginald.
Walker looked up, his eyes firmly on Reginald’s. Reginald’s new sense tingled. There was something strange in Walker’s eyes — something he’d never seen before. Fear. Helplessness. Panic.
“Tell me who did this,” said Reginald.
“It’s all my fault. The blood, Reggie. It was like someone was throwing water balloons, the way it flew. And there was so much screaming. It’s all my fault.”
“How many were there?” said Reginald.
“Four.”
“How did you escape? How did you get away from them?”
“It’s all my fault, Reggie,” said Walker. His eyes were wet, pleading. “All of these people. They’re all… gone.” It looked like he was trying to swallow but couldn’t manage. His throat worked and hitched, his perfect adam’s apple bobbing up and down. His upper lip quivered. It almost looked like he had a lump of something under it along the top, as if the vampires had surprised him while he was having a good chew and spit.
“Walker,” said Reginald. “Tell me what they looked like.”
“It’s my fault they’re dead, Reggie,” said Walker, his eyes pleading.
Maurice nudged Reginald with his foot. Reginald looked up. Maurice tapped his upper lip just below his right nostril. Right where Walker had his lump of chewing tobacco.
“Walker,” said Reginald. “Do me a favor, will you? It’s easy.”
Walker said nothing, waiting.
“Show me you can still smile and stay sane. Show me those pearly whites.”
What Walker managed was more like a grimace than a smile, but his lips peeled back enough to show the two large fangs he’d grown to accent his perfect white tombstone teeth.