Tale of the Dead Town (4 page)

“Hey—you’re a dhampir, ain’t you?” The giant’s deep voice was soaked with vermilion
menace.

D didn’t answer him.

Something flowed across the man’s features like water. A frightened hue. He’d looked
into D’s eyes. Ten seconds or so passed before he managed to squeeze out another word.
“Seeing as how the mayor called you to his house, there ain’t much we can do about
you. But this here’s a town for clean-living folk. We don’t want no Noble half-breed
hanging around, okay?”

The heads of those around him moved in unison. Nodding their agreement. There were
men and women there, and even children.

“There’s Nobility here. Or someone who serves them,” D said softly. “The next family
attacked might be yours.”

“If it comes to that, we’ll take care of it ourselves,” said the giant. “We don’t
need no help from the Nobility’s side.”

Nodding faintly, D took a step. That alone was enough to part the fearful crowd. The
giant and the others moved back like the outgoing tide.

“Wait just a damn minute!” Embarrassed perhaps to be afraid, the giant unleashed a
tone that had a fierceness born of hysteria. “I’m gonna pound the shit out of you
now, buster.”

While he said this, the giant slipped on a pair of black leather gloves. The backs
of them looked like plain leather, but the palms were covered with thin, flexible
metal fibers. When the giant smacked his hands together, it set off clusters of purple
sparks that stretched out like coral branches. People backed away speechless. Electromagnetic
gloves like these were used by huntsmen. The highest setting on them was fifty thousand
volts. Capable of killing a mid-sized fire dragon, they were lethal weapons to be
sure.

“What are you, scumbag—half human? Or is it a third?” the giant sneered. “Whatever
the hell it is, you’re just lucky you’re sort of like us. Now say your prayers that
the only part of you I burn to a crisp is your filthy Noble blood.” Purple sparks
dyed his rampaging self-confidence a grotesque hue.

D started to walk away, oblivious to the giant’s threats. The giant ran at him, right
hand raised and ready for action. D’s movements and his expression were unchanged.
Like shadows that’d never known the light.

A sharp glint of light burned through the air. The giant shook his hand in pain. Sparks
leapt wildly from his palm, and then a slim scalpel fell to the ground.

“What the hell are you doing?!” The giant’s enraged outburst went past D and straight
on down the street. Coming toward them with determined strides, his lab coat crisp
and white, was none other than Dr. Tsurugi. “Oh, it’s you, Doc,” the big man said.
“What the hell are you trying to do?” Though he tried his best to sound threatening,
there was no doubt the giant had the recognizable threat of the physician’s scalpel-throwing
to thank for the slight tremble in his voice.

Coming to a stop in front of the crowd, Dr. Tsurugi said sharply, “Would you knock
it off? This man is a guest of the mayor. Instead of trying to chase him off, you
should be working with him to find the Nobility. Mr. Berg!” An elderly man, older
than anyone else there, seemed shaken by the physician’s call. “You were right here—why
didn’t you put a stop to this? If we lose our Hunter, it stands to reason the Nobility
will remain at large. As you’ll recall, all
our
searches have ended in failure.”

“I, er . . . yeah, I thought so, too. It’s just . . . ” Berg stammered ashamedly.
“Well, if he was a regular Hunter it’d be one thing. But him being a dhampir and all,
I knew they wouldn’t go for it. You know, the women and children been scared stiff
since they heard the rumors he was here.”

“And they can get by with just a good scare—a Noble will do far worse to them, I assure
you,” Dr. Tsurugi said grimly.

“B . . . but, Doc,” a middle-aged woman cradling a baby stammered, “they say dhampirs
do it, too. I hear when they’re thirsty, they drink the blood of people they’re working
for . . . ”

“Damned if that ain’t the truth,” the giant bellowed. “See, it ain’t like we got no
grounds for complaining. The whole damn town may be on the move, but information still
gets in. Y’all remember what happened in Peamond, right?”

That was the name of a village where half the townsfolk had died of blood loss in
a single night. Descending from the Nobility, dhampirs had a will of iron, but on
occasion their spirit could succumb to the sweet siren call of blood. The man who’d
been hired in Peamond found the black bonds of blood he’d tried so long to keep in
check stirred anew by the beauty of the mayor’s daughter, and then the Hunter himself
became one of those he hunted. Before the inhabitants of the village got together
and held him down long enough to drive a stake through his heart, the toll of victims
had reached twenty-four.

“That’s the grandfather of all exceptions.” There was no vacillation whatsoever in
Dr. Tsurugi’s tone. “I happen to have the latest statistics. The proportion of dhampirs
who’ve caused that sort of tragedy while on the job is no more than one twenty- thousandth
of a percent.”

“And what proof do we have that this ain’t gonna be one of those cases?!” the giant
shouted. “We sure as hell don’t wanna wind up that fucking one twenty-thousandth of
a percent. Ain’t that right, folks?”

A number of voices rose in agreement.

“Come to think of it, Doc, you ain’t from around here, neither. What’s the story?
You covering for him because you outsiders gotta stick together or something? I bet
that’s it—the two of you dirty dogs been in cahoots all along, ain’t you?!”

All expression faded from Dr. Tsurugi’s face. He stepped forward, saying, “You wanna
do this with those gloves on? Or are you gonna take them off?”

The giant face twisted. And formed a smile. “Oh, this’ll be good,” he said, switching
off the gloves and pulling them from his hands. From the expression on his face, you’d
think he was the luckiest man on earth. The way the physician had nailed him with
a scalpel earlier was pretty impressive, but aside from that he was only about five
foot eight and tipped the scales at around a hundred and thirty-five pounds. The giant
had strangled a bear before, so, when it came down to bare-knuckle brawling, he was
supremely confident in his powerful arms.

“You sure you wanna do that, Conroy?” Berg asked, hustling in front of the giant to
stop him. “What do you reckon they’ll do to you if you bust up our doctor? You won’t
get no slap on the wrist, that’s for damn sure!”

“So what—they’ll give me a few lashes and shock me a couple of times? Hell, I’m used
to it. Tell you what—I’ll leave the doc’s head and hands in one piece when I bust
him up.” Roughly shoving Berg out of the way, the giant stepped forward.

As the young physician also took a step forward, D called out from behind him, “Why
don’t you call it quits? This started out as my fight, after all.”

“Well, it’s mine now, so I’ll thank you to just stand back and watch.”

The air whistled. It could’ve been Conroy letting out his breath, or the whine of
his punch ripping through the wind. Dr. Tsurugi jumped to the side to dodge a right
hook as big and hard as a rock. As if the breeze from the punch had whisked him away.
The young physician had both hands up in front of his chest in lightly clenched fists.
How many of the people there noticed the calluses covering his knuckles, though? Narrowly
avoiding the uppercut the giant threw as his second punch, Dr. Tsurugi let his left
hand race into action. The path it traveled was a straight line.

To Conroy, it looked like everything past the physician’s wrist had vanished. He felt
three quick impacts on his solar plexus. The first two punches he took in stride,
but the third one did the trick. He tried to exhale, but his wind caught in his throat.
The physician’s blows had a power behind them one would never imagine from his unassuming
frame.

A bolt of beige lightning shot out at the giant’s wobbling legs. No one there had
ever seen such footwork. The physician’s leg limned an elegant arc that struck the
back of Conroy’s knee, and the giant flopped to the ground with an earthshaking thud.
Straight, thrusting punches from the waist and circular kicks—there’d been no hesitation
in the chain of mysterious attacks, and how powerful they were soon became apparent
as Conroy quickly started to get back up. As soon as the giant tried to put any weight
on his left knee, he howled in pain and fell on his side.

“Probably won’t be able to stand for the rest of the day,” the young physician said,
looking around at the chalk-white faces of the people as if nothing had happened.
“Just goes to show it doesn’t pay to go around whipping up mobs. All of you move along
now. Back to your homes.”

“Yeah, but, Doc,” a man with a long, gourd-shaped face said as he pointed to Conroy,
“who’s gonna see to his wounds?”

“I’ll have a look at him,” Dr. Tsurugi said with resignation. “Bring him by the hospital
some time. Just don’t do it for about three days or so. Looks like it’ll take him
that long to cool down. But from here on out, there’s a damn good chance I’ll refuse
to treat anyone who raises a hand to the Hunter here, so keep that in mind. Okay,
move along now.” After he’d seen to it that the people dispersed and Conroy had been
carried away, Dr. Tsurugi turned to face D.

“That’s a remarkable skill you have,” the Hunter said. “I recall seeing it in the
East a long time ago. What is it?”

“It’s called karate. My grandfather taught it to me. But I’m surprised you’d put up
with so much provocation.”

“I didn’t have to. You put an end to it. Maybe you did it to keep me from having to
hurt any of the locals . . . Whatever the reason, you helped me out.”

“No, I didn’t.” There was mysterious light in the physician’s eyes as he shook his
head. While you couldn’t really call it amity, it wasn’t hostility or enmity, either.
You might call it a kind of tenacity.

And then D asked him, “Have we met somewhere before?”

“No, never,” the physician said, shaking his head. “As I told you, I’m a circuit doctor.
In my rounds out on the Frontier, I’ve heard quite a few stories about you.”

The physician looked like he had more to say, but D interrupted him, asking, “Who
used to live in that abandoned house?”

The physician’s eyes went wide. “You mean to tell me you didn’t know before you went
in? The house belongs to Lori Knight—the girl you rescued.”

-

-

I

-

The girl was sitting up in bed. She looked like a snow-capped doll—the plaster for
removing radioisotopes that covered her limbs was called snow parts. Glowing faintly
in the evening from the radiation it’d drawn from her body, it hid the soul-chilling
tragedy that’d befallen her beneath the beauty of new-fallen snow.

“There’s no immediate threat to her life. I believe you heard all about her condition
from Pluto VIII.”

D met the physician’s words with silence. The girl—Lori—was reflected in the Hunter’s
eyes, but what deeper emotions the sight of her stirred in D’s psyche even Dr. Tsurugi
couldn’t tell. Or maybe it didn’t stir anything at all. The physician thought that’d
be entirely appropriate for the young man.

They were in one of the rooms in the hospital that stood near the center of the residential
sector. Dr. Tsurugi and a middle-aged nurse lived there and treated every imaginable
ailment, dealing with everything from the common cold to installing cyborg parts.
His skill at being able to handle such a wide range of health problems made him a
qualified, and accomplished, circuit doctor.

“Could I put some questions to her in writing?”

D’s query put Dr. Tsurugi’s head at a troubled tilt. “Perhaps for a short time,” he
said reluctantly. “It’s just . . .”

D waited for his explanation.

“I’d like you to refrain from asking her any questions that may likely prove shocking.
We’re dealing with a young lady who’s been seriously wounded both physically and psychologically.
She’s already well aware of what the future holds for her.”

“How old is she?”

“Seventeen.”

D nodded.

The physician looked rather concerned, but he soon walked over to Lori’s bedside,
took the memo pad and electromagnetic pen from beside her pillow, and jotted something
down. An introduction for D, no doubt. Her white shoulders shook a bit, her downturned
face shifted slightly toward D—then stopped. D watched expressionlessly as her face
turned down again and her lily-white fingers took the electromagnetic pen from the
physician. The pen moved with short, powerful strokes. Like it was fighting something
off. Tearing off the page, the physician stood up straight and handed the message
to D. In beautiful, precise penmanship it read,
Thank you so much
.

Returning the sheet to the physician, D settled himself into the chair beside Lori’s
bed without saying a word. The blue eyes peeking out from under her various white
wrappings suddenly opened wide. The girl turned her face away. Quickly bringing it
back, she cast her gaze downward. From her reaction, she apparently recognized D.

The physician got another pen and notepad and handed them to D. The Hunter’s hand
quickly went into action.
There’s someone in your house
, he wrote.
Were there any strange occurrences there before?

Lori stared at the page he’d given her. And continued to do so for a long time. It
seemed like nearly ten minutes passed before she shook her head from side to side.

Once again D’s hand scrawled a few words.
Do you know what your father’s experiments involved?

Again, she shook her head.

D readied his pen once more.

Lori shook her head. Over and over she shook it. Her shoulders began to quake, too.
Bits of healing plaster fell from her like snow-flakes. Dr. Tsurugi held her shoulders
steady. Still, Lori tried to go on shaking her head.

“Kindly leave. Hurry!” the physician said to D. The door swung open and the nurse
rushed in.

Getting to his feet, D asked, “Where’s Pluto VIII staying?”

“As I recall, he’s in P9 in the special residential district. It’s right by the law
enforcement bureau,” the physician called out, but his words merely echoed off the
closed door and died away.

-

Exiting the hospital, D walked down the street. Despite the sudden madness they’d
witnessed in Lori, his eyes were as cold and clear as ever. Any human emotion would’ve
seemed like a blemish when it showed in the young man’s eyes.

Though plenty of people were coming and going on the street, the path directly ahead
of D was completely unobstructed. Every last person in his way stepped aside. They
didn’t do this out of the superstitious, ingrained distaste they had for those who
dwelled outside their society, but because of the young man’s good looks and the aura
about him. Everyone knew. They also knew that not everyone out on the street was necessarily
human.

And yet, there was a hint of intoxication in the eyes of all as they gazed at D. His
gorgeous features made them shudder with something other than fear, and not only the
women but even the men felt a sort of sexual excitement when they saw him. Most of
the people wore work clothes and carried farm implements. Working the earth wasn’t
quite the same in a sector of a moving town, but people went about the business of
living as best they could. They labored. On the far side of the park lay farms and
fields, as well as a sprawling industrial sector.

D soon found the law enforcement bureau. Despite the grandiose name, it was no different
from the sheriff’s office you’d find in any town this size. The group of blue buildings
across the street made up the special residential district. A pair of three-story
buildings that looked like hotels—that was all there was to the district. As D came
to the door, a cheerful voice shouted to him from across the street. On turning, the
Hunter found Pluto VIII trotting his way. Both his hands were covered by a riot of
colors—flowers.

“Hey, what are you doing, stud?” The biker wore a personable smile that made his hostility
back at the mayor’s house seem long forgotten. Once he’d reached D, he looked all
around them. “They’re mighty unfriendly in this town,” he groused. “I heard there
ain’t a single florist anywhere. Someone said there was a flower garden, so I went
to have a look-see, and they tell me out there they don’t sell to outsiders. Well,
that ain’t so rare in itself, but I tell ’em, ‘Dammit, I wanna take them to a sick
friend,’ and still they wouldn’t give me the okay.” He was truly indignant about this.
Foam flying from his mouth, he added, “Hell, I told ’em the flowers were for Lori.
I say, ‘She used to live here just like the rest of you, right? I don’t care if her
family decided to leave; it ain’t like she came back here because she wanted to. She
lost her mother and father, and got hurt real bad herself, and only came back to try
and save her life.’ Son of a bitch—they still told me I couldn’t have ’em. Said that
once you leave town, you’re an outsider.”

To his snarling companion, D said softly, “So, how did you get those flowers then?”

“Well, er—you know. Anyway, I was pretty pissed off at the time.”

“That’s not exactly new territory for you, though.”

“Yeah, you could say that,” Pluto VIII confessed easily. It was frightening how quickly
his mood could change. “Oh, well, not much I can do now. Anyway—did you have business
with me?”

“I want to ask you something.”

“Is that a fact? Well, let’s not stand around here jawing. There’s a bar around the
corner. What do you say to having a drink while we talk?” Laughing, he added, “Don’t
think they serve human blood, though.” Knowing exactly who he was saying this to,
his joke might’ve had deadly repercussions, but D didn’t seem to mind. He followed
Pluto VIII.

-

The bar was packed. Work in town must’ve been done in shifts. As the two of them entered,
all chatter in the watering hole stopped dead. The eyes of the bartender and the men
around the various tables focused on the pair.

“Excuse me! Coming through! Pardon me!” Pluto VIII called out amiably as they slipped
between the crowded tables, finally seating themselves at an empty one in the back.
In a terribly gruff voice he shouted, “Hey, I’d like a bitter beer. That, and a—”
Turning to D, he asked in a completely baffled manner, “What’ll you have?”

“Nothing.”

“Dope, you can’t just walk into a bar and order nothing—you’re a nuisance.” Yelling,
“He’ll have the same,” to the bartender, Pluto VIII turned to D again. “So, what’s
this business you have with me?”

“I went into a certain house earlier,” D said. “There was someone strange inside.
Wasn’t you, was it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t think anyone from town would be rooting through the house at this late date.
And the only ones here from somewhere else are you and me.”

Pluto VIII leaned back and laughed heartily. Those seated around them flinched and
gave him startled looks. “Hate to disappoint you, but it wasn’t me. Hell, even if
it was me, you think I’d just come right out and say so?”

“Why are you here? Seems someone like you would be better off leaving town.”

“I’d tend to agree with you,” Pluto VIII conceded easily. “But it ain’t that simple.
Why, compared to the world down there, this place is like heaven. If you got money
to spend, you can buy just about anything, and you can get by without messing around
with any of the Nobility’s deadly little pals. I tell you, I plan to stick around
until they toss me out on my ear.”

“You couldn’t buy flowers,” D reminded him.

“Yeah, but that don’t change much.” But, just as his confident smile spread across
his gruff face, a number of people piled in through the bar door. A gray-haired crone
was at the fore, and behind her three powerful-looking young men. All four were pale
with anger.

D’s eyes dropped to the bouquet on the table, and he said, “You stole those, didn’t
you?”

“No, I’m renting them, you big dope. I just didn’t leave a deposit for them.”

The whole bar started to buzz with chatter, and a bunch of people gathered around
D and Pluto VIII’s table. “There he is. There’s the no-good flower thief. I’m sure
of it,” the crone shrieked, her bony finger aimed at Pluto VIII’s face.

“Now that ain’t a very nice thing to say,” Pluto VIII said, knitting his brow. “I’m
just borrowing these to take ’em to a sick friend, okay? What could make a flower
happier than that?”

“The hell you say!” The crone’s hairline and the corners of her eyes rose with her
tone. “Do you have any idea how much back-breaking toil it takes to grow a single
flower in this town? Of course you don’t! You’re a dirty, rotten thief!”

“He sure is,” another person surrounding the table chimed in. “And thieves gotta pay
a price. Let’s step outside.”

“Nothing doing,” Pluto VIII laughed mockingly. “What’ll you do if I don’t go?”

“Then we’ll have no choice but to use force.”

The biker’s confident laughter flew in the faces of the tense men. “Do you folks know
who the hell I am? I’m the one and only John M. Brasselli Pluto VIII, known far and
wide across the Frontier.”

Silence.

“What, you bastards never heard of me?” Pluto VIII said with a scowl. “Well, at any
rate, I bet you know my friend here. The most handsome cuss on the Frontier, a first-rate
slayer of Nobility, an apostle of the dream demons, and all the beauty of the darkness
in human form—I give you the Vampire Hunter D!”

Every face around them went pale. Even those of the men in the very back of the bar.

“Hell of a reputation he’s got, eh?” Pluto VIII chortled. Looking around at the men
who were now still and pale as corpses, he asked, “Still want us to step outside?
My buddy can split a laser beam in two.”

“For your information, this doesn’t concern me at all,” said D, his gazed fixed on
the same spot on the table the whole time.

“What do you mean?” Pluto VIII said, bugging his eyes. “Oh, you’re cold-blooded. Aren’t
we buddies? Don’t listen to him, guys,” Pluto VIII laughed. “He was only joking.”

“Go outside if you want. But leave me out of this,” said the Hunter.

“I don’t believe you!” Pluto VIII rose indignantly. “Did you forget about the beer
I just bought you?”

“Sorry, sir, about that,” someone called from behind the bar, “we just ran out of
your beer.”

“God damn it all, this just ain’t my day!” Pluto VIII cursed.

“Quit your bellyaching and step outside already,” said one of the men surrounding
him. “Stealing flowers is stealing all the same, and a thief’s still gotta pay the
price.”

“Oh, really? And what did you have in mind?”

“A thousand lashes with the electron whip, or thirty days hard labor.”

“Don’t care much for either. Well, I’ll go out with you anyway.” Giving D a look that
could kill, Pluto VIII didn’t seem terribly afraid as he followed the men out. Still,
it wasn’t the fight headed outside that every eye in the place was following—their
eyes were riveted to the handsome young man who remained at the table.

Four men escorted Pluto VIII outside. Two of them were in their thirties, while the
other two were younger. They must’ve been around twenty years old. As was normal for
laborers on the Frontier, the mass of their muscles was evident even through their
rough apparel. Every one of them stood over six feet tall. Pluto VIII, on the other
hand, was five foot four. The biker was just as big through the chest and shoulders,
but, in a bare-knuckle brawl, he’d be at an overwhelming disadvantage.

Snapping his fingers, Pluto VIII asked, “Okay, who wants to be first?”

“Don’t go looking to get yourself hurt any worse than need be,” said the man who seemed
to be their leader. “Just come along quietly to the law enforcement bureau and take
your pick of the two punishments. Then this’ll all be over.”

Pluto VIII chuckled. “Not a chance.” His face brimmed with self-confidence. Beneath
the beard that hid his mouth, his deep red tongue was licking his lips. “If there’s
one thing I can’t stand, it’s assholes who get all tough when the numbers are on their
side. See, I’m more of a loner. So don’t just stand there acting scary. Hurry up and
come get a piece of me!”

Even before he had time to realize the last bit had been a challenge, the young man
on the left took a swing at Pluto VIII. He didn’t say a word, didn’t even exhale.
He must’ve been a first-rate brawler. Just as the two figures were about to make contact,
Pluto VIII backed away without moving a muscle. Still swinging his right hand down
as hard as he could, the young man had no time to compensate and hit the ground shoulder
first. What the hell happened? The perfect timing of the biker’s defense against the
attack almost made it look like the two of them were in collusion.