Anton Strout - Dead Matter

“Well, this is eerie,” Godfrey said.

I listened to the sounds of pursuit getting closer, but there was still no sign of light off in the darkened distance heading back from where we had come.

“Please tell me you know the way back,” I said.

Godfrey looked unsure. “I think so.”

“That doesn’t sound promising, God.”

“Only one way to find out,” he said and started off into the dark. I followed the small cone of light generated from his flashlight until we spied other lights approaching us. People were shouting, but they were hard to understand in the echoes that filled this area of the Gauntlet. A pool of light hit us, and the shouting became louder.

“Stick close to me,” I said to Godfrey, grabbing the flashlight.

“Hey!” he called.

“Sorry,” I said, running off down the nearest aisle of books.

“You’re never going to outrun them all,” Godfrey said, hurrying to keep up with me.

“I can try,” I said. I turned at the next corner I encountered and ran on. “Besides, I don’t need to escape them. I just need to tie them up for a bit.”

And that was what I did. At every turn, I switched directions, sometimes doubling back over areas I was sure I had already been through. Within minutes I was good and lost, which was fine by me. To my amazement, Godfrey had kept up with me. By the time we found ourselves trapped in one aisle between two different sets of Shadowers, we were both panting and wheezing but willing to give ourselves up.

As one of the men forced my arms behind me and put them into restraints, Allorah came walking out of the darkness. She was the only one of my pursuers who wasn’t out of breath. Several of the other Enchancellors trailed behind her, all of them nervously clutching flashlights in one hand and stakes in the other.

“Not too tight,” Allorah warned the Shadower cuffing me. “We’re civilized… and the head of Other Division seems to have a fondness for this one.”

The Shadower did as he was told. Two other men moved to grab Godfrey, and he looked about to faint.

“Leave him alone,” I said. “Godfrey’s innocent in all this. I threatened him and made him take me down here. I thought there might be a way out.”

The Shadowers backed off Godfrey, who let out a deep sigh of relief.

Allorah walked up to me, lowering her staking device, contempt in her eyes. “Where are they?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, cocking my ear to one side as if I was having trouble hearing. “Who?”

“You know who,” Allorah said.

I smiled and shook my head. “Just me and the books down here.”

“Fine,” she said. She grabbed me by the shoulders and spun me around before grabbing the cuffs and pressing them till I could feel them pinching into my skin. I hissed as the sensation hit me. “You’ve seen what they can do, and yet you’re trying to help them? You want to play traitor. We’ll treat you as one.” She looked at two of the Shadower team. “Take him up to containment.”

“Sorry, Simon,” one of them said as they started to drag me away.

I dug my feet in and turned back to Allorah.

“You know, you’re much more pleasant when you’re playing scientist,” I said.

For a second, the Enchancellor actually looked hurt by my words, but only for a second. “Take… him… away.”

The Shadowers started to walk, pulling me along, and then stopped to turn to me.

“You don’t happen to know the way out, do you?” one of them asked.

After a half hour of wandering, the distant promise of electric lighting became apparent and the Shadower team headed me toward it. Without too much manhandling, they escorted me back upstairs and took me to one of the rarely used rooms up on the second floor that looked a bit like a professorial lecture hall. I was forced to sit down in the first row with one Shadower on either side of me and two directly behind me.

“Isn’t this a little overkill?” I asked. “I’m not going to run.”

None of my guards responded. Time passed in silence for quite a while before I heard the door at the back of the tiny lecture hall open, and voices approached. Dozens of members from various divisions of the Department crammed into the space, filling the seats and lining the walls. Director Wesker came in with Jane trailing behind. I gave her a weak, weary smile, and even though she smiled back, she looked nervous for me.

The two of them sat together in a section off to my far left. Last in the room were the thirteen members of the Enchancellors, with my accuser, Allorah, coming down the stairs last and remaining standing while the others seated themselves at a long table along the front. As Allorah waited for the room to settle, Inspectre Quimbley entered and moved down to my row, taking the one empty seat two people to my left.

Another of the female Enchancellors, this one much older than Allorah, cleared her throat and the room went silent.

“Due to the specific nature of this inquiry, we are deferring to Enchancellor Daniels, given her knowledge of vampiric lore and taxonomy.”

Allorah nodded to her, then turned to address the assembly. “I have conferred with the rest of the Enchancellors on what I have seen this evening,” she said, her face solemn as she raised her voice, “and we are meeting on the grounds that a member of Other Division stands accused of treason.”

The assembled crowd let out a dull murmur, and I felt the eyes of everyone in the room focus on me. I felt my face go flush and all I wanted was to sink into my seat until no one could see me.

“Will the accused please rise?” Allorah said, not even bothering to look at me.

I stood, despite a weakness in my knees and the sudden racing of my heart. Allorah stepped toward me.

“What say you?” she asked.

“I don’t wish to offend any of the Enchancellors,” I said, “but ‘what say you’? Are we at the Salem witch trials here?”

“Salem is not in our jurisdiction,” Allorah answered, humorless. “But I take it your willful betrayal of the trust of this Department strikes you as humorous?”

“Not at all,” I said, sobering. “What strikes me funny is the tone of these accusations.”

“Did you or did you not willfully invite a vampire into this building?” Allorah said, her voice rising in anger.

I took a deep breath to keep my cool. “I did,” I said, drawing another murmur from the crowd.

“A known enemy of this Department,” she continued. “A creature of the night who, I might add, is also a known enemy of the Fraternal Order of Goodness, of which you are a part.”

Inspectre Quimbley stood up. “In the boy’s defense, Allorah, I saw no aggression from this creature when the boy brought it to my office.”

Allorah ignored him, her eyes still focused on me.

“You are aware of the sign hanging high on the wall overlooking the main section of the office floor, aren’t you?”

I nodded.

“Would you kindly tell the assembled Enchancellors what it says?”

The blood in my veins started to race. I was losing patience with this whole affair.

“It numbers the days since our last vampiric incursion,” I said, very slow and pointed. “I believe it’s almost at eight hundred now.”

“Until today,” she said. “Yes. It was.” She turned away from me and walked down the line of seated Enchancellors. “Mr. Canderous here has had his issues with that sign before, calling in a false vampire alarm a few months back, if you will recall. Tell me, Mr. Canderous, did you think we put that sign up there just for fun, or do you think maybe we had a reason for doing it? Like maybe the fact that vampires are considered a threat in New York City, one that must be eradicated.”