Konrath, J.A. - DRACULAS (A Novel of Terror)

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He crouched, felt the new power coursing through his system, and then he was soaring through the lobby, everything slow and fast all at once, and he came down on the shoulders of a man behind the snack bar—the smell of his blood so pure and rich—and as the man screamed, he took his head between his claws and twisted and ripped until a geyser of glorious red erupted in two ropes and he drank from the larger of the two like a water fountain. Had tasted nothing better in his seventy-six years, not even the Macallan fifty-five, not the models he’d fucked back when he could still get it up. The taste of it he couldn’t begin to explain, only how it made him feel, each drop running down his throat—sweet warm salty rust. Like he’d never breathed before until this moment and had finally taken his first hit of oxygen, knowing the more he drank the better…

FUCKFUCK FUCKFUCKFUCKFUCK

Already the blood flow was ebbing. He had to lick it off the floor now, where it was cooling and congealing, and that beautiful euphoric push had begun to pull away, leaving something black and terrible in its place.

A headache descended, like someone driving an ice pick through his frontal lobe.

Something stung his shoulder. He jumped up onto the snack bar, fire blooming down the corridor, streaking toward the doors to the ER, men screaming at him, the gunshots distant, like he heard them from underwater, and with some of the lights came a brief but violent sting, and he could smell blood, his blood and their blood, still muted under their clothes and skin but it was there, calling to him, and he was moving toward them before he realized what he was doing, the men retreating, yelling, more points of light opening and dying like fireflies.

He stopped.

These men would fight him.

He didn’t want to fight.

He just wanted to drink, and there must be a hundred or more of these blood containers on the floors above him.

Sick. Drugged. Helpless.

He leapt off the snack counter and bounded through the lobby toward the elevators.

Jenny

RATHER than dwell on why this was happening—which wouldn’t help things make any more sense—Jenny fell back on her training. After applying antiseptic, lidocaine cream, and a compress to the claw wound on her hip (which thankfully wasn’t serious), she administered a cryoprecipitate IV to a softball player with a transradial amputation of the forearm, and put a Celox compression on the stump to control bleeding. Jenny repeated the procedure with his friend who was missing half his ass, and also gave him a shot of synthetic morphine because the guy was screaming so loud it made her ears ring. Once both patients were stabilized, she allowed herself a bit of pride at her efforts.

This was the reason she’d become a nurse. To help save lives.

Focusing on that, she turned her attention to the hallway, remembering how close the pediatric ward was. Jenny Bolton had no idea what Mortimer had become. But if he got to the children…

Screams, from behind her. She spun and stared in disbelief. The ER had become a war zone.

Somehow, Mortimer’s affliction had spread, infecting others. Jenny counted three—no, four—of the fanged creatures, and a fifth in mid-transformation, spitting out teeth as longer ones grew in. Those still human tried to make it to the exit, but the EMT Jenny had ridden here with was blocking the doors, snapping and slashing at anyone who came close.

That a-hole Lanz was nowhere to be seen, but bending over one of the infected, smashing its head in with a chainsaw, was…

“Randall!”

“Jen?”

Her ex-husband’s neck craned up at the sound of her voice, and he caught Jenny’s eyes and smiled at her, big and stupid.

That’s what Randall was, at his core. Big and stupid. But despite all he’d put her through, seeing him there, alert and sober amid the horror and the chaos, gave Jenny a burst of hope. More than anything, she wanted him to spirit them both out of here.

But they couldn’t leave. Especially now. With more of these… things …in the hospital, someone had to protect the children.

Randall limped over to her, that familiar, lopsided grin on his face, as Dante’s Inferno raged around them. She met him halfway, and when his huge, hairy arms closed around her in a hug, she endured it.

Hell, against her better instincts, she welcomed it.

“We’ve got ourselves a dracula outbreak,” he said. “Let’s get out of here.”

Jenny pulled away. “I can’t leave. There are kids in this hospital. Sick kids. They won’t have a chance on their own.”

Randall’s brow furrowed, and he pursed his lips. “Okay. I’ll take you to the truck, then I’ll come back and—”

“No time. I have to go now.”

“It’s too dangerous, Jen. Let me do it.”

“Do you even know where pediatrics is, Randall? Can you even spell pediatrics ?”

Randall frowned. “That’s low.”

He was right. And Jenny wanted more than anything for Randall to come with her. But she couldn’t ask that of him. She’d divorced him, kicked him out. Even if he had sobered up, she couldn’t ask him to risk his neck in such a deadly situation.

During their courtship, their engagement, the early years of their marriage, Randall had been the sweetest man on Earth, a big, loyal puppy dog. Not the brightest bulb in the box—really, she could do the New York Times crossword while Randall couldn’t even spell crossword —but that didn’t matter. Randall was…Randall—insanely devoted, who always had her back. Here was a guy who was there for her.

Until he started drinking. Then a new Randall emerged. Violent. He never touched her, never even raised a hand to her. But he’d break things and pick fights with other people. She’d finally given him an ultimatum: Jenny or the bottle. He chose her—or rather said he did, but kept sneaking drinks on the side. Finally she’d called it quits.

Now he seemed more like the man she’d fallen in love with.

“Get out of here, Randall. Save yourself.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Jen. You know that. Let’s go save those sick kids.”

Jenny shook her head. “Don’t do this for me,” she heard herself say. And at the same time, part of her hoped he was doing it for her. She still loved him. After all, she’d never been able to bring herself to go back to her maiden name.

“Of course it’s for you. But it’s also so those little diseased children don’t become dracula snacks. We need to get them safe so they can be sick and die in peace.”

A dracula launched itself at the duo, and Randall pushed Jenny away and swung the chainsaw at its head. Though the saw wasn’t running, the blade hit with such force Jenny heard the creature’s neck snap as it fell to the side. When the dracula hit the floor it thrashed and kicked and screamed, its head gyrating at an odd angle.

“Come on!”

Randall grabbed Jenny’s arm and marched her through the double doors into the depths of the hospital. After a few steps, Jenny took the lead, pulling him to the stairwell, tugging open the door.

“Maybe an elevator?” Randall said. He stared down at his leg, which was dripping blood from torn stitches.

“Aw, Randall…”

Dropping to her knees, Jenny tore at the hem of his hospital gown and began to wrap it around his leg to stop the bleeding. As she was tying off the cloth, she noticed Randall’s gown beginning to extend in front.

“Randall!”

“Sorry,” he said, turning red. “Ain’t been with anyone since you left.”

“Really?” Randall wasn’t smart, but he was handsome and charming, and he’d had a steady stream of girlfriends before they met. Though Jenny was comfortable with her could-stand-to-lose-a-few-pounds body, she’d known that Randall usually dated much hotter, thinner women. If he truly hadn’t had sex with anyone, he’d definitely turned down some offers.