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

As his eyes rolled up into his head and his brain kicked out its last few beta waves, Dr. Kurt Lanz MD thought, Smart, smart girl. I probably shouldn’t…have fired her…

Adam

“DID you stop the bleeding?” he asked.

“The Pitocin stopped it, but she’s lost about fifteen hundred milliliters and her vitals are way down.”

They entered Stacie’s room, and something inside of Adam broke apart seeing her still lying unconscious and bloodless in the bed.

“Where’s my daughter?”

“Resting peacefully in the nursery. The blood?”

He took his pack off and unzipped the pouch, handed Herrick the first unit of O-positive.

She already had the intravenous line lodged into Dee’s arm, and she hung the bag on the metal stand’s hook and plugged the IV line into the plastic, Adam watching the line of darkness push down the tube toward his wife’s veins.

He touched the back of his hand to her cheek—clammy and cool.

“Is she going to make it?”

Herrick didn’t answer.

“Nurse?”

Adam glanced over his shoulder.

Herrick stood with her hand cupped to her mouth, spitting blood and…were those teeth?…into the palm of her hand.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

She looked up at him, confusion brimming in her eyes. Tried to speak, but more teeth were loosening, and she plucked one of her back molars out—root and all.

Said something that sounded like, “I don’t feel right.”

Adam reached out to touch her shoulder, but she retreated and ran out of the room.

He turned back to Stacie, took her cold hand in his.

“I’ll be right back, sweetie. You’re going to be okay now. Just rest.”

He leaned down and kissed her on the cheek, and as he turned to leave the room to see what was wrong with Herrick, something standing in the doorway stopped him cold.

A little demon-girl.

“You get out of here,” he said.

She hissed at him.

He noticed a pair of scissors protruding from her chest.

“Go on!” he shouted.

But she didn’t go on. Just stood there, drooling out of those horrific teeth, black eyes gleaming in the blue-glow of the emergency lights, watching him almost like she was gearing herself up for something, and then he realized she wasn’t looking at him.

It was the blood bag.

She moved forward and before he knew what he’d done, Adam swung and hit the little girl with a devastating left hook to the face, felt her nose sink in, his knuckles pop, and she went sliding back across the floor.

Something possessed him—a livid, white-hot jolt of rage, and as the little girl tried to sit up, the minister rushed forward, grabbing a knot of her hair as he shot past, and dragged her out into the corridor.

He could feel her struggling, trying to regain her feet, so he ran harder, hit a full-on sprint as he approached the junction, and then he gave one hard tug and sent the demon-girl careening into the nurses’ station.

She crashed head-first into the wood paneling and lay unmoving on the floor.

Adam could hear noise everywhere now.

From Room 12—Brittany’s room—God-awful screams, figured she was pushing the baby out, and he hoped Nurse Herrick was in with her.

The barricade was rattling, too, a demon trying to squeeze itself through the square window-frame.

The demon-girl jumped to her feet, hit the ground running, coming straight toward Adam, talons out, screeching like some battle cry, and it happened so fast Adam didn’t even react, just let the monster slam into him at full-speed.

They crashed hard to the floor, the little girl’s talons digging through his black pants, pinning him to the linoleum.

He looked down, saw her head moving toward his crotch, those shark teeth snapping.

Adam reached out and grabbed another handful of the little monster’s hair and torqued her head a half second before she decapitated his johnson.

He brought his legs up around her and squeezed her between his thighs, straining to crush her ribcage.

She screamed, tore one of her talons out of his leg and swiped it at his face.

Adam could hear those demons trying to break through the barricade, couldn’t see them from where he lay, but he could hear the ominous crack of wood splintering.

The girl struggled to inch toward him, close enough now that he let go of her hair and started punching—direct, solid blows to her face, her eyes swelling shut as she screamed.

And then suddenly he felt her talons close around his neck, and her face—the nightmare wreck of it—inches from his.

He stared into those black, soulless eyes that glistened with…

…joy…

It was unmistakable.

This little demon-girl looming over him, saliva dripping in long, bloody strings from her fangs, was pleased as punch, as if she’d finally managed to catch her first real prey.

I can’t be killed by a little girl.

Please God.

Not like this.

Wait! Someone had appeared behind the girl—he craned his neck to see who it was as those monsters ravaged the barricade beyond the nurses’ station.

Brittany! It was…Brittany?

Brittany stood in bare feet on the cold linoleum, her head tilted, watching Adam.

Her face had exploded, and her stomach too, and in the cavity a little eight-pound demon with a face full of half-inch razor whites was slowly chewing its way out, Adam thinking…

This is a hell worse than any I ever read about. Please God, please…where are you?

Jenny

IN a night filled with countless horrors, killing Lanz had to be the worst one of all.

Jenny huddled with the children once again, not even knowing what she was saying, but continuing to speak in soothing tones until their hysterics leveled off. Then she found a spare blanket and draped it over Lanz’s body so they wouldn’t have to look at it. She kicked something wet and lumpy— is that his stomach? —underneath the cover and then retreated back to the corner of the storage room.

“It’s okay now,” she said. “We’re all going to be—”

But she heard something that stopped her.

Squeak…

Squeak…

Squeak…

Could it be…?

The boys screaming in unison, so loud and shrill it hurt Jenny’s ears. She whipped her head around, following their shocked stares and saw…

That clown. That damn clown.

It stood next to the window, peering inside. Benny the Clown’s teeth were gone, and it looked like he’d been gumming barbed wire. But the red nose and the fright wig remained, as did patches of white make-up, reflecting multicolored hues of pastel in their glow lights.

Jenny summoned up courage she didn’t know she had and said, “It’s okay, kids. It’s okay. He can’t get in.”

“I hate clowns!”

“That’s not a real clown,” another boy said. “That’s just some guy dressed up like a clown!”

“It’s a monster clown!”

She hugged them. “Don’t worry. The monster clown is out there. We’re in here.”

“He’s doing something!”

Jenny didn’t want to look at the creepy thing again, but she felt compelled to. Benny the Clown was holding something in his hand and waving it into the broken window.

A blue handkerchief?

Squinting at it, Jenny realized it was sticking out of the vest pocket of his clown outfit. Benny the Clown gave the cloth a sudden tug.

The first handkerchief was tied to a second, yellow handkerchief. He fed both through the window and kept pulling.

Attached to it was a red one.

Then a green one.

“Go away, you goddamn clown!” Jenny ordered.

But Benny the Clown continued to pull out handkerchief after handkerchief. Five…ten…fifteen…then…