Mark Tufo: A Plague Upon Your Family

When she awoke that cold early day in December she had no reason to believe that this day would not be like the myriad of others she had endured over the millennia of her existence. She was hungry. It was feeding time. Time to thin the human herd. Eliza stayed away from the old. Their blood had become insipid. It had turned to an inedible watery stew of prescription drugs and cheap TV dinners. Healthy adults were a satisfactory meal, but unless she planned on draining them dry she shied away for reason of not wanting to leave any witnesses. She also didn’t like teens, as more time than not, their blood would be proliferated with drugs and alcohol. No, Eliza’s meal of choice, were infants, the new rich scent of them stirred something deep within her instinctually. Was it the lost legacy of motherhood that stimulated her senses or was it the closeness to creation that the baby’s blood brought to her? These were questions she asked herself on occasion, but dwelling was not one of Eliza’s personality behaviors. Action best fit her persona.

All legends tend to have a kernel of truth to them no matter how much Hollywood tries to distort them. As for the tale that a vampire cannot come into your house until it is invited, this has very strong ties to reality. It’s just that this is only half the story. Vampires can go into anyone’s home unless they are expressly forbidden to do so. In this day and age when magic is more of the playing card variety, what is the incentive to bless one’s abode against vampires (and witches by the way). It is an ancient custom that the druids knew how to perform and passed down to countless European cultures. Unfortunately though this knowledge never crossed the ocean. Once a vampire entrance ritual was performed, the vanquished vampire could then only enter when invited to do so. Why at that point would you invite the vampire inside is open to debate. Vampires do have the ability for mind control, but it is generally within a limited distance and eye contact must be maintained. As for vampires being invisible in mirrors, this also is a half-truth. While it is true they cannot be seen in a mirror it is not due to their soullessness. It has to do with their innate ability to bend light. This is not something they do consciously but it can be controlled. It is their predatory version of camouflage, like the lion’s color to match the savannah grass or the tiger’s stripes which break up its profile in the jungles of India. This refraction makes it very difficult for humans to ‘see’ a vampire, usually a vampire is only seen in the peripheral, as a black shadow passing by. If a vampire was spotted, it was because they wanted to be, quite probably to instill fear in their victims. It is said that the adrenaline that pours through a human during times of fear is like ambrosia that makes the blood all that much sweeter.

There were times when Eliza thrilled in the hunt. The taste of the max-stressed blood. The scent of terror as it trailed behind her intended victim. The panic, the horror, she craved these feelings from her stock. Those emotions out of her chattel proved her superiority, her place of dominion in this world of man. The derisiveness of the word ‘man’ was used as both the hatred for mankind as a whole and especially for the lesser of the two sexes. She would feed on whatever was available if need be, but she took a cruel sort of satisfaction in feeding a little deeper in the arteries of a man. Possibly tearing the walls of the blood vessel more savagely than necessary. Of another important note, vampires do not leave puncture wounds (unless they want to). Unless a vampire is trying to make a point (usually ‘Don’t fuck with me!’), they will scarcely leave a mark. Most times a vampire bite will be attributed to bug bites, these also have the added benefits of healing fast and diminishing to a red spot no bigger than the tip of a pencil eraser. This aids in the hunters ability to stay hidden, to make her prey less wary. An unsuspecting victim is an easy fruit to pick.

Eliza Present Day– Prologue Two

It was 6:30 in the morning when Eric Hoto traveled down the length of his extensive driveway, wrapped only in an ill-fitting jacket, to grab the morning paper.

“How many times have I told that kid to bring the paper up to the house?” Mr. Hoto said aloud. Mainly to keep his teeth from chattering together in the frigid arctic blasted air. As he stood, a sense of immense apprehension tugged at his essence, the paper and the paperboy nearly forgotten, he redoubled his efforts to close the jacket against the preternaturally chilly air that surrounded him. The sense of something dancing in and out of his vision made him nearly run. Vertigo threatened to drop him where he stood. As suddenly as it started, it stopped. The air around him warmed considerably, even though it was only ten degrees out. His thrashing heart beat a little easier against his near battered rib cage. His breath came a little more evenly. His shaking legs almost once again stilled.

“I feel like a rabbit looking down the snout of a fox.” Eric could not even fathom how absolutely close to reality those feelings were. But like most humans he was quick to pass on his baser instincts and use higher reasoning to completely gloss over the unthinkable. “I think I need a vacation, if I wasn’t 34 I would think that I had just suffered a stroke. That’s it! That boy either brings the paper up to the door or I’m switching to USAToday.”

Eric’s steps faltered once again half way up the steep grade to his front door. His storm door opened without the benefit of any apparent human locomotion. That unpleasant sensation of being stalked greasily crept across his scalp and was whipped away with a stiff breeze. He was left feeling oddly unclean, unhealthy.

“Wind must be stronger than I thought.” Eric said. Now not so willing to get out of the elements and into the ‘safety’ of his home. His eyebrows drew closer as he questioned his new unwillingness to enter the ‘lion’s den’. “Now why did I think that? And why do I keep talking to my damn self.” As if in answer.

“Because it’s what you do when you’re mad…or scared.”

“Something’s in your house!”

“You’re an engineer, Eric. Think rationally. The wind opened that door. That’s all.”

“Then why aren’t you hurrying up to get out of this cold weather?”

“I’m going.”

“What about your wife and baby?”

“It’s too late.” He moaned.

The sound of heartless laughter would be the last thing Eric heard. It would be two more days before his frozen body was found, but by then there were much bigger happenings going on.

Eliza’s Transformation – Prologue Three

Eliza hadn’t intended on killing the mother and her child, but the impudent animal had somehow sensed the invasion and gone to do what any good mother would, protect her offspring. Eliza was reveling in the freshness, the newness of the baby’s blood, its closeness to the source of life, when the woman had come in. Eliza stood there in all her startling cruelty, surprised when the woman instead of cowering and shrieking and running away stood her ground. Not only stood her ground, but against all of her instincts advanced on the predator. This was the same as the gazelle turning to the lion and charging. The lion might be momentarily stunned, more from the shock of something so unusual happening than of any perceived threat. But still the indignant bitch, who did she think she was? With one lightning fast movement, Eliza wrapped her ungodly strong hand around the slender woman’s throat. Instead of immediately crushing the worthless life out of her, Eliza held her at bay as she drank the baby’s essence into the netherworlds. The mother watched wide-eyed with dismay as her child was taken from her. By the time Eliza was finished with the baby, crushing the wind out of the mother was almost unnecessary. All signs of life had been extinguished with her baby. Eliza laughed as her fingers punched through the soft skin surrounding the woman’s throat. Unlike the previous encounter, there was no more fight in this creature. Blood shot out at all angles as if happy to be free of its veiny trappings. Giant swaths of the nectar bathed across Eliza’s face, she greedily licked up the offerings even as she watched the light of life dim and then fade away.