At the last minute they decided to go with flares instead of more lanterns. Lanterns were a more steady light, but they couldn't figure out a safe way to carry them as far into the darkness as Felix wanted.
Only they didn't have any flares and they weren't at all sure the local cops would give them any.
Deputy Kirk Thompson was sure.
"I'll get your flares," he said ominously and walked over to a patrol car.
They couldn't hear what he said to them. But they got the tone.
And they got their flares. The deputy had three dozen delivered to them within five minutes.
"So," said Jack Crow as they assembled before the warehouse once more. "We're all set. Rock and roll!"
And as he led the Team inside he thought: Please, Felix! Don't fold on us again!
He didn't. Felix was, if anything, more impressive the second time. He was cool and calm and deadly accurate, and the closest monster to them was the one Jack picked to crossbow, Roy.
Roy was as big and strong as he looked. But not as strong as the winch. Not with Felix continually, mercilessly, shooting him. By the time he'd been dragged to the sunlight, Roy had forgotten all about the stake through his chest. And then it was too late.
They waited five minutes and went in again and got another, as easily as the last. Then they did it again. And again and again and again. The crowd watching them began to grow as their success continued, some of the policemen going so far as to actually stand just behind Carl's winch to watch.
Carl ignored them. So did the others.
They always followed the same procedure. Jack led them in, then they fanned out on either side of him into position. Felix would light a flare, toss it way into the shadows at the edge of their lanterns, and begin to shoot everything that moved but the one Jack had picked to stake. After Jack made his shot, the others would fade back toward the door while Felix kept the rest at bay. They would all exit with the burning vampire. Then a sip of something cool, a quick puff on a cigarette, and back they'd go.
And then the vampires began to change.
There were only a handful left, most of them shot several times, and they weren't moving much. Some weren't even on their feet. Not dead, not nearly dead, but hurting.
And waking up.
It was the pain, decided Adam. The pain was shocking them back into consciousness after the zombie-limbo of death. Whatever, they were no longer the same. And their eyes were no longer just the blank thirst-stare. They were alert. And angry.
They found this out on their sixth trip inside the building. It started off just like the other times, Crow in first, followed by the others fanning to either side of him. There were no goons in sight, which wasn't especially unusual. But Cat's detector showed nothing approaching and that was strange.
Felix tossed a flare anyway, flinging it with a long side arm to avoid the low ceiling.
It landed on a vampire.
It was a young woman in her early thirties. She was wearing boots, blue jeans, and a black sweatshirt advertising "ZZ Top's North American Tour." Felix remembered that sweatshirt. He had put at least three silver bullets through it that day.
The woman had been lying there in the dust, unmoving, when the flare landed on her chest. She sprang to her feet, yelping and brushing wildly at the flame flickering from her sweatshirt. Then, once she was free of the fire, she stopped.
And looked at them.
And then she felt the bullet holes in her chest.
And then she looked right at Felix. Right at the gunman.
And then she let out an awful shrieking cry, like a satanic infant's tantrum, and ran straight at Felix, the source of her anguish.
Felix shot her twice more, without thinking. Both bullets struck her high in the chest, flipping her over backward. After she hit, she lay still.
"Good Lord," whispered Cat harshly, "I think you killed her!"
"Does anybody remember how many shots it took?" asked Adam. "Felix?"
"Hold it, goddamniit! Cat! Anything else coming?"
Cat bent over his detector. "Not yet," he replied.
"Okay, then," Jack announced. "We can afford to wait a bit to see if she's really..."
She wasn't. The second wailing was even worse than the first. And her scrambling headlong charge for the gunman was even quicker. Felix's startled third shot was from the hip. It struck her in the left thigh and she cartwheeled forward onto her shoulder...
Then leapt back to her feet and came at him again, right at him, shrieking that shriek, and bounding on that shattered left thigh.
Their eyes had met before Felix managed to shoot her again, this time in the exact center of her pulsing throat.
She slammed backward into the dust, writhing and flinging that mad baby's cry all around her.
Jack made a quick decision. He stepped over in front of Felix and raised the crossbow.
"That tears it," he barked gruffly. "We're taking this one."
And they did. When next she rose, Jack's crossbow almost folded her in half.
But it held and the cable held and a few seconds later they were watching her burn just as all the rest had.
No one moved after the fire was out. They just stood there.
"She knew you," cat said at last, looking at Felix. "She knew you were the one who'd hurt her."
Felix took a long puff on his cigarette, nodded.
"Yes," added Adam. "They are definitely waking up."
"Let 'em," snarled Jack Crow. He fixed the Team with a frosty stare. "It's too late for 'em. We just stay a little tighter, work a little faster, be a little more careful. We still got 'em."
They were right. From then on, every ghoul Felix had previously shot would scream that insane wail and rush him as soon as they saw him. There was no doubt they recognized him. No doubt they hated him.
But Jack Crow was also right. It was too late. The system worked. It worked on zombies or vampires or any combination of the two. Felix's shooting was too quick. Jack's crossbow was too accurate.
The only trouble spot came toward the end. They were getting tired, with some four hours at it by then, and due for a mistake. The mistake was Felix's, and it was a beauty he dropped his gun during a charge.
First he slipped, in that awfully gooey stuff the monsters used for blood. It was a clear, viscous, odorless mucus that had been pouring from the wounds onto the cement and Felix made the mistake of stepping in it as he spun to shoot the third of the trio, which had rushed screaming out of the flare's light toward them. When he went down, Felix's right hand went out instinctively to catch himself and it went into another puddle of the junk and the pistol squirted out of his grip like a bar of soap.
Jack had already made his shot, the vampire already wriggling on the huge arrow, when it happened. He frantically fished for the pistol on his belt. Cat did the same and had actually managed to draw his pistol before Adam, calm and cool, stepped forward and fired his crossbow through the last monster's chest. It dropped like meat on a spit.
Seconds later they were out watching another fire while Carl toweled the clinging mess from Felix's hand and gun and everyone else exchanged proud grins with the young priest. It had been his only chance for action in hours and he had been flawless.
They felt good.
Nothing else even slowed them down. And only one thing actually frightened them again: going down into the basement.
The detectors said there were no more inside. Jack Crow believed them. They had already killed twenty-four and that was something like the third highest number Jack had ever seen in one place.
But they were still going to have to go down there and see for themselves.
And while they were sitting there trying to figure out the best way of going about it an old man wearing a faded pastor's collar started across the street toward them. They had noticed him before and ignored him. Just another one of the local biggies come to oversee.
But as he got closer, they could tell this was no bigshot. The knees to his slacks were worn through. The lining of his jacket was hanging loose on one side. And he looked like he hadn't shaved that white beard in a week.
He began to walk faster and faster as be approached them. He was carrying a piece of pipe in one hand, holding it in front of him like an offering. Jack had stood up to introduce himself, had even stuck out his hand to be shaken, in fact, when the old man swung the pipe at his head.
Jack half ducked but the pipe still banged him good on his left shoulder before glancing hard against his ear. Blood splattered from his ear and he reeled from the stunning ringing in his head and if he'd been alone the old man might have finished him off.
But he wasn't alone. The old man was down hard on the street with the deputy handcuffing him within three seconds. The next minutes were spent bandaging up Jack's ear and screaming at the local cops for an explanation as to just who in the hell let this crazy old fart in here, anyway?
That's just Old Vic, they were told.
Who?
Old Vic Jennings. He's just a crazy old coot lives down there by the railroad tracks. He's an Englishman. Uh, ya'll don't wanna press charges or nothing, do you?
Jack stood up and pointed to the bandage covering the left side of his head. "I sure as Hell do!"
The cops looked back and forth between each other, shrugged, and tried to explain that "there's kinda somewhat of a problem with that."
Oh, really? Team Crow asked.
Jack looked down at Old Vic, who seemed delighted with all the attention. He was grinning a satisfied death's-head grin at Jack. The two men exchanged silent looks while the Team heard the song and dance about being able to arrest him, okay! We can arrest him easy. Only they couldn't put 'im in the jail on account of the jail being closed because of two prisoners we got down there got AIDS and we don't wanna risk no epidemic thing.
Jack was listening as he stared at the old man's grin and tried to keep from grinning back. He asked one question:
By whose order was the jail closed?
The mayor, he was told.
Jack nodded, told them to take the old man away anywhere they wanted - to the Hood County Jail, if necessary - but keep him away from Team Crow.
"Because," he added, "we'll be finished here in another hour and I don't want anything to screw it up. Dig?"
They dug. They hauled Old Vic, still grinning, to a squad car. He had never, Jack suddenly realized, said a single word.
Didn't have to, thought Jack, finally letting himself smile. He got what he wanted, attention, without it.
Thirty minutes later, Jack and his gunman were ready to hit the warehouse basement. Just the two of them.
Jack had fussed and fretted over the choice but he couldn't think of another way to do it. He had to go; he was in charge. Felix had to go; he was too good. But what about backup?
Well, what about it? They were going after master vampires, the ones in charge, the ones who'd created the goons in the first place, and if they came across them in that narrow stairwell anything that was going to happen would crack too fast for anyone to stop it. Jack didn't believe the masters were down there - they were in that goddamned jail - but if they were they might very well wipe out the entire Team. This way there'd at least be somebody left to do it the old-fashioned way, with plastique.
And besides, he wasn't sure he wanted a lot of trigger-happy well-meaners shooting off pistols and crossbows past his head.
No. Just him and Felix would go down, with both halogen crosses blazing from their chests. Felix first.
Crow felt the last part deserved an explanation but Felix didn't need one. Felix didn't even raise an eyebrow. Gunman first made sense to him too. Then Jack tried to explain about master vampires, the real live movie types that could throw cars and move so fast they literally blurred, but he didn't think he had the gunman's attention.
"You're saying they're worse, right?" Felix interrupted at last, sounding irritated and bored.
Jack just nodded.
Felix nodded in turn. "I figured that," he whispered harshly. "Now let's get on with it!"
They did.
The rich, rotten-sweet smell of death and decay rose up to them from the dark basement stairs through the harsh smoky halogen beams. Jack nodded one last time to Cat and Adam, who would wait there on the first-floor battleground for them. Then he touched Felix on the shoulder and the gunman started down the steps. There was no trouble on the way down, save for their occasional starts and jumps at some imagined movement at the edges of the shadows. The detector never beeped, their radios retained clear and crisp reception.
But it scared the hell out of both of them.
The stairwell was too goddamned narrow and the shadows too goddamned dark and the smell grew so strong they felt they could lean against it and their boots sounded harsh and rasping on the dusty steps and they couldn't help but notice the scores of other footprints besides their own. The basement was worse.
It was a crypt. Nine bodies in all - six townspeople and the three policemen who had gone inside to save them. Their bodies were rank and swollen, unevenly, grotesquely bloated. And there were maggots. Thousands of maggots swarming in the chests.
"How could they rise up after that?" gasped Felix, staring at the maggots.
Jack shook his head. "I don't know. But they do. Every time. Unless we do this right." He put down his crossbow and reached back for the ax strapped across his shoulders.. "Or unless I do, rather. You don't have to do anything. But pay attention to what I do. Okay?"
Felix nodded, moving over against a bare wall.
Jack steeled himself. Get hard, dammit! he screamed inwardly. But it didn't work. It didn't help. Not even the hatred of the vampires made it any easier. It never did.
But he did it. He chopped the heads off and put them in one pile and then he dragged the torsos into another heap' and then he poured gasoline on both piles and set them alight.:
They burned like dry, dead leaves.
Jack and Felix hunkered down in one corner underneath the cloud of smoke to breathe.
"Sometimes the fires go out," offered Jack by way of explanation.
After that they didn't talk for several minutes. They just sat there and watched the flames that burned so brightly and so angrily, flames that never would have appeared over normal corpses.
Only here, thought Jack, and he sneaked a look at his companion. He couldn't see much in the uncertain light, but... there! There was the glimmer of tears! And only after he had seen Felix's could Jack bear to lift a hand and wipe away his own.
How can this sicken me so much, he thought as he always thought, and still break my heart at the same time?
And then he stood up to retrieve a blazing skull that had rolled away from the flames. He eased it gently back into the fire with the head of his ax.
Eventually the flames did their work and Jack was able to get up and spread the ashes and then the two of them walked back up the stairwell that seemed not frightening at all now, only sad and lonely and forever and ever empty.
Outside in the sunshine, Madame Mayor had already begun the celebration. She had a table set upon the sidewalk in front of the courthouse. On it was a white tablecloth and a large silver ice bucket holding a magnum of champagne. All the city father types stood around her as she began some little speech about the gallantry and bravery of Team Crow.
Jack's inclination was to insert that bottle of champagne, cork and all, into a certain place in her body. But he was smart enough to control his anger. Even smart enough to signal to his troops to play along. And so they all stood there on that sidewalk while somebody began to pour and they all drank and they all smiled and they all pretended not to notice that too-strident cheery tone the mayor was pumping out.
That's a terrified woman, Jack thought behind his grin. What if we win? Or, hell, what if we lose? Either way she's had it.
But he just kept smiling until he had a chance to interrupt graciously and inform the audience of Team Crow's desire to rest and get cleaned up and change clothes and all that before the dinner in their honor.
Fine they all said. That's just fine! Good idea! 'Cause ya'll are gonna need your rest for the shebang we're hitting ya with tonight! And we got just the place for ya!
And with that they escorted Team Crow the two blocks through the early afternoon sun to the William Willis Inn, the finest hotel in town. Through the lobby door and past the desk to an ancient elevator that required three trips to accommodate all the hangers-on to the top floor and the presidential suite, where food and drink and a cashier's check were waiting.
It took another fifteen minutes before Cat could usher out the last of the instantly drunk partyers, and then only by promising they'd be down soon.
Then he locked the door behind them.
Then he went to the window and joined the rest of the Team.
And then they went out the window and down the fire escape and into Deputy Thompson's patrol car waiting in the alley. They hunkered down in the back seat until they were outside the city limits. Twenty minutes later they made their, rendezvous with Annabelle and Davette at a trailer court thirty miles away.
Then they sat down and ate the food the women had ready while Jack Crow curled their hair with his plan to enter the police station, subdue whatever cops were on duty there, go downstairs into the basement where the cells were, and, without a trace of sunlight to aid them, slay however many master vampires were down there waiting for the night to come.
"It's three thirty," he announced. "Five more hours of, daylight. We gotta do it right. And we gotta do it now. Questions?"
There were one or two.
But Jack didn't seem to care. He leaned back in the room's faded and moth-eaten easy chair and smoked cigarettes and let them rant for some time.
Then he grinned, leaned forward, and said, "Relax. I've got a Plan."
Cat eyed him sourly, disgusted. "Think you can give us a hint, O Great Leader?"
Jack laughed. "Sure. Remember the flare Felix bounced on that woman?"
Cat was still suspicious. "Yes..." he replied cautiously. "It didn't hurt her a bit."
"Didn't harm her maybe. But it did hurt her."
"So," replied Jack easily, turning to the deputy, you know where we can get some thermite?"
