Darkest Night

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Jamie sat back in his seat and stared at the screen that had been folded down from the ceiling of the van. The connection to the Surveillance Division was active; all that remained now was to wait for their first alert of the night to come through.

“What’s your bet?” asked Lizzy Ellison, from her seat opposite him. “Domestic disturbance? False alarm?”

“Domestic,” said Qiang. “They are always domestic now.”

Jamie shrugged. “You never know,” he said. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and actually see a real vampire tonight.”

“Steady on, sir,” said Ellison, smiling broadly at him. “Let’s not get carried away.”

Qiang let out a grunt of laughter, a sound that never failed to amaze his squad leader. When he had first arrived at the Loop, the Chinese Operator had seemed more like a robot than an actual human being: utterly professional, precise, and not given to conversation beyond what was necessary for the Operation at hand. Now, more than six months later and following a concerted campaign by both Jamie and Ellison, Qiang was a markedly different person. He was still unlikely to ever win the award for most light-hearted member of the Department, but he was now capable of making a limited amount of small talk, of telling his squad mates about the family and friends that he had left behind in China, and, on extremely rare and joyous occasions, making small, bone-dry jokes.

As the months after Zero Hour had lumbered slowly past, Jamie had come to see his squad as a lone beacon of stability in a world that was becoming ever more uncertain, and when he had thrown himself into his job in an attempt to escape the misery and chaos that had been threatening to drag him down, his squad mates had been right there beside him. Neither Ellison nor Qiang knew the truth about his father, or why he no longer spoke to Frankenstein, but they knew about Larissa; everyone in the Department did.

Word of her departure had raced through the Loop, causing dismay among those who understood that Blacklight was weaker without her and relief among the many Operators who had never truly been comfortable with a vampire wearing the black uniform. In the first days after her disappearance, dozens of Jamie’s colleagues had asked him what had happened, if he had any idea where she might have gone, until his patience began to visibly wear thin and people realised that questioning him further would have been unwise.

The only thing Ellison and Qiang had ever asked was whether he was all right. He had told them that he wasn’t, but that he didn’t want to talk about it, and they had left it at that. It had been a show of respect for which he remained profoundly grateful.

Ellison had, in fact, been entirely awesome since the day she had joined the Department. Jamie had once told Cal Holmwood that she was going to sit in the Director’s chair one day, and nothing had happened since to make him revise that opinion. She was a brilliant Operator, smart and agile and fearless, but more than that, she had the uncanny ability to drag him out of himself, to cut through the fog of gloom that hung over him and force him to laugh, usually at himself. Jamie knew he was susceptible to self-pity, and Ellison was the perfect antidote: irreverent, kind, funny, and absolutely unwilling to indulge him. He loved Kate and Matt and relied on them more than anyone, even more than his mum, who, for all her empathy and unconditional love, could never really, truly relate to what his life had become. But Ellison was close behind them on his priority list; when he was on Operations with her and Qiang, he felt accepted and valued and appreciated. He felt at peace. As a result, it was not uncommon for his heart to sink when the time came for them to head back to the Loop.

Jamie was roused from his thoughts by the loud alarm that accompanied a new window opening on the van’s screen.

ECHELON INTERCEPT REF. 97607/2R

SOURCE. Emergency call (mobile telephone 07087 904543)

TIME OF INTERCEPT. 23:45

OPERATOR: Hello, emergency service operator, which service do you require?

CALLER: Police.

OPERATOR: What is the nature of your emergency?

CALLER: I just got home from work and something’s been painted on my neighbour’s front door.

OPERATOR: Does this qualify as an emergency, sir?

CALLER: It’s the same thing that’s been in the papers, that Night Stalker thing. The wolf’s head. It’s right on the front door.

OPERATOR: You can call your local police station to report vandalism, sir. This line needs to be kept clear for emergencies.

CALLER: Right. Sorry.

INTERCEPT REFERENCE LOCATION. Violet Road, West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire. 52.933714, -1.122017

RISK ASSESSMENT. Priority Level 2

“All right,” said Ellison, rubbing her hands together. “Let’s go.”

“Have you got the location, Operator?” asked Jamie.

“Yes, sir,” replied their driver, his voice sounding through the speakers. “ETA three minutes.”

“Very close,” said Qiang, as the van accelerated, its engine rumbling beneath them.

“Weapons and kit check,” said Jamie. Excitement was crackling through him at the prospect of something that might actually be worth the attention of his squad. Ever since V-Day and Gideon and stupid, reckless Kevin McKenna, Patrol Responds had become purgatory: night after night of false alarms, attacks on suspected vampires who turned out to be every bit as human as their assailants, denouncements and accusations that were usually the malicious result of some minor grudge. This, the call they were now racing towards, had the potential to be different. Everyone inside the Department was following the Night Stalker attacks with great interest, although, for once, Blacklight seemed to know little more than the public and the media.

There had been ten attacks so far, all in the Midlands and East Anglia, all bearing signature similarities, most notably the wolf’s head painted on the doors of the victims’ homes and across their bloody remains. Public opinion seemed to favour the lone crazy theory, that the Night Stalker was a single individual carrying out vigilante executions, but Jamie, along with the majority of his colleagues, thought otherwise. He knew better than anyone how powerful vampires were, how fast and agile, especially when cornered; even allowing for the element of surprise, he didn’t believe that anyone could carry out ten vampire killings on their own, unless they were also a vampire. Which was a possibility, although Jamie subscribed to a simpler solution: that there was no such thing as the Night Stalker, but several Night Stalkers, at least two, perhaps even four or five.

“Twenty seconds, sir,” said their driver.

Jamie fastened his helmet into place, flipped up the visor, and looked at his squad mates. “Ready One as soon as we touch the ground,” he said, and felt his eyes bloom with heat. “Non-lethal. Clear?”

“Clear,” replied his squad mates.

The van slowed to a halt. Jamie twisted the handle on the rear door and pushed it open. “Go,” he said.

Ellison and Qiang leapt down on to the tarmac, their weapons at their shoulders, their visors covering their faces. He was beside them in an instant, floating a millimetre or two above the ground; his vampire side, the part of himself that heightened his senses and kept him sharp, was wide awake, and hungry, as he looked around. They were standing in a quiet suburban estate, a long row of square, two-storey houses with neat lawns and mid-range Japanese cars in their driveways.

“Shall I circle, sir?” asked their driver, his voice loud and clear through the comms plugs in Jamie’s ears.

“No,” he replied. “We’re not going to be here long. Ask Surveillance to bring up the CCTV grid for a ten-mile radius from this location and leave a line open.”

“Yes, sir.”

Jamie nodded, and looked at the house standing before them. It was identical to all the others on the estate, with one ghoulish exception; sprayed on its front door, in white paint that had dripped all the way down to the step, was a crude wolf’s head, its teeth huge, its eyes wide and staring.

“Night Stalker,” he said. “Or a good impression, at least. Check the door.”

“Yes, sir,” said Ellison, and jogged up the driveway, Qiang close behind her. She moved to one side of the door frame, her back against the front wall of the house, and tried the handle. It turned in her hand, and the door swung open.

“Sweep the house,” said Jamie. “Both of you. Quick as you can.”

His squad mates disappeared inside as he took a closer look at the quiet street. The night air was still and cool; his supernatural ears could pick out the low drone of dozens of televisions from inside the identical homes. Jamie spun slowly in the air, until movement on the other side of the road caught his eye; a curtain had fluttered in the window of the house opposite, as though someone had been peering through it until he looked in their direction.

Nosy neighbour, he thought, and flew slowly towards the house. What would we do without them?

Jamie rose over the low wall at the front of the garden, crossed the lawn, and waited in front of the window for the curtain to open again. He had absolutely no doubt that it would; the van and his squad’s unusual appearance would prove too tempting. Long seconds passed until the curtains parted, ever so slightly, and the face of an elderly woman peered through them. Her eyes locked with Jamie’s, and he smiled widely as they flew open with fright. The curtains snapped shut again; he waited a moment, then flew along the front of the house and knocked hard on the door.

“I didn’t do nothing,” called a voice from inside. “Get away with you. I won’t look no more.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I need to ask you some questions.”

Silence.

“I’m not opening the door,” shouted the woman, eventually. “I don’t care who you are, I don’t open up after dark and that’s all there is to it.”