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Serial (The Further Adventures of the Frankenstein Monster) |
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Short Story
Subway Seductress
by Joe Vadalma
After the bars close, the city dies. An
atmosphere of hopelessness and despair pervades. Only the evil and destitute
are on the streets; the homeless, junkies, muggers, killers, and worn-out
prostitutes. And few of those. Dirty scraps fly around
empty streets. A pedestrian glances furtively over his shoulder for an evil
presence, trembling in terror when under a lamppost his shadow looms up.
On such an evil night I met Celia. In a bleak
mood, I slunk past islands of lifeless light between terrifying stretches of
darkness, my jacket collar up; my hands stuffed in my pockets. My footsteps
echoed as I descended into a filthy subway station to the tomblike gloomy
platform. Especially gruesome graffiti decorated the walls, symbols of death
and Satan, pentagrams, skulls, ravens, corpses, prayers to the evil one. One
dark splotch could've been blood. I shuddered, wondering what some Satanic cult did down there.
I leaned against a gray steel pillar,
alone except for a shabby drunk asleep with his head on his chest, clutching a
bundle of newspapers. I shivered, hoping that no predator would arrive before
the train. I glanced at my watch. An eternal fifteen minutes had elapsed with
no sign of a train.
A bad feeling came over me. The station
seemed abandoned. Enormous cobwebs hung from the ceiling, and mold grew in the
corners. A rat eyed me. I wondered whether I had wandered into an unused
station. No attendant had been upstairs. I shook the drunk by the shoulder.
"Hey buddy, does the B train stop here?"
He slumped over at my touch. I gasped and
stepped back. His rotted face and stench told me that he was a corpse gone bad. A voice close to my ear said, "I don't think he'll
answer you."
I turned quickly, prepared to defend
myself. Next to me was a strange girl dressed Goth style, dozens of earrings,
spiked dog collar, tight jeans, a top that ended above the midriff, a pentagram
tattooed on one bare shoulder and a skull with a bloody knife through an eye
socket on the other, pink hair cropped like a boy's, pale white skin as though
she'd never been in the sun. Nonetheless, she had a
eerie beauty, with high cheekbones, full carmine lips, dark eyes flashing with
amusement at my reaction to her, attractive curves that I traced with my eyes.
I wondered how she'd come up on me so silently with her four-inch spike heels.
I acted cool. "You're right. We
should tell somebody."
"Why? If anyone cared, they would've
found him already." She laid the corpse out flat and crossed its arms.
"Shall we perform a service?"
I grinned in response.
"Why're
you here, dear? This station's been closed for years."
"I wandered down here by mistake. I
could ask you the same question."
"Me and my
friends hang here." She lit two cigarettes and handed one to me. "So,
where're you going?"
"Nowhere."
I took a deep drag. "I lost my job, my girl and the apartment we shared. I
was celebrating."
"Too bad.
What you need is some fun."
"With you of course," I replied
sarcastically.
"I could show you things that you've
never seen before."
"How much will that cost me?"
She laughed. "I'm not a
hooker." She flipped away her cigarette, put her arms around my neck, and
gazed into my eyes. "What I have to offer is free."
Her strange dark eyes held mine so that I
could not look away. An icy chill made me tremble. What was this girl to
paralyze me with a look?
"Stop shivering. I promise not to
take so much that you die. I like you." She pulled me close. Frigid lips
and a dry tongue brushed my neck. Ice picks pierced my throat. Pure terror
turned my legs to jelly. Was this how I'd end, my essence feeding this monster?
My blood spurted into her mouth, my heart beat wildly, and an intense ecstasy
overcame me. My world grew dark. Death was a heartbeat away. But, before I lost
consciousness, the vampire halted her feeding. She propped me up by one armpit
and wiped blood from her lips. She dragged me to a bench, covered the wounds
with Band-Aids, and lifted my chin so that I once again gazed into hypnotic
eyes. "You're my slave now. What's your name? Mine's Celia."
"Josh. Will I become a
vampire?" The idea didn't seem too awful Vampires remained young for
hundreds of years. Wasn’t immortality worth never seeing the sun?
"You know better than that. For you
to become a vampire, you'd have to drink my blood." She tipped her head to
one side. "Which I might allow, if I really like you.
Now, sit still until your strength returns."
I had no choice but to obey her. Her
mysterious hold on me made me do whatever she demanded. I asked, "What
now, Celia?"
"I'm bringing you to a place where
people are dead, yet live."
I sat immobile for a long time. When my
strength returned, I said, "I think I can stand."
Her icy fingers led me to a bus stop.
Before the bus arrived, two hoodlums approached. Celia watched them coldly.
When they neared, one brandished an automatic. "Hand over your money and
jewelry," he snarled.
I gave my wallet to his partner. Celia
grinned with her hands on her hips. "You too, bitch," shouted the one
with the gun. Celia's foot came up kicking the gun from his hand. "Hey,
what the ...." He went after her with fists. Big
mistake. Her Karate chop dropped him like a stone. His partner grabbed
her and held a knife to her throat. She flung him over her shoulder. He landed
with a thud. She grabbed his gun and shot him and his partner in the head.
"Close your eyes."
I wanted to, but could not. I watched in
horrible fascination as Celia sucked blood from their bodies. Her skin became
rosy and her hands warm. "Help me," she ordered. She dragged one
corpse into an alley. I hauled the other. We stuffed them into a dumpster.
We rode uptown on a bus, getting off by a
cemetery. I asked Celia, "You killed those hoodlums in cold blood. Doesn't
your conscience bother you?"
"Oh Josh, you fool. The undead don't
have consciences."
We entered an evil cemetery. If there's
one place I don't like at four in the morning, it's a cemetery. This one was a
labyrinth of tombstones, crosses, stone angels and mausoleums. A white mist
rose from the ground. She led me through the oldest section -- where the
gravestones had weathered blank, and dark angels stared with granite eyes --
into a Greek-revival mausoleum, like a miniature bank, except that the dead
were stored instead of money. I wanted to scream as she closed heavy brass
doors, leaving us in utter blackness and the silence of the dead. The stifling
air smelled of mold and decay.
Celia lit her lighter. "Over
here." On the face of the vault was written, Lucelia
Washmeyer, 1726-1745. "I sleep here."
"You're almost three hundred years
old?"
She chuckled. "Don't I look
it?"
"You brought me here to show me your
tomb?"
"One reason.
But there's something else." She pulled a circular iron ring, part of a
decoration. With a tooth-jarring screech, a secret panel opened. I peered into
the darkness beyond, but saw nothing. "C'mon." She grabbed my arm and
pulled me through.
We exited somewhere else, in a place outside
the familiar universe. A full moon lit up an unearthly nightmarish graveyard,
with thousands and thousands of sepulchers, at all angles in a jumble as though
thrown there. "Where are we?"
"The land of the
living dead." She slid off the heavy stone top of a tomb. A man in
a cape and nineteenth century garments popped out and hugged her. She and he
ran around waking the undead until a large crowd had gathered. They built a
bonfire and
passed around a cup. Celia made me sip the thick, salty dark
liquid. "What is it?"
"Fermented
blood."
We disrobed. She took one hand, and
another of the undead took the other. Naked, we danced wildly around the
bonfire. The fire grew higher, and a towering horned demon rose in the flames. With an
earsplitting voice like nothing human, it shouted, "Rock on my children.
Do what thy wilt."
Celia grabbed me. Holding me in her grasp
of steel, she sucked my blood until I passed out.
***
Naked, weak, filthy, with puncture wounds
on my throat and numerous scratches where Celia had dug long nails into to me,
I awoke in the cemetery next to her mausoleum. As I headed to my motel, I knew
I'd be back that night and every night afterward, as long as Celia desired to
dance the dance of the undead with me.
The End
ore sunup, the knight rode away.
If you liked this story,
you might like to read one of my anthologies. Click on the word anthology for more information.