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Chapter 9 - Know When To Hold 'Em.

"Just because everything is different doesn't mean anything has changed." - Irene Peter

Miami, FL

August 9, 2012

Well, since we are here..." I muttered as I flipped the door open with the toe of my booted foot, "May as well check on the kid. Not sure if they found a guardian for him or not but can at least find out his condition." I kept silent the fear festering in my chest that the kid was at best doomed to be a marked person, the specter of undeath after death haunting the remainder of his life. At worst...The ME might need to use some silver to open the poor kid up...or rather what the poor kid had become.

I had two magazines loaded full of silverdots...I did not want to need to use them.

It was only a short walk down to the ER...although the wrong turn here and there ate up a little more time than I would have preferred. Finally we hit the doors to the ER, catching the red scrubbed doctor from earlier in the middle of typing the care report for one or another patient as they nurses scurried around from bed to bed.

"Hey, doc. What's up for the kid?"

"Huh? What kid?" He looked up, confusion playing across his face as he looked up from the report as I leant against the side of the island, my jacket advertising what kid I meant pretty directly as his eyes flashed in recognition, a bit of fear leaking out of him subconsciously as he recognized what lurked beneath my calm exterior.

No matter how many times a mythos meets a Lycan, the fact of what we are tends to really make them uneasy.

At best.

"The reason I am out here is actually from the XXX case, the double homicide with the kid. How is he?"

"Oh." The doc took a short intake of breath as his body calmed down and rational thought process took over again. "Let's talk in the crash pad, I have his paperwork right here. His grandparents are on their way and cleared me to give you some...sensitive info."

I quirked an eyebrow, thankfully restraining my head from tilting to the side in confusion as I followed the doc into the night room, well the cubbyhole with a couch. "Kid's lucky. He-"

"Doc, let's not tell him that."

"Ah. Yeah...guess that's right. He's stable. Remarkably so for what he went thru. I got the bloodwork back from one of the early draws. He did have the iGV markers in his blood so he has been bitten by a member of the vampire family at some time."

"How recent?"

"Can't say for certain. Within 30 days. Don't know the kind yet, either."

"We can test at USAMRIID." Given the sensitivity and danger of certain mythos biology, the Army at Ft. Dietric had been identified as one of the preferred laboratories for Class VI mythos samples - The kind that would kill or change with minimal contact.

"It's waiting for an address downstairs in the lab. All your custody crap should be there too."

"Good. Not your first rodeo, I take it." I sigh softly. "So the kid's a wraith."

"No, he's not."

"Wait, but you said-"

"He was bitten but we also found iGG in his bloodstream as well."

"But he's not a giant. Family was human sized."

"Must have been pretty far back in history. Thankfully it is one of the markers that blunt the vampire's bite.. Just like yours will. Estimates are that about 20% of the human population has this sort of historical immunity."

"Good. So he has a shot for a normal life."

"Well, as normal as it will be after a vampire attack. I actually asked a friend of mine to chat with him, see how he is doing and do what she can."

"A fae?" I raised an eyebrow. Not an uncommon shrink for mythos. Pretty unthreatening and thus not as scary as talking to a more 'normal' or predatory mythos. In addition, the telepathy helped a lot. Made them able to tell when they were being bullshitted.

"Yeah. Part of the local crisis team."

"Good" I smiled as I scribbled down a phone number on the back of a business card. "Have the lab give this number a call. We'll get a courier down within an hour. It'll be in the lab in 24 hours at most..."

Usually a lot less. Jet fuel is cheaper than time, when time can potentially mean an outbreak of flesh eaters and negative publicity for some random bureaucrat.

"He's sedated, but you should be able to come back tomorrow to talk."

"Alright, doc. Thanks."

An unspoken sigh of relief escaped my mind as the fear at having to use the steel hanging from my hip of a kid left my mind. Kid wasn't out of the woods, but at least he had a fighting chance.

I looked behind me as I saw Witters coming up on me quickly.

"Sorry." I just waved his apology off. "We have bad news."

Oh, shit. "What's up this time?" I turned toward the doors to the ED, figuring that this bad news meant more work.

"We have another multiple homicide. No survivors this time, but it's better than even chances it's one of your kind, Hart?"

"My kind?" The snarl barely hid itself underneath my voice as I turned to look at Witters, a twinge of fear flagging in his eyes at my glare, as if he saw the predator inside me trying to claw its way out. I could tell that he barely stopped himself from putting his hands up in front of him defensively.

"The body was completely exsanguinated and barely a pint of blood was found on scene. Either one of your cases, maybe like the one earlier or we have a phlebotomist gone mad running around."

"Ah." I took a breath as we came to the cruiser, getting into the more private confines before I continued the conversation. "Sorry, just a bit jumpy I guess."

He sighed softly. "I guess I can't blame you."

"It's been a hell of a day. Not only do I get a nice outbreak to add to the list of cases I've worked in only six months, but my partner very nearly kills a kid because he's scared and may need to get bounced from the group. And now he's fully aware of the existence of us. And he has serious issues with us." My fingers kneaded my forehead. "Aaaannnd....I nearly attacked you all." I sighed softly. "I apologize for that."

"May I be an ass, Agent?"

"Agent Hart or Michael. They didn't throw a bar code on me when I joined the bureau. And I don't see ears or a tail on you."

I tried to smirk, but the almost deadpan expression on his face, marred only by the cringe at my pitiful attempt at humor.

"Sorry. Long day and my humor shows it. Go for it."

"What's it like? Dealing with all of that"

"Dealing with the cases? Honestly, it's not too much different from when you deal with any type of crime. People in general are bastards."

"No. I meant the werewolf part."

I bit my tongue for a moment, pausing to try and gather my thoughts for a second.

"First, the preferred term is Lycan. Werewolf has a much darker connotation that we would rather not use. Second, I'm honestly not certain. I'm an abnormality. I was not born Lycan, or at least able to shift. So I have to learn how to deal with all of this now, as opposed to as a kid. Mental plasticity and all that stuff you hear the shrinks jabbering about for kids and languages works here too. The pup's doing better than me on some of this stuff and he's not even a week old. But it's kinda like someone else is in my head sometimes."

"It must be odd. I mean, looking almost like the mythical monsters but thinking like a man. How do you keep your calm? I mean, just chemically your body has to be ready to rip itself apart after the change and drive you mad? How did you not go after Morse?"

I shrugged for a short second before exhaling a deep breath, one I had been holding for I do not know how long. That was the sixty four thousand dollar question.

"I have no clue."

Well, it was a simple and true answer.

"I was pissed off, and for where he is now, he should know much better. But one of my friends...well, my first encounter with him ended with him out cold and me with a bent cast iron skillet after he rode the lightning. If I had my pistol, I probably would have done the same thing. We...no I fucked up by having Morse working this case before we got him enough training."

"Wait...you beat a wolf with a skillet and made up? That some sorta challenge for dominance like deer do?"

I chuckled. "It was a bit of a misunderstanding, and I kinda took a few bullets for his pup a little bit later. Plus my wife and mother were both good friends of him as well. Lycan packs tend to be pretty close knit. And if you know how parents can be...multiply that by fifty for a Lycan parent. But there is a human mind and logic that can overpower the animal that we are. Just like as humans we need to remember that we should not take our anger out on people just because we can."

"What do you mean?"

"We go day by day and see scum regularly, often getting shafted by the world, but we still shouldn't go and feed someone a faceful of pavement or light them up because they were pissed off. A coat of fur, fangs and teeth is honestly less dangerous than these pieces of tin and pistols." I fingered my shield as I shrugged. "I think that is what hurt the worst about the events today. I almost had it, but Morse got scared and escalated everything."

"I guess that way it makes sense. But scary when you put it that way."

I had intentionally left out that the very ancestor that allowed me to survive that bite and enter this new chapter of my life was someone that had been one of those very predators that I chased. One that ended the chapters of others lives just for the thrill of taking it.

My thoughts thoroughly jaded, the car lapsed into soft silence as we headed through the city, heading from the hospital toward our next body. With each block the city grew in decay, a fleeing body or two catching my glimpse as we passed, lights flashing against the broken windows and boarded up storefronts. The lights of only a solitary cruiser lit the street up as Witter started to slow, the red and blue in stark contrast to the dimness of the long broken streetlights.

"This...is different."

"This section of the city was hit very hard in the last hurricane. A lot of the business just could not come back from it and it's been painful. It's never been great but..."

"It's almost abandoned." I murmured as I got out of the cruiser, my foot crushing a discarded French fry container as Witters headed toward the building nearby, the front door illuminated by a single naked bulb as the gurney jockeys from the ME pulled up, pulling the body bag from the van while I let the door swing closed behind me.

The stairs reeked of piss and grime, the paint faded and chipped for the four floors of the apartment building as we climbed, the air still hot and sweltering even inside. Ducking under the tape as we passed a uniformed officer, the cuff of his glove under his nose, we entered a small attic room, the smell no less pungent inside.

"You've gotta be shitting me."

The male on the bed before us was definitely one of my cases. Not only was he easily seven feet tall with the dusky skin and gap toothed grin of orcish or trollish blood, but the blood was obviously drained, a pair of almost farcical fang marks on either side of his neck.

"Why someone would have stuck him to empty him of blood?"

"They didn't stick him." I sighed. "They bit him. Definitely a bloodsucker. Vamp or wraith. Fuck." I groused. "Mind if I borrow your phone?" This wasn't good. Not only did we have a bloodsucker, but it was a hungry bastard and had no subtlety at all. We were gonna have a hell of a time with damage control if it kept up.

With a grousing grimace Witters handed me his phone. Stepping away from the door and closing it behind me, the stench of the room grew even more detestable but the reality of what I was calling in made me put it out of my mind. My thumb dialed the number from memory.

"Stark."

"Sir, it's Hart. I need more people down here. We have a stalker preying on the populace. Cold blooded bastard. I've seen three bodies in past two days plus a fourth that survived. I have one person who states the stalker is adept in mental control of general populace and has done it at least once. With four feedings and that level of skill we're gonna need more than locals."

"I can be down there tomorrow with the contractor team we were working with here. The tac team is gonna be here for a bit more. And Mike, what about earlier?"

I sighed, knowing that the death of an agent in a wight den would take a while, but it would be nice to have the rest of my team with me. And of course he had to bring that up.

"Yeah..." I drawled the word off a bit. "Subject is stable. He's expected to survive. Not sure what's going to happen on other stuff. Guardian's already agreed that the kid will provide us information on the stalker. He wasn't involved but our hostage was. I have someone that I can get some help from for talking to both of them. I'll write up the paperwork once I have all the information but I doubt the DA will have to do much. It's a pair of scared kids. Morse is on desk duty and right now..."

"Right now, what, Hart? What did you do?" Of course he could read me.

"We had a slight exposure. No one outside of those already aware but I'm not sure I want Morse with a firearm anywhere near me."

I could hear the sigh...and could about see his hand trailing down his face over the phone.

"Hart..."

"He hasn't yet understood that we're the same. He's still afraid." After my little display this morning, perhaps he did have some kernel of fear that was justifiable but he needed to learn how to control that fear.

"Alright, Mike. Let him be. I'll talk to him in the morning. Are you still with this Lt. Witters?"

"Yeah. He's one of the ones that got exposed. He's handling it pretty well, more curious than anything. I'm just about to clear the second scene. I'm not sure where he is and there's no one here that can give me anything. Basically an abandoned flophouse."

"Alright, Mike. See if you can dig anything else out. I'll be down there in the morning."

"Yes sir." The click of the phone greeted me as he hung up, my breath escaping in a huff as I pondered my options. I had three folks in the hospital that I couldn't get to until tomorrow at least and then between Morse and trying to track this bastard down it could get busy...or the wight could go underground.

"Witters, is this the same precinct as that other family?"

"No. We're about two precincts outside it."

"I really hope something ties these two sites together or else we have to consider a very disturbing possibility."

"What?"

"Two of them."

He thought for a moment. "I take it that is very bad."

"I hate dealing with just one of these bastards. Plus they can feed off each others conquests and that'll just run the body count higher and make them stronger."

"Wait, what?"

I stepped into the cruiser, embracing the cool air conditioning in the sweltering heat of the late afternoon, as Witters quickly followed me. "Vampires, and to a lesser extent, wraiths grow more and more powerful as they feed. For them, human blood is not only food but almost a steroid. Their mental abilities are sharper, they heal faster and are much stronger. So our best case is that we have a wraith that has recently turned and he's had three meals plus the kid. Worst case is two vamps."

"I'm sorry, but what is the difference between these wights and vampires? I've heard of the latter from movies and tales but not the former." Ah, the fun of pop culture completely screwing up reality.

"Basically a vampire is sorta kinda the thing you see in the movies. Drinks the blood of their victims and has mental ability to con humans very easily. Science still not completely sure how, though. Pheromones is the theory but has never been proven. Typically they are more likely to hide in plain sight and have exceedingly long lifespans. A wight, on the other hand is stronger physically and has some ability to modify its body, growing claws or other weapons. However it has significant difficulties living in human society and about all it can do is make people overlook it. Given how it sounds like our unwitting accomplice was coerced into giving the information I'm leaning to vampire."

"So...wights are more animal?"

"Kinda, sorta, yeah. I'd personally go for monstrous than animal. Animals usually have a reason for their actions." I shrugged as I tried to process it myself. "If it has a pulse it's usually a lot more sensible. The undead or never-living can tend to be much more cold blooded and evil. Maybe it's my religious sentiments but I look at it as having a soul vs giving it up or losing it. Thank God..." I trailed off.

"What?"

"I forgot to tell you. I spoke with the doc at the hospital. Our kid from this morning is lucky as hell. He's got natural immunity to vampirism. He has giantism somewhere in his family tree. Just like lycanthropy and a few other families of mythos it blunts the ability of the vampire to mark you or change you. Don't ask me how that works. I don't even understand how I work."

"Damn. You mean."

"Yeah. You get bit, you're gonna end up like them. And usually not in a good way. Vast majority of newly turned simply become wights. And most that do retain higher level functioning usually are bound to their creator. Agents not immune carry incendiaries to burn themselves if they are bit. We just lost one agent to that, actually. That's why I'm here and not an entire team"

"And there's no cure?"

"Not yet. Fort Dietrick's working on a genetic vaccine but problem is that the body tends to rip itself apart when they introduce mythos genes. For instance, if I hadn't had a Lycan in my history I would have died...painfully."

"Gah. Sounds like an ugly world."

"It's a curse and a blessing. It makes my job less dangerous, but makes life more difficult. But..."

"But what?"

"I admit. I wouldn't trade it back. My wife...my son...both of them are here. In this world of Lycans and I can live in their world, rather than being the stranger. Apparently I've lived a charmed life."

"Good for you, agent. I guess...no. that isn't right." He scowled as he muttered to himself.

I had to smile myself. "Just say it."

"It's a good thing Morse fucked up. Otherwise I don't know if I'd be as trusting of you mythos if I hadn't seen you in action and heard how you work. If I may ask something..."

"Shoot."

"Could you give me some contact information for your, forgive me, normal mythos down here? I'm guessing they already have some folks at the dept that they know, but I'd still rather let them know I am...how to say...sympathetic and understanding."

He sighed.

"Yeah, Morse fucked up earlier...but what if that kid knew he could call one of us. Knew we'd trust him and could accept the strange. Someday it won't turn out so nicely."

"Don't blame yourself. I've talked to their pack alpha. None of them were aware. Otherwise they would have contacted. As for contacts...ask your captain to introduce you. He can give you names of some of your coworkers."

"Huh? You mean?"

I chuckled. "Oh yeah. We're overgrown dogs. What's better than chasing someone. Legally."

He laughed as I continued.

"My mate's a sheriff, the friend I brained with a frying pan a US Marshal. There are lots of Lycans on the law. Sadly on both sides of it."

"Well...I guess that makes sense. If you're like everyone you get your bad apples."

"Yeah. That's the way life works." I didn't say that our bad apples not only spoiled a bunch but would also go and annihilate villages once in a while.

"Thanks...You've given me a lot to think about." His smile was tight but at ease. He had a damn flexible mind. Good to see.

But, my mind kept racing as we passed through the silent streets. Something still felt off.

What was I missing?