Amanda walked into Eloim’s room followed by her brother Junior, their father and their older brother Gary stood waiting inside.
“Eloim is no longer in the citadel Father, do you want us to send someone after him?” Amanda asked.
“There’s no rush Amanda. What we need to concentrate on is making everyone think that he is still here,” their father said, inspecting a rail full of clothes.
“We need a decoy then, Junior is roughly Eloim’s build.” Gary said with a smile on his face.
“No way! Don’t even go there Gary. I’m a good two or three inches taller than our brother.” Junior said, he threw a dirty look at his big brother.
“How about if you wear a boot without a heel? From a distance those watching wouldn’t notice.” Gary pressed, throwing an evil smile at his brother.
“There is no way that you’ll get me dressing up in Eloim’s outfits and walking around where people will see me.” Junior said.
“I think you’d look cute,” Amanda sniggered.
“Don’t you start, Amanda! It’s not going to happen,” Junior said, then he looked over to his father who stood holding a long dress he had removed from the rail of clothes.
“It only needs to be for a few days, to give him a head start, son,” his father said quietly.
“No, I’m not wearing women’s clothes.” Junior was growing angrier with each suggestion. His father shrugged sadly.
“Well if that’s your last word, although I’m going to have to explain to your mother that you refused to help protect Eloim.”
“That’s blackmail and so not fair, Dad,” Junior said, as he snatched the dress and looked around at those in the room. “Anyone laughs and I’ll rip their throat out.”
Lynne hated Halloween. It was a stupid reason for people to dress up as monsters and run around like idiots. Hordes of small children walked from house to house, fuelled by an all-night sugar rush as they shoved sweets into their mouths, while still hunting for even more sugar. To make matters worse, when the night fell mid-week, they did it all twice. Once on the Saturday before and then repeated it again on the actual night. As if a normal Saturday night wasn’t bad enough, you had the so called adults staggering from pub to pub in yet another excuse for a drunken evening. As she walked through the city centre, she avoided the main streets, those that held the heaving bars full of the night’s revellers all dressed in silly costumes, celebrating a night most of them had no real clue about. She had decided she wanted to avoid the hell of another night watching the drunken excesses of the city and took the longer route as she headed home.
As she finally left the noise of the city centre behind, it started to rain, that cold wet drizzle that seemed to get you wetter than a real downpour. She came to the gates of the memorial park and decided to cut through rather than walk around it, a shortcut that should save a good ten minute walk. She justified this to herself by the fact she was getting wet and was now hungry; she would be through the park in a couple of minutes anyway. Adjusting the large handbag hanging from her shoulder, she shoved her hands into her coat pockets and started through the gates to the park. During the day the park was a pleasant place where people brought the kids to play or walked their dogs. At night though, gangs of youths would gather and cause petty vandalism but the cold wet night should have sent them all indoors.
Half way through the park, she reached a section where the street lights had failed, leaving the area ahead in darkness. She looked to the shadows cast by the trees, searching for movement but saw nothing. Increasing her pace, she started to walk through. As she reached the other side, a figure stepped out from behind a tree. He was dressed as many of the youths seemed to dress, a dark top with the hood pulled up and trousers worn low to show his underwear.
“Twick or tweet laby!” He demanded; his words distorted. In the faint light she saw him smile, revealing his teeth and elongated fangs.
“Pardon?” She replied, coming to a stop a few feet away, nervously casting quick looks to the shadows to see if anyone else lurked.
“I swed flukin twick or tweet blitch,” he said, pulling a knife from his pocket while with his other hand, he reached up and removed the plastic teeth from his mouth and dropped them to the floor.
“Just hand over the bag lady, you make an effort and try to be all festive and Halloween like,” he left the statement hanging with a shrug of his shoulders. Lynne looked down at the plastic fangs on the floor in front of him where he had dropped them.
“So you’re not a vampire then?” she asked, looking back at his face.
“Of course I ain’t, ya silly cow, now giz the bag or I cut ya face up,” he said angrily, taking one menacing step forward.
“That’s a shame.” Lynne said sadly and she gave him a big smile, making sure she showed her own teeth and the fangs that suddenly grew longer. “Well for you anyway, because I am a vampire!”
To be continued.