StarFall Comics
A Division of Pullemouttayerhat Productions
A Wholly-Owned Subsidiary of StarFall Innovations
Proudly Presents:
Blood Ties
#3: Reluctance
cover: A girl in a swimsuit swinging a baseball bat at Mike, ducking behind a chair.
What Has Gone Before: Samantha Douglas had been kidnapped by the self-styled vampire queen Keili Nephthys. Her husband, Rick, aided by the vampire hunter Michael Jocasta, himself a vampire, tracked them to their hideout. During the melee, Sam was revealed to have become a vampire herself, killing Rick before disappearing with Keili.
Ithaca, New York, is the kind of town that is in many ways a duality. Nestled on the southern tip of Lake Cayuga, the town boasts such attractions as Cornell University, Podunk Street, and the annual, infamous "submarine races". The South Side is the home to many sprawling estates, while the North Side is considered to make the South Bronx look good. And nestled between the two is the 20th Street Church, long since abandoned.
Amber and Donna had to pass the church every day on their way to Cornell. It was a dark and forboding feature, and yet... never quite the same. Each time they passed it, they noticed something that wasn't there before.
This time, however, they were not going to go past the church. This time, they were going inside it.
"This place gives me the creeps," Amber commented softly, lighting a pair of candles, passing one to her friend. The candlelight gave the girls' faces an eerie glow.
"Stop being a worrywart!" Donna chastised her. "Look, the place has been abandoned for years. And this is your last semester at Cornell. You know the rules."
"I know. Everyone who's graduating from Cornell has to swim in the crypt in order to get rid of the stench." She looked around at the insides of the building. "Sure doesn't look like much, does it?"
"Yeah... Come on, it'll be dark soon."
The girls wound their way down a spiral staircase, the rotting boards creaking under their weight. Reaching the floor, the two moved across what may once have been a conservatory or study, and stood before a pair of massive oak doors. Looking nervously at each other for a moment, the girls pushed them open and stepped through into a wide chamber.
"Must've been the bathroom," Amber giggled, her heart pounding.
"Yeah, but I don't see a john."
Crossing the length, they came to a much smaller door. From beneath it seeped a waft of chill air, and the stench of rotting wood. Putting a hand to the rusted knob, Donna turned to Amber and said:
"Welcome to the Dip!"
Standing in front of the pool of black water, Amber held her nose in disgust.
"What is that stench?" she demanded, probing the water with a toe. "Smells like something died!"
"Well, duuuuuuh! We are in a crypt."
With a fluid motion, Donna raised her shirt up over her head, revealing her swimsuit. After giving Amber a nudge, the other girl followed suit.
"You first, scaredy-cat!" Donna teased.
Holding her nose, Amber closed her eyes and dove into the water. The warmth of the water washed over her. Breaking the surface, she opened her eyes wide in surprise.
"Come on in! It's warm! And it's clean!"
The splash of Donna entering the water echoed throught the cavern.
On the far side of the crypt, another pair of women sat, their legs dangling in the pool.
"Sounds like we have company, Keili."
"Indeed." Keili's red hair seemed on fire in the candlelight. "Now for your final test, Sam. You know what to do."
Silently, Samantha Douglas slipped into the water, heading for the pair of intruders.
"You know, it doesn't smell as bad as it did earlier," Amber muttered as she drifted aimlessly in the water.
"Not unlike Cornell," Donna laughed, giving her friend a playful splash.
"Remember our sorority's rendition of the alma mater?" Amber chuckled.
"How could I forget it?!"
The girls' voices joined together, the words of the parody echoing through the crypt.
"o/~ High above Cayuga's waters / There's an awful smell! / Some say it's Cayuga's waters / Others say Cornell!! o/~"
Laughing together, they almost didn't hear a delayed echo.
"o/~ Others say Cornell! o/~" Keili laughed to herself. "Now that's something I haven't heard in almost ten years."
Sam drifted along the bottom of the flooded crypt, sazing up at the slender legs of the two girls above her. A glint of metal caught her eye... one of them had lost something. This would make her job a lot easier.
"Oh, shit!" Donna cried out. "I lost my necklace."
"I'll get it." Amber dove under the surface and caught sight of the errant piece of jewelry. Swimming farther down after it, she grabbed at it, and felt something close around her left ankle. Turning to see what it was before going back up for a breath she recoiled in fear, barely suppressing a scream. There before her floated Samantha, the vampiress' eyes glowing an evil red and her fangs bared.
Donna waited impatiently for her friend to resurface, and was becoming tired of treading water. From across the crypt she thought she heard a faint whisper as it grew to a soft dirge. It was the song they had sung earlier.
"Come on, Amber! Quit fooling around!"
Instead of one of the pranks she had come to expect from her friend, Donna heard only a soft cruel laugh.
The water glowed briefly before two figures burst out of it. The first was Amber, limply grasping the necklace. The second was taller, holding Amber firmly in her grasp, her mouth clamped on Amber's neck, an arm over the girl's mouth, and staring down at Donna with an evil glare. Another parody of the Cornell alma mater drifted across the crypt, echoing off every surface, and coming closer.
Donna fought off her paralyzing fear, and swam frantically for the steps.
Mike wandered the streets of Ithaca, hoping he wouldn't look too suspicious to the locals. He'd been in the town for several weeks now, hiding out in the basement of a downtown department store. His instincts told him that Kei and her followers had stopped here, but to date he'd had no sign of them.
He stopped just short of the 20th Street Church, as he watched a girl, no older than her early twenties, run frightened out of the abandoned church wearing nothing more than a swimsuit.
Looks like I found Kei's hideout much faster than usual, he thought. Turning away from the building, he followed the girl, hoping she was... unaffected by her encounter.
"Wakey, wakey!"
Amber opened her eyes, and recoiled in horror as she found herself gazing up at two sets of fangs.
"Who..?" she started.
"Never mind that right now," the redheaded one stated. "I imagine you must be hungry after your ordeal."
"Hungry," Amber whispered, not quite able to focus. Her throat felt rather raw, and for some reason she found it hard to speak without biting her lip.
"Why is it they always try to talk before feeding?" a voice asked from behind her. "It wastes so much time."
"You weren't so easy yourself, sis," the redhead remarked before returning her attention to Amber. "Don't be alarmed. You're one of us, now."
"What do you mean, 'one of us'?" Amber asked, finding the strength to sit up. "Who are you?"
"I'm Keili. We're what the outside world call vampires. And now, thanks to Sam here, so are you."
Amber shook her head in disbelief.
"That can't be," she muttered. "There's no such thing as vampires!"
Sam and Kei helped Amber stand up, and led her over to a mirror.
"Look at yourself," Sam told her, "and see if you still believe that."
Amber stared at her reflection in disbelief. Like Keili and Sam, she had a pair of fangs where her canines were. Her eyes had turned from their usual hazel to a blood red.
"Then, it's true."
"Of course it's true," Sam told her. "I know what it's like, that first few minutes. I was just converted myself."
"I'm a vampire?" Amber whispered, still not quite believing her own senses.
"Drink this." Sam pressed a plastic cup into Amber's hands. Slowly, hesitantly, Amber sipped at the warm, viscous liquid in the cup, her strength returning with each sip.
"Don't worry," Keili told her, "it's fresh. Cow, not human. This time."
Sitting down in a chair, still half-dazed, Amber gazed at these women who seemed to revel in their vampirishness, and inwardly shuddered at the thought of being like them.
Following close behind, but staying to the shadows to avoid drawing notice to himself, Mike tailed Donna all the way back through town. Taking to the rooftops, Mike watched as she fled into an apartment building.
I better find out what she knows, Mike thought. Keili ain't so careless as to allow her prey to escape.
Floating down to ground level, Mike entered the tenement, following the trail of spattered water to Donna's apartment. Waiting at her door for several minutes, he knocked and waited for an answer. From the other side of the door, he could hesar something heavy being moved, terminating with a dull thud as it hit against the knob.
"Looks like we do this the hard way," he muttered. Concentrating, Mike began to feel light headed, his body slowly melting into fog. The feeling was a peculiar mix of warmth and vertigo, a dimness overcoming his sight as he became sensitive to the flow of air. Drifting over the floor, he slipped under the door and into Donna's apartment.
As he solidified he felt something moving through him, then wrap itself around him. He stood like a statue until his senses stopped reeling.
Now I remember why I hate misting, he thought as he took in the surroundings. The clothes never come with me.
The apartment was typical for most college students; books and clothes tossed everywhere. A large chair had been tossed in front of the door, jamming it shut. A young girl cowered behind the couch, half in shock from her recent experience, clutching a baseball bat in her hand.
"Don't come any closer, pervert!" she yelled in panic. "You won't get me like you did Amber!"
"Excuse me for a moment," he stated calmly, lifting the chair effortlessly out of the way, opening the door, and retrieving his clothes. Disappearing into the bathroom for a few moments as he dressed, he sensed her apprehension, yet she did not flee.
"That's better," he commented, returning to the main room of the apartment. Sitting in the chair near the door, he focussed his attention on Donna. "Forgive me, I forget my manners sometimes. I'm Mike. I don't believe I cought your name, miss...?"
"Donna," she whispered.
"Donna. I noticed you leaving the Church in a hurry, and thought you might need some help."
"I don't need your help," Donna hissed.
"If you encountered who I think you did, you'll need all the help you can get," he told her.
"Help?" she asked, strength returning to her voice. "Just who the hell are you, what did you do to Amber, and why the hell shouldn't I call the cops on you?"
"Like I said, my name is Mike. I didn't do anything to your friend, although I think I know who did. And if you want to survive the next few days, you'll need a bodyguard."
"You're nuts."
"Listen to me, girl! There's a war going on in this town, a war only the participants know about. And Keili's apparently decided to drag you and your friend into it. Why? I don't know. I've spent the last ten years chasing her around the country, and I still don't understand how she thinks."
"Why should I believe any of this?" she demanded. "For all I know, you could just be some lunatic rapist with a good cover story!"
"If I was a rapist, wouldn't I have acted by now?"
There was a knock on the door. "Donna?" a voice came from outside. "Amber? You girls okay in there?"
Giving her a piercing glare, Mike fixed Donna, nodding.
"We're fine," she replied, trying to make herself sound as normal as possible. "Just argueing over some homework."
"You two are actually doing homework?! Well, try and keep it down."
"'Homework'?" Mike asked with a grin. "I never used that one when I went through Mount Pleasant."
"Key word for having a guy in the room," she muttered. "Okay, you're not a rapist, and you're not here to beat me up, slit my throat, or anything like that. So what are you? And who's this 'Keili'?"
"Keili is my biggest mistake," he explained, his head in his hands. "You see, I made her the monster that she is. But whereas I can control myself, she cannot, or will not."
"What are you?" she asked, coming out from behind the couch, sitting on it's arm.
"Keili and I are both... Vampyre."
"Now, Amber," Keili asked, "tell me about your friend. The one called 'Donna'."
"What is there to tell?" Amber replied. "We're roommates, classmates, and are in our last semester at Cornell. She's an Education major, and on the diving team."
"Where do you two live?"
"Why? So you can kill her?"
"No," Keili stated. "I'm building an army. I simply want to recruit her, like I did you."
"Why?"
"You'll find out soon enough. Now, where do you live?"
"Fifty-three, East Broad Street," Amber whispered. "Apartment 114."
"See," Keili told her, "that wasn't so painless."
And it's my neck you'll sink your teeth into when you find out I lied, Amber thought. I've got to get out of this madhouse.
The next morning, Donna wandered into the kitchen of her apartment, only to find Mike already making her breakfast.
"I thought vampires had to sleep during the day?" she asked.
"Most of us do," he explained, "but only because sunlight weakens us. I think it has something to do with the way our bodies react to ultraviolet light. There's less of it at night, so that's when we move around. How do you want your eggs?"
"Scrambled," she muttered. "Like the rest of my brain."
"Scrambled it is."
"So," she asked a few minutes later, pouring herself a mug of coffee, "how long have you been a vampire? Couple hundred years?"
"Only ten."
"A thousand years?"
"No. Ten years."
"How... how did it happen?"
Sitting at the table across from her, placing a frying pan of eggs between them, he stated, "It happened because of a vampiress named Starr.
"Ten years ago, Keili and I were lovers, roommates, friends, classmates, you name it. Then, one night at a frat party I'd been invited to, although I can't remember why I decided to go, Starr seduced me. When morning came, I found myself a vampire. Without thinking, in hunger, I killed the first person I ran into. Horrified, I returned home. Keili convinced... no, seduced me into converting her. To share my curse, she claimed. But when she awoke, she was... different."
"'Different'," Donna muttered. "If Amber's still alive, as you think she is, do you think she's changed as well?"
"Other than the obvious?" he commented. "It's difficult to tell. She'll have the instincts and desires that we all do, but any changes to her personality is difficult to judge."
"I hope she doesn't become a monster, like...."
"Like Keili?" he finished. "One thing I've learned over the past ten years is that anything is possible."
Amber slipped away from the other vampires in Keili's stronghold as they slept. Slipping silently into the waters of the crypt, she swam towards the entrance.
Quickly dressing in the clothes she'd left there the previous day, she then exited the church. Hiding her eyes from the sun, she stuck to the shadows as she wandered through the streets towards her apartment.
Donna watched Mike as he slept in the recliner. Like this he didn't appear to be what he claimed; to her, he looked like a normal person. Kinda handsome, too, she thought. Starting at a light rapping at her window, Donna gaped with surprise at the form of her friend standing on the fire escape.
"Amber?" Donna gazed out the window at her friend. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah. This vampire stuff is a cinch. All I have to do is avoid sunlight and drink a little bit of blood every few hours."
"I'm sorry I asked," Donna muttered, cringing.
"Seriously, though," Amber stated, "It's a drag. Nothing is fun anymore. All life consists of is eating and sleeping and killing. Nothing is as it used to be. I tried smoking a cigarette... I couldn't inhale, my lungs wouldn't let me. And this whole immortality bit? What good is living forever if you can't enjoy it."
"Sounds awful."
"Donna... help me stop the madness."
"How?"
"We're gonna kamekazi that bitch. Sneak back into the church, and drive a stake through her heart. After that, I'm gonna do myself in... if I can. Are you with me?"
"But what about him?" Amber glanced over at Mike, who sat softly snoring in the recliner.
"Leave him. It's you she's after. He's safe as long as she's hunting for you. You comin'?"
"Yeah." Grabbing a bunch of the wooden stakes she'd been carving, Donna glanced back at Mike a second time before stepping out the window onto the fire escape.