Baser Instincts
Posted: Sun Jul 03, 2016 5:01 pm
May 23rd, 2027
The DJ had bolted out the door hours ago, the dry ice machines had run out of fuel for just as long, and Moscow had displayed its usual administrative reticence. Contrary to popular belief, Russia's summers could actually be fairly sweltering in the metropolitan area, and Fabrika 17's deserted concrete expanse had trapped the body heat of a few hundred vampires who'd made the mistake of picking the previous night to host a rave. The local officers had dazedly stuck police tape around and the federals had harassed gawkers away, but it took the Chairman's arrival for a supernaturally-endowed hand to grasp the entirety of the massive sound console's cabling and rip everything out in a single and deliberately careless yank. Sparks flew, speakers squawked and the insane tempo designed to appeal to supernaturally resilient dancers looking for an adrenaline fix died out. Forsythe Atticus Holden felt his headache recede and set aside his homicidal fantasies of going back in time and tracking down the fathers of both turntablism and audio console programming.
Anyone with a pair of fangs and below a hundred years of age would have felt themselves salivate at the carnage that surrounded the mouse. Dozens of corpses littered the concrete floor, some reduced to pulpy messes that were barely recognizable as human or anthro. Most of the fangs he could see were small and dainty, barely more than enabled human canines. That placed most victims in the stripling range - somewhere between a few months old as vampires, to maybe a single century. Forsythe, however, was too old to see this as anything more than wanton carnage. In some sick display of effort, the killer had managed to launch a few bisected bodies over the warehouse's support beams, gray intestinal tendrils and displaced spleens and livers being tossed here and there, along with the discarded lower halves. The younglings had put up a fight, at least - a few of them had their mouths smeared with something that felt too dark and reflective to be common blood, and several of the female corpses showed damaged fingernails.
They'd turned desperate, then. They'd stopped pleading and had tried to use their instincts to survive the night. Their killer hadn't allowed it.
Past the cordon, the concerned and bereaved faces of makers or striplings from the same maker were obvious to all. Common stereotypes placed makers as being dispassionate towards their progeny, but Forsythe knew phlegm was a growing rarity in the community. Openness had won out once the Vienna Accords had been ratified, and now centuries-old makers no longer had to pretend not to feel anything in order to survive. Old eyes ensconced in young faces wept, confusion and anger mingling the salt of their tears with blood. Somewhere outside and out of his field of view, a man wailed something in Russian, his voice carrying an immense amount of grief. The mortals that passed by looked shocked.
Vampires of the Ordo Dracul could cry as much as anyone else, but Forsythe didn't feel compelled to mourn these young folk. He hadn't known them, hadn't known their life stories or what had compelled or forced them to venture into unlife, to forsake the promise of a full and healthy mortal life for the uncertainties of immortality. All he knew was that history had been written over the last week. This was the third assault on an undead public gathering, done in the kind of overt brutality that reminded him all too well of his own people's crimes against mortalkind.
Amsterdam, London, and now Moscow. Whoever was responsible could either coordinate attacks quickly, or they had access to private shuttle pads and stayed on the move. This was the third day, and no manifesto had come up. Nobody had claimed responsibility for any of these attacks - but the public had already made its mind. He wasn't concerned by those who supported the grieving vampires of this world - he'd already Tweeted several would-be heartwarming platitudes in thanks to the posters of the most Retweeted condemnations - he had more energy to put towards the stamping-out of those who glorified those attacks.
Sighing, he opened his quilted tablet case and looked down at his timeline. Notifications were still popping up like wildfire, informing him of every single hateful screed that came into existence in the most popular Far Right and Alt-Right discussion forums around the globe. For once, Holden was glad that Alexander Ruthven had extinguished what little had been left of his human passions; a distant corner of his mind wanted to immediately draft a press release that would challenge those cowards who dared to spout hatred and bigotry behind the cover of a user name to do so out in the open. He shut the door on that vague impulse, now sensing the way in which his own predatory nature tended to rise up from deep within.
Oh, but he wasn't one for lunges or leaps and desperate biting attempts. He wasn't one for slaking his feral side over furniture or onlookers. As far as anyone in Moscow knew, the English mouse Vienna had spat out wasn't capable of anything more than pushing pencils. That would've been wrong, however. Forsythe was an old and experienced predator, not old enough to lose the living rush of it all, but certainly old enough to appreciate a carefully-planned strike. Ruthven had made him into someone who could stalk his prey for weeks or months, and who preferred the comfort of assumed friendship as his killing field. This, in and of itself, had been the old warlord's undoing. He'd hoped for a politically-inclined bruiser, and had instead fathered a beast bred and born for boardrooms and public appearances - his intellectual and professional superior in every way.
Some catches, however, required bait...
* * *
May 24th.
Few people ever called Marianna Jameson directly. Her secretary took the brunt of the PR work, when H&J's own PR goons didn't. Considering, the people who called her were usually boardroom members, friends, colleagues from Shield, or maybe Auntie Song. It made business talk curt and effective and left more space open for interpersonal exchanges. Time zones being what they were and human error being what it was, this one would reach Mary's phone just a minute or so before the beginning of one of her Hong Kong workdays. She'd miss it, but the voicemail that followed was fairly clear. The voice felt like it could've been one of those of the last few great dames of British theatre - somewhere between Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren.
"Mss Jameson, I am Justinia Davis, secretary to Forsythe Atticus Holden of the Vienna Council. I am to inform you that Sir has chartered a shuttle for you within the hour. He cites matters of international security, so any prior engagements you may have had are to be rescinded. The shuttle will take you to Austria, more specifically to our Köeningstrasse headquarters. Please pack for several days, and bring with you any objects or data storage devices which may be pertinent in the study of your own augmentations, as well as others from similar or complementary manufacturers. Sir would particularly like to hear of your former colleagues in Hong Kong's Special Response team."
There was a brief pause, followed by something that felt like a last-minute addendum. "Please skip breakfast, as well - what we have to show you is not for the squeamish."
The DJ had bolted out the door hours ago, the dry ice machines had run out of fuel for just as long, and Moscow had displayed its usual administrative reticence. Contrary to popular belief, Russia's summers could actually be fairly sweltering in the metropolitan area, and Fabrika 17's deserted concrete expanse had trapped the body heat of a few hundred vampires who'd made the mistake of picking the previous night to host a rave. The local officers had dazedly stuck police tape around and the federals had harassed gawkers away, but it took the Chairman's arrival for a supernaturally-endowed hand to grasp the entirety of the massive sound console's cabling and rip everything out in a single and deliberately careless yank. Sparks flew, speakers squawked and the insane tempo designed to appeal to supernaturally resilient dancers looking for an adrenaline fix died out. Forsythe Atticus Holden felt his headache recede and set aside his homicidal fantasies of going back in time and tracking down the fathers of both turntablism and audio console programming.
Anyone with a pair of fangs and below a hundred years of age would have felt themselves salivate at the carnage that surrounded the mouse. Dozens of corpses littered the concrete floor, some reduced to pulpy messes that were barely recognizable as human or anthro. Most of the fangs he could see were small and dainty, barely more than enabled human canines. That placed most victims in the stripling range - somewhere between a few months old as vampires, to maybe a single century. Forsythe, however, was too old to see this as anything more than wanton carnage. In some sick display of effort, the killer had managed to launch a few bisected bodies over the warehouse's support beams, gray intestinal tendrils and displaced spleens and livers being tossed here and there, along with the discarded lower halves. The younglings had put up a fight, at least - a few of them had their mouths smeared with something that felt too dark and reflective to be common blood, and several of the female corpses showed damaged fingernails.
They'd turned desperate, then. They'd stopped pleading and had tried to use their instincts to survive the night. Their killer hadn't allowed it.
Past the cordon, the concerned and bereaved faces of makers or striplings from the same maker were obvious to all. Common stereotypes placed makers as being dispassionate towards their progeny, but Forsythe knew phlegm was a growing rarity in the community. Openness had won out once the Vienna Accords had been ratified, and now centuries-old makers no longer had to pretend not to feel anything in order to survive. Old eyes ensconced in young faces wept, confusion and anger mingling the salt of their tears with blood. Somewhere outside and out of his field of view, a man wailed something in Russian, his voice carrying an immense amount of grief. The mortals that passed by looked shocked.
Vampires of the Ordo Dracul could cry as much as anyone else, but Forsythe didn't feel compelled to mourn these young folk. He hadn't known them, hadn't known their life stories or what had compelled or forced them to venture into unlife, to forsake the promise of a full and healthy mortal life for the uncertainties of immortality. All he knew was that history had been written over the last week. This was the third assault on an undead public gathering, done in the kind of overt brutality that reminded him all too well of his own people's crimes against mortalkind.
Amsterdam, London, and now Moscow. Whoever was responsible could either coordinate attacks quickly, or they had access to private shuttle pads and stayed on the move. This was the third day, and no manifesto had come up. Nobody had claimed responsibility for any of these attacks - but the public had already made its mind. He wasn't concerned by those who supported the grieving vampires of this world - he'd already Tweeted several would-be heartwarming platitudes in thanks to the posters of the most Retweeted condemnations - he had more energy to put towards the stamping-out of those who glorified those attacks.
Sighing, he opened his quilted tablet case and looked down at his timeline. Notifications were still popping up like wildfire, informing him of every single hateful screed that came into existence in the most popular Far Right and Alt-Right discussion forums around the globe. For once, Holden was glad that Alexander Ruthven had extinguished what little had been left of his human passions; a distant corner of his mind wanted to immediately draft a press release that would challenge those cowards who dared to spout hatred and bigotry behind the cover of a user name to do so out in the open. He shut the door on that vague impulse, now sensing the way in which his own predatory nature tended to rise up from deep within.
Oh, but he wasn't one for lunges or leaps and desperate biting attempts. He wasn't one for slaking his feral side over furniture or onlookers. As far as anyone in Moscow knew, the English mouse Vienna had spat out wasn't capable of anything more than pushing pencils. That would've been wrong, however. Forsythe was an old and experienced predator, not old enough to lose the living rush of it all, but certainly old enough to appreciate a carefully-planned strike. Ruthven had made him into someone who could stalk his prey for weeks or months, and who preferred the comfort of assumed friendship as his killing field. This, in and of itself, had been the old warlord's undoing. He'd hoped for a politically-inclined bruiser, and had instead fathered a beast bred and born for boardrooms and public appearances - his intellectual and professional superior in every way.
Some catches, however, required bait...
* * *
May 24th.
Few people ever called Marianna Jameson directly. Her secretary took the brunt of the PR work, when H&J's own PR goons didn't. Considering, the people who called her were usually boardroom members, friends, colleagues from Shield, or maybe Auntie Song. It made business talk curt and effective and left more space open for interpersonal exchanges. Time zones being what they were and human error being what it was, this one would reach Mary's phone just a minute or so before the beginning of one of her Hong Kong workdays. She'd miss it, but the voicemail that followed was fairly clear. The voice felt like it could've been one of those of the last few great dames of British theatre - somewhere between Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren.
"Mss Jameson, I am Justinia Davis, secretary to Forsythe Atticus Holden of the Vienna Council. I am to inform you that Sir has chartered a shuttle for you within the hour. He cites matters of international security, so any prior engagements you may have had are to be rescinded. The shuttle will take you to Austria, more specifically to our Köeningstrasse headquarters. Please pack for several days, and bring with you any objects or data storage devices which may be pertinent in the study of your own augmentations, as well as others from similar or complementary manufacturers. Sir would particularly like to hear of your former colleagues in Hong Kong's Special Response team."
There was a brief pause, followed by something that felt like a last-minute addendum. "Please skip breakfast, as well - what we have to show you is not for the squeamish."