Washington DC
Year 2224

There's no way out. I may as well sit down and enjoy the view . . . while it lasts.

This is not quite how I pictured my last night alive.

You'd think there wouldn't be much to see at the bottom of a holding pit, but that's where you'd be wrong. This is the Floating Carnevale. Every once in a while, the airship tilts. It's part of the appeal. The allure. The magic.

We must be revolving at an angle. The top of the ferris wheel dips into view. Soon, I can just make out the red and white stripes of the circus tent. It's probably some strange acoustic thing, but the carousel music gets louder the more we tip. The red blinking light of the House of Ill Repute then merges with the blue and white lights of the rollercoaster. For a time, everything levels out and goes almost dark for me, wherever I happen to be in the Restricted Zone. There's only the pale glow of starlight.

Once everything goes still, there's the faint creak of gears shifting. Then we start revolving at a new angle in the opposite direction. The glossy walls of this pit morph again as well, almost in sync.

I wish I could detect a pattern. I guess I'm not smart or attentive enough. Or there just isn't one. Sometimes the walls look climbable or leapable if I change forms. As a wolf, I'd get somewhat higher, but forty feet is still forty feet. Sometimes it doesn't look spannable whatsoever. Currently, the sharp spikes are changing into these smooth, globular bumps. They may be less lethal, but they aren't any more useful.

Maybe in better circumstances, this strange light show would lull me to sleep. But, for the thousandth time, I find myself running a finger through the seam that runs across the floor. At any moment, it could open. It's all part of the torture. The ambiance is supposed to give me hope, and then somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean, it'll be bye-bye Larc.

We're thousands of feet in the air, and even if I could survive the fall, I'm not much of a swimmer. It isn't easy to kill a shapeshifter, but that would do it.

Coming onto this death trap, I expected it. I was ready for it, in fact. It sure beats the alternative—going home with my tail between my legs. Still, I wish I accomplished what I set out to do. It'd be for the greater good. And, a little part of me, as foolish as it may seem now, thought I'd be able to plant the bomb and figure a way out of here before it went off. I'd be presumed dead and could start over somewhere, and no one would ever be the wiser.

I don't know what Ivan Kozlov, the ringmaster of this spectacle, will do if he ever gets his bloody hands on me. There's no question about it. I'd rather face the Atlantic Ocean than find out.

My shudder is cut short by a scuffle overhead. Everyone is wearing black, and most of it is a shadowy blur, but I do catch flashes of skin and lace, a masquerade mask and long blond hair.

I retract my legs, balling up against the wall.

The little blonde is putting up a good fight, but they manage to get her over the edge.

By the breadth of her lace, her body just misses the spindly projections that are now protruding upward. She could have easily been impaled by them. Not that they'd care. And not that it would necessarily matter. I have a feeling this pit is designed with the supernatural in mind. It's probably why I'm the only one in it.

Deviants would only be welcome here with security clearance or a special permit. Ivan Kozlov wouldn't want anyone here who would threaten his standing. He may think he's superhuman, but the truth is, he's a flesh-and-blood human, and despite the promises that have gone on for over a century, doctors and scientists haven't quite perfected the supernatural art of fast-healing. All it would take is one well-aimed blade or bullet and that would be the end of the most unscrupulous drug tzar of all time. Unfortunately, no one, no matter who or what they are, has ever been able to get close enough to him. Anyone who could is probably on his payroll.

On the long way down, the blonde femme fatale does a swan-like flip and half turn. She lands on her shoeless feet, almost soundlessly, in a perfect lunge. It's an impressive feat, especially in handcuffs, behind her back, no less.

There's only one type of Deviant who'd be able to accomplish something like this. With a whiff, I confirm it. Vampire. The smell of blood and death isn't strong, though. Her scent is actually a pleasant one. If she intended to fool other Deviants, she may have accomplished it, at least temporarily. In a crowd, I may not have noticed, and I'm the best there is.

"Lay a fang on me, wolf, and I'll end you." She never even laid an eye on me. Her nose shouldn't be as good as mine. She's not even afraid, and I find that insulting. She is in handcuffs, and I am not.

"I'd like to see you try." I stretch out my long legs and cross them at the ankle.

The blonde leans against the opposite wall, but she doesn't bother to sit down. "Don't tempt me."

"Since when does a vampire need tempting?"

She doesn't answer. In fact, she doesn't acknowledge me whatsoever.

I can't tell if I know her or not. Her face and scent are masked, and the lighting is terrible right now.

I admit, there's something familiar about her, but I can't quite put it all together with just her hair and skin exposed, a greater area of that than clothing. She's wearing this black corset-thing with garter straps, and that's about as far as my knowledge of these things go. It's artfully low-cut and looks expensive. She may be tiny, but she has these ridiculously perfect proportions.

If I was into the vampire thing . . . which I'm not . . . it would be . . . she would be . . . assuming she'd let me anywhere near her. But, judging by her expression and the upward tilt of her head, what's crossing my mind isn't crossing hers.

That's typical. Insulting. Maddening. Am I really that invisible, even across the species divide?

I'm relatively open-minded. At least I used to be, before the rejection was so universal. Can't say I ever met a vampire, though, who didn't want to rip my head off at first sight. I know it's complicated. Mortal enemies and all. Everyone always says, "times have changed," but many of the vampires who survived the Unholy Wars are centuries old. Humans are now aware of our existence, and we're all—at least on the senate floor—moving toward tolerance. Still, vampires have long memories and play a much different mating game.

"I'm Larc, by the way. . ." It's my last-ditch effort to play nice . . . and I get no reaction. "This is when you give me your name," I snarl, feeling suddenly hot and shaky.

I push to a squat. The beast in me lies just below the surface, and that surface is thinner than usual. It must be my fear of death and her complete disregard for that. I might be able to take her in a one-on-one fight, but in almost every other calamity, she'd have the advantage. I don't expect any compassion from a vampire, but a little civility would be nice! 

When the walls morph again, the light shifts, and I realize her eyes are closed and her lips are moving.

My change in posture seems to interrupt her concentration. She flashes those eerie blue irises at me. The cock of her head is both menacing and condescending.

"Keep it in the cage, wolf. Can't you see I'm busy?"

I fall back to my ass and lower my head. And while I'm humble and unsuspecting, I get blasted by heat, suddenly overwhelmed by a noxious odor and an abundance of light.

My head lifts and my eyes adjust. The vampire is melting the handcuffs off her hands.

"You're Sultry." It comes out as a whisper, but her gaze slices toward me anyway.

I'll assume that's a yes.

I'm not sure anyone even remembers her real name. Vampires don't usually have any special powers, but she does. It could be bullshit, but I heard she has some kind of connection to a powerful demon. It gives her firepower, among other things. It's a long list, one I hope she doesn't find a reason to use against me. Her mind-control tricks are allegedly unrivaled. They even work on other vampires.

She tosses the masquerade mask aside, and she is, of course, breathtaking as well. I bet she was hot before the change. Fives become sevens, sevens become nines, but twelves are not supposed to exist on this earth. Senators, tycoons, and gang bosses should be wary, but I see them bending to her will anyway. Or asking for dangerous favors. She's a killer and a quietly effective one, but it's not just about revenge, although I'm sure that can be a part of it. If the rumors are true, it's usually for money, a lot of it.

She kills bad people and must have some moral code which she abides by, but her sexual exploits may not play into that. Isn't it a means to an end for someone like her? Won't she screw anyone and anything if it gets her closer to her mark?

It makes me wonder if it's Ivan's saliva that I caught a whiff of earlier. And if she's down here with me, mostly untouched by his stench, I guess it didn't get very far. Or go very well. Doesn't mean she didn't succeed, though. Unlike me, she may have been apprehended after the fact.

"Is he dead?" I ask her as the last of the metal sizzles into the floor.

She rubs both wrists and dips a stockinged toe into one of the pockmarks it left. "Is who dead?"

I stand up and put a finger in one of the holes in the wall. "Kozlov."

She spins around, her eyes on the odd candle-stick shape of our enclosure. "How often does this thing change?"

"Why should I tell you? You're not sharing a damn thing."

With the speed of a viper, she removes a long, thin blade from her corset and lunges for me. "It's pretty simple. Answer, live. Pain in the ass, die."

She has me pinned to the wall, the blade angled toward my carotid artery. We're fast healers too, and can usually survive the average stabs, slashes, scrapes, and burns, but a direct puncture wound to an artery is another story entirely, one that doesn't end well. There comes a point where blood loss outpaces our healing capacity.

"Every three minutes or so." I lift my hands in surrender. "And the transition takes about a minute. Why?"

She glides backward, re-sheathes the blade, and with both hands, she launches a stream of fire at the wall. Up the entire shaft, the plastic-like material becomes a bright yellow-orange that isn't subtle. Glancing up, seemingly concerned with the likelihood of discovery as well, she makes it quick and waits.

At a place where the wall was flat and vertical, there's now a flat protrusion. It holds her up when she puts some weight on it, and then time runs out. Everything starts to reform. It was a promising experiment, but, unfortunately, the "step" gets reabsorbed. The black splotch fades to gray. Beyond that, there's no indication that it was ever there.

I guess that's that.

(part 1 of 3)
WC: 1961