3. Christopher
Chapter three
Christopher
Arizona—Three minutes earlier
From the open top, I peer into the silo, and what I see at the distant bottom shoots a wave of longing through me.
Bunnies. Fluffy, cute, alive. At least forty of them, maybe more, crowded into what used to be the blast zone. And whoever breeds them keeps them apart. The rexes are separate from the lops, which are separate from the Flemish giants.
My envy grows. I have a breeding pair of rexes in my ark. But the others? They are breeds that were lost when freaky weather collapsed the world. What an opportunity. Save another variety from extinction and receive bonus clone blood pouches from the Lux for enlarging my ark’s animal population.
But to get to the bunnies, I need to climb down a one-hundred-and-fifty-foot silo that’s covered on all sides by fruits and vegetables.
Water reclamation and recycling equipment, if I’m not mistaken, rests in an alcove at the bottom, kept separate from the floppy-eared cuties by a wire fence.
And then I figure it out—during the day, when there’s no threat from vampires, they open the retractable blast roof to provide light for the vertical garden.
When the monsoon rains hit, the open roof allows the occupants to collect and store water.
I know a thing or two about growing plants, being an ark keeper in a preservation dome.
So color me impressed. The system isn’t perfect, but judging from the lush greenery, it works.
And its presence answers the burning question.
The occupants must be mortals, what with the dim battery- and solar-powered lights dotting the silos and balconies.
Vampires don’t need night-lights or green beans and lettuce.
I take a couple of quick photos before I start my descent.
I could just leave, but I want a breeding pair of each rabbit variety I don’t already have.
Extending my claws, I hook them into the gaps in the concrete wall and descend to the nearest balcony, ready to grab the vegetable trellis that starts there in case the balcony gives way under my weight.
I’d survive the drop to the cement floor, but I’d prefer not to break any bones.
From the top balcony, I descend ladder after ladder past a rich garden of herbs and vegetables growing along the silo’s wall until I reach a larger platform with a half-circle rail located about two-thirds of the way from the top.
An open door across from me leads into the operations section of the missile complex.
I lean over the rail and sniff the air. Definitely cooler than the scorching ninety-five degrees outside.
Whoever runs this place has jury-rigged air-conditioning units to keep the bunnies from roasting prematurely, although their AC system loses a lot of cold air to the silo’s tall expanse.
A trade-off—they can’t cover the garden to hold in the cooling drafts without starving the plants of light.
The rabbits are hopping around, munching on cultivated grasses and doing what bunnies do—the males mount the females, then collapse on their sides in an ecstatic freeze.
And there are so many of them. Surely the mortals who bred these bundles of fluff could afford to part with one breeding pair.
I have plenty of luxury items to trade for a pair of Flemish giants with ears twice the size of a normal rabbit.
I’ll happily make the trip again to deliver any trade goods they want.
Maybe I could get bold and ask for a pair of lops too, with their brown-and-white dappled fur, their fuzzy little heads, and their cute hanging ears, begging to be stroked.
And bunnies are affectionate. At least, my rust-colored rexes love to be petted, and, in return, will lick my hands or face. Their fur is like a man’s buzz cut, except velvety, not prickly when touched, and I’ll sit for hours, petting one as I play video games.
A twang of a bowstring and the shush of an arrow startles me, and I dive to the balcony floor.
“Leave or die.”
I roll away, looking for cover, and scramble behind a long wooden planter, then peek out around the edge to see if I can figure where the arrow came from.
“I just want to trade.” I shuck the backpack I carry and wave it in the air. “I’ll give you food and medicines for a breeding pair of each.”
Another arrow passes close to me. This shooter is good.
“I’ll let you leave.” The voice comes across as feminine. High-pitched, though she’s trying to lower it to sound like a gruff male. “Get up and climb to the door you came through.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to trade?”
“This is your last warning.”
She’s too far away for me to mesmerize, plus she’s half-shielded by the doorway frame, which is partially concealing her eyes. I could try to wait her out. But if she stays awake until sunrise, I’m toast—burned toast, as I’m trapped directly under the launch duct opening.
Better to accept her olive branch.
“Okay, I’m standing up. I’ll leave.”
Then I glimpse her. Mortal. Gorgeous. Powerful. The way she stands ready with an arrow nocked, her dark hair braided back. Damn. I’m undead, not blind. Under different circumstances…
“If you change your mind, put a note on the roof and—”
The ringing twang of the bowstring warns me, and I dive to the floor, twisting, intending to snatch the shaft from the air, but not in time. The arrowhead pierces my left shoulder, not my heart, and doesn’t burn, so it’s not made from silver. Glass or obsidian, maybe.
A somewhat lucky break.
“Ow.” I yank out the arrow. “I thought you said I could leave.”
She creeps closer with another arrow nocked.
How has she survived so long? Despite her beauty, she’s very skinny from malnutrition. If only she’d taken my offer. My ark produces enough high-quality food—the Lux would never miss whatever I siphoned off for her, the poor thing.
Strange that I feel sorry for the woman who just skewered me with an arrow.
She stops a few feet away, avoiding eye contact. “The only way you’re leaving is in a coffin. I can’t trust you.”
“Why not?”
“You were going to steal the rabbits, weren’t you, thief? To feed your blood slaves? You’ll come back with your buddies next time for me. I won’t live that way.”
“I’m not a renegade. I wouldn’t—”
She raises the bow and, over the top of the planter, aims for my heart.
No choice, dammit. Reaching under my t-shirt, I slide the gun from my hidden holster and fire.
Bang. Bang.
I don’t have time to aim. I don’t have time to scare her off. I’m pinned in place between the railing and the planter, and an arrow through the heart will turn me into a dried-out mummy.
She drops like a sack of potatoes, and the arrow goes wild. I peek around the edge of the planter. She lies on the platform, moaning. As I stare at her face, my gut clenches. She isn’t old enough to remember what a sack of potatoes looks like. She can’t be much over thirty.
I didn’t want to kill her, but I didn’t want to die, either. And killing her sort of violates my contract. Any mortals I find outside the domes are to be left alive to survive or die based on their own ingenuity. The Lux hope it will improve the species.
I scramble over to where she fell, hoping I can save her.
Blood shoots out of her chest with each pump of her heart.
I probably hit the thoracic artery, and not even vampire blood will heal a wound like that, not without turning her.
The last thing I want is a dependent fledgling.
My post-Collapse existence is bad enough…
but raising a vampire child? Being bonded to a stranger? Nope. Not happening.
Plus, it’s against the rules. All vampires are required to seek permission from the three councils before turning a mortal.
If I fail to get that permission, I don’t want to contemplate what the Lux Protectors—or the vampire and mortal councils—might do.
Besides, I can’t reach them via comm. I’m too far away, and she’s dying too fast. I’d have no time to drive her back to my ark, assuming I could haul her up to the top of the silo.
Damn, what a waste of a beautiful woman.
As bad as I feel, I need the blood gushing from her wound.
Without it, my shoulder won’t heal enough to climb the silo’s walls.
I don’t know if there are other hostiles in here, either.
Grimacing at how screwed up this is—this is not how I’d prefer to take blood—I seal my lips over her chest wound and take a couple of deep swallows.
“Mommy?”
No.
I jerk upright just as a little girl steps through the doorway. She can’t be more than three or four. A brown-skinned girl with dark eyes. Hugging a lop-eared rabbit to her chest, she stares at the woman on the ground in front of me.
“Fuck.”
I hate children.