Curse Of Darkness By Steven Gilby - Chapter Nine

"Where's Robert?"
I looked away from her eyes. "He just up and walked away."
She nodded. Something she might have expected him to do? They are related after all.
"Let's just go back to Vincent's for a bit. After that we need to go back to Eddie's for some things. Then we hunt down Robert."
For being related I sure didn't think she would say "hunt" down Robert. Track him down maybe, but not hunt. But I guess it wasn't so bad. I just hoped I was the one to kill him. I still think it's his fault I'm like this, that I'm dying even after I died. But I guess as long as I kill Robert before my DNA war comes to a complete stalemate everything will be alright.
I helped Razz stand up with her left arm over my shoulders and I put my right arm around her, just below her right breast to give her some support. We walked outside where Vincent and Mick were out there just standing. Vincent noticed us and he turned to Mick and said, "Yeah, so if you just clean the intake valve every three to six months with some boiling water your old heap should be good as new." He was so noticeable. I knew he just wanted to give me and Razz some alone time, but he didn't have to say that. I nearly laughed when he said it, though, but all I did was grin. All Mick did was nod and he went back into his store after saying goodbye to me and Razz.
I helped Razz into the front passenger seat. She asked where I would be sitting to which I responded I would be sitting in the bed like I was when we brought her here.
"But there's blood all back there."
"I'll be fine. A little blood never killed anyone."
She sort of glared at me, "It almost killed me."
I almost smiled, "Yes but that blood was leaving your body and you did survive so case in point."
She told me nothing and I left her there and jumped into the bed of the truck. The ride back to Vincent's house was nice. I like it when the wind blows in my face. It's soothing on any kind of day.
At Vincent's house we saw through a window that Eddie was still there with Magnus doing tests on the blood they took from me earlier while I was asleep.
I jumped out of the bed of the truck with wet blood on my pants from when Razz was back there bleeding all over the place. I didn't mind. What's a bit of blood between friends?
Razz started getting out and I went over to help her.
"I'm fine. I can make it into the house without being carried."
I realized I was babying her. I didn't mean to it was just because of what I did. It wasn't entirely my fault though. She moved in front of it. But I guess she had good reasons. I mean how would it look if I, someone who is supposed to be dead, was at the scene of a murder alive with a bloody knife and Robert laying at my feet at a school? Well there is no murder scene and Robert's body isn't lying at me feet. But now things are different. Now we will be hunting him down. Killing usually comes within the boundaries of hunting. I will kill him, make no mistake about that!
I seemed to have been lost in my mind thinking about when I would kill Robert for a while because the next thing I heard was "Come on, Steven. We need to go back to Eddie's for some things."
I snapped out of my "Kill Robert" state and followed her outside to Eddie's car which was parked on the curb in front of the house, whereas Vincent parked his truck in the driveway (it was his house after all).
Razz had a couple black duffle bags, empty of course, all the stuff was at Eddie's place.
I opened the door for shotgun and sat down. I never liked sitting in the back. For some reason or another I seemed to get carsick in the back seat.
Eddie came running out of the house as Razz got in the passenger seat after putting the empty bags in the trunk. "You better not get vun scratch on my car or I vill kill you!"
Razz just seemed to smile at that as she revved the engine and sped off swerving by parked cars. I swear some people had to many cars in their driveways. Three and four cars, one for each person, and on extra "just in case". Some people just need two cars. One for Mom and Dad and one for the kid or kids. They can fight over who uses it.
Anyway, we drove back to Eddie's place. When we got there I went and grabbed one of the bags out of the trunk as did Razz. We walked up to the front door but it was locked. Razz lifted up one of the boards from the porch and it had a little compartment with a key. That puts new meaning to "the key is under the mat".
She unlocked the door and pushed it open and it fell over like when I first met Eddie. Dust flew up just like before, too.
Razz didn't mind it and walked in and straight to the basement and opened the old, creeky wooden door and walked down. I followed a few seconds after she went down and turned on the light. I looked around and saw all the machines and gadgets and things and thought it was amazing that he knows how to use all these things.
It was just a small square basement with a couple closet doors. The stairs were on the very right, but that's if you're facing the direction the stairs go down in. The closets were right next to each other on the left wall. Cabinets filled with a crap load of different knives and bullet shells and unfired bullets, shotgun shells that were green and red, fired and unfired, tens of different sharpening stones and many other things like grenades and a lot of things that I couldn't recognize.
I saw all those bullets and shells but I didn't see a single gun of any kind. I turned to Razz who just put a few knives in her bag and was looking at a good sword to use.
"Razz?"
She answered me without even looking away, "Yeah, what is it?"
I pointed to all the bullets and things like she could see, force of habit for anyone I suppose, and said, "What's with all the bullets and shells if there aren't any guns to put them in?"
She picked out a sword and carefully placed it in the bag then looked at me. "Eddie doesn't just do things for me. He makes guns and ammunition for other hunters that are vampire or werewolf but never for a human hunter."
"Why not human hunters?"
"Humans kill us for money, plain and simple. A vampire or werewolf hunter hunts for a reason, whether it be for revenge or for justification of some kind of existence that they think needs justified by killing who they think are the evil vamps and wolves."
That answers that. My next question would be to ask where my sword was.
"Where is my sword? I haven't seen it for some time now."
She walked over to the left closet door and opened it and pulled out my sword. There was something on the sheath that I couldn't make out from where I was.
"What's up with it? It's different."
"I told Eddie how much you like all that Samurai stuff so he made this special belt that wraps around so your sword sits at your side like one of the great Samurai warriors of the old days. It's also easy to remove. It snaps on tightly but all you have to do it pull at where it's snapped and it will, of course, unsnap and come off. I suggest you take it off if we get into any skirmishes. You'll be able to move faster without it."
"Sweet!" I grabbed like a little kid who just saw his parents holding a gift he really wanted. MINE!
I snapped it on, very comfortable fit. I swung out the blade form the sheath and swung it around a bit to get a feel for it. I hadn't used it in a while.
Razz opened one of the glass cabinets and took out a metal block a couple inches thick.
"Here!" She tossed it in the air and I watched it go up as far as it would go before I swung my sword. The blade was facing the floor at the time I started my swing so I made something like a backwards C but kept going up with the blade as it faced upwards now and sort of made a lowercase B in the air. I met with some resistance and I didn't cut through the stupid thing, but it did bounce up in the air and Razz threw a ninja star at it. She's good! She hit in the cut I made with my sword. It was only about a centimeter deep and she hit a star right in it. I thought that was cool. Sometimes I wish life had slow motion instant replay.
"That's like something you'd see in a movie or something. That was cool! But I thought you tossed that thing to me to show me I could cut through it."
She walked over and picked up the block and tossed it away into a pile of junk that was inside a large cardboard box while I sheathed my sword a little disappointed.
I unsnapped my sword from my waist and set it inside my bag and zipped it up.
"No knives or daggers?" Razz asked.
"I see no need."
She walked over to a section of one of the cabinets and opened it and took out three knives: a switchblade, a butterfly, and a regular pocket knife.
"Can I trade the pocket knife for another butterfly?"
She tossed it back in and pulled out another butterfly knife. I didn't put them in my bad. I put one butterfly knife in my pockets to my slightly baggy jeans. I thought about where I could put the switchblade. It needed to be somewhere where I could get at it fast. A switchblade is an emergency knife, you're supposed to have fast access to it and the blade comes out fast so when you're in a jam its like "WHAM BAM BOOM!" and you got 'em.
"Do you have something I could put this in that would strap to my ankle or somewhere easily accessible?"
Razz looked around before she found an old leather thing that looked like it was made back in the 1800's or something. She tossed it to me and it was limp in my hand, probably from lots of use in the past. It was like a small belt with a pocket that had a snap cover to keep the knife in. I put it around my right leg and tightened it enough so it wouldn't fall off but not as tight as to cut off circulation to my foot. The knife settled in the little holder quite nicely and the cover fit snugly over the top and snapped in place. I had placed it down so I could pull it out and push the button and have at it instead of pulling it out and flipping it over and being killed before I could even hit the button.
I didn't even need a bag. I put the knives in my pockets and things and my sword was too big to even put in a bag.
We walked out to Eddie's car and set out stuff in the trunk. I didn't see what Razz had gotten. All I knew is that she got herself a sword and maybe a knife or a dagger.
We got in the car and she drove back to Vincent's place.
At Vincent's place we saw Magnus and Vincent outside on his front deck talking about something. Vincent was wearing a shoulder strap, but I couldn't see a gun if he had on in it. Magnus was sitting there waiting for us to show up I suppose.
Razz and I got out of the car and Magnus walked up to us, calmly, like he does with everything.
"Razz, Steven, I must inform you that I cannot join you in this fight."
"Why not?" I asked.
He looked at me and then back to Razz but talked to both of us, "I have a house to run. It would be hard to run it if I was dead. I regret not being able to join you but my people need me."
"We understand." Razz said and she gave him a hug.
"See ya later, Magnus." I said.
He bowed his head slightly and he started walking away.
Vincent ran off the porch and caught up to him. They said some things I couldn't hear and then they jumped into Vincent's truck and drove off.
"I guess he's going to give him a lift to his place."
We almost ignored them and walked inside to see Eddie was inside drinking from a giant bottle of Jack and blowing on one of those party tongues that makes that annoying sound after they roll out. He was happy about something.