Jamie pushed himself dizzily to his feet and saw that he was standing alone in the middle of the chapel hall; the vampires had backed away to the walls, taking his companions with them. His head was ringing, and his gorge had risen. He swayed unsteadily on his feet and turned to face Alexandru.
The ancient vampire was standing on the edge of the platform, staring down at him with delight in his eyes. Behind him stood Marie Carpenter, her arms dangling at her sides, her eyes wide with concern for her son.
“Move an inch, and I’ll gut you,” said Alexandru, in a voice that was little more than a whisper. Marie moaned, but she stood still.
I’m going to kill you, thought Jamie. Even if it costs me my life, I’m going to kill you for what you’ve done to my mother.
“So,” said Alexandru. “It appears we have reached an impasse. I no longer feel inclined to let your friends go, but I will make their deaths quick if you come up here to me now. If you don’t, you will have the privilege of watching them die, one after the other. It’s entirely up to you.”
Jamie stared up at the vampire, looking for something, anything that might help him. His eyes flicked to the huge window behind the ancient vampire, and then suddenly he saw it.
He put his hands to the belt on his waist. He brought his T-Bone and his MP5 up, and pointed them at Alexandru, his hands shaking.
The ancient vampire laughed.
“Oh, good Lord,” he said, bemusement in his voice. “Take your best shots, Mr. Carpenter. If it will make you feel that you did everything you could, then by all means take them.”
Jamie looked around the room at his friends.
Frankenstein was staring levelly at him, a look of confidence on his face, and it heartened Jamie to see it.
This needs to work. I’m only going to get one chance at this.
Larissa looked at him, her eyes shining red, her chest rising and falling. There was pride on her face and something else, and Jamie felt heat rise in his face. He didn’t care; he let it flood through him and looked at Kate.
Her face was full of fear, but there was a determination there, as well as revolted anger at the touch of the skeletal vampire.
Finally, Jamie Carpenter looked at his mother.
She returned his gaze, favoring him with an expression of unadulterated love. He smiled at her, and she smiled back at her son.
He lifted the MP5, twisted its selector to full auto, aimed it, and pulled the trigger. The bullets streamed past Alexandru’s head, who didn’t even flinch, and thudded into the huge cross that stood behind him. The wood splintered and shattered under the impact, and the great crucifix creaked on its suddenly unstable base.
Alexandru didn’t notice. He looked down at Jamie and opened his palms toward the teenager, as if to say, “What now?”
Jamie threw the gun aside; it clattered to the floor, and slid to a halt in the middle of the room. He raised the T-Bone against his shoulder.
One shot. Just one shot.
He fired, and the projectile screamed across the chapel hall. It sailed over Alexandru’s head, and crashed into the center of the cross with a heavy thud, digging deeply into the dense, ancient wood.
“Oh, dear,” said Alexandru, softly. “You missed.”
Jamie set his feet against the uneven stone floor, and held the T-Bone against his chest. The motor whirred as it tried to wind the metal stake back in, and he felt his feet slide momentarily toward the old vampire, who was looking at him with an expression that was close to pity.
Then the bullet-weakened base of the cross creaked, and gave way.
Alexandru Rusmanov, who could move so fast he was a blur to human eyes, who had walked the earth, killing and torturing, for more than five hundred years, never saw it coming. At the last second, a shadow fell across him from behind, and his forehead creased into a frown before the huge cross, which had overlooked forty generations of the faithful, annihilated him.
It landed on his shoulders, shattering his spine and crushing the back of his skull to powder, driving him from the platform and onto the ground. His legs broke, and he crumpled to the stone floor, his pelvis cracking in two and filling instantly with blood. He rolled as he fell, and the right arm of the cross ripped his left arm out at the shoulder, sending it sliding wetly across the floor. The vampire hit the ground, a limp sack of flesh and blood. The cross settled on top of him, tearing his chest open as it slid to a creaking halt.
For a second, there was silence in the chapel hall, as the vampires stared blankly at their fallen leader.
Then the Blacklight team moved.
Frankenstein reached out and crushed the PVC-clad vampire’s hand. Her fingers broke, and she dropped the knife, shrieking in pain, until the monster staked her and she exploded in a pillar of blood. He rose from the floor like an erupting volcano, firing his shotgun and his T-Bone, scattering vampires across the hall.
The operator grabbed Anderson’s ankle and twisted it, sharply. There was a loud crack as the bone broke, and Anderson howled, the high wavering cry of a child. He reeled backward, his infant face clouded with pain and confusion, his eyes flicking from Alexandru’s fallen form to the operator in front of him, who was pushing himself up the wall. Anderson backed away, then turned and leapt into the air. He flew across the hall like a swollen, misshapen bird, smashed through the stained-glass window, and disappeared into the night sky.
Larissa lunged forward and sank her hand into the chest of the vampire nearest her, who was staring with a look of incomprehension at the fallen cross. The woman screamed as fingernails tore through her skin and found her heart. Then Larissa clenched her fist, and the organ exploded. A moment later, the rest of the woman erupted, and Larissa moved forward, a snarling, blood-soaked angel of death. The other three vampires who had backed her against the wall turned and fled, leaping across the room and disappearing through the broken window.
The rest of Alexandru’s followers went after them. Frankenstein and the operator each T-Boned one of the fleeing vampires, smashing them out of midair with the screeching projectiles. They were hauled back to the ground and exploded on impact, sending fresh blood running across the stone floor.
Kate saw her chance and sank her teeth into the skeletal vampire’s arm. She shook her head like a terrier, then pulled hard. A chunk of meat tore out of the vampire’s arm, and he screamed in pain. His fingernail left her neck, and she ducked out of his grip, spit out the chunk of meat, and turned to face him. The vampire looked up at her with red eyes, and she plunged the stake into his chest, driving him back against the wall. He burst in a great explosion of blood, soaking her from head to toe, but Kate didn’t flinch. Instead she turned back to the center of the hall, saw the blood-soaked remnants of the Blacklight team walking toward each other, and ran to join them.
As his friends routed the remainder of Alexandru’s followers, Jamie walked slowly across the room to the fallen vampire. His mother took a tentative step toward him, but he held up a hand.
“Stay where you are, Mom,” he called. “It’s not over yet.” He crossed the stone floor of the hall and knelt down next to Alexandru.
The vampire’s face was destroyed; one of his eyes was missing, his mouth opened and closed silently, and blood was pumping steadily from the back of his head, running freely across the ground. The severed arm lay beside Jamie, and he pushed it away, disgusted. Then he looked at Alexandru’s chest and smiled at what he saw.
The skin had been torn away, and the ribcage had been shattered to pieces. Alexandru’s insides lay open to the cold air of the monastery, and Jamie could see the slowly beating red bulb of the ancient vampire’s heart. He reached down to his belt and pulled his stake from its loop.