The Hollow Church Read online

  Stepping past an old telling counter, I finally see what he's talking about. The bodies look like rag dolls, their arms and legs twisted and turned in various directions, but from this distance they all seem to have two other things in common: they're all shacked to the floor with iron manacles, and they're all wearing torn, shabby clothing. Stepping between a couple of the bodies, I look down and see thick wounds around their necks, as if someone inserted a pair of tubes, leaving two thick holes just below the jawline.

  "We've identified a few of them," calls out a familiar voice.

  Turning, I see Detective Duffield kneeling by one of the bodies, making notes on a clipboard. "You'll be shocked to learn that they're all deadbeats. Runaways, addicts, that kind of thing. Some of them were reported missing a while back, most were probably just left to drift away. I know this might not be a very politically correct thing to say, but whoever did this to 'em, they might actually have done us a favor. I mean, no city needs to have these fucking criminals running around in the shadows. Even in New York, we could do with a spot of relief."

  "Each of these people was someone's son or daughter," I reply, bristling at the way Duffield seems happy to write off so many people all at once. The guy has always got on my nerves, and today is no exception. "What else have they got in common? You found anything?"

  "So far," he replies, "they all seem to have been between the ages of sixteen and thirty. It's a pretty even mix of male and female. I've only had a quick look at a few of them, but it's not hard to find needle marks. I'm pretty sure they were all users." Groaning a little, he gets to his feet and wanders over to join me. "It's like Christmas, Mark. Someone took a hundred of the worst junkies this city's ever had, and killed 'em all in one nice neat place. Frankly, I think we should be offering a reward for anyone who -"

  "Good job you're not in charge, isn't it?" I reply, interrupting him. "Whatever else happened to these people, they were still human beings and they were still murdered. Unless you're going to suggest that they did this to themselves?"

  "You know what it reminds me of?" Duffield asks. "A zoo."

  "They weren't animals," I point out.

  "Hear me out," he continues, turning to look at the bodies all laid out in neat rows. "It's like someone gathered 'em all together and just kept 'em here for... Well, for what? For fun? Sure, they've got nasty crap around their necks, but apart from that there's nothing to really indicate what they were being kept here for. Hell, these weren't exactly the nicest of people. They probably didn't smell too good to begin with, and all the ones I've checked so far seem to have lacked access to proper toilet facilities, if you know what I mean. They're all pretty thin, too. Even thinner than your average junkie. So yeah, I reckon it reminds me of a zoo."

  "Or a farm," I add, walking over to one of the bodies.

  "Like a petting zoo?" Duffield replies. "You think people paid fifty cents to come and feed a junkie?"

  "No," I say, staring at the corpse's pale face, "but I definitely think someone kept them here for a reason. All these people had something that someone wanted. Have you checked for any sign of scar tissue or open wounds on the bodies?"

  "I took a look at one of them," he says. "There was nothing."

  "The wounds on the neck don't look large enough for anything surgical," I continue. "The only thing that could have been taken was blood." I turn and look at another of the bodies. "They're very pale. We need to find out whether they'd had their blood removed."

  "I'll tell the medical examiner," Duffield says gruffly. "If she ever shows up. Apparently she's stuck in traffic."

  "If you wanted to remove someone's blood," I say, walking between some of the bodies, "you could do it fairly easily. But if you wanted to maintain that individual as an ongoing resource, you'd have to keep them in a certain space and only take so much blood at a time." I pause for a moment, trying to get the theory straight in my head. "The average adult male has, what, eight or nine pints of blood? If he can stand to lose forty per cent at a time, that's roughly three pints, multiplied by the one hundred and ten bodies we've got here, and then based on the assumption that you could take the same amount once every three weeks or so, you're looking at an operation that could potentially have been harvesting around four hundred pints of blood every month. And that's assuming you're keeping the subjects in optimal health. If you didn't mind making them sick, and if you fed them a carefully-designed diet, you might be able to double the yield."

  "You think someone was farming blood?" Duffield asks.

  "Yes," I reply, "I think someone was farming blood. Call it a hunch, but it's the only thing that makes sense so far."

  "And you got all that from a quick look at the bodies?" He smiles nervously. "What are you, psychic?"

  "It's just the logical conclusion," I tell him. "However, logic isn't enough. We need proof. When that medical examiner turns up, get him to check how much blood is in each of these bodies. I guarantee you'll find they were almost empty. I want to know how much was extracted, when, and how. I want to know all the possible uses for such a huge amount of blood, and I want to know if there are any cases over the past decade that have any similar elements. I also want to know what happens next. If someone needs a large amount of blood over a considerable period of time, they don't just stop one day. Whatever was going on here and however long it lasted, someone seems to have become a little greedy, but I'm worried they might have just moved on to another site." I pause for a moment. "Who found the bodies again?"

  "A group of guys that had been hired to clear the site," Duffield replies. "They were sent in after a court order came into effect at midnight. As far as they were concerned, they were just gonna find a bunch of stoned junkies. You think whoever was running this place, they found out they were gonna have company and panicked?"

  "The bodies are too old," I reply. "They died weeks ago. Besides, if you're the kind of person who can arrange this kind of set-up, you're unlikely to get spooked and caught with your pants down. This whole thing was probably run to a fine schedule, and there's no way these victims could have been kept like this indefinitely. When the medical examiner gets here, tell him we need to find out how many times these people had their blood removed. There's got to be a way."

  "Actually," he says with a grin, "the new medical examiner's a woman. That's probably why she's late, right? Probably got a bloody mess of her own to deal with, eh?"

  I turn to him.

  "You know what I mean," he says with a grin. "A bloody mess of her own."

  I frown.

  "In her underwear," he continues. "It's probably her time of the month. Eh? That's why she's... Forget it. It was a joke."

  "I thought jokes were supposed to be funny," I mutter.

  He smiles awkwardly, but it's clear that he's got no answer. I've known Duffield long enough to understand that the guy's got his schtick down pat but he can't defend himself. Deep down, even the biggest assholes know that they're assholes, and I wouldn't mind betting that Duffield has moments of pure self-hatred. After all, no-one could be so dumb that they actually believe this kind of crap. Sometimes, I feel as if Duffield's shallowness is the deepest part of his personality.

  "Just trying to lighten the mood with a little humor," he grunts, before glancing over at the door. "I think she's here."

  Turning, I see a tall, dark-haired woman coming up the stairs, lugging a large and heavy-looking bag of equipment over her shoulder. I'm immediately struck by the intensity of her gaze, and it's clear that her eyes are darting quickly around the room, almost as if she's making a quick assessment of the scene. Maybe I'm just a little caught out by her beauty, but I could swear that she's got the most intelligent expression I've ever seen on a woman. Even though she's visibly struggling with the weight of her equipment, she seems to have a sense of almost frightening resolve.

  "Not bad," Duffield says quietly, as if he's talking to himself. "Not bad at all."

  "What's her name?" I ask as I watch the medic
al examiner finally drop the bag onto the floor with such force that she kicks up a cloud of dust. She immediately kneels and starts opening the zip.

  "Dr. Abigail Hart," Duffield replies, with a grin on his face. "I'm not into gossip, but from what I've heard, she's a little bit..." He pauses. "Well... apparently she's a little bit weird."

  Abby Hart

  I hate vampires. I hate them with a passion. My father had it easy. For years and years, he was the last vampire in the world. He didn't have to deal with the possibility of one hiding around every corner or lurking in every shadow; he didn't have to walk down busy streets and suddenly pick up the faint, distant odor of a member of our species, and he didn't have to live in constant fear of being attacked while he slept. I know he had his own problems, but still, he definitely had it easy when it came to vampires. Life must have been so much simpler. Why the hell did he have to bring them all back into the world?

  "Dr. Abigail Hart?" says a voice nearby as I continue to pull my equipment out of the hold-all.

  Looking up, I see a man staring down at me. For a human, he's not bad looking, although I wouldn't go so far as to say that he's attractive. For a fraction of a second, I feel my primal urges starting to surge through my body, but fortunately I'm well-practiced in keeping my cool. After all, I decided long ago that I'm never, ever going to take a mate. Standing up, I force a polite, believable smile and reach out to shake his hand.

  "I'm Detective Mark Gregory," he says with a faint, polite smile. "You must be Dr. Hart. I hear you're new on the job?"

  "I -" I start to say, but as soon as we shake hands, I realize that I'm picking up a scent from him. It's faint, but it's definitely something to do with a vampire. He's not a vampire, but he's clearly been near a vampire at some point in the past, maybe many years ago.

  "Is something wrong?" he asks.

  "No," I reply, momentarily shaken. "I'm fine."

  "You just looked a little shocked," he replies.

  "I transferred last week from New Mercy Hospital," I reply, trying to avoid eye contact as I lean down and start gathering the equipment I'll need for my preliminary assessment. I wish I could get everyone to leave while I work, but I guess I'll just have to put up with their company for a while. "I trained in forensic medicine," I continue, "but I had to do my internship first. Don't worry, though. I know what I'm doing."

  "Good to hear," he replies. "I'm afraid we've got something big here. Maybe the biggest case I've ever encountered. You're gonna need back-up."

  "We'll see," I say with a smile. "Show me first. Then I'll decide whether I'm going to need back-up"

  "One hundred and ten bodies," he continues as he leads me over to the first collection of corpses. The room is large and dusty, but to my surprise I find that there's no hint of that old familiar vampire stench. I thought the place would stink, yet so far the only smell seems to be coming from the large number of oozing, decomposing human corpses. "Arranged in an eleven by ten grid," Detective Gregory adds, "and chained to the floor using some kind of manacle."

  "Cause of death?" I ask, kneeling by the nearest body.

  "I was hoping you could tell me. There are puncture marks on the necks, and my suspicion is that they've lost a lot of blood."

  After putting on a pair of plastic gloves, I reach down and push the corpse's head to one side. As soon as I see the puncture wounds, I know that they weren't caused by any kind of vampire I've ever encountered before. Then again, there are so many different strains kicking about these days, it's completely possible that this is the work of a new sub-species. Placing a finger on either side of one of the wounds, I pull the skin apart and see that there's a deep, wide hole in the flesh. Damn it, this was definitely caused by a vampire.

  "The bodies are all very pale," Detective Gregory continues. "As far as we can tell, they all have identical injuries. Frankly, we were starting to wonder if maybe we'd got a flock of vampires in the city."

  "These holes were made by a blunt instrument," I reply, shining a torch into the interior of the corpse's neck, figuring I need to tell a few lies in order to distract him from all talk of vampires. "Maybe some kind of industrial stapler. Something heavy and fast, but definitely blunt. A fang-like shape would have made a very different type of hole." Carefully slipping a finger into one of the holes, I push down until I feel bone. "It's very dry," I say after a moment. "More than I would have imagined, even though they've clearly been dead for a while. You were right about the blood loss."

  "Any idea how much blood was removed?" he asks.

  "About ninety-five per cent," I say, surreptitiously sniffing the air. "Up to ninety-nine. Whoever did this, they were thorough. Getting that much blood out while keeping the body intact is kind of a miracle."

  "You can tell that just from looking at the necks?" he says.

  I nod. "There's a lot you can tell just from a quick glance. Sight, smell, sound... They all help build up a picture. Whoever did this to these people, they clearly used industrial equipment to drain the bodies, and they obviously knew what they were doing. Look at the way the corpses are placed. They're just far enough apart to prevent them from reaching each other."

  "I noticed that too," he replies. "I guess the killer didn't want them to make physical contact."

  "It'll take a while to work on all these bodies," I tell him. "I'm fast, but not that fast." Feeling something brush against my shoulder, I turn and find that there's no-one behind me. I'm starting to get a little freaked out by how often this has been happening lately.

  "You'll need to call in some help," Detective Gregory suggests.

  "No," I reply firmly. "I work alone."

  "But if -"

  "I work alone," I say again, getting to my feet. After a moment, I realize I'm still holding the scalpel, which undoubtedly makes me look a little more menacing than I'd intended. "Some people work best in teams," I continue, putting the scalpel down, "and some people work best alone. It's not like there's a wrong or a right approach. It's just..." I pause, trying to think of a way to get this human to understand. Granted, no normal medical examiner could hope to process all these bodies in less than a month, but I know I can get it done in two days, maximum. "I'm new," I continue eventually. "You don't know me yet, but when you do, you'll realize that I can get the job done. If I fuck up, feel free to come down on me like a ton of bricks, but right now, the only help I need is getting them to my lab. Once I've taken photos, can you get some of your men to start loading the bodies up and bringing them to me?"

  "Sure," he replies, clearly a little shocked by my directness. "I'll go and organize it right now. It's good to be working with you, Ms. Hart. I've got a feeling we're going to get along just fine."

  I smile politely, preferring to avoid the bon homie of casual conversation. Humans have this unerring tendency to talk all the time, even when there's no point. They constantly say things they don't mean and things that don't matter and things that are downright false, just so they can fill the silence. Sure, I don't take things to quite the same extremes of silence as my late father, but I prefer not to talk unless there's a reason. Besides, I still don't quite understand some of the subtleties of human conversation, and I've discovered in the past that it's surprisingly easy to say the wrong thing. Humans are very keen to read unexpected meanings into even the most straight-forward of sentences. At least vampires just say what they mean.

  Once Detective Gregory has made his way over to his colleagues, I crouch next to another of the corpses. It's just like the previous one, of course, and I'm certain I'll find that all one hundred and ten are pretty much identical. I can smell the very distinctive odor of all these bodies rotting without blood, and it's abundantly clear that whoever's responsible for this massacre, it's the work of vampires. Still, I've never heard of vampires working on this kind of industrial scale before. The only conclusion I can draw right now is that they needed a lot of blood, not just for personal consumption but for some other purpose, and they needed it in a hu
rry.

  "Watch it doesn't put you off your lunch," says a nearby voice.

  Turning, I see a short, squat police detective grinning at me from a few meters away.

  "I said, watch it doesn't put you off your lunch," he continues, as if I didn't hear him the first time. "All this nastiness. You ever actually seen a murder victim before?"

  "I'm fine," I reply. "Really. I've seen lots of things."

  "Still," he adds with a condescending grin, "you don't want to get your hands too dirty, do you? Might chip a nail."

  Reaching down to the nearest body, I lift the stiff arm up up to my face and, before I really have time to consider whether this is a good idea, I lick the flesh of the victim's dead hand. Seeing the detective's face turn white, I let the arm fall back down.

  "I'm fine," I continue, "but thanks for your concern."

  As the detective shuffles away, looking distinctly troubled by my little display, I grab a tissue and wipe the corpse's hand. Turning and walking past some more of the bodies, I eventually reach the center of the huge room and stop to look around. There are so many dead bodies, it almost defies belief, but I can't deny what's right in front of my eyes. Someone killed these people slowly, over a long period of time, and the motive was almost certainly a desire to gain as much blood from them as possible. For the victims, the nightmare is over, but the blood collector is still out there somewhere, and something tells me he or she is going to need more blood soon. I always suspected that vampires would eventually start causing major trouble in this city. I guess that day has finally arrived.

  Mark Gregory