By Cheezey
Part Five
Defiance
After she left the Tower of Omens Pumyra eventually found herself alone on the moonlit shores of the River of Despair. She had intended to go to Cat’s Lair, but with the Thunderstrike and HoverCat both destroyed by the Lunatacs, she would have needed a ride and although she had a communicator in the pouch on her belt that she could use to ask for one, it was turned off. Besides, the truth of it was that she did not want to see any of the others at the moment. She wanted some time alone to sort out and make sense of what had happened with Bengali before she talked to any of them.
She closed her eyes as fresh tears threatened to come again while the events of earlier replayed in her mind far more strongly than the brutal attack they had suffered at the hands of the Lunatacs, vampires, and Mumm-Ra.
Bengali…
Pumyra’s mind filled with the terrible image of his face in twisted into vampire rage and his voice demanding harshly that she leave. Telling her that he would kill her and that he could kill her, and that she was a fool for trusting him, saying that he couldn’t trust himself around her because of what he was. The puma could hardly believe that he was the same tiger she had known since she was a girl and loved almost as long.
“Why are you acting this way, Bengali?” she said out loud. “Why don’t you have any faith in our love anymore?”
Her only answer was the rushing water of the River of Despair; a place at that moment she felt was quite aptly named.
The puma picked up one of the smooth pebbles along the riverside and turned it over thoughtfully in her hands. “It just isn’t fair,” she whispered sadly. “There has to be a way to fix this, to make it right. There just has to.” She studied the rock silently for several more moments and then threw it forcefully into the river, where it disappeared forever with a light splash into the heart of the current.
As she turned around from the throw she gasped in fright when she saw a shadowy figure standing directly behind her that had not been there moments ago. In the moonlight she recognized the pale human face and short blond hair instantly. “LaCroix!”
The ancient vampire smiled pleasantly. “Hello, Pumyra.”
The Thundercat tensed into a defensive stance and reached for her belt instinctively.
“You have no need for that right now,” LaCroix stated calmly. “I am not here to attack you.”
The puma’s eyes narrowed in disbelief. “Right, as if I have any reason to believe that,” she said in a light growl.
“If I had intended to take you, you would have been caught and dead before you had the chance to draw breath to ask for help, alone out here as you are,” the vampire informed her.
“That wasn’t your attitude tonight at the Tower of Omens.” She took a step back, holding her lariat tightly. Her pulse quickening with adrenaline, she fished two marbles out of her pouch with her fingers.
LaCroix let out an amused chuckle. “Oh, that. Yes, I admit I was tempted to take you earlier this evening, but I’ve since eaten, and those warrior maidens are rather hearty and filling.”
“You’re a monster,” she whispered in disgust.
“Do you call me that because I tried to kill you?” the vampire questioned with a raised eyebrow, taking a step closer to her.
“No,” Pumyra replied with a scowl, backing up slightly, his closeness and calmness unnerving to her.
LaCroix’s ice cold and deceptively human eyes stared at her unwaveringly. “You fear me.” The slightest hint of a smile tugged at his lips as he said the words.
Pumyra swallowed, forcing herself to put up a brave front but feeling more like an insect trapped within a spider’s web under the vampire’s intense gaze. “Yes,” she stated honestly, “but I will still fight you if you attack me. You won’t take me without a struggle.”
The ancient vampire’s smile widened, but not in a cruel manner, rather in a way that indicated that he found her words endearing or cute, like those of a young child attempting to be tough when faced with something terrifying. “Very brave and noble of you. I can see why both Nicholas and the night-cat would enjoy your company,” he said, a sincere note within his condescension. “But as I told you, I don’t plan to kill you. So why don’t you answer my question?”
“What question?” Pumyra said, taking another step back.
Without missing a beat, LaCroix advanced toward her another step, but only that far. “Why it is that you would call me a monster?”
“That should be obvious. Your attacks on our people—tonight, the first night Nick was with us, all the warrior maidens and Tabbots and Wollos and everyone else you’ve killed, and worst of all, what you did to Bengali!” the Thundercat answered heatedly, wondering what it was that LaCroix wanted if not to kill her or feed on her. To gloat? To mess with her mind?
“Ah, Bengali,” he said dramatically. “Your night-cat is very troubled, isn’t he?”
“Because of you,” Pumyra snapped angrily, a surprising amount of venom in her tone. “Because you tried to kill him and made it so Nick had to change him into what he is or let him die! And then you twisted his mind.”
LaCroix frowned. “Such accusations. I assure you that I twisted no one’s mind, child, I find those games tedious more often than not. I merely enlightened him to the truth of his nature, one that Nicholas seeks to repress. One that would put his fellow Thundercats in danger—ones he cares for, like you.” His eyes bored into her once more.
Pumyra straightened, relaxing slightly as it did not appear an attack from him was imminent, but she still eyed him warily and wished he would stop staring at her. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, but I do,” LaCroix corrected her. “You say quite a lot when you talk to yourself out here, such as how you don’t understand why it is that your lover can push you away when you so obviously love him and trust him. Is that how you sort your thoughts and clear your mind? Talking about them to the empty air, not really knowing who might be listening?” He smiled. “That might be one thing you and I have in common.”
The puma scowled indignantly. “We have nothing in common.”
“Don’t we?” the vampire pressed, raising an eyebrow. “Believe it or not, Pumyra, I understand quite well how it feels to have one you love and cherish push you away without regard for your feelings, for your love for them, when all you want is for them to stay with you.” LaCroix took another step closer and stared hard into her soft brown eyes. “Doesn’t that about sum it up?”
That time Pumyra did not back up again. “Bengali only does that because he can’t control what he’s become—something you forced him to become. Because he’s afraid he’ll hurt me.”
LaCroix glanced over at the rushing waters of the River of Despair for a moment, the full moonlight glinting like silver upon the small waves within the current. “Earlier you spoke into the darkness saying that there had to be an answer to your heartbreak. What if I were to tell you there was? A way that you could overcome his temptations and be with him, free of the risk of harm and the frustration of guilt?” He turned back toward her as he awaited her response.
She frowned slightly, but her tone was as curious as it was guarded. “How?”
A slow and deliberate smile spread across the vampire’s features. “Simple. I can make you immortal, one just like him. Think of it—who better to understand the needs of a vampire than another, and as a bonus you will have an eternity to spend with your lover—young and free, never to be parted if you so desire.” He paused for a moment to allow her to process the information. “I can give you that gift, Pumyra. All you need to do is say yes.”
“I—I can’t. No,” she said, shaking her head. “It would be wrong.”
“Wrong to be with the one you love for all time?” LaCroix pressed. “Or would it be more wrong to love him for the few years you have together and leave him to a long and immortal life without you once you age and die, breaking his heart—assuming he goes against the advice that I and most likely even Nicholas have given him to let you go so that you both might be spared that pain?”
Pumyra blinked as the vampire touched upon an issue she had wondered about but had never the courage to give a voice to. “Nick would not tell him to leave me. Nick is my friend, all of our friend.”
LaCroix nodded. “On that matter I entirely agree. Although I can’t say I understand it, it is quite evident that Nicholas cares for you and your people—which is why I would expect he has advised your night-cat to set you free. You see Nicholas, like I and like any vampire who has loved a mortal at one time or another, knows the pain and heartbreak that path leads to. It is one best not traveled for our kind.”
“And that’s just that?” Pumyra said, shaking her head incredulously. “I can’t believe that. I won’t.”
“You must, and you will eventually whether or not you accept it now, because it is the truth,” LaCroix asserted, reaching out to touch her on the cheek as if to drive the thought home. “But like I said, there is a way around that. You would hardly be the first to be brought across to be with a vampire lover, and I doubt you will be the last.”
Pumyra wrenched away, suddenly very uncomfortable—both with how easily he had gotten so close to her with her guard down and with how easily she listened to his words. “I never said that I wanted to be brought across,” she stated flatly, stiffening as she met his gaze. “And if I did, I would not take it from you, not when I have Bengali or Nick to do it for me. I would never trust you.”
“You would have no reason to,” LaCroix admitted. “Other than my given word that I would bring you across if you surrendered yourself to me willingly, of course.”
“The word of one who allies himself with the Ever-Living Source of Evil means very little to me,” the Thundercat replied.
LaCroix shrugged slightly. “That is your decision then, my dear. By all means, should you decide to take the path I have shown you as a means to be with your beloved, ask your night-cat or Nicholas for it first. Should they refuse, you know where you can find me.”
Pumyra frowned and glanced away at the river for a moment, her mind reeling with the implications of what the ancient vampire had said. When she looked back toward him to reply, he was already gone. She stood there alone on the riverbank for several long moments, and then started to walk, her thoughts filled with things that she should not have been thinking about at all for the remainder of the night.
* * *
Well into the following day and only a short while before it would turn into night, Alluro awoke from his sleep, still wrapped in the velvet bedding where he had fallen asleep after being taken the night before. He rolled over and glanced around the dark room, now lit only by two candles held in sconces high upon the stone walls at opposite ends of the room. It struck him that his vision was clear—remarkably clear—for the low light in the shadowy room. Not only was it not nearly as dark as it should have been, but the clarity and detail of everything from the natural patterns of the stone on the wall behind him to the play of the candlelit shadows upon the sheet beneath him was absolutely amazing.
It was not only his vision that had improved with his transformation, however. Alluro noticed the background scents of the tower—old and musty stone and metal mostly—as well as the more subtle fragrances of the forest outside, mixing and mingling but somehow still remaining distinct. Upon the sheets of the bed upon which he had slept he became aware of the hint of himself, his mortal scent at any rate, and the distinct aura—not even a scent so much as an intangible sensation—of Janette nearby.
He sat up and looked around for her but found the room empty. He did see the oaken door that led to the other rooms upon the top floor of the tower open, the only open thing in the suite as the doors that led to the balcony were tightly closed as were the heavy shutters upon the arched stone window near the ceiling. “By the Moons, it’s really happened,” he murmured, taking in the scenery of the closed room in an almost childlike awe.
Wondering where it was that his new vampiric mistress had gone, Alluro pushed the bedding aside and stood on the floor, finding his discarded pants at his feet. A smug smile crossed his lips as he slipped them on and the details of the night before replayed briefly in his mind. It occurred to him that he wished he could have experienced all of that with his newly improved senses—his new immortal vampire senses—but he supposed that now he had all the time he wanted to enjoy such things.
As he stood up, a wave of intense hunger and thirst unlike anything he had ever experienced before surged within him, as if every cell in his body cried out at once for nourishment. He winced at the sharp sensation of the pang and it was then that he caught the distinct scent of blood—exactly what it was that he craved. The newly changed vampire Lunatac whirled around in the direction of the aroma and saw a large silver goblet, engraved with an intricate design by a highly skilled Wollo artisan back in the time of its former owner Baron Karnor, sitting upon a polished wooden table a few feet from the bed. Alluro found himself beside the goblet almost instantly, so quickly that if he had been asked he would have said he did not remember even walking.
When he picked it up and inhaled the scent of the blood contained within it, the craving he had felt a moment ago intensified a thousand fold. His luminous psi eyes reverted to a glowing vampiric state and as he opened his mouth slightly he could feel unnatural fangs descend, fangs for feeding, which every fiber of his being demanded that he do, and quickly. Without even thinking twice about the distasteful nature of what it was that he was about to do, the hungry Lunatac vampire brought the goblet to his lips and drank the contents of it quickly until it was completely emptied, leaving only a light trace of the red liquid against the metal wall of the cup as evidence that it had been there at all. As it flowed into his system the rich vital fluid soothed and sated the raging hunger and thirst inside him.
Alluro stood there for a moment, getting used to the unfamiliar sensations that had come with his new state of being. The blood left his body feeling flooded with a strange and comforting warmth not unlike the one a mortal would feel after taking a shot or two of alcohol into the system, but infinitely more filling and satisfying, and with a delicate flavor that was as enjoyable as any fine food would have been.
He glanced down into the empty goblet and found himself longing for more. He was still hungry, although there had been enough blood in what Janette had presumably left for him to calm his appetite so that it was no longer raging. Curious as to how easily he could get more food, he set the cup down and moved—not walked, exactly, but flew not unlike he had seen Janette and the other vampires do—to the other side of the room at the double doors leading to the balcony.
“You’re up,” Janette’s soft voice remarked from the opposite end of the suite.
Alluro smiled back at the vampiress, now his mistress as the one who had brought him across. “Yes,” he replied. “I had wondered where you went.”
“I was passing the time sorting through some of the former Baron’s treasures in the room down the hall. There are so many, two separate rooms within the living space dedicated to them as well as the main room that controls the traps, the one I think was originally his throne room. Did you know that Karnor himself still sits in there? He has certainly seen better days,” she said, wrinkling her nose slightly in distaste. “But far be it from me to disrespect the chosen tomb of the one who has so kindly left his home here for my use by removing him from it.”
“I take it that’s where you found the goblet?” Alluro asked.
Janette nodded. “Yes, with a little polishing it was quite nice, and the metal keeps the blood nice and cool.” A sly smile played upon her lips. “Did you enjoy it?”
The Lunatac vampire returned her smile and nodded a slow affirmative. “I did, far more than I had expected that I would when I was still mortal.”
“It was from a Balkan, I think they are called,” Janette told him. “Woolly sheep people? Their flavor is good, although there is better.”
Alluro frowned playfully. “For my first meal I didn’t rate the best?”
The vampiress laughed and joined his side. “And risk spoiling your appetite for hunting something even tastier tonight? What would be the fun in that?”
“If that was as good as it was, what is better, then?” he asked curiously.
“Warrior maidens are better. Call me a slave to classic tastes, but there is little better than fresh human blood, hot from the kill,” Janette said, taking hold of his arm and looking up at the vampiric psi. “I think one with as fine taste as you seem to have will enjoy them far better—especially as your first kill tonight.”
Alluro smiled contentedly, pleased with that answer. “I look forward to it, then. Maybe we should leave soon?” he asked, circling his purple fingers around the door handle.
“Wait—”
Janette barely had the time to draw breath to stop him when Alluro lifted upon the latch to open the doors and opened them, spilling a ray of late afternoon sunlight into the room. The burning flash of light was a thousand times more intense than Alluro had ever imagined it would be, and he recoiled from its presence instinctively like one would from an unexpectedly hot pot upon a flame, squinting his eyes shut and backing against the wall. Janette, experienced enough to be able to tolerate the sunlight somewhat for a second or two, also thrust her head to the side to shield her eyes from the painful light as she slammed the door shut. “As I was going to say,” she continued, “waiting a few hours for that will be necessary.”
Relieved to be enclosed in the darkness again, Alluro opened his eyes and glared at the door. “I knew the sun was bad, but I had no idea…”
“I have not exaggerated the extent to which it burns our kind. When I said it had to be avoided entirely, this is why,” the elder vampiress explained.
Alluro nodded. “So I see.”
Janette walked over to the bed and sat down upon the edge of it. “So since we have some time to kill, as it were, tell me how it feels to be a vampire—perhaps the first of your kind ever to come across. How do you feel in your new skin?”
“Until a moment ago I would have said powerful and invincible, but the sun is rather humbling. I’m hoping the moonlight will have the opposite effect,” he said, joining her at the side of the bed and leaning against one of the wrought-iron posts.
“It will,” Janette assured him. “And that feeling will never leave you. You will feel like this—strong, lethal, and free of the rules and constraints of mortality—forever, so long as you avoid the daylight and feed your hunger as it demands.”
“Speaking of feeding, I am curious about one thing you said earlier,” Alluro said, leaning forward toward her. She eyed him curiously, and he continued. “You said that there was little better than a warrior maiden for blood.”
Janette gave him a nod. “Human blood is exquisite.”
Alluro raised an eyebrow. “But you said that there was something better?”
“Yes,” she told him, “there is something better than hunted human blood, blood that could be called the rare gourmet meal of the vampire world, something that is a luxury for each of us when we have the chance to enjoy it.”
“May I ask what that is?”
The vampiress smiled smugly and reached up to stroke the side of her fledgling Lunatac vampire’s neck, her fingertip pausing at the now mostly healed puncture wounds upon his neck as she gave him her answer. “Willing blood.”
* * *
At the heart of the Black Pyramid and shielded within the confines of his sarcophagus Mumm-Ra’s scarlet eyes blazed to life in the confining darkness. He did not yet leave his place of rest, however, choosing instead to use the privacy of his tomb to think, a sanctuary that would not be invaded by an outsider or even by his guest. Or especially by him—for the main issue that weighed upon Mumm-Ra’s thoughts was his guest, the vampire LaCroix.
The immortal mage was finding the ancient vampire tedious in greater degrees with each night that passed. Although LaCroix had fought with him and assisted him as he had agreed to, and he had not attacked any mortals he had specifically asked him not to, Mumm-Ra could hardly say he was pleased with the vampire’s performance thus far. As a result he was growing tired of him and their alliance.
His reasons for considering a termination of their partnership were piling up. For one, LaCroix was arrogant—insufferably so. From the first time the mummy had laid his undead eyes upon the vampire he had disliked him. That in and of itself was not uncommon with his associates, however, for those that served the purposes of the Ancient Spirits of Evil were rarely pleasant company and those that were more often than not were merely putting up a friendly façade to further their own agendas. Mumm-Ra rarely liked any of the souls he allied with in his business and he was accustomed to that. Having to deal with rudeness or insolence was annoying, but they were minor irritants dealt with easily enough.
LaCroix, however, was becoming more difficult to ignore especially in light of the string of failures and setbacks that had beset their alliance thus far. Despite the vampire’s self-assured boasting, LaCroix had yet to deliver any of the Thundercats into the hands of death. Even worse, the one whom he had nearly eliminated backfired, and LaCroix’s attack upon the tiger had instead set the circumstance up to make the feline an immortal, another vampire, one that fought against them. The two vampires that served the Thundercats—the night-cat Thundercat Bengali and LaCroix’s errant vampire son Nick—were interfering intolerably with his plans and they had made it that much harder for Mumm-Ra to gain any sort of advantage over the Thundercats, much less eliminate them.
Then there was the most recent failure, the prior night’s strike on the Tower of Omens, to consider. Mumm-Ra had hoped that by deliberately attacking when the Lunatacs were also striking that the felines would be overwhelmed, but things had certainly not gone as well as the mage had hoped. Yes, the Tower of Omens and its vehicles had been effectively destroyed and put out of commission, but for how long? Before the blink of an eye would pass in his long and immortal life, the Berbils would likely have it rebuilt for them. No felines were dead, and that Mumm-Ra considered a failure, a large one. It seemed to him that for LaCroix’s body count across the villages of Third Earth, he would have expected that by then there would have been a higher one—or even one at all—among his enemies as well.
Instead all there was to show for the newly arisen vampires’ actions were new vampires. That was the other development that had Mumm-Ra slumbering in a foul mood. His last look in the cauldron during the early daylight hours had shown that in addition to Nick bringing across Bengali, now LaCroix’s vampire daughter Janette had decided to create a fledgling as well, in that insolent Lunatac Alluro of all souls. The Lunar-Plundarrian hypnotist was arguably the second most arrogant individual that Mumm-Ra had ever had the displeasure of dealing with—leaving the dubious honor of first place to LaCroix—and the mummy did not relish the idea of any Lunatac being around to irritate him for all of eternity.
If I had my choice I would be done with the lot of
vampires and start anew with a fresh plan, Mumm-Ra mused silently into the
darkness. But I will honor the wishes
of the Ancient Ones a short while longer and keep this alliance, lest I risk
offending them… and should our plans backfire further at the hands and fangs of
those accursed nosferatu, then they can hold no one accountable for that
failure but themselves.
Satisfied with that thought, the devil priest drifted back into a state of rest.
As the last rays of sunset slipped past the horizon, leaving the forest around Baron Karnor’s tower dark and hazy with impending nightfall, Janette opened the oaken doors to the suite in which she and Alluro sheltered themselves from the daylight and allowed the fresh evening breeze to permeate the room.
Alluro joined her on the balcony, peering carefully at the last rays of sunlight, distant and now pink and purple with the inky sky above them. The light was bright but not agonizingly so, and he was comfortable enough to assume that low level of natural light was something a vampire could tolerate. As he glanced over the stone wall enclosing the walk at the top of the tower, he saw the distant glowing spots of the firelight belonging to the warrior maiden scout encampments within the trees in the distance. He remembered that he had not been able to see that far or clearly as a mortal, and it pleased him to see that his vision for distance had improved as well as sharpness and detail of his close-range sight.
“I can see them… well, their lights at any rate,” he remarked to the other vampire. “Is that how you find your prey so quickly?”
“Yes, by seeing the fires and catching the scent in the air,” Janette told him, and then watched him closely. “Can you smell it? Faint and subtle on the evening breeze?”
The recently transformed vampire psi closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. He remained silent for a moment and then spoke. “I can smell many things—the trees, flowers, and animals.” He made a slight face. “When I go back to Skytomb, remind me to stay out of TugMug’s room with these heightened senses.”
“I would imagine that is brutal even for a mortal,” the vampiress replied wryly before growing serious again. “But focus on the animal scent. Can you differentiate between them, or perhaps sense the distinct human element within it? Since that is what we hunt tonight?”
Alluro took in a heavy breath of the air again, but shook his head. “Not this far away, at least not yet.”
“Then we will get closer,” Janette decided. “Follow me.” She flew off the balcony and into the darkened forest below, in the direction of the Tree Top Kingdom. The fledgling Lunatac vampire quickly followed.
With vampire flight the two made incredible time reaching their destination, the forest floor a short distance from one of the Tree Top Kingdom’s numerous scouting posts. Alluro had found the experience of flying incredible, and he was surprised at how naturally it came to him. He had spent some time learning the basics of it within the confines of the suite back in the Tower, putting the few hours he had between waking and sunset to productive use. Doing it outdoors, however, was a whole new experience and one he found rather exhilarating, not to mention efficient. He realized that for a vampire, walking was for the most part a social and casual activity, rather than a necessary means to get around.
When the pair of vampires landed, Janette looked toward her fledgling expectantly. “Surely you can smell them now? They are very close.”
“I could shortly before we landed,” Alluro confirmed with a nod. “And right now I could swear I almost smell her blood.” As he finished his sentence, a stab of hunger went through his system.
“You can,” Janette assured him. “I would guess that you could almost taste it.”
Alluro’s gaze drifted upward toward the tree that held the lone warrior maiden scout. Indulging in the close scent of the prey as hungry as he was and as new as he was to his vampire state, his body reverted quickly into its darker nature and his green eyes glowed with unsatisfied thirst. “Yes,” he asserted, his suave voice holding a more dangerous undertone to match his appearance.
Janette gave her fledgling an encouraging and predatory smile. “Then take her.”
His only answer was to let out an almost feral growl of bloodlust and vanish with a flash in the direction of the trees. Eager to see how her Lunatac protégé would handle his first kill, Janette followed. She landed on a high tree branch just to the side of the platform where Alluro found his victim—a redheaded warrior maiden scout—and watched.
Although all of the warrior maidens were on high alert for vampire attacks after having lost several of their people to feed the bloodthirstiness of LaCroix and Janette as of late that particular scout was confident—overconfident perhaps—in her fighting skills and did not wear a necklace of garlic as many of them now did. That particular woman, called Aurora and one of the highest ranked warriors in Queen Willa’s settlement, found the preventative measure cumbersome and hung her garlic wreath upon the edge of the platform, figuring that she would grab it to wear only if engaged in combat with a vampire. Her error in judgment would prove fatal.
When she sensed someone beside her, Aurora turned around and gasped, and then lifted her bow scowling at the sight of the hated Lunatac next to her. Although vampires were the primary threat to their people as of late, the Lunatacs as well as the Mutants were still hated for their past aggression toward them, and there were standing orders from Queen Willa to kill them on sight if they invaded. “Lunatacs,” Aurora said contemptuously, reaching for an arrow within her quiver.
The vampire Alluro had her in his deadly grasp before she could even draw the arrow from her pack. “Not your average Lunatac,” he corrected her with a decidedly wicked chuckle, his voice still managing to hold its suave tone despite his deadly intent. The hungry psi vampire pushed the struggling warrior woman’s head to the side, exposing the soft flesh of her neck. Flesh that called to his blood-thirst, and pulsed with the inviting rush of vital fluid beneath.
Take her and taste her, Janette’s seductive voice urged within his head, although he hardly needed any urging. Savor her. Experience her.
Alluro leaned his head back for a moment, his fangs now descended fully, and then thrust his head forward, sinking his descended vampire fangs deeply into the unlucky warrior maiden’s neck. Aurora cried out in pain while Alluro felt the rewarding rush of her hot blood enter his mouth, flooding his senses with a pleasure that could almost be described as orgasmic as he drank it. Much to his delight and amazement he tasted not only the sweet flavor of the woman’s blood itself but also the indescribable essence of her emotions, her fear, her dizziness, and her—was it excitement?—mingled in with memory flashes of others in her tribe that she knew or thought about and had shared experiences with. The sensations were incredible, almost overwhelming to the new vampire Lunatac. He craved more, but much to his disappointment soon there was no more to be had and the flow of her blood slowed to a trickle, his victim nearly dry. Aurora’s struggles ceased within Alluro’s arms as death drew nearer to claim her.
Janette was at her fledgling’s side by the time he finished his kill, smiling at him satisfactorily. “Now do you understand why I didn’t want to spoil your appetite for this?” she asked sweetly, eyeing the human’s limp and drained form.
“Oh yes,” Alluro answered, an extraordinarily pleased smile upon his features. He set the fallen warrior maiden down against the base of the tree. “She tasted wonderful.”
Nodding in approval of the younger vampire’s clearly fine taste, Janette then knelt by the warrior maiden’s body and touched it to ensure that she was dead. “I see you took enough to kill her—that is good. If you do not intend to bring them across, it is best that you kill them. Although it is rare without the transfusion of our blood to make it happen, sometimes they can come across anyway, and they are generally quite bitter when that happens. Besides, nothing is more annoying or threatening to the existence of our kind than ill-selected fledglings. Although this world is wild, there are still consequences to careless killings, and even mortals can be dangerous to us in numbers, especially when driven by fear.”
“I understand,” Alluro said with a nod. “I will make sure they are dead when I take them.”
“Aurora?” a female voice called out in the darkness to the side. Both vampires turned around in surprise, but before they could leave a blond warrior maiden called Eliza landed on the platform, swinging over from a vine. At the angle from which she had approached, she had not been able to see the two vampires standing there through the tree trunk, and they in turn had not noticed her due to their momentary preoccupation with their conversation. “I thought I heard something—” the maiden stated as she let go of the vine, and then she screamed in horror and outrage when she saw the body—and the guilty vampires above it.
“Monsters! What have you done to her?” she demanded, drawing her weapon.
Both Alluro and Janette noticed immediately that unlike her friend, that warrior maiden wore a necklace of garlic, and both grimaced at the scent, although it bothered Alluro far more due to his young vampiric age. “We did what we will to you if you do not leave,” Alluro said, his eyes glowing with threat. “And we may just do it anyway.”
Janette was not as willing to get involved with a brawl with the warrior maidens on Alluro’s first night as an immortal. Although she was confident they could dispense with her easily enough, it would rile the human women up considerably if they fought with one and she had time to call for help. She decided the best way to go about their business was to get her to leave and forget about the dead woman on the platform so that she would be discovered after they were long gone. “Forget what you have seen here,” Janette stated concisely, her eyes fixed upon the mortal woman. “You will leave and forget that you ever came here to see your friend.”
Eliza blinked, but the sight of Aurora dead in front of her was too much for Janette’s will to overpower, especially as the woman was a natural resistor to such influences, as some humans were. “Never,” she hissed venomously, and fired an arrow at them. “You bloodthirsty demon creatures are an abomination! You will pay for this. We are not here to be your prey!”
Janette easily caught the arrow in her hands. “Your puny human weapons are useless against us,” she hissed, “except as an annoyance!”
The warrior maiden drew something else from her belt, a crudely fashioned wooden cross, which she held out as a talisman against them. Both vampires felt a force repelling them, much like two magnets of the same polarity being forced together. “Legend says this symbol will keep you away,” Eliza said hatefully, “and I will use it and anything else to see you all destroyed so that you can never harm us again.”
Why did she not fall under your power, Janette? I heard the hypnotic lilt in your voice, Alluro questioned telepathically, eyeing the strange artifact that kept him away warily. And what is that thing?
It is a cross, they were used against us on First Earth, and she is apparently a resistor to mesmerism, the vampiress’ voice echoed back in his mind. We will have to deal with her the hard way.
Not necessarily. Let me try, Alluro replied, and stepped forward. Although he had no psyche club as he had not yet repaired it, he did have the backup enhancement of his eye medallion to call upon, and he used it as he spoke hypnotically to the enraged warrior maiden. “You will forget,” he said forcefully, drawing fully on both his natural hypnotic abilities and the ones granted by his vampire spirit. “You do not stand a chance. You are a mere mortal, and we are vampires. You do not want to fight us, and you are afraid of us. You will drop your talisman and if you wish to survive you will leave and forget we were ever here. You will leave and forget,” he finished, emphasizing the last sentence. As he spoke he could feel the extent to which the vampiric spirit amplified his powers and it thrilled and excited him.
Alluro’s magnified hypnotic hold was enough to overcome Eliza’s natural resistance to suggestion, and the cross slipped from her fingers and fell through the planks of the treetop platform to the ground below. A glazed look filled her brown human eyes, and she mumbled helplessly in the glow of the beam. “I will leave and forget…”
I am impressed. Very impressed, Janette told Alluro in mind speech. Remind me to send all of our resistors to you.
Just as the hypnotized warrior maiden turned to climb down from the platform and return to the ground, a flash blacker than the darkest night pounced on her and bit her neck roughly, interrupting Alluro’s thrall prematurely.
“LaCroix!” Janette exclaimed, recognizing the other vampire instantly.
He drank heartily of the woman’s blood and then discarded her to the side. “You looked like you needed some assistance,” the elder vampire said, wiping the unseemly traces of blood from his mouth as he straightened to face the pair.
Alluro narrowed his eyes irritably at the other vampire. “We had it under control. Resistors are nothing to one of my power.”
LaCroix smiled amusedly, and glanced from Janette to Alluro and back again to Janette. “Why Janette, you did not tell me you brought an addition into our little family… and one so confident in his abilities at such a young age at that. That must be a common thing in fledglings these days.”
A glare crossed Alluro’s psi features when he heard the condescending tone in LaCroix’s voice while Janette smiled cordially at her old friend and vampire father. “Thank you anyway for trying to help,” she told him sincerely, and then looked to Alluro. “He is confident, but his confidence is well founded. He had the warrior maiden in his hold despite her being a resistor. Lunatacs such as he have influential powers naturally.”
“And the vampire magnified them,” LaCroix guessed. “Interesting indeed. It would seem that these non-human vampires are affected in unforeseen ways by the vampire spirit—making new rules as they go along as it were.” The ancient vampire eyed Alluro curiously. “So what made you choose this one, Janette?”
“I asked,” Alluro informed LaCroix, his ego feeling more than a little slighted at the way LaCroix spoke of him as if he was some child barely worthy of notice.
LaCroix nodded. “I see. Well in that case, let me welcome you to our little entourage. I do hope that you will not disappoint my dear daughter.”
Janette smiled confidently. “I have no worries of that.”
“In that case, I will leave you two to your hunting. Enjoy,” he told the two younger vampires, and vanished into the night.
“Part of your family am I now?” Alluro asked Janette once LaCroix was gone. “I’m not sure how I feel about being related to Nick.”
The female vampire let out a wry laugh. “Don’t trouble yourself with it. I don’t understand how I feel about being so closely tied to Nicola after eight hundred years of it before the end of First Earth.” She grew serious again and then looked around. “Regardless, this is not the place to discuss this any further. We should leave and continue our hunting before any more of the warrior women happen by and see us. The less they see and learn about us, the better.”
“All right,” Alluro agreed, and flashed Janette a charming smile. “Lead on, my mistress.”
* * *
After spending the remainder of her night sleepless and much of the following day restless, Pumyra returned to the Tower of Omens to visit Bengali. She knew he was still there, as were Lynx-O, Panthro, and Snarfer, who had gone over earlier to start the tedious chore of repairing the damage. She intended to take Bengali aside and talk to him about the decision she had finally come to after much internal debate—she was going to ask him to bring her across.
It was not a decision she had come to easily or lightly, and on some level it disturbed her that it had been LaCroix of all individuals to be the one to enlighten her to the possibility. Admittedly the vampire lifestyle did not hold any special lure or appeal for the puma Thundercat. She had always enjoyed the sunlight, and as a healer she had always been one to try and minimize bloodshed as opposed to adding to it. She had also hoped one day to establish a family and have cubs with the cat she loved—but that cat was Bengali. After some soul searching she realized that she could more easily give up the dream altogether than imagine living it with someone else that was not her cherished tiger, her soul mate. If transforming her mortal body into that of a vampire was the only way to preserve the unique love they shared, then so be it. She would go across with no regret and be with him for the remainder of her days.
When she entered the Tower of Omens she found the other Thundercats scattered and hard at work. Panthro had the remains of the Braille board on a bench, taken apart to see what components in it could be salvaged and which ones were junk that would need to be replaced entirely. Snarfer and Lynx-O were on the other side of the room repairing the view screen. When she asked them about Bengali’s whereabouts, they directed her to the hangar, where the vampire tiger was tinkering with what remained of the main section of the Thunderstrike.
“Hello, Bengali,” she greeted him as she approached.
Bengali looked up when he heard Pumyra’s voice. He smiled, genuinely glad to see her, but both it and his eyes shone with sadness. “Pumyra… I didn’t expect to see you this soon after last night. I figured you were angry with me.” He wiped his fur clean of the grime and lubricant of the vehicle’s inside and leaned against the side of the demolished Thunderstrike. “Not that you don’t have the right to be. I’m sorry I was so—”
“It’s all right,” the puma cut him off, approaching him but respecting his wish to not get too close lest she rouse his hunger. “But I want to talk to you. Both about what happened and the things I’ve been thinking about as a result.”
“I said everything I had to last night, although I should have said it better,” the tiger said with a sigh, fully expecting her to say words that he had been alternately hoping for and dreading—that she was going to end their relationship. He hated the thought of losing her and what they shared, but he hated the thought of what could happen to her if she stayed with him more. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”
She smiled at him gently. “I know that, and I know you said and did the things you did because you thought you had to.”
“I’m glad you understand,” Bengali replied, not taking his eyes off of her. “I love you, Pumyra,” he added quietly, the emotion echoing his sentiment clear in his voice. “And I understand that you have to do what you have to do, too. I’m just sorry it had to be that way,” he finished with a sigh.
Pumyra blinked. “What do you mean, Ben?” she asked, genuinely puzzled. “You don’t think I’m leaving you? Telling you goodbye?”
Now it was Bengali’s turn to be surprised, although it was not exactly an unwelcome surprise for him. As much as he rationally thought it was for the best, his heart ached at the thought of losing the puma he cared so deeply for. “You mean you aren’t?”
“Never!” she exclaimed. LaCroix’s remarks from the night before about how Bengali had been advised to end things with her resurfaced in her mind, and it doubled her resolve to prove the evil and smug vampire wrong. “I would never leave you, Ben, not unless you told me to go.”
The tiger folded the rag he had used to clean his hands absently, and then tossed it onto the top of one of the Thunderstrike’s destroyed pods and approached Pumyra. “What was on your mind then? You said you were thinking about us.”
Pumyra nodded seriously. “I have. I took a walk last night and—and a way that we could be together occurred to me,” she said, leaving out the part that it was LaCroix who had suggested it.
“How?” Bengali asked. “There isn’t a way to change what I am.”
“But there is a way to change me,” Pumyra replied, eyeing him closely for his reaction. “You can take me and then bring me across. Then I could be as durable and eternal as you, and you wouldn’t have to worry about harming me.”
Bengali’s mouth fell open, aghast in utter shock. “You want me to destroy you?”
“It’s not destruction,” Pumyra protested. “I’d be immortal—and with you.”
“Hasn’t anything Nick said, and the things it’s done to me, shown you that this is more of a curse than a gift?” Bengali argued. “I wish I could go back to how I was, and what you are. There is no way I could take that from you and make you live like this too.”
The puma frowned, not expecting and feeling somewhat stung by the heavy resistance to her suggestion. “You aren’t making me do anything, I’m volunteering,” she argued. “I want to be with you, and if that’s what it takes then I’ll do it.”
Bengali growled in frustration. He was deeply touched by the depth of her love for him and what she was willing to give up for it, and he loved her all the more for it. The selfish part of him would have gladly done as she asked, as the thought of eternal life seemed a lot brighter knowing she would be at his side. His conscience however did not sit well at all with the thought, especially because he knew the raging desires and drives of the vampiric nature that he had experienced were something that ran against the very grain of the puma’s gentle soul. He knew that in a very short time she would likely be much like Nick was, or perhaps even more guilt-ridden and tormented. “I’m sorry, Pumyra, but no,” he said tenderly, but firmly. “I can’t condemn you to a life like that—it would be wrong. I love you too much to do that to you.”
Pumyra bit her lip, her heart aching with his refusal. “If you loved me, you wouldn’t say no.”
“I say no because I love you, don’t you understand that?”
“No, I don’t see it,” Pumyra replied. She held back a fresh wave of tears, tears that seemed to come to her too easily as of late. “You aren’t condemning me to anything. I’m asking you of my own free will, because I love you and want to be with you.”
Bengali sighed, his emotional state reaching new highs of frustration as he tried to make the puma understand what it was she was asking of him. “You also love being a Thundercat and a healer,” he countered. “I don’t have the right to take that from you, whether you ask me to or not.”
The puma’s face twisted into a hurt glare. “You’re a Thundercat too, Bengali. If you won’t believe it for yourself when I say it, you should at least believe the Sword of Omens, because it still calls you one,” she snapped. “If anything you’ve proven that someone can be both vampire and Thundercat. It’s one’s actions that make them evil or good.” She took a step toward him with an imploring look in her eyes. “Please, Bengali. Bring me across! I know it’s an incredible change, but—”
The tiger vampire stared dead on into her brown eyes. “You have no idea.”
“I’ve seen you, and I’ve seen Nick. Yes, you struggle, but you handle it.”
Bengali laughed in bitter disbelief. “To say I’ve struggled is a big understatement, Pumyra. I wish I had a good comparison to make to something in mortal life to make you understand just how big an understatement it is. If I had the choice I would be a normal Thunderian again in a heartbeat.” He looked away for a moment. “There’s also something else we have to consider. Our people—Thunderians—are all but wiped out because of Thundera’s explosion. If you throw away your mortality, you as possibly one of the only three females left of all our people for all we know—our race is that much closer to dying. And you’ve always wanted cubs anyhow. You could still have that with someone other than me. To throw it all away just to be with me… it would be selfish of both of us.”
Pumyra’s face crumpled, emotionally hit as hard by his words as she would have been if he had struck her across the face. “If wanting to be with someone I love is selfish, then I guess I am,” she replied icily.
“I’m sorry,” Bengali growled softly.
The puma’s expression grew stony. “So am I.” With that she turned and left the room, leaving Bengali to slam his fist against the Thunderstrike’s already bent hull in frustration.
* * *
After a few more hours spent hunting together, Janette and Alluro returned to Baron Karnor’s tower. Both had taken their fill of blood in their travels, and Alluro was feeling quite comfortable with his new vampiric powers. “Coming back here to find things so quiet, I’m not used to that. I hardly know what to do with myself,” Janette mused as she walked into the suite.
“It’s nothing like Skytomb, that’s for sure,” Alluro agreed, and then glanced curiously out onto the balcony, his gaze falling in the direction of DarkSide.
“They still don’t know,” Janette said, her eyes upon the younger Lunatac vampire as she lit a candle. “They should be told.”
Alluro nodded. “Yes, I suppose so. I imagine by now they’re wondering what happened to me and where I’ve been. I also imagine Luna is not pleased that I disappeared for a day or so—although I don’t care.” He walked into the suite to Janette’s side. “I suppose I should go back and tell them.”
Janette turned and laid a hand upon his arm. “Do you think you will be back tonight?”
The psi vampire paused thoughtfully as he considered her question. “I don’t know,” he said eventually. “It depends on how things go.” A smile spread across his features as he realized that he now had the power to dethrone Luna from her self-appointed position of power if he chose to do so. “I would like to lead the Lunatacs myself. I think I could do a much better job of it. And if she refuses—I can kill her, or at least leave her for good.”
“I wish you luck then,” Janette said, and reached up to touch the side of her fledgling’s face affectionately. “Come back when you get the chance and tell me how it goes.”
Alluro smiled charmingly at his vampire mistress and took her hand, caressing it gently for a moment before releasing it. “Indeed I will.” The Lunatac vampire then turned, walked out onto the balcony, and flew off into the dark sky above.
* * *
It was two hours before dawn when Queen Willa was awakened with a shake from her younger sister Nayda. When she sat up, she saw both Nayda and another of her people, a warrior called Almika, standing above her. “We’re sorry to awaken you, my Queen, but we need you to come. There has been another attack.”
Willa frowned and got to her feet immediately. “Vampires?”
“I’m afraid so, sister,” Nayda confirmed with a sigh. “Cirindi found both Aurora and Eliza bitten on one of the scouting outposts. Aurora is already dead. Eliza is alive, but just barely. Thelia is tending to her now,” she said, referring to the Tree Top Kingdom’s primary healer.
“Take me to them,” Willa instructed the two women, and the trio hastily made their way to the outpost.
When they arrived Willa found a few more of her people there, including the healer Thelia and Cirindi, the scout that had discovered the unfortunate bodies, both of which were now at the base of the tree instead of up on the platform. Thelia’s young apprentice Tarasil was also there, just finishing the prayer rites for the deceased Aurora.
“There was nothing we could do,” Thelia told Willa, looking up from the groggy Eliza for a moment. “Aurora was likely dead from the vampire’s bite before she hit the ground. Eliza’s bite wasn’t as severe though. I think perhaps the vampire was interrupted, or the garlic made her too distasteful for the demon to withstand holding long enough to finish her.”
“Two,” Eliza groaned, sitting up as she tried to focus on the warrior maiden Queen standing above her. “There were two of them.”
“The man and woman?” Almika asked her gently.
Tarasil handed Eliza an herbal remedy that she and Thelia had brought with them. “Drink this. It will help your strength. Try not to talk too much if you’re still weak.”
“No, I’ll be all right,” Eliza murmured, using the back of the tree as a support while she searched for her strength. “I don’t think he took that much—the third one.”
The gathered warrior maidens let out a collective gasp. “A third?” Nayda said, alarmed. “But only two of the vampires have been openly hostile to us, and there are only four that we know of—the evil man and woman, the man vampire that stays with the Thundercats, and Bengali the night-cat. Those two have never hurt us.”
“Maybe not yet,” Cirindi said, her eyes darkening. “Or maybe just not that we have seen with our own eyes.”
Eliza sipped at the herbal elixir. “There’s also a Lunatac,” she said weakly. “The tall one now walks with the night creatures. He and the woman killed Aurora.”
“I see,” Willa said, narrowing her eyes. “And the one that bit you, Eliza?”
“It was a man… but I don’t remember much else. My memory is hazy—like they tried to control my mind and make me forget.”
“All vampires can do that, according to the legends,” Tarasil said.
“Even a Thundercat one, or an ally, if he wanted,” Thelia agreed, and helped the recovering Eliza to her feet. “And maybe that’s why they tried so hard to have you forget.”
Nayda, a longtime friend of the Thundercats but also very loyal to her people, was very torn by what to believe. “Do you know which man it was that bit you, Eliza?”
Eliza shook her head. “I just know it was a man—one who was once human like us.”
Willa’s expression hardened as she took in the implications of the other women’s words. “Then none of the vampires are to be trusted, nor any that walk with them.”
Eliza reached for Willa’s hand. The warrior maiden Queen met her gaze, and the bitten maiden addressed her. “Queen Willa, not trusting them is not enough. They will keep killing—all of them will—unless we stop them. We have to destroy them all and burn them, before they kill all of us.”
* * *
After her emotional confrontation with Bengali in the Tower of Omens, Pumyra returned to Cat’s Lair where she knew she would find Nick. Although she was angry at Bengali’s refusal to bring her across, she still wanted to be with him. In her heart Pumyra believed that although the tiger vampire thought he was doing the right thing for her, he was still wrong, and perhaps Nick could make him understand that. Nick was a vampire and was her friend, after all, and surely he would understand and help her.
She found the formerly human vampire in the lab with Tygra. “Hi,” she greeted the two. “I hope I’m not interrupting, but I was wondering if I could speak with you alone for a few minutes, Nick?”
Nick smiled warmly at the puma. “Sure,” he told her, and then looked to Tygra for a moment. “You can spare me for a few minutes, right?”
Tygra nodded. “Go ahead. But on the way, try this formulation,” he said, pulling a sample tube out of a nearby ice bucket. Inside it was a reddish fluid the color of blood. “We’ve been working on synthesizing artificial blood,” the tiger explained to Pumyra. “It’s based on the real stuff, but cloned and cultured so that we can reconstitute it here. That way we don’t have to kill quite as many animals to feed Bengali and Nick, and we can get replacement blood cells from the ones we hunt for our own meat and duplicate them. It wouldn’t be up to par for a transfusion or any other medical use, of course, but it would have all of the necessary proteins and nutrients for nourishment with in it. Ideally it will make things a little easier for them.”
“That’s great,” Pumyra told the tiger sincerely.
Nick popped the tube open and downed the sample, wincing slightly. “A little too metallic and watery—this will need some fine-tuning. And maybe a bit of sugar,” he added. “It’s pretty bitter.”
Tygra smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind. See you later.”
The red tiger then returned his attention to his work while Nick followed Pumyra out into the hall and down the hall to the council chamber where they would have some privacy. “What’s on your mind, Pumyra?” Nick asked the puma, having the feeling that if she had come to him, it likely had something to do with Bengali.
“I need a favor from you, Nick. A big one,” she said, her tone serious. “I want you to bring me across, and make me into a vampire like you and Bengali.”
Nick frowned and led her to one of the council table chairs, and then sat beside her. “Why?” he asked in a low, but gentle tone.
“I know it’s a big decision and change, but it’s the only way I can see for Bengali and I to stay together. His being a vampire is destroying us, and hurting the both of us. We can’t change him back, but I can change into what he is.”
Nick sighed. “Please don’t ask me to do that, Pumyra. You don’t understand what you’re asking of me.”
“But I do,” the puma argued. “It’s what I want, Nick. I came to you because I thought you would understand and help. Bengali refused, and I think he’s trying in his way to protect me. But I don’t need his protection, Nick, I need him. I love him.”
The vampire laid a reassuring hand on Pumyra’s. “I know you do, but this isn’t the way to show it or to be with him. Bengali refused you because he loves you.”
Pumyra fought back a resurgence of the same feeling of frustration that she had felt earlier during her conversation with Bengali on the subject. While she had been on her way to Cat’s Lair the puma Thundercat had kept herself calm with the reassuring thought that Nick at least would understand if Bengali was too emotional to be objective about it. From Nick’s tone now that she had the discussion with him, however, she got the sense that she was heading down another dead end. Even one as cold and evil as LaCroix understands how I feel, so why don’t the two of you? Pumyra thought sullenly.
At Pumyra’s clearly displeased silence, Nick continued to try to explain his reasons to her. “The vampire spirit brings very dark and wild urges into your soul, Pumyra. It makes you want to kill, to spill blood and drink it and treat mortal life as if it was nothing but a toy. Just because Bengali and I don’t do it, doesn’t mean it’s easy for us to quell those urges. He’s trying to spare you the pain of that struggle,” Nick explained. “He knows, as I do, that you are a kind and caring soul. Changing you into what we are would destroy that.”
“It won’t,” Pumyra asserted emotionally. “I wouldn’t let it, just like he hasn’t! Please, Nick,” the puma implored.
Nick sighed. “No. I can’t. I’m sorry.”
The refusal from the older vampire on top of the earlier denial by felt to her like a double betrayal, and she stared sourly at Nick. “You can’t do it for me, but you can for Bengali?”
“Bengali was nearly dead and had no other way,” Nick reminded her. “If you remember, I asked all of you if it was what you really wanted, if you wanted me to save him that way. You said you did, so I honored your wish. But you,” he looked at her sadly, “you aren’t in a position like that. You’re young and you have your whole mortal life ahead of you. I can’t in good conscience take that from you, and especially not against Bengali’s wishes. I would be betraying him as well as you if I did.”
“Even if I wanted you to?”
“Even then,” Nick replied firmly.
Pumyra clenched her jaw, forcing herself to retain her composure. “I see.”
“Please trust me,” the vampire told her, looking sincerely into her hard eyes. “It is for the best.”
The angry puma was not swayed by his words. “What’s right for you is not necessarily what’s right for everyone else.”
Nick blinked, taken aback a bit by the undertone of venom in her words. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were talking like Janette or LaCroix.”
“Maybe they know what they’re talking about then,” Pumyra replied flatly, standing up to leave. “All right, if you don’t want to bring me across, that’s your choice. You have to do what you think is right, and I respect that decision. But don’t expect me to live with it though,” she finished, and walked out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
* * *
Although the hour of night was late, all of the Lunatacs—semi-nocturnal for the most part anyhow—were still up and about in Skytomb, assembled in the control room while Luna rattled on for what felt to the other Lunatacs like the thousandth time about how disappointed she was with how things ended in their strike upon the Tower of Omens. She had since rationalized it to laying all of the blame for the failure on Mumm-Ra’s interference and Lion-O’s sword, both convenient enough excuses, but still not enough to keep her from complaining about it at length. When Alluro walked in through the control room’s doors however, the conversation stopped dead and all eyes were upon him.
Chilla regarded the psi coldly as he strode in. “So you finally decided to grace us with your presence? How thoughtful.”
“Where have you been, anyway?” RedEye asked.
“Out,” Alluro replied, and walked past them both, stopping at the edge of the console.
“All day and all last night?” Luna questioned, eyeing him suspiciously. “Where did you go?”
Alluro smiled, being deliberately ambiguous. He felt a surge of egotistical pride at the fact that his absence had them all wondering. “I was with Janette.”
Chilla grumbled in disgust. “I knew it.”
“Offered her the chance to lick your wounds, huh? Or anything else you could think of?” TugMug remarked with a leer.
Alluro did his best to ignore TugMug’s lewd innuendo and instead looked to Chilla with a raised eyebrow. Knowing that his disappearance had bothered her was further proof to him that she was indeed jealous, and that swelled his ego considerably. He liked the thought that Chilla—cool, aloof, icy Chilla, who had always taken a very nonchalant attitude toward their unique relationship—missed him. He liked it quite a bit… enough to make her squirm and show it. “And what is it to you who I spend my spare time with, Chilla?”
“Absolutely nothing,” the icewalker assured him coldly. “We just don’t appreciate having to cover your shifts and pick up your slack.”
“Chilla is right,” Luna cut in. “You were expected to return here after the failed takeover of the Tower of Omens. When you chased after Janette we assumed that you would return here after speaking with her, and certainly not be gone for a day and a half,” the lunar woman lectured. “You had no right to simply disappear like that.”
“I wasn’t aware that I had a curfew, nor that you were my timekeeper,” Alluro remarked sarcastically.
Luna let out a frustrated shriek and waved her crop at Alluro angrily. “Don’t get snide with me!”
Alluro narrowed his eyes, thinking that it was time Luna learned to show him some respect. “And don’t you start with me,” he threatened, a dangerous undertone to his voice that was not usually there.
While the others heard the subtle change in Alluro’s tone and exchanged suspicious looks, Luna either missed it or completely ignored it, and instead became even more irate at his backtalk. “I will say whatever I please and you will sit there and listen to it, and even like it if I say so,” she screeched. “I am in charge here!”
At that tantrum-like display from his childish lunar leader, Alluro simply laughed, and much like his voice, his laugh had an ominous and threatening ring to it, almost like that of a man bordering on the edge of lunacy, or one who at the very least truly believed he had nothing to lose. “You know what, Luna?” Alluro said, approaching her and Amok with a wild gleam in his eyes, “I don’t have to take orders from you.”
“What?” Luna screamed, outraged at the psi’s insolence. “Oh yes you will, Alluro, you will listen to me or else!” Beneath her, Amok growled and balled his hands into fists, preparing to use them if need be to protect his mistress. “How dare you talk to me in such a manner?”
“Quite easily,” Alluro replied with a smug chuckle. “Because I am tired of you and your controlling, demeaning, obnoxious leadership.”
Fuming, Luna shrieked and prodded Amok to advance toward the psi, who shifted to the side quickly with more speed and grace than he should have been able. Amok grumbled and turned around while Luna continued to holler at her insubordinate crew member. “Do you have any idea where you would be without my leadership, Alluro? Nowhere! You would be either dead and buried at the hand of someone who was less tolerant of your shameless manipulation and arrogance than I am, or sitting in a dead-end hole in the wall back on the Moons looking for some other sucker to prey upon, living like the bottom-feeding leech you were when I hired you. You, all of you—” Luna glanced around the room, “would be nothing without me to hold you together, you would be worthless wastes of space stranded on this backwater planet scraping out a miserable life not much better than the ones you left behind on the Moons.”
Luna raised her crop in the air and waved it angrily, Amok tense and growling beneath her, the brute’s mood mirroring Luna’s and ready to punish whoever it was that had put her in that mood at her command. “I have done all of this for you, for all of you, and this is the thanks I get?” she finished, her voice hitting an unprecedented shrill note.
“Oh please, Luna, you haven’t worked a day in your life. You’re too busy spending all your time telling others how to spend theirs to your benefit,” Alluro sneered contemptuously, seemingly unafraid of her or Amok. “We’re here because you hired us with the promise of riches and plunder, assuring us that as a raiding team we would become wealthy and powerful beyond our wildest dreams. And then we were run off the Moons and wound up stranded here on this backwater planet—first enslaved by Mumm-Ra, then imprisoned by him, only to be freed and conscripted to do his work again and be harassed by a bunch of self-righteous Thunderian zealots to boot. Oh yes, your leadership has done a fine job, Luna,” he said in disgust.
“Do you know how sick I am—and how sick everyone else in here is except for you and your pet brute—of watching you lead us into failure after failure, over and over again? How fed up we are having you constantly promise the world and then lead us straight into defeat and humiliation, and then turning around and laying the blame at our feet with threats of Amok beating us to death where we stand if we argue? Oh maybe if you’re feeling generous, you pass the blame onto the Thundercats, Mumm-Ra, or even circumstance… but never where it belongs—on you. Oh no, it’s never you, never your fault,” Alluro continued, his voice taking on a snarl of rage.
Luna was livid with rage. “You can’t talk to me that way, Alluro! I won’t stand for it another minute!”
“And I won’t stand for you for another second,” Alluro challenged, the raging spirit of the vampire that now dwelled within him starting to come forth in his heated emotional state. “It ends here and now, Luna. I came back tonight only for one reason—to take over the leadership of this place for myself, or to take my leave of you for good. The choice is yours.”
“Oh no,” Luna said hatefully, “I don’t think so! Skytomb is my fortress, and I am its one and only commander. I am the law here, Alluro, and you and everyone else here will obey it! You will not and can not take my leadership from me! Furthermore,” she continued threateningly, “you aren’t going anywhere, except into a hospital bed when Amok is finished with you. We both know that you would never have the guts to leave for good, no matter what sort of silly independent notions your fanged girlfriend might have put in your head in the last twenty four hours. You need us.”
Alluro scowled at Luna with unbridled contempt. “You would almost be funny if you weren’t so galling. Do not ever disrespect me in such a way again, or you will live to regret it,” the psi snarled, drawing back his arm and striking the tiny lunar woman off of Amok’s back with surprising force, and knocking her to the floor with an angry and indignant squawk. Chilla, RedEye, and TugMug exchanged dumbfounded glances—all of them had at times thought about giving their bossy leader a well-deserved thrashing, but none of them actually went through with it, mostly because of Amok. Their fears were well founded. Amok, like all brutes, had a naturally high resistance to pain and psychic attacks as well as massive physical bulk. And now that Alluro had dared to strike at his mistress, Amok’s anger was entirely focused on Alluro—who the other three watching Lunatacs were convinced was about to be pummeled into putty.
The second Amok reached for him, Alluro focused the full extent of his hypnotic powers, both natural and vampiric, on the brute. “No Amok, you will not touch me,” Alluro commanded powerfully. “You will not dare to come near me!”
Much to Luna’s surprise—and horror—her steed, apparently no longer immune to Alluro’s hypnotic abilities—stayed put. “Amok!” she shrieked desperately. “Beat him! Put him in such pain that he won’t be able to move for a week without bawling like an infant!”
Alluro faced Luna, his vampiric nature now clearly showing as his eyes blazed with the dark supernatural vampire spirit and his fangs descended in anticipation of battle. “Your pet isn’t listening to you any longer, Luna, and neither am I,” he growled assertively, and strode purposefully over to the hypnotized brute. “If I wanted, I could kill him where he stood—as easy as this.” To demonstrate he grabbed the stunned Amok by the chin and threw him into the nearby console counter with his newly acquired vampiric strength. The brute growled as his bulk slammed into the console, leaving a noticeable dent and causing the dazed Lunatac to grumble in pain.
“And if I could do that to Amok,” Alluro continued threateningly, “imagine what I could do to you, weak and helpless on the floor.”
“By the Moon gods,” Luna gasped, her expression reflecting the mixture of outrage, betrayal, and fear she felt at that moment when she stared up at Alluro and saw his bared fangs and glowing eyes. “She did it. She made you into one of her kind.”
Alluro smiled complacently. “Very sharp of you, Luna. Yes, last night Janette gave me a priceless gift—immortality and power. No one, including you, will stand in my way ever again.”
“Except old mister sunshine,” RedEye remarked sarcastically, while Luna crawled her way over to Amok. The stunned brute placed Luna gently onto his back but did not advance toward Alluro. It was not so much out of fear as it was out of the fact that Alluro’s hypnotic suggestion was still acting upon him. Although Alluro was not actively projecting it any longer, it would remain with the brute until Alluro left the room.
“The sun is a technicality,” Alluro stated calmly, his features reverting back to normal as his physical scuffle with Luna and Amok was over. “This is what I came back to tell all of you—that I’m now a vampire. And I must say I do not regret the decision in the least.”
Chilla stared hard at the Lunatac-turned-vampire. “Why did you bother coming back at all if you don’t need us, then?”
“Yes, why?” Luna demanded, feeling the bruise both upon both where Alluro had struck her in the face and more powerfully in the ego. “To gloat or simply to torment me?”
“Any tormenting was instigated by you, Luna,” Alluro replied, and then answered Chilla’s question. “As for why I came back, I told you. I will stay on here with her,” he glanced as Luna, “but not unless I am the leader and she the one taking and following orders for a change. If not, then I’m leaving.”
“And go where?” TugMug asked dubiously.
“Janette,” Chilla predicted disgustedly. “Where else?”
RedEye frowned. “DarkSide and Skytomb are the only home we Lunatacs have on this planet.”
Luna fixed her large eyes upon Alluro coldly. “And what about when Janette tires of you, or you of her? Don’t be an even bigger fool than you’ve already been, Alluro. Stay where you belong.”
“Only if you resign your leadership to me,” Alluro countered. “Otherwise, forget it—and rest assured, I will go.”
Chilla exhaled a frosty breath of disgust. “Your way or no way at all? How melodramatic and childish. Even if leadership did change hands here, I doubt it would get much more mature.”
“I didn’t ask you, Chilla,” Alluro replied.
The icewalker narrowed her eyes at the psi vampire. “Are you going to strike me too, or just suck my blood like Janette did to yours?” she challenged coldly.
Alluro stiffened at that remark, stung by the icewalker’s caustic tone. “I have never taken anything from you, Chilla, except that which you have freely offered, and I would not presume to start now,” he stated quietly, and then turned to Luna. “What is your answer? Will you concede leadership to me or not?”
Luna stared back at Alluro stubbornly. “No. Skytomb is mine. Go on and kill me for it if you hate me that much and if you want it that badly, because that is the only way you will ever have it, is over my dead body.”
“No, Luna, I won’t kill you,” Alluro said after a moment’s pause. “Mortality will do that to you soon enough, and that in and of itself is enough to satisfy me. But I will not stay here and wait for it to claim you, either. Goodbye, Luna,” he finished. He gave one last meaningful glance around the room to the other Lunatacs, and then started for the door.
Chilla clenched her fist against the edge of the console she stood beside. “Don’t let the door hit you on the way out,” she said icily.
Alluro stopped and faced her, locking eyes with the angry ice woman for one long moment. “Farewell, Chilla,” he said quietly, and left.
Luna scowled as she watched him leave. “Oh no, Alluro, it won’t be that easy for you to walk out on us,” she muttered to herself angrily. “This is not over. I’ll see to that.” No one but Amok heard her, however.
* * *
Nick landed on the top deck of the Tower of Omens and went inside through the broken door on the deck. When he went into the control room, still in shambles and in the process of being rebuilt, he saw that Bengali, Panthro, Snarfer, and the Thunderkittens were there. The two young Thundercats had volunteered to stay at the Tower of Omens while it was being fixed as a change of pace and to give them some ways to help out. Unbeknownst to Snarf they had also volunteered for it because Bengali, now adjusting to the permanent position of nighttime work, would let them stay up as late as they wanted. Panthro had agreed not to tell Snarf or Tygra as long as they did not get too sleep-deprived.
“Hi,” Nick greeted them as he entered. “I don’t suppose Pumyra’s here?” he asked the group of Thundercats.
“Nope, not since we got here,” WilyKat answered with a shake of his head.
“She probably won’t be back here tonight,” Bengali said with a quiet growl. “She and I had a bit of an argument earlier, and she was pretty upset when she left.” Snarfer nodded from alongside the vampire tiger in agreement. Although he had not been involved, he had heard the raised voices and had seen her leave, and she had not looked happy at all.
“She’s ok isn’t she?” WilyKit asked, glancing at Bengali.
Nick frowned, somewhat concerned. “I’m not so sure. She’s not at Cat’s Lair either. She walked out earlier this evening after a discussion we had. I gave her some time to cool off, and then when I went to find her in the Lair, she was gone. Cheetara said she might have come here.”
“You two argued?” Panthro asked, looking at Nick with surprise. “That’s not like either of you. You’re both pretty easygoing.”
Bengali sighed. “I know what you argued about. At least I think I do. She asked you to do it, didn’t she?” he asked, looking at Nick.
The human vampire nodded. “She asked me to bring her across because you wouldn’t, and explained to me why. When I told her no she didn’t take it well.”