his Chilly Willy chum couldn’t take care of us, what makes you think you or your imaginary m-m-muscled boys can?”
Poe looked down at the two friends she considered family, and for some reason she did not care anymore. If she died, big whoop. There was nothing left for her. Then the inimitable voice in her head said, Snap out of it! and the self-pity ended there.
If she was going to croak that day, she was going the JKD way and take out as many as she could. She would not be made into cattle or a stinking vampire.
Hell would freeze over before she lay bloodless and dead on the floor next to her friends.
She nodded, trying to look scared which wasn’t hard. “W-what do you w-want me to do?”
The leader smiled, pleased by her quick acquiescence. “That’s a good girl. Just drop your gun, and you’ll be treated like candy.”
“I’ll do whatever you say. Just d-don’t hurt me,”
Poe said in her most childish voice, which came out as a croak since her voice was quite deep for a girl.
“Can’t wait to re-slice that caterpillar of a scar,”
said one of the stoner leeches, but the tanned halfdead quickly silenced him.
“You’re not slicing anything, leech. You, girl, put your weapons down on the floor,” he ordered. “Slow like a snail.”
“Y-yes. Please don’t shoot me.”
“You’re the freshest dish anyone’s come across in years. No one’s gonna do no shooting, girl,” said the halfdead gallantly.
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Poe lowered the strap of the Uzi, as if to lay the weapon on the ground. With a whip of a hand, the Uzi snapped into her palm, spraying a round of bullets. The halfdead was showered first, his chest and head eviscerated. The leeches, not at all slow to react, dashed behind the marble columns and shot at her from every direction. Poe, invigorated by fear, adrenaline, and hate, dove to the ground, making sure not to step on Sister Ann and the dogs.
Peeking from the floor, she spied an ankle and fired. A body fell clutching at his splintered anklebone.
Poe finished him off before he ruined her eardrums.
Two left. Her Uzi locked, refusing to fire. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, not now! She took out her Walther PPK
and Beretta, cursing the wretchedly unreliable Uzi. She sat up, careful to keep her head low. A squeak of pain nearly caused her to jump and be a human target for leech heshers. She had accidentally stepped on Penny’s injured foot.
“Sorry,” she whispered apologetically to the suffering dog.
Poe touched Penny’s neck with the tip of her smoking Beretta and vowed, “If I get out of here alive, I promise I’ll take you with me.”
“You’re done for, assholes!” she declared. She lunged and ran at the two leeches, guns blazing. With her right hand she shot leech one dead center in the forehead. With her left, leech two got it in the heart and eye.
Like a crazed hyena, Poe ran around the suite, checking out the ceiling, bathroom, columns and nooks. Only when she was sure that the home was secure did she re-sheath her guns and put a new clip in the Uzi. To make sure, she looked under the king-size bed. Instead of vampires, she found a gift-wrapped box with her name written on it. The sight almost undid 59
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her. Shaking, she brought the box to the living room and placed it beside Goss.
Poe pulled off Goss’ intravenous drip that was pumping hardly more than air, and she checked for a pulse. Her most brave and tender friend was dead. She turned her attention to the nun, who lay unmoving on the floor. On her arm were days of needle marks. She, like Goss, was lifeless. Not since her parents’ and siblings’ deaths did she feel this awful, so awful that she wanted to puke her entrails out. She was alone.
Again.
Sister Ann and Goss, her second family, had taught her how to fight back in this horrific city overrun by thugs and bloodsuckers. They treated her like kin. Poe had the urge to shoot herself. If she had left the safety of her bunker days earlier, she could have done something to help her friends.
“Fuck me and my goddamned phobias!” Poe cried, smacking her forehead with her palm several times. She wiped an errant tear. She didn’t even deserve the comfort of a good cry.
Poe stroked Sister Ann’s icy neck. Unlike Goss, she had not been bitten. Sister once said that no creature of the dark would