headed to the far end of the hall. The hall, cordoned off by a balcony, gave an awesome view 107
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below of two massive flights of escalators in between a sentry of towering columns thirty hands thick. Each floor led to different sections of the library.
“This place is smaller than I remember, but still massive,” she mused quietly.
Below, Poe spied vampires, humans, and a sprinkling of adrenaline-rushed halfdeads, the latter noticeable by their healthy complexion, performing different tasks. And that was what it looked to be, humans and undead of differing ethnicities going about their work. I thought minorities were turned into shit sweepers and laundry washers. One particular section, the Social Sciences floor, appeared extremely busy.
“Hello, what’s this?” she asked the post she was leaning on. Poe squinted, swearing that the floor had been converted into a laboratory. Despite the half-closed blinds, Poe could see microscopes and other lab equipment through the otherwise clear glass walls.
Fear choked her. Could it be a blood farm? Poe swallowed hard and turned away.
“I hope that place isn’t what I think it is,” she boiled.
She tiptoed with her bare feet to the first escalator, disregarding the stares of two vampires coming from the opposite direction and carrying bags filled with clear liquid.
“What?” she hissed at them.
Emboldened as they did not lift a finger to stop her or alert the vampire security, Poe descended the second set of escalators. She winced at the cold bite of the metal steps that aggravated the myriad bruises and cuts on her body. She had found purpose again. If the Social Sciences section was a cattle farm, then she would find a way to destroy it.
“Goss and Sister Ann would’ve wanted it this way,” she whispered.
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There certainly was a bustle of activity in there.
She hadn’t seen so many living people since she was eight, and she felt intimidated. Clutching the rosary and minuscule dart blower around her neck for courage, Poe entered the lab.
At first Poe’s uncanny appearance didn’t cause an iota of controversy. A couple of dozen vampires and humans went about their work, not even glancing at the barefoot, oddly dressed young woman scoping the spacious converted floor for any signs of cattle bloodletting. Instead, only live and undead creatures in white lab coats fiddling around with vials and serums casually greeted her.
“Hello. Hello to you, too. Oh hi,” she nodded at everyone who greeted her. Heartened, Poe ventured further inside the lab, occasionally reaching out and squeezing hanging plastic containers filled with thick clear liquid that seemed to be everywhere.
A vampire with atrophied veins on her face startled Poe by appearing electrically quick in front of her. The undead gave her a most benign, fanged smile and went about her work. Poe fretfully skipped to the next table that happened to be empty of supernatural beings. Some vamps were faster than others, but she preferred the slower ones.
Hanging on hooks was a dozen or so plastic containers of the clear, gel-like liquid. In the middle, though, a lone plastic bag containing red liquid looking suspiciously like blood stopped Poe in her tracks.
“Is that blood?” she muttered.
Disquieted, Poe reached for the bag for a closer look. Poe was heavy of hand given that she had never had the chance to outgrow the grabby reaction of a third grader. She did not gauge her strength and before she knew it, the bag of red liquid was off the hook. It 109
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slipped from her fingers like a fat balloon filled with water, crashing like a wave on the white marble floor.
A tepid, “Oh shit,” was all she could say. The design left on the floor would have made Jackson Pollock applaud from the grave. Poe couldn’t escape notice.
She was the center of attention, standing with her mouth open, eyes huge from guilt. She was crimson down to her toes. To her chagrin, the human contingent seemed more furious and outraged at the mess their fellow live person had made. Vampires had to restrain a particularly incensed man, cursing the newcomer cruelly, from rushing at her.
“You stupid little jerk!” the man with a goatee, a more annoying version of Jim Carrey, bellowed. “If you can’t keep your sticky fingers from touching lab work, you’re not welcome here!”
Like a goldfish ignominiously jumping out of its bowl onto a messy desk, Poe opened and shut her mouth several times before saying, “M-miserable leech.”