Vampire Hunter D Fan Fiction ❯ Dark Encore ❯ Prelude to Trouble ( Chapter 1 )

Dark Encore

Chapter One: Prelude to Trouble

"Without a soul

My spirit sleeping somewhere cold

Until you find it there and lead it back

Home…"

- Evanescence, "Bring Me To Life"

~*~

It was night. It made sense for the van to be traveling at night, but not only because of the lack of traffic. The reasons for the lack of traffic could be traced to the fact that those who would have been traveling at night were humans, and they were afraid. It was whispered, spoken, screamed that the vampire race was slowly, but surely, gaining in number. It had been about one or two generations since the greatest of the vampire hunters, the Markus Brothers, had died, and it had been around ten or so years since their 'sister' Leila had died as well. Since then, the only vampire hunters around were incompetent fools who more often than not failed while chasing after quarry too difficult for them to defeat.

An exception to this rule was D, the dhampire vampire-hunter who had yet to die off. He had lived long enough to honor a promise, and during that time he had seemed to be in his typical good health, which is to say, he hadn't looked like he was going to die any time soon. Good health was difficult to gauge in one whose skin was almost as pale as a corpse's, and who was half undead; therefore, all that could be said was that the last time D had been seen in public, he had looked like he wasn't about to die anytime soon.

Yes, D was an exception in a generation of failing vampire hunters - but he was not the only one. Vampire hunters who actually knew what they were doing were almost entirely gone, but they still existed. One of them was the woman who was Leila's granddaughter, the girl who had talked to D at the funeral. She had grown up to bear an uncanny resemblance to her late grandmother, save that she wore more modest clothes. The outfit was crimson and lightly armored, as well as tight enough for the armor to serve its purpose, but it was not skintight as her grandmother's had been. She had learned how to fire a blaster her grandmother had once had, as well as how to use blades if need be. She much preferred the blaster, though.

Her name was Erika, and she drove the van that sped through the night.

She was not alone in the van. Sitting near a window, on a rather hastily made seat, was a pale young woman dressed in a pair of black jeans, black boots, a loose white shirt, and a chainmail vest that did not seem to befit her. Deep crimson hair curled slightly past her shoulders, swept back in an inelegant braid to keep it from getting in her way. Light brown eyes with elegant lashes were half-closed, giving the girl a look of slight sorrow. A quiver full of arrows was strapped to her back, and she held a crossbow in one small hand. The slightly younger girl - her name was Rose - looked out of place in the van, with the duty of one who killed to make a living. She looked as if she should have been at home, perhaps taking care of a pet or of an ill relative. Nobody who had contracted Erika's help, however, had questioned the presence of the girl.

The girl in question closed her eyes entirely, put one hand over her mouth, and yawned a little. Re-opening her eyes, she called to Erika, "Please tell me why we are out killing people again? I don't remember…"

Erika's voice, one with slight hints of a Southern accent, responded coolly, "They're not people, Rose, they're vampires, and there's been an increase in their numbers lately. Not only that, but there's a rumor going around that a Noble's decided to show his ugly mug again, terrorizing locals that go too close to his lair and all that. That's the one we're after, in case you forgot. His name's Mei-something…Meier Link, if I remember correctly. Story has it that back in Grandma Leila's day he fell for some human girl, but a bunch of things went wrong, Grandma and the Markus's got involved, and they flew off into space to be happy together. I think that's how it ended, I don't know for sure. From the way Grandma phrased it though, it looked more like the girl wound up dead."

There was silence for a moment, and then Rose said quietly, "And then what happened?" Erika looked over her shoulder slightly, surprised. The look on Rose's face was that of deep thought, of a withdrawing from this world into her own mind. Rose did that often, but it was still worrisome when she did. Or rather, it had been worrisome ever since four years ago…Erika shook her head; no remembering the past now.

"Well, from the looks of it, he might have reached wherever it was he and his girl were planning to go, but she wasn't going with him if you know what I mean, and I guess he snapped. I don't know how it happened, but he's back now, and he's causing trouble. Guess he couldn't take that other humans could be happy when his girl was dead and they couldn't be happy, so he decided to go back to what vampires do best."

Rose said quietly, "It's so sad…" But in the middle of the word 'sad,' the van squealed and stopped abruptly, causing her to lose her balance and be thrown into a wall. Her sentence turned out more like, "It's so sa-OOF!" A loud 'thunk,' a groan, and then the sound of someone sliding to the van's floor said exactly what had happened to Rose: she had almost literally flown into the wall, groaned in pain, and then gravity had taken hold of the girl, dragging her to the ground once more.

Erika, after killing the ignition so that it wouldn't cause any trouble later, sprung up from the driver's seat and walked back. She peered around the corner to look at her friend. "You okay there, Rose? Didn't get yourself injured too badly, right?"

Rose gave her older friend a weak smile after crawling away from her uncomfortable location against the wall and perching once again on her seat. "Yes, I think so. Perhaps we shouldn't drive this van anymore, though; it seems a little dangerous, don't you think?" Her utterly innocent look said that she wasn't really implying that they give up the business, and yet that was exactly what she was saying with those words. It was almost as if she had forgotten…

"We've been over this, and over this, and over this. We are not quitting the business. You remember what happened four years ago, don't you? Hell, it's almost five years ago now!" Erika's voice softened a bit, "You're like the big sister I don't have, Rose, and after what happened four years ago…do you think I'll let vampires walk the earth the way they do, knowing what they almost did? How you nearly…Never mind, you just don't seem to get it."

Her voice then resumed its usual brusqueness as she continued, "Stay in the van, but make sure one of the windows is open so you can fire if need be. I'm going outside to see what happened."