As Serena relinked her and Wayne’s arms, he realized that he might be suffering from a similar problem. He had killed that other vampire without hesitation or remorse, yet Serena hung off of his arm without retaliation. All because he had bought into her earlier sob-story about becoming a vampire. A story she had freely admitted was untrue.
If he didn’t need her for Sarah’s sake, would she still be here?
“I’ll keep on watch for any nuns, I suppose,” Serena said.
“I don’t know how you can stand to be awake,” Sarah said with droopy eyes. Whatever adrenaline had been keeping her alert was rapidly vanishing. “No torpor for you?”
“Being the pinnacle of vampires that I am, I can easily ignore the effects for a day or two. Maybe when you’re older.”
“Alright,” Wayne said. “Let’s find a place to hold up for a few hours.”
—
Wayne clicked the CB radio off.
“Worthless,” he mumbled as he hopped out of the truck he had been sitting inside of for the last hour.
“No luck?” Sarah asked, yawning despite sunset being within the hour.
Shaking his head, Wayne said, “I didn’t expect much. It’s an unmodified civilian-band radio. Mostly certain that it is illegal to modify it to drop to military frequencies.”
“And you don’t know how to modify it yourself?”
“Can’t say that I’ve ever studied radios. Wouldn’t know where to start.”
A sharp clap in the back of the truck had Wayne turning around.
“We’re going for the break out forcefully plan then, right?”
“Unless Sarah wants to tunnel,” Wayne said, turning to his sister with an eyebrow raised.
“Not unless you want to be buried. While alive. Permanently.”
“No. Not so much.”
Earth magic had never come easy for Sarah, despite it being her primary element. After graduating, she hadn’t even passed her third class exam. Wayne was still sure that she could tunnel them out. He could even help with his own meager skills.
Pushing her to do it wouldn’t help. Wayne knew his sister. She would get either angry or nervous. Both could easily lead to a cave-in.
“We need to find a weak point in their barricade. The roads all have heavy-duty checkpoints. Snipers, several soldiers, flamethrowers.”
“The river? We shouldn’t have a problem finding a boat at one of the houses along the Grand.”
“Not sure. I didn’t thoroughly scope out where their fence met the river. I assume they’re watching it.”
“Better plan than charging through with a car,” Sarah said with a self-affirming nod. “We can ditch the boat shortly after and find a car. Probably switch cars a number of times to hide from any followers.”
Experience had taught him that getaways were rarely so clean. He’d never tried fleeing from the actual mundane military before, but it probably wouldn’t be so simple. It was a better plan than nothing, though, and he had been winging things for long enough that he was sure it wouldn’t be that hard.
Using a bit of heat manipulation, he could probably hide them completely from any night vision equipment they may have. Then it was just a matter of losing them long enough to hunker down at a hotel. Preferably in Detroit. Being a big city–bigger, anyway–it would be easy to get lost inside.
“Alright,” Wayne said. “Jump in the truck.” The river wasn’t far, but they needed to be indoors by sunrise. Even though the sun hadn’t even set yet, every second counted.
Serena jumped to her feet. “Oh, I call–”
“The back of the truck,” Sarah said.
Serena’s glare was muted by her mask, but there was definite hostility behind it.
Wayne stepped between the two before a fight could break out. Looking up at Serena, he tried to deflect her attention. “Is Zoe still asleep?”
“Out like a light,” Serena said, her eyes wrinkling in a genuine smile.
“If you could keep her from sliding around,” Wayne said, “I would appreciate it.”
“Alright,” came the instant response. “I can do that.”
Shaking his head, Wayne turned to Sarah. He gave a sharp nod towards the truck’s cab before climbing back into the driver’s seat.
Sarah circled around to the passenger side and got in without a word. She remained silent until they had been driving for a few blocks.
“So,” she said, tentative hesitation plain in her voice, “the girl…”
“The kid or the granny?”
A heavy thump cracked the rear window. Looking through the mirror, Wayne saw a pair of eyes glaring at him.
“Guess she can hear,” he mumbled to himself.
“Zoe,” Sarah said. “Serena told me how you saved her, and that’s great, but what do you plan to do with her?”
“Find some orphanage and drop her off.”
“That’s it? Simple as that?”
“Simple as that. Why?” He took his eyes off the road for a moment to glance in her direction. “You want to adopt her or something?”
“I’m a vampire.”
