Vampire Reflections

Vampire Reflections
D. J. Miner
Prologue

Kate ran from the terror of the mobs and there was no place she could go with out someone finding her. These people were not normal. They were ghouls that would swipe at her with their sharp claws, slash chunks of flesh from her body, and devour what they have taken from her. She passed by windows see her reflection. Those who pursued her had no reflections.
It was a very different London, where red flags with two bolts of black lightning crossed in the center, waved sadistically with no wind to disturb them. The artificial canyons of the city echoed with the cadence of troops fully clad in grey with armbands that matched the flags on their right sleeve. The silver centurion helmets with black plumes never dipped when they held their head high and their crimson glowing eyes stared straight ahead.
Other troops raided houses and shops, abducted innocent people and threw them into ambulances and trucks. Kate ducked into an alley to watch the bizarre scene unfold. She turned her head when she heard a trash can being kicked over.
The patrol leader yelled, "Seize her!

"She had just had a seizure!" a paramedic yelled while they rushed in to the Putney Hospital Urgency Room with the unconscious woman. "We have a female, twenty-three, became unconscious in front of the Suite Mystique Club twenty minutes ago. Shallow breathing, low pulse. BP forty-three over seventy."
For Dr. Michael MacKinnon this had been a quite a Thursday night. In the last four hours, the night crew handled three car wrecks and two heart attacks. Now it was a quarter after three on a Friday morning. "Take blood and do a tox screen on her! She might have reaction to drugs or alcohol or both."
The woman was wheeled into treatment room three where a nurse was beginning her checks on the patient. "No pupil response!" announced a nurse who had put down the light and reached for the hypodermic needle to draw blood.
Dr. Casey Leu had just taken the patient's pulse. "What's her name?" she asked the paramedics.
"Kathy Whitcomb," A paramedic responded. "Her friends call her 'Kate' and according to her friends, she had little to drink tonight and she doesn't do any drugs."
Kate suddenly sat up and screamed in Latin. Her russet eyes stared at nothing as she continued to babble and her speech changed to Slavic. Her fiery orange hair danced violently over her shoulders. She settled back down and closed her eyes.

Kate opened her eyes to discover that she was in a treatment room from the turn of the twentieth century with a doctor whose face was covered by a surgeons mask.
"My diagnosis would be that this lady is suffering from ingesting a foreign substance with a volatile reaction that is indeed menacing her condition at this moment. I sternly recommend we eradicate her tummy thingy immediately and permanently."
"Oooh, Doctor Hyden Killmore," cooed the blonde nurse in the tight-fitting uniform. You are so smart that I didn't understand what you said."
"Nurse May, I simply became aware of her symptoms and deduced something she ate didn't agree with her." Then he grabbed her about the waist and kissed her through his mask.
The ominous sound of dramatic music was heard and then, then the curtain parted and a man entered. He pointed his index finger at her and shouted, "She tried to eat me. She tried to suck my blood when she and I went to Paris last week."
"I did not!" Kate fired back to her last boyfriend.
"How could you drain my blood when I was about to propose marriage," he cried in dramatic anguish. "My mother liked you. Oh, the shame of it all."
"I didn't drink your blood!" Kate screeched.
"You did too." The man argued and then leapt on top of Kate.

It took five men, doctors, orderlies, and paramedics along with two nurses and Dr. Leu to hold her down. A nurse prepared a needle with a tranquilizer and waited as seven people struggled to keep Kate on the gurney. Kate stopped and the nurse plunged the needle in to Kate's right arm. Hastily, another nurse drew blood. Dr. MacKinnon, like all others in the room, was bewildered by the blood drawn. He had practiced medicine for fourteen years and has never seen anything like this it before.
"Get her into isolation immediately!" Doctor MacKinnon ordered. "We have to call the Ministry of Health on this one."
Casey wiped her brow and was finally able to say something. "Do you think it's contagious?"
"I hope not," Michael replied. "But we can't take that chance."
A nurse at the front desk had just gotten off the phone. "Three ambulances loaded with burn victims here in five!!"
"Get her up to the isolation ward now!" Michael ordered. "And nurse, see if you can get Sebastian Bishop on the phone."
Casey knew of the man that her colleague wanted to get in touch with. "Do you think Sebastian should be called in on this?"
"If anyone knows blood, Sebastian is the man to go to." Dr. McKinnon said before he went to see one of the new patients.
An intern had rolled Kate out the treatment room and to the elevator just as one ambulance had arrived with two people who had third degree burns over their upper bodies.

The elevators doors closed.
Nurse May Kerse wheeled Kate down the white corridor.
"Doctor Killmore is one of the bestest doctors ever. He'll fix you up quick-like and you won't worry about that nasty old gastritis anymore."
Nurse May wheeled Kate in to the operating room as the nurses were sharpening saws. The doctors ate sandwiches, and washed it down with beer, laughing at the impromptu belching contest.
"Do you think she needs anesthesia?" one doctor asked, "Because I don't have the keys to the supply closet."
"She's young. She'll survive without it."
Everyone agreed to not use it and the orderlies lifted her off the gurney and placed Kate on to the operating table.
Kate thrashed on the gurney. "What about me?" she hollered.
"This doesn't concern you at the moment." Dr. Killmore growled, "We are highly trained medical experts and we think you'll survive without Anastasia.. ..amnesia.. .that stuff that knocks you out."
One orderly grabbed Kate's arms. Another orderly grabbed her legs and then tossed her on operating table.
Kate was lifted on to the bed by the ward nurse and an orderly. The two left Kate alone and unaware of was going on around her or where she even was because she was trapped in her mind, facing those that she had fed upon, because of her drug twisted mind.

Outside of her dream, Kate thrashed violent on the bed under the frightened eye of the nurse who had come in to check on her before the doctors made their eight o'clock rounds. The nurse was about to call for help when Kate lay on the bed with arms crossed over her chest. Lisa crept closer to see if she was even breathing.
"Oh, thank God. She's still breathing." The nurse whispered to herself. She went to the window to let in the sunlight and she did feel better when the caretaker felt the sunlight on her.
Kate screamed and sat up She hissed.
The nurse threw off her mask and dashed in the hall, running into a group of five doctors who were all about to check on Kate. They rushed to the room as Lisa ran out. She babbled about what she saw and the six of them opened the door as Kate stopped screaming and turned to ash and crumbled into a pile.

Chapter One

"Master, awaken."
I open my gray eyes.
"The hour has arrived." She informs me as she does every evening on schedule. In my previous life, Ramona was my assistant, yet she serves me now because her existence depends on it as does mine.
I stare at her and the way her azure hair accents her white porcelain skin. She is truly a lady of death, and like me, she seeks to drain life from others at night when most life rests.
At night, there are the prey and predators and Ramona Swain is a predator of the highest caliber. At the same time, she is also the prey. It is too early for her now to begin her hunt, but later her hunger will lead her into the nightlife of London, and she will be the prey until the time for her to strike is right. She is a selective huntress and clever prey for the men she chooses.
I rise from my coffin. My hunger burns deeply tonight. I look at Ramona and say to her, "Prepare my meal, please."
She curtsies, responding with, "Yes, master. It will be an hour."
"That will be fine, Ramona."
She turns and leaves while I climb out and walk up the stairs to my customized "Noctorium". I select Mozart and turn the stereo. I pour myself a glass of red wine and sit in my high-backed leather chair, staring westward out of the glass wall, being pelted by rain. I glance upward at the rivers forming on the glass ceiling and cascading in waterfalls.
The one thing I have always liked about my homeland is that even though the days are long in the summer, the clouds .rule.
Dreary night, but I still can sense the full moon.
My north wall is also glass and my south is brick, blocking the summer sun. Along my south wall is my television that I try not to watch but I will later for the financial reports of my corporation and its stocks. In a little while I will go online to study financial trends and the market in whole.
For now, I wish to sit and listen to Mozart's Fortieth Symphony while rain strikes my windows. I sip my wine. I think of nothing and yet everything. Random thoughts like moths, and I don't want to catch any particular thought. I was beginning to think back through the opportunities that I have wasted and the new things I wish to try. I think back to my trip to Budapest and the mysterious woman who seduced me. I thought her violet eyes were erotic and hypnotic, and maybe I was under a spell when I went with her. She opened a new door of my life, but it locked away the old, and trapped me here in this realm of the night.
I have met others like me. We gather like normal people do. The younger ones, like Ramona, prowl the streets and clubs for their meals. They will never age along with their attitudes. Only a few will mentally mature and seek new pleasures.
         My old life seems so distant and useless. I have kept my old talents and applied them to my situation with the current technology, I have opened a new door for the survival my kind.
Ramona has returned, "Master, your meal is ready. If I may, I wish to begin my hunt tonight."
She is kind but far from subservient. I smile at her and ask, "Is it warm?"
         "Yes, sir. At the right serving temperature."
I graciously whisper, "Thank you," and she turns.
Ramona leaves through the front door, and I head downstairs to my laboratory. My meal waits for me on the sliding gurney. My hunger will no longer wait. I sink my teeth into my neck and drink my own blood.
He will not awaken. I shove him back into the storage container. He will need to recover, but I will have to find out what to do with him soon. He is infected with me and will change, making him useless to me.
With the myriad of diseases that are floating around the world, we have to use what resources we can to continue to exist. I have seen too many of my companions try to find a clean source of food. Diseases have caused metabolic transformation in the blood stream, and in growing cases, are making the blood repugnant to many.
         I have found a way keep my existence. I was able to clone myself using a sample of blood before I took my trip to Budapest. From that sample, I was able to reproduce a source of disease-free meal from myself for myself.
But also I think, with my knowledge, I could end my current life and return to my old one. I could transfer my mind into one of my unaffected clones of me and be reborn to the normal world.
But do I really want to?
Ring!
I pick up the phone in the lab. "Hello? This is Sebastian Bishop..."

         The bouncers at the Suite Mystique wasted no time in letting Ramona into their club, and she strolled to the bar. Ramona ordered her usual and scanned the atmosphere. There were a few prospects for her tonight. The selection at Suite Mystique was better than the disgusting vermin of the last three clubs she had attended.
         Her eyes followed one young man as he fought the crowd to the bar and ordered two ales. Ramona's eyes feasted on this handsome mobile blood factory. He might make a great slave. Ramona stared at this delicious piece, but she was suddenly repulsed He carried the scent of diseased blood. She gulped down the rest of her drink to wash the rancid taste from her mouth.
Ramona ordered another "Pink Lilith" and continued her hunt for the perfect meal, but lately they have not been as common as they once were. There was one that did seem right. The scent of his blood captured her and so she prepared the trap.
         She sat on the barstool and caught his attention with a quick but piercing glance. She then stared at the door, waiting for someone and looking disappointed when someone came in. She slowly sipped her drink and continued to appear that she was waiting for someone. The man she wanted slowly edged his way towards her. Ramona kept her act going. She added a tear after the next time the door opened and glanced at her watch. She gulped down her drink.
The bartender gave her another Pink Lilith and said it was from the tall red-head gent in the leather jacket. Ramona feigned her surprise and thanked the gentleman. She approached the man.
"Thank you for the drink." She said in timid voice and lowered her eyes. She forced a fleeting look directly into his eyes. "I'm Ramona."
"I'm Malcolm. Malcolm Daide."
"It's nice to meet you, Malcolm." Her eyes scanned his large body underneath his coat. "You're a big boy. I bet you play rugby for Oxford."
Malcolm smiled. "I play football on the weekends with me mates, but I coach rugby for a private school."
Ramona's eyes sparkled. "I didn't know they let someone your age coach. You seem too young." She kept making eye contact with him while he began to glorify his dismal past. She could sense she was wearing him down with flattery and subconscious hypnosis. She reached further into his mind. She could smell his blood and lusted at for a taste when the alcohol.
Malcolm started to feel dizzy. "I don't seem to be feeling well at the moment."
         "No, Malcolm, you don't look well. You need rest. A big boy like you needs lots of rest to keep up with a wisp of girl like me." Ramona smiled. I might need you later or tomorrow. Ask me for my number.
"Could I have you number?" He wrote his number on the back of a napkin. "This is mine. I'm free on the weekends."
"Oh, sure." Ramona wrote hers down and stuffed in his coat pocket. "You won't forget me, will you?"
"I can't seem to get you out of my head, Ramona. Could we get together tomorrow night- if it doesn't work out with your boyfriend?"
"I was thinking of dumping him anyway." Ramona smiled and turned away.
         She found some of her friends sitting at a corner table and she joined them.
"Hey, girl," Sasha greeted when she saw Ramona. "Thought you'd show last night."
"I went north last night." Ramona sipped her drink. "Not much going on."
"Ramona, this is my friend, Brooke. Brooke, this Ramona." smiled Sasha. "She's a new friend of mine. Brooke is going to be a student at London University next week. We met at Regent Park.
Brooke smiled, yet there was a stirring inside saying something about not liking Ramona. Brooke tried to move away from Ramona as discreetly as possible.
Sasha felt she had to say something. "Brooke is a student from America. She's here studying European history."
Ramona smiled politely. "We have plenty of history to go around. What interests you most?"
Brooke inhaled. "I want to focus my studies on Viking, Catholic, and Roman influences that formed the United Kingdom and how these influences were carried to the colonies and later the Commonwealth."
"That's quite ambitious of you. I applaud your efforts in this study." Ramona marveled.
Brooke blushed in the dim light of the corner, hoping no one would see her.
Ramona sipped her drink. "So are you from the Catholic Vikings of Rome?
Brooke wasn't sure if that was an insult. "Both of my parents are Roman Catholic, but my mother's side came from Norway and my father's ancestors fought in the Norman Conquests.
"So is your position for or against?" Ramona asked politely.
Sasha felt the tension rise. Something had to happen before someone exploded and luckily, Gilley and his two buddies, Adrienne and Douglas, showed up. Gilley was a good friend to both Sasha and Ramona and always arrived at the table with a broad smile on his thin face. His hair was short and spiky on the top but the rest was long and flowing to his shoulders.
But Adrienne made Gilley appear normal with his black hair and white stripes above each ear and one thick stripe along the middle of the hair. Douglas also never removed his rose-tinted oval-shaped glasses. He had a smile duplicated from the Devil as he approached the table.
"Good evening ladies." Adrienne stared at Brooke, focusing his eyes on her youthful beauty. "And who is this one who could dim the loveliness of Venus?" He reached to kiss her dainty hand, but he also could get a scent of her blood. He drooled a little. She was ripe like fruit at the height its season and she needed to be harvested now to not lose the flavor of her innocence and untainted blood.
Sasha shot Adrienne a "She's mine!" look and Adrienne stepped back, but now he hungered for Brooke.
"Couldn't we share tonight?" Adrienne whispered to Sasha.
"Find your own. She's mine, Adrienne." Sasha snapped back.
Gilley stood and listened until Adrienne stopped and gave a hello to Ramona. Ramona returned the greeting and invited him to sit down.
"Hey, did you hear about Katie last night?" Gilley started and before anyone could answer, he told them. "We were leaving the club last night and she just fainted. The ambulance took her to Putney Hospital and I haven't heard from her since."
"Have you been to the hospital?" Ramona queried.
"No." Gilley admitted. "I wanted to ride along but they wouldn't let me. I even tried to see her at the hospital, but she had been quarantined. I don't know why. They wouldn't let anyone see her unless they were the next of kin, but fat chance of that, eh?
They all laughed except Brooke.
"Why is that?" Brooke innocently asked. The others were quiet. Ramona announced she was going to the ladies' room. Sasha and Brooke went along with her.
Brooke went into a stall.
Ramona and Sasha washed their hands and faces; Ramona looked at Sasha.
Ramona was a bit angry with Sasha. "Why didn't you tell me earlier?"
"I wanted to but we never had a moment ‘til now! Do you think that Katie's dead?" Sasha splashed some water on her face.
Brooke exited the stall and saw that her friends had no reflections in the mirrors.
"It can't be!" she screamed in disbelief. "Vampires? You can't be vampires? They don't exist!" Brooke darted from the ladies room and pushs her way through the club with Sasha behind the frightened girl. Ramona comes out and sees her friend chasing Brooke and follows both of them
Brooke screamed, "Vampires in the club!" But the line waiting by the doors laughed at her. She scowled at them and ran down the street Sasha exited the club. Brooke was half a block ahead and was able to scurry down the steps to the Underground as Sasha approached the street level stairs. Brooke didn't care where she was heading and jumped on the train leaving the platform.
Sasha watched the train roll out, disappointed and famished.
Sasha turned to Ramona and said, "I hate fast food." Ramona started digging through her purse while Sasha stared into the tunnel. "I just wanted to have a bite."
"Hold the phone!" Ramona said.
"You have an idea?
"No." Ramona replied. "I needed you to hold my cell phone while I find a schedule.
Sasha held on the phone and then it rang.
Sasha answered. "Hello... it's Sasha. Who's this...Dr. Sebastian Bishop? What's up, doc?"
Ramona seized the phone from Sasha. "Hello... Where? I haven't eaten yet... Really...Could Sasha join me...Great... I'll be over." She turned off her phone and smiled at Sasha. "Good news. You can dine with me. Come over around four in the morning
"I'll be there. Has he a victim?'
Ramona formed a sharp smiled. "Private stock."


Chapter 2
         Putney Hospital is very chaotic, dynamic with people everywhere, carrying equipment, supplies and sometimes people. I arrived after two ambulances had brought several people, victims from a collision between a truck hitting one car and sending it into another motorcycle.
I wish I could be of some help.
         I spent two years in emergency medicine before I decided work in hematology. A big step for me, but I had a knack in that medical field. It got me where I am today.
For the moment, I was useless and perplexed. An hour ago, I was in my laboratory when Dr. Phillip Nesmith called me and said he needed for me to look at some blood samples.          Phillip Nesmith and I were old friends from medical school.
One person was being rushed to surgery. Another died in a treatment room. This was not Phil's night. Death was Philip's natural enemy, yet to some tonight, it was their best and last friend.
         He finally came out to see me, appearing very exhausted at the moment. I could feel how tired he really was when he shook my hand.
         "Sebastian, I'm glad you came."
I smile politely when Phillip lets go of my hand.
"Sorry, I was not available this morning. I got back from Glasgow this afternoon and needed some rest." I was hoping that would satisfy him for the moment. He still doesn't know what happened to me and I don't know what he would do if he found out.
"I'm glad you're here now."
"You look as though you could use some rest." I said to him with great concern. He looked as though he has been through a lot in the past several hours.
"I don't know what is going on tonight, but this room has been full since I came here this morning. It reminds me of my father's story of being a medic in the big war."
Ramona enters the Urgency Room and finds me with Dr. Nesmith.
         "What happened?" she asked. "It looks like there was an accident." Ramona turned to Dr. Nesmith. "It's good seeing you, doctor."
         "Hello, Ramona. Good to see you again." Phillip grinned wearily "Yes, there was an accident on Shingle Street. I have a few minutes to show why I have asked you here before the emergency copter arrives in twenty minutes."
We followed Phillip out of the fully occupied Urgency Room to the pathology laboratories. Phillip didn't want to say much and I didn't want to push him. I know the man very well and when he is silent he is saying more than the right words ever could. His walk is regimented. Right now, he is very tense and his head was bent slightly forward instead upright and focused. Right now, Phillip is shouting his frustration and confusion with this situation.
Sitting at a microscope was a young German lab technician. Phillip introduced Rudy Klausseman to me. The young man looked up from the eyepiece at the sound his name and recognized me before I was introduced.
         Rudy beamed. "Dr. Bishop? An honor, sir. I have studied your works including the DNA of DNA. Sir, it is brilliant."
         His expression changed. "I have done two hematocrits, a red cell morphology, even the erythrocyte sedimentation rate and none of them had any red blood cells to speak of. I have been studied many types of blood infection, but, sir, I have never seen anything like this. It is almost opposite than what it should be."
         I listened to him. He might have an observation that would be important. As much as I know, there is no harm is listening what others have to say.
         "Based on all my works, what would be your theory then, Dr. Klausseman?" I ask him gently, genuinely interested in his opinion.
         He was startled by my question. I had "put on him on the spot", but sometimes instinct does supply the better answer than have to think through illogical theories and make them fit the situation. I wanted to know what was going through his mind.
         He looked into the eyepiece and then he looked to me and said, "I would have to say that these cells attack and breaks the erythrocytes down for the protein. I'm not sure what this could be. It looks like something from a horror movie."
         As he rambled and searched for an explanation, I had to take a glance at the sample for myself. Rudy was close with the information he had available to him.
         "Phillip, I know this might be unorthodox, yet I would like full access to the laboratory and files."
         Phillip didn't blink an eye and answered, "I can do that."
         "I would also like one of the vials for my studies."
         Phillip didn't even blink, "I can let you have a vial before you go."
         I felt relieved when he agreed, knowing if the Ministry of Health found out about this we would all be in trouble. Phillip was gambling his career on me and I wanted to make it pay off for him. For right now though, we will have to...
         "Doctor Nesmith!" a nurse called when she entered the lab. "You have to come out here! There's a wild boy in the Urgency Room causing a panic!"
         I followed behind Phillip as he dashed to the Urgency Room. Another nurse pointed to a curtain and Phillip and I approached. He pulled back the curtain and we both saw a boy, about twelve or so with his mouth on a patient's neck.
         The boy glared at us and released a growl and a hiss, blood spilling from his mouth and staining his fangs. The boy attacked with his sharpens nails and raked Phillip's midsection.
         The crowds panicked and backed away. Some fled.
         The boy turned his attention to me and he and I stared eye-to-eye for a moment. He growled like a wolf and leaped over my head. He glided between the crowd and the low ceiling before he landed in an area cleared of people. He didn't glimpse behind him while he ran out the ambulance doors. As fast he was, Ramona was behind him.
         Frightened spectators filed out the door, leaving the medical personnel to attend to the people in the room.
The lad was climbing the building like a lizard. Ramona had run straight up the wall, chasing him to the roof. Most of the crowd stopped to watch, but I found it fortunate that there was a crowd to conceal my next move.
         I slipped in to a shadowy corner and glided up. I witnessed Ramona grip the boy and pull him to the roof by the time I landed. I still had to make my way to the fight.
         I worried about his sharp claws and prayed that Phillip would be all right. At this moment, that boy was my concern. I knew one of them was going to get injured and I had to be prepared for any serious wound.
         The boy attacked with pure animal force, clawing and kicking at Ramona. Ramona defended herself and struck when there was an opening. Ramona was doing her best to subdue the boy and then I appeared. I distract the boy long enough for Ramona to kick the boy with her boot and knocking him to the ground. As I approached Ramona, she was sweating and angry.
         "This little bastard stole the blood of Malcolm! My Malcolm!" she screeched. "I never got a taste. I wanted to wait until the alcohol was out of him before I took his blood! I was saving him for tomorrow night."
         The boy stood up and said nothing. I stared into his eyes and noticed he had the same look as he did in the Urgency Room.
         His expression was savage, not of hate, but like an animal protecting its territory and the prey that it hunts.
His eyes were cloudy and told a story. His intelligence departed and left him in this primitive animalistic state. I could see that to him, this was his hunting ground and he was protecting his kill from us. He was trying to drive from his territory or make us his prey.
         He growled again and lashed out at Ramona. Ramona dodged the attack barely and slammed her elbow into the back of his neck.
         The boy went down and I took advantage. I pinned him to the roof and injected him with enough Demerol to knock out a Sumo wrestler.
         The boy threw me off of him.
         The needle flew from my hand and over the side of the roof.          My existence meant nothing at that moment when I thought of the possibilities of that needle infecting someone.
         I also knew that boy wasn't going to try to leave. He found his hunting ground. I believed he climbed to the roof to claim his land. We imposed on him and he was going to deal with intruders with the only way his mind could comprehend.
         This had to end now.
         Ramona threw herself at the boy and wrestled him. The two rolled around on the gravel roof and Ramona held the boys wrists, keeping his talon-like fingernails a distance from her. I threw the boy off of Ramona and sent him halfway across the roof. He charged at me with everything he had and I managed to flip him on his back.
         He got up again. It seemed that he was growing stronger instead of weakening from the muscle relaxant.
He was granted good fortune and the battle turned when a female doctor had decided to come up the roof to unwind, finding her at his mercy. The boy had his hand around her trachea and he had the possibility to draw blood.
         "Let her go." I said quietly.
He seemed to have found his prey and would let her go. Naturally she yelled.
         "Let her go. You've had your meal for night. Release her, please."
         The doctor struggled and boy growled and bared his fangs. He was about to sink his fangs into her neck.
         Ramona appeared from the shadows and kicked his jaw. The boy loosened his grip and the doctor ran back toward the doorway. Ramona and I were not going to let him capture her again. He was far too dangerous, even by the standards of a vampire, to be loose anyway and anywhere. We both tackled him before he could turn to the door.
I heard something and looked in the night sky. "No. Not now!" I muttered.
         We all heard something that I hoped wouldn't appear. An emergency helicopter with a spot light was approaching us. The boy growled and threw us off of him with renewed strength.

         I landed hard and bounced once. Ramona had been thrown in to the air but she managed to hang in mid-air and wait for right moment to attack. She lowered herself to the roof.
         A team of five had come on to the roof with a stretcher and equipment.
         He was now longer interested in us and decided the helicopter was a bigger threat. He flew at it the helicopter, but he couldn't seem to reach it. He was running out of strength and grabbed on to the landing runners.
         I wasn't sure what I should do.
         All Ramona and I could do is watch the helicopter try to land, unbalanced, because of the added weight. The boy leapt to the roof again. He was going after the medical team now with his claws. Ramona and I got between the medical crew and the boy, driving him back and away from the landing pad as the craft landed.
         The boy renewed his attack of the helicopter and began to claw at the glass, trying to get in. He used all of his remaining strength to smash his fists on the doors.
         The boy backed away, weakened from his attack. He staggered away and from us and the whirlybird to the edge of the roof. He lost his balance. Ramona darted over and managed to catch him. She hung on to him by his jacket collar. I helped lift him to safety, but he was asleep.
The medical team unloaded the helicopter while we examined the boy. I opened his eyelids and with what light there was, I was dazed when I saw the how cloudy his eyes were.
His breathing was raspy while he lay on my arms.
         I had noticed red blotches on his hands also and this raised a series of questions. We had to get him inside and once inside, we were met by the police and a couple of doctors, and luckily one of those doctors was Dr. Klausmann.
         "We have to get him to isolation immediately!" I warned. "Get him to a padded room and get a sample of blood."
         The boy was taken and placed on a gurney and Rudy stepped toward me. "Herr Doctor, we just lost Dr. Nesmith. We lost him on the way up to surgery. I am truly sorry to tell you."
         "How...?"
         "Cardiac damage." He sadly reported to me.
         If I could cry, I would.