New York, New York. A helluva town.
Cynthia and I were very nervous. We were walking past the vampires. We were terrified but we pretended to be joking and fooling around with each other.
I tried to whistle. I tried to pretend that I wasn’t afraid. But I wasn’t making any sound. My mouth felt very dry.
We passed by the vampires. They didn’t smell me. I didn’t smell.
But now something very ominous was happening. A darkened mist seemed to infiltrate the air. And it was getting darker. It was like fog.
And in this darkened atmosphere, where there is no Light, you could now clearly see the demons.
And I saw grey ones. They were horribly disfigured and had spikes protruding from their bodies. They too, like us, were afraid. And the red demons were whipping them. Urging them on. Forcing them to fight.
But it was just the Count.
Why did they need a whole army… to just fight against him?
We were running as fast as we could in the opposite direction. Away from the factory. But it was hard to run through the fog. It was like being encased in mud, from head to toe, and trying to run through it. Or trying to run while you’re under water.
The fog felt like it was alive.
It seemed like an eternity, but we finally ran past the fog.
We were only a block away and now in a normal darkened night.
Cynthia and I looked back.
I saw dragons fighting in the skies. The same kind of dragon that carried off the homeless man. But these were much huger. As big as skyscrapers.
I saw three-headed monsters with horns that had the body of a snake, fighting against them.
They were slithering in the air… just like a snake would slither on the ground. And they would wrap their muscled bodies around the dragons.
I saw what looked like vultures, with beaks as big as a building, swooping down… tearing apart the dragons, piece by piece.
What looked like huge bats, in a swarm, thousands of them… attacking the dragons.
There were also three headed dragons, fighting alongside the other dragons and they were spewing out white fire. They incinerated everything in their path.
There were monstrously deformed vultures engulfed in flames… and crying out from their pain.
I saw what looked like gladiators, each 500 feet tall. Beings that had as skin, a silvery metal, and from their mouths roared death and destruction. A spraying burning liquid acid, deforming and piercing through everything that it touched.
They were helping the dragons.
There were beings that looked like hyenas, that stood erect, with two bronze legs, and with claws as big as a building. They were tearing into the dragons.
I stopped looking. I didn’t want to see anymore.
My sister screamed! “Look!”
A huge lightning bolt lit up the sky, cutting it, and it started pouring drops of blood. And then the sky split in two. Like the Red Sea. And in the middle was a blackened portal. The entrance to hell. To unbelievable horror.
And some of the dragons, still alive, were being dragged there. And so were the people.
You could hear the people pleading for mercy. Crying out for help. Even crying out to a God that they had long ago abandoned.
Now it was too late.
I remembered the line in a movie, “As darkness envelops the Light, the Souls of the people will also be enveloped in darkness.”
I put my hands over my ears. I couldn’t bear to hear the screams from the people anymore. Both Cynthia and I felt like crying. But there were no tears to shed. No drops to display how awful the horror was.
Vampires don’t cry.
There was a loud roaring explosion. It shook the ground. The night was engulfed in flames. The sky was burning.
There were cars underneath the explosion, parked on the ground… they melted.
Cynthia and I could feel the heat and started running.
I now realized that everything that the Count told me was a lie. He made me believe that he didn’t have any power. But they would have never assembled such a great army just to destroy an ordinary vampire.
Who was he really?
When we arrived at our apartment… We were both still shocked.
I found myself staring straight ahead. Deep in thought. I looked at my sister, and she was staring straight ahead.
I wondered what type of horror the Count had witnessed over the centuries… he was always staring straight ahead. Was he Imprisoned by the thoughts of his past? Shackled to a history that he could not undo. And a loneliness known only to those that experience unbelievable horror. Or a loneliness known only to those that orchestrate it.
I didn’t sleep that night. I would never sleep again.
I noticed as the night advanced, how incredibly strong I felt. I also had a better sense of hearing, sight, and smell.
I saw a vision. It appeared right in front of me.
I was in a Church… No! It was a large auditorium. There were beings arguing with me. They weren’t people.
My eyes started burning. A fire was lit inside them. It was a raging inferno.
They exploded and engulfed the whole auditorium. Everything was on fire. And the creatures were burning and writhing in pain.
I walked through the flames… like I was walking through air. Unharmed.
I tried to look away, but the vision continued and I was motionless… paralyzed.
I saw different kingdoms. Different cultures. Human beings and those that were not. And I saw a plague… a Black Death. This disease was merciless… heartless. It killed everyone in its path.
It was a raging inferno that could not be contained.
It was the Black Death.
Someone lit the match. Someone lit the match.
Everything was scorched… consumed. Everything became ashes. It was a burning ring of fire. And it burns, burns, burns.
I lit the match!
I was the Black Death.
I turned everything into black ashes.
Is this real?
The night embraces me. It coddles me. It protects me.
Darkness is my cover.
A veil that shields me. Conceals me.
I am the fire that lights up the darkness. When I want to be seen… I burn.
I am a spark from the nether world.
Born in hell.
Immortal!
I consume everything that I touch.
I’m a scorching, penetrating fire that brings fear into people’s eyes. To meet me… is to invite unbelievable horror and terror into your life.
I am not a vampire. The vampire is my host. I feed off of it. I live through it.
It hides me.
I remain in the shadows. Unknown… unseen.
A parasite.
Count Vampiro was not a vampire. That was his costume.
The vision ended.
I stood in my living room and looked around. My sister was standing up and looking straight ahead. I started staring straight ahead. My eyes burned.
I hissed.
All of this happened two hundred years ago.
And we’re still searching.
Myself, my sister and Elvira. If the Count was still in this world… he would have contacted us by now. If dead… there is nothing else that we can do for him. If imprisoned and enslaved… we would have to fight our way past the gates of hell to retrieve him.
We continue to look for the girl with no name. She is our only link. And as we look for her… we are gathering our own army.
My sister and I do not feed off of the blood of people. Neither does Elvira. We only feed off of vampires. And we are their mortal enemies.
And so, our legend grows.
Photo by David Knieradl on Unsplash
Fictional stories by John Saccone 
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