cw: strong language

II.

When Sayre opened his eyes, it was to slam his hand down on the annoying chirp of his alarm clock. It had kicked on the radio to his favorite station and halfway into the verse of the latest hit song. He rolled to his back and drilled his palm into his eyes, but eventually he sat himself up and stared through the polarized glass window where a giant polygonal ray of sunshine warmed him.

“Mornin’, you cheeky bitch,” he groaned to the sun.

He slumped out of bed, holding back a yawn, and scratched his stomach and around a new tattoo on his side through his ragged and beat-to-shit band shirt. In his little kitchen, he cranked open the fridge door and pounded back a quick shot of blood and V8 (his own morning blend he’d been ingesting since their launch back in the 40s). He wiped it with the back of his hand. Tired eyes stared at the fridge door and the various flyers for bands, upcoming album releases, and business cards of assholes in the city he would, quote, ‘keep an eye on.’ He blinked apathetically for a long moment, then left the empty carafe in his little metal sink and showered.

As he dressed, he bopped along and hummed lyrics to himself from the cassette player of his own personal mixtape. Some Queen, Misfits, The Clash, Ramones, Blondie, Suicidal Tendencies, The Descendents, and about a dozen more. He’d rather have kicked on his turntable, but the need to hear all of the songs he loved made the Leaning Tower of Pisa of mixtapes next on his bedside table worth it. 

His comb and fingers twisted his bleached hair, a potent and jarring departure from his ruddy-brown. He sank to the edge of his bed as he tied down his Doc Martens (a quick, “Hello, doctor,” muttered through his lips), then fluffed the edge of his leather jacket.

One hundred years later, in 1980–whatever, Sayre sported his favored pair of jeans, band shirt, and leather jacket littered with patches and pins, and buttons. Punk rock had been around for a few years by then, but since the inception and popularization of rock ‘n’ roll, he had always been a fan. What wasn’t to love? It felt alive, and bare. For Sayre, all the sub-genres of it hit him in some way. They felt human. No lies about what it felt like. It was honest. The yearning, the anger, the screaming, the hope, the frustrations, the love. Listening to it was the most he had felt human, in a long time.

He left his apartment and shuffled down the building’s stairs into the busy streets. The same city, only bigger, dirtier, fuller. By now, it was his oldest friend, and honestly he couldn’t have asked for anyone better. So long as he was good to it, it was good to him. After all, all these years later, he was still alive. Still well-fed. Still—

Sayre lit a cigarette at a corner, doing the same for the pedestrian’s beside him. Together they crossed the street, but Sayre split off down an alley and through a heavy warehouse door, and straight through the open space, past the silent stage, and to the bar at the back.

“Isn’t it a little early to see your ugly mug?” said the bartender, Leah—short black hair, a nose-ring, and a white tank that didn’t hide the polka-dot bra beneath—as she poured a shot.

“It’s never too early.” Sayre sat on a stool and leaned into the bar, towards her. He lifted the shot with “Don’t tell me, you missed me?” before he threw it back. A finger tapped his cigarette over an ashtray.

“You? Ha!” Leah leaned into him, then she swiped the cigarette from his lips, took two long pulls, and put it out. “You have visitors.”

Sayre’s face twisted. “At…ten o’clock in the fuckin’ morning?” She pointed and Sayre glanced in the direction. “The gaggle of black clothes, slicked back hair, and enough velvet for a vampire porno?” he said as he reached for his still smoldering cigarette in the metal ashtray. 

“Yes. Go talk to them, they’re scaring my customers,” Leah ordered through her teeth.

The returned cigarette bounced on his lips.“You don’t have any customers.” 

“Exactly!”

Sayre tapped a finger on the bar. Leah glared, but poured him another shot. He threw it back, gave her wink, then turned to deal with—

“Sayre,” growled the group. They cornered him at the bar. Leah slunk away towards something on the far end. Her eyes were as glued to the men around Sayre as his were. Some of them massaged their knuckles.

“Dr. Acula and the Fangasms.”

“What?” one of them asked, but another continued on. “Come with us.”

“Where?” Sayre eyed them.

“The Den wants to speak with you.”

“Which den?”

“The Den.” Two from the group dropped hands on him and pulled him along as he protested: “Hey, hey! The jacket!” all the way through the back room and to the basement. It was always a basement. Maybe if his kind didn’t worry so much about politics and territory, and more on modern inventions, they too could have beautiful apartments and homes above ground, but Sayre didn’t follow the doctrine of his kind. He had always done things his own way. Maybe that’s why he lived as many centuries as he had.

For the most part, the Dens left him alone. Not that they could do much, he was one of the few who had grown beyond a shadow-walker. He was sun-blessed now. A secret he would take to his never-grave.

The group of Velvet-and-Hissing pushed open a padded door that led down into a large room. An underground music venue. On the stage, a long table with a lit candelabra, decanters of wine and blood, and bowls of snacks. Farther away, he could see a leg peeking from behind a curtain—still and dead. 

His kind lived for theatrics and dramatics. Sayre just wanted peace and quiet.

Up the side-stairs and at the edge of the long table, Dr. Acula and the Fangasms left him. Sayre twisted and fluffed his jacket with a grunt and growl, but was silenced by a chuckle.

“Sayre,” greeted an older man at the other end of the table—the head of the table. He dabbed a napkin across his lips, then stood. A well-dressed man in a large, navy suit, with white collars and sleeves. A golden signet ring on his pinky. Slicked back hair on his balding head. The profane ability to sneeze the words: “stocks!” and consequentially see white power spew out. A Wall Street shark. The Den Leader smiled, and his fangs glistened. “Salutations. It’s been some time.”

Not long enough. Sayre rolled his eyes. 

Younger vampires tended to lean harder into more traditional ways of speech. One den, to his great annoyance, felt that hand-written, wax-sealed correspondences trampled the use and glory of an answering machine, or a phone call, or even a telegraph. His desk became littered with the broken discs of wax seals, and eventually the discs of their spines when he had had enough of them. What was the point of seeing humans invent wonders across the years if you never used them? He shouted something similar to them as he cracked their vertebrae apart like pieces of a chocolate bar. The only way to survive was to evolve, adapt.

“Sure has, Walter,” Sayre said, thinking of that moment. No reason. “What do you want?” 

“It’s been years since we’ve last had a—Well, since we’ve had a nice, long chat. Let’s drink, and catch up.” The smile was as fake as the invitation. 

Sayre knew a trap when he saw one. He crossed his arms. His jacket squeaked. “What do you want?” he repeated, flatter.

That shark’s grin of Walter's broke from the waters of pretense. The maw of teeth bared; as much as Walter’s fangs copied. A thick finger pointed and the grace Walter tried to exude crumbled like a jenga tower made out of wet noodles.

“Funny, how you think you can talk to me like this. The disrespect! After I allow you in my city. After I allow you to fuck about, and do god’s knows what!” Walter’s accent weighed down every word. An accent that he had heard change over the decades of the New—whatever—City.

“Your city? I’ve been here decades longer than you.” Centuries, even.

“Doesn’t matter!” Walter stepped closer and wrapped an arm around Sayre.  “There’s no reason we can’t be pals. Be buds.” He punched a fist into Sayre’s shoulders lightly, a show of camaraderie (and threat). It only made Sayre tense more. “When I rescued this den,” —he didn’t, it was a hostile takeover and coup— “they assured me you wouldn’t be a problem, Sayre. Now—you ain’t gonna be a problem for me, are you?” They didn’t so much say Sayre wouldn’t be a problem, as they did: don’t be a problem for Sayre.

Sayre’s glare narrowed. “Don’t jerk me around, you twat. I am far, far older than you.”

Walter lifted another hand and pulled on the edges of Sayre’s jacket, threateningly. “Answer the question.”

Sayre fingers wrapped around Walter’s wrist and bent it backwards until the middle-aged looking man was on his knees, wailing. As Sayre pressed Walter’s face into the ground with his boot, a dozen guns lifted and aimed at him.

“Bullets?” Sayre laughed, angry now. “You think bullets will do anything!”

Walter squirmed and groaned.

Sayre grunted and kicked Walter away. He watched as the den-leader scrambled to his feet, then came charging back at Sayre. The guns never lowered.

“I’m done, you lousy piece of shit! Done! I ain’t playing no more Mister-Nice-Guy! Take a fuckin’ seat! Or” —Walter laughed, cackled, a threat he had made a dozen times before, when we was with a different sort of den— “I break your fuckin’ knees so you have to sit. Your choice.”

“You can certainly try.” A hand fell on Sayre’s shoulder with a vice grip. He snarled, “There’s a reason the last den-leader left me alone, Walter. And the one before that. …And the one before that.”

Walter soured. “You think just because you’re fuckin’ old, you get to do whatever the hell you want? Not in my city! Not—”

“Enough!” Sayre roared as he invoked the voice of an Old One. The lights flickered. The table and chairs shook. The glasses and plates clattered. The ground rumbled. His voice boomed, layered with the centuries: “Last time: What the fuck do you want?”

A spooked but still very angry Walter shook his head and meaty finger at Sayre. “You, you’re no-good. You’re trouble. I want you outta my city! I ain’t protecting you no more!”

The sour, festering scowl of Sayre’s expression changed. His voice normalized. “Protecting? From what?”

“Who.”

“Whom?” Sayre pressed. “Protecting me from whom?”

“’pparently, I ain’t the only den-leader you’ve pissed off. I ain’t even the only leader you’ve pissed off.”

“The hell are you talkin’ about?”

“Word is…there’s a coven looking for you, and the word is, they’re mighty pissed off…at you.” Walter poked a finger to Sayre, but when a single glance from the older vampire lingered, and darkened, he reeled it back.

“I don’t deal with witches any more.” Sayre crossed his arms over his chest again. “I haven’t—”

“In a hundred years?”

“…Something like that.”

“You know, I’ve read the documents. Boring, really.” Walter moved back to his seat at the head of the table. “What happened?”

“None of your fuckin’ business.”

“I’ve made it mine. Think of it as…retroactive payment. I protected you, you owe me.”

Sayre snorted, but he said nothing. His teeth gnashed together.

Walter sat and took a long drink from his glass. “Where’s the witch, Sayre?”

“What witch?”

“The Witch. The High-fucking-Priestess? That Witch. The fuckin’ witch—rumor has it—that you used to work for. The fuckin’ witch—rumor fuckin’ has it—you used to—”

“Watch yourself,” Sayre snarled. “That witch…is dead. You wanna know how I know? ’Ccause I’m the one who killed her.” He threw up a hand and spun away. “The next time you want to talk, it will be on my terms, Walter. Don’t bother me again.”

“Sayre!” Walter stood and slammed his hands on the table. “Does a witch named Hazel mean anything to you?”

Sayre stopped. His expression sank. He turned to meet the satisfied grin on Walter’s face.

“Word is…Hazel’s coven is out for revenge. Witches are a spiteful sort. They’re not going to let it go. If it’s true, if you killed their High-Priestess, then I want you gone. Don’t you dare bring that fuckin’ fury to my city.”

“What,” Sayre snorted, “you afraid of a couple witches?”

“I am, when the current High-Priestess is out for blood, because you killed the last one.” Walter threw down the napkin he'd picked up after his attempt to resume his meal failed. “I am, when I don’t wanna be cursed for all of fuckin’ eternity with my dick in a twist and ‘Walkin On Sunshine’ in my head on fuckin’ repeat!” he barked. “So take your old-ass outta my city, and pray that I don’t kick you out myself.”

Sayre stared. The arms across his chest tensed, until he couldn’t hold it back any longer. He cackled until he cried. He cackled and laughed until he had to lean forward to the table to hold himself up and wipe tears from his eyes. 

“Oh, oh,” he said as it finally died, “Walter, Walter, Walter.” Sayre shook his head with disappointment.  The joviality of his voice snapped cold, like a broken neck. His eyes burned black and red, and furious. “A Coven of witches, or me? One of us is already in your den. One of us already knows where you sleep. One of us” —he lifted a hand gently, and with it the settings of Walter’s food, from his drink to his fork, floated in the air at Sayre’s beck and call— “has had centuries of cultivating powers. …Who do you really think you should be afraid of?”

“Get out of my city, Sayre,” Walter quivered.

“Get out of mine!” Sayre scoffed. His hand dropped, and so did everything that hung in the air. It all came clattering and thumping down in an instant. He bore his eyes into Walter, snarled with his fangs still bared. A final warning. Then, Sayre turned, pushed past Dr. Acula and the Fangasms—guns still aimed but dumbfounded—and shouted, “Don’t bother me, again!”