Diamond and Chris walked down a pathway in Blackgroove Cemetery and Diamond slowly rotated as they walked to survey the landscape. Chris kept walking in a straight line to the dumpsite and once there Diamond stopped rotating. 

“Anything out of place with those special eyes of yours?” Chris asked as he looked into the shallow grave that the body was found. “She was barely covered, as if he couldn’t be bothered.”

“Because he didn’t care, she was a failed experiment.” Diamond said and her back was to the grave. “He did this at night or people would see him in this wide open area.” 

The cemetery had little tree coverage and the tallest grave was barely three feet tall. There weren't many lights around the area and would make it easier to sneak around at night rather than in daylight.

“Makes sense,” Chris said as he bent down to look closer at the grave. “Is that sensitive nose of yours picking up an odd scent?” 

Diamond looked over her shoulder before looking back forward, “There were a few faint vampire scents but most of them didn’t come this way.” Diamond said and took a deep inhale through her nose. “Sewer and vampire strongest around the grave.”

“Which way does it lead to?” Chris asked as he stood up and Diamond turned to her right. “Lead the way and I will follow.”

Diamond started to follow the scent she picked up with light trot and Chris trailed behind. Diamond stopped at the east side of the cemetery steel bar fence. “Go limp.” Diamond said.

“Wh-” Chris was cut off when Diamond put him in a fireman's carry before using her super strength to leap over the fence. When she landed on the other side she put him back on his feet. “Okay…thank you for the warning.” 

“I didn’t forget.” Diamond said as she waited for Chris to get his legs back. Once Chris got his legs Diamond continued to follow the scent and Chris followed Diamond closely. 

The scent led them to an old abandoned underground sewer tunnel drainage and Diamond covered her nose as she winced. “It leads to the old sewer tunnels.” Diamond said. “Makes sense he works in those tunnels.”

“Can you keep following the scent?” Chris asked and Diamond took a step back shaking her head no. “Going in there without a map or trail we would get lost for sure.” 

“Bastard probably thought to use the smell of the old sewer smell to hide his trail from a cleaner like me.” Diamond said and she knew if she had trouble other cleaners would be lost. “Also a homeless vampire won’t question seeing another homeless vampire traveling through these tunnels.” 

“A lot of homeless vampires use old subway tunnels as home bases, maybe he is doing something like for his lab.” Chris said and started to back up as the smell was getting to him. “Those two tunnels tend to connect from walls breaking down.”

“We should get maps of old subways and sewer tunnels.” Diamond said and grabbed Chris’ coat to gently pull him away from drainage. Chris didn’t fight it and his phone went off.

Chris pulled it out his cell phone and put it to his ear. “Office Quinn,” Chris said and paused before turning pale. “Understood, we’re on our way.” 

Chris and Diamond drove up to an alleyway that was taped up with police tape and the two got out of Chris’ truck. There were other police cars there and Diamond saw Nix’s van as well. 

Chris flashed his badge to get past the tape with Diamond and the two walked towards Nix, who was over a dead body. Nix looked to them, “Her name was Alex Cornwood.” Nix said and handed Chris a driver license. 

“She’s barely twenty years old.” Chris said as he looked at the driver license before handing it back to Nix. “Diamond c-”

“Very fresh, this way.” Diamond interrupted Chris and started to follow the scent from before with fast trot. Chris took after her without question and led to another abandoned sewer tunnel drainage opening under an overpass. “Get your gun ready.” 

“Alright, lead the way,” Chris said as he took out his pistol and a flashlight. Diamond turned to the drainage and walked into it with Chris behind her. 

The smell of the sewer was strong to Chris and it would have been strong to Diamond but she had a strong grip on the vampire scent that was on the newest victim’s body. It allowed her to block out the smell of sewer and Chris heard bone cracking as she shifted only her forearms.

The scent led them through several twisted turns and it felt like hours of walking only to lead them to incave blockage. “A deadend?” Chris whispered as slowly moved his light to see if he could spot an opening.

“No,” Diamond said as she pointed to a large piece of rubble to the right of them. Chris used his light to look at him then pointed it to the bottom of rubble and saw drag marks on the ground. “Cover me.”

As Diamond walked to the rubble Chris pointed his gun to the rubble and kept an eye out for any vampire movement. Diamond easily slid the rubble to the side and once done moving, there was silence for a few seconds from the hole behind it. 

“Tougher than steel warrior first.” Chris said and Diamond made a small smirk before returning to a serious face. She looked down the hole to smell stale air that didn’t smell like sewer. 

“Abandoned subway is my bet.” Diamond whispered as she walked through the hole and Chris followed right behind her. In seconds they were in an abandoned subway that had few subway carts in it. “Stay alert.” 

Chris slowly moved his light but stopped on the wall as he noticed some writing on the wall. At first he thought it was bad graffiti but he started to notice it was names connected with lines. “A family tree…” Chris whispered as it dawned on what was written. Chris put his light in his mouth and took out his phone to take quick pictures. 

Diamond slowly moved into carts in the station and noted a lot of papers scattered on the benches. One bench was cleared with a blanket and a pillow, “This is where he sleeps and writes his notes.” Diamond whispered.

“He has a family tree written on the wall, I saw the girls’ name on it.” Chris said as he entered the carts and looked around the cart. His eyes locked on a small booklet and he picked it up. “So this is his office.”

“His lab may be close to here.” Diamond said and her ear twitched as she heard a click and her nose finally picked up C4. Diamond acted as she tackled Chris out of the cart and closer to where they came in from as there was a loud boom.

Chris' ears were ringing and dust that flew up from the explosion made him unable to see. He felt something grab her shirt and started to drag him, his reaction was to grab what grabbed him only to feel fur. “Diamond?!” He yelled and the smell of sewer hit his nose.

Chris’ eyes adjusted to darkness as they entered the sewers and could see Diamond’s shadowy silhouette in the dark. He had dropped his flashlight but he fumbled to take his phone out to use its light.

“Can you stand?” Diamond’s voice was slightly muffled to Chris as he turned on the light. Diamond flinched from the light in her eyes and Chris looked to his legs with the light. 

“No broken bones or blood.” He said loudly as he shifted to stand up and he did grab Diamond’s shoulder for a second. “Bastard booby trap his own home.”

“Ya, lucky I smelt the C4 and heard him trigger it.” Diamond said and Chris noticed a bit of blood on Diamond’s forehead. “Sorry about not warning you when I tackled you.”

“No problem, you got some blood on your forehead.” Chris said and Diamond just shrugged it off. “What about me?”

“A little bit but nothing bad, just one that tends to bleed a lot.” Diamond said and grabbed Chris’ wrist. “Let’s get back to the surface.” Chris nodded with thumbs up as Diamond gently guided Chris out of the sewers. 

“Stop moving,” Nix snarled as was trying to patch Chris’ cut just about his brow. “Or do I have to strap you down?”

“Sorry, I’m just trying to read this family tree.” Chris said as she leaned back in his desk chair and stopped moving for Nix. “Can you read that book I got?”

“No, it looks like slavic of some sort.” Diamond said as sat on the window sill looking at the booklet that Chris had picked up. Diamond glanced at Nix and she shook her head no as to knowing slavic.

“Slavic, makes sense why the top names of this family tree are hard to read.” Chris said. “While the lower down on the tree are more modern names.” 

“Wait, go back to that top name.” Nix said and Chris went back to the top name and noticed a red like cross beside the name. “That's a vampire ankh, it’s used on vampire family trees with human offspring.” 

“Of course, he is aiming for humans with vampire ancestors,” Diamond said as she stood up from the window sill. “Ya, look at this here, this vampire had children with a human and all of them must have been human.”

“That’s strange, why would all of them be humans though.” Chris asked. “I mean shouldn’t it be a fifty fifty chance of being one or the other no matter which parent is the vampire?”

“In therianthrope, yes but in vampires it depends on the gender.” Nix said. “For example if you and I have a child and the child was born male then it would be human.”

“Looking closer at these pictures it’s clear the vampire was female,” Diamond said as point to the name beside the vampire name. “The children share the same surname as the human parent.” 

“So all they had were human children and the rest of this tree are humans.” Chris said and paused as he looked at more modern names. “Wait…wait if he’s targeting females of this blood because their vampire ancestor was female.”

“Maybe he thinks the vampire gene works best in the females of this family for his experiments.” Nix said and Diamond started to look at names. “We should try to find these ladies.”

Diamond froze up as she read the most modern names and rushed to pull out her cell phone but tossed it onto Chris’ desk. Her phone screen was broken to hell from the explosion, “Shit!” Diamond said and started to run full speed to the stairwell door.

“Diamond, where's the fire?!” Chris yelled out before looking back at the image, “What did she see?” 

Diamond was running up the stairwell of her apartment building and once on her floor she rushed down the hallway. She stopped in front of apartment thirty-two and banged on the door, “AZIZA!” Diamond yelled loudly and kept hitting the door.

The door swung open by Aziza and Diamond rushed into the apartment. “Diamond, what’s wrong?” Aziza asked as Diamond was scanning the room.

“Where’s Layla?” Diamond asked and noticed Layla’s shoes were missing. “Start calling her and tell her to come back to the apartment.”

Aziza pulled out her phone and called Layla’s number. “She’s not picking up.” Aziza said after it Layla didn’t answer. “She was just heading to the store to get some things for supper.”

“Keep trying and follow me.” Diamond said as rushed out of the apartment. Aziza slipped on her shoes and followed Diamond out of the apartment while trying to get hold of Layla. 

The two rushed down to the streets and Aziza started to panic before noticing something, “Layla’s car is still here.” Aziza pointed out. Diamond and Aziza rushed to her car and didn’t see any broken glass. 

Diamond’s ear twitched on hearing a phone going off in the alleyway and the two rushed over to the sound. Diamond spotted an over the shoulder purse, keys, and set of keys. Diamond could smell Layla’s scent on purse and the vampire’s scent was lingering in the area. Diamond’s blood turned cold as she knew Layla was kidnapped by that mad man.