Strong and silent was the best way to be. That way, no one would get an inkling as to what you could bring to the party, and they sure as hell weren’t going to spot any chinks in your armor.

Kelita pushed her head flat against the roof of the van. Her arms and legs were outstretched as she gripped. The vehicle twisted and turned down the backstreets on its way to its destination. She had no reason to look until it slowed. Then, she could inform Maria about where they were.

Her head bobbed up and down as the van slowed and traveled down the cobbled alleyway. The van crawled at snail pace. Kelita cocked her head as the low rumble of small metal wheels crept across the runner of the gateway. The slab of rust-colored metal inched its way inside the wall. She saw hordes of vlads milling around, and she saw the honey-like glow in their eyes, just as her own fired with the color of reckoning.

The vehicle pulled into the yard. Kelita reached up and took hold of the chunky water pipe which crossed the gate opening. Her arms and legs were locked together as she slithered to the end, away from the guard’s station. She cast another glance over the vlads as she pondered over the best way to tackle the onslaught she’d face. Yes, the future onslaught that would come once Sanders gave the order. Kill ‘em all!

She had a significant advantage, apart from the numbers the vlads had increased to. She saw how the Dixie Mafia girl had dealt with the vlads. An authentic blade and a clear-cut to the throat was enough to sever enough of the spinal column to prevent them from recovering.

She saw a couple of guys dragging a jack across the yard. “The tires are shot,” she heard one shout to another, who was inside the loading bay. A female voice answered and told them to be quick. They’d need the van very soon.

She watched the van lift as the guy pumped the jack up. The second guy popped off a pair of chrome hubcaps.

Hmm, it appears now I have what I was looking for.

With a few cracks of the bolts; the guys started rolling the two tires into the loading bay. Kelita dropped to the ground, silently. Her arms were outstretched and poised. She was ready for action. She stood and huddled her way to the van. She eased the hubcaps from the ground surface and vanished into the shadows.

Shit, I can’t hold them. And they aren’t very sharp.

Her back pushed, and she was hard up against the shadow-filled corner as she called on her hybrid wolf. Her body juddered as her claws pushed through the thin leather gloves. She placed her claws against the steel and pushed. The buckled steel popped like a can of sardines. Her fist clenched and the steel folded in her grasp. The second folded the same way, and now she required a good cutting edge. The veins in her neck bulged and tendons tensed as her hybrid snout pushed from the front of her face. Her tongue ran along the inside of her mouth and she felt the razor-sharp tips of her fangs. It was a long shot, but she had nothing to lose. She bit into the edge of the hubcap. The taste of rusted metal filled her mouth and mixed with the saltiness of her blood. She stared at the jagged edge. If it was enough to cut her, then it was good enough to deal with the vlads.

Kelita finished the second and spat the last pieces of metal onto the ground. Her fingers fitted snugly into the handles she’d made. She swung a couple of practice swings and thought it was a good weapon she’d fabricated from almost nothing. She called back her inner wolf, and her snout receded. The trickle of blood remained at the corner of her mouth. However, that’d be gone or covered by a lot more by the time the night was over.

The question was, where was she? She needed to message Maria.

The vlads went inside, apart from the two who were attending to the tires. They wheeled the new tires back in the direction of the yard. Kelita stood. The light from outside now cast her shadow in front of the two vlads. They stopped rolling and looked up. Kelita raised her eyebrow as the guys realized she wasn’t one of them.

The wheels rolled slowly down the slope as they released them and turned into their vlad forms. One wheel moved faster down the incline, and one wobbled and fell over like a spinning coin that reached its final turn.

Kelita held one hand outstretched in front of her. She flicked the hubcap back in her direction, signaling for the vlads to bring it on. Her other hand was held behind her head. The vlads parted and attempted to flank her from both sides. They lunged at the same time. The vlad on the right never recognized Kelita, but he realized it was his hubcap that flashed before him as steel teeth ripped flesh from his neck. Vlad two tried to call the alarm. As his jaw opened, Kelita rammed the silver-colored disc hard into his mouth. He tried to bite and pull back as Kelita swung her free arm.

She stepped back and thought how effective her new weapons were. One vlad lay motionless as the other quivered on the ground. His head would’ve shaken with his body, but it was still clamped to the hubcap which hung from Kelita’s hand. She lowered it to the ground and wedged her boot against the side of his head. She yanked the metal from its death grip and kicked his head underneath the van.

From the loading bay she opened the door. There were red and gold walls. Large red drapes were also placed in a significant way, and what used to be a blood-red carpet also still remained.

It looks like a cinema?

She texted Maria: Location. Here now. Check old cinemas, or something similar. I’m going in.

She turned off her phone and slid it into the breast pocket of her black leather vest. All the vlads were down in the lobby or filling the staircase. Kelita realized it wasn’t a cinema. It was a theater, and she knew precisely which one it was.“The Carver.”

She rushed to the door under the large staircase. She bolted it behind her, and she saw it led to the rear of the stage. Steps led to a steel gantry which ran from one side to the other. She climbed. The echo of her footfall rattled around the eaves. She crept forward, her eyes fixed on what laid beneath the steel walkway.

The light hit the floor as she approached the stage.

She saw Dustin tied to the chair. There were puddles of blood under where his fingers hung from the arms of the chair. His head was bowed, but she heard his breath. Slowly.

“Rise and Shine,” she heard from the back of the theater.

She glanced around the edge of the curtain. Her eyes were blinded by the spotlights. She squinted to focus. A hubcap hit the gantry. She froze and crouched. She pulled the back of her arm to her eyes.

Muddled patterns flashed against her eyelids. She heard a voice shout to check out the noise, and she heard footsteps start to climb up the staircase. She looked up and saw a large rat wiggling its nose at her. She cuffed it with the hubcap and watched it fall to the stage.

“It’s only a damned rat.”

The footsteps stopped and faded as they changed direction again. She stepped further forward. She sat, center stage, and watched as they carried Kelvin in and bound him to a chair opposite Dustin.

Kelvin looked around when the hood was removed. Kelita knew he was looking for her. “Wake him up,” she heard Sanders say.

A vlad picked up a pale of water and threw it against Dustin's limp body. His head flew back, and he gasped as his lungs filled. She saw his face. There was one eye closed and swollen, it was the size of a golf ball. Blood also covered one side of his chin. Dustin lifted his body, and Kelita saw the things protruding from the ends of his fingers.

“Holy fuck,” she mumbled to herself.

“You’re fucking dead. How could you?” Kelvin screamed. He had a huge lump in his throat. Tears streamed from his eyes. He shook his body as he tried to call for his inner wolf, but he was restrained too tightly.

Sanders slowly walked around Dustin and Kelvin in a figure of eight. Kelita saw his sadistic grin and his egotistical sense of achievement.

“Now you both understand… I always get what I want.”

Hours had drifted by.

Sanders beamed a smile as he came back in. “Everything’s almost in place. There’s only one thing remaining, and it’ll all be over.”

Dustin spluttered. Congealed blood dripped from his chin onto his shirt. “Kelvin, don’t tell him anything. Maria and Gabriel will sort it out.”

“Ooooh! Your beloved Maria and that human you’re doing all this for,” Sanders said, now waving his hands in front of him in a mock-scared gesture. “Well! It looks like you won’t tell. Either of you. That’s okay, I have your gris-gris, and I’ve also got the key. I’m sure I can convince someone in the Dirty D to tell me where the shaman is.”

“They won’t tell you shit,” Kelvin remarked.

“Ah! That’s where you’re wrong. It doesn’t have to be in words. Actions speak so much louder than what’s said,” Sanders replied, now pacing around in his never-ending loop. “I know it’s by a church. A process of elimination. That’s all it’ll take.”

Sanders tugged on his glove. The leather tightened as he clenched his fist. He slammed his fist into Kelvin's face. Kelvin's head spun to the side. He exhaled as anger filled up inside him, even though he was unable to do anything.

“Is that all you have?” he asked, spitting onto the floor.

Sanders punched him again. His knurled knuckle bounced off Kelvin's eyebrow. Blood started to trickle and ran past the corner of his eye. Kelvin's head fell from side to side as Sanders vented his frustration on Kelvin's face. He was made all the angrier as Kelvin continued to laugh at him.

Kelita saw it was time. Sanders could take the Dirty D into his own hands. He had the key as he’d said. So, neither Kelvin nor Dustin was of any further use. She grabbed one of the large ropes and wrapped the end around her leg. Her hand gripped above her head as she slipped from the side of the gantry. The rope frayed with the first swipe of her teeth, just like the edge of the hubcap had. She gritted her teeth and lashed out again. The creak of a pulley filled the rafters as she started to drop toward the stage. Sanders never noticed Kelita hanging above him.

“You’d better get rid of these two,” Sanders said, flicking his hand to dismiss them as nothing more than rubbish. And you better torch thi…”

“Hey there,” Kelita said with a huge grin. She dropped from the end of the rope. The thud of her boots echoed around the theater.

“Who in God's name are you?”

Kelvin laughed. His chest heaved, and his saliva-covered chin lifted. “You dumb motherfucker. You think you’re so righteous. You don’t know shit.”

Sanders smacked Kelvin with the back of his hand. “We only need you for your blood.”

“My god, haven’t you realized yet? I’m no hybrid.”

“Of course you are, you’re the firstborn.”

The light patter of Kelita’s boots got louder as she walked toward Dustin and slashed his binds. She faced to the rear doors of the theater as vlads started to file their way in and walk toward the stage.

Kelvin leaned his head to his side and spat a large mouthful of blood onto the floor. It splattered on Sanders’ shoes. “The first male born. Not firstborn.” Sanders looked puzzled, and he turned to look at Kelita. Dustin had his hands to his mouth as he tugged with his teeth on the pins shoved underneath his fingernails.

“So your brother, you have a brother who’s the firstborn?” he snapped. Kelvin shook his head as Sanders shook him by the shoulder. “Tell me where he is!”

Kelvin looked up. “It’s like déjà vu, it bit you in the ass last time you had me, and it’s gonna do it again.” He laughed, nodding across the stage. “I think you should meet my guardian angel.”

Sanders turned. Dustin started to stand as Kelita took meaningful footsteps in his direction. He heard Kelvin's voice behind him.

“I’d like to introduce you to the firstborn. The hybrid you wanted. My twin sister.”

Sanders stepped back. He knew it couldn’t be. All the effort. Kelvin was a waste of time and his sister… she was, she was —female. He needed a firstborn male. Kelvin or anyone else had never mentioned he had an older twin sister. There was only one thing he could do. He had to find the one he knew was a real firstborn male.

“Oh well! It’s back to plan A, I suppose,” Sanders said. He edged nearer the stage steps.

“And that is?” Kelvin asked.

Sanders took the four or five steps as Kelita started to unshackle Kelvin. Sanders began to vanish in the vlads that approached the stage.

“Well! It starts with me saying kill them all,” Sanders shouted as he reached the rear of the theater.

Kelvin was free, and he called on his wolf. He held it half way. Kelita offered him one of the sharpened hubcaps as a weapon. Kelvin smiled and said no thanks; he’d use his teeth and his claws.

“We need to stop Sanders from getting to the shaman,” Dustin said as he dropped the last needle to the floor.

“He’s not going anywhere by road. I made sure of that,” Kelita yelled as she helped the first vlad lose his head.

Kelvin dived in and lashed with his claws. His jaws snapped, fracturing skulls and ripping tendons from voice boxes. The whir and flash of the hubcaps sliced and weaved as Kelita took on her majestic pose as bodies fell at her feet.

Dustin sat in his chair and smiled at the sight that was laid out before him. Fucking hell. The gruesome twosome.

The vlads at the rear started to run from the exit. They saw all of their comrades falling in front of them. There was no way they’d overcome Kelvin and Kelita. They had the higher ground up on the stage, so it was impossible. The last few vanished. Kelita and Kelvin checked for any vlads who were still alive. One or two more rips and slices and there wasn’t a single spinal cord that was still intact.

Kelvin looked to the rear of the theater. The small red box sat above the door with red letters. Fire Exit. The door slowly opened, and he readied himself for another battle. He recognized the friendly face. Maria finally made her way to the stage and commented it was like an apocalypse, and then she saw how bad a condition Dustin was in.

“We need to get to the shaman before Sanders,” Dustin croaked from his seat.

“We aren’t going anywhere until I’ve bandaged you up at the motel.”

“That’s time we can’t afford.”

Maria shook her head and explained. She said, “Dustin, you stupid old fool. If we don’t have you, none of us have anything.”

“That’s okay. You’ve all got each other.”

“Shut your mouth.” Gabriel hoisted Dustin over his shoulder and helped him walk to the rear of the theater and the waiting van. “And do as you’re told, will you!”

Dustin shut his mouth and did as he was told. Kelita walked around the bodies, kicking them to make sure they were all dead. Kelvin wiped his face with a towel.

“It’s a good job you were there for me,” he said.

“I’m your big sister. Not by much, admittedly, but I’ll always be there for you.”

“You want a lift?” he asked.

Kelita wrinkled up her nose and shook her head. “Nah! The night’s only halfway done, I’m going to roam around and see if I bump into any more vlads.”

Kelvin laughed as he patted his sister on the shoulder. “God help them if you do.”

She smiled back, raising her new weapons. “There’s nothing he can do to help them.”

“A soul like Lucifer, black and cold. A misguided angel, who I’ll fight until I'm dead.”