CHAPTER 33: CREATING ANOTHER HOLLOW

Across town, a van drove at normal speed, cruising through the night’s express. The van reeked of blood and gunpowder. Four men sat inside, their tactical gear stained dark red from the night’s work. Steam rose from their clothes in the cold air.

"Third generation bastard nearly took my head off," Mendy said, pressing a field bandage against his neck. "Came at me with that blood whip bullshit. If Santos hadn’t put two rounds in its chest..."

"You’d be vampire chow," Santos finished, checking his rifle. "That’s what you get for underestimating them. Third gen and up, they’re a different breed entirely."

The rookie, Thompson, sat in the back seat trying not to look at the gore covering his vest. His hands shook as he cleaned his sidearm. "How do they do it? The blood magic?"

"Same way they do everything else," Mendy said. "By being unnatural freaks of nature. Third gens can manipulate their own blood, turn it into weapons. Second gens can use other people’s blood too. Gets worse from there."

Santos nodded. "Saw a Second gen once turn a man’s blood into acid. From the inside out. Poor bastard melted from his own veins."

"Jesus Christ," Thompson muttered.

"Christ’s got nothing to do with it, kid," Mendy said. "Been three hundred years since the Break. If God was paying attention, those things would’ve stayed dead."

The driver, Luke Chad, hadn’t said a word since they’d left the warehouse. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel, jaw clenched tight. The others had learned to give him space on nights like this.

"Remember that Third gen in Detroit?" Santos asked, lighting a cigarette. "Thing could make blood constructs. Actual shapes. Saw it create a fucking sword out of thin air."

"Yeah, and you nearly pissed yourself when it charged you," Mendy laughed.

"Damn right I did. Smart thing to do when facing blood magic. Fear keeps you alive."

Thompson looked between them. "How do you tell what generation they are?"

"Experience," Santos said. "And sometimes you don’t get the chance to find out before they kill you."

The van slowed as they approached a wrought iron gate. Chad pulled up to the entrance, engine idling. The mood in the vehicle shifted immediately.

"Chad, you sure about this?" Mendy asked quietly.

Thompson started to speak. "Maybe we should—"

"Shut it," Santos hissed. "Not now."

The rookie looked confused but closed his mouth. Chad turned off the engine. In the silence, they could hear the wind rustling through bare tree branches.

"Where are we?" Thompson whispered.

"Cemetery," Mendy said. "We’re here."

"Here for what?"

Chad finally spoke, his voice hoarse. "My daughter’s buried here. Sarah. She’d be eight today."

The weight of understanding settled over Thompson. He’d heard the story in fragments around the base. Chad’s family, the bloodsucker attack, the aftermath that had broken a good man.

"Killed by a pack of Third gens," Santos said. "They didn’t just feed. They played with her first."

"Every year on her birthday, Chad spends the day hunting the bastards that killed her," Mendy explained. "Then he comes here at night to tell her about it."

Chad opened his door. "Let’s get this done."

They climbed out of the van, weapons secured but ready. It was night time, one couldn’t be too safe.

The cemetery stretched out before them, headstones casting long shadows in the moonlight. Chad led the way down a gravel path, the others following at a respectful distance.

"She liked stories," Chad said without turning around. "Used to make me read the same book five times before bed. About a princess who saved dragons instead of the other way around."

They walked in silence for several minutes, boots crunching on dead leaves. Chad stopped at a small headstone near a oak tree. Fresh flowers lay at its base.

"Sarah Marie Chad," he read aloud. "Beloved daughter. The light that never goes out."

Thompson stood back, feeling like an intruder on something sacred. The three veterans gathered around the grave, removing their tactical helmets.

"Tell her about tonight," Mendy said. "She’d want to know we got them."

Chad knelt beside the headstone, his voice barely audible. "Hey, baby girl. Daddy’s here. We killed some bad ones tonight. The kind that—"

Santos grabbed his arm. "Movement. Two o’clock."

They turned toward a cluster of graves fifty yards away. A figure crouched beside an open grave, partially hidden by a mausoleum. Even in the darkness, they could see the dark stains covering the person’s clothes.

"What the hell is that?" Thompson whispered.

Mendy raised his rifle, activating the night scope. "Looks like someone’s digging up graves. Covered in blood."

The figure moved with inhuman fluidity, lifting something heavy from the excavated earth. Body parts. An arm. Part of a torso.

"Bloodsucker," Santos breathed. "Has to be. What else would be grave robbing at midnight?"

Chad’s face went stone cold. His daughter’s killer had been destroyed months ago, but every bloodsucker was the same to him now. Every one of them deserved to burn.

He drew his sidearm without a word, the sun-round chamber glowing faintly in the darkness. The blessed ammunition would burn through supernatural flesh like acid.

"Chad, wait—" Mendy started.

The gunshot echoed across the cemetery. The figure by the grave spun around, clutching its shoulder. Blood ran between its fingers.

Kaine felt the bullet punch through his jacket and into his shoulder blade. The pain was immediate and wrong, like liquid fire spreading through his muscles.

[FOREIGN OBJECT DETECTED - BLESSED AMMUNITION]

[REGENERATION HINDERED - SEEK IMMEDIATE MEDICAL ATTENTION]

[HEALTH: 380/420]

The system’s warning flashed across his vision as he turned toward the gunshot. Four figures in tactical gear rushed toward him, weapons raised. Shadowguard hunters.

"Fucking perfect," he muttered.

"Don’t let it escape!" one of them shouted.

They opened fire simultaneously. Kaine dove behind a headstone as blessed rounds shattered stone around him. The bullets that grazed him burned like brands, each one sending jolts of agony through his body system.

These weren’t ordinary rounds. They were designed to kill things like him. Well, now he was discovering that. They seemed to work just fine on things like him, a lich, as much as they did in vampires apparently.

Santos flanked left while Mendy went right, trying to pin him down. Chad advanced straight ahead, his face a mask of cold fury. Thompson hung back, covering their rear.

Kaine rolled out from behind the headstone, moving faster than human eyes could track. He closed the distance to Santos in three strides, ducking under the hunter’s rifle barrel and driving his fist into the man’s solar plexus.

The impact lifted Santos off his feet and sent him flying backward into a marble angel. The statue’s wing pierced his chest with a wet crunch. He gurgled once and went still.

"Santos!" Mendy spun his rifle toward Kaine, but the dead man was already moving.

Kaine caught the weapon’s barrel and twisted, the metal groaning as it bent like soft plastic. Mendy tried to draw his sidearm, but Kaine’s backhand caught him across the jaw. The hunter’s head snapped sideways with a sound like breaking kindling.

He had no intention to kill. But he as well was hitting these hunters with zero discretion. After all, they shot at him first.

Mendy hit the ground hard, his neck bent at an impossible angle.

Chad kept firing, the blessed rounds forcing Kaine to weave between headstones. Each bullet that found its mark sent waves of burning pain through his body, but he pressed forward. The shooter was good, but not good enough.

Kaine vaulted over a low stone wall and landed behind Chad. The hunter spun around, bringing his pistol up, but Kaine was faster. His hand closed around Chad’s wrist and squeezed.

Bones snapped like dry twigs. Chad screamed as his fingers went numb, the gun falling from his useless hand.

"You started this," Kaine said, his voice flat and cold.

He drove his knee into Chad’s ribs, feeling them crack under the impact. The hunter doubled over, blood spraying from his lips. Kaine grabbed him by the back of the neck and slammed his face into the nearest headstone.

The stone cracked. Chad’s nose exploded in a fountain of blood.

Thompson raised his rifle from thirty yards away, hands shaking. "Stop! Please!"

Kaine looked at him with eyes that reflected the moonlight like polished steel. The rookie’s finger trembled on the trigger, but he couldn’t bring himself to fire.

Chad rolled onto his back, choking on his own blood. His right lung had collapsed, and pink froth bubbled from his lips. "Please," he gasped. "Don’t... my daughter..."

Kaine knelt beside the dying hunter, his expression softening slightly. "You shot first. I was just trying to help a friend."

"Wasn’t... wasn’t supposed to..."

"Yeah, well, shit happens." Kaine sighed, looking at the man’s wounds. "You’re not going to make it. Internal bleeding, punctured lung. Maybe ten minutes if you’re lucky."

Chad’s eyes rolled back, his breathing becoming shallow and rapid.

"I don’t have time for this," Kaine muttered. He hated the Shadowguard with every fiber of his being. They’d betrayed him, left him to die, and now they thought he was dead. Good. Let them keep thinking that.

But this man hadn’t been there. Hadn’t been part of the betrayal.

"Fuck it," Kaine said. "Maybe I can put you to better use than bleeding out in a graveyard."

He placed his hand on Chad’s chest, feeling the flutter of a failing heart. He sighed as he knew the man wasn’t going to make it and true to his suspicion, Chad died on the spot. That’s when a Green hue began to flow from his palm, seeping into the hunter’s body.

[HOLLOW RITUAL INITIATED]

[MORTAL ESSENCE COST: 150 ME]

...

Multiple prompts appeared in his field of view, similar to when he tried to turn Marcus that he didn’t bother glancing through. This was either going to work or not. Either way, he figured he’d better summon Soulrend just Incase an abomination popped out.

That was when a flash of light cut through the darkness.

Kaine’s head snapped up. Thompson stood by the van, flashlight in one hand, keys in the other. The rookie had seen everything.

"Shit," Kaine cursed, pulling his hand back.

The van’s engine roared to life. Thompson threw it in reverse, tires squealing on asphalt as he backed toward the cemetery gate.

Kaine broke into a run, abandoning Chad’s body as he sprinted across the graveyard. His enhanced speed carried him in long, loping strides, but the van was already through the gate. He didn’t stop, pushing harder, his boots pounding against asphalt as he gave chase down the empty street.

The taillights grew smaller in the distance, but Kaine kept running, determined not to let the witness escape.

---

Back in the cemetery, in the shadow of Sarah Chad’s headstone, the hunter’s body lay motionless. The mortal essence energy coursed through dead tissue, seeking completion. And suddenly, Chad’s eyes snapped open.

But there was a chance.

His eyes were glowing red in the dark.