Blood Hunt

the covers. As she did so, the smell of her filled his nostrils…a pleasant mixture of soap and fabric softener and something with an odd but strangely attractive metallic/salty scent. “How about a back rub. That may help.”

It did not. The sheets felt hot and sticky every place they touched him, with razor creases. He twisted in vain looking for a cool spot. However futilely he hunted a comfortable position, however, unit of blood reduced his feeling of weakness. The dragging weight of his body lightened and he moved with less effort. A thirst that had persisted all day turned into hunger and he looked forward eagerly to supper. An eagerness evaporating abruptly when he saw the broth, gelatin, and tea they allowed him.

“I don’t get real food?” He thought longingly of fried rice and Lien’s sweet-and-sour pork.

“We don’t want to strain your circulation by making it work at digestion.”

Maybe we did not, but he wished otherwise. Then again, maybe she was right. After eating, his stomach churned uneasily, as though debating whether to keep the offering or not.

Garreth lay quiet, willing the nausea away. Could this be part of last night, or was it an aftermath of Chiarelli’s punch?

At length, the nausea subsided…and Garreth discovered he felt much better. Full of new blood and a symbolic meal, he felt surprisingly normal. Though he still needed sleep, he found some of the aches had subsided. He wished he had a TV to watch.

A doctor appeared later in the evening, introducing himself as Dr. Charles. Garreth recognized the voice from the group at the desk earlier. “You’re looking much better, Inspector. Your blood pressure is steadily improving. Now, let’s check a few other things.”

He used a stethoscope and rubber hammer and tongue depressor, listening, peering, tapping, probing. While he worked, he hummed. Occasionally the hum changed key, but Garreth could not tell if that had any significance or not. What he did notice was the same metallic/salty odor about the doctor that he had noticed on the nurse. Did they all wear the same antiperspirant or something?

“You’re doing much better. What you need now is a good night’s sleep, and if you’re doing this well in the morning, we’ll move you out of Intensive Care,” the doctor said. He discontinued the blood and fluids.

Garreth, however, did not feel the least like sleeping now. He wanted a TV or visitors. Lacking both, he could only lie in bed listening to the heart monitors bleeping in ragged syncopation in the other rooms. He closed his eyes, but opened them again when his mind began replaying the nightmare in the alley. Where had she learned that perversion?

Why did they keep Intensive Care lighted so brightly at night? he also wondered. How could anyone sleep in a glare like this?

He lay awake when dawn came, and then, astonishingly, for what must be the first time in his life, the first rays of the sun brought an intense desire to sleep. Only he could not. Just as suddenly, he rediscovered all yesterday’s aches. The sheets heated up and Garreth found himself once more in a ceaseless hunt for a comfortable position. Worse, when breakfast came, his stomach voted against it. It came back up almost before he swallowed.

On his morning rounds, Dr. Charles frowned gravely at that. Garreth told him about Chiarelli.

“We’ll schedule for a barium series tomorrow and see about your stomach.”

In the meantime, they returned to intravenous feeding. After the morning bloodwork, they decided he needed still more blood. He lay with clear liquid running into one arm and blood into the other. He would look like a junkie by the time he got out of here, he reflected.

The air filled with that metallic/salty scent, stronger than ever. Only this time, with none of the staff around.

Sniffing out the source, Garreth discovered that it came from the tube feeding blood into his arm.

The hair on his neck rose. That was what he was smelling, blood? He smelled the blood in people?

He shivered. Son of a bitch. What was happening to him?

Before he had a chance to answer the questions about himself, Serruto arrived with tape recorder to ask official ones. The statement taken, Garreth was moved to the medical floor and left to sleep. But the huge weight pressing him into the steaming sheets gave him no chance…no peace.

Garreth did not even attempt lunch. The mere scent of it nauseated him.

Lien came for a short visit in the afternoon. “You look terrible,” she said, “but at least you’re alive. I had a frantic call from your mother yesterday morning.”

Garreth’s stomach tightened. “They heard about me on the news?”

“No, it hadn’t been broadcast yet. She said your grandmother Felt you’d been killed, that Satan tore out your throat.” Lien paused. “I’m happy she’s only part right this time. Unfortunately, at that time we did think you were dead, so the happiest phone call I’ve ever made was the one later to let your mother know you’re alive after all. She said to tell you they’ll be up in a couple of days to visit.”

He would like that. Maybe Judith would let them bring Brian, too.

Lien chattered about her job and art classes, relieving him of the necessity of saying anything. While she talked, she distracted him from his discomfort.

Which all came back once she left. He resumed fighting aches and searing sheets. To make matters worse, his upper gums now hurt.

He eyed the cushioned chair by the window. That might be a helpful change; it would be a change anyway. So he threw back the covers and eased over the side of the bed.

In two steps he had fallen flat on his face, giving himself a bloody nose and — he discovered with horror — loosening his upper canine teeth. They wiggled when he touched them with his tongue.

He was trying to crawl back into bed when an aide found him.

Dr. Charles wasted no time with sympathy. “That was a stupid thing to do. You’re still too weak to get out of bed, and when I decide you’re ready — when I decide — you will be helped in and out. Under no circumstances are you to do it alone. I presume that as a police officer you know how to take orders. Well, I’m giving you one. Stay in bed. Do nothing without permission first. Is that clear?”

Garreth nodded meekly. “Yes, sir.”

“Good. We have the barium study scheduled for you tomorrow. We’ll get a dentist to check your teeth as well.”

Though he never managed to sleep, he dozed, and toward nightfall not only felt much better, the desire to sleep vanished.

He turned on the TV.

A nurse, coming in to check his vital signs, turned it off. “Dr. Charles wants you to sleep.”

As soon as she left, however, he switched the set back on, keeping the volume as low as he could and still hear. That proved to be very low indeed. It seemed that his sharpened hearing persisted. He used it to listen for nurses in the corridor, so he could shut off the set before they came in.

After midnight, Channel 9 started its Friday Fright Night feature, three horror movies in a row. Garreth settled back to watch, as he often had since Marti died. However melodramatic, the movies diverted him. Tonight’s offerings began with Dracula.

He sighed. How appropriate. His entire life these days seemed to revolve around blood, or the lack of it.

Into the movie, with everyone worrying about Miss Lucy’s mysterious wasting disease, Garreth reflected that his one complaint with these shows was the way the characters waded up to their necks in clues and yet never realized they had a werewolf, demon, or vampire loose among them. On the other hand, perhaps that was reasonable. In real life no one would guess such a thing, either. They would hunt a rational explanation. Like with Miss Lucy. They thought the broach on the shawl caused the punctures on her neck. No real-life person would consider a vampire bite as -

The thought ended in a paralysis as profound as when he lay in the morgue. He could not move, only stare at the TV screen with mind churning. No, that was impossible…a crazy thought! He was losing his mind. Lane Barber might be psychotic and a killer, but a human one, certainly. Nothing more or less. How could she be anything else? She slept all day because she worked nights. If she kept no food in her apartment, maybe she hated to cook and always ate out. He kept little more than snack food and microwave dinners at home himself. Yes, she bit men she