I flew into Manhattan withGarrison in tow, as Thaddeus the hawk flew next to us. We hit theground and I had an immediate flashback of the chaos that ensued inSan Francisco around the plague that took my family away from me atthe peak of our existence.
Thad and Gary kept walking andthen they noticed that I was frozen in the middle of a cobblestonestreet with a horse and carriage bearing down on me—not that itwould have done me any real harm anyway.
“What’s wrong with him?!” Thadasked, having never seen me like this before.
“Oh, boy!” Gary exclaimed and thenrushed over to move Hartwell away from pending danger.
Thad joined Gary as they helped mesit on a nearby stoop, away from oncoming traffic.
“We have to let him ride thisout,” Gary said to Thad. “He’s thinking about his familyagain.”
Thad had been so intent onstrategy and maneuvering for years that he hadn’t bothered to ask howwe all got there in the first place. Gary and I spent so much timetogether that we were able to fully discuss our lives beforemeeting each other.
“How come we have never had thisdiscussion before?” Thad asked Gary as they walked through thefrenzied streets of lower Manhattan as I glided next to them. Noone even noticed that my feet weren’t hitting the ground.
“Because I didn’t want to talk aboutit,” I said as I snapped out of it. We walked to the Battery, orBattery Park as it is now known, and stood near the water facingthe Statue of Liberty.
“I’m sorry I brought you both intothis,” I said to Thad and Gary, “this was only meant to be a meansto see my family again.” To say that I dropped into a greatdepression along with the rest of my surroundings would have beenan understatement. It was potentially the most pathetic I had beensince my final days in San Francisco.
I could sense that Thaddeus wasstill confused and needed to be updated on what started this wholething, so I stretched my left arm and rested my hand on hisforehead. I then looked over at Garrison who knew the story, but hestill wanted to view the moving pictures, so I reached over with myright arm and rested my right hand so he could partake aswell.
I didn’t think that I wanted to seewhat they saw at first, but then found myself closing my eyes andexperiencing it first-hand like it was happening to me all overagain. My theory was that it would be therapeutic and produce someclosure, but all it did was make me miss my people evenmore!
I thought back to the time when Ihad the gun in my hand and was about to take my own life while Thadand Gary finished up their little movie. Maybe it would have beenbetter if I had thought about my decision in the years leading upto this day, but it wasn't like I had so many options at the time!My choices were:
Blow my brains out
Take a chance and potentially seemy family again
Continue to wander the streetsaimlessly and then eventually be devoured by a vampire
Wait until I eventually got theplague and died
B was the only option where Iactually had a chance to continue to exist. Lowery never mentionedthe term "vampire" when presenting me with the idea, so all Ireally heard was "see you family again." Honestly, I wasn't evensure if he was telling me the truth. He could have just taken allof my blood and left me dead in my house for all anyone knew, and Iwould have been in the same place I would have been if I pulled thetrigger myself.
It was all about them! It alwayshad been and always would be! Life wasn't really worth living,either as a vampire or a mortal, without my wife and son. Beingalone would have been pure torture, so I guess I had Gary and evenThad to thank for keeping me busy.
The playback finished with Loweryturning me into a vampire and Thad exclaimed "I didn'tknow!"
I must have been looking at bothof them with a loving gaze, or something positive they hadn't seenbefore because he added, "What? Is there something on myface?"
"Have I ever told you guys howmuch I appreciate you?" I said with a heavy dose ofvulnerability.
Thad looked at Gary and mouthed,"Is he okay?"
Gary mouthed back with his palmsup, "I don't know? Never seen him this way."
And thus, I fell into adecade-long depression along with the rest of the country. Iwouldn't feed and somehow Gary and Thad kept me alive throughmaking me drink the blood of many living things. Thad had nothoughts of killing me during this time and he probably would havebeen passive even if I was at full strength. He was a family manthrough-and-through and he appreciated my sense of loyalty, even ifI had misguidedly become a vampire.
WAR
A funny thing happened in themidst of my depression: the country became preoccupied with notone, but two world wars. Gary and Thad took me on a vacation toEurope just before the second world war to try and cheer him up. Imust admit that I always liked to sample the European nectar, but Ieven noticed despite my fragile state that something was differentthis time around.
"Is it me, or is something weirdgoing on here?"
Gary was surprised at first that Iinitiated a conversation, "Oh, did he just talk?" he askedThaddeus.
"Yeah, he talked. Did you feelthat weird vibe?" he asked Garrison.
Gary had been so focused on me andcracking my protective shell that he became shielded to thepowerful force that was engulfing both the U.S. and all of Europe.We happened to be in middle of Paris, France on June 2,1944.
Garrison closed his eyes and thenpointed due northeast.
"Wow! I don't think I've ever feltthis much rage since we first met you," he replied to Thad. "It'scoming from over there."
I then stepped up in front of theother two, my extended bought of depression now over, and said,"Wölfe unter."
Thaddeus wasn't fluent in Germanbut he sort of understood what I was getting at. He still looked atGary
