DRACULAS (A Novel of Terror)

Dr. Lanz

“He bit his arm off, doc!” the bearded one said. “That animal bit his fucking arm off! And he bit me in the ass!”

As the pair struggled past, Lanz saw that the man’s ample right buttock was missing a sizable chunk—mostly fat, but a little of the gluteus was exposed.

Talk about a half-assed injury.

Alternate Ending

Joe says: This was as close as we got to any outright disagreements while writing this. And I gotta give big props to FPW, because it was totally unfair to him. We established early on that we’d all have POV characters, and we could end up doing what we wanted with them. I met with Jeff in Florida and we discussed how the Jenny/Randall dynamic would end up—they were star crossed lovers, with Randall’s love strong enough for him to fight for Jenny even after he became a dracula. I’d also discussed Adam and Stacie’s fates with Blake, and since he grooves on nihilism and tragedy, he decided to go the tragic route.

Paul had free reign to do what he wanted with Shanna and Clay, though we’d all discussed letting Shanna live. Clay’s fate, however, changed often during our email discussions. He lived and died and lived and died, back and forth, over and over. The problem was Clay turned out to be one of the most memorable, and likeable, characters in the book.

We all knew going into this that we wanted a Night of the Living Dead type of ending. So Paul did what each of us did—he killed his main character in a spectacular fashion.

But I really didn’t want Clay to die. Paul had created such a fun character, and the rest of the climax was such a downer, that I really believed Clay should live.

Happily, Paul was big enough to allow it, even though it was uncool of me to be such a whining little bitch boy. We compromised with the new, happier ending that appears in the manuscript.

Paul also introduced another mysterious character in these scenes named Dr. Driscoll, who seems to understand what’s going on. This hints at a deep government conspiracy. We all liked this idea, especially if we do a sequel, but it confused some of our beta readers. If we do wind up writing Draculas 2, no doubt Dr. Driscoll will be a key figure.

Shanna

SHE stood by Clay’s suburban, watching the dark, blocky mass of the hospital. A faint, faint glow lit some of the windows, probably backwash from the emergency lights in the hallways, but for the most part it looked dead and deserted. But looks were deceiving. She knew it crawled with—what had Jenny’s ex called them? Draculas. Right. Jenny and her ex were in there—still human, she hoped—and so was Clay.

She prayed for his safe return. Yes, she was going to break his heart when he did return, but she wanted him back. Because somehow the world seemed a better place with Clay than without him.

Ten minutes ago the army had roared in and heavily armed soldiers had piled out of their trucks. A large black trailer had followed the soldiers into the lot but had parked away toward the rear. The people who had emerged were civilians.

And then something scary: The army set up spotlights at the emergency entrance, around the main entrance, and at each stairwell exit. Then they’d positioned soldiers with flame throwers at each point. Looked like they’d been convinced it was contagious. She’d expected officialdom to scoff at the stories of what had gone on in the hospital, but she guessed the recording Clay had insisted on making had convinced them.

Well, she’d never said he was a dummy, just not on her wavelength.

Just then, to her right at the corner of the building, flames lit the night. A scream echoed and then died.

Her heart stumbled over a beat. That was the door she and Clay had used to escape, the door he’d re- entered. They wouldn’t have burned him by mistake, would they? No…that scream had had an unearthly quality. Had to be one of those draculas trying to escape the building. Still…

She took a step in that direction to go check, just to be sure, when she noticed movement on the ground, not too far from her. She looked closer and saw one of the supposedly dead state troopers moving—one of the pair Clay hadn’t shot.

Oh, God. As it lifted its head and looked her way, glow from the army headlights glinted off rows of long sharp teeth.

“Hey!” she called. “Hey, somebody! We’ve got trouble over here! Hey!”

Nobody seemed to hear her. The noise from truck motors revving, soldiers shouting to each other, giving and taking orders, swallowed her cries.

“Hey!” she called, raising her voice to its limit. “A little help over here.”

She backed up a few steps, readying to run, fearing it was coming for her, but it veered away, toward the empty darkness.

Confused? The side of its skull looked bashed in. Too damaged to know what it was doing? Well, that was fine with Shanna…

Except if it got away and bit someone, the plague would be loose and there’d be no stopping it.

She screamed. “Will somebody please—oh, crap!” He was going to get away and no one was paying her a bit off attention.

She glanced in the rear of Clay’s Suburban and saw his super shotgun, his beloved AA-something. She didn’t want to touch it…she remembered Marge back in the chapel, but somebody had to stop that thing.

She grabbed the gun and went around the other side of the car in time to see the dracula passing. How hard could this be? She raised the shotgun, pointed it toward the thing, and, closing her eyes—she couldn’t look—pulled the trigger.

The gun boomed but had nowhere near the kick of that pistol Clay had handed her.

She opened her eyes and saw the dracula on the pavement. She was about to congratulate herself when she realized it was still alive, if that was what you could call whatever it was, and trying to regain its feet. But it couldn’t. Shanna had shredded its knee.

“Lower your weapon!” shouted a voice behind her.

She turned and found herself facing the muzzles of half a dozen guns of various shapes and sizes and a chorus telling her to drop it. She laid the shotgun gently on the pavement. After all, Clay loved that thing.

“Now you listen!” she said.

A soldier who looked like he was in command got in her face. “What do you think you’re doing, firing that here?”

Shanna jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “One of them was getting away.”

A couple of the soldiers looked past her. She could tell by their expressions they’d never seen a dracula before.

“Get Doctor Driscoll,” the officer said.

A few minutes later a woman, one of the civilians from the big trailer, appeared. She stared at the dracula with virtually no reaction, not a hint of surprise.

After a few seconds she said, “Dispose of it.”

The officer motioned behind him and a soldier with a flame thrower appeared.

“Light it up,” he told him.

The soldier hesitated, then sent a stream of liquid fire at the thing, engulfing it in flame. It screamed, spasmed, rolled on the ground, then lay still.

Shanna turned away and retched. That had once been a person…

She turned back to the woman, Dr. Driscoll. “Is that the only way to stop the infection?”

The woman stared at her with an alarmed expression. “Infection? Who said anything about infection?”

“It’s obvious.”

“It’s nothing of the sort.”

And then it hit Shanna. Dr. Driscoll hadn’t been repulsed by the dracula. She’d been expecting it. “You’ve seen this before, haven’t you? You knew about this.”

“Who are you and where do you get your wild ideas?”

“I was in there. I saw—”