Sole Scion - 1. Chapter One: Home and Hearth

Chapter One: Home and Hearth

November 1^st, 2460 AD

Year 3 After Azrael (A.A.)

While any day when there was food on the table and a warm bed to sleep in was a good day, today was especially special for the eight-year-old Daniel. It was the 1st of November and it was his birthday. While recent birthdays had not been as good as those he used to have before his father died it was still his special day. What made it extra special was he had just lost another tooth. Tonight he would put it under his pillow and see if the tooth fairy paid him a visit. The tooth fairy hadn’t come the last time but that was okay. If he woke to find the tooth fairy hadn’t come he would just put it in his box of memories with the other one.

As on every birthday Daniel opened his box of memories and recalled happier days. It was not really a box but a briefcase that had known better times. The worn black leather case had been his father’s. Not his stepfather’s and not the men his mother brought home with her. It was his real father’s. Three years ago his father had been the center of his universe. He would ride on his father’s back as they ran through the house, let Daneil sit on his lap whenever he wanted to. He read him the most wonderful of stories and made the very best pancakes. Then he died and Daniel’s world fell apart. No more pancakes, no more stories, no more piggyback rides, and no lap to sit on whenever he was hurt. Since his father’s death every day was painful.

Daniel knew his dad was important to him but he never imagined he was so important that when he died so did billions of others. He had once asked his mother if the Azrael Meteor crashed into Earth because dad had died. Instead of answering she had slapped him. He did not ask a second time.

Opening the case, he took out the baggy holding the other tooth he’d lost. Next he took out an unplugged digital picture frame. It had once shown him helping his father making his famous pancakes. He used to look at it every day. When his mother caught him looking at it after his father died she took away the plug and threw it out the window. Still he kept the picture frame. There was a sixth place ribbon from swimming lessons, his kindergarten graduation certificate, and his favorite book which had a bluebonnet pressed inside. Last he took out a painted t-shirt. When he was four his father had helped him paint it with sponge stamps. There were stars, rainbows, four leaf clovers, and hearts. From the moment he made it to the day he could no longer fit into it he would try to wear it every day. When his father died he would often cling to it as he cried himself to sleep. Just holding it brought tears to his eyes. When he was done going through the briefcase he wiped his tears away with the shirt he put everything back in his memory box and slid it back under the sofa bed.

With that done with it was time for him to make himself his birthday cake. Knowing his mother would come home too tired to make anything he had to come up with something on his own. Though he was now eight, he knew better than to think he could use the stove. He had tried to bake a pizza once but he didn’t understand how to set the temperature. With him being hungrier than usual he wanted to eat as fast as possible. Figuring out that higher the number the hotter the oven he turned the knob all the way to 500. After his neighbor, Mr. North, extinguished the fire all that was left was a soggy burnt clump of dough. Luckily his mother had come back homed too stoned to notice the smell.

From the cupboard he took out a box of saltines and a jar of peanut butter. Needing a dish for his cake he carefully climbed up the cabinets and got himself a cake pan from the top shelf. Sitting himself down on the countertop he put three handfuls of the crackers into the pan. He then stood up and, performing a balancing act, used a foot to crush up the crackers. With his foot covered in crumbs he looked at the sink which was still filled with yesterday’s dirty dishes. Among the dishes were sharp knives and the dirty syringes she would reuse for her drug habit. Seeing all that, he didn’t want to put his foot in there. That did little to ease his fear of what his mother would do to him if he walked through the apartment leaving crumbs all over the place. Maybe if he hopped on one foot he wouldn’t get too many crumbs on the floor?

It was now time to put on the icing. After four tries, he managed to open the plastic jar of peanut butter. He scooped out the peanut butter with his fingers and began spreading it over the crackers. It didn’t work out as well as had imagined. Instead of a cracker cake with peanut butter icing, he ended up with peanut butter cracker balls and sticky hands.

Although somewhat disappointed, they tasted good. All that was really missing was a candle, and he knew how to fix that. Sliding off the countertop he jumped on one foot to the bathroom. He intended not to leave any crumbs on the floor but all the bouncing left about as much a mess as if he had walked normally on both feet. Once he washed up he went to the living room and dug out of the sofa one of the many lighters scattered about the apartment. He then hurried back to get his cake.

Forgetting his feet were wet he slid on the tile floor. In a desperate attempt to stop himself from falling he grabbed a tablecloth. It didn’t work. He fell, and so did a variety of empty liquor bottles littering the table. Falling on the back of his head he screamed as he saw the bottles falling towards him. Luckily none of the bottles bumped him in the head. Of the eight bottles he had knocked off the table only three had shattered. That didn’t change the fact that he was now surrounded by broken glass. This was bad. Whenever he got hurt at school, the nurse would chastise him to be more careful. Even the doctor at the clinic had warned his mother that he was quite the bleeder. The doctor had given his mother medicine for him to take but she rarely gave it to him.

Not sure what to do he did what he always did when faced with a challenge. He asked himself what his father would have done. If his father was still around he would fly in like Superman and carry him to safety. His dad would then use his x-ray vision to bake Daniel a real cake. As much as he wished otherwise Super Dad wasn’t going to come to his rescue… not now, not ever.

Surrounded by a minefield of sharp cutting shards of glass he whimpered as he tried to figure out what to do. Maybe if he jumped far enough his dream of flying would finally come true. Unable to make a running start he was barely able to jump the foot-and-a-half needed to get clear of the glass. Breathing a sigh of relief as he landed on the other side of the debris field. He then surveyed the chaos he had created.

Looking around he saw he had made quite the mess. There was smeared peanut butter on the countertop, a trail of cracker crumbs stretching from the kitchen to the bathroom, and now broken glass on the floor. All he could do was hope he could clean the mess up before his mother came back.

He knew today was his special day… the truly special part just hadn’t occurred yet.

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Tara sat on a park bench gazing out into the darkness of the night. The cold autumn air passed through her poorly patched coat as if it were paper offering no protection from the cold which chilled her to her bones. She knew what the doctor at the clinic would say... that she had no business being out this time of night, not in her condition. As the wind of this never ending night picked up, her shivering grew worse. If she was not careful she would end up deathly ill. She couldn’t afford for that to happen again. Not before she had her revenge.

Two years ago that no good second husband of hers had abandoned her and her son. Not for another woman, but for one of the male partners at his firm. That betrayal did not anger her as much as the mess he left behind. A half dozen maxed out credit cards, the car repossessed, followed soon after by her eviction from their sixteen-thousand-dollars a month Manhattan apartment. After six months of living in a homeless shelter, her second ex-husband had at least had the decency of arranging for her to live in a rent controlled apartment in the Bronx.

At first it turned out Tara was one of the lucky ones. She and her son were allowed to stay in their third floor apartment while millions were sent down into the canyons being dug into the dried Hudson River and Long Island Sound. After the meteor strike, the surviving world governments herded the majority of the surviving population into mega-cities such as the Boston- New York- D.C. corridor, as well as Houston, Chicago, New Delhi, Beijing, and London.

When Tara had reached the point where she couldn’t imagine things getting any worse, she became deathly ill. At first she thought it was just a bad case of the flu. Into the second week however she was too weak to leave her own bed. It was her then six year old son Daniel, ever the little trooper, who had remained cheerful during the recent rough patch, who saved her life. When he could not wake her one morning he had gone to their next door neighbor, Mr. North, for help.

It was only after three weeks of intensive treatment before Tara had the strength to be discharged from the hospital. By that time medical tests had reviled the depth of her second husband's betrayal. Greg, who had left her for another man had not only left a mountain of debt behind, but also left her with HIV. From what the doctors told her, she had contracted the virus midway through her second marriage. It was only now that the disease was showing its ugly head.

The only good news was that Daniel’s father, her first husband, had not been the source. After all the terrible things she said about Avery, she hadn’t wanted it to be him. That did not mean she appreciated the irony. After years of accusing Avery of cheating on her it had been the man she had been having an affair with that led to her present situation.

Resentful of living off handouts from her ex, she lived most of her life bouncing from one addiction to another. Through it all, Daniel had remained the same, watching and protecting his mother from harming herself too severely. Since Azrael fell three years ago he had been forced to grow up quickly. These day he didn’t act like a normal eight-year-old. A typical child his age did not find himself tuning their mother on their side so they won’t chock on their own puke, or go across the hall to Mr. North’s apartment to ask the ex-cop to scare off his mother’s drug dealing friends. He carried the responsibilities of a grown man yet remarkably still had the innocent heart of a loving little boy.

Two weeks ago Tara had traded her meager ration card for 5 cents on the dollar in cash. Taking the money to the closest bar she planned on spending the rest of the night drinking and getting high. Any concern for her son was soon washed away by a constant flow of booze. She had just ordered three rounds of scotch when she first saw the stranger.

He was a handsome man, with dark, greying hair, a firm narrow build and dressed in a suit that reeked of money. She had no idea why such a man would be looking for women this low end dive. Noticing the man was looking in her direction she looked away from her drink to see that the stranger was looking right at her. When they made eye contact, Tara saw his ice cold silver-blue eyes gazing back at her. They did not look so much at her drug ravaged body, but her frail defeated soul. Before she could finish her next drink he took her with a firm hand away from the bar into a dark alley. As they screwed he whispered to her all her dark secrets and desires. It had been a long time since a man as handsome as the stranger had made love to her. While some who passed by assumed Tara was nothing but a cheap whore, for a woman like Tara who had grown accustomed to being fucked by her drug dealers, the stranger’s gentle touch reminded her of her days when she had been a member of high society.

Just as he came and had her begging for more he promised to fulfill each and every one of her deepest desires. He only required he be given one thing in return... a small price really given what he offered. They sealed the pact with a kiss.

On the night of her son’s eight birthday she followed the stranger’s directions and walked to the center of what remained of Central Park. With no other place to put the growing number of refugees, the famed park had become a ghetto of tin shack and converted shipping containers for the homeless to live in. Though she burned with fever it was time to make a down payment.

“How long is he going to take?” The anger in her words were canceled out by her chattering teeth. She had already stuffed her coat with dirty newspapers in a desperate attempt to stay warm but she could not stay outside much longer.

She was about to give up when the stranger arrived. She felt his presence before she saw him. His cold body slid up next to hers on the park bench. "So you’ve made your choice?" he whispered in her ear. There was the tinge of lust in his voice.

She looked dumbfounded at her would be savior. "Was there any doubt? Her bitterness was as harsh as the freezing winter wind. “I do not care if you are nothing but some crazed mad man. If you keep even one of your promises it will be worth it."

The stranger wrapped an arm around Tara's thin waist. "Are you sure this is what you want?"

She rested her head on his shoulder. Feeling a large firm bicep from beneath his clothes she relived memories when similar arms had held her tight and kept her warm. She would be shedding tears at this moment but the cold dry wind had already sucked up all the moister in her eyes. “I can't live like this anymore... I do not care what happens so long as I have my revenge."

"You will always be despised. Always hunted." The stranger let his tongue circle around the outer curve of her ear.

"But I will no longer have this... this sickness in me, sucking away at my soul.” She held out her right wrist and squeezed it as if the disease inside her would ooze out. “You promised you will protect me and my son… that we will want for nothing."

"And I will keep that promise for as long as I can. I have also promised you your revenge." His tongue jingled her left earlobe back and forth like a bell marking the final moments for her to make her final decision.

Tara nodded. She was finding it difficult to breathe. "Yes... that too." At that moment she didn’t know what she wanted more. Her revenge against her second husband or for the stranger to fuck her then and there. Either way she had made her decision. "I will pay your price."

The stranger smiled to reveal his fanged teeth. Fearing he was about to rip out her throat, Tara took in a breath ready to scream. Before she could the stranger leaned over her and silenced her approaching scream with his lips against Tara's mouth and slipped his tongue inside and stilled her wagging tongue.

Feeling a warm sweet liquid filling her mouth, Tara responded by opening her mouth wider. Her body, long fatigued felt alive for the first time in years. A new fire was burning in her veins. No longer shivering she was sweating under her clothes. She opened her blue eyes wide while wrapping her arms around the back of the stranger's neck. When the kiss ended, Tara possessed a new found strength. She felt more alive than she ever had. She also felt so very, very hungry.

She had traded AIDS for a newer type of disease, known simply as the Plague. More brutal and destructive to those affected than any other disease to come before it, it stripped a person of their humanity. Once infected, the most pious and gentlest of souls would turn into a rabid animal. The person’s need to kill would only be outmatched by their insatiable lust.

While the Plague affected every person differently, the mutagenic disease would strip a person of their human form and turn them into monstrous killing machines. What better way to get revenge than to have her second husband die at the hands of the enemy of all mankind.

“Hungry?” the stranger asked after she had caught her breath. She nodded eagerly. “Then go to it.”

With the silent quick feet of a prancing deer, she made her way to the nearest of the shacks. She studied her potential victim with an inquisitive look. He was handsome… possible some young football college student who had fallen on hard times. As she was in no rush she decided she would sate her new sexual appetite before feeding off his blood.

The stranger could only laugh when he heard the groans and shouts of sexual pleasure coming from the shack. The new ones were always so rambunctious when they are first turned. When the sounds from the shack suddenly went silent he went inside to check on her. Her pale naked body was smeared with blood. Though Tara’s victim was dead, the stranger found her nuzzling against the corpse like an old lover. “Don’t you two make the happy couple?”

“Do you think so Dmitri?” She didn’t know how she suddenly knew the stranger’s name. Maybe it was because he was the one who turned her? She was heading toward the exit when Dmitri shoved her down on the corpse. “What was that for?” When she pouted it was always with curled lips and wide round eyes. There was almost a Disney quality to it.

“You’re not done.”

“But I’ve already killed him. What else do I need to do?”

“You need to make certain he doesn’t come back as a zombie.”

“Zombie, really?” She looked down on the corpus with a hint of longing in her eyes.

Dmitri found the expression disturbing. “Rip out his heart and be done with it,” he hissed between gashing teeth.

“But what if I want to fuck him again?”

Having lost patience Dmitri shoved her aside, thrust a fist into the man’s chest and ripped out the heart and threw the steaming piece of flesh at Tara. “Do not try my patience youngling.”

Though covered with blood Tara’s face noticeably paled. “Oh course… forgive me Lord Dmitri.” She whispered submissively. She might have gained much by being turned but she knew now was not the time for her to press her luck.

Dmitri wiped the blood off his hand on his dark coat. “Forgiveness must be earned before it is given.”

“As you say Lord Dmitri.” She did her best to make a gracious bow but she couldn’t pull it off, not with blood dripping from her hair and her pale bare breasts reflecting the glow of the remaining embers of the dead man’s fire.

"Now for your revenge," The stranger said as he took Tara's hand in his and led her away from the park to a waiting black car. “While his people fetched her ex, he would get her cleaned up. It would not do for her son to see his mother naked, covered in blood, and insane with lust. It was as he watched the woman licked the blood from her fingers that Dmitri began to worry he had just made a critical mistake.

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