Tension edged up his fingers, his knuckles white around the hilt of his sword. Looking around, there were at least fifty vampires; they were in a circle, standing silently and glaring holes through them. Jack racked his brain for a way out, but he couldn’t find one.

There was no way they could beat that many.

The air was heavy, and viscous enough to walk on. A light breeze strolled through the yard, whistling to itself, and all present wound themselves tight enough to snap.

Jack flexed his fingers.

Turning to face the school, he saw a vampire, dark and lanky and weathered, leap towards him and Hannah, the grace of his movements almost cutting through the air.

He stopped breathing.

With a low rumble, Choo-chooin reared up, chomping down on the vampire mid-air. He screamed, blood spewing as the turtle threw him back. He knocked over a group, who struggled beneath his body with a cacophony of curses and yells.

The rest of the vampires cast a wary eye over Choo-chooin, some even taking a step back. Behind him, a tornado buzzed towards Lydia, the figure of a bear blocking its path. The Tasmanian demon tried drilling through Russ’ chest, drawing blood and a primal roar as he pushed him back.

Lydia raised a hand.

The temperature rose, his skin tingling and his mind, even racing, infuriatingly empty. He took the sword from his belt, sheath and all.

The circle was closing.

Almost as one, the vampires surrounding them were advancing, Russ still on the defensive as the demon used its speed to beleaguer him.

Jack’s sweat was pouring, his ribs aching as his skeleton tried escaping his skin. Hannah was scrambling to remount Choo-chooin, scratching at the edge of the disc with her teeth grinding each other to dust. She probably thought she’d be safe behind the wards, but they could only keep out small matter, like debris in the air. They were useless against a full-blown humanoid.

It was happening too quickly. “Wait!” he shouted, when the nearest vampire was close enough to smell. It was a mix of copper and budget bin aftershave. To his surprise, everybody stopped, a few vampires even falling on their faces as they tried to arrest their momentum. Putting it down to the goodwill of the universe, he continued:

“Just what is the point of all this? Seriously? I know you’re after that vampire liberation or whatever, and we’ve got our reasons, but why should we stand here and fight each other? Kill each other? Deep down, we’re all the same, living on the same Earth and breathing the same air; surely we can come to an understanding if we talk to each other.”

His head on a swivel, he noted that no-one was moving, many with contemplative looks on their faces. Even the Tasmanian demon seemed to be listening intently.

With a deep breath, Jack said, “I’ll get us started then. My name is Jack, and I’m addicted to porn.”

Hannah, kneeling atop Choo-chooin’s disc, had to support herself with her arms as her chin went diving. “What the hell are you doing?”

“It’s called negotiation.”

Lydia glanced over her shoulder. “I thought it was called masturbation?”

Squinting, Hannah shook her head. “Was that supposed to be witty?”

“Anyway,” said Jack, throwing his arms out to the sides, “more times a day than I could count, I was choking the chicken. Beating the bishop. Pulling my pudding.”

“Are there any more you need to add?” said Hannah dryly.

“And anything I could find, I was all over it. Every kink you can imagine, and all the ones you can’t, it had my hard drive so full the thing was about to explode in a shower of strap-ons. But then I realised that I couldn’t live like that! You know those scenes they do at the end, the ones where they’re all satisfied and cuddly? Well, they’re fake, and a lot of the time people don’t even know what they’re signing up to!”

A bead of sweat fell down Hannah’s forehead. “I feel like this chapter’s becoming something else entirely.”

Russ grunted, swiping at the Tasmanian demon while he was distracted. The thing flew twenty feet, doing cartwheels across the road and crashing into a house.

The vampires didn’t notice, mesmerised by Jack’s speech. He said, “so when you watch porn, you’re really just perpetuating a cycle of exploitation and violence, without ever really knowing what goes on behind the scenes. Look, the point is that everybody has compassion for their fellow person in their heart, so dig in there and realise what you’re doing here; not just to us, but to yourselves!”

Hannah grabbed her temples. “How are we supposed to come to that conclusion?!” She threw her arms down. “You didn’t just miss a step, you missed the entire staircase!”

Licking his teeth, Jack raised his shaky sword-arm. “Yeah, now’s probably a good time, Lydia. Unleash the charged death ray, or whatever.”

Lydia whipped round, eyes wide and mouth open. “Excuse me? This is the first I’m hearing about a charged anything.”

“Well, what do you think I was talking all that shit for?”

“You said you were negotiating!”

“Nobody negotiates like that!”

“That’s a nice speech,” said a vampire maybe five feet in front of him. He was stocky, with jet-black hair and a ridged forehead, and he eyed Choo-chooin with consternation. “You can get Rousseau to rate it when you meet him.”

His stomach sank as the circle restarted its closing, uncountable arms and mouths slashing and tearing towards them. He lashed out with his sheathed blade, hitting necks and chests as he weaved his way through the attacks.

Cold washed over him at a firm hand on his shoulder, being pulled to face the ridge-headed vampire. His lip was curled in a snarl, and his grip was like iron. Jack shuddered, struggling to draw in breath.

He jabbed at his stomach, and then at his throat, but the vampire dodged, almost too quickly for him to see.

Something smacked his temple, and blackness fell over his vision. An instinct told him to step back, and he did, a rush of air skimming across his face. He could smell the vampire’s coppery breath. Jabbing at the source, he elicited a cry as he heard the sound of enamel shattering.

Then something hit him in the spine, and he fell to all fours. Flipping on his back, he yelled, jabbing his weapon up into a vampire’s throat. She gurgled, collapsing away.

To his right, Russ had resumed grappling with the Tasmanian demon, blood and fur and fangs flying everywhere as they rolled across the car park.

Lydia was throwing fireballs around, incinerating enemies where they stood.

And Hannah… was messing around with Choo-chooin’s keyboard.

“You never told me he had a battle mode!” she said, voice full of wonder.

Wait, what? “That’s because it’s news to me.”

She put her index finger on her chin. “Should I use it?”

With his arm hairs on end, he pivoted, clubbing a vampire across the neck. His parasol went flying, tripping up another vampire. Jack shouted, “yes!”

She hit a button, and Choo-chooin reared once more, bringing his thick front legs down with a squawking cry on any who were unfortunate enough to be in his path. He squashed half a dozen into a fine paste, and reared again. Laughing, Hannah clung to his neck as his jaws snapped out at those who escaped his stomps.

“You’re making a vampire smoothie!” said Jack, flicking his sword between two enemies’ necks. “Why are you laughing?”

“I can’t help it,” she said. “This is the first time I’ve ever really felt alive!”

He frowned. At a different time, he might have asked her to elaborate, but they were a bit busy.

The combination of Lydia’s machine-gun fireballs and Choo-chooin’s rampage had decimated the New Bloods’ encirclement. Hannah hopped from the disc, over the remaining gaggle between them and the door, and took off in a run.

“Let’s go!”

Before anyone could warn her, a prone vampire with its face in the process of knitting back together grabbed her ankle, and she screamed.

Time stood still.

A great mass of fur pounced on the vampire, mauling it. Hannah jerked free of the grip, looking back at Jack and Lydia with frenzied eyes.

Standing tall on hind legs, Russ roared, challenging the remaining combatants. Choo-chooin rumbled beside him.

Jack chased after Hannah, his mouth full of sawdust. Following them, Lydia was still shooting fireballs, her nostrils flared and jaw clenched as she backed away.

They reached a set of blue double doors, framed by concrete, the fenestrations of the building strangely arched. Parts of the brick were flaking away, making a splotchy canvas of the exterior.

He looked back at the battle, where a dozen or so New Bloods were being beaten back by Russ and Choo-chooin. The bear Shifter glanced at them, an imperceptible nod telling him all that he needed to hear.

Waving her hand, Lydia summoned a burst of energy, and the doors slammed open. Inside was a short hallway, unguarded, leading to a reception area with a screened desk.

“Well,” said Jack, stepping forward as the new atmosphere made his skin squirm. “Who’s ready to go back to school?”

Hannah stared at him. “Don’t say a line like you’re signing off, we still have five hundred words left!”

Lydia scowled, her fist clenching. “It shouldn’t take that long to find Jess and get her out.”

Stepping into the reception, Jack said, “uh, no, I think you’re overestimating what the author can do.”

It was a small space, the entire back wall taken up by the desk, around ten feet across. In front of it, there was barely enough space to walk two abreast. Behind it was nothing but a pair of old, battered office chairs, and cream-coloured walls over which shadows danced, every window covered by a blind.

The carpet was blue, and it smelled musty. Crinkling her nose, Lydia looked right and left: there was a door at each end of the wooden desk. Clomping over to the left, she said, “this way.”

Jack made a face. “Why that way? Did your new mate tell you something you forgot to share?”

She growled. “Call him my ‘mate’ again and I will literally unmake you. And he said something about a staff room.”

Hannah blinked. “That’s helpful.”

Nodding, Jack flicked his gaze between the two doors. “Well, I guess when in doubt, turn left.” He stepped past Lydia, opening the door to another corridor. To his left was a flight of stairs, and beyond those three doors on either side. There was a right turn at the end.

“When did your last name become Reacher?”

Lydia snorted. “With that speech he gave before, it’s more like Reacher-ound.”

“Shush!” Jack edged forward, opening doors one-by-one. Each classroom was empty, the walls bare and crumbling, chairs and tables scattered and overturned. Projector screens had been torn, and there was a lingering stench of rotting meat.

As he opened the fifth door, Hannah retched, doubling over to the side. She said, “what is that smell?”

Jack sighed, his upper lip trembling. “Can’t convert them all.” Shutting the door, he crossed the hallway to the final classroom.

Her shaky gaze landed on him, tears threatening their escape. “Why? What did anyone ever do to these people?”

“Beats me. I couldn’t get an answer out of him.” He gulped. “You sure you’re ready for this? What’s behind this door could be horrific.”

She nodded, her expression firm.

“Just open it!” snapped Lydia, blowing it open herself.

As a crack echoed around them, Jack took in a surprisingly tame sight: there was a single table in the middle, with a chair on either side of it. In the seat on the far side was a person he had hoped to never see again.

“I’ve been expecting you, Miss Blackwell.”

Stomping his foot, Jack’s face was aghast. “I thought you didn’t know where this place was!”

Shuffling his deck, Gamey smirked. “You should know better by now than to underestimate the great Gamey King.”

Hannah’s face was taut, her tone acidic. “You don’t seem that great to me.”

Ignoring them, Lydia took the seat across from Gamey and placed her deck on the table. “I knew this day would come, Gamuel. Let’s not waste any more time.”

Jack grabbed his hair. “This is the very definition of a waste of time!”