___________________________________________________________________________________
Piotr looks out the little peep hole and his heart sinks down to the pit of his stomach. One the other side of the door was a face he hadn't seen in almost 80 years. A face he wasn't likely to forget, however. Not in this lifetime, or the many thereafter. It was his olf friend Dmitri. Over the years, Mitya had been his mentor, his nemesis, his protector, his rival, and most recently, a betrayor.
Piotr studied his former friend carefully. Dmitri seemed to be in great discomfort. If he didn't know any better, he would even go as far as to say that Dmitri was in considerable pain. In agony, in fact. This was quite impossible, as being undead, neither he nor Dmitri had any feelings, but ty the loks of him, he seemed to be on the verge of collapse.
Dmitri looked directly into the peep hole and flashed one of his wry grins that Priotr remembered so well. "Come now my old friend. Now is not the time to be shy. Open this door and greet your old friend proper. I have much news to tell you."
Piotr replied gruffly through the door. "I seem to recall all sorts of unpleasantness the last time I saw you, Mitya. In fact, I distinctly remember all manners of unpleasant words exchanged between you and I. As a matter of fact, I can't seem to find a single, colitary reason compelling enough for me to open this door and let you in, let alone drop and end you where you stand."
Dmitri tilted his head back and let out a throaty laugh. That's when Piotr realized that Dmitri's throat had been slashed. From one side all the way to the other. Dry bits of black blood clung to Mitya's neck and the wound was quite deep. Mitya leaned against the wall by the door. "I only seek lodgings for the day. Will you refuse me quarters? That would be a violation of the code set by the Great Dracul himself, the First of us. Can you really afford to be ostracized from the society of the damned? Where will you go when you're cast aside from the unwanted?"
Piotr replied, I've had no dealings with the Society in many a years now. I'm pretty much cast aside by them already. As you can see, I can manage perfectly well with or without the Society, or the code."
"Oh yes. You manage so well, I can see that. In this luxurious palace in the hall of kings. What is that, a studio apartment you live in? With your royal duties as the king of refuse at the hospital, waving your scepter shaped like a mop? Why on earth would anyone want to leave all this?"
"Good bye Dmitri. I'll tell you the same exact thing I told you the last time I saw you. Never darken my doorstep again."
"How can I darken anyone's doorstep when I cast no shadow?"
"Good bye Mitya".
"Come on Petey baby!" Mitya said, raising his voice. "At least let me show you what I got, man, lemme show you the goods!" Every word Mitya spoke got louder and Piotr knew that if he had Mitya on the other side of the door for too long, his voice would reverberate through the walls. He intended to cause a scene and Piotr was not about to have it. He had worked hard to maintain his quiet life here and he wasn't about to let Mitya mess it all up, like he had so many times before. Especially that nosy Mrs. Leibermann. It's like she has a sixth sense for gossip or something. Like a radar that picks up the faintest signals of discord implanted in her head, hidden somewhere in that mass of blue hair that resembled a bird's nest, somewhat.
There were days when Piotr would come back from his work and he would find her sitting on a plastic stool in front of the apartment complex. She brings the plastic stool out with her every morning to sit. She's just one of the many old hens that sit out there, but she's always the first one out there. It's like the day doesn't start until Mrs. Leibermann is outside on the steps with her stool.
Not having brought a stool himself, as he was coming home from work, Piotr would sometimes sit on the first step with Mrs. Leibermann and have a smoke with her before going in. Only if she was alone, though. If she was already surrounded by her court of old hens, he would walk past her and they would exchange a smile with their eyes, or say hello, but that was about it.
When she was sitting there by herself, he would walk up to her and say, "good morning my sunflower. May I sit here and greet the day with you?" A short burst of laughter would explode out the side of her mouth and they would both chuckle and she would pat the ground next to her and he would sit. There, she would tell him about all the drama that had been ensuing in the apartment complex in his absence. How a strange looking man was seen entering the Paulsons's in 3H, how the Burnhams in 6B got into another argument last night, how Mr. Stahl in 4C came home drunk again and beat his wife, etc... Every night it was something different and Mrs. Leibermann never seemed to grow tired of the variations on the same theme.
Mrs. Leibermann would say to Piotr, "I like you. You remind me of my late husband... He passed away so young... He died in the war, you know? They never found his body. The poor dear... The military, they sent me a letter he had written before he died. That's all I have of him now. That and some stupid medals. I'd trade all those medals to have my Stanley back again..."
Piotr would always say, "I'm sure Stanley loved you very much. If he were still here, he'd tell you himself, I'm sure."
He said it with such sincerity, that Mrs. Leibermann looked at Piotr, smiled and said, "that's very nice of you to say". Then she'd continue on with the gossip. The unending gossip.
Piotr had no intentions of adding to the ever-growing list of topics for Mrs. Leibermann, so he opened the door quickly, grabbed Mitya by the shirt collar and pulled him inside with much force. "Hey, easy easy... I know it's been a long time, but I want you to be gentle with me... Besides, this is a six hundred dollar shirt that you're ripping... That I got my blood on... Piotr, that bastard made me spill my own blood!!!"
"Keep your voice down! Just take it easy. What in the world are you talking about? Who made you spill your own blood?":
"The Hunter."
There was a pause for a moment. The room was silent except for the ticking of a clock and the labored breath of Mitya, bubbling from the wound in his neck. Piotr went and got a small hand towel and handed to Mitya. mitya pressed it up against his neck.
"So the Church has got themselves a new Hunter, huh?"
"Yup, a new Hunter."
"So what's the big deal? This isn't the first Hunter there ever was, nor will it be the last. At least he's not a Slayer. Why doesn't the Council dispose of him the usual way?"
"He's good. Real good. So far, every one the Council's sent out has not made it back. And now, he's targetting the members of the Council itself. They're scared. I've never seen the Council be frightened of one man before. We know very little about him. We know that he was ordained Hunter by the Pope himself sometime last year. That doesn't mean he's green, though. Being ordained by the Pope probably is just official recognition of years of service. We do know that he's a true believer, which makes him all the more dangerous. We know that he likes to work alone, likes to kill from a distance, and prefers to use a crossbow. That's about it. We don't even know what the Hunter looks like. I mean, he attacked me last night up close, but I still didn't get a good look at him! He was wearing goggles and a mask. Like night vision or something. I think I hurt him, though. But not without him taking a chunk of my flesh out."
Piotr listened carefully to all Mitya was saying. The sun was coming up over the city.
A Hunter...
After all these years...
"So where do I come into all this?" Piotr asked. "I'm just a janitor at a hospital. What can I do against a Hunter that's defeated the agents of the Council?"
-To be continued-
__________________________________________________________________________________
Just a little something I whipped up a few nights ago. I've been meaning to keep up with this story.
Thanks for stopping in to take a peek.
-Grape-
