Cold Open.

Chief Constable Oscar Gordon took his coat off from the hook on the back of his door and put it on. Time to go home and put my fucking feet up. After the day he’d had today, he couldn’t wait to shut his office door on the way out.

“Good night Sir,” an officer said as he passed them in the corridor.

“Good night Dalgleish,” he said to her. “And good job today. That domestic sounded gnarly, and I heard good things about you. Make sure you take it easy tonight, alright?”

Dalgleish looked visibly touched by his words. “Thanks Sir, I will. Take care yourself.” She walked off back towards where the locker rooms were.

It was dark and particularly cold when he got out of the police station but his reserved parking space wasn’t too far for him to go. He unlocked the car, and got in, shuddering from the cold and put the key in the ignition.

“Don’t.”

Oscar almost shit his pants at the male voice in the car with him.

“What the fuck?” he cried out in anger. He tried to turn around in his seat but his slight gut gave him reduced mobility.

“Don’t move. Don’t start the car and don’t do anything sudden. Just listen,” the voice said again.

Oscar felt a pointed prod in his left side so he scrapped his plan of jumping out of the car as quick as he could. “Who are you?”

“It doesn’t matter who I-”

“Of course it matters,” interrupted Oscar. “You broke into my fucking car.”

“What matters is how you can help me.”

“Then make an appointment tomorrow with my secretary, but I don’t help scum bags who have me at knife point.”

“Maybe you should re-evaluate that mantra of yours,” the mysterious voice said, applying more pressure to the knife he was digging into the Chief Constable’s coat.

Oscar sighed almost in resignation. “Fine. What… What can I do to help?”

“The Collector wants to know where the vampura dog statue is. And then he wants it in his possession.”

Oscar Gordon saw red again. “Tell The Collector he can come here himself and suck on my dick. I’m not telling you that information, and neither am I going to give it away. It’s evidence.”

“That won’t make The Collector happy.”

“Quite frankly, I couldn’t give a shit. You can’t just come here demanding I give you something you have no right in having. The Collector will have to collect something else instead. Give stamps a try.”

“Look,” the voice becoming more desperate in tone. Before he was cool and calm and in control, perhaps buoyed by a false confidence that he would get what he came for. “The Collector will pay a good price. I’ll cut you in. Just tell me where it is.”

“You’ve got more chance of me becoming the next Queen of fucking England.”

“Sorry it had to come to this then,” and with a swift push, the knife went through Oscar’s coat and into his side. He felt the burn as it was pulled out and he was jabbed with it again, just next to the first wound.

Oscar’s back arched as he began to writhe in pain, the old man managing to get his left hand to press onto the wounds. His attacker bailed out of the car and ran off into the dark.

Oscar clambered to open his own door. Luckily he didn’t put his seatbelt on when he got into the car and was able to topple out of it, pulling himself along so that his legs weren’t still in the car. He rolled over onto his good side, still trying, despite an ever growing weakness, to apply pressure to his bleeding holes.

“Sir? Sir?” Dalgleish cried out, coming out of work herself and seeing her boss laid on the ground. “What the hell happened to you?”

Oscar grunted, trying to find the words and the strength to say them. The only thing he managed to utter before breathing his last breath, was “Th… Collector…”

Chapter Ten.

“There is a lot to get through tonight,” sighed Alistair, reading through his notebook in front of his team. “I don’t even know where to begin.”

“Let’s start with some good news?” Stanley said, looking wide eyed at Alistair and rolling them in the direction of the newest additions of the group.

“Ahh, of course yes.” Alistair awkwardly coughed. “There is good news. Thanks Stan. I’d like to welcome to the team a couple of Town Centre transferees, Zoe and Callum. We were looking for a… um… new member…” he started to say, trying to avoid eye contact with Henry, “and we got two. How lucky are we? Callum’s almost got his twenty stakes and Zoe as you know is a pro.”

The whole team turned to cheerfully face the new Pin Corner pair at the back of the room.

“Thanks Captain,” Zoe said. “It’s good to be here.” She smiled, but what really caught Henry off guard was the fact she looked dead into his eyes when she said it. And it actually looked a bit disingenuous if he was being honest. Henry’s own smile was wiped from his face and he quickly turned back round. Does she fancy me now Mark’s not around? We were identical twins after all, Henry thought.

“How come you are here?” Nadheera asked.

“Did I not make it clear already that there’s a lot to get through Nadheera? Ask personal questions in your own time,” Alistair said.

“Sorry Captain,” Nadheera said, shifting back round to the front.

“Um, so you will have heard about Oscar Gordon’s murder in the early hours of this morning. It’s all in the press of course, but what has been left out, which our Chief Teddy Shepherd wants you to know and keep secret naturally, is that his last words were ‘The Collector’.”

“Holy shit, that bastard is just everywhere,” Lana said.

“Quite, it seems so. Which is why all the Captains are telling their Divisions. You need to be on your guard. Now from what we think we know, The Collector is just someone, and people are acting out on behalf of them?” Alistair said. “Am I understanding that right?”

“Yes Cap,” David piped up. “It’s my understanding that The Collector just pays good prices for these vampura statues, driving normal folk to just go out and get them for him.”

“But now they’re killing in their quest to collect, and that changes everything.” Alistair said. “Lana, you and Mark came across two, then there was the issue at the QwikBite last night and now this. And that’s just what we know of.”

“So what do we do?” Nadheera asked. “When we come across these people? Give ‘em what they want?”

“Under no circumstance do we give them what they want,” Alistair said firmly. “You silver the statues to dust them as soon as you can. If there’s nothing to collect then they will have nothing to have… or whatever it is I’m trying to say. You know.”

“I think so,” Nadheera replied.

“And to top that off, Henry and Lana have some chilling news.”

Henry proceeded to update his team on what happened at the end of their shift by Mark’s tree and Marta’s warning about Tallon and Rowena, much to the shock of everyone else.

“I don’t believe it. I thought she was stuff of myth. It’s so cool you actually saw here,” Callum was the first to say.

“Cool?” Lana asked. “It was scary as fuck Callum. Not cool.”

“So a great big evil comes by to tell of more great big evil, and she wants to tell you?” Zoe asked.

“I’m not sure exactly what you’re saying but your tone suggests you’re being a bit critical,” Lana said, coming to Henry’s defence. “But she knew Henry had lost his brother, and she said something about understanding loss, so I don’t know. We’re just telling you all what happened.”

Zoe shrugged and Henry shared a quick look with Lana.

“If it is Tallon and Rowena, then we need to be on the lookout for that too. I’ll dig out the portraits, drawings and photographs of the three from the last century or so, so you know what you’re looking out for,” Stanley said.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“Yeah, if you’ve been living under a rock and have absolutely no idea what they look like,” David muttered.

“I know son, but I don’t want to take anything for granted,” Stanley argued. “Those vampura fucks have been around a long time and they know exactly what they’re doing.”

“For what it’s worth, I think she was being genuine,” Henry said. “She seemed concerned about those two and what’s coming.”

“That may be so,” Stanley said. “But those three have been playing cat and mouse with each other for over a hundred or so years. Rowena is Marta’s Vamp Mama. Rowena sired her in the mid eighteen hundreds and they’ve been fighting and being friends on and off all that time. She just wants us to do her dirty work because she’s probably decided she’s had enough of them.”

“Do we know of anything in particular this time round?” Henry asked.

“Your guess is as good as mine son,” Stanley said. “But we’ll deal with them when we need to. There are other pressing things going on at the moment.”

“Like The Collector,” Nadheera said.

“And let’s not forget QwikBite last night,” David chipped in. “I keep thinking back to what the vampuras were saying. They felt the blood was tasting funny. Do we think there’s anything in that?”

Alistair buried his face in his hands. “Oh boy, my head is spinning. I don’t think we can be worrying about vampura’s palates right now David. Let’s get the fuck out of here shall we and get some fresh air. I feel like I need a good fight right about now.”

***

“Large vampura congregation seen on Turner Street,” was the radio transmission that got the Pin Corner team running.

When Henry and David arrived, they were the first. “I thought they said it was large? I was expecting bigger,” Henry whispered as they watched from a distance away.

“That’s what she said,” David muttered under his breath, causing Henry to blush.

“Shouldn’t we go in and break it up? They look like they’re going to kill that guy.”

They were watching three men pinning another man against someone’s garden wall.

“I’d rather him than me though,” David said. “And if we go in then we risk getting bitten. That is not a way to… Shit. I’m really sorry Henry, I didn’t mean that,” he said apologetically.

“It’s alright. You did mean it, and it’s ok. It’s no way to go for anyone.”

“I know, but I should’ve been more sensitive. I’m so sorry.” He held onto Henry’s wrist and gave it a gentle squeeze. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine, honestly.” God I feel like such a fraud for allowing him to apologise like that. It’s not fair on him. He’s right. It’s no way to go and I’d rather not be bitten myself. So much so that I scarified my fucking brother. Fuck, I feel like a piece of shit.

“Come on, the others will be here soon. Let’s go now, and save this guy. It’s no way to go, so let’s stop it from happening,” David said. And before Henry could say anything David was out from their hiding spot and running up the street. Henry had to sprint to catch up.

By the time the Nasscies made it to the confrontation, Henry had caught up, and the three aggressors were still behaving aggressively towards the lone guy.

“Oi, fucking leave him alone!” David called out, grabbing at one of the aggressors and pulling him off.

The three all spun round and Henry and David could see for certain that they were dealing with vampuras. David and Henry both reached for their stakes.

“Good, about time!” one of the aggressors said. He was wearing a denim bucket hat.

“You called us?” Henry asked.

“Of course we did,” Bucket Hat Vampura said. “We got one of the guys.”

“What guys?” Henry asked.

“You had some kids killed a month or so back. Four in a back garden. This is one of the arseholes who did it. Some of my friends have gone after another guy who was there too.”

“Well ok…” David said. “Is that true?”

“Of course it’s true,” Bucket Hat said. “I’ve told you so.”

“But I can’t just stake him if he didn’t… Ok so I just heard that out loud. We can totally stake him regardless. He’s a fucking vampura.”

“Wait!” the accused vampura whimpered. “I can explain!”

Bucket Hat and his two friends turned back on him, pushing him back against the wall. “There’s nothing you can say. There’s rules. We don’t bite kids. We don’t sire kids. Otherwise we’d be having hundred year old kids running around and it just makes no sense. It’s always been like that!”

“Look, I know but hear me out. We’d been having a rough time not finding anything to feed on and what we were getting tasted of shit. We just needed something fresh. C’mon, you must know how it is?!”

“Fuck this guy,” Henry said, pushing past the aggressors and staking the kid killing vampura. He then knocked the corpse statue with his mallet, dusting it instantly.

Zoe and Nadheera arrived, running up to join the party.

“Stay back now!” Nadheera yelled, her arm raised, stake in hand.

“Oi, put that down!” Bucket Hat cried. “We just caught one of the kids killers.”

Nadheera and Zoe looked equally confused, more so by the lack of action from David and Henry. “What?”

“These vampuras called us to say they had found the vamps who had killed the kids a while back,” Henry said.

“It’s true, we did,” Bucket Hat said. “We’re from Manchester and when we heard about what happened we decided we had to do something to find those responsible. We can’t have bad eggs giving a bad reputation to us vampuras. SURE, we’d all like the taste of fresh blood. You know I can’t imagine how fresh and clean it would be… hmm, but no. No, it’s not right and there are rules against it and we had to hunt them ourselves.”

“Well, ok thanks for that,” Zoe said. “But you do know there’s only one way this is going to end for you?”

“Oh hell, are you going to stake us now? After what we just did for you?”

“Yeah,” Nadheera said. “Pretty much. We are grateful though.”

“Goo-” but before Bucket Hat could even finish the word, the four Nassices lunged in unison to stake the three vampuras.

“Let me,” Henry said, knocking each one consecutively with his mallet, reducing them all to dust. “Vamps turning on vamps, I didn’t think I’d be seeing that.”

“Less competition for hunting I suppose,” Nadheera guessed.

“But did you hear them say that about taste of blood?” David said.

“You’re obsessed,” Nadheera said, looking at David with slight disdain.

“I’m just hearing it all the time at the moment. Doesn’t it interest you?”

“Not really. So the blood tastes like shit? They stop hunting and drinking and they die off from dehaemodration. End of vampuras,” argued Nadheera.

“Well, whatever. I think we should continue our patrolling,” Zoe said. “How’s your night been going so far Henry?”

“Er well… alright thanks. Quiet, up until this bit. And yours?”

“Great thanks.”

“Good.”

“…Good.”

“Alright then. Well David and I will continue in that direction. Thanks for coming to help, we’ll see you around.” Henry took David by his jacket sleeve and pulled him away.

“Alright, steady,” David said.

“She’s weirding me out David.”

“She’s just being nice to you H, chill.”

“Perhaps. She’s just giving me weird vibes since Mark died.”

“Well didn’t you say she had a thing for Mark? Maybe she just misses him and sees him in you. Do I need to start getting jealous?”

Henry couldn’t help but laugh. “No you don’t! I only need one work spouse.”

“I’m touched!” David said, playfully nudging Henry. “But you tell me if she makes any funny moves, and I’ll get her!” he joked.

And with that, Henry continued his night, his feelings of guilt from earlier having subsided in David’s company.