I crept around one of the army vehicles to find Kayla peeking over the top of the bonnet. I sneaked up behind her and looked over her shoulder. She immediately turned and shoved me in the chest.
“There’s a vampire coming! Get down!” she breathed.
We crouched beside one of the vehicle’s colossal wheels and I prayed the vampire would walk by without discovering us. I closed my eyes and waited for a cold, bony hand to fall on my shoulder. But it never came. As soon as the vampire had passed by, Kayla was back on her feet again. She weaved her way through the vehicles and piles of rocks until we were only a few feet away from the massive wheel, which was being continuously turned by those people. We came to rest against a large rock, which protruded from the ground like a gigantic tooth.
“Kayla, I know you want to help these people, but this is crazy,” I whispered.
“I’ll think of something,” she said, looking over the rock at the people. I looked back and could see that the others were still hiding beneath the truck.
“Kayla, we don’t even know how we’re gonna get outta here, let alone rescue a load of half-starved people!”
But Kayla made no reply. She was on her feet again and scurrying over the rocks. I crouched down, and moving like a crab, I scuttled over to the wheel. Kayla reached one of the people, an emaciated looking boy of about thirteen and gently took hold of his arm.
“Hey,” she whispered at the boy.
He didn’t respond. He kept his head down and continued to mindlessly push the wheel round and round.
“You want to get out of here, don’t you?” Kayla almost seemed to plead with him.
I found it upsetting to watch Kayla desperately try and get a response from this boy. Kayla shook the boy again and said, “Please! My friends and I could rescue you!”
Moving closer to Kayla, I placed my hand gently on her shoulder, and said, “Kayla, he can’t hear you. Look at him, whatever they’ve done to him, he’s not like a normal person anymore…he’s a shell.”
Kayla pushed my hand away and said, “I want to help these people.”
“But Kayla…” Before I could finish, the boy spoke, ever so faintly, but he had said something.
“What did you say?” Kayla asked.
“Help me,” he said.
Hearing his cry for help, Kayla bent down and picked up a rock, which filled her whole fist. She brought it up above her head and I could see she intended to try and break the chains which held the boy prisoner. Kayla swung her arm down and I thrust my arm out, grabbing hold of her wrist before the stone crashed into the metal chain. Kayla looked at me and tried to break her arm free.
“No Kayla!” I warned her.
“Get off me!” She hissed, her eyes fixed on mine. “I’m setting this boy free.”
“Now’s not the right time…”
“Let go!” and again she tried to wrestle her arm free from my grip.
“Kayla, if you try and rescue the boy now, you will alert the Vampyrus, and none of us will ever get out of here. Let’s just do what we came for, find this Elias Munn and then come back and rescue him…we can come back and rescue them all!” I pleaded with her.
Before Kayla could respond, my arm was gripped from behind. I wheeled round to see a Vampyrus, just inches from me.
“Who said you could stop working?” it screeched. Looking down at our legs and seeing they weren’t manacled, he screamed at the top of his voice, “Intruders! Intruders!”
I looked quickly about and could see that the other Vampyrus, who were standing within earshot, had stopped what they were doing and were looking at us. Kayla brought the rock she was holding down onto the top of the Vampyrus’ head. I heard a sickening thud as it collapsed onto the ground, where it lay twitching.
“I’ll come back for you, I promise!” Kayla told the boy. Then Kayla turned to me and said, “Here we go again!” and a part of me wondered if she was looking forward to slaying some vampires and Vampyrus.
Kayla darted away from the wheel and ran alongside the empty tubs, which were beginning their ascent back to the top of the pulley. As she drew level to one of them, she jumped in. Kayla looked back at me and shouted, “I thought you wanted to get out of here!”
Glancing over my shoulder, I saw a group of vampires running towards me, their eyes burning red and their fangs drooling. Not needing any encouragement, I turned and ran as fast as I could towards the tub that Kayla had jumped in. But it had started to rise and move away from the ledge of the crater.
Kayla lent out of the tub and shouted, “C’mon Kiera, run!”
I drew level with it and took hold of Kayla’s hand, which she dangled over the edge. She wrapped her fingers tightly around my wrist and yanked me up into the tub. Looking over the rim as we began to rise, I could see the vampires jumping into the tubs that were close behind us, desperate to sink their teeth into us.
I pointed down at them and shouted, “They’re coming!”
In the distance I heard sirens begin to wail, and I suspected the Vampyrus were alerting Elias Munn to the mayhem, which was now unfolding around the crater. The tub behind us was about six feet away and although it couldn’t get any closer, the four vampires that had managed to clamber into it were now desperately trying to reach for us. They waved their arms about frantically and snatched at the side of the tub that Kayla and I were in.
“Hungry!” they moaned.
One of the vampires managed to take hold and put all of his weight on that end. The tub began to tilt down, forcing us to slide towards the awaiting arms of the vampire. It clawed at my legs and managed to take hold of my feet. The vampire tugged fiercely at me and I began to slide from the tub. I looked back at Kayla and she’d managed to take hold of the other end, stopping herself from falling towards the vampires like I had done.
“Get the fuck off me!” I shouted as the vampire continued to pull at me and I slipped further towards it. I looked down through the gap between the two tubs and screamed. Although we were only about twenty feet from the rocky ground around the crater, I was now suspended above it, and it spiralled away below me. It looked so deep and black, that it could have almost reached the Earth’s core. I couldn’t even see the bottom, only darkness. All around the walls of the abyss there was scaffolding, which housed even more humans, digging and chipping away at the walls.
Realising that if I should fall I would certainly die, I began to frantically kick out at the vampire, who was pulling me from the tub. I then felt Kayla take hold of my arms and begin to yank me back towards her. It was like a bizarre game of ‘tug of war’ that they were playing, and I was the rope.
“Kayla, pull!” I screamed.
“I am!” she shouted back over the wail of the sirens and the shrieks from the vampires.
I lashed out again with my feet and struck the vampire straight in the face. Its head rolled back, and then snapped forward again. It was grotesque-looking, and had a badly stitched scar running from the bridge of its nose and right over the crown of its head. It looked as if someone had tried to stitch the vampire’s head back together.
Kicking widely, I managed to break myself free. Kayla hoisted me back into the metal tub and I collapsed onto the floor of it.
“Get up, Kiera, there’s no time for rest,” she shouted.
I looked up and she was pointing at another vampire that was now making its way across the chain that linked the tubs together.
Don’t they ever give up? I asked myself.
The vampire managed to take hold of our tub and it began to climb aboard.
It screamed at us, spit and drool splashing our faces. I pushed it backwards, but the vampire managed to take a hold of the edge of the tub and pull itself in. It loomed up and came towards us. As it did, the tub began to roll dangerously from side to side, like a small boat on a rough sea. Then an idea came to me.
“Kayla, hold on!” I yelled, as I took hold of the side of the tub and began to rock it from side to side.
The vampire began to wobble and I rocked the tub even harder and faster. I looked over my shoulder and saw Kayla gripping the side of the tub, her knuckles glowing white through her skin. Seeing that Kayla was safe, I rocked the tub back and forth as hard as I could. The vampire began to lurch from side to side, as it fought desperately to maintain its balance. I pushed the side of the tub again and again, and even though the night was bitterly cold and snow swirled all around us, sweat ran from my brow and into my eyes.
I watched the vampire stagger violently to the left, so I kicked out at it with my feet, almost spilling it over. The vampire flapped its arms wildly, then disappeared over the edge of the tub. I watched it spin and turn through the air as it fell into the crater. Over and over it spun. The vampire seemed to fall forever, the crater was so deep. Before it had even smashed into the bottom, it had disappeared from my view and into the darkness. Then, I heard the sound of screaming. Looking back, I could see that two of the Vampyrus had swooped through the air and were now trying to yank Kayla from the tub. Scrambling forward, I tried to reach for her. With a booming sound, the night felt like it was being torn apart as Isidor raced through the sky towards his sister. With his crossbow drawn, Isidor fired off a flurry of bolts, harpooning the Vampyrus through the head. Within seconds, they were spinning lifelessly away down into the abyss. Isidor winked at his sister and was gone again, chasing down more Vampyrus that had sprang into the air.
We had reached the highest point of the pulley and were now making our descent. The remaining vampires in the tub behind lent out and tore at the air hysterically. One of them stood up, as if getting ready to jump the six foot gap that separated us.
I looked down and could see we were now about ten feet away from the ground. Throwing a quick look over my shoulder, I could see the vampire was just about to leap at us. I turned to look at Kayla, who was now standing in the tub, with her wings out. Wrapping her arms around my waist, she shouted, “Jump!”
Together we leapt from the tub and soared through the air. We hit the ground softly.