 
Blood Shadow

Book of Manuel

Phil Wohl

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2013 Phil Wohl

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ONE

Gabriel Billingsley and his pack of gorillas were placed safely back in the zoo where they belonged, but he definitely was not pleased with the outcome. While the other gorillas had reverted back to their more beastly form, it was Gabriel that refused to fully make the transition and spent his days planning to get back on the outside.

His vibes were so strong and his intent to get revenge so verbose, that it awoke the originator of all things vampire, Manuel Ortiz. Manuel had been in an extended slumber in a fairly-appointed coffin within the confines of the Muirback Cemetery grounds in Burlington, Vermont for the better part of three decades.

Ortiz had spent most of his life as a vampire transitioning from one spell to another at the hand of a scornful witch who was well within her path to giving a new meaning to the term "revenge."

The wedding of Carmen Rosario and Manuel Ortiz was proceeding after a rather tepid courtship of almost two years and a dozen breakups. It was the mid-1700s and the American Revolution was still more than a quarter-century away from fruition, so the land that encompassed the future U.S. territory was still rather raw in structure and the people tended to live within tribes as a means for community and survival.

The group of Spanish settlers was small in number compared to the dominant Native American tribes, the Apaches and then the Comanche, so they had to move often to avoid devastation. So, they migrated from the area that is now Texas and headed northwest then southwest in order to be in sync with the weather and the growing, fishing and hunting seasons.

Manuel and Carmen's courtship was so long because of his wandering eyes. Every time the tribe picked up and moved a new squaw would catch Manuel's eye and cause trouble for both him and the tribe. But, since he was the largest and strongest member of the tribe and its leader, he could do pretty much anything he wanted to do when he wanted to do it!

Manuel finally gave into marriage after the following conversation with the tribe's elder, Juan Nescacio.

"If you choose to continue down this path, you will lead this tribe to destruction."

"Because I will anger the wrong person?" Manuel questioned.

"Well yes, but mostly because you will not add to our numbers," Juan replied.

It took Manuel a few seconds to understand the reference. Then Juan continued,

"My niece may not be the most colorful flower in the field, but she will always bloom every spring," he said, referring to Carmen. "She will also give you sons who will be warriors and protect all of us for moons to come."

Manuel wasn't completely buying the argument of the hearty flower versus a flower with such beauty that it takes your breath away, but he swelled with pride over the potential of having boys that would be as strong and free-wheeling as himself.

Manuel smiled, "Then there will be a wedding."

"You have made a wise choice my son," Juan stated, although he wasn't quite sure that the insatiable beast could ever be contained.

While Manuel was busy running around with the most desirable squaws of each village, his girlfriend Carmen sat and waited—in silent anger—for her man to return to her each time. In between doing her chores and helping organize the entire tribe, because extremely fast moves were usually hiding just around the corner, she started to dabble with dark magic as an outlet for her frustration.

Juan's wife Rosa had a conversation with Carmen only days before the wedding.

"Are you excited about the wedding?" Rosa asked, trying to keep the conversation light.

"In some ways," Carmen replied in a somewhat cryptic manner.

Rosa was confused by Carmen's response, "Manuel has many good features."

Carmen was not in a pro-Manuel mood after he left her behind for another night of drinking and frolicking in a neighboring village until dawn.

Carmen kept shucking corn and didn't pick up her head as she angrily replied, "But being true to the woman that loves him isn't important?"

"No, it isn't," Rosa replied, as Carmen's anger made the flames in front of her grow in intensity.

"I know you all have been talking about me," Carmen stated as she looked up at the elder woman.

"Only because we are concerned that such dark magic will lead you down a path guided by scorn, not love."

Carmen barely heard the old woman's words of caring.

"There is little love left in this vessel," she said patting her left hand to her chest.

Rosa knew that Carmen's path in life had been chartered for her already and there would be little to dissuade it.

"Your life is your own, my child, and no one can walk in your steps. It is for you to decide the way of this tribe. You are now the power, but choose carefully how you wield that strength, for it has led to much unrest within our family."

Carmen hugged Rosa, releasing the last ounces of care and love she had remaining in her shattered heart.

It was the evening before a wedding that would change everything for the tribe and the life of Manuel Ortiz.

"Where are you going?" Carmen asked her man as he tried to make himself look extra-pretty to go out.

Since he always came and went as he pleased without question, Manuel wasn't exactly receptive to the query.

"Don't ever ask me where I'm going," he grunted as if she was barely good enough for a response.

"Are you ever going to stop? Are you ever gonna' love just me, Manuel?"

He had his back to her, so he turned around and snorted "No!"

And then he finally sealed his own fate and coincidentally her fate as well.

He laughed, "What are you gonna' do about it Carmen? Want to call of the wedding? Then what will the others think of you? Who will ever want to share your bed?"

It was the first real exchange the couple had experienced in their rocky, but remarkably silent courtship.

"The wedding is off," she replied, standing her ground, waiting for him to show any sign of aggression in order to propel her pre-meditated plan in place.

Manuel never stood for any form of insubordination and reacted to the challenge with a predictably-physical response. He raised his large, muscular right arm and clenched his mighty fist, and was in mid-swing before he met with a force, the likes of which he had never experienced.

"What the?" he started to say.

"I think you've done quite enough talking," she said not only restricting his ability to speak but also his movement.

Carmen then closed her eyes in order to focus her energy on the forthcoming spell. Moments later she summoned years of negative energy caused by Manuel and then her lids flashed open, revealing eyes that were as dark as the bottom of the deepest cave.

"Living beast of the day" she chanted in a loud, monotone voice, "you must now be transformed into a dying beast of the night! As your sire, I will control your actions if I so choose. The spell only to be broken three cycles past the witch's moon after I cease to exist!"

Carmen closed her eyes again, and when they reopened they were once again and almond color. The dirt in the teepee that had been blowing around in a circular fashion ceased and the clouds that had assembled over the village parted and the sun was allowed to set unobstructed.

Manuel crumbled to the ground and was no longer of this world as the women of the nearby village would be disappointed when he did not return until the following night, when his unquenchable thirst would make him order his new beverage of choice throughout the camp.

Rosa came by the next morning and spotted Carmen outside her abode packing her belongings. She looked inside the tent and asked, "Is he sleeping off another long night?" as she saw an unconscious Manuel sprawled on the ground. If she would have taken the time to really look at him she would have noticed he was no longer breathing, no longer with the living.

"Something like that," Carmen replied.

"Are you ready for the wedding?" Rosa asked.

"Don't think that is a good idea, especially if you were thinking of waiting until the sun went down to start the ceremony."

"Our wedding ceremonies always take place when the day meets the night," Rosa replied.

Although Carmen had turned to dark magic and was now a slave to its power, she still showed care for the people that had taken her in and cared for her at a young age when her parents had perished.

"Garlic," was all she said.

Rosa was confused, "Garlic? Why do you need garlic? Is it some new thing at weddings?"

"Not for me," Carmen replied. "Everyone should wear a necklace of garlic to ward off evil spirits."

"If that is your wish," Rosa stated.

Carmen nodded, "Yes, it is my final wish."

Rosa quickly thought about the word 'final' and knew this would be no ordinary nuptials ceremony, but she nonetheless complied with the odd request.

The day seemed to move at an accelerated pace, as the powerful rays of the midday sun transitioned into the remaining flickers of sunlight of dusk. And as the sun was no longer the dominant force in the sky, the ascending power of the moon awoke a slumbering and internally transformed groom.

Manuel groaned as he woke up and then struggled to get to his knees.

"I feel like I have been hit by a buffalo at top speed.

Carmen had a remedy for her fiancé's paranormal hangover, as she walked into their living area with a bucket filled with cold water from a nearby stream. She tossed the water through the air and it engulfed Manuel's body, instantly awakening his senses.

He shook off the excess water like the soggy dog that he was and exclaimed, "Woohoo! Thanks doll, I needed that!"

Before she left the tent to put on her wedding dress he asked, "I hope you don't mind, but I invited a few people from the neighboring village?"

It wasn't so much of a question as an information update. She knew that the "people" would be women he spent time with.

"The more the merrier!" she said with a genuine smile. And then she thought to herself as she walked away, "Serves them right for messing with someone else's man. That's their funeral. No garlic necklaces for them."

Fifteen minutes later, the ceremony was about to start and Carmen was walking down the aisle toward Manuel, as the other women vying for his affection looked her over. All she had in her broken heart was smiles for her detractors because she knew of their fate.

When Carmen finally got up toward Manuel, she looked toward the black sky and knew that the fun was about to begin, so she leaned over after he pulled back her veil and whispered, "You can run to the ends of the earth but I will always find you."

He pulled back and was unsure whether he was being threatened or she was just trying to convey a somewhat aggressive romantic gesture?

But before Manuel could act on his usually aggressive impulses, he was struck with a full body pain that not even the greatest Native American warrior could inflict. He screamed from the agony and Carmen turned to the crowd and said, "You might want to take a step back or two." And then she turned to the handful of women from the neighboring tribe and said, "You ladies might want to start running, real fast!"

The women were confused at first, but when Manuel's fingernails started growing and his teeth turned to fangs that were all the incentive they needed to get going. Had they seen the full wings unfurled then they surely would have passed out from the unusual sight.

Manuel roared as he felt even more powerful than he ever felt in his mortal skin. He thought about attacking the people of his village but then he was quickly put off by the repulsive and overpowering scent of garlic, so he floated over to his new master, Carmen.

She patted him on the head and said, "Good boy!" in her most sarcastic tone, like a dog owner would say to its pet. Carmen then turned and nodded in the direction of the running women and exclaimed, "Now, go fetch!" and then walked over and picked up her luggage bundle and left the village while Manuel feasted on the blood of the infidels and the other people of their village.

TWO

Somewhere around the 1980s, Carmen got tired of playing with her toy and decided to simply bury Manuel in a small cemetery in Burlington, Vermont on the top of a hill overlooking the new Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream complex.

He took the burial as the chance to finally be able to slow things down and get some much needed 'me' time for a change. After a few centuries of doing horrible things mostly against his will, Manuel was looking forward to whatever time he had alone in the darkness.

Four years into his below-ground exile, Carmen was killed as she performed a spell with a bunch of wiccans. The spell went horribly wrong as all of the 10 witches burst into flames and were reduced to piles of dust. Carmen's reign of revenge was over, although she was in a better place mentally after she buried Manuel and never planned to think about him or see him ever again.

The desperate call from Gabriel Billingsley hugged the coast of the Atlantic Ocean on its way up north, and awoke Manuel Ortiz from his extended meditation. He looked up through his coffin past the extensive root system that had grown all around him and exploded out of the ground, unfurling his wings to land softly on the ground. While he could have floated above the grass, Manuel desired to feel the ground under his feet again as he moved.

Manuel looked down at the Ben & Jerry's location and suddenly had the urge for something sweet. It was after nine o'clock in the middle of the summer and regular business hours had just passed on this busy Friday night. Manuel looked like a regular mortal—a quite pale one at that, because he hadn't seen the light of day in years—as he surveyed the list of flavors available to patrons for the day. And then one particular flavor caught his one-tracked mind.

"I'll have a large cup of the 'Vampire Red' ice cream, my good man."

The company had been experimenting with more trendy flavor names and found that its blood red ice cream had been quite popular with the teenage crowd and, apparently, the night walkers it was named for.

"Oh I'm sorry, we're closed," the young man named Travis said.

Manuel thought, "This boy has been alive for fewer years than I have been buried. Surely he just needs some coaxing."

He looked deep into the boy's eyes and then Travis went from cleaning to scooping a bunch of 'Vampire Red' into a large tie-dyed cup.

"This is our most popular flavor this summer. We can't make it fast enough!" he beamed and then happily handed the groovy cup to Manuel, who took a taste of the somewhat tart flavor and said, "Needs more blood."

Travis slid his arm through the ice cream delivery window and Manuel bit into his wrist and emptied some blood as topping over the ice cream.

"Looks like magic shell!" Travis exclaimed and then started to feel faint from the blood loss as Manuel continued to feed.

The vampire rolled his eyes and said, "Mortals," as he bit into his own wrist and let the kid drink enough of the good stuff to fully recover and instantly heal.

"Now, isn't that the best blood red you've ever tasted?" Manuel asked as he pulled his wrist away from the eager kid's mouth.

Travis nodded in agreement and smiled as if he had done something naughty that felt so nice. He had blood all over his mouth and cheeks and didn't realize it, so Manuel reached for a napkin from the back and silver dispenser in front of him and cleaned Travis' face like a caring parent.

"Have a little pride in your appearance for god's sake!" Manuel said and then said and then wet the napkin on his tongue and wiped off the more stubborn blood.

"There, that's better. Who's my handsome boy?"

Travis raised his hand and beamed, "Me!"

"You be a good boy and stay out of trouble," Manuel commanded and then flew away with his bloody ice cream before the kid even remembered that someone had come to his window after hours.

Manuel was on his way to the Beach Haven Zoo to the source of the distress call, Gabriel Billingsley. He was mere miles away from the zoo when his attention was diverted to another location where he felt his particular skill set was more in demand.

The sun was rising in the eastern horizon as Manuel Ortiz landed softly in the broken pavement driveway of an old abandoned warehouse. He looked around and thought for a moment that his senses must have been out of tune after all these years of inactivity. That was, until, he picked up a familiar scent and was then overwhelmed by a wave of other intriguing scents.

And, as the smells permeated his senses, the rubble in front of him transformed into the most beautiful and modern house he had ever seen. So he walked to the back of the house and sat in a chair on the patio facing the sun and the ocean with his back to the sliding glass doors. Manuel felt free for the first time above ground in more than 200 years.

THREE

Everyone in the House of Hartwell was so exhausted from days of battle that no one detected Manuel's presence, at least not at first. Hartwell, as was his usual routine in being the head of the household, was up first and left his wife Maggie behind to see if anyone else was awake. Heartbeats were moderate in most cases, except for Samuel's beat which was pulsing quite fast because he was dreaming of chasing a butterfly and then turning into the yellow and black Monarch butterfly because he couldn't catch it.

Hartwell was about to turn around and go back to bed, but a strange feeling overcame him and he felt compelled to walk through the main room of the house and out to the patio/deck. He opened the sliding door with his hand, although he could have easily moved it with his mind under normal circumstances.

"The sun has such restorative powers, even for us vampires," Manuel said as he sat back in the white Adirondack chair and kept gazing at the sunrise.

"Come take a seat next to me, Thomas," he stated and then gestured to the chair to his left.

"I have seen more sunsets than sunrises in my day, but even as I lay dormant in a box for the last 30 years, I craved the warmth of the sun and was trying to remember back to the days when my life was normal.

Manuel still had a powerful body and shorter, more muscular pair of legs on his six-foot, one-inch frame. Hartwell, by comparison, was much longer in his spider-like legs and shorter in his rugged frame and would tower over the former warrior if they were both standing up.

"Do I know you?" Hartwell asked as the familiarity to the root of all things vampire stirred within him.

Manuel smiled as he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled put a pair of 35 year-old, half-broken Porsche Carrera sunglasses, and then dangled them on his nose.

"There, that's better. The sun is quite strong today."

"Must be global warming," Hartwell replied as he closed his eyes and started to relax.

"The planet is getting warmer? Things were much easier before cars were invented."

"Amen," Hartwell concurred, as they had both lived in eras that pre-dated automobiles.

"There is no better feeling than riding a horse," Manuel said. Then he qualified the observation, "Well, in comparison to the automobile."

"Fresh blood always gets the heart pumping," Hartwell stated.

"Yes it does, Thomas. Yes it does," Manuel replied and then took a deep breath and furiously bit into Hartwell's left wrist, propelling the two men from their cozy confines to a place they both had never traveled.

It appeared to be foggy and filled with clouds, so Hartwell asked, "Are we in heaven?"

Manuel laughed, "I'm not sure that's the place we're going to wind up when it's all said and done."

Hartwell regained his bearings first and then his sense of humor.

"Then this must be San Francisco. But why would a bite on the wrist take us to San Francisco?"

Then he playfully nudged Manuel and asked, "Why would you bite me?"

Manuel replied, "Because that's what had to be done. And don't ever think about putting your hands on me again. Unless, of course, I tell you so."

Hartwell nodded, "Understood. At least about the part where I nudged you."

Manuel might have been underground for an extended period but he was still a bad-ass who would throw down if someone just looked at him the wrong way, and Hartwell inherently knew his place.

"Who are you?" Hartwell repeated his question that remained unanswered from when they were sitting on the deck.

Manuel smirked, "The more appropriate question, Thomas, is who are you and what has your life become?"

FOUR

The two men were transported to a time when Hartwell was mortal and was down on his luck. He is wearing a large cowboy hat with holes in it and his clothes are tattered. He appears to be on the verge of giving up.

"That is not your best look," Manuel said playing the part of fashion critic. "Not really sure what you were thinking when you bought that hat?"

"It was hot and I was getting burned. And it was the only thing the shop keeper would give me for doing some odd jobs. I barely had enough money for food!"

Manuel pulls out a violin and bow from behind him and sings, "Cry me a river!" And then he tosses the instrument away and says, "I don't think I've ever heard such a sad story. Get a job!" he yelled.

Hartwell took the comments in stride as he and Manuel went on to watch Hartwell stumbling on a major gold find in a section of water he had already panned and given up on. He punched his hand in anger through the water and then pulls out a huge gold rock that he is about to throw as far as his arm would send it, until the fading sunlight reflected against its shiny, reflective surface. His eyes widened as he yelled, "Gold! Gold! I stake this land as my own!"

"You see," Manuel said to observing Hartwell. "Sometimes you just have to dig a little deeper," as gold rush Hartwell jumps up and down and his face reveals pure joy.

"Were there any other times when you were at the brink and life was so miserable that thought you had finally run out of options?"

And before Hartwell could answer, they were following him inside of a bank some months earlier.

"I never liked that era. Everything was so dusty, musty and dirty," the now fastidious vampire Manuel observed.

"Yeah, I know what you mean. I'm uncomfortable just having to come back here."

"But I believe that is the point, Thomas," Manuel stated firmly like a teacher to a student.

"I had been casing that bank out for weeks, and I would have pulled the job off if not for..." Hartwell said.

"Who is that woman?" lifetime ladies' man Manuel asked with particular interest.

Hartwell wasn't having any of that, even though he knew that Manuel controlled whatever world they were in now.

"That's my wife, Maggie!"

Manuel smacked Hartwell on the back and said, "Not bad! You have pretty good taste for a guy who can barely dress himself! She must have seen something in you that you, yourself didn't even know you had."

"I don't know how she knew?" a confused Hartwell asked.

"Well, probably the same way you knew," Manuel replied.

"I just couldn't rob that bank," Hartwell stated.

"You think he could have pulled it off?" Manuel questioned as he walked over to Maggie, who was sitting behind a desk in a long skirt and a smart blouse buttoned as high as it could go.

She smiled, "Not a chance!" and then she high-fived Manuel and they both laughed at Hartwell's expense.

"But I had a gun!" a somewhat frustrated Hartwell admitted as he walked over to his mortal predecessor, reached into the dusty jacket pocket and pulled out a decent-sized pistol. Modern Hartwell talked, "I was all ready to use it!"

"Until I looked into your eyes," gold rush Hartwell stated, completing the sentence.

Maggie walked over to both Hartwell's, "That is why I love you both so much," and then she hugged both of the book-end Hartwell's. They broke the hug and she turned to mortal, down-on-his–luck Hartwell and said with her left hand on his face, "You, with your puppy-dog eyes and rugged good looks."

And then she turned to modern-day Hartwell and placed her right hand on the right side of his face.

"And you, with your unshakeable self-confidence, loving disposition and... so handsome!"

Manuel turned to both Hartwell's and said, "I can see why you love this woman. I have never been that lucky."

Maggie inquired, "Are you saying that a woman has never shown you unconditional love? What about Carmen?" because everything appeared to be fair game in this alternative universe.

"Sadly," Manuel stated, "I did not love her the same way she loved me."

"Sorry to hear that. Maybe it will be in the cards for you again one day," modern Hartwell said as he gently patted Manuel on the back.

"After all, we are all one big family," mortal Hartwell said as he and Maggie disappeared and the original duo was back in a transitional phase in the clouds.

"What does that mean? Who are you?" Hartwell asked with a tinge of desperation.

"I am Manuel Ortiz, and we have some more work to do on you before we talk about me."

FIVE

The next stop was late 19th century San Francisco, although Hartwell didn't realize it at first because they were in a thick, early morning patch of fog.

"While it would be easy for me to take you a few more years into the future and show you the life you loved with Margaret and Nathanial—now Maggie and Daniel—this is a working field trip and we always have to learn about what sits just beneath the surface, Manuel stated.

"Holy crap!" Hartwell exclaimed. "Billingsley looks so young!" he added as he saw a mortal Gabriel Billingsley walking through the streets of San Francisco at the top of his game without a care in the world.

"This was years before he and I painted the country red," Hartwell said.

Billingsley looks dapper in a brown tweed three-piece suit and a bowler hat, which he removes as he approaches a familiar lady figure.

Hartwell gasps, "Oh my! She is breathtaking at any age," he says as he sees Maggie dolled up in a brilliant blue dress eagerly waiting for Gabriel to arrive.

Maggie extended her hand when they met and Gabriel smoothly kissed the top of her hand.

"Is this their first date?" Hartwell asked.

Manuel was intrigued by the scene and didn't want to be bothered. "It looks that way. Why didn't you just go over there and ask them?"

Most of Hartwell was jealous at seeing his woman appearing interested in another man. But there was a growing part of him that always yearned for the truth in his life, and that was the spot that Manuel was looking to exploit.

"Remember, getting involved with past events in this realm will have absolutely no impact on actual outcomes or the future."

"That's good to know," Hartwell replied.

"Right?" Manuel concurred.

They followed Maggie and Gabriel to a nearby café and the new couple sat outside. Hartwell and Manuel trailed and sat an adjacent table.

"Is this the place with the wild green tea and the blueberry scones that melt in your mouth?" Manuel asked as the pervasive scents refreshed his memory.

"Yes! How did you know? I used to come here almost every afternoon when we lived here!" Hartwell beamed.

"I got around," Manuel replied as he was always on the run from Carmen, and this avoidance of his almost-wife made him quite well traveled.

It was a few years later from this point in time when Gabriel and Maggie were expecting their first child and he had run into some significant cash flow problems in his previously-flourishing import/export business. The Chinese had stolen all of his merchandise and cash, so the prospect of going back to his supplier empty-handed without payment was quite painful. In those days, there were no terms of payment of leniency for nonpayment, only a smoking bullet between the eyes. So, instead of dying, which appeared like the logical conclusion, Gabriel was presented with a similar solution to the one that Hartwell received from Alexander Lowery.

"What troubles you, friend?" Brenda Vinson asked Gabriel as they sat in the same café years later.

"How do you know I'm troubled, ma'am?" Gabriel questioned.

The witch leaned in, "Because I can feel the heat from that firearm you just purchased, and your blood appears to be pumping in an accelerated pattern that suggests strife and stress."

"I don't know how you know that, but I would wish that you would leave me alone!" Gabriel said, trying to avoid any conversation that might change his mind.

"You know, you're not the first person that has run into a little trouble, and I'm sure you won't be the last. What if I told you that there was a way for you to get out of all this mess?"

Gabriel's eyes opened wide, "Really?"

"And you could probably put that pesky supplier of yours out of business, and also square things up with the Orientals that put you in this mess in the first place."

Gabriel wasn't totally gone mentally, "What's the catch?"

"You probably won't be able to see that wife of yours for a while," Brenda replied without hesitation.

"But she's pregnant! Will I ever be able to see them again?" a confused, yet still self-centered Gabriel asked.

"Yes. This I can guarantee," Vinson replied, trying to seal the deal on a future she had already seen.

As in every deal with forms of the devil, there are complications. Gabriel agreed to the deal without ever facing his wife again and at least telling her the truth. He turned up days later after he was found dead and then buried by his grieving wife Margaret, who had suffered a miscarriage shortly after being told of the shocking news.

Gabriel's absence eventually created an opening for Hartwell, who had assumed when he met Billingsley that he was just a fellow vampire that he was happy to call a friend.

"I can't believe you let her go!" a disturbed Hartwell said in anger to Billingsley after he turned around and made eye contact with him at the café.

"It's not like I wanted to! I really didn't have a choice!" he shot back at Hartwell and then turned to Maggie.

Hartwell would not relent, "You were just a yellow-bellied chicken!"

While he wasn't sure why he had used that particular reference, it nonetheless found its mark.

"What did you just say?" Gabriel asked as he stood up from his chair.

"You heard what I said!" Hartwell countered, not wanting those words to have passed his lips more than once.

"Do you want to back that up?" Gabriel verbally pushed back in what amounted to 'fighting words.'

Hartwell scoffed as he looked over his smaller, yet younger, adversary.

"What are you going to do, junior?"

It had been some time since Hartwell was involved in a confrontation without his vampirical powers. The last occurrence was a boxing match with Cal Brewster, and the fight nearly killed both of them. But Hartwell was so amped up that he put aside any adverse thoughts or trepidations.

"I'm gonna' knock your block off!" Gabriel shouted.

Hartwell turned to Manuel, momentarily taking his eye of Gabriel, and said, "Would they have really said something like that back then?"

"Maybe the reference was a bit dated or pre-dated, I'll give you that one," Manuel replied as Gabriel charged toward Hartwell and struck him on the side of the head with a knuckle sandwich. Hartwell was so big and strong that the blow only made him wobble back a few steps before he regained his balance. He then smiled, which made Gabriel almost soil his well-pressed trousers.

Gabriel looked toward Maggie like he was about to abandon her again and run. She shed a few tears after absorbing the look but then became incensed when she really thought about it.

"You should have fought for me!"

Hartwell was already in motion by the time Maggie stopped talking. He reached back and connected with Gabriel's jaw on a thunderous right fist that send Gabriel flying back toward the cobblestone street.

Maggie looked down at her stomach and said, "You should have fought for us."

And then her mood brightened dramatically as she ran to Hartwell and jumped in his arms.

"I love you, Thomas! You will always fight for us."

SIX

Before Hartwell even had a chance to enjoy the younger version of his wife, Manuel pulled him out to start their next 'City by the Bay' adventure. The two men were outside on the street facing the townhome that Hartwell and Maggie owned.

"Wow! I can see now that it was probably a good idea to be somewhere else during the turn of the 20th century plague in San Fran," Manuel stated as he looked around and there was complete chaos throughout the city.

"Is this going to be before, or after, my family died?" Hartwell asked, trying to brace himself for the potentially-emotional impact.

"After," Manuel replied. "This journey is not about pain, it's about gain. We're all trying to get somewhere in life, Thomas."

"Well it's good to hear that all of this serves some sort of purpose," a non-believing Hartwell countered.

"More listening and learning, less lip, Hartwell," Manuel said in a more stern voice, which reminded Hartwell of a feisty hunter named Cal Brewster, so he backed off for now.

They spied a person walking calmly down the street, so his demeanor set off a few alarms.

"It's Lowery!" Hartwell stated.

"Who is he to you?" a clueless Manuel asked.

"He's my sire."

"Oh, that Lowery! Alexander Lowery?" Manuel asked after his memory kicked in.

"Yes, that's him."

"He's quite the dresser," Manuel said.

Lowery walked up to Manuel and said, "I get all of my suits custom-made by a tailor in New York. He has a brother who runs a shop down the block, so he fills in when I'm out here."

Manuel nodded, "Good to know."

Then he turned to Hartwell, "I smelled your desperation from two blocks south, Thomas. Ten minutes later and I might have been too late."

"Is that right, Thomas?" Manuel asked.

Hartwell thought about the question and then decided that it would be best to answer the question by letting the situation play out.

"I'm not sure. I was pretty much out of my mind at the time." Then he turned to the two men and asked, "Why don't we just wait a few minutes and see what would have happened?"

So they stood outside of the building for the next five minutes, then 10 minutes, then 15 minutes.

"Do you think...?" Manuel started asking and then was interrupted by a flash of light above them, the loud popping sound of a gunshot, and then the voluminous thud of Hartwell's limp body crashing to the floor.

Lowery looked at his wristwatch and said, "Good thing I happened to be hungry and walking down this block."

Hartwell agreed, "Yes, I'm not sure if I would have heard anything you said if you came even five minutes later than you did?"

"The fortuitous part for you was that my hunter was in hot pursuit and I didn't have much time to waste."

Hartwell then switched gears, "Why were you trying to kill me recently?"

Lowery laughed and looked toward Manuel, who also appeared to be in on the joke.

"Don't you know, Thomas? Hasn't the hunger hit you yet?" Lowery asked his protégée.

Hartwell never liked to be toyed with and he definitely wasn't in the mood for ridicule.

"What are you talking about Lowery? What hunger?"

Lowery got all serious, wiping any remnants of joy that remained on his face.

"The hunger to live, Thomas. This hunger will supersede any other feelings you have in your brain. Your mere existence will dominate everything in your life and you will place your own survival over all things around you."

"Are you saying?" Hartwell asked, not having to even complete the question to be understood.

"Yes, I want to live forever."

Hartwell could not believe his ears.

"Is this true?" he asked Manuel, somehow knowing that his guide was the source of all information of the three men.

"Yes. Alexander speaks the truth. I am a prime example of what he is saying. I spent 30 years under the ground, in the dark, in fear of something happening to me if I poked my head out and ventured above the ground. You become paranoid and distrusting of the people around you."

"But all of the people around me love me!" Hartwell protested.

Manuel looked at Lowery and then both men rolled their eyes.

Manuel asked, "Don't you live with hunters?"

Hartwell thought back to all of the brutal battles with Cal Brewster, his sister Emily and their father Thaddeus, and then wondered how long the détente would last.

"Well, most of them love me. At least the ones I'm related to," he stated, reaching to find some solid ground to stand on.

SEVEN

Remember when you thought that Gabriel Billingsley was your friend?" Manuel asked Hartwell as they transitioned from standing in front of the townhome in San Francisco to a dive bar in Vancouver, Canada.

"Not only did I think he was my friend, I also thought the big ape was a vampire!"

"He wasn't the brightest bulb in the box," Billingsley said as Manuel snatched a beer off the bar and said, "Oh boy, here we go again."

"You're trying to get me to fight with him, aren't you?" Hartwell asked and then hauled off and struck Gabriel on the side of the head, Billingsley flashing his ape and vampire facades as he flew through the air and disappeared behind the bar.

Manuel took a swig of beer and then replied, "I'm just trying to show you that your judgment hasn't always been so stellar, and it's probably going to get worse!"

"Are you saying that I'm trusting people that I shouldn't be trusting?" Hartwell asked and then grabbed Gabriel as he came over the bar, and he threw him down the length of the bar, effectively using him as a human towel.

Manuel moved his head to the side as a bottle of beer came whizzing past him. He didn't want to give away the real purpose of his interaction with Hartwell, so he sat in quiet while Hartwell continued to physically work through his issues.

Hartwell walked to the end of the bar and grabbed Gabriel by his shirt.

"You know that I will never let you anywhere near Maggie again!" he yelled and then punched Gabriel repeatedly until he forced a change.

"Be who you really are!"

Gabriel turned into a full-fledged ape and then got back on his feet as Hartwell transitioned into his vampire persona with sharp teeth, long nails and extensive wings.

"Wow, I didn't see that coming!" Manuel commented to himself while sitting on a bar stool and watching the action. And just as the ape and the vampire were about to crash together in full-contact bliss, Manuel switched it up and brought Hartwell back to his earliest remembrance of being a vampire.

Instead of having Hartwell watch the scene unfold with him on the sidelines, he placed him in-body so he could experience everything first hand.

Hartwell's pulse quickened as he started to breathe heavier like he was running away from someone or something. This fear of a foe was also interspersed with scenes of unsuspecting men and women shockingly looking into the eyes of a creature while it devoured them from the neck. He was also treated to reels of the evolutionary tract of both the protectors and hunters. And then he anticipated a view of the beach and the word 'SAFETY' just as he experienced when he first transitioned into becoming a vampire.

The image of the beach was then replaced by an image of a vampire that was killed with a long, sharp spear, and then he arose as a mortal man with the word 'SAFETY.' Hartwell gasped and then awoke with a huge pain in his chest, as if he himself had been the target of the action.

Manuel transported the confused vampire to a somewhat familiar bar in Pennsylvania.

Hartwell regained his bearings by saying, "This is the night I met Garrison and then Thaddeus."

But what Hartwell didn't know was that the people he was using in his sequences were not replications, or holograms, they were now the actual people being taken from their modern-day surroundings and being taught a lesson of their own.

Garrison was so dead asleep that he thought he was dreaming when he first saw Hartwell in the bar.

"Hey, Thomas! Are you sleeping, too?"

Hartwell pondered the question because his journey definitely felt that way at times, although the intense physical and emotion pain told him otherwise.

"I really hope so, but I don't think so Gary."

Thaddeus, Hartwell's natural adversary and his hunter, jumped into the scene and did the first thing that instinctively came to mine. While Hartwell's focus was on Garrison, he also used whatever instincts he could draw upon and lifted his left hand up and caught a long, sharp knife that was headed for his neck. The blade stopped only a fraction of an inch from its intended target, leading Hartwell to question the known aggressor.

"Thad, what in all things that are good and decent are you doing?"

Thaddeus Brewster rubbed his eyes to make sure he was not dreaming.

"What do you mean, Thomas?"

"Why would you throw this knife at me?" Hartwell yelled and then gently tossed the blade back to the hunter.

Thad caught the blade, handle first, and then placed the object back in his belt holder.

He thought logically, "Because that's what I have always done!"

"But we don't do that anymore!" Garrison interjected.

"I was just sleeping a minute ago!" a confused Thaddeus exclaimed.

"Yes, what's going on here, Thomas?" Gary asked.

"I don't know, but this guy named Manuel is taking me on some sort of life lesson," Hartwell replied.

Manuel stepped back into the picture and restricted Hartwell's access to his colleagues.

"Did he say Manuel?" Thaddeus asked Garrison.

"Yes, I think that's what he said," Gary replied.

And then Manuel muted out the remaining words as Thad explained Gary that the originator of the Hartwell vampirical line was probably holding school for either a lesson or some sort of maniacal plot that they would have to put their bodies on the line for again.

We are definitely getting too old for this stuff," Garrison stated.

Then they started walking out of the bar and Thad replied, "No doubt. We should get a place together and do some traveling once this is all over."

"I'm in," Gary said.

EIGHT

"Why wouldn't you let me here what they were saying about you?" Hartwell asked in frustration.

Manuel remained indignant, "What makes you so sure they were talking about me? It might have started out that way, but it definitely didn't end that way! Vampires are the vainest and self-centered creatures I have ever been around!"

Hartwell took it all in and replied, "Even more self-centered than humans?"

"As much as I want to answer that question right now, we'll get into that later. But the short answer is that I think you're diluting yourself if you think your journey as a vampire has been anything but a series of selfish, self-centered acts."

Hartwell thought to himself, "That's the short answer?"

And then Manuel thought, "Yes, my friend, when I'm done with you it will be painfully obvious that was the short answer. The reason we have to go through all of this is because you won't disengage without a fight."

So Manuel was inspired to show Hartwell how selfish he actually had been during his recent tenure as a vampire. There was no better place to start than with Cal Brewster.

Since both Cal and his wife Sharon were involved in the first example, they were extracted from their bed and were made to feel the pain of being separated all over again.

Sharon the protector was Garrison Phillips' daughter and Nicole's mother. She had been with Hartwell on a few occasions because of their close working relationship. Hartwell was a quite possessive vampire and thought that no one else was worthy of someone he paid attention to.

Cal Brewster was a real thorn in the Hartwell's side and became his greatest lifelong adversary. So it enraged Hartwell even more when he discovered that 'his' Sharon was fraternizing with the enemy, Cal Brewster.

It was always a struggle to get the hunters to 'play' near the water because it was the one place they knew they weren't safe.

Every fight started with more of a scramble but usually ended up with age, gender and strength-specific pairings. Hartwell was busy battling with Emily Brewster on this particular night in the past, as Emily was taken from her bed as she was sleeping with her husband Aaron. Emily was Cal's fraternal twin but she was definitely on the short end of the fight while old-timers, Garrison and Thaddeus were awoken and engaging is some old-fashioned fisticuffs.

Sharon and Cal had met the previous week in the woods and went at it like wild animals after Hartwell had been killed by Cal, who had extra incentive to end the fight expediently. Modern-day Hartwell internally mumbled to himself as the action unfolded, "The smell of 'together' was all over them!"

He thought back to the night and ho Sharon was all-too agreeable to tangle with Cal, even though he was at the top of his game and was pretty much unbeatable in those days. He finally got Sharon in a strangle-hold, but he really wasn't cutting off her air supply.

He whispered, "Meet me in the woods tonight. I've been thinking about you all week!"

Hartwell was tuned into the frequency of the conversation, both as he stood with Manuel and as he out the finishing touches on Emily during the fight.

"You look particularly delicious tonight my dear, " Hartwell said to Emily, the two haven taken a few previous 'rolls in the hay' - as he drained all of the remaining blood in her body before he dropped her useless body on the ground.

"Bastard!" Emily said as she played dead for the scene.

Cal was so focused on Sharon that he didn't notice Hartwell drinking the last drops of his sister's blood. Manuel's purpose of starting to bring the real people into the journey was important for all of their purposes going forward.

Emily sat up and then yelled at her brother, "You see, you didn't even notice that I was dead!"

She had experienced years of guilt for her brother's subsequent plight, but never realized that her focus was less on the battle and more on his budding social life.

Cal was just as in love as he was enamored with her back then. Before he could look up and see what was going on around him, he was hit across the face by a close-line delivered by a rapidly-charging Hartwell. The hunter went down in a huge heap, but then sat up and talked to his sister even though he was out cold in the original iteration.

"It was my fault, Em," he said, telling his sister. "I blamed everyone but myself for what happened next, but now that I see that I was just being plain selfish."

"Do we have to go through the rest of this again?" Thaddeus asked Manuel and Hartwell as they observed the scene.

"Yeah, it was pretty painful the first time," Garrison added.

Both Hartwell's were outraged, so they spoke at the same time.

"Why was it painful for you, Gary? We stopped getting our butts kicked for a while!"

The dueling Hartwell's were too much for most of the people to handle, so they looked to Manuel for relief. He used his right index finger and merged the Hartwell's.

The next step in the process was Hartwell taking Cal to the bottom of the ocean and Sharon and her father Garrison burying him with rocks as Orca whales. But before the completed the act in real life, Manuel replayed the confusing scene for all to see, especially Hartwell, and thought it would be more effective if the actual players reenacted everything.

Hartwell said to Sharon, "Meet you at the bottom," before scooping up Cal and then standing off to the side with Manuel.

Once Hartwell hit the water there would be no way to stop the inevitable. Thaddeus fought to get loose from Garrison when he saw what was happening, but Sharon came over to help hold him down.

Thaddeus had no idea what Hartwell was planning, but he could see the extreme look of concern on Sharon's face.

"You can't let him do this!" he pleaded with Sharon.

Sharon tried to fight off the fresh tears because her ultimate duty was to protect Hartwell.

"It's what he wants!"

"But is it what you want?" Thad asked, trying to desperately appeal to her more sensitive and love-struck side.

She initially said, "It really doesn't matter what I want, does it?" but she decided to say instead, "Why is it that the only thing that matters is what he wants?" she asked with a strong hint of dissatisfaction, gesturing toward Hartwell.

It had been four years since protected, and only protected, Hartwell. She had subsequently switched to the other side when she fully committed to Cal.

"I have a fresh perspective in this," she stated. "Even now, every time someone comes after him, we always have his back no matter what he did in the past!" she said looking lovingly at Cal. "Those were the longest and emptiest years of my life when you were buried at the bottom of the ocean."

"I always knew you were alive," Emily said to Cal, "and that he was up to something!" she added with venom as she glared at Hartwell.

"I just couldn't get there in time," Thaddeus said as he had been let free by Sharon and Garrison. He had flown after Hartwell as a hawk and almost caught him until Gary jumped out of the ocean as an Orca killer whale and swallowed him whole.

"You asked why it was painful for me the first time," Garrison Phillips said to Hartwell. "The minute we did this I knew I had lost my daughter forever. She was so down all of those years, because we all knew that one day Cal would return. But now I feel that I haven't lost a daughter—actually it's quite the opposite—I have gained a son," he said looking at Cal.

Cal looked at his own dad, Thaddeus, and asked, "Is it okay if I call him dad?"

Thaddeus laughed, "Sure! We spend so much time together now that the kids can barely tell us apart."

Gary chuckled, "Yeah, there have been a few times when Samuel called me Uncle Thad!"

NINE

The scenery went blank again and Manuel and Hartwell were only separated by fog.

"Has this become the 'bash Hartwell' tour?" the vampire asked as he tried to displace the fog so he could see Manuel.

The fog cleared and the duo was sitting on a bench at the Beach Haven Boardwalk facing the ocean. Manuel sat calmly and enjoyed the golden rays of the sun for a moment before responding. He knew there was only so far he could push Hartwell before he either lost interest, or rebelled.

"While your actions have caused many of these people—including your wife and son—great pain, it has also fostered a tremendously-cohesive family structure.

Hartwell wasn't sure how he should approach the bad cop/ good cop treatment, so he remained silent, which was unusual for the alpha vampire.

Manuel opened his eyes and turned to look at Hartwell. "Did you hear what I said?"

Hartwell still wasn't having it, "Yeah, I heard you."

"So why didn't you respond?"

"I'm just waiting to see where you're going to take me next. "Then I will react," Hartwell stated.

Manuel admittedly had something in different in mind than what he was originally going to do after gauging Hartwell's mood. They had a long road to go, but a slight detour with a lighter and more positive spin could only help the process.

"A lot of stuff has happened for you on this beach," Manuel stated. "It would appear that the water here means a lot more to you than just safety," mentioning the water advantage the vampires and their protectors had over their pursuers, the hunters.

And instead of the two of them watching the action, Manuel put Hartwell directly in the game. A warm feeling came over Hartwell and his more than 100 years of waiting to be reconnected to his son was over. While he was aware that his son Nathaniel had been reborn through the odd combination of hunter Calvin Brewster and some random woman named Belinda, it wasn't until the group moved to Beach Haven, New York that Daniel was of age need his father, any father.

Cal was on the bottom of the ocean and the boy needed to be guided down the path of life with a more masculine hand.

Hartwell relived the feeling of being needed again, and he described the details of the events as they unfolded.

"Belinda was so concerned with Daniel's health that she was constantly shuffling him in and out of doctor's offices even if there were no signs of illness. She had been on her own for years after Cal disappeared and then she became estranged from his family, which was basically Emily and Thaddeus Brewster.

"Do you think you had something to do with that discord?" Manuel asked, playing the role of a therapist for a spell.

"Yes, and it was completely self-serving, but I had waited 100 years for my boy and wife to come back and I didn't want anything, or anyone, to get in the way of those reunions."

Manuel nodded in understanding and then Hartwell continued.

"I was in this exact spot, gazing at the ocean and trying to find my center, when a call of need came from the hospital and I could begin my life again, somewhat anew."

Hartwell, who previously was in a pair of shorts, a t-shirt, flip-flops and sunglasses, was now in his more familiar tan trench coat and New York Yankees baseball cap in the clouded darkness of the day in front of Nightsdale Hospital—which had subsequently been renamed Beach Haven Hospital to go along with the town-themed naming of every business to improve the regional profile.

"What's with the Yankees hat?" Manuel asked.

"Well, I used to be Red Sox fan until they traded my friend to the Yankees," Hartwell replied. "He was so angry and felt so betrayed when it happened that he came to me with nothing but revenge on his mind. George and I used to drink together at this bar on Delaney Street in Boston - he loved scotch and I had a particular taste for blood, at least, until, he became bitter both inside and out."

Manuel searched his mental database for players named George that had been traded from the Red Sox to the Yankees, but kept coming back to a single transaction in 1919.

"Are you talking about 'Babe' Ruth?" he questioned.

Hartwell laughed, "Yes! Nobody really called George Herman Ruth 'the Babe' back then.

"Are you saying that babe Ruth was a vampire?" Manuel asked.

"Why are you surprised? They were playing with so dead it was like hitting a couple of tube socks, and the parks were so cavernous it was like trying to hit one out of Yosemite. That man was so strong after I got done with him that he could have probably hit one out of Yosemite! Ever since then, I've been a Yankees fan, more or less."

"Yeah, I guess I'm with you," Manuel concurred.

They both walked in through the automatic sliding doors of the hospital and then Hartwell smiled at Daniel, just as he did years earlier when the boy was in the waiting area with his mother, and Daniel smiled back.

"What did I tell you about strange people?" Belinda Thompson asked her son.

Hartwell thought, "There's no one stranger than you, mom."

And Daniel laughed and thought, "You can say that again!"

"There's no one stranger than you, mom," Hartwell thought again as Daniel laughed and Hartwell focused his energies on influencing Dr. Marc Levine to follow his marching orders.

Daniel and Belinda were ushered through the golden doors, much to her surprise and delight, and present-day Daniel was awoken from his slumber at Hartwell's house and was now walking next to his younger counterpart.

"Who are you?" young Daniel asked as he looked up.

"I am you," modern Daniel replied as he looked down and then extended his fist.

"I'm cool with that," seven year-old Daniel beamed at seeing his muscular development.

"I bet you are, little guy," Daniel countered with a big smile on his face, while Belinda focused on the promise of the vaunted swine flu vaccine.

Hartwell put Dr. Levine and Belinda in an extended slumber, but before she went out, Belinda said to both Daniel's, "I just didn't want anything further to happen to you. There were so many things in our world that I just couldn't explain." And then she looked at Hartwell, "It sort of freaked me out." And, as she was fading, Hartwell replied, "You did a great job raising him, Belinda, and you are still a great mother!"

"Back to sleep," Belinda said as her eyes closed, and then she was back in her bed with Agent Blake at Hartwell's house, thinking of the events that had just unfolded and how they were part of some cushy flashback dream.

Blake, being a former F.B.I. agent, was awakened by the strange ramblings of his wife. He had never witnessed this type of active dreaming from Belinda, and immediately wondered if Hartwell had anything to do with the extreme pattern change?

Belinda always had slept through the night and barely moved off her stomach from the time she went to sleep to when she woke up in the morning.

Blake tried to jostle her with a few mild pokes and shoves but she did not respond. Usually, simply touching her would be adequate to interrupting her sleep, but not this time.

"She's not here," Blake whispered to himself.

"Why am I whispering?" he whispered again and then shook his head in disbelief. Agent Blake rolled out of bed and his first stop was to check on Daniel. He thought if Hartwell was pulling strings, surely Daniel would somehow be involved. He took a few steps out of the room and then realized he was only wearing his light blue boxer shorts with yellow giraffes all over them, so he doubled back and put on a robe. He then strode quickly by Daniel and Nicole's room and was about to give his daughter and son-in-law the privacy they deserved until he saw only one body in the bed.

He again turned to his good friend, the whisper, after he entered the room.

"Nicole, wake up."

Nicole didn't move, so Blake rolled his eyes and was just about to use a louder tone of voice until light-sleeping Nicole awoke from her slumber and was surprised to see her father standing over her bed.

"Dad?" she asked as she jumped up. "What are you doing in here?"

"Trust me," Daddy Blake said in a normal, full voice.

"Where is Daniel?"

"I have a strong suspicion he is somewhere with Hartwell, but he might be coming back soon," Blake replied.

TEN

Back at the hospital formerly known as Nightsdale, the two Daniel's sat on the bed as Hartwell and Manuel stood across from them.

"Who's the big chief?" elder Daniel asked.

"How did he know I was a chief?" Manuel asked Hartwell as if he knew the answer to the complicated riddle that was Manuel.

"I didn't even know you were a chief?" Hartwell replied.

"Then who is he? My mom always tells me that I shouldn't talk to strangers," young Daniel said to Manuel and then folded his arms across his chest. And then elder Daniel and Hartwell did the same, signaling that they were a united front and would not be talking any further until they got some information in return.

"My name is Manuel," he simply said.

Daniel turned to Hartwell and asked, "Why is it that every name rhymes with your name?"

Hartwell had no answer for the logical question, so he turned to Manuel for clarity.

"Symmetry," Ortiz replied.

"Yeah, I like it," Daniel agreed.

Manuel continued, "I am taking your father on a journey that I'm hoping will be clarity to his life."

Daniel was confused, "But he seems pretty happy right now. I don't think our family has ever been closer."

Manuel wanted to be careful with his words, "It's not what has been done that concerns me, it's what is yet to be."

Daniel looked down at little Daniel, who's legs were dangling off the bed and swinging back and forth, to see if he was following the conversation.

"I'm good," the little guy said.

Big Daniel beamed that his younger self was already so sharp and was tuned into the adult lingo.

Hartwell looked at Daniel for the next move, as much of the animosity and confusion he had been feeling abated. He no longer thought this man was there to mess with him, but help him, which was a change of pace for Hartwell who usually wasn't the most trusting of souls.

"Do you remember the day you first saw your father? This day?" Manuel asked.

Both Daniel's replied "Yes."

"Were you scared?"

"No," they both answered in unison.

Then young Daniel added, "I felt like I knew him."

"Yeah, he was familiar," elder Daniel concurred.

"How was your life going to that point?" Manuel continued his questioning.

"It was fine," young Daniel replied.

"We moved a lot, and mom held me out of school quite often," elder Daniel said.

"Were you really sick?"

Hartwell was shaking his head back and forth and the Daniel's said "No" in unison.

Hartwell took over, "But my blood made you stronger?"

"Yes," little Daniel replied and big Daniel said "Of course."

"But did it change your life?" Manuel asked, knowing a deeper conversation would ensue.

The Daniel's looked at each other because the question was much easier to answer on the surface, but when they peeled away the layers, the issue was much more complicated.

"Of course it changed their life!" an indignant Hartwell interjected. And then he looked at his sons and asked, "Didn't it?"

"It definitely changed our life," elder Daniel replied trying to assure Hartwell. And then he shifted gears, "But in what capacity? Would I have fallen for Nicole if she wasn't my natural protector?" he asked. He then turned to little Daniel, "Do you like girls?"

"Not generally," the little man replied.

Then Daniel flashed an image of young Nicole in young Daniel's mind.

"She and I were always meant to be together, with or without your blood," a defiant and self-assured little Daniel stated as he looked at Hartwell.

"Then why did I have to help you ate the dance?" Hartwell asked, as the group was transported to the Beach Haven High School gymnasium.

Nicole had been walking with Blake to check on the others throughout the house when she disappeared into thin air. Blake kept walking a few more paces until he could no longer see his daughter's shadow. He stopped and turned around to see an empty hallway, "They got her, too!"

"Nothing should surprise me anymore," he thought to himself. "I have to figure out what's going on here," he added out loud.

ELEVEN

Carla leapt out of bed and ran into the hallway once she noticed her husband had disappeared.

"What's going on here? One moment her was there and the next he was gone!" she asked Blake.

Carla and Blake walked back into the room and the only thing that Blake could see were ruffled sheets and the outline of Drew's body.

"That's not good," Agent Blake said without trying to make his reaction sound alarming.

Carla wanted to be anywhere that Drew was, "I gotta' get there!"

"Where is that?" Blake asked.

"I don't know, but there is gonna' come a point when he will need me and I will be there!" she replied.

The gym was dark and the strobe lights accentuated the pulsing rhythms of the dance music. Drew, Nicole and Daniel were teenagers again and they were having a great time at the sophomore dance, sharing a fierce set of break-dancing. The trio did everything together up until the pint where the music slowed and it was time for her to pick one of the guys to dance with.

This was about the time when Nicole waited for as both guys created an uncomfortable silence from their collective nervousness. But it was Drew, not Daniel, who eventually stepped up. Hartwell was about to intervene, just as he had done years earlier, with some liquid ex-lax in Drew's punch to make sure that nature really took its course.

Drew turned to Hartwell and Manuel, "Do we really have to do this again?"

Hartwell slipped the lethal elixir back in his pocket and then he looked at Manuel for direction.

"Are you sure that you want to go ahead with this, son?" Manuel asked, knowing that Andrew never ended up on the winning side when nature was in full bloom between Daniel and Nicole.

Drew nodded in affirmation as Manuel turned to Hartwell, "Let it play out, Hartwell."

Hartwell smirked and then talked to Manuel. "Remember when we waited to see what would happen to me if Lowery didn't show up?"

"Yes, you blew your brains out," Manuel replied and then looked at Hartwell, which helped him realize the full weight of Hartwell's point.

"So, you think no matter what the Brewster kid does, she will still come back to your boy?" Manuel asked with a hint of challenge in his voice.

Hartwell knew what Manuel was trying to say, so he reached into the pocket without the laxative and pulled out a crisp $50 bill.

It had been 30 years since Manuel might have used currency, and even then he really never had the need to really pay anybody. He searched his pockets and pulled out a $5 bill from one pocket and then two $1 bills from another.

"I have seven dollars!"

"I'll take that bet! My 50 against your seven, "Hartwell stated and then dove deeper. "You win and the 50 is yours, but if I win you have to give me $43 worth of information about you."

Manuel smiled, "Sounds like a sucker bet to me."

"All bets are sucker bets," Hartwell countered.

"Yes they are," Manuel agreed and the men shook hands on the deal.

Andrew stayed on the floor with a disappointed Nicole, who had dreamt of this moment for quite some time. She tried to mask her feelings but her friend Drew could feel her angst as they started to slow dance.

Drew had recreated that night in his mind, both awake and in dreams, over and over again during the years. But he wasn't alone in revisiting the events of the evening.

"You know, I only asked you because he didn't."

"What do you mean?" Nicole asked as she stepped back slightly so she could make eye contact with Drew.

"I really never got to thank you for including me in this night. It always meant a lot to me that we were such good friends. But it's always been Danny and you, and thankfully it always will be."

Nicole hugged Andrew, much to the disdain of Daniel and delight of Manuel. The originator's celebration appeared to be premature as Hartwell pointed to Drew and Nicole and said, "Wait, there's more!"

Andrew backed up from the hug and he and Nicole transformed from their high school forms into their current bodies. And, as Daniel approached the duo, he also transformed into his current form.

"Well, I'll be," Manuel said.

"We'll call that one a draw," Hartwell stated, as they both were impressed with the cohesiveness and sanity of the trio formerly known in volleyball circles as 'The Three Slam go's'.

Daniel shook his cousin's hand and then they met in a bro' hug.

"So glad it worked out this way," Drew said and then extended his hand out to the side once they broke the hug, and Carla appeared.

Daniel started slow-dancing with Nicole and then Andrew drew Carla close and kissed her on the neck.

She looked over Drew's shoulder and said to her good friend Nicole, "I had no idea it would be a dance!" she laughed with a red face as she dropped her sword on the ground and Drew slowly removed her extensive padded armor.

Carla had to deal with the ghost of Nicole Phillips in the early years of her relationship with Drew, but the two women had come to really like each other after airing out their differences in several battles.

Hartwell and Manuel looked on and Manuel asked, "If this is possible, what else can be accomplished?"

TWELVE

"What do you mean?" Hartwell asked as they left the friendly confines of the Beach Haven High School gym and were back to their cloudy transitional phase.

"Why do you always have to talk in riddles?" Hartwell further questioned.

"Well, why do you always have to ask so many questions?" Manuel countered.

"Because I really don't know what you are talking about?"

Manuel transported them back to the Beach Haven Boardwalk on a bench facing the ocean.

"Ah, that's better!" Hartwell sighed as he closed his eyes, put his clasped hands behind his head and extended his long legs to rest on the iron rails in front of him.

"Why must everything be about you, and why must you control absolutely everything around you?" Manuel asked in a tone that reeked of annoyance.

Hartwell smiled with his eyes still closed, "Look who's asking all of the questions now..."

He then thought about what Manuel said and the upturn in his face neutralized.

"Wait, what are you saying?"

"I don't think you give all of the people around you enough credit," Manuel explained. And before Hartwell could keep the tables turned and ask another question, Manuel changed locations. However, once they reached the destination, Hartwell dipped back into the well.

"Why are we in Gary's backyard?"

Just then, Daniel flew in from points unknown in the sky and pounded down to the ground like he hadn't completely gotten the hang of the landing thing just yet.

"Smells like fresh vampire to me," Manuel surmised.

Hartwell took a deep breath and concurred, "Yes, he's only minutes old."

Daniel used his mind to alert Nicole via text message that he was in the backyard. He then removed his own phone from his pocket and flipped the useless device into a garbage can some 30 feet away.

Perky Nicole bounded out of the back door of the house and said, "Lucky shot!"

She hadn't seen him in weeks because he was making the transition to vampire, so she jumped in his arms and hugged him tight. Daniel leaned in and inhaled the intoxicating scent of her fruity hair and closed his eyes.

"Can you freeze this is a second?" Hartwell asked and then Manuel obliged, as two heavenly bodies were melted into one.

Manuel anticipated the next question by giving a suitable answer.

"Because your son had just become a vampire, yet he was still thinking about the others around him and how best to protect them."

Hartwell acknowledged the dead-on guess with an affirmative nod.

"I don't know if we were so level-headed in our first steps of the brotherhood," Manuel added.

While Hartwell heard every word that Manuel just said, he was transfixed on the word "we."

Manuel smiled because he knew what he just did.

"See, I've been so good up to this point! But I have to concede that you sort of won that bet back there at the gymnasium." And then he turned less jovial, "Yes, it's "we," Thomas."

Hartwell's eyebrows rose at first, but then he wasn't sure if he should feel comfortable in the presence of a vampire, or threatened by the possibility that another vampire in his line was trying to plot against him.

Daniel exhaled because he sensed like-beings close by. And before Nicole could react, he froze her and then walked across the backyard toward the two men. He was locked in on Hartwell.

"Is this about me or you? Because I'm not sure that I'm enjoying reliving all of these events that caused me pain?"

Instead of answering, Hartwell again turned to Manuel for clarity.

"What were you about to do?" Manuel asked Daniel.

"I was about to break up with her because I didn't know what I was capable of. The only thing I knew to do was protect her."

Manuel countered, "So, you didn't know that you were trying to protect the one that was sent to protect you?"

"No," Daniel replied. And then he switched gears, "Do you mind if I talk to my father for a second?"

"Of course not," Manuel replied to the boy that he now considered his great grandson, not having kids of his own when he was a mortal—at least not ones that he knew about.

He walked over to Daniel and put his large hand on the kid's face, "You're a good boy, Daniel."

And in that moment, looking deeply into Manuel's eyes, Daniel realized that this man was family, not foe. He leaned in and whispered, "Thanks for coming, Pop Pop."

He then walked with Hartwell, "What was that all about?" a paranoid Hartwell asked his son. "Do you think this guy is good or bad?"

"He's definitely good."

"He is? How do you know?" a surprised Hartwell asked.

Manuel could sense that Daniel was about to spill the beans, so he pulled Hartwell out of the backyard and back to the boardwalk, where Daniel's voice could be heard saying, "Because he's one of us."

THIRTEEN

Daniel was a few paces away from where the two men were sitting, having a real heart-to-heart conversation with his cousin and best friend, Andrew.

The original conversation centered on Daniel telling Drew that he was a vampire, which meant that he wasn't a hunter and was now the enemy.

"If you hadn't broken up with Nicole, she never would have asked me to come over! If you had waited a few more hours I would have been with Carla in Portland!" Drew yelled in frustration.

"But I'm not mad anymore that the two of you were together," Daniel replied as the two men in their current age took over for the emotional teenagers.

"It was something that just happened," Daniel said diplomatically.

Drew smiled, "That's easy for you to say now! Being that Maxwell wound up being your son," referring to a time when the father of Nicole's child was still in question.

Daniel laughed and the two guys walked and sat on the bench just to the right of Hartwell and Samuel.

"Who's the other vampire?" Drew said internally to Daniel so Hartwell wouldn't hear him.

"I think we're related to him somehow," Daniel replied internally in a rather conservative and basic response, even though he already knew who the man was.

They all watched as teenage Daniel told Drew that he was a vampire and not a hunter, as they both had surmised.

"I'm not going to fight you. We are brothers," a confused Drew stated.

Daniel was less brotherly than usual on this day, "We are going to have to fight eventually."

Drew never backed down from a fight.

"Just not today," he stepped closer to Daniel and angrily clenched his shirt collar, "Not today!"

"You really crumpled my shirt," modern-day Daniel said to his cousin. "I had to get up into the atmosphere just to get the crease out," as fellow-fastidious vampires Manuel and Hartwell smiled in understanding from the next bench.

The Daniel that was being confronted by his cousin left the scene and zoomed up toward the sky, while his blindly enraged cousin was left to deal with the destruction of his life himself.

Drew was so angry that he flew toward the sky in his hawk exterior and then splashed into the ocean as a hammerhead shark until he crashed his head on what he thought was the bottom of the ocean. He kept up this pattern for the better part of an hour until exhaustion finally broke the chain of anxiety.

"Can you see now that your actions not only set of a chain of events, the events themselves are also connected?" Manuel asked Hartwell as he phased Daniel and Drew out of the conversation, sending them back to the house.

Hartwell thought about it for a moment and then replied, "Because Drew was so mad that he banged his head against the rocks and that, in turn, freed Cal."

"Exactly," Manuel said. "And then what happened?"

Manuel and Hartwell moved a few hundred yards down the beach where Cal had washed up in the darkness and awaited the rejuvenating powers of the morning sun. He was on his back for the better part of two hours, lying motionless and without a heartbeat as the waves continued to crash into him.

The sun started to rise and its east-to-west rays worked its way down the Beach Haven shore. The light shot through Cal's waterlogged body and steadily shot healing crystals to revitalize his organs. Water trickled out of his pours until the way was clear to start his heart pumping again. Cal coughed violently and sprayed water all around as he rolled over on his side in great pain.

Years of intense darkness had given way to the intense brightness of the new day. Cal rose to his feet, although he was weighed down by his water-soaked clothes and atrophied muscles. He then turned toward the sun and kept his eyes closed and his arms extended for the next five minutes while his body underwent extensive repair. And once he was as good as new, Cal pumped his fists defiantly toward the sky and yelled, "HARTWELL!"

"Well, that doesn't look so good for you," Manuel observed.  
I used to know someone that must have looked like that before they did me in," referring to his Carmen.

Cal was so locked in that he didn't see Manuel and Hartwell standing on both sides of him. He dropped his fists toward his side and then crouched down in a sprinter's position. Cal was focused on Hartwell, and only Hartwell, as he and the bookends blazed a trail toward the vampire's lair.

Hartwell had been sitting on the fence of 99 deaths, which meant the next time he died would be his last as a vampire and everyone associated with him would return to mortality. Thaddeus Brewster told his daughter Emily that number 100 would be his for all the years he battled the vampire and his protector Garrison. But he gladly would have given the honor to his son if he knew that he was alive.

Cal longed to see his sister and father and the nephew he left behind, but the one person he thought about the entire time he was in captivity was his son Daniel. Not his wife Belinda or his mistress Sharon, who he thought had betrayed and abandoned him.

He turned the corner at top speed as the action continued to slow, modern-day Hartwell on the other side of the door ready to watch the action.

"I would assume that this angle would be preferable to the one I had back then," Hartwell surmised.

"Did you see him coming?" Manuel asked his usually-loaded question.

"Not until the deed was already done."

The other Hartwell opened the front door to go out and he was not visible to Cal, who was so hyped and focused that it appeared to the naked eye that he had run right past his intended target.

Hartwell fell back to the floor as Cal held his still-beating heart in his right hand. Moments later, Hartwell had died for the 100th time and Cal dropped the useless organ to the floor.

FOURTEEN

"So, your death not only triggered your own mortality, but it also led to the mortality of everyone else associated with you? How did that work out?" Manuel asked.

"Well, it started out a little rocky. We went through quite an adjustment period until things finally settled down."

Hartwell's death sent shockwaves through his community, as everyone was put into an extended slumber within minutes of his monumental expiration.

Some were luckier than others...

Emily Brewster was moving huge containers of dog food, which cushioned her drop, while Thaddeus had flown to the roof as a hawk and was fixing a shingle and he suffered from mostly sunburn damage when he awoke.

Across town, Sharon was working out in the basement on her treadmill, which ejected her limp body across the room and into a pile of clothes. Garrison Phillips had the easiest transition while remaining asleep in his La-Z-Boy recliner.

Brandon Justice, the lone vampire that Hartwell sired before Daniel, was on his way back to Beach Haven from Portland, Oregon, when his vampire wings stopped working about 50 miles from his target destination, and his body rested comfortably in the middle of a tree.

Most of the affected persons escaped injury until Drew and Carla took flight in their BMX bikes and literally hit the dirt with a broken leg and arm, respectively.

The only person that wasn't impacted by Hartwell's death was Daniel, who managed to keep his extended vampirism a secret from the group for some time.

"I think the only person that wasn't satisfied in mortality was Cal," Hartwell stated. "But he had a lot to be upset about."

"Do you think part of the reason you buried him for so long was because of Daniel?" Manuel asked as they were back on the boardwalk bench.

"He was in the way," Hartwell quietly, but intensely, replied.

Manuel smiled, "Funny thing was that he also thought you were in the way."

Hartwell laughed, "Yeah that is so Cal!"

"How did you resolve your issues?"

Hartwell beamed, "It was a little thing called 'bash therapy'!"

The two men were transported to the dewy pitch of the great lawn at Beach Haven Park. The individual matchups had been predetermined by the Winters' family, who were in town on a peacemaking mission.

"If those people hadn't come to town, we'd probably still be fighting," Hartwell said to Manuel as they sat in two folding chairs behind some brush across the field from the Winters' family—Joseph, Katherine, Victoria, Brandon, Bryce and Cheryl—who were also nestled in obscurity behind some brush.

Momma Katherine passed out drinks and popcorn for everyone in the group.

"Do I smell popping corn?" an enticed Manuel sniffed.

Hartwell looked across the way and retraced Katherine's steps to getting the popcorn. He was back from the Beach Haven Bar & Grill seconds later with two tubs of popcorn and couple of hearty mugs of ale.

"Nice touch," Manuel said. "Thank you," he added in what was the first acknowledgement that the two men were peers.

"You're very welcome," Hartwell replied.

Many things had transpired since Hartwell's 100th death, the families turning mortal, Daniel concealing his vampiracy, Cal attempting to kill a mortal Hartwell—only to have Daniel save him by turning him back into a vampire—and then everyone coming back on line as extraordinary beings. But the one thing that hadn't changed was the mountain of unresolved issues between rivals lining up across the field from each other on this night.

Maxwell prepared battle strategy for the vampires and protectors, and Kayla did the same for the team of hunters. But their strategy on this night was planned by Joe Winters in order to get the most out of the individual matchups.

"The concept behind 'bash therapy' was fairly simple," Hartwell explained as he and Manuel stuffed their faces with popcorn. "We all were supposed to beat the heck out of each other until we were physically exhausted. Then the mental battle could begin and we could actually make progress."

"Makes sense," Manuel said after he took a big swig of beer and let out a loud burp, which bordered on a belch. He was really enjoying himself for the first time in more than a century.

The battle started with on-field Hartwell and Thaddeus Brewster, which was apropos because that's how it all began with Thad impaling Hartwell on a tree for the vampire's first death. Agent Blake Wallace, Nicole's father, was going against the one person of the group that flat-out disrespect him, Andrew Brewster. Maybe it was because Brewster was not the father of Nicole's child, or maybe he just didn't like Blake?

Blake walked slowly toward Drew, which had sort of a hypnotic affect in him. Drew often called Blake "frog man because of his work in the F.B.I. aquatics unit, so Blake simply said "Ribbet!" and then slapped Andrew across the face with his open right hand, sending Drew spinning toward the ground.

Drew gathered himself and yelled, "Bad froggy!" as he soared through the air as a hawk and then changed into a mighty ram just as he swooping vertically toward Blake. The agent was mesmerized by the flight of the bird until he witnessed the exterior change, but it was too late. He was head-butted by Drew the ram and then changed into an Orca killer whale for the flight through the air.

Next up were former sister-in-law's, Belinda Wallace and Emily Brewster. They didn't really like each other going back to the days when Belinda was married to Cal. A power struggle between the ladies for their favorite man left them both bitter and basically unfulfilled.

"You're mine!" usually-aggressive Emily shouted as they locked arms like Greco-Roman wrestlers.

"Oh, I like trash talk!" Manuel cooed.

Hartwell shook his head in disagreement, "Not so much, unless it's used in place of a physical advantage."

Emily was always the alpha female dog, and she changed into a Pit Bull Terrier and showed her fangs after she engaged from the Hungarian death grip. Belinda smiled as Emily went airborne and was headed for her jugular vein and an easy victory. Emily zipped over to a local newsstand and retrieved a bunch of rolled-up papers while the dog was still in the air.

"Bad doggy!" Belinda yelled as she swatted Emily on the snout. Emily yelped and then returned to her human form as her butt hit the ground.

"Oh, it's gonna' be like that?" she defiantly stated.

"Yeah, it's gonna be like that!" Emily shot back.

Manuel turned to Hartwell and he finally agreed, "Yeah that was hot!"

Garrison Phillips and his daughter Sharon had been estranged for quite some time after she defected from the protector ranks and literally went to work for the other side after she stayed in love with Cal.

Gary started the therapy portion of the night, "You abandoned us!"

Sharon, to her credit, was about as succinct as she could have been with her reply.

"Abandon this!" she yelled as she punched her father in the jaw with a massive right cross. She quickly changed into a ram and bucked him with her headgear on his way down, sending him low-flying only a few inches off the ground before he came to a stop after making a long trail in the park lawn.

Perhaps the bitterest matchup of the night was Carla Brewster against Nicole Thompson. The two women had so much in common, being that they almost had the same baby-daddy and everything.

"Why did you call him over that day Daniel broke up with you?" Carla asked, referring to her husband Drew.

Nicole stepped as close to Carla as she could and whispered, "Because I could," which was out of character for her since she was usually so nice.

"That makes me sweat," lifelong bird-dog Manuel said to Hartwell.

"Yeah, I don't think so," Hartwell replied, trying to squelch any ideas Manuel had about his kids. "This one's going to get ugly."

Aaron, the huge hunter, stood up from the bench because he was new and didn't have as many issues with his opponents yet, and said "Ooh, a cat fight!"

He was on the sidelines to watch after Maxwell and Kayla, who said "So that's what a cat fight looks like," even though her mother was in the middle of the action.

FIFTEEN

But the main event of the evening battle that would forge the direction of the future of the families—was Daniel against his father, Cal Brewster.

"I don't think a son should ever pick a hand up to his father, but it was the only way they could communicate at the time," popcorn-eating Hartwell said to Manuel.

Manuel nodded his head in understanding and thought to himself, "I think I learned more about life when I was in the dark under the ground than when I was actually living."

"I heard that," Hartwell whispered as he leaned toward Manuel.

Manuel smiled, "I know," even though he really didn't know that he was transmitting his thoughts. But the more he spent time with Hartwell and the family, the more he actually felt at home for the first time in his lives.

As Daniel and Cal squared off in their boxing stances, Cal used the opportunity to throw his first verbal jab.

"Did your father teacher you to stand like that?"

Cal was quite an accomplished boxer and took offense to anybody but himself teaching the kid how to fight.

Daniel said the first thing that came into his mind.

"Yeah, at least the father I knew."

"That's not going to be good," Hartwell commented because he knew all about Cal Brewster, who landed a left jab to Daniel's right eye. Daniel quickly countered with a right hook that surprised Cal.

"No, but he taught me how to punch."

Cal absorbed the blow and then said, "You've been asking for this for a long time."

Daniel was in no mood to give in, "I never asked you for anything."

Four hours later, all of the combatants and bystanders were getting tired, including Hartwell and Manuel.

"Good thing you played that movie the last two hours," Manuel stated. "Otherwise, I don't think I would have made it. How much longer?"

Hartwell surveyed the landscape, "Now is the time to pay attention. We're nearing the end of all of the battles."

"You gonna' give up?" Carla asked Nicole, trying to make it seem like she was somehow in charge.

"Give up?" Nicole replied. "Why should I give up? You give up!"

"You're always in my way!" Carla screamed as the women remained locked in a loose grip.

"With Drew!" Carla clarified.

"What about Drew? I don't have any intention toward Drew!" Nicole replied as Carla loosened her grip and fell to the ground. Nicole didn't know what to do at first so she went to the ground, sat up and faced Carla, who was covering her crying eyes with her scratched, dirty and bloody hands.

"I thought I lost him," Carla sobbed, proving that the years had not dulled her pain.

"I thought I lost Daniel!" Nicole replied as she reached down with her left hand and clasped Carla's right hand.

Carla wiped her tears away with her left sleeve and replied, "Lost Daniel?"

And then Nicole explained the chain of events that led to her brief rendezvous with Drew, including Daniel breaking up with her after he became a vampire and then turning to the one person in the world she could turn to—Drew—that could help her understand what had just happened.

And after Carla gave Nicole a 'you're forgiven' hug, they stood up and took a walk together away from the field.

"That's one down," Manuel said.

"How long can you keep this up?" Gary asked his daughter.

Sharon replied, "As long as I'm alive, old man!"

Gary saw the end in sight, so he instinctively positioned himself for the kill. He picked up Sharon over his head like a professional wrestler and then focused all of his energy on the downward motion, slamming an almost lifeless Sharon to the ground.

She barely moved as Gary got her in a choke hold.

"Finish me," she whispered as he continued choking her until he changed into a wolf and surrounded her neck with his sharp fangs. And then, just as he was about to act, he had a lone rational and peaceful thought amidst a sea of rage.

"What am I doing?"

He changed back into his human form as his daughter slumped against his chest, beads of blood trickling from her punctured neck—her sad, watery eyes telling an all-too-familiar tale of family estrangement.

He stopped the flow of blood as Hartwell's wife Maggie zoomed in from the sideline and vacuumed the blood dry while he administered a tourniquet.

"Thanks, daddy," she said feeling better by the second.

"No problem, pumpkin," he replied, using the nickname he gave her when she was young because of her love of Halloween.

SIXTEEN

Andrew and Agent Blake continued to trade jabs and barbs, but neither man could seem to seize the upper hand.

"When are you going to learn?" Blake asked as he used his massive lifeguard thighs to wrap around Drew's midsection, effectively cutting off his air supply.

Drew's face was turning bright red from the lack of oxygen, but he still managed to poke fun at Blake.

"What do you have to teach me, Willy?"

"Oh, now it's Willy! What are you gonna' do, Andrew, free me?" Blake said in response to Drew's whale reference.

Blake was getting nowhere fast so he kicked Drew out of his grip, sending the young man spinning a few feet away on the ground.

Blake stood up and Drew remained on the ground trying to regain his breath.

"What is your problem, man?" he grunted.

"What is my problem?" Blake asked, because he couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"Drew, you do realize that there are other people in the world besides you?" He then followed up with, "You never respect the dead!" finally advancing the discussion to the heart of the problem.

While Drew followed, and mostly agreed with the first point, Blake sort of lost him with the second observation.

"What? Respect for the dead? You're crazy!"

Blake walked up to a now upright Andrew in a manner that suggested that the physical portion of the bash therapy was about to get going again. Instead, he simply took the index and middle fingers of his right hand and placed them on the right temple of Drew's head—a trick he had learned from Daniel.

Scenes of severing heads with his sword and then kicking the heads down the field and putting golf balls into the mouth were replayed. He also took several severed heads and shot baskets on the adjacent basketball court in the park.

Blake removed his fingers and screamed, "I woke up the next morning tangled in the net of the basket! It took me 20 minutes to untangle my ears!"

And then, suddenly, Blake felt better for having aired his grievance.

"I was just thinking about what that must have looked like. My body looking for my head and all!" Blake exclaimed as he pulled his shirt over his head and stomped around the field to laughter.

Drew followed Blake, who pulled his shirt back down and then put his arm around Drew while getting headlock, complete with nuggies.

"I would have paid money to see that!" a gleeful Drew said after being released from the play-fighting.

They kept walking and a still-laughing Blake added, "I was yelling at my body from the basket but it didn't hear me!"

The family reunion continued with the bitter battle of Emily versus Belinda.

"Even when he was yours, he was still mine!" Emily grunted, referencing Cal, as she threw punch after punch like a machine.

Instead of getting angry, Belinda referred to the sage wisdom of her vampirical martial arts instructor, Thomas Hartwell.

"Opportunity presents itself through other's aggression."

Belinda slapped Emily across the face and then left four, three-inch scratched from her hairline to her chin on the left side of her face.

Emily was so tough that she barely noticed the blood staining her white shirt. She hauled off and punched Belinda in her kidneys with a vicious left hook.

Belinda dropped down to one knee and Emily stepped forward and rammed her knee into Belinda's face, sending her back toward the ground.

"You were never good enough for him anyway!" Emily growled.

Belinda appeared to be dizzy, but she was actually dizzy with plan.

Emily's usual move would have been to finish Belinda off, but the calming thoughts implanted by the peacemakers curtailed such action.

Emily turned her back on Belinda, who unfurled her vast vampire wings, and they were airborne before Emily knew what was happening.

"Let's take a little spin to the beach," a now-confident

Belinda stated, and Emily knew she had to do something before they reached water because it was not the favorite place for the hunter's to visit.

She first changed into a rather tame Grizzly bear, and then a pit bull and hawk, as they were rapidly approaching the shore.

Emily was still defiant as they neared the water, so Belinda ran through 15 up-and-downs, in-and-out of the salty water and then asked, "You calm now?"

Water gushed out of Emily's mouth, along with a few small fish, but she still would not relent.

"You know how I feel about seafood."

Belinda countered, "Why does it have to be this way, Em?"

"What way?" Emily replied, fully knowing what her rival meant.

And then the conversation turned personal.'

"Why did you have to shut me and Danny out?" Belinda asked about her family's treatment of her and her son after Cal disappeared.

"What were we supposed to do?"

Belinda was emotional, "Treat us like family!"

Emily was in full denial, "You're not family!"

Instead of continuing to butt her head against a concrete wall, Emily simply took a deep breath.

"You know, if I wasn't thinking about vanilla-scented potpourri, I would have snapped you in half from that remark."

"Yes! Vanilla-scented potpourri! Where can I get some of that?" Emily gushed.

"They have it at Beach Haven Drugs and I've smelt a bunch of it at the mall."

Belinda then got back on topic, "If you had no feelings for me," Belinda said softly, "how could you turn your back on Cal's son... your nephew?"

All of the feelings that Emily had bottled up came to the surface at once. She started crying, "I couldn't live without Cal!

Everyone thought he was dead, but I knew different. I knew where he was and I couldn't do anything to help him!"

She continued, "Every time I looked at Danny I saw Cal," she revealed. "I'm sorry we left you and he cheated on you."

"Thanks, Em" Belinda said as she rested her forehead on Emily's forehead as the landed softly in the beach.

"No problem, B" Emily calmly replied.

SEVENTEEN

Only two battles remained, and at least one observer was being thoroughly entertained.

"I don't think that I've ever been to any event that has kept me at the edge of my seat for this long, except for those two hours we watched the movie," Manuel said to Hartwell as he took of frozen yogurt topped with Cap'n Crunch. "And you made a good call with the Cap'n on the yogurt."

Hartwell smiled, "Yeah, I had you pegged for a Cap'n kind of guy."

"What did you get on yours?"

"Well, I couldn't decide between brownie bites and Cocoa Krispies, so I put the brownies on the bottom and the Krispies' on top."

"Talk about chocolate overload!" Manuel said.

"Hey, we only live once," Hartwell stated in jest. "Or twice, I

kinda' lost count."

"Next time we're in the Vermont, I gotta' take you to Ben & Jerry's. They have the best blood-infused ice cream!" Manuel excitedly said.

Hartwell thought that his new friend was becoming more and more comfortable being around the family for an extended period of time, and that was a good thing.

"Do you want to stay and watch the rest?" he asked like two friends deciding on whether to stay until the end of a baseball game.

"I really want to see what happened between Daniel and

Cal," Manuel replied. "Can you give me the Cliff Notes version of the battle between you and Thaddeus? No offense."

"None taken," Hartwell replied because he had already experienced everything before.

"How many times have I cut your head off, only to have you come back and make my life miserable?" Thaddeus asked. "I would kill you for the next 50 days if it meant that you would no longer be my reason for living!"

Hartwell then stopped the action and turned to Manuel, "Then we started getting along after that raw and revealing statement, and then I promised to repair his favorite sword that I had broken in half."

"Hope that will prepare me for the written test later," Manuel joked.

"Okay, let's get to the main event!" Hartwell exclaimed.

"Yes, let's" Manuel replied, and the sat back and fully enjoyed his yogurt.

Not a word was spoken between Daniel and Cal during the first four hours of the fight after the initial barbs. Cal's incredible boxing ability was neutralized by Daniel's knowledge of every form of fighting and defense that the world has ever known.

The punching slowed as the boxing marathon had reached its 100th and final round. Cal's inner mechanisms pushed him to change into a ram as he backed up to give himself more room for a run-up. Daniel had ceased being Daniel the vampire and had to pause for a moment to deal with the violent changes occurring in his core.

Daniel screamed toward the lightning-laced skies as the DNA of the hunter finally consummated its transition and altered his gene sequence. He took a few steps back and yelled as he changed into a ram.

Manuel gasped, "Whoa! I definitely did not see that coming!"

Cal was ready to charge, dragging his hoof across the ground in pure fury. The two juiced-up rams charged at each other from 30 paces in a cloud of thick dust.

As focused was Cal was on the impact, he had a sobering thought just prior to impact.

"Danny is a ram."

The euphoria was short-lived as Daniel crashed into Cal and sent him flying through the air about 100 feet past his original starting point.

"He got all of that one!" Hartwell said to Manuel.

"Yes, he sure did," Manuel replied.

Daniel was so keyed-up that he kept advancing toward a now human Cal, who could only watch his son coming toward him.

"Danny!" was all he got off before Daniel plowed his head and plunged his left antler into Cal's midsection.

But once Daniel realized what he had done, he morphed back into his human form.

"Dad?" Daniel exclaimed, finally realizing that he had just done damaged to a person that wasn't fighting back.

Cal was on his last breaths and made the final seconds count. He reached up and cradled Daniel's face with his left hand and proudly said with tears rolling down his cheeks, "I love you, son."

Daniel held Cal as he died, crying from the pain of losing him and the joy of finding him again. A few minutes later, the sun peaked out from the east horizon, renewing Cal's life force and enabling the reunion to continue.

Cal opened his eyes and said, "Good timing," as Daniel hugged him and then helped him to his feet.

"How long was I out?" Cal asked as they started walking.

"It was only a few minutes," the elated son replied.

"Good to have you back, dad."

"Good to be back, son."

EIGHTEEN

Hartwell and Manuel were transported from the fringe of the great lawn of Beach Haven Park to the calming neutrality of the inside of a teepee.

"Did you do that?" a surprised and now paranoid Manuel asked.

Hartwell thought deeply about the question and then answered.

"I believe I did."

"Why?" Manuel questioned.

"Well, why did you do what you did to me?"

"What?" Manuel asked, because he was both disoriented and really didn't understand what Hartwell was trying to ask.

"I don't know?" Manuel replied once he understood the question.

Hartwell nodded, "Then, maybe we should just go with the flow. I'm game if you are?"

Manuel laughed, "I bet you are. The heat appears to be off you now."

"Yeah, why do you that that is?"

Manuel replied, "Because I started to care about you and your family."

Hartwell was in agreement again, "I know! One minute you want to kill them and the next their all living in your house and we're all on the same side."

"It's time for you to meet Carmen," a woman entered and said to Manuel.

"Guess we're not watching this one. You think I should meet her? I didn't turn so great the first time," Manuel said quietly to Hartwell.

"I think you should go through with it, but I probably wouldn't be a great idea to let me out of your sight."

"I'll take care of it," Manuel whispered. And then he talked to the woman standing across from him, "This gentleman will be joining us for dinner."

The woman didn't dare question Manuel, who was the new chief of the tribe, but she did look the pale-face man over.

"Is there anything else?" Manuel asked her with a strong hint of impatience in his voice.

She glanced at Hartwell and said, "No."

As the flap closed Hartwell stated, "Well, that was one of the most ominous "No's" I have ever heard."

"Right?" Manuel exclaimed.

The guys got dressed in traditional garb, Manuel wearing his chief headdress, and made their way out to the meeting place.

"What do you think happened between you and Carmen?" Hartwell asked trying to stay ahead of the curve.

"I don't know. Things were usually good between us when we were together."

"Then why do you think you did the things you did?"

Hartwell questioned, referring to Manuel's rampant infidelity.

Manuel proudly stood ahead of and pounded his chest with his right fist, "Because I could!"

He then suggested, "You might want to have an escape plan ready just in case things go bad. People of the sun don't exactly trust pale folk like you."

Hartwell joked, "I wonder why? We just took your world from under you and made it our own."

Manuel shed some wisdom, "Man is of the earth but cannot own the earth."

"Point taken," Hartwell replied as they walked up to a fire in the center of the camp.

Manuel was introduced to Carmen and her natural beauty literally took his breath away.

"She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen," he said to Hartwell internally.

"Yes, she is breathtaking," Hartwell concurred.

"Why didn't you look at me this was when we first met?"

Carmen asked internally as Hartwell looked on. And then she smiled and Hartwell said, "How are you doing big guy?"

Hartwell immediately thought of Maggie, who was the love of his life, and she appeared in an outfit that was similar to Carmen's.

"He's spoken for!" she yelled and then popped out of the scene and was standing in the main room of Hartwell's house wearing the same outfit.

"Blake asked, "Where were you?"

"Not sure, but it was real dusty and some Native American woman was making a play for my man, but he thought only of me," Maggie proudly replied.

Blake laughed, "Could it be that you finally have him tamed?"

Hartwell had not been able to breach the parallel universe to that point.

"I love my wife!" as he kissed Maggie passionately right in front of Blake. He broke the kiss and said to Blake, "Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Agent Wallace! I gotta' go!"

And before either Maggie or Blake could ask the obvious question, "Where have you been?" Hartwell was standing next to Manuel and staring at a pack of angry and confused naysayers.

An elder grunted, "Diablo!"

"Maybe you shouldn't have disappeared and then appeared again? Now they think you're the devil," Manuel stated.

"Oh, that can't be good," Hartwell replied.

"I mean, they were thinking you were the devil purely by the color of your skin and then you left and came back, which basically confirmed their paranoid suspicions."

"So, what does that mean?" Hartwell asked as the two men started slowly walking backwards to stay ahead of the advancing mob.

"We either run, or you get us the hell out of here. And I've seen you run, so I would suggest Plan B, because we have some people that can run faster than the deer."

"Plan B it is!" Hartwell exclaimed amidst a cloud of dust.

NINETEEN

Hartwell and Manuel were back at their bench on the Beach Haven Boardwalk.

"That was a close one," Hartwell said. "What would they have done with me? Cooked me for dinner?"

Manuel replied with a straight face, "They would have cooked you, but fed you to the coyotes and buzzards."

Hartwell was ready to laugh until he realized that most of the joke was on him.

"What are you really doing here?" Hartwell asked in an attempt to avoid any more potentially death-threatening questions.

Manuel's first instinct was to continue to put Hartwell off until resolution, but the game had changed and he was in no mood to be under the microscope anymore.

"I was under the ground for the past 30 years and figured that some fresh air might do me some good."

"So, you were scared to come out because that woman we just saw was son angry with you?" Hartwell asked.

"How did you know?" Manuel asked.

"You didn't see that wild look in her eyes?" Hartwell asked.

"You must have really pissed her off!"

"I was out all night in the days and months leading up to our wedding, and I even invited a few of the women to the festivities," Manuel detailed.

Hartwell was flabbergasted, "Wait! Wait! Let me get this straight! You invited a date to your wedding?"

"It was actually a few dates," Manuel corrected.

"You invited dates to your wedding?" Hartwell exclaimed, and then the complete gravity of the situation finally caught up with him.

"She was the one who starting this whole thing!" he gasped.

She used black magic and turned you into a vampire!"

"Guilty as charged," Manuel replied.

"She must have either died, or lost interest," Hartwell surmised.

"No, that one would never have lost interest," Manuel explained in a way that he wasn't trying to seem self-serving.

"She was having way too much fun."

"Where am I on your family tree?" Hartwell asked.

"It was me then Alexander Lowery. That really wasn't my finest hour. I had a bit too much to drink and probably should have been cut off. Normally, I would have just drained him, but I passed out just before he was about to cross the threshold.

"So, you're saying that I should have died in my house in San Francisco?" Hartwell asked with a hint of sobering reality.

"Yes," Manuel replied. "But, frankly, I'm glad I passed out and you got to see your family again."

Hartwell smiled, "Yeah, me too." Then he asked the question that was at the forefront of his mind. "Where do we go from here?"

Manuel thought about the query and offered very little in terms of clarity.

"You know, for the first time since I came out of my coffin, I'm not really sure what comes next?"

Hartwell took the opening as an opportunity.

"Well, maybe we should start by going home."

Manuel nodded in agreement, "It's been a long time since I've been anywhere that remotely resembled home."

"Except maybe that coffin."

"Yeah, there is that," Manuel chuckled and agreed.

And then the pair was standing in front of Hartwell's house.

"You know we still have that pesky problem of Gabriel," Manuel stated before they walked into the house.

And then Hartwell understood what Manuel was trying to get at since they met.

"It's never going to end, is it?"

"No, not unless we do something about it," Manuel replied.

Hartwell nodded as they glided toward the front door.

"Then we'll do something about it," he stated. Although he wasn't sure what that 'something' was, he knew that it would require a supreme sacrifice on their part. But whatever he could to help his family and keep his loved one's out of harm's way, he was on board for. And it appeared that Manuel Ortiz had his back and would support any decision they jointly made.

TWENTY

While the ape formerly known as Gabriel Billingsley wasn't sure who he was calling via his distress growls and grunts, he knew that his emotional pleas would not fall on deaf ears. He had impatiently waited in the confining space of the ape exhibit at the Beach Haven Zoo, until he decided that he could bare the weight of frustration no more. So, he simply swung his way out of the zoo at night, using the trees adjacent to the exhibit to leave the area undetected by spying security cameras.

Since Gabriel was the leader of the pack, all of the other members followed him without hesitation back to the vacant house they had been previously living. The familiarity of the scents of this location eased the transition and opened the door for the other apes to regain their previous powers. And for that task, he called on his witch, Brenda Vinson.

"Gabriel is at it again," Brenda said to her daughter Linda as they sat and got the mani/pedi special at Beach Haven Nail Salon.

"You better go talk to Hartwell before things get out of hand again," she added.

Linda didn't dare question her mother's sixth sense about such things, because her entire body was tingling from the recent surge in paranormal activity.

"What's going on?" Linda's daughter and Brenda's granddaughter asked as she leaned forward and sensed something was wrong. She had also felt the surge but didn't want to stir up trouble. It had been a stressful couple of months for the newbie witch, and she was looking forward to a normal life with her family. Her mother had been on the run from Lowery since the day she was born, because she didn't want him finding out about his daughter.

The usual answer to one of Claire's open-ended questions would be to say nothing and quickly close to door to curiosity.

But the girl was now of age and her predecessors had to start treating her more like an equal, a woman, a witch.

"It's starting again," Linda Vinson said to her daughter.

Claire was about to panic and react emotionally, but her grandma'- who she had lived with her entire life- nipped that in the bud.

"Claire Rebecca Vinson! If you want to be one of us take your emotions and turn them into action!"

She lovingly put her hand on her granddaughter's face and added, "Together we can do anything."

Claire calmed down and regained control of her rampant emotions. She then turned to mother and grandma' and asked with all of the maturity of a woman.

"What do you need me to do?"

Brenda looked at Linda and it was Linda that made the somewhat surprising assignment.

"For starters, you can reconnect with Hartwell's son."

Brenda and Claire hadn't realized that Linda was privy to that connection.

"Daniel?" Claire asked.

"Yeah, he holds the key to anything we can accomplish."

Brenda was usually the one who came up with the master plans, so she was curious of the direction they would be taking.

"So Lin, what do we hope to accomplish?"

Linda Vinson replied without hesitation.

"A life together."

The other two nodded in agreement and then sat back, waiting for their nails to dry.

Back at Hartwell's house, people had been coming and going so fast that Agent Blake Wallace could barely keep up with it.

Strange things had always happened with anything and anyone associated with Hartwell, and Blake was the resident expert about all things to do with Hartwell- being that he spent his entire F.B.I. career tracking the whereabouts of the vampire, while also keeping an eye on his daughter Nicole.

There was an audible buzz throughout the house, and any remaining stragglers had been awoken and naturally moved to the main room to see what was happening. The throng barely noticed Hartwell and Manuel when they came through the front door, partly because they were distracted but mostly because they never actually used the door. One moment they were gliding toward the house outside and the next they were inside.

"Thomas!" Maggie shrieked out of relief that her husband had arrived home safely. She glided over to him stuck to him like crazy glue, while everyone else made it over to Hartwell and either hugged him or slapped him on the back while Manuel instinctively moved away from the crowd and sat in a stool just outside of the kitchen.

One the welcome home parade subsided, attention naturally turned to the visitor that was assumed to have caused all of the ruckus.

The elder statesman, Thaddeus and Garrison, stood on each side of Hartwell and Gary asked, "Do you want us to take him out, boss?"

"Yes, we would be happy to dispose of him," Thad added like they were two gangsters preparing to get rid of a problem.

Manuel was a big proponent of loyalty, although he had spent most of mortal life satisfying his own needs at the risk of the other tribe members.

Hartwell held both arms out toward Thad and Gary's chests, mostly for the affect, and replied, "No, I think we're good here.

Our new friend Manuel Ortiz is going to stay with us for a while and I don't want anybody to try to hurt him.

Most of the people in the family focused on the word "try" and then looked Manuel over to what they might be up against.

Manuel stood up and flexed his muscles, but then Samuel glided over to him and changed into a virtual clone of Manuel, which frightened the old-school vampire, who had not been properly introduced to the new-school until now.

"Diablo!" Manuel screamed because it was the first thing that popped into his head.

Samuel repeated, "Diablo!" as everyone in the room got a good laugh out of it.

Blake walked up and escorted a stunned Manuel to a seat on the couch.

"How did that boy just do that?" he asked.

Blake smiled, "Evolution."

TWENTY-ONE

Once the war paint dried, the witches Vinson went their separate ways: Brenda to see Gabriel Billingsley, Linda meeting Hartwell at the Beach haven Diner and Claire strolling over to the beach to have a little chat with Daniel. While those discussions were important, it was sort of an impromptu meeting later that day that held the key to the future paranormal activity in the normally sleepy town of Beach Haven, New York.

Hartwell and Maggie sat in their usual booth, which was located some three paces to the left of the Beach Haven Diner cash register. He always liked to sit facing the door so he could keep an eye on the action, and his wife Maggie sat next to him because they were expecting a guest on this day.

The clock struck noon and Linda Vinson walked through the front door of the diner.

"Well, that was punctual," Maggie said with her usual perky voice.

"It's a good thing, I'm hungry," Hartwell replied.

Linda walked in and looked to the right first and then sensed Hartwell and immediately turned left and walked toward the table.

She sat down and nodded, "Thomas" and then "Maggie," as she greeted her hosts and then opened the gigantic menu, which read like a culinary manuscript.

"What's good to eat here?" Linda asked. "I feel as if I haven't eaten for days."

Hartwell wondered the same thing being that he had downed a bunch of blood bags at the house before they left and yet he was still famished.

"I know I'm hungry, too!" Maggie agreed.

"Breakfast is always good here. Pancakes, waffles, eggs, bacon..." Hartwell detailed and then looked at Maggie and Linda. "We might need a bigger table."

"I've seen that look on your face before, Mr. Hartwell," Trixie the waitress said as she walked over toward the table. "Why don't you all move to this big oval table behind you. No need to order. I'll just start bringing out your favorites until you tell me to stop!" she said and then disappeared into the kitchen.

"I like this town more and more each day!" Linda Vinson exclaimed. And then she changed the subject after they settled into their new table. "Do you think we'll be able to stay?"

"That all depends?" Hartwell replied.

And then when he did not expand on his own question, Linda became even more curious.

"Depends on what?"

Trixie brought out a bunch of toast and drinks as Hartwell said, "Thanks, Trixie."

"I'll be back in a jiff," she said and then scooted back into the kitchen to pick up items off the conveyor belt of continuous food.

Everyone was munching on toast as Hartwell started talking.

"Me, you, your mom, Maggie, your daughter, Gabriel Billingsley, my son..."

"So, basically, it's going to take a village," Linda stated.

Maggie looked at Maggie and then Linda and replied, "Pretty much."

Claire Vinson had a special connection with Daniel, so when she went to the popular Beach Haven Boardwalk and sat on a bench, he knew it was time to go.

"You want to come with me?" Daniel asked his wife Nicole.

"Sure, where are you going?"

"The beach," Daniel replied.

Nicole zipped out of the room and then zipped back in with some sunscreen on her nose, a beach umbrella and chairs in her hands.

Daniel laughed, "It's not that kind of outing."

"Oh!" Nicole said and then came back and forth in her original outfit.

And while their journey to the beach only took a few seconds, Nicole said as she felt Daniel staring at her nose, "Do I still have sunscreen on my nose?"

They came to a stop at the beach and Claire said, "Yes, it's still there," and then she offered a tissue to Nicole.

"Thanks, Claire," Nicole said and then removed the lotion from her nose.

"You're welcome," Claire replied.

"So, what's on your mind?" Daniel asked as they sat down on two benches facing the ocean.

While Claire knew why she was there, she wasn't really sure how to broach the subject and her personal anxiety toward subject the showed.

Nicole could see she was struggling, so she extended an olive branch.

"Take your time, dear."

"Thanks. It's Billingsley," she replied.

"I thought we took care of him?" Nicole asked Daniel in a surprised tone.

He was miffed, "Does anything really end in our world?"

Then Claire realized why she was there, beyond what her mother and grandmother had instructed her to do.

"Why can't it end?"

"Because it never does," Daniel replied.

"What if it could end?" she asked.

He was confused, so Nicole stepped in.

"Will we be living on the other side?" she asked, because death was a finality that no one in this group of extreme warriors would accept.

"I don't see why not," Clair replied. "But all of these problems will be replaced with the issues of your youth," she added, referring to their mortal roots.

Nicole smiled because many of her best memories occurred before her and Daniel's 18th birthdays.

"I can live with that."

"Yeah, me too," Daniel agreed.

Brenda Vinson knocked on the front door of the vacant house and Gabriel Billingsley opened the door in his ape form in case trouble was waiting on the other side. His minions followed close behind and were ready to pounce if their leader suffered a single shred of distress.

"Brenda! So nice of you to come!" he exclaimed, still in primate shell.

He then turned around to the group and forcefully grunted, which meant that everything was okay and they should find something else to scratch in another room. Gabriel morphed back into his human form and said, "I'm getting tired of this ape thing and not being able to speak in my own voice and be understood. What else can we do?" he asked as if Brenda shared an equal weight and responsibility for his group.

"I can make them look like us again," she replied.

"Good! I knew you could do it," he enthusiastically replied with a tinge of relief.

"But it's going to take a few days," she added, knowing that anything Hartwell and company were cooking up probably could use a head start.

Billingsley had always been a control freak who never seemed to be in control of his own emotions or thoughts.

"Okay, but only a few days. I don't want them suspecting anything that we're doing," he said as paranoia was becoming an equally-imbalanced emotion to revenge.

TWENTY-TWO

Brenda Vinson left Billingsley's housed armed with the knowledge that she was solely responsible for starting the fighting again. She had felt sort of guilty after the last battle, although she really didn't have much choice in the matter. But, this time, she had both the power and the motive to change things up a bit and finally take charge of a situation that had haunted her for the better part of the past 20 years. The only question was, how?

Manuel Ortiz had been an expert tracker in his teenage years, and he used that expertise to hunt down the energy of a person that was naturally drawn to. He had eaten lunch with Thaddeus and Garrison at Beach Haven Bagel, and said after eating one of their 'everything' bagels, "Nobody makes bagels better than New Yorkers."

And then he followed it up with, "It's too bad they're such vile beings. In many ways they remind me of some of the people of my tribe... always picking at you, but then are the first person to stand behind you when they need protection during a fight."

He left Thad and Gary in town and told them he would return home later after he took a walk around the town. They agreed that it wouldn't be a bad idea for the warrior to become more familiar with his surroundings, and acquaint himself with the terrain in advance of a certain conflict.

Manuel walked and walked until he felt compelled to stop in front of a vacant house, which was clear across the town from Hartwell's. He stared at the front door and waited patiently for his mark to emerge from the structure.

Once Brenda Vinson was done pacifying Billinglsey, she walked out of the front door from one situation to another potential issue. She felt the energy of the handsome stranger standing upright across the street, and it was nothing like she had ever experienced before. This was raw, original energy that was of interest to her, instead of being compelled to act on someone else's behalf.

Brenda was so paranoid that she decided to walk out of the neighborhood instead of walking straight across the street to the big chief, which was obviously her preference.

She cleared her thoughts of Gabriel and then said to Manuel internally, "Follow me," and he replied in kind, "As far as it takes."

Brenda kept walking and was so enthralled with the pursuit that she didn't stop for the next 20 minutes until she was standing in front of the Beach Haven Café.

"Won't you join me for some afternoon tea," he said internally.

She broke the outer silence, "I was thinking more of some scotch on the rocks."

He smiled, "Ah, there's nothing like a few shots of fire water to calm the nerves."

So they walked a few doors down to the Beach Haven Tavern and sat on a few stools at the bar.

"Two glasses of your finest scotch barkeep," Manuel asked the bartender in a tongue that suggested to Brenda that he had been around for a while.

"New to town?" she asked, as the bartender returned with two glasses of scotch on the rocks.

"Here's to new beginnings," Manuel proposed as a toast.

"To new beginnings," she happily repeated.

"And yes, I am new to town," Manuel stated.

"Do you plan to stay long?" Brenda asked because she had seen her share of men come and go.

Manuel usually had a way with words and ladies, but he was having difficulty expressing himself about this specific topic.

"Somehow I'm getting the feeling that it depends on you?"

"How is that?" an intrigued Brenda asked.

Then Manuel changed direction before he got into the meat of the conversation.

"Why were you in that house?"

She was equal to the task, "Why were you standing outside of that house?"

"Because that is where my feet took me. I started walked from the bagel place and saw that as my path, he countered.

"Eating with Gary and Thad?" she asked, trying to prolong the chit-chat phase of the conversation long enough to raise the interpersonal comfort level. And then she took a nice sip of whisky to calm her nerves.

"Yes," he replied.

"They love that place," she replied and then picked up the seriousness of his gaze, which meant that he wanted to put an end to the small talk and get to the main event.

"Bagels are good," he said with a straight face.

"I am a witch," she said without further hesitation.

Manuel jumped out of his stool and on to his feet, as the thought of encountering another witch was too much for him to handle. He nervously reached into his pocket, pulled out a $20 bill and dropped it on the bar before walking out of the bar.

He was so disoriented that he ran out of the back door of the establishment. Brenda downed the rest of her poison and then followed him closely into the back alley.

Manuel reached the dimly-lit alley and Brenda ran and lunged for his left hand with her right hand and made the connection. She tapped into his brain and searched for anything witch-related, and was treated to quite a horror reel.

When the short movie was over she pulled away and said, "Wow! You must have really done that woman wrong to make her so angry!"

Manuel dropped his head in shame and then said as he looked at Brenda, "I broke her heart many times."

"Then she turned you into a beast?" Brenda asked.

"A vampire. I was the first in the family," Manuel explained, infusing his place at the root of Hartwell's family tree.

Brenda's eyebrows rose at the possibilities, "Then I guess you've met Thomas Hartwell?"

"He is the reason I am in Beach Haven. I heard the distress calls of a primate but decided to visit a being that needed by help more."

"I was just in that primate's house," she stated.

Manuel nodded, "That makes sense. Is there anyone else in that abode that I might know?"

"Who else is in your line?"

"Lowery. Alexander Lowery," he replied.

"Yes he is in there, but I brought him back from the dead."

Manuel was interested in the potential of correcting his mistake.

"So, what side are you on?" Brenda asked.

"I know where I stand, but what side are you on?" he countered.

"That depends?" she replied.

He was disappointed at first that there were conditions being placed on her allegiance.

"I'm on the side that will end all of this turmoil and help me live a normal life with my family?" she stated.

"Then we are in agreement," he replied.

TWENTY-THREE

"I wish there was a way that we didn't have to involve the kids in this anymore," Hartwell said to a table of adults that included Maggie, Daniel Nicole, Thaddeus, Garrison, Cal, Emily, Sharon, Aaron, Andrew, Carla, Blake and Belinda.

Hartwell was visibly agitated and stood up from the table, although he could have used his vampirical powers and not expended any physical energy.

"We all started this battle and I think we should be the ones that finish it."

"But what guarantees do we have that it will end, Thomas?" Thaddeus asked.

Just then, Manuel walked into the room and said, "There are no guarantees in life, or even death for that matter. Are there any among us that crave for a 'normal' life, if not for just the younger generation?"

Hartwell nodded in thanks for the assistance.

"Listen, I don't think there are any of us that don't enjoy the sweet struggle of the fight." Hartwell laughed, "Especially you, Calvin."

Everyone laughed in response and Cal smirked at Hartwell, his greatest foe of his lifetime.

"But there has to come a time when it comes to an end! And from what I can gather from my trip with Manuel, the fighting will never end until we all are destroyed."

Agent Blake had a keen eye and ear for observation.

"So, it's either total destruction, or...?"

Manuel filled in the blank, "Mortality."

That was a tough pill to swallow for a group of supernatural beings that had been god-like for so long. The thought of getting older and then passing on one day was a common thought among this group, from the last time they became mortal when Hartwell reached his 100th death.

Back then, the hunters tormented Hartwell by killing him in sync with the daily soup special at the Beach Haven Diner, before Cal was released in time to record number 100.

Hartwell joked, "I don't think there's enough soup in Beach Haven to get me to 100!"

Everyone laughed, especially the hunters, because they knew he was more than 50 deaths away from his and the group's mortality.

Blake stood up and turned toward Manuel and said, "But none of this will end until we stop things at the root. We have cut the branches off before but they always grow back."

Then Manuel put up the three middle fingers of his right hand, which instantly captivated everyone in the room.

"You are the key to all things Hartwell," Agent Blake said, and all of his years of research had come down to this moment.

"Yes, my death holds the key to all of our freedom."

Hartwell was so enmeshed in the conversation until he had a random thought.

"Why don't we send the kids to Disneyworld?"

Emily Brewster was about to jump on Hartwell for such a trivial suggestion in the middle of such a serious discussion, but the idea started to resonate with her and everyone else at the table.

"But we better buy round-trip airfare tickets because they might be able to fly there without the plane, but the way home might prove difficult," she said.

There was a renewed sense of spirit and energy around the house following the discussion, which revealed crucial elements that had not yet been supported with a plan. It was decided that Aaron would chaperone Kayla and Maxwell—the family's battle strategists—Samuel, Ariel and Claire Vinson were also asked to tag along. Everyone else that stayed had a history, a vested interest, in the potential life change. Joe and Katherine Winters, two peacemakers, were also sent plane tickets so they could bring Bryce and Cheryl down from Oregon to Florida to enjoy the trip as well.

TWENTY-FOUR

"Is everything set?" an impatient Gabriel Billingsley asked his witch Brenda Vinson.

"Yes, the change should occur tonight as the moon peaks in the sky," she replied.

"Then we attack tonight!" Gabriel excitedly exclaimed as he turned away from Brenda and his human form and pounded his ape chest to in view of the other apes, who followed suit and generated a great deal of excitement.

Brenda started to walk toward the front door and hopefully out of Billingsley's life for good, until he stopped her.

"What else do I need to know?"

"They sent all of their kids to Disneyworld," Brenda replied.

Gabriel remained in his ape exterior and was thinking only about the battle, not how nice it was that the kids got to go on such a cool vacation.

"So, they no longer have their battle strategists, or the ability to duplicate our force?"

"Yes, I believe that is correct," she agreed.

"Then that will make our task that much more simple," he confidently stated.

She walked a few paces and then turned around for one more parting shot.

"You would be mistaken if you underestimate that group. See you on the other side," Brenda said, but the door slammed in her face about mid-way through her sentence.

True to her word, the apes that had lost their human identity came back on line just after midnight. The faces and bodies of Eloise Phillips, Mary Brewster, Julie and Gregory Justice, Randy Prince, Agent Terrence Carter and Alexander Lowery were now visible to everyone including their leader Gabriel Billinglsey.

"So nice to have you all back where you belong!"

"Isn't that a lyric from 'Hello Dolly'?" Mary Brewster asked Eloise Phillips.

"Where were we all of this time?" Gregory Justice asked.

His wife Julie had other concerns, "Did we win?'

Randy Prince gave it a shot, "I don't think so."

Agent Terrence Carter added, "Yeah, if slinging your own feces is winning, then I think we won."

Lowery walked up to Billingsley and asked, "How long were we under?"

Billingsley replied, "Long enough to have a real chance at success this time."

"Excellent!" Lowery replied. "You might want to hose the others down while I take a shower. This place is ripe!" Hartwell's sire in another life punned.

"It's time!" Thaddeus said internally to the entire group, as people were relaxing with their loved ones in different rooms and were scattered throughout the expanse of the spacious house.

Within minutes, all 16 members of Team Hartwell were gathered in the main room, including Manuel Ortiz, who was about to experience his first battle in quite some time.

"How does this work exactly?" he asked Garrison.

"We line up on one side of the field and they line up across from us on the other side of the field, and then we charge at each other," Gary explained.

"Just like old times," Manuel responded.

"Yep," Gary concurred.

Daniel turned to his fathers—Hartwell and Cal—and asked, "What are we gonna' do without a strategist or rolling protection?"

The two men looked at each other in disbelief, and wondered where they might have gone wrong as parents?

Cal asked Hartwell, "Do you want to handle this one?"

Hartwell replied, "No, by all means, you're probably better suited to answer," and then smirked from knowing what Cal would say.

Cal moved closer to Daniel and grunted, "We're gonna' give them an old-fashioned beating."

Daniel looked at Hartwell for confirmation, "Yes that sounds about right."

The rules of the battle were simple: if either Hartwell or Manuel died, or every member of the ape clan perished, then the fight would be over.

"Keep an eye on Manuel, will you?" Hartwell asked Thad and Gary as they left the house on the way to the great lawn at Beach Haven Park.

"Will do," Gary replied as Thaddeus also nodded in affirmation.

There was a soft mist falling from the blackened sky as the Hartwell 16 progressed from a fast walk to a jog, to an all-out sprint until they reached the field.

Billingsley sensed their presence and said to his fellow apes, "It's show time! Let's go!"

The nine people in apes clothing swung through the trees as their preferred method of transportation until they reached the outskirts of the park. Then they took to the ground in knuckle-dragging, galloping fashion.

"They're big," Manuel said to Hartwell, who was standing next to him.

Hartwell was rarely in the mood to back up, and hoped to tap into Manuel's inner warrior.

"So?"

Manuel looked at Hartwell and his icy stare and mirrored the sentiment, "So?"

Hartwell was getting all kinds of strange vibes as the apes approached. He usually was able to focus solely on the fight, but Manuel's strange energy seemed curiously out of place. He thought, "Surely this man has faced much worse than this?"

Although the apes were not of this world, either were vampires, protectors or hunters.

"Don't leave anything behind!" Hartwell yelled internally to the group. "Use all of your changes if you have to!"

It appeared that the apes' only strategy was totally annihilation, as the zoo captivity had made them extra motivated.

The action slowed in Team Hartwell's minds as the first blows were struck. Hartwell focused on Billingsley and Lowery because he knew the duo would be coming at him just on instinct. Billingsley never stopped being angry at Hartwell for 'stealing' Maggie away, even though he all-but-abandoned her. And Lowery was still enraged that Hartwell and company stopped his endless reign of terror.

Just as Billingsley was about to swing at Hartwell, Maggie came out of nowhere and blindsided him with the help of Sharon, who had turned into an Orca killer whale, sending Billingsley deep into that 'good' night.

Lowery ran straight into Hartwell, sending him back a good 50 yards before Hartwell picked up him up, flipped him upside-down and forcefully drive him into the turf!

Elsewhere, Brandon justice and his wife Valerie squared off against Brandon's abusive parents, Gregory and Julie, who he had drained of their blood and buried in the bottom of the Pacific Ocean before they were later exhumed and resurrected by Billingsley and Brenda Vinson.

Valerie was hoping that Brandon's father, or the ape that was now his father would not resort to his usual name calling, but that dream was obviously short-lived.

"Come and get some, BJ!"

Brandon turned to his wife and asked, "What did he just call me?'

Valerie started to reason with her husband, but Julie Justice wanted no part of any nurturing of her 'soft' son.

"He called you BJ, BJ!"

"Oh boy!" Valerie said as she took a step back and waited for the tornado that was her husband to pass through.

"I hate it when you call me BJ!" Brandon roared as he changed into a new iteration of a hybrid creature, half lion and half man.

Valerie took a stab at naming the creature, which had the head and the upper body of a lion and the lower half of a man.

"Li-man," she said, although her guess served to stop the action while everyone else took a stab at the name.

"I would have gone with Mion," Julie Justice said.

"Yeah, I like that one!" Greg agreed. "But I would adjust it slightly and call him a BJ-ion! Get it? There's a BJ in front and then an ion."

And the three other people, including Brandon, said, "Yeah, we got that."

"I hate being called BJ-ion!" Brandon roared and then charged at his parents before mauling them.

The 2-to-1 advantage for Team Hartwell was leveraged through most of the other matchups. Gary and his daughter Sharon teamed up against Gary's dead wife Eloise, who was no longer soliciting weakened emotions from her ex-husband and daughter. The duo was aggressive from the onset, blending their skills to dismantle any offense the confused ape could mount.

Gary backed Eloise up as a wolf distracting her as Sharon flew over her head as a hawk and then changing into a grizzly bear, pinning the ape down for a moment after impact. The moon cast a shadow on Eloise as bear Sharon rolled away and bottlenose dolphin Gary kicked into the air and then changed into an Orca killer whale just before splattering impact.

Cal and Thaddeus Brewster had a similar dynamic going with Thad's dead wife, and Cal's mother, Mary. Cal went in as a pit bull and distracted Mary by biting her ape ankle, clenching on to the surface with his mighty locking jaw. By the time Mary kicked her son the dog free, Thad chugged through the hitting zone with a massive clothes line across the face, which separated Mary's head from her body and ended her night.

Manuel stood motionless the entire time and watched the action while being protected by Carla, who was a hunter by biology. Thad and Gary had transferred the line of guardianship to Carla by Thad yelling, "Carla, watch Manuel!"

Andrew and Emily went right after her ex-husband Randy Prince. Since they wanted to prolong the agony, no changes were made early on for these protectors. Drew played off his mother's actions the way his Uncle Cal did for years, as was her nature, when her twin brother Cal was the finisher.

Emily loved to engage the enemy in sword play, so she walked up to Prince with a pair of swords and then Randy morphed back into his human form as she tossed him the sword from her left hand.

"All of these years and I never knew you could use one of these," he said while examining the blade like it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

"I want to remind you that I was captain of my college fencing team," Randy said with a strong suggestion of arrogance as he ran the blade back and forth across his body.

Emily rolled her eyes, "Yes, I've heard!"

Randy kept warming up until Emily grew impatient.

"Are you ready?" she yelled.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Randy then opened his eyes and extended his left arm and waved her forward with his fingers.

"Seriously?" Emily questioned as Drew swooped in from Randy's blindside and lopped his head off with one clean slice of his blade.

"I swear! I couldn't listen to him talk another second! That's my dad? You married him?" Drew exclaimed.

"He was a lot more charming when we were younger. Hey, next time I get to shut him up! Okay?"

"Okay," Drew reluctantly agreed.

TWENTY-FIVE

Three matchups remained. The first of which was Agent Blake Wallace and his wife Belinda against Wallace's former cohort at the FBI, Agent Terrence Carter. Carter was killed while on Blake's team and was renewed by Billinglsey because he had an ax to grind with Blake.

Belinda the vampire and Daniel's mother in the world took the fight to Carter by extending her long fingernails and slicing both sides of his neck with a cross-cut. Carter grabbed both sides of his neck, primarily out of instinct, for fear that his head might separate from his shoulders. Blake took the opportunity to charge at Carter as a rhinoceros, striking him squarely in his upper body and causing his head to remain on the spot of the impact while his body was dragged by rhino Blake for another 75 yards.

Once Blake realized that Carter, or what was left of him, was not offering any resistance, he stopped and morphed back into his human form. He walked back to Belinda and she exclaimed, "That was easy!"

And he hugged his wife and replied, "No doubt."

Belinda's proclamation of ease could be heard by Daniel and Nicole, who were about to square off with Alexander Lowery, but Hartwell ignored the elation as he and Maggie were about to drum up and old trick on what they knew as a dog with fleas.

"It's been a long time since we tried the human sippy box," Hartwell said to Maggie.

"Too long!" she concurred, as she was pleasantly surprised to see her husband let loose and have some fun for a change.

Obviously, the group's memory was rather short on this night because the last time they attempted such a move victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat by Kayla, who wasn't even supposed to be in the fight that night. The vampires had cornered her father Andrew, and had punctured long straws through his body and were draining him of his blood until Kayla could take no more. She came off the sideline before she and Maxwell had turned 18 and removed Hartwell's head from his body with one mighty cut through the hitting zone. She was so amped up that she then went after Maxwell, who was had also come off the sideline to try and calm her down. If either child were killed before their 18th birthdays there would have been no recourse for either of them. Luckily, no one was hurt other than Hartwell and then Drew, who expired just after Hartwell lost his head. But they came back on line the next day when the sun reinvigorated them.

Hartwell didn't like Gabriel, so killing him the rather quick conventional way was definitely not preferable. Gabriel had befriended Hartwell after leaving Maggie and staging his death in order to get out from under a pile of debt and escape this world, only to come back by the guiding hand of Brenda Vinson as an ape. Not only had Maggie lost Billinglsey, she also lost couple's child she was carrying in the process. Brenda also used her powers to shield Billingsley's true identity to Hartwell, who thought he was gallivanting around the country with a fellow vampire. By leaving, Gabriel had opened the door to Maggie's heart and it was Hartwell who stepped through the door and more than filled the void.

Hartwell came back with two long sippy straws and handed one to Maggie as Billingsley charged at them completely unaware in his angry ape persona.

"Not yet!" Hartwell yelled as Gabriel drew closer and closer with each thundering step.

Daniel and Nicole were en route to Lowery, but stopped or a moment to take in the action.

"No way!" Daniel yelled in a surprised but excited tone.

This statement of joy also got the attention of Carla, who was guarding a motionless and curiously detached Manuel.

Billingsley was now within 10 feet of the Maggie and Hartwell and Hartwell grunted, "NOW!"

They both sidestepped Gabriel and then reached their arms and straws over their heads and then plunged into both sides of Gabriel's neck. They both starting drinking the apes supercharged blood, weakening him with each passing sip. Daniel, Nicole and Carla all clapped in appreciation of the move, while Lowery focused his attention on his intended target once he realized that the night would be a total loss unless he immediately made a bold move.

Lowery was headed directly at Daniel and Nicole until he swerved around them with his borrowed vampire wings and was continuing on a course that would take him behind both Manuel and his protector Carla. Alexander Lowery had reached his 100th death and then was subsequently killed by his protector Abraham Ellison once he turned mortal the morning after his vampire death. So his reincarnation as an ape and part-time vampire came with smoke and mirrors and a few other tricks performed by Brenda Vinson.

He took the edge of his razor sharp right wing and sweeped it from right to left, severing the head of Manuel Ortiz before anyone had a chance to know what was going on. It was the sound of Ortiz's head making contact with the ground that snapped the group back into a sobering reality. Although none of them had lost their individual battles, it was the death of Manuel that ended the night on a losing note for this group of unbeatables.

Carla turned around in shock and said, "Where did he come from?"

And Daniel was quick to supply an answer, "Over here," as Lowery landed in front of Hartwell and Maggie and was about to shove his improbable victory in their smug faces.

The couple had drained the lost ounces from Gabriel via extremely long straws and released their lip locks, sending Billingsley's limp body falling backwards toward the turf. Hartwell wiped the blood from his lips with the sleeve of his shirt, but then realized that he was a vampire and such messy conduct had to be rectified. So he zipped back to the house and furiously used a stain remover, lifting the stain clean before he returned a split-second later with what appeared to be a brand new shirt. He then Hoovered Maggie's excess blood up before turning his attention back to Lowery.

"Are you done yet?" Lowery asked with a huge hint of impatience. "Because I haven't had ample time to gloat yet about this victory and I would like to commence that celebration."

Hartwell became so angry that he was not able to acknowledge that the fight was indeed over and further action was not recommended. He stomped over to Lowery and pushed up, while Lowery pushed him back. They started throwing punches until Thaddeus and Harrison caught wind of the action and separated the two men once they realized saw that Manuel had been beheaded and the fight was over. Cal Brewster wasn't such a good loser because losing was always unacceptable in his book of competition. After Lowery was separated from the group, he walked over and smiled at Lowery in order to mentally disarm the ex-vampire and then he hauled off and flattened him with one massive punch to the face. Lowery was out cold even before he hit the ground.

Hartwell and Cal were always going at it.

"Ahhh! You always get to have all of the fun!" Hartwell yelled at Cal.

"Me?" Cal questioned. "You just put two straws in a guy and were drinking his blood!"

They started walking together and then Cal picked up Manuel's head and Hartwell picked up his body.

"I can't argue with that. But I want first crack at him tomorrow night!" Hartwell stated.

"Done!" Cal replied.

Maggie and Sharon were walking behind the men and Maggie shook her head in disbelief, "Boys..."

TWENTY-SIX

Once Lowery awoke from his knock out, he gathered the body parts of his fallen comrades and placed them in the brightest room of their house, where they would be reenergized in a matter of hours. Hartwell and Cal placed Manuel's head back on top of his body once they returned to the house and walked into the darkened sun room.

"That didn't end the way I thought it would," Hartwell said to Cal.

"Tell me about it," Cal replied as they sat in chairs on either side of Manuel.

"What do you think he's up to?" Hartwell asked as he nodded his head toward Manuel.

"I don't know, but whatever it is I didn't see a lot of movement out of him tonight," Hartwell said and then summoned Daniel internally.

Daniel walked into the dark room that was dimly lit from the hallway light and said, "You rang?"

"Yeah, can you do us a favor and tap into this guy and see what kind of warrior he was," Hartwell asked his son.

"He's definitely built for power," an observant Cal stated.

Daniel rubbed his hands together to create the necessary friction like a jumper cable or EMT electro-shock machine for a human. He then placed his left hand on top of Manuel's head and then channeled a large image against the windowed back wall of the room.

Andrew was walking past the room with Blake and Drew said, "What are we watching?"

One by one and two by two the rest of the family made their way in the room and the usual popcorn and refreshments were served.

"Cal and I were wondering what was up with Manuel tonight? And I'm sure that many of you had the same question. So we thought that Daniel could tap into his memories and see what kind of warrior we are dealing with here."

Although the group now knew that Manuel was only two deaths away from both his and the group's mortality, they weren't used to just laying down and shrinking at a challenge.

"If we're going to do this, Thomas, I want to go out fighting," Thaddeus said and then looked at Garrison for confirmation.

"Fighting to the end..." Gary stated as they pounded fists.

"It's show time," Daniel said and then sat down next to Nicole as the images of Manuel's life were portrayed for all to see.

Images of Manuel as a youth tracking down and killing small animals with his bare hands were transitioned into him brutally killing just about everything in his path, both human and animal, as a teen and then a man.

"I'm glad the kids weren't here to see this one," den mother Belinda said.

"And I thought I was a killing machine," Cal added and everyone laughed somewhat nervously.

And just as Daniel was about to turn off the flow of information, things got really interesting.

Manuel was awoken on the day of his wedding with a cold bucket of water. Most people in the room started talking because the endless string of violence was becoming a bit tedious.

"Hold on a second!" Daniel yelled and then said again because of a lack of cooperation. "I think we should watch this part."

The visual focused on Carmen as the group could see her through Manuel's eyes.

"Wait a minute,' Daniel said. "I think we're missing something. Let me rewind this a bit," he said and then used his right hand to move back to a scene a few hours prior that he felt a significant amount of heat from.

"Where are you going?" Carmen asked as Manuel prepared to go out the night before their wedding.

Daniel scanned the possibilities and flashed two women from a neighboring village in the corner of the screen while he froze the main action.

"Nice!" Garrison exclaimed.

"Next thing you know this guy's gonna' want to bring a few dates to his own wedding!" Thaddeus added.

Carmen and Manuel went back and forth until he said, "What are you going to do about it Carmen? Want to call off the wedding? Then what will others think about you? Who will ever want to share your bed?"

All of the women in the room winced and Emily said, "Oh, that's not gonna' be good for business."

"The wedding is off,' she replied and all of the women clapped in approval.

"I'm starting to like this woman," feisty Carla stated and then Daniel flashed her name on the screen. "Go, Carla!"

Manuel was about to fight back with force with his words and fists, but Carmen would have none of that. She closed her eyes and a now-frightened Manuel started shaking.

"Living beast of the day you must now be transformed into a dying beast of the night! As your sire, I will control your actions if I so choose. The spell only to be broken three cycles past the witch's moon after I cease to exist!"

The next image was of Carmen pouring a bucket of water over Manuel's head, waking him from his paranormal hangover.

"I hope you don't mind, but I invited a few people from the neighboring village?" Manuel asked Carmen.

"Bingo!" Thaddeus yelled. "I told you that this guy would invite dates to his own wedding!" as the pictures of the same two women lined up for the previous night flashed across the screen.

Everyone razzed Thaddeus and he was showered with a blizzard of popcorn from all directions.

"The more the merrier," Carmen replied and flashed a genuine smile for the first time in a long time.

"Honey, I want to hear what she's thinking," Nicole asked Daniel, who turned up the volume on Carmen's thoughts.

"Serves them right for messing with someone else's man. That's their funeral. No garlic necklaces for them."

The neck image shown was that of Carmen walking toward Manuel as they were about to get married. She pulled back her veil and real joy was spread over her face as she looked up at the blackening sky and then whispered to him, "You can run to the ends of the earth, but I will always find you.

He pulled back because he was unsure whether she was threatening him or trying to convey some sort of new-fangled romantic gesture.

The next images were of Manuel screaming and writhing on the ground in pain and Carmen saying to the crowd, "You might want to take a step back or two."

And then she turned to the women of the night from the neighboring village and said, "You ladies might want to start running real fast!"

The women in the room starting clapping from delight until Manuel transformed into a vampire.

"Now go fetch!" Carmen said to vampire Manuel as he hunted down everyone that wasn't adorned with garlic.

Belinda stood up and said, "Let me see his family tree!" because she sensed that something was amiss.

The scene shifted to a blood-drunk Ortiz feeding off a horrified Alexander Lowery. Manuel passed out and then Lowery came on line as a vampire after his transformation was complete. Then hundreds of branches formed off of Lowery, with the screen focusing on his encounter with Hartwell.

"Okay, okay! We've all seen this before!" He turned to Daniel and shot him a look that suggested that movie time was over.

"How many deaths is he away from 100?" a concerned Sharon asked.

Daniel used his mind to raise Manuel's right hand and then formed the number two with his index and middle fingers.

"That's pretty close," she replied.

TWENTY-SEVEN

By the time the sun came up an hour later, everyone was sound asleep in their own beds. The warm rays penetrated the glass unobstructed and through Manuel Ortiz. The pain of his resurrection so severe that he might have thought it was his first time coming back from the dead, but it was his first time in more than 30 years making the transformation.

"Ohhhh!" he screamed after his head and neck were fused back to his shoulders and his internal organs came back on line after his heart started pumping again. He looked around the room and wondered for a moment where he was until thoughts of the previous day registered in his brain.

He first thought of Hartwell and then the image of Lowery thinking he was sneaking behind him was ingrained in the playback of the previous night. But, his fervent desire to be normal again was overriding his thirst to get back at Lowery for the coming night.

He glided into the room that was built for him the previous day and nestled into bed for so much needed rest. He didn't awake until 11:00 p.m. that night and looked over to his nightstand, where a bunch of blood bags were waiting to fuel him up for the upcoming fight.

"You sleep well?" Hartwell asked Manuel after he showered, dressed and then walked into the main room.

"I could have slept for weeks," Manuel replied.

Hartwell thought about Manuel's 30 years inside a coffin under the ground and wondered about the vampire's motivation heading into night two of the battle. Manuel plopped down on the couch and stared into space while he waited for the team to assemble over the next hour.

"What's up with him?" Daniel asked Hartwell, who was standing in the middle of the room with a group of people that were observing Manuel.

"Is he just going to stand there in the middle of the field again?" Carla asked.

"From what we all saw on the screen last night, that guy can more than protect himself," Andrew added.

Hartwell listened to the talking but everyone could see that he was trying to break down the potential battle strategies.

"What are you thinking, Thomas?" Garrison asked.

"Maybe we should leave him behind," Maggie suggested.

Hartwell thought back to his recent journey with Manuel and came to a sobering conclusion.

"I don't think we can."

"Even if he's just gonna' take a knee and not fight back the next two nights?" Cal Brewster asked because he never liked to enter a fight without motivation.

Hartwell looked around a group that he had fought against and with, and their motivation was usually to either kill him or fight for him. But now he was in danger of losing their interest because a stranger, albeit a related stranger, was in the midst of a mid-life crisis and wanted all of the discord in his life to cease. The witch that had turned him into a vampire, and generally made his life miserable, was gone and he simply wanted to live to rest of his life in peace and harmony.

Hartwell was ready to answer Cal's question, but not completely.

"I'll get back to you on that one. Let's prepare to fight and see what happens. If I know one thing about this family, everything doesn't always end the way we always think it will."

It was a fairly weak answer to a pretty strong question, but it was the best Hartwell could do based on the unknown of Manuel.

"You ready to go, big guy?" Cal asked Manuel as he slapped him on the back.

Manuel was still in a trance and sitting on the couch, as he barely reacted to the love tap with emphasis.

"Is it time to go?" he said and then stood up slowly. His body language suggested Rip Van Winkle not the warrior that he used to be.

Thaddeus was walking with Cal and Emily and said, "If we survive this battle tonight, we have to start making some preparations for our life after all of this.

Cal and Emily nodded in agreement of their father's plan, which undoubtedly involved robbing a few banks before their powers were gone. The trio used their abilities to fund their effusive grocery bills for years through the robbing of financial institutions and other assorted locations where cash was readily available.

Hartwell looked over at the trio, because he was always listening to everything, and flashed a knowing smile—for he was also manipulating stock markets and executives into huge cash windfalls before his abilities became permanently diminished.

It was probably the least prepared this group was for a battle since the protectors stepped aside and let the hunters make split pea, squash puree, lobster bisque, chili and matzoh ball soup of Hartwell as he approached his original 100th death.

"Are we going hard tonight?" Cal asked Hartwell internally.

"There's no running out here if we don't go hard," Hartwell replied, although the rest of his crew did not share the same sentiment.

They ran out to the field and fanned out across the main lawn of Beach Haven Park, Hartwell and Cal on either side of Manuel in the middle of the queue. The apes did their usual swinging in the trees and then crashing back down to earth bit, but kept charging once they hit the ground.

One side had a concrete plan for victory on this night while the other appeared to have perfected the recipe for defeat. The people away from the middle of the Hartwell line expected to engage in combat by using their sizeable body advantage. But a funny thing happened only a split-second from impact: Gabriel Billingsley decided to mix things up a bit.

He grunted, "GO!" as the eight apes collapsed the eight-wide formation into a four-by-two configuration, but only Hartwell and Cal were in range to do anything about the change. Cal charged at the right side of the pile while Hartwell did his best to neutralize the left flank. Billingsley stepped back from the formation and let the others crash into the killing machines in front of them. He then changed back into human form and angrily swiped his sword through the air and then landed on one knee on the other side of the confrontation.

Three bodies on the right and then four others on the left fell limply to the ground, as Cal and Hartwell were proud of their accomplishments until the saw Gabriel kneeling and smiling a short distance away and then Manuel head sliding off his shoulders and spinning through the air and then rolling on the ground.

Gabriel stood up and made a point of walking past Cal.

"That's two, hunter!" he grunted and then aggressively made contact with Cal via his shoulder.

Billingsley kept walking a few more paces until he turned his head around and was about to say, "One more left."

Hartwell smiled as Cal followed Gabriel after the bump and cocked his right arm and clenched his right fist before striking Billingsley on the left side of his jaw and rendering him unconscious as he dropped to the dewy turf.

Cal looked back at Hartwell and exclaimed in frustration, "We can't go out this way!"

The others looked on in stunned surprise as Hartwell replied as he first acknowledged Cal and then the remainder of the group, "Then we shall fight to the end!" as everyone pumped their fists and yelled in harmonious accord.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Manuel awoke the second morning just as he did in the first, only this time there was slightly less pain. He really didn't give much thought to his last day as a vampire, so he repeated the previous day's pattern by crashing into bed and falling asleep until just before the fight that night.

"Do you think we should wake him up?" an anxious Cal asked Hartwell as they waited in the main room of the house.

Hartwell was all about letting things unfold organically unless, of course, things weren't going exactly as he planned. He anticipated a repeat of the previous two nights with Manuel 'mailing it in' and not fighting back. That would not be acceptable on this night.

"No, I got this."

And just as Hartwell was about to create a ruckus and slam some metal objects together near Manuel's ear, the root of all evil walked out of his bedroom and into the main room with perfectly-pressed clothing and a countenance that suggested a complete lack of urgency.

"Oh, we're done," Andrew stated.

"So much for going out fighting," Garrison added.

Hartwell turned to the group as Manuel walked toward them, "Let me do this my way! Have I ever steered you wrong?"

The group started smaller discussions about the statement, and it appeared that there was not a general agreement.

Hartwell rolled his eyes, "I mean, lately."

The discussions stopped for a moment and then continued.

"What other choice do we have?" Hartwell asked, trying to stem the mutinous flow.

Agent Blake was usually a receiver of information, but on this night he was less inclined to wait and see.

"We could just kill him ourselves."

Belinda looked at her husband with a new-found appreciation.

"Honey, that is so vampire of you!"

Blake smiled, "You live long enough and anything is possible.

There were other people agreeing with Blake to off the slacker before they even left for the field.

"Let me handle this!" Hartwell implored. "If I can't reach him before the fight begins, then by all means end this thing!"

Heads were nodded in accord as Hartwell turned to Manuel and said, "You ready for the beginning of the end, big guy?"

Manuel opened his eyes a little wider, as the thought of such a massive life change started creeping in.

"As ready as I'm ever going to be."

The group left the house and went from their fast walk to brisk jog and then all-out sprint until they reached the edge of the field at Beach Haven Park. Hartwell wasn't about to wait until they got into position to get inside of Manuel's head. He could sense that the apes had left their house and were swinging branch-by-branch closer to the final judgment.

"You know, all these apes coming at us were once people who were dead. A witch was able to bring them all back, can you imagine what will happen if she brings back Carmen? Because, if you don't start fighting, I will personally make sure that she comes back to make your life miserable again!"

Manuel was deep in a self-induced trance until he heard the name 'Carmen' being uttered in such an angry manner by Hartwell. While his desire to be mortal and live a calm life for the rest of his days was strong, his desire to never see Carmen again was much more powerful.

His eyes widened and he turned and looked at Hartwell, as the angry mob of apes hit the outskirts of the park and an equally-edgy gang surrounding Manuel and Hartwell were about to pounce.

"I don't need that!"

Manuel screamed in brute force, channeling his inner beast, as he the apes headed towards him from the front and the rest of Hartwell's gang converged on him from the back. It was one big dust pile from the well-worn portion of lawn at the park. Screams could be heard as Hartwell took a step back and let the action unfold, at least initially.

Hartwell then stepped in when he sensed conflict between like forces. Manuel had run through all eight apes and was now headed toward the next perceived threat, a group of other beings that wanted him dead.

"Whoa!" Hartwell yelled at his own group and put up a stop sign with his right hand.

The rest of the group watched as Manuel advanced unabated, both of the nails on his fingers extended, ready to slice Hartwell and anyone else that stood in his way into pieces. Hartwell looked into Cal's eyes and the reflection of Manuel coming toward him. He smiled at Cal and then snarled while he spun and delivered a punch, the force of which Manuel had never experienced.

Hartwell turned back around and faced the group as Manuel absorbed the blow and was on the ground just after he started speaking.

"See, I told you I would take care of it."

TWENTY-NINE

When Manuel awoke 20 minutes later he was alone in the field and he didn't like it. He dabbed the blood that had trickled out of his nose and mouth with his hand and wondered what one creature could have been strong enough to put him down? And when he found that creature there would be hell to pay, or so he thought as he ventured back to the house.

It was still four days from the time everyone was expecting the kids to come back, so there was considerable after-fight activity and late night snacks galore!

"Is there really any way to eating smores without getting sticky?" Nicole asked Carla as the family sat around a bonfire just outside of the house on the beach.

Daniel zipped in and licked Nicole's fingers clean, "I don't mind the cleanup," the fastidious vampire interjected.

Hartwell was sitting with his back to the house and didn't see Manuel coming, but he did feel him coming.

"Looks who's back," Thaddeus said as he tapped Garrison with the back of his hand.

Maggie saw everybody looking in a certain direction and then looked at her husband, who could have handled the situation in a few different ways. He could have let it go and maintained a "Let's get that creature!" stance, which would have kept Manuel hungry. Or, as Maggie surmised, he could approach Manuel the same way he did everything else: head on!

"I'll be right back," Hartwell said to Maggie and then looked at his boys, Thaddeus, Garrison, Daniel, Cal and Agent Blake across the way and they nodded in a "We got your back" way.

A confused and extremely perturbed Manuel saw Hartwell coming toward him and yelled, "What the hell happened back there and why are all you here and I was left in the middle of a field?"

Hartwell enjoyed hitting Manuel so much the first time that he smirked at Manuel, which disarmed the vampire. He then swung with his strong arm this time and flattened Manuel with a forceful right cross.

He started walking away as Manuel's limp head and body hit the sand. But midway back to the bonfire, a familiar voice slowed his roll.

"You want to try it this time when I'm ready?"

Hartwell smiled and then turned back around, "You should know better than anyone that you should always be ready."

Thaddeus looked over the two men and then screamed the first thing that came into his adolescent mind, "Fight!"

The group made a sticky circle around the two men.

"Do you really want to fight with your grandpa?" Manuel said as he approached Hartwell and then dropped his hands.

Hartwell thought about the question and hesitated for a moment as his foil Cal Brewster yelled, "No!" because he realized that the old man was turning the tables on his protégée.

Manuel balled his beefy right fist and raised his fist to the sky while stopping to connect with the bottom side of Hartwell's chin in the process. The blow sent Hartwell flying through the thin night air and to the other side of circle, where he regained consciousness mid-way and landed on his feet.

"Whoa!" the collective exclaimed as they struggled to clap over marshmallow, graham cracker and chocolate-laden hands.

"That was quite a shot!" Hartwell yelled across the way to Manuel.

"Is this the way it is going to be, Thomas?" Manuel asked.

Hartwell looked around at the group. Either you're in or you're out, Manuel. We do everything as a group, either in this life or as mortals."

"I'll think about it," Manuel said as he turned around and started walking toward the back porch of the house with a huge smile on his face. He had come back to point Hartwell in the right direction and convince him that his contribution was no more or less than any member of the family, although he knew there would never be complete equity in the family.

There was a clean separation between Manuel and the family the next day, as Manuel woke up just after noon because he was anxious to get back out there and fight again that night. The only person that dared to go near him was Daniel, who felt drawn to him since the previous night. They met 'by chance' at Beach Haven Sporting Goods that afternoon.

"Now this is a sport I can identify with!" Manuel said excitedly as he picked up a lacrosse stick. "I might have been one of the people that actually invented this game. Lord knows how many goals I would have scored if I had one of these!"

Daniel picked up a stick and then a ball and the two men tossed in gently back and forth.

"Why were you smiling last night?" Daniel asked.

"You saw that?" Manuel surprisingly questioned.

Daniel pulled up the image above their heads and then rotated the video so Manuel's face could be seen.

"It looks like you have eyes everywhere," Manuel replied.

"Do you really hit him as hard as you could?" Daniel asked.

Manuel smirked, "I hit him pretty hard."

Daniel smiled back, "But not as hard as you could?"

"Probably not," the original vampire conceded.

Then Daniel cut to the chase, "Are you going to be part of this family great grandpa'?"

"Only if you don't consider Lowery to be your grandfather."

Daniel was repulsed with the idea, "No way!"

Manuel caught the soft tossed ball in the web of his stick and then glided toward Daniel.

"You know, my boy, that I really came back for you and your children, and their children... is there anyone else I'm missing?"

Daniel shook his head "No."

"This battle will rage on as long as we are the way we are. The second I become mortal, we all can live in peace and harmony until we turn to dust."

"But we won't live forever anymore," Daniel stated. "I can't remember a time when I didn't have my abilities?"

"What good is time if you can't enjoy it?" Manuel asked, thinking he was spreading some wisdom to his young charge.

"But we used to be apart and now we are together. I never thought I would see the day that we would be so close with the hunters."

"Those to which we have the most conflict with are the ones that we have the most in common."

Daniel nodded in understanding.

"Except for the white man," Manuel panned. "Your group excluded of course."

"Of course," Daniel said.

"So, when is this all going to end?" Daniel followed up with a question.

Manuel thought about it and then replied, "When your father wants it to end."

He could see Daniel wanted a more concrete answer. "When are the kids coming back?"

"Three days," Daniel replied.

"Then we shall be one in three days," Manuel stated.

Daniel smiled and then took a few steps back as the two continued their soft toss catch in the middle of the store.

Hartwell was eating lunch at the Beach Haven Diner with a big group including Cal, Agent Blake, Brandon, Thaddeus, Drew and Garrison, while Nicole, Carla, Emily, Maggie, Sharon, Belinda and Valerie were at the Beach Haven Nail Salon getting their usual mani/pedi.

The conversations were vaguely similar and could have been combined as one seamless discussion.

"What do you think will happen next?" Cal and Sharon asked.

Hartwell answered, "Why, do you have a tee time at the Beach Haven Golf Course?" while his wife replied, "Do you think we should book our next appointment ahead of time? Next week should be clear."

The guys laughed as Cal said, "We haven't played golf in a while. Do you think it will be as fun without our abilities?"

Drew rolled his eyes and wondered where Daniel was before he said, "It never was fun to begin with!"

"I hope our nails don't chip tonight," Emily said in a rare public display of femininity.

"Nails chip, you come back tomorrow and we touch up," the Asian owner of the nail salon said for her best customers.

The women got all excited as Daniel came through the door with a couple of lacrosse sticks and then sat down.

"Where have you been? We were just talking about golf," Drew said to his first cousin.

Daniel shot him a look and replied, "I was at BH Sports getting a few lacrosse sticks."

Daniel handed Drew one of the sticks and he exclaimed, "I love lacrosse!" as he flung the ball across the restaurant and it was headed for an old man's head. Daniel sped across the room and caught the ball only a few inches from the man's head. The man looked at Daniel and wondered why he was in such a close proximity to his steaming bowl of soup.

He looked at the white ball in his hand and said as he looked at the soup, "The matzoh balls look great today!"

The man looked at his wife and then back at Daniel, "Can you believe this kid? He should be working for Zagat's. Four stars for the matzoh ball soup!" and then he nodded for Daniel to give him some space as he opened a small packet of Saltine crackers and crumbled them in his soup.

Daniel returned to the table in normal speed and then said to Drew as he took possession of his stick, "I can see why they never let us play."

"Do you think your husband will fight with Manuel again?" Nicole asked Maggie as Cal asked almost the same question of Hartwell, "If you don't want to fight him again I would be happy to take a crack at him?"

Hartwell and Maggie thought about the queries and replied, "My husband will do whatever is best for us," and then Hartwell asked the group, "What is the best thing for us?" which mirrored a question then asked by Belinda.

"Together," Sharon and Agent Blake replied and then got conformation from the rest of the group.

"Fully powered or mortal?" Carla and Aaron asked.

Garrison looked at Thaddeus and the two men had seen their 'share of rodeos' and were tired from the fight. "We are ready to make the turn," Gary answered for the two of them.

Maggie took the lead again, "There are advantages and disadvantages to both sides, but I think I'd prefer to see you go back to college," as she looked at Nicole, Carla and Valerie, "and it would be nice to see your children not grow up so fast!"

"I like being who I am," Daniel defiantly stated.

"Me, too!" Drew exclaimed in support of his cousin and 100 miles per hour lifestyle.

Emily Brewster echoed the sentiment, "I have always been comfortable in my hunter skin. It was the boost I needed in life to feel comfortable, to be in place."

Carla added, "It's what brought Drew and me together."

Similar tales of sentimentality were exchanged as years of being special could not be expected to melt away over night after a stranger came into town and offered the ultimate antidote.

The family gathered in the main room of the house just before midnight and awaited the appearance of Manuel so they could head out to the night's battle. Manuel had been thinking since the previous night about how he should approach the family going forward, and came to a harmonious conclusion.

He stopped in the middle of the room and addressed the people scattered in front of him.

"We could drag this out for days," he started saying.

Belinda interjected, "I don't want to kids to be out there at Disney and experiencing the change alone."

"Yes, we all should be together," Maggie added.

"Have we even decided if mortality is the way we all want to go?" Drew asked.

"Some of our best times have been together," Nicole added.

All the while Hartwell listened as one after another spoke about the merits of both mortality and supernatural. It wasn't until everyone had a chance to speak that Thaddeus turned to Hartwell and asked, "So, what do you want to do Thomas?"

Hartwell looked deep into Manuel's eyes and then had his answer.

"I was ready to put a bullet into my head when my wife and child died. And, in fact, when Manuel took me back to that day and we let it play out without Lowery and I did end things."

There was an audible gasp in the room as Maggie clutched her husband's arm in shock.

"The one thing I learned from that whole experience is that you can't interrupt the flow of life. If Lowery had not come to my doorstep that day then we all would not be standing here together right now. And that would have been the biggest crime of all. So, if I get to spend the next 40 minutes or 400 years with you all it will the best moments of my life."

And then the delivered the statement that bounced off the boundaries of the paranormal world.

"I had the faith for over a century that my wife and son would return to me based on a stranger's advice. And then they came back to me..." he said as a few tears rolled from his eyes and instantly froze into ice cubes. All of the other vampires turned on the waterworks, including Manuel who said, "Ice cubes? Who knew?" as he had refrained from crying since he became a vampire.

"The one thing that I learned—and that we should all know—is that it doesn't matter when we die, because we will all come back to each other one day. And that cycle will repeat itself for all eternity... we will always find each other, for we are a family."

Hartwell extended his arms and the entire family came toward him for a massive group hug. Even Manuel, who was not usually prone to such fuzzy feelings, joined the group meld.

THIRTY

So it was decided once the group hug physically unhinged, that they would go out to the field the next two nights and have a good time after their victories, which took mere seconds to complete. And, on the third night, they would pick up the kids and enter a new chapter of life together as a family.

Gabriel Billingsley had become sick of losing, so he called on Brenda Vinson to concoct a spell that would give his side a better chance at winning.

"You have to neutralize Hartwell and Manuel, they're literally killing us by themselves."

Brenda Vinson agreed to come up with a spell that was predicated on the 100th death of Manuel, not the ascension of the apes. She also decided to throw something in there about her and her family, in hopes that the action could also free them from the bonds of oppression they had felt for years as witches tied to others.

The family left the field the next two nights and then went to eat at the 24-hour Beach Haven Diner, where they simply just enjoyed each other's company. No plans were being made for life after the change, because Hartwell's view of their continuous path made them all live each day without recourse. These special people could live the remainder of their years without looking over their shoulders, because another family member would be watching their backs.

The kids had so much fun flying in a plane that they decided to take the plane back from Florida to New York. Riding in first class sort of skewed their view of air travel, with all of the warm cookies and towels and everything, but Hartwell and company wouldn't want it any other way.

"We can't let the kids know what's happening," Maggie said to Hartwell. "There's no telling with Maxwell and Samuel will do with their abilities. They might not understand?"

"I'll talk to Manuel about it," Hartwell replied. "We'll work it out. I just know that if Maxwell sees my face he'll know something is up."

It was late afternoon as the family piled in separate cars to greet Aaron and the kids at the airport. It was a joyous scene at the gate as kids melted into parents and grandparents arms. Once Hartwell hugged Maxwell and Samuel, he turned to Manuel and they both disappeared.

"Where's grandpa'?" Max asked Maggie.

"Grandpa' had some business to take care of. He's going to meet us back at the house," Maggie said as if she was talking to a little kid.

Max looked at her and said, "Will this put an end to the fighting?"

She had a million reasons not to tell him the complete truth but none of them made sense anymore.

"Yes Maxie, the fighting will be over."

"Can we all still live together?" he asked.

"Of course, my angel" she said as she hugged Maxwell.

Hartwell and Manuel were back in the clouds again before they transitioned to the Beach Haven Boardwalk.

"It's been quite the journey, hasn't it Thomas?" Manuel observed.

"I never thought it would all end this way, but I'm glad that we finally got to meet because it put a few pieces together for me that I questioned," Hartwell replied. "I definitely learned a valuable lesson about the pitfalls of infidelity," he added, referring to the reason that Manuel became a vampire in the first place.

"I learned a valuable lesson as well, Thomas."

"Yes, what was that?"

"I learned that family is the most important thing in life," Manuel stated. "Sadly, I was young and impulsive and I took my family for granted, the most of which was Carmen. I can't say that I would have acted differently in her position, although I might have just killed her and spared myself the imposition of learning the black magic's."

Hartwell and Manuel laughed until Manuel asked a more somber question.

"How have you envisioned your death? Your 100th death?"

"Well, the first time I thought I was going to experience 'death by soup special' until Cal got loose and basically removed me from my heart."

"Yes, I think it's only fitting that it be death by heart, but I imagined that it would be by spear," Manuel explained.

"They just returned safely to the house," Hartwell said as he felt that all of his people were safe in the house that he literally built.

Manuel nodded, "Then I guess it's time for us to go," as both men stood up. Manuel momentarily zipped out of the picture and then came back with a long, tribal spear and handed it to Hartwell.

"Make sure you don't miss. These things can be a bit head-waited."

Hartwell nodded in acknowledgement of the tip as the men met in a handshake and bro' hug.

"Just make sure I'm facing the ocean with the sun at my back when it's time," Manuel gave final instructions.

Hartwell joked, "Anything else?"

"Yes, I want to settle down at some point."

Hartwell replied, "Maybe Carmen will come back and give you another chance."

And the vision of a young, undamaged Carmen danced in Manuel's head as the two made the transition to the porch of the house, Manuel facing the ocean as the sun set to his back. Hartwell coiled then uncoiled from a relatively short distance and hurled the spear towards Manuel's heart, the sharp blade piercing his chest and penetrating clear through his shoulder blade.

"See you on the other side, Thomas" Manuel said. And then with his last breath he added, "Thank you for giving me another chance."

A few of the family members saw the two men on the porch, but it was Maggie that sped out to the porch and yelled "Time!" so everyone could be with their loved ones during the transition. She held Hartwell's hand as Manuel expired. And then they kissed as the impact of the 100th death drained all of the beings of Hartwell house and made them collapse to the floor in an extended slumber.

Across town, Gabriel Billingsley was trying to think only good thoughts for the night ahead. If his witch had complied with his wishes then his group would surely have a better showing. But then a strange sensation be-felled him as he watched the other members of his gang undergo a metamorphosis from corporeal to their previous forms before reinvention.

Eloise Phillips, Mary Brewster, Julie and Gregory Justice, Randy Prince, Agent Terrence Carter all turned from body to dust as the last flashes of light in the sky disappeared. Then Alexander Lowery, who was the last link between Manuel Ortiz and Thomas Hartwell in the vampirical world, turned to Gabriel and said, "Thanks for the extra time." And, just before he turned to dust he added, "Let it go."

"Let it go?" Billingsley questioned the wisdom of such a statement. "Let what go?"

And then he felt surprised and a bit betrayed at first as his own body start to release any substance of wholeness.

"Oh, let it go."

He closed his eyes and said as his body turned to dust, "It's time to go."

A few hours later, Hartwell and Maggie awoke on the porch in the dark of the night. They both felt a little hung over at first as Hartwell helped Maggie sit up.

"Do you feel any different?" Hartwell asked.

Maggie checked herself and smiled, "I feel unobstructed love."

Even though Hartwell had reached his 100th death in recent times, it had been over a century since he had been mortal with no associated paranormal activity. His view of the future always was ringed with clouds on the horizon. He helped Maggie to her feet and then said, "It's like when we first met all over again."

They met it a passionate kiss as the power of the moment eventually caused Maggie to lose her balance. She backed up slightly and he followed, their lips still locked, until she came up on an object that impeded her path. Maggie looked up at the long spear that was still poking a whole in Manuel.

"We should probably remove this at some point," she suggested.

Hartwell got in position and tugged at it, but the object wouldn't budge.

"If we can," Hartwell replied.

Other people throughout the house woke up and headed through the main room and to the large back porch, which also could be considered a deck or a lanai in some parts.

"Is this going to be like King Arthur's sword in the stone?" Thaddeus asked as he and Garrison came outside.

One by one, each member of the family tried unsuccessfully to pull the spear from Manuel's chest. Even Cal Brewster admitted it was too much for the likes of him, "That thing isn't budging."

"Well, he can't stay out here," Belinda stated.

"Should we store him in the garage?" Agent Blake asked.

"No way, that would be creepy!" Maxwell exclaimed.

And while everyone was discussing what to do with the body of Manuel Ortiz, Hartwell had a vision from the original vampire.

"Family is everything. We can accomplish together what we cannot do apart."

Hartwell broke out of the trance and yelled, "Hold up! The only way to solve this is to do it together!"

The solution resonated with the crowd and then they made a line of some people holding the spear and the others grabbing on to each other in an efficient chain.

Thaddeus yelled, "Heave!" and everyone else yelled "Ho!"

This pattern went on for the better part of a minute until the rocking motion of the pulling dislodged the spear, which exited Manuel's body in one final pull. The force of the collective pulled each member stumbling toward the ocean and over the railing of the patio and onto the sand.

Manuel's body dropped to the floor of the advanced composite material patio and it took less than a minute for his body to heal and then reboot. It had been so long since he felt real, lasting pain. The fallen members of the family stood up and then stood on the other side of the railing, waiting for Manuel to come to.

He awoke and let out a startling gasp like he had been holding his breath. All the pain in the universe seemed to flow to Manuel's chest as he clutched the area like he was having a heart attack. But the pain quickly subsided and he was able to focus on all of the smiling faces looking at him in the distance.

You would think someone would have jumped over the railing and helped him to his feet, but there was something else afoot.

The line of people parted in the middle and a woman that was knew, but familiar, to the group walked up and asked, "Excuse me, does anyone know where I can find a place to stay for the night?"

Hartwell opened the gate on the porch and the woman walked through and was now visible in the sensor-activated back light.

Manuel rubbed his eyes and then got to his feet. He could not believe his eyes.

"Carmen?" he asked as he was less apprehensive with each passing moment.

"Yes. How did you know my name?" she asked.

Manuel looked at Hartwell and Hartwell mouthed, "My gift to you."

Manuel smiled and replied, "We are all family," as the other members of the tribe gathered around Carmen and Manuel and shared love that would endure for the rest of their lives.
