Eph stopped cutting then. He saw, without truly processing it, the head in his hand with its stinger drooping through the severed neck, still twitching.

He then saw Nora and the others watching him from the open door. He saw the wall and the white mess dripping down it. He saw the decapitated body on the floor. He saw the head in his hand.

Blood worms wriggled up Matt's face. Past his cheeks and over his staring eyes. Into Matt's thin hair, approaching Eph's fingers.

Eph dropped the head, which struck the floor with a thud, not rolling anywhere. He dropped the knife too, which fell soundlessly into Matt's lap.

Eph said, "They took my son."

Setrakian pulled him away from the body and the infested vampire blood. Nora turned on her Luma light and irradiated Matt's body.

Fet said, "Holy, holy shit."

Eph said again, both as an explanation and as a nail to be banged more deeply into his soul: "They took my son."

The homicidal roar in his ears was fading, and he recognized the sound of a car pulling up outside. A door opened, soft music playing.

A voice calling out, "Thanks."

That voice.

Eph went to the broken front door. He looked down the walk and saw Zack getting out of a minivan, shrugging a backpack strap over one shoulder.

Zack made it only as far as the gate door before Eph wrapped him up in his arms. "Dad?"

Eph checked him over, grasping the boy's head in his hands, examining his eyes, his face.

Zack said, "What are you doing-?"

"Where were you?"

"At Fred's." Zack tried to wriggle out of his father's grip. "Mom never showed, so Fred's mom took me over to their place."

Eph let Zack pull back. Kelly.

Zack was looking past him, at the house. "What happened to our door?"

He took a few steps toward it, until Fet appeared in the doorway, Setrakian behind him. A big guy in a hanging flannel shirt and work boots, and an old man in tweed holding a wolf's-head walking stick.

Zack looked back at his father, the troubled vibe now fully setting in.

He said, "Where's Mom?"

Knickerbocker Loans and Curios, East 118th Street, Spanish Harlem

EPH STOOD in the book-lined hallway of Setrakian's apartment. He was looking in on Zack eating a Devil Dog at the old man's small kitchen table, where Nora was asking him about school, keeping him occupied and distracted.

Eph could still feel the sensation of the Master's grip on his head. He had lived a life built on certain assumptions, in a world based on certain assumptions, and now that everything he thought he could rely on was gone, he realized he didn't know anything anymore.

Nora saw him watching from the hall, and Eph could tell by the look on her face that she was frightened by the look on his.

Eph knew that he would always be a little insane from now on.

He went downstairs two flights to Setrakian's basement armory. The UV alarm lights at the door were turned off, the old man showing Fet his wares. The exterminator was admiring the modified nail gun, looking like a longer, narrower UZI submachine gun, but orange and black, and with its loading nail magazine feeding the barrel on a slant.

Setrakian came straight over to Eph. "Did you eat?"

Eph shook his head.

"How is your boy?"

"Scared, but he won't let it show."

Setrakian nodded. "Like the rest of us."

"You've seen him before. This Thing. The Master."

"Yes."

"You tried to kill it."

"Yes."

"You failed."

Setrakian squinted, as though looking directly into the past. "I was not adequately prepared. I will not miss again."

Fet, holding a lantern-shaped object with a spike on the end of it, said, "Not likely. Not with this arsenal."

"Some parts I pieced together myself, from things that came into the store. But I am no bomb maker." He clenched his gloved claws as proof of this. "I have a silversmith in New Jersey who molds my points and needles."

"You mean you didn't pick this up at Radio Shack?"

Setrakian took the heavy, lantern-shaped object from the exterminator's hands. It was constructed of shaded plastic with a thick battery base, a six-inch spike of steel on the bottom. "This is essentially an ultraviolet light mine. It is a single-use weapon that will emit a cleansing spray of vampire-killing light in the pure UVC range. It is designed to clear a large room, and will burn very hot and fast once charged. You want to make certain you are out of the way when it does. The temperature and the radiation can get a bit...uncomfortable."

Fet said, "And what's with this nail gun?"

"This is powder actuated, operating on a shotgun load of gunpowder to drive the nail. Fifty nails per load, inch and a half brads. Silver of course."

"Of course," said Fet, admiring the piece, getting a feel for the rubber grip.

Setrakian looked around the room: the old armor up on the wall; the UVC lamps and battery chargers on the shelves; the silver blades and silver-backed mirrors; some prototype weapons; his notebooks and sketches. The enormity of the moment nearly overwhelmed him. He only hoped that fear would not turn him back into the powerless young man he had once been.

He said, "I have waited for this a very long time."

He started upstairs then. Leaving Eph alone with Fet. The big exterminator lifted the nail gun out of its charger. "Where did you find this old guy?"

Eph said, "He found me."

"I've been in a lot of basements in my line of work. I look around this little workshop here, and I think-here is the one crazy who's actually been vindicated."

Eph said, "He's not crazy."

"He show you this?" Fet asked. He crossed to the glass specimen jar, the afflicted heart suspended in fluid. "Guy keeps the heart of a vampire he killed as a pet in his basement armory. He's plenty crazy. But that's okay. I'm a little crazy too." He knelt down, putting his face close to the jar. "Here, kitty, kitty..." The sucker shot out at the glass, trying to get him. Fet straightened and turned to Eph with a look of Can-you-believe-this? "This is all a bit more than I bargained for when I woke up this morning." He sighted the nail gun on the jar, then pulled off his aim, liking the feel of it. "Mind if I claim this?"

Eph shook his head. "Be my guest."

Eph returned upstairs, slowing in the hallway, seeing Setrakian with Zack in the kitchen. Setrakian lifted a silver chain off his own neck-containing the key to the basement workshop-and with his crooked fingers he placed it over Zack's head, hanging it around the eleven-year-old's neck, then patted his shoulders.

Tags: Guillermo Del Toro The Strain Trilogy Horror
Source: readsnovelonline.net