The Mortal Burden
Book I
Chapter III
Part XIV: “I Can’t Take You Anywhere!”
May opened the door; smoke and heat rushed out into the corridor. Inside, creatures—dead, undead, deformed, unformed, and created—intermingled, laughing, dealing, and feeding. They walked through a multicolored, dimly lit dance floor heavily trodden down by the ages, slipping past the seductive sway of the inhuman dancers.
At the end of the area lay a bar. Clayden followed May obediently, but clumsily bumped into another ghoul. The creature, rotting and not much bigger than Clayden, picked him up by the neck, dangling him in front of his friends. One was a humanoid genetic mutation covered by a sickly, pungent green slime, with large claws protruding from his overlong shirt sleeves. The second was a renegade Titan follower drinking heavily, except that his mug had to be bound onto his double-bladed axes, which grew from both arms.
“What’s a weak little fleshling doing in a place like this?” the decaying ghoul asked Clayden as he squeezed his neck harder.
“Put him down! He is mine!”
“Sure he is, my pretty little vampire,” the brute chuckled condescendingly. He threw Clayden onto the floor, sliding him into a support as he gulped desperately for oxygen.
“Let’s see under that pretty dress of yours!” the renegade slobbered while reaching for May. “Bloody pussy or dry cunt?”
May jumped behind him, grasping onto one of his arms and ripping it off his body easily. Rotting flesh and putrefying blood spilled onto the ground, releasing a sickly aroma into the smoky atmosphere. The renegade took his free arm and threw her over him; she flipped, landing on her feet with claws retracted and fangs drawn.
“STOP!” a frankentender—a patchwork of mismatched flesh and body
parts—screamed while wielding a powerful yet ancient shotgun.
“Ghoul, take your renegade friend and leave! You’re no longer welcome here!”
The renegade picked up his amputated arm, pointing it at May. “The next time I see you, bitch, I’ll devour your heart, vampire thot!”
The ex-Titan renegade, the mutant, and the ghoul walked to a door by the side of the bar, exiting into the catacombs and tunnels beneath the ancient city, loudly complaining and laughing.
“Are you all right?” May asked as she pulled Clayden from the floor out of a pool of the renegade’s fetid blood, fermented and vile. Long, congealing, oxidizing ropes of rotting blood clung parasitically to his jacket as he was helped up.
He nodded silently, regaining his breath. They walked to the bar, and she pulled cash out of her jacket pocket, handing it to the bartender. The mangled human puzzle pointed to a door on the opposite side of the bar.
May and Clayden went through it, finding themselves in a musty, ghastly, decaying cavern smelling pungently of mold, cigarette smoke, beer, and old death. The door closed behind them.
“Thank you for saving me,” he touched her arm affectionately, his eyes half-lidded in submission, warmth soaking into her cold skin.
“Saving you was like saving a pet,” she responded coldly, unsettled by Clayden’s touch, scared to admit that at one time she was once human. “If I had my way, I would kill you right now and end your misery.”
Clayden didn’t respond, recognizing that she feared her suppressed emotions, jealous of his mortality. He understood that if she showed any of her humanity regarding the act of surviving off the blood of humans, she would consider herself no better than a parasite, or worse, that she was still human.
But what choice was there anymore? She was a vampire, and that is how they survived. *Just like a human survives,* he thought. *Eating the flesh of a cow is no different, except for the emotional baggage of feeding off your own kind. Too much information… just too much to think about. I wonder if…?*
“Clayden,” she waved her hand in front of his face.
“Sorry, I was thinking,” he replied, dazed.
“Think later. Now listen carefully: you’re about to talk to an Ancient. Be very direct with your questions, and don’t lie—they’re very strict. Don’t anger it; otherwise, you’ll be dead in a matter of seconds,” she paused. “Understand?”
“Yes,” he answered, following May deeper into the ancient cavern, which decayed more as they walked deeper into its endless dark.
Finally, they came to a door with the fading light of a torch by its side. May opened the door slowly into a torch-lit room, the shadows playing aimlessly with both their fears—his fears not even close to the reality.
Written ~ 1997. © Jacob A. Pickard 2025. All rights reserved. This work is protected by copyright and may not be reproduced, republished, excerpted, or used for academic, commercial, or derivative purposes without written permission.
Ecoheretic 