"Fine," Locke muttered under his breath, lowering his arm after sniffing his sleeve.
He carried a scent too, of course. That was normal. He was a man; a trace of sweat after a long day wasn't exactly shocking. But the odor clinging to those male vampires across the street was something else entirely.
It was dense and unpleasant, like damp wood left to rot in a basement. Worse, there was something faintly funereal about it—like the sour decay that hung around the very old when their bodies were already beginning to fail them.
"That's it," Locke murmured softly. "I'm not a pureblood vampire. I just fused the gene."
Under normal circumstances, if an ordinary human wanted to become a vampire, the process required a First Embrace. A true vampire would feed, then feed their blood back, initiating transformation. It was ritualistic. Biological. Corruptive.
Locke had skipped all of that.
He had directly integrated the vampire gene through the Ultimate Evolution Module. No ritual. No sire. No blood exchange. More importantly, his version could be upgraded continuously. There was no static ceiling.
It made sense that he didn't carry that stagnant, corpse-adjacent odor.
The thought settled comfortably in his mind.
Brown turned from the windshield, eyes sharp. "Should we call for backup and just wipe this place out?"
He had been counting. In a single hour, at least a hundred vampires had slipped into that warehouse. If he could kill that many tonight, it would go a long way toward honoring the five men he'd lost.
But Locke rolled his eyes without hesitation. "These are vampires, not mutants. Did yesterday teach you nothing?"
It was nighttime. This was peak performance for their kind.
Brown had lost five agents to a low-level E-class vampire during daylight. Now he wanted to storm a nest at midnight? That wasn't tactical aggression. That was volunteering as catering.
"And besides," Locke continued evenly, "not everyone going in there is a vampire."
He'd seen it clearly. A few female vampires had escorted men inside—wide-eyed, grinning idiots clearly thinking they'd stumbled onto some secret underground party.
Those men weren't targets. They were inventory.
There was a fundamental difference between being lured and drained in a controlled predatory environment versus being killed indiscriminately in a government operation. If the Sentinel Secret Service launched a missile strike and civilians died, New York's media would lose its collective mind.
Locke would survive the fallout. He had credentials, a Harvard law degree, and connections in high places.
Brown didn't.
Brown frowned slightly. "How could you tell they were ordinary people?"
Locke chuckled. "Didn't you see their faces? When they realized there was a 'bar' hidden in a pork warehouse, they looked like tourists from Jersey who just discovered Times Square."
Brown thought back and nodded slowly. "Now that you mention it… yeah. A few of them did look like that."
Calling in an air-to-ground strike helicopter now would be absurd.
Brown exhaled and glanced sideways. "Then what's the plan? We didn't come here just to watch, right?"
"What if we did?" Locke smiled faintly and tapped the roof of the car. "You forget about the high-definition facial recognition camera mounted up there?"
Brown blinked.
"We've recorded every single person who entered that warehouse," Locke continued calmly. "Human or vampire. So what comes next should be obvious."
He never entered a fight blind.
That was why he'd arranged for the camera installation that afternoon. Every face that crossed that threshold had already been logged.
Next step? Overtime. Run facial recognition. Cross-reference databases. Build a list.
Then tomorrow morning—when the sun was high and vampires were at their weakest—they would start knocking on doors.
More importantly, the Sentinel laboratory was already rushing production of ultraviolet rounds. One night was enough for emergency fabrication.
By dawn, there would be at least a few hundred UV bullets ready for deployment.
"When you're at full strength," Locke said quietly, "I step back. When you're weakened, I strike."
Brown's eyes lit up. "The UV rounds will be ready tomorrow?"
Locke nodded. "Debbie already pushed it through. Minimum two hundred units."
Brown's shoulders loosened. "Good."
"Let's—"
Locke had just begun to suggest leaving when the phone in his coat vibrated silently.
He answered immediately. "Rock Underwood."
"Sir," came the voice from the bureau. "The signal has moved."
Locke's expression shifted slightly. "Which signal?"
"The tracker placed on Eric Brooks' vehicle."
Blade.
"Yes," the operator confirmed.
Locke straightened in his seat. That tracker had been installed earlier that afternoon after Sentinel satellites identified Blade's location. If Blade's car moved, Locke would know instantly.
"And where is he headed?" Locke asked.
"Sir… it appears he's moving rapidly toward your coordinates."
Locke's thoughts accelerated.
Internally, he had no desire to entangle himself with Blade. The man was trouble incarnate—focused, relentless, obsessive.
But there was no denying one fact. Blade was the most efficient vampire hunter in the Marvel Universe. A walking slaughterhouse.
And the Ultimate Evolution Module didn't require Locke to personally kill every vampire. Any vampire eliminated by his team contributed to his extraordinary point accumulation.
During the day, Blade's gaze at the bureau had not been friendly. Not neutral either. It had been assessing. Measuring.
Preparation wasn't paranoia. It was survival.
Locke was about to instruct the operator to maintain close surveillance when he fell silent.
"Sir," the night-shift sentry continued, "he's closing in fast. His trajectory suggests he's heading directly toward you."
Locke's face darkened slightly.
At that exact moment, a distant engine roar cut through the quiet night.
"Knew it," he muttered.
Brown glanced over. "What's wrong?"
Locke didn't answer immediately. He simply stared toward the source of the sound.
Headlights pierced the darkness, slicing across the industrial street. A black vehicle emerged from the shadows and slowed as it approached the warehouse zone.
It didn't drive toward Locke and Brown. It didn't pull up to the bar either. Instead, it stopped at a calculated distance, engine cutting off in silence.
For a few seconds, nothing happened.
Then the driver's door opened.
A tall Black man stepped out, movements smooth and controlled. He wore dark tactical clothing that blended almost perfectly with the night. A long sword was strapped across his back. Even standing still, he radiated lethal focus.
Blade.
A moment later, the passenger door opened.
A woman stepped out, and even in low light, her presence was striking. She wore a fitted black combat suit that hugged every curve. Her long red hair cascaded down her back like flame against the darkness. Her posture was confident, alert, ready.
Locke's breath caught faintly.
"Hiss…"
He didn't finish the thought aloud.
...
Read the next 3 chapters for free on my p@treon.
Premium members get to read ahead by more than 60 chapters.
Link : [email protected]/Dream_Guardian