The ancient fire escape creaked and groaned under the feet of the three men as they bravely climbed the treacherous old metal fire escape. The three climbed up the side of the abandoned slum building as the hot LA Santa Ana Winds whipped over them. It was good that the night felt like hell because they were climbing into the depths of it. They reached the 8th floor and climbed in through the window.
The apartment had been abandoned for years, the walls had huge holes were teenagers on destructive rampages had knock new passages through, the floor and the ceiling were rotting and with each step the possibility to the floor giving way and one of the three plummeting down was very real. Malcolm Toombs turned to his two partners, John Rodriguez, and the newbie, Tyler something or other. " Now stay close" said Malcolm to Tyler, " this will get crazy fast, so stay cool and aim for the head, these fuckers won't stop unless you get them in the head."
Malcolm drew out his Ruger Redhawk Revolver as John pulled his shotgun from its sheath on his back. Tyler drew his Colt 45s out and swallowed hard. " We all got to start someplace" said John.
The three slipped out the abandoned apartment, intelligence said the nest was in the middle group of apartments. Malcolm was nervous, usually by now somebody would have noticed them. Malcolm and John stuck their heads around the corner and they heard a young girl scream, then a loud group laughing. Malcolm gripped the red-jeweled handle of his revolver, no wonder they had ordered in. Malcolm started down the hall; there was light pouring from underneath one of the doors. Malcolm was sweating, twenty-six years of this bullshit it never got easier. John readied to kick the door in when it suddenly burst open. A young teenage girl rushed into the hall, two men were chasing her and stopped cold when they saw John's shotgun. He squeezed the trigger and blew both men back into the room in a spray of black red blood. Malcolm grabbed the terrified girl; she started hitting him with her bloodied little fists. " Run hide" Malcolm said to her, " you'll be okay, just run!"
The naked girl took off as the three of them entered the room. A man was in the kitchen, a large jar of blood in his hands. He gave Malcolm a confused look just before Malcolm leveled his Redhawk and fired. The heavy 44 calibre round simply blew the man's head apart. More people entered the room, John fired twice with his shotgun and Tyler opened up on an extremely thin woman exiting another room. He hit her twice in the chest, the force of the rounds throwing her back into the bedroom. " Head! Hit Them In The Head!" Malcolm shouted.
Tyler took two steps towards the bedroom when the woman reappeared, fully transformed. Her face had now morphed into a grotesque visage, warp and distorted, like something from a nightmare of a very sick person. Her teeth had grown twice the size and her canine's were now almost five inches long. With a swift motion, she buried them into Tyler's neck. Tyler screamed loud, his blood was spraying from the large wounds in his neck. The woman grabbed his neck and snapped it with a loud crack, spraying blood all over the room from the wound. Malcolm and John heard Tyler's last whimper as she collapsed to the ground totally lifeless. John emptied the last round from his shotgun into the face of the female vampire smashing through the extremely weak wall next to the bedroom. " Reloading" said John.
Malcolm shot another vampire that rushed in from another room. These were young whelps, but there had to be a master close by. John finished reloading just as a vampire dove down from a whole in the roof. He tackled John but his thin heroin chic frame was easily thrown off by John, then John grabbed the vamp and slammed him through another wall. He howled as wooden slats from the wall pierced his chest. John decided to let them thrash for a while, wood through the chest wouldn't kill a vampire but paralyze them and cause a great deal of pain.
Malcolm flicked open the cylinder of his revolver and stuffed in six new silver tipped howl point bullets. As Malcolm snapped the cylinder closed two more vampires came around the corner, this time with guns. " Cover!" Malcolm shouted.
John ducked into the bathroom and Malcolm leapt over the counter into the kitchen. Malcolm slipped on the gooey blackish red blood of the first vampire he killed and hit hard on the tile. The two vampires opened up with their MP5s, spraying bullets all over the room. John ducked as bullets began to rip through the wall and shattered the tile all around him. John stuffed his shotgun out the door and began to fire using the door jam to rack the shotgun each time.
Malcolm watched as the bottles of blood and empty liquor bottles exploded over his head, soaking him in luke warm blood and the last bits of liquor from the bottles. Malcolm closed his eyes; a faint glow of pale blue began to glow from inside his shirt. He opened his eyes, they were now electric blue, he casually leveled his revolver and fire twice and the firing from the vampires stopped. Malcolm and John looked out and saw both vampires were dead. " How many more?" asked John.
Malcolm shrugged, " I can feel several" he said, his eyes still glowing.
Malcolm turned and fired twice through the wall, two splattering noises echoed down the hall. Suddenly two vampires leapt down from another hole in the ceiling. The impact of their bodies made the floor start to groan and wobble under their feet. All four men looked at each other as the floor gave way and all four plummeted straight down.
They crashed into the floor below, one of the vampires smashing through that floor and continuing down to the sixth floor. The other vampire was writhing in agony from a large table leg that was smashed clean through his chest. " You okay?" asked Malcolm.
John nodded, coughing from all the dust their fall had kicked up. They both got to their feet, " Just one left" said Malcolm, " I think."
Malcolm was too shaken up to use his powers again. They started into the hall when a female vampire attacked Malcolm. She tackled him and slammed him into the floor hard. John rushed to help but she simply hit him and threw him across the room and into the opposite wall. They had found the queen of this nest.
Malcolm grabbed the barrel of his Redhawk and slammed the butt into the queen's face. A loud sizzling noise was rivaled only by the queen's screams. The bright-jeweled handle of Malcolm's revolver was made from Bloodstone, a rare gem that was like acid if touched by a vampire. The queen threw Malcolm down the hall, holding her burned face. She rushed at Malcolm but a blast from John's shotgun hit her legs. She stumbled and Malcolm leveled his revolver, he squeezed the trigger but heard it hit an empty chamber, CLICK. The queen smiled, her left cheek burned through so that Malcolm could see her teeth inside her mouth. She rushed Malcolm; Malcolm coolly opened the cylinder and drew out another round. With a quick snap he closed the cylinder and grabbed the queen by the neck. He slammed her into the ground and jammed the gun in her mouth. Her face quickly morphed back to what was once an attractive woman. " Please, no, please don't" she begged.
Malcolm pulled the trigger; the report echoed down the now silent hallway, the nest was eradicated. Malcolm got to his feet, John was in the hallway, " It seems to get harder and harder these days" said Malcolm, rubbing his neck.
" Because we're getting old" said John.
The loud scream of the sirens of the LAPD suddenly filled the night, " Great, guess we have to run now" said Malcolm.
" FREEZE MOTHERFUCKER!" shouted a uniformed officer as he came up the stairs.
Malcolm and John simply ran into the fire stairs with the first two officers in pursuit. " They are upping their response time" said John.
" My tax dollars at work" said Malcolm.
The pair sprinted up seven flights of stairs until the burst out onto the roof.

The officers burst onto the roof with guns drawn ready for a hard fight but they found the roof empty. " The hell?" the first officer asked to his partner, " they jump?"
" Fuck if I know" said the second.
The two officers cautiously walked to opposite ends of the roof looking for the two men. Neither saw any sign of them, " Weird shit man" said the first, " come on, we need backup, they must have doubled back."
The roof door closed, " I think their gone" said John.
He and Malcolm where hiding underneath the lip of the roof, underneath Malcolm's feet glowed more blue light. " How much longer can you hold this?" asked John.
" About thirty seconds" said Malcolm, his entire body tensed up and sweating, " I want you to put your feet against the wall, and when I saw 3 push."
John pressed his back against Malcolm's and they linked arms. " 1… 2… 3!" said Malcolm.
John pushed off and the pair silently floated over to a building across the street where they both promptly fell to the rough asphalts. John rolled over and saw Malcolm flat on his face. " You okay?" he asked.
" Landed on my keys" groaned Malcolm.
" Come on Superman" said John helping Malcolm to his feet, " lets get the hell out of here."
The pair limped down the stairs of the building. " Bet the old man is going to have a fit over this" said John.
" I told him to stop sending us amateurs" said Malcolm, " stupid fuck didn't shoot them in the head, what are we supposed to do?"
" Move to Nebraska" said John.
" I somehow doubt either of us would fit in living in Nebraska" said Malcolm.

Detective Jenna Wilcox got out of her navy blue Crown Victoria and looked at the building, " You sure we aren't going to die in this rat trap" said Detective Melinda Esperanza, Jenna partner climbing out of the passenger side.
" Hey this job promised excitement" said Jenna with a wry smile.
" If I get eaten by a rat this is totally your fault" said Melinda.
The pair walked up to the front doors, " What's up?" asked Jenna.
" We got multiple homicides up there" said the officer guarding the front, " it is a slaughterhouse."
" Let's see it" said Melinda.
They were led up to the eighth floor and into a room where several bodies laid. " Hey ladies" said Deputy Coroner Kevin Arculeta, " we have struck the jackpot here."
" What happened?" asked Jenna.
" Well we have the first three here, teenagers, oldest probably no more than 14. Tortured and drained of blood" said Kevin, " just like that teenage couple we found in Griffith Park last month. Apparently one survive, she is down at County being treated for numerous wounds, and she is the one who called the cops."
" Was she?" asked Melinda.
Kevin nodded, " Then we have the rest all gunshot wounds and a broken neck" he said, " 44 calibre and 12 gauge shotgun."
" Just like the last seven multiple homicides we've had this year" said Jenna, " the vigilantes strike again."
" The teens were all killed between 24 hours and two weeks ago" said Kevin, " the vigilantes got here just in time."
" Maybe we should just catch them and give them badges" said Jenna, " these guy get the job done."
" I bet the boss will be happy when we tell him we have a mountain of corpses and nobody to pin them on" said Melinda.
" I'll pack them up, god I am going to be a shitload of overtime on this" said Kevin.
" Dead flu still going around?" asked Melinda.
" Yep, already worked two shifts and now this" grumbled Kevin.
" Hey sleep is vastly overrated" said Melinda.
" Yah right" said Kevin.

Across the street hidden within the shadows of another building a man watched the comings and goings at the building. He took out his cell phone and hit 1 on the speed dial. " Yes Lord Dante" he said, " it appears the renegade nest was eliminated. Yes it appears it was the Chosen. Yes sir the police have them. Yes sir I understand, should I… Yes Lord Dante I will take no action."
The man hung up and started to leave. He spotted another figure standing on a rooftop also watching the action. This person was strange, he was clad in a long black cloak, his face was blank white. The other man looked and slowly melted back into the shadows. The first man leapt across the span of the building with no effort and landed on the next rooftop with no noise. But the mysterious figure was gone, only a strange feeling that permeated the air. The man knelt on the rooftop and began to sniff, something was wrong; this figure left no scent, not even an aura trace. The man snarled, baring his fangs, this was trouble. He slowly melted into the shadows and took flight on the wings of darkness; he would have to look into this.

In a stately manor high up in the Hollywood Hills stood an old man, short and with balding grey hair. " Tyler is dead then" said Ebenezer Chillton, trying to contain is emotions.
" He was sloppy" said Malcolm.
" And what was your job?" asked Ebenezer, " wasn't it to make sure he learned."
" We did, we trained him the best we could" said John, " he just didn't listen, he thought he was Rambo."
" The Council is raking me over the coals here" said Ebenezer, " we are losing control of Los Angeles, our casualties are higher than any other major city, vampire infects are twice the rate of any other city. We need more results with fewer losses. Tomorrow I am sending you a new recruit; she is a very special recruit, we've been training her for some time. I hope she will be able to tip the balance. Expect her tomorrow, I will rotate you to patrol quieter areas until she gets accustomed to Los Angeles."
" Yes sir" said Malcolm.
" Rest up" said Ebenezer.
The pair left the mansion and looked down at LA below them. " Well as chewing outs go that was painless" said John, " my ass feels relatively penetration free."
" Something else is going on" said Malcolm, " I bet we'll soon find out. But until then, lets get a burrito I'm starved."