Chapter 24
Ward was back in the office the next day, and he had a bit more information to share, though not much. He called the entire staff into the conference room to meet at nine o’clock sharp, and despite the fact that they hadn’t gotten in until nearly 3:00, the time was no problem for the teammates who rarely slept anyway.
There was a total of ten individuals on the London Team as it was referred to. Over the last forty years, Aaron had watched as the two good Passels, the Hunters and Guardians, began to organize themselves to better fight the evil Vampires. Though technically, the job of the Guardian was to protect whichever of the other two Passels needed protecting, Aaron could never even fathom a situation where he’d need to protect a Vampire.
With better organization came a more concentrated battle effort, which also required funding. Several sources supplied the money to operate their organization, but the primary sources were governments that realized there were supernatural threats beyond their control and wealthy individuals who required constant security in exchange for their generous donations.
While large cities began to form their own teams to protect the humans nearby, there was both a Hunter Leader and a Guardian Leader who oversaw everything, a difficult job since the communication sources just were not there. They did have a direct telegraph service to reach the Leaders, both stationed in the US, and that was Ward’s primary method of communication. The Leaders just happened to be a married couple, and while Aaron had never met them, their reputations for being highly efficient killing machines, as well as organized and effective leaders, preceded them, and he secretly hoped one day to excel so well in his operations in the London Area that he could be reassigned to work directly with the Leaders in America. He was looking forward to meeting Janette and Jordan Findley.
This morning, however, he was eager to share the information he and Vicky had pried from the Vampire in the alley with the rest of their teammates. Vicky was one of only two women on their team. The other, Berta, was a large German Guardian who was known for her ability to pick Vampires up and slam them into hard surfaces—such as buildings or streets—crushing their bone structure and leaving piles of ash in her wake. Spying her squeezed into a chair at the end of the table, Aaron was glad to be sitting far away from her, next to the dainty-in-comparison Vicky, who likely wouldn’t accidentally crush his hand should she get excited and need something to squeeze.
“Are you eyeing Ms. Berta down there?” Vicky asked, leaning over and whispering in his ear.
The feel of her breath against his neck sent a chill down his spine, and he pulled away from her before she could even finish the question. “Of course,” he replied, flashing Vicky a smile. “Who wouldn’t?”
She grinned, but he sensed she wasn’t completely sure he was entirely joking.
Before he could even attempt to reassure her that he was not interested in Berta, Ward began the meeting. “Good morning, team,” he said, leaning forward over the end of the table. “I trust you all had a nice evening?”
He looked around at his teammates as they all nodded before he cleared his throat and continued. “This morning, I wanted to discuss with you a situation we have going on in Whitechapel. You may have heard about the murder that took place there last week. There’s a strong indication that this might be one of ours, though the police are attempting to establish if the case can be linked to two vaguely similar murders from earlier this year. Personally, I feel they are unrelated, but there are a few reasons to think otherwise.
“All of the murders involve a knife, though in the first one, the victim was definitely not bitten, as she lived for several days and did not mention such an occurrence to police. I think we can dismiss that one. The other two involve stab wounds and could be the workings of a Vampire, possibly the same one. I sent a team out to Whitechapel last night, and I’d like to hear from them now. Aaron?”
“Actually, Vicky is going to take this one,” Aaron replied with a smile. While he’d had lots of opportunities to present at these types of meetings, he liked to give others a chance to highlight their skills as well.
“Thank you,” she said, a lilt to her voice as she smiled an acknowledgement in his direction. She had a sheet of notes in front of her, but she seldom glanced down at them as she explained what they had discovered the night before. “Frank, Edmund, Aaron, and I began an exploration in Whitechapel early this morning at around 1:00. We split into two groups, and eventually, Aaron and I made contact with a male Vampire just before 2:00. Through a series of questions, we were able to ascertain that, at least to this Vampire’s knowledge, the first murder on our list, the one taking place in April of this year, was not Vampire related. He was unsure whether or not the early August stabbing was the works of a Vampire, but he said if it was, he knew it was not related to the slaying last week. When questioned about that particular event, he said it was the workings of quote, the Ripper, unquote, and that we would know about him soon. He then began to laugh rather loudly before disappearing down the alleyway.” When she had finished, she turned to Aaron, as if looking for approval, and he smiled at her before turning back to Ward.
“So, it is your belief, based on the information supplied to you by this alleyway Vampire that the first murder is not of our concern, the second may be but is not related to the third, which most certainly is a case we need to pursue, and that the culprit goes by the pseudonym ‘the Ripper?’” Ward restated for clarification.
“Yes, sir,” Vicky nodded. “I think that our entire exploratory team has accepted that interpretation, though Edmund and Frank were not present at the time of the interrogation.”
“Interesting,” Ward replied. “And who conducted the interrogation?”
“Mostly Aaron,” Vicky said. “I only asked one question, and the Vampire didn’t answer it.”
“What question was that?” Harvey, another teammate asked from his seat across the table from the blonde.
“He made the comment that he didn’t know the Ripper yet, but he would know him—that we will all know him,” she explained. “And I asked him what that meant, but he just said he didn’t know.”
“And what do you think it means?” asked Paul, a Guardian seated toward the other end of the table.
“I think it means this Vampire has a lot planned, and we need to catch him right away,” she replied, matter-of-factly.
Ward nodded. “I think you might be right. Excellent job, team. We need to get on this quickly. I want everyone to drop everything else they are working on. I will assign each of you a partner and a station in Whitechapel. If what this Vampire says is correct, we need to stop this Ripper character now before the body count begins to rise. There are enough dangerous humans on the loose in Whitechapel. The last thing we need is a Vampire with malevolent plans unleashed in the area.”
