'94, Ascension, Mexico

"El Exstinguido... Órale..."

Romeo murmured into a brick-sized cell phone while Anton Flores slumped forward slightly in the seat opposite him. The bar band could be heard through the walls, doing their best on a buzzing, uneven PA system. Under the table the Haunt clutched at the hole border patrol bullets had punched in his abdomen a few nights ago. One man flanked him; a cagey thrall clearly awaiting some kind of cue, his nerves in knots. That was Romeo's man. Anton was the guest here. He had an idea why the ghoul looked so anxious, what he’d have to do once he got the nod.

Romeo. He was a squat savage crammed into a cheap, tan suit. Lank hair brushed the open collar at the back and thinned into a widow’s peak up front. He nodded along with the voice on the phone; one hand toyed with the oversized shades he'd removed, revealing puckered, beady eyes set above a smashed-flat nose. Romeo was Sheriff here. That might actually be impressive were Ascension not a three-vamp town enjoying independence that'd last only as long as the Estate was able to war with the Carthians for a hold on the cartels in nearby Ciudad Juárez.

"Gracias, muy amable, adios."

Romeo placed the phone down onto the nicked table, smiling strangely. The thrall stepped forward suddenly, only to be calmed with a dismissive wave from his Regnant. Romeo produced a cigar. He toyed with it, tapping it on the edge of the table as he took in Anton with his eyes. Reading the scarification in the Haunt’s skin and putting together its hazy narrative. Finally he ignited the cigar. Anton flinched as the flame burned. The nervous ghoul jerked forward again in response. Romeo scoffed as he exhaled. The cramped back room became choked with smoke. At last he addressed Anton in hoarse Spanish.

"Your arms. Show them to me."

Anton tore away old bandaging and held up the back of his forearm to display the jagged tattoos covering his flesh. Romeo nodded, tapping flakes of cigar ash onto the table surface.

“Tell me those are not from your days, Nunez,” he chided, mocking.

Nunez. That’d been the name King Beneath had known him by.

“Little about me comes from my days.” Anton answered, impatience edging into his voice.

“And he calls himself King Beneath now?”

“All of us leave names behind.”

“As the snake sheds its skin.”

“If that’s the way you want to put it.”

“Heh,” Romeo snorted, savouring another drag. “El hombre pálido. This is another name that has been shed, long ago. But it is the name you search for, yes? The Cuban - your King Below - tells me to tell you of him.”

“Yes.”

“He tells me also that you make timely deliveries.”

Anton tried not to glare back as Romeo leaned forward, his hands clasped together in a weak attempt at either humility or commiseration.

“I won’t lie to you, Senor Nunez; I know the man who has your ghost. And I need his favour more than that of faraway Kings, more than the gratitude of Enspectros couriers.” Romeo sighed. “Forgive me.”

‘Forgive me’ – so that’d been the cue. The thrall lurched forward clutching a hooked blade in spastic hands; running on frayed nerves and withdrawal. Anton felt the edge begin to split the pale scar crossing his throat as he pumped strange strength into a dead body. In one whip-cord motion, he twisted around, grasping the man by the throat. He let the Beast gaze out through his eyes, into those of the thrall. The man dropped the blade as he fell into the corner, weeping.

Romeo lunged, snarling. His thick hands twisted into crooked ruins, slick with black blood. Anton upturned the table, and used it to block the assault. The pair tumbled to the ground, broken table between them. The Savage slashed wildly with his one free claw, taking off a piece of Anton’s ear and widening the Haunt’s mouth. Anton tried to use the fear to freeze his opponent, but the claw kept raking at Anton’s face even as a piece of splintered table leg was plunged deep into Romeo’s chest. The thrall in the corner screamed with the savage as Anton bludgeoned the improvised stake into Romeo’s shrunken heart, inch by inch.

***

Romeo awoke sharply, on the edge of a deep, narrow pit in the depths of the desert. He began to twist and turn, letting loose a torrent of curses as realization dawned on him - his limbs had been sawn off at the joints, reduced to bloodless stumps, dusted with ash. He recoiled helplessly as a lit match sailed past his head, only to burn out a foot away from him.

“We need words, you and I.”

Anton’s voice came out in a passionless whisper. The Haunt’s features had partially healed into something somehow less disquieting than the smell of scorched earth clinging to him.

“Pinche idiota…” Romeo began to rage back, teeth bared, in a baleful hiss. It became a shriek as a second match flew towards him, blowing out before it hit his bare belly.
Anton kicked the squirming burlap sack by his feet.

“We need words,” he repeated.

As he did so, he held Romeo’s temple to the ground with his boot, forcing his guest to stare down into the grave, six feet deep and reeking of fuel. Romeo swallowed. It was strange, how the fear of God brought out these little relics of human reaction.

“I have my pack… Romeo started out thinking to threaten Flores with familial vengeance, but in the end he appealed to the Haunt’s grasp of incentive.

“... my Daughters. I have more to lose than my flesh… More reason to die silent.”

“Shhh,” Anton whispered, willing out all the poison of his clan’s curse in one disquieting pulse. The Haunt watched with quiet satisfaction as Romeo’s lips draw back involuntarily. “I understand,” he lied.

“Let us speak of the Black Sleep instead.”

Romeo looked puzzled as Anton sank the stake through his heart once again. The disfigured Savage was left in torpor for ten minutes. Anton touched Romeo’s bulging eyes as he slept; wondering what haunted him in his death-sleep. He had been told once that Torpor was like a bad world within each of the Damned; an aspect of the hell which awaited them all, to burn away the ties to the people they were. He repeated the same words over and over into Romeo’s ear ‘El hombre pálido’ in a creaky whisper, using the fear. An hour passed. Anton wondered at the amount of time Romeo had perceived in his aspect and yanked the stake from his chest, freeing him from Torpor.

“What did you see?” he asked. Romeo paused, staring up at the sky.

“I saw a great Crone … gravid, grey, swollen hag. The formless birds ate her as she gave birth to all the shadow…” Romeo answered. His voice quivered. He looked older.

Anton let silence set in for a moment. This deep into the desert, all that could be heard was the faint squeaking from the wriggling sack.

“El hombre pálido?”

As Anton toyed with the stake that’d plugged his chest, Romeo spoke the name into Anton’s remaining ear in a ragged whisper. The Haunt nodded.

“Yes. I’d heard as much. From another, you understand. Thank you, Sheriff.”

Anton kicked the torso into the pit unceremoniously. Romeo landed with a wet crunch and a muffled cry. As he wrenched his body around to look up at the sky he saw Anton on the edge of the pit, clutching the squirming sack in one hand and a single rat in the other, a calloused thumb circling the creature’s neck.

“What do you wait for? End this,” Romeo said, with a hint of disdain. All he could smell was gasoline co-mingling with the dry earth.

A ghost of a smile passed over Anton’s face. “I can’t.”

The Haunt tossed the rat into the grave and watched the Savage attempt to rein in the hunger. It wasn't long before he began to twist in the pit, gnashing fangs at the rat, which scurried over his pitiful form. Anton watched as Romeo managed to catch it in his jaws, and listened to the wet, sucking sound over the squeaking vermin. Anton tipped the rest of the sack into the deep pit, watching fat rats swing out, clinging to the burlap being dislodged into the pit, where they swarmed over Romeo. Anton watched for a time

“All I can do now is leave you in God’s hands, Sheriff,” Anton explained, with vague reverence.

The Haunt began the journey back to Ascension, leaving Romeo in his grave helpless with dawn on the way. If the grace of God allowed Anton to meet the Sheriff again, he would truly envy him.