Neil Kingsley - Four Years Before Sacramento


The quiet twap-twap-twap-twap-- of his silenced pistol followed Neil Kingsley as he fled the scene of Perrin's latest kill, some gangster boss of some kind or another. The names, the targets, they all ran together these days in Neil's mind. His Sire ran before him in the dark alleyway, his pair of heavy handguns in his own strong, murderous hands firing as well. The difference between Neil and Perrin was, Neil was shooting to make them put their heads down. Perrin's laser sights were locking on heads and chests, firing, tearing into the gangsters, spilling their blood and ending their lives. The older Mekhet sneered as they hit the next corner. "Cover me, Kingsley." An order, just like always, delivered in a rough, deadly voice. He had no choice but to comply, or be 'dusted' - that was always what Perrin called it. 'Dusting' him was a common threat.

Neil's heart, if it still could beat, would've been pounding. Bullets fired from powerful guns and machine pistols hit the brick corner, sending debris and dust into the air. He didn't want to go out into that, not even for a moment... but what choice did he have? Perrin was his Sire, the only thing he had in this dead world. They'd been together for years... but Perrin had never asked him to risk killing anybody. I could... I could never! At heart, Neil Kingsley was still a cop, no matter how crooked he had been. Please, God --

He heard the magazines hit the ground around the corner as their pursuers reloaded, and he knew he had to fire. Spinning out from the corner just enough to put his right eye and his pistol out, he emptied his clip in a slow methodical fashion, delivering flesh wounds and minor injuries and close calls to the men chasing them. I won't kill for you, Perrin. Then bullets came back at him, a spray of desperate shots. One struck him high in the shoulder. He grunted and fell back behind the brick corner.

"Let's go," his Sire said. Neil was pressed against the corner, looking shaken. Perrin sneered and got in his face, firing around the corner for him to drive them back. Kingsley was in too much shock to reply. He'd never been shot before, and despite the fact that he wasn't bleeding, it certainly hurt. He clutched the wounded shoulder with his right hand, holding his weapon in his left as he looked incredulously at the wound, trying to figure out how to focus, how to close it, how to make it go away -- "HEY!"

Perrin slapped Neil with the back of his handgun, and still the younger Mekhet didn't move. "Fine. Get yourself clear." And then Perrin was gone, fading from view, a ghost. Neil had recently learned how to hide what his Sire had called the Beast from the world, avoiding the notice of other Kindred and becoming a wolf in sheep's clothing to other Kindred. But this, this he could not do, no matter how hard he tried. He could not make himself fade from view.

As the footsteps approached, he finally snapped out of it, running aimlessly. He was so far from their Haven, and Perrin had the car keys. He had no idea what he would do. There was a fire escape, and he ran towards it, climbing upwards, although to what he didn't know. Beneath him were six, seven, eight angry-faced men, firing up at him. Their bullets rang off the metal fire escape ladder, and one struck him in the chest. He cried out in pain as the bullet ripped through the dessicated flesh of his right lung, and he fired back down at them, hoping to buy time for him to go... where am I going? Do I even know anymore?

The sirens were approaching as he ran. This was so obvious, so terrifying, and he was sure SWAT would be coming. This much gunfire didn't go unnoticed by the kine authorities, and they really, really wanted him dead. "Where the fuck is the other one?" he heard one of them yell, one who was climbing up after him. He fired down at him, hitting the guy in the right arm and causing him to cry out and fall a storey off the ladder onto a pile of garbage. The hail of gunfire slowed for a moment as they reloaded, and he did the same, only to grit his teeth in agony as a third shot blasted out a bit of his back.

Kingsley made it onto the roof, and there was nowhere to go. All there was was some sort of air conditioning vent, too small and too heavily grated for him to go into. He leaned against it anyway, taking a deep breath and letting out a sigh. They would come around the vent soon. He checked his gun. It had three bullets left in the magazine and one in the chamber -- always one in the chamber. Too few to win. Too few to cover himself until the police arrived, even. It was over.

The Mkhet closed his eyes, resting his head against the comforting, cool metal of his constant companion. He began to weep silently, tears staining his face red. He didn't want to die. Three wounds that would've downed any man, he had survived. Hundreds of nights with that bastard, Perrin, and he had survived. It wasn't right that he'd die here, on the rooftop of some shitty, run-down apartment building like one of the pieces of shit he had spent his life putting away, to those self-same pieces of shit.

He heard the humans coming up, reloading their guns as the sirens closed. They came around the vent, and Neil Kingsley prepared to die in a hail of gunfire.

But the strangest thing happened. Their guns were aimed right at him, but their eyes didn't see him. Two of them, right there, staring at the spot where he was, as if they didn't see him. Others came around, looking. But Neil Kingsley was gone. While he had heard them arguing, maybe he had jumped, maybe he had gone into a top storey window, he wasn't listening. For on that night, Neil Kingsley had learned a valuable lesson.

His Sire was a shitty teacher compared to Lady Necessity.