I used the Colts.
When I stepped into the fifth room, I found myself in an operating theater, looking down onto the surgical floor. The men gathered around the patient may have been doctors. They might have been professors.
They were not of my time, and I doubt they were of my world.
Their clothes had gone out of fashion around the turn of the century, and the men appeared to be stiff and uncomfortable in them.
They were far better off than the man on the gurney, however.
He was dead.
Of that, I had no doubt.
A man stood at the head of the gurney, leaning over it and the patient and extracting a pair of hellishly long needles from the patient’s neck. There was no blood flow from the exit wound. His chest did not rise, nor did it fall. The patient lay unmoving. As I watched, a man clad only in a vest reached under the gurney and retrieved a large metal container.
“This will keep the blood warm,” the man with the vest stated. “Not as fresh as if you were to drink it directly from him, but enough to stave off any hunger should you find yourself in a place where you cannot feed.”
A tall man nodded and smiled and allowed me to catch a glimpse of the fangs in his mouth.
I’ve never been a fan of vampires.
I find little reason to suffer their existence.
The Colts cleared leather, and the vampires heard it. I saw surprise and concern flash across their faces, only to be replaced with relaxed smiles.
All save one vampire.
He stood next to the man in the vest, and his undead eyes widened.
“He’s a Blood,” the vampire stated.
My Colts thundered and confirmed my name.
The vampires tried to jump toward me, but the revolvers roared in my hands. Brains rained upon the men, and the vampires collapsed. The doctors tried to run, and I gunned them down before jumping into the chamber. On a side table, I found a chest cracker, and I set about my task.
It was a hard and bloody chore, but I sang while I worked, pausing occasionally to shoot again when a vampire struggled to rise.
Soon, I had a pile of hearts and a pile of heads. I washed, lit my pipe, and then found a hacksaw.
It was time for the arms and legs.
