Tommy and Laura in Midnight at Vampire Castle

It was a pretty average day at school until they met the vampire.

At first Tommy wasn’t sure. Okay, the coach is pretty pale (unearthly at best) and he doesn’t wanna go outside. Then he slapped himself in the head when Jess was carted out on a stretcher with two holes in her neck.

“Hey Tommy,” Laura said as she sat down, unpacking her blue lunch bag with little kitten shadows all over it. “Jess got bit.” They sat at the lunch table far away from the rest of the high schoolers, alone.

“Yeah, like what the fuck?” asked Tommy. He prodded his fork at the square pizza on the beige colored tray.

“I’m telling you, it’s a vampire.” she said as she unpacked a bag of rice. She dumped the ziploc bag’s contents onto a paper plate and grabbed a plastic fork.

“That seems kind of silly to me. Vampires are just fictional stuff right? Folk tales? I don’t honestly think it’s a real deal thing.” Tommy said, taking a cut bite from the pizza’s square crust.

“It does seem like something Jess would do for attention you know? But I don’t really know her motives for something like that.” Laura said, talking while rice jumped in her mouth. Tommy winced as he noticed.

“His name is Coach Feratu after all…” brooded Tommy. He finished the pizza and moved onto the school milk, which reminded of him of glue.

“Oh god, is that his fucking name? Jesus christ, dude is definitely a fucking vampire. You just don’t call yourself that unless you’ve got a baby brain.” Laura yelped as she grabbed a pair of cookies.

“I guess that settles that? I don’t know what we’re gonna do about it.” Tommy said, before sipping at the carton, his thumb over the maze on the side.

“We should kill him.” Laura said, chipping into a cookie.

“The fuck, Laura?” Tommy asked, almost spitting out milk.

“I’m serious.” she said, in her british accent that made everything not serious.

“You can’t just kill someone you think MIGHT be a vampire, that’s not how it works. We call that murder in the United States and you know what will happen to me if I’m caught murdering someone.” Tommy responded, with fear in his tone.

“Yeah, yeah, the police will kill a black man. But I don’t think you want to be bit either right?” Laura said.

“Laura, we’re not murdering anyone.” Tommy flatly said. Laura brushed him off again.

“Well, if he is a vampire, it’s probably a good idea to something about it. How hard can making wooden stakes be? Getting holy water? Fashioning a whip? I mean come on, your dad’s like a priest or something right?” Laura stated.

“Don’t remind me,” Tommy said, glancing at the bible in his backpack. “But seriously, we’re not murdering!”

“It’s really easy. You just shank that sucker with a pointy piece of wood. Really dig it deep inside of him. For extra damage you burn his eyes out with the holy water.” Laura said, demonstrating with her hands.

“LAURA THERE’S A COP HERE,” said Tommy, almost screaming as he grabbed her hands to put down at the table. He watched as the cop from fifty feet away look at a window. “...killing vampires shouldn’t be this whimsical!”

“Okay, fine, I guess we’re not doing that. Let’s just capture him then.” Laura said.

“Kidnap?” asked Tommy, watching the cop from afar.

“God, you have to make everything I suggest sound like a crime?” Laura brushed off his retort.

“Look, we’ve been friends since middle school and I’ve never heard you suggest harm to anyone except Mark.” Tommy said, shuddering.

“Well, I’m was just saying that Mark could stand to have his little testicles ripped out.” Laura said. Tommy gave her the look.

“Anyway… look, we’re not gonna do anything about this. For one, we’re not entirely sure he’s a vampire to begin with.” Mark stated.

“We should probably still do SOMETHING about it, right?” asked Laura. “Unless you want more kids with holes in their necks.

“How long have we been sitting here?” asked Tommy, glancing at the empty lunch room.

“Oh fuck. Shit shit. God damn it!” Laura cursed as she checked her watched under her green sleeves. “We got a minute until class, damn it!”

Just then a black janitor came in and changed their lives forever. “I heard you kids talking about vampires, right?” he asked as he stood with a wet mop.

“God, make this quick. I ain’t got time for this shit,” said Laura, packing up her bag. “FUCK!”

The janitor laughed. “I used to be a monster hunter back in the day. I was just like Tommy right here, even had a white girl with blond hair be my accomplice.”

Tommy laughed before looking at the janitor. “Are you serious?”

“Shit yeah I am. I can get you some vampire hunting gear and give you a late pass,” replied the janitor. “Follow me.” he beckoned as he placed the mop in the bucket, it’s wheels squealing just a little. Tommy grabbed his stuff and followed, along with an nervous Laura who was watching the time.

“Do you think he’s being real with this shit?” she whispered to Tommy. Tommy shrugged. The janitor walked to the janitor’s closet and opened it, revealing… a normal looking janitor’s closet. He put the bucket and broom to the side of the tight space and stepped inside. Tommy followed inside but Laura kept her distance. The janitor felt along the wall… looking for something… and then he found it. He tapped a brick with an x mark and the room made a small groaning sound before the wall began to move back. A hatch appeared on a dirt floor.

“What you kids don’t know is that I’ve been with this school for a long ass time. They hired me as a monster hunter but I kind of got demoted ever since they stopped showing up. Of course, this was a little while after she died…” the janitor stated, putting his hand under the latch.

“Did he just say his accomplice died? The blond one?” asked Laura.

“Jesus christ girl, either you come in here or you get to your class late. A little late to back out now!” groaned the janitor as he lifted the hatch. A ladder was in the hole under the latch and he climbed down, with Tommy and Laura following him.

A fan attached the far back of the walls of the room oscillated the wall. Laura made the mistake of touching the wall, which was slimy and gross. Under the little light in there, she could have sworn it was green. She shook it off as she felt it move, yelping a bit but was ignored by the janitor and Tommy. The janitor lit up the room with a flashlight, looking through the stuff he had. Gold swords and knives, a jar of scarab beetles, a book with it’s cover torn off, a jar of green slime, and a ghostly photograph hanging on the wall… the janitor finally pulled out a red milk crate.

“Check this out.” the janitor said as Tommy and Laura closed around him. The janitor pulled out a pair of brown leather robes, a knife that looked kind of like a cross, a jar of maple syrup with water inside instead, bandoliers with wooden stakes in them, and a bible.

“Woah. Shit.” said Tommy and Laura at the same time. The janitor smiled under his bushy mustache. Laura grabbed the cross knife and pretended to stab Tommy which made the janitor frown very quickly.

“Watch it. This stuff isn’t to be played around with.” the janitor said. He put back the stuff into the milk crate. “Alright, go to the main office when you leave for school today. I’ll hand you this shit in a gym bag and we’re gonna see Coach Feratu after school.”

“Oh god, is this a club? I got saxophone lessons today.” said Laura. The janitor looked at her and then lit up.

“Don’t worry about it. We’ll figure out the schedule later or something… just don’t worry about it. Focus on this.” said the janitor.

“Wait… are we seriously killing someone?” asked Tommy.

“Buddy, you gotta learn that shit like ethics and morals don’t matter when you’re a monster hunter. If you don’t learn it when we go to stop Coach Feratu, you’re gonna learn it the hard way. They’re monsters, not people.” coldly stated janitor. The flashlight showed something that Tommy didn’t notice before, but it was the scar by his neck.

More to be written...