The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

Chapter Twelve ~ Here I Come





Laurell spoke slowly, as I placed the mug down and sought out her hands again, with mine: “Cameron defeated Revok, the first of us; whose grand plan had been to flood the country with Ephemerol and build a new generation of Scanners, under his control. But, his defeat had come at a cost Keiren; the loss of all he was, bar one thing…”



‘Go on?’ I prompted impatiently.



And, Laurell smiled a little, at my sudden use of telepathy.



‘His mind…’ Her voice, that soft lilting musical voice told me.



And, she smiled.



“Okay, Okay… What happened to my Father then?” I asked; I had to.



“Ah… they disappeared. Both he and Julie…”



And, that was it: she could tell me no more…



Laurel squeezed my hands and I felt good. For the first time, in such a long, long time, I felt good.



“So, how did you find me?”



She smiled.



“Since seventeen… Our little group of listeners….” And again there it was; the smile.



“Well, we’ve known of you since you were seventeen…” “The test that Roughton had put me on?” I recall losing it with him one time with him; ‘lunge, parry, lunge’…



We had been in all the gear, masks and swords, with red training tips and, dancing the moves as he encouraged me, loudly. I hadn’t like that. And, my anger had broiled inside, deep inside. It had been released in a burst of energy, and…. the end of my blade had come broken of as the blade had bowed on impact with his padded jacket; there’d been that much charged emotion behind my moves and, that final thrust.



“Yes, that test. Some of the results had been of particular relevance, to Us…”



She touched my cheek, with delicate fingertips.



“And, with your… pedigree, as it were…” Laurell grinned, “We had been waiting to see whether you realized that… potential.”



‘That’s quite a time to be following someone…’ I mused.



“Not so long Keiren… not so long…” Laurel nodded, as she stood.



She had read me and, there’d bee no nose-bleed, or head ache and; it’d felt, ‘Right.’



“C’mon, lets go up top, with a drink, eh?” I’m sure you could do with the fresh air…”



She was right, fresh air sounded good.



“Whiskey, isn’t it?” Laurell asked me, picking up a bottle of Teachers and two whiskey glasses.



“Heck,” I began, “I don’t know why you asked. My mind; nay, my whole Life, is an open book to you look…”



“Aw, now don’t be like that,” she reproached, “It’s mostly been for your own good…”



“And the bit that wasn’t?” I asked. I just had to.



“The way we saw it, you may have ended up like your grandfather, or if we were very unlucky, his brother…”



She rises from her stool and I follow.



I’d followed her anywhere.



She leads me to the short vertical ladder, leading up top and, again I follow, watching her shapely derriere, clad in elasticated type skin-tight jeans, tight as a second-skin.



She looked good, real good.



“Should I say ‘thank you,’” Laurell asked, looking over her right should, mirth in her voice. And, I know I blush. I know I blush… as I climb after her, making an effort not to think thought that she’ll find too amusing.



Up top, she leads me to the right side of the barge, which is painted beautifully.



And yes, there is a bucket, painted in dominant blue and white, with delicate flowers on stems, coming from a green watering -can, painted on the side.



The barge was… lovely… her home, was lovely.



We sit and she pours our drinks, which I hold, as she replaces the bottles cap.

And placing the bottle down, she takes her glass and we smile at one another, before clinking them together.



‘Cheers’, we think, as One. And, we smile.



For a long moment, silence reigns.



Looking around I finally note my surroundings. She has moored the barge with open fields either side of us. There is no-one in sight, not on the canal tow-path, or in the fields… well, bar the odd bird or two… and, I see a kite, or kestrel wheeling in the air; and, there is a fine warming sun against my face.

.

“You’re lucky…” She said to me, out-of-the blue, after sipping at her drink awhile.



“Huh?” I quizzed. Not feeling very lucky; bruised yes; but, not lucky.



And she laughed. Laurell laughed.



“You can be funny.”



“You’re scanning me again…” I snapped.



“It’s not hard Keiren… you’re feeling emotional. So I feel your thoughts just flow…”



“Oh…” I retorted. What else was there to say?



I drained the contents of my glass.



“Don’t be like that,” she admonished, “I am trying to help…”



“Yeah, I know,” I answered, dully.



She crouched down, to my right and sliding her left arm over my shoulders, Laurel drew me to her.



And, as I rested my head, she stroked my hair, “Believe it, or not, you can make it alright…”



“Me?” I whispered, looking down, to her lap.



Suddenly I heard the voice inside my head; filling me with beautiful warmth that radiated inside me; and for a very brief moment that soft Irish lilt was all I heard, or knew.



Yet, it wasn’t Laurel; or, it wasn’t just Laurel that spoke inside my head, ‘Yes you… Keiren Foster… You’re One, but you will be many, when the time is needed.’



I saw Laurell staring wistfully into the far distance, her face quite serene. Then turning to me, I heard her say inside my mind, ‘You are lucky,’ again.



‘Why?’ I asked, communicating in the same fashion. And, she smiled, at my ease of use of telepathy, one of the talents of a scanner, I’d learnt.



‘You’re third generation Scanner Keiren,’ she told me, ‘and, you had nothing of the voices that drove some demented…’



And, she must have seen the images that flowed from her remark, as I recalled that first breakdown at college, then the other two, the latter of which had led to me ending up in hospital, with little awareness of who or where I was.



Placing a her left hand over my right hand, her gentle smile warming, she told me, ‘Yes, I know you had some difficulties my friend…. But, it could have been worse, far worse. Some had their minds torn apart, from birth, as they suffered sensory overload…’ And, squeezing my hand a moment, she told me once more, ‘You have been lucky, that your own awakening has been as it has…’



I can’t say that I saw it as she did, but that said, if individuals with my abilities had suffered as she’d described, with imagery thrust into my mind, of people writhing in pain, clutching at their heads, before one exploded, literally; then maybe I was lucky.



“It seems that you’re found some understanding my friend,” She said to me softly, as a gentle breeze blew and the water rippled beneath my dangling feet. And, I really did like hearing her saying ‘my friend’. That’d sounded good to me, particularly from someone who knew so much more than me, someone I felt such a rapport with.



She stood and, offering me her right hand, Laurel said to me, “Come with me…”

And, I don’t ask ‘where?’ It really doesn’t matter.

Chapter Eleven ~ Ready, or Not





“So what can you tell me of my Birth Father…?” I asked after due deliberation. After all, ‘did I want to know?’ It was a damn fine question.



“He was adopted, by the couple he was left with, before his parents were killed…” Laurell told Keiren, conscious of his emotional condition .He was in a state of flux as his mind showed her; and so she had to be careful, with what she told him and how she said it.



‘Killed?’ I mused. There were more questions than answers. Yet, there was one thing that needed answering: “What was his name?”



Smiling gently and squeezing my hands, Laurel said to me, “It was David Kellum…” Then she continued, “And, your Aunts name is Julie, Julie Vale.”



I was stunned, ‘an Aunt? Well, of course… why not?’



“She was as powerful as he was and, if they’d got their way, there’d be peace, between the humans and Us…” She added.



“Hang on,” I interjected, “What did you mean by Us…?”



And, without using her mouth, Laurell illustrated further, just what she meant.



‘People like Us,’ Her soft Irish lilt inside my head: ‘People like you and me Keiren. Many call Us Scanners…”



And, I groaned, the mother of all headaches sweeping through his skull, as Laurell continued her explanation, “Scanners were, or are, individuals born to Mothers who took a drug called Ephemerol, during the late nineteen forties and early nineteen fifties. The drug was intended to ease childbirth, but it had totally unexpected side-effects. The children were born with abilities that the normals don’t have, hence their fear of us…”



“Fear?” I quizzed, through the pain.



“Yes, fear Keiren. Look I’m sorry that hurt so, she told him, “but, you had to know this is all real, alright?”



“Uh huh,” I responded, nodding.



Again she squeezed my hands, in reassurance.



Then, she continued: ‘He was ready.’



“Pretty well anything humans are scared of, they try to destroy…” Yet, instead of hearing Laurell’s rhetoric, keiren was still intrigued by the term ‘Scanners’.



And, Laurell smiled, “A scanner? Well… you know when I listen in, or put thoughts in another’s head, that’s scanning. If I were to bring you a drink…” And so saying, she directed her gaze from him to a rack of mugs; one moved across the small galley, to hover beneath the cold tap, which turned itself on and, water filled the mug, which floated across to Keiren, as the tap turned again and, the water ceased running.



I let go of Laurell’s right hand and took the floating mug, looking at in complete bemusement….



“And, I can do that?” I said softly.



Again Laurel smiled at her companion, watching him cautiously sip the water: “You’re the Grandson of Cameron Vale. You can do that and, so much more…”

Chapter Ten ~ Chu… Chu… Changes…





Up till just that very moment I’d not cared a jot about the so-an-so who sired me.

‘He’s a married Catholic with four kids of his own…’ I’d been told.



Now it seems, that was only half the story, as it were ‘the story’, at all. Up till hearing what Laurell had to say about him and I’d not cared a jot.



Laurell stood back and laughed.



Watching me struggle from amidst the middle of the bed and shattered wood, Laurell stood back and laughed.



“It’s not that funny!” I told her, glowering at the amused woman.



“Well,” She said to me, after a moment or two’s consideration, “If you knew what you are capable of, I think even you would find it funny…’



“What can I do?” I queried, stepping out of the bed-frame carefully.



“Well, when you were tested at seventeen your abilities were deemed as a potentially latent skill, to be realised, then honed; if and only, they manifest.”



‘Huh?’ The only time I recalled having any kind of assessment at that age was at college. My Dad had wanted me to ‘get into sports’, as he didn’t appreciate me ‘sitting in all the time drawing’, as he phrased.



So I’d ended up going to the Heswall Boys Club, where I’d taken part in fencing, which had been run by, of all the people, the Head of the catering department of the college where I’m been doing my catering course.



I recall being left in the office, while he attended to something, or other; turning a report round and, seeing a really stupidly high poetial IQ figure there. I’d turned the paper back round, then on his return; I’d said my goodbue, then made my way to the nearest toilet block.



I’d been disappointed in the system. If I were so bright, had so much potential, then why had it never been realised? So I’d entered a cubicle and unwrapped my knives on the floor before me. Staring at the handles of the many different sized knives, I’d taken the largest, the French knife and looking at my inner left wrist, I’d drawn my knife across. Seeing my blood run and flow, I’d fainted.



But, I’m still here. Was that just happenchance? Either way, as the fellow had said I’d ‘great potential’ and, until now, that had made little to me. But now, looking back at what he’d said, I had to think on it all somewhat,



And after long moments, the look of concentration that had crossed Laurell’s face ceased. “He was right Keiren, you do have great potential…’



She’d read my mind??



“Yes I did…” Laurel said to me, reaching for the back of my right hand and holding it, gently, as she answered my unasked question.



“And I’ll be able to do that?” I quizzed, frowning.



Laurel smiled, then I heard her musical lilt in my head, as she responded, “This… and oh so-much-more…”



I wanted to know more about these newly discovered abilities; but now I needed to know about my Birth Father.