Episode 12 (3/16/01)

In all the time Lily Sloan lived in Rose DeVega's apartment, she hardly ever touched any of Rose's comic book collection. Preferring nonfiction, both current and historical, Lily never saw much point in reading--let alone seriously studying--escapist fantasy since the truth was always stranger (and thus, ultimately more interesting). But after going over the comics Rose had "borrowed" from a nearby convenience store (abandoned due to the ravages of both Y2K and what appeared to be an immediately subsequent Wolf Pack attack), Silverbullet finally began to understand.

Rose gave her a copy of Rubberman, a character in a red bodystocking who could elongate his body with superhuman elasticity, and The Green Guardian, another character with a magic wand who could form solid, giant human hands, mallets, cages and other similarly simple objects out of pure energy, presumably stemming from his willpower. After scanning each book, Silverbullet looked up to find Rose holding the flag of the Vampire Empire that Captain Rancor told her to carry during the hunt. "Now do you see what you're capable of? See how Rubberman can literally slip under a doorway by becoming thin as paper? Or how the Green Guardian's magic wand formed that giant pair of scissors? Let's see you do that. Cut this damn flag to pieces."

Silverbullet glanced at her right hand and felt it twist, stretch and flatten as she imagined the kind of garden shears that'd be strong enough to prune a shrub. The pair of shears Silverbullet turned her hand to in a matter of seconds was of sufficient sharpness to render Rancor's flag into so many shreds. A big grin came over Rose's face and when Silverbullet noticed it, she admonished her lover with a worried tone of voice. "Now look, don't get any ideas about following me around. I want you to get down to Saint Michael's on Fourth and Main and find a guy named Father Garibaldi. In fact, I'll take you there myself and then I may hit the arena after the sun comes up. We could both use the sleep and I'll have daylight on my side--"

"Oh, great. And while we sleep on holy ground, the unholy will be doing who knows what to whom! Li--Silverbullet, in addition to whoopin' ass and taking names, you have to be a symbol of hope. Sure, you can wait till the vampires are hiding from the sun and the werewolves turn into weremen or whatever, but that's when the people can fight back. Your time is the nightshift, when there are things people can't fight against. And when they see you at night, fighting the unholy, they'll be inspired enough to finish what you started!

"And besides," Rose concluded, "what makes you think I'll stay at the church? Maybe I'll sneak out as soon as you drop me off."

Silverbullet wagged the comic books in Rose's face as she remarked, "You read far too many of these things as a child, darlin'. C'mon, let's go."

Nikolai Brown, despite his Russian first name, was a muscle-bound, dark brown American of indirect African descent. His hero being Muhammad Ali, it came to no surprise that his size would lead him into a boxing career. But that career came to a sudden end when Y2K and the Vampire Empire/Wolf Pack swept the land. Once he made $300 to $400 a night in "the squared circle," now he fights for the vampire officers' amusement in the same arena where dead, obese bodies are drained of blood by "Leeches," Aryan-appearing humans who aspire to join the empire.

Of course, this isn't known to Nikolai or any of the other non-Aryans in the Sin City Arena, since their makeshift cages (resembling giant wire chicken coops) were all segregated and kept in the dark, as it were. All they know is someone named Captain Rancor promised them freedom if they fought or evaded a hunter as Rose was supposed to have. Nikolai had boxed against nearly every ethnic variety of human the Wolf Pack had drug in off the streets and he had beaten them all. Now he was about to try to make Rancor keep his word.

"This-black-human-wants-to-see-you-sir," announced the large white werewolf Captain Rancor that seemed to use as a personal guard.

"Hey, man! I beat everybody y'all threw at me, man! I wanna be free, man!"

"And what," Rancor thought he'd bring up, as though he really cared, "of the rest of your kind? How about their freedom?"

"Hey, let them fight their way to the top like I did! Now how about it, man?"

"Human nature in action, my dear Fritz," Captain Rancor said, slowly standing up from behind the desk in what used to be the arena owner's office. "It's why I don't feel the least bit guilty. My dear Nikolai, you want to be free? Here, let me free your soul from that cramped body!" With the speed of a cobra, Rancor had maneuvered himself behind Nikolai Brown and snapped the boxer's 22-inch neck in two as one would a twig.

"Do you think you can dispose of this without leaving a trace, for a change?" Captain Rancor grimaced. "We can't have the others learning what 'freedom' really means."

"Yes-sir," Fritz barked, and then licked his lips. "Dark meat!"

TO BE CONTINUED