Demon invasion the vampi.., p.11
Demon Invasion (The Vampire from Hell Part 7), page 11
“You probably just need a nap,” Brittney called out to me. “I take one under my desk all the time. That’s probably what you need.”
As I forced my legs to move forward, I felt like I had been drained of all my energy. Maybe a nap under my desk would revive me for the next shift, I thought. There was no way I heard what I thought I heard. Just no way.
***
The sardine sandwich laced with avocados stared back at me. My idea of dieting just so I could fit in my stupid work clothes had gotten to a new level of terrible lunches. If I had enough money to go out for lunch like everyone else, I wouldn’t be sitting in the kitchen area at work forcing myself to eat my lunch. The weird call wouldn’t let go of me. I sighed a few times to try to calm myself. It had to be my overactive imagination, not reality, I decided.
“Hey Sasha, how’s the phones today?”
I glanced up as I saw Whitney, one of the executives walking into the kitchen. She could care less about customer support calls, but I played the game and answered her. “Oh doing fine. You know? Good calls, some crazy calls.” I laughed it off like I had a million times.
“More good calls, than bad let’s hope.” She chuckled and passed by me in her executive outfit, white blouse, tight black skirt, and high heels on the way to the TV set hanging in the corner. She flipped it on.
Had she asked me if I wanted the TV on, I would have of course said yes, out of politeness, but she didn’t think to do that. All executives were alike at our company. Never interested in the worker bee, no matter what.
“You’ll want to avoid any people who seem to be angry or showing a drastic change in personality. At all cost, do not try to reason with them. Simply walk away.”
Another executive walked in the kitchen area. “Hi Sasha, hi Whitney. How are you guys doing?”
I nodded and tried to consume my sardine sandwich. I avoided the sardine mixture and picked at my avocados instead.
“I hear that people are eating each other. Have you heard this?” Whitney asked.
“Noooo, really?” the other executive replied. “I think I did hear something about that. It’s not going on in Dallas, is it?”
I sighed and frowned at my lunch. It was time I got up and headed back to my desk. Maybe a nap would do me good. Smiling, I nodded to the execs, and left them there staring at the TV as it blabbed on.
***
“Mrs. Evans! Look here! What are you doing sleeping on the job? The company is not paying you to sleep! How many times have I told you this? Must you be so difficult? Mrs. Evans! Mrs. Evans, can you hear me? I say here. Mrs. Evans, WAKE UP!!!”
I jerked up and screamed at my computer monitor as it glared at me. My phone headset yanked out of my ear and fell around my neck. Whirling around in my office chair, I spoke at my boss as the phone cord snaked around me. I wasn’t really sure where I was. But hearing that annoying voice I had grown to despise, I knew my boss was calling me out…again.
“Yes ma’am. I’m here.” Glancing around my desk, I saw my office phone blinking. Eight calls waiting. Damn it, I grumbled to myself silently.
“You certainly are not here,” my boss chimed in. “Really, Mrs. Evans! This behavior will not do. I’ll meet you in my office momentarily. We’re going to have a talk, you and I.”
Finally focusing on my boss’s figure, I saw her small, chubby body looming in front of me. Her long black hair stuck to her neck and large shoulders. The short flowery printed dresses she wore seemed to hang oddly on her body, as if the seamstress had run out of material. Her high heel wooden clogs clacked against the floor as she tapped her foot over and over.
Suddenly, a blue mist rose up around her upper body, coming from out of nowhere. I blinked my eyes several time, trying to get my wits.
Again, my boss shouted at me. “Mrs. Evans! I find this appalling. We’re running a customer service center here, helping people during tax season. Don’t you understand? You can not sleep your life away at the company’s expense. Do I make myself clear? In my office. Now!”
My stress and anger hit me like a ton of bricks. How many times had I been in my boss’s office for ‘a talking’? Ten, fifteen times? The number escaped me. If they wanted to fire me, they would, I had decided. Instead, I was pretty sure my boss enjoyed making my life hell and wouldn’t be happy if she couldn’t bitch at me at least once a day.
Swiftly, I stood up. With my height of 5 feet and 8 inches, I towered over many people I worked with including my boss. I did not try very often to impose my height onto others, but sometimes – like this time – it came in handy.
She flinched and momentarily froze in front of me. Then she quickly recovered and shuffled out of my cube.
“Mrs. Evans!” My boss barked at me again. Snapping her fingers as she hoovered at the end of our office aisle, she motioned to her office and then pointed at me.
I tried to follow her, but the phone cord still hung around me. As it wrapped tighter around my neck, I fell and collapsed on the floor of my cube.
My boss’s voice echoed in my ears. “Untangle yourself, Mrs. Evans and meet me in my office at once.”
“Yes ma’am,” I said, feeling defeated and drained in a heap of despair.
My coworkers, Ashley and Brittney rushed over. Kneeling in front of me, they huddled with me on the floor. “Did you log out?” Ashley asked.
“She’s ripped her phone out of the socket again. She’s logged out alright,” Brittney announced.
I sighed. “Why does this stuff keep happening to me?”
“You can’t sleep through lunch and expect not to get caught,” Ashley offered as she unwrapped the phone cord from around my neck and pushed it to the side.
“That’s why I sleep under my cube.” Brittney smirked at me. “If I could turn invisible, I’d have it made.”
“If I could turn our boss into a newt, we’d all have it made.”
The girls laughed at me.
Standing up, I slowly combed my fingers through my long blonde hair and tried to remove a few tangles. Ashley and Brittney helped me smooth away my wrinkles in my work dress. It was bad enough we had to be on the phones all the time, but it really didn’t help that we had to wear company uniforms as well. My dark green dress fell straight down my slender body and looked as if I had been stuck in a bundle of asparagus. Green was not a favorite color of mine, so wearing glitter tennis shoes with my outfit whenever I could had been a way I performed a silent revolt as often as I could.
As I walked away, I heard the girls arguing over the best type of harmless animal we could turn all the executives in the company into. I decided I’d have to get an update as soon as I got back from my boss thrashing. Sharing fantastical fantasies about how we could alter our reality helped us survive the dead-end jobs we had. It was our way to deal and survive the monotony.
Then my smart phone buzzed. Pulling it out of a front pocket on my waist, I thanked the gods it had not been on my desk for my boss to see. I glanced at the text. It was from Ashley. “Sasha, don’t do anything stupid. You don’t want to live with your mom and aunt again. Do you?”
“True,” I texted back to her without looking at my phone.
Returning my phone to my pocket, I stepped into my boss’s office. The afternoon sun radiated into the windows near her desk. All the executives had offices on the west side of the building. That’s how brilliant our leadership was. Had they thought about the intense heat of the Texas sun in the afternoon, they would have moved to another side of the top floor, like the east side. Instead, their offices warmed up in the afternoon due to the hot sun and my boss complained often about how hot her office would get during the summer months. Today was no different.
She looked up from her large desk and squinted at me. Her forehead glistened with sweat.
My phone buzzed again and I grimaced. I had forgotten to turn off the vibrating function.
My boss took that as her opportunity to launch into me. “You millennials are all alike, aren’t you? Can’t be away from that phone for a second. How many times have I told you to keep your phone in your purse or backpack, Mrs. Evans? And on silent! I do not want to hear your phone! If I could get a rule passed to be in the Employee Handbook about no cellphones on the floor, you wouldn’t be here anymore! Your focus at work is work and taking customer calls, not chatting with your friends and playing SnapBat.”
I remained silent as she went on bashing my generation. However, I wasn’t a millennial. Being 23, I was technically from the post-millennial generation, the generation after millennials. But I knew my boss didn’t care and I wasn’t about to correct her or share any of my thoughts on the discussion. Slowly rocking back and forth on my heels to calm myself, I watched her rant and rave. Conversations with my boss always annoyed me and made me fidget. Today I felt like the straw was just about to break. Why did I take this kind of abuse? Just for a paycheck that barely covered our rent and Clark’s rising credit card bills. It was ridiculous.
Once I heard a pause in her blasting, I offered, “Yes ma’am. You’re exactly right. May I go now?”
“Of course not. I haven’t even gotten started. Sit down, Mrs. Evans!”
As she walked over to her filing cabinet, I realized what she was about to do. I stood still instead of sitting down in a chair as she had instructed me. “Are you writing me up? Please don’t tell me you are writing me up!”
“Sit down, Mrs. Evans and don’t you dare take that tone with me. I am indeed writing you up. Let’s see what number we are on. How many times this month has it been?”
My head started to swirl. I could feel a wave of anger growing in the pit of my stomach. Clenching my hands, I couldn’t stop myself from lashing out at her. “You can’t write me up! I produce more than anyone else on the team. I’ve taken over a thousand calls this month alone. How many calls has your pretty pet, Margaret taken?”
“How dare you?” she screamed and threw the file folder, stuffed with all my disciplinary reports, at me.
I ducked behind the chair and watched as papers rained down from the ceiling. The thickness of my file folder had to be over two inches and I had been unfairly accused of every indiscretion my boss could imagine.
“For your information Mrs. Evans, Margaret is on the special projects team and she works very hard at her position. You have no right to slander her. I’ll just add that to your file!”
Over three years at this dead-end job, I had had enough. Without any hesitation, I blew up at my boss, three years’ worth of frustration. “Sure, go right ahead,” I said. “And how bout I tell the vice president how you treat her like your own personal slave and make her run all your errands. How would you like that? She may not be all that smart, but that doesn’t give you the right to treat her like your personal servant. Now does it? She’s terrified of you.”
My boss screamed at me. Her face turned red.
I had never seen her so mad. I braced myself and hid behind the office chair, with only my head peeking over the top. Uh oh, I thought. This job is over.
Grabbing everything not nailed down on her desk, she started throwing items at me. A stapler flew past me, her notepad, and then a book.
“Stop this! Stop!” You’re going to hurt someone,” I yelled.
She screamed and grew angrier.
Standing up, I thought about rushing over and tackling her to the ground, but I couldn’t get a chance.
Plants, pens, folders, picture frames. She continued to chunk anything she could find at me.
When her coffee mug smashed into my forehead, I fell against the office door with a loud thud. Momentarily I was stunned, but I recovered quickly. The pain in my head leapt forward and I felt nothing but a wave of rage like I had never known. The pain laced around my face and raced down my arms. A voice called to me. Take her down. Like a robot, I raised my arms and pointed my hands at my boss. Blood dripped into my eyes. I struggled to see. Then suddenly flames, followed by electricity, shot out of my fingertips at my boss. Not wanting to hurt her, I screamed as I tried to divert the energy away from my boss. What was going on?
She dove behind her desk and yelled at me.
I remained frozen, knelt with my back against the door. I didn’t want to move. Then the energy from my body surged forward again. I watched as yellow and orange rays of light swirled around my boss’s desk and then flew underneath the furniture, finding her hiding behind it. I heard her scream, or I thought I heard her scream. Maybe it had been my voice I had heard. When I clamped my mouth shut, I heard silence. The energy evaporated from my hands and disappeared as if it had never been there. I couldn’t believe it. A hush fell over the room. Gradually I stood up and wiped the blood away from my face. I felt the knot on my forehead and groaned. From behind my boss’s desk, I heard a chirp or a squeak. Something seemed to be moving around, so I decided to investigate.
About the Author
Ally Thomas loves writing young adult books about vampires as well as werewolves, zombies, witches, and any furry monsters who go bump in the night. Her paranormal fantasy series, The Vampire from Hell remains a favorite among fans. Ally also writes two other young adult fantasy series called The Moon Journals and Vampire Wolf, originally based on her short story, Zombie Wolf. Contact the author at allythomas dot com
Books by Ally Thomas
The Vampire from Hell (Part 1) - The Beginning
According to Rayea, the oldest daughter of Satan, the origin of vampires started in Hell, and it started with her. Rayea isn't daddy's little girl, even if he is the most powerful fallen angel around. He wants her to take an active role in the family business. But she's not interested in his schemes for world domination. Instead, she wants to spend her time shopping on the Internet, rescuing humans from a horrific eternity, and practicing martial arts with her seven-foot hellhound. Then one day everything changes.
A Vampire Among Angels (The Vampire from Hell Part 2)
Living a life with an overbearing father can be a challenge. For Rayea whose father is the fallen angel, Lucifer, it has been torture. In the second installment of the Vampire from Hell series, Rayea finds peace when she visits the House of G. There she hopes for a new beginning among Blick's angelic friends, only to discover a Vampire from Hell may not be welcome.
A Vampire on Vacation (The Vampire from Hell Part 3)
In the third part of the Vampire from Hell series, Rayea travels to Earth hoping to meet her online friends, leave her disturbing past with her father behind her, and embark on a new future without her meddling family.
The Vampire from Hell Returns (The Vampire from Hell Part 4)
Blood of the gods has brought a new dimension to Rayea’s life as the Vampire from Hell. In the fourth installment of the Vampire from Hell series, Rayea juggles her new responsibilities and starting a relationship with her best friend, Blick. Additionally, Rayea realizes her sordid past with her family is catching up with her, and she is going to have to deal with it once and for all. When two of her friends go missing, she knows she must begin a search to find them. And the first place she has to look? Hell.
Blood of the Gods (The Vampire from Hell Part 5)
Rayea has been missing a year and presumed dead. In the fifth installment of the Vampire from Hell series, it’s open season on the Ancient Council. Angels and gods alike are being systematically wiped out. Only one person can save them, the Vampire from Hell, but how can Rayea do that when she does not recall who she is and none of her friends can find her?
Zombies Unleashed (The Vampire from Hell Part 6)
The last thing Rayea, the Vampire from Hell needs to worry about is a zombie invasion. In the sixth installment of this series, Rayea realizes contending with creatures forged by her father, Satan may be a reality for her and her friends on Earth. Her walking nightmare begins as Rayea struggles to deal with the ongoing complications of her life: a wedding to plan, the world to save from zombies, and an unexpected call for help from her evil sister, Stephanie.
Demon Invasion (The Vampire from Hell Part 7)
Rayea's world descends into chaos weeks before her wedding to her fiancé, Blick. Making a surprise visit, Blick's grandmother invites Rayea to meet Blick's extended family. To the couple's surprise, Blick's relatives welcome her with open arms, but insist on a change of cast for the wedding. Rayea instead will marry Prince Sebastian, Blick's nephew. If Rayea objects, Blick dies.
Under the Fang (The Vampire from Hell Part 8)
Imprisoned by the Demon Witch, Rayea must participate in the Blood Games. For a vampire from Hell, that shouldn't be a big deal. But there's only problem. Rayea is no longer a vampire. She's something far more deadly.
Zombie Bite (Zombie Wolf #1)
Shapeshifting warrior, Zachary Kerzek comes face to face with his destiny when an innocent bystander gets bitten by a zombie. If he doesn't do something to save her, she's as good as dead, and there's something about this girl that makes him realize he can't allow that to happen.
10.11.22 v01612
1st edition
Ally Thomas, Demon Invasion (The Vampire from Hell Part 7)
