Dark moonlighting, p.4
Dark Moonlighting, page 4
“Sounds like someone is having a bad night,” the Chief of Medicine said to my patient.
Tyrone’s response came in the form of another violent round of puking.
“Sorry to interrupt, Nick. I just wanted to introduce you to one of our new medical interns. This is Lara Russell,” Robert said.
Lara was on a tour of the hospital, so she was not wearing the scrubs or lab coat typically worn by the medical staff. Instead, she wore a professionally appropriate blouse and skirt. The clothing was not designed to highlight her physical features, but she would have been hard-pressed to find anything that could hide them. She was tall, skinny and chesty. Her blond hair was cut in a short, stylish fashion that certainly required a lot of expensive upkeep. Her exposed legs and arms were tanned almost brown and looked out of place compared to the extremities of everyone else living through the winter in Illinois. Overall she looked better suited to be a Hawaiian Tropic bikini model than a doctor.
“Nice to meet you, Dr. Whittier,” Lara greeted me with an extended hand.
“Likewise,” I responded as I returned the gesture.
I immediately regretted my single word response. It had been an impulsive attempt to look cool and hip, but I was sure it had failed miserably. I realized this was not the worst part of the introduction a second later. A small dab of Tyrone’s vomit had been on my hand and was transferred to Lara’s during the handshake. She sneered at the partially digested chicken soup and turned towards the sink at the back of the room. I was about to apologize when Robert interrupted.
“We were just finishing up the tour, so I thought I’d pop in and show her Doogie Howser in action.”
“Doogie Howser?” Lara questioned over the sound of a running faucet.
“Oh, you’re probably too young to remember that old TV show,” Robert reminisced. “It was about a genius kid who becomes a doctor. Dr. Whittier here was only twenty years old when we hired him. Not quite as smart as Doogie, but impressive nonetheless. The weird thing is that he doesn’t look a day older than he did on the day we met.”
“Doogie Howser wasn’t so smart,” I said quickly to change the subject. “Look at the end of the show when he was on the computer. He could only type, like, eight words per minute.”
Having never seen the show, Lara did not understand the reference. Robert got it but did not care. The joked failed, and I felt embarrassed for the second time in as many minutes. A silence fell in the room as even Tyrone’s chorus of upchucking had momentarily abated.
“So, are we all done here?” Tyrone’s father awkwardly interrupted.
“Yes, sorry,” I answered. “Give him plenty of clear fluids and Tylenol for the—”
“Don’t give that child Tylenol!” Robert interjected forcefully. “Fever is an important part of the human immune system. It helps kill the virus.”
“Sir,” I started diplomatically for the sake of my patient. “I really don’t think—”
“Dr. Whittier, I have been practicing medicine a lot longer than you. I think I know the proper way to treat the flu.”
I found his statement to be quite amusing as I was old enough to remember the creation of modern medicine.
“Is that true?” Tyrone’s father asked. “Will the fever help him get better faster?”
“Yes,” Lara answered as she stared down at the chart she had taken the liberty of examining. “But it’s kind of a moot point if his brain boils.”
Robert furrowed his brow at the chart that Lara helpfully pushed towards him. He let out a whistle and shook his head in resignation.
“Boy, that’s a high fever. Yeah, on second thought go ahead and give him the Tylenol just to be on the safe side. The trade-off is that he’ll be sick longer but feel less miserable over that period of time.”
Robert, Lara and I escorted Tyrone and his father out of the examination room. Robert offered to take them the rest of the way and asked me to show Lara to the human resources office. It was a short walk, but I was happy to get the time alone with her.
“So, where did you go to medical school?” I asked casually.
“Case Western in Cleveland,” she responded. “I was hoping to do my residency back in Ohio, but this was the closest hospital that would take me.”
“You have family back there?”
Lara nodded. “My parents. I’m an only child so I feel bad being so far away from them. They helped put me through med school, and I was hoping to at least be able to keep them company.”
“You’ll be so busy this first year that the time will just fly by,” I reassured her. “You’ll probably find a position back home before you know it.”
“Yeah. So what’s with the Doogie Howser nickname?” Lara asked, eager to change the subject. “You been putting up with that shit from Dr. Little for long?”
“He means it as a term of endearment,” I responded defensively. “Besides, I have lots of different nicknames here. Doogie Howser, Dr. Awesome, The Love Doctor…” I finished slyly.
I was typically never awkward around women, even those as beautiful as Lara. It has been my experience that men are more confident with women when there is an age gap. A thirty year old man would feel at ease with a woman in her early twenties, for example. As I was easily 600 years older than any woman I met, confidence was never a big issue for me. I wrote off the series of unfortunate faux pas as an effect of sleep deprivation. To my surprise, Lara did not seem disturbed by my comment.
“With lines like that I have my doubts,” Lara joked. “I’m thinking the love doctor is going to have to do a lot of healing thyself if you know what I mean.”
Lara winked at me before entering the office for human resources. I stared at the closed door for a moment, thinking about how amazing she seemed after only a few minutes of conversation. The fact that she pulled off a sexy wink without looking awkward was fascinating to me. I had never known anyone under the age of sixty who was able to make winking look like a natural facial expression. The puzzled look I received from a passing oncologist snapped me out of my fantasy. I cleared my throat awkwardly as I realized I was standing in the middle of the hallway, and I quickly moved towards the nearest elevator.
I felt relieved when I made it back to my isolated office in the basement of the hospital. I had become a doctor specifically to see and treat patients, but that was not the reason I had accepted my current position. The social aspect of the job had taken a back seat over the last decade as I increased my efforts involving my pet project. It had started as a fantasy many centuries earlier then gradually developed into a working theory. With the hospital’s hematology fellowship as my cover, I was in the process of running practical experiments. There was not enough time left in my shift on that day to start anything too involved. I resigned myself to type up the notes I had dictated into a small recorder earlier in the week.
I had been living as a vampire for two centuries before I had a startling realization. The religious and mythical aspects of vampirism were so prevalent that I had always accepted them at face value. Vampires were possessed by demonic spirits, and they killed humans because of an inherit desire to do evil. This was, of course, horseshit. When I started studying science, I realized that the “evil” I was doing was done commonly by many other species in the natural world. Hematophagy, drinking the blood of another creature, is practiced by some fish, leeches and worms. Even mammals like the appropriately named vampire bat survive off the blood of others. The only odd part of the process was that it was being performed by some human beings. With this new knowledge, I became convinced that my condition must have a logical cause. The solution escaped me for many centuries. Finally, in the last decade of the nineteenth century a Russian scientist by the name of Dmitri Ivanovsky discovered the first virus. That revolutionary advancement in the field of medicine allowed me, after three decades of work, to discover the bug responsible for vampirism.
I had confirmed that my rare condition was a strictly medical problem. There was nothing supernatural or evil about being a vampire, it was simply another in a large family of viruses. The bug I discovered was somewhat unusual given that it forms a symbiotic relationship with the host. Through research conducted exclusively on myself, I found that the vampire virus infects almost every cell in the human body. It fundamentally changes human physiology. Infected humans become physically stronger, develop better eyesight and have more sensitive hearing. It greatly increases metabolism and speeds up the host’s natural ability to heal. This increase in rejuvenation means less sleep is necessary for the infected human. It also stimulates the immune system which kills any other virus or foreign bacteria that tries to get a foothold within the host. The virus even shuts down the natural aging process.
There are obvious downsides to this relationship as well. The virus is susceptible to sunlight. Though it is impossible to know why, I speculate that the organism developed in an area devoid of sunlight like a cave or even deep in the ocean. Sunlight kills the virus, and since it is so intricately tied to its host, exposure to ultraviolet radiation causes intense pain and damage to the epidermis. My early experiments focused on using sunlight to destroy the virus. After several painful attempts, I realized that the host would die long before the virus was completely eradicated.
The vampire virus does not kill, but it results in death. It is designed to change the host into a more efficient specimen. Cooking meat and harvesting vegetables is not the most convenient way to survive. Digesting animals and plants to absorb their nutrients is a waste of time. The easiest way to live is to take what your body needs directly from the blood of another creature. When the majority of your own species is still digesting their food like a bunch of chumps, the best way to ensure you get all the nutrients your body needs is to feed off one of your own kind. The virus cannot comprehend human morality. It does not understand why someone would be reluctant to drink the blood of another person. After thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of years with human hosts, the bug evolved to ensure its own survival. The virus greatly amplifies the predatory instinct in human beings. If the host refuses to hunt on moral grounds it will die of starvation. The bug is quite committed to ensuring that its host survives.
The reason I took the hospital’s hematology fellowship and started pretending to study anemia was because of yet another stunning medical breakthrough. While antibiotics have been used for quite some time to kill bacteria, the development of antiviral medication did not start until the late 20th century. Thousands of scientists with billions of dollars worth of funding have designed antivirals to attack HIV, influenza, herpes and many other viruses. Building on their research, I had spent years developing my own custom built antiviral. After centuries of hard work and research, I was finally on the verge of curing vampirism.
Chapter Three: Nocturnal Emissions
Although I was encouraged by the progress I was making towards a cure, I was perfectly happy to leave the hospital when my shift was over. It had been a grueling workweek, and I was looking forward to having the weekend off. I did not need much time to physically recuperate after a rough week, but I always liked to keep my weekends open for hunting.
I lived in a nice apartment complex in a fairly affluent part of town. My apartment had plenty of space that I did not need, and a huge bedroom that I rarely used. After the glorified rat’s nest I had called home in New York, I had decided to splurge on my new place when I moved to Starside. My apartment was at the far end of one row, bordering only one other apartment and an empty field. This allowed me a little more privacy, for which I was thankful. All the apartments in the complex had attached garages, which was essential for my comings and goings. It was past midnight when I got home on that day, so the sun’s deadly rays were not a concern. I left my garage door open after parking, and I walked across the street to retrieve my mail from the box.
“Evening, Mr. Whittier.”
I turned to find a young black man wearing dark slacks and a Chicago White Sox jacket on the other side of the street. He would have been invisible to most humans given the dim light, but my predatory eyes could make him out clearly. Though it would have been a terrifying encounter for most Caucasians to run into a black man dressed the way he was after midnight, I was actually delighted to see him. I retrieved my mail, locked the box and moved quickly back across the street.
“Anthony, buddy, you’re killing me,” I responded. “I’m not that much older than you are,” I lied. “Start calling me Nick so I don’t feel like I’m ancient. And if I ever catch you calling me sir, so help me God...”
For the sake of accuracy, I think I should explain something at this point. In case you were wondering, no I was not stupid enough to use the same name for every aspect of my life. Nicholas Whittier is my original name. It is the name I was given when I was born, the name used at my trial and the name that will soon be printed on my tombstone. It would be impractical to use that name consistently. If one of my police colleagues had Googled my name and found an article I wrote in a medical journal or discovered my name attached to a high profile legal case, I would have been in big trouble. Anyone curious could find that name in centuries-old public records in a matter of seconds thanks to modern technology. I was using four different aliases at the time: one as a doctor, one as a lawyer, one as a cop and one for my apartment life just to be on the safe side. I got used to switching these names around every time I moved to a new community. This practice occurred every fifteen years or so. Any more time than that in one place and people started to seriously wonder why I did not look any older than when they had met me. So, long story short, I replaced all the aliases in this book with Nick Whittier so it is less confusing for the readers.
“Sorry, Nick,” Anthony apologized. “How was work? Did you cure cancer yet?”
I did not socialize with many of my neighbors in the apartment complex. I always found it safer to minimize my personal relationships. For those who I was forced to make chit chat with, I had decided that medicine would by my official profession. My conversations with Anthony often went beyond small talk though. I had befriended the young man six months earlier when he moved in next door to me. He was a nice kid, and I found it easy to interact with him. Though he dressed like a Crip, he spoke like a Huxtable.
“Anemia,” I clarified. “Technically we already have a cure I’m just researching… stuff that would bore you to tears. What are you doing home so early on a Friday night? Young, rich kid like you should be out partying.”
“I didn’t really feel like going out tonight,” he responded sheepishly. “I’m trying to spruce up my apartment, but the painting I bought is giving me trouble.”
“Debating where to put it?” I guessed.
Anthony shook his head. “I know where I want it; I’m just having trouble hanging it. I ran an internet search for ‘how to find a stud’ but all the results were gay porn.”
“I can give you a hand,” I said after a good laugh. “I’ll be over in a minute after I take the mail in.”
Anthony thanked me and retreated to his apartment as I entered my own. I tossed my keys on the kitchen counter and was only halfway done sorting through my mail when I felt a familiar sensation on my leg. I looked down into the expectant eyes of an eight-year-old calico cat.
“Hello, Oliver XLVIII,” I greeted the animal in a ridiculously high-pitched voice. “Did you miss me? Daddy wanted to come home this afternoon, but he had to meet with a dickhead lawyer. Yes he did! Daddy would very much like to eat that lawyer, but that lawyer is very influential and people would ask a lot of questions if he went missing. Yes they would! Even if the police didn’t think Daddy was a suspect, they’d start poking their noses into Daddy’s life, which would be bad.”
Oliver XLVIII purred in delight as I picked him up and ran my hand over his back. At least I think he was the forty-eighth cat I had by that name. I lost track during the seventeenth century for a time, but forty-eight was probably a pretty good estimate. I always enjoyed having an animal in my life. Dogs required too much attention, but cats were independent enough that I did not feel bad if I left them alone for a long time. Given how much time I spent away from home, cats were always a perfect match for me. I suppose I could have gotten a bird or something… but what would be the point? They just sit in a cage all day long. Anyway, cats provided an emotional connection for me that was so often lacking in my relationships with other humans. My cats never judged me when I left home dressed all in black. They never scolded me when I came home smelling of blood and sweat. The cats just wanted me to feed them.
“You just want me to feed you.” I said to the animal.
Oliver XLVIII jumped out of my arms and ran to his bowl. Animal behavior was one of the few things I had not studied, so I never knew if he was reacting to the words I spoke or just my tone of voice. I grabbed the bag of cat food from the cabinet underneath the kitchen sink and filled his bowl up. Having gotten what he wanted, Oliver XLVIII ignored me and tore into the processed nutrients.
I looked around my apartment’s living room out of habit. Nothing was out of place or required my attention. The single fake plant near the door did not require watering and did little to spruce up the place. The room was Spartan, consisting of only a couch and a ten-year-old television. I never had company over and so had no need for extra seating. The sheer number of cat toys and scratch posts made it look more like Oliver’s apartment than mine. Since he was home alone so much of the time, I felt obligated to spoil the animal.
After patting my cat on the head I left my apartment, walked next door and entered without knocking. I found Anthony standing in the center of his living room with his hands on his hips. I knew a little about art, and I could tell that the painting that was leaning against his wall was an expensive piece. He could certainly afford it. Although he was only nineteen-years-old, I wagered that he had more money accumulated than I did. Anthony did not brag about his success, but his windfall had been widely publicized. He had designed a social networking website shortly after hitting puberty. The website allowed students at various schools to connect with each other, share photographs, send messages and even start relationships. It was completely abandoned once Facebook started, but Anthony had wisely sold the website for several million dollars before that happened. Now the young man had plenty of time on his hands and no worries. He had told me about a new piece of software he was designing, but the specifics went way over my head.
