Jared had a slow start Monday morning. Slower than usual, that is, for the aches and pains that plagued him. It was like middle school, all over again. Sunday he'd spent most of in bed, willfully ignoring his alarms. The analog ones had gone off again after twelve hours, to the fury of his neighbor.

He was later than usual, walking through the doors of the office of Lou's Paper. That was the actual name of the paper. Jared had thrown it out there, while eavesdropping in the next row of an English class years ago, when Lou had been confessing his dream of starting a newspaper to Rose.

"Yeah? Whaddya gonna call it? 'Loose Paper?'"

He had been joking, but Lou had liked it.

Lou was a conspiracy theorist, and his paper was his mission to spread the truth to the people.

Jared was not a conspiracy theorist, and he struggled with his job.

His boss understood that the lofty heights of Jared's moral high ground impaired his ability to disseminate the truth, and so confined his writing to boring, highly factual filler, which his colorful style couldn't help but spice up a little. Lou didn't like Jared any more than Jared liked Lou, but he also understood that, having spent most of his childhood in communion with a book, Jared knew what sounded good, and so he was kept around for editing, which was his primary function.

This worked well enough in their arrangement, as it was further understood that Jared was not a morning person, and the schedule was such that there was usually something for him to edit by the time he made it in.

For all this, Lou insisted on Jared's being on time for his coming in late, as he loved the opportunity to blow up at him for his laziness.

Jared slouched into his desk chair, clicked on the fan, and reviewed the day's assignments. Some research needed on the ramifications of the impending technical apocalypse of the new millennium. Follow up on yet another article on the cultist origins of the Ross family fortune. Edit the horoscopes. He sighed.

There were more important things on his mind today. He stretched his sore muscles, flashing back to last night's confrontation. One thing at least was clear. He'd taken this too lightly. If he was going to do it again, he had better go in better prepared. The more he knew, the safer he'd be.

Fishing a copy of the latest weekly from a stack, he reviewed the headline article. "MAN WITNESS TO VAMPIRE KILLING??" His focus derailed as he began to read it. Lou had nixed his edits around the "alleged"-ness of certain aspects of the story, and to the tie-ins to a supposed city-wide vampire killings cover-up angle.

Why do I bother?

He had thought about quitting, of course. Had nearly done so, even, despite the fact he could scarcely afford to, after a particularly flagrant article on the flat Earth model went out without his some of his edits. But Rose always talked him down.

"It's people like you need to be working there, Jer," she would say. "You keep 'em honest. Think what it'd be like without you."

With this in mind, he did what he could. For any introduction that was, by some chance, written well, he took it upon himself to "bury the lede," stashing juicy tidbits under a few lines of dryer ones, where they would be less likely to hold the eye of a newsstand's passerby. Lou had yet to get wise.

Shaking his head, he refocused on the content in front of him. The story was based on the report of a homeless man, accustomed to panhandling out of Midtown, who, after a late night, had been on his way back to the cardboard he called home, when he'd seen something unnatural.

He'd been on the streets for years, but ever since an issue headlined by supposed missing POWs caught his eye at a newsstand one day, he'd been a fan of Lou's work. So naturally, when it came to a tale the police would never take seriously, he turned to his favorite paper.

Last week Jared had assumed the man had been, if not off his rocker, at least jumping to conclusions, but now he rather thought he had been. The description of the scene was all too familiar.

A deserted area after dark. Suspicious figures. A body. Blood.

The article consisted largely of an interview with Suzanne Fillmore, its author, which had left little Jared could do to improve it.

"It was really dark," the man was quoted as saying. "The streetlights were out. But I saw the guy lying there, not moving. I almost tripped over him. Not that that's unusual, mind, for a guy to be lying there, but like I said, I almost tripped over him. And he didn't move. So I think, gee, maybe he's dead. Or dead drunk. Or maybe he's on the drugs. [...] But then this ambulance comes out of nowhere. No sirens or nothing. Just pulls up, and two guys hop out with one of them wheeled stretcher things. And I get real uneasy like, not sure why, so I keep back, in the dark. [...] But they start scouting around with flashlights, and they were coming at me, one of them was, with the flashlight beam going back and forth, closer and closer, sweeping up to where I was standing, and I couldn't see anything but this dark shape with the blinding light, and somehow I started to feel like I was under fire. I was seizing up, ready to run, and then a deep voice says, 'Found him,' and I tell you, my blood froze solid. But they had found the guy on the ground. So the one getting close to me went off to help the other guy, and they got him onto the stretcher and get him in the back. Still no sirens, and off they go. So I figure, the guy must've been dead."

"That's very interesting," Sue had editorialized, "but what was it that particularly struck you as odd?"

"Well it was what I saw when they were getting him onto the stretcher thing. They had the light on in the back, and I could see he was really white, I'm telling you death-white. And there was blood on his neck. [...]"

"Can you talk about the blood more?"

"Well it was just in one place. And all running down. But not anymore. All dry and sticky-looking. But like he got cut there. Bad."

"And what was it you said about his face?"

"Oh! It was an awful look, like—like he'd seen the Devil himself! Only here was the really strange thing—like I said he was totally death-white, but not like a body usually gets. More like he'd bled out. [...] But I didn't see any mess of blood around, or on his clothes. Just his neck. And this guy hadn't been there long, either, on account of the body being limp when they got it put away. The arms hanging down. Not stiff with death. But anyway I only saw it all for a second. Those two guys got him put away fast."

"Did they see you?"

"No, I don't think they saw me. I don't think I'd be here talking to you if they'd seen me, if you know what I mean."

The article got worse from there. Jared finished it anyway, then sat back in his chair and scratched his neck. It had been put to print for the weekly issue, but it promised a follow-up with more detail and snatches of dialogue. As it was, it wasn't much to go on. Hazy descriptions of two men in a suspicious ambulance. One "tall," one "probably Asian." The tall one could be the vampire, but it could as easily not be. The homeless man's name had been withheld, but he could ask Sue about him.

Lou swaggered past, returning from a coffee run, a scowl materializing as he caught sight of Jared. "About fucking time, Stern," he greeted him.

"Are we holding orgies here now?"

Lou blinked at him. Jared watched his gears turn. The scowl rematerialized as they clicked into place. "Keep your lip to yourself."

"I wasn't planning on joining."

Lou was about to retort when he noticed the paper in Jared's hands. "The fuck are you doing, looking at last week's issue? We got work to do, chop chop!"

"Yeah, sorry. I'll cook something up."

Lou scowled deeper and stalked away.

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"Hey Sue."

It was after hours, but she was still typing. She looked up from the mess of posted notes and memos that was her desk. "Hey?"

"Uh, yeah, I was wondering...about that guy you interviewed the other day?"

Her eyes lit up. "The vampire guy? Was that cool or what? We've never gotten such a solid lead on the vampire cover-up!" Her enthusiasm dipped. "Oh but I was supposed to follow up with him today! I thought of a lot more questions."

Jared waited for this thought to complete, but it already had. "And? What'd he say?"

"Oh I didn't find him. He said he panhandles on 60th and Park, but there was no one there. I mean there were people there, but not him."

"A homeless guy, taking the day off?" A suspicion had taken a cold hold in his stomach. An image surfaced in his mind, of a form slumped motionless before an alley wall. "Did he give you anything else to find him by?"

She shrugged. "No, just the panhandling spot. The hell's he gonna do, gimme an address?"

"You didn't, um, did anyone else know about where to find him?"

"No. Who else would know? Aside from like, everyone who passes him every single day."

"Did uh, did anyone unusual stop by on Friday?" Jared's eye had caught on the yellow notepad at the top of one of her stacks. On the street corner written in her loopy hand, over top the double-underlined note: "vampire cover up??".

"Well there was someone," she replied. "A fan. Said he read one of my articles. He bought like every copy I had to distribute at his office. Said he just had to stop by after work, to say how much he liked it." She blushed, remembering, then turned back on him. "I have fans," she informed him, in case he'd missed this point.

"Uh, course you do. What'd he look like?"

"Ohmigod he was gorgeous. I mean, tall, dark, and handsome, expensive suit, greeeat physique, the full package. Not married, either! No ring. Can you believe it? I bet he's gay."

Jared had stopped listening. Sue's lack of journalistic talent in no way impeded her enthusiasm for the craft, and she often worked late. Still, the street was busy at all hours, and Lou was usually around. "You dunno anything about this guy. You should be careful when weird guys come around here."

"He wasn't weird. He was less weird than you."

"Just—just please be careful, Sue."

"Aw. I didn't know you cared."

"Hey I'm serious. What if—what if he's a vampire?"

Sue gave a hysterical giggle. "That'd be my luck!"

He pressed his lips together. Should he tell her? Of course he could. She'd believe him for sure, that is once she realized he wasn't making fun of her. And he'd end up on the front page of the next issue...and that was evidently not a good idea. Keeping vampires out of the paper from here on out was in the best interest of them all. "Hey what do we have on the, um, the vampire cover-up?"

"Oh loads. I mean, nothing as hot as this eyewitness report, but loads of sightings over the years."

"Years? This isn't new?"

"The vampires aren't new. They've been here for decades." Her eyes widened. "Probably even centuries!"

"But no one ever got around to causing a panic...not enough evidence? But wait, then what's happening to the bodies? I mean creepy ambulances or no, someone's gotta notice tons of bodies drained of blood."

"Oh there are loads of possibilities!" Sue enthused, ticking them off on her fingers. "There's the bay, of course, the old 'swim with the fishes,' and there's incineration, there's Hart Island, you know, the one the city uses as a potter's field—they had a fire at the records office in the '70s, very suspicious—and there's dismemberment with burying, or just burying in the woods, there's cannibalism, and there's feeding to dogs, the flesh-eating bacteria the government developed, or maybe they all rise as vampires themselves, and did you know you can break bodies down with acid? Leaves hardly a trace!"

Jared was rapidly becoming uncomfortable with the amount of thought Sue had given this.

"And then of course there's the most obvious explanation."

He waited for it.

"The aliens? I mean think about it. A perfect pipeline. Human bodies, ripe for experimentation, sucked up in the tractor beams every night! The perfect crime! No evidence!"

"Yeeeaah. No evidence..."

She caught his wince and scowled. "Really, why do you even work here? When you can't appreciate the evidence we're collecting every day."

"I guess I just don't have a probing mind."

"Oh leave me alone, would you?" she snapped. "I've got work to do."

Jared grimaced and went to pack it in for the day.

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There was still the question of the files, Jared thought, on the subway home, of whatever else Sue had on the vampire cover-up. He'd have to ask her later.

When I haven't alienated her.

In the meantime, there was the matter of Saturday. He'd been putting off thinking about it, but little shocks of anxiety were starting to crop up whenever he remembered the approaching duel. He needed a plan.

Gowanus. He'd been through there, on some of his longer walks, wandering from Prospect Park to the water, but he couldn't picture the building the vampire had mentioned. He'd want the whole day to explore the power station, to get a feel for it and check for traps, which meant he'd have to cancel on Rose. He sighed.

In the dingy lobby of his apartment building, he stopped to check his watch. She should be back from work by now. He went to the payphone, fed it a quarter, and punched in her number off the scrap of paper in his wallet. A few rings later, she answered.

"Hello?"

"Hey Rose, it's me."

"Jer! Whassup! ...everything okay?"

"Uh, yeah, it's fine, I just—"

"Hey how'd it go with the cops?"

"Huh?"

"Uh, that murder you saw?"

"Oh! Right. Fine. I mean, it's taken care of."

"Cool. Look I been meaning to ask ya, we been planning to go to the beach this Saturday. I forget to tell you when you ran off."

"Oh."

"Uh, so you coming or what?"

"I—I can't make it. I have other plans."

Rose started coughing. "Say what? You got an important book to read? You can do that at the beach."

"What—no! I have a social life! ...aside from you."

She perked up. "It's a date?"

"Wha—god no!"

"Oh. 'Kay... How long's this mystery thing gonna take?"

"All day. ...and all night," he added, before she could mention the marshmallow roast.

"All day and all night? The hell are you doing? Replacing your wardrobe?" She sounded hopeful.

"Leave my wardrobe out of it. It's Narnia business."

"Excuse me?"

"Uh, sorry. It was a joke."

"Well thank god I don't get it. You hit me with one I get, and I'm hanging up on you, understand?"

"Uh, so anyway, next Saturday?"

"Aight. We been planning the beach for then too, okay?"

"Okay."

"And no running off this time."

"Yeah, well, I don't need to cop out anymore."

She hung up on him.

Jared returned the receiver to the hook and headed for the stairs. It wouldn't be dark for another hour or so, but he didn't feel like being caught out on a walk. He locked himself in his apartment and paced the narrow floor space, frowning out the window at the dark gaps between the surrounding buildings. His body was still recovering from the last encounter, and he felt no better prepared, and yet...he'd granted the vampire an entire week to carry on its murderous life, while he hid inside.

Fetching his violin from the desk, Jared stretched himself out on the bed, leaned back against the headboard, and drowned his worries in a melody.