When the sirens cut out Reggie was more than grateful. Humans seemed to need things so loud. No one further challenged her on the way to the control room, in fact the corridors were suspiciously empty.

"Where is everyone?" she asked David.

"I have a diversion running on the floor above," David replied. "That's where they thought we were concentrating our attack and I've cut off their communications, so most of them still think that."

"How should I know," Sorin said at the same time, clearly thinking Reggie was talking to him.

She did not bother to correct him.

Outside the control room were two more soldiers, one woman and one man. Both had more familiar darts sticking out of their necks. While Reggie and her family might have been willing to kill supernaturals who went up against them, they had a strict policy of only killing humans when they could not avoid it.

The door opened as soon as they reached it and Reggie pushed Sorin through it. Inside was a reasonably large control room with screens and computers, six people she did not know, and four she did.

"'Bout time you got here," said one of them.

"Not all of us had weapons," Reggie replied in her best offhand tone, "we had to improvise."

That was the kind of relationship she had with most of her relatives, and Quin grinned at her. Technically he was her great grandfather, but he had always been more like an older brother. It wasn't as if any of those in the family with their talents looked older than their early twenties at the oldest.

"Who're your friends?" her grandfather Abe asked from where he was covering everyone in the room with a mean looking gun.

It could fire darts or real bullets at the flick of a switch and several people were eyeing it worriedly.

"This is Sorin," Reggie introduced, "and he seems to work here even though he has fangs, and I first met him in a cage. The woman behind me is Magda and, thanks to these morons, she is now my wolf."

"Welcome to the clan, Magda," the head of the family greeted as she walked around the side of one of the computer terminals.

Wilhelmina Harker was not a large person in stature, but there was no escaping her presence.

"Who the hell are you people?" one of their prisoners finally demanded.

"We could ask the same of you," Mina replied.

"Interpol," one of the women spoke up. "I am Director Lan of Special Division 5."

"That would explain your access to records," Reggie observed.

"You didn't answer my question," the man who had first spoken said.

"And you are?" Mina asked.

"Major Baron," the man replied, "British Intelligence on secondment. And?"

"My name is Wilhelmina Harker, previously Murry," Mina replied and waited for the inevitable reaction.

"You seriously expect us to believe that?" Baron scoffed.

"You know Dracula is real, but you won't believe you're talking to the real Mina?" Reggie asked, her tone scathing.

Her opinion of the man was going down quickly.

"Stoker's account has been shown to be highly inaccurate," Baron replied.

"That's because he was a hack who read private journals and made the rest up," Mina said, "but you must have checked my records by now."

"And you died in 1931," Lan pointed out.

"It was becoming hard to explain my lack of ageing," Mina replied. "I moved and reinvented myself as my own cousin. My husband had been dead ten years and my children were old enough to be independent."

"Your husband died in 1921?" Lan asked.

"He never completely recovered his full strength after his contact with Dracula's wives," Mina replied. "It took him from us too soon."

"Dad was the one who figured out some of us are not like the others," Quin said, "and he and Mum were the brains behind our organisation."

"You're all Harkers?" That came from Sorin.

"The traits I inherited from Dracula pass to one of my descendants each generation," Mina stepped in.

"But you're not old enough to be outside his influence," Sorin said.

Mina walked over to him, looking at him carefully. Her great-great-grandmother had certain gifts the rest of them didn't. With each generation their abilities changed.

"But you are," Mina said. "When did Dracula sire you?"

Sorin did not look happy with that revelation.

"I really wouldn't tell her it's none of her business if I were you," Reggie said, just to be helpful.

"1497," Sorin said after something of a resentful silence.

"You're one of his early children," Abe said, sounding shocked.

Reggie had read about the early brood in restricted Vatican documents, just like her grandfather. Most of them were supposed to be dead, either killed by Dracula himself, or having succumbed to bloodlust so badly they had become easy prey for human hunters. Her estimation of Sorin went up again, and his involvement made more sense.

"So you teamed up with humans before Dracula gets to you for his army, then?" Reggie said.

"I have not killed a human in over three hundred years," Sorin replied. "I 'teamed up', as you put it, because I despise most of my own kind. Killing is entirely unnecessary and most vampires do it because they like it. I will see Dracula dead before I join his ranks."

It sounded like a very noble cause, but Reggie was pretty sure there was a goodly amount of self-interest in the whole arrangement as well. In fact, it made her more comfortable with the idea, because altruism could be a changeable thing.

"You can't kill Dracula," she said.

"He's a vampire, all vampires can die," Baron broke in.

"Three times people have tried to end him and failed," Quin pointed out. "Once when he first came into being, Van Helsing, and we have a report of someone trying a little over twenty years ago."

Reggie caught the look that passed between Lan and Sorin at that.

"That was you," she said.

"We were less well organised back then," Lan said.

"It won't make any difference," Reggie insisted, "you can't kill Dracula."

She could tell they didn't believe her.