"Warriors, come out and play..." Beatrice's voice sang, fully off-key, hollow and echoing off the walls. That was followed by a scream of rage, and then the deafening KLAT-KLAT-KLAT as Dreadlocks opened fire with his BFG.

All I could do was stare at the horror show that was Enzo of the formerly-blue tie. For a second, I wondered what Beatrice had done with his jaw. Had she kept it or just chucked it aside like some useless bit of garbage?

Tattoo opened fire, shooting at something I couldn't see, the gunshots adding to the already deafening staccato of gunfire that was threatening to become my entire existence. It seemed like it would never end.

Trenchcoat yelled something that I couldn't hear.

It might have been "Kill the bitch!" Or maybe something else equally aggressive. It didn't matter, because there was just a wall of noise and the bitter chemical taste of cordite from the gun-smoke that hung heavy in the air.

And through it all, poor fucked-up Enzo stumbled towards us, a glazed look on his face, his vampire healing ability useless to do anything for him except keep him alive and awake to suffer. He brought the spectre of suffering with him, but most of all, he brought fear, and it was beginning spread.

Fear is a motherfucker.

I can't remember who said that to me. Maybe I'm only just making it up right now, and I'm thinking that it sounds so much like a line that I had to have heard it somewhere. It doesn't matter anyway, and that's because it is so true.

Fear is a motherfucker, and it will remind any man or woman what it feels like to be small and powerless. It will take no prisoners, just force the horrible reality into our faces that we're all going to die and yes, it's going be a fucking bloodbath.

This isn't the regular fear of dying, of course. This isn't the fear you carry around with you your entire life, from the moment you realize that a random act of violence or happenstance can wipe you off the face of the planet. That kind of fear just lurks and eventually becomes part of you, and you forget about it. No, this is the other type of fear, the one that keeps us from venturing too deeply into dark places, keeps us praying that there really is nothing hiding in the closet. It's the kind of fear that whispers in your ear that yes, there is something in the closet and it's got claws, such claws...

You can either be the cowering creatures, sacred of the dark, or you can be the thing in the darkness that everyone is terrified of.

Which brings me to my girlfriend, in case you were wondering what all of this preamble was about.

It turns out Beatrice is what the things in the dark are terrified of...

The firing stopped all at once, the silence shocking and only underscored by the ringing in my ears. There was a huge number of brass casings scattered around Tattoo's feet, and I wondered if Dreadlocks was now waist-deep from the amount of firepower he had been laying down.

Trenchcoat looked down at me, and she just looked so tired, but here's the kicker: she also looked disappointed in me.

"Your girlfriend is a monster," she said, with a flat dullness, and it was a small wonder that I actually heard her. I rubbed my knuckle in my ear, and the ear popped.

"What?" I asked, pointing to my ear. The ringing was already fading.

"Your girlfriend is a monster," she irritably repeated. "This is what she does."

I glanced at poor Enzo and opened my mouth to respond, maybe something witty or pithy. Or maybe even to agree with her. I never got a chance.

BLAM!

There was a wet splat and Trenchcoat was drenched in blood and reddish-white blobs that my brain refused to identify

(brains)

for what they were, instantly trying to classify them as 'jello,' but I knew that was wrong, so wrong. All I could think of was blood and jello and how this kid I knew back in high school used to pour milk into his jello, and why was I even thinking about that anyway?

I dared to look back, only to see Enzo topple forward onto what remained of his face. Half of his head was missing. Actually, that's a lie: it wasn't missing, just no longer in his head. It was instead covering and dripping down the front of Trenchcoat from the waist up.

That almost took me over the edge into the delightful land of throwing up. It wasn't even the gore that set me off, though. It was the thought that it was Beatrice who had been responsible for the carnage, for the horror, a full reminder of exactly how monstrous she was capable of being. It was the thought that I was already making excuses for her in my head—

Tattoo raised his gun reflexively towards where the shot had come from. He looked puzzled for a second.

"Where's Marcus?" Tattoo asked with concern. "I can't see Marcus anymore!" He yelled out at the garage: "MARCUS!"

A well-muscled arm with dark-brown skin came sailing through the air, one end torn and grisly, bone jutting out from the end, blood trailing its flight. It landed with a meaty thud in front of us, the hand smacking into the concrete.

"Give me back my boyfriend!" Beatrice yelled and man she sounded pissed off. "You've got ten seconds!"

Trenchcoat ripped the mask from her face and threw it down onto the floor, clearly wanting nothing to do with the mask or the blood that now soaked through the black fabric. Her eyes flicked up to meet mine, and there was nothing but rage and sorrow in them.

"Get the van," she said to Tattoo. "We have to get the fuck out of here."

I knew the face staring back at me. I knew it well, and at any other time, I would have burst into tears from sheer relief, absolute joy. This was not one of those times. She grabbed me by my jacket and easily pulled me to my feet, reminding me how strong she was. From the corner of my eye, I saw Tattoo running off towards the van, gun at the ready.

"You asshole!" Louise, my friend and maker yelled into my face. The disappointment and anger in her eyes told a whole story. "Of all the women you had to go and fuck, why did it have to be her?"

"Well, nice to see you too Louise," I said in a surprisingly level voice, surprising even myself. I didn't even try to pull away. I might still have been in shock. "Glad to see you're not dead."

"Oh cut the shit Bob," Louise snapped at me. "You have to know what Beatrice is really like! She's a fucking monster!"

"That's it!" Beatrice yelled. "I'm ripping this fucker's other arm off—"

"Hold on Beatrice!" I found myself yelling. "I'm having a moment here!"

"Seriously Bob? I'm trying to rescue you!"

"This is very personal for me, okay? It's the most fucked up reunion of my life, and I'm not sure how I feel about it yet." I smiled nervously at Louise, not sure if she even wanted the reunion. Maybe she wouldn't even feel any way about putting a bullet in my head.

"Well... okay," Beatrice demurred. "Have your reunion! But thirty-seconds and then I'm killing these motherfuckers."

"Sounds fair!" I turned back to Louise, satisfied at a job well done. "You should probably run right about now, you know. She really wants to kill you guys."

Louise looked at me carefully, as if she were looking into my soul.

"Did you actually just call a timeout? You do know this is a firefight?"

I found myself nodding deliriously. I clasped my hands together to stop them from shaking too much, but it wasn't enough to quell the fear that was rising in me.

"Dunno if we'll get the chance to talk," I said. "One of you is going to die tonight, and I honestly don't know who I want to win. I mean, at least I know what I get with Beatrice: constant terror masquerading as a relationship in which I'm afraid to fuck up, or there's you, lying about being dead and beating up me and my friends in dark alleys. I don't think I've even met the real you, so there's that?"

Louise shrugged and peeked out to see if Beatrice was making a move. "This is stupid," she snapped. "We are not having a heart to heart about me dying, especially right now."

An engine roared to life, and Louise glanced in the direction, eyes scanning the garage for trouble. Tattoo reversed the van away from the door and immediately began the process of turning the van around.

"This is your fault, you know," I said to Louise, and she raised an eyebrow. "If you hadn't gone and gotten yourself dead, I wouldn't have fallen in with Beatrice. We wouldn't be here right now. In this garage. With a gun pointed in my general vicinity."

"I dunno," Louise said. "I think you would have still fucked her. You have a seriously fucked up love life, you know that?"

I glared at her, irritation taking over now. I noticed that my hand had stopped shaking, but my heart was pounding in my chest. It felt like I was waiting for disaster to strike. I tried to focus.

"Was everything I knew about you a lie?" I asked suddenly.

"We don't have time for this," Louise said, and then she punched me in the face. Or at least that was what she had intended to do. She punched, and somehow I saw it coming. I easily moved out of the way, stepping back out of punching and kicking distance.

"What the fuck was that?" I practically shrieked at her, dancing back out of punching distance. "You tried to knock me out!"

"I did no such thing!"

"You totally did!"

"Well, I can't trust you! You've seen what Beatrice is capable of with her glammer." Louise hissed. "I don't know if she owns you."

"OI!" Beatrice yelled from behind us. Louise and I both turned, my heart beating just a little harder.

Beatrice stood behind Dreadlocks, using him as a shield. The stump where his missing arm had been previously attached, spurted blood that looked impossibly red. Dreadlocks stared at the stump as if Beatrice had just performed the greatest magic trick in the world.

"Thirty seconds," Beatrice said. "Time to die."

Louise pressed a gun against my ear, and I froze.

"Any closer and I paint the walls with his brains," Louise yelled back.

I scoffed and looked back at Louise in disbelief. "You're not going to shoot me," I told her, then turned back to Beatrice. "She's not going to shoot—"

BLAM!

Louise barely moved her hand, but there was a searing pain at the side of my head, and I had gone deaf in one ear. I clapped one hand to my ear, but there was only a mangled, bloody mess.

"You shot me!" I whispered. "Friends don't shoot friends."

BLAM!

I looked down at the growing red stain in the middle of my chest, not sure what had just happened, but suddenly finding it hard to breathe. I lost all feeling in my legs and sunk to my knees.

"Stop shooting my boyfriend!" Beatrice snarled, and she made her move. It was amazing to watch as she unfurled the sword from behind her with one hand, the other hand shoving Dreadlocks in front of her into a stumbling run.

Louise raised her gun and calmly walked forward, squeezing the trigger over and over again at the swiftly approaching Beatrice. Bullets thudded into the running figure of Dreadlocks, one catching him in the kneecap and sending him sprawling, leaving Beatrice exposed, but it was as if she knew exactly where the bullets were going to be, and she was getting closer with every step, the sword coming around at Louise's head. For the first time, Louise seemed to lose her cool and leaned back to dodge Beatrice's sword, panic on her face, fear that she was going to die finally taking over.

Beatrice turned the sword to slash down—

Louise pulled out a stiletto switchblade and in one motion, stabbed Beatrice right in the eyeball. Beatrice froze, and Louise slammed the base of her palm against the hilt of the knife, one, two, three times; the blade slammed through flesh and bone and protruded from the back of Beatrice's skull.

And just like that, it was over.

Beatrice collapsed on the ground next to me, the stilletto still lodged into her eye, the other eye open and staring. Dead.

I stared back, not really hearing anything, not feeling anything anymore. Louise was trying to say something to me, even put her hand on my shoulder, but I shoved her away.

When she and her friends drove off, I didn't even notice.

I don't even remember picking up Beatrice's body.

I just remember holding her close and not feeling her heartbeat anymore.