GUEST BLOGGER: Royston Blake - "Blakey on tour Part 8"

(A story in n parts. Part one here)

'I don't think you understand, Jock,' I says, staring at the corpse.

It were quite interesting because no blood were coming out of where he'd rammed the stake. I knowed it were dead quite a while now, and the blood dried up or replaced by special vampire blood or summat, but it were still a strange sight to see.

'It's you who disnae understand, Royston,' says Jock, sharpening another stake. 'You and all the other cunts aroond here. I'm giving you a chance, here. If you come in with me noo, and help me do what must be done, yis'll be a hero. The world will praise the name of Royston Blake, who wis the assistant of James McCrae, the great vampire eradicator.'

'No, I'm on about the hearse, Jock. I don't think you understand how much I needs it. It ain't just the pulling power them hearses have got, I could also do with the space in the back. When I goes on holiday I takes a lot o' gear, know what I mean? Who's this James McCrae, by the way?'

Jock had the half bottle of Bells out again, uncapping it and taking a swig. He held it out to us, spilling a bit. 'Yis'll need this.'

I frowned at it. 'Don't take this the wrong way, Jock, but I'm gonna say no this time. I got refined taste buds, see, and you can damage em if you drinks cheap shite like this. I drink Famous Grouse or fuck all.'

'It's no for yis taste buds, ye wee fuckin' bampot - it's to line yis blood. Vampires cannae drink blood that is lined with Bells whisky, which is a holy spirit.'

I took it and had a closer gander. 'Is that what they mean, then, when they're on about holy spirits in prayers and that?'

'Aye it's what they mean. It's a coded message - they're tryin' tae send us a public warning aboot protection from vampires. They dinnae want us to know the full facts, Royston. But I found them. And do yis ken what? I'm no standin' for it. Nor are yis.'

I sniffed the whisky, wondering who the fuck Ken is. Seemed to be a lot of folks I didn't know tied up in this. 'Cos when they says the holy spirit,' I says, getting back to the subject of prayers, 'I always pictured a massive ghost, with a big white sheet and—'

'Drink up, will yis!'

I necked some whisky. I'll be frank with you and say that Jock were making me a bit nervous. But he didn't half know a lot, didn't he? I found it amazing how he'd worked all this shite out on his todd. And him foreign. 'This Bells ain't so bad, Jock, once you gets used to it. Got any more?'

'Aye I got more. I got these wee fuckers.'

He were sat on a small chest of drawers, and he reached down and pulled the top one right out and dumped it on the floor. Inside was about a dozen wooden stakes like the ones I'd seen so far. He pulled the other two drawers out and they was full of em too.

'These are the tools of battle, Royston,' he says, picking one up and holding it aloft, like he wanted it blessed by the strip light he had up there. 'With these, and the Bells, there's no stopping us. The evil ones widnae stand a fuckin' chance.'

'I been thinkin' about that, Jock,' I says, draining the bottle. 'These evil ones, or badgers of the night or whatever, where exactly are they? I mean, is you saying they'm all in that place where I got the hearse? Cos I gotta tell you - I been watching that place a while now, eyeing up that hearse of theirs, and I don't see much coming and going.'

'Och, no – that place is the inner sanctum.' He got a couple of carrier bags and started stuffing them with stakes while he talked. 'Him in there, he's the queen fuckin' bee o' the entire operation. We'll deal with that cunt last, dinnae you fuckin' worry. First, we've the drones tae deal with. We eradicate them, and the queen fuckin' bee, and the whole evil hoose of cards will collapse. See, when the vampire who turned yis into a vampire gets destroyed, youse gets destroyed too.'

'Eh? I gets destroyed?'

'No, the hypothetical youse, yis fuckin' eejit. Now come oan.'

He grabbed the bags, now stuffed with about eight stakes apiece, unlocked the door and peered out, looking left and right and up towards the sky, which were now black like I couldn't recall ever seeing it. He handed me one of the bags. 'Take these,' he says. 'Yis drive the fucker under the ribcage, angling it like so. Reet? Then stand well back and watch him turn tae dust before yis very eyes.'

I looked over me shoulder at the one stretched out on the bench. 'So, erm, how come that one there never...?'

But Jock had bailed out, leaving the door swinging behind him.

I followed.

'You got a map or summat?' I says, catching up with him. He were crossing the road, heading back the way we'd come. 'I mean, say we get split up, we gotta know where the drones—'

'The drones are all in the one place. You dinnae need a fuckin' map.'

'Aye but we still might get split up. The coppers'll be... erm, Jock?'

He'd turned off the road into the frontage of one of them condemned houses with the boarded up windows. Looking more close, it were only the front window that were boarded, the rest being unsmashed glass. And it weren't a warning sign out front but a blue and white notice saying POLICE.

'From now oan, shut yis mooth,' Jock hissed, sweeping through the crime scene tape. 'Reet?' He picked up a half-brick and smashed the window of the side door with it, then stuck his arm through and let himself in, holding a stake high.

(Come back next week for more...)