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During the next week there was a very expedited court process, in which the three men all testified that they were acting on the orders of Marconi and taking plea bargains to testify about Marconi’s numerous crimes. None of it would be held up in magical court, because even though every word was true, they were obtained through magical duress. However, since the Nervetti family couldn’t openly admit to co-opting Marconi and his men for their dirty work, there wasn’t much that could be done. Marconi’s lawyers had found themselves mysteriously unable to slow the process, forgetting certain documents they were trying to bring and even how to practice law entirely, at least for a few critical hours.
That same week, three more of Marconi’s men were caught trying to intimidate some of those involved with the case, and two vampires working for the Nervettis were caught in the area.
Nico now owed about a half-dozen favors to various people, but he wasn’t just going to sit around letting normal humans spy on his apartment. More importantly, he wanted the Nervetti family know that he wasn’t going to sit by and let them do what they wanted.
—–
Erkan was woken from his sleep by his phone going off. He blindly reached over and picked it up. It was 12. Why the hell was Savina calling at noon? “Hello?” Erkan yawned as he sat up in his bed.
“Erkan!” Savina yelled loudly from the other end of the phone, “Miriam and Peter are in trouble!”
Erkan blinked, “Sorry, what?”
“I just got a threatening message with a picture of West High and they said not to tell anyone and…”
“Okay, first, take a deep breath,” Erkan followed his own advice, “They said not to tell anyone but you definitely should. Call the police or your Uncle Nico and also warn your friends. Also, I’m someone still.”
“I know! If they say ‘don’t tell anyone’ that’s because they’re insecure in getting what they want!” Savina’s voice hadn’t lowered anyway, “I already did that but it’s noon and neither Uncle Nico or I can go out and the police won’t be there for like 10 or 20 minutes maybe and you’re just a few minutes away!”
“Okay, right.” Erkan nodded, forgetting they were on the phone. “I’ll go, though I’m not sure what I can do to help…”
“Uncle Nico said you can use the good blood in his room! Please hurry.”
“Right. I’m on my way!”
Erkan quickly changed into the first real clothes available. Before he finished, he got a series of texts from Nico confirming what Savina had said.
| Savina’s friends might need your help at West High
If you go, stop by my room and take the blood from the second from the top shelf of the fridge The top is my blood and thus kinda useless outside during the day Be careful, someone will be watching |
Just as Erkan was filling his arms with bottles of blood, he got one final text.
| Oh right, check my closet too. Top shelf has a silver knife you’re legally allowed to carry. |
Erkan frowned. He’d seen a knife on Nico’s dresser. He hadn’t been in the room before so maybe it was misplaced. Even so, he checked the top shelf in the closet.
The top shelf only had a few smallish boxes on it. Erkan took them down and opened them up, finding a handgun and several clips of bullets, but no knife. Looking at one of the clips, a glint of silver stuck out of the tip of the copper jacket.
Erkan stopped to think for a moment. The message could be taken to mean he was supposed to take the knife, but it could also mean he was supposed to take the gun… and it just wasn’t legal. Erkan didn’t really know how to shoot a gun, though he knew the basics. He took a minute to look over the gun which wasn’t currently loaded. Safety, trigger, and then probably something to eject the magazine. Erkan gingerly put in a magazine and tried that. Well, it seemed to work.
He strapped the knife and gun onto his belt and put a few clips in his jacket. Maybe he was misinterpreting things and would get in trouble later, but now he needed to hurry. He’d met with Peter and Miriam again a couple times, and they were Savina’s friends. Both Savina and Nico had helped out Erkan many times in the past few months, so he owed something to them… he just hoped he could actually help.
Erkan staggered to the elevator with one bottle in each hand and another two cradled in his arms, then out to his car.
He was lucky to find little traffic between Nico’s condo and West High, which he circled past once, carefully. What he was looking at were not the people- he wasn’t sure if he would recognize them as being dangerous- but their blood. Human, human, human… human and werewolf pair… human, human, something else and a human. To Erkan, that meant there were probably two groups near the school, since there weren’t that many supernatural people around, and they wouldn’t just be standing about.
Erkan pulled around to the back parking lot, where there was a closed gate with one inch bars behind which Peter was standing.
“You’re here!” Peter unlocked the gate and helped take two of the bottles of blood, quickly locking the gate again. “That will hold them off for a little bit at least, but we haven’t locked the front gates yet. As far as we know, they still think we’re unaware… though the school’s basically on lockdown. Only me and Miriam and a couple campus police are around.”
“You spotted them?” Erkan asked, “I saw two suspicious pairs…”
Peter nodded, “That sounds right, Miriam is watching them now.” As they walked between the classrooms, they came out into a courtyard with a few benches and a tree, “There she is.”
Miriam was just standing next to a tree, her hand touching it. Erkan looked over at Peter, “She’s watching them… how?”
“Dryad stuff, obviously. She can sort of see through any plants nearby.”
“Well… great. That’s good.” Erkan took a deep breath. “I guess… I’ll get started setting up some stuff. Maybe I can place a few magic circles at choke points or… something. Yeah. Hey do you know how to shoot a gun?”
Peter shook his head, “Not at all. Those silver bullets in there?” He looked at Erkan.
“Err… yeah.”
“I couldn’t even touch the magazines safely then. Werewolves are extra sensitive to silver stuff. I assume you mean you can’t shoot?”
Erkan shook his head, “Not very practical for killing microbes.”
“Right. Leave it for Miriam then.”
“That’s right!” Miriam nodded, though she wasn’t looking at either of them, “I can shoot. I don’t have a license but…”
Erkan shrugged, “Me neither. Be careful.” He handed over the jacket that had the clips in it, then followed Peter towards the rest of the school. He had no idea what he was doing, but it had to be something. Hundreds of magic runes swirled through his head as he tried to make enough sense of them to even make the most basic arrangement.