Web hosting Custom Email SiteBuilder

Alternate 3^rd Season: Black Buddha

By AlexaKnight

AlexaKnight@earthling.net

Standerd disclaimers, charectors and situations owned by TPTB, original stuff owned by me. Portions taken intact and extraplolated from FK ep Black Buddah written by JP

And now on to the story...

Nick enjoyed the feel of the wind in his hair as he drove his beloved car through the city streets. His instructions were clear both spoken and implied. Give the commissioner’s daughter a grand tour, make her your temporary partner, train her, evaluate her, but most of all keep her safe.

Nick Knight was considered a hero, never mind that accolades had little to do with his reasons for being a cop. Being a cop meant so much more to him, it was a way to save lives, to atone for the evil he had been, the lives he had taken in the nearly eight hundred years of this accursed existence.

So now he was a hero, not because he was brave...how could a man who was bullet proof be brave...all it did was irritate his mortal partner but Nick couldn’t help protecting him...Schanke meant something to him. Donald Schanke, annoying though he could be, was a friend.

The vampire-cop wasn’t a hero because he wanted to be, Nick didn’t want the spotlight, in fact it was risky for him to be in it. But he did thrive on action, excitement, danger, and hunting for perpetrators it was his nature to be attracted to such things. He needed to do good with those needs to be at peace with himself.

Schanke was good for Nick, he drew him out and made him remember to laugh...he made Nick feel human again...and that was something he would sorely miss when the time came to move on.

But there were times like these when Nick couldn’t do something that was part of his job. Schanke had to transport the prisoner with Cohen because Nick dared not take a flight which could easily expose his secret to the world. Schanke thought it was Nick giving him a consolation prize for being the wonder boy’s backup and Nick really didn’t begrudge Schank the glory.

All Nick cared about was not spending hours flying in daylight, hungry, and surrounded by mortals...alone he could have made the flight...could have brought himself supplies and whammied surrounding mortals into closing their windows or better yet made sure the entire flight was at night.

The risk was quite simply too great...The vampire detective couldn’t afford to spend an entire week in an unfamiliar city under the close scrutiny of his captain and coworkers, especially when plane flights and security high issues like the transport of a dangerous bomber were involved, there were just too many chances for his dark secret to be exposed.

And so claiming his "sun allergy" and telling Schanke that he deserved this chance in the limelight, Nick bowed out of the transport duties and sent his partner on the biggest prisoner exchange of their entire career...which left him shepherding Tracy Vetter, newly promoted green as grass detective and commissioner’s daughter around Toronto alone, until Schanke returned....wonderful.

Nick allowed the pleasant night air to restore his good mood....the wry humor which Schanke and Nat had helped to rekindle in his life emerged once more and he delighted in the wonder of the night and the irony of being chosen as this girls teacher...a vampire cop it was an almost humorous notion...and yet it suited him somehow, it felt right.

Nick contemplated the young woman beside him with the experience of nearly eight-hundred years and the instincts of knight and cop. She was raw, overly eager and nieve. Obviously promoted to fast because of her father’s position...he’d seen it hundreds of times, young pages, raised to squire, squire raised to knight more for who they were then what they had done. In all ages of human society people were still people.

And yet, there was something about her, she had promise. An eagerness to learn and more important a willingness to listen. This one might make a good cop, given time and a chance, but it would be a long road.

She commented about his non-regulation car. And he quipped that he wouldn’t tell if you wouldn’t. Her response told him that she didn’t want to be known only as commissioner Vetter’s daughter....she wanted to be judged only for herself....he vowed to do exactly that.

It surprised Tracy Vetter greatly, for the first time in her accelerated career, someone was willing to see her for herself, not her father’s daughter. She intended to learn all she could from Nick Knight and Don Schanke they were the highest rated partnership in Toronto, they were the best. She had so much to learn....and so much to prove.

Without really planning to, Nick meandered the Caddy toward the airport in an unconscious desire to see his partner off.

Tracy studied the man beside her. He was good looking , but decidedly not her type, which was just as well considering she was supposed to learn from Nick, not drool at his feet.

There was an aura about him of controled power but he was charming, likeable, and mostly lacking the condescending air so many other officers used when they weren’t just afraid of her father. Benevolent but dangerous if crossed, she decided.

They continued speaking, mostly aimless conversation to pass the time while driving. His boyish grin was infectious and she couldn’t help joining him in laughter.

Tracy knew he was a hot shot, a real life hero, his reputation was legendary, as was his resistance to question about his personal life. But one thing that seldom got into the media was very odd about him.

She decided to come right out and ask him if what she had been told about him was true. "I heard you’re allergic to the daylight, phototropic or something?"

Nick nodded affirmatively, inwardly wondering where on earth that word came from, he knew it had something to do with plants...and it definately wasn’t the word Nat was using to cover for him.

"Can I ask you a question?"

He looked at her apprehensively, hoping he wasn’t about to be quizzed on the details of his supposed condition. Covering for his true nature was often a challenge. But as time went on and records improved it became more of one...without Natalie to cover for him Nick would have found it difficult to hold such a public and record prone position as a big city police officer.

Of course many parts of his life were carefully protected by the vampire network but certain day to day, or in his case night to night, issues would have been much more difficult without Nat always there to alibi for him.

"Why the convertible?"

Nick had been so ready for a difficult question that this one caught him by surprise. Such an innocent, logical question....with such a convoluted answer.

The trunk space which protected him from deadly sunlight when needed, the classic predatory ‘cool’ car with its sleek image and high speeds, appealing to the hunter, the knight/adventurer, and the bred aristocrat in him. But most of all the convertible so he could feel the wind in his hair, the night whipping by on his sensitive skin.

It allowed him to bathe in the speed and sensations of flight and heightened senses even while doing something as inherently mortal as driving. A way to subliminate his desires into something without guilt. Nick didn’t really know what to say to her, the why was so deeply a part of who he was, what he was.

Nick shrugged and flashed his boyish grin. The vampire detective opened his mouth to tell her some small piece of the truth....when suddenly a terrible sound thundered in his sensitive ears.

In horror both detectives watched as a plane exploded, a fireball blazing across the night sky, then plummeting towards the ground.

"Tracy, call it in!" He shouted, breaking her stunned reverie. She picked up the police radio and reported the grim news even as Nick floored the caddy toward the site of the crash.

The car came to a smooth but swift stop near the rim of the hill. Tracy watched as Nick pulled the keys from the ignition and leaped into action.

She sat there stunned for a moment as her new partner raced from the car and disappeared from sight.

Slowly she climbed out and closed the door behind her. In a moment she stopped, barely able to catch her breath, on the rim above terrible carnage. From her lofty vantage point on top of the hill she could see the vast tapestry of destruction in the natural crater below.

She glanced downward and saw Nick moving swiftly through the twisted fragments and flames and followed him slowly down the hill. As she moved downward an updraft sent the horrid stench of burning metal and charred flesh into her nostrils, not daring to breathe deeply she readjusted the competent cop facade around herself and continued into the disaster scene.

She saw Nick pause for a moment as if searching for something, it gave her a few precious moments to move closer to him. She watched him race across the field amid shattered debris and broken bodies , stumbling numbly in his wake, unable to believe the speed at which he was moving or the carnage around her.

She watched as he suddenly glanced downward and picked something up. Nick dropped to his knees, his face filled with anguish as his voice called a single word in a primal scream "Schanke".

Nick was on the edge of collapse; torn between anger and tears, neither of which he dared show...not here, not now.

Rising to his feet he heard a distant sound, a cry of further misery in this accursed night, and yet it represented hope. Frantically he raced toward it throwing pieces of the plane with a strength no normal man outside of an extreme adrenaline burst could have replicated. The burning metal scorched his hands but they healed quickly enough for him to pick up the tiny survivor without pain.

He saw her lying there a small innocent, in all this carnage, and it brought him hope...for a moment warmth flooded his cold heart as he lifted the infant into his arms.

Tracy arrived then and gently took the baby from Nick...she was also enchanted by this tiny symbol of hope in all this despair. She saw the momentary peace leave her new partner’s face and watched the driven despair claim him once more. She reached out to put a hand on his shoulder but he moved on without her; still searching, hoping to find more life...or answers or both.

Tracy handed the child to arriving emergency personal. She watched them try to take Nick aside but he was a man driven in spite of the slim chance of additional survivors being found.

As Reese escorted her from the disaster site she saw the body of a dark haired young man on the ground, it was badly mangled but for an instant

she could have sworn the eyes had blinked.

"I think this one is alive captain"

Reese walked over doubtfully and felt for a pulse...the skin was cold as ice, the injuries obviously fatal. The young detective was obviously seeing things. Slowly he closed the eyes and wished this one like so many others tonight, a final peace.

"He’s stone cold Tracy"

"But I saw..." saw him blink, she knew it was real she wasn’t that weak to start seeing things, it had to be real. Still she let Reese escort her away like the good little girl...but she glanced backward...back, in time to see the man Reese had unequivocally declared a corpse disappearing into the distance; running on his own two feet.

He searched tirelessly through the wreckage, throwing aside heavy obstacles in a frantic effort to reach each faltering heartbeat. Nick consistently outdistanced the other rescue workers, they’re strong heartbeats masked the faint sounds of the faltering ones he had to find. Had to search, had to keep searching until he found his captain...his partner.

With each uncovered survivor he moved onward, knowing the emergency personal were much better equipt to save them unless he planned to bring every one across. Even among those he did locate few were likely to survive and still he kept searching.

He searched endlessly for them; Schanke, Cohen, the blues who had accompanied them on the plane, the prisoner. He didn’t know what he would do if he found them, could he stare at those corpses, were there any he was willing to bring across. Nick just didn’t know, and he couldn’t think about it...He had to keep searching.

Hands touched him, told him to stop, that others would take over now. He shook them off and moved on, reclaiming the distance necessary to hunt for survivors. And he was hunting, functioning with the single -minded precision of the vamparic predator he was. Searching for life with the heat-sensitive vision, and acute senses of the killer inside, then slamming that deadly instinct away...to present a human visage to the rescue workers and stop himself from making a kill. It was difficult, brutal, a tease to his darker nature.

All the spilled blood only fueled his hunger. The open flames pained his sensitive eyes as it overloaded the inferred portion of his vision, the smell of burning and blood and fumes assaulted his nostrils. All of it and the anger tested his resolve but still he kept searching, he had no choice.

He saw a scrap of blue, the charred metal upon cloth and stumbled toward the faint heart beat. Throwing aside a heavy mound of debris, Nick uncovered the mangled body. The legs were gone, one arm stripped to the bone, the skin was charred, the hair burned away. Yet the life hung on defiantly in this one for a few moments longer. Only the scraps of blue uniform and the charred remnants of her badge distinguished the dying officer from any other.

His fingers traced the imprint of her name badge and remembered the spunky young woman who had fought her way back from cancer only to die like this.

Beside her was another blue unformed corpse, he recognized. A solid cop, 3 years in blues, six years past his violent past on the streets. Nick wiped the tears from his eyes, before they could dry into bloody tracks on his face.

He knew why this one was here, Schanke considered him a prodigy of sorts, a kid he had redirected from a life of crime into one of preventing it. and that reminded him that Schanke, his partner was also on this plane...he had to find him.

He glanced again at the young woman who had impressed the department, being such a fighter...would anyone even such a valiant survivor as this wish to live with her devastating injuries, should he bring this one across.

Gently he placed a hand on her charred skin and touched her fading mind. It was a skill he had seldom used but the strength of that life force impressed him, it told him to try. He reached out and tried to give this one strength and peace...she was still alive when the emergency crews took her from his hands.

As soon as they took her away the tears and anger slowly returned to Nick’s eyes as he frantically searched the vicinity. The other searchers were still to close for him to easily discern heartbeats so he let his sensitive vision roam the vicinity, let his ears listen careful. There it was, yes a faint moan.

Moving as fast as possible while around mortals, Nick raced over and began shoving debris aside. First he came upon a mangled corpse still firmly strapped in its seat...the head had been severed. It reminded Nick of the beheading he had once seen with a sword.

Dimly he heard several workers rushing off to be sick, he fought down hunger from the spurting blood and disgust at the sight before him to find the life. And there was life, he could hear it. He moved another chair that had crashed inward with that of the corpse, covering its torso. Carefully turning it over he found the child.

The boy was slowly awakening and when he did would be staring directly at the horrifying corpse.

Nick called the rescue workers over and gingerly removed the boy’s arm which had become wedged deep within the corpse’s body and did his best to keep the child under for a few more moments...no child, no person should ever be forced to awaken that way.

He hurried away clenching his jaw to hide the emerging fangs, turning away so yellow was not seen creeping into his eyes. Why couldn’t these people move on so he could listen, this was the area, the place he would find Schanke, it HAD to be, he had to be alive.

But there were too many people around, surrounding him, overwhelming the heightened senses he needed to search, and too much blood. He dared not stay here much longer if the other workers remained this close, dared not let them see his dark secret.

Nick was so preoccupied that he did not even recognize the most familiar heartbeat of all. Her voice echoed in his ears and he turned to her nearly back in control. His red rimmed, gold-flecked eyes looked into her tear streaked face. They held each other for what seemed like hours....anchors for each other in this storm of tragedy.

"They found Cohen" she told him, watching a dim spark of hope return to his eyes.

"Is she..." He began.

"Alive, she was in shock but they think they caught it in time.... Nick...Nick...I...s-s-saw them bringing her through. Burns, bad burns...the kind I still see in nightmares. I-I’ve seen so many people with burns tonight."

Nat spoke on that knife edge between strength and weakness. A matter of fact business like manner, but her hands shook and the strain in her voice was very evident. Then she pulled herself together and looked at him, saw the strain, the weariness, the anger, realized the gnawing hunger he must be feeling even beneath the genuine concern for her.

"They say you’ve been a hero Nick, You’ve saved a lot of people...They haven’t found Schanke yet, you’ve been through that area and you didn’t find him...and there are too many people for you to try again now.

They may not find him...not alive. Nick you don’t want to be here if that happens" She pleaded with him. "You *can’t* be here if that happens..."

Her pointed look was enough to remind him of the danger, the constant gnawing of hunger in this blood soaked environment, the churning tides of emotion within him, the powerful sea of sadness and anger which seeing Schanke’s death would trigger.

He had to take some small solace from Cohen’s survival, even if it didn’t last and for all those he had rescued this tragic night. It wasn’t enough, it was never enough...but Nat was right he dared not stay here any longer.

He wanted, needed to continue searching that area but he had no other choice...it was time to leave.

He left the car behind and made a quick flight to quell the fire in his blood, arriving at the loft he drained a bottle, then two. Letting the soothing liquid take away the strain and hunger of the past several hours.....the anger was channeled now...he had only a few hours before dawn but Nick Knight intended to find answers. He knew it was a bomb...he knew and he was going to find out who and why.

Nick was just about to leave when he turned back toward the far shelf, taking the box down he gingerly opened it and removed its contents with a shaking glove-covered hand.

Slowly he grasped the object with both hands and sunk down to his knees while raising it above his head.

He stared at that object...silhouetted in his shaking hands and illuminated by the moon and stars shining through the skylight and whispered a prayer. "Please...Please don’t let them die."

Then Nick reverently laid Joan of Arc’s cross back in its box...and took to the air.

*****************

By the time Nick returned to the crash scene and retrieved his car most of the survivors had already been transported to the hospital. Those officers that knew him watched his progress with sympathy and perhaps a little fear and awe in their eyes, others wondered why this man in a suit walked among them.

He didn’t need to whammy the answers from them, those that understood his need were more then willing to speak, they just didn’t know. All lists were tenative, none of them knew his partner’s fate either way. Nat had already left to get to work, and he tried not to think of her grim task.

Nick went to the station for information. Even there he could get no answers, no proof that it was a bomb, and not the even more important question of his partner’s fate.

Returning to the caddy, the vampire detective glanced at the night sky, as it slowly moved toward day, and knew that he was running out of time.

He drove back to the loft, pulling into the garage as the sun crested the horizon.

The day felt impossibly long, waiting, waiting for Nat; for someone to phone him with the grim news, hoping against hope to hear his partner on the line. He watched the news as report after report scooped the disaster

and still there was no list of deceased no list of survivors...no explanation.

In the confusion and rampant emotion of the previous hours he had forgotten the tentative reports of Cohen’s survival.

After several false starts through the impossibly busy switch boards of all the area hospitals and make-shift trauma centers he eventually learned that she was in serious but stable condition. Although he asked for a record of Officer Donald G. Schanke at every hospital...he was not among the logged survivors or the identified hospital deaths. Could he call back later the records might be more complete, they asked.

Finally the sun set, Nick once again lifted Joan of Arc’s cross. allowing it to slightly singe his hands before going to/calling the morgue.

*****Next section is tenative*******

"City Morgue" A tired voice, that Nick recognized as belonging to Grace, answered.

"Hi Grace, Its Nick" He said cautiously.

"Nick…Any word yet on the cause?…" She asked hesitantly.

"Not that I’ve heard, Grace" He answered quietly. "They think Cohen is going to make it he continued."

"Thank G-D"

Her sigh of relief was audible to the vampire’s sensitive ears.

"How is Nat holding up…and you?" he asked gently

"As well as can be expected" she sniffled, "this is just awful."

"What about you, Nick….Have they found Schanke?"

"I was afraid to ask you the same question"

"I’ve called all the hospitals inquired after every list, I’d go searching again myself if the sun was down" He said unable to hide the hint of bitterness that crept into his voice. "This not knowing its driving me crazy Grace"

"The odds aren’t good, you know that?"

"Yeah, I know…I should have been the one on that plane, it should have been me"

The silence reigned between them each haunted by this terrible event and the mystery of Schanke’s fate.

Finally Grace spoke "Sometimes things are just meant to be a certain way..and maybe there is still a chance"

"I pray you are right" And for once Nick meant it

TO BE CONTINUED....