We Don't Die

Chapter title: To Protect And Serve

Rating: R

Musical Inspiration: Jupiter Jazz pt. 2 from the Cowboy Bebop OST







Flashback



As a human, Mac had fought in World War II. He would’ve gone to Korea, too, if his life hadn’t taken a complete and unchangeable turn.



It was 1950. He was in a motel room in civilian clothing, reading the newspaper in bed. His Marines dress blues were hung tidily in the tiny little closet. He had just finished up his ten-year tour of duty, but reading about stories of unrest in Korea and the predictions of the United States joining the war in that area had made Mac glance at his uniform more than once.



He was twenty-eight and a civilian once again. He’d been thinking about going to Chicago to visit his mother, but at the same time the idea didn’t exactly appeal to him. Mac had never been very close to his parents, and what little bond he’d had with his mother had quickly dwindled after Mac’s father had died of small-cell lung cancer.



Dissatisfied, Mac had turned off the lights and crawled under the covers. It was a warm night. He left the window open.



A visitor had come calling that night, and Mac had awoken to the feeling of an incubus on top of him, fucking him madly and with teeth deep in Mac’s neck. The feeder serum did its job and Mac swooned, moaned, screamed, came more times than he ever remembered experiencing from one single session. And when the incubus had finished with him, Mac had lost consciousness under the quiet and lustful gaze.



When Mac had woken up, he was in a very different place. He was naked, and standing over him was that same incubus. What Mac would quickly learn was that this was a particularly ancient vampire, and a sadist, and he didn’t take no for an answer.



He’d turned Mac into little more than a blood doll, a slave, and kept Mac secluded from the rest of the world for nearly four years. Mac had trouble remembering those years. He’d spent a very long time trying to forget them, but he did remember that they ended on the sadist Turning him and then releasing him. And thus Mac became a vampire, his face frozen forever at the age of thirty-two for so long as he fed on a regular basis.



When he’d Turned and his vampire master had abandoned him, he’d had no idea where to go after being all but locked in a small room for four years, so he’d returned to the Corps and offered his new skills in the service of his country. It had been vastly different from his previous tour of duty, and to see a familiar face was a rare thing indeed. His new tour also didn’t go nearly as well as his old one. Some of his fellow Marines had tolerated the new him and a few had even genuinely liked him, but in the end too many people were just plain uncomfortable with bunking next to a bloodsucker. Some people had been ‘just okay’ with the few other vampires in Mac’s unit, but they were Dracula-types and an incubus was a bit harder to live with. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell had been implemented and to be living under the same roof as a bisexual man was nearly as disconcerting as the fact that he drank blood.



There’d been talk of forming a separate division for vampires and supernaturals, but that became a problem; as a whole, vampires didn’t function very well as a segregated community. Instincts started to flare up and some got downright territorial. Only a pathetic number of human Marines had volunteered to donate blood specifically as food to the vampires, and blood banks had had enough shortages as it was back then as the country was still recovering from the ending of the Korean War. The Corps, of course, frowned on its vampire-Marines feeding on civilians and frowned even harder on feeding on human Marines. And so it got ugly… very ugly.



Some of the weaker, younger vampires had actually starved to death. In uniform.



There was definite military promise in using vampires, but it in the end it was scrapped as its own separate project. Too many altercations, not enough information and tolerance… segregation and civil rights all over again, but this time the minority lost. It was also deemed that while some supernaturals could stick around, vampires simply had too many specific dos and don’ts—strict avoidance of sunlight had been another major pain in the ass—to make the effort pay off.



Mac considered it a personal, deep, and very painful insult for his country to have turned its back on him when all he’d wanted to do was be a Marine again. To defend his country again. To belong again. He had been present for the Raising of the Flag of Iwo Jima (for both raisings, actually, as most people didn’t realize that there had been two), but despite his new abilities and his determined control over his subconscious and his previous record of service and words of praise from every one of his commanding officers, he’d been discharged again after less than three years. He’d signed on for twenty. He’d been all but kicking and screaming when they handed him his discharge papers; at least it was Honorable again.



Mac had remained friends with a few of the vampires that had toughed it out, somehow staying under the radar until they’d been in the service long enough that revealing the Big Secret wouldn’t cost them their uniform. One was a Dracula-type that had been walking the night for over a century, and that guy was now a Brigadier General. In his most recent letter he’d informed Mac that he’d signed on for his fourth twenty-year contract.



Mac had been jealous. ‘Once a Marine, always a Marine,’ or so the saying went… but while Mac might still think of himself as a Marine, it was obvious that nobody else did.



His friend the Brigadier General had then tried to soothe Mac, saying that while he wished Mac could’ve stayed, in the end Mac was better off where he was. Mac did enjoy going off and doing his own thing as well as certain freedoms denied to the Marines, such as the right to choose where he lived and what he wore and—delicate cough inserted here—who he decided to go out to dinner with. Being a regular vampire was one thing, but to be one who was driven insane by sex pheromones while surrounded by lonely men overseas… it just wouldn’t work.



Mac had written a reply and thanked him for the kind words and wished him good luck with his latest tour of duty. He’d then laid the letter down on the nightstand, and then he’d sat on the edge of the bed and stared into space for a full hour.



For the first few weeks after his discharge he’d done something rather uncharacteristic: he’d drifted aimlessly, feeding randomly, sleeping wherever he could get away with not paying because he didn’t really want to pay. He had his savings accounts but he saw no reason to tap into them; not like he had to buy groceries or anything. He held no job, kept no schedule, and carried few possessions. His own damn country didn’t want him, so what else could he do?



Weeks turned to months, and then to years. He wandered all across the United States, never staying in any one place longer than a few months. He didn’t want people to notice him and divine his secrets and then set an angry mob after him (wouldn’t be the first time). Eventually he was drawn to New York City; it was a nice big city with a staggering number of people. The perfect place to get lost at night. Get lost, ha. Like anybody was looking for him?



He came to learn the territories of the more powerful vampires and he stayed away from them. He wanted no trouble. That was, until one night, when his attention had been drawn to an altercation between a pair of human gangs. They’d chosen to have their little war in the middle of a rather downtrodden Manhattan neighborhood that was not only on their own border but also on the border of two different vampire clan territories, and there were plenty of innocent people just a bullet’s flight away.



Mac had not reacted peaceably. In the middle of their firefight he’d swooped down and disarmed them one by one, rendering them all unconscious. He’d tied their shoelaces together and used their belts to tie wrists, and then he’d stood back and wondered what to do with them. Not like he was Spiderman or anything, some sort of vigilante do-gooder, but suddenly Mac was tired of drifting. He bit each one in the neck without drinking and let the wound scab over without healing completely, so that each one would carry scars from his fangs and be reminded of how close they’d come. He’d then dumped the lot of them on the steps of the nearest police precinct like so much garbage, along with their unloaded and completely disassembled guns.



The weapon disassembly was remarkable enough, but it was the fang marks that really caught police attention. Mac had packaged the gun-parts neatly, of course, and he’d bought a camera and taken pictures of the shootout scene and taped the film canister to the forehead of one gang leader. The other gang leader’s forehead had gotten the scene’s address with a permanent marker.



And so Mac settled. That entire block became his territory; the clans let him have it, and no stray vampire would come near it. Men overheard yelling at their wives would come home one night pale and sweating and full of apologies as well as sporting a hand-shaped bruise around one wrist. Children who snuck out after dark would get home safely and walk blindly passed men with broken hands that had been planning on grabbing those children. Even the pimps and the drug dealers decided that they’d seen a menacing shadow with burning eyes one too many times and that they were going to a different neighborhood. Anyone who dug in their heels enough to warrant a second face-to-face confrontation got the same treatment as the gangs: fang scars on the neck and a free trip to the police station with a detailed accounting of crimes written on their back with that same damn permanent marker.



Over the next few years, that one little run-down block of Manhattan gained a reputation as being a strangely good place to live considering the surrounding areas. That one tiny section of the city almost never reported a crime, and produced even fewer bodies. It was unreal; you crossed the street and you were dodging bullets, but this little slice of the city was… people whispered that it was protected. What was oddest of all was that, if reports were to be believed, a vampire was the one keeping it clean. It was the ‘vampire’ part that kept it from causing a sensation, and so it became a well-known secret shared between friendly locals. People started calling it the Oasis Block.



Some people hated the vampire. Some people didn’t mind paying a little blood in order to be guaranteed a safe place to live. Some people thought he was the spawn of Satan and others thought he was a gift from God. Mac never really let himself listen to any of them. He liked the fact that they thought it was safer at night than it was during the day, though.



The Oasis Block was rumored to be one of the safest places in the Five Boroughs. So safe, in fact, that on a whim one rich man went there one evening, walked down a random alleyway, and laid a stack of $100 bills on a dumpster. He lifted his head and shouted to the whole block that he needed a safe place to keep it for a while.



He came back to check at random times, and the money was still laying there in plain sight. An entire week went by before it finally disappeared early one afternoon. The man had been shocked that it had stayed there that long until someone had tapped him on the shoulder. He’d turned and saw a rather muscular man in a hooded sweatshirt, holding a large umbrella in one hand and the stack of money in the other. “Sorry I had to move it for you,” the stranger told the man, “but it rained last night, and then the garbage truck came this morning.” It wasn’t raining at that moment but he still had the umbrella open and shading himself. He’d handed the money back. The rich man had wanted to ask the stranger so many questions, but the man with the umbrella had just shrugged and gave a smile just large enough to show the hints of fangs. The stranger had then turned and disappeared among the alleys.



Mac had bought a small apartment within his territory. Nothing special, but the shower worked and it got decent TV reception, and it had room for bookshelves and a decent desk and there was a Laundromat in the basement. Here he could finally lay down his meager possessions, most treasured of all being a photograph of his unit back in WW2. He kept the place white-glove clean out of habit and because he was resolved to never drift again. He couldn’t defend his country but at least he could keep the people on this block safe, and as long as they let him keep to himself he’d be fine.



For the next twelve years he became the face in the back of the jazz club that popped in every now and then, or the guy in the bookstore right before it closed that was poring over science texts, or the crazy fitness freak that went jogging in a Marines T-shirt right after sunset even in the middle of winter. He was the ‘recurring dream’ that neighborhood ladies giggled to each other over while their husbands were out of town, and more than one bi-curious man’s introduction to a whole new lifestyle. In that tiny little neighborhood mothers weren’t afraid to let their children play in the alleys after dark, and a few women would swear that they caught rare glimpses of a pale muscular man with short brown hair and dark clothes that sat on the roof of a mom-and-pop grocery store at night and just watched the children play with a sad smile on his face.



It was twenty-five years after his Turning that he had his first face-to-face meeting with the police. A bright young detective named Donald Flack, Sr.—he had a toddler at home, a little boy, and he loved to show off his wallet full of pictures—began stirring things up in Mac’s neighborhood. It had been driving him insane how this block was so crimeless when all you had to do was walk across the street in any direction and had to instantly fear for your life. He’d actually started knocking on doors and asking questions in his spare time, but learned nothing.



On the guise of wanting to do something special with the wife and the little one, Donald had taken a basket and blanket to Oasis Block and settled down on the roof of the tallest building in order to watch the fireworks one Fourth of July night.



His wife was beautiful. They’d gotten distracted by the romance of the moment and by how little Donnie was being so quiet and still, and they’d started kissing when they’d heard a childish squeal. They’d sat bolt upright and turned to see Donnie trying to dive off the edge of the building to catch the pretty lights. What was holding him back was the mysterious pale man in a long black overcoat buttoned all the way up, black pants, and black boots, sitting casually on the edge of the roof with his legs over the side and with a firm grasp on the back of Donnie’s railroad-conductor overalls—Donnie was actually leaning forward, straining the fabric and trying to reach the edge of the roof.



The pale man had lifted a somewhat amused eyebrow. “Cute kid.” He held his grip steady and little Donnie continued to absently scrape trails in the roofing as he was still transfixed by the fireworks. “He doesn’t give up, does he?” He smiled down at the boy, who finally stopped and looked around to see what the holdup was. The dark little head swung around in that uncoordinated way that toddlers sometimes have, and the blue eyes fixed uncomprehendingly on the man.



Not knowing what else to do, Donald remained where he was and introduced himself and his wife Maggie, and added “that’s our boy. He’s a Donald, too.”



Donnie’s savior just chuckled down at the two-year-old that was now trying to twist around in his overalls and pry the large hand open. “Nice to meet you, Donald Flack Junior,” the man murmured. “My name’s Mac.”



The little boy looked up at him, then looked at his father and tugged at the fabric in Mac’s hand, giving another frustrated squeal when the fingers wouldn’t budge. Mac winced and lifted his free hand to casually stick a finger in his ear and shake it, then looked at the parents. “Next year, you might want to hire a babysitter.” And he suddenly scooped Donnie onto his lap and went back to watching the fireworks.



Donald and his wife glanced at each other, and then Maggie spoke up. “Can we offer you anything to eat?” For some reason they felt like they could trust this guy. After all, if he’d wanted to hurt Donnie, he could’ve just let the boy fall off the side of the building. It was so weird, though; he’d come out of nowhere and he hadn’t made a sound. “We’ve got some sandwiches. Soda.”



Mac gave a quietly amused snort and then shook his head, turning his profile enough for them to see a polite smile. “I’ve already eaten this evening, thank you.”



Donald stood and made his way cautiously closer. “You’re him, aren’t you?” At Mac’s lifted eyebrow, he clarified. “You’re the vampire. The one that runs this block.”



Mac smiled broadly and in the flashing glow of colorful sparks Donald and Maggie could see the fangs extend and then retract behind Donnie’s head. “I don’t run anything,” Mac clarified calmly. “I just don’t appreciate all the lawless idiots thinking that they have a right to do anything they want. Violence without purpose is just stupidity, guns are tools that should be used with training and with respect, and I’ve never been fond of drugs.”



Maggie had gone very pale and still at the word ‘vampire’ and at the sight of fangs, especially since the bloodsucker was holding her son, but Donald gave her a comforting look before turning back to Mac. “So why just one block?”



Mac shrugged, smiling down at Donnie who had bounced in his lap and clapped his little hands at an especially large display of color in the sky. “I’m not greedy. One block is all I care to call my own, and if I went any farther in any direction I’d be stepping on the toes of some rather old vampire clans. They’ll let me have this one to myself, but that’s about it.”



Cautiously Donald made his way closer and on an impulse he sat on the edge of the roof as well, although he didn’t go so far as to dangle his legs over the side. “Why? Why do you do it? I mean, why do you…”



“Do your job for you?” Mac supplied wryly. He gave a long sigh and stared up at the brilliant patterns in the sky. “Because I don’t have anything else. I fought in World War II when I was still human. After I Turned, I tried re-enlisting in the Marines because I didn’t know anywhere else to go. They discharged me again. It’s a long and fairly disturbing story, but the short of it was that nobody wanted to bunk with an incubus.”



Donald knew what an incubus was, and he couldn’t help throwing a glance at Donnie in Mac’s lap. Mac caught the look and frowned at the man. “I’m not a pedophile, Detective. I could never do that to a child.” His gaze softened and he looked down at Donnie again. “Children are honest. They don’t lie or hate. They just… accept.”



Donald had to agree with that, and then his brows furrowed. “How’d you know I’m a detective?”



“Other than the fact that you’ve been asking questions about me for months?” Mac gave a dry snort. “I’m one of the people you talked to somewhat recently.” He turned his head to face the detective fully.



Donald blinked at him and then a rather large white-gold pattern exploded above them, illuminating them, and Donald’s eyes widened in recognition. “The coffee shop a few nights ago. That was you.”



Mac nodded. “Sorry I wasn’t more helpful. I’ve… made a habit of avoiding attention. I’ve been something of a minor myth in the tabloids for twelve years now, and all I want to do is just be left alone.”



Donald regarded him for a moment. “I don’t think that’s true. I mean, I don’t think you wanna be left alone. Otherwise you would’ve just dumped Donnie on top of us and then disappeared.” Mac had to give him that one and nodded, and Donald went on. “I think you just wanna be accepted for who you are. Even more than that, though, I think you just wanna do the right thing.” He gave his own sad little smile. “You can’t protect the peace of the country, but you can protect the peace of this one little chunk of Manhattan.”



Mac dropped his head a moment and cleared his throat. He had absolutely no medical excuse for clearing his throat—didn’t breathe, no mucus—but it was another human habit he’d kept for no real reason. “It’s been called the safest neighborhood in the city.” He allowed himself to be proud of that, trying to ignore the pain from the unintended jab about ‘protecting the country.’



Donald saw the effect the remark had had, and decided to drop the Marines subject. “What really stands out about it is that it’s such a stark contrast. I mean, you go across the street and everything’s shot up and filthy and just fallin’ all ta Hell. But here, this one little city block… this is Oasis Block. This is the slice of New York that they wanna shoot movies and TV shows at.” He kept his voice deliberately casual, playing a hunch. “If you’re tryin’ to keep it low-key, you might wanna tone down the ‘friendly neighborhood vampire’ act.”



Mac actually rolled his eyes. “It’s not an act, and I couldn’t care less about being low-key when people’s lives are at stake. I just want to—“



“Do the right thing,” Donald interrupted quickly. “To make a difference. To protect and serve.”



Mac stopped in mid-sentence, thought about it, and looked at the detective fully. “Yeah. Protect and serve, that sounds about right. I guess I’d like some people to see that not all vampires are indiscriminate killers.”



Maggie had finally come over and stood next to her husband and gestured down at Mac’s lap. The two men were startled to realized that the toddler had actually fallen asleep. Sheepishly the vampire turned and stood and handed the boy to his mother. She took him graciously, and gave him a small smile and nod of her head. “Thanks for watching him. When we, ah, weren’t.”



Mac looked away for a moment and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “What kind of person would that make me if I just let him walk off the roof?”



“Same kind of scum that you keep dumping on our doorstep,” Donald answered, also standing. “I’ve been wondering, how is it that you can get that up-close and personal with the suspects and the evidence and you never leave trace of yourself except for the obvious?”



Mac shrugged. “If I trampled all over the scene or altered the evidence, you would A, come looking for me, and B, that would invalidate the case and they’d come running right back here. When I hand them over to you, I want them to stay out of this neighborhood.”



Donald paused. “I kinda figured the why. I asked for the how.”



Mac gave another shrug, only this one was a bit testy. “I’m very good at moving through the world and leaving no trace behind, because I don’t want people to notice that I’ve been there. I’ve learned to not leave anything behind and I notice when other people make mistakes.”



“But you… you move like a friggin’ ghost, man! Nobody can be that good.”



Mac lifted a slightly irritated eyebrow. “Can’t I just be careful? Okay, I may be a bit lighter on my feet than most people, but still. Why the fascination?”



The words were out of Donald’s mouth before he could stop himself. “I think you would make one helluva cop.”



Mac’s brows furrowed, lifted, and turned thoughtful. He started to turn away and paused, and they all three looked up as the fireworks hit the finale. When Donald looked back at Mac, the vampire was all the way on the other end of the roof. Donald could just make out the pale man stand straight and tall and snap off a crisp salute at the colorful explosions, and then Mac turned and walked behind the tiny little structure with the door to the stairs and didn’t appear on the other side.



The year was 1980.







It was a few days later when Mac and Donald met again. It was early morning; the sun had come up (in theory) but it was raining cats and dogs. Donald had been standing in the doorway of a coffee shop with his hands wrapped around the Styrofoam cup and wishing like hell that he’d remembered his umbrella that morning. Staring through the glass door, his car was only twenty feet away but it may as well have been twenty miles.



And then a figure blocked his vision and he stepped back to let him in when he realized that it was Mac standing outside and holding a large umbrella of his own. He stood there as though waiting, and Donald got the hint and stepped outside and shared the dry spot with Mac. “Didn’t figure you’d be up this late,” Donald said by way of greeting, “and aren’t ya a little out of your jurisdiction?”



Mac shrugged a little and started walking in the direction of Donald’s car and the detective quickly followed suit. “I’ve been thinking,” Mac said finally.



“Yeah? ‘Bout what?”



“What you said. About me being a cop. They’ve got a crime scene unit, right? They specifically gather and process the evidence?”



“Yeah. Gotta testify in court sometimes, but it’s no big deal. The big thing is, you gotta be impartial and you gotta be right. CSIs don’t decide who’s guilty. They just figure out what happened. Guilty is a jury’s call.”



Mac nodded and the two walked around to the driver’s side of Donald’s car. Mac wasn’t looking at the man but instead stared at nothing across the street, his face tight. “Would they take me? I don’t do daylight. I mean, it’s early morning now and it’s raining hard, so… does the academy have night classes?”



Donald nodded. “It’s not an official class, but there’s a couple of instructors willing to take on the ‘night owls,’ if you catch my drift. Graduation’s a whole hell of a lot less public, too. And if you want the CSI training, well, there’s some ‘science classes’ at the academy.”



Mac nodded absently. “I study a lot of science. I confess that it’s one way I got good at dissecting those crime scenes; I read some old forensics textbooks I found in some used bookstores.”



“That’s good, Mac, that’s real good.” Donald sighed. “No offense, but the cops that work night shift are gettin’ more nervous every month. More vamps and other supers are comin’ outta nowhere, and it’s us versus them. It’d be kinda nice to, you know…”



“Fight fire with fire?” Mac asked dryly. He finally looked at the human. “That brings up another point: if this all goes through and I get a badge and a gun… who is going to partner up with a vampire? Especially since, as you said, the guys on Graveyard are already more than nervous around supernaturals.”



Donald thought for a long moment. “Tell you what. You get a badge and go on Graveyard, and if you can’t find anybody that wants to partner up with you, I’ll be your partner.”



Mac blinked. “You’d do that?”



“Sure, why not?” Donald took a swig of his coffee. “Besides, you saved my kid. I figure I can trust ya.” On an impulse he reached out to clap Mac’s shoulder in a friendly way; the vampire flinched but otherwise didn’t react. Donald decided to ignore that because he probably wasn’t used to it… and that gave the detective an idea. “Hey, why don’t you drop by my place sometime, come see Donnie? He liked ya, and he usually doesn’t like strangers.”



Mac just stared at him, hazel eyes boring holes into Donald for so long that the detective was starting to worry that he’d crossed some sort of bad boundary, and then Mac broke into a wide smile. “Come over to your place, huh? Sure, I think I can do that. Sounds nice. You sure you won’t mind, uh… me?”



Donald snorted. “C’mon. To me and Maggie and Donnie, you’re just another guy.” He wasn’t worried about Mac being a vampire; he’d already shown that he could be trusted.



He hadn’t thought that Mac’s smile could get any wider, but he was wrong. Mac suddenly looked like a completely different person. A happy person. “Thanks, Detective.”



“Aw, call me Don.”



Mac nodded stiffly. “Don. Okay.” He paused. “Do I need to bring anything if I’m coming over to your apartment? I’m not exactly… well, it’s been a while since I’ve been what you would call social.”



Donald just shrugged. “Just bring yourself. We’ll refresh your memory.”



There was a surprisingly tender look to the hazel eyes. “Thanks, Don. I’ll be there.”









Author's note: Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated!