The Blood Hunt

 John, cut up, a little bruised, looking like he had just walked out of a battlefield ran down the street as the thunder rumbled within the clouds. A omen of things to come no doubt.

Just a few blocks down the street he noticed a little kid. He couldn't have been more than twelve, though it was hard to say really. Crouched down on the cement, he was mostly hidden by a coat that had clearly seen better days, and the ubiquitous baseball cap that all boys seemed to own was pulled down over his eyes. Most people wouldn't have known exactly what to make of this youngster with his hand held out: street urchin, pan-handler in training, who knows what, but there was something about the boy that caught John's attention.

He looked up at John as he got close. He brought up a Rolex, that he stole from someone no doubt. With a devilish grin he winked at the older assassin. "TICK TOK!"

John glared at the kid but didn't reply, he just quickly scooped up his doggie in his arms and ran as fast as possible. Relying on pure adrenaline now. He knew who that kid is, or who the kid belongs to. Henry The Red. Or The Bowery King as most would refer to. He has agents on every street corner and every low-end job known to man. They're his eyes and ears and when they're observing he knows Henry is there observing too. Like a vulture lurking within the shadows. And is loving every moment of this.

The most important thing on John's mind right now is getting his dog somewhere safe. Henry and whatever's out there can wait.

The Puppy Hotel

A young woman in her mid-twenties. Dressed in a black t-shirt with a dog paw and words beneath saying Pawsitive Attitude and kakis rushed to the pounding door. She can only make out the silhouette through the window, but her irritated sigh shows she recognized the person behind the door. Nadia opened it and faced the taller man with her arms folded. If John were expecting to enter he's going to have to get through her.

Her expression softened when she noticed the dog in his arms. Looking at her in pleading eyes. She returned her gaze at John and kept it firm. "You have a lot of nerve, man. This place is off limits to you"

His eyes motioned to the clock behind her. Nadia looked back at the grandfather clock near the checkout desk

"I still got an hour left Nadia. And I didn't come here on my behalf."

Nadia looked at John and cast her gaze downward at the dog. She's not stupid, John looked like he was in a warzone, a dog in his arms.

"I want you to take care of him. He's a good dog. He has nothing to do with this. And I know how you feel about animals, I don't want him caught in the crossfire."

The dog whined up at Nadia. It's expression is enough to make her heart melt. She relaxed her position and snapped her fingers. "You have my word, John. He will be taken care of"

A member of the hotel staff arrived, he looked at the dog that John placed on the ground.

"Make sure he gets the deluxe package" Nadia instructed and gives John and the dog some time before the pup is checked in

John knelt before the dog."This is a good home, boy. You'll be safe here"

The dog whined, he walked up and licked at John's face. John smiled and pets the dog. "I'll miss you too boy. Be good ok?"

The dog barked in assurance.

John stood up and watched the hotel staff escort the dog in.

"For what it's worth, I'm glad you killed that son of a bitch" Nadia say softly, referring to Sevario Constantine

John nods, "Take good care of him"

The moment the security guard noticed him he pressed the button to open the gates to let him in. "I'm rooting for you, John" Zaburo, the elderly security guard commented before he closed the gate and returned to his post.

The community he ran into is a gated community and the residents within just so happen to be of the supernatural variety. The neighborhood where The Draculina resides in. Running as fast as inhumanly possible he made it to the home where Carmella lives in.

It is a three story home that looked to have been custom made from the ground up. Despite his current state he showed enough gentlemanly resolve to not go and bang on the door like a wild madman. He rang the doorbell and called out, "Carmella? It's me, John"

Faint footsteps grew louder as they approached the door. Once it opened, he sees Carmella standing before him. She is dressed in nothing more than a pink shirt with a crescent moon symbol on it. John knows how much she likes Sailor Moon. The shirt was long enough to stretch to her long, caramel-colored legs to the knees. She surveyed him as her eyes bore concern, "You're getting blood on the welcome mat, John"

She moved to the side to let him in.

"If by some miracle I make it out of this, I'll make sure you'd get a new one." John staggered into the house holding his guts and Carmella draped her arms around him. "You look like you've been through hell."

"Yeah...that sounds about right." John choked out, despite his condition he managed to hug Carmella back with one arm.

"Don't worry we have more than enough time to get you stitched up."

"Listen...to me...if you run out of..."

"We'll make it. Even if we can't? Screw the rules. We'll take as long as we need to fix you up." Carmella replied firmly.

Another set of deathly cold hands held John around the waist and his arm was moved to a pair of slender shoulders to support him. John had to do a double take as he realized that Loreto Luciano, Carmella's stoic vampiric maid, had appeared out of nowhere to help him. Either she was a master of stealth, or he was in worse shape than he thought because John didn't even sense her arrival.

John tilts his head slightly, as long as he has known Carmella and Loretto he has never witnessed L's capacity in shapeshifting. But despite her appearance he recognizes her stoic gaze anywhere, yet even behind her stoic expression he noticed a hint of compassion. "Did you do something with your hair?"

Not many could make Loretto smile but John managed to be of the few who does so. "As The Princess has commanded, we will take as much time as we need to operate on you properly and finish your recovery with magic. Come now. The surgery room is already prepared."

"Thank...you..."

"Save your strength." She replied stoically while they carried him through the home into a shadowy wall that appeared in front of them. John closed his eyes and held his breath as they passed through the ethereal darkness of The Umbra to be transported to the surgery room. It was not a pleasant experience, humans were not meant to pass through that realm, and especially not in his wounded damaged condition, and he could literally feel the darkness clawing and grabbing at him, trying to drag him down into the darkness and devour him but thanks to their short trip and the auras of the Vampiric Pair, he was able to make it through. They exited The Umbra's Darkness and walked into the surgery room where John was laid down on the operating table and his outfit was removed. Loreto and Carmella claned their hands and created a pair of gloves around their hands while Loreto gestured and telekinetically pulled a table of surgery tools over to them and Carmella gave John a small pill to take.

"Here. Take this. It'll numb the pain. You're going to need it." 

John accepted the pill. Carmella pats him on the back, "There you go, in a few minutes you'd be feeling like you're in Nirvana."

"Thank you" John complemented

"Thank Sammy, she's the one who designed it" Carmella said.

As she and Loretto escort John to the room where they'll be able to properly treat him Carmella calls for Sam's assistance as she and Loretto guide John to the private room to patch him up. As they do John could hear a small voice calling out for Carmella. "Mama! Auntie Lorrie?! Is everything OK? All of a sudden I picked up a scent of a wounded animal and-"

Glancing at the direction of the voice he sees a little girl, stopping in her tracks, in the middle of the hallway looking at John curiously. She's dressed in pink PJ's studying John as Loretto and Carmella sat him down. "Who are you?"

"Oh Carmella, I'm sorry" Catching up with her is the Changeling, Sam Blackwell. She picked the little girl up in her arms. "I only took my eyes off her for a second and she was gone, she can be quite a ninja sometimes."

"It's alright Sammy. Hello your highness." Loreto greeted her. "This is Johnny. He's a friend of your mother's and a living legend but right now he's hurt from fighting a lot of very bad men so we're going to fix him up so he can finish them off." Loreto explained still in her standard monotone. However there was something else there. Either he was hallucinating or he heard something motherly in her tone. "We're going to take him to a special surgery room now so be sure to give us all of your moral support, okay?"

"John, this is my daughter Lian. My little Ninja In Training" Carmella joked.

John surveyed the young lady once again then complimented, "You look just like your mother"

Lian smiled and responded, "I like this one, Mama"

Carmella laughed as she went over to her, placing a hand on her daughter's head gently, "That's John for ya. Let Sammy go and tuck you into bed. I'll wish you a good night after I patch up John OK?"

She lunged forward and hugged her mother. "Okay mommy I love you!"

"I love too, Lian, more than you'll ever know." She replied while placing an arm around her beloved daughter. They hugged each other tightly and then she ran away laughing and ran circles around Sammy before jumping away into an Umbran-Portal up to her bedroom.

"She really is just like you when you were little, your highness." Loreto complimented.

Carmella blushed and laughed a little while John laughed a little only to cough up a bit of blood. "Ohhhh Gooood. I have got to hear all about this when I'm all patched up."

"Then let us commence with the operation." Loreto decided and then she turned to look at John and casted a spell to take away the pain his body was in. As is her usual style she spoke her spell in Italian. "Il dolore è sparito, sono libero La Dea mi ha tolto il dolore Acqua, spirito, fuoco, terra e aria togliere il dolore con cura Lasciate che le mie parole guariscano il doloreGrazie alla Madre Terra."

John let out a prolonged sigh of relief as the pain in his body faded away until he flat out didn't feel it anymore.

"Thank you, Loreto."

"You are welcome. Lets proceed."

Sammy took a bow. "Beautiful. I'll leave you too it then, honey." She winked at Carmella and teleported upstairs to take care of Lian, tuck her into bed and read her a bedtime story.

Loreto and Carmella were NOT kidding! John could already feel the effect kicking in and the world around him transformed into a swirling shining shimmering wavy fantastic kaleidoscope of colors while their voices grew distant and twisted and sing-songy and John found himself floating away from the world. He didn't even feel them working on stitching him up and sewing up his wounds. John had never done drugs, he didn't want to risk slowing himself down or dulling his senses, but he had to imagine what doing hardcore drugs felt like as he flew up and away from his body and the house and into an endless hall of mirrors reflecting every aspect of his life, everything and anything, all of it, all at once in  a flurry of warped, colorful universes kaleidoscoping from one world to the next so quickly it's nearly impossible to take in what he was seeing like he was flying through a mulversal Escher Painting of Mirrors faster and faster until he suddenly flew through a bright light and suddenly found himself standing in the middle of a lake. Or rather on top of it surrounded by a thick wavy mist. "....Hello?" John asked awkwardly confused as to just what was going on now after everything he saw on the way here. His voice echoing out into the void around him endlessly until it was suddenly interrupted by another voice, an Angelic Voice, A Heavenly Voice, one that made him freeze up, grabbed his heart and nearly dragged tears straight from his eyes. 

"John?" Helen's voice asked. 

Before John could respond to the woman who won his heart before him a small presence rushed up to him and John felt it tugging at his pants leg. He looked down at another familiar figure who greeted him with nothing but a simple bark.

"Daisy?" Jon asked in surprise. "DAISY!" He crouched down and picked up the innocent little puppy who wriggled in his hands and wagged her tail rapidly while rapidly licking and slurping his face. "I-I-I...hah! Hahahahaaaa!" John laughed as the puppy licked and nuzzled him. He held Daisy close and walked towards Helen. "I-I don't...understand? Am I dead? Did I die on the operating table? What is this?"

"You're alive John. You're alive and you'll survive this. You're just...sleeping and your mind has drifted to this place. A place of dreams between life and death. You took the pill, you received a magical spell to numb your pain and you went to sleep. Due this combination of events and your mindset you've come to this place of dreams. You've come back to me, to Daisy, to both of us, for now, until you wake back up again, so that we can talk." Helen stepped in and hugged John and he gently embraced her as well fighting back the tears forming in his eyes.

"I don't want to wake up." John admitted. His voice cracking, sounding like a crying lost child. "I don't want to wake up. I want this....this...this is all I've ever wanted in this world." 

"I know and we've missed you so much John. But this is not your time. Not yet." Helen whispered to John. "We still have some time though. And we need to talk."

John nods, still holding the puppy in his arms while observing his surroundings. He always had theories about the afterlife. A few of his colleagues had various theories but John was comfortable with the idea of vanishing from existence. At least till he met Helen. When she died he couldn't imagine that scenario happening with her because, to him, she didn't deserve that scenario. He's still unsure what this place is but he's more comfortable in not knowing. He's just comfortable to spend these last few moments with the people he loves the most.

From what John observed it is the exact replica of his home. Everything is just how he pictured it. From the smell of the morning dew of the grass to the structure of his home. "Yeah. Whatever time I have, I'll cherish every moment of it"

"We all will sweetie. The three of us. Until the time comes for you to return." She sat down at the table with John who John who gently set down Daisy who ran around the table a few times before running over to her food bowl for a snack. Helen laughed and then returned her attention to John. "You face a flood of death and devils ahead of you John, men and monsters, not all of them supernatural. Greater horrors are coming for you and Carmella. I know the two of you can handle it, John, you're both amazing that way, but only with the proper mindset. You are facing a flood of death but you both can withstand the storm and force it back so long as you are prepared for it. Regardless of how hard it is going to be, regardless of whatever you face ahead of you, regardless of whatever has happened to you in your past, keep moving forward. Keep pushing back the flood. Do not go out there to die. Fight to survive until the time comes."

"What time is that?"

Helen smiled. "When the time comes, John, you'll know. The Princess is a very clever girl, John, put your faith in each other and you will make it through this."