Available Darkness Season 2

hurt Abigail to see it.
    Larry and John were off fighting monsters, or whatever it was John was doing for the government. What was to say he would ever have time for her? If she was losing control of her vampire abilities, how long was it before she hurt Larry, or someone else John cared about? Abigail thought of John’s love, Hope. What would happen once they were reunited? Would John try to become human again? If so, surely they’d have no place for an out-of-control vampire child in their life or home.
    What was I thinking? That we could all be one big happy family?
    She felt so foolish.
    Everyone would be better off without me.
    “You don’t need to be alone,” Talani reassured Abigail from inside her head. “Come, meet my family. You can decide if you want to stay. If not, I’ll bring you back home.”
    OK, Abigail thought back, though she wasn’t sure she really had a home to go back to, not once Larry found out about Katya.
    Abigail grabbed her coat and was about to head out the door, but stopped, realizing she had no money. She grabbed Katya’s purse and dug for her wallet, phone, and credit cards. She took them all, shoving them into her coat, then headed out to find the voice in her head.

    **

    Abigail walked to the corner gas station, called a cab, then took the taxi downtown following the directions Talani fed her mind. She arrived at a cyber café located at the far end of a strip mall with a grocery store, bar, bank, and few other places, all closed. The café was small, lined with a dozen or so surfers, all sitting at cramped desks, lining each wall and running down the small shop’s center aisle. Most of them seemed to be playing some sort of car game or another.
    Near the shop’s rear sat an old black woman in a bright pink floral dress, looking up from behind a larger desk with a computer and register. In front of the woman sat a romance novel, face down and open to the center, a long haired man’s bare chest gleaming from the front cover.
    “Ask for me,” Talani had said. “Edith will bring you to the back room.”
    Abigail approached the old woman, nervous, feeling as if she were doing something criminal by asking for Talani.
    “Hi,” Abigail said, her quivering voice betraying her timidity. “Is Talani here?”
    The woman eyed Abigail up and down, as if trying to determine if she belonged there. The woman, probably Edith, nodded then pointed to a door behind her. “In there,” she said.
    “Thank you,” Abigail nodded, then went to the shop’s rear and tried the doorknob. At first, it didn’t budge.
    Edith pushed a button behind her desk and the door clicked unlocked. It was only then that Abigail spotted the shotgun sitting on a shelf under the desk, within easy reach of Edith.
    What kind of place is this?
    Abigail turned the knob and slipped through the doorway and into a narrow hall with another three doors on either side, and one at the end with tinted glass leading outside. Abigail spied a camera above the rear door with two lenses, one aimed at the door below it and the other directly at the door she’d just come through.
    Before Abigail reached the end of the hall, one of the doors opened, and a thin, black girl with long, dark hair and a stylish, black coat and dress stepped out, studying Abigail. She seemed maybe 16.
    “Abgail?” the girl said, her voice the same as the one in Abigail’s head.
    “Yes. Talani?”
    “Good to meet you,” Talani smiled, a big, genuine-looking smile, walking toward Abigail and reaching out to pull her into a hug, as if they were long-lost friends freshly reacquainted. Abigail pulled back out of instinct, forgetting she was harmless to a fellow vampire. Talani smiled, and Abigail relaxed into her embrace. Her newest friend wore the scent of a faint but sweet perfume which Abigail instantly liked.
    “Come,” Talani said, “there’s someone I want you to meet.”
    Talani led Abigail through the door she’d just come out of and into a small storage room piled high with cardboard boxes. Abigail looked around, confused, seeing no one.
    “Just back here,” Talani said, leading Abigail back past the boxes and through a doorway leading to a second storage room, also filled with boxes. Talani opened a door which spilled out into a much larger room, the boarded up storefront next to the cyber café . Is this some kind of secret place that you can only get to by passing through their security in the cyber café ?
    The room was lit by