Vampire Slider:
Part One: Night World (5/?)
By Kristofer Armstrong
Copyright 1997.
Disclaimer:
Sliders, and it's characters are property of St. Claire Entertainment/MCA/Universal.
Night World and it's inhabitants belongs to its creator, L.J. Smith.
No permission was given (by them) to use their characters/ideas.
Spoiler Warning: This story takes place during and after the episode entitled "Stoker" and includes references to other episodes including "Dragon Slide".
CHAPTER FIUE:
"You asked about the Lamia? I'll tell you the whole story...take a seat first." said vampire Quinn, clearing his throat. "This story takes place back when Homo Sapiens were first starting to appear on the Earth. Living alongside the humans was a tribe of Night World people; Thierry hadn't been the first vampire, he had only been the second. Thierry had grown up in the tribe of Maya Hellewise. The Maya and the Hellewise, the twin daughters of Hecate, the Queen Witch. Maya and Hellewise would go down as two of the greatest figures in Night World history; Hellewise Hearth-Woman as the ancestress of the Harman family, the most famous of the living witches, and Maya as the ancestress of both the Lamia and the made-vampires."
"Maya desired to be immortal, and eventually found the right spell. The problem was that to do it, she had to steal the babies of the tribe-all four of them. She took them into the forest, did the spell, and drank their blood. Thierry and the rest of the tribe found the four bloodless corpses later. A few nights later, Maya came to Thierry, but she was different: she moved the grace and ease of a night-time predator, and her eyes reflected the firelight. 'I want to make you immortal. You're going to be mine, now and forever. I'm going to have child-not by you though. I don't think that you'll be able to.' Grasping and draining him, she used a fire-hardened splinter of wood to open a hole in her arm and forced him to drink."
"How come she used a piece of wood? Why didn't she use a stone knife or flake fragment?" asked Wade.
"Child...You yourself are a vampire. Don't you know that only wood can kill us?" asked vampire Quinn, all the while giving her a look that one would give a child who'd just asked a stupid question.
"My kind of vampires can be killed by exposure to direct sunlight, beheadment, and a wooden stake through the heart. The old adage goes 'The stake, the sword and the fire.'"
"You mean you can die just from the sun?! You poor child! How does your kind survive?" asked vampire Quinn, sounding incredulistic.
"With these," indicating her monk's robes and coffin.
"A coffin?!" gasped the vampires within earshot.
"Yeah. And what do you use?" retorted Wade.
Shouts of 'Sealy-Posturpedic' and the like answered her.
"A normal bed?" said Wade. "But..."
"Let me guess: Dracula." sighed vampire Quinn.
"Yeah." Wade said softly.
"Child, that story and others like it, were what the Night World had paid to publish and circulate to make people get the wrong ideas about us. After all, where's a better place to hide than right in the open?" said vampire Quinn.
"Umm, I hate to interrupt. But, can we get on with the rest of the story?" asked Rashel.
"Sorry. Thierry awoke to find that he'd been buried in the Traditional way: in the soft dirt at the back of the cave. Clawing himself out of the shallow grave, Thierry came face to face with his brother-Conlan. Before his brother could yell for help, Thierry pounced on him and drained him of his blood."
"Thierry started to run out of the cave, and stopped when he heard his name being called. It was Hellewise; her brown eyes huge and spilling with tears, her mouth trembling. The first made-vampire ran from the cave and into the wilderness. Eventually, Maya would have son-it was not known who the father was-just as she'd promised, became known as the first of the Lamia, the family of vampires who could grow up and have children. And her son, Red Fern, became ancestor of the most powerful Lamia family in the Night World - the Redferns."
"Eventually, the witches, Lamia, made-vampires, and shape shifters founded the Night World. The Night World isn't a place. It's all around you. It's a secret society of Lamia and made-vampires, werewolves, witches, and other creatures of darkness that live among you. They're beautiful and deadly and irresistible to humans. Your high school teacher could be one, and so could your boyfriend."
"The Night World laws say it's okay to hunt humans. It's okay to toy with with their hearts. Hell, it's even o.k. to kill them - discreetly, of course. There are two things you can't do with them: One, never let them find out that the Night World exists. Two, never fall in love with one of them. That's why Circle Daybreak was founded; it's a group of witches who're trying to get humans and Night People to...live in harmony. And here lately, many of the Night People have been recognizing human soul mates..."
"Soul mates? What's a soul mate?" interjected Remmy.
"Well Remmy, the soul mate principal goes something like this: it's the idea that everyone has one and just one soul mate in the world, and that if you find them, you recognize them immediately. And..that's that." said vampire Quinn.
"Well, what have we here?" a loud voice said. Every one turned to see who it was; it was Thierry! Upon seeing the Sliders, and also noticing that there were two Quinn's, he said, "Sliders?"
END CHAPTER 5.