He reached into his waistband.

But before he could produce his weapon, he heard a curdling wail, and saw a little black bullet leaping at Crispley. That could only be one woman. The one Silas had urged him to avoid.

“What have you done with my sister?!” Lydia barrelled towards the vampires, her expression contorting to something inhuman.

Crispley snickered, shifting to the side and away from Lydia’s rush, which for copyright reasons shall be described as a mid-air Pigeon Punch.

She screamed, her eyes the size of dinner plates as she faced him, charging something in her palms. Probably one of those fireballs again. Seeing a vampire incinerated so easily had jolted him, the sheer power required to do such a thing. He wouldn’t get to lay a hand on Crispley. He wouldn’t need to.

He turned around, casting his gaze for Hannah, who was hiding in the shadows of the doorway. He narrowed his eyes. Her face was fraught, and her shoulders hunched as though her neck was trying to meet her ribs, and potentially have dinner with her spleen. She looked like she might pass out any second.

He could hear the fighting above them, the screams of the laws of physics overshadowing the enraged grunts and cries of the Blackwell heir. At least one of the vampires was a magus. It was obvious, given that the three of them were flying, but it could have been any of them.

It could have been all of them.

He doubted that Crispley was, though. Silas wasn’t a big fan of sharing, but he would have told him something that important, at least.

He hoped.

He waved at Hannah, beckoning her towards him. There was only around ten feet between them, and twenty feet between him and the walls, but the girl was clearly thinking in light-years.

“Come on,” he hissed. “We need to get out of here!”

She leaned on the doorframe, quivering, and pointed at the sky.

Thump!

He heard a feminine groan, and edged around to face the source. Lying on the cracked ground, convulsing as she gripped her head, was Lydia Blackwell.

Crispley stared down at her, grinning. He held up a wooden square, so full of carvings that any more would have made it disappear. “Do you like it? I quite like it; I had it made especially for you, after all. Well, your mother, but this makes a perfect audition, no?” He scoffed, and looked to his two minions, who were pointing their arms at Lydia with every muscle as tense as a Gallagher family Christmas.

A wave of cold washed over Jack, the bottom of his stomach turning leaden. He looked up with gritted teeth. “Why?”

Crispley cocked his head. “Excuse me?”

His nose twitched. “What, did the Princes stuff your ears with garlic, or something? I asked you why!”

The cloaked woman next to him growled, descending towards Jack. “How dare you-”

Crispley held an arm in front of her. “Stop.” He turned to Jack. “What could a human hope to understand?”

He nodded towards Lydia’s twitching form. “I understand that it won’t just be her. You’re bringing the entire Circle down on yourself, legions of Blackwells, and now they’ll wanna avenge their princess. So why?”

He gave a wry smile. “I needed their attention.”

He felt blood dripping down his palms. “For what? What’s worth all this senseless slaughter?”

Crispley laughed, high and clear and mocking, and shook his head. “You know nothing of senseless slaughter, boy.”

He clenched his jaw. “People keep telling me things like that, but you know what? You ain’t in my head. I’ve seen things that make you look like a kitten, armies of monsters and endless wars, and I’ve had enough. So tell me what the end goal is here. Make me understand.”

In the corner of his eye, Lydia was clambering to her feet, hissing through gritted teeth. If he could keep Crispley talking long enough for her to rise, then he could use her skills to escape, and take Hannah, completing Andrea’s request – the lives already lost were acrid on his tongue, but he could still save one of them.

Conveniently, also the one he was being paid for.

Though Lydia’s steely eyes were focused on one man. Crispley. His pair of magi were locked on to her, rigid and unmoving, aside from the minuscule quake rising from their feet.

Crispley shook his head again, giving Jack a sad smile. “The vampire liberation.”

“Liberation from what, infinite Big Bang Hypothesis reruns?! Why don’t you take that idea up the mountain and we’ll see you in twelve years?”

He snorted. “Take solace while you can in your silly references. It will be the last one you ever make.” He turned to his minions. “Kill them all.”

The hooded man made a confused noise. “But, sir... they’re mostly dead already.”

“Well, kill the rest of them, then, you halfwit!” Crispley floated away with an aggravated sigh.

Jack looked over his shoulder. There were tears tracking down Hannah’s cheeks, her eyes puffy and a darker shade of grey than the rest of her. Seriously, how did that work?

No. He couldn’t let himself get distracted.

With a series of elaborate grunts that wouldn’t have been out of place in a Fake Taxi, he managed to grab her attention and encourage her back into the warehouse, allowing him to turn his attention to Lydia, who was standing on shaky legs, panting, and staring at the swiftly retreating form which had become a speck in the night sky.

And then the light show started.

A web of lasers erupted across the air, scorching everything they touched, and sending Jack and Lydia dancing.

He felt a scream rising, but he suppressed it. Instead, he looked to Lydia, who was snarling at the two and firing beams of her own.

“You can get us out of here, right?” he said.

She curled her lip, taking to the air herself. “There is no ‘us’. I’m killing these two, you can do what you want.”

A laser nearly struck him, and he felt it singe his beard. It was like in a spy movie, where the security system is a light grid, allowing the protagonist to be cool and acrobatic. But that wasn’t Jack. His best exercise was walking home from the pub when he was too drunk to ride.

He couldn’t see Hannah, which meant she had either listened or died. “Ah, f*ck this.” He pulled out his gun, aimed, and emptied the magazine at the pair.

Bullets don’t travel in a straight line. It’s basic physics; gravity acts upon them as it would any other object, moving or not. Firing forwards, this doesn’t take much sting from the shot, except over long distances, where one would have to consider many other variables anyway.

Firing upwards was like telling politicians not to hide in fridges, in that at first it may seem successful, but then it comes time for the interview and he already has his coat on.

The runes allowed his bullets to ignore that. Or rather, to anchor their gravitational potential upon his target. Because it was dumb metal, that was whatever they were pointing at.

Most of them fell straight back down, but one elicited a yelp as it penetrated the cloaked man’s leg. He plummeted, shrieking, and landed on the gravel with a great crunch. Jack allowed himself an exhale when the field of death let up: it was now focused entirely on Lydia.

Except for one which landed between his feet, splintering the floor and sending a shard to smack into his forehead. He growled, a sharp pain driving across his skin.

And for some reason, his face was burning. Where was the smoke coming from?

His eyes almost popped out when his gaze went down, finding the flames flickering in his beard. He yelped, flailing and jarring his own teeth as he slapped at the fire, and stumbled towards the warehouse. He managed to kill the facial blaze before any real damage was done, but it still felt raw.

He looked up and sighed. The beams didn’t seem to have a point of origin, so he’d have no idea where the next one was coming from, and his luck had always been such that if he won the lottery, the next day he’d fall down some stairs and knock over some movers carrying a priceless artifact, or smash into the Queen’s carriage and end up as lizard food.

He sprinted the few feet, and ducked into the warehouse. Hannah was cowering just inside the door, trying to stifle her sobs with her head buried in her knees.

He crouched down, putting his hands on her shoulders. “Hannah. It’s Jack. We need to go.”

She looked up at him, eyes quivering, and shook her head violently. “They’re all dead.”

He grimaced. “Yes they are, Hannah, but we’re not. Your mum’s waiting for you.”

She wailed. “But- but how am I supposed to face her? When I’ve turned into this!”

His face twisted in tandem with his heart. She was at breaking point, which was natural after a traumatic experience, and he didn’t know how to help her. Except to save her life.

“We can work that out once we get outta here,” he said. “But I need you to trust me, Hannah. Can you do that?”

After a pause, she nodded, wiping her face with her hand and rising.

“Okay,” said Jack, holding out his arm. “When I say go, you run as fast you can, and don’t let go until I tell you. Got it?”

She nodded again, grabbing his arm with a flinty expression. “Got it.”

He guided her towards the door, stopping in the frame and taking a deep breath. It didn’t work. “Go!”

They pelted out of the warehouse, yells blooming in their stomachs as they were nearly incinerated. Reaching the gate, Hannah shook at it, increasingly frantic as she realised that it was barred by a heavy padlock. She moaned.

Jack pulled her to the side, gesturing upwards, then squatting with his hands cupped in front of him. She took the boost, hauling herself up and over, flapping as she lost her balance and pitched backwards off the wall.

Following her, he jumped and grabbed the rim. He felt a heat in his crotch, as though his jeans were melting away. There was a scorch mark on the wall, between his legs. He squawked. With a heave, he went over, allowing himself to clunk onto Choo-chooin's disc. “Get us outta here!”

The turtle needed no more prompting, rumbling as he took a gargantuan turd on the speed limit. Jack and Hannah noted each other with deep exhales, and Jack smiled. Hannah noticed the front of the disc and knit her eyebrows. “Why does a turtle have a keyboard?”

“Why does a human look like a picture from the ‘50s?”

As she opened her mouth to reply, there was another thwack, and a panting Lydia lay upon the disc.

Jack looked behind them, clenching his jaw as he saw the vampire magus darting after them. “What do you think you’re doing? What happened to killing them? I don’t wanna end up like Ralphie Glick!”

Lydia whined, sitting up but refusing to look at either of them. “I can’t help it, that thing he used stole all of my energy. Do something.”

“That’s easy for you to say! I thought there was no ‘us’? Convenient timing for you to change your mind!”

She shrugged. “Count yourself lucky I’m allowing you to save me.”

Hannah looked back at the vampire, bleating in terror. “Uh, guys, she’s gaining on us!”

Jack barked in frustration. “I’m charging you double rate for this, you pretentious bitch!” Though he said that, he had no idea what to do. Despite Choo-chooin’s impossible speed, the flying magus was even quicker, almost close enough to touch.

She had been throwing beams and fireballs the entire time, but the turtle’s barrier had neutralised them. The barrier, however, was a product of the disc: Choo-chooin wasn’t protected from underneath. She had realised that, and was trying to overturn him. He almost pitched over. He considered shooting her, but remembered that he’d already emptied his magazine.

The ground started shaking.

A light came on in his eyes, and he smirked. He checked his watch. Looking around, he found that they were on a residential street, one far too wide to be normal.

He grinned. “Hold on tight, ladies!” He leaned over the rim, patting Choo-chooin's rear leg and tripling his speed.

Hannah screamed, gripping the sides until her knuckles went white. Being familiar with magical interactions with physics, Lydia sat with her arms folded and still refused to look at them.

“Hmph,” she said.

The vampire also sped up, now struggling to keep up with them as they barrelled through a blurry Blackpool.

Something exploded behind them. Choo-chooin wailed, rocking and sliding, and slowed down.

Every step became a minefield.

Jack hollered, seeing flashes of his school days before it finally came around the corner.

Hannah gulped, and Lydia stood up, pointing at the onrushing Tower with a rickety arm. “What the hell is that and why are we heading straight for it?”

“That’s the Tower, baby!” he whooped. “Only in Blackpool!”

“It’s going to crush us!”

“Only if we miss!”

They all clamoured, panic bubbling in their chests as Choo-chooin slalomed towards its legs. The road was still exploding around them, and the turtle’s breathing was getting ragged. Jack felt a twinge. He’d need to have him looked at straight away.

A fireball engulfed them, and they tore through the gap, the thunderous pounding of the Tower’s legs almost shattering their eardrums.

There was a muffled splat, though. He looked at the retreating architecture, spotting that their tail had disappeared, and slowed Choo-chooin. Giving Hannah a grin, he fell onto his back, cheering.

Hannah laughed. Lydia, on the other hand, still wouldn’t look at them. Even without seeing her face, Jack could see the curl in her lip.

“Okay,” he said to her, “so let’s talk about fee.”