Infinite Moon
INFINITE MOON
Vampire for Hire #20
by
J.R. RAIN
MATTHEW S. COX
Other Books by J.R. Rain
STANDALONE NOVELS
The Pale Cold Light
All the Way Back Home
Winter Wind
Silent Echo
The Body Departed
The Grail Quest
Elvis Has Not Left the Building
The Lost Ark
The Spear (with Randy Keys)
The Journey (with Piers Anthony)
The Worm Returns (with Piers Anthony)
Lavabull (with Piers Anthony)
Jack and the Giants (with Piers Anthony)
Dolfin Tayle (with Piers Anthony)
Dragon Assassin (with Piers Anthony)
Lost Eden (with Elizabeth Basque)
Judas Silver (with Elizabeth Basque)
The Vampire Club (with Scott Nicholson)
Cursed (with Scott Nicholson)
Ghost College (with Scott Nicholson)
The Black Fang Betrayal (with multiple authors)
VAMPIRE FOR HIRE
Moon Dance
Vampire Moon
American Vampire
Moon Child
Christmas Moon (novella)
Vampire Dawn
Vampire Games
Moon Island
Moon River
Vampire Sun
Moon Dragon
Moon Shadow
Vampire Fire
Midnight Moon
Moon Angel
Vampire Sire
Moon Master
Dead Moon
Lost Moon
Vampire Destiny
Infinite Moon
Vampire Empress (coming soon)
SAMANTHA MOON CASE FILES
Moon Bayou (with Rod Kierkegaard)
Blood Moon (with Matthew S. Cox)
Parallel Moon (with Kris Carey)
SAMANTHA MOON ORIGINS
with Matthew S. Cox
New Moon Rising
Moon Mourning
Haunted Moon
SAMANTHA MOON ADVENTURES
with Matthew S. Cox
Banshee Moon
Moon Monster
Moon Ripper
Witch Moon
Moon Goddess
Moon Blaze
Golem Moon
Moon Maidens
VAMPIRE FOR HIRE SHORT STORIES
Teeth
Vampire Nights
Vampire Blues
Vampire Dreams
Halloween Moon
Vampire Gold
Blue Moon
Dark Side of the Moon
Vampire Requiem
Moon Love
Moon Musings
Moon Beast
Vampire Widow
VAMPIRE FOR HIRE
COLLECTED SHORT TALES
Moon Tales
Moon Shots
Vampire Vacation (coming soon)
VAMPIRE FOR HIRE EXTRAS
Vampire Alley (poem)
Moon Extras (Bonus Scenes)
Moon Dance (Deluxe Edition)
JIM KNIGHTHORSE SERIES
Dark Horse
The Mummy Case
Hail Mary
Clean Slate
THE WITCHES SERIES
with Rod Kierkegaard and Matthew S. Cox
The Witch and the Gentleman
The Witch and the Englishman
The Witch and the Huntsman
The Witch and the Wolfman
The Witch and the Hangman (coming soon)
WINTER SOLTSICE SERIES
with Matthew S. Cox
Convergence
Containment
Catalyst
Catacombs
ALEXIS SILVER SERIES
with Matthew S. Cox
Silver Light
Deep Silver
Silver Quarrel
Silver Cauldron (coming soon)
MADDY WIMSEY SERIES
with Matthew S. Cox
The Devil’s Eye
The Drifting Gloom
Dark Mercy
The Queen’s Gambit (coming soon)
THE PSI QUARTET
with A.K. Alexander
Hear No Evil
See No Evil
Speak No Evil
Touch No Evil
NICK CAINE SERIES
with Aiden James
Temple of the Jaguar
Treasure of the Deep
Pyramid of the Gods
THE WATSON FILES
with Chanel Smith
Sherlock Holmes and the Missing Shakespeare
Sherlock Holmes and the Lost Da Vinci
Sherlock Holmes and the Werewolf of West End
DEAD DETECTIVE SERIES
with Rod Kierkegaard
The Dead Detective
Deadbeat Dad
ICE WOLF
with H.P. Mallory and Crystal-Rain Love
Ice Wolf
She Wolf (coming soon)
IMMORTAL OPERATIVE
with Matthew S. Cox
Broken Ice
THE SPINOZA TRILOGY
The Vampire With the Dragon Tattoo
The Vampire Who Played Dead
The Vampire in the Iron Mask
FOUR ELEMENTS TRILOGY
with Matthew S. Cox
The Elementalist
The Black Rose
The Wakefield Curse
THE ALADDIN TRILOGY
with Piers Anthony
Aladdin Relighted
Aladdin Sins Bad
Aladdin and the Flying Dutchman
THE WALKING PLAGUE TRILOGY
with Elizabeth Basque
Zombie Patrol
Zombie Rage
Zombie Mountain
THE SPIDER TRILOGY
with Scott Nicholson and H.T. Night
Bad Blood
Spider Web
Spider Bite
TEAM QUANTUM TRILOGY
with Kris Carey and Matthew S. Cox
The Accidental Superheroine
My Big Fat Accidental Superheroine Wedding
Accidental No More
SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS
Dark Rain: Stories
Blood Rain: Stories
Black Rain: Stories
Red Rain: Forty-One Stories
Moonlight & Monsters: Ten Vampires Tales
For Young Readers
STANDALONE NOVELS
The Enchantress (with Randy Keys)
Spirit Mountain (with Alexandra Swan)
The Emerald River
Forever Silent
The Angel and the Gift
YOUR CHOICE BOOKS
Deep Sea Danger
The Legend of Eagle Eye Mountain
Playoff Pressure
THE ROBOT TWINS
The Mystery of the Walking Statue
The Secret of Stonehead Island
The Mystery of the Lightning Cave (coming soon)
KIDQUEST ADVENTURES
The Secret of the Sphinx
Treasure of Oak Island (coming soon)
THE DISTANT WORLD TRILOGY
Dare to Enter a Distant World
Dare to Rule a Distant World (coming soon)
Infinite Moon
Published by Rain Press
Copyright © 2020 by J.R. Rain
All rights reserved.
Ebook Edition, License Notes:
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
> Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Reading Sample: Dragon Assassin
Reading Sample: The Vampire Club
About the Authors
Infinite Moon
Chapter One
On the Fly
Frantic emotions make it difficult to think.
My entire vampiric life thus far feels as though it’s been leading up to this point: a confrontation with Elizabeth. The emotional strain of constant vigilance, worrying what she’d do and when she’d do it has eclipsed my memories of mortality to the point they’re more like a dream than anything I’ve ever lived through.
Ever since she’d escaped from me, I’ve expected she’d do something bad. The only questions I had were ‘when, and how many are going to die?’ To be fair, my assumptions proved a bit off. We’d all been bracing for her attacking us: meaning my family, possibly Kingsley and Allison as well. Turns out, she didn’t really care about us one way or the other.
Perhaps a little hubris came into play, but the woman did have me convinced for quite a while the only thing standing between her and the ruination of the world as we know it was me. Yeah, also a lie. Not exactly sure what benefit it provided Elizabeth other than getting me to resist her taking over my psyche entirely. Maybe a host ‘letting them out’ fuses dark master and host together in a way where she couldn’t simply leave whenever she wanted to, so she had to trick me into doing everything I could to keep her in a metaphorical pit in my head. I suppose it would also imply a dark master can’t help themselves but attempt to infiltrate their host’s psyche.
Or I could be completely wrong.
Elizabeth adores messing with people and causing emotional pain. She might have only been mocking me for being proud of my becoming a federal agent, thinking I made a difference for good in the world. I confess to a little pride, but no one goes to HUD for glory. Eight out of ten people probably don’t even know the agency exists. Hollywood is riddled with movies starring fictional FBI agents or CIA agents. Can’t say I’ve seen even one film about a Housing and Urban Development agent.
Whatever.
Point is, Elizabeth separated herself from me awhile back, and ever since, we knew she gathered her strength for something big. I’d mistakenly assumed she planned to raise an army of immortals and conquer the world. Believe it or not, ancient mysticism doesn’t have a big advantage over modern weapons. Vampires are tough, but if Elizabeth took them public and tried to overwhelm entire nations, big bombs, tanks, military aircraft, and so on would get involved.
She’d probably set off nuclear war—sorta like that guy in Florida who burned down his entire house trying to get rid of a cockroach.
No, the only way a creature like her could take over this world would be subtle manipulation of prominent leaders behind the scenes. And while such a plan is completely within her powers, she doesn’t want to be subtle anymore. This crazy bitch wants to be an empress, queen, or some such thing like a goddess on earth. Sorry, Liz. You might be fast, but you can’t outrun a hellfire missile from a Predator drone. Can’t mind control one of those either. Blow a vampire into tiny enough chunks, especially with fire involved, and it might be game over. Though, I have a feeling she would drift off somewhere and regenerate a new body.
I got a peek at her frustration when Izeth the ninth-dimensional being nearly exploded. Guess when you’ve been planning something for centuries, an unexpected failure is exceptionally infuriating. Damn her for fooling me again. Sitting there having tea and talking came too close to making me think of her as an actual somewhat-human being with functioning emotions and depth of personality.
Looking back on it, I’m sure she had no intention of releasing the creators she abducted alive. If her plan worked, she’d have needed them to essentially prop up the world they made. Without getting the creators’ work out there into the sphere of public awareness, it would have ceased to exist without them. Her entire reality would only have existed by virtue of the creators mentally living in the world they made. As soon as they died, bye-bye everything. She probably would’ve turned them into vampires, maybe brought them into the world with her so they had the motivation of oblivion keeping them working on it for eternity.
Anyway, back to my whirling emotions. Not only do I have the worry, fear, and adrenaline rush that comes with the manifestation of my biggest anxiety of the past few years coming to fruition (the war between Elizabeth’s dark masters and everyone else), I also get to freak out over bringing my damn kids with me.
This is elevating ‘take your kids to work day’ a bit too far.
Tammy emits a noise... part sigh, part giggle.
She’s scared, but dealing with it. Can’t blame her at all. Of everyone here, she’s the closest to a normal person. Even Allison can defend herself with magic to a point. Granted, one of those ascendant dark masters would easily kill her before she even knew an attack was coming. They’re ridiculously fast, though Kingsley probably has the reflexes, at least in wolf form, to deal with them. He’s also far tougher than an average human, so a hit or two won’t be instant death. Any ascendant who bites Kingsley is in for a rude awakening. He bites back, and his fangs are way bigger.
Even Anthony, at least if he shifts into the Fire Warrior, could probably protect himself against ascendant dark masters. The big burning guy isn’t terribly fast—albeit he is much faster than a person would expect from looking at him—but my son has impressive dexterity. Probably from working out with Jacky and boxing. He’d have a better chance of catching an ascendant by the throat or punching them in the face than diving out of the way.
Point being, Tammy is an ordinary human girl with ridiculous telepathy, who doesn’t belong anywhere near a fight with supernatural beings strong enough to throw cars. Fortunately, she’s got long range skills. She doesn’t have to be close to the dangerous parts to read minds.
Anthony thinks of her like ‘command and control’ from one of his video games. She’s our radar and communications system, so to speak. My daughter can allow us to all basically communicate (through her) as though we had radios. Plus, she can sense the presence of sentient minds trying to sneak up on us and give us warning. Most importantly, however, she can mask us from Elizabeth’s ability to detect our presence.
That reason, more than any other, is why she insisted on going with us.
Another source of my crazy emotions is how rapidly everything is moving. Elizabeth and her people took a magical gateway straight from Barrow, Alaska to somewhere in Venezuela. She’s planning to invade another dimension, but not one above ours. Going laterally prevents certain annoying issues like eventual complete disintegration—always a plus.
Her plan is to invade an alternate version of Earth containing a far more primitive civilization so she doesn’t need to worry about laser-guided smart bombs or nukes. It’s also supposedly ‘more magical’ than what I think of as our ‘normal’ world. I’ve got no idea exactly what it means to be more magical… anywhere from dragons flying around like sparrows to people like Allison making up a significant portion of the population. Good chance, magic in the dimension Elizabeth has targeted isn’t something people try to keep hidden and/or don’t believe in.
In her ascendant form, she has access to the full range of the abilities she had in her mortal life plus all the perks of immortality. I’m also not sure if we should consider ourselves lucky Elizabeth’s forte is ritual blood magic. This means, she’s not going to do—I
’m guessing—the ‘stand there and throw fireballs’ thing like Allison. Oh, wait. She tried to impale me on an earthen spire.
Yeah, I’m anxious as hell because everyone is rushing, trying to stop Elizabeth from opening a portal to the other dimension. It would’ve been one thing to let her rule a world the creators made up for her, since everyone in it never would have existed otherwise. However, I can’t just sit idly by while she spreads pain and misery over already-existing actual people. Just because they live in an alternate world doesn’t make them less than real.
Worse, Tammy saw a vision of men tied to trees in a ritualistic manner, their chests bare and painted in arcane markings. Since they all wore olive drab pants, she thinks they might be soldiers. Kingsley suggested the idea of criminal gangs, mercenaries, or rebels as well, all of whom might be wearing ‘military type’ uniforms. Since, according to him, all sorts of ‘bad guys’ are down there.
Great.
It’s like having to run through a swarm of wasps to get to the fire in the corner of a backyard so we can put it out.
Max has a private jet, much to my surprise. He’s gathered up all the Light Warriors in close proximity who aren’t either children-in-training or too old to help. They’d been preparing to meet us up in Barrow, but changed plans when I updated them on her sudden relocation.
Once Kingsley arrived at my house, I teleported us all to LAX.
Speaking of teleportation, I almost used Google Earth to jump us straight to Venezuela, but allowed Kingsley and Allison to talk me out of it. Allison worried Elizabeth would expect this and might have put up a temporary magical trap. The last thing I’d need is to try teleporting down there and being forcibly redirected into the heart of, say, a volcano or some such thing… or potentially across dimensions. Kingsley thought teleportation risked us leaping into an ambush of a more mundane type, and also believed the people Tammy saw about to be sacrificed had already been killed by now.
He has a point. It doesn’t seem like ritualists would tie their victims to trees days in advance.