Kinn or Kine

By: Jack Kerouac
Prologue

Sunnydale, 1948

Time was running out.

There are too many of them this time, he thought, there's no way I can hold them off.

Jack Kinn looked down at his broken leg and grimaced. The pain was controllable, but there was no way he could run fast enough to escape. He was trapped and the end was near.

Strangely, the thought of dying wasn't as frightening as his first thought. He had lived with the threat of death for years now, and the constant strain of not knowing when or how it would take him had plagued his every step. Now that he knew the end was somewhat more imminent, a strange calm had descended over his thoughts.

Strange, I would have guessed I'd be blubbering like an idiot right about now.

Kinn reached over from where he was sitting on the floor and flipped over a small table, spilling its contents onto the floor. He dragged he table in front of him and positioned it so it was between him and the door. He reached into his overcoat and pulled out his trusty .45 automatics.

Not that these going to do me much good, he thought. Bullets are only going to slow them down. Kinn looked up sharply from loading his weapons as a loud pounding began on the door. He could see the wooden door begin to buckle under the pressure. He quickly reapplied himself to loading his automatics. He reached down to the ornate silver cross around his neck, kissed it, and positioned himself behind the table.

The door exploded inward.

There was no better way to describe it. One second the door was there, the next its shattered remnants were flying into the room, followed quickly by several dark and menacing shapes.

My God, they're fast, Kinn thought. I've never really appreciated just how quickly they can move when they want to.

But Kinn was fast too. He quickly snapped off two shots, feeling slightly rewarded that two of the dark shapes fell to the floor, writhing in agony. He knew they'd be up again soon enough, but he had resigned himself to his fate, and he was just trying to buy some time anyway.

He methodically began the task of firing his weapons into the shapes entering through the door. It was no use — no matter how many he shot, more kept coming.

One of the things came rushing towards him and he shot it through the head, like the others. Its forward momentum carried it into the table Kinn was sitting behind. The table went flying into the far wall with him trapped behind it. He hit the wall with a loud crash, momentarily dazed. He heard a snarl and felt one of his pistols kicked out of his hand. His vision cleared from the gray fog that had enveloped it just in time to see a distorted, hellish face in front of him.

It was a vampire. It hissed at him menacingly. "You're out of time, Kinn," it said. "And you're out of luck."

"I might just have a little bit left," Kinn growled. He lifted his hand, the other hand with the .45 in it, and placed the muzzle under the vampire's chin. Click. "Or maybe not."

Damn.

The vampire just smiled.

Then there was nothing but teeth and pain. And screaming.