His targets were always big, beefy assholes. And that was how he’d come to be a lesser. He’d targeted one of the Lessening Society’s members, and when he’d nearly killed the guy in spite of his size, the slayer had been so impressed he’d asked Mr. D to join up and go after the vampires.

Seemed like a good deal. Once he’d gotten over the whole good-dog-was-this-for-reals.

After his induction, Mr. D had been stationed in Connecticut, but he’d moved to Caldie about two years ago, when Mr. X, the then-Fore-lesser, had tugged in the Society ’s reins a little.

In thirty years, Mr. D hadn’t been called by the Omega.

That had changed a couple hours ago.

The summons had come in the form of a dream when he’d been sleeping, and he hadn’t needed his mama’s manners to get him to RSVP in the yes. But he had to wonder if he was going to live through the night.

Things weren’t going so good in the Lessening Society. Not since the prophesied Destroyer had pulled his horse into the barn.

The Destroyer had been a human cop, from what Mr. D had heard. A human cop with vampire blood in him who had been tinkered with by the Omega to real bad results. And, of course, the Black Dagger Brotherhood took the guy on and used him but good. They weren’t no dummies.

Because a kill by the Destroyer was not just one less slayer.

If the Destroyer got you, he took the piece of the Omega that was in you and drew it into himself. Instead of the eternal paradise you was promised when you joined the Society, you ended up stuck in that man. And with each slayer what got destroyed, a piece of the Omega was lost forever.

Before, if you fought the Brothers, the worst that could happen was you went to heaven. Now? More often than not you got left half-dead until the Destroyer could come by and inhale you into ash and cheat you out of your rightful eternity.

So things had been right tense lately. The Omega had been nastier than usual, the slayers were prickly from looking over their shoulders, and new membership was at an all-time low because everyone was so worried about saving their own skin that they weren’t looking for new blood.

And there had been a lot of turnover of Fore-lessers. Although that had always been the case.

Mr. D hung a right on to RR 149 and went three miles down to the next RR, the sign of which had been flattened, probably by a baseball bat. The winding road was just a footpath frosted with potholes, and he had to slow down or his guts milk-shaked it: The car had suspension like you’d find on a toaster oven. Which weren’t none.

One bad thing about the Lessening Society was they gave you POSs to drive.

Bass Pond Lane… he was looking for Bass Pond La- There it was. He wrenched the wheel, stomped the brake, and just made it onto the road.

With no streetlights, he blew right by the shitty, overgrown yard he was looking for and had to throw the clunker into reverse and backpedal. The farmhouse was worse off than the Focus, nothing but a loose-roofed, barely sided rat hole choked with New York State’s equivalent of kudzu: poison ivy.

Parking on the road because there was no driveway, Mr. D got out and adjusted his cowboy hat. The house reminded him of back home, what with the tarpaper that showed and the sprung windows and the poorman’s lawn of weeds. Hard to believe his fat, housebound mother and his worn-out farmer father weren’t in there waiting for him.

They musta passed a while ago, he thought as he walked over. He’d been the youngest of their seven kids, and both had been smokers.

The screen door had almost no screen and a frame that was rusted out. When he opened the thing, it squealed like a stuck pig, squealed like Big Tommy, just like the one back home had. Knocking on the second door didn’t get him no answer, so he took off his cowboy hat and pushed into the house, using his hip and his shoulder to bust free the lock.

Inside smelled like cigarette smoke, mold, and death. The first two were stale. The death was fresh, the kind of juicy, fruity stuff that made you want to go out and kill something so you could join the party.

And there was another smell. The lingering sweet scent in the air told him the Omega had been here recently. Either that or another slayer.

With his hat in his hands, he walked through the dark front rooms and into the kitchen in the back. That was where the bodies was. Two of them on their stomachs. He couldn’t tell the sex of either because they’d been decapitated and no one was in a dress, but the pools of blood from where their heads should have been mingled, kind of like they was holding hands.

It was real sweet, actually.

He glanced across the room, to the black stain on the wall between the harvest gold fridge and the spindly Formica-topped table. The bomb burst meant a fellow slayer had bit it and bit it hard at the hand of the Omega. Evidently the master had fired another Fore-lesser.

Mr. D stepped over the bodies and cracked the fridge. Lessers didn’t eat, but he was curious what the couple had in there. Huh. More memories. There was an open package of Oscar Mayer bologna, and they were almost out of mayo.

Not that they had to worry about making sandwiches no more.

He closed the fridge and leaned back against the-

The temperature in the house dropped by twenty degrees, like someone had cranked a central-air unit on so the dial read, Freeze Your Nuts Off. The wind followed, roughing up the still summer night, gathering in force until the farmhouse groaned.

The Omega.

Mr. D came to attention just as the front door blew open. What came down the hall was an inky mist, fluid and transparent, rolling along the floorboards. It coalesced in front of Mr. D, rising up into a male form.

“Master,” Mr. D said as he bowed at the waist and his black blood raced in his veins out of fear and love.

The Omega’s voice came from a vast distance and carried an electronic cadence with static. “I am appointing you Fore-lesser.”

Mr. D’s breath caught. This was the highest honor, the single most powerful position in the Lessening Society. He’d never even hoped for it. And maybe he could actually hang for a spell in the job. “Thank-”

The Omega misted forward and blanketed Mr. D’s body like a coating of tar. As pain took the place of every bone in his body, Mr. D felt himself get spun around and pushed face-first into the counter, his hat flying from his hands. The Omega took control, and things happened that Mr. D would never have consented to.

There was no consent in the Society, though. You had only one yes, and that was the one that got you into it. Everything else that came after, you had no control over.

When what seemed like centuries passed, the Omega stepped out of Mr. D’s body and clothed himself, a white robe covering him from head to foot. With ladylike elegance, the evil arranged his lapels, his claws having disappeared.

Or maybe they’d just been worn to stubs after all the ripping and tearing.

Weak and leaking, Mr. D sagged against the pitted countertop. He wanted to get dressed, but there wasn’t much left of his clothes.

“Events have come to a head,” the Omega pronounced. “The incubation is done. It is time now to shed the cocoon.”

“Yes, suh.” As if there was another answer? “How can I serve you?”

“Your task is to bring this male to me.” The Omega extended his hand palm up and an image appeared, hovering in the air.

Mr. D studied the face, anxiety kicking his brain into high gear. For sure, he needed more details than this translucent mug shot. “Where do I find him?”

“He was born here and he lives among the vampires in Caldwell.” The Omega’s voice was out of a sci-fi movie, echoing with eerie displacement. “He is newly transitioned by but months. They believe him to be their own.”