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blow-and-illuminate weapons that hadn’t been seen for decades. She was gasping at the daylight that was painting the square in the distance.  
    “They have a sun blocker,” she said.  
    “Apparently not anymore,” said Reginald.  
    His keen eyes, peering at the large high-definition TV, picked out dozens of piles of ash visible all around the sun-lit square. Geneva, like the USVC’s home city of New York, was usually protected by the massive, geosynchronously orbiting shield that had been assembled in space twenty years ago. Both cities — the vampire world’s two major hubs — operated 24 hours a day in permanent night.  
    Or at least, they used to.  
    Reginald’s mind barely registered the deaths that must have occurred already this morning — or already this afternoon across the ocean. It was focused instead on logistics, consulting the collected vampire knowledge that was resident in his brain. Battle gears that had been long dormant began to turn.  
    There had been at least five incidents, and more might be in progress or forthcoming. If you counted whatever had been done to the sun blocker (Reginald’s guess was computer-based sabotage; it seemed unlikely that the humans had actually gotten into space), then there were six. The fog of war would mean that until this wave passed — if it passed — they wouldn’t be able to accurately tally the damage because there’d be too much panic and misinformation. The best they could do would be a guess — and right now, a guess wasn’t good enough.
    Reginald needed data. Not gossip, not hearsay, and not second-hand accounts. Data .  
    Nikki gripped his arm, the pressure of all five digits suddenly betraying her need for his support. It was strange. There had been frightening times in their shared past, but even when she’d been afraid, she’d always held her own. He hadn’t seen her truly vulnerable since she’d been human. Nikki had lost her parents early and as a result had put up a solid wall for the rest of her human life. Weakness, she’d learned, could be deadly. But now here that weakness was, and Reginald couldn’t fault her one iota for it.  
    “It’s a bus ,” Nikki said, looking at the TV. “Why did nobody think a bus was suspicious?”  
    “They use buses in Geneva,” Reginald told her. “New York too.”  
    “You’re kidding.”  
    “And subways. Why are you surprised? We have a car.”  
    “Well…” she began, but didn’t finish. Reginald felt a frown forming on his lips. It was impossible not to sense some of the old feelings returning. He’d been a vampire for longer than he’d been a human, but 42 years (80 if you counted from his birth) compared to a vampire’s potential lifespan was nothing, and he was barely faster or stronger today than he’d been when he was first turned. On his first vampire night with Maurice, Reginald had managed a pushup and a slow jog. Today he could place highly in a human marathon and lift around three hundred pounds, but both feats could be outdone by a fit human. Reginald having a car was like a handicapped person having a wheelchair. It didn’t make him feel any more like he belonged.  
    “City-dwellers are apparently as lazy as I am,” he said, a bit more harshly than he’d intended.  
    “I didn’t mean it that way,” she said, loosening the pressure on his arm and turning it into an affectionate hold. Then she looked at him appraisingly, continuing when she deemed it safe. “But it does seem strange. Vampires taking buses.”
    “A lot of things are strange these days, Nik,” he said with a sigh.
    He looked at the screen, watching the station flip between the five incidents. The shot of the bus bomb caught his attention, and he wondered if vampire troops had reappropriated the robots that were once used by human bomb squads. There would be little point to robots under normal circumstances; unless bombs flung wood or silver or unless the shrapnel threatened to result