Derek found a brush and comb. He caught sight of himself in the long mirror on the open closet door. He hadn’t seen his own reflection in so many years. It felt unbelievably good to rip the brush through his thick hair. But he knew his son had a confidence and demeanor he didn’t possess. He looked like his son’s younger brother.

Suddenly the computer began to talk. But the talk was entirely mixed with the sound of a piano playing. Ah, it was Benji Mahmoud talking on the vampire radio station.

“And all the Children of the Night throughout the world must be on the lookout for these three, Felix Welf, Dr. Karen Rhinehart who might also use the middle name Kapetria, and Garekyn on the West Coast of the United States, who has murdered another blood drinker.”

“Welf! Did you hear that?” Derek cried. “Welf is with Kapetria. We are all alive, all of us! That is all of us!”

“Yes, I know,” said the boy indifferently. He was tapping the buttons relentlessly as the voice continued. Suddenly Derek saw three faces on the screen: Garekyn unconscious lying on some sort of table; and official frontal portraits of Kapetria and Welf.

Welf was smiling in his photograph, Welf the calm one, the one who had always smiled so easily, my big brother! His curly hair was massive and handsome, and his dark eyes brimmed with spirit.

And we will be together once again! Derek was struggling to keep back tears. “We have to escape, we have to survive, we have to!” he said childishly. And then, “You will never in a million years know what all this means.”

He buttoned his new clean shirt and tucked it into his pants.

The voice went on, words running steadily under the soft sweet current of the music, like a dark unfurling ribbon.

“I do know what it means, Father,” said his son, “because I know everything you know, I told you, but I don’t have so much emotion attached to the information.” The boy looked at him. “Now I want you to give me a name.”

The computer voice was saying something about murder, blood, decapitation. He was describing the trio of black-skinned black-haired non-humans as murderous, and a danger to the Undead. Worldwide alert. All blood drinkers were to hunt the trio.

“Listen to him, he’s lying!” said Derek. He was going through the socks and boots laid out on the bed. “Listen! This is all wrong. We are not the enemies of anything. What did you say about a name?”

“I suggest my name be Derek Two pronounced as one word and spelt as such, Derektwo, and I’ll take your modern last name, Alcazar, which you took after your rescuer.”