Elara did not like taking advice. Especially not from the target she was trying to liquidate.
Try fire next time, Valerius had said.
So, naturally, Elara decided to freeze him until his atoms stopped vibrating.
She chose the setting carefully: the Cryogenics Wing of St. Jude's Research Hospital. It was a tomb of chrome and frosted glass, abandoned when the power grid failed thirty years ago. But Elara had brought her own power—industrial generators rigged to the emergency containment units.
She stood behind a blast shield in the observation deck, her breath fogging the glass. Below, in the containment chamber, she had placed a single, elegant chair. On it sat a note: Sit here. Don't move.
Valerius arrived precisely at midnight. He was wearing a velvet coat the color of dried blood. He picked up the note, read it, and looked up at the mirrored glass of the observation deck.
He waved.
Then, with the obedience of a well-trained dog, he sat in the chair.
"Predictable," Elara muttered.
She slammed her hand onto the activation console.
The vents in the chamber exploded open. It wasn't just cold air; it was liquid nitrogen, pressurized to seven hundred PSI. The room turned white instantly.
Valerius didn't even have time to stand. The temperature plummeted to two hundred degrees below zero in a heartbeat. The velvet of his coat stiffened and snapped. His skin turned pale, then blue, then a crystalline white.
Through the thermal cameras, Elara watched his heat signature vanish. The red glow of his immortal body was extinguished, replaced by the deep blue of absolute zero.
He was a statue. A perfect, frozen monument to an ancient king.
Elara didn't stop there. She picked up the microphone connected to the chamber's PA system.
"Phase Two," she whispered.
She activated the Sonic Resonance Emitters she had bolted to the walls.
HMMMMMM.
A low frequency vibration shook the room. It was tuned to the resonant frequency of frozen water.
Down in the chamber, the statue of Valerius began to vibrate.
CRACK.
A hairline fracture appeared on his cheek. Then another on his chest.
Elara cranked the dial to maximum.
SHATTER.
It was a beautiful, horrific sound. Like a thousand chandeliers hitting a marble floor at once.
Valerius exploded.
He didn't turn into mist. He turned into shards. Millions of tiny, diamond-like fragments of frozen flesh and bone sprayed across the room, glittering in the emergency lights. An arm lay in a pile of crystals near the door. His head was a pile of dust near the chair.
Elara leaned back, exhaling. "Put yourself together from that."
She walked down to the chamber, wearing a thermal suit. The cold was biting, but the nitrogen had dissipated.
The floor was covered in what looked like red snow. It crunched under her boots.
She kicked a pile of frozen gore. It skittered across the floor like gravel.
"Checkmate," she said softly.
Then, the temperature in the room began to rise. Unnaturally fast.
The red snow began to melt. But it didn't turn into puddles of water. It turned into thick, viscous blood.
The blood began to boil.
Elara stepped back, her hand hovering over her pistol.
The puddles moved. They slithered toward the center of the room, drawn by an invisible magnetic pull. The red slush hissed as it knit itself together. Bones formed from the liquid with sickening pops and snaps.
It was faster this time. Maybe the cold had preserved the cells. Maybe he was just showing off.
In less than a minute, Valerius stood before her. He was naked again—his clothes were dust—but his skin was glowing with a radiant, feverish heat as his body worked to warm itself. Steam rolled off his shoulders.
He took a deep breath, inhaling the frosty air.
Then, he laughed.
"Refreshing!" he declared, his voice booming. "Like a winter dip in the Volga River, 1604!"
Elara stared at him, her face twisting in genuine disgust. The sheer absurdity of it—the man had been dust thirty seconds ago—made her stomach turn.
"You... you are a cockroach," Elara spat, stepping back. "I shattered you. I turned you into gravel."
Valerius shook his head, wiping a crystal of ice from his eyebrow. He looked at her, and his expression softened. He didn't look like a monster. He looked like a man watching a sunset.
"You are special, Elara," he murmured, stepping closer. The steam rising from his body made him look ethereal. "Most people try to stake me. Or burn me. But you... you tried to turn me into art. An ice sculpture."
"Stop it," Elara snapped. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like I'm... interesting."
Valerius chuckled, a low, velvet sound. "But you are. You are adorable when you are homicidal. The way your nose scrunches up when the murder doesn't go according to plan... it is quite charming."
Elara gagged. Visibly. She made a retching noise.
"Ick," she said, backing away until her back hit the cold glass wall. "Don't say that. That's disgusting. I am not adorable. I am the thing that is going to end your miserable existence."
Valerius cornered her. He didn't touch her. He just boxed her in, placing one hand on the glass above her head. The heat coming off him was intoxicating, smelling of ozone and old blood.
"You are trying so hard," he whispered, leaning down so his face was inches from hers. "I haven't felt this much... attention... in centuries. Be careful, Little Hunter. If you keep chasing me with this much passion, I might start to think you care."
"I care about the money," Elara hissed, gripping the handle of a combat knife she had hidden in her boot.
"Is it just the money?" Valerius teased, his eyes searching hers. "Or do you enjoy our little dates? The violence? The chemistry?"
"Falling in love is a crime," Elara recited, a mantra Krixis had drilled into her. "Love makes you slow. Love makes you miss."
Valerius threw his head back and laughed. "Love? Oh, my dear, this isn't love. Love is boring. Love is domestic. This... this is predation. It is far more intimate."
He looked back down at her, his gaze dropping to her lips for a fraction of a second, then back to her eyes.
"But be careful," he warned, a playful glint in his eye. "Keep killing me like this, and I might actually fall for you. And trust me, a vampire's love is a heavy thing to carry. It tends to suffocate."
Elara felt a spike of pure, unadulterated rage.
He was mocking her. He was treating her life's work—her violence—like a flirtation.
"Fall for this," she screamed.
She didn't use the knife. She reached into her belt and pulled out a modified Thermite Charge. She had brought it as a backup, remembering his advice about fire.
She pulled the pin.
And she shoved the grenade directly into his open mouth.
Valerius's eyes widened. Not in fear. In delight.
Elara dove to the side, rolling behind a heavy steel table.
BOOM.
The explosion was contained, muffled by his indestructible flesh, but the heat was intense. White-hot fire erupted from his nose and ears. His jaw was blown clean off. His neck was incinerated.
Smoke filled the room, smelling of burning meat.
Elara coughed, waving the smoke away. She stood up, looking over the table.
Valerius was staggering around. He had no lower face. His throat was a ruin of charred flesh.
But he was giving her a thumbs up.
The flesh around his jaw began to knit together, bubbling and popping. Within seconds, his mouth reformed. His vocal cords grew back.
"Spicy!" he croaked, his voice raspy as his throat healed.
He turned to her, his face smeared with soot, a massive, bloody grin stretching from ear to ear.
"Ice and Fire in one night?" he applauded, clapping his hands slowly. "A poetic duality! You listened to me! You actually listened!"
Elara screamed in frustration. She grabbed a heavy oxygen tank from the wall and threw it at him. He caught it with one hand, barely looking.
"I hate you!" she yelled, stomping her foot. "Why won't you just stay dead?"
"Because I'm having too much fun," Valerius replied, tossing the tank aside like it was made of styrofoam.
He walked toward the exit, grabbing a lab coat from a hook to cover himself.
"Same time next week?" he called over his shoulder. "I was thinking something with electricity. I haven't been electrocuted properly since Tesla. Surprise me, Elara. Keep me on my toes."
Elara stood in the ruins of the Cryogenics lab. The floor was wet with thawed blood. The air smelled of sulfur and nitrogen.
She watched him leave, her chest heaving with anger.
But beneath the anger, there was something else. A terrifying, gnawing curiosity.
He was right. She was obsessed.
"Electricity," she whispered to herself, wiping soot from her face. "I can do electricity."