Chapter 138: The Pureblood Council
Eleanor's operation ran quickly. Word of the Umbrella attack spread across every channel within hours.
While speculation was still forming about what had caused the incident, Umbrella Corporation publicly disclosed the existence of vampires.
The attack, they stated, was a terrorist strike by vampires against a human organization.
The announcement landed like a stone in a still pond.
To back the credibility of the disclosure, Umbrella released footage. A vampire in a dark alley, feeding. Fangs visible, skin pallid, and in the latter portion of the clip, what happened to that same skin under UV light: the spontaneous combustion, the deterioration, all of it captured clearly.
Within hours, the video was the top trending item across every major platform. Likes broke ten million.
Several people who had maintained cautious skepticism changed their positions immediately.
America's largest newspapers and networks saw Umbrella's release and joined in within minutes, publishing additional footage they had sourced independently. They didn't stop at Umbrella's material: they also reported that vampire infiltration of human society ran deeper than anyone suspected, including at the highest levels.
Public sentiment tipped sharply and completely in one direction.
Street marches began forming. People calling for government action.
Matthew, watching the coverage from the office, found the whole thing entertaining enough that he had the company release one of the vampires from the research pool, and then, in full view of the marching crowd, dealt with it using gravity.
The crowd's reaction was thunderous.
The Pureblood Council.
"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!"
In a conference room with no natural light, the air had broken into howling and fury simultaneously.
"Are you all seeing this! Are you seeing this!"
"What has Deacon Frost done!!"
"This isn't revenge against humans, he was personally walking us toward extinction!" Dragonetti, chairman of the Pureblood Council, was shouting at everyone in the room.
The composure that vampires cultivated over centuries was gone entirely. What was left was rage and panic.
Waking from sleep to find your entire species had been publicly exposed was, apparently, the kind of thing that dissolved several hundred years of elegance in under a minute.
And because the target of the attack had been the world's largest pharmaceutical group, the public sentiment could not be managed.
The arrangements the Council had maintained with certain human power brokers for decades were evaporating in real time, with messages arriving to inform them that this situation was beyond anyone's help.
Suppress it? With what?
The press was free. The public was frightened. Any attempt to apply pressure in those conditions would become its own headline.
Furthermore, this hadn't been a single company disclosing vampire existence. It was Stark Industries, Osborn Industries, and Fisk Industries publishing simultaneously. Major newspapers and networks had joined. SHIELD had somehow obtained information and was acting on it.
Under those conditions, who could have brought it back under control?
The human power brokers: unable to assist. You're on your own.
The coexistence arrangements that had protected vampire society for generations were gone.
Leaving only a very specific kind of despair.
"We can't simply wait." A vampire across the table spoke.
"What exactly are you proposing? That we declare open war on humanity?" Dragonetti's voice had an edge to it.
He turned to look at the display mounted on the wall.
"Take a long look. This is not the Middle Ages."
"And even in the Middle Ages, we never won an open engagement."
"They have developed weapons specifically designed to kill us."
On the screen, anti-vampire spray, a joint product from Umbrella, Osborn Industries, and Stark Industries, was showing sales growth that had gone vertical.
High-concentration allicin and silver powder as primary agents. Portable. Effective against vampire physiology. Not necessarily fatal on its own, but more than sufficient to protect a human in a dangerous situation.
The elders around the table looked at the numbers and went quiet.
With that product in mass circulation, they didn't have the leverage to start anything.
"This is Deacon Frost's fault." A female elder's voice was flat with fury. "That latecomer started something he had no right to start."
"Exactly. If Frost hadn't organized an open strike against a human institution, we wouldn't be sitting here watching our arrangements dissolve."
Agreement moved around the room.
"I say we bind Frost and hand him over to the humans. That might be enough to cool things down."
"Even if it doesn't, removing him as an unstable element benefits the clan regardless."
Silence.
Then the elders exchanged looks.
The answer was already clear.
In Cambodia.
Frost, having fled there once the news broke, sat with anger and a measure of regret that he wasn't particularly accustomed to feeling.
He had no goodwill toward humans. He intended to rule them eventually. But the ritual wasn't ready, the preparations weren't complete, and starting an open war before then had never been part of the plan. The strike against Umbrella had been a straightforward revenge operation. Make them think twice. Nothing more.
Nobody had anticipated that it would produce this.
The situation had deteriorated badly enough that he didn't dare contact the Council. He'd had to run to Cambodia and hope no one found him.
"Fuck. Didn't expect these Umbrella bastards to have absolutely no sense of fair play."
"Killing my people wasn't enough, they had to flip the whole table!" Frost took the blood bag his aide had brought and bit into it furiously.
Blood sprayed across his face. The human inside the bag went quiet.
"Umbrella. Mark my words."
"Once this ritual is complete, you will be the first thing I destroy." He said it quietly, with teeth.
Then something shifted in his expression, and he corrected himself.
"No. Second."
"Blade goes first."
Blade had always been the more personally irritating problem.
Elsewhere: SHIELD.
The vampire disclosure had the entire organization scrambling.
First a mechanical construct capable of shooting fire had materialized in New Mexico. Then this morning Thor's hammer had apparently launched itself into the air and disappeared. And now vampires were openly operating in daylight media.
Nick Fury had been saying the same word since he woke up, and he showed no signs of stopping.
His desk was covered in intelligence reports. His superiors were sending him directives that contradicted each other. The Avengers Initiative he'd been quietly building toward hadn't produced a single confirmed member.
And the problems kept arriving.
***
vampires..no, supernatural beings in general for that matter, are fking stupid if u ask me. at the end of the day, they are "super/enhanced" humans..... especially vampires, they fucking lazy if u ask me....lived so long, no true contingency for humans...I get that humans out number them....but still, they don't have to defeat humanity, just protect themselves sufficiently against them....I'm getting mad just thinking about it