2 comments/ 4228 views/ 4 favorites Somali Vampire Family Saga By: Samuelx The sun will rise soon, and since I'm yet to feed, this is decidedly bad news. Soon the unbearable light will bathe the desert sands, and like all my kind, I must hide or perish. Such is my lot in life as one of the undead. I walk through the streets of Mogadishu, a slender, brown-skinned young Somali woman, my head covered by a nice hijab, my dress blowing in the wind. Beautiful, sweet and innocent as can be, it's all part of my predatory lure. I seem like a pretty little flower, right until I sink my fangs into your neck. Finally, I spot my prey, an old man who leans against a building wall, unsteady. Don't know what he's doing walking the streets in the wee hours of the morning, but his life is about to end. I approach him cautiously, shifting my predatory gait to that of a concerned citizen. I will myself to smile, and look at him. As Salam Alaikum older brother, I say respectfully. I bow gently for emphasis, and decide to indulge him with polite conversation before going for the jugular. Like a cat, I like to play for my food. The old man looks up at me and smiles. For a long moment, neither of us says anything. He looks familiar, though for the life of me I couldn't tell where I met him. It is you my Fatoumata, he says, in a voice filled with emotion. Father, I say breathlessly, suddenly dumbstruck. And I stand there, frozen, as he warmly embraces me, his long lost daughter. As if the past decades years hadn't happened. I missed you so much my little one, he says, tears welling up in his eyes. I missed you too, I say, and then whisper into his ear that I must depart. My father stares at me blankly. Come home with me my daughter, he begs. I shake my head sadly, and vanish into the night. My name is Fatoumatta Hanaffi, and I was born in the City of Mogadishu, Somalia, on November 7, 1965. My parents, Ali and Maryam Hanaffi are poor farmers who moved to metropolis Mogadishu to escape atrocious conditions in the desert. I lived a normal life as befitting any young woman from my clan. In the summer of 1984, I married a young man named Salim Wahid. In 1985, I bore my husband a daughter, our little Mona. This little bundle of joy was the light of my otherwise dreary existence. A woman's life in Somalia is set in stone due to the constraints of Islam. My whole destiny seemed mapped out before me due to my gender. Somali females grow up to be obedient daughters and later wives. That's it. Little did I know that horrors and wonders awaited me. One night, in the summer of 1986, while walking through Mogadishu, I was attacked by a vampire. The fiend's bite infected me with vampirism, and I've been one of the undead ever since. Vampires are real, ladies and gentlemen, and we're nothing like you'd expect. We cannot turn into animals or read minds. Nope, we don't glitter. We are much stronger and faster than ordinary human beings, and we also heal quickly from injuries that would cripple or kill a normal person. Our senses are wickedly sharp. Just how sharp? Let me put it this way. I can smell a person coming across a distance of two kilometers. I can hear a pin drop on the carpeted floor of a ten-story building...all the way from the basement. I can see a tiny black dot on a lightly painted wall from a distance of sixty feet. Telescopic eyesight and night vision are keen assets among a vampire's sensory apparatus. Becoming a vampire changes you. As a vampire, I have the power of total recall, an absolutely perfect memory. We simply cannot forget, but only those things we learn after becoming vampires. Our human memories fade away quickly. That's why I had trouble recognizing my own father. Even though I still live in the same body I inhabited while human, I've become so much more than that...and in a way, less. I walked away from him not because I hate him, but because a part of me still cares. Most fledgling vampires abandon their families because they know, deep down that the monster they've become will eventually come to see their mortal relatives as food. I returned to my dwelling, a hole hidden underneath what once was a marketplace located near the largest Masjid in metropolitan Mogadishu. I have a whole apartment underground, with a bed and pillows, books, toiletries, weapons, everything I could ever need. I live alone, and that's how I like it. As I lay on my bed in the cool, comfortable darkness, far away from the sun's lethal rays, I couldn't sleep. I kept thinking about my father, and the old life I left behind. For decades I hadn't even thought of my family. Love and hatred are human emotions, and as a vampire, I am above that. I found myself thinking of my husband Salim and our daughter Mona. I once went out to look for them, and found out they left Somalia for North America. My dear ones, as I call them in my mind, in my most private moments. A lot of Somalis have been leaving the homeland due to internecine wars between various clans. This era of political instability and hatred has led to us being considered one of the most dangerous countries on the planet. The Americans invaded in a bid to stabilize the region, but promptly left once they realized that we Somalis cannot be harnessed or controlled. For better or for worse, we're a ferocious people when our faith and culture are under attack by outside forces. Odd, the fact that even after all this time, I still consider myself very much a Somali woman. For my culture and the Islamic faith very much influence everything that I am, even in this undead existence of mine. When the sun finally went down, I rose and went back to the streets. I fed on a brash young man who reeked of violence and mayhem, one of those Islamists who kill their fellow Muslims for being insufficiently religious or too 'westernized'. They're quite common in today's world, ranging from Somalia to Pakistan, from Afghanistan to Chechnya. After draining the anonymous killer, I disposed of his corpse, then went back to my father's house. I entered the modest dwelling, and searched for him, but in vain. When I asked one of the neighbors, they told me that the old man left for the deep desert in the morning. Anger and disappointment filled my heart. I was too late. I returned to my lair just before dawn, simmering with conflicting emotions. Why had I gone to my father's house? To make him one of us, the undead? To kill him? To reveal the secrets of my unnatural existence to him and expose my kind? I don't know. I don't have the answers. In that regard, I am just like you. I have questions, I have doubts, and sometimes I lie awake thinking about it all. Sometimes I wonder about what my life would have been like if I hadn't been forcibly changed from a normal woman, a loving wife and mother, a proud Somali sister and pious Muslim into what I am now. A creature that hides from the sun and drinks the blood of the living. A dead thing that somehow lives. Where would I be if the monster which made me, a creature I hadn't seen since that first night, hadn't changed me? I would be a middle-aged woman with a grown daughter. I'd be seeking a proper husband for my little angel Mona while her father Salim doted on her. I'd be counting the days until my daughter made me a grandmother, as is the custom among Somali women. I'd be alive, out in the sun, with my husband and daughter, with my family. Instead, I'm here. The life of a vampire is a lonely one. In the movies and television programs, vampires seem at ease in the world of the living. If only that were true. Even the least astute human will sense that I am somehow unnatural, if he is around me long enough. I don't age. I don't get sick. As long as the sun's rays don't burn me to ash or I don't get decapitated, I will continue to live. I've traveled a great deal, from Somalia to Ethiopia, and even to Yemen. I've lived in the dunes of Saudi Arabia, the land I always dreamed of visiting as a young Muslim woman, yearning for the sacred Haj. Yet I have not ventured too far from the land where I was born, for being a vampire limits my travel options. I cannot obtain a visa, and travel to the United States, Canada or Europe. I don't blend easily into the human world, especially in a country with close-knit communities like Somalia. I never stay too long in Mogadishu, for when my kind stay long in one place, we get discovered and hunted. Soon I will leave, destination unknown. I've heard terrible things about Nigeria. The conflict between Christians and Muslims has resulted in thousands of deaths and terrorism has put a chokehold on the country's politics, economy and social life. Sounds like the perfect place for me. With so many people turning up dead, my predations ought to go unnoticed for a while. At least that's what I planned. Even for one such as myself, life can have unexpected results. I was in my lair, sleeping when a general sense of unease caused me to bolt awake. I found myself staring at a very familiar face. The face of my father. Hello Fatou, he said somberly. Father, I said, staring at him. In his right hand he held a wooden stake. Don't do this, I pleaded. Shaking his head, my father pressed his foot against my chest, and raised his stake. I squirmed, unable to believe that after living so long as a vampire, it was going to end like this. I am here to bring you peace my daughter, my father said as he raised the stake. At the last moment my father hesitated, and that was ten times what I needed. With supernatural strength and speed I grabbed his foot and hurled him away from me. Before my father crashed to the ground, I leapt on top of him and sank my fangs into his neck. Three nights later, with my father by my side, just like a proper Muslim daughter, I walked through the streets of Mogadishu. I caught a thief, and fed on him while my father fed on his acolyte. I can't tell you how proud I was when my father killed and fed. This is a wonderful existence my daughter, he said, with his arm around my shoulder. Thank you papa, I said happily. My father told me how, as the only member of the family still in Somalia after my mother's death, he'd begun to despair. My death and disappearance had driven my mother into a fatal depression. I was deeply saddened to hear this. Rejoice my daughter for I do have good news, Papa said. I looked at him, wondering what else he had to reveal to me. Smiling, my father showed me the visa he'd recently gotten from the Canadian Embassy in Mogadishu. Apparently, my husband Salim and my daughter Mona lived in the City of Toronto, Ontario, somewhere in Canada, and had sent for him. Your daughter Mona s getting married and sent for her dear old grandpa, my dad said. Smiling, I looked at the sky and thanked the fates for this. In spite of the difficulties awaiting us, my Papa and I made our way from Mogadishu, Somalia, to Toronto, Ontario. It took us three months to get there, traveling inside a cargo hold. We'd bribed a high-ranking official from an international shipping company. At last, we were in Toronto, where our dear ones awaited. At first glance the Canadian metropolis dwarfed anything I could have imagined. The place was so big and bright, and filled with so many people! I vowed to myself that I would explore every nook and cranny in this place. First, though, I had family business to attend to. Dad and I made our way to the fancy Mississauga townhouse my erstwhile husband Salim shared with our daughter Mona. I was touched when I learned that Salim never remarried, and I saw a painting of me on the living room wall. The man I loved hadn't forgotten me. He looked a bit different from the younger man I married, but he was still the same. And my tall, statuesque daughter Mona was the mirror image of me. What a wonderful reunion it was, in spite of the initial unpleasantness of having to forcibly bring them into the ranks of the undead. I took no pleasure in hurting my dear ones, but I did what I had to do. It's for the best, after all. Only by shaking off the mortal coil can one achieve immortality. Thus I bit my daughter, and my father bit my husband Salim. Three nights later, they joined the ranks of the undead. A few days later, my daughter Mona bit her fiancé, a nice Muslim lad from Nigeria named Omar Adewale, and he's one of us now. I can't wait to help my daughter plan their wedding. At last, we're together again, just like a real family. Only this time, I vowed that nothing shall ever get in our way or tear us apart. Now I know what I'd been missing all those years. At the end of the day, no matter who or what you are, nothing is more important than family. Even if you've got fangs. Somali Vampire Family Saga Ch. 02 The Vampire Raoul Wahid screamed painfully as I thrust my stake through his heart, and within seconds he crumbled into a pile of dust. Like all newbies Raoul was aggressive, vicious and utterly convinced of his own invincibility. That's why it took me all of five minutes to slay him. Freshly risen from the grave, he went to a movie theater and tried to prey upon some college girls. Typical newbie mistake. Venturing out in public like that. He might as well paint a target on his chest. Someone called the cops, and the N.H.T.U. took the call. I'm with the evening division of The Non-Human Tactical Unit. Our various teams deal with all sorts of threats to human life in our fair metropolis. Vampires, werewolves, zombies, whatever the creep of the day happens to be. We put them down for good. It's our job, you see. Someone has to do it. The world found out about the existence of nonhumans, essentially signing their global death warrant. Here in Quebec, we take great pleasure in taking them out. I'm one of thirty women in a unit of a hundred and seventeen people assigned to kill any entity that isn't human. We have jurisdiction throughout Canada. My co-workers call me the Huntress. Sounds cool, eh? Some people have unfortunate names, and I'm one of them. What were my parents Amir and Yasmina Osman thinking when they named me Fartuun? It's a fairly common name for females in the nations of Somalia, Djibouti and Eritrea, where people don't even think about it when uttering said names. Well, I live in the City of Montreal, Quebec, and English-speaking folks have been having a field day with my name for as long as I can remember. Seriously, Fartuun does sound funny. One particularly mean gal named Miranda nicknamed me Farty Pants in high school and unfortunately, it stuck to me. It followed me throughout my university days and in my career as a policewoman dealing with threats that are out of this world. Not much I can do about it. Anyhow, why am I thinking about the old days? It's because my twenty-year high school reunion is almost up. I graduated from Saint Antoine Academy in south side Montreal in 2007, the same year the world discovered the existence of the nonhumans. All of a sudden, the stuff of myth and legend was making its presence known around the world. Mermaids lured Hawaiian swimmers into shallow waters and consumed their flesh in a frenzy caught on camera and broadcast on national television. A Canadian news anchorwoman transformed into a reptilian humanoid monster while attacked by a crowd of angry men on the streets of Teheran. As more and more nonhumans were revealed to be hostile to the majority of mankind, the world formed specially equipped squads to hunt them down and eradicate them. At first vigilante groups were formed, but the nonhumans quickly made short work of these disorganized, ill-equipped goons. The governments of the world stepped in, and since then, they've decided to leave the hunting to the professionals. From the moment the menace was revealed, my life and that of billions of people changed. I knew what I was meant to do. I would hunt nonhumans to protect the human race. Thus I studied Criminal Justice at McGill University from 2007 to 2011, eventually graduating with a bachelor's degree. These days I'm a Constable with the Montreal Police Service. The best cops in the province are recruited into the nonhuman fighting units. It's the most dangerous job in the world. And I excel at it. I am one of a few Muslim immigrant women working enforcement across North America. Last time I checked, I'm the only woman who wears the hijab while on patrol, a fact that irks proponents of the renewed Quebec Charter of Values. What in hell is that, you may ask? It's a proposed law that would ban public sector employees from wearing religious symbols while on duty. Although they've mentioned Sikh turbans and oversized crosses they're not fooling anyone, it's us Muslims that proponents of the Charter can't stand...and everybody knows it. Apparently since I wear the hijab in public, I'm supposed to be soft, malleable and submissive. That's the stereotype that many westerners hold of us Muslim immigrant women. I'm forty two years old, I'm educated and successful, and I own my own home. A lovely four-bedroom, two-story house in the Laval area. Two bathrooms, a two-car garage and a little yard big enough for a small pool. Yeah, we do alright for ourselves, my family and I. I take excellent care of my seventeen-year-old son Omar, who's lively and funny in spite of his autism. He's six feet tall, curly-haired, caramel-skinned and absolutely gorgeous. My perfect angel. My husband Khalid Hussein is currently working as a foreman in the oil sands of Alberta. He'll come home at the end of the month. We only see him five to ten days out of every month. Khalid's work is very demanding. I tell myself that I understand why he does what he does. When we met, Khalid was a Concordia University dropout turned vigilante, hunting nonhumans on the streets of Quebec City. This tall, ruggedly handsome Mauritanian stud saved my life one night when, as a rookie cop, I walked into a nest of vampires. We became friends, and eventually fell in love and got married. We had little Omar. Khalid changed his line of work, from huntsman to oil and gas industry journeyman. Our house isn't cheap. Omar's boarding school isn't cheap. We do what we have to do, you know? Sometimes I worry about Khalid. There's an outbreak of zombies in Alberta. Out of all the nonhumans out there, zombies scare me the most. Vampires, werewolves and ghouls are intelligent predators. Zombies are simply death come walking. They don't feel fear, or pain. They cannot be stopped. They multiply like locusts. A single bite or scratch from a zombie and you become one within a few hours. These mindless, shambling monsters gave the world one hell of a scare three years ago. There was a zombie outbreak in Paris, France. Within days, what began as an 'industrial accident' in a warehouse caused all of Paris to be quarantined. A month later, millions of zombies swarmed all over France. The European Union's various armed forces stepped in, and the nuclear option was used. In the end, Paris got vaporized for the greater good of mankind, and with it, untold millions of humans locked in deadly battle with who knows how many zombies. The City of Lights is no more. The leaders of the Free World decided that if one mega-city had to be sacrificed to save humanity, then so be it. We've been wary of another zombie outbreak ever since. Of all the nonhumans out there, zombies are the most prolific and the most dangerous. It's an insane world we live in. A world where ordinary men and women have to contend with the fact that there are monsters everywhere. I wonder if the day will come when we meet some supernatural menace beyond even our technology's ability to counteract it. Only time will tell. As the night wound down, we answered a few other calls. A shape-shifter was prowling around the Dawson College campus, alternately morphing into various male campus residents to sexually assault women. Our guys cornered the intruder and decapitated it before setting its corpse ablaze. All in a day's work. It was still dark when I got home. I immediately went to check on my son, and grew frantic when I realized Omar wasn't in his room. Calling out his name, I searched from room to room. Finally, I went to the basement, and what I found there chilled me to my bones. My son Omar lay on the couch, fast asleep. Relief washed over me in an awesome way. Taking his blanket, I lifted it to cover him. That's when I saw...them. The two tiny puncture marks on his neck. Telltale signs of a vampire's bite. I gasped in shock, and fell to my knees. He'll be alright, said a familiar masculine voice. I turned slowly, knowing who I'd see yet hoping against hope that I was wrong. I found myself staring into the face of one Khalid Hussein, my husband. Tall, dark and handsome. His features a beautiful blend of African and Arabian, like most Mauritanians. The man I often called my knight in shining armor. His eyes bore into mine, and they glinted with the sickly, ethereal glow of the undead. When his lips parted into a crooked smile, they revealed his pearly white fangs. As Salam Alaikum Khalid, I said breathlessly. My hand went for my service revolver. It was still loaded with silver bullets, any of which could end Khalid. Moving with superhuman reflexes, Khalid's hand caught mine. Good to see you too my darling wife, he said sardonically. Then he sank his fangs into my throat. When I came to, three days later, I was...changed. I woke up in an unfamiliar place, some kind of basement, to find the two of them standing over me. My son Omar and my husband Khalid. I looked at the two of them, the two individuals I loved the most. And it was as if I were beholding them for the first time. Vampire eyes see the world differently from human eyes. Mom you're awake, Omar said, smiling as he pulled me to my feet and hugged me. I hesitated, then hugged him back. I took Omar's face in my hands. There was something different about him. His eyes...there was a clarity and focus in them I had never seen before. Vampirism cures autism, Khalid said evenly, gently rubbing Omar's head. His eyes met mine. You changed Omar and me, I said, accusation in my tone. Khalid sighed, and rolled his eyes. It was the only way, he shrugged. Motioning for the nearby table, he pulled a chair and looked at me. Hesitantly, I sat down. Khalid licked his lips, then looked at Omar, who smiled adoringly at his father. We're a family again, he said happily. I looked from my son to my husband, still taking it all in. Then Khalid explained. He told me about how the oil sands of Alberta became a battleground between the zombies and the government-sponsored extermination squads. On the run from zombies, Khalid encountered a vampire who fed on him...and three days later he rose as one of the undead. The blood-drinking kind, not the brain-munching kind. At first he had to battle hordes of zombies as well as the humans assigned to contain the infestation, then he fled Alberta by boat, eventually making his way back to Quebec. The rest is history, Khalid said, with that fearless smile I knew so well. I listened to his little tale, shaking my head in amazement. My husband made me into a vampire, the thing I hate the most. My life had irrevocably changed. What life? I have no life now. I'm a half dead thing with no pulse who registers at room temperature. My old life, my job as a policewoman, my old friends, all gone. What did I have left? I'm not even a person anymore. A while ago, the United Nations declared that all nonhumans, and former humans such as vampires, werewolves and zombies can be killed without trial by any member of the Homo Sapiens genus. Human rights...can't have them if you're not human. As if reading my mind, Khalid gently took my hand and brought it to his lips. You've got Omar and me and we're going to be together forever, he said confidently. I looked at my husband, then our son. I will never be sick again, Omar said happily. I smiled then. My sweet son Omar. The three of us, together forever. Now that does sound like a good idea. I smiled at Omar and Khalid. Quietly, I hugged them both. My family. At last, we're united again. Together, we welcomed the night. I know what we're up against. News of my abduction by my freshly turned hubby and forcible transformation into a vampire have circled the globe by now. All the government-sponsored hunting groups will make my eradication priority one. I know too much. I can't be allowed to exist. Would you be surprised to know that I don't feel nervous? Most newbie vampires rely exclusively on their newly acquired superhuman strength and speed. They're overconfident, and that's why the death squads get them so easily. When you're a creature with superhuman strength and speed, an accelerated healing factor, immunity to disease and imperviousness to the aging process, it's easy to get careless. Me? I know better. I know ALL the battle tactics of both vigilantes and government-sponsored anti-nonhuman hit squads. I know what to expect from them, but they don't know what to expect from me. I took Omar and Khalid to my secret armory, and equipped us with automatic rifles, head-to-toe Kevlar body armor and military-grade weaponry. Vampires don't usually bother with any type of weapon. I'm smarter than that. And I'll do anything to protect my family. When we go out to hunt, the humans won't know what hit them...you've heard of Hobo With a Shotgun? Meet the ones with fangs, bitches!