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Chupa Cabra: The Undead Of Mexico

"I'ts the Devil's night alright" Xavier thought as he swung the big rig around. For the last four years every night has been the Devil's night. "Kell, our passenger isn't looking too good." "I've seen this before. When you take them away, they get weak, drained. Even if she is not undead, the ones they use as bait are still under their control and they feed off their life force." Kelly glanced down the road and seeing the bible carrying girl from the convenience store said "Give her a lift?... Maybe a break away from the diesel fumes will be good for her. We still gotta decide what we're gonna do with her. She's probably a homing beacon." Xavier looking at him not to give away what he already knows; "Bait with bait." Rolling to a stop, "Give you a lift ma'am?"

  

It was a long driveway just a minute up the road. Two ruts in a field of grass for a driveway.An older but somewhat well kept home in the distance. Lights were on. "Hmmm, no Bates Motel here." Kelly understood what she meant by "It's the Devil's night." Bible toting little wench. Common ploy, "flirt to convert."

"So do they celebrate Halloween in Mexico?" After a pause, "No, we have... a picnic day... kinda like Memorial Day. A day of the dead, remembering. Madison Avenue tries to get us to dress up and dance like they do in New Orleans.   A lot of abuelas practice witchcraft. My family never did." "Yea man, I could see having blood fly out of the pinata of a mummy." As they came to a stop at the front of the wood frame home "would you mind if we took a break here? It won't be long, just to stretch and get some fresh air." No sooner than had she gone into the house, she returned with a tray of cookies and a pitcher of lemonade. "Ok, here comes the preachin'.. time to pay for the cookies." "You don't have to do this." "Nonsense, it's been awhile since we had Sunday night company on the front porch." The cool night air was helping their Syrian princess come to. Somewhat astonished as is she had been slipped ecstacy in Vegas and awoke in bed with a man she didn't remember she looked about wide eyed. "Welcome back to earth. You slept the entire trip." Yawning and wiping her eyes "how long?" "oh about ten hours." "Oh no, where are we?" "West Texas. Taking a break. Want a cookie." "I should be at work." "Honey, I don't think they expect you at work anytime soon." Starting to swoon, she leaned back. "I feel so washed out." "That's common. Here, have some lemonade, this nice girl has taken the trouble to make some." 'Wanna hear me play a song?" She chimed in. 'Well, not right now." "I'm a song writer. Aside from being a tongue talkin' dipped in the spirit born again Christian... This one's got the Devil in him, that one too. She looks like the great whore of Babalon dressed like that if you know what I mean." "Oh,... it's Halloween, remember? Just a costume. I'm sure she's quite religous; maybe even a Catholic or something." Kelly grasped for words but he was digging the hole deeper for our host to start making us pay for the lemonade and cookies.

Chupa Cabra: The Undead Of Mexico

3/25/07

Vampire Lure

What? I said Vampire Lure. Lore, right? Like legend. No, lure as in fishing lure. That's what the Syrian Princess is. A honey trap. If you aren't interested in her for obvious reasons, you may be interested in her sob story to rescue her. That's why they haven't killed her. Not alive, but not dead. Not even a blood bank. Well I'm sure they made their deposits in other ways? Know why Vampire's don't cast shadows? (Pause) They're spirits. Ectoplasm or something like that. They can touch us, puncture our veins drain energy form our blood. And as spirits they can feel. But they are driven by evil. Remember, the bible says that when we die we sleep. So any manifestation of a dead person is merely demonic...dirty spirits... fallen angel... emissary of the devil. We must remember not to be deceived as our noble of intent will be exploited as weakness. So, we should kill her now? Eyebrow raises and a side glance is noted as she is using her compact to check her makeup. See her reflection? She's not dead. But, she needs to choose to live. No one can bail her out.

Like most women, she wants to call her own shots and doesn't care who she steps on in her efforts. So, we should kill her now?  Is there something about your past you're not telling me?  No, I'm just a pragmatist. Yeah, a very eager pragmatist. Hey, when you have as much education as I, you learn to get to the point fast so you can move on.  Besides, the way you look at her, remember:Lure is blind.

To Be Continued.

Chupa Cabra: The Undead Of Mexico

12 JUL 06

There was a silence... finally "So, where did the girl come from" Javier said glancing over the girl sitting between them.  "From the bar?"  He was beginning to see that Hero could also be well known for understatement.  "It's OK, I'm not one of them... not yet.  That's why I wanted to get out."  "I was a bad girl, rebellious, I was even called an evil sex kitten by my boyfriend as he was spanking me once but I'm not one of them."  "Great, now I got a sidekick and a Girl Friday.  Look guys, I drive alone and eventually I'll need to work alone again.  When we hit the bordertown, the girl goes.  "Hmmm bad choice she's kinda cute for a middle eastern."  "How did you know I was middle eastern?"  Kelly continued "You're too pale to be mexican.  Too many rings with rubys and other stones to be native.  I bet you speak some arabic."  "Cudda bouie."  "See...  So you're on the run?... death squad after you because you wouldn't marry your cousin after he won a date eating contest?"   "Just get me to the border, I'll leave."  "No, what we dealt with back there may have people looking for you.  So what makes you so special?  So special they wouldn't ... you know, convert you?  Not religously anyway."  "I don't know.  My family did come from royalty"  "Oh, so you're a sand queen.  Probably a large diary... all 50,000 square miles of it.  I wish I had just one more beer before the fight broke out."  She giggled.  "I like the older wise one." She said in an ancient arabic dialect.  Kelly responded with gratitude in the same dialect.  She shot him a glance.  "I studied language while in college too.  What?... you think all I ever did was drink beer?"  "So what are you guys, Vampire Hunters?"  Silence... from both.  "Because if you are, you're in the right place.

To Be Continued...

Chupa Cabra: The Undead Of Mexico 12 may 06

"I can handle this." we both said simultaneously.  At which we both glanced at the other wonder what the other has been doing with their free time.  Kelly reached for his well worn travel bag and promptly produced one of his widdeling sticks that happened to be sharpened to an extreme point.  "Let me jab this in his chest, that'll do it."  "I thought you said you didn't have any steaks in that bag?"  "Well, not S-T-E-A-K-S steaks..."  As Kelly started to move for a position our adversary just hung and swung, eyeing the situation.  I put the backside of my right arm in his path of movement.  He stopped.  I then reached into my right side under my vest pulling out my pistol.  "Cripes, where'd you get that... your Grandfather?"  I had, in my hand a rolling block Colt Navy cap and ball black powder pistol.  Kinda like the one on Josie Wales or some other old Clint Eastwood western.  "The advantage" I rebuked my colleague "is it is alot easier to get silver spheres than bullets."  Besides, musket balls function better at short range and fragment a whole lot more.  Kelly grabbed his ears.  "Kabloom."  God I loved that sound.  Before we knew it, our ceiling ornament shattered into thousands of pieces of old dirt.  Cascading to the floor, Kelly reached into his bag producing a corked vial of clear liquid.  "Vodka?"  "It's a spirit of some kind."  And with this he uncorked the vial, sprinkling some of the enclosed liquid over the area.  "Don't want this dirt used again."  Gathering our things we left as the room was enshrouded in a cloud of dust and powder blast.  Hoping into the truck, shifting into gear, down the road again.  We had traveled in silence for ten minutes.  Sitting between us was the girl from the bar who evidently hopped into the cab while we were inside.  Exchanging glances, Kelly and I waiting for the other to speak first were beat to the punch.  "I told you I wanted to get out of there."

To Be Continued...

Chupa Cabra: The Undead Of Mexico

"What the hell was that?" Kelly said as he was awakened by a bump in the road.  "That's the difference between Mexico and the United States.  A bump in the road."  "You'd of thought Hoffa was under there... sheesh why don't they fix that?"  "Don't know... maybe the border patrol thinks the illegals will fall off the frame before crossing the border."   Looking down at Kelly's feet I notices several dowels of wood in his bag.  "Vampire hunting?"  "No, I just whittle on wood when I'm waiting for someone to pick me up.  I gotta knife, nice huh?" as he produced a 1960's vintage pen knife with corkscrew.  "Nice huh?" as I pulled out my Mexican Express.  It was long, extremely sharp and serrated on part of the cutting edge.  "Hey man, I'm cool... put that thing away."  I guess Kelly had been a biker too.  Leather jacket and all.  And a strong respect for knives larger than his.  "Hey, a cantina!  C'mon man, I'll buy you a beer."  "I'm driving."  "We're still in Mexico"  "Oh yeah, I forgot."

to be continued

Chupa Cabra, The Undead Of Mexico 02 APR 06

The desert was hot during the day.  Bright.  I'm used to driving at night.  Alot cooler, the illegals don't cook as much as they are slid across the border.  So this was odd.  Even more odd, there he was.  In the middle of nowhere, on the side of the road.  I pulled over to offer a lift.  He had all the appearances of a hippie from the sixties all the way from his wide smile to the way he said "hey man, thanks for picking me up". The only thing missing was a tie died shirt and a Volkswagon. "Javier" I offered.  "I'm Kelly, you know like the movie in the sixties "Kelly's Heros".  I was right, hippie.  No headband, no pony tail even though he wasn't going bald.  Just a tshirt, bombadier jacket and jeans.  "In the military?"  "Yeah man, I was... couldn't beat the draft in the sixtys.  Luckily I got a soft tour in Germany."  "How'd you manage that?"   "Dad was a congressman.  Pull helps when you can't get an exemption".  "Exemption?... couldn't he just make a phone call?"  "Only if he wanted to get me out."  "Oh.  So what brings you out here in the middle of the day?"  "What would be tequila.  You haven't seen a Volkswagon van alongside of the road by any chance?"  "I'll keep my eyes open, I travel these parts alot."  "Running drugs?"  "No, just plain cargo (yeah right!), I bring mexican items to merchants stateside."  "Oh, too bad.  I could use a fatty right now man."  "We'll be at the border in awhile, where you headed?"  "Actually, nowhere.  I'm enjoying my retirement.  I was a chemistry professor at Berkley after the Army.  AARP said Mexico was a cheap retirement.  Wanted to try it out."  "So nothing in the bag?"  He glanced down and looked back at me.  "Naw, just some clothes... and...are you hungry? I have some ... "Got any steaks?"  "No man, but I have some Tofu.  A habit from my hippie commune days."  "I'll pass.  I'm partial to chicken enchiladas myself.  Actually pick up alot of girls that way."  "I use pot.  It's quicker"  "Cuts down on the prep time, eh?"  "Yeah.  Anyway, (As he leaned back tilting his hat forward) wake me up before dark or the border...whichever comes first" 

To Be Continued

Chupa Cabra- The Undead Of Mexico 09 Mar 06

It is said in the bible that demons, fallen angels, mated with humans producing a monster race. That's why God created the flood, to kill off the perverted human geneology. Am I doing God's work? I don't really know. All I know is that I lost a friend and am now also hunted. I was an EMT. I treated his wounds. His blood was on me and I then too was hunted for revenge. So I hunt them and ultimately him the one that seeks me. Javier DeJulian, Vampire Bounty Hunter.  Jules for short.  Many families have been hurt by the infamous legacy of this monster.  The undead walk the lands of Mexico and those further south. Chupa Cabra, "blood sucked goats... sucked dry and left to die".   I still don't know what I am chasing or even how to kill it.  I do know that it's victims are no longer part of the living and that the families that grieve them pay eagerly to have justice.  The ones higher up in this vampire food chain get to be brought down. Them I know how to kill. And that's where I start. Meanwhile it, it's smart. Mostly mutilating field animals. Why goats are his favorite? Perhaps a biblical reference. Horned demons. So here I am. Today driving truck. Smuggling illegals across the border. Many undead travel at night, or sealed from the light of day.  Those, they never see the other side of the border.  After they finally die, I cut off their heads. That's how I collect my bounty.  The families want proof.  What they do with the head is none of my concern.  They promise money, I deliver.  It keeps me going, continuing my hunt lest I be hunted first.

The victims were almost always weak females. Weak minds are always seduced by the darkness.  More easily cast into it's spell. They would and did die for It. Then rose again to serve It's whims.  A smiling face in the dim light luring unsuspecting men to their end.  Lonely men, young men, men cheating on their wives.  Luring the weak.  Desirable, hypnotic,... seductive. Luring them, to It.   There is only one chupa cabra, but there are many of his undead. Many servents to his evil. Their thoughts can fool you into thinking they are of the living. That they are beautiful.  The Venus drug effect?  When actually they are just rotting flesh hidden by night's shade.  All too late those foolish men both young and old, angry or restless fell into the lure of the spell of such undead in search of more blood. The natives say that "Chupa Cabra took the livestock from their farms and the live blood from their hearts."

Chupa Cabra- The Undead Of Mexico 08Mar06

Chupa Cabra: The Undead Of Mexico 03Mar06

It all started in Florida. I was divorced, but had a daughter... a girlfriend... a job I liked. I used to draw blood; medically. I was an EMT, trained/working as a phlebotomist. My friend James took me on a trip to Ochopee in the Everglades. Actually there had been two Chupa Cabra sitings there. It was folk lore among the spanish people. Sitings of a monster. Goats with puncture wounds drained of their blood.

So there we were. On the Turner River bridge at midnight. On the concrete rail of the bridge sat our digital camera, an old video camera and a spot light. Watch, said James. He set the camera timer. It flashed as it took a picture. Upriver, the double red reflex of alligator eyes could be seen to reflect the light of the flash. An old trick to catch small gators was to tie two bobbers together, cast into a pond, sign a light on them to make a gator think another had invaded it's territory. Chomp. Then reel it in. It was rather unnerving to count how many red reflexes reflected back at us. If we were in the water, we wouldn't be whole for long. Then to get some video footage, he turned on a spot light. That's when we saw it. A hideuosly grotesque tall thin creature. Pale much like an albino gold fish, but walking upright as a man. Very tall, very this, very pale.  Winged, almost bat like. It shreiked violently covering it's eyes. Overcoming the surprise, it looked at us with large oval cat like eyes.  It growled, then hissing. Without warning, it lept from the river's edge into the air aiming for a landing on top of us. James had a shotgun strapped on his back. He pulled, pumped and fired just as the... whatever it was was about to land on him. Boom. Point blank into it's chest. Blasting it back into the air, and back into the brush and water. Let's go man, said James. Grabbing cameras. Bolt for the car. As we turned to the left to run back to the car, the creature rebounded and pounced upon James slamming him into the blacktop. This time it was my turn. He had lent me his Glock. I shot at it's head. Enough to jolt it's head back violently like JFK in the Zagruder film. I thought it either ripped it's head open or snapped it off it's neck. James, knocked down but full of adrenaline, sprang to all fours and began to run into an upright position. We  reached the car. We got inside....  Once inside the creature was nowhere to be seen. There was no moon that night as some passing cars provided the only light.  Cars that passed and perhaps it was their lights that had scared it deeper into the woods. James was bleeding. He scraped his chin when he fell. Blood, blood on the asphalt... the begining of a long blood trail changing my life to what it is this present day.

To Be Continued...