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Stopped
A tale from the road
by Zee Carmina
I got stopped again the other night.As you may know, I like to drive fast. Especially when I’m in my Porsche 911 Turbo S. (My second beloved Trrrb. Blood-red just like the first one I had.)
It’s really not a problem that I speed, because I’m an excellent driver. But sometimes I do get pinched. In the fourteen years I’ve lived in metro Buckingham, our hackers have had to go in and “correct” the DMV computers six times to eliminate points and restrictions from my license. Tiresome, but they have to hack the expiration date and my DOB every few years anyway. I’m forever 23!
This night, I was northbound on the Pat Kelly, heading home to Bienville after an evening of harmless socializing at Unhallowed, the place on North 37th in Buckingham that some of us frequent. Excuse the crudeness, but I’d failed to “score.” I was in jeans and wearing my purple leather jacket — so cute — over a denim shirt. Nothing fancy for the Hal, but attractive! Anyway, it was going on two-thirty and traffic was light, so I was kind of zipping along.
I had just passed the Dove Creek Avenue interchange, midway through North Buckingham, when Mr. Tricky Trooper zoomed down the ramp behind me, red and blue lights flashing. He even warbled his siren at me for a few seconds, which was completely unnecessary. I pulled over, careful to use my turn signal. I really should invest in a radar detector — not that this cop needed radar to see that I was exceeding the absurd 60 mph limit.
Good citizen that I am, I had my papers out — ihre Papiere, bitte! — and on the passenger seat beside me, and the window down, by the time the cop came up and shined his flashlight all over the interior of the Porsche. He was a big guy. Early forties? His trooper hat hid his hair, if he had any. He smelled pretty good. Normal heartbeat. He was wearing a body cam on his chest, of course. No, I didn’t zap it.
“Hiyee!” I said, trying to be pleasant.
“Evening.” Gruff. All business. “Trooper Arnett, State Police. Could I see your license, registration, and proof of insurance, please.” No audible question mark there, despite the “please.”
I passed the stuff over.
Some perusal ensued. “This still your address? In Bienville?”
“Yes, sir.”
“OK. Well, Ms. Carmina, I stopped you because you were doing 103 miles an hour. Forty-three over the limit.”
“No! Really?” Amazing! Astonishing! Impossible! Yeah, if only.
“Really. Please turn off the engine and give me a minute. I’ll be right back.” He went to his car.
Now you may be wondering whether I was planning to unleash any mesmerism on the guy. No, again. I figured I’d rely on my natural charms — which are considerable — instead of the supernatural ones. I mean, more than forty over the limit? I’d really have to blast the guy with the mezz, and then afterward he’d realize how spooky that had been. Instead, I’d take the ticket and then call our hacker friends.
The next few minutes seemed like an hour. It’s crazy how subjective time can be. Finally Trooper Arnett came back and handed me my papers.
“Ms. Carmina, your current license is clear, which I find sort of surprising.”
Smart aleck.
“Turbo, right?” he asked. “Quite a car.”
“I like it.”
“Might be too much car for the public roads, though.” Was he saying too much car for you, little rich girl?
Then came the question they always ask: “Where you comin’ from tonight?”
“I was at Unhallowed. A club in the city. In the Stretch.”
It looked as though Trooper Arnett might have heard of the Hal. It was somewhat notorious. Maybe he’d even heard of me.
“Well, I do smell the odor of an alcoholic beverage,” he said. Oh, sure, now you do. “How much have you had to drink tonight?”
Now, if you’ve read S.V. Florian’s book, you know that I can be impulsive. Also, I was a wee bit irritated at this point. So I told the truth instead of lying as usual. “I had five doubles. Bourbon. Knob Creek, to be specific.” (Note: I’m 5’3” and weigh 112 pounds.)
That got his eyebrows raised. “In what — I mean, how long ...”
“I was there about two and a half hours. But listen, I’ve got a condition. I mobilize alcohol really fa– I mean, metabolize. I metabolize it. Fast.” Seriously? Alcohol has no effect on us, so it must have been the semis booming past that sucked out my brain.
“Is that right? Ms. Carmina, please step out of the vehicle and give me your keys.”
I sighed. But complied.
“Let’s avoid the traffic and move back between our cars,” he said.
Groan. Where were we heading with this?
He asked, “Would you be willing to perform a field sobriety test?”
A new adventure for me. Both boring and undignified. Simpleton that I was, I asked, “Do I have to?”
“If you refuse, I’ll have to transport you to the post in Augusta Park for a Breathalyzer test. You refuse that, and your license will be suspended. And I would have probable cause to arrest you for DUI.”
Complete fascism, and this was supposed to be a Blue state. Purple, at least!
I sighed again. “OK. Test away.”
We started with the horizontal gaze nystagmus (HGN) test <— I’m quoting from Google — in which I had to follow Arnett’s pen with my eyes as he moved it, without moving my head.
A-plus!
And he went, “Hunh,” maybe because my pupils had contracted to pinpoints in the glare from his headlights.
Then — isn’t this fun? — I had to do the one-leg balance test. I folded my left leg up tight against my thigh and went statue-still, with my hands clasped behind my back. That also seemed to impress Trooper Arnett.
Onward to the nine-step walk-and-turn, which I performed with ballerina precision. Gotta show some style. I might have done it a little too quickly, though.
“Uh,” Arnett said, “are you a dancer?” That seemed to be off-script. His heart rate was up, and I was smelling tension.
“I used to be. Long time ago.” Almost a hundred years ago, in fact.
Trooper Arnett had gone almost as pale as I was. He backed up a few steps and shifted into what looked to me like a combat stance. We were nine or ten feet apart now.
It was at this point that I finally zapped the trooper’s body cam and radio. Just in time. He said, “You’re one of them. Aren’t you?”
“One of what?” I asked, still trying to be hopeful.
“Vampire. You’re a vampire. Just like that professor said in his lecture.” He was referring to the notorious public lecture by Professor Adrian Revard at the University of Buckingham, back in 2020. It was posted to the Net for a week or so before the UB authorities took it down.
I was indeed a vampire, and also a reckless exhibitionist. I belatedly started inundating Trooper Arnett with the benevolence vibe. But a lot of cops are resistant to our mesmerism, and Arnett seemed to be one of them.
“Seriously?” I asked. “You know that Revard guy was a nut, right? I’m a prominent and respected businesswoman!” Pompous much? “I would have sued him if he hadn’t —”
“My cousin said ...” Arnett had his hand on his sidearm. “He didn’t say it right out, but he implied ...”
“Your cousin? Who’s your cousin?”
“Tim Bowman. He was investigations chief for BPD.” Arnett was breathing fast. “I know now that he wasn’t just f—ing with me.”
What are the chances? And why is it that coincidences are so often unfavorable for the virtuous and beautiful heroine? How much spillage had the Secret suffered, anyway? Damn that Bowman.
I upped the mezz and ignited my eyes — the “blue lasers,” as I’ve heard them described. “Trooper Arnett, take your hand off your weapon. I do not want to hurt you.”
I slurred my words somewhat, because my fangs had come out to enjoy the evening. Not reassuring for Arnett, but a fang-drop is almost involuntary for us vamps when action is kicking off.
“Jesus. Jesus.” He started to draw.
I moved.
Disarming someone at vamp speed is tricky if he’s not a bad guy and you don’t want to hurt him. Almost always he is a bad guy, and you end up damaging his gun hand. I once removed two fingers from a hoodlum along with his gun.Arnett was bending over his hand now, gasping, and I had the gun — and it had my fingerprints and DNA. Just great. But I’d done the takeaway exactly right and only bruised him. Didn’t break a single finger. I stood close (fangs retracted) and returned the gun to him. Still loaded. After a few seconds he took it with his left hand.
I then moved back, in a second display of what we call “schnelling,” and leaned against the rear of the Porsche with my arms folded. “Sorry, Trooper Arnett, but we don’t allow people to point guns at us.”
“Right. Right.” The mezz was having some effect, though he was still wide-eyed, gapey. He slowly holstered his pistol with his right hand, wincing. “God almighty. What — what happens now?”
“Well, I don’t know whether we have a liaison officer with the state police, but we do have one with BPD. I’ll tell him about this, just for the record. My advice is, don’t add to the rumors. We have to protect our Secret. We’ll have to talk to Cousin Tim.”
“Please don’t hurt him. Tim’s had enough trouble ...”
“We’ll just talk, for now. I hope I’ve shown you that we’re not monsters.” Technically, we are monsters, but you know what I meant.
Arnett nodded. His heart had slowed down.
“I guess you never did start writing a ticket, did you?”
“No.”
“Good that there’s no paper.”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “Assuming no DUI, I was going to cite you for criminal speeding. I mean, a hundred miles an hour? ‘Criminal’ means you couldn’t just send in the fine. You’d have to appear before a judge.”
I made a show of shuddering. “Ick. But hey, listen, this wasn’t my finest hour. Let me give you something.” I dug into my jacket pocket for a card. I always carried a few, printed with one word — “Amelia” — and a New York City phone number. I approached and handed it to him. “If you’re ever in really big trouble, call this number. We may be able to help.”
He hesitated, but took it and then gave me my keys. His hand trembled only a little. “Thank you, Ms. Carmina.”
“‘Miss,’ please. I’m going to split, if that’s OK.”
“Yeah. OK.”
I was turning to leave when he added, “Drive safely, now. And slow down!”
I gave him my dazzling grin. “You’re quite a character, Trooper Arnett.”
February 2, 2026
To installment #1 of Amy reports
To installment #2 of Amy reports
To installment #3 of Amy reports
To installment #4 of Amy reports
Like all other installments in this series, this is a work of fiction, based on a character in the novel Chaos and Old Night.
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