A/N: Okay everyone. Back after a rather…erm…extended absence. Life has been interesting to say the least, but I should be back for good, and I’m excited about it. And of course…the fiction! Now, this is my first Blood Ties fic, so you have been warned.

Disclaimer: Blah blah, yes, I’m aware that I don’t own Blood Ties or any of the characters within. They are Tanya Huff’s. Happy now?

Rating: T for now. Will change later

Plotline Note: In some cases, this follows along with the show. In others, it does not…and I made it that way on purpose. Those of you who have seen the show will know what I’m talking about.

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Puppet Master

Chapter One: The Disappearing Act

Vicki jumped up as the phone rang, her head meeting unceremoniously with the table near the couch on which she’d been napping. She sat there for a moment in the silence of the room before the phone rang again. Other than the sound of her own breathing, Vicki heard nothing. But…that couldn’t be right at all, could it?

She swung her legs over the side of the couch, rubbing her head and casting an angry glare at the side table as she did so. “Coreen?” she called out. “Coreen?”

She was greeted with only silence in return. Her secretary? Nowhere to be found. Groaning in frustration as the third ring of the phone set off the answering machine, Vicki charged into her main office, where Coreen was supposed to be manning the phones during her down time. No one. Of course.

“Damn it,” she pressed the play button on the machine, but her attention dwindled somewhat when it was a familiar voice coming out of the speaker. Mike. She wasn’t even sure what she wanted, but it didn’t seem important. Vicki was far too stuck on the disappearance of her trusted and loyal secretary. Boy, was she going to ring the girl’s neck when she got her hands on her…

Grabbing her coat from the rack, she charged at the door, arm outstretched to push it out of her way. Unfortunately, it opened just as she reached it, and she let out a squeak of embarrassed surprise as she collided with Henry.

“Henry,” she blushed. “Sorry about that…”

“In a hurry?” he smirked.

“To give Coreen a piece of my mind? You bet.”

Her answer was met with a confused stare from Henry, who promptly looked behind Vicki to the empty desk in her office: the one usually occupied by Coreen. After a moment of confused silence, his gaze returned to Vicki as he pointed a finger at the empty desk.

“Where did she go?” he asked.

Vicki could only shrug. “If I knew, I wouldn’t be about to go looking for her, now would I?” Her voice dripped with sarcasm…something Henry was probably all too familiar with. “She was supposed to be watching the phones for an hour so I could get some sleep, but when I woke up, she wasn’t here at all. Dumped poor Mike into voicemail…”

“Yeah, poor Mike,” Henry feigned interest. “Look, I just talked to Coreen. She said you were sleeping, but I told her I would wake you up when I got here…” His eyes scanned the room, but he noticed nothing out of the ordinary. It was all so strange. After all, he had just talked to the girl. What would possess her to leave when she knew she would be leaving Vicki and her office all alone? What if it hadn’t been he who had come charging through the door? Of course, it wasn’t like Coreen could protect Vicki from someone like him, but that wasn’t the point…

“Earth to Henry…” Vicki couldn’t hide the agitation in her voice as she waved a hand in front of the vampire’s face. “What do you mean you just talked to her? Did you tell her to go somewhere? If you have her running errands for you again, I swear I’ll…”

She was stopped by the shaking of Henry’s head. “First of all, I didn’t tell her to go anywhere, and second of all, calm down. Did you have a bad dream or something? I know Coreen is AWOL, but I’ve only seen you this upset once before, and we both know how that ended…” Henry’s eyes shone with genuine concern for his pseudo-partner and secret love interest.

“Actually, yes…” Vicki’s gaze fell to the floor.

“About?”

“Nothing important…”

“Vicki…”

“I said it isn’t important, Henry. Can we please just…”

“Chinese food? My treat. You look like you need it.” Henry offered. “Besides, maybe after we’ve sat down and had a bite to eat, Coreen will show up...with a really good explanation as to where she’s been…” He gave Vicki a knowing wink and offered her his arm.

She studied him suspiciously for a moment before taking his arm and allowing herself to be led from the office. He was right, after all. Perhaps the only thing Vicki needed was a belly full of greasy Chinese food to put her in a better mood.

Cars whizzed past them as they walked down the sidewalk. It was late as always, but the city of Toronto was alive with lights. It made it all the more difficult for Vicki to see, but her companion more than made up for the problem.

Taking a right turn, the two found themselves face-to-face with a run-down old building. When Vicki was a child, the building was once home to a small toy store. Now, just as it had back then, the old building housed Vicki’s favorite thing in the world—mass quantities of Chinese food. Without a second thought, Vicki quickened her pace into the building, dragging Henry along as she went. She seated them herself at a table in the back, and looked expectantly at one of the passing waitresses.

“If you get this excited over food, I’d love to see how excited you get about…” A punch to the arm cut Henry’s sentence off early, and a few seconds later, Vicki was looking at him with an innocent smile on her face.

“I want beef and vegetables,” she said sweetly, pretending as though nothing had happened. “With lots of soy sauce…”

Henry rubbed his arm and glared at her, but said nothing. He deserved it, anyway. He knew as well as she did what he was going to say. “What she said,” he reported to the woman who had come to take their order. “And that’s all. I won’t be eating tonight…”

Vicki stifled a laugh, raising an eyebrow at her friend. When the waitress left, she twirled a pair of chopsticks in her hand for a moment before she simply let them fall to the table, letting out a sigh of frustration. “I just don’t know where she could have gotten to! It’s not like her to just leave like that, and I…gah…” she groaned out in frustration.

“I was wondering when we would get to this part,” Henry smirked.

“The part where my head pops off and spins into an alternate dimension, or the part where you insert the words of reason into the conversation?” Vicki retorted.

“Both.”

“Smart ass.”

“Why, thank you.”

Before the irritated PI could get another word in, the waitress reappeared with a tray full of delicious food for Vicki to devour. Her eyes widened at the sight of her favorite food, and her hands flew to the chopsticks she’d dropped on the table earlier. For most women, chocolate was a cure-all; Vicki’s cure-all was this.

Vicki shoveled a large amount of rice into her mouth and looked up at Henry, who just happened to be staring wide-eyed at the spectacle she was making. “Shut…up.” She said between bites.

“Didn’t say anything,” He said with an innocent smile.

“You’re thinking it,” Vicki accused him with another mouthful of vegetables and rice. “Coreen gets that same look every time I…” she stopped again at the thought of Coreen, and Henry could tell she was agitated once again.

He sighed. “Calm down. I’m sure she’ll turn up by the time we get back to your place…” He shook his head as his eyes busied themselves with counting the cracks in the tile floor. He couldn’t look at Vicki. He knew she was angry at the sudden disappearance of her assistant, but seeing her there seething with her cheeks puffed full of Chinese food made him want to laugh out loud. Coreen would already be facing Vicki’s wrath tonight. Henry was not about to add himself to that list.

However, when they got back to Vicki’s apartment office, Henry was proven wrong. The desk that Coreen usually occupied as empty, just as it had been when they’d left, and things in the office had not changed one bit…at least, at first glance.

With a renewed burst of anger, Vicki charged forward, lunging for the phone and punching out Coreen’s number. “She better hope she has a really good excuse for…” Vicki’s eyes narrowed as she slammed the phone down on the receiver, “…voicemail…”

Vicki was so preoccupied with beating her phone senseless in an effort to contact her missing assistant that she missed the sudden change in Henry. Something wasn’t right, and he knew it. His eyes scanned the room, just as they had when he arrived, but nothing seemed to have changed. Still, though, there was something strange about the space…something familiar. Henry could not shake the feeling that there was more to this than there seemed to be.

In an instant, he knew what that something was, and his eyes blackened with anger. Vicki finally noticed when she heard the faint sound of a growl coming from the other side of the room.

“What’s wrong, Henry?” She knew that reaction, and it never meant anything good. “Is something here?”

He shook his head. “Something isn’t. Someone was. I don't know why I didn’t notice it earlier…” The sound of the growl in his throat grew louder, and Vicki would have been a fool not to notice how his nails were beginning to grow into claws.

“Henry…” she whispered. “Calm down. What is it?”

“Not what, Vicki. Who. Christina has been here.”

“Chris--not that Christina?” Vicki’s eyes widened. It had to be her. She was the only Christina they both knew, and she had a not-so-secret death wish for Vicki. Swallowing the lump in her throat, Vicki was surprised how worried her voice sounded when she finally spoke. “You think….you think Christina has Coreen?” she whimpered.

Henry said nothing, merely nodding as he tried to keep his anger in check. He’d warned her. He’d told her to stay out of his territory and leave Vicki alone. Why was she doing this?

“Henry…”

“Coreen will be fine.”

“But…”

“You aren’t going after Christina, Vicki. She’s even older than I am. You’d be killed. And seeing as how that’s exactly what she wants, I think it’s a bad plan.” He paced for a moment before looking up to meet her gaze again. “If I know Christina, she should be easy enough to find. I’ll get Coreen back safely for you, all right? You just stay right here. And I’m serious. I’ll call the office phone. Best make sure you stay here to answer it,” he smirked. With that, he rounded on his heels and was gone before Vicki could blink.

She sat dumbfounded for a moment in Coreen’s office chair before something dawned on her, and her hand flew to one of the desk drawers. She let out a tiny gasp when she found the drawer to be empty. Of course. Christina knew about it…because Vicki had threatened her with it the last time she’d seen her.

Wherever Christina was, she had Coreen and the Illuminacion del Sol. It was the weapon Javier Mendosa had used on Henry, and the only weapon Vicki had against Christina. What exactly was the female vampire planning?

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A/N: Okay, so I couldn’t reveal too much in the opening chapter, and I had to cut it off right there. The next chapter should be up soon. As always, your reviews are greatly appreciated!