#*COUGH COUGH* COUNT BRAM

[gengar-pixel-2]

YOU

YOU THINK?? DO YOU UNDERSTAND HOW MESSED UP AND SCARRED MOST OF POPTROPICAS VILLAINS ARE??

DO YOU

UNDERSTAND??

HAVE YOU NOT TALKED TO. ANY OF THEM.

I HAVE SEEN THINGS.

IT’S GONNA TAKE MORE THAN “TOTEMS” TO “REMOVE” THE EVIL.

..Also thats not me this image was taken from the wiki.

[selfaware-bungou-stray-dogs]

Back to the Self Aware! BSD AU x Black Butler Crossover

________

Same voice actors time again.

While Ace didn't get into the Real World (I have an ask about him, that ask is in a process of being answered, and I am planning to write about his situation in the future [Somewhere after Fyodor's entry]), let's imagine, that he also got into the real world with the rest of the cast.

Ace didn't like GL. Mostly because GL didn't have anything good to say about Ace. Add Karma in top of it. He just keeps everything to himself, staying away from GL and BSD Cast.

So, after Black Butler get into the real world. And Reader are happy to see almost everyone from them. And form mutual respect with Sebastian...

_____

Reader: Thank you, Sebastian, for helping with the dinner.

Sebastian: My pleasure, [Y/N].

Reader: You know, despite being a demon, you are a savior for this place. Helping to feed everyone and keeping the mansion tidy.

Sebastian: quiet chuckle

Reader: grinning Still can't believe it. Someone, I thought wasn't real, is in my house. And I can talk to them, and their voices are voices I get used to. No need to pay for VA's lines.

Ace: barging in Why you little?! This demon and I have the same voices! Why you have never complimented my voice? Am I not enough for you? What he has, that I don't have?

Reader: look between Ace and Sebastian Do you need the short list or the long?

_________

If we count Season 2 characters

Alois felt jealous, because every demon (Sebastian, Claude, Hannah and Triplets) treat you with genuine respect. He was afraid, that you will steal Claude from him. You assured him, that you already have your own demon (*cough* Fyodor *cough*) and don't need any more demons.

__________

William T Spears and Kunikida quickly became friends. Unfortunately for them, Dazai and Grell also became friends.

_______

(Slightly) non-related idea. I have a feeling, that Grell will love Edna Mode from The Incredibles.

______

Undertaker made a new coffin for Bram. Many coffins. Because Bram was "that one client", who will always find something to complain about. Then Undertaker snapped.

*during dinner one day*

Undertaker: to Bram Just how big of a coffin you need? I have been redoing it for the fifth time already.

Bram: Big enough for two people to fit. I want our weekly cuddle time with My Little Bat, My Dear [Y/N] to be as comfortable as possible. Especially, when others cuddle with [Y/N] in beds during their cuddle time.

*Black Butler Cast froze. Lizzie dropped the teacup. You are covering your face with both hands. You felt like you will burn in a flame of embarrassment.*

/Next lesson of "How to live in this world and this age" for BB Cast was focused on explaining, what "polyamorous relationship is"./

[talesfromthecrypts]

Does continuing work in the public domain count as a series being "franchised into oblivion"? I'm not trying to troll, I'm just curious. I know that something like fanfic probably wouldn't count, but I can figure out if "retelling" or "extension" counted as fanfic under those rules.

I don't think so. I don't think necessarily other people working in the same sandbox is bad if its completely separate. Room for Bram Stoker's Dracula, Dracula 2000 and Van Helsing as they all work with the same basic idea but the building blocks are different. Which is why public domain is a good thing. Having the Peter Cushing Sherlock Holmes movies and The Great Mouse Detective is a boon. It helps introduce important pieces of the history of stories to a new generation who wouldn't get it otherwise. Like how they used to pass down stories each person putting their own spin on it when they told it through the oral tradition. Public domain is so important which is why its so scummy that Disney keeps extending it. And they are the current huge perpetrator of "stories that go on forever" with both the MCU and St*r W*rs pumping out "content" not meaningful stories with an end. Just filling in holes that were perfectly fine people used their imaginations to fill for sometimes 40 years (cough OB* W*N cough) often with less interesting things than many could come up with or a never ending stream of consciousness that means nothing (cough M*rvel shows every week forever). And its not for the love of the story or the love of the art of the medium in which these people work, its all to keep a precious IP and build a monopoly on culture. So bring on the various Pooh and Jane Ayre and Beowulf and Titus Andronicus adaptions! Its good for culture to have multiple voices in the stew.

[snowe-zolynn-rogers]

Pairings: Pre-ChuuRanPoe (Ranpo caught feelings), Pre-Kousano (Yosano likes Kouyou), Stocraft

Word Count: 1,194 Words

Summary: More Bram and Nikolai has a plan.

Warnings: Fighting Mention, Abuse Mention, Death Mention, let me know if I should tag anything else.

Translations:   Flirtezi cu alți bărbați!: You're flirting with other men! [Romanian]; Minciuni!: Lies! [Romanian]; Fără valoare.: Worthless. [Romanian]

Notes: Yeah, this may or may not be three weeks late…sorry.

How Poe Stumped Ranpo: Chapter 29

"Flirtezi cu alți bărbați!" Bram felt the ground far too hard against his side, he already felt bruises flowering up and his bones felt achy.

"I'm not!" He told him.

"Minciuni! You fell into him on purpose!" Mihai roared and he felt tears slowly coming up that he pushed down.

"I love you, I wouldn't flirt with anyone else, certainly lot a stranger." Bram told him.

"You love me? You didn't a week ago, who's to say you won't love him in a week?" Mihai snapped.

"I won't. I love you." He insisted, struggling air.

"Fără valoare."

Bram got a kick to his stomach, choking on air and a sharp cry tumbling from his lips as he felt pain bloom in his stomach, coughing up what Mihai had fed him the night before and struggling for air.

He'd be damned if he died here. He'd put up with being trapped in a coffin for eight years, he wouldn't die as a captive, he refused it. He steadied his breathing carefully, still hiccupping a bit with the tears that had managed to fall over his face.

"Back to your cage." Mihai insisted, dragging him up, arms behind him to throw him back into his cell and he was safe from him again at least. "I only hurt you because I love you, dear, and I don't want to lose you."

Bram called bullshit, this wasn't what love felt like. Love felt like resting on a couch, his husband lying on his stomach in front of the lit hearth, moonlight pouring into the room as he listened to Howard's old tales of his youth and sharing his own back.

"I know." He lied, finally letting his pent breath out when Mihai left. He still had to be quiet or he could be heard, but he buried sniffles into his knees, trembling with the fierce sobs that wanted desperately to leave his wracking form, not to mention the hunger from not eating breakfast and the bit of frostbite he still had from the cold outside.

"Where are we going? Are we visiting the store again?" Fyodor asked.

"Honey, you get to go home today." Yosano told Fyodor, leading the raven into the offices.

"With Mama?"

"No, honey, I don't have enough room in my apartment and it wouldn't be right to make you sleep on the couch." She squished his face.

"Who?" Fyodor asked softly.

"Dazai, your new charge." Yosano put Fyodor in front of the brunette.

"'Samu!" Fyodor cheered, hugging to him and Dazai blinked in confusion a few times before giving a little laugh and hugging him back.

"Hey, kid." Dazai greeted him.

"You're going home with Dazai. Trust me, he needs something to be responsible for." Yosano patted Fyodor's head gently.

"Plus I know how to take care of seizures." Dazai reminded her.

"So you'll be safe with Dazai."

"'Samu's safe." Fyodor beamed.

"Alright, kid, wanna get food with me before we go home?" The Russian nodded, ready to follow the other by holding onto his arm.

"Miss Yosano." She turned to look at Gogol and Twain in the Agency's doorway.

"Checkup? Did something get hurt again?" She asked, already checking over his past injuries but they were healing just fine.

"No, it's not that. Bram's alive. I saw him this morning. Me and Mark went to get groceries and he hit into me, we fell, he's being held captive by the other tester." Nikolai told her.

"Bram's dead." She told him.

"Yeah, he was all bloody." Fyodor confirmed before the knowing look behind his eyes disappeared again and he just looked confused and frightened.

"There's other testers?"

"Just Mihai Eminescu. He joined us just after Fukuchi started showing up, he's that idiot's friend but he was obsessed with Bram from the start, not the drug, just him. And something must have happened. I don't know his ability completely, but he made a copy of me once, it went away when I asked him to, but I don't think it was a true duplication ability because it was too faded? It looked faded."

"Illusion?" Dazai asked.

"Sounds like illusory." Jun'ichiro answered from his visiting position with Fukuzawa.

"So he faked Bram's death and stole him." Ranpo told them.

"Tell us everything that happened this morning." Yosano forcefully sat him on a chair.

"Oh, Huck is following him." Mark told them.

"What?"

"I have Huck following him since Nikolai didn't seem comfortable with how that guy was so I have Huck in his jacket and Tom here can tell us where they went." He presented Tom, who happily waved his little doll hand.

"He's in a house three blocks down from the green house in front of the park, two rights and one left, two houses down. Light grey."

"Thank you, Tom." Mark thanked him.

"Dazai, Kenji, and Atsushi, you three will get him. Kunikida, Kyouka, you two are their backup in case they need you." Fukuzawa told them.

"Wait." Nikolai forced his voice loud, over theirs as they all prepared to get ready to fight.

"Yes, Gogol?" Fukuzawa asked.

"It should be Howard." He insisted.

"What? He's far too emotional-" Fukuzawa began.

"Bram asked me specifically to tell Howard he was captive. Mihai called him his boyfriend, Bram said it back, Mihai thinks he's getting Bram to have an affair with him and he's been threatening him to do it, he had old bruises on his face that were healing and he was disguising messages to me while we were talking."

"A few bruises and being called a romantic interest doesn't mean we put someone who was just grieving their husband on the front line of saving that same husband." Fukuzawa told him.

Yosano saw that defiant look in his eyes, burning rage and spite she liked seeing in her colleagues. He'd fit right in here in the Agency if he joined them, she thought with delight.

"I won't put it past Mihai to threaten to kill Howard to threaten Bram into cooperating, he's made threats like that before to Sigma when he joined us because Sigma is smart and Mihai thought Dostoy was replacing him." He looked over the director and Yosano wanted to laugh at the realization on the poor president's face.

"If your team goes in and Mihai makes an illusion of himself killing Howard, Bram will freak out and bite someone the minute you try to get him out once we get Mihai. Then we have a vampire infection spreading to the whole world in just two weeks. We need Howard there to make sure he doesn't because he doesn't get affected by it." Nikolai told them.

"The safest team to send in is nonhumans. Not even Dazai can nullify his ability."

"Hm, you know I can nullify."

"I've memorized every ability holder in the databases. My parents are influential officials, they hate ability users. Once mine came in at six, as a punishment, they made me memorize every name in the ability-user databases."

"Your parents sound horrible." Dazai told him.

"They sold me to a circus, I use their last name to get what I want." Nikolai alerted him.

[fuyunoakegata]

The AO3 meme

tagged by @thychesters  :)

How many works do you have on AO3?  8 and some of those are incomplete, sorry

What’s your total AO3 word count? 36,737

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they? On AO3, only DC Comics/specifically Batfam

What are your top 5 fics by kudos? Precious Things; Collar Me (Don’t Collar Me); Turn, Turn, Turn; Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground; Flaws [Collar Me co-written with the amazing @caramelmachete]

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?  I try to respond as soon as I see them, but sometimes I’ll miss a notification, because of work/family obligations or I missed the email. And I’ve been missing a lot of emails, lately because of not  getting the notifications on my phone, recently. Feel free to poke me about those! If you sent me ANY positive comment, even a keysmash, then I definitely want to thank you and acknowledge it.

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending? On AO3? It’s probably Warning Sign. They would eventually have a happy ending, but... I didn’t finish them so they look pretty grim *cough*

Do you write crossovers? I have, but not on AO3. And they’re unpublished, just some collabs with friends (Batman and Naruto, Batman and Inception, and Batman and Ghost in the Shell)

Have you ever received hate on a fic? Not hate, just a comment over me cherrypicking details to fit the story I wanted to tell as opposed to the exact canon timeline.  And one time long ago, some unasked for “concrit” on style. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Do you write smut? If so what kind? I have. lots of different kinds, but I haven’t posted those on AO3, sorry :)

Have you ever had a fic stolen? nope

Have you ever had a fic translated? nope

What’s your all time favorite ship? It’s hard for me to pick just one! :P I do have a very soft spot for Dick/Roy, or Birdflash if it’s YJ-verse. And I love DickKory and DickBabs, depending on when in the timeline it is or if it’s comicsverse or another adaptation. They’re both important in his life.

Whats a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will? Maybe Warning Signs, just because that was for whumptober, year before last. I’m reworking Flaws and still want to finish Collar Me.

What are your writing strengths? I’ve been told I’m good at getting imagery across, and showing things through the senses.

What are your writing weaknesses? Finishing things :D

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic? I prefer just writing it in English and putting it inside <  > Because I wouldn’t want to get someone else’s language wrong. I love the idea of it being presented in the original language, but unless it’s something I or someone I know well enough to ask for help with speaks it fluently, I won’t include it myself (and one tiny nitpicky preference of myself is that I don’t want to have to stop reading a fic to go to google translate or scroll to the end of the fic to find the translation; I know you can sometimes figure it out through context, but if the translation isn’t presented immediately, it does pull me out of the story slightly, because I NEED TO KNOW WHAT IT SAYS lol)

What was the first fandom you wrote for? On AO3, it’s only been the Bats. (off AO3, it was officially X-files and unofficially Bram Stoker’s Dracula, back when I was like 10)

What’s your favorite fic that you’ve written? Probably Collar Me. But for finished ones, I really liked Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground.

tagging anyone who hasn’t done this and wants to :)

[rachellevic]

As I sit here, thinking about the end of supernatural, reading all the beautiful tributes and articles, I feel a very great sense of loss. Not because I believe this is the end, the real end, that’s not possible with the Winchesters, but there is something much deeper going on and I can’t quite put it into words, so maybe that’s why I’m writing it down.

Maybe it’s a little bit selfish, maybe I’m just not ready to watch to ‘the end’. Rarely has a show done this to me, and believe me, I have a ‘brand’ of television that I get into. Confession, I only started watching supernatural because someone told me that Kim Manners was a producer on it and I was a huge, I MEAN HUGE, fan of the X-files, and I didn’t feel this way when that show ended. It was also several season in before I started watching supernatural because, truth be told, I very strongly dislike ‘vampires and werewolves’ stories and what media has done to lore and historical context; I’m looking at you Bram Stoker, you started this and opened the door to things like sparkles and Stockholm Syndrome and that’s not okay. But Supernatural had something that I had been missing in TV, in life, and I very quickly became a fan...thank you for fixing vampires and werewolves by the way.

I like endings. I like beginnings. I love the journey to get from beginning to end. Maybe I am feeling something more than a loss of a show, but a loss of a way of life, a path, the road...I don’t know. To be honest Supernatural is one of the last shows that I have tuned in to on the regular, week after week, to watch because the way we watch TV has changed. The way people experience a serial show has changed. I don’t know if Supernatural would have been what it was if it had found a life on a streaming service to begin with. But they didn’t exist, or were just in their infancy when supernatural started. What I will miss the most, I think is the episodes in between. Rarely do you find a show that can start a plot episode one and carry it over many season, reinventing itself, playing off its past and building a future. It has built such a future that regardless of how it end, whether they die or they live, they will always live, they will always live in the stories that we know and the stories that we will tell. Jared and Jensen will go on to do other things, as they had done other things before this, but they will always be Sam and Dean and whenever you see their faces, your first thought will be Sam and Dean. Like Anthony Hopkins will always be Dr. Hannibal Lector (so will Mads Mikkelsen, just saying) and Colin Firth will always be My Mr. Darcy. Misha, though an antagonist to us all, is literally an angel in real life. I said what I said, change my mind.

This thing we call Gish has it’s own life now, and will continue to do great things, but we are deeply bound to our Supernatural roots. Looking back on 15 seasons, the good the bad and the ugly, (*cough* Bugs *cough*), what would the show have been if it were a max of 9 or 12 episodes a season? I mean, honesty, if you are a fan of Lucifer, who has watched it on Fox and now on Netflix, it just isn’t ringing the same. It’s good, but there is something missing and I think what that is, is the passage of time. The episodes in between the big plots, the monsters of the week, and the goofy playful, ‘I killed Hitler’ And ‘Sam hit a dog’ moments. We know a milk run is never just a milk run, that life is big and bold and in your face, even though it seems a little slow right now, and that sometimes, staring a books and computers too long is going to force you out into the world to just look for some trouble. Supernatural has taught me a lot about life and what is out there in the world, the good, the bad, the people, this planet we live on and some of our fundamental flaws as humans. Nothing is ever going to be perfect, but if we work at it, we can touch perfection. It’s the moments and the anticipations, it may also be the glimpses of joy when the world is crashing in around us.

It has been a long time, 15 seasons, 320 plus episodes, and yes it does feel like an end, but not for Supernatural, for the way we watched TV. I like a mini series as much as the next person but I don’t think you can do what supernatural did in a handful of episodes even if you can keep yourself going for as long. I don’t think a community like this will ever happen again in the same capacity because the interactions on episode night wont be the same if they just throw everything up onto a streaming service. We have been so lucky with this show and the cast’s willingness to interact with us as much as they do and recognize the power of the fandom as a force for good. Networks were always just looking for viewership, but seemed to forget that the viewers make or break a show and I feel like Supernatural found a way to take views and unite them, to appreciate the fans and see the power that people can have when hey get behind something. That wasn’t the networks doing, it was the cast, it was the fans, I think that is very obvious. So, maybe this is where my feeling come from, maybe I just don’t see how a show doing as well, doing so much good outside of the show, making money, bringing in viewers, being the longest running show of its kind, could just be cut off when there could have been so much more to be done...Do I blame the network for the fall of TV and that they are grasping at straws for an old way of viewership? Yes, yes I do. I believe that they see the streaming services have been a mighty blow to their structure, that it has made TV so much more accessible and frankly so much less annoying with no commercials, but what I think the streaming services of the world have wrong is the limited number of episode and the anticipation of a new episode week after week. Sure, I hate a hiatus as much as the next person, and when I want to watch 15 season of supernatural all in one shot, I do have the DVDs so F you Netflix for taking it down and putting it back up and taking it down again only to put it back up, I have the collection and I can watch it any time I want! But, where is my live viewing party, the gasps and shock you can literally hear over twitter. The standing and singing Carry On when you know it’s going to play. You don’t get that binge watching a show on Netflix...Supernatural is so much bigger than the money maker it was for the networks.

Truth be told, I’m kind of over TV. I rarely turn the thing on in the off season. I didn’t watch anything new this whole pandemic, but instead went back to the familiar, the comfortable. I marathoned all of the X-files in order from beginning to end with two movies, two event series, and cried over their Kim Manners tribute. (Word to the wise, it may not be the best show to watch in a pandemic with all it’s government conspiracies and alien viruses...but the 90’s fashion in the early seasons, and so many actors who we know and love from supernatural were just babies back then, and yes almost everyone is in it. Baby Crowley, Baby Lucifer, Baby Meg (First Meg not Second Meg...sorry Rachel!)) And when I was finished with The X-files I jumped right back into season one of Supernatural.

Supernatural has kept me coming back every week, and it’s been around for almost half of my life (do we even count the years you can’t remember?). I’m about as old as Sam, I was in university when I started watching supernatural but I’m also an older child and I grew up on my dad’s music, and he had a classic car that I remember but my brother doesn’t and my dad isn’t with us anymore (2012). I found so much to connect with in Supernatural, like I relate to Dean on a level that I can’t even explain; from having a little brother to pie is the superior celebratory dessert - also pie for breakfast is totally okay not because there is fruit in it but because I’m an adult and I’ll do what I want! Go team free will! Does that make me a Dean girl? I don’t think so, because You can’t have one without the other. This whole time, it has been about family, more specifically siblings. Dean isn’t Dean without Sam and Sam isn’t Sam without Dean. But yes I’m a Dean girl for other reasons.

I don’t know, maybe it’s just me, I doubt it, but supernatural hits the family feels, it came into my life at a time of transition, it was there when my dad died, and has been there for 15 years. Thinking back to the ‘where do you see yourself in 10 years’ question, and not being at all where I’d thought I’d be, there has been something very constant in the inconsistencies of the road so far. Remember back in season one when we didn’t even know demons were a thing and now our biggest issue is literally Chuck? What a metaphor for adult life. For dealing with this crazy world and society and all the weird that seems to be oozing out of the pours of humanity. We’ve grown with this show. I’m not going to say grown up, because I sure didn’t get any taller in 15 year, but I did evolve, and maybe in some ways I have also digressed, but we keep pressing forward because no one else is going to save my world but me.

Supernatural reminds me of so many part of my life. I saw so much of the X-Files in there, the show that formed my younger years, and was devastated when Kim Manners passed away. There was a familiarity in Supernatural. The idea of seeing Sam and Dean come back, in event series (like the x-files) gives me hope, because we know that death isn’t really death for the Winchesters, but there will be something very profoundly missing from the world going forward. Maybe it’s the last of the magic, something that I’m holding onto in my adult life from time before, the spark that has managed to light up a really strange time, and I don’t just mean 2020. Maybe its a Millennial thing, I am an elder Millennial, right on the edge of two generations and I’m not even 40 yet. I’ve lived in the 80s, 90s, 2000s, 10s and here were are almost through the first year of the 20s (its going to be a very different kind of roaring 20s but um...very similar. History repeating itself a little too literally at times)

I don’t think the Supernatural Family is going anywhere any time soon, I don’t feel like I’m losing that, but this is an end for us. Maybe it’s the end of one book and the beginning of the next. Maybe it’s now our time to carry the legend of the Winchesters forward. I can only hope that somewhere, somehow we’ll see the world expand, the characters lives on; this isn’t the end of the road, but I guess the road can only go so far. I don’t want it to be over. I feel the loss, the lump in my throat, the tears in my eyes that I am fighting back even though no one is going to see them. It’s all good. All good things come to an end, or do they? Regardless, we’ll always have Tuesdays.

Carry on, everyone. I hope that you’ll be okay. Sorry for the long rambling journal entry that didn’t actually come to any real conclusions...thanks John! (Oh yeah, my dad’s name was John too...)

#supernatural #SPNFamilyForever #theroadsofar #lastdaysofSPN #theend

[darksunrising]

Sola Gratia (5/?)

Masterlist

Rating / Warnings : Graphic depiction of violence, disturbing imagery for sensible minds. Reader’s discretion is advised.

Fandom : Bram Stoker’s Dracula, BBC’s Dracula, various Dracula and vampire lore.

Part 5/? (1606 words)

Author’s notes : (at the end)

~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~

“Run, little rabbit.”

My heart sank into my stomach. Time seemed engulfed in syrup, for a second. The cup dropped from my fingers. It took forever to shatter into the ground. The sticky feeling of the splatter on my boots snapped me back to reality. I slipped away from his grasp. His hands trailed on my body as long as he could before I made my way out. I could hear his soft laughter as I disappeared into the corridors. There was no way. No way this was happening. The boots made an impossible ammount of noise on the stone floor. Even if he couldn’t hear me, I bet he could smell the blood soaking up the hem of my skirt.

I wouldn’t survive to see the next day. I was going to die, here. Turns out I might have had a better chance with an axe murderer, I bitterly thought to myself.

Focus. I paced my breathing, trying to make sense of the situation. Run ? Couldn’t outrun him. Hide ? He would find me, and fast. My throat started burning, and an incomfortable metallic taste settled in my mouth. I slowed down, walking on the tip of the boots not to have the wooden heel clank at every step. There goes flight, now to see about fight. He was very obviously far stonger than me. Unarmed, I didn’t have a chance.

The armory. I took a left, and found the expected dopuble doors. Locked, of course. Fuck. Alright, think. He may have some sort of weak point. Had to believe legends, for lack of better reference. Apparently, sunlight did little to nothing. There was staking, but had yet to find a stake. Silver was a thing. But why would he have anything in his home that might harm him ?

He wouldn’t. But others would. The coin from the village. Blessing my goblin nature that had me keep it all along, I fumbled into the skirt’s pocket to find it still there. Alright, that was one thing. I might even find more into the village. That was, if I ever made it there. A voice broke the silence.

“Ready or not, here I come !”

It echoed through the halls, yet felt like it came from inside my head. Hide. Hide now. Next door was slightly ajar. Excrutiatingly slowly, I pushed it open, praying every god out there not to have it creak. I slithered inside, in the semi-darkness. The windows were obscured by thick drapes, only having thin rays of silver light seep through. I glanced around, frantically searching for anything that could be made into a stabbing device.

Come on, anything. My eyes finally laid on a trophy, mounted on the wall, over the hearth. Roe deer antlers, still attached to the top part of the skull. Antlers. Pointy Wood. I grabbed the nearest pedestal table, and brought it to the fireplace. Hiking my skirt up, I climbed over it to reach the trophy, ripping the antlers off. Not caring about the noise it would make, I snapped the skull in half, pocketed one, and gripped the other.

Everything was eeriely silent. I found myself shaking. Breathe. Focus. I moved to the room’s door, laying my ear against the panel, closing my eyes to hear better. Nothing. Nothing, until the door started to open. Miracuulously holding in a gasp, I moved back, and flattened myself against the wall. The door spun out on its hinges, and the tall silhouette of the Count stepped in, not making a single sound as he moved to the fireplace. He took hold of the wooden plaque that had been holding the trophy moments sooner.

“You’ve been here… What did you find, I wonder, little rabbit…”

I held my breath. He was turning his back on me. Maybe… Slowly, mindful of every step, I moved to the entrance, eyes locked on his tall figure. I reached the doorframe.

“I can see you, darling.”

He tilted his head back, a large grin revealing a line of long, jagged fangs and teeth, too many, too large, almost like his jaw was unhinged. His eyes were glowing from the inside, and seemed entirely dark, not a trace of white in the sclera. Move. Move ! I took back control of my body as he started to walk towards me, a guttural laughter, like a hyena’s, escaping from deep into his chest. Forcing myself off the horrifying sight, I blinked off the tears that started welling up in my eyes, and ran as fast as I possibly could through the corridors. Get out. Get the fuck out.

My hand started to sting. The protusions of the antlers started digging into my skin. I didn’t care. Run. The hall. Rushing to the door, I tried to open it. Locked. My stomach turned so violently I almost gagged. Maybe there was another issue, somewhere. I turned to the next buiding. In a second, he was there. Before I could think of using my weapon, he ripped the makeshift stake out of my hand. Beads of blood gushed from my palms, which had him snarl like a famished beast. I thought to use the distraction to run. He grasped at my throat, raising me in the air. A scream escaped my mouth like a choked gurgling sound. I started to see lights dancing in front of my eyes. Not like this. Not like… this…

The coin. Using the last of my consciousness to grab the small piece of metal in my pocket, shaking, I slapped it on the back of his hand. Shrieking, he let me fall back on the floor, not releasing his grip. I gasped for air, as he cursed at me in his native tongue, his voice sounding like dozens, filling the room. In a single push, my feet left the stone floor, and I flew back, right through the window.

I felt the glass shatter against my back, slice through my skin. All seemed silent, except for the shimmering of the shards, all around me. The sky, so bright. I hit the ground, the air winding out of my chest as I crashed through the snow. A second then, the Count was hunched over me, mouth agape, feral, hissing.

“Not bad, for a rabbit”, he growled.

His mouth twisted in a deranged manner of rictus, deformed, terrifying. He grabbed my injured hand, watching the blood seeping down onto my wrist. Shaking with anticipation, he pressed a kiss to my palm. I felt only teeth, and his tongue. As soon as it touched my skin, I couldn’t repress a soft cry. A jolt of electricity ran through my body.

Everything was red.

My feet, ankle deep in translucent water, laid above golden sand. The sky, purple above, fading to yellow to the horizon, where a large, ominous sun was setting over the water. There was nothing else.

“Where am I ?”, I asked, to myself.

“Where you want to be”, the Count replied.

He was standing next to me, as barefoot as I was into the water. He looked calm, peaceful, watching the sun. Nothing hurt anymore. A wonderful feeling of warmth, happiness, washed over me, as soft wrinkles of water licked at my feet.

“What is happening ?”

“You are a very clever prey, but I am a better hunter”, he told me.

He gave me a soft smile, almost… Sad. Disappointed, maybe.

“Am I dead ?”

“Not yet.”

I slipped my hand into my pocket. Not yet. I thrust my arm toward the sun. Next to me, the Count suddenly coughed up a splutter of blood. Considering the black liquid, softly dripping away on his hand, he then lifted his eye to see the second antler, secure in my hand.

Everything was white.

The sudden rush of pain was unbearable for a moment. The antler secure in my hands, it rested on my chest, the pointed end buried in the Count’s heart. I pushed him off with all of my remaining forces, and he fell over to the side.

“Clever… Rabbit…”, he gasped.

A hint of laughter started, for a second. Then, nothing. Unable to move, I focused on breathing. Cold air. Every cut stung. Every breath had me crying out in pain. A muffled noise had me twist my head back. Soon, I felt the coarse hairs of a horse’s muzzle on my forehead.

“You again”, I croaked. “Don’t have any apples. Leave.”

The stubborn thing stayed, poking at the side of my head with his. I groaned, and painstakingly managed to sit up. The old thing lowered his head, and I grabbed at his neck. He slowly raised up, and so I did too. To be fair, this wasn’t the weirdest thing happening today. In the red snow, he didn’t seem dead. The makeshift stake deep into his chest, his eyes hadn’t turned glassy, cloudy. He looked like he slept, eyes open.

Not much inclined to test that theory, I took a deep breath, and hoisted myself onto the beast, groaning with pain. I grabbed a handful of his mane, careful not to hurt him. Fighting to stay upright, I didn’t give a second look to the castle as I left, nor at the tall silhouette lying dead on the frozen ground.

Had I been more keen to read on legends, to give credit to myth, I might have learned something very important. Something, which, in retrospect, I should have been weary of.

Only a stake made of white oak may kill a vampire.

~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~ - ~

Author’s notes : And here's the end of part one ! I might take a few days' break before I continue with the rest, but be sure that this story isn't finished. I promised romance, I promised slow burn, and we only got to the burn part yet. Get ready for some mortal enemies to lovers, my guys.

Stay tuned...

Taglist : @carydorse @angelicdestieldemon @bloodhon3yx @thewondernanazombie @battocar @moony691 @mjlock @thebeautyofdisorder

[hamdrewburglar]

Dracula Obstacle Course

The goal of a pinball obstacle course is to achieve various objectives, in order. The scoreboard is irrelevant. If players are having difficulty but still want to overcome all of the obstacles, progress may be carried from one game into the next. Each objective must be finished before progress towards the next can be counted. Some carry-over progress is unavoidable, and that’s OK. Here’s my suggested run for Bram Stoker’s Dracula:

Objective #1 Rats in the Dungeon Shoot the altar (lower right scoop) three times to start RATS +1 point

Objective #2 We Are Wolves Shoot the right orbit enough times to spell "v-i-d-e-o" and play video mode +1 point Beat video mode playing one-handed +1 point

Objective #3 BATS & BATS & BATS Shoot left ramp enough times (3?) to qualify Bats 1 point Each additional BATS for the duration of your game +1 point

Objective #4 Maureeeeeen Shoot left ramp enough times (5?) to qualify Mist Mb +1 point (Otherwise, Mist multiball is automatically qualified on ball 3) +0 points Start mist hurry-up by shooting the MISTery scoop +1 point Free the floating ball and start Mist multiball +1 point

Objective #5 Soul Coughing Shoot the Coffin (right) ramp to advance the value 500K, 1M, 1.5M, 2M, 2.5M, and eventually light coffin lock +1 point per locked ball (up to three)

You're still not undead yet?- Objective #6 +1 point for starting any multiball +3 points for stacking two multiballs +6 points for stacking three multiballs

Fluffy Asylum Carwash Shoot asylum (left side "secret" hole- above stand-up target bank) to visit Renfield. +1 point Catch Fluffy the Vampire (watch for crosseyes) +3 points Wash Dracula's car + ??? Points

Love Never Dies. Good luck!

[littlecrookedheart]

Pine Springs Picnic Party

This is a fic I wanted to write for my bestie, @europeanguy 's 20th birthday. Good job being born, bud. Love u

Pairing : Bram x Parker

Word Count : Under 800

Rating : 18+

Authors note : Please don't read this

“Thank you for this beautiful picnic, Bram. I haven't been on one since I was a kid.”

“I only wish I'd have remembered you've been craving those cookies! It would have been the perfect surprise.”

Parker grinned, kissing him on the cheek, “It was perfect anyway.”

Bram turned toward him, pulling him close, “Up for one more surprise?”

“Have you ever known me to say no to adventure?”

“Touche,” Bram sighed, pointing toward the lake, “Let's go...have some fun.”

“Do you really want to risk this?”

“With you? I know you'll protect me.”

“....You're lucky I care about you, you know.”

--

“What's that smell?”

“Hmm?”

“It smells like..oranges or maybe…” Parker trailed off, hooking his fingers with Bram’s as they waded into the lake.

“Do you trust me?”

“When have I ever given you a reason to believe otherwise?”

Bram pulled a rainbow bandanna from his pocket, gesturing for him to turn around.

“You want to blindfold me?”

“Are you too chicken?”

Parker smirked, rolling his eyes with a huff before following Bram’s request. The cloth masked his vision with a spectrum of neon, the scent of citrus more prominent now. His lips were met softly with Bram’s, melting together as they had a hundred times, the ebb of the waters surface chilling the dry spaces on his arms. Bram’s kiss grew hungrier, rushing down his neck and the lines of his shoulder.

“Slow down, I'm not going anywhere,” Parker moaned into his touch, shuddering as Bram’s hands yanked his shorts away just enough.

Bram pulled the fruit from his pocket, sliding it onto Parker's erection, quickly moving it up and down, followed by his free hand, lips still locked.

“Oh my god, what are you doing to me?” Parker gasped, holding tightly onto him as his hips started to thrust.

“Do you like it?”

He didn't need a verbal response, nipping Parker's neck as he groaned in delight. He took a deep breath, bobbing beneath the water to adjust his own shorts, letting the grapefruit float away and guiding Parker to his entrance.

“I want you,” he whispered, reaching his arms backward to graze the muscles of Parker's chest.

His hands gripped around Bram’s torso as he moved into him, the thrusts of their hips creating waves all around them.

“Harder!”

A shrill screeching sound filled the air, causing Parker to rip off the blindfold, staring in shock at the creatures watching the two of them, their heads just peeking over the surface of the lake.

“Bram! What the hell?”

Bram turned to face him, cradling his face in his hands.

“What's wrong?”

“Maybe the 50 monsters watching me fuck you and you weren't blindfolded?!”

“Let them. They're not trying to hurt us, are they?”

“Why aren't they?” Parker pulled away, readjusting his bottoms.

“The grapefruit. They're allergic.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I was giving you a hand job with a slice of grapefruit. I read that it can ward off evil, so-”

Parker shook his head, blinking quickly. “What?”

“I read that it can-”

“I thought that's what you said. What is wrong with you?”

“Leave him alone!”

Parker jolted backward as a fish with three heads swam over and screamed at him from the water. He looked to Bram, the terror in his eyes reflecting in the tears they began to release.

“Stop crying!” The fish yelled, gulping a large amount of water and expanding in size.

“When did you arrive?” Bram asked, smiling widely.

“I heard someone yelling so I came as fast as I could.”

“Bram...we need to leave. Now,” Parker reached for his hand, but Bram swam over to the fish, petting it gently.

“He's my friend.”

“He's a talking fish, Bram. We need to go or both of us are going to end up washed up on shore! Please, come with me!”

“He doesn't want to!”

“I'm not arguing with a three headed fish!”

“Parker, stop! Stop, okay? It's not a fish. It's Chief Kelley.”

“What?”

“I'm Elliot. Don't lie, Bram. Makes your skin slimy," The fish coughed.

“You're telling me...this fish is your brother?”

“I am Elliot.”

Parker gagged once and started swimming toward the shore, but not quick enough. The skeleton monster beamed out of the depths, yanking him by the ankles and drowning him in the center of the lake.

Parker's body slowly floated to the edge of the lake along with the grapefruit, leaving Elliot and Bram alone in the water.

“What now?” Elliot asked from his third head.

“Glub?”

Bram high fived his brothers fin with his own, gulping a large amount of water to double in size.

“Glibb,” aes eht rednu ytic eht ot maws sa rehtorb sih otni gnipmub ,dekoj toillE.

[silverdawere]

Better at Being [3]

Word count: alot

Content warnings: Very slight violence?

Protagonist[s]: Bram van Jessen, Seamus Dacs.

||| ||| |||

《《Convergence》》

||| ||| |||

He pushed through the mass crowd, pushing aside bodies who protested with curses and swears. There was no time to reminisce, no time to think over how he'd grown over the past five years, or how much stronger he'd gotten. Clutching the purse in his hand and close to his chest, he propelled with vigor through the crowd, shoving people out of his way with indifference. He wasn't in a hurry, no, hoping to loose his pursuers in the mess of faces. He weaved clumsily, his green gaze looking over his shoulder to check for them, only to be jostled by sudden impact. He had knocked into someone, someone tall, someone big.

"Watch where you're going," They boomed.

Gathering himself, he was gifted the sight of large man, twice his size, but that honestly wasn't saying all that much, or living up to the mountain of a man in front of him. One particular thing that had grown with him, save for his messy, unkept ginger hair, was his temper, as well as his foolishness. He, shortish and stout, wrapped the purse tightly around his hand and puffed out his chest.

"Who's yous to be talkin'?" He exclaimed wildly, shoving the man back ever so slightly, to his surprise, causing him to stagger back into the crowd. Passersby behind fell all the way to the concrete, but the behemoth of a bloke stood steady, his face conveying visible shock, which turned to annoyance, than to blind anger. The man steadied himself, but our hero was too excited to notice, raising the purse to strike the other fellow. The big one wasn’t one to be taken lightly, reaching in his pants and pulling out a pocketknife, opening it in one swift motion. As our hero brought his hand down, the stranger caught it, pulled him close, can cut him along the face, pushing him down. The people around paid little to no mind, save for the occasional sideways glance. The man spoke low, baritone, stepping on the smaller man’s hair.

“What’s your name?”

“Seamus,” Was the response, the short ginger standing and wiping his cheek, red with blood. Before Seamus can think to retaliate, an elderly comic called from far behind.

“There he is, that one!”

Seamus' eyes widened, swallowing hard. He pulled himself away from the confrontation, dashing down the ever expanding sidewalk between East and West, off, off past the horizon. He weaved between pedestrians, shoving and haggling them in a hurry. 

Hats flew off heads as he ran, careless of the safety of the pedestrians around him, bodies moving and ducking out of his way like roaches from light. That is, until he met chest.

|||

“Watch it buddy,” Seamus exclaimed, attempting the same as before. The man did not budge, nor did he retort, instead looking over his shoulder behind him. He grasped the shorter man by the elbow, pulling him along. “What ar-”

This new person, this stranger, he drug him quickly back up the sidewalk, so quickly Seamus couldn’t register it. He pulled him faster as he noticed the people following him, dragging him into an alley way, now a swearing, sputtering mess. 

“Who are you?!” Seamus said, tossed on the ally floor. Standing and rolling up his sleeves, to which the stranger sighed, folding his hands into the pockets of his big, winter coat-

“Bram.”

“Bram?”

The stranger, Bram, didn’t say much for a moment, and then- “Are you always this trigger happy, kid? How old are you?”

Seamus gaped for a moment, counting, before shaking his head. “Maybe I am, mister, it’s none of yours-” He coughed, patting his own chest, “-and I’ms nearly sixteen.”

“Well then, I assume you don’t have anywhere to be. Follow me.”

Seamus was confused, highly skeptical of this strange person. Regardless, he followed, further into the alley.

[hollynotebooklover]

Every time I re-read Bram Stoker’s Dracula, I find myself sadly underwhelmed by the second half of the book. The first half at Dracula’s castle I adore and then... it’s well crafted by a bit meh by comparison. I’m fairly certain that the reason I feel this way is because, to me, the first half of the book is a tensely building but highly Gothic romance conducted between the Count and Jonathan Harker. It’s a romance which builds and builds and contains gems like the whole “This man is mine!” scene. Then, just as I feel sure that something just has to happen soon, Dracula goes off to England (or runs away from his feelings) and Harker has his mental collapse and marries Mina and then Dracula begins to pursue Mina (obviously not for reasons of jealousy and revenge *cough*). To me, it feels like all of those later events only happen because this is a 19th Century Novel bound up in the conventions and prejudices of the time so Dracula and Harker can’t end up together. Because of this, the second half of the book always makes me feel unbearably sad. They should end up together, surely. 

Anyway, you’ll never convince me that this book isn't a romance. Possibly, the greatest love story never told.  

[areistotle]

Hey guys! This post has been coming for a really long time, I’m sorry to have kept you all waiting but university readings have kept me very very busy! I have compiled a list of books which are classics (in their own way, some even being modern classics). Books that I’ve read and loved or other people in my life have loved have been italicised and this list includes links to my favourite covers/the edition of the book that I own since you all ask me where I buy my books from on my bookstagram (and that is from book depository!). I hope you enjoy this, stay bookish 📚

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee 

The Great Gatsby; Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger 

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck 

A Tale of Two Cities; Bleak House; Great Expectations; Major Works by Charles Dickens

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury 

Dracula by Bram Stoker

The Iliad and The Odyssey by Homer 

The Four Tragedies and The Four Histories; The Complete Works by William Shakespeare

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas 

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy 

The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien 

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley 

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo 

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett 

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

Northanger Abbey; Persuasion; Pride and Prejudice; Emma; Sense and Sensibility; Mansfield Park by Jane Austen

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway 

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare (*cough* my name is mentioned here *cough*)

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville 

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll 

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery 

Treasure Island and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson 

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller 

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad 

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier 

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut 

Tess of the D'Urbervilles; Far from the Madding Crowd; Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy

Middlemarch by George Eliot

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy 

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis 

Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

The Stranger; The Fall; The Myth of Sisyphus; The Plague by Albert Camus

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Beowulf

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez

Candide by Voltaire

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Bhagavad Gita

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

Paradise Lost  by John Milton

The Divine Comedy by Dante

The Awakening by Kate Chopin

The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

To the Lighthouse; Mrs. Dalloway; A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf

The Trial; Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

The Picture of Dorian Gray; The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde

The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

Antigone by Sophocles

The Republic by Plato

Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh

Utopia by Thomas More

The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

The Epic of Gilgamesh

The Rainbow by D.H. Lawrence

Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco

Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Atonement by Ian McEwan

Harry Potter by JK Rowling

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

The Brothers Karamazov; Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

Confessions by St Augustine of Hippo

The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

A Passage to India; A Room with a View by E.M. Forster

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins

The Plays by Christopher Marlowe

Norwegian Wood; Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

The Secret History; The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

[other links]

all my masterposts

my study/book instagram @ aristotelian

my goodreads @ mitochondrions [also snapchat if u wanna]

I hope you guys enjoyed it! Feel free to message me if you want me to add one of your favourite books or something, happy reading 😙❤️

[intergalactic-zoo]

The Impetuousness of Youth

I wrote this Halloween-y short story in 2014, and since it’s the fifth of October Halloween, I thought I’d revisit it, do a quick little edit, and repost it. Hope you enjoy!

Dracula slipped silently into the bedroom where Van Helsing lay sleeping. The Count felt undignified, breathing through a gas mask he’d salvaged during the Great War. He hoped that his aged foe wouldn’t wake to see him in such a state. With haste, he stripped the hanging cloves of garlic from the walls and threw them out the window. Dracula removed the unsightly mask and set it gingerly on the floor, then approached the bed. Van Helsing slept fitfully, his breathing ragged and raspy. He had grown frail with age, and time raced against cancer to claim his final breath. Hands that once were so strong, wielding swords and stakes and silver, were now gnarled by arthritis, and Dracula suspected they could scarcely hold a pencil. He stood over the bed for a long moment, then cleared his throat. “Van Helsing.” The old man stirred slowly at first, but quickly returned to himself. Neither sickness nor age could dull the edge of those steely eyes, which glared at the undead Count in the moonlight. “Come to gloat?” hissed the doctor. “Or to finish me off?” “Neither,” said Dracula. “I’ve come to help.” “I’ll not sell my soul for the Devil’s brand of help.” “I am not—“ Dracula stopped, composed himself. “You are dying, Van Helsing.” “And not by your hand, no matter how you’ve tried!” “I know,” Dracula said. “We have chased each other for…what, thirty years now?” “Thirty-eight.” Dracula nodded. “And this is how you wish to end it?” Van Helsing gave Dracula a puzzled look, then stifled a hard cough. “My friends and family are here, Dracula. Soon I will see my wife, my daughter. I am surrounded by love, Dracula. I would not expect you to understand.” Dracula looked for a long, silent moment out the window at the crescent moon. “Let me turn you.” “What?” “Let me give you back your health, your youth.” “Go to blazes, creature.” “You can send me there yourself! I can cleanse your sickness, give you the strength to fight once more!” Any angry curse Van Helsing might have uttered was swallowed in a coughing fit. Dracula waited until he finished. “Van—Abraham—if you could have cured your wife’s illness, if you could have revived your daughter, would not you have done so? Would not you do anything in your power to save them?” Van Helsing thought for a long time, and were it not for his labored breathing, Dracula might have thought he’d slipped away there and then. “Any earthly thing, yes," he said finally. "But I would not save their bodies only to damn their souls.” “I do not need your permission, you know,” Dracula threatened. “I could turn you now, and you would spend every night for eternity chasing after me, avenging your own soul. You would never forgive me for robbing you of paradise." “Then do it, demon.” Van Helsing tore at his shirt, exposing his neck with trembling hands. “Or have your words more teeth than your jaws?” Dracula felt rage rise up at the old man’s obstinate impudence. He lunged forward, before sentimentality could blunt his resolve, and had nearly reached his old enemy’s throat when he caught a glint of reflected moonlight at the corner of his eye. Van Helsing swung with all his diminished strength, but the sharpened silver cross found no target, only shapeless mist. Dracula solidified by the window, stooping down to retrieve his gas mask. He paused and looked back to his old adversary. Any parting words he might have shared remained clotted and dry in his throat. He dove out of the window in silence, and nothing more passed between them. Dracula visited Van Helsing’s gravesite only once, and only briefly. A silver-tipped crossbow bolt broke his reverie, sailing past his head so closely that it nearly parted his hair. He spun around, hissing. Dracula was not surprised to see Quincey Harker, who had been expertly trained these last twenty years by old Van Helsing. Dracula was surprised to see the young boy holding the crossbow. “Good shot, Bram!” Quincey clapped his son on the shoulder. “But aim for the heart, not the head.” “Yes, father,” said the child, loading another bolt. “I shan’t miss this time.” Dracula leapt upward and soared into the air on leathery wings, feeling a weariness that no fresh-drawn blood would ease. The vampire withdrew to his estate, staying only long enough to arrange long-term travel to Geneva. 

A century of rumors whispered among Swiss schoolchildren and around campfires had transformed Castle Frankenstein into a thing of horrifying legend, untouched even by those who might seek to tear it down. Dracula was one of very few old enough to remember the true story of that house, and one of even fewer estranged enough from humanity to know its sole occupant. That building, once a laboratory, now a hermitage, would offer Dracula the solitude he so craved. Adam Frankenstein proved a gracious host, and welcomed even what little company Dracula provided. But weeks turned into months, and Dracula spent more and more time in his coffin. He refused to eat, even as Adam broke his exile to retrieve fresh goats and sheep to satiate his guest’s hunger. “Vlad, you have to eat something,” Adam pleaded through the thick wooden door. “Come on, it’s still bleating.” There was no response. “I know what you’re going through, believe me. Come out, and we can talk about it.” After another moment of silence, Adam unlocked the door and led the goat in. “I’m going to leave this here for when you get hungry.” As he left, he turned back to face the coffin once more. “You can’t spend the rest of eternity locked up like this, Vlad. I’ll be here when you’re ready.” The readiness was slow in coming. Dracula would eventually eat the meals Adam left for him, but he never even left the basement chamber anymore. Adam knew what it was like to want solitude, to lose loved ones, even to watch the endless years pass steadily by. But he did not know how to help, so he turned as always to his library. He read for days. The letters and telegraphs and messengers had all been sent weeks before, and with the night finally approaching, Adam felt an unfamiliar feeling of excitement. His plan was meticulous, and surely it would bring an end to Dracula’s depression. The guests began arriving an hour after sunset, with the moon glowing full and yellow, low in the autumn sky. Adam greeted them at the door, each ghoul and ghost and creature, some familiar, some he’d only heard of through fanciful stories. Crackly phonograph music echoed through the castle, and Adam wondered what eerie songs the villagers might sing about the strange night when monsters reveled at Castle Frankenstein. Adam stood once more outside the wooden door to the basement chamber. “Come on, Vlad. Everyone is here for you. They want to meet the great Count Dracula!” “Go away,” Dracula muttered, barely audible over the thumping music from upstairs. Adam's enormous shoulders drooped, but he was resolute. “I’m going to go back upstairs. If I don’t see you up there in ten minutes, I’ll drag you out of that coffin myself.” Dracula pulled the lid of his coffin closed even tighter, hoping it might seal out the noise, but the acoustics of the chamber only amplified the caterwauling of the unfamiliar rhythms and melodies, which in turn amplified his feelings of isolation. Ten minutes was all he could stand. Adam was undeterred by Dracula’s refusal. He had one last card to play, one which relied on Castle Frankenstein’s ancient harpsichord, lovingly restored over these last several weeks, and a piece of 15th century dance music popular in Wallachia during the adolescence of one Vlad Tepes. Adam had merely dabbled with the instrument before, but he was quite sure that his skills were up to the task. He turned off the phonograph and urged the guests to be silent as the dead, then sat down at the bench. He cracked his patchwork knuckles, then gingerly played the instrument with fingers that seemed far too clumsy for such nimble motions. Dracula threw open his coffin lid, raising a hand in rage. But before the cry could escape his parched lips, he heard a familiar tune, plucked out on metallic strings. He was transported back to his boyhood, so many centuries ago, before blood and bats, before stakes and silver. Memories flooded his mind of a time when he could dance in the sunlight on a Carpathian mountainside, a time when he was truly young and not merely ageless, as Adam played a song that Dracula had long thought lost to the mists of history. The guests clapped when Adam finished. He backed gingerly away from the harpsichord and turned around to face the crowd, but his cloudy eyes quickly fixed on the disheveled, emaciated figure of Dracula, standing at the top of the basement stairs. The Count smiled wistfully, tears welling up in his dark eyes. Adam returned the smile. “I always wondered,” Dracula said, drawing his hulking friend into an embrace. “Whatever happened to my ‘Transylvania Twist.’”