Metamorphosis 1

[fatherssins]

Characters: Alucard and you!
Setting: Room 2-16, then the open halls of the Tower
Format: Prose
Summary: Woken from his long sleep Alucard finds himself in an unfamiliar setting. Curious, he decides to explore the area around him.
Warnings: N/A

The long, dark sleep of the undead could seem like a limitless stretch of time to those that slept it. How the all enveloping pitch blackness of the night worked as a comforter to Alucard, the beautiful, hideous, half-cast son of the Vampire King. Neither dead nor alive, existing entombed in an ageless, cursed body for all eternity. The sins of the past haunted his dreams as he relived the final moments of his mother's life spliced together with the finishing blow he had dealt his bloodthirsty father. He had designed the remainder of his days to be lived out in his coffin, sealed away from the world where Dracula's cursed bloodline could too slumber, keeping the innocents safe from the unholy desires of the undead.

But now he finds himself woken, no longer surrounded by the confining security of his coffin walls but outstretched on a very human bed. Pale sunlight filters in through dirty windows and he feels the familiar sting of light on his skin. A soft groan eases past the dhampir's lips and he finally moves to sit up, blankly staring down at his gloved palms, tensing his hands and then relaxing them. His limbs feel tired and strained, as if he'd been torn apart and then haphazardly put back together again, his joints ached and it took the dhampir some time to summon the strength to stand and even that was with some difficulty. Alucard's eyes begin to adjust to the dim light in the room and as his pupils dilated and focused until he spots a letter on the tattered bedside-table next to him. Feeling his bones flex and crack as he steps closer he picks up the small paper envelope and unfolds the parchment inside to skim its contents.

And then he reads it a second time.

The dhampir's head throbs all of a sudden, aching a piercing, penetrating pain. "Ce înseamnă acest lucru..."* Alucard murmurs in his mother tongue (Romanian), his voice low and solemn. These printed words could not possibly be true, he knew he had extinguished the last, true evil in the world. He was the only one who could have done it. So how it is that his homeland is now destroyed. No, the dhampir would not believe it, and proceeded to convince himself that this was some illusion, black magic devilry that was designed to plant the seed of doubt in his mind.

The confines of this small room held no answers for Alucard and so, after delving deep into a hidden reserve of energy, he decided to step out into the corridor and upon doing so he saw what appeared to be an endless line of closed doors mimicking the one he had just stepped through. Turning back he noted the number he had stepped out through and, feeling his senses overwhelmed with a variety of scents, sights and feelings, he had no choice but to simply choose a direction to walk in (which happened to be left) and begin walking until he came across someone or something that could explain this madness to him.



* "What does this mean..."
[ooc: For any characters with a particularly strong sense of smell or who can pick up the "scent" of blood Alucard has a very distinct odour. Any character who recognises the scent of a vampire will definitely be able to smell that undead blood in him. For those who don't know what a vampire smells like then he will give off a general aura of death and foreboding...!]

 

 

Comments

[urnotafraid]

"I could die tomorrow from a bullet wound. I could die ten minutes from now by making a wrong turn in these halls. I'm mortal. Dying is part of the job description."

Sho shook his head sadly. Just like Kei, this one cannot seem to grasp the very nature of being mortal meant that death could happen any time. Why should he distance himself from anything just because it might kill him? He might as well give up alcohol and cigarettes while he was at it. They will kill him eventually, just like a vampire would if his mouth got him in extreme trouble. As usual.

"So do dictators. So do serial killers and rapists. Vampires are not the only ones that have a monopoly on death and destruction; they've only had the time to perfect it."

He was starting to feel like he could be arguing this forever. That whenever he found a vampire, he would end up having this same conversation over and over again. It was easier to have with Kei since they knew each other that well, but this one was a little hard to read.

"It could be a lump of coal in your chest. Your heart is where your actions come from, not what pumps your blood."

[fatherssins]

Whether he realised it or not, this man was finally beginning wear down Alucard's defences. The dhampir had little experience dealing with people and his arguments of self-deprecation were starting to sound flawed. Perhaps this man was right? Maybe mortal men were just as capable of causing damage as he was. But that still left him wondering:

"Why are you so keen for me to see myself as something more than I am?" He was not scolding, he was not lecturing, Alucard was merely confused and perhaps a little curious, "Do you give your affection to everyone quite so freely?"

[urnotafraid]

"People are people to me," Sho replied. He knew this answer already and didn't have to think about it. Kei used to say something similar to him and he had always followed up with the reasoning behind his views.

"I don't care if someone's black or white or Japanese or German or even a vampire. It doesn't matter. We all bleed and we all can die. Everything else is just superficial."

[fatherssins]

There was a long pause before Alucard spoke, a distant look in his eyes as he did so. "It's a pity that that was not the consensus in my homeland." Perhaps he may have been a more open-minded dhampir if it had been, perhaps he could have had friends, or perhaps his mother would have lived past her thirties.

[urnotafraid]

"Most homelands are like that."

Maybe his parents would still be alive if it wasn't for the riots. Maybe he would have had a normal life and never would have met Kei. So many maybes. Sho didn't live for the maybes, he lived for the nows.

"C'mon. Let's see if we can find a way out of this maze."

[fatherssins]

Although Alucard did not choose to openly thank this man for his level-headed, kind words Sho should have been able to notice the hint of a smile on the dhampir's features as he moved to stand beside him.

"You're quite right, come, perhaps we can find our way together." He turns to look at his new companion briefly "By the way, I'm Alucard."

[urnotafraid]

There. That was a little better. Sho nodded to himself at the change in the man's features, the slight smile and warmth in his words and started walking in the direction he had been going in. It didn't look like it, but he was scanning the area, making sure nothing was too out of place for a simple seeming hall.

"I'm Sho."