cryptsleeper | 20s AU Post

20s AU Post

Current Carmilla plot outline
--Post-fire, Carmilla and Mr. Peanut team up mostly to use each other. Carmilla's spent the past several months (since November, it is now February 1925) networking, and it's clear to her that Alucard's not suited for the position and that the other two are the obvious weakness. Mr Peanut needs something back, so this is perfect on her end. Mr Peanut can only imagine the joys of vampire blood in his work, and he'd like an army of vampires for his own ends.
--Shit stirring from Mr Peanut (all of March?)
--Mr Peanut also begins to sell mis Miracle Serum, which has vampire blood in it.
--Gang is very much trying to murder Mr Peanut during this.
--Start of April, vampire gets a call from one of the blood bank contacts that 3 patients have come in and are displaying some bizarre signs. Investigation yields the fact that they're in process of turning, and they've all taken the same serum.
--Additional investigation reveals O FUCK IT MR PEANUT
--Meanwhile Carmilla's been made aware of a familiar she didn't sire, so she knows something's up. Big fight with Mr. Peanut and thus Mr. Peanut is left depowered
--Gang commits a murder
--Carmilla's well sured up on her contacts now, and it's time for open rebellion (mid-April)
--In a more subtle attempt to let Alucard just step aside, she cuts the breaks on demon car and shows up to gloat/suggest he not pull a dad and go to deal with his grief quietly while she runs the city. The how he wants to do it is up to him (black widow joke goes here.) Treffy and Sypha walk in.
--1 week of straight up rebellion; feedings, no help from allies, need to do damage control instead of fight carmilla, every dracula rule is
--MEANWHILE IN GRAVITY FALLS, triangle shows Vlad what's up to try and psyche him out, somehow this finalyl snaps Vlad out of his depression and he heads home
--Just in time for Alucard and Carmilla to be tearing each other to bits in one of the bayous, it's not going well
--Vlad coming in means the king of vampires is accosted by a belmont with a pair of blessed knitting needles and a speaker with a fucking gun and he's just like what the shit happened to the world while i was gone
--Wards around the fight means that only demon car can break the wards, everyone has to pile in.
--Carmilla gets her ass kicked AND SENT TO THE JUSTICE DIMENSION

THEN THERE WERE FAERIES.
--Prior to all of this the vampire and Sypha have done a shit ton of research on how to get their Belmont back
--Sypha has also been practicing debating with dad, which leaves everyone Very Tired.
--When Trevor is actually snatched up (1 year after marriage, it takes fae effort. Taking Arn's shape fails, so it's a lot more kidnapping by force), Sypha and Alucard go into Faerie
--But they're playing this as politics, not as heroes rescuing their damsel, so that means the faeries are just "wait what now excuse u?"
--There are 3 gates and 3 trials (the particulars we're still bullshitting.) Each is asked to sacrifice 3 things. (Alucard: voice, his titles as bestowed upon by his father and his people, i forget the third; Sypha: her human form (she's a birb), fuck what were the other two)
--They enter the court at the end of the third trial. After LITERALLY ALL THE TITLES Sypha declares she Speaks for Trevor Belmont
--Claim debate over Trevor, turns out that the rules are in Sypha's favor.
--But that means debating to leave Fae without giving up what they've chosen.
--Sypha lawyers it all out, Alucard is a safety deposit and hangs out with Fae!Trevor
--In the end, safe passage out of Faerie consists of Sypha giving up her memory of the necromancer (billed as a great mage she studied under), the vampire gives up his immortality, and Trevor is replaced with Carmilla (dad was aware of this option and OK with it), but Trevor has his ability to swear taken. He now soundslike a rubber ducky when he tries
--Everyone gets home okay, except for the AU of this AU where the gang fails, but Trevor's on their doorstep like a bat out of Hell because time doesn't work right and he's been in Hell for a WHILE.

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Coddling would be the polite word for it, yes.

[ He says, as if being polite has been a priority this whole time. Enabling him. Outright fucking deluding him. He tries his best to hold still. It's hard, because this shit is both painful and cold abut mostly because he's furious. He's furious with a vampire for not being enough like Dracula, which is kind of new. Dracula would have crushed all of these dissidents the second they spoke up. It would have been brutal, would have left no ashes for anything to rise from. ]

Fine, he's paying attention. He's just not doing anything but sulking. [ Otherwise known as mourning. Becoming overwhelmed by terror. Luxuries that Trevor has no patience for. ] Any vampires shirking Dracula's old rules need to have examples made of them, no matter how minor.

You are a vampire hunter, and you object because you think he is not being enough of a monster?

[It would be petty to poke him in the ankle, and she doesn't, but she thinks about it. His injury is at a point now where repeatedly packing it in ice will ultimately do him more harm than good, which means she has to be a little bit more creative in how she treats it, but that's no great issue. It would be better still if he would stop trying to walk around the house on it and surrender to a few weeks of sheer bed rest, but the likelihood of that happening is essentially nil, too.

She blows lightly on her fingertips, then braces the opposite side of his leg with her other hand while the first comes to stroke lightly down the length of his ankle. Her fingers are cold, but it's a dry, tempered chill instead of the strong sharpness of ice outright.]

You realize that you very likely owe your life to the fact that he is not his father, don't you?

All the same, the wards balance out.

[There's something missing from the map, and that's the official delineations. Alucard reaches for the charcol, and on the map he adds in the city's wards and numbers each in turn. The ward, it seems, dictates how many grain piles there are that have real meaning. Smaller wards have one, the biggest have 3 to 5, depending.]

Much like the government of the country, the cities run on checks and balances. Yes, there are even more churches that have no meaning in the wards, but the ratios do equal out.

[But there's a grander point here.]

The concentration is not an accident, but it isn't for the reason that you think. When all the night things began to pass here, the things of this land made it clear that their territory would not be encroached upon. As such, anything from beyond must cluster in the city, or be destroyed. Those treaties were in place even before my father arrived. Why else would that man live in a city?

[The question is rhetorical.]

New York and Los Angeles have more mages. The country's capital has the most secret societies and conspiracies, as is fitting. Chicago is where everything mixes the most freely. The northwest is for werecreatures, New Orleans is for vampires. Almost every region has a speciality, save the states between New York and Canada. The witch trials cast too long a shadow, and the so-called vampire panic ensured that no one would go into the territory. [Then quickly, to clarify:] No one in the area comprehended what tuberculois was.

[ He’s walking with a crutch, and that’s the compromise. He can’t stay still. Can’t.

The cold is- cold. But it helps. It brings the swelling down again, makes the bruising just ugly rather than ugly and also lumpy. He’s being an ungrateful shit, and he’s kind of aware of that. But then, this is gratitude, from him. He’s trying, trying very hard to care. Which is why he does not say how fine that would have been with him. ]

Sometimes you need a monster to get shit done.

Yes.

[It's an automatic response, given because Alucard must say something. Anything. It lets the other two know he's grounded in his own head by just a little bit. So onward it is, to the Church Ladies. Agatha, the one in charge, she doesn't like this but she understands why they're being asked to lend authority.]

The priest's eyes.

[Alucard speaks only after they've loaded them all into the car. Locked the trunk and sealed it tight. Have been driving for some time along the roads that lead into the city itself. The silence has been no better now than it was before. Perhaps it is worse, as Alucard's white knuckles show thanks to his driving gloves.]

You two know better than I would. Their color, what does that mean?

So he should allow this city to eat him alive, for the sake of "getting shit done".

[Honestly, with the way the Belmont is acting, he almost doesn't deserve the courtesy of the prototype walking cast she's got with her, but, well. She was raised not to let her own opinions get in the way of people in need of help (however they might color her own demeanor when engaging with them), and it'd be a waste of the apparatus if she didn't try to fit him with it anyway, so.]

This will feel a little strange. There are screws in it that need to be tightened, so you might hear the noise of those, but the only thing you should feel is a little pressure around the ankle. Lift up just slightly; an inch or two.

[But anyway.]

He sacrifices so much already. He should not have to give even more.

[ He bristles at the words ‘vampire panic’, but then calms quickly. That, at least, is familiar ground. ]

Opposite happened, in London. Spring-Heel using the cholera to hide his work. Always a big fucking mess when this shit gets confused.

[ That’s. Probably an attempt at making conversation. He doesn’t have a lot of good conversation topics, really. ]

What rules did your father enforce here? In Europe it was no turning children, humane treatment of livestock, and quick deaths. Imagine keeping up shit like this takes more than just that.

[HOW DOES DISEASE WORK apparently no one knows!!!]

Those same checks help to avoid confusion. We're confined to a smaller space, so we know each other. If there's someone acting a fool, everyone knows it, everyone responds. It isn't quite self-regulating, but it means most problems are put out by peers and the knowledge that because we're in a small space and if the others we live in found out, well...

[He needn't say more.]

The first one is consistent. The second is no livestock, period. People notice these things, and we're highly concentrated. You don't feed from the same person more than once a month, you only take a pint otherwise too much will be caught onto. There are regular arrangement with hospital bloodbanks, which some of us prefer in full.

[He uses the charcol to mark those spots as well.]

Turnings are highly limited. Once per vampire per decade. The population balance is essential for everyone.

Beyond that, the city's nightfolk tend to see each other more often. It is the spirit of this age that large parties are common, and there's no exceptions here. Social gatherings reinforce the rules as much as simply being present. It gives everyone the chance to play at pettier politics, and that keeps everyone very occupied indeed.

Yes. Absolutely.

[ He lifts his leg, and he’s fairly steady like that even before he plants his good arm against the wall for balance.

It’s fucking laughable, that a whole city of people ought to be put at risk so that one person might be a little bit less sad. This shouldn’t even be a discussion. ]

He should give what his birthright fucking asks of him, and not an inch less. He isn’t the one who’ll be the first to suffer, if he doesn’t.

If humans found out, you’d have to kill the humans. And then there’d be no food.

[ He’s not stupid enough to think that the immediate danger to the vampires is anything other than starvation, maybe inter-vampire conflict. That’s always been the only advantage that anyone really had to leverage against them - that vampires would always need humans to sustain them. ]

There must have been immigrants, since the start of the Great War. How did the influx of people who wouldn’t be missed affect your father’s rules? They’re usually the first to be targetted.

[ Damian had had feeding cells. Ones that were to his knowledge empty but for him. But feeding cells nonetheless. ]

Are you sure you're angry that he's not acting enough like a vampire?

[The cushioned footplate (makeshift, a bit lumpy, but there's room to refine it) goes underneath his foot, and she takes a bit of time adjusting it before motioning for him to lower his leg again; the side pieces will snap in and around after the fact.]

Because it sounds to me like you are angry that he's not acting like enough of a Belmont.

Every city lives on it's own knifepoint. Los Angeles has...found an outlet, through film making, and it seems to have settled the nicest of all.

[But yes, the influx. Alucard nods quietly.]

Feeding rule was still the same, and everything else relied on his name as currency. It still does, and the interim has seen a few of the others who would have taken his role attend to this same problem.

[ How dare you call him the fuck out like this?????? Aka shit Sypha guessed it in one.

He tries to disguise the too-long silence that follows that by lowering his foot into the cast. And then he goes still, and doesn’t really make any attempt to disguise it at all.

This is about more than vampires and Belmonts. This is about playing one’s fucking role. This is about Alucard having the luxury to at least play at making choices, here, in a spoiled fucking country in a spoiled fucking decade. This is about a little princeling being spooked by the one responsibility that’s ever been expected of him. This is about people with power over people’s lives making selfish choices and letting others shoulder the consequences.

But it is also. Very much. About vampires and Belmonts. About sunk costs and 900 years of sacrifice. ]

He doesn’t need to be a Belmont to care that people’s lives are worth more than being a little bit less sad.

It- [ And he cannot believe he is going to fucking say this. ] -under those rules, if they’re enforced. It’s not ideal, but-

[ But it’s a hell of a lot better than Europe was, even ignoring the war. Figures that the thing that would force vampires into line would just be something bigger and scarier than them. ]

-how much of this stands to change, with the wrong person in power?

Limits on feeding would be the issue at hand. As you've said, the city has enough people that those poorest would not be noticed as missing until very, very late.

[Alucard doesn't like this discussion. At all.]

Someone who's the wrong person and too clever would rely on natural disasters to enable this sort of thing. Hurricanes do happen, from time to time.

[ Sorry Alucard this is literally the only thing he knows how to talk about unless you want to go back to the topic of 'salt is great' or 'this curtain pole is my new best friend'. ]

The next big storm, then. That's when we'll know if everyone intends to follow the rules.

[ He sighs. This is where he needs to be. This is there the vampires are. But in truth, while this place is properly managed, there's not a lot he can do. Demand turnings stop altogether, that all blood is given willingly. There's nothing else any Belmont could ask for. ]

You still want rid of me, don't you?

It'll be some time. Those don't begin until September.

[Alucard nods at Trevor's other question. No denying it, but it's also a turn to a topic they really, really do need to discuss.]

You come to my door demanding death and shaming me with truths while I'm in mourning. [He's saying it to make that clear. Trevor's timing is fucking garbage.] Yes. Horribly and desperately.

We need to determine how to play your existence within this city's political landscape. You...complicate matters.

The entire fucking world is in mourning. Your pain isn't special.

[ Harsher than he meant to be. Very harsh, considering this was meant to be a peace offering. He exhales. ]

September, then. If you've found no use for me, if you can maintain control during the first big storm. I'll leave then.

[There's a very tense moment where Alucard seizes up, and there's something very strangled in his throat. It dies, inch by inch.]

Unfortunately the way that you have ended up under this roof makes you bound to this house for far longer than a few months, Belmont.

[ If he notices (he notices.), he pretends not to. ]

You can lose me in the storm. I'll find a corpse for you to produce.

I'll consider the offer. But we must address your presence in the meantime. If I haven't made a spectacle of your death, there is an understood assumption you live and are expected to be treated as a trophy.

[The look on Alucard's face says it all. It disgusts him to even have to say those words.]

I do not imagine that you are a skilled actor.

If I found the idea of tricking people at all appealing, I wouldn't have knocked on the front door with a stake. So no.

[ Has anyone in his entire family ever had the capacity for subtlety? Probably not. ]

I can keep my mouth shut and follow orders. Will that do?

It will have to for now. As it is, we'll be another two months in holding before anything is made well and truly official.

[Some of it is down to planning. Some of it is down to mourning. The rest of it is down to indulging in eight more weeks of relative freedom for himself and Sypha, because if this is what is demanded of him, then he shall take something for himself before hand.]

I don't intend to force you into that spotlight immediately either. Power moves are important. [And what is possibly a bigger power move than a Belmont playing nice because the vampire demands it?]

I do need to introduce you to the babas though, they'll be happy to have someone from the old country around. With a modern vocabulary as well, apparently mine is archaic.

The old country. That could be- awkward.

[ Wounds between Romania and its neighbors are still fresh, after all. Romania's new claim of Transylvania, the dissolution of empires- The 'old country' is 'old countries', and they were all on different sides. ]

It may not be a good idea.

I suspect you will be pleasantly surprised.

[Geopolitics be damned. Agatha claimed to have grown up in a town not far from Belmont lands, which is as good a way as any to force Trevor to deal with his own grief.]

If only because you need to imagine this pack of grandmothers running down two vampires, and enjoy the image for a long time.

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20s AU Post

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