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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[ The process of every last thew of his back relaxing back into place after tensing and curling backward toward Alucard is slow, with a slight shudder to it. There's no more noise at it, save for how even his breaths come, but whatever look is on his face, Sypha's stopped what she's doing to better watch it.

Both of them are dressed almost fully, and he is very much not, and that's not entirely an unusual situation (he spent as much as he could get away with of the later part of summer and the early parts of autumn wearing as little shirt as possible, because summer here is fucking miserable, and he wonders every now and then if that contributed to Alucard at least being so quick to accept his affections) but it adds to the sensation of being vulnerable but cared for.

Sypha's hands aren't doing much of anything right now, but she's staring at both of them with the most adoring face and he can't not pull her closer. So he unweaves his hand from Alucard's - he doesn't need the reminder that he's here anymore, not with the buttons of his suit jacket cold against his back. After a few false starts because he's too stupid with bliss to realize that his hand is stuck down the side of his trousers and that's why it's not moving the way he wants it to, he has his arms around her. He pulls her closer until he's trapped between the both of them. ]

That's nice.

[ The still-gloved hand on his thigh, he means. But also all of this. Absolutely all of this. He's flitting into french every now and then, the same way he does when he's half-asleep or panicked or any number of other things - it's apparently just a thing that happens when his ability to think is compromised by something. ]

Back at the party- you should do that more often. I liked it.

[ He's grown more comfortable to be around since the first talk, where Sypha has asked him not to be awful. Sadly he's resumed being awful from time to time but since coming out of the casts and starting attending church and meeting the local hunter groups, he's at least softened a little. The best indication of this is his willingness to generally exist in the castle proper rather than camping out in the room he was granted. The other indication is that he's started following something of a schedule.

Sunday is church and he attends early morning service. He walks to the road and takes public transport rather than troubling his hosts for a ride, partly out of not wanting to owe them, mostly because the two of them are rarely awake in time after a Saturday night. Late morning service is afterwards, with a half hour between them, and that time is for helping Agatha set things up for the sunday school children while Florence complains about the misadventures and posturing of the younger vampires in a neighboring district and the hunters there that refuse to keep them under control. There is an hour and a half of quiet knitting in the next room while Agatha teaches her class, and then another half hour of talk of strategy.

He comes home just after noon and takes a seat in the chair furthest from the sofa that his hosts like to use. Sypha's radio play begins at one, and she looks forward to it all week, enough to be in here and staring at the thing expectantly almost a full hour in advance. It's been the same for three weeks in a row now, every Sunday going the same way, with the difference today being Alucard's absence.

He takes his seat as usual, and the quiet sound of knitting needles clicking against each other begins. ]

[One particular thing that has never been a mystery, nor subtle has been the fact that Sypha does like to watch the other two. Alucard's no better in that regard, so when he feels Sypha's gaze, Alucard milks it for all it's worth. Presses kisses along Trevor's shoulder blade, tender and looking up at Sypha every so often just because he knows what the result is.

Alucard's hand stays where it is for a few moments before it travels up, starting to deal with the problem that is called Trevor has a belt on and we need to fix that. A problem compounded by Trevor pulling Sypha right up against him, so Alucard's hand is just sort of stuck there now and there's no better place for his hand to be trapped, is there?

It's a sight. Alucard sighs all too happily for it, mind wandering against the tradition of how one spends New Year's Day is a predictor of the year to come. A good year.

He answers in English. Softly.]

Will you be like this every time I do?

Every time you tell a room full of people 'this man is ours, and no-one else's'?

[ He sinks back in to Alucard, tilting his head back so that he can see his face. It's flushed from ear to pinkish ear and from nose to collarbone. His eyes are heavy and not entirely focused, staring more at a nearby lock of Alucard's hair than at his face. His lips are parted slightly and his breath is slow and steady but comes out trembling.

The movement also gives a little more room to work with, and Sypha's hands fall upon Alucard's, guiding it through the motions of unhooking the belt. ]

Absolutely. Every time.

[And that proves to be a question that she could answer with a narrative that goes on and on and on, and she does. It lasts through the rest of her plate of dinner; it lasts until the sunset is once again staining the room hues of orange and gold. She thinks of details to add as they put the plates away and store the rest of the pasta for later; she chatters as he leads her into the living room and they find their seats again, and as this time she takes the loveseat for herself instead of the chair and kicks off her shoes to curl her legs up beneath her on it, catlike.

But soon, things wind down, and a pleasant solemnity settles around them. She's toying with the tassled fringe on the edges of one of the throw pillows, and watching him, and more importantly, watching him watch her right back.

It's as though they both know that the evening ought to end any minute, and yet both of them are pointedly ignoring it in the hopes that if they refuse to acknowledge it, maybe the reality of it will just go away.]

You are in high spirits tonight.

[She observes, managing not to yawn in the middle.]

You're feeling better, then?

[That face is everything.

Alucard knows he's made the equivalent of that face time and again. But to see the version of that on Trevor's face, the softness, the relaxation, the sheer fucking bliss, it's the greatest thing in the world. He never knew how badly he wanted to see it until now.

What else can he do but kiss that face? Put lips to lips. Make sure tongue meets tongue, and hold Trevor there for as long as he possibly can. This beautiful, perfect look on Trevor will come around again. But it will not be the first time and it is terribly precious.

Sypha's hands end up doing all the work. Alucard has just enough in him to move his legs so that Trevor's trousers can be removed. There. One of them's free.

When Alucard does pull away (only for want of air), he just smiles.]

Then we'll do it as often as possible.

[Time is the enemy, isn't it?

Dinner goes by so fast. Alucard listens with too much intensity, a thing he'll recognize as jealousy when Sypha leaves. To travel so widely, that was what his mother wanted of both the men in this little family, wasn't it? What Sypha says is as close as he may get for a very long time, so he clings to every little detail.

There's dessert in the form of strawberries and freshly whipped cream (a perk of vampire speed, actually), which he brings into the living room. He takes one of the armchairs, and there's so much clinging to every reason for Sypha to not leave.

That yawn means she really does have to go, doesn't it?]

I believe the answer is yes to both.

[He's the kind of person who sits up straight in an armchair around guests. But there's a little bit more slouch to him.]

Within a week I think all will be well. Two at the most.

[Sundays are days of rest, for the most part, where Sypha is concerned — things have reached a point where she's just come to expect that Fridays and Saturdays will be marathons of this event or that one, of places to go and people to see and images to live up to. It wears on Alucard more than it does her, which makes sense; he is the one with eyes on him, always, and half the time that she's with him, she's going out of her way to try to draw attention onto herself, just to spare him those few extra moments in the spotlight.

It's a set of circumstances that lends itself to almost always sleeping in on Sundays, simply by virtue of how late they'd gotten home the morning before (Saturday parties always run late, pushing the envelope almost up to the darkness just before dawn), and so usually she sleeps comfortably until some form of brunch rolls around at about the same time as Trevor arrives home, and then it's just an hour's worth of time to relax until she commandeers the front room, the sofa, and the radio for the week's installment of her favorite program.

It's rare that Alucard isn't here today, but there'd been a note slipped to him in the midst of the party last night, and so she suspects he's spending his afternoon doing something or other about it — it's the sort of affair where she knows not to ask, simply because he'll tell her if he wants her to know, and if he doesn't, then she'll have spared them both the awkwardness of having to shoot her inquiry down. He took the car, though, so he'll be a while.

That's fine. In five more minutes, she'll have a pleasant diversion to preoccupy her, anyway.

And Trevor is here, which is nice. He's brought his knitting and taken up his usual chair, and she's curled up on the loveseat with her nose about an inch from the radio speaker, waiting intently for the familiar introduction of this week's installment of dashing rogues and bold adventure.]

What are you working on today, Belmont?

Mmmm.

[She has to reach a little to get at the strawberries and cream, and overestimates a bit as she dips one of the pieces of fruit into the whip; in trying to get it into her mouth, half of the cream ends up on the tip of her nose, and she absently sticks out her juice-reddened tongue to try to get at it before discovering the hard way that it's unfortunately too short to reach.]

But you said it was odd, didn't you, that it took even this long to heal? Most wounds you get, they heal in a matter of minutes, yes?

[Alucard's watching her. Because of course he is, and he wouldn't have missed the glorious move of getting far too much cream on her nose. Then failing to retrieve it. There's no way to hide a smile at that, and it means that her question isn't as sobering as it ought to be.]

I did, yes. It's the first time it's ever happened.

Hmph.

[That's directed at the whipped cream, not at Alucard. Curse you, whipped cream, being right where she can't reach it with her tongue.]

...I promised you I would not ask how it happened.

[She hesitates a minute; a ponderous silence.]

I...am not asking.

Just use your finger. I won't judge manners.

[Or it's going to be there all night, out of reach and driving your nose insane, Sypha.

Now it is sobering though. The silence is what does it more than anything else, and Alucard props his elbow up on the arm of the chair, then rests his cheek in his hand. He's quiet for a long moment, then closes his eyes.]

People do very, very stupid things out of grief.

[She wrinkles her nose as she swipes at it with her fingertips, managing to get the spot of cream off, which is the good news. The dangerous news is that now it's on her fingers, and seeing no sense in wasting it, the only option remaining is to lick it off of them.]

...Then...

[She frowns, deeply.]

You...did it to yourself...?

[ Sypha begins the second part of the process of undressing him, and he at least has the presence of mind in the aftermath of that kiss to move his legs to finish it, kicking off his trousers until they hang from the foot of the bed.

He doesn't have a whole lot more than that, because Alucard is smiling at him and even just that is a lot. That smile means he's done something right, even if he has no fucking clue what it might have been. He's aware that he's the only one here who doesn't have clothes on, and that feels a little strange, and- he rather hopes the clothes do leave sooner rather than later, because they're nicer than his church clothes and he doesn't want to ruin them. But for now it's nice to be the only one coming apart so visibly, to just become more and more of a pliant mess of emotion with the other two there around him to guide him through it. ]

Yours. [ He says, and it's low enough to be a whisper and dies into a soft sigh as Sypha lets a hand settle against his hip and strokes gently. ] Yours.

No.

[He's firm about that point, but that also means there's only one obvious suspect. Alucard opens his eyes just in time to see Sypha finally solve the whipped cream problem, and it does help. Does coax out a little more.

What it doesn't cancel out is the sadness in his words.]

My father is...not in his right mind, at the moment. Wherever he is.

[She stills, as all of a sudden a lot of individual pieces of information all start to fall together, and add up into a great deal of sense.]

...That is why you couldn't go to your own people for help. Why you're here in this townhouse instead of...elsewhere. Because he owns this city.

[...But wait.]

What do you mean, wherever he is?

[Alucard presses a tender kiss to Trevor's forehead. He's not as far gone as Trevor is, but he matches that softness perfectly.]

More importantly, we're yours.

[In the sheer mess of emotion that is Trevor Belmont, this seems an important point to underscore. He's so very much undone that the point may not stick, and he'll have to be reminded in other little ways. That's the opposite of a hardship, and one that Alucard looks forward to.

Where Sypha's hand is gives Alucard an idea. One that will at least solve half the problem of the other two being dressed, so far as he can tell. There's another long and slow kiss pressed to Trevor's lips, then Alucard withdraws from the bed in full. Stands up, and gives Sypha just enough time to turn Trevor over so that the two can watch Alucard carefully undress himself, Sypha's hand still at Trevor's hip.

There's a simplicity to the actions that belie exactly how bothered Alucard's become at all of this as well. He'll never turn as pink as Trevor or Sypha do, but his hands are the giveaway. Cufflinks go down on the bedside table, and his fingers shake just a bit. Buttons on his shirt take just a little bit longer to undo, and having two sets of eyes on him cause more fumbles than would be there otherwise. None of that precludes the fact that he folds his shirt properly once it's off (same with his trousers), but God in heaven this is starting to become too much.]

Testing something for Bunicuta. She wants to see if it's possible to knit a protection spell into a blanket.

[ He's been a member of his church for less than a month, but he's already on first name basis with most of them. Which is a lot, because he's fairly certain that he hasn't actually got around to properly introducing himself to his hosts. One of them is expecting a baby, and the many grandmothers of Trevor are fussing dreadfully over this. ]

It would probably be more possible if I didn't keep fucking it up.

[He nods, confirming everything she's said. The townhouse, technically, is less because his father owns the city and more because the castle is painful to be in, but that is a petty detail.]

Exactly what it sounds like. He's fled the city. No one knows where he's gone.

Mine.

[ It's soft, and where each 'yours' had had an undercurrent of aching longing to it, there's only quiet satisfaction in this. His Sypha. His Adrian.

The cool, solid surface of Alucard's chest behind him is gone, and for just a moment he doesn't understand why. He's half turned - there's a desperation to the movement - even before Sypha guides him over the rest of the way onto his other side. And it's just about worth being separated for a few moments. Because he's dizzy with wanting right now, but he can still pick out the important things. The important things like the way the cufflinks click against the hairpin on the bedside table, and how that click happens more than once because Alucard's hands are trembling, and it's a little like a bell ringing. Important things like the way it takes him a good twenty seconds to untangle a lock of hair caught in his collar button. Like the simple efficiency of it all combined with the fumbling.

Except then there's a soft gasp, followed by a deliberately slow exhale. Because Sypha is at his back now, hands trailing upward along his spine from his arse while her lips move downward from the back of his neck. And hopefully that gasp is enough to catch his attention away from the task of folding clothes, because this is his chance to see the face that he got out of Trevor earlier, eyes closed and mouth hanging open just slightly, lower lip drawn behind his teeth but not quite bitten down upon. He's leaning back into Sypha now, trembling a little with the tension as his body tries to curl further backwards against her touch. ]

Yes.

[Confirmation and a reminder. That one word from Trevor can hang in the air for as long as it likes, but it must be responded to with all the reinforcement in the world.

The gasp does catch Alucard's attention, just as he's folding his trousers. He stops halfway through, fabric landing on the floor with a soft fwump. What he sees is a face he wants to replicate again and again, because it is damn near obscene on Trevor. There's a little gasp of Alucard's own in response to it, dumbstruck by just how overwhelming what he's looking at is right now.

Everything else is removed as quickly as it can be. No more folding. No more fussing. Just flinging socks over the shoulders and returning to bed as quickly as he can. Hands moving to press against Trevor's chest and to take Trevor's face and gently hold it. Legs not tangling up quite yet because Sypha still has to undress herself. Making sure that there's as much skin against skin as humanly possible.

He sighs. Still awstruck. Still caught up in what he's seeing.]

Beautiful.

You're saying he did that to you and just...left?

[Her expression is darkening now, as her brow furrows with uncertainty and something else, something approaching disapproval.]

He is not even close at hand to know if you've recovered from it, or —

Hmm. Is the protection spell attached to the yarn, or is it worked into the knots you use when you knit?

[The ultimate dilemma: this business of knitting spells is painfully interesting, but there are now four minutes and five seconds left until her dashing rogues and bold adventures, and this might be a conversation that runs for longer than that.]

I assume the latter, if making mistakes is disrupting the spell?

As I said. Stupid things are done due to grief.

[Alucard's face is tired. Weary, it shows mostly in his eyes and with the little bit of slump in his body language. He's been doing a stellar job of avoiding this particular thought, and it's been in no small part due to Sypha just...being around. And if not around, providing him a good challenge that demanded all of his brain power.]

...I can think of some choice words with which to describe your father, but I will refrain.

[That may, after all, be rudeness past the benchmark given earlier. Saying them might mean destroying the house in a different way than just physically.]

But if he is gone, then...who is ruling the city?

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Page 30 of 141

20s AU Post

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