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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[Time in the fae realm was a thing of legend. Step through a portal, then out, and it'll be a hundred years. The three of them, they've been here for what seems like a week and yet there has only been one meal served (dinner, made to be elaborate, because last meals and Alucard used a lot of self control to not react to it.) So it tracks that it must still only be the 31st, and Sypha has been negotiating for such a long time.

With Sypha there (she is queen of words, of particulars, of knowing how to argue and dip into legend to back everything up), Alucard could do nothing else but stay with Trevor. Curl up around him, protective and possessive and ready to snarl and destroy anything that comes near. Face buried in Trevor's back pressing kisses there whenever he can. They've been through this once before, back before his father was in the city, back when Carmilla was still a threat, back when the ordeal hoisted upon them chose Sypha as a victim. (It should be over after all of this. They've each had their trials. Sypha and that fucking necromancer. Alucard and the city. Now Trevor and the fae.) The snarling possessiveness has been tempered with a two year reprieve from acting as regent, but the instinct remains.

Other instincts remain too. With time fluxuating around them, there is the other hunger, the one usually kept at bay by the fridge's blood compartment. Drinking from fae is what got the Belmonts into this mess in the first place. Alucard also can't imagine a worse violating of hospitality.

He dozes every so often. He's doing it now, using the Belmont as a mattress, covering him as best as he can. Trevor's still too wide for it to be done by Alucard alone, but he's trying his best. He's also realizing there's a metallic smell in the air, and in the dozy, dreamlike state he's in, instinct has more sway. Alucard perks, blinking away the sleepiness.]

[ He had been waiting for them, at the place that the compass led, difficult to recognize even when the funeral shroud (thin silk, sewn in beautiful patterns with silver thread that meant that Sypha had to be the one to pull it away) was pulled back. Because he's different, in this place. All scarless, with silver-blue eyes reflecting light like a cat's. Not paler, not quite, but with magic shimmering under his skin and catching light. Breathing comes more easily. Everything looks and sounds sharper to him, more real. Even silence has a weight to it. It's a little like being in church, and isn't that kind of a fucked up thought?

The prison is what one might metaphorically call a gilded cage. It's only metaphorical instead of literal because the intricate, swirling bars of it are silver and not gold. There is no furniture, but it's comfortable, the floor lined with cushions and silk blankets and soft furs from creatures he's certain don't really exist. He isn't sure what he was expecting, when this finally happened. It wasn't so much colour, so much brightness, to be washed in perfumed water and wrapped in silk and beads and fed figs and honey and wine.

(The door of it isn't even locked. But he can't leave. He's been told not to. And the orders of the fae hold truer even than Sypha's.)

And he's forgetting. This place seems so sharp. So colourful. So real. The time before it seems soft and dreamlike, and even with Alucard lying on top of him, even knowing that somewhere beyond that open door that he can't pass there is someone fighting for him-

-he's biting his lip again. Drawing blood, this time. ]

Her name. [ He whispers when Alucard stirs. His voice is so heavy, so weary, so defeated. ] The speaker, did she have a name?

[The change in their husband had been more than enough to throw Sypha and Alucard for a loop. (They got a year and a day with him, if this all goes to hell. Not enough time, but probably more than he ever expected. It isn't a compromise but it's...ugh. That stupid fucking motto. Alucard always wondered why the Belmont coat of arms didn't have that phrase on it.) Magic wasn't for Belmonts except when it was, and then it was a specific brand of it. Not intent. Something that could become intent though, when channeled.

It's still strange now, however long it's been. Alucard doesn't like it, doesn't like the lack of scars that he knows so well, the way light hits Trevor's eyes and make it clear he isn't exactly human. (That is Alcard's job.) How easy it is for him to get out, out but to have free will denied to him.

Alucard lifts his head, following the smell.

Trevor. Just Trevor. Being stupid and biting so hard he's drawing blood. His mind elsewhere, this place shifting reality far too much for Alucard's liking. That question, that alone makes him want to demand how dare this place make anything from the past twenty some years of Trevor's life be anything but real.

Anger isn't helpful. Alucard just reaches down and takes Trevor's right hand. Brings it up, so that they can both look at it. At the wedding ring, because fuck that still has to carry weight.]

Sypha. Your wife. Ours.

[ His right hand lifts without resistance, and he tilts his head to look at the ring there.

Oh. He thinks he remembers that ring. They tried to remove it from him, didn't they, when they bathed him. None of them could so much as touch it. ]

Sypha. Syyyyphaaaaa. [ He says, dragging out the syllables, testing the word with his mouth to see how it feels. Correct. Correct is how it feels. She must have been nice. She must have been wonderful. The third time he says it the floaty tone is gone from his voice, replaced with intent. ] Sypha.

[ ('I want to Speak for Trevor Belmont.' He remembers that.)

He turns his hand, as if expecting to see something on his palm. There's nothing there. Was there ever anything there? 'Ours' he'd said, and Trevor stares at Alucard like he's a puzzle he's trying to solve. ]

[He hates it. Hates the way Trevor has to even test her name. Has to say it thrice to stir up anything at all, and the tone isn't much better. But this is an endurance trial as much as the last time was, and he has grown. He isn't a hissing and spitting thing backed into a corner. He's still terrifed of course, but Sypha's here. Sypha's doing the work, the kind of work she was born for.

And he's here. Here bound up with Trevor, and that's terrible too. The same configuration as before. She's still alone, like before. But all the power is in her hands now, and vaguely Alucard wonders what happens if you take off a fae's teeth with a firearm.

Alucard doesn't move much from his current position. He only stretches up so he can kiss Trevor's jaw.]

Legally she has more claim now than they do. You'll be home soon.

[ There's a pleasantness to all of this. A kindness. An absence that he knew held something dark, something that gentle hands have cut out from inside his heart.

(There was never a war. There was never a family home in ruins. There was never a city or a tragic murder or an empty throne or an usurper. There has only ever been this place, this cage of intricate silver vines and flowers, all silk and sunlight and the smell of jasmine and berries on a romanian summer evening.)

But for everything that he doesn't miss, there's an absence that aches. He stares at the ring, at the way it's actually two rings wound around each other and locked together, one copper in colour and one gold. And that's somehow a mystery he doesn't have the answer to, just as surely the man on his chest is. ]

'm married. [ He protests, when Alucard kisses him. ]

You're married to me too, Trevor.

[Alucard's words are soft. Only hinting at fear, fear of being forgotten. His hand comes up and rests atop Trevor's. Same ring, the gold darker through some magic. The same inscription if Alucard bothered to take either off, but he won't. Not now, not when it might help the fae's case against them both. (Against Sypha, really. She's the one on the paper work, after all.) His trace over the part of Trevor's ring that is gold, hoping to bring that point home.]

To us both. A year and a day, then with us for many months before that. Loved her first of course, but that's easy to do.

[Which is why she's easier to remember as well, of that much he's certain.]

You've only been here less than a day.

[ That's not right. He came here when he was baptized, after the service. It was winter, and they washed the holy water away with goat's piss because this is not The Lord's and then bathed him in hot water steeped with rose petals to take away the smell. He has always been here, in this cage.

Or maybe he's just been here for a very, very long day. From baptism to now. ]

Oh. [ Well that's okay then. Not that adultery should concern him much, but it somehow does. He leans up to return the kiss. It's comforting, and he can't remember why he needs to be comforted. ]

Who are you?

[Alucard shifts up on Trevor. He had been using Trevor's chest to rest his head, but now isn't the time for that. Now is the time for kissing him again, hand carefully running through Trevor's hair. The kiss is soft and trying to make the moment sacred, like that could break through whatever magic's at play.

(The fae never specified trying to break any spells in place. Just put Alucard in here as a security deposit. Alucard had agreed to it because he'd be useless to Sypha anyway.)]

Adrian. Alucard. Dracula's son. You stabbed me the first time we met.

[He's still quiet, but there's a gentle urging in his voice. As for names in-threes, that's something he picked up from Sypha over the years. A memory device.]

Your husband. Her husband. Yours.

[ Adrian Belnades. Belnades. Like him. Like Sypha.

That makes sense. ]

Adrian. [ And then, after a moment, he wraps his arms weakly around Alucard and pulls him close. The 'yours' helps, and there's recognition in his voice when he repeats it again. ] My Adrian.

[ They'll go home after this. No matter what. Alucard and Sypha will be safe, even in failure. That can be enough, if it has to be. ]

Glad I stabbed you. Ended good for me.

[He doesn't have to say mine. The arms around him are enough. They're not as strong as they should be, but they're present and Trevor is doing it under his own will. That's important. That's the only important thing right now, and Alucard picks his head up so he can look Trevor in the eyes when he repeats Trevor's words.]

Your Adrian.

[There's a flyaway hair on Trevor. Alucard fixes it immediately, because fussing is one of the few things that feels normal right now. That and being glad about stabbing. That's pure Belmont.]

It isn't ending. Not for a long time yet.

[ God, he sounds so certain of that. Trevor isn't certain of anything right now, anything except for the fact that the man lying against him is Adrian and somewhere he can't see there is a Sypha and that one day he stole something from her and gave her his voice in return and that she's using it now, far away.

(This is a kindness. The forgetting. He knows that, horrifying as it is in his moments of lucidity. Horrifying as it must be from the outside. Better to never have known anything else, where they mean to send him. Easier that way. It hurts less, to not know there's anything better out there.)

Alucard fusses over him. He always fusses, doesn't he? Terrible fucking vampire. It's soft and familiar, warm and kind, and recognition washes over him. He worries at his lip again as it does. Her forgot, didn't he? His hold tightens, still nowhere near as strong as it ought to be, arms trembling with the effort. ]

're you holding up okay? [ He says eventually, forcing himself to calm. He's more present now, more himself. No matter how bright his eyes, how his skin has the dusty, fragile feel of moth wings. And he's- he doesn't need to eat here. He's sustained by the sunlight and colour and birdsong of this place, like all of its other residents. The food is a formality. A gesture of ownership. A mockery of the needs of his lost humanity. Sypha and Alucard- the both of them need more than just this place. Alucard most of all.

(And that will be part of the negotiations, as much as anything. Fairy food must be paid for somehow.) ]

Better now.

[Always better when there's more Trevor present than the thing that returns, all past history cut away. It left a Trevor shaped thing, one that had always been here. One that didn't know what was coming, and while such actions made sense, it was still a horror to witness.

His hand moves down to Trevor's lip. Thumb goes over where he's bit it so hard that there's blood, and Alucard tries to press down on it to get the flow to stop. That is a selfish action, because the scent is too much right now and Alucard's needs are pointless. Trevor's freedom is the only thing that matters. Making him only theirs. Getting out of this silver fucking cage and back home to their bed.

(He can't know how Sypha's negotiations are going. Alucard hates that he doesn't, but this was how they agreed it would be. It was the best use of resources. Best show of good faith to the fae to let Dracula's Son sit in a silver cage while a Speaker was the one who spoke for the Belmonts. His father's name could yet be an advantage.)]

She's doing fine.

[ He's slow. So slow. It shouldn't take a Belmont a few seconds to understand why a vampire would be trying to stop bleeding. ]

It hasn't been a day, has it? It's- going to have been a day, when you go back. But that's not the same.

[ For him, it's been a lifetime here. A whole alternate lifetime with no family and no war and no city and no vampire or speaker. For Alucard- he couldn't begin to say. Less, maybe, he'd have starved already if it were that long.

The sun doesn't set here. The seasons don't pass. The birdsong doesn't fade away and begin again with the passing of hours. His heartbeat is not the same as it was when he was human, worthless for counting time by. ]

Everything we read to prepare us said time wouldn't work properly. So far as any calendar cares, it's been a day.

[The arctic circle is like this for half of the year. Sun, sun, sun, constant sun, nothing but light even when the clocks strike midnight. But that is not Faerie. You can still eat food there and not worry about cost.

Oh, he and Sypha came in prepared. Brought spell components and rations and water because they knew the first part of all of this would be trials. Worst fears mae manifest, situations that demanded cleverness instead of brute strength, all the things that made it clear they were in Faerie and no longer home. Three was traditional, so it had been three before they even were granted negotiations. Time and it's horrible flow had taken most of the food then.

(They hadn't packed blood. It was unsafe to do that, to bring mortal blood in bags.)

Alucard shifts his weight on Trevor, just to make sure that neither side of the Belmont is too compressed for too long.]

What grounds you most?

[Stay.]

I- normally, I'd say 'work'. [ But he can't work here. Because even if Sypha did not have it under control, 'work' is getting him out of here, and he's physically incapable of even considering how to do that. ] But talking helps, I think. Hard to forget when we're talking.

[ His hand finds Alucard's hair, stroking through it. He won't ask what it took to make it here. Not until they're safe. If he's with them when they are. It isn't that he doesn't trust Sypha, just- he wouldn't be here if the fae weren't good at this. She's in the same situation they were with Bluebeard. Desperate for one thing, one thing that cannot be compromised upon. The worst position to start in. ]

How long has it been, for the two of you? I've been- my whole life again, I think.

[ He was able to tell by the length of his hair, at first. But it's been cut a few times now. ]

I can do that.

[He can do that, but he's not moving from his current spot. The hand fussing at Trevor's lip moves, and it comes to rest on Trevor's shoulder instead. The other, the other is curled into one of the furs that Alucard is almost certain is one of the night creatures from his father's many, many books on the things. It is impossibly soft, and more importantly, it is a buffer from the silver that sits at the bottom of the cage. A protective layer, and there have been moments where too much has moved under foot and the vampire burned himself for a horrible second.

He breathes out, relishing the touch. There's no thinking this could be the last because it isn't going to be. Not by a long shot.]

We noticed quickly. Then...a week, maybe? We brought food with us for 10 days, it was the most we could carry. That we noticed you had been taken so soon, I...

[He pauses.]

It was one of the reasons I thought it safer to not move out of the house immediately last year. There'd be more resources to fight against this, books that couldn't be found elsewhere. Means and ends and tricks that have helped so far. [There's another undercurrent there, my father is aware. Because as tense as things still are between Alucard and his father, disappearing into the night and never returning is not a wise choice to make.

(It was a tiring conversation to have. It ended with Alucard walking out of the door, and his father sighing the name Leon far too tiredly than he should. Alucard never asked. His father never offered explanation.)]

We'll move out when we get home. [We always means three.] Los Angeles, with the rest of Sypha's people. A pack of Speakers in case the fae try to contest this again.

[ Ten days. More, probably. The two of them are both the sorts to eat less to leave more for the other. Ten days rations could have spread to twelve easily. And then there's the time that Alucard's been here with him. Not long enough to count in hair growth. Long enough to count in healing, though, because the cut from the first time he bit his lip bloody was healed before he opened a new one. ]

You didn't bring blood.

[ It's a statement of fact, not a question. They couldn't have, not unless it was Sypha's. Bringing any part of a person into this place is as good as bringing the whole, and the two of them wouldn't endanger any innocent in a bid to save him.

The rest, he'll deal with later. Los Angeles is a pretty name. Moving means saying farewell to his family here. All that kind of thing. ]

Too risky, donated blood in this place. Even with the name and information all stripped off from the bag it'd...

[No one else need be involved. It was irresponsible. Stupid. Reckless. They were great with all three of those things, but it could only ever touch the three of them.]

You'd yell at us if we did.

[The words are said far more warmly than anything else so far. Because it's true and it would be funny if circumstances weren't dire. Dark but not gallows humor. ]

[ He laughs, because- he would have. More than yelled. He'd have assumed they were some trick. We wouldn't have been able to remember them, if they'd proved themselves not to be who he thought they were by doing that. ]

I'd have been right to, and you know it. How shitty is it getting?

[ Enough, he knows, that just a trickle of blood is difficult for him. ]

[That laugh is everything. Alucard's face finally twitches upwards, a near smile there. Just for a moment. Just at that glorious sound. (He'll hear it again. He just wanted to hear it here.)

Trevor's question is sobering though, and Alucard's expression fades away into something much more somber.]

I can manage until I am 14 days out. Then...[The noise he makes isn't a laugh.] Doesn't matter. I can't take from anything here, faerie blood is why any of us are in this mess to begin with.

A fortnight.

[ Ten days' food gone. That's anywhere between eight and twelve days. Likely to be higher, knowing what he does of the two of them. Then another day at least here, as best as he can manage to count by the healing of his lip and Alucard's silver burns. The meal that was provided to welcome their guests, too, that must have taken at least a half day. ]

Mmn.

[ He pushes Alucard slightly, trying to sit up. ]

[Alucard rolls off of Trevor, but he doesn't like it. All he wants is to keep being wrapped around him. Dhampir armor that can take whatever the fae try, because even with silver, he'll endure whatever he can to make sure Trevor doesn't fully become theirs. It's selfish and spoiled and a princeling in every sense of the insult.

He really doesn't care.

Once sat up, Alucard still has to rearrange the pillows and blankets and all the soft things underneath him. Maximum coverage. Maximum protection.]

[ He pushes himself up, blinking at his beautiful, disorienting surroundings. Long strings of glass beads hang from the high ceiling of the cage, where all of those vines braid together, sending tiny, colourful reflections moving across everything. And then careful, careful not to pull any of the blankets and furs out from under Alucard, he moves closer.

His weight has probably always been near nothing to Alucard. But now, as he leans against him, that is more than ever, as if his bones were hollow like a bird's. He reaches a hand out to lace his fingers with Alucard's. ]

What happens, after fourteen days?

Nothing good. [He sighs, the discussion about to veer into uncomfortable territory. Words that will contrast with the opulence of what's around them, harsh and bloodied among the chimes that sound when a soft summer breeze catches the things that dangle from the not-a-ceiling.

Trevor's too light. He tries not to think about that, because there's only two reasons for it to be as such. He's starved or his entire make up has changed. Deep inside, Alucard knows damn well it's the latter, and he hates it.]

Your family records would have probably defined it as blood lust or something equally feral sounding. It's driven by hunger, means the first warm and full of blood thing you see sends you into a fury until you've taken what you need.

[It'd be dangerous here. More than that, it would violate any pretense at hospitality because Dracula's son committed a grave offense.

Faux hospitality has been learned, of course. That was what defined being regent, holding it all together and being noble and obliging while wanting to just screech and throw everyone around. To be on the receiving end of it was a novelty, but it also meant Alucard and Sypha could read the intentions of every action. It was an advantage. It was an advantage as they had stood together after all three trials, Sypha putting herself forward and demanding control of the situation. Alucard was good for the weight of his heritage and for being beside her, tall and silent and deadly. Another novel situation, their roles reversed.

Alucard leans forward, the things overhead catching the gold of his hair and casting new colors into it. His forehead rests on Trevor's shoulder, and the hand Trevor holds rests upon Trevor's thigh softly.]

She'll come through before then.

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