gʀɑɦɑɱ ɦɑʆɗɑʀ, ɛรquiʀɛ (businesslike) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2015-10-03 12:38:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, dracula, jonathan harker |
Who: Jonathan & Vladcula
What: Thanks to dreams, J begins his transition into a vampire - and wakes up in sort of a limbo
When: Saturday morning
Where: The crypt
Rating/Warnings: A thunderstorm of FEELS (and an actual thunderstorm)
Status: Complete
A hammer and a wooden stake. Into the heart of the vampire - blood pooled, undead heart pierced, she aged rapidly in an eerie fast-forward of years before his eyes and perished. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. One half of the mission accomplished, but then there was Dracula at the top of the stairs. The door was slammed shut, no light, absence of everything - Jonathan didn’t remember anything after that, oh, but he recalled the hunger though. How it warmed the center of his chest and was a spike of a punch, over and over, to his ribs - it caressed his bones, kneaded his skin. Then he began to wake up. Here in bed, in the large would-be gothic manor that was Vlad’s, he was already tossing and turning - apparently he somehow felt he needed to be the little spoon because he’d grabbed at Vlad’s arms and pulled them around him but now he was flailing and coming out of a deep sleep which meant limbs everywhere and probably awakening the dozing vampire if he’d been drifting off, since the sun was up which meant, conversely, that it was time for Vlad to sleep. Jonathan emerged into the new day and a pounding echo tore through his head - memories of thick, hot, red pools. It wasn’t even just that; his ears fluttered on the inside as if they concealed those telltale butterflies, rather than his stomach, and he had to cover them because he heard everything. The woman next door was up, awake, shuffling to and fro - coffee pot on, and even that was loud but the sound of cars on the road was like he’d stuck his head into the engine. Birds chirping, the house settling, every creak and swish, Felix stirring rooms away - how the fuck did anyone ever sleep around here?! He sat up, fingers sprawling, thrilling through his hair as if that might disperse the swarming going on. Tick-tock, pitter-patter, beating hearts - obscure sounds, he heard them all too, and if they were real or imagined, he couldn’t tell right now. “Vlad - “ Stumble to the mirror, keep going, look in - In the bathroom, there was no reflection. His hands flew to his jaw, his mouth, feeling his gums, and an index finger traced one sharp pointed canine, that hadn’t been there when he’d fallen asleep last night. Vlad was having his own dreams. They were much more tame than any future endeavor, a toned down version of the original set. He'd just come across Jonathan there - not the Jonathan he had grown so fond of. This one was too much romantic lead and not enough romantic hero. It didn't suit the story. But that wasn't enough to make him stir. What made him stir was a shift, more mental than physical. The noise was something he'd learned to block out, a mental filter to keep out what wasn't important. The link he had with Jonathan was not different. Jonathan's mental distress slipped past, and Vlad woke, groggy and disoriented with being disturbed during morning. By the time he himself acknowledged the flailing, the stumbling, the sound of his name being said, Jonathan was gone. For once he was glad he had no reflection. The thin lipped look that hit Vlad's face went unseen by Jonathan that way, as Vlad himself came up behind Jonathan to see there was no reflection there either. His hand reached out, fingers gripping tight, seeking a sign of pulse or warmth. Inside, Vlad was raging. There was nothing but dissonance coming from Jonathan. Vlad remembered that moment for himself, remembered that Jonathan had been what calmed the chaos. Could he be that in turn? He'd need to try. He pulled Jonathan around to face him, fingers going through sleep-messy hair. Hands rested over Jonathan's ears as Vlad pressed their foreheads together. "I am here," he said. Anger could wait until later. Funnily enough, there was still a pulse. Still color to his complexion; he was not so pallid or pale as the moon - body temperature was only slightly chilled because of how any human’s dropped during the night, but he wasn’t...complete. Jonathan could feel it. Could still keep a tight grip in the reliquary of humaneness within him - he hoped to always, but sometimes, it would be so difficult. So very difficult. He wrapped his arms around Vlad, holding him tightly as the noise became somewhat muffled - and he remembered what he’d said when his other half went through it too. Focus, focus on me, focus on that, focus on anything but the void, the longing, the onslaught of everything amplified - even emotions, a whiplash back and forth between multiple different ones. “I’m...dead,” he stated, not loudly so as not to tip off a migraine of epic proportions. “Undead. In the dreams. But not...here. I’m not...it’s like how you were, I think. Before you finally dreamed of drinking for the first time.” Vlad had known it was coming, he exhibited all the signs, all the symptoms - and then the bloodlust hit him full force. But Jonathan was already a vampire in those dreams, it had to be like that. Dracula hadn’t killed him - he’d bitten him instead. Vlad tutted his tongue. It was a displeased sound. Inside, though, the demon perked up. A companion. It yearned for one, reached out its claws to try and draw Jonathan to it. Finish the job. Vlad could remember what it had been like. To be alive but not, dead but not undead. The apprehension that came with each day, waiting for the inevitable. The dark part of Vlad reasoned it would be a kindness - spare Jonathan the worry and the anxiety. He huffed. His fingers tightened into the hair at the back of Jonathan’s neck. The bloodlust simmered down but kept its presence known. What it wanted was well within its grasp now. It would bide its time. “Come, we will try to soothe your mind.” Vlad had locked himself away in darkness to try and ease the ache, so he would try that with Jonathan. If that didn’t work, they could always resort to potatoes. Either way, there’d be no sleep for the vampire this morning. He drew Jonathan out of the bathroom, back to bed, back to the safety of darkness thanks to the blackout curtains. Window closed, door shut. As soon as he managed to get Jonathan lying down, Vlad would sit next to him, cool hand on Jonathan’s forehead, petting his hair. He kept it to a predictable rhythm. Vlad had no breath, no pulse to keep Jonathan’s attention. This was the best he could do. Jonathan went easily, a return to bed, and he would try to sleep - but he couldn’t. Couldn’t go outside either, he assumed - didn’t want to risk it, the sunlight completely crisping him because deep in his bones he knew that was what would happen. Knew what would happen if he picked up that crucifix with the rosary beads he’d gotten from his gothic dreamworld. There was everything, he had everything. Except one very important factor. One raindrop on the roof, tap-tap-tap, lightly at first, and then it began to pick up. Clouds covered the sun though he couldn’t tell from here, thanks to the curtains - could only hear the downpour as he breathed, anxiety rolling through him like the thunder that cracked and boomed, and he took Vlad’s hand, fingers curled with his in a paramour’s entwine. “Vlad.” The grip was tight, blood-promise, like they were both doomed - and they were, but together, always together. "Trebuie.” Maybe not now, but they both knew he had to finish this - he’d started it, in another life, and this Vlad didn’t remember it. It didn’t seem fair, in a way, but things here were hardly ever fair. The scent of rain reached Vlad, refreshing and calming in its own way. He wondered if Jonathan could smell it, too. What all had Jonathan been gifted from these dreams? The hearing, the most obvious and disorienting of them all, was obvious. Could he see in the darkness? Did he find himself feeling the pull of night? Vlad would have to ask. Another time, though, always another time for things that cross his mind. He raised Jonathan’s hand with it’s vice-like grip to his lips, kissing the knuckles before shifting down on the bed. Jonathan was pulled close, bundled against his chest, Vlad’s arms wrapping around him as if that alone could shield him from this waking nightmare. And if his embrace tightened at Jonathan’s words, well, who could blame him? “Shush. Do not think of such things now.” One thing at a time, that was how this needed to be dealt with. Jonathan would learn to cope with what he’d been given, then they would talk about where to go from there. Anything to delay the inevitable. It was all at once, an onslaught - he could hear the entire world on surround sound, especially the sounds of nature (that he’d...indirectly caused, but again, it wasn’t like he knew how to turn off a downpour and dissipate the clouds). Even Vlad’s touch felt amplified too, radiating like rings on water from a pebble dropped, and Jonathan sighed, shifting close and hooking a leg around him to trap him - but it wasn’t like he was going anywhere, not with the way Jonathan was clinging. Like they were clinging to each other. His pulse was still fluttering, a hummingbird’s wings, as he breathed - the scents he inhaled amplified too, Vlad, since he was the closest, that old-world aroma (something sweet, like sap, cloves, spices, anise) but also the box of dirt underneath the bed and the Turkish coffee Vlad always had, remnants of that, the wooden furniture and of course the rain. Fingers sought out cold skin, on his abdomen, stroking there as he squeezed his eyes shut and tried to get the rain to cease. Instead it just poured down harder. Hilarious. “How do I get it to stop storming?” Before a Biblical-esque flood washed away the house. There was a laugh, more of a low, rumbling chuckle than anything else. Vlad's fingers twisted and twirled Jonathan's hair, nails occasionally scratching reassuringly against the back of Jonathan's neck. "That, I am afraid I cannot help with. As with all things I have come to find, it is merely focus and concentration. Your mood will dictate much of it at the start." Vlad closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the headboard. "I know this is distressing." And it was, for both of them, but Vlad understood the turmoil that came when that life was thrust upon you. "I will not lie to you and say it will be easy. But I will tell you the truth when I say you do not need to worry. I am here with you, and we will walk through the darkness together to find our source of light. It will be easier together. I will not leave you." Oh, good. And Jonathan’s mood was in complete disarray - he was drowning in a din of yearning, ashes sinking, on the verge of a sanguine pact with the devil that began to take root within him. But Vlad’s words were what he needed to hear and he kept close, the desire to stay that way never waning - he held on, breathed him into his pores, one of those waves of bone-crushing passion in an embrace that stole breath. The Victorian ways of suppression. The thunder sounded eerie - more like a moan than anything else, and rain swept sideways. Jonathan stopped thinking about it. Maybe if he stopped thinking about it, it would go away too. “It’s always easier together,” he said, nudging Vlad’s cheek with his nose. “You...well, not you...but that Dracula. I staked the female - there was only one. He was angry but he didn’t kill me. I suppose he wanted to turn me into what I fought against, so I’d know what it was like forever.” If he even made it to forever - what was it that Vlad said before? An eternity was no guarantee? Jonathan didn’t have the best feeling about his ‘life’ continuing. “But this isn’t what you wanted, is it?” This bleeding over, dripping into reality through the thin barrier that separated them because apparently the dreams were not enough. Zelda had seen it, and she’d believed the future could be changed - and maybe sometimes it could be, but what was happening now seemed as set in stone as those coffins in the basement of Dracula’s castle; sometimes when you tried too hard to change the future, it crept up on you anyway. “I’m so sorry.” “No,” Vlad admitted. There had been a long pause before his answer had come, a silence filled only by the rain hitting the house. “There is no need to feel sorry for any of it. It was perhaps foolish of me to think I could keep you as you are. We may not have to be what we dream, as you say, but we are bound by those actions. I … Suppose now that we are faced with the end of your mortality, I am, in a way, pleased for it. It would not have been easy for us to say goodbye to one another.” His thumb moved in gentle circles along Jonathan’s neck. The pulse there gave Vlad a sense of relief, the reminder that things had yet to change and they were still as they had always been. More or less. When his touched brushed across the marks from the bite, Vlad lingered. They were still healing, would probably never fully heal until Jonathan had transitioned. But they were redder, Vlad thought, than he recalled them being. A terrible temptation. They always were. “I will mourn the loss of the man I have come to love so fondly. Yet I will embrace your change as you have embraced mine. I will try to learn from your steadfast optimism.” Wetness pooled in Jonathan’s eyes, making the green look even more electric, and radioactive. He shifted, knee on either side of Vlad and while it was habit to hold his weight correctly (because no one just sprawled on another person - okay, maybe sometimes Jonathan did), he was still draped over him like a human blanket. Human for the moment, anyway, mortality slipping through his fingers, sand through the hourglass - then it would freeze, and he’d stop aging, and everything would change. But he didn’t have to go through it alone. “I knew that optimism would come in handy sometime,” he rumbled, and his eyes gleamed as he watched Vlad, like he couldn’t get enough of drinking in his features. It was comforting to know that he’d have a long, long time to do just that. “And I wouldn’t have wanted to say goodbye either. Or to grow older and...break down.” In general, it wasn’t something to fear - but most did anyway, because it meant a few things. It meant that your time was almost up, your body becoming weaker, the natural course of things - but their lives were different and went against the grain, he expected to shift with the tides and roll with the changes; Jonathan wouldn’t have wanted to become a burden, in old age. Or leave Vlad behind. And he realized then that he had embraced Vlad’s change. It was difficult at first when he had no idea, when he didn’t understand - there were likely still aspects that he would not fully grasp until he felt the very same hunger. And maybe at first he tried to hold onto the concept that Vlad was still completely human but he wasn’t - and Jonathan had to let go and understand that it was Vlad, and only Vlad, who could take the reins on the beast within him. That inner dragon wasn’t going anywhere - you couldn’t banish it, maybe could appease it with ‘alternative’ methods if that worked for you, but you could never truly conquer it until you made peace with its existence. Until you accepted yourself, and what you had become. Until you had warred with the human parts that lingered. “I love you.” Voice sure, with certainty, steely. That fact, it had never changed - throughout everything. He could also say with certainty that it never would. “Te voi iubi mereu.” "You will grow tired of me after two centuries," Vlad said, a sleepy murmur. His hands found Jonathan's thighs, fingers lazily dancing patterns over his skin. In moments like this, Vlad found it easier to live in a world of soft affection. His eyes opened. Green met green, and he smiled. "I will love you as long as you let me." They were each other's story. One could not exist without the other. Vlad was never one to pass off his responsibilities. He would see this through, for an eternity if needed. "But first give me time to accept you will change, though if you feel it is too much, I will do as you ask." Two centuries, only two? A drop in the bucket, even though it seemed unfathomable now. Time passed differently when you were immortal - he felt that from Vlad, sensed how he looked at it. Likely, it cultivated a unique sense of patience. That made Jonathan chuckle a little, and he grinned, a brief exposure of pointed fangs that actually felt kind of funny in his mouth. “I doubt it, but I’ll remind you of this conversation in two centuries,” he said. And the rain slacked off a bit - stopped mercilessly assaulting the roof, at the very least, more like a gentle tapping now. Jonathan felt calmer, and that was reflected in nature too - good thing, since he didn’t want the county to get pounded by a monsoon. “It’ll be easier for you...to be close, wouldn’t it?” he wanted to know, words murmured against icy cold skin, lips pressed to Vlad’s collarbone in the center. “I’ll give you time, dragoste. It’s important...to give you time.” Since it affected Vlad too, they’d be going through everything together, as they always did. But it was him who would be sealing the fate, so to speak. Jonathan couldn’t complete that transition without another bite. "It will be very easy for me. For a part of me." Vlad felt the wash of Jonathan's chaotic mind calm, felt it in the room and in his mind and in the air. No potatoes needed. His fingers stopped moving. They settled, gripping but not firmly, this man belongs to me. And he did. Jonathan belonged to Vlad, not to Dracula, contrary to what the monster thought. Vlad would decide when they jumped off that bridge. "Careful you do not bite yourself." A change in the mood, to save them from getting bogged down in shadows. Vlad tapped a finger against one of Jonathan's fangs. "I did, at first. But you will be accustomed to them shortly." “I love all the parts of you.” And he knew the sentiment was returned even on Dracula’s end, in his own way - his own very fucked up way. Jonathan shifted again on Vlad again, a bit to and fro restlessly, teeth nipping at the finger getting close to the wolf’s den. Playfully, in a sense, though he knew he’d also end up biting himself at some point. Because it seemed inevitable, and just his luck. Fingers entwined with Vlad’s too, reaching, pinning his hands back behind his head. “We might need a new bed,” he stated. “A new house, actually. The idea being so that we don’t have separate ones. Maybe?” But they’d keep the box of Transylvanian dirt where it belonged - it was strange, he didn’t think Dracula required it in this second dream set. The coffins were simply stone slabs, carved to fit himself and his bride. Not very luxurious. Vlad simply hummed. He was perfectly content to be subject to Jonathan's restless energy. His eyes, which had drifted closed, opened again. If one looked closely, they may have even seen a smile. "Do you think so?" Vlad didn't see why Jonathan couldn't just move in with him, but as he let the thought start to sink in, it didn't seem so bad. A new home, something that they can theirs - that was a good image. Away from nosy neighbours and busy roads, with room for Felix. "That may be nice." The whole idea was getting away from the nosy neighbors. Sort of a new start too, for this next stage since what would happen next, it would be new for the both of them. They have to traverse it together, and Jonathan knew that he personally would struggle - he would go through the pain of losing part of himself to something dark, something hungry, but in the end he would take the reins and he would get through this, even though living here was obviously going to change him forever and he couldn’t take it back. “It may be,” he smiled a bit; outside, it was still raining, but not horrendously so. “We can work on that. You’re sleepy though.” His nose nudged Vlad, body shifting to lie halfway on him and halfway off, leg curled up across his waist. "Inchide ochii. Have good dreams, for once, I hope.” Jonathan wasn’t going anywhere. |