---/---
"I don't know what else to say Zoe, I was here all day. It just didn't happen. If you don't believe me you can check yourself, the video recordings don't lie. You're a scientist examine the evidence." Dr Bloxham insisted, turning the computer screen around so her boss could take a look. "See twelve hours of recording, from when you left at five this morning and came back."
Frowning Zoe scrolled through the closed-circuit surveillance footage, dragging the curser along and speeding up the video, minutes passed in seconds...chess...lots of time spent on chess. Then there was some pacing about and sitting down but Veronica was right, there was none of the threatening behaviour Dracula had accused them of.
"I don't understand, why would they lie?"
"To mess with your head?" Dr Bloxham offered. "To try and turn you against your friends and colleagues? Divide and conquer. Who knows what they have planned, they are vampires, you can't expect them to behave like real people. We just need to go back to the protocols you designed; they are test subjects, not people."
Yet as much sense as Veronica was making, Zoe was still stuck on how believable it had all been. "I mean Dracula I could understand; mind games are his forte but Agatha too? She loathes him, why would she back him up?"
"Zoe, I'm saying this as your friend, so please don't take it the wrong way, but that creature in there is not your family. Agatha Van Helsing was an inspiration and a hero, but she died a 123 years ago. Whatever remains of her in that cage, is not the same woman who gave her life to stop Dracula...I mean just look..." Veronica gestured to the window that looked down over the glass cage. "Would Agatha Van Helsing ever allow that?"
Pausing to glance down, Zoe had to admit Veronica was right. Her aunt Agatha would never sit, happily side by side with her killer, allowing him to teach the art of navigating the internet.
"No...No you're right. I'm sorry I even questioned you."
"That's ok, I'm not just your colleague I'm your friend. I know how much you have on your plate, just remember from now to keep your analytical head on. You wouldn't want the board to think you've been compromised. They will stick you out on gardening leave, and don't you want to make these last few months really count?"
---/---
When Zoe Van Helsing returned, she brought with her four parcels of blood, and two staff members, who were certainly not hired for their brains.
Dracula as usual took to testing the blood samples first, his nose curling at three of them. "No these will not do..."
"Well they are all you will be getting, so drink them or starve, its up to you. I am not here to pander to your unreasonable demands Count."
Frowning at Zoe's change in attitude, Dracula handed the one decent sample to Agatha. He had fed earlier, and was capable of going without, if necessary. "Is this how you treat the other members of your staff Dr Helsing?"
"Only when they have been wasting my time." Zoe countered, meeting his gaze without flinching. "Didn't you think I would check out the truth of your accusations?"
"I had hoped you would..."
"Why, so I would waste my time clearing up your ridiculous lies, rather than getting on with some real work?"
"Oh, they were my lies?" Dracula scoffed, his quick mind already grasping that Zoe had been turned against them. Well that was their one tenuous ally down, an unfortunate turn of events, but nothing he would lose sleep over...well he wouldn't but one glance at Agatha...
"Zoe, I don't know what other people have said but we weren't lying. I swear it on our family honour..."
"You are not my family." Zoe insisted, Dr Bloxham's words on repeat in her mind.
She had to do this, she had to regain focus and distance. All she had to show for her life was her career and reputation, it was too late to try and change things now. She only had a few months left and Zoe Van Helsing would not allow her family legacy to falter with her...the weak link in the chain. Her father had been so proud, when she had succeeded him to run the foundation, that was the family Zoe had to focus on, not this echo of a dead woman who wore her face.
"Zoe..."
"Dr Helsing."
Agatha couldn't reconcile this iceberg of a woman, with the one, who only a few hours earlier laughed at her blushes. Stepping forward, it was a natural impulse to try and reach out to her; Agatha had always been a tactile person. She didn't even consider the consequences, as her hand crossed the divide from shadow into light, her focus was on Zoe, on reaching Zoe.
"No!"
Yelping in surprise Agatha found herself dragged back into the shadow. Dracula's arms were like locked iron around her waist, pulling her back until she was pressed tightly to him, her back to his chest, as he walked them back.
"Crazy...stupid...woman..." Dracula hissed through his fangs, his more monstrous aspect prevalent, drawn out by his fight or flight reaction. "Never do that again!"
Zoe by contrast didn't even blink. It was if Agatha damaging herself didn't even matter, and that hurt far deeper than anything else, Agatha couldn't even feel any pain from her hand. Instead Zoe indicated for her two colleagues, to remove the remains of the table and chair from their cage. She would have taken the ipad back too, only that was very much in the vampire side of the cage, and Zoe doubted that even with cancerous blood, that she would be safe in the shadows any longer...not if the way Dracula was growling at her was any indication. No he looked like he wanted to snap her neck right about now.
"Zoe please..." Agatha called out again, trying one last time to reach her niece.
"Dr Helsing." Zoe reminded her subjects, before turning to leave.
Dr Bloxham had been right, Zoe had been damn lucky the board hadn't found out, how close she had come to being compromised. Even now as she walked away, her clinical mask firmly in place, inside she could feel what remained of her heart break a little. It had been wonderful whilst it lasted, the connection she had thought she felt with Agatha, a feeling Zoe hadn't felt since her father passed away. Being known and understood and accepted...kindred spirits...but that sort of connection only existed in children's novels.
Biting her lip Agatha tasted her own blood. She was not a woman prone to emotional outbursts. Always the one in control, her joy and pain tightly controlled, and yet she still felt them. It was ridiculous that now she was dead she was losing control over her feelings.
"She's not worth it."
Dracula's voice was soft in her ear and Agatha turned her face away, rejecting his comfort. She was used to looking after herself, never letting anyone in that close. Just the solid weight of him at her back, was making it harder to retain her composure; finally having the option of a shoulder to cry on, it seemed made crying more likely.
"Let me go."
"I am not going to let you do anything stupid." Dracula insisted, his gaze drawn to the rest of their cell which was still cast in sunlight.
"Please...Please let me go." Agatha pleaded, hearing Dracula sigh against her neck. In all their time together, Agatha had demanded, commanded and heckled him, she had never asked him for anything, and Dracula found he didn't have it in him to refuse her.
"If you set so much as foot towards..."
"I won't. I promise."
"Well your word is more than good enough, for me at least." Dracula added bitterly, as he released her reluctantly.
Yet as much as he did trust her word, Dracula was relieved when the option of suicide was removed from Agatha's reach. The sunlight was beginning to fade, the sun must have been setting, as Zoe had certainly not chosen to return the whole use of the cell to them. As grateful as Dracula was for more room, he was almost reluctant for the distance between him and Agatha, his arms feeling so very empty all of a sudden.
Turning from Dracula, from the whole cell, Agatha retreated to the far corner. Curling up on the chemical toilet and staring out into the dark void beyond the glass. If she had been paying attention, Agatha might have watched the reflection of Dracula, pace up and down, like a captive tiger slowly going mad from the confinement. If she still believed god was real, this would have been the time Agatha turned to him for guidance, a conversation to help calm her troubled mind. Yet it seemed in a short experience of her undeath, Agatha had lost her purpose, her faith and now her family as well.
"How do you do it?" Agatha whispered, her voice carrying as she knew it would, a vampire's hearing more than sensitive enough to pick up on her words.
"Do what?"
"Keep going when everything you ever valued about yourself is destroyed?"
Dracula opened his mouth to banter back, the flippant comment on his tongue dying, when he saw the reflection of tears on Agatha's cheeks. "You find new things to value."
Snorting Agatha wiped at her cheeks. "Oh, that easy."
"No not easy." Dracula chided her gently, moving until he could crouch down beside her, his fingertips grazing her forearm. "You are changed from who you once were. You can either live in grief, for everything that you have lost, or you embrace the opportunity."
"Opportunity?" Agatha really did frown now, turning her head to look at him. His dark eyes were looking up at her so intently, it was hard not to get drawn in. There was something heady, almost addictive, about being his single point of focus.
"Agatha haven't you ever wondered what if? What if you could change your life completely, live a completely different existence, without all those obligations weighing you down, learn new things, see new places. Well you have a new life now, let go of the shackles of the last one, everyone you ever owed anything to, is long gone my Agatha, you are truly free."
"How can I be free, I'm in a cage."
"Yes, you are, not just physically, but in your mind as well. Until you can free yourself of them both..." Dracula trailed off, his half smile almost sad as he broke their gaze and instead looked down, at some point in his little speech Agatha had covered his fingers on her arm with her other hand. Only she wasn't pushing his touch away, her fingers were almost gripping his like he was her only lifeline.
"I don't know how." Agatha whispered.
"I'll help you, I promise, for as long as you need me to. You won't be alone in this Agatha."
It was easier to look at him when he wasn't staring at her. His normally perfectly coiffed hair had fallen over his face a little, the imperfection almost making him look like a real person, an annoyingly attractive person; one whose touch on her arm was burning her skin...
Pulling her arms away, Agatha caught Dracula expression of resigned disappointment. Yet he didn't move to rise, instead remained kneeling by her side, his expression now hidden from her by his hair. Perhaps it was because he looked so young in that moment, an echo of the boy in the face of the monster he had become. Agatha didn't think about it, she just did it, her fingers were there brushing the hair back out of his face, almost of their own accord.
It was so soft and thick, as she ran her fingers through its length, brushing it back and then again to straighten it into place. A smile pulling at her lips as Dracula's eyes shuttered, his neck arching as he leant into her touch, like a cat wanting some fuss. Yet the moan that escaped his parted lips, as Agatha ran her fingertips along his scalp, was not the reaction of a harmless animal. When Agatha went to draw her hand back, his hand grabbed her wrist, holding her in place as he rubbed his head against her fingers.
"Do you know how long it has been since anyone has touched me like that? Agatha you don't know what you do to me...How hard it is to keep my hands off you..."
"Do you really mean all that hogwash you're speaking? I mean does it usually work, or are you just rubbish at trying to seduce me?" Agatha asked, her tone amused, as a potential mate Dracula was passible, at least until he opened his mouth.
Cracking one eye open Dracula released his grip on her wrist, instead sitting back on his haunches as Agatha had the nerve to smirk at him. "Believe me, if I was really trying to seduce you Agatha, you would not need to ask, you'd know."
"And I suppose I would fall at your feet. The arrogance of the vampire."
"No, the arrogance of a prince, who more than his fair share of fair maidens falling at his feet." Dracula teased right back, eyebrows waggling suggestively as a grin broke out across his face.
"I am hardly a fair maiden..."
"Why what else would you call a good catholic girl like yourself?" Dracula grinned, this one all teeth and dangerous teasing. "Unless there is something you are not telling me Sister Agatha?"
For that there was no answer, well no good answer, and Agatha chose to ignore it. "So, for curiosity sake, if you were seducing one of those many maidens, how would you start?"
"Is that an invitation?"
"No, it's a question."
"Why with a dance of course." Dracula teased, standing and bowing to her, remaining bent over he offered her his hand.
"Seriously?" Agatha scoffed, rolling her eyes as Dracula continued to hover.
"Why not, have you got any better ideas about how to while away the next few hours? They took the chess set."
"I've never been much of a dancer, there wasn't much call for it in the convent. Your toes will regret asking."
"You will be, by the time I am through with you." Dracula pronounced, full of the confidence that only an aristocrat could possess.
"Fine. Don't say I didn't warn you." Agatha retorted as she accepted his hand and allowed Dracula to move her into first position for a waltz, her left hand resting on his shoulder, as he took her right in his own grasp, and wrapped a possessive hand about her waist.
"Now one...two...three..." Dracula counted them in, stepping forward on the three, only Agatha hadn't moved, and they clashed awkwardly. "You need to step backwards with your right foot first."
"Fine but you didn't say when to start." Agatha huffed, glaring up at Dracula as they moved back into first position.
"Now on three...one...two...three."
This time they made it through two of the steps in the basic box step before Agatha tried to go the wrong way and only Dracula's grip on her waist propelled her along, only her feet had to scramble to keep up.
"Honestly how can such an intelligent woman struggle with dancing." Dracula despaired. "I thought you were just being modest, but you really aren't much of a dancer."
Barely resisting the urge to clip his ear, Agatha huffed. "It would be easier if there was music, then I wouldn't need to keep count and remember what direction I am meant to be moving."
"Ahhh. Who says there cannot be?" Dracula paused their lesson, moving to pick up the tablet and searching for waltz music. A moment later the sound of a full orchestra filled the cell, blasting out of the tinny little speaker, and it was the most glorious sound Agatha had ever heard.
"Now, where were we?" Dracula began only to stop when the music suddenly stopped only to be replaced with an irritating bleeping.
"What on earth is that?"
"We are getting a call?" Dracula replied, picking up the tablet and opening the skype app.
Expecting to see Renfield's obsequious face on the screen, Dracula was startled when instead there was a figure whose face was blurred and unrecognisable.
"Count Dracula." The voice didn't sound human, all sharp and mechanical. "It such a pleasure to finally meet you. My associates and I have a business proposition to put to you."
Amused Dracula cast a look to Agatha who was approaching cautiously. "How unusual, this is my second job offer in as many days, after all those centuries of blissful unemployment."
"We are sure that you will find our offer superior, as it caters to your...particular talents."
Frowning slightly Dracula could only guess that the talents he was referring to were not his superior wit or learning, but those afforded to him by his vampire state.
"We are in the business of eliminating obstacles for people of wealth and discernment..."
"You're assassins." Dracula deadpanned, his lip curling in disgust. "Come let us call things by their proper names."
"Occasionally those obstacles are people yes, and I am sure you can see how such a situation could benefit us both."
"Why, because a vampire would be the perfect addition to such a company? You forget I cannot enter, where I am not invited."
"Oh, we have ways of getting you entrance."
"How nice." Dracula declared, his tone artificially light. "Only I already have employment."
"That can be changed."
"Really, how?"
"Let us just say we have interests in common with The Harker Foundation."
"Ahhh the mysterious backers. The ones who can afford mercenaries." Dracula's smile was wide now, the tips of his fangs showing.
"The very same."
"And you will spring me from my cell, if I agree to be a good monster, and only kill the people you want dead? What makes you think you can control what I do?"
"If a few additional people end up dead it is no matter to us, but to ensure your continued employment, your bride will remain in the custody of The Harker Foundation, as guarantee of your good behaviour."
"Ahhh, there had to be a catch." Dracula added, his dark eyes flicking up to where Agatha stood, her blues eyes locked on him, her expression almost wounded. "And you think that will be sufficient motivation, and I thought you people did your research..."
Agatha couldn't believe what she was hearing. As bad enough as it was being trapped here, at least she was not trapped alone, Dracula's company was the only thing keeping her sane right now and if he left...
"Oh, we always do our research Count Dracula and we know she is valuable to you. Valuable enough that you wouldn't want her to be harmed."
"First the honey and now the threats, well as tempting as that all sounds, I am afraid I must decline your most generous offer." Dracula replied, his gaze still locked on Agatha, watching as she seemed to sag with relief. "I have already given my word to another and I am loath to break it."
"I am confused as to why you think you have a choice Count? We had hoped for your full cooperation, perhaps in time you will come to see the benefits. Our associates will be in touch in a few days, with your first assignment."
The call suddenly cut off, leaving Dracula to stare at the dark screen. He was so lost in thought that he didn't notice when Agatha sidled up to him, her hand on his arm making him jump.
"Thank you."
Dracula didn't need to ask what she was thanking him for, it was barely anything, keeping his promise not to leave her alone, and yet it was the most progress he had made with her.
"What are we going to do?"
"Well I am certainly not going to kill on command like some sort of foot soldier." Dracula sneered, almost insulted that someone would presume to try and manipulate him, him of all people. "We are going to have to get out of here before that assignment arrives."
"Leave?" Agatha felt the panic grow in her chest, as claustrophobic as the institute was, it was all Agatha had known in her undead state. Outside the world would be so different and she would have to kill for food, and despite everything that had changed about her, that was not something could bring herself to do.
As if able to read her thoughts, or perhaps just her face, Dracula covered her hand and squeezed it tightly. "Whatever has you panicking, we can fix it afterwards. Like it or not Agatha we are on the same side, we have to be. There are too many other people with agendas, either to use us or harm us; so, for now I need you to trust me...can you do that...can you trust me?"
It was a good question, a very good question, only Agatha Van Helsing wasn't sure, she knew what her answer was.
---/---