The Resurrection of Russell Edgington: A True Blood Season 5 Story
Prologue
Sookie Stackhouse's blood still lingered on Eric Northman's lips and tongue even though it had been quite a few hours since he had tasted her that second time. His enjoyment of the flavor was marred by the distinctive smell of charbroiled vampire as he drug the crispy Russell Edgington to the rear of Alcide Herveaux's truck. Raising the door with one arm and holding the thick chain in his protected hand, he leapt easily up into the back of the truck and started pulling on the chain. A groaning Russell, complained even louder as the tension on the chain tightened around his throat, and Eric purposely missed the first attempt so that the other's head hit the edge of the truck rather abruptly.
Eric smiled with satisfaction when Russell started swearing in German and said, "Oh? Did that hurt?"
"You know very well it did," sputtered Russell.
"Good," Eric replied and did it twice more just for the hell of it before lifting Russell into the back, sliding him across the floor. When Russell kept swearing and squirming against the chain, Eric kicked him in the jaw. "Shut up!"
Russell coughed and spat out his remaining fang along with a little blood. Eric knelt down beside him and picked it up. "Excellent!" smiled Eric. "I needed this one for the set. Nan Flanagan and The Authority will be pleased."
As Eric stuffed the detached fang into the pocket of his track suit, Bill hopped into the back of the truck, and Alcide lowered the door, shutting the three in the back. Alcide walked to the cab, climbed in, closed the door and started the engine. The engine roared to life and he pulled away from Fangtasia.
Russell looked over at Bill and said, "So, you've thrown in your lot with the Viking? Couldn't face me on your own? All you had to do was give me the girl. This could all have been avoided."
"Right. You would have just let my progeny and I go free? I don't think so." He looked over at Eric and then back at Russell, nodding in Eric's direction. "I'll take my chances with him."
"Then you are a bigger fool than even I imagined. It's a shame, really, that Lorena didn't finish the task I gave her. I should have known that she would never be able to do it. She had a weakness where you were concerned. Just like you have a weakness for your own child and the delectable Miss Stackhouse."
Eric looked at Bill and drolled, "Don't encourage him further. He likes to hear the sound of his own voice."
Russell continued, addressing Eric this time. "Northman, do you really think you can trust the redoubtable, Mr. Compton? He's a snake, tightly coiled, and ready to strike. He will betray you as soon as the opportunity arises. Like you, he has no honor. He wants the girl as much as you do."
Eric angrily rounded on Russell. "Would you like me to tell you how I seduced your lover? How much he panted for me, opening up for me, so trusting that I would give it to him? How when he was lying naked and face down on your floor, he raised his nice white ass to me, calling me his 'daddy'?" Russell's mouth closed and pursed as Eric continued.
"Just when he thought he'd get the fuck of his life, I stabbed him in the back with your precious Japanese porn scrolls, watching him lose cohesion and become a stain on your oriental rug."
Russell started sputtering again in German and struggling against the chain.
"Then I gathered the trophy that you took after you and your wolves killed my entire family over a few goats. My father's crown."
"I bow to your superior ability not to encourage him, Eric," said Bill with polite southern sarcasm. "Clearly, you have mastered the art yourself."
Eric glared at Bill. They all fell silent.
At the construction site, Alcide opened the rear door of the truck, went to start the cement mixer and started pouring the mix into one of the holes. Eric drug Russell out of the truck. When the area filled up with cement, Alcide showed Bill and Eric how to operate the machinery, watched as Eric tossed Russell onto the top of the cement, and then went to his truck. He was relieved that his family was finally free of Eric Northman.
"Kill me Viking! Take your fuckin' revenge!" Russell yelled at Eric.
"That was the original plan," Northman said. "Then I was thinking... how do I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you won't find some sort of peace afterwards? I can't bear the thought of letting you find any redemption whatsoever."
Then Bill added, "Wrapped in silver. Encased in concrete. You won't be going anywhere for at least a hundred years."
Northman continued, "That's one hundred years with no escape from your grief. No escape from knowing that I took from you what you loved most... and you will never get it back."
He'd warned them that they would regret what they were doing, and they would.
Chapter 1
"How did I escape? With difficulty. How did I plan this moment? With pleasure."— Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo
When Russell had felt Sookie Stackhouse leave this world, with the cement hardening around him, Russell had laughed thinking that she was dead, pleased that neither Eric nor Bill would have her. It was only fair since they had taken his beloved Talbot from him.
Just over a year later, Russell Edgington had plenty of time to plan his revenge on those who had taken his perfectly well-ordered life away from him. He spoke to himself, non-verbally of course, a long, verbose inner monologue. Finally, he closed himself down to everything until one night... he felt her return.
He found himself wondering. Where had she been? What had she been doing all this time? Why was she back? Wasn't it enterprising of him, unbeknownst to the others, to have slipped her a few drops of his blood in her drink at Fangtasia before he tasted her and walked out into the sun?
As his mind raced, Russell found himself recalling a tale that had amused him when it was first published, "Le Comte de Monte-Cristo." Long suffering Edmond Dantès had been imprisoned on the Château d'If for fourteen years under false circumstances with no trial and nearly driven to madness, trying to discover what he could have possibly done to deserve his punishment. Russell couldn't help but compare his own situation to that of Edmond.
Unlike Edmond, Russell knew why he had been imprisoned, and the targets of his revenge were not Danglars, Fernand, or Villefort. He also did not have a mad priest to talk to unless you counted his remembered centuries of conversations with Talbot. Those conversations haunted him until he thought he himself would go mad, maybe as mad as the proverbial Hatter that Compton had predicted.
Northman! Compton! Stackhouse! He thought back to the last time he'd seen Eric Northman.
Northman had betrayed him, killing his beloved Talbot. He'd tricked him with the fairy blood, encased him in silver and buried him alive. Compton had pledged his loyalty to him, then lied to him, and had helped Eric Northman in trapping him in this cement tomb. Miss Stackhouse had dumped what remained of Talbot down the drain and turned on the garbage disposal. He had nothing... nothing physically left of his precious, precious boy.
Russell had lost all sense of time and no longer knew just how long he had been entombed. Fully awakened now he planned his revenge over the next few days. An odd occurrence took him unawares as he was making his mental list a few days later.
Feeling a rush of air around him where he knew none could possibly exist, he began to tingle from head to toe, feeling energized. He knew he had somewhere he needed to be, and it took over every fiber of his being.
Overwhelmingly strong, he began to find extra strength to struggle against his neck chain. The feeling built that he needed to break free and see the sun. The glorious sun. He had to see the sun again. The beautiful, warm sun that had taunted him, just out of reach, for millennia. "Die sonne!"
Russell could feel the words and the strength building as his body moved of its own accord. He struggled more until he could push up with his body against the hardened cement. He was compelled to escape and look at the glorious sun again. Over and over again, he pushed and willed the mass to move.
"Die sonne!"
Finally he felt it give just a little, then a little more until he had one hand out of the cement. He pushed and pushed until he was able to move the cement from his face and neck and then got his other arm free.
"Die sonne!"
Between his hands and lifting up his legs, he was able to burst free of the cement and supporting rebar and crawled out of the cement, pulling himself toward the exit of the parking garage with the silver still wrapped around his neck.
"Die sonne!"
He had to see the sun again. That was his only thought. As suddenly as it started, the feeling abated, and he was weighted down again by the silver around his neck. How long he lay there he was not sure. He said aloud, "Talbot! My beloved, Talbot. We are almost free." He started laughing maniacally and fell silent.
A shriek tore through Russell's eardrums, an all too familiar one at that, arousing him from a self-induced rest. "Russell! Russell!"
"Will you please stop that caterwauling! You are giving me a headache," said Russell.
"Thank the gods I found you! I've been searching everywhere for you."
"Talbot? Is that you? Are you really here?" asked Russell, turning his head painfully to the side to see a faded version of Talbot standing there with his hands on his hips and a look of exasperation on his face, seeing one of the structure support columns showing through him.
"Yes, of course it is. Were you expecting one of your flea-ridden wolves, you silly man..." Talbot screamed again as he finally noticed what shape Russell was in. "Oh, oh, oh! My dear god, Russell, you are burnt to a cinder and covered in concrete particles! You look worse than that Lorena bitch after Bill set her on fire!"
As Talbot's spirit knelt down beside him, Russell inquired, "How? How are you here?" he questioned.
"It is close to All Hallows Eve. I could not come to you before this. You called my name, and I was able to find you."
"It doesn't matter," said Russell. "What matters to me is that you are here now."
"Look at you, my darling! Look how far you have fallen. I told you that you were a very wicked creature. It finally caught up with you, did it not?"
"Yes, yes, it did. I was careless. Never again."
"Careless? More than careless. You were overconfident. You left yourself open."
"Left myself open? I suppose you didn't leave yourself open when you let Northman have his way with you in my den! He admitted it to me. Even if he hadn't, I saw your clothes strewn about the room when I found what was left of you on the carpet."
"You were never around, Russell! As usual, I had to find my own diversions like I always have. You stupid man. How could you leave me all alone with that sexy, muscular beast, Northman. Why didn't protect me!"
"I gave you everything you ever wanted, Talbot. Everything. Everyone you ever wanted. All of it."
"So you could keep me in a pretty cage and let me out when it suited you? How dare you!" he spat.
"I'm sorry. I foolishly trusted him. Never again."
With that, Russell filled Talbot in on everything that happened since Talbot's death.
"Hush, be still, Russell," Talbot cautioned, then cocked his head. "Someone is coming."
It was then that Russell heard the definite sound of work boots walking across the cement. Closing his eyes, he made himself very still. He heard someone stumble to a stop as a clipboard dropped on the hard surface of the cement, clattering until it settled itself.
"What the fuck?" the construction supervisor exclaimed as he rushed the remaining distance and bent his hefty body down on one knee to turn Russell over. He nearly fell back on his ass when the charred body opened its eyes, fixed on his and locked. He was immediately overcome.
"So nice of you to come along. Would you be so kind as to remove this chain from around my neck?"
"Sure," the man said as he obeyed.
"Thank you," replied Russell when the chain was finally gone. He quickly pulled the man down to bite him and didn't feel his fangs come down.
"Really, Russell," said Talbot. "You can't do much damage without your fangs. You told me Northman had removed them. Are you planning to gum this one to death?"
Swearing silently, Russell asked the man, "Do you have a pocket knife?"
"Sure," he replied as he moved his hand to his pocket and pulled out a buck knife, handing it to Russell.
As Russell flipped it open and raised the knife to the man's throat, Talbot said, "What are you doing? You don't need to slit his throat."
"Why not?" asked Russell, with the knife against the side of the man's throat.
"Think about it. Do you want to draw attention to your escape? The police will be all over this place if a construction worker goes missing. Just take enough to heal your burns. When night comes, we can find someone else to drain. Away from here."
Russell saw the truth in Talbot's advice and said, "Yes. Yes, you are quite right. I can find somewhere else to feed after dark."
To the man, Russell commanded, "Roll up your sleeve and slice the knife across your bared wrist." The man complied, and Russell immediately latched on, drinking greedily.
After Russell had healed the cut, stood and kicked the silver chain into the hole in the cement floor, Talbot added, "You might want to take the knife with you."
Russell glared at Talbot and then glamoured the construction worker.
"You do realize that grey is definitely not your color. It does absolutely nothing for your skin tone. We must get you cleaned up. A long, hot shower. New clothes. A manicure. New..."
"Talbot, I've been in solid concrete for some time now. You can't expect me to snap my fingers and make myself look like the charming fellow that you remember."
"Did you know that you have dried cement in your nostrils?" asked Talbot.
Russell rolled his eyes, and he and Talbot went back and forth with their bickering and banter, waiting until cover of darkness to slip out of the parking garage. He drained two more people after he had gone some distance from his former cell. His fangs had grown back by the second. By the third, he could fly again.
TBC