SAVAGE CARNIVAL

A vampire chronicles fan-fiction

(Lestat x Male OC) (Louis x Male OC) (Lestat x Louis) (Armand x Male OC)

Genre : Drama/ Horror

Inside the Savage Garden, there is a place tucked away called the Midnight Carnival. This is our little corner of the garden, a place where the innocent and the dark converge…

About this story: (skip this if you like,  ) This uses elements from both the Anne Rice books and the movies, so let me clear up a few things for you.

Seeing as the book and movie on Interview with the vampire are so close plot-wise, you can refer to either. However, we'll use the book version of Armand because I much prefer a 16-year-old Russian boy with curly auburn hair to… well, Antonio Banderas.

This story uses the book version of events from Queen of the Damned, meaning mostly that A) Lestat was NOT made by Marius, but rather, Magnus. And B) there was no romance between Jesse and Lestat (Akasha and Lestat, however, is a fact.) But seeing as I love the movie so much, as a treat to those who've seen it, Lestat may be caught singing some of the songs at some point.

As well as that, references to some of the books are made so it may help if you've read The Vampire Armand (Sybelle is referred to early on although she doesn't play a role), Merrick (both Merrick and David play a fairly important part in a later chapter), either Queen of the Damned or the Vampire Lestat (simply so you know about the origins of vampires, although you could pick that up from the movie) and possibly some further reading (passing references are made to Gabrielle, Pandora, and a few other characters.)

Of course, you're not required to know this, and you don't have to have Lestat, Louis or Armand's histories memorized back-to-front, just know a bit about them. If you really wanted to, you could get through this story on only one of the books or movies. The bottom line is for you to read and enjoy, so have fun getting through this. I apologize in advance for any OOC-ness in this story, because I know I'm not perfect, and I welcome constructive criticism. Also, it DOES feature OC's, although male ones, and if they're Mary Sues (is there a male form of Mary Sue?) please, PLEASE tell me. And if you don't like Shonen-ai or Yaoi… why the hell have you read the VC's?

Je suis le vampire Lestat. I am the vampire Lestat. I am the brat prince, the one who tasted from the mother of us all, the one who walked as a mortal, the one who met with the Devil himself.

But you already know of these adventures, and I would not want to bore my beloved mortals with a re-telling of the same tale. No, this is a new thread, a new tapestry to be woven. After all, I live to entertain. It is YOU that keeps me alive and splendorous, your screaming voices I long to hear again, your love and wishes that I was real.

But I get side-tracked, as they say nowadays. This story starts not with me, but in a small and ordinary suburb of the kind that fill the country of America. A nice, peaceful Suburbia type, filled with middle-aged business men, lonely unfaithful housewives, and their restless children, a mishmash of races sharing the middle class. Those youth

, the restless, experimenting, suicidal, beauty that fills the schools and the streets by the thousands… one such child begins this story.

So, as it is not my section of the tale to tell, I will hand it to its rightful narrator. As a great playwright once said, parting is such sweet sorrow. But I leave you with the promise I will return. When the proper time comes I shall be back in all my glory. So I know you'll be waiting with bated breath until my return. But until that moment, the story must go on.

With Love,

The Brat Prince,

Lestat

PART ONE

In a nameless suburb in an average city in any state of the USA, a teenage boy slept restlessly, his dreams invaded by a burning pain. He was a beautiful youth: chocolate colored-skin that's damp with terror, long ebony hair styled into dreadlocks, and a slim athletic build that could belong to a basketball player or a dancer equally. He bolted up out of terror, and the eyes that flew open revealed themselves to be a shocking, electric lime-green.

It was these eyes that so captivated the monster perched outside his window, these eyes that he stared at through the branches of the tree he hid in. He was in love with the rarity and brightness of these eyes, he though. He watched as the boy looked around in terror, gasping for a second, and then became aware of his surroundings, sighed, and lay back in bed.

The monster in the tree had been stalking this boy for three weeks, knew his name was Rai Jackson, that he was sixteen years old, that he was a student at the local high school and took English, Science, Math, Art, Geography and Spanish, that he liked basketball and techno and parties, that he disliked wannabes, long phone conversations and some boy named Trey, and that he lived alone with his mother in a middle-class neighborhood. The monster smiled down at his sleeping prey, his Rai.

Soon, very soon, this one would be his.

(Rai)

I awoke that morning like all mornings, late, and desperate not to go to school. I pulled on my school uniform (button-down top, blue blazer, red tie, gray pants), ran a hand through my dreads, and grabbed my bag. I headed out the door like usual. I was completely unaware that I was soon to die.

I was just a normal 16-year old boy named Rai… up until that day. But on that day, everything would change.

The day went as all school days do- badly. I thought that my problems were the end of the world, tests and other students and teachers, normal teen stresses. So after school I went to a favorite spot of mine- a pretty park not far from my house with a duck pond. I sat on the bench and before I knew it I was nodding off to sleep.

Suddenly my head shot up and I looked around, panicked, to see it was dark.

And sitting on the bench next to me was a tall man, dressed in the oldest and most elegant clothes I'd ever seen. His hair swept past his shoulders to mid-back, thick, luxurious and a deep brown, and he was wearing sunglasses even though the sun had set.

"Hello there," he said tentatively in my general direction. I saw a cane sitting near his leg. Poor guy must be blind, I realized.

"Hi," I said, starting to pity him. He didn't look much older than twenty, it must have been hard.

He smiled in my direction. "Lovely evening, isn't it?"

"Yes, you got to love this autumn weather," I said conversationally.

"The water on the pond sounds exquisite. Are the leaves spreading ripples across it?"

I smiled. "Yes and the water is nice and clear so you can see the night sky in it, and the wind in the trees is making red and gold leaves flutter down to the pond and float along its surface like little boats."

The blind man smiled wistfully. "The way you describe it, it sounds stunning. Thank you for brightening up my evening."

"No problem," I said, feeling slightly better about myself for the good deed. "Well, sorry to run away on you, sir, but I should be getting back home; my mom will be worried sick."

He placed a tentative hand on my arm. "Not to be an inconvenience, but you mind showing me how to get to Joy Flower Street? I have a cousin who lives there, but I'm horrible with directions."

I was foolish not to think how strangely convenient it was that this was the street neighboring mine. Cheerfully I told him it was on my way home and that I would be more than happy to walk him there.

His grip on my arm tightened. "Thank you so much, you're a kind boy."

"No problem." I went to turn, but he wouldn't release my arm. I pulled, but he dug his nails hard enough to draw a yell of pain out of my throat.

"Such a kind boy," he said, opening his mouth wide and flashing abnormally long canine teeth. He leaned towards me, a searing pain filled me, and then everything went black.

The monster smiled, leaning over his victim, stroking his pretty face, touching the eyelids that fluttered under his touch. The boy's body was chained to the wall, leaving him looking vulnerable and untainted, so soft and sweet. The monster touched his victim's chest as it rose and fell with unconscious breath.

"Beautiful, beautiful boy," he said with a smile that flashed his long canine teeth.

Suddenly Rai stirred and his eyes flew open. Immediately he began to struggle, his head whipping in around, sending his dreadlocks flying in all directions. His eyes were wide with fear; his breath came out in short gasps. He stared at the monster.

Those beautiful green orbs shifted through confusion, then terror, and finally he started screaming. "WHO ARE YOU? WHERE AM I? WHAT DO YOU WANT WITH ME? I'LL CALL THE POLICE ON YOU! OH GOD! LET ME GO!"

The monster chuckled. "I am Lucas. You are in a place where not even the crows will find your body if I leave you here. What I want with you… you shall find out yourself in due time. You shall not be calling the police seeing as there are no phones here and no neighbors to hear you scream. And if you're a good boy and nice to your master I'll consider undoing your chains."

Rai was still panicking. "Let me go please! I', just a kid, please don't hurt me, please, please-" His words were lost as he choked on a sob. He started crying, tears spilling out of his fantastic green eyes.

Lucas took off the sunglasses he had been wearing and touched Rai's cheek. Rai flinched in anticipation of pain, shutting his eyes tightly.

"Look at me," Lucas said softly. He didn't, so Lucas slapped him. "LOOK AT ME!"

Terrified, the schoolboy obeyed. And he gasped at what he saw.

The 'blind' man's eyes were entirely black. Not just the pupil, but the iris and even the whites, were deep, endless obsidian. Against the pale of his face, his eyes stood like vortexes, black pits sucking down to the Abyss.

Rai also noticed he stood without assistance of the cane. And though it was hard to tell, it looked like those ebony eyes seemed locked on to Rai. He was something, but that something wasn't blind.

"You are gifted," Lucas said, caressing Rai's face. The teenage boy held his breath, trying to hide his revulsion at the touch. "Your eyes…"

Realization hit Rai. This…freak, this serial killer, or whatever he was, had singled him out because of his eyes.

From the minute he had been born his mother had told him he was special. "My baby boy was born beautiful," she bragged to co-workers sometimes. "He has the prettiest damn eyes I've ever seen."

True, it had always been a talking point amongst classmates and friends, this neon-lime color like a cat's. Always it had been there, his little irregularity, and now…

Now it had singled him out for some predator to kidnap and do who-knows-what to.

"One like you should not be forced to live amongst the commoners," he said with a smile. "One like you should be something MORE." He touched Rai's lips. "Do you know what I am, boy?"

Fear paralyzed his throat, and all Rai could do was shake his head.

Lucas sneered coldly. "But you should. You see us on your TV and in your movies, read our books, hear songs about us. You think we are fiction, but we are very real. I am… we are…vampires."

Even if you hate this first bit, review because I love to be criticised.