And now, from Rougue Productions...

CASTLEVANIA:

ELEGY FOR THE DAMNED

DICLAIMER: This story was created by me for the sake of other's entertainment and not for profit. Castlevania and all its assorted characters are owned by Komani, not me.

All the characters in this story are fictional. Any similarities to any real person; living, dead or undead; are purely coincidental.

SUMMARY: A new world has emerged from the chaos of the early 21st Century. But in 2074, the forces of chaos arise once again, and the horrible structure is summoned back from the powers binding it in the solar eclipse. Two brave warriors step forward to overcome this evil. However, before their adventure is over, a sacrifice must be made, or else all will be lost in an instant. The heroes don't always get to live happily ever after...

And now, lets go to the show!

Prologue: Dirty Business Gone Wrong

Justin Belmont knew he was walking a fine line as he walked down the street in Bucharest, Romania on May 19, 2074, wearing an old-fashioned business suit and carrying a large, black, leather briefcase in his right hand. His blue eyes scanned his surroundings as he swept his left hand through his short blonde hair. He also felt the early-afternoon sun on his back as he walked forward.

Justin smiled as he looked around. Much had changed from the days when many thought the saving of mankind and civilization to be a lost cause. On the street, Justin saw buses, trams and the occasional car fly past him. Fifty years ago, this street would have been locked up by traffic, but now the story was totally different. Most of the vehicles were older models of vehicles, using solar power to drive their motors, but Justin noticed the occasional newer model vehicles, which were powered by super-efficient fusion engines.

And Justin did not overlook the fact that the streets were safe to walk on. Fifty years before, the streets of many eastern European countries resembled warzones. From Moscow to Kiev to Bucharest to Athens and Istanbul, the major cities were turned into battlefields where secular government forces clashed almost daily with Islamic terrorists, bent on turning Europe into an outpost of their beliefs. Suicide bombings and assassinations were almost daily events in the Romanian capital city, which was a particularly heated conflict zone. However, The Great Reforms which took place worldwide between 2025 and 2050 effectively destroyed the base of the disgruntled poor that these terrorists had once recruited from. Slowly but surely, the violence ended and Islamic Fundamentalism, which appeared unstoppable only a generation ago, was effectively dead.

Many people of Justin's generation, the first born into this new world (Justin was born in 2044), took all these liberties for granted. Justin was not among them. His own mother, Raisha Bashir who was born in Syria, was saved from a life of hopelessness and poverty by The Great Reforms. She was recruited and placed in some of the best schools in Germany, and then moved to Romania where she met Mark Belmont, Justin's father. Justin owed his existence to a legacy of violence, a legacy that he would always keep in mind and pass on to his children.

Justin stopped at a building which had been converted into a post office around the time Justin had been born. Inside, however, was a memorial to a ghastly incident of the violence from which the new world had been born. On April 13, 2027, a dozen men wearing government uniforms entered what was then a school. They were actually terrorists with orders to take everyone in the school hostage and demand concessions from the Romanian government, including the release of known terrorists from prisons and the appointment of suspected fundamentalist sympathizers to key government offices. In response, after a six-hour standoff, government soldiers sneaked into the school via the sewer system and were able to take the terrorists by surprise, killing all 12 simultaneously without harm to the children.

Or so it seemed initially. What no one could have known, outside of the terrorists themselves, was that the terrorists were meant to be suicide bombers. Each of the twelve terrorists was wearing a vest packed with high explosives underneath his uniform. All were rigged with a dead man's switch, designed to set the bombs off when its wearer's heartbeat dropped to under 20 beats per minute. Even worse, one switch going off would instantly set off all the others.

The results were horrific. Only seconds after the soldiers indicated the situation was resolved, 12 bombs went off inside the school simultaneously, killing almost everyone inside and leaving the school a smoking ruin. The incident was meant to rattle the people so badly that they would simply give up against an enemy willing to go to such lengths to get their way, and it worked that way initially. But once The Great Reforms began to take effect, public opinion changed from despair to outrage. In 2030, the mastermind behind the bombing was captured by vigilantes and brought to where Justin now stood and was executed (due to the flagrant disregard the terrorists showed toward the legal system, the government had all but encouraged vigilantism against known terrorists at the time). Justin often walked by this building to remind himself of the violence that his generation tried to ignore and hide, thinking it not to be part of their new world. But Justin knew otherwise. To ignore the past is to forget the past, and to forget the past was to be condemned to live it again. And this could not happen, under any circumstances.

"Justin! Snap out of that trance, dammit!" Justin heard from his right.

He turned to find a young man walking toward him. He was also wearing an old-fashioned business suit and was carrying a large black briefcase. This man was slightly shorter than Justin and had green eyes and brown hair which was fashioned into a flat top which Justin thought looked ridiculous. "Francis! Good to see you too!" he replied as he walked over and shook his free hand, "You ready to do this?"

Francis and Justin entered law school in Bucharest as members of the same class after they had attended different universities beforehand. Like Justin, Francis Mauscu felt a dedication to preserving a memory of the past due to a personal connection with that past. Francis's father was one of the few survivors of the Bucharest School Massacre of 2027. His father had never actually told him about his experience on that day, but it was something that Francis knew troubled him often. Justin attributed this to survivor's guilt.

"This better go down as planned," Francis replied as the two waited for a moment where they could cross the street safely, "I know I owe you for all those times you helped me in law school, but I didn't think you'd mean like this."

"Neither did I, to be honest," Justin replied as they began to cross the street with a brisk walk, "But I got a call from home about a month ago, saying that they needed this stuff. I know this is dangerous, but I have assurances that this is the way to go."

"The things you do for your family," Francis retorted as they got on the sidewalk on the other side of the street and began walking down the street again, "Seriously, I've never seen any of them. Where do they live?"

This was a question that Justin never liked to answer to those he knew, not because he was ashamed of his past, but because he knew that no one outside of the world he grew up in would get it. "They live in western Wallachia," he replied, "A whole different world from here in Bucharest."

"Western Wallachia?" Francis replied, "Sheesh, I thought there were only those small hamlets from hundreds of years ago out there. You grew up in one of those?"

"Yeah, I did," Justin answered, "It wasn't always easy, but you get a real appreciation about what's important when you grow up like that. I feel like a lot of us are missing those things nowadays."

"Yeah, you're probably right, but how did you get out of there?" Francis responded, "Most people born into those villages just stay there forever, like the peasants of feudal times."

"While I appreciate all the lessons that place taught me, I knew that I wasn't meant to stay there," Justin replied, "And my family knew that too, so they helped me get into college here in Bucharest and now I find myself about to break the law. Maybe I should have stayed in that hamlet."

"Nah, this'll go off without a hitch," Francis assured, "And in case things do get ugly, I'm packing." He then opened his sport coat slightly to reveal a handgun inside.

"Yeah, me too," Justin said, "This is just too dangerous a thing to go through without some insurance."

The conversation ended as the two men entered an alley between two office buildings. Both men pulled out sunglasses from their pockets and put them on, hiding their eyes from sight. They stopped midway through and waited.

A few minutes later, two Arabic men, about 10 years older than Justin and Francis, appeared from the other side of the alley, both carrying a black briefcase with them and wearing more casual attire then Justin or Francis. They got within a few feet of them and placed a device on the ground between them.

"An electronic jammer," the man explained, "No cops, no fuss. Understood?"

Justin simply nodded. "Show us the goods," he requested.

"Show us the money first," the other Arabic man demanded. Both spoke Romanian passably, but certainly were not fluent in it.

Justin nodded at Francis curtly, and both brought up their briefcases and opened them. Inside, the Arabic men found what they wanted.

"One hundred thousand Euros in used five and ten bills, as you requested," Justin explained, "Random serial numbers. These will be completely untraceable."

"Let us test them," the first man asked as he approached the money and grabbed a random stack of bills out of each case and examined them carefully.

"Satisfied?" Justin asked after about a minute.

"Yes, they're real," the man answered as he put the bills back and Justin and Francis shut their cases, "Now, I assume you'd like to examine your merchandise."

"Absolutely," Justin answered.

The man motioned to his partner, and they brought up their cases and opened them. "The finest opium you can find, harvested in the fields of Afghanistan only a week ago. Five kilograms, as you requested."

Francis was now visibly nervous. "Is he a cop?" the second man inquired as he looked at Francis.

"No, he's just not used to this sort of thing," Justin answered as he stepped forward and examined the opium. Each case contained small, sealed plastic bags, each containing a small amount of opium. Justin picked up a random bag from each briefcase and examined the opium inside. After a minute, Justin was sure this was the real deal. "You got yourselves a deal," he said as he put the bags back in the cases.

"You didn't open the bags," the first man noted, "Are you a doctor?"

"No, but I have worked with one before," Justin explained, "I think you'd like his methods. Old-fashioned, but effective."

"Not enough of those people around now," the second man said as the four began exchanging briefcases with each other, "Good doing business with you two."

"Likewise," Justin replied as the first man picked up his jamming device off the ground and walked past Justin and Francis and out of the alley.

"Is that it?" Francis inquired as he and Justin began walking forward through the alley.

"Yeah, now we just need to get this back to my place and I'll take care of the rest," Justin explained, "You'll receive a full reimbursement within the week."

Francis was too scared to ask how he would be getting that money back or what the opium would be used for. He was too scared, thinking that something was about to go wrong. Justin felt this tension immediately. His family all seemed to have a sixth sense for picking up on the emotions of others. It was one of the things that had kept them alive over the past thousand years. "Francis, don't worry. Things are going to be alright," he claimed as he patted his shoulder, "You're not going to get in trouble, I promise. And hey, now you don't owe me anymore."

Francis chuckled at that. "At least I'll never have to do this again," he reasoned, "So what does that village doctor of yours have in mind for five kilograms of opium?"

"Didn't say, but I'm sure he's come up with some great idea for it," Justin answered, "The man is a pure genius when it comes to medicine and healing wounds."

"So what do we do now?" Francis inquired as they approached the end of alley.

"We'll head back to my place and I'll take care of things from there," Justin answered as he turned a corner of the alley.

Suddenly, gunfire rang out and before he could get behind cover, Justin felt something rip right through his left shoulder painfully. He looked down at his left shoulder once he was behind the wall again and saw blood coming out from a gunshot wound. "Francis! Call the cops! We've been double-crossed!" Justin shouted as he pulled out his gun with his right hand.

While Francis quickly got into contact with the police, who wouldn't be that far away from this location, Justin heard chatter in Arabic from the gunmen outside the alley. From what he was hearing, they wanted to get the opium back and were wondering if Justin was dead. After about 30 seconds he heard someone running up the alley toward him.

Time to make that fucker pay! he thought as he quickly blind fired into the alley opening at various angles. After his third shot, he heard a shout of pain, followed by a body collapsing to ground and further shouts of pain. Justin knew he had self-defense on his side, but he didn't want to get Francis involved with this any further.

"Francis, listen carefully," he begin to instruct his friend, "When we hear the police sirens, I want you to take both briefcases and leave the alley through the other end, the one we entered. Make sure the cops don't see you. Go back to your place and stay there. I'm going to go to the hospital, but someone will come to your place to pick up the opium. He'll ask for some food, you reply that you'd be happy to share with him and he'll respond by saying, 'Actually, I was referring to your blood.' Creepy, yeah, but that's the way you know that I sent whoever comes to see me. Give them the opium and your hands are clean. Understand?"

"Yeah, I got it," Francis replied, "The cops should be coming any moment now."

Sure enough, a few moments later, the two of them heard sirens approaching them. "Francis, go, now!" Justin shouted.

Francis nodded and took a briefcase in each of his hands and began running down the alley. Justin heard the screeching of tires as the gunmen ran off before the police arrived. Justin couldn't hear the screaming man anymore and assumed that he had escaped with his partners.

Justin heard the sirens just outside the alley and then were joined by the screeching of tires, the clatters of cars doors opening and closing, and the chatter among police officers. "There's no one here!" one officer shouted.

"Look! There, in the alley!" another officer replied, "There's some blood."

"Somebody! Help me, please!" Justin shouted from where he was sitting, "I think I've been shot! Help!"

"Hey! Someone's in the alley! Call an ambulance!" another officer shouted, "Sir! Do you have any weapons on your person?"

"I have a handgun, that's it," Justin replied, "I think I got one of those bastards with it!"

"Can you toss it into the alleyway so that we can see it?" the officer asked.

"Yeah, just a second," Justin replied as he took the gun in his right hand and slid it along the ground away from him where the police could see it, "Can I get some help here?" He was now starting to feel a great amount of pain from his left shoulder.

"Don't make any sudden movements," the officer instructed, "We have an ambulance on its way for you. Do you understand?"

"Yeah, I got it," Justin answered, "Just hurry up. I'm in a lot of pain here."

Moments later, two blue-uniformed police officers appeared to Justin's left, aiming handguns at him. Justin made no motion to look at them as he raised his right hand slowly.

"He's got a wound in his left shoulder! It's bleeding pretty bad!" the officer further away from Justin shouted, "We need to get this guy to an emergency room immediately!"

Justin heard another siren in the distance, but this one was different from the police sirens. "Is that the ambulance coming?" he asked the officer in front.

"Yeah, sounds like it," he answered, "Can you tell me your name, sir?"

"My name is Justin," he answered.

"Last name?" the officer inquired.

"Belmont. My name is Justin Belmont," Justin replied.

"Okay Justin Belmont," the officer began as the ambulance arrived on the scene, "I've seen people survive worse things than this. You're going to be fine now. The medics are on their way to take you to a hospital. Just stay with us."

Justin nodded, showing he understood what he was just told. "When we get to the hospital, make sure to give my name for their records," he requested.

"I was going to do that anyway, but thanks for reminding me," the officer responded, "Just stay with us, Justin."

At this point, two medics with light blue uniforms rushed into the alley carrying an orange stretcher. Carefully, they placed Justin onto the stretcher and carried him back to the ambulance, which immediately took off for the nearest hospital, while the medics inside did what they could to patch up the wound and stop the bleeding.

In an apartment on the other side of the city of Bucharest, another Arabic man's cell phone rang. He answered it. "What is your status?" he asked.

"We have the money, 100,000 Euros," came the answer, "We were unable to recover the opium and Abdul took a shot to the abdomen. Once he gets back to headquarters, he should be okay. I'm sorry sir, but we failed you."

"Relax Anwar," Amir Muhammad replied, "As long as you have the money, we can finish our plans. Make sure you aren't being followed before you get back here and we'll help Abdul as best we can. And then we'll pack up shop and move west."

"Understood sir," Anwar replied as the he hung up his phone.

Amir Muhammad hung up his phone and stared out the window of his apartment room. He was the leader of The Sword of Allah, the last Islamic Fundamentalist organization operating outside of the Middle East. Over the course of his leadership, he watched as the numbers of his group had dwindled to fewer than 100. He knew that if his group died, all hope of their worldwide victory over the infidels would die with them. And without drastic action, the group's death was inevitable. There was just no way to find new recruits in this so-called new world. One by one, he saw every brother organization collapse via Internet news stories.

After a few minutes, he opened up his cell phone and scrolled through the contacts stored there. He eventually came upon a contact titled "Witch". Hesitating momentarily, he dialed the number there and placed the phone against his ear. The line rang three times before it was answered.

"Amir Muhammad, I knew you would contact me again," an almost devilish female voice greeted, "Have you give my offer any thought?"

"Let me make one thing clear to you, Miss Francescu," Amir began, "You are an infidel. I do not trust you. If you cross me, I will have you killed."

"You can try, but I don't think you could succeed," Francescu replied, "Now, have you acquired the 20 million Euros I require?"

"Yes, we have the money in the forms you requested," Amir confirmed, "Is there anything else you require?"

"One minor thing that we can discuss face-to-face," she answered, "I will send you coordinates to travel to in a few hours. Arrive at those coordinates on the night of the next full moon, which will be on June 8. Come with the money I requested and your most trustworthy men and I will tell you of my plan. I think you will find it to your satisfaction."

"You told me that you could hand me the world on a silver plate," Amir pointed out, "You better have not been exaggerating."

"Trust me, I wasn't, but that's all I can say for now," Francescu assured, "I look forward to meeting you." And with that, the line went dead.

Author's Notes: I decided to post this to get some initial reaction for this project, which I have been working on in my mind for a while. I know where I ultimately want this story to end up, and that ending may shock some of you Castlevania fans out there. The action in the story early on may seem rather unlike a Castlevania story, but we'll get to that stuff soon enough.

By the way, I put all the conversations in English although it is implicitly understood that most of the time the characters are speaking in their own native tounges (Romanian, Arabic, etc.). Just trying to make life as easy as possible for myself.

I am playing it safe and giving this story an M rating. If you feel that a T rating is sufficient, tell me as much in a review.

Speaking of which, please leave good reviews. They help me improve my writing. Thanks a lot!