Experimenting on yourself is the direct opposite of safe. Frankenstein's about as rational when it comes to protecting people as Rai is. Those two, I swear.

This is an AU where Frankenstein wasn't able to mess around with a kind of power that turns humans into crazy mutants and escape completely unscathed.

I posted an alternate scene from this AU in the Elegance Under Pressure collection - it's not how things went in this 'verse, as you'll see.

Grinding too-sharp teeth behind his mask, he scowled. With the Central Order Knights pursuing him like this, it was hard to find somewhere to conceal himself during the day. Since he'd taken in Dark Spear, their energy delighted in ripping holes in his gloves when there was a lapse in his control, and keeping track of a score of nobles at a time was distracting. It had been too long since he'd managed to get one alone, but, "The prideful nobles… they'll never think to look me here, in Lukedonia." There should be civilian nobles here, he could find one and wipe their memory. Then he'd have a guard during the day, as well as more time until the next episode. He had too much of that corrupt, mutated energy in his aura right now.

"You're right," he heard from behind him, and whirled. "Not many would have thought to find you here."

Damn.

Then they gave their names, and the Kertia clan leader just appeared right next to him. Revealing that he knew they were clan leaders stunned them enough to give him a bit of time to think, although the effect wasn't good enough with his smirk concealed behind the mask. Tinted lenses hid his eyes, to conceal that his own had long since turned red.

The physical symptoms got worse the longer he went without bite anything to earth the charge. Nobles worked best, because he didn't have to worry about infecting them with this energy and turning them into mutants as well – and it was painful to kill an animal he'd turned, the energy bonded him to it – but no. A creature as powerful as these clan leaders weren't going to just hold still so he could bite them.

He stunned them with his words on what their kind had wrought among humans, but eventually the battle began, the Kertia clan leader attacking.

He was outmatched, but he was beginning to get a feel for how the noble fought and devise strategies.

When the mask was knocked from his face.

It was useless to try to hide his blue skin, so he faced them squarely.

Both of them were shocked, but only his current opponent was stunned, jumping back to appear next to Gejutel. "Are you truly a human?" Gejutel examined the red-eyed man. "Did you somehow turn into a noble? A mutant! But I don't sense that anyone else has a hold on you."

"And no noble will ever get control over me, over my dead body." He bared his fangs at them. "Why so surprised by what your kind has wrought? Humans can't fight you, so I had to lower myself to becoming like you!" Scum like you. "You hunger for our blood out of greed and the desire to control us – it's fair for me to shed your blood, isn't it, when so many humans have bled for your negligence!" He wouldn't feel guilt about hungering for their blood, when they had fed on so many humans.

And of course it was only after seeing that he wasn't 'only' a human but partook of some of their nature that the younger one admitted he would need his soul weapon to deal with him.

Frankenstein had already gone too long without taking a noble's blood. Letting Dark Spear's energies of destruction into his body, when it was already hard-pressed to fight off what the warped noble power within him was trying to do to him…

He expected to die. To fall to Dark Spear, to unleash a mindless, rampaging thing on their island, the way they'd unleashed so many on human lands.

It was Ragar's words that woke him, that reminded him of his refusal to lower himself before them, to let them look down on humanity.

Not that he would ever be grateful to a damn noble.

Why isn't there anyone here? he raged, stalking through the manor. There should be a large staff, and that might have made it difficult to find a deserted corner but he was past the point where he could truly care about that. Especially with so much noble power hanging in the air, power and soul leaked from his prey and it maddened him like blood in the water.

He already almost died once tonight.

"There has to be someone who lives here, they couldn't – wouldn't – have evacuated this place, surely? Not over a mere human!" If he counted as a human anymore. In the human world, he would absolutely be a threat worth evacuating over, but to arrogant nobles? Can't their superiority complex work in his favor for once?

Finally he heard steps coming towards him in the darkness, and he stopped only to get a look at the noble.

He looked like a defenseless youth, simply-clad, but he had an impressive poker face. Or perhaps it was just a tired one. They regarded each other, Frankenstein trying his best not to be obvious he was waiting for a moment to strike. "That shirt…" the noble said finally, ignoring the blue-grey skin on Frankenstein's face.

"My apologies, let me return it to you," was what Frankenstein meant to say. Use that as an excuse to take a few steps forward into striking range, but the noble's lips remained parted after he said those words, leaving the sentence hanging there, and that uncertainty signaled weakness and Frankenstein was so empty.

Worse than empty, after letting Dark Spear flow through him – he heard their voices but they clawed at him. He knew he needed to use the blood to get control of this noble long enough to make them forget being bitten and make them think that Frankenstein has always worked here, but it had been a long night and he was so tired in a way no sleep but an eternal one can cure and this soul before him was so quiet and lonely and shy instead of fighting him when he couldn't resist anymore and lunged.

I work here, he remembered to push at the noble's mind, and then he slumped against their body, fangs still in that neck because this noble was powerful and he couldn't risk it wearing off. A bed, or a couch… politeness might keep them from searching the bedroom of a sleeping noble, especially because the nobles that slept regularly were the young ones.

They found the mutant with Sir Cadis Etrama di Raizel, in the Noblesse's sitting room.

It was unusual to see the Noblesse sitting, but it was alarming to see the mutant on top of him. Biting the Noblesse's neck. Gejutel felt Ragar's shock, and had to veto the impulse to cover the younger clan leader's eyes. Ragar had reached his age of majority and needed to be aware these things happen so he was properly motivated to send anyone who contemplated them to eternal sleep.

"Sir Cadis Etrama di Raizel," Gejutel greeted him, after seeing that the Noblesse did not look distressed, merely doing his elegant best to ignore that someone was doing something highly inelegant.

While Ragar followed his example, Gejutel gave Frankenstein a hard look. The mutant's red eyes were closed, and if Gejutel recalled correctly if a human was breathing that slowly they were likely asleep.

"He works here," Cadis Etrama di Raizel told them, after nodding to acknowledge Ragar's greeting.

It was only Gejutel's millennia of experience with the Lord that allowed him to cough and say, "He works here?" Making it very clear that he knew the Noblesse had just said something that was not true. This was the same Raizel that had no sense of direction, but… Well, they had a properly elegant Noblesse and look how that turned out.

"Yes," Raizel said firmly.

"Be that as it may, the Lord has requested his presence," Gejutel said, ignoring Ragar's confusion. He took a step closer and it was an effort not to react as the mutant woke up, wrenched its fangs from the Noblesse's neck and turned to hiss at him, as though a clan leader was supposed to be impressed by glowing red eyes and bared fangs. All they meant to him was a loss of composure – not that Gejutel hadn't done the same when he'd lost his own composure, but he didn't have to admit it.

Ragar looked to him instead of making his own display right back, because Gejutel had been raising Ragar right (not that there was much he could do about Ragar's nature, but he was doing his best). If Urokai was here he'd be disgracing Zarga with all the noise he'd be making. Gejutel supposed he was fortunate he was ordered to look after the Kertia – that clan understood quiet.

Perhaps satisfied that the two of them had acknowledged his authority when neither of them bothered to challenge him, the mutant made a pleased sort of growl and returned to Sir Raizel's neck.

Gejutel's eyes narrowed slightly in anger once the mutant was no longer looking at him. It was disgraceful. Earlier, Frankenstein was able to talk, to fight effectively, to trick not just Ragar but Gejutel. To see him reduced to this… Yes, this human did it to himself, but if he was telling the truth, if nobles were responsible for other humans having their hard-won elegance stripped from them then any right-thinking noble would be enraged. Or any right-thinking human. Enraged enough to forfeit their own elegance and become… this if it was the only way to gain the strength to act in accordance with their will to protect?

"He is not well," Raizel said, knowing he was stating an immediately obvious fact. Healthy humans didn't have pale blue-grey skin. "I will bring him to the Lord when he is recovered."

"Ah," Gejutel thought, closing his eyes for a moment. Of course the Noblesse would view mutants as an effect of nobles losing their honor. So was this evidence for Frankenstein's claims? If Raizel was taking responsibility for this, he hoped the Noblesse wouldn't spend power trying to cure the human. "We will report to the Lord," he told Cadis Etrama di Raizel, bowing and turning to go. The Lord was the only one who might be able to intervene and convince the Noblesse not to spend his life, even if he did not have the best luck convincing the stubborn Cadis Etrama di Raizel of anything.

Gejutel doubted that this mutant would ever recover from what he'd done to himself in his quest for power.

He woke up when the sunlight coming in through the two huge, glass-paned windows crept up high enough to hit his bare forearm.

The smell of singed human flesh was… distinctive. To someone who had to bury or burn too many dead. It was one of the frequencies in sunlight that did it – thank goodness the same frequency wasn't found in firelight, even if his modifications included night vision.

He moved his body out of the path of the too-bright light, fumbling in his shirt pocket for the glasses he wore to protect his eyes, which were far more sensitive than his skin, only to find there was no pocket. His spare glasses with the special lenses must have been destroyed with his shirt. He sighed and pressed a hand to his face because of course they were. He should be used to this by now. It was like the universe simply refused to allow anything he made to remain intact for more than a month.

Eyes firmly shut to prevent the sunlight from getting in and damaging delicate tissues (or worse, the attached nerves), he hummed under his breath for a moment to get a picture of the room and try to find an interior door.

He was aware he was lying on top of a noble prisoner, but his standards had fallen in the past several months, with the constant hunt, and thankfully he could just wipe their memory. Mind-controlling one of the Central Order Knights to keep a lookout was the only way he'd been able to get any sleep while the hunt went on.

With a rustling noise, the room dimmed. He froze, risking opening his eyes but there wasn't anyone near the curtains to close them.

"You are still wearing my shirt," he heard. He could feel the noble's hesitance to say it, but he absolutely understood why the noble felt he had to point it out. Nice shirts didn't grow on trees, and this house was so bare that if it weren't for the fact his interrogations revealed that nobles didn't have a currency or the concept of loans, he'd think it had been stripped of everything worth money by creditors. That sometimes happened when a family fell into poverty, after running up debts trying to maintain their former standard of living (and an upper-class family had to, to remain noble and have any chance of escaping ruin).

"I'm sorry," he said, before he realized that he was apologizing to a noble. "I don't have anything else to wear."

He jerked back, then froze, looking down at himself, when the fabric of his clothing began to move. Eyes wide, he watched it change form into his familiar clothing – even gloves to protect his hands from the sunlight and hide his claws. He reached up when he felt glasses over his eyes.

He needed to take a blood sample from this noble. No more fighting in rags when he was forced to destroy his possessions so they couldn't fall into enemy hands and was attacked before he could establish a base and make new clothing, no more… His face fell slightly when he remembered he'd need a lab for that and he was presumably still on Lukedonia. "Where am I?" he asked.

"My house," the noble said.

If the noble was being so helpful, then the mind control must have worked and he didn't remember Frankenstein biting him, thought the human belonged here. Good. "Did the clan leaders come last night?" He couldn't quite ask 'what happened' and get an accurate account with this noble's memory tampered with, not unless trying to recall events made the noble dig up the memory of Frankenstein's attack.

"I told them that you work here now."

Good, that was more evidence the mind control had taken despite his exhausted condition.

"They wished to bring you to the Lord, but he is…" The noble sighed. "You should not have to deal with him until you are well."

"So they'll return today, now that I've healed?" And was in condition to answer questions? Damn.

The black-haired noble shook his head. "You are not well," he said, looking at Frankenstein's face. He'd covered every other patch of skin on his body, but what he'd become was still visible there. "I told them that I would bring you to the Lord when you are well."

Frankenstein snorted. "So never, then."

He saw a small frown, could read worry for him on the noble's aura. "What's your name?" he asked.

"Cadis Etrama di Raizel."

"Why is your house like this?"

"It was a gift." From the sigh, it seemed as though he knew how extravagant this building was for one person.

Just to be sure, Frankenstein asked, "Does anyone else live here?"

The noble shook his head, then frowned, looking at Frankenstein.

"What?"

"You said that you work here now."

"I suppose yes, that would mean I live here." Not that he intended to stay in servants' quarters – not that this house had an area with smaller rooms for servants – but room and board was an expected part of the benefits of working in a manor like this.

…He did need a base of operations. A base of operations in Lukedonia itself would be perfect if he could keep the damn nobles from stealing his research. He supposed he could refrain from doing any research useful to them – focus on learning how to use Dark Spear, because it seemed he was going to need it in order to kill clan leaders. He also needed to find the ones responsible for backing the Union.

This building had plenty of space. It also had a noble he could mind-control, so he'd have something to bite on hand when the power built up too much. It was interesting that the mutants' urge to take the blood of others came from the need to get rid of the corrupt noble power that was inside them by channeling it into some other poor soul, but although gaining better control over the energies within him helped, eventually he would need to take something's blood. He'd tried once to dispose of the energy by letting Dark Spear have it, since having a piece of him might make them happy, but… not again. Especially in Lukedonia. He couldn't afford to be helpless, even temporarily.

He'd pick a part of this mansion for his lab, then take Raizel's blood for his research and ingest some of it so he could mind-control the noble into forgetting about that part of his house and staying out of Frankenstein's lab. Right.

Presentable clothing in seconds, even protective gear! Perhaps he should ask Raizel to conjure up one of the masks he wore for when he had to operate in daylight. No, he'd scout the surrounding area once he'd recovered a little more. Right now, he was weak enough he was having a hard time fighting off the impulse to just sleep until the sun went down and he didn't have to worry about the light-beyond-violet disrupting his energies anymore. He needed them under control so they'd heal him instead of just damaging his body further. Or transforming it.

He smiled bitterly at himself. Maybe he should just go to sleep. Until he healed up he was helpless against a clan leader – being caught sleeping wouldn't make any difference. If he took some fresh blood from Raizel, he could be sure the mind control wouldn't wear off while Frankenstein was asleep.

Decision made, he took one of the handkerchiefs saturated with a disinfectant out of one of his coat's waterproof pockets and reached out to take Raizel's hand. Turning it over, he swabbed down the noble's wrist. Noble skin was normally sterile, but biting into someone's skin was such a disgusting thought. Cleaning it off himself instead of trusting in noble powers let him feel a bit better about it, at least.

His fangs were already extended: they had been since he let his eyes focus on the vein in that delicate wrist.

He did not let himself shudder in front of a noble, but he hated this feeling. Vile, disgusting, like a street strewn with animal feces because the Union suppressed even his disease research to make it easier for them to spread plagues. He couldn't avoid touching it, or scrub himself down afterwards. It was his own body that made his skin crawl with utter revulsion. But he needed the power.

He wanted to be human again? Dark Spear wanted to be human again. There were so many out there in danger of being killed by the mutants or worse. It was so selfish of him to want to get rid of this power, spend however many decades it took researching an alternate method.

He forced himself to bite down almost as punishment for his selfish desires. Holding the blood in his mouth for now, he scrubbed down the noble's wrist again – the solution on the cloth would help the wound heal as well as disinfecting it. It tasted awful, but it was well worth it.

One would have thought that blood would be more effective held in the mouth, closer to the brain, but he got the best results after swallowing it. Perhaps because it was closer to the core of his energies? Now that he had a channel into the noble's mind, he looked up, meeting the noble's red eyes with his own. Eye contact helped mind control.

Not enough, it seemed.

This power! "Are you the Lord?" he demanded, enraged. Had he delivered himself to the Lord of the Nobles?!

The noble's eyes widened with alarm. "I decline," he said quickly, then hurried to hide the alarm under noble elegance.

"You decline?"

"I cannot be Lord. There is… something else I must be."

"And that something else?"

Raizel looked hesitant. "It is forbidden for any but the clan leaders to know of the Noblesse, but you are not a noble."

Damn right he wasn't.

"It is my duty to protect the honor of the nobles."

"Well you're doing a terrible job."

Eyes downcast, the noble nodded.

Well, that was unexpected. "You aren't going to claim that mutants are all the fault of human greed for power?"

The noble stared at him.

"That's what Gejutel claimed."

That earned him a frown – not at his transparent attempt to see if this would get the clan leader in trouble, but at the fact someone would think that.

Frankenstein returned his attention to the blood link before it could vanish – with nobles, he always lost it after his stomach acid finished destroying their blood. He hadn't been able to change Raizel's memories or affect his will, but he could understand how he'd missed that last night, when Raizel's mind was willing to accept the thoughts he sent it, and comply with his orders, without putting up a fight. The noble was powerful, but soft, sad, lonely.

Was he blaming himself for his inability to do his job? Not that Frankenstein could throw stones, when he hadn't been able to put a stop to the nobles and their quislings. He was trying, but trying didn't matter to the dead, which was why he couldn't blame Dark Spear for hating him. At all.

"You'll have to teach me how you made this," he told the noble – Raizel – while looking under the sleeve of his coat at the shirt underneath. Even got the lace right. So unless Raizel was one of the criminals and someone had brought him one of Frankenstein's shirts, he'd gotten that information out of Frankenstein's mind.

Raizel blinked and nodded. It looked as though Frankenstein's words had surprised him enough to jar him out of his guilt, at least temporarily. Frankenstein understood blaming yourself for not being able to stop the criminals – at least Raizel had clearly known there was a problem, unlike the oblivious Gejutel and Ragar.