There's a Bad Moon
On the Rise
Victor Frankenstein steps lightly along the cobbles with his coat drawn tight around his frame and bags under his sleepless eyes. It's too cold and too early for anyone to be stumbling through the streets sober, the first morning light hasn't even reached the chimney tops or broken through the clouds yet. He treads lightly but swiftly past the rowdy drunkards arguing in the alley way over a huge hound and the drunken layabouts asleep against the tavern door waiting for opening time to come again.
Caliban walks several steps behind him and he can feel The Creatures eyes on his back with each step, he wants to stop, tell him to leave him be; that he's working on it, that he doesn't need him watching his every move making him feel guilty and ashamed of himself. But he doesn't, instead he keeps walking, his head down and his mind already back in the lab.
He's seem the power of his creation, he's seen the heartless jaw-wrenching strength that can break a man's neck in one swift move, he fears Caliban, as he rightly should.
He knows what is coming next, knows that Caliban will shove him up against the wall once they get inside and threaten him, demand he hurry, that time is running out and so is his patience. Victor knows that he'll make promises that he's struggling to keep, that Caliban is forcing his hand in the wrong direction. Proteus had been a success but a delicate creature like him would never suit a vengeful creature like Caliban.
Caliban's mate had to be damaged like her partner, she had to suffer like he had and learn in the same way. The mistakes Victor made would need to be re-created for Caliban's mate to suit well beside him. The thought brought a sick feeling to Victor's stomach and his steps faltered slightly. How was he supposed to submit an innocent girl to the hands of his butchered son?
And where would it stop? Would Caliban and his bride shrink into the shadows never to be seen again? Would that be the end or would they come back in a few years asking after children. Victor couldn't stomach the thought. There was never going to be an escape, there would always be that guilt knowing that his morbid curiosity was skulking around towns looking for him, for the people he cared about.
There was a bad moon on the rise and Victor Frankenstein was to blame.
His greatest creation had brought nothing but misery and death down upon him, where he should have been the master he was Caliban's slave and Caliban ruled with an iron thumb. Victor would do as he wished because he felt he owed Caliban, that he had let him down and that this would make at least a portion of what had happened right.
Victor couldn't determine what scared him the most, fearing Caliban's wrath at being denied what he had wanted since Victor had abandoned him. Or knowing that he had let the one creature he was supposed to care for down again. He had no choice but to give Caliban what he wanted, he had after all brought it all on himself. Had he not ran away maybe things could have been different, his actions had determined his fate and now he was to live with the consequences.