He was, by birth, a Londoner. His father had a large house in Islington, easily affordable on his high-ranking lawyer's salary. He was rich and well respected, just like his father before him, and all of the Frankensteins previously as far back as records went. His mother had died when he was sixteen. If you were into psychoanalysing, you might reason that it was because of the loss of his mother that he set about trying to be the most unique, obscure man he could be. Maybe if he was unconventional, then conventional troubles like death and pain couldn't touch him -but that's impossible to say with any certainty. We may never know what his motivation truly was. It is doubtful that even he knew.
Of course, he would break the mould. If he conformed in any vague sense to what his father wanted him to be – a lawyer, a banker – then he wouldn't have been Victor; he would never have achieved his dream of being one of the great hipsters of our time. .
No: instead, he chose to major in advanced biochemistry, with a minor in fashion. It hadn't been easy, but he was enraptured by it, to the point of unhealthy obsession. He couldn't stand to be distracted from his ultimate goal: creating something totally new, in the laboratory as on the catwalk. Not something alive, but something new- something to set him apart from the pretenders.
His obsession resulted in him losing touch. With himself, and with reality. He thought himself a god, inherently above those who he associated with. When they came to ask him questions, or to his loft apartment in Camden – paid for, of course, by his perpetually disappointed father – he spoke and thought like a man humouring sewer rats. He had a girlfriend: a model whom he had met at his student fashion show: she was the only one he could imagine wearing his fashion line. His art mimicked his work in the labs, with obvious suturing and patchwork; bruise-coloured material and blood-red tights. Her physical presence made the end product seem uncannily similar to what he would end up crafting from dead flesh: his Creature.
But their relationship was hindered to his blindness to social cues: he didn't even kiss her, but whenever she inquired why not, he would just mumble something like, "Kissing? . . . No, no . . . Too mainstream . . . Everyone kisses, Elizabeth. Do you want to be like everyone?"
The same applied to anything beyond kissing, too. It rankled with her, but then she was so in awe of this amazing man that she could hardly argue with his faux-logic.
He saw little else than his compulsion, to the envy of his peers. His drive, attitude and uniqueness earned him a reputation, as well as a large group of friends and followers who regarded him as the greatest hipster that had ever lived. It wasn't uncommon to go into a coffee shop in Camden or Covent Garden and hear mutterings of his name from writers sipping at espressos as they struggled to muster an original thought between them. His exploits were public property: where was he now? What was he wearing lately? What was Victor making at the moment? Clothes?- Something else? Of course there were rumours that he had demanded increasingly peculiar and horrifying things from those who procured his materials for him, but no one suspected for a minute that Frankenstein would seriously be interested in spare limbs or internal organs.
Perhaps he could have enjoyed this acclaim, but he was unable to: until his work was consummated, it owned him.
In short, Victor Frankenstein was a man consumed by one single, unhealthy obsession, and it had been that way for as long as he could remember. It was the only thing that really mattered to him.
Raised voices emanated from the camera shop, despite the fact it was late, and dark, and there was hardly anyone around. It frightened the Creature, who had spent half an hour running about Camden in search of . . . Well, he didn't really know.
The voices were higher and lighter than his creator's baritone, or his own hideous exclamations. When he came up to the doorway of the still-lit shop, he perceived two people having verbal altercation, pointing at one another, with aggressive body language. The people appeared physically different from himself or his creator. Something told him that they were the same species, but maybe . . . They were of a different gender? Yes, that was correct – higher voices, smaller physiques. His keen sense of smell confirmed the difference, also. They were women, younger than his creator, but older than himself. He was only forty-five minutes or so old, after all. Not that he had the concept of time quite down yet – he just understood that the air was cold on his bare feet and arms, and that it was getting progressively darker. He had feared that it was something to do with his vision, but when he looked up into the sky and saw something bright and silver shining down upon the streets, he knew that he could still distinguish brightness. It had appeared magnificent to his eyes, but remembering the light bulb that had burnt his still-sore hands, he was still a little wary of that which shines bright.
That said, the shop with its doors still open, and its lights still illuminated, had attracted him like a moth to a flame. The voices had also drawn him in: despite being threatened by his creator, and the fact that the voices sounded hostile, he still couldn't keep away. Perhaps he was a sociable creature after all? Not that he understood the concept of friendship, or love, yet. These feelings were very basic, but still complex to him.
He couldn't understand what the two women's voices were saying, but something in the tone of the people made it sound very, very serious. He wondered if one of them had been physically injured, but he couldn't smell the metallic sting of blood in the air with his amazing sense of smell, like he could when he was back at the record store. He had known it was blood, because when he lifted his sutured arms to his nose, the same queasy mix of salt and metal assaulted his nostrils.
The women were peculiar-looking to him: their eyes were lined with black, making them look much larger than any he had seen before, and their skin seemed void of blemishes. That said, they smelt sickly sweet, with a smell of chemicals he couldn't identify as make up. Their clothes showed a lot of their tanned skin, and were flattering. He couldn't say they were beautiful, because he had no standard to compare them to, but to him in that moment, they were the most desirable creatures that walked the planet.
They smelled unpleasant to his sensitive nose, and this added to their arguments convinced him to hang back. After all, hadn't even his creator shunned him? . . . What if these apparently delightful creatures did the same?
He couldn't understand what they were saying, but he could hear:
"Could you just take a picture of me already, or do you want to bitch and moan at me some more first?"
"You are such a camera whore!"
"I'm a model. It's my job to get my picture taken, dumbass!"
"Yeah, whatever. 'Model'. Everyone knows you sleep with the photographers,"
"That was one time! I wouldn't have asked you to come and test out fisheye lenses with me if I'd known you were going to be a twat about it. Fuck, when did you become such a bitch?"
"Me? Bitch, you . . ."
But she stopped, trailing off. Her face drained of colour, and she grabbed the display of Canon cameras they were standing in front of to steady herself, in vain. She actually passed out, keeling over. She was staring at the front door, where the Creature stood.
The other girl frowned, and muttered something like, "Fucking drama queen . . ." before turning around, and trying to see what she was looking at.
Her breath caught in the back of her throat, and she went rigid and cold. Her eyes dropped to the floor, and gradually, painfully, ascended to behold the entire body of the seven foot spectre in the doorway. She opened her mouth to say something, but at that point he took a step forward, and made a horrific noise.
"I . . . I'm not gonna . . . S - Scream . . . I . . . What the fuck are you wearing?" She said suddenly, and though he couldn't understand her, he interpreted her unkind up-and-down look at him as a critical reception of his clothes.
His face contorted into a defensive expression, as he tugged at his sports top, and his tracksuit bottom.
"You don't come around here dressed like that unless you wanna get stabbed . . . I mean, it doesn't do you any favours, does it? Fuck, you've already got the whole plastic-surgery-gone-wrong look going on, why make it worse with those? She said, indicating his clothes again. Confused, he backed away, not liking the sound of her criticisms.
"I . . . I think you should just go, now . . . I – I'll call the police! . . . I'll say you hurt her! They'll believe me over a . . . A . . . A freak, like you! . . . Get out!"
He drew back, frightened, though she was much smaller than him. She didn't have his enhanced senses, or his muscles, but she still looked terrifying to him.
"Fuck off!" She screamed at him, lurching forward. This was enough to send him running out of the only shop with the lights on, and out onto the streets.
He sprinted around the streets, unsure of what to do, or where to go, until he saw another light: blue and red, with white squiggles that he couldn't have understood said, 'LONDON UNDERGROUND'. He'd made his way to the underground station, flying down the steps, vaulting the ticket barriers so stealthily that the skeleton-crew of underground workers didn't even notice him – not that he knew he was committing a crime by failing to pay for a ticket.
Though the steep escalator moving all by itself scared him initially, after a while he plucked up the courage to tentatively put one of his feet on the first step. His other foot was dragged along with it, as he clung to the step, sitting on it, not moving and quaking with fear. When he got to the bottom, he got off the escalator gladly, running for the nearest exit he could find, and coming across a platform.
There were very few people on the platform, and he found he'd reached a dead end, aside from a dark tunnel. He reluctantly climbed down onto what he didn't know was the train track, and began to walk into the dark, looming tunnel. Suddenly, from behind him, he heard drunken shouting that drew his attention.
"Hey, mate! . . . Mate! Get off the track, you wanker! . . . "
Frowning, the Creature turned around to face the only two people at the edge of the platform. But they'd already lost interest in him. He was far from disinterested in them, though: he stood in the middle of the track, looking at them quizzically, and listening to their slurred speech.
". . . Said 'e was, like . . . Working on some shit, I don't know . . . Something to do with science. Like . . . Organs and shit. Fuck,"
"I . . . I, I dunno, mate, I though, like . . . I thought he was a designer or something . . . I don't know a lot about him, though, 'cept from he's got a fuckin' fine bird . . . Doesn't even go near 'er, though . . . What a fuckin' waste!"
He noticed them swaying as they talked, louder than was normal in his experience – granted, his experience was limited to a threat and an argument, but they still sounded really loud. Maybe this was the normal talking volume? He memorised that for if he ever decided to try and speak again.
They were both men, both similar looking. Both wearing jumpers: one knitted, burgundy and oversized, and one grey jersey with an ironic original MTV logo on it. He couldn't have known that was what it was: he just thought it odd that two people would wear the same three-quater-length blue jeans and lace-up Keds as one another by choice. He presumed they were twins, or part of a tribe, or something. He couldn't have been sure, but it still seemed very weird.
"Seriously, mate . . . Th' train'll be here in like . . . A minute or something . . ." One of them called out to him. He suddenly became aware of a low rumbling, like white noise. It was coming from the tunnel that he was standing close to. He edged closer to it, and listened intently. He couldn't say how far away it was – he couldn't really make a guess based on experience, after all – but he could say with a fair degree of certainty that it was getting closer, because the noise was getting louder. Now there was a screeching sound, like screaming, or . . . Or? Or something more specific, more memorable to him . . .
. . . The sound of metal screeching on metal. It set his teeth on edge, and raised the hairs on his arms. It made him want to shake, which he did so violently. He used his depleted bodily control to back away from the tunnel, as if he could back away from the memories.
He saw light in the tunnel, and could see that something was approaching around a corner. There was a rhythmic pulsing roar, which was in line with his fast heart beat, and brought back even more memories for him.
Oh, the horror of being born – no, created! He was a wretch, not worthy or deserving of a birth, nor a name. The sound of his own heartbeat and the blood in his ears; the feelings of pain that accompanied the screech of metal-on-metal; the sudden bright light and dark loneliness which were entwined upon his awakening. . . These were the things that his current situation reminded him of. He scrambled up to the side, leaning on it for support, as he panted and stared at the oncoming headlights, just like the blinding illumination of the single, burning bulb.
The roar got too much for him: roaring himself, unable to hear the hideous noise that his mouth produced, he hoisted himself onto the platform just in time to be out of the way of the train, which slowed to a halt in front of him. It was well-lit, and not many people adorned its carpeted seats. He panted, staring confused at the train.
"Mate . . . Are you alright . . .?" Asked one of the drunken pair, as they came up to stumble through the door of the train, he put an arm on the Creature's shoulder.
The Creature made a noise that could only be described as a growl, rumbling up from his stomach, and overflowing from his mouth, escaping from his throat.
"Alright, easy!" The man said, falling backwards and away from the Creature.
"You're . . . Y' fucked, mate . . . Come on, then!" He said, not learning from his friend's mistakes, and tugging the Creature's arm, and yanking him onto the train. At that moment, there was a voice that the Creature couldn't identify the source of, which sounded unnatural and flat.
At that moment, the train began to move, making the Creature panic, as he was whisked away into the dark tunnels with the same screeching noises as before, but with the lights of the train and the idle chatter of his two new acquaintances to comfort him. He wondered where he would end up . . . If his creator would ever find him. Would he even care? He couldn't be sure . . .
He just knew that he was tired, and so curled up on a carpeted tube seat, the motion of the vehicle rocking him like a gentle hand, and fell through the welcome darkness behind his eyes until he was dead to the world and his creator alike.