The Darkness Within

He didn't understand how this could've happened, everything was going so perfectly at the Christmas party and all of a sudden she just ran off in tears out to the Haunted Forest, of all places.

Dracula would have given her time to calm down, but when the Armor Guard reported to him where Elona had gone an overwhelming instinct told him to go after her before she got hurt, and he feared he might be too late as his acute hearing heard her scream. It made his heart drop and his blood run cold as he set out to search for her.

Zooming out the revolving door as indigo mist and taking bat form, he flew as rapidly as his supernatural speed allowed him to across the long bridge and into the snowy and heavily misted forest.

"Elona!" he cried out, looking all around his surrounds as his Vampire Far Sight searched hither and yon to find his runaway love, but so far only saw bare skeletal trees, snow and mist, all the while desperately calling her name.

"Elona, where are you?! Whatever I said, I'm sorry! Elona!"

He continued to call her name; worry grew within Dracula more and more as his Far Sight searched the cold ominous forest until he finally spotted her silhouette among the mist, laying as still and unmoving as the tree roots upon the snow covered ground.

"No! No, no, no," he cried as he suddenly resumed his human form in a puff of indigo mist.

He fell to his knees by her side as he gingerly gathered her into his arms to gently cradle her unmoving form, her body was still warm enough even he could feel it yet he still felt the warmth and life fading from her body.

"Elona! Elona, can you hear me?!" he pleaded as panic nearly overcame him.

She remained unmoving and unresponsive to him as he gently shook her limp form to coax some response from her but it was to no avail as his eyes began to glass over as he cradled her closer to his own cool body to nuzzle his face deep into hers, his hand cradling her back then felt something slick and wet.

Something far too familiar.

He looked up to slowly bring his hand into view as his breath caught in his throat to stare at the deep crimson blood staining his hand; old suppressed instincts threatened to resurface within him but he mentally pushed them away.

With his enhanced sense of smell, Dracula took a whiff of his fallen love's blood, and indeed it smelled wrong, off somehow, no doubt the condition she poured her soul out to him about. But something else smelled wrong with it, something familiar yet sinister.

"Venom," he breathed.

In his centuries of existence he knew all too well of different Vampiric abilities, especially the differences between those like himself, such as members of his family, and the overrated dimwits in service to his father.

His face twisted in a sneer as his teeth grit hard as he whispered with a disgusted and glacier cold tone, "Bela."

He'd always found Vlad's minions, especially their now humiliated leader, to be nothing but embarrassments in their very existence to monster kind hardly worth anyone's attention which just added to his amused disgust with them. But now that insignificant overlooked disgust with Vlad's minions had now turned into a growing burning hatred, a kind of hatred he hadn't felt in decades, not since that night.

Only a moment had passed as he breathed out the vile creature's name, for as though by some mystical summoning, Dracula then heard a pair of maniacal laughs and cackles as he finally saw two familiar inhuman figures emerge from the mist and shadows, Bela and Quasimodo.

"You!" Dracula spat out as he saw the former leader of the Cronies and his former head chef approach him yet his growing disgust and loathing turned to confusion as he said, "Quasimodo, what's the meaning of this? Why is the overgrown chew toy with you again?"

Bela gave a dirty glare for the insult, but Quasimodo just gave a low evil cackle as he looked at Dracula with an evil smirk to tell him with smug venom in his voice, "Ze meaning of zis, Monsieur Dracula, is simple le revenge."

Dracula could only be silent with shock as he continued to cradle an unconscious Elona.

Bela smirked as he said in a snarling voice with ecstatic malice, "I now see revenge as just a perk. Once this damn 'you can't go wherever you want' curse if lifted, I'm gonna show you and that traitorous Vlad what it means to be a real monster, starting with destroying that stupid human infested hotel!"

This made Quasimodo stare up at Bela angrily as he scolded the bigger monster, "You will do no such zing, we agreed ze hotel is mine!"

"I don't remember that!" Bela said with clear dismissive disinterest, "Whatever you thought you were getting out this pathetic team up, I never really cared!"

Quasimodo swore in arcane French as he yelled in growing anger, "You miserable brainless excuse for a flying rat, you knew perfectly well I wanted ze hotel! I want to return it to its former glory as a sanctuary for monsters only as its rightful manager, and you won't lay a claw on her!"

Bela just rolled his eyes as he snapped back, "Oh puh-lease, like we need a place to hide from the world like cowards. That's all that joke of a place it is, a place for cowards and my crew's gonna wipe it from the face of the earth! Monsters shouldn't have to hide from the world, we conquer it!"

"You or any of your miscreant brutes try to lay on a damn claw on my beautiful hotel; I'll make your teeth rot so good you'll need to suckle blood through a woman's teat!" Quasimodo challenged in anger.

"Ha, ha, ha, I'd like to see you even try it, short stake!" Bela shot back in amusement.

"I will, 'cause after years of hard laboring slavery, I'm stronger zan I look, and I'll pound your hideous face into ze ground!"

The two shaky allies' arguing had become inaudible to Dracula, completely shut out from his own mind, as did the rest of the world around him. Everything just faded away as he gently laid Elona onto the soft snow and stared at his own blood stained hands, the blood a vibrant crimson against his pale skin in the dark backdrop.

It has happened again, like a vicious circle fated to plague and curse his semi-immortal life. Love, a Zing comes into his life like a whirlwind and brightens his mostly lonely and drab gothic world as a beacon in the lonely night. But then fate conspires against him and it's taken all away, lost in one seemingly fell swoop.

Memories of Martha's death threatened to resurface and haunt him once again, as Dracula could all too clearly see her dead body in pools of blood like Elona is now.

A moment stretched into eternity, but a moment was all it took.

What no one knew, what no one but Vlad could truly understand was while Dracula had feelings like anyone else, allowing himself to feel emotions such as happiness, joy, even love, he always had to have a great disciplined control over his more destructive emotion, especially his anger.

While he expressed it with an occasional glowing red eyed roar, he maintained enough control to never allow himself to give into rage. A rage he hadn't felt for some centuries now, and never wanted to feel again.

But it only took this moment for it to snap, a moment for centuries of discipline and self control to built up higher than China's Great Wall to come crumbling down like brittle glass; for a mighty dam to finally crack and break to release the waters it held back for so long to cascade forth and release the deluge; to finally awaken the centuries long dormant volcano and unleash it's fiery fury.

Those occasional roars didn't even scratch the surface.

His stare became an angered scowl as he squeezed his eyes shut tightly and clenched his sharp jaw, his hands slowly became fists as Elona's blood stains evaporated into nothingness in thick wisps of indigo mist from his hands.

His entire countenance became still and ice cold as something dark, sinister, and nightmarish welled up with him, something long suppressed and beyond eager to resurface, something predatory and dangerous.

"Bring it on, pipsqueak!" Bela challenged with a smirk as he leaned down and protruded his chin out enough for Quasimodo to punch him, not that he expected anything so hard.

"Oh, I will!" Quasimodo sneered happily, "Because when I'm done with you, being the were-brats' chew toy will be happy nostalgia in comparison for you!"

"You're height must show how much brains you gots, because it just shows how little you got!" Bela just further mocked, "And I'm through with the small talk, Ha, ha, haaah!"

"SILENCE!"

That one word, though spoken as a whisper, may as well have been thunder as Dracula's voice had become a bit deeper, more primal, and echoed otherworldliness.

It alone made Bela and Quasimodo cease their arguing and stared at the infamous Count with confusion, awe, and a bit of fear.

It was as though a crack of thunder had boomed from somewhere so close, yet it was felt more on an ethereal level rather than physical and somewhere from deep within the earth to make even the other monsters be weary of the Prince of Darkness as dark violet and darker indigo and even black mist surrounded his figure as he spoke slowly with a cold anger in his now preternatural voice,

"You have just made your last fatal mistake."

Emotions raged within him, churning at his guts and welled up hotness within his chest. His thoughts became a haze as only one thing implanted itself upon his mind; Rage. And Hunger. Hunger for vengeance. For justice. For Martha. For Elona.

His entire figure became enveloped in the dark mist of magic, softly but sinisterly wisping and billowing about his kneeled figure enough so his long elegant black cape and the mist had seemingly become one and the same. Yet the unconscious Elona remained untouched.

His fists snapped open as his nails grew into long deadly talons to nearly rival Bela's own; his mouth opened as he gave off a snarling growl as his already formidable fangs grew to twice their length as his face became sunken in and skull like and paled more to a ghostly white; his eyes then snapped open, revealed to be the glow of the deepest blood red crimson with no whites, no irises, and no pupils were visible, his eyes now only glowed as two fiery pits of the Hellish underworld.

Bela and Quasimodo now witnessed before them only the beginning; a mere sampling of why Dracula is called the Prince of Darkness.

The now changed Dracula slowly rose, his long misted cape billowing sinisterly and ominously behind him as though living shadows. Quasimodo began to whimper and mumble a bit incoherently with a growing fear as he witnessed his boss's transformation, a fear that seemed to invade his mind and burrow its way into his soul as though a glacier cold intangible force from the ether to overpower and takeover his entire consciousness to only know fear, as though to be eternally hunted and devoured at any moment.

Meanwhile, Bela, while also in awe, only saw Dracula as finally offering a worthy challenge he had been denied for some years now. He gave out a beastly roar to call to his two other compatriots, giving a look to Carridine and he knew what to do.

Carridine gave his own equally beastly roar to summon his followers, slumbering deep within Vlad's cave. The roar echoed far into the night to make various glowing red eyes open to the summon; moments later the swarm of Bat Cronies heeded the call, wasting no time in flying out into the night.

Beastly shrieks echoed throughout the forest as dozens more Bat Cronies flew to the roaring call, many laughed maniacally and evilly as they finally got the chance for action and destructive violent fun they had been denied for months upon months.

Some of the gang landed with hard thumps into the ground between the three Bat Cronies and their hunchbacked ally, and the red eyed shadow misted Dracula. This made Quasimodo smirk evilly at how the tables had turned in their favor.

But he couldn't help but feel duped as he snarled at Bela with a shaky but ice cold tone, "You said this was nothing to worry about! That doesn't look like nothing to me!"

"Obviously you don't know nothing about us Vampires," Bela said arrogantly, "I didn't say it was 'nothin'', I just said don't worry about it. But you're so dumb, you don't see I bent the truth a little."

Quasimodo just growled in frustration at this as Bela ordered with over enthusiasm in a shout, "Destroy him, boys!"

For a moment Carridine glared at Bela for daring to try and usurp his leadership, but he let it go for now as he and the others gave vicious wild roars to launch into the air at the misted shadow of their intended target, claws and fangs bared, ready for the kill.

But it proved futile as one Bat Crony tried to ensnare Dracula, but merely past through him as though he were nothing but thin air, leaving him with a look of confusion to stare back at the shadowed Dracula who returned with a soul shattering look of hatred.

Quasimodo's face quickly dropped to again have a look of dreaded fear, yet Bela just dismissed his confusion as he gave another snarl and became determined not to be stopped from his need for destruction and 'monstrous' fun.

One by one members of the Bat Crony crew continued to try and attack Dracula and do him harm, but it was all for naught as they merely passed through his misted shadow form.

All this did was aggrivate and further enrage Dracula.

From his own point of view time seemed to slow, and the entire world became akin to the view of a heat reading camera with the surrounding land of snow covered trees and ground in hues of deep blues and greens while the warmer heat radiated in deep blood reds, oranges and yellows from the bodies of living creatures, glowing in his sight like beacons of which he saw as clearly and sharply as pure crystal glass the patterns of individual blood veins and arteries as the life giving blood flowed through their bodies, while even his acute enhanced hearing heard loud and clear like thunderous war drums the heart beats of the living creatures around him.

It all beaconed him, stirred in him the long denied instincts now resurfaced to become all consuming one of life's most ancient creations. Now, not only must he protect his mate, he must satiate his Hunger as it demanded of him.

How he now undeniably craved the power of the life giving nectar of all living creatures.

As another Bat Crony tried to attack the undisputed Lord of the Undead, with astonishing speed Dracula grabbed the Crony by his thick neck, making him choke hard, and held it with even more incredible strength. He then stared at him straight in the eye in with his own sinisterly glowing red ones as he easily took over the Crony's mind and penetrated deep into his primitive psyche to make him more submissive.

Dracula then opened his mouth wide, as did the Crony like a mirror image, as a pale ethereal blue mist emanated from deep within the Crony's throat and into Dracula's open mouth.

As the ethereal mist vanished into Dracula's mouth, there then came the sudden sound of a cracking neck as Dracula squeezed on the Crony's neck harder to then ram his body into the soft snow covered ground hard enough to make the earth shake and leave a deep dent in the earth twice the size of the Crony's body. He then suddenly set to sinking his long deadly fangs into the creature's neck and within seconds was drained of every drop of blood, the Crony now nothing but an empty husk with an emptier gaze from lifeless staring eyes with a pale gray tint to them now.

Just as he once threatened to kill Johnny, the Crony's body had been sucked of blood to almost be a deflated whoopee cushion.

For a long moment, Bela, Quasimodo, and all the other Bat Cronies could only stared on in shocked confusion, but this only lasted a moment as more mustered up the courage to attack Dracula, but the same thing only happened to another attacking Bat Crony, and then another, and another.

Finally realizing their attacks were in vain, some of the Bat Cronies fled into the misted forest, making Bela shout at them,

"Come back here, you cowards! He's just one guy, it took his entire stupid hotel to defeat us! C'mon, get back here and destroy him!"

Dracula then gave a frightful wild roar in defiance and triumph to the sky, his claws bared and black misted figure encircling Elona as though a protective blanket, having downed a few of his monstrous victims and drank their blood. For with every ounce he fed from, he became stronger, more powerful.

Finally realizing his ally's gang was outmatched, fear grew stronger within Quasimodo to make him realize he now had no other choice; he ran in the opposite direction from Dracula, deeper into the forest.

Bela finally noticed this as he growled irately, "Oh no, you don't, get back here, you little runt!"

He set to chasing his pathetic ally, though Quasimodo was still very quick and nimble to stay ahead of Bela. All Quasimodo knew in that moment was he needed to get away from the now feral Vampire.

Dracula gave a dark smile as he watched the prey scattered about him, a new hunt had finally begun.

Part of him dared not to leave his mate unprotected, but the night beaconed to him, called to him to seek out prey and quench his renewed bloodlust, satiate his Hunger.

He flew as mist in a random direction as he fully embraced what he had denied himself for so long.

At last he was free.


Back at the hotel, the lively and warm party continued without any awareness of what had just happened to their now absent host.

Mavis and Johnny laughed at a rather hilarious joke Pedro had told them, though it had taken Johnny a second longer to understand what it meant.

"Ha, ha, ha," Johnny laughed, "Pedro, dude, you remind me of a friend back in Santa Cruz, he always told the funniest awkward jokes."

"Thanks, man," Pedro said with a knuckle bump to Johnny, "Yo, seriously, how'd Mav land the coolest human in the entire freakin' world?"

"You really want to hear the story again, P?" Johnny said.

"We all do," Hank concurred with a crooked smile.

Johnny was about to tell Mavis's friends the story of how they met again but when he looked at his lovely wife she had a rather odd look on her face, like she was suddenly worried about something and it chilled both of them to the marrow.

Not too far from them Dennis was playing with Winnie at one of the game tables when he too got the same worried look upon his young cherub face and just stopped playing, making Winnie ask if he was okay.

Vlad chatted with some human townspeople, among who was Dr. Simon, as he regaled them with stories of Dracula as a kid as he drank some blood red cider. They laughed as he shared another story of a young Dracula and was about to take another sip of his cider when he just froze as he sensed something wasn't right as his psychic senses just went on high alert, becoming so aroused no spoken words were able to truly bring understanding to a non-supernatural.

"Oh, no," he breathed out as he dropped his glass and it shattered with a noise easily overlooked by a crowded Great Hall full of reverberating echoes, but enough to worry the small group he had been talking with.

"Your Grace, your drink!" Dr. Simon gasped, "I'll get you another one."

But Vlad didn't listen as not a moment had passed when his fears were confirmed.

"Mavis, what's wrong?" Johnny asked, and was about to make a joke about her seeing a ghost, but not a half moment passed when he too seemed to sense something was really, really wrong.

At the game table, Winnie finally understood why her Zing had stopped playing at the same time her own parents and hundreds of werepup siblings heard a spine chilling roar from the air outside the hotel.

All this happened mere seconds before mere human ears heard the otherworldly roar which carried so strongly upon the winds it made the entire party come to freezing stand still to even make the zombie orchestra stop playing and chill them to their rotting bones. A few silent but confused seconds passed as the entire crowd stopped, wondering what they had just heard and all somehow sensing something wasn't quite right.

A rather long pregnant second passed as murmurs of confusion finally began to reverberate throughout the Great Hall, snapping Mavis and Johnny back to reality as they saw Vlad headed for the door.

"Guys, I need you to stay here, and keep the party going," Mavis told her friends, making them give looks of confusion.

"Why, Mavis?" Hank asked, "What going on? Does it have to do with that weird noise?"

"I can't say, but please, trust me, keep everyone here and keep the party going," Mavis said with a serious tone, yet pleaded with her friends, "Something suddenly doesn't feel right."

"You got it, Mavis," Wendy said with a salute.

She, Johnny, and Dennis followed Vlad and were soon joined by the Drac Pack, their lady friends and even the pack of werepups to all gather together in the lobby.

"What's going on?" Frank now asked, "Why is everybody in the lobby? And where's Drac?"

"He went to find Elona," Johnny explained, "All I know is she got upset about something and ran out, then I overheard one of the security Armor Guards tell him she ran into the spooky forest; so they're probably still out there."

"Something's wrong with Drac," Vlad said with a serious stone hard tone, "I can sense it, and it won't be good for anybody, human or monster. We need to find them fast before Drac kills somebody."

"What do you mean, Grandpa?" Mavis asked with confusion and growing worry.

"No time to explain, you, me, and Denisovich have to search from their air, while the rest of you look from the ground."

"Okay, guys, you heard Vlad," Johnny said with initiative, "We'll go through the forest in teams, me, Frank, and Griffin, while Wayne goes with Murray."

"I don't know, Johnny," Wayne said with some doubt, "My sniffer isn't so great after so much…"

"Okay, Wayne, I'd hate to get the pups involved, but we'll need all the help we can get."

Wayne gave a nod as he said, "They won't let you down, and I know just the pup to lead the way."

Winnie was already front and center as Mavis, Vlad, and Dennis became bats and flew out the door as the others followed close behind, Eunice, Carol, and Nefi followed while Wayne told Wanda to stay behind due to her latest pregnancy.

As the Vampire family flew through the air, worry lines deepened Vlad's elderly face, making Mavis and Dennis worry even more as well.

On the ground, the Drac Pack and the ladies split away only a short ways from each other as they searched the forest for any sign of Dracula or Elona.

Wayne told his pups to sniff out any sign of their friends and to focus only on those scents. Winnie was ahead as she picked up a familiar female human scent, giving a worried whine as she called out to everyone to follow her as she sniffed out for Elona.

"She's here somewhere," Winnie said, "But I think something is wrong. Mr. Ugly and that mean Quasimodo were here, too."

"That can't be good," Griffin said.

Winnie continued to sniff as everyone looked around the area, until Frank finally called out, "Over here, I found her! She doesn't look good."

Frank gently gathered Elona into his large hands as everyone else gathered around, Johnny looked her over and became fearful as he saw how pale she had become. He felt a pulse, but it was weak and her body temperature was cooler than normal.

They also all saw the small pool of blood staining the white snow as Frank moved his hand enough to see more blood staining it.

Johnny felt his heart just drop as he said with a dead serious and urgent tone, "Get her back to the hotel as quickly as possible, she needs a doctor!"

They started to head back for the hotel when Murray saw something that was all sorts of wrong.

"Uh, guys," Murray spoke up rather softly with apprehension, "Is that what I think it is?"

The Drac Pack and the ladies gathered closer to a large form laying deathly still near where Elona was found, and it was the unmistakable body of a now dead Bat Crony.

"He's dead," Griffin said quickly with shock as realization set in as he examined the body more closely, "He's completely drained. What happened here?"

"There's another one," Murray pointed to another too far away.

"I see more over there," Eunice said as she pointed to at least three more dead and drained Bat Cronies, "This is too freaky, what the hell happened here? Did Drac do this?"

"Let's get back to the hotel," Johnny ordered, feeling the urgency of the situation even more now, "Let's hope Mavis and the others find him. I'm getting a bad feeling about this."

Wayne then noticed something that made his heart just drop.

"Wait, where's Winnie?" he demanded, fatherly protective instincts surged up within him.

Looking around, no one saw her and they called for her with new worry and fear.

Having found Miss Elona, Winnie then sniffed another familiar scent and followed it, but something about it seemed weird, in a really wrong way. It was Uncle Drac's scent, of that she was sure but it smelled different somehow as well, like he was made of air or was something…bad, or scary and not in the good way she knew.

She sniffed the air and ground around her as she walked on all fours, certain she was close to finding Uncle Drac.

She then caught sight of something strange as she slowed her pace to investigate closer. It was a large dead deer, and it was fresh, not even dead a few minutes.

Winnie got up to walk on her hind legs as she looked more closely at the deer and her keen sight couldn't help but notice two still bleeding holes on the deer's neck.

She gave a soft breath as she tried to not think about what that might mean.

Sniffing the air some more she then saw another freshly dead animal, a goat with large spiraling horns, and upon closer inspection also had two holes in its neck and had been completely drained of blood.

As Winnie cautiously followed the short path of dead and drained prey animals, she began to breathe heavily as her misted breath thickened as the chilled air became colder around her enough for her to shiver beneath her thick fur.

She then suddenly heard what seemed to be a faint but hard crash and then a biting crunch of flesh as a bloodcurdling scream gargled from some poor victim, making her momentarily flinch.

Winnie continued on her path as she then sighted through the trees movement of two strange shadows, one seemed covered or made from dark mists. She slowly approached them, the misted figure seemed to make squeamish slurping and sucking sounds as though feeding off of the other larger shadowed figure.

She just watched with some grossed out fascination as she slowly approached the figure, her nose telling her clearly who it was yet she just couldn't believe it. He seemed to not notice her or chose to ignore her, until she unintentionally stepped on a rock hidden by the snow that stubbed her toe and made her give a small pained cry.

This made the misted figure stop feeding to give a dangerous growl at this sudden interruption, which allowed Winnie to see the familiar shape of a high collar and slicked back midnight black hair as he kneeled over a now unmoving giant bat creature.

She took another step closer and the figure just suddenly turned his face to face a shocked Winnie, a monstrous ghostly white face, sunken in and skull like to enhance sharp features of a familiar but nearly unrecognizable face.

He glared dangerously at her with glowing fiery blood red eyes as he gave a low snarl with blood stained lips to reveal fleshly stained teeth and long deadly fangs as fresh blood drooled from his mouth while he held up a ghostly white and gnarled hand to show long deadly sharp claws also covered in blood.

"U…Uncle Drac?" Winnie breathed low, uncertain it was truly him she was seeing.

He just gave a low growl as he glared at her with a clear burning anger, not realizing from his point of view he saw her body heat as clear as day as he listened to the hard beating of her heart as it sped up with a growing fear; and it just enticed him even more.

As Winnie just stared at her changed uncle, unexpectedly he changed before her eyes into a dark indigo and black living mist with the same glowing red eyes to momentarily billow away from the Bat Crony's fresh corpse to slither to and fro with a foreboding grace like a snake of fog and towards her. Winnie took some steps back as cold fear grew within her, the very mists and snow of the forest seemed to increase all around the both of them.

If this was really Uncle Drac, why was he doing this? What was happening to him?

She backed away a bit more as he got closer, steadily the mist rose to tower over her and partially reform into Dracula as he seemed prepared for something unfriendly towards the young werewolf.

Winnie suddenly tripped as she began to whimper with fear, her heart pounding in her chest as his misted cape flared like a giant cobra hood and he suddenly gave off a bone chilling roar at her.

"RAAARRGH!"

"AAAAAAH!" Winnie screamed, echoing throughout the forest to get the attention of everyone else, even in the sky.

Winnie finally got back onto all fours and ran like her life depended on it, and in this case it truly did.

Yes, young one, run. Run as fast as you can for it only entices him more, makes him thirst for fresher untainted blood of the young, to add to his power and become stronger.

He gave a low sinister laugh as he watched her run, allowing a ten second head start so as to revel in this brief but invigorating thrill of the hunt.

Winnie ran as fast as her little legs could carry her, zigzagging through the trees as she could hear and smell her now scary Uncle Dracula behind her. This wasn't some fun game, it was real danger and it confused her as to why he was doing this.

He was her Daddy's best friend and her Zing's Papa, he was always so nice and fun to be around. What happened to make him so scary and mean now? Was it because Miss Elona was hurt?

She barely had a moment to really think about this as she just tried to find a place to hide, or even find her Daddy and the others. She took a brief look behind herself to see Dracula flying through the air as mist, easily going around or even through the trees like they were nothing, chasing her down with a honed in focus like she was to be his next meal.

She finally saw a big enough tree she tried to hide behind as she panted and heaved so hard her chest hurt and she needed to catch her breath and hoped it was enough to evade the feral Dracula. She could smell and almost hear him get closer to her, so tried to quietly move around the big tree to keep out of sight as she sensed him slow and nearly stop close to where she hide. She heard him actually smell the air as though trying to detect her scent upon the air as he gave a low growl.

Moving further behind the tree she slowly peeked around to see his misted form drift by looking for her. For a moment he almost saw her as she hid again, but he showed no sign he saw her as he finally drifted past with a nearly quiet sigh of air and blended with the air and shadows of the snow covered forest.

Winnie backed away in the opposite direction as she tried to catch her breath, her heart still pounding hard in her chest as she tried to decide where to go now or how to get back safely to the hotel, unaware of small billows of mist behind her began to swirl up from the ground and gradually reform into a familiar figure.

Sensing something dangerous right behind her, she slowly turned to see Dracula from the dark mists practically feet from her, to then growl dangerously at her with malicious intent.

"AAAHH! No, no!" she screamed as she tried to back away from him again as he drifted closer to her, readying to feed on her as she pleaded, "Uncle Drac, please, don't! It's me, Winnie! Don't you remember?! Please, please, don't hurt me!"

She found herself trapped as her back hit the big tree again, unable to escape as the snarling Dracula cornered her and his face was inches from hers. She panted hard as she saw him look ready to bite her like he did those big uglies, the fear in her eyes added to his power as he psychically fed from it.

But for some reason, he just stopped and stared at her straight in the eyes, as though something changed in him and he truly recognized her, sensing a familiarity from her through her fear.

"Winnie," he nearly whispered slowly with an otherworldly voice, like something ominous upon the air as the tip of a sharp talon lightly stroked her above an eye.

"Yeah," Winnie squeaked, "It's me, Winnie. Remember?"

He seemed to back off a bit when there came a beastly roar from above to grab Dracula's attention; another Bat Crony flew right at him challengingly and Dracula easily caught him by the shoulders as they briefly wrestled, each testing each other's strength until Dracula just pinned the Crony on the ground and sank his fangs into the creature's neck to make him gargle out a pained scream, momentarily making pools of blood fly.

Winnie just watched in frozen horror what her uncle just did when a familiar male voice called out with worry, "Winnie!"

Through the trees she saw Johnny, the ladies and the Drac Pack running towards them and she just ran to Wayne as she yelled, "Daddy!"

She was safely in his arms again as she sobbed with some fright into his shoulder, the others briefly watched what was happening to just gape in shock.

"Drac?!" Johnny gasped, "What the hell happened to you?"

Dracula just took a sharp breath as he finished off the Bat Crony and tossed the limp body aside like trash not worth his attention to then stare at Johnny with malice in his glowing red eyes.

A chill ran down Johnny's spine, not liking how his father-in-law now looked at him; not like family, but as his next meal.

Yes, though he grew stronger with each piece of prey he consumed, this kind of prey was what he truly craved above all else: human. He can smell them at the nearby fortress and a village not too far away upon the air, and it called to him like a siren. But, for now that one will be a good start, for he has been denied it for far too long.

He flew right at Johnny in a shot, making him give a brief girlish scream and grabbed Johnny by his jacket as he flew them straight up into the sky above the canopy of the trees, growling at Johnny as he gave off frightened yells.

"Drac!" he cried, "Drac, stop, don't! It's me, Johnny! C'mon, dude, snap out of it!"

Dracula just growled at him with a clear hungry rage, making Johnny whimper as he realized his pal wasn't the friend and fatherly figure he had known for seven years, but the monster of legend.

But then something seemed to change in the enraged Dracula as his eyes squeezed tightly for a moment and he gave a strained groaned. His eyes then opened again to reveal familiar blue ones instead of demonic glowing red ones.

"Johnny?" he questioned with confusion, yet his voice still echoed with otherworldliness.

"Drac?" Johnny breathed, "Drac, what's happening to you? How can I help you?"

"I…" he strained, "I don't…I can't…uggh…" His straining became a growl again as his eyes squeezed shut again to reopen and be red again as he growled out in anger, "They hurt her! I must feed!"

He opened his mouth wide to show his blood stained fangs, making Johnny's eyes go saucer wide as he feared what Dracula was about to do and could even smell the stink of Dracula's breath.

A moment before Dracula could sink his fangs into Johnny's neck, something hit Dracula from the side as she gave a battle cry, making Dracula let go of Johnny long enough for the younger man to hang in the air before gravity took hold and he screamed as he felt his body go heavy for a fall.

"I gotcha, Daddy," a boy's voice called out as Johnny suddenly felt something small grab him by the collar of his jacket and flew him to the ground safely.

"Dad, stop it!" Mavis shouted angrily at her father as she shifted from a bat to her human form in a puff of blue mist as she bodily slammed into him.

Dracula tumbled through the air for some moments before catching himself and growling in aggravation to his own daughter, and she just growled back at him with her own red glowing eyes and seemed on the verge of going feral herself when Vlad appeared and grabbed Mavis to bring her back down to the ground and warned her with a hard tone,

"Don't! Don't give in to it, you won't be able to control it! He's losing himself to it!"

Mavis was about to question what Vlad was talking about when Dracula flew down at them in a shot on the attack, but at the last second something or someone body slammed into him hard and they fell and rolled onto the ground.

It was Wayne and he just shouted at his friend and the godfather of his pups, "Drac, stop it! We're your friends, your family! We don't want to hurt you!"

Dracula just growled loudly at Wayne as he over powered the werewolf and pinned him to ground, but something seemed to awaken in Wayne as his eye pupils just thinned into sharp slits and they seemed to glow a golden-green by the light of the moon.

Wayne gave off a vicious snarl as he wrestled and pushed against Dracula hard enough to get back up onto his feet and the arm wrestled each other for some long seconds.

Wayne then bit down hard onto Dracula's arm, making the Vampire give a cry of surprised pain but became angered enough to punch Wayne hard on the face to make him give a yelp and nearly dislocate his jaw.

This disoriented Wayne enough he didn't have a chance to react when Dracula pinned him to the cold snowy ground again, roaring right into the werewolf's face as he raised a clawed hand to maul Wayne but then he stopped again as something caught Dracula's eye and he gave a surprised or confused look.

Everyone thought they were finally getting through to him when his face twisted with anger and he roared again as he leaped right for Frank, who was still holding an unconscious Elona.

Wayne was able to react again to grab his crazy possessed friend by his cape and keep him from attacking Wayne, but Dracula backhanded Wayne in the face and grabbed him by the waist to toss him hard and send him careening through the air and hit a tree hard enough to crack it and give a pained yelp.

He was atop Frank again as everyone tried to come to the rescue, but with a gesture as he spread his arms out wide Dracula sent a wave of telekinetic dark indigo mist that forcefully pushed everyone back hard and they fell away some meters from where they stood.

Frank gave out cries and yelps of surprise rather than pain as he was literally torn apart; an arm landed here, a leg there, his head landed right into a disoriented and surprised Johnny's grasp as Frank's head said urgently,

"He's got her!"

Everyone looked to see Dracula had Elona limply in his arms now, looking at everyone with a burning scorn as his hissed at them,

"Mine. Mine!"

With a flare of his misted cape, he wrapped himself and her in it like a cocoon and vanished in a billow of violet mist like a ghost on the wind, leaving his friends and family in a state of worry and confusion.

"Where did they go?" asked a worried Mavis, "What'll he do to her? What's wrong with my dad, why is acting like this?"

"Yeah, why is Papa Drac being so mean?" asked a worried and hurt Dennis, both he and his mother gave Vlad demanding looks.

Guilt stung at the eldest Vampire's heart, but he dismissed it for the moment as they had to find Dracula and get Elona medical help quickly.

"No time to explain, we have to find him," Vlad said quickly, "Use your psychic senses to get a fix on him and we'll stop him before he hurts anybody else."

"But I need to know what's going on with my dad," Mavis demanded, but Vlad was already concentrating hard as he shut his eyes tightly and held his temples.

"Whatever's wrong with him, Mavis, we'll help him," Johnny tried to reassure her, "He's still in there, I saw it, but it isn't easy for him to fight it off."

Giving a huff, Mavis did the same as Vlad did but she couldn't sense her dad anywhere, like he didn't want to be found or he just disappeared off of the face of the Earth.

"I can't sense him anywhere," she complained, but Vlad got a serious cold look as he said, "I know where he is, follow me."

He led his family and the rest of the Drac Pack through the forest to where he thought he sensed Dracula had teleported to.

"You guys go on, I'll catch up later," Frank's head called as a hand picked it up and dragged it to a torso with an arm and leg reattached in the wrong places, making him mumble annoyed, "Really, really later."


Dark violet and indigo mist gracefully billowed and swirled with quiet ethereal whooshing as it reformed into Dracula holding a limp and unconscious Elona.

He hugged her close in a protective embrace, hoping she would awake. He realized he had been foolish to leave his mate unprotected like that, and he needed to leave her some place safe for the time being until he was strong enough to protect her for eternity.

As he gently caressed her pale face with a ghostly white and gnarled taloned hand, he momentarily looked at her vulnerable neck, so tender and soft, as he thought the only way to save her was to bite her, make her like him.

But something kept him from doing it, like he knew it wasn't what she wanted and he would only hurt her if he did, very much like the last time he tried to do it on one he once thought could be his eternal companion.

He gave a cry of sorrow and guilt into the night that echoed throughout the forest, making animals flee and birds fly away into the sky, yet was enough to draw a certain group to its attention and confirm Vlad's suspicions.

Keeping her wrapped in his misted cape, Dracula drifted to and forth throughout the forest as he looked around as fast as he could for a safe place to hide Elona until he could come back for her. He finally found the one place he was certain she should be safe and warm away from danger.

With a hard stomp into the ground the door of the old hidden tunnel to his hotel opened with a creak to allow him entrance to then lay her down gently in a corner. He caressed her cheek one last time as his thoughts finally set on the one whose blood he truly craved, on who he truly wanted revenge on.

The opening to the tunnel closed with a loud creak as he flew through the narrowing gap into the night as dark violet mist on a single minded mission to satisfy his Hunger in one small way before truly giving into his true power.

He could smell that traitorous hunchback's blood not too far away in the Haunted Forest, and he mentally locked onto tracking his intended prey.

From behind some nearby trees and bushes, his family and friends watched with tense patience as he sniffed the air as though in search of something. For a moment, he seemed to glimpse suspiciously towards them, but just evaporated upon the wind.

Vlad pushed the hidden door open again with his foot as everyone gathered into the hidden tunnel's entrance, searched for Elona and found her not too far inside. Vlad gathered her into his arms, and his ancient undead heart dropped at how cold she was becoming even to someone like him.

"It's a good thing the hotel's not too far away now," he said, "she's needs a doctor right now. Dr. Simon can help, I was chatting with him and a few other humans at the party earlier."

"We'll take her," Eunice said as she took her friend into her arms, "And when you find Drac, tell him I'll tear his wings off for what he did to Frankie."

Vlad just gave a raised eyebrow as Nefi summoned a small sandstorm to take her and the girls back to the hotel as quickly as possible to save their human friend.

Vlad led the rest of them through the forest as he, Mavis, and Dennis flew as bats but Mavis wasn't having it anymore as she wanted answers now.

"Grandpa Vlad, I know we have to find my dad, but you have to tell me what the hell is going on with him," she demanded, "and how can we make him stop."

"The Hunger," Vlad said low.

"He's hungry?" Mavis said with some confusion, "but there's plenty to eat at the hotel, and he only ever had blood substitute."

"No, Mavis, the Hunger," Vlad said with a dead seriousness, "Remember how you felt when he attacked Johnny? Now imagine that hundreds times stronger and no way to come out of it because you want more and more. It's what makes us what we are, and the Dracula bloodline is the most powerful of all."

Mavis didn't know what to say, as she began to realize things her father had only vaguely told her about growing up, but she understood he had to be stopped before he hurt himself or someone else.

"How do we stop him?" she asked with conviction.

"As a family."

****Somewhere in the Haunted Forest

Chills went down his hunched spine as Quasimodo tried to find a way through the forest, he had easily leaped and bounded from one tree to another like a deformed monkey, but now he walked steadily as he shivered from the cold and just tried to find shelter so he could figure out what to do next.

It hadn't gone as he had intended, and that traitorous demon had tricked him. Well, for now it didn't matter what Bela's true intentions were and his true colors hadn't been completely lost on Quasimodo, but he did realize he should have known better than to think that destructive brute ever cared about the hotel the way he did.

This was just another setback, he'll figure something out. He just needs to lay low and avoid Dracula for some time, perhaps a few months. His boss may have been a fool about the humans but Quasimodo now realize he was far more powerful and dangerous than even he ever realized.

He let out another deep heavy breath as it misted in the cold air, trying to catch his breath as his body ached from so much leaping and running to escape the now feral Vampire. He didn't know how long or how far he had run, but he knew he was lost but he won't let that stop him.

Perhaps he could lay low in Little Sighisoara for a while, take advantage of the humans' stupidity if the hype of them loving monsters was all it was cracked up to be.

He just needed to get his bearings, figure out what direction to go but then felt the air become colder as he thought he heard a quiet sigh of air.

He looked all around himself but didn't really see anyone or anything until he thought he saw a shadow move through the tree and make him give a frighten gasp.

He then heard a dangerous predatory growl in the darkness, making him look in random directions until he saw a pair of blood red eyes looked right at him with pure hated from between the trees.

He tried to stifle a scream of fright and began to run for his life with thick billows of black and indigo mist spiral and swirl up from the ground to form in an all too familiar figure; Dracula stared down at Quasimodo from an imposing height as his figure from the shoulders down was a cocoon of an elegant black cape to then become mist and shadows as though part of the landscape.

He growled dangerously as she stared at Quasimodo intimidatingly, his voice seemed to echo and reverberate between the trees and sky as he said, "You were warned, and now you will pay."

"Monsieur, please," Quasimodo said with a barely controlled squeak in his voice, "I didn't realize…I didn't know…"

"Shut up," Dracula ordered harshly, and Quasimodo's mouth shut tightly, "I've been too easy on you, Wilson, no more Mr. Nice Vampire."

"But, Monsieur, I beg of you," Quasimodo pleaded fearful, now fully aware of the dangerous trouble he was in as he fell to his knees and beg pathetically, "Master, spare me, I was foolish, I see that now, have mercy."

"Like you did to my precious beloved?" he spat back angrily, "You're an idiot, and for her I now show my True Power."

Quasimodo was momentarily confused by this statement, but didn't like what it implicated.

His fear just grew worse as Dracula wrapped himself fully in his shadowed and misted cape like a black cocoon, cloaking himself fully from site as black mists seemed to be absorbed into him to add to his dark mass as the 'cocoon' seemed to increase in size, getting larger and larger with each passing moment until it blanketed Quasimodo in a shadow and he couldn't even see starlight between the tops of the trees.

Finally, the mass opened but was no longer a cloak but a pair of large bat wings, they opened with a dark grace to reveal Dracula now as a giant ebony black and crimson eyed dragon with fuchsia colored wings. The dragon looked down at Quasimodo with a burning hatred as he growled.

The hunchback just gave a cowardly whimper as the Dracula dragon then gave a fierce and mighty roar.

"RAAAWRRR!"

"AAAAAAAAAHH!" Quasimodo screamed as he tried to run, tripping over his own feet as he did as the dragon tried to grab at him with huge claws, "No! No! Stay away from me!"

He managed to get between the trees and evaded Dracula from a minute as he heard him say in that frightening otherworldly voice,

"You can't hide from me forever, hunchback! I will have your blood! I will have revenge for Elona!"

If that was true, Quasimodo wasn't about to stick around and find out.

For a long minute as Quasimodo ran through the dense forest, he could hear Dracula's footsteps right behind him as trees were crushed and they shook the very earth, but he managed to find an overgrowth of thick roots and took shelter beneath them, hoping he could stay here long enough until Dracula tired or lost interest in his hunt. Perhaps he'll stay there until sunrise, considering how Dracula and the Sun itself didn't mix well.

Dracula sniffed the forest for his prey's scent, and he was near alright, but the forest was too vast and thick even for his Far Sight and X-ray powers, making him roar in frustration as his Hunger gnawed at him for more.

His craving for that little morsel's blood will have to wait, he can smell what he truly craved at the fortress on the other side of the forest, just on the inland lake. Oh, how his bloodlust surged through him, coursed through him to make him the force of nature he truly was and he will have his revenge.

He gave another fierce roar as he spread his great bat like wings to take to the air, creating a powerful air current to send forest debris flying in all directions, becoming a black silhouette against the night sky as three much smaller flying creatures came into view.

Vlad just went wide eyed with shock as he breathed out, "Son, what have you done?"

"Is that…? No way," Mavis gasped in awe, uncertain to accept her own father was the giant dragon they now saw.

"Stay close," Vlad ordered, "But leave this to me now, as he's becoming so dangerous he may not recognize you two."

"But, Grandpa…" Dennis started to say, but Mavis told him,

"Listen to him, Dennis, if we can help Papa Drac we have to trust him."

He just looked unsure but he knew his mother was right, and he just wanted to help his Papa any way he can.

They flew up to the great dragon as he clearly began to hone in on the hotel, making the three little bats speed up to intercept him.

"Drac!" Vlad shouted to get his son's attention, finally flying up to his line of sight to make Dracula give a low rumbling growl of annoyance to have something essentially the size of a fly buzzing around his dragonian face.

So Vlad shifted to his proper form to levitate and shouted at Dracula, "Son! Don't do this! Remember who you are! Remember control!"

But Dracula just swipe at him with a huge claw, making Vlad dodge and evade it at the last second to keep from being hit and he glared at the dragon.

"So, you won't listen to me like this," he said quietly as Dracula flew onwards towards the hotel high above the forest and Vlad, "I never thought I'd have to do this to my own son, but you leave me no choice, Mr. Tough Guy."

Vlad wrapped himself in his own cape like a cocoon as red tinted mist enveloped him and increased in size to then reveal a giant ebony dragon with red wings and wispy white eyebrows, and his eyes remained a normal red instead of glowing a deep demonic light.

He gave a roar to get Dracula's attention, and the other dragon looked back behind a second before Vlad body slammed into him with a hard bang of thunder to make them propel back some dozen or so meters with their momentum before Dracula finally threw his father off of himself.

Vlad caught himself in the air as he flapped his wings to catch an updraft and fly again towards his insanely single minded Hunger possessed son, this time swiping his own claws on Dracula head to get his attention, and really hurt as Dracula gave a pained grunt which then became a snarl as Dracula dared to return the attack upon his own father.

But Vlad evaded him again as he flew slightly higher, folded his wings in as he let himself fall and landed hard on Dracula to then have them both crash hard into the trees, making the very earth shake around them and show how slightly bigger he was in comparison to his son.

"Remember who you are!" Vlad roared at him.

But this just enraged Dracula more as he pushed Vlad off of his back hard enough to make the older dragon tumble back and crush more trees and Dracula leaped onto him to bodily hold him down as he roared,

"You'll pay for that, old man! I'll destroy you!"

For only a microsecond this actually frightened Vlad as he knew his son was capable of it, but it was over in a second as he just swiped at his son's face and it was enough to confuse him and for Vlad to push back against Dracula and bodily hold him down as he again roared at his enraged son,

"Remember what I taught you! Control!"

Dracula just gave a defiant roar, but then looked to his right to see the two remaining bats change into two more familiar faces, and it took him an eternal second to realize who they were, which just confused him further.

He gave a roar of confusion and devastation as he finally allowed himself to remember things, important memories he always cherished, he always held on to for the love of his lost wife and his precious daughter.

Yet as his memories came rolling back to him, his Hunger demanded he just keep feeding and unleash his power upon the world, conquer it and hunt in it as it is the way of things.

Dracula squeezed his eyes shut as he grabbed his draconian head, as though his head hurt and he was struggling from within. Vlad gradually picked himself off of his son as red tinted mist billowed around him and he returned to his normal humanoid form.

Dark indigo and violet mist swirled and billowed around Dracula as he struggled with his psyche, memories of love and family fighting against his ancient supernatural nature, a struggle for his very soul.

He finally grabbed onto those memories; of meeting Martha and getting married, the birth of their first daughter, playing with her as she grew up, meeting Johnny and their evolving friendship, the birth of his grandson, the reconciliation with his father, and finally the meeting of his hew love, Elona.

It was a long and tumultuous inner struggle for him, like there were two powerful forces warring for his very soul and he had moments in and out of his consciousness of knowing and uncertainty of who he truly was.

Finally, as the mist dispersed to finally reveal Dracula in his true form once more, kneeling upon his knees while hunched over tightly into himself as his cape draped over him and spread like a blanket around him upon the ground, there was a thick tenseness about him as his family just watched and looked upon him in concern.

Mavis slowly approached him as she quietly called out, "Dad?"

She slowly reached out to him to reassure him, to know it was truly him again. But as her hand was mere inches from his shoulder, his voice broke through the quiet to say with a quiet tone colder than the snow, "Don't touch me."

Mavis could only draw her hand back and gasp quietly as she heard her father speak, uncertain of how to feel about it.

"Papa Drac?" Dennis timidly said as he came out from behind Mavis.

Dracula barely gave a response as Vlad said, "Son, remember control."

A long silence passed as Dracula was as still as a statue until he finally said with a quiet but still cold tone, "It's still there. I can feel it."

"And it will always be there," Vlad said with fatherly patience, "But you're stronger than it, stronger than you know."

Dracula finally slowly looked up to his family, revealing his mouth still stained with blood he had consumed, as well as his formal Christmas tux was stained with blood.

He gave them a look Mavis couldn't quiet place, but he looked confused as well as gradually realizing what had happened and a great weight of guilt began to pressed upon his shoulders. She could see in his eyes it was like something that wasn't him was still there.

"Elona?" he asked.

"At the hotel," Mavis began to explain, but before she could explain more Dracula vanished in a flash of indigo mist like a shooting star back to the hotel.

Vlad, Mavis, and Dennis were left standing in the quiet night.