It was the following evening after Dennis's birthday, and Dennis, Mavis, Dracula, and Vlad were already flying around the lobby as bats laughing. At least until Dennis noticed something.
"Hey, where did dad go?" He looked around concerned, since Johnny had been watching them fly earlier.
"That's weird, normally he loves watching us fly around." Mavis said.
"Maybe he decided to take care of a hotel problem on his own so we wouldn't have to stop having fun." Dracula suggested.
"He's selfless like that huh?" Vlad said.
"Oh yeah, he always puts us before himself." Mavis smiled.
Dennis however sensed that something was bothering his dad, and flew off to find him.
"Dennis?" Mavis followed him.
She caught up with him easily, because Dennis had suddenly stopped. When Mavis looked where Dennis was staring she understood why:
Johnny was leaning front-first against the edge of the courtyard, as if he was watching something in the waters below.
Dennis turned back to human form and hurried over to him. Mavis, Dracula, and Vlad stayed back, unsure of what to do.
"Dad? You okay?" Dennis asked Johnny.
"Hm? Oh hey Dennis." Johnny smiled sadly. "Yeah I'm fine..."
"Dad, you can't fool me." Dennis looked at him pointedly. "I know something's bothering you."
"Too smart for my own good huh?" Johnny chuckled affectionately before becoming solemn. "Well, I can't lie to you: I've been feeling left out for a long time now. First Mavis kept canceling Date Night to keeping hanging out with you. Not that I blame her, but I miss having Date Night. Then..." Johnny hung his head. "Then you got your vampire powers. And I can't join in on everything you and Mavis can do."
Mavis teared up and rushed over to hug Johnny.
"Mavis?" Johnny said with surprise, feeling a little bad since he never wanted to upset her.
"I'm so sorry Johnny, I was so caught up in making sure Dennis would always be safe and healthy that I forgot that you're as important to me as he is." Mavis almost sobbed.
"Hey it's okay." Johnny returned the hug. "Keeping Dennis safe and healthy is important after all."
"Still..." Mavis sobbed, then calmed down a little. "To be honest I've been missing Date Night too. How about I make up for neglecting you by letting you and Dennis hang out by yourselves tonight, and then we can have Date Night around early-morning while dad puts Dennis to bed for us."
"That sounds awesome." Johnny smiled.
"It sure does, in fact I've been wanting to hang out with dad more for a long time." Dennis grinned. "He's my hero. Well, non-comic-book hero." He chuckled.
"Really?" Johnny beamed, happily surprised.
"Yeah, after all it's thanks to you that humans and monsters can hang out together now." Dennis smiled. "And you were able to make mom and Poppa Drac's lives better just by being yourself. I hope I'll be as successful as you at improving the world one day."
"Well you have your mom and vampa's awesomeness, so I'm sure you will."
So Mavis and Dracula went back to keeping an eye on things at the hotel, while Johnny and Dennis went up to the family's floor to play. They decided to play hide-and-seek first, with Dennis deciding not to hide in bat form since his dad couldn't. During Dennis's second turn at hiding, Johnny started counting...but then he froze. For some reason a cold grip of fear clutched at his chest. He didn't know why or how, but he knew who:
"Dennis?" He called out worriedly. "Are you okay?"
No answer. Johnny became even more afraid, and started running. He didn't actually know where Dennis was, but something told him to look in a particular direction.
At the same time, Mavis was chatting with a suit of armor about a problem in the hotel when she fell silent and formed a horrified expression.
"Mavy? What's wrong?" Dracula asked concernedly.
"DENNIS!" Mavis cried, instantly turning into a bat and flying out the window.
Horrified, Dracula and Vlad turned into bats as well and followed her. Frank, Griffin, Murray, Winnie, and Johnny's human family knew that Johnny and Dennis were at the Dracula family floor so they headed for the elevators to go there (Wayne wasn't there, he and Wanda were too busy with their other pups).
Johnny and Mavis found Dennis at the same time...he was in bat-form in Quasimodo's grip struggling to break free!
"Cease your struggling half-human!" Quasimodo glared. "An abomin-"
"Let. Him. Go." A furious voice growled.
Mavis - as well as Vlad and Dracula, who had just arrived - was stunned. That was Johnny! He was standing there glaring at Quasimodo like he was ready to kill him! Quasimodo was shocked too: was this the same human who was terrified by Esmeralda's deadpan squeak?
"I said let him go!" Johnny growled.
"I don't think so human, humans and monsters should not interbreed!" Quasimodo frowned back defiantly.
Instead of disagreeing, Johnny tackled Quasimodo and grabbed the arm that was holding Dennis. Quasimodo tried to break free, but Johnny's determination to save his son was too strong for him. Johnny had one hand on Quasimodo's throat choking him, and was tightening his grip on the arm that was holding Dennis. Finally Quasimodo, not able to fend Johnny off with one hand, let go of Dennis. Johnny instantly caught Dennis and got up to start to run away, but he didn't need to. The moment Johnny was off Quasimodo Mavis used her powers to suspend Quasimodo in tortured animation.
"Don't you ever hurt my son again!" She roared.
She then flung him into the wall, knocking him out.
"I thought you froze him after he tried to eat Johnny." She then said to Dracula.
"I unfroze him after locking him up in one of the dungeons." Dracula explained. "He couldn't eat while frozen and I didn't want him to starve to death."
"Oh."
The others caught up, and were shocked to see Quasimodo there.
"Aw man, he must've broken out." Frank realized.
"Yes, so this time I'll keep a straightjacket on him and post a guard at his cell." Dracula nodded.
"So...what's the story behind him?" Mike asked.
"Quasimodo the human-eater, who used to be the hotel's chef." Griffin explained. "He wouldn't accept Johnny being Mavis's zing so Drac locked him up."
"You hired a cannibal as a chef?" Linda asked confusedly.
"Wha- Oh, no he's not that Quasimodo, that Quasimodo died of old age centuries ago." Dracula explained. "This one is a distant descendant, and a mix of various monsters. Frankly, I think that mix made him unbalanced..."
A.N. The monsters in this franchise are obviously different from their book counterparts (save a few details), so I figured that maybe the books were fictional versions of their stories. However I made the original Quasimodo an ancestor rather than the character we see in the first movie, since this Quasimodo is too insane to have been the famous bell-ringer
"Son? Are you okay?"
That was Johnny, who had calmed down after Quasimodo was knocked out and was now on his knees with now-human-Dennis lying in his arms. Mavis was kneeling by them too, worried about Dennis.
"Yeah, just a little out of breath." Dennis wheezed, and then turned back to human-form before smiling. "You saved me dad, you're now a superhero too."
"Of course I saved you, you mean the world to me." Johnny smiled back. "No one is allowed to hurt you while I'm around."
Dennis reached up to hug Johnny, and Mavis gave Johnny a big kiss.
"You're not just Dennis's hero." She smiled lovingly at Johnny.
Johnny just gazed lovingly back at her.
Dracula didn't want to interrupt this moment, so he grabbed Quasimodo and carried him away from the scene. Quasimodo woke up shortly after this, so Dracula stopped to lift him up.
"I've had enough of you." Dracula glared at him. "I don't like killing others, but try to harm my family or even another human again and I will kill you."
Quasimodo gulped, knowing very well that Dracula was capable of killing him. He reluctantly nodded. Some suits of armor then showed up.
"Take him back to the dungeon, and keep a guard there. I'll be down later to put a straightjacket on him." Dracula ordered.
"Aye-aye sir." One of the suits of armor saluted.
They took Quasimodo after Dracula used a nearby curtain pull to tie him up - just to be on the safe side - and Dracula went to see Dennis. Johnny and Mavis had ended their gaze and were now group-hugging Dennis; Winnie had joined in too.
"I'm glad you're okay Dennisovich, Quasimodo's tougher than he looks." Dracula kneeled down.
Mavis and Johnny let go, and so did Winnie after realizing why. Dennis went over to hug Dracula, who instantly returned the hug.
"No kidding, he appeared out of nowhere and asked who I was. I didn't know of his hatred for humans so I told him who my parents were, and he flipped out and tried to strangle me! I turned into a bat to fly out of his reach but he leapt up and grabbed me before I could react." Dennis said. "And then dad suddenly showed up- Wait a minute, we were playing hide-and-seek how did you find me so quickly?" Dennis realized, turning to Johnny.
"Don't really know, I just know that while I was counting I suddenly felt terrified and somehow knew that you were in danger. And then I ran to you without knowing where you actually were." Johnny shrugged.
"I felt the same thing when I was downstairs." Mavis added. "I'm sure it was parental instinct, since nothing else can explain it."
"It was. Sometimes a parents' love for their child is so strong that they can instantly sense when their child is in danger, even when their child isn't within sight." Dracula smiled.
"That sounds like the best superpower ever." Dennis grinned.
"It sure is." Johnny chuckled in agreement, affectionately ruffling Dennis's head.
"It definitely was a superpower in your case, the way you saved Dennisovich was awesome." Dracula smiled to Johnny. "Even the gargoyles and my knights have trouble handling him, but you were able to pin him down."
"Huh...didn't even think about that. I just knew I couldn't let him continue hurting Dennis." Johnny shrugged humbly.
"Still, you are definitely the son Martha and I never had."
"Aw gee..." Johnny chuckled embarrassedly, since that was high praise coming from Dracula.
Mike and Linda just smiled at the scene. Even though they had accepted Johnny's marriage to Mavis and even liked Mavis they still had some reservations about Johnny marrying into a family of monsters and living with them. Not that they didn't trust the monsters, but centuries of prejudism and wild stories can sometimes make you wary even when there's no reason to be.
But seeing Mavis's obvious love for Johnny and Dracula's love for his whole family made them feel a lot better. They decided to stop worrying about Johnny and Dennis and let them live their lives here in Transylvania, rather than trying to visit as often as possible to keep an eye on them. They would still visit of course, but truthfully it was easier for Mavis, Johnny, and Dennis to visit them than it was for them to do the visiting (especially expense-wise).
So later that day, Johnny's human family decided to head home. But before they left they talked with Johnny about future visits. They all decided that Thanksgiving would definitely be hosted by Mike and Linda whenever Dennis's teachers would let him take time off school, otherwise they would just celebrate Thanksgiving separately.
Mother's Day, Father's Day, Halloween, and birthdays would just be sending cards and presents in the mail (it was a bit much to make someone travel across the ocean just for one day). Johnny's human family will now mostly visit for the Christmas holidays (mostly because it'd be insane to invite ALL the monsters to their place for the holidays), with a few exceptions.
