EDIT: Quite a bit of change. Someone brought to my attention about the presence of Samiel in Rip's world. This is important. So I fixed it so that I would still have my story and her fear of Samiel.
TITLE: Der Herr ist mein Hirte
SONG: "Der Herr ist mein Hirte" by ENomine
AUTHOR: Alyxandria Jolivet
RATING: PG
CONTENT: Violence
GENRE: General
SUMMARY: Rip Van Winkle's story.
The question: How did RVW become a vampire? And why did she hesitate before she died? This was originally a story by itself, but we fixed that bit. Now it's a short story in a series of short stories.
:::::::::: Der Herr ist mein Hirte ::::::::::
Und ob ich schon wanderte im finsteren Tal.
Fürchte ich kein Unglück, denn Du bist bei mir.
Dein Stecken und Stab trösten mich.
Du bereitest vor mir einen Tisch im Angesicht meiner Feinde.
(translation)
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;
thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest
- Der Herr ist mein Hirte, ENomine
You know... It's not so strange dying.
To be honest, dying is a bit of a relief.
Here I was thinking I'd have to walk around suffering eternal life with a damned soul and what do you know? There we go, over the top, turn the ignition counter clockwise, wham bam... it's over honey. Turn the light out. It's done. Done done done.
Don't get me wrong. Living forever wasn't so bad. Now, this is where you are probably asking 'you are kidding me right? Living forever.. watching everyone die... isn't that terrible?' See, it's only the initial steps that are difficult. The first death is terrifying.. then the second... the third... fourth... fifth... soon, however, the effect goes away. Oh, right. So that person is dying now. No big deal, happened before, no one important, who gives a fuck?
Heh. Fuck. See? You can say obscenities like that at my age and there is no substance behind it. I used to make up songs revolving around curse words just for the holy hell fun of it. Soon the songs got boring, soon curse words held just the same amount of weight as an inoffensive word.
Run away my dear
There's much to fear
From the Hunter
The Hunter
Gotcha.
Soon my life became a royal contradiction. See? That's what I am, or rather, was. A walking contradiction. The sky is down, the ground is up, umbrellas on sunny days, rejoice equates to tears, sadness represented by sharky smiles, and songs of sacrifice are songs of hunt.
It was all about the hunt. You see, I'm the hunter. Samiel gave me that power. Gave me that wish. That dream. That desire. That ability... the ability to survive. Overcome.
Hunt.
Youth trapped in immortality.
Undeveloped breasts, no hips, a certain lack of femininity. Androgyny at its best, a blessing, a curse.
What did I say that day? What did I scream...?
HE'S HERE!!! HE'S HERE!!!! HE'S HERE!!!
SAMIEL!!!!
I was waiting for him. I wanted him. Delicious. I've been waiting for him since 1897... or should I say 1456? That fucker owed me. He goddamn owed me.
SAMIEL!!!!
'What.. Owed you? You? No... No way... What did he do?'
That fucker. That fucker.
Van Hellsing did a great job collecting the multitude of letters and diary entries between Mina Murray, Jonathon Harker, and all their little friends in his research. Sure, it was kept confidential and hidden away from the public, but I must remind you that I come from Neo-Nazis, honey. And there is nothing you can hide from my branch. But by any means, he wrote those accounts... two of Samiel's previous brides were destroyed, Lucy's unfortunate demise, and Mina's rescue. What they forgot to tell you were the other victims. The ones that didn't have it so lucky as to die or be rescued.
When I was fifteen, I was gangly and pathetic. Poor, too. But that's the gypsy way. God blesses our poverty, right?
Back in 1456, my family and I were beggars. It was our way, it was our religion. We were paid to do nothing, God owed us that much for keeping Christ company on the cross. I danced to tambourine magic, my mother slept at the steps of a church. We belonged to a community, we worked together. We were family.
This shortly changed when a young man took the throne. Normally, we gypsies didn't care for politics, but when there was a new king, this often meant the new king would do special favors to the people to gain their trust. It wasn't a surprise when Vlad invited the beggars to feast in a castle. He was new to the throne, so we thought this was a celebration, a day where the king would sit with commoners and relate with his people.
I remember the feast in vivid detail. Tender pork, baskets of fruit, and oh god.. the spices... spices!!! Salts, peppers, things that flavored plain tasting food so it was rich and exotic. We ate more than our share, and stored twice as much under our scarves for the days after.
Vlad left the table... the doors closed... they locked... and the room burned. Flames flickering off walls, eating the tapestries, devouring the wood, my family, my mother, everything. I passed out in the smoke, but I managed to survive. I hid in the tomb of water to protect myself. The most I suffered was a few third degree burns. The others were unfortunate.
"Ah, who is this pathetic pigling? See before you... These people worked for nothing. I do not honor the mouths of starving people who do not earn their own food. Nor do I honor the luck of a pathetic little girl who fouled my water."
Later that day I was impaled with several other gypsies as a demonstration to the people of what they too could earn from sheer slothfulness.
"Still alive girl? Three days... and you still twitch... You intrigue me."
Rumor had it he sold his soul to Satan after he was baptized a catholic. I don't know why he did it, I don't know his reasons. What I do know is he was mad. Insane. Crazy. Sadistic.
"Well... If there's no way I can kill you, then I suppose eternal agony will suffice. Do you want to live girl? Do you fear death so much that you'd be willing to suffer forever?"
When you are fifteen, there are no wise decisions. There's only fear.
"Fine. This is your decision."
Dying is such a strange sensation, as is resurrecting. I didn't know the consequences. I didn't know what he was doing. All I knew was that I would live, and that would be enough. He was gentle, breaking the spike and withdrawing it from my burned and tattered body. My skin ached from abuse, and my insides were rotten with infection. I didn't feel the twin pricks at my neck, I didn't care. I felt like I was in the arms of an angel, and that was enough.
My blood left, replaced with hollow veins squeezing decayed liquid. I could see with new eyes, taste with new senses, be something... extraordinary. The strangest part of my experience was that I could feel him. The back of my mind could hear what he was hearing, taste what he was tasting. I was his shell, and it repulsed me.
"Heh... Not for long, dear. I won't let you remain connected with me for long."
Soon, he forced me to drink his blood. Tear the flesh of his arm and devour the cool, dense liquid. It was done, the connection was severed, and I started to fight him away from me.
"Now now, dear. I promised eternal suffering. We aren't done yet."
Maybe he wanted revenge for being unable to kill me. Maybe he was bored, and wanted entertainment. I don't know. All I remember was being nailed in a coffin and buried ten feet under the ground. A castle was built over my resting place. With no access to blood, restrained under the cold earth, I died a second time and remained aware of the pain I had to live through for five hundred years after.
On rare occasions, he'd visit me. Pound the stone over my head and laugh.
"Awake yet? Still asleep, my little Rip van Winkle?"
He'd do that many times, walk by, and just start talking to me - knowing I was unable to answer. He enjoyed that power.
"The world has changed so much... Did you know that there is another world aside from this one across the ocean? Did you know the world was round? Of course you didn't. Poor little Rip van Winkle, sleeping under the stone never to awake... hehehehe."
Trapped. Not only physically, but intellectually. Spiritually. I couldn't grow.
"You can't leave. You can't die. There is no Samiel to save you."
Samiel?
"The executioner, my dear. The angel that slaughters the tainted."
The tainted..?
"Yes. The tainted. Us. Our souls are damned. Inside or outside that box ten feet underground, that numb feeling of dread and regret will never leave you. We can only kill our own kind. And I won't let you die any time soon, my little sweet heart. The only prayer you have is for an angel of execution to stop your pain. But he won't come. Can you hear it? Hehehe. That laughter? That's God. He turned away from you a long time ago."
Samiel. Samiel. Samiel.
There's a point where we want the pain to stop, so we beg harmful forces to help us.
Samiel. Samiel.
That changed, though. Van Hellsing came with his little crew, took that fucking bastard away and killed his servants. The years ticked on, and eventually World War I came and went... then World War II. My salvation. My messiah.
The bombs tore the castle. The blood of soldiers was thick... it seeped into the ground, soaked my coffin, and dripped over my body. The lives that were sacrificed to revive me were innumerable. It took fifty men to revive my dead tissue. I crawled out and ate the first soldier who stumbled across me.
"Lieber Gott! Was ist dieses?"
I bathed in warm blood for days, in ecstasy. Drunk, the men seized me, bound my body, and took me to the nearest site for observation and questioning. Bound to the wall. Chained to the corner. Struggling against my restraints, chewing through the cloth.
I didn't understand. I forgot how to talk. So I communicated the only way I could.
It's fascinating... the telepathy of a vampire.
What are you?
I don't know... what am I?
A devil. A she-devil.
Maybe I am. Where is he?
Where is who?
The owner of the castle.
The owner?
Yes.
Gone.
Who are you?
We are the Nazi regime.
Nazis? Where are you from?
Germany.
What is that? Is that in the new world?
No. It is here.
Where?
By the North Sea, beside France.
You mean the Holy Roman Empire?
No. We mean Germany.
Eventually, I learned to read their minds apart from communication. I learned world history through the interpretation of four Nazis, two captured Russians, and an American.
What's your name?
I... don't remember.
No one called you by a name?
He called me Rip van Winkle.
That is a Dutch name. You are clearly Romanian.
I don't know.. I don't know.. I don't know..
I suffered numerous experiments after that. Countless doctors scrutinized me, took samples, read signs, and learned what I was. I didn't give a damn after a while. I went along for the ride. I could've left them at any day. I could have torn them apart limb for limb.. but I didn't care. I had no purpose. I was a leach, and the only thing I gained in that was a sense of humor.
"Rip van Winkle, Major. Reporting. Heh."
Let the bodies hit the floor.
We were a secret covert operation. We called ourselves Millennium. We were the new Millennium, to speak. We wiped them out, used supernatural sources to our advantage, and ruined the lives of our enemies. There was always research done on me. One of our purposes was to create a vampire such as myself, but one that could be controlled. I didn't give a damn. I was there for the ride. They made me a weapon, they fed me lame soldiers, and gave me status rank hoping I'd always remain there... knowing that no amount of chains, binds, or holy artifacts could stop me if I were to become displeased.
The Nazi Regime eventually died, but Millennium always remained. Abraham Van Helsing died, my dears. But his institution lives on. We live on.
Eventually, I realized I was a pawn. In fact, we are all pawns. Marionettes in a play called life. My play just so happens to involve blood thirsty tyrants, vengeful angels, and hair trigger weaponry.
I never miss, you know. I sold my soul to Vlad and I sold my spirit to Samiel. This enables me to manipulate a certain edge of deadliness. Now I patiently waited for the both of them to make their appearance.
"Rip. They are approaching...!"
"Dummer Major, do not worry so much. I am there... Always there..."
And I'd sing.
"Es gab einmal ein kleines Mädchen
wer wenig Wellung hatte
gerade mitten in ihrer Stirn
und als sie gut war
sie war sehr sehr gut
und als sie schlecht war, war sie horrid"
Oh, the Hunter Rip has come to find her kill! Rip was no longer a victim of circumstance, heaven forbid. Rip was no longer the prey of a pompous king, oh no. No, Rip was going to hunt you, eat you, and chew you! Run run run, little prey! Run run run!
I told you previously I was a walking contradiction. Umbrellas keep the sunshine away. That's why I always carry one. Chim chimeree!
What you saw before was only a glimpse of what I was actually capable of. Certainly you are familiar with Vlad's abilities. Dogs, mists, shadows, eyeballs, all that jig. Whatever he could do, I could do. That is the power of a No Life King - particularly one as old as we were. I was only a few years younger than Vlad. The both of us were experimented on, the both of us were connected to humans, and the both of us wielded weapons of incredible power. We were exactly alike.
So why did you let him kill you, you might ask?
I thought I answered that question before you got to this point. I told you. I was tired. I got bored.
Well, that would be a lie.
I was fucking scared out of my mind.
And I learned the truth.
"HE'S HERE!!! HE'S HERE!!! HE'S HERE!!!"
The maniacal screams, the agony, the pain. I could see my mother burning, I could hear my people dying around me - their flesh falling off their bodies like tender roast beef over a slow broiling fire.
"HE'S HERE!!! HE'S HERE!!!"
The long stick hammered into my body, through the tissue, the muscle, the flesh. Hanging with my back faced to the ground, eyes watching the moaning, twitching, and dying around me. I wanted to die. I wanted to die so badly, but I was so afraid, so afraid. I wanted to live too. It was all too soon, too quick, too sudden.
"HE'S HERE!!! HE'S HERE!!!"
When he thought I wasn't suffering enough, he would nail my hands to my feet while I was still impaled. Collect the blood, and drink it before my eyes. I could still feel the length of his tongue running over my flesh as I screamed in pain.
"HE'S HERE!!! HE'S HERE!!!"
Then the final touch.. burying me alive so he could mock me for all eternity.
Finally, I saw him. Six centuries later, and there he was. Only, that is when it dawned upon me. That is when I witnessed a revelation.
Vlad was Samiel.
"OH GOD!!!! SAMIEL!!!!"
Samiel has come to reclaim me. He has come to judge me. Ruin me. Murder me. Focus? What focus? It was the end. There was nothing. I would not live through this. No one is capable of killing an agent of God. Particularily one as cold blooded, cruel, and malign as Samiel was.
Like the great play, he gave me my powers.. and he came to finish what he started.
When he killed me that day on the ship, he loved every second of it. Knowing, finally, after nearly six hundred years he could finish what he started. I was no great masterpiece. I was no pet of his. I was only a toy he ripped open and tore apart like a child.
Could I have killed him? I was capable of it. Yes, I could have.
But fear was my downfall. My weakness.
His only weakness was his inhumanity.
But in the end, that's not really a weakness at all, is it?
Tick Tock, The Witch is Dead.
I died that day, I did.
And I realized when it was too late that death is a great awakening.
How ironic.
- Fin
Author's Notes: God, what an AWFUL way to end things, huh? Well, grit your teeth. That's what you get )
Things to clarify:
Rip's Name: Rip van Winkle was this Dutch guy in American legend that was enchanted and slept for quite a long time before waking up to realize that things have changed quite a bit since he was asleep. So I wondered how the hell Rip van Winkle ever got a name like that. All the other characters have meaningful names. Integral means essential or necessary for completeness, Alucard is backwards for Dracula, etc. So... I made up my own reasons how Rip got her name.
The Song: The song is actually Psalm 23 - famous prayer. It relates with Rip in that she now no longer fears the shadow of death. She transcended that. It took her a while to get there. Hell, she even had to die in order to reach that point. But regardless, she found the strength to find her place.
That weird German song in the middle of the story: Rough translation of 'There once was a girl who had a little curl' poem...
Why did Rip die so soon in the Manga..?: I dinno. What I do know was she was DAMN afraid. Incognito wasn't afraid. Valentine brothers weren't. None of them were when they first met Alucard. Rip, however, was dead scared out of her wits before she even SAW Alucard. And I think that was her greatest weakness. I spun off that. I figure, if she had her nerves, Alucard would've been in for some serious ass whooping. But that unfortunately wasn't the case.
Rip's German.. not Romanian: Dude. She looks Romanian. Hell. She looks like a freckled version of Alucard, really. Just because she speaks it and is a Nazi doesn't mean she IS it. Alucard speaks English. Does that mean he's from Australia? Nope.
Why didn't you explain why Rip has freckles/a curl/really sharp teeth?: Those aspects aren't very important. I don't care for physical feature so much as psychological molding.