Chapter 5: Rescue

Gabriel Van Helsing had only one thought on his mind as he stepped purposefully through the doors leading into the ball. He was going to save Anna, or else.

"Or else what?" ventured Carl when he spoke this thought out loud.

"Or else Dracula and everyone in here gets it...that includes you, Carl."

"Irritable, aren't we.."

"Just a little," replied Gabriel grimly. He looked carefully around the room, looking for Anna, but it was impossible to distinguish one face in the throng of rapidly moving dancers and guests. "We have to get higher," he said, heading towards a nearby staircase that led to a balcony above the dance floor. Carl followed without complaint.

It had been surprisingly easy to get into Castle Frankenstein, once he had obtained elegant costumes. The ushers had bowed and simply let them walk by. He supposed Dracula's All Hallow's Eve Ball had a don't ask, don't tell policy. On the other hand, he was of course being expected, and he couldn't help but feel he was still an utterly distinguishable figure...

The balcony was thankfully empty, and it gave Gabriel and Carl a clear view of the colorful scene below. After a few seconds of searching—there was no time to waste—he saw Dracula, the center of the activity, waltzing elegantly with—Anna? A closer look showed that it was indeed. She was wearing a ridiculously extravagant gown and had her hair up, which changed her look entirely, but he could tell it was her. He struggled to keep from crying out in indignation when he saw Dracula kiss her and caress her. He wondered what else he had been doing to her. Oh, when he had his hands on that vampire.. Then he remembered how it was virtually impossible to kill him and decided to wait until a later date. Right now, his focus was purely Anna.

"Well," he managed to say to Carl, who was busy watching the stunning acrobatics show, "it looks like he hasn't harmed her...yet. Who knows what he'll do when he finds out we don't have the creature, though. We're going to have to make this fast." He searched the scene below for a plan, any plan...then it came to him. Unlikely? Yes. Difficult? Definitely. Possible? Of course.

"Carl," he said, staring fixedly at the acrobat swinging nearby, "you're going to have to do something for me. For Anna."

Carl turned to look at Van Helsing. He said in resignation, "I'm not going to like this, am I?"

Gabriel merely smiled tightly and told him what to do.

A/N: We all know what happens, right, so I decided to spare you from a long and boring explanation and just skip to the action. Hope that's okay! Here goes...

Van Helsing watched as Carl moved quickly through the crowd to where Dracula had Anna, towards the flame thrower. Perfect. He turned his attention to his own task then, and concentrated as he stepped up on the balcony railing and waited for the swinging acrobat to come closer.

Anna, he thought. And then he jumped.

Anna waited, eyes shut tightly, but the sharp pain to fangs in her neck never came, and soon she felt no cold touch, no draining support on her back, and she fell to the floor. Snapping her eyes open again, she looked around in a daze and saw Dracula a few feet away...on fire? Shaking her head to try to clear it but finding it an impossible task, she dizzily pulled herself up. The music has stopped, came a thought from her half-conscious mind, and then a dark shape came flying towards her and she was flying.

She watched Dracula and the dancers—who were still now—get smaller as she flew up, and then, feeling slightly less dazed, she looked over at her rescuer. It was none other than Gabriel Van Helsing.

"Gabriel..." she whispered, feeling an exhilarating whoosh on her now free neck as she sped through the air. It was too good to be true.

Then she came to a stop, and she felt Gabriel's strong arms rest her gently on her feet. She stumbled back against a wall, but felt the thrall wearing off now that she was away from Dracula, away from the hypnotizing music and the never ending dance.

"Are you all right?" came Gabriel's voice, and she looked at him. Was she? Yes, she supposed she was. It was over now. She was with Van Helsing, and they were safe.

Immediately, she began to rip off the count's 'gifts'—the crown and earrings clattered to the floor. She started to unclasp the necklace, then froze.

The calm, smooth voice she now knew so well drifted up the still air, floating through the balcony and into Ann's ears. "Gabriel," it called. "Oh, Gabriel..." dreading what she would see, Anna unglued herself from the wall to follow Gabriel over to the balcony edge. She looked down at the owner of the voice and gave an involuntary shudder, thankful nevertheless that fifty feet separated him from her.

Dracula looked slowly up at two member audience, and the eyes of every still guest in the ballroom followed his. Under the heat of a thousand piercing eyes, Gabriel merely stood, still and unreadable, his own eyes fixed on the figure in black below.

"Welcome to my summer palace," was all the count said. Anna saw his gaze shift to her for an instant, and when he caught her eye she saw the glimpse of a small, knowing smirk.

"Master, master!" came the shrill voice of an unknown child, breaking the icy quiet in the room. "Look master, look!" Dracula, of course, turned and looked, with thelegions of dancers once more following his lead. With a sick feeling, Anna too, looked and caught her breath when she saw the interruption.

It was the creature, of course. Strapped to a moving wooden piece, he was carried through a parting crowd toward the waiting, smiling count, yelling and struggling the entire time, but to no avail. "No," Anna cried. After all this, all she and Van Helsing had been through this night, it couldn't end this way!

Slowly, ever so slowly, Count Dracula turned around to once again face Gabriel and Anna. "Now," he said softly, with an underlying trace of menace, "that everything is as it should be..." He turned slightly, gesturing to the many guests who were watching their host intently. "Ladies and gentlemen, I give to you—VAN HELSING!" He spun around, and with that what Anna had suspected and feared became reality: the throng of dancers, of acrobats and singers and magicians, turned in one terrifying instant into a mass of furious fanged vampires. They roared and looked up at them in hated and bloodthirsty anticipation, as Dracula's cold laugh rang out above them all.

Anna, who was wide awake now, turned and grabbed a weapon from a nearby suit of armor, but was infuriated when Gabriel hurriedly dragged her away.

"Not now," he growled, dragging her towards a door. "Plenty of time for heroics later." They dashed into an adjoining room of the balcony, frighteningly aware of the hundreds of vampires right behind them. Thankfully, Carl was in the room, standing by a huge stained glass window, puzzling over a device of some kind.

He looked up in surprise, eyes widening, and asked, "Where...are we going?"

It was almost humorous. Anna and Gabriel looked at each other, locking eyes for an instant, before replying confidently, "Through the window!"

They barely registered Carl throwing the device he was holding and the door being broken down by dozens of vampires before, indeed, leaping into the window itself.

Holding Gabriel's hand in a tight grip, Anna felt the sting of glass, the gust of wind in a fall, and the cold, wet impact of water, then a blinding flash of light obscured her vision and she saw no more. All she was aware of was Gabriel's hand still entwined with her own.

A/N: Sorry that took so long to upload! School's kept me busy. Hopefully it was worth the wait, however, lots of action in this chapter! Hope you guys like it. Yes, I took some more creative liberties with this scene but whatever...basically the next two chapters will be completely made up, so yeah... Thanks once more to all reviewers. Your comments are awesome to read!