G'day we're back! Thank you thank you thank you to all the reviews! It's so nice to know someone's actually reading this crappy story. Sorry about the incredibly long time between updates. Dracula's Rant has been suffering at the hands of author holds up brightly colored advertisement The Phantom of the Light Opera Company Production of Guys and Dolls! C'mon everybody! Be excited with me! It's an insanely long fic and posted complete because I hate doing the chapter deal thingey. Entire cast of POTLOCPGAD walk onscreen and take a bow. They look very annoyed.

Disclaimer: I own practically nothing. Not even a house. I live in a cardboard box writing these fanfics on old t-shirts using the remains of McDonald's happy meals. Also I have a cold and am very sniffly today. If I owned Dracula, he would be very nice to me and bring me a hot cup of tea.

The Cupboard and the Phantom: sorry about the slang, could not help that Rox and Jackman and Dwenham are from the land of my ancestral ancestraliness (waves Australian flag) I put some more-standard slang in just for you. It was the least I could do…you like reviewed ever single one of my fics in a day. For that you get cyberhugs and points! 

Camera blinks on.

"Hello and welcome to Velkan's Rant about all the things wrong with the movie Van Helsing." Velkan rubs some more kitchen grease into his muscles. "For one thing there isn't enough ballet. I mean sure there's ball room dancing and all, but nothing can express the soul quite like ballet." Velkan looks over at Dracula, "Aren't you going to get mad and stop me?"

Dracula shakes his head, "Don't be boring. Besides, I want to see where you're going with this ballet thing."

"You sure you don't want to stop me?"

"Pretty sure."

Velkan finishes preening and stands up straight. "Ok then I'd like to do some great ballet moves to show off my finely toned physique." He tour jetes, arabesques, releve en pointes, fouettes, and then finishes off with a bourree and frappements.

Dracula just watches sadly.

"I can't take it anymore!" Anna shrieks, and begins stabbing Velkan in the stomach repeatedly with a foot-long hypodermic syringe. "Dear brother I will rescue you from the evil that holds you in thrall!"

"Gee, I actually feel better." Velkan looks down at the needle sticking out of his guts. He looks up at Dracula. "You had me under your evil mind control! You wanted to take all the happiness out of my life! You didn't want to let me frolic among the daffodils! I remember now!"

Dracula sighs, "My adoring public, I think I have been exonerated from any accusations connected with Velkan. I think you will agree that this young man needs help. And shock therapy."

Van Helsing nods his head with a look of horrified disgust plastered on his face. He pulls a pistol out of his belt and tries to shoot Velkan. Anna whacks him on the head and he misses.

"That's my brother you idiot!" Anna says.

"I certainly hope there's nothing in heredity."

Dracula crosses his arms across his chest, raises one hand and leans his forehead against it.

"Well you can't just shoot my brother! I wouldn't like that!"

"Why not? He's a werewolf. Everyone knows you have to kill werewolves."

"So? You're a werewolf too!"

"Yeah, and I didn't even have silver bullets in my gun! Sheesh."

"Stupid vampire hunter."

"Moronic gypsy princess."

"Humph."

"So there."

"Fine."

"Fine."

Dracula gives Velkan a benevolent smile, "Come here, my lad. I understand you had a difficult childhood. Why don't you tell Dracula all about it, hmm?"

Velkan edges nervously around Anna and Van Helsing, "Well it all started when you killed my father and grandfather and great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather and all of my relatives."

Dracula picks up an overturned chair and offers it to Velkan, "And then what?"

Velkan gracefully collapses into the chair. He sits with his knees primly together. "What do you mean and then what? Isn't that enough?"

"Well your relatives were all in a sort of contract with me."

Velkan nods. "That's what comes of making pacts."

"You see back when your great-great-grandfather was very young, he invented a special electric machine but he couldn't get a patent on it, so he asked me to get the patent and fund his research." Dracula pats Velkan on the shoulder. "It was kind of like a family business."

"But they all ended up as unrecognizably charred corpses!"

"That's what happens when you try and invent bug zappers that work on dragons." Dracula shrugs, "Fact of life, mate. I tried to talk them out of it, but it was some kind of fatal obsessive compulsion to work on the invention."

Velkan sits bolt upright, "Wait….an electric bug zapper for dragons? WHOA so totally AWESOME DUDE!"

Anna stops ignoring Van Helsing for a moment and runs over to Velkan, "Vhich is it?"

"Bug zappers for dragons! We could call it like, The Drago-Zap-O-Tron."

"That ROCKS."

Velkan jumps up and starts pulling wires up from where they are taped to the studio floor, "Come on help me this is so totally cool."

"RIGHTEOUS MAN."

"Oh snap," Velkan says and some lights go out. The lights flicker back on and Velkan's hair is trailing smoke. He's sucking on his fingers, "I didn't think my fingernails were that sharp."

Anna leans over and looks at the burn mark on his hand, "Dude."

Velkan nods in agreement. "Dude."

"Duuuuuude."

"DuDE!"

"Dude?"

Velkan rolls his eyes, "Dude."

Van Helsing looks at Dracula. Dracula looks at Van Helsing. They shrug.

"Did you get a word of that mate?"

"Nope."

Somewhere in the world, TheCupboardandthePhantom reads Anna and Velkan's conversation and understands every single word of it.

"Have you ever wondered," Dracula says pensively, "Just how amazing it is that in movies the laws of physics, mathematics, and geometry don't apply?"

"Not really." Van Helsing stands up and straightens the brim of his hat dramatically. "I like to think that I can warp the fabric of space-time to meet my needs."

"Does it ever bother you when you watch a movie and see the hero shoot a spiraly grappling gun thingey into a tree, swing halfway across an endless chasm, and then the cord breaks and he just swings to the other side and lands on the grass?" Dracula walks toward the camera making expansive hand gestures.

"I had Anna with me. We were just lucky."

"It was blatant disregard of Euclidean Geometry!"

"No really, it was just a really really tall tree."

Dracula starts turning red. He sputters. He makes nasty sounding vampire noises.

"You look like you're running out of props." The author says from the sky.

Three blobs ooze onto the stage and place a set of magnetic poetry, a bottle of perfume, and a stuffed kangaroo in front of Dracula. Then they bow and reverently back away.

"Ooh poetry." Says Velkan.

Dracula clenches his fists and refuses to do anything with the props, "and you, Velkan. How come you appear out of nowhere and magically set fire to Van Helsing's car and then just as magically disappear for half an hour and then magically reappear out of the flames? Do you realize that you would have to distort the space-time continuum to do that?"

"It wasn't a car." Velkan protests, "It was a horse drawn carriage. I know because when that other carriage fell off the cliff it hit the ground and exploded. All carriages explode when they hit the ground. It has something to do with the gas tank."

"Got rid of that weird flying chick though." Van Helsing says while arranging the magnetic poetry to look like a picture of Anna.

"Hey…" Dracula starts twitching, "that's my wife you're talking about."

"I thought you said they were your fifteen year old mental patients." Van Helsing doesn't even look up from his magnetic poetry.

"Well she was…that is..until….well er... You're messing me up! Now where was I?"

"Creepy sheila. Doesn't even have eyebrows."

"I'll have you know that Verona is the most beautiful woman in the world!" Velkan stands up and shouts patriotically.

Dracula and Van Helsing freeze.

"Yeah!" Anna pulls a knife out of some kind of buckley leather secret pocket, "And I'll tell my villagers to kill you if you insult her again!"

"Vlad, I think this might be a good time to change the subject." Van Helsing smiles in a small and scared sort of way.

"And you!" Velkan points a french-manicured finger at Van Helsing, "It is because of you that I don't believe in Santa Claus any more!" He gets a mean nasty-velkan look on his face, "Yeah! You don't remember, do you? I was minding my own business one day when I look up and there you are with six reindeer flying over another one of those endless chasms." Velkan spits on the floor, "Well I believed it. Every word! But I didn't get any presents. And Anna didn't either."

"Yeah."

"And now I hate Santa Claus." Velkan snarls, "And I hate you too. In fact I hate Igor and Prince Dracula and everyone."

Van Helsing looks over at Dracula, "I thought you were a Count."

"Common misconception."

"The reindeer on the front even had a glowing nose!" Velkan is starting to sprout hair and shed skin, (yes it is kinda disgusting), "I was so happy and then you had to go and ruin it! And then you shot me! Twice!"

Van Helsing leans closer to Dracula, "What is wrong with them?" he whispers.

"Severe Shakespearean Monologue. I told you that drastic measures needed to be taken." Dracula pauses for a moment, "Besides he's right. I saw you with those reindeer the day you were filming that shot."

"Well what was I supposed to do? Get flying horses? Pah-lease."

Dracula looks regally at the camera, "Another example in the never ending string of crimes against the laws of physics perpetrated by Van Helsing."

"Well you got to do that instant replay thing." Van Helsing points out.

Anna and Velkan retract their fangs, "Instant replay?"

"It's at the ball…"

"Aleera's prom."

"….Aleera's prom. And I got Carl to push that flamethrower at Dracula and…"Van Helsing pauses to do the arm motion throwing thing, "He tosses the guy off in the corner, and then I swing down to grab Anna and his shadow does the throwing thing again, and then I get Anna and swing up and Dracula does the throwing thing again." Van Helsing pants for breath.

Velkan blinks a couple of times.

Van Helsing makes a desperate grab for the perfume bottle because his hands have nothing else to do, "Ok, it sounds better if you actually see it. You had to have been there."

Velkan blinks some more.

"It was instant replay." Van Helsing unscrews the top of the perfume bottle and drinks it, "Go ahead, get the Portuguese speaking expatriate yogurt covered Jacuzzi party Flamenco dancing cameramen to show you the clip. I'll wait."

Velkan takes Anna's arm and pats her hand, "I think it's about time we got going dear."

"Yes love." Anna says and they wander solemnly off screen.

"But it was instant replay, I swear!" Van Helsing wipes his mouth on his sleeve, "By the way that was some of the best tasting absinthe I've ever had."

Dracula is squinting at something off screen. "Did you say that they're doing flamenco now?"

"Last time I looked."

"Then who is that in the Carmen Miranda costume with bananas on his head?"

Van Helsing squints. He shakes his head, reaches into his pocket and pulls out a very think pair of glasses, "Oh are those bananas? I thought they were chickens." He observes the figure silently for a while, "It can't be Carl, it's too tall."

"How can you mistake bananas for chickens?" Dracula points, "Ooh look, he's started a conga line."

"Well they're yellow. And squishy. And they taste good. And the first thing they see after they come out of the egg they think is their parent."

Dracula goes green, "Er, don't mention that. I don't want to talk about that right now. Besides bananas don't come from eggs! Everyone knows that their giant south American spiders that die hanging in trees and get mold all over their legs."

Van Helsing is waving at the Carmen Miranda impersonator, "He looks like he's oozing something sticky and gross. I wonder who it could be?"

Dracula spins around smartly on his heel and starts walking in the other direction.

BUT HE IS TOO LATE MWAHAHAHAHA!

Frankenstein's Monster leans forward and squints a little, "Is that Van Helsing….and Mother!" He starts running/hobbling/loping on his leopard print platform shoes, "Why? Why? Why did you do it Mumsy? You sucked all the blood out of Father! Hwwwwwhhhyyyyy?"

"Goodbye now, thank you for listening to Dracula's Rant," Dracula says stiffly, "We will probably not be back next week. We will probably never ever see you again."

"No Mumsy come back!" Monster wails desperately, "I love you! You're all the family I have left in the world! Don't leave me aloooonnnneeeee!" He lunges forward and tries to give Dracula a hug,

Dracula teleports onto the nearest conveniently placed fireplace mantle. "Eek Gabriel! Do something!"

"G'day mate, my name's Van Helsing." Van Helsing shakes Monster's hand.

"My name is Monster." Monster says, "But I always wanted to be called Hamlet. It has such a nice ring to it… Ham-let…Ham-let Hamlet."

"G'day Monster." Van Helsing says.

"Have you seen my Mother?"

"What did he—she look like?"

Monster leans back to think about this, "well she had long black hair, and shiny gold earrings, and she wore a big swirly velvet cape, and a really big nose… I mean really big. The type of nose that you inherit from your dad and it just won't stop growing." Monster looks down at Van Helsing. "Have you seen her?"

Van Helsing glances nervously up at the fireplace. "Noo." He follows Dracula's prompting, "She went to a…wait Vlad could you do that last hand motion again? Oh right she went to a …carnival? And got a pony? Yeah, because you were good. No because you were bad. No? Orright, keep ya' shirt on! Oi'm doin me best an he's right you do have a dirty big conk an if you wouldn't stick it in the sky hoity toity like it wouldn't seem 'arf as big."

Monster wobbles around and stares at Dracula with large Bambi-esque eyes, "Mumsy?"

Dracula waves sheepishly.

Monster picks up the heaviest, largest object in the vicinity and chucks it at Dracula. It happens to be the stuffed kangaroo. "You have killed my Father! Prepare to die!"

Van Helsing looks shocked, "Wait that's matricide!"

Carl in a green cloak and some nasty looking daggers and bow and arrow sets jumps on to the screen. "May death find all of you very quickly if you bring that poor mother to harm!"

"Um Carl?"

Carl in the green cloak doesn't even look at Van Helsing.

"Um Carl?" Van Helsing asks again , "Actually that's my hairstyle that you're wearing there. Yup. Says so in my contract. I get the wavy long hair and you get the monk cut.

Carl in the green cloak and long wavy hair is still ignoring Van Helsing. "Dear Madam," he says to Dracula, "Are you hurt?"

Dracula watches solemnly for a moment, observing the new situation and coming to the obvious conclusion, "the Author took too many antihistamines again didn't she."

Carl in the green cloak is oblivious, "I am Captain Faramir, Prince of Gondor! I shall keep you safe from this Monster who seeks your life."

Van Helsing does a double take.

Carl in a yogurt stained brown dress wanders on to the screen with a bowl stuck on his head. He stumbles about and gurgles contentedly. "Van Helsing? Van Helsing? Where are you?"

Dracula looks up at the author miserably. Then he shoots a look offscreen, "IIIIIGGGGOOOOOORRRRR! Get me out of this!"

The Author's pale little trembling fingers reach out across the metal I-beams in the ceiling and gingerly stroke some of the fluffy fuzz on the kangaroo's head. H/s/I cackles like a maniac and hugs the stuffed kangaroo dramatically. "You shall never escape from meeeeeeeee!"

And so the Rant continues……

Is the fic now a crossover? Or is the author stupidly inserting random characters that our hero and all those other lousy villains have played? And most importantly, will the next chapter contain a musical number?

Find out next time in, The Return of the Fellowship of the Two Daisies, or My Heart Belongs to Daddy.