"CastleVania 2000"
Chapter II of III : "Running the Gauntlet"
Transylvania, Romania
December 31st, the year of our Lord 2000 A.D.
"Are we there yet?" Buffy whined. It was nightfall by the time they neared the end of the cobble bridge they were crossing.
The privately chartered jet flight from California toRomania's Henri Coandă International Airport—the whole time of which being plagued with a seemingly unending series of storms and windy conditions—across the Atlantic had been the fun part. Taking it on foot from there on out after arriving in Bucharest, through the town of Veros they had hiked, over the Wicked Ditch they had gone, through the Aljiba and Dora Woods, through the ghost town, and finally through the Vrad Graveyard. As they came to a long bridge across the Argés River, they had been forced to use several vials of Alucard's Holy Water to break through the tainted bricks that impeded their way. It was when they reached the end of the Borgo Pass that Alucard told his two companions they had at last reached CastleVania, the scenic Carpathian Mountains and closer Transylvanian Alps looming on the horizon.
The Demon Castle Dracula. Dracula's unholy kingdom, cursed by the hundreds of the very spirits that, in life, helped build it.
Blade shot a sneer at Buffy, his hand at the handle of his katar punching dagger. "Ask that again, blondie, and I swear to god I'll cut you a new leering mou—"
"Yes, Ms. Summers, we are there," Alucard cut Blade off, answering Buffy's query.
"Gotta say, though," Buffy offered her two cents as she gazed in awe at the castle's splendor, "It's a definite improvement over that cheap imitation Drac threw up back in Sunnydale when he, er, visited for the fall."
Blade just shook his head, giving a grunt. "Some motherfucka always tries to iceskate uphill..."
Gathering their wits even as they gathered their weapons at readiness, Alucard led the way into the night.
-----
"Freeze! I said freeze, mother fucker!"
"He's got a gun!"
"He's got a sword!"
"She's got… some kind of bow and arrow…?"
"They're rabbittin'! Smoke'em!"
Dashing under the cover of the mist-ridden night, trio of warriors went into action. Their movement going into fast forward, Blade with MACH pistol in hand, Buffy brandishing a polished oak stake and crossbow, and Alucard with his broad Crissaegrimm Sword—their bickering and casual demeanor dropping as their roles as the roles that the hand of fate had dealt them to play materialized.
Getting through the armed security guards was the easy part—neither zombie, nor ghoul, nor vampire, they must have been normal.
"They've been marked," Blade noted, a hint of his fangs visible between his lips as he kicked over one of the bodies. "Look at their necks."
"I don't see anything... oh..." Buffy trailed off, noticing the hieroglyphic-esque tattoos on the back of the thugs necks when she thought she was looking for bite marks.
Blade harrumphed. "Marked by a head vampire... they serve this master in the hopes he'll make them Undead as well if they serve him well." Hocking, he spat on the body under his heel. "Congratulations, asshole."
Buffy's gaze shifted to Alucard, who she was startled to see was already looking at her behind a stilted grin. Giving a muted giggle, the three continued on toward the already-lowered castle gates.
"What's next, I wonder?" Buffy thought aloud.
CastleVania, the Demon Castle Dracula
In the ill-lit, grandiose foyer now of CastleVania, the sounds of the battle abruptly died out with a final animal-like whimper, then a gurgling noise.
Crouched in a cat-like position of resting that could turn into full readiness at any given moment, Buffy brushed a stray strand of sweat-strewn hair from her face. "Okay... any thoughts on just what the hell that thing was?" she inquired in annoyance. She wiped at the purple-tinted, viscous blood that had spattered across her cheek from the onslaught of the Mossberg 500A combat shotgun Blade insisted she take earlier. She spared one last look at the remnants of the disfigured, vaguely canine corpse at their feet.
"One ugly-fuckin' Cujo, that's for sure," Blade said. He gave his closest equivalent to a smile. "Nice work, though, girl."
"Cerberus," Alucard was quick to answer. "The three-headed dog that guards the gates of Hell. In many instances... his services are summoned... elsewhere."
Blade gave a scowl. "Well, you k—"
"My finest hound... once again given flesh yet once again slain..." a thundering voice cut Blade off. There, materializing in the air immediately behind the threesome, hovered the dark figure every mortal man would face sooner or later yet could never avoid.
The Grim Reaper. The Duke of Doom. Thanatos.
As was known to the three companions—each had made it their business to know everything there was to know about the supernatural and arcane (or in Buffy's case, she left that to Giles, the essentially paternal figure that was the Slayer's resident Watcher)—the Book of Nod and popular myth both placed the being celebrated to man as "Death" a Fallen Angel of biblical origin beside Gabriel, the angel Uriel, who with his fiery sword played a righteous judicator to human souls. His name meaning "Fire of God" and being described as "The Angel of Repentance," Uriel was said to be the Archangel that held the keys to the gates of Hell, who was also said to be the one who warned Noah of the impending Great Flood. According to Milton, Uriel was the Archangel with the sharpest eyes. As the "Interpreter of Prophecies," Uriel was usually depicted carrying a book or a papyrus scroll, or possessing the said Fiery Sword.
Now he was a cloaked skeleton, the veils of Time and Creation itself visible through the eternities through his dark, tattered robes.
"The slayers of the nosferatu, the vampyre… the strigoi, two of you sharing the best of both worlds yet each of you sharing the same blood ties…" the vague outline of the Reaper's skeletal visage wavered, perhaps trying to smile, "… the same bloodline. Or did you not realize?" The laugh was unmistakable, reverberating through the chamber's interior. "You did realize—one of you must have, for your union was not put forth by chance."
"What's your stand, Death? We have no beef with you… unless you wanna make one with us."
"Well, Eric… my stand is and has always been of a neutral nature. Though of late… these last few centuries I have been bound to a deal with a particular soul."
Alucard took a step forward, then faced his comrades. "He is bound to Dracula, my friends. The legend of CastleVania… its centennial resurrection with my father… these are not by random."
"Indeed?"
"No..." Alucard raised slowly his finger, pointing it accusingly at the visage of the Grim Reaper. "They were by your hand."
With that, the battle began. The three warriors pulled out all the stops, giving it all they had as they worked as a unit.
Blade pressed the offensive, katana-like silver sword in hand, staying in Death's face and keeping him on his toes; Alucard moved about as a ghost, showing great agility as he seemingly attacked the Grim Reaper on all fronts with various weaponry; Buffy fought side-by-side with Blade, their martial arts prowess clear as they stuck to blades-only.
The odds were stacked. It was only a matter of time before Death's number was up. In a gust of raw Entropy, Death went screaming back into the void before the quickness of Alucard's sword.
The three took a moment to gather themselves both mentally and physically, Alucard now seeming more in his element the more he engaged these dark minions of his father.
"Since Prince Vlad Draculea's mortal death in 1476 Death has been bound by a pact, a barter on Vlad the Impaler's soul—a soul with great renown among the Powers that Be in the hereafter, the warrior of Romania that sent over a hundred and fifty thousand of his kingdom's Turkish enemies and native criminals alike screaming into Hell's ever-welcoming embrace. This pact called for Death to resurrect Dracula in 1476... but it was no longer the same man. Not my father. This new Dracula had been cursed with the spirit of Mathias Cronqvist, then going onto fight Trevor, Grant, Sypha, and myself in 1499; it called for Death to resurrect Dracula in 1576 to face Christopher the first time; it called for Death to resurrect Dracula in 1691 to have a number of confrontations with Simon; it called for Death to influence the dark priest Shaft—"
"Dark priest? Shaft? Hey, yeah, I know all about that cat," Blade interjected. "Shaft, Shaft's Big Score, Shaft in Africa… forget Sam Jackson's take, that was my childhood hero—baddest cat in town. Baddest brutha, that's for damned sure."
Alucard rolled his eyes, understanding the modern-day reference to the biggest star of the '70s blaxploitation movies though not allowing himself to appreciate the humor, then continued, "It called for Death to influence the dark priest Shaft to resurrect Dracula with the help of his followers in 1788 to face Richter, then again four years later to ultimately face myself… and Maria; it called for Death to answer the summons of a countess named Carmilla not long thereafter to resurrect Dracula to face Nathan Graves and Hugh Baldwin; it called for Death to influence the dark priest Samuel to resurrect Dracula several decades early in 1844 to face Cornell the man-wolf and Henry DeRais the knight, then eight years later Reinhardt Schneider the Belmont and Carrie Fernandez; it called for Death to resurrect Dracula to ultimately face Jonathan Harker, Abraham Van Helsing, and Quincey P. Morris the Belmont in 1897; it called for Death to move the hand of the reborn Countess Elizabeth Bartley in 1917 during the First World War, resurrecting Dracula to do battle with Quincey's son John and his friend Eric Lecarde.
"That brings us to the year 1997, when Death once again rose to fulfill his pact with Dracula... for his Fifth Centennial Resurrection. This time he disguised this most latest reconstitution of the Demon Castle Dracula and resurrection of Dracula by reaching beyond the nether realms to move the hand of a union of historians who led the media to believe they had been working as early as the 1970s toward manually restoring Vlad III's Transylvanian Castle Dracula. Historian and Dracul family descendant Radu Florescu and others, showing aristocratic Americans about the premises as if it were no different than any other tourist trap, invited tourists, none having any idea they were treading upon the cursed earth of CastleVania.
"No one bothered to question the Florescu family's request to the Romanian government to end the tours last year. No one even seemed to wonder, even the most avid of Dracula enthusiasts, how the closing to the public of Castle Dracula related to the proximity of the new millennium."
"But it's already the millennium… it's the year 2000, isn't it?"
Blade was about to offer a correction for Buffy, letting Alucard speak in politeness.
"There was no year 0, my dear Ms. Summers, thence the Julian Calendar of Anno Domini started at the year 1, and thence the year 1 was the start of the First Millennium, 1001 was the start of the Second Millennium, and 2001 will be the start of the Third Millennium."
Buffy gave a sigh. "Don't I feel stupid. If Willow were here she'd probably smack me…"
Blade shook his head. "What the hell you majorin' in school, Buffy? Cheerleading?"
"All right, all right… it's pick-on-Buffy day already…"
The three began walking out of the chamber in the direction of a winding staircase with candelabras all the way up, Alucard's back turned to Blade and Buffy.
"What was Death talking about, Alucard?" Buffy asked, the burning curiosity overcoming her. Blade was likely wondering himself, but was equally willing to brush the whole matter aside.
Alucard stopped walking, but did not turn. "What do you mean?"
"Y'know… about each of us sharing the same 'bloodline'?"
"It is not easy to accept… or at least it is not easy to fathom its plausibility… but it is true."
Blade gave his usual dismissive grunt, putting on his best couldn't-care-less face. "Man, I don't even need to be hearing this shit."
"Before I fought by Trevor C. Belmont's side in the fifteenth century—"
"Man, there goes chatterbox again," Blade interrupted. "Cut to the chase, Drac Junior. Or is it Kid Dracula?"
Alucard sighed, retaining his composure and patience but finding it slowly but surely wearing thin with Blade's continual flippancy. "Against Dracula during his first resurrection I made another stand against my father… though passively. It was in this encounter… this happening only months after my mortal body succumbed to mortal ailment in the care of the Bishop of Ordea in 1482… that I fell in love for the first time." Not even Blade offered any retort, smug or otherwise. "It was with Sonia, the first of the vampire hunters to challenge the Undead Dracula after he fell in the swamps near Buda."
Buffy cocked an eyebrow. "Sonia… Sonia Belmont. You mentioned her before."
"Yes, one of the first Belmonts to raise the ancestral Vampire Killer whip against the minions of my father. I tested her along her journey within the gates of CastleVania under the guise of being one of my father's generals while quietly plotting towards his undoing." Alucard winced, his emotions and expressions known only to himself. He couldn't be proud of standing against his father, but it seemed clear that he believed that whatever Dracula was now was not the same Wallachian Prince that Romania celebrated as a hero he had once been proud to call his father.
"Upon Sonia's slaying of my father we reconciled as kindred spirits. Soon, as more than that, and within the year she gave birth to my only child… Trevor C. Belmont." Alucard finally turned around. "The Legend of CastleVania that has become popularized leaves this part out… the mystery behind where the Belmonts' mysterious powers originated from and the unthinkable truth—the Belmonts, the biggest bane of Dracula, stem from Dracula's own bloodline."
"Trevor… a quarter vampire," Blade mused. "Hey, great. That's fuckin' great. That's beautiful."
"You see, Buffy… the legend of the female Slayer… that every generation has one, and every Slayer has a Watcher." Alucard paused, perhaps for effect. "I could tell you your entire family line… trace it back to the beginning."
Buffy nodded in awe, understanding wholly where Alucard was going with this and accepting it. She generally considered herself a good judge of character, of truth and falsehood. There was no deceit to be found beneath Alucard's facade, if that's really what it was. "Sonia… Sonia Belmont was one of the first Slayers. Wasn't she?"
Alucard nodded. Buffy had her answer.
"All right," Blade interjected, half-jokingly. "I'll play. What does that make me to you guys? "
"Part of the bloodline, Eric."
Alucard's matter-of-face tone was taken as condescending by Blade, who had become accustomed to living a life of being the one who always had the answers even when Whistler had been his mentor. "First, stop calling me that like you fuckin' know me. Second, last I checked my last name ain't no Belmont, Summers, or Dracula. At any rate, in case you haven't noticed… I'm black. Y'know… Action Jackson kinda thing? Blackula? The Count Chockula to your Captain Crunch? The Chris Rock to your Tom Green? The Samuel L. Jackson to your Bruce Wil—"
"First, you got your given last name from your mother. Your father was a man by the name of Devante Johnson. His father—your paternal grandfather—was a man by the name of Charles Lee Johnson… a man who wed a thoroughly Caucasian Cynthia Morris, the daughter of none other than John Morris, son of Quincey."
"What the fuck, man... basically... all three of us..." Blade paused, doing a double-take. "You saying I'm related to both your skinny, lilly white asses? Oh, this is sweet."
As the three ascended the winding staircase to the Demon Castle Dracula's second floor, little further was said between the three.