Castlevania: Let the Symphony Last for Eternity

Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix

Beta By: Lady Lunar Phoenix

A/N: There is an OLD Halloween cartoon from Warner Brothers were a vampire turns himself into a bat while facing Bugs, slips on a pair of reading glasses and asks 'you wouldn't hit a bat with glasses would you?'. That's what goes through my head with the last few part of this chapter when it deals with Soma dealing with finding out who Alucard 'is'.

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"And then there is Adrian... my pride and joy..."

The sentence sparked like flame, grating on Alucards' nerves like the sparks cast off flint, igniting his need to move. He couldn't face his father like this, this amicable, friendly voice, his name being used ever so casually. The clarion call of how wrong never was so loud until that moment when he was brutally reminded that this wasn't the real reality. The casual way that his father addressed Leon proved that there 'was' a past between the two. Willing to properly introduce Alucard, by birth name, to the man had not been something his father had 'ever' done before. Even when his mother was alive, his father had always had a title or moniker for him. 'Young Master', 'Prince', 'Highness', 'Kid Dracula' but that had been ages and Alucard didn't speak of his childhood title.

The second his father had started to address the pair the desire to not fight had blossomed in Alucard. A desire to just have his father send Leon home and leave the time line like it was. So that he could once again have his father like this. Calm, engaging, as close to human as was possible for a vampire. When the claymore that Soma bestowed upon him almost trembled at his side like an alarm it rattled away thoughts like dust from a blanket. Reminding him that this was a lie and the longer he heard his fathers' voice the harder it was to want to rescue the Belmont.

Better to take action and escape while he could.

Flee from his father's humanity.

Run from his own damned soul and facing his sins.

The painting hung before him against the wall of the Belmont, one he didn't recognize save for the whip. He could feel the aura of whoever created this entrapment painting and with every step he went about interfacing with it, so it would open its door for him. The Belmont before him, Simon as the stories went, probably kept frozen in this painting that he was sealed in. Only Alucard didn't know what the painting itself represented, the fighting spirit of the Belmont or what he had been doing before being sealed?

The locks to the painting came undone readily, forced open by a power older than its maker causing the environment around Alucard to drip down like spilled paint down a canvas. Swirling around him and carrying him and a wave of the colors from his fathers' throne room to...

"Finally! A vampire! Something I can fight!"

The voice was strong, a bit over eager, to the degree that would make Alucard think this person bored and looking for something to do. As the spilled paints that had carried him pulled away he found himself in a day time setting of a town with the Belmont he was looking for standing before him. The 'town' of sorts was a series of quiet shades of brown and grays. There were flags raised in celebration and he could hear the strains of music coming from further within the town carried on the wind.

Only there was no sound of people or animals, outside of the distant music the world was utterly silent of anything living. Natural or Supernatural. Though perhaps it wasn't this way in the beginning and only became this way after a certain person went on a killing spree. This particular Belmont looked unrestrained, and quite interested in a fight, so apparently the whole painting was a type of world onto itself.

Interesting.

"No, my name is Alucard. I'm not here to fight."

Simon blinked as the vampire introduced himself, a name well known among the Belmonts who wielded the Vampire Killer. The dhampire clearly on the 'no kill' list that Simon absolutely had to follow, yet... this was a vampire... The hunter had stood for what felt like ages trying to figure out how to get the painting to 'work' for lack of better term. Poking, prodding, threatening it with Vampire Killer and nothing had happened, leaving him disgruntle as he sat before it. Because sooner or later someone was coming for him right?

Once the painting started to waver like a pond disturbed by a stone, Simon had been gripped by the excitement of facing a good challenge. Maybe the vampire who put him in this strange place? Rough the monster up some before forcing the vampire to release him, then, kill the fiend. And this stranger, or rather well respected ally, who appeared with his black armor with gold trim and helmet twisted like the face of a fierce dragon certainly gave off a feeling of power.

So of course he wasn't there to fight.

Simon felt so disheartened, he let his shoulders drop as he recoiled Vampire Killer and hooked it back on his belt. Really? He was going to die of boredom long before he had a real challenge.

"Not even a brief battle?" Simon asked, hoping for something, "or is the battle outside the painting?"

"...Actually if everything goes according to plan, once you are free of this prison you absolutely may 'not' fight the white coated man." Alucard answered realizing that the stories were almost horrifyingly true. This particular Belmont 'did' have a blood thirsty obsession with fighting, meaning once they left, if Soma 'did' reappear... Well then they'd have to hold Simon back from the reincarnated version of his father. "... You're not even concerned that I just appeared?"

"I'm bored, if you're not going to face me, then I want out so I can find something that 'will'." Simon retorted as he casually rested his hand on the handle of the whip at his hip. "But if I can't even fight out 'there' what's the point of even leaving here?"

"Once you left the castle the time line changed, father came back and the world has changed as his war consumed it." Alucard retorted as he tried to understand why this had to be explained. Than again he 'did' enter here with the assumption that Simon was sealed, not that Simon was still physically active.

"So there 'is' something I can fight out there?" Simon asked, growing frustrated at this ball in shell game that Alucard was giving him.

"No," Alucard slowly replied, "the odds are that once you leave here, time will reform itself to what it was before you were captured."

There was no mistaking the disappointment and sheer annoyance on the Belmont's face as he crossed his arms as he sighed in response.

"Sooo outside this 'painting' is all manners of monsters I could be killing at my leisure, however; if I leave here, they all disappear. And I'm stuck back in a castle that is strangely normal," Simon recited, showing the Vampire that this hunter 'was' more than just a blood thirsty hunter. "What's the point in leaving?"

"Because with you gone, so has left the Belmonts; my father wiped your clan out of existence with your absence. Countless have died," Alucard pointed out trying to process the fact that this was even a 'discussion'.

"So..." Simon began when his gaze dropped to Vampire Killer at his side. 'Oh, and I have the Whip so it wasn't a matter of just finding a new heir.' He finished the sentence in his head and sighed, seeing that it made sense what he was being told. If the whip was back with the clan it wouldn't have mattered and damn it.

"So what am I supposed to do once I leave here? The Castle is boring me to death."

'Leon, Trevor, I apologize for every demeaning thing I ever thought of you because of your human blood.' Alucard thought to himself though he replied, "we could... hunt down the people who caused you to be pulled from your time as well as your other family members who are here."

"Could I fight these kidnappers? Or would that be another situation of me being forced to stay my hand?" Simon asked, not yet willing to be hopeful that he could have something to do.

"Be my guest," Alucard answered his voice clipped slightly under his helmet.

Simon sighed again, but walked up to Alucard everything about his posture screaming his displeasure and sheer boredom. "Maybe I can fight that blue coated Belmont."

"Please don't kill your own kin," Alucard asked, hoping against hope that his father and Leon were well.

"This might surprise you, but I 'can' avoid killing what I am facing," Simon retorted to the frustrated sign coming from his vampire rescuer.

"You don't say..." Alucard noted as he willed the painting to respond to his power. Bending it to his will and carrying both himself and his fellow hunter through its paints and out back into the real world.

There was no sound as they traveled through the painting back into the real world, the swirling vortex of paints the only clue. As colors associated with the painting began to bleed into the colors he knew to come from the Master Chambers. Yet there was a spot of white that appeared and blossomed like a flower. More colors began to bloom as well, shades of blue and pink that had not been in the Master Chambers when he left.

As the colors bled away the 'picture' of the real world coming into focus, Alucard was confronted by a much larger group than he anticipated. A vast majority of women in fact, given what Leon had recounted of his time in the castle. So time's effort at 'fixing' things was to bring people to where they would have been had time not been disrupted? Since Leon was here, the group he had found were thus brought here. While behind the blond Belmont, Alucard could see Soma standing there clearly counting all the people in the room. Now knowing who this person 'was', Alucard found himself stricken with a sense of child like curiosity and longing.

While Soma stood there taking in the stupid number of vampire hunters in the room, 'nope. Not even going to try to reason with, I'm out.' he thought as he began taking quiet steps back and towards the doors.

"DRACULA!"

'Why me...' Soma pondered as his shoulders drooped at that strong, male voice issuing a challenge clearly.

Suddenly all the women turned to look at him and he could hear them all blustering that name out... Why did his life have to suck this badly? Vampire jokes aside, he really needed to get out of the Master Chambers if this was going to turn into a massive brawl.

"Ladies... ladies, ladies please!" Leon began to plead wishing the women would notice him. While he 'was' ecstatic that they had reappeared and where in the room with him, especially seeing Maria returned and normal and Charlotte alive. He didn't need them trying to smite Soma!

'White coat...' Simon mentally processed and remembered what Alucard had said about 'not' hurting the white coat person. 'Damn it.' "So wait, I can't fight him but you're going to let a bunch of barely dressed women fight him? How is that 'fair'?!" Simon demanded as he turned glaring at Alucard, getting to see the man's face for the first time. It seemed strange that when Alucard appeared in the painting he had been in full armor and helmet. Now he was wearing only a nobles' attire and the claymore.

"Excuse me? 'Barely dressed' am I?" Several of the women turned to glare at Simon.

"Two of those women just so 'happen' to be my future daughters, thank you very much," one man, the only non Belmont yet still human in all the Chamber, while carrying a spear called out defensively.

'Ahh sweet, sweet distraction,' Soma thought as he ducked his head down a little more into his fluffy collared white coat and sped up towards the doors.

"Soma wait!" Leon called out, "is this what herding cats is like?" He finally blurted out in mild frustration.

"Given that women 'are' often associated with cats, yes, yes you are. Good luck, may the force be with you, but I'm still out." Soma called out over his shoulder in answer.

"Where are you going?" Alucard demanded as he turned his steps towards Soma.

"Room full of Vampire Hunters who know who I was? Do the math, I'm out." Soma answered and turned back to the door.

Only Alucard had a strong enough desire to know his father's new self and even if he was a Dhampire once more, he was still faster than his father. Placing himself between his father and the door leading out of the Master Chambers with his inhuman speed.

"When I said 'keep doing what you want' I didn't mean for you to keep me in a room full of people who want to kill me," Soma retorted falling back a step and crossing his arms with the most disapproving expression written on his face.

"We do not mean you harm," Leon pointed out, sliding past the women around him. He had been looking at the painting when the surface of the painting started to ripple again. Mathias had grown quiet, but it hadn't mattered at the time because before Leon people began to fade into view. Turning his attention from the painting to the faces of people he had met since entering the Castle originally. Trevor didn't manifest, but again Leon didn't meet Trevor or his friends until after time had changed.

But the presence of the group with Maria, who had been turned, was reassuring so he hadn't really thought about Mathias. Until now when he finally could put a definitive face to Mathias' future incarnation. The eyes were strangely shaped he noted, the hair was stark white and blended well with the white fur collar coat that he wore. And yet 'this' was Mathias, how had the future changed the man that Leon knew?

"You 'say' that but," Soma began turning to face Leon before looking beyond the Hunter, "who would like to kill me! Show of hands! One, two, three... You're a Belmont you're automatically included..." Soma continued counting every hand that went up, which was literally everyone save Leon and Alucard. "Seven, seven people want to kill me. And that one Belmont would probably like second helpings of slaying me."

"Father stop embarrassing yourself and I," Alucard grumbled at Soma's back.

So he missed the expression that crossed Soma's face as he processed the words, his blue eyes growing large. He pointed to himself mouthing the word 'father', less for the sake of an answer from those standing in front of him and more for himself.

'I have a kid? Arikado didn't tell me anything about that! And I 'told' him to tell me everything he knew about the castle! I would expect something like a 'child' would be part of the verbal tour!' Soma thought as he turned and started walking towards the throne of the Castle. The room lacked chairs and he needed a seat and while he had no desire to sit on the throne. The steps were perfectly acceptable for sitting. 'Did I rape her? Is that it? Oh God that's it isn't it? I raped his mother and literally am living the 'I hate you Vampire Dad' trope!'

"Oooh noooooo," Soma groaned as he walked off leaving Alucard and Leon baffled by Soma's total shock.

"Is there a problem?" Leon asked following Soma to the throne just to watch the young man drop into a disgruntled sitting position.

Soma looked up at Leon attempting to stuff his mounting self loathing so it wasn't so evident on his face. His memory of how he met this person was fuzzy, just that Leon walked in with a literal fan club of women at his back. At first Soma mistook the fellow male blond vampire hunter as a type of wing man. Until he heard two of the women address him as 'father', and Soma was forced to stop making up amusing ideas of this group of hunters.

"I have a 'son'? Ok, I don't have kids in my life, that means if I have a child, its from back when I was a vampire! This doesn't end well!" Soma retorted as his mind churned out so many possible ways he could have a child.

"What? You met your wife and got married..." Leon pointed out watching as Soma's expression switched from unimpressed to outright disbelieving.

"A 'vampire', someone willingly married a 'vampire' in a day and age where vampires were feared and hated..." Soma repeated slowly before hiding his face behind a hand that rubbed at his forehead.

But at least Leon knew what was going on now.

Right?

Wait...

"Soma... are you suggesting you... forced yourself on Alucards' mother?"

"Well would you? Yeah, sounds the most logical conclusion," Soma answered only to be cut off by a very irate Alucard.

"YOU MOST CERTAINLY DID NOT!"