ONE WAY OR ANOTHER

-CHAPTER TWENTYFOUR-

BETA: Tammy Brown

INFO: www. livejournal. com /users/Draycious

LINK: http//www. fanfiction. net/s/2562885/1/

"Are you happy with yourself now?" A voice said behind him and startled him greatly. He whipped around and came face to face with Dracula.

"What?" he cried out both shocked and angry while trying to hide his now freely bleeding arm behind his back.

"There's no use for that," Dracula said calmly, seeing his movement. "I can smell the blood, I'm a vampire after all," he said and smiled ironically. Raven stared incuriously. He had waited for a reprimand to come, he never expected Dracula to be so cool about it. Dracula stood there, ever so black and tall, just looking at him with an ironic and cold smile. He hadn't expected to ever see that look directed at him. He was very confused by the reaction and didn't quite know what to do with himself.

"What? I can hear no words coming from you, and hell knows your lips are almost always flapping," Dracula said and rolled his eyes. Now Raven became seriously freaked out. What the hell was going on? Was he dreaming or… no, he couldn't be dreaming, not with that bitchy pain in his arm.

"Are you just going to stand there?" he asked once he had found his words. The question sounded ridiculous even in his eyes, and seeing Dracula's ironic smile widen he knew he had fucked up.

"What do you want me to do? Stop your bleeding? Oh I can do that, the question is if you'll learn something from that… isn't it better if I just let you bleed, letting you take care of your own mess?" Dracula asked with his eyebrows raised, other than that he showed no emotions and his face was impossible to read. He didn't move, he simply stood there right inside the door. Raven didn't move either, other than squirming slightly on the spot.

"I… I…" he stammered and didn't feel so big and mighty any longer. He was a confidant person, but he was in the middle of a break down and couldn't quite pull himself together at the moment.

"But then again you might bleed to death…but maybe that's good… Then I have a good reason for turning you and none of those humans can blame me for it…. What say you?"

"Er… are you feeling alright? Because I'm not and if you wouldn't mind…" he said and trailed off. Then he snapped. "Either heal me or leave me the fuck alone so I can think!" he shouted. Irrationally enough he was starting to get angry with Dracula. Even if it wasn't everyday you cut yourself and had your blood father Dracula just standing there weighting the options whether to kill you or not, he shouldn't be mad at Dracula because he had done nothing wrong. In the end it was his own fault.

Dracula heaved a great sigh and walked over and leaned down slightly so he could take a good look at the wound. For a while it seemed liked Dracula would actually lick the blood but he seemed to restrain himself from doing it. He used his fingers to heal the wound, it tingled and it felt warm but other than that Raven could feel nothing. It didn't hurt or such. All in all it was quite a nice feeling. Protective almost.

"You do know that you nee some serious anger management, right? I would suggest therapy," Dracula said once he had finished up. "You have too much on your mind and you've had that for a very long time. I know about your problems and even through you're improving with Blade's help it's moving on to slow. You need help and you need it fast in order to sort yourself out before you do something worse than this." Dracula seemed to regress the situation for a moment. "This was a spontaneous act, next time it might be a planned out suicide. You don't want that and neither do I. Due to those certain circumstances I'm going to suggest a new method of therapy that I wasn't willing to let you know about before because it's a tiring process for your mind and you might even feel physically ill," Dracula said and paused for effect. He let Raven know he was dead serious about this, whatever it was. Dracula continued when he was sure he had all of Raven's attention. "What I'm talking about is that I'm willing to look into your memories like I've done in the sessions we've had before, but this time unlike the other times I'll help you see and analyze those memories from a different angle in order to help you come away from those captivating and haywire feelings you're projecting all around you. What do you think about that?" Raven had listened as if enchanted to every word Dracula had spoken. He shook himself to get out of his daze.

"Alright… What do I tell the others?" He agreed willingly, but a bit helplessly. He wasn't sure what to expect.

"Why tell them at all? They don't need to know about this." Dracula said with a little smirk, very typical him.

Raven thought it through quickly. "Fine then," he agreed. "When do we start?" he asked and crossed his arms.

"You need help as soon as possible, obviously," Dracula said dryly and Raven gave him a halfhearted glare. "We might as well start now. The process of going through your memories might seem like an long term project but in truth we can get through half your life in four hours."

"How's that possible?" He asked astonished and sat down when Dracula mentioned for him to do that.

"I am a vampire," Dracula said and looked at him as if he were stupid for even asking.

"No shit," Raven couldn't refrain from saying as he rolled his eyes. Dracula only inclined his head slightly but otherwise he ignored it. "I can move with an incredible speed with my body, but my mind is even faster."

"But is my mind able to keep up with that speed isn't it dangerous?" Raven asked anxiously. This way felt way too easy to be true. Dracula actually laughed at him. Although, it was perhaps a bit dry and sarcastic laugh that he mustered.

"You are my heir and blood child after all, don't you think a child of mine would be able to master the speed? Now that's a laugh," Dracula said. Then he turned serious. "Even if you hadn't been my blood child I wouldn't be surprised if you had been able to master it anyway. You're a very powerful person and therefore very dangerous. Especially if disturbed in anyway."

"Gee thanks," He said dryly. Dracula made him sound like a mental patient on the run and he didn't like that image in his head. He was through with people thinking he was insane, it was in is past and he didn't want to deal with any of that ever again.

"Let's begin," said Dracula and took Ravens head in his hands and looked him straight in the eye. Raven found himself tumbling downwards towards the depths, which seemed endless in those dark eyes. He started to relax after he had reached a dark place filled of shadows.

"That's right, relax," a voice told him. It was a deep, rich and silky voice, almost spinning who began to give him instructions. It was very persuasive and he found himself willing to obey everything he was told.

"Look around you," the dark voice continued. "What do you see?"

He was going to answer when he heard a new voice, but it seemed so very far away, almost miles away.

"What are you doing?" the outraged voice of Sirius Black said.

NOTES: Well, I think I have to explain the attitude in this chapter. I've read a lot of fan fictions with a suicidal Harry Potter and I've seen all the adults react strongly and violently, which is normal of course. The thing is that this time I wanted it to be different. I didn't want the person who found Harry to be freaked out. So the natural choice was Dracula. Dracula wouldn't freak out. He's old, wise and powerful and he's got the gift to heal wounds. Why would he freak out? Blood is his meal for God's sake! I saw this as an opportunity to experiment with the characters and hopefully make something original out of it. I'm not sure it worked, but it might get better in future chapters. Also, isn't a cool Dracula better than perhaps, an hysterical Hermione Granger? Anyway, until next time.

/ Pure Black