Chapter 4: All Consuming Obsession

Disclaimer: Hellboy characters do not belong to me. However, Erica Schwarz, Volker Maynard the vampire, and the plot that isn't from the movie is mine.

Author's Notes: Thanks for the reviews everyone! And I sincerely apologize for taking so long to post this chapter, I was the head of the costume department for my high school's musical Once Upon A Mattress, and finding or sewing all the costumes for a cast of about twenty people consumed almost all of my writing time. The play was last weekend, so I'll have more time soon, which means the next chapter will be up much sooner than this one was. Anywhoo, here is the long awaited chapter devoted entirely to Kroenen and Ilsa. As might be expected with such characters, there's a bit of mild language and violence. Here are the German to English translations: 'Ja' is yes, 'Nein' is no, 'Guten abend' is good evening, and "Auf wiedersehen' is good bye. Enjoy the chapter!

iluvrocknroll: Yeah, poor Erica with Volker going for her throat. And Agent Moss does seem to be screaming 'kill me', doesn't he? Thanks for reviewing!

The Common Wind Deity: I put lots of detail in here for you! I know exactly how you feel, I like to be able to picture things too. And the next chapter is also about Kroenen and Ilsa, since I thought they deserved some more attention.

amyltrer: Hmm, someone's good at paying attention to my foreshadowing! Thanks for the idea, I'm using it in the next chapter, which is also only about Kroenen and Ilsa.

CicadaS/Psycho Llama: Yeah, Erica's love life needs some work. I think that might be mentioned in chapter six, hint hint. And I guess I can see Volker being hot, as long as he wasn't trying to kill me. I liked your vampire pun, it made me laugh!

Gestalt: Sorry, no Sammaels in this chapter, but they're coming up soon-ish, believe me! Yay! You caught on to my foreshadowing too! Here comes the baddies!

"Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harms we do, we do to ourselves."—Mitch Albom

October, Present Day

A Castle in Norway

Night

The study and extensive library was dark, the only light came from the roaring fire in the fireplace. The fire cast dancing shadows over the bookshelves that covered the walls from floor to ceiling. The books were crowded together but meticulously organized to their owner's preference. Ancient books and scrolls on the Occult took up most of the shelves, some of them written in secret or long dead languages. Medical texts with titles in English and German took up the rest of the shelves, and large, disgustingly detailed diagrams of the human body were tacked to the walls in the small spaces between the bookcases.

Victorian era furniture made from dark wood was scattered around the center of the room: a desk, a few chairs, and a table. Every horizontal surface in the room was cluttered with piles of books, papers, burned out candles; even a few chairs and the red rugs on the stone floor were barely visible under the haphazard avalanche of books and scrolls lying on top of them. Scattered among the typical library objects were several things that shattered the bookish atmosphere and made the room extremely disturbing. Here and there metal gleamed eerily in the firelight: half disassembled clocks, their gears and inner workings removed with surgical precision and left in piles beside the systematically gutted clocks. Small and unidentifiable parts of machinery lay in similar piles, awaiting the time when they would be needed to make repairs. A clock sat on the mantelpiece, ticking away despite the fact that its housing had been removed, exposing all of its working parts. Tools and a variety of medical equipment with lethally sharp edges lay on the desk beside a manically grinning human skull. Next to the skull was a row of strange metal masks, each of them a cruelly twisted man-made reflection of nature. A large Nazi and Thule Society flag hung from the top of a nearby bookshelf, almost obscuring the entire bookshelf as the length of black cloth draped down to touch the floor.

An opera by Wagner was playing on an ancient phonograph whose metal parts gleamed with care in the flickering firelight. Dr. Karl Kroenen was dressed in his skin tight black bodysuit, knee high black boots, and his metal and leather chest plate that resembled a distorted parody of the human ribcage. The ornate designs and ceaselessly rotating gears on the chest plate glimmered, but the glass 'eyes' of his black metal mask were dark. The clockwork assassin sat hunched over in a chair at his desk, his mechanical left hand lying on the desk in front of him—he had detached it from his wrist in order to improve its mechanisms. He bent over the mechanical hand and adjusted a few gears with the tool he held in his gloved right hand. The fingers of the mechanical hand twitched in response, the metal fingertips tapping gently against the wooden surface of the desk. In the background the opera music built up to a crescendo and the opera singer held the note for an unbearably long and beautiful length of time before her voice began to grow faint. The music gradually faded away as the song came to an end, finally leaving the room in silence except for the gentle and disquieting ticking of Kroenen's clockwork heart.

Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock…

SNAP!

The burning logs in the fireplace shifted and crackled loudly, sending a cloud of red sparks up the chimney with the smoke. The sound broke Karl Kroenen's concentration, and slightly irritated at the distraction, he looked up from his work and glared at the fireplace. As he did so he happened to catch a glimpse of the mountains of books and papers his study was currently swamped in. Kroenen eyed the mess with distaste. He was normally obsessive compulsive about his work area and belongings: everything was always in its place and it was always put away neatly—well, almost always. Right now was an exception, since he and Ilsa had been doing a lot of research using the books they had gotten from Volker Maynard. And even though Ilsa was primarily responsible for the mess of books and papers, he knew he was the one who was going to have to clean it up.

The clockwork assassin sighed and glanced down again at his work, but he paused and reflexively stole a sidelong glance at a framed black and white photograph on his desk. The photograph was a little faded and had a yellow tinge from age, and the top left corner had a slight crease in it where it had somehow gotten folded over and he had straightened it out as best he could. There were a few tiny rips around the edges of the photograph, each carefully repaired with tape that he had replaced over the years more times than he cared to count. But he didn't care how ragged it looked, his attention was focused on the image, on the three people standing together, all dressed in their black SS uniforms.

It was a photograph of The Three, the name the Allied soldiers had given to himself, Erica Schwarz, and Ilsa Haupstien. All three of them were standing in the garden of the mansion where they had lived during WWII. He was standing on the left, beside Erica, and Ilsa was standing on Erica's other side. All of them were in full Nazi uniform, but there was a casual air to the picture: Erica and Ilsa were smiling and laughing, and Erica had taken off her hat and let her hair down. There was a rose behind her ear. The entire scene was perfect.

Despite the perfection, Kroenen scowled. The smile on Erica's face seemed to be purposefully mocking him. Liar. Traitor, he thought bitterly. Sixty years ago, during the last few days they had been together, she had done nothing but lie to him, Ilsa, and Grigory. She had lied to him, over and over and over again, and continued to do so even when they both knew she was lying—lying in order to hide that she had betrayed them, the Thule Occult Society, and the Nazis. And it had worked, no one had found out until the end. Kroenen himself hadn't seen it coming until it had been too late to stop it and everything was falling apart around him as he and Erica were fighting to the death.

Only, nearly to the death was more appropriate.

I should have killed her when I had the chance, he thought, mentally berating himself for his weakness, I should have killed her when I had wounded her and beaten her into exhaustion! I should have spilled every last drop of her blood—should have sacrificed her to the Ogdru Jahad! But no! I, Hitler's Top Assassin, couldn't bring myself to kill her! Damn her and my emotions!

He glared daggers at the young woman in the photograph—a woman he had once nicknamed his Angel of Death for her unwavering loyalty to him. So much for loyalty and friendship! Kroenen thought.

The assassin picked up the framed photograph and ran a gloved finger down the glass that separated him from, what was to him, a picturesque scene. I wish I could go through the glass so I could live there again, he thought. To anyone else the battered photograph would have been a reminder of what a vile period in history WWII had been, but to him it was both a treasure and a curse: Besides Ilsa it was all he had left to remind him of how perfect everything had been Before.

Before Erica betrayed us, he thought bitterly, Before she betrayed me—her teacher and friend! And all for nothing but a religion we had already convinced her to reject and forget about—for a religion whose principals she had broken over and over again—for a Christian ideal! How frustratingly typical. Damn her!

It was torture to think about what could have been: The Ogdru Jahad would have escaped their crystal prison and scoured the earth with a raging fire, killing the Nazis' enemies and all others unworthy of existence. The world would have ended, burnt to a cinder by the hellish flames, and a new, perfect world would have risen from the ashes like a phoenix—a world where those loyal to the Seven Gods of Chaos could have lived in paradise. He and Ilsa and Erica could have been happy forever. But all of that had been destroyed because Erica had sent a tip-off letter to the Allied Forces—oh yes, he had since found out about that letter!—and it had been answered by a meddling Professor who specialized in the paranormal, and a ragtag group of soldiers from the Allied Forces.

I don't understand why she wanted to get in the way of perfection, Kroenen thought as he put the picture down on his desk. He leaned back in his chair and gazed blindly at the flickering flames in the fireplace. She's German, she became a Nazi. She willingly went along with Project Ragnarok for years, and then everything changed in the space of a few days.

A small nagging doubt began gnawing voraciously at his insides as the tiny, squashed emotional part of him struggled to the surface. Was it my fault? He wondered, Did I do something wrong? Am I the reason she betrayed us? He realized what he was doing and violently suppressed his emotions—the same emotions, the same weakness that had stopped him from spilling every drop of blood in Erica's body. He squished his doubts into a mental corner and then blocked them out completely. Once his emotions had been restrained again he considered how ridiculous his thoughts had been. My fault? Hah! It was entirely her fault! She made the decision to become a traitor, she destroyed the Nazis only chance to win the war and crush their enemies into the dust! Because of her, because of one person, the entire world changed.

But that belonged to the history books.

Kroenen's lidless blue eyes flicked over to the photograph sitting on his desk. The flames in the fireplace were reflected on the polished surface of the glass. He scowled at the ghostly reflection of flames as they reminded him about what had happened to the place he, Ilsa, Erica, and Grigory had called home. At the end of WWII the Allied Forces had invaded Germany and sent a group of soldiers to search the mansion for The Three. Of course the place had been empty: he and Ilsa had secretly fled to Norway after the failure of Project Ragnarok, and Erica had gone to America with Professor Bruttenholm. But despite the fact that the mansion had been empty, less then half of the soldiers had made it out of the building alive. Those that had died were all victims of the traps, pitfalls, and the dangerously magical rooms beneath the mansion. Kroenen thought it was fitting that his traps had been his last blow to the enemy that had destroyed the Nazis and the hope of a perfect Germany.

The surviving Allied soldiers had been so infuriated at their failure to find The Three and so afraid of the darkness and evil that consumed the building that they had set fire to the mansion. The huge, elaborate building had burned for days, destroying Kroenen's library and the valuable books within it that would have helped to bring Grigory Rasputin back from the dead within a year or two. Even after the initial blaze was gone the foundations had continued to smolder for the next week, and thick smoke had poured out from the mansion's maze of underground rooms. Quite fittingly, the soldiers from the Allied Forces had nicknamed the place Hell's Mouth and then proceeded to slowly forget about The Three—most of them assumed The Three had simply been rumors or propaganda invented by the Germans to frighten their enemies.

They couldn't have been more wrong. But it's just as well that we've been forgotten. It will be much easier for Ilsa and I to go unnoticed in public when we leave for Moldavia. Though it is interesting that Professor Bruttenholm neglected to inform the Allied Forces that he had found Erica Schwarz. I suppose he didn't want them to know that he asked her to work for him, Kroenen thought cynically, How clever of him. Because of his actions there's no solid evidence that she ever existed. She's not in the history books, she's not even mentioned as a rumor. She just disappeared. Just like us. But Professor Bruttenholm can't hide her from me forever. There isn't a place on Earth, in Heaven, or in the depths of Hell where she can hide from me!

And he could actually back up that statement.

Because he had found her.

While he and Ilsa had been waiting for WWII to end there really hadn't been a lot to do at the castle. True, they had been building up a new library and doing research into the matter of how to resurrect Grigory Rasputin, and when they hit a dead end or a major mental block he had his clocks to tinker with or his pet project of making improvements to himself. However, in between those activities he had made it his business to find out exactly what had happened to Erica Schwarz. In fact, it had soon turned into a point of all consuming obsession.

Kroenen knew he was still obsessing over her—just as he had realized he was obsessing over her then. But just like then, he still didn't care. In 1944 all he had cared about was finding out if she had lived, and if she had, he had desperately wanted to find her and get revenge for her treachery. At the beginning, only a few days after the failure of Project Ragnarok, he hadn't known if Erica had survived October 9, 1944—she could have died from her wounds or been killed by the soldiers from the Allied Forces. A few weeks later he had caught and 'interrogated' a spy from America that had been snooping around outside the castle. Before the man died, he told Kroenen that Erica was alive and that she was in America working for Professor Bruttenholm, one of the men Kroenen remembered shooting in the knee on October 9th. As soon as Kroenen knew what country she was in, it had only been a matter of narrowing down her location. This had initially proved to be more difficult than he had expected, but eventually reports trickled in, sometimes trickling from the mouths of people along with their blood as he sought madly to locate Erica. In the end he had learned more from paranormal creatures than humans.

I should have expected that, he thought, looking back on the past, The human race believed Erica had never existed, but since she was working for Professor Bruttenholm, it only makes sense that monsters and ghosts would constantly run into her.

A surge of triumph filled him as he recalled his elation at the exact moment when he had put the pieces together and realized where Erica was hiding: The BPRD, or The Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, located in Newark, N. J.

The Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, he thought darkly, Quite a fitting home for her since she betrayed the Thule Occult Society. No doubt she's put her inside knowledge to good use. I'll be sure to 'interrogate' her about the BPRD and their activities when I see her again.

He grinned liplessly at that thought, imagining what her tortured face would look like. He hadn't seen his Angel of Death for sixty years and was looking forward to meeting her again—preferably somewhere where his revenge wouldn't be interrupted. Fortunately Grigory Rasputin had granted Erica the gift of immortality and eternal youth only minutes before she made her betrayal known to everyone, which meant that she would be easy to recognize: she would look exactly the same as she had six decades ago.

Well, she'll look almost the same, he thought, correcting himself as he remembered the "T" he had cut into her left cheek. And there was sure to be a huge scar on her left shoulder where, in his damned moment of weakness, he had turned his blade at the last second to avoid stabbing her in the heart. Behind his mask Kroenen's lipless mouth twisted into a grotesque shadow of a grimace at the unpleasant memory of that dark, rainy night and his failure to kill Erica. And his failure to grab the grenade that had exploded and permanently ended Project Ragnarok. Kroenen mentally winced, knowing there was going to be Hell to pay the first chance Grigory or the Ogdru Jahad got around to punishing him for his moment of emotional weakness and his failure to grab the grenade—both of which had cost them everything. The entirety of the Nazi's and Thule Society's destiny had hinged upon that grenade—and he had failed, just as he had failed to kill Erica, just as he had failed to realize she had betrayed them. If it wasn't for Erica, he would have grabbed the grenade and the Nazis would have won the war. As it was, the threat of punishment hovered over Kroenen's head constantly. It was like waiting for the other shoe to drop—for sixty years.

The actual punishment probably won't be as bad as waiting for it, he reflected, And even if it is, at least I know I'll get to 'punish' Erica for her treachery by sacrificing her to the Ogdru Jahad. It's my duty as the Head of the Thule Society. The shadow of a grim, satisfied smile drifted across his mutilated and scarred features. I will have my revenge soon, he thought. A few nights ago, in the process of finishing up their research on how to resurrect Grigory, he and Ilsa had been in Transylvania, wandering around inside a castle trying to locate a library of books on the Occult—some of which had to do with resurrecting the dead. Only, the castle hadn't been as abandoned as they had thought, and they had stumbled over someone Ilsa knew from WWII, a man—if you could call him a man—by the name of Volker Maynard. Kroenen could see that night's events replaying inside his head, the images flickering in front of his mind's eye…

It was a dark night in Transylvania. The night sky was overcast and the thick cloud cover obscured the stars and moon. But that was fine, Kroenen was used to walking in the darkness with very little light to see by. His boots made no sound against the stone floor as he walked through the corridors of the abandoned castle. Ilsa followed behind him carrying a lantern that did next to nothing to dispel the darkness. However, it was just enough light to allow her to reference the papers she was carrying: a set of ancient blueprints of the castle that she had found lying on a table near the entrance of the castle.

"The library should be just through there." Ilsa said, pointing to one of the doors.

Kroenen nodded and tried the handle. As he had expected, the door was locked. He swiftly took out one of the tools from the small satchel he was carrying and knelt at the base of the door. He inserted the strange looking piece of metal into the lock and Ilsa held the lantern close to the door so he could see what he was doing as he tried to unlock the door. Actually, pretending to be trying to unlock it was a more accurate description, he could have had the door open in a second if he had wanted. Instead he worked slowly and quietly, putting his concentration into what was going on around him. He knew something was there, he could feel it watching him—he just didn't know what it was. Whatever the creature was, it was very, very quiet.

For a while the silence of the stone hall was only disturbed only by the slight rasp of his breathing and the ticking of his clockwork heart, and the click of metal on metal as he messed about inside the lock. He glanced at Ilsa, who had obviously caught on that something was wrong. He nodded ever so slightly and then beckoned her closer on the pretense of having her hold the lantern closer to him. She set down the blueprints and then knelt down beside him and leaned towards him as she brought the lantern closer.

"Someone else is here," he whispered in her ear, "They've been following us for a while."

Ilsa's expression was unreadable, but her cold blue eyes glittered sinisterly in the light thrown by the lantern. "Let's surprise them before they surprise us." she suggested, her red lips twisting into a wicked smile as she spoke.

"Ja. As soon as I get the door open find somewhere inside to hide."

Ilsa nodded. Kroenen twisted the tool in his hand and there was a soft click as the lock opened. He quickly put his tool away and threw the strap of the satchel over one shoulder. Ilsa picked up the blue prints and stowed them away in her own backpack. Kroenen pushed the door open and then stood to the side and gestured at the opening.

"Ladies first," he said, making a half bow.

Ilsa laughed derisively. It was a sharp, harsh sound. "You can't possibly mean me, Karl." she said, even as she walked through the doorway.

Kroenen followed her, winding up his heart as he went. The gears and springs grated together and created a scratchy mechanical noise that echoed in the huge, round shaped library they had just entered. A sigh of contentment escaped his lipless mouth as the clockwork inside him sped up, ready for the unnaturally quick and ruthless movements that were part of his unique fighting style. A moment later he gracefully slid into the shadows of the room and slipped behind the door, silently drawing one of his baton swords as he went. From his position he watched as Ilsa set the lantern on a desk and then ducked behind an armchair that was close to the door. She pulled a small revolver from her belt and held it at the ready.

Everything was silent as they waited breathlessly for whatever it was to take the bait. The small flame in the lantern flickered in a draft of cold air and then burned strongly. Kroenen didn't fail to notice the change and peered out into the hallway through the crack of space between the open door and its hinges. As he watched, a man-like shape darker than the other shadows started towards the door. A man? Fool, Kroenen thought, This will be easy. He raised his baton sword and prepared to strike the killing blow. Every muscle in his body was tensed for action and ready to spring.

The dark shape came closer and then paused a moment at the door, cocking its head slightly to the side as if listening. Then it started forward again and the light from the lantern finally chased away the concealing shadows. A pale faced man dressed in a black frock coat and pants slipped through the doorway, his cape billowing slightly as he moved. He walked so carefully that every footfall was perfectly silent. The man entered the library and slowly began to edge past the open door—

—like an attacking panther Kroenen suddenly whipped around the door and leapt into the man's path. His arm thrust the blade of the baton sword into the man's chest so hard that the pointed end of the blade came out through the man's back. The crunch of bone and the tearing of muscle translated itself into vibrations that traveled up the length of the blade and into Kroenen's hands as he held onto the sword. The man arched his back in agony and a gurgling shriek escaped from his lips as his pale, spider like fingers clawed at the air. Behind his mask Kroenen's skull-like grin grew wider as he attempted a triumphant, if lipless, smile. The man's cry of pain faded and died. Kroenen knew from his experience as an assassin what would happened next: the man would fall to the floor, dead. It's the same pattern every time, he thought, watching the man's pain distorted face. He'll go limp at any moment.

Suddenly the man stood up straight and smiled.

Impossible! Kroenen thought. His lidless eyes darted to where his baton sword protruded from the man's chest. No blood spurted from around the blade or dribbled slowly down the man's chest. There was no sound of the guttural gasps for air that one would expect to come from someone with a punctured lung. No blood bubbled from the man's nose or lips. And most importantly, the man wasn't dead.

With the baton sword still firmly embedded in his torso, the man calmly tucked a few loose strands of his long black hair behind his ear and then straightened the black ribbon tied around his ponytail. Kroenen simply stared, trying to figure out what sort of creature was currently impaled on his baton sword.

"Guten abend, Karl Kroenen," the man said in a voice with a strong German accent. He casually looked down at the baton sword protruding from his chest, which Kroenen was still holding onto. He looked up again and his electric blue eyes seemed to be glowing in the dim light. "Is this how you greet your allies now?" the man asked, "I must admit, it's a pleasure to meet you. I recognize you from a picture I saw a long time ago. It's so nice to finally run into you, though not so nice to run into your sword." He glanced down at the blade that Kroenen was still holding onto. "Are you going to pull this thing out yourself or do I have to do it?" the man asked.

Kroenen didn't move. The man—if that was what he really was—sighed and slowly took a few steps backwards so the baton sword slid out of his torso. The blade gleamed in the light, it was perfectly clean and there was no sign that it had been embedded in the man's chest a moment before. Kroenen watched as the pale man straightened his elegant black frock coat.

"Volker?" Ilsa asked, standing up from behind the armchair, "Volker Maynard the vampire?"

The man made an overly elegant bow in her direction. "Ilsa Haupstien! So good to see you again!" He tried to reach for her hand but she swiftly moved it behind her back and took a few steps backwards.

"You know each other?" Kroenen asked dubiously, looking from Ilsa to Volker. If the man was a vampire that explained why stabbing him in the chest hadn't killed him. But how does he know Ilsa? Kroenen wondered, He can't be another of her former lovers from before she met Grigory, can he? He thought about that for a moment and decided that it was actually a good possibility.

"We know each other," Ilsa said in a tone of voice that made it obvious to Kroenen that she disliked Volker, "Erica and I met him one time—"

"And ve had such a good time, didn't ve, discussing vhat you vould give me in return for killing that pompous official from the Allied Forces? He vas giving the Thule Society and the Nazis so much trouble." The vampire paused and looked at Ilsa eagerly. He slowly moved closer towards her, "A pity Erica vas so able to resist me. If it vasn't for her…Ilsa…you vere quite taken with me…as vas Erica at the time, though she hid it better…" He started to reach out for her, but Ilsa quickly retreated around the armchair so it was between them. Volker ignored the fact that she clearly wanted nothing to do with him and simply walked around the chair towards her.

"Ja, well, Grigory would hardly have been happy if I returned to him as a vampire." Ilsa replied as she retreated to Kroenen's side. "Damn vampire magnetism," she muttered, just loud enough so Kroenen could hear her.

Seeing that Ilsa was standing beside Kroenen, Volker gave up on getting closer to her and stayed where he was, looking slightly crestfallen. Kroenen had had enough. He wanted to get the books that had brought him and Ilsa from Norway all the way to Romania.

"What are you doing here? Why were you following us?" demanded Kroenen.

"I think I should be the one asking that question. I happen to live here. Vhat are you doing trespassing in my castle?" Volker shot back.

"Looking for books on the Occult." Kroenen replied harshly.

"Ah." A slow smile crossed the vampire's ashen face and his anger disappeared, "You're trying to resurrect Grigory, ja?" Volker walked over to the fireplace and did something Kroenen couldn't see. Almost instantly a fire sprang up in the cold grate and cast a reddish light over the room. The vampire stood beside the fire, an orange glow lighting up one side of his pale face. "My condolences to you for the fall of the Nazis. And the betrayal of your friend Erica Schwarz." the vampire said, hissing as he said her name.

"How do you know about Erica?" Kroenen asked, his voice tight as he recalled the events that had brought Project Ragnarok to a crashing failure that had irreparably crippled both the Nazis and the Thule Occult Society.

"How do I know about her?" Volker asked, his words tinged with anger. His voice grew steadily louder as he spoke and his eyes burned with anger, "You ask me how I know about her? News travels fast among creatures of the dark. And I have recently had the misfortune of learning about her from my kindred. My remaining kindred, at least." He turned to face the fire, his hands clenched into fists. "She has lately done something I find totally unforgivable. She has murdered several of my friends, all of them vampires! Killed them—staked them—gone!" He whirled around to face Kroenen and Ilsa, his electric blue eyes burning with barely contained anger. Suddenly the anger faded and he walked over to the desk and sat down. He leaned back wearily. "I vould go after her, but I vouldn't have a chance. The BPRD is too vell guarded, I'd never get in. And vhen she's outside of it she's alvays with her friends."

Kroenen thought for a moment. "Perhaps we can come to an agreement." he said. Volker looked at him curiously. "All of us want revenge and I have an idea about how we can get it. You stay here and attack some of the local villagers. That's sure to get the attention of the BPRD and lure them here. When they get inside this castle you can make sure Erica gets separated from the others. When she does, capture her and bring her to us in Norway. In return, we will give you a sizable reward in gold. And you can watch when we sacrifice her to the Ogdru Jahad."

The vampire leaned forward on the desk and steepled his fingers as he considered the offer. "I vould like to be able to kill her myself." Volker said after a moment.

"The Ogdru Jahad have the prior claim on her blood." Ilsa pointed out, her blond hair shining in the firelight.

"Ah yes. A pity," Volker said wistfully, "But I'll do it."

"Good. Can we have the books we came for?" Ilsa asked.

"Ja, help yourself." Volker said, gesturing at the bookshelves that went from floor to ceiling, "Borrow as many as you vant. I don't need all of them. There's a thousand or so. I can't imagine I'll miss any of them." He stood up and walked towards the doorway. He paused and turned back. "See you in Norvay, say, a veek from now?"

"The dead travel fast." Kroenen observed.

"Ja, and so do those of us vho are dead to the vorld." Volker said, gazing at Kroenen and Ilsa pointedly, "So, a veek?"

"Done." Kroenen said as Ilsa went over to the bookshelves and began searching among the titles for the ones they had come for.

Volker grinned, displaying his long sharp fangs. "Auf wiedersehen." he said and began to leave.

"Oh, and Volker," Kroenen said, stopping the vampire in his tracks, "Bring her to us alive and unharmed. Every drop of her blood belongs to the Ogdru Jahad." The clockwork assassin paused and then added as an after thought: "Don't tell her Ilsa and I sent you. And don't touch her."

"Touch her? Vhatever do you mean?" the vampire asked, feigning innocence. It was very ineffective.

"You know what I mean. Biting her to kill her or to turn her into one of your kind counts as harming her."

"I vouldn't dream of doing that to her." Volker said bitterly, "She doesn't deserve to be one of my kind. And I think I'll enjoy vatching her tortured to death much more than just biting her once."

"Don't come to Norway without her." Kroenen said, the warning clear in his voice.

"I von't." the vampire called over his shoulder as he left the room. As soon as he was gone the fire in the fireplace went out, plunging the room into darkness.

"Scheiße!" Ilsa cursed in the blackness. She stalked over to the desk and picked up the lantern so she could see the titles of the books on the shelves.

Kroenen went to the door and looked down the hall to make sure Volker was really gone. There was no sign of the vampire. Kroenen closed the door and then walked over to the bookshelves to help Ilsa.

"Well, that was easy," Ilsa said as she pulled a book down from the shelves, "Though I'm not so sure you should trust him."

"He did agree to help us a little too readily. He might be sincere, but there is the possibility that he's more interested in getting his own revenge than in handing Erica over to us. I know I wouldn't be satisfied with just watching someone else kill her." Kroenen thought for a moment. "I don't think Volker would be able to kill her, even if he tried. I was the one who taught her to fight, after all."

"If Volker wouldn't be able to kill her then he might not be able to capture her." Ilsa pointed out as she stood on her tiptoes to reach a book on a shelf above her head. Kroenen reached up and got it down for her.

"If he fails, one would hope he would continue trying until he succeeds. And if he shows up in Norway without her…" he trailed off. Ilsa smiled as she realized what he meant.

"That would be fun," she said, a cruel glint coming into her ice blue eyes…

Author's Notes: Another sorta-cliffe (Don't you love my terminology?)! Kroenen is obsessed with Erica and a little more then a tad bit insane. I hope you liked the flashback. Hehe, now you know why Volker made that remark about having been stabbed through the chest twice in one week! There will be more on Kroenen and Ilsa in the next chapter, as well as what happens to Volker. Tell me if you liked this chapter and review, pretty please!