A/N: Setting is the Five at Oxford for this one. First go writing the five - I rather enjoyed it. Hope you do to!
Final Words
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3. Sanguine Vampiris (Or, The First Time's the Hardest)
It occurred to him at some point during that endless night that he was probably dying. It would not have been fitting to complain of it - despite the temptation to do so, if only to provoke some sympathetic reaction from Helen - but the thought was there all the same.
The experiment had been a risk. They had all known this from the start.
For the first few hours after the source blood entered his vein, he knew nothing but pain. Helen and Nigel, who had preceded him in the experiment, had both displayed some reaction. But where theirs seemed to pass in but a few minutes, his own stretched from minutes to hours of agony that wracked through his body, as if some hellish force had seized hold of him.
He was changed; he could feel it in his bones. He barely felt human after a time, so deeply the transformation penetrated his being it seemed impossible that he could survive it.
He passed in and out of consciousness, dozing fitfully through the night, feverish and restless, finally coming fully awake at some early hour to the sound of Helen and James speaking in hushed tones. They were across the room, Druitt and Griffin with them, and it occurred to him that he could hear them quite well despite the distance and their obvious efforts to remain unheard.
"I thought of a transfusion," Helen was saying.
James nodded. "Mm, as did I, but can we take such a risk?"
"He may already be past the point where the chance of his condition continuing any longer is the greater risk." As she spoke, Helen's gaze was drawn to the couch where he lay.
Even through half-lidded eyes he could read the deep concern on her face. It did not much improve his confidence in his chances.
"We've not got much choice then, do we?" Nigel said.
"Griffin, you cannot donate, your blood is altered."
"No, nor can I," Helen said. James blinked as if he hadn't even considered she might be a potential donor. "It must be you or John," she concluded.
"Draw lots?" Druitt suggested, with his typical arch humour.
"Oh I'll volunteer," James said. "Just this once."
"I'll fetch the apparatus," Nigel offered. "Hoping I won't have to go too far at this hour. Helen?"
"Yes of course, downstairs in my father's laboratory."
"I know where to look," James said, and he and Nigel left the room.
"A good thing your father is travelling," John said to Helen. "You've not yet told him of our experiment, have you? This would not be the way to introduce the idea."
Nikola had had the same thought when Helen insisted he be brought to her home from their laboratory upon realising his condition was growing more serious by the hour.
"I wish my father were here," Helen countered. "No matter what he might say. He might have some insight - he is a better doctor than any of us."
"But a worse scientist," Nikola spoke up suddenly, alerting them to his lucid state. "And not the most gracious of hosts - I doubt the master of the house would like to encounter an expiring foreigner on his fine upholstery."
Helen came to his side at once, kneeling by the couch and clasping his hand in hers. And even though it was an excuse to wrap her fingers around his wrist and take his pulse, he appreciated the gesture all the same.
"Still very fast," she murmured. "How do you feel?"
"Magnificent, why, do I not look it?"
There was a rude snort from behind her, from Druitt, but Helen smiled. "Quite as magnificent as ever."
"And if we were to give a serious answer, as opposed to flirting with Helen?" Druitt prompted dryly.
Nikola drew in a laboured breath. "I assure you, my dear John, I've always taken flirting with Helen very seriously."
"Behave, gentlemen," Helen chided absently, removing her hand from his grasp to press it to his forehead and cheeks instead, gauging his temperature. "Now, did you hear?"
"Transfusion? We are embarking on all manner of adventure today."
"You seem better," Helen said, regarding him with a critical eye. "Perhaps we should delay the procedure."
He looked past her, to catch Druitt's eye. "She seems to have lost her nerve."
"Surely not," the other man said mockingly.
"Perhaps the treatment changed her after all."
"A cautious Miss Magnus, whatever will become of us?"
For a moment, Helen looked quite irritated rather than worried and fearful, and Nikola considered it a victory. But whatever sharp words she had for them were silenced as Nigel and James hurried back into the room.
"Here," Nigel said, "Let's get set up."
Nikola waved a limp hand. "No hurry, my friend, Helen is entertaining me with delightful expressions of grief at my condition."
"He seems better," James said, almost accusingly, coming to stare down at him.
"Not getting out of it that easy," Nigel said, bringing over a chair to place near Nikola's head, and took James' arm to guide him to sit.
As they arranged the tubing and pump, Nikola began to suspect that they were perhaps right - he did feel somewhat improved. His mind was clearer, and he felt none of the pain of before. He was not comfortable, however. His body felt peculiar and there was a pang in his stomach like a hunger but more intense. More like a deep craving.
His fingertips itched.
Activity proceeded around him as his attention was drawn inward, musing on the new specifics of his condition only he was privy to. Soon, though, Helen was pushing up his shirt sleeve, and the large hollow needle pierced his skin. He hissed, making Helen look up quickly with a reassuring word on her lovely lips; but it was not the pain, it was the blood that spilled into the tube that was the cause. The sight of it called up some strong reaction within him, unlike anything he had experienced before.
His focus narrowed, turning suddenly to the other exposed limb very close at hand. Helen turned too, introducing the second needle to James' arm.
And very quickly it became clear, the mistake they had made in attempting to perform a procedure that involved the use of blood.
Nikola lunged from the couch and knocked James clear across the rug with the force of his strike.
The uproar was complete; James cried out, Helen fell back, Nigel swore, John wavered between going to Helen's aide or James'. Nikola, for his part, hesitated not a second before attempting to sink very sharp, efficient teeth into James' arm.
But John acted then, grabbing Nikola and hauling him backwards - only to have him tear free in an instant, staggering a few feet away. All four gasped as they saw him changed for the first time - saw his black eyes and razor teeth.
"My god," Helen said, pushing herself up from where she'd fallen beside the couch. This drew his attention, and when he took a step in her direction, everyone acted at once.
"Hold him!" James cried, surging up from the floor, and the three men bore him quickly down - one at each flailing arm and James at his head, forearm across his throat, attempting to pin him to the floor.
He raged. His strength was beyond measure, certainly beyond the frantic bodies desperately trying to hold him down, and he might have broken free in the next moment. But then there was Helen, her knee digging sharply into his abdomen, her hands, small and soft and so very capable, pressing firmly on his chest.
"Nikola! Nikola!" she cried, staring down into his face as she called to him.
And it was Nikola who responded; a newly born Nikola, different yes, better almost certainly, but also the same.
He thought there would never be a time in his life when he wouldn't come at her call.
"Well," he said, working his jaw as it returned to its natural, human state, "Perhaps I'm not dying after all."
They didn't let him up for a good ten minutes longer after he had stopped struggling. However, they did not grow bored in the meantime. The five of them, sprawled there on the floor together, began a rather long conversation concerning vampires.