one of the campiest, funniest things about the first two series is Van Helsing not only dressing up as a woman with a full goatee but his ancestors just being photos of the same actor dressed up. peak tv, 10/10 no notes
As I finished editing my Autistic Character Month stories and got to work outlining for Swoon June, I started to miss horror.
Then I had an idea. So, here's a preview of a captivity/psychological horror story I've been having fun with!
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It hurts.
His forehead, his eyes, his cheekbones. His skin is too tight. Too tender.
His head is full of water and lead. His neck aches under the weight of it, and Vlad now realises that he’s sitting. He’s propped up against a hard surface, a pillow or a blanket or something else soft underneath his legs. It would be comfortable, if he were in the mind to feel comfort, and he suspects that’s the point.
Fabric rustles. As his senses trickle back, he picks up on the sounds of movement, and wind through thin walls, and the distant rumble of cars.
His eyelids are like theatre curtains with the amount of effort it takes to pull them open. His fists clench—yes, he feels them on either side of his thighs—as if grabbing a rope.
One they’re open, he has to blink a few times before anything makes sense. The low light doesn’t aggravate his headache, but it does blend together the earthy tones so that, at first, all he sees are the colours.
Then, he sees hell.
Van Helsing—Eric Van Helsing—not the dead woman he was married to, or the dead son he raised. Eric Van Helsing: slayer, widow, grieving father.
The man whose life Vlad’s father ruined.
Vlad opens his mouth—to beg, to reason, to scream. He doesn’t know. It doesn’t matter, because no sound comes out beyond a strained gasp and a dry click.
‘Shhh, it’s alright. Don’t speak,’ Mr Van Helsing says, voice soft. He steps closer, empty hands held out, like he’s concerned what Vlad might do. ‘Just relax, okay? You’re safe here.’
Safe? Vlad swallows down the solid mass—tears? vomit? snot?—crawling up his throat. Takes a slow breath. In and out.
Jonno’s face. Ashy and lax, with eyes like glass. How he hit the stones like a crumpled doll. The two black caverns in his neck—nothing left to ebb out. Nothing to carry the infection to the rest of his body. No hope that he would come back.
It’s fragmented.
Robin went home for dinner. The sun was still out.
Vlad argued with Ingrid about something, and his dad had yelled—at her or at Renfield, he can't recall.
It's all just sound, now.
The dark sky.
Black eyes.
Slayer blood.
He has no idea how Jonno got in.
He remembers other things with perfect clarity. His father’s laughter, and the red glinting on his teeth. Wood hitting stone. Mr Van Helsing, frozen, staring at his son’s corpse.
Vlad could do nothing for the man except hold his own father back as he collected the body.
He thinks he held the Count back. Maybe he just clung to him.
Vlad isn’t safe here.
‘Hey.’ That soft voice again—just barely audible over his own shaking breath. A firm hand grabs Vlad’s shoulder.
He flinches, and a sound leaves his mouth—small, somewhere between a whimper and a yelp—but the hand is steady.
Mr Van Helsing crouches low enough that Vlad has to tilt his head down to look at him. His thumb massages circles into Vlad’s collarbone. Mr Van Helsing’s face holds worry—eyes wide and brows creased—but his posture is relaxed. He’s still and patient as he comfort’s Vlad. And that is what he’s doing. Comforting him.
‘I’m sorry,’ Vlad whimpers. He hadn’t meant for it to come out like that (like a plea), but he can’t stop his breath from hitching, and the pressure behind his eyes and at the back of his throat is suffocatingly wet.
‘It’s not your fault,’ Mr Van Helsing speaks in a soft rumble. ‘You’re a good boy.’
‘Huh?’ He isn’t a good boy—he's a lousy vampire. Only three years out from becoming another blood-sucking parasite, as Mr Van Helsing used to remind him. He would never call Vlad ‘good’.
The trepidation must show on his face, because Mr Van Helsing goes on: ‘I know this seems strange, but I’m here to help you.’ There’s a crack in his calm veneer—the corners of him mouth pull down, his chin wrinkles, and he glances away from Vlad to blink a sheen from his eyes. He swallows before continuing. ‘Your father has been lying to you your whole life, but I’m going to set things right. I’m going to save you.’ His voice is gruff. Raw. ‘That monster won’t take another child.’
‘What are you talking about?’
The man shakes his head. ‘It’s late. That’s a conversation for tomorrow.’ He slowly pulls himself up onto his feet, then gestures behind him to the wooden cupboard. ‘Would you like something to drink? Or anything for the pain?’ Mr Van Helsing doesn’t wait for an answer. The cupboard door creaks open and he disappears behind it. The sound of glasses dragging against the shelf makes Vlad flinch. ‘You were out for a good twelve hours,’ he says as he fills a glass with tap water, his tone light and jovial. ‘You’re probably dehydrated.’
He puts the glass on the small wooden folding table beside Vlad, which the boy hadn’t noticed until now. It bled in with the rest of the brown. He pops two Panadol tablets from the foil blister sleeve, label pointing out, and drops those onto the table as well.
The longer he’s awake for, the less Vlad’s body wants to be. Adrenaline wearing off, he doesn’t have the energy to properly examine what is happening, nor does he want to.
Everything is underwater. His thoughts are clogged up, and reaching for the glass feels like wading through the public pool. He takes the tablets, downs the entire glass, and waits to see what Van Helsing will do next.
‘Good boy. Lie down, get comfortable, and I’ll see you in the morning.’
Van Helsing uses a gentle hand on Vlad’s shoulder, and another on his calve, to urge him onto the bed. It’s a bed he’s been sitting on. He pulls his legs up, one at a time, and watches them stretch out across a green doona cover. More pressure from that guiding hand and he slides down. The soft thing he’d been sitting on is a pillow.
His head is heavy. His eyes are heavy. Sleep floods his brain.
I need you all to understand that I am a British Millennial and so when reading Dracula THIS is the guy I see in my head for Van Helsing.
You know, Eric! The guy who keeps trying to convince his son, Jonathan, that Vampires are real and making his Year 7 Woodwork class whittle steaks is perfectly valid!
