Immortality
folder
S through Z › Van Helsing
Rating:
Adult ++
Chapters:
23
Views:
4,138
Reviews:
11
Recommended:
0
Currently Reading:
0
Category:
S through Z › Van Helsing
Rating:
Adult ++
Chapters:
23
Views:
4,138
Reviews:
11
Recommended:
0
Currently Reading:
0
Disclaimer:
I do not own Van Helsing, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.
The Forgettable Man
***
Two
He woke to the cawing of a crow outside his window and slipped out from the warmth of his bed to the frigid morning air. The room was full of cold light, touching him and the things he was assured were his all around him, from between the open curtains he was sure that he'd closed. Something bothered him and that in itself was bothering; he considered long and dreamless nights a blessing and woke refreshed, but that morning he felt somehow different. He plucked his thick dressing gown from the stool by the dresser and tugged it on over his shoulders, tying the belt tightly around his waist. When he faced the window it seemed that the crow was looking in on him.
Taylor never understood his master's odd compulsion to grab whatever food available and wolf it down for breakfast. That morning was no different; he stood by, hovering at Van Helsing's elbow as he made his way through several slices of cold cooked meant and two peaches. Then he whisked himself away upstairs to wash and dress in another fin but irksome suit. He prodded at his necktie 'til he was sure he was losing his mind and good time to it, then pulled on his heavy wool overcoat, and a hat.
It was a top hat. Charcoal grey to compliment his suit and coat and making him feel like a prize fool despite the fact that ever other male pedestrian he saw after leaving the house seemed to be dressed in a rather similar fashion. Not, of course, that knowing that served to comfort him in any great or sweeping manner; it rather made him feel even more the fool.
He hailed a carriage and gave the driver the address of the Traveller's Rest. He could have walked the whole way if it hadn't been for that suit and his accursed shoes; he swore to himself silently that no matter what Society might say, he was not wearing such decorative, impractical shoes again. He had a strange though admittedly understandable yearning for his old boots. To hell with suffering for style.
They sky was dull grey-white and overcast as he stepped out to the street outside the hotel; he paid the driver who left him immediately and pushed open the door with one gloved hand. Holding his hat in both hands and feeling oddly conspicuous, he asked after a man, an old man, of indeterminate height and build and who might have been younger or older than sixty - a man who was thoroughly forgettable. With a quick glance at the register the clerk knew him at once - the gentleman in question was Mr. Klaus Van Varenberg.
Soon he was on the second floor landing, knocking with remarkable insistency upon the door of Mr. Klaus Van Varenberg, whose name had once already seeped from his memory and from which he felt his hold was slipping. He ceased his knocking for a moment to scrawl the name on the reverse of the envelope containing the letter from his alleged brother. Then he resumed knocking.
But there was no answer. He called out 'Van Varenberg!' three or four times, until the next door on the right opened to permit the rudely awakened resident to complain loudly. When the man had retreated, Van Helsing forced the door. It made considerably less noise than his knocking.
The room was small and simple and though in lesser hands than its current owners it may have lapsed into shabby, it was neat and well presented for the cell-away-from-home that it was. The bed was still made. There was an untouched plate of some substance which at one point may have been edible sitting beside a poured but otherwise untouched cup of tea. A fresh set of clothes was laid out over the small armchair by the bed. The single space in the room that Van Helsing couldn't see was behind the old lacquered screen in front of the window; he moved slowly toward it.
For one sick second he wished that he had a gun, his pistol, as he dreaded what he'd see behind that screen, but all he had were his fists and the closest thing to deadly on his person was his torturous footwear. He took a breath and rounded the edge of the screen.
Klaus Van Varenberg was dead. He had no need to reach out for his cold body as he did because there was no sleep among the living that could have mimicked that of the old man. He sagged forward in his armchair, his chin resting down against his chest; he was still dressed in the suit that he'd worn to see Van Helsing, but the man himself inside it, resting, then looked older still. But there was peace in him, and that was least was a relief to see.
He turned away and rubbed his eyes; when he turned back he realised that his name was gone against and most of the memory of his face. There was a moment of panic, when he wondered, *believed* almost, that his whole memory was fading, but he could still recall the exact shape of Anna's face when he tried and that calmed him. It was just this man, somehow, that slipped from his memory, dissipated like a drop of blood in a fountain. In a few hours he wouldn't remember him. He had no idea why, and now that he was dead there could be no explanation there. It only strengthened his resolve to leave for Paris.
As he leant back against the wall of the small room, watching the light from the window play on the face of the dead man, feeling the collar of his shirt suddenly becoming far too tight, he decided to remember. Not the man - that seemed to be impossible - but the room and everything in it. He moved through it, touched it, committed it to memory by touch and sight and the slight hint of ashen death that he could taste in the air. He'd remember Van Varenberg by context, if nothing else. This final context.
And then he left. He slipped unseen from the small hotel by the back staircase, slinked through the alleys 'til he came far away and felt safe to hail a carriage out out implicating himself in the demise - though seemingly natural - of a man who was destined to be forgotten entirely within three hours. By the time he arrived home, all he knew was that in that room had died a man that he'd forgotten, and he must find out why. He felt there were no answers left in London. He had to make for Paris and the masquerade ball of the Countess Dupré. And perhaps while he was there, he would come across this 'brother', this man called Abraham.
***
Two
He woke to the cawing of a crow outside his window and slipped out from the warmth of his bed to the frigid morning air. The room was full of cold light, touching him and the things he was assured were his all around him, from between the open curtains he was sure that he'd closed. Something bothered him and that in itself was bothering; he considered long and dreamless nights a blessing and woke refreshed, but that morning he felt somehow different. He plucked his thick dressing gown from the stool by the dresser and tugged it on over his shoulders, tying the belt tightly around his waist. When he faced the window it seemed that the crow was looking in on him.
Taylor never understood his master's odd compulsion to grab whatever food available and wolf it down for breakfast. That morning was no different; he stood by, hovering at Van Helsing's elbow as he made his way through several slices of cold cooked meant and two peaches. Then he whisked himself away upstairs to wash and dress in another fin but irksome suit. He prodded at his necktie 'til he was sure he was losing his mind and good time to it, then pulled on his heavy wool overcoat, and a hat.
It was a top hat. Charcoal grey to compliment his suit and coat and making him feel like a prize fool despite the fact that ever other male pedestrian he saw after leaving the house seemed to be dressed in a rather similar fashion. Not, of course, that knowing that served to comfort him in any great or sweeping manner; it rather made him feel even more the fool.
He hailed a carriage and gave the driver the address of the Traveller's Rest. He could have walked the whole way if it hadn't been for that suit and his accursed shoes; he swore to himself silently that no matter what Society might say, he was not wearing such decorative, impractical shoes again. He had a strange though admittedly understandable yearning for his old boots. To hell with suffering for style.
They sky was dull grey-white and overcast as he stepped out to the street outside the hotel; he paid the driver who left him immediately and pushed open the door with one gloved hand. Holding his hat in both hands and feeling oddly conspicuous, he asked after a man, an old man, of indeterminate height and build and who might have been younger or older than sixty - a man who was thoroughly forgettable. With a quick glance at the register the clerk knew him at once - the gentleman in question was Mr. Klaus Van Varenberg.
Soon he was on the second floor landing, knocking with remarkable insistency upon the door of Mr. Klaus Van Varenberg, whose name had once already seeped from his memory and from which he felt his hold was slipping. He ceased his knocking for a moment to scrawl the name on the reverse of the envelope containing the letter from his alleged brother. Then he resumed knocking.
But there was no answer. He called out 'Van Varenberg!' three or four times, until the next door on the right opened to permit the rudely awakened resident to complain loudly. When the man had retreated, Van Helsing forced the door. It made considerably less noise than his knocking.
The room was small and simple and though in lesser hands than its current owners it may have lapsed into shabby, it was neat and well presented for the cell-away-from-home that it was. The bed was still made. There was an untouched plate of some substance which at one point may have been edible sitting beside a poured but otherwise untouched cup of tea. A fresh set of clothes was laid out over the small armchair by the bed. The single space in the room that Van Helsing couldn't see was behind the old lacquered screen in front of the window; he moved slowly toward it.
For one sick second he wished that he had a gun, his pistol, as he dreaded what he'd see behind that screen, but all he had were his fists and the closest thing to deadly on his person was his torturous footwear. He took a breath and rounded the edge of the screen.
Klaus Van Varenberg was dead. He had no need to reach out for his cold body as he did because there was no sleep among the living that could have mimicked that of the old man. He sagged forward in his armchair, his chin resting down against his chest; he was still dressed in the suit that he'd worn to see Van Helsing, but the man himself inside it, resting, then looked older still. But there was peace in him, and that was least was a relief to see.
He turned away and rubbed his eyes; when he turned back he realised that his name was gone against and most of the memory of his face. There was a moment of panic, when he wondered, *believed* almost, that his whole memory was fading, but he could still recall the exact shape of Anna's face when he tried and that calmed him. It was just this man, somehow, that slipped from his memory, dissipated like a drop of blood in a fountain. In a few hours he wouldn't remember him. He had no idea why, and now that he was dead there could be no explanation there. It only strengthened his resolve to leave for Paris.
As he leant back against the wall of the small room, watching the light from the window play on the face of the dead man, feeling the collar of his shirt suddenly becoming far too tight, he decided to remember. Not the man - that seemed to be impossible - but the room and everything in it. He moved through it, touched it, committed it to memory by touch and sight and the slight hint of ashen death that he could taste in the air. He'd remember Van Varenberg by context, if nothing else. This final context.
And then he left. He slipped unseen from the small hotel by the back staircase, slinked through the alleys 'til he came far away and felt safe to hail a carriage out out implicating himself in the demise - though seemingly natural - of a man who was destined to be forgotten entirely within three hours. By the time he arrived home, all he knew was that in that room had died a man that he'd forgotten, and he must find out why. He felt there were no answers left in London. He had to make for Paris and the masquerade ball of the Countess Dupré. And perhaps while he was there, he would come across this 'brother', this man called Abraham.
***