[text] @helsing; I've always liked to play with fire [open]

[kungfuey]

I'm looking to speak to anyone who;

1. Has communicated with the Church hermit
2. Has come across any railroad tracks in Beacon
3. Has seen any antibiotics lying around

[ She would have left it there but figures maybe she should probably let people know this next bit; ]

I also spotted a giant spirit in the woods around the museum. Try not to get killed by it.

Comments

[kungfuey]

[ There's a long silence that borders on painful on the line. Just the sound of Scarlett breathing as she absorbs all of that. ]

Are you... messing with me?

[ She doesn't sound accusatory or even angry. It's something close to disbelief and yet even that doesn't accurately describe her tone. ]

Do you need blood to survive or is that more a, blood comes with perks thing?

[ Asking for a friend. ]

[tribridfreakshow]

No.

[She sounds almost offended that Scarlett would even ask her that, but a moment later she's trying to keep her emotions in check, letting out a quiet sigh.]

I don't drink blood at all. I've never needed to. But my blood heals me...and other people.

[ public >> private ]

[kungfuey]

Well, shit.

[ Here's the thing. The only other person she knows like that, who isn't Scarlett herself? Is her sister. ]

[ private ]

I don't suppose the name Van Helsing means anything to you, does it?

[tribridfreakshow]

[Give her a moment.]

...you mean like the famous vampire hunter? That's supposed to be fiction, but it wouldn't be the first time fiction was based on reality.

[kungfuey]

[ She snorts a huff of laughter at that because the amount of Vampire fiction out there was insane, especially when you knew the truth. ]

Yeah, well. [ How the hell to explain something she still doesn't get? ] Harker was my parent's name. The... people who raised me, but... I was born, Scarlett Van Helsing.

[tribridfreakshow]

Holy crap. And I thought I had a last name with a lot of baggage.

[...]

That doesn't mean you're gonna like...try and kill me now, is it? Because that would really suck.

[kungfuey]

[ She laughs, both at the comment and the idea that she was going to kill Hope. Child, please. ]

If I made a habit out of killing everything with vampire blood, I'd have to be pretty suicidal.

[ Something in the way she says it indicating that Scarlett doesn't just mean because 'they might try to kill her'. ]

[tribridfreakshow]

Look, vampire hunters are a thing back home, too. And seeing as my Dad was literally one of the Original vampires, well...

[She pauses and Scarlett can practically hear her shrugging on the other end.]

...seems like something a Van Helsing would go after in the stories, anyway.

[It's clear at this point that she's just making something of a joke out of it and didn't think there was much of a chance that Scar would come after her anyway.]

[kungfuey]

[ There is so much in what Hope is saying that's hitting way too close to home for Scarlett and she's grateful that Hope can't see her face. It's one thing to keep from reacting vocally, but nothing would erase the look on her face. ]

An Original? Like, an Elder?

[ Trying to keep her voice even. Hope wasn't her father any more than Scarlett was her own bloodline. ]

I imagine most of the Van Helsing's in the stories didn't have the blood of The First in their veins.

[tribridfreakshow]

I guess? He and my aunt and uncles were the first vampires ever created, and that was over a thousand years ago.

[She's never heard of them being called Elders before, though.]

I've only ever heard about them in passing. They're in movies and things like that. It wouldn't be the first tale of a hunter with vampire blood inside them, though. It just doesn't work entirely like that where I'm from. [A beat.] When I died, I thought I would end up turning. Instead, I woke up here, the same as ever.

[kungfuey]

[ she always thought the first was Dracula, but she won't say that name, even here. It was one of the few things her birth mother had warned her against and while they might be dead? Scarlett wasn't about to tempt fate. ]

My sister. Vanessa. She died once. Not, a little dead I mean. She was - [ She laughs then, the disbelief evident in her tone. ] Lying on a slab for three years kind of dead and she came back.

[ Honestly? Scarlett had half expected the same might happen to her. For all she knew it would and this? This was just where people went when they were neither dead nor alive. ]

I take Vampires are still in the shadows for you?

[tribridfreakshow]

[She ponders that for a moment; it's not like people being a death-like state for an extended period of time was all that...unusual for her.]

Was it caused by magic? Or did it just take a long time for her to heal?

[She said that they had the blood of the 'First' in their veins, which has the wheels in her head turning.]

Wait...does that mean you're like me? Vampire blood but...not a vampire?

[Except the other half is...human? Maybe? What is even happening?]

Yeah, it's for our safety. Most humans don't know supernatural things exist but there'd be a lot more hunters if they did and we're kind of outnumbered. [A beat.] Unless you mean literally, in which case vampires usually can't go out in the sun unless they have something called a daylight ring.

[kungfuey]

I wasn't there when it happened. We were, kind of estranged. [ Sure that's one way to put it. ] All I know is that she was dead and then she wasn't.

[ She was waiting for Hope to make that connection. ]

In a word? Yeah. [ Though she doesn't sound... entirely thrilled by it? ] It's a bit more complicated than that but, yeah.

I'm... I don't really know what I am. [ Except, not human, but she's not too keen on saying that out loud. She can barely acknowledge that herself.

Wait - WTF. ]

A daylight ring?! [ Clearly she's never heard of this. ] Don't suppose that matters here at least.

[tribridfreakshow]

I know a little about estranged family...

[is her voice strangely bitter? I'm sure it's nothing.]

It always is. [Complicated, that is.] Just because I know what I am in theory didn't mean I know how it all works. Comes with being the only one of your kind.

Most don't have one. You have to know a witch that can actually do the spell, and those are few and far between.

[kungfuey]

[ The stories these two could swap.

Scarlett catches it but doesn't push - at least not yet. ]

Technically my sister - [ One day that won't feel weird to say. ] has the same deal but... we haven' t exactly had a chance to compare notes.

[ Give she didn't exactly know she had a sister until very recently. ]

That explains a few things. [ Like why they hadn't gone on a murder spree before The Rising. ] Have you ever... Been bitten by one?

[tribridfreakshow]

No, I guess not. The vampires at school only drink from blood bags, and it's not even human blood. I gave my blood to a werewolf once...two doses, technically, but that ended up being a really big mistake.

[kungfuey]

[ You didn't actually think that Scarlett was going to let it end at that, did you? ]

Define, mistake. Raged out werewolf ripping people apart kind of mistake or... dead werewolf kind of mistake?

[ It says so much that these are her two 'mistake' scenarios. ]

[tribridfreakshow]

....both? sort of? But it didn't have anything to do with my blood.

[Not the answer either of them wanted.]

He was being bullied really bad at school. I helped him turn into a hybrid because he asked for my help. Half-werewolf, half-vampire, and new vampires tend to lack self-control. He accidentally killed someone. A witch, actually. So the witches wanted justice and the werewolves wanted to protect him and it was a huge mess.

[A beat.]

He ended up strung up in the streets of New Orleans with his heart missing. He was fifteen.

[kungfuey]

So your blood actually turned him?

[ Her tone a mix of surprise and confusion. She'd started to think of Hope as exactly like her, only with the WItch & Werewolf additions. ]

Jesus.

[ Hearing Hope talk about a fifteen-year-old boy being strung up like that? She wants to believe that even in her world, she'd have been horrified but the fact is? She probably wouldn't have been. ]

You talk like... he was still him.

[tribridfreakshow]

I still have the magic that creates vampires running through my veins. If someone dies with it in their system, they'll go through transition like anyone else.

[That should include her, but things are weird here.]

Well, yeah. That's because he was still him.

[kungfuey]

Magic. [ What the fuck is it with people associated with Vampires messing with her understanding of... well. Vampires. ] That's what you believe makes them?

[ She can't quite shed the note of disbelief as she asks that either. ]

I thought you said he'd killed. Fed.

[tribridfreakshow]

Well, yeah. My grandma is the one that cast the spell and made the first vampires out of her entire family. She basically invented dark magic.

[She doesn't believe that's what makes them. She knows.]

You have to feed to fully transition anyway. In order for him to survive becoming a hybrid, that blood had to be mine.

[kungfuey]

Different worlds, different Vampires.

[ It's said like a revelation rather than an argument or statement of fact. Even if she wants to see Hope as like her, they're still completely different. ]

So your blood turns them into Hybrids. [ She's been saying that but none of this has really sunk in until now. ] What if a vamp bites you?

[tribridfreakshow]

That's my guess, yeah. Similar, but not exactly the same.

[Which was still a slight comfort. After all, they both had dealt with some pretty heavy shit.]

The bite itself wouldn't do anything. If they took too much and killed me, I'd probably transition into a vampire, but that's only because I'm weird. Humans have to ingest vampire blood and then die to turn. The same thing would happen if a human died with my blood in their system.

[kungfuey]

Heh - [ A dry, bitter bark of laughter. ] My world would be a lot less fucked up if things worked that way there.

The infection comes from the bite. Like... Zombies or some shit.

[ An infection, not magic. At least, that's how she's always seen it. ]