Fic: Hunted

[csi_sanders1129]

Title: Hunted
Chapters: 4/5
Author: csi_sanders1129
Genre: Hurt/Comfort. Drama. Adventure. Romance. Established Relationship.
Ratings: T
Word Count: 1,543
Pairings/Characters: Dracula/Johnny
Synopsis: In which a familiar vampire hunter makes the mistake of targeting Johnny to get to Dracula and things spiral out of everyone's control.
Comments: This has been in progress for months now and I'm so so so glad it's finally finished. First try at a Hotel Transylvania fic, hopefully no one is to OOC. Takes some liberties with vampire lore not mentioned in the movie. Characters not mine, please enjoy! Comments are awesome.

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 |

Finally, things stop hurting. Slowly, the pain recedes down his fingers and toes, to his arms and legs. He expects it to center back on the stake wound, where it started, but now the only thing that hurts is his stomach. It's a feeling like he hasn't eaten in weeks. He's pretty sure he knows why.

When he finally does manage to force his eyes open, he's surprised to find that everything is blurry.

"Weird," he mumbles, but a dry mouth and a raw throat devour anything recognizable in the word and leave him coughing.

This, however, seems to get the attention of the other occupant of the room and he's more than a little surprised to see (a blurry outline of) Mavis instead of Dracula because he's sure Dracula has been here with him. While he has no idea why she is here and not searching for a Chupacabra in the Puerto Rico, he's happy to see her.

"You're awake!" She exclaims, the widest smile on her face as she rushes toward him. She helps him sit up and then catches him into what is quite possibly one of the best hugs he's ever had. "Oh, no," Mavis says, the smile gone from her face when she pulls away. "Dad is not gonna be happy about this..."

"Huh?"

She glances toward the door, where she finally managed to coerce her father into taking a break less than half an hour ago. He'd still been wearing the same clothes he'd found Johnny in, all bloodstained and ruined. She'd talked him into cleaning up and getting some rest and now... "That he missed you waking up, I mean. He's been here with you the whole time and he's been so worried."

Johnny frowns, hates that he's the reason Dracula's been upset - hates that Van Helsing's plan got to Dracula - and cringes when pointy, new fangs dig into his lips. "Ow!"

"They take some getting used to," Mavis warns him. "I remember how many times I did that after I lost my baby-fangs."

"Fangs..." He looks down at his chest (why is everything blurry? This is so not what he expected!) and sees no sign of what had to be a wickedly gross wound. His hand comes up to where the marks on his neck have been and those are gone, too. Even the old ache in his wrist (where he broke it when he was little) is gone. "I have fangs!" He freezes, as another thought hits him, "Can I fly?"

Mavis laughs at him, and keeps him from trying. "No, not yet. You have to learn. You'll have a lot to learn - flying, time freezing, hypno-eyes..."

"Speaking of eyes," he manages, "don't vampires have like, super awesome vision?"

She nods slowly, not sure where this is going.

"Then why is everything blurry?"

"Did you take your contact thingies out?"

And nope, that's it. He'd learned his lesson about wearing his glasses into the woods, too, so he'd had contacts in when he was taken and no one would have thought to take those out. It proves easier than usual to take them out this time, the last time, perhaps because of super awesome vampire coordination.

Suddenly everything is crystal clear in a way it's never been before. More details, more colors. He feels like he could pick out a needle in a haystack with ease, he can see that sharply. "This is so cool."

"Anything else?"

"Um," he starts. "I'm... I think I'm hungry?"

"Oh, duh," Mavis answers. "Do you want to come with me or stay here?"

Johnny slides carefully off the edge of the bed and tests his weight. "I'll go with you. I have a feeling I've spent enough time laying here doing nothing."

Mavis lets him follow, but argues that, "I wouldn't say recovering from being stabbed in the chest counts as nothing, really," as they slowly move through the familiar halls of the hotel. They pass a suit of armor and they both know that the news will surely reach Dracula momentarily.

They find the new chef well prepared when they finally arrive in the kitchen. Many options are available: blood substitutes, near blood, and a limited supply of the real thing are all present in varying types.

"What should I-" Johnny starts, but sure enough, Dracula appears. And with a 'whoosh' that speeds by in more of a blur than anything recognizable, Johnny finds himself pinned against the closest wall. Dracula is there, eyes aglow and jaws snapping.

"Dad!" Mavis is shouting, but Johnny tries to stay cool in spite of the fact that crazy-mode hasn't been pointed at him since he first showed up here. "Dad! Stop! What are you doing!?"

"Drac?" Johnny tries, hands coming up to settle on Dracula's arms. "I'm fine, it's okay."

Dracula lets out a breath he might as well have been holding since he realized Johnny was missing and his eyes fade from red down to that eerie blue that usually only pops up when he's talking about Martha. From there, the blue fades and he pulls back enough to crush Johnny against him in a hug so tight that it is actually painful.

"Do not ever scare me like that again, Jonathan," Dracula demands, with notes of lingering terror and fresh exhaustion in his voice. In response, Johnny steals a kiss, something he never thought he'd get to do again, and revels in the fact that they don't have to breathe as often and so this can last and last and last.

"Hey, I'm not going anywhere," Johnny says quietly when they do finally separate.

"I think I'll just leave you two alone," Mavis interrupts as she starts to back away, a happy smile on her face. "But, Dad, feed him, will you?"

"Yeah," Johnny agrees, "I'm kinda starving. My stomach's making more noise than that Banshee convention ever did."

Dracula grabs a bottle of real blood off the platter the chef had set up, presses it into Jonathan's hands. "You need this for now. You can try the other kinds later, once you're more adjusted," he explains, watching carefully as Johnny downs the pint of O-negative without a complaint.

"That's... weird. Oddly filling."

***

Later, once Johnny's new-vampire thirst is temporarily sated, Dracula speeds them back upstairs to their room so they can speak in private. "These were not exactly the conditions I imagined turning you under," he starts, a lengthy apology already composed in his mind (though he's sure he can never make amends for turning someone against their will, if that's what he's done). He'd imagined something not unlike the wedding that had taken place before he'd turned Martha, honestly. He'd imagined that he'd have time to teach Johnny about the things that he'd need to learn (the bat thing, the super speed, vampire history), and the things that would change (like the part where even the slightest bit of sunlight is near fatal for years, and the way his new senses would affect his life) before going through with it. "But if I hadn't, you wouldn't have made it... I wasn't sure you'd make it even with my blood. When we found you..."

"Whoa, there. Wait." Johnny stops him, "I told you I was okay with this. Like you said, not the ideal conditions, but you don't need to apologize for saving my life. I know what Van Helsing did to me. I know how you must have found me. Even I thought I was dead, okay? So thanks for not letting me stay that way."

"I know what he wanted finding me to do to you," he continues, rambling on even though Dracula looks like he's afraid to hear what comes next. "He wanted it to send you over the edge so he'd have a reason to get the people to turn on you. And I'm glad it didn't work."

"It did," Dracula admits, his eyes on the floor. "When we got there, I... I thought I was too late. I thought Van Helsing had taken you from me and I was prepared to fight him to the death if I had to. I told the others to take you home, to keep Mavis safe, and I went after him, but he was gone." He moves to stand in front of Johnny pulls him in close again. "I don't know what I would have done if I had lost you."

Johnny relaxes into the familiar feeling. "You didn't," he says, leaning up for another long, slow kiss. "I'm alive," a kiss, "I'm a vampire," another, "and you're stuck with me for a very, very, very long time, so calm down."

Dracula does, reveling in the reality of those wonderful facts. In those hopeless moments where he'd thought he'd been too late to save his zing, his Jonathan, he'd been sure that he'd never be happy again. Surely he'd never find a third zing, wouldn't have wanted one even it were possible. No, all he'd wanted in those dark moments was some old-fashioned, bloody, monstrous revenge.

But this, he thinks, as he tangles his fingers in Johnny's messy hair and slides his tongue over pointy new fangs, he can definitely be happy with this.

-- Chapter 5