Nature or Nurture Ch. 17

It feels weird, walking to the theatre without Adison.

Bruce and Maud are chatting merrily, Bruce nevertheless very attentive to what happens around them, though no-one would notice. Besides Vincent, that is. Bruce's vigilance gives him only a slight sense of security, he feels vulnerable, being wounded and not at his fittest.

Or maybe he just misses Adison's stable presence. Or maybe he's afraid she has misjudged Mina, who may also have spelled Victor with her vampiric charms, putting both people he loves at risk. Or maybe he is afraid what Mina will reveal, what evil he has done, what ties he had when he left that life. He will probably hear more than he wants to.

Vincent has never felt reluctant to play his role before, but he does not have his heart in it tonight. As nothing escapes Bruce's notice tonight, they have no sooner arrived at the theatre, and seen Maud off to the dressing rooms, before Bruce pushes Vincent into one of the thousand nooks and crannies of the ancient building.

'No-one can hear us here, so tell me what is riding you.'

Vincent knows he cannot shine on stage feeling like this, so he obeys readily.

'I miss Adison, I feel unprotected without her. I feel vulnerable because I'm not fit, my wounds hurt and I can't fight to defend myself. I'm afraid Mina will come forward with all kinds of sordid details of my former life, with grotesque misdeeds, or maybe an abused wife and children somewhere in or out of the city. And I'm afraid she fooled us all and is still evil, has tricked Victor and Adison, and is now doing unspeakable things to them. That's all.'

Bruce does not fall for the attempt at a joke, he knows these fears are serious and even well-founded. Vincent is a very protective man, and trusting the self reliance of his loved ones is hard for him. And his totally opposite fears are even more realistic, he is helpless to magical attack without Adison around.

Thinking about his answer for a moment he tells Vincent, 'I understand your uneasiness. Fact is, without Adison you have no protection against evil powers. But it is not easy to influence someone, they have to be open to it, and I think you are so devoted to your lady you will be safe from temptation.

I can protect you from physical threats, and don't underestimate yourself, you may feel lousy, but you can still beat anyone in this city but me, unarmed if need be.

Adison cannot be tricked by something evil, but she could be fooled in a smaller way, which would possibly hurt Victor, but not tonight. Also, Adison and Victor are not helpless, they can defend themselves very well, even against a vampire or one of those creatures I think.

Though I think you will find Mina everything she seems to be: a young woman, tricked by an evil master into doing horrid things against her will. If she reveals misdeeds out of your former life, you can process them right along with her, for she'll have plenty of her own to get to terms with. Also, you'll be home before you know it. Do you need any painkillers, or a massage or warming up to smooth your muscles?'

Vincent feels relieved already, Bruce is such a steady chap despite his youth.

'No, I just needed a big reality-check. You are right, Adison and Victor can take care of themselves. I just miss having them around.'

An hour later, both are ready for the stage. Maud is looking lovely, already waiting behind the scenes. She steps up to him and hugs him really carefully.

'I'm sure Adison and the doctor will be fine. It is always hard to be parted from a loved one, but she will be waiting for you when you get back. I promised her I'd take care of you, and I will. Are you in a lot of pain? She told me you've been wounded.'

Surprised that Adison would confide in Maud, he tells her, 'It does hurt, but nothing I can't handle. I'm surprised she told you.'

Maud laughs. 'We girls have to stick together. You need looking out for, and I'll be closest to you.' Standing on her toes, she kisses him on the mouth, but with no intention to take it any further. He accepts the kiss for what it is, a sign of intimate friendship common in a close-knit group like a theatre crew, and gives her a bear hug in return, careful of his chest, but feeling a lot better for the warmth of her friendship.

Then they get ready for the show, and if he plays with a little less fire than usual, no-one in the audience and on stage even notices. After the show, they make as quick an exit as they can get away with, and he walks home so fast, that Bruce and Maud have to pick up their pace to keep up with him.

When she hears Vincent return, Adison is every bit as eager to see him as he is to be reunited with her. He takes her in as strong a grip as he can stand, painful to him but very satisfying to both. She kisses him eagerly, and he really has to control himself not to run straight to the four-poster with her, to rip off their clothes and make love madly. He knows she can see his intent in his yellow eyes, and feel it somewhere else entirely.

But he also knows they have a house guest, now undoubtedly awake, so he stuffs his lust where it will keep, and just breathes in her ear with a husky voice, 'I've missed you so much!'

She merely looks at him in a certain way, and he knows she has missed him just as much, worrying about him even more than he did about her.

'What is the matter love?' he asks quietly.

Adison admits, 'I left Victor and Mina by themselves, they needed that. But then I imagined how Mina would tell us you had a wife and four children in the city, and then you'd remember and leave me for them.'

Vincent snorts derisively.

'Not very likely, if we believe what our friends told us. Why would a demonic fiend have a wife and kids?'

'I kept reminding myself of that, but I just wanted you to come back and say it,' she says. 'And now I want to take off your shirt, so I can check on those wounds. Come sit here, close to the fire.'

And sitting astride his knees, she carefully unfastens all the buttons of his shirt, then helps him out of it, baring his bandaged chest. The wrappings are still clean on the outside, which she is relieved to see.

'Maud was very careful with me, and she took great care of me as well,' he says teasingly. Adison does not rise to the bait.

'She's a good girl, follows instructions to the letter.'

When she removes the padding there is some bleeding from the smaller wounds, the ones she didn't stitch up. She cleans them very carefully, still sitting on his lap, alternating the cleaning with caressing and kissing the undamaged skin.

The patient clearly experiences a rising passion rather than pain.

'You are a very bad girl, you make me want to get hurt more often, or heal more slowly.'

He can't help distracting her from her work by kissing her intensely. When they run slightly out of breath, she continues her ministrations, nearly finishing before they kiss again. Then she has to get up to fetch clean bandages, and she wraps him up tightly again.

Back on goes the shirt, and she refastens all the small buttons neatly. Then she sits back on his lap and kisses him again. But they cannot keep stalling, Vincent needs to meet Mina and face his past. So they make a nice supper and knock on her door, knowing that Victor at least must be starving.

Her dress ruined, Mina has nothing to wear except the loose nightgown Adison gave her last night. But on Mina it is decidedly on the short side, and Adison's dresses are really too small for her. Victor promises to do some shopping for her tomorrow, he has a fine eye for fashion and will be able to find her some better fitting stuff.

So for now she makes do with a shirt and a pair of loose trousers from Vincent's closet, his size matching hers better than the doctor's. Taking a shower is a real eye-opener for Mina, she has never had any of the modern conveniences. Clean and dressed in clean clothing she joins them at the table, though of course food is of no use for her.

She does accept a glass of wine, she is able to digest it, though it will not set her drunk. Even if she tries to do it unobtrusively, it is clear she cannot stop watching Vincent. Finally, she cannot stand not knowing anymore.

'How come you look so much like Heathcliff, when I left him for dead a little more than a year ago? One just doesn't recover from a crushed skull.'

Vincent offers to shake hands, and when she accepts he says, 'I go by the name of Vincent now, and I have only started to remember smatterings of my former life as Heathcliff. And I think it is Victor's tale to tell how that came about. I thought you would have heard it by now, you've already spent quite some time together.'

At his knowing look, Victor colours and excuses himself.

'We've actually spent most of the time you were at the theatre sleeping, Mina is not totally recovered yet and needs more sleep than usual. Needless to say I could use it too. I don't know how you manage, playing a show day in day out after working through the night, being wounded quite severely on top of it.'

Realizing this is true, Adison feels a stab of guilt, not having thought of it herself. But Vincent makes little of it.

'Apparently you made me really strong and tireless, I really don't feel worse for wear.'

Mina puts in her two cents here.

'You never slept much when I knew you either. But I'm nearly dying of curiosity now.'

Adison and Victor are both pleased to see her piqued with interest, instead of sad and guilty.

Victor knows it is his turn to explain first, and he doesn't spare himself in his tale.

'The man you knew as Heathcliff was brought into my pathology workshop dying of head trauma. I had been planning to create a superhuman by treating a corpse with a special chemical mixture, then starting the heart again with electricity.

This body was in excellent shape and looked very strong, and the damage that was killing it could easily be remedied once he was dead. There was a severe thunderstorm predicted the day after, so I kept him alive until it arrived, then killed him, fixed the skull, set him up in my machine.

Lightning struck, he came to life, but he was covered in blood through my sloppy suturing and in excruciating pain because of the lightning and probably the chemicals as well. His screams of pain and the blood made him look horrible, and when he saw me and came towards me he seemed mindless and very aggressive, and I fled, leaving him behind to suffer the pain in loneliness.His cries were heart-rending, but I heard them as threatening.

Adison came up from next door in reaction to his screams and saw straight away what I had missed: my progeny was not mindless and violent, but in agony, his mind wiped by my procedure, a true newborn with no sense of self. She cured his wounds and filled his loneliness. She gave him love and instruction. She and I set up a practice together, and Vincent grew up within a few months.

I felt a lot of guilt towards Vincent, for in the beginning he was really afraid of me. When he was grown up, we became friends, and then he and Adison discovered that they loved each other. Though I was afraid they'd leave me, they stayed, Adison and I continuing our practice and Vincent starting a career as actor.

Through my work as medical examiner your father found me, getting us all involved in your situation.'

Mina now feels justified to take a good long look at Heathcliff, or Vincent, as he is now called. She catches his eye, and speaks directly to him.

'You are nearly the same man to look at, you have the same strong body with its erect carriage and proud bearing, the same longish black hair, the same facial features. But there the resemblance ends. Heathcliff had very dark, nearly black eyes and a swarthy skin. Your skin is so white as to be nearly translucent.

And your eyes are very different, the yellow colour gives you the same intense stare as Heathcliff had, but I also see life and friendliness in them. You have a sense of humour, he didn't.'

She stops talking, looks at Victor, and asks him, 'Did your chemicals do that, bleach his skin and eyes? It must have been strong stuff, small wonder he had no memories.'

Then, at Vincent again.

'Your face also looks softer, that may be the colour or because you seem to lack a beard. But I don't think that's it. I've already seen you laugh, you enjoy life, you have things you like to do. And you have love.

Heathcliff loved someone too, obsessively, but their relationship was twisted. They hurt each other, wanted to control, possess the other. You seem to love more freely, more givingly. Adison is the total opposite of Catherine, your great love in your former life. Catherine was demanding, unreasonable, unstable.

When his Cathy died, Heathcliff became even more morose, vengeful and downright cruel. You might have become like him, had you been left to pain and loneliness. The doctor is right to reproach himself for the sin of raising you from the dead and abandoning you. You would have become a worse monster than Heathcliff was, and a lot less easy to kill.

I see you walking around and you have been performing in a play with wounds that would have sent another man to bed for a week. Does anyone of you realize what that means?'

Looking at the three for an answer to her question, she sees Victor looking very depressed, clearly this conversation has raked up his guilt. Adison has a calming hand on his shoulder, reminding him he has long since made up for it.

With everyone else looking at the doctor, Vincent follows their attention and notices Victor's demeanour. He reaches over the table, takes the doctor's delicate face in both hands, stares at him. 'Dear Victor, you know that we're way past that. I've long since forgiven you, Adison has not ever held it against you. You made a mistake, the worst didn't happen. It all turned out right, and you are a totally different man now. I love you, you know that.'

Looking at Mina, he says, 'He did give me this life, as you said, a happier life, with real love and with things in it that I love to do.'

Now Adison speaks up.

'That is exactly what Mina means, guys! Heathcliff was a monster, Vincent could have been a monster, but he isn't. He's a loving man, who enjoys life. Her former master's plan is nearly in ruins. And now we've freed her as well.

Oh my, that means we're in terrible danger, doesn't it?'

Mina takes her hands and says frankly, 'Yes it does, Adison, we are all in danger, and since you've foiled him most, you're in the most danger. But you've already saved our souls and he hasn't been able to get at you. So you see, we're not totally helpless.

I don't want my father to know I'm here, because he trusts Vanessa, and she is the weakest link we have. She cannot know I still live, free of the thing that ruled me all this time. The enemy'd find out sooner or later.'

'What can we do?' Vincent asks.

'First, I will tell you all about your past, and how you got to be the Heathcliff I knew. Then we need to get Vanessa cleared of the enemy's taint. She is the last active part of his current world domination plan.

Then we enjoy life, learn to live with our pasts, prepare for the future, until he has cooked up some other plan we need to foil. But first, you all need to eat and a good night's sleep. I'll take first watch tonight.'

After supper, they spend another hour together. Mina tells them how she met Heathcliff after he'd eloped with his girl, escaping her cruel brother and a loveless marriage. He had convinced her he'd take care of both of them, that he would make their fortune in the city.

'And he did, she never lacked anything material, but somehow they were never truly happy together. Do you think people can love each other too much?

Serving my master didn't help of course. He didn't control Heathcliff as totally as he did me, but he knew exactly what his weaknesses were and used them.

He employed Heathcliff as intermediary when he did business with people, and Heathcliff had a certain charm that made him very good at his work. Soon, he was able to afford a nice house, with staff, and beautiful things for his girl. They got married, at her insistence.

But my master slowly but surely put Heathcliff on a path to self-destruction, dragging her down with him. Heathcliff gambled a lot, and won a lot of extra money with it. Also, my master got him to dispose of people now and then. And he taught him the rudiments of sex-magic, enabling him to use his twisted relationship with his dissatisfied and passionate wife to get magical power to become even more charming.

I think my master was grooming him to become his vessel, taking away his conscience bit by bit, crossing the line of humanity a bit further with every murder he committed, every beating he gave to or took from his wife.'

Vincent swallows hard.

'I saw one of those lovemaking sessions in a flashback. It made me sick to the stomach, but I felt the passion, and to someone who had never felt real love, it might have seemed like an all-consuming love.'

Mina nods.

'I think he'd never had any love as a child, so he wouldn't be able see that the feeling they shared was something else. And she was as mad as he was, I think, but again, she truly loved him in her way. He was well on the way of becoming the vessel for my master, a vessel my master needed to marry the goddess that had succeeded in tempting Vanessa in her youth.

She had not and still has not been won completely, her love of me and her sense of self still hold her back, I think, but not enough. She should have been a man, travelling and exerting herself would have filled that eternal emptiness inside her, but being expected to behave as a noble lady drove her to do desperate things out of boredom.

Then Cathy died. My master wanted to be rid of her, I don't know if he helped her along, but she had been weak in the mind always, and Heathcliff being away a lot and not telling her what he was about didn't help. Also, his character change reflected on her, their love changed as he did, and became ever more sickening.

They were chained together for life, and when she died, he just went mad. He became a wild beast more than a human being, his veneer of civilisation dropped off him and his real nature showed. There was no way my master was going to trust his future to a vessel as cracked as Heathcliff. He decided to try to make him useful after all, by having him killed, putting him in the way of the doctor, and hoping to get hold of him with his mind wiped and with superhuman strength. How he knew what the doctor was planning I don't know, but it was easy to predict that a resurrected Heathcliff would scare poor Victor witless, for at that moment the man was a fright to behold.

I was part of the set-up to kill him, I had never liked him, and I couldn't resist my master's will, but nonetheless I felt bad to betray him. Though something in me tried to convince me it would be a relief for him to die.

When I actually met him in that bar, he was different, almost like his own self again, but it was too late: he sensed he was in danger but reacted distractedly, and got hit by one of my master's henchmen. They delivered him to you, Victor, and hoped you'd take the bait. The rest, you know. Adison saved all of us, for you would not have survived the rise of your progeny to godhood.'

This is a lot to take in. They sit in total silence for a while. Strangely, Mina is already part of their circle, totally included. At last, Adison breaks the silence.

'So that great battle I was afraid of is not coming?'

Mina replies, 'There will always be a new battle, but I think this time it was not fought with arms, but with dedication, and you were the main soldier. There may still be one ahead, but I think that once Vanessa has thrown off her possession, and has found something in her life to keep her busy and away from temptation, all will be well for some time.