Encore

Animals

Alucard spends most of the trip frantically whispering objections in Sypha's ear. That leaves Trevor fielding the questions.

What's vampire blood magic?

"No idea! I don't know magic."

Is this dangerous?

"Not for any of us at least!"

Are they summoning demons to do the work?

"If there is ever a plan that involves summoning demons, which there will never be, I would tell you up front so stop asking. And he can't, so you're not going to get anywhere begging him behind my back."

This is black magic, right?

"It's vampire blood magic," Trevor reminds them. "Cast by Dracula's fucking son. Yeah, pretty sure it's black magic."

Can you shut up?

"Sypha, we both know you have to put up with me if you want to drag Alucard out to show you how to turn dead animals into regrettable masonry. Can I? Yes. Will I, no. Anyway," he says to the previous person, "don't get your hopes too high, he's probably found a way to make black magic boring."

Zero people have tried to stab him even though there are so many more people than zero following them. Black magic black magic black magic nobody actually cares, years of his life thinking people believed a lie and it didn't even fucking matter. He feels somewhat giddy, only there's no lightness to it, more like he's the ocean stuffed into a barrel swirling around with no way out.

And there is no way out and that is not a line of thought he wants to pursue so instead Trevor continues, "Whatever he'll do, it's definitely not loud or bright or anything else that'd alert someone if it happened at midnight. I guess it makes sense black magic is pretty stealthy. I mean, it'd have to be for anyone use it without everyone else realizing what's up."

Alucard's whispering gets even more distressed, followed by Sypha muttering, "Well, this should establish if he's right about people not killing us all."

"Just worry about yourself, they can't kill him anyway," Trevor points out much more quietly. "It's really hard to kill a vampire and they have no clue what they're doing." Although that does remind him... "Oh right. Alucard, there was holy water dumped all over the place, sorry I almost forgot." See, that's why you tell people your stupid plans, so they can tell you if there's a problem with it instead of it igniting in your face.

"Thank you for telling me?" Alucard says.

"It's from yesterday night, right before we fell down." Alucard is just staring at him, looking baffled. "I'm telling you because I figured you'd know how long it lasts better than me."

"Why would I know?"

"Why the fuck wouldn't you know?" Trevor demands. "What do you do with your time?!"

"Oh, right," Sypha says. "Yes, that's a problem. Can you float over it? Or is the remaining courtyard blocking your abilities now?"

Alucard looks irritated. "It is not an issue."

Trevor rolls his eyes. "Yeah, durable, I know it doesn't kill you guys, but half of incineration is still going to smart."

"But you complained at length that I did this. So you must..." Alucard pauses. "I appreciate your concern," he says. "I will give it due consideration but it should not prevent me from resolving this problem."

And there are no flames. However, Alucard spends only seconds standing on the actual ground in favor of flinging himself right off the stones and into the empty pit, which sure seems like something somebody might do, if they were trying to pretend they were too cool to care about their feet burning.