Most of them stay dead...

Part 14

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Agatha didn't move when Zoe stepped into the cell.

Her aunt was still bound, her arms behind her back, as she lay on her side staring blankly at the far wall.

"Agatha..." Zoe prompted her, unexpectedly nervous as she approached the catatonic nun.

Agatha was covered in blood, Dracula's blood had stained her and the floor of the cell, not from Agatha's feeding, but from when the security guards had roughly dragged her off him.

Sighing Zoe signalled for the two guards to come in, between them they lifted Agatha, and she made no move to protest, or even speak. This was going to make things more difficult. Zoe needed Agatha to cooperate, but if she couldn't even communicate...

"Follow me." Zoe commanded, knowing that she had scant few hours in which to do something.

The board might have already voted to hand the vampires over, their new "caretakers" might be already on their way, and even if they weren't it wouldn't be long before Zoe's own access to the Foundation was revoked. No, she had to act now, whilst everyone still thought she was in charge. Afterall Zoe had dragged Agatha into this mess, and it had been Zoe who had supported bringing in the new funding stream, it wasn't fair that Agatha paid for her mistakes. Family looked after family and Agatha Van Helsing was family, practically all the family Zoe had left, and she was not going to fail her again.

"Take her into the showers...You can wait outside and guard the door, there is only one entrance and she's not in any position to cause trouble." Zoe added when the guards looked like they were going to protest.

Finally, they obeyed, dropping Agatha on to the floor of the shower area, and finally leaving them alone.

"Agatha...Agatha listen to me...You have to snap out of this." Zoe hissed, kneeling next to her aunt, who hung her head and avoided her gaze. "None of this your fault."

"I'm a monster..."

"No, you're not." Zoe snapped, fumbling in her pocket for the key to the handcuffs. "Listen...Listen to me!" She added, when Agatha continued to mumble about losing her mind.

"I am going to unlock those cuffs, and you are going to get out of those dirty clothes, and I am going to clean you up and..."

"What is the point Zoe, I'm a monster. You should let me wallow in my own filth, it is nothing more than I deserve. I should have stopped...why couldn't I stop?"

"Because you were starving, and inexperienced, and probably a hundred different reasons." Zoe speculated. "None of that matters now."

"How can it not matter? I killed him. I can hear him, so loud now in my head, I can't shut it out, him and all the people he killed...I'm going insane...I can't make it stop."

The sharp echo of a slap resounded off the tiled walls, and Zoe lurched backwards as Agatha snarled in retaliation for the strike, her normally blue eyes flooded red.

"Do you think it is wise to provoke such a monster Zoe?"

"No, but I finally have your attention." Zoe snapped, for a moment pondering whether to tell her Aunt, that she hadn't killed Dracula, before dismissing it. Zoe couldn't be sure that Agatha wouldn't insist on freeing Dracula as well, and that just wouldn't work. Zoe couldn't live with, unleashing that monster, on her conscience.

No Zoe could only safely save one, and she was choosing Agatha. Dracula could save himself. Zoe doubted those mercenaries would be able to hold him long.

"Look either you pull it together, or you are going to regret it. There are people coming to take you away, people who won't hesitate to hurt and use you, or force you to hurt others."