Chapter 10: Life goes on

Ericka woke to the sensation of someone holding her hand and rubbing it soothingly with their thumb.

Ugh, next came back and neck pains from having slept leaning over a table…

But the sight when she opened her eyes was worth any of that pain.

Dracula, her zing, was smiling up at her, lovingly rubbing her hand in his. The only reminder of last day's horror being the empty bags hooked up to him as Drac was completely healed and awake.

"Drac!", she beamed and leaned over to hug him tightly, causing the count to let out a little laugh and hug her back.

"I'm glad you're alright."
"Idiot!", she glared at him for a moment before softening up and tightening the hug again, "I'm the one who should be saying that!"

"Ah, I'm sorry I frightened you, my darling", He excused himself with a little kiss.

Ericka pouted for a moment longer before letting it slip back into a loving smile.

"I think we should put that couple-coffin on our wedding wishlist", she finally said.

"What? But I thought you weren't comfortable with the thought of sleeping in a coffin?"

"I changed my mind", she gave him a small kiss back and stroked his cheek, "the thought of sleeping without you is worse." With that she snuggled up against him as well as she could from her position, simply enjoying how her head against his neck let her hear the slow, faint but definitely present heartbeat of her love.

As soon as the Doctor returned and unhooked the bags, releasing the count, the pair left to see if their family and friends were up yet.

"Drac!", they heard the moment they entered the lobby before the addressed vampire was scooped up into a bone-crushing bear hug by Frank. The rest of Drac's Pack soon followed, all excitedly talking over each other about how glad they are to see him back on his feet.

"Ah ha, yes, yes!", Drac smiled and patted Frank's arm as well as he could with his own arms being restrained by the hug, "It's good to be back, guys. I hope no one was too worried."
"Well", Griffin spoke, "Ericka, Mavis and Johnny were devastated, but you know us, hehe. We're big tough monsters after all!"

Murray gave him a look, "You used me as a TISSUE, that's not what I call a big tough monster, man!" Griffin tried to shush him while Murray just went on and on about how Griffin was crying the most out of them all and how he even fainted in the med bay.

But none of that concerned Drac, "My poor Mavy Wavy", he spoke as Frank let him down, "I have to go talk to her right away!"

"Go Drac," Ericka patted him on the shoulder, "I'll be waiting for you down here."
He gave her one more loving smile before hurrying up to Mavis' apartment at vampire speed, stopping abruptly in front of the door and knocking.

"Hello, papa Drac!", it was Dennis who opened the door.

From the casual greeting he guessed that his vampson didn't know what happened last day. That's good.

"Hello, my little Dennisovich!", he picked the boy up into a quick hug.

"You've been so busy, I haven't seen you in days, papa Drac! Can we go out for a fly?"

"Of course! But not right now, ok? I would like to talk with your parents for a bit."
"Oh, ok! They're both still asleep though. It's the first time I've ever seen them sleep in!"

Drac gave a little laugh, "How lazy of them, huh? Why don't you take Tinkles out and go play for a bit? I'll go fly with you later", with that he sat his young vampson down again.

"Yeah, ok!", Dennis agreed excitedly before whistling to call, "Tinkles!"

The older vampire had to jump to the side to avoid getting run over by the giant puppy, whereas Dennis simply hopped up onto Tinkles' back and rode him out of the room, laughing in joy.

Dracula closed the door behind them and headed to Mavis' and Johnny's bedroom, knocking lightly before opening the door a crack.

They were actually both still asleep. Just when did they go to bed? Ah well…

He slipped into the room and practically slid across the floor without a sound, stopping by Mavis' bedside. After watching her sleep for a moment, he leaned down and woke his daughter with a peck on the forehead, "Rise and shine, my little blood orange."

Her eyes fluttered open a little before widening completely the moment she spotted Drac right in front of her.
"Dad!", she exclaimed before throwing herself at him in a levitating hug, "You're ok!"

Dracula just smiled, happy to see his little girl this cheery, and hugged her back, "Of course, I am, my little devil chum, I told you I would be."

Hearing that, she looked him in the face with a serious frown, "No 'of course', dad! Not this time! That was an insanely close call, the doctor had no idea if he could even still save you!"

His smile disappeared, "Oh.. I-I'm sorry, my dear. I had no idea… I'm sorry I scared you like that…"

"It's ok, I know you just wanted to protect Ericka… Just promise me you'll be more careful?"

"I promise I'll be more careful", he wanted to sound as convincing and honest as possible although they both knew that he'd probably still go throwing himself in the way if someone he cared about was about to get hurt.

A deep yawn brought both their attentions over to Mavis' husband who'd just woken up.

"Aw man, what's-", Johnny cut himself off once he saw who Mavis was talking to, "DRAC!", he beamed and threw himself at the both of them, unfortunately not having levitation powers so he simply knocked into them with his entire weight and clung to them in a tight koala hug, "I can't tell ya how happy I am to see you! I love you, man! Please don't go running into any more stakes!"

"I'm not planning on it", Drac promised, getting one arm free to pat the messy orange hair of his son-in-law, "By the way, what happened to the mob?"

"The mob? Oh! The protest, yeah, they disbanded, I don't think they'll be coming back any time soon", Johnny explained while still wrapped around the two vampires.

Mavis smirked, "Don't be modest Johnny", then she looked back up at her dad, "Johnny gave them a piece of his mind. It's thanks to him that they left."
"Really?", the count asked positively surprised, "Wow, well, in that case, thank you, Johnny, you saved the hotel!"

"Nah, it was nothing", he shrugged, "I just let loose, that's all."

"Are you guys going to keep this hug going all night or can I go check on Dennis now?", Mavis asked with humor in her voice.

Dracula ended the hug, letting Mavis go and Johnathan drop to the ground before explaining, "Dennisovich is fine, I just send him out to play with Tinkles. It would be great if he, my dad and the other guests didn't find out about what happened."

"We're not gonna tell", the young man sitting on the ground threw in, "but we dunno if anyone's gonna watch the midnight news. They're probably gonna recap about the protest."

The count sighed, "Well, if anyone does find out on their own, we'll have to explain it to them… But if news reach little Dennisovich we should at least leave out the part that I almost died."
"Agreed", Mavi nodded, "I don't usually support your lies, dad, but knowing that he'd almost lost his grandpa would only hurt Dennis."

They had a moment of silent agreement before Johnny stood and broke the silence, "So, uh… since you're all healed, that means you don't need to rest up after all that, huh?"

"That's right, I will get back to wedding planning as soon as Ericka is ready to pick up on that as well. But first I promised Dennis that his vampa would go out for a fly with him. Mavis, would you like to join us?"

"Of course!", with that both vampires turned into bats and flew out of the room to go get Dennis.

Johnny could only watch them leave and sighed, "Man, I wish I could fly on my own…"

A little over two weeks later, Dracula and Ericka had the most perfect wedding either one could wish for.

They managed to balance each other's tastes and interests into the food and decorations perfectly and Ericka was wearing the most beautiful, sparkly spiderweb dress they had ever seen with a single golden hibiscus flower attached to her headwear.

Their wedding kiss was the most wonderful moment in Dracula's life since the birth of his daughter. And unlike with Mavis' and Johnathan's marriage, nothing and no one had interrupted it, even though someone had wanted to.

Mavis knew her dad had only interrupted their kiss because he had still been fighting his protective instinct to attack Johnny if he got too close. They had married not too long after returning from their trip so Drac hadn't had a lot of time to get used to seeing them kiss before him by the time of the marriage. Although she'd wished for more, she was happy that they could at least have the small kiss which they sealed their marriage with in the end. Mavis understood her father's feelings about that, but she wasn't the one feeling the protective anger rise when she saw Ericka and Dracula kiss on their wedding. No, that was someone else.

Drac remembered that the first time he woke that day it was to Abraham being about to end him off, he remembered that he hypnotized him to keep him from doing so and he remembered ordering him to let Ericka love whoever she wanted… right? He couldn't recall what exactly he managed to demand of the old man, but it was apparently enough to keep Van Helsing from killing him, not let anyone know that he'd tried to kill him and to let him allow his great granddaughter to marry him and that was enough for the vampire.

Although, while he didn't stop or interrupt the wedding, Van Helsing wished he could have with ever fiber and every screw of his body.

For now he would just watch and let them have their big day, but Abraham was going to get his chance someday.

After all, there are more ways to kill a vampire than staking.

The End