SUPER READ FIRST: I wish there was a "macabre/silly" option when setting the genre for stories, because I think that would be suitable here. As you can tell from the description, this is obviously a crossover between "Dark Shadows," which is my favorite campy TV show ever (well, tied with original Star Trek), and the '70s cult movies starring Vincent Price, "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" and "Dr. Phibes Rises Again." This story starts off right after the latter movie's ending, then blends into "modern day" Collinsport, which I guess is late '60s/early '70s. I'm not thinking of any particular plotline going on for Dark Shadows fans to keep track of. For example, there's no Adam lurking about (yet) or Barnabas out stalking anybody. I guess you could place it roughly after Burke's disappearance/death thing and in the middle of Barnabas's obsession with Vicki. I don't know if the 1795 séance has happened yet…if it has, just assume Vicki forgot everything (whoops) and Barnabas left things at that. So...things are slightly AUish? Only not really. Heh. I do warn you, though, later on there might be some romantic pairings involved that will befuddle seasoned fans, making them echo one hon. Scooby-Doo, esq.: "broo?" That's just the way I roll, baby.

If you haven't seen the Phibes movies, you can currently check them out on YouTube, or else I'm sure they're available on DVD and Netflix. But I warn you: they are VIOLENT and GRUESOME. At least to a wimp like me. I actually skipped over or turned away from the more bloody parts and focused instead on the gothic romance while watching them, because I'm a total sap. Anyhow, a quick run-down: the maniacal, deformed Dr. Phibes, a renown organist and dabbler in the occult, is obsessed with reviving his dead wife Victoria, no matter who he has to kill in creative, macabre fashion, getting help from his faithful and mysterious assistant Vulnavia along the way. Gee, DS fans, who does this romantic and violent character remind you of? Anyway, because of these thematic similarities, I did start thinking about Dark Shadows, and how strangely coincidental it is that Phibes' wife and Dark Shadows' protagonist share the same first name along with the fact that, at least in my opinion, both women sort of resemble each other physically….

So. Remember while you're reading this: macabre/silly. Oh, and disclaimer: don't own or have any of the rights to either Dark Shadows (Dan Curtis Productions does) or the Phibes franchise (MGM does). Now go!

Angelique stood quiet at the river's edge, her long gown a bluish-white in the underground cave's irregular light.

She cared little if the waters touched her feet. After all, she had already been resurrected, so what did it matter?

She made a strange but lovely figure in this empty underground lair, for she was the first visitor to stand on the River of Life's shore in over seven centuries. This bank was located miles beneath the Pharaoh's Tomb in Egypt, which required a lengthy, winding journey by raft to reach. It was a daunting voyage, but those who made it had the ultimate goal in sight: immortality or resurrection.

Angelique waited for one who sought both.

Her unique jade eyes pierced the darkness surrounding her, focusing on the boat that was to come. The boat that was predicted to come in Vulnavia's prophecy.

Angelique's lips curled into a kittenish smirk. Yes, the great Vulnavia's precious prophecy, she inwardly jeered. I'm absolutely certain Nicholas wasn't supposed to get a hold of that one.

Still, through nefarious methods unknown to Angelique, the warlock had indeed uncovered the prophecy, and had deigned to bring it to her attention. The witch was no fool; she knew that Nicholas was not an altruistic man and that he no doubt expected something in return. For some reason, he wanted to stop this prophecy from occurring as much as she did. She bristled, hoping that Nicholas's desires did not conflict with hers. But she would confront that possibility later. She was right now too anxious to get what she wanted out of this excursion.

Her eyes grew steely with resolve as she recalled what the prophecy had foretold:

Victoria Phibes shall bathe in the River of Life and be resurrected, and will one day win the heart of Barnabas Collins, replacing Josette DuPres Collins in his affections.

Her blood grew hot at the very memory of those words. "Remember, Barnabas," Angelique whispered to the cool, damp air, "Everyone you love shall die…even…." Her eyes lit up. "Even if you have not yet met them."

She swallowed her mocking laugh and stiffened, alert as a scavenging lioness. She heard a strange, ghostly singing in the distance.

As she hid behind one of the pillars bordering the great river's shore, she also heard an oar lap at the water. The singing continued, clearer now and with less of an echo. The singer's voice was raspy and elegant, yet with a jerky, almost mechanical cadence.

Somewhere over the rainbow

Way up high,

There's a land that I heard of

Once in a lullaby.

Angelique paid little attention to the melody. She didn't know it, but Nicholas had only resurrected her two weeks prior. How was she, a witch murdered in the year 1795, supposed to know a tune that was presumably popular in the year she now found herself in, 1928?

She had no way of knowing that the song was actually written ten years later. But if she had known, she would not have been surprised.

For she knew that the man singing and rowing the boat, Dr. Anton Phibes, was half god, related by blood to his helper and confidant Vulnavia. So he, too, had insight into the future, though of a very limited range.

Peeking from behind the pillar, Angelique studied the strange forms approaching the river's end.

Anton Phibes stood on a raft covered in white lotus flowers, the man dressed in a ceremonial robe of the same color. He was positioned at the back of the raft, staring down with great reverence at the supine body that took up most of the conveyance.

There, before him, and in front of Angelique's searing eyes, lay the preserved body of his deceased wife Victoria, inside the crystal coffin Egyptian princesses had been laid to rest in millennia ago.

Angelique's teeth clenched as she took in the girl's beauty from what she could see of it beneath the glass. Victoria Phibes' presence was so lovely and innocent that even in death her image was haunting. Like her husband, she was clothed all in white, feathers bordering her silken dressing gown. Her long hair flowed down her shoulders, and her porcelain skin made her petite and fragile features stand out starkly against the dark mane framing her face.

Yes, her beauty was indeed as great as Josette's.

Angelique's fingernails cut into her curled palms.

At last the raft docked into the bank, and Phibes, gingerly avoiding disturbing the crystal case of his beloved, stepped onto the shore.

He lifted his hood. Angelique could not suppress her curiosity as her eyes ran over his countenance. For all the stormy emotion evident in his pale blue eyes, the face of Anton Phibes was strangely immobile. Angelique knew why.

It wasn't really his face. He wore a mask and wig made to resemble the head of a man in his mid-fifties with shaggy gray hair, long mustache, and aquiline nose, all evidence of his aristocratic background and eccentric nature.

That was what Anton Phibes once was, and still affected being. But beneath this lifelike cover was a face scarred and deformed by fire, until it resembled nothing more than a blood-colored skull.

The flames had ravaged him the same day, seven years prior, that he lost his sanity–for the unfortunate occurrence had taken place because Phibes, in a frenzy, had urged his poor driver to hurry, hurry, hurry the car toward their destination, and the harried chauffeur had raced instead over a cliff by mistake. The resulting accident had taken the driver's life, but Phibes, scarred and broken, had survived the wreckage, unknown to the authorities.

Yet this was not what took his rationality away, or any sense of moral fiber left in him. He had been urging his driver so heatedly because his wife–his beloved, his sweet, his precious wife! –was undergoing emergency surgery. The highly skilled team of nine doctors, surgeons, and nurses that the organist demanded for his wife's care had failed to keep her alive.

When Phibes emerged from his near-death experience, he had discovered that Victoria was dead. His physical life was saved, but with Victoria's death his real life was gone.

And malice and insanity took hold.

Nine killed her. Eight died. One was spared…but that was another story. Phibes eagerly awaited this next chapter, when he and his noble queen would be reunited in each other's arms and hearts once more! Once more and forever more!

He knelt down beside her, tracing a gloved finger over the glass by her face. The accident had also damaged his tongue and vocal cord, but the brilliant doctor, combining his knowledge of music and science, was able to fashion a hose connected from the side of his neck near his windpipe to a gramophone in order to speak. The gramophone was now located at the edge of Victoria's coffin.

He spoke to her now, Angelique once more noting the jerky, robotic rhythm of this inhuman voice. He stared lovingly at his wife, but because of the contraption sticking out of his neck, his lips remained still.

"My sweet Victoria, we have at last reached our destination. Soon you will again be by my side, and not even death shall part us!" The mechanical tone of his voice served as a strange contrast to the passionate words he spoke. He delicately lifted the coffin's lid, and Angelique was struck by the heavy lilac scent that wafted outward.

How well Dr. Phibes preserves his little embalmed bride, she observed sardonically to herself.

Although the mask Phibes wore was practically lifelike in its similarity to his original face, heavy emotions were often beyond its powers of expression. Yet Angelique could detect a gentle smile forming. He leaned forward and stroked his darling's hair. "Yes, my love. Very soon now. And then Vulnavia will guide us through the portal of the gods, where I shall claim my birthright as the son of a goddess. You shall be my immortal queen. My dear maternal aunt Vulnavia has served all this time as Athena to my patient Odysseus. Like Odysseus, I too have been fighting, slaving over the years to return to my sweet and faithful Penelope…my Victoria," he cupped her cheek. Then he stood, and unhinged the side of her coffin.

"And now, my love, comes the final task. I shall take you in my arms, where you shall lie lifeless for the last time. I will place you in the water, where it shall wash over us both, and after only a few moments you will return to life, and we both shall be immortal, like the god I truly am and that you soon shall be."

With regal grandeur he gently lifted his wife in his arms, placing her at the raft's edge. Straightening his robe, he turned to loop the raft's rope securely around the pillar….

But it was caught, instead, by a sleek and feminine hand, accompanied by a harsh and elegant laugh. "Oh, I don't think so, Dr. Phibes."

Phibes' eyes, the only true portal to his feelings, stared with indignant rage at the haughty Angelique, revealing herself from her hiding place. "Who are you?" He demanded.

"An interested party," she said, walking gracefully down to confront him. "You can call me Angelique."

"Angelique?" He asked swiftly, looking her over. "I do not know that name."

"Then here's one you might know: Nicholas Blair," she whispered teasingly.

His eyes snapped fire. "Blair? The warlock?"

"Yes," Angelique laughed again. "And your dear aunt's archenemy."

"Yes," Phibes' gramophone hissed. "Yes, I know of the power struggle between them…she spurned his pleas to turn him from a sorcerer to a god and he vowed to gain powers equal to, and even stronger, than hers!"

"And he has almost succeeded. That is, I know he's now at least as powerful as Vulnavia is."

"What interest does Blair take in my plans?"

Angelique shook her head slowly. "Not his interest." She pointed at her face, staring him down. "Mine."

Phibes returned her glare. "You? Who and what are you?"

Angelique shrugged carelessly. "Hm. I see no reason to deceive you. I am a witch. I died over one hundred years ago, but Nicholas revived me. He warned me of…her." With violent contempt written all over her face, she glued her eyes on the lovely Victoria's body.

Phibes instinctively blocked her view, cloaking his beloved. "Warned you of her? What about her? What interest should you take in Victoria? In life, she was an innocent mortal from a good family, a family of oil barons and aristocrats, but with no ties to the occult. What could my darling have done to you, a witch, to make you look at her with such hatred?"

Angelique's blazing eyes seemed to sear through Phibes' midsection, to where Victoria still lay motionless at the edge of the raft. "I'm not interested in what she was. I am interested in what she will be."

"And what is that? A goddess?"

Angelique's voice became timorous with ill-concealed rage. "A rival."

She took a menacing step forward, raising her arm straight before her. She spoke in demanding, clear tones…but not to Phibes. "O, Dark Powers of the universe! Hear my cry! Give me fire to reduce to ashes the one who stands between me and my dreams!"

Panicking, Phibes rushed toward Angelique to halt her progress, his arms out to block her from Victoria. "No! Stop! I will not allow it! Leave her be! Be gone, witch! Be gone before I strike you down!"

Angelique lifted her arms skyward, and as she spoke, the water began to ripple violently, a gale of wind suddenly sweeping down against those assembled. "Dark Powers! Give me what I ask! Fire to the body, the body to ashes! This I demand now!"

Phibes tried grabbing her by the throat, but the witch halted his hands with a flick of her wrist.

The organist struggled against her force. "I…have…no choice…." Focusing all his energy into one word, he cried as the wind howled around him:

"VULNAVIA!"

The name resounded like thunder throughout the stormy labyrinth.

Angelique gasped as her powers suddenly froze, the wind and water calm, still.

But just as suddenly, the earth shook around them as white light blasted at Angelique, causing her to cry out and shield her eyes. A large, iridescent portal appeared, and both doctor and witch could see the shape of a lithe and graceful woman come nearer and nearer to the portal's opening. Out stepped the raven-haired beauty, bedecked in Egyptian finery and majestic as the sun.

Usually mute in human form, Vulnavia broke her silence to answer Phibes' call. "Yes, my nephew. I have come."

"You!" Angelique spat. "Nicholas was supposed to detain you!"

With a quiet but still self-assured dignity, Vulnavia glanced down at the cowering, incensed Angelique. "You flatter Nicholas's abilities. He has retreated." She turned to her nephew, reaching out her hand. "Come, Anton," she said. "You and your beloved must join me now on the other side."

A gleeful Phibes bowed his head in thanks to the beautiful goddess. "Thank you, Vulnavia. You have again served me well, and in timely fashion."

He made to embrace her, but was stopped by Angelique's blood-curdling, hysterical laugh.

From where she crouched by the river's edge, the witch pointed with brutal ecstasy at the water. "HA! Look! Look, Phibes! Look at what your love and devotion have done to your sweet Victoria!"

Phibes whipped around and horror, unlike any he had known since first learning he lost Victoria in the hospital, filled his very soul.

Whether in his struggle with Angelique, or from the rocking waves and winds caused by her attempt at black magic, or from the tremors caused by Vulnavia's entrance, the raft had somehow overturned, plunging Victoria into the river's depths.

"No…no!" Phibes cried aghast.

A few seconds submerged just barely beneath the water's surface was all that was required to either revive or give immortality to a human being.

But left too long and too deep in the waters….

As Phibes stumbled blindly for his wife through the dark stream, he could see her regressing from the beautiful young adult she had been when she died to returning to her formative years, her pre-adolescence, her childhood….

His godly blood protected him as he grabbed for her, only sending him back about fifteen years.

But he was too late for Victoria.

When he finally pulled her from the water, he found he held a squalling baby in his arms.

Angelique's deafening laughter blended with the newborn Victoria's cries as Phibes, in a haze, stumbled back to the shore and collapsed to his knees at his goddess aunt's feet.

"Gone…all gone…." His gramophone voice intoned, its speaker broken with despair. "She has regressed too far for immorality. All of my hopes and dreams, the eternal life I envisioned with my one dear treasure…." He looked down dumbly at the cradled creature in his arms. "All…all gone."

Vulnavia grasped his shoulder in sympathy. "My apologies, dear Anton," she whispered. Angered by Angelique's continuing laughter, Vulnavia struck her a heavy blow to the cheek, sending the witch careening against the pillar. Angelique slid unconscious to the ground. Just as his inhuman blood protected Phibes from a fate similar to Victoria's, so did the magic coursing through Angelique's veins keep her alive in her unconscious state, whereas a mortal would have been felled for good at Vulnavia's hand.

Before the goddess could comfort the shattered husband further, the ground started shaking again. Light similar to the one proceeded by Vulnavia's entrance pierced the darkness, growing brighter and stronger by the minute. Another portal was slowly forming to the left of Vulnavia's. A man's voice vengefully calling her name filled the air.

"Nicholas," Vulnavia whispered. Taking Phibes by the shoulders, she helped him to his feet, and stared him deeply in the eyes, willing the grieving man to focus. "My nephew," she said. "I must make haste and escape the wrath of Nicholas Blair. Angelique was correct in her assessment of his powers. They have grown considerably since last I saw him. It took all my powers to defeat him in battle, but he has obviously recovered. My suspicion is he has aligned himself with Diablos, of whom both you and I have had dealings with in the past. He is coming soon, and I must protect myself. But," she placed a hand on the baby Victoria's head. "I claim responsibility for what has happened to your wife. Perhaps it was the tremors brought about by my own powers that resulted in her fall into the waves. I will make this up to you. For whatever reason, Nicholas wants her dead. I…I will protect her."

"How, dear Vulnavia?" Phibes asked sadly. "I would give worlds for her to be safe, particularly in this vulnerable state. But where can she forever be safe from Blair's wrath, if he is so powerful?"

She tilted her head, analyzing him. "You are willing to wait for her? No matter how long?"

Phibes nodded his head slowly, emphasizing his sincerity. "Until the end of time, if necessary, Vulnavia."

She raised an eyebrow. "Not that long." She stared into the distance, past the growing white light and into the darkness. "I feel the forces gathering to warn me. There is a place I am being beckoned to…a great ways off…in another time…there I must go, and there I shall take Victoria and leave her in safe hands."

Phibes wrapped tight and protective arms around the small Victoria. "Where? When?" He rasped.

Vulvania's wide eyes still stared unseeingly into the air around them, and she answered in a far-off voice. "I will know not where…and I will know not why…until I am there…. the forces of my magic shall lead me." Returning to reality, she stroked Phibes' cheek lovingly. "Come. Give me Victoria. She shall be safe. You will take the path I have already laid out for you." She indicated the portal she had previously walked through, competing for vibrancy with Nicholas's growing one. "You will live in the Other World with your godly ancestors, who shall await you with open arms." Her eyes twinkled as she reached out and removed his mask. Its fleshly duplicate at about age thirty-five was now the face underneath, hair dark and cheeks ruddy with health. Somehow sensing the change, Phibes gasped, and felt his face with one free hand. "You are no longer a shambles," Vulnavia explained. "The river has healed you completely. When the time comes that Victoria is grown and safe, you may seek her out and woo her back to your side. Go now!" She kissed his cheek, and reached for the child.

With feigned stoicism, Phibes reluctantly released his hold on his wife, now so small and helpless. He watched as his aunt cradled Victoria to her chest, and then turned her head skyward. She closed her eyes as another gust of wind blew into her, causing her and Victoria to fade into thin air. Phibes felt a great stab of anxiety and rushed forward, but they were already gone.

The gentle flowing of the river rushing against the bank was the only sound left in that dark, unearthly cavern.

Phibes feebly lifted his hand to where Victoria had rested in Vulnavia's arms. "Farewell, my beloved," he said aloud, the gramophone also starting to become unnecessary. "We shall meet again. And this time I will not be defeated." He stared venomously at Angelique's form as the witch began to moan and twitch on the ground, fighting for consciousness. His hand clenched as he contemplated destroying her once and for all, and he was about to act when the light from Nicholas's portal burst forth again, with more and more vibrancy.

He could not fight them both.

No. Not yet. But soon, someday, Anton Phibes would have his revenge on Angelique and Nicholas Blair both.

He turned and saw his wife's dressing gown wash ashore. Reaching down and clutching it as a lifeline, he pressed his face into its soft material, breathing in the faint lilac scent that still clung to its folds. Then, turning his eyes toward Vulnavia's portal, he strode forward purposefully into the light. As he disappeared into his ancestors' home world, the portal shut behind him and he was gone.

Only a few moments later, the other portal that had been struggling for life finally opened completely. Its crisp white mist poured into the river's edge, slowly awakening Angelique. From the thick haze of the portal stepped out a dapper gentleman, jauntily twirling his walking cane. He was dressed impeccably in late 1920s fashion, a sleek trilby in his other hand. His dark, handsome face looked casually peeved, his slick black moustache twitching with mild curiosity as he suavely took in his surroundings. This careless front turned immediately to fury when he saw Angelique lying in the corner, still stirring into consciousness.

"You! You incompetent bungler!" He yelled at the now fully awake, though slightly dazed woman, who was struggling to sit up. "You've failed, haven't you?" He fumed.

Recovering, Angelique pushed herself to her feet, quivering with self-righteous anger. "You are the one who has failed, Nicholas! You were supposed to destroy Vulnavia! How could I, unpracticed in magic for over a century, be expected to compete with a goddess on my own?"

"Don't make me laugh, Angelique," Nicholas sneered. "Even at your best you are no match for Vulnavia."

"Neither are you, apparently," Angelique retorted with a sneer of her own.

"I will have none of that talk!" Nicholas snapped. "Remember, you are under my power and my power alone!"

Remembering the catastrophe on their hands, Angelique rushed to him, grabbing his arm. "Nicholas, what do we do now? Victoria…she fell into the water too long and has regressed into a baby!"

"So, she is still alive, then," Nicholas ruminated bitterly. "Perfect."

"Yes, but how are we to stop her?" Angelique pressed desperately. "We have to get to her before she can meet Barnabas!"

"We?" Nicholas laughed. "My dear Angelique, there is no 'we' in this matter. Not anymore, not after what has happened here." Smiling, he removed one of his gloves. "No, I am no longer in need of your services."

Angelique stared at him wide-eyed, controlling the trembling that suddenly seized her body. "What…what do you mean? Of course you still need me! I'll…I'll help you find Victoria!"

Nicholas laughed derisively again. "Oh, my pet, I have no need of your assistance. I am clever, you know. Obviously, Vulnavia has her. I find Vulnavia, I find the girl. And you certainly won't be able to find Vulnavia, given how weak your power is now. That is up to me alone." He had by now removed both his gloves and placed them in his hat, which he now laid neatly at his feet.

Angelique swallowed. "Nicholas…what are you going to do?"

He grinned. "Now, now, don't fret, Angelique. There may come a day in the future when I'll need your assistance again. Then I shall be more than happy to resurrect you once more. However, until that day comes…." His eyes narrowed in on her, raising his arms as she had done when summoning fire for Victoria.

Angelique shook her head, numb with dread. "No…no, no! Nicholas, don't!"

"Goodbye, Angelique!" All at once the fire shot from his fingertips and enveloped Angelique's form, and her heart-stopping cry was the last thing he heard before her body burst into oblivion.

As the smoke cleared, Nicholas brushed off his sleeve with his pocket-handkerchief, sniffing disdainfully at the slight covering of soot that blanketed his arm. Then fastidiously picking up his walking stick and hat, he once more put on his gloves and situated the trilby on his head.

Twirling his cane, he said aloud to no one in particular as he headed back toward the portal, "Well! Back to Collinsport, I suppose."

On a cool, quiet winter evening in 1948, a woman stepped out of the shadows in front of the Hammond Foundling Home in New York City. She was dressed in a long, dated-looking cloak whose hood hid her features. She carried some sort of indiscernible parcel in her arms.

With nimble, sure steps the figure tripped up to the building's door. She knelt down and placed her package, a cardboard box, on the doorstep. She glanced into the open box, placing tender fingers inside.

The baby was asleep, huddled in an ordinary little blanket atop some common newspapers.

For Victoria to be fully protected, Vulnavia knew no one must suspect magic was involved.

Yet if something happened to herself, Phibes must have some clue to trace him to his lost wife.

And that was why, on a note pinned inside the box, Vulnavia had written but ten words:

"Her name is Victoria. I cannot take care of her."

The baby stirred in her sleep, whimpering. Smiling sadly, Vulnavia stroked her soft cheek, then leaned down and kissed her, briefly. She then stood, knocked sharply on the door, and vanished once more into thin air.

TO BE CONTINUED

….Maybe. Maybe not. The more I think about it, this might just do for a spooky little oneshot. I don't know. I'll have to think about it. Opinions?

Either way, hope you enjoyed! Let me know if you have any questions, or if you're confused by anything. Or if you're a devoted fan of either DS or Phibes and you noticed I got a fact or detail wrong, lemme know! I'll appreciate any guidance! Thank you for reading.