Reflections

Vlad searches for a reflection.

Reflections

Vlad doesn't know where the time went, the time where he and Robin were running round Stokley as two humans, albeit a bit weird or the time where sometimes Ingrid and he could share some form of kinship. He doesn't remember when the brightly coloured clothing disappeared and the leather jackets took its place. Doesn't remember where the sweet moments he and Erin had shared had gone but he missed them. Those moments where he felt almost human.

He remembers bitterness. A dark void in his optimistic exterior where a nasty voice whispers nasty things it's like looking in a mirror, isn't it?

Except he can't. He looks in his mirror and sees no one, nothing. He never even saw his evil reflection in the mirror; he was in the mirror too. He supposes that's good, he didn't see his reflection transform into a monster rather than a bearing of his soul.

He wonders what his soul is now. Is it coated in grey? A manifestation of the dust of dead vampires that he'd ended? Is it smeared with crimson? A fountain of blood from Erin's fangs? He misses Erin. She haunts his dreams at night, a shade with no purpose other than to summon guilt and longing. He longs for her return, vampire and all. Sometimes he wonders if that's all Erin is, a shade. A shade of the old Erin in a world of black. A demon of his creation playing with her corpse. Sometimes he fears she was always a shade to him, always held the darkness that he revealed. He sometimes fears that all he loved was a shade and the beast in him knew it too.

Maybe she's his reflection, his mirror. He vaguely remembered an english teacher saying that people were reflected in those they knew. Was he reflected in her? He remembers staring into her baby blue eyes so many times but he never saw his reflection in those. He's seen anger, love, compassion and he's seen fear in her eyes. She used to reek of it, she'd wander into the throne room and his mouth would water at the aroma. He wonders if Ingrid is also his mirror.

Ingrid, the embodiment of everything he was not. Was he reflected in her? Was he the bitterness and the hate that shone whenever their eyes met?

He likes the reflection he sees in his father. It's disappointment, he thinks this is good because it means he's still good, and sometimes it is so hard to tell. He also likes Jonno's reflection, sometimes. The compassion that is often reflected shows that he's still in the light. It means that the dark void hasn't won after all.

Jonno doesn't like mirrors. Vlad sees the disillusionment diming Jonno's eyes whenever they meet a reflective surface. He thinks this is because Jonno doesn't like what he sees. Jonno was meant to be at a university using his fantastic brain to make a living, not using it to design weapons to fight monsters. He wonders whether the slayer ever wants to run from his destiny too.

Vlad doesn't like or dislike what he sees, he just wants to see something.

Vlad has a mirror; it steams up when he's in the shower. He's never needed a shower a day after he turned sixteen as he has no body odour but it feels human. Until he looks in the mirror. It's steamy; he used to draw patterns until he hated looking at his finger pressed against a blank reflection of the room. He doesn't see himself in the room. He knows where his reflection's reflection is, it's the fear in his heart and in the frantic disorder of the chaos he causes.

Sometimes he's afraid of a reflection. Afraid it'll be Jonno's short life looking at him or Renfield's distain as he tries to work out how to fix what he's looking at or the bloody mayhem his evil reflection longs to trail behind him.

Sometime he's afraid that one day he'll finally see someone in the mirror, and he won't like who he sees.

I think Vlad is so desperate to be good that he's letting the goodness he sports drain away.

If I beg will you review?