AnimeCon Harem 15: Sunrise (Patreon)

An impatient rapping on the hotel room door jolted Kelly out of the fitful sleep she’d enjoyed for less than two hours. It was dark and still within the room, her mood was terrible, and it was early. Weak light was just barely starting to show through the curtains, and by the time Kelly sat up Rebecca had already hopped out of the other bed and crossed over to get the door.

“Wait—” Kelly blurted out in a flustered panic, squinting miserably. “Check the—”

“I am,” Rebecca responded, carefully peeking through the tiny glass peephole built into the door.

She seemed satisfied with what she saw, because a moment later she drew back the chain latch they’d closed as a precaution, and then stepped back as she turned the doorhandle and swung the door open. Christine bustled inside past her, hugging her exposed arms and exposing a grimace of pain.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Christine mouthed. “Jesus. Fuck. Fuck.”

“Are you alright?” Rebecca asked, quickly closing the door.

“No I’m not fucking alright, I started fucking frying out there,” Christine hissed, checking her skin for blemishes. “No one fucking told me that—”

“Mnnh—?” Emily sat up in alarm, throwing back the bedcovers. “Chloe? Where’s Brian?”

“What happened?” Kelly demanded. “Is Brian okay?”

“Brian is—” Christine paused, staring at Kelly for a moment before snapping her jaw shut. “Before we get to that. You said you could fix me.”

“We can,” Kelly said. “Sorta.”

“Sorta?!” Christine snarled, moving across the room to tower over Kelly. “Fucking—what do you fucking mean, sorta?!”

“Chloe, calm down,” Rebecca interrupted, holding up her hands. “We can discuss this without—”

“Where’s fucking Brian?!” Emily leapt out of bed in pure agitation.

“Your ‘healer peoples,’ said there wasn’t a magic fix for—for this,” Christine hissed in pure anger. “Yeah. Yeah I fucking asked. Of course I did. So—”

“It’s not a magic fix,” Kelly admitted. “What we have to do is—”

“Bitch, you tell us where Brian is right fucking now, or—” Emily yelled.

“Everyone, please,” Rebecca stepped in, trying to pull Christine back from Kelly.

The vampire didn’t budge a millimeter—even with Rebecca leaning into her tug, it was as futile as if she was yanking on a steel fixture. It did serve to get Christine’s attention, however, and the loose ponytail she’d pulled up her silvery hair into flicked through the air as Christine turned to shoot a venomous glare at the interloper. Everyone in the room paused, and the air filled with tense silence for an unbearable moment.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” Christine said, brushing off Rebecca’s grip and stepping back towards the far corner of the room where she would have some space again. “You’re full of blood. You’re all full of blood, I’m literally fucking dying here, and—and I don’t even know what I might do. Okay? Back the fuck off.”

“Rebecca,” Kelly warned.

“Okay! I’m sorry,” Rebecca held up her hands in a non-threatening manner. “I didn’t mean to invade your space. Let’s all calm down so that we can talk about what happened, alright? Alright. First of all. Are you okay?”

“No,” Christine spat. “I’m not okay. I’m dying. I can tell that I’m dying. My heart’s gonna stop soon, pulse is getting really, really weak. Sorry for freaking the fuck out over minor things like that.”

“Okay,” Rebecca nodded. “Kelly—solution?”

“Hold on,” Kelly hedged. “Let me remember.”

She was honestly stalling, because there wasn’t much to remember. That information was what the future Emily had dubbed an echo—Kelly never received a direct send from the vampire Rebecca timeline. What she did get was memories of getting the send from the timeline who’d sent to her, or maybe that was even three or four times removed. All of the ‘interesting’ branch off timeline stuff tended to wind up getting bundled into the big daisy-chain send, on the off-hand chance those details might be useful.

Or, at least serve as a cautionary tale, Kelly swallowed. On what shit NOT to fucking do.

“Kelly?” Emily prompted her, urgent for them to get on with things.

“There’s no magic fix,” Kelly sighed. “What we had to do—we basically restrain her somewhere, while we have her go cold turkey on all the blood shit. It takes a while, it’s gonna be real shitty for her, and—yeah. So long as her heart’s still beating, she can live through this. I think. Just get all this blood magic shit out of her system. There’s this shed Rebecca had way out in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, and—”

“My uncle’s hunting cabin?” Rebecca asked in surprise.

“No, it’s not a cabin,” Kelly shook her head. “It’s like a shitty homemade shed. No plumbing or electricity, no beds, nothing that’s—”

“That’s my uncle’s hunting cabin, for sure,” Rebecca confirmed. “Should I start getting ready for a trip out there?”

“Where’s Brian?” Emily seethed.

“I’ll fucking get to that,” Christine hissed. “It’s complicated.”

“Complicated? If—”

“Emily, please,” Rebecca shushed her. “Kelly, anything else we should know?”

“Um, let me think,” Kelly scowled. “She has to be restrained, and I mean like, tied up, gagged, chained. Forcefeeding her oral rehydration solution helps. Not like—”

“Forcefeeding?” Christine crossed her arms.

“—Not like sports drinks,” Kelly continued, “I mean like, actual pediatrician brand formula whatever stuff you get in the pharmacy aisle of a big store. When you force her to drink until her stomach is painfully full, it helps. Takes it down from… completely uncontrollable dangerous feral vampire, to uh, to just extremely uncomfortable thirsty as fuck vampire. That way she maybe only has to be fully restrained for a few hours while she weathers through the very worst of it. I think.”

“And—and that’s it?” Christine scoffed. “Drink Pedia-lite hydration stuff, wait it out?”

“Not exactly,” Kelly returned her angry stare without flinching. “You’re, uh. You’re gonna be in pretty shitty shape afterwards. Whatever vampire shit you pulled, like the superspeed stuff, you don’t feel the strain from that now, but—”

“The fuck I don’t, it makes the thirst fucking worse,” Chloe interrupted. “You try fucking—”

“—I mean you don’t feel the damage from that now,” Kelly talked over her. “But you will, when you’re back to completely human. I don’t know how bad it’ll be. You could have broken bones, you could have—I’m gonna be honest, the vampire Rebecca from that timeline basically pulverized all the bones in both hands—and whatever sun exposure you’ve had will seriously fuck up your skin.”

“It’s just barely sunrise now,” Rebecca observed, checking through the peephole again. “If—”

“That’s why I was fucking banging on the door,” Christine insisted. “Started getting light out and could feel the fucking sunrays starting to bounce off of things. So—what the fuck happens to me in actual sunlight?!”

“Right now it just messes with your energy reserves,” Kelly explained. “Direct exposure makes it so like you have to actively regenerate from a burn, or something like that. You should be able to go out into daylight, just it’d be extremely unpleasant. Later on, when you’re off the blood magic? It—yeah, it’s gonna be like actual semi-serious burns.”

“So—tell us what the fuck is going on with Brian,” Emily warned, growing teary-eyed. “Or, or I swear to God I’ll yank back those fucking curtains and just, and just—just let you fucking fry!”

“Calm down, calm down,” Rebecca moderated the situation. “So, we have pieces of a plan and things we can work with to help you, Christine. If you need aftercare, I’m willing to take responsibility, and look after you for however long that takes. How does that sound?”

“Fine,” Christine bit out, not exactly looking pleased. “Fine. Brian’s safe. He’s going to be fine. Fast healing apparently causes extreme cancer later on, so instead there will be a spell matrix with some safeguards on it that will accelerate his natural healing. It’s going to take a while.”

“A… spell matrix,” Emily repeated.

“Yes,” Christine laughed. “I’m—first of all, I’m not allowed to disclose the identity of the healers. To just get that out of the way. Second, the spell shit will keep Brian in six-month stasis, but—”

“Six months?!” Emily cried out.

“—Let me fucking finish,” Christine shot Emily a look of annoyance. “The spell matrix is good to keep him in stasis for a maximum of six months, it’ll be much much less than that if you’re putting power into it. But, he won’t piss himself, or digest food, or really need much of anything in that time. She said something something about needing certain cubic feet of air because he’s technically still breathing, but I told her that doesn’t matter, we’re not gonna like, bury him in a coffin or anything. Right?”

“Okay,” Emily said, still glaring.

“So, you push power into the spell frame things by kissing him, basically,” Christine continued. “And it overclocks the healing. So long as the spell matrix is always kept topped off so that it can run at full tilt, he could be all healed up in as little as a month or two. Maybe. No way of knowing until you see how it goes. Except—I’m not even eligible, so as far as I know, only you, Kelly, and Stephanie can for sure put compatible magic into the thing. Not sure about Rebecca.

“When the spell matrix can’t find anything else appreciable enough to heal for the remaining power that’s in the frames, they just light up. Like, glow. She said they’ll get more and more visible, and then when they’re bright enough to see through like, a blanket or comforter, he’s ready. Takes two of you guys to wake him up, as a safety measure thing so that it doesn’t happen accidentally, there’ll be hand shapes on either side of his ribs where you put your hands. She said it’ll be super easy to tell what to do by then.”

“So—so, we’ll have Brian asleep like prince charming, and we just kiss him every now and then?” Emily seemed perplexed. “And that works?”

“It’ll be more than just a kiss, it’ll like, be draining,” Christine clarified. “She said in the same way that it was ‘empowering’ kissing him in the first place. It’s that, but in reverse. I don’t know what to tell you. I’m on the blood magic bullshit, instead. Apparently.”

“How often do we need to kiss him?” Kelly asked.

“You don’t, even,” Christine shrugged. “Leave him be somewhere and the spell thing they set up will do its thing all on its own in six months. There’s a built in thing even, to snap him out of it by then, in case you guys forget about him.”

“Never fucking happening,” Emily retorted.

“I’m just repeating all the shit she told me,” Christine made a face. “You wanted to know? Now you know.”

“You say ‘she,’” Emily asked. “But I thought it was healer peoples, plural.”

“Emily,” Kelly shook her head. “Just—don’t even ask. Please? Trust me. Absolutely need to respect their privacy on this one.”

“Fine, whatever,” Emily grumbled. “So—where fucking is Brian? Still at the hospital? How do we—”

“They’re discharging him, and wiping all the records of him being there,” Christine said. “They’ll contact my phone, since apparently Kelly’s phone is toast, and then I’ll speak with Kelly, and Kelly will go alone to receive Brian from them. Since—yeah, sensitive identity stuff there that I’m staying out of. I’m not allowed anywhere near Brian, because apparently I mute the spell matrix or something just with my presence. We tested it.”

“Okay. Okay,” Emily frowned, thinking it all over.

“Then… I think we have a plan?” Rebecca asked. “Or, a bunch of pieces of a plan? Maybe?”

“I have to get dressed and ready for work,” Kelly grunted. “Barely got any sleep.”

“I’ve gotta call Brian’s work,” Emily remembered. “Gonna do that now. I just got the warehouse’s answering machine thing last night. Gonna call and make sure I talk to someone.”

“I’ll run out and buy hydration formula,” Rebecca volunteered. “Are we trying to do sunblock for Chloe?”

“Fuck no,” Christine cringed back further into the room. “No way am I going out into that.”

“Then—we need to go to the front desk and get the room for a few more days?” Rebecca asked, unsure.

“At least one more, I think,” Kelly murmured. “I’ll be borrowing Brian’s car to get to my shift, so I’ll be here in the city to wait for them to send Brian. You should probably take Chloe—take Christine, and start working on some way of safely restraining her. She’ll be running out of time.”

“How thirsty are you?” Rebecca asked, turning back towards Christine. “How bad is it?”

“Bad. I don’t fucking know,” Christine rubbed her arms. “I’m not going to immediately lose it or anything, but it’s getting worse really fast.”

“I’ll move some stuff around in the back of my car,” Rebecca decided. “We can make enough room for you to lay down, and I have blankets and a bedroll we can cover you up with during the drive. Emily? Are you coming with us, or are you staying here?”

“I’ll… stick with Kelly, so, staying here,” Emily said. “I want to be with Brian as soon as possible. Gonna call his work, then I can call Stephie and get her up to speed on everything. I still have a key to Brian’s apartment, so whenever Kell’s put in her notice or transfer or whatever, I’ll be ready. I guess my plan is to just kiss the fuck out of Brian’s spell matrice thing and make sure it’s always super charged? As charged as possible, or whatever.”

“There’s limits to what you can put into it,” Christine said. “She said you’ll be able to tell.”

“Okay,” Emily nodded, staring off at nothing in a daze.

“Then—that’s that,” Rebecca said. “If it’s okay with you Christine, we’ll have Emily hang onto your debit card, in case they need more days here at the Westerlin. I guess your phone should stay with Kelly?”

“Yeah,” Christine sighed, making a face. “I’ll make it so that it’s unlocked. Sure. Just, like… be honest with me, Kelly. What are my chances?”

“Of surviving?” Kelly paused. “Pretty… decent. Slightly better odds than the Rebecca back in that other timeline had, for burning all the blood magic shit out of your system, at least. You might have a tougher time in recovery than her, I don’t know. Decent chances.”

“Okay, and—then what?” Christine snorted. “We’re just making this all up as we go. If I even survive this without going full fucking bloodsucker or just dying, then what? Am I stuck with all of you in this stupid shitty harem thing? Or, do we go our separate ways? Pretend I’m not aware of all this—all this insane bullshit going on? Future sight, rapist Master creeps, vampires, whatever the fuck was going on with Stephanie’s thing? I’m saying; what happens then?”

“That isn’t my business,” Kelly said, shaking her head. “All of that? You’re going to have to work out with Brian. I’m fine with whatever you want to do, but if you want any further involved with this? That’s between you and Brian. I don’t speak for him, Steph doesn’t speak for him, no one can, not on this. But, I think no matter what—when all of this is over, you need to sit down and have a serious fucking talk with him. Apologize for all the psychotic shit you put him through.

“I’m—” Christine flinched. “I’m not psychotic. Anymore. I don’t know what was wrong with me, but all of… all of that, that’s not who I am. I’m not like that.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Emily made a face.

“Emily,” Rebecca admonished.

“Yeah yeah, thank you for getting the creeps to back the fuck off,” Emily huffed. “But, that’s not oh hey, water on the bridge with everything else, you know? So just—fuck off. You’re not forgiven, and we aren’t going to forget all the shit you pulled. Ever.”

“I’m going to—” Christine hesitated. “I am going to apologize. Or, try to. Try to explain. I can’t even make sense of it, myself. I don’t know. I don’t know. This all feels like one long bizarre nightmare to me, and I’m still not sure it’s even time to wake up. Not yet.”

/// One or two more I think, and then we'll start getting into the epilogue stuff for AnimeCon / prologue stuff for Renfaire Fantasy. Will fix links later, I'm tired af and my head is pounding