Chapter Text
London Flat, One Dark and Rainy Night
Victor came in the door, dispensing with his hat and coat, leaving them in a wet heap on the floor. The rain was pouring down in sheets outside, and mixed with the cold temperatures, it made for a miserable night. Igor was making himself useful preparing a hot meal. Victor had been at the college most of the day, one of the rare days where he actually put in an appearance there, and Igor had been left to amuse himself for the day. He'd spent most of it reading, devouring one of the scores of books in Victor's impressive and eclectic collection.
"Bloody awful night out there," Victor complained.
"Been pouring all day. You must be soaked to the skin," he said. Victor seemed to be shivering and his hair was pasted to his head even though he'd worn a hat.
"You made dinner," he said with a slight smile, joining Igor in the kitchen to investigate what he had bubbling in a couple of pots.
"It will be ready soon," Igor said. "Why don't you put on some dry things before we eat?"
"Yes, I will. Here, put this in your pocket. You must have a way of knowing where you should be and at what time you should be there." Victor put a small red velvet drawstring pouch in Igor's hand and then left the kitchen to go take off his wet things.
"Victor–" Igor called after him, then opened the little red pouch. Inside was a gold pocket watch, very similar to the one Victor was never without. He opened it, smiling when he saw it had been wound and was ticking away, displaying the correct time. Then he noticed the inscription:
Sometimes the heart sees what's invisible to the eye.
He recognized it; it was from a Tennyson poem. He'd read some of Tennyson's poetry in one of the many books there in the flat. Since Victor wasn't given to organizing his books, one might be reading up on the anatomy of the brain and pull the next volume off the shelf and find a collection of poetry or a nightmarish ghost story.
"Dinner ready?" Victor asked, returning to the kitchen in a night shirt with a heavy robe over it, long underwear beneath it, his feet in slippers. It was rare to see Victor in night clothes; he was usually working until dawn, but tonight he seemed content to be inside where it was warm, and Igor hoped they might spend a rare evening by the fire together, reading or just talking.
"Victor, this is a lovely watch. I've never had one before."
"I don't know how you manage to show up when you're supposed to without one. Now that should be easier for you," he said, but there was a hint of a grin on his face as he sat at the table.
"What made you choose the inscription?"
"Come now, Igor, as bright as you are, I'm sure you can figure that out."
Igor wasn't sure what to say to that, so he reread the quote. Victor certainly had to look beyond what his eyes saw when he first met Igor, saved his life, and became his friend. With a little smile, thinking he had figured it out, he closed the watch and tucked it in his pocket. "Thank you. I know I'll enjoy it."
"Come here," Victor said, sounding exasperated. "You don't stuff it in your pocket like a soiled handkerchief." As Igor approached him, he added, "Hand me the watch. I'll show you how to fasten this properly." He took the watch and tucked it in the pocket of Igor's waistcoat, then unbuttoned one button in just the right spot. "You fasten the end of the chain in the buttonhole," he said, "then button your waistcoat. Then the watch goes in your waistcoat pocket. There you go."
"I've never had one before," Igor said again, smiling, liking that he had the little glint of gold showing on his waistcoat. Just like Victor wore his.
"High time you did."
Igor noticed Victor's hair was still wet, and even with a few radiators in the flat and a fire in the fireplace, it was chilly in the room. He found a towel in the kitchen and returning to where Victor sat, started using it to absorb the moisture and dry his hair. He expected Victor to shoo him away or object, but instead he sat there quietly, even closing his eyes and sighing softly, letting Igor towel dry his hair. Igor affectionately tossed the towel over Victor's head when he was done.
"Dinner should be ready by now," he said.
"Thank you so much," Victor replied, but he was laughing as he removed the towel from where it covered his head and most of his face.
They shared a tasty meal, and Igor listened intently while Victor recounted his day at the College. Victor didn't seem particularly interested in the lectures he'd sat through or the cadaver they'd been carving up in a laboratory, but it was all fascinating to Igor. He wished he could hear and see and experience it all first hand.
Once dinner was through, they settled on opposite ends of the settee in front of the fire, Victor picking through Igor's pile of books he'd spent the day exploring. Sometimes, Victor would chuckle softly at something Igor did or said and, for a moment, he would feel as if Victor was making fun of him, but he never was. More often than not, the laugh would fade to a smile and Victor would look at him with what looked like...affection. This was no exception. Victor seemed amused by the sheer number of volumes Igor had been reading, but it was a fond amusement, not ridicule. It was that, and there was something else...Igor wasn't sure what it was, but no one had ever quite looked at him that way.
Victor didn't linger over the oddly intense moment of eye contact. He poured them each a glass of whiskey from the decanter he'd set on the table nearby, and settled back in his seat.
"Why don't you pick up where you left off before dinner? Read aloud?"
"I was reading a novel. You won't know what's happening."
"Doesn't matter. I'd just enjoy hearing you read a while."
"Yes, of course, if you like," Igor replied. He opened the book to the spot where he'd left off and started reading aloud. He couldn't help but think, on the rare occasions he snuck a peek as he was reading, that Victor looked sad as he sat there listening, staring into the fire.
********
Whitebridge, A Day's Journey from London
Six Months Later
Victor sat on the bed in his room, studying his sketch of the brain and brain stem and its connection to the spinal cord. It was the thing that haunted him most: what went wrong with his Prometheus that made him violent, less than human. He tried to silence the voice inside him that said it was unholy, that it was a soulless thing and that's why it had no intellect and stomped around wreaking havoc like a mad gorilla, only in semi-human form. The scientist in him knew there was a logical, physical reason it had all gone so wrong that night at Castle Erskine. He also knew that he needed Igor to help him put all the pieces together, both literally and figuratively, so he'd risked traveling back toward London in the hopes of sneaking onto the grounds of Bomine's estate to see him again, to see if there was any chance of luring him back to their work together.
For all he knew, Igor had married Lorelei by now and if he had, he'd never leave his wife to run off with Victor and pursue a project he never believed was destined for success in the first place. Despite the tendrils of logical thought that plagued his plan to reunite with Igor, Victor had to try anyway. This, indeed, was not life...traveling about hiding in the shadows alone, pining for just the sight and sound of the man, not to mention all the other ways he thought of him that strayed far from the laboratory.
It was getting chilly in the room again, and he noticed he'd let the fire die. It was easy to forget it in the middle of the day when sun streamed in the lone window of the room. The inn wasn't fancy, but it was quiet and comfortable and, so far, no one had recognized him or questioned who he was or what his business was there. Exactly the situation he needed at the moment. Sighing as the chill settled around him, he got up and went to the small stove in the corner and began working at rekindling the dying embers of the fire.
The commotion on the stairs outside his room startled him, and he rose from his crouched position just as the door burst open and a constable walked in, followed by three stocky, grizzled looking villagers.
"Victor Frankenstein," the aging constable said, though it was an accusation spat out between clenched teeth, not a greeting.
"What is the meaning of this?" Victor protested, refusing to allow himself to indulge in fear or show the men any sign of unease. "You have me confused with someone else," he stated firmly, wondering if he'd kept the tremor out of his voice and the bravado in his demeanor.
"No confusion. We know who you are, and you're coming with us," the constable announced, gesturing to his hostile-looking, shabbily dressed companions. Victor imagined they must be what passed for the law in this village, a ragged bunch of vigilantes led by an idiot with a badge who thrived on his tiny sphere of power.
"I most certainly am not," he replied.
"You're under arrest, and you're coming with us, one way or another," he said as one of the men was on either side of him, grabbing at his arms. He probably should have given more thought to his reaction, but his instinct was to throw them off, to fight with everything he had to escape. They were aging, unfit, spongy men who smelled as if they'd spent most of the day at the pub down the street before being recruited for this little mission. Predictably, he was able to break free and was almost out the door when something heavy hit the back of his head and he was barely aware of falling on the rough wood floor before everything went dark.
********
His head was pounding, but he forced himself to open his eyes. Things were blurry at first. He was sitting on a cold, rough wood floor, his back against an equally unyielding brick wall. He reached up to feel the lump on the back of his head, dried blood matting his hair. As his surroundings came into focus, he found himself inside a cell, lit only by a bit of daylight struggling through the small window that would have been high above eye level, even if he'd bothered to stand.
Using the wall, he managed to push himself up into a standing position, the room spinning as he did. He looked at the weathered wood door with its barred window, and staggered toward it, peering out into the shadowy hall beyond. There were men's voices, probably from other cells. All he could see was the hall, down to where it turned. He pounded on the door.
"Hey! Is there someone in charge here?" he shouted angrily. The sound of his own voice reverberated in his head, and he rested his forehead against the rough wood a moment. There were some mocking replies from the adjoining cells, along with derisive laughter. If there were guards or constables on the premises, they were unmoved and uninterested in the racket he was making. He rattled the door, pulled on the bars that blocked the one tiny window in it. Despite its aged appearance, it was not going to yield to his best efforts.
When the pain in his head became too much, and it was clear he was neither going to escape nor get the attention of anyone who cared to hear what he had to say, Victor finally retreated to the corner of the grubby cell and sat on the floor again, rejecting the thought of lying on the filthy thing that passed for a bed.
He didn't know why he thought about Igor then, although he often thought of him in the dark and the quiet of night. Sometimes he just wallowed in the regret that Igor, as brilliant as he was, didn't understand his backhanded attempt at professing his interest. No, not his interest. His love. Sometimes the heart sees what's invisible to the eye. But Igor's heart didn't see it. Didn't see him. At least, not that way.
And now, Victor figured he was destined for a horrendous life behind bars, and that was assuming these people ever turned him over to proper authorities for trial and didn't just hang him from a tree out behind the jail. He tried to calm himself with the false glimmer of hope for an escape. It wasn't completely impossible; some prisoners managed it. After all, he'd broken Igor out of the circus under impossible odds.
Igor again. Igor, with his sweet smile and his big blue eyes and his beautiful brain and his skilled hands. He closed his eyes and thought about how it would feel to have those hands on him now, to feel them in a lover's caress. For that, for one night like that, he'd go off to whatever fate awaited him. At least if he died in the dark corner of a filthy prison, he'd left the world the legacy of Igor, freed to be the man he was meant to be. A scholar, a healer...likely a husband and a father soon...
"Igor," he whispered softly, smiling, allowing himself an escape back to the London flat, to one of a dozen of their conversations. It didn't matter which one or on what topic. The sound of Igor's voice was there in his head now. A memory of the one passion they did share before all was lost, whiskey and chalk and laughter, confiding to Igor secrets that festered in the darkest corner of his soul... "Goodnight, my friend. How I miss you tonight," he whispered.
*********
The next several days were a blur of lessening headaches, the pain of existing on a cold, hard floor, relieving himself in a bucket and ignoring the foul, inedible excuse for food that was hastily shoved in a slight opening of the door a couple times each day until he was so weak he finally relented and choked down a few bites to keep himself alive. He'd shouted at the jailers, tried to seize the door when it did open, and demanded to speak to someone in authority. All his physical aggressions had earned him was a fairly thorough beating from a couple of guards who were tired of listening to him and even more annoyed when, several days into his captivity, he almost got past them and out of the cell.
It didn't make sense that they just kept him caged like some kind of animal and never brought him before a judge, never discussed charges with him. Days passed of this strange, surreal hell with no end in sight. He heard other prisoners come and go, some returned, some didn't. Even in this remote corner of the world, people must be tried and either convicted or acquitted.
On what he calculated to be the tenth day, the door to his cell opened, and he didn't even bother rising from the floor. His body hurt, his mind was muddled from so little food, and he knew he didn't have the strength to rush and overpower the guard who opened the door all the way to allow another man entry.
"Get up."
That voice cut through the fog. The iciness, the command, the underlying harshness in it. He struggled against the weakness of hunger and the pain of fractured ribs to obey, almost by instinct, as if he feared being thrashed within an inch of his life if he didn't. Maybe in some corner of his addled brain, he did. He managed to stand to face his father, standing there in his fine clothes, unmoved by the filthy and pitiful appearance of his son.
"Put this on," he said, tossing Victor's coat at him.
"You've come to take me out of this place?" Victor asked, stunned, a little spark of something that had died long ago flickering to life inside him; that tiny hope of feeling even some small crumb of his father's concern or affection. He struggled with the coat, but finally managed to get into it.
"You sure you don't want him restrained, sir? He's a bit of a handful," one of the guards said, chuckling. Victor longed for the strength to knock the bastard on his ass. He knew that was the guard who'd kicked him in the side viciously enough to fracture his ribs.
"I've never been unable to manage my own son," the elder Frankenstein replied, looking Victor up and down with such disdain that Victor almost felt self-conscious for looking haggard, smelling unpleasant, or having bruises. "Come along, Victor, don't tarry," he ordered, turning on his heel and walking briskly toward the hall. Victor longed for even a little support to walk, since he was dizzy, but he managed to navigate the path his father took, only swaying slightly into the wall a time or two on the way out.
A coach was waiting for them outside the dingy, squat building that housed the jail. His father climbed in as the coachman held the door for him. His father's coachman, Rollins, a man only a bit younger than Victor's father who had been with their family for years, looked shocked at Victor's appearance and the slight unevenness of his gait. Victor admired the man's courage in risking the wrath of his father, as anyone did when they ever intervened on his behalf, but he took Victor's elbow and helped him step up into the coach where he slumped gratefully into the seat as the door closed.
"Father, I'm so glad you've come. How did you find me?"
"The Finnegan family was rather dismayed over the death of their son, and the unexplained... mayhem at Castle Erskine."
"They're dismayed at the death of their son? Finnegan was an ass, but I would have expected his parents to be a bit more grief-stricken."
"Really?" Dr. Frankenstein sighed, as if the whole conversation was an imposition. "The two of you did nothing but bring disgrace and humiliation on both our families. Finnegan got what he deserved."
"Is that what you think I deserve? Why have you come for me, then?"
"The Finnegan and Frankenstein families have resources sufficient to find anyone, anywhere. I've come for you because I'm the one who had you tracked to that filthy little inn where you were holed up. What I can't figure out is why you would do something as foolish as traveling back toward London. Made you infinitely easier to find."
"You..." Victor began to panic. This didn't bode well for him. "Their treatment of me meets with your approval, then?"
"I do wish they'd...freshened you up a bit before the coach ride," he said, his nostrils flaring.
"That's all you find objectionable about my present state? That I haven't been allowed to bathe while they've had me in that God-forsaken hole?"
"Victor, you've sealed your own fate. If you're waiting for me to bestow some kind of absolution on you for your behavior, save your time. I am weary of your madness and I don't intend to sit back and let it destroy our family's reputation. Once your situation has been resolved, the Finnegan family will also consider it resolved, and the matter can be closed."
"What are you going to do to me?" Victor asked, berating himself for allowing the moments of hope and relief he'd experienced when his father arrived.
"I'm not going to do anything to you. I'm simply going to deliver you to a place where they can manage your behavior."
"Manage my behavior? You speak as if I'm insane."
"One could make a good argument for that. We also know from unfortunate experience how dangerous your unchecked behavior can be. I think you'll find the staff at Crestview a match for your antics."
"Crestview? Father, Crestview is a madhouse!"
"I believe 'lunatic asylum' is the preferred term now, but yes, Crestview is a madhouse. I can think of few people who would contest the appropriateness of a madhouse as your place of residence. Deluding yourself that you can raise the dead, putting ungodly things together, conducting unspeakable experiments. My God, Victor, you're lucky not to be executed."
"Lucky? You could help me! Why are you doing this to me? I'm in hiding. I'm not even causing you any embarrassment. You could let me go, tell Finnegan's family you couldn't find me. Or...or that you did and stashed me somewhere. Isn't that what you all want? For me to disappear?"
"When you were apprehended, the materials found with you indicate you have no intention of giving up your...work," he concluded, the final word dripping with disdain. "Dr. McIntosh is a good friend of mine. He will see to it your days of tormenting this family are over. I don't know why you're so incensed, Victor. You are destined for prison or execution anyway, it's only a matter of time."
"Please...don't do this," Victor said tightly, hating to give his father the satisfaction of begging him. He wouldn't do it when he was little and his father was looming over him, and he loathed doing it now. The thought of being locked up in a madhouse full of screaming, babbling lunatics was too horrendous to imagine.
Summoning the last of his strength, he propelled himself off the seat, pushed open the door of the coach and leapt out of it while it was in motion, the impact of the ground brutal on his already battered body, his leg landing at a bad angle, sending an excruciating flare of pain from his knee to his foot, accompanied by a sickening crack. He knew it was hopeless, but he struggled to his feet, crying out in pain as he dragged the injured leg, trying to stagger to freedom across an open field.
He was vaguely aware of the sound of the horses being brought to a halt, but he kept going, knowing in his heart he'd never make it to the woods before either his father or the coachman caught up to him. He doubted his father would take off across the uneven ground to catch him, but poor, loyal old Rollins, the coachman, would be sent to fetch him. He'd run away before as a child, and it was Rollins who was sent out to lead the search, and Rollins who, with a strange reluctance, had taken him back home in the family coach.
It was clear he wasn't even moving as fast as he thought when Rollins caught up to him as easily as he did. The other man took hold of his arm and Victor gave up his feeble attempt at flight.
"I'm sorry, Master Victor. You know you're not able to get away."
"Just let me go," Victor gasped, knowing it was foolish. "He won't chase me if you don't do it for him."
"You can't make it on your own, and you'd only die in the woods if you did make it that far. We're miles from Crestview and the next village. There is nowhere to go for help on foot." He paused. "I'm...sorry I took you back there when you ran away after Master Henry's death. I should have left you be."
Victor looked at the man who was still supporting him even as he was trying to hobble in the wrong direction. The look on Rollins' face was the same as it was that night when he'd collected Victor from his hiding place in the woods and delivered him back to his father, a mixture of regret and defeat, as if he were as trapped as Victor himself.
"I wonder how things might have been different," Victor muttered, letting Rollins help him as they made the long, painful, awful walk back to the coach and his fate, which seemed sealed now as he was loaded back inside where he tipped over on the seat.
He felt sick and dizzy, the pain of his injuries, the days of little or no food, and the horrible prospect for his future were coming together, making things dimmer. His father's coldly stated condemnations were even fading as the coach was in motion once again. He fought against it but he finally passed out, his last thought being that he hoped he was dying, that his father would deliver a corpse to Crestview.
Victor woke to the sound of his own moan as he was dragged out of the coach what seemed like moments later. Night had fallen, and an ominous-looking stone structure with the appearance of an evil castle loomed in the shadows. There was a strong, well-built guard on either side of him, dragging him along without regard for his weak protests or the condition of his injured leg. They paused at tall iron gates as a doctor in a white lab coat came out to greet them.
"It appears you've had a bit of a struggle getting him here, Carl," he said, actually looking amused at Victor's condition. Victor had no recourse; all he could do was hang there in the grip of the guards, gritting his teeth against the agony in his leg, wondering what kind of monsters would find his condition funny.
"I wouldn't have brought him to you if he was not...difficult," the elder Frankenstein replied, a rare smile tugging one corner of his mouth. "Jumped out of the moving coach on the way here, made multiple attempts to escape custody before that, so you'll have to keep a close eye on him." He pinned the other doctor with a meaningful stare. "I hope you'll give the matter your personal attention. I don't want him running around the countryside. If you need proof of his madness, these may be of help," he said, producing folded up papers from the breast pocket of his coat. Victor recognized the notes and sketches he'd been working on when he was arrested. He tried to struggle, but these guards were up to the task of keeping him still and he couldn't have stood on his own anyway.
"I'm sure we'll be able to settle him down," the doctor said, accepting the papers. "We have special accommodations for our residents who have an unmanageable wanderlust."
********
Estate of Baron Bomine
"To the future Doctor and Mrs. Igor Strauss," Bomine announced boisterously, standing and raising his champagne glass. Igor smiled at Lorelei, uncomfortable with all the attention and fanfare. Parties at the Bomine estate were enormous, overdone, opulent affairs with long, laden banquet tables, sparkling chandeliers, and huge, varied guest lists. Tonight, he and Lorelei were the guests of honor at what promised to be a whirlwind of partying and festivities surrounding their upcoming wedding the next afternoon.
Igor had finished an accelerated program of course work and exams at the Royal College, thanks to an influential member of their board being a close friend of Bomine's late father, and been granted his medical license. His professional life was likely to consist of a quiet private practice and serving as the personal physician to Bomine and his large circle of friends. Some of them were wealthy and prominent members of the best families, and others were more covert "special friends"–in other words, Bomine's lovers. Behind the gates of his sprawling estate, he lived as he saw fit, enjoying the company of various gentlemen, some of whom came and went, others who had rooms there much the way he and Lorelei did. Once you were in Bomine's circle, you were part of a cobbled together, slightly scandalous, and yet still elite family.
Igor took out his watch and checked the time. His eyes went to the inscription, and his thoughts, as they always did, went to Victor. He wondered where he was, what he was doing...if he ever thought of Igor anymore.
"Do you have another engagement we're keeping you from?" Lorelei said lightly, looking over his shoulder.
"No, of course not," Igor replied, smiling. "We should get a good night's rest before tomorrow."
"I don't think we'll be off to bed anytime soon. The party has barely begun. It's the eve of our wedding day," she said.
"So it is," he said, tapping his champagne glass against hers as they drank their own private toast. As he tucked the watch in the pocket of his waistcoat, he thought of that rainy night in the flat when Victor fastened it for him, showing him how to wear the watch like a proper gentleman. "Excuse me, dear. I need some fresh air."
"Are you all right?" Lorelei asked, frowning.
"I'm fine. Just a bit warm," he said, running his finger beneath his collar, as if the formal attire was what was making him uncomfortable. He kissed her cheek and slipped away from the din and merriment of the party, going out on the large stone patio, crossing it and walking out on the lawn under the moonlight and the twinkle of an abundant array of stars. It was a stunning spring evening. No one could hope for better weather and a finer time for a wedding.
He took out his watch again, opening it and reading the inscription for what seemed like the millionth time. Sometimes the heart sees what's invisible to the eye. He'd been so proud of himself for figuring out what Victor meant, and now he wondered as he was about to commit himself to Lorelei for the rest of his life, if he'd missed something. If Victor had been trying to tell him something that night, and many times after that, and it had just flown right by him.
Maybe he was spending too much time around Bomine and his harem of male companions. Somehow it made it seem so easy and so natural for a man to love another man that way. It almost made it seem all right that sometimes he'd dream of two warm bodies tangled in the heat of passion, making love to exhaustion, and awaken alone in his bed to realize that the lover in his dreams was not Lorelei. It was Victor. Always Victor's intense blue eyes, his soft pink lips that looked as if they were made to be kissed, the touch of his hands, the scent of his cologne...
All this time later, when it did him no good, he'd fallen in love with Victor. When he had the woman of his dreams, a beautiful, kind woman who loved him. The one he thought was the answer to all his fantasies. And now he writhed about in his bed dreaming of Victor's arms around him, Victor's body next to his in bed, Victor's voice and his smile and his sweet, chaotic, broken soul.
He looked up at the stars and wondered where, under those stars, Victor was, and if he had found a way to pursue his work. If he was working feverishly in another laboratory somewhere, or just hiding and studying and scribbling endless notes and making sketches and planning. If he would, in fact, show up again someday. And if he did, would Igor be glad to be married to Lorelei, perhaps father to their children, or would he long to make those forbidden fantasies come true?
If Victor were to stride across the lawn at that very moment, Igor could only picture rushing forward to meet him, to pull him close, to kiss him right there in the moonlight and resolve to never let him slip away again.
"I know what the inscription means now, Victor. My heart finally sees you, my love," he whispered, kissing the watch much the way he'd watched Victor kiss his own precious pocket watch all those nights ago. The night before he left Victor to go be with Lorelei.
He looked back at the lights burning bright in the windows of the mansion, heard the laughter and music carried out on the mild evening breeze. What he was thinking was awful, almost unthinkable, but there was no other choice. What he'd done so wrong had to be righted somehow. At the very least, he owed that honesty to Lorelei, and to himself, finally, even if it was too late to finally tell Victor everything that was in his heart.
The rest of the party was intolerable. The dancing, the drinking, the celebration of something that Igor knew was wrong. Bomine and the guests making such a production of separating them for the night, all the pre-wedding customs and superstitions in place about not seeing the bride before the wedding. Now as the clock ticked on into the small hours of the morning, Igor made his decision. He hastily packed his things, knowing his welcome there would not be extended once he did this thing that was almost as terrible as a marriage built on feelings he no longer had.
He stood outside Lorelei's door a couple hours later, hesitating and then knocking. Her maid answered, about to launch into the expected admonitions about not seeing Lorelei before the wedding. He pushed past the startled girl and strode through Lorelei's sitting room and knocked on the door to her bedroom. A couple moments later, the door opened and Lorelei stood there in her dressing gown, her hair long and abundant, flowing over her shoulders, down for the night. Any other man would be quivering in anticipation of having this woman as a bride, living the life that stretched out before him.
"Igor, what are you doing here? You shouldn't be here tonight, of all nights," she added, smiling, since he'd crept into her room, and her bed, more than once before their impending marriage.
"I have to talk to you."
"Mary, leave us, please," Lorelei said, and the young maid curtsied quickly and left the room, back to her own adjoining quarters. "Something has been troubling you all evening," she said. "I really haven't been sleeping, either," she added, smiling.
"Lorelei...I can't marry you," he blurted, afraid he'd lose his nerve if he didn't say the awful truth immediately, before he had more time to think about it.
"If this is a joke, Igor, it's not amusing."
"I am so, so sorry. I've struggled with this for some time now, but tonight, I realized that I couldn't go through with it."
"For how long? Igor, we're to be married in several hours. Why would you wait until now to decide you were...undecided?" she demanded.
"I hoped it was just the natural nervousness people sometimes feel before they're to be married. But it isn't. In my heart, I know this is wrong."
"You don't love me?" she asked, sitting in one of the room's fancy upholstered chairs near the fireplace.
"I do love you, Lorelei. I will always love you. I always have." Igor sat in the chair across from hers. "You were my first love, my unattainable dream. And then, when suddenly I became someone worthy of your love and attention, it never occurred to me to question it, because it was all I ever wanted."
"What do you mean, when you became worthy of my attention? Was I ever unkind to you before...everything changed?"
"No, you were always kind to me. Besides your grace, and your beauty, it was why I loved you. In fact, the first thing I told Victor about you was that you were kind to me. Until I met Victor, you were the only person who ever treated me...like a person."
"Victor," she repeated, sitting back in her chair, staring into the weak flames of the dying fire. "How did I know he would have a hand in this?"
"A hand in it? I don't even know where he is."
"And if you did, you would be with him now."
"Lorelei, I–" He stopped short when she caught his gaze. "Yes, I suppose I would. It doesn't really matter anymore. I have no idea where he is or how to go about finding him. It's true that I've never really forgotten Victor, but this isn't solely about him."
"But you are in love with him."
"I suppose I owe you the truth. Lorelei, I've never had a chance to figure out what I wanted from my life, because I never had one. And then when I did, and it all opened up for me, there was always someone there to point me in one direction or the other–including Victor, and I know he definitely had a notion of what he thought I should do with my life. I barely became a...a person and my whole life was decided for me. My world has been the circus, Victor's flat, and this estate. I've never known anything else and I've never had a chance to experience anything on my own. I think it's why I only now realized, when it's too late to do anything about it, that I do love Victor in a way that everyone but Bomine and a few people like him, would find unnatural. I love him and want him the way I should want you. But it isn't only that. I don't know if I want to live here, beholden to a benefactor forever. I would like to help people who truly need a doctor's help, not just sit in a posh office and grow plump and bald treating Bomine's friends until I wake up one day and realize I never actually lived my life the way I wanted to live it."
"The one constant has always been your love for Victor. My God, Igor, you were so forlorn without him that you didn't get out of bed for weeks after he left you the first time."
"I was nearly drowned."
"And you were physically ill for a time, but when Victor needed you, you rose from your sick bed and scaled the castle tower in a violent storm just to be by his side again." She smiled sadly. "That is the stuff of fairy tale love."
"I can't expect you to forgive me, but you've always been my friend, so I hope you can understand. Or, maybe someday you can find it in your heart to at least understand how I feel, even if it remains unforgivable."
"I should have known you well enough to know you were in love with him back then, and left you to it."
"I'm not sure how you would have known when I didn't know it myself."
"So what are we to do now? The house is full of wedding guests ready to begin a day of revelry and celebration, and here we are...well, where we are."
"I will go talk to Bomine–"
"No, I'll talk to him. He'll take it much better coming from me. If you tell him, you're liable to wind up thrown head-first into the pond."
"I don't deserve for you to care if I do."
"No, you don't, but for some idiotic reason, I do." She sighed. "I'll tell him I changed my mind. In that spirit, he will not blame you and he will stand by me. Alphonse is my friend," she said, referring to Bomine by his first name, "and he will take care of all this. The guests, the arrangements. Gather your things and leave before first light."
"You would do that for me? Why?"
"Because I do love you, Igor. Perhaps it did take your transformation to make me see you in that light, but then it was like a miracle–the man I loved for who he was on the inside was suddenly beautiful on the outside as well." She stood. "You should go now, before sunrise and the household begins stirring."
"Lorelei, I wish things were different, that I felt differently than I do. I hope I don't look back on this moment someday as the greatest mistake of my life," he said. It haunted him that the greatest mistake of his life had been not chasing Victor that day, letting him leave feeling as if Igor wanted to be free of him. Now, he was either being true to himself for the first time in his life, or he was letting go of the last chance he had for happiness by turning his back on his one remaining ally.
"If you want to leave on the eve of our wedding, you are doing the right thing. I don't say that in bitterness, but in honesty. Tonight is when any couple should be more in love and more desirous of each other than any other moment of their lives."
"Yes, that's true. Thank you for being so good to me about this. You will always be my dear friend."
"Leave, Igor. I have had all I can bear of this conversation," she said, and before he could reach out to her, touch her, say anything else, she had retreated into her bedroom and closed the door decisively.
********
Crestview Asylum
"I am going to offer you one opportunity to pass your days here in a tolerable manner. You are an educated man, you know medical terminology, and I am operating on limited resources here," Dr. McIntosh said, pacing back and forth behind his polished mahogany desk in his nicely appointed office. His resources didn't appear very limited, only when it came to operating Crestview and buying things like food for the residents. Inmates. Lunatics. Whatever the preferred term was.
Victor had been there a week, securely chained to a bed, but allowed to bathe, given decent, though bland, food, and his injuries had begun to heal. His broken leg was splinted and he was hobbling about on a crutch when he did have to get around, though this was the first time he'd been allowed out of his cell.
"It would be in your best interest to cooperate, Victor. If you are turned over to the authorities, you will most likely hang. If you prove to be unruly and unmanageable here, I will have no choice but to modify or control your behavior through whatever means necessary. Your only real alternative is the option I am about to offer you."
"What do you propose I do, then?" Victor asked. He'd spent most of the time the doctor was making his speech trying to assess the room, the windows, the door, and his own strength and mobility to attempt an escape. There was a guard outside the closed door, and his leg would not allow him any worthwhile speed to make a run for it if an opportunity did present itself.
"I need someone to organize the patient files, update them with my daily notes from my rounds. Eventually, if you prove trustworthy, you may be entrusted to accompany me on my daily rounds and take those notes for me."
"I am to be a file clerk," Victor replied, deadpan.
"You would do well not to take that tone with me. You have no idea how fortunate you are to be offered this opportunity. Your time here can be as pleasant or unpleasant as you choose."
Victor considered his response carefully. The potential freedom of movement he might have once his leg healed and he earned Dr. McIntosh's trust would give him his best chance for escape.
"Thank you, Doctor. I appreciate the opportunity."
""Excellent," he said with a slight smile. "Jennings will bring you here immediately after breakfast in the morning and I will assign you your tasks for the day."
As Victor made the long, laborious hobble to his cell with the hulking Jennings looming behind him, he made note of the potential exits, the distance, how many of the loonies got agitated–and loud–when someone passed their cells, where Jennings wore the giant ring of keys on his belt, and how many other guards were visible in the halls at any given moment.
Crestview had a reputation for patient abuses and poor conditions. Reformers had taken it to task in the last decade or so, forcing upgrades to food and living conditions. Still, Victor knew there were worse horrors lurking down the bend of a hallway or behind locked doors even than what he'd seen first hand. McIntosh didn't need to elaborate on their behavior management techniques. The place looked like a medieval castle and he was sure it had its own version of a dungeon and torture chambers.
As a medical student, he'd been in a madhouse once with a couple of classmates to do some medical work on a few of the lunatics, and part of the tour was an overview of the "behavioral therapies," like ice baths and electric shock treatments, that the doctors prided themselves were very effective. Victor had earned a stern lecture from his professor on his impertinence because he'd pointed out that it would be effective on anyone, as they would behave in the manner necessary to avoid the experience in the future. That the doctors had achieved nothing but terrorizing the inmates into behaving in the way they wanted in order to avoid pain. There was nothing new or groundbreaking about it. It was just torture, which had been used for centuries to achieve compliance of some sort. Those who fell into line because of it merely proved their sanity in being able to behave to avoid torture.
"Get in there and behave yourself," Jennings barked as he gave Victor a little shove into the cell that almost sent him sprawling as he managed to catch his balance with the crutch. As he sat on the bed and the other man fastened the manacle on his ankle that chained him securely to the bed frame for the night, he longed to bring his foot up and kick the bastard right in his beefy, jowly face. "Heh. Just another looney on a chain," Jennings muttered, standing and heading for the door. "Sit there and mind your manners and you might get your supper. If ya say please," he added, chuckling at Victor's black glare as he left the cell.
*********
Despite the many accusations of it over the years from his father and several of his professors, Victor was not a fool. He knew that making himself useful and swallowing his inclination to slit Jennings' throat with a stolen scalpel would benefit him more than living up to the reputation his father had burdened him with when he delivered him there. As the days passed, he grew stronger, his injuries healed, and while the work of organizing Dr. McIntosh's files and notes was demeaning to his education and intellect as a fellow physician–well, at least, as a man with skills equal to but not licensed as a physician–it was far better than what most of the other poor wretches in Crestview were doing with their days.
There were a few residents there whose families really did want them to have a safe haven from critical eyes, social embarrassment, or criminal prosecution. They lived out their days in nice quarters surrounded by their own belongings. They were allowed to walk in the garden, engage in some kind of recreational activities both indoors and out, and socialize with one another. He'd also seen remnants of their meals and smelled their food cooking when he was in that wing with Dr. McIntosh, and they obviously ate better than he did.
Victor didn't really care about socializing with them, but he did envy them their outdoor privileges and he longed for some books or writing paper or something to occupy his mind when he was locked in his cell, which was a barren stone room not unlike the cell he'd been kept in when he was first apprehended. He also found his mouth watering at the smell of decent meat cooking, and he suspected Dr. McIntosh was letting him see what he could earn if he behaved himself. He wondered how long he'd have to behave before Jennings would no longer have the satisfaction of fastening him to his bed like an animal every night. The chain was long enough to allow him to leave the bed to wash up or to relieve himself, but not to reach the door. The only way he'd escape during the night is if he either came into possession of a large saw or could run off with a metal bed frame attached to his leg.
Slowly, Dr. McIntosh began allowing him to do minor medical treatments for some residents. Victor was a talented doctor and for McIntosh, he was free labor. Since he hadn't openly rebelled or managed to jump from an upper floor window and run off into the woods beyond the asylum, McIntosh put him to use more and more to handle the less savory tasks, like bandaging wounds, examining obviously ill and potentially contagious inmates McIntosh didn't really want to touch, or treating and tending to the frail and elderly who were dying and in search of someone to sit with them so they didn't make the journey alone.
His leg was aching as he lay there on his bed with its marginally tolerable mattress. He turned over and tried to find a comfortable position, but the pain was enough to keep him awake. Of course, the girl in the cell down the corridor was screaming again, so he wouldn't be able to sleep anyway. He lit the lone candle in the small holder on the little table by his bed, and eased his treasured contraband out from under his mattress. A few sheets of paper and a pencil, stolen from McIntosh's office, saved what was left of his sanity on nights like these when his neighboring lunatics were restless, and he couldn't sleep. He would have literally killed someone for a bottle of whiskey, but he hadn't managed to pilfer one of those from McIntosh's office yet. Yet.
He sighed, frustrated with the lingering weakness in his leg. He still needed a cane, and he wondered if McIntosh even knew what the hell he was doing when he set it. He'd been so weak and in so much pain when the procedure was done that he hadn't been able to focus on it with the eyes of a doctor. Even on the rare occasions he wasn't being watched, that leg wouldn't be reliable for climbing or running. Yet.
Hoping to focus his attention on something other than his miserable situation, he lost himself in sketching for a while, obsessed as he always was with the brain and how to improve on the intelligence and sanity of any future iteration of Prometheus. He'd let go of the illusion that he was going to somehow restore Henry to life even if he succeeded, but they'd been so close to success...it wasn't an unattainable goal to create a rational, thinking being. The screaming of the girl down the corridor was fading, and he found himself fighting drowsiness as he worked on his sketch, his mind blissfully occupied with something that interested him, if only for a few moments.
He thought of Igor then, and wondered if this was what life in the circus had been like for him, trying to hoard and hide a few materials to keep his nimble mind occupied. One of the great joys of Victor's life had been that moment when he presented his entire library, all the equipment, everything to Igor to use and think of as his own. If ever anyone deserved to gorge on knowledge until he'd had his fill, it was Igor. The memory brought a rare smile to Victor's face. The only time he smiled now was when he could find it within himself to offer some comfort to an ailing and dying inmate. This smile came from his heart, and he tried to hold onto the happiness of that memory and not the bitterness of the loss that always came with thoughts of Igor.
There was noise at his door, so he stuffed the drawing supplies under his mattress and blew out his candle before the door opened and Jennings lumbered into the cell.
"Get up. You're needed down the hall," he ordered. "You gonna behave yourself if I take this off?"
"Unless you want me to drag the bed with me to go do whatever it is you want me to do, you're going to have to chance it, aren't you?" Victor retorted, so infuriated by the ignorance of the question and the constant taunting that the words came out before he could think them through. He wasn't even surprised with the backhand blow that knocked him back on the bed. He licked at the blood in the corner of his mouth and sat up, glaring at Jennings. He'd taken worse from his father when he was ten. This neanderthal bastard would have to do better than that if he wanted him to cower.
"Another remark like that and you'll end up in the ice baths with the rest of the loonies. Think you're so smart working with the doctor." He unfastened the manacle on Victor's ankle. "Get up, come on. I haven't got all night."
Since Victor slept in his clothes, what few he had, there was no need to pause to dress.
"If someone's sick or injured, I'll need supplies from the dispensary."
"Just move. I'll be the judge if you need supplies."
It was on the tip of Victor's tongue to remind the idiot that he was the doctor, not Jennings, but since he wasn't trying to lose any teeth or significantly change the bone structure of his face, he stifled that thought. Since Victor still used a cane for his weak leg, Jennings seemed to take perverse pleasure in shoving him whenever they walked anywhere, so Victor had become used to it and prepared to counterbalance it and stay on his feet.
He found himself at the door to the screaming girl's cell. She was lying on her bed, one leg hanging over the side, one straight, her shabby nightdress disheveled and pushed a bit too high up her legs to be logical considering how cold it was in the cell. It was almost winter, and surely she would have had her gown over her body and the inadequate blanket over her. Her head was turned toward the wall, her scraggly blonde hair fanned out on the pillow.
Victor made his way over to her, noticing she was not responding to his presence. For someone who screamed for at least a brief period every night, it seemed odd she would be so calm when he approached her. He touched her chin, turning her face toward him. She stared at him from large, lifeless blue eyes. She couldn't have been more than sixteen years old.
"She's dead," Victor said, turning to look at Jennings who, for the first time since he'd had the misfortune to know him, looked nervous.
"You just have to get her breathing again," he said. "She's just fakin' it," he insisted, but there was panic in his voice.
"You'll have to get Dr. McIntosh," he said. "I can't help her."
"You bloody well better help her!" he bellowed.
"You can shout at me all you like, but without supplies and help from another doctor, there's no chance to do anything for her." Victor knew she was dead, and without the Lazarus Fork and a generator, there was nothing he could do to help her.
He hoped Jennings would go get McIntosh because Victor had a sick feeling the disturbed girl who appeared otherwise physically healthy didn't just abruptly drop dead without help from the guard. It suddenly made sense why she screamed for a brief period of time about the same time every night until she would taper off to sobs and moans, then fall blessedly silent. He steeled himself to confirm what he suspected, lifting the hem of the girl's nightdress a bit higher. There was some bleeding visible and bruising beginning to appear on the pale skin of the girl's thighs. It matched the bruising that was coming to life on her neck.
It was all too much, and he spun on his heel and swung the cane at Jennings' head, missing his precise target and landing a painful but not debilitating blow across the man's ugly face. He knew things hadn't gone his way when the blow didn't knock Jennings out cold. Jennings grabbed the cane before Victor could get another good swing in, Victor holding onto it in the fight for his life that it was. If he could overpower Jennings, there was a small chance he could escape. If he didn't, he had a good chance of winding up like his unfortunate neighbor who lay dead a few feet away.
Jennings was bigger but Victor was the better fighter, which kept them wrestling for the cane until they wound up on the floor. Ultimately, Victor needed the advantage of strong kicking ability, which he didn't have with his weak leg, his good leg pinned under Jennings' weight. A particularly hard blow to his recently healed ribs loosened his grip on the cane enough that Jennings got it away from him.
Victor wasn't even surprised by the hail of blows that Jennings delivered, trying to curl up to protect his head and vulnerable parts from the beating. He was down, he wasn't able to fight back effectively anymore, but it was relentless. He could withstand a pretty vigorous beating, but even his father had stopped short of this the last time he'd lost his temper with him. A wicked blow landed on the side of his head, and everything seemed to sink into a well. He wasn't unconscious but the sound faded and the pain was piercing, making it even harder to predict where the next blow would land. It was almost a relief when another blow to his head made everything go dark.
********
Everything seemed muffled, and all that was clear was pain. Pain, and the fact he couldn't move his arms from where they were restrained above his head. His back was against the wall, his ass on the ground and his legs stretched out on the cold floor. He felt himself moaning, though he could only hear it on his right side. His usual cell was primitive, barren, and cold, but at least it was clean. This was a filthy, smelly place with no source of natural light, a few inadequate gaslights burning to give it a dim glow.
"...revealed your true, monstrous nature." Dr. McIntosh sounded as if he were concluding some self-righteous condemnation of Victor, but Victor had no idea what his true monstrous nature supposedly was, or what he'd done to deserve this.
Then memory started slowly seeping back into his throbbing head. The screaming girl, dead on her bed, violated and choked by Jennings.
"I didn't..." He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to shake away whatever was blocking his hearing on the left side. "I didn't hurt that girl," he said firmly, finally locating McIntosh in his field of vision as the doctor paced in front of him.
"The first step to addressing your madness is to bring you to a point of acknowledging your crimes. After your vile assault on that helpless young girl and your attempted murder of Jennings, more drawings of your unholy experiments were found in your cell. Most doctors would consider you quite unredeemable. You are fortunate that I believe all men, no matter how mad they may appear, have some potential for treatment, if only to neutralize them as a threat to themselves and their fellow men."
"What are you going to do to me?" he muttered, more to himself than McIntosh. He was in pain, he could barely hear what the man was nattering about, and he just wanted to die. No, that was wrong. He wanted something he couldn't have. He just wanted to see Igor one more time before being allowed to slip into the blissful numbness of death.
********