calliopes_pen: (sallymn save me from purple prose)
calliopes_pen ([personal profile] calliopes_pen) wrote2018-01-02 05:37 pm
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Deleted Scenes

As promised, here are the deleted scenes from The Book Of Night Was Opened Wide.

In chapter 2, when Mina is having her flashback/overview of events, I wrote out the immediate aftermath of when Lucy bit Jonathan, as well as one of his first sleepwalking excursions before he started not being fully himself during those incidents.

However, as I had already incorporated the overview thoroughly, I couldn’t extract that overview and slide one of these first two into that without a massive overhaul in other areas.

So here you go—first, the writing of the immediate aftermath of Lucy grabbing Jonathan, without any beta reading (and probably with a few references that were scrapped, so just overlook them if you catch them).
--

Jonathan winced, as he walked out of an alleyway that he couldn’t remember walking into, and that he had no place being in whatsoever. He shook his head, and began the slow process of staggering down the correct road. He felt different. He felt wrong.

Instead of a brief jaunt by train, or even taking a carriage ride, something had possessed him to walk from the office to his house. His neck stung, and he clapped a hand over it with a grimace. He looked down at his palm, and saw specks of blood. It reminded him of something, but he was scared to think of what.

What had happened to him? He didn’t know. He couldn’t say. He had almost lost his way, he knew that much. Whatever caused him to bleed, it didn’t much matter all that much. It wasn’t life threatening.

It would be fine. He found himself at the door to the house, and couldn’t find his keys, as scattered as he was. Had it dropped them? Feeling silly at his own confusion, he knocked. He felt himself start to fall over, as though he had misjudged his ability to do that much. He wasn’t drunk, so he didn’t understand what was wrong with him.

“Jonathan,” Mina cried as Jonathan practically fell into her arms upon her opening the door. His briefcase fell to the floor; it looked like it had been scuffed from a previous fall.

She had heard something, but didn’t expect him to be standing on the other side. He looked blank, but hopeful. The last confused her. “What happened?” She asked as he straightened. When he didn’t reply, and only stared beyond the threshold as though lost in thought, she touched his arm and tried again. “Jonathan?”

“Oh,” Jonathan said as he was jarred loose from whatever had engrossed him. “I don’t know,” he sighed. “I believe I lost time at the office, but not for a delay of the train. I didn't go to the station tonight. I felt strange in the office, as though I was being watched, and then as though I was followed when I locked up. Nobody was there, and then—time was gone. When I returned to myself, I was as you see me.” He swallowed. “I feel like something has drained me dry of all my energy, though it's not that warm of a night."

Drained him dry? It was a figure of speech that didn’t sit well with him, he mused. In truth, it felt—and he was being melodramatic, of course—as though all he was and ever shall be had been poured out. As though he were a simple decanter of brandy, which simply must be diluted. Even worse, it felt as though it had been returned, but changed when he had returned to his senses.

He should remember why he felt like this. He didn’t. And what frightened him the most after his brain fever was that he didn’t feel it was a pressing concern. It was like someone somewhere had told him not to dwell on it, but he didn’t know why or who or where.

Mina touched his forehead. “You don’t have a fever; perhaps it is only the beginning of one. Maybe you’ve been working too hard.”

“Perhaps I have been,” Jonathan sighed. He had been trying to catch up and find everything that Mr. Hawkins had left behind for his clients. This could be the result of that hard work. He didn’t want to worry Mina, but as the night stretched on, he found that he wasn’t tired.

Only once did he try to leave again that night, and that was due to the overwhelming thought that he had left an important document at the office. Which case, or which document he couldn’t have described if his life had depended on it. It felt like a subterfuge when he stepped outside for some air. He stepped back inside after half an hour; perhaps he was wrong, and the document was in the house. And then he was exhausted, all too suddenly.

As the sun rose, he stumbled. He fainted without warning, to Mina’s horror. He had felt it coming and him growing almost feverish in the seconds before then, but hadn’t seen fit to warn her. To Mina’s relief, he hadn’t hit his head when he collapsed face down, and had merely landed upon a nearby settee. When he regained consciousness a few moments later, he sighed upon the sight of Mina’s worried face.

“You’re sick, Jonathan. Don’t try to get up,” Mina insisted.

“I agree, Mina,” Jonathan sighed. “I’m not entirely well, am I? I think you should wire the office and extend my apologies for not being in attendance. They have their own keys. They must carry on without me!” That felt so overwrought, and he suspected she felt the same by her long look at him. Mina hurried to do as he requested while he took advantage of his place, and fell asleep without meaning to do so. “It will be fine tomorrow,” he muttered as he drifted off.

Shortly thereafter, he resolved to get up, only to feel dizzy. He promptly gave himself leave to go to the bedroom, remove every source of light there could possibly be, and pass out where a man should sleep: under the most comfortable quilt in his life. From time to time, he drifted to a semblance of wakefulness, though it felt like it was a terrible hour.

It was only noon, he was appalled to see at one point.

Mina offered food for lunch. He accepted her splendid soup, with a dash of paprika just as he had begged, but found he just didn’t have much appetite for it after one bite. That night, he found the strength to get up. Unfortunately, his insistence, coupled with a strangeness of manner, lateness of the hour—far too late for a proper gentleman to be out—and his worsening pallor as he began to feel wretched brought both Mina and the maid to the point of barring him.

Jonathan spent a full hour trying to do so anyway, until Mina brought out the laudanum (found, leftover, from Mr. Hawkins; thus explaining how a man in such pain could greet him on his homecoming when he could barely walk) and threatened to tie him with rope to the bed. She brought these implements to good use when he hit upon the thought of going out the window, as dim memories said he surely did within the castle for some strange reason.

Perhaps he could scale the wall of a normal house, and get to wherever he must before he gained either injury or scandal. Or he would just end up leaning out the window while bats flapped about him. That seemed equally calming to his mind; he should just take a breath of Exeter’s decidedly foggy night air.

He was waiting for something to happen. He was waiting for someone to come to pay them a visit, he explained when Mina drew him away from the windowsill.

Neither he nor Mina knew what, or who, but between the two ladies they had successfully subdued him. One woman, truly frightened for his health, and the other reluctant but agreeing this just would not do at all. Once he was suitably prevented, the drug was administered, and he passed out.

He didn’t wake again until mid-day from his drug-induced slumber, when promises were extracted not to do such a thing again. It brought back vague and confusing flights of fancy for Jonathan, for one thing. Jonathan and Mina both apologized, though they felt this wasn’t the end of his illness.
--

This next scene is that sleepwalking episode I mentioned.
--

Jonathan tossed and turned, for his head felt like it was being seared. Whenever he opened his eyes, it felt like the gas lights flared as bright as the sun. He couldn't look upon them without pain, and knew that Mina couldn't hope to understand.

How could anyone, when he couldn't understand the cause himself?

He began to hear voices clamoring for his attention, and strove to block them out. He didn't know what to do, or whether he should call out. He couldn’t take this if the brain fever were returning! This wasn’t real. He had to remember that. It wasn’t real. He grimaced; he didn’t want to open his eyes yet, for they hurt so much.

‘There is no light. You will have your darkness, Jonathan,’ a voice soothed, and Jonathan took a shuddering breath that became half of a silent sob. He shouldn't listen to voices like this, but he carefully opened his eyes at last. What harm could it do if the voice was wrong? The lights remained lit. Before he protest that this had been a lie, or perhaps simply an outright delusion from his mind that he was to scared to confess to Mina, the light beside the bed flickered. He glanced at it, and then it went out.

Jonathan sat up, confused, but grateful. From his view of the window, he saw that even the gas lights that lined the street outside were blinking out one at a time. The relief almost made him weep. All was dark, as he had been promised. A stern darkness flooded over him in reply. The feeling was as though it could temporarily hollow him out, and would draw him elsewhere. It frightened him.

All was dark, as he had been promised. A stern darkness flooded over him in reply. The feeling was as though it could temporarily hollow him out, and would draw him elsewhere. It frightened him. There was the faintest of thrills simultaneously. Then, he felt like he was falling asleep again, but only his waking mind fell aside.

A need to see her grew larger by the second. It was greater than him. Slowly, he turned and fixed his now vacant eyes on the doorway. Yes. He must go out. He must go for a little walk, mustn't he? He wouldn’t need to travel far. He needed to go to the front door. He needed to let someone in.

He exited the side of the bed, and made his way, slowly, barefoot, to the stairs. He was merely a sleepwalker guided by an unholy force as he stared down the way that was shrouded in darkness. It was like something was stitching gossamer threads, even as they were being woven through a wondrous dream that he never wished to end.

He felt a tug. He knew the way he must trod. He had to follow the thread and find the one that was calling him. He moved to the first step down.

Then, he felt Mina’s hand on his shoulder; he barely noticed her worried face, for he sought to look away from the candles she had found. "Jonathan? Come with me," she urged him gently once she had taken stock of the situation. Unable to resist in his trance-like state, without even a murmur of protest, he was led back to the bedroom.

He shook his head, confused as he regained his sense of self, just as he approached the bed. His head ached. "Where was I going?" He asked himself more than her. His reasons for leaving the bed were falling away from him.

"I don't know," Mina replied. She placed one candle beside the bed.

The light hurt his eyes to the point they were watering. Almost childishly angry at the sight of it, he blew out the candle. Mina didn’t protest his actions as she put the cover back over him, for she had seen his weary discomfort. She placed the other candle on the windowsill while she stayed with him.

When she felt he was asleep, she softly blew the second one out herself.
--

Another moment I located in my notes, from another moment of Jonathan being a bit off.
--

Mina glanced up from writing in her diary, for Jonathan had begun to moan in his sleep. He had been tossing and turning with increasing frequency, and she knew he was close to waking. He began to rub his neck as though it pained him, before he quieted. She caught a slight whimper, but even as she rose to shake him from his dreams, he gave a full body shudder and abruptly snapped awake all on his own. She glanced outside; the sun had set not so long ago.

It was like the previous few nights. “Jonathan?” Mina asked. Once his confusion passed, he almost appeared happy.

“I feel so much better now that the sun is gone,” Jonathan slowly insisted. “This is a wonderful hour, is it not? I shouldn’t feel so, but I do. I also feel as though we need some fresh air in here.”

Mina knew he was correct on that last count. “You slept the day away again.” She opened the window, but no more than a crack. She didn’t want him to grow sicker. He was sitting up when she turned around, but was staring at the window with agitation. “What is it?”

“You need to open it wider,” Jonathan urged, before he blinked and shook his head. “I suppose I feel confined.”

After that one night with him half hanging out of it before those wounds on his throat reopened, she wouldn’t do such a thing. She dreaded an attempt to jump, not for wanting to harm himself, but for wishing to escape something. Or even to get to somewhere she couldn’t fathom. He could even have an attack of vertigo if he thought he was being pursued by imagined demons and returned to his senses at a terrible instant. As she watched, he appeared to be falling back into exhaustion.

“I will,” Jonathan declared unexpectedly in the midst of everything.

She gleaned he wasn’t following her line of thought, or even speaking to her. His voice had sounded desperate. “You will what?” Mina asked softly as she put the blankets back over his legs. He had almost shoved them off the bed.

Listen, of course. To them,” Jonathan dazedly replied.

Mina looked him over. Was he really half asleep? He certainly wasn’t with her, and he wasn’t really seeing the room. “I can’t hear them,” she gently confided. “Neither should you. Kindly ignore your voices, dear. If you cannot, I would advise a regime of tempered rest until you behave more like the gentle solicitor that I know you to be.” Her tone was light, but she was struggling to keep from weeping.

It upset her so to see him like this.
--

This next one takes place after Mina and Jonathan woke up changed, and is a bit after Jonathan attacked Lucy. Jonathan asks if he can still keep a journal. Once I went with the idea of him begging the original to be burned, and Van Helsing finding and eventually translating Mina’s, I decided it wasn’t necessary and was now completely out of character. Dracula also gets a different entrance than the way that I went with in the end, but Jonathan’s still desperate to go to him.
--

Jonathan had an unholy desire to both learn from the Count, and play with him in various ways. The latter didn’t bother him as much as it would have when he was alive, for he just wanted to experience new sensations at his feet. To gather his thoughts, perverse though they may be, he considered beginning a second journal. Or would that befit his new station?

He could always hide it beneath his head, as one would place a pillow in the coffin. He could cover it with dirt, if that wouldn’t rip the pages. He found a pen, old but still useful, lying unnoticed in the dust that had accumulated. Perhaps he had dropped it as he had taken his Kodak and photographed the grounds for the Count prior to his journey, but he didn’t recall it.

When he scooped it up, Mina chuckled. She shook her head when he looked her way. “We both want to put pen to paper,” Mina smiled. “You’ll have your secrets, and I shall have my own private thoughts if we resume the practice.”

“Is it contagious?” Lucy wondered. “I imitated your habit for a time toward the end. I don’t feel the need anymore, but I did share it while I still breathed. Any scrap of paper that could be clutched to my chest would do, then, really.”

“Would he allow us such a luxury? Would he allow us to cling to such vestiges of mortality?” Jonathan asked, genuinely curious. It was something he wanted, aside from law books to read when he was certain he wouldn’t be doing the Count’s bidding. He knew the Count would permit the last. What of the first?

“Yes,” the Count himself murmured in his ear, with great authority. He whirled, while Mina and Lucy didn’t seem all that shocked. Jonathan couldn’t keep a particular unholy and eager glee from his eyes. Only when the Count noted it with a smirk did it seem to be given permission to drain from the newly undead solicitor. “It is tied to you, and your…obedience would suffer were it taken away.”

He moved a hand down Jonathan’s arm, as the man took a shaky and unneeded breath. He covered Jonathan’s hand with this own, before he plucked the filthy pen from an unresisting grasp. “I have more fitting instruments for all, if they are prone to writing their thoughts,” he promised. He smiled at the shiver that went through Jonathan, and would allow him no protest.

As though he didn’t have a profound effect on the man, Dracula turned to his other two creatures. Though not of his own making, as a result of Lucy’s newness, he was partially responsible for Mina. “You will find all you require beside your coffin in the evening, tomorrow night. Before we go hunting, I shall learn if it merits your approval. Seek me out, if the books are not big enough for you or for him.”

“Thank you, sir,” Jonathan replied with pleasure, even as Mina added her own thanks. “I won’t forget this mercy.”

“Take care to spill no blood upon your so precious pages,” he warned. “It would ruin them just as a toppled inkwell must.” The young were messy when it came to the feast, and there were bound to be casualties when it came to both clothing, as well as paperwork. This warning was critical.
--

This next one was more of a joke that wasn’t required. Lucy tells the worst part of being undead.
--

Lucy reached over to wipe some mud off Jonathan’s face before he could leave her side. “Do you know what the worst of this life was before you did that, Jonathan?” She softly wondered. “Not being able to see a reflection and know when you’ve got some blood on your chin! And you have very persistent dirt right here from coming back to life and rolling around in it!” One last swipe, and it was gone.

Jonathan chuckled, darkly amused; she was proud of having drawn that out of him before she walked away.
--

I had many ways in which Jonathan would awaken. This was a snippet from one of the more peaceful ones, when Lucy wanted Mina to herself and had Jonathan go away. Somehow I missed the chance to add Lucy’s line about wondering if she had made the papers in the fanfic itself. I eventually did use the “death dulled the mind” line.
--

“Jonathan,” Lucy whispered as she wrapped Mina in a hug. She looked over Mina’s shoulders in a fanged smile. “Go see the Count; maybe he’ll speed along your feast.” Maybe it would be like her first night’s wanderings, where she had mesmerized and bitten several children, but she doubted it. She wondered just what normal people made of her nighttime visitations.

Had she made the papers? Had she caused a scandal? Should she ask? No, that was the height of garishness! One simply did not pour over such things for a mention of themselves, especially when they had managed to leap across the barrier between life and death. She had transcended such things.

Jonathan smiled as though he was still a gentleman, though the wicked creature could not hide for long; though he dashed out the door, he was diligent enough to quietly latch the door behind him, thereby enabling them a dash of privacy.

Death dulled the mind; rebirth awakened the senses and rekindled it anew. Every nerve would be joyfully heightened. Mina kissed her passionately, though her desperate hunger made it weaker than it surely would have been otherwise. “Can you hear their planning, too?” Mina asked.

Lucy grinned. She could. “Jonathan will have a wonderful time, after his woe with that brain fever you wrote about! And,” she added as their fingers entwined. “We will find someone as well. Young or old; man or woman. Whoever fills you up, my dear Mina. If you only desire a small bite, that’s fine, too.”

“Yes,” Mina agreed, quietly delighted. She ought to be concerned about drawing attention to their activities, however. Practicality reigned, living or undead. “Away from Jonathan’s duties, of course.”

“Of course,” Lucy laughed. Their little family’s happiness and fulfillment, as well as their Master’s was all that mattered in the end. They would thrive in this city, Lucy knew. They would remain unnoticed by the teeming throngs who could never scarcely dare to dream of what they were.
--

This short bit would be from when Mina interrupted Jonathan and Dracula talking, just prior to the plan’s reveal.
--

An infinitely sorrowful expression was what Mina beheld on Jonathan’s face as she opened the door. He still held himself accountable for Renfield’s becoming, as brief as it was. It wasn’t his fault! Mina desired to hold Jonathan, though she would refrain from showing her heart until her idea was laid bare.

She would tell them her plan; she would allow the Count to judge it. She would see to their salvation. If any of their makeshift family should perish at the hands of Abraham Van Helsing, then she promised herself she would tear out that man’s throat personally.
--

And this last one is from after Jonathan escaped out the window, after turning into a wolf. All of the rats had scattered, but one of them was still at the window. Given how it’s pretty much throwing itself to its death, possibly at the behest of Dracula for a show of power, I felt it was unnecessary. While it is dark, nothing is described as to what actually became of it.
--

Arthur cried out, for as he moved closer to the bars to witness the daring escape of Jonathan, a well fed rat appeared deucedly near to biting off his nose. He evaded it at the last when it snapped with cruel intent. It sat on the outside wall, beside the bars. It snapped a second time and just missed Quincey’s ear, as well.

Van Helsing raised a brow as Arthur and Quincey both backed away from there. His expression became one of disbelief as the vermin first backed away in silence, and then fell off the wall in silence, choosing to plummet to its death rather than enter the warmth of the cell and seek a hiding place…or a grisly meal. The creature had to have still been under the vampire’s thrall.

Was it some sort of sign of the extent of Jonathan’s control even from so far away? Van Helsing was disgusted, but inwardly intrigued by such a line of thought. Or was it that young one’s sire that was behind such a vision? Were they both showing how anything could happen around them, and their safety was uncertain?

He no longer wished to puzzle this over. They had greater matters to ponder.
--

And there you have it. That is all that was cut from the fanfic.