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Aufnahmevorrichtung
(German for cradle)
by Allen Casavant (AJ)
Ti's close to midnight, in the year 1765. I am alone, head resting
against the door of this sacred place. Contemplating my survival and
how it is that this corpse, who goes by the name of Dimitri in his
partial-living state, became both my father and my victim. As it is,
I am writing this as a memoir to his death and my final birth.
T'was the morning of the twelfth, exactly one year ago, that his
ending and my beginning came to mingle in a solitary graveyard,
towards the center of London.
I had decided to take a stroll through the forest, before that night
moons diminished it's light and the trail became that like a fox's
den; blacker than the darkest reflection in a broken mirror. Like a
Black bear catching salmon in the rapids of a rushing river, I had
clamored down the woodland trail without concern for the noise I
made. Of course, I didn't expect to have any company that night,
except for the few creatures that inhabited the dismal air. It wasn't
long though, before I became to get the feeling, that not all was
right in the surrounding area. I began to believe that I truly wasn't
alone on that misty road to Avalon.
It was then that I quickened my pace and it wasn't long before I
arrived at the gates of my masters friedholf, where I worked my way
to my parents resting place. Reaching their shared grave plot, I
knelt down to say a prayer of sanctuary. Upon ending that prayer, I
slowly glanced up towards the top of the inscribed stone which stood
just in front of me.
I had heard nothing since entering that place and by the end of that
prayer, I had started to think of myself as crazy for being in such
fear, whilst surrounded by that holy ground.
As I laid my eyes upon the top of the gravestone, and was glancing
around, I suddenly became aware of someone laughing, like a jester at
a feast of kings. Terror! It coursed through every nerve in my body,
like spiders, crawling up my flesh.
Slowly, I turned around to see who or what was creating that ghastly
sound that made my, very hand, tremble unlike anything that had ever
trembled before. As my eyes caught sight of him, crouching on the
roof of one of the many mausoleums, a stench like that of a dead
deer that had been left to rot, enveloped me. It took my senses and
pounded my tiny heart into a distinct drumbeat. Boom, Boom, Boom!
Harder it became, till I felt I could stand it no longer. Already I
was keeled over on the ground, sweating from exhaustion and fear, all
conjoined together in a cooking pot. It's boiling concoction
threatening to drown me.
Then, while I still had my head pinned against the dewy soil, a voice
sounded ahead of me. No! Not a voice, but "his" voice. surprisingly
it was very angelic. A calmness washed over me and I got the nerve to
look up at this person who greeted me as a friend. His
words, "Welcome! I see you finally decided to return. I greet you and
open wide, the gates of salvation. I apologize for this, but alas, I
will not be hear to teach you. Instinct should take you over and my
essence shall live on. In your very veins, you will carry my blood
and with it, my legacy!"
It was then that he moved forward and placed his long fingers on the
side of my head. Those pale white tips of his nails, caressing my
flesh and silently shifting my head to the side, revealing my neck,
open to the elements. Ever so slightly, Dimitri enclosed his mouth
upon me and sunk his fangs deep within my flesh. I felt the crimson
stream of the liquid-creation, running down towards the southern end
of my soul. It was then that I passed out, laying there on the
ground. I neither heard nor saw anything, but when I awoke; it was
darker than a winter's eve and yet I could still see perfectly.
Dimitri lay next to me, his life teetering on the brink of
redemption. The time for his soul to fly free was closely upon him.
He took his last few breaths and spoke a solitary word,
Aufnahmevorrichtung.
That was the night that my creator also became my victim. For it was
my birth, which drained him of energy. And now as I lean against the
crypt that I left his corpse that fateful morn, I reflect upon the
last year that I used my time to teach myself the ways of the
nocturne. For my name is Aufnahmevorrichtung. In the old text it
means "cradle". I am a creature of the night, a nocturnal killer, a
vampir. I carry the essence of Dimitri in my veins and am the sole
survivor of his legacy, and forever shall he be remembered!
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