Two years ago.

[SCENE: A typical Japanese suburban house.  It is compact, two
stories high, with a small yard surrounded by a high stone wall.
It sits flush against the curb.  The narrow street continues to
the right and left, with similar houses with similar small yards
covered by similar stone walls.

The view pans slightly to reveal the house and a small amount of
the street beside.  Beside the gate is a nameplate spelling
'Amano' in simple calligraphy.]

WOMAN'S VOICE: Yoshi-chan, can you run out and get some tofu for
dinner?

BOY'S VOICE: Hai~!

[A thundering of footsteps can be heard growing louder.  Then,
*SLIDE*SLAM*SLIDE*SLAM* -- probably the front door.  Also, in the
distance, a dull rumble can be heard.

The gate is thrust open to reveal a smiling boy of no more than
12.  He takes a couple steps into the street, then looks back at
something; his mother has called him.]

BOY: Nani, Kaasa--

[There is a terrible screeching noise as a large semi rushes the
bottom corner of the screen.  Blackout.  A woman screams.]

		*		*		*

Improfanfic throws in your face as a distraction while it
escapes:

Castlevania 1970: Disco of Evil

Chapter Twenty Two: Amano, A Plan, A Canal... Panama

Believed to be written by Erin Ellis

Since Gaijin Dan Mastriani didn't want the blame...

		*		*		*

Today.

"Mom... are you bringing up that story -again-?"  Yoshitaka Amano
groaned in exasperation.

His mother gave a gently chiding look.  "What are you talking
about?  I think it is a great story... especially since there was
a happy ending.  Ah, I was so scared then!  But then, my darling
Yoshi-chan was okay."

"-Please- don't call me 'Yoshi-chan'.  Look, I've got to go to
work.  If any of my friends call, tell them I'm off to Konami."

"All right, honey.  Walk safe!"  Mrs. Amano smiled.  Yoshitaka
was such a good child!  And to get a job working in an art
department!  How fortunate.  Funny, his mother thought, if his
hand was crushed under a lumbering truck, how had he become such
a good artist?

Also, there was that large credit card bill to some address in
Translyvania...

		*		*		*

"It's not here."

"Eh?" Alucard grunted.  He looked up from where he examined a
portion of the wall of the Church of Scientology's catacombs to
the bedraggled figure of Bob Belmont which stood before him.
"Have you a problem, Robert?"

The boy scowled.  "Yeah, I think I do.  There is no way the key
to the Disco of Evil is in this place.  I've whipped everything
here, and all I've gotten to show for it was crushed by a huge
pile of pamphlets."  He brandished his left arm, covered in paper
cuts.

"Do you have need of Bactine?"

"NO! I have need of dinner, a hot shower, and a soft bed."

Plaz approached, nodding with a disgruntled look.  "This is
definitely not cool, Alucard.  We have been here for the better
part of the day, looking for a key that you sold to the Motel 6
so that we could have a crappy room that didn't even come with a
continental breakfast."

The half-vampire's slim lips quirked in a way that on a normal
man would look like a grimace, but ended up as a beautifully
unhappy look.  "Without contributing to the payment of any hotel
bills, most likely you have no feet to stand on in the matters of
receiving a complimentary breakfast or not.  Furthermore, as the
cursed half-breed son of Dracula whose human and vampire natures
ever war with each other and who struggles to do good in the face
of overwhelming evil, and also as someone who has been warring
against my father, Dracula, who would enslave the world to do his
evil bidding for more time than you can actually conceive of, it
seems as though I would be the more reliable a source when
considering matters of whether or not a key to the lair of the
main boss of evil (in this and so many cases my father) will or
will not be found in a particular sub-dungeon (in this case, the
Church of Scientology).  Thusly, when I suggest that a second key
may be found within the Church of Scientology's walls, it
certainly will."

Hecubus wandered up to the group, feeling somewhat confused at
his still being placed here with the heroes.  "You're all looking
for a second key?  There was only one made; I just checked the
records.  And you all stayed here the whole day looking anyway...
evil!"  He grinned, handjiving.

"That's it," Bob said, stalking off.  "Come on, Plaz."

Alucard watched as the two younger party members left the Church
of Scientology catacombs.  "Well, perhaps it would be best if we
postponed further inquiry into the location and entrance to the
Disco Infernal until after dinner and a good night's sleep."
Things certainly had changed from the old days... Trevor Belmont
had certainly never complained over a dungeon being too big, or
over a key being too hard to find.  And Sonia... well, that was
something different altogether...

He gathered himself, brushed some stray dust particles off of his
cape, and made his way back to the Motel 6.

		*		*		*

No.  This wasn't happening.  It was Amano's worst nightmare -- a
blank piece of paper.  He knew what he wanted to draw -- he could
see it in his mind.  But when he moved to get his hand to take
the pencil and let it do its magic, it refused him.  Stupid
hand...  "Why don't you work, you stupid thing!"

"What's wrong, Yoshi-chan?" came a sing-song voice from above.
It was his greatest rival (or at least his most annoying) --
Akira Toriyama.  Yoshitaka had been none too happy to find that
the boy who had tortured him throughout elementary school had
also gained the a position on the art staff of Konami.

"Never call me that."  Amano's voice dripped with barely
concealed hatred.  "What do you want?"

"Just checking on you," he said innocently.  "I can't help but
think that shaking your hand like that can't be productive in
your drawing.  Fallen asleep again?"

"Yeah, just like your brain.  Except eventually, my hand wakes
up."

At the crack, Toriyama's eyes flashed briefly, then regained
their smug smirk.  "Well, don't stress out about it.  The head
honchos have assigned me a bunch of your old projects.  -You-
won't be needed, especially if you can't produce.  Thanks for
doing all the work... I'll be sure to take all the credit."  He
walked off, his laughter echoing through the office.

Shaking visibly, Amano grabbed all his papers and stuffed them
back into his portfolio.  He had some calls to make.

		*		*		*

Death sat in his Special Place.  For once, he was able to just
sit... people finally left him alone.  Dracula hadn't bothered
him.  Shaft hadn't bothered him.  Hecubus hadn't bothered him.
There was nothing at all separating him from his life of
relaxation.

In short, Death was bored.  Bored, bored, bored.  He was bored
out of his skull.  He regretted thinking it, but he needed
something to do.

Death sighed, walking slowly through the fields of his Special
Place.  He idly swung his scythe at some grasses, cleanly slicing
them in half.  What to do, what to do.  He had sworn not to
return to the Disco Infernal.  But... without Dracula, where
could he go?

"Stop right there, whippersnapper!"

"Eh?"  Death stopped, turning and looking.  Approaching him was
an agitated older man in overalls holding a pitchfork.  "What are
you doing here?"

"I might ask the same question.  This is my land that you're
traipsing through.  This is my wheat that you're chopping to
pieces.  Now, I hope you have some money to pay back for the
crops you've just ruined."

"Money?  Death has no need of money."

The farmer's eyes narrowed.  "However, -I- have need of money.
If you can't pay for the crops, you'll have to work for them."

"Work?  I cull the dead and escort them to the next world."

"Sounds perfect... You'll be culling the dead wheat and escorting
it to the baling facility."  He chuckled, pulling out a whip from
where it had previously been hooked to his belt loop.  "Yeah... I
think this'll be fun."

		*		*		*

The signal was a little weak... the problem with long distance
tapping.  Ah well, she could accommodate for that.  Ooh, there
was finally a call.

[SCENE: A phone tap.  You can't see anything.]

WOMAN'S VOICE: Moshi moshi, Amano residence.  Collect call from
whom?  In Translyvania?  No, we know no one of that name--

BOY'S VOICE, DISTANT: Mom!  I'll take it.

[There are rustling noises, like the phone is being transferred
to a different person.  A click signals the charges being
accepted, and a second series of clicks indicate the call being
connected.]

OLD MAN'S VOICE: Young Amano.

AMANO: You promised me!  You promised me a hand better than the
ruined one.  Why has it failed me now?

OLD MAN: Please review again the price of our exchange.  You were
to pay in several installments, and during that time, the hand
would be functional.  Payment was stopped on your credit card.
Subsequently, the power of the hand has stopped.  This is why I
suggested that you pay in cash.

AMANO: But... but...  I -need- my hand!  How am I supposed to
draw now?

OLD MAN: Remit the remaining $435,000 balance, and the hand is
yours forever.  As it is now, you will retain basic functions –
grasping, feeling, etc., but drawing will be beyond its powers.
Nice to do business with you.

AMANO: Wait--  [*click* -- the dull drone of the dialtone is the
only answer.  Amano swears under his breath, then hangs up the
phone.]

Yes, yes, perfect, perfect!  The mahogany hand clenched in
satisfaction.  It was just beautiful timing.  She turned off the
phone tap, unable to smother a grin.  Dracula was gonna love
this.

		*		*		*

Alucard woke to meet a sun already high in the sky.  He stumbled
out of the bed, blearily making his way to find the others.  He
shook his head... something was a little off.  His shoes felt a
little larger.  His clothes were a little tighter.  Maybe he had
eaten something that had disagreed with him.  "Good morning,
Belnades," he addressed the boy(?) sitting at the table.

Plaz let out a wail.

"What's wrong?"  Bob came running into the room, sweaty from
where he had been practicing his whip techniques.  "What's going
on?"

"Alucard... he's not pretty anymore!"

"What are you talking about?"  The half-vampire shook his head in
confusion.  He had been born pretty.  He had lived pretty.  He
had planned on dying pretty, when and if that ever happened.  He
looked from Plaz, who had degenerated into incoherent babbles,
periodically pointing at his face; to Bob, who just stared in
wide-eyed disbelief.

Unsatisfied with their answers, Alucard ran to the mirror,
peering into the slightly smudged surface.  The shadows of a
large crease in his forehead were gathering, something to never
before pass over his beautiful face.  As for that face, it was
seemingly more squared, angular, pointed.  The pale blond soft
curls that had cascaded down his back now were straight, plain,
shoulder-length locks.

There was a horrible, pregnant silence, then a cry wrenched from
the depths of his soul: "NO~!"

		*		*		*

_Sancho_ felt a great disturbance in the Force.  It was the
feeling of one suddenly finding that No, they were no longer
beautiful, and they just looked like a Normal Person.  Of course,
this was nothing that _Sancho_ had personally ever had to
experience, but he could sympathize... it was bad enough for
everyone not to be _Sancho_, and then to be not only Not _Sancho_
but Normal as well...

_Sancho_ wept a manly tear for the world.

		*		*		*

Chop.  Chop.  Chop.

Death was no longer bored.  Death was tired.  Granted, the
purpose of scythes is to cut.  However, five straight hours of
cutting grain out in a hot sunny field got really old really
fast.

*CRACK*

The leather strip was uncannily painful across his spine.  "OW!"
Death whirled, enraged.

"Get to work, you.  There's no time for slacking."

Death growled.  Soon, he would no longer have to deal with this
crap... unfortunately, whips were his weak spot.  It just seemed
oddly reminiscent... Death would throw scythes and some Belmont
would whip him, and Death would end up doing things he didn't
really want to do.  "Question... what is your name, farmer?"

"Hm?  You may call me Mr. Belmont."

		*		*		*

Shaft was very confused.  He refused the urge to twitch his
hands, bite his lower lip, or any of the other nervous actions he
was prone to do when Dracula called him unexpectedly.  Entering
the prince of darkness' throne room, he knelt low before his
plastic throne.  "Yes, Brother Drac?"

There was a pondering pause.  "Shaft... what have you done?"

What had he done?  The black priest's mind whirled.  Well, there
was that profit skimming with the Disco Infernal, but there was
no way Dracula could have found out already.  And the drug and
pornography side businesses, but those were a matter of course.
So then, it had to be--

"Hecubus... I tried to stop him..."

"Hecubus?  What are you talking about?"

Hm.  If Dracula did not seem to realize that his sub-sub-minion
had met an unhappy demise at the hands of the ground, Shaft was
certainly not going to be the one to tell him.  "Nothing.  What
did you need?"

"Look at me."

Shaft did.  He looked pretty much the same... maybe a little less
scowling, maybe a little rougher.  "Did you forget to shave
today?"

The vampire jumped up, his mock-stern expression exchanged for
one of excitement.  "Exactly.  I haven't shaved in centuries.  I
haven't -had- to shave in centuries.  And look: muscles! And my
hair!"  He flexed, pectorals and biceps bulging beneath Dracula's
white jumpsuit.  Spotlights beamed down from somewhere, bringing
into sharp focus an afro to put the most jive of cats to shame.

Shaft let out a low whistle of appreciation.  No question...
obviously something had happened to Amano, and Dracula did not
know what.  Time to take credit.

"Lord Dracula, let me confess -- I've removed Amano from the
picture."

Wait a minute.  That wasn't Shaft's voice.  That was the person
currently standing with one foot pressing into Shaft's back.
"Ow!  What the hell's going on?"

"Heh," Mary laughed, kicking Shaft off to the side.  "If you had
spent less time crying over Manservant Hecubus and more time
doing your job, then you would have noticed me carefully
manipulating people and places until everything fell into place,
causing Amano to lose his job and Dracula to have a more manly
physique without even having to be pixellized."  She shifted,
turning fully to Shaft, placing her hands on her hips and
taunting openly.  "I -told- you I could do your job in a week.
Bii~" she stuck out her tongue.

"Hasn't it been -more- than a week?"

"Shut up.  Either way, now that Dracula has seen what I can do,
he is so impressed that he's thinking of having me as his new
right-hand woman."

"What?!" Shaft was livid.  "Brother Drac, is this true?"

"Eh?"  Dracula looked back from his new, less beautiful self, to
the quarrelling pair.  "Um, whatever."  He shrugged, wandering
off to find a mirror.

"Wait -- come back!"  The black priest stopped at a hand on his
shoulder, and concentrated hard upon not punching the grinning
face he met there.  He didn't hit women.  Not with a closed fist,
anyway.  "Mary," he growled.

"I've finally bested you," she crowed.  "And you know, it feels
kinda nice.  I think I'll continue."  She gave an evil grin,
cocking her head back and breaking into a bitch laugh.

"Geez, Shaft, I'm gone for like a day, and this is what happens?"
Hecubus frowned, arms crossed.

"HECUBUS!"

[The following tearful reunion scene has been cut due to length
and content. --eme.]

		*		*		*

A typical dinner at the Amano household.

"Dad."

The man, in his mid-fifties, looked up slowly from his dinner,
peering across the table at his youngest son.  "Yes?"

"I was wondering... maybe I can go with you to the Sony factory
tomorrow."

"Eh?"  A bushy eyebrow was raised.  "I thought you didn't want to
work with the rest of us.  Transistors were not good enough for
your artist's hands."  He shrugged off the reproachful look his
wife gave him.

"Well, I've been thinking.  I need money..."

		**		**		**

WILL YOSHITAKA AMANO EVER GET ENOUGH MONEY TO GET HIS HAND BACK?
WILL ALUCARD BE ABLE TO LIVE WITHOUT HIS BISEINEN CHARM?  HAS
DRACULA REPLACED THE BLACK PRIEST SHAFT WITH PROUD MARY?  MORE
IMPORTANTLY, DID SHAFT AND HECUBUS WIN THAT CRUISE TO THE
BAHAMAS, AND WOULD THEY EVEN BE ABLE TO GET THE TIME OFF TO GO?
AND WHAT OF DEATH AND 'MR. BELMONT'?  POSSIBLY NONE OF THESE
QUESTIONS WILL BE ANSWERED NEXT TIME, IN THE INVENTIVELY TITLED
"CHAPTER TWENTY THREE"!

	     ***	     ***	    ***

Gee, no love for Alucard and friends... ^_^;  My friend Glenn
swears that there is a magic hand or something that you can buy
from the Master Librarian...  Now, Yoshitaka is a pretty smart
boy, right?  And if he really wanted some better way to draw, he
could find himself a hand, right?  I hope this makes some
sense...  By-the-by, Akira Toriyama is the artist for
Dragonball... I figured that was about as different from Amano
art as you could get.  And blame Richard for Farmer Death.

Erin (ee970@hotmail.com)
  -- just realized 'Alucard' was 'Dracula' backwards