Home / Fan Fiction / V(cough) C(cough) fic / Oliver Stone's Memnoch the Devil

DISCLAIMER: The following stories are all non-profit, amateur efforts not intended to infringe on the rights of Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, David Geffen, Warner Brothers, Geffen Pictures, Knopf, Randomhouse, the city of New Orleans, the U.S. Consititution, any copyright holders that I might not have thought of or even a certain author who shall remain nameless but who has a set of initials which are, coincidentally enough, just one letter off from spelling "B.S."

Oliver Stone's Memnoch the Devil
by: The Brat Queen

District Attorney Lestat de Lioncourt stood before a blackboard and watched as the coven filed into the room. He waited until everyone had found a seat before speaking.

"I suppose you're all wondering why I called you all here," Lestat said.

"Oh, *that's* not to terribly cliche," Eric muttered.

"Shut up! I'm the D.A. around here!" Lestat glared at him.

"Lestat, you don't even *like* Kevin Costner."

"Completely beside the point," Lestat said. "We have a conspiracy on our hands and what better way to solve it than in an Oliver Stone movie?"

"He's got a point," Daniel said.

"Thank you," Lestat said. He checked to make sure there wouldn't be further interruptions, then continued. "Ladies and gentlemen, there has been an assasination. The Vampire Chronicles... are dead."

Gasps of shock were heard throughout the room.

"Lestat, are you sure?" David asked. "That statement seems a bit harsh."

"Behold!" Lestat flung a store-bought copy of Memnoch the Devil onto the table in front of him. "I give to you Exibit EGTH."

"EGTH?" David asked.

"Earnest Goes To Hell," Lestat explained. "Go ahead, read it. But be warned, it's not pretty." He handed out copies of Exibit EGTH for everyone to look through.

"Wait just a damn minute!" Armand said. "I die in this!"

"Don't make such a big deal out of it," Mael said. "After all-- WHAT THE HELL? For God's sake, I'm a Druid!"

"I told you, it's not pretty," Lestat said.

"Lestat," Louis spoke up. "What is this? I don't understand. How can this talk about you in chains, or us not being together or you not giving me your stronger blood? Don't they know the truth?"

Lestat caressed Louis' cheek tenderly. "Ah, beautiful one. Would that I could have protected you from this. But, sadly, I cannot. We must take action." He turned to address the group. "What we have before us is murder in cold blood. Someone has worked to destroy the chronicles and they must be stopped! I have a theory--"

"Me too!" Armand said. "Fire plus paper makes lovely ashes! Daniel, give me a lighter!"

"Not so fast!" Lestat said. "There's plenty of time for that later. Believe me, I've got the gasoline all ready. But first, we must find out who our enemy is."

"Indeed," Maharet said. "I for one would like to know how a book could be printed in which I'm made out to be some sort of bitch."

There was a long silence in which everyone looked the other way.

"Yes, well, ah, be that as it may," Lestat said. "I would like to give you my interpretation of the EGTH conspiracy." Lestat pulled down a movie screen, on which was written an elaborate flowchart.

"We begin at point 1," Lestat said, indicating the spot on the chart. "A Mrs. Anne Rice declares to a group of fans on Halloween 1993 that she has the idea for the sequel to Tale of the Body Thief, in which I may meet the Devil himself. She declines to give further details as it 'might ruin it'."

"Bit late for that," Santino said.

"I'm getting to that," Lestat said. He moved his pointer along the chart. "Years pass and things look fine. Mrs. Rice publishes some novels which are not part of the vampire series, word spreads about the upcoming chron. book, the fans get psyched up for it and the book comes out. Everything's nice and dandy, isn't it?"

"Hardly," Jesse snorted.

"Exactly!" Lestat said. "We must look closer!"

"Couldn't we have looked closer in the first place?" Marius asked.

"I'm building drama *if* you don't mind," Lestat said.

"Sorry."

"To continue," Lestat said. "Everything looks fine and logical, but when you piece together all of the evidence you can see what happens!

"I draw your attention back to the time after that 1993 appearance. During that time three other books were published: The Vampire Companion, The Witching Hour Companion and the Anne Rice Trivia book.

"Also during this time a crisis occured within the fans as it was announced that Tom Cruise would play me in the movie of IWTV. Anne Rice is spurred into action as she defends the opinion of her fans and speaks out against Tom.

"We now turn back to Exibit EGTH. In it you will see such things as Armand, a very strong vampire, being burnt instantly in the sunlight. The date of the year that I was given the Dark Gift is clearly impossible given all the other supporting dates within the series. The amount of time that I can go without blood is constantly contradicted. I'm described as wearing a Brooks Brothers suit in the middle of the worst winter in centuries, when anyone who knows me knows that even *I* know enough about fashion to have worn something that the snow wouldn't ruin. And I'm also wearing violet glasses which is plain silly because that shade of violet is just *not* my color."

"Lestat," Khyman said. "This is all very interesting, but does it have a point?"

"Yes!" Lestat cried. "I put it to you that Exhibt EGTH is *not* the Anne Rice version of Memnoch the Devil!"

"What are you saying, Lestat?" Gabrielle asked. "How can it not be the Anne Rice version?"

"Follow me on this if you can," Lestat said. "Our assasin decided one day take the vampire chronicles away from Anne. What better time to do it than in the novel that all of her fans will be snatching up because of its promise that I shall be meeting the Devil himself?

"Our assasin came up with a fiendish plan and the plan was this: to distract Anne away from her own work and replace Memnoch the Devil with a false version. It was our assasin who stirred up all of the trouble over Tom Cruise by encouraging Anne to speak out. With Anne's energy focused on first attacking, then defending the movie, our assasin was able to move in and switch the books unnoticed."

"But when could this happen?" Pandora asked.

Lestat walked over to a monitor complete with a VCR. He put a tape into the machine and turned it on.

"Watch this tape," Lestat said. "This is the video copy of Interview With the Vampire. On it we can see Anne Rice holding up what I believe is the true copy of Memnoch the Devil. Note how the book she is holding is the size of an unabriged dictionary whereas the only way Exhibt EGTH could hold that description is if it was a dictionary for illiterates.

"Now watch very closely..." Lestat slowed the tape down. "Notice how the book moves in Anne's hand. Back, and to the right. Back, and to the right. Back, and to the right. Back--"

"LESTAT!" the coven yelled.

"Sorry, got stuck in character there for a moment," Lestat said. "Anyway, the point being that this is the ideal time for our assasin to switch the books. What we see here must be the sole copy of the real Memnoch the Devil. Our assasin pushed Anne to bring it with her to this taping so that the false version of Memnoch could be shipped off to the publisher's without Anne being the wiser."

"But wouldn't Anne notice that she didn't send the copy herself?" David asked.

"True," Lestat said. "Which is why our assasin has to be someone who was close enough to Anne to have enough of Anne's trust that she would hand over the real copy of Memnoch, thinking that our assasin would mail it."

"But who would do such a horrible thing?" Louis asked.

Lestat pointed to Exhibt EGTH again. "Check the facts," he said. "In this story not only do we have continuity errors that do not work with the other books of the chronicles, but errors that do not work within the story itself.

"Though this was touted as a book that had my voice throughout, I am actually very silent while other characters, new characters, go on about their life stories. And once it gets back to the part where I can speak, it is said that I am insane and thus not enough of myself to explain discrepancies within my voice.

"The stories of Roger and Memnoch are boring, too long and written poorly. Plus they have plot points that you could ride a rhino through.

"Relationships are indicated and conclusions made that are not natural given what has preceeded them in the chronicles. Any evidence to dispute this is either conveniently ignored or attributed to 'poor memory' on the vampire's part--though the book makes the point of reminding us that vampires have perfect memories.

"And finally, the piece de resistance, there is the character of Dora."

"Do we *have* to hear about her again?" Jesse asked.

"Only briefly, I promise," Lestat said. "For it is Dora who proves to be our assasin's fatal flaw. First, we can see that Dora was our assasin's failed attempt at imitating Anne Rice for it is clear that our assasin tried to continue the pattern of having my love interest resemble Anne in some way, but the killer's poor writing style flows through as this character, unlike my lovers before, is a hollow shell and clearly a pale imitation. In addition to this, it can be seen that Anne could not have come up with this character for Dora is often described as being 'thin', something Anne Rice would never focus on in a character which resembled herself for Anne always thought that she was overweight and often complained that modern weight expectations were unattractive. Just look at Gretchen in TotBT, or how she had David bulk up before I made him into a vampire."

"But that doesn't prove who our enemy is," Jesse said.

"Ah but it does," Lestat said. "Because if Dora is Anne Rice and I am written as having a greater devotion to Dora than I do to Louis, then what is actually being said is that I am in love with Anne Rice. And, since Anne is the one who created me, then she is rightfully my mother. And if she is my mother and I am in love with her, then we are talking about an Oedipal complex--a Fruedian concept!

"Now then, who do we know who was close enough to Anne to switch the books, has poor writing skills, a habit of not being accurate in her facts and another habit of being too Fruedian?"

Maharet was aghast. "You don't mean..."

"Yes. Our assasin is Katherine Ramsland." Lestat regarded his companions as they sat there in stunned silence. "We're through the looking glass people. Be afraid. Be very afraid."