Chapter Text
Well, Guy can say with complete confidence that he never thought he’d be here.
“Are you okay?” Guy doesn’t dare get too close to the couch.
Jasper groans. Yeah, he’s gonna stay right here.
“Why are you hiding behind the couch? Silly boy,” Jasper’s voice is breathless, which should be impossible, vampires don’t need to breathe. Right?
“Do vampires need to breathe?”
“Quit it with the questions, already.”
Guy huffs then creeps closer, placing both hands on the couch and leaning over it like some great cavern to peer over the vampire.
“You’re freaking me out.” Guy states.
Guy raises an eyebrow in challenge to Jasper’s incredulous side-eye.
“Christ, I’m not gonna lose control because of a little…” He flails his hands in the air for a second. “A little impairment, kid.” Jasper stresses the word, throwing a limp hand vaguely in his direction.
“I thought you weren't allergic to garlic or whatever.” He snarks, arms crossing, a pillow to his chin and Jasper moans miserably from the couch, his head tilted back. Silver hair fans out, supported by a pillow, his words wilting.
“Heightened senses. Hurts and burns.”
“Ah,” Guy winces.
He spends a while shuffling nervously as he debates the best move in his head, he knows what he absolutely won’t, shouldn’t do, but he does know something. But is it weird? Will Jasper laugh in his face?…
Who is he kidding, he doesn’t care.
Guy storms off into the Motherhouse kitchen, wafting through the remnants of his garlic oil noodles, glares at them as if he wasn’t the one who bought them, and grabs Jasper’s usual mug and a bag of blood.
“That’s gonna take a while,” he announces as he strolls back into the living room, the perfect picture of casualness. Yeah, he’s totally got this.
“What’s gonna take a while?” The pile of small wet towels Guy had piled on Jasper’s face jostles with the movement.
“Be patient.”
Later, when it’s finally set and Jasper’s virtually upright on the sofa, Guy brings over the mug with an unmoving spoon in it. Shoving it into the vampire’s chest, he walks off incredibly normally to study a painting in the room.
A pointed cough makes him double take, nervous under the full, confused attention of the vampire.
“What is this?”
Guy scoffs.
“It’s jello, what else does it look like?”
Jasper eyes him, shaking his head just-so to convey his message. ‘This fuckin’ kid,” his eye roll laments, he can’t hide his humored smile though.
“What?!” Guy spreads his arms out wide, expression confrontational and tone even more so.
Jasper’s head tips back on a laugh.
†
“So you’re saying It’s fine to not have connections growing up.“
“Well yeah, but that’s the thing, I never really-“ Guy cuts himself off, blinking rapidly.
They’re strolling through one of London’s secret gardens at night, everything swallowed up by the black until it feels like everything outside their little bubble has been eaten- it doesn’t exist anymore. Somehow, they’d gotten onto the topic of their mutual upbringings through the brush. Jasper’s coven, his life before of which he refuses to speak of, at least right now, and Guy’s… Modest social circle growing up.
“I wasn’t outcast really, past a certain age I started preferring my own company anyways.”
“Right.” Jasper drones, a disbelieving look plastered over his face. “And you’re sure that that’s not maybe a coping mechanism built up to help you survive being isolated?”
Guy flounders for a moment.
“I- Well I don’t know, I just know that now I prefer being on my own and I don't find myself craving company until I actually have someone, y’know like-“ like you, he’d almost said. God, he couldn’t sound any less like a lovesick teenager if he’d tried.
From their topic of loneliness it’s not hard to picture Jasper as less of a lone wolf and more of a barn owl- fairly solitary unless they have a single companion. Silent, deadly killers and they hunt alone. Guy chews his bottom lip in thought.
“Are all vampires lone hunters?”
Jasper mulls the question over, rolling it in his mouth like a hard boiled sweet.
“Depends, but most of us prefer to hunt and live alone if outside of a coven, and these days covens are getting incredibly few and far between…” He sounds wistful, no, mournful. Guy feels a certain twist of guilt in his belly. He doesn't want to make the vampire upset.
“But that must be so jarring, to have some vampires be pack hunters and others be solitary- it’s surprising is all. Most species that form large communities struggle to survive alone.” It’s only a passing comparison, but Jasper gives him the stink-eye for it. It’s just on the side of playful, where Guy can safely laugh softly.
“Not like that- I mean like- humans are animals too. And I- It’s stupid to forget that, really self centred even, we’re obviously social creatures, we still got instincts. We even have the silly little rules we made up like penguins with their rock currency or elephants and their funeral rituals, we just got big heads about it and decided we’re too civilised to be animals anymore.” He gesticulates more with his face than with his hands, which are twisting idly the fabric in his pockets.
The silence that settles over them is accompanied by the faint humidity in the air, close to water. It’s strangely comfortable.
“Care for a stroll by the boats?” Jasper swings his arm in a wide arc in the path towards the docks.
“Mm, sounds nice. I like the water. I was mainly surrounded by shitty run-down buildings all my life, although the graffiti added a nice touch.” Guy laughs a little nervously, humor put on in an attempt to add substance. Nothing good ever came out of forcing it though, he winces. Jasper takes pity on him.
“I was mainly surrounded by greenery, sand and colourful stalls. It was nice. Big witch scene, too. And alpacas.” They both keep their eyes on the scenery, washed over with darkness to avoid how close they’re walking.
Not long after, the pathway winds down into a narrow tongue until it all opens up. It’s incredibly dark out, the black on black almost indiscernible from each other if not for the texture and colour shifts. Guy breathed in slow and long, dragging in the salt and a weird mineral funk that all bodies of water seemed to possess.
It’s so peaceful, so quiet that when Jasper’s gravelly voice kicks up again, it sends a slight jump to his shoulders.
“When I was a kid… About 10-12 maybe, I would run rampant through the streets, tumbling through bright coloured cloth, kickin’ up sand like a goddamn chinchilla in a dust bath. One of my coven members would scoop me up like an unruly dog and put me back where I should be… I never stuck around though.” There’s that mournful tone again, Guy tries to think of ways to take the sadness out as he stares at the sleepy boats, bobbing over the water. How do they stay afloat like that? Up and down, rarely betraying the equilibrium.
“Why not?”
“I wanted… More” There’s a thunderous sort of shame buried shallowly in the words, a grit to Jasper’s voice, his brow pinched and eyes covered by the night in the angle where he turns away from Guy.
“Wanted some sort of adventure, somethin’ or someone… I left and came back and had far less than I did. I’d ran away from my family because I thought I needed space, freedom, a story.”
He turns to Guy then. “I didn’t need anything but them. Losing them ruined me.”
The disagreement must show on Guy’s face, twisting and creasing, because the vampire laughs.
“You aren’t ruined, just different. Ruined is implying you’re… Undesirable or ugly, you’re not.” Guy tries to come across as mild, but his words sound more like pleas.
Jasper raises an eyebrow.
“I’m old, kid, not as handsome as I used to be.”
He shoots Guy a strange look when that only makes him scoff, the sound bouncing aggressively against the lulling sounds of the water against the stone.
“That’s not…” He scoffs again, frustrated, fingers and thumb coming up against his temples to pinch inwards. Colours explode behind his eyelids. “You’re not ruined- you wouldn’t call me ruined, would you?”
“No? Of course not, but you’re-“
“I lost her.” Guy stares, a hard stare challenging Jasper to compare or deny.
“I lost her and it tore me up inside every day. You know, I can’t remember her face? Not because of normal memory lapses but because I never looked at anyone's faces? I was weird Jasper, fuckin’ strange. No one wanted to talk to me and I don’t blame them, I couldn’t even look at my goddamn mothers face, so even at 10 I didn’t remember what colour her eyes were.” Fiery eyes fill with liquid gasolene, fuelling the fire in theory but drowning it, he stands sodden in the harsh cold air. Exposed.
Guy takes his sleeve to his eyes roughly, looking up at the stars.
“All I remember is her voice…” He sniffs, looking dead on into Jasper’s eyes and doesn’t dare to analyse what that look is. “Neither of us are ruined. Just odd.”
“Odd? I’m odd?” A teasing grin twists on the vampire’s thin lips.
“Yeah, you’re fuckin’ weird, man.” Guy laughs wetly, face breaking open in a bare smile. He catches Jasper’s shoulders softly shaking on his own laugh, a flutter in his chest.
After the laughter fades, Jasper casts his eyes onto the pathway they’ve paused on. The curved line of his nose sloping handsomely down his profile. Guy can’t look away.
He startles when Jasper looks up to meet his eyes, keeping him anchored within his own glacial blues, softening.
“I suppose you’re right. I just can’t help but… What was foster care like?” And just like that, Guy’s throat closes up. His hands tighten into fists in his pockets and the line of his back straightens, too much, then hunches back down. Trying to speak only prompts a click in his throat, a hoarse sound.
The world gets swallowed up, the sounds of the night falling silent, overtaken by his heartbeat in his ears. The wet in the air dries up entirely, his skin pulled taut and pained.
The major problem is that he wants to talk to Jasper, not out of a feeling of debt or obligation, but he feels with a fierce certainty that he wants nothing more than to truly open up. It might be putting himself on the chopping block, a bleating lamb in the jaws of the wolf… Guy finds he doesn’t think Jasper would bite down. He hopes.
But his body tightens up, he knows if he tugs at that spot in his throat he might vomit, spew like the world's worst champagne bottle. If his body won’t let him, maybe he can just invite Jasper into his head again.
The idea comes naturally to him, to let the vampire into his mind, not thoughtlessly, but knowing exactly what it means. He's informed of what this means for their relationship and how this will change it, deepen it the more it happens. Guy stares into the cavern and fastens the harness of Jasper’s fondness and protection around himself with a type of stubborn bravery and thinks do your worst.
Dragging Jasper in feels a little like falling down the rabbit hole from Alice in Wonderland, except it’s less like he’s falling for a while and more that he’s falling and falling and falling, for no longer than a melt into a lakes surface on loop.
Submerged and cold to the touch, Guy guides Jasper through waist-deep water, fingers skimming the surface every once in a while as if pushing aside paperwork to remember what's underneath.
They encounter mirror images of the expected isolation, a small child sitting alone in class, in the library, at lunch, on the swings.
A child wanders through the halls of school aimlessly as if he’s trying to memorise what childhood looks like before a teacher is scooping him up and bringing him back to the policemen, telling lies that his mother’s dead. She’s not dead, she wouldn’t leave him, she loves him.
Then, a child curled into a question mark in a bed that isn’t his own, surrounded by people he doesn’t know in walls he isn’t familiar with.
Unfamiliar walls with unfamiliar people ‘they’re your new family’. He knows what family is, it’s not this, not cold, never this cold, she never let him get so cold; even when the heating ran out she’d rub his arms and cuddle him in close.
He thinks the Anatole's would rather pour boiling water over his skin until he bubbled up like seafoam before they ever hugged him.
Maybe he smelled, or was he just that odd? Perhaps he was giving off all the wrong signals, but he’d never understood people. Never understood why adults got loud and scary and then got louder and scarier when you were upset by it, claiming nothing is amiss when spittle flies from their mouths like stray bullets. He found it was easier to scuttle away and hide than to stand and bear the scathing squabbles that seemed to shake the house, an earthquake tearing through his skull.
Guy startles when a cool hand dips two fingers into the pool and doesn’t so much swirl or ruin the image, more so call attention to the pile of trembling blankets in the cramped closet, a raise to his eyebrow when Guy slowly turned to look at his face.
“You didn’t have the space-“ the statement rocks the boat they’re in now, Guy unable to stand that water for a single second longer, seeping into every crack, greedily rushing into any pocket of air it can to swallow up and suffocate the area. “-to identify or regulate what you were feeling unless you were alone. That’s not preference-“
The boat starts to spin, a whirlpool tipping the lip of Guy’s side of the boat down, down, down until Jasper sits so far up he’s blocking the sun that spins with them, a solar eclipse blocking out the Anatole’s cold light. Water droplets fly in a circle, their hair flying off to one direction as they stare at each other; Guy’s wide captive eyes stuck on Jasper’s intense glare.
“-that’s survival.” Everything releases, the boat rocks dangerously still on even waters and Guy finds his face wet and his curls sticking to his forehead and the back of his neck. He’s completely sodden whilst Jasper has only wet his fingers from the shallow dip.
They sit in silence for a moment. Guy simmers in cool shame, the creeping temperature turns his fingertips and lips blue, his breath mists out from him, dragons breath.
He feels the urge to do something for Jasper, to give him something in return, Guy knows where he got that from, knows what fear based appeasement looks like. So he doesn’t give in to the urge, the crying between his ears to tear off planks of wood from the boat and offer them to the vampire, an example of his strange self preservation.
Guy sits still. Simmers until the crawling urge melts away. Nothing bad happens, no one dies, no one gets hurt.
Shivering from the cool breeze on his slick skin, Guy looks up from the painted grain of wood he was staring at, tracing the edges of the curved planks with unblinking eyes to glance over Jasper’s dry form. He can’t help the little trickle of resentment that doesn’t quite run off his back, an anger born from self consciousness.
Of course, that resentment is quickly washed away by an abundance of panic, splashed clear across his body when a bucket full of scarlet liquid is poured over Jasper’s head. Red running in rivulets down his form, not quite thin and not quite thick, an almost candy colour that assaults his nose all the way up to his eye sockets and the back of his throat with iron, iron, iron.
It’s blood. It’s blood all over him. Is Jasper thinking about his coven? Is-
“Why would you do that?!”
“Thought I'd paint the roses red since we’re going for an Alice in Wonderland vibe.” Jasper said with a startlingly casual air. Guy supposes he shouldn’t be surprised by a vampire being unfazed by a shroud of blood and yet… There’s a twitch to Jasper’s left lower eyelid, and a hardness to his pupils, where instead of the endless deep dark they seem to have a flat black quality to them. Shiny and fake like plastic doll eyes.
With a false calm, Jasper smears blood onto his thumbs then leans forward to press it onto Guy’s suddenly furiously closed eyes. Red seeps into his skin, this memory less a picture painted and more a record, pressed in fine lines and bleeding into every corner of the room, making the space feel both bigger than it is, and cramped with him and Jasper inside.
Dirt stained human fingernails, old human sweat offensive in his nose, almost blinding. He’s Jasper. After his coven’s death, he’s Jasper as a man.
He’s Jasper tearing through tall forests, immortal cities, small sleepy towns, tearing through iron skin, slashing veins clogged with magic, shooting from fur to flesh to heart to flesh to fur again, the pelt of a werewolf dragged into the light. Statements, threats, carnage in the pursuit of knowledge.
Who, who, who, who?
Who killed my fucking family? And how many do I have to kill for you to fucking tell me?
He’s after Vesel, but he doesn’t know that name yet, the name of the rat who got his family butchered like pigs. He’s gonna kill him, slow and public, it’ll be horrific, it’ll reflect his soul. Jasper dreams of eating the beating heart of whoever did this, just for the chance to replace his own organ, an aching open wound pumping rage and grief fiercely through veins that bulge under his ageing skin.
Guy opens his eyes, the soft skin of his lids flaking with dried blood. Everything’s too bright for a while, flashing vivid green and purple whenever he blinks harshly against the darkness, pained. Then they’re back out at the docks.
The soft lapping of the water guides him back, Jasper at his side and no longer staring out at the boats with him.
“Vampires don’t like me very much, or the other immortals for that matter… I’m unstable and untrustworthy. Made the wrong name for myself.” Jasper drawls softly, a flair used to cover up the raw wound underneath.
Guy lets the statement sit for a while. There’s really nothing he could say to that, Jasper doesn’t need his consolation, his placations, his scorn for any and all enemies. Slowly, he covers Jasper’s hand with his own on the metal barrier stopping them from falling steeply and drowning.
“I’ve always been a bit of a loner. So that’s how I can stand here and tell you that yes, Guy. It’s important to have people in your corner. You… I haven’t had many people in my life after my coven but you.” It sounds so stilted and awkward coming from Jasper, someone usually so suave and put together. He’s not necessarily coming apart entirely, more unravelling, peeling back a section of the layer he tightens to his bare bones.
A sudden urge for closeness overtakes Guy. His natural awkwardness and the fact that the last time he hugged someone was probably when he was ten impacts the way he reaches for Jasper with his hand.
Fingers loosely wrapped around Jasper’s wrist, sliding down into the heel of his palm, Guy can’t look up now.
“M’not gonna sit here and lie, say I don’t get what lonely feels like, y’know… Or that… Jasper, you’re important to me, I- I think I-“ He can’t say it. He just can’t say it.
A scoff wrenches his neck straight, looking straight at Jasper’s face, smiling and lit up like a goddamn Christmas tree… And Guy feels so devastated because he looks goddamn fond, and handsome, and hot and…
“Yeah Guy, me too.” Jasper smirks, a secret shared between them, their mirth reaching out and entangling with each other.
Jasper throws an arm over Guy’s lowering shoulders, pulls him into a sideways hug, the hand ruffling his hair. The calm that spreads through him, the affection and ease is not unlike what he imagines a beloved dog feels like, comfortable in an entirely animal way. He could fall asleep here, in the salty air, he thinks. The steadying arm around him, Jasper’s breath on his neck, his eyes on his face, blanketing the blush.
“That’s cute.” Jasper muses, teases really.
“Outta my head.” Guy shoots back, grin splitting his face in two.
“Yeah, neither of us were socialised right, puppy, but that’s okay- we don’t even like normal people, why would we need them?”
Guy chooses to ignore the new nickname, he fears if he tried to brush it away or complain he’d give away the shyness in his chest entirely.
“So we’re gonna run off together, drive down Route 66 and never look back, the classic American runaways is that it?” Jasper jabs him in the ribs for his snide comment, Guy squeals and struggles in the iron hold. Jesus.
In his fluster, his physical throat closes up again when he really does want to keep talking. This time, inviting the vampire into his head is as easy as cutting into softened butter.
This time, with an absence of water, they wander through great windy halls with impossibly tall ceilings, Guy taking Jasper’s arm in his mind and leading him around. He shows Jasper about miscellaneous memories of social slip ups and loneliness, this time less intense and more a comical art gallery. Well…
They find it funny enough, he doesn’t know how the general public would respond to his kicked puppy demeanor on a big screen whilst the odd pair snicker or loudly exclaim the familiarity in the dead silence, throwing popcorn at an image of Guy upset and alone.
“And here you’ll see the collection of times I made a contribution to a group joke and everyone went quiet and stared at me…Still don’t know what I said.”
“Hey, this was when Amber Baker took me under her wing as a joke in my teens. It wasn’t very mysterious of me to deer-in-the-headlights it whilst all her friends laughed at me from like three steps away as if I couldn’t hear them- they weren’t the brightest but we were all assholes at 13.”
“And over here we find the abstract painting of a ten year old not understanding why adults keep bringing him into rooms to ask him questions when he doesn’t get to ask any back. Brilliant use of isolated colour. Haunting composition.”
He makes Jasper laugh, and it makes the latent bird on an active power line in Guy’s chest flutter and sing but his chest has also grown tight, containing it, preventing true flight. Maybe that last one was too on the nose.
Jasper reads him like a well worn book and gives a considering look to this particular page.
“Let's go on a trip, I think there’s somewhere we can go that’ll be fun and help us with the 7-5-2.”
†
“Your definition of fun is a little different from mine!” Guy crows, a wobble to the hard set of his mouth, making way for a traitorous smile.
“This wasn’t part of the plan!” Jasper volleys back.
Guy just cackles, all too aware of the pins and needles pain in his feet from just seconds ago when they hopped from a height. Crashing onto an uneven cobbled floor had sent a stinging pain like pop rocks up his legs.
“You’re really fucked up, you know that?” and because it makes Guy laugh, the vampire keeps it going. “Wires all crossed, think it's all fun and games, sunshine and rainbows, huh? They’ve got honest to god pitchforks, Guy!” His words should be aflame, yet Jasper can’t hold off the sly grin that's been growing on his face since the witches found them out.
“We were poking around!” Guy’s head throws back, a giggle in his voice, giving an echo to his argument as he stares up at the stars. They move fast, heading in as convoluted a fashion as they can whilst running from an angry mob that’s very capable of harming both of them, mainly Guy, and yet he can’t muster up enough fear to wipe the mirth from him. His whole body sings with it, the pumping of his legs, the flush of his blood. The stretch and sting of his hands rhythmically clenching and unclenching makes him feel alive, as if his body doesn’t know whether to cup his palms to drag himself through water, or if he’s stepped into a boxing ring and he’s running the wrong kind of circles around his opponent.
Either way, he feels alive.
They’d been in a rut together, even after Jasper had so gracefully fallen behind into step with Guy, humoring the psychic with hands in pockets and a whistle on his tongue, Guy still felt as if there was an unspoken chart somewhere. A tally keeping score of who owed who and he hadn’t the time to really dwell on whether that was an actual feeling he got from Jasper, or if he was just used to transactional pressure. I got you, so now you get me.
He’d buried himself in research he and Jasper needed, hoping to prepare them as much as possible for the coven they were about to snoop on. He’d done as much recon as possible without showing his face, hoping his psychic fingerprint wasn’t distinct enough. Turns out it was. So now they’re running, and even though Guy can’t feel any presence or hear any malicious thoughts coated in magic, he knows better than to slow down and check.
Turns out they didn’t have the 7-5-2, nor did they know anything more than they did, and yet Guy couldn’t find it in himself to be upset or nervous or mad at all.
Jasper, observing the wild boy beside him breathlessly tearing through the night with a weightlessness they both know isn’t typical of him. He rolls his eyes at Guy, prompting a mirthful cry.
“Hey! If we were really in any danger, you’d’ve picked me up like a sack of potatoes and zoomed us away! We’re fine!”
“This is so bad, you’re codependent now.”
“We are codependent!” The smile is carved into his cheeks and palpable in his voice.
They run a little while longer, stopping their verbal volleying in order to preserve Guy’s human lungs from collapsing from either heavy breathing or laughter. Although he does feel a stitch coming on in his right side, prompting him to breathe deeper through the frantic, hitched gulping.
“Y’know if I had the fire gift this would be a real good time to turn the tides, although it’d be way more fun if we had pitchforks as well to fence with them or whatever- we’ll think about that next time.” Jasper muses, breathing not an issue so of-fucking-course he’s got nary a bead of sweat on his forehead.
Guy’s got more pressing issues to attend to. Mainly-
“You’ve got fire powers?!”
“Not me! I just said that! But some of us, yes.”
“Oh my god, like dragons?! Tell me dragons are real!”
“No, dragons aren’t fuckin’ real, good god, and we don’t breathe fire for fucks sake it’s- it’s a- like a summoning. With our hands or our minds, it depends- can we quit with the questions right now?” Jasper stresses, teeth bared to the night.
“But I'm the only one who needs to breathe between the two of us!”
“Exactly! Now shut your trap!” Jasper tries to swipe at Guy, a large obvious arc he dodges with a stupid giggle. God, he feels so alive. It sings through his veins, simmers under his skin and singes his nerve endings. He feels his synapses sparking off and Guy Anatole feels goddamn animated. The pounding of the ground meeting his feet, the swing of his arms that fights against the wind, his beating heart stubborn and fast. Jasper gives him a certain look, it’s charged with something that has him batting back with human hands, harmless. Maybe the vampire’s considering Guy’s mental wellbeing… Yeah.
†
Guy’s running. He’s crashing into brick walls, the consequence of the too-sharp turn he keeps making, then breaking through a crowd of friends bar-hopping. A grin spreads bitten lips taut across his teeth, the group cries at being shoved, Guy pays them no mind.
Legs burning and feet thumping against the ground, a low rumbling sound grows from a corner in his head- was it always there? It’s rattling deep in his mind, scrambling him and making his feet fall unsteady on the cobblestones. Guy feels it more than hears it, a primal feeling opening up in him at the sound and the smile wobbles, his right shin lighting up in pain at his constant unsteady run.
So, here he was, running away from Jasper like he didn’t want the man to keep him, all because Guy got a little bored. He’d been thinking intensely, restlessly about their run in with the witches. Had sat awake in bed with tired eyes, missing the animated feeling of being completely and utterly present and at attention, fingertips digging into the meat of his palms to staunch the buzz.
Therefore, like any sane person, Guy had waited until just before sunset to rush out of his bedroom door, tackle the stairs and squeeze out of the ground floor window. He scampered down the street chasing the last claws of sunlight scraping through the gaps between tall thin buildings, with pins and needles in his feet. With his panicked mind the lamp light made it all look decadent in black and gold.
It’s a while before anything truly happens, Guy switching up between a light jog to a sprint when he feels or sees something alarming, then slowing to more of a scamper than anything. Despite the lack of Jasper, Guy is always thinking of the next move. In an unfamiliar country, he is tapping into animalistic instinct and all his senses are heightened, exhilarated. He drags in oxygen like he’s greedy for it, like it’s his favourite meal, he loves this. He needs this air if he wants to get away.
Only he doesn’t really want to get away.
He can only hope the vampire picks up on that. Guy hadn’t wanted to tell Jasper beforehand, for fear that it might lower the stakes, make it fake and plastic in comparison to the raw chase he was now cultivating. When a prickling sensation spread across his brain, that growl, he knew Jasper was awake and looking. Already hard-pressed for air, Guy didn’t let himself laugh unnecessarily, just held the giddiness in his torso until the poking and prodding became more like a hook- Jasper trying to reel him in or pin him down to pursue.
The long feeler of that attentive, cool presence curling inside his head sent a strange jolt of excitement into Guy’s stomach- It was unsettling but not necessarily in a bad way, it prompted Guy’s legs to pump harder into the ground, run deeper into the city, a rabbit squirming into its burrow.
He doesn’t know the difference between lactic acid and painful arousal anymore, but a simmer spreads along his arms and chest, cascading down his sides as if he’s being doused in hot water that stings. Guy picks up the pace through a hidden garden until he breaks out through the other side- twigs in his hair and mud on his shoes.
When he first hears Jasper’s bellowing beck and call he becomes electrified, an exposed live wire finally shocking him with blinding white lights stripping him down to base instincts. He pelts it deeper into the dark. Jasper will have to come and take him.
Down this street, no, that one's too long, back up, back up. Run along the high street and down, down, down until Guy comes across a fairly populated, warmly lit pub hanging on the corner. Hide within the writhing bodies, the wordless mental activity, lost within the scent of sweat and tempting heartbeats. He’s sticking to the middle of the room but his patience is running thin when his head sings with the idea. What he’s doing is probably the vampire equivalent of rolling in the mud in the forest to kill your scent. A grin spreads across his face at the idea and Guy’s grown bored camping out here, so he takes off running out the door again, the cold hitting him like a wall he pushes through stubbornly.
He’s pelting through the dark like a madman, a strong flow of water running down a dried out river, when the end of a narrow alleyway opens up like a mouth, the new open space making him startle and freeze. The hair on the back of his sweat soaked neck perked like a deer in the silent meadow. The grass is too short and his legs are rooted to the floor until they’re kickstarted by a hiss inside his head, a strange presence next to the base of his ear, too close. Taking off in an unsteady sprint, a twinge of pain establishes itself along his shin. Lightning sears up and down the front of his leg, his mistake for straining to go faster, to keep up the pace.
Heart rabbiting in his chest, his lungs heave until the muscle feels stretched thin and sore. The air is too cold and it leaves his throat raw with a faint metallic smell that has him swallowing, choking on his breath.
Now that Guy’s taken off again from his brief pause, his lower back twinges and he tastes blood in the back of his throat. He hasn’t been chased since he was in high school, booking it away from bullies and adults wanting to scruff him. That same urgent sensation boils deep in his chest and straight down his spine to the tailbone as he flees. At some point, he feels the vampire draw closer as Jasper gives chase at different paces, steady prowls when Guy isn’t far in front, human sprints then sudden jumps at vampiric speed that rip a scream from Guy before Jasper lets him go; Escaping from between the beast’s great claws. The vampire’s laughter echoes up to Guy’s scurrying form, delighting in making his heart rate skyrocket- his pulse beating in two places, he’s humoring Guy.
It's the realisation that slows him first, the slight pins and needles sensation that creeps up his legs, leaving behind a numbness that unsettles him. It makes him stumble, from exhaustion then, sputtering out his wheezing throat when slowing down only makes it ache more- a taster session of what awaits him when he finally falters. He chances a look behind him when his femurs feel like they’ll slip right out of his hip sockets, only to find Jasper gone.
Completely vanished, head whipping this way and that, Guy just can’t find him. His legs slow without his permission. No, he swells, this is what he wants, you’re not safe here. His body doesn’t listen.
Helpless to obey his overworked muscles, Guy leans against a lamp post. A foolish place to stop, where the light hits him starkly, but he finds nowhere else for a few paces and he doesn't think he'd make even that length before his legs would fold up like a cheap lawn chair. An ache is spreading across his foot from the arch, but he tries to ignore it, sure that if he focused and whined it would enlarge the pain until his ankle imploded, sending bone fragments flying like spittle. At least, it felt like that might happen. Guy didn’t know, out of his mind with too-sharp eyes and ears picking things up that weren't there, his fawn-weak legs shaking.
He only allows himself to pant for a while. Greedily gulping harsh air before he’s pushing off the post. Taking off past the blanket of light is fleetingly terrifying, as before he plunges back into the dark he can’t see a thing until his pupils enlarge and he adjusts.
That’s when he settles back into pure flight, tearing through a world that slowly bleeds back into comprehension again. He comes to a crossroads not long after, head darting left, right, left, right, left, right until he’s kicking off, please be the right way. He’s never been this way before.
Flat pathways turn into cobblestones, turn into train tracks until Guy is stumbling his way through the brush, it catches at his hands, bramble thorns tugging on his trousers. He can faintly feel the blood slicking his knuckles, his knees. Jasper croons in his head, it travels from his upper spine to the underside of his skull, hooking under to make him falter.
Snapping his head in all directions, the darkness shifts, trees move and the wind laughs in his face at his swift-footed retreat deeper into the maze.
Running through the forest takes away half his stress in some respects. That animal instinct to hide within various textures in the dark where it’s thick with vegetation and when he finds that perfect spot. With Guy’s heightened senses keeping him sharp and his painfully hard cock in his pants tethering him to the present moment, he squeezes himself into a low hanging shrub. The underside of it balloons upwards, creating a space to crouch and watch the edges of his hiding place. Looking up, his eyes follow down windy, spindly branches that grow in size the closer they get to the stump Guy leans against, his lungs stuck in a staccato.
He wheezes, exhales forced out of his spasming lungs and eyes fluttering as his fingers dig into the dirt, curling towards his palms.
As with everything, there’s another side, and the other end of the deal is every sound of the forest sets him off, a gasp catching in his throat at the slightest sound, the smallest twitch, his eyes darting up, down, left, right from that bush to this dirt path and back again, all the while a zing of pleasure runs up his spine. Yes, this was what he was craving. He’s making the rounds like a prison guard except he’s inside a cell and it’s no panopticon and the prisoner wants to pin and fuck him on the floor. Yes, his flesh sings. His panting is displacing the top layer of powdery dirt and he’s not being fucking quiet enough.
Then the forest falls silent.
There’s a terrifying sort of awareness that fills one to an utter stillness, his lips close themselves like fortified castle gates and he makes like a statue- staying his heaving chest, lying in wait for the hunter to track his prey. Feeling like a sitting duck, Guy’s breath catches entirely in his throat, waiting for those cool fingers to wrap around his ankle and wrench him out. He waits for Jasper to gorge himself on him as if he were nothing but game, a quail or a pigeon, perhaps a pheasant running with nuptial plumage and lean flesh tenderised by fear.
Snap!
His heart plunges into the depths of his stomach.
A soft footfall onto a twig behind him has him foolishly scrambling to look behind him, Guy could hit himself as a teasing phantom-touch flicks his ear when Jasper predictably grabs at one of his limbs to drag him out. Guy tenses, free limbs tucking in only to be let go, sending him sprawling in the leaves and earth with a frightened cry. He scrambles, flailing limbs frantic in their mission to get him up and moving again even as they shake- he can almost hear his bones rattling with fright.
He doesn’t dare look behind him when he careens back into the green, his footfalls are loud as are the helpless, panicked keens. Guy knows Jasper is there, he doesn’t need to turn around, so his legs take him on a complicated path, zig-zagging and weaving between trees, tripping occasionally on a bulging root but never slowing.
Frightened out of his mind, Guy flinches hard when that growl in his head breaks out and booms out in the open air.
“Yeah that’s right, boy, keep running! Wear yourself out for me, make it nice and easy. I’ll find you, whether from the scent of your fear alone… Or better yet the scent of your arousal, you filthy boy!” Jasper cackles in delight, his voice telling Guy he's physically making distance but god, Jasper is so loud. Guy can’t help the wobbly grin that splits his face in two, nor the flush that stubbornly warms his cheeks against the bitingly cold wind.
Guy’s legs naturally fall into a gallop, green and brown and black blurring around him as he runs into windy natural pathways. Jasper's low growl croons in his head, taking up space between his brain and skull in a way that makes Guy’s eyes flutter and knees go weak under the threat and pressure.
Breaking into a clearing fills him with a great dread, he treads the outskirts of the shrubbery with arousal pooling low in his belly, making his wound-up gait even more awkward.
Ducking back into the forest only allows him a false safety, this he knows. He’s debating the probability of Jasper looking in the brush for him again when something trips him up. It’s then and only then that the vampire pins and looms over him, Guy’s entire flank pressed hard into the ground. His breath leaves him in a great whoosh, his struggling sounds falling flat with no air to let him sing. Jasper plays him anyway. Fingers trailing playfully, dangerously along Guy’s expanding and deflating ribcage. Smooths along the long line of his body to rest a branding palm, frigid and curling against the base of his supplicant throat.
When his breath comes back to him, a long deep gulp is heaved into his lungs, straining every inch of himself to inhale as relief floods him and he lets out a sudden whooping laugh. With Jasper crowded over him with an indulgent smile, Guy’s laughing hard and without restraint. He’s choking, hiccuping and sputtering his elation
Guy’s laughing hard and the damn vampire’s lookin’ at him weird like he’s never heard him laugh before. As if Jasper’s never seen him so happy and surrendered and now that Guy’s thinking about it, aside from quiet giggles and the occasional surprised snort pried out of him, he supposes he’s never laughed like he really wanted to.
With the crescendo of the chase dwindling his rabbitting pulse back down to a slow army march, the adrenaline leaves him aching in several areas. He winces and his laughter sputters into a pained sound at the movement of his palms, scrunching them into loose fists makes them sting from where he’d fallen and Jasper flits his eyes all about to see where Guy hurts.
Palms up, Guy offers the vampire to overlook the damage, soft tuts and gentle hands raise grit-sore skin to cool lips. Cool tongue. Guy’s surprised gasp is swallowed up by the blood now rushing in Guy’s ears. Jasper’s lips hover over his palms, tongue lapping at the blood beading at his scrapes like cranberries before it folds back up into his mouth; pink gums, white teeth.
Guy’s breathing turns ragged, the fabric of his lungs the torn bag of a vacuum cleaner, he’s wheezing out dust motes as a firm thigh slowly slots itself between his legs.
Guy can’t breathe.
“Beautiful boy… You’re so breathtaking when you chase after what you want. You’re honest like this, I like it.” Jasper’s soft praise and confession drags air back into his lungs with a ragged gasp. His lips tremble ever so slightly on a wheezy laugh.
“What was that all for, puppy?” Jasper probes, a curious smirk curling at the corners of his mouth.
“I just- felt like it-“ Guy breaks off into a giggle. “It was good! I liked it! God, I loved it, I feel so alive.” The smile establishes itself onto his face, it’s been a very long time since he’s felt so carefree, so joyous, that his cheek muscles are out of practice. They ache gloriously. He rolls his hips against Jasper’s thigh, just once to sate the growing pressure.
“‘Mmmm, that's nice, baby” Jasper purrs, a fond little mirthful smile as he sends his fingers carding through Guy’s hair, adding that last tip over from adrenaline high pleasure to carnal pleasure, a little unsure moan and big, big eyes are looking up at Jasper, is this okay? Am I okay?
“Oh baby, oh baby” That hawkish mouth shapes itself around an indulgent croon, hands planted on either side of the human’s head. Guy’s nerves light up like a Christmas tree under the blanket of condescension, of that dark surrender Jasper pulls out of him like a spool of yarn pooling at their feet; he’s gutted by his honesty on the floor.
Twin petals brush over his face, cascading down from the sturdy line of Jasper’s back bending to reach Guy’s cheeks, his browbone, the corner of his mouth, tasting the sweet breath. Guy writhes, turning frantic with a heady haze, pollen clogging up his airways as he reaches up, up, up like a flower to the sun. Grinding up into Jasper’s pelvis with feet digging into dirt, Guy sobs at the ebb and flow of pleasure, wanting to share it. He wants Jasper to feel it too.
Soon, they’re pushing their hips together hard and slow, Guy a complete unravelled mess, a pried open and swollen fruit underneath Jasper, the devouring mouth gnawing at the bitter pit. It’s worship and indulgence, eating the body and the blood, the saliva, the sweat. Not until it’s all gone, but just to make a mess of the pulpy flesh and dripping juice.
Jasper’s hips roll, snapping against Guy’s crotch just right, just enough to make him lose it a little.
“Ah, ah.”
“Shh shh- shhhh It’s okay just give in, just let me take-“
Guy lies there, practically humped into the ground until he’s sure once they’re gone there will be a permanent impression of himself in the soil, the remnants of his dying body left behind like a molted shell. His legs spread wider, inviting Jasper in closer. Back arching, locking ankles behind the vampire's waist, heels digging into the cool lower back to get him just that little bit closer, if Guy can get him closer then they’ll merge. Jasper looks down at him with a tilted head, a little considering, a little wondrous and ruts hard and swift between his legs, Guy’s cock jerking in pleasure within his clothes. Guy chokes.
Claws weave into his curls to pin more of him down.
“Nnnhhh, haahh” Guy leans his head back, wanting to get away from the strange noises he’s making.
“Thaaat’s it, good boy” Jasper praises as he nuzzles into his canted neck.
“Ah!”
“Yeah you would like that, wouldn't you? Give him a little praise and he’s gagging for it.” The words are pressed hot against his skin, a brand and Guy shakes his head in denial as his orgasm hits him too soon, making him delirious against the waves. Bottom lip wobbling, Guy doesn’t open his eyes through the soft golden fog in his head, clouds drifting in and out of his ears.
He comes back to himself in little sections, first he hears Jasper cooing over his endearing fragility, his trembling face through the aftershocks of pleasure. Then, he can feel his legs regain their strength, awareness floods into his chest and arms. Guy wakes up in a body made new by their sex, eyes peeling back gently to pitch darkness. The forest floods back to him in a widening radius, his skin coming up in gooseflesh and shivering against the cold.
It’s a startling awakening, to realise you’d entirely lost yourself in the embrace of an apex predator.
Panting together, Guy can’t help but to draw a line in the sand. A sheet of glass coming up between them, his mind closes off to Jasper. They’ve come to a crest and now the glow of his orgasm is replaced with the dropping sensation that can only come after a peak like that. Guy has glanced over the very top of the world and in coming back down the mountain, his popping ears and his frozen eyelashes repress everything for him.
With crawling skin, Guy gathers the guts still spilling out of him wetly and shoves it all back in, a false fullness that brings only sickness in the back of his throat.
Who’s to say Jasper truly cares? What separates this vampire from every other person Guy has entangled himself with? The ones that string him along, laughing in glee as he stumbles after them. The partners that just wanted his body, wanted to touch his pretty face because they had an idea about him and then when the idea shattered. When reality came crashing through and Guy had thoughts and opinions and more than just flesh and blood and a hot mouth, Guy was real and odd and suddenly he wasn’t desirable anymore.
Surely Jasper’s done now, surely this is when the vampire pulls away with the bragging rights to tapping that, getting a leg over the odd kid, fucking the hot new bombshell psychic. There’s a knot in his chest that’s been there since they started humping each other and it’s now that Guy realises with a wave of something wet and relieving like sadness, that Guy Anatole is afraid.
Trepidation, unrest, anxiety. It all curdles dark and syrupy in his stomach as he pushes all his attraction to Jasper into a box. Guy shoves it all back inside, builds a wall so high that if Jasper wanted to see inside his head he’d have to climb for days. He’s not falling for Jasper, that would be goddamn ridiculous, he’s got an addictive personality and the thrill of a chase just perked him up- he’s not in love. Guy Anatole is not in love. He’s goddamn horny and thinking with his dick.
Staring up at Jasper, watching his eyes shutter, watching the older man’s forehead wrinkle in confusion, his head tipping to the side, all Guy feels is pain. Glacial eyes turn cold and his back draws tight in suspicion.
Fuck.
Guy turns away, cheek to dirt, unable to look Jasper in the face. He’s hardly able to stare at his chin or shoulder, ignoring the vampire’s withdrawal, his hurt.
They make their way back to the Motherhouse, looking entirely indecent with wild hair, vacant eyes. Dirt clings to their sweaty skin that stinks of sex. Jasper murmurs beside him, looking forward when Guy turns to stare at him in profile.
“See, now I’m back to feelin’ like this was a set up.”
Guy doesn’t know what to say to that.
He doesn’t know much at all.