what_wings_dare | I'm good at this.

[ Blood and bile hit the bottom of the sink, another mouthful of blood wasted. The hunger is there, undeniably so, gnawing and clawing, burrowing deeply into nerves, cells and tissue, but his mind and nature are in direct conflict. One cries out for blood, the other refuses to acknowledge his lost humanity.

It's not even human blood. It's pig's blood, a gift from Frankie, deposited on his door step, after Ed had chucked the bottle of human blood at him the day before. "How dare you come here and show your fucking face--"

Frankie, Frankie, Frankie. Murdered by his own damned brother, who would've thought? Edward had told him to leave, to never show his face again, because weren't we brothers, Frankie, how could you do this to me? After I'd told you that I'd rather die than become a vampire? Who the are you?

Ed had yelled and cursed, blustering with anger that fell short. If only he could bring himself to hate Frankie. It would make things easier. Give him something else to obsess about, besides hunger. But try as he might, he can't because Frankie is and always will be his brother.

Always. Hah.

Fingers trembling, countenance paler than death, Ed slides against the sink cabinets and onto the floor in an undead heap. He gives into his exhaustion, buries his head in his hands. Barely a week since he's become a vampire, though it feels like a hell of a lot longer.

Seems like time passes slowly when you're falling apart. ]

[He can smell it from outside the door. Being a vampire, mostly it's not what all the old movies told you, but when it comes to blood super-fucking-powers are practically inadequate to describe it. He can smell it; he can hear the throbbing hearts of those who haven't turned when they're in the next room; can practically feel the contours of veins on his tongue from a distance. Maybe it's wistful thinking. Even so. If it was just an open bottle in there he'd be salivating, though he ate recently. The spoiled touch of acid, that's not appetizing. And it worries him.

It all worries him.

Which is why he's showing up, again, even though Ed has been clear about not wanting him here. The last thing he's going to accept, after saving Ed's goddamn life by taking it, is letting his brother starve to death out of stubbornness.

He pounds on the door. No need to announce himself. Who else would have come?]

[ The pounding is in perfect syncopation with his already unbearable headache. He ignores him until his head can no longer take it. ]

How many times do I have to say it? Get lost, Frankie.

[ This time he won't open the door. He won't accept any of Frankie's "get well" presents, won't listen to him try and rationalize taking his life. No more fucking excuses. There's also the problem of standing up and dragging himself to the door-- his legs feel useless and leaden, his hands are shaking, and yes, he's really that weak. ]

I won't see you. [ A voice, thin and ragged. ] I don't ever want to see you.

[ His face is back in his hands, but this time he's got a wrist pressed against his mouth, teeth ghosting over the artery, biting motions that never break the skin. Not yet, at least. It's soothing, like shaking your leg in a fit of anxiety.

He continues to ignore Frankie, but Edward forgets that even if he'd gotten the locks changed, the door was still made for a human society. The thicker wood, the extra bolts, the high-tech security systems? That won't come until a few years.

-- and now there's blood dripping on his pants, finally nicks an artery. ]

Edited 2014-06-19 03:30 (UTC)

[Ed has always been a stubborn son of a bitch. It’s served him well. Usually, Frankie knows, Ed is right to trust his own judgment; he’s always been the smart one, but these days it’s not about intelligence, it’s about survival. Mandatory turning is more than just a rumor, now; it’s only a matter of time, and even if Ed thought he could outrun it, Frankie knows better. He’s the smart one, but he’s also the principled one. He’d said more than once that he’d rather die than turn, without ever realizing what a self-fulfilling prophecy that was. There aren’t other choices, Frankie knows. Not here and now, and he couldn’t stand the idea of losing Ed.

The pounding stops, but only for a moment; when it resumes it’s harder, slower, the whole door shuddering with each kick. Frankie might be a slacker-- his army days are still years away-- but he’s always been strong, and between his undead state and his frantic purpose, there’s really no question how this is gonna go. It doesn’t take long for the wood to start splintering around the knob.]

You fucking idiot,

[he snarls when he manages to get it open, slamming what’s left of the door open. He’s furious. He’s furious because he’s terrified, but that doesn’t really show. No reason to try to play nice with Ed saying shit like that, anyway. The whole place reeks of bad blood.]

What did you do?

I'm serious. If I see your face again--

[ Bam.

There he goes again, barging into his home uninvited like some perfect metaphor for this whole fucked-up situation. What did you do? Frankie demands, and that bitter part of Ed can't help but laugh silently. He grew up taking care of Frankie, being the one to chide him at times, make sure he was all right -- money, a roof over his head, whatever he needs. Ed's never stopped taking care of his brother.

But now? The tables have turned. According to all those vampire movies, Frankie is his maker, which is weird and fucked up and Edward isn't going to think about that. Point is, now Frankie's taking care of him.

And doing shitty job at it. ]

You already murdered me, Frankie, at least have the decency to leave me the fuck alone.

[ However, his intrusion does stop Ed short form actually licking up the bad blood. He tries to push himself up quickly, make his way into another room where he'll keep on evading his brother. However, that doesn't go off quite as planned-- Ed gets up and immediately his legs give out, sending him palm-first onto the hard floor.

A week since he's turned, and he's had no more than a mouthful of blood. ]

[Frankie doesn't even dignify that with a response. He takes the scene in quickly: Ed, bleeding; the blood in the sink; the hollow look in his eyes.

It's not some kind of maker thing; that's just one more stupid myth, like turning into mist or fearing crosses. Frankie's barely seen the girl who did him-- one of his friend's girlfriends, though for all he knows she's an ex now-- and he doesn't feel any kind of obligation. He's taking care of Ed because they're brothers, because even if Ed doesn't know it this was the best thing he could do.

Not like any of that is appreciated.]

If you off yourself does that make us even?

[He mutters, though it's rhetorical, leaning over his collapsed brother to grab a dish towel, wet it in the sink, washing down some of the mess as he does. The air might as well be blood-soaked; the scent is thick and distracting, and frankly he doesn't understand how Ed can manage to puke it up, he must be starving, and it's everywhere. Frankie is only starting to enjoy the taste; mostly he takes it in beer, hides the taste.

He bends down to wipe up the spatters on the floor, to grab Ed's wrist and clean the ragged little wound.]

Have you kept anything down?

[ The same reason why he's upset at you, Frankie: he's clinging so tightly to his humanity, or the spectre of it at least, that his brain won't allow him to carry out what his instincts need. Now, his body is screaming at him, forcing him to face what he's been trying to ignore--

If he drinks, he gives in. A thin, superficial layer of humanity separating him from truly being a monster. ]

Only if you help me. [ The way he says that, you have to wonder if it's even a joke. ] You did it once, you can do it again.

[ Edward lets Frankie tend to the wound. He's like a rag doll, limbs limp, head lolled to the side. Ignore all of this, drown Frankie out, forget the hunger, the teeth and claws tearing and gnawing inside of him, forget you exist-- ]

Do we really burn in the sun?

[ Edward already knows the answer, but he wants to hear it from Frankie. ]

[At least Ed's not fighting him off. If he did, Frankie's pretty sure he'd still have his way and get this cleaned up, but it'd be a hell of a lot harder to get done. As it is, once he's got the worst of the blood cleaned up he ties the towel around Ed's wrist. Not likely to die of blood loss, after all; there's so little and it's so sluggish. Just gonna leave him hungrier.

You dumb fuck, Ed.]

Yeah. You don't wanna try it, trust me.

[He pulls out a chair.]

Think you can sit up?

[He asks, assuming Ed can't but leaving him to try anyway as he goes back to the sink. It's funny, Frankie's never been this efficient, never been this caring, but in a pinch here he is. And of course Ed doesn't see it like that, only sees-- what? Torture. Gloating, maybe.

He washes out the glass, eying the pink-tinged steel of the sink thoughtfully.]

Have any coffee around here?

[Belfast is cold in the winter; it's the kind of cold that always sees Eden bundled up tightly, her scarf up against her chin, her hands in a jacket that's one size too big - only because it belongs to Moore - and a huge pair of boots.

She's sitting at the train station.

She doesn't really know why she's sitting at the train station. Ever since she left the City, ever since she let Frankie go home, she's come here, once a day, usually for the noon train from Dublin. Every day, she sits and waits, and leaves back to the hospital, or sometimes to the pub, quiet and unhappy.

She has a coffee in her hands, and a pair of fingerless gloves, and she keeps watching the people file out, like maybe one of them will be familiar, but none of them are. Moore thinks she's crazy.

She's not crazy.]

[She's a lot of things, but she's not crazy.

There's nothing he wanted so badly as to go home with Eden-- home to a world that's not on the cusp of fiery rebirth, home to something other than a swift death-- but what he needed was to go back. It hadn't been an easy decision for either of them. At the end, all he could say was that to be the kind of man who was worth the life he'd led in the City, he couldn't leave Ed alone to be torn apart in his place.

He'd accepted that, he'd expected it. Finding himself bleeding out in a vacant lot in Queens had come as a shock, and from there it had been sheer luck that he'd survived. Luck, and maybe the dregs of borrowed magic; Eden's and Amory's and the City's all in one. Once they'd gotten him stable it had been luck and bureaucratic indifference that set him loose; Frankie Dalton in a world with no Frankie Dalton in it, a world without Subwalks and blackout curtains.

Luck and work and the kindness of strangers had eventually gotten him some semblance of a life, and from then it was a matter of work and time, ridiculous and aching time, until he could cross the ocean to look for his wife, knowing nothing more than the city, knowing that would be enough.

Coming off the train maybe the face isn't that familiar after all. He's unkempt and unshaven, tanner than he used to be and older. He looks, rightly, like he hasn't slept in a week, like he hasn't eaten anything while standing still in an absolutely shamefully long time.

But maybe he looks enough like himself, glancing around him like the crowd's gonna part and point him in the right direction.]

[It doesn't help, of course it doesn't help, that she is not always the easiest person in the world to find. She has a mobile, of course she does, but the only people who have the number are the other technicians at the hospital, and Moore, of course. And some of her old crew, because she's still in a way the de facto healer and drug runner for that lot of arseholes.

Still.

She takes a sip of her coffee and it burns her mouth, and of course that's when she sees him. It takes her a minute, because he looks unkempt, like he did in a way before her, broken and a little lost. He's looking around the train station with that expression on his face that says that maybe he's still trying to figure out what it means to be human, and he's wearing her bracer, the one she made him.

She drops the coffee.]

Frankie-

Frankie!

[She yells it and it's a bit drowned out by the hum of people, but she's pushing past them, all five feet of her demanding space, demanding that she be allowed-

She slams into him, partly from momentum, partly pushed by someone behind her.]

Frankie.

[In the City, over the years, he'd gotten good at being human; it's harder to be human in a world like this one, so close to his but not quite right, years shaved off his history. His parents' house was there, painted the wrong color and lived in by strangers. It's better that way, maybe, not coming face to face with some other him, some other disappointed and neurotic Ed, but it means he's got no one. That's the hard part.

The first time she calls him he half disbelieves it, he doesn't look. Her voice echoing in the back of his mind, it's nothing new; makes sense, here. He's half turning when she calls again-- mostly to assure himself that it's not her, things can't be that easy-- but suddenly there she is knocking him half off his feet.]

Eden! [He barely takes a moment to steady himself before he grabs her, folding her close against himself. He's still wearing that silver chain, his ring dangling from it, the metal warm against his skin.] Jesus Christ, how?

[She doesn't reply at first, her fingers are in his coat, in his shirt, they're clutching there tightly for a long moment and she's breathing him in - breathing in the smell of him, so familiar, so precious. She reaches up, her fingers in his hair, and it's longer but the texture is the same.

People are starting to give them space, because this is clearly a Reunion of a magnitude that isn't seen often.]

Frankie.

[She says it with a whisper in her tone, like maybe she's still trying to believe he's here. She's here. They're both here.]

I'm a prophet, remember?

God-

[She whispers that too.]

Did you replace me? Is there a girl on the train with you?

[Maybe it's a serious question, but she wants to know, before she kisses him, she wants to make sure that he's hers.]

[He's fine, letting her take her time to reassure herself he's real. He's doing the same, resting his cheek against the top of her head, fingers on her shoulderblades like he's afraid she'll vanish if he doesn't hold tight. Fuck, fuck, he's missed her every moment since he woke up in the hospital but the ache is all that much sharper now that it's finally eased. He chokes a little laugh when she reminds him that she's a prophet, and--

--and then that kind of ruins the moment for him.]

What?

[How could he ever, what girl could ever, he doesn't even look, not anymore.]

Of course not!

Good-

[She says it fast and then she's on her tiptoes to kiss him on the mouth, her hands in his hair, all her weight against him. It's lucky she's so tiny.

She finishes the kiss and she's crying, and then she hits him a little]

Fuck-

[It's like air to a drowning man, her kiss; he'd pick her up to keep her close but he's too rapt, he's been waiting, it feels like lifetimes that he's been waiting, and in the moment it's worth it, it's all worth it because here they are.

He almost winces when she pulls away, he does when she slaps him. Fuck.]

I had to, you know I had to.

[He's not letting her go, his hands aren't budging from her shoulders.]

I know-

[She kisses him again, and again]

God, I kept your fucking ring, I'm so fucking in love with you-

[She's crying and people are staring but she doesn't seem to mind.]

Are you hungry?

[He can't dig up words to answer so he kisses her instead, on the corner of her mouth through her words, lifting one hand to brush the tears off her cheeks, like he needs to squeeze everything into this moment. The crowd is parting around them; it could be entirely gone, he wouldn't notice.

Finally she asks that, and all he can do is laugh, suddenly and wholeheartedly, because it's so her, fumbling to clasp her hands in his.]

[She holds tight to his hand, and presses her head against his shoulder. It finally feels right, it finally feels like she's whole again. She hadn't realized how gutted she had felt until today, until she was back with him. Like part of her soul had gone missing.]

There's food back at me flat.

[Choosing to die had been the easy part. He'd already come to terms with that before the City, in that split second when he'd told Ed to run. He's never regretted it. But choosing to leave her?

It was right, it's what he had to do, but fuck, it tore him apart. He wasn't wrong, but that doesn't mean he's not sorry.

He nods, a little shaky still, and grins like an idiot.]

Fuck, I miss your cooking.

[Along with everything else.]

[She tightens her grip on his hand.]

You look like you haven't eaten in a month.

[She doesn't doubt that this might actually be true.]

Airplane food, soup kitchens, hospital a while before that. Shit fast food now and then.

[For years before that he'd lived on Eden's cooking, and before that it had been nothing but blood. Hell of an adjustment.]

I think there's breakfast left over at home.

[It's her day off, and Moore is usually out of the flat by this time]

You're a lifesaver.

[He's grinning at her like old times already. For the moment he's not even thinking about Moore or about the ways this is going to get hideously complicated.]

I can't believe you found me like that.

[She just holds his hand tightly and she guides him.]

I'll always find you. Don't you know that by now?

[If he's anywhere she can find him, she'll do it.]

Good to be reminded.

[He says that a little bit quiet, gentle. Fuck, it's gonna be a long day because he isn't going to let go of her, not for a second, not if he doesn't have to.]

[She doesn't say anything for a minute. She just holds tightly to his hand, and then pulls it up to press her mouth against his fingers, for a moment, just a moment.]

So, you do need to know, I'm living with Moore.

[He stops short. Fuck, he ought to know that.

Maybe he should pull his hand away, but he doesn't have the heart to do it, he just looks stricken.]

Frankie!

[She says it and maybe it's a little more sharp than she intended, but she's still holding on]

You knew that, I warned you, didn't I? Before we left, I said, if you were going to go die-

[Maybe she said that. Maybe she just wanted to.]

[She's the only thing he's been thinking of, he's been drawn like iron to a magnet since he woke up here, when he shouldn't have woken up at all. Day after day after day tracing his scarred shoulder with his fingertips and thinking, and not thinking, just wanting.]

I shouldn't have come.

[That was the deal, wasn't it? The City was meant to be all he had.]

I'll fucking punch you out, you fucking arsehole.

[She says it and she means it.]

[She might have to.]

It's not fair. You know it's not.

Not fair to who? To Moore? Since when do I give a flying fuck about what's fucking fair?

You know what isn't fair? Having your fucking husband leave you to save his fucking brother, that's not fucking fair.

[She is getting very clearly angry - there is no doubt that punch is coming soon]

You think I was fucking happy about it?

[She's the only good thing he's ever had.]

You went! You went even though you didn't have to go, you left me, and I let you, so don't start up on what's fair-

[Oh, people are looking, now]

I couldn't have left him to fucking die!

[Let them fucking look, he doesn't give a damn.]

What the fuck are you gonna tell Moore, huh?

I told him I was married, didn't I? I told him and he fucking got it, better than you did-

[She's starting to hyperventilate now]

How could you fucking do this to me? How could you fucking do this to me?

Eden.

[He's not sure if he's pleading or trying to reason with her or trying to calm her down. Or maybe he's just saying it while he can, like he's going to vanish.]

It wasn't supposed to be like this, you fucking know I didn't mean it to be like this.

And here we fucking are, and you want to leave-

What the fuck did you think was going to happen, Frankie? That I would sit and mourn you forever?

Course not.

[He's not even really trying to not look petulant.]

I didn't think I was gonna make it out of that fucking room.

Then act like a fucking man about this, will you?

I'm fucking trying to. I'm trying not to tear things apart for you, here.

Don't be fucking daft?

[She hits him again, but less hard.]

[Christ, what a mess. He glares for a moment, not exactly at her but sort of in her direction, without a damn idea what to do.

So he leans in to kiss her again, if she lets him.]

[ n a m e ; ]	Frankie Dalton
[ c a n o n ; ]	Daybreakers
[ g a m e ; ]	saw it through the end @ poly_chromatic

I'm good at this.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject