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The air is thick, not with fog or smoke or ash, but with tension. Palpable. Pyro could feel it as it lingers. The forest keeps getting smaller. The fights amongst the vampires keep getting longer, more intense. There's a few times where Pyro's caught the site of Scott holding a stake. He's not stupid, despite most people's claims. He knows who it's intended for. Scott knows what words to use to cut through him, and soon Scott will be the one to stab through his heart. A bitter irony. The same one who brought him into this undead life will be the same one who takes him out. It's almost poetic, if poetics were something that Pyro cared about he may consider it a final sweet sentiment.
He's never been one for flowery prose either.
"So you're here to kill me?" He says. There's supposedly no one else around, so if anyone else were to see him it would look like Pyro were talking to himself — like he had truly lost it. Though he does fear that in this entire process he has lost it. Though what it is he couldn't say. Maybe a handle on reality, a piece of his soul, the remaining humanity that he had when he left home. What it is, it's long gone and far out of his reach.
A gentle breeze sweeps over the lake, fish pop up and down — the trees rustle as they roll thick notes of pine through the air.
He stares at the cloudy day time sky. He likes days like this, where he can walk about and not fear the fearsome burn of the suns wrath. Where the saints don't condemn him for his sin by forcing him to hide away. He's a monster though, so he deserves it. Two deaths on his hands. Two deaths and counting. The lingering understanding of what he can do, and what he would do if he made it out alive somehow. Killing has become his addiction, and it's perhaps the only thing he's ever truly excelled at. The monster that he is… he laughs under his breath. The clouds block just enough of the sunlight to allow him to walk about freely, but allows just enough through so that he can see without the night vision kicking in.
Visibly, there's no one else around. But just as Scott can feel him, he can feel Scott. He knows his sire by feel alone, knows the gentle steps taken by an invisible individual. He knows when there's someone else around. And he knows that the person here with him is Scott.
Pyro lets out a half hearted laugh, covering up for awkward silence as Scott refuses to reveal himself. "I suppose to you I must deserve it." The saints cast him aside, and so to does Scott. He is only valuable while he is useful, and he has outlived his use this time. He cannot follow simple instructions. He's a curse more potent and vile than vampirism. "Maybe I do deserve it." He turns facing the direction he hears the footsteps. "Grant me one boon before you do so."
If he were to die he would wish for a swift end. He'd pray that the stake does not hurt too terribly. "Won't you be so benevolent as to do that?" He stares straight on at Scott, watching, waiting.
Enough time passes that the invisibility wears off. Scott waves his hand in vague dismissal. "I suppose I could do that. What did you want to know?"
Jealousy is a disease. It's a disease that rotted his core, that ate away with his thoughts. It's jealousy that sent him into a murderous spiral time and time again. Jealous. Pyro is a jealous fool, and he always has been. Czeslaw had it coming, and so to did Avid. Jealousy, just because he has named that wretched feeling does not make it better, it does not make it go away. It does not soothe his mind or wash the blood from his hands.
"What… What did Avid have that I didn't? What did he offer that I couldn't? What made you like him more than me?" It's all Pyro's been able to think about, the one thing that he stewed over. Obsessively he thought about all of his actions and all of Avid's complaining — comparing himself to the spoiled brat. The town and coven babied that boy far to much for what he was. Owen had the right idea.
The right idea that would now get Pyro killed.
Scott sighs, stepping ever closer. Pyro refuses to back away, he refuses to bend a knee — not now. Not to Goldsmith. Scott snorts, dragging a sharp nail underneath Pyro's jaw like he's done so many times before, this time feels like malice. There's no comfort in the familiar action.
Shaking his head Scott draws blood. Blood that Pyro meticulously hunted for. It's punishment, wasting such a precious resource like that. "He cared for me," and despite Scott saying it with conviction — Pyro could see the flicker of doubt as his expression falls for just a moment. "Were you anything more than scared?"
Pyro grabs onto Scott's wrist as his claw continues to sinks into Pyro's flesh. "If you think Avid was genuine then you're mistaken. He was a coward in life, he was a coward in undeath. You just couldn't see through his mania and having a shiny new toy, could you?"
"Watch your tongue, childe," Scott hisses, snapping as soon as Pyro's mouth fell closed.
It stings, and his instincts yell at him to bow his head to submit, apologize, submit, beg, apologize. Instead Pyro laughs, it bubbles into something big and bright and insane. "Why should I? You've signed my death warrant already. What happened to needing numbers, to killing the brood being a bad idea? Or is it only a bad idea when it's not yours?"
The claw digs deeper, Pyro winces but he doesn't let Scott pull away, he keeps Scott's hand in his vice grip. If he's dying today, which he's certain he is, he's going to ensure that at the very least Scott has to reconcile with his mistakes. That he has to live knowing that he's a hypocrite hiding behind a guise of charm. His boasting about being the top of the food chain means nothing when he's stupid.
Despite those thoughts, there's still a voice in the back of his head weaseling him. He's bad for thinking that. Scott must know how bad he's been, an Pyro will surely be punished for it. The beads of blood that fall onto soft sand is not enough. He's spited his sire. That's his sire. He needs to be good and right and stand by his sire. He needs to help his sire.
The stake in his satchel is as heavy as the one in Scott's belt. If he killed Scott could he ever get over himself? Could he ever come to terms with the instincts that would guilt him into oblivion over the obvious decision? Did he even want to kill Scott? Or did he just want to prove that he isn't worthless, that he's capable of acting on his own with intention. He's not just a sheep. He's more than a follower.
Sometimes he wishes that the waters drowned him before he could have been turned.
Scott doesn't have anything to quip back with, doesn't have anything else to say. He stares at Pyro through narrowed eyes. They stand there in silence, deafening silence. Not the crash of waves against a sand bank , nor the rustle of the trees. It's silence. More silent then the night Pyro died, more silent than the moment when Pyro told Scott about Avid's death.
"When did you get nerve," Scott asks.
Maybe it's nerve, maybe it's a general lack of self preservation. A need to prove the masses wrong, a need to prove to himself that he's not useless. If he can do one thing, then at the very least he will attempt to do it well. He will attempt to do it without regret.
Pyro shakes his head as best as he can. "I'm not going to die silently. I want the truth, Goldsmith. Why Avid? Why not me?" Jealous, till his bitter end Pyro will be jealous.
How could he not? How could he watch everyone else get everything he's ever wanted, and not be jealous? How could he watch their happy smiles, their joyous laughter, their elation, and not get jealous? He's a jealous creature. He watches their accomplishments, watches as they win. And he's left to rot on the side. He's been awarded every opportunity, every privilege. He should be happy, but he's not. And he never will be.
"You were my first fledgling in over 600 years, Pyro," Scott's face is kind but his words are cruel — evading the answer. "That makes you special." Special, Pyro's never been special to anyone in his entire life. He's never been precious or worth killing for. Evading the answer.
Pyro throws Scott off of him, and like that the world breathes. The winds once again rustle the leaves, a wolf in the distance howls a melancholy melody. There is death in the air and every creature could feel it. Every monster knew their fate. It's the cycle of life, isn't it?
"I don't get you! I don't understand you! You were constantly fighting with Avid, constantly squabbling — he tried to kill you! He tried to out us!" Pyro's breathing picks up though it doesn't need do. He's panting, his words frantic, falling from his lips before he can properly think. "Why was I not good enough for you, sire?" The honorific slips from his tongue like a curse. He pulls on that invisible thread that keeps them bonded together. Sire and childe, the most twisted of relationships. "Why am I never good enough for anyone? For you, for Oakhurst, for my family."
Understanding dawns on Scott's sordid face as he laughs under his breath. Pyro falls to his knees, exhausted, ready for the end that has always been inevitable for him. He wants to kill Scott and beg his forgiveness, and plead for his life all in the same breath. He wants to damn Scott to the special spot reserved in hell for him, while asking the saints to give Scott a second chance.
He hates Scott. But he'll never stop loving him, in whatever twisted sick way he has. He's been scared, and grateful, and angry, and now Pyro is tired. He's tired, his eyes slip closed and his arms hang heavy at his side.
There's a stake in his bag reserved for Scott, he even carved his sires name on it. There's a stake in his bag that he will never use. He never had the guts for it. He was always going to die like this. Wasn't he? A monsters death, for a monstrous person.
Scott kneels down, placing the stake right above Pyro's heart. "I don't like it when other people touch my things, much less when they break them." Pyro lets out what very well could be his last breath. He's almost excited for it, for the bliss and the nothingness. If the saints are real that means that the afterlife is to, but he hopes he can just… not for a while. He hopes he's granted that single kindness in his meaningless life. "Would you kill him again?" Scott asks.
Pyro knows the answer that will perhaps save him, earn favor with his sire again — fix the mess he's made. He also knows what his answer is. Those are two different things, and maybe he doesn't want to be remembered in that way. Maybe he doesn't want a lie to be the last word upon his lips. Maybe he wants to live just one moment in truth.
"No. It doesn't matter how many times Owen offers, how many times I live through it — I'd say yes. I'd kill Avid as many times as it would take to get you to look at me." Not just as his first fledgling, but as his equal — as someone capable.
The stake falls, slipping between the mere inches between the two of them. Then, as though the night did not happen, Scott stands up. He appraises Pyro with new eyes, as though seeing him for the first time — finally doing more than just looking through him.
"You're not going to kill me?" Pyro asks, his voice soft and unbelieving.
Scott tilts his head, taking a step back. "No, I don't think so." Then, after a moment he adds. "At least not yet." And before Pyro can get in another word, Scott bats off.
Leaving Pyro alone, like how he always knew he'd be. Alone, and not quite alive but not quite dead. He buries his head in his hands, and he weeps. He weeps because he does not know what else to do. He has not the courage to end his own monstrosity, and he has not the courage to end Scott's reign of terror.
Avid lived in undeath as he was in life, a coward.
Pyro lived in undeath as he was in life, a coward.
He wonders if there was ever truly a difference between them at all, or if Pyro just as always pulled the short end of the stick. Rotten luck to follow a rotten man.