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There are rules. Especially so, for people like Jannik.
The most important ones aren’t written anywhere, though. Still, Jannik learned them early, the same way he learned footwork, and discipline, and how to keep his face blank under pressure.
Don’t show your teeth. Don’t react too fast. Don’t let them see you noticing things that they can’t.
It’s not exactly about hiding what he is, not really, or not anymore, at least. The world has decided it can tolerate vampires, that it’s no longer a condition, just a genetic mutation. More like green eyes and less like cancer. But there are still regulations, committees, and carefully worded inclusion statements with every step Jannik takes.
The tour has entire protocols now: medical screenings, dietary oversight, approved supplements shipped to every tournament ahead of time. Even vampire-friendly sponsors.
Jannik never truly understands the circles they orbit around him, but it’s the only way forward if he wants to play tennis. There's no other path for someone like him, no vampire-only tour that will take him. If he wants in, he has to submit.
So he signs the contracts. Smiles when they ask him to, and wears the sunscreen they developed specifically for players like him: high-density and faintly tinted, it leaves a dull sheen on his skin under certain lights. Performance neutral, they assured him. Everything is always performance neutral.
The blood packs his team orders are measured, logged, and delivered in sterile containers with barcodes and tracking numbers, like any other regulated substance. Animal-based, always, and very diluted, to keep him right on the edge of advantage. It’s enough to maintain baseline function, but never to feel good. Never enough to be stronger than the rest. Even so, he still gets tested randomly several times a month.
Like everything else, Jannik learns to get over it. He has nothing to hide. If the world wants to believe him human, then that's what he’ll be.
—
Jannik grows while building his life around predictability. Early practice slots before the courts fill and the air grows thick with bodies and noise, controlled environments, controlled inputs. His team knows not to surprise him and not to push unnecessary contact, not to make a scene if something goes wrong. Still, he’s careful.
Even the cameras are manageable, once he learns to understand them. He figures out where they like to linger (the unnatural sheen of his eyes, the paleness of his neck, the flash of his crooked teeth), and what they look for (his stillness against chaos, his quiet against louder personalities). It plays well. Mysterious, they call him. Sometimes, when they’re feeling kinder, even focused, instead of cold or reserved.
Jannik makes sure that they don’t see the calculation behind the veil. The constant, quiet filtering of everything around him: sound, scent, movement. All input gets reduced, sorted, and dismissed into something more ordinary-looking. He has to ignore most things, if he wants to blend in.
Jannik is twenty years old, and someone splits their lip during practice on the next court over. He hears it before it happens – the shift in breath, the stumble, the impact. Smells it a second later, sharp and metallic, cutting through the synthetic scent of the court.
He doesn’t look. Instead he adjusts his grip, resets his stance, then sends the next ball exactly where it needs to go. Off to the side, Darren catches his eye, then nods, and returns his attention to the tablet he’s holding, because he knows Jannik won’t be fazed by this.
Control is a habit born out of repetition, and it works. Right up until it doesn't, of course.
“Hey.”
Jannik turns before he can stop himself.
Carlos is leaning against the net post, like he’s always been there, like he belongs in every space he steps into without even needing to think about it. That’s the first key difference between them – a certain effortlessness Jannik has never managed to achieve, something you just have to have been born with. The sense that he’s lacking something unsettles him more than it should.
“You’re going to make a hole in that spot,” Carlos says, nodding toward the baseline. There’s a smile there in his lips, easy and unguarded. It never looks rehearsed when it’s aimed at Jannik. “You’ve been serving for like, an hour.”
Jannik starts gesticulating around himself before he can even think about it. “I’m, you know. Practicing.” Suddenly, the racket feels awkward in his hand, even when it shouldn't. It should be a natural extension of his arm, an intrinsical part of him at this point.
“Yeah, I can see that.” Carlos laughs, and the sound reverberates against the court, in Jannik’s eardrums. There’s no edge to it. Just casual conversation.
Jannik doesn’t know how to respond. So he resets again, bounces the ball once, twice –
But Carlos doesn’t leave, even when most people probably would’ve. After all, there’s an unspoken distance people keep from Jannik. It’s not fear, exactly, just… An awareness. A line most people don’t dare to cross, just in case.
Jannik serves. The ball cracks cleanly across the court, and, secretly, he feels relief that it didn’t go off flying where it shouldn’t.
“Show-off,” Carlos says, smiling, but there’s something else underneath his words. Something sharper.
Jannik exhales slowly.
“You have your own court, you know.”
“Yes.” Carlos steps closer instead of away, circling slightly, like proximity is something he gravitates towards by instinct. “This one’s better,” he jokes.
Jannik becomes aware, suddenly, of everything at once.
The heat of the sun – not burning, muted by the layers of sunscreen on his skin and the cap screwed firmly on his head, but present. The faint hum of distant conversations, the rhythm of Carlos’ breathing, still a little elevated from his own practice.
And then something else, something that’s hard to categorize. It makes him stop.
Carlos notices. “What?”
“Nothing.”
It’s not nothing. It’s –
Jannik frowns slightly, just enough to feel it. The sensation is faint, almost imperceptible then, but there all the same. He’s aware of Carlos in a way that feels… disproportionate.
He forces himself to look away, to focus on something else, anything. His grip, the lines of the court – but the awareness doesn’t fade. It lingers in the air like dust you can never truly air out.
“You okay?” Carlos asks.
“Yes.”
“You hesitated.”
“I’m just adjusting my serve.”
Carlos studies him for a second longer than necessary. Jannik feels it again under the weight of his stare: that pull, faint but insistent. Not exactly like hunger. He knows hunger. This is –
He cuts the thought off, then serves again, harder this time. The thwack of the ball against the court feels like a dismissal.
Carlos laughs softly. “Okay, okay. I’ll leave you alone,” he says, but he doesn't sound like he means it. Jannik doesn’t watch him go, busying himself with the balls.
He waits until he can’t hear Carlos’ footsteps anymore, and then he drops his shoulders. He presses his tongue briefly to the inside of his teeth, checking, grounding. Normal. Everything is normal.
He has trained for this, lived with this his entire life. He’s in control, and one person doesn’t change that. In the grand scheme of things, Carlos doesn't matter.
—
There are patterns on tour, and Jannik enjoys patterns. The same cities, the same courts, same old routines trying to dress themselves up as something new every time, fitting themselves into worn, ill-fitting costumes.
And, increasingly, Jannik also starts facing the same opponent.
It starts with quarterfinals. Different tournaments, different surfaces, but it’s always the same moment: Jannik walking onto court, eyes forward, mind already narrowing into focus, and then –
Catching sight of Carlos across the net. By then, Jannik has already started to consciously prepare for it. For him.
He drinks his allotted amount of blood exactly on schedule. Never early, never late. He keeps his distance before matches and limits unnecessary interaction, both with Carlos and his team, even though Jannik likes them. But clinging to control is easier like this.
The only problem is that Carlos isn’t very predictable.
“Again?” he says the first time they meet like this, smiling like it’s a coincidence instead of a pattern forming, metal chains slowly inching towards Jannik’s ankles.
Jannik nods once, even manages to return the smile. But throughout the match, something is… off. Not his game per se – he’s precise, clean, exactly the way he should be. Rather, it’s everything else that's wrong.
Carlos moves differently than other players. Always looser, reacting almost instinctively, adjusting mid-point in ways that shouldn’t be possible. It forces Jannik to track him more closely, to anticipate, to calculate. To watch.
By the second set, Jannik is aware of things he shouldn’t be, like the exact hitch in Carlos’ breathing after a long rally, or the sweat spreading across his skin under his clothes, soaking the fabric. Worse still: the throbbing pulse at his throat when he tilts his head back in between points. Jannik always tries to look away.
And then their quarterfinals start morphing into semifinals, and, eventually, into championship finals. The rankings shift, and soon their names start appearing together more often in headlines, predictions, comparisons. They call it a rivalry. Jannik allows them to, because it’s a simple enough word, and it feels quite contained.
But, in his head, the sensory intrusions get worse. It’s a gradual process, a needle poking his skin slowly, over and over, until he stops noticing the pain. Until it breaks without him realizing.
Carlos laughs across the net after a particularly absurd point, bright and sharp and alive and unmistakably human, and something in Jannik’s chest tightens unexpectedly. A drop of sweat slides down his neck during a changeover, disappearing beneath the collar of his ugly Nike shirt, and Jannik’s focus melts just enough to notice.
He stops watching replays of their matches. At his request, Darren starts summarizing the press’ post-match analysis for him. Jannik doesn't want to see any more than he has to, for the sake of his own sanity. But none of that seems to change the fact that Carlos keeps showing up.
“Are you angry at me?”
The question comes out of nowhere, and it makes Jannik freeze. They’re in a hallway this time, away from the courts and the cameras, the kind of space Jannik usually prefers when he has to focus.
Carlos is staring at him with big warm eyes, the way he does when he wants to win the press over. “No. No, I’m not,” Jannik says.
Carlos tilts his head slightly, studying him in that open, unguarded way that isn’t actually unguarded at all.
“Oh. Good,” he says. “It’s just… Something Álvaro said.” He laughs, brushing it off, but it’s muted. “That it looked like you were avoiding me.”
Jannik draws his gaze away, trying to ignore the beating of Carlos’ heart pounding in his ears. “I don’t like sticking around. For the cameras, you know.” And while that’s true, it somehow falls flat between them.
He can feel it again, that… Sense of Carlos. Like the faint ache of an overpulled muscle, or a particular tightness in his throat.
Jannik takes a step back, and Carlos notices. Of course he does. Something flickers in his expression briefly, quickly hidden. Not offense, or discomfort, but more like… Interest.
He makes a soft noise, not unlike a realization. Jannik’s mouth goes dry.
“What?”
“Nothing”, Carlos replies, still looking at him. Jannik tries to make a conscious effort to relax his body, to recall, What do humans look like? How do they move? And Look alive, Jan.
Carlos smiles.
—
It becomes sort of a game, at least for Carlos. Not one they ever acknowledge, of course, but it’s there all the same.
Carlos starts closing distances on purpose.
Sometimes he lingers after matches, fiddling with his racket or his shoes and orbiting Jannik’s space whether he loses or wins the game. He stands a little too close during net exchanges, then lets his hand brush Jannik’s for half a second longer than necessary when they shake.
The cameras catch on soon enough, but it’s all read as accidental, mindless. They're friendly, and Carlos is touchy by nature. It’s good for the sport. Drives Jannik mad, though. Over time, he starts anticipating the touches before they happen.
He notices the subtle shift of Carlos’ weight before he steps closer, the change in his breathing. The way his pulse picks up – not from exertion, but from something else.
It takes a while for the realization to land: Carlos isn’t just careless. He’s aware of the edge Jannik keeps drawn between them, and is willingly leaning into it.
—
At twenty-two, another final finds Jannik distracted. It gets worse the longer the match goes on, as he gets tired and control slips slowly from his fingers.
A five setter this time. By the fourth, Carlos is across the net, shirt clinging to his skin, movements just a fraction slower now, just enough to reveal the strain underneath his brilliance. Jannik, despite himself, finds it beautiful.
He tries to focus on the next point, on the familiar rhythm of the game. But then Carlos looks at him from across the court and it makes Jannik’s teeth ache. Something else too, lower in his belly, deeper still.
He turns away before the point starts. Wins it anyway.
—
Something shifts permanently, and Jannik knows it. Feels it settle into place like a fault line finally giving way, like a car crash in slow motion. Except he’s the one about to go flying through the windshield.
The hunger isn't even the worst part. Rather, it’s the unsettling sensation that Carlos knows he’s pushing them towards something dangerous, and that, recklessly, he seems to want it.
—
When it happens, Jannik knows something is wrong long before. Not during the match itself, but after, when the last point is tallied in and they start engraving Carlos’ name in the trophy. Even exhaustion has its rules.
The locker room is too quiet. There's sweat drying slowly on his skin, tacky and wrong and disgusting, and Jannik really should hit the showers. But his pulse hasn’t settled, and every beat feels louder than it should, like his body is trying to tell him something he refuses to hear.
He lost, yeah. That should be the worst of it.
He sits because standing feels uncertain, elbows braced against his knees, head bowed, fingers digging into his own skin hard enough to ground himself in something physical. His mouth feels dry in a way that has nothing to do with dehydration. The ache in his teeth is constant now, insistent.
When he breathes in, he regrets it immediately.
“Hey, you disappeared.” Jannik closes his eyes. Opens them again.
Carlos is there, framed in the doorway, hair still damp, skin just slightly flushed from exertion and heat and everything that still lingers from the match. Jannik’s mouth waters.
He clears his throat. “You should be celebrating,” he says. His voice sounds distant even to his own ears. Carlos shrugs, stepping inside, letting the door fall shut behind him.
“I will, later,” he says. He steps closer, and every footfall sounds like an earthquake. It’s never been this bad.
It must show on his face, on the barely-contained shaking of his hands, because Carlos stops and asks, “Jannik?” His voice shifts, softer, more careful. “You don’t look –”
“Stop.”
The word comes out sharp, and Carlos does stop. For a moment, neither of them moves. The world seems to have narrowed down to them, to this specific locker room, in this specific moment.
And then Carlos steps closer anyway.
“You’re shaking.”
“I said stop.” Jannik means it this time. There’s something in his voice now, almost feral, animal. Scared. It should be enough. But Carlos doesn't move away. Worse still, something sharpens in his expression, fueled by the confidence of a championship winner.
“Is this about me?” he asks quietly, and Jannik barely manages to repress a whimper. Of course it fucking is. God, Jannik can almost smell his blood even from here, and it’s so –
It’s almost like Carlos knows. Maybe not the details, the full shape of it, but he knows enough. Enough to see the tension, the restraint, in the lines of Jannik’s body.
His fangs drop before he realizes it. Carlos sees.
Any sane person would step back and call for help, even security. All vampiric players are purposefully weakened, but what he lacks in strength he can make up through height and teeth. Jannik’s dangerous, even with his sharp edges dulled down. But, still, Carlos doesn't move.
Instead, something shifts in his face. Something dark, and curious and wanting, and Jannik hears the way his pulse jumps.
“Oh,” Carlos breathes. Jannik can feel the way his blood is rushing, leaving his head, pushing through the heart, and moving downwards. Jannik wonders if he’s dizzy with it, even half as much as he is.
“Don’t,” he says again, but it’s weaker now, strained, breaking at the edges. “Carlos, I –”
“You can,” he replies, like everything in the world is easy.
Carlos reaches for him, and Jannik breaks.
It happens too fast to stop. One moment there's distance between them, and the next Jannik’s standing and his hands are on Carlos: on his shoulders, arms, pulling him in with a force that isn’t careful anymore. Carlos inhales sharply, but he doesn’t pull away.
“Jannik –”
His name dissolves into something else as Jannik presses in, breath dragging in against Carlos’ neck, overwhelmed, drowning in the heat and the scent of his skin, the traces of sweat left. He’s so full of life it’s almost unbearable.
But Jannik manages. He stays there, still, breathing and drooling like a dog over a rare steak, but he doesn't bite. And then Carlos tilts his head, exposing his throat.
Jannik makes a sound, something low and raw, barely human. It’s then that Carlos’ hands find him and grip him by the hair, pulling him closer and in.
“Yes,” is all he says, before Jannik's fangs sink in.
The instinct to bite comes naturally, a thoughtless action driven forward by his body. It stems from somewhere deep and ancient, and so, so fucking hungry.
Carlos gasps, body tensing hard against him. And then he softens, almost like he’s melting in his arms.
Jannik feels it under his hands, the way resistance drains out of him, the way his grip changes. Not resisting, but rather holding on. That's when the venom hits. And Jannik feels that too – his own body responding, instinctively releasing it, something designed to soothe and quiet its prey, to make the feed easier. Carlos exhales, long and unsteady.
“Oh –”, he moans, and Jannik knows he’s not in pain. It’s all pleasure now. When blood starts flowing from Carlos’ neck, everything else disappears.
For once in Jannik's life there are no rules and no consequences. He just is, as he was born to. There’s only sensation and heat, overwhelming and constant.
Carlos’ throat pulses against his tongue, his lips, fast and alive and endless, each draw sending something electric through Jannik, something that feels like it’s rewriting him from the inside out. It’s so much. He needs more, now, forever.
Carlos’ fingers get tangled in his shirt and his hair, holding him there, keeping him close. He’s making small, broken sounds, rubbing himself against Jannik, and he’s hard, Jannik can tell even through the fog of want and bloodlust.
He can’t do anything about it, can’t do anything at all, just hold onto Carlos and drink from him. He’s turned into something feral. His mind just screams Mine. His grip tightens.
Carlos arches into him, hips pressing into Jannik and searching, looking for friction. He feels it when Carlos comes inside his shorts – the way his breath catches before it happens, the even sweeter taste of his blood as it does, making Jannik moan around a mouthful of blood. And then Carlos’ body goes pliant and yielding, and Jannik loses whatever semblance of sanity he still had left.
Time loses meaning. There is only the taste of Carlos' blood warming Jannik from the inside out, hot in his belly. He deals in want and need, and nothing else. At least, until Carlos' weight shifts, getting heavier. His heart slows enough for the rhythm of his blood to change, and then Jannik realizes, with a sudden flash of clarity, that he’s going limp.
He pulls his teeth out. “Carlos,” he tries, but the word comes out garbled by the fangs, his voice rough and unsteady.
He moves back abruptly, breath tearing out of him, hands still locked in place as if they’ve forgotten how to let go, and Carlos sways in place. Jannik manages to catch him right before he hits the ground, lowering him to the floor with shaking hands.
“Carlos – Hey. Please.”
His head lolls slightly, eyes half-open but unfocused, breath slow and uneven. But he’s alive. Jannik presses his hand against Carlos’ chest, feeling for a heartbeat, and shakes when he finds it. It’s slow, and weak, but there anyway.
Relief hits like a wave, but it doesn't stay for very long. Because, as Jannik realizes with something that feels like doom – the truth is that he doesn't want to stop. He knows he should let go, should call Darren or Simone or anyone at all, but instead he pulls Carlos closer.
His body folds into Jannik without resistance, like a doll. His head drops against Jannik’s shoulder, breath warm against his neck.
“Jannik…” he murmurs, barely coherent, but does not pull away.
“I –” Jannik tries to speak, and fails. His fangs are still dropped, and he can’t force them back into his gums no matter how hard he tries. His hands tighten again, pressing Carlos closer. “Fuck, I need to –”
Let go. He knows that. But he tries, and fails. His body refuses to soften, every instinct recoiling at the idea. The feeling claws its way up from somewhere deep and inhuman within him, locking his arms in place, screaming.
He slides down to the floor without realizing it, back hitting the lockers, dragging Carlos with him and holding him there, cradled against his chest.
“I’m sorry,” he tries. “I can’t.”
Carlos shifts weakly in his arms, a soft sound escaping him. But he doesn't try to break away. It’s almost like he’s… Settling in. Content.
Jannik presses his face into his hair, breathing him in, trying to anchor himself, to find something human to hold onto in the wreckage of what he’s done. He knows he went too far.
The thought of it – of killing Carlos – hits late, but when it does, it’s suffocating.
“I didn’t –” His voice shakes. “I didn’t mean –”
But even then, he doesn't loosen his grip, entire body locked around Carlos like something territorial. Like he’s protecting, instead of holding hostage.
Carlos’ breath ghosts against his throat, and Jannik holds on to the feeling.
—
Jannik is late.
Not by much, really – ten minutes, maybe fifteen. But it is enough to be unusual for him. He doesn’t really like to linger after matches, attuned to following their routine. Cool down, media, physio, debrief. They have a structure, and Darren respects Jannik’s proclivity to follow it.
So when he doesn’t show, something feels… off. Darren checks with the physio, and finds nothing.
“Maybe he’s still in the locker room?” Simone suggests, and so Darren goes to check.
The hallway is quiet by then, with most of the circus already cleared out. So Darren doesn't expect much when he reaches the locker room door and pushes it open, but he thinks it’s worth a try anyway. And then he goes in and stops dead in his tracks.
Jannik is on the floor, back against the lockers, body curled forward in a way that seems immediately, instinctively wrong. There's someone sprawled over him in a mess of limbs, whose face Darren can’t see but recognizes anyway because he’s spent hundreds of hours looking at him, both through a screen and in person.
Carlos’ head is tipped back at an unnatural angle against Jannik’s shoulder, throat exposed and –
Clearly marked, covered in blood.
There isn't that much staining his clothes, really. In a sick, terrible moment, Darren thinks, Jannik must’ve licked the rest clean. When panic threatens to overwhelm him, Darren tries to push it down.
“Jannik.” He keeps his tone soft, controlled. Paternal, even. But Jannik takes a while to respond at all, inhumanly still, until his head moves up. When he does, the scene is shocking.
Darren’s seen Jannik under pressure, exhausted, frustrated, pushed to the edge of his limits both on court and off. But never like this.
For starters, there’s blood on his mouth, smeared all over like he drank in a rush, like he couldn't stop himself. But maybe worse are his eyes: unnaturally bright and sharp, tracking Darren in a way that feels almost predatory. A low sound rumbles out of Jannik’s chest, like he can’t form words, and it feels too much like a warning.
“Hey,” Darren says quickly, even softer now, palms open towards him in offering. “Jan, it’s me. It’s okay.”
Jannik’s gaze flickers, just for a second, flashing in recognition.
“Darren,” he says, voice rough, strained, like it’s being dragged out of him. Darren has time to think Oh thank God, he’s still himself, before Jannik’s arms tighten again, pulling Carlos closer, tucking him in against his chest with a movement that is unmistakably protective, or maybe possessive. Or both. “Don’t,” Jannik says.
Carlos shifts weakly in his arms, a faint sound escaping him, alive. Barely, but alive.
“Jan. Carlos needs help,” he says carefully, keeping his voice level. Jannik grunts.
“I know,” he replies, but his grip doesn’t loosen.
“If you know, then we need to get him to medical.”
“No.” The word is sharp. His shoulders hunch slightly, curling further around Carlos, shielding him. Darren dares take another slow step forward.
“Jannik, listen to me. He’s hurt,” he tries, more firmly now. “You didn’t mean to, I know that, but he’s hurt and we need to help him.”
“I didn’t –” Jannik’s voice breaks, sharp and uneven. “I didn’t take too much. He’s fine, he’s –” His hands shift, almost frantic now, pressing against Carlos’ chest like he needs to feel it in order to prove it. “I can hear it,” he says. Darren believes him.
“Okay,” he says, adjusting, changing approach. “Okay, that’s good. Then we keep him that way, right?”
“Yes,” he replies, almost immediately.
“Then we need help.”
There's a pause, short, before Jannik’s grip tightens again.
Darren exhales, slowly.
“Jannik –”
Jannik doesn’t lunge, but the movement is fast enough that it doesn’t matter. His body shifts forward, teeth bared, and for a split second Darren fears for himself. Not because he thinks Jannik will actually try to hurt him, but because it’s the first time he's had human blood in years, probably since he was basically just a child, before ever playing competitively. The issue isn’t even that he’s much stronger now that he’s properly fed, but the fact that he probably doesn't even know his own strength.
Darren steps back, pulse loud in his ears. “Alright, I’m not coming closer.” Jannik doesn't move, but he doesn't blink either, like a cat. A huge, dangerous, ginger cat. Slowly, Darren walks towards the door, never turning his back, reaching for the phone in his pocket.
When the call connects he speaks low, even though it doesn't really matter. Jannik could hear him just fine from the end of the hallway.
“I need medical in the locker room,” he says. And then, after a beat. “And security.”
His eyes flick back to Jannik, still cradling Carlos’ body. There's a tremor to him now, something unstable in the way he’s almost rocking forward and backwards.
Darren hangs up.
—
By morning, the story is already contained, which actually manages to surprise Darren. Not the efficiency of the process – he’s worked around professional sports long enough to know how quickly things can be buried when they need to be. But the cleanliness of it.
There aren't any whispers in the hallway come morning, no headlines, no phones lighting up with questions they can’t answer. Just a statement put out by Carlos’ team and then later echoed in the media. Fatigue and dehydration, a terrible combo after a five-set match, but believable this far into the season.
Carlos is taken in the night by a medical team with private transport, no cameras allowed anywhere. By the time anything could have leaked, there are no visible injuries that can’t be explained away, and no teeth marks that can’t be hidden under high-collared clothes and controlled appearances.
He’s stable, they say. A little weak, but expected to make a full return very soon. Darren pretends they didn't know anything at all and doesn't press for details he doesn't truly need.
They fly Jannik home under strict surveillance, sedated at first, then willingly when he wakes up and his eyes look not crazy again. He stays in for several days afterwards, like he can’t bring himself to be in the sun, even with his usual protections.
On the third day of his voluntary confinement, Darren finds him sitting by the window, blinds half-drawn, light muted to something tolerable. He hasn’t touched the food they left out for him: the blood packs sit unopened on the table, exactly where they were placed in their tidy refrigerated packets.
“Jannik. You need to eat.” Or drink, more like, but there's an acquired forced normality in the way they’ve always tiptoed around blood, like Jannik is just another normal human and not a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
He replies without even turning to look. “I tried. It doesn’t stay down.”
The words land heavier than they should, slowly, as Darren studies him for a moment longer.
“You’re in shock,” he says, because that’s the most reasonable explanation. “Your body’s reacting. It’ll pass.”
Jannik doesn’t argue, and maybe that's worse.
—
The official notice comes two days later, talking about irregularities in testing parameters and elevated markers in Jannik's results. The language is carefully chosen and deliberately vague, but the meaning is still crystal clear.
Jannik’s too strong, too close to something he’s not allowed to be. Either because he took performance enhancement substances or because… Well, the report doesn't specify, but it's obvious what it is that they're not saying.
The three-month suspension is lenient, all things considered. They all know how badly this could've gone for Jannik, under different circumstances, or if Carlos’ team had decided to press charges.
He nods once when they tell him, no reaction beyond that.
“You understand why.”
“Yes.” There's a beat, measured in the endless space between seconds. “I didn’t –” Jannik starts, then stops. “It doesn’t matter.” And yeah no, it doesn’t, really.
“They’re not making it public,” Darren adds. “It’ll be framed as a standard violation. Nothing more, yeah?” Preferential treatment, only for the best of the best. A lot of money just went into buying this silence. Jannik nods again.
—
It’s on the fifth day that Carlos calls. Darren only finds out because he’s there when it happens.
He’s nursing a cup of tea when Jannik’s phone buzzes on the table. It’s from an unknown number, unsaved, but the prefix reads +34, and that is incriminating enough. Jannik looks at the screen and freezes. They both watch the call ring.
Eventually, Darren asks, “Are you going to answer?” Jannik visibly hesitates, then slowly reaches for the phone, only to let it ring out. The silence that follows is heavier than the quiet that came before.
“Jannik – ”
“I can’t.”
The words are quiet. Darren doesn't ask him to elaborate.
—
Later, when he thinks Jannik is asleep, Darren checks the table again, only to find that the blood packs are still there, unopened. He frowns, picks one up, turns it over in his hands like it might offer some explanation. The color seems fine, but to be honest Darren is no expert.
Suddenly, behind him, Jannik speaks, “It’s wrong.” Darren startles, puts the blood bag down carefully. “It tastes awful.”
The day after the incident Jannik’s cheeks were rosy, freckles standing out over pale skin. His hair was soft and shiny, his complexion brighter despite the newly-added weight on his shoulders. That glow has been fading out since then, slowly but inexorably, as his body runs through it and processes Carlos’ blood, exhausting it and begging Jannik for more. It’s like giving someone a line of coke and then asking them to feel as good on decaf.
“Your body will readjust,” he says, because that’s what you say. Because there has to be a way back from this. “It just needs time.”
Jannik doesn’t respond, shifting in bed and turning his head toward the window instead.
—
A week later, Carlos returns to the tour. Smiling, even if a bit pale, but the story holds.
Darren watches the broadcast from a hotel room, arms crossed, attention split between the screen and the person sitting motionless a few feet away. Jannik hasn’t moved since it started, but he hasn't looked away either.
On screen, Carlos laughs at something an interviewer says. It’s an easy and familiar sound, carefree, like nothing happened, and he has reason enough to smile: things are looking up for him, with Jannik's suspension. The path to number one is all clear for the next three months, practically gift-wrapped.
Darren glances back at Jannik and sees the tension in his jaw. He doesn't speak again until the broadcast ends.
“Do you think he knew?”
Darren frowns. “Knew what?”
Jannik doesn’t look at him, keeping his eyes trained on the TV.
“That it would happen.” The words settle, heavy and uncertain. “That I wouldn’t be able to stop.”
“No, Jan,” Darren tries. “Why would he –”
“He told me to,” Jannik says. “He didn’t even try to stop me.” There’s no accusation in Jannik’s words, and that makes it worse. Darren just sees… confusion. Suspicion.
And something else, something he recognizes too late.
Hunger.