Archive of Our Own

David takes one last drag from his stolen cigarette before he drops it off the edge of the pier and watches it fizzle out when it hits the water below. There's no moon, but he can see just fine without the light.

Turning away from the railing, he shoves his hands in his pockets and hunches his shoulders against a cold he no longer feels. Each footfall against the pier sounds wooden and dull to his ears, and he lets the rhythm lull him into a sort of mindlessness. He can smell the throng of life not far down the boardwalk and he turns his head away from it with a look of disgust.

His steps were slow and almost reluctant. With his boys dead and his previous plans foiled, the sunken hotel is too silent for his liking. He spends his evenings instead like this, feeding occasionally but mostly just walking. Walking, and thinking.

Regardless of how far he gets from that night, the final scene between him and Michael continues to play over and over again in his mind, terrible in how it thrills him. When Michael pushed him onto the spike of horn with that look in his eye, all David had been able to think was, 'I made this. This is mine.' and he'd smiled as he'd passed out from the shock.

Even now, the kid's last words to him still ring in his ears, how he'd touted the strength of his own blood over David's. It'd been beautiful really, a moment of poetry.

Fuck poetry.

He scowls at his boots and jumps from the retaining wall onto the beach. The sand smells cold.

It's seems like he's always watching Michael these days. Never near enough to get himself noticed, but close enough to see the shadows under the kid's eyes, to catch the way his reactions have slowed and become lethargic. It's like Michael is living a half life, part of him stuck in his memories. Memories David refuses to let him forget.

After all, David's waited so long time for someone like this. He isn't gonna let Michael go, not for anything. He thinks he might need this boy, as pathetic as it sounds.

What's more, his claim is already staked. He just needs to follow through on it. The only thing is that the first time he'd gone to secure that claim, to his surprise, Michael had fought.

His boys had never fought him before; when he'd found them and drawn them in they'd fallen into line quick as ducks. Of course, Michael had been a different kind of animal right from the start, but that fierce anger in his eyes during their last fight, god. David had been caught unaware.

Since then he's been biding his time. Waiting hungrily for when he'll get Michael where he wants him: by his side, under his influence, within his reach.

He gloats silently every time he breaks through the boy's defenses, even a little. Particularly when he enters into Michael's dreams.

At least once every other week David would crouch on a thin branch outside Michael's window and talk to the sleeping human . The words were not spoken aloud, but rather passed through the thin thread of influence which still sewed them together them together. The changing blood may have been Max's but Michael's bonding night had belonged to David. Now the boy's living mind felt familiar under his psychic touch, planes of dreams he had mapped before were now so well known to him it was like coming home.

'Soon' he thinks, pulling himself out of reverie with a scowl. He's never been a patient man, but for this he will wait. Even at risk of sounding trite, David would say that Michael is his salvation. The life of a vampire is long and cold and cruel, Max made sure David had known these things early on in his un-life, but from the moment he'd first seen Michael on the boardwalk the kid had shone like a beacon for him. Hot and fierce and defiant in a way no one had acted towards him in so many years. Michael could once again make the darkness worth it.

That terrible fight in many ways had sealed Michael's fate, the proverbial coffin nail. After such a display, how could David let him go? He's wanted someone to fight with, hunt with, fuck with for so long. Someone who wouldn't just bow and capitulate at every turn, someone with balls who he can stand with, side by side.

He sighs, and the exhalation is swept up in a sharp ocean wind full of water and brine.

'Soon.' He thinks yet again, pausing to study the horizon where a dark ocean meets an even darker sky. 'Michael...'

----------

Michael knows he's lost his mind the moment he picks up his keys and shrugs on his jacket, but there's nothing to be done for it. He has to know.

The nightmares hadn't bothered him much at first. He expected them. He expected him to leer pale and beautiful and terrible out of the dank mess of memory. All of them had had nightmares after all, but unlike the others, his had never faded.

Star had left with Laddie to try and find the family she'd abandoned in Washington years ago and Michael had been surprised by how little he missed her. Sam had started his Sophomore year of high school a few weeks back and was doing well like the little geek he was. Mom was still spending most of her time putting the house to rights and looking for jobs in the odd hours in between, and gramps was no different than before.

Michael was the only poor bastard still stuck remembering. It made him wonder sometimes if any of it had ever really happened. As the house was repaired, everything went back to normal. Not a trace of that night remained, save for David's face still burned into his minds eye, waiting for him every time he goes to sleep.

Sometimes Michael's visions are taunting, David looming over him laughing and trying to spur him on and it makes Michael wake up hot faced and angry. Other times though, the dreams are almost gentle. Like the feeling of sitting in silence with someone you've known for years. He can't say which kind of dream unnerves him more.

He shivers for more than just the night chill and tries very hard not to remember. Whenever he closes his eyes to sleep, whenever he blinks too long against the light of the sun, he sees that face again. The pale blond hair and piercing blue eyes. Sometimes David's laughing at him. So fucking cocky, saying 'you're eating maggots Michael, how do they taste?'

Turning that particular memory over in his head, Michael shoulders his way out the new front door and slips silently into the night.

Sometimes when he relives the events in the cave he sees himself behaving just as he did, dropping the food and turning away in repulsion.

Sometimes he sees himself throwing it in David's face.

Sometimes he sees himself continuing to eat until he was sick with the writhing things swimming in his gut, and he laughs back at the man saying 'What now David? What the fuck are you going to do about me now?"

He walks his motorcycle about a block before he straddles it and brings it to life. It's loud in the otherwise silent night and he hopes he's far enough from home, but doesn't turn around to check if any lights go on.

Last week some punk smashed out his headlights and he's yet to scrounge up the cash to make the repair. The road is dangerously dark as he eats up the miles and he feels angry and reckless. Maybe it's the sleep deprivation, but he feels furious like he hasn't in months, not since he felt Max's blood boil right out of his veins. Not since he watched David die in agony.

Doing all he can to skirt the parts of the city still active that time of the night, the clouds part and the sliver of a moon casts light down on the highway. The black strip of asphalt stands out clearer against the desert than it has all evening. With a twitch of his lips that isn't quite a smile Michael guns his bike faster, racing with the ghosts of his once-brothers, voices still flitting around his head. 'Join us Michael' they say, all blissed out and bloody from the hunt. God damn David for this doubt. God damn them all.

He can't stop asking himself if he made the right choice. That night with the Surf-Nazis freaked him out so bad, he'd subsequently acted without considering all the possibilities. Sam's big emphatic gaze and Star's terrified doe-eyes had been enough to convince him to leave immortality behind, but what now? School had ended in a world war three with the Principal and no one wanted to hire yet another high school drop out bumming it on the board walk. He's a statistic, just like every other low life in this dead-beat town.

Not that he isn't trying to make something of his life. He'd had that job as a garbage collector once, and he'd tried to apply for the job again, but they'd turned him down with a weirdly nervous look in their eyes. It was like he had a mark on his record now, something intangible that people instinctually flinch away from. People shy away from him on the street during the day and outright run from him in the dark. Even mom, though he can tell she tries to keep things normal, flinches whenever he goes to touch her arm. Though he's tried not to take it personal, it's depressing.

'Maybe it's me.' He thought half-heartedly one day when yet another coked up groupie had fled when all he did was look at her. Maybe the dreams were his fault. Maybe it was his own fucked up psyche that was keeping David so close, haunting him.

The other boys show up in his dreams from time to time too, but never feature as prominently. It makes him sad in a way he doesn't want to think about to see their faces. He shouldn't have felt anything for them, they'd been more of a gang than a family by anyone's measure, but that doesn't stop him from waking up with a sob sticking in his throat, remembering the way they'd laughed and goaded him on, teasing but not unkind.

'Brother.'

The word comes unbidden and he shuts his eyes, driving blindly into the night. The road is straight and clear. He doesn't know what's waiting for him at the end, but any which way he has to find out.

'Michael...'

Biting his own lip until he tastes blood, Michael braces himself against the sound of that voice, a purr which can shake him to his core.

"Fuck." He whispers, opening the throttle, going even faster. The word is snatched up by the wind and hurled into the blurring, empty expanse of desert. He can see the ocean looming ahead of him and ignores the sting of wind getting around his sunglasses.

"Fuck you David. You did this to me." But again the words are lost as Michael keeps pushing on into the night

----------

David doesn't hide when he hears Michael's bike roar up to the entrance to the sunken hotel. He smells the dust kicked up by the boy, the salty chill of a coastal night, and Michael. Yet again he kicks himself for never tasting the kid, only doing as Max had ordered, feeding the boy and nothing more. If he'd done with Michael as he'd done with the others, an exchange of blood for bonding, would things have turned out differently? In the end it was the lying which had killed them. They'd pushed Michael too far and the half-vampire had pushed back with more force than any of them had ever expected.

'You just have to keep up.' He'd said, confident that the boy's fixation wouldn't waver. In the end though, Michael had outstripped them all.

The human's boots sound loud on the steps. Apparently they're both beyond hiding by this point. Good.

"Take two, Michael." He murmurs, throwing back the last of his beer before relaxing back on his throne. "Hears to this round being better than the first."

A pair of legs appear, creeping down the stairs in the dark. "David?" Michael hadn't heard David's words, all his vampiric prowess out the window. It pisses David off more than he wants to admit but he bites down on his anger, hard. Tonight would be nothing without control.

David doesn't make a sound as he waits for Michael to inch further into the lobby. His feet are leading him unerringly in the right direction, dodging obstacles he remembers precisely despite relatively little time spent in the vampire's hangout.

Recalling the old vampire films Dwayne had sometimes roped him into watching, David can't help but wish he could slam a door behind Michael with just a thought and lock him in the hotel with him. There was no door, he didn't know of any power like that, but the idea was alluring. Max had died long before he'd parted with all his secrets, perhaps there was something to those old legends he could use.

Storing the idea away for later use, David grins into the dark and lets the beer bottle fall from his hand. It doesn't break, but it makes an almighty noise when it hits the dusty floor.

Michael looks ready to shit himself at the sound. Jerking around, straining for the origin, he loses track of his footing and runs the back of his knees into the arm of a beaten and torn couch. Falling backwards and landing with an oomph he twists immediately, trying to get back to his feet. David can't help himself. He laughs into the darkness, amused despite it all.

He barely hears it when it comes, terrified and hoarse from the half righted human on his furniture, but he understands. He understands perfectly, even if he doesn't want to.

"David?"

He wishes he had another beer or a lit cigarette to artistically illuminate himself in the glow of orange cinders. Instead he has only himself and he shifts, giving up on silence and rests his cheek on his fist.

"Michael."

----------

Michael wants to run. He wants to bolt up those stairs and ride like hell back into the night. This was such a stupid idea.

His mind races trying to figure out how this is even possible. He was so sure he'd gotten him, run him through on that spike and watched him die. He'd watched him die damnit! Him and all the other boys were dead. His Brothers were dead.

He puts his hands over his eyes and shakes his head, not caring about what sort of picture he presents. Hiding in the dark, just waiting for death to find him.

The couch shudders when David kicks the far end, laughing again, and Michael flinches away, turning his face towards the cushions. The fear is burning so hot and his heart is pounding so fast, he's barely able to think.

"Come on, Michael." The voice taunts behind him, unmoved. "Don't be a baby. Did you really expect it to be so easy?"

Michael swallows hard. "The Others? Max?" Hating how tiny his voice sounds to his own ears, he grits his teeth and forces his hands to his sides, where he scrapes his nails absently against the beaten fabric. He tries to ignore how frantic his heart beat sounds, thudding dully in his ears.

David's quiet for so long Michael wonders if he's left, or if he was ever there at all.

"Max and the boys are dead. Thanks to you and your little squadron of wannabe hunters."

His tone is bitter and cold and it's all Michael can do not to flinch away from the sound. Once again the guilt is rushing up like bile, unexpected and unwanted. He doesn't miss Max, he disliked the video store owner from the first moment he met him, but the others...

A part of him wants to apologize, but even he knows anything he could say would sound trite in light of their history. Not to mention another part of him tells him, loudly, that he did only what he needed to do to protect Sam and his mother, and to save Star and Laddie and himself.

Some salvation this was turning out to be.

The angst waxes heavy and he shuts his eyes. His vision is adjusting to even this oppressive darkness and he's unwilling to actually take a look around him and remember it all, to see the shape of him in the bitter, ice cold flesh.

"Come on, Michael." David croons. The razor sharp edge is gone and replaced by something Michael remembers hating.

He snarls and swipes his hand through the air, blindly, as if clawing the tone away from him. "Don't patronize me!"

The vampire snickers. "Don't be so sensitive."

Working with a courage born of anger Michael sneers at the ceiling. "What, I shouldn't take this personal? I shouldn't let it bother me when you fuck with me like this? You know, your mind games this time are even better than that parlor trick with the Chinese food. For awhile I actually thought I was free of this bullshit."

"You'll never be free Michael." The words are plain for once, untouched by David's usual bitter humour. "I waited a long time for somebody like you to come along. You'll be with me or we'll both be dead."

"You're deranged."

"Maybe."

"David..." He starts at a shout but doesn't know how to continue. Gritting his teeth he slaps his hands over his eyes again, and scrubs hard. "I don't want... this."

"Then try and leave. You know the way."

Michael scowls but doesn't move. "It's pitch black you vampiric shit. I can't see anything."

"That didn't stop you when you came in." David's voice is smug and Michael hates him for it. He has nothing to say in retort.

"Riddle me this, Michael. How do you navigate this place so well when you've only been here twice before?"

"Instinct."

There's a hard chuckle out of the black and the voice has moved. Alarmed, Michael tries to sit up but it's too late. A knee is pressing firm into the tense plane of his gut, a cold hand on his throat. The boy's eyes fly open and he can barely see that face, pale and terrible and beautiful, so close he could bite him if only he could move.

"You have no instinct Michael, not like this. You know that."

He leers, that's the only word for it. For a moment Michael sees instead David's face when he 'died.' His features painted in pained disbelief, turned up in rapture, his beauty undeterred by agony. Blinking rapidly, the vision clears.

David's sneer fades. "Would you still have killed us all if you'd known then what you know now?"

Wouldn't he have? He doesn't want to think about it. "You're changing the subject." Michael growls out around the hand that constricts his breathing until it's wheezing and faint.

"Not really." David's tone his mild, contrast to the strength of his hold and Michael hopes this isn't how he dies. "It's all connected Michael. Like one big fucking spiderweb."

"Enlighten me." He gasps out. The hand vanishes abruptly and he coughs, reaching up to touch his abused throat but David catches his hand and jumps back in a show of inhuman agility, tugging Michael up so he's forced to stumble forward lest he fall on his face or worse, fall into David.

"Remember this, Michael?" David snaps his fingers and candles spring to life. It's another parlor trick but it's effective. Michael can't help but flinch back from the bursts of golden light, soft as they are, and turns his gaze towards the ground. He doesn't want to see this again.

"This is where we ate Michael!" Turning away from him, David raises his arms like a king or a priest, surveying his castle, blessing his church. "This is where you drank Max's blood. This is where you fucked Star. It all happened here. Remember?"

"I don't-"

"You can't wish this away Michael. What we've gone through is bigger than your mortal mind can afford to forget." Suddenly he's behind Michael, pressed close, chest to spine. He wraps an icy hand around Michael's forehead and his other arm around the bulk of the human's body, keeping his arms trapped at his sides. Pulling back until Michael can do nothing but lean his head against David's shoulder, the vampire grins, fangs sheathed but the sharply pointed canines still glinting in the firelight. "You were one of us Michael." His voice is hot and low. "We let you in, let you join the family, and you turned your nose up at our gifts."

"They weren't-"

"Think Michael!" He jerks the kid a little, as if trying to shake is argument into him. "We were your brothers. Bonds like that don't break so easily. Not even in death-"

"Shut up!" He struggles, flexing against David's grip. "They were monsters! You are a monster! I'm not like you!"

Although it would seem impossible David presses even closer, squeezes him even tighter. Michael feels deprived of air, his ribs aching sharply. "Really? Think hard. Think about when the junkies on the boardwalk flee from the very sight of you. What is it really that your body's telling you? Don't you want to follow them Michael?"

"I don't want them to think I'm dangerous." His words sound weak, even to him.

"Really? Don't you want to chase them Michael?"

"No, I don't-"

"You feel the pull of the hunt, don't you Michael?"

"No-"

"You like it when the run. Deep down you imagine you can hear their hearts pounding..."

"No! I-"

"They're prey. You can feel it, you want it. You never got your kill Michael..."

"STOP!"

David growls and in less than the blink of an eye he's hauled Michael across the room and thrown him on the bed.

"Admit it Michael!"

"I will never be like you!" He's so furious he could kill David, if only he could move. David's let go of him but he still feels crippled, every breath laboured and painful and every limb leaden and dead against the familiar, rumpled sheets.

Just a step away, looming over him, David looks as pissed as Michael feels. His teeth are bared and his hands are clenched so tight Michael expects to see blood any moment. "When will you give up on this fucking pretense?" The vampire snaps before he shuts his eyes, visibly schooling his features away from his hunting visage and back to human. There's remains a hint of yellow in the iris when he opens them again, fury still trapped inside.

"Would you stop fighting this? Haven't you caused enough problems, for both of us?"

"What the hell are you on about?" The words were supposed to be loud, forceful, but somewhere on the way out this throat they lost their edge and turned to whisper.

There's an intensity in David's eyes which Michael is desperate to turn away from, but he can't move, can't even blink when he hears David say "You've dreamed about this, haven't you?"

Michael swallows hard. "How the hell would you know about-"

"This is is your destiny, Michael!" Closing the distance to the bed, he reaches out as if to touch but pulls his hand back and tucks it once again into a fist at his side. "I had hoped there would be brothers to share in our future, but we will just have to find new members for this family."

"My destiny?" Michael tries to shake his head but only manages the barest tremor. "No, I only ever wanted to be human I didn't ask for your insanity."

"You'll be more than human Michael. I wish my plans had been given a chance to play themselves out as I'd intended, but Max's obsession with your mother fucked everything up."

A laugh escapes Michael's mouth, but it's weak and hollow. "You're one to talk. Let me go you bastard, or I'll-"

"Or you'll what?" He sneers. "You're not gonna kill me Michael."

"Don't sound so cocky, I tried pretty fucking hard to off you last time-" He cuts himself off as the feeling of restraint which has been plaguing him lifts.

David doesn't say anything, just folds his hands behind his back and bows his head with the sneer still in place.

There is silence. Neither man moves.

It's a test, Michael knows it, and it infuriates him. He has a pocket knife in his jeans and it would be so easy to pull it out and finish this. David isn't moving.

He studies the vampire's still figure, noticing for the first time the stillness in his chest and Jesus he gets a chill when it hits him again that this is a vampire. The monsters of his childhood made real, in the flesh before him. He's not a horror nut like Sam or the Frogs, but there's still an undercurrent of excitement that thrills him whenever he gives himself a chance to actually process the idea. David is a vampire. He was almost a vampire. Once.

Michael doesn't realize that his gaze has lingered on David's throat, no flutter of pulse or flush of blood but he knows that the artery is there, the current of blood still flowing sluggishly beneath the skin, cold and perfect and...

A hand touches Michael's face and it's cold. He closes his eyes and relaxes against the bed, suddenly more exhausted than he's ever been in his life. His fury has vanished completely and he feels hollow and chilled.

He doesn't flinch when he feels a pair of icy lips touch his. The pressure is barely there and almost tickles but he doesn't turn away. He's not even sure he could if he tried. He has no idea what he wants, but this feels right even though it shouldn't and he's tired of second guessing himself all the time. For the first time in a long time he lets the part of him that yearns for contact with David have center stage and it scares him how good it feels.

'Is David right? Is this really how it's meant to be?' For a moment he struggles with the question, then David presses against him, kissing him in earnest, and he can't think anymore.

He always thought he was straight. Always thought he was a decent person with decent morals and a decent future ahead of him, but maybe David's been right about him from the very beginning. Maybe his life will only really start in death.

----------

David feels it the instant Michael gives up. He lets himself relax as soon as the human does and he crawls onto the bed, kneeling on either side of the boy's thighs and finally, finally tastes the kid. He's warm like all mortals, and the smell of his blood is so hot and pungent it's all David can do not to taste deeper and bring that heat to the surface, test the strength of the flow with his teeth deep in the kid's throat.

"Michael..." He draws the word out until it's just a whisper. He loves the sound. Those syllables taste sweet on his tongue, and the way the human shivers to hear his own name is beyond beautiful.

"What are you doing to me?" Michael can barely manage a murmur as he reaches up a hand to brush his fingers over David's leather clad bicep. Sometimes the touch seems intent to repel, sometimes to encourage, always shifting.

It makes David smile and it's not a pretty thing. "I'm just giving you what you want."

David kisses him again, silencing any response. He licks along the boy's lips until he feels them part just barely, enough of an invitation to move his tongue in, tasting deeper into that wet heat. Fisting a hand in Michael's hair to keep his head where he wants it, he lets the fingers of his other hand run down the boy's cheek, just feeling the smooth skin and strong jaw, tracing the line of a cheekbone, soaking up some of the rising warmth. There's a blush on Michael's cheeks now and it's exquisite. David chaffs his thumb over the flush and growls softly.

A moan escapes Michael and David pulls back just enough to allow the boy a moment's breath before moving back in, his hand moving lower to trace the lines of this throat and along his collar bone. The corded muscle in his neck tenses as the boy kisses him back, his adam's apple bobbing when he sucks and swallows around David's tongue. He wants to squeeze that throat, make the boy work for each breath. He wants to bite the pulsing artery he can feel fluttering so quickly under his touch. He wants and he wants and Michael's shoving at the lapel of his coat and who is he to argue with that? For a moment he breaks their exchange as he sheds his coat and tosses it to the floor, his shirt following without hesitation.

Maneuvering a hand under Michael, David makes the kid arch his back so he can tug his jacket off his arms and drag it out from under him. He's only got a t-shirt on and David wants to tear it in two but Michael's already struggling to pull it over his head so David just helps. Hissing when he gets his first feel of skin on skin, the heat almost scalds him as it seeps from Michael's chest into his, making his ribs ache in a way that's unfamiliar.

David manages to toe off his boots and socks without turning away from his quarry and if Michael's awkward squirming is any indication the kid is doing the same. Soon they' re in nothing but their jeans and they must look something like a gay Calvin Kline add but David's loving it, laughing as he rears his head up and grins at the canopy, still feeling Michael's breaths heave under the press of his body.

When he turns his head down again and he fixes his gaze on Michael, his eyes are yellow and his fangs are out. Still he's grinning, leering, looming over Michael and the human shudders but doesn't turn away.

"You're mine, Michael."

For a moment the hazy look of pleasure on Michael's face fades and is replaced by confusion and anger. He seems about to say something, to counter David's claim, but David's done with waiting. With a cruel hand he takes a hold of Michael through his clothes and squeezes, hard. The human boy yelps and tries to cringe away, twisting his head to the side and exposing his neck in the process. It's all the invitation David needs.

With a low growl he lowers himself so they're pressed hip to hip and chest to chest, unable to help himself as he grinds down and pushes their arousals together, the friction rough and not nearly enough and he hisses and puts his mouth to that beautiful, beautiful throat. For barely a second he pauses to savour this moment when Michael is finally under him, exactly where he wants him, then the human jumps as if startled and tries to push at his shoulder.

"What are you-"

David doesn't let him finish, ignoring the fear as he opens his mouth and bites down.

He knows there is pain. He remembers the night Max changed him well enough, and he knows it hurts like nothing Michael's ever felt before. He's ready for the struggle, using his enhanced strength to keep the human pinned down as the feed begins.

'Wait for it kid.' He thinks, focused more on Michael's reactions than the feed itself for the moment. 'Give it a second.'

And for the second time that night he feels Michael relax and give in, letting David have his way as the first wash of pleasure pulses through him. If David could leer around a mouthful of throat, teeth out and blood on his lips, he would, just to let the human know exactly how much he enjoyed this.

Instead he grinds down again, satisfied to feel how hard Michael is in response, distantly registering the quiet sounds of hitching breath and involuntary moans seeping past Michael's lips in a steady litany of want.

Then the flavor overwhelms him and he growls at the back of his throat, barely able to think as he reacts instinctually to the taste, the scent he's lusted after for so long bursting to life on his tongue. It's hot and sweet and laced with the strong tang of iron, then there's something in there that David's never tasted before and the beast inside him is roaring, making him greedy as he pulls deeper and deeper from the vein, wanting more and more before he sucks hard and gulps down a last mouthful. Then he pulls away, almost choking, tearing gouges in the flesh as he rips away from the wound.

Michael looks pale and disoriented but he's bucking his hips against David and the vampire licks his lips, gasping out of habit despite the fact that he has no need for the oxygen.

They crash against each other in a kiss more violent than tender. David alternates between biting and licking those lips and ducking down to lick over the neck wound where the blood flow is abating, healing quickly with David's help.

Surprisingly it's Michael who starts to tug at their jeans first, the constraining denim too rough and painful against his cock. David's only too happy to oblige and tugs pants and boxers away and rejoices to have Michael bare beneath him, so fucking willing for whatever he wants to do. Shifting back on his heels, he ducks his head and presses his lips against Michael's inner thigh, inhaling the scent of him, drawn to the thick artery near the groin which pulses even stronger than the jugular...

A hand tugs at David's hair and he looks up to see Michael's face a cross between pleasure-drunk and confused. Frustration lances through David and puts a hand to Michael's chest, forcing him to lay back and holding him there as he stares the boy down.

"Don't. Fight. Me." His voice sounds too deep even to his own ears and Michael's pupils dilate as he gives in to the pressure of David's touch.

With his other hand David traces sharp nails lightly over the skin of Michael's cock, infinitely careful not to draw blood unintentionally. The human twists his hips, thrusting up as he tries to find more than that feather light touch, shuddering gritting his teeth and David leans in close to lap at his ear, his tongue curling around the metal stud piercing the lobe.

"Trust me Michael." He murmurs. "This is how it's meant to be."

Then he's suddenly gone and Michael gasps as a cold mouth engulfs him, the heat in his own body burning all the brighter for the contrast. David uses one hand to cut the pads of his fingers on the other, concentrating on shifting the nails of his bleeding hand so they are once again blunt and human. Sucking Michael hard, he smirks around the mouthful as the boy's legs fall open, looking for something more.

Tracing lines of blood up the inside of Michael's thigh, he squeezes his sac before moving past it and finding the tight entrance. He circles it once before pushing a gory digit inside.

----------

Michael's head is spinning so fast he feels like he's falling, unable to think with David sucking him off, David fingering him open, David, David, David real and in the flesh and Michael can barely believe this is happening at all.

He tries to buck up into the wet mouth surrounding him but David's got a forearm pressed across his hips pushing him against the bed and he can't get himself in any deeper. Then the vampire swallows and the soft tissue deep in David's throat is working at the head of Michael's cock and he actually sobs, nonsense syllables spilling out of him, loud and unbidden and a part of him is ashamed, confused, embarrassed while the greater part of him is roaring in pleasure. He's coming without warning, his body clamping down on David's fingers still deep inside him, barely touching his prostate but still making him twitch and shudder with aftershocks of pleasure which continue to roll through him in waves.

David doesn't stop. Barely even slows down as he keeps his lips curled around Michael's cock, just holding the organ in his mouth as he inhales Michael's scent and keeps stretching the boy open. There are three fingers in him now and Michael can't remember how they all got there. He's light headed and dizzy as he pushes at David's head weakly, shuddering every time David swallows reflexively and milks his already spent member.

Michael would swear the vampire seems almost reluctant as he pulls back and pulls his fingers out. Rearranging Michael's limbs so he's between his legs with his own turgid prick lined up with Michael's entrance, David braces one hand on the bed so he can lean down for a kiss.

For a moment Michael feels disgusted and tries to turn away, because this is David who's been sucking him, who's going to fuck him, and Jesus the situation is so out of hand. David won't take no for an answer and he grabs his jaw to hold him still as kisses him deep, pushing his tongue into Michael's mouth and licking along the boy's teeth, tasting and sharing Michael's own flavor back with him.

Not for the first time that evening a wave of fear pulses through Michael and he tries to draw back, tries to get the situation back under control but David's not waiting. There's blood on his cock to ease the way as he pushes himself into Michael fully in one stroke.

Michael swears he can't breathe. He doesn't even try.

----------

David's never felt so good in all his unnatural life. The heat of Michael's body, the steady beat of a living heart so loud to his ears he almost misses feeling the rhythm in his own chest. It's been so long.

Then he's leaning down to the wound he made earlier, cleaning the congealed blood eagerly, the black gobs sticking to his teeth as he scrapes them over Michael's golden throat, not quite biting but tasting none the less, knowing that he will never let this one go. He's waited so long for something like this to make death exciting once again.

The boy is clamped down on him, his whole body drawn taught as he grits his teeth. He's holding his breath but David knows that can't last long and he leans down to kiss the corner of Michael's mouth in a way so dangerously close to gentle that he jerks his hips so he shifts inside him, making the kid jump and whimper faintly.

It feels so good he does it again, drawing back further and pushing in harder. He's got a hand on Michael's shoulder, pressing against his bite mark with his thumb as he starts a rhythm the boy can barely keep up with, still shuddering, but with more pleasure, less pain as Michael tentatively arches back into the next thrust, jumping when David hit's his spot dead on and that pleasure lances his body once again.

As Michael gets with the program David lets go. He gives into the urge to claim, to finally take the boy as his own. When he'd had Star with him he'd been able to ignore this instinct, but now there's no one left but him and instinct is overwhelming. It's only himself and Michael, and that's all he fucking needs. Snapping his hips forward, his own pleasure is heightened when Michael yelps and moans in quick succession.

The boy throws an arm around David's shoulders and undulates with David's motions. They sync up and it's better than the hunt, better than fucking Star, better than sex has ever been before and David's roaring. He's in full game face, monstrous and beyond caring. Dropping his face to the unmarked side of Michael's neck, he sniffs the flesh and darts out his tongue to lap at the sweat, the taste of the boy's blood still on his tongue and just taunting him to do it again.

Through the haze of lust he knows he isn't going to last long and he groans, speeding up his thrusts as he races towards climax. Beneath his fangs the skin and muscle of Michael's throat split smooth as water and the human doesn't even struggle this time, still trying to meet his thrusts as he shouts and gasps, a hand on the back of David's head to hold him there like he fucking wants it and David feeds because this is all he's ever wanted. All he never thought he'd find.

Michael...

David thrusts as hard as he can, grinding his hips against Michael, gripping Michael's thigh to hold the boy there. Then he's coming harder than he can ever remember, slowing the flow of his feed as his vision clouds over and his whole body tenses, so blissed out he can't think, can't move, can't imagine living without this now that he's found it.

He feels Michael panting as he comes down, the boy's whole body shaking with the force of each breath. The bliss of climax fades slowly. His fangs withdraw of their own volition and he nurses the wounds at Michael's neck, his cock still buried in the warm, mortal body, his own body still arched over Michael's heaving form. He sniffs and he smells semen. Drawing back just slightly he looks down between their two forms and sees the results of Michael's second orgasm slick across the boy's sweat shined skin and he smiles.

He'd lick him clean if he thought he had the energy. Instead he pulls out, not unaware of the way Michael flinches, and uses a corner of the bed clothes to scrub off his and Michael's stomachs. He can burn the sheets later and steal some new ones next time he's in town.

Michael doesn't say a word but David knows the bliss of orgasm is fading fast. He's been running from moments like this his entire life and he leans over the side of the bed, digging his lighter and a pack of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket. It's disgustingly cliché, but at least with a mouthful of smoke he'll have an extra moment to figure out just how to convince Michael to join him. Permanently.

----------

The moment he smells smoke Michael lets out a silent breath and holds out his hand for the cigarette. He doesn't want to hear what David has to say. He doesn't know what he'd say back.

The thin cylinder of paper and tobacco is pressed to his fingers and opens his eyes to stare blindly above him as he raises the cigarette to his lips and takes a pull. This has got to be the biggest fucking cliché on the planet, but he feels like his head is stuffed with cotton, like the bottom has dropped out of his stomach, and the smoke feels reassuring as it burns his lungs. He pauses for a moment with his lips wrapped around the filter before he pulls it away and exhales, handing it back to David.

They lay side by side, passing the cigarette back and forth and staring above themselves at the canopy. Michael tries not to think about the fact that he's lying swollen-lipped and debauched on a bed with a man he tried so terribly hard to kill not all that long ago. His body is starting to ache as the adrenaline fades and his neck is throbbing. The whole situation seems too insane to be real, but the pain is real enough.

He let David bite him. He let David fuck him.

He's scared to death that he'd let David do it again. Damn the man for this doubt. His life had been pretty shitty before David, but at least it had made sense.

All too soon the cigarette is almost gone and he laughs. It's a hard and ugly sound and he passes off the smoke so David can take a last draw and stub it out.

"This is so fucked up." He places a hand on his chest and rubs at the broad swatch of skin faintly darkened by bruises.

"Don't I know it."

"I tried to kill you."

"I will kill you. Soon."

Unable to laugh for that constricting feeling under the rib cage Michael shuts his eyes and lets out a violent breath.

He feels David shift. The vampire twists his upper body to put out the cigarette before moving closer still, bracing a hand on the other side of Michael's body. Michael swallows, and opens his eyes.

"You're mine Michael."

'Is this what you want Michael?' He asks himself mentally as he tries to move away from the cage of David's arms.

"I have to go." Is what he says aloud.

"Michael-"

"Look, I have to go. No one knows I went out. They could be forming a search party as we speak, and..." He trails off, unsure of how to finish. And I don't want them to find me like this? And I don't want you dead?

"...I just have to go." He finishes lamely, finding his jeans, shirt, jacket and boots. Pulling them on he forgoes a search for the rest in favor of beating a hasty retreat.

"You'll be back." The muttered words are almost too quiet for Michael to hear but he still turns to David to retort. A gust of wet coastal wind blows down the stairs, disturbing the stained gauze curtains around the bed, and David's gone. His coat and clothes have vanished too. Not for the first time Michael wonders if he was the only one here this whole time. Wonders if it's all in his head. Wonders if he's sleeping with ghosts, or just living in a nightmare.