Let The Darkness Lead You Home 10 страница

"You can always change your mind," Gerard says.

"I've never changed my mind about a tattoo in my life."

"I meant about turning," Gerard says, and puts down Frank's grandfather before picking up his mother, laying that on Frank's forearm and giving it an uncertain frown.

"I know," Frank says, because this is the tenth time they've had that conversation, and he suspects they'll have it a hundred more by the time his tattoos heal. "And if I do, you'll be the first to know. I promise."

Gerard refuses to watch Frank get inked, which is ridiculous, considering how often he stabs Frank with his teeth and drinks his blood. "I just can't, okay?" Gerard says when Frank pushes it.

"Would you rather I didn't get them?" Frank's gonna get them anyway, but he's curious.

"No! I like them. I just don't—"

"He puked everywhere when I got mine," Mikey says, making Frank jump. Sneaky bastard, creeping up behind them. "Still squeamish about needles. Why do you think he always makes sure someone else is around if he thinks you need a hand with the BloodPlus?"

The glare Gerard gives his brother is epic.

"Don't give me that look," Mikey says, squeezing next to Gerard on the sofa. "I bet Frank thinks it's adorable. Do you think it's adorable, Frank?"

Frank totally thinks it's adorable. "I don't need an audience," Frank reassures Gerard, patting his knee. "Never had one before."

It takes a week to have his family inked into his skin. Pete ends up sitting in on some of the sessions, watching carefully in a way Frank suspects is leading to Pete getting some new ink of his own, but mostly it's just Katherine and Frank and the ghosts of his ancestors. Gerard examines each one closely as Frank unwraps it, but he's not allowed to touch, not after he couldn't help licking the first night, and Frank had to have half his grandmother's hair re-done because Gerard healed the ink right out of his flesh.

"Why the rush?" Katherine asks the third evening as she's inking his uncle onto his side, trying not to lean on Frank's red and aching arm that she'd worked on the day before. "The money your master's paying me, I would have been more than happy to come out a few times, spread it out a little."

Frank's not sure what it's like for artists in Western—here they can get tech status even if their art is really only useful to humans the way a tattoo artist's is, but that might be Gerard's soft spot for artists—so he isn't sure how Katherine feels about vamps when they're not paying for her services. "I felt the need," he says. "And I have a pretty high pain threshold."

"That's true enough," she answers, and changes the subject. Frank's grateful. He doesn't want to have to explain himself to a stranger.

**

"What if you can't do alts anymore?" Gerard asks, watching Frank rub tattoo ointment into his grandfather's face the night after they send Katherine home. "Is Pete ready?"

"Pete's ready," Frank says, moving on to his mom. "I'd let him work on me."

"We'll lose most of the business from the other zones, of course. You have such a great reputation. And you really pioneered—"

"Gerard. Why are you so sure I'm going to lose it?" He's never explained what happened to his drawing skills when he turned.

"What you do is art. And art is part of what dies."

Frank isn't convinced. "But—"

"Besides. No one wants another vamp working on them. Techs are human for a reason."

"What's the reason though?"

"Everything isn't better when you're a vampire, Frank," Gerard says. "I wish you'd listen to me."

"Everything isn't better when you're not a vampire, either. Think about your life after Mikey turned. If he'd been a vamp and you'd just been you. Commuting to the city, fantasizing about killing the drones on the subway. If you can tell me that you genuinely wish that's how it went down, I'll think about changing my mind."

"I wish Mikey'd never turned," Gerard says, frowning.

"No deal. He turned. Do you wish you stayed human while he was a vampire."

Gerard's frown deepens, but he finally says, "No. I couldn't leave him to go through that alone."

"There. I told—"

"But it's different now. I'm not alone. Vamps, humans, everything's different now."

"Not the point," Frank insists. "You love him. I love you. Besides. You're the fucking Gerent of the Eastern Zone! Tell me that woulda happened if you stayed a drone. Yeah, I'm a great fucking tech. But I'm gonna make a kick-ass advisor to the king, too. Just wait." Done with his ointment, Frank flings himself in Gerard's lap and tucks his face in Gee's neck.

"Fuck advisor, you can be the king's concubine."

"Hell, no," Frank says. "You're totally making an honest woman out of me."

Gerard pushes Frank back a bit so he can look him in the eye. "What you want is a lot more permanent than that. You're bound forever to your maker, no divorce."

This isn't the first time Frank's heard that, but it's the first time he's really listened. "Who turned you?" he asks.

Gerard's always skirted the question, but this time he doesn't hesitate. "Mikey."

"And who turned Mikey?" Frank's never noticed anyone who Mikey seems particularly bound to, other than Gerard. And maybe Pete.

"Gabe."

That would actually explain a few things. "But they aren't…" Frank's not sure how to finish.

"The bond takes different forms. And it can change over time. But until one of you dies, it's never broken."

"You're not actually putting me off, you know." Frank says, tucking his head back under Gerard's chin, licking gently at his collar bone.

"Figures," Gerard answers, and pulls Frank closer.

**

They wait for Frank's tattoos to heal, and then Gerard has to head to the northern border for a few days, and when he gets back, he tries to think of another reason they should wait. But Frank says, "Tonight. You promised, and let's just do it tonight." He's done all the thinking about it he wants to do. He will actually be eighty before Gee turns him at this rate.

Gerard grumbles, and tries to stare Frank down, but in the end he gives in. "Okay," he says. "We'll do it."

Frank doesn't think to ask what it involves, and Gerard doesn't think to tell him. It's not until Frank's nearly drained, eyes too heavy to stay open, and Gerard's whispering, "Drink. Drink for me Frankie," in his ear as he presses something flat, warm and wet to Frank's lips, that he realizes, of course, he needs to drink Gerard's blood. He can't find the coordination to do as he's told, but his mouth fills anyway, and he swallows on reflex. And again. And then Gerard's teeth are back at his throat and he's gulping loud in Frank's ear. It would be easier if Frank could reach up, hold Gerard's arm to his mouth, but the best he can do is prod gently at the wound with his tongue, do his best not to slip away.

And then darkness.

Frank wakes up starving. A snarling, snapping, clawing hunger that eats at his bones and his belly, that turns every pore into a gaping maw screaming for food. He fights with the sheet covering him, tears at his clothes, at his hair, and when Gerard lands on him, pinning his hands away from his face, Frank figures out how to breathe and the scream comes out of his lungs. Gerard's mouth is moving, but all Frank can hear is the sound of his body's need. Heaving, he throws Gerard off and is on him faster than thought, teeth— fangs —tearing into his neck. His mouth fills with blood, but it's wrong. Sluggish and tepid and not what he needs.

He's ripped away from his meal, viciously strong hands around his throat yanking him halfway across the room. His master, his mate, is lying there on gory sheets, and Mikey's voice is saying, "You fucking idiot. Did you forget he'd need to eat?"

Frank's vision greys and when it clears again they're moving, Gerard and Mikey dragging him along by the arms, past the compound's gates, so fast that everything should be a blur, but it's not. Frank can see. And smell. God, the smells. Food is close and getting closer. Frank can taste it.

They come upon a parking lot filled with cars, a stream of people exiting the adjacent building toward them. Frank breaks Gerard and Mikey's hold and flies. The people scatter, some heading back inside the building, others diving for their vehicles, but two or three stand still, just staring, and Frank takes the nearest one down. There's nothing graceful or smooth about the process; it isn't pretty. Footage of this would never make it to tape. But all Frank's thinking about is how hungry he is, and a flying tackle is the quickest way to the guy's throat.

The blood is raw, fierce, vibrant on his tongue, and Frank can't get enough. He wants to drink forever.

Too soon there is no more no matter how hard he sucks, how tightly he presses the man's flesh to his face. But there're more good smells nearby, living, vital, human smells dominating the oil and asphalt and automotive steel. Frank leaps, landing on the hood of a jeep, and spies someone huddled by the back tire of a car two rows over. He's on her almost before she can look up at the sound of the impact he made on the metal, and this time he drags her up to his mouth instead of feeding on the ground like a dog. She cries out once as he bites, but she doesn't struggle, never makes another sound. Frank can feel it this time when her life evaporates, when she becomes literally nothing more than a bag of blood. He squeezes her, sucks harder, gets two more swallows before he drops the body next to the tire where she'd tried to hide. All that blood thrums through him, pounding against his skin from the inside, making him feel slick, oiled up, ready.

Gerard's scent gets stronger, and he's there, by Frank's side, reaching for him. And that's what Frank wants now, after his meal. He wants to rut and fuck and roll with him, use the strength he has, feel Gerard push back. "Fuck, Gee. Fuck. You didn't tell me. You didn't tell me how good it is."

"I know, Frankie," he says, pulling Frank into a crushing embrace. "I know. But sun'll be up soon. We've gotta get back."

And when Gerard says the words, Frank can feel it. The pull of sunrise, a bone-deep exhaustion calling him to bed. But first he needs to run.

Still clutching Gerard's arm, he goes, neither noticing nor caring which direction he's headed. Gerard keeps pace with him smoothly, and Mikey's there on his other side, hair pushed off his face by their speed. Buildings, trees, cars flash past, and Frank keeps waiting for his lungs to burn in his chest, for his heart to start pounding with exertion, but there's nothing. Just the riot of smells every time he forces in a breath, the barely-there sound of their feet on the ground, and the feel of Gerard's fingers twined with his.

"You didn't tell me!" Frank yells into the air rushing past them as he puts on an extra burst of speed.

It felt like the others were following him, but they must have been guiding him too, because they end up back at the compound and Frank doesn't have a fucking clue how. They slow at the gates, and are walking by the time they hit the front stairs. There's no twinge in Frank's muscles, not a hint of the shakes. If he didn't need his bed so badly, he could run for a week.

"Sleep," Mikey says sternly once they're inside. He glares at both of them. "I mean it. No fucking till nightfall. Frank needs to sleep."

"I'm not stupid," Gerard grumbles, but he doesn't meet Mikey's eyes. Frank hears the shutters, ten times as loud with his vampire hearing. It feels like his bones are going to break with how badly he needs to shut down.

"Bed," he says. "Bed bed bed. Where is it."

There's just time to hear Mikey say, "See?" as Gerard scoops Frank up and whisks him to their room.

**

When Frank wakes again, the hunger's there, but it's an ache, not a ravening beast. "You can have a mouthful," a voice says from the edge of the bed, and Frank turns to find Pete standing there, one of the throwing blades from the display in Gerard's office held loose in his right hand. He smells like food. Without conscious thought, Frank's up and surging toward him.

"Fuck, no," Pete says, glaring, blade now at arm's length. Gerard has both arms wrapped around Frank's chest, is gripping Frank's wrists tight.

"I've got him," Gerard says. "It's okay."

Frank struggles in his hold, but while he has more success than he would have two days ago, he can't break it.

"This was a bad idea," Pete says, still pointing his knife at Frank's face. Frank doesn't understand what's happening.

"Shh, Frankie, shh," Gerard says, pressing his cheek to Frank's ear. That's when Frank realizes that he's thrashing his head side to side as well as still trying to fight out of Gerard's grasp. He goes limp, but it only lasts a second before he's straining toward Pete again.

"I don't want to eat you," Frank says, trying to sound reassuring. But he does. He wants to rip Pete's throat out and gulp down every drop of blood. He doesn't want to kill him. Or hurt him. But, food.

"It's just the first few nights, Frank. It gets better soon. I promise," Gerard says, voice buzzing right in Frank's ear.

While Frank's calmer, Gerard shifts so his legs bracket Frank's hips, one calf pins Frank's thighs. Frank tries to relax, but Pete's scent is so strong.

"I'm not coming anywhere near his fangs," Pete says, backing up one step, then another. "I know I said— But look at him."

Last week Pete wrestled Frank to the ground and licked his face like a puppy while Frank laughed and tried to slap him off. Frank's brain knows that, knows Pete is his friend, but all Frank feels is need.

"I can't take him out like this," Gerard says. Frank doesn't know why not. Taking him to feed would solve everything. "What if he saw Ray. Or Christa, or one of the others before I got him off the grounds."

"Fuck you," Pete snaps.

"Here." Gerard shifts again, gets both Frank's wrists in one hand, holds his other out in Pete's direction. "I'll feed him. You can stay over there."

"Have you got him like that? He's not going to escape, is he?"

Frank uses every ounce of control he can summon to go still as death. Gerard's legs wrap more tightly around him; he gets a better hold on Frank's wrists. "I promise," he says.

Pete still looks skeptical, but he turns the blade on himself, cuts into the meat of his arm. The iron stench of blood overwhelms Frank's senses, but Gerard is a steel cage. He stretches his free hand closer to Pete, and Pete leans forward to meet him, letting the blood oozing from the cut drip into Gerard's cupped palm. Frank hears the growling a second before he realizes he's the one making it.

"Shhh," Gerard says again, and then he's bringing the blood up to Frank's lips, letting him taste.

It's warm, still alive, though not as good as it was last night fresh from the source, and Frank dives at it, pushing his face into Gerard's hand, chasing the taste with tongue and lips. He cuts himself on his fangs, bites the fleshy base of Gerard's thumb, and the taste changes, makes him pause. "More?" he says, reassured that he can even speak, that he's not crazed with the taste.

"A mouthful you said. Gerard, you said a mouthful." Pete has his hand pressed to the cut on his arm and he doesn't look happy.

"That was more like half a mouthful," Gerard says.

"You are lucky I owe you, Frank Iero," Pete says and squeezes a little more blood to the surface. Frank wants it still, needs it, but it doesn't feel like torture to wait for Gerard to bring it to him.

This time he's careful not to use his fangs, just to lap it up, let the taste fill his mouth. It's counter to all the logic he can muster that just a taste of what he needs would make him anything other than desperate for a full meal, but he can look at Pete now, can say, "Thank you."

"Let me heal that for you," Gerard says to Pete when Frank relaxes back against his chest, but Pete won't come any closer.

"Your mouth is right next to his mouth, so no thanks," Pete says. "I'll be fine. Mikey can do it."

"I thought we weren't going to tell Mikey," Gerard says. Which makes no sense at all, because Gerard tells Mikey everything.

"Well, you lied about him not wanting to eat me, I lied about not telling Mikey." Pete shrugs. "It's not like he won't forgive you."

Frank twists so he can see Gerard's face. He looks perturbed, but not angry. "Yeah," Gerard says. "Okay. He'll know anyway. He always does."

"Go get him some real food, man," Pete says, and then he's gone.

Frank follows Gerard, though before they get up to speed it's hard—even with Pete's blood to tide him over—not to break off every time they pass a human scent. Running is no less amazing than it was the night before, a riot of smells and sensations, a rush of power and purpose. Needy as he is, they hit the warehouse district almost too soon; Frank's legs still want to fly. Until the scent of hot throbbing dance floor hits his nose, and all he wants to do is feed.

There's a pair of bouncers on the door, and Frank thinks they'll have to take them first, but Gerard grips Frank's elbow, walks him right past them into the heat and flashing lights. "You okay?" he asks, not loosening his hold even a fraction. "We'll find you the right one."

All of them are right, all filled with life, with blood, and Frank doesn't see what they're waiting for, but but he lets Gerard guide him through the bodies to the back of the building where the lights don't penetrate. How will he know? How will Gerard know? But then a sharper scent breaks through the redolence of blood, and Gerard's pulling a girl with neon cord woven into her hair and thick paint around her eyes into Frank's reach.

On tape, it's always blink-and-you'll-miss-it from a vamp sighting his prey to sinking his fangs in, but Frank has time to feel the give of her skin over muscle, the thickness of her muscle over bone, smell the fruit and the liquor in the cocktail she was drinking and the grease base of her eyeliner, as he drags her close enough to bite.

She's hot in his hands, under his lips, and she tastes sweet and tangy and rich. He's aware of the music, of Gerard beside him feeding too, of the darkness and the oblivious crowd. His throat and tongue and lips are working to catch all the blood spilling into his mouth as her heart beats faster and more weakly against his chest the more he drinks. He's thirsty, so thirsty, but the desperation of his first feed isn't there, and as he lets the girl's body fall into the corner, he doesn't want another victim. He's thrumming, eyes wide, jaw loose, universe sized. His ears buzz, the people around him fade, and Gerard is the only thing that feels real.

"You okay?" Gerard asks again. Frank nods and takes his hand. He's never been more okay in his life.

As they step back into the sweeping lights, Gerard's flushed with blood, nearly glowing with it, even without infrareds, and he's looking at Frank from under the deep-burgundy slash of hair across his face. He's beautiful in ways Frank's never seen before. Sound rushes back in and the music pounds in Frank's chest like a heartbeat.

Gerard starts weaving his way back toward the doors, but Frank stops him. "Dance with me," he says. He hasn't danced since college. Jammed, thrown himself around and rocked the fuck out, but he hasn't danced. "Dance with me!" he says again when Gerard just looks at him.

Time stretches out on the wail of a single lyric, and Frank's sure, for a minute, a year, a lifetime, that Gerard wants to take it back. Wants to make Frank human again, take all this away. Then a smile breaks across Gerard's face, feral and sweet and delighted all at once. He leans in, licks the corner of Frank's mouth, gives him a quick kiss, and time starts up again.

With a laugh welling up in Frank's chest, they throw themselves into the press of bodies, and dance.

~fin~

Notes:

This story would not be here if not for the people who helped me with it. bluesoaring has been cheerleading me since I started talking about it what feels like a hundred years ago now, miss_begonia listened to me babble on, and then read my draft while she was in the middle of moving and gave me invaluable feedback, reminding me when I needed to hear it that I could do this, cee_m gave me feedback and support and pictures of the boys when I was sure I could never finish, and isweedan not only gave me copious beta notes, but put up with my arguing points over IM until ridiculous hours of the night in her time zone.

I really was so lucky to get art that fit so well with my own vision of this story. Please go visit: MIX; ART

I also got linked to this gorgeous art by niniaiero on deviantArt today, inspired by my story.:D

Дата добавления: 2015-09-29