CURIOUSER

Why? Why would you bother yourself with helping me when everyone else is so certain humans are a lost cause? It… it just seems like a waste of your time.

I have no answer for you. Maybe I have gotten attached, seeing as I am the one who told you of this world-- I feel like I want to see you succeed. Humans may not be the strongest, but they have come such a long way since I was one, and I want to see you go above and beyond.

“I used to look on with disgust for anybody who would even possess a willingness to turn themselves into a lab rat. I still would, but I know now what I’ll experience for myself eventually you can do a million things and still aren’t satisfied.” Dylan wore the weight of his traumas on his shoulders, feeling that it was his responsibility to take on the others in the house. The habit brought about the grumpiness  and the uptight personality Dylan seemed to be famous for nowadays. A painful side effect of an Alpha who lost his crown. “The soldier’s resurrection, you could almost write it in a song.” The hybrid rose from his spot, moving around the coffee table and taking a seat next to Jaego, resting his elbows on his knees as he leaned forward, “I don’t see that side of my immortality, Jaego, I don’t see the beauty of it the way you do. I’m caught between a rock and a hard place.” He sighed, “I wouldn’t know what to do with it.”

He couldn’t help but give his friend a sad smile. Jaego wasn’t blind-- he knew what happened to Madeline and Dylan for them to become a hybrid along with him; captured and changed against their will. He should have known then and there that the experiments weren’t something that he wanted to be a part of, but if he didn’t undergo it, then he never would have met his closest friends. His family. Jae moved slightly to make enough room for the hybrid as he sat next to him, scratching his chin as he thought on Dylan’s words. “I never had the idea of making a song about that-- I should right something up,” he gave a small chuckle before he sighed sadly, “I know you don’t. I don’t know how long it will take for you to see what I see-- and you may never be able to. I know the trauma you carry, the ties that you have and refuse to sever. Just don’t let it drown you.” Jaego thought back on when he first became immortal and what he did to pass the time. “Is there a hobby that you have always wanted to try but never got the chance to? Learn an instrument? Learn to paint? There is a world out there waiting for you to discover, all you have to do is take that first step.”

Everything. Something to help my brother. It’s all just superstition and honestly just plain nightmarish.

I only heard about what he was through hearsay-- Harry was Rowan’s prize experiment and wendigos are not common. I wish I could give you more information, but I have never came across any of them personally and what I did hear is contradictory. I will do whatever I can to help you find the information you need.

“Right, people tend to notice when they start sprouting gray hair and you, well, don’t. Immortality is a bitch.” Wilburn clasped his hands in front of him and internally detailed the choices that brought the two supernatural to this very second. Their lives changed forever by one decision that caused a snowball effect, but nothing neither could erase even if they wanted to. “You get quite the earful for that, signing up as a willing participant, don’t you? I can’t personally picture myself growing bored enough to take the next evolutionary step, not that Cassie would ever let me do something that stupid. Maybe there’s a way to remove the kill switch.” He slid from his chair, moving over to grab himself a clean glass and filled it with water. “I’ve got to live my life by that motto, you know? Always forward, never back. I feel like I’ll fuck this up somehow.”

Jaego couldn’t help but snort laughter at the wolf’s crass words, it always made conversation enjoyable. He thought on Wil’s question, chewing on his lip as he thought back on how he’d became a hybrid. It was a rash decision, one that he’d somehow caught wind of-- it was exciting and new, and him being the way he was... jumped at the opportunity to be something new. “Not as much as the beginning. The others in my group of hybrids don’t judge me... and in a way I can help them. It’s not like I can stop my nature, so I may as well put it to good use. Perhaps there is a way to remove the switch, but with the main perpetrators indisposed it is not the biggest issue here,” he said with a small shrug as he watched Wil get up to stand near him, “everyone makes mistake, Wil. Life is but a long road full of pebbles-- even the smallest one can trip you, but it is how you pick yourself up that counts.”

Eloise brought a thumb to her mouth, nibbling at her perfectly manicured nail anxiously. Detail her whole life, was she really resorting to having her story written in a book for others to mock? If this town is forcing her to decide who lives, who dies, and who tells her story, it may as well be the vampire herself. “Well,” She moved across the room, taking a slow seat in a chair, “I was born the only child of a wealthy businessman about 340 years ago. My mother became the socialite of the town, every bachelor wanted her and every woman wished nothing but to be her, and she raised me with the same poise bestowed upon her. I grew with a gold spoon in my mouth, spoiled, bratty, I was a temper tantrum waiting to happen.” Ellie’s smile rose, pondering, “As arrogant as I was, I had fallen in love with the idea of love. My father’s business associate, for example, had been my first. William. Tall, handsome, mysterious, and all around a flirt.” Her smile faltered and replaced with a curious expression, “Have you ever been in love, Jaego?”

Sorry – reflex. I guess there’s no point hiding it now that basically the whole town knows.

The kind you consider family.

Maybe you should try slumming it, might loosen a few of your buttons. It never hurts to get in touch with your roots after a few centuries.

You know how to pull at my heart strings to get what you want, you minx.

Friend? What happened to best friend.

I also resent the implication that I’m tacky with no taste.

Am I supposed to disregard the fact that you drank my expensive brandy without me? What best friend does that?

“Majority are in for a goddamn shell shock outside the town, of course they wouldn’t take too kindly to vampires casually spewing about their immortality.” Wilburn looked down at the liquid in the glass as he smacked his lips with distaste and placed the rim to his mouth, tipping it and downing the rest that was left in one fell swoop per Jaego’s advice. His taste and smell hasn’t been the same since the turn, flavors intensified, some scents bothered his nose. He pushed through the obstacle. “Coming down with the flu never didn’t suck. At least I have being what I am going for me.” He pushed the empty glass to the side, feeling a hint of the effects already washing over, “You think it’ll get any easier for you? Being half and half?”

“Especially when it came to the whole... not aging bit. Towns like these make it easier to stay in a place for a long time. I was not a fan of constantly having to move around,” Jaego said as he took the empty glass and placed it next to the sink, leaning back as he observed the wolf. Thinking over everything he had become and what he still had to master. “I’m sure it will... I feel as though I was the luckier one out of the others, since I volunteered for this. It made things... easier to accept, but knowing that I have a killswitch inside of me that witches can control if they want is something that I will always resent,” Jaego said with a simple shrug, “I’m always one that tries to live life going one step forward and never back. In time everything will be easier.”

“I’m not a bashful prude if you display your business in the sheets for an audience.” Dylan pointed out in a playful matter-of-fact way, “We’re all full of ourselves sometimes, Jae.” The hybrid placed his index finger to his lip as Jaego recounted bits and pieces of his backstory, the small collective of a family, and a surprising willingness to fight a war and provide for his mother and sister’s welfare. Dylan never knew someone like that in his life, someone protecting him, he was thrown into a harsh regiment since the moment he could talk. “You preferred adventure over a charmed livelihood, which explains why you volunteered for the experiments. Always looking for the next big thing.” Dylan’s gaze shifted to his hands, “I can’t begin to understand the battles you’ve fought or the shit you encountered in however long you were walking the earth, but I would have given anything for that freedom.”

“When you get as old as I am, things start to get a little stale. I was running out of things to do, things that felt new whenever I tried them. In hindsight, I understand how that makes me sound to someone who did not want this done to them in the first place,” he said with a small sigh. In retrospect to the other two in their triplicate, he wanted the change. Craved it. He had already mastered so many skills that an eternity was starting to feel like a death sentence. He rose a brow as the man continued to speak, giving Dylan a small shrug. “As a human, I died rather quickly into the fourth crusade not long after I joined. That was a particularly gruesome battle, but then my sire found me and I began my true journey. The thing is... you have that chance to get that freedom. You don’t have to answer to anyone who betrayed you now, you are going to live long enough to do all of the things you have dreamed. It is waiting for you, and that is not just me being an optimist.”

What? Isn’t ‘drinking your problems away’ a necessity for those who live in this town?

Yes, it is, but you are drinking trash. You are a friend of mine, we only drink with expensive class around here.

So unentertained that you resort to meddling in another’s affairs. If that is not so me.

Serious as blood splatter on my walls. Where do I even begin, the human years?

I do hate being bored.

“You, not bragging? Shocker, I guess the gossip from that damn rumor mill isn’t working accurately. I mean, if I knew as much as you did, that shit would be spewing out like word vomit.” Wil leaned forward and hummed, elbows resting against the counter as Jaego busied himself with his work. “To see what little light came from the pile of shit I was handed. I have my kids, my girlfriend who I’m taking a right step in the direction with. Got a pack too. Hunter or not, they took me in. Not to mention…it is kind of awesome hearing conversations from two floors below.” Wilburn wrinkled his nose, overwhelmed by the aroma of the tea even as Jae placed it in front of him. “Fuck, that is rancid.” He gagged and wrapped a hand around the cup, nearly gagging again when the liquid passed his lips. He forced himself to swallow down a couple gulps before coughing. “Was one of the ingredients cow manure? Jesus.”

“You learn not to ‘word-vomit’ as much when it means your life on the line. People are not exactly friendly with vampires outside of the town,” Jae gave with a shrug, listening to the man count off the silver-linings. “Ah, I remember the days of being freshly turned into a vampire-- knowing that I would not be killed by plagues was a plus,” he said before chuckling at the man’s reaction to the tea he made. “Do yourself a favor and do not smell or taste it, it is better that way but drink it in one go-- goes down easier.”

Have you forgotten you live with a super hearing hybrid?

“You like talking about your life or you enjoy talking about yourself? There is a difference.” Dylan rounded the couch and plopped himself into a chair, kicking up his legs on top of the coffee table with a relaxed disposition. It wasn’t difficult to rile the man these days and certainly was the case when Jae pushed every button imaginable. “Then consider me sharing the sentiment, for once.” He pressed his lips together with a small one-shoulder shrug, “What was your family life like? Parents, siblings, all that?”

Would you care to scribe mine? I’d adore reading a book of myself.

I do enjoy the process of writing down ones life-- seeing the intricacies of their life and chronicling it.

I should when I can hear you from the living room on a different floor.

Watch it turn out you actually were Hemingway using a pen name. It’s funny, though, the time we spent together and I really know little of your life.

Have you tried not listening?

“No, but some of them might given the first whiff you aren’t as old as you appear. Or you just enjoy spilling the beans as bragging rights.” Wilburn followed after, not quite remembering how he and Jaego even became friends, but it was as if the hybrid’s visits were bound to lead the pair for interactions. Jae reminded the former hunter of the moments he embraced life by the balls and faced the world with recklessness. Those days were buried and dead, for his kids’ sakes, for Cassie’s sake. “I used to think I knew how to live it. Didn’t always end the greatest as you can see.” Wil found a seat in the chair at the kitchen’s island, drumming his fingers along the counter’s edge, “Tea’s been in my blood since I met Cas. I’m not disappointed.”

Jaego chuckled, “well you’re not wrong, although I do not normally talk to brag. What is the point in living for so long if the knowledge that I have is not shared? At least, that is what I think.” Jae measured the ingredients out into a mesh tea bag carefully as he waited for the kettle to boil. “I know that things have not exactly gone your way, with the change and all, but I am sure that there is at least one good thing that you can think of that did come from the change you went through. Looking on the bright side, I guess,” Jae said with a hum as he took the water off of the stove and poured it into the cup, taking the mug over to the table where Wil sat, “now, it will not taste great at all, but you will feel better.”