#ficscraps

Spring comes early in Korea, blossoms slowly unfurling in the morning light as Yushi drags his luggage through the walkway and into the dorms. This time it is for good– there is a new contract inked with his parents’ names that passes on some pseudo-guardianship to the tall building that has been looming in Yushi's head more and more with each summer he's spent in it. 

Yushi is not new here, but he may as well be. There has clearly been a fresh round of departures since he last set foot here. There is a memory stuck in his head of Jungwoo smiling at him kindly three years ago when Yushi first arrived. It is foolish to look for him here now, he's already moved onto bigger things, but the lack of any anchor makes his stomach churn. 

The dorms are sparse. Most of the familiar faces are ones Yushi was silently hoping to never see again. He is still not any good at Korean, despite how much he tries. It does not come naturally to him and everyone knows it. He huddles in the corner of the dorm on his own and scrolls over flashcards of vocabulary and tries not to think too much about how easily other new trainees integrate socially with the seniors, smiles blooming easily and laughter uniting quickly whenever Yushi mispronounces a word. He keeps his voice quiet to practice the syllables to himself, a test of how little sound can escape his lips. 

Spring is in full swing, delivering pretty bouquets to the SM building hallways and painting the grass outside a vibrant green even behind the glass. Yushi is supposed to stay inside, not get too much sun. Spring glows in multicolored hues and brings with it a new trainee. 

Oh Sion is lanky and slouches so much he almost looks short. He looks all around the practice rooms with his eyes so wide they might pop out. He is stuck somewhere between a forcibly schooled poker face and an easily broken awkward smile. He only speaks when spoken to and he sits quietly by himself most of the time. He's only a little older than Yushi and he's been dropped into the same practice group as him presumably based on that alone. Yushi likes him. 

Sion doesn't really fit in. He isn't ostracized– not in the way that Yushi is, at least. Sion is already handsome and he can kind of dance and he was scouted. He already has a face that the company will adore. He's threatening. Not that Sion recognizes it, but Yushi has been around long enough to see it. There's some jealousy in the eyes that watch him, but there's a certain untouchable factor to him. Sion is rough around the edges but he walked in here with the look of someone who will make it. The others can't afford too much bad blood. Yushi likes him. 

Sion is nice too. Sion has been here a week and he hasn't laughed at Yushi even once. Sion looks so out of his depth he doubts he even knows a third of the trainees’ names. Sion is free real estate. Sion is a big open field that is begging for somebody to walk over and plant a seed into the soil and start a garden. Yushi has never been an especially brave person, and going out of his comfort zone is difficult, but that plot will not remain untilled for long. 

Sion is nice. He smiles kindly at Yushi and orders him food and sort of preens when Yushi calls him hyung. Yushi is not confident enough to ease into a friendship so seamlessly as that, but he has a foot in the door– a shovel planted in the dirt. Evidently it is enough because Sion buys Yushi ice cream when he is sad and before he knows it they are both sort of orbiting around each other more often than not. 

Yushi knows he must look a little silly, lingering around behind Sion all the time like an overly attached companion animal. It doesn't matter because the other trainees start to leave him alone and Sion is kind-of sort-of his friend. Sion's face lights up whenever Yushi calls him hyung and Yushi gets a little companionship. They are symbiotic. Sion is just so nice. He smells good too. Yushi really does like him a lot. 

“That sounds like a crush,” Yushi's little brother sneers over the phone and he absolutely means it in a mocking way and it is not meant to be a revelatory statement. It is eye-opening all the same. Yushi picks apart how defensive he got with his eyes squeezed shut instead of actually sleeping. He can’t bring himself to look Sion in the eye the next day because he is ashamed. Of course it's not a crush, Sion is a boy and so is Yushi. He feels silly for acting the way he has. 

Hyungu watches the slow rise and fall of Harin's broad shoulders. He sleeps on his side, or at least he does tonight. In nothing but the shred of moonlight between the curtains (came with the apartment, too elegant, not quite him and certainly not them) the contrast of their skin is stark. Harin is so tan. Hyungu wonders what number his skin tone color is and then corrects the question into if Harin would even know that sort of thing. Harin is not the sort to hide his blemishes. They are unalike. 

Hyungu has shared a bed before. He spent many nights as a young teen avoiding his parents' house by falling asleep crammed between some combination of Giuk or Dongmyeong or Dongju. Back then, they were in beds too small for their limbs which were growing too quick for the hem of their pants to keep up. Even before them, Hyungu shared beds with Harin once or twice. Back then, they were too small on their own to fill up the space in a bed made to last them long past their tenth birthday. 

Now, Hyungu is in a bed that fits him (No– them) just right. It has enough width for two to fit more than economically. Harin is long-legged and with his knees just slightly tucked, his feet don't hang over the edges. It is enough space without being too much space. 

Hyungu has never shared a bed like this. They are bare-skinned but not truly nude. They are close but not within each other. They are friends and they are lovers and they will continue to be both when they wake up in the morning. There is no expiration date on them anymore. 

Hyungu understands intimacy but he does not understand this intimacy. This is not an intimacy he has practiced and prepared in advance. Hyungu is the sort who can only be comfortable when he is performing what he already knows. There are no memorized chords that translate to Harin's form next to his. Hyungu can tie a cherry stem with his tongue but he has no muscle memory to tell him how to sleep with Harin without sleeping with him. 

Gingerly, delicately, discreetly, softly (maybe if he finds the right word in his head he can find the instructions too) Hyungu moves his body towards Harin's. Hyungu dips down, he lies flat on his back, he looks up to the ceiling, he does not pray. He feels the heat radiate off of Harin's body, small and mild yet somehow also large and hot and impossible to ignore – he does not pray. 

Harin's shoulders are so wide. They make his silhouette unique and eye-catching. They are unalike. Harin sleeps quietly, and he sleeps on his side. They are alike, too. Hyungu pushes onto his side and counts the centimeters from his chest to Harin's back. It is a polite distance for standing next to someone in a crowded subway. If the subway car lurched, Harin would lurch with it and maintain the distance, they would not collide. (Except Hyungu likes colliding, at least with Harin. He is hardwired to like it. He is fated to like it.)

Hyungu can be brave, especially when there are no witnesses. He does not fear failure. He fears being seen failing, being known to fail. They are back to chest, face to nape, toes to ankle. When Hyungu breathes in he can smell the remnants of cologne, the scent of sweat from a day spent unpacking boxes. Bare skin to bare skin, there is a warm thrumming through his body– the universe or God or nature or hysteria telling him this is good, this is what you're supposed to be doing, this is what you were made to do and this is who you were meant to do it with. (He does not pray.) 

It is a sensation he has felt before in a different context, one that requires even less clothes and that would necessitate the direction of their bodies be flipped. Hyungu reaches out his arm, hesitantly, in a necessary gesture to recontextualize before his body can act on impulse. Hyungu wraps his arm around Harin's front, his skin so hot it burns, the thrum so loud in his ears it is defeaning. Harin inhales and Hyungu does too. Hyungu holds his breath as Harin releases it. A slow sigh through his nose, breath slowing and evening out again. 

Hyungu is the big spoon and it feels nice and it feels right and it feels dangerous. It is unfamiliar but familiar, uncertain yet correct. He falls asleep like this, with Harin too hot against his skin, with Hyungu too small to properly puzzle piece into him (and maybe they aren't meant to fit perfectly, maybe that's okay). 

Hyungu does not pray. 

-—-

Dongmyeong links his arm with Hyungu's, leaning into him as his steps start to wobble. He is entirely too drunk for this early in the evening but Hyungu won't chastise him tonight. Dongmyeong has only even been to Seoul a handful of times, and they're celebrating, and tomorrow he and Giuk and Yonghoon will drive home and the next time Hyungu will see them in person is up in the air. 

It is not a question of if, because Hyungu is certain that he'll never escape Giuk and Dongmyeong entirely. It is a loss all the same, if they come visit him next weekend or if they don't see each other until the next holiday. The impending absence is already hollowing out a cavity under his skin that can only be filled when they are all together. 

"This place has great seafood," Harin announces as they walk through a street packed with bars and dotted by couples and small crowds. Harin grins at him, no doubt eager to impart his seolite wisdoms. Hyungu stifles his smile before he can remind himself that he doesn't have to. He doesn't remind Harin that he and Yonghoon know this city too. 

Dongmyeong pouts at him until Hyungu agrees to take a shot of some sort of fancy liquor alongside him. Dongmyeong is scouting out the city drinking culture for the bar back home – his excuse. Hyungu knows that Dongmyeong just loves to drink, he has a certain pride about it, and he also knows Dongmyeong well enough that calling his bluff while he's already tossed will lead to nothing but directionless arguing. 

"Love shot?" Dongmyeong smiles at him, holding the shot glass up and gesturing to their still locked arms. "To my ultimate first platonic love," Dongmyeong sing-songs and the liquor burns a hot streak down Hyungu's throat. 

"How is he your first platonic love," Giuk scowls and pokes at Dongmyeong with his chopsticks from across the table. Dongmyeong sticks his tongue out at him and clutches at Hyungu's arm dramatically. "I've known you longer than you've been potty-trained."

"Hyungu was a cool upperclassmen who played guitar. You were an ugly little toddler who never shared his crayons," Dongmyeong squints at Giuk accusedly for his baby-aged social crimes, "What was there to love, exactly?" Hyungu chuckles and a smug look of satisfaction spreads across Dongmyeong's face. 

"You know Giuk is my favorite though, right?" Hyungu asks him, making a show of shuttling some of his food to Giuk's plate. Dongmyeong slithers his arm away and sulks, a man scorned. Giuk flashes him a cute little pose and mumbles his thanks before stuffing the food in his mouth. 

For a moment, Hyungu can forget that they're leaving tomorrow. He can almost forget Harin on his other side and Yonghoon across the table too, bearing awkward witness to the three of them. Hyungu isn't so oblivious as to not notice how little Yonghoon is drinking or how he avoids eye contact with Hyungu in particular. 

"Shouldn't you be taking love shots with your boyfriend?" Harin tells him, under his breath so the others can't hear, charming smile but eyes a little pleading. Hyungu can count the number of times that Harin has called him that on one hand. It makes his heart flutter and the liquor stain down his throat. 

"When the others go to their hotel?" Hyungu offers, a hesitant smile that is quickly stifled by old habit. Harin returns it regardless. Yonghoon shuffles out of his seat and taps the pack of cigarettes in his pocket as explanation. Hyungu watches him go, shoulders hunched for more reason than just the short doorway. 

Hyungu follows him out. It is oddly parallel to their first real moment together, (handsome upperclassman Yonghoon, awkwardly flirting Yonghoon, tipsy and tongue-tied Yonghoon) a time when Hyungu was a bit smaller in his emotions, even more self-contained, embittered and easily smitten. There was a time when Yonghoon reached out to him despite his aloofness. There was a time when Yonghoon would surprise him with flowers, would whisk Hyungu away to rooftops to stargaze with hands shoved in each other's pockets. 

Those were authentic times– an authenticity that Hyungu can no longer afford him despite how desperately he once tried. He was never in love with Yonghoon no matter how much he liked the idea of it, and they will never be soulmates despite how often Hyungu would reassure him it didn't matter. (Guilt, guilt, terrible guilt. A guilt that bubbles just below the surface, a carefully watched pot to ensure it will never boil over.)

No amount of sorry will ever suffice and they both know it. It sits on Hyungu's tongue, heavy and wriggling with desperation to be freed. It isn't what Yonghoon needs, so Hyungu swallows it down, sour like spoiled milk. "Will you be sharing a room with Dongmyeong tonight?" Hyungu asks, traitorous mind and treacherous words. 

"Is it your turn to play the stern older brother warning me not to play with his heart? I already got an earful from Giuk, by the time I work my way up to his actual brother I'll have heard every line in the playbook, I imagine," Yonghoon is joking, but not really. He's speaking like he's telling a joke but it doesn't sound right, he doesn't look right. 

"No," Hyungu defends himself too quick, always too quick, always gives his anxieties away much too easily. "I think you should spend time together. You'd be good for each other, honest," Hyungu swears on it, and he means it. They're good people, they deserve good things. Yonghoon deserves much better than a sort-of boyfriend who ran off on him for the soulmate he promised he didn't even want. 

Yonghoon reads his face. He knows Hyungu, not in the way their friends in the bar know him. Yonghoon knows Hyungu at his lowest, he knows Hyungu free of the context of his circumstance. Yonghoon knows who Hyungu is without the ghost of his father hanging over his shoulder, without the church and the broken home and the shattered dreams. He knows the raw Hyungu, the Hyungu that only can exist in front of a stranger. 

"Am I good enough to keep him when his soulmate waltzes into his life out of the blue?" Yonghoon asks (rhetorical, probably, maybe, possibly, not at all). He nudges the pack of cigarettes in Hyungu's direction while he lights his own. Hyungu declines, because that may be something City-Hyungu would do, but it is not something the Hyungu that Dongmyeong and Giuk know would do. 

Hyungu knows Yonghoon and knows he is good enough. Hyungu once asked Yonghoon to call him a slut and it made Yonghoon cry after he did it. Hyungu is under no disillusion that it would ever be Yonghoon to do the hurting. Hyungu may have cried over him once but it was him that ended them – he is the one who has hurt him. (He is also the one who loved Yonghoon in that wishy-washy sense that wasn't love at all despite his bluster.)

"What are the odds of that?" Hyungu jokes, but it comes out all wrong, much too sincere, not a joke at all. Hyungu once thought soulmates were the dumbest thing in the world, a stupid pretty half-truth ingrained into society just to hurt him, specifically. He doesn't anymore, he can't anymore, he won't anymore. 

"Pretty high, apparently," Yonghoon tries to grin but it's more of a grimace. He takes a heavy drag of his cigarette, releasing a cloud of pretty smoke from his chapped lips. Yonghoon is good at kissing, Hyungu remembers but doesn't miss. Yonghoon still prays at night (or maybe just when there's people around to see it and repeat how Yonghoon is such a good boy who still follows all the rules).

Hyungu inhales the smoke, stinging in his lungs. “Even if Harin had never came back, I don't think I could have given you what you wanted,” Hyungu confesses, raw and vulnerable. It has always been easier with him, maybe too easy, the sort of easy that leads to people hurting each other, taking each other for granted (or maybe it was just like that for Hyungu in the end).

Veganism is starting to sound appealing. Minghao likes his meat pre-prepared. He doesn't want it to look or bleed like an animal. The more divorced his food is from actual creatures, the better. The bloody hunk of raw meat from the street vendor his boss gets her cuts from is blurring the line. 

It hangs heavy in its sheer plastic body bag, a foul puree of blood and viscera pooling at the bottom. Minghao doesn't have the money to get something nice and pretty. It was a pig, once. Maybe it was an ugly beast when it was slaughtered, but it was certainly cute once too– innocent and unaware of the grisly fate awaiting it. Now Minghao won’t even offer it the dignity of being cooked first. 

Minghao is two steps away from Soonyoung's door when a hand grasps his tricep tight, vicelike, cutting off his blood flow. Minghao spins on his heel but the grip doesn't loosen remotely. 

“Hey, looks like you've found Kwon Soonyoung for me, right?” Seungcheol grins, smug, fingers digging in deeper. It's not outright malice in his eyes, but the real intent is nothing good. He's got his jacket hood up, and for a moment Minghao swears his eyes are glowing. Where he was hiding between the stairwell and Soonyoung's door, Minghao wouldn't know. 

“This isn't– this is for me,” Minghao sputters, drowning in the suddenness of it all. Two steps ago Minghao was alone. Seungcheol laughs at him, performative and mocking. Maybe he's imagining it, but his arm is starting to feel numb. 

“Oh really?” Seungcheol plucks the bag out of his hand with no resistance and peels back the plastic to expose the corpse to the dusk air. “Let me see you eat it then,” Seungcheol thrusts the meat towards Minghao's mouth. Minghao was fortunate enough to never be bullied in school, but he figures that now he's making up for that lost experience. 

“No,” Minghao recoils, slapping the hunk of meat away. Seungcheol drops it and it lawls on the edge of the walkway before plummeting down to the ground with a sick squelch. Minghao wonders what sort of sound he'd make if he fell from here. Probably the crunch of broken bones. Maybe he'd squished just like the pig, he's all full of meat and blood too. 

Seungcheol lets go of him and Minghao's back collides with Soonyoung's door in a desperate attempt to get as far away from Seungcheol as possible. He hastily types in the code, fumbling awkwardly behind himself for the keypad. He stumbles into the dark of Soonyoung's apartment, door swinging open and colliding noisily with the wall. 

“Let me in, won't you?” Seungcheol leans against the doorframe with a disarming smile unbefitting his posture. Minghao hadn't noticed before just how pale Seungcheol is. He can't be much taller than Minghao and he's certainly being helped by some pretty chunky boots, but he might as well loom over Minghao with how he carries himself. Seungcheol is in control. 

“Who the hell are you?” Soonyoung yells from across the room but it has no bite. He looks even paler than Seungcheol, definitely weaker than when Minghao left. Seungcheol's smile doubles in size as he locks eyes on Soonyoung. 

“Just who I wanted to see,” Seungcheol straightens up, hands braced on the doorframe but carefully refraining from entering. “We need to talk, and you'll regret it if we don't,” Seungcheol tilts his head a tad as he examines Soonyoung, “Looks like you won't last much longer like this– let me in before you do something you'll really regret to this friend of yours.” 

Soonyoung hesitates but eventually offers a “Come in,” to Seungcheol. Seungcheol steps forward with an amount of confidence Minghao has never had at any point in his life. He pulls the door shut behind him. 

“You're lucky, Soonyoung,” Seungcheol grins with inherent menace, “When I try to kill people, they usually wind up dead.” Soonyoung blinks vacantly at that statement before shuffling back with his hands up. It doesn't take long for the back of his knees to align with his bedframe. No place to run. Seungcheol laughs at him. 

“Relax, there's no point now– as long as you don't cause me any trouble,” Seungcheol puts his hands up in some gesture of good will that has spoiled long before he walked in here. “You fought me off, I have to respect that.” 

Soonyoung's jaw drops as realization dawns on him. “You're that freak who bit me!” Soonyoung points at Seungcheol like he's just unmasked the monster in a Scooby Doo cartoon. Briefly, Minghao wishes Seungcheol had finished him off the first time. This scenario is unreal. Seungcheol looks baffled but rolls his eyes and moves past it. 

“You need to eat,” Seungcheol skips to the chase, “If you don’t eat soon, your body will make you,” Seungcheol glances back at Minghao with a hint of amusement. “I don't think either of you want that happening.”

“You threw out what I brought him,” Minghao musters up a small fragment of defiance. Seungcheol scoffs at him. He sidles around Minghao to wrap an arm around his shoulder and walk him up to Soonyoung's bed. 

“Animal blood– not even fresh,” Seungcheol pulls a face at the very idea, “It's hardly satisfying, and for the first time–” Seungcheol explains, sliding his hand down Minghao's arm and gently folding his sleeve up, “It's got to be the real deal, nothing else will satisfy it.”

Seungcheol grips tight to Minghao's forearm and pulls it forward, right before Soonyoung's face. Soonyoung goes wide-eyed and Minghao tries to jerk his arm away, but Seungcheol's grasp is so strong he barely even budges him. 

“Eat,” Seungcheol instructs. 

Soonyoung sinks his teeth into Minghao’s wrist, first lightly then deeper, a steady pressure that sinks into the flesh then breaks it. Minghao gasps and stifles a noise of pain in his throat. A rush of fear hits him strong and he makes another attempt to pull away but Seungcheol's grip is knuckle white. 

Eventually Soonyoung pulls back enough for his teeth to slip out, lips still hovering over the skin. Rivulets of blood begin to trickle down from the punctures and Soonyoung chases them with his tongue, an oddly sensual trail down the full length of his forearm. Soonyoung returns to the little wounds he's made and presses open-mouthed kisses against him. Minghao’s mouth goes dry and his blood flow doesn't know where it's going. Soonyoung has red smeared all over his lips.

“Lucky you, with a helpful little donor,” Seungcheol grins and Minghao's heart hammers in his chest at the shape of his teeth, just a glimpse in the crook of his smile, long and sharp. “Try to keep him around, and if you can't, try to practice some restraint– we don't want the cops around and three vampires in one city is pushing it.”

“What?” Soonyoung asks, near zero comprehension on his face. His tongue darts out to swipe at the smear of blood at the corner of his mouth, head still dipped low and posture atrocious. He keeps glancing at Minghao's wrist like a dog patiently waiting for a treat.

“I'm telling you not to kill anyone, dumbass,” Seungcheol rolls his eyes and crouches down to Soonyoung's level to meet eye to eye. “You saw first hand what happens when you deny yourself what you need– don't make the same mistakes I did.” 

“You tried to kill him last week and now you're being nice?” Minghao speaks, the words coming out the moment he thinks them. Seungcheol's face drops and he stands upright to face Minghao, suddenly very tall and menacing and definitely a person who could kill somebody in a second if he wanted to. 

“I didn't mean to do this,” Seungcheol glances back at Soonyoung, blood smeared messily down his chin, “The guy who turned me should have snuffed me out then and there if he had any sense of self preservation, but I'm still here, aren't I?” Seungcheol cracks his neck then lets it droop low towards his chest, “The least I can do is pay that benefit of the doubt forward, for all the trouble I've caused.” 

“Thank you,” Soonyoung practically slurs, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Seungcheol's face warps into something resembling a genuine smile, although bittersweet. 

“Just don't give me a reason to need you gone,” Seungcheol straightens his shoulders and turns on his heel to make for the door. He stops halfway out the threshold, one pale hand keeping the door ajar. “And don't bite him here,” Seungcheol gestures at his own neck, one fingernail making the smallest indent in the skin. Minghao can just barely make out scarring, a clean and pretty bite mark pricked into his throat. Soonyoung's scar will not turn out nearly as neat and orderly. 

Minghao makes Soonyoung a small, daily donation. It takes remarkably little for Soonyoung's craving to subside and his mouth to stop aching. They can reuse the same spot and it only hurts a little. Soonyoung is very gentle about it. Minghao may have to commit to a lifetime of long sleeves. 

"Not fair," Soonyoung giggles, all grabby hands as Minghao holds his arm just out of Soonyoung's reach. Soonyoung is still mostly bedridden, trembles all over his body when he stands like a particularly bad cold. “If I end up being one of those vampires that can turn into a bat, you're gonna be so screwed." 

“Say please,” Minghao demands. Soonyoung's hands find his waist to pull him over the bed and he does as he's told. Minghao slots himself into Soonyoung's lap and lets Soonyoung have as much as he pleases. 

Soonyoung kisses all over with his blood stained lips leaving marks that could almost pass as lipstick and Minghao gives him whatever else he pleases too, and it is fine. Minghao does not feel used or guilty and there is no regret or heartache. Soonyoung is lovely and sweet and kind and maybe he is also a monster in molting who survives off the blood of humans. Minghao has dated worse. 

It is the moments that Minghao spends with Soonyoung– light-headed and isolated and hedonistic– that he feels some shade of happiness, even if it is dilute. Soonyoung presses a kiss to his wrist, right near the pulse point, and Minghao feels a flutter, albeit buried behind layers of repression. The familiar tone of Soonyoung's door code beeps behind them. 

Soonyoung's head shoots up like a rabbit hearing a crunch in the underbrush. Light floods into the apartment briefly before the door swings closed and the two of them can finally make out who has interrupted them. 

“Chan,” Soonyoung says with no sense of direction. Even in the throes of heartbreak and vampiric transformation agony, Soonyoung never sounded this directionless. Chan stares at the two of them wide-eyed and speechless. Minghao finally gets the wherewithal to get off of Soonyoung’s lap.

“What’s going on?” Chan looks beyond flustered– confusion and concern and frustration. His hands tighten into fists and a dangerous smile starts to play on his lips which he quickly represses with a dip of his head. “Nobody has heard from you in days, and your mom called me today. She’s so scared.” 

“Oh,” Soonyoung's hand absent-mindedly slips into Minghao's, lightly slotting their fingers together. “I've been sick,” Soonyoung states as if he's going to elaborate but nothing follows, just awful soul crushing sadness. Soonyoung doesn’t wear his heart on his sleeve. His heart may as well be stapled to his forehead. 

“I didn't know you had, uh,” Chan starts his sentence strong but stumbles quickly, awkwardly chancing a glance in Minghao's direction. He presses his lips together then dips his head and sighs in quiet exasperation. “Can we talk alone, please?” Chan asks, face scrunched up in frustration. Soonyoung's immediate agreeance and the speed with which he detaches from Minghao only stings a little. 

Minghao briefly considered being good, but the idea came to him too quickly to stop himself. By the time he's pressing his own door code into the keypad it's already there, egging him on. He steps into his apartment and takes three steps to reach the window, prying it open quickly and quietly making his way to Soonyoung's side. If he wasn't already crazy a week ago, he's certainly crazy now. 

“How long have you known him?” Chan's voice is raised, frustration immediately evident. He's unrestrained now, none of that persona of normalcy and politeness. Minghao leans in as close as he can without being seen, holding his breath as the debris crunches beneath his feet. 

“Not everyone is secretly a murderer,” Soonyoung scoffs, the beginning of laughter that aborts itself quickly and unnaturally. Soonyoung's next words come out small, like a scolded toddler. “We had some classes together, been neighbors a while, he's not a stranger.” 

“That's not funny,” Chan snaps, anger barely restrained. There's a long quiet between the two of them, some meaning Minghao cannot guess. Chan inhales a shaky breath. “I've been thinking about it a lot, whenever I see you,” Chan's voice is small now, hardly audible, “I swear I can see his face when I close my eyes, like it's tattooed to my eyelids.”

“You know I did that for you,” Soonyoung's voice is just as quiet, some hint of a plea buried in his words. 

“I didn't ask you to do that,” The recoil is evident in Chan's voice. Tension spreads thin between them, so brittle that Minghao is afraid he'll shatter it if he breathes too loudly. 

Soonyoung stays quiet for a long moment. “If you asked me to, I'd do it again.” He states as if he's laying out plain facts. “For you,” Soonyoung reiterates. 

“I would never ask that,” Chan spits out the words quick. Minghao can hear the fear in his voice. “Never ever do I want you to do that,” Chan's voice raises again, a twisted amalgam of stern and desperate. 

“Would you do something for me, too?” Soonyoung asks, small and sad, desperate like he knows the answer but is hoping beyond hope that he's wrong. 

“I can't,” Chan replies as if he's echoing a script he's uttered a hundred times, “Not anymore, I can't do it without thinking about him,” Chan's voice dips low and mumbled, so quiet Minghao can hardly make it out, “I already told you.” 

The door slams shut. Minghao gives it a moment before leaning forward to get a glimpse inside, possessed by whatever insane force has taken over his willpower over the last week. Soonyoung has laid back down in bed, hair splayed out around his head like a dark vortex. He cracks open an eye and finds Minghao's gaze immediately. 

Soonyoung smiles weakly, the sharp teeth at the corners of his mouth only a little pointier than would be considered normal– still sated. He reaches up to press his fingers against the dirty glass and shift the window open a tad. 

“Very sneaky, Myungho,” Soonyoung scolds without any real hurt. “Have you been spying on me when I change clothes, too?” Soonyoung giggles, settling easily into an almost perfect veneer of nonchalance. 

“Do you want to talk?” Minghao asks. Soonyoung straightens up and pushes his window all the way open. He climbs out only a little awkwardly, stretching his arms out over his head. It's all over exaggerated, but Minghao holds his tongue. 

“I'd rather go for a walk,” Soonyoung declares, pointedly sidestepping the elephant in the room. “I feel pretty good actually, maybe I'm finally done teething.” Soonyoung takes Minghao’s hand in his, gently so as not to pull at the wound they’ve been bothering every day. He leads Minghao along the rooftop to its end, and eases himself down onto the fire escape along the edge of the building. 

Soonyoung helps Minghao down like a gentleman. It only makes his heart flutter a little. Soonyoung pulls him down the steps at a quick pace and hops the little gate at the ground level with a flourish. Minghao steps over it with the ease that Soonyoung chose not to take. The city is dyed amber this time of day, sun quickly setting behind the rooftops. Soonyoung turns to him and smiles wide. 

“The light doesn't hurt, but it does tickle,” Soonyoung announces, smiling brightly at Minghao. He leads him through the streets, practically running like he wasn't bedridden for days. The whiplash of it all nearly leaves Minghao breathless, and the speed Soonyoung pulls him through the streets leaves his lungs struggling to keep up with the rest of his body. 

Soonyoung moves with purpose but it's clear he has no real direction. He loops them around a block twice and takes every opportunity to hop up on low railings or jump over curbs. Minghao hasn't been on his feet this long in forever, possibly. The heat from a humid day clings to his skin and makes the back of his neck feel sticky. Somehow Soonyoung isn't bothered, but maybe being cooped up inside so long has given him temporary immunity to the ails of what exists outside the front door. 

Soonyoung stops dead in his tracks in front of a particularly reflective shop window. Minghao takes the opportunity to catch his breath and when he straightens out he sees Soonyoung staring at his own reflection, one hand fishhooked into his cheek to bare tooth and gum. 

“Oh, that's kind of noticeable, huh?” Soonyoung leans in closer like he's trying to check for greens between his teeth. His canines are only a little pointier right now, they could believably belong to a normal person. It gives him a cat-like image, although Minghao would never consider Soonyoung especially cattish in personality. 

“They were bigger before,” Minghao tells him, “I think they get scarier when you're, um–” Minghao searches for terminology that the two of them do not have. They looked bigger when Soonyoung had first bit him. It was gradual, but they've definitely receded back to something that resembles normal. “When you’re thirsty, I guess.”

Soonyoung smiles at that. He loops around behind Minghao and puts his hands on his shoulders, his reflection peeking out from behind and making an exaggerated chomping motion. For a moment, Minghao swears that Soonyoung's reflection disappears, flickering like an old movie. 

“Was Chan your–” Minghao starts, but Soonyoung cuts him off by harshly pulling Minghao back into a brisk walk down the sidewalk, daylight fading quick and streetlights popping up to take its place. Soonyoung's fingers loop around his arm, pulling him in closer. This part of the city dies too early in the day for many people to be out, but the reality of what they must look like is stifling nonetheless. 

“No,” Soonyoung declares with no indecision, but it does little to convince Minghao. He turns his face to stare insistently at Minghao’s features, far too close and personal to pass as friendly. Minghao feels the overpowering urge to shrink away, but he fights it back and wills himself to meet Soonyoung's gaze instead. Soonyoung grins, soft and unguarded. “Would you like to be?” 

Minghao's mind immediately tells him that no, of course he can’t say yes to that. He's not sure he knows how to love someone. He's not sure he should love someone. He'd be nothing but a burden in the end. He almost says it but his tongue catches on the words. Soonyoung watches him patiently, something glittering in his eyes where they catch the remaining slivers of sunset. 

“I would like that,” Minghao says. It's a fleeting moment of broken barriers, he's run all the stop signs in his brain. Soonyoung's hand drifts downwards to confidently lace their fingers together. He pulls them along once again, nose scrunching up in triumph and head tilting up to watch as night envelopes the sky completely. 

“It's settled, then,” Soonyoung declares. He swings their arms between them as they walk and the Minghao last month probably would have cringed at the mere idea of that. The Minghao of today, however, doesn't even make a face. “We're boyfriends now, no matter what anyone else thinks.” 

When Soonyoung drinks until he is full, Minghao can rest his head on his chest and beneath layers of fabric make out what seems like a heartbeat. He can fit his thumb against the slight divot in Soonyoung's wrist right against his pulse point and feel the beating, or at least an approximation of it. Soonyoung will feel warm like a human would as they share body heat. 

Hours will pass and slowly but surely that steady beating will turn molasses. It'll turn into the sort of heart rate that would necessitate hospitalization. His temperature will drop but he will still move and act like regular Soonyoung. Inevitably he’ll start chasing Minghao a bit subconsciously, fingers wrapping around his own wrist or nose buried in his shoulder, inching closer and closer to his throat. 

Soonyoung will request it. Neither of them are eager to push the limits of his body much farther than that. No matter how much Minghao mollifies him, it is obvious that on some level Soonyoung feels guilty about the whole thing. Increasingly so, as Minghao picks at scabs he's refusing to let heal. Another solution is necessary. 

Soonyoung stops dead in his tracks about twenty feet away from the doors to the blood bank. Even behind his dark sunglasses and jacket hood, Minghao clearly sees him pull a face. He's dressed so inconspicuously that it becomes conspicuous. He looks like an obnoxious celebrity who wants to be spotted by paparazzi. 

“Y'know, the more I think about this,” Soonyoung states, the beginning of a grimace contorting his face, “Isn't this even more unethical than just grabbing somebody off the street?” Minghao delivers his most clear disapproval face possible. 

“I'm becoming anemic, Soonyoung,” Minghao reminds him, teetering the line of gentle and condescending. Soonyoung's face shifts comically in thought like some living cartoon character. “Stop thinking,” Minghao adds for good measure. 

“But I could be stealing from some little girl for all I know,” Soonyoung argues, “I can't steal from sick children, Myungho,” Soonyoung frowns deeply. Minghao feels even more light-headed than he did this morning. “I bet you taste better than whoever I can swipe in there instead,” Soonyoung punctuates his words with a swipe of his tongue along his lips, the hint of his fang briefly catching in the sunlight. 

“I don't think it works like that,” Minghao responds, a little dazed. His heart thumps fast and hard in his chest, from both the suggestion and the stark reminder that it is daytime and they are absolutely planning on committing a very serious crime and if Soonyoung opens his mouth wide enough those teeth are hard to miss. 

“What do you know?” Soonyoung argues back childishly. He briefly takes his hand out of his pocket to point at Minghao, only to wince and stuff it back in. There’s the crunch of tires on gravel and the tell-tale beeping of a vehicle in reverse as a delivery van slowly backs towards the facility. The doors open and Minghao spies a collection of bags not yet concealed by sterile white cardboard. 

Soonyoung's eyes are on it in an instant, head tracking the worker begin to package it in mundane, practiced rhythm. He falls silent and focused until the collected blood is safely within its unmarked confines. Minghao swallows hard as the gravity of the situation continues to implode into his very being. 

“You don't know anything either,” Minghao half-heartedly keeps up the argument for the sake of some shred of normalcy, “Maybe I taste bad, you have no frame of reference.”

Soonyoung's head snaps to Minghao in a second, all attention gone from the box he was tracking. His hands grip Minghao's shoulders in reassurance. 

“Absolutely not,” Soonyoung announces to the world at a totally inappropriate volume, “You taste fantastic.” Minghao feels what must be a newly discovered avenue of ego death crush him from the inside out. Prostrating himself for Soonyoung to eat alive and put him out of his misery suddenly sounds appealing. Several people shoot them fleeting glances of confusion and disapproval. 

Minghao squeezes his eyes shut in a desperate bid to wake up from the neverending fever dream that his life has become. He opens them in time to see Soonyoung withdrawn his hands quickly like he's just passed off a hot potato and grin at Minghao painfully endearingly, uttering a small ‘oops’ mostly to himself.

Soonyoung's bandaid is blue and Minghao's is purple, probably. He's so dizzy it might as well be rainbow. He sucks down the vitamin-rich drink in his hands and pretends that Soonyoung is not drinking a contraband vial of some stranger's blood right next to him. He chooses to not consider the consequences of a vampire donating blood just like he chooses to not consider that he is a liar who has absolutely given blood several times this week, even if it was all for one particularly needy donor.

“I was right,” Soonyoung declares, finishing his drink and biting on the end of his straw, “You do taste better.” 

“Are there any vampires that turn into something cool– like a tiger?” Soonyoung asks from his position awfully hunched over his desk. He's been drafting the last bits of his next comic for two hours and has only gotten distracted by Minghao twice so far. Minghao may have insisted he should leave him alone to work but Soonyoung had insisted with twice the fervor that he stay. 

“The ones we have back home in China can fly,” Minghao offers. “At least, that's what the legends say, I haven't met any personally.” Minghao smudges at his notebook, peeled open on the ground. It's an approximation of that dark backdrop he's left abandoned in his own apartment, still devoid of any meaning or subject. 

“After I finish this series, I want to make one about people who turn into animals,” Soonyoung smiles to himself at the thought, “The main character can become a tiger– something with a lot of action and dynamic poses to draw.” Minghao has taken the liberty to scroll through Soonyoung’s comics when he's not looking. He's a more talented artist than Minghao would originally have credited him. The series he's making now is a romantic comedy, far from what he's currently describing. 

“Will your publisher like that?” Minghao asks, lazily smudging rings of darkness into the center of his book. “If I suddenly brought a landscape to my patron, I'm not sure how they’d take it.” Minghao regrets conjuring the idea of patronage back into his mind, immediately renewing the cloying dread of incoming disappointment back into the depths of his psyche. 

Soonyoung purses his lips in thought then slinks down from his chair to meet Minghao on the floor. He spins his ink pen around between his fingers before lacing his other hand with Minghao's. He presses the delicate black tip of his pen against Minghao’s arm, held steady in his lap. He traces lines and shapes dark against his skin, from his bicep down to just shy of Minghao's bandages. 

“I can't lie and tell you the money isn't important, or recognition isn’t appealing,” Soonyoung muses, “But no matter the form or style, I don't want to make something if I don't like making it,” Soonyoung skips past the bandage to trace lines on his hand, along the trail of his bones. “I guess that's probably why I'm in this tiny apartment, right?” Soonyoung chuckles to himself, Lightly tapping dots into his work, little flourishes. 

Minghao inspects his work. Spirals and swirls and vines and veins across the length of his arm. It's pretty, if not a little meandering. Minghao is envious, so remarkably envious at how easily Soonyoung can create. It's as if the whole thing is easy for him, automatic even. Soonyoung's art requires no profound thought and he surely has more admirers than Minghao will see in a lifetime. 

“Have you ever thought about getting a tattoo?” Soonyoung asks, but it's not so much a question as it is an excuse to ramble about the new tangent that his wormed into his brain. “I think I'd like one here,” Soonyoung pulls his shirt collar back to expose those awful bite marks. They’ve healed, perhaps unrealistically quickly, and left behind a shocking scar. “I'm not a big fan of Seungcheol's artistry,” Soonyoung grins expectantly at his own joke. 

Minghao gently traces the scarring with his finger tips. He really does look like he was attacked by a dog, or maybe a bear. It's odd how the healing has made the whole event look like a past tense, as if it is something to move beyond and not a terrible fate that Soonyoung has been doomed to for eternity. 

“I was hoping maybe you’d design it,” Soonyoung asks sheepishly. Minghao must pull some sort of face because Soonyoung quickly goes on the defense. “I don't know how much you get for your paintings but I can come up with something– maybe we can work out a payment plan?” Soonyoung cannot stop himself from cheesing, smile widening enough to reveal his pointy teeth, “I'll let you charge me interest.” 

Minghao leans in close enough to graze his lips featherlight against the skin. He presses a kiss, almost chaste, against where he might feel a pulse if Soonyoung was alive in the way that most people are. Soonyoung complains that he's ticklish and Minghao nearly goes mad with the desire to kiss until the sun rises. 

“I'll do it,” Minghao announces, pulling himself out of Soonyoung's orbit with much mental duress. Soonyoung looks dumbstruck but follows it up with a smile that surely dwarfs the light of the sun anyway. Ignoring the fangs in his mouth is almost second nature now, the little animal part of Minghao's brain only startles for a moment. “It's free for friends,” Minghao appends, “Although interest is tempting.” 

Smiling has never been Minghao's strong suit. Soonyoung wraps his arms around Minghao's waist, hands clasped together millimeters from his bellybutton. Minghao is struck vividly with the image of Soonyoung pressing his blunt fingertips against bare skin, short fingernails scratching useless and dull and persistent, digging deeper and deeper until Soonyoung can break the skin and rummage around in his guts. 

"See you tomorrow," Minghao calls over his boss as he steps out into the muggy night weather, just warm enough to slightly discomfort. It's late but this part of the city never sleeps, raucous clusters of nightlife indulges all along the street ensuring there will be no moments of silence. 

"Don't forget to take these with you," His boss hurries out after him, pressing a warm and slightly moist to-go box into his palms. Minghao thanks her with a little bow and she smiles at him with a parental fondness before making her way back inside. A Chinese owned and ran restaurant was a haven for Minghao when he first came to the city and the woman running the place seemed to consider Minghao working there a forgone conclusion the moment she heard him speak Mandarin. 

Minghao walks home typically, with the restaurant open late into the night for bar crawlers and the distance home being a manageable twenty minutes. Minghao is more than old enough to not be afraid of the dark and this is hardly a rough part of the city. The few people he does encounter are typically drunk enough that a particularly strong breeze will knock them off their feet. 

Tonight, however, Minghao is being followed. Steady footsteps, lacking the swerving gait of intoxication. From the moment he stepped out the doorway the footsteps were there, trailing him, pausing whenever he pauses. 

“That smells good,” Soonyoung announces, suddenly at Minghao's shoulder. Briefly, Minghao swears that his pupils glint– reflective like a cat. It takes an awful amount of restraint to not promptly punch Soonyoung in the nose. Soonyoung's hands find Minghao's shoulders and steer him forward. 

“Don't follow me around like that,” Minghao barks with little bite, “It’s not an even playing field.” Soonyoung grins and squeezes his shoulders, solid and comforting despite the inherent menace he’d been practicing moments before.

“I can't help myself,” Soonyoung snickers. When Minghao looks offended Soonyoung gasps in faux-shock. “You're telling me I can't pick my boyfriend up from work?” Soonyoung tucks his chin of Minghao's shoulder and plasters himself to his back. Even in the dark Minghao feels his face burn at the horrible intimacy of it all. 

There's a fumbling sound in the alley beside them and the clank of a bottle hitting the pavement. Minghao throws Soonyoung off with a force he should definitely apologize for later. The fumbling turns into grumbling, deep-chested and anguished. Soonyoung is turning into the alley before Minghao can even think to stop him. 

“Are you alright?” Soonyoung asks, looming only a little intimidatingly over the figure of a man hunched over on the curb. He has thick arms and a crumpled white button-up rolled up to his elbows. He’s older for sure, but certainly not elderly. With his head hung low and an empty liquor bottle nearby it doesn't take a genius to deduce that he's beyond sloshed. 

Minghao notices too late the cloth wrapped around his hand, a peek of dark red bled through on the bottom when he gestures at Soonyoung to move along. The man mumbles something incoherent and Soonyoung is on him in an instant. Soonyoung grips his arm and pulls it up, peeling the rag away from his hand. With arms like those, this stranger could likely fight off anyone he pleased even while plastered. Soonyoung somehow manages to handle him like he's nothing but a toy, even as the man begins to thrash beneath him. 

Minghao watches with horror as Soonyoung presses his boot against the man's chest, disorienting him enough to press him back against the building exterior and wrench his arm up towards his mouth. The man shudders beneath him, desperately yanking his arm this way and that. Soonyoung's grip is stalwart, much more of this and the arm will be dislocated. Screaming Soonyoung's name doesn't seem to faze him, let alone register in the first place. 

Like a fool, Minghao throws himself at Soonyoung, taking his turn to latch onto his back. Minghao takes Soonyoung's wrist in hand gently, as if he's handling some keyed up dog rather than a human being. Hesitantly, Minghao begins to pry at his fingers while the drunken man gurgles helpless beneath them. Soonyoung's grasp is like steel. 

“Here, here,” Minghao bargains, bringing his own wrist up to Soonyoung's face and pulling the bandage loose to reveal his own healing bite marks. “Take me instead, leave him be,” Minghao pleads, holding Soonyoung tight and presenting himself like some twisted martyr. Soonyoung’s gaze slides back to Minghao's face, the brown of his irises more burgundy now, practically red. 

Soonyoung bites. His teeth sink deep, no fanfare or preamble like usual. Typically Soonyoung will kiss first, bite into Minghao at the same spot with measured hesitancy. This bite is wide across the extent of his wrist, boring new entry into previously untouched skin. Minghao clenches his teeth and bares it, a horrible whimper he cannot contain slipping past his lips, tears pricking in his eyes. 

It takes a remarkable amount of willpower to disregard the inherent urge to get the fuck away from this. Soonyoung pulls back like he's looking to rip flesh from the bone. In spite of it all, Minghao rubs a shaky hand up and down the expanse of Soonyoung's bicep. Soonyoung is beyond out of control– this is carnal, unrestrained lust. 

“It's just me,” Minghao speaks through the trembling in his voice, “You can take as much as you like, just be gentle,” Minghao presses a delicate kiss behind Soonyoung’s ear, where the column of his neck meets skull. His fingers tug gently at Soonyoung's sleeve, desperate in any attempt to ground him. 

Soonyoung releases Minghao’s wrist without taking any meat with him. He is on Minghao in an instant, swiveling around and backing him into the wall opposite them, boxing Minghao in against the brick. He holds Minghao's face in one hand, a thumb stroking tenderly against the skin of his cheek. 

“You're too good to me,” Soonyoung mutters, somewhere between pitying and enraptured. “Much too good for me,” Soonyoung’s tone starts to ramble but he silences himself by pressing into Minghao, a heady and wanton open mouthed kiss. Soonyoung kisses sloppily and hungry, all tongue and teeth and the coppery taste of blood. 

Minghao wraps his arms around Soonyoung's shoulders, surely staining his shirt red from the open wound. This is beyond intimate and far beyond dangerous. They're practically in the open, anyone could walk by and Minghao has no idea if the man from before has taken his opportunity to escape. Minghao's heart thumps hard in his chest. Adrenaline courses and wounds leak and Soonyoung grinds up against him, an oddly pathetic whine at the back of his throat. Excitement burns in Minghao too– shameful, horrible excitement, unmistakable in its urgency. 

Minghao fists his fingers into Soonyoung's hair to pull him away from his mouth, because suffocating to death is decidedly unsexy. Soonyoung goes easily, pliant in Minghao’s touch, unrecognizable from the immovable force he was moments earlier. He pushes incessantly against Minghao regardless, relentless in his pursuit of hedon. His lips travel down Minghao jaw to his throat. 

There's a small prick where his teeth catch against the skin, ghosting across veins. Minghao's head swims and he holds tighter to the roots, knuckles digging into his scalp. It is frightening how much Minghao wants it in an instant. To be like Soonyoung– so unabashed and free and untethered from the rest of the world. In the reflection of the window across from them, through layers of uncleaned dirt and grime, Minghao can make out how Soonyoung has stained his lips red– as if he'd freshly applied lipstick from diving for Minghao's mouth. 

“You're so good,” Soonyoung demures, lips pressing one more kiss to Minghao’s pulse point then turning to nuzzle into the crook of his shoulder. Soonyoung reaches up to detangle Minghao's fingers from his hair, smoothing his thumb across his knuckles. “You should try,” Soonyoung mumbles into his neck, “You should taste,” Soonyoung insists, taking Minghao's wrist delicately in his hand and raising it up to his own lips. 

A rational person in control of their own thoughts would decline this offer. Minghao has tasted his own blood before, of course– nosebleeds and a heavy blow to the face once in a martial arts class. The inherent human instinct to press your tongue against a paper cut on the tip of your finger, warm and wet and soothing. 

Minghao tries himself. He lathes his tongue over the open wound, metallic and a little bitter. Soonyoung watches him like he's having a revelation. He kisses the back of Minghao’s hand, only a cosmically thin layer of flesh and muscle and bone between their lips. Perhaps it would be better to do away with all of that excess, so that Soonyoung can kiss his lips unfettered. Minghao’s body has never been much more than a nuisance. 

Minghao pulls away and inspects the damage on his wrist. Worse than he'd anticipated. It looks like he's been attacked by a dog. Jarringly, he feels little pain– just a steady buzzing sensation at his fingertips. He flexes his fingers and blood oozes, vision tearing at the corners, pretty black dots soaking past the pupil and into the socket. 

There's a shout somewhere distant, or perhaps very close. There's a roaring in his ears, voices imperceptible but undeniably mocking. The sound of a siren dutifully attempts to pierce through the din with little success. Soonyoung grabs his face tight in both hands, eyes wide and terrified like a prey animal backed into a corner. 

Soonyoung wrangles Minghao in his arms enough to drag him around. Minghao can't really feel his feet, but he can see them moving, so dizzy he can't bare to look anywhere but down. The distance blurs and smudges at the edges but Minghao recognizes the dirty steps leading up to their apartments. Soonyoung bundles him inside.

~

Minghao clenches his teeth, tight and tight and tighter still. It aches, deep in his gums and spreading through his jaw up into his temples, dull and thrumming. There's a flickering in the corner of his vision, dark threads hanging off of all the edges, bleeding from the table corner and pooling onto the kitchen tile and gone with the slightest flick of his eyes. 

There's a cracking, rattling, skull shattering sound in his head. His fingers dig against the faux-leather barely hanging onto the arm of the chair. Dark specks discolor under the nail. It cracks and cracks and breaks under the pressure. Shooting pain, lacing its fingers gently through his hair and shoving his head under the water until the bubbles come fast. Fingernails dig into his scalp, they break the skin, and they yank him upright before his lungs become concave. 

Liquid fills the mouth. Pressure alleviated, pieces jumbled, they pour out from his lips, spitty and red and sticky against his fingers. He spits, fragments itchy against his palms. 

~

Mingyu leans forward enough for Minghao to see his phone screen. He was looking at his follower count. It's a pretty big number. It's not that Minghao didn’t know, but that number must have gotten a lot bigger recently. Maybe it's that pretty girl in all of his recent pictures. Mingyu is finally playing the game properly. 

Minghao steps forward into his space and loops one arm around Mingyu's neck. Mingyu manages to splutter his name once before Minghao is kissing him. This is a performance, he makes it look good. Mingyu is too easy to turn, too drunk to think through his actions, he reaches for Minghao's waist and kisses him back easily. 

Cold liquid splashes over the two of them, but mostly Mingyu and his far more expensive shirt. There's a couple flashes somewhere and some giggling. Minghao can't stifle the laughter that bubbles up uncontrollably from his chest. Seungkwan looks at them like he's genuinely heartbroken. He probably is. 

“What's wrong? You're just friends, aren't you?” Minghao lazily slides his gaze from Seungkwan's face to Mingyu's. Mingyu is frozen, the booze battling with his brain. He shoves Minghao back but there's only so much distance he can make in a crowded hallway. “A friend who picked out these awful navy slacks for him, right?” Minghao hooks his thumbs into Mingyu’s belt loops, “Maybe you can pick out his wedding tux, too.” 

There are tears brimming in Seungkwan's eyes and he tosses his now empty cup at Mingyu's chest for good measure. Seungkwan spins on his heels and pushes his way through the crowd. Mingyu calls his name and unhooks Minghao from his pants. He grabs him tight by the shoulder, far from friendly. 

“You're a real monster Minghao, you know that?” Mingyu looks him dead in the eyes. Minghao nods in acceptance. Mingyu is right. There is a monster in him, in his skull, desperate to claw its way through his gums. 

~

"Bite," Soonyoung instructs, holding his hand up to Minghao's mouth. He fixes Minghao with a wide, serious stare, demanding eye contact that Minghao can barely return. He tries to focus on Soonyoung's eyes but can only keep his vision clear for a few moments at a time before Soonyoung's face blurs left and right and fuzzy. 

Soonyoung shakes his hand in front of his face again and pauses a moment before shaking his head and swearing. Minghao watches Soonyoung's gaze dip down to his abdomen hazily. Then it's sharp, horrible, stabbing pain right around his stomach. Minghao's gaze shoots downward and he sees Soonyoung fist deep in his guts, hand wrapping around warped metal. 

Minghao belatedly does as instructed, barely muffling a scream into the leather of Soonyoung's glove, his teeth digging in harsh. Soonyoung pulls the shrapnel out ever so slightly and Minghao feels his whole body lurch with it. He scrabbles at Soonyoung's sleeve, a no doubt pitiful whine bleeding past his inhibitions. 

There's another pull and another garbled choke deep in his throat. Lights flash violently in the corner of his vision, increasingly blinding and disorienting. He's struck with a sudden urge to wretch but he can't unlatch from the barely concealed meat of Soonyoung's hand and nothing is coming up anyway. Pain curls around his whole body so thoroughly that it's all become a numb throb. 

Soonyoung's palm presses against Minghao's chin in a desperate bid for more leverage and he yanks once more and suddenly Minghao feels oddly light. His eyes cross as he tries to focus on Soonyoung while the blood roars in his ears. Minghao closes one eye to try and focus better just in time to see Soonyoung lift up his other hand, drenched in more blood than Minghao's ever seen. 

"There, that's better," Soonyoung grins at him shakily, breathless, eyes wide as he tries to meet Minghao's gaze, "Good job, that was the hard part, now we just need to get you eating," Soonyoung reaches out to pet Minghao's hair, smile faltering just as Minghao feels the heavy liquid stick in his hair. Soonyoung falters, before bringing the blood and viscera to his own mouth and swallowing it sloppily, like an animal. 

Minghao can't feel his limbs but he can feel that nagging desire to vomit resurface, lingering in the back of his throat. Soonyoung licks his fingers then brings his wrist up to his mouth. He bites into the flesh, ripping off skin and meat in a surprisingly efficient motion, and Minghao squeezes his eyes shut so tight it hurts. 

Soonyoung is pulling at the corner of his mouth, "Gotta let go so you can eat, it'll be quick, I promise," He tells him as if speaking to a child. He pries at Minghao's jaw, wrenching his mouth wide until he can pull his gloved hand away and replace it with terrible metallic tasting flesh and veins and Minghao gags and drools. He meekly tries to turn his head away but Soonyoung refuses him, leather against his cheek where he is held in place. Soonyoung's fingers creep along his tongue and Minghao swallows uncomfortably. 

Soonyoung releases him and Minghao coughs and splutters. His face is wet all over with tears and blood and drool and rain. His skin is buzzing, hands trembling uncontrollably. He wills his stinging eyes open and finds Soonyoung in his face, smile wide and red all over his teeth and chin. He slots his hand behind Minghao's head and tilts him forward so that their foreheads meet. Minghao can't feel where they make contact. 

"You're gonna be okay, it's gonna be okay," Soonyoung tells him and it sounds like he's convincing himself of it more than he is reassuring. Minghao sobs, reaching out to try and find purchase in Soonyoung's jacket. He can't do it, but Soonyoung notices and grabs his hands and slots their fingers together, rough on the left and slick on the right. 

Soonyoung kisses him, soft and easy and oddly innocent. The sort of kiss you give your first, adolescent love. Minghao's fingertips twitch involuntarily, a buzzing in his toes as the sensation of feeling returns to them, spreading from his appendages through his veins deeper into the body.