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“I’m hungry,” Pocket says in the corner, quiet and plaintive. They never used to pout like some angry child. It’s not different enough to matter though.
Nothing about them is quite right anymore, but it’s too close to reject them.
“I can’t let you hurt anybody,” he says, already tired.
“I won’t,” they say. The flat affect is almost the same as their old sardonic tone. Almost. “I’ll just take a little. You know I don’t want to kill.” It’s clever to remind him of who they were before. Too bad their red eyes give away the lie.
There has to be something left of them though, or they wouldn’t come back every time.
“Please, Shiv,” they sigh. Then again, maybe he’s just an easy mark.
“Come here,” he sighs right back. They’re in bed in an instant, pressed against his bare side, not quite as warm as they should be. He strokes his good thumb just beneath one of those red eyes. They used to be deep, black pools of grief, but there was a well of compassion there. Determination, too. It’s all gone now, replaced by animal eye shine and ravenous hunger.
A wooden stake hides between the mattress and the bed frame. There’s a silver knife in the nightstand drawer, a lighter on top of it. Any of those would do in a pinch. They’re still new to this, still tied down by old human habits and limitations. And they trust him; God knows he’s made that too easy. It’s the perfect time to strike.
Instead he lies back, eyes fluttering shut at the first, chilling stab of their fangs into his throat. His hand lands heavy on the back of their neck, and he doesn’t pull them away.
It’s viciously cold at the start, ice in his veins as they begin to suck, but the venom works its magic soon enough, spreading sick lethargy through his limbs. He doesn’t know if the desire is the venom or not. He’s only been bitten by two of them, and in both cases the desire was already there.
His eyes and throat burn at the memory. Pocket’s only like this because Drifter wanted to get to him. Drifter took everything from him once before, and now he’s done it again. No telling if it’s meant to be a goad or a leash, but either way, Shiv won’t hesitate when he sees him again.
Pocket, though. That’s harder. Every time he thinks he can take care of them, it feels like his ribcage is going to collapse.
He’s so caught up in his wandering thoughts and the heaviness of his limbs that he almost doesn’t notice their cool hand pawing at his chest. He notices the goosebumps that trail in its wake though, and the stiffness digging into his hip.
He doesn’t stop them when their hand glides lower, down the soft plane of his stomach and through the faint trail of hair below his navel. They stop themself, though, fangs easing from his neck with a self-control he didn’t think they possessed. They lick at the blood that trickles free, then they look right into his face with those wide eyes, so familiar and so strange at once.
“I’m so cold,” they murmur, pressing their whole body closer. “Kiss me?” Their lips don’t part enough to show off their fangs, which maybe explains why he’s stupid enough to do it.
It’s almost the same, if he can look past their too-cool lips and the metallic taste on their tongue. Until recently, he would have said kissing them was one of his favorite things. Now it makes a knot coil hot in his stomach. He still won’t stop.
Their hand slips between his legs, stroking on the outside of his underwear. His thighs part, and his hips move of their own volition.
When the kiss ends, it’s because Pocket decides it’s over. One fang catches on his lip, and they follow it with a lick almost like they’re apologizing. They break away to peel out of their clothing, then they’re back. He doesn’t even flinch at the chill of their body against his. Then their mouth slides along his jaw and down the side of his neck, ghosting across the skin until their teeth sink in again, lower than before.
Their fingers press at his mouth until his lips part again, then their hand slips beneath his waistband, warming against his body heat. Spit-soaked fingers stroke his cock until his hips move restlessly beneath them.
They bite him again, then again, littering his skin in some perverse reenactment of the marks he used to leave on them when they fucked. The next time their fangs slip free, they ask, “Do you still love me?”
They stroke along the outside of his cunt, more confident than they ever were in their past life. Their hand has finally warmed to a living temperature, leeched entirely from his own heat, and it teases him now, tracing through humid curls.
“I don’t know,” he says.
A brief, almost human sadness flickers across their face before their jaw sets with that too familiar stubbornness. “You never used to lie to me.”
No telling how sincere they are anymore, but he didn’t think he was lying. Maybe he’s too selfish, unable to let them go. Or maybe he never loved them at all, not really, not enough — not if he can’t end this for them like he should.
Their fangs sink into his chest while it’s still seizing around his last thought. In time with their teeth, they press two fingers in, slow and shallow. His heart thumps in his chest, accompanied by a matching throb where Pocket’s mouth is. Every bite mark they’ve left pulses with that heartbeat, and so does the heat between his thighs.
There are a dozen weapons all around him. Pocket only knows about a few. If they’re blood drunk and lulled into a sense of false security, they won’t see him coming in time. His fingers flex as he imagines the shape of the stake nearby.
He’s blood drunk too now, lightheaded and stomach lurching. What little brainpower he has keeps getting rerouted to the involuntarily squeeze of his cunt around those fingers.
His eyes roll to Pocket’s head, and he can picture them propped on his chest and laughing, face lit up in a rare display of real happiness. That was less than a week ago, before Drifter came back and found Shiv’s weak spot once more.
Overlaid atop the memories of Pocket laughing, Pocket smiling, Pocket’s old dark eyes, he can still see Drifter claws dragging across their skin. Can hear his drawl, see his teeth piercing tender flesh. Pocket, slumping to the ground like a rag doll — then Pocket, the same one who refused to die at their father’s command, scrabbling for life as it dripped from Drifter’s wrist.
Shiv’s eyes squeeze shut tight as the world tilts around him, and Pocket’s fingers work inside him, knuckles butting against the skin, until they can line up a third finger with the others and pry him open more. Their palm thuds against his cock as they work, no longer languid but determined.
Red dances behind his eyelids and his head’s begun to pound in time with the pulse between his legs. His thighs tense, twitching around Pocket’s wrist before they spread again, and his hips take on a mind of their own.
He’s half aware of the stiff jut of Pocket’s cock against him, the stuttered jerks that jab it against him over and over, as mindless as their feeding. Sparks line the edges of his vision, followed by aching blackness; he seizes them by the hair and those teeth come free, and they rock against him more erratically now that he won’t let them bite again.
They don’t speak, and he’s grateful for it. He floats instead, head spinning and chest clenching, while their fingers drag him closer and closer to the edge. He lets his guard down just enough, and they lick at his neck where the feeding began, but their fangs don’t touch him again. More self-control than he expected; more than he’s showing right now too.
Their lips are cool but soft against his throat, and that’s all he has left to focus on. Their fingers press in and in, knuckles spreading him sharply at the widest point, and the heat that’s been coiling inside him finally spreads, sudden and searing, through the rest of his body. He shakes in their arms, helpless, but they’re so far gone that it doesn’t matter, one leg curling around his so they can rut against him. When they finish, he thinks it should sear his skin, but it’s as lukewarm as the rest of them.
He misses them even now while they’re lying in his arms. It’s wrong in a hundred ways, and he knows it. He knows the solution too. It’s right in arm’s reach. They’re gorged on blood and drowsy from the sex. There’s never going to be a better time. If he doesn’t do it, someone else will, and sooner rather than later.
He catalogs his tools again in his mind: the stake, the silver, the fire.
Pocket shifts in his arms, nuzzling at the stinging wound in his throat. His fingers, twitching with violent impulse, land gently in their hair.