Prometheus Bound [Whit]

[Peter Parkman]

Sticking a knife in his neck was the absolute worst thing that Whitaker could do.

Where the human might be feeling a conglomerate of different physical and emotional things, so too did the vampire. Pathetic, really, a vampire who could not stand the sight or smell of blood; a vampire who was always conflicted when feeding, as to whether he enjoyed the experience or whether it was the worst that he had to do with his night. But he knew he had to, every single night – he had to consume just a little, otherwise control could be lost. He needed to moderate. He needed the same amount, at the same time, every single night.

Of course tonight with Whitaker was going to throw the entire thing off balance – but that was a sacrifice that had to be made. The one concession Peter should have asked for was patience. Time. To let him make his own preparations and go about this in a methodical manner.

Instead, the boy had stuck a knife in his neck, and at the first sight of blood bubbling to the surface, as the smell of it whisked across the space between them before Peter could stop breathing, to keep it out, he had to fight the gag. He had to fight the wave of dizziness and the blackness that threatened the edge of his vision. The very worst thing that could happen would be if Peter passed out, and in his unconsciousness, Whit would die. He would bleed out, because he has stupidly stuck his own neck with a knife.

Peter was slowly planning it. He’d had it there, in his mind. If Whitaker was comfortable in the kitchen, then Peter would drain him there in the kitchen. But he would do so with lips closed around the wound, not allowing a single drop to escape and threaten his own slimly balanced ease. Now all that ease was gone. All the gentle ways in which this could have gone were washed down the sink.

The one thought in Peter’s mind was that he had to save Whitaker. Panic urged him forward. He stumbled and had to grasp onto his wounded human for momentary balance; with vampiric speed, he whisked the knife away from Whit’s neck. With animalistic tendency, the head was wrenched to the side so that the flat of the tongue could lave the spilled blood from the skin of the neck; so that the mouth could clamp over the viciously spurting wound. Peter had his fingers fisted into Whitaker’s shirt; had him trapped up against the bench as he released his hold of Whit’s hair and instead balanced himself against the wood, fingers white as they curled into the edge of the bench top.

Peter’s back was arched and his eyes squeezed shut. He fought for control, as he swallowed the first mouthful. The blood was different. It was tainted, like he could taste the cancer in it. Maybe he was only imagining it. He didn’t stop. As the blood poured from Whitaker’s body, Peter took it. Even after he’d reached his quota – even after his body told him to stop, he kept going. He would let there be a mess. He would not faint, because there was too much blood. He would make sure that there was no more blood left to spill – only enough, so that it could be fed back.

If Peter’s hand flattened against Whit’s chest it was for no other reason but to better able to judge his heartbeat. Now was not the time to panic. He had to remember. He’d been week. He’d been near blackness, when Keara’s blood had brought him back to life. He had to replicate this scenario as much as he was able to.

[Whit]

Was that disgust evident on Peter’s features?

Apparently dying made a man think the strangest things. Maybe it was the loss of blood making him delirious, or maybe insanity had laid its cool fingers on his cheek and given him sight he never should have possessed, and made him witness to things outside of mortality. There was often this description given when faced with the possibility of death, of one’s life flashing through like a film, and Whit got little snippets of that rushing through him all at once. But it wasn’t quite like you saw on the television screen; it happened all around him, and he could have reached out and touched those moments.

He was a young boy with bright blue eyes and fair skin that didn’t look like it could survive the sun. He wore his school uniform, which involved uncomfortable shorts, a blazer, button down shirt, and a striped tie. Every hair was in place and every fiber of his clothing was carefully pressed thanks to the efforts of Sister Margaret. Though she did not need to, she had always taken very special care of him, because you see St. Adrian’s, was not just a school, but an orphanage and the local parish house. He was no older than six, and wasn’t used to being called to the administrator’s office, because that was generally where boys and girls went when they got into trouble.

He’d been too scared to shake like a leaf.

That was the day he found out he was being adopted by a nice little couple, and it had gone from one of the scariest, to one of the best, to one of the most nerve wracking all in a very short period of time.

Then he was older suddenly, and he was tucked into a corner of the library at the public school. Transitioning out of St. Adrian’s had seemed easy at first, he’d actually liked it because he thought the clothing he was meant to wear was worlds more comfortable (which was of high importance in those days). But he had never been a particularly sociable child so despite having attended classes for three years, he hadn’t made any friends. He was a year away from graduating elementary and moving on to middle school, and he’d literally read through most of the books the establishment had to offer. Not a bad thing, mind you. He happened to love reading, books were his solace. They provided not only adventure, but beauty in the form of words. The written language was this divinely intricate thing that he couldn’t help but want to discover over and over again.

He was pouring through the pages of his latest acquisition when a boy ran up to him, shoved at his shoulder, screamed ‘tag’ and ran off. Well Whit normally would have been too timid to get involved in that sort of game, but he had been all but thrust into it. So he put down his book calmly and proceeded to run the other boy down. Of course, that sort of horseplay wasn’t allowed in the library. He got into trouble, and it was the first time he had ever gotten disciplined. Well worth it, he reasoned later.

‘Grape’, his friends called him, at least by the time he hit high school. The surname he had taken after the adoption had been Concord, and young boys never were known for being creative.

His first time driving, his first crash, his first kiss and the first time he ever brought someone other than himself pleasure. That growing collection of leather bound classics, the neatly filed comic series – all of it was in his head, and in front of him, and all around him as his blood flowed. It came in hot spurts that grew weaker and weaker by the moment. He didn’t even realize it when Peter was there until he was clutching onto the man, holding him close. Or he tried to. The truth of his actions could have been radically different.

And then he was lying there, and he was still, impossibly still, except he wasn’t really. His heart still beat, but he drew closer and closer to the brink. It was a struggle to keep his eyes open, and breathing was difficult too, like some sort of labored burden he would have loved to shirk.

[Peter Parkman]

Of course Peter wasn’t aware of what was going through Whitaker’s mind. He’d have been terrified, if witness to the numerous memories that Whit possessed, and which he touched with the fingers of his dying mind. Not because Peter wouldn’t want to know, or that he wouldn’t be curious or sympathetic. But simply because he had a task that he needed to perform and he couldn’t screw it up. He couldn’t mess up, otherwise this boy would die and it would be all Peter’s fault. It wouldn’t be the fault of cancer, or of Whit himself. It would be all Peter’s doing, because he had agreed to this. And because he hadn’t outlined the plan before they’d reached the apartment.

That was what he should have done, he reasoned. Back in the library, he should have stayed. He should have pulled out a pen and a notebook and made notes on Whitaker’s behalf. The whole process should have been explained before they’d ever reached this point. Peter had to wonder at the irrationality. At his rush. Did he think that the cancer would have suddenly claimed him in the next half an hour? Was it the cancer itself that he could feel, which he could stand a second longer as it grew inside of his body? Is that why he rushed?

What kind of person acts on such a whim, and plays with such a dangerous foe as death? What kind of person gave their trust so thoroughly, so willingly, without any kind of hesitation? A reckless person, maybe. What kind of vampire would a reckless person make?

Peter couldn’t think about that. He felt Whitaker’s body weaken, and he had to wind an arm around behind the boy’s back in order to ease him down to the cold, hard kitchen floor. And then he felt the heart slow, and he knew he had to act fast. What would happen if the heart stopped? Would it be too late? Peter couldn’t know. He wasn’t given the opportunity to talk to Keara about this – to ask about the definites and the doubts. This had to be done right now.

But he didn’t panic. He kept his reason, and his strength. If Peter had been allowed to take his time, he’d have been able to heal the wound properly—the wound that he would have made with his own two teeth. As it was, the knife wound was too large and too deep for him to heal; he plucked Whitaker’s discarded shirt from nearby and, as soon as he pulled away from the boy’s neck, covered the still-seeping wound with the material, applying pressure. Without hesitation, he tore into his wrist with his own teeth. The blood surged like a black plague to the surface, before dispersing. But it glistened, in the depths of his skin. A think that could be consumed. He pressed the bleeding wound to Whitaker’s lips.

”You have to drink it, Whitaker,” he said, praying that Whit could still hear. Had they talked about it beforehand? They had. Whit had to know that he needed to drink. Otherwise he would die. Peter hoped that his friend’s rush would, in the end, ensure that he would do all that he could to remember. And to survive.

[Whit]

There was friction against his lips, the slide of flesh against flesh, and then slickness. He tasted something on himself when his tongue flicked out to try and get rid of the sensation, and then his hands lifted. It was the very last of his energy, and it showed in truth, the strength by which he wanted to desperately hold on to life. His hands clenched an arm, one at the wrist and one just below the elbow so that he could squeeze. But he was fading, and the grip loosened. He got only a little more than a mouthful before his limbs went limp, and fell to his chest and the ground. He was gone, totally and completely.

He looked peaceful like that dead. Covered in blood, a weapon just off to one side.

Maybe death would have been better for him than he’d thought.

At first, nothing happened, but then his body began to change in subtle ways. First there was the way his cheeks seemed to grow a little more hollow, his eyes a little more sunken. His skin had been naturally pale in life, and grew even mores, until he looked sickly. He lay there, still as the deepest waters, but it couldn’t have been for all that long. No more than five or ten minutes, and then there was the movement of his eyes under his lids, a back and forth motion much like one might have expected from someone dreaming, deep in REM. They opened a second later abruptly, that same haunting blue they had always been.

His lips parted and there were fangs there. The scent of human blood was thick in the air and he was hungry. Like he hadn’t eaten in days. Still, he didn’t know exactly what he was hungry for, just that the smell of something new was there and it made his mouth water. It was immediate, the influx of sensations. He wasn’t really all that ready for it, the sounds of the water in the pipes, the creaking of wood, the gurgling of a stomach. All of it was turned up until it molded together into a roar in his ears. Smells were the same, though that one delicious thing was by and far the most invasive. He had trouble focusing his vision. It was like a camera, trying to decide if it wanted to pick out the fine wood grain above him in the natural beam or if it wanted to settle on Peter’s features.

Peter.

Peter was there. He couldn’t help but smile.

But it was short lived. He had a few choices to make, and not a lot of time to make them. He was up on his feet a moment later. “Make sure your fingerprints aren’t on anything.” He doubted that was the first thing that a vampire was expected to say after being brought back, but he had loose ends to tie up. Whitaker had always been a creature strongly rooted in logic. His parents were going to come looking for him if he didn’t turn up soon and they would have further questions if he didn’t die after getting diagnosed with cancer.

So he was going to have to be presumed dead. Which was cold, and cruel. But Whit had already said his goodbyes to them. They had been good parents to him for years, but the first job of any mother or father was to prepare their child for the world. They had. In much the way he had stepped into adulthood, he felt he needed to step fully and completely into his new life with no distractions.

He looked at the mess on the ground. It was a horror show, enough blood to easily account for a dead person.

He was hungry.

But he had to take care of the scene. So he stepped towards the pantry, reached inside a second later to pull out a metal bat. He had been gifted it one year by a hopeful friend. He’d never use it. Making his way to the front door, he pulled it open and, after making sure he was not being observe, slammed the bat down on the door knob. The thing cracked the wood and bent. It would never close right again. He then nudged it shut and used a heavy book to keep it closed before turning to his living room. “Get my bag from my bedroom please? I want to make this look like a robbery gone wrong. I need to grab a few valuable things to make that believable. Bag is in the closet in the corner.” He said before he glanced at the clock on the wall.

He figured if they made a commotion, they had a good twenty minutes before one of his nosy neighbours called the cops and said cops arrived. So he wasted no time in laying waste to what had been his home.

[Peter Parkman]

Peter had thought that he was careful. As careful as he could have been, given the circumstances. Blood and Peter did not get along; for whatever reason, the very presence of the red stuff sent Peter into a tailspin. Which was unfortunate, given that he was a vampire and needed to drink the stuff in order to survive. But he hated blood, just like he hated large bodies of water. Just like he hated mess, or for things to be out of order, or unfinished. He and Blood had a strict relationship.

This? This, however, with Whitaker, here in this apartment, this was breaking the boundaries of that relationship. Rules had been broken. In the five to ten minutes of dead silence, while Peter waited to see whether his blood had worked, he began to realise how much of a mess there was. The panic began in the pit of his stomach and slowly rose like bile. He tried to keep his green eyes wide and stuck only to Whitaker’s face, as he looked for changed, and for signs of life. He tried not to look at the spilled blood on the floor beneath them – or to think about how it must have been sinking into his clothes. His jeans. How could there be so much blood?! How, when Peter himself felt like he had consumed so much? When he thought he had got to the knife in time?

Was he imagining things? Was it some kind of hallucination? Was this his fear, come to life around him? He had to focus. Had to try to focus.

And then Whitaker’s eyes were open, and that was a new thing for Peter to focus on. Relief, that it had worked. That he had killed Whitaker, and had brought him back to life. Or, well, maybe it was Whitaker who had killed himself with that knife, but either way. It had worked, and for a fleeting second Peter grinned, his relief obviously etched upon his features.

But then all of a sudden Whitaker was up and barking orders. How was he doing that? Peter remembered his own turning. How painful it had been, as his old body had died and the new blood had taken over. How heightened his senses were, and how overwhelming it had been. But the scent of blood became stronger as Whitaker’s sudden movement shifted the air around them. Peter fell backward, onto his backside, his fingers smudging into the blood on the ground. He barely shouted. It was like some kind of horror movie. Whatever Whitaker was saying, it went right over Peter’s head.

And then… and then Whitaker became the epitome of chaos. His lithe frame with a baseball bat, smashing what was previously a very well organised and neat apartment. It didn’t matter that Peter didn’t need to breathe. He watched on in horror – and he began to hyperventilate. There was the singular urge to get up and make Whitaker stop. To start cleaning up after him, to hurriedly put everything back where it belonged.

But the blood was too strong. As Peter tried to push himself up and away from the mess, he only made it worse. He had to balance himself against the bench, but vertigo still had a hold of him. The darkness crept in at the corner of his eyes, and this time he couldn’t resist. This time, he couldn’t overcome the weakness. The panic had pitched and reached its climax – nothing was going right. Nothing was following any kind of logical plan – not to Peter’s mind. It wasn’t neat. It was messy. And he couldn’t… he just couldn’t.

So he fainted, right there in the kitchen. Back into the mess of blood.

[Whit]

He heard a thump.

Whitaker was driven by his adrenaline, and by his sheer force of will. Had he been anyone else, he might have been overwhelmed by the need to feed, which gnawed at his stomach like a monster nestled deep inside. It was like a runner on the track who had tunnel vision. He cut out the entire rest of the world. He didn’t care about the sounds. He didn’t care about the sight. What he cared about was cleaning up any messy loose ends. He knew that his adoptive parents would come looking for him if he didn’t and that was the absolute last thing he needed.

It wasn’t even just that he was a vampire and did not want to deal with his old life – you see, he had been an orphan for a long time. Maybe another child would have been thankful to have been taken into a loving home, but by the time it had happened for Whit, he had already built the thick barriers around himself which refused to accept most people into his heart. His parents had not been bad people, but Whitaker had never really seen them as anything other than wealthy people who had given up their ability to reproduce in order to make money and regretted it later in life. They had offered him love, but he knew almost as soon as he had been adopted that he’d been very little more than a substitute for what the both of them really wanted.

They had been old when they’d gotten him and would be dead soon anyway. Maybe that was a cold way to look at it, but they knew about his cancer. It wasn’t like he was robbing them of anything other than some sort of prolonged goodbye.

There wasn’t much of an emotional attachment there in either direction, regardless of what any of them said or pretended around the holidays.

He went to investigate the sound and found Peter collapsed on the floor. Lovely. He didn’t know exactly what the matter was, but he figured maybe it was the shock of the turning or the violence of it. Peter never had seemed like the sort of man who could really handle that sort of thing. There was a second in which Whit felt a little bad for what he had done. Peter had saved his life after all, had given him hope when he’d needed it.

One crisis at a time.

He marched into his bedroom and grabbed his travel bag. He left all his clothes, but nabbed his collection of antique pocket watches as well as few other expensive pieces that he thought a thief might grab. Next was his game room which was half electronics and half comic library. He had carefully catalogued an maintained thousands of individual and collected works, most of which he was going to have to give up. He grabbed the crate labeled ‘first editions’ which was obviously the most valuable, and then kicked over one of the shelves, scattering his years of hard work. He hated that. Hated it. But he would have time to rebuild his collection.

Next came his large flat screen television, which he smashed with his bat. Too big to grab anyway. He snatched up as much of the machinery as he could fit into the bag, because it seemed logical to him that a robber would be able to turn a profit on just about anything current or sufficiently vintage. Atari, Playstation 4, Xbox One. He’d purchased most of his things with gift money from his parents which he had received during his birthday or over holidays. He was a hard worker, but the majority of his cash went to paying rent or purchasing text books. The Concords had cash to spare, so he didn’t flinch at letting them spend it on him.

Besides. It was how they showed affection.

He had to double back to his bedroom when he realized he had left it essentially pristine, and smashed a mirror, kicked over a dresser, and shoved his mattress of the box springs. The living room was the easiest. He ‘d already destroyed it save for the shelf with his collected leather back first edition books. They were all classics and most of them were collector quality, carefully preserved and even restored after generations and generations in print. They were his most prized possessions, so they went into his bag as well.

Which left him with one last issue. Peter. Grumbling, he hauled the man up and off of the floor, dragging his sire onto his back. He realized that wasn’t going to work almost immediately. There was nothing to hold the man to him, so he backtracked to his bedroom for a third time (he was beginning to feel like he was a frantic child), and tore strips out of his bedding. After they were tied end to end, he returned, and took a look at his watch. It had already been a few minutes, and they needed to get going. Surely someone had taken note of the ruckus. So he fashioned a harness, strapping around legs, waist, chest and arms, before he hauled Peter once more onto his back and tied the thing into place. It wasn’t exactly pretty and they looked absurd but it was functional.

Thank god his bag had wheels.

Once Peter was ready to go, he rolled right out of the apartment as quickly as he could. He made sure nobody was watching and knew his apartment building well enough to get out without being spotted on cam. By the time he was out into the night, the two of them faded into the shadows and were gone.