multiversallogs | there are far, far worse things to be than a monster

Given that he has taken on the role of monster bait more often than he'd care to admit, Fish would be indoors too, this evening, had he not been summoned out here. He was still in his pyjamas when Deacon called, actually—hope you enjoyed the spectacle of his bed-head, sir—but it did not take long to get himself ready. Having clothes already set aside cut the time down significantly.
...What, so he gave it some thought. When you have a limited wardrobe, it isn't easy to find a balance between this looks good on me and I don't give a shit if blood gets all over it. That and he's done the deliberate apathy version of staring at the phone since this idea was first mentioned.

This rotten, beastly idea. This idea that should make him feel guilty for even considering, but doesn't. It really doesn't. He's pretty sure.

Fish had considered this while doing the usual camera-mirror-screen setup dance so as to apply liner without sticking the pencil in his eye. He's been doing that more often, lately. The eyeliner thing. Just smeared around, usually, unless he's going out. And so, the big question: why get prettied up to go murder somebody? It's sick, probably. But it's not the first time he's done it. Granted, those few times did not involve quite this much premeditation, but they still count.

And so, when Fish rolls up to the decided meeting place, freshly showered and brushed and smelling clean, in his tight jeans and layered shirts, and his coat with the hood, and those leather boots with the few buckles that he loves, all blacks and greys and milky palor, he's feeling pretty okay about it.
Nervous as hell, but okay. For the time being.

His approach seems casual, at least.

The vampires from Deacon's world aren't caregivers, it should probably be noted, with exception to the born vampires. Vampirism otherwise spreads as a plague and is just as impersonal, fledglings left to fend for themselves or perish but it's okay, because a single bit bolsters the population. So it isn't like Deacon is used to having baby vampires tag along with him...

...but he is used to steering perspective his way.

He looks over at the sound of approach, lazily expectant, and doesn't immediately stand up. He waits for Fish to get closer as he sends ash flying with a flick of his cigarette, dwindling specks of orange and grey upon the sidewalk, between his boots. "How do you usually do this?"

Straight down to business, then. All right, he can roll with that, even if the question smashes through his inner sense of composure like a fist. It's not that difficult to make Fish feel like he's being put on the spot—just ask him about anything vaguely personal, really.

Having successfully rolled a will save against the urge to start every sentence with uh or um or while touching his hair, Fish threads his fingers together instead. Stiffly, in front of his chest, to be lowered again soon enough. "Usually, I... don't. Do it." He left on this dark nail polish because it's days old, already chipped, and therefore doesn't look like he's trying to impress anyone. On his murder date. "Not like, um," damn it, "not like this."

His hands separate so that he can gesture like he was about to wave but realised how lame that would be about a third of the way into it, and so he shoves both into his back pockets instead. "Hi. By the way."

"Hi."

Deacon stares at Fish once this is drolly delivered, like he isn't sure if he wants to bother press more information from the other monster or not, before steering his attention back down to cigarette. A last inhale, before he discards it to drop, crushing it out with his heel, and gets to his feet. No, evidently, he does not need to dig his claws into the details of how Fish feeds when he manages to, because, well. They're doing this Deacon's way.

"You look nervous," he comments, not really meaning to dismiss all of Fish's efforts to the contrary, but it's important. Nerves are irritating. "You need a minute?" That would be almost mock concern, tone dry as the Sahara, and expecting the answer to be no.

Nerves are even more irritating when you're the one having them, you don't even know.

"Nope." That's a lie. He could use an abundance of minutes, actually, and maybe a bucket of liquor in which to dunk his head. "I'm ready." So ready that he can't make eye contact for longer than some passive fraction of a second. Oh god, why is he even out here? This is the worst. No, okay Hamilton, you can do this. Just...get your hands out of those pockets for god's sake, you're basically grabbing your own butt over here.

(He does this as casually as possible.)

Eye contact is only so important. By the time Deacon is moving, he is already assuming he is dragging Fish through this first part not unlike taking a reluctant dog for a walk through the rain. In spirit, at least. He does not make for the open street or for a nice dark alley to lurk in like cut throat ne'er-do-wells, because he's always had a fondness of simply taking what he wants.

So, like any good murder date, it starts off with a door violently kicked in.

Inside, it's dark - and if there's even any power running, which is highly doubtful, no one is turning on a light. Disappearing inside, Deacon tunes his tenses to who and what and how many happen to be living here, and the amount of rooms and floors are far greater than the people shacked up in this place. "Third floor up," he suggests, moving for the staircase and doing it with a sort of swift, agile energy as a cat, different to his usual self-assured lazy aloofness.

Somewhere, there's the sound of a door clicking shut. This is not the kind of neighbourhood that looks after its own, taking a leaf from the Militia in this regard.

To his credit, Fish does not jump when Deacon's heel engages that door (huh, nice shoes), but he does lift his shoulders in a nervous hunch and casts a glance back to the street. He is not at all synced up with the neighbourhood vibe; to him, born and raised in the suburbs as mom's favourite, this is a realm unknown, even apart from the... oh, shit, he'd better catch up.

Fish is not in anything resembling pro athletic condition, but he isn't clumsy, at least. And he can navigate stairs. Which is always a plus. He can do so in a way that suggests he could be properly light-footed given the practice, too—taking them two at a time (no doubt fuelled by a sudden giddiness) and no stomping around like an idiot in those boots. So far, so good.

Wisely, he chooses not to ask any brilliant questions on the way up.

The hallway is cramped when they reach solid ground, Deacon slowing as he passes doorways, looking for the right one. This place seemed like it could have been nice when it was built (or... organically sprung out of the world, who knows, with Baedal), with two doors splitting off from the out-of-service elevator, and he moves for the one that has the sound of breathing behind it. He simply shoulders through. No one has keys, here.

And the apartment itself is the same as it is outside; a little broken and repeatedly abandoned, grey in neglect. Someone has sealed a window in plastic to keep the cold out, and there is next to no furniture. Water stains spread across the ceiling, and in the immediate room, small as the apartment itself is, is a mattress left on the ground and two sleeping bodies tangled beneath sheets of wool. One head, silhouetted by a mass of dark hair and bleary eyes, pops up at the sound of invasion.

Deacon doesn't go for her as he moves in on the end of the old mattress. He reaches down and finds an ankle, and draws an immediately thrashing body out of its recline, a masculine, incoherent shout as the man is dumped unceremoniously on the floor. A kick sends him tumbling against the wall, skull smacking against plaster enough to leave a dent.

The girl is moving already, scrambling out of bed, skinny limbs covered in loose wool and cotton, and she goes for the dubious safety of the bathroom.

This... is not at all what he had expected. If asked to describe what he was expecting, Fish would not be able to articulate anything specific, but still. This was not it.

When he creeps across the apartment's threshold, he is wide-eyed and utterly devoid of confident projection, and frankly looking like he's shown up there by accident. Like, whoops, wrong apartment. I'll just let you assault these people in peace, okay, bye. Only, he doesn't leave. He tracks each new flurry of movement with snaps of his eyes, more or less involuntarily, and he starts a little as the girl bolts, but doesn't move from where he stopped.

He does look to Deacon, though, once she's out of sight. And down to this guy on the floor, lying there about to die, and back up to the vampire's face.

Uh, basically.

Deacon is largely ignoring Fish at this point, as well as the girl who bangs shut the bathroom door and wonders what the fuck she is going to do now. No, he is hungry, and looking down at the stunned meal he has won for himself. He reaches down to collect the man by the front of his sweater, someone who looks to be in the apparent age bracket between Hamilton and Deacon.

Fangs get longer by the time he muffles his own snarl against the man's throat, a choked out cry that gets weaker as strong jaws almost suffocate him, like he may die sooner of asphyxiation than blood loss despite that so much of it is emptying out of him. Deacon drinks, and a lot of it goes to waste.

He lifts his head by the time his victim is sagging weakly by the careless grip Deacon has on him, still dying by the time he throws the man in Fish's general direction after maybe three quarters of a minute has breezed by. Which is really only when he notices the look on the other xenian's face, scarred eyebrow raising incredulously.

"You want him?" he asks anyway, smearing red off his face with his palm, before tipping his head towards the bathroom. "Or you want her?"

"Okay." What? No, that's not even an answer, come on. "Uh, him." Words are especially difficult to negotiate when he has been hypnotized by the sight of arterial jets, evidently—which he seems to have been, given the almost dazed way he responds.

This is so much blood.

It's not even that much, or even the most he's seen all at once, he knows this logically, but. Look at it. It's there. And it's so red on everything it touches, so red and bright and wet. His expression is a mild gape at first, but the tip of his purplish tongue ruins the moment's innocence by making its debut, pressing against the point of one cuspid. His gaze lifts just in time to track the path of Deacon's hand across his face, takes a detour down the line of his neck and falls away again, and in a singularly preoccupied undertone he says, "Yeah."

See, there he is.

'Yeah' is echoed, which is partially mockery, but also to keep Fish on track. The smile he gets is full of fangs, blood smeared pink on ivory, before Deacon moves for the bathroom. He bats open the door and leaves it dangling wide, and there's the sound of a vocal startle, a scuffle, as the woman moves in attempted attack as preemptive defense. It doesn't last long, slick hands gripping at her arms, the sound of a body shoved against the wall. He will feed and leave her dead on the floor, handling her in exactly the same manner as her partner.

Said partner is bleeding profusely from the neck, staining the ground beneath him and not so deluded that he is attempting to reach for Fish or any such thing. He curls on his side and a few ragged syllables leave his throat, raw sounding and thin, possibly the girl's name.

It's about as much as he can do, one arm folding under him like he might like to try getting up, but he isn't making it that far.

He sure isn't.

While Hamilton is not particularly brutal when it comes to eating, generally, he is an enthusiastic opportunist. Before the struggle in the next room even begins, Fish is grabbing two (comparatively weak) fistfuls of shirt and dragging this unfortunate gentleman back to the wall to be propped up. He's no rougher than he needs to be—buddy's head doesn't even catch a bump, really—and if the murmuring continues he will tell the guy to shut up, but in a hushed and wavering tone, like they're only accomplices in a petty theft, excited but afraid to be caught.

Unless it takes Deacon an unusually long time to emerge, upon doing so he's likely to see Fish sitting on this guy's lap, knees and upturned soles on either side, clutching him around the neck and shoulder, face still tucked in close to his neck. (Fish's toes are curling inside his boots, too, but that is probably not obvious.)

He never takes very long when it comes to drinking his fill; longer than he spent on the dude, having largely left him for Fish to take care of. The woman is unconscious by the time he is done, letting her fall as soon as she expires. Gravity carries her back into the shower tub in a tangle of dead limbs, the moonlight from a grimy window above her, while pretty, doing no favours.

Back into the bedroom, or the room they've appropriate for this use, Deacon glances over the spectacle of feeding across from him; it is not a strange sight, by his standards, but he'd almost been doubtful that Fish ever does this. For all that he'd witnessed the mangled mess the other carnivore had left behind at his club.

A bed sheet is used to wipe off his hands and face.

"I don't play with my food much," he, rather belatedly, explains, letting the thing drop and glancing down at himself. His clothes will deal with it, his leather jacket repelling liquid more or less, but as long as his skin is more or less dry of rich red-- "And I don't mind reminding people that there aren't any safe places anymore. Not from us."

Actually, the number of times Fish has put his jaws on a living thing until it died can be counted out on two hands, and that's over a span of several years. If anyone knew how enervated he feels on a day-to-day basis, how fucking hungry he is all the time—it's not always the feverish desperation that haunts creatures like Frost, but the hollowness and disconnect of starvation, the quivering weakness of a body malnourished. He sleeps rarely. He is anxious and inattentive and tries to alleviate it by living inside a bottle.

Fish doesn't smile when he turns his head to spy his fellow monster, brushing his bloody cheek against the throat of a dead man, but sort of feels like it. The lazy, feline shape of his eyes, rimmed in smoky black. He considers Deacon's statement before answering, "There's one place." A smile would give this reflection some pitiless emphasis, but no, he's only looking.

He sits up, flips his black hair back from his face, and when he stands the body slumps sideways down the wall to reveal more than a few deep and nasty impressions along the neck and shoulder, no missing flesh this time. He's still looking down at them when he asks, "How often do you do this?"

Edited (i can't words) 2012-02-02 00:57 (UTC)

"When I need it."

That's sort of true, if one quantifies a need to murder people as a way to vent one's restlessness as opposed to his actual hunger; there are evenings enough where willing donors have to do, and evenings enough where they don't. Deacon flicks a look down at the slumped over body, the marks torn into throat and shoulder. "Where's that?" he asks, then, for the sake of it, turning a little as he glances upwards - but if there's anyone on the floor above, they're not moving in such a way that puts him on alert.

"Wherever this guy ended up, I guess." It's easier to ingratiate yourself when you're not being contradictory, but he's still trying to feel Deacon out, so he adds, "Or Bonetown, maybe. That place is kinda fucked up."

He bends at the waist, then, and reaches to move some of the recently departed's hair to cover his eyes. The few times—well, comparatively few times—he's done this, he has made a point of leaving the body in as respectful a position as he could, provided there was time for it. He sort of wishes he'd taken this guy over to the couch, or something. Lying all bent over like that doesn't look very comfortable.

Well. It's a good thing where Deacon left the girl is out of immediate view. That is some discomfort, if the inanimate dead could fuss about such a thing.

These ones aren't coming back, anyway. He shrugs concession with regard to Bonetown; it's off his radar enough that he isn't even sure what happens when people like him go there, but the thought is noted and dismissed. He was being slightly more esoteric. Sometimes murder has this effect, like commenting on the scenery should this have been a real date.

"We've probably got another bite or two out of this building before we have to move on," he says, dismissing the room by turning his shoulder to it. Fish can sort the funeral rites, or whatever. Meanwhile, at least one person was wise enough to get out; they took the fire escape. The few others are just.

Hoping. "If you were still hungry and wanted to do the honours."

What? Fish stands partway through Deacon's last sentence, rising much more quickly than he'd bent down, and pretty much gapes at him. It could be an entertaining picture, actually, this little guy with a slick of blood on his lips and chin and the trails drying on his neck (and one little red smear on the pointed tip of his nose, too), looking frankly stunned, like he's just been told Santa is coming or something. Evil Santa. Whatever the born undead get to look forward to as kids.

"We're going again?"

Like killing people is a merry-go-round ride, is what that question reminds Deacon of. He doesn't entirely disapprove, even if he raises an eyebrow. "Night's young and there are alive people left to eat," Deacon says, almost good-humoured, looking down to adjust shirt sleeves beneath leather jacket, standing casual in a room where the smell of death is already beginning to expand to fit the size, and he can hear the implications of terror in the other corners of the place.

"I can do the heavy lifting if it's not your thing." He only sounds slightly condescending. He only dimly recalls that Fish had been able to fend him off for a few moments, and maybe that as more surprise than brute physicality.

Because it had been pretty fucking surprising.

That's what he's relied on almost entirely so far: surprise. It's easy to catch someone unawares when you've basically made a career out of looking harmless. (Not that Fish has to try hard.)

The surreality of his own response struck him, too, just as it left his mouth; now he's grinning about it, but trying not to, more self-conscious than actually entertained. "I guess I could try." This only comes out because of the cozy feeling creeping outwards from his guts. This is the rejuvenation talking. Meanwhile, this comes from the same place that tells his tongue to sneak its way into his grin: "You probably look better doing it, though."

What. Honesty is the best policy.

"Fortunately not a requirement."

That Deacon is in better humour after recent murder is probably not wholly coincidental. The door was left hanging open, which could have been hilarious had anyone been brave enough to walk by; Deacon grips the edge in hand and yanks it open wider, and out they go. Rather than warn the building as to their imminent arrival, the apartment is left wide open as they make a descent and a different direction.

Deacon slows as they come up on Door Number Two, following his senses to the closest beating heart, sluggish with dozing. Like the others, this place is broken into rather than enjoying working locks, so as promised, he allows Fish to do the honours.

Deacon's reluctant shadow follows him a step behind, of course, and when they stop outside this particular door he stands there for a moment, wringing his hands slowly, listening. Fish doesn't know exactly how the vampire is making up his mind, but figures it's some kind of old-guy mojo he doesn't possess himself. He's tonguing the inside of his lower lip when he hears it, too—the life inside, detectable now that there are no footprints to muffle it—and this triggers a look askance to Deacon.

"If there's like five huge guys hiding in here, or something, secretly, I'm gonna come back out here and punch you in the ass." Empty threats are the perfect preamble to home invasion, clearly. Which he shall now do by just...opening the door, and leaning in, like he's just checking to see if the place is occupied.

(He did take a moment to scrub at his face before they left the other room; it's not perfect, but at least he doesn't look like Hallowe'en anymore.)

There aren't five huge guys.

The place is empty, in fact, and more cluttered than the first apartment, more lived in; there's even a coffee table that matches nothing, on which lies some debris in the form of a loaded ashtray, a homemade bong tipped over and gross with ashy water, some sketch pads and paint drying on palettes. No sofa, no real furniture. Cigarette marks on the carpet that's degraded and water-eaten where it meets the wall.

But the bedroom door is open and upon approach, the figure sleeping inside doesn't seem to suffer the same problems of cold, living out here. Long-limbed, androgynous without being necessarily pretty, the creature is very warm by his or herself, the smell of rich blood much stronger than what the humans were providing.

The xenian shifts where he (let's assume) lies, tangled up in a thin layer of wool, wearing some sort of band T-shirt that drapes past his pointy knees.

If Sir T-shirt were looking, he would see the slow lean of one very cautious young spook, emerging hair first until he is visible past the door frame only up to his pointy pixie nose. His eyes dart here and there... and then he looks back once over his shoulder to where he last left Deacon, his green eyes wide and his lips pressed into a funny little line, perhaps looking for reassurance.

Or making sure buddy isn't sneaking up behind him to scare him like a jerk. One of those.

Deacon has since moved, managing to be near silent. Nothing important, just headed for the window, navigating shiny, expensive shoes over thin carpet and around emptied beer cans with the precision of something feline. There's curtains here, remarkably, although it's little wonder that no one would want to steal these; he picks them back to see if the Militia spontaneously decided to show up.

Nope.

By then, Fish is looking at him, and he glances that way; raises a shoulder in a shrug. What the fuck are you waiting for?

He is waiting for the blood in his belly to ferment into actual liquid courage, that's what. The nourishment may have sharpened him up, and maybe (hopefully) injected a little metaphorical steel into his fists, but this is not a Jekyll-and-Hyde situation, here...

Which is why, instead of stomping over there and roughing up this xenian guy however he likes, Fish slips through the bedroom door and pads toward the makeshift nest as quietly as he can, taking pains not to tread on anything that might make a sound. There's a funny little hollow feeling in his chest where his heart should be rattling its cage in excitement. And why are clothes so loud? Jesus.

Oh, okay, so the floor creaks there. Where he just put his foot. That's nice. Whatever, fuck it, he's going for it. He has to pull a face first, to communicate a silent and toothy oh shit to this sleeping dude before he does, so it seems like he's frightened himself into attacking... which... he has, essentially. But never mind that. The point is, Fish is more or less hurling himself down there bodily and so this is about to get messy.

Oh, god. Deacon is kind of glad he sort of shelved his dignity for the few seconds it takes for him to move hurried for the door (no one was looking, it's fine) by the time there's the shuffle of Fish going for it. He grips the doorframe, hangs there a little, to watch.

Meanwhile, the xenian's eyes spring open barely a moment before Fish pitches himself downwards, sharply awake. There's a flurry as long fingered hands go up in flaily defense, one smacking at Fish's face and the other trying to grip a shoulder to shove. A skittering of some other language leaves his mouth, pitchy and sharp.

Whatever he is, he isn't strong - possibly quick, and mean, but--

While he does not rank super high on any supernatural scale, in this fed state Fish does have a few definite advantages over your average human. Probably not as quick as this thing, though. Its hands, anyway. Was that seriously a slap he took just now? It was, and he barks a startled sound—Deacon may recall its similarity to a quack, in fact—and turns his head away instinctively, which of course makes pinning his victim that much easier. Because doing this blind is absolutely the way to go about it.

He's not about to be shoved off any time soon, but while feeling around for a neck, he ends up sticking his thumb in this thing's mouth, probably. Oh god, what is going on. Why can't he just go back to eating people food? You don't have to wrestle a fucking sandwich.

This is all happening very quickly, of course; less than a second later he's got his eyes back on target and is looking considerably more pissed off than before. Until: "What the fff— OW!" Whatever just happened, apparently it sucked.

The creature is regretting it, though, wrinkling his face and taking his mouth away from where he just bit Fish's wrist with needle-sharp teeth (ones that are hidden beneath the more human kind that fill his mouth), tainted blood smearing darkly purple on pale lips and his own purple tongue. The xenian is hoping it's enough, anyway -- he twists like a pinned ferret, kicking and scrabbling to get out from beneath Fish.

Which is when Deacon's posture stiffens a little, readying, and his own toothy grin dimming; he doesn't want the food to get away, less about his own hunger and more about the danger it poises. The Spatters is full of the strangers who would never go to the police anyway.

Except there's a first time for everything.

Edited (HDU) 2012-02-11 14:02 (UTC)

Oh hell no. If this wriggling jerk thinks he's getting away now, he has been gravely misinformed.

Granted, Fish's increasingly fierce efforts are not even close to graceful, or even slightly efficient, or... even that good, frankly... at all... but he is tenacious, and if it means clinging to this fairy fuck until he's being dragged around on the floor, so be it. Part of it is panic, honestly—this is the first time he's been bitten by something he doesn't recognize—but his own fledgling predatory instinct is stronger than the residual human urge to jerk back and let it go. So whether his jaws find fabric or bare flesh, muscle or bone or otherwise, Fish latches on like a snarling bear trap, squeezes his eyes shut, makes fists around whatever's handy and hangs on tight.

Meanwhile, he does appear to be juicy inside. His wrist isn't exactly spraying a dark fountain over here, but that wasn't a polite nibble, either; there shall be blackish spatters and smears aplenty.

This could probably be going worse, honestly. Deacon relaxes again, hand going to his pocket and the cigarette pack inside, but he doesn't light up. It's not taking that long.

But the howl from the fairy means they've been making too much noise and it'll be time to go, whether they can fend off anyone getting all prepared for invasion or not. On the plus side, it also signifies that Fish's teeth found flesh, tearing into pasty fairy skin for vibrantly red blood that tastes more or less amazing, if almost sickly - the wine coolers of the cruorvore world.

The fairy thrashes, but it's out of pain, not forward progress. Deacon enters the room further.

The more his prey writhes, the harder Fish's inhuman jaw squeezes; something so comparatively delicate should not be able to withstand this crushing pressure for long. He does not have proper piercing fangs, no, but he makes do.

The warm gush in his mouth, down his chin and his neck and smearing on his cheek, his hair dragging through it to become a wet brush, the burst of metallic tang—none of this is new to him. But the cloying nature of it is. His eyelids flutter open; he squints through his lashes only briefly before they close again. Once the worst of the struggle subsides, Fish eases up, loosening his clenched hands and drawing his teeth out of the wickedly deep wound almost carefully. His mouth relaxed and streaming like an open gash. Long black eyelashes still pointed down, his cheekbones freckled red.

He is aware of Deacon's approach, but doesn't look up for approval. There is so much going on inside him right now—not only the blood—and for once, if only for now, he's actually enjoying it.

It isn't unexpected; Deacon can smell the blood from all the way over here to know that it's different, and he's certainly dined on xenian before for all that he doesn't see them as the same breed of cattle as humans. Which doesn't stop him from taking the arm of the captured fairy, wrenching it up and producing a sharp gasp as strain twists in the victim's shoulder, and closing his fangs on delicate arm with a certain amount of savagery despite the sharpness of his own fangs.

To him, it tastes sweet without also tasting impure, and he draws deep where he's sliced open critical arteries. But as soon as he feels something other than a predator's satiation, a certain airy giddiness--

"Alright," he says, dropping the arm promptly even as speaking causes blood to trickle from the corner of his mouth, and smear across his chin. Kids, don't do fairy. Except sometimes. "That's definitely," he says, flicking a hand to rid it off excess crimson, droplets flying, "a sometimes food."

Fish observes this, not hungrily, but with an air of glassy detachment, his eyes hardly focused. By now he's closed his mouth, and swallowed the spit and blood pooling in there, and while his pupils are now attempting to match the size of nickels, apparently, one may get the distinct impression that he isn't thrilled by this. He watches the arm fall almost absently.

It's not that he doesn't like the feeling—because he does, he would have paid money for this if they hadn't just come in and take it. There's something else; an accumulating gleam in his eyes that has little to do with the blood high.

Abruptly, Fish seizes the ruined creature's body, dragging him more or less into his lap, still dribbling slmost-black at the wrist. When he puts his jaws to that long neck and squeezes, though, feels the pop of skin under his teeth, the subtle roughness of slicing meat and the impossible richness of the gore on his tongue, he does not swallow. He just hangs on, and waits, pushing away the slow moving arms as they protest, staring at nothing. Just waiting for him to die.

It's only when Deacon sees the run off of rich blood, disproportionate to how much would be going to waste if Fish had been drinking, that has him not forcibly separating one monster from the fairy full of magic blood. He watches, instead, and listens to the erratic heartbeat that will eventually give out, and palms away the rivulet of blood that had coursed down his chin.

He stands, then, other hand briefly clasping over Fish's shoulder while he's still engaging in murder; steadying for either of them, and comradely affirmation, gone again by the time he's headed for the door, mostly to check that nothing has happened to the main room and what he can see of the hallway beyond in the time it's taken to feed.

And now he is going for a cigarette, to clear his own head.

So he's clinging to this guy, bleeding him out, and reacts to the unspoken support of a hand on his shoulder by closing his eyes in calm appreciation. But it's good that Deacon leaves. When Fish finally lifts his mouth away from the fairy's neck, he doesn't burst into tears or anything so regrettably lame, but he sure feels like it. The jolt of realization, and the lingering ache of regret, they're just augmented by whatever is going on with this...thing's insides. This beautiful, dead thing that he killed. That must be it, he decides; it really shouldn't matter.

He tells he body he's sorry and that he didn't know and leaves it laying on its side in a creeping dark halo of its own blood.

Eventually he goes in search of Deacon, emerging from his moment alone quietly and mostly cleaned up. Rusty streaks still linger around his collar, and by his one cheekbone a twist of his black hair is dried stiff. He's still picking at his fingernails when he appears.

By the time Fish is done, Deacon has nursed his cigarette into being lit, smoke unraveling, never quite as acrid to his senses than that of spilled blood. They should go, so that's what he does; briefly glance to check that Fish is ready before headed out with his attention and senses focused forward in case anyone with more power than that of a baseline human has decided to investigate.

They don't meet anyone on the way to the street. "Everything you wanted and more?" he asks, pitching for dry and pseudo-optimism. He enjoyed himself. Fish is being quiet.

Quiet, yes, and trying to crawl out of whatever happened back there without making a fuss about it. He succeeds in detachment, mostly, and moves in Deacon's shadow as if through a dream, all the edges gone fuzzy. This is where he prefers to be, he reminds himself. It's been a long time since anything hit him this hard, though... and the further they get from the rooms, the easier it is to get comfortable feeling this way.

He's finally pushing the hair back from his face when Deacon asks. "Yeah, actually." Smoking suddenly sounds (and smells) like the best idea in history, so he starts feeling around his jacket for the necessities, his hand moving slow and lazy—until another thought interrupts that one, and he lifts his other hand to see the wrist past the cuff of his jacket. That gash still there, still oozing slowly. Blackish blood painting a smooth line to the tips of two fingers, stark against his skin. He can barely feel it. "I wonder if that was poison or anything."

Deacon deals a glance at the little injury, having not quite thought that way; for someone who can die via garlic, most other toxins aren't so much a concern. "I guess you'll find out," isn't very helpful, as breezy as the smoke he exhaled just before. More helpful; "Ask around Mafaton. Doctors for the dead."

He's never felt dead, though. It may be a species thing. His kind of vampire are more animals, certainly more alive than he was when he was a human, and the infectious nature of turning speaks more of leveling up than dying and resurrection. It's a glimmer of a thought as he considers Fish.

It doesn't really matter. It certainly doesn't make a difference to the three dead bodies left behind. "How long will that last you?"

Although he doesn't comment on the suggestion, Fish does make a face. A stink-face, if you will, with a little crinkle of his nose and all. Doctors for the dead. It's not like he's a zombie, none of his parts are rotting off. And he does vaguely possess a heartbeat... sort of... but there's another question to answer now and this alone prevents a little argument about his corporeal state. Because he is easily distracted.

"A couple days, maybe?" He's still fussing with his wrist, squeezing the skin around the wound's edges, dabbing at the oozing ichor with his middle finger. "I can go a lot longer, though... but I can't sleep unless I really, like, actually eat somebody. Until they're gone. I mean, I can nap, but it doesn't do shit— ow." Fish. Stop picking. "It sucks major balls."

Deacon isn't about to trade stories about what happens when one doesn't eat, because the point of being a vampire means that that is never a pleasant consequence, but he does listen in the same way people might assume their cat is listening when they absently mutter at it. He picks up the info he wants, smoking, teeth set against his filter before he draws it away again to flick ash.

"Then sweet dreams, sport," he says, dry forever, twisting away to regard the direction he'll be headed. "You know where to find me."

What? No. A complaining urge rises at once, and while he can't kill it, he can smother it slowly down, which he does, because he's sure it would come off as whining. And that's the last thing he wants to convey.

So he says, "Yeah," and in his head tells himself to shut up. Just shut up and go home. You're gonna say something idiotic, so just leave it. That's it, keep walking.

"—Wait."

Great! That's great. Damn it, Hamilton.

Hanging up on a given interaction he is done with is a lot easier over the network, Deacon reflects, but this irritation a sort of idle glimmer orbiting by; he is actually slightly too stoned to mind beyond principle. He stops walking, anyway, a half step taken to turn back and ask what? with a look, cigarette held loose at his side, hand turning in support of this query.

If Deacon's interrupted indulgence left him feeling it, imagine what is going on with Fish right now. Just imagine.

Rather, observe: by the time the vampire turns, his reluctant shadow has moved to follow, and now approaches with light but purposeful steps. His eyeliner's a bit messed up, there's still blood behind his ear (how did it even get there), and he's got a funny little look on his face, sort of shy and giddy but fundamentally at ease, and wow his pupils are actually enormous right now, and how does Deacon actually feel about hugs, because he's getting one.

... oh--

Deacon's retreat from whatever is happening right now manifests as the tiniest step backwards, but Fish is already right there and folding him into a hug. Going very still and instinctively adjusting his hand so his cigarette doesn't get knocked away, Deacon takes a stab at patience by not immediately throwing Fish into the wall.

He waits, then a hand pointedly closes on a Fish elbow. An eyebrow raised, he queries; "You done?"

Yeah, yeah. Fish grins against the leather collar before his retreat; it's gone by the time his face is again visible. He doesn't linger there any longer than would be considered friendly—this isn't a suggestive move, only a whim—but does feather his hand down the length of one sleeve on its way toward a try at stealing the cigarette from Deacon's hand. His fingers are still cool, their touch light.

Whether or not he comes away with a reward, Fish steps backward into the beginning of a turn, either lifts his hand for an easy drag or doesn't, and maybe breathes smoke as he says, "Thanks." And then drifts off down the street, clearing the next curb with a little hop.

Deacon sort of tilts a cynical look down the length of his arm as Fish's hand creeps, and-- now he doesn't have a cigarette. His fingers splay in a sort of wry resignation, standing side on and watching as Fish takes his leave, smoke trailing after him. There's no you're welcome, mostly because it seems unnecessary.

Christ, is the sentiment behind a shake of his head. He turns, once more, to go.

there are far, far worse things to be than a monster

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