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Armand does not remember telling Louis he was twelve. But he must have, because Louis knows.
Head rush as he hears the words, like being discovered, and after 500 years it should feel less like being stripped bare: while Louis is dying, while Louis’ soul is in the oxygen of the butcher shop, aerosolized between his head and body: he is not cruel, not in this moment. Louis does not tell Arun he is dirty. He does not paint him in shame.
“You need a love that’ll cradle you.”
Possibly, he should not have put the Fred Steins-
He leaves. He brands his ex to let the Talamasca know Louis is one of theirs. He is to be saved. Why does loving hurt so much? Why does being known hurt like sex? He knows he’s only experiencing the tip-edge of his full-pain and he feels as if he is going to black out.
Arun leaves, he practically runs. He flees.
———————————————————————
4 HOURS EARLIER: BEFORE BEHEADING (B.B.)
“The butcher will be closed, Daniel,” his Maker snaps his fingers, elegant flick.
Keeps snapping because Dan is not LOOKING (he’s being bad again, zoning out), the heaviness of his very-much-attached-head in his hands, palms hard against his brow bone. Armand’s iPad on the fold-out table in front of him.
Armand eases into his lap, head cocking into Dan’s face like a bird. “Your final interview with Lestat and Louis went well. You got into his mind, my special, special boy.” The one fluorescent light above them flickering: so he sees Armand’s cheekbones, his eyes, the hollows under those eyes from when… when has he last slept(?): all in flashes, his Maker in startling stop-motion.
The vampire plucks up Daniel’s wrist, kissing the pulse. Armand’s other hand on the back of Danny’s neck, rubbing lightly, except for the pressure of his nails.
His hand loose, Dan lets his companion kiss the pulse point. He’s been drowning in Armand, drowning in this; and he’s really trying to hold onto at least a sliver (at least, c’mon, Dan) of humanity instead of-
Armand’s lips warm on his inner wrist, nose into the heel of Danny’s palm, hot breath.
“The butcher will be closed, because of shabbat?” Dan echoes, lips numb. Groin numb, sensitive.
“Yes,” Armand kisses Molloy’s knuckles, one by one; licking with the barest flick of tongue.
He shifts underneath his Maker, jeans rubbing. “Uhhhh, I understand Lestat… death of the author; separation of work and body... and head?” Daniel’s been trying to stay awake, keep pace with his Maker.
Armand is pulling his hair, not hard, tipping up Dan’s chin. “Are you tired, Beloved?”
“You weren’t gonna call me that.”
“Not ready?” Round phosphorescent eyes; eyes are the window to the soul, so his vampire Daddy must have a bright, bright soul for such bright, bright eyes. A song in his head: turn around-
“Not ready,” Dan grunts. He’s gotta get something, right? Get the story, bright young-old reporter, point of view. “Stop the concert, snip-snip Lestat,” a cutting motion in front of his neck, but his hand’s too heavy halfway through. “I get it, I get that. Don’t wanna to listen to Big Boss again either. Yeahhhh, but, why… Louis?”
Armand’s vibrating, his thigh jiggling with impatience on Dan’s leg. Dan wants to grab him, pin him, stop him.
Asking another question, but he should be waiting for Armand to answer: let him spill out his story like intestines. Dan says, mouth dry so he keeps moving his tongue, “Are you kidnapping Louis de Pointe du Lac because the butcher’s closed? If the butcher wasn’t closed, you might not?”
Armand’s a little blurry. Did Daniel forget his glasses, are they on his head?
His Maker steps off Daniel’s lap.
Dan groans, he didn’t mean for him to leave, and now his jeans are cold. Wheeling around the whiteboard, Armand’s going to explain again, again, again. Daniel doesn’t like the whiteboard, the squeals of marker, the scrubbed out bits.
Armand’s saying, “Follow on the iPad, Daniel. One of Regina’s roommates moved out a week prior, because of a burst pipe. I burst the pipe.”
Armand’s breathing through his mouth: “Another roommate held interviews. I procured one of my followers, we said we would always wash our dishes, now he is the girl’s new flatmate. On my command he will duct tape her mouth, zip tie her wrists, drive her to the butcher.”
Daniel’s not following on the iPad. He’s staring at his companion, occasionally in pops of light, the bulb almost burnt out and dying. Why doesn’t the vampire fix the light bulb? How many vampires does it take to change a-? (they take away one Pulitzer if he finishes that joke).
Armand’s slender fingers tapping the whiteboard, thrumming at it, “The butcher will be closed, all the shops will be closed, I will not be interrupted. I will speak to Louis. He will make his amends. He may die.”
Dan’s not looking at the iPad, but it levitates: bopping closer to his face. Glares at Armand. His Maker said he wouldn’t use his Gifts on him, around him; the device gets too close, bumps Molloy’s cheek stupidly. Daniel muscles it back to the table, fingers flat over the screen.
Clattering against his palms as he listens; the iPad trying to jump back into the air.
Armand’s giving the world’s most niche TED talk with his little whiteboard: “Fareed will be pleased, his ample research expanded, how interesting to cut off a vampire’s head and still speak? I wonder if the soul is more truthful in the air than the flesh? I wonder: if the flesh holds our past, it is possible to sever ourselves from our skin’s pain; how long does it hold that pain, if our epidermis takes 42 days for the cells to turnover?”
Red lines swooping on the board, adding more for emphasis. Armand’s voice echoing in the basement, “Is that how long the pain lasts, 42 days? And for a vampire, in the course of twelve hours we may be healed, what does that mean for us, for how we hurt?” Clicking the cap of his marker with his thumb, click-click, click-click, “I do not believe Louis will be reasonable, I hope he is not, perhaps he will grieve better if he watches Claudia’s simulacrum die in front of him.”
His voice lighter, curious, “He never saw her die. Do you believe it will help him?”
And Armand breathes again, sucking in air. He wasn’t speaking quickly, but he’s standing different now; as if he’s a person in a body again who actually needs air to breathe. And he looks at Daniel.
“No,” Dan says.
“No?” Armand’s eyes flicking to middle-distance, staring, recalculating.
Dan knows Armand’s going to turn back to the whiteboard, another series of strung-out words: a plan that only makes sense in that it’s something the vampire CAN do; a series of dominos that WILL fall when pushed. But really, really: it doesn’t make any goddamn sense, because why are you pushing THOSE dominos, Armand?
The iPad rattles loud against the plastic of the fold-out table, jittering under his hand. “Can you quit it?” Dan grunts.
The device settles as Armand blinks. Did he even mean to use his Gift?
Molloy says, “I don’t think killing… a lookalike of your ex’s daughter… will help his mental health. Am I getting that right?” Then he softens it, “Arun?”
Arun’s sinking to his knees, his back still straight, chest puffed out: half of him the posture of man giving a shareholders meeting, as if torturing his ex is another item on a crowded to-do list: except his knees, his knees don’t agree.
Kneeling in front of his companion, Daniel’s thicker fingers on the nape of Arun’s neck, threading up into his hair. “Boss?”
“Mmm?” A dimple of pain in the corner of his mouth? “Daniel?”
“When did you last sleep? The thing where you put your head on a pillow?”
Those orange eyes half-lidded. “Not required.”
“Yeah? Humour me.”
“Six...”
Daniel waits, doesn’t speak, waits for the answer.
Armand says, “Six months? Eight? October?”
“That is one calendar year, 365 days of I’m thinking: iPad-baby and cult tactics?”
“Mmmm.” One slow blink, then the orange suns up again. “It is not necessary.”
Dan’s brushing back one of his companion’s curls, it won’t stay behind his ear. “Hard disagree. Hey, also, your plan is nuts,” he says fondly. “The worst thing I’ve fucking heard. And I’ve heard a lot of Phish.”
“Oh.” Armand’s brows drawing together, one forehead wrinkle. “I apologize.”
“No,” He’s gathering him up, Armand more and more boneless under his touch. “No, no. If you try to sleep, try, take a nap, close those eyes for a hot sec, and still want to do this,” exhales through his nose, “I’m in. Get your closure.”
“I do not know-” eyes flicking over him, “If it is closure, Daniel. It may simply be…?”
“Finish the sentence.”
“Too much momentum? Overwhelming… history?” Arun’s voice in fragments, smaller, “I’m not sure where to- put it?”
“Hey, hey,” hugging him for real, real fucking hard. They’re sitting awkwardly, and Armand ends up wrapping his legs around his waist. Dan’s mouth into the side of Armand’s hair, “You put it on me.” Bunching up Armand’s coat, trying to squeeze through the layers of his clothes. “Got it? Got it?”
The feeling of Armand nodding, chin bumping his shoulder.
Daniel says, “You put all your shit on me.” Maybe that makes no sense, could definitely workshop the verbiage; but Armand starts hugging him back with more force, until Dan’s ribs hurt. Fuck. “Harder, Boss.”
There’s a bad noise, a rib might have cracked. Dan doesn’t let Armand let go.
Arun says, “I don’t want- sleep. I don’t want to rest.”
———————————————————————
AFTER BEHEADING (A.B.) AT THE BOWLING ALLEY
Daniel drops his fangs; gums stinging with that full feeling as the teeth ease out of him. Raglan James is a turtle of a man and his agents are only people. Dan’s stupidly confident, so confident for a man wearing bowling shoes.
They have iron chains. The iron makes him weaker, complete fucking bullshit. The chains weigh his neck, his legs, once they get him pinned, it’s medieval as fuck. He’s screaming some stupid insults that probably don’t hurt anyone’s feelings.
They cut him open.
He kills a guy. Gets a hand free so he can rip out his larynx. Bye-bye. So they leave Daniel, he’s too much effort to fully rip apart, reverse build-a-bear; bleeding out under the scoreboard of his perfect game. Oh, yeah, and Alex is no goddamn help (he notes that, it’s noted, fuck Gabi’s fledgling, fuck!).
When it’s over, he’s no longer whole.
Stumbles, carrying his dismemberment like bad luggage to the nearest hospital; drinks from a patient on a morphine drip. He’s learned enough from his Maker he can wipe the mind of the nurse who sees him: a monster hunched over the hospital bed, face and cracked-open-chest slick with gore.
Makes it back to the house, plops his severed arm in the freezer, holds in his lungs with his good hand, tries untwisting his intestines but it makes him throw up. Surprised everything’s still aligned enough he can throw up. Good job stomach, good job throat. Good night house, good night mouse.
The sensation of the detached limb getting chilly despite it being… inside the pull-out freezer.
The morphine from the patient’s blood isn’t working, is it a tolerance thing? Tolerance from the day he was turned? Fuck. Shit. Or maybe it is working? Dizzy, but he’s already sitting down, tin ceiling tiles all spin-y.
He’s curled against the fridge when his partner finds him. He’s had the foresight to use his shirt to hide most of the damage. Danny rasps, “Closure?”
“Daniel?” Armand’s beautiful, romantic voice breaking, “You are hurt?”
“Good news: I got my arm.” How is he still talking? He’s understanding his wives and daughters’ frustration a little, why won’t he shut up? “Bad news: it’s in the fridge. I don’t think that’s food safe.”
Armand’s moving him, sliding him to the floor. Sliding open the ice box. “I will sew it. And your- chest?” He’s using his nail to cut back the shirt, hissing at the red cavity where his lungs, heart, and stomach are just chilling, hanging out. “Daniel?” Cold fingers on his face. “Daniel, I will fix you, is it alright? Do you wish me to proceed?”
“Yup.” Mouth dry, smacks his lips a few times. “Patch me, baby.”
The sutures aren’t as bad as he’s expecting, it’s the skin tugging together that’s weird, makes him sweaty and hot, or maybe that’s the morphine. Armand’s hands inside him, moving organs in a way that makes his vision lurch.
Wiggling his fingers from his severed arm until Arun tells him to stop: it’s distracting, and his surgeon needs to do a good job. Got it, boss. Did he say that? Got it, baby?
Armand lies beside him on the linoleum when he’s done.
Dan thunking his head sideways to look at his impromptu-doctor: Arun’s hair pulled back, still the signs of exhaustion on his thin face. Dan slurs, “How’d it go? Louis de Pointe du… say sorry?”
“In his way,” Armand whispers. Then, “I perhaps, did not need to… kidnap, or behead… perhaps I did too much.”
“No shit.”
Armand’s poking at the reattached arm, then those icy fingers on his face (icy: because he’s too hot, not because Armand is too cold). His companion asks, “What happened?”
Laughing, though the sound coming out of him is more of a sob, “I did too much. Yeah. But they, uh, got Lestat’s head. Raglan tooting James. Fucked up.” Oh. He should have said that first. “You gotta stop the concert, huh? Go.” Muttering, “Go, go, go.” Nudging him with his nose, because he forgets he could use his good hand.
“I cannot- I will not… go,” shakes his head, hair slipping out of how he’s tied it, so it unfurls around him, inky curls on the white floor.
“Go, go, go,” definitely too much to move his arms, so he’s just murmuring. “Don’t let him play Big Boss.”
“We were stopping the Great Conversion, Daniel. I do not mind if he plays his maudlin songs.”
“I mind. You also minded, don’t fuck with me.” He doesn’t know if Armand gets he’s on his side, so he says, “That song sucked ass.”
“Will you drink some blood? Please?” Armand’s been picking at his lip. Though maybe he means biting?
They rarely drink from each other. Armand’s blood is hard for him. Makes him fuzzy, good fuzzy and bad fuzzy, a high kind of fuzzy. Daniel wants, wanted to… go slow, apparently, prude that he is. Figure things out. But here he is, no matter how slow they’re moving, not going to change his fascination with holding matches to lighter fluid.
Dan uses his good arm to reach to his Maker’s mouth. Thumbing at the bright redness, then Daniel sucks it off his own hand. It makes his lips tingle. “Uh-huh. Put your mouth on my mouth, that’ll make it easier.”
The vampire snorts. “Do you want to kiss me?”
“Not smooth, am I?”
Armand leans over him, filling his vision; presses his lips soft into his skin, lingering, pressing, tasting.
Daniel’s tongue is on his companion’s bottom lip, then in his mouth. Then he’s drooping back. “Sure you don’t have to save the vampires from the supreme idiocy of making too many vampires?”
“Let them.” Armand’s on him, a good heaviness grinding him into the floor. “Let them bury themselves.” Kisses him harder.
———————————————————————
They’re in Dan’s bed, his arm has the red mark of reattachment, but he’s less loopy about it. “So. How was your day?”
Armand’s curled on his side, hands folded under his head in the pantomime of sleep; staring wide-eyed as Daniel’s been stuttering in and out of consciousness. He doubts Armand’s been actually sleeping. His companion echoes, “How was my day with Louis?”
“Yeah. You’ve been quiet.”
“Perhaps you have been loud.”
“Oh. Ok, I see how it is, make fun of the guy who had his organs rearranged. I think they put my liver upside down just for fun. You did flip that one around again?”
“Louis was angry.”
“Mmmm, yeah,” Dan frowns at the ceiling, crown moulding cracking with too many layers of paint. “I can picture that.”
Armand’s voice soft and… fluffy? Vague, as he raises one of his hands, watching the curl of his fingers as if he’s never seen them, “A twisted liver is Hepatoptosis. Some humans are born with a congenital defect where the ligaments are absent so the meat wanders. You would have abdominal pain and potential nausea.”
“Thanks, Wikipedia. Uh, but, sure, thanks for,” he doesn’t know how to say ‘fixing me’ or untwisting my liver without sounding insincere, gives up. “Did you and Louis work things out, or… do I block his number?”
“I… do not know. No… no. Yes.”
Dan hovers his hand over Armand’s lifted fingers. “Can I hold this?”
“My hand?”
“Yeah, boss. I’d like to hold your hand while we talk, that good?”
The pillow rustles as Armand nods against it.
Dan asks, “Is there anything Louis said that’s sticking with you, words that keep repeating, something you saw?”
Armand closes his eyes, so slow. “Louis told me: ‘you need a love… that will cradle you.’” Shunting open again, looking through his eyelashes.
Then gasps, because Daniel’s tried to scoop him onto his lap, sitting them both up; blankets bunched between them, Dan’s hand under one of Armand’s knees. Molloy chuckling, “I’m cradling! I can’t cradle if you’re wiggling.”
Arun stills against him, head heavy against Dan’s collarbone. Whispers, “Not literal.”
“Are you sure?” His voice quieter, he’s usually being sarcastic in some stupid way; but he’s not, can’t right now, too hard to be flippant when Armand’s heavy in his arms. “Will you finally fall asleep if I hold you like this?”
“No.”
Kisses the crown of his hair; smells his shampoo, coconut(?), which seems oddly mundane for an ageless creature. “Why don’t I tell you nice things, and you try not to fall asleep?”
“A test?” the vampire yawns.
“Mmm,” rubbing Arun’s bicep with his thumb, soft circles. His companion’s legs tucked sideways over Dan’s lap; Daniel’s other hand wrapped over Armand’s knees, the same soft rubbing. “I like your… intensity.” He says the word careful. “Scares me sometimes, but it’s, god, it’s something to watch.”
Muffled, into Daniel’s chest, “It does not serve me.”
Barks a laugh, “Yeah, probably not.” Shuffling his butt with Armand still on him, so his back’s against the headboard; brings up his knees, squeezes his Maker between his legs and chest. “I like that you’re addicted to, I think, several apps on your phone.”
Armand groans something, tries to justify.
“No. No. This is not a dialogue. This is a one-way compliment monologue: I tell you you’re special, you listen. It’s crazy that you started a second cult, it’s crazy that you killed me and I still can’t stay away, it’s crazy you’ve been through six or seven lifetimes of bad shit, real bad shit happening to you; but you’re still a person, you’re still this weird guy. I still see… you. I think. I dunno, fuck, I think.”
Armand’s face has tipped up.
“I like your face,” Daniel says, his words for once really fucking failing him. Hunches to kiss Armand’s forehead… then his nose, because he’s already so close. Then hovering, breathing into his companion’s lips. “I like the way you flick your wrist when you snap your fingers, like a sassy waiter.”
“Are you sure these are all compliments, Daniel?”
“Mmm, yeah,” jostles his lap, bouncing Armand as he readjusts. “Sorry, yeah, I keep saying ‘I like.’ ‘I like it’ when you make fun of me. That’s wrong-”
Armand’s still: it’s taken him months of reading this man to separate the normal-vampire-stillness from the frozen-prey stillness. He doesn’t mean to scare him.
Molloy says quick, “I should be saying, ‘love.’ I love your intensity. I love-” caught, can’t say anymore; romantic declaration has always been a bit of a problem for ol’ Danny Molloy. Croaking, “Call me ‘beloved.’ Please, Armand. I want that.”
“Beloved,” Arun whispers. Hand on Daniel’s cheek.
“How fucked am I on a scale of one to ten?”
Armand kisses his neck, sucking on the skin until Dan moans.
Ten. It’s a ten.
Molloy holds his companion; he isn’t quite rocking the vampire, so he’s not sure if it counts as cradling. But he holds him that night until Arun’s eyelashes finally flutter closed. His lover rests.