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delimeful · 2 years

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to taste your beating heart (7)

warnings: vampire au, dissociation, silly goofy vampire worldbuilding moments, remus pov so intrusive thoughts/gore mention/etc., references to past abuse/trauma

It took a while for Virgil to drag himself back up into complete consciousness.

Rather than stay and sit with him, Janus had immediately resorted to scheming, AKA, his primary coping mechanism for when he had to deal with upsetting emotions.

He’d exchanged a glance with Remus, silently assigning him babysitting duty, and then swept off to the den to discuss how he planned to destroy whatever coven had done this from the inside out. Logan had started contributing to the scheming before they’d even fully left the room, and Patton had followed them to either belatedly try and apply the brakes to that trainwreck or convince them to stop pulling the brakes on his own attempted trainwreck.

Honestly, the guy should know better by now. Not only was Janus an unstoppable force of self-care when he wanted to be, if they’d let Patton get away with that self-sacrificial bullshit, Virgil would have had their asses on a platter once he got back.

Wait, no, Virgil was already here. They’d found him, he just wasn’t himself. Had a funky new nickname and everything. Remus shook his head a bit, trying to get the thoughts to fall into place properly instead of bouncing around like wasps in a jar.

This was the problem with having vampire instincts that were more convoluted and twisty than a maze made out of rusty corkscrews. Sure, he got that this was Virgil’s face and body and goofy emo bangs, but his brain latched onto details like the glowing eyes and fresh-out-of-the-coffin smell and told him baby vamp instead.

The appropriate behavior for dealing with a distressed baby vamp did not include Janus swanning off to pretend like he’d never heard of an emotional crisis in his life, but luckily Remus was there to pick up the slack.

Planting his butt on the linoleum a few feet away from the corner ‘Anx’ had wedged himself into, Remus cleared his throat with a few obnoxious, phlegm-filled noises before starting up one of the few vampire-specific sounds that were audible even to humans.

The separation call was a low trill, one that burbled out in short staccato bursts, like a songbird’s chirrups but squeakier. Allegedly, it was similar to the noises bats made to communicate, which was about 60% of the reason that Remus was still of the firm opinion that vampires totally could turn into bats, everyone but him was just too limp-dick to really try.

Predictably, Anx’s head jolted up, the call catching his attention the way words hadn’t. His eyes were still a little distant, but they were at least seeking out Remus… and then settling on him with no recognition whatsoever.

Talk about a stake to the chest. He hadn’t realized how bad it would feel to have Virgil staring at him like a stranger. Remus thought he would honestly prefer it if Virgil had reverted to that one phase in his teens where he’d tried to stab Remus whenever he’d appeared on Janus’s behalf for check-ins.

He pushed past the knotted little ball of grief in his throat and made the chirp-call again, glad that this was one aspect of vampirism that he excelled at. Janus mostly stuck to the more subsonic vocalizations, but even those could come out a little wonky if he was all twisted up about something and ignoring his instincts.

Since Remus’s instincts were turned up to eleven pretty much always, he didn’t have that problem. Even with his calls coming out perfect, though, Anx was slow to respond. The baby vamp would inch forward a bit and then pause, all tense muscles and perked ears, before inching forward again.

It was… unnatural. Remus wasn’t a part of the coven that had turned Virgil– he planned to burn that coven to the ground with the vamps inside, actually– so a rejection wouldn’t have been unreasonable, but this wasn’t a rejection. It was just a very strange, stilted approach.

More than anything, it seemed as though Anx was waiting for someone to notice his response to the call and punish it, which was so antithetical to the idea of a call meant to reunite younger members of covens with the older protectors that Remus had to spend a few moments blinking away the haze of murderous intent that clouded his vision upon realizing it.

This wasn’t the time for murder, he reminded himself. This was the time for reassuring babies.

He added a crooning undertone to the next call, and was careful not to twitch as Anx finally crossed the last of the distance to slot neatly under Remus’s uplifted arm. He did that painful little tense pause again, but when all Remus did was start up a contented rumble, he went floppy against his side.

The last vamps he’d been with had hurt him for this, but he was still trusting Remus not to do the same. The thought made something in his chest feel bizarrely squishy.

“What are you doing?” Roman whispered furiously, as though he was worried that talking too loud would somehow make V’s dissociative fugue state worse.

“Come on, Ro-bro,” he replied from where he was squashing Virgil against his side and nearly vibrating with the force of his purr-rumble, “I know you don’t get bitches, but even you have to know how cuddling works.”

Roman made a face at him, but drifted closer regardless, watching Anx with a complicated mixture of confusion and curiosity.

Remus spared a second to be glad that his brother had never registered to his instincts as anything but a colony member, even back when they’d sort-of kind-of been trying to kill each other. That weird organ-squashing feeling seemed to correlate with how much trust his kinda-baby-brother-turned-baby-vamp was placing in him at the moment, and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to endure not disemboweling anyone he viewed as even a minor threat the moment they got in range.

“I thought he was freaking out,” Roman said, giving the floor a distasteful look before sighing and sitting next to them. That was what he got for wearing white pants like a chump.

“Yep,” Remus confirmed. “I’m un-freaking him. Duh.”

“Impossible. You’re like the freakiest person I know,” Roman replied, earning himself a fastpass ticket to being put in a one-armed headlock.

The resulting swearing and wrestling jostled Anx slightly, and this time when his gaze flickered over to them, he was actually seeing them.

After a beat of processing where he now sat, Anx went entirely rigid, fingers curling in preparation to strike like the flashing of a cornered alley cat’s claws.

“Emo!” Remus greeted, keeping his left side loose and unthreatening even as Roman made dramatic choking noises from his right. “Welcome back to the land of the unliving!”

Anx stared at him apprehensively, pupils blown wide to catch every movement, and when Remus only sat there and continued his casual soothing rumble, he glanced at Roman’s thrashing with badly-hidden concern.

“Are you… killing the hunters?” he asked, looking like he was itching to start a fight about it but he knew in his little vamp heart that Remus could kick his ass into next week.

Not that he would. Who would fight a baby?

But man, Anx must have checked out early if he hadn’t even heard enough earlier to cotton on to the weird detente that Janus had with these guys. “Nah, just applying a little mild strangulation! It’s affectionate in nature.”

Anx didn’t look like he believed him, so Remus loosened his grip enough for Roman to wiggle free, making sure he ruined his perfectly coiffed hair in the process, of course.

“You loathsome, loutish, lawless little leech!” Roman cried, grabbing the hilt of his sword with a flourish that was all show.

But he was still grabbing a weapon next to a twitchy anxious newly-turned vamp, proving that he had not a single brain cell to rattle around in that thick skull of his. Honestly, it was like Remus was the only one with a little decorum around here!

Rather than shy away, however, Anx made a low growl in his chest, a baby version of the ‘my colony member, back off or lose a limb’ noise. He blinked afterwards, seeming almost as surprised as Roman about it, but there was no lying when it came to primal vamp noises.

Remus couldn’t have stopped the delighted, lip-splitting grin if he’d wanted to.

“Aw, you like me,” he singsonged, and was utterly unsurprised when Anx responded by growling and shoving him hard enough to make him topple over. He didn’t resist the momentum, cackling all the way down to a slumped position on the floor.

Yeah, that was definitely Virgil. Even if he did look alarmed and confused at his own daring.

“Hold it, is this a normal vampire thing? I thought the creature noises were just you being you,” Roman asked in an accusatory tone, seemingly ignoring Anx apart from the way his hands were now carefully positioned away from any visible weaponry.

For about a fraction of a millisecond, Remus contemplated the possible repercussions of throwing Janus under all six wheels of the double decker bus that was Virgil’s band of emotionally constipated hunters.

About as quickly, he remembered he didn’t give a shit. Also, it would probably be really funny.

“You just think that because your main point of vamp contact is Janus. You’d have better luck prying emotional vulnerability from a rabid raccoon than that guy. Also, I guess most other vamps you three meet instantly attempt to maul you to death. Or run away, y’know, if they’re boring.” He stretched, making his back pop grotesquely.

“A rabid raccoon, huh.” Roman was looking at Anx contemplatively now. “Do you think vampirism counts as a form of rabies?”

Anx bared his teeth halfheartedly, but he seemed mostly preoccupied now with glancing between Remus, still sprawled out on the kitchen tile, and the door to the den.

“Why are you so…,” he trailed off, sounding confused and sort of miserable.

“Annoying? Vexing? Gross?” Roman listed helpfully, kicking in Remus’s general direction when he started preening at the “praise”.

“Safe?” Anx tried, and then shook his head like a dog trying to shake free a tick. “You’re not, you’re with him, but you feel…,” he grimaced, switching tracks. “If you’re not here for the hunters, you’re here for me. What do you want with me?”

Remus stared at the kitchen ceiling and contemplated deeply for a moment. “Mostly, I want to try pitching you into the air like a baseball.”

This was a thought he had about babies frequently, which was why he didn’t ever stick around when they were present. Luckily, baby vampires were far more resilient than mortal ones.

Anx stared blankly. Roman sighed with the exhaustion of one who had been subjected to this particular idea before. “You cannot ‘fastball special’ a baby. He’s not even a baby, he’s a grown man!”

Remus made an extremely dubious face, and Anx bristled in offense. The infant energies were off the chart with that one.

“What’s got you so freaked out about Janus, anyhow?” Roman continued, and Anx’s eyes flickered back over to the doorway with no little wariness.

He didn’t answer, so Remus decided to cut apart the middle man and spill the details himself. “It’s because Janabanana is a coven head, isn’t it?”

Anx stiffened in a way that meant his guess was right on the money. Remus propped himself up on his elbows, squinting at him intently until their eyes locked.

He ticked options off on his fingers, one by one. “Can’t be how strong he is, ‘cuz I’m stronger. Can’t be bad blood, ‘cuz you don’t remember him. So, it’s gotta be the only other thing you’d be able to pick up within minutes of meeting him: coven head.” Remus shrugged casually. “I mean, they’re easy enough to identify by scent. You’ve met one, you recognize them all.

“So, what’s got you all nervous, Count Dorkula? Bad experiences with the one you met?”

“None of your business,” he snapped, his spine stiff. “I’m not telling you anything.”

Despite the snarl in his voice, he looked only a moment away from retreating back to that dissociative shutdown.

Roman shot him a warning glance over Anx’s head, which Remus would have given him shit about if Anx’s response hadn’t just proved that it was actually extremely reasonable to be concerned about whatever the hell was going on in the gray matter of the vamp in front of them.

Still, pressing now wasn’t going to do anything for any of them. Remus shrugged and flopped himself back down against the floor, letting his head hit the tile with a dull crack to make Roman cringe. “Yeah, alright. Enough about that, then. Back to our original conversation; how do you feel about heights?”

“What?” Anx asked, bewildered. The utter confusion he was feeling at not being interrogated or otherwise tortured for information was not making Remus feel any less homicidal about his former coven, but it at least seemed to knock some clarity back into the baby vamp.

“Heights,” Remus repeated. “The sort of thing you would experience if you were, say, thrown at a supernatural speed into the air? In a manner similar to the act of throwing some sort of spherical object used for sportsgames? Hypothetically but also for real.”

“No,” Roman interjected immediately, like the buzzkill he was. “You are not throwing V– Anx around the house at mach speed. Janus will murder us both for endangering his already-traumatized family member, and then Logan will find a way to bring us back to life just to kill us again for destroying the furniture.”

“I’ve always wanted to get the full Frankenstein experience,” Remus mused brightly, and then rolled out of the way of his brother’s attempt to elbow him right in the solar plexus. He was midway through shoving Roman into a retaliatory chokehold when a throat cleared pointedly.

“I see you two have been very productive while I’ve been gone,” Janus drawled from where he’d snuck silently into the room so he could insert himself into the discussion with a snarky comment at the perfect moment. Classic Janus.

Of course, this has the side effect of making Anx jump like a cat faced with a cucumber, and the guy now looked one wrong move from crabwalking himself backwards into the security of the corner once more. Janus very carefully kept his mask of sardonic amusement at others’ expenses in place.

Honestly. Awkwardness must have run in the family or something.

Remus reached around and squished Anx into a sidehug briefly, long enough to roll his eyes at Janus over his head, before releasing him and springing to his feet. “See you around, hellspawn! Remember, if you commit a felony, I’ve got you covered like mold on an abandoned slice of cheese. Especially if it’s one of those really messy ones we talked about!”

This was confusing enough to drag some of Anx’s attention from his overwhelming wariness, and as a bonus, it distracted everyone else in the room from watching Janus experience emotional devastation in real time.

“I don’t think there’s any feloneed for that,” Patton said with a nervous laugh. He was making alarmed eye contact with Roman, who would now take the fall for seemingly allowing Remus to impart extensive knowledge of felonies upon their amnesiac teammate.

His job done, he gave Anx a hair tousle and the three stooges a customized version of a jaunty farewell salute (now with 200% more middle-fingers!) before following Janus back out of the sickeningly domestic little house and slamming the door shut behind them.

(He had already broken 4 sets of door hinges for this place, and was gunning for a fifth, but alas, the door remained upright. Not today, it seemed. Probably because Logan had started enchanting the damn things like the sore loser he was.)

On the porch, Janus turned away to compose himself, a bit of vulnerability that only Remus was allowed to be privy to. Remus didn’t say anything aloud, but he knew that Janus picked up on his subvocal hum, an ‘I’m here’ that wasn't spoken in words and didn’t require a response.

After a few moments of patiently waiting, he watched as Janus turned back towards the rest of the world. He’d pried each fragment of the sharp, jagged-glass hurt he felt about Virgil from his heart, and aimed them outwards.

At those who had dared to steal his only remaining family away. At those who had made sure Virgil remembered fear, even when he didn’t recall anything else. At those who had dared to spit in the face of the city’s most powerful coven leader.

It was time they got a little reminder of just why Janus had earned that title.

And just as promised, Remus would be right at his side.

#sanders sides fic #vampire au #ts remus #ts virgil #ts roman #ts janus #ts patton #ts logan #ttybh #to taste your beating heart #My writing #writing #sanders sides

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anxiousgaypanicking · 2 months

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Hunger Hurts

Synopsis: Janus is an old-fashioned vampire, living secluded in an archaic mansion past the outskirts of town. On one particular night, four intruders decide to snoop around his house, leaving Janus delighted at the opportunity of a few free meals. However, he decides he has plenty of time to play with the group before killing them to satisfy his own gluttony, and so decides to keep them around as his temporary pets… nothing more, nothing less. Part One

Janus perks up in bed as he hears his front door be pushed open.

Normally, this would be an instance where one might call the police, or something of the sort, but Janus doesn't feel the need to. And the reason he doesn't is because the distance between Janus’s lavish bedroom - in which he was resting in - and the front door was rather large. He lived in an old mansion, after all, so there were long hallways between this door and that one, the bathroom and the kitchen, et cetera.

The only reason Janus could hear multiple sets of footsteps slowly creep into his house was because of his acute hearing, which he luckily had to counteract his colour-blindness. It didn’t make traversing his house difficult, but it messed with his depth perception considerably.

And the only reason he has excellent hearing was because he was bitten by a vampire nearly three centuries ago, and turned that very night.

Janus slides off his comfortable mattress, and slips out of his room, stalking the halls of his house without a care. The electricity had long been cut from this place, and so he resorted to lighting candles to see at night (as in the morning, golden sunlight seeped in from the giant windows anyway, which Janus could carefully manipulate with curtains to give him the light he needed to traverse without tripping) but blows out the many he has burning through his halls as he passes, shrouding more and more of the interior in darkness.

In the distance, he can clearly hear “it’s not as dilapidated as I expected. Just… archaic.”

A scoff follows, and a second voice speaks “well, if the exterior wasn’t falling apart, why did you think the interior would be? That’s not typically how architecture works. It’s not like the living room is exposed to sleet and snow.”

“Don’t be an ass.”

Janus smiles, almost able to hear the way arms cross over chests just from the tone of the first’s voice.

“Everything’s… eerily upkept,” a third speaks.

“Don’t worry,” a fourth - four intruders? - soothes. “I’ll protect you.”

The first voice huffs. “From what? Spiders? There’s nothing here. It’s just a creepy ass house; nothing more, and nothing less. It’s not like it’s haunted or anything. At worst, there’s probably just squatters, and that’s why it’s not completely in ruin.”

“That’s logical.”

“Oh gosh, I didn’t even think about the amount of spiders probably roaming around! Maybe… maybe we should just go home!”

Following the chittering voices, Janus silently slinks onto his balcony overlooking the front door - which was left wide open, blowing the chilly night air into Janus’s otherwise warm house - but stays a few paces away from the rails in order to keep himself obscured in shadow. One of the four stands before the winding staircase leading to Janus’s position, but doesn’t climb it yet.

From his vantage point, Janus takes a moment to assess the group.

They were varying in style - quite an unlikely quadruple, in Janus’s opinion - but that made them more interesting. The tallest of the four was who Janus could immediately equate the bravest voice to, as with his muscular frame and protective arm wrapped around one of the others, it was clear to see he was rather protective. The one he was holding was leaning into his touch, eyes wildly looking around behind his round frames, as though scanning the area for spiders. His face was tucked into the larger one’s chest, which was about as high as it reached. Alright, so he’s paired two of them to two voices with ease.

The other two provided much more of a challenge. Both of them look like they could retort something sassy, and neither of them looked pleased with where they were, but as one curiously crouched down to poke at Janus’s stairs (something that only irked Janus to a minimal degree), the other was more careless with his touches, more huffy and puffy as he jabs his fingers into a beautiful lamp Janus had acquired in the 1950’s.

“Not a speck of dust,” the more inquisitive one says, which allows Janus to place him the second voice from earlier. The one who’d talked about “architecture.”

That left the final one as the feistier one, who immediately quips “cool, so the spiders can do housework. Good to know.”

With a wave of his hand, Janus wills the front door shut, making the smallest of the group yelp as he whipped around to face it, though everyone admittedly jumps at the noise. Silence settles among them, before the curious one adjusts his rectangle glasses, and clears his throat.

“It’s a windy night,” he states, though Janus smirks as he hears him attempting to settle the quake in his voice. Rather interestingly, he sounds less as though he’s applying logic to quell himself, and more like he’s trying to soothe the others. “Just a disparity in air pressure.”

The man he had originally been arguing with - bickering with? Bantering with? - moves towards him, and holds onto his arm, shoulders tense. They’re more affectionate than Janus would expect them to be.

It makes him curious about their relationship. Initially, he’d assumed them to be a group of friends, but they seem more affectionate than that. Call him old-fashioned, but typically you don’t cling that closely to someone you’re merely acquaintances with.

“What if this house really is haunted?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Patton,” the logical one says. “You’re perfectly safe. We all are.”

“Quite the contrary, Patton,” Janus finally speaks, enjoying the way “Patton’s” name feels on his tongue as he says it. He watches with delight as all four faces whip up towards the balcony, searching for the source of Janus’s voice with varying degrees of fear on their faces. “You’ve essentially wandered into a lion’s den, and unfortunately, the four of you look like fresh meat.”

“This house is abandoned!” the brave one speaks, urging Patton behind him and into the remaining arm of the analytical man. “It’s illegal for you to be here!”

“This house is mine,” Janus corrects him. He takes a threatening step closer to the balcony’s ledge, allowing the group to see his silhouette. He knows he’s not particularly threatening - he’s about as tall as the sassy one, who’s the in-between height-wise of the group - but he quite literally has the upper hand here. “And you’re trespassing.”

“Logan,” Patton whispers, voice quiet and shaking. Logan - who was the man Patton was currently cowering against - shushes him softly.

He takes a step back, guiding Patton and the other with him, while the brave one stays near the stairs.

“We’ll leave, then,” Logan says, keeping his voice passive and steady. He turns to the man closest to Janus and goes “Come on, Roman. Let’s go,” before tilting his head back up towards Janus and adding “we’re very sorry for breaking and entering.”

Janus cocks his head to the side, watching the snarky man turn from Logan’s arms and to the front door, and he can’t help grinning wide when his pale hands grasp the doorknob tightly, and struggle to turn it at all. Grunting with increasing desperation, he tugs on, before eventually stumbling backwards as his hands slip off the knob with a particularly rough pull. He falls flat on his ass, with Patton rushing to his side.

“Virgil!” Patton softly exclaims, crouching down to tend to Virgil, who Janus can see is trembling in the darkness.

“It’s not opening,” Virgil grits, voice low and shaking. Roman finally turns to look at him.

“What do you mean it’s not opening?”

Virgil’s fists hit against his thighs. “I mean it’s fucking stuck!”

“‘Stuck’ is one way to describe it, I suppose,” Janus pipes up, moving even closer to the railing and leaning over it, resting his chin on his hand as he watches the four gasp as they see him, no doubt startled by the shimmering yellow scales lining half of his face. “I personally would use the word ‘locked,’ but the four of you wouldn’t really have a way of knowing that, would you?”

Janus smiles, wide and playfully, allowing the group to see his sharp fangs. Roman backs up to stand in front of the other three.

With his arm outstretched to protect them, he shouts “what are you!?” while Janus watches Logan subtly reach into his back pocket and pull out a dimly lit cellular device. Janus hums as he sees it, before waving his hand again. As Logan flips his phone over, preparing to call the police, he finds it off. And when he tries to power it on, nothing happens.

Mouth agape, Logan looks between his cell and Janus.

“Don’t bother trying to call anyone,” Janus states, with a shrug. He watches Logan fumble with his phone, before it falls from his hands and onto the ground. He doesn’t bother to pick it up, and so stands staring at it as Janus continues. “None of your phones will work. I’ve always hated the technological age, you know. You’ll come to find my house is quite unplugged.”

“How are you doing this!?” Roman asks again, increasingly worried as he feels Logan very slowly grab the back of his shirt, trying to keep himself grounded. “What are you!?”

Laughing softly, Janus recedes back into the shadows, murmuring “why don’t you come up here and find out?”

Just as he expects, Roman breaks away from the group to head up the stairs, much to the dismay of the other three. Logan reaches for him, but doesn’t follow, while both Patton and Virgil yell his name to try and stop him, both panicked. Virgil tries to get up and chase, but is stopped by Logan who holds him back, clearly not wanting two of them to impulsively get themselves hurt. Virgil struggles rather valiantly. Janus can’t help lingering his gaze on him for a few seconds, before focusing back on Roman.

Roman’s footsteps are heavy as he ascends up to the balcony, though Janus is already walking backwards into a dark corridor, out of sight of the other three. Foolishly, Roman follows him further, which is exactly what Janus was hoping for.

As Janus is chased into a separate hallway, a large set of double doors separating that from the main area slams shut, effectively trapping Roman with him, and leaving the other three stuck oblivious on the other side.

Janus continues quickly moving back as Roman runs toward him, angry and, perhaps, feeling the need to defend his friends (partners? Lovers? Janus still wasn’t sure what to make of them).

He stops in front of a large window, which, with a quick flick of his wrist, has the curtains pulled back, allowing bright moonlight to stream in and cast over Janus, illuminating his rather nonthreatening form, but providing Roman with enough of a look for him to slow somewhat. And that slight falter, where his eyes travel Janus’s body, sizing him up and soaking in his appearance, gives Janus that mental slip he needs to sink his teeth into Roman’s mind.

As Roman steps before the window, about an arm’s-length from Janus, Janus raises his hand into the air, thumb and middle finger pressed together. And as Roman stares at Janus’s digits - his face falling as he wonders what ability Janus will use next, and even doubting whether or not he’ll survive - Janus snaps.

A loud thud echoes throughout the mansion’s walls, startling Logan enough to make him drop Virgil, who immediately scrambles up the stairs and over to the doors keeping Roman from them. He shoves his shoulder against it, attempting to use his rather unimpressive body weight to get the doors open, but they don’t budge in the slightest. In fact, Janus merely grins as he hears Virgil pounding on the wood, shouting through it to “give him back!” and that he’ll “call the cops!”

“He’s worried about you,” Janus muses, as he bends over so that he’s face to face with Roman, who’s chin Janus keeps tilted upwards, forcing eye contact. His own eyes - which are normally bright yellow with slit pupils, reflecting those of a serpent's - spin with colours so intoxicatingly vivid they’d be deemed poisonous. As Roman stares, drool begins to dribble out of the corner of his mouth. “I’m sure they all are, actually. You’re very brave… stupidly so. How much must they mean to you for you to thrust yourself carelessly into danger on their behalf?”

Roman lets out a soft groan, as though he’s actually trying to answer Janus’s question, but he’s unable to form any proper words.

“They’re more than friends, are they not?”

This time, Roman’s eye twitches, but Janus doesn’t get much else from him. For someone so physically strong, Roman’s mind was pathetically weak. All brawn, no brain. All bravery, no brevity.

“If I told you to hurt them, you would.”

Though Roman doesn’t react physically, Janus can almost feel the air shift. He knows that the part of Roman’s brain that can process Janus’s words doesn’t care for them at all. Discomfort and fear surrounds Roman like a tainted aura.

Janus smiles sweetly. “You can’t resist, after all. Quite literally can’t. I’m stronger than you. I’m stronger than them. And I’m quite hungry.”

Janus takes a step closer to Roman, breaking off their eye contact. Though Roman’s head is dizzy, he’s not being actively held captive in a trance any longer, and so lets out a choked “pl-pl-please.”

He sounds scared. Worried. Desperate.

Fingers combing through Roman’s hair, Janus pulls Roman’s head against his stomach, allowing Roman to hear the dramatic noises his gut makes as it craves a meal. Typically, Janus goes out at night, finds some loser in a bar, and feasts on them. If he does it often enough, he doesn’t even have to kill the person in order to be satisfied! But he hasn’t eaten in a while… he hasn’t really had the energy to go out and make small talk in order to con some pervert into letting him bite. Yet, now he has four meals, trapped inside his house.

“I could eat the angry one. The one right outside the door.”

Virgil pushes into the door again, emphasizing Janus’s words with his harsh punching. A sweet, metallic smell wafts through the air, and Janus sucks in a deep breath when it hits him, licking his lips afterwards. Roman seems ignorant to it, as though he can’t smell it.

“He doesn’t look like he has much in him, though. Rather thin. If I tried to get a full meal out of him, he’d be empty on the floor afterwards, and I’d still be hungry. Perhaps I’d have to eat the smart one as well. He looks healthy enough to be satisfying, at least. But I like to overindulge, so he’d be disposed of after, too.”

“Stop,” Roman begs him, sucking in a shuddering breath. He tries to move, or stand up, but his body feels heavy. After Janus snapped his fingers, Roman felt like gravity was actively pushing down on him, keeping him on his knees.

“Or what about the emotional one. He seems sweet,” Janus continues, petting through Roman’s hair rather affectionately, even though he can see Roman’s body trembling as he tries to fight Janus’s control. “If you gave me just him, I’d be full enough to discard the rest of you.”

Janus takes a large step back, watching Roman struggle to lift his head and watch him.

“I’ll let you pick, since your feelings were strong enough to chase me,” Janus begins, as though mocking Roman for willingly defending the others. “One of them is staying with me. You’ll choose which one.”

“Give him back!” Virgil shouts from the other side of the door. Beyond it, Janus can hear both Logan and Patton attempting to hold Virgil back.

“You’re bleeding,” Patton cries, though Janus assumes his tears are for Roman, and not for Virgil’s supposed injuries.

“None- none of them,” Roman responds, eyes welling up with tears.

Tsking, Janus shakes his head. “That wasn’t an option, love. What were their names… Virgil, Logan, and Patton? One of them, Roman. You’re dumb, but not this dumb. Which one is staying with me?”

“None of them!”

Humming, Janus taps his chin. “Really? Even if it means you and two others get to leave, you won’t give up one? That’s rather selfish of you.”

Truthfully, it was quite the opposite. Stupid, yes, but Janus never really expected Roman to give any of them up, not with how he’s been fighting to protect them. However, it was never Janus’s intention to let any of them go.

“Fine.”

Janus crouches down before Roman, who, despite the fog consuming his mind, tries to lunge forward. He’s unable.

Once more, Janus seizes Roman’s chin, and forces eye contact. “If you won’t leave one of them here, I know a different way to keep you all together. And alive. At least for now.”

As spirals once again spread through his irises, he watches Roman’s jaw go slack, his chest slump, and his entire body give up and only be supported by Janus, who’s speaking softly to him. His hushed words bounce against his extravagant walls, and wrap around Roman’s brain, being the only clear instructions Roman can focus on. Janus’s voice is the only thing he can listen to, his own thoughts drowned out by Janus’s commands. And Janus keeps talking, until he’s sure that the voice in Roman’s head isn’t speaking at all.

***

The double doors are thrown open so violently, Virgil, Logan, and Patton are all knocked back and onto their backsides.

“Roman!” Patton exclaims, but cowers immediately when Roman rather roughly bends down to scoop Virgil up, throwing him over his shoulder. Virgil thrashes as he’s held, demanding “put me down!” as Janus circles around Roman’s back, before standing rather smugly at his side.

“Virgil- Virgil hates being held like that,” Logan stammers, staring at Roman, who’s staring blankly at the floor where Virgil was previously laying. “Roman wouldn’t hold him like that.”

“No, I suppose he wouldn’t,” Janus responds, giving Logan a faux pout, before turning to Virgil. He has to lean back a bit to make eye contact with him, and can’t help grinning when he sees Virgil’s pissed face, smeared with wet tears and fresh snot. His cheeks are red, and his eyes are glistening with frustration and fear.

When Virgil sees him staring, he quickly yells “fuck you!” which has Janus rolling his eyes.

“You know where to take him, Roman,” Janus says, ignoring Virgil’s angry hitting and kicking. Roman doesn’t react to it either. “I’ll meet you there.”

With a snap of his fingers, Roman turns on his heel and walks off, leaving Patton gasping.

As he covers his mouth with his hands, Patton shakily asks “what did you do to him?” staring horrified at Roman’s shrinking frame as he disappears down the long corridor.

“Nothing I can’t reverse,” Janus dismissively replies, waving his hand. “But I’m only willing to do so if you’re obedient. Both of you.” Janus turns to Logan, whose hands are balled into fists by his thighs despite his relatively expressionless face. If Janus wasn’t more perceptive, he’d assume Logan cares naught about the situation. But his chest was turned ever so slightly towards Patton. His knuckles were white. He was seething beneath the surface, but was doing a rather impressive job of keeping that anger hidden.

“Now stand up.”

Patton scrambles to his feet, while Logan is a lot slower pushing himself up. He fixes his glasses as he stands, glaring at Janus with his dark blue eyes from behind the frames.

Janus then holds his hand outstretched, causing Patton and Logan to glance at each other.

“I’m absolutely famished,” Janus explains, fangs shining as he speaks. “It took so much energy to subdue Roman. And I need to replenish it.”

Briskly, Logan states “you’re not drinking our blood.”

Janus frowns at his resistance.

He clears his throat. “Let me rephrase that. I’m starving, and if one of you doesn't submit willingly, I’ll just take your blood forcefully.” Janus’s eyes narrow, but he smirks as he adds “and I have a reputation for getting carried away. Though, I suppose only having to manage three of you will be a lot less difficult than having to keep track of four.”

Patton’s face pales. “You’ll kill one of us?” he whispers.

“I might. Perhaps Virgil. The smell of his blood is permeating the air, after all. He’s basically taunting me with it.”

Patton turns to look at Logan with wide, wet eyes. He’s visibly afraid, and yet sympathetic. So, he offers his arm out, only for Logan to quickly grab it and pull Patton behind him.

“No,” Logan firmly says, directed at Patton, though he’s staring at Janus as he says it. “He’s not touching you.”

“Hm. You’re almost as heroic as Roman was. You did see how that turned out for him, didn’t you?”

Logan stands up straighter, not bothering to acknowledge Janus’s mocking words. Instead, he holds his own arm out, with Patton holding onto him from behind.

“Whatever you need to do, do it. And then take us to Roman and Virgil.”

Janus hums. “You’re not in much of a place to be making demands.”

“Starve, then.”

“No, no,” Janus quickly replies, laughing softly at this one's… forwardness. He was just as spritely as Virgil! He was just better at keeping that attitude repressed. How… fun. “I’ll take you to them. After I’ve eaten, of course.”

Janus’s fingers firmly wrap around Logan’s arm, before tugging him closer. Logan is rigid - clearly uncomfortable - but Janus pays no mind as he slides Logan’s long-sleeve shirt up his arm, exposing his forearm.

“I thought vampires traditionally drank from the neck,” Logan comments, and as Janus’s eyes flicker toward him, he can see curiosity swimming within him. Even if he was mad, he was still eager to watch. “Provided you are a vampire, of course.”

“Who’s to say?”

Logan frowns at the ambiguous response, seemingly hoping for a solid answer. Though, Janus is rather pleased to see Logan’s pale cheeks glow pink when Janus places a kiss on his knuckles.

“What’s he doing?” Patton whispers into Logan’s ear, but seems embarrassed when Janus looks at him instead, realizing his question must have been overheard. Neither Janus or Logan answer Patton.

Then, Logan’s arm is being flipped over, exposing his underarm and thick, healthy veins.

“You drink a lot of water,” Janus comments.

“I do.”

“And you exercise.”

“On again, off again.”

Janus chuckles, pressing his thumb down on a vein right below Logan’s palm. “Not as often as Roman, I presume?”

Logan doesn’t answer him, and frankly he doesn’t need to. Instead, he stiffens as Janus guides Logan’s wrist to his mouth, tongue sliding over Logan’s flesh and making him shiver. Where Janus’s saliva makes contact with Logan’s skin seems to buzz, as though it’s more abnormal than normal spit. And yet, Logan’s still not prepared for when Janus bites, sinking his sharp fangs into Logan’s wrist and making Logan yelp in pain.

Patton quickly wraps himself around Logan’s free arm, grabbing his hand and holding it as Logan squeezes his fingers, clearly in pain. He sucks in a hissing breath through his teeth as Janus pulls away, before wrapping his lips around the two holes he just made, sucking the blood out of him. Logan can feel himself losing a lot in just a little bit of time, both from his veins having been impaled and Janus actively working to drink it out of him.

He starts to get dizzy on his feet.

“Wait,” Patton speaks, voice soft. However, as Logan’s eyes narrow, then slowly blink, and then snap open again, Patton’s louder. “Wait! He’s- you’re-”

Janus pulls away, pushing his thumb over the holes to prevent blood from being wasted.

“He’s fine.”

“You’ll kill him!”

Janus licks his lips. “Not yet, I won’t.”

He reattaches his lips to Logan’s wrist, moving closer until he has an arm looped around Logan’s waist, pushing Patton to the side as he single handedly keeps Logan upright, savoring each mouthful of blood that he gets.

Logan’s blood tastes healthy. It’s thick, filling, and tastes so distinct to Janus. It’s not as trashy as the blood he’d drink from an intoxicated loser. It’s a lot nicer. A lot nicer.

It almost reminds Janus of after he first turned, and the first blood he’d after tasted. He’d been healthy, fit, charming. He’d been delicious.

Logan lets out a shaky moan, and finally Janus pulls away, gliding his forked tongue over the wound and giving Logan that same burning, static feeling. Though, when Janus stands back up, Logan sees the fang marks have been completely scabbed over.

Breathily, Logan tries to ask how Janus did that, but he crumples before he can, falling right into Janus’s arms.

“Is he-”

“He’s fine,” Janus assures Patton, quickly and confidently. His voice is calm and passive, and he even offers Patton one of his warmest smiles. It’d be rather nice if he wasn’t holding a limp body in his arms. “He’ll just be exhausted for a bit.”

Janus glances at Logan, watching as his bleary eyes look around drowsily, before falling shut as he tries to take long, deep breaths. Janus smiles, and rather easily lifts Logan into his arms, which has Logan letting out a groan of displeasure, but keeping his eyes shut, too tired to protest.

“Follow me,” Janus then instructs Patton, turning and heading down the hall Roman had traversed, making good on his word to bring them to the others. He hears Patton’s footsteps rush to catch up with him, before Patton’s walking at his side, near Logan’s head, looking towards him repeatedly with concern in his eyes. But he doesn’t say anything, almost as though he trusts Janus’s word. Hm.

Janus cracks a smile; smug, and temporarily satiated.

#sanders sides #sanders sides smut #not safe for sanders #sanders sides fic #vampire janus #dlamp #dlamp smut #dlamp fic #initial dubcon #dubcon #eventual consent #hunger hurts #hunger hurts fic #tw dubcon #tw noncon #cw dubcon #cw noncon

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