The Other Side - Ch. 8
Title: The Other Side - Ch.8
Author: kaybee38
Word Count: 2907
Rating: R
Pairings: Minho/Onew, ninja!JongKey, Cousin!Taemin
Genre:vampire, fantasy, sci-fi, character death
Disclaimer: SHinee is owned by SM Entertainment only
Summary: Minho’s a vampire, Key’s a shapeshifter, Jjong is a werewolf and Taemin is a vampire hunter. Jinki is the mortal object of Minho’s affection, or is he? Only Taemin, (Jinki’s cousin) knows the truth.
A/N: We finally find out what happened to Jinki and what he is...sort of. This story is brought to you by this song.
[CH1] [CH2] [CH3] [CH4] [CH5] [CH6] [CH7]
The Other Side - Ch. 8
Taemin was only 9 years old when he attended his parent’s funeral. He was angry because everyone kept talking around him instead of to him, as if if couldn’t understand that his own parents and sister had been murdered.
He was 9. Not stupid.
The only one who treated Taemin like a person and not like a broken family heirloom was Jinki. Although Taemin caught the 13 year old looking at him with a sad expression on his face ocassionally, Jinki never voiced any pity for his cousin.
After the burial, everyone went over to Jinki’s house for food, and to discuss “what to do”. He knew they were talking about him, and after the fifth person he didn’t even recognize told him “it’s okay to cry” Taemin shrugged their hand off of his bony shoulder and slipped out of the house to the backyard.
The rocking motion of the swing reminded him of how his mother used to gently rock him to sleep when he was sick. As he pumped his legs, he could almost feel his father’s firm hands at the small of his back pushing him just a little higher, his little sister’s happy squeal as she tried to try to swing higher than him…
Jinki had been looking for Taemin almost a full half hour when he looked out of the kitchen window just as the boy broke down and fell from the swing onto all fours, sobbing salty tears into the dirt.
Jinki heard something crash as he pushed past the mourners, and raced out the back door over to Taemin falling into the dirt next to him. He felt the younger boy’s whole body shake with sobs as he gathered him up in his arms and rocked him back and forth soothingly.
“Why? Why did the monster leave just me? Why didn’t he kill me too?”
________________________________________
A year later, Taemin woke to screams.
He was frightened, groggy and disoriented.
Was this another nightmare?
A gurgling scream that he recognized as his aunt’s could be heard through his bedroom door. Taemin jumped right off the bed and ran into the closet. He huddled crouched on the floor as he had so many times when he’d been frightened by so many bunps in the night.
Only the moonlight slipped in through the louvered panels of the closet doors as tears streamed down his face. Hiccuping, he silently asked God how many more times he would be forced to relive his family’s murders?
He wanted to scream out to find Jinki, to call for help, but his voice just didn’t seem to work properly. Neither did his bladder, which emptied the moment the bedroom door flew open with a bang.
“Taemin! Taemin where are you?”
Jinki’s voice could be heard searching the room frantically. Desperately trying to warn his little cousin of the horrible danger that Taemin was all too familiar with. Taemin shut his eyes and held out his stuffed bunny like a shield when Jinki threw the closet door open.
“Oh my God Taemin! Are you all right?” Jinki tried to physically check to see of Taemin was hurt, but Taemin flinched away in fear.
“He came back for me didn’t he?” Taemin whispered sadly.
“He said he’d be back."
Jinki looked puzzled, but didn’t have time to respond before his whole body was yanked from Taemin’s view, and was replaced by a face he’d seen almost every night in his nightmares for a year.
“There you are little one.”
Jinki yelped as he hit the floor, but regained his footing quickly and ran back across the room, jumping on top of the intruder’s back.
“RUN TAEMIN!”
Jinki yelled as he tried to distract the man long enough to free his cousin. He kicked, he bit, he hit the man as hard has he could, but nothing he did seemed to have any effect. He was just too strong. Suddenly, he was airborne, landing in a heap at Taemin’s feet, who stood shaking like a leaf just outside the closet door, his favorite bunny stuffed animal in his hands, his piss-covered legs refusing to move fast enough to make a proper escape. He was staring wide-eyed at the man who had broken in their house and attacked Jinki’s parents.
Jinki instinctively jumped up and stood in front of Taemin, ignoring the pain that shot down the side he’d landed on. As he looked up at the face of their attacker his blood ran cold with fear. The thing standing before them, looked more like a monster than a man.
Long black hair and long fangs hung over his other teeth and jutted out over his bottom lip, which dripped with blood adding to the mess of torn flesh and blood smothered over his chin. The entire front of the man’s once white shirt was saturated with even more blood.
Part of Jinki’s brain knew it was the blood of his mother and father that he was staring at, but the other part of his 14 year old brain just refused to make the connection.
“Please. Just leave us alone. Please.”
Jinki’s voice broke on the last word as he winced in Taemin’s white-knuckled grip on his forearms from behind him.
“Oh I will my boy.” The man-monster grinned grotesquely, his eyes shrinking to half-moons, his lips dripping with more blood and saliva.
“As soon as I get what I came for.”
He peered around Jinki’s shoulder to the frightened mushroom-haired child behind him.
“Give me the little one, and I’ll leave you to live the rest of your tormented days in peace.”
Slowly the pieces began falling into place in Jinki’s mind. He looked over his shoulder, making eye contact with Taemin’s tear-filled eyes, who pleadingly, almost imperceptibly shook his head.
Don’t do it. Please.
This was the monster that had Taemin waking up screaming at least once a week. This was the monster that had Taemin hiding in his bedroom closet every night after he’d moved in with Jinki and his parents after the funeral. This was the monster that had killed both their parents, their families, had left them alone in the world to fend for themselves.
Now they only had each other.
“No.” Jinki said with more bass in his voice that he even knew he had.
The man-monster raised an eyebrow and gave another crooked smile as he re-buttoned his cufflinks and straightened his ruined shirt. Crossing his arms, he was clearly amused by the brave defiance of one of the puniest humans he’d ever encountered.
“I see. Well, I’m sure I have room for dessert then.”
Before Jinki could take his next breath, the thing was on him, holding him in the air by the shirt as he bit deeply into his neck.
It took Jinki a full minute to process that the person screaming off in the distance was him.
Taemin was in shock. It was all too much for his brain to handle. All he remembered after that was the monster leaning around Jinki’s limp body in his arms sneering at him.
“Watch and learn, my child. This qualifies as your first lesson. When you become mine.”
When he bit Jinki again, Jinki passed out.
________________________________________
Jinki woke with a start. As his senses slowly became alert, the night’s events came rushing back to him in a jumbled puzzle. His bandaged hand ached from his sudden movements.
Glass breaking. Bartender. Confusion. Alley. Blood. Minho’s lips. Tongue. Teeth. Taemin. Gun. Guns.
Taemin had a gun.
Jinki sat straight up in bed, chest heaving.
“You’re awake. Good.”
Jinki jumped as Taemin’s voice rang out in the darkness from somewhere off to his right.
“What…?”
“Here. Drink this.” Taemin handed Jinki a glass of water, after flicking on his bedroom light, along with two aspirin just as Jinki became aware that his head was pounding.
“Taemin. What the hell is going on?” Jinki asked between sips.
Taemin leaned his lanky body against the doorframe of Jinki’s bedroom watching him intently for a minute. He had sat, gun across his lap, knife at his hip watching Jinki for almost 6 hours while his elder cousin fitfully slept off the effects of the alcohol.
He knew this question was coming.
Taemin couldn’t remember how many times he had thought about how to explain Jinki’s “condition” to him. He’d replayed the best way to describe the horrific events of that terrible night, hundreds of times in head.
How exactly do you tell your only living family member and closest friend that he’s not quite human anymore?
“Taemin?”
Taemin was wearing a blank, unreadable expression and Jinki couldn’t decide if he was frightened or annoyed.
Taemin heaved a sigh and slid down the door jamb to the floor. His long legs folded up as he tucked his knees under his chin.
“It’s a long story Jinx…”
Jinki winced at the nickname Taemin reserved for when he was about to tell him something extremely important.
“… but the short and the long of it is that some time ago, you were bitten by a vampire.”
“What?! What the actual fuck is going on?!”
Key had been reading Minho the riot act about Jinki ever since they got back to the loft and let Jonghyun out of the bathroom. Who'd responded to his incarceration by promptly punching Minho in the face and storming out of the apartment. Now Minho sat with an ice pack on his eye, which was taking much longer than normal to heal as a result of the alcohol in Jinki's blood that he'd consumed.
“What is going on with you Minho? He’s protected by a hunter! A motherfucking hunter Minho! Who I saw actually kill another vamp! What the fuck?!”
Every time Key left the room, it seemed as if he was done with his rant, only to return moments later with yet another reason why Minho should stay away from the human, or…whatever it was that Jinki was.
“You should have seen his face! His eyes…they went all metallic like, and then his forehead…” Key trailed off with a dish cloth limply hanging from an outstretched hand, having stopped himself mid-motion from draping it off of the sink.
“You really don’t know do you?”
Minho, who’s face had switched from boredom to surprise at Key’s last statement, lowered the ice pack, raised his head from his arm perched across the back of the couch and shook it in response.
“Hmph.” Key said still looking at Minho for a second, before resuming his cleaning.
For the first time in over 2 hours, Key was quiet as he wiped down the stove. Curious, Minho unfolded himself from the leather couch and padded over to the kitchen. He tossed the ice pack into the sink before grabbing a glass and pouring himself some water from the dispenser on the fridge. Sipping from the glass, he reclined against the doorframe and thought about how Jinki, smelled, felt, tasted…even the blood that flowed from his injured hand was succulent. However, what Key was describing, was not the adorably sweet, brave, drunken man who had fallen into his arms earlier that evening.
“What happened Key?”
Key closed his eyes and tried to remember exactly what Jinki had looked like in the dim light of the bar. The shape of his face, the contour of his lips, his drunken gaze, the color of his eyes, the length of his hair…
Minho stumbled back from the doorway suddenly, his eyes round as saucers and his mouth agape as he took in the sight before him.
Key had shifted to look like Jinki.
The glass in his hand missed the table entirely and splintered onto the floor with a wet crunch.
“I-I was bitten? By a…a vampire?”
Taemin left the room, retrieved a hand towel from the hall closet, returned to the room and knelt to clean up the mess before he spoke.
“Yes. Twice.”
“Twice?! Are you trying to tell me that I’m….I’m…a…a..” Jinki's breath became short as he began to hyperventilate.
“Jinki breathe.”
Taemin was on the bed in a flash, hands on Jinki’s shoulders, gently kneading them, trying to calm his cousin down.
“Look at me Jinx. You are not a vampire.”
Slowly Jinki felt his heart rate returning to normal, his lungs finally recieving the oxygen that only moments ago seemed to be sucked out of the room. He had to take a few more deep breaths before he was able to speak.
“I’m…I’m not?”
“No.”
“But…but the dreams, the blackouts, the voices, thoughts I hear…what…” Jinki sighed with his face in his hands.
“What am I?”
Jinki’s face took on a pained scowl, his mouth turned up into a snarl, his brow bones jutted out and his facial hair grew. His skin grew paler as his fingernails grew longer and when he looekd up, his eyes glowed a faint metallic gold.
“What am I?” Jinki said in Key’s voice.
Minho was stunned as he took in the image of Jinki before him. But this was not Jinki. Key could easily shift to look like anyone or anything he chose, but he could never change his voice.
“This is what he looked like?” Minho asked.
Not-Jinki nodded.
“What am I Minho?” Not-Jinki repeated.
“I-I don’t know. I’ve never seen anyone like that. You almost look like a vamp, but there are no fangs, and the eyes are…I don’t know… wrong.”
Minho stepped across the linoleum and stood face to face with the shifter. The likeness was so real, that his body didn’t know the difference, and he felt his cock twitch as he reached out to touch Not-Jinki’s face. Just as the pads of his long fingers made contact with his cheek, Key shifted back to his own form, grabbing Minho by the wrist and glaring at him. Demanding an explanation.
“I don’t know.”
“I think you do.”
“I don’t know exactly what you are but...” Jinki looked up at Taemin trying to read his unreadable face again.
“...you are not a vampire Jinki. You need to be bitten 3 times for the change to fully take hold. That night, he bit you twice.”
"But I'm not exactly human either am I?"
"Well...no...but..."
“How did we get out of the house? More importantly, why can’t I remember any of this? And where the hell did you get that gun?”
Taemin looked at Jinki long and hard for a moment.
“Do you remember Changmin Shim?” Jinki thought for a moment, looking at the wall trying to remember the face that went with the name he recognized.
“Our neighbor? The quiet, creepy, tall guy with the big eyes?”
Taemin chuckled a bit at Jinki’s description.
“Yeah. Him.”
________________________________________
One moment, little Taemin was helplessly watching his cousin bleed to death at the hands of the monster who killed his entire family and the next, there was a deafening blast and Jinki’s limp form fell at his feet as the monster screamed, cursed, then ran right out of the second story window.
Taemin was so in shock he didn’t even feel the shards of glass grazing his back and neck or the strange man with the big gun screaming in front of him.
“Hey kid! Are you deaf?!”
Taemin looked up at the man in the long trench coat and black ponytail and shook his head slowly. The man kneeled down so that he was eye level with him.
“I said. Is.he.dead?” The man didn’t wait for an answer as he checked Jinki’s pulse on the side of his bleeding neck.
No.
“Shit. He was bitten more than once...and he's still breathing.”
The man stood quickly and pointed his weapon at Jinki’s prone form. Suddenly the gravity of the situation hit Taemin full force, and he found his voice again.
“NO! You stay away from him! Stay away!”
Taemin threw his bunny in one direction and his body in another, landing sprawled onto Jinki’s body, gripping him as tightly as he had his stuffed animal, and began shaking him.
“Jinki wake up! You gotta wake up now! There’s a big man with a gun and I don’t know what to do! Jinki wake UP!”
Taemin was screaming now.
“Jesus Christ kid. Keep your voice down! He’s not your cousin anymore, he was bitten by a vampire, now he’s one of them!”
“No! No he isn’t, go away!” Taemin sobbed, “Jinki please!”
The man grabbed for Taemin, trying to pull him off of his cousin, but Taemin kicked and screamed and clutched his only family member so tightly, he left red marks on Jinki’s arms.
“OW! Shit kid! You don’t understand, when someone is bitten 3 times, the venom gets into their bloodstream and begins to change them. You want him to become a monster?! When he wakes up he’ll be a…”
Jinki coughed and gasped for air, clawing at the harwood with one hand. The man jumped back and leveled his gun at Jinki’s head.
“NO! Jinki! Come on! Wake up! You’ve gotta tell the man that you’re not a vampire! Please Jinki come on!”
Someone was screaming his name, Jinki could hear it, but for some reason he couldn’t respond. He couldn’t feel one of his arms, his legs, or one whole side of his face. There was a burning pain in his neck and his feet felt like they were being stuck with pins and needles. His tongue felt heavy, his mouth numb and his breath raspy.
Taemin yelled happily when Jinki’s eyes opened, but he could see that Jinki couldn’t focus.
“Yes! Jinki that’s it, come on!”
“Kid move.”
“No! Jinki please, tell him you’re not a vampire. Come on!”
Taemin could hear the gun cock behind him.
“I said move dammit.”
“No!” Taemin bawled and rocked a still out of it Jinki back and forth in his small arms on the floor.
“Don’t make me shoot both of you.”
“No! Please God, don’t take him away from me too.” Taemin whimpered.
Tears streamed down his face as he prayed and rocked Jinki in his arms, rubbing him all over, trying to warm him up.
He was so cold.
“MOVE!”
“Heechul. Drop it.”
Taemin looked up and was shocked to see their reclusive neighbor Mr. Shim in the hallway standing behind the man with the gun, aiming at him with a weapon of his own…a crossbow.
A/N: Sorry I took so long to update. RL has been kicking my ass again. I actually wrote most of this by hand, on a little notebook, on the train going back and forth from my new gig.*sigh* Okies. I purposely didn't alert the reader to flashbacks or scene changes a few times here, because I wanted to get across the feeling that everything was connected in some way. It's a transition technique I've been aching to use, but couldn't find a suitable story. Hopefully it worked and I didn't confuse you too much. If I did, just ask and I'll explain anything that doesn't make sense. So Jinki is not quite a vampire, but he's not quite human either. Why he doesn't remember will be revealed in the next chapter. Hopefully it won't take me as long to get that one out. Comments are love!
Author: kaybee38
Word Count: 2907
Rating: R
Pairings: Minho/Onew, ninja!JongKey, Cousin!Taemin
Genre:vampire, fantasy, sci-fi, character death
Disclaimer: SHinee is owned by SM Entertainment only
Summary: Minho’s a vampire, Key’s a shapeshifter, Jjong is a werewolf and Taemin is a vampire hunter. Jinki is the mortal object of Minho’s affection, or is he? Only Taemin, (Jinki’s cousin) knows the truth.
A/N: We finally find out what happened to Jinki and what he is...sort of. This story is brought to you by this song.
[CH1] [CH2] [CH3] [CH4] [CH5] [CH6] [CH7]
The Other Side - Ch. 8
Taemin was only 9 years old when he attended his parent’s funeral. He was angry because everyone kept talking around him instead of to him, as if if couldn’t understand that his own parents and sister had been murdered.
He was 9. Not stupid.
The only one who treated Taemin like a person and not like a broken family heirloom was Jinki. Although Taemin caught the 13 year old looking at him with a sad expression on his face ocassionally, Jinki never voiced any pity for his cousin.
After the burial, everyone went over to Jinki’s house for food, and to discuss “what to do”. He knew they were talking about him, and after the fifth person he didn’t even recognize told him “it’s okay to cry” Taemin shrugged their hand off of his bony shoulder and slipped out of the house to the backyard.
The rocking motion of the swing reminded him of how his mother used to gently rock him to sleep when he was sick. As he pumped his legs, he could almost feel his father’s firm hands at the small of his back pushing him just a little higher, his little sister’s happy squeal as she tried to try to swing higher than him…
Jinki had been looking for Taemin almost a full half hour when he looked out of the kitchen window just as the boy broke down and fell from the swing onto all fours, sobbing salty tears into the dirt.
Jinki heard something crash as he pushed past the mourners, and raced out the back door over to Taemin falling into the dirt next to him. He felt the younger boy’s whole body shake with sobs as he gathered him up in his arms and rocked him back and forth soothingly.
“Why? Why did the monster leave just me? Why didn’t he kill me too?”
________________________________________
A year later, Taemin woke to screams.
He was frightened, groggy and disoriented.
Was this another nightmare?
A gurgling scream that he recognized as his aunt’s could be heard through his bedroom door. Taemin jumped right off the bed and ran into the closet. He huddled crouched on the floor as he had so many times when he’d been frightened by so many bunps in the night.
Only the moonlight slipped in through the louvered panels of the closet doors as tears streamed down his face. Hiccuping, he silently asked God how many more times he would be forced to relive his family’s murders?
He wanted to scream out to find Jinki, to call for help, but his voice just didn’t seem to work properly. Neither did his bladder, which emptied the moment the bedroom door flew open with a bang.
“Taemin! Taemin where are you?”
Jinki’s voice could be heard searching the room frantically. Desperately trying to warn his little cousin of the horrible danger that Taemin was all too familiar with. Taemin shut his eyes and held out his stuffed bunny like a shield when Jinki threw the closet door open.
“Oh my God Taemin! Are you all right?” Jinki tried to physically check to see of Taemin was hurt, but Taemin flinched away in fear.
“He came back for me didn’t he?” Taemin whispered sadly.
“He said he’d be back."
Jinki looked puzzled, but didn’t have time to respond before his whole body was yanked from Taemin’s view, and was replaced by a face he’d seen almost every night in his nightmares for a year.
“There you are little one.”
Jinki yelped as he hit the floor, but regained his footing quickly and ran back across the room, jumping on top of the intruder’s back.
“RUN TAEMIN!”
Jinki yelled as he tried to distract the man long enough to free his cousin. He kicked, he bit, he hit the man as hard has he could, but nothing he did seemed to have any effect. He was just too strong. Suddenly, he was airborne, landing in a heap at Taemin’s feet, who stood shaking like a leaf just outside the closet door, his favorite bunny stuffed animal in his hands, his piss-covered legs refusing to move fast enough to make a proper escape. He was staring wide-eyed at the man who had broken in their house and attacked Jinki’s parents.
Jinki instinctively jumped up and stood in front of Taemin, ignoring the pain that shot down the side he’d landed on. As he looked up at the face of their attacker his blood ran cold with fear. The thing standing before them, looked more like a monster than a man.
Long black hair and long fangs hung over his other teeth and jutted out over his bottom lip, which dripped with blood adding to the mess of torn flesh and blood smothered over his chin. The entire front of the man’s once white shirt was saturated with even more blood.
Part of Jinki’s brain knew it was the blood of his mother and father that he was staring at, but the other part of his 14 year old brain just refused to make the connection.
“Please. Just leave us alone. Please.”
Jinki’s voice broke on the last word as he winced in Taemin’s white-knuckled grip on his forearms from behind him.
“Oh I will my boy.” The man-monster grinned grotesquely, his eyes shrinking to half-moons, his lips dripping with more blood and saliva.
“As soon as I get what I came for.”
He peered around Jinki’s shoulder to the frightened mushroom-haired child behind him.
“Give me the little one, and I’ll leave you to live the rest of your tormented days in peace.”
Slowly the pieces began falling into place in Jinki’s mind. He looked over his shoulder, making eye contact with Taemin’s tear-filled eyes, who pleadingly, almost imperceptibly shook his head.
Don’t do it. Please.
This was the monster that had Taemin waking up screaming at least once a week. This was the monster that had Taemin hiding in his bedroom closet every night after he’d moved in with Jinki and his parents after the funeral. This was the monster that had killed both their parents, their families, had left them alone in the world to fend for themselves.
Now they only had each other.
“No.” Jinki said with more bass in his voice that he even knew he had.
The man-monster raised an eyebrow and gave another crooked smile as he re-buttoned his cufflinks and straightened his ruined shirt. Crossing his arms, he was clearly amused by the brave defiance of one of the puniest humans he’d ever encountered.
“I see. Well, I’m sure I have room for dessert then.”
Before Jinki could take his next breath, the thing was on him, holding him in the air by the shirt as he bit deeply into his neck.
It took Jinki a full minute to process that the person screaming off in the distance was him.
Taemin was in shock. It was all too much for his brain to handle. All he remembered after that was the monster leaning around Jinki’s limp body in his arms sneering at him.
“Watch and learn, my child. This qualifies as your first lesson. When you become mine.”
When he bit Jinki again, Jinki passed out.
________________________________________
Jinki woke with a start. As his senses slowly became alert, the night’s events came rushing back to him in a jumbled puzzle. His bandaged hand ached from his sudden movements.
Glass breaking. Bartender. Confusion. Alley. Blood. Minho’s lips. Tongue. Teeth. Taemin. Gun. Guns.
Taemin had a gun.
Jinki sat straight up in bed, chest heaving.
“You’re awake. Good.”
Jinki jumped as Taemin’s voice rang out in the darkness from somewhere off to his right.
“What…?”
“Here. Drink this.” Taemin handed Jinki a glass of water, after flicking on his bedroom light, along with two aspirin just as Jinki became aware that his head was pounding.
“Taemin. What the hell is going on?” Jinki asked between sips.
Taemin leaned his lanky body against the doorframe of Jinki’s bedroom watching him intently for a minute. He had sat, gun across his lap, knife at his hip watching Jinki for almost 6 hours while his elder cousin fitfully slept off the effects of the alcohol.
He knew this question was coming.
Taemin couldn’t remember how many times he had thought about how to explain Jinki’s “condition” to him. He’d replayed the best way to describe the horrific events of that terrible night, hundreds of times in head.
How exactly do you tell your only living family member and closest friend that he’s not quite human anymore?
“Taemin?”
Taemin was wearing a blank, unreadable expression and Jinki couldn’t decide if he was frightened or annoyed.
Taemin heaved a sigh and slid down the door jamb to the floor. His long legs folded up as he tucked his knees under his chin.
“It’s a long story Jinx…”
Jinki winced at the nickname Taemin reserved for when he was about to tell him something extremely important.
“… but the short and the long of it is that some time ago, you were bitten by a vampire.”
“What?! What the actual fuck is going on?!”
Key had been reading Minho the riot act about Jinki ever since they got back to the loft and let Jonghyun out of the bathroom. Who'd responded to his incarceration by promptly punching Minho in the face and storming out of the apartment. Now Minho sat with an ice pack on his eye, which was taking much longer than normal to heal as a result of the alcohol in Jinki's blood that he'd consumed.
“What is going on with you Minho? He’s protected by a hunter! A motherfucking hunter Minho! Who I saw actually kill another vamp! What the fuck?!”
Every time Key left the room, it seemed as if he was done with his rant, only to return moments later with yet another reason why Minho should stay away from the human, or…whatever it was that Jinki was.
“You should have seen his face! His eyes…they went all metallic like, and then his forehead…” Key trailed off with a dish cloth limply hanging from an outstretched hand, having stopped himself mid-motion from draping it off of the sink.
“You really don’t know do you?”
Minho, who’s face had switched from boredom to surprise at Key’s last statement, lowered the ice pack, raised his head from his arm perched across the back of the couch and shook it in response.
“Hmph.” Key said still looking at Minho for a second, before resuming his cleaning.
For the first time in over 2 hours, Key was quiet as he wiped down the stove. Curious, Minho unfolded himself from the leather couch and padded over to the kitchen. He tossed the ice pack into the sink before grabbing a glass and pouring himself some water from the dispenser on the fridge. Sipping from the glass, he reclined against the doorframe and thought about how Jinki, smelled, felt, tasted…even the blood that flowed from his injured hand was succulent. However, what Key was describing, was not the adorably sweet, brave, drunken man who had fallen into his arms earlier that evening.
“What happened Key?”
Key closed his eyes and tried to remember exactly what Jinki had looked like in the dim light of the bar. The shape of his face, the contour of his lips, his drunken gaze, the color of his eyes, the length of his hair…
Minho stumbled back from the doorway suddenly, his eyes round as saucers and his mouth agape as he took in the sight before him.
Key had shifted to look like Jinki.
The glass in his hand missed the table entirely and splintered onto the floor with a wet crunch.
“I-I was bitten? By a…a vampire?”
Taemin left the room, retrieved a hand towel from the hall closet, returned to the room and knelt to clean up the mess before he spoke.
“Yes. Twice.”
“Twice?! Are you trying to tell me that I’m….I’m…a…a..” Jinki's breath became short as he began to hyperventilate.
“Jinki breathe.”
Taemin was on the bed in a flash, hands on Jinki’s shoulders, gently kneading them, trying to calm his cousin down.
“Look at me Jinx. You are not a vampire.”
Slowly Jinki felt his heart rate returning to normal, his lungs finally recieving the oxygen that only moments ago seemed to be sucked out of the room. He had to take a few more deep breaths before he was able to speak.
“I’m…I’m not?”
“No.”
“But…but the dreams, the blackouts, the voices, thoughts I hear…what…” Jinki sighed with his face in his hands.
“What am I?”
Jinki’s face took on a pained scowl, his mouth turned up into a snarl, his brow bones jutted out and his facial hair grew. His skin grew paler as his fingernails grew longer and when he looekd up, his eyes glowed a faint metallic gold.
“What am I?” Jinki said in Key’s voice.
Minho was stunned as he took in the image of Jinki before him. But this was not Jinki. Key could easily shift to look like anyone or anything he chose, but he could never change his voice.
“This is what he looked like?” Minho asked.
Not-Jinki nodded.
“What am I Minho?” Not-Jinki repeated.
“I-I don’t know. I’ve never seen anyone like that. You almost look like a vamp, but there are no fangs, and the eyes are…I don’t know… wrong.”
Minho stepped across the linoleum and stood face to face with the shifter. The likeness was so real, that his body didn’t know the difference, and he felt his cock twitch as he reached out to touch Not-Jinki’s face. Just as the pads of his long fingers made contact with his cheek, Key shifted back to his own form, grabbing Minho by the wrist and glaring at him. Demanding an explanation.
“I don’t know.”
“I think you do.”
“I don’t know exactly what you are but...” Jinki looked up at Taemin trying to read his unreadable face again.
“...you are not a vampire Jinki. You need to be bitten 3 times for the change to fully take hold. That night, he bit you twice.”
"But I'm not exactly human either am I?"
"Well...no...but..."
“How did we get out of the house? More importantly, why can’t I remember any of this? And where the hell did you get that gun?”
Taemin looked at Jinki long and hard for a moment.
“Do you remember Changmin Shim?” Jinki thought for a moment, looking at the wall trying to remember the face that went with the name he recognized.
“Our neighbor? The quiet, creepy, tall guy with the big eyes?”
Taemin chuckled a bit at Jinki’s description.
“Yeah. Him.”
________________________________________
One moment, little Taemin was helplessly watching his cousin bleed to death at the hands of the monster who killed his entire family and the next, there was a deafening blast and Jinki’s limp form fell at his feet as the monster screamed, cursed, then ran right out of the second story window.
Taemin was so in shock he didn’t even feel the shards of glass grazing his back and neck or the strange man with the big gun screaming in front of him.
“Hey kid! Are you deaf?!”
Taemin looked up at the man in the long trench coat and black ponytail and shook his head slowly. The man kneeled down so that he was eye level with him.
“I said. Is.he.dead?” The man didn’t wait for an answer as he checked Jinki’s pulse on the side of his bleeding neck.
No.
“Shit. He was bitten more than once...and he's still breathing.”
The man stood quickly and pointed his weapon at Jinki’s prone form. Suddenly the gravity of the situation hit Taemin full force, and he found his voice again.
“NO! You stay away from him! Stay away!”
Taemin threw his bunny in one direction and his body in another, landing sprawled onto Jinki’s body, gripping him as tightly as he had his stuffed animal, and began shaking him.
“Jinki wake up! You gotta wake up now! There’s a big man with a gun and I don’t know what to do! Jinki wake UP!”
Taemin was screaming now.
“Jesus Christ kid. Keep your voice down! He’s not your cousin anymore, he was bitten by a vampire, now he’s one of them!”
“No! No he isn’t, go away!” Taemin sobbed, “Jinki please!”
The man grabbed for Taemin, trying to pull him off of his cousin, but Taemin kicked and screamed and clutched his only family member so tightly, he left red marks on Jinki’s arms.
“OW! Shit kid! You don’t understand, when someone is bitten 3 times, the venom gets into their bloodstream and begins to change them. You want him to become a monster?! When he wakes up he’ll be a…”
Jinki coughed and gasped for air, clawing at the harwood with one hand. The man jumped back and leveled his gun at Jinki’s head.
“NO! Jinki! Come on! Wake up! You’ve gotta tell the man that you’re not a vampire! Please Jinki come on!”
Someone was screaming his name, Jinki could hear it, but for some reason he couldn’t respond. He couldn’t feel one of his arms, his legs, or one whole side of his face. There was a burning pain in his neck and his feet felt like they were being stuck with pins and needles. His tongue felt heavy, his mouth numb and his breath raspy.
Taemin yelled happily when Jinki’s eyes opened, but he could see that Jinki couldn’t focus.
“Yes! Jinki that’s it, come on!”
“Kid move.”
“No! Jinki please, tell him you’re not a vampire. Come on!”
Taemin could hear the gun cock behind him.
“I said move dammit.”
“No!” Taemin bawled and rocked a still out of it Jinki back and forth in his small arms on the floor.
“Don’t make me shoot both of you.”
“No! Please God, don’t take him away from me too.” Taemin whimpered.
Tears streamed down his face as he prayed and rocked Jinki in his arms, rubbing him all over, trying to warm him up.
He was so cold.
“MOVE!”
“Heechul. Drop it.”
Taemin looked up and was shocked to see their reclusive neighbor Mr. Shim in the hallway standing behind the man with the gun, aiming at him with a weapon of his own…a crossbow.
A/N: Sorry I took so long to update. RL has been kicking my ass again. I actually wrote most of this by hand, on a little notebook, on the train going back and forth from my new gig.*sigh* Okies. I purposely didn't alert the reader to flashbacks or scene changes a few times here, because I wanted to get across the feeling that everything was connected in some way. It's a transition technique I've been aching to use, but couldn't find a suitable story. Hopefully it worked and I didn't confuse you too much. If I did, just ask and I'll explain anything that doesn't make sense. So Jinki is not quite a vampire, but he's not quite human either. Why he doesn't remember will be revealed in the next chapter. Hopefully it won't take me as long to get that one out. Comments are love!