Fic: Undertow
This was a challenge to myself, the details of which are complicated, boring, and involve stories that I started writing seven or eight years ago when I first learned what fanfiction was. :-D
Fandom: Vampire Chronicles
Word Count: ~1800
Rating: PG-14
Pairing: Armand/Daniel
Notes: This is an unpublished work of non-profit fanfic; these characters definitely aren't mine. (Don’t sue me, Anne Rice!)
They reunited because Armand had asked for him, and because Marius had said that it would be ‘good for them’, whatever that was supposed to mean. Whatever the case, when you had 2500 years of cumulative life playing telephone tag for the sake of a get-together, it wasn’t exactly the sort of thing you could turn down.
So he met Armand in a neutral coastal city, nobody’s turf, a geographical blank slate, or as close to such a thing as they could get. There weren’t many places on the map that they hadn’t left their footprints side by side, once upon a time. There was water heavy in the air here, beading on the shoulders of Daniel’s jacket and slowing the line of evening commuters coming over the high-level bridge to a grudging crawl, but no memories. Trust Armand to find a place like this.
“Speak to me,” Armand said. Ordered. Same old story. “I miss your thoughts.”
Speak. Daniel resisted the urge to bark for him, suspecting Armand wouldn’t get the joke. “I was thinking that you’re still the emotional equivalent of a Brinks truck.”
He could hear the rhythmic huff of a jogger coming down the pathway towards them before she materialized out of the fog, and they parted for her, easy as dancing. It was Daniel that got the double-take, the startled flash of what’s with him? He was out of practice moving like a real boy and old enough that it was beginning to show.
It didn’t matter. It was a bad night for humans to be out, and the joggers on this path were few and far between. Daniel put his hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders, because it was what he used to do, remembering how the cold used to hurt him.
Wasn’t much of anything that could touch him anymore.
“That’s hardly fair,” Armand said. He was trailing his fingers along the mossy wall that separated the pathway from the cliff down to the bay, a seemingly unconscious gesture that was just a little too perfect, and Daniel had to wonder where he’d picked up that move. “We don’t really know each other anymore, you and I.”
“Is that what this is about? Getting to know each other?” Daniel could feel himself grinning, the chemical tang of the ocean air filling his mouth. He wanted to get down on his hands and knees and lick the salt off of the buckling walkway, off the tips of Armand’s fingers. Couldn’t remember if that was forgivable behavior. Hadn’t the Beatles sung about something like that once? Why don’t we do it in the road? Yeah, you’ve come a long way from wanting to hold my hand, Pauly-boy…
Stop. Focus. Focus.
It was usually easier holding onto time with Armand around. He wasn’t sure if it was because Armand’s presence instinctively made him pay closer attention to reality, or because patient Armand always waited for him to catch up again instead of going on without him.
“So, what, we’re going to be buddies now?” Daniel asked.
Armand shrugged, graced him with his old ‘for guests’ smile, all polite reserve. “If you’d like. If you think we’re capable of it.”
The little bastard was as hard to read as ever, and the bitch of the thing was that Daniel still loved him. Was still in love with him. He could tell, because just looking at him felt as though someone was driving a corkscrew into his sternum. Twist, twist, twist. It was easy to be sure of something that painful.
“You want to hear my theory?” Daniel asked. The steady line of headlights on the bridge were reflected in the water below, blurred and dancing with the waves, a parallel universe that shifted when you weren’t looking. It was distracting.
“Yes, I would.”
“I think that a little birdie went and told you I was finally losing it for real,” Daniel said. A raven croaked throatily out of the dark evergreens at them as if on cue, and it made Daniel laugh out loud before he could help himself. The little birdie he had in mind was significantly nosier. And less literal.
“Losing… it?”
“Losing my mind. Cracking up. Padded rooms and ceremonial bonfires all the way. So what does Marius do? He sends in the expert,” Daniel said. “I bet you’ve got a good guess already. How long do you think I’ve got?”
Armand turned away abruptly, resting against the stone wall like he was admiring the lights on the water, but his head was bowed. If it was an act, it was a good one. Daniel moved to stand beside him, leaning on his forearms.
“I don’t think I want to tell you,” Armand decided, with the quicksilver flash of a frown. It was easier catching his expressions these days, the graveyard angel mask made more human after his little trip into the sun.
“That soon, huh?”
“Not necessarily. You’re… You’ve always been a remarkably perverse creature. I’m afraid that you’d go out of your way to prove me wrong, and I rather like knowing you’re still around,” Armand told him. He smiled at Daniel, a teenage smirk that had taken five hundred years to perfect, and close enough to a wounded fuck you that it felt like victory. “Not an empty Brinks truck, Daniel.”
There was someone else coming down the path… no, he could hear the footsteps of two humans and the wheezing rasp of a dog choking itself as it strained against its collar… and Daniel suddenly didn’t want to see them. To smell them. Being around Armand made him hungry, made him start jonesing like an addict all over again. Fucking study in transference was what it was. The only thing he wanted was the only thing that he couldn’t hang onto, so he filled himself up with booze or blood or any other poor substitute that would keep him warm for a little while…
Planting his hands flat on the top of the guard wall, Daniel vaulted easily over the slippery stone, landing in the wet foliage on the other side. The mossy ground held the damp like a sponge and he felt his shoes soak through almost instantly as he started down the treed cliff towards the bay, pushing the line between running and falling… Breakneck speed. Shit, what did that even mean anymore? If he broke his neck, he could fix it easily enough.
The ocean bay came up too fast and he skidded to a stop, an avalanche of pebbles spilling into the water, and Armand was already there beside him. Fucking infuriating, not being able to escape him but not being able to touch. They’d never been this civil with each other before. It had been a mess of tears and blood, torn clothing and broken glass, and Daniel had always been able to add up the bruises on his throat to know exactly where they stood.
“Come home with me,” Armand said.
Daniel eyed him warily. Armand was wearing his hair long tonight, the fog making it curl darkly against his skin, and that was even more distracting than the lights. It wasn’t fair that he looked so good. “For how long?”
“As long as you’d like. Stay with us; meet my children.”
“Now that would kill me,” Daniel laughed. (The problem with being at the bottom of the cliff was that there was nowhere else to run from here, and the need to move was making his skin itch.) “Oh, come on, don’t look so sad, boss. Does it really matter if I kicked it now? This is longer than I ever would’ve survived as a human. You know, if I hadn’t died when I did…”
“Died, or was killed?” Armand asked. He sat down on a fallen tree that had been polished smooth by the elements, leaning back on his hands, as perfectly at ease as he would have been in a boardroom, a bedroom, a brothel. How did he do that? Daniel hadn’t even been able to catch up with fashion again after the eighties.
“Died,” Daniel assured him with feeling, “Alcohol poisoning and a terminal case of Stockholm Syndrome.”
Armand laughed, one of those rare unguarded reactions that made him look utterly human for a moment. “God. I should know better than to fall in love with writers by now. You’re so effortlessly cruel.”
Hard to remember that Armand had ever loved him, or fancied that he had. Hard to tell the emotion from the gambit.
Daniel sat down beside him, tucking his hands between his knees. “So. Are we going to talk about it?”
“Please, be more specific. You know that I can’t read your thoughts anymore.”
“You. Your spiritual revelation. Your… You know how I found out? I was almost asleep, half-dreaming already, and then suddenly I’ve got Lestat screaming in my mind that you’re dead. That you burned. And you know our boy Lestat: he doesn’t talk, he broadcasts. Technicolor and surround sound.” A strip of smooth bark tore away from the log under his hand and Daniel tossed it into the water. “Nice way to end the day.”
“I trust you understand that it wasn’t intentional,” Armand said quietly.
“Crazy person here, remember? Pretty sure that means I don’t have to be mature about it.”
“Daniel.” Armand turned to him, his hand on Daniel’s thigh, demanding his attention.
Yeah, here came the corkscrew again, angling upwards for his dead heart. He hated that Armand couldn’t work the psychic razzle-dazzle on him anymore. It meant that there was no one to blame for all the broken clutter and yearning in his head but himself. Armand was still talking, low and earnest, about times of crisis and miracles, and Daniel had somehow missed the whole thing.
“Daniel?” Armand said again, less command behind it this time. He looked so worried, big brown eyes just made for sadness, so Daniel leaned forward and kissed him on the lips. It had solved most of their problems before, hadn’t it, kissing? Or maybe it was what had gotten them into trouble in the first place.
Didn’t matter, didn’t matter. Armand was kissing him back, cold hands on his face, strong enough to hold Daniel steady and keep him from spinning off into real madness.
“Come back with me,” Armand murmured, lips against his cheek. Who needed telepathy anyway? He was seductive enough without it. Daniel slid his hands into Armand’s hair, aching with familiarity. For better or worse, this was the only part they’d ever been any good at.
“Is that what you wanted?” Daniel asked. He wanted to lay with Armand like a mortal, press him down on the broken stones and taste the truth in his blood again. “Please, is that why you asked for me? Just tell me and I’ll say yes.” It had to be the answer, but he couldn’t understand why Armand looked as though he was going to cry.
“Oh, beloved,” Armand sighed, being so gentle with hands that could bend iron, “You called for me. Don’t you remember?”
With a sudden shock like the sensation of stepping off a cliff in the dark, Daniel knew that he was right.
Fandom: Vampire Chronicles
Word Count: ~1800
Rating: PG-14
Pairing: Armand/Daniel
Notes: This is an unpublished work of non-profit fanfic; these characters definitely aren't mine. (Don’t sue me, Anne Rice!)
They reunited because Armand had asked for him, and because Marius had said that it would be ‘good for them’, whatever that was supposed to mean. Whatever the case, when you had 2500 years of cumulative life playing telephone tag for the sake of a get-together, it wasn’t exactly the sort of thing you could turn down.
So he met Armand in a neutral coastal city, nobody’s turf, a geographical blank slate, or as close to such a thing as they could get. There weren’t many places on the map that they hadn’t left their footprints side by side, once upon a time. There was water heavy in the air here, beading on the shoulders of Daniel’s jacket and slowing the line of evening commuters coming over the high-level bridge to a grudging crawl, but no memories. Trust Armand to find a place like this.
“Speak to me,” Armand said. Ordered. Same old story. “I miss your thoughts.”
Speak. Daniel resisted the urge to bark for him, suspecting Armand wouldn’t get the joke. “I was thinking that you’re still the emotional equivalent of a Brinks truck.”
He could hear the rhythmic huff of a jogger coming down the pathway towards them before she materialized out of the fog, and they parted for her, easy as dancing. It was Daniel that got the double-take, the startled flash of what’s with him? He was out of practice moving like a real boy and old enough that it was beginning to show.
It didn’t matter. It was a bad night for humans to be out, and the joggers on this path were few and far between. Daniel put his hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders, because it was what he used to do, remembering how the cold used to hurt him.
Wasn’t much of anything that could touch him anymore.
“That’s hardly fair,” Armand said. He was trailing his fingers along the mossy wall that separated the pathway from the cliff down to the bay, a seemingly unconscious gesture that was just a little too perfect, and Daniel had to wonder where he’d picked up that move. “We don’t really know each other anymore, you and I.”
“Is that what this is about? Getting to know each other?” Daniel could feel himself grinning, the chemical tang of the ocean air filling his mouth. He wanted to get down on his hands and knees and lick the salt off of the buckling walkway, off the tips of Armand’s fingers. Couldn’t remember if that was forgivable behavior. Hadn’t the Beatles sung about something like that once? Why don’t we do it in the road? Yeah, you’ve come a long way from wanting to hold my hand, Pauly-boy…
Stop. Focus. Focus.
It was usually easier holding onto time with Armand around. He wasn’t sure if it was because Armand’s presence instinctively made him pay closer attention to reality, or because patient Armand always waited for him to catch up again instead of going on without him.
“So, what, we’re going to be buddies now?” Daniel asked.
Armand shrugged, graced him with his old ‘for guests’ smile, all polite reserve. “If you’d like. If you think we’re capable of it.”
The little bastard was as hard to read as ever, and the bitch of the thing was that Daniel still loved him. Was still in love with him. He could tell, because just looking at him felt as though someone was driving a corkscrew into his sternum. Twist, twist, twist. It was easy to be sure of something that painful.
“You want to hear my theory?” Daniel asked. The steady line of headlights on the bridge were reflected in the water below, blurred and dancing with the waves, a parallel universe that shifted when you weren’t looking. It was distracting.
“Yes, I would.”
“I think that a little birdie went and told you I was finally losing it for real,” Daniel said. A raven croaked throatily out of the dark evergreens at them as if on cue, and it made Daniel laugh out loud before he could help himself. The little birdie he had in mind was significantly nosier. And less literal.
“Losing… it?”
“Losing my mind. Cracking up. Padded rooms and ceremonial bonfires all the way. So what does Marius do? He sends in the expert,” Daniel said. “I bet you’ve got a good guess already. How long do you think I’ve got?”
Armand turned away abruptly, resting against the stone wall like he was admiring the lights on the water, but his head was bowed. If it was an act, it was a good one. Daniel moved to stand beside him, leaning on his forearms.
“I don’t think I want to tell you,” Armand decided, with the quicksilver flash of a frown. It was easier catching his expressions these days, the graveyard angel mask made more human after his little trip into the sun.
“That soon, huh?”
“Not necessarily. You’re… You’ve always been a remarkably perverse creature. I’m afraid that you’d go out of your way to prove me wrong, and I rather like knowing you’re still around,” Armand told him. He smiled at Daniel, a teenage smirk that had taken five hundred years to perfect, and close enough to a wounded fuck you that it felt like victory. “Not an empty Brinks truck, Daniel.”
There was someone else coming down the path… no, he could hear the footsteps of two humans and the wheezing rasp of a dog choking itself as it strained against its collar… and Daniel suddenly didn’t want to see them. To smell them. Being around Armand made him hungry, made him start jonesing like an addict all over again. Fucking study in transference was what it was. The only thing he wanted was the only thing that he couldn’t hang onto, so he filled himself up with booze or blood or any other poor substitute that would keep him warm for a little while…
Planting his hands flat on the top of the guard wall, Daniel vaulted easily over the slippery stone, landing in the wet foliage on the other side. The mossy ground held the damp like a sponge and he felt his shoes soak through almost instantly as he started down the treed cliff towards the bay, pushing the line between running and falling… Breakneck speed. Shit, what did that even mean anymore? If he broke his neck, he could fix it easily enough.
The ocean bay came up too fast and he skidded to a stop, an avalanche of pebbles spilling into the water, and Armand was already there beside him. Fucking infuriating, not being able to escape him but not being able to touch. They’d never been this civil with each other before. It had been a mess of tears and blood, torn clothing and broken glass, and Daniel had always been able to add up the bruises on his throat to know exactly where they stood.
“Come home with me,” Armand said.
Daniel eyed him warily. Armand was wearing his hair long tonight, the fog making it curl darkly against his skin, and that was even more distracting than the lights. It wasn’t fair that he looked so good. “For how long?”
“As long as you’d like. Stay with us; meet my children.”
“Now that would kill me,” Daniel laughed. (The problem with being at the bottom of the cliff was that there was nowhere else to run from here, and the need to move was making his skin itch.) “Oh, come on, don’t look so sad, boss. Does it really matter if I kicked it now? This is longer than I ever would’ve survived as a human. You know, if I hadn’t died when I did…”
“Died, or was killed?” Armand asked. He sat down on a fallen tree that had been polished smooth by the elements, leaning back on his hands, as perfectly at ease as he would have been in a boardroom, a bedroom, a brothel. How did he do that? Daniel hadn’t even been able to catch up with fashion again after the eighties.
“Died,” Daniel assured him with feeling, “Alcohol poisoning and a terminal case of Stockholm Syndrome.”
Armand laughed, one of those rare unguarded reactions that made him look utterly human for a moment. “God. I should know better than to fall in love with writers by now. You’re so effortlessly cruel.”
Hard to remember that Armand had ever loved him, or fancied that he had. Hard to tell the emotion from the gambit.
Daniel sat down beside him, tucking his hands between his knees. “So. Are we going to talk about it?”
“Please, be more specific. You know that I can’t read your thoughts anymore.”
“You. Your spiritual revelation. Your… You know how I found out? I was almost asleep, half-dreaming already, and then suddenly I’ve got Lestat screaming in my mind that you’re dead. That you burned. And you know our boy Lestat: he doesn’t talk, he broadcasts. Technicolor and surround sound.” A strip of smooth bark tore away from the log under his hand and Daniel tossed it into the water. “Nice way to end the day.”
“I trust you understand that it wasn’t intentional,” Armand said quietly.
“Crazy person here, remember? Pretty sure that means I don’t have to be mature about it.”
“Daniel.” Armand turned to him, his hand on Daniel’s thigh, demanding his attention.
Yeah, here came the corkscrew again, angling upwards for his dead heart. He hated that Armand couldn’t work the psychic razzle-dazzle on him anymore. It meant that there was no one to blame for all the broken clutter and yearning in his head but himself. Armand was still talking, low and earnest, about times of crisis and miracles, and Daniel had somehow missed the whole thing.
“Daniel?” Armand said again, less command behind it this time. He looked so worried, big brown eyes just made for sadness, so Daniel leaned forward and kissed him on the lips. It had solved most of their problems before, hadn’t it, kissing? Or maybe it was what had gotten them into trouble in the first place.
Didn’t matter, didn’t matter. Armand was kissing him back, cold hands on his face, strong enough to hold Daniel steady and keep him from spinning off into real madness.
“Come back with me,” Armand murmured, lips against his cheek. Who needed telepathy anyway? He was seductive enough without it. Daniel slid his hands into Armand’s hair, aching with familiarity. For better or worse, this was the only part they’d ever been any good at.
“Is that what you wanted?” Daniel asked. He wanted to lay with Armand like a mortal, press him down on the broken stones and taste the truth in his blood again. “Please, is that why you asked for me? Just tell me and I’ll say yes.” It had to be the answer, but he couldn’t understand why Armand looked as though he was going to cry.
“Oh, beloved,” Armand sighed, being so gentle with hands that could bend iron, “You called for me. Don’t you remember?”
With a sudden shock like the sensation of stepping off a cliff in the dark, Daniel knew that he was right.