✟ the shadows kept me hidden from the light that calls my name;

[todoright]

“…Shanshu has roots in so many different languages. The most ancient source is the Proto-Bantu and they consider life and death the same thing, part of a cycle, only a thing that's not alive never dies. It's- it's saying - that you get to live until you die. It's saying - it's saying you become human

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[chasinghumanity]

Mitchell had started to feel the ache, the want, the urge. The meeting earlier had helped, but it hadn't just stopped what felt like was an addiction hardwired into his brain. So he'd gone for a walk, a long walk, enjoying the change in scenery, when he saw some bloke in black go shooting like a bat outta hell into the ocean.

George and Mitchell's favorite show back home had been "The Real Hustle". It made you look at details. So Mitchell looked from the cartoon, the familiar red spill to the man, dressed in black and oddly familiar looking, looking panicked himself, and it just clicked.

"Whoa, whoa, hey mate," he called, jogging over. They could have been the perfectly matched odd couple, in shades of black and gray on a tropical island. "You alright?"

[todoright]

The lilt in Mitchell's accent is not lost on Angel, and it reminds him of days long past - his life in Ireland. Of course, he'd spent most of it drinking and making merry with the local girls, but Angel remembers green pastures and the lively melodies of the songs that they danced to.

Two hundred or so years had largely washed his own accent away except for the smallest traces, but now was no time to be getting nostalgic.

"I'm fine." and he is, once he reminds himself to breathe regularly - and then his body takes over from there. The sand is stained with blood and he's sorry for that, but he supposes the water will wash it away. If his suspicions are true, he won't be needing it anymore.

The other man is wearing black too. And from the way he hadn't looked twice at the carton, Angel could make his own guesses. "You're human now, too. How's that workin' out for you?"

[chasinghumanity]

The quick jump to the proper conclusion, leaps of logic made Mitchell smile broadly. He saw it, too, what they were. Had been. Despite all the terrible things they did, all the times Mitchell had tried desperately to separate himself from the vampires in Bristol, there was still that kinship, that sense of brotherhood. He missed that. He cherished that. And helping out someone like him was the least he could do, something he was happy to do.

"Uh, kind of fucking brilliant and terrifying at the same time," he laughed. "Just remember to breathe, deeply. Don't let the adrenaline or the racing heart get to ya. Nearly passed out the first minute I got here but it's easier from then on."

[todoright]

Angel, on the other hand, didn't have much of a brotherhood with his fellow vampires - his contact with them normally ended up with him shoving a stake through their hearts. They didn't have souls, so their decisions to do the evil that they did wasn't exactly a choice - but that also meant that he didn't have a choice when it came to killing them

[chasinghumanity]

He blinked once at the blunt question, but given their apparently obvious backgrounds Mitchell could shrug it off quickly. It was pertinent if nothing else.

"Nah, of course not," he said, letting his smile falter only fractionally. "Even signed up with the AA group here. Been trying to get off it for a while actually, back home."

And that was sure to get at least a look if not a sneer. Or maybe this wasn't even a vampire from Mitchell's world and... it would get some other reaction he hadn't anticipated.

[todoright]

Instead of a sneer, Angel's look was one of empathy and respect. He knew what it was like, roaming the streets, feeding off rats - feeling the burn and the hunger and thinking that he was going to go crazy with it. He would have, too, if Buffy hadn't given him a reason to live and change.

He only hopes that this other vampire had someone like that in his life as well. Angel nods, his glance briefly going down to the blood staining the usually pristine white sand. "It gets easier. The thirst never really goes away, but it's manageable."

Maybe their worlds were not so different, after all.

"Can I ask what made you change your mind?"

[chasinghumanity]

He glanced down at the blood too, which not only confused him but made him lick his lips. It'd been a rough day. He pulled his eyes away and focused on the man.

"The people," he said, rolling the tension out of his shoulders. "And a girl." That summoned a faint smile, before he went back to the confusing part.

"But, uh, why is it from a carton?" he asked, jerking a thumb back to the blood. "Doesn't that taste.... disgusting?"

[todoright]

"A girl. I know the story." despite the star-crossed quality of the relationship between him and Buffy, if Angel could choose to do it all over again, he'd still choose to meet her and know her. His mind goes back to that one Christmas Eve, where he'd stood on the top of a hill and waited for the sun to rise. Buffy was the one who had convinced him not to kill himself, that his life was something worth saving...and perhaps the Shanshu Prophecy was an affirmation of this.

"A little." pig's blood from a carton could never replace the taste of warm and fresh...no. He wasn't going to think about it. Despite his body not needing it to survive, old habits die hard. "It's animal blood. Pig's is generally closest. It keeps me alive without having to drink from others."

His stomach rumbled - having been empty and useless for so long, it now demanded food with a vengeance.

[chasinghumanity]

Mitchell gagged automatically, covering his mouth with his hand and looking at the man with wide, almost frightened eyes.

"Pig?" he echoed weakly. "Are you-- Oh my God." Dropping his hand, Mitchell took a step back. "Are you one of those sparkling vampires? The ones who call themselves vegetarians or something equally ridiculous and insulting?"

oh my god I lol'ed so hard

[todoright]

He'd expected the gagging, but not the next words - sparkling vampires? Vegetarians? Angel blanked, the confusion obvious on his face.

"I - what? I don't sparkle." he'd never heard of such a thing, but the notion was just ridiculous. "And I don't eat vegetables. That answers both your questions."

rofl i couldn't not

[chasinghumanity]

"No, it's not-- You've never seen those books?" It felt sometimes like they were everywhere back home, every bookstore and cinema, every other commercial. Nauseating.

"But how can you drink pig's blood? It's not even human. And even if it were, out of a carton? I'd have-- Oh, you're not even from my world, are you?" he said, sighing. "I thought you looked familiar." Which should have meant that Mitchell had seen him around in the last hundred years, but clearly that was on a television set.

it was epic <33

[todoright]

"Okay, wait. Back up, slow down - you're not making any sense here." the babbling was supposed to be informative, sure, but without context it just sounded like jibberish to Angel. "First off, what books?"

And if it were possible for him to make less sense, he just did. Angel looked familiar but wasn't from his world. Another version of himself, perhaps? "And why exactly do I look familiar to you?"

Re: it was epic <33

[chasinghumanity]

"Thought you did," Mitchell amended quickly. He wasn't the best liar, but he wasn't hiding something he had done in this instance. He could manage. Telling someone they were from some television show you didn't remember right off the bat was a bad idea.

"Guess I was wrong," he said, shrugging. "As for the books, there's this series called.... Twilight. One of those stupid, trashy vampire romance novels that's just exploded with popularity. They sparkle in the sun. ...Sparkle."

[todoright]

"They sparkle." Angel's deadpan manner was his way of expressing disbelief. Humans were always getting it wrong when it came to vampires, a fact that bothered him more than it probably should. If they weren't romantisizing them by making them tortured and dark and completely sexual, they were trivializing them by making them harmless or even friendly. Not to mention the hack methods of killing them that had surfaced over the years, like garlic.

It was dangerous. Vampires were monsters, and humans shouldn't ever forget that.

Angel shook his head in evident disgust. "Figures they'd get it wrong. Do they sleep in coffins, too?"

[chasinghumanity]

"I honestly don't know and don't care to find out," Mitchell replied. It was bad enough knowing what he knew, picked up from advertisements and girls gabbing in public, sometimes to Mitchell. The world was a terrifying place.

"But enough about the fictional," he said, and offered his hand out. "Name's Mitchell. In my world, you don't drink pig's blood or even donated blood. Tastes like... what week old bad milk would taste like. I don't sparkle or sleep in a coffin. And I've been human five days. What's your story?"

[todoright]

A handshake with another vampire. Now there's something that hasn't happened...well, ever. Even back when he was Angelus, other vampires were mostly too scared of him to engage in formalities, not that his kind were ever big on formalities anyways.

"Angel. I've been human...about five minutes." he paused, because asking someone like him what his story was meant something like an hour of retelling. At the very least. So he counters with a question instead. "How old are you?"