The Gratuitous Vampire AU - Part 2
Did I say this was going to be four parts? Obviously when you all thought I said four what I actually meant was five. >.>
Title: Sign of the Cross (a.k.a. the Completely Gratuitous Guilty Gear Vampire AU)
Summary: Gears or vampires, it's all just another day's work for the Holy Order. But they never do quite manage to screen some of their more unusual recruits as carefully as they ought to either.
Characters/Pairing: Sol/Ky
Chapter: 2 of 5
Rating: Rapidly moving towards R territory
Word Count: 3230
Previous Parts: Part 1
The rest of the night passes in similarly uneventful manner. Not a single call for assistance comes in from anywhere in the city, the one report that might have warranted attention is corrected as a false alarm almost as soon as it arrives (attractive female restaurant staff whose jobs require them to walk home alone late in Paris these days have apparently learned to do so heavily armed and wary), and several hours patrolling the areas known for their popularity with the less ‘lively’ portion of Paris’s nightlife reveal not so much as a new kind of mildew. By the time they turn for home in the early hours of the morning, Ky has to admit that he might as well have let Sol sleep in that evening, for all the good they’ve done for the city that night.
After starting the night already irritable even by his usual standards of antipathy towards the universe at large, Sol has grown more sullen and tetchy as the night wears on, hitting ‘monosyllabic’ in their last hour and continuing only downwards from there. For a man Ky knows would happily spend twelve hours a day asleep when allowed, he has remarkably little patience for a slow evening. It's hard not to sympathise though; a quiet night in this job in a city of this size all too often means only that all the trouble is going on somewhere out of sight.
“I suppose we can’t expect to uncover a whole nest posing as a theatre company every night,” Ky muses (and really, what the vampires of Paris had with that particular ruse he'll never understand).
Reminders of that incident usually get him some kind of grin from Sol, but tonight, he just mutters something that would probably have been unrepeatable even if it had been audible, and keeps walking.
Ky reminds himself - in what is something of a regular ritual on these patrols - that Sol is extremely good at his job just as soon as the action starts, so he as the superior officer here is quite justified in ignoring a few minor incidences of insubordination in the name of keeping the Paris streets that little bit safer after dark.
It’s hard to imagine how he would have made it into the Order in the first place if Sir Kliff himself hadn’t been so determined that Sol be signed up at any cost. Never before had anyone made it into the Order's ranks with barely a form filled in to his name; Sol had dealt with any questions that more than touched on his history and qualifications with stony silence, and the Order's usual background checks had uncovered little more than rumour. But whatever dark secrets Sol's past might hide, his instincts where vampires are concerned are unnaturally well refined, and his skills speak for themselves. He takes to the task of hunting with the single-minded obsession Ky is used to seeing in men who join the Order to seek revenge for loved ones taken by the undead - or worse, sent back to taunt their mortal families, barely recognisable as their human selves. It's hard to imagine Sol with any kind of family though, and unlike so many other men, he's never shown any signs to warn the obsession was at risk of spiralling into self-destructive tendencies as their owner lost himself in the desire for revenge - even if it is only his shear bloody-mindedness that saves him.
Ky gave up trying to figure out what to make of Sol months ago. He’s never going to be a man any competent captain could afford to have less than half an eye on at all times, but he's been such a boon to them in the time since he joined that it's hard to imagine how the Paris division would operate without him nowadays.
“Do you think there’s something brewing?” Ky asks, his usual determination never to rely on Sol’s instincts giving way to curiosity yet again.
Sol glares at him balefully out of the corner of an eye.
“It’s too quiet lately,” Ky continues, “Maybe I should be glad of the reprieve, but I can't help wonder what it might mean.”
Sol’s reply still bears more resemblance to incoherent grumbling than real speech, but Ky thinks he catches something like, “Hell if I know.” He shakes his head and tries to convince himself he’s letting paranoia get the better of him. If they’ve got downtime he should be making the most of it - scheduling some extra training sessions with the men, perhaps. Even if he refuses to trust the peace to last, there's no excuse to waste it. Perhaps he'll even take the opportunity to give himself a few daylight shifts for a change. As much as he’s become accustomed to this schedule - coming to appreciate the peace of crisp, early mornings like this one while the city still sleeps - it’s been too long since he saw much of the sun that wasn’t in the act of rising or setting.
Sol probably won’t be very happy about it though. Lazy or not, there are times he seems almost as reluctant to be dragged from bed in daylight hours as the quarry they hunt...
Ky’s just about to follow that thought somewhere he would have found unsettling when he realises the sound of Sol’s footsteps has abruptly ceased. He looks up from his thoughts just in time to see Sol recover from whatever startled him and dash away down a side street as though all the hounds of hell are on his heels.
Ky curses himself and gives chase. It’s obvious what’s happened - Sol’s seen or heard something that he must have missed while lost in thought; there’s nothing rare about Sol running off without bothering to explain himself when he thinks he’s on to something. He calls after Sol once but isn’t surprised to hear no reply, and after that it’s all he can do to keep Sol in sight. So much for the rare reprieve of a quiet evening. He hadn't known Sol could move this fast - isn't sure he's ever seen anyone move this fast - and something genuinely uncomfortable settles in Ky's gut as he tries to imagine what could possibly spook Sol so badly.
He’s just starting to worry he’s lost Sol altogether when what had been little more than a narrow alley opens suddenly in front of him into a decent-sized plaza. Sol is standing only a handful of paces away from him, all his attention focused up and away, and when Ky follows his gaze it leads him a figure perched high and precariously up on a rooftop overlooking the plaza. The man - or not a man, there’s no way he could be human - stands out as little more than a shadow against the night sky, but Ky can just make out long hair, the folds of an outlandish leather outfit that hangs like a skirt around his waist, and a long-handled scythe held in one hand - presented almost; this creature wants them to know he’s dangerous. It’s ridiculously over-dramatic, even by vampire standards, and yet Ky cannot shake the fear that for once, the drama may not be unjustified.
Sol yells something that sounds like a name, hard syllables that register more in tone than in words, and Ky suddenly finds himself wondering whether this is the vampire Sol’s been hunting all along - the answer to everything he’s never dared ask about the obsession he so often sees in Sol’s eyes.
Despite the distance to the rooftop, the vampire's voice carries as if he was standing right next to them. “Well met, Corrupted One! I had wondered how long you’d take to find me out. So this is what you’ve come to, currying favour with lowly mortals?” There’s a glint of yellow eyes in the darkness as the vampire turns his attention to Ky, and he almost doesn't remember how to breathe until it leaves again. “Whatever will my mistress think of this?”
The vampire laughs, loud and grating, no care to spare for who might overhear it. Ky can’t see the look on Sol’s face, but for a terrible moment he’s not sure he wants to.
With an inhuman snarl and a noise like tearing fabric, Sol launches himself at the vampire. The next thing Ky knows they’re both on that rooftop - then gone again the next moment, the vampire fleeing away and Sol giving chase. It all happens so fast Ky is left staring dazedly after them in shock, convinced his eyes must be playing tricks on him. Surely he couldn’t have just seen Sol leap to the very top of that building in a single bound - not even a vampire could jump that far.
There’s no hope of following them the same way, so Ky has to give chase at ground level, keeping pace with the battle erupting on the rooftops above him largely by sound - the distinctive ring of the vampire's laughter and the roar of flame so hot that even from this far away he can feel the heat wash over him in waves. He’s never seen Sol like this before, rarely seen a vampire that could stand up to him for half this long, and he trembles to think how old this creature must be to have such power.
The sound of the battle is interrupted by an ear-splitting crash as both combatants come tumbling down from the sky as one, overbalanced while one had the other in a vice hold and leaving both too occupied to do anything to pull themselves out of the dive. They land in a small courtyard almost right in front of Ky, bare cobbles providing nothing to break their fall. There’s a terrible moment where Ky wonders whether Sol will get up again, but it’s over as soon as he sees Sol stagger to his feet, dazed and bruised but miraculously unbroken. The vampire does likewise - certainly not laughing any longer - and both take a few seconds to reorient themselves before the battle resumes.
The pause gives Ky the first clear look at Sol he’s had since the battle began, and what he sees all but stops his heart in his chest, worse than any of the horrors he’s seen or even half-imagined since this began.
Sol has wings - leathery and batlike - sprouting from his shoulders, the top of his uniform all but torn to shreds to accommodate them. His fingernails have grown into vicious claws and his eyes - unusual enough normally with their odd red/brown hue - glow in bright yellow and are slitted with catlike pupils. When his lips draw back into a silent snarl, Ky can see his incisors have sharpened into fangs.
Sol has become a vampire.
And not just any kind of vampire - Ky can count on one hand how many times he’s encountered a vampire powerful enough to endure this degree of transformation, from the humanoid to the beastial; and not all his fingers and toes could count the number of lives, Order and civilian alike, that were lost at the hands of each such creature before it could be subdued.
Even retreat to the comforting numbness of shock is denied to him - this is nothing he can pretend not to have seen before, time and again and never any easier for the horrible familiarity of it all. It's common, horribly common, for men of the Holy Order to be taken by the enemy and sent back as twisted monsters to torment their former comrades - or worse still, to mimic their human selves just long enough to strike where they can hurt the worst. Not all the security measures the Order has ever implemented succeed in catching every vampire-spy. It doesn't matter in the least how powerful Sol may have been as a human, doesn't make the slightest difference how many vampires he's fought and beaten; no-one is immune to the vampire's embrace. And it's not until now Ky has ever realised how completely he'd allow himself to forget that when it came to Sol.
All this time Ky has waived away so many of the rules Sol breaks as casually as breathing - all the times he used to sneak out to hunt alone, counter to every regulation ever enacted for the men's own safety, sneering brazenly at the ridiculous idea he might need backup for his own protection. Sol's been such a boon to their Order, such a scourge to the vampires of their city that Ky has fallen head-first into the trap of imagining him invincible. How could he not have seen this coming, when Ky should have known it was only a matter of time before everything that made Sol indispensable would be making him a target?
Ky doesn't know how this could have happened, doesn't know when, or how long Sol's been deceiving them, whether this is what the other vampire was alluding to or what he's even to make of the fight he's witnessing (yet another ridiculous political squabble between differing vampire clans?), but it's impossible not to feel so keenly it cuts him to the bone how much of this must be his fault.
He’s got no way of understanding any of it, not even any time to waste wondering. It’s more luck than he deserves just to have seen this before Sol turned on them (and how much more lucky Sol is so caught up in his fight he's forgotten Ky could be watching), and under all the disbelief, all the betrayal that's almost choking him from the inside, there's the part of him locked down hard enough to be unassailable that knows all too well there's only one way this can be allowed to end. All those years of Order training that saw him promoted to captain before his twentieth year, all would be for nothing if he hadn't long ago trained himself in how to shut down those parts of himself that want nothing more than to grieve, and to fight the battle in front of him. As hard as he may hope that neither of the combatants will survive the fight, even as the bile rises in his throat at the thought, Ky knows this may be the only opportunity he’ll ever get.
He can't know how long this thing in front of him has been pretending to be Sol, but there's only one possible way to honour the man Sol once was.
By now both vampires are flagging. There’s blood running down Sol’s face, and one of the other’s arms hangs useless at his side, broken so badly not even vampiric healing could mend it quickly, his scythe a much more ungainly weapon to wield one-handed. Yet the glare in his eyes suggests he is far from defeated, although it slips a little when he ducks too late under a blast of fire, blinded long enough for Sol to land a kick to his good arm, sending his weapon flying (and it's easier with every blow for Ky to convince himself how real this is - no human, not even Sol, fights the way that thing with Sol's face is fighting now). Opponent disarmed, Sol lunges for him head on only to find himself grappling with empty air as the other vampire dissolves in front of him like smoke. He reappears again next to his fallen scythe and staggers to his feet, but recovers to retrieve his weapon, glibly throw a mocking bow and vanish away into the night. Sol lets out another growl, spreads his wings and leaps after him.
That’s when Ky, knowing it’s now or never, shuts his eyes, raises his arms and throws every volt of lightning he can summon into Sol’s body.
Sol lets out a roar that turns into a scream, muscles seizing before he can do anything to break his fall, crashing back to the ground with a sound Ky can feel in his ribcage, and goes on feeling even as he throws everything he has - all the rage and betrayal and loss - into his magic until he’s got nothing left, praying with every fibre of his being that it’ll be enough - that he won’t have to see Sol get up again.
(When Sol does, frazzled so badly that tiny streams of smoke are rising from all over his body, there’s still one small, crazy part of him that feels relieved, and that might be when it dawns on Ky that even if he wins this he might not come away from it sane.)
The vampire with Sol's face staggers to its feet in stilted movements, muscles twitching in ugly spasms from the shock. Ky draws his sword and prays for the strength to make this quick.
“Damn you boy, what...?” the vampire coughs, still sounding so much like Sol that Ky can hardly bear it. There’s a look in the creature’s eyes that Ky won't for a moment let himself believe.
“Monster,” Ky hisses, not daring anything longer, biting down on what he really wants to ask - just how long he’d planned to go on deceiving before he turned on them all.
Sol lurches forward; Ky can see him recovering dangerously fast. “Fuck you, Ky, listen to me...”
He reaches for Ky, only a few feet left between them, but Ky shakes his head desperately and stabs forward with all his might, trusting to training and instinct that the blow will strike true. He doesn't even let himself hear the sound Sol makes when the blade goes straight through his body, embedded in the flesh almost to the hilt. Opens his eyes to see he’s missed his mark, the wound too low to be mortal, but too deep for any vampire to shrug off with ease. All he needs to do is twist the blade that bit further, Sol's heart is so very close...
Ky never makes that last thrust, because that's when he makes his mistake - he looks up, into Sol's face, catches his eyes and freezes. Because Sol's eyes aren't the yellow-gold of an unnatural monster anymore, they're the familiar, human eyes he's looked into so many times before, and suddenly it hits him hard enough to knock the wind out of him: it's Sol he's about to kill. Sol, who for all his failings is the greatest ally the Order has ever had, who's saved Ky’s own life probably more times than he knows - who's mere presence has made Ky feel safer than anyone in his job has any right to ever feel. This is the same man he's an inch away from murdering in cold blood oh god what has he done...
He's still frozen when he hears the sound of his sword clattering to the ground after being wrenched free, and the inhuman snarl that leaves Sol’s lips before he pins Ky back against the wall behind him with all his weight.
The last thought that goes through Ky's mind is how utterly he's failed - himself, Sol, the Order, everyone - before Sol's fangs sink deep into his neck.
Yes, the next part is in progress - practically finished, in fact. Will be sure not to leave people hanging so long this time. ^^;
Title: Sign of the Cross (a.k.a. the Completely Gratuitous Guilty Gear Vampire AU)
Summary: Gears or vampires, it's all just another day's work for the Holy Order. But they never do quite manage to screen some of their more unusual recruits as carefully as they ought to either.
Characters/Pairing: Sol/Ky
Chapter: 2 of 5
Rating: Rapidly moving towards R territory
Word Count: 3230
Previous Parts: Part 1
The rest of the night passes in similarly uneventful manner. Not a single call for assistance comes in from anywhere in the city, the one report that might have warranted attention is corrected as a false alarm almost as soon as it arrives (attractive female restaurant staff whose jobs require them to walk home alone late in Paris these days have apparently learned to do so heavily armed and wary), and several hours patrolling the areas known for their popularity with the less ‘lively’ portion of Paris’s nightlife reveal not so much as a new kind of mildew. By the time they turn for home in the early hours of the morning, Ky has to admit that he might as well have let Sol sleep in that evening, for all the good they’ve done for the city that night.
After starting the night already irritable even by his usual standards of antipathy towards the universe at large, Sol has grown more sullen and tetchy as the night wears on, hitting ‘monosyllabic’ in their last hour and continuing only downwards from there. For a man Ky knows would happily spend twelve hours a day asleep when allowed, he has remarkably little patience for a slow evening. It's hard not to sympathise though; a quiet night in this job in a city of this size all too often means only that all the trouble is going on somewhere out of sight.
“I suppose we can’t expect to uncover a whole nest posing as a theatre company every night,” Ky muses (and really, what the vampires of Paris had with that particular ruse he'll never understand).
Reminders of that incident usually get him some kind of grin from Sol, but tonight, he just mutters something that would probably have been unrepeatable even if it had been audible, and keeps walking.
Ky reminds himself - in what is something of a regular ritual on these patrols - that Sol is extremely good at his job just as soon as the action starts, so he as the superior officer here is quite justified in ignoring a few minor incidences of insubordination in the name of keeping the Paris streets that little bit safer after dark.
It’s hard to imagine how he would have made it into the Order in the first place if Sir Kliff himself hadn’t been so determined that Sol be signed up at any cost. Never before had anyone made it into the Order's ranks with barely a form filled in to his name; Sol had dealt with any questions that more than touched on his history and qualifications with stony silence, and the Order's usual background checks had uncovered little more than rumour. But whatever dark secrets Sol's past might hide, his instincts where vampires are concerned are unnaturally well refined, and his skills speak for themselves. He takes to the task of hunting with the single-minded obsession Ky is used to seeing in men who join the Order to seek revenge for loved ones taken by the undead - or worse, sent back to taunt their mortal families, barely recognisable as their human selves. It's hard to imagine Sol with any kind of family though, and unlike so many other men, he's never shown any signs to warn the obsession was at risk of spiralling into self-destructive tendencies as their owner lost himself in the desire for revenge - even if it is only his shear bloody-mindedness that saves him.
Ky gave up trying to figure out what to make of Sol months ago. He’s never going to be a man any competent captain could afford to have less than half an eye on at all times, but he's been such a boon to them in the time since he joined that it's hard to imagine how the Paris division would operate without him nowadays.
“Do you think there’s something brewing?” Ky asks, his usual determination never to rely on Sol’s instincts giving way to curiosity yet again.
Sol glares at him balefully out of the corner of an eye.
“It’s too quiet lately,” Ky continues, “Maybe I should be glad of the reprieve, but I can't help wonder what it might mean.”
Sol’s reply still bears more resemblance to incoherent grumbling than real speech, but Ky thinks he catches something like, “Hell if I know.” He shakes his head and tries to convince himself he’s letting paranoia get the better of him. If they’ve got downtime he should be making the most of it - scheduling some extra training sessions with the men, perhaps. Even if he refuses to trust the peace to last, there's no excuse to waste it. Perhaps he'll even take the opportunity to give himself a few daylight shifts for a change. As much as he’s become accustomed to this schedule - coming to appreciate the peace of crisp, early mornings like this one while the city still sleeps - it’s been too long since he saw much of the sun that wasn’t in the act of rising or setting.
Sol probably won’t be very happy about it though. Lazy or not, there are times he seems almost as reluctant to be dragged from bed in daylight hours as the quarry they hunt...
Ky’s just about to follow that thought somewhere he would have found unsettling when he realises the sound of Sol’s footsteps has abruptly ceased. He looks up from his thoughts just in time to see Sol recover from whatever startled him and dash away down a side street as though all the hounds of hell are on his heels.
Ky curses himself and gives chase. It’s obvious what’s happened - Sol’s seen or heard something that he must have missed while lost in thought; there’s nothing rare about Sol running off without bothering to explain himself when he thinks he’s on to something. He calls after Sol once but isn’t surprised to hear no reply, and after that it’s all he can do to keep Sol in sight. So much for the rare reprieve of a quiet evening. He hadn't known Sol could move this fast - isn't sure he's ever seen anyone move this fast - and something genuinely uncomfortable settles in Ky's gut as he tries to imagine what could possibly spook Sol so badly.
He’s just starting to worry he’s lost Sol altogether when what had been little more than a narrow alley opens suddenly in front of him into a decent-sized plaza. Sol is standing only a handful of paces away from him, all his attention focused up and away, and when Ky follows his gaze it leads him a figure perched high and precariously up on a rooftop overlooking the plaza. The man - or not a man, there’s no way he could be human - stands out as little more than a shadow against the night sky, but Ky can just make out long hair, the folds of an outlandish leather outfit that hangs like a skirt around his waist, and a long-handled scythe held in one hand - presented almost; this creature wants them to know he’s dangerous. It’s ridiculously over-dramatic, even by vampire standards, and yet Ky cannot shake the fear that for once, the drama may not be unjustified.
Sol yells something that sounds like a name, hard syllables that register more in tone than in words, and Ky suddenly finds himself wondering whether this is the vampire Sol’s been hunting all along - the answer to everything he’s never dared ask about the obsession he so often sees in Sol’s eyes.
Despite the distance to the rooftop, the vampire's voice carries as if he was standing right next to them. “Well met, Corrupted One! I had wondered how long you’d take to find me out. So this is what you’ve come to, currying favour with lowly mortals?” There’s a glint of yellow eyes in the darkness as the vampire turns his attention to Ky, and he almost doesn't remember how to breathe until it leaves again. “Whatever will my mistress think of this?”
The vampire laughs, loud and grating, no care to spare for who might overhear it. Ky can’t see the look on Sol’s face, but for a terrible moment he’s not sure he wants to.
With an inhuman snarl and a noise like tearing fabric, Sol launches himself at the vampire. The next thing Ky knows they’re both on that rooftop - then gone again the next moment, the vampire fleeing away and Sol giving chase. It all happens so fast Ky is left staring dazedly after them in shock, convinced his eyes must be playing tricks on him. Surely he couldn’t have just seen Sol leap to the very top of that building in a single bound - not even a vampire could jump that far.
There’s no hope of following them the same way, so Ky has to give chase at ground level, keeping pace with the battle erupting on the rooftops above him largely by sound - the distinctive ring of the vampire's laughter and the roar of flame so hot that even from this far away he can feel the heat wash over him in waves. He’s never seen Sol like this before, rarely seen a vampire that could stand up to him for half this long, and he trembles to think how old this creature must be to have such power.
The sound of the battle is interrupted by an ear-splitting crash as both combatants come tumbling down from the sky as one, overbalanced while one had the other in a vice hold and leaving both too occupied to do anything to pull themselves out of the dive. They land in a small courtyard almost right in front of Ky, bare cobbles providing nothing to break their fall. There’s a terrible moment where Ky wonders whether Sol will get up again, but it’s over as soon as he sees Sol stagger to his feet, dazed and bruised but miraculously unbroken. The vampire does likewise - certainly not laughing any longer - and both take a few seconds to reorient themselves before the battle resumes.
The pause gives Ky the first clear look at Sol he’s had since the battle began, and what he sees all but stops his heart in his chest, worse than any of the horrors he’s seen or even half-imagined since this began.
Sol has wings - leathery and batlike - sprouting from his shoulders, the top of his uniform all but torn to shreds to accommodate them. His fingernails have grown into vicious claws and his eyes - unusual enough normally with their odd red/brown hue - glow in bright yellow and are slitted with catlike pupils. When his lips draw back into a silent snarl, Ky can see his incisors have sharpened into fangs.
Sol has become a vampire.
And not just any kind of vampire - Ky can count on one hand how many times he’s encountered a vampire powerful enough to endure this degree of transformation, from the humanoid to the beastial; and not all his fingers and toes could count the number of lives, Order and civilian alike, that were lost at the hands of each such creature before it could be subdued.
Even retreat to the comforting numbness of shock is denied to him - this is nothing he can pretend not to have seen before, time and again and never any easier for the horrible familiarity of it all. It's common, horribly common, for men of the Holy Order to be taken by the enemy and sent back as twisted monsters to torment their former comrades - or worse still, to mimic their human selves just long enough to strike where they can hurt the worst. Not all the security measures the Order has ever implemented succeed in catching every vampire-spy. It doesn't matter in the least how powerful Sol may have been as a human, doesn't make the slightest difference how many vampires he's fought and beaten; no-one is immune to the vampire's embrace. And it's not until now Ky has ever realised how completely he'd allow himself to forget that when it came to Sol.
All this time Ky has waived away so many of the rules Sol breaks as casually as breathing - all the times he used to sneak out to hunt alone, counter to every regulation ever enacted for the men's own safety, sneering brazenly at the ridiculous idea he might need backup for his own protection. Sol's been such a boon to their Order, such a scourge to the vampires of their city that Ky has fallen head-first into the trap of imagining him invincible. How could he not have seen this coming, when Ky should have known it was only a matter of time before everything that made Sol indispensable would be making him a target?
Ky doesn't know how this could have happened, doesn't know when, or how long Sol's been deceiving them, whether this is what the other vampire was alluding to or what he's even to make of the fight he's witnessing (yet another ridiculous political squabble between differing vampire clans?), but it's impossible not to feel so keenly it cuts him to the bone how much of this must be his fault.
He’s got no way of understanding any of it, not even any time to waste wondering. It’s more luck than he deserves just to have seen this before Sol turned on them (and how much more lucky Sol is so caught up in his fight he's forgotten Ky could be watching), and under all the disbelief, all the betrayal that's almost choking him from the inside, there's the part of him locked down hard enough to be unassailable that knows all too well there's only one way this can be allowed to end. All those years of Order training that saw him promoted to captain before his twentieth year, all would be for nothing if he hadn't long ago trained himself in how to shut down those parts of himself that want nothing more than to grieve, and to fight the battle in front of him. As hard as he may hope that neither of the combatants will survive the fight, even as the bile rises in his throat at the thought, Ky knows this may be the only opportunity he’ll ever get.
He can't know how long this thing in front of him has been pretending to be Sol, but there's only one possible way to honour the man Sol once was.
By now both vampires are flagging. There’s blood running down Sol’s face, and one of the other’s arms hangs useless at his side, broken so badly not even vampiric healing could mend it quickly, his scythe a much more ungainly weapon to wield one-handed. Yet the glare in his eyes suggests he is far from defeated, although it slips a little when he ducks too late under a blast of fire, blinded long enough for Sol to land a kick to his good arm, sending his weapon flying (and it's easier with every blow for Ky to convince himself how real this is - no human, not even Sol, fights the way that thing with Sol's face is fighting now). Opponent disarmed, Sol lunges for him head on only to find himself grappling with empty air as the other vampire dissolves in front of him like smoke. He reappears again next to his fallen scythe and staggers to his feet, but recovers to retrieve his weapon, glibly throw a mocking bow and vanish away into the night. Sol lets out another growl, spreads his wings and leaps after him.
That’s when Ky, knowing it’s now or never, shuts his eyes, raises his arms and throws every volt of lightning he can summon into Sol’s body.
Sol lets out a roar that turns into a scream, muscles seizing before he can do anything to break his fall, crashing back to the ground with a sound Ky can feel in his ribcage, and goes on feeling even as he throws everything he has - all the rage and betrayal and loss - into his magic until he’s got nothing left, praying with every fibre of his being that it’ll be enough - that he won’t have to see Sol get up again.
(When Sol does, frazzled so badly that tiny streams of smoke are rising from all over his body, there’s still one small, crazy part of him that feels relieved, and that might be when it dawns on Ky that even if he wins this he might not come away from it sane.)
The vampire with Sol's face staggers to its feet in stilted movements, muscles twitching in ugly spasms from the shock. Ky draws his sword and prays for the strength to make this quick.
“Damn you boy, what...?” the vampire coughs, still sounding so much like Sol that Ky can hardly bear it. There’s a look in the creature’s eyes that Ky won't for a moment let himself believe.
“Monster,” Ky hisses, not daring anything longer, biting down on what he really wants to ask - just how long he’d planned to go on deceiving before he turned on them all.
Sol lurches forward; Ky can see him recovering dangerously fast. “Fuck you, Ky, listen to me...”
He reaches for Ky, only a few feet left between them, but Ky shakes his head desperately and stabs forward with all his might, trusting to training and instinct that the blow will strike true. He doesn't even let himself hear the sound Sol makes when the blade goes straight through his body, embedded in the flesh almost to the hilt. Opens his eyes to see he’s missed his mark, the wound too low to be mortal, but too deep for any vampire to shrug off with ease. All he needs to do is twist the blade that bit further, Sol's heart is so very close...
Ky never makes that last thrust, because that's when he makes his mistake - he looks up, into Sol's face, catches his eyes and freezes. Because Sol's eyes aren't the yellow-gold of an unnatural monster anymore, they're the familiar, human eyes he's looked into so many times before, and suddenly it hits him hard enough to knock the wind out of him: it's Sol he's about to kill. Sol, who for all his failings is the greatest ally the Order has ever had, who's saved Ky’s own life probably more times than he knows - who's mere presence has made Ky feel safer than anyone in his job has any right to ever feel. This is the same man he's an inch away from murdering in cold blood oh god what has he done...
He's still frozen when he hears the sound of his sword clattering to the ground after being wrenched free, and the inhuman snarl that leaves Sol’s lips before he pins Ky back against the wall behind him with all his weight.
The last thought that goes through Ky's mind is how utterly he's failed - himself, Sol, the Order, everyone - before Sol's fangs sink deep into his neck.
Yes, the next part is in progress - practically finished, in fact. Will be sure not to leave people hanging so long this time. ^^;