paradisalogs | To be endlessly cold within...

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To be endlessly cold within...

Who: Vicious and Gren
What: Post-virus fall out.
When: Evening
Where: Gren's apartment in town.
Rating: R, for mentions of drug use and possible bad language.

Things had not been going well for Vicious in the wake of virus that had swept through the castle. Fights had left him injured--and for a time, totally unmindful of said injuries--and more than a little drained. Worse than that, however, was the conflicted emotions that came with it all. He hated the idea of being manipulated or controlled, but at the same time, the virus had given him a sense of purpose, something he had not had since coming to this place.

He didn't like it, and he didn't want to sort through it. Thankfully, the castle was as willing as ever to offer him his preferred distraction, all packaged up in a little glass vial.

The Red Eye heightened everything, but it killed the distracting thoughts in his head. It freed him from the things he didn't want to think about, and offered up other possibilities.

Which was how he eventually wound up at the door to Gren's apartment in town, banging on the door with his good arm, completely heedless of neighbors, the time of night, his own somewhat disheveled appearance, or whether Gren was even likely to be there at all.

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Gren heard the banging all the way from his bedroom. It was far too late for any casual visitors, not that he ever really had any visitors to speak of. There was the possibility that one of his new clients, or a disapproving party, might have tracked him down. Not exactly the way he wanted to end the evening.

He threw a jacket on over his shirt, since he'd been ready for bed and had his chest unbound, then headed out to the living room. By the time he reached the front door he could make out the faint sounds of people shouting and dogs barking over the harsh knocking.

Frowning, he readied his pistol and cracked the door.

"Vicious? What the hell are you doing?"

The neighborhood certainly wasn't happy with his method of getting Gren's attention, but Vicious hadn't noticed, which was probably best for everyone involved. There was a brief moment, after the door opened, when he seemed as if he were going to try and knock again anyway, but then dropped his arm and looked at Gren as if he'd just asked something profoundly dumb, and not a totally rational question, given the circumstances.

"Looking for you."

Which he had succeeded in doing. Mission accomplished, so far as his very altered mental state was concerned.

"Well, you found me," he said, giving the other man a slightly perplexed frown. For the second time this week there was something odd about the way Vicious was acting.

"Come in, then, before somebody calls the police."

He backed up and opened the door wider to let Vicious pass. Maybe he should get a duplicate key made, if this was going to become a habit. Not that he objected to Vicious coming to find him for once (something that gave him a tiny exultant thrill), but maybe less with the disturbing the peace.

With the mood he was in, Vicious almost would have welcomed the police showing up. It would have been entertaining. But it also would have been messy, and that wasn't something he was interested in dealing with.

He stepped into the apartment, talking quick, almost paranoid stock of the place, but it seemed Gren really was the only person there. Who else would have been, he didn't know, but he wasn't feeling overly burdened by logical thinking at the moment.

When he saw the gun in Gren's hand, an amused smirk slid on to his face. "Were you planning on shooting me?"

Gren scoffed lightly at that, and ran fingers through his hair in mild exasperation. "Planning to, no."

He walked away and set the gun pistol down on the counter with a light but audible thunk.

"But I didn't exactly know it was you, since it's my door you're in the habit of beating down in the middle of the night."

"It got your attention."

Which was all he really cared about. Of course, he hadn't put much thought into what he was going to do once he did track Gren down. He was acting all on impulse now, something he found almost impossible to do without the Red Eye to free him from the usual cage of his own thoughts.

You always had my attention, Gren thinks. Vicious never really had to do much to accomplish that. Just be his usual cold distant self. And Gren would always be there, like a moth striving for the moon.

It worried him a little that this wasn't quite the Vicious he knew. Nor was it the feral, wrathful version that had pulled a knife on him not long ago. But he couldn't put his finger on what it was, just yet.

"Right. So what do you need me for?"

He shut down the concern from his voice. Vicious never seemed to want that from him.

He looked from Gren, and then around the room again, almost as if he hadn't already seen the inside of this apartment before. He had, of course, but his focus wasn't what it normally was... or rather, while it seemed normal to him, it was all just a trick of the drug and the way it seemed to stretch the moments out far longer than they lasted in reality.

He shifted focus again, walked over to the gun and looked down at it, though he didn't move to pick it up. "I wanted to see if you'd really answer."

Always testing. Always looking to see where the edges of Gren's devotion to him lay. It was less calculated a challenge, this time around.

What did he need Gren for? It was something worth contemplating, but his current state wouldn't allow it.

He glanced at the gun for a moment, wondering if he should move it away and deciding against it. Better not to give Vicious another reason to doubt his loyalty to him.

Instead he frowns and reaches out to grab his comrade by the shoulder, shifting Vicious to face him. Now that he was closer, he could make out the bruises, the drawn and weary look on an already haggard visage, and the slightly unfocused look in his eyes that said more than anything else could.

"Of course I would. Just because you can be a bastard sometimes doesn't mean I won't come if you call me."

He wasn't too fond of Gren grabbing him, but his annoyance was offset by that answer, which amused him more than it might have, otherwise. People tended not to be that brutally honest with him, unless they had a death wish. Coming from Gren, it was almost endearing.

And then he was distracted again, close enough to Gren to actually notice that he'd apparently caught him on his way to bed. A crooked smirk of a smile slid across his face. "I'm not keeping you up, am I?"

Gren glanced down, then self-consciously tugged the jacket closed and crossed his arms. Never mind that Vicious had certainly seen far more than this when they'd been in the shower, but he tried not to think too hard about that moment, for reasons that went beyond simple embarrassment.

"Losing sleep over you is nothing new," he said bitterly, not sure if Vicious would even bother to note that, especially in his current state.

"It's not my sleeping habits you should worry about. What about you? When did you last sleep? Because, frankly, you look terrible."

Whether he noted the bitterness or not was likely hard to tell, because the same semi-amused look stayed on his face. Even if he had been more himself, he likely wouldn't have cared--it wasn't as if he concerned himself overly with how his behavior affected anyone else.

There was a half-shrug in response to that question, a gesture far more casual than he usually would have allowed himself. "It doesn't matter." And he didn't remember anyway. Of course, if he didn't remember, than it really couldn't be that important, could it?

He frowned. When was Vicious going to figure out that it did. Never mind that he didn't seem to want to do it for himself. Gren cared. It hurt to watch his comrade fall apart - and especially not knowing exactly why.

"It does matter. You're stronger than this. And I don't mean staying awake forever because you can. I tried that once. It drove me crazy. I don't care how far removed from human needs you think you are."

Gren narrowed his eyes, as if sighting in on an idea.

"Is that why? That the castle made you feel something? Proved you're not immune to it?"

The smirk fell off his face at that, amusement turning very quickly into annoyance. "No."

He didn't pretend he was immune, per se, but it was true he did not care for the castle's crass manipulation of the few feelings he did allow himself.

He was supposed to be in control, even when, like now, he chose not to be. He didn't have to be stronger, in his opinion, because he already was. He controlled this, not the other way around. He reached out to catch hold of Gren's chin with one hand. "We're nothing alike."

Gren's failings were just that, so far as he was concerned. That experience reflected nothing on his own.

There was a moment of surprise and an uncontrolled shutter. Vicious had to know what he was doing by now, when he touched him like that, whether or not there was anything behind it. And maybe he was right. That control he saw as unobtainable was exactly the thing that made the man attractive. Even blurred as it was right now, he had a momentary urge to kiss him again.

Instead, he smiled and reached up to curled a hand around Vicious' wrist to tug it away.

"Maybe that's what makes this work..." His eyes strayed down to the man's arm and his expression immediately resumed his earlier frown, "--are you bleeding?"

It would have been impossible not to know, and Gren's reaction almost made him smile again with the feeling of control it gave him. It was why this worked, why he had decided it would be imprudent to discard Gren again, as he had in the past.

The question distracted him from those thoughts, however, causing him to look down as well. "So it seems." He was unconcerned, more annoyed by the distraction than anything else. He couldn't feel it, and it seemed like an issue that did not particularly involve him at all. It was certainly his blood, but it just didn't seem important.

So he could probably add bathing to the other things he suspected Vicious hadn't done in the last couple of days. He suddenly remembered the man had been injured the last time they met and wondered just how old these were and if Spike was involved. Whether or not he could blame Spike this time remained to be seen.

He shook his head. "Take off your shirt," he said, and tugged at it for emphasis.

Vicious was not the sort to take orders--not in situations like this, at any rate--but this one amused him enough that he complied anyway, stepping away from Gren enough to unbutton the shirt and drop it on Gren's floor.

"Happy?" The smirk on his face was quite intentional.

The bruises had started to fade a little against the pallor of his skin, but they were still there in a multitude, along with the gauze taped over the right side of his ribs and along his left upper arm. He'd changed them since he'd been injured, but it hadn't been particularly recently.

His cheeks colored a bit, though he managed a slight roll of his eyes at the comment.

"Extremely," he answered flippantly, reaching out to lightly run his fingers along the edge of the bandage on Vicious' ribs and reminding himself to keep breathing. Honestly he hadn't felt like this in years. After Titan, real desire had been nothing more than a memory.

"There's hope for you yet, I see. These could use some changing, though, in the very least. I should have some in the bathroom."

Gren turned to head that way, wondering just how Vicious could play him even when he was only half functional.

He stayed perfectly still under that examination, but kept his eyes on Gren as he did so. It was entertaining to watch that subtle play of emotion across Gren's face, to see the sort of effect he had on him, without even putting much effort into it.

"Should I take that as a compliment?"

He followed along behind Gren for a ways before losing interest and simply leaning against the nearest wall instead.

"If you want," he answered as he exited with first aid kit in hand, not bothering to ask exactly which statement Vicious was referring to.

The look on his face was halfway between exasperation and contemplating pinning him to that wall. He settled for ripping the bandages off with a smirk.

That got a faint twitch out of him--the high was starting to wear down a little, and he actually felt it--but it didn't last for long before the corner of his mouth quirked up again.

"Right to business?"

He was absolutely not above needling him a little, especially in his current frame of mind.

Gren gave him a wry smirk in return.

"Should I have offered you a drink first?"

He ducked back into the other room and returned a few moments later with a washcloth soaked in warm water. Compared to how rough he'd been earlier, he's far more gentle about cleaning the wounds. It was important to see just how severe they were. It was unlikely they were too severe, if he'd gone this long without actual medical attention. The hole in the arm was his biggest concern. Best to make sure there wasn't still a bullet in there. And it was a welcome distraction from his other less than clinical thoughts.

"It might have been a start."

The wound on his arm was the worse of the two, but neither were particularly life-threatening, and he'd certainly had far worse in the past. No one got through a life in the syndicate unscathed, regardless of how good you were at it. And even as high as he still was, he couldn't quite pretend Gren's efforts at patching him up didn't hurt, though the only indication to that he let slip was the way his jaw tensed in an effort to remain stoic about it.

"Hm. Drinks after taking off clothes? I think we're doing this backwards," he couldn't help but say, though he carefully did not look up from his task. So much for clinical thoughts.

"I didn't think you were the type to follow convention," he replied, smirking despite the discomfort as Gren tended to his injuries. "Are you planning to start now?"

"You're right. I don't."

He smiled. A trace of that darker expression Vicious had glimpsed the first time they spoke here. His head tilted, hovering close to Vicious' as if considering kissing him again. But, no, he wouldn't. Not yet. He'd already made the decision that Vicious would have to be the one to open that particular door, and Vicious wasn't exactly in the state to fully consent to anything. As tempting as that might have been.

Gren reached for the kit again and pulled out the fresh bandages.

"You'll get your drink when I'm done."

If he were in any state to, Vicious might have admired that restraint. As things stood, however, he simply settled for watching Gren work with a kind of detached interest.

"How generous of you."

The drugs were starting to wear off, but he really had no desire to slip back into the realm of reality quite yet. Of course, there was still enough Red Eye left in the vial in his pocket to keep him from having to face that for a long while, yet.

"I'm a very giving person, you know that..."

A little more carefully than he was at the beginning, he applied the gauze and tape to the wounds. He wondered, if it would always be this way, no matter where their relationship ended. Him standing by to put Vicious back together. Or if that bothered him at all. He couldn't answer that for sure.

He made a vague noise of acknowledgement at that, but his thoughts were betraying the careful distraction he'd laid down for himself, reminding him of all the other times he'd been in this routine, trying to conjure the memory of a ghost he had done his best to banish. He didn't need those memories, anyway. They weren't worth anything, anymore.

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