Little Lamb

by baggybitemejeans

Summary:

"We all have something we want, Jay."
"I want you dead."
"There's always suffering before a death. Can you take it?"

The one where the world as Jay knows it, is in a crisis. The world is overrun with ferals, mindless, notorious beings that stalk the cities and crawl into small villages. They're a threat, a large one at that, and Jay---Well, Jay doesn't give a shit. One would reckon that he should. That he's human and as un-presented as he is on top of that, there were many reasons to be worried.

Thing is, no one's ever given him a reason to be worried. He's him. That is, until he reaches the Academy, an infamous school known for graduating full packs: werewolves, vampires, magics---whatever, all in the efforts of depleting the feral population. They want hunters, trained killers, and Jay plans on coming out as just that. Alone; A pack all in himself.

In hindsight, maybe this is truly where he should've started to worry.

Chapter 1: Chapter 1

Strands of tainted linen frayed off from his blanket of hair; seemingly as a flower reaching for the sun at dawn, the strands poked from the bushes of his crown and reached out towards the window his head laid just below. There was really only so much he could do about those attention-seekers: one bad bleach session, followed by frantic silver-blue dye, and a random hair essence that shouldn’t have soaped in his hair had led to their uprise today: fine hairs at his crown that believe the window is the Romeo to their Juliette. Ignoring their love affair has since become innate as Jay tilted his head up to look out the window.

There had been nothing of interest for hours. The wonders of the city, though not as populated as they once were, faded with every turn of the wheel. Jay wouldn’t say he was necessarily missing it, but as he stared life into the upcoming lone stick on the road, he had to admit that things had been less boring.

Or, at least, he wasn’t sitting in anticipation to see which way the wishbone shaped stick would break once they drove over it. Yes, they; Jay really doesn’t want to talk about it.

His chauffeur — if one could call him such — wasn’t an asshole in the traditional sense, but he wasn’t —he really wasn’t anything, honestly. Jay doesn’t know; the man had been looming when Jay had first seen him. He stood outside the slim limousine with gloved hands that clasped just below his stomach, staring ahead of Jay even when he stood within distance to introduce himself.

To say the least, Jay had been promptly ignored; the thin, outwardly elegant man, with shampoo commercial pale hair only glanced upon his crown before turning on his toe. Jay was left to the rest: packing the trunk with his stuff and shaking his own hand back. He had said nothing since, not even to Patrol as they exited the city.

Everything was deadly still and deadly quiet; one could argue even more so than the chauffeur.

Even the sky competed with him for the most dead and draining. Clouds muddled the sky and withheld every last drop of color that could dare paint Jay’s eyes. The only light that pulsed through the barrier of clouds casted the world in a sick blue. Admittedly, Jay had thought it was the effect of the window at first: reasoning that the academy who sent the limousine was so into the color blue that they had it inked into the windows to be obnoxiously suffocating with the blue-black of the car and the silver seals on its front insignia.

Unfortunately, the world beyond these four doors remained sick despite the heavy tint; villages below the hill in which they drove were abandoned and rotting. The trees that should be in peak form for Fall shook in the wind and splintered before its leaves could even depart.

Alas, the world seemed dead and his chauffeur, drought of all manners as he is, was plump and colorless only in hair. How fair for the dead walking to be the only sources of life; their limbs, the tree trunks and their reddened tongues the juice of ripe fruits. Jay distantly began to wonder how the massacre against vampires was going.

The car jostled, fucking up Jay’s shoulder and his angle of the stick and sooner than expected - -– one would question the sudden speeding of the car -–  all Jay was able to do was feel the stick break under his ass before they turned. He couldn’t even see what came of the stick if he tried. Jay’s lips folded into a thin line at the event; one churlish glance reserved only for the driver.

It couldn’t have been going well, he surmised.

Closing his eyes to dampen the eye roll that he surely was about to inflict, Jay straightened up in his seat. He felt the car’s wide turn and when he arrested to look again, they had rounded the hill and were encroaching on the outskirts of a town. Old and as country-custom, there was a wooden welcome sign: poorly kept with a torn bed sheet laid across it. Curious as he was, his hand instinctively sought to roll down the window; It whimpered upon its release and Jay leaned in while it slowly sank; His nose skirting along the glass.

“What?” his voice barely competed with the sound of smooth rolling tires. 

The bed sheet was hung so loosely off the sign that if this town’s wind was anything beyond a soft exhale, it would have fallen right off; that is to say that Jay was having a hard time making out any words that seemed to be written on it. There, between the folds, the words Jay was trying to piece together crumpled into one another; They beckoned him to come closer, to —

“Shit!”

Jay ricocheted back into the middle of the seat, clutching the ache that spread through his nose; it took mere seconds before his blood started to sing to the same beat of his heart. “What the fuck was that?!”, he cursed as his only free hand squeezed and balanced himself around the thick flesh of the cushioned backseat.

The chauffeur didn’t refuse to meet his heated gaze – No, more like he simply hadn’t given a shit to try.

“The windows stay closed.”

Jay clung harder to the seat, all anger and embarrassment coursing through him at an adrenaline spiking rate. This fucker just closed the window on his fucking face! He could of knocked off his fucking nose!

Sick fucking bastard probably would’ve enjoyed it too.

The all suffering sigh carries out from his chest as Jay lifts his index and forefinger to pinch at the bridge of his nose; He pulls in deep breaths, the cool mint of the car refresher coating his senses and icing out any heat he so wishes to set a blaze. He calls upon the manners and composure his mother had always taught him. 

Thus, he diplomatically proceeds, “Was that really necess—”

The partition starts rolling up.

And the procession is slow; stuttered. Purposeful in that he wanted Jay to see the pure, unfiltered satisfaction leak from his shoulders, the relieved squeeze of the wheel. Unadulterated warmth spreads through his chest, thawing the ice in his hands, melting the icicles that sewed Jay’s lips together like string; they part and it's like the mere sound of its wakening catches the chauffeur's attention, like he heard it, maybe he did.

He stares at Jay through the rear view mirror and his eyes flash a pale silver: nothing but mirth. Then, it’s closed. The partition sealed shut with a sharp snap.

Another wave of mint decorates the walls of Jay’s lungs and he lets it sit there: stewing and undisturbed. His shoe soars through the air. Who knows how, don’t ask, but the loud smack radiates to his ears as it hits the partition; right in the middle, beautifully accurate to where Jay intended to throw it.

 

His next exhale is one of minty warmth.

 

It takes all of two minutes for Jay to realize that they have stopped; embarrassing, really considering what he does for a living and what he’s about to get himself into. You’d think he’d be more adept, and he was: typically. But no matter, Jay tears his gaze away from the partition – no he wasn’t glaring at it the whole time — and out the accursed window.

They had stopped right in front of the village center; old and decrepit with dirt pathways moistened into mud from the day’s wet. Short houses strewn about with no particular layout; unlike the city that was almost cookie-cuttered in plan, this village, who most likely built their own houses, didn’t seem to care if their house cut off a path. It was a sort of neutral chaos; abiding only by one rule: avoid blocking the middle of town, of which was marked by a stone well,

In Jay’s opinion, probably the most sturdy structure out of everything.

Each house though all mucked and deteriorating kept its nuances: some had spired roofs and stone exteriors, others compact hay roofs that by now were frayed and patchy from the elements. The town though small – he could probably walk through the whole thing in under 10 minutes – also served as a marketplace seeing as some houses had built in wooden roofs that hung off the side of the house: most likely a renovation made to shelter their goods during bad weather. Besides, there were also many wooden tables, crooked from having a leg or two sunk into the mud, that lined the sides of the middle of town; they acted as defining barriers.

Jay could only begin to imagine how tranquil and routine life here would have been; how colorful their harvests of grains and fruits would have been; the ease of trade between neighbors: chatty and reliable. Now, it was nothing more than a ghost town: empty and void, a weakened reflection of what it once was. A home that no longer looked like home; homesickness that plagued no matter the distance.

Even if you were standing right in it: Jay knew the feeling; how everything he knew felt wrong: the floorboards he’s dragged himself across in the mornings, the railings he’s clung to more than a few times after hunts. This was his home; that was the couch where his mother first taught him guitar; those stairs were the same ones he coaxed his mother down when she was too scared to come out her room.

He knows every part of this house; he knows the hallway he sat in for hours with his back against his mother’s door, playing his guitar for what felt like hours. Talking never worked when she got like that so he kept playing for her; playing; playing; the notes speaking to her better than Jay’s voice ever could. He played everything he knew then played beyond: learning for her ears in real time. He’d keep playing until she opened the door for him, and even still, he played on; settling on the first song she’s ever taught him: a lullaby.

In the end, her eyes would clear and the last of warm tears would fall from her eyes; she’d finally look at him and not a single word would pass between them for the rest of the day; his mother saw him and that’s all he knew she needed. All of this played in his mind as if it had been that morning.

His mother was still there when he reached the house; even then, she still only looked at him. Even when Jay had to catch his balance in the doorway, his knees weakened under the perversity of his home.

Everything was wrong. Everything in him screamed a parallel universe. But, his mother, she looked at him how she always did: he was her peace. And so, he had reasoned: he could brave anything, even the most foreign as long as she never looked away. Jay remembers how quickly he rushed in; how quickly his first step had altered everything he thought he knew about his mom.

She looked at him still and she wanted him to leave: now.

Jay tore his eyes away from the crumbling village, hands coming down to smooth at his knees as the wetness from eyes was thoroughly blinked. When he became more managed, in a caress, he let a hand run along the back of his silver-blue hair – ironic, he knows, shut up.

“So why did we stop?” he questioned softly while leaning towards the partition. He let the low purring of the engine calm his mind, pushing his feet further down onto the car so he could feel its faint vibration along his soles; he let it ground him, or at least, he tried.

Jay’s eyes flicked up to look at the small window when nothing reached his ears in reply; not even a breath. Silent treatment: the most mature method in the book. With a cut off laugh, Jay slumped back into the seats, the cushion pillowing against his shoulder blades; he rested, arms fitting around his pelvis and laying on his thighs.

Fine, Jay can do silence; he didn’t think of himself as much of a yapper anyway. Thirty seconds passes; a minute; two, and Jay’s beginning to seriously think of ways to break a partition when a huff resonates in his ears: irritation. Then, a harsh rapping sounds against the driver’s side window and Jay can viscerally feel the stick being poked into his dying flames; the fucking audacity.

“Oh, am I allowed to open the window now, Loreal?” Jay scoffs, “you know just bec—” Another rap against the window, purposely louder, completely disregards the fact that Jay was still fucking talking!

“Are you dead – fucking – ass?”

A hiss snips through the car, rattling Jay’s ear drums at its uncanny, almost sizzling quality; Jay doesn’t give a shit though, instead allows for the small victory to lift a smile onto his face. It’s truly the little things in life after all; especially, when the world has been suffering at the blood lust of feral werewolves.

 

Tch.

 

Jay’s eyebrows jump at the noise, full bodily turning to the right. The door unlocked.

He’s truly no better than the monkey: curious Jay tucks his hand into the hovel behind the door handle, and pushes the door open. He was half expecting it to close right back on him, but it doesn’t; it stays open no matter how long Jay lets it sit there, and trust him he lets it sit. So he’s supposed to get out here then, is that it?

It sure didn’t look like the prestigious, invite and recommendation only Academy that everyone back at his old camp salivated for. It didn’t even look like anyone lived here, let alone could. However, as he stared at the door hinges, his body reminded him of how they’ve been on the road for hours, and he was only allowed out at certain pit-stops to pee.

So, of course, without further thought and after having done his testing thoroughly, Jay gladly stepped out onto the dirt path. All it takes is his right foot stepping out and lifting himself out for Jay to start feeling the blood pumping back to his ass and legs again.

“Uh, yes” he groaned; all sorts of places popping with relief. He didn’t even know some of those parts could even pop, fuck. He’s never been cooped up in a car for so long before; his longest record holding to 30 minutes in the back of a trunk while hiding from a pack of ferals. Jay’s still blessed to this day that he doesn’t have a scent or really any pheromones; things would have ended much differently then.

Sidestepping the door, Jay intends to go to the trunk and receive his bags, but upon said step, his left foot exits from the clean, vacuumed interior and spectacularly sinks into the wet earth.

His shoe…it was still—Jay grimly looked back into the car; he never did put it back on. As Jay attempts to inspect the damage, his lips curl down at the roiling image of the dirt having messed up the top of his sock as well. “I just washed these.” It's reasonable enough to be upset, the city having lost its power and electricity to the epidemic caused limited ways to wash clothes; it often took hours to find water, boil it, and then wash it by hand with Dove Sensitive.

Besides, Jay never had all the time he wanted; he had to hunt; he had to scavenge, for how meticulous Jay was about his cleaning, he only could devote a day or two to fully wash everything. His socks only lasting 24 hours pissed him off. Turning his foot down, he blindly reached to the side of himself to pull the door open fully.

His scowl only deepened when he found himself swiping at air. It was unnecessary to glance around; Jay knows, but he does it anyway because that shit was embarrassing and even if they are in the middle of fucking nowhere, he needs to know no one saw anyway.

 

Tch.

 

Everything in Jay’s body stills except for his heartbeat out of pure duty. 

Fuck no. Quick movement from his peripheral gets his eyes growing to saucers, and Jay forces himself to whip around and grab at the rapidly closing door. That fucker! 

Despite, the strength Jay puts into his grip and the socked foot he has propped up against the car, the door snaps shut anyway, and then he’s stuck there watching a dumb look overtake his face in the window, and not only witnessing but feeling through his foot on the car, his shoe jostle inside to the far left from the force.

By the time he hears a car horn sound off from across the village, Jay was already making his way around the trunk to the driver’s side of the car. Pausing in his track momentarily, he looks for the source: on the other side of the village, to be exact, is what looks like the same limousine: darkly tinted windows, glossy, silver insignia, however, distinctively no mud print of Jay’s foot on the door.

Jay contemplates between both cars; a trade off, perhaps? What the fuck was actually going on?

Taking in a breath, Jay rolls his shoulders and rounds back towards the trunk to get his belongings. However, surprise, surprise, it didn’t open. True to his heart, Jay was going to kill whoever that man was if he didn’t get his shit back by the end of all of this; he swears on it; he doesn’t give a shit about the low vampire population.

Stalking away from the car, Jay heads out into the heart of the village. His pace gradually slowed as he fully took everything in; he could see just how much of the village was still frozen in time. The leaflets that were dropped to encourage residents to evacuate were still flown about the area; some still held the footprint of those who trampled over them.

Still though, something kept eating at him. What point was there in having him walk through the village just to get into another limousine? A fucked up history lesson?

It was getting darker now, that or the clouds knitted themselves further together, and he was maybe a couple feet away from the well that marked the middle of the village when he felt the spray of soft mist settle around his ears and coast along his neck. A small shiver coursed through him as the sensation quickly coursed around his body.

Jay looked up to see a dense fog starting to lower onto the town and another sigh escaped him. He should’ve worn a jacket this morning. Then, he wouldn’t be out here in only a fitted white tank and jeans he stole from the Prada in the mall, with a one shoe and muddied sock to keep him warm; Granted, the sock wasn’t his fault.

Jay sucks his teeth at the situation and continues to the car, but as quickly as he began he freezes to a halt.

 

Footstep.

 

It was only for a split second and the jostling of his rings when fixing his belt had nullified most of the sound, but it was there; it was heavy .

 Jay skinned through every corner, every building, his eyes sinking into each opening and crevice like a knife to open flesh. He wasn’t naive enough to believe it to be his driver; vampires were too light on their feet to make a sound with so much depth and weight. Hell, some preferred wearing heeled shoes when wanting to make an entrance.

To put it simply, besides a vampire, there were still too many options that it could be. Many creatures, feral or not, found Jay threatening: a variable that acts against the conformity of society. He wasn’t human, nor was he of magic; he was unpresented as well, which made him not wolf either. He was the closest thing there probably was to a human nowadays and he wasn’t only surviving, but he was killing ferals without all the enhanced senses and abilities characteristic to other species.

There were many reactions to him: pity, wannabe “saviors”, jealousy, but most commonly they were guarded, wary. All eyes were on him: at all times.

Jay pulled his hands behind him and grasped the familiar edges of his jeweled Mughal daggers; a pretty set of fraternal twin blades: the left was a curved, white jade hilt with intricate silver pattering that hooked around palm slightly before straightening and thinning out into an off-set dagger, the second was much the same, but with a true jade hilt instead.

They were scared because they couldn’t sense what he was feeling; they couldn’t predict who’d he save or who’d he kill because he belonged to no group, nor no pack; he shared no loyalty and truly had no desire for community unless it was beneficial.

Jay clicked both daggers out of their blood-red sheaths, being mindful to keep his shoulders and knees set but not tensed; Fluidity within the unknown was always the better option.

He scared them as much as he worried them.

A growl like ice shredding in a blender snapped at his ear drums; the chorused beating sounding in his chest; up top; to the house on the right; there, on the rooftop. A fully grown wolf prowled. Long, ragged scars dragged along its mange and freshly pitted skin shone in Jay’s eyes like a pretty mine of rubies. An injured wolf wasn’t anything Jay couldn’t handle. He watched as it jumped off the rooftop, the unclenching of its claws sending down a confetti of hay onto Jay.

“Thank you, but my birthday’s in April,” Jay joked, rushing towards it; his left arm fixed perpendicular to his chest, allowing his white dagger’s curve to shield his neck; his right arm stooped low, albeit slightly extended backwards past his hip. Jay made sure he was right there when the animal landed; his feet already shifted his weight for the plunge as soon as its paws tapped the ground.

Jay sliced his white jade along its jugular, thrusting his green jade in an uppercut into the wolf’s chest; aimed for the heart. Jay always preferred to keep his cuts clean and targeted; he didn’t see the good in dragging deaths out. Ferals were once coherent, functioning werewolves just as most of the population that presented wolves; there was certainly no need for Jay to treat them as less than without reason. He had to kill them, else they would kill him or others, but even so he’d try to do it as peacefully and as fast as possible.

Hand dug far into the wolf’s chest, its fur blanketing it with scratchy warmth, Jay began to turn his Green Jade towards its heart: his puncture site having been a couple inches off. Jay made eye contact with the feral; he was male, that much Jay could tell from when it jumped above him, but there was a patch of white fur just above its eyelid; it was familiar.

“Fuck!”, Jay screamed as he was sent flying back towards the stone well. His momentary lapse had dulled the pain from his daggers enough for feral to throw a desperate swipe at him.

He landed harshly, the momentum of the hit still sending him rolling closer towards the well. The cut wasn’t deep: the move was more of a distancing tactic than a fatal hit, but the pressure from the hit along with the budding red tracks left on his mid-chest to stomach from the claws were searing. 

“Uugh,” Jay grunted as he rolled away from the stone well right behind him; he only narrowly avoided the collision.

His jaw ticked as he could feel more than dirt, but less than mud, that now slept on his skin, sunk into a coma on his white tank, and straight up died in his sock. Jay quickly lifted himself up and back on his two feet, holding the feral’s gaze all the while. Reaching behind him, he slowly slid White and Green back into their sheaths; they wouldn’t suffice anymore.

This feral wolf, he knew it, or at least, he knew of it. It wasn’t a personal connection, by any means.

It was winter and Jay had been tasked with a supply run for his camp; he’d been out for maybe ten minutes: checking stores, gathering medicine, ramen – an added item, but on the list nonetheless – and other essentials when he had heard a sharp yelp. Initially, Jay wasn’t all that moved by it, opting to make a decision on Fun-Dip or a Tootsie Pop, instead. However, his mental pros and cons list was torn from his mind when caught sight of a pup pushing at the corner store’s entrance, clearly trying to come in.

Now, Jay wasn’t familiar with anything that wasn’t how to kill a wolf; his life didn’t require the need to know anything else. But, the pup, if size was anything to go by, couldn’t have been older than sixteen, which he did know was weird. Pups at that age usually knew how to shift. Jay’s hand immediately unsheathed Green and walked towards the door.

Placing his left hand on the handle, he heard the pup’s whimper through the door; it didn’t look feral, just scared. He let the pup in after brief consideration and long story short, the pup had been being hunted by his own mother: a feral.

Jay couldn’t let her roam regardless, so he stepped out with all intentions to put her to rest. A mother should never have to see their child die, especially not by their own hands, whether she was aware or not. It was right before her body settled, all life bleeding from her that Jay noticed the rounded belly and swollen nipples.

He remembered how hard it was to draw in his next breath, the abilities for his lungs to expand stunted as he peered on. Ferals couldn’t mate; they only murdered and left nothing but wreckage: this was not a behavior ever exhibited. Needless to say, that moment had fucked up his day and he spent the rest of it trudging to the hospital on the far end of the city to read up on every article or piece of information he could find.

Ferals were not only those who caught the sick, but also included the ones who lost themselves to rage, depression, or such inescapable pain that their body’s felt the only way to protect them was to drop their consciousness.

Even to this day, Jay wouldn’t be able to predict what really happened to her. Only that she must’ve undergone something traumatic and couldn’t handle having to protect her pup from this new world, but also the however many that were waiting and still growing.

It's unfortunate that something she may have feared, then became her as she hunted her very own. But Jay also couldn’t say for sure that this feral was the woman’s catalyst; he only knew that the pup he inadvertently saved, the pup that followed him all the way to the hospital and back had the same exact patch over his eye too.

That was two years ago now, if the pup was still alive they’d be eighteen: nowhere near the size of the full-grown adult ahead of him. Therefore, he switched knives.

He never got to use these ones much.

Jay leaned down and snatched the two small, thick, black Jade daggers from his holders in his right shoe. He squeezed the daggers in his palms; it truly has been so long.

His Green Jade stood for abundance and prosperity; White Jade was for emotional healing and calmness; Black Jade was for protection and warding off negative energy.

“It's about to get real fucking sticky”, Jay grumbled.

The feral matched his velocity and when it lunged, its head angled down to gnash at Jay’s neck. But Jay was ready and he jumped down into the slippery mud at such an angle that allowed him to use the warning leaflets as a make-shift slide. This angle, along with the momentum and extra slip from the paper and mud, let Jay smoothly slide under the beast.

His hair ghosted along its upper chest before he took both daggers, jagged in design, and plunged them deep into the wolf’s lower chest. Using the slide, Jay summoned all his strength to drag both daggers straight down and through its stomach. Landing on his back, Jay watched as the feral fell just above his head, trapping both his hands that were still wrapped around the knives under the wolf.

Jay drew in a deep breath and engaged his core; rotating them like rotisserie hot dogs before gouging his knives the rest of the way, tearing apart its privates. Blood splattered up his neck and around the sides of his cheek and ears; his arms thickly coated already from the initial incisions.

Now with the wolf dead and Jay officially wearing out with his own blood dribbling along his stomach, he took this moment to fully breathe. Half heartedly working out the daggers and brushing the bloody excess on whatever fur was left on the wolf. Then, in the next minute Jay stood up, knees cracking when he reached his full height. The wolf had seized all breathing by now and laid belly up and split down the middle, blood and mud mixing into a maroon-ish kind of clay.

With a small flinch Jay bent down slightly to put his black jades back in place and proceeded, quickly finishing the rest of the walk to the other limousine. He had ended everything just in time; it was getting darker now and the fog started to settle into the town, thick white ghost cotton flirting at the top of his head.

As Jay approached, the window jerked a couple inches and a pale hand stuck its way out the top; curled, the thumb jutted him in the direction of the trunk. It was questionable yes, but Jay was too tired to give a shit so he walked to the back and opened the trunk.

A rag, a change of clothes, and a chocolate chip cookie with a little note attached that read: for the blood loss.

Jay rolled his eyes and grabbed the rag and clothes, heading back to the well. Walking around the bloody pool, he got naked, absentmindedly throwing his tattered clothes on to the corpse. He could feel himself tensing all over as the fog misted his skin way before he even got to the well’s edge to start wiping down. Dipping the rag into the water, his lips melded together as each cold swipe along his skin sprouted goosebumps.

Peering up at the sky, there was still no way of telling if the moon had joined the watch party, but Jay could only presume from rapidly dropping temperatures that it would be night very soon.

Whatever the case, Jay elected to make this as quick as possible; the longer he stood out here, the colder it got. Not to mention, Jay’s abs kept tensing upon each cold shot, which only seemed to further irritate his wounds. Speaking of which, he forewent wiping those down; there was truly no telling how clean the well’s water really was and the mere thought of adding bacteria to his problems was going to run Jay mad before he even got to the Academy.

Once he declared himself cleaned enough, he let out a small hum of relief; his skin finally able to breathe again after having been clogged and caked with mud and blood. Jay twists the cloth in his hands, thoroughly ringing out any of the excess water, and places it to hand and eventually dries on the well’s arch.

When that was finished, Jay returned his attention to the folded clothing pile he had balanced on the well’s stonehenge; they were folded perfectly with no piece pooling over the other or resting unevenly. It brought a smile to his face; his mother was just as meticulous over presentation.

Hopping on the one foot that still carried a shoe, Jay took a hold of the clothes. As it stood, the oversized gray sweatshirt and matching sweatpants felt just as soft and comfortable as they had looked; it truly felt like if Jay were to squeeze the sleeves in his hands, the cloth would just fill back up around his grip like memory foam.

It was good; Jay felt fuzzy, like his body was ready for a nap because damn him, he always felt tired after getting wounded.

He hopped back over to the car because yes, new clothes, but no shoes, and pulled at the handle to the back seat; once; twice. Oh okay.

Jay turned on his heel.

The sound of the window lowering the only thing refraining Jay from slamming the rock he found into the backseat window.

“No dirt is allowed in the car.”

And the window seals back up.

Jay strikes a cursory glance down at his muddied shoe, “Fucking fine” he agrees and waits for the door to unlock. But, again, it doesn’t, and Jay legitimately wants to scream and laugh at the same time.

He finally lets go and tosses the rock somewhere off in the distance.

 

Tch.

 

Jay slips his ass in first and with his one leg still dangling out the car, swiftly slips off his remaining shoe and closes the door shut. Settling in, Jay shifts to seat himself in the middle, only looking up at the driver when he’s done.

Silver blue eyes and stark white shampoo commercial hair.

Jay peers back out the window to the other end of the village where his previous limousine, now directed by someone else entirely, drives off; they had switched.

“Go fuck yourself.”

A chuckle: mirth, amusement, a fucking bitch.

“It’s a pleasure to finally have you admitted, Mr. Park. Do eat your cookie, it seems you’ve lost quite a bit.”

Chapter 2: Chapter 2

Jay’s been standing here for a while, with his feet sinking into the fine fescue grass that thickly clumped around and caked the hill. He’s never even seen grass like this in the city: long shoots that seemed to matte together, conjoining in an intimate locking. When Jay had first exited the car, he only felt how densely packed the hill was, but as the car drove off, he could feel it start to soften and mold around his feet; the grasses below parting for him, slowly sucking him in.

His feet hadn’t yet touched wet earth, his toes and soles being comfortably held within the layers above Earth’s mouth. The cavity kept his feet warm as he looked around for somebody—anybody: a student, a teacher, the dean; but, nothing. He stood there, harsh wind batting at his hair, on a hill of hills. Football fields down he would be able to see the small village where they’d come from, albeit it was but a speck from up this high. 

Jay thumbed around the edges of his sweatshirt, its small cotton balls massaging the ridges of his thumb, creating a cotton stamp of his fingerprint. He wondered if the ocean was nearby—maybe on the other side of the hill; the smell of wet salt breaking through the smell of sour plants and fertile earth hit him: lemon and bark. It wasn’t unpleasant, if anything it did well at soothing the small ache in his nose from having taken in too much of the mint in the car. He stood right at the edge where the fescue grass feathered out into gravel; the short path leading to a dual wrought iron gate that closed off the academy.

The gate almost matched the school in every way: Gothic design and formidable in its height: possibly ten to fifteen feet high. Gorgeous patterns were welded in and around each iron bar; symmetrical even up to the topper where every bar shot up into a spear and every ornamental swirl flowed up to make a sort of thorn crown. Aside from each side of the gate were thick, smooth rectangular columns that stood just as tall, only its Corinthian capitals hovering slightly higher.

Jay stutters with his next inhale, the shiver coursing through him making him finally relent and walk along the graveled path to approach the gate. Each step felt like fuck as he both tried and failed to avoid any of the sharper stones. With nothing but one sock and a bare left foot, the dueling sensations had Jay hiking up his knees and cursing with each step.

“This is actually fucking stupid,” Jay rambled, every misgiving from the start of this trip coming out in a long speech to the heavens. Jay clasped his hands around the bars, pushing on them, expecting a loud screech as the gates worked against its hinges. Nothing, not even a little give.

He panted, salt and lemon encouraging spit from his ducts; his tongue, plump and newly wet swiped across his lips.

He’s just about to say fuck it and start climbing the damn thing when upon his investigation for a foothold, he spots a dark vanilla envelope at the very bottom stuck between the gate and foliage. It’s damp when he picks it up, no doubt swelled from the moisture in the air. The vanilla of it is deep enough to be coffee stained; it’s seared with a bright cherry seal: a bloody beacon in the pools of dark midnight and diamond flakes. Jay digs his nail under the wax, humming happily at the satisfying pop it releases; there’s a key and small note: Return to 1118, Habitation: 614.

“Okay,” Jay coos; slowly pushing the heavy ass door open.

“There it is, that’s it.” he grunts, slipping past the small opening he made and letting the gate swoon back into place, hauntingly slow. He won’t lie, his arms are a little fucking sore now.

Jay swiftly locks the gate back up, pressing the key back into the envelope before he turns to get a look at the place–the academy he'll be spending the next couple of months in: hopefully only three.

Sublime.

Jay remembers first hearing the word back in Art class when shit was normal. He didn’t remember what painting it had been of, but he remembered the meaning: grandeur that evoked such awe and wonder; a combination of beauty and terror. The idea of being surrounded by nature; the sun coating your skin in honey sweat; the ocean lapping at your ears and ankles until all at once it's like your body just syncs...and sinks. Your body's sinking and those thick lines of honey start to harden in your eyes; its dark; you’re afraid to sink further; Each wave that lapped now feels like it's crashing over your head; the ocean is beautiful, but it is terrifying.

That’s what Jay feels as he peers upon the hulking structure. From where he stands, tiered towers that stretched into stone buildings rose and looked over the plot of grass in the middle–-a quad, if you will. Arched windows were of metal pane that trapped glass. Everything was sharp, tight. The roofs had spires that divided each window; they stood tall, a coal colored spear that pierced the sky like needles. The second tier seemed to have an open system where students passing could peer over the stone balconies to look down on it.

The quad, short trimmed, compared to the grass beyond the gates, was in view no matter what angle or building you resided from; windows framed it and some towers looked like they were built slightly asynchronous: all to get the quad in its sights. Jay walked along the flagstone pavement, but he kept too close to the edge, and his foot slid off and into the squared off field.

Ice shot up his leg.

He was shaking.

“Fuck that’s cold,” he groaned, but his voice softened out before the end, only the short plume of white breath that left his mouth finishing his sentence.

Hair on the back of his neck rose; They curled up from his skin slowly, hesitantly tasting the air like a snake does to find its prey or its predator.

Swallowing the remaining spit, Jay turns around, hands fitted around his sweatpants that hold all his daggers.

He looks behind him; all around.

There was nothing; but the hairs wouldn’t cease.

Jay shook his head, smoothing over the back of his neck to relieve the feeling. Did the buildings move? As if his little stumble had snapped their heads to him: seeking him.

Jay arches an eyebrow in question, but effectively just turns back around and continues on, sauntering into the school and sliding his feet along its sandstone and marble floors. Inside is just as immense as the exterior, with solid stone staircases that you only see in Dark Academia or Princess movies and rooms with doors that had their knobs in the center, instead of to the far right.

Fancy, Jay sang, shoulders jumping in jest. The first room he found had engraved gold metal plating:“Mailing”. Jay turned the knob to the office, the knob turning with his hand, but not releasing the lock. His eyebrows furrowed and he tried again: nothing.

So, it's locked locked then, got it.

Jay then went around trying a few more doors; he just wanted to run into someone who could direct him to wherever 1118 was and maybe his chambers as well. But all the doors, even the ones that were classrooms, were locked.

“Oh, so its fuck me then, ” Jay says to the last door, then dragging his feet and wallowing through the endless halls of locked doors and slip and slide floors.

Eventually, Jay found himself six floors up, sweaty and holding onto room 14 for dear life as his legs shook under him. Even the elevator had been cut off.

“Aghh,” Jay groaned, finally rising from his stance.

Each level he had entered looked different and his floor by far looked the most vintage. The hallways were an off-white with black diamond patterering. Tall square rectangle windows decorate the whole wall opposite of his door: dark chocolate just like the exposed beams above and gold chandeliers hung off every other one, then there were pedestals between each window with a different statue. Jay didn’t care enough to actually decipher what kinds. His door was the only thing newer and not wood, though it was still that dark chocolate that accented around the hall.

Swiping his hair from his eyes, Jay rested his hand on the knob, praying upon every beautiful thing in the world that it would open.

Click.

“Bless,” Jay whispered, passing through without a glance back.

It wasn’t all that impressive inside; at least, nothing compared to the first floor. The room really reminded Jay more of an attic than anything; it was spacious—yes, but the ceiling, groin vault in design, was short and easy enough for Jay to touch when it sloped down. There were two columns that supported the ceiling that went down the middle of the room; a natural separation between the left side where his bed waited and the sturdy mahogany desk on the right that was pushed up against the plaster wall.

The door automatically locked as he walked further in, feet brushing against the smooth grain of Hershey wood floorboards. The walls were a static cream, the swirling and flowering designs crafted into the ceiling being the only decoration. The ceilings arched low around his bed, creating the illusion of his bed being in a small cave; his dresser, three-wide, also wood, was at the foot of the bed, behind the curve and snug between it and the large arching window straight across from the door.

Jay walked straight over to the window, looking as well as feeling around for a latch: walking up all those stairs had really made him hot. However, much like everything that has happened today, Jay’s wishes were not met; there was no latch. He rested his head against the glass instead, the cold seeping through his forehead, freezing the sweat in its place. Jay flicked his eyes around the campus as he rested; noticing that he, too, had a direct view of the quad below.

Moving up, Jay stared out and passed the gates.

His eyes squinted. “What’s…”

Jay lifted his head from the glass, straightening to look better.

There was movement from just below the curve of the hill; it was hard to make out as the slope cut off most of the image, but as the movements, mere ghosts of winds, slowly apparate and rise above the hill and onto the semi-flat hill-top: he sees a little more clearly. Boys; there’s only three from what Jay can tell, but the one on the right has his back turned to Jay, and seemingly talking to others further down. The other two stood directly around the spot Jay had been lurking.

Jay eyes the envelope he threw on the nightstand.

“That’s shit,” he chuckles.

Jay locked the gate, he wasn’t sure how they were going to get in: it wasn’t his business either. They should have to figure it out just as he did. 

Jay turned away, heading towards his desk; they had dropped his belongings next to the chair, with a meal—cold, but who was Jay to complain to?—rested on top of the desk.

He settles in, noting a few things as he tears open the plastic to the utensils: one: his shoes were still missing; two: the cookie he refused to eat was now mocking him from the corner of his desk; three: a first aid kit was inside a small bag beside his bags; four: the hairs on the back of his neck have risen again.

It's an hour later that Jay settles into his bed; thin, linen sheets and an even thinner pillow doing nothing for the day’s he’s had. It could be worse, Jay had thought; it had been worse.

At least here he had his own bathroom where he could wash up at will and clean his daggers thoroughly; speaking of which, they rested in order of size on his desk. They were all sparkly and sharp: a mirror truly could never. It's Jay’s reveling in his clean knives that makes him not see it; for anyone who was not lost in their own head and thinking of when to they’d get to sharpen their daggers next would have surely seen the little green spark circling in the air above his head; Most definitely would have seen how it cut a whole into the very air, would have easily caught what came next.

A paper airplane that stuck him in the head.

Jay swatted at the offensive object; thinking it a bug, but when he settled he opened the plane and saw someone had really bad handwriting.

“Hello,

I’m Yihwa, your advisor…kind of. I’ll be showing you around tomorrow, so get some sleep! Breakfast is at 8."

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jay rose easily; it was truly hard not to. The large window–even to the side of his bed—was large enough to fill up that whole wall; and what’s worse, it had no curtains to block the white light of morning from lighting the switch to day. So, yes Jay rose easily. It was perhaps seven in the morning at the time and in the time since Jay has unpacked his small amount of clothes, set aside his guitar after a light tuning, and did a couple of morning stretches to waken his muscles. His body had not been ready to move; the fuzziness of sleep still stuffing his joints.

Jay held the beige wrapping to his chest, carefully (and to the best of his abilities) wrapping it around. He was fresh out of the shower: hair wet and dripping along his laboring fingers as he secured the wrap in place. Thankfully, the wounds have stopped bleeding for the most part; only small specks spotting the bandage. When he finished with that, he cleaned up the sink, putting everything—antiseptic, the wraps, etc.—back to their rightful places, when suddenly, as he stepped out of the tiny space, he froze.

His foot had barely passed through the threshold when his breath caught in his throat; his right hand discreetly flew out to grip on the doorway to suppress the violent flinch.

A girl sat at the foot of his bed.

“It’s moments like this where you're forced to believe the dean has favorites— your first year, too—” she scoffed in wonderment shaking her head at the ceiling, “a transfer , no less! I have seen it all— Oh, you’re naked . ” 

“And you're in my room,” he retorted, finally stepping out into his room because that’s exactly what it was; his .

Jay stopped just a foot off from where her knees pressed against his bedding; his eyes lowering down to meet her's; she barely made it past his belly button sitting.

“and why is that, by the way?”

Her eyes flickered between his own and the bandages wrapped around his torso; her lips forming a ghost of words.

“Wait, this is actually great!” she says, her eyes resolutely meeting his in excitement as she gestures flippantly at his body. Jay frowned; quickly stepping back as she sprung up from his bed, clasping her hands together. She turned to her left, picking up whatever it was she had hid behind her: when she spun back around, ebony curls bouncing with the movement, she displayed her findings out to him.

“Nothing but the school’s finest,” she remarked, “personally delivered and paid for by me.”

She smiled at him.

“Yea…” Jay said, unsurely reaching out for the stark white tee and navy blue sweats from her palm “ you are?”

He left the rainbow umbrella swinging along her wrist.

“Yihwa, I wrote to you last night,” she began, relaxing back onto his bed, hanging the umbrella on his bed frame.

“— Oh, speaking of which, doors automatically lock at ten—that is, of course, unless you're new; in that case, yours remains open until it is opened for the first time. Doors unlock at seven thirty—so, that explains me: hi—if you don’t want people walking in, re-lock your door.”

Jay listened as he smoothed the shirt over his head; the shirt was white except for the small blue lettering of the academy printed over his left peck.

“Or you could have knocked: normally ”, Jay roused, releasing the knot on his towel.

“Blue Jay, that's inappropriate, Yihwa had shrieked, whipping herself around so hard, she slammed her shoulder into the wall.

Jay laughed, the sound opening up from his chest as he pulled the pants over his ass. He walked up to Yihwa with his hands in his pockets and leaned down.

Hovering over her as he spoke.

“How can that be?” he teased; voice lowering below the rays of the sun, it's pale yellow rays slipping along his honey skin. He continued “when it's my room.”

“.... we’re late for breakfast!” She says, knocking him to the side with his own pillow. 

Momentarily blind Jay can do nothing but catch himself on the bed.

 

 

 

 

“Okay,” Jay sighed as he flitted around the room: slippers, zip-up jacket, the envelope—he grabbed them all, putting on the slippers as he followed Yihwa out the door.

“How do I lock it then?” Jay asked, rucking up the jacket so it loosely hung around his shoulders; the envelope neatly placed in the pocket.

Yihwa turned to face him, having been staring out one of the many curved  windows that lined the opposing wall; she had been muttering to herself—rehearsing—when he had spoken.

“Hm? Oh you’ll get it with your schedule,” she said, already brushing past him to walk down the hallway—backwards and facing him. Her hand spoke with her as she announced “But! onto bigger—better amusements: breakfast!”

She turned without further adieu and didn’t wait for Jay to catch up.

They walked down the corridor, each window reflecting light and its heat into his jacket. He was warm by time they stepped out into the mouth of the floor: about half the size of a lobby, it was the area in which each corridor led to a grand staircase: both the floor and the stairs continuing—albeit bigger—that same white and black diamond pattern all the way through; the banister was a deep black with similar designing to the gate out front the academy. 

Yihwa started down the stairs first. As they descended she flicked her hand up; a vague gesture to the upper floor they were leaving.

“Nothing important is on that level, just dorms,” she informed. Jay nodded absently, really just taking the place in now that he wasn’t fighting fatigue and the urge to crawl up the remaining staircases to his room. The fifth floor had an elevator, as well as long black runners that ran through each corridor and all about the main area. 

Taking the elevator down to the main floor, Jay was immersed back into the high ceilings and polished dark marble floors.

“ This ,” she swirled her finger around, “is more or less the center of things—not literally, of course. Regardless, this is the main building and this ,” another swirl, “is the break off point to the East and West Wings. Each wing has its own breakdown, but for now I’ll just tell you the basics: breakfast will always be in the West Wing, dinner in the East, classes are in the Far East and Far West wings usually on the lower levels—unless you’re like the sight in your pack, then you’re screwed—”

“The sight?” Jay questioned, confusion contorting his face until it was a little more than pinched; Yihwa just nodded, “Yea, pack shit.” She continued on.

“Dorms are located everywhere. As you know, yours is six floors up from here. Far East and Far West wing dorms are usually for established packs, whereas everyone in this is either waiting eligibility, completely unaffiliated—you— or unpresented.”

Jay didn’t bother to correct her; she wasn’t wrong technically, he was unaffiliated and he didn’t blame her for thinking he had presented already. Everyone usually did by the time they were sixteen.

“Now, Blue Jay, which way is breakfast?” she asked, posture straight and both hands coming behind her back to mimic authority.

“West.” Jay answered, rolling his eyes, both at the nickname and at Yihwa herself. She had paid it no mind though, her posture melting before she roughly grabbed his elbow and pushed him off to said wing. “Very, very good. You’ll do just fine—let’s eat!”

She pulled him along through the large hall; Jay peered at the passing students; some stared, some completely ignored him, others tilted to chins up to smell the air around them, frowning at him when they got nothing. But, most importantly Jay saw a distinct difference between their attire and his. “Does anyone even wear these?” he asked, pinching at the memorabilia. 

Yihwa spared him no glance as she continued on her path, “No, never–-not even once. But, don’t let that discourage you.”

They were about to break off into another corridor: a walkway open to the outside with pillars and stone lining the sides when he stopped them, remembering the envelope in his pocket.

“Hold on, where’s 1118? I was told to return this today.”

“Right,” she nods completely understanding, “it can wait until after breakfast.”

“Yihwa,” he says sternly, grabbing her fleeting wrist and tugging her back to him; their conjoined limbs hovered in between them as he looked down upon her, “please.”

She kissed her teeth.

“Dean’s office,” she points to an old passageway with a spirling stone staircase; it reminded Jay of the cramped stairs in cylindrical towers, yet these were much wider looking. “Climb those, there’s no door, just opens up into his office.”

“Thank you,” Jay said and let her go, “I’ll meet back up with you in ten.”

“Oh, but there’s no way I could possibly leave my new student to fend for himself.” She leaned in with a whisper, “We have wolves you know.”

They looked at each other: “Bye, Yihwa”, “See you Blue Jay”.

Jay made his way up the winding staircase, stopping at the top to catch his breath against the curve of the wall; the office just beyond that corner. When he considered himself managed, he turned and walked in. 

The room from the stairwell flattened out and spilled into an open space; it was circular with dimmed yellow lighting from the small sconces: what seemed the only sources of light at the top of this tower, completely built from a mixture of stone and concrete, with no windows to benefit the space. 

Jay stepped down into the lower level, a small step separating the room from the stairwell. It was spacious and by that he definitely means closer to empty. There was not much decoration or furniture in the room besides the absolute necessities: chairs for the students to sit, a small leather couch by a coffee table off to the far left, a rug—really nothing.  

Jay straightened, looking over his shoulder just enough to give a look at the dean who had been standing right behind him: unmoving and unbreathing. “What are you doing?”, Jay questioned, trying his best for it not to come out degrading.

The dean blinked at him slowly, his lips turning up the barest bit; he looked pleased. 

“You must be Jay then,” he mused, guiding them both further into the room towards the desk that sat facing the stairwell; he continued, “I must say it takes the unpresented quite a bit before they notice me, some still don’t after the fact: how shameful”. 

Shameful , Jay thinks, but why do you sound so pleased with yourself? 

Jay tampered the annoyance that soared up in him; he was reminded of his chauffeur. 

Vampires loved to play games. 

 

“Please, have a seat,” the dean said as he lowered himself into his. Jay bowed and sat in one of the dark green leather chairs in front of the desk. He made sure to rest the envelope on the man’s desk. The man, dark hair and all only nodded at it in acknowledgment. 

“My sincerest apologies for not having escorted you personally into the school. As I'm sure you’re aware by now, curfew is at ten: everyone is expected to be in their rooms by that point, if you miss curfew you will be locked out until morning. With that said, this is your schedule and room key, any questions can be directed to your advisor and if you were to have any… complications , you come see me.” 

Sounds easy enough.  

Jay pushed himself forward and took the paper and key from his hands; on it four classes that interchanged between days. 

“Great, thank you,” Jay nodded at him, already standing up to meet with Yihwa, but he was held back when the dean lifted a finger.

“Not yet; I have something to ask you, it will only take a moment”, he said, his eyes staring off to the side somewhere, hands now clasped over the desk. Jay’s eyebrows furrowed as he sat himself back down, gesturing with his hand for him to continue. 

“The file we had you fill out from our recruit mentioned your lack of presentation. Given the week that you’ve joined us it would be ill of me not to inform you ahead of time. Firstly, what kind of pack are you looking to join? Any preferred presentation?” 

Jay held back the scoff that was curdling in his throat, “ That ,” he thought, “that was what he got so serious about?” Jay held back the scoff but he couldn’t resist the head shake and amusement that took over his face after; he relaxed into the seat. 

“None. I’m not looking to be in a pack: like I told that recruit, it's just me.” 

The dean didn’t seem to reciprocate his relaxed demeanor, a grave expression taking hold. 

“I see, then recommendations would be naught to you,” he stated, but the way he stared straight into Jay made it feel like it was more a question, asking Jay again: was he sure? 

“Yes.” Jay had replied strictly, a bit annoyed. He had told the recruit way back when he saved their dumbass in a random alley way in the city: gone through the exact same incredulous looks, same repeated questions; he would have assumed they’d pass along the information. The dean continued to challenge his gaze: water and fire.

The dean withdrew first, eyes flashing with excitement as he leaned back into his chair. Jay noticed he had really white eye sockets. 

“Well, then you will do well to avoid people this week: your status until you finish our exams will hold you tentatively ineligible for this first half, however, that isn’t always enough for our established packs to not show interest.” 

Jay rolled his eyes, nodding along as he stood back up. “Sure, thanks for the heads up” he said— in truth, he didn’t actually give a fuck. He could handle himself and he could definitely reject bitches if he had to. 

Jay had just made it to the stairwell when he heard a tune: deep and clicking like a crackling fire. 

“Jay”, it sang, small laughs breaking into a wisping wind, it smacked against the red embers, burning it brighter: “Avoid Territory.”

Jay didn’t turn back around, “What’s territory?”. 

Jay could imagine how tempting those flames were; burning hot and bright; waiting, hoping he’d stick his hand out to play. The dean wanted him to bite first; he didn’t.

Jay heard nothing else from the man, as if the partition had rolled up on him yet again. Fucking vampires. 

Finding the dining hall wasn’t all that hard after he exited the stairwell; all he really did was return to their last spot, then follow behind a group of girls who had been talking about breakfast options. However, finding Yihwa in a room so grand, it rivaled that of a ballroom, with ceilings as high as what was almost standard for large cathedrals, Jay wasn’t so sure.

He hesitantly walked in; the space was overwhelming; long cherry wood tables lined up in three separate rows: with twelve to a seat, there were fourteen tables going down each row; tables never touching. Each table had two lamps and giant chandeliers that lined the ceilings above them. Compared to the dean’s office, the dining hall was well lit: large glass stained windows lining the walls. It felt like a sanctuary, like Jay was walking through a greenhouse. 

“Jay over here!”Yihwa's voice broke his wandering, steering him to the first row (farthest on the left), second table down.  Of course, Jay could feel the stares hitting him from all angles— he practically dripped the new kid in the school memorabilia that apparently no one wore. He tried not to pay much attention to it: he wasn’t new to it—only the number of how many were doing it. 

He pulled out the chair next to Yihwa and sat down; she had already placed a plate of food for him. Jay mutters a thanks to her before he begins to break apart the sunny-side up. The yolk, a warm yellow, spills out over the egg whites like dressing, even rolling off and oozing into the vegetable fried rice and thickly-cut bacon. It was fucking heaven; even the small bowl of rouge cinnamon coated apples. 

He’s right in the middle of mixing the running yolk with his rice when he hears a deep inhale overcome the noise of his fork scratching the plate. 

“What a hot commodity—,” says the girl now, suddenly sitting across from him; her cranberry red hair glowing brighter under the sunlight coming through the window, “he’s like pancakes.”

“Chloe!” barks Yihwa as she sets down her drink and looks back at Jay weary, “he’s probably suppressed—pancakes?! At least, let him be the french toast on Fridays!” Yihwa tries to come to his defence and truthfully he’s not too sure if was actually going through suppression if he’d feel grateful by that or not. Regardless, Jay takes a gulp from the soy milk before responding: in the meantime, they continue. 

“If he was I would be able to smell at least a hint of his previous presentation: I got nothing!”Chloe defended, “That doesn’t justify calling him a pancake!” yells Yihwa. 

“I’m not suppressed,” Jay pushes through, “I’ve never had a pack, never presented, and before you ask the answer is no: I do not want one.” 

Both Chloe and Yihwa pause, their slow turn towards him almost creepy in its synchronization. 

Yihwa looks at him like she’s doomed: “He’s the stuffed fucking pancakes”, while Chloe looks at him in wonderment: “Wow you’re—you’re like unheard of. How the fuck did you manage to…” 

Jay shrugs before she finishes, collecting the remaining food onto his spoon. 

“It isn’t that hard,” he relates, “there are just certain things you have to look out for: and when you know what they are, it's easy to avoid.” 

“Yes, we’re all well aware of the traditions to pack integration and presentation,” Chloe bellows boredly, rolling her head round in a circle as if just her eyes weren’t enough, “what I want to know is why?”

There were many reasons; some of which he didn’t truly want to talk about over breakfast so early. Jay switches the conversation, “So what of you two? Are you guys pack?” Chloe glares at him, but responds no less, “No, not really: we’re in agreeance though” Now that Jay hasn’t heard before; again, he knows as far as what concerns him and his livelihood, but interpersonal pack relations and how they do business with each other isn’t necessarily his forte of knowledge.

But, before he could ask, Yihwa jumps in nervously, “Uh that’s not what we need to be focusing on—right now, Jay needs to know about the ….” 

And so she went on to tell him further about the workings of the school. Apparently, every student underwent an intense exam that tested not only for their physicality, but mental state and knowledge: depending on the results, you will be eligible for Territory and packing. When Jay went to ask and actually get an answer to what “territory” was, all Yihwa had done was pushed the apples onto his plate: “Not now,” she had said.

From these results your strengths and weaknesses will be matched up with a list of packs who are lacking in the field you're regarded in: the whole point was to set each pack up for success in the monthly hunt. The packs in question have the right to reject or accept their choice in any fashion they want—that’s where Territory came into play. But like Yihwa said to him the second time he asked: “Later.” 

Doors opened. 

No, more like swung; the intensity in which the heavy doors departed reminded Jay of the powerful winds that accompanies tornadoes: sweeping and blowing away cars, tearing roofs straight off of houses, caving them in as absentmindedly as pushing in the ring tab of a soda can; it was quick and easy and once the seal cracked, air panted out softly. The unnatural wind the doors forged was nothing close to that. 

They were the second table on the left and perhaps their proximity was to blame: but, that didn’t account for how a simple push had its resulting wind mussing his hair and pushing all their dishes a whole inch across the table, Jay’s plate making a disgusting chinking noise as it collided with Yihwa’s. It was bewildering, such power and the nonchalance in which the young man had strided in with. 

He entered first, front center in between two others that stood just off from him. Nothing about him gave away that he was even slightly exerted from the act, his breathing barely there, his face not even strained: when he entered, he all but relaxed his hands back to his sides and walked on. 

“Oh,” he heard Yihwa mutter under her breath and it was the last thing he heard from that second on. 

Everyone in the hall seemed to resonate with Yihwa, completely pausing their actions, refusing to even pick the forks that dropped or finish chewing the fork full they had. It was shocking, Jay understood that— but, were the dramatics really necessary though ? 

Jay’s eyes made it back to the small group now sauntering down their aisle. The door sweeper was tall, for sure taller than himself, and his skin, a light clam shell, contrasted with the dark sediment of his hair; it reminded Jay of coals. His eyebrows, a dark cinnamon, were thick and nicely encased the seafoam blue of his eyes: a protective glass casing around jewelry. He was a vampire, no doubt, those eyes were dead giveaways; vampires and werewolves eyes always flashed color when in a heightened state of emotion, but to see it so consistent, as if it were a natural eye color, was uncommon. Maybe that’s why Jay felt this mock warmth around him; the grim reaper that appeared to you in death with a cold exterior and a scythe that reflected your dead body back to you as he smiled down, encouraging you to pass. 

The other two were slightly different; they chatted together as they walked; the one on the left had black hair as well, but less inky than the first, siding more on the side of dark espresso. His hair was longer and waved around his ears with curtain bangs. He was cute Jay ventured to think.

The last one on the right had hair just as long as the left one, but his was toffee blond with heavier bangs and an overall tousled look. His lips were light pink and his eyelids were darkened, allowing the beautiful cursive of his eyes to appear sharper. He was by far the warmest of the three; Jay would guess he’s a wolf out of anything else. 

They walked past them, quickly as they were all tall and had long strides. Jay more than just felt Yihwa shrink next to him, looking down at her fingers as Chloe's foot came from under the table, knocking him by: accident pending—and placing it over Yihwa’s. Jay watched as the two exchanged looks before he looked back to see the boys had already sat: the table at the head of the dining hall; the whole hall seemed to hold their breath as Jay stared curiously. Food came to them, more than the three plates Jay was expecting and once they lifted the food to their mouths, everyone else picked up where they left off: it was utterly bizarre, like Jay had just pressed play on a movie. 

Jay glanced at Yihwa who still seemed to be catching up with the change in script, so he looked over towards Chloe, his questioning gaze verbal enough.  

“No,” Chloe answered, her eyes flicking back to Yihwa. 

 

 

Chloe parted from them once they came back to “the center—but not literally” the center. Yihwa waved her off, herself having come back to her as they left the dining hall: but Jay wasn’t always known for tact when he wanted information. 

“So what the hell was that?”he threw out as they walked north, straight out the back doors of the main building. As they stepped out into the grasses, Jay saw nothing but a large expanse of dying grassfields that inclined into yet another hill before flattening into a forest far aways from the school itself. Jay couldn’t even really see it that well, except for the still semi-bushy heads of the trees peering over the hill line. Yihwa guided him to their right, walking the outlines of the school. Jay wasn’t sure why they had to walk outside to do this; they could have just as easily taken the same root inside. 

Yihwa looked at him: wait. 

They continued and Jay saw how the main building, most likely symmetrical on both sides, had a shorter building that attached diagonally to the main structure; they walked past those. There was a small gap in between the last building, of course walled up, but right after that was the beginnings of a completely different building: same gothic styling, however, these ones were all black compared to the main buildings white. 

“This is the Far East building, not to be confused with the East Wing; those were the smaller white buildings off of the main building.” Jay nodded, a light breeze fencing with the small hairs on his crown. 

“Yes, and what’s your problem with it?” Jay questioned, watching Yihwa turn to him, her nails scratching at the top of her hand. “I mean, there is a reason you had us walk around it, instead of through it, right? 

Yihwa sighed, shoulders dropping as she mindlessly played with a blade of grass that was too limp to really move. 

“Sunghoon, Jake, and Jungwon,” she relayed, blinking up at him briefly, “that’s their names.” 

Jay nodded slowly, turning a bit more so he could openly face her; she was talking about the three boys who had entered the West Wing for breakfast. “You remember how I said that Far East had classes, as well as dorms for packs? Their pack lives here—its more or less their building. You saw how everyone reacted at breakfast, some even transferred classes to Far West if possible.”

“So?” Jay said, stuffing his hands in his pockets; he looked up at the building before closing his eyes to feel the wind. 

He could hear the sigh escape her.

“Whatever—just—your next classes are in there, so…” he slid one eye open so he could see her through his peripherals, “I’ll see you at dinner.” 

Jay’s head ducked down, hiding his amusement. When he schooled his face somewhat, he patted her on the shoulder; she was still looking down at that blade of grass. He wasn’t sure what everyone was so afraid of and honestly none of it really concerned him either: pack relations have nothing to do with him. This was all he could give her; protection was only something packs offered. 

“Don’t worry about me, okay?” he squeezed her shoulder, feeling it relax and lower from where she had slightly hunched them. She nodded at his words, letting her hand go.

“Now tell me about territory,” Jay sneaked in.

“You–you and fucking Territory!” Yihwa bellowed, slapping his hand off her shoulder; she scoffed: “maybe I should just let you find out yourself”, she threatened, losing steam rather quickly and just rolling her eyes instead. “The quad, surrounded by all the buildings; you most likely walked past it on your way inside last night—”

“Yea I remember, I tripped into it.” Jay said, but it seemed like the words only horrified her further, her mouth dropping in shock: how dare he speak of it so calmly! 

“Do not do it ever again, no one just goes out onto Territory.” 

Yihwa rubbed at her temples, “You’re so—ugh whatever, go to class; there’s only fifteen minutes until roll.” 

Claustrophobic; If anyone ever were to ask Jay what the Far East building was like this is the only thing he would say. It shouldn’t make sense: the walls were still tall and it couldn’t really be described as cramped by any means. What Jay means is that nothing felt like it was breathing. 

Old portraits of varying metals and wood framings plastered every square inch of the walls: rectangles, squares, ovals. In the mismatch of the frames were small air pockets of wall; short, cut off breaths that were surely insatiable for a wall that size. Dark diagonal floorboards received no affection of the light that bled from the doors and the stairs choked under thick runners that flowed into the corridor. Chandeliers lit his path as weaved through people.

The wolves couldn’t smell him coming, but surely the vampires heard him as they were the only few who would push to the side before Jay even came close. 

When he reached his classroom, marking his entrance on creaky floorboards; dark, cold. He looked out into a small classroom, three rows of three two-seated tables. No lamps or lights were anywhere Jay could see, only two small windows whose light; cold and still gray from early morning, mingled with the room’s natural darkness; In result, a pale gloom overcasted the desks and Jay sauntered through the shadows to the front of the room where the teacher stood looking over papers at her pedestal. 

He tapped on the nearby desk to gain her attention. 

“Hello there,” she drawled, long soy nails scratching against the papers she held; they etched themselves down, dragging balled up bits with them; the sound tickled at Jay’s ear drums: it was uncomfortable, but he could see the sheer shudders from the others in the class. Jay was looking at her, but she was gazing at him, hollowing herself into his pupils, “don’t believe I’ve ever had you before,” she continued, her voice coming out multiple seconds after she had opened her mouth; offbeat: delayed. 

Despite the eeriness, Jay was well-mannered. He gave her a short smile and dipped his head in respect before he rose, “Park Jongseong, though I go by Jay. I’m joining this year.” 

She blinked; the sharp corners of her lips extending out into her cheek. “Jongseong,” she considered, testing his name along seams of her lips, “I’ll remember” she quieted, eyes not quite looking at him anymore than at his mere presence. 

“Sunoo, darling, raise your hand” she crooned, her voice slow and smooth; coaxing. 

Jay looked over his shoulder and spotted the upright hand, nodding to himself as he bowed for the teacher once more and walked over to the third row from the door. 

He sat beside Sunoo, the boy in question having watched him the whole way. There was something about him; like a comforting chill. He stared at him; feline eyes striking against soft features. He stared and the longer Jay met his gaze, the more inky and bottomless they seemed to get; the pull of fabled sirens, a riptide dragging you into deep waters. 

His earrings shone in Jay’s eyes like silver buoys.

And then Sunoo smiled, pretty hemlock incisors extending down from his gums.

In the end, he didn’t say anything and Jay didn’t introduce himself either; there was no point, he had heard it. They both turned towards the board, listening to Jay’s first actual lecture on strategy. 

Sunoo raised himself, spine uncurling from where he had tilted to rest his head on a fist. Jay had to blink a couple times; his eyes having to re-adjust. Sore. Jay blinked again; the smaller details around the edges of his vision slowly came back to clarity. Disorienting is all Jay could think to word it—as if simply looking at Sunoo sprouted hands from his scleras and pulled at him—stretching his pupils from each end and dilating—taking in more of Sunoo; the more he grabbed, the heavier and deeper he sank.

 

 

 

A church bell, somewhere off in the distance, rang: end of class. Jay stood up, running a hand through his hair as he ran through times he could stop by the academy’s store for stationary. He was already regretting not having asked Yihwa sooner; he needed shit to take notes on—well, and shoes now that he’s thinking about it, walking around in slippers for the rest of his stay wasn’t all that appealing.

“Omission,” came a voice, light and delicate, “beside the gym.” It wisped around his ears like the fog that settled over the village, it pinched his ears, and pulled his head to look for his seatmate.

He was gone.

Jay only sighed; back to the fucking stairs.

The gym was definitely not standard by any means—or at least by Jay’s. The walls were still of a cold cream plaster, and small benches for rest pushed against the sides of the walls, but Jay walked in on grass. It was like they had built the building and forgotten to build a floor with it. Matter of fact, add the ceiling to that as well because Jay was seeing straight sky.

“What the fuck?” Jay says incredulously as he upsettingly has to walk over slightly damp grass from last night in his newly stolen sneakers. He had stopped by Omission; it was a store where you could buy anything you may have forgotten. 

“Anything that could of been omitted from your memory.” the door had engraved above it. Turns out it was also pretty easy to steal from. The store attendant was a wolf and since Jay had no smell, he was able to nab a shirt and shorts, as well as a notebook before they caught onto his presence. Still, though, he’d have to knick a pen off of Yihwa or something.

Jay sat his notebook on one of the seats before jogging out into the middle of the field where all the students in varying gym attire sat in a circle surrounding their teacher—“Coach”—someone had referred to him.

“the new kid, right? come on” A boy, black hair, and sharp features like a cat nodded him over as he jogged past him. Jay followed, sitting in suit as the two boys who were originally closing the circle moved to create space for him and Jay.  

“Nicholas,” the boy shared, extending his hand out for Jay to shake. He took it, “Jay,” he replied, listening to the ending of Coach’s speech.

“So, what should I expect?” Jay privately asked as everyone stood up and started separating off. Nicholas chuffed a laugh, hands slipping into his shorts as he looked up to the sky; it was only for a moment before he turned himself towards Jay, a smile softening his features, “A fight.”

Nicholas swung at him, laughing as Jay ducked and countered with an uppercut to his side, only narrowly missing his liver. Jay huffed in frustration: a liver shot would have weakened his knees.

 “Good, good. More of that: today’s all about sparring.”

Nicholas was sharp, each move swift and powerful; only something that came with time and confidence. 

But Jay was fluid and adaptable. His time with knives had taught him how to twist and maneuver his body to dodge and create openings for himself. Especially since knives, depending on its wielder, can be slow, Jay learned to center his focus on the vital points and most importantly, the importance of keeping your target close. 

Minutes in Jay found himself actually having fun; he’s never got to spar with anyone. Only learned through battles; it was kind of refreshing to be able to fight without your life on the line. 

Jay panted, the both of them stuck in an ever-changing wrestling match. Jay’s hair had all sorts of grass in it and dirt stained his elbows, but he refused to let Nicholas gain the upper hand again.

That is, until he felt the bottom of a shoe shove into his ribs, ripping him off of Nicholas who, though still panting, rested his hands by his head and laughed.

“Okay, that’s enough. I’m not teaching you how to be tumbleweeds. Two minutes ‘till switch!” Coach yelled out, kicking Nicholas' legs out for fairness.

Nicholas stared at him in utter disbelief as he saved himself from a face plant, landing in an awkward plank. Jay only laughed, shaking his head both in response to Nicholas who melded his plank into a push up, and to rid the browning grass from his hair: with it being silver, the grass shoots probably made it seemed like Jay was due for a touch up. 

He picked himself up, patting his hands down his sweats as he met Nicholas half way, looking around at the ending quarrels. 

Sunoo. 

There. In the distance, he stood off by the doors. His posture is as strict as before, but not tense like Jay would be from lack of practice. He looked relaxed, a ghost of pleasure along the curves of his face, but nothing tangible enough for Jay to dare say he was happy. 

Everyone started finding their pairs. 

No one approached Sunoo. 

Jay inwardly scoffed, enough with this bullshit . Seeing as Nicholas had already been approached by another, Jay turned on his heel to invite Sunoo to spar; but a hand wrapped around his wrist, fingertips pressing down around the bones. 

“Not him,” Nicholas doesn’t even warn, more like lightly demands. Jay takes his wrist back, a fine eyebrow arching back at him. 

“Oh pray tell,” he lilts back in mock interest. The boy, taller than Nicholas with longer hair that parted down the middle, glared at him, stepping forward. He made no other moves,  simply moving forward so that he stood ahead of Nicholas, but not in front of him. 

They must be pack , Jay deducts as he watches Nicholas sigh at him. 

“Jay you’re new—”, he starts. 

“So–”

“He doesn’t attend,” cuts the taller one, looking off at Sunoo before his eyes come back to rest on Jay. 

Jay’s mouth opens in an ‘O’, understanding rushing through his veins; he waves the pair off, “I’ll go easy on him, that’s no problem,” he tells them and walks away. It made sense that Sunoo would skip PE, he didn’t really look like one for confrontation anyway. He seemed to just enjoy his peace. 

Jay walked up, waving a little as he approached.

“Sunoo, you wanna pair up?”he asked, although a little awkwardly; Sunoo’s gaze was something that needed to be endured; it was isolating, as soon as their eyes met, it was like Jay was locked to them; in an endless room with only them two. 

He saw the smile bloom onto Sunoo’s face, a sunny aura that both contrasted and emphasized the empty dark in his eyes. Jay was stuck; he didn’t even register the sweltering body heat of another licking at his arms, puffing out steamy smoke along his back. A hand wrapped loosely around his wrist, sparking his nerves, alerting him back into his surroundings. 

Jay blinked. A thumb was slowly rubbing circles along the inside of his wrist. 

Jay flinched back violently, quickly gaining his senses and spinning back with an elbow crashing down into the person’s chest. The guy heaved as he was pushed back a couple steps, hands grasping at his chest and gulping in air; but his eyes never left Jay’s wrist. 

Jay was fucking disgusted and his heart beat faster from the absurdity of the action just attempted. 

Sure, Jay had no scent glands, but the action itself was enough. 

“Spar with me,” came the wish; a stupid one.

“I don’t think you can take me,” Jay simmered, stepping back and propelling forward into a roundhouse kick.

By the time Jay’s brain had even registered the whistle, he was already being pulled off; Nicholas and his packmate—K, if he heard right—was pulling him off. They hadn’t even been fighting for that long, but the boy’s howl of pain after his initial kick must have alerted Coach. 

“Jay—Jay, what the fuck?” Nicholas posed after they gained some six feet of distance. He was caged between K and Nicholas as they guided him to the locker rooms: class was over and they were all thoroughly sweaty. 

K broke off to the side to grab towels from the linen cabinet. 

“He tried to scent me,” Jay grits, smoothing down his rebellious teenagers at the crown of his head. He sees how Nicholas tensing up at the word, eyes already sharp, thinning down into slits. Good, at least someone understood the weight. 

 Scenting outside of pack members was almost never done. 

Scenting is on the long list of ways to expose someone’s suppressed presentation, or in Jay’s case, checkboxing someone into a presentation. No one was born a wolf like those who were of magic, therefore no one was naturally an alpha, beta, or an omega. Similar to vampires you needed to be bit for the transformation, but for it to even take hold, you would need to present as one of the three categories first. Doing this involved for a person to be connected, reliant in some fashion, and submissive to another, either willingly, or not: this resulted in betas or omegas, whichever presentation fit best with the chemistry of the pack, as well as the alpha leading it.

Naturally, leading, making or forcing decisions successfully, amongst other traits and actions resulted in alphas. Rubbing someone’s wrist was a dominant action. If Jay were suppressed, it would have brought his presentation traits to the front, exposing his designation to anyone with a working nose. But, Jay wasn’t and he’d be damned if he ever did, it would make his whole plan of never packing up a deal a lot harder. 

K had heard, stretching the towels out to the both of them. 

“You want our help?” K offered; it was a kind gesture, but Jay’s heard too many stories about accidental presentations too: people who ended up presenting for a person or a pack because their body developed an attachment; a dependency on them. Jay taking protection from another pack, the alpha of one no doubt, was surely not on his “Fuck Packs” bingo card. 

“No, thanks though,” Jay sighed, grabbing the towel and finding a shower stall. 

He wished so hard for the water to have felt amazing, but with as many students as there were using them right now, the hot water only seemed to last two minutes into Jay washing his hair. Unfortunately, the rest of his shower ended in the cold; sharp memories of the well and chilling fog replayed in his head. 

Jay stepped out, towel wrapped around his waist, heading over to the middle row of lockers where he had thrown his new clothes into while he and Nicholas were waiting on K. Curling his fingers under the metal hatch, he pushed up and pulled the locker open; the locker warm under his already cool fingers. 

The locker room was misty, hot plumes from the few who got the good showers clouding the room. It kept his skin damp, refusing any type of evaporation request from his skin. Jay slicked his hair out of his face, wet strands easily retreating from his forehead to rest along the top and sides of his head. Maybe being the closest thing to a human wasn’t always the best thing in this world, especially when if he weren’t, he would have smelled the boy from earlier walk up on him way before he was slammed into the side lockers. 

“Mrph,” Jay grunted as his shoulder took the brunt of the metal, saving him from a complete facial hit, but the cold metal soon met his cheek as a hand pushed his head further in; the other having already wrapped around his elbow, holding his right arm behind his back. 

“Calm down, I got you," came the almost high-pitched voice to his ear. He almost sounded like he was choking on his own air, his excitement too much for him to manage, “Jay was it?” 

Jay was calm though, after his initial hit he had barely moved: he stood there, annoyed and waiting. 

“My foot in your ass, is that you?” Jay gasped, no amusement making its way to his face as he turned as much as he could to see the boy. 

The hands around him sunk in deeper, “It’s Malachi.” 

He leaned in, his breathing edging along the lower back of Jay’s neck—that’s all the short bitch could reach anyway. 

“I’ve always wanted something pretty in the pack,” comes a breath and in true dog fashion a wet nose smears along his skin.  “You will do, even if you’re the sloppy, unwanted conception of another’s pack.”

The room was still. Everyone who had been mindlessly chatting as they dressed and even those still in the showers have stopped moving: not quite the same as breakfast—no, everyone here was watching in anticipation, eyes locked onto every moment; waiting just as much as Jay. K and Nicholas stood together off by one of the stalls. When he and Nicholas made eye contact, he could feel the silent question being asked: Help?

Jay rolled his eyes at him. Nicholas smirked, shaking his head before tapping K. They walked out. 

Jay tests the guy’s hold on his arm. Firm and Jay’s begins to feel something close to pain start to shoot up his shoulder. 

“You wouldn’t mind me would you? You’ve already let someone turn you out. This is a dream for you as much as it is for me” he groaned. 

And then it happens—or at least, Jay supposes something happens. 

Everyone in the room tenses up and Jay can see flashing lights of colors spring into their eyes: reds, yellows, and bronze. The alphas move to guard those in their pack, while the betas wrap themselves around the omegas and that’s what keys Jay into what the fuck is really even going on. Betas have a neutralizing scent. This short dick was projecting his scent out and onto Jay, trying to dominate him with the use of pheromones alone. 

Jay breaks out into a full body laugh, knees buckling with the small loss of strength.

Except, Jay has none so a battle is pointless. Shit like this only worked on the suppressed. 

“Ow-ha, ow,” Jay laughs, the action putting more pressure on his twisted arm. 

The guy looks at him miffed.

Jay smiles back at him: all pretty and pearly.

“What do you have to laugh ab—” and Jay, without regard, throws his body back into the boy. 

The force throws them both towards the wooden bench bolted into the floor, and their departure from each other only lasts a couple of seconds before Malachi brings them back together. 

He throws the first punch, but even though Jay blocks it, he ends up falling over to the other side of the bench. He had already been holding onto his failing balance over the bench before he had been punched, but the sharp turn to block had him losing it all in one go. 

Malachi lurches over the bench, probably aiming to straddle him while he’s down, and Jay stills; timing it. 

Not yet. 

Malachi crouches down over him, a nasty look in his eyes as he lowers himself down. 

Almost. 

His nails extend out into claws, “One last chance—” Now. 

Jay wraps his legs around Malachi’s waist, interlocking his ankles as he uses all his core to flip them. In the process, Malachi’s head crashes into the side lockers, loosening some of the fight in him. Jay turns them until he’s on top, and does it again until Malachi is more or less laying in between his locked legs.

Jay wraps his arms around his neck, silencing his breaths with a chokehold. 

The little breaths Malachi is able to take comes out in short, suppressed whistles. 

Jay holds tighter, unbothered by Malachi who is writhing around, flopping like a fish. 

“You give me even one chance and I’ll fuck you up everytime,” Jay seethes, squeezing tighter if only for the mere fact that he could. 

No one tried to help Malachi; not even as his face started to rouge. 

It's the sound of a banging door that grabs Jay’s attention. 

Coach barges in hurriedly, demanding everyone leave the locker room: now.

It is when Jay’s watching everyone slowly flood out the doors that Jay sees him. 

Sunoo’s watching. 

Jay’s back in that dark room; a spotlight highlights them. He feels more than sees Sunoo’s change. A sound like that of a incoming tsunami disrupts their space: a flash of ice blue stares back into him. 

“Fuck!” Jay screams, tearing his arms away to clutch at his clawed thigh. 

He’s bleeding.

Notes:

Sorry for the wait, this literally took all week to write! Anyway, its not perfect but I hope there are moments that you enjoy.

Special thanks to all the support on the last chapter, it was the only thing keeping my motivations up this week.

 

Hope everyone has a good holiday! Or, at least a good break :)

Chapter 3

 Fast, frantic.

A flock of black birds—Ravens Jay could only assume—pushed towards the windows of the nursing bay. There was barely any time between to register their incoming before dreadful squawks burrowed under the sealed hatch and into Jay’s ears; they didn’t hit, but it's a small mercy. They’ve just barely managed to miss the complete impact, full wings skimming the thin glass. Then, again, in a flurry of flapping wings and rushed panic, they make another course: set for the high skies—an escape: an illusion of freedom. 

Jay watches them strain their wings, forcing them to keep pushing; He sees their muscles long sore begin to seize on them: it forces them back, drops them a couple of feet. 

Something must be in the air: a scent, a pulse, a frequency so potent that it cleanly undid the synapses in their brains. The flock collided in circles, their natural signaling to fly in formation unlaced. Something in the air wanted them—something was forcing them down like a beacon. Instinct made them rise, a heavy pull made them fall, their heads snapped down: all staring. 

One pair hit the nursing bay window, their wings converged in a deathly embrace as Jay was guided over the room’s threshold. The harsh thump reverberated against his ribs, his heart drumming with it. The pain that circulated his leg harmonized along to the continual taps of the birds bouncing down the window. 

Jay grimaced, grunting with the sudden pinch of nails. 

Sunoo had wrapped his arms around his waist, his nails, though clean cut, seeped into the skin around his hip: a small but constant pricking. Jay would have sworn at the boy: in truth, the words still laid in the cock-bed of his tongue, but as those pricks seemed to distract his body even momentarily from the pain in his thigh, he ruled sparing as a just course. 

Jay to his slight chagrin is lifted too easily, Sunoo merely holding him with one arm as he presses Jay further into his side for leverage: like this, he is carried the rest of the way into the room. The nursing bay is small and bland: creamy linoleum coat the floors and bare walls do nothing to accentuate; six beds line the length of the room—three to a side—as large arched windows with dark embossing carried in the greying light of afternoon. Jay’s heart calmed and warmed with blood at the cleanliness, but it was almost too clean: unused. 

All the beds were tightly tucked and applaudingly symmetrical in their pillow positioning and blanket dispersal—no wrinkles, no dents, and probably no warmth either: nothing to indicate life, but the blood trail he’s leaving behind.  He almost feels mournful of the mess. 

“Thanks Sunoo,” Jay grits as his weight becomes his own again, gravity immediately coming down to push on the five puncture wounds in his thigh, “you didn’t have to. I can’t imagine this being the most sought after sight so close to dinner.” Jay huffs, carefully lowering himself onto the bed. 

Sunoo’s hands come around his hips when he stumbles. He was quick, but not alarmed: like he expected as much to happen and was simply waiting for it. 

Jay gets steadied and it's only when he's being supported down by that same grip that he realizes it. Sunoo is looking at him. In the moment that Jay had fixed his gaze to give the boy a small smile of thanks, Sunoo had finally looked back at him; The boy’s eyes previously fixed on the ruddy mess around Jay’s thigh. It hadn’t been discreet, he’d been staring at it the whole way here, guiding Jay to the nursery bay on some kind of autopilot. It didn’t help that his blood was continuous. Jay could feel it even now, slipping down his thigh, rounding around the meat, painting a new system of veins along his inner thigh down to his knee. 

Like this, up so close, Jay is able to see that Sunoo’s eyes have gone back to their deep quicksand color from class. Their icy shift in the locker room is nowhere to be seen, almost as if Jay had never caught it in the first place.

Jay watches the hair brush over the tips of Sunoo’s eyelashes as he smiles at Jay gently: pleasant and subdued. 

“Not at all”, he hears and it's like a whisper; a wet fog misting his ears with a soft and medium tamper. It’s befitting of the boy, so it must be him. He’s right in front of Jay, and Jay’s been looking at him (or well a part of him) this whole time, and the Sunoo he sees doesn’t speak: his mouth barely opens past a smile.

Jay can still feel the ghost of it around his ears even as he huffs out a laugh, attempting to shake off the tension locking up his shoulders. 

“Right, well thank you…” Jay musters out, his voice trailing off.

Jay's eyes accidentally meet Sunoo’s: something he’s been avoiding and he thinks…he thinks he sees the beginning of small shoots of ice blue spearing themselves between the brown: icicles falling into plump earth. 

 Again,” Jay finishes some time after, turning his head to break eye contact. Sunoo’s eyes were just so…and what the fuck was Jay even saying for real? Sunoo was a vampire ‘course this shit was more appetizing than any meal provided at the school. 

It's Jay who ends up tapping Sunoo’s hand to remove it from his hip. 

“Some first day, am I right?” Jay tries to joke, but fails miserably on his choice of words and delivery. In place, he gestures to his injuries: his thigh and the wrappings around his chest.

“Constantly looking like I got my ass beat,” Jay shakes his head, a smile coming through because he knows it's the exact opposite, “Hopefully next time, it won’t be so broadcast.” He says as he leans back further away from Sunoo, who's stayed close. 

But the boy mirrors him eventually, straightening up with a light, short laugh that sweetens his smile. Jay watches him shake his hair at him, the quick sand is back. 

“I would know anyway,” Sunoo hums, soft humor still coating his features as he looks at him. 

Jay smiles back unknowingly. He doesn’t understand the joke there, but the amusement on Sunoo was enough to tickle him anyway. Jay’s a lot of things: stubborn, confident, strong, well-mannered, humble, efficient, calm—for the most part—but above all, he was so fucking curious. He tilts his head up at Sunoo. 

“What do you mean?” Jay asks, letting the tension bleed from his shoulders. 

In the background, Jay can make out the noise of a door opening, but there isn’t enough interest for him to look and see when Sunoo is suddenly stepping forward again. It's a quick shift, a small breath, a blink of his eyes, and Sunoo’s knees subtly knocking against his. Small shoots of pain radiate up his left leg and Jay feels his body cringe from it. Jay’s still looking at his body, but he sees Sunoo’s shirt move out and the act of taking in a breath has Jay’s attention falling straight into the wet sand of Sunoo’s eyes.

Sunno doesn’t need to breathe, hasn’t this whole time. 

Sunoo looks down to him and Jay can’t help but feel like he’s so far away even when he knows the hairs on his leg can still feel Sunoo’s orbiting his, even when he’s so close their shoes almost touch and Jay’s twin rebels are already seeking the friction of Sunoo’s shirt. 

Jay feels himself lean in closer to him, to those eyes: belatedly wrenching a hand around the bedding to prevent an utter upheaval from the bed. 

“Blood travels easily around campus.” he finally speaks, the voice sounding like echoes in Jay’s ears. The tight wrap of sand pulls him in further, swallowing him in slowly and maybe Jay’s going crazy but he swears he can feel a tug pull at his irises: dilating him beyond repair. He tries to blink, reduce the stretching, or break the stare in anyway he could. Jay lifts a hand to hover above his bleeding wound: at all costs, even if he had to dig his own nails into the site to break the stare. His eyes were starting to fucking hurt, but he still doesn’t know what Sunoo means, so he keeps his hand still. His eyes must carry over whatever question Jay hasn’t asked yet, because Sunoo nods at him in acknowledgement and Jay watches as his mouth finally parts: the tip of his tongue peeking out, but never venturing out. It was just enough to taste the air. 

“You’re sweet, Jay.” 

Then, Jay feels all autonomy come back to him. He breathes in deeply as he looks around—anywhere but at Sunoo—and he closes his eyes, but the pain is gone already. They really needed to fix his fucking staring problem. When he opens his eyes Sunoo’s staring: stuck. Calmly and intently staring at the blood that’s contouring his thigh, oozing down his skin like the dead raven’s discharge dripping off the window. They also see his hand, curled, and perfectly aligned with the claws that Malachi stabbed him with. 

A smirk? A small smile? Jay doesn’t know, makes its way onto the boy’s face before his eyes come back up to meet Jay’s—to which they never truly met, Jay kept his eyes to Sunoo’s brow. Sunoo backs up fully, full cheeks hanging onto his smile, and suddenly he’s talkative. 

“I couldn’t tell you what exactly,” he shakes his head comfortingly as he gestures towards Jay, “but, there’s something spiking about it.” 

He shrugs his shoulders and leans on one foot as he continues his light-hearted nature. Jay’s in awe at the sudden information, his mouth opening over and closing because he really doesn’t want to offer back an awkward ass “thanks?” but what else does someone say to that! Maybe this is how vampires make friends, or just Sunoo. 

Luckily, he doesn’t have to come with anything in the end as what he presumes from the gown is the on-campus nurse. 

“Oh, sorry um, I’m—”

“Yes, I know. Mr. Kim has called in your incident. Are these your only wounds?” 

Jay feels himself blink twice at the interruption. 

“Yea,” Jay confirms before jumping into a short explanation of what happened in the locker room, followed by refusal of treatment for the wrappings she’s seen on his chest.

“I treated it last night already, it's nothing too serious. Thank you, though.”

He doesn’t see Sunoo’s reaction to all of this, having turned fully so she could inspect his thigh, but he does hear him mutter something. Regardless, if it was meant for Jay to hear, he would tell him so Jay doesn’t spare any mind. Instead, he lets his attention naturally fall back onto him after the nurse goes to the cabinet. Sunoo’s still softly smiling, but he’s also staring out the window in a sort of dream-like stance. 

Jay gives him the greatest stank face. 

“Contacting Sunoo,” Jay hums playfully behind the invisible radio he holds in his hand.

Sunoo’s head turns before his body. 

“Reporting,” Sunoo humors after a blip, before he walks back up the bed and lays a hand on his shoulder just as the nurse returns to his thigh. 

“I have to go,” Sunoo says, his face coming down to rest close to his ear to whisper, “but you’re in good hands, Miss Ooyang can heal anything.” And yes, Sunoo is a shit whisperer, but he didn’t say anything to justify Miss Ooyang’s stutter on his wound, much less the hand squeeze when she turned to retrieve her tools for stitches. 

Jay yawns, nodding and he pushes Sunoo’s head softly away. Sunoo chuckles at the swat. 

“Alright, see you.” Jay says as he reclines, fully prepared to sleep through the stitching—healing was always tiring. 

.....

 

 

When Jay awakes next it's to soft curls tickling around the high bones of his cheeks. Flinching away, Jay slowly opens his eyes and it takes a couple of tries; but soon enough he’s able to remove the heaviness of his hibernation. The next thing he sees are hazel-brown eyes—genuinely, like their eyelashes almost fucking touch they’re so close. 

“You’re not going to report this are you? It’s only my second day as Advisor,” comes her voice, imploring and light, matching her big ass eyes that appear so round up this close. 

“Yihwa,” he says and she nods dramatically, “back up.” The gravel in his tone only reflects his sleepiness, rather than any actual plight. Yihwa’s brows downturn at the realization and energy sparks green in her eyes and so when she settles back in her chair, her body having been halfway on the bed, Jay can finally see the room come back into his vision: untouched. The room was an exact copy of what it had been before Jay had crimsoned it: fully made beds and clean floors. The only difference now is that it was darker. He probably slept for a couple hours as outside was already getting dark from Fall and the room that was once cradled in pale light was now closing in around lavender grey: it was all moody and dark, but there wasn’t enough reduction in visibility to trigger the small sconces to turn on. 

Jay slowly lifts himself up, mainly using his upper body to scoot himself to the headrest. Miss Ooyang must have stepped out already, the wrappings and first aid materials no longer on his bed, the trashcans already changed. 

“Is this normal?” Jay asks Yihwa, wiping along his face before fixing his hair that was sure to have frizzed in his sleep. 

She cocked her head at him, but upon seeing him stare off around the room, she nodded, and then quickly shook it after.

“No, actually it’s abnormal” she says, “usually no one’s even treated. The room’s basically decoration.” 

Jay grunts as he cautiously turns on the bed, resting his legs off the edge in preparation to stand. “What do you mean?” He queries and Yihwa comes to his side immediately to help steady him as he stands, “Miss Ooyang just cleaned and stitched me up.” Jay tests his injured leg, figuring out how much weight he could put on it without too much pain. 

“Some packs have a healer, or if not, they know one. Coming here isn’t always necessary for them, though, even that is uncommon.” Yihwa says, letting him go to retrieve his bloodied shoes and rest them at his feet. Jay merely grimaces at the sight, the visceral disgust so much that he fully stands on his left leg to push the shoes to the side with his right. Another fucking pair of dirty ass shoes. 

Yihwa rolls her eyes at him but continues nonetheless to return his shoes and keep talking, “The main reason?,” she says as green plumes of smoke come from her hands like personified air and Jay’s too enthralled to fully pay attention, but once the smoke dissipates and his shoes come out looking every bit how they did before the locker room, he looks down to focus on Yihwa, “You’re one of the only ones that’s actually made it here.”

Jay feels the heaviness of her sentence, for not only what it says about the school, but what Yihwa may have seen in the past. “Did something happen?” he asks softly, wanting for every bit of the question to come out slowly so as to not disturb her any further. He watches her shoulders droop slowly and her eyes begin to crystal. “Jay—”

 

A scream. 

 

So loud Jay almost mistakes the building for shaking from it, but no, it was Jay’s own adrenaline that peaked so fast he became slightly dizzy from it. Yihwa jolts up, any ounce of their little world in the nursing bay now completely shattered. Her hand clinches around Jay’s wrist, struck still from the shock. 

He, not known to lie in wait, recovers first and is already pushing towards the exit by time Yihwa catches up with him. Each step sends arrows up his thigh and as they reach the door, Yihwa, with a hand surrounded in that emerald mist, comes to hover near his left hip. Jay as he walks begins to feel lighter. Yihwa is levitating his leg only an inch in the air, enough for him to be able to walk with only his right: like magical crutches. 

He thanks her and they stay close as they open the door and leave. 

The scream had been singular and unfollowed by any other sound or even a murmur. 

Together they turn the corner and up ahead are the balconies, the same ones Jay had seen when he first arrived, the same ones that decorated the inner sides of the buildings facing the heart of the school: Territory. 

The large quad that had so much lore, but no tongue to willingly speak of it. 

As they stepped down the hall, closing in, Jay shivered. 

It hadn’t been long, couldn’t have even been two full minutes, but there was a hoard: a hoard of students standing shoulder to shoulder, leaving but the smallest gap in between for comfort. They stood in some sort of pattern, short to tallest from front to back, each person standing in between the gaps of the two heads in front of them. Everyone had a view. Everyone had their place. None of this was new. 

Jay clenched his hands, momentarily reheating the palm of his hand and fingertips against the chill air and deep grey skies. There was something going on and Jay wasn’t sure if it was the morbidity of the picture in front of him or whatever else, but something felt wrong. 

His eyes distinctively look down for his blades that he knows are still perfectly polished and …on his desk. 

Fuck it he’s never coming out without his knives again. 

 

Jay peered out at the rest; the foreboding form and stiffness of the students carried out all around, wrapping the school’s balconies in a half circle. The darkening night sent shadows upon most of their faces, Jay could only make out certain features: a pointed nose, a tilted lip, eyes shadowed and looking out, stampeding towards any ounce of light to consume. Excitement. Fear.

If he were to take a picture from below, he’d argue it looked nothing short of a full collosseum. 

Yihwa saw first and her reaction: almost dropping his left leg, had forced Jay’s attention from the crowd and into the field. Territory. 

He stops the gasp somewhere between his throat and uvula. 

A body.

 The body of a boy, a student badly bruised, puffy, and seeping in the blood that still dripped from his nose and hair. He was dead that much had to be true: he was naked and whole strips of skin hung off from his stomach like streamers, his fingers stayed frozen in a fist, eyes and mouth blown wide open: he had taken his last breaths petrified and pleading.

The fog began to draw in, creeping into the field and settling and steaming over his body like eggs they had this morning. Jay grasps the balcony and realizes that it's been minutes since they’ve got here, been staring.

“Why is no one moving?” Jay speaks, the only sound amidst pure silence and wind spooking Yihwa, “ Why hasn’t anyone come to get him? .”

She remains stuck in the scene: the last moment of his death. She’s quiet when she replies and its equally as unhelpful as every other time. “They can’t. Not yet at least.” 

“And what the fuck does that mea–”

Yihwa cuts him off sharply, the mere snap of her head enough to stop Jay in his sentence, enough to not piss him off for being cut off. 

“What happens when you step into someone’s territory, Jay?” Yihwa directs, her eyes boring into his with a fury, a tension Jay cannot place. 

“The pack has every right to do what they please. Its law, I get it, but this is a school,” Jay asserts, sharp eyes digging into Yihwa, “and that’s a field, a fucking courtyard.” 

“And you were targeted in a locker room, Jay.” Yihwa’s mouth runs back at him like he’s the dumb one here, like he’s missing something that’s dangling right in front of his face. He scoffs and eyes start blinking in annoyance: he’s incredibly prepared to tell her how Malachi is one student amongst many, a bully, an overconfident dumbass, that every school has at least one, but murder?! 

But, Yihwa stares back at him and it's almost enough for him to drop his tone. 

Her eyes looked empty, drought. 

“It's called Territory for a reason, Jay. It's the student’s Territory. You think wolves, vampires, and magics are able to cohabit a school in peace, much less listen to a dean that is not like them? We are in the midst of an outbreak—even if we are all fighting to graduate in our packs and fight this, our alike goal doesn’t balm over nature. Territory belongs solely to us, to do with what we want, to settle issues, no matter how important, petty, or selfish in any manner we wish without penalty. It's what keeps the peace among the species, it's what quells the natural urges between foe.”

“So what happened then? What did he do?”Jay knows she was with him, that she couldn’t possibly know the answer, but he couldn’t help but ask it anyway, whether he got answered or not. He looked back down. 

“Something, maybe nothing.” She says softly and turns her head towards him, but not to look at him, “Sometimes you don’t have to do anything at all.”

Jay’s mind is in constant churn: his thoughts mushing together with a million questions with none of them seeming efficient to produce an answer. Jay takes one more glance at the hoarding of vultures they’ve become; feasting on the sight of the dead and Jay doesn’t understand how he hadn’t seen it earlier: the wrinkled noses, how no one besides himself seemed to touch the fencing of the balconies, as if there was a wall that prevented from even getting an foot close to it. 

Above the birds were still trying to force their ways beyond the balconies and away over the rooftops, but they were still in a constant state of duress and derailment. 

“Yihwa, what does everyone smell?” He asks, back straightening with the tense that comes from something he has no clue about. Senses.

“Heeseung,” responds a pale blond with warm chocolate eyes. He says it sweetly, looking upon the boy’s grave remotely, familiarly, “It looks like he’s already started”, he chuckles as he begins to walk away, theres a dreamy quality to it, as if he’s walking on air. His voice puffs out like soft clouds as he speaks to no one, “The new kid is new.”

Jay freezes, his heart beating slightly fast in juxtaposition. There was another new student? He looked towards Yihwa as the guy walked off, and she stared back into his: yes. Jay thought about those birds, the two who clashed into the window: both supposedly dead, until he left and saw only one left still. His eyes find the boy on the field again, long gone, but now ever-present. 

“I meant it earlier, Jay.” 

Yihwa’s voice brings him back up.

“We have wolves.”

....

 

Dinner is always held in the East Wing he remembers as they make their way into the hall: it’s the exact opposite of the West: though both had similarity in the layout of tables and its long interior, the East Wing was not only noticeably more intimate, but concealing as well. When Jay walked in he was immediately swallowed in darkness, not complete like the lights had gone out, but enough for Jay’s eyes to have to adjust. 

Small, stained windows lined the very top of the high-rise walls: their stained nature only further filtering out any light from the setting sun. Hell, any light that did pierce through barely managed to even touch the blanketing black that settled around the corners of the room. Yihwa, with her hand still hovered around his hip, tugged him towards the left. 

The dining hall itself was dimly lit, the low beaming chandeliers that hung over every table doing little else but casting their own shadows into the place. 

As he and Yihwa walked among the unaffiliated pack tables, Jay watched the others file in. Some groups veered off to the far right, others, often singles, came towards them, but his main interest: mostly vampires and werewolves sat in the middle tables where besides the corners of the room, was the darkest and most poorly lit. He guesses it wasn’t much of a problem for them as their eyes appeared brighter, almost glowing in the dark—fuck, do they have night vision?

Jay huffed, maybe there were some things he was jealous of. 

“You got lucky you know?” Yihwa starts as they round the end of a table.  Jay passes her a glance as they seat themselves, “If that fight happened with anyone else off of Territory, they would have been kicked out of the school.”

Jay nods his head more out of respect than anything else and claps his hands on the table, his forearms resting lightly on the red velvet runner that extended down the length of the table. He’s about to straighten out his back, remembering his mother’s manners, even makes a mental list to check that his elbows were off the edge. 

“What the hell?!” Jay jerks his arm to his chest, clutching the meat that had just been pinched. 

“ You, Jay! You would have been kicked out! Do you understand?” Yihwa nags at him, her hands moving wildly in offense.  

He all but sighs, returning his posture and slipping out, “Key word: would. ”

“You’re fucking insufferable,” Yihwa throws at him, annoyance so palpable he can see the tiny green sparks surge amongst the hazel, but she continues anyway like the good Advisor she so wants to be. 

“Right now you’re ineligible for packing, okay? Therefore, Malachi’s attempt at initiating you was a break in the rules, so you had every right to respond however, but you need to be more mindful about who you pick your battles with and when.”  She’s looking at him sternly and her arm is fully rested on the table and as she leans into him. 

Jay smiles, his teeth teasing along the seams of his lips as he turns to face her. He can’t help it, really. 

“Why?” He nudges Yihwa as he closes in on the space between them. His eyes must light up with his confidence, revealing every ounce of playful cockiness Jay tries to withhold, “because of Heeseung?”

The name is like a rainstorm over a bonfire. The annoyance that he surely caused faltered under the wet pellets and each second doused a flame: one, two, until Yihwa was nothing but a pile of wet wood in front of him. 

His eyebrow raises by itself at the action, but not much can be said when the room goes silent once more. It's almost an exact repeat of this morning, except no one has entered through the doors. Everyone is just sitting there. Waiting. And it only manages to keep him stock still for but so long until his curiosity runs out and turns to continue on with his life. Yihwa slaps her hand around his mouth, a frazzled, but harsh look in her eyes that tell him to shut the fuck up or else, and that sucks honestly cause Jay’s always been a “or else” kind of guy. 

“What is up your ass?” Jay’s question tumbles around Yihwa’s fingers, his breath no doubt moistening the inside of her hand. Jay almost laughs at the snap of her neck at his words, almost, you know until he realizes that everyone in the hall has done it too. 

And he barely even gets to question that because eventually he hears it too. Footsteps. 

They're in a quiet room with low visibility and there’s so much Jay can do to prevent his mind from curating. As the steps get deeper, the black that surrounds Jay starts to feel like the chilling fog that caressed his shoulders in the village. His mind flashes with his memories: the muddied pathways, the crinkled and aging flyers, the wolf. 

They get closer and he can tell that there isn’t just one.  The steps are too loud to belong to only one person, but they are incredibly synchronised, if it wasn’t for sheer volume, Jay wouldn’t have been able to tell otherwise. 

A pack then? Jay thinks, maybe that’s why their steps seem to fall into one another, falling and playing into each other's rhythm. 

Then the door opens and unlike earlier, it's slow. 

Fuck, it’s so slow that the door begins to whine, high and squeezed out like each second was pure agony. The sound starts to sink into his ears, a tickling air against his ear drums that makes him want to rub them free, but he doesn’t. For some reason, it feels like he can’t move; maybe it's the sound paralyzing him, or maybe as the tip of well polished leather shoes steps into the room, perhaps it's the small hairs all over his skin that stand up, shooting up with such vigor it almost itches. 

He keeps himself steady though, his hands lay unmoved on the table, his elbows resting off of it politely as he breathes through the feeling. Even when the itching is starting to feel incessant; a constant poking, as if his body is trying to alert him over and over again. It's familiar—this feeling—he’s felt it that same night as he was walking along the school grounds. It had been nothing then. 

The doors finally rest and the room barely breathes in relief. 

Standing at the entrance are four boys: all in line and at varying heights. They were tall, yes, but that’s not what seems to have everyone in a choke hold. Jay can’t feel their pheromones, much less smell whatever scents they have, but they look formidable: an impenetrable field that seems to force onlookers and people away from them as they move in. Jay’s seen these three already. They were the same boys from breakfast: Sunghoon, Jungwon, and Jake, they were still the same. The two are playful, but noticeably walking with a confidence that Jay knows only comes from winning, knowing that no matter what happens the outcome for them will be the same. It took Jay years before he could feel that, before he could confidently, no matter the time of night walk through the city street unperturbed by what may be hunting. Sunghoon walked the aisles with a calm stride, his posture perfect and shoulders straight, but his eyes glinted. The darkness that swallowed the room, only heightening the impact: he looked like he was hunting. 

Through all of this, Jay seemed to be the only one still watching, perhaps even the only one still capable of it. He saw them approach a table in the middle and again this one already had plates on it, set for six. His eyebrows jumped at the subtle hint: there were more of them that weren’t here.  Jay broke his stare to peer at Yihwa, simply to check on her. It didn’t seem like she had responded well last night. The last thing they needed was another trip back to the nurse’s office, but as soon as he turned his head, a shudder ran through his body. It jerked his hands that were neatly folded and banged his elbows against the edge of the table. 

His blinking speeds up at the action, Jay a little weirded out by what just happened. It had felt like a needle, as if every hair on his body curled and plunged itself into the top layer of his skin: Don’t turn, threat. It’s so shocking that Jay actually lets himself be forced back to look.

His lips part, but Jay refuses for any air to pass through them. 

He’s staring at him. 

The one that had been walking just slightly ahead of the rest of the boys. The one whose shoe was broken into the little bubble that surrounds the dining hall. The one who as soon as Jay saw even the tip of his shoe had his hairs splitting themselves. He’s the only one still standing in the aisle as the three sit. 

His hands are in his pockets as he looks over his shoulder to look at Jay, and the stare nearly stops Jay’s breathing altogether. He feels his body pause everything: the pricking, his breath, hell maybe even the blood pumping from his heart before it starts back up again. It’s almost like the power went out. It happens so fast, one second you’re relaxing under your fan and the next the lights are out, you can see nothing, and the fan harshly blows its last rotation. It only ever lasts mere seconds before the backup generator kicks everything back on, but it feels longer, the brain having already filled the deep void with anything haunting. 

Haunting, that’s what he was. 

Sable black strands sink past his eyebrows, ghostly whispers just above his cheekbones. He’s not as pale as Sunghoon and Jay briefly wonders if that’s due to his stare pulling the color out of everyone around him instead, inking his skin a dark salmon. His eyes slit when they look at him, no doubt not used to people meeting his gaze. Hell, half of the room is frozen, and those that aren’t are flinching even as they look down, and Jay has been feeling the tight grip Yihwa has on his leg only tighten by the second. 

His eyes dip and Jay catches the boy’s heel begin to turn towards him.. 

Fucking knives. 

Jay’s knees tense up with the adrenaline to stand up, free himself from the confines of the table. 

He’s only just beginning to think of how he’s going to work through this—Whatever this was, when the door opens again and Jay’s reminded of the two plates that are empty. 

Jay regards him strictly before quickly looking at the door. 

It's Sunoo. 

His heart relaxes and Jay subtly takes in a breath, a short amused huff in between at his hilarity. Why the fuck was he getting so on edge? 

Jay shakes his head, physically trying to yank himself back to reality as he makes Sunoo’s eyebrows and smiles. Yihwa is shaking her head profusely next to him, so much so he lays a hand on the back of her head softly: calm down, I’ll introduce you, he intends to mean. 

Jay gestures Sunoo over to the empty seat in front him, watching as Sunoo regards him slowly, eyeing the seat, then Jay, before they lock with the boy’s.  Jay silently hopes Sunoo is doing that weird suction cup shit with his eyes on him, but the contact is only brief, Sunoo merely gouging the situation before he makes his way over to them and sits. The boy who Jay swore was standing just a second ago (he’s kept his eyes on him as Sunoo approached, making sure his journey was safe) was now completely sat amongst the other three: fully settled like he hadn’t been feet away. 

“Have I missed something?” Sunoo questions and it comes out playfully to Jay’s ears, even if a smile never adorns Sunoo’s face. Jay rolls his eyes and waves his hand as if he’s physically waving the situation away. 

“The greatest power play, one could ever see.” Jay jokes and staff begin rolling out the food to tables. 

“This is Yihwa, by the way,” Jay says, his hand already having come down to lightly press on her shoulder, “she’s my advisor.” 

He introduces them and Sunoo is friendly enough, even going as far as to give her a small smile that Yihwa never sees. She keeps her head low, playing with her fingers and their plates are laid in front of them. Almost everyone picks up their cutlery with ease, digging in with an ease that’s not practiced. Werewolves and Vampires’  eyes glow dimly in the dark, nothing near what Sunghoon’s are, but enough for them to be able to distinguish the particular shapes of the food on the plates. A sort of night vision. 

Jay entertains himself with this: noting all the eye colors that sheen soft to bright depending on the section of the room. Werewolves’s eyes came in more shades than vampires did and Jay’s only ever seen varying shades of yellows and reds.  That is, until his eyes meet a pair of deep wine; they’re his. 

Sunoo doesn’t look when he speaks, “Heeseung,” he answers. His eyes bore into Jay. 

Jay’s eyes widen at the ounce of information. Oh. Sunoo chuckles softly as he leans in slowly, “His scent is all over the school.” Sunoo says, his eyes rolling at the statement, but they blink and they meet his.

“You smelled it, didn’t you?” The question is general, but the sound of it alone hits Jay in the chest and freezes his movement with his fork. If he didn’t know better, it’d sound like Sunoo was asking him something deeper; confirming, maybe even accusing.” Jay opens his mouth to explain that he in fact can’t, he’s already expecting a similar reaction to breakfast, but Yihwa’s hand crushes his thigh, and all he does is nod instead. 

“He marked the whole area,” Sunoo continues, loosening his stare and playing with his glass, “that’s why no one has retrieved the body yet. They can’t pass.”

“Why?” Jay asks, his face scrunching up at the idea. All because of one man?

“Some are scared and too weak to enter, others know it would be a direct challenge to Heeseung himself, not just the pack.”

“He’s the alpha then?” Jay questions, looking towards Yihwa who still hasn’t picked up her utensils to eat, “I thought you said they didn’t mix.”

“Something like that.” Sunoo answers him, looking off to spare a small glance at Yihwa and Jay can feel the hand she left on his thigh twitch, “She’s not wrong. Everyone in the school was shocked to see a pack built of werewolves and vampires. It hasn’t been done here for at least a decade.” 

Jay nods, a small glance going over to the group. He returns to Sunoo. 

“So how was it done?” Jay mumbles to himself, he may not understand the instinctual tension between the different species, but Sunoo made it sound like a feat—like it wasn’t something someone normally did just for the hell of it. There was intention, a need. 

“Be careful, Jay” Sunoo sings to him, his voice soft and comforting: it spreads through his chest like the butter he is swiping on his bread. Jay looks up, meeting the boy’s eyebrows in question. “You’re a new student,” he says and Jay rolls his eyes. 

“I’ve been told.” 

Sunoo smiles, no doubt used to him by now.

“The pack came back from a mission not too long ago. Same day you arrived actually, same day as that kid.” 

“Everyone thinks something happened that day, that that’s why Heeseung’s started so soon. That there is something linking you all: their maknae, Niki, he hasn’t come out of their dorms since that day.” 

Jay scoffed. The fuck does their youngest have to do with him. 

“You remember what I told you earlier”, Sunoo asks, a certain glee wetting his eyes: in the dark they glow a soft blue. 

Blood travels fast on campus . 

Jay nods.

Yes. 

“It probably won’t take long before he finds out who it is, who did it; probably knows already.”

The room comes back to life, plates clacking, jokes pouring from all ends of the room, and chatter enveloping them all in a warm intimacy. 

....

It’s pitch black outside as Jay makes his way back towards the West Wing. Yihwa had left him to visit Chloe and even though the gravity brought back onto his wounds pained him with each step, he knew Yihwa should go. The girl had been so wound up the whole dinner, Jay had almost called her out for not eating. She did, thankfully, but only after Sunoo had dismissed himself early, claiming to have an early start the next day. Jay hadn’t questioned it, he was more worried about how sore he was going to feel in the morning than anything else. Not to mention, he had to meet with a couple of teachers to discuss the placement tests. 

Jay stretches his arms as he walks, hair sweeping along his eyelashes. The halls are murky with low visibility, nothing but the occasional candle lit chandelier breaking through the haze of night and fog. He shivers a little, all his adrenaline officially drained from him. The depletion leaves him chilled. Who knew adrenaline could warm him as well as any fireplace? 

The steps he makes are quiet, the sound swallowed by the thin, but plush carpet that lines the hallway. He’s grateful for it; somehow, walking on the carpet feels easier on him than the marble. His procession isn’t necessarily slow, but he’s not rushed either. Jay takes his time, blending into the dark, letting his eyes soak in the sheer beauty that is the architecture of this school. Carefully carved walls, point arches, and long and tall columns decorate the hall alone and Jay can’t help but stare in awe. It's just so different. So different from the sleek glass buildings; the crumbled and destroyed remains of stores that were attacked; the streets that were now bare and no longer withheld the people that made it so different from the next block ahead. The school is deadly charming. 

Jay turns the corner, one more long stretch before he makes it to the center, but his body freezes again for the umpteenth time that night. 

He saw something. 

It was quick, almost like a flash in the corner of his eye. But he did see it. 

Jay looks around slowly, taking in every minute detail: the way the moonlight shone through the window, the many shadows that swarmed the floor and walls, the absolute open hall that had no room to hide anyone. He frowned; He couldn’t have been seeing things, but if not, then what was it that he’d seen and where was it now. 

Jay breathes softly and continues walking, not necessarily faster, but with more intent. He keeps his breaths soft and passing through his lips as quietly as he can manage. Jay’s listening. To everything: his own body and the way his chest rises and his stomach fills; the way his shoes leave small taps in his wake; the wind licking at the windows willing to be let in. 

There. 

A matching tap. 

Jay’s breath catches. 

Vampire. 

The step was intentional. They wanted him to know he was being followed. Vampires had the power to be completely silent if they chose: this one was alerting him. It only meant one thing: it wanted a hunt. 

Suddenly memories of cold seafoam vexed him, the straight posture, constant primal aura that surrounded him. 

Jay’s heart pounds harder and before he can think properly, he’s running. Pushing harder than he’s ever had and willing away the pain that shoots through him continually. He’s panting hard as he comes into the center. He’s running with a harsh limp, but there’s nothing he can do about that now. He can’t stop. 

Vampires are fast, incredibly so. Jay shouldn’t be escaping, he isn’t; knows that vampires liked to watch it happen, see the fight, see the energy slowly bleed out of them, feast on the fear they could smell. The rapid thumping of hearts and rushing blood exiting them. Jay knows he’s making it worse, feeding right into it, but he’s hurt and a one on one so soon doesn’t benefit him. 

He stumbles into the elevator and hits his floor, rapidly hitting the door to close and it does, but Jay doesn’t settle. Can’t settle. His heart was beating so loudly, so unusual to all the heartbeats beating in the school already that he could be easily tracked over the rest. 

He reaches the sixth floor and honest to the world books it to his room. There’s thirty minutes left until the doors lock, he’d have to lock it himself. 

He reaches his corridor and that’s when he hears it again. The tap. But this time its quickly accompanied by running. 

“Fuck.” Jay curses, pushing his legs harder, but he feels a breeze catch onto his skin and Jay’s body flinches at the presence.

He grabs the door, knob twisting harshly and Jay all but throws himself inside, but it happens anyway. 

At the threshold, right before Jay had closed the door. A cold nose ran along his jugular , the tip sending another shiver up his arms. And he stays shivering, long after he has locked the door because he knows he’s not gone. Sunghoon’s still beyond the door. 

Breathing. 

Vampires don’t breathe. They don’t fucking need to.  He’s doing it on purpose, he’s letting Jay know. 

“Fucking—” Jay never finishes it, just stumbles over to his desk and his leg almost gives out when his hands grab onto his daggers. 

The pain is becoming unbearable, his leg is shaking with it, begging him to settle. Sweat dots his forehead and glosses his whole body in a warm heat. 

The door knob jostles and Jay stands in position, his body leaning too far into the desk, trying to relieve the pain itself, even by a little. 

The jostling gets louder, more incessant. 

Jay swallows his spit. 

And then, a howl. 

It spooks Jay so bad, he almost drops his knives. He had been hyper-focused on the door, hadn’t expected a noise, much less a howl from somewhere beyond his window. Jay doesn’t move, doesn’t let his curiosity disturb his main objective, but the knob goes still. Immediately. 

Then it’s just quiet. No breathing, no footsteps, silence. Jay’s hands are slightly shaking by the time he limps over to the window, he actually ends up grabbing the lone umbrella Yihwa gifted him that morning to cane his way over. 

He peers out the window, breathing harder but slowly finding a rhythm back. 

Down on the field, Territory,  is a wolf. Fully transformed and sitting—looking up at Jay. The fog surrounds it , but Jay feels like he’s seeing it in high definition. It's not too big. Not the size of a Pack Alpha. It looked like a teenager, somewhere in between a pup and an adult. 

A gasp escaped his lips. 

The pup. 

The one that he had saved all that time ago. He watches him stand up on his legs and runs off; the body is gone. 

 

 

When Jay opens the door, no one is behind it. There’s no traces of anything, just a hall and its windows. Fuck this school.

 

Notes:

Guys its been so loongggg! I'm sorry, but I had to LOCK TF IN with school. Can't promise when the next chapter will be, but I promise I haven't given up on this story. It's actually so fun to write. Anyone who has stayed, THANK YOU. Anyone who has left, THANK YOU and my bad for the sudden bounce.

Hopefully y'all are enjoying it as much as I am. See y'all!

 

Also, excuse any mistakes in the writing. I decided to do this randomly at 3 am.

Chapter 4

Notes:

When y'all get to the library scene just know that the humming Jay hears is the humming from XO...this is only important to me lol doesn't necessarily mean anything in the story. Fun fact? I guess.

Lead. 

As if there’s iron casted chains compressing him into the bed; his limbs feel fuzzy like they’ve been stuffed to the brim with cotton and Jay can barely register when his toes move, the feeling drowned out amidst the heaviness that anchors him into the sheets that smooth over his skin.

He’s been in and out of sleep for the past fifteen minutes, his mind rested and up for the day, but his body lags behind what feels like acres from where Jay stands mentally at the finish line. 

Fuck, he’s so glad Ms. Ooyang gave him immunity for classes the next two days. It’s not that Jay’s body is bad at healing, it's much better than any plain human’s would be: the rapid evolution that took place to help the next generations survive amongst vampires, wolves, magics, and now ferals having done a good job at that—but, Jay’s still the closest thing to one, meaning healing took time, it was a process, and unfortunately, that process always tired him beyond belief. 

And it’s only Tuesday. Fuck . 

The thought wakes him up with the birds that chirp against his window. It was only Tuesday and his first day had left him wrung out as he’s been going through it all week. 

Jay sighs, his eyes fluttering shut as he stretches his neck back against the pillow. Light was shining through his room, yellow daylight adorning his white bedding as he sat up slowly. For a few seconds Jay just lets his head hang, body sore and too loose to give a damn about holding it up, but he finds the will to lift it, and with it the rest of his body. 

Pain. 

Jay walks to the bathroom with it like it's a common occurrence—it’s not, but something’s telling Jay maybe it will be now. Whether it's just the birds speaking by the window or the legitimate threat that was posed to him just last night, there is certainly no going back. Not that he would even if brought the opportunity, there was so much he had to gain still, so much he had to do in order to protect his mom, the memory of them, the memory of what his mom looked like when she was peaceful.

His mother was gone, but the man that killed her was not; He wasn’t going to let anyone scare him away, not when graduating here would provide him with all the resources necessary to track him down. Sure, many were here to help fight the feral epidemic, one he couldn’t give a rat’s ass about. He can live in it, he knows how to live through it. He’s here to kill one man and everyone in the pack that follows him. So, fuck Heeseung, fuck Sunghoon, fuck Jake, Jungwon, and whoever their maknae was, he’d kill them if he needed to—just like everyone else who got in his damn way. 

Jay stripped his bandages anew, cleaning them as thoroughly as he could. 

He should fucking kill that bitch ass driver, too. Those shoes were Prada. 

Once Jay was done he wrapped his thigh up once more, settling to forgo the ones around his chest; they were closing up nicely and were no longer bleeding. A blessing if you were to ask Jay, healing always took longer when the body has to focus on multiple areas at once. 

When he left the bathroom, he slinks over to the door, re-locking it with his key before getting ready for the day. He’s sure he’s missed breakfast by this point and if breakfast was in the West Wing, dinner in the East, he had know clue where lunch was held, if that, and Yihwa…he has no clue what her schedule looks like to even attempt a search and assist.

Pulling on a random sweatshirt and sweats, Jay simply sets his heart on the vending machines in the gym: he had seen them by the bleachers before he found Nicholas. It was a solid plan, he had to talk with Coach about his physical exam anyway. There were three exams he had to take to pass for eligibility by the end of the week: a health assessment, a mental and skill evaluation, and the physical exam. He’s not sure what they all entail exactly, but he’s at least hoping to catch a break on the last one until he no longer walks like he’s part penguin. 

Jay slips his shoes on, not even bothering to tighten the laces with the way his whole leg thrums in pain. 

He grabs his two longer knives; White Jade and Green Jade slipping into both of his pockets and when it comes to his smaller two—ones he usually keeps in small holsters near his ankles—he ties the holsters around his wrists, slipping the shiny Black Jades home and covering them over with his sleeves. He will not make that mistake again. Ever again. 

Once he’s out and locks the door again, Jay thanks fuck for the working elevator. Jay knows they only turn off past ten, but his first night had truly been horrendous, climbing all those flights stick with a person, no matter how good his ass looked. 

He slips inside, thumbing for the first floor and he’s leaning his weight into the metal walls. He rests his head against it, closing his eyes for a second longer than he initially meant, but when he opens them, right before the ding, right before the thick doors slide apart for him, he sees another button on the pad, much lower down, and almost tiny compared to the other buttons that protrude out nice and thick. This one was small, thin, Jay could have mistaken it for a bolt if he wasn’t looking; it had a marking, a capitalized ‘L’. 

Food for thought , Jay surmised and left the elevator. 

The center of everything was just as grand as it had been yesterday, as it had the night he got here, but now as the tall walls and ceilings bared down on him, Jay could feel his skin crawl; memories from last night trying to bring goosebumps to his skin. Jay’s face was hardened even as pain shot up his leg, even as the passing students stared at him: in awe, confusion, fear—that was always the same everywhere he went, it brought an imperceptible smile to his face. He’s still him. Even though he has both hands clutched around his daggers and his body is tense as he walks through the scene. Jay hasn’t changed. He doesn’t fear them, doesn’t fear Sunghoon. He’s simply coming prepared: for anything, for nothing. 

Jay walks straight through the East Wing, managing to make it to the Far East’s door before having to take a seat at one of the perches. Similar to how there was a hallway of arches open to the outside before entering the West Wing, there was a twin that connected the East Wing to the Far East building, and from where Jay sat up on a perch between columns and under an arch, sun shone past him, warming his back, melting away any tension until his body felt fluid. 

He breathes it all in: the lemon and bark from the dying leaves, the waking smell of salt water, and his own powdery smell from his soap. 

Fluidity was always the better option, he reminds himself. Remain adaptable, light and movable on your feet and you’ll be ready. 

“You fall asleep sitting up?” 

He hears it and though he doesn’t expect it, Jay doesn’t flinch, allowing but the smallest twitch in fingers around his handles. 

Jay slits his eye open to look down at Nicholas who looks at him from the ground amused. 

“I can, but I am not currently.” is what Jay responds with, closing his eyes back again as he waits for the throbbing to dull. 

“Right,” the boy draws out and the words round out against Jay’s ears—Nicholas is smiling— “seems like you needed help after all.” 

It's a quip, a small tickling comment to get Jay spurred because even though they don’t know each other well, Jay was easy enough to understand. 

“Oh” Jay chuckles off to the left before he settles his gaze straight, his jawline sharp and pronounced as he bites back at Nicholas, “Did I?” 

He’s challenging him, that much Nicholas knows, his wolf knows; Jay can see the way his eyebrows lower slightly, how the shine in his eyes flicker, but Nicholas smiles still and leans in.

“You have his claws in you.” He teases, that flicker in his eyes, twitching again over the words.

“And somehow, “ Jay grins slowly, whispering his next words as he leans in too, “ that’s a minor detail.”

Nicholas whirls back, throwing himself in the air.

“Fuck, I’m so mad we left!” He groans aloud.

Jay laughs as they break apart, Nicholas swiftly lifting himself onto the thick ledge where Jay sits, but scooting farther away until his back leans along the edged column. 

“Then why did you?” Jay shakes his head, turning his body to the right slightly to see him better. 

Nicholas rolls the top of his head against the column, smooshing his hair into it.

Then huffs.

Fucking dog, Jay thinks amusedly. 

“It was respect,” he says, drawing his knee up to lazily lay his arm across it, “you didn’t want our help, us lingering wouldn’t have respected that. If we hadn’t made the offer it wouldn’t have mattered, but since we did—”

“It would have been like you were watching over me.” Jay finishes, understanding washing through him. 

“Exactly, you’re independent from us, so we had to show that, not only to you, but ourselves.” Nicholas shakes his hair and smiles as he looks off into the square, “We’re a group of rag tags that somehow found our way to each other by helping—inserting ourselves in each other’s situations.” 

Jay hums, “And I bet you had a lot of those.” 

Nicholas gawks at him, scoffing out a laugh as he pushes the hair out of his eyes. His hands go up with a smile.

“Guilty.”

The wind rustles between them. 

“Anyway, we’re always willing to help, Jay.” Nicholas says jumping off of the ledge and back onto the ground. 

Jay rolls his eyes, “Don’t need it.” he grumbles, slowly lowering himself down. His toes dance for a minute, skirting along the ground until he gets enough purchase and balance on one foot to let go.

“Uh huh.” Nicholas says and his side eye says more than he’s let out. 

Once Jay’s back on his two feet, one more than the other, he throws a weak jab at Nicholas’ ribcage. 

“Fuck off.” 

Nicholas walks with him all the way, parting with him at the gym’s doors. He had another class further down, so Jay waves him off, barely staying long enough to actually see the boy off before he’s pushing through the double doors. There’s a slight squish to the grass when he enters, his heels sinking in the longer he stays looking down; there are beads of water running down the backs of short grass. 

His eyebrow quirks up. 

Yes, the gym was all grass, but it was encased in four walls and a roof, there should be no reason for it to be wet, much less knowing that it did not rain last night or this morning. Jay may have been asleep for most of it, but the lingering smell of petrichor would have stayed by, attached to every ray of sun. Jay would've noticed it, if not when he officially woke up, then by the wind when he was with Nicholas.

“If you can’t fight in the elements you might as well drown in them!” Coach yells and Jay’s head snaps up to meet the voice. 

The class looks to be running another sparring lesson, but this time Coach is drenching them with a hose, wetting the ground beneath their feet, splashing it over their clothes, and because Coach’s like that: drenching their faces for his own amusement: if the school asked he’d say it was to blind them and make them focus more on their movements, but Jay knew, as well as anyone else, that it was definitely mainly for amusement. 

In the mess, Jay watches, sitting on one of the benches with a luke-warm sandwich he jostled the vending machine for. He eats as he waits, waiting for Coach to have a moment for them to talk. This part was interesting too, watching the fights instead of being in them: you could learn just as much from analyzing others as you do fighting them.

Both had their strengths and with Jay’s one leg in remission, this was the best way to keep his mind sharp. But Jay doesn’t stew there for long; not with the high-pitched whimper that tears through his ear drums, and causes such a violent flinch he loses the pickle between his teeth. 

The sound directs him to the far left of the field. 

And Jay lets the pickle drop into the earth. 

Wolves. 

There are two of them, but to say they’re fighting would be an understatement. It was one-sided, a singular fighter against another trying to survive. 

One wolf, bigger in almost every sense: paws, jaw, the thickness of their coat, dominated the other. Its teeth sunk in deep around the other’s neck, thrashing the other’s body from side to side. It was animalistic, like they were trying to shatter every bone in the wolf’s body by their own weight, willing their head to eventually snap off from the pressure. 

The captured wolf tries everything: clawing helplessly, tucking its feet in as much as they could to avoid irrevocable damage, but it was already done and getting worse; with each choked off whine emitted, their blood gushes from around that thick jaw, soaking the grass, and flattening their fur as it traveled down their body. 

The wolf wants to kill them, anyone would say that, wouldn’t question it, but Jay saw it, saw how the bigger of the two’s fur shined bright and warm like cinnamon chocolate, how it extended to their tail: one that was moving aggressively. 

Wagging. 

Jay shivered.

The wolf still thought they were sparring—thought they were playing. 

Blood was dripping off their fur, but the wolf had no visibly deep wounds to produce such an amount. Jay thought it was simply the back-splash of the wolf they held between their teeth, but that didn’t make up for his whole body being covered in it. 

A chilling thought strikes through Jay as he watches the tail that never ceases in its excitement, the heavy drool that snails out of their mouth, the ears that remain relaxed despite being in fight. They rolled in the other’s blood, happy and drunk. 

“Alright, alright! You two—Break it up!” yells Coach, stomping over with his hose. The commotion brings the scene to everyone’s attention, it brings from his thoughts, forces him to focus back on the two. The wolf stops thrashing the other, instead just holding them in his mouth like a dog who’s not ready to let go of its chew toy. Three students hesitate to step forward, meanwhile everyone takes several steps back. 

“Almighty sake.” grumbles Coach and it’s like he’s disappointed, “Switch, now!” 

The cinnamon wolf does so immediately, but doesn’t move from his position. 

Jay looks away as the bones beneath its fur start jerking, popping. He also lays his sandwich, wrapped, down on the benches. 

When Jay looks back up, their eyes lock. Jake.

He’s still hunched over the limp boy, both arms caging around his body as he stares at Jay—misty blue eyes from his wolf stare into him and Jay’s breathing slows a bit at the sight. 

His ruddy mouth is still stretched along the other’s neck, teeth barely visible with how deeply they’ve sunken in; the boy is still gnawing around its meat, bloody juices smearing his complexion, seeping into the light tan of his skin. Jake’s lips are even redder, his eyes the only cool tone that offsets, but balances the ugly dance of bright, soppy red blood that tries to darken his honey hair strawberry blonde. 

He’s looking at Jay even as blood drops from the ends of his hair, eyes following down his body, all the way to twitch in his pocket where Jay tightens his grip around a dagger.

Jay’s not frozen, this gaze is different from Sunoo’s, he can move, he can look away,  but his attention is grabbed, his curiosity spiked, his disbelief deepened as Jake unfurls his tongue, their eye contact unchanging as he slides it along the wound, his tongue dipping into its cavity momentarily as he moves over it. 

His own mouth parts at the sight. 

No one moves him, not until he’s ready. 

And when he does, he rises to his full height, naked body doused in red. 

What the fuck was wrong with this pack?

 

 

“Jake’s a little rough when he plays.” 

“Shit, Sunoo. Make some fucking noise next time.” He scolds, fervently unclenching his fists from around the dagger, “What are you doing here?” 

Sunoo smiles at him, dipping his head in acknowledgement as he hovers over Jay.

“Ms. Kim sent me to find you—wanted to schedule your capability placement.” He says and Jay, though looking at his eyebrows, still can make out how Sunoo’s eyes seem to dance: a hypnotizing sway. “What are you doing here? Gym’s every other day.”’

“The physical placement,” Jay says, “I was going to speak with Coach and figure out a better time—Now is…a bit unfortunate.”

“But not impossible?” questions Sunoo, smiling. 

Jay scoffs, “Definitely not.” 

Sunoo nods at him, satisfied, happy as he hums and steps away. 

“You already took it.” He says. 

“What?” 

“There’s a test before you get to the school. It’s different for everyone, but you wouldn’t have been driven up here if you didn’t pass it.” 

Jay’s eyebrows shoot up at the information, Oh seriously? 

That wolf that he fought in the town…that was all a part of a test to see if he could carry himself? Jay breathes out. Well, at least his shoes didn’t go to complete waste, but even so where the fuck were they? He had gotten everything he left behind but those. 

Jay stands, nodding along to himself, but also in partial to Sunoo. One less thing he had to worry about then. Sunoo watches him stand, eyeing his thigh again—surveying. Jay chooses not to question it, it’s probably just some weird ass vampire shit he doesn’t need to know about. 

Jay is beginning to gather his things, or well just his sandwich when poses the question, “What was—” He means to ask him what his test was like, if it was the same as his or something else perhaps, but Sunoo doesn’t even let him get the words out. He’s right up against Jay, in a flash, quicker than the wind that lags behind. He’s starting into Jay.

“What was yours? ” He speaks softly and it's almost tantalizing, coercing to the point where Jay’s stuck again, but not because of his eyes. It’s almost like his brain just stops processing, stops responding. 

Sunoo chuckles and it low and deep, the deepest Jay’s ever  heard from him yet. 

“Careful with that question, Jay.” He says slowly, never blinking. “We don’t go around telling—usually.” 

“Why?” Jay asks and it comes out just as soft as Sunoo’s. Jay almost doesn’t even recognize it as his own voice, wouldn’t have believed it if it couldn’t feel his mouth moving, physically forming the words.

“Isn't it more fun to find out?”

Yourself, goes unsaid. 

Sunoo smiles sweetly, stepping back. 

“Come on, I’ll walk you.” 

 

 

Jay doesn’t do much the rest of that day, Sunoo takes him to see Ms. Kim and together with her Jay schedules his exam for the following day. Sunoo remained outside the classroom while they did, leaning against the wall beside the door; he’s gone by time Jay walks out—without a trace. 

 

 

 

 

It’s Wednesday when he asks. 

“What’s the small button in the elevator?” 

He and Yihwa are walking towards the Far West where his exam will be held. There are much more people on this end, he notices. Probably due to the class switching Yihwa mentioned the other day. 

“Hm?” Yihwa hums, stopping her stride momentarily to think, “Oh, the library. No one really goes down there.”

“What now?” Jay groans, rolling his neck as they continue down the hall. He’s honestly so sick of this school and its complexities, secrets, methods, whatever the fuck you could call them. 

“No, no nothing like that.” Yihwa laughs, waving him off. “It’s just underground—and it's dark, cold. Are you really interested?”

“Yea, it's open to the students?” 

“Pretty much.” She shrugs as they turn the corner, “The button will take you straight down, just remember the lock up time. Stay down there too long and you might end up staying the night.” She teases at the last part, wiggling her eyebrows and using the light that comes in from the window to exaggerate her face—like she’s telling a cliche ghost story in the dark with a flashlight.

“Alright, this is me.” Jay says as they finally reach the classroom, unlike some of the other rooms, Jay can’t see inside it: no windows in the door or in the wall to look through the room. 

“Good luck and don’t be nervous, okay? Think lightly,” she says, “the stuff’s mainly about instinct and survival skills—a gauge to see if you're mentally ready, as well as prepared to enter the forest.”

“The forest?” 

Yihwa nods, “The monthly hunt.” 

“The forest is piled with rogues—ferals. The school captures the worst of them: ones that ransacked whole cities, torn families….the worst of the worst. They’re all relocated there. It’s not pretty, food is scarce and anything that enters is fair game, even each other. Overtime, they must have caught onto the monthly pattern, so now around the time they ally, certain groups of them are dominating and circling areas. When we come, it’s like a feast—a holiday.”

“Why don’t they kill them?” Jay grounds out cause this was actually fucking stupid, what’s the point of keeping them?

“They could, but it's easier to have us do it.”

“Pussy.”

Yihwa rolls her eyes at him no doubt, but Jay doesn’t bother to look and check. He’s staring out at the window behind her, at the field he saw the pup in just the other night.

“We benefit from it though. There’s a kill count set at the beginning of each hunt. One the school expects to be reached: it's a cohesive number, not specifically set per pack. If it’s reached every pack gets boosted a grade level, if not, the pack with the most kills does and the rest according to their kills gets held back or they have to restart from the beginning.” 

“Easy enough.” Jay nods, ignoring, but thoroughly enjoying how his nonchalance grinds at Yihwa. 

“ Then ,” she seethes, “ there’s the kill switch—if the number of students the ferals kill outweighs the amount we killed. The population doubles.”

“Then?” He asks and he finally looks at her. 

He finds that she’s already looking at him, “I don’t know.”

It’s much later when Jay finds himself back in the elevator, eyeing the small silver button that reflected back at him. 

‘L’ —Library. 

The whole thing has been on his mind since his conversation with Yihwa that afternoon, he barely responded at lunch: Sunoo had looked at him curiously, but ultimately let it go, eating with him in silence as Yihwa and Chloe (who has since joined them) spoke quietly to the side of them. This school was beyond anything he had expected, beyond simply training—Jay didn’t come to be a hero, he knew the gruesome reality they were living in, but he didn’t expect the grotesque to be so widely accepted, unprevented.

Coach had watched a student be gnawed on almost to the bone; He’d spoke up, but he did nothing. No one did anything. Jake had smiled, silently grabbed the hose, and cleaned himself on the field, standing in now watery blood puddles on the grass. He even sprayed the boy down. Jay couldn’t read lips, had no clue what he was saying at the boy whose only sign of life was a softening twitch, but Sunoo could hear. 

“I promised I’d only hurt you a bit. Did you feel that?”

 Jake turned the hose's intensity, "Do you feel this?”

Then the boy was left there, just as the one on the field. No one moved to grab him, not until Jake had left. 

The school had questionable tactics and even poorer management. 

Jay hit it, a sour yellow lighting around the edges. 

All academies had records, had their history—surely Jay would be able to learn something about something. For the time he’s been here, it feels like he’s only found out once he’s stumbled into it. Flexibility is important in battle, adaptation is important in surviving, but preparation is strength.

It’s what allowed Jay to avoid presentation because he knew; he knew what to look out for, knew vaguely what to avoid. It allowed him to be successful on all his scavenging out into the city streets and buildings for food and supplies—the other dwellers might’ve lost a member, might’ve come back heavily injured, or without their lists crossed off, but never Jay. 

A heat starts to boil in his chest. 

His thigh throbs. 

He remembers Malachi, remembers Sunghoon, the hairs on his neck that stab whenever he feels Heeseung’s stare. 

 He lets out a heated breath, a dragon’s inferno, as his hands clench tightly around his daggers. 

He’ll be ready—for all those sons of bitches. 

The elevator doors slide open, beautiful sleek steel that spreads apart to bear Jay's nose to immediate must and worn books. The smell wasn't obnoxious, the slight sour note flying below his nose discreetly. 

When Jay steps out into the narrow aisle, he’s suffocated between yellowing pages and tight bookshelves that line the entry. Jay hasn’t seen every room the school has to offer, but this one has the shortest ceiling he’s experienced by far. Above ground, the ceilings were high, to an extent of multiple ladders, but the library—down here the ceiling was lower, possibly only a couple inches off from where his head naturally raised.

However, gratefully as he passes the shelving, the aisle opens out to a round common area: expansive but quaint, decked in reddy brown wood floors, and yellow lit sconces that lit up reading nooks. The ceiling was taller in this space, closer to that of a normal room, but even with the added space, the comfortable darkness that blanketed most of the area hugged Jay closely. 

For a few moments, Jay orientates himself, letting his eyes get comfortable with the low dim, browsing the pulled books on the side tables—there’s only two and inch off of the table so close to falling that Jay reasons someone must have left them not too long ago. He pushes them firmly to the middle, lining them up spine to spine. It’s as he’s leaving them that his hand knocks against the corner of the table. Immediate cold seizes his hand, sending avalanches of goosebumps down his arms. 

Yihwa was right, it was cold. 

Jay shivers and goes to grab one of the wool blankets draped over the worn dark brown leather couches and promptly wraps it around his shoulders before he begins to actually search. He passed a couple of books, many he thought would be helpful aid to his classes, supplementary material that probably would have done him well for the test he took earlier.

Eventually though, he finds his way to the last bookcase, settled in the darkest corner of the library; the last sconce was six bookcases away and Jay had only the small lit candle flame on the side table next to it to guide him. When he approaches, the candle flame sends a wash of light over the wooded and bending shelves: above them, a worn sign that says “Archives”. 

Bingo.

Jay gazes over their gold embossed spines, fingers grazing over spines of thick and thin; entranced and searching, so much so he forgets to question the mere existence of the candle. The way it’s flame gently shakes even before Jay had neared it, how in a room that was completely empty, a candle was somehow lit and kept burning when no one usually came down here, and quite possibly the most important facts: 

1. The students here could see in the dark—the vampires, werewolves, even the magics if they knew the spell. A lighted candle was not necessary and since Jay hadn’t caught any lighters lying around, someone must have brought it. 
2. The books Jay saw on the side table earlier were not from this section, their spines were completely different, but the candle was here. 

It all would’ve put Jay on edge.

He would have surveyed the area more if he focused, but his hand tenses around a thick spine, leather and aged.

He slides it out of its pocket, feeling over the cover page as he quickly stalked over to the next sconce: settled high above into the concrete walls, casting warm bronze light over a small, personal mahogany desk—a self-study table.

He sits, the creaks and snaps whistling through the quiet room as he opens it up. 

He’s not sure how long he ends up there for, but it must be a while.

He’s already part of the way through the first half and chills go through him even with the blanket on. 

The school used to be a prison, one that promised remission for wrongdoers, and asylum for the feral or about to be. Never in his life has Jay ever heard of both of those systems being within one facility and as Jay reads on, he understands exactly why. The prison became overrun, far beyond their capacity and yet more and more sick, far gone, and prisoners were sent. So they created Territory.

It became a battleground. Inmates would be pinned up against the ferals to fight for better confinement, more food, sometimes even a shorter sentence—if they killed them. Then reciprocally, the ferals, with the prison having run out of funding for conversion therapy, were treated like dogs, and their only food were the prisoners.

They were put against each other, the ferals’ conditions only worsened and sometimes the pressure and anxiety of being on the chopping block next sent some of the ill and inmates feral too. It was sick. There was no trust, they were turning on each other left and right, killing whoever came too close, the feral population was growing stronger, almost reaching the numbers of what Jay could see alone in his city, but he was in an epidemic. 

It felt like the room was getting colder, bleeding through the blanket to ice his joints; meanwhile, his heart sped up as the darkness that felt comfortable before no longer hugged around as he thought, but instead was sneaking up on him, waiting to pounce. 

The library used to be where the worst of the ferals were held. That, and the ferals that the ward of the prison experimentally turned. 

 

The candle light goes out.

 

The small flame from the corner of his eye flashes out and the sound of its metal holder clinks against the wooden table. 

He blames the darkness of what he just read because the sound feels like it reverberates around the room like a scream. 

“Shit.” Jay loses his breath, body almost jerking him completely off the seat.  

He stays there, breathing, taking in light gulps so that he could hear over himself. 

The candle is still rocking gently back and forth; It was hit. 

Someone was down here with him. 

He stands up steadily, not even bothering to be quiet: if they hit the candle, they also knew exactly where Jay was. 

Jay leaves the book wide open on the desk, as he steps back onto the beating red runner. It spreads from under his feet and images of Jake soaked in it come to mind: his eyes that simmered in glee as he purposefully ground his feet into the bloody pool in the grass, his toes rowing through it. 

He pulls out Green Jade, the pretty orange bronze of the sconce glint over the mixed metal. They were freshly cleaned, freshly sharpened, and it reflected Jay’s image back to him as he held it steadily, moving out carefully into the common area.

When he reaches safely, he disregards the blanket and unlatches White Jade, together he brings his arms up into a cross, an ‘x’ across his chest and below his chin, so that both blades curve sweetly around his neck. 

Vampires were fast, faster than transformed werewolves and they have the advantage of silencing their steps. Most predators when in attack go for the neck: wolves, tigers, foxes, Jay’s even seen some birds do it over bread.

It’s the quickest way to gain submission, the fastest way to kill, and right now he’s in a closed off space underground, surrounded in darkness and orange spotlights that do nothing to give him visibility farther than his immediate place, and the only way out is through a small aisle congested by bookshelves on either side. If they were hiding between one of them, Jay wouldn’t be able to know until he was being attacked. This was his only option to save himself from a submission attack—from death.

At least, if it were a werewolf, Jay would have more of a chance to adapt—more time to adapt. 

Jay closes his eyes, breathing in deeply as he further curls his fingers tight around the helms. 

Now or never. 

He starts walking through the aisle, knees ready but soft and all the way Jay keeps his shoulders hunched. 

The sour note is getting to him, wafting under his nose much more often than he had noticed before. 

He was nervous, breathing more. 

But he wasn’t scared, yes the night prior may have messed with his nervous system a little, but he had this, he could handle this—he always did. But even though Jay told himself this he couldn’t deny that something felt different, that this felt different. 

Whoever it was, wasn’t Sunghoon. 

Above his next breath, Jay hears a page turn, a slick papery sound that tenses his shoulders. As if it wasn’t quiet already, the room is becomes deafening, so quiet Jay can even pick up the general location of the noise—right where he had been sitting. 

They’re turning a page in his book. Humming.

A soft tone that skips and repeats in a drawn out haunting melody.  

Then they’re moving.

Their footsteps, a deep clacking that holds weight—confidence. They end up at the couch, a direct view from where Jay stands in the aisle. Jay doesn’t turn to look, only prey keep their backs shielded. He keeps going, carefully and as silently as possible; Jay knew they would hear him regardless, the point was to not make so much noise that Jay wouldn’t hear them. 

He’s six feet from the elevator when he hears it. 

Ding. 

Jay startles as the doors open to him, the flinch taking him back a step, but there's nothing in front of him, the elevator’s empty. It doesn’t make sense to him, none of it, an elevator can’t be moved unless it’s been sent down, unless someone has tapped the button. So where were they? Why couldn’t Jay see them?

Tap. 

His heart pounds against his lungs, every ounce of air left in them seizing up. 

Sunghoon , Jay thinks. 

His body is threatening to tense back up, memories so fresh in his joints that they begin acting by themselves, but Jay restrains it; He forces himself to remain poised but relaxed in his position, even as he continues to make progress towards the elevator, but now even that feels unsafe.  

The sound came from up ahead. Within one of the book rows that lined the aisle on his left. There were two people in the room, and they’ve both been here. 

As Jay passes the final two bookcases, his feet kiss the demarcation between the cement basement and the marble elevator's floor, but his feet are not alone. 

He doesn’t hear it, only feels. 

A body is behind him, a presence that seemed to only appear. The tip of their oxfords poke into the heel of his sneakers. Jay can smell them, their cologne, their clothes—it's a clean musk, white tea with mint and an overlay of something fresh. Its unsettling, a light, unbound scent that contrasts how claustrophobic Sunghoon feels behind him, cold breath sloping down his neck, leaving goosebumps spreading in a necklace around the collar of his shirt. 

Jay’s right by the exit, his feet fucking skirt the edge, but he can’t move. Doesn’t move. All he does is push his elbows out, further encasing his neck with his daggers as he waits. He’s never fought a vampire before, and with everything new, you have to learn from your opponent, to study them, let them lead until you’ve cornered them. 

But Sunghoon doesn’t move, he stays right up behind him, and he stops breathing. 

Jay’s smothers the shiver. It’s like he had gotten used to feeling his breath, that the sudden stop feels like a withdrawal. His body doesn’t know what to expect next, it remembers last night, and it's trying to force Jay to move, to leave, to swing, but Jay can’t. Not yet. Something was wrong, had to be. Why wait now?

The humming stops and Jay can feel how hot his hands run, how they start to dampen his hold around his daggers. 

“Silver?” 

Jay hears it from just behind Sunghoon, off to his right. The other person, possibly a wolf. 

Jay squints, “Fuck does it matter?” 

The question gets him a laugh and he can hear them come closer, pressing up against his shoulder to lean in. “I heard a lot about you,” he says, “They don’t seem to be wrong.” 

Jay rolls his eyes, “I wouldn’t go trusting everything you hear. Of course, unless it’s about me not wanting to be fucked with.” 

Jay hates it, hates the silence that follows, hates that he can’t look them in the eyes. He hates not being in complete control. 

“Heeseung’s gonna enjoy that.” 

“What the—” Jay make to whirl around, question the fuck out of him, maybe even do worse, but strong hands sink in around his waist and keep him front facing. The strength in them makes his skin dent under their fingers, and the pressure they push down into Jay keeps his feet cemented to the floor. Jay winces, waist flinching away from hands that refuse his movements.

“Ah, Ah. Don’t move, you’ll trigger Sunghoon.” 

Jay’s hand curves around his knives, preparing to cut off the very fingers that touch him. 

“Don’t test him.” the boy whispers to him and his voice is light, breeding with a happiness that could’ve been charming in any other scenario. “He’s not all present/cognizant.” 

That kills every thought of violence. 

“How’s that possible?”

A feral vampire wasn’t necessarily uncommon. They tended to exhibit such behaviors as fledglings, but Sunghoon was grown, his age if Jay had to guess, probably more in vampire years. But more than that, Sunghoon wasn’t on a spree, mindlessly killing: he walked, he ate with his pack, he responded to outside stimuli, he had some type of conscience left in him to stay rooted behind Jay without killing him on sight.

Although, now that Jay was thinking about it Sunghoon’s eyes never shifted from his primal state. Jay breathes in. The school was allowing a feral to walk and live among the students. 

“That’s the least of your worries.” 

“And what exactly do you think I need to be worried about?”  Jay scoffs, even as his heart pounds in his chest.

The boy hums in his ear, standing shoulder to shoulder with him. “You’re the new student,” he starts. Jay can barely help the anger that curdles up in him, it's fast, his vision goes blurry with it. If he gets told that one more time— 

“Kill.” 

Sunghoon says it and it's a low murmur, an immediate response like its been trained in him. 

Jay gasps, the sound small, as contained as he could manage it. 

“Hurt pup.” 

The hands on Jay’s waist shifts, circling around him until the boy stands in front of him; big boba eyes and a feline smile. Jungwon.

“It’s okay, Sunghoon.” Jungwon whispers to him, but his eyes stay on Jay’s as he says it, as he leans in slightly. “We’re gonna kill him.” He croons and his fingers dig so much deeper Jay can’t help but flinch in his hold, “gotta wait for Heeseung, hm? Gonna put him on stage in front of all the packs, let ‘im fight, wear him out until the exhaustion and sweat ruins his scent, forces it out, and then when he can’t hide, Heeseung will drag his unconcious body to Ni-ki to finish.” 

Jay is huffing out breaths by the end of it, adrenaline rushing through him at the monologue. He’s shaking and the daggers are slipping slowly in his grip. 

But he tightens his fists just as fast, focusing all his energy to his elbows and hands; he doesn’t care, doesn’t care what Sunghoon might do, he’s not going down without a fight. 

“Jay?” 

It stops him mid-breath, before he could even twist his body for a swing. How did he know his name?

Jungwon’s mouth is at his ear, his breath curving down his neck, fogging the sides of his blades. A hand has come to grip his wrist firmly, resting it harshly to his chest so he doesn’t swing. 

“Give Sunghoon another good chase, for me yea? We don’t need him killing you before Friday.” 

Jay glares at him as he lets go and steps back, the light of the elevator illuminating his features for the first time. …

“Don’t worry, we’ll let you get the elevator first.” He smirks, an eyebrow jumping up from his amusement, but he doesn’t move from Jay’s way, even as Jay nears. 

His hands clench and he no doubt knows that his anger reflects on his face, in his eyes that bore into Jungwon’s. He knows he shouldn’t, knows Jay should take the offer, leave up the elevator and run.

He knows. 

 

 

 

“Fuck that.” 

Jay makes a valiant attempt, he does, but Jungwon grabs hold of his arms and full bodily flings into the elevator. 

Jay’s back hits the wall, the metal almost crushing against his bones. A sharp groan escapes him as he flops to the floor. Knuckles unrelenting around his daggers, he glares up at him, even his knees shake from the impact, but a gasp escapes yet again.

Sunghoon’s growling, fangs elongated and almost sinking past his chin; his eyes a shielded seafoam, now have a reddish pupil as he bucks towards him, only held back by Jungwon who has both arms wrapped around him, but he’s laughing, smiling happily. 

“Don’t get bit, Jay. He doesn’t stop.” 

Then he lets Sunghoon go and would have screamed at the speed in which Sunghoon comes for him, like he’s racing, every reserve in his body set for Jay alone, but the doors slide shut and the elevator lifts and Jay’s beginning to realize if he doesn’t control his breathing now, he’ll start hyperventilating. 

Breathe, breathe, breathe, Jay. It's fine, he tells himself, even though he knows that its not, that somewhere deep down that speed, that intensity, the growl, it all reminded him of him, his mother, it took him back to that house where he didn’t know what to do, back to being weak. 

Jay refuses, shaking his head. He’s killed, fought so many ferals, killed people, this should be nothing, all he should feel is anger, strength from knowing he’s skilled now, he can kill him, he can kill them, but the truth is…the truth is Jay’s never encountered a feral as far gone as the one that claimed his mother that day, hasn’t seen such a ferocity as that day, an intent that all the mindlessly killing ferals he’s met lacked.

This was the closest he’s ever seen it and he was scared. 

The doors opened up and Jay quickly gathered his knives, picking himself back off the ground. 

His eyes were wet, but he wasn’t crying. 

Disappointment, anger, and resentment swirls in his chest and run his way out of the elevator, heading towards the bridge that would take him back into the center. He’s fucking pissed, their just another pack, he tells himself. He doesn’t want to see, doesn’t want to acknowledge how Jay may have a weakness that he hasn’t purged that night his mom died, that he might not be ready to fight that man alone as he is, that he might die if he tried to. 

Especially when the mere ding of the elevator, so far and faint, sends violent shivers up his spine, so much he almost trips. 

“Fuck,” Jay whimpers. 

His leg no longer burned, only sore as he bared his full weight on it. He didn’t know what to do. He was running again, he said he wouldn’t, but most of all, he wasn’t going to make it—not like last time. Sunghoon wasn’t hunting anymore, prowling for prey, he was going to kill him or get tired trying. 

That’s when Jay stops running. 

Fine, he breathes in, and his breath gets caught in his chest along the way. This was going to happen either way, whether it was him and Sunghoon, or later with their Alpha. Jay rather chooses his battlefield; he doesn’t know when they’ll attack on Friday, but he knows Sunghoon will now, and that’s enough preparation for him to fight, not to kill, but for his life. 

Jay readies his stance, his knees bending slightly as he raises his arms and daggers around his chin, his shoulders sting in discomfort, having been held up for so long in the library. Jay bobs slightly on both his feet, constantly shifting his weight so he’ll be movable. The crashes come closer, at an alarming speed, but Jay steadies himself, refuses to even breath unless he choke on his own breath, but then there’s movement from his side and a bark. 

It makes him flinch, lose his stance as he jerks further away, but when he settles a look, he finds the wolf, the pup that had followed him around after he killed his feral mother. Jay’s mouth gapes, his head shooting between Sunghoon and the wolf that hikes their forelegs over the perch to stare at him, head tilted, debating. Jay rushes to him, shooing him off and away. 

“You have to go, have to go, okay! It’s not safe. Fuck, I don’t even know how you got here? Leave!” 

The wolf neglects him, instead reaching its snout out to nose along the wrists Jay was shooing him with. Jay’s shaking. 

“It’s me okay, it’s me. Now you have to listen, okay. If you stay I can’t save you again. You’re shit on your own.” Jay rushes, yanking his arm back. He barely gives himself time to register the wag of the other’s tail, how it seems to try to smile around all those large teeth. Fuck, he’s grown up now hasn’t he? He’s no longer the small teenaged pup outside the corner store. 

Jay turns his back to him, readying his stance yet again. 

He’s so wound up, anxious, angry, but now worried for the wolf. He doesn’t care, he doesn’t, he just doesn’t want all his hard work saving the bitch the first time to go to waste, but Jay can barely think past this, can barely think about his starting move when a wet tongue licks up the back of his nape, a snout digging into the side of his neck and teeth sinture into his sweatshirt and full bodily lift him over the perch.

For a couple seconds Jay’s cursing as he’s pulled over the ledge, momentarily hanging in the air by the wolf’s mouth, like he’s the fucking pup in this situation. 

Jay goes to hit him in the nose as the wolf settles both his paws back to the ground, but he drops him before he can, chuffling as Jay sprawls in the grass. 

“I can’t do this with you, okay?! I—” Jay watches as he sits up, the wolf slowly bend down, low enough for Jay. 

“You want me to…?” 

The wolf just looks at him and Jay says no more as he climbs onto, thick fur bedding under his ass. He leans down so he’s bellied to the wolf’s back and after putting his knives back into his pockets, he clutched his hands into the fur. It was soft, matte black, and so thick Jay believes he could quite possibly be better than any bed he’s slept on. 

The wolf checks him fast before he’s off, feet racing through the night and it's so fast Jay feels like he’s flying, like the wolf’s paws barely even touch the ground with how smooth the ride is, how much wind if flying all over and around Jay, poofing up his sweatshirt and blending his silver hair into the dark fur below him. It's exhilarating, freeing, a nice reprieve of how anxious and pent up he’d been. Jay relaxes into him, closing his eyes and not minding where the wolf takes them, as long as they keep going. 

When they do stop, the wolf doesn’t bother to force him off, just lays down with Jay on his back, chuffling again as Jay slowly slides off to the side, body so limp, he simply glides off unintentionally. 

“I think that’s the closest I’ll ever get to riding a horse.” Jay says stupidly, body so lax and mind blank that he says the first thing that comes to mind. He’s staring up at the stars as he lays in the grass, but it’s not cold, not with the big ass furnace that lays pressed up beside him. 

The wolf howls into the air and then begins nosing around Jay’s hair. 

“Would you stop that? You’re not going to smell anything beyond my soap.” He tries to push the snout away to no avail. The wolf looks at him as he sniffs. 

“I haven’t presented, you look stupid.” Jay says and the wolf freezes, taking in the information, before he just whines, snapping his teeth at him playfully before he settles back down and for a couple of minutes Jay just watches him. He truly has gotten bigger, older, Jay doesn’t know by how much, wasn’t even sure how old he had been then. Jay has so many questions: how did you get here? Where did you go? But the only thing he says is:

“Did you learn how to shift?” And the happy nod Jay gets back almost makes him feel proud as if he’s watched the boy grow himself, raised—Jay quickly stamps the idea down, shaking his head.

What the fuck was wrong with him? He can’t have these thoughts, can’t afford to blossom a relationship like that, even if small. Jay couldn’t take any chances—won’t. So, Jay rolls away, lets the cold earth and sharp wind freeze him. 

He doesn’t say thank you, doesn’t acknowledge what the wolf has done for him, doesn’t even think about it unless it'd form an unconscious bond that could trigger him. 

“Do you think we’ve lost him?” Jay asks, staring out at the descending hills, the wolf had taken them outside the gates somehow. 

He just tilts his head and Jay sighs. 

“How much longer before he retreats?” 

The wolf looks up towards the moon and Jay groans, shivering with the next gust. He was going to be here until morning. Jay hides his head in his arms and wills himself to not move, to not shake. Breathe in slowly and breathe it back out. He’ll make it through, at least he had a sweatshirt and pants. 

The wolf shuffles somewhere off to the side of him and Jay doesn’t bother to pay it any attention. Not until heat wraps all around him again, crushing any goosebumps that haven risen back into his skin. It was nice, it was, but…

“Get your wolf-ass off of me, you're heavy as shit!” Jay curses, scrambling under the wolf, but the wolf just chuffs again, laying his entire weight on Jay like it won’t crush him, or maybe the wolf wants it to. 

It’s all confusing. Everything. 

Jay’s mind is swirling with questions as he slumps his way through his hallway. His body feels soft, light like he’s just woken up from being on the clouds, and in a way he has.

He woke with the first rays of light spearing themselves through his eyelids, body curled into the wolf, fur encasing every part of him it could reach, and where it didn’t the wolf’s warm breath covered the rest; like that between the plushy grass and the wolf Jay slept deeper than he’s ever had since he’s gotten here, since the epidemic, since his mother… 

He was the first to leave, climbing out from under the wolf and stretching all the way towards the gate.

He didn’t want to stay longer, didn’t want to process the very real fact that this pup, a wolf, just saved him from a night that could’ve been Jay’s last, and what did Jay do? He took both their parents from them, much worse, the wolf didn’t even know that Jay did, didn’t know he killed his father, didn’t know he had done it as an entry test, didn’t know he could’ve still encountered him, and tried to speak to him only four days ago.

It set something heavy in him as he stared at the sleeping pup; it bloomed questions, dark petals that shriveled and fell to the ground. What if the wolf had been tracking his father? What if he had wanted to see him, settle something, anything? The boy had been so close and Jay had taken that from him. 

He didn’t want to tell him. Knew that if he stayed, this ugly feeling that edged too close to guilt would make him admit it, take him to the last place his father had been, gutted out, separated and bloody in the middle of a muddy, ghost town. He’d let the wolf have a hit, just one before they fought, or they walked away from Jay once again. But, he had let that thought die. He didn’t need another fight. Had too much on his plate already and now wasn’t the time to feel whatever this was, people wanted him dead. 

So yea, Jay left him in the hills. 

But, now as he came upon his door, hand wrapping around the knob, he wondered why Sunghoon had never found them. It wasn’t like they were hidden, it wasn’t like that mattered. Sunghoon no doubt knew what his blood smelled like from his wounds, no doubt knew the unique pattern of his beating heart to track him outside the compounds. But, nothing had happened, all night. Even during the small moments Jay would wake because of the harsh wind, no one stood above them, no one stood awaiting them in a window like some freaky horror movie. 

Jay felt oddly safe. 

And he didn’t fucking like it. 

Who the fuck was their maknae and why do they think he did something to them? What did he do that was worth killing him over? Jay’s mind is reeling with questions, reeling like the old camera film with faces and interactions, even small moments of awkward eye contact he’s made with random people, but for all his effort he can’t think of anything. Anything, anyone that could’ve sparked this. 

Jay steps into his room, blindly throwing the door behind him shut. 

What did he do? Something, maybe nothing at all. 

The new kid is new. 

Blood travels fast. 

We have wolves, Jay. 

It all builds in his head and his hands grab at the roots of hair. 

“Rough night?” 

Jay releases his breath, “Quite so,” he grumbles, flopping down on the bedding beside Yihwa. He lays back against the sheets, keeping his eyes shut to the ceiling. He feels Yihwa move closer from the end, closer until he can feel the brush on her shirt against his arm. 

“I told you the library sucks—cold, probably haunted honestly. Did I tell you that?” 

Jay’s lip twitches in a smile he suffuses, “What, that the library is haunted?” 

Yihwa nods and Jay only knows from the way her body bounces on the bed with it. 

“Yea, Chloe’s had many encounters apparently.” 

“No, you didn’t tell me.” Jay says, opening his eyes slowly. 

“Damn.” Yihwa whines, laying herself in perfect symmetry to Jay. She babbles on about her position as Jay’s Advisor, how she’s supposed to warn him of these things. All it does is roll Jay’s eyes and get a small smile from him. 

“What happened, then? Did you see a ghost?” 

Her head turns against the sheets to look at him. 

Jay shakes his head. 

“No,” he begins, turning his head so their eyes connect over the sheets, “but I may have solved the case.” 

He watches her eyes widen, amusement taking hold of her face, along with sarcasm. 

“Oh yea? And by any chance does this solution end with a tussle in the grass, detective? You know, a fight, something I told your ass to stop!” 

She rises up the bed with each word, her sentence ending in a giant, dramatic flurry of arms and plucked piece of grass from his hair. 

Jay ignores her theatrics. 

“I was cornered by Sunghoon and Jungwon. I didn’t know, but they were already in the library by the time I arrived.”

Yihwa gasps, her body freezing even in breath as Jay continues, “This isn’t the first time, two nights ago, Sunghoon set a hunt on me. I barely managed to get out of that one and ever since that night it’s like I’ve been seeing at least one of their pack everywhere: it feels like eyes are always watching me, and they are, but not for what I’m used to.

Last night, they told me they were going to kill me, but they had to wait until Friday, had to wait for Heeseung. Yihwa, what’s going to happen on Friday?” He asks and he’s serious even as he stays rooted to the bed. His eyes are set on her, unmoving and cold. 

Yihwa is pacing the room, her finger caught in a curl. When she stops she looks to him, but not at him. 

“You only have her health check up left, right?”

Jay nods, sitting up. 

“Yea, supposed to meet Ms. Ooyang around ten.” 

“You’ll be eligible by Friday.” She continues on once she sees Jay lift his eyebrow at her, “Which means that not only will you be available for pack courting, but your skill rank will be posted on the Center’s bulletin. Your skill rank is based off of all the tests and exams we take in classes and by the end of each month, we’re graded in our agility, combat, resourcefulness, amongst other things. Since you only just arrived they had to combine yours in one week. Anyway, I’m rambling, your skill rank is going to show what packs are most compatible with you, what skills they’re lacking, or that you lack—”

“I don’t want a pack.” Jay cuts in hard. 

“I know, dipshit let me finish. Just because you don’t want one doesn’t mean other packs won’t want you. Everyone needs a complete pack as a part of the requirements to graduate. If they have a hole and you fill it, you will be a target. If they’re good they’ll court you and take your answer as is, if they’re not, you’ll have to fight to prove your strength alone.”

“Right cause that’s fair.” Jay scoffs. 

“You want to be a Lone Wolf in a packing society, Jay. It was never going to be fair from the start.” Yihwa glares at him and she holds it, even as Jay sends it back tenforth. Jay smirks as she holds his gaze, so she does have some fight in her. 

Yihwa rolls her eyes at him, blushing lightly. 

“Look, you can avoid it, alright. You don’t have to fight for your lonesome unless you’re challenged.” 

“Challenged how?” Jay asks and it's a genuine question, not just one out of ego. Jay wasn’t presented, he didn’t have the same instincts and sensitivities that wolves and vampires did. A growl his way or a bark wasn’t going to get him bucked up. 

“Dragged out to Territory,” she answers, “If they can catch you on Territory at the same time as them, then it’s immediately started. It’s like how a divorce doesn’t begin until you’re able to get the paper in the other person’s hands.” 

Jay laughs at the comparison, shaking his head, some more grass falling from his hair onto the floors. 

Okay, that’s gross, Jay thinks and promptly gets off his bed. 

“So basically it's a game of hide and seek for the whole day unless I want to fight? Got it. How does any of this matter to the whole Heeseung thing?” He asks as he walks around the room, grabbing his towel, a pair of underwear and clothes. 

Yihwa floats the shoes he takes off to the corner of his dresser. 

“Easy. You’ll be on Territory.” She says, but contrary to what she says, she’s biting her lip, gnawing into it as she holds onto both her arms. She’s worried. 

Jay pauses. 

Anything can happen on Territory without penalty or intrusion. People can right a wrong, wrong a right. Take, ruin, decimate. Jay remembers the boy who had been torn into confetti, petrified and gripping the grass, eyes frozen open staring into the eyes of the millions that looked down at him, doing nothing. 

We’re going to kill him….

“I see.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Notes:

It's finally here, omg!!! I'm so sorry I can't believe it's been a month already, fuck I'm glad school's almost out.

Anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. Jay's truly going through it, my poor baby and his birthday was just a couple of weeks ago!

It's gonna get worse though, Heeseung's officially making his appearance in the next chapter! Fucking finally! Let me know what y'all think, I love reading your comments. <3

Until the next chapter!

....I really need to stop posting at 5 am, what's wrong with me? Editing is gonna be so much fun.

Chapter 5

White light; A pale morning.

  Jay’s beginning to grow used to the lifeless skies, the constant clouded filters that smother every inch of the sun’s yellow warmth: without it, the warm toffee brown in the mixed stone of the school looks drained, while the trees and grasses remain downtrodden and soppy with wetness; it was the reverse of what should’ve been: the trees and grasses should be drying up from Fall, falling to the ground in heaps, spiders hidden all throughout their orange and yellow leaves. 

That was part of the fun, part of the fear: jumping in leafy mounds, throwing them up in the air, itching along your skin, but rolling back down into them right after in way that’s completely counterproductive, and then a small thing, a black thing tickles along your ankles, your neck, if you were worse off around you hairline. It's just another itch at first, until it persists, until it grabs enough of your attention to really look at its thin, long legs extended out to stick upon your skin, the small body appearing to be hulking and dire to your eyes. It sparks fright. You run, and for a second you believe it's trying to follow you, clinging to your pants, shoes, socks, until it gets run over from the leaves. The breeze you create is cooling against the scared, heated skin, and you minorly acknowledge that you're smiling, even while your heart pumps erratically. 

It’s nothing like that, Jay surmises as he walks across the darkening marble flooring. He’s on the second floor balcony stretch, the same one he and Yihwa had discovered the boy on the field from, and per the early morning and classes, not many students are out. Of course, there are still some, in between classes, ditching, lunch, bonding. Some sit on the flagstone marking the courtyard, strictly keeping their distance from the middle plot of the field as they chat, goof.

There are more as Jay turns the corner, sitting on the floors next to class doors, playing footsies with the person they got kicked out with. Everyone seems chipper, or more appropriately, like there’s some energy in the air, running through their veins that keep them all from being still. If Jay were dramatic enough, he’d say some of them were even shaking with it, that he could feel the mere vibrations of their restlessness rest unsettlingly between his joints. 

Jay sighs and runs his hands through his silver hair for like the seventh time already in the last three minutes. 

They're stressing him out, he thinks as he walks up to the nursery bay’s door. He grabs onto the silver knob, classic and clean of engravings, unlike most of the school and turns it, pressing his body forward and moving into the room when it opens up enough for him. 

The room is much the same as Jay saunters in: blank and paling walls, smooth linoleum that hasn’t seen wear for months—it’s so clean, Jay could see himself in the tiles: his hair is still wet from his shower and it leaves little dark imprints onto his white tee. He looks well rested, his skin warm with blood from his hot shower, but his stare is firm, as unyielding as his grips around his blades rested in his pockets. Today, he’s strapped his black jades to his ankles. 

Moving on, he finds a random chair in the back of the room, sleek, and white, with no rust around its metal legs or nuts. He has to walk down the aisle to get to it as the pristine, white beds lined either wall. Their pillows are fresh and evenly placed at the head, while the sheets cascade from the bed elegantly, no part inching too far towards the ground, it was even on all sides.

At the sight a calmness wraps around Jay, a small smile making his way to his face as he grabs the chair and starts gently dragging it back down. Clean, neat surroundings always calmed him, always reminded him of his mother. She was strict about it and he hadn’t minded, cleaning was the longest he ever got to spend with her before she panicked, before she trapped herself in her room for hours, sometimes days. It's for this reason Jay even learned how to cook. 

Jay drags the chair, coming up close to the nurse’s desk when one of the beds catches his eyes. He hadn’t paid attention to it before, probably was looking at the otherside of the room by the time he passed it. There was a room divider: all clean metal except for the white, sheets—curtains—that hung from it. It wasn’t connected to the ceiling, was more like a contractible, transportable one. It must have been placed within the last couple days or so because it certainly wasn’t here Monday when Jay had to get his stitches. 

He breathes in as he looks at the thing, questioning its very existence until he decides to move around it to see for himself. 

Yihwa said no one ever comes here—that no one truly ever makes it to the nursery bay. Jay was one the only one, if not a part of the few. 

Rounding the divider is a bed, similar bedding to the rest: the pillows are fluffed, the headboard white with metal bars, but as his eyes traveled lower, chills ran up his spines. There were no sheets, only a covered, grey mattress, but more than that, there were built-in restraints: two for the wrists perfectly aligned to the each edge of the pillows, and two more at the end of the bed; light from the windows behind shown onto the bed, highlighting it like it was some shiny object on display, like a product, like a warning.

Something was beginning to twist in his gut as he stared, he could feel his brow furrowing as his expression became more stern, the grips around his blades unmoving. 

The questions kept gnawing at him, begging him to answer them, even as he forced them to the back, forcing the voices to silence. 

Was it for him? Why? 

He hears footsteps entering the room, even claps that tell him it is Ms. Ooyang. 

They stop. 

Jay removes his gaze to look at her and she’s already looking at the bed: blank expression, even as her eyes circle around the restraints to Jay’s hands, then up to his face. 

“Pull the seat up. This won’t take ten minutes.” She says, turning away from him and heading around the desk. 

Jay notices it. 

The small hesitancy in her steps. How she fiddles the one button of her coat. It reminds him of the way she paused after hearing Sunoo, “Ms. Ooyang can heal anything.” 

He knows what she means by it. It’s not that it should only take ten minutes, it's that she’ll make five if she can. 

He follows, setting the chair down in front of the desk and sits. She doesn’t look at him as she brings out a large, black binder with white tabs peeking out from the top and sides: the top is by year, the sides are by alphabet groups. 

“Park Jongseong, first year” he supplies easily without being asked. It gets him a short look, a small nod and then she’s flipping to the correct pages. He watches as she pulls a new sheet from the drawer and places it in. 

She grabs a fountain pen and ink, looking at him, but not at him. Jay’s guessing she’s somewhere around his eyebrows. A small smile ghosts over his face, but never fully appears. It’s similar to how he is with Sunoo. 

“Date of birth?” 

“April 20th, 2002. I’m 23.” He says. 

She nods. 

“Blood type?” 

His leg twitches. 

“B” 

“Presentation?” 

“None.” Jay replies automatically, eyes somewhere else as he answers the questions. 

Her pen stops and Jay looks over. 

She’s looking at him now, her eyes slightly wider than what he remembers and she’s gripping the pen. 

“What?” Jay asks and his eyebrow jumps with the question. He’s not trying to intimidate, doesn’t think he could even if he tried. There’s something already eating at her. 

She clears her throat and looks back down to the books. 

“Your preferred presentation, then? I’m sure you’re aware that every pack needs a complete pack to graduate: Alpha, Beta, Delta, Omega. What status are you looking for? This will help us better pair you with potential packs.“ She says and its monotone, almost robotic in how rehearsed it was. 

“None,” Jay replies again, “I’ll remain unpresented, no pack.” 

He sees her shoulders tense and how her lips rub into each other as she tries not to bite them. 

She nods stiffly. 

Her pen starts back up. 

“Lone.” She says as she writes, “We haven’t had one at the school—”

“First time for everything, right?” Jay smiles and it's an attempt to remove the tension in the air, to stop the slight tremor running through the fountain pen she holds. 

“No.” She says and it echoes in the room, bouncing off the walls and slamming hard into Jay’s ears, down into his chest. 

“We’ve had them. They never made it to graduation.”

Jay wants to question it. Ask whether they died before it, but his eyes catch her’s wandering back over towards the bed, to the restraints glistening in the light. 

“The older you get Jongseong, the harder the presentation is on your body.” 

She looks back at him. 

“They were only nineteen.” 

For a moment all they do is stare at each other, her stare is blank still, but he can’t help but feel like she’s begging him, for what he does not know. 

His hand runs through his hair again, but this time slowly, pulling lightly at the roots. He settles her with a small grin; not smug, but not fully humble either. 

“Guess it's your lucky year.”

She remains unmoved, but the tension does leave her shoulders.

“Then, there will be no issues?”

“None.” 

 

The rest of the assessment consisted of her removing his stitches, taking his height and weight measurements, and then normal physical exam things: bending over to check his spine, thumping against his knees and elbows for reflexes, shining a light into his eyes, and overall noting down his general health.

It's around lunchtime when he notices it. The weather—he knows, again—but, it's so calm, not even a breeze floating by. It’s unusual, there was always a breeze, always a hint of sweet salt blowing under his nose from the nearby water he’s never seen.

More than that, the trees were utterly still; Jay could have been fooled to think that time had been frozen, that the world had stopped if it weren’t for the constant, loud chattering, the flooding of students in the center, in the hallways, bodies and bodies. However, what was most disconcerting was how alone Jay was. Amidst all these bodies of students, amidst the commotion, Jay was alone, unfollowed. No one even dared to look at him as before and much more obvious than that, he hasn’t run into any of them.

Not Sunghoon, not Jake, not Jungwon, and Heeseung, he didn’t only not see him, but he couldn’t feel him either. The hairs at the back of neck and along his arms finally lax and limp, no matter where he went. 

It was odd. Weird. The fucking calm before the storm. 

 

 

 

It’s much later, after his classes and such, that he meets back up with Yihwa for dinner in the East Wing. 

“Oh, Jay, wait for a second. I, um, we have something for you.” Yihwa says sheepishly, resting her hand on his shoulder to sit him back down.

Dinner’s finished, their plates have already been cleared from the off the tables, and the crimson runner is clean of any crumbs and wrinkles that may have collected throughout the feast; All’s to say, the hall was clearing out, students jumping up from their seats and scattering towards the doors in a rush: they pushed and teased each other, jumping off of one another’s backs as they spoke boisterously, the energy alone could’ve had the lights flickering in shame, their voices spearing through the darkest corners of the room bringing in life. 

There was some urgency about them tonight. An excitement that carried on past the tall, double doors that would lead them back to the center or towards the Far East dorms. Jay could still hear them, even as they stepped into the hall outside, their voices and steps like low thumping music that mumbled through the mosaic windows. 

Something about it felt wrong, off from what dinner was usually like—from what Jay had grown used to in the past four days he’s been here. And maybe it had something to do with the rankings tomorrow, maybe it didn’t; Jay just knew something was wrong. 

All four days they had quieted when Heeseung’s pack arrived and everytime Jay had not given a shit. He may have been silent among them, but his stare was an never-ending curse of profanities and intent.

All four days they had had comfortable chatter and dinner plate clanking, all four days he would sit with Yihwa across from Sunoo, sometimes Chloe on the (placement of tables), and all four days he would try to dodge Sunoo’s eyes as Heeseung walked in: the hairs on the back of his neck striking up, his arms and legs, hell even the smaller peach fuzz on his face spearing back into his skin the moment Jay felt him close by. It was insanity, how it made him want to peel his skin back and run, or fight until the sweat from exertion loosened its hold, but Jay has more or less even grown used to that. But, this never happened. 

Sunoo didn’t come to dinner. 

“Jay?” 

His head flinches a little as he finally acknowledges Yihwa. 

“Yea, yea, sure” He says and he knows from the sound of it, she can tell he’s still partly entranced. He sighs and gives her a smile, one he hasn’t had much practice with in recent years, but he tries to make it as soft and comforting as he can. And to make the message clear, he keeps it on even as he lowers himself back into his seat, elbows off of the edge as always. 

Yihwa smiles back at him and nods, small green surges of her green spiking in her eyes as she turns away from him and rounds the table. 

She’s heading down the closest aisle, opposite of the exit when she quickly spins on her foot and points at him. Jay rolls his eyes as he makes out the words “Don’t move” form from her lips. 

“Go already.” Jay shoos, feigning annoyance to her, even though he’s laughing lightly once she turns around. 

He watches over her as she leaves through another wooden door, tall, but skinnier, probably way lighter, too; it’s the same door their food comes from so Jay has no real choice but to think that she’s heading towards the kitchens: which is weird, and interesting . Didn’t she say ‘we’ earlier?

It’s curious enough to him that the uncomfortable feeling squirming in his chest lightens, slowly bleeding out with the last student that closes the large doors. Sunoo’s probably not feeling well, if that happened to vampires—maybe something came up, or he had some last minute assignments. Whatever it is, the reasons for it could truly be endless and there was no point in fretting about it now, not when he finally has a moment of silence.

So he sits there, lets his shoulders hang, clasps his hands together on the table, and closes his eyes. He takes into account everything: the dull ache that runs up and down his injured leg, his belly, soft from exfoliation and smooth with lotion is rumbelling pleasantly as it digests the big ass turkey leg Jay yanked from the bird as soon as it landed in front of them—he needed it with the week he’s been having. The feeling settles heavily within him like weights wrapping around his ankles and wrists, pulling him down, keeping him still, reminding himself just to breathe. 

It works for the most part. The slight dark of the room blankets his closed eyes and Jay has no choice but to focus in on himself. The room is completely empty from this point of view: the tables are gone and Jay’s standing under one light fixture surrounded by nothingness: no walls, no flooring, just an endless, serene black.

It’s comforting like the night that settles over a beach; it's an unafraid, soothing darkness that makes you want to walk the shore at 3 am, go up and down a boardwalk even though the sun has gone down, when normally you’d be behind shut windows and locked doors. 

His shoulders relax and his hands weaken in their clasp. 

It’s nice. 

He’s still standing there, doing nothing, gazing into nothing, when his small imaginary light fixture flickers. At first a small twitch of light, barely noticeable, only enough to make you question that something happened, but then it happens again. It gets worse. The lights are shutting on and off rapidly and it's making his head dance with how it distorts his vision; his body goes through constant shifts and his head is swirling with it as his fingers tense back over the table. There’s something in the black, there’s something here with him. 

Jay’s eyes cinch, trying to dispel any and all stimuli, trying to get back to his meditative state, but all he sees is an outline ahead of him, taller than him. 

The hairs on the back of his neck raise up like pitch forks into his blackening sky. 

“Heeseung.” Jay gasps out quietly, his eyes tearing open at the feeling, the one that has been absent all day. It gets him out of his seat, scrambling over the bench to perfect his stance, to grab his knives. 

“Jay?” 

But there’s nothing. 

The feeling is gone and no one is in the dining hall with him except for Yihwa. 

“Are you good?” 

And Chloe.   

Jay nods, sending one last cursory glance around the hall before releasing his grip. 

“Yea,” He chuckles around a sigh, “just felt a little cramped.” 

The girls look at him from across the table and he can tell Yihwa’s smile is hesitant, like she wants to ask, wants to comfort, but knows it's not something Jay would want. Chloe is devious and ignores the situation entirely to ogle at the strawberry shortcake still resting in Yihwa’s hands. 

“So we're gonna have a therapy session on how Jay sees ghosts or are we gonna eat like kings!” Chloe bellows, grabby hands going for the cake herself. 

Yihwa slaps them and tuts at her. 

“Mix the drinks and keep it light, and do not touch this cake before Jay gets his piece. You know, Jay? The one we prepared this for?!” 

Chloe lets out an all suffering sigh as she produces the two drinks and sets them on the table. Apple cider and whiskey. 

“Whatever,” Chloe responds, popping open their caps lazily, not minding them as they spin out on the table, “Looks like Jay needs something stronger anyway.” 

She’s smirking at him as she pours. 

Jay’s so fucking confused. 

“Wait, what’s going on?” he asks, coming closer to the table to help Yihwa lower the cake. The strawberries are fresh, he can smell how sweet they are, how there’s still reddened juice running over the whipped cream, bits of it dragging down its honeyed cakes. It’s sick, but it almost reminds him of how blood was seeping out all over his tanned legs, reminding him of how Sunoo’s eyes had switched while he stared the whole way to the nursery bay. 

Yihwa flutters, “Uh, well. We just wanted—”

“She wanted,” cuts Chloe, who slides all their shot glasses out, darkened yellow liquid sloshes over the edge when they stop. 

Yihwa glares at her while Jay claims the knife. 

“It's your Eligibility Eve and I wanted it to be special. I know there’s a lot going on and tomorrow’s going to be crazy, but I want you to know that at the core, it’s supposed to be an exciting day, an achievement.”

“Oh it will be exciting, alright. Great job by the way, pissing off the highest pack.” 

“Would you please, I’m trying to make this memorable!” Yihwa frets, her foot stomping lightly into the floors. 

Jay smiles as he finishes dividing up the pieces. 

“It’s okay, Yihwa.” He speaks softly, handing her a plate, and then Chloe. 

“It's usually not something you should fear, but—”

“You’re the stuffed pancakes.” 

Jay’s head dips when he laughs, the reference back to his first day taking him by surprise. Wow, fuck, it’s truly only been a week. He feels like it's been a lifetime. 

Yihwa sputters, rocking between scolding Chloe and cleaning up the situation she created, but as she watches Jay relax into his seat, a smile beaming up at them as his tired eyes adorn them slowly, she finally releases. If you can’t beat 'em join them, Jay mentally encourages. 

“You’re the stuffed fucking pancakes!” Yihwa groans loudly.

It’s nice, it is. The drinks, the conversation, the fucking cake, but even while they eat, he can still see how Yihwa’s eyes never leave him, like she’s afraid he’d disappear if she looked away for even a second. This was supposed to be a celebration for Jay, but he couldn’t help but feel like it was his last moments to Yihwa; She’s mourning him even as she watches him eat and bicker back with Chloe, paying her respects quietly before she’s forced to send him off.

“What would I ever do without my Advisor.” Jay jokes sarcastically, grabbing his own shot glass and joining the three way clink of glasses Chloe started. 

“I know, leave me a good review.” She jokes back, even though the smile never fully reaches her eyes. 

They throw back their shots in sync. 

The next morning Jay gets up earlier, not before the sun and not specifically after, but right before the doors unlock. 

“What the—Jay?!” Yihwa yells out from the other side as she’s pushed back with the door. Light is bleeding in from both sides of it, the pale light that haloes his room, and the sharp rays coming from mosaic windows in the hall. 

Jay lets himself laugh, a full body one, that sends his bed head reaching in all sorts of directions as he fights Yihwa through the door. She’s trying to get it open, throwing her whole body against where Jay simply holds it with his shoulder and a hand. 

“Seriously what is this?” She curses, slamming her hands on the door one last time as the door locks shut. 

He waits there, his own amusement building tension in his joints as he waits for the right amount of time to prolong this, to piss her off further. 

Now. 

He opens the door gently, like a butler expecting guests and he catches the contorted face Yihwa makes, one she didn’t think Jay would see. 

“Someone once told me if I didn’t want anyone coming in my room—that’s you—to lock my door. Now, I humbly invite you in.”

Yihwa grumbles and she shoulders past him, “Goofy ass.” 

Jay shakes the hair from his face as he closes the door back behind her, his smile unchanging. 

“Someone has to be. It’s much better than a tipsy young woman shaking in my arms about how she’s so scared for me.” 

He’s smirking, honestly he’s damn near fully smiling with how he can see both the embarrassment and pride build up in Yihwa’s body language: her eye ticks, her hands ball and then release, her cheeks flush. 

“Yea well, God forbid someone cares! I’m your Advisor!” She yells but like how it always does, it weakens at the end. 

He walks up to her and lifts his hand up. Yihwa automatically curls closer to him, seeking comfort, pats that she’s no doubt used to from Chloe.

Jay pushes her head like an annoying older brother and watches her stumble away from him. 

“Oh sure,” He responds, his hands going into his pockets as he looks at her, “no more whiskey and apple cider for you.” 

He still remembers last night. The decent and easy conversation: he learned that for lunch you had to go into the kitchens and order something. It was nice and so was the cake, but after a couple of shots, he had stopped, not wanting to cause any detriment to himself the following morning, but Yihwa continued—heavily, and as the father clock ticked, she got messier, more frantic, until she was all but wailing dramatically to Jay, having crawled across the damn table to get to him.

Chloe had watched her crawl to him, much too amused, much too focused on something entirely different than the current situation. They ended the night exactly at nine, Chloe tearing a clinging damsel from his shoulder and Jay watching the two girls walk off to the West Wing. 

Even now Jay can see the flush from the mixed drinks warming Yihwa’s skin, and honestly maybe some of it still warms his veins too with the way his body feels completely at rest, his smile lazy. Yihwa relaxes too, but he can tell she has something to say, some dramatic ass, theatrical shit Jay just can’t wait to hear. 

And then the pin drops. 

Their bodies flinch and Yihwa unconsciously moves closer to him as the sudden thunder sends bolts through their chests, and rumbling vibrations up their legs. 

She gasps and all words she had readied herself to say go to hell. Instead, her flush drains, she sobers, and she grips the edge of her shirt as she stares towards the large window at the other end of his room. 

Jay doesn’t say anything, not until the rain hits. 

It's heavy, hard, pelting against his window so rapidly and thick that their view of the outside is blurred beyond recognition. 

The storm has finally come. 

“I’ll get ready.” He says and it's not quiet, it isn’t, but against the earth’s sound it feels like a whisper, something intimate and intense. Yihwa looks back at him, all dark curls framing her wet eyes. 

“Yea,” she whispers, “okay.” 

 

He makes it quick, actually changes in his attached bathroom for once for Yihwa’s sake. She’s too shaken up for play and the thunder just keeps hitting in too short of intervals, it sends Jay’s heart beating faster in anticipation. 

I’ll be ready. 

He’ll be ready. 

He picks a t-shirt even though it looks cold outside, even though it's raining harder than Jay’s ever seen it. He doesn’t plan on being challenged, doesn’t plan to be anywhere near Territory, but the preparedness that’s rooted within him makes him account for the worse; just in case, he needs to be able to move, to have full motion of his arms and less surface area for his opponent to grab onto. He’s not dumb, he doesn’t expect the fight to be fair, plus Jay was never above hair pulling himself.

He pairs it with the same jeans that he had worn in that little town; his sweatpants were technically more freeing than these, but his knives would be able to sit better in his pockets, he’d be able to pull them out easily without having to reach too far into them to get to them. After that, he slides his jades in place, Green and White in the back and his two Blacks down by his ankles per usual. 

Yihwa tries to fret over his hair when he comes back out, honestly she’s just trying to do something with her hands, but Jay still doesn’t let her. He points to the window, to outside and tells her the moisture in the air alone will be heavy enough to weigh down his twin rebels that refuse to recover from his dodgy bleach session. 

“Right, yea.” She nods, and then they leave in silence, down the hall that has gone dark grey from the rain reduced visibility. Their shadows walk behind them, shrouding them further in darkness as they go. Jay thinks that the black diamonds on the flooring almost look like playing cards in this lighting. They go on onto the fifth floor where the elevator awaits them and Jay refuses to even glance at that button that is so much smaller than the rest. Yihwa doesn’t, she even hesitates as she pushes the button for the center; probably considering locking Jay up altogether and telling him the tales of the day at another time, but they both know that can’t happen.

If it isn’t today, then it's tomorrow, or the day after that. Heeseung’s pack has shown him enough that they’ll double down on him, that they won’t let him go until he rectifies whatever ill thing Jay couldn’t have possibly even done to their fuck ass maknae, like seriously fuck that dude, the boy hasn’t appeared all week, hasn’t said shit, and now Jay has a chance of losing his life. 

But that’s just it isn’t it. Jay was never handed the best cards in life. He had to fight for everything. 

Ding. 

They’re out as soon as the doors open wide enough and the center is absolutely full to the seams, like fuck Jay really didn’t know just how many kids went here until the lot of them were gathered for a common thing. 

“Shit.” Jay breathes out, astounded and the normalcy of it must be what gets Yihwa to laugh and look at him. 

“I know, it's just as overwhelming every time. Thankfully, once you're in a pack, you don’t really need to come to this. It doesn’t really matter how compatible your skills are when you already belong, but some still come just to see if they’ve gotten better; if they’re beating anyone in particular.” 

Yihwa chuckles even more, “Can you imagine what the first year was like? When everyone needed to know their rankings?” 

Jay shakes his head and mocks a shiver running through him, but even that doesn’t feel too fake as the front doors are open, as they always are during the day, but the harsh wind wisps throughout the building, coating Jay’s arms in such a cold it almost feels wet. 

“It was probably a bitch.” Jay responds, running his hands lightly over his arms as they make their way to a line. They woke up early thankfully so the lines weren’t running out the doors just yet, but Jay could still see more students coming down: the presented, the unaffiliated—Jay can recognize most of them, they all sit at the same tables to the left near the doors. One of them even settles behind the two of them, waving lazily. They’re clearly still shit tired. 

“Sup guys, fuck this is shitty start to the damn day.” He yawns, stretching out his neck and popping his knuckles. The sound alone is revolting to Jay’s ears; he’s never done that, his mother always found it distasteful, telling Jay it was rude and aggressive. He couldn’t agree more with the first half.

The boy pats down on both of their shoulders, clearly unbothered by his lack of personal space. 

“It’s good we came early though, the longer the line, they’ll have to start lining up in the courtyard.” He says and he looks between the both of them, shaking his head in mock exasperation,  “ya’ll get it.” 

Yihwa sighs, nodding, even as she politely removes the guy's hand from her shoulder. 

Jay mirrors her, “Why?” 

The boy chucks him on the arm like they’re friends, “C’mon you know, if the line gets long enough, they have no choice but to start lining in the field—you know, the field—Terri—”

“I understand.” Jay interrupts and Yihwa coughs around her laugh at the cold, stony delivery. 

“Yea ‘course you do big guy, but listen, we’re lucky. We won’t get plucked off like cats to hawks.” 

Jay barely gives the boy back a hum of acknowledgement before he’s turning back around and moving forward with Yihwa in the line. He side eyes her, a quiet way of relaying to her: what the fuck? She bunches her lips together in a suppressed smile and grabs his arm, green smoke encircling it before it dissipates and leaves golden lettering in his skin. 

This is his fourth year here and he’s still unaffiliated. No packs seem to want him. He’s lazy, barely makes it to his classes, he’s overly personal too fast…. And the rest seeps into his skin into invisibility when hands wrap along their shoulders and a face with greasy hair rubs along Jay’s shoulder and Yihwa’s face. 

“What’s up? What are we talking about? Any news on what’s on the breakfast menu after this?” 

Jay shoves him back and the boy flies into the people behind him. 

“Dude, you have to teach me that.” Is all he hears as result of it when he turns back around with Yihwa. 

The letters reappear. 

And nosy.  

“Fridays are usually french toast.” Yihwa says sweetly back to the boy who is fumbling for his glasses. 

“Fucking nice! Wait, I hate french toast.” 

 

It takes maybe half an hour, Jay doesn’t know—wasn’t counting—but his arms are frozen, almost stuck in the arm fold he has them in. 

He’s freezing. 

The wind blows in harder, knocking the doors further open until they slam against their conjoined walls. 

It blows the rain from outside, harsh pellets hitting them at an angle: wetting the floors, increasingly soaking their clothes. The wolves are fine, if not only a little bothered from being wet. Their natural body heat protects them and the vampires are naturally cold so they feel no difference in temperature, but Jay—Yihwa—they’re close to shaking as they finally get access to the board. 

There isn't anything fancy to it: no streamers that line the edges, not even a title—just their names on one end and their results on the other. Jay starts near the end, looking for the Parks, but Yihwa taps his shoulder, points until his eyes follow her hands up. 

“It’s sorted by scores, not alphabetical.” She says quietly as she scoots closer to him. Only four people at a time are allowed up at the board. 

“Ah,” Jay says and automatically starts searching for his name at the top. It’s like a leader board then.

Park, Jongseong. 

It’s further down then he expects, but once he pinpoints his name, he follows the direct path to the other side of the board where his ranking and breakdowns are. 

“It's a ten point system,” Yihwa starts, already breaking down what Jay is seeing, “the higher the score, naturally the better. 6 in strategy, but a 9 in resourcefulness, that’s good, shows you know how to handle your situations even if things don’t go according to plan. Uh let’s see, 5 combat and 7 agility. Not the worst, it means you have the stamina and capability, but they're not sure how you’ll do in multi-fights. Usually happens when you’ve only fought one on one.” 

Jay nods to all it, mentally taking notes for what he needs to focus on, what areas he lacks the most in. 

Yihwa stops short, a quick intake of breath before she’s covering her mouth. 

“What?” Jay questions, butting his shoulder softly into hers and looking for whatever it is. 

“Nothing, nothing. You just—You got a 2 in collaboration.” She grits out, her laugh completely un-hidden like she planned. 

He did. 

But, that wasn’t false. Jay never liked relying on others, never risked it, but what was more important to him was the very end of his results.

 Status: Lone

Compatible packs: N/A, presentation not filed. 

Yihwa eventually sees it, too.

Letters rewrite in his skin: Good, no one needs to know.  

He looks at her and she gives him a grimace in return. Those shackles glint in his head and somehow the image of them alone sends more chills down his spine then the wind that wrestles his hair. 

He hears a bright whistle. 

“Wow, look at that, you almost beat Beomgyu’s rank.” 

Jay turns to the side, wide eyes as he shifts his gaze higher up. It's him. The same boy who had stood by them on the balcony. The one who had a whimsical gait to his walk. 

“Oh, Huening, what are you doing here? Jay, this is Huening Kai, we take Alchemy together.” 

“I see, it’s nice to meet you.” Jay says agreeably, moving his hand out to properly greet him. Huening smiles back at him, cheeky with playful eyes. 

“Yeah right, you too.” He responds upbeat before his eyes direct back over to Yihwa. “I bet Taehyun that I beat Yeonjun for pack rank of the month.” 

Yihwa snorts, her head rolling with her eyes. “You know Yeonjun gets it every month in your pack. He’s a legend for a reason.” 

Huening Kai just hums happily, rolling on the balls of his feet as he looks at Jay again, quiet and seeing. 

“Yea, my pack…” He starts, curiously gazing off into something, somewhere that isn't directly Jay himself, “You’ll meet them eventually, or, well, Beomgyu.” 

Jay can feel his eyebrows knit in his confusion, and can feel Yihwa’s hand circle his elbow. 

“Kai—” 

“He’s been working on a new salve.” He interrupts, eyes finally breaking away from Jay to look back at the board. “N/A” he says to himself in a whispered, delighted manner like he’s intrigued. 

“I hope it works.” he sings before drifting away amongst the sea of people and crushing waves of rain and wind. 

“Let’s go.” 

Yihwa tugs him to the West Wing. 

“Alright, this is for you.” Yihwa says, dropping a large plastic container full of fruit, pancakes, bacon, and buttered biscuits into Jay’s hands. The heat of it fogs up the surface, white steam and water bubbles forming at the lid. 

“Okay, and why is it packed?” Jay questions, blinking. 

“Because you are going to eat this in your room and never come out.” She responds and somewhere off to their left he can hear Chloe chuckle, then choke on her fried potatoes. 

“Yihwa,” Jay sighs. 

“I know, okay, just for today. Please.” She begs and Jay’s already groaning to the tall ceilings, the noise probably doesn’t even reach it. 

“Whatever.” He concedes,  snatching Chloe’s unopened water bottle before pivoting back to the door. 

“Find the Janitor’s closet,” Yihwa whispers from behind him, “there’s a door in there that leads to one of the secret passageways in the school. There are many doors along the staircase, do not open any of them. Only the sixth, that will take you to the fifth floor.” 

Jay stays turned, “And why exactly do I need to take this “secret” passage way when there’s a perfectly functioning elevator?” 

She slaps him between his shoulder blades. 

“You can’t trust anyone on Eligibility day. The unaffiliated may try to trick you, force you onto the field. You’re wanted by the most notorious pack on campus, Jay. They’ll do anything to get into their good graces, if not for themselves, then for the packs they want to join.” 

“And how does that change tomorrow, two days from now. Any day where I'm still breathing.” Jay argues back.

“Eligibility day is a lot of things, I already told you most of it yesterday, but it’s also the day where the unaffiliated can promote themselves to potential packs if their skill and compatibility are too low for them to be noticed naturally. They’ll use you if they can to make themselves look better because this is their only day for action. The weekend into next week is White Week: the courting week, it's up to the packs to seek out only, it's the week right before the Forests.” 

Jay hears her, he does, but more so than that he sees the way some of the heads from their end of the room, ones that are usually stuck down into their plates, are looking up through their eyebrows to look at him—thinking. The boy from before, the nosy one with space issues, and apparently pack issues, eyes him now in a different light than this morning. 

“Okay.”

Jay nods and walks out. 

 

The janitor’s closet is not hard to find and with everyone too focused on the board, he slips in easily—well as easily as one can when he almost kisses a broom. The shock sends his food jostling in the container and Jay laments how his cold melon has now touched his syrupy and warm pancakes. 

“Deadass?” Jay groans, moving the pale of cleaning supplies out of his way with his foot before feeling along the walls for a switch. When he finds it he switches it on, but only for long enough to get a feel for the room before he’s switching it back off. He doesn’t want to draw any attention to himself, to this place— at least, not while he’s in it trying to make a sneaky getaway. 

He feels along the walls, slightly pushing in as he does to see if he can feel any give, anything hollow. 

Gotcha . 

He pushes with his body and the wall snaps back, revealing a dimly lit, narrow staircase that takes him up between the walls. The stairs are cricket-y as he ascends and the walls are so thin, Jay can hear the students from the subsequent floors talking amongst themselves. At some point Jay even thinks he’s in the walls of someone’s room because he can hear their springs jostle when they move, and the distant sounds of water shut off from a shower. It honestly kind of creeps him out, so he hurries past those few staircases, his pace only slowing once he nears the third door. 

Music. 

It is soft from what Jay hears, still a distance away from where Jay stands behind the “door”. 

Jay stays there, leaning back against the railing and softly sits his head against the curved wall. 

It’s been so long since he’s heard the piano. 

He’d always wanted to learn it, but his mother never left the house enough to take him to lessons, and didn't go to work enough to pay for his bus fare there either. In the end, guitar was cheaper, he could play it at home, he could teach himself through trial and error. Jay loved his guitar, grew a passion for it so deep he always made sure to stop by the guitar shop in the city on his runs, just to clean the strings. There was this one electric guitar there. He remembers his fingers itching for it, but he couldn’t risk playing it, any of them, not with what was roaming the streets. They couldn’t smell Jay, but they would hear him. 

He wonders if the school has a music room, and wonders if that’s where this is coming from now. 

He wonders if they have an electric guitar, if the person playing so beautifully right now would have it in them to let Jay play along, maybe even teach him some chords. 

His hands ghost around the wall, hesitant. Yihwa said not to stray from the path, told him to keep to the stairs and only exit at the sixth door, but this wasn’t some children’s retelling of Red Riding Hood. Yihwa was dramatic and overly worried.

And Jay wants what’s always given him peace, what’s always brought him and his mother together, what’s kept their relationship strong even through the closed doors. 

So in the end he decides to exit here. 

He won’t stay long, he tells himself, just wants to see. 

The door pops open with a shove, this one definitely less used than the one he’d entered from and peeks his head around, silver hair scoping the place before his eyes even land on it: it’s a hallway; a dark one where the only source of light comes from the small windows in one of the empty classrooms to his immediate left. The light doesn’t reach far into the hallway, sliding windows on the wall partially draped; not to mention, the storm outside reduces almost all saturation until the light that does wisp through into the hallway is white like smoke and thin like it had been blown out from around a cigarette, rather than discharged from a bonfire. 

He steps into it, the low light seemingly glowing against his skin like faux moonlight. The music is slow, soothing in an otherwise haunting scape. 

It’s alluring, hypnotizing: reminds him of lullabies. 

He comes closer, body moving for him—closer, closer until he’s close to five feet from the room. Jay can see its windows from here, would be able to make out a glimpse of the room, see whoever’s playing, drift his eyes over the instruments no doubt organized perfectly around the room, sitting and waiting; but, the windows are blacked out. 

Jay can’t see a thing and he hadn’t realized it before, but his hand is shaking around his breakfast box: hand clenched so hard around it that the plastic dents horridly, but he can’t make it stop, even though his feet do. They freeze in place, glue him to the ground like he’s been planted there, like he has roots that run down into the very cement and marble flooring he stands upon. 

His whole body is red hot. Every hair on it is a splinter that’s been shot through the top of his head and down his legs; His skin feels like skin , a separate organ from himself that shifts around the splinters with every breath. It’s agonizing, every move lodging themselves deeper: a puppet stuck to strings that pierce through his skin and tie knots into his body tissues. 

His mouth is dry: a small blessing because Jay’s sure he couldn’t even swallow his own spit if he tried to, the fluid would seep from the corners of his mouth like the blood Jay feels like he’s bleeding. 

The piano plays without pause and Jay can’t see anything, but he knows what’s inside.  

Heeseung. 

At the end, if he gets to look back on this, he’ll know that this was a bad idea—that some doors were made to be closed. That he should’ve listened to Yihwa. That this was how he was going to die: paralyzed, on display, and in pain like an animal— like prey . 

His heart thunders in his chest and Jay can feel the sting in his eyes when they begin to wet. He’s so fucking pissed, he’s frustrated. This isn’t how he wants to go out. He wants to fight. He wants to get out of here. He wants to kill him. He wants something.  

Please, please, give me one thing . 

His throat chokes down the whimper. He doesn’t even get to shed a tear. 

Multiple hands grab him and there’s too many for him to count. 

They’re everywhere. 

They squeeze into his arms, they push up on his spine when he’s lifted, they seal around his ankles, clapping them together in a bone dance that sends pain up his body that he is too overwhelmed to even respond to. The hands push the hair on his skin deeper than he’s ever felt:  and it feels like his own blades rip into his skin even though he knows they're capped. 

His food knocks down to the ground and as the pain overcomes his threshold, the room  spins, like the hallway was a painting that just had a brush swirled over it. 

Jay doesn’t recognize time, doesn’t even recall if he’s closed his eyes or if he’s truly surrounded by black, but eventually, he feels the pain lessen. 

And it keeps lessening, even when the hands don’t. 

And then they do. 

“Fuck!” Jay screams, pushing his arms out ahead of him as he’s thrown from the first floor window, landing heavily into flagstone pavement, stone cutting his skin for bloody pockets to bubble up. 

He breathes heavily as he tries to get his bearings, glad enough that he didn’t land too hard on any of his bones. 

“What the fuck?” Jay gasps as the world comes back to him, he’s outside in the courtyard, there’s a small crowd of people, but it’s not really the world is it? 

“You see what our pack can be, Jay? They brought you to me.” The boy leans down, foot tapping against the ground, “Miss me?” 

It’s just Malachi. 

“You would like that, wouldn't you?” Jay grins, watching the anger bleed into that mousy face. His eyes are wild, piss fluorescent yellow with the call of his wolf, of whatever pathetic alpha rests inside him. 

Malachi growls, a medium sound that doesn’t even meet the forward and fullness of Sunoo’s voice when it's softer. His nails are out, clawed, and they swipe for his nape. 

“How are my claws healing up, huh?” 

Jay dodges as best he can sprawled out on the ground as he is. Malachi’s trying to scruff him, set in some type of submission over, a visual one as much as it is an instinctual one because that’s what this was now, a performance. A bloody colosseum that had the students lining up on the flagstone that surrounded Territory, had them teetering over the edges of balconies on the second and third floors to gain a peak. 

Fuck them , Jay thinks. Fuck this school.  

Malachi misses, but his hands dig into the meat of his arm and there is only so much Jay can do on the ground, after he’s been thrown out a fucking window like a sack of potatoes. 

The nails don’t pierce him, not yet; they’re not in Territory, but Malachi makes quick work of it, dragging Jay’s body with as he runs them out into the middle of the field. Thank fuck the storm has let up into light rain, but the massacre it left behind has not been mulled over. The grass is nothing but drowned in the wet, slick mud Jay is dragged through. Every inch of his skin, up to his shoulders being slathered in it. 

It’s pungent, true earth that dispels any sense of warmth he had once gotten from the lemon and bark from dying leaves. This is revolting, heavy and wrung out with wear and tear, filled with previous shoe prints, split open bodies, and re-hydrated blood from its history. 

Jay tries to get his bearings, dig his feet into the ground for some leverage as they go, but it's so wet he keeps slipping. It’s way worse than the village, but Jay always finds a way. 

He has to. 

When Malachi tugs back his arm in a movement to haul Jay forward, Jay lets himself go into the movement, using his heels to jump into the forward motion with him. At first, it must feel like Jay’s gotten lighter to him, he must think he’s so strong and brave, Jay teases darkly. But, Jay uses it as momentum, a propeller, a damn swing because as soon as Jay surfs into it, he pushes his legs out underneath him like he’s on a swing and propels himself with enough strength that he flies forward, Malachi being sent back from move. 

The rain helps, it gets Malachi off balance as Jay momentarily soars in the air. He keeps his core tight the whole way, using it to straighten out his body before lifting his upper body enough so that he can land on his feet, one hand in the mud for support as his feet and knees hold up the rest. 

Superhero landing. 

Unnecessary, but the child within Jay is thoroughly amused and pumping his small fists in happy, baby aggression. 

The hold on him lets up naturally and Jay gets to both his feet, Malachi quickly does the same, hands on all floors and he runs himself back a couple of paces. 

Jay smirks. Smart. 

Jay doesn’t expect fair fights, ever. He doesn’t hand them out, either. If Malachi stayed, Jay would have certainly stomped his head in with enough force to separate his consciousness from his body. 

“Give me a chance and I’ll fuck you up every time .” 

Jay lets his right foot slide in front as his left slips to the side then back. His arms naturally come up as he hums around a chuckle.

“You take instruction so well,” Jay says, letting his voice slip into something softer, something praising, “ So obedient. How could you think I’d be anything to you, let alone pack?”

Jay doesn’t say it loud. Doesn’t have to, most of the school are werewolves or vampires. He knows they hear, they know the weight of what he just said—to an alpha. 

“AHA—” 

“Shhh, Nicho!”

Malachi rips out another growl and this one sounds better, deeper as the bones in his back begin to shift, his spine humps up and down as his organs jump around and rearrange. Fur spikes between his pores until like a tsunami it's covering his entire body. He crouches down and when his head comes back up, he’s all wolf. 

Jay whistles, a short, mocking tune as he grabs for his daggers, clicking them out of their sheaths and sinking into his stance to fit. 

He sees the slight wobble in the wolf’s irises as Malachi sees his daggers glint in pale light. 

“I know,” Jay breathes, “and you’re gonna make them so much prettier.”

Malachi charges, full speed ahead and to his credit, he is fast and it keeps Jay on offence for a while, dodging at half seconds and using the mud to slip away faster, and that’s when Jay realizes: he’s covered in mud. 

Jay stops, panting lightly as the wolf crouches low in a preparation to pounce. 

And Jay, well, Jay runs away. 

He makes it look good too. A pretty look over the shoulder out of fear as rain drips from his eyelashes, mud smearing towards his neck. 

It’s the perfect display, the perfect vision of prey and predator, a lion and a deer. 

Malachi laps it up, probably aching for this, and takes the bait, pouncing with all his force, except it's wet outside, unbelievably slick with mud that too much force of anything will immediately give way, and though Malachi gets some air, his hind leg, the one he has to use to propel from, slips, ruining his speed and motion forward, leaving him falling in the air, with his belly exposed. 

Jay grins. Now how familiar is this?

Jay pivots gracefully, mud below him letting him spin like a ballerina and since running in mud as a human was close to running in sand, Jay uses his momentum from the spin to propel his body down into the mud like a damn slip and slide. 

He hears the collective gasp from their audience. 

He’s willingly putting himself under the wolf. 

Water beats into his eyes but Jay works faster to blink them out. 

He can’t miss this shot. 

As he slides under, his right hand comes around with Green Jade to aim at the side of the stomach. 

Green Jade is for good fortune and renewal. 

He’ll give this to Malachi, stab him so he can’t move and continue to fight Jay. It’s a small gift, a little fortune he can give to the wolf. If Malachi’s smart, he’ll take it and leave this field alive. Leave Jay alone and get a chance for renewal. 

The wolf lets out a guttural moan as Jay pierces through him, that same spot near his liver that Jay had missed with his fist the first time they had met. 

It’s loud and croaky, almost blood curdling. 

It's weak. 

I know I’ll never tell you this pup, but at least your Dad took it with some dignity.  

Malachi slumps over, his pain tolerance clearly not up to par as all he does is whimper on top of Jay, but someone yells off in the distance. Jay can’t hear it well, the fur lowkey muffles a lot, but it sounds urgent, pushing and whatever it is gets Malachi to realize his position as well. How close he is to Jay’s neck to bite. 

Jay watches him rev his head back, teeth sharp and ready, and when Malachi rushes down, jaw tense in anticipation Jay’s heart barely stutters. 

He sits up as much as he can from where Malachi’s body lays on his lower abdomen and legs, he sinks Green Jade just that bit deeper and meets Malachi’s head thrust with his White that he settles right in between his teeth, keeping his open.

Surely, Malachi can feel its sharpness slightly slice the top of his gums, can feel the threat lurking just below him because Malachi refuses to close his mouth any further, but with how overzealous he was with his bite, he can’t open his mouth more to retract himself. 

He’s stuck.

Jay takes a second to breathe, to blow out the water collecting around his lips, before he meets Malachi’s beady eyes. 

“Roll over.” Jay says and he can see the way Malachi’s breathing falters, he can feel his stomach flinch against his legs, but he does so anyway and Jay goes with him, until he’s on top, one knee pressed into the mud and the other hanging off the side of the wolf’s stomach. His holds don’t change, he keeps their intensity constant, even as he looks down now. 

Jay slowly begins to turn the dagger in his stomach and watches how Malachi’s start to roll to the back of his head, body vibrating with the beginnings of a thrashing. 

But Jay ends it right after, removing the dagger in a clean motion back. Blood spurts out from the wound, drenching over Jay’s hand and spotting over his arm, and Jay just sits there. 

Watching Malachi. 

It's a test.

Will he take it? Will he not? 

He doesn’t. Of course, he fucking doesn’t. 

Malachi makes to lunge forward with his body as much as he can with Jay on top of him, manages to him dig the claws of his paws into Jay’s thighs to lift himself forward, and the pain would’ve made him scream, just as the first time, but Jay’s felt worse. He felt worse and it was only a mere ten minutes ago. He was only standing outside a fucking music room.  

Jay doesn’t let Malachi get any traction, he thrust White up through his snout from his mouth and Jay pushes until he has Malachi’s head pinned to the ground. 

The boy is certified wailing now, body doing everything it can to get from under Jay who changes position to sit on the wolf’s chest. 

Jay grunts as he forcefully drags White out from his mouth, blood splattering across his face and over his shirt as he does. When Malachi moves away, he holds Green along his neck, it's pretty curve, snuggled deliciously around his throat; It gets Malachi to freeze, as much as he can while in pain. 

“Open.” Jay grunts, sliding White softly between the seams of the wolf’s lips. 

Malachi does and Jay gets started. 

White is for purity, innocence, and growth. If Malachi won’t take his blessing and change, then Jay will have to purify the wolf himself: starting with those teeth, those fangs that allow an alpha to claim a pack, and in some cases trigger a presentation or transition. 

The one pops out, a nice suction cup sound that gets Jay’s heart racing pleasantly. 

The tip of White circles around the red and pink rim of the left fang’s gum. 

“Good boy, we’re almost there.” He whispers out. He’s barely paying attention when he says it, eyes focused as his tongue peeks out from his lip when he curves it around. He doesn’t mean to taunt, the performance is over. Jay’s won, but sometimes he just can’t help that his mouth runs faster than his brain. 

Jay's bloody and bleeding as he saws at the gum, and like bliss he can’t feel any of it. His body is warm with adrenaline, warm with Malachi, the freezing rain almost feels relieving to the touch. 

His head feels light—hyper focused, like his senses have been turned down, tunneled through to just the display in front of him. He doesn’t see the student body double in population on the courtyard and balconies combined, he doesn’t hear them suddenly go quiet, he doesn’t feel anything beyond the blood rolling off his skin and the mud weighing down his clothes. It’s Jay’s world now and it's beautifully quiet, almost deafening. 

Almost. 

Until Jay is breathing so hard his fucking chest hurts and his heart is beating so loud against his rib-cage he can’t help not only hear it, but feel it palpitating in his eardrums; dizzily it’s starts to feel like Jay can even feel his own blood moving within them: in his veins, all throughout his heart, along his skin where it tries to dry. It takes him so long, so long for him to come to from his haze, but his body doesn’t care for where Jay’s at, it forces him in the present and the next thing he knows, he’s five feet from Malachi’s and his hands are shaking and tight around his daggers. 

Jay blinks the water from his eyes, feels the wind pick up as the fog in his head retracts. It’s harsh, batting at all of Jay’s weak points like it wants him to fall to his knees. 

They’re here. 

All of them. 

They walk onto the field and they’re not perfectly aligned, some stray further from others, but despite the off-balance of it, they remain unified; footsteps walking in sync even when not lined side by side, sinking into a formation only they can recognize. It's terrifying and beautiful like a whole army charging as the sun begins to peak over the horizon—it's sublime. 

Sunghoon stands to the far end, the farthest back but his eyes pierce towards the front like he’s the one leading. They shoot through the field like an archer’s bow and arrow and they find Jay; his eyes, they don’t move from his, they don’t look at his state, they don’t look at the field, they keep track of him, they haunt him, his every emotion and expression. Sunghoon drinks it in, seals it behind his glass enclosures. Even if the guy’s dressed in a white button up that sticks to his chest with rain, and black slacks that his hands rest in, Jay knows how unkempt he really is.

Jake and Jungwon are much like they were the first time at breakfast, but instead of talking and messing with each other, they look over at Jay happily. Jungwon’s smile extends as he sees Jay, his head nodding to him in greeting: you made it. 

As if Jay had any other fucking choice. 

Jake’s wilder. His canines have already pierced into his thicker lips and he’s not even looking at Jay anymore—he’s staring at the mess he’s created: all the dug up mud, the blood, the body that’s still warm and flinching. He looks like he’s barely containing himself, Jungwon sticking just a bit closer to rest a hand on his shoulder when they all stop. 

And Heeseung. He’s at the front and his shadow alone reigns bigger than Jay’s ever seen one: it stretches along the mud, distorted and dark; it makes Heeseung giant. 

Jay pants.

The longer he stands here, the more he’s beginning to think that he’s been feeling him this whole time. His body’s warm, his head felt lighter, his breathing was shot, his skin feels like pins and needles: as if the sensation of his foot’s going to sleep had balmed over his whole body. Thankfully, it wasn’t searing pain, the invisible stab wounds that made him pass out, he supposes the mud can be thanked for that, it coats almost every inch of his skin by now, lubing up every pore so that when his body responds to the danger, it doesn’t sting as bad. 

  In the light, Heeseung is dark. Deep salmon soaks in all the shadows, all the intensity of rumbling earth and frigid rain held within him as his moves. The wind even pushes towards him like it's been called, a breeze flipping over a strand so Jay can see the smoked charcoal of his eyes, the coarse eyebrows, matches that threaten to set it all alight. 

Heeseung crouches down slowly, the wind blowing through his black top, the shirt fluttering around sharp hip bones and a  deep v. 

Long and thinly veined hands encircle Jay’s knife, his White Jade rested between palm and thumb comfortably, but noticeably smaller than when Jay holds it, and maybe Jay’s focusing too hard, over analyizing everything, but he swears he even hears the chink of those thick, silver bands wrapped around Heeseung’s index and ring finger against White.

The dagger is easily retracted from the boy’s mouth, and Heeseung remains passive, unflinching: either un-answering or uncaring that his pull comes with wailing, a sea of pain for a wolf he probably doesn’t even know. Jay sees him inspect it, sees those dark eyes run loosely along its structure, and lower when they run along Malachi’s wounds—assessing, fitting together the weapon and puncture sites like Jay’s left him a puzzle.  

Looking at him feels dangerous, unpredictable: a fire waiting to combust, but even so,  something inside Jay twists when he sees Heeseung stand back up with White clutched in his hands. It strikes something possessive in him, it strikes the fear of not having both of his knives on him, that his one side now open. 

Heeseung steps forward. Alone. Towards Jay, until they both skirt an inch from what marks the middle of Territory. 

Only three feet apart. 

       It's not a face off, not really. Not when Heeseung’s eyes probe him in an anger that extends off from him rather than shakes from within him. The magnitude of it is relentless, rather than restless Jay can’t detect pheromones—can’t smell him, this—this feeling was pure instinct: fight or flight, a built in system to keep humans alive, to keep them humble. To keep them from biting.

 But, Jay’s already bitten off more than he could chew. He can see that in the way there’s a spark in that darkness, a twinge in the dull expression: Jay's made him curious. 

Predator and prey. 

They’re surrounded by hundreds of students.

Jay’s surrounded.  

They line the flagstone up to the very edges without getting any centimeter touching the grass. They’re unbelievably quiet and Jay can’t hear anything: not a sneaker scuff, not a step, their mouths are sewed with string and bows, and their eyes are darkened endless pits that constantly take them in: Heeseung. Jay.  

Rain is puddling down Jay’s face, salty bursts shocking his tongue alive, recirculating his spit.

Heeseung lifts White up to his chin, the long curve in the dagger curling up to indent the plump bottom of his lips. The tip is sharp, Jay’s made sure of it, and the point pierces lightly into that pomegranate flesh: easily, so easily,  and when they do, Heeseung’s eyes snap to his like magnets, and it feels like the thunder claps from it. 

The stare is hard, cornering Jay in the foliage, wet nose breathing around his burrow in wait; it’s strict and dark with underlying tone of promise. 

Heeseung’s tongue chooses then to venture out, soft and wet as it brushes up the sharpest point against his lip. 

One short, slow stroke, and Heeseung watches him all the way through it, watches Jay eye the blood pooling onto the length of his tongue, watch how when he swallows the blood inks the whites of his eyes until bright currant washes over his irises, darkening his pupils. 

“What was it that you said?” 

His eyes hint back down at the knife, but suctions Jay back in when he wants hims, and when Jay settles on those eyes again, the red currant has deepened into oxblood and they keep getting darker, blackening until Heeseung’s eyes completely black out around a wine purple iris, with grey veins pulsing from under his lashes . 

“Gonna make me pretty?.” He teases and his mouth opens into a smile: fangs as well as canines, six sets of incisors. At the same time, Heeseung chest rumbles: a deep baritone that Jay feels vibrate down into the ground. It buzzes up his calves, weakening his knees. 

Jay flinches.

“What are you?” He whispers under his breath, heart stuttering around it, like grasshoppers jumping back and forth in his chest. This wasn’t right—wasn’t natural. 

Heeseung takes one step forward. 

“Ask me again.”

Jay shakes his head, stilling, keeping position, holding himself stronger than he feels. He never meant for that to be heard, it came out of him before he could think—think, Jay needs to start thinking. 

He can feel the heat coming off from Heeseung. 

Vampires are cold. 

Werewolves don’t get blooded eyes if they drink. 

“What—” Jay starts and he means to ask him what he did—what he really did, and not some bullshit answer about how he hurt their maknae because that just didn’t happen. It wasn’t true and wanted an actual answer, no matter how insignificant it might have been, but Jay never gets to finish his question, Heeseung cuts him and steps back. 

“I’ll show you.” 

White drops at Jay’s feet and Jay, without sacrificing any of his attention in the man, slides his shoe under the handle and toes it until it's spinning up in the air, at perfect height for Jay to snap his left hand out and grasp it. All the meanwhile, Jay is seeing the most horrific, traumatizing transformation. 

It's fast. Too fast for how hulking Heeseung gets. 

Not only are his bones breaking and rolling under his skin, and somehow, horrifyingly, they attached to others, different ones; they extend until Heeseung’s nine feet tall, with long, muscles and drooping arms, matching legs and hands; hands so huge Jay’s alone becomes no bigger than a tennis ball. It’s wolf: long, shagging hair, long, blackened and curved nails, pointed ears that have seen better days, and its face: its snout, wet mouth and teeth; but it’s also human.

It stands like one, bipedal with slight hunch at the shoulders, and Jay can tell from the slight bend in what would be its hindlegs, that if Heeseung wanted to, he could run on all fours: bigger, bulkier, and longer than any of the other wolves. 

That means he’s faster, stronger, packs more durability than Jay’s ever seen, than Jay’s ever fought. 

And the blooded eyes that are now so deep there close to black, Jay doesn’t want to think about it. His thoughts bring up the library, the old book he read from the archives. He remembers what this school used to be, what they used to do. He refuses to think about—any of it. 

Heeseung doesn’t give a warning growl—doesn’t need to. The sight of him is one enough. 

Okay, you freaky fuck. 

Jay clenches down on his daggers before he’s running off to right, ducking under a long arm that swipes out for him, but its extremely long, its reach far wider Jay was expecting, so he has to crunch lower, his hamstrings on fucking fire from use. 

Jay’s using everything, his core, his thighs, everything down to his toes to prevent himself from slipping. 

He tries to get behind the thing, away from its claws and jaw, but Heeseung is faster, he's smart. He lets Jay get closer, enough for Jay’s Green to swipe into some of the hair along his spine,  not even remotely obtaining damage from how thickly stacked his fur is, before he whips around, arm coming out and large blackened palm closing around Jay’s waist, encircling it just like Heeseung did White and lifting him up. 

Jay’s breath deepens when he feels the ground leave his feet. 

He’s light, floating, Heeseung holds enough strength in his one arm to hold him up for gravity not to take effect. It’s exactly how piggybacking someone in a  pool feels weightless, as if they had wings and never had to walk upon land; except, up this close the pins and needles harden and now glass shards stretch the surface of Jay’s skin apart, cutting and seeping deeper into Jay. The pain’s enough, but Heeseung’s hands begin to curl into a fist, squeezing his sides, his stomach, his organs. 

“Ueghh” Jay can’t even scream his agony. His eyes feel ready to pop out of their sockets from the pressure, blood starts boiling up from his mouth, pouring down from his lips in a non-stop waterfall. 

He can’t breathe. 

He tries to keep his mouth open so he doesn’t choke on his own blood, but the squeeze gets tighter, a boa constrictor adhering to every inch of him, clenching down in the last hug its victim will ever get.

A rib snaps. 

Then another. 

Both his daggers drop from his hands. 

His body contorts in his hand and Jay knows with the way the sky slowly becomes grey and indigo that this is it: he’s gonna pass out from the pain, or suffocate just before it. 

He’s crying—fully, and the tears drip from his eyes and gather into the bloody pocket his mouth has become; his head is limp, dangling in the air off to the side. 

Someone’s screaming, but it's muffled against the ringing in Jay’s ears. 

His eyes stumble over the crowd, his sight fading out with each head until he lands on one he knows so well. One that’s been in his face far too many times to count, despite her being shorter than him. 

Yihwa. 

She’s screaming, crying, struggling against Chloe until she breaks from her arms and runs up against the edge of Territory. 

She’s terrified, Jay can tell. 

“You're one of the only ones that's actually made it here.”

“Did something happen?” 

“Jay—” 

Yihwa's foot inches out to the very edge. Chloe’s growling. Her foot’s about to sink into the grass. 

Yihwa, no. 

He doesn’t know where it comes from. He doesn’t, but Jay finds it in himself to move his legs, flip them up in an uppercut that slams deliciously  below the wolf’s jaw. He gets a grunt as the wolf’s head knocks back slightly, it's not enough to break it, Jay knows, but all he needed was a distraction. One powerful enough to loosen the hold around his body, even just a little bit. 

And it did. 

There’s enough space for Jay to reach down for his ankles, pop out his two pretty Black Jades and spear them into the hand around him; one goes into the thumb that traps against the four, and the other stems itself into the upper wrist: where all the veins are yes, but most importantly, where the reflex for hand opening and closing lies. 

The wolf howls  and Jay digs in deeper, breathing more and more air in by the second. His Black Jades are favorite: they’re deadly, they’re deep, but their power lies within the design. A jagged shaft all the way through: there’s nothing clean about it, it cuts harder, it heals worse. 

But, Jay’s lucky, the wolf could easily bite its head off, but instead, Heeseung throws him halfway across the field. Towards Yihwa, but still a couple yards out. The commotion has stopped her, the students and what may be Chloe’s pack dragging her back from the edge. 

Good.  

Jay spins in the air, curling into the fetal position once he falls back into the Earth, bouncing off on his first plummet, before his body is rolling against the grass from the rest of the energy. 

Blood coughs out from Jay when he stops, a clot of it working out of his throat and collecting into the grass. 

Jay looks up, his eyes doing the motion as his face stays half smothered into the mud. Hair obstructs his vision and it's brown, a shade it hasn’t been for the last month or so, but here it is drenched and slimy with mud, sticking along his face that’s a mess of blood, rain, salt, and mud, again. Heeseung is coming over and Jay can feel each of his steps through the ground.Heavy booms that accelerate his heart, that rings the bells in Jay’s head, but his body is slumped. He can’t move, every inch is on fire and every part of him feels heavy. He has nothing left. 

Jay watches Heeseung slowly shift forms as he gains proximity, his body returning to that of a man. 

Jay distantly begins to wonder if this is what the onset of organ failure feels like. 

His bottom lip shakes when Heeseung is finally close, when he sinks down to his knees right at Jay’s feet. His breathing is shallow, harsh hiccups that barely get enough oxygen to his brain. Then Heeseung is wrapping those same hands around his ankle, his thumb cursing over the bone there before he grabs, dragging Jay’s entire body to him, until Jay’s curled by his lap, body shaking lightly from trauma.

He leans down, nose knocking up against Jay’s ear and traveling down the sharp line of Jay’s jaw, all the way to where Jay’s panting, soft puffs of air rippling the blood staining his lips. Heeseung breaths it in, sliding up slightly to speak into his mouth. 

“Sweet.” He hums, thumb coming up to push Jay’s face up, so their eyes can meet. “Honey and whiskey, the same blood scent from the village. 

Jay can’t form the words, not yet, but his eyes widen enough in answer to Heeseung. The grin on Heeseung is sick, a wicked stretch that Jay wants to turn away from, but he can’t. He physically can’t. 

“Well then?” Heeseung prods, thumb shaking Jay’s head back and forth. The small movement makes him dizzy. “What am I, Jay?” 

Jay focuses on breathing, something that gets harder with each breath. All he can smell is metal and earth, it's nauseating, twisting up his guts more than they already were. Heeseung doesn’t care, doesn’t even seem to process what Jay may be going through, or even the tan paleing in his skin. He leans back over to his ear and croons, “Hm, little one? Say something to me.” 

He continues and Jay is hardly picking it all up. 

“Have you figured it out? ” 

“Jungwon’s been telling me how much you like to talk. Let me hear you.” 

His eyes are closing again and this time not even Yihwa ignites another surge of energy. Heeseung sets his head down, but doesn’t move away and it lets Jay’s eye wander off to the end of the pitch, where a black wolf is running towards them. 

Pup.

“No.” Jay winces, it's soft, closer to whimper than any demand he wanted. Tears rush to his eyes and the pup runs up next to them. He’s scared. He can’t breathe. 

“No?” Heeseung's voice is icy where he is by his ear. He doesn’t even acknowledge the pup next to him, not until after he's dug one claw into Jay’s old wound on his thigh, re-opening and re-claiming that area on his thigh that Malachi has split early this week. The slow sink gets a high pitched, dying scream from the back of his throat. He closes his mouth, doesn’t wish to satisfy him, even as the pain remains constant because Jay can’t move away from it, can’t get any reprieve. 

The pup noses at Heeseung’s jaw, gruffing to get his attention and for a minute Jay has no idea what is happening. It's quiet, everyone’s so quiet, and the two figures above him are beginning to blur, but they’re looking at each other, Heeseung’s eyebrows moving as if they're having some kind of silent conversation. Heeseung even tilts his head at one point, but eventually his claw retracts back into his hand and the pup, world bless him, begins to lick at Jay. 

His face, his neck—he’s grooming him, cleaning him. Something breaks in Jay at the action: the comfort he knows will go to waste because he's dying, because he doesn’t deserve it after taking away his parents. 

“ N-no, please.” He whispers out finally, and the pup’s ear twitches against his jaw when he hears it, but he doesn’t leave, he doesn’t run for his life like Jay wants him too, just stays there with his warm tongue, too hot against Jay’s cold skin. 

Heeseung’s laughing at the display, but adoration is no doubt full in his eyes. 

A hand comes down into Jay’s hair, massaging softly at his scalp and Jay's eyes finally close. He doesn’t even properly register the movement, or how the pup moves aside at Heeseung's call to get closer to Jay’s neck. Jay’s numb all over, can’t even feel what it is that Heeseung does, what he confirms, can’t even tell the difference between him and the pup anymore as the black abyss seems to grow larger.  

“Little one,” someone whispers, “what are you ?” 

His neck is being bared to the side. 

“What can you be for me?” He purrs. 

Suddenly he feels light again, like he’s back in that pool, except when his eyes slit open that tiny bit, he sees green plumes wrapping all around his body, keeping him afloat as Yihwa runs with his levitating body off the field, away from the courtyard. She’s heading towards the nursery bay in a panic, she makes wrong turns, she doubles back: it all makes Jay even dizzier. Somewhere away from them a deep growl expands, storming through the whole campus as if the ocean has just crashed a wave against its walls. He can feel the magic buzz and shake like Yihwa. 

“Get him on the bed. Now!” 

Ms. Ooyang. 

“We need Morphine. Something to stop the pain!” Yihwa panics as she lowers him down, “He was gonna—Heeseung—again. I can’t watch it again.” Yihwa’s crying. 

“You won’t,” Ms. Ooyang asserts, “you got him before that didn’t you? Now, you need to focus, we have no morphine and magic healing makes it worse before it gets better. Help me put these on.” 

Jay hears the sounds of metal chain, leather straps. 

Fuck.  

“No! No, I’m not shackling him!” Yihwa yells out and it's the most assertive she’s ever sounded. 

She sounds so cool. 

“Then, hold. Him. Down.”  

Small hands press down into his shoulders and he can feel the ends of curly hair brush against his jaw. She smells like citrus. The cleaning supplies he and his mother used to clean the counters and floors with it. His heart slows with it, a pleasant feeling taking over Jay, but another pair joins—they actually remove Yihwa’s light press in place for their own. There’s not a lot of pressure. They are simply resting their hands on Jay’s shoulders just as Yihwa did, but the power is so much different. It's like if Jay moved, he wouldn’t go anywhere anyway. They feel familiar, like Jay’s body recognizes their hold. 

Sunoo. 

His heart struggles to leap at the thought, shock and joy too smothered under all his body is going through, but he does manage to get his eyes open one last time—to look directly into those quicksand brown ones that are now an oceanic blue. 

“I would know anyway.” 

“What do you mean?”

“Blood travels fast.”

“Where…” Jay croaks out softly. He wants to know where Sunoo’s been, why he hasn’t seen him, if he’s okay. Sunno smiles down at him and Jay can feel the pull of his eyes, the way they stretch open Jay’s pupils to let himself inside. 

“ Sleep.”

 

 

 

 

 

Notes:

....14k guys...14k and I was struggling earlier with a 3 paged, fuck ass essay. Something is so unfair about that lmao.

ANYWAY, you guys' are so fucking cool. Thank you so much for all the comments and interest on the last chapter, reading how you guys respond to each chapter makes posting so much more rewarding.

I tried with this, ya'll, so fucking hard. I hope you guys enjoyed it.

 

Oh right, I finally updated and fixed that half-assed summary, too, so if something looks different, that's it.

Chapter 6

The rain has started again. 

It’s a long, pleasant sound; one where the water dribbles down the windowsills, a voluptuous wet that slides down the glass, leaving behind watery streaks like the spit on pavement. 

It’s a nice gurgling noise to him, one that feels far away and distant: so tangled between the cotton and linen in his head that he’s not able to process the sound properly. The windows are just above him. He knows that, and yet his body feels blocked off from the room, from the world; as if he’s rolled himself in bubble wrap from head to toe, ear canals to his eyes. 

Blurry, it's so blurry. The nursery bay is awash with grey and purple watercolors and Jay thinks he sees white light heat waves buzz in his vision; the room becoming distorted as heavy, painful pricks spread along his eyes, even when they open the smallest bit. One shoot of it strikes up into his brain, and his body is too fried to even flinch from it, his throat too raw to even groan. 

Needless to say, he’s slow with it—waking up, that is.

He slides an eyelid apart and when the room begins to vibrate to him, he closes them again, goes back to sleep, tries again fifteen minutes later when he resurfaces. He’s in the middle of one of these rounds, at what part he’s at he doesn’t know, can’t remember how many times he’s repeated this process, how many times he has sunk back into the depths, but he knows how he feels each time. He knows at one point there was nothing but pain and blindness; that at another, wet, thin droplets fell to his cheeks and coursed down to his jaw. He remembers the smell of citrus as something soft brushed the wetness away. 

Then, this: a warm, fleshy nub tickling along his jaw, softly lining the contours of his face. They’re so close as they breathe him in, warm breath puffing over his ears, soothing them from the cold. The pain is still there, Jay knows, but under the gentle strokes along his cheeks, ears, jaw, the beginnings of his neck, something soothes him, sends the pain stumbling back far.

Far enough away for Jay’s breathing to regulate, for his hands to twitch against the leather cuffs, for a small pant, a short, soft release that tinges up into a whine to come out when he feels the hot outline of plump lips glide over his throat.

They don’t press in, they just barely kiss the surface of his apple. Jay can even feel it as their lips rub together. 

The feelings in his body are cloying: hot and sticky with warmth, comfort, familiarity. Jay can’t help it when his head falls to the side, open, wanting to get closer. Jay’s more sleep than he is awake, but his body remembers: thick, insulating fur and a heavy body that pressed him into the grass like a weighted blanket. 

Pup. 

He feels that warmth come closer, hair skirting along his nose as he leans down more. Goosebumps rise onto his skin like it can feel those lips coming closer to him, responding to him. 

“Niki-ah.”

His pup freezes up, Jay can feel it because the warm breath along his throat recedes and goosebumps rise again, but out of the sudden cold his skin feels drenched in. He doesn’t know what’s going on, doesn’t understand what just happened. His ears feel clogged like he’s underwater and he can’t open his eyes, doesn’t even gather that it's not just him and his pup. 

His eyebrows furrow at the loss, the cold seeping back into his skin along with the pain. Jay can feel himself try to move around uncomfortably, try to subdue that pain himself now that he knows it can be conquered, but a hand comes along his shackled wrist, a thumb sliding its way under the leather, its tip settling right against his pulse. 

Jay gasps, the sound choking in the back of his throat as his eyes twitch. Pins and needles: but, they don’t hurt, their edges soften out, until all Jay feels is sensitive, like he can feel every ridge of their thumb against his pumping veins.

His body remembers this one, too, and the memories are awful; they’re gonna wake him, force his body to face the onslaught of pain waiting for him, but then Jay feels a shock of cold: one that shocks his body enough to slow his heart, refocus him entirely.

Then, hands, different ones, his pup’s, spreads along his limp fingers, his hand almost engulfing Jay’s as the boy lifts it up in his hands. 

“Hyung,” he says and his voice is so deep, it scratches something in Jay's brain. It's only his talking voice, but Jay thinks his voice settles over him just as heavily as his wolf, as any weighted blanket that could lull him to sleep.

Cold metal clinks as the boy messes with his hands, but soon enough, that same coldness is sliding along his finger; a shuddering feeling of hot and cold that makes Jay want to tremble. 

A chair squeaks as that breath returns to him, this time along his sideburns. Their cheeks nestle gently against each other as the pup leans in further, whispering in his ear: a deep, lulling melody that Jay feels rather than hears, “I’ve missed you.” 

And then it's hot, instantly shocking and heating as his lips press softly around the corner of his eye, the ends of his eyelashes curling around those lips. 

The thumb presses into his pulse deeper, but Jay’s too busy worrying about the hum building in his own throat. 

He can’t see, doesn’t understand why, but his pup’s chuckle hits his ears, vibrates down his neck, and Jay finally acquiescences. 

He has missed him. Just a little. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When Jay finally gets a grip on life and opens his eyes without the pain, without the heatwaves blurring and distorting the room into some disfigured glob, it's already deep into the night. The rain has given away to fog that now coats the glass, the deep purple outside making the bundled air seem like black, disembodied spirits that curl and smoke up the visibility so much the room is almost pitch. 

Almost. 

One of the small scones on the other side of the room is on, and though it gives little help at lighting all corners of the room, it’s enough to make out parts of himself, the outlines of the walls, the even darker shadows casted down onto the floor from the beds, and then of course the beds themselves—or well, the ones closest to the sconce. Yihwa lays on one of them, untucked, bodily collapsed and sprawled in a way that unsettles something in Jay. 

He tries to sitting up, all efforts put forth to check on her. Her hair’s sprawled everywhere, covering her face, and resting over her open mouth that Jay can’t hear anything from. No noises, no snoring. She could be a quiet sleeper. Could be. 

Jay makes it up to his elbows, then pauses, head falling between his shoulders as he tries to breathe through the soreness. When he works up enough courage, he lifts himself up, only to be brought straight back down. 

Fuck, the restraints , Jay curses. He completely forgot about them. 

Jay releases a heavy sigh as he looks down at the one wrapped around his right wrist; his left unconsciously already trying to come over to unbuckle it, even though it’s trapped just the same. 

Why did he have these on? I thought Yihwa—

Jay shakes the hair out of his face, but a hair stays perched in his eye anyway. He doesn’t remember—not much of anything after Sunoo had come in, but he knows Yihwa had refused to shackle him. She said no. 

There’s a folded towel at the end of his bed. It's clean and it's close enough to his feet where he can fit a foot under. They weren’t shackled, thankfully, so all he really had to worry about was getting the angle right, fitting his foot under with enough balance to flick up and hull the towel at the girl’s body.

He didn’t care if she was asleep. He felt off. Something was off. So, Jay gets his foot under and spends a minute getting it balanced on his foot.

He’s focused, his tongue starting to peak out between his lips when a glare disrupts his vision. A small flash that reorients Jay’s attention to the metal framing behind his foot; something’s shining, something near Jay. 

The towel drops from his foot as he twists to look. 

“What the…” There on his middle finger sits a ring; A chunky, chrome silver that takes up most of Jay’s finger. It’s heavy, weighted, its designs so intricate and stacked that they hold down his finger comfortably. Relax. Don’t move. You have nowhere to be. 

It was a nice weight, but where the actual fuck? 

“Keep it on.” 

The voice almost startles him, but it's soft and calm, unassuming. 

“Sunoo.” Jay breathes out, fingers still trying to use the sheets to roll it off, but Sunoo’s hand comes over from where they had been neatly folded on his lap, and rests on top of his. It’s not forceful, Sunoo barely even puts pressure behind just a touch. 

“You wouldn’t want to lose it.” He says easily, a smile adorning his cheeks as he looks at him. 

Jay’s brows furrow when he looks down at it again, wrecking his brain for when, how this even got here, but all he remembers is warmth and breathing around his jaw. Jay’s mouth opens into an ‘O’ as the ring owner’s identity dawns on him. 

Sunoo chuckles at his revelation, his shoulders relaxing as Jay stops the movement against the sheets. 

That’s fine then , Jay thinks. He’ll find the pup and give it back to him later…that is, if he hasn’t left town already. 

“Yihwa—” Jay starts, mind now back to his starting problem. Sunoo sits in the metal chair he pulled up the other day, dragging it beside Jay’s bed by his chest and by the wooden side table. 

“Sleep,” He says, “Had to put her down ‘else she be up all night fretting and thus.” The white sconce brightens half of his face, revealing the smile, the swirling eyes, and the darker, much darker side that was heavily shaded by the fogged windows.

Jay means to nod; he understands fully already how overwhelmed Yihwa can get, that what Sunoo did was probably for her sake, even though he could’ve tucked her properly, but Jay flinches instead, his eyes catching something off to the far right, far behind Sunoo, masked within the bounds of darkness that the sconce doesn’t reach. 

It was so fast, barely there that Jay’s mind was left thinking. His eyes skit over the area a thousand times, trying to see it again, figure out what it was. 

And Sunoo lets him, sits there quietly with his folded hands back in his lap, waiting for Jay and when Jay does come back to him, he leans in, his head tilting with curiosity even though his voice sounds nothing like it, “See something?” 

Jay gulps, eyes doing a once over of the room before he settles. He looks into Sunoo’s eyebrows and shakes his head, “No.” 

Sunoo nods at him encouragingly, “Good,” he whispers, “It’s just me, no need to worry. I won’t let anything happen to you.” He chuckles, his head tutting over to the body on the opposite bed as Jay’s, “Especially on Yihwa’s watch. Tough one, she was able to wrap you in her magic and run off with you all without ever touching the grass. She’s impressive, thought she would always be too scared.”

A smile stretches along his face, pride and relief swirling in his chest. He looks down at his bedding, his toes playing with the blanket that wasn’t there when he entered. 

This is what having friends is like , Jay thinks. He finally got one thing—two—and he’s immensely grateful for them both. 

Sunoo presses a cold glass of water against his cheek. 

“Here, drink something. The healing isn’t over yet.” 

 

And Sunoo was right. It hadn’t been over. Not by a long shot. Somewhere through the night, the fog lifted and the sun rose, marking Jay’s skin with the morning rays of Saturday; he couldn’t welcome the day, barely recognized that the fleeting warmth over his skin was the sun and not his skin stitching itself together.

He’d been screaming ever since he became lucid. His guts were twisting and jolting apart, trying their damndest to untangle the mess they had been squeezed into.

He could feel his deflated and dragging organs re-plump themselves, pumping up his stomach as they bounced and arranged. Hours went by: sleep, pain, sleep. Jay doesn’t remember ever eating. Then the sun vanished, whatever little light that lit the room leaving him in the dark. 

He woke up again.

“Sunoo.” He wheezed, hands surging up against his restraints, his whole body thrashing as he felt his organs lock into place, his flesh grow over cuts and punctures. Sunoo’s next to him, somewhere, Jay can feel him, his hands on his shoulders light and pressing.

Jay forces his eyes open, forces them to meet the large pockets of quicksand behind dark eyelashes. Jay sticks his feet in them as he thrashes harder, willing the sand to sink him quicker. 

“I got you, Jay.” Sunoo’s smiling. “I got you.” 

And then he’s asleep again.

Blissfully. 

 

 

 

Weak. Drained. Hollow. Jay’s feels like but a shell of what he was. Nothing hurts, not anymore, the pain that coursed through him had been filling, all encompassing, to now where it's gone Jay’s body folds at the loss. His fingers are vibrating, and so are his legs; they shake in expectation, preparation. His body is so scared that this is only a moment, that the pain will return, but Jay knows it's over. It’s finally done. 

Still, he allows himself a long moment before he blinks his return.

There’s a dark grey behind his eyelids that he searches, calmingly, not rushed to find anything in particular, simply to distract himself as the light from the room dots small spaces within his grey white. He hears Sunoo move from beside him, hears Yihwa’s murmuring to Chloe, who by all means hasn’t changed and proceeds to talk loud despite that Jay’s “asleep”.

Sunoo probably can detect it, that he’s awake. The vampire no doubt knows the difference between his sleep and resting heart rate, can smell his blood rushing through him faster now that his body is using up more energy, but he doesn’t say a word to the girls.

A small hum and a giggle is all he lets out from his seat by his bed. He’s been there all night, all day Saturday and the night following that as well.

Jay’s so eternally grateful for him, the magic healing or whatever it was that Ms. Ooyang had called it, was debilitating, agonizing.

Sunoo kept him asleep for most of it, kept him awake only long enough to get Jay to drink something. He couldn’t imagine what it would have been like without those eyes of his.

Jay breathes deeply, feeling the air fill out his stomach, the distention of his stomach lifting the thin sheets that cover him just slightly. It feels normal, if not better. His airways are clear, unblocked by blood clots and tears, his stomach rises and falls like baked bread: soft and delicately, unshaken and undisturbed by a strong grip, wrenching him like an orange of its juice. 

“There he is.” Sunoo sings, hair a pretty brown that flirts behind his ears and eyes shiny and light from the sun cascading through the windows. Jay smiles at him and holds his gaze for a second longer.

A little secret is between them—that he had been awake—and together they bury it in the quicksand pits behind those lashes.

 Yihwa gasps, almost trips over herself as he runs from the bed to his. Chloe follows behind, too, but only to stand Yihwa up. Yihwa comes right to his side as he sits up, resting up against the metal headboard with pillows cushioning the cold, hard surface. Yihwa’s checking over his vitals, touching lightly to his blood pulses by his neck, his wrists, feels along his forehead for a fever. 

Jay shakes her off, chuckling though his throat is gravelly from disuse, “I’m fine.” 

Chloe claps for him, slowly, sardonically as a smirk and an eye roll flies at him. 

“Well would you look at that, Jay the Great, you have finally awoken.” 

His nose scrunches, “What?” 

Yihwa suffers him into a side hug, her head resting on top of his and her curls pooling around his vision. 

Sunoo coughs over his laugh, curling a long piece of hair to the back. 

“You haven’t heard, sleeping beauty, but it seems like you’ve caused quite the uproar.” She says melodically, strumming her fingers over the sheets that cover his ankles. Yihwa finally breaks away from and he looks between the two: Chloe and her, but when neither gives him further details, he looks expectantly, exasperatedly over to Sunoo. 

He winks at him, standing up and holding a hand below and around Jay’s elbow, like this Sunoo helps haul him out of bed. Jay gets a foot onto the cold, smooth linoleum and shiver runs through him as he’s pulling his other leg to him, but Sunoo pulls, pulls him until Jay is almost falling into his arms, into his chest. 

Jay catches himself right before his head falls into the crook between his neck and shoulders. 

“What–” Jay pants from the unexpected self-save. 

Sunoo’s eyes shoosh him as his hand, smaller, softer, but no doubt stronger cuff Jay’s head, just above his nape, and pulls him in further, until his chin is skirting the crease of Sunoo’s black tee.  His hand holds him there, they rest, and Sunoo’s face comes closer to his ears. Jay can’t feel him there though, just his breath when he decides to breathe. 

“You’re popular.” He says and it's low, a mild tease. 

Jay’s head falls to Sunoo’s shoulder completely as he groans. 

“Fuck this school.” He grits.

 

 

The last bit of tension uncoils as his feet finally slap upon those black and white diamonds. It’s bright outside, warmer, and the yellow light that shines into the hallway as they walk makes the floor look almost old, vintage like the rest of the sixth floor. Jay absorbs it, every ray, every clack their feet make when they connect with the diamonds. It’s a different heat, something lighter, airy, floating like the fuzz and dust particles that they can only see when the sun shines like this; daytime stars. 

“Blue Jay,” Yihwa opens up as they walk past a particular bright window. Jay hums back to her, his hands hidden within sweats that are too big for him. “I never want to see you like that again.” 

They stop, right in front of his door. There are presents, small and palm-sized stacked neatly along the outlines of his door. Jay turns to Yihwa, leaning his back against the door as he flicks his hand between them.

Come here , it reads, and Yihwa follows through, hesitant at first, but surely enough stumbling forward, kicking the small present in her way as she goes and hides her face between his side and arm, like a cat between the cushions. 

Jay nods, chuckling as he holds her there, hands swaddling her head and sides as he lets her rest, letting her heart slow to beat with his. She still smells like citrus, brighter now that he’s fully to his senses, something like bergamot. He can’t imagine how he smells, two days without a shower, having only been wiped down of his blood and mud. 

Jay sighs and they sink further back into the door. 

“Yihwa?” He ventures and she shakes her head at him, her curls tangling between his fingers as if she’s trying to tell him: no, not yet. 

“Yihwa, you’re great and all,” He says, massaging a bit of her scalp as he leans down towards her ears, “but tell me you weren’t the one to change me out of my clothes.” 

The girl jolts back quickly, horror lifting her face grotesque as she slaps her his chest lightly. 

“Fuck no, I did not!” 

Jay smiles, nodding as he remains against the door, and lifts his eyebrow. 

“Mhm, then who did?” He asks. He’s teasing but he is genuinely curious as well. He needs to know if the nursery bay kept spare clothes for the students or if he should be washing and returning these.

Yihwa calms, probably cursing him under her breath as she eyes his clothes closely: sweatpants, a long sleeve—nothing out of the ordinary, nothing crazy, but Yihwa tilts her head anyway. 

“I don’t know. I mean I was there the whole time so…but, I don’t remember…” 

Jay shakes his, rising from the door, “Mn, it’s probably Sunoo’s. Don’t blow your head thinking about it.” He says and finally opens his door. He didn’t need his key, the door’s opened at 7 anyway. 

The both of them walk in, Yihwa immediately dropping in his bed and Jay rummaging through his dressers for a shower. 

“So, mind telling me what those things are doing outside my door?” He asks as he gathers his clothes, flitting around the room for his towel. 

‘Things?” Yihwa scoffs, fluffing his pillow behind her, “You mean your gifts?” 

Jay stops, standing in the middle of his room, between the two columns that hold up the roof. 

“Gifts?” 

“Yes. Jay the Great, that’s what they're calling you. Gruesome, strong, resourceful just like the board said. Some are inspired, some are interested, others…others want to court you.”

“I got my ass beat.” He grits, hands clenching around his clothes from the memory. That bitchass motherfucker. Jay never felt so useless in a fight, he barely even got a swing in before he went down whimpering at his feet. It irritated him. It scared him. He shouldn’t have let it end like that. He can’t let it end like that. 

“You survived, Jay. Do you understand that?! No one ever survives Heeseung. Not even if they’re strong like you…stronger than you.” Yihwa yells and her pupils start to shake, grow shiny and wet.  

So something did happen. 

Jay nods, keeping her eye contact, tries to let her know that he understands, that he sees what she’s trying to say. Whatever happened with Heeseung in the past is why her and Chloe’s pack have this “agreement”. 

“Then why?” He asks, irritation still boiling within him, but he buries it for now, douses his fire with his own cup. 

“Because…” She croaks, “because somehow you’ve gained his favor, and they think if they get you, they’ll have it too. That they’ll be safe…”

“Safe from what, Yihwa?” 

She looks at him and a tear falls from her eyes. She lays against his pillow and it's a half whisper, a voice that starts out full but loses its power before she can speak, “...from the bite.” 

 

 

 

 

Water runs down his body, rivulets of warmth that shape him, mold his body into something new: clean, but not better. Nothing hurts, hasn’t hurt, but it feels different, like he’s replaced his tires and the drive back feels smoother, unhitched; as if the road’s gotten repaved, his suspensions elevated, and the whole car’s gutted out and clean, all rounded leather and vacuumed seats. It’s almost foreign; foreingly his; his own rebirth within the same grown shell. 

You can’t teach a dog new tricks, but Jay feels like he’s been enlightened, his bones weightless as his muscles never knew a day of tension. Restitched with new skin, infused with childlike stamina: even the claw wound left on Jay’s thigh has been glossed over: only healthy, pinking skin where it was mauled. 

Jay sighs, fingers lazily dragging through his hair, pressuring into his scalp until it tingles back. 

Goodness, he could hike a mountain, run a mile like this. 

He shuts off the water. 

Toweling his body before his hair, then changing. Heat is still steaming from his pores when he comes out, red warmth seeping from his soles into the brownie floorboards. 

Yihwa stands with him and they exit together in silence.

They’re silent the whole way through: down the elevator, through the center, across the open hallway, but the students are not, the atmosphere is anything but. 

Everyone’s watching, bumping around each other and jumping on top to look at him closer.

The magics eye him and nod. The vampires who could always hear him coming and moving before he’d approach now bodily face him, meeting his eyes before they sway away from him. The werewolves stood off to the sides, watching him closely, excitedly, tense, subtly sniffing the air and touching his shoulders as they gave him props.

Jay was used to attention, but not like this.

He was used to the way once they realized they couldn’t scent anything on him, once they realized he wasn't a wolf, or anything occult, they would shift back, their eyes searching for something, ousting him. He knew the look when Jay broke their egos, bested them, was better than them, at fighting ferals, at patrol, at supply runs. 

He knows what it's like to have to kill the otherwise innocent just because they tried to break him.

He won’t be. Ever. He’s not a thing to be used. He’s not a lucky charm or a bargaining chip. He wasn’t wolf. He wasn’t vamp. He wasn’t magic. He wasn’t presented and therefore subjected to any pack, any twisted, corrupted hierarchy, any Alpha; not like his mother had been. He was nothing as his mother was raised, but he was everything like this mother. The one who ran away while he was still a baby—for him. 

For you. She would say in her sleep. For you. 

She’d hid them, she’d raised him, she’d made sure nobody took advantage of him; she taught him until Jay knew enough to venture outside by himself. It was all for something. The sheltering, the panic attacks, her obsessions with cleaning, soaking the air to chemicalize her pheromones, scolding Jay, telling him not to get close with others, not to get too close to her, her crying, her own eyes on him before her death. 

Jay wasn’t going to let it all be for nothing. It can’t all be for nothing. 

So he glares at every single one of them. He walks tall, squared, ready for anything. He’s not easy, his gait tells them. He’s strong, but not impenetrable, and Heeseung…Heeseung was something unnatural, unbidden by the laws of nature. Something of two kinds, or maybe the first and only one.

Jay wasn’t sure, still isn’t. Whatever that beast was, whatever those eyes were; Whether he was a monster, a fluke, a wrong, it all had nothing to do with Jay, had nothing to do with his plans.

What he will do.  

When he enters the hall it's different. They don’t go quiet and still like they do for Heeseung’s pack; They don’t look at their packmates worried while biting their lips, not to breathe heavier. They look, they whisper, they talk louder, some get up from their seats as he passes their tables. 

A congratulations, an encore, a welcome. 

He ignores them all, bypasses them like they were never there in the first place. 

It's unnerving and buttering. 

It’s insulting. 

Yihwa tensed beside him as she feels the change in him, her eyes constantly flitting all around his face, except for his eyes. But, Jay’s over talking about it, done with the reminder of Heeseung in everyone’s eyes, in their thoughts, in the way his own heart ponders the question. Why? Why the mercy?

He finds reprieve in Sunoo when they sit. He’s across from him as always. His cheeks are full, soft as the small winking fat under his eyes. He’s relaxed completely, no care for their surroundings, only Jay; and when he looks at him Jay can tell it's only him in those eyes, not a replay of the fight, or glancing of his condition to size him up.

If anything they tease him, a gloss in his eyes that glides over his nerves, embalming them until they’re static: popular, told you. 

Sunoo’s eyes smile for him, “You haven’t eaten in days. I told them to pile the meat up for you.” He says. 

Jay’s shoulders drop, a crooked smile as he touches his hair.

“Thanks, needed it.” He says, collecting the fork and scraping up as much fried potatoes and ham as he can. 

With puffed cheeks and puckered lips he asks, “And you? How are you? You were with me both days, awake—honestly, I don’t think you even slept. Did you…” Fuck how does he say this, “Eat…drink?” 

Sunoo laughs around his glass, shoulders jumping with him. Jay’s kind of memorized, he’s never seen Sunoo seem so real. The boy nods as he licks his lips, his nail cutting along the cup. 

“Yes, I did.” He chuckles, “You don’t have to worry.” He adds, eyeing him over his cup as he drinks. 

Jay sputters as his heart beats a little faster, and almost shakes the eggs of his fork when he moves his hand around. “I–I’m not worried,” he scoffs, “just asking. You’re kind of a stalker.” 

Sunoo smiles, his thin, pearly fangs stretching just beyond the opening of his mouth, “You’re innocent.” 

Jay stops chewing. A hum gathering in his throat in question. Yihwa’s hand guards the back of his arms. Chloe isn’t looking, she never truly is, but he can tell she’s listening intently, her fork pushing around parts of her pancakes. 

Sunoo’s fangs sink past his lips and when Jay’s eyes accidentally collide with Sunoo’s, the world around them becomes quiet; barely a murmur that itches Jay’s ears; the sound almost becomes fleeting, a leaf in the wind that blows away from him in circles, until it all comes back crashing into him as once like a downpour. 

“You’d ask your stalker if they’ve eaten?” Sunoo counters, nosy and sassy, and overly in Jay’s space, in his eyes, in his body, even though the boy sits more than an arm’s length across, his head thrown back as he laughs cutely. 

Jay blinks. Then sputters. 

Finally laughs. 

“You know that’s not what I meant!” He yells playfully, rolling his eyes and stuffing in more ham than potatoes.

Yihwa gasps beside him, her hands wretching away from his arm, but Jay doesn’t notice. He’s chewing slowly, trying to break the smile that comes from watching Sunoo so food doesn't peak out of his mouth. 

He doesn’t notice it—the quiet, and his body—his body doesn’t tell him anything. 

Only sees Sunoo’s eyes open up more. 

“What did you mean?” Croons into his ears, a coaxing sound that’s not at all round or soft. It’s low, edged, breathy. Rusted nails that sink into marshmallows.

A nail scrapes gently down his neck, from behind his ear, down to his jugular. 

Heeseung. 

Jay drops it, the fork clattering to the plate loudly. The sound echoes throughout the hall as so many eyes drink them in. Again. Not again. 

His foot twitches, his hands tense, and his adrenaline rushes to his head as his ass begins to lift. 

“Jay, sit .” 

Sunoo. Fuck, Sunoo. Those eyes. 

Jay’s body thumps back down, his daggers jostle in his pockets, his Black Jades cold around his ankles. 

“No,” A faux whine breathes into his ear, a crackled chuckle passing through right after, stoking the flames, “Keep going.” Heeseung grounds, his nail stopping at the collar of Jay’s shirt, a trail of goosebumps that lead to the top of collarbone. He scratches there and it tickles as well sends small shivers down Jay’s arms. 

“I’m sure everyone wants to hear the story. So brave of you,” he continues, his words like burning oil waiting to be lit, “You fought the beast and haven’t a scratch on you to show for it.” 

He can’t move, not beyond clenching the table. 

A nose, cold, and pointed slides down his ear, breath pooling around his shoulders. 

“Little bell of the ball, huh? You’ve already got yourself a ring. Feels better than all the others, doesn’t it?” 

Jay grits his teeth, absolutely shaking with the want to slam his face into the table. 

“The fuck do you want?” Jay hisses, even as another hand comes around the back of his head,  so close to his nape. He doesn’t grip, just starts smoothing down the hair there. 

“Easy,” Heeseung breathes, “don’t be so mad at me. Even your little girl can’t hold a proper grudge against me.” 

Heeseung presses in closer, until Jay can feel him all around him, around his ear, “I killed her, you know. The head of her order died right under me. She was scared shitless,” he laughs, “she begged, screamed, and asked me so nicely to leave her order alone. ‘Just take me. Don’t touch her.’ All for what? The little girl can’t even defend her dead leader enough to tell me to stop.” 

Yihwa was crying, fullstop, but she even did that quietly, her hands pressing into her arms, eyes closed as tears slid down her face. 

“Heeseung—” 

“I won’t kill you, not yet. Ni-ki told me you were promising, but Jungwon, Jungwon knew I’d like you.” 

A wrist brushes over the ring.

“Hope Niki was right Jay-ah,” he whispers, sliding away, “ because liking you won’t be enough to save you. You’ll be dead before the Forests at that rate.” Heeseung finishes, leaning up as his hands fall back to his sides.

Sunoo keeps his enchantment, keeping Jay sewed to the seats no matter how much he glares at him to let him go. Jay’s shaking in frustration. 

Heeseung walks away, hands in his pockets, leading the rest of his pack to their table. There’s someone new with them. He’s taller, so fucking tall and he watches him the whole way down the aisle, eyes sinking in on the ring before he turns around and sits. 

That must be Niki, their maknae. 

“Jay—”

“Never do that shit again, Sunoo.” 

“I’m sorry, but you only just got discharged. You may feel fine, but the magic hasn’t settled yet. We don’t need you fighting just yet.” 

“Whatever—just…” Jay sighs, “you can’t use that shit on him?” He grumbles out, stabbing his eggs. He doesn’t mean it, not really, but damn if Jay could do anything like that. 

Sunoo crashes out laughing again, but this time it's loud, unmistakably so genuine as his shock keeps his mouth open. 

“You’re cute.” Sunoo wheezes. 

Jay really doesn’t get it. 

 

 

 

“Hey, where’s everyone going?” He asks, his eyes never leaving the students as he and Yihwa walk through the center. So many of them are rushing out the back doors, footballs in hand, easels, a whole assortment of hobbies and stories unique to each one. 

Chloe shoulders him when she passes to walk next to Yihwa. “It’s the weekend, Jay. You actually expect them to keep us cooped up in this bitch 24/7?” 

Yihwa sighs, “What she means is that on the weekends, the students have access to the outer grounds. It used to be a grazing field kind of. It's ten acres long with hills and ponds, and plenty of space for packs to run and play without running into another. It’s healing.” 

“It’s healing.” Chloe mimics and starts them off towards the doors and when they get out, Jay stops for a second to breathe in the fresh air. Fuck, he really did feel light, and everything—the sun, the breeze, to the slight wetness in the air that moistens his skin, feels different, new like he’s experiencing them all for the first time. 

Yihwa grabs his wrist and drags him along with them, over the large, plush hills, across a field. Jay has no idea where they’re going, where they’re headed, but the journey is enough. A small smile dimples his face; It was healing. 

“Aye Jay, hold up!” 

A yell catches his attention and when Jay looks over to the side, somewhere down the hill that they are walking the spine of, he sees Nicholas. Nicholas and his pack; there’s a lot of them, nine in total, and some of them—the younger ones—are still mussing each other’s hair, tackling and growling playfully in the grass. K’s there too, grabbing the worst of them by their napes and dragging the whining pups to re-join the rest of their group. 

Jay hums at the sight, amused as he nods at Yihwa and Chloe to keep going. 

“You’re sure?” Yihwa asks, even though Chloe’s already bouncing away. 

“Yea,” He nods, “go ahead, you were with me so much already.” Jay laughs out, lighthearted and at ease. Yihwa nods and her curls do a little bob with her when she smiles. “Okay, I’ll see you later.” She says and leaves off the hill, running to catch up with Chloe. 

“Jay, boy damn, how have you been?!” Nicholas runs up the last few meters of the hill to reach him, almost pummeling him over with his charge. Jay stumbles back slightly before he’s reaching out to cross hands with Nicholas. 

“I mean, what, better?” Jay laughs and Nicholas joins him, bringing him into a hug; a soft one, that is more their bodies simply touching than any cocooning squeeze, but it was still too much. It’s dead fucking gross.

“Why the fuck are you wet?!” Jay screams, shoving Nicholas away from him, his hands coming down to his shirt in disdain. There's a growing water circle around his belly button. 

“Dude that’s fucking gross!” He complains, sliding his thumbs under his shirt to bat his shirt out, getting some air under it even though he knows that won’t make it instantly dry. It’s annoying, gross, annoying again and when he looks up at Nicholas he expects the boy to be all teeth and mirth, triumphant even though it hadn’t been intentional, but he’s not; He’s looking at him sharply, his lips curled slightly into a snarl.

 It makes Jay take a step back. He drops his shirts, lets it suction back wetly to his stomach. 

“What?” 

“You smell.” 

Jay gawks, “Excuse me?!” He knows for damn sure he scrubbed in the shower, exfoliated, washed his hair, all that. There’s no way the stench of two days has stuck to him after that, but then again, Nicholas is a werewolf isn’t he? Can they smell shit like that, but Chloe hadn’t said—fuck that, Chloe wouldn’t have told him .

Jay subconsciously tilts his head down, reaching to pinch at his shirt for a whiff; maybe Nicholas is imagining things, maybe he’s smelling the wet dog that just hugged him and thinks it's Jay and not himself. 

“Are you sure?”

Nicholas comes closer, all in his space as he removes Jay’s hand from his collar, sharp eyes piercing up from his collarbones to his neck as if he could physically see the stench coming off of him. 

This was so embarrassing.

“Nicho—”

“Why does it smell like Heeseung scented you?” 

There it is. The sky parts, lightning strikes, and the ground below them must rumble in pain.

“It what?” It leaves his mouth like a test, an interrogation, rather than an inquisitiveness. Those embers inside him bristle and crack: waiting, daring.

“Jay, I can smell him on you, it’s not strong, but it's there.” He says. 

Jay moves Nicholas away, pressing on his shoulder before he kicks the nearest pebble. 

“That son of a—I’m going to kill him!” 

“Jay, you can’t—” 

Jay grabs Nicholas by the shirt, the fabric bunched and wrung thin in his fists as he drags the boy to him. He doesn’t give a fuck, not about his pack, not about the dark, warning growls, or the wicked smirk bleeding onto Nicholas’ face, “I will, and this time it’s on sight.” 

He pushes him back, his shirt still wrinkled with his force. 

“He won’t even get the chance to shift.” He seethes, passing the boy who's smiling and ignoring K’s impressed looks. 

He trudged down the hill, each step a thunder crack of its own. He’s heading down the direction the pack came from. If they were wet, then a pond of some sort should be nearby. He was going to scrub this shit off. 

Like that he’s stomping, with his feet plundering into the ground, making obvious tracks of each step he takes. It takes ten minutes, maybe twelve, Jay doesn’t know. 

He’s fucking pissed, livid and the warm yellow of the day is ceasing to quell his irritations. What used to be comforting was now a swelling heat that Jay’s whole body rejected. The moisture felt out of place, the sun was an outcast that had no business gleaming against him in the midst of Fall, and the dewy grass that tried to sneak into his socks were nosy and alien.

Of course he couldn’t fucking smell it, how would he? He cursed; Scenting wasn’t the worst trigger in the books, even less since its effects are null to him being unpresented, but it's the principle.

No one should be doing that to him. He shouldn’t have even gotten close enough to try. 

Jay continues until he smells it, not the salty brine of the ocean he’s still never seen, but the weak mossy smell of a lake and wet earth. 

And what a lake it is. 

The grassy fields he inches through slowly fades, blends out into shorter grass, wetter grass that’s yellowing and brown with mud; the ground curves down as Jay near’s the edge, creating a soft, rounded mound where the water begins to lick the earth.

The lake is extensive, wide as it pools around the clearing. At the shore, grass still grows into it, small shoots adorning its surface, then, much further, packets of algae, a lake’s pulp, floats around, moving slowly, relaxing to nature’s rhythm.

Jay bends down into it, his knees sinking into the soft grass edge as he looks into the dark teal waters. Jay can see himself, can see his hands reflect into the water as they disturb its surface; the action sends small waves over his face. 

Jay breathes deeply, looking into his own eyes for solace, for temperament. When he finds it, he lifts the bundle of water in his hands and starts haphazardly throwing it at his neck, the water soaking the top his fitted white tee, until it's almost sheered out; the curves of his collarbones sticking out, and the texture and color of his chest and skin, glimpsing through. Wet amber and marigold skin overlaid barely anymore by ivory fabric.

Once he’s sufficiently coated, Jay dips his hands in again, the cold shivering up his arms, and begins to rub along his neck, fingers and thumbs dipping under his collar, running along the bone there, before rising up his jugular, then along his jaw, until he finally wets behind his ears.

Jay’s eyes are closed as he does it, relaxing into his own touch, blending his own vibrations in with nature’s. 

He hears it. 

The footsteps. 

He’s beginning to get tired of always hearing them, but these ones sound different; not the ones he’s learned to look out for or the ones he’s familiar with hearing. So, he lets it be. He can’t be the only one wanting to use the lake while they can. It was Fall after all, swimming in the coming weeks was not going to even be a thought soon enough.

That is, until the white behind his eyelids suddenly goes dark. The sun that had been beaming along his lids has disappeared, nothing but a faint orange glow to suggest that it’s still there, out there in the sky somewhere, covered away from Jay’s eyes. 

It startles him, even though he tries not to show it, and that’s when he feels it. An emanating heat that reaches to him, warming his brows, tickling against his eyelashes.

When he opens his eyes, it’s to a large, thick hand hovering around his browline, and thick silver rings that Jay can feel his eyelashes curl up against—they're cold, still, unlike the hand Jay can’t see up through, but he feels their long legs touch along his spine, and hears the swish of baggy jeans in his ears when the boy finally crouches down to speak. 

“Surprise.” 

Deep, husky. 

Jay rounds on him, elbow shooting out to dig into the boy’s chest as the other digs for a dagger. Any of them. 

The boy falls back, almost willingly, large hands grabbing along Jay’s sides and pulling him up against him as he tumbles back. He takes Jay with him, arms suctioned around him, with one hand holding Jay’s left down, keeping it in his pockets, preventing him from bringing out Green.

They roll and grass shoots into his ear at some point as they constantly fight each other for top. It’s not until Jay digs his heels into the ground, dirt gathering around his feet that he’s able to finally stop them. When he does he realizes that he’s breathing hard, breath coming out ragged, and harder than it should’ve been…maybe Sunoo had a point.

Jay’s kneeling over him as he pants, his legs on either side of the boy’s lower chest when he finally looks at him—fully. 

A short gasp comes out and so does Green at the same time. It’s instant, it unsheathes and Jay rounds it around the boy’s throat, but the boy only leans into the ground, resting his hands along the round of Jay’s thighs.

He looks up at him, jaw slightly jutting away from the knife, but not by any means flinching away from it. It’s like he wants to give Jay more room to fit it.

Black, feathery hair curls along his eyes as his bangs cover his forehead, whatever part his hair may have been in, completely ruined and tousled from the roll. His eyes remind him of Nicholas’, how they’re sharp, piercing, but unlike Nicholas’, his are lower, thinner.

They have something else to them, not a playful and challenging tune that plays in Nicholas’ eyes, but something daring and deep: Do i t. 

The maknae. 

They finally meet. 

“Kowai.” He breathes out, full and deep and Jay can feel the sheer heat that bleeds into his body from those hands. Jay understands it, knows fully what the boy said to him around smiling teeth and long eyelashes, “Scary.” It translates to. 

Jay grits, his face no doubt twisting into something ugly. He’s gonna tear him a new one for all he’s been put through. He lifts Green up slightly, only enough to get some air behind his impending swing, but the hand leaves from his thigh and wraps around his wrist completely. It stops him, it redirects his attention. The boy’s ring collides and taps along the one on his own. 

Tap. 

Tap.

Tap. 

The boy’s eyes smile at him and his tongue washes over his teeth before his smiles. 

He sees the white tuft of hair that blends into his left eyebrow and Jay feels his heart stutter in his throat, his mouth stuck agape as he lowers himself gently on the boy, his dagger letting up. 

The rings match.

“Pup?” He breathes and his breath almost hitches over the question.

Jay watches his eyes light up, even when they roll at the use of nickname; both of his hands come back to his thighs to tap at a random rhythm. 

“Hyung, what's wrong? Why’d we stop playing?” He grins.

The fucking audacity. 

Jay punches him. Everywhere. 

“Are you fucking insane!?”  He yells.

He keeps them fast and unpredictable. He barely even thinks about the place he’ll hit next before his fist is already flying at it.

Niki is laughing the whole time, putting his arms up weakly like he doesn’t actually want to block Jay, but eventually when he realizes Jay has no intentions on stopping, he bucks up with his hips, setting Jay’s center off balance enough for him to wrap around him again, send them rolling back towards the lake. 

“You’re their fucking makn—this whole fucking time!?” Jay’s still screaming even as they tumble like a pair of bowling balls. 

He takes in a deep breath when they stop, his hand clutching around the pup’s shoulder as the boy hovers over him. They’ve stopped too close to the water edge; Jay’s shoulders slipping off the soft rounded mound, and water rocks up, licking at his shoulders, pooling slowly around his neck.

Jay shivers at the cold, at the heat on top of him.“I almost died—multiple fucking times, mind you!” 

Niki slides up his body, black tank top showcasing the curves of his arms as they encase Jay between them—between his arms, between his body and the ground.

He’s smiling as he hovers, head tilted slightly in that mischievous, wolfish way Jay recognizes from when he was small and was following him everywhere like a duck. 

“But you didn’t.” He grins, triumph glazing his eyes, a bit of orange blaze from his wolf lighting them up, “I saved you, hyung. Just like when I was a pup. I got to be just like you.” 

Niki lowers, until their noses almost touch and Jay can feel his silver necklace touch his own wet chest; it's cold, just like his rings. “I always wanted to save you.” He whispers, joyfully, intensely as he looks back up at Jay. 

The pup’s an asshole , Jay rages. 

“Yea you’re such a hero, pup. You waited until the last fucking moment!” Jay scolds, nails sinking into his shoulder, but it doesn’t seem to do the boy any actual harm, his eyes just flutter at the sensation.

“You didn’t?” The pup questions back, his eyes hardening ever so slightly as he maintains their eye contact, “You stood there watching me paw at the door, helpless and scared as you stuffed pomegranate Toostie-pops into your jeans. You waited too,” he points out, “and you were so mean,” Niki growls.

“Just like you.” He reiterates, wetting his bottom lip, it looks even plumper now with the spit. 

Jay shakes his head, “That’s—that’s completely fucking different.” 

Niki only raises an eyebrow at him, but Jay doesn’t go on, doesn’t explain. 

“I still don’t know why. None of that explains why they wanted to kill me.” He mutters.

Only explains why you kept your mouth shut the entire time and watched like a freak, who does that? 

“I saw my dad.” Niki says and Jay freezes, all the air leaving him as he’s pressed into the grass. His hands drop from Niki’s shoulder, along with his eyes as another shiver rakes through him. 

Fuck, he knows. 

“Saw him splayed out and cut into strips in the mud. Hyungs knew, they could feel it—feel me.” 

Jay’s mouth opens, but he doesn’t know what to say, if he should say anything. He refuses to even look at him, keeping his eyes to the necklace that’s dangling now as Niki pushes himself higher. 

“We couldn’t smell you at first, but the vampires were able to separate the blood scents. Problem is, you weren’t bleeding anymore by the time we got to the school.” 

“But the boy?” Jay questions quietly, it's barely audible as he swallows around his guilt. The water from the edge of the grass is starting to seep into his hair, soaking every strand, straightening out those fried twins at the top of his head. 

Niki hums, moving a wet strand away from his ear, “I didn’t know how I felt about it: I was angry, sad, relieved that he was gone, but there was something festering within me. A hatred. I hated that it wasn’t me, that some stranger had the nerve to choke him before I could even try to talk to him—to meet him, at all. I was going to kill them, whoever they were. Hyungs didn’t know that there were two of you—new students— and there was no scent, so they assumed, but when you did bleed, and word got back to us, it was already too late.” He says before he’s leaning down again, slower, and moving higher up so that he’s closer to Jay’s hairline. His necklace, cold, heavy, taps against Jay’s lips. 

“Then I saw you, that first night Sunghoon hyung hunted you. You looked familiar, your hair was different, but I remembered you—never forgot. But, I wanted to be sure.” Niki sighs, his body slumping gently atop of Jay’s as his nose begins to nuzzle along his baby hairs, “Then you came to me,” he says, “you could recognize me. That’s all I needed.” 

“That’s why you—from Sunghoon?” Jay’s eyes widened, understanding washing through him at the coincidence, the well-timed series of events that kept him alive. 

He would have died on his first day.

The thought makes his heart pump just a little harder.

“Awe, your welcome, hyung.” He coos, slipping down from his hair to trace his brow bone. His breath hits his eyelashes.

“You crazy bas—” Yikes, maybe not that one— “that’s not what I was saying.” Jay fumbles, pushing and squirming away from his touch, “For fuck’s sake would you stop! Stop with the scenting shit, I don’t—” 

“I missed you.” 

He can feel his fight deflate, a balloon that was ready to burst, slowly leaking its air. His head falls back into the wet puddle in quiet defeat, but he keeps his arm pressed against his chest: a boundary, something at least because his heart’s softening the longer he looks at the pup he hates to admit he’d gotten used to being around, following him everywhere, sharing his fire boiled ramen with.

“Pup—”

“Niki.”

Jay sighs out, squeezing his fingers in a fist. C’mon, Jay . “Niki—”

His hand cups his jaw, tightens around his molars as he pushes Jay’s head to the side.

“You killed my parents. Both of them.” He says gruffly, nudging along the skin just behind his ear.  “But, I saved you.” He breathes, lips moving over to the top of his ears, “I deserve this. I deserve more.”  

Jay feels everything in him go limp for him; his arm against his chest falls, his head relaxes further into the grass and he lets himself be completely flattened. Water begins to soak down his back, a small stream running down his spine, tickling and cold as it gets absorbed by his pants.

“Fine just…not my neck.” Jay says quietly, head turned and watching the lake sway. He sees the reflection of them in it, too. His—the overgrown pup moving around him slowly, sniffing, rubbing his nose and cheeks everywhere he can, and Jay’s eyes begin to droop at the small vibrations coming from Niki’s chest, pressing into him, rocking him. 

“Niki, why are you with them? Did…did they hurt you?” He whispers into the lake, hands weak and resting in the grass. He knows, he knows he of all people shouldn’t be asking this, not with what he's done, but he can’t help it. He wants to know. 

Niki’s distracted though, but he does answer, eventually, but it's short, not anything like the backstory and cause and effects Jay wanted.

“Never. They found me, raised me, taught me how to shift.” 

Then, he’s gone again, doing whatever it is that makes him so happy as he works around Jay.

I found you, too. He wants to say, I let you eat one of my Toosite pops. 

Why did you leave? His heart pounds. Why didn’t you tell me?

“You choose horrible role models.” He spits.

 

 

 

 

 

Niki doesn’t scent him the whole half hour that they’re out there by the lake. At some point he had stopped and laid himself behind Jay—too close, but Jay chalked it up to the boy not registering that there is a difference between personal space as a wolf and as a human. They don’t talk, not really. There’s subtle jabs and hits to get his attention, to bring him closer, as they both just bake under the sun, drift between the breezes, and succumb to the mossy smell surrounding them. 

Jay gets up first, just like last time. Except, Niki’s awake to rise with him. 

Jay takes a step back, watches how Niki follows, easily balancing the distance between them. 

Jay chuckles and shakes his head free of any grass, takes another step back and motions for the boy to stay put. He does, albeit moodily. 

“Let me look at you.” Jay says lightly, eyes moving around him, up and down. 

Niki grins, straightening out his back, rising as tall as he can for Jay. 

He truly has gotten so big. 

Jay nods his acceptance, the pup is truly not a pup anymore. He’s taller than Jay, probably faster and stronger. He’ll be able to defend himself without him now. He didn’t need him, not anymore. The smile he gives Niki is a little sour at the end, but he doesn’t comment on it, just replaces it with a glare that comes much easier to him. 

“You don’t need to save me anymore.” Jay tells him and the wind blows harder between them, it sends Jay’s hair flapping over his eyes, but he can still see the way Niki’s stance falters, how his smile begins to drop. 

“I can’t tell you how this is going to end,” he says, scratching along his arm, the rolling in the grass is really starting to get to him,  “but someone’s going to die.”

He watches the boy take it in, whatever it is that he’s saying; his eyebrows knit together, his eyes travel down to Jay's neck before they come back to him, soft and yearning, but for some reason hopeful. Jay doesn’t want to take another family away from him. 

He has to. 

Niki nods.

“I’m sorry,” he tells him, “it won’t be me.” 

And then he leaves, back turned as he begins hiking up the hill. He doesn’t look back, but he hears Niki walk away too, off to the side, somewhere towards the trees. Jay’s heart sits heavily in chest as he walks back towards the school, not bothering to find Yihwa and Chloe. 

He needed to rest. 

White Week was going to be a sort of hell he’s never gone through, and for once it’s not something he can prepare for. He doesn’t know Heeseung, doesn’t know what it is he plans to do. Doesn’t know what the fuck White Week even is.

Jay rolls his neck as he collapses back to his bed, the ring alongside his daggers on the desk. The presents are still sitting, scattered all around his door.

He’d have to meet up with Nicholas soon: figure out what the fuck courting all entailed. He needs to know the signs. He has to be careful.

He can’t present, he has plans.

 

 

 

 

 

Notes:

So, I got a B in art...yea, I don't know how either, but fuck that, the COMEBACK?!? Amazing, give me all seven of them right now. AND my birthday's this weekend. I'm being treated so well, love those boys.

Jay's got so much confidence in himself, it's almost a fatal flaw lmao.

As always, let me know what you guys think!

See y'all in chapter seven!!

Chapter 7

Notes:

Little warning before we start. There is a small scene during the gym sequence where a character rubs their neck against one of Jay's blades. It's not that detailed, but I just wanted to mention it just in case. :) have fun, get snacks, it's dumb long.

 

 

 

The wind was shivering, delivering nothing but shaky wisps around his hair and throat; it was a ghostly presence that stalked behind him, over him, in front of him as the chill stole his breath with each pant he fed it. The sky above was white and crystalline; the clouds were gone and with it the dense fog, and so heaven’s canvas remained blank, devoid of texture, of planes, of stars— only the parchment yellow sun was painted, small and dim, barely awake to shed it’s gaze upon the cold stricken grass that was icy and shattering like glass every time his feet came down.

The day had barely awakened and Jay was up and jogging through its dreamstate, even if his own exhaustion rested heavily behind his eyelids. His tongue having long since gone dry; the roughness having become the texture of the sandy grit that stuck in the corners of his eyes.

It wasn’t a pleasant morning. Not by any means. 

He was shaken awake, forcefully, unkindly, and not by the hands or voice of someone else, nor by the feeling of anything either. If anything his body had felt clear and as untouched as the sky he ran under: which was what made it all the more confusing—what made him all the more confused.

There was no contact, no presence inside or near enough to justify his jolting. There was nothing, and yet his heart pounded harder than any drill into rock; the wreckage echoed and banged against his ribs, and shook in his chest like a boat over uneasy waters. 

It didn’t let up, even after he saw it. 

On his windowsill there was a crow, all glossy with black down feathers and a sharp, straight beak. The small thing was curled against the thin window pane, its head sinking against it in defeat, in acceptance. Something about the sight brought him back to his first day. 

He had been so tired, worn out from climbing six flights that his body had grown hot and sweaty. So, he knows how nice the glass feels against skin, how cooling it can be to the furnace hidden within his pores, or bundled under those feathers; he knows and yet when  Jay stood there, he knew it was different. The bird was twitching around every breath and Jay was counting the seconds of each intake as they became slower. Blood streamed from its feathers, a river of life that will no longer be drunk from. Their legs were crumpled, wrung out and tangled like they had been crushed. 

His own hands had twitched, too, right against the cold pane when he attempted to reach out for it, save it…maybe.

Jay honestly had no idea what he thought he could do. The windows were sealed shut on dorms this high up and all that happened when he reached out was his three fingers jabbing into the glass, freezing his bones as the vibration from the hit surged down the window and knocked the bird’s head off of it. 

Shit. 

The crow thudded to the sill, dead, still leaking, and bit.  

Someone had bit it, punctured two holes into its stomach as their hands squeezed along the rest. They didn’t finish, there was too much blood still left, too much to be an accident, too much for them to have just gotten full because honestly were vampires ever not hungry? Do they feel satiation? Jay doesn’t know, but the purpose, whatever it was, wasn’t to feed. 

The scene was unsettling, it reminded him of those ravens that flew against the nursery bay that day the kid died. 

Needless to say, Jay hadn’t been able to fall back asleep after that. It had been close to five in morning when it happened and Jay had to unlock his door when he left his room. It wasn’t a decision he made consciously, he just let his body move, let his feet walk him around the room, grab his knives, tie his shoes, lock his door, and bound off to the outskirts of the school; all the way until where was now—running, jogging through the slush of long, thick grass that blanketed around his ankles every time his feet so much as connected off touch. 

His clothes rustled in the brightening light of day, each step like an extra light switch Jay sets off in the sky as he finally comes to a collapse at the front gates. 

Jay pants, short, half breaths that don’t even fill his stomach up properly. 

“Urgh,” Jay grunts and bends over, resting his hands over his knees as he breathes in deeply. 

The iron gates haven’t changed. They’re as imposing as before, rising to fifteen feet, heavy with carved iron that pitched up into the sky like forks. Nothing about it was different, but the fact that Jay’s seeing it at the birth of dawn, rather than the bed of night. There’s no rust on them; they’re clean, but Jay still feels that awful tail wrap itself around his heart, shaking him, telling him to flee, that he could, no one would stop him, it was only him.

Jay tried to shut it up, shut it out as he stood to his full height, but that was the problem wasn’t it?

Jay was small; even after his head stopped, the gate rose above, taller, bigger—Jay’s head had to tilt to allow his eyes to follow the pitchforks higher—higher—until his eyes were caught, held, but not trapped. 

There is a  light on, a warm, dark, syrupy bronze and bright orange flaring from behind arched windows and coal spires. It’s an inferno that threatens to burn him, singe every inch of flesh until he’s nothing but a wet, bloody clump of unrecognizable atoms. 

It’s warm, it’s burning and he stands within its pits amongst the flames like they charcoal just for him. 

His hair is down, wet amongst the heat, as it drips unsinged against his eyes. The hair at his sides is flared out a bit and stokes an image in Jay’s head; one of furry ears and a large body. The image is enough, but then it starts to move, the wolf’s ears twitching at the sounds of distress: the whimpering, the hard breathing—prey, prey, prey. 

Jay stops breathing, holds his air—his noises—in the little cavity in chest, and lets the tension build up thick, mudded walls until they surround him, until the urgency to release is buzzing in his head: but he doesn’t give in. Jay can’t let him in, can’t let himself be heard. He has to protect himself. Has to stay hidden within that dark den. 

Heeseung smiles and his shoulder leans into the glass. 

Big, big, big, big. 

All four fangs extend from his top row. And his eyes are darkening at their corners, even when his pupils remain dark brown, but Jay knows, knows that’s only the coarse cork that caps the dark wine eyes of his wolf.  

Jay doesn’t know what he looks like, can’t imagine because he can’t move away. Heeseung needs to stay in front of him. He needs to be in Jay’s sights because he doesn’t want to risk knowing what it's like when he isn’t. Not anymore now that Jay knows he’s being watched, but Heeseung’s shoulders are shaking, his rumpled shirt sticking and contouring along the parts of him that are still wet, while the rest of it teases over his hanging towel. He’s laughing at him, at Jay, but his eyes keep darkening, and he keeps getting closer to the glass. 

Jay’s foot twitches in the grass. The sweat on him has cooled and the longer he remains here the more it's beginning to feel like a thick film, a blockage that is keeping him restrained. 

Heeseung’s mouthing something slowly as if Jay was just supposed to get it, as if Jay wasn’t multiple feet below his dorm and outside on top of that. 

But, maybe it wasn’t for him. It’s not for him.

A hard chest hits his shoulder blades and it's a small touch, but the feeling wretches the breath from out of his chest, has it tumbling out over his lips before Jay’s tries to heave it all back in. Amidst it all, Jay still manages to jerk away, even if his back hits against the gates, their frigidity and hard metal sealing impressions into his skin. He’s plastered up against them, right in the center as he holds onto one of its poles, squeezing. 

He breathes and breathes, watches Sunghoon watch him do it. Those striking seafoams tracking down to his chest and counting. 

Slowly the color returns to his skin and the dizziness recedes, but Sunghoon never moves. 

Jay stutters as he jerks around and as he breathes through opening the heavy gates, his eyes flitting up, and finding Heeseung’s. The black in his eyes has receded and his smile has twisted up as he praises Jay’s small figure below him. The flames still burn behind him, yearning for his attention, but he their eye contact. 

It only lasts an instant; just something fleeting, a cursory glance to make sure Jay stays where he wants him: at the school, ready for him or not. 

A tongue wets his lips as he turns and Heeseung’s hand comes down to readjust the knot that’s loosened before he leaves. 

 

White. 

Everything is white. 

Yihwa breathes next to him, a small touch to the back of his elbow that tries to nudge him forward.

“Welcome to White Week.” She narrates somberly, her voice void of any real cheer or animation Jay’s used to.

They’re barely even revealed yet; behind the large doors that loom over them, Yihwa and him are all but shadows to the room beyond, to the creatures that lurk and graze ahead. They don’t see them, not yet, but Jay—Jay can see them. Through the small inch crack that slices down the middle of the two doors, separating the two thick mahogany slabs, Jay can see the breakfast hall, can make the haze of students shuffling inside. 

White. 

Everything is. The West Wing was usually brighter, more freeing in concept to the East Wing: because West was shrouded in windows, a greenhouse ballroom that let sunlight phase through on top of light cherry wooden tables; it was pretty, a little earthy, whimsical on the best of days.

East was the opposite: a constant midnight whose stars and moon were suffocated behind deep stained glass with blood red table runners nestled over dark wood. Jay had grown used to both environments, knew to accept the warmth that came from West and adjust his eyes for the dark in East, but this : ghostly thin white table cloths that draped over the tables, lace curtains that covered all the windows and pulled out into skirts on the floor, the chandeliers that were turned off in place for candle sticks that rested in all eight of it’s holders, perched and lit; some of the wax dripping onto the floors in subtle markings that only further unsettled him, reminded him.

The curtains blocked some of the light, blurring it until the room was shrouded in a milky haze, a feigned innocence as all the students eligible dressed in white: from head to toe, no accessories, and all tattoos if any covered. 

“Yea,” Jay breathes, sending out that last push against normalcy, and stepping forward into the unfamiliar, “the pleasure’s all mine.” 

Jay wasn’t wearing white, Yihwa had said it was the color of the week, of those who were packless and eligible when she had barged into his room again. 

“It won’t change anything,” she said, “your status and what, but it will make a statement.” 

Jay had agreed, thanked her even, but fuck he didn’t think everyone would take it this seriously. The unity was almost clinical, psychotic if you were to ask him: the way they all wore similar lengths of clothes—a tee or a long sleeve, slacks or sweats.

He and Yihwa walked down together, easily finding their usual spots, but nothing got rid of those eyes, the sheer burn marks they were trying to impress into Jay as he happily sat down in his bright, baby pink sweater. 

A statement , Jay thinks defiantly, his smile prominent as he scoots in. 

Sunoo hums in amusement as he watches Jay sit. He’s wearing gray, unlike Chloe and Yihwa who are adorned in black. 

“Good morning?” Sunoo quips, his eyebrow twitching. 

Jay rolls his eyes, fully prepared to defend his choice of fashion when a throat clears behind him. Sunoo responds first, or maybe Jay does, but he just watches Sunoo: but, there’s not much to see, only a flick of his eyes up and behind him, but they land long enough for Jay to process that the person is not moving away or speaking with someone else. Sunoo's eyes slowly come back to rest on Jay. 

It’s for him. 

Now his eyes actually roll, his shoulders slump, and he annoyedly releases his fork into his waffles. 

“What—”He stands up, hands already grabbing at the daggers in his pockets, knowing that they can see him do it. The boy seems younger than him, his face is rounder, all soft cheeks where Jay is sharp; his eyes are big too, looking up at him nervously as he shakes.

“F-for you.” He stutters out softly, pushing out the neatly wrapped gift in his hands towards Jay. 

“Eh?” Jay gasps and his hands release quickly, his posture quickly responding to the boy’s nature, his own face softening as confusion and shock blend within him. Furthermore, he lets his hands come out to hold under the small box as it’s almost pressed to his chest. Their hands touch for barely even a second before the boy is pulling away, bowing. 

“We hope this is suitable, we don’t have a lot, b-but we hope you like it, Alpha.” 

And then he’s running away alongside two others: two girls that are slightly taller than him and hug him as they leave the hall. 

And oh, Jay must look fucking crazy because Chloe barks out laughing, little growls vibrating through as she loses all stability: her fork clatters, her hair falls and she starts slapping Yihwa arm like it was made of sand bags and not flesh.

Yihwa’s gawking at him, and honestly that’s not really helpful when he’s gawking at her with a fucking present in his hands and the ‘A’ word buzzing in his head. 

Jay looks at Sunoo and thank fuck someone is actually taking this serious because what the fuck what that? Sunoo’s eyes are watching him carefully, deepening as he continues to look at Jay, taking in the way Jay brings up a shaky finger to point at himself. 

“Al—” He doesn’t even get the fucking words out they sound fucking crazy. 

Chloe explodes into another fit, “You?! Oh that’s hilarious, oh please, please Yihwa, it hurts, it hurts.” —A squeal tears out of her— “They—oh god—they want Jay to—oh shit, I got this, I got this. Jay couldn’t be an Alpha if the world needed it.” 

“Don’t be mean, h-he could!” Yihwa defends weakly against the shaking body that is most certainly not listening to her. 

“Sunoo…” Jay says, but he doesn’t even know what he means to say afterwards, what he means to question, it all just goes to mush and he sits back down across from him and opens the lid. 

“Oh wait—”

“Jay.” 

“What the fuck?!” Jay flinches back, accidentally or maybe not so much elbowing that shit away from him and towards the middle of the table, right next to the buttered biscuits— fuck!

Jay’s frozen in place, but his eyes continue to widen like saucers. 

Naturally they connect with Sunoo’s once again, but this time there’s no sand to wrap around his ankles, only dark brown eyes that seem almost calculating, thinking. 

“Jay,” he whispers, but it sounds like a bass in his ears, “do you want it?” 

Jay’s breath hitches and his hands twitch, a small spark started between rubbing pieces of wood. 

“You have to say it, Jay.” 

The small fire finally catches. 

“It’s a dead fucking animal, Sunoo! A dead rat next to my damn biscuits for fuck’s sake. Nothing should have to be said! I mean what the fuck!” Jay curses, biting into his lip to calm himself down. He knows half the cafeteria is probably looking at him now, but shit he can’t help the horror still bleeds in him. 

“What the fuck!?” He yells once more, baffled, utterly fucking lost for words.

Sunoo smirks, grabs the box. 

“Good.” 

Then his fangs fall and the limp rat between his fingers is pierced into. Jay’s mouth is open, the visual, a sentiment he never thought he’d have with Sunoo. Sunoo drains the thing in under ten seconds, long pulls that don’t so much as drip from the corners of his mouth. 

Yihwa slides closer to him while Sunoo drops the rat back into the casing, “That was a courting gift. Most gifts are something small, a trinket, clothes they’ve scented, they show interest.” She says, “but this is a dead animal with a small section from their omega’s nesting blankets, it’s a call. Their pack is only three: two betas and one omega, not enough to graduate, but even more so without a leader their hunts during the forests are poor. They haven’t moved from freshman.”

Yihwa sighs, “they’re basically asking you to be their Alpha. The nesting blankets are supposed to have a heat scent that your Alpha could respond to, decide compatibility.”

Jay’s still so shocked that for a few seconds all he manages is a dumb and simple, “Uh-huh.” 

“I’m not an Alpha, though. I can’t smell any of that shit. I see a dead rat, Yihwa.” He states when the mystical leaves him. 

She slaps his arm, “Maybe they think you’d become one when paired with them. They have two betas and an omega, the balance is naturally off. If you settled with them, it wouldn’t be a question of what you would become. What you present as is: omega, beta, alpha, it has to do with your natural disposition, yes, but it's more reliant on what the pack needs and wants. That’s why betas have turned alphas after switching packs or alphas have become omegas, although it's rare.” 

She sighs, shakily taking a sip of juice before she speaks to him again.

“Just be careful okay, opening gifts in front of the pack can be seen as acceptance. You’re lucky they left.” 

“That simple?” 

Jay looks down at his hands, smooth, warm, void of that cold, heavy ring that held his finger down like a blanket, but Jay shakes his head. 

No, it was just a ring, and plus, Jay wasn’t even conscious when it was given to him. 

It can’t count.

 

 

After that Jay’s almost bombarded, left and right, people, girls and boys alike, someone’s pet bunny drops gifts in his arms and at his feet.

Jay almost thinks he’s gonna have to start apologizing and practicing a rejection speech with how full his arms are by the time he reaches his classroom; his pockets are even full, bulging awkwardly in his pants as little heart stickers adorn his skin from the most recent pack he had tried to side-step. They stickered him, putting hearts on either cheek, while others jumping on the wagon had put stars and potatoes on his arms.  

It was embarrassing walking around the halls with all of it, his chin pressed tight along one of the boxes to keep the leaning tower stable in his arms; every turn felt dangerous and every step up the stairs was wobbly at best. Jay didn’t know how to feel—like yes, it was flattering and Jay took all the gifts out of the kindness of his heart—well, more out of manners than his heart, but the fact still stood: it felt off.

Jay felt off with every single gift given to him, every demure smile, sizing wink, and in the small touches that they left on his skin: the ones that lasted too long, dragged their texture along his clothes.

In every gift, every smile, every seemingly innocent interaction was a clouded glaze in their eyes as they looked at him, a sickening film left over his skin when they touched him, an oily feeling, something that repelled against the water still drying in his silver hair and twisted his polite smiles into something questioning and cautious. 

True, maybe Jay just didn’t know how to handle this kind of attention, maybe he was so averse to “genuine” displays of affection that he was looking for something wrong, but…fuck no, there was something wrong with them. Someone had even fucking asked if he needed help!

He was on the stairs, re-balancing himself and his hoard of horrors when a hand touched at his hips—not too low, not too high—it was appropriate, but that voice—confident and so fucking sure pissed him off.

It was like—it was like they all thought this was a joke, that Jay was going to easily fold under just the right amount of pressure—like he was destined to be in someone’s pack—one of theirs if they were lucky, like they all were just waiting for his decision. 

“Back the fuck up.” Jay had gritted, “Before you come out the nursery wrapped up worse than these presents.”

Needless to say, Jay was fucking irritated by time he slid into his seat beside Sunoo, unceremoniously dropping all those damn things to the ground. Some of them clattered to the floor while others banged, and Jay only heard liberation as they rolled around his desk, hitting against others feet. The class hasn’t started yet, their teacher slowly flipping through her lessons for the day when Jay sits his head back, rubbing along his arms. They’re a little sore. 

“You were so helpful Sunoo. Thank you, really.” Jay mutters sourly, his mouth twitching into frown when he digs into a knot. He doesn’t mean it, not really, Sunoo had left breakfast early, but so what? 

He hears the wet pop of Sunoo’s mouth opening—maybe into a smile, Jay doesn’t know, but he hears the boy turn towards him, his chair screeching from the wooden floors. 

Jay doesn’t know what he expected, not sure if he ever could expect anything when it came to Sunoo, but whatever the case, it wasn’t this. 

“Your ring’s gone.” 

It sends a chill over Jay’s warm skin, like a frost had just taken over the field, freezing the grapes and peaches with icy permafrost. Jay can feel the finger it resided on twitch at the mention and something stirs in him, it makes him blink beneath his eyelids. Why, why does it feel like he’s done something wrong? 

Jay lifts his head back up, gently opening his eyes to look at Sunoo. 

“It’s—I mean I still have—” Fuck how does he say that he took it off because he’s not sure he should be allowed to wear it? That he doesn’t know if that was just one of these things or a genuine gift. 

Jay doesn’t realize when it happens, but he can feel himself holding his breath, can feel how his chest condenses around it, can feel the spark of panic that strikes up through his heart when the feeling reminds him of the dark hair, the predatory lean, how big he was so high up over Jay. 

Sunoo smiles and his thumb scratches just below his jaw, the nail pulling back the air he trapped. 

“It’s okay.” He says and turns back around, facing the chalkboard, and that was it.

Their teacher had approached her stand, book opened and in hand. 

Jay shakes his head, for himself, for Sunoo, he doesn’t know, but he turns back around as well just in time to see one last student nudging a new thing onto his desk, and Jay’s suddenly brought back to the world. 

His eyes narrow, Sunoo’s shoulder brushes against his, and Jay points a strict finger down at the familiarly small box. 

“If it’s a dead animal, you keep that shit.” Jay decrees, eyes going wide then sharp again in his emphasis. 

The girl, an alpha, he can only assume from her confidence and the way she doesn’t flinch when he speaks.“No, no, you’re safe.” She speaks to him, her eyes cozying up to him and she drums the desk methodically, “There’s nothing much, some jellies the girls like, a patch of our combined scent and an invitation.”

Jay nods, her voice sounds nice, almost cushiony to his ears. 

She’s pretty like Yihwa. 

“An invitation?” he asks. 

She nods, “If you want to meet my pack. We’d like to get to know more about you, Jongseong.” 

Then she smiles and leaves back to her seat. Jay watches her the whole way and he smiles as he returns his attention to the front of the room. 

Now that’s manners.  

 

 

 

 

 

“Why?” 

The tone almost sounds strict coming from Sunoo, his hand tense around the small thing that Jay keeps in his hands. They’re standing in one of the many long hallways, the both of them lined up against the trash shoot. Jay had been carelessly tossing over the multitude of wrapped paper boxes for Sunoo to toss, but when they got down to the last few, Sunoo had grown tired of waiting for Jay to inspect all the different patterns on the boxes and started just tossing them himself. 

“Efficiency.” He had said. 

Whatever , Jay had thought, fingers curling around the Grinch and Lilo & Stitch crossover wrapping paper. Seriously, who would have thought to pair those? But now, Sunoo's looking at him curiously as Jay tightens his hold against the box—the one from the girl in their class. 

Jay shakes his head, a short chuckle coming out as he tries to ease it out of the boy’s grip, “There’s jellies,” he answers huffing, “and it’s rude. She was very respectful, I should at least open it.” 

Sunoo’s eyebrow twitches and Jay can feel the power he holds through the box as he tightens his grip, but it's not cinching, Sunoo’s hand looks relaxed; all he did was press the pads of his fingertips into the edges. 

Jay trembles in excitement and curiosity. He and Sunoo should really spar. Jay has a feeling that he would learn so much, there’s absolutely no way he wouldn’t come out stronger than how he went in. 

“Okay, remember to do it alone.” 

Then he lets go of the box, filtering the rest through the disposal with one final sweep before he starts walking them to the gym. 

“Oh, and Jay?” Sunoo queries, his head slightly turned even though he keeps walking ahead. 

Jay is playing with the blue bow when he looks up, “Yea?” 

“If you use anything you get as a gift, do so privately. Even those jellies, be seen eating them by the pack and it will be considered accepted. Doesn’t matter if they didn’t see you open the actual box. They’ll be able to smell from the packet the jellies were theirs.” 

Jay groans, “Shit, thanks.” 

“Anytime.” 

 

Jay takes a deep breath as he steps out onto the dry field. The grasses here are malleable, still energetic under the glass roof that keeps its moisture from hardening into crystals.

Jay was partly glad for the roof, it wasn’t always there, but as the weather got colder, the roof was added or maybe it had always existed and magic was used to finally reveal it; whatever the case, the grass didn’t split where he walked and Jay was able to settle down comfortably between Nicholas and K as Sunoo rested on one of the bleachers—watching. 

“Popular, oh you’re gonna be pop-u-lar.” Nicholas sings, knocking into his shoulders roughly and thumbing at the stickers on his skin. He pulls at some of them, digs the hearts under his eyes further into his cheeks even as Jay fights him off. 

K laughs, “Nichol, enough. Don’t tease him, he’s no doubt had a long day.” 

K is still laughing with his hair fanning into his eyes and Nicholas, to some credit, does let up, but only after Jay has pushed back an inch into the grass. 

“Enough with the stickers.” Jay hisses and yes Nicholas has settled, staying an inch away from Jay as pushed, but something about it still irks him. The pride, the smirk, the starkiness that no doubt still brims to the surface of Nicholas, and maybe Jay’s petty, but honestly pettiness is only  unnecessary, justified actions.

And Jay never does anything without proper cause. 

So, he kicks his shin, and when the growl rumbles, Jay laughs and promptly rolls behind K as Nicholas lunges. K gets a lapful of him, struggling, or barely trying to withhold the boy who's snapping his teeth at Jay, even as his eyes curl up in happy annoyance. 

Victory tastes sweet, probably looks even better on Jay as he claps for himself. 

Ah, fuck. He needs to get on Nicholas’s nerves more often. 

Nicholas doesn’t let up, trying everything to get beyond the solid build of K. K tries to shush him, petting at his back, tapping his hips, but when none of that works because Jay flicks the skull between Nicholas’s eyebrows, K reaches his last resort.

Coach is coming and he no doubt doesn’t want to stay behind an extra ten minutes for their shit, or drop and give him 50, so Jay watches him slot his mouth around the meat of Nicholas’s neck, right in the crook between his throat and shoulder. 

Some of Jay’s laughter dies at the sight: at Nicholas collapsing into K’s hold, body dead and breathing against him. Nicholas is still looking at him, but his eyes are lidded. He almost looks tired, even though Jay knows that’s not quite right. It’s honestly a little shocking, almost like he forgot they were wolves. 

Regardless, Jay chortles and doesn’t question the action further; simply sums it up to some werewolf shit, the only thing that concerns him is that Nicholas’ face kind of looks stupid from it and he wishes he had a camera to capture it. 

It’s unfortunate really, losing such good black mail material, but it’s the way of the world, he supposes, centering back in on Coach who made it to the middle of the class’s circle. 

“My favorite bloody week.” Coach grinds, “No crazy drills they tell me, like I’m not paid to ready wusses for war! Fucking brilliant.” 

Coach’s eyes surf his class, utter disappointment and the look of blame covering them all until he lands on Jay, lands on that bright, soft pink sweatshirt and matching pants; a stand out amongst the laundry pile of white. 

“It would be you.” He says rolling his eyes, and then takes his clipboard and throws it far, the thing landing somewhere amidst the bleachers. The whole class watches him walk away, turn on the water to his favorite hose—because, yes he has multiple—and saunter towards the only exit. 

He locks it, a simple turn that locks the door mechanically instead of with a key like their dorms. He comes back, with the hose in hand, and points it up in the air. 

“Come on, Jay. You don’t want to be caught up in this.” K says simply and lifts Nicholas with him before he walks away, closer to the sidelines until they are sitting on the opposite side of the bleachers that Sunoo is. The few students that are wearing black mirror them quickly, and Jay barely gets to his knees before water springs from the hose: splitting up through the air before it fans down on all of them, darkening their clothes, dampening their hair, but most importantly, wetting the field. 

“Fuck, what.” Jay slips, falling back down to his knees. He pants. What the fuck is happening? 

“Shit!” Jay falls to his back as a wolf steams past him and his breath trembles as he tries to get back to his feet.

Jay’s there in the middle of the field, dressed in pink, while wolves are running all around him in waves. He hears the sounds of clothes splitting as they shift, the screams of his fellow classmates as they are tumbled to the ground, bit in their sides, nothing but blood coats Jay’s vision; it splurts out along the field: white, green, pockets of red, the colors of a haunted, tainted christmas because the white doesn’t stay pure, it becomes tarnished, and soaked through with the red and muddy streak of struggle. 

His knees feel weak. This is the first time he’s been back amongst such a large group, since he’s been in such an aggressive environment since the fight; and everything is reminding him of it: the blood, the screams, the wolves hovering over their heads. 

Jay gulps, breathing heavily. 

It’s not him , he tells himself, they’re not him. It’s fine. It’s fine. It won't happen again, not again.

He doesn’t realize he’s closed his eyes, not until he’s opening them to three wolves, all a pale brown. They encroach on Jay’s space, one on each side of him: in front, behind, and to his right. He can hear K’s voice shout from somewhere behind him, too, but Jay’s senses are tunneled, stuck under water as his body focuses in on the three surrounding him, circling. 

He’s surrounded again. 

Jay steels himself. 

Get a fucking grip, if this were him, you’d been dead already.  

He’s not going to be bested again, he’s not, and if a couple of small ass wolves think they can win after one loss, he’ll make them feel sorry for themselves. 

Green comes out easily, a familiar weight that straightens out his spine, lines up his shoulders. 

Jay cracks his neck and smiles, “You ready?” 

The one in front of him stutters, a short glance towards Jay’s right that tells him all he needs. Not only is this not the leader, but clearly the pack isn’t united on this decision. So, Jay seizes the moment, while the wolf is connecting with the other, he launches Green straight through the head of the one to his right, dragging the dead brained wolf to him as he uses their body to block the attack from behind. 

It’s almost sad how long it takes for the supposed leader to notice, to realize they’re clawing and tearing shreds into the dying carcass of its pack, but he can see the recognition in the smallest one; the one still in front of him whose ears have flattened.

The whine they belt is terrible: full of pain, the loss of a loved one and their eyes never leave each other as Jay flips the body to the front of him, the leader following swiftly, his claws still embedded. 

He looks at the wolf, trails his eyes down to the leader who is just now understanding what has happened; the beating of a dead horse they just initiated; all the little care they had to not even realize it wasn’t Jay who they were clawing. 

His eyes come back up to meet the smallest’s and he nods at them encouragingly. 

“Take it back.” He whispers and then he runs off. 

The sounds of a surprised wolf and a grieving, angry one coming to his ears. They’re fighting as he looks back, the smaller getting the leader by the throat. 

He’s proud and he knows none of it is his fault. It was survival. They chose to come at him like this. They knew better, but still the whine rings bright in his ears and his heart feels just a little bit heavier than it did this morning. 

Jay can’t settle in it. 

Doesn’t honestly get the chance to. 

A hand wraps around his ankles, pulling him down and Jay’s lucky he’s capped his knife already with the way he lands on the grass, the blade of it settling right up against his throat. 

Jay coughs around it, dirtied sweatshirt lifting from the grass and he sits himself up and twists his head. 

A girl is clutching at his feet, tears streaking down her face in globs and spit spills out from the sides of her mouth as she spits, “Help me! Help me, please! I don’t want it!” 

The hands grab at him incessantly, her nails digging into the skin of his calves. It takes him a second to think beyond the pain, to see that she’s using his calves to pull herself closer to him; she’s on her stomach, white shirt torn apart and bloodied. Her legs aren’t moving, both thighs have been bitten—no, taken chunks out of. Jay eyes widen at the sight, at how much blood she’s losing and he scrambles for her, grabbing along her arms and trying to pull her with him, but she’s not letting his legs go. 

“You–you,” Jay slips back to his ass, “you have to let go. I can’t move if—”

She’s hysterical, shaking her head, spit flying all over the grass, “Please don’t leave me, please. I’ll do anything, just—” she’s gasping for air, on the verge of hyperventilation when another wolf stalks up to them. She pushes her head into his lap, moving it around there. 

“It’s okay, it’s—”Jay’s breath is taken from him, the hand he puts to her head to soothe her jumps off, lays shaking in the grass at her intentions. 

She’s rubbing her head in his lap. 

She’s rubbing her throat along the closed blade still pressed into his lap. 

Her cries bubble out, “Please. Please.” 

Jay’s heart shakes and his head begins to mirror it viciously. 

“No, no. I can take him, I can—” 

Jay’s ripped from her clutches and he doesn’t know by what; it’s all so fast, his vision a blur and his breathing stops from the motion. His brain jostled around dizzy, but he could feel hands along his waist, holding him. Its familiar, it is, but he can’t discern with whatever speed this is, at whatever the fuck was happening. He can’t feel his body, can’t feel the ground, the speed at which the air whips at him chokes up his throat. 

But, he hears her scream. 

Jay’s sat on his feet and he’s standing; he is, until  something else, something completely different crashes into him: a body, thick and warm—unrelenting power. He’s thrown back, falling on his back in a way that gets him arching up in pain, a curse rolling off his lips. A loud clang sounds from the side of him, but Jay couldn’t care less, not with the way warmth starts to encase him again. 

Jay gasps as he tries to push out with his hands, but he’s easily flattened to the ground. A body lined up joint for joint against his; his thighs pressed into his, pelvis to pelvis and Jay can feel from where his sweatshirt has rucked up the hard line of abs that rub up against his stomach. 

“Hello, darling.” 

Jay’s eyes fight open, even if his brain protests it. 

He curses and his head lulls to the side, slowly to not further mess with the dizziness in his head.

They’re under the bleachers, grass is cocooning around him, and it's dark, except for the few strips of light that highlight their faces. 

Jake.

His breath stops and Jay spreads out for his knives—either of them, he doesn’t care, but Jake laughs against his cheek, his hand coming from around Jay’s waist to pin his wrist. 

Green’s too far away from where he’s pinned; White is stuck in his pocket, closed into his thigh as Jake’s presses down into him. 

“M’sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” He grins, “Things have just gotten so much more fun with you around.” 

“Couldn’t help it.” He says, cupping Jay’s jaw, thumb swiping along the bone slowly until Jay is flinching at the sensation; it almost tickles. Jake uses his leverage to turn his head, moves Jay sight off to the right and noses down his neck, right to that injunction where K had mouthed at Nicholas. 

There’s a couple of stickers there, Jay remembers, and he can feel them intensely now that Jake’s breath moistens around them. 

Jay shakes his head, heart thumping at the following scream. He can still see her, through the cracks of the bleacher seats, she’s still there, crawling, crying. The wolf hasn’t gotten to her yet, but they're not rushing; they’re padding closer, circling around her to enjoy the view, and enjoy taking her down. 

Jay still has time. Jake is still fucking talking.

“...like destiny, you know?” He mindlessly plays with the tips of Jay’s nails, fingers circling them softly, petting him.  

Jay’s fucking shaking, trembling as he tries everything to get Jake off. 

“Move, move! Please, let me help her!” He screams. Fuck, why is he fighting so hard? Why is…? 

The wolf moves above her, baring its teeth. 

His heart lurches. 

Mom.

“Do you know why they wear white?” Jake asks and his accent is heavy, as thick as the pelvis that slots against him, and the thigh that presses between his own, separating his legs so he can get closer. Jay’s not sure how much closer he even needs to be, but the boy is pressed against every part of him, just breathing against him.

Jay feels him every time his stomach distends and pushes down into his own, forcing Jay to duet his breathing, so his own diaphragm isn’t crushed. 

His breathes come out shakily regardless, even as he hooks his chin over Jake’s shoulder to breathe in something that isn’t his skin, his hair, his heat cause fuck it was sweltering. Jake’s body trapped heat like nothing he’s ever felt and the warmth itself is almost suffocating. His eyes are going glossy, he can feel it; just like he can feel Jake’s tongue curve along the stickers on his skin. 

“The blood stands out the brightest for one,” he croons, “but what’s most important, the real purpose? The amount of white left after.”

Tears track down his eyes as he keeps his eyes on her. He’s still moving, shouldering Jake away, but each second gets lazier, harder. 

“You need to be thoroughly marked,” Jake speaks over the stickers, teething at its edges, the flimsy film peeling up before it slaps back down into his skin, “until nothing is pure, until even our little human can smell it, can see how they’re taken.” 

Jake’s petting the back of his head when he stills, and it's not at the touch, not at the sight, but at the revelation in his chest that begins to burn. He shivers at it, the touch indirect, but so close; intimate in the soft pressure, and the warm, wet air that pools around his skin, threatening to weaken the adhesion. 

Jake said they, and Jay knows that he isn’t wearing white either, but the segregation feels deeper than the physical—as if Jake already considers him taken, as if the blood Heeseung had made him shed that very day is what tinges his clothes pink instead of a chemical dye.

“We picked a good one this time, I can feel it.” Jake is whispering to himself more than he is to Jay, his fingers pushing him further into the ground. 

“You’ll be good. It’s going to be so much fun once I can—” Jake pants against his neck, fitting himself completely between Jay’s thighs, “Hyung said we can't fight yet: you’re too small.” 

Jake sucks the skin into his mouth and Jay’s breath hitches up. It’s a soft suction that has him gripping through the fingers that hold him down as a violent shiver rakes down his body. 

Jay gasps, “She doesn’t want this.” He says it cause he has to, has to remind himself, needs to push back against whatever this was. I don’t want this. “Just let me—”

Jake ignores him, slamming his pelvis down on him when Jay gets himself an inch into the air. 

“She does. She accepted their courting—every single one.”

Jay chokes around his own spit at the force, at the ground that no doubt has an impression of body now in it. 

“Is that what you do—what he does?” Jay spells out weakly, a fear he refuses to show shaking in his eyes. Jake doesn’t see, he’s not looking at him. 

“Heeseung doesn’t court, baby.” 

His tongue circles around his skin, already haven gone warm with his heat, and dives under the sticker. Jay’s fingers tighten, his shoulders hunch, and his foot twitches against Jake’s at the sticky slide. Jay’s skin gets pinched around blunt teeth and then it’s pulled off. 

The aftermath has him breathing heavily, his head lumping back to the ground when Jake pulls himself over him, showing him the pretty sticker now plastered on his tongue. 

Jay can feel Sunoo watching, can hear the final scream the girl lets out as she’s marked. 

Jay lays there for seconds, minutes after, his skin cooling and shaking from the withdrawal of heat. He doesn’t know how long he takes to come back to himself, to push what happened to the pits of his memory, to completely erase the utter desperation and despair he had seen in her eyes as she rolled on top of his dagger. At some point he had closed his eyes—knows, because when Sunoo’s hands rest on his arms, they open, they search, they find him. 

To forget.

Jay’s lips part, breathless words, a quiet asking, but Sunoo only shakes his head, his thumb spreading circles into his pulse points on his arm. 

“Let’s go.” 

And they do, Sunoo helps lift Jay like he did in the locker rooms and they leave the empty gym; nothing but red puddles and bloodened streaks splattered along the bleachers, and barely any white left. 

Jay doesn’t leave his room after that. Sunoo drops him off with a touch to the small of his back and Jay tells him not to expect him at dinner, to tell the girls he had gotten tired—something, anything would do, and Sunoo had nodded, sweet and understanding, then left without a word.

Jay didn’t know how to explain it, he just…he just felt overwhelmed; too much happened, too much interaction than what he was used to, too much new. Jay was used to empty streets that blew across torn up grocery bags, dark alleyways, infested malls where ferals camouflage themselves between clothing racks and chase him down escalators in his new Prada attire; he was used to bloodshed, caused it many times; he was used to unwanted attention: the people he shared quarters with always watching him, waiting for him to mess up. This, though, was something else, something different. A whole other beast. 

The mere thought of a beast had almost sent a shiver through him. So, he threw the wrapped box onto his dresser and busied himself the rest of the day: he cleaned his knives, sharpened them, showered, stretched, and brought the small wooden guitar he had brought over his knees. 

He played and played, closed his eyes and let the music calm his heart, let it hypnotize him until like a siren to a sailor the only thing he could think about were the notes, the pretty tune that promised him peace; the lullaby his mother sang to him, the one he played for her behind locked doors and panicked breaths. 

I’m here, it’s okay. We’re all we need, remember? He would say.

Jay’s lost in it, his body swaying in his old desk chair that creaks and he doesn’t stop, he lets the noise blend into his strumming, letting it scream out for him how much he misses her, and then there’s a knock at his door; a small, polite rump that spurs his attention, that stops his fingers so the room is filled in silence.

Jay’s not expecting anyone and another knock doesn’t come. So, he sets his guitar aside, dropping it gently on his bed as he walks around the columns that separate his room. He opens the door, only slightly, curiously, but no one is there, not even when Jay links his head around to peer down the hall—just a plastic bag tied into a bow. 

“What?” Jay murmurs, quietly reaching for the bag and spinning it around in his hands. Steam licks up around his fingers as he holds the bow, and the bag when Jay sits his other hand below it is definitely warm. 

It smells good, like meat. 

Instantly Jay’s fingers are already undoing the knot, spreading the handles open when he flinches back inside, shutting the door harshly. 

“Remember to do so privately.” 

Shit, that could’ve been bad, Jay reprimands, but soon enough, after the door is locked and his desk is cleared, the scolding falls from his attention, and he finally peers into the contents: pork belly, rice, with a separate container for kimchi. 

“Fuck.” Jay groans happily, setting it all out on his desk. He’s in the middle of sifting through the bag of chopsticks when he hits a floppy thing—a note. 

 

You told me not to save you. I’m listening well, so take care of yourself for me, hyung. 

I just got you back…would it kill you to indulge me one last time? 

Come to the music room, hyung. 

I promise, after that, I’ll let you go. 

 

Hyung . Pup. 

Jay’s sighs into the letter, slapping it against his forehead as his shoulders slump. He shouldn’t go—he—Jay’s eyes connect with the silver ring, bright and shiny cause Jay had cleaned it alongside his knives. 

Should he? It’s just once, surely…fuck, I don’t know. 

 

The morning following finds him pacing the floorboards, socked feet stepping into its hershey coloring and swiftly turning when he’s reached the edge of the room again.

He still hasn’t made up his decision, still hasn’t decided whether he should go or not, but each slide of his feet, each lap he takes across the room that refuses to change despite how much Jay pummels through it, feels more and more like finality—like he’s going, like Jay already knew his answer before his head had even hit the sheets. Something about that irritates him: how much of a soft spot he has, how much he regrets hurting him even though both times were not his fault, but he still feels bad.

Jay knows what it's like to lose a parent, he knows and fuck, fine! I’m going!

Jay shoves his daggers into pockets, thoroughly regretting his past decisions of overlooking a belt to attach his knives to. No matter, he sticks them into pockets—baggy jeans this time instead of sweatpants. He not only wants his daggers to be more accessible, but he wants them to be seen.

Yesterday, he had been approached way too often, way too much for his liking, but this time, this time he was going to make it clear. His knives are going to be on display along with the rest of him; Silver hair emboldened by the loose, deep gray, almost green t-shirt and the chunky, cold, silver ring. 

Pup’s ring. 

He wasn’t going to wear it. He took it off for the sole reason that he wasn’t sure if it counted as a courting gift or not, but Jay figured that it wasn’t. That Sunoo would have told him so, wouldn’t have told him to put it on otherwise. Plus, those who were eligible and packless wore white and nothing else: no nail paint, no piercings, no jewelry; this would make his defiance obvious, a clear strike from head to toe. 

Jay smirked, a balloon of pride swelling in his chest and straightening out his shoulders. Nothing was going to happen; he wasn’t going to let it. He had been nice yesterday, but today he wasn’t going to let any of it slide. 

And he didn’t. He pushed boxes back into their owner’s hands, letting Yihwa start turning them down for him since all he would do was stare and walk away. One of them, an alpha, had even gotten pissed at him—something about thinking he was too good, showing respect, blah, blah, blah. Jay truly couldn’t care less.

He had twirled his Black Jades between his fingers, looked at them once, and scoffed, “I am too good, dear.” 

Classes went well too, everyone seemingly catching on to the shift  in Jay’s attitude. They still watched him, still hovered, but they never approached. Instead, they left their wrapped things at his desk for him to arrive at, or slid them over his way. Jay never picked up any of them, left them right where they were placed without a trace of a fingerprint of his own. 

And now he’s here, back in the Janitor’s closet with the bulb shining bright over his head like this was the best idea he’s had in weeks. Fuck, he really can’t believe he’s doing this. Jay’s hands smooth over his face, his palms soft rub over his cheeks, the cold, hard bite of the ring digging into his cheekbones.

He’s nervous, he is, but he’s not scared. Sure, he hasn’t seen the pup in years, his chosen family was questionable, but Jay knew him first, found him, took care of him as much as he could with what little he not only had, but even fucking knew about wolves—pups even less. Jay knew how to kill, but the pup wasn’t feral: he was young and alone, just like Jay. He’s not scared of him, the nerves coursing through his veins since the moment he had laid that note down on his desk, was barely concealed tension for the foreseeable future.

This was it, this was going to be the last time they talked, that they see each other as they were instead of the enemies they’ve become; forced on opposite sides even though Jay rather have him away from it all. 

Maybe Jay will play him a song, strum the guitar, like he had planned to do the night Niki vanished…maybe. 

Jay’s walks between the walls and this time he lets both his hands glide against its rough texture as he steps. There’s no particular reason, he doesn’t mean to feel the vibrations of students moving about in their rooms, or to absorb the sounds of daily chatter that come through.

No, he just simply needs something to distract himself, something to tether him to reality and away from his thoughts. For a while it does just that, until his hand falls into a dip, a small creek that Jay knows opens up into that hallway. 

Jay breathes against the door, his body almost hugged against it from how close he presses. He knows it's stupid, but he presses even closer, until his forehead is resting against it, too, pressing, hoping to see through the barrier—somehow meet him without having to be physically present for it.

It’s dumb. This was inevitable, he tells himself, the odds were never in their favor, not even from the beginning.

So, Jay pushes the wall open, listens to the nasty pop it releases when he does, and steps through. The hesitation from last time is gone. He doesn’t linger to scope out the hallway first; he comes out, presses the wall back in and walks down the hall. It’s much brighter this time around without the storm caking the windows, without the sounds of heavy rain and thunder raising his blood pressure—it’s much better now that his life no longer has a certain expiration date. 

It is cold, though. 

Jay rubs his arms as he finally nears the room; blacked out windows and a thin door that stretched tall. No music is playing through the walls this time and when Jay’s hands clasps around the metal knob, no one’s inside either. 

Jay lets out the breath he had been holding and his hand drops from the handle, falling back to his side as he walks in slowly. He must’ve arrived first, or maybe he was late. Jay didn’t know the pup never specified a time. 

Jay sighs against the smell of old wood and paper; it smells so similar to the library, except less condensed. The smell filters around Jay instead of balling up in his chest and weighing him down like he was the one holding up the floors above and not the columns.

He looks around and the space is vast: a long room with a low-rise piano, music sheets, a couple of guitars, an old chalkboard, but even so, this—this isn’t what he imagined. He’d pictured a sort of glamour, a dark marble similar to the center building, beautiful and intricate patterned wallpaper that wrapped every inch of the walls, sleek black grand piano, ruby red electric guitars Jay could see his reflection in; but this, as Jay steadily walks around the room, is different.

The walls are stripped, colorless but darkening. The chandelier above is cobb-webbed and dusty, probably doesn’t even turn on if Jay were to guess—he doesn’t try it either, letting the light from the un-blackened window cast streaky, pale light into the room.

Jay can see the dust floating about, can see how they shiver and fall like stars around him when he moves. There’s wooden planks scattered around too, broken wooden cases that must have held instruments at some point, and there’s an old, but plushy looking brown couch pushed up against one of the walls. There’s no glamour in it at all, it's old, worn out, but for some reason Jay doesn’t mind. It’s chaotic and messy, but it feels used, like someone still cares for it. 

He can feel their attentions, their passion; it slides up against his ankles and threatens to cut his skin in little thin slices. Jay hums as he bends over, starts collecting the sea of torn and crushed music sheets. They cover the floor, almost every inch of it cascades in parchment and ink.

Some sheets have fully filled scores, others are harshly crossed out, and there’s some rare ones too, ones that have notes on them, and Jay decidedly doesn’t read those. An artist’s diary isn’t something for him to read; at least not without their permission, their guidance to understanding the world inside their head.

So he makes space for himself, he picks up and organizes the papers until he has three distinct piles and a clear path towards the piano. He sets his piles down on it, runs his fingers along its sides. It’s smaller, but probably in the best condition compared to the rest of the place. Sure, there was a fake fireplace somewhere near the old couch, and a big, delicate looking mirror hung above it, but even the fireplace had a couple of scratches and the mirror was blurred with dust. 

Jay tries to breath around the dust as he sits, doing his best not to step on any of the music sheets that pool under the bench and cuddle beneath the piano. 

“Oh,” Jay breathes once his fingers touch the keys, “wow.” 

The keys are smooth, somehow a little warmer than Jay feels from the room, but as he presses a finger in, the sound comes out sweet, a pretty ding that shocks a smile into his face. He’s always wanted to learn. He—the door closes, and the click of it locking almost gets drowned out in the noise Jay’s making on the piano. 

He doesn’t look up, doesn’t turn, he presses into another key, one that comes out higher than the last. 

“Ni-ki pu—do you play—” Jay never gets to finish it, his voice chokes in his throat and the pressure he feels bearing into his skin has him pushing down on the key. The sound comes out harsh, deep, a boom that reverberates into every cavity of his body. It has him wanting to shake free, but he’s not held down, he’s not in those leather cuffs anymore, he isn’t. 

Jay gasps. A body curving over his, their stomach pressing to his lower back and their chest caging his neck, hard muscle tapping against his head. 

They lean down and their breath curls around his ear, rustles the needles that threaten to dig into his bloodstream. Jay can feel himself hunching away, even as an arm circles around, holds onto the piano in front of him. 

“You know better than that, bell, don’t you?” He husks, his nose poking around the seam of hair before his ear. 

A shiver threatens to rack his body, but Jay curls his hands to fists, keeps the tension from breaking, wets his lips as he thinks. 

Heeseung. 

The thought of him still shakes him, still takes him back to the grave of blood and mud he’d made himself, but Jay shakes his head, doesn’t let his thoughts go anywhere beyond, anywhere near those memories. He hasn’t shifted yet, and right now, that was all that mattered. 

Jay steals a couple of breaths and relaxes his shoulders, tries his damn hardest to look unbothered, calm. He even plays a couple of more notes, randomly placed, but he keeps doing, even as one hand slowly disappears from the board for his front pockets. Heeseung’s humming, fitting in closer to him as he watches Jay poke around. He’s amused no doubt. 

Jay’s hands press around one of his Black Jades. His larger ones are in his back pocket, but reaching for them would be too noticeable, too obvious. His Blacks were smaller, almost hidden completely. 

“What do you want?” Jay says evenly, moving as minimally as possible as his fingers flit around to pull at the handle. 

He’s inching it out, slowly, carefully, but Heeseung’s knee knocks into the small of his back, makes him release it for a split second, but Heeseung is just adjusting himself behind him, his left hand that’s not caging him in coming around Jay’s hand on the piano.

So Jay continues, resumes his collection, and lets Heeseung’s hand cover his. 

Heeseung isn’t warm. Not like Jake, not like Ni-ki, but he isn’t really cold either. He’s somewhere between, lukewarm in how the shower gets after you spend too long under it: it’s unstable, erratic, a temperature that can either spring hot or wash you cold in a matter of seconds. 

“Right now?” He speaks to him, hands spreading apart Jay’s fingers, placing them neatly on the keys, but Jay can see the way Heeseung’s right hand squeezes the piano, “or long term?” 

Jay swallows as his fingers are adjusted, keeps his hands as tense as they can get to prevent them from shaking. 

He’s almost there, the handle is almost in his palm. 

“Now.” Jay mutters quietly and it feels like there’s barely air left in the room, but that can’t be true because Heeseung’s breathing, he can feel him against his back, hear him around his hair, feels his exhale when his face comes closer, almost brushing against his cheek if Jay hadn’t turned. Heeseung’s also smiling, Jay can see it. 

Heeseung hums against him, nose almost touching his jaw as he presses one of Jay’s fingers into a key, “To teach you how to be good.” 

“This is an E.” 

Kiss my fucking ass.  

The dagger slides into his palm and Jay doesn’t waste a second. He flies up and his arm comes across at a 90 to cut straight through that thick neck, and he would have done it, it would have hit cause he never misses, but he’s just stopped. 

“Mgh.” Jay groans as his arm is slowly wrenched away, his arm folded and held out to the side awkwardly. Pain shoots up his arm at the extension and Heeseung doesn’t give him room to even move as he crowds him back against the piano.

The keys dig into his ass, another site of pain that only serves to weaken his grip around Black: and when it drops to the floor in a loud clatter, Heeseung’s knee pushes up from under him, tapping under his ass, and forcing Jay on top of the keys as he’s pressed into the hard music rack. 

Jay curses beneath the loud, dying noise the piano makes, his body desperately trying to get purchase on anything, but his feet aren’t hitting the ground, and the music rack hits into his spine in such a way it has him arching off of it in pain, right up into Heeseung’s chest: but Heeseung presses closer, pushes that long piece further into him.

Jay glares at him while he’s wincing from the pain, but flinches when Heeseung's face comes closer, saddles right up against the extension of his neck. 

“I’m not dumb, little one.” He speaks and his lips tease along the very edge of his throat.

They don’t touch him, but those needles sinking into his skin feel like they're separating his skin apart, widening his pores so Heeseung can fill them up with his breath alone. It’s like every cell of his body is on high alert for him and making him sensitive, so sensitive his breath stutters out and his legs absolutely flinch when Heeseung’s hip touches them.  

A hand touches along his thigh, light but tickles up his spine anyway even though Jay knows he’s doing it to keep him still. 

“That’s too docile for you, isn’t it?” 

Then his lips drag along his throat and Jay’s whole body thrums. The keys below him are ringing and it's so loud, everything is too much, and he just wants it to stop, to slow the fuck down. His hand that isn’t pinned comes across fast, too fast for Heeseung to properly catch, but the punch doesn’t land; not properly, aiming at this angle is hard, but Jay will take what he can get because his fist slams parts along Heeseung’s lower cheek. It gets Jay all but three seconds to breathe, to calm his nerves, and unstick one needle, before his hand is being crushed into the fallboard. 

A scream tears out of him, “Fuck! Stop, Heeseung.” The grip only tightens, grinding his bones against each other with his grip alone. Jay’s head falls back and his teeth clench because fuck it feels like his bones are about to pop. 

“Why are you so angry with me, Bell?” His voice is light but there’s tension, a line that’s been stretched almost to its limit. Jay can see it in his eyes, see it in the way the brown begins to bleed slightly maroon. Heeseung drags him forward, until their noses hit and Jay can do nothing but whimper and see him. 

“Hm? What did I do?” He hums darkly, but his eyes flicker down half way through, watching Jay’s mouth part open as he pants and something changes, something deepens. Heeseung's voice gets quieter, cooing, “It’s not bad to need some guidance. I can teach you. You know it’s my piano, right little one?” 

Jay’s teeth grind together as he glares, slowly lifting his knee closer to himself, “You scented me,” Jay seethes at him. He's distracting him, yes, but the point still stands and his eyes never leave Heeseung’s, not even as he twists his foot, tries to line it up with a body he can’t see. 

Heeseung’s nose nuzzles his own for a moment, his amusement clear, but his eyebrows furrow in mocking gesture, “Did I?” Heeseung laughs, moving closer, dipping his head into the crook of Jay’s neck, his nose rubs lightly along the prominent vein there; it pumps harder when he presses in. 

Jay can feel him grin against his skin.

“Can barely smell myself anymore.” 

“Fucking bitch!” Jay curses and wrenches himself out of the grip, his foot springing out, shoving Heeseung back a couple of feet by his hip. Jay’s livid, the sheer anxiety he’s feeling only makes the disrespect ebb deeper. 

“You talk too damn much,” Jay grinds grabbing onto both White and Green as he pulls them out of their sheaths. They come out all pretty and sharp, his own reflection a harsh addition of glass to its surface. He lines himself up, settles comfortably into his stance. Don’t let him shift, don’t let him shift , go off like a mantra in his head as he glares. 

“We’re done now.” Jay finalizes and charges. Somewhere in the middle Heeseung bites his lips, eyes lidded as he watches Jay come at him, “I didn’t come to fight, Jay-ah.” but he’s smiling even as he says it, and maybe it's true, but Jay wants one, and he knows it. 

“Cry about it.” 

Then he’s swinging high, averting his attention up before Jay is dropping low, kicking out Heeseung’s legs with a quick turnaround sweep on the floor. He grunts when he hits the floor, but that smile hasn’t left, hasn’t so much as twitched. Jay scowls, jumping on top of him, pinning both biceps with his knees as he swings his daggers.

He’s pressing his whole weight into his arms, doing his absolute most to make sure Heeseung can’t deflect his hits. He’s not going to be nice about it. He’s not giving him a chance to live like he did Malachi. He’s going to kill him. Today. Put an end to whatever game he thinks Jay signed up for, but none of his swings land. At most, Heeseung allows for White to slice a thin line across his cheek before he’s pushing into Jay’s chest, sends him stumbling off his body until Heeseung’s able to completely kick him across the room. 

And Jay fucking flies across the floor, the wooden planks hitting him upside the head and stubbing into his spine when he smacks up against a pile. Dust flies out, curtaining his vision as he groans. His body hurts, his hand fucking red, and Heeseung’s standing, walking through the starry dust as if he’s something out of a story, a movie, something bigger than life, bigger than Jay. 

Jay wheezes from the hit to his stomach, but pushes himself up nonetheless. His arms are shaking, but it's not enough to pull him back down. White had fallen out of his hand somewhere after the push, but Green still sits nestled in his hands.

The blood from the slice on Heeseung’s cheek is dripping now, oozing down his cheek until it connects into his smile. Jay sees it, sees how the blood scoops over his lips, dips onto his tongue, and how Heeseung's eyes begin to pool red at the edges. 

“Is this what you want, little one?” Heeseung questions and Jay can feel the change in his voice. The sound of it echoes through his chest, sends his skin itching and peeling itself apart. 

Jay rises, even if legs shake from the baritone. 

“You, dead? Yea, pretty much.” 

And then Jay’s moving, spinning in the air and thrusting his foot into the man’s sides, right where his liver is. The spin kick takes energy from him, but it's worth it; worth the way Heeseung howls out and bends over, falling to his knees. 

Jay spins Green in his hands as he speaks, his other Black Jade poking out from his jeans. 

“Does it take this much for you to get the hint?” Jay spits, his right hand coming down to land the punch that should’ve landed when they were at the piano. It’s a hard smack, one that pleases his ears and settles some of the blood that rushes through him. Jay’s sweating, drops of salty wet sliding down his face as he pants. His knuckles are stamped into Heeseung’s face, the blood there drawing the lines in from his fist. 

The blade comes up just under his jaw and Jay tilts Heeseung face up to look at him. He presses it in deep, ready. “I’m sure pup would have lasted longer than this.” 

Jay’s arm moves, jolts, but the pain in his arms are unrelenting. The needles sink in, his bones infiltrated and poached, and Jay collapses to his knees. 

“Aeh!” Jay grunts, using his right hand to press into his wrist, to physically keep Green pressed up against Heeseung’s neck. He’s trying, trying to move his arm across, finally fucking end it, but the pain makes his arm weak, makes it droop, even as Jay is trying to keep it together, because his right arm is no better. Speedily the pain spreads, it lights up down his arm and spreads along his neck until he can’t hold it up anymore, down his back until he’s almost bowing from the pain. His body is twitching, wanting to writhe, but Jay shakes his head, tears rolling down his cheeks at the non-stop onslaught of pain. 

“No, no, fuck.” Jay whimpers as his hands slide down from his throat, sinking to Heeseung’s chest that rumbles, absolutely vibrating Jay’s hands until they’re bouncing off of him completely. His arms fall with them immediately, limply and the vision of the bird slipping off his window won’t leave his head. 

The floor rumbles under his shins, rocking his body like ocean waves around a cruise. His eyes are constantly watering and his throat is clenching, clenching, releasing. He thinks he’s going to be sick, but Heeseung doesn’t stand up, he remains kneeling, still so much taller from where Jay is almost curling in on himself, weak and trembling below him, hands too buzzed to hold onto Green any longer. 

Jay tries to keep his eyes on him, tries, but his vision is blurred. Heeseung nothing but malformed shapes, but his body understands, his body can detect the blackening swallowing his eyes, and can already feel the six incisors that lower from his mouth. 

“Fuck.” Jay’s hyperventilating, the air in the room is too small, and his brain won’t stop racing, remembering the claws piercing into him, the tight pressure that squeezed his lungs up his throat, blood, blood, blood. 

A hand curls around his throat, tightening ever so to pull Jay’s body up, but Jay can’t hold himself anymore. He slumps into the grip, Heeseung’s strength the only thing keeping him held up. It hurts worse like this; Heeseung isn’t squeezing hard, but Jay’s body pushing down makes it feel like he’s being choked regardless. 

Heeseung’s lips are just above his own, reddened and plump as canines poke up from his bottom row, and Jay can feel them scratch him when Heeseung lowers to speak against his mouth. 

“My turn.” and it’s like something breaks, the sky, the wooden planks, Jay’s pride when he’s pressed back into the ground by his throat. 

He’s gagging, small cut off noises that gurgle uglily in his throat as Heeseung forces himself between his legs, lowers himself down onto Jay’s body. 

His opposite hand runs down his stomach and folds into his pocket, unworriedly throwing his last jade across the room. 

When Heeseung’s attention comes back, he noses along the tears streaming down his face, drinking in the sight of Jay’s eyes shaking in his pupils. The hand around his throat squeezes harder and Jay’s whole body jolts, a terrible sound croaking out of him, and that’s when Heeseung purrs, loosens his fingers and begins to massage slowly around Jay’s Adam's apple. 

The sound is different from the growl, it's not a rumbling that splits through the earth and up his muscles like an earthquake; it’s a melody of its own, a constant humming, a bumble that clouds Jay’s head, makes the exhaustion already setting in him from the fight worse. 

“There you go, little one, just relax for me.” He purrs against his ear and Jay’s eyes flutter. Everything feels too heavy, his arms, his legs, but Jay still tries, tries to move his head away, inch at least a centimeter away from him.

Hands grip into his hair and wrench him back, baring his throat until its nothing but dark marigold skin stretched in front of him, below him. 

“Stay here, Bell. Right where I can see you, that’s it.” 

Jay legs are stretched wide as Heeseung comes a bit closer, his hips pushing them apart the further up his body he gets. 

“Come in .” 

Jay’s crying, because of the pain that won’t stop, because of the frustration that he can’t think straight, because his body is so heavy he can’t move it beyond a twitch, because he doesn’t want to know what Heeseung means, but he has no other choice.

He hears the sounds of footsteps come into the room, and Jay shakes further. That should be impossible, the door was locked. Heeseung locked it and neither of them had the time to open it back up. So, how, how were the rest of Heeseung’s pack gathering around them, circling them. All of them wearing black.

“You came right to me, right to my pack.” Heeseung whispers praises down his throat and Jay swallows. 

“N-no,” his voice stutters out over the thumb still massaging into his voice box, but Heeseung hears it. They all hear it. 

Heeseung lifts his head from his Adam’s apple, just a bit so his black eyes can reach Jay’s and he smiles, “This is our territory, little one.” 

Jay’s heart stops and the air that had been taking in completely dissipates at the words puffed out above him. 

No. 

His eyes search, they shimmer, and pass by Jungwon’s happy, go-lucky smile, Jake’s wink, Sunghoon’s hard, detached stare, until he lands on him. 

Pup. 

He comes forward in the circle, watches Heeseung before he swoops down, leaving a warm kiss against the corner of his eye. Ni-ki’s eyes are bright, happier than the day Jay walked away from him on that hill, and Jay can see himself in them, hair mussed, and his face a wreck. 

His lips move, but no words come out, none that are verbal, but Ni-ki responds anyway, to what question he does not know. 

“It’s okay, hyung.” He chuckles, “I won’t save you, as promised.” And then he’s laughing, going back to his spot in the circle as he bumps excitedly into Jake. 

Somehow even like this, Jay thinks about pummeling him next. 

Heeseung moves away from the middle of throat, pushes Jay’s head aside with thumb and forefinger and his mouth curves along Jay’s neck, just touching, feeling. 

He stops around the crook of his neck, chuckles into it. 

“Jake’s been here, hasn’t he? That’s alright, he’s excited. He’s never got to fight with baby omega before.” 

Jay gasps, squirms, tries to will the pain to a dark corner so he can lift his arms, wrench Heeseung away from his neck. Avoid this, avoid it, avoid it, but Heeseung’s body is solid against his, his legs attached around his hips, and Jay has nowhere to go, nowhere to move. 

“You can’t!” Jay spits. 

“Can’t I?’ Heeseung chuckles, grating his teeth lightly along his neck. Shivers explode through Jay, shaking his shoulders, until the rest of him is vibrating against the floor. Jay shakes his head, fresh tears glossing his vision.

“Please don’t. I—I don’t want a pack.” He tries, but Heeseung is ignoring him and Jay’s anger naturally deepens his tone, “I don’t give a fuck what you are or where your pack comes from! Leave me out of it. I made a promise, I promised her…”

His voice cracks in the middle and the tears fall down his cheeks, pooling under his jaw before they finally slide down his neck and Heeseung licks them up, his tongue fully following the trail until Jay has to close his eyes around the pink organ; it slides through his eyelashes and around eye fat below his waterline. 

“And how’s that going for you, little one?” He whispers, a hand massaging at his hips and a rumble bleeds down into Jay’s chest, shakes his heart, stutters his breath.  Heeseung’s blood is dripping down on his face and Jay flinches. Heeseung smiles, his nose pressing against his. 

“I think you just want to talk to me, baby.” He purrs, “chat my fucking ear off until it bleeds, yea? Tell me about your day, all the courting gifts you received, but refused.” Heeeseung continues on, mocking him, each word like a lashing even though Jay knows he’s speaking utter nonsense. Jay doesn’t feel that way. 

“Is that what you want, little one, to be courted?” Heeseung dips his head when he laughs, lowering down until his teeth wrap around the veins pumping heavily through his skin. Heeseung breathes him in heavily. 

“So fucking pretty, strong, too. Sweet .” Heeseung’s voice is leaving, getting quieter the longer he stares, the longer he gets soaked into the rhythm of Jay’s pulse beating against his lips like it wants to pop out of his skin. 

Both of his thumbs are rolling into the skin around Jay’s lower stomach and Jay shakes, finally gets his arms to move and his legs to kick, but the boys are just as fast, sealing his limbs down to the floor. It only takes two of them; Jake and Ni-ki, Jungwon stays behind holding onto Sunghoon in preparation for the bloodshed. 

“I have a good feeling about this.” Jake giggles to Ni-ki, who's looking at him fully, happy still, albeit a little worried. Jay can feel him rubbing circles into his ankles. 

“I’ll court you, little one.” Heeseung breathes into him, “but you’ll have to survive me first.” 

Then all four incisors are piercing through his skin and Jay’s eyes roll to the back of his head as he screams. It hurts, hurts so fucking back and Heeseung hasn’t even bitten fully down. Jay can feel the tears bubbling up behind his eyelids, pouring at the corners when Jay refuses to open his eyes.

His back arches into the air, but Heeseung holds him down, the hand in his hair keeping his neck stretching while Heeseung’s hips press into his own, forcing him to the floor. Niki’s still rubbing circles into his ankles, but Jay can barely feel them anymore with how hard they’re shaking. 

“Euh”, Jay grunts wetly, breaths coming out in hiccups. Something’s off. Heeseung isn’t fully biting down, his top incisors don’t even sink much past their tips, but Jay can feel something, something leaking into him, flowing into his bloodstream and creating wildfires under his skin. Jay doesn’t know how this kind of thing works, but he’s seen a lot this week: he knows what a bite looks like, has seen the faint marks along Nicholas’ neck, has seen it placed multiple times during gym, but he doesn’t know. He doesn’t understand what the fuck is going on! 

Jay gasps for breath when Heeseung’s mouth releases, pushes that thick tongue he teased along his dagger, across his skin to seal over the small puncture sites, and the pain almost soothes with it, almost, until Heeseung is pulling back with red spreading between the black in his eyes, and Jay feels the fire light again. 

Heeseung is licking his lips as Jay cries, lifting himself up slowly. He cocks his head off somewhere to the sides, to the boys around his limbs, and they scatter, gathering things around the room until Jay can feel his daggers slide back into his pockets, re-sheathed and tucked in like a child. Heeseung’s hand comes down then, softly pushing the wet hair out of Jay’s eyes, the other re-fitting the pup’s ring onto his finger, and his voice is nothing but hungry. 

“So fucking sweet.” 

And Jay doesn’t know how he does it, doesn’t know how he manages it, but he pushes himself back, uses the fake fireplace behind to pull himself up on his shaky feet and runs for it; full-stop, and he doesn’t look back.

No, he runs like he’s about to be caught again, like his life depends on it, like he’s prey, and maybe for the first time, Jay actually feels like one; shivering, shaking, bleeding, bitten, and on his last attempt at safety. 

The lock undoes easily and Jay swings the door open and instead of an empty hallway, he sees Sunoo, standing there, hand out like he was about to open the door. Sunoo looks at him, all of him, the rumbled clothes, the sweat wet hair, the four punctures on the side of his neck that are still beading with blood.

His face is mute, no smiles or worry, just those brown eyes that start to spike icy, but Jay doesn’t care, he doesn’t. He grabs Sunoo’s hands and runs them away from the door—from the room and he doesn’t stop, not until he has them both crammed back into the stairwell between the walls, until he’s breathing against Sunoo’s shoulder as he holds him steady. 

His thumb is smoothing down the hair at Jay’s nape, but every so often it ventures too far, flicks along the tender skin surrounding his wound, and Jay flinches in his hold. Sunoo mutters his soft apology every time, and Jay forgives him, lets him guide him closer until Sunoo's back is leaning against the wall and Jay into him. The position is familiar, reminding him so much of how he had held Yihwa. 

“Jay,” Sunoo speaks against his hair and the sound feels almost hypnotizing, a swirling note that makes Jay want to relax into a lazy waltz, “did something happen?” 

Jay knows Sunoo can probably tell, can most certainly fit the pieces together, but Jay nods anyway, feels the movement push out some blood from the punctures until they’re sliding down his neck. 

He can feel it when Sunoo chooses to stop breathing. 

“Heeseung…he—” 

Fingers, delicate and soft, caress around the reddening, puffed skin, and Jay shivers in his hold.

“It’s not deep.” Sunoo cuts him off, but Jay’s not even sure he means to do it. Not with the way he’s clearing his throat after and nuzzling his head into his hair, “It’s not that deep, thankfully. It’s not a proper bite, more of a nip, you’re okay.” 

And Jay tries to believe him, tries to feel just as optimistic, but for now all he does is nod into his shoulder. He needs to find Nicholas. 

 

 

 

And Jay did intend to find him, question him until the anxiety burning in his chest subsided, but Sunoo had walked him to his room, had told him to get some sleep, that he’d feel better in the morning. So he did, he showered, ate the food Yihwa had dropped off, and went to bed. 

Now it was Wednesday and Jay only had one goal: find Nicholas. It wasn’t hard to do, especially when the boy himself comes running at him, and Jay doesn’t know what he should do: catch him, or let him run himself into the wall Jay is leaning against.

In the end, Jay doesn’t have to do either, because Nicholas skids to a sharp halt right in front of him, their shoes just touching and his eyes wildly running all over Jay’s face. His hand even jumps out, squeezing along his jaw to push Jay’s head aside, to sniff the still red and puffed skin high up on his neck. 

Jay hits his wrist, pushing his shoulder back, but his movements are a little groggy. It hasn’t been long since he’s woken up, but even with that his whole body feels sore. It’s bone deep, a soreness that feels more embedded than any surface bruises from the fight; it feels like his body is fighting something internally, like his bones are decaying within him and the bacteria from it is starting to eat holes into his muscles.

Nicholas is looking at him in shock, in despair, and he can see the way the boy’s bottom lip shakes as he tries to laugh it off: act normal, but nothing has been normal about today.

No one has been normal. The presents have completely stopped, and the stares seem to have gotten worse, but instead of the awe, want, and calculation, Jay sees watching, stalking, recording, like vultures surveying a death, reading its symptoms, and preparing a date for its feast. 

“Can we talk?” He asks and his voice comes out in shards, no doubt from the screaming and choking he had endured the day before, but it does the trick. The shards pierce into Nicholas’ ears and shocks him back from his thoughts, he nods hastily, fumbling with his hands before he’s grabbing Jay’s wrist gently. 

“Yea, just not here.” 

Then Jay’s being guided through the halls, past the West Wing, until Nicholas is inviting him into his pack’s dorm in Far West. 

“I heard about it, what happ—everyone knows.” Nicholas says stressed as they sit on the couch. The dorm is large, fit enough for nine wolves, and the couch is warm and soft, full of blankets that sink down when Jay sits. 

“Amazing.” Jay grunts, leaning his back into the corner, breathing deeply once his body gets to relax, taking some of the pressure off his bones. 

“It’s like no one has anything better to do,” Jay says, rolling his eyes and Nicholas smiles just a little, “Heeseung nipped me. What does that mean? How is it different from a bite?” 

Nicholas nods, running his hands through his hair. He sits back himself, getting comfortable and facing Jay. 

“Right,” he sighs, “a bite has multiple purposes and it changes depending on if you’re presented or not, have a pack or not. In your case, bites are usually done to kickstart a presentation, establish a sure dominance over the other. This isn’t always needed, though, presentations can happen for many reasons.” 

Jay nods his understanding. He’s heard about it. Sometimes people who join a pack naturally become what that pack is lacking, others can be influenced towards a certain presentation depending on their own actions and disposition, or outside influences.

Yihwa even explained an example of it days earlier with the first omega that had approached him to become the Alpha of their pack. 

“But Heeseung didn’t bite you?” 

Jay shakes his head. 

“Fuck, okay.” Nicholas rubs his eyes, “A nip, a nip usually means nothing. It’s something that happens when you play-fight, when you want to tease the other wolf. It’s not meant to hurt, to change, to do anything, but Heeseung…”

Nicholas fumbles with one of the blankets around him, his eyes looking off to the window as he thinks. 

“With Heeseung it’s different.” 

“How?” Jay inquires and he’s interested, he is, but his head feels heavier than a bowling ball right now, so he lets it go limp against the couch. 

“It ends up killing them.” 

“What the fuck do you mean them?” Jay bogs.  

“Heeseung’s pack, it’s not complete. They get the most kills every Forest—hell, they’re a part of the reason why most of them are even successful. They’re the reason why no one knows what the kill switch does, but they can’t graduate, not without an omega. Their vampires, they act like betas for the most part, some take on other parts like the Delta, ect, but their maknae is an Alpha like Heeseung and Jake and Jungwon are actual Betas.” 

“So why doesn’t Heeseung just make one of them an omega?” 

“Because Jay, his bite kills. He’s tried others before, other omegas, other Alphas, Betas, magics, vamps, they all end up dead before they can even present or change fully.” 

Jay slumps down into the couch further, shoving one of the blankets over his body. The new position exposes his neck more, shows off the puffy, risen skin, and Nicholas watches it; His eyes flicker down to it, analyze it, until they meet Jay’s eyes again. 

“I think you should go see the nurse.” He says, adjusting the blankets around his feet. 

“Ms. Ooyang—”

“Beomgyu, he’ll know more. He can tell you more. The whole school knows about it, the whole school is watching you. He’ll be there, in the nursery, trust me.” 

Jay’s eyes shut and he breathes out heavily, the air making his chest hurt. 

He releases a sarcastic chuckle, “So the presents have stopped because everyone’s just waiting around to watch me die, nice.” 

Nicholas pats his shin, smiles annoyingly, “That,” he agrees and Jay softly kicks him for it, “and because you’re considered temporarily claimed. You may not have accepted any courting or a bite, but something like this, when it comes from Heeseung everyone takes it as ownership.” 

Jay's eyes do open at that. 

When Jay wakes up next, Nicholas is gone, but K is sliding over a glass of water to him, to which takes gratefully, chugging it down before he’s forcing his limbs up. 

“You’re sure? You can stay, you know. We can monitor you.” K looks at him as he walks sluggishly towards the door, his body no longer burns with wildfires, instead he feels cold, almost freezing. 

Jay shakes his head, but stops as soon as the movement starts to make the room spin. 

“Thanks, but I gotta talk to some people.” and then the door closes behind him and he’s off. He should be going to the nursery bay, and he is, just after he finds Sunoo. 

 

 

 

He finds him in a random class, one that he doesn’t share with him. Jay’s panting slightly with exertion, except it hadn’t taken much energy to walk down the multitude of hallways, he didn’t climb any stairs, his body was just tired, constantly fighting.

He leans himself against the wall of the classroom, lifting to his toes just enough to be able to see through the windows going into the classroom. He hopes Sunoo sees, knows he will; no doubt heard his heart as soon as he comes onto the floor because when Jay peers inside, Sunoo's head is snapped towards him; and Jay doesn’t have to breathe, barely even has to blink before Sunoo is smiling and disappearing.

Or at least it seems like it, but Jay can feel the wind beat at his skin seconds later and Sunoo is standing next to him, holding onto his hip. 

Jay licks his lips, “Why didn’t you tell me it’s a sort of claim?” He asks and for some reason the question makes him nervous; there’s a ball constantly spinning in his chest, fumbling around in anxiety. 

Sunoo makes a small noise, a cute hum that expresses his confusion, until Jay gestures lightly, pokes his neck out slightly. 

Sunoo’s hand presses further into him, soothing. 

“I didn’t know.” Sunoo tells him softly, directly, never shaking within Jay’s eye contact, “I’m a vampire, Jay. Ownership, claiming, whatever they call it. It’s different for us, it looks different.” 

The ball in his chest slows, begins to flatten the longer he looks at Sunoo, the more he hears him speak, and Jay nods, his fist squeezing the ends of his hair. 

“Yea, right, right. I’m sorry, I just—I guess I don’t feel good.” Jay admits. Sunoo pushes his hand away, fixes his hair. 

“It’s okay.” He says as smoothly as he moves. 

“How? How is it different?” Jay fills the space, breaks the silence.

“We share blood.” 

It’s pitch black outside when Jay finds his way back to the nursery bay. The halls are clear, ghostly, nothing but empty shells of today’s memories.

Jay slumps through it, barely paying attention to the way the clouds haven’t come back still, how the night seems so naked without the wetness of fog puffing and cloaking along his skin and the windows. 

When he steps into the nursery bay it looks no different, the pale sconces are on, and they light up the room dimly. A shiver runs through him at the sight of the one bed, the leather cuffs still attached, still waiting, as if a round two was bound to take place at any moment. Jay closes his eyes, pulls back the memories of twisted guts and screams and steps in further. There’s already a metal chair pulled up to the desk when he walks up, already a stark, white coat that breezes the ground when he sits. 

Beomgyu. 

He’s young, much younger than any doctor Jay would have envisioned. His hair is long, brown and curling at both sides of his mid-neck, and Jay finds that it makes him look youthful, boyish, but when a smile stretches out his cheeks and Jay sees the gleam in his eyes, Jay understands just how crazy he actually might be. 

He doesn’t say anything, they both don’t for the first ten minutes. Beomgyu just watches him, surveys how his body twitches every so often, makes notes in his journal probably over the smallest of things, the stuff Jay doesn’t even see, because to him he isn’t doing anything besides breathing.

But, eventually, his pen stops, he puts it down and he gets up to put a first aid kit on the desk. 

“You’re skipping dinner.” He states, thumbing through gauze and liquids, “Hungry?” 

“No.” Jay answers, gulping as Beomgyu finds what he needs, pulls his chair closer to him. 

“I see.” Beomgyu begins cleaning the wound slowly, so fucking slowly Jay starts to feel like he’s become some kind of archaelogical dig.

“So what happens now?” 

“We wait.” 

“Eh?” 

“I’m sure you know a little about the history?” 

Jay nods, “I mean yea, I know it's not a bite, I know that whatever it is has killed people.” 

Beomgyu leans closer and Jay leans away, the chair creaking as Beomgyu is shaking his head with a smile. 

“Not a bite, not just people. Vampires, werewolves, magics, all dead within 48 hours. Doesn’t matter their strength, power, rank: they all fall once Heeseung places his mouth over this spot.” He says, flicking the bunch of skin that has risen.

Jay flinches, hissing at the pain. 

“So what, his spit can kill me?” Jay grits, smacking Beomgyu’s hand away from him, glaring at the lackadaisical boy when he laughs. 

He’s clapping his hands loudly, wildly, “It’s fascinating isn’t it?” His eyes gleam and both arms trap Jay between the chair and his body when Beomgyu grips along the metal. 

Beomgyu lowers, until their eyes are level, until their breathing patterns unconsciously sync. 

“But you want to know what I think? I believe it’s not only his spit, but its properties—hell, it might be his whole genetic makeup.” Beomgyu wets his lips, “A venom, something that makes the incompatibility deadly.” 

Beomgyu pops off of him, finally dresses the wound with gauze and covers it in a large bandaid. 

“I have this theory, Jongseong.” Beomgyu smiles while walking around the desk to sit. 

“All the victims, their common: we see them every day, the beta, the omega, the alpha, but Heeseung? Heeseung’s different, he’s something else entirely, something that doesn’t allow him to mesh with the common.” 

Beomgyu leans forwards, pen head clicking against his lips. The binder with all of Jay’s health information that he did with Ms. Ooyang opened below his drumming fingers.

“Oh Jongseong, but you’re not common either, like Heeseung your blood is different, your makeup; dull, blank, unbidden—You’re not an omega, you’re not anything!” Beomgyu laughs, hands gripping in his hair as he spins around in the chair happily. 

He stops. He melts into the desk, sighs out behind fogging fake glasses, “You just might be perfect.” 

Jay gulps, even if he tries to disguise it behind the tick in his jaw, “For what?” 

Beomgyu eyebrows jump, he smirks, “Depends on who you ask.” 

“You.” Jay says sternly, fingers scratching at his pants in annoyance.

“My studies.” 

 

 

Jay doesn’t stay for much longer after that. Beomgyu asks a few more questions, asks about how it happened, everything he’s been feeling in order of occurrence, he fucking sketches Jay’s wound by memory and shows off his notepad to him, paper dancing in his hands. 

“Would you say this is accurate?” 

Jay’s eyes bore into his, doing everything not to simply roll them at him, “Perfect, should be your day job.” 

And then he’s released, back into the halls, back into the silence. 

He walks on auto-pilot, letting his weary body just move him wherever it likes because the pounding starting to increase in his head is bothering him. 

When he checks back in, he’s opening the doors into the back kitchens and Jay lets it happen. He lets himself bring out the sharp cutlery, pull out a couple of slabs of meat and seasonings. 

It was probably close to nine now, no time to prepare anything meticulously like he’s wanting; honestly, there’s not even time to make a full meal at this point. So, Jay sticks with his meat, the most filling thing that Jay can probably cook in under 45 minutes. 

Jay’s rounding the pan with some oil when he hears it. 

The tap. 

And when he looks up, his movements already a little sluggish, Sunghoon is there, in the corner of the kitchen under the one light that hasn’t stopped blinking since he turned them on. 

They stare at each other. Sunghoon stays still, stays put. He’s not moving, just watching, or waiting. Jay doesn’t know, but with a careful eye on him, Jay finishes his meal and makes it to his room with five minutes to spare before 10 pm. 

The whole time he thinks Sunghoon is standing outside his door.

Maybe. 

It could be the cold settling in, disrupting his senses and stuffing his nose. 

Jay groans into the sheets. 

Fucking hell.

 

 

 

 

Notes:

Guys I didn't mean to take three weeks to write this!! lol omg I don't know wtf was wrong with me, but this felt so much harder to write than past chapters. Not to mention so much has been happening with the boys. The outside MV, Sunghoon's arms, goodness, Jay, Jay, Jay, this era is unlocking something in me I swear.

Anyway tell me what you thought about the chapter!! I hope ya'll had some good snacks and pee breaks lmao, 16.9k ain't for the weaakk.

Chapter 8

The night had been unending. 

A frightful chill had taken his body hostage and held it within a refrigerated confinement, locking him between the thin sheets, wilting pillows, and his own stretched out blanket as he fisted it around his shaking form.

He wrapped himself up, tried to squeeze himself between the cotton counts of the blanket to relinquish any semblance of warmth; any sliver of comfort between those stitches that hugged each other so tightly, but the freeze never lulled, the threads refused him, and with him the entry into their woven cocoon. He was left there, all night, fading between worlds, with his whole body revolting against him. At one point breathing had even become difficult, chest frozen so solid it felt like he was lifting an iceberg off his lungs with each inhale. 

He was exhausted. He was cold, but he was fighting through it. Fighting until the warm rays of sun poked through his hair and the clouds returned to the sky. 

Melted. 

That’s how Jay felt as the rays scoped over him, as if the sun was checking over his body. The rays were barely there, faint and barely touching the hair on his skin, but like the first day of spring, the permafrost over him melted under its smile, its grace, its gentleness, and the goosebumps like groundhogs went back into hibernation below his skin. The soreness had left sometime throughout the night and so all he really felt was the deep need, a gnawing, aching thing that pleaded him for rest, for sleep, to be finally given the time to heal. 

And Jay conceded, gave in without a single fight, stabbed his white flag into the ground and let his evening breaths wave it in the air. 

Peace, at last. Peace, for now. 

 

He sleeps through most of his classes, rests all through lunch when he feels it: the little touches along his forearm. They swirl and curl along his skin in pretty cursive patterns and the ticklish feeling that erupts is almost welcomed; Jay almost lets it lure him back into the warm confines of his sheets, but gold flashes in his peripheral, and the gleam stuns his eyes so much he’s forced to blink away the sleepy blur to play detective. 

It’s Yihwa—or well, a part of Yihwa. Her magic etches letters into his skin like he was nothing but the sand below her stick: If you can see this and I really hope you do, come to the auditorium in Far West. Mandatory assembly. See you…. 

Jay’s head thuds against the wall as he works down the irritation. He’s not mad at her, of course not, but fuck why is there always something . Jay groans as he stands, a small amount of dizziness coating his vision before he’s able to stand fully without his bedpost.

His head is still pounding, but it doesn’t hurt, it’s like a pressure, something constantly pushing at his head, begging for entrance, or forcing it. 

Jay sighs and gets ready—slowly. 

His hands caress the face of the dresser before they attach around its knobs, he stares at his clothes for minutes on end with nothing running through his mind, but the snot still stuffed up his nose. He holds the clothes in his arms for longer than he should as he stands next to his window soaking in the sun.

He holds them close and thinks that maybe he’s trying to warm them under the thin rays too, or maybe the small pile feels too heavy in his arms for him to admit. He idles, he stares, he puts on one clothing piece every couple of minutes, and eventually he weakly walks out, the world on his shoulders and gravity pulling his body down from every inch of clothing that hangs off of him. His daggers feeling like added weights. 

Somehow, despite all of that, he still feels better. Better than the day it happened, better than the day following it where his bones felt like they were disintegrating and he was about to turn into goop in the corner of Nicholas’s couch. His body just felt heavy, maybe a little weak if his grip around the auditorium door was anything to go by, and that was fine, that was normal. He felt strangely normal. 

The auditorium was grand and gothic. Black and white diamond floors pooling down the stairs and out in the semi circle of wooden chairs. The seats were split into two levels, the lower seats closest to the stage, and the higher ones closest to where Jay is closing the door.

The whole room was round, and completely dark beyond the small pockets of candle lit light stoking from the tall and imposing candelabras; they decorated the room purposefully, two beside the double door entrance, then one at the welcoming of each row of seats, and finally at the ends of the sleek, black, curtained stage. It was darker than the East Wing, even with the mosaic skylight that was cut out amidst thickly carved marble and cement ceilings. 

He feels enveloped in its depths, in this large room that is quiet, undisturbed, but somehow patient. Jay looks around, his eyes bouncing over dozens of heads just to find a specific curly head: one that he knew curled into his eyes at one point and smells like citrus. His body doesn’t move an inch when he does it, only his eyes surfing the crowd for her.

It was eerily silent for an assembly. As if the room simply existed, no noise, no livelihood, not even a buzz to waken its heart. He’d noticed it: how everyone’s heads were down when he walked in, how they remained so as he closed the door.

He accepted it, brushed past it like it was a minor detail, but it wasn’t.

As he breathes in, as his foot ever so slightly quirks up in the direction of Yihwa’s hair, he starts to see their heads pop up: one by one, then a dozen at a time—reacting to each other, following each other. Some are this slow creak, like their neck was an unoiled door hinge from a scary movie ominously sliding open, and others snap to him like the sound of jump-scares and spilt popcorn.

They’re all looking at him, horrified, shocked, maybe something else, but it’s truly too dark to see much beyond the glow of multicolored eyes. It felt like he was in a forest, broken and defeated, lying between the leaves for some reprieve, when suddenly dots of yellow started to poke into the dark. The existence of predatory creatures hiding behind the dark and watching him. 

Jay lets the thought go over his head and wills the uncomfortability away with the sweep of his hand through his strands. He doesn’t pay them any mind—the crowd, that is. 

Instead, he locks eyes with the dean.  

They’re a sour yellow when his gaze lifts from his folded hands on the podium and they bead into Jay like the first day he had entered his office, and what’s more, nothing has changed. Despite all that Jay’s seen and been through, he still sees the mirth that’s soaking that man’s un-dead heart and the excitement of the slow drum his fingers make against the podium when he recognizes Jay. There’s a small head tilt as the dean appreciates him, like Jay’s just did something special, like he’s truly paying attention to him now, like the game has just truly started. 

That’s when this all makes sense, when Jay understands fully what he walked into. 

A moment of silence, for him. 

Slow claps echo through the auditorium, large, controlled cupped sounds that send chills of morbidity down Jay’s spine. They expected him to die. They thought he was dead. 

The almost insincere clap isn’t echoed by any of the students. They sit there and watch Jay. They wait until the claps die out. 

“It seems we have an unexpected guest,” warms the dean, a shrewd smile adorning his features, “Welcome back, Park Jongseong.” 

Back.

It feels like a decree, like a bong sounds through the room at the drop of his name. The energy in the room shifts, it gets heavier, more subtle, like the quieter it got, the louder Jay would hear the ticking. The ticking to the bomb Jay no doubt feels about to go off. 

Back.

Jay drops his foot, thumbing at the bottom of his grey sweatshirt all the while as he straightens his back and bows down into a respectable 90 degrees. 

“Pleasure.” Stays wilting on the length of his tongue to never be said because someone chokes. Another sniffs. Jay hears a whisper. 

“Why?” 

It’s small, miniscule, a little broken, but in this realm of silence and enclosure, she’s mic’d up, a boom box attached to her vocal cords as she looks at him frantically. Jay’s eyes don’t have to fight to find her, her voice is clear, soft, a string wrapped with barb that easily pulls him to the right. She’s in the bottom split of seats; shaking and messy, with soured blonde hair and balled up fists, but when Jay moves to see better, when his eyes readjust, the light from the candles grace her face and unshields the glossy paint peeling from her eyes. 

“Why do you get to live?” She whispers again, shaking her head, elongated nails digging into her palms. 

She steps out into the aisle and like this they're facing each other. She puts herself directly in his path. Jay from up top the staircase on the top split, and her maybe twenty or thirty stairs down, feet spread apart and knees slightly bent. 

Jay understands her posture, knows what she wants, but he stays unresponsive, daring, and she takes it.  

His eyes squint through the darkness as she takes a step up. 

“Everyone,” she says.

“Everyone dies! Why do you get to live?!” She screams and Jay has to cover his ears. Her voice is shrill, and this damn quiet, this damn echo, intensifies how the sound tears through her throat. He can feel the desperation and anger that’s leaking from every pore of her body: her blood, her tears, her voice that’s shredding his eardrums, and all Jay wants to do his roll his fucking eyes. 

“My sister died because of it. Heeseung killed her! She was the best out of our pack: she was the strongest, she was everything to me! We…we were all going to graduate.” She stammers and voice tilts out into a whine, her hands shaking harder with every word, “and in two months we would have been out, two months, we would have been free and she’s taken from me within a day—two fucking hours!” 

Her eyes water as they flit around the room, they probably ripple down her cheeks, but Jay knows for certain that they harden, that they glow bright like a beacon when they find Jay subtly hiding his yawn.

She takes another two steps up, her laugh coming out like aborted breaths, “And you’re telling me he survives forty eight. Him? He’s a fucking blank.” She growls. 

Then silence fills the room again, quiet all but in movement as the student body reacts. Some of them nod, they agree with her, but more than that, they shift to look at Jay. It’s his turn to talk. 

Oh, amazing, he thinks. 

Jay sucks in a breath and rolls his shoulders back as he thinks.

What does he say to her? He’s not obligated to say anything, and in all honesty he doesn’t give a fuck anymore. The last two weeks have been hell and back: he’s been on the brink of death more times than he cared to count, he’d been tricked and used, his body and mind put through the ringer time and time again.

He has no fucking sympathy for these people. For the people who oggled him just days before, then stood to the side to watch him die like a fun party trick. They were holding a fucking moment of silence for him just seconds before this, and what, he’s supposed to be sentimental? He’s supposed to coddle a grown ass woman he doesn’t know because her sister died while Jay’s still here getting over the last remnants of whatever illness Heeseung gave him? 

Fuck all of that. Fuck her. Fuck Heeseung. 

The anger builds within him slowly, like lava oozing out onto the terrain. He’s livid. His tongue is cocked back like a gun waiting to be popped, but Jay settles his mind, reminding himself of everything his mother ever taught him. 

Manners, Jongseong, always. 

 

“Bite me.” 

 

He can tell it shocks the crowd, can hear their collective inhale at his discretion. Yea, the word choice was horrible, but did Jay stay polite? Yes, and honestly that’s all his mother could ask for of him at this moment. He could’ve done worse. He could've said fuck your sister and everyone she knows: but, maybe that part doesn’t come across, maybe they think Jay couldn't do worse. 

Her shoulders hunch, the beginning of bones snapping sounds like small bombs going off. 

She growls hard at him as she shifts, but her threat is overcome by something larger, something greater. The sound of it vibrates under their toes and shakes their brains until it feels like the whole auditorium is jolting with them.

It doesn’t, of course, but the magnitude is great, its impact no different from the rumble of an earthquake. Jay’s shoulders jump slightly, the bone softly touching the bottom of his ears before he forces them back down. Jay should be feeling it the most, the sound is coming from somewhere behind him.

Somewhere just beyond those doors, but when he looks out he sees the lot of students shrunk in their seats, shaking, hiding, heads back down, and a drawn out whining coming from the girl opposing him. She’s cupping her ears as she falls to her knees, shifting stopped, and somehow Jay doesn’t feel scared. 

Not like the other times, and maybe he should credit his adaptability, say that he’s gotten used to it by now, but that’s not the truth; the truth is, he’s not shaking and fighting for breath because somehow Jay knows it's not directed at him. 

For once. 

The sound gets closer until Jay can feel it in his heart, vibrating around it and down his body. He didn’t hear the door open, supposes none of them really could. Not with the growl as deep and fusing as a bass when you stand too close to the speakers flooding through the auditorium in a tsunami. 

Jay shivers when he feels the presence just behind him. A small jolt that feels more like a rejection, like his body was already trying to deploy. 

Then the growl rumbles out, tapering away into a calm breathing that hits the back of Jay’s head; it’s warm, it travels down to his nape, and his goosebumps take it all the way down his spine. The world stops, it sits back in silence for Heeseung as he steps around Jay, his oxfords tapping against the stone diamonds the only sound that gets to penetrate through, and the deep clicks feel edging, provoking as Jay is circled.

No one is looking at them. Not this time, only a crowd of shut eyes and hidden bodies folding into the dark. 

And Heeseung rounds him. His shoulders brush against his shoulder blades and Jay can hear him breathing around his neck so clearly, his brain misinterprets them for touching. His skin pricks, the small hairs on his arm reacting and reaching out for Heeseung.

He feels them tense with each step, with each brush of wind Heeseung creates, but they don’t hurt. They itch and by time Heeseung is facing him, with their chests breathing a foot apart and their faces even less, Jay’s balling the fabric of his pants together in his pockets. 

Heeseung is hidden even like this, with their chests a step away from colliding, and Jay’s fried pieces of hair caressing under his chin. It’s dark, but Jay can feel everything about him, his power, the tension, the hum that Heeseung purrs into him. It nuzzles against the itch in his skin, pushing it deeper down, pressing into him, and Jay’s breath falters.

It’s loosening something, loosening his hands around his pockets, suppressing the shiver running up his spine and Jay flinches from the feeling, takes half a step back and Heeseung follows, never letting Jay change the distance, to get away from deep and aged wine eyes.

“Seems like Ni-ki was right.” Heeseung says quietly through the hum and he comes closer, connecting their chests, bending down to whisper into his closed nip, and the praise befalls Jay like a gentle breeze, “Good job, bell.” 

And the air settles out of him in a pant, his heart is beating, his hands tensing to the pump, and Jay feels a little light for his weight.

The pressure in his head is heavier, thicker: almost worse now that Heeseung is this close, and Jay is just so tired. He doesn’t want to fight, not now, not yet. So when Heeseung dips his head down and Jay can feel his mouth’s heat warm up his neck, Jay stops him. He throws his arm up against his chest and presses him back, but Heeseung doesn’t move, doesn’t allow himself to be pushed.

He’s a solid rock that Jay’s recovering body has no motivation to shove, but Heeseung stops his descent anyway. He lingers. He lifts his head slowly and lets Jay feel every inch of his skin when his cheek slides against his. 

Heeseung is soft, his skin almost soothing to the pressure in his head, a silk wrap that covers his skin, slinks around both of them in soft attention, and Jay can feel his eyes flutter at it.

The gasp strangling in his throat when Heeseung’s nose runs down from his cheekbone, along the outline of his lips, and Jay feels lost, lost under the blankets of darkness wrapping their bodies, under the false comfort of the pressure being gone, under his eyelids that he retches open when he finally realizes that they’ve been closed, and that Heeseung has pulled away: but, he isn’t far. Heeseung is never too far, he’s breathing against his mouth, his exhales warming his cupid’s bow, and Jay’s gaze flickers up, up to Heeseung, Jay's eyes round with exhaustion and his mouth parting as he takes his breaths from Heeseung directly. 

Jay is waiting for the fight, for the prodding questions, and rough hands, but they never come. The candle flames flicker from either side of them and Jay can see their wavering flames in the reflection of Heeseung’s eyes, and the rest of his pack that guard behind his back. Their presence, ever constant and steady. 

Heeseung’s head bobs and his eyes travel down to where they’re breathing against each other, where Jay is inhaling for his every exhale, and Jay feels a match light when Heeseung growls again, closer, darker, for him. Jay’s hand fists into Heeseung’s shirt in surprise. It’s not like before, the loud boom that washes out a colony, but it's not quite a purr, either.

It’s a low, lurking sound, one that picks up Jay’s heart rate and gets him breathing irregularly—short puffs that hesitate in his throat: nervous but he's not scared. This doesn’t feel like fear. His eyes blink back and forth from the sound in Heeseung’s chest and the eyes that have locked in on him. He doesn’t—he doesn’t understand. 

It's weird, that’s all he can think to describe it. The sound ruffles at him, licking and vibrating his pores to get below his skin. It sinks into him like it's trying to speak to him, but Jay doesn’t understand what it means, what Heeseung is telling him with it, but Heeseung tries to come closer, tries, but Jay presses his arm into him further, halting whatever it is Heeseung is fixated on, on whatever he’s wanting, and the pressure seems to work, seems to remind Heeseung that there is indeed something in his way. 

His eyes flit back down to where Jay’s holding him, where his shirt is still bundled in Jay’s hands, tense, maybe a little shaken, and slowly, like it never mattered, his hand comes up around his wrist. Probably to pull it off, to then push forward, but Jay’s too hard-wired, too sensitive from the memories of those fingers crushing his body and wrapping around his throat that he spits, “Don’t touch me.” 

Jay glares at him, even through the confusion and the sudden spark of panic, and Heeseung’s eyes come back up, they wrap around Jay’s irises and claim his entire gaze for himself, but his hand stops from around Jay’s wrist, remaining encircled but not closed on top of his skin.

Listening, yielding, but still in charge.

Heeseung smiles, nods for Jay, and Jay has to stop his head from mimicking it. His heart is still going ragged in his chest because it can't be over. This doesn't feel like it's over, but Heeseung pulls away completely, leaving Jay like a portrait on the wall as his pack comes from around him, and joins the man in walking down the stairs to the bottom split. 

None of them look back and Jay doesn’t stay idle long enough to make sure. He makes his way to Yihwa on the top split and promptly sits in between her and Chloe. The red head grumbles something under breath and he can feel Yihwa’s hands clasp around his, lettering etching into his skin: I’m glad you’re here. 

Jay gives her a small smile, taps her hands, and she releases him. Sinking into the seat, Jay for once thanks the darkness that surrounds them. He sinks into it, calming his mind, relaxing his body that is still thrumming lightly.

The assembly doesn’t start until Heeseung has sat down. 

“High spirits, students.” The dean speaks, “Why don’t we get into the announcements now that we have everyone.” 

He nods with his words, a small, curt motion that hides the tilted smirk he’s suppressing, but Jay sees it, can hear it in the funny lilt in his usually cold, hardened tone. 

Jay’s heart beats with the strums of the dean’s fingers on the podium. 

Three rotating taps for every three bloody pumps from his heart. 

When the dean opens his mouth again, his fangs sink past his slips, shiny and white, “As I’m sure most of you are aware our beloved White Week is coming to close. I know, I know, it’s sickening to see it come to an end,”—No one groaned. Honestly, the students were still barely breathing—“but, when one chapter closes, another one begins. With the Forests!” 

This time,  the crowd claps, an overwhelming wave crashing and clacks that shakes Jay’s shoulders. A couple of thin whistles split through the air as well, and it’s all he can do to spare a glance over to Yihwa, to ask, to question, to get another confused look back, but she’s too focused in to pay attention to Jay, green shoots sparkling in her eyes as she presses her lips together. 

The dean makes another two taps on the podium—a sign: a signal that cuts all the applause in the room within seconds. 

“This month it will take place over the course of three days: from Saturday to Monday you will be with your finalized packs and if luck has you like it has the past few years, you will meet this month’s kill count…250.” 

There's a collective gasp, one that Jay partakes in fully. 

The dean simply smiles, a long stretch of pale skin, “Don’t worry, my students. There will be enough to go round. Our pride is in our stock. It’s a little high, but surely you all can handle it. Why, we have such a good batch this month round. I’m excited to see what it produces.” His eyes course over the student body, meeting eyes, stroking over shivers, absorbing the whispered curses and gasps. 

His eyes meet Jay’s, and another few taps are delivering into the wood of the podium, like a heartbeat. 

“However, we have a lone wolf this month.” He smiles, “Naturally the rules may adjust accordingly. The 250 kill count is the collective goal of all participating packs: you meet the goal, each pack graduates a level.” 

The dean’s head tilts, a little snap that could’ve killed him if he were alive. 

“But that's too easy, isn’t it? A lone wolf, despite their personal kills, gets to soak in the glory of others who have killed more and still levels with the rest? No, doesn’t seem right, does it? Park Jongseong will have his own kill count set: one that if reached will be— without question— a testament to his capabilities, a showing of why he should be allowed to be alive, to be packless.”

The dean hums, faking calculations in head for show. 

“What should it be, my students? If each pack has up to seven members on average and each member of that pack racks in an average of 2 to 3 kills. Then…” He sighs, sour eyes decaying the room around them, seizing every moment of silence, and putting it to rest at Jay’s feet. 

“Jongseong needs to kill an average of 14–21 ferals to meet the status of one pack alone.” 

His mouth drops at the number and Yihwa’s hand wraps tightly around him again. Chloe is muffling a gaffle to his side and Jay just…well he fucking accepts it, what else is there to do? He’s never killed that many before in a go, never counted honestly. The city was full of them, ransacked, but that didn’t mean Jay went out looking for them. No, living in the city meant surviving: learning the hotspots, sharpening your skills in silence, and then when you run into one, you strike first.

He’s probably killed that many within a week, but a time limit was foreign to him. Not to mention, he didn’t know what kind of ferals he was up against in the forest.

Fuck Jay’s never even been in a forest. 

The dean nods to himself, smiling as bright as the day Jay barely got to experience as the crowd hoots for him, and he leans back, utterly delighted. Fucking vampires and their games.

“Now, that sounds good.” He gravels into the mic, then he sucks his teeth.

“Onto lighter matters, it is Thursday, which means tomorrow will be the Ball & Banquet. So, my dear students, please use the rest of today, and the morning after to prepare yourselves diligently. No classes will be held for the rest of the day and tomorrow. I suggest using this time to get your last health checks,” —He looks at Jay— “and prepare your weapons, clothes, whatever essentials you require for the Forest. Remember you will be there for three whole days, unless the kill count is reached earlier.” 

The dean flips through a sheet Jay cannot see, but he hears the rustle of it as it’s turned between his hands. 

“Ah right,” the dean snaps and just like that, papers fall down from the ceiling, small slips that the students grab out of habit, but Jay’s is already hitting his lap by time he catches on, by time he even truly sees the damn thing.

 “Please list the names of your finalized pack on your slip, along with everyone’s rank and year. There is a list you have to make before you are allowed into the banquet, so please write with care and precision. These will be how our butlers know you are meant to be there. You may be dismissed as soon as the paper dissipates.” 

Yihwa hands him her pen and uses her magic instead to engrave the paper; it automatically dissolves in her hands once she’s done. 

“Thanks.” He mumbles, etching in his own information before capping the pen. His paper, too, shrivels in on itself, folding continuously until it zaps into nothing. 

Together, he and Yihwa stand up from their seats and start filing out with the rest, her hand holding the corner of his shirt to keep him close amidst the crowd. 

Yihwa and him eat lunch out by the hills. Jay had thought it was only open to them on weekends, but considering the class cancellations, along with the monthly hunt taking place over their only free days, he assumes this was an exception to that rule. Yihwa had made sandwiches and for the most part they simply ate in silence: a comfortable one, one that was very much needed for the both of them. 

Jay had a lot happening, a lot still left to conquer, and Yihwa, bless her heart, worried for his well being well beyond an Advisor. She was his friend, a good one, and he was grateful for her. 

Eventually, they part: Yihwa to Chloe’s pack to discuss their “agreement” and Jay over to the nursery bay, back to Beomgyu, who was spinning his chair when he opened the door. 

“Fancy seeing you, what brings?” Beomgyu says sweetly and it's a fad, a blatant sugar coating because he knows. He pulls out his notebook and prepares his cleaning supplies. 

“Check up,” Jay says and sighs. 

“Tell me.” 

“Fever, all night. Broke just this morning. It feels like a light cold right now, but there’s this damn buzzing in my head. It never lifts.” 

Beomgyu is nodding to himself, jotting down the notes between his thoughts. 

“But otherwise?” 

“I feel fine.” 

Beomgyu laughs, his head throwing itself back like it has no concern for his vertebrates. When he meets his eyes again, Beomgyu peels back the bandage he had placed the other day. 

“Fucking perfect. I told you.” He whispers in awe—of Jay, of himself, of the nip wound that has finally closed, Jay hasn’t a clue. 

Beomgyu’s fingers press around it, palpate the skin that was raised and red hours ago to feel for any abnormalities, any inflammation, but there’s none. The surface of Jay’s skin is smooth so he sets the bandages back into the kit, unused, and takes a couple of minutes to get a sample of Jay’s blood. Beomgyu moves fast, efficiently, and the small syringe fills up quickly, pooling faster when Jay’s eyes land on it. Then he’s bandaged up with a small cotton ball pressed to his skin and a strawberry bandaid laid on top. 

“I’ll clear you for the Forests.” Beomgyu says and Jay scoffs, dusting off his pants as he stands up. 

“What do you mean?” 

“There’s no scent gland,” Beomgyu starts, swishing his coat as he circles the desk, “means you won’t present. You’re still…you, so to speak? If you had grown one, that’s usually the first sign of a shift. To put it simply, scent gland, heightened senses, well-placed pheromones and coercion, presentation. Get it?” 

He doesn’t give Jay a chance.

“Good.” Beomgyu says without pause, “students on the verge of a presentation are disqualified from Forests. You’re clear.” 

Beomgyu smiles with finality, like he’s answered all the questions Jay had.

The eyeroll begins before he can even think to stop it and Jay turns on his heel to leave. 

“Wait!” 

Beomgyu slides up next to him, his shoulder brushing his, and holds out something small, pressing into his hand. 

“A notebook. Record every symptom, every ache, even if you think it is nothing or from your fights. Write it all in here.” 

Jay squints, but takes it anyway, nodding. 

“Anything else?” he groans. 

Beomgyu pokes his tongue into his cheek and his eyes light up dangerously, “I’m working on something. I’ll see you at the ball.” 

 

Sunoo is there as soon as he shuts the door. 

“Ohh!” Jay startles, almost flinching back into the door if it weren’t for the hand Sunoo slides against his hip. Sunoo’s eyes are electric, a crashing wave of blue that steels Jay’s heart, has him going stock still as he waits. 

“What—” 

The blue bleeds out to brown. 

“You were bleeding.” Sunoo states, eyes flicking down his body, then to his arm. 

Blood really does travel, “Yea,” Jay sighs, tapping Sunoo’s shoulder, “it’s no big deal, just a checkup. I’m cleared for Forests.” 

Jay nods into the silence and Sunoo just watches him, no ounce of emotion betraying him as  thoughts run through his head: but, he nods at Jay eventually, moves away from his space so they can walk down the hall and Jay doesn’t question it, doesn’t feel the need to.

 He doesn’t know where they’re headed, and with each step, he honestly isn’t even sure who’s leading who. 

A smile crosses his face and he shakes his head at the amusement of it all. They had no destination, no discussed appointment, and yet they came together to walk around aimlessly, following only each other rather than any plan. 

When Jay stops, Sunoo stops and when Sunoo detects that Jay has nothing to say, he walks on and Jay follows. 

They do that for a while, push and pull, stop and start until they're nearing far too close to the Far East dorms. So, Jay pulls on Sunoo’s sleeve, and the boy stops, keeps his arm hanging between them as he side-steps to face Jay. His head tilts as he looks at Jay, confused, expecting, telling him he better have something to say this time before he walks again. 

Jay smiles at that, at the familiarity that’s grown between them, that despite how mysterious and detached Sunoo may look at times, Jay can still read him. 

“Let’s go back to my dorm.” He says, “I’ve been meaning to return your clothes.” 

Jay tugs at the sleeve still within his fingertips, trying and failing to pull Sunoo to him. It’s weird, a break in their routine, in their unspoken self-made choreography that they’ve been dancing to throughout the school. Sunoo remains still, unmoved. 

He blinks. 

“What clothes, Jay?” His voice isn’t quiet, it’s an appropriate tempo and speed for their distance, for the fact that they're inside, but it feels slow in Jay’s ears, like a track vinyl put on rewind. 

It’s so disturbing that Jay has to sneak a look around them. The hallway feels still, their shadows frozen into the marble flooring like they were merely graffiti, and the sunlight that managed to pass through the windows, felt cold, still, a picture of reality that could not move, that could not be shielded by the form of a moving cloud. 

But there’s people outside moving, Jay can hear them still, far off and distant, but alive and interacting. 

Sunoo’s eyebrow lifts at him and Jay releases his sleeve, smoothing his palm against his pants.

“Uh sorry,” He fumbles, “I mean—back when I was in the nursery, my clothes were changed: uh, a white shirt, sweatpants. Yihwa said it wasn’t her’s so.” 

Jay peeks up at Sunoo, his eyes having been on his shadow that remained still despite him palming his pants. 

Sunoo nods, smiling at him and Jay sees his shadow finally mirror him back. 

“Are you inviting me?” 

Jay’s heart flips in his chest at the change in atmosphere, the sudden heat he feels from the sunlight moving to shine over his eyes. 

He shivers, releases a half chuckle, and nods, blocking the light with his hand. 

“Yea, of course.” 

Sunoo’s smile slowly diminishes as he steps next to Jay, “Take me.” 

 

And they go. The choreography solely led by him and Jay doesn’t stop once. Sunoo doesn’t either, he keeps toe to toe with him, breathing as he breathes, slowing when he slows, yet Sunoo is the one that opens Jay’s door, who walks right in like there’s no barrier, no pleasantry of waiting for the owner to enter first. 

Jay just playfully rolls his eyes at him, chuckles when Sunoo smacks his shoulder with just as much jest. 

“Here.” Jay starts, bundling the clothes that had been cleaned and pressed into perfect squares on the side of his dresser for days. He holds them out to Sunoo, but Sunoo shakes his head at him and drops onto his bed. 

“Forget it. They’re not mine.” He says whimsically, looking around the room, eyeing the dip and curves grounded into the ceiling. He sits there, swinging his legs minimally as the sun slowly darkens against Jay’s window. The shadow it casts from behind Jay hides his own expression: the head tilt, the slight jump of surprise and confusion his eyebrows do when Jay actually internalizes what Sunoo just said. 

“Then why…” Jay begins, but Sunoo's smile comes back. He pats the space next to him and Jay forgets about it. Well, not quite forgets, but he figures it doesn’t matter, that Sunoo just wanted to hang out regardless. Plus, Yihwa has been here many times—mornings, nights. It was only a matter of time before the boy joined in as well. 

They talk for a long time, maybe a few hours and Sunoo sits there, entertained and patient as Jay runs his mouth, absolutely spoils the boy with all his best stories: how he ended up the in a trunk hiding from a group of ferals, about his greatest supply runs, his near encounters with death. Sunoo listens to them all, without judgment, without annoyance. 

“How do you kill vampires?” Jay asks and it comes out just as random as it had entered his own head, even Sunoo chuckles against the wall, turns his shoulder to look over at him with a long blink. 

“Excuse me, Jongseong?” 

Jay’s heart spikes and his hands are already coming up to freak, “No, no! Not like you or anything! My god!” 

Sunoo laughs at him full bodily and Jay’s too busy running his mouth in panic still to realize he’s grabbed onto Jay’s pillow; no, he only feels the impact of plush and cotton slap against his head. 

“Okay shut up, I’ll start to feel bad.” Sunoo jokes and Jay calms with how Sunoo’s eyes roll. 

“Many ways,” Sunoo speaks, straightening his posture out and moving over so Jay and him are both crisscrossed on the bed, facing each other. “And each way working depends on the century the vampire was turned. Steaks and sunlight, more primitive, happened during the pilgrimage age. They’re dead by now, most of them anyway; they were too weak, but they turned a lot. The next generation was stronger, sunlight wasn’t enough anymore.”

“They evolved?” Jay inputs, and Sunoo knocks their knees together softly as he nods. 

“Yes, but they were also messy. Because there were so many of them, order was hard to keep. A lot didn’t grow out of their feral phase—we call them fledglings, babies that haven’t learned to control their blood lust. Usually their sire would teach them, raise them, but with how easy the first vampires died, many grew up without a mentor, and others who did, didn’t get to learn far enough to teach others, to even understand the point of it.” 

Sunoo paused, his eyes looking out at the sky behind Jay before coming back to their bubble. 

“Histeria. Do you know what that is?” Sunoo asks. 

“Disorder, chaos. It’s like this uncontrollable fear or excitement.” Jay says and Sunoo nods. 

“Attacks were at an all time high, humans were going to be extinct by the following full moon. And so, histeria broke loose, humans banded together, they formed groups, cliques, hierarchies, they became and birthed hunters. They were gruesome, but extremely creative. They didn’t know about the sunlight thing, it had become a myth, but that wasn’t their style anyway. They decapitated and burned the bodies.” 

Sunoo leaned in, eyelashes batting at him, “and some of them went further. They started spreading rumors to cover up their own devilishness. They said those two alone aren’t enough, that we’d rise again the following dusk. No, what they had to do was cut out our hearts, rip off our heads, burn the body, the heart, and head separately until the ashes were so thick and dark, they resembled the horse shit on their farms.” 

Jay’s mouth dropped and goosebumps tracked all up and down his arms. 

“What the fuck?” Jay cursed beneath his breath and Sunoo’s lips quirked up. 

“Most of the fledglings from that time died, only a select few having still lived. The ones who ended up surviving mainly were the half-taught vampires. They went into hiding, raising a generation of secrecy. They’d only come out at specific times and they only ate when it was dire.” 

Jay nods, leaning in further, “But what about the hunters, did they not chase them?” 

Sunoo taps his fingers along his knee cap and hums, “Mm, they did. Some found them, most didn’t and eventually vampires became a scary story, a small worry in the back of your mind when you walk home alone. These vampires weren’t killed differently, but there were new ways of guarding. The most suspicious lined their houses with garlic, while the religious decked their halls with holy water. It kept them away, the vampires then were so used to hiding, used to starving to just the brink of death, that those things felt like poison to their weak systems.” 

Sunoo looks back out the window and shakes the hair from his face. 

“What, what do you see?” Jay mumbles, turning himself around to look out the window, but Sunoo grabs his shoulders and shifts him back, shaking his head. 

“No, nothing, but night has come and you haven’t eaten. I cannot continue to bore you with a history lesson—”

“It’s not bori—” 

“Jay, you have to eat. It’s almost nine.” Sunoo chuckles, lifting himself up and sliding his shoes back on. 

Jay groans. Fuck, he had to cook again. 

“Ugh fine, but what about now?” Jay says, sliding into his shoes as well. “What kills one now?” 

Sunoo smiles, fondling the door handle as Jay approaches, his knives tucking into his pockets easily. 

“It takes a lot nowadays,” Sunoo opens the door, “sometimes the vampire council handles it: eternal torture, mixed methods to see how the body deteriorates, or direct deaths depending on the vampire’s birth. But if it's not the council, then usually the quickest way is through the bite of a werewolf. There’s no cure for one, it’s a certified death for every kind of vampire. Werewolves are still relatively new, our bodies have no way of fighting it.” 

They’re standing in the hallway as Jay locks his door, the beginnings of a moon start to apparate in the sky. 

Jay nods, “One more question, last one I promise.” 

Sunoo smiles, nods at him to continue. 

“Do you have a pack—or eh, a coven? It’s just that sometimes I don’t see you when you’re not with me.” 

The smile doesn’t break, it doesn’t twitch, it remains constant, smooth, reassuring. 

“No,” Sunoo chuckles, “no coven. Why, trying to recruit me?” 

It’s a tease, a large poke in Jay’s side that is verbal, rather than physical. Jay balks, the laugh falling from his lips in gallons. 

“You know damn well I’m not.” Jay hisses, lightly pushing Sunoo away from him. 

Sunoo just bobs his head with his amusement, “Sure, whatever you say, Park Jongseong, but just so you know, asking me on the last day of White Week is really unattractive.” 

And then he’s gone, a wind blowing Jay’s hair back as the boy walks—runs?—at a speed Jay could never get to in his life. The smile doesn’t leave his face even by the time he reaches the elevator, he can still see himself chuckling in the reflection of the panel. 

A pack with Sunoo? Jay shook his head, even if his heart softened at the thought. Suddenly Yihwa was flashing through his head too, all the times all three of them sat and ate breakfast together, dinner. The times they were by his side when he was hurt and sick.

Jay didn’t want a pack. He didn’t want a presentation, or the rules and hierarchy that came with everything combined. He didn’t want the power imbalance that had hurt his mother, had forced her to run away with a newborn and raise him in solitude. Packs weren’t for him, his mother knew they weren’t meant for him. Yihwa was in an order of her own and Chloe, a pack, and together they had an agreeance. 

Sunoo was his other friend, a thing he never thought he’d have, let alone accept and he was packless too. It would remain that way for Jay, and Sunoo might decide to join a coven in the future. Jay would congratulate him despite their differences and act like the thought never crossed his mind, that the feeling in his chest that was melting like marshmallows over a fire never occurred.

The thought that: somehow, the idea of them fighting together wasn’t so bad. 

 

This time when Jay flicks the lights on, the one flickering light is fixed: nothing, but a consistent corn yellow dim washing the room. The tone of it is deep, makes the stark white and black diamond tiled floors look like old parchment, and the whole room feels like Fall, like it’s been steeped in cider and the pigment of orange leaves, even though Jay’s walks around professional blue steel and silver appliances. A double stove with connecting counters are centered in the room, a sleek all-in-one build that lines the middle.

Large silver range hoods hang above it from the ceiling, and Jay steps quietly over to the massive fridge in the corner of the kitchen, swiftly and easily pulling out his ingredients and setting them aside on the counters that line the walls. There’s a sink close by too, everything perfectly measured to be in appropriate, efficient distance from one another, and Jay only has to slide his meat over the counter to drop it into the running water. 

He washes the meat, takes his time to rub his fingers along the fat and kneed his thumbs into its elastic flesh. Blood runs over his nails, and the smell of meat stains into his fingertips, even when he begins dabbing the meat dry with clean paper towels. When he determines them dry enough, he washes his own hands, slides the slab onto a wooden board, and sets it by the stove, close to his seasonings. 

The process is calming, mixing his seasonings together and letting them soak into his meat while he butters a warm pan; then, the frying sizzles, cracking fireworks in his ears as he flips the steak continuously to keep the sear even. 

The lights make his skin even more honeyed, a pretty drizzle of caramel coating his skin, infusing him into the deep warmth of the room. He’s comfortable, calm, feels at ease in the familiarity of the act; this is by far the best setting he has ever cooked in, and the options for taste were even more boundless.

He got to play around, try new things, mix oils because he liked their scents, or simply because macadamia nut oil sounded exquisite. It was like mixing potions, at least, from Yihwa’s complaining of the class, that’s what it seems like. 

What he means to say is, it’s easy. It’s easy to get lost in the motions, the flipping, and hiss and crack of the oil and butter; so easy, Jay misses it. The slight flicker of the entry light by the door, the way it cuts back on, but never fully brightens to its previous setting.

No, Jay only feels a slight draft crawl up his arms when he places his steak on the freshly cleaned wooden board to rest. It’s not done yet, possibly another five minutes, but Jay still has vegetables to cut. 

Tap.  

Jay’s shoulders freeze. He stays staring at his cooling steak until the adrenaline shooting into his heart and weakening his knees drools out. 

Sunghoon is back and his hair is down, feathering into his eyes. The lights make him look a little sallow with how pale Jay knows him to be, his seafoam eyes softened with the yellow. He’s not breathing, he can tell. His chest doesn’t rise, his body stays still, but unlike before it is not strict, uptight or wound.

His shoulders slouch, barely, but Jay notices it. His edge is softer tonight, that lurking danger that’s always pressed just below the surface of his skin. Jay can feel it in the atmosphere, feel it in the way he doesn’t bother to even look for his daggers somewhere on a far counter, sees it in the way Sunghoon gets closer just to watch him cut into green beans. 

Jay does it slowly and for the life of him he doesn’t want to admit to the reason why: that he wants to let Sunghoon see every cut, every way Jay’s hands move in accordance to his knife. 

Some vampires were never taught, some were stuck. Jay’s eyes flickered up multiple times during the process, just to watch Sunghoon. Was he from that generation? What was his story? Did Heeseung find him like this, or was he forced? The thoughts purge his instincts to run, to pose a threat.

Sunghoon’s hair looks lighter. The dark sediment made a softer, deep brown, and Jay’s not sure if it's that, if it’s the history lesson Sunoo gave him, or the way Sunghoon’s eyes track his movements subtly with such apt attention, it's like a child seeing something fly, that gets him to loosen his guard, that gets him to mime his hands cupping together until Sunghoon mirrors him. He holds the laugh in his chest, along with the coo, when Sunghoon simply stares at his cupped palms, watching them just as intently. 

Jay bites the smile away with his teeth and gathers the chopped vegetables together, and gently, one by one, pours them into Sunghoon’s hands. The vampire's eyes squint at the feeling, and Jay can see the way both of his arms begin to flex, and Jay actually lets his laugh slip. 

“You won’t drop them,” Jay giggles, two fingers on the vampire’s wrist guiding him towards a separate smaller pan. 

“Here, let them go.” Jay instructs once he’s properly gotten Sunghoon’s hands over the pan, but Sunghoon is still staring, at the vegetables that curl and poke at his thumbs, then at the pan that  is no doubt warming his cold skin, then at Jay, blinking. 

Jay nods, waits for him to do it himself, and it takes a couple of minutes because Jay doesn’t push him, doesn’t put his hands over his and separate them himself. He waits patiently and in the end all it takes is for Jay to put his steak back in the pan for Sunghoon to finally place them down; and he does it gently, one by one, in the same fashion Jay had poured them into his hands. 

“Good job, Sunghoon.” Jay compliments above the sizzling, his left arm reaching out to adjust the temperature before moving to season the vegetables. 

Sunghoon stands back at first, peering over Jay’s shoulder so close the frost of his skin spreads through Jay’s clothes, but eventually, when Jay’s busy moving between both pans, he moves. He sits at the island on the other side of the stoves and watches Jay there. 

It’s fine, maybe even nice. Sunghoon doesn’t speak and Jay gets soaked back into the noises of the kitchen. Everything is fine, it is, there’s just this buzzing in his head, that same one that’s been there all day, pestering him, budging at his brainy walls. It almost feels like it's getting worse even though there’s no pain with it, but it all feels too much still; the heat from his pans, even though he's turned them off, starts to get to him, makes him feel slightly sick all over again.

He knows his hairline is sweaty from the steam and as he starts slicing into the steak, all plans to share a few pieces with the boy on the other side, his head starts to feel dizzy. The room blurs and sharpens sporadically and his movements with the knife are getting hard to see, hard to visualize when one second he sees it and the next black dots are censoring his vision. 

He thinks Sunghoon can sense it—the change, see the way Jay’s cutting has slowed because Jay hears the creak of the chair, and when the dots uncover his eyes for a split second, he sees Sunghoon staring at him, stone faced, but intently, confused: but, so is Jay.

He's not presenting, he knows that. It’s the only thing that keeps him from panicking. Beomgyu had called it venom, people didn’t survive 48 hours, this was probably just another symptom, the last hurrah before Jay’s completely defeated it. 

It’s fine, he tells himself. He hasn’t eaten in a while and his body needs constant nutrition to fight off viruses as it depletes every reservoir to kill whatever venom is still circulating through his veins. Jay reminds himself of this, reassures himself and carefully places the knife, using his fingers to feel around when the dots come back to ensure it’s in the right place. 

Then, he bears down and cuts. 

“Uh!” Jay gasps, throwing his head back as the knife clatters against the steel counter. Curses fly out his mouth at the speed of light, but not faster, not faster than the blood that decorates his vision next to the black, the seafoam that darkens into seaweed once his blood starts pumping out his finger and down his arm in rivulets.

It’s a bloody web around his arm, dripping off the edge of his elbows, and splattering over his white shirt and the parchment tiles, rewriting his night, rewriting the atmosphere he had created. 

Sunghoon’s tensing all over, arms flexing so hard Jay can see the veins protruding out, like miniature vines hidden within his skin that wanted to sprout out and wrap around Jay’s entire being, squeeze him, bring him forth. The island dents and wheezes underneath Sunghoon’s grip and Jay’s eyes gloss over, at the pain, at the way he can see that tinge of red in Sunghoon’s pupils beat like the warning lights of a patrol car, at the fact that Jay can tell Sunghoon’s trying. 

“S-Sunghoon, it’s—” Jay stutters, fumbling around, grabbing a dry rag and wrapping it around his hand and wrist. The dizziness is subsiding, the pressure in his head lightening now that his body has a whole other focus, a whole other life or death situation. 

“Don’t get bit, Jay. He doesn’t stop.” 

Jungwon. 

Jay jolts, his breath catching and the island corner snaps off. Then Sunghoon is there, thick chest pressed into his, breathing into his hair, pushing him, crowding him back. 

“Sunghoon.” Nothing is moving in those eyes, they don’t blink, they don’t recognize him, they don’t need to, he’s bleeding for him. Sunghoon steps forward and his chest shifts against Jay’s collarbones, pressing him into the counters until the silver handles are digging into his lower back, until Jay can be pushed no further. 

He unwraps the rag slowly, letting its wetness drag along Jay’s skin, coat him better, coat him fully. His whole hand is glazed in red, its thinness streaking down his arm.

He has to to do something, has to stop—

Jay gasps out, his lips curving around the noise and Sunghoon’s lips, plump, and cold skid along his fingernail. He’s painting his lips, waiting, wanting for Jay’s blood to pour out over him, coat his seams, his pores, his chin, and when it does Sunghoon breathes warm air out onto his finger. A sharp heat. His first breath. 

“Sunghoon, no that’s—” Jay whimpers out the sentence but it becomes nothing but noises and mush. 

Plush, soft, wet: Sunghoon’s mouth opens around his fingers, the walls of his mouth, spongy and warm as it envelopes Jay entirely, sucking gently around his knuckles, sliding up and down his lengths of his fingers with the help of his tongue, eating the blood off his skin. 

His left hand comes up, but it’s quickly engulfed in a fist and gently pressed back onto the counter, Sunghoon’s hand frosty and tense around Jay’s own. He slides closer, until Jay’s face is tucked into his neck, and Jay shivers against it when he feels that tongue dip in between his fingers. 

Sunghoon sucks, licks, slurps around his fingers, tickling and laving over the palms of his hands, until he’s suckling around the wound, the source fervently. He almost looks content and Jay almost forgets that he’s in danger when he sees how Sunghoon softens and slowly comes back to him, but his blood coagulates, it clots so that Jay doesn’t bleed out, and that’s what Jay needs.

It’s what is supposed to happen, but that’s a problem; a sin Jay has committed because Sunghoon’s eyes shoot into his in offense, in depravity, and his features lengthen and scrunch. His fangs, long and thin stretch out long like saber tooths below his chin and his nose curls into this ugly scowl, a ferocious hissed growl slapping against Jay’s ears at a glass breaking pitch. 

His eardrums pound from it, about ready to explode, and Jay’s shaking his head mindlessly, trying to shake that pain away, somehow muffle his ears before they bleed too, but he’s trapped against the counter, Sunghoon’s knee fitting between his own, separating them far apart enough so Jay has to lean either against him or the counter for support

“Sunghoon, stop!” Jay squirms, wiggling and flinching, but his arm is wrenched from him anyway, the soft side of his arm being smoothed against ragged teeth and cold lips. 

It’s fast. Too fast. Jay doesn’t see it, but the shriek tears from his throat when those fangs sink into him. 

The tips pierce and Sunghoon barely fits in another inch before the pain and fire is blooming through Jay's arm, seizing his shoulder, paralyzing it with pain as Jay blubbers into his neck, spit sliding all across it. 

He can only watch, can only cry as Sunghoon sinks in deeper, slower like that’d make it all the better. 

“Sunghoon, please” Jay whispers and there isn’t a big reaction. There’s no sudden humanity, a weakening grip, or a hesitation in his puncture, but Jay feels the wet tear slide against his cheek, feels and sees it combine with the spit along his neck. 

He’s trying. 

Jay chokes on his breaths and he nods into Sunghoon’s neck, “Okay, okay. It’s okay, I’ll—” 

Fuck, what? Do what? Handle it? Help him? Jay bites his lips and buries the wince under his skin. His silver hair rubs hot against Sunghoon’s neck and he decides. 

No. 

He’s going to survive, he’s going to escape. That’s it, that’s all he can even attempt. 

Jay’s run out of options, his daggers are far, he’s trapped completely and immobile from the neck down, but he is still breathing at least, breathing against Sunghoon’s open neck and that’s when Jay makes his final decision, his last commitment before the last of him is drunk. 

He bites down, right at the juncture between the slope and shoulder and digs in hard. His blunt teeth sawing their way in: and blood splurts messily around them, not the pretty and clean way Sunoo had drained the rat, nor the delicate needles that wasted no drop like Sunghoon. The blood danced and sprayed in massacre, covering his face like a mask, flooding down his throat until he gagged, and decorating Sunghoon’s whole shoulder until it was red and absolutely decked like millions of lights over a house for Christmas. 

Sunghoon freezes, his breathing becomes hotter, sharper, panting against his veins, but the fangs retract. Jay breathes in, coughs up more of that metallic blood, and in the moment of stillness, Jay pushes through. He side steps Sunghoon, slips out of his frozen, but weakened grip, and darts for his knives: but he doesn't flip around, doesn't raise his arms to swing.

He slips them into his pants and races towards the doors. He's halfway out, he's going to escape but he hears a thud and Jay knows he shouldn't look, knows he should kill the curiosity here, but he risks it anyway. 

And his hands shake. Sunghoon is slumped down on the ground, leaned up against the counter with blood dripping down him and an equally bloodied steak and vegetables scattered on the floor by his feet. 

He feels his heart lurch for him and the feeling confuses him, has him hesitating, but Jay cannot risk it. He can't. He shouldn't.  

He won't. 

He runs out of the kitchen and makes it to his room two minutes before curfew with blood staining his body and pints of it still spurting out from his mouth.

 

 

 

Notes:

....soooo don't be mad...the ball and forests were originally supposed to be in this chapter. I KNOW I KNOW!! but I just can't find the motivation in me to write them yet lol. Plus, I didn't want to sit on this chapter any longer than I already have so TADAHH chapter 8!

Honestly excited to see how this all unfolds though. I love me some action and the next chapter is gonna have a lot of it...honestly, maybe it's my excitement intimidating me...but honestly, as I should, intimidating yourself is kind of sexy.

Alright, I'm actually fucking yapping now. I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, tell me what your theories are or simply your thoughts. Hearing from you guys is the best part of updating.

Byeee!!

Chapter 9

So much of it. 

So, so much. 

Blood was sprayed over his cheeks and it clung to his eyelashes like a monkey’s tail on a branch. The color desecrated his face, and the pigment left behind dried ambered freckles that wouldn’t come off with just a scrub. Each blink was seeped in deep ruby, a royal tone that bejeweled the cave of his throat and adorned his neck like the finest of pendants: but Jay’s wasn’t a necklace made of the finest of rock, grown and picked in the darkest of mines with the brightest waters; it was a liquid syrup, hot and molten to his skin, melting down his body like candlewax each moment Jay stayed under the hot alkaline water.

It pooled at his feet a ruddy, burnt orange and he watched as maroon clots slipped between his toes. Together the scene was carried away in an ocean that had once been clear, had once been pure, 

He showered immediately when he came back to his room, frantic and panting. Almost ran his faucet dry with the amount of times he’s washed his mouth out, but it stayed, the contamination skirted around his toes, his heels, and left its aftertaste on his tongue: even when the layers finally began to peel off, it remained.

The memories, the give of skin, the final squish beneath his teeth before it colored him as red as the table runners in East Wing. It all remained in Jay’s mind, in the forefront of his brain, reminding him, berating him, complimenting him for his escape, nagging at him for leaving. 

There was a moment where he choked on it—the thoughts, the water filling his mouth. He clung to the shower curtain with wet fingers that were now more water than blood and wretched: water springing from his throat anew and his eyes welling it up like the bucket sent down had finally been filled. He’s gasped, he’s shook, and he fucking hoped. 

Find Sunghoon, please. 

The day greets him, it shines the brightest light into his room that he’s seen all week and it tries, gosh, it tries to fumble him out of bed, to wave him outside—anything, but Jay doesn’t heed it, doesn’t bear to listen.

He actually grabs a spare bedsheet and duck tapes it to the forsaken window, bandaging the sun, separating its rays from his skin, and like that his room truly looks like an attic, an old, aging thing reminiscent of abandoned buildings and soured memories.

The poor village with the torn sheets over the welcome town sign. 

He’s so fucking thirsty, has been thirsty from the moment he woke up and every tinge of light that shined on him, or still shines through the halo of his bedsheet—he doesn’t care if it only touches along the hershey floor boards—they feel drawing, like every ounce of moisture in him and around him, is being taken for itself, evaporating before his eyes before he can even breathe that soft, wet air into his lungs.

Everything within him feels cleaned out, freeze dried, and air tight since the moment he finally freed himself of all that blood.

A part of him still feels queasy from it, but he drinks and drinks, watering himself like a plant in its infancy, and it only just works. The four glasses become just enough to abide the desert inside of him, to distract him from his heart that feels like it's beating faster, pumping harder, sending out more blood through his veins than Jay needs.

The rush of it is dizzying at first, but Jay learns to stand until he’s no longer wobbling from it, until the rush becomes just another part of him, even if he’s getting thirsty again. 

He doesn’t let anyone in. Not Yihwa when she comes up with breakfast, nor Chloe who follows behind her unwillingly, but somehow, he lets Sunoo. He lets Sunoo enter without a word having to be spoken between them. Sunoo knocks and when Jay unlocks, Sunoo gives him no time to open the door for him.

He saunters in by himself, welcomed and taking advantage of it, and slides a glass of juice into his hands. The glass is cold around his fingers and Jay can already feel himself lifting it to his tongue, his lips desperately parting for it. 

“What is it?” He whispers out quickly, right before his hands force the rim to his lips and its pretty jam colored essence sweetens his walls. 

Sunoo smiles and comes closer, wrapping his fingers around the glass too, around Jay. 

“Blood orange.” 

Jay’s eyes flinch around the urge to flutter open, to meet Sunoo’s gaze and see what he’s doing, but the juice tastes so sweet, it coats over every cactus in his mouth and opens its reserves. It spills out into his stomach like the first rain in months. 

Jay moans around it and his thighs clench around the knee that’s placed between his own. Sunoo’s fingers, delicate and soft, slowly tips the glass up for him, letting him sip until the last drop, until there is nothing left but his breath filling the glass, and fogging its insides. 

He feels good. It felt good. He’s not thirsty.

Jay stutters over his breathing and Sunoo doesn’t remove the cup, not until Jay unlatches himself from it, sucking in small breaths to regulate his breathing. His eyebrows furrow then, confusion blooming within making him want to shake his hair out. What was that? He didn’t breathe once.

He wasn’t breathing that whole time, even though he needed it. It was like his body had forgotten about it, like he abandoned himself so he could taste it, like the air exhaling from his mouth would somehow burden the flavor, or blow away the nutrients like a harsh wind over a crop field. 

“Are blood oranges always that good?” Jay quips weakly, a desperate smile stretching his face and Sunoo’s smile at him deepens, becoming more endeared as he presses their heads together and rubs. 

“Sure, Jay.” He giggles above him, his eyes flashing blue, “Sure.” 

 

 

It still doesn’t sit right with him—that whole scene, the thirst, the nagging memory in his mind that dispels danger: that Jay might have fucked up. 

“It’s different for us—it looks different.” 

It bothers him, stains him even hours later as he’s closing the cuffs around his wrists. He’s in a slim white blouse, one that puffs around his elbows and falls into waves of layered lace and ruffles to his wrists. The length of the material dangling off of him, floating in the air like golden hair flowing out the tower. The design is a bit Victorian, smaller ruffles flowering around the lace up his chest. Yihwa had brought him a corset too, one that was supposed to fit like a vest over his blouse and hug the outlines of his chest down to his waist. 

He had been against it at first, had not wanted his movements to be in any way hindered, but as the fabric slid along the pads of his fingers, he acquiesced. The outfit would look complete and at least the corset was a buttoned style, instead of string. It could easily be undone and ripped if needed.

So Jay lets himself have it, lets himself wrap his waist snug until he can feel his posture straightening from it. The corset is black with bright silver jacquard patterning that matches his hair. The silver continues on, matching with the silver cufflinks, and silver plated heels under his dress shoes. 

He gives himself one more look in his mirror, attaching onto every detail of his wears, adjusting and centering the bow near his collar that closes off the deep contours of his chest. He hadn’t tied the chest completely shut, left an appropriate amount, his collarbones poking out prominently like sturdy honeycomb structures, but nothing further. 

“How…how is it different?” 

It still runs through his head—what he asked Sunoo. Non-stop. The answer, the bone-chilling response that shouldn’t have meant anything to him—that he desperately hopes still doesn’t—freaks him out. 

“We share blood.” 

His lips beat red with how much he’s worn them down, with how those three words have carved out a section inside Jay’s brain. Festering. Swarming like ants and flies around a carcass. 

Did they…? …did Jay? 

He shoves his clothes into a duffle bag, his daggers and medical kit roughly pushing in after them. The thought is too much, means too much, means more than Jay even knows about it cause if they did, if they did what does that make him? What does that make them? What did he do to Sunghoon?

His heels click against the floorboards with each step and the sound ticks like a clock in Jay’s head. Minute by minute. Second by second. When he’s by the door, he double checks—then triple checks that he has everything packed. He will be gone for three days, fighting for three days: 14–21 ferals, that was the goal, that was his ticket to becoming a sophomore. One step out of the three he needs to graduate.

This was his starting point, it must go well. 

 

 

The sounds of his shoes entering the room before him is something Jay isn’t accustomed to. The way the clacks sound so crisp and stacked as he walks alongside Yihwa and Chloe; compared to them, his sound is lighter, chirpier. Simple tapping that choruses well with the deep snaps of their heels. He follows them, trailing close behind them both with a hand behind each of their backs.

He doesn’t rest them there, only hovers in protection; in case, one happens to fall.

Although he’s eyeing Yihwa more so than Chloe, the woman’s ankles have worried him coming down those stairs when they had met up in the Center. They walk through the halls, carpeted runners making the women’s gaits funny and as the fog curls against the windows, the night seeping through, Jay finally places a small touch to their hips. 

Yihwa smiles at him, curly hair inching for her lip gloss and eyes full of that green magic that sparks like electricity in her irises. 

“Thank you kind sir.” She humors, pressing back into his hand in affection before she’s moving forward again, handing off her backpack to a guarding butler to her right. 

Chloe barks at him, but is smiling none the less as she repeats the same action but towards the guard on her left. 

They’re somewhere in the Far East, not quite near the dorms, but definitely far past the East Wing, and down this far the hallways were long, stretched out pieces that seemed like they’d never end, that when they turned that final corner, looking down its length and at the two, old guarding butlers in front of grand, black double door with golden handles, felt otherworldly and imposing. As if it were a warning as much as an invitation: enter at your own risk. 

Jay stood just a foot behind them, watching the guards take the bags calmly in hand. 

Vampires with salt and pepper hair and freshly shampooed and prim handlebar mustaches. They wore classic bow and ties, black with stark white accents, and fresh, ironed gloves that covered their hands to their wrists. 

When their bags were placed, both in sync and artfully practiced, they dip their heads, short quips of their lips moving up to suggest conviviality without actually trying. 

“Your names.” One of them says, a small board in hand while the other brings out a white, blank, stickered sheet. 

“Chloe Clauherout, junior. Moonlight Pack” Chloe mouths, confidence filling out every point, every sharp edge of her tongue as she stares into the butler. She’s dressed completely in a deep emerald green, one that makes her hair more vibrant than it usually is. 

The butler checks for her on the list, nods over to the other, who writes down her information, peels the sticker off and places it around her bag for identification.  

They look at Yihwa expectantly. 

“Ahn Yihwa, junior. Sacred Order.” She says softly, sweetly, her voice floating like the waterfall nature of her soft blue dress and the process repeats until they’re all looking at Jay, waiting for him before they open the doors. 

“Park Jongseong, freshman. Uh, me?” Jay informs and the response immediately gets a groan out of Chloe and a small, light slap from Yihwa. 

“Lone wolf, sir.” She covers, her smile sweetening at the edges. 

“That.” Jay agrees and he does it mainly to piss Yihwa off with his tone, himself laughing joyfully when she doubles back to actually hit him across the chest. 

The butlers pay them no mind, the one catches the duffle bag he throws and labels it all the same. 

They bow to them at the waist, turning once again, gloved hands wrapping each around one handle. 

They pull and it’s worse than otherworldly—it feels like a separate dimension. A detached space that should be a part of a museum, no more like a movie, or, or—a castle. 

Jay hears violins. He hears harps and a soft piano and when the doors budge apart, he sees liquid amber, apple cider lights, and dark gingerbread floors. 

“Fuck.” Jay whispers. 

He was going to stand here, stay here and stare like it was a projected image, a mirage his own mind had created, but he feels his shoulder tilt, feels his arm loop around another—shorter, pulling him down slightly for their comfortability and as a link Yihwa walks him in, into the ball, into the masquerade. 

The ballroom is larger than anything, more grandeur than anything, dipped in burnt gold and umber. The chandeliers are stacked, a tiered cake of lights that dangle and drip down diamonds like teardrops from their base. They encapsulate the room in a ciderish yellow, the same yellowing of an exposed apple to air, the same deeper yellow of a flame, of the cider-whiskey shots they took on the eve of his eligibility.

It warmed the space rather than brightened, the dark hickory floors patterned into snowflakes, or broken glass, and tall, deep caramel and gingerbread ceilings that were painted with a muse: Greek heroes' battles painted and mythical drawings and corners of nature danced above them. 

The fresco paintings displayed scenes down the whole ceiling, making them feel closer to the solicitors below, like they were suffocating them inside their world as well. Below that, large paintings, self-portraits of previous alumni, teachers, deans, framed the walls between thick and chocolate satin curtains: and against either side, lining the walls, were long tables with a spreads of food: buttered puffs, brown sugar and honey yams, pork belly, kimchi, and ox bone soup still on the burner.

There was so much more, so much Jay could not see, but the smell reminded him of feasts, of satiation and a full stomach that stretched his skin until it almost hurt. 

Then there was the center, the large space left untouched by off-white satin covered round conversation tables, and to which a grand staircase, cinnamon marble with gold and copper railings pooled out into. The stairs were rounded off, the last fifteen tiering out into the floor like it were another dress itself, and the floor was bustling; women and men, men and men, women and women, dressed to the nines dancing, waltzing, rocking, sliding along the floors calmly, contently like there was no rush.

As if the music would keep them stuck in this moment forever. Some wore masks, small, or large adorned things with swirls and patterns, gems and stones. Others wore their flash in their clothes, in ball gowns, in their sleek slips, and prim suits and coats. 

Jay smoothes his own corset, thumbs twitching to correct the puff around his sleeves, and he sighs. 

“Thanks, again.” and Yihwa laughs, her hand curling around his bicep where they’re still linked. 

“You are very welcome, sir.” She brightens, her hand sliding down his arm to hold around the sleeves that cup at his wrist and she comes closer, her feet stepping in line with his and the green in her eyes is emboldened prettily by the golden atmosphere. 

“Don’t tell me you don’t know how to dance.” She teases. It’s below her breath, and there’s another shared secret between silence that Jay shares because the awkward blink of his eyes is apparently enough for her.

She nods happily, laughing as she slowly inches him out onto the floor, Chloe having stalked off towards a table to claim and he keeps looking for her, his head and eyes jerking unconsciously for the fire head, and Yihwa rolls her eyes at him, at his feeble attempt at an SOS and simply starts to softly shimmy him further, his arms swaying lightly with hers and his chest does this weird swish thing that gets more air running through his blouse. 

“Yihwa, I believe this isn’t how it’s done.” Jay scrambles, his voice smooth, but his tone pitched as they finally get swallowed into the mist, into the bubble of dancing partners that held each other at the waists, shoulders, or more traditionally, with their bodies apart, but their forearms held between them in promise, against each other in a slow tease. 

Yihwa chortles, flicking the one curl coming over her eyes out of her face and she stills. She drops her arms from him and shifts back, almost bumping into the backs of another couple. 

Clumsy, Jay utters in his head, but he swears it is with adoration, even though she’s the one supposed to be guiding him and all. Advisor, remember? 

Jay smiles and steps between their space, silver strands flirting against his cheeks as he slides an arm and closed palm behind to rest on the small off his back, while his left hand holds out for her. 

“This is a bit more appropriate, I think.” He teases, dipping down into a curt bow, and with his head low, he asks, “May I?” 

The violins are still softly playing, even as the harps begin to pick up speed, but his palms don’t sweat, they are covered by something warm, dry, a bit thick. 

A hand wraps around his and sharply tugs him forward and Jay almost fucks up his face in their chest. 

“What, Yihw—” The ugly gasp comes out of him in a freak moment of shock, “What the fuck?!”  

The boy above him sighs dreamily, “I thought you’d never ask.” 

Jungwon’s dimples are deep when he smiles, they dig tunnels into the apples of his heart-shaped face and spring out pearls that shine in his big eyes when he looks slightly down at Jay. 

Jay who’s still pressed flat into his chest, into the velvet suit that’s buttoned but surely has nothing underneath. Jungwon dances with him like this, with his arms tensed around him and Jay’s pressed into his sides. Jungwon hums to the music and lifts Jay off the floor like it's easy, like it takes nothing for him to hold him up against him and sway them around like he’s dancing with a doll rather than a whole person—a whole ass man. 

“Jungwon, this is not the time. What are you even…” His voice trails off just as his thoughts are invaded, just as he feels his heart pump all that bit more faster in his chest. The dizziness is small, a drowned out thing compared to what he’s looking at. 

Sunghoon. 

Jungwon hums, giggles and stays swaying in place, like he knows, like can hear exactly why his heart is pumping and won’t tell Jay. 

Sunghoon looks…unchanged. His hair is styled back, and he’s in a long suit with a coated layer that makes him look all the taller, all the more imposing. He’s pale still, his body still closed off and rigid, but he’s looking at him with a softer sea foam in his eyes, blinking, breathing, choosing to breathe when Jay’s looking and for once Jay doesn’t feel like he’s being analyzed, being hunted. 

If anything the roles have reversed, Jay’s analyzing Sunghoon, his eyes are trailing down his neck, trying to undo the collar that’s hiding the bite Jay knows is healed and gone, but he wants to know, needs to see it.

“Sung—” Jay catches himself before he says it in its entirety, the fucked question of asking about his well being, for inquiring the safety of a member of their pack, for asking for something from them. 

“Hm?” Jungwon teases, “What was that Jay?” 

“Nothing,” Jay squirms, “Nothing, will you let me go now? No violence or harassment of any kind is allowed at the Ball, those are the rules.” He scolds and to his credit, Jungwon lets him go, he loosens his hold, lets him finally touch the floor with his feet again, and Jay’s only given a few seconds to calibrate when those dimples face him again and whisper, “It’s time to switch anyway.” 

“What?” 

The room spins, utterly circles in Jay’s irises like a pack of spin tops zipping along the floor, and Jungwon’s hands are still around his, holding him as steady as possible throughout the twirl, but Jay’s so off balance, he pulls the boy closer to him, hoping for stability, but all Jungwon does is fall into him, pressing him back, checking him up against a hard wall. 

Jay gasps as his vision is swirled, a soft hand with trimmed nails fitting under his chin, pushing his face up until all Jay sees is a motion picture of paintings on the ceiling. A shiver shakes his shoulders. The pins and needles collected along his tongue, liquifying, and streaming down his throat with the caress of those hands around his Adam's apple.

His knee gives out at the unexpected feeling, the touch that’s sending warmth through his veins, and he collapses back into it, into him. 

The rumble vibrates his heart, pressing through his back from the hard chest he’s still being pushed up against and Jay wants to shake because Jungwon hasn’t left—no, he stays like a lid capping Jay into confinement, into the sharp, hot, and cold box that is Heeseung’s body and his left arm wrapping around the corset.

He holds Jay. Jay’s being held and Jay can do nothing but slump against the numbing the needles are doing. He can’t feel his feet the longer he remains pressed to him, the longer Heeseung’s hand keeps his head up to the ceiling.

If Jay didn’t know better he’d think he was helping Jay center his vision again, forcing him to focus on one spot, and not the continuously swaying bodies around them. The bodies don’t stop, they keep dancing to the music, heels cracking like thunderstorms in his ears, and the orchestra deepens, becoming darker, bolder, full notes pressed down, rather than light, half-touched notes. 

“Bell.” Heeseung greets and Jay can feel the smile up against his ear, feel the way his fingers play with the buttons of his corset, plucking them to the harp like his body was the instrument, and his buttons the strings.  

Jay squirms, tries to despite the sparkle of feeling from his numb feet shooting up his legs. It doesn’t hurt, if anything it makes him tired, the dizziness slightly worse even though it is clearing up, the shapes above slowly sharpening into strokes.

“Shh,” Heeseung coos, “come back to me first, baby. Don’t rush yourself, I'll be here.”  and Jay swallows, his head falling back unknowingly onto Heeseung’s shoulder as he breathes through it all. 

He can’t explain it, doesn’t think he wants to. The numbing feeling that feels almost comfortable, pleasurable like his heavy limbs after a deep sleep; a feeling that makes him not want to move an inch, but to only sink in deeper. 

“I have something important to ask you, little one.” Heeseung’s voice caresses him, tickles along his sideburns and sends baby tremors along his skin. 

“Wh–at?” Jay grits the best he can, but he sucks in another breath in between because Jungwon’s heat finally leaves, the pressure pressing him tight up against Heeseung is gone, but Jay remains kept, kept there. 

“May I have this dance?” 

The ceiling centers itself, refocuses like the lens on a camera and the sudden clarity helps Jay think, helps ground him back to Earth among the student body and harp instead of gods with wings in the sky. 

“Fuck no. Are you insane?” Jay curses, already ripping himself from his grip and even though Jay knows it should be futile, knows that it's not that easy, Heeseung lets him, lets him go about an inch before his hands are pressing around his waist properly. 

He laughs, “Hands up.” He says, bobbing his head down at Jay’s hands and he feel his eyebrows knit into each other, can feel his face twist as he eyes the boy like he’s grown a second head: but he delivers anyway, maybe a bit hesitantly because—who the fuck asks for that?— and squares up, his right fist brushing low against his chin as the other guards his left cheek and eye. 

Holding him at the waist was a weird fighting technique, one Jay hasn’t seen before, but he’ll work with it. He’ll find a foothold, a loose grip, anything. Heeseung watches him with doe eyes, long eyelashes blinking at him slowly before the smile cracks his face.

The laugh pours out of him happily, not bidden or held down by pride or nonchalance. His eyes crinkle at their edges and the last thing Jay sees before Heeseung’s head presses down into his shoulder, his hands pulling Jay in closer, is the slight tinge of wine that coats the brown in his eyes. 

Jay’s stance weakens at the ordeal, an emotion swirling in him that he’s not used to, one that he doesn’t have often. Embarrassment makes him scrunch his nose and bites furiously into his lip. Heeseung was still puffing around his neck, warm air wrapping around his neck. 

Jay’s fucking peeved. 

“What? What the fuck is so funny?” Jay hits his shoulders harshly, trying to stump that laugh back into his damn chest because who the fuck was Heeseung laughing at?

He was a threat, an opponent, someone who could easily defeat him if his reflexes got faster, if he was stronger, if just knew more: more about Heeseung and what makes him weak. Heeseung was something different, something new Jay had to learn—that’s all, he wasn’t weak. He could—he could handle it. 

Jay’s face warmed slowly, embarrassment and anger seizing his chest, rushing his blood through faster. His fists curl even harder and the tension in his throat gets to a point. His throat filling with words fast, filling up quickly like helium into a balloon Jay is about to fucking pop, and he grabs the lapels of Heeseung’s suit jacket. His fingers curling around the material and digging in until he’s sure it’ll wrinkle when he lets go.

He means to shove him, means to somehow send this man flying down the strip like a bowling ball knocking down barbie dressed pins, but the tension is stolen from him.

The moment of opportunity is gone.

Heeseung curves his head along his shoulder and presses his lips into the hardened vein of his throat. 

“Heeseu—” Jay gasps out quickly, fingers slipping from around his coat, until he’s no longer clenching, but holding on. 

Heeseung hums deeply into the vein, his chuckle dark and crackly to his ears, “Cute .” 

His hands come to touch around Jay’s, they slide them from his lapels so they're holding onto his shoulders instead. 

Heeseung smiles against his ear, “I meant up here, little one.” Then he’s pulling back to face him, their noses almost brushing and he can feel the tips of his ears begin to heat up. 

Jay stutters, his mouth moving around empty words that his brain hasn’t even come up with yet and he looks away, tears his face away from Heeseung’s even if the sudden swing makes Heeseung’s nose brush against his cheeks. 

“Whatever,” Jay settles on indignantly, shaking his head, “it doesn’t matter. We’re not dancing.” 

And he tries to push away, tries to finally leave towards the refreshments where Yihwa and Chloe are sipping cider whiskey as they watch them: Yihwa downs them and the liquid shakes down to her wrists and Chloe’s just watching intently, amused, but impatient as her foot taps against the floor.

Sunoo is over there too, with a lemon cake and another glass of what looks like the orange juice from earlier: but, Heeseung doesn’t let him go, he keeps him welded into the floor like Jay was crafted there, cupped and sculpted right before him. 

The smile lessens to a light smirk and soft air. 

“Where are your manners, bell?” He says pulling Jay in, until their chests have touched and Jay can feel the poke of Heeseung’s suit against his collarbones. “It’s not only impolite to turn down a dance, but it’s against the rules. You’d disrespect the ball, little one?” 

He leans in closer, brushes away the bit of hair in Jay’s eyes and his eyes slowly begin to darken black, “Do you even know what that entails?” 

Heeseung smiles, his eyes completely black and his hair gelled back with strands curving around his face. He looks unhinged, slightly insane. Those weren’t too far from the truth.

“Do you want to find out?” He whispers to him like it's a secret, a sharp breath that strikes into Jay and has his fingers twitching around his shoulders. Jay breathes in deeper as those needles begin to pierce. 

The music cringes sharply, an accidental note that throws off the rest of the chords.

He doesn’t have his daggers, they are packed away. Tonight wasn’t supposed to be like this. There wasn’t supposed to be violence.

Something else is happening around him, the other students are slowing, moving barely beyond stop out of fear that wasn’t the right move either. Some of them even have tears already in their eyes as they silently plead with him in his peripheral vision.

“No—I” He pieces together, then shakes his head, “no.” 

There’s a dying noise Heeseung makes, one that has Jay lowering his eyes to their feet and clenching his fists in fear as he begins to shake. It’s like a haunting siren noise, a broken bleat of an animal that witnessed its prey give up too soon, the dying excitement that he doesn’t get to kill, doesn’t get to hurt. 

Then those fingers come back, they tap under his chin once—softly, and Jay raises his head up slowly. 

Heeseung’s back, his eyes are brown and more chocolatey under the ambering lights. 

Jay’s barely breathing as the thumb circles up from his chin, pressing lightly into the balm on Jay’s lips. 

“Bell,” Heeseung purrs, eyes flitting down to watch his thumb absorbing the heat escaping from Jay’s lips. “I want you to talk my ear off.” 

Then he presses his thumb in, never passing the seal, and watches the way Jay’s eyes shake with both fury and fear. 

Heeseung smiles as Jay finally shakes off whatever stupor he put him in. 

“C’mon, hands up.” 

 

 

They dance. They dance and Jay steps on Heeseung’s feet on accident and on purpose, and each time Heeseung smiles at him, attempts to nuzzle their noses together to which Jay always rejects. Jay keeps doing it because he can, because there’s nothing else he really can do without triggering something worse, and he almost enjoys it.

The subtle swaying of their dance, of the music that’s returned to its calming, tantalizing nature. Heeseung doesn’t touch him beyond where his hands lay placed on his one hip and the other in Jay’s hand to lead them around the floor. He stays close, but only enough to keep their steps in sync, in time, as much as they can be with Jay’s poor rhythm and side quests of pettiness. But then, the lights dim, the caramalled gold darkening into burnt sugar, and then it’s as dark as East Wing. 

“What?” Jay startles and his body naturally flinches closer to Heeseung, fitting himself against his chest like he was trying to get away from the darkness creeping along his shoulders. 

What the fuck was happening? 

His heart pumps a little faster, the adrenaline already curling his fingers when he begins to pull away, to find Yihwa, Chloe, Sunoo, make sure everyone is okay, but he’s tethered. Heeseung’s grip is the length of rope that prevents Jay from floating off into the dark space. He pulls him closer, he places Jay on him, binding him to him by letting Jay stand on his feet. 

“Relax, little one. It’s okay.” He whispers between them.

Jay’s taken a back by it, his eyes still adjusting to sudden change in visibility, but Heeseung breathes against him, pulls him closer to tuck Jay under his chin, to press their bodies together in a way that feels too close, too intimate for what they are, for what is happening.

They still, but they don’t just stand there. Heeseung moves side to side, a small swaying that remains in one spot—just them, just Jay on his feet, bodies almost becoming one as millions of red lights begin to fall from the ceiling: but they’re not quite lights, not really.

When Jay turns his head on Heeseung's shoulder, dutifully ignoring the way Heeseung’s nose taps his ear, he sees them more clearly. Small red fairies that glow like lights but shine like glitter. They’re not any bigger than a speck, but there’s colonies of them streaming from the ceiling in pretty formations, forming dances and shapes like the choreographed water fountain sprays Jay used to see in the nicer parts of the city. 

Jay breathes in awe, he accidentally breathes in the fresh press of Heeseung’s clothes and he feels the way the man’s arms have fully encircled into close around his waist. Both arms down and around him, his cheek pressed to Jay’s hair, and Jay’s one hand still gripping his shoulder, the other haven fell down in his enchantment.

The faeries bring a minimal amount of light back to the ballroom, decorating it like red stars in the night sky and Jay blinks easier, his eyes feel less strained as begins to see the images of the people around them again—still dancing, slower, closer: a couple’s dance. 

Ah shit , Jay curses internally, but Heeseung laughs and nudges him like he’s heard it anyway, like he expected it, like he could already interpret what that sharp puff of air Jay’s releases through his nose like a bull means. He’s fucking infuriating. But the faerie lights are so pretty, soft punch red, with some magenta clinging to the ceiling like stars and coating the floor like a galaxy.

Small faeries twinkle around their legs, around the fingers that hold Jay close, and even in between the small space Jay keeps between their faces as he comes back to look at Heeseung. 

The soft raspberry red that glows against his skin suits him. 

“It didn’t work.” Jay says between the keys of a soft piano playing off in the distance, and for anything he doesn’t know why he says it quietly, like it was something supposed to be kept between them two. The whole fucking school knows, but maybe its the atmosphere, or maybe its the way their so close it feels improper to speak louder than this. Heeseung’s eyebrow just jumps, in interest, in a slight egg for Jay to continue. 

“Whatever it is that you did—that you do . It’s over now, it didn’t kill me, it didn’t change me. You’re plan, I survived it.” It feels like—like a weight gets lifted off his chest, like he can stand straighter in front of him because he’s earned it. He’s fucking fought for it and right now he gets to shove it in Heeseung’s face, show him just how capable he is, and Heeseung responds.

Just now how Jay wants him to. 

He cups the back of Jay’s head and brings them closer, until their breathing against each other again, and with each move Jay makes to go back, Heeseung just brings him closer— too close, enough to the point where Jay stops struggling because he’s scared if Heeseung comes any closer the outlines of his lips might brush against his as he talks. 

They all had serious proximity issues.

Jay swallows and Heeseung’s eyes follow the movement, black starting to bleed back over his eyes, blending him into the darkness. 

They’re noses brush and Heeseung’s tongue wets his lips. Fangs and canines, six of them. 

“You want your courting present, baby?” He chuckles but the smile is unkind, but not towards him, not exactly. Jay trembles from the pins sewing back into his skin, soft welding that feels like marshmallow fluff webbing around his fingers, and Jay can see where Heeseung’s eyes shift to, who they shift to. 

Malachi. 

“That was a courting gift. Most gifts are something small, a trinket, clothes they’ve scented, they show interest.” Yihwa had said, “but this is a dead animal with a small section from their omega’s nesting blankets, it’s a call.”

Jay scoffs.

“I can handle him on my own, and I’m not—” 

“Did I ask you that?” and the interruption startles him, his voice is louder, a little deeper, it breaks the soft seal Jay had kept them under. It shocks him mute for a couple of seconds, staring into those bottomless pits that Jay can no longer even see his reflection in.

“Jay-ah, what did I ask you?” 

“I don’t want it.” Jay grounds, “I have nothing to do with you. I’m not your pack and I am certainly not your om—” 

Heeseung's hand falls down to wrap around his throat, leaving his hair in a smooth motion, one that has Jay stuttering even on top of Heeseung’s feet. The hand presses in, but doesn’t close, just keeps the pressure and heat of his hand present; Heeseung feeling every stretch and tense of his throat, and Jay every bit of texture along those hands, shivering from the way his fingertips are freezing, but his palm is heated. 

“You mentioned a plan earlier.” Heeseung notes, all black diffusing from his eyes, “I don’t need to plan, little one.” He says to him and a nail presses lightly into that same vein, that same artery where his teeth had been. 

“My omega is already doing everything he needs to come to me himself.” 

“It isn’t that hard. There are just certain things you have to look out for: and when you know what they are, it’s easy to avoid.” 

“Yes, we’re all well aware of the traditions to pack integration and presentation.” 

“What does that mean?” Jay says, the words hollowing out in his mouth, his heart growing in panic. Heeseung smirks, eyes flitting to Sunghoon who has come closer, his feet touching the edge of the stage. He’s looking at Jay still, but softer, attentive—not analyzing to kill.

“Your steak was good, Jay-ah.” Heeseung smiles, setting Jay back on his feet, back on the floor where he should have always been. Jay whips back around, the hair he set in place, breaking its mold ever slightly.

“No, what the fuck does that mean? Heeseung!” Jay tries to grab, find those lapels again and shove, but his fingers clasp red air. His breath stutters as he looks down, dead pixes coating his palms like blood, and even in death, they still glow brightly. 

Then the lights cut back on, the piano became an orchestra once again, but Heeseung was gone, and so was his pack. 

Fuck! 

Jay mentally screams, physically kicking air along the dance floor as he tries to tamp down the frustration buzzing through his skin. Heeseung was fucking irritating. 

Jay breaths in harder, deeper.  

Always questioning him, always too close, always touching, always beating him in some way: always, always, always. 

He’s getting in his head, Jay thinks as he wipes the pixies off on one of the side napkins at the round tables. Chloe and Yihwa sit there watching him, making faces at each other as they watch Jay roughly wipe over his hands, even when they're clean. 

That’s all it was, talk. He wants to piss Jay off, wants to still feel like he has the upper hand now that Jay’s thwarted his precious goals. Jay didn’t have anything to worry about. Nothing. 

Jay’s teeth sunk into the meat of his cheek harshly. 

He’d be fucking damned. 

“U-uhm, Jay?” Yihwa calls hesitantly, quietly, slowly standing up with her dress that seems to float and blow around effortlessly. As if there were wind cascading around her even though they were inside and the windows were closed. She smiles at him sheepishly, little hands holding out a golden glass with silver carvings to him. Jay let himself take in another breath as he laid his eyes on her, watched the magically induced breeze flow her fabric and calmed.

Trust Yihwa to always be a mediator. 

“Here, drink something. Sunoo left it for you—said it was your favorite.” 

Jay brightened at the thought. 

“Are you guys finally talking? He’s not all bad, you know.” Jay smiles, taking hold of the dark orange drink. He wasn’t thirsty, not really, but fruit was hard to come around in the city. He’d take this any chance he got. Jay hummed around the cup as the juice fell upon his tongue. He’d have to remember to ask Sunoo where he got the blood oranges from. Jay didn’t recall seeing any of the times he’s been in the kitchen to cook, much less at all last night. Maybe they were popular, or maybe Sunoo has a secret garden he doesn’t know about. 

Yihwa tries to smile, he can tell. She lifts her head instead of her lips and only ends up showing teeth when she realizes what she’s done: but still, never a smile. 

“It’s just—Jay, I didn’t want—” 

Jay shakes his head and gives her a bone, “he’s a little creepy isn’t he?” He playfully whispers around the rim of his cup. It doesn’t fog up this time. 

Yihwa deflates. 

Jay chuckles. 

“It’s not all the time,” Jay defends happily, “just you know sometimes . He doesn’t have a coven you know: probably lacks some social skills.” 

Yihwa’s face does this forlorn thing, a long drawn out expression that looks both sorry and sad for herself. Chloe just takes another shot, in her own world as always, and stands up. 

“You want to dance?” She lays out flippantly like she doesn’t really care either way, even though her eyes stare hard into Yihwa and her hand is already out waiting. 

Yihwa looks at Jay as he sits down into a seat and all he bothers to do is tilt his glass towards her in acknowledgement. 

Then the two of them leave to prance around like they were in the middle of field rather than a ballroom full of glitz, glamour, and fucking predators. 

Well…not all. 

“There you are!” Beomgyu jests behind him, easily pulling himself out a chair besides Jay and knocking their knees together just to watch Jay flinch from the pain. 

Jay goes to curse, but Beomgyu lays himself out on the table dramatically, sighing louder than Jay feels appropriate for their proximity. 

“For my life I just couldn’t find you,” He whines, “it’s like you were trapped on the dance floor by a hulking body and pretty faeries adorning your—”

“Why are you here?” Jay cuts and this time he doesn’t care to stop the eye roll from happening. 

Beomgyu sobers, pulls something from the pocket of his coat. 

He drops it into Jay’s hands and wraps his fingers around it to keep it hidden.

“For emergencies.” He smirks.

Jay’s eyes squint.

“What kind?” 

Beomgyu shrugs, pats his shoulder like a damn bongo. 

“You’ll know.” 

Then he’s gone too. 

Whatever it is feels smooth, circular like the fake pearl he had found once in a vintage trinket’s store on his way back from a two day supply run. 

He sighs, fitting it into his pant pockets and unceremoniously chugs the rest of the glass empty. 

Let’s see what those desserts are about . 

 

In the end Jay ends up eating a shit ton of beignets, even going as far to take the emptying basket with him towards his table when he realizes no one is really guarding the food. He keeps them at their table, covered sweetly for later, and munches on the ones still in his hands.

Yihwa comes up to him at some point, too—asks him for a dance and per custom he accepts. It’s a much better experience with Jay leading, even if he still unsure of how to waltz, his nerves feel at bay, and the light conversation between them is nice, slowing—allows Jay to actually appreciate this moment as a whole, rather than bait his breath over every millisecond, every word, every small movement around him. It’s just a dance, as it should be, as it should’ve been. 

He doesn’t know how long the ball lasts for after that, possibly twenty more minutes—thirty? Who knows, but eventually the dean comes to stand at the top of those grand staircases, poised and strict in his posture, with a slim fitted tuxedo and a feathered black mask covering his eyes. Simple extravagance. 

“Thank you all who have attended, but merrily the time has come. Please finish up your conversations, drinks, your last bites, and make your way to the gates. Cars will be outside stretched around the school waiting for you. They are assigned, of course. I sure hope you remember the drivers who have escorted you here.” He smiles, “You are going to need them to get to the Forests.” 

And they exit in a water stream of flowing dresses and solid suits, trickling down the halls and flowing out into the courtyard under the rising moon. The stars have yet to peek into the sky, but the clouds are thinning out, becoming mere whispers in the sky as the chilling air breathes along his skin and hair. The temperature is just above uncomfortable as the three of them pass by Territory, his sleeves billowing out with the wind and blowing like wings out towards it.

The sight of it still gives him small chills. How could it not? Guts ruined, blood and tears coming from every orifice he could think of, the pain that was slowly becoming numb to him as his vision blurred. He was dying. He almost died, and he was now: alive, breathing, and cold standing outside the gates like he had the very first night he arrived. 

His feet still sunk into the thick tresses of grass matting the hill and the salty sweet smell of ocean and sand from a beach he still had no sight of dusting under his nose, tickling the hairs in there and shocking his system every time he breathed in too deeply. He stands on the same pebbles that stabbed like hot coals into his feet, but this time his dress shoes smooth out their ire, they protect his feet from the provocation.

Yihwa squeezes around his elbow from the side of him and turns his face from the sky to look down at her, to see the small shoots of green swirling around in her eyes as she smiles softly. 

“Good luck, Jay.” She says with another squeeze,  stepping with Chloe off the pebbled path where Jay lingers. 

“I’ll see you after, yea? Fighting!” She cheers, pumping her fist into the air for him and admittedly it does get a smile from him, a small chuckle that seems to damper the nerves breeding under his skin. 

“I’ll see you Yihwa.” He salutes, “Until we meet on the other side." 

Then they’re gone, going off down the line of limos that line up the dirt path circling around the hill. Each limo was different, all mismatched to what Jay would have assumed. Some are shorter, others longer depending on the pack. Others were white and glistening through the darkening night like lighthouses, while others blended into the deep navy of the sky. 

Jay sighed and rolled out his shoulders. 

“Okay.” Jay says to himself as he walks down the line as well, passing packs, passing chauffeurs that weren’t his. He nods at them in greeting anyway as he passes by, not to be rude when they’ve already made eye contact. He’s in the middle of a bowing his head slightly when his shoulder gets knocked back. The contact pushes him back a couple of feet, making him gasp both in shock and sensitivity when he feels little pricks dance beneath his skin from where their shoulders  met. 

Jay finishes his greeting despite the hot flash of anger that zips through him, but he doesn’t spare any semblance of prim and proper when he turns back towards him. 

Heeseung who stands tall, his hands in his pockets and now dressed in a simple black tee that hugs his body too well. The black accentuates his shoulder span and it tapers nicely along his waist before his sweats start. He’s dressed comfortably. The smile adorning his face is no doubt an even more physical representation of that as he steps forward. 

Their shoulders brush again and this time they stay connected. Heeseung and him staring each other down, waiting for the other. 

Jay huffs. 

“Don’t try anything.” He grits out, his eyebrows creasing into his forehead from his intensity. The air between them goes stale, a bonfire blown out by the wind as Heeseung’s head dips, his chin brushing along the collar of his shirt as he listens.

He’s biting his smile, his canines piercing his lips ever so slightly, and then he’s flicking his eyes towards Jay, leaning in just that little bit. Stealing away time, forcing Jay to feel every wisp of wind that courses along his neck and down his chest. He’s holding his breath again. 

“Okay.” 

Jay’s eyes shake and the breath he’d been holding stutters out dumbly. What the fuck did he mean, okay?

“I mean it, Heeseung.” He pushes further because he means it, he really does. He can’t have anything going wrong because Heeseung wanted to be bitch, or bored, or whatever the fuck Heeseung was fucking with Jay for now.

Jay’s not an omega, he hasn’t turned. Messing with him was pointless now, and all Jay wanted to focus on—fuck, he needed to focus on that that kill count. Fulfilling his quota, so he can move up to sophomore. He had to. He was only a freshman, if didn’t succeed this time there was no other grade to drop to, he’d be expelled immediately.

There were real stakes with this, real stakes that determined whether or not his route to revenge would be easy or not: but other than that, there was pride—the will to prove himself. Back in the city, Jay always completed his runs, always came back with every item on the list no matter how far or dangerous the area it occupied was.

That wasn’t going to change, not because of Heeseung, not because of anyone. 

Heeseung’s hair was down and wet and from this close Jay could almost smell the freshness of it; he smelled clean and Jay could already feel his shoulders loosening at the scent. Cleansers and detergents, cotton and linen, febreze and soapy sponges. The memories of him and his mom. 

Jay blinks himself back, hardens his eyes that have no doubt gone soft and for a second he thinks he sees Heeseung’s face soften, feels his hot and cold heat come closer to him. 

“So we agree?” Jay says between them, letting the words center them back to the present, somewhere away from his memories, from the way his heart sores at the thought of her. 

“We do.” Heeseung states closely, intimately, a small bundle of secrets only he and he carry. A small truce. 

This time it’s Jay who shoves his shoulder into the other. 

“Okay, then.” 

The moon is completely up now and the stark white of his chauffeur’s hair hasn’t aged a bit. It still blows with the wind like a shampoo commercial in constant loop, his face still stoic and emotionless, even when Jay knows him to be a little shit, but he tampers that down. Even though he hasn’t forgiven him, he will be the bigger person as always. He will be amicable and down to earth, willing to listen and be heard. 

“Long time.” Is all he says in greeting and this time he gets a blink in return. A small reaction, but a stark difference towards the blatant ignorance Jay had faced when they first met somewhere just outside the city walls: but that is all he gets.

The man turns on heel swiftly and Jay has to let himself into the backseat even though he’s seen other chauffeurs open the doors for their clients. It ruffles the imaginary feathers below his skin, but he tries to let that go: tries to smooth over them until they're neat and looking untouched. 

They’re well-brushed and sitting nice when Jay closes the door and slides into the middle seat. His bag of belongings he had given the butlers is off to the side, nestled against the door with his name tag nicely pressed and flat to the material.

Jay reaches for it, one hand out, while the other is already popping the buttons on his corset. He can feel the limo start up with a hum under his ass, small tremors snaking their way down his legs. The mint is still present, still lingers coolingly along his skin and through the air of the car and the familiarity settles him further. The car moves and Jay can feel the small bumps of the road pop him out of his seat as he undoes his shirt, reaches for his pants. They’d be taken straight to the forest from what he understands.

It will be best to be dressed for the part in case of anything. 

So Jay begins stripping, changing out of everything except for his underwear and by time he’s rolling a white shirt over his head, he reaches out blindly for the button. The window comes down and Jay leans in slightly closer to it.

The salty breeze mixing with the mint of the car as they descend around the hill, but the rushing wind barely kisses his skin, barely even lasts long enough for Jay to peek his head out of the hole of his shirt before the car is abruptly stopping, flinging his unbelted body towards the partition, shirt stuck around his dome, and his belly tan and soft out for the air to nip at. 

“What the fuck?!” Jay spazzes, utterly shoving the shirt past his ears and slamming his fists on the already closed partition that he hit head into. 

“No, open this shit up. I’m not fucking playing with you!” Jay yells, kicking the seats, trying with his whole back to tear back that damn partition, but nothing gives, nothing but that damn clicking sound. 

The car’s turned off, the keys shifted and taken out. 

Jay breathes heavily as he tiredly comes to a stop, but the fire in his chest doesn’t abate, the friction between his teeth doesn’t relent. 

“The windows stay closed.” 

And Jay almost sees red. 

 Mirth, intention, purpose. 

Jay sits back, body absolutely thrumming with the need to hurt him, but there’s nothing he can do, not really. 

“So I can change butt ass naked in the backseat, but I can’t open the damn window?” Jay seethes, letting the window stay open, letting the wind course over his still barely concealed chest and abs. 

He doesn’t answer, doesn’t even breathe for Jay in response. He holds it all in, fucking basks in Jay’s building fury as he’s ignored, and lets the pitiful sound of his driver’s seat squeaking do all the talking for him. 

They don’t move, not for thirty minutes until Jay finally gives up and pulls up the window. 

Then the car starts back up, he feels it in his legs before they even move. 

“Pleasure, as always Mr. Park.” 

“Go fuck yourself.” 

It’s a clear night tonight and the moon feels rounder out here than it appeared at the school: a waxing gibbous—almost a full moon. 

Jay trudged along, stepping through foliage and scratchy ferns. The forest floor was dense, healthy with grass and moss that napped along his ankles, and soft, soil hydrated and so untrodden that Jay’s feet molded it anew, squished in and created an imprint of himself like a stamp of his being. He sank almost every time, the earth cushioning his gravity, loving on his soles so that he could continue marching through—searching. He arrived not too long ago, exiting the car at the lip of the forest with his bag slung along his shoulder and completely changed into comfortable wear.

He had entered immediately, not sparing any glance or words towards his chauffeur—as if any would be given back—and went on his way following the stars. There was no specific purpose for it: he wasn’t using them to navigate or tell time.

It’s just that when he became surrounded by long trunks that encircled him, stood in his way at every turn, and looked the same no matter how far Jay thought he walked, the stars remained still. The delicate and small bundles of fire in the sky that split through the tree canopies like shooting stars, or little guides. 

The stars keep him going straight for the most part, but eventually when the sounds of rushing water rings off like bells in his ears, Jay bids his farewells. This was his first night, the first night of the Forests and his first night in a forest. They wouldn’t be given any care packages during the duration, each pack placed at different starting points throughout the forest to disperse the resources.

Quickly put, Jay had to find shelter and a source of water first before anything, before any kills, before any hunting, or else his time here would be ending much sooner than he intended, for a variety of reasons that it shouldn’t.

He follows sound this time, each step he takes into the floor getting a little more damp, more wet as he approaches.

There’s a mess of leaves and branches winding around each other where he stands now. Some twist for room, while others break through the leafy flesh to block out where they want. It’s almost like a wall with the way they hold onto each other, the way they don’t break away easily under Jay’s hands, but there’s no other choice, or maybe Jay is being stubborn.

He doesn’t want to find a walk around, doesn’t really believe in himself and his comfortability with the forest to not get lost again, and he can hear the water just beyond clear as day.

His throat almost lurches for it himself. 

Fuck, all that walking really dried him out. 

Jay huffs one final time and finally takes his hands off of the branches before him. Shaking them won’t work, spreading them apart didn’t either, other branches, other leaves Jay hadn’t even seen would quickly fill up the void. 

“Fine, then.” Jay grunts and goes to open his duffle bag. Green is filtered out easily, Jay recognizing its long slope and encrusted casing even in this kind of dark. It’s freshly sharpened, too, once he uncaps it and the mere vision of himself through the blade’s reflection is enough to bump his pride.

He smiles at the foliage in front him, rolling the dagger between his fingers. Let me in.

And then he’s whipping around, slashing branches down, cleaving off leaves and roots as he pushes through. He doesn’t need the whole structure to be broken, he just needs space for himself. So wrestles his way through, cuts and scratches prickling at his skin: on his arms that were exposed and along his face where the leaves slapped into him or fell against him.

He makes it through though, even if it leaves him scratching and smoothing over the bits that tickle. 

Jay breathes it in—the other side.

A river runs long and wide down the middle of the forest, decorated and home to large, flat rocks that the water rolls over easily and the moss sits on top of cozily. It’s louder past the wall, almost pounding in his ears, but the sound isn’t heavy. It doesn’t batter his heart or stop his breath; it’s a smooth rhythm, one that flows to Jay like he’s the shore coming back.

His shoulders relax, drop and Green goes into his pocket capped.

He comes forward, almost in a trance and similar to the lake at school, he bends down into the soppy, weak grass and hovers over the bend: but this time he cups the water and sends it directly down his esophagaus and he fucking shivers from it. He can feel the water, cold and clear, spreading icicles through his stomach, sitting low in it before it is warmed by the acid.

It tastes a little earthy, how Jay thinks licking a rock would taste like, but it’s undoubtedly fresh, clean. The rocks and the moss act as filter systems to collect out any of the dirt, leaves, or bacteria. 

He takes in a couple of gulps, five handfuls to be exact before he stands up, hands coming out in the air as he steps forward, inching over the river.

There are a couple of large rocks leading across the river to the other side of the forest. It’s a grassy hill with trees almost thicker than the ones he’s leaving behind, and Jay doesn’t know, just goes by how he feels. Thicker trees, better wood and shelter. So he jumps onto the first rock, arms rocking in the air wildly to maintain his balance.

They’re wet, unbelievably wet, which isn’t a shocker, but still not something Jay thinks he can ever fully be prepared for.

When he stabilizes, he visualizes his path, acts out the jump in his head, and after every scenario is considered, he goes for it, each time, seven times until he’s jumping back down in wet, giving earth. It’s not too interesting after that. Jay walks up the hill, further into the trees and tries to stay close to the water, always keeping it within hearing range now that he’s found a water source.

He walks along, breaks through some more branches, almost trips over a particularly thick root when he happens upon a shelter. Except, it's not the pile of sticks pitched together by leaves into a tent that Jay was hoping to find already made from past events.

No, it’s a small home, or more like a slightly bigger shed. The grass gets thicker the closer Jay gets to it, longer and wilder in the way that they curl around his kneecaps, high and mighty.

The place has seen better days that’s for sure, but the walls are made of rock and cement, the roof a thick wood that’s started to bend inward from weathering. There aren’t windows when Jay circles the place and no light bleeds from below the door when he stands up to it.

The door isn’t as sturdy when he wretches it open, doesn’t even have a lock of any kind on it to fully keep it closed, but a brick that Jay belatedly moves. 

He keeps the door open as he walks in, needing the moonlight to brighten the room so he can see, and it’s not bad. It’s better than what Jay would have done. There is a small cot built into the corner of the wall, along with a side table with metal bowls and lanterns placed randomly on top.

There’s no bathroom, nor kitchen, just this, a one room that Jay could walk to the end of in three strides. 

“This will do.” He smiles to himself, dropping his bag onto the cot. He means to unpack, set out his daggers on the side table for easy access, and place some of his clothes and other belongings in the small cupboard above the cot, but he heads outside first.

Going around the shed until he’s back in the thick of the forest, collecting branches. It takes him about two trips, but he collects enough fallen branches to start a fire and leaves them outside his door for the next day.

For now he just grabs two of them and rubs them together until he gets a baby fire sparked between them.

He doesn’t even breathe when he carefully carries it back inside, nor when he lowers it into one of the lanterns: he only takes in the much needed gulp once the fire catches, the little flame wiggly and bright, lighting up the room in a warm yellowed corn. 

Then, easily, he blows the sticks out, throws them back into the pile and closes the door back with the brick. The grasshoppers are rubbing their legs together now and the sounds of the forest bleed into his room all around him even though there are no windows.

It’s different and he’s not used to it, but he tries to not let it send shivers down his back and goosebumps up his arms. Unpacking is quick and Jay finds himself laying down in the cot, under a shelter, faster than he would have thought at the beginning of this trek. 

At least 14 kills, he thinks. 

14.

And he drifts to sleep, White pressed to his chest and his two Black daggers attached to his ankles. Green sleeps happily next to him, taking up the other side of his flattened, musty pillow.  

When Jay wakes next, his fried pieces of hair stand up at attention first like little antennae that taste the air for movement, vibrations. Jay doesn’t bother with them, never did after their one sided relationship with the static from the car window, but even though his hair is mussed and shielding him from most things, his ears remain naked, bald to the outer happenings. 

At first it's just the forest. The grasshoppers, crickets, the occasional gallop of a deer or the hiccup of a frog, and the constant pouring of the river not too far away: but, then there’s new sounds. Ones that Jay hears, but doesn’t fully register.

They’re just another part of the living and breathing forest he’s sleeping in, but then a stick breaks and the sound shakes him from his slumber. He blinks his eyes quickly, his brain is not on yet, not even able to fully comprehend why he’s been woken. 

Then he hears it again. Not a stick, a step.

It didn’t want to be heard, but its heaviness comes with sound regardless. Jay breathes softly, thinly, enough to go unnoticeable to his own ears, and slowly presses his ear to the walls: cobblestone and cement, but when Jay’s ear suctions it, it’s like he’s in a tunnel hearing the vibrations of the forest beyond it, hearing the flap and rubbings of the bugs’ wings that sit just on the other side of where his ear is pressed. 

Breathing. 

Panting. 

When Jay licks his lips, a hand already coming out for Green to his side, he hears the small slip of a growl spread like jelly between the walls and his ear. 

Feral. 

Jay grins. 

Time to start counting. 

Jay bounces out of the cot, the feral’s growl cut in its rumbling as it hears Jay coming for it, spinning round the damn house and sliding through the mud. 

He’s laughing, half delirious and tired, and half excited to finally start. 

Jay anchors himself as he slides into a partial squat, dagger cutting through the soil as he grounds himself to a stop. 

Murky amber eyes meet Jay’s adjusting pupils and soft eyelashes. They’re skinny, almost emancipated compared to Jay who is lean and muscular, but they crouch down regardless, lowering with Jay. 

They're both shaking. 

Excitement. 

“C’mon baby.” Jay coos. 

And they collide. 

One.

When Jay steps out of the river the following morning—or really, the next few hours—wet, and using a towel to dry his naked body, the body is gone. The blood remains, soaked all around his little cabin in a circle. It marked the leaves on the ground and seeped into the soil like fresh fertilizer, but the lump, the thin, raggedy body of a dead wolf is nowhere to be seen at his doorstep.

Last night, he had dragged the thing around the cabin, scent marking it not as only taken, but deadly for those who’d come closer, those ferals who’d think about jumping him in his slumber again. He’d left the body right outside his door, pressed right up against it in a red, goopy puddle too.

Jay wasn’t a wolf, nor was he a vampire, that scent marking shit did nothing for him. He couldn’t even smell it, but the body? A clear visual, one that stoked his aggression and coaxed the adrenaline from his pores in waves. It was motivation. It was a sign. It was proof. 

And well, now it is gone. Replaced by a small sticky note on his door with the stamp of the school impressed on top. 

Jay peeled it off, the smirk bending his mouth as he threw the towel over his shoulder. The sun was extra bright today, warming his bare skin, sending down rays of light like halos around his ass and balls. Jay hummed as he looked out at the mess he made. 

It sure did feel good to let loose every now and then, but alas, he was in a forest, crawling with bugs, bacteria, and things that could bite him anywhere without remorse or consideration. So, Jay walked inside and changed into his clothes for the day. The blood pile from last night was still resting on a branch by the river. They weren’t drying per se.

The branch was half way into the river when he found it and after hours of rubbing at the blood that wouldn’t come out, he’d decided to just rest them on the branch, let the water and rocks continuously roll and wash around it like a makeshift washing machine until he got back.

It’d be better if he'd brought some detergent, but unfortunately he did not think that far and he wasn’t willing to waste his bar of soap on anything other than himself at the moment. 

After his daggers were well tucked, Jay headed back out: fresh and early, and as clean as a daisy.

He smiled as the sun showed him the way to nowhere and happily walked off away from his cabin, using a Black Jade to chip at the trees he’s passed so he can easily find his way back. It was around seven in the morning and definitely time for breakfast. 

Jay wandered, listened intently for any signs of movement or rustling. He was the hunter in this scenario. The one sniffing around dens, prancing quietly but strongly through the foliage, peering, and waiting for that one moment to stalk, to strike. 

A fox. 

Small, smaller than what Jay’s seen in books and through pictures, but a fox nonetheless is bustling around a bush bursting with berries. Its tangerine coating contrasts sharply with the deep purples of the blackberries it nips.

It’s calm, relaxed, its ears only twitch at the sounds of the birds gossiping in their nests above and the deer that’s grazing not too far from them both. 

Jay steps silently through the brush, bent low, but not squatted.

Foxes were fast and squirmy. He had to be close to the ground, but able to have as much availability in his movements as possible, but just as Jay’s silver hair peeks through the leaves, the color camouflaging itself easily among the white bark on the trees, Jay isn’t the only one eyeing the fox. 

There’s a wolf here, its dark grey snout breaking through the treeline. There’s a jitter to the way it stalks, unsteady like it might trip over its own weight, and there’s this look in its eyes, one that doesn’t seem present. One that neglects to look at its surroundings in correspondence to the fox.

One that doesn’t even blink at the sunlight Jay has to shield his own eyes from for a couple of seconds as the rays become too bright. 

Another feral, but Jay’s body tenses with his eyebrows. How does he kill the feral without scaring away the fox? How does he get to the fox first when a feral could come for him from the side? 

Jay quietens his breathing and it's enough for the two animals to not notice him even as he comes into the small space between the trees. The fox is focused, too calm to recognize Jay’s steps as being as anything other, and the feral is close to unresponsive, as they almost always are.

They were individuals whose moral and mental state collapsed and was now only driven by instinct and the need to gnaw, shred, and bleed. The only time they were ever stationary or seemingly sane was when their instinct had gotten locked on something: food, not killing. When wolves hunt, when predators hunt, their eyes lock on their prey, it’s a sure death, one that chains you between their teeth before they’ve even sunk them in.

It’s supposed to enhance focus, help with direct attacks, and to be able to track their running prey easily, but with ferals it doubles.

Their ferality overrides the need for spacial awareness and though the feral can see Jay through its peripherals, its brain isn’t computing him as actually being alive, moving, anything beyond a tree. Not to mention, Jay has no scent, no pheromones that could possibly compete or distract from the fox in front of them to catch its attention.

It’s a blessing; it’s one of Jay’s unofficial superpowers that comes with being unpresented. It’s gotten him out of a lot of sticky situations, it’s allowed him to hide in a trunk while a horde of ferals ransacked the city and came out of it unscathed, untouched. 

Jay slides Green back into its casing, switching it out smoothly for White and then he waits, grabbing a small rock from the ground and rolling it in his palm.

Two birds with one stone. 

Jay crouches low. 

He throws the rock into the blackberry bush and the fox absolutely startles. The berry hiding between its cheeks splattering out and the fluffy tail spiking up. 

It runs. The wolf chases. 

And Jay, waiting for the right moment, baits his breath as the fox starts coming upon a tree. 

“Now.” Jay mutters and throws his dagger. It's a straight, sharp throw, one that aches his shoulder like he was playing baseball, but it’s worth it. It’s all worth it because the sleek dagger pierces through the foxes head, sliding through its brain with ease and pinning it to the tree. The fox dangles from it, bleeding and still twitching from the shock. The impact was so sudden it’s dying body hadn’t even the time to catch up. 

“Beautiful.” Jay whispers, and finally now that the fox has been pinned, now that its body has gone limp, the feral stops in its attack. The hunt is over and it was taken from him. 

It growls at him, the sheer force coming from its throat shaking the loose hairs from its body. Jay sees the nails stretch out further from its bruised toes, travels up its body to see the past bites and fights its had with other ferals in the forest too, no doubt over food.

It had taken Jay almost half an hour to find something and with how the dean said their numbers have doubled, Jay could only imagine how bloody it got. 

Hm, too fucking bad. 

Jay waves as they’re finally introduced and the wolf only grovels lower, perches its legs, and pounces off, jaws wide, spit flying, and eyes completely hazed and yellow. 

Jay dives off to the side, uncapping Green midair as he falls into the heap of fall leaves. They fly up around him when he lands, a couple landing under his shirt, and if he were to think about it, he’d say he felt a little black something tickling along his ankle. 

Jay grins. Now it feels like fall. 

Jay swirls out of the heap, a pretty rotation that gets him back onto his feet and like one of those b-boys Jay used to watch perform in the street before things went shit, Jay plants his hands into the ground behind him, and does a kick up into the wolf’s jaw. 

The resounding howl presses a sharp, happy yip from Jay as he lands back on his feet and rushes forward, catapulting himself onto the wolf’s back, but this wolf is smaller, definitely weaker, and it must have a bad ankle because that gives out first when Jay’s weight sinks into it.

Jay can feel his shoulders straighten out a little at the fact: his pup was strong, was able to hold him, and run with him without a hitch.

This one, this wolf falls flat under Jay in seconds and Jay spares it not even one. Green comes down and around its neck easily and Jay holds both its ears as if it were a rabbit he just pulled from its den. 

Together, he slices it’s throat open, finching away in time for the blood not to pour over his hand and arm. He looks up one time and sees his precious fox still planted into the tree by White and he can’t help the glee that spreads through his chest, and brightens up his skin into a sweet honey.  Two.

“Yes!” Jay fists the sky, his first hunt successful. He’s never had to hunt actual animals before, maybe he’s hit a squirrel once or twice in the city on a run, but other than that, he was grabbing preserved shit from the stores or freezers—if they still worked.

Maybe that’s why he was so excited, why this was so much more fun than he expected it to be. He’s in his element, doing what he’s good at, while experiencing what it’s like to be in an open forest unbidden by any rules, or decorum, or even suffocated in by empty skyscrapers and metal and steel buildings that no longer came alive at night with neon lights. 

But blood splatters along his mouth and all prior excitement and jest expires in him like curdled milk. Jay looks up, disgusted, utterly confused, then slightly irritated with himself. 

He forgot to let go of its ears, and now Jay was holding up a severed head to the sky that he had unintentionally torn off its body. 

“O-oh” Jay spills out, the words muddled in his disgust as he feels the blood trail down his chin, dropping stains into his fresh shirt. 

Jay slams himself back into that heap of leaves and whines. 

This was a clean fucking shirt. 

 

 

He decided to just take the head with him. There was truly no point in wasting time making two trips when he could just carry the fox in one and the dripping wolf’s head in the other. Surely, the point would still get across that he had killed it. So, Jay stuffs his daggers back into their holsters and his pockets after wiping them on a cleaner bed of grass and grabs his bodies by their ears.

The way back is easy thanks to the chippings he’s made on the trees and before long he’s already sitting in front of a mini bonfire, roasting his skinned fox over a stick with the wolf’s head now speared into the ground like his very own mailbox. Jay kind of liked it, felt like he had placed his own special touch onto the cabin. 

The fire crackled in front of him, sending wisps of heat along his arms as smoke flavored his meat and glossed his eyes. He turned it over one last time, just to make sure it was evenly cooked, and went back inside to retrieve one of the metal bowls from the side table.

Then, quickly while his food finished up, he ventured back toward the river, rinsing the bowl and checking on his clothes that definitely looked less red by now.

Jay scoops up some of the water into his bowl and walks back. 

A little drink to go along with breakfast. 

 

 

Jay doesn’t wait. He doesn’t let himself sink into the full feeling in his stomach nor the way the sun casts around his shoulders warmly. As tempting as it is to fall back into his cot and burrito himself sleep, he takes one last gulp of his bowl and snuffs out the fire with the remaining.

Time waits for no one and Jay doesn’t stay long enough to see the heavy bouts of grey smoke that comes up from the burnt wood. 

Jay bounds off and rides with the wind. He finds a package deal in a small clearing feeding off the corpse of a group of students—a pack no doubt and he kills the three easily enough. All of them were focused on chewing apart intestines to really hear Jay coming, and since they couldn’t smell him, his knives went through their skulls like a trained assassin.

When they dropped dead, Jay waited until their bodies stopped twitching to start wounding the rope around their bodies, interlinking them so Jay could more easily transport them back to his cabin.

The rope had been thrown off to the side somewhere, whether on purpose or for what Jay doesn’t know, but he thanks the pack anyway for how helpful it is for him now.  

Five.

Then, comes the rag tag wolf: medium sized, with only a few tufts to call fur, and a missing eye that tells Jay all he needs to know. It’s fucking manic. Ferals don’t know when to quit, can’t decipher what it means to be on the losing side before an attack has even begun, but this one. This one right here seemed worse off, pouncing against the trees like pingpongs to get to Jay and Jay almost get fucking mauled midair before he’s able to drop his line of dead wolves and duck and roll.

That fight was surprisingly fucking tough.

The disgusting naked mole rat of a wolf was fast and unpredictable, jumping around Jay like a goat, running between his legs to claw at his inner thighs—to which Jay had only barely somersaulted away from—and used its claws more than its teeth to come at him.

It takes a couple of minutes of them zipping around each other, playing ring-a-round the rosie with trees before Jay’s able to get a shot in: both daggers straight through the paws.

The wolf howls out and in its distraction, Jay gripping his knives twirls the wolf around and onto its back like the damn twirl and dip he did with Yihwa at the ball. From there, once his foot sinks into its stomach, firmly pinning it to the ground, Jay slices its throat, too and attaches it to the very end of his wolfy choo-choo train. 

Six.  

His shoulders and thighs are aching by time he drops his wolf kebab by his mailbox, the four of them together dragging along the forest floor, catching along branches, and sinking into muddy pits was almost too much for himself alone. Even when he took breaks, the emerging soreness didn’t seem to abate, but settle into his bones. 

“Ughhh.” Jay groans out, hands massaging at his biceps, his shoulders, attempting at his shoulder blades behind him, but it doesn’t do much. He’s not able to get as deep as he would like. 

He was going to feel this one tomorrow, wasn’t he? 

Jay sighs, fitting the end of the rope into the impaled wolf’s mouth and subconsciously closes its jaws around it. 

“Watch them for me, you’re the oldest.” He mumbles out tiredly and shakes the hair at the top of his mailbox’s head before trudging back out. 

 

 

He walks around aimlessly, whistling tunes to himself as he marks trees and clears himself a path when the branches hang too low and thick. There are a lot of bent trees over this way, leaning like they have been carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders for so long that they’ve started to weaken.

It’s a little scary walking around them, between them. Their shadows cast deeper along his skin and their leaves whisper above his shoulders in secret as he climbs over broken and rooting stumps.

He’s just in the middle of tugging himself up a large stack of stumps when he hears the running—swift steps that hit the ground in too close of intervals. And Jay stops atop the fallen trunk, sits down patiently as he takes out both White and Green.

Afterall, there were only so many reasons for someone to be running during the Forests. So he waits amongst the low lying branches. The leaves shielding his presence and the shadows blending him into the background. He sits. He clicks his shoes together in minor impatience, and then finally, finally straightens up his back when he sees her break through the treeline. 

She’s not screaming, but Jay can see the terror on her face, can see how overwhelmed she is with the way her eyes dart here—there—then over—above—below, and in repeat like she’s unsure of herself in this environment, unsure of which way is the right way: but that’s the thing about the forests, there was no right way, only instinct. 

What she’s running from comes quickly after and fuck, this one is big. 

Still nowhere near Heeseung, but its bulk almost rivals Ni-ki.

Ni-ki’s wolf almost hits his chest without lifting his head, whereas this one he estimates to be up to his navel. So even if the bulk is worrying, Jay’s dealt with worse, he’s tumbled with worse: but that’s Jay. The shorter girl who is unknowingly about to run herself into a dead end of tightly compact trees seems inexperienced—or at the very least, wholly unprepared. 

How did she pass her exams? 

The girl races past him, his scent non-existent and even from the brief close up shot, Jay can see the way her clothes are torn, hanging with little pieces flying in the air behind her. She wasn’t fast, she was just fast enough. 

Jay stands up slowly from the stump, bending his knees slightly as he waits for the wolf to round the next tree, to come flying right past him to chase the blonde. His hands clench and unclench, sweat and blood from past encounters loosening up his grip, making his skin feel all the more sticky. 

He breathes in deeply one last time. He has to time this right.

The wolf comes surging, completely checking into a thin tree that stands in its way instead of running around it, and the resounding crack is a little shaking. The tree splits from the short impact alone and Jay rubs his lips together as he formulates just how accurate he’s going to need to be with his knives.

This wolf can clearly take a hit. Can most certainly take the pain of his knives slicing through him, so Jay’s gonna have to rely on precision, rather than pain. A straight shot through the brain, disconnecting the signals from the brain to the body to move. 

Eventually his moment comes.

The blonde trips over a nasty root and the wolf comes to pass. It doesn’t smell Jay, doesn’t see him—it’s perfect.

Jay jumps ten seconds before the wolf even turns the corner and he’s in the air for those ten seconds completely unprotected, splayed out and facing the floor like he was attempting an awful belly flop into the forest floor. It would be nerve wracking, thinking about his body connecting with flat earth, the impact of it all shattering his ribs and ripping the air from him like it was never his to breath: but, Jay’s sure, and then, he’s right. 

Those ten seconds are just enough to line with the wolf’s speed and he lands straight onto its back, the fur sharp and spiky with caked and dried mud and blood. It almost scratches at Jay’s skin when he brushes against it.

The wolf doesn’t stop. It keeps pushing forward, jaw already jutting out for the girl whose eyes have been closed since she fell, but it knows Jay’s here. 

She screams. 

Jay lifts his daggers into an angle.

The wolf’s ears twitch in acknowledgement of him. 

And Jay stabs them down, gliding and piercing right through the ear canals. He can feel the automatic stun it brings to the wolf’s body. It freezes momentarily, only the spit from its jaws wrapping around the blonde’s ankle as the pain and weird pressure is categorized: but it's far from over, the wolf isn’t necessarily in pain. It’s taking it. 

Jay pushes his daggers in further, sliding them up, before twisting them in like nuts and bolts. Jay’s so deep, he’s mincing the wolf’s brain up, chopping it up and disturbing the natural fluid around it so much it begins to leak from its ears. 

The wolf howls, spazzes. 

And then they’re bucking around. Jay the rider, the wolf the bull, but he holds on tightly to his knives that pierce through its head like horns and cinches his thighs tightly around the thick body. 

They bounce for a while, Jay being rocked back and forth until he’s able to unscramble his own head enough to hit that nice, soft spot on the right—the cerebellum. The mincing of it hinders all movement within seconds, completely cutting off the nerve impulses connected to the spinal cord. Together, they fall flat and Jay takes a second to orient himself back to the ground.

“Whoo!” Jay whistles out with a laugh. 

He shakes his head, jumping off its back and prying his daggers back out. They make a wet squelching sound as he does it, brain matter and blood all leaking down his handles, and onto his hands. It smells wretched. 

“Ough, fuck me.” Jay winces out, the smell striking him up the nose like an uppercut. He really needs to get back to the river and soon, before the smell alone kills him, and to be real, he’s about to do just that. His hands are already holding on to a paw to drag it with him and kill it back at camp, but there’s a small shuffling behind him, a crunch of leaves.

Then a shaking voice that wraps around his ears as hands clench into the back of his shirt. 

“Thank you, thank you. Alpha, I—”

Jay swerves, the curve in his face and scrunch in his nose prominent. 

“Do not call me tha—”

Oh. It’s her. 

“Where’s your pack?” He asks, instead.

Memories come back to him instantly: White Week, his first courting: the small omega that had given him a dead rat while he was eating breakfast. Except, this wasn’t the omega, but one of the betas he had run to after his present. The mere mention of them seems to get her started again, busting out into a full wail that must rival any horror film Jay’s ever seen.

The emotional pain makes her tremble and she’s barely able to meet his eyes as her weight shifts, her body giving in, giving up.

She falls right into his arms—Jay having to let go of the paw  to make it so. She doesn’t speak, though she tries, but it's all bubbles spit and nuzzling into his chest that Jay doesn't try to respond to. He just lets her cry there into his bloodied shirt, hovering his hands around her form, but never touching. They’re still covered in brain matter. 

He tries again, a couple moments later. “Can you tell me?” He asks calmly, softly enough not to come off as rude or impatient, even if a part of him slightly is because he can feel the brain starting to cool on his fingers. She looks up at him, pitifully and Jay tells her no when she tries to speak for him again. 

“Show me.” He says instead and then they’re walking back where she’s run from, retracing her steps perfectly all the way back to her pack. Or to what’s left of it. 

“It’s okay, you don’t have to look.” He says, already blocking her vision with his body as he surveys the situation. 

The pack had made a small open hut by the trees: long leaves collected into a roof over tightly compacted sticks that arched over the ground. At least, that’s what it probably looked like before, before blood caked all over and the branches were split and cracked with messy holes around the unit as if something was trying to dig them out.

Then, the bodies. The taller girl and the smaller boy, holding hands, except their bodies were found separate from their link. 

“We were attacked.” She whispers behind him, but there’s too much breath in it, too much of a cry that it comes out high pitches anyway. “They–they told me to run. They told m—I didn't mean to leave them, please!” 

She cries into his shoulder blades, “please,” she whimpers, “I really didn’t. Alpha, I’m sorry.” and there’s something in the way that she says the word, the way she huddles closer behind him that makes him drop his shoulders.

She wasn’t using the title as a way of status, or respect of power. It was seeking comfort, a want for stability when everything felt like it was crumbling down. She was lost and she was speaking to him, asking him for guidance and peace. 

Jay pulled her to him, hand coming behind him to pull her by the hip into his back. She plasters herself into him, and he keeps a steady hand on her even though the backward angle is uncomfortable for him.

Is this what Alphas did for their packs? Was there more to it than pissing and domination over others? Was he wrong? 

His eyebrows furrow with the thoughts, with the mere idea that packs could be anything but harmful and degrading. His mother had been terrified, had been murdered, there’s no way there wasn’t a systematic problem with packs, one that took the freewill of all the individuals: but then again, if he and Sunoo were a pack… Jay shakes his head, silver hair flying free and with it hopefully his fucking thoughts. 

“I know, pup.” He pats and almost fucking cringes at himself for the words. They feel wrong even though he’s just saying them to comfort her. 

She’s not his pu—Jay hits the side of his head with the crook of his wrist. It's the soreness, it’s getting to his head. He’s had a long day afterall and he still has to drag this wolf back to its brothers. 

“Can you tell me what happened?” 

She takes a second, but she nods into his back. 

“There was a group of them, eight—ten, I don’t know, but it was like they were working together. They came in all at once, but it was somewhat organized. They had certain wolves who came first. It was—it was nothing like we’ve ever seen. They’re feral; they're not supposed to be able to communicate with each other like that, much less organize a hunt.” 

Jay’s breath slows between his teeth, the suddenness almost making a hissing noise that Jay tries to muffle as fast as possible. Fuck, so that’s what Yihwa was talking about before his exam. 

“Over time, they must have caught onto the monthly pattern, so now around this time they ally, certain groups of them dominating and circling areas. When we come, it’s like a feast—a holiday.”

Shit. That’s three down then. Jay remembers what she said about the kill switch, how no one knows exactly what it will do, what will happen, but that the only thing that triggers it is if the ferals end up killing more students than the students kill them, and Jay’s only killed seven by this point. His alone would cover these two, but if the ferals were really temporarily packing then at some point his kills alone were not going to be enough. 

Jay nods jerkily, patting her hip one more time before stepping away from her. 

“Watch my wolf.” He says to her and immediately gets to work. He walks around the site, even ventures a bit out into the trees and collects all their parts. Once he brought them back together, he began chipping at the soil. In a mix of stick shoveling and rock carving, Jay made a shallow grave, one big enough for them both.

Sweat was dribbling down his temples, coating all along his arms, and he thinks the brain matter has probably wiped off somewhere amidst all the dirt by this point, but eventually he lays them both down, leaving their connected hands on top of them. 

Then, kneeling back to crack his back, he looks over to the blonde. He’s just checking on her, he’s not really worried that she ran off with his wolf or not, but she’s come a little closer now. Eyes completely on her pack mates as Jay begins to push the mounded hill of dirt towards the pit. When he’s got it mostly at the edge, he looks to her one more time, tips his head in question: do you want to say something, anything before they rest? 

She breathes in deeply and settles down into a crouch besides Jay. Her hands are still shaking, but he can feel that she’s gathered herself in the thirty minutes Jay’s spent digging. 

She rests her hand atop of theirs. Linked and held. 

“I heard you,” She says, her thumb running over their knuckles. 

“And I love you both, too.” 

Jay connects their shoulders briefly and looks at her and when she nods, they both push the mound over their bodies. 

To be covered and reconnected to the earth, a cycle none of them can escape from. Not them anyway. 

 

 

Jay takes back the reins of his wolf and they head back together. It's undiscussed, but Jay doesn’t mind her following him back. Honestly, he probably would have suggested it if she hadn’t fallen into step with him anyway. She’s gone through too much tonight, the least he can do is make sure she isn’t left alone. 

Jay is preparing dinner when he asks. 

“What did you mean when you said you heard them?” He says hesitantly, softly enough so she knows that she doesn’t actually have to answer him if she didn’t want to. She sits across from him on the separate pile of leaves, watching the orange in the fire dance and sway with the slight wind.

Thankfully, they’ve already bathed in the river—separately—so the only thing Jay can smell is the roasting of two rabbits. 

“When you’re a part of a pack, there’s a natural connection that links you all. It’s like everyone’s on the same frequency, the same brain wave: you can feel what they feel sometimes if it’s strong enough, but more relevantly, you can speak to each other through the link. It’s like their voice in your head.” 

Jay smiles around a quiet laugh and turns the rabbits, “I can’t imagine what that’d feel like.” 

She smiles at him back, hugging her knees as she drops her head onto them. 

“Hmm,” she hums, “at first it feels weird, like vibration or buzzing in your ear that you just want to slap off.” She looks up at him through her eyelashes, “But, eventually when it happens, they just start to feel like thoughts—except, not in your own voice.”

Jay purses his lips at the visual, nodding along. 

“I think I’d go insane if I had to hear Yihwa’s worries and whines about my safety throughout the day.” He jokes and tries to make it seem like it burdens him, throws in a sigh and a slump and everything to seal the deal, but he’s smiling the whole time. 

He wouldn’t absolutely hate having a built in walkie talkie. 

She laughs as she accepts her own rabbit from Jay. 

“Sorry, by the way. For the whole Alpha thing, I know you don’t really—” 

Jay shakes his head, bringing his rabbit to his lips. 

“Don’t worry about it, it’s all forgotten.” He says easily, stretching out his legs, “Just call me Jay.” 

“Esme.” She delivers between bites, “and thank you, Jay.” 

 

 

Jay gave her the cot and slept on the floor. Lights were out and Jay finally settled back down after having run off another student. Those heightened senses really came in handy it seems.

Esme was able to smell them even before they stepped into his domain. Jay wasn’t initially worried about it, but she had been adamant he checked, and he did, mostly to cull over her nerves, most likely still frayed from the event earlier, but she was right. Another student was trying to walk away with his wolf kebab in the middle of the night.

It was pitch black outside except for the stars above and the lightning bugs bringing him enough light to see. He had yelled at them, threw a Black Jade at their retreating body, but they managed to slip away. Not with his kebab or his mailbox, thankfully but still Jay wasn’t able to fully make out their identity.

It honestly almost looked like the boy from the eligibility line up: the same one with no boundaries who kept talking to him and Yihwa like they’ve been friends for years. He wasn’t sure though, the boy had been packless even into the beginning of White Week when he last saw him, and Jay was the only Loner here. 

Hm, whatever , is what he thought before he situated his animals back and came in to lie down. Stealing someone else’s kills was such a low move, even for Jay. 

“We should go west in the morning.” Esme says into the dark and Jay rolls onto his back. 

“Why west?” He mumbles out, the strain and pull of the day taking him quicker into the darkness than he expected. He isn’t mad though. 

“The ferals, Yusei said he saw them heading west together. He told me to steer from it, but…” 

‘What?” Jay tries to push out, even as his head falls to the side. 

“My cousin, her pack was down that way when I last saw her.” 

She doesn’t say more after that. She doesn’t have to. 

“Okay, we’ll head west.” 

 

 

 

Notes:

Omg so how we feeling?! Our very own chauffeur is back finally after so many chapters lol.

So sorry it took me another three weeks with this, but hear me, hear me: ya'll are getting two chapters this week. I may have accidentally fucked around and made a 28K chapter. I know, insane. So, here is the first...idk half of that 28k? I'll be editing the second half as soon as possible, so you can expect the second part honestly within a couple of days.

But yeaaaa, tell me your thoughts and feelings on the chapter!!

See y'all real fucking soon lmao.

Chapter 10

Jay sleeps in—just a little. Going west sounded like it was going to be a long journey and after all the chaos yesterday, his body was going to need as much tlc rest as possible. Esme doesn’t bother him either. Lets him sleep and gives him a cooked squirrel she finished firing when he stumbles out of the cabin. Jay mumbles his thanks to her and chews it down. After that they don’t take long to get back out on the road, or foliage, however the saying should go now that they’re in the forest. Jay just makes sure to take some time beforehand to sharpen his daggers against a rock and clean them again.

Then, after that they’re off.

He left most of his stuff in the cabin like his duffel bag, clothes, and what not. He didn’t need them, not really. All he was going to do was drop Esme off with her cousin and kill whatever ferals he met on the way back. It was a pretty solid plan, one that was sure to keep Jay on his feet for the most of the day. He followed behind Esme, letting the girl sniff her way to her cousin or whatever she meant by “tracking”.

He was glad to let her do so, it’s not like the stars were out to be of much help navigationally anyway.

Besides, he had to trail behind to knock chips into the trunks so he knew how to get back himself later. And so they kept moving, no breaks needed really thanks to the canisters Esme had brought with her. It allowed them to be able to move away from the river, with cold water sloshing in their metal cans for future use.

They walked and walked.

Jay ended up injuring another feral, but it had gotten distracted by another noise in the forest and pounced away. That shit had pissed him off. He got his knives dirty for no reason.

Jay only had seven kills so far, which wasn’t bad. It was half way, but still Jay couldn’t rest until he made at least the minimum. And maybe this side quest wasn’t doing anything to help with his momentum on the goal, but fuck he’s a gentleman okay? 

It takes an hour, maybe two to trek West for them to reach the middle of the forest. There’s more clearings here, less places to hide and use for shelter, but also more room for large packs. Ones like Esme’s cousin. 

“That’s your cousin?!” Jay balks quietly to Esme’s side after she howls out to the pack. Esme had grabbed Jay’s shoulder and rushed him back when he was about to just walk on ahead. Something about territory and needing permission. Jay scoffed at it. It’s a damn forest. 

She looks at him curiously and nods, “Yea, know her?” 

The girl in question walks up to them, eyebrow raised but a smirk heavy on her lips. Alpha. Black hair. Confidence. Pretty like Yihwa. 

“Jongseong, surprised to see you here. To what do I owe the visit, cous’?” 

Jay smiles off to the side, shaking his head. They would have definitely gotten along if she hadn’t courted him during White Week. 

“They got my pack. There was a pack of them—ferals, I mean. They were heading West before Jay saved me.” Esme summarizes heavily, her uncomfortability showing through the way she scratches into her arms. 

“Hi.” Jay supplies unhelpfully, raising his fingers in greeting. 

The Alpha blanches, smirk quickly dropping to pull her cousin into her arms safely. 

“I’m glad you’re okay.” She kisses into the top of Esme's head, before her eyes come to Jay’s. 

“Thank you, Jongseong. Whatever we can do to help you, we will. If you’re interested in—.” 

Jay puts his hand up. 

“No, no thanks. I appreciate the offer though. Your pack has good taste in jellies.” He declines politely, hands fitting into his back pockets. 

“I just wanted to make sure she got here before I head back. Speaking of, we wasted some hours getting here. Any ferals in the area?” He asks after looking up at the sky. It's probably early afternoon now. The Alpha frowns at the question, eyebrows creasing as she looks off around her thinking. 

“If kills is what you’re looking for, a lot of them at that and if what you say is true then you’re going to want to be here tonight.” She says and now it’s Jay’s turn to tilt his head. 

“There’s a reason why first years are dropped off in the outskirts of the forest. Towards the middle is where most of the ferals are, where the worst of them lurk. Getting jumped in packs is almost commonplace this far in, though I’m not sure what’s made them venture out so far to you guys.”

She shakes her head, “Regardless, there’s always a collective that happens. A night where most ferals pack together and meet around a specific area before they break off into smaller packs to jump. Think of it like pre-gaming.” 

“You can rack up your kills easily if you know what you’re doing and know how to pace yourself amongst tens of tens.” 

“Where is it?” Jay asks, stepping forward in his eagerness. 

The Alpha smiles. 

“We’ll take you.” She says, hand brushing out towards her pack who sit by their tents, watching them closely. “No intention behind it,” she says to him waving him off, “but it’s harder to explain where, when we can just sense it.” 

Jay nods. That makes sense, he supposes. How do you give directions to someplace you can only ever smell? 

The Alpha invites them into her territory and both he and Esme walk behind her as they cross the grassy clearing towards her pack. 

“Aarie, by the way.” 

Jay hums in response, stepping over a lone stick that threatens to poke into the bottom of his shoe. 

“What’s up with tonight?” He asks distractedly, “why’s it gotta be tonight?” 

Aarie looks back sweetly, a smile covering a laugh at his ignorance. 

“Tonight’s the full moon, Jongseong. 

They wait until dusk to move. Jay amidst a nine membered pack excluding Esme and himself. Out of the nine, all of them are girls. It didn’t bother him at all, just made him curious as to why they were interested in him then. He doesn’t ask though, there’s much more important shit happening at the moment.

They’re only moving through the forests as a unit, Jay still marking every now and then, but overall his mind is elsewhere. 

It’s the full moon tonight and Jay doesn’t really know what that’s supposed to mean in its entirety. Just knows that supplies runs were never scheduled or asked for on those nights unless for emergency medical equipment, and that even then, they only ever asked the adults to do them.

Even if Jay was perfectly capable. Whatever it was, whatever it did must enhance them in some way, or make them more crazed than the next—that much he could only assume.

It made him curious, made him wonder if ferals were such a thing on the full moon than what of the pack he was currently walking with. Was he safe with them then? Or was the full moon effects only felt depending on the amount of the control a wolf had. If that were the case, he should be fine.

They seemed fine anyway. They chatted around him, even trying to include him when they thought he could relate to something.

Normal. Pretty normal. 

But other packs would most likely be at this spot too, right? If it was such a hot spot for ferals, there was bound to be more packs with the same idea than just them. Aarie said first years were put on the outskirts, so that meant that second and on came closer and closer towards the epicenter. 

Jay breathed as he stuck Black into yet another wooden trunk. 

Would Heeseung be there? 

He banishes the thought as soon as it comes, but the shiver doesn’t go with it. It stays and travels down his back like sweat dripping down from his nape. 

It’s fine, he tells himself, he agreed. Heeseung had agreed. They had a truce for the moment. 

All Jay had to worry about was killing ferals, that was his goal, just like everyone else. 

They’re walking through a makeshift, overgrown cemetery when Jay looks back up from his feet. Plaster and marble columns guard the place like open door ways when they step through, and there’s small gravestones, some old, and some newer; some are toppled over from weather and others have leaves blown between their cracks, but what strikes Jay the most are the statues. There aren’t a lot of them, they don’t decorate the whole yard like Halloween blow up dolls, but instead there’s one for every column that squares off the lot, and then another one, bigger, taller, in the center of it all. 

She’s a fairy. 

Made out of stone, built on top of a solid block, was the statue of a fairy with wings that spread far beyond her height, their tips curling in around the curls in her hair.

She looked smooth, clean, unlike the many graves that had undergone turmoil in their past, and she was looking down at the ground, a pleasant, but somehow also forlorn expression on her face.

Her small hands titled up sweetly in a curl at her sides like she was going to cast the nicest spell onto whoever’d ask, and the smile was soft and un-overwhelming: but her eyes looked almost lost, worried, sorrowful. 

“Jay, you coming?” Esme touches his wrist and it yanks him out of his reverie. He’s stopped somehow right in front of the statue. 

“Yea, yea.” Jay nods softly and he lets her drag him out of the lot and away from the fairy who's center guard to the small mausoleum ten feet behind her. 

“Shhh, okay. Everyone come.” 

Aarie flips her hand and they all come crowding low behind her. Jay’s crawling on his hands and knees to her side, the only human amidst a pack of shifted wolves. He can feel the heat of all of them surrounding him, their fur cushioning against his skin, tickling the small hair on his arms.

It’s nice to be crowded like this, it feels warm and safe from the harsh wind that’s picking up the longer the night goes on. Jay really should have brought more long sleeves, maybe even a jacket with him since it’s fall, but he figured he’d be running hot from constant fighting that he wouldn’t need it.

Never did he think he’d be lying low with nine other wolves atop a hill, hiding between the bushes and trees as they looked down into the large crater below. 

The ferals are still gathering down there, sliding the inward curve of the hill to meet within the flattest part of the curve.

They walked around, paced, some even started fights in their impatience, but there was one wolf, one bigger than the rest, an ashy brown and black mix that sat in the middle of the crater, tall and poised like it wasn’t crazed out of its mind like the rest. The others left at least a four foot distance from where it sat and none of them bothered to mess with them.

There had to be some kind of power dynamic amongst them then, or at least a proved dominance that pushed past the ferality to make them understand they were not be fucked with. Much more, this wolf looked the most healthy, the most fed and well-kept. Even though it had deeply pitted scars on its body and snout that showed some kind of past deterioration of its feigned perfection.

Long, thick scratches that pelted deep into their stomach and continued in one continuous strike to its eye and snout.

A wolf couldn’t have done that, Jay thinks. Their paws weren’t big enough to, not any that he’s seen, not any except for… okay, we’re not thinking about him. 

There’s around fifty of them by time Aarie speaks back up.

“This is where we part, Jongseong. You won’t be able to hear me once I shift.” Aarie whispers to his left. She’s already taking off her shirt to prevent its ruin. 

Jay doesn’t watch, but he nods. 

“Rodger that. I didn’t plan on sharing kills, anyway.” Jay smirks back and he gets a small nudge to his shoulder. 

“Be careful.” She scolds, “Try to fight the ones that come up from the crater. You’ll have more room, you’ll have the trees. Going in is almost a death wish: you’ll be surrounded instantly.” 

Jay rubs his lips together as he takes the information in, nodding where important to let her know that he is listening to her. Stay on the edges, utilize the trees. Got it. 

“Mhm, gotcha.” 

Aarie scoffs out a laugh and steps away to shift. 

Jay does too—the step away part anyway. He leaves the group and silently weaves between the trees. Green and White are out and the stars reflect back on them as he walks in the dark. He knows the knives are noticeable, their gleams twinkling like stars of their own between the trees. 

He lets them, even angles them better to catch the light, and like that he makes fast flashes of light throughout the trees. Enough to catch attention, enough to lure in. 

Jay smiles as he sees a couple bend their ears at the light, at the constant moving flickering. 

He stills once he sees one step forward and he keeps the flicker there, right there for it to see, for it to target. 

And it does. 

It rushes up the curving pit and jumps off onto the edge in a spread out stance, paws gripping the drier soil, and jaw hanging low like it's been dislocated. There’s a low growling that emits from it once Jay hides his knives from the stars, cutting off the flicker sharply. Now it can’t see him, can’t smell him, can only hear the minute, slow steps of Jay’s feet against the leaves: but it doesn’t jump at him.

Not like how they normally would. This one is waiting, barely, but still waiting. It’s hair spiked up like a cat and its ears rolling in circles to track Jay as best as it can. It wants to get a feel for his location, his position, for Jay. 

Jay smiles and slowly grabs the stick from below feet. 

“Here, kitty, kitty.” Jay whistles out sweetly tossing the stick at its feet like it were a bone and the wolf takes obvious offence. Whether it could comprehend Jay’s words or not, it certainly felt from his actions the mocking nature. One that brought bliss to Jay’s heart once it finally darted forward, steaming head straight and the commotion alone, gets the heads of a few more ferals that had been watching. 

They move closer to the curve of the hill. 

Yea, Jay was going to hit it in no time. 

The wolf darted in and Jay matched it head on. A game of chicken was probably not the best game to play with a feral, but when has Jay ever cared for probabilities when he could make it possible. Green and White come in front of him like an ‘X’ and once the wolf gears back on his hind legs for a jump, Jay gets quicker.

He brings down his ‘X’ to slash deep horizontal lines into the wolf’s chest and easily, thanks to their sharper quality, the whole chest pops open. Skin and fur peeling apart for him and fanning his skin like the spray of an orange peel.

The wolf lets out this high squeak, one that gets one wolf from the gathering crowd near the bottom curve of the crater to start slowly climbing up. Jay hums as the wolf falls down in a heap, twitching slightly and legs still moving about to try and get up, but Jay doesn’t let it. He holds it down with a foot on its head and with Green, stabs the tip of it into its heart, then using the edge to carve the organ out cleanly like he’d do a pit to an avocado.

More blood splurts out and the wolf completely goes limp beneath him. 

He can barely contain the laugh that breaks through his lips when he walks out of the tree lines. Face and neck splattered in blood, with a still beating heart at the tip of a knife like his cut steak on a fork. 

They all see him now, especially the one now half way up the curve. 

Everyone, except the one in the middle, the Queen Bee so to speak, she stays seated, unbothered, not even looking. 

On the other side, he sees Aarie’s pack start slowly crawling down into the crater while Jay has their attention. 

His eyebrow jumps at that. 

Oh, no you don’t. No easy kills at his expense. 

Jay eyes lower and the smile finally fully breaks on his face. He almost wishes he had a walktalkie.

This is going to be so much fun, Aarie. 

He grabs the beating heart from Green, sliding it off with a nasty pop. It’s a fucked up feeling that he holds. The heart pumping between his fingers and palm, bleeding hot heat into his hand as it somehow slowly starts to match the pace of his own heart. 

The blood doesn’t get to make it down to his wrist. 

He sends the heart rolling down the crater, the thing bouncing along the dirt like a skipping stone to a lake. 

It lands right at the feet of the Queen. 

Now, she looks at him. And the wolves that had been focused on him slowly turn around to finally notice Aarie’s wolves too. Fairness.

Jay jumps along the next wolf that surges up for him. He meets them midair, hamstrings and calves working overtime to catapult himself in the air to wrap his thighs around the wolf’s neck. The latching shakes the wolf enough, but Jay sticks both White and Green along its jaws to prevent them from clamping down on him as he uses his core to turn them. 

Jay lands on top, sitting and squeezing along the wolf’s throat all the while. 

He slices through its mouth quickly, accidentally tearing through its tongue as he makes his way further to the back of the mouth, right at the tonsils before curving them up, piercing through the skull and brain from the mouth. 

The wolf limps down and just in time too because there’s another stumbling behind him. Slow enough that Jay’s able to roll himself off to the right, but fast enough that Jay’s stuck underneath, kicking his feet at its private parts—he does go low, sometimes—and Green and White going into its mandibles to prevent the jaw from biting his face.

However, the position gets spit and blood all over his nose and face, some of trying to seep past his lips as well, but Jay keeps them screwed shut. Angles his ankle to such a degree that if he were not as flexible he’d sure to have cramped, and tries his best to make a cut with the Black Jade attached there. 

It does something, albeit nothing huge. 

It gets Jay more time, more room to push out from under the wolf, but a claw screams down the back of his thigh anyway on his way out. 

Jay groans, a heavy wince taking over him as he pulls himself through the pain. Thankfully, it's not too deep, not anywhere as bad as Malachi’s that had sunken deep into him. This was a surface scratch, one that he could easily wrap up and stop the bleeding within a couple of minutes of rest and pressure. 

Jay spins out, foot on his better leg coming out to kick the wolf upside the head. It sends it off balance and that’s all the opening Jay really needs. The opening sends the wolf’s neck stretching open and Jay takes it, stabbing Green and White into the jugular and then slicing it apart in opposite directions like he would opening a package. The sound of ripping skin is almost plasticy and wet; a squelch and a hiss all at the same time. 

Ten.  

Jay grins, excitement taking over him and eleven comes just as fast. The only problem? Eleven sends him down rolling into the crater after one particular last push before its death. 

“Mgh, fuck, fuck.” Jay bumps out as he tumbles down, hitting rocks, and scraping his skin. Dirt gusting up his nose and over his eyelids. 

He coughs as soon as he’s stable, scurrying to his knees as he lets out one last wretch. 

Aarie’s pack is still fighting, even though some have stopped once they’ve seen him fall in. But for the most part, they continue, scurrying halfway down the curve and picking ferals like cherries to bring back to the lip of the forest. 

Jay rolls his shoulders. 

Fuck, he was starting to feel thirsty. 

He shook it off, poised his daggers again and turned in a circle. 

He was surrounded, just as Aarie said. 

Wolves of all different sizes, colors, and states stood at each hour of his clock and admittedly Jay was a little worried, a little scared if the hitch in his breath was anything to go by, but it can’t be helped. He was at eleven, he was so fucking close. He just needed to make an opening again, race back up the hill, hell maybe even take them down here and find ways to use their bodies against each other as shields.

He didn’t know, but he’d figure it out. 

Jay clenched his knives, sweat starting to bead at his forehead and sheen along his arms. 

One lunged for him.

Jay prepared for its income, bending his knees a little and sidestepping its jump swiftly. Green swipes down and across, while White goes up and both slashes aren’t deep enough for a final kill, but cause damage enough to get the wolf limping.

The others don’t take well to it, they close in too and Jay’s just about to say fuck it and dip into a run when a larger, bigger shadow covers over his feet. The effect it has on Jay has the same it does on the wolves just about to pounce on him.

They freeze, then scurry off, giving space for another four feet. 

The Queen. 

Jay swallows hard and turns around slowly, each shaky breath another bit of fur he sees, another bit of bulk and thick body. 

Then he’s facing her, and the air she huffs out ruffles his shirt. 

She’s tall. Her snout right at height with his collarbones and the adrenaline must be making him a little loopy, the constant haywire of fight or fight loosening his lips and fucking up his filter because his mouth starts running in place of his legs.

“What a big bitch.” He whispers under his breath. 

Her ears, almost completely torn into nib, twitch at the sound, but there’s no reaction beyond that. She’s still feral, even if she looks the most composed out of the bunch, so her understanding isn’t something he’s really afraid of. No, it’s more like, the intense, unflinching gaze that’s locked onto Jay’s that has him flinching back: and the dull, wet thud of the heart he threw falling from out of her mouth. 

It splats into the ground between them cleanly. All blood sucked free and it rolls limply, coating itself in fine dirt until it’s kissing the tip of Jay’s shoe. 

She’s mimicking him, except this time, the heart is no longer beating. 

Jay’s breath stalls and he looks back up. She’s circling him, head dipping low to analyze him from head to toe. Her nose twitches, too, probably trying to pick up a scent from him, any kind of pheromones that might tell her more about him—more about what he may be capable of. 

But she won’t get anything. She doesn’t get anything and that alone pisses her off. 

“Shit!” Jay screams, throwing himself out of the way, but it was too fast. His body reacted before his brain could even catch up and the discombulation of both sends him tripping over himself onto the ground. 

“Fuck.” He gasps, quickly rising to his elbows and pushing out with his heels to scurry further away. 

She just turns her body slowly, her head coming after. She’s not growling, she isn’t, but Jay feels like she is with how her body is shaking ever so slightly from the tension. He had felt it in the ground right before she snapped her jaws at his legs. The vibration the only thing that alerted him to move. 

When Jay stops, there’s only ten feet between them, something the Queen could easily close in seconds with a mere jump. So, Jay makes the decision. 

He wants to live and before her joints bend, Jay takes off. 

He’s running for the curve of the crater, slipping and ducking ferals as he goes. It’s rough, it’s messy, the terrain tears up his skin, and Jay’s rolling around all over, sliding under wolves that jump at him, and using Green and White when he can to blind the ones that get too close. The tears up the back of his thighs burn into him.

He makes it to the curve and quickly he realizes he has to use both Green and White to ice pick his way up.

The curve is too steep for his rounded feet and fingers, his grip too weak to keep himself from sliding right back down: but his daggers work, of course they do. 

They’re just not fast enough. 

“Agh, fuck, shit!” Jay screams, scrunching up his legs as the Queen jumps at them, an attempt to drag him down by his waist. 

Jay’s hanging on, legs dangling dangerously, and his grip slips around the sheer amount of sweat he’s leaking. 

“Fuck, please.” He whimpers to himself, wrenching Green back and plugging it back into the hill further up. His feet skitter around the curve as he tries to pull himself up, White coming out to get to the next hold, but Jay’s nowhere close enough to the lip: and the Queen was climbing just under him, her own paws fitting into the rock and curved slope perfectly.

She’s under him and he can feel her breath ghosting around his ankles even though he tries to fold them into his stomach. 

He’s at eleven. He’s at eleven. He just needs three more. It can’t happen now. He’s not ready to die. But what he wants doesn’t matter. It never mattered to anyone but himself. 

The Queen pulls her weight back on her hind legs, pulling back like a spring. 

Jay’s shaking. She’s gonna take him, gonna pull him back down into the crater. 

Tears spike his eyes. 

He misses his next hold and almost falls right into her. He closes his eyes, breathing erratically and the tears come down his cheeks. I’m sorry, Mom. I did my best, I really did, but even in death you will not see me. I will haunt that guy until the end of my second life. I promise. 

Promise. 

The ground shakes—violently, almost ejecting his daggers from the side of the crater. He feels it vibrate down his whole body, and when his eyes open in confusion of why he isn’t dead yet, he sees the rocks and boulders that were impressed into the sides of the crater start pouring out like a landslide.

It's forcing the ferals further towards the middle of the crater, some getting toppled and crushed by them in the process. And Aarie’s pack, they’re scrambling back up from the edges, scurrying back towards the forest in panic: but he won’t call for help— can’t , it could break a seal.

Then the growl comes and the sheer pressure of it wrecks through his whole body. 

Jay whines sharply against the hill, still hanging, but pressing himself flat into it now, dipping his head lower until he’s hidden by his arm. It’s like his body knows, like it can feel him coming. 

Heeseung , his pores dilate. Heeseung , his heart thrums. Jay’s toes curl in his shoes and he gasps out around the tears. Why, why does he feel relieved? 

When the growl bleeds out, Jay finally looks up. He looks towards the treeline first, but Heeseung isn’t there. He’s not here yet, but he’s coming, and somehow that gives him enough energy back to press his feet back into the hill, stab himself just a little higher up. 

And then he looks down. 

The Queen hasn’t moved. She isn’t moving. She’s staring at him, almost considering him again, but he doesn’t know why, doesn’t know what he did beyond reacting, but if that’s it, his reaction to Heeseung must tell her something. He doesn’t know what, but she’s looking at him anew. A newfound vindictiveness and cunning that melts into a sharp sneer directed at Jay. 

It’s scary, unnerving and something in him—call it instinct—knows she wants to kill him now more than ever, in ways that will not only satisfy her, but prove something to Heeseung. 

Why use me? Jay fucking whines in his head, but there’s no time for that. Not when she’s already lunging midair for his stomach. 

There’s no time, not enough, not enough for Jay. He’s only fucking human, and he plants himself further into the wall like it would swallow him up, soak him in like a seed of its own and harbor him behind its dirt: but none of that happens. A sharp wind bullies his body and Jay can’t help the goosebumps that rise up violently along his neck and arms. 

Thud. Hissing. 

Jay swallows again, trying his hardest not to gasp at the scene below him. 

Sunghoon’s here, the only one—probably the fastest—and he not only decimates twenty-sum wolves teeming about in the crater, but he knocks the Queen back into the pit of them. Jay gulps as Sunghoon turns around to face him and the boy looks pristine as always, but under the moonlight, he looks bigger, thicker.

His shoulders are wide and his arms long and veiny. His hair is longer than it had been in the kitchens and his face is soaked in blood that isn’t his. The vibrant red makes his bright seafoam green eyes even more striking, more piercing. 

Jay flips himself over the edge, leaning down to pull out his daggers before he brings his eyes back to Sunghoon. That dizziness is starting to come back and his mouth feels drier than he thought it did before. He blood is fucking rushing. 

Sunghoon can hear it. His tongue wets his lips as he begins to come to Jay, almost pulled, like Jay was the siren singing to him under the stars and he was trapped in the sea, and in a way, he is—swimming through, or walking through, the mounds of dead ferals he’s killed in seconds, just to get to Jay who’s sitting on his knees atop the crater as if it were a rock in the ocean. 

He’s distracted. It’s not good. 

“Sunghoon, watch out!” Jay screams, panicked. The Queen has risen and she’s darting at him with a pace that shouldn’t be possible, that Jay’s never seen before. The moon shines down on the crater, ghosts through Jay’s hair in apology and his heart drops. 

Does the full moon make them stronger? But the wolves he killed, they weren’t this fast. They… he didn’t have time to fucking think about this. 

Sunghoon’s not flinching, he’s centered in on Jay, walking towards him slowly like he didn’t want to scare him, like he didn’t want Jay to get hurt like the green beans. 

Jay scrambles to his feet, but it happens too fast. She bites Sunghoon just under his ribs. 

Jay freezes, the gasp not even having enough air left in it to tumble out his mouth. Sunghoon drops to the ground, twitching as the Queen steps over him. She was going to kill him, and if not the bite would. Jay remembers everything that Sunoo told him, knows a wolfbite is the only thing that can universally kill them, and it’s not sitting right with him. His blood freezes at the mere thought of Sunghoon getting hurt again and he can feel his eyes mist up all over again.

His lips tremble and he shakes even as he runs towards the nearest bolder by the edge of the crater. 

Why is he like this? He’s safe now, he can run. Why isn’t he running?! 

“Eu–ahhh!” Jay grunts, pushing with his whole body to get the bolder over the edge. If he can just get it to roll, get it to fucking budge, it’ll topple her away from Sunghoon, bid them some time. Fuck, something! 

But no, it won’t move. Jay’s too weak and the tears are blinding him. Why the fuck does he feel like he’s losing something!? 

“We share blood, Jay.”

 “So what, so what, so what?!” Jay curses, slamming his fists into the rock, but all it does is send pebbles into his skin and pain up his arms. Jay heaves as he leans against the rock. Sunoo, Sunoo said that claiming happened via sharing blood. He said that feral vampi—or fledglings had a hard time controlling their blood lust and needed a sire, a teacher of sorts. He remembers how Sunghoon was so interested in his skills, and was so willing to help and abide Jay even though he was scared.

Is that what this was? When they drank each other’s blood that night, did he connect him and Sunghoon like that? Is that why his blood rushes harder when Jay sees him? Fuck, he doesn’t know and it doesn’t really fucking matter, either. Not right now.

So, he pushes again, with all his might, digs his damn heels into the ground to do it harder, and he remembers the rocky landslide.

And then he screams—screams for Heeseung. 

“Heeseung, growl!” Jay yells and it's so loud, so high pitched that it scratches his throat raw: but it works. The ground rumbles with a new veracity, one that almost sends Jay toppling over, but Jay pushes one last time and the boulder goes running down. 

“Okay, okay.” Jay frets, taking White by the handle as he watches the boulder hit Queen to the side. She doesn’t get trapped under it like he’d wanted, but the impact keeps her down, twitching. 

Jay slices the palm of his hand, letting the blood drip out along his fingers.

“Sunghoon!” Jay calls out and his voice is scratched, his throat raw and the sound comes out smaller than he wanted it to, but Sunghoon hears him anyway. He turns his head limply to look at him and Jay can already see the seafoam dimming. 

Jay holds out his dripping hand, hoping the blood is enough to kickstart some kind of instinct, one last push in him. 

“Come to me.” He begs and Jay only sees his stomach fill out, sees him breathe for a millisecond, before wind is rushing against him, then a large body toppling down into his. 

Jay fumbles around catching him, the boy close to deadweight in his arms, but he holds him tighter, closes his arms around his torso so he can pull him. 

Queen is down, but only for now. They needed to leave. 

So, Jay does. He drags himself along with Sunghoon all the way back. He doesn’t know where back is exactly, he’s in a completely different direction than where he had laid his marks, but he just continues anyway, blends through the trees and leaves the sounds of growls and fighting in the distance. 

Jay drops Sunghoon on top of the flat tomb. It’s a pretty one, all white concrete and marble that lets him know that it was made by the school. The top of it is flat and squared unlike the normal rounded shape Jay’s seen at funerals, but it helps him nonetheless.

He lays Sunghoon flat on it, situating his arms and legs to be straight and resting on it, rather than dangling off, but he can’t really help his feet. Whoever died must’ve been short because their tomb wasn’t long enough to keep Sunghoon’s feet on it and his head at the same time. When he’s stable, Jay sinks down to the ground, head thumping against the sides. 

Everything fucking hurts. 

He had taken so fucking long, longer than it would have if he wasn’t carrying a half dead vampire on his back and shoulders, but he got lucky. So fucking lucky. Just when he was about to collapse to the ground, Jay had somehow stumbled back towards the graveyard.

It felt like a blessing almost, a fucking breath of fresh air as he passed the fairy and entered the mausoleum.

A mausoleum was like a crypt, a small chamber richer families put their dead family members’ tombs in. It was on the smaller side and only held one tomb, so there was enough room for Jay to sprawl himself out in and catch his breath, rest his limbs: but, he doesn’t even get to do that for long. 

A hand, soft, too limp, and big hangs off from the tomb and rests in his hair. It doesn’t pull or tug, but Jay rises up with it anyway, leaning over Sunghoon’s body like he was supposed to be checking on him. 

Sunghoon’s always pale, this isn’t new, but there’s a thin sheen to his skin now that makes him look sickly. Small blue veins appear under his eyes that have never been there before and when Jay lifts his shirt to inspect the wound, it’s not sewing itself back up like Jay’s bite did. If anything, the skin around it is turning black, souring the skin around it quickly. Enough to the point where Jay starts to panic. 

“Sunghoon. Sunghoon. Hey, wake up.” Jay starts lightly slapping the sides of his face, poking his eyelids, anything to be annoying enough to waken the boy, but Sunghoon is barely responding.

He’s not breathing, but he usually doesn’t, which doesn’t fucking help clue Jay into anything, and his eyes are moving slowly under his eyelids like he wants to open them, like he’s searching for Jay even in the depths. 

Jay hiccups on air as he moves Sunghoon over a bit. 

This is dumb. This is dumb. This is so fucking dumb. 

Jay lifts himself up and cradles Sunghoon’s hips with his thighs. He doesn’t put his weight on him at all, carries it all himself even if the marble is making his knees bruise. He doesn’t want to add insult to injury.

When he’s settled, he takes the hand that has by now stopped bleeding, only small bits blooming at the cut site. 

Jay comes up to sit on his chest, to hold him down for what he’s about to do, if that would even work. Then, slowly, he hovers his fist over Sunghoon’s mouth, letting the blood pool together then drip in droplets along the crease of it. The blood curves along his plump lips and some of it leaks inside to his tongue Jay cannot see. 

He’s a vampire, right? Surely this is how it works. This was going to work, right? 

Jay waits a breath. Then, two, and then Sunghoon’s lips are folding in, sucking up the blood that didn’t drip inside and in Jay’s excitement, he presses more to his lips, completely forgoing the fact that he needed to go slow, that he needed to be cautious. But that dizziness is creeping back into his head, along with the buzzing that he thought had stopped since Friday, and Jay can’t help it.

Doesn’t think his body can either because he feels the way his blood is sloshing around thicker, pushing against the walls of his closing wound to leak more for Sunghoon. 

He doesn’t want to help him. He needs to. Something feels urgent about this, even his throat dries up the longer he’s here. 

Thirsty. He’s thirsty…is, is Sunghoon thirsty? 

His eyes lazily open and they meet Jay’s eyes this time before they ever do his bloody hand. 

“Uh.” Jay gasps as a hand squeezes into his thigh, wrapping around the whole meat and holding on—trying to stop himself. 

Jay blubbers over his words, his hand moving upwards for him, raising it until his wrist presses lightly against his bottom lip. 

Soft. Cold. 

“You can do it, Sunghoon. You—” Jay gasps, his whole body shivering from the cold that wraps around him as Sunghoon presses his lips further in—wanting, wanting, but waiting. 

Jay’s shoulders drop and his teeth wear into already red lips. 

“Take it, it's okay. Just keep listening to me.” He breathes out and it comes out like smoke from the cold. Sunghoon’s eyes are shinier than he’s seen. They look like fragile glass compared to the dark crypt and concrete floors and walls. They entrap Jay, they slot around the both of them like they’re in a safe cube, untouched by the dirt and dust of the mausoleum. 

It’s just them and the buzzing in Jay’s head that gets heavier the longer they’re here. 

Jay nods.

Sunghoon’s eyelashes flutter. 

And his fangs pierce him gently, more controlled than before and Jay can feel it: the bond he accidentally created. As Sunghoon drinks him in, his grip gets tighter around his thighs and Jay has to sit harder on his chest to keep Sunghoon from surging closer, from digging his teeth in deeper. 

Jay pants. The feeling is something he cannot describe. It’s like with each pull Sunghoon takes from him, the more is being poured into him—like Jay’s own thirst was being quenched, like every gush of his blood sent clear spring water down his throat. 

Jay was drooling and his thighs twitched from around his chest. 

It didn’t hurt. It felt almost…good. 

Jay’s hand came down to pat down Sunghoon’s hair and he leaned in even further until their foreheads pressed together. 

“Slower.” Jay mumbles against him, feeling his blood leaving him too quickly, his body starting to go lax from the rush and loss. 

And Sunghoon grips him harder, but doesn't slow. 

Jay rubs against his forehead. He should stop him. He needed to stop him. 

Jay hums high in the back of his throat. 

It was foolish to think Sunghoon was going to learn this fast. Not after how many years he’s been stuck in this state, but Jay’s new to this too. The feeling is wrapping around his body like a weighted blanket, keeping him there, making him safe. 

“Sunghoon.” Jay whispers and his eyes roll back, his breath stuttering and hitching. 

He’s going to pass out.

But the color is coming back to Sunghoon, the veins under his eyes fading out, his eyes are lidded but not from death. It’s working, somehow, something is working even though it probably shouldn’t. Sunoo said there was no cure for a werewolf bite, that it was certain death. 

Jay wants to preen, wants to praise Sunghoon, wants to fall asleep right here on top of this random dead person’s coffin, but he gets shocked out. Pins and needles stab into his skin and the sudden pain of it all jerks him back, and Jay’s sudden movement dislodges Sunghoon’s teeth from his wrist. 

“Oh.” Jay holds onto Sunghoon’s shoulders, balancing himself as his body starts to sway. The sudden motion was too fast for how light he feels and it seems to get worse before it gets better. So much so, Sunghoon wraps both hands around his thighs and slides him down his body until Jay’s resting at his hips. 

The boy rises like a cliche vampire out of a coffin and wraps Jay to his chest, holding him between those thick arms and pressing his face into his neck. Jay doesn’t know what he’s doing, doesn’t know what Sunghoon wants with him, but he can feel that Sunghoon needs something.

His fingers insist on Jay being in the crook of his neck and Jay doesn’t fight him, lays into it and lets the swirling in his head come to a stop. 

He feels Sunghoon swallow. 

“Jey.” 

Fuck it’s cute. Sunghoon doesn’t speak, not much. Ferals never can, but Sunghoon wasn’t fully gone, there was still a part of him in there that recognized his surroundings and who he was with; that knew what he wanted, but was suppressed under this untrained need. Sunghoon says his name like he’s speaking words for the first time, even though Jay’s heard him say three other words before. 

Then Sunghoon chomps his teeth together and Jay hears it in his ear like soft pats. Jay must be a little drunk because he giggles and nods into his neck, somehow understanding the body language without having to ask. Jay turns into his neck, the same place where he had bit him before and presses his lips against it. Sunghoon wants him to bite back, he knows, but Jay won’t. He has no need to defend himself like he did last time, so he settles for this. It’s not a kiss, just pressure to let Sunghoon know that he heard him and Sunghoon grunts, but ultimately accepts it. 

It’s nice, too nice. He almost forgets why he had wrenched away in the first place when another growl rolls through him. Jay shakes, hands accidentally curling into Sunghoon’s shirt as he gaps into his neck. 

Sunghoon holds onto him harder, probably trying to comfort him, but it makes it worse. Jay shakes his head and tries to wrench himself out and off his lap, but Sunghoon doesn’t relent, pushing him further in. 

The growl is getting closer. Jay’s heart is leaping for his throat. 

“Sunghoon, stop. Fuck, please!” He begs, thrashing against his chest and pushing away the best he can. His hands are shaking now and he can feel the adrenaline coursing back through him already, clearing his head a bit from his drunken state and bringing back to earth. 

Footsteps. 

Just outside the building. 

Jay’s eyes spark in fear. 

He’s here. He’s here. 

Jay doesn’t want to see him. He doesn’t feel good, maybe it's the pins curling in his stomach, or maybe it's something deeper than that—instinct. Jay can’t be near Heeseung right now. He can’t. Something’s wrong. Heeseung’s not safe. 

Jay tightens his hands around Sunghoon’s grip, glaring at him with everything he’s got before he’s mouthing the words strictly: Listen.  

And something shocks Sunghoon, Jay can feel it in how his own blood jumps and Sunghoon lets go completely, listening and sitting like a good boy. 

Jay would reward him, he would, but instead he quietly dashes out the back way. The wind blows him straight in the face when he exits and thankfully the pack isn’t surrounding the crypt, but that doesn’t mean Jay can just steam roll ahead into the open forest waiting just meters in front of him.

He’s never been in that direction, he has no markings to guide him back, has no abilities to help him track his way back to the cabin. There was no telling if he’d be able to find another fresh water source if he decided to brave it. Hell, he had gotten lucky with finding the first one to begin with. 

Jay squeezes his hands together as he furiously crouches down low into the soil, slowly crawling along the sides of the crypt. He has no scent, no pheromones for them to pick up his exact location. All they can smell is his blood, his blood that no doubt reeks throughout the whole crypt and all over Sunghoon.

It shouldn’t be enough to out him, not until he’s gotten further away from building where it's most potent. 

When he hears them enter, Jay stops. 

He yanks the piece of t-shirt that had already been on its last few minutes and wraps it tightly around his wrist. He keeps the pressure tight, almost unbreathing around the wound. It’ll close up faster this way, and the faster it closes, the less fresh blood they’ll be able to use to track him when he runs. 

He just has to get to the forest. 

There’s shouts, there’s murmurs—worries over Sunghoon. 

Good.

Jay continues to creep, until his shoulder is brushing the corner of the building and his fried pieces of hair are sticking out to assess the area. 

They’re all inside. 

“Where’d he go, Sunghoon?” 

It’s Jungwon. 

“How’s hyung?” 

Pup. 

His heart lurches.

He has to go now. 

Jay holds his breath, tries to calm his heart down to a level that isn’t off-putting, one that could easily blend in with any of the werewolves inside, or even close by, if any. Jay inches forward, every step he takes is a damn landmine waiting to be set off. He avoids the leaves, as much as he realistically can.

It’s fall afterall, they’re fucking everywhere: but when he can’t avoid it, he opts for the wilted ones, the ones wet and deteriorating into the soil. They don’t make as much sound as the dry, crunchy ones; if anything, they almost muffle his steps further. 

He passes the small stretch in between the crypt and the statues, having switched on to his hands and knees once he realized he wasn’t low enough. 

Too high , his instinct had panicked, get lower, down! 

The cavity in his chest is closing from the lack of air, creating this deep pressure that almost forces Jay’s lips apart and open, but Jay grounds them together, eyes screwing shut in his will to keep it all in. 

C’mon, C’mon. 

They’re shuffling around, but Jay can’t hear much beyond the pounding starting up in his ears. 

He needs to fucking breathe.  

Jay slips himself around the statue: the same one from earlier—the fairy in the center of the graveyard. She looks down on him with that same expression of wariness, but it feels almost like pity when Jay looks up, meeting her eyes as he tries to draw in silent gulps of air. 

A growl wrecks through the graveyard and Jay has to slap a hand over his mouth to keep the gasp in, and the feeling of it shatters his whole being. The growl is different, it’s protective, urgent—like a mother bear being separated from its cub. Heeseung’s not in the right state, he won’t listen to Jay, won’t be sated until he’s got him under him again. 

Jay squeezes his pants, pressing himself as far into the thick slab the fairy sits atop of as he could. His body shakes with the rumbles, his hips and feet twitching with the urge to just run: but, he stays rooted, looking up at the fairy with wide eyes and dirt and dried tears trekking his face. 

He pleads her— help me.  

He can’t run yet, not like how his body is calling for him to. It would make too much noise, be too much movement at once. He would get caught. He knows Heeseung would catch him. 

But, she doesn’t do anything. She doesn’t wake to his mental pleas and cast fairy dust on him that will vanish at the strike of dawn. He doesn’t start soaring through the stars away to another land promising to keep him young forever.

He’s scratched up and bloody, with a bite in his wrist, and a body that still hasn’t fully recovered from whatever drunken, loopy state Sunghoon had put him in. He’s thrumming with anxiety. He doesn’t know what to do—he can’t—he has to—but how? 

Jay winces when he hears the steps come behind him, right on the other side of the statue. 

It’s Heeseung, he knows it. It has to be. 

A purr hums in his ears and the sound builds in his muscles, licking into his joints, and curling his toes as Jay’s head hits back against the concrete.

No, fuck. The pins and needles in his skin dig deeper now that Heeseung’s close, they start pinching at his nerves, teasing him, and Jay’s breath stutters when he feels them starting to go numb. 

“I know you’re here, bell. You’re bleeding all over yourself, baby. Let me see you, hm?” He taunts, “I can make it better—lick you right where you need it.”  

Heeseung’s moving behind him, doing something that Jay cannot see, but it gets his heart beating faster anyway. He doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like that he can’t see him, that he can’t prepare for what he might do.

Jay feels cornered, driven against a tree trunk by sharp teeth and a pressing snout. His heart thumps like the fluffy tail he doesn’t have. 

“You need it don’t you, baby? Need Alpha’s spit to close it all up.”

Jay shakes his head viciously despite himself, his hair throwing leaves out on the floor. The mere thought of Heeseung licking up the scratches on the back of his thighs throttles something in him. He doesn’t need it, he doesn’t need anything from Heeseung.

He can—he can still get out of this. Jay just has to think— think.

He was graded highly on being adaptable and resourceful, he’s built for this. He supposed to fucking shine in situations like this. 

“ Honey.” Heeseung purrs, and it comes out so softly, almost flipping into a moan and Jay completely fucking shivers, his shoulders bucking into the stone. His blood—Heeseung once said his blood smelled like honey and whiskey. 

He flits around, looking, trying to find something—fuck, anything will do, but all he sees are small gravestones: broken and new that won’t fucking help him. 

He eyes the trees, the forest he so wishes to come back to, to hide in, to feel the safety of a large trunk between him and the man that could ruin the rest of his life’s plans. He sees one now, a large one, wider than Heeseung’s shoulders that could shield him nicely.

It’s not too far either, almost right at the entrance of the graveyard—waiting for him, encouraging him to climb its roughened face or swing along its sturdy branches or, or—Jay breathes in sharply.

There’s a hovel near the bottom of the trunk. 

A small den. 

Jay can fit in it, he knows he can. There will only be enough room for him, he can hide, shelter himself inside the hardened walls and keep Heeseung snapping at the gate, too big, and too tall to get in, to reach him. 

His breath stutters and his pulse jumps. 

“ I hear you. ” 

Then Jay fucking bolts, runs like his life fucking depends on it because it fucking does and he can hear the growl split out of Heeseung before he can even hear his own breath freeze in his chest. The sounds for him, only him and the depth threatens to trip him over. There’s only so much he can repress, only so much that he can focus on. He has to pick. 

And chooses to keep running. 

Which means, Jay’s lips part open, and they let out a long shriek in response, almost a fucking squeal as the terror unfolds within him. 

Heeseung’s on his heels, he can feel him all around him, and Jay wants to beg, wants to plead with him, but he doesn’t have the words. None of them fall from his mouth when he’s barely even breathing anymore to begin with. 

Den. Den. 

It chants in Jay’s head like it’s always been there, like it was a normal line of thinking for him. 

Jay crosses the boundary between forest and graveyard, fucking dives for the den, his fingers digging into the soil, rocking himself forward. 

His head knocks against the hollow insides of the trunk and smells like rot, but Jay doesn’t care he doesn’t. 

“Heeseung, Heeseung, please!” Jay screams as a hand cinches around his ankle, pulling right out of the den and dragging his thrashing body through the soil and leaves, right back towards him—towards his lap where he’s kneeling down, one hand rooting into the ground as he hunches over. 

Claws. Heeseung’s claws are out and sinking into the ground as he pulls him in, his eyes going black. 

Jay’s stomach is coated in soil, wet and moist with it and his sweat. 

He whimpers once he’s flipped to his back, his foot getting caught mid kick and just pulled to bring him closer. The stretch and pull burns the cuts along his thighs.

“Hee—Heeseung.” Jay hiccups, his eyes watering all over again and the feeling is starting to give him a headache. He can’t catch a break, his heart’s been pumping nonstop this whole time. He really wants to cry. He was so close. He’s so scared. 

Heeseung’s mouth is parted open, breathing in heavy gulps of air through his mouth like he’d be able to taste Jay’s scent from just that. Then, he’s separating Jay’s thighs, fitting himself between them like he’s always belonged there.

As if he was bound to end up there one way or another, and it's pressed together, pelvis to pelvis, that Jay starts constantly shaking, his own chest shuttering against Heeseung’s as the man noses along his jaw. 

Jay squeezes his thighs from around his waist: a failed attempt at moving him. 

“You—” Heeseung mouths along his adam’s apple, his tongue rolling along the hard bump, “you promised.” Jay whimpers, mouth rounding at the warmth that’s covering his throat. 

Heeseung growls into him. “You called for me.” He nips at Jay’s skin, one of the six incisors scraping along him, “You need me. I’ll protect you.” 

Jay vibrates, “No, no. I don—” 

“You’re hurt, omega.” Heeseung lilts, hand coming up from where it rested along Jay’s stomach to hold him down, and fisting softly into his hair. He slides Jay’s head to the side, exposing his neck to the air completely, “Let me make it worse.” 

Jay flinches at the words, the juxtaposition between the two sentences Heeseung uttered unsettling him.

The pack starts to come around them, all of them more clean than they should have been for two days of fighting. No scratches, no blood that was their own. 

The wind blew over them and Jay could barely see through his tears as their hair blew in his direction. 

“You’ve done so well for me, bell. You deserve it.” He whispers into the wet of his neck, his own breath adding into the fluid.  

“My equal. My compliment. My omega .” He kisses his neck for every word and Jay cries out, even as Heeseung tries to soothe him. He kisses along his ear, rubs his scent into Jay’s hair, sucks at a particularly sensitive patch on his neck. 

Jay feels nothing but misery and he can see Ni-ki’s face twitch, his foot angle out towards him, but ultimately he stays still, holding himself back because he can’t interrupt this. 

“I hate you, I hate you.” Jay blubs, his body finally numbing out under Heeseung and he feels everything go limp for him, opening up to him. 

Heeseung smiles into his lovebite, “We all have something we want, Jay. You’re not the only one who has people waiting for them outside of here.” Heeseung’s grip in his hair hardens, the strands stretching from his scalp. Jay chokes. “You’re not the only one who's been wronged.” 

Jay breathes harder, but Jay’s not the one fucking up anyone’s life because of his goals. 

“Fuck you.” Jay spits weakly, “you’re nothing like me.” 

There’s a rumbling in Heeseung’s chest that won’t quit, one that shakes into Jay’s rib cage when Heeseung pushes his head back into the ground. Jay almost wants to apologize. 

“No,” Heeseung’s voice deepens against his skin, grating against his ears, “you’re so much worse.” 

 Heeseung slides over to look at Jay and his breath hitches sharply when their noses touch. There’s barely any white left to his eyes and his pupils are a cellar wine.

“You much rather I kill every student here trying to see if it takes than show any sacrifice. You know how long I've been stuck here, bell? You don’t, do you? You don’t know shit about what I've had to hold back, what I’ve had to withstand. You don’t even know what’s really outside of this school, what’s beyond that damn city you come from. I’m done waiting, bell. I have shit to do.” 

Jay shuts his eyes as Heeseung scolds him, his lips trembling. He can’t—He can’t comprehend all of this right now. 

Heeseung’s tongue licks the tear that balloons at his tear duct. 

“You want me to kill them, Jongseong–ah? Every body in that fuck ass school until its just you and I? Would you give yourself to me then?” 

Tears fall from his eyes, fresh and hot. Jay’s hands curl harder into his clothes and that’s all the answer Heeseung needs—it’s exactly what he expects. 

Hell no.  

Heeseung moves, his nose following his tears down to the corner of his mouth. 

“Selfish little lamb.” He sings, “pure and soft—thinks he can bond with my pack and still be let off, still not take me.” 

I didn’t, I didn’t! I didn’t mean to. Jay yells in his head. He didn’t mean for any of this to happen. He didn’t cause this. Why? 

Jay sniffs, snot watery and willing to dribble down to his chin if he let it, and maybe he should. What was the point anymore? He can’t hide, can’t move. 

“ Heeseung .” Jay tries. It’s a whine, small and high—a voice too desperate for Jay to claim is his. 

Heeseung comes back into the crook of his neck, lips rolling against his skin, “You’re strong Jongseong, but you’re not stronger than me.” 

He kisses down slowly, sending sparks up Jay’s legs. They twitch from around his waist and his heels accidentally push into the small of Heeseung’s back. 

“What makes you think you can handle yourself, bell? You couldn’t even handle a rogue without wailing for me. You need me.” Heeseung asserts, licking around that soft spot of his neck. 

And Jay holds it in, the soft gasp that rises in his throat. His eyes flutter. What does he mean by rogue? Jay doesn't get to think about, can barely spare a thought to it before Heeseung speaks.

“You’ll die without me.” 

Jay can feel them, all six of those incisors.

He flinches at their mere touch against his heated skin. Jay barely can shake his head, but he tries to anyway. 

“You’ll kill me.” He wretches out, specifying like that would in any way change things. His fingers vibrate from where they're still lightly pushing against his chest.

Heeseung's purring against him.

“Then, till death do us part.”

Then his canines and fangs plunge into his skin: a full-on bite that chomps around both sides of neck, close to his shoulder. 

Jay screams, but the sound quickly dies out into silence. His voice is gone and he can’t feel his body, only Heeseung—his breath, his weight, his heart beating against his chest, the searing pain from his skin being torn open for him, and it opens, it spreads itself apart like butter for Heeseung’s teeth to build a new home in.

His skin made soft and malleable around those fangs and canines to make perfect impressions of his teeth.

He can’t move, not really, but his hand claws into the back of Heeseung’s hair anyway—holding on, pulling, pleading for a break. 

His throat hurts and he feels like he has no tears left to cry as Heeseung falls deeper into him. 

Something snaps tight within Jay at that. 

His back arches and he’s batting at Heeseung’s head. What’s happening, why is—He’s overwhelmed, in pain, something’s going on, something is happening.

The longer Heeseung stays buried in his neck, the more Jay starts to feel these weird pulls, six of them that connect all around him with Heeseung at the center of it all. 

Jay groans. And that vibrating in his head, that annoying ass pressure that Jay assumed was illness starts to clear out—starts to sound like a voice: but it’’s mumbled, blurry—a cracking, hazy radio that Jay doesn’t know what it really says, who it's talking to—just knows he doesn’t want it to be him. 

Jay opens his eyes into small slits because that’s all he can manage with everything going on. He feels so sensitive, hurt, but there’s something else, something round and hard digging along the other hand that isn’t in Heeseung’s hair trying to pull him away. 

Jay lets out a whimper as he tries to move, tries to subtly flick the round thing into his hand to see and Jay’s glad. He’s fucking happy his voice is damn near gone because he would have screamed again. 

Beomgyu’s pearl. It’s glowing brightly. 

Emergencies, for emergencies, but how could that be? He left it at the cabin—it was still in the duffle bag with all his clothes. 

Jay’s heart twists, his pulsing jumping harder than ever. 

He looks up, ahead back into the grave. The fairy’s eyes are now on him. 

And Jay pants as his thighs begin to shake. Heeseung’s feeding, drawing small amounts of his blood and purring into him. 

That pleasant feeling comes back and his hand flattens against the back of Heeseung’s head, no longer pulling him away, but resting close, entangling between as he gasps. Jay’s face scrunches up and his lip breaks open from how hard he’s biting into them. He will not let it be pushed out of him, that little sound Jay refuses anyone to ever hear. A moan.

Heeseung’s rubbing circles into his lower abdomen. 

“You’ll know.” 

Beomgyu was right. He does. 

Jay smashes the pearl between his palm and fingers and the thing explodes into ghostly powder, covering his body inch by inch until all Jay sees is a pale, powder blue and a light feeling like he’s in a cloud.

He’s getting away, he’s traveling somewhere he doesn’t know where, but he can feel tears come down anyway. It’s too late. He’s already bit. He’d need a miracle now to not present.

And somehow that’s now even the worst thing because Jay never made his kill count. It was over for him. 

Please, someone go easy on him. 

 

When the weight of his body comes back, he doesn’t even realize it. The pressure forming in his head keeps him dissociated: high and condensed like the clouds before a thunderstorm. It’s taking everything in him not to break, not to scream out and thrash like he so wants, but he’s tired.

His body is a fucking wreck: his muscles so sore they hurt at rest and the bite leaves him flayed open like a fish—raw and red, deeply penetrated holes in his skin that disrupt his scales and make him bleed profusely.

It feels no different than what he assumes a bear biting a fish from a river would feel. Except, Jay can’t even flop in distress. He lays there in a fresh cotton bed, leaving his body stain of dirt, blood, and tears onto its thousand count Egyptian sheets.

The pearl had teleported him somewhere warm, somewhere that smelled of cinnamon and gingerbreads and there was a window open—had to be. A soft breeze shocks over his open wound and all Jay could do was hiss from the attention. He could hear the rustling of animals settling for bed and the crickets playing creaky lullabies for the flora and fauna to rest. 

He was still in the forest. Somewhere. 

New tears bundled in his eyes, coating and blurring his vision anew. 

What if he found him? How far away was he? Panic settled in his heart and the beat of its drum grew louder over the harsh cut of a shower. It wouldn’t be enough, nowhere was far enough. Heeseung would come, eventually. He’ll clog Jay’s system up until there was no other way this could play out. He’d be a part of Heeseung’s pack. He’d be an Omega. 

He’d be his.

Fuck, Jay whined mentally. His body eliciting shivers down his spine at the mere thought. He breathed in deeply, trying to calm himself, trying to avert his attention, to not think about how Heeseung had always been so sure. How with this bite mauled into his neck, the only thing keeping him from being officially in his pack was the fact that he had gotten out before the links solidified: snapping tight until all their hearts were intrinsically intertwined, bound by thread and rope.

He can still feel them faintly, the six strings that stuck needles into his heart. The threads waved in his body like a kite in the sky, free and loose, ready to break free as soon as the hand that held it let go: but there were six—six of them. He’s only ever seen the five of them: Heeseung, Sunghoon, Jake, Jungwon, and Ni-ki. There was always an empty plate beside them at breakfast and dinner. 

“Fucking—!” Someone yelps and Jay can’t see them, can’t turn his head to look, but he can feel the warmth from the bathroom billow out into the room—steam. Then footsteps, wet flops that squish into the wooden floorboard of the log cabin to hover over Jay. 

A sigh. “I knew it.” 

Jay sniffs, finally blinking. His head hurts. 

“Beomgyu.” He croaks and finally, finally the tears stream down. Beomgyu’s face doesn’t soften, it blurs with the way his tear ducts won’t stop and all he sees is a softly defined blob reaching down for him, hovering over him. 

Beomgyu’s hair drips into his tears, mixing them together and diluting the salt. 

And his hands come to gently push Jay’s head over, a movement he can’t resist. His neck opens up for him, exposing the full bite and set of teeth edged into his skin. 

Jay pants, bubbles out, “Tell me.” he begs, sucking in his trembling bottom lip. “Tell me it’s not that bad.” His voice hitches, “Gyu say—”

He doesn’t get to finish his mania. Beomgyu slides his hands to his hair and pets his strands down, undisturbed that the motions flick pieces of grass and chewed up leaves onto his bed. 

His hand comes down to rest on his cheek, “Oh, Jay.” He whispers out softly, almost a coo like he’s trying to help a baby sleep.

Then, the tears dry enough for him to see him clearly, for their eyes to connect, for Jay to feel it when his next words flow out just as softly. 

“Of course it is.” 

Of course it’s bad. 

“Why?” Jay cries weakly, “I didn’t—I don’t think I did—.” 

“My omega is already doing everything he needs to come to me himself.” 

“Tell me,” Beomgyu says, thumb swiping over his cheekbone, “tell me everything you did or didn’t do. Every interaction you’ve had with his pack and him.” 

And he does. He tries anyway as Beomgyu cleans him up, patching the bite as much as possible and giving him pain killers that make him sleepy: but Beomgyu listens attentively anyway, no matter the slur that comes up in his speech, or the stutter in his words. He tells him about the scent marking during breakfast, pup’s ring that he still has in his room at school, the scenting by the lake, the bleachers, the nip, all the way up to Friday night at the ball with Heeseung and Jungwon.

“There’s good news and there’s bad news,” Beomgyu tells him once Jay finishes, “which do you want to hear first?” 

Jay blinks slowly, body sluggishly trying to move to face Beomgyu. 

“Bad.” He answers. 

“You’re going to present. In the next couple of hours, your body will go through some changes: heightening of senses, strength, you’ll grow a scent gland, too.” 

Jay just nods through it, a tear curving over his nose. He doesn’t even bother to ask what the fuck a scent gland is and what its function is. 

It’s just too much. Everything. 

“And the good?” He whispers out, and the question feels as hollow as he says it. He doesn’t believe that there could be any good to come out of this situation.

“You won’t designate into Alpha, Beta, or Omega, not yet. You left at just the right time, any longer and the pack’s link and empty need for an Omega would have changed you completely for them. However, from what you said their link is faint, not fully developed: which means, neither will you be.” 

“But you’ll be highly perceptible during this period. If Heeseung or even members of his pack scent mark you or get too close, your wolf will respond to them accordingly.” 

“So what do I do, we leave back late tomorrow.” 

“We stay.” 

Jay shakes his head against the pillow, dread and panic rising and plummeting his heart.

“No, no that won’t work. Heeseung will find me, I know he will. He—” 

Beomgyu sets a firm hand to his shoulder, squeezing into to get him calm, to stop.

“Shh, you know I’m not just a doctor—” 

“You’re right, I think even less.” 

“You—” Beomgyu rolls his eyes, “My clan are spellcasters. This cabin’s enchanted. Even if Heeseung came sniffing around, he won’t be able to find it exactly. It’s hidden behind a force field. Plus, students aren’t generally allowed in the forest past the slotted time. If he wants to stay in the school, he’ll have to leave Monday with the rest.” 

“Okay so I'll stay here through the presentation. Then, what? How does that help if once I see him again, shit goes kaput.” 

“Easy.” Beomgyu sighs, “The longer you’re away from them during this time, the links will continue to fade until they are no longer there. No link, no connection, no worries. You’ll still be presented, but you won’t be a part of their pack or have a specific designation.” 

“Is there a chance—”

“No. You’re no longer human, Jay. Honestly, I don’t know what you are quite yet.” 

“What do you mean?” Jay asks and Beomgyu gets up to look around the room. He doesn’t know for what, but whatever it is must not be here.

“That’s the fun, isn’t it. Finding out what I mean?” Beomgyu laughs as he comes back. 

“The venom, remember my theory? I think it has to do with that other part of Heeseung, and when he nipped you, he gave you a part of it. You currently are the only person alive that has withstood it—that carries the DNA. Then, you blood shared with Sunghoon and well, now you got a typical werewolf bite—albiet more gruesome and larger than most. Your DNA right now must be all types of fucked up.” He says and he’s not looking at him when he says it, he’s looking off somewhere else, daydreaming right before Jay like this is some brilliant finding, some amazing story he must decipher immediately.

Beomgyu blinks, gives him a smile.

“I’m curious about something, is all.” 

“About what?” Jay grits out the best he can, he’s beginning to drift. 

“Hmm, who’s to say. I have a hunch, but first you’ll need to replenish your blood count before I can start my tests. I need to see how your genetics have changed since the last time I took a sample.” 

He bundles Jay up in the bed, magics some devices and a drip to attach to Jay’s arm.

“You should know,” he starts, bandaging the needle so it stays nestled into his vein, “there was nothing else you could do—that you could’ve done to prevent this. It’s not because you were weak that the bite took. The full moon has multiple effects and it can affect one wolf differently than the next. In some cases, their bite becomes stronger. That may have been the case for Heeseung, but beyond that, even beyond today it seems, you’ve been slowly—unintentionally, I know—completing the conditions for pack integration.”

“You’re a damn lie.” Jay mumbles, eyes fluttering shut, “ and you call yourself a doctor.” 

“You already have a bond with at least two of them, Jay.” Beomgyu says sternly. 

“I—.”

“Ni-ki counts, Jay. You see him as your own no matter how much you like to pretend you don’t.” Beomgyu puts another finger up, “You blood bonded with Sunghoon. You’re more or less a comfort person and a secondary authority figure for him, especially considering his history.” 

History…what history?

Beomgyu continues. 

“Bonds, claiming in any way whether that be by scent, clothes, or the way you talk—yes even as a human your words had power, Jay, calling him your pup was setting yourself up. What else…companionship and mating. These are the four main pillars to pack integration, of course there’s more such as courting and blah blah blah. The point is, you broke damn near all of them. I mean fuck did you even find out whose clothes those were the day after you got released?” 

“It doesn’t matter. That’s only two and I can work on it. I’ll stay away from Sunghoon, I’ll avoid Ni-ki and fix my vocabulary. That shouldn't even be enough, they are superficial at best. I never agreed, I never entertained even the thought of packing with them.” And it’s true, the thought of packing with them has never crossed his mind, not even when it came to Ni-ki.

“I know people who have presented under less.” Beomgyu strikes back and then to answer his second statement, “Are you sure?” 

Jay nods.

“There is no companionship, I’m not friends or buddy-buddy with any of them, and don’t even piss me off about mating. You know damn well. I want nothing to do with any of them.” 

Beomgyu just grimaces. 

“Get some sleep, Jay. Things are going to be a little overwhelming in the next few hours. Thankfully, it won’t be a heat or rut, but growing scent glands is almost worse than a baby teething. Not to mention, your senses.” 

 

 

Notes:

wow...that was a little intense. That aside, these parts were so much fun to write, like I usually don't know where I plan on going with chapters beyond a couple of details, but this probably has my favorite fight scenes. And Jay's just so fucking cool, fuck I know he would have blew this shit out of the park if it weren't for those meddling kids :)) lmao, sorry I'll leave.

I hope you guys had a good time and were well entertained lol. I wonder which half of this chapter you preferred more (9 or 10) even though....I think we all know each other well enough to to know the answer to that lmao.

I love ya'll. Ya'll are truly pretty little beacons of light...or tall, idk. Bye!

Chapter 11

Deafening. 

He can’t hear anything else. 

It takes up his entire being, spearing through his brain and tacking him to the bed like his own dagger did the fox to the tree base; the sign of a successful hunt, a quick, unseeing death.

There’s a belting, a bright ting that staples his muscles down and drives him paralyzed against the sheets. A screaming.

Jay’s screaming and he can’t hear it. The presence of his pain is quiet to him, the shredding in his throat, the rawing pink of it, couldn’t even wake a mouse in his ears. Blood leaks from his ears and Jay imagines the hot liquid sounding like dripping water from a closed faucet. It spreads out around his lobe, falling down onto his neck, and he can’t hear any of it. Not even the chafing on his arms, legs, chest—fucking everywhere— sizzle and crack like pop rocks in his ears. 

It’s all quiet. All drowned beneath the waves of everything. 

Because he hears everything , everything and it hurts so fucking bad. 

He can’t even decipher between the noises of the forest, of the house, of the five members moving about the house because everything conjoins. Everything fights for dominance and wrecks and tears into his brain like they’re entitled to it.

They grab at different areas: some hook around the water, some bite into the proteins, others pull and gnaw at the fat—everything that makes up his brain is a different territory, a new front line for the other noises to push against, to blow holes into in hopes of decimating the opposition: and Jay’s nothing but the pliant Earth, constantly harboring the bullets that miss, taking shots into his soil, breathing even under the harsh press and roll of metal tanks.

Dead bodies fall onto him, they decay into him, and Jay can do nothing but remain. He endures every hit from every team, but Jay doesn’t have medics, doesn’t get the break of sundown, or the mask to cover himself against the chemical warfare singing the lining of his nose.

He remains exposed with open airways and soon the blood breaks there too, like the acid rain that comes after such chemical exposure and it wets his face, wets down copiously in apology for the tears that can no longer well.

There’s no water left to nourish, tears left to cry, only blood and screams he can’t hear, but can feel himself making. 

His Earth rumbles, it moves and shifts, scratching at his skin because the sheets aren’t soft enough, and every brush of air from that open window feels like a new lashing upon his skin: fresh and unabating, skinning him open so the sheets can shave and grate his veins directly. The rumbling comes closer, fast and urgent, until Jay’s feeling heat before anything even touches him. 

Beomgyu’s above him, hair a mess, eyes frantic, and hands hovering over him, moving all around him at every significant haphazard, but refusing to touch him; good, because right now he truly feels like one touch would send his skin popping open like a loosely sewn button.

His mouth’s moving, steam rolling over words Jay cannot make out, but he knows he’s calling for him. He wants to answer, but the pressure in his throat has stopped, a dull heartbeat and the taste of metal take place within it now. 

He can’t speak. 

Beomgyu moves, closes the window shut and Jay sees a powder blue cloud seep around the room, filling it until the smoky–like appearance bundles under him, clouding around his skin and cottoning his ears and nose. 

Then, finally, everything stops. Everything becomes fully silent and the soft, powder clouds that feel like silk and cooling air against his skin paste over his wounds, slicken him so he’s no longer chafing and shedding his skin as a snake. 

Jay calms slowly and Beomgyu puts a wand up to his throat: blue silken webs sprouting from the tip to wrap and cuddle around his throat and Jay knows it’s laced with medicine, knows that it will be released into his skin and to his reddened insides over time. 

The powdery clouds bubble wrap the walls, silencing all the sounds from inside and out and Beomgyu touches the tip of one strand of hair, stroking it softly. It’s enough, almost too much. It’s one strand, but Jay feels it like he’s stroking his whole head. 

Sunoo.

He wants Sunoo. He’d been with Jay last time and he’d put him to sleep every time. He wants that now, wants his constant presence at his bedside instead, and wants Sunoo’s eyes on him at all times even if they can be too invasive. He can’t do this again, doesn't want to endure it without him because he knows, he knows if Sunoo knew, he would come, he would help him.

He’s his friend and just having him here would make it better, Jay knows.

He can feel it. He knows Sunoo, he trusts Sunoo, Sunoo can protect him when he’s like this. Not that Yihwa couldn’t, she has, but she’s also fragile, but Sunoo, Sunoo was never scared of Heeseung—never showed it at least.

He’d warned Jay against him, but that was it. Sunoo can handle this, can handle seeing him like this. 

He can’t voice any of that though, can’t summon Sunoo even by accident like what happens so much at school. It’s just him, Beomgyu, and that damn sketchbook of every ailment, wound, and wrecked appearance Jay has shown him: clinical notes and messy theories that write off to the end of the pages. 

Despite it all, he tries to disappear into the silence, to forget about his body completely and just be a figment of his own imagination—to be a spirit that’s floating between the planes of existence, but it’s in that silence, in that detachment that the radio finally connects frequencies with him: even for just a second. 

Bell.  

The whine doesn’t come out, but it builds in his chest. The one string, the strongest, the thickest, pulls at his limbs, and forces his feet to twitch towards the door even though Jay knows that’s not the exit. 

Jay closes his eyes, tries not to respond, tries to forget. 

When Beomgyu leaves the room, he can feel his footsteps get lighter the farther he goes, but Jay’s Earth feels it all the same—the trampling, the stampeding.

The Earth is walked on all day even while he’s getting murdered and they continue to plant things in him, continue to expect him to bear full and healthy fruits for them to eat to their fill, and when the war eventually ends, they’ll leave the pits their bombs have created in him. 

 

“Don’t scratch at it, premature exposure can cause infection and further sensitivity.” Beomgyu says, slapping away his hand from his neck for maybe the tenth time in the past three minutes. 

Jay huffs, squeezing his hands into fists. It doesn’t hurt, not yet. Beomgyu had said that his scent gland was forming just below his skin, in the space right below and behind his earlobe: a small inch and a half bump that he could feel slowly rising up.

It feels uncomfortable, the kind of small, minute pain that feels more ticklish than upsetting, but that’s also a problem. Jay wants to rake his nails into it, scratch at the soft under layer of his skin until his nails fill with blood vessels and tissue. It’s maddening that he can’t itch it and it gets worse when Beomgyu puts pressure on it to try and stifle the feeling. 

His hand twitches again and Beomgyu sits on it like the unprofessional doctor he is. 

“Tssk,” Beomgyu kisses his teeth, “worse than a baby teething. I told you.” He says pressing an ice cube to the spot. 

He flinches at the starkness of it.

He’s still covered in that blue cloud, still coated in that mist, but his sensitivity hasn’t ended. He can feel every rough edge and sharp icicle belonging to that frosty cube.

He almost screams in pain from it when Beomgyu moves it to slide across his skin, along the area where his gland is forming because before it adjusts to Jay’s heat and actually slicks his skin with its melted water, it sticks harshly, smacking and velcroes against him until it finally begins melts. But, Jay eventually settles down, even if his right hand remains hooked around Beomgyu’s wrist while he rubs it against the forming skin.

He lays his head back into the pillow and gently slips his head to the side, shuddering when Beomgyu gets more access and deepens his touch. 

The cold does something, it helps freeze the constant bickering sensation of tickles that spazz around behind his ear: but even so Beomgyu’s careful. His gland is growing on the same side as his bite and any amount of touch, water or not, will be enough to send Jay into a black out. 

“It hasn’t closed yet.” Beomgyu notes when Jay finally was brought to some semblance of stability. He’s talking to himself, but Jay opens his eyes anyway to try and look at him.

He can’t get much, just the very edge of his face and some hair since Beomgyu’s on the other side of his turned neck. 

“What do you mean? It hasn’t stopped bleeding?” Jay asks quietly and even at this decibel his voice shakes and his throat tightens: don’t talk yet, please. It hurts. 

Beomgyu sighs, rolling the ice cube up to the top. 

“No, I mean it’s not healing—closing up so to speak. Pack bites are unique. They don’t heal like normal wounds or nips. They require extra attention, specific care right after the bite is delivered.” 

Jay’s hand  loosens around his wrist and his eyes close back. The clouds clog his senses and block any smells or sensations from coming in, only in his ears where Beomgyu has thinned out the mist can he hear the boy talk and the gentle, quiet swaying of trees that are about fifteen feet away from the log cabin he’s in. The sound is calming, lulling. 

“Like what?” He whispers back, his hand falling to his stomach, magically clean of all mud and sweat. In fact, he’s in a whole new set of clothes too. No doubt, magically put on him like the spell Beomgyu used to clean him. 

“Your Alpha.” 

It shocks him. It almost fucking sends arching up from the bed.

His air gets stuck and his heart fucking leaps out of his chest. Images of him. Images of Heeseung running behind him, his clawed hands curling around his angles and yanking him through the dirt and leaves to him.

His constant fleeting temperature, the wet tongue that ate his tears, and that stare, that body that pressed him so deep into the earth Jay couldn’t move. 

The gasp comes out hitched and his knees knock against each other when he turns. 

He has to grit his way past the pain that blooms up his thighs from it. 

“Don’t.” His voice cracks, his eyes wetting anew as he retakes Beomgyu’s wrist tightly, “Ever call him that again.” He shakes, but he tries to hold firm, even as Beomgyu’s temperature feels like lava under his fingers.

The boy smiles, stabbing the ice further into that place and the tickles recede further, the cold spreading into his skin. Jay whimpers. 

“Down, boy.” Beomgyu jests, “I’m only saying that the Alpha who administered the bite has responsibility over its healing.” 

“Then say that.” Jay cuts in rudely, pursing his lips as he glares at the ceiling. 

“Awe,” Beomgyu tantrums, “but that’s no fun! Seeing you get all pissed is more my style.” 

Jay doesn’t dignify that one with an answer, not that he really has to anyway. Beomgyu’s always been good at continuing conversations, or even talking to himself. 

“It’s a double edged sword: you left at the perfect time, but on the other hand, you just made the healing process that much harder for yourself. Bites like these need constant wetting from the Alpha—licking, sucking, drooling. Whatever the Alpha deems is necessary, it’s an instinctual response. Their spit is supposed to help glaze over the wound, protect it from possible infections and start the process for the skin to stitch up.” 

Beomgyu leans in forward, setting the near nub of an ice cube off on the rolling tray he brought to Jay’s bedside. His hands hover his neck again, pausing near where it extends into his shoulder. 

“And with how deep his bite is, it’s like he planned on keeping you right on his tongue for a long time.” 

Jay bites into his lip, ignoring the fuzzy ticklish feeling trying to sprout out again. 

“I thought his spit could kill me.” He spits out. Memories of them back in the nursery debating over his nip replaying his head.

Beomgyu laughs. 

“I know it feels like yesterday.” He says dreamily, meeting Jay’s eyes with his own very brown, very playful gaze and Jay wants to fucking drown him. 

“I never said that though.” He states standing up from his seat on the bed, “I believe I said the properties of it contain something that doesn’t mesh with the common. I said that Heeseung is a kind of disease that doesn’t have a cure, a disease so evolved and separate that none of us in this age have antibodies for it.” 

Beomgyu grabs another cube from off the tray and presses it into Jay’s hand. 

“Until you. You fought through his venom like it was a bad cold when others would drop like flies within hours.”

“Why?” Jay wants to cry, but his voice doesn’t go beyond a whisper, if anything it cuts out before he can even say ‘me’. 

Beomgyu smiles, eyelashes flickering like the lights in the kitchen, “Fascinating, isn’t it?” 

An hour later, Beomgyu comes rushing back into the room and through the door that he leaves open Jay can hear the rest of his clan moving about: packing. He hears the crisp sounds of zippering, and the harsh rolling of wheels against the wooden floorboards.

He can hear Huening Kai laughing at someone who’s groaning not even five feet from where he stands, crashing themselves into the couch; that’s how good Jay’s hearing has gotten, he can hear the squish of the pillow cushions whining under their weight and he can calculate their approximate distance from not only himself but between each other as well.

And Jay knows it could be so much worse because Beomgyu has only thinned out the mist about 50% since the first time he has clogged his senses.

He still doesn’t let Jay smell though, only slowly exposing one sense at a time. 

“Change of plans.” Beomgyu huffs about, filtering around the room and checking drawers. He stumbles into the connecting bathroom to survey the supplies: Jay can hear the opening and closing of cabinets, the whispered counting of body soaps and shampoos. 

A small stroke of panic casts down in his chest. 

“Wha-do you mean?” He stumbles out, a sharp cough wrecking him right after. His throat’s not ready yet, it’s still too soon. 

Beomgyu giggles at his failure as he stands back, pulling away from the sink to rest his shoulder into the bathroom doorway. 

“The flare’s up.”

Air sticks in his chest, bundling its weight to press on his heart. 

“How? How, it’s not suppo—” Jay coughs and this time blood splatters against his chin in a crude image that reminds him of his first bite with Sunghoon. 

Beomgyu sighs and Jay hears rather than sees him reaching for his wand, his long sleeve brushing against the grit of his jeans, and soon enough that blue webbing is back around his throat, glowing brightly and pushing a relaxing mint and lemon down through the skin. 

Beomgyu hovers above him creepily, big eyes and big face centered right above his and Jay has nothing else but to watch the slow smirk creep up as the small crinkles at the edges of his eyes deepen when they dilate. It’s unnerving how much he knows about Beomgyu already from their small, infrequent visits. 

His eyes always dilate when there’s something intriguing to him, something amusing. 

“Seems like a little birdy pissed off the big bad wolf.” Beomgyu hums, tilting his wand away to start cleaning at the blood on Jay’s face. Beomgyu leans down, until his lips are close enough to his ear for him to flinch, “Everyone’s dead.” 

Jay shakes, flitting around in the blue cloud that still covers his skin like a masque. He pulls himself up even though it hurts, even though his skin still sings with sensitivity and the bite, inflamed and red, causes his lower neck and part of his shoulder to be sore. The webbing prevents him from speaking, holds Jay’s throat snuggily and keeps his vocal chords relaxed, but Beomgyu sees his lips move anyway, can guess what it is that Jay needs to be answered. 

His friends were out there. 

“Shh,” Beomgyu shushes and irritatingly drags his wand’s tip to press against Jay’s lips in lieu of a finger. Probably to overwhelm Jay less, not touch him directly yet, but the boy fails at it anyway because part of it catches his tooth, fucking stabs his gums like darts on a board and Jay can’t help reeling back from the pain—annoyed and utterly pissed.

It feels like he just got slapped. 

Beomgyu bites his lips to stop the absolute stampede of a laugh Jay can hear vibrating in his chest and throat.

“Relax, no one we know. Just you know every feral in the forest, even the rogue.” 

Beomgyu blinks away, another daydream appearing before him.

“They’re all dead,” he hums, “you really did a number on him, didn’t you Jay?” He smiles as he turns back to him, and his eyes flit down to Jay’s chest for a split second. Not long, not long at all but it was enough for Jay to feel self-conscious, to feel overly exposed, to realize—he’s breathing heavily.

“Had such a big Alpha and his pack tearing through the forest for you, killing every feral they’d seen.” 

Beomgyu comes closer and his breath tickles against Jay’s chin when his eyelashes bat at him. 

“You know why?” He whispers, but Jay shakes from it like Beomgyu’s broadcasting himself over the loud speakers. Beomgyu thins the mist in his ears, thins out all his senses slowly. 

He smells something sweet, something a little woody. 

Jay nods, tries to, but his eyes are flitting around the room as his senses come back: every hair on his skin individual and standing, he could count them they felt so prominent. The small gusts of air from the fan above that sent chills over his body like Arctic winds, and that smell, that familiar, but so foreign scent. 

“Yea? Why, Jay?” Beomgyu asks patiently, that amusement and excitement still present in his features, still brimming to the top and wanting to be chaotically tipped over, a full glass broken into shards on the floor.

Jay’s mind runs with a lot of things: it was because he made Heeseung mad, it’s because Heeseung didn’t get to finish the bite until it completely took, it’s because—

“No.” Beomgyu says back to him, biting his lips as he smiles. He comes closer and finally places his hand on his arm.

The first direct touch since he’d been diluted and dulled. Jay’s lets out his air, the deep breathing becoming heavy pants as he shakes and shivers from the heat, from the pulse he can feel beating from Beomgyu’s hands, and an almost extra sensitivity that makes him want to not only flinch but recoil from Beomgyu entirely—as if something wrong with him, like Beomgyu wasn’t right, like he couldn’t—shouldn’t be touching him right now.

His eyebrows furrow at the feeling, at the thought, he’s so fucking confused.

Jay’s eyes are slightly watery when he looks back into his eyes. 

Beomgyu pats his fried twin strands back into his bed of hair. 

“Don’t get me wrong, he’s definitely pissed.” Beomgyu beams, slow pats continuing even as Jay nods back to him: focused, worried, preparing for the unknown. 

“But,” He says and the word pops out of his mouth, cocking back like a gun.
“There’s something else to it too.” 

Beomgyu nods with him, stringing him along before he whispers, “Alpha doesn’t know you’re not in heat.” 

His eyes widen and his breath cuts short like a television cutting to commercial break. He’s stuck there and Beomgyu just watches him take it in, watches him as Jay starts violently shaking his head because no, no he’s not in heat, he won’t go in heat.

He doesn’t need Heeseung or anyone to protect him. He didn’t need them to hunt him down and take every spark of competition out along the way. He didn’t—the string, the one that connects him to Heeseung vibrates, feels like icy hot in his chest where he’s trying to breathe. The radio noise comes back tenfold now that his senses are coming back, but it’s a little quieter now, like the person who was trying to contact him has calmed down.

And Beomgyu continues to be a little bitch, stroking his hair a little deeper until Jay starts to feel it in his fucking toes. 

“He’s ensuring no other wolf would touch you like this while also having a grade A crashout.” Beomgyu chuckles before sighing, “The things you do to him. You would have thought he was defending his mate.” 

Mate. The words feel wrong, they make him sick.

Jay’s head turns to the side, his nose hovering over just over the bite along his neck to shoulder. His gland is pulsing just under his ear, part of it now breaking through the skin, and Jay can smell it here the most—that sweetness, that woodiness. 

“Honey.” 

Jay doubles over, his eyes squeezing shut as he holds onto the wrist in his hair. 

His scent is developing, he can smell it.

The rich, golden honeycombs that Jay once saw built along the branches of the thick trees in the forest; they were sopping sticky with honey, its sweetness dribbling out onto the forest floor in soft globs. Jay smelt like that, sweet, abundant, and filled to the brim and sopping, but there was something else too.

Not the woody scent that came along with the whiskey in his blood, though Jay can smell the reminiscence of it in the air still from when he coughed, but something tart, still sweet but with some sourness to cut through the honey. It brought water to his mouth, soaking into his dry corners where the honey only coated and stuck—it was something with juice, something deep, fresh, and indulgent. 

Cherries. 

His breath comes back to him heavier, faster. He looks at Beomgyu and Beomgyu just smiles. 

“That’s your scent.” He says quietly, “Now you know exactly how you smell. The notes won’t change, only deepen, sweeten, sour, or lighten with your mood. You can tell a lot about someone just from their scent: how they feel, what they may want, and most importantly, who they are mated to.” 

Jay whines, hand crushing around Beomgyu’s wrist and he can see the boy wince from it, can hear the bones twist in his ears.

Fuck! Jay lets go, he's gotten stronger.

“Relax, Jongseong, you are not mated. That’s a different bite you see.” Beomgyu says, wand coming over to course around his scent gland, its cold wooden tip gliding around it, sparking new shivers down his body. 

“Here, right here where it's so sensitive.” Beomgyu breathes, “that’s where he would need to bite you to mate the both of you: it's a permanent binding, one that doesn’t undo like pack bonds. Your scents will change after, it will be a combination of the both of you.” 

Beomgyu looks at him sternly, more serious than he’s probably been this whole time. 

“Do not let him mate you, Jay. Nothing can save you from that, not even me.”  

A tear falls down from his eye when he nods, panic abating, but his feelings do not. This was too much, everything was. He wanted it to stop, he wanted to go back to how it was not even twenty four hours ago. He would have never gone west, would have never saved Esme in the first place.

He would have done it all differently.  

“Good.” Beomgyu smiles and finally steps away, his hand coming loose from his hair. 

“Now let's go over how this is going to go.” 

 

They left not even ten minutes after Beomgyu had started, creating an orchestra of rolling wheels, dropped pillow plushies, and Huening Kai screeching at a Soobin to be careful. All five of them, a walking, on the road orchestra whose performance only lasted mere seconds before the curtains closed and the wooden door snapped shut behind them. 

Jay laid there for hours after, watching the sky deepen.

It’s getting darker earlier now that Fall is fully kicking in, but even more than that the darkness feels thick: a thick painted coating that Jay can smell still drying on the canvas of the world.

It plasters thickly between the trees, almost melting them into its coloring, but there’s still just enough light left from the stars, from the moon to distinguish them, to highlight their tall stature almost as well as the green stems to Beomgyu’s growing rosemary on the windowsill.

He didn’t do anything but stare, didn’t attempt to stretch his muscles, or brave finally walking on his feet. He laid on the bed staring out the window until his butt began to sore from the same position and the rosemary’s strong scent started to smell like medicine and vomit. 

That’s when he got up, when he decided to slowly wiggle his way off the bed and towards the windowsill. He flinched every time his feet so much as touched the floorboards, the wood was cold, but Jay was feeling it more now than he could ever before, but it got better.

This whole sensitivity thing got better with time. 

“Expose yourself slowly. Many found that being amongst nature and laying in the grass and mud helped a lot. Your body needs to adjust, you need to show it that this is normal, that this is what it is and naturally it will follow after. The body can be a force to be reckoned with, Jay. It’s highly adaptable as long as you let yourself feel it.” 

That was his homework while he was gone: to adapt, to force his body to accept these new changes as his. But they’re not his, they were never supposed to be.

The icicle shards that spear into the soft underbelly of feet as he walks through the hallways isn’t his. The screeching of crickets and clicking hooves of deer settling for bed isn’t his.

The constant tingling in his skin that catches every breath of air circulating through the place, the scent that follows him like it's a second skin, and the radio that switches on and off isn’t his. This body isn’t his anymore, not really and now he has to accept it, has to unless he’d bleed from every pore he had and then survive it tearing open more when it wasn’t enough. 

Jay pads into the living room and sets the rosemary off on one of the side tables of the couch.

The place wasn’t big, but it was spacious enough, cozy enough, warm enough to dry up the water works glossing his eyes. The walls were completely made of logs, each stain and tree ring unique to itself.

The exposed wood with dark and light grains swirled around each other like freshly made cinnamon rolls and the lighting was a light yellow-white icing that dimmed over the whole place.

It was nice: there was a main couch with crocheted blankets, mittens, and hats askew over it, a soft, and plush white knitted rug underneath the bean shaped coffee table, and three other chairs of differing sizes and colors. The furniture worked well together, but was also mismatched; there was a rocking chair off to the side closer to the fireplace with plaid cushioning, a big leather recliner to the other side of the couch, and a fully fur bean bag diagonal to the couch.

The calm chaos brought a seed of warmth into Jay’s chest, blossoming out into his face to smooth the creases, lift the edges of his lips that have sunk into a pout.

The scene reminded him a bit of the Goldilocks and the Three Bears. 

A shiver tore up his spine at that moment, a sharp shaking that moved even his shoulders. 

Fuck, it’s cold. 

Another thing that came along with darkening skies was lower temperatures.

Something Jay knew, something he even experienced during his test at the village when he had to strip naked and clean himself at the well. It had been cold then too, he had shivered then too, but it was bearable then.

He was able to get through his washing and throw on the provided clothes unrushed and with precision, but now as Jay rucks through the multitude of crocheted blankets, he’s shivering like a leaf. His hands even move slower because of the cold cinching at the muscles, trying to stop them, trying to preserve as much energy as possible since the cold is zapping it from him expeditiously. 

And then there’s another thing.

The constant pushing of each fabric along his skin and running its scent under his nose—judging it, throwing it to the side, and picking up another. He’s never done this before. He’s always settled on what he had at first sight and went on with it. The random blanket he found in the library is a prime example, but now, it felt like a mission.

It had to be soft enough for his skin to handle it being across him for a time, had to smell right, but what the fuck constituted as right?

They were all clean, all smelt good so to speak, but there was an unease in each he threw away: the embers and fire were too sweltering, the gummy bears too sweet, the mint too sharp, but they all had a scent. None of them were freshly made, none of them unworn. He didn’t expect there to be.

This was a clan’s home, of course there were only five for each of them.

So, in the end, even though a part of him was still restless he went with the one that smelled the most like Beomgyu, the most familiar scent out of all the clan—apples and cinnamon. 

His blanket was thick and well knotted, but also flexible. It stretched around Jay’s shoulders and cascaded down his body like a well-stuffed coat, or the feeling of a life-size teddy bear wrapping around his body, and it didn’t chafe at his skin, didn’t sting his nose so bad it began to bleed. 

It was just okay and for now that will have to do. Especially given that with Beomgyu gone the mist coating and stuffing his senses was slowly disintegrating, and soon enough he’d be feeling everything if his body didn’t snap back. 

Jay sighed, pressing his lips together in a harsh, tight press just to keep his lips from wobbling again. 

It’s fine, he tells himself, it’s fine. 

And he goes back into Beomgyu’s room, closes the door and settles himself in front of the mirror in the bathroom, staring at the salve. 

“Kai—”

“He’s been working on a new salve. I hope it works.” 

“It’s still in its beta form, but ideally it’s supposed to mimic an Alpha’s spit. There’s nothing on the market for untended bites, and with how easily these things can happen—forced or not—there should be more options. Alternatives that those with a poor Alpha, health conditions, or…eh, unfortunate circumstances can rely on to help it heal.” Beomgyu had said before he left. 

“It’s not guaranteed that it will work. We just have to hope it does enough.” 

“And if it doesn’t?” He asked.

“Just have hope, Jay.” 

Swallowing down the spit and rolling back his tears, Jay finally uncaps the small container. 

Beomgyu was right, even though Jay will never tell him such: but, nature did help, being outside did help. 

Jay was curled up into a ball in the short grass surrounding the log cabin. Earth and the smell of green refreshing against the healing walls of his nose. The smells around him—albeit the wet smell of dirt, the salt and rock of the small pond nearby, or the slight musk from the dirty bunny hopping around near his ankles—all soothed at his open senses, calmed and wrapped him tight between them like Jay was just another kit belonging to the forest, another seed to be nourished and sprouted.

The smell of pine was what kept him the most centered, the endless array of dancing trees that circled this little clearing. The trees were dropping their pine needles as he lay and forward upon the wind, thier crisp and clear scent drifted towards him, washing over his whole body, blanketing him further into the soft cusp of the grass.

The smell was close—close to being right, whatever that was and its effect had almost been immediate. 

When he walked out onto that large porch, the wooden platform larger than the living room itself, Jay had almost fled back through those wooden lined glass doors. The cabin sat half way on top of the pond and he could feel the pulsing of the water just below his feet like he’d been knee deep in it.

The wind still felt too harsh over his gland and bite, even though the wound was covered, the constant attention and wisps had him already beginning to shake with oversensitivity.

It was easy to get swept away in everything. Once one sense overwhelmed him, everything else got louder, everything else fought against the other harder. It was hard to focus. He couldn’t focus, not until the pine touched under his nose—it redirected him, forced him.

Something about it made his body listen, made him focus on it slowly until the noise was turning down, until his skin wasn’t letting in every subtle murmur and ghost of movement tread into him, until Jay was able to lay in the grass, Beomgyu’s blanket still draped along his shoulders, and just melt under the soft yellow haze of the sun. 

So, in his short reprieve, in this small world he had bubbled wrapped himself in, he let his eyes close comfortably. They don’t twitch with every sound he hears and they don’t threaten to open once a noise comes in too loudly.

They finally rest and Jay, even if he’s still hurt and changing, feels like the healing process is finally beginning. 

He’s so relaxed that he even starts trying to practice: he attempts to control his senses, trying to filter each of them out one by one, and attempts at controlling how much he hears, how much he feels, but they are only attempts.

This shit was clearly harder than Jay could assume and he had no one to teach him, no one to help him navigate through these changes—teach him how to be at the center of everything and not let it crush him.

Beomgyu was a spellcaster, a medicinal one focused in creatures, Yihwa was magic too, and though Chloe was a werewolf he didn’t feel comfortable with showing such a vulnerable side of himself to her—they were friends, of course—they just weren’t close in that kind of way.

Not to mention, if his blood is really as fucked as Beomgyu says, he’s not even sure if these are all the side effects he’s going to get. 

Jay sighs, whatever .

He keeps playing with his hearing, seeing how far he can hear and how much of that distance he can channel out. He’s also distinctly ignoring the small, warm nose taps the bunny is giving against his cupid’s bow.

She’s cute, all light grey and white spots, furry and warm, and overly curious. It brings a smile to his face as she sniffs him, nuzzles against his cheek before throwing her small body into his face just to see if he’d move.

Jay wants to laugh, wants to coo at her childishness.

She reminds him so much of his pu—a stick breaks through his thoughts, a sharp snap, one too thick to be a normal hoof over foliage. It’s a deep, reverberating noise that travels through the ground like an earthquake until both he and the bunny are lifting their heads up from their hovels—Jay from his place in the grass, her from the inside of Jay’s shirt.

A branch was snapped in half. 

He doesn’t know how he can tell, but he knows. 

It takes a second for his eyes to adjust, but once they do he’s seeing everything beyond 20/20 vision. The world is crisp, the colors exuberant.

He means shit, the world almost looks fake, like it’s being caught through camera lenses and editing screens than his actual own eyes: but maybe these additions aren’t all bad, maybe they are helpful, because with his next blink his eyes re-dialate, re-size themselves to tunnel through the trees, moving, moving, searching between them and over the stumps until he sees him. 

Sunoo. 

He jumps up from his pile with a gasp, adrenaline and excitement buzzing through his veins. 

Sunoo’s here, Sunoo. 

Jay’s blanket falls from his body and he rushes to his feet. The little bunny startling but hiding away in his heap of crocheted blankets. 

How did Sunoo find him?

Jay’s already smiling ear to ear when he makes it to the barrier, a hazy force field that Jay can see right through.

It’s almost imperceptible to him even though he’s inside of it, only the small shivering of it reminds him of its presence, of the reason why he cannot break through it. So, he stands just a touch away from it because he can’t bear to be an inch further and waits, waits for Sunoo to reach him.

He’d watch him again, oversee his journey if he could, but has no idea how to do it, how to repeat what was almost instinctual.

He waits and his shoulders jump once he realizes that’s what a lock was: the narrowing gaze of a predator latching onto the movements of its prey.

He doesn’t get to think about that much, dwell on it too far, because quickly his attention is lost, stolen by Sunoo breaking through the treeline and entering his little clearing, his own alcove within the forest. 

It’s Tuesday, he shouldn’t be here.

Everyone was gone, Beomgyu hadn’t even come back yet like he said he would. A pigeon was sent through his window that morning telling him that something had come up, that’d he back later than he expected, and told him to prick his finger over the note so he could compare his blood in the lab. 

Jay watches Sunoo look around, watches him start in one direction before stopping a second later.

He stands there, back towards Jay, eerily still and silent. Not one breath leaves him and Jay listens. Every part of him is listening to Sunoo, seeing Sunoo.

Seeing how out of place he looks amidst all the warm things: the yellowing leaves, the brown trunks that murmur and squeak, the deers that poke their heads around them to stare beadily at them, the frogs of orange, blue, and green flopping into the pond by the house.

Amongst all of the live things, Sunoo stands unmoved by the wind, colder than a stone, stiller than the surface of the pond that’s now rippling from a croak. Between the living, Sunoo is dead. 

His heel turns and his head twists around again before his body, but it remains tilted, sloughed off to the side like he’s interested in something, confused and curious; the curiosity doesn’t feel the same, though.

It’s not filled with soft aggression and small pokes.

It’s a peering gaze, a lidded expression that feels more like a detective catching onto a clue, like a hound freezing as it finds a scent. Sunoo’s face is dark despite the fluff of his cheeks, his eyes slitted as he stalks forward, almost gliding over the grass instead of stepping. A confidence in the unknown, an offensive take to being tested: you think you can hide from me? Not that Jay ever would.

Then, he’s standing right in front of him, body lined up perfectly with Jay’s, toe for toe, and Jay knows he can’t see, knows he can’t possibly see him through the one-way enchantment.

He knows Sunoo only sees a blank clearing and pond before the forest continues out again. 

He knows and yet when Jay’s eyes travel up from their feet that are so close they’d be touching if it weren’t for the barrier, he takes a step back. 

Sunoo’s staring straight at him, straight into him and those eyes are dangerous. They always are, but this time the sand wraps around him quicker, holds onto his ankles harsher until he can almost feel the grit of it sawing into his skin. 

The sand yanks him closer, tripping him back over the step he took away from him. 

Jay gasps, almost crashing into the barrier, but his breathing stays panicked after. Fuck, he almost—he could have—the thoughts have him clutching his hands together as they shake. Too close, but it’s okay, it’s okay because he’s still behind it, still safe from the empty forest beyond his bubble, and the sudden jostle removed his stare, removing Sunoo’s hold. 

Jay’s eyes don’t move away from the boy’s nose, not even attempting the eyebrows like usual.

His heart thuds, fucking lurches.

Sunoo smiles. 

“Jay?” He asks, “Are you there?” 

Jay tries to chuckle around a shuttery breath. Fuck that really scared him. What the fuck was he going to do when he had to leave this bubble? 

“Sunoo,” Jay sounds out and the words alone remind him of who he’s with, reminding him that he’s safe. He’s with Sunoo. The forest can’t get him, Heeseung can’t either. 

His name alone calms the nerves bristling under Jay’s skin, wraps his heart in a life vest so it can continue to float amidst the oceans of blood rushing within him. 

“Sunoo, hey—hi.” He sounds stupid, he does, but fuck him, he misses his friends, misses the comfort of them being there.

Especially after such an event where he felt like he had been cut open and displayed out for Heeseung to eat, to lick.

Right now he lacks skin, he lacks covering, he lacks the scales that used to shine like diamonds in the river before he was roughly clawed. He’s open, but where he is open Sunoo would be there to close it, close it like how he did his eyes every night in the nursery bay. Sunoo would be his scale, his net to filter through the bacteria before it got into his wounds. 

“What are you doing here? I thought—” His eyebrows furrow and his lips purse, “Students aren’t allowed to be in the Forest past the flare.” 

Sunoo’s lip twitches up and Jay can see his eyebrow jump in amusement. 

Jay panics. 

“That doesn’t mean I’m not glad that you’re here. I am! I really—” Jay looks down at his feet, hand curling into his shorts. His voice next comes out quieter, lighter, but he knows Sunoo still hears it—that he always will.

 “I’m actually really glad you’re here,” He confesses, eyelashes batting faster to prevent another wave of tears that he doesn’t need. He shakes his head and his voice cracks lightly, “It’s been hard—” 

Sunoo’s smile widens, but Jay’s own eyes are stuck on the jelly sandals he slipped on from the porch. 

“Jay, can I come in?” 

Sunoo’s voice cuts him off, cuts through him, and it startles him—that soft, vanilla tamber. The sound settles up against his skin, cuffs around his ears until Jay’s only hearing Sunoo. 

“What?” 

It’s unexpected, the question. He didn’t expect that to be the first thing out his mouth, didn’t expect to be cut off really either, but he doesn’t hold it against him. He’s been missing and Sunoo has no clue as to why.

Even with the gossip that is sure to have spread amongst the student body, no one really knows the exact truth, the full extent to what had happened to Jay that night. They can only assume, can only gossip and rumor. 

Sunoo’s shoulders drop and voice quietens down to Jay’s level and it feels nice, like Sunoo’s curling towards him, draping himself across his shoulders for comfort. 

“I just want to make sure you’re okay.” He says and Jay nods viciously. He should see him, Sunoo should see him. He was probably worried beyond comparison and he knows no doubt that Yihwa probably hasn’t been helping either. 

But, Jay shakes his head. Sunoo hears it. 

“I can’t, I’m not allowed t—” 

“I need to see you.” Sunoo cuts in again and this time it's harsher, his heart stutters. It’s not deep and it’s not scary, so Jay doesn’t know why his heart beats faster, why the tears that he managed to push down slowly come back up. He clutches his pants harder and all of sudden it feels like he’s drowning. 

The birds are screeching, the pond is a thundering rainstorm that threatens to flood Jay’s little clearing and push him out into the forest, spitting and crying. 

“Sunoo, I’m sorry I—” He whines as he begins to shake. He doesn’t want Sunoo to think he doesn’t trust him. He doesn’t want Sunoo to think he’s scared of him or that he was pushing him away. He wasn’t. Beomgyu told him no one. 

Before he’d left out the barrier, he whispered it into the sky—knowing Jay would hear it over the wind. 

“Don’t invite anyone in, Jay. Once you do, the enchantment will be visible to them and like you they will become keyholders. They will be able to invite others.” 

It shouldn’t have been a problem. Jay didn’t even think anything of it when he said it. No one was supposed to be in the forest, much less anyone Jay would let in, but he didn’t think it through. He didn’t think about the very real fact that he had friends willing to seek him out, ones that cared about him.

He never had that.

He didn’t assume, but Sunoo was here, needing to make sure he was okay and Jay was rejecting him. 

Fuck, he really hoped being overly emotional was also apart of this whole transition. This shit was embarrassing, he’s almost glad he can’t be seen. 

“Hey, okay. It’s okay.” Sunoo coos, stepping that bit closer even though the barrier must be pushing back against him. 

Jay looks up from where he hunched himself in, looks up at Sunoo, locks eyes with his eyebrows and he can see the softness in his face, the worry lightening his eyes. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to overwhelm you. Just—tell me what’s happening. What can I do? Are you hurt, sick?” 

Jay takes a minute to breathe and Sunoo does it with him, his stomach poking out and deflating back in just to match Jay’s. Jay smiles at the act, the unneeded gesture just to make sure Jay felt seen even though Sunoo could only hear him. 

“I’m okay,” He nods to himself, then at Sunoo, “I’m okay, it’s just I never thought I’d end up here, that I'd be like this.” His eyes water and he abandons all care, meeting Sunoo’s eyes. 

“I can’t change it Sunoo,” He whispers weakly, “I can’t undo it. It keeps getting out of my control and I can’t wrangle it in. Ever since he bit me it’s like the world’s been trying to swallow me whole and I can’t even move to fight without flinching.”

I’m stuck again , he doesn’t say. He’s stuck back at that threshold to a house that didn’t feel like his, frozen, and watching his mother’s last moments, hearing her last words scream in his ears. 

“I don’t feel like myself anymore.” His mind wanders off.

Sunoo shakes his head, and Jay can hear his arm lift up, his hand curl in front of his mouth.

“Contacting Jongseong.” Sunoo sounds out deeper, voice gone more military and cartoonish. The memory of them back into the nursery bay strikes back into him, yanks him back from that hole he was sinking in.

 A wet laugh bubbles from out of his throat, “Reporting.” He answers back, looking back at Sunoo and pretending that they're seeing each other for real, that there is no barrier, that they’re together, just like at the nursery. 

“The bite doesn’t change who you are, Jay.” Sunoo says, foot tapping along the barrier, sending small ripples up it. “It doesn’t change what you’ve triumphed and what you’ve fought for. It doesn’t change that you survived where your ancestors did not.” 

Jay sniffs, wiping the tip of his nose clean from the tear. Confusion bundles within him just a little.

“What do you mean?” He asks lightly, intimately as if the whole forest may hear, and what if they do, Jay wants to keep him and Sunoo separate. He doesn’t want to share—doesn’t want to be open. 

“Can I tell you something, Jongseong?” Sunoo’s eyes smile at him before his lips do and Jay feels that sand again, but this time it doesn’t attach at his ankles to slowly swallow him; it flattens out until it's nothing but a soft warmth beneath his feet, spreading between his toes. 

Of course , Jay wants to say. He nods. 

“Everyone thinks the humans died out with the start of the epidemic.” He says closely, “but you know what I think? I think they all killed themselves.” 

Jay sucks in the breath that was already tumbling out between his lips, “Hm?”  

“I think they’d rather die than be outranked. Rather die than face the brutality that they administered over us for centuries; Fear and weakness ruling them. They died because they could not adapt, because they could not fathom a coexistence, a partnership to end the plight. You’re their closest relative Jongseong and nothing about you plays by their rules. Nothing about you would they consider being human .”

His fingers tangle back around his shorts and his heart beats a little slower. 

“I’ve known many, I’ve faced even more. Trust me, Jay, even put amongst their prime, you would still be an oddity.”

Sunoo, I don’t think this is helping , he wants to say, but instead he hangs his head, listening to everything that is Sunoo: the breathing he still does that Jay unintentionally matches, the little hums he does in the back of his throat when he mulling something over or about to tell him something, all the way to the shoe that continues to send pulses through the barrier. 

“You’re innocent, Jay. You’re sweet. You wouldn’t do what they did to us and for that you’d be considered an outsider. You’d be supernatural to humans as you were a human to us. Do you get it? Being human was never you, it was never what you were. You do not mourn the self you created, for it was always yours and will forever be with you bite or not. Omega or not.” 

Jay breathed it all in like it was oxygen and he was on his last breath. He soaked in what Sunoo was trying to tell him like a sponge thrown into a bath. He let his words seep in, let them make him heavy and full. 

He nods, silver hair falling into his eyes, but he still tries to look at Sunoo through it, like he’d be able to breathe the sight of the boy in too. 

He doesn’t say anything else after that. Doesn’t bother to clarify that he hasn't been designated into any rank yet because in the grand scheme of things it was not important. It didn’t change who Jay was, it wouldn’t change how Sunoo thought about him.

Jay was his own person from the very beginning, he redefined his role in this world brick by brick; the world expected him to be weak, expected him to just fall under any Alpha and join any pack for survival or be forced under one, but he had torn that narrative to shreds with his own daggers.

He may not be human anymore, but he never was. Not truly, not deeply. He was his mother’s child and he was going to do everything he could to put her to peace. 

Even if he had to do it presented with no real designation. She’d understand, she knows he did everything he could. 

Sunoo smiles at him like he can hear his thoughts, or maybe there’s just something in the way his heart squeezes, beating anew, fresh and driven right off the lot that tells him something. Either way, he looks proudly at Jay, nodding. 

“ We got you, Jay.” He says, and Jay can’t help the images of himself, Sunoo, Yihwa, and Chloe coming to his head—of all of them together, laughing and joking back at the breakfast tables in West Wing.

“ I got you.” 

One more pulse gets sent up the barrier and it's hard enough to have Sunoo bouncing back a bit from it. 

“Dumb.” Jay laughs.

Sunoo shrugs. 

 

 

 

It’s after dinner when Yihwa calls—or, more like a random mist expands from behind him in the kitchen with Yihwa’s crazed eyes and Chloe lounging on their green couch with her feet up and head rolling off the cushions. That fucking girl scared him so bad, he dropped his meat back in the sink. 

“What the fuck is this?” Jay freaks, gesturing out to the weird ass portal projector shit happening right above his kitchen counters. 

Yihwa nods urgently, curls bopping back against her cheekbones from the force, “Right, yes. This is called a—” 

Chloe’s fingers come up, “Doesn’t matter. Get to the point.” 

“Blue Jay, are you alright? Beomgyu hasn’t said much—I mean he really can’t of course given—” 

“Yihwa. Five minutes.” Chloe sings.

“Jay.” Yihwa whines like that alone is sufficient enough to relay to him everything she wanted to say. 

Jay huffs, smile denting his cheeks as he shakes his hair out. 

“I’m fine, Yihwa.” He says, picking his pork belly back from out the sink. There's a window lining the wall the sink sits against. They were wooden lined as well and open to let out the steam Jay was no doubt about to create when he began to cook. 

“At least I’m feeling better than initially. The bite still isn’t threading back together though, but the salve Beomgyu made is doing enough to keep infections out. I don’t know, this whole heightened senses thing is tricky.” He says, finding himself a pan and setting it to warm on the stove. 

“I already broke two door handles by accident and I had to stuff toilet paper up my nose when I opened the seasonings. Tell me it gets better.” He says, sinking his shoulders. He’s trying to keep it lighthearted and sweet, only mentioning the more recent struggles with his condition than any of the more debilitating details that would send Yihwa into a frenzy.

Besides, Jay’s tired out from all the emotions swirling inside him. It’d be nice to just have a normal conversation, one not about what he was or what he was becoming, much less how he feels. 

“Nope.” Chloe pops the ‘p’ like she’s pulled a lollipop from her mouth. 

“Chloe! Don’t lie like that. These are his formative years!” 

“He’s not a child!” 

“He’s my Advisee!!” 

“That’s not a valid argument!”

Jay smiles and just stays quiet, letting their bickering fill the house around him. Their voices yell and laugh just behind him as he cooks and if he doesn’t think too hard, it feels like they’re there with him, sitting at the barstools of the island behind him, waiting for dinner to be served. 

But eventually, he does chime back in. 

“And Sunoo, did he get back okay?” 

The question floats up into the air with the sizzling steam from his meat and Jay almost misses the immediate quiet that happens behind him. The weak humming of a table top fan in Yihwa’s dorm whirling back the only answer he gets. The silence gets him to pause just as much as the sudden white noise he hears from beyond the cabin.

The crickets have stopped rubbing their legs together, the owls stopped hooting—only the grass seemed to sway and the trees groaned. 

Jay stared out the window, his heart beating slightly irregularly at the sudden pause on both fronts, but ultimately he lets it go. Let’s the sharp pop of his meat being done wring him back to the active now, turning the stove off, pushing his pan off to the side. 

“Hm?” Yihwa’s voice jumps high in her throat, a horrible lie, acting like she hadn’t heard him. 

He turns around, wiping his hands against the baby blue apron. 

“Sunoo,” he says, “he came around earlier to check on me. Did you see him at all, like at dinner? I wanted to make sure he got back okay. I know all the wolves have been killed, but still.” 

Chloe turns up right for the first time the whole call. Both of them stock still and shoulders aligned as they lean forward. Green sparks weakly in Yihwa’s eyes and Chloe’s eyes blink one more time than usual. 

“Yea.” Chloe says and for the first time Yihwa is the one expanding further. 

“I see him.” 

The wind whistles behind him like a crisp voice and all their shoulders seem to jump from it like a bad jump scare. 

Jay cuts a laugh, “I’m sorry, what?” 

He hears rustling in the trees. It crutches in his ears like an empty bag of chips.

Yihwa looks at him, then over his shoulder, out the very window Jay stands in front of feeling the wind come through. Chloe’s eyes go bronze. 

“I see him.” 

“He never came to dinner.” 

“Jay!” Yihwa screams and the sound shoots through him, flinching him back into the counters. Hard. Rough. Pain shoots up his spine from his lower back, the pain expanding to his hips as his hands rush to cover his ears. He’s shaking.

 His heart is fucking thundering in his chest, beating at speed unknown to man and the hairs on his arms stand up, stiff straight to the point where the goosebumps pebble and harden with the shock, pain and fear that Yihwa sparks through him within seconds. It’s a cocktail, one that fucks him up. 

“Yihwa, Yihwa. Stop, please.” He says shakily, his shoulders still jumping because it feels like her scream is still screeching through him, but he moves, he tries to turn around. Slowly. Breathing on every second. Every inhale, every exhale is a fucking tsuanmi that threatens to drag him under. 

 What the fuck was she talking about? What’s going on? 

Jay barely gets to look over the windowsill before he freezes, before the breathing wind chokes against the hairy armor that stands up from his skin and his heart, the apple to a broken branch, falls into his stomach, rolling in its dirty pits.

Pulsating. 

The cobwebs webbing around his heart, the thin needle and string, each a dagger that pierces through him, pulses, pumps his heart until its bleeding more, fucking pouring like faucet out onto those strings: but, he only pours around four of them. Only four of them are strengthening, tightening their hold in his chest. 

They’re close. 

Some are missing. 

His eyes shake over the windowsill, a shivering that distorts his vision as he looks back into that blackening abyss. The trees are looming, tall figures even from this far away, and the black night seems to make them stretch, pulling them thin and long like stringing gum. It's unnatural. They're too long and they just keep extending, getting bigger, getting closer, swallowing his vision until all he sees…until all he sees is Sunoo looking right at him.

Right at him like there wasn't anything ever separating them.  

The breath tumbles out of him, the sudden panic and fear erupting from his chest. Something in him wants to hunker down, disappear below the black marble countertops: hide, hide, hide. But no one can see him. Jay knows that. The force field hides the whole house—on the outside it's nothing but a clearing. They won’t be able to find him, even if Sunoo—He tries to shake his head clear. 

Why was Sunoo back?

Chloe’s words ring in his ear. Did he ever leave?

Jay stands there shocked still, barely breathing as he watches Sunoo step into the clearing. The steam from his meat curls under his chin, mists into his eyes, and something activates when he blinks through it, and through the sheen on the window Jay can see his own eyes glowing silver. 

And then he’s seeing through the night, ripping its layers apart until Sunoo’s bright ocean eyes and pearly teeth are all he sees. 

Sunoo. 

He’s smiling and the vision of it with the striking, blank cyan eyes feels terrifying, like a predator just jumping out of hiding: ready, set. But Sunoo’s holding his daggers, both hands wrapped carefully around Green and White like he knows those are Jay’s treasures, that they mean so much to him. 

Jay’s lips twitch at the corners. He got his daggers for him. He thought he’d lost them forever, that they’d surely be buried somewhere amidst the landslide Jay had sparked. 

But even though his high drops, the pulsating doesn’t, the constant tightening in his chest doesn’t abate and before he knows it, he’s dropping his tongs and rounding the island. 

They’re close and Sunoo’s outside.

“I need to warn him.” He panics, rushing towards the pink jelly sandals. 

“No, Jay. Don't go outside!” Yihwa barks, “It's dark. You said you weren’t feeling well, right? Jay!” 

He doesn’t pause, he grabs his blanket and wraps it around him as he slams the door shut.

“What if something happens to him Yihwa, what if he gets hurt.” He says back, even though he’s well beyond the hearing range.   

He runs—fucking sprints to the barrier’s edge. The night is swallowing him, coating him a part of that canvas until the only thing that sets him apart is the shining silver of his eyes—his night vision—another sign of his change—molten white that rivals the twinkling of the stars. 

Jay stops, just barely off the edge of the force field. It's a blessing really—these heightened senses—he could feel the vibrations and coolness of it right before he went too far, right before he almost ran right through it. 

Sunoo hears him skid to a halt, hears his heart, hears his fucking heavy breathing. Has to, Jay can. 

“Sunoo, you have to go.” He heaves, “It’s not safe! Their—” 

Sunoo leans in closer, his whole body pressing up lightly against the force field and Jay can hear it bounce and shake around him. 

“Why?” Sunoo queries, the two daggers clinking in his hands, “Sense something?” 

Jay breathes in, the air inflating his chest as he shakes his head. This was not the time for jokes, not the time for reminiscing about that time he stupidly thought he saw something in the nursery bay. 

“Sunoo, be serious. They’re in the forest, they’re close. I don’t know how—I don’t—No one is supposed to—” 

“Jay,” Sunoo laughs, “relax. Nothing’s going to happen to me.” He says and waits a beat, waits for his sentence to settle within Jay’s eardrums before he speaks again, “Breathe.” 

Jay’s nodding before he even understands what Sunoo’s demanded. His shoulders relaxing as he starts to breathe in slower, deeper, as much as he could with his chest folding in. 

“Have a little more faith in me, will you? I am older. ” 

Jay scoffs, flinching from the wind.

“The centuries you’ve lived before me don’t count. I am older than you, do not try it.” 

“Sure,” Sunoo draws out and his bangs curl into his lashes, “ hyung. ” He teases, splicing the word with so much sass it almost gets Jay to act up. 

Almost—Sunoo cuts him to it. 

“By the way,” He says, gesturing down to his hands, "Found them buried beneath rubble and bodies in the crater. Thought you might want them back.” 

But, Sunoo sighs, twisting the daggers in his hold, “Though, I’m not sure how much use they will be to you now.” 

Jay smiles shaking his head, “Why do you say th—Fuck me!” He curses as Sunoo holds them out against the barrier. His precious knives were ruined. The steel of his daggers were bent beyond repair, their sharpened tips completely severed into a dull nub. 

Jay groans, spinning on his heels like that was going to shield him from the fit he was going to throw. Sunoo couldn’t see him, even if he had a weirdly good way of detecting where he was beyond the barrier. 

What the fuck was he going to do? He couldn’t just get a new pair, it didn’t work like that. Not when Jay had randomly stumbled upon the knives in the back of a rundown, infested Japanese restaurant. They were practically one of a fucking kind! 

Jay turned back around, rubbing his hands down his cheeks so he could get another look at them. 

“Fuck.” He whines, “It’s just as bad the second time.” 

Sunoo’s smile wobbles as he nods, then it drops like his voice. 

“Can I give them to you?” He asks softly, both hands still held out for him to take. 

Jay fights himself to look back at Green and White and yes, the third time still fucking sucks, but his chest hurts—now with a sort grief added on, but he nods to himself. Fucked up or not, they still got him through a lot. He doesn’t want them to just rot away in this place—No, he’d keep them with him, probably find a nice glass box to display them in. 

His hands twitch for them, rising until the barrier pulsates against his fingertips. 

Jay’s eyebrows furrow.

His hands would be exposed if grabbed them from Sunoo, part of him would be fleshed out again against the elements, against the forest, against those strings that continue to get stronger the longer he’s out here, the faster they come. 

“I can’t it’s—” 

“They’re still far. I can hear them about two minutes away. It’ll be okay, it’s just for a second. You have me, remember?” 

Jay’s breath hitches, but he nods despite the voices telling him to stay hidden, to stay within his alcove. 

“Jay, you have to say it. I can’t see you remember?” Sunoo jests and all Jay sees is just how bright his eyes are in his daggers.

It’s okay, he tells himself, Sunoo’s here. Nothing bad will happen, plus it’s just his hands. 

“Right, sorry. Ye—”

Jay gasps, fucking falls to his knees because his ears begin to ring. 

A crash echoes from behind him, from within the house and the sound sends him into a state he’s never felt before. His breathing slows almost to a complete stop and with his eyes squeezed shut as they are, he can feel the blood coursing through him thin out, flattening itself until he almost doesn’t feel it, as if the blood rushing through him has now gone dry, depleted of all its reservoirs.

He becomes quiet, blending, merging.

Jay almost feels like nothing.

He turns in the grass, the strands feeling overly friendly against his knees, cupping his skin like long fingers. He looks back at the house, into the house, and he sees Beomgyu through the window. The window that’s still  open in the kitchen. 

“Inside,” Beomgyu whispers over the wind. “Now.” 

Jay swallows, his jaw clicking. 

He rises back up, turns back towards Sunoo. 

He’s frowning. 

“Jay?” 

“Yea, I’m here, sorry.” 

Sunoo nods, brows lowering ever slightly like he’s contemplating something. 

“Interesting.” He says, head tilting and his eyes switch—blue then brown, back to blue. 

Jay doesn’t say anything, but he mouths the words “what” even though Sunoo can’t see. 

“You’re right in front of me, aren’t you?” He questions.

“Yes.” Jay says quietly, feet already turning for the house. Beomgyu is staring him down and with his vision, he can see the boy hasn’t been sleeping well. There’s a shadow below his eyes and his head stays stuck out the window, keeping Jay in his sights as if he’d disappear. 

“For a second, I couldn’t sense you. At all.” He says, then follows up, “And I always can.”

Now it’s  Jay’s face that screws up. “What do you mean?” 

Sunoo's smile comes back and his fangs peek out above his lips just barely.

“Jay.” He hears Beomgyu say again, this time slightly above a whisper. He sounds exasperated.

“Sunoo—”

“It’s okay, I’ll just leave them out here.” He says, laying his daggers down in a bed of grass, “Get some sleep. I’ll watch over your dorm.” 

“Okay.” Jay nods, “Be careful going back. Go in the opposite direction if you have to.” 

“Will do.” 

Then Sunoo turns, heads back into the forest within a blink of an eye and Jay recedes, slinking back into the house and wondering why the pack hasn’t approached yet. It’s been two minutes, he knows that for sure, and he can still feel them close by, but the pulsating has stopped. 

They’re not coming closer to him. They’re sitting. He just hopes none of them pick up on Sunoo.

 

Jay quickly saunters into the house, leaving the sandals by the door as he goes. Beomgyu is on the couch, nursing a hot tea between his fingers and leaning back into the corner of the main couch. 

“What happened?” Jay rushes in, sitting on the other side of the couch. 

“Freak landing. I was never the best at teleports.” Beomgyu scoots forward, resting the cup on the coffee table. 

“Ask me what else.” Beomgyu beams and even though his eyes look tired, they still manage to crinkle at the edges with his excitement. Jay almost doesn’t want to know, but he prepares himself for it anyway. 

“What else?” He says, fisting a random blanket he’s left alone since he’s picked his one. 

“I compared your blood samples.” Beomgyu chucks his head back with a short laugh, he claps, “I even propped it up under a microscope and put it up against other occult DNA’s.” 

Beomgyu slides to his back, arms coming up in a hoorah before they link behind his head. 

“Ask me what I found out.” 

“Beomgyu.” Jay grounds, already rolling his eyes despite the simmering anxiety that floats just beneath the surface of his skin. 

“Ask.” Beomgyu juts his chin out. Then, resumes rest. 

“What.” Is all Jay says, all he fucking cares to say. Hurry the fuck on with it, he wants to badger. 

Beomgyu’s eyes open to the ceiling, “You’re blood fights.” He says. 

“The blood sample I had you give today, I took it under a microscope to take a look at your cells. They were a fucking frenzy. Your cells were being attacked, foreign cells trying to merge membranes with your original set. These cells looked different from any creature I’ve ever seen. I’ve browsed every book and all I could compare it to were two different sets of DNA, sets that do not mix whatsoever. But that’s impossible, I told myself.” Beomgyu smiles to the ceiling, most likely replaying his moments of “genius” like a movie in his head. 

“Unless you're Lee Heeseung,” His eyes flicker down to Jay, “And apparently also, Park Jongseong.” 

“What are you saying?” 

Beomgyu ignores him. 

“So I compared it with the DNA we took after the nip. I expected the same thing and in a way I got it, but the cells had settled. They weren’t fighting and there weren’t any foreign cells attacking—only a blood infection. It had broken through the membrane and was settling into your cell. In other words, his venom is infecting you, it is making you sick—or at least it would be.” 

“Beomgyu you’re not making any sense right now.” 

“Who knew that all those years spent human, all those years avoiding any lick of coercion and pack integration would grant you such a gift? Jongseong, your blood is full of antibodies. The infection broke through your cell membranes but it couldn’t attack the nucleus. The nucleus plays a key role in immunity, in health. Your antibodies, in response, grew another layer to protect the nucleus. That’s why you didn’t die—the fact that you were nothing, that your blood had nothing for so long it built up resistance. I extracted the infection—tested it. It’s vampirism, Jay. Heeseung’s part vampire, part wolf.”

“No, how? Wolf bites kill vampires.” He says quickly, shaking his head. It can’t be. He can’t be.

“Yea.” Beomgyu nods giddy, “You both should be dead. I gave it a couple of hours, waited until your recent sample settled. The foreign cells—the mixture of a hybrid, the mixture of the incompatible—seeped into your membrane as well, and just as with the venom, your body encapsulated your nucleus to prevent a full overtake.” 

“So what, I’m like him now?” Jay spits, but it’s really just a mask, a front to cover up the sudden panic, the fear. 

You’re nothing like me—No, you’re so much worse.

Beomgyu sits up, twiddles his thumbs in his lap as he bites his smile down. He’s failing. 

“No.” Beomgyu flirts, “Where Heeseung is poison, you’re the antidote.” 

“What, Beomgyu, tell it straight for once your fucking life.” Jay grits, moving between the blanket and cushions uncomfortably. 

“Sunghoon, Jay. I mean Sunghoon.”  The name reminds him, the name sends a dizzy spell upon him with the way his blood begins to respond.

“Excuse me?” 

“His bite is getting worse. You probably haven’t felt it because your body’s been overwhelmed the past days, but he got bit by a wolf.” Jay knows that, he knows. He tried to fix it. 

“Why aren’t you with him?” He asks, trying to ignore the way he’s biting through his lips at the news that Sunghoon hasn’t healed, that the thought is scaring him and bringing right back to that crater when his body had been laid out and almost unmoving.

“Jay, he needs you. Not me. A werewolf bite kills all vampires within four hours. It’s almost clockwork, but Sunghoon’s still alive—unconcious in the nursery bay, sure, but he’s as alive as the undead can be. Why, Jongseong?” 

Jay blinks, his mouth falls, and his breathing stutters. 

“Correct. Your blood.” Beomgyu says, “Your blood not only protects you from the warring DNA, but it’s giving Sunghoon the antibodies to fight it out of his system: but he needs it consistently until he is healed. It needs to be from the vein for full recovery, the sample I gave him only helped slow the spread. That’s why I’m back.” 

“I need to go back to the school?” Jay says quietly, a newfound dread, disappointment, frustrations flexing his hands. He stares down at the blanket, even if the sight of it is blurring by the second.  

“No.” Beomgyu says softly, scooting forward. “You don’t need to. This is entirely up to you, Jay. I’m the assistant nurse at the school, so it’s my duty to at least ask and try every route possible to save the students in my care: but I cannot force you, I will not.” 

Jay nods, he knots his fingers around the crocheted holes, and the tear releases without his permission, just as the decision does his mouth. 

“I’ll do it.” 

Beomgyu sighs, laying a hand along his ankle. 

“It’s only been two days since the bite. You need at least a week before the strings dissolve. Being back at school will be difficult, the school won’t allow you back in the forest once you’ve left.” He informs him, making sure Jay is fully aware of the decision he’s making, of the potential consequences. This could all go so wrong, but hasn’t it already?

“How long does Sunghoon have?” He asks and swallows around the mucus in his throat.

“ ‘Couple days, two minimum without any blood.” 

Jay hides himself under the gummy bear scented blanket, hiding himself away from the world, away from the lights, from Beomgyu. He covers himself, tries his best to close the wounds that remain open no matter what he does: the bite, his gland, his scent, the image of Ni-Ki’s father cut open and gutted. 

“We’ll go back.” He squeaks beneath it all. He remembers what he said, he knows what he told the pup, but he can’t do it. He can’t kill another family of his. 

At least not Sunghoon and maybe it’s their bond, maybe it's the way Sunghoon follows him, maybe Jay doesn’t really actually understand what it is himself. 

“So what am I? Am I a hybrid as well?” He asks later in the night. Beomgyu had covered him with his own crocheted blanket as well, topping over the gummy bear. The extra weight anchored him, calmed him. 

He hears Beomgyu’s hair shake. 

“Not quite, your antibodies prevent full transformation of either. You are both, but you are also none. We’ll have to monitor you, see what traits present themselves. Heeseung and you are similar, but still whatever Heeseung is, his blood is much different. Possibly dangerous.” 

What Sunoo said pops back up in his mind at the thought of traits, but he ignores it for now. He’d have to explore that later, but for now, he settles into the couch. 

“Will it kill him?” Jay asks, closing his eyes as Beomgyu turns out the lights. 

“I don’t know, but if so, it’s possible that it already is.” 

Jay sniffs, breathing in deeply. He feels them, all of them, glowing bright in his chest. 

“Good.”

 

 

 

Notes:

Omg what the hell has it already been three weeks?! I'm sorry this took such a long time, I've been having on and off headaches for who knows how long. Fuck those shits were so annoying. I tried to write this despite them, but overall I just took a break because whatever I ended up writing came out like shit. This still isn't my best, but I tried and that counts! lmao.

It is a little bit of a slower chapter though, which is fine. Our boy needs rest, anyway.

Also, I saw a lot of new people commenting on the last chapters as well as just newcomers overall? HII, WELCOME TO MY BRAIN?! lmao.

Aight, see ya'll.

Chapter 12

Notes:

The way I've read this far too many times and I'm still nervous about posting it. I swear I drive myself crazy.

Have fun!

He's back. Actually back.

The same cakey hill, the same mousy strands of grass that encapsulate his feet and swallow him up to the ankles. It's soft, he's sinking, and the grungy smell of earth with the dying sweetness of fall whips around him.

It's windy—incredibly so: his hair is being shaken into his eyes at an uncomfortable pace and the strands strike his tear ducts at every gust, every chance. It's too fast for him to expect it; the wind pushing them further up the hill and towards the gates, too strong for him to simply run his hand through his hair and be done with it.

It's a surreal feeling to be back, staring at the looming black gates and the school that still manages to look dreadful and drained; the corners still feel like their curving into him, still twisting and leaning to bate their breaths on his neck like they're waiting for his every move, entertained solely by his fluctuating chest and the shiver that runs through him at the press of that metal into his hot palms.

Nothing about the school has changed still and when he thinks back on it now, for a while there, neither had Jay truly either. He experienced near death, he experienced being hunted, experienced low-life, try-hard bullying, and a shit ton of turmoil and fights.

He experienced friends, and yet he had still been the same despite it all, unchanged except for his experiences: but now, he was something else. He was a part of them as well as separate—them the oil, and he the water. He didn't quite mix, he didn't mesh, even if they could both be labeled as liquid.

The sound of the gates unlocking for them clicks in his ears.

Jay was more than that, more than the beady stares and dilated pupils that reached a new crescendo, a new intensity when his scent was caught in the air. It was still early morning and the doors had just opened. 7 am sharp, as always, but there stood students along the balconies, huddled then sprawled out, dotting the open ends of the buildings like crows on an electricity line.

There weren't many, but the few that were there felt plentiful to Jay's senses. They stood still, just grazing the edges, with their clothes slapping in the wind. They kept breathing him.

The texture of the gates becomes almost grating against his skin the more conscious he becomes of them.

Beomgyu's the one to actually open the gate, slightly cold hands resting over his own to push. It startles him slightly, but all Jay sees when he flinches is warm eyes and a soft nod. Beomgyu tilts his lips at him and Jay nods back.

Right.

He's still himself, even with the blue cloud coating the inside of his nose to block out most of the scents. He's made a lot of progress in the past two days with his heightened senses, especially after the help of nature. His skin was still sensitive but he could handle the wind now, could handle the warmth that spread off from Beomgyu's body when he got close, and his hearing no longer rang until his drums bursted with blood. Overall, he's a little better at controlling the intensity of it, but a school is different.

The students were altogether, bundled up and reeking of varying scents—good and bad—and then there was the worry of pheromones, imperceptible tinges within scents that deliver messages, that speak to the more primal functions: mating attraction, territorial marking, dominance and submission, and alarm signalling. All things Beomgyu did not think he was ready for just yet, at least not right off the bat with his first steps back onto the wet flagstone.

And maybe he was right, maybe Jay wasn't ready, but that wasn't going to stop him. He was still going to give them all hell if they tried something. Hell, maybe he will even welcome it a little. He's gotta try out that newfound strength somehow, right?

Jay's smile curves into a smirk. Surely, no one would mind being his test dummy for a bit. Things were always more interesting after a little pressure, and diamonds weren't made from coddles and kisses.

Jay moves in front of Beomgyu, leading them across the pavement and their shoes smack wetly from last night's rain. He walks straight with his shoulders relaxed and tries not to bristle at the fact that everyone can see him. That everyone even from within their dorms are staring eyeballs to the window to get a glimpse at his heavily bandaged shoulder.

Open.

The bite is still open and it's pulsing as fresh as the day it was born, but Jay keeps the pain to himself, harbors it within the open laces of his skin so no one can tell that it's hurting, that it isn't healed. He's an unfinished work and not fully presented either—he wasn't omega, beta, alpha; He's an uncertain outcome and he wasn't going to let any of them, any of those glowing eyes finish the narrative for him before he's even gotten to heal, to prove himself.

But that's the thing isn't it?

The hairs on skin alight, they stick up one by one like the caramelized sugar melting off from a pan. The sensation corrupts his breath, keeps it choking in his throat.

He's not the only one in charge of his fate anymore.

Jay halts. Beomgyu crashes into the back of him and Jay can predict the ramblings that are probably pouring out of his mouth, he can feel the small slaps the boy gives to his shoulder blades in retaliation, but Jay doesn't hear it, doesn't feel it much at all. Not over the needles sinking slowly into his skin in a torturous descent that gives Jay no reprieve, no space to think about anything else. The world whites out and it's only Jay, only his skin pulling away for someone who isn't here, slowly spreading its pores to be filled in by more pain.

He has to close his hands to prevent them from shaking, he fucking holds his breath to prevent himself from hyperventilating.

His chest is glowing, burning white hot in his chest. Hot. Hot. Then, it's cold. A sharp wind freezing the tips of the needles and sending ice through his veins. A hot and cold mix: lukewarm hands that covered his over the piano. Heeseung.

His string. Their strings. They're beating like a second heart in his chest, fucking up the rythm of his own and it gets even harder to breathe.

There you are, little one.

It's right in his ears, in his brain, speaking the words into him like they're falling from Jay's own lips—smooth, a little raspy at the edges, intimate—fuck, close.

You can feel me now, can't you.

It's a question but he says it like it's fact, like he can feel Jay at this very moment—as if he knows his whole body in and out already.

"Jay?" Beomgyu questions quietly to his left. His hands are hovering around him unsure, waiting, trying to piece apart what might be going on through the sense of his palms.

The air comes out in a harsh pant, stumbling and tumbling from lips as small shivers erupt beneath his skin.

Heeseung's voice, the teasing edge, the timber, it's caressing down his spine, breathing around the vertebrates, until it settles low in his hips and spreading them, carving a space for itself in his lower stomach.

Jay's knees feel weak.

Poor thing, it's difficult isn't it? Hurts still. Come here, let me settle you. You're going to need it, little one. You'll want it. I should've been giving it to you all week. 

"Beom—Beomgyu." Jay pants, it comes out harsh and thick, like it's taken him climbing a mountain through feet of snow to push it out.

"Jay," Beomgyu comes in front of him calmly, keeping up their charade of nonchalance even when his eyes are creasing with worry as Jay clenches to stay as unaffected visually as possible, "what's—".

"Force me to walk." He says speedily, the words tumbling down his tongue as his heart speeds up.

I'll close you up.

Beomgyu mimics being annoyed, grabbing at his wrist in a harsher manner than what it feels like and starts skipping them to the center's entrance. And it works, the sharp tug gets his system flowing again, gets his body to readjust and finally remember that there are outside stimuli that it should be paying attention to.

The whole time they skip, Jay gains back his breath, gains back his function from the horrible needles that were trying to subdue him. The clear voice, it starts to turn back to static, like the station is about to switch: but before it does, before Jay seals it shut tightly like the pandora's box, he speaks back.

Go fuck yourself.

The station crackles, the tempo jumping randomly. It's like—it's like he's laughing.

Come, belle.

 

When they come up to Jay's dorm, his body has regulated and the small shakes that stretched his pores apart like gum ended. He walks in, alone, pushing the door off to the far right so Beomgyu could come in without Jay holding it for him.

His hands stay fisted in his pockets as he drives in. He's still squeezing them despite it all, despite that he's fine now, despite that Jay can't hear him anymore.

"Sorry," Jay forces out, fumbling for words, for anything. "It was cold." He says and the lie is as stale as it sounds. He even cringes from it, but he tries to continue, to cover it with a smile, to appear calm about whatever the fuck just happened, but it's useless. It really is because he doesn't even lift his head from the floorboards to show it to Beomgyu.

Jay's paced himself all the way into the middle of the room by now, eyes searching around every grain of the Hershey floorboards as if he'd find a splinter out of place. And he follows them all the way towards the other, towards the feet that haven't moved beyond the door.

Jay hears the shake of his hair when he nods, but Beomgyu otherwise doesn't say a thing. He's waiting for him, leaning up against the doorway, expectantly.

Jay's hands squeeze again in his pants.

The whole purpose for their return—Sunghoon. They were supposed to be going to the nursery bay. Jay was supposed to change quickly and they were supposed to leave.

His throat bobs.

"You, um…" Jay starts, fidgeting stupidly, "You said he had two days, right?"

Beomgyu's eyes shift, they slant. "Yes, without blood. The last of your blood should be leaving his system by the hour." He answers, lifting himself up from the door.

"Right," Jay nods.

He picks that time to finally look at the boy, to finally lift his head and make eye contact. He fucking regrets it immediately. Beomgyu's eyes are round and brown and they look at him with understanding, with empathy even though he can't possibly know exactly what Jay heard: but Beomgyu knows enough about him, just as Jay knows enough about him.

"Jay, it's okay if—"

"I'm doing it," He cuts in harshly, slightly offended even though he shouldn't be. It's just—I'm scared I'll run into him. Jay shakes his head. "The blood bags help slow the spread, right? I just…I just need the day, I promise."

And he means it, he does. He's good for his word, always.

The light from the breaking clouds cascades into his room, bloating behind his back, but he doesn't feel any warmth from it, it's actually a little cold against his adrenaline warm skin.

Lukewarm. Everywhere.

"Always believed you," is what Beomgyu says back. A light smile beading along his face, but he still waits by the door, still stands there with one foot turned like he's expecting Jay to come along.

So, here goes the second request.

"Can you do it here?"

Beomgyu's eyebrow twitches and the grip around his wand tightens momentarily.

He speaks slowly to Jay, clearly and enunciating every word.

"Can I perform a very important medical procedure in an unsterile environment?" He asks back, questioning Jay like he had just said the most absurd comment of his life. Except, it's Beomgyu and Jay has fortunately, but reluctantly grown closer to him in the past couple of days. So, Jay's not surprised. If anything, he scoffs out the air he had been holding in his chest and rolls his eyes.

Beomgyu's swooning into the room within seconds, a fake and overly high-pitched moan exiting his lips, "Fuck, ask me again."

 

 

It's when Beomgyu magics his set up to his room that Jay finally calms down enough to notice. The sheet he had duck-taped over the window is gone, taken down and re-fitted to his mattress how it was supposed to be. He feels a little tinge in his chest at the realization, a smile, a happiness brewing on his face.

Sunoo really did take care of the room.

Something in Jay's chest relaxes at that—maybe that's why his room smelled different. He had noticed it almost immediately when he came in, albeit he was distracted , but his body had felt the shift, noticed it before he even had to acknowledge it. Underneath all of the stale musk from his room having not been aired out for a couple of days during the Forests, there was something minimal lurking below—not overbearing or repelling, but there.

Jay sits on the bed once Beomgyu's ready, the small hand gesture out all he needs to settle down. The bed dips with his weight as Beomgyu wands about and the needle and attachment to the plastic blood bags float in the air, working themselves together for him.

The mist in his nose has thinned out slightly since Beomgyu had first applied it this morning at the cabin, and through the thin airway, he can breathe more of his room in—more of that musk, that staleness that comes from dust, and then finally, underneath it all, like a monster stewing under a bed, there was the scent of wet metal.

It smelt a little like blood to Jay, but it was a grounding base note to the more greenness of moss that came next, and the bright lemon that sweetened and strengthened the scent. It was a confusing mix that somehow worked, that somehow felt familiar even though he had never smelt it before; it was almost deceiving—the scent, it came off bright and refreshing, but the metal undertone darkened it, plummeting the scent until it sat along his gums.

Jay mushes his lips together. It's Sunoo's—he just knows because it can't be anyone else's, but he thought vampires didn't have a scent, thought only their blood did.

Speaking of, "How many blood bags do you need, isn't one unit custom?!" Jay freaks as his eyes finally land on the three blood bags floating over his bed, one of them already attached to the needle.

Beomgyu just smiles at him cheekily, showing Jay all his teeth and the way his eyes curve into a smile from it.

The needle slips into his vein and he tries not to flinch at the un-professionalism—at least answer the fucking question first.

Beomgyu keeps his thumb pressed there as he speaks.

"On average, sure! But since you're blood bonded with Sunghoon, you have a higher blood count than normal. Basically, your body's naturally generating more for him to drink. That's why you get dizzy with blood rush when you're near him. You have too much for yourself to handle alone, you're supposed to keep each other balanced."

"You're just now telling me that?"

"You only just told me after you went poof on my bed like my freaky one-night stand that won't let me go. I'm hardly the one to blame." Beomgyu quips back, pressing his thumb back over the slit to prevent the blood from dripping as he exchanges blood bags, but he's smiling as he does it, biting his lip at the memory.

Way too much information. Jay slaps him in the side, and once the next bag is attached, Beomgyu jumps back.

"And I was in the middle of a shower, Jongseong!" Beomgyu gasps dramatically, his free hand coming over his "shaking" heart. "A nurse and his patient. The scandal we could have caused!!"

"Get the fuck out, I'm fucking sick of you."

"Woof, woof. Now let me finish up."

 

 

"Visitations aren't limited over the weekend, Jongseong. Take your time, but you have to come to a decision by Friday—whatever, that may be. We have closed visitation in the early hours before 7 am, but since Ms. Ooyang who's usually morning and afternoon shifts refuses to be near the pack, you will only be able to come after the last meal. I'll be there, if you choose to come. It'll just be us and Sunghoon."

Jay doesn't say anything, just nods his response.

Beomgyu doesn't miss a beat.

"The dean is going to want to see you. You should pay him a visit before he sends for you."

"Right," Jay nods. "Thanks."

 

 

Beomgyu leaves right after, blood bags warm and pressed into his chest as he walks back towards the nursery bay. The door shuts behind him, seals without a click, but it does the job: it seals Jay off from the world, off from the school beyond his bedroom, beyond these four walls that smell like must and abandon, but the sheets are warm under him. They smell like detergent and Sunoo and by the second he can start to smell his own scent sinking into the place.

He still hasn't messed around much with controlling his own scent, hasn't even attempted whatever disappearing trick Sunoo seemed to think he had: but, as he sits there on his bed, letting the smell of metal and lemon be coated with his honey, doused in the watery juice of cherries, he thinks the earlier he tries, the earlier he can master it, the best chance he'll have at keeping some parts to himself and out of gossip.

At hiding, his heart beats.

Jay blinks and folds his legs underneath himself to get comfortable, arms coming down to rest along his thighs while his hands press lightly on his kneecaps. He takes a deep breath in and fills his stomach with the scented air.

He holds it for five counts, then releases. He repeats it over and over again, until his thoughts blow out with the carbon dioxide from his lungs and he's left completely blank.

When it had happened the first time he had been scared, shocked out of his skin from Beomgyu's arrival to even notice the change: but, he remembers two things. The way his blood had thinned, slowed almost to a complete stop even though adrenaline from fear should have had it racing. Then, there was his heart. The imperceptible pressure that beats within his chest that suddenly went hollow, a dark empty space.

For now he focuses on those, keeping his breathing deep, and with each inhale he holds his breath for longer: five seconds, then ten, twenty—he keeps at it and during each hold where he can feel his heart the best, where he can hear the rush of his blood the most, he tries to pull back.

He imagines his blood like an ever-flowing stream that he builds a sturdy dam in front of, blocking and building a wall with the same thick trunks he saw in the forest. He builds it high, ensuring no cracks, and eventually the blood he traps doesn't slosh anymore up against his barrier, it doesn't try to fight what he's done. He feels it still and calm under his attention.

It's not gone, but she's thin, barely moving like the still water of a pond.

It's a little easier after that. After his blood has stopped, after he can no longer even hear it, because his heart reacts. It stops pumping as much, as hard. It goes slower, slower, and Jay imagines the air he's holding in his stomach now floating to his chest, encasing around his heart, condensing into something thick before it chains around the organ, around the strings that glow bright despite anything he does, and prevents his heart from pumping.

His chest goes hollow, it goes quiet just like that night.

And when he lifts his nose slightly, eyes having closed at some point, he doesn't smell himself. Only smells where he's been. It's a little confusing since he hadn't focused on it, but its quite possible with Jay's body as close to being dead as it can be—no beating heart or pulse from the blood—that the scent leaving was a side effect of the whole transition.

He engraves this feeling into his brain, into his heart.

He'll need to remember how this feels, how it feels when he's done it right.

There's no telling when he'll need to bring it out, there's no telling if he'd have enough time for meditation to activate it every time: but now that he has it, he doesn't switch it off. He gets up with it and walks over to his dresser, pulling out a sweatshirt and sweatpants.

It's not by random selection like usual, no, he still fondles the fabric of all his clothes, feeling the way it sits on his skin, whether it chafes or itches. In the end, he settles on the pair from the nursery he's never given back. It's scent smells the most clean and like Sunoo. He must have washed some of his clothes for him.

Jay chuckles as he brings himself into the bathroom. The boy must have a perfume that sticks easily to things. Even though, Jay's never smelled it on the boy before, he isn't shocked with how sensitive and heightened that his nose has gotten that it might've always been there, just not perceptible to humans. It was possible.

 

When Jay leaves, he's clothed in the sweatshirt and sweatpants and his skin is positively buzzing. The hairs on his arm feel like they're little babies curling into their blankets, making the inside of his sleeve their own personal cot. The set was incredibly soft and its wasn't too big, albeit maybe a little long, but the sleeves had the right amount of poof to them to not feel stuffy, but still touch along his skin enough for him to feel blanketed at all times.

It felt good. He felt warm, coddled, and he smelled like nothing—well, besides detergent and Sunoo.

Jay locks his door behind him and makes his way through the hallway, calmly entering the elevator when he approaches it. He hasn't seen anyone yet, but he could smell where they passed, could almost follow a trail of it if he focused on one or two at a time. He doesn't. He keeps his senses as low as he can manage for the time being and it helps, the sweatshirt and Sunoo's scent, they help ground him and revert his attention to what really matters, to what's not overwhelming.

That's how he enters the center. All 5'11 of him cozied up and walking through the congregation of people with his head high and his shoulders awfully relaxed. Each step is like an act of defiance, every one eyeing him at one point or another. They blatantly stare and for those who try to keep it subtle, Jay still sees, still notices it, still smells the pitching of scents flaring around him.

His skin even crawls when some of them flow out towards him: curiosity, pride, suspicion, and the type of confusion that makes you want to put your hackles up and fight. The blue cloud is working overtime no doubt, especially considering the sheer amount of students that seem to just be waiting around as if breakfast wasn't being held: but, Jay wasn't born yesterday.

He knows.

They were waiting for him, waiting to latch on to any piece of him they could sink their teeth into—the sight of his bite, the scent of his presentation, maybe even the look and smell of conquering and ownership.

He feels their expectation, feels their frustration when he doesn't give it to them, doesn't set himself tied up on a platter with a warm apple in his mouth.

They can't smell him. They can barely even hear him past the steps he makes on the marble and for now that's good because that means Heeseung might not either, not unless he physically sees Jay, and even then, Jay will make sure he sees him first. No matter what.

He walks up the spiral staircase to the dean's office and it's a weird feeling, honestly. A mix of nostalgia and deja-vu because he's been here before, because he's walked up these same stairs his first day here to return a key, and now, now he was about to do the same for a much darker reason: one that threatened to send his nerves twitching to life under his skin and warming his hands to the point of dampness.

But he doesn't stall, he doesn't wait before the curve into the room to breathe like before.

He walks right in, bounces off the small platform step and sits himself stiffly in the green leather seats. The dean's already at his desk this time, not bothering with the peek-a-boo charade from last time.

The man's skinny, pale, and his dark hair only emphasizes those two things. The slight curl to his strands making the swallows of his cheeks more prominent, the darkness of the pigment against his skin bringing out the almost pearlescent look to his skin: but the man's lips are muddled burgundy, all the way up to the sharp cut of the lip corners when he smirks.

They lift slowly, as if they were manually being pulled up.

His cheeks don't dimple.

"Half a step lighter." He says and in this lighting his eyes are a dim chartreuse, instead of the sour lemon they glowed in the auditorium.

Jay's eyebrows pinch, his lips part, but the dean lifts a hand to him as he leans back in his seat. The chair creaks and Jay feels like the sconces flicker at the sound, but if they do it's too quick.

It only leaves him blinking, wondering if it actually happened.

The vampire's eyes travel down his neck and they sit over the collar of his sweatshirt. Jay knows he's looking for the bite, smelling it out for any traces, maybe even trying to see through the clothing to see it: it makes his throat bob with the need to gulp, but it's just his paranoia, just his imagination.

The dean can't see through, he can't see it at all under his sweatshirt, under the multiple wraps that are pressing down on the wound tightly. Jay can barely even move his left shoulder from it there's so much, but it was needed—all of it. They needed to make sure it wouldn't bleed profusely. They needed to make sure nothing could get in to infect it. The salve was working, but neither of them knew for just how long.

Jay's eyes slit, fuck they might glow silver for a solid second because his vision suddenly goes crisp again.

"Speak." He says, "Ideally before I do."

The dean's smirk only deepens, widens to a nasty stretch as he moves his gaze up to Jay's. The man's chest thumps, Jay can hear it, like tight air bouncing like a lone ball in a hallway—he's amused.

"Park Jongseong." The man plays with his name, a serpent-like tongue rolling around the syllables, "You have certainly garnered a lot of attention in the past few days. There's speculation, gossip—you know I as the principal am not immune to these things."

He smiles.

Jay's eye twitches.

"How about we begin small?" He asks, hand coming over to slide a stark white envelope towards the middle of the table, perfect distance between the both of them. There's a blue seal impressed on the back with the school's emblem.

"How are you feeling?" The dean curves his words, "How's the semester treating you?" He grins.

Jay glares, gaze flicking between the envelope between them and the dean before him. His breathing picks up the slightest bit at the sight.

That's his fate. The decision.

Jay stares straight, face as mute as his heart.

"I thought you said you weren't immune? You'd know better than anyone wouldn't you?" Jay's jaws ticks, "Semester's fine, I'm starting to see the appeal of genocide."

It's only a slight hit, a small reminder of the decrease in vampires since the start of the feral epidemic.

The dean hums and he leans forward, narrow shoulders casting shadows onto Jay's body.

"In that case, the floor's all yours." The dean says and he gestures down to the envelope, "The school board's decision is based on your results from the Forest."

Jay's hands are shaking below the desk.

"Do you not know?" He asks and his glare never lets up. He won't show weakness, not in front of him.

"Of course I do." His fangs curve into his lips.

Vampires. Games. Fuck all of them, but he smells metal, smells lemon and moss. It smells like the cleanup of a murder site—dark, strong, but clean. Jay likes clean things, Jay likes Sunoo's scent, and he's here with them even if he himself isn't present.

He lets the scent sit on the back of his tongue, hogs it between his airways, and eventually his hands still, they relax.

He picks up the envelope easily and carefully pops open the seal.

The letter inside is formatted with a whimsical border and cursive lettering.

And he tries to stay stoic, tries to hide the way his eyes shake over the wording, but there's no hiding the release of breath, the frantic folding back of the paper. Especially not from a vampire.

The dean's eyes glimmer.

"A lucky boy." He teases, "There's a reason why we do routine health check ups before the Forests, Jongseong. To prevent presentations from occurring during the event. You're very lucky. Your Forest will be forgiven due to the handicap, but understand, otherwise you would have been expelled."

Jay doesn't spare him another glance, doesn't let the dean see the wetness clouding his eyes from relief.

He walks out, never looks back, and practically speeds down the staircase.

He doesn't watch where he goes, and doesn't bother to look ahead. Not until he's being frozen in his tracks on the very last step.

"Blue Jay?"

His face twists when he hears her, even more once he's looking right at her.

Her voice was soft, tinged with worry, but happy with affection.

He wasn't going to cry. He didn't want to do anymore of that, but maybe…maybe he did need a hug.

He falls into her, tucking Yihwa deeply under his chin as he rests his face between her curls. They're soft, just like how Jay likes his stuff now apparently, and she smells really good, really nice. Citrus—it's coming from her hair. It's one of his favorite things about her.

"Blue Jay, you're squeezing."

"Sorry." He lets go.

"No, don't apologize." Yihwa whines, eyes batting up at him and her mouth pouting. She grabs his arms back, fitting them back around her.

"Here, squeeze me again. C'mon it's no issue." She says, trapping his arms to her chest and absolutely trying to smother herself, squeezing for him like that would help him kick-start.

He kisses the bundles of curls, instead—lightly. He doesn't bring it down her scalp so she can feel it, he just pokes his lips at the pretty strands.

"Let's go, Yih. I'm hungry."

The nickname slips out easily. It's the first one he's ever given and Yihwa loves it, her energy surges green in her pupils.

She doesn't let Jay's feet touch the floor the entire way to the cafeteria, using her powers to hold him up above it. He felt like an old, wise warlock accompanying his student. A little dramatic, but it dried his eyes by the time they got to the West Wing doors.

 

 

The dining hall was back to its original design: the open, greenhouse ballroom that had sun rays striking in from every corner. Yihwa and him walk through them, their yellowed rays sparking heat within their clothes and blinding them partially in the eyes.

The chatter in the hall was loud, always was before a certain pack came in, but this time, as Jay walked past tables, as he walked with Yihwa back over to the unaffiliated side, he heard quieted conversations when he past and saw way too many eyes shifting over to a still empty table in the middle. Heeseung's table.

Like I'd fucking sit there.

Jay's more than bristled by the time they sit: Yihwa next to Chloe on the other side of the table and he alone.

"Sunoo's not here?" He asks Chloe, but the girl is too busy eyeing him up and down, making the meanest stank-face he could ever think of at him, and he's not given time to ask her, to inquire.

She kicks him right in the shin.

Hard.

"What the fuck?!" Jay hisses, and it's a full hiss, it comes from the back of his throat and sizzles out over his tongue. It sounds similar to his chauffeur when he'd finally managed to piss him off one time.

Fuck, so he hisses now. Jay wants to tear everyone a new ass.

Chloe flinches, but only slightly, not seemingly all that bothered by her actions, standing on them matter of fact.

Yihwa sits there gobsmaked, like her brain hasn't computed the fact that Chloe bold faced kicked him.

Chloe relaxes, shrugs.

"I was making sure I wasn't seeing things."

"Seeing what exactly, may I ask?!" Jay yells, the words coming out harsher to cover up the blush that's taking over his cheeks. He really fucking hissed. "I'm right fucking here!"

Chloe lifts her eyebrow, arms crossed as she leans in over her plate.

"A ghost, dipshit."

Jay leans in too.

"Get haunted, bitch."

They flock at each other, hands flying, feet already off the floor.

"Guys, break it up. No!" Yihwa gets between them, using both hands to send her magic pushing them both back down into their seats.

"We are not fighting above the fucking biscuits and that's FINAL!!" She yells and even though her naturally thinner voice doesn't allow much base to pass through, they both huff at her words, reluctantly settling.

She fixes her hair when she's got them sat.

She nods when her hands find her hips.

"What do you have to say for yourself? Regardless of your history with ghosts, you cannot just kick people!"

"He has no heartbeat, Yihwa. And he smells different, I didn't even know it was him until I looked at him." Then, she does look at him, "You smell like blood."

Yihwa looks confused, a little bit of her authority softening at the words. She looks over at him, too.

"Jay?"

Magics had heightened senses too, but not to the same extent as werewolves and vampires. It made sense that she didn't catch on to the heartbeat or the blood flow stoppage right away.

"It's fine, just trying something out."

She hesitates on her nod, her eyes dropping to his clothes momentarily before she shakes her head into a smile.

"Let's just eat, yea? It's been a while since it was just us three."

 

 

Jay should've expected it to come. Should've known there'd be side effects.

It's near the end of breakfast while he's shoveling the last spoon of miso soup into his mouth when the feeling surges up on him.

His heart—it fucking races.

His blood, it breaks the dam with such force, the blood rush has him toppling over the table, head banging into the cherry wood, and jostling the dishes. They clank loudly, harshly enough to chip, and his soup not only spills out, but it starts crawling back out of his throat to where he's retching it out onto the wood.

Everything happens so fast.

He can't move, can't think.

Yihwa's worriedly monologuing as she rips herself from her seat and to his side. Chloe even stands up, too.

Fuck, it was that bad, was it?

His heart's racing to the point of his chest shaking and the quaking is so violent his shoulders are knocking into the edges of the table. Repeatedly. Over and over. It hurts, it does, but Jay's vision is blurring from the dizzy spells wrecking his brain, and he's still choking out soup and breathing the chopped up air back in as if he'd hadn't been breathing this entire time.

There's not enough.

He claws at the table, mouth open, panting and wet against the grain.

There's not enough oxygen.

"Outside, oustide! He needs air." He hears Yihwa panicking and then Chloe is woman-handling out of his seat, hands under his armpits like he's a kid and she carries him like that: feet dangling as she holds his choking, heavily breathing form just off of her like an unwanted kid she had to pick up. Whatever the case, she runs him out of the dining hall, and the wind from the speed knocks his head back.

He sees the tall ceilings of the center pass above him, he sees the top of a doorway, sees the glare of a sun too bright for how dizzy he feels, and he closes his eyes. He tries to breathe and at some point he's put down, right into a thick bed of grass.

He curls into himself then, tucking his head as far into the earth as possible, letting the grassy strands pet his ears and the earthy dirt smell take him back to pine trees and a fluffy rabbit.

They've taken him to the gazebo just before the outskirts: it's the definitive object that separates the school grounds and the fields.

The gazebo is small, only fits about five people sitting in a circle at a time and Jay's curled in the middle of it with worn, but beautifully carved stone pillars caging them off from the land beyond. They're strong, sturdy, and they hold up the intricately carved roof with a spire on top.

There's no flooring in this gazebo, the bottom completely open to grass.

"Jay?!" Yihwa calls from above him. He can smell her, that citrus—she's kneeling just behind his back, knees pressing to his spine comfortingly. He can hear her fumbling though, wringing her hands. She wants to touch him, hold him, something, but she's stopping herself.

"Chloe what's happening? Smell him!"

"I told you, I only smell blood. It's not his, but it's in his clothes."

Yihwa curses, but she relents.

She finally lays a hand to the back of his head.

And they both watch over him, they stay there until his breathing comes back to him, until he can open his eyes again without the world collapsing before him.

There's soup still wetting his chin.

"You're back?" Yihwa whispers softly, curling a silver piece between her fingers.

Jay nods shakily, "Yea, I'm good."

Yihwa's fingers stop.

"That new thing you're trying, stop. I don't like it."

Chloe chimes in, still watching him like a hawk, "If you want to hide your scent, take suppressants like a normal wolf."

Jay swallows and for their sake he just nods. He doesn't tell them that Beomgyu already told him he can't take them—they wouldn't be compatible with his DNA. If he wanted to hide, if he wanted to be hidden in every single way—sound, scent, sight—he had to do this. He had to master it. He just overstepped today, that's it. He'll build up the tolerance, he'll have to.

But for now he settles down in the fact that his scent hasn't imploded yet like the rest of his body. He still has some time before his first class, maybe if he rests now, he'll be able to try it again before he goes.

The girls watch him for two more minutes. Yihwa checks his pulse five times and each time she lets out a sigh of relief when she feels it pumping heartily.

"We should get him some water." Chloe cuts through the silence, stalling Yihwa's sixth health check. She's looking straight at Yihwa, waiting, but not patient. She looks miffed, slightly in a rush.

"Huh?!" Yihwa gawks back because yea what the fuck was Chloe talking about: doing something for Jay?! The shit almost has him rising from his place in the grass to stare at her just as lost, but Chloe doesn't expand, doesn't even say anything else.

Yihwa looks back down at him, then back up, and then she's nodding: "Yea, yea—no you're right, fuck why didn't I think of that on the way? Jay, don't go anywhere okay? We'll be right back."

She brushes her knees when she stands, waiting for Jay's nod of confirmation before her and Chloe exit the gazebo; and true to his word he stays put, curled up and resting his face in the grass as he watches them cross the yard and disappear back into the school.

 

 

Then he's alone in the grass, but the wind is sweet, it's calming; it swirls his hair into pretty 'c' shapes against his forehead and kisses over his skin in appreciation. He lets it coax and sway him like a leaf falling off a branch. Nature's never felt so good, he swears: but then again, he's never experienced much of it before coming here, before the Forests. The city was all metal, concrete, plastic, and unnatural dyes. This. This was heaven.

The birds sing from somewhere above and their lullaby lacing in the wind settles over him in a weightless blanket.

He breathes. He smells. He's barely a witness to his own vision blurring out to nothing.

Jay rests half-asleep on the beds of earth with his skin covered by the heavens. He pays attention to nothing: not the time it's taking them to come back, nor the shifting sun away from his skin.

Though, his skin does tremble at the loss, the extra comfort of yellow light missing, but he doesn't surface—not fully. He doesn't need to, the earth below him is sending small vibrations through his bones to rock him back to semi-unconsciousness, and the heavens don't leave him waiting for long. The warmth comes back, covering his skin in a larger expanse than before.

Good things come to those who wait. Jay's heart thuds.

The heat radiates into him, all along his arms, his chest, down to his legs. It feels so good, so complete, that he rolls from his side onto his back, revealing himself more, opening himself further to the weighted heat.

Jay shivers again, this time because of how encapsulated he is. He doesn't need anything else. The goosebumps recede and his body hair doesn't search for anything else to warm him. It's all right here, everything he needs.

A fresh heat burns at his neck, an unexpected gust that curls right against his scent gland.

He gasps from it, head bobbing, eyes twitching.

It doesn't stop. It gets closer.

His body moves before he wakes, honed-in reflexes spearing his hands up, knees bending.

He wants to cover his gland, reduce the exposure, but his hands are blocked. They meet the grassy bed on either side of his body and they don't move. He doesn't understand, each flex is for naught. It's like the grass had grown longer and laced around his wrists to plant him down into the soil.

His feet are digging into the ground as his head turns, half sleep, but awake enough to feel that something's wrong, enough for his body to shift his head to the side as if he could see the problem and fix it: but it's the wrong move.

It stretches out his neck, a tan expanse, a long, pretty stretch of skin that glows like the sun is hidden within it, and then there she is, the soft bundle of flesh, lightly pinked from how new she is, how sensitive. A ruby in the sand.

"Oh." Jay gasps and a violent shiver shakes down his spine. His hands tighten to fists and his shoulders try to lock up, to cower in, to bury her back under the dunes and away from hunters.

It's too late, it's far too late.

Plump lips kiss around his gland. Soft, light pecks that send tingles shooting straight down his legs and warmth blooms to the surface of his skin. A different warmth, one that's reactive, one that is completely internal.

Jay's knees fall from the feeling, pressing out flat to the grass as his breathing picks up. The heat feels heavier by the second, hotter like a furnace, like Jay's getting too close to the pit.

Fur, weight, gushing wind as he buried himself further into him. The long night on the hill.

Jay gasps awake and his arms are already fighting to be released, for the hands pinning him down to be removed.

Deep black hair, thin eyes, a danger to Jay's heart.

"No, Ni-Ki." He gulps frantically, shoulders jumping to cover any bit, but it doesn't matter. Ni-ki's nosing all along the expanse of his neck, huffing and growling when he doesn't smell anything.

He holds Jay down easily, hands pressing into his wrists with a pressure that Jay knows is going to bruise, that he knows he's going to see dotted in a purple ring around his wrists in the morning.

Ni-Ki's above him, chest pressing into his, but the boy is so tall, and he wears clothes so much bigger than Jay that when Jay moves his head back even the slightest, he still can't see him. If anything his world goes black again.

Leather and smoke, with a wash of baby powder under all of it. It sinks into his being, renders Jay soft and pliant.

His body jolts, Jay arches—right into him, right into Ni-Ki's warm body and cold belt. Fuck, it's cold, just as cold as his rings in Jay's wrists.

"Pup." Jay whimpers. He doesn't mean to, he said he was going to stop, but his head is caccooned within the hoodie of his pup's sweatshirt and he can't fucking help it. He's all around him. He can smell everything about him, and—Jay's heart skips a beat—he's upset with him.

Ni-Ki's growling above him, face tuckering into his neck as his nose fucking abuses every ounce of skin. He just barely manages to miss completely running over his gland, ruining Jay for good, but he's flinching anyway, every time Ni-Ki gets too close.

He's smelling him. He's trying to. He wants Jay's scent, needs it. He always had.

Fuck, no this isn't the time! They can't—Jay can't let him do this, not again. Not ever.

"Get off of me." Jay grunts, but he keeps his voice as even as he can. He keeps the anger to himself, he holds all of his emotions in for himself. He needs to be dismissive. Ni-Ki needs to understand.

He's not innocent, Jay tries to tell himself, tries to remind himself. Ni-Ki's made this happen just as much as the rest of them.

He can't trust him.

He's not his. He isn't, even if it feels wrong, even if the mere thought sends a sliver of pain through his chest where Ni-Ki's string lies daggered into his heart.

Ni-Ki stops and the breaths that still pat against his skin has his feet twitching in wait.

He moves over, his nose gliding along Jay's cheeks for their eyes meet and Jay has to look up to meet him.

Orange blaze.

He tries not to gasp, but the air tumbles out of his mouth in a breath anyway. The cloud is still there, still coating his nose thinly, but Jay can smell it now.

The pheromones—Ni-Ki's Alpha.

They don't smell any different than his scent, but Jay can feel them signalling him. Upset, upset, angry, don't anger, hurt, frustrated. You. You. You.

What is he supposed to do with that? How does he make it, right?

His lip begins to shake below his round eyes, and Ni-Ki's grip softens, his hands slide up to interlock with Jay's, but he doesn't push off. He doesn't give Jay any extra room to breathe—doesn't lessen his pheromones that are confusing his thoughts and trying fuck up his resolve. Their eyelashes comb each other and Ni-Ki's lips are ghosting over his nose, hot and plump and slicked with spit.

Ignore him, don't say anything. Don't let him have anything. He repeats it, he fucking marches with it, but Jay's staring. He's completely fucking lost.

He can see the way Ni-Ki's eyes harden, how his stare becomes more cross with him.

He squeezes their hands and Jay has to take a breath in.

"I don't like it." He gravels and Jay doesn't need him to follow up. He knows he's talking about his lack of scent, that he's hiding it, keeping it from him.

Jay's eyes wet with irritation.

He doesn't get a say in what Jay does, he's not allowed to be upset. He wasn't the one forced into a new body. He's not the one who has to worry about how the other students will affect him once the magic clears from his nose. He doesn't understand how exposing it is. He doesn't know how open Jay feels with his scent out and this bite on his neck and shoulder that won't heal.

It's not for you to fucking like! Jay wants to scream, but he tries to remain calm, tries to keep up the facade of composure as best he can.

"You will live, Ni-Ki." He says monotone, already trying to push the boy off him now that his wrists aren't pinned. He even tries to use his core to lift his upper body even a smidge, just to further his point, to get his own message across: but Ni-Ki has never listened, not fully. Not even when Jay had him as a pup.

He slams Jay back down into the grass, the impact so deep it tugs the air back out of him and it's when Jay gasping for it back that Ni-Ki's voice deepens, that it echoes through his system like loud speakers.

"I said I don't like it, hyung."

Ni-Ki snaps at him, jaws snapping in warning as he lowers himself to Jay's neck again.

Don't move, his pheromones say and the fucking action only coerces him, has Jay rapidly blinking to not let his eyes shut, to not let his body slice himself open further for him.

"Ni-ki." Jay panics, hands already squeezing around the other, shoulders dancing to press his chest back.

Ni-Ki's mouth is open, Jay can feel the warm wet of it breathing against his gland.

No, no, no,no. Jay doesn't understand the alarm, doesn't get it, but his body does. Ni-Ki's going to draw it out, he's going to force his scent to bleed.

Jay feels the blunt scratch of his teeth around his gland.

"No!"

It happens too fast, he moves too fast. Jay doesn't even fully process what he does until he's already done it, not until he's staring at Ni-Ki's body slumped at the bottom of one of the concrete pillars.

There's a large crack in the middle from where his body hit. It's bad, there's holes, and the wind whistles through them.

The air freezes in his chest and the horror of what he just did mars his features.

He threw him. He hit him.

Jay's on his knees, but he falls down to all floors as he looks at his boy, at his little pup wincing in the massive heap that he is; and the sound, the bleating—it's so loud and the cry rings in his ears. He can fucking feel it. Through the string that connects them, he feels the cry, he feels how he just hurt him.

Jay hurt his pup. Again.

Tears blink down his face and he doesn't even know when they got there, but he slowly crawls over to him. He looks so much smaller now, curled up like he's swimming through his oversized black sweatshirt.

Ni-Ki's head shifts from where it's pressed into the dirt. He probably hears him padding closer, because he's flinching from him, keeping his head low, eyes to the ground.

Jay's head is shaking off its access. No, no, no please. I didn't mean it. I'm sorry.

Jay stops three feet away because he can't bear to scare him further, to see his pup flinching at the sound of him. Jay's tears are dripping into the grass below him.

He's heaving.

Bad, bad, bad. The feeling courses through him, berating him and hitting upside the head with a wooden plank. He should have never—he didn't mean to—flashes of everything he's done, everything he's taken appears before his eyes. The night Ni-Ki fell asleep still shaking in his arms after the death of his mother. His dead father. Now, him.

Jay chokes, he feels his gland tighten, then loosen.

"Puppy." Jay whimpers. Help him, calm him. Tell him I didn't mean it.

Please.

Honey and cherries.

His scent starts to leak and Jay's too much of a wreck to think about the consequences, to even bother with attempting to control the intensity.

He only pays attention to his pup. His pup who stills immediately, whose eyes narrow up at him before they round out. Ni-Ki's scent is floating towards him like a tentative hand and when they meet, they interlock, they blend, they meld together in an apology Jay wants to repeat over and over again.

'Hyungie, more." Ni-Ki whispers as he lifts his head slowly. He smells completely like baby-powder now.

His, his, his. Jay has to comfort him. That's his job.

So he does, he cracks himself open for his pup, lets the wet, sticky scent of him bloom out into the air, coating Ni-Ki from head to toe. He thinks of safety, he thinks of them playing tug-of-war in the abandoned parking lot using one of the leg bones from a feral he just killed. He doesn't have pheromones, they only come with alphas, betas, and omegas, but he tries, he hopes Ni-Ki gets the message.

His chest is sore, but the pain lessens with each inch Ni-Ki crawls over.

There's something else sparkling below Jay's skin, a tension that he throws away easily.

Please come closer.

They're in the middle of the gazebo and the wind pushes back some of the hair in his pup's face.

Ni-Ki hovers over him even when they're both on their hands and knees, and his eyes aren't wet like Jay's when their noses touch; his body doesn't shake when he curves down to Jay's cheek, sliding along his jaw, then back to his ear.

His breath doesn't shake from turmoil like Jay's, his hands feel stronger than ever when he pulls them both up to their knees and fits Jay against his chest, pressing him in at all points of his body, but Ni-Ki's lips are wet when they start kissing down his neck, just below his ear, and Jay has to grip onto the boy's sweatshirt to prevent himself from shaking, from falling.

Jay wants to talk to him, wants to ask for forgiveness. He wants to apologize, but instead, he lets his pup do what he wants. He slides his head to the side and rests his forehead on his shoulder.

"Too easy, hyung."

A puff of laughter, mischief.

Then, wet heat is suctioning around his gland and Jay falls apart.

 

 

Ni-Ki leaves him there shaking and twitching in the grass, still trying to catch his breath, and completely open: but it's different now than it was before, almost worse. His mind's hazy and his body is vibrating, buzzing like the bees in May.

His scent is everywhere, splattered against the pillars, stuck to his own tongue, and its too much, but then there's even more. There's his pup's scent that overpowers it all, that hides between every crevice on his body: behind every knee, the inside of his elbows, his neck, his ears, his chest. Ni-Ki scented him everywhere and the smell of them together makes him feel overly exposed—high. Everyone could smell him now. Everyone would smell them and Jay couldn't do anything about it.

He was too much of a mess. He couldn't think about anything other than his pup, couldn't move past the image of his hurt body.

Something in Jay was breaking, was beating him from the inside about it still, even though he had watched his pup laugh happily as he moved around his body, and felt him nip his jaw before walking off like he'd never been hurt—never been touched.

The girls find him like that and neither of them touch him even when he gets himself to stand. He knows why, he knows with such a fresh scenting no one would touch him, but it still hurts, still fleshes him open for everyone to see because he can't have the cover of his friends shielding him, wrapping their arms around his back to try and muddle the scent.

He doesn't hate that he smells like his pup. He hates that everyone will be able to know exactly how he smells now, that they'll be able to hear him, smell him, and see him once he gets close enough to the school. He hates what they'll assume when they smell Ni-Ki on him.

His presentation is still fresh, un-whole, and he hates that they'll be able to smell that on him as well. That they'll eye him harder, they'll want him more, they'll search for the Alpha that hasn't closed his bite yet and beg him to do it in front of them, because everything was a show for them.

Jay was always on display. He was always open. And what's worse, he had no knives either, no extra layer of protection, no cold metal pressing into his skin through his pants. His Black Jades are still pressed into his ankles, they were the only daggers that survived that night, but he can't use them—not freely.

All of his knives had their purpose, had a principle—his Blacks weren't intended for just anyone, only the worse, and when in life or death situations. And, they were short, jagged: Jay wouldn't be able to use them for long-distance or quick swipes and their edges made them even harder to pull out from a stab than Green and White. They weren't practical.

Sunoo's by the entrance when they walk up the staircases. His nose twitches, but he otherwise doesn't say a word. He takes the place of the girls and the both of them separate from them, walking off to Far East for their first class. Sunoo's closer, but he still maintains his distance.

It's the same distance as always, but Jay feels the space differently now, differently now that he feels so raw.

The hallway isn't full, it isn't flooding, but Jay still wobbles from the flurry of scents anyway. Ni-Ki's scent was strong, it broke right through the cloud and tore it right out of his nose like it had the right to do so: and now Jay could smell everyone. Could smell those who forwent a shower last night, could smell the nasty mixes of rosemary and tea tree, and he saw the way they all looked at him, how Malachi looked at him.

He stood just behind the curve of a wall, further down the hall, far away from where Jay and Sunoo were walking, but Jay felt like he was closer. Motor oil and acid twisted up his face, bobbed his throat with a sickness that Jay hadn't known was building up the moment he caught the scent.

He didn't like the way Malachi smelled, he didn't like the dark look he was giving him the closer they got. He didn't like the slight panic he felt when the thought of him—anyone—being able to easily insert their teeth into his bite.

They were going to have to pass him, his bite would be on Malachi's side.

"Sunoo," Jay chokes out, but he tries to stay upright, even despite the want to hurl building in his throat. "Can…can you come closer?"

Sunoo immediately does without question, without dramatics. He sidesteps around Jay until he's plastered up against his left side, the side of his bite, and he wraps an arm around his waist like their very first trip to the nursery together.

His thumb rubs circles into Jay's stomach and the barrier Sunoo puts between him and Malachi makes him feel less crazed, like his bite is protected, like no one else will get to it, and it's enough to relax that part of him. The part that wanted to hiss, hurl, and fight.

He manages to hold his breakfast when they pass and Sunoo doesn't spare a glance towards the boy, completely unbothered, unworried about his presence.

Jay relies on his strength, relies on Sunoo basically walking them to their seats and placing Jay down into his. The scents are still all around him, still clogging up his senses and it doesn't help—it doesn't help that he can smell his puppy all over him, all on his skin because that memory replays in his head, the pitted feeling of horror wrecking through his chest with every inhale.

He can't get over it. He can't. The bleat. The cry. Pup. He did it.

Jay folds his arms over his desk, stuffing his head between the limbs. He tries to hide from the feeling, from the smell, from the other scents spiking in worry, in approval, and the worst one: want.

He folds his arms tighter around him, the sweatshirt bunching right under his nose, trying to suffocate himself: but where Jay thinks suffocation, his body purrs safety: metal and lemon, leather and baby powder. They both blow into his nose, pant into his mouth, and he tries to blindly search for more of it. More of that metal scent that's faded with the day, with the rolling in the grass, with Ni-Ki.

Jay feels Sunoo's hand run up his spine, a slow stroke that has him shivering and his feet accidentally tapping against the floor.

Beyond his touch, the teacher's book hits her podium with a deep pang, but it's underwater to Jay's ears. It's far away, in a whole other world Jay doesn't want to belong to: but the touch keeps him here, it slides up to his nape and curls into the hair at the back of his head.

Jay fucking whines into his sleeves and Sunoo closes in, drapes himself partially along Jay's back. He leans over him, his head dipping close enough to speak into the small hole Jay keeps in his bundle so he can still breathe.

"Is it too much, Jay?" He speaks into his space lowly and his hands are still moving, still massaging at his scalp.

Jay can't get the words out, huffed out high pitched breaths come out only: but Sunoo understands, he always does.

He doesn't hear anything above his own breaths and he doesn't think Sunoo says anything else.

He surely doesn't move from where he is pressed against Jay, holding on him and running his hands through his hair, making Jay's shin hit the leg of his desk: but he hears a chorus of thumps—hard hits into the desks all around them and the sound is intense, it's frightening with its one by one sequence. So much so that Jay buries himself deeper. Hiding

But then it's completely quiet, no rummaging, no papers, no scents swirling and peaking in the air as he breathes. No, the scents around him are dampened, they're stable, like how one's breathing evens once they fall asleep.

Jay ears perk at that, his twin hair spinning in calculation. What happened—where did everything go? Where is the danger now? Jay slowly peeks from above his makeshift den, eyes coasting over soft fabric to see a still classroom.

The teacher's still moving, but she now sits at her desk reading a book instead of at her podium where she had one been preparing to teach, and the students—the air hitches in his throat—all their heads are slammed down, forehead to the desk, shoulders slumped and eyes open, but stuck facing down.

They didn't even blink and if Jay cared to look close enough, if he wasn't so fried in the head from over sensitivity he would have seen the way their eyes began to tear up and drip down onto the desks from exposure: but he doesn't see it. No, once he sees everyone's eyes are off him, Jay tries to go back to his den, his little bundle of nice scents, but Jay misses his sleeves—or more appropriately, his nose grazes his entire sleeve until his nose is following an invisible line right up to Sunoo.

Jay's barely thinking, his senses are all riled up.

He feels bad. He feels guilty. He wants to be okay again and he follows his instincts—right under Sunoo's chin where he begins nosing at his throat—asking, wanting, searching, and Sunoo sits down to get closer for him. His hands return to tug lightly at his scalp as he pulls Jay back, only a little, just enough for Jay's neck to crane, for Sunoo to see the pretty way his throat bobs and his pulse jumps.

"You need something?" Sunoo asks without speaking. It's that weird technique of his, the one that feels like his words are ghosting next to his ears, but his mouth doesn't move an inch.

Jay nods frantically, blunt fingers clawing and clutching at the boy's shirt and Sunoo just smiles. His thumb comes down from his hair swipe at his cheek and Jay can't help but feel a little lightheaded. They've been here before—kind of, but this time feels so much different. So, so much.

"I've got you."

Sunoo staring, he's bringing his free hand to his neck and slowly, proudly, sharp, shiny nails tear a line down his neck. It's just a small slit, one that closes up as soon as Sunoo's nail leaves, but Sunoo smears it for him, smears the blood along the expanse of his neck all for Jay.

It gets all over his index and pointer fingers, but Sunoo doesn't seem to mind. Not when Jay's rushing towards, sliding into his lap to rub his nose into the mess, wetting his face with it—breathing in his scent.

Finally.

It's like a puzzle piece gets fitted into the right place. The scent he couldn't smell off him before hitting him full force, wrapping around him and marrying with his pup's. Like this Jay can barely even smell himself anymore, and that makes him feel even better, even safer.

Sunoo, his heart pounds.

He keeps Jay close, rocking him in his lap while he keeps Jay's head pressed to his neck. He's giggling in Jay's ears as his fingers, drenched in blood, come up to rub softly against his gland and Jay writhes in his lap. He gasps against him wetly and his hips buck against his stomach, but Sunoo holds him through it, whispering encouraging words into his ears as he begins to cry from the pleasure.

This feels good, feels almost right.

Almost.

There's something else. Something else he's searching for that he needs. He doesn't know what it is, but these scents for now distract him, fill him momentarily before the inevitable hollowness comes back.

Hands curve back into his hair when Sunoo finally lets up, finally gives his pulsing gland a break.

"You wanna go to my dorm with me?" Sunoo lilts into his ear and Jay shivers at the breath the boy chooses to let out.

"I—" Jay's trying to think, but every time he tries it's like he just falls further into him. Maybe, if Sunoo wants—no, they have gym. Jay likes gym.

"Hmm, what do you say?" Sunoo nuzzles him, their heads kissing. "What's this silence?" he teases, nail scratching at Jay's scalp.

Jay's gasping against his skin.

"Want me to call you hyung to get an answer?"

Jay shakes his head, mouth dry but somehow rubbing wet when he folds his lips together.

"No, no. I—I want to go to gym. I wanna see Nicho and K."

Sunoo doesn't seem pleased, but his smile never leaves.

"Hn. Very well."

 

 

Jay doesn't speak to him the whole way there. There's a permanent flush on his cheeks that hasn't left since he tore himself off of Sunoo's lap at the ring of the bell.

The rouge tint under his eyes and at the tips of his ears refusing to leave even when he's splashed himself silly with cold water—it was still dribbling down his neck, still soaking the ends of his hair a dark grey, and yet his face continued to burn bright. And fuck, Sunoo wasn't even teasing him about it. He hadn't even said a word as he aptly watched Jay wash off the dried blood on his neck and face.

He just stood there, standing, arms at his sides and a whirlpool in his eyes that Jay refuses to look at even on his good days—you know when he's not a fucking mess after coming down from the weirdest high he's ever experienced.

Sunoo remains quiet, but present. He slinks to the back of Jay as Jay marches forward, awkward and too embarrassed to walk side by side, to even feel the press of their clothes touching.

So, Jay keeps an eight foot distance the whole time they walk to gym: every turn is measured, every jump in his shoulders rat on him when he accidentally listens to Sunoo's footsteps too closely, and Sunoo adheres. He succumbs to the rhythm Jay sets, he dances to the new choreography that Jay hadn't introduced him to.

Everything they do goes without words and thank God for that because he uses the time separate to finally get a fucking grip. His body is still slightly shaking from the whole thing—the overload of emotions, of sensations. It's like he had been driven into over sensitivity and then ran over with a bullet train, and the worst of it all was that his brain was still trying to catch up to tell his body that it was over: that it didn't need to replay Ni-Ki's slumped form, his scent that went dim, or the flinch when Jay got closer, but it did.

It still did and even though Jay had put it to the back of his mind with each freezing douse, he knew the guilt would persist, he knew the string skewered into his heart would remind him of it until he fixed it, until he replaced the memory with something better. He won't. He doesn't have to fix shit that he didn't break to begin with.

He didn't mean to….he didn't, but they started all of us. They were hurting him, so why the fuck does he feel guilty when his pu—Ni-Ki doesn't. Jay could feel him before he pulled away—even better than he could have before, and Ni-Ki, if he focused on the string, the boy feels the same way even now.

Giddy. Sly. Impatient.

A straight fucking brat that lured him away and stole all of his belongings like a fox.

Jay took a deep breath and opened the doors into the gym. Even with his scent out, albeit muddled under the smoky scent of leather and baby powder mixed with Sunoo's lemon and metal, and even with the stares he was getting as they walked across the grass, he still had something that was his—that wouldn't change.

"Fuck, finally. Jay!" Nicholas meets him halfway on the field, his eyes glowing bright right before he lunges the last five feet between them to scoop Jay up into a squeezing hug.

"Nicho, no! Don't—"

He's not listening to K.

Nicholas spins them like a fucking table top—fast and in short bursts that quickly has him losing his balance upon the wet grass, and when his foot slips, it sends them both crashing down—read: Nicholas letting go of him to save himself and Jay tripping his ass up anyway out of retaliation when he lands on his side.

"Fucker." Jay laughs as Nicholas lands on his ass, howling at the afternoon sun.

"Say it again!" Nicholas growls, crawling on his hands and knees to swipe at him and Jay hisses back happily, catching his wrist and wrestling him back down into the grass.

"My pleasure." Jay grins in his face, Nicholas successfully pinned beneath him. The boy rolls his eyes, playfully snapping his teeth at him when he realizes Jay is now stronger than him. Jay hovers above Nicho and his head tilts at the proximity, the glee still swarming in his veins guiding him forward without thinking.

Jay can feel it, K coming closer to the two of them, but he doesn't pay him any mind. Instead, his nose filters through Nicholas' dark hair, barely touching the strands, but hovering all around.

"Strawberries?" Jay asks softly, a little amazed as well. Nicholas didn't look like he'd smell like that, but it was nice and the more Jay looked at him with the scent in his nose it began to meld—began to make sense.

Nicholas smiles at him then, his own hands coming to push Jay down to his chest. It puts Jay low enough for Nicholas to sit up on his elbows, to sniff around in his hair for himself, too.

Nicholas coughs.

"Please tell me you're the honey." He gags and Jay jumps off, hand rubbing at the back of his neck as he sneaks a glance over to Sunoo. He's watching them as always from the benches.

"Uh yeah, yeah." Jay nods at the grass and K finally approaches them. He smiles at Jay, nods at him in greeting all the same, but he noticeably stands further back than normal, sticking closer to Nicholas rather than in the middle of them. Jay doesn't fester over it, not when Nicho's sliding close to him, wrapping his arm around his shoulder.

"It's okay." He says lowly, hesitant. "It's um…normal to smell like pack. I—" Nicholas lowers his voice, whispering for only Jay to hear. "Are they, Jay?"

He asks it like it's a triggering subject, like the mere mention of them would send him into a break down the very second he said it: and to be fair, it would have—it still might. Everyone could smell Ni-Ki on him, everyone knew who he was and whose pack he belonged to. They'd assume Jay had lost, had finally given in to the structure he's always pushed against.

Jay shakes his head no, blinking rapidly to avoid even the slightest hint of tears appearing before Nicholas, but he must smell it, must sense something because his wolf croons at him: a small, soft sound that's short enough not to draw attention to them from the whole class gathering in a circle, but was still loud enough to speak to Jay—speak to whatever it was inside him.

Nicholas rubs his cheek against his and light strawberry ghosts lightly over his skin. It doesn't mix with the others, but it floats in passing like the smell of pie from a bakery over the wind.

"If you ever need anything Jay." Nicholas says quietly even if K's squinting at him from the side, "You remember, right?"

He feels a sharp twinge in his chest where his strings lie and it almost steals his breath, something he dutifully ignores.

"We're always willing to help."

He remembers. Both of them outside in between buildings, discussing his claw marks from his first day. It brings a smile to his face and a short chuckle leaving his throat.

"Don't need it." He jokes back, pushing Nicholas' cheek back with his own. Something has changed between them—their dynamic. It feels closer, like there's a commonality there that Jay hadn't felt before. One that makes him feel like Nicholas and him were the same—made to look out for each other.

K clears his throat as he picks up Nicholas from his scruff, a hand coming out to Jay to pull him up at the same time.

"Class kids." Is all he says as he then pushes them in front of him, watching them push and bat at each other all the way to the circle.

There's a new student there as well when Jay sits next to Nicho. Well, new isn't really right because Jay's seen him before—they've interacted briefly—but, Jay's never seen him here. In his class.

"Am I tripping, or is he not supposed to be here?" Jay questions Nicholas silently. Aloud before them Coach starts bellowing out about the Forest statistics and what he would've liked to see from them.

Nicholas looks over to where Jay's making very obvious side glances at.

He even rolls his eyes when he sees.

It's the boy from White Week: the one who was overly personal too quick and had no sense of boundaries.

"Yea, I don't know. His schedule changed after the Forests. He's here now, but that's not even the weirdest part." Nicholas scoffs, fiddling with his chains so they don't get hidden under his shirt.

"What?" Jay asks and he says it with so much disdain that you'd think the boy personally offended him. He didn't know him, didn't even know his name, and yet he was already a little annoyed. Shit, that was shitty of him wasn't it?

Nicholas laughs and taps his thigh, "I know."

"He's got a pack now and yea," Nicholas says, "it's as sudden as it sounds. I don't think anyone knows when it happened, much less how he ended up becoming the Alpha."

"Ehng?" Jay blurbs, "Alpha? I—Yihwa said that he was shit and lazy."

And Chloe said he couldn't be one, fucking please.

Nicholas' hands flip out, "Co-signed."

Jay laughs and shakes his head. Weirder things have definitely happened and he moves on. He doesn't think about how the boy smells stronger than Malachi, even though Malachi was an Alpha, too. Of course, Malachi had almost made him puke his breakfast on the floor, but it had less to do with the intensity of it and more of the smell itself combined with Jay's overall sensitivity.

Malachi wasn't here, hadn't been since the school changed his gym class after their first fight to avoid further altercations. Some shit that was.

A small smile creased Jay's face. Maybe Malachi was just that much of a bitch that his smell didn't even give what it was supposed to.

Jay tuned back in to the teacher, watching the clipboard he kept of their attendance be thrown at a kid who gave him the wrong answer.

He looked once more at the other kid. His hair was still too greasy, but his shoulders were now sewed straight, a weird confidence that used to be lackadaisical and uncaring now prominent within him.

A pack only serves the wants of its Alpha, that much he still felt was true, even if the dynamics between Nicholas and K seemed healthy. They were just one pack—an exception to the rule. Most were like Malachi, most were like his mother's. He'd never join one, would never subject himself to being under anyone's authority but his own, but as he looks at the boy's posture, he guesses that's what it was like for Alphas—what it must have felt like for him. He could sit so tall because he was the one calling the shots, making the rules.

Jay averts his gaze.

Hm, good for him.

 

 

The wind blows heavily through his clothes, an invisible rampage that sends his sweatshirt and pants rucking to the side and back harshly. His clothes were convulsing, flinching away from the small yellow rays that showed upon the grass gently; it was like they were being exorcised with how furiously they moved, how desperately they seemed to want to tear away from Jay's body.

They almost drag him back, but Jay's strong, he's faster, he's better than he ever was with his knives. His hands twitch with his speed. The world slows for him as he runs through it.

He doesn't know how he's doing it, how he's managed to run so fast he's able to catch up with K's wolf and send them both grappling over the grass when Jay attaches to the flag in his jaws and rolls them over.

It must be the adrenaline rushing through him, must be the way his blood is pumping so fast that it seems just as happy as Jay feels.

Jay huffs a smile and K doesn't let go. Paws are put on him, but they don't break the skin. They push him down, hold his chest as still as possible with Jay still hanging on to both ends of the flag: but Jay plays dirty. Always.

He laughs, glee scrunching his nose as K's big puppy eyes look at him lost, as they watch his fleeing back run his team's flag back over to their post.

He broke the stick, completely snapped it in half in K's mouth and ran off with the blue nylon fabric.

The fabric flaps in the wind, hitting back against his hand as he gets closer to their post. His teammates, wolves and other, fighting all around him. The guards are fighting too, Nicho and two others defending the pole even as nothing lies within it because they know Jay is coming. They're not looking at him though, they keep track of his steps, his proximity through his scent, through the sounds of his feet stamping into the ground.

He's coming closer, almost at the 50 yard line.

There's just 50 more to go before he can secure their flag back and run back out. They hadn't given Jay a specific position, their team had one less member than the other due to their class size being odd. So, Jay was a floater, he went where he was needed, he aided where necessary, and this speed, this newfound intensity had helped him get to everyone.

He still wasn't as fast as Sunoo, which means he was still nowhere close to Sunghoon, but he didn't care. It felt like he was flying.

Another yard.

Then another and that's when he hears the chorus come in, the stampeding of a line of wolves coming for their front defense. They pass him, rushing to break up their front line and be there to receive Jay instead when he gets to the 80 yard line, and Jay steels himself.

Sweat is dripping down his face, but thanks to the sheer speed he's running at, the wind wipes it away—keeps him dry, even though his body is heated and willing to be wet. He'll have to side step them, maneuver and jump above snapping jaws when gets there.

They'll take him down as soon as possible if they break through, but Jay doesn't need to be the one to place the flag. He just needs to get within range for their one mage to finish her spell.

So he takes a deep breath and slows down half a pace. He'll need to focus on sight rather than speed. He needs to see their attacks before they touch him.

75 yards.

Here he goes, all or nothing, but his whole self is yanked back.

His sweatshirt is caught between teeth and from the smell, he can tell it's K's jaws that have closed around his shirt.

The Alpha's fucking strong. He stands on his hind legs as he bites Jay back, and he doesn't give him enough time to even process how high up in the air he's being held when K winds to the side, thrashing Jay to his left before whipping to the right. He lets Jay go at the perfect time, at the perfect momentum, because it has Jay being thrown twenty yards back right to the middle.

Damn near right at the 50 yard line.

Jay screams his fucking head off as he quite literally flies.

"Shit, you bitch!" Jay curses as he lands, touching the ground with his feet lightly before he breaks the impact by rolling forward in a tumble. He lands on his back anyway, head dizzy, and breath taken, but his eyes stare daggers into K, into the stupid, big, smoky grey wolf that shakes his tail at him and runs off to join the fight of their front line.

It sets him back, puts him not only further away from their post, but even farther from their mage.

He looks at her as he gets up, emerald green hair and striking blue eyes. She nods at him, finishing the last of her cantations and he sees it as he heaves, the bright blue of her magic lacing around her body.

They still got this.

Jay squeezes around the flag, the nylon slippery and too soft against his slick palms.

He runs.

He gets another five yards.

Then, he's tackled. Hard. The wolf jamming into his stomach has a rock for a head and Jay's fucking groaning on the grass as he flops down hard. His body fucking rejects the grass and he flops two more times until he falling stationary two yards back.

His leg twitches from the pain as he tries to get to his elbows.

"Mgh, fuck me." Jay grunts, left arm popping as he reaches out for the flag he dropped. His knuckles go white around it as he squeezes it. He can't let it go again.

Shit, they're too close to the enemy's post. They were still in the damn middle. It's anyone's game.

Jay fucking hates that.

He grits his teeth as the hairs on his skin rise. The wolf is prowling closer, shoulders hunched and gaze lidded. He's going to lunge.

He sees the blue glow of magic in the corner of his eye.

"Suck my dick." Jay hisses.

The wolf lunges at him with a growl, face ferocious and teeth sharp. The sight is a little confusing. This was a game of capture the flag, the fuck was this wolf doing trying to actually bite. It doesn't matter, not to Jay at least.

Jay meets that bitch toe for toe, running up and with the strength he doesn't know how to control yet, and jumping into the air until he's hovering just above the wolf's head.

Fuck, almost.

A falcon flies over his head.

Their mage, but Jay's not high enough.

Jay grins and without thinking, he lets himself fall a couple of centimeters. The wolf jumps to his hind legs to clench its jaws around Jay's ankles, probably drag him down by blood and teeth, but Jay's faster, Jay's smarter.

Jay planned this.

His jaws open, they unhinge back like a shark preparing to catch a seal above water, and Jay giggles.

So fucking stupid, he thinks and the edge of his shoe stomps down into the wolf's nose, settling slantly on the curve of the wolf's face just before his snout. The hit shuts its mouth, but Jay uses the seconds in between to hinge down, to fucking catapult himself in the air using his their face like a diving board.

The wolf shrieks, probably falls back, stubbed into the earth from the push Jay gave himself and Jay's soaring up, his clothes batting like wings behind him.

"Go!" He screams out and the falcon swoops down, talons sinking into the nylon flag easily and then she flies off, way above the crowd, above the packs of warring wolves and vampires.

That should be it, Jay should be off the hook. He no longer has the flag and the others, with their flag nicely secured in the sky, are running for the other side of the field—for the other team's flag. The attention should shift. He could steal a couple of breaths for himself and figure out where to go next: flag or guard, but he doesn't get the chance to.

He doesn't even get to land before thick hands are wrapping around his shins and hauling to the ground, bodily throwing him into the grass, and Jay's head bangs into the ground.

"Hugh," Jay whimpers and his body gets dragged, the wolf, now a boy roping him back by the leg as Jay's whole body freezes.

He hit his head.

Jay can't see anything but color. The grass is blotchy and green and he can't tell where the green blobs end and the browns and grays from wolves around them start. They meld together like finger painting, streaky with definite shapes.

The world feels slow again, but this time it's not because he's moving fast, it's because his head so lagged its choosing not to process anything else around him, but the slow, wet glide of grass and dirt coating his shirt, rucking it up so it can lick at his stomach.

Jay's turned onto his back, caged in, and his eyes swim: mousy brown, greasy, too close.

The boy saddles closer, digs his pointy knee into Jay's thigh and Jay flinches, hisses. Honey is wafting into the air slowly, darkening its sweetness by the second as the pain courses through him.

"Get off," Jay says gruffily, head still making loops in the sky, "I don't have it."

His hands come up to push at what he hopes is a shoulder.

"His name's Theo."

Nicholas. Nicholas had told him and gave him a name for the grease ball.

His hands are slapped away and through the small haze of clarity he gets every couple of seconds, he sees the glint of fangs in front of him—too close, too close. His heart thunders at the information, his body starts shaking with adrenaline.

Get out, get out! Get out from under him, his instincts claw into him, but he can't. His head is still in the clouds, still spinning from the hit and he can't feel his legs yet, but the constant nagging, the urge, it's starting to scare him.

What, what was happening?!

He hears the first whistle being blown. A warning. So something wrong was happening around Jay, but where? What was it?

His body frets. Every blood cell in his body running around and trying to alert everyone: Get the white blood cells! Give another dose of adrenaline! Pump it, now!

Theo's grinning above him, a clawed hand coming up to rest over Jay's mouth and nose, his wrist right at the corner of Jay's mouth as he cinches tightly, suctioning around his breathing points like an oxygen mask.

Jay sees bright red add to the painting—Theo's nose is bleeding where he jumped off it.

His fingers clench around the boy's shirt as he breathes. He's not suffocating him. He's sealing him off and at first it makes no sense to him, but he feels it. The way his body responds, how that something in him retaliates.

Sandalwood and musk. It's creamy, woody, and warm and it starts infiltrating, staining the insides of his nose, traveling along the seams of his lips and doesn't wait to be let in. It forces its way through and the smell alone is enough to set Jay off.

His eyes widen. The second whistle is blown and Jay starts thrashing.

Fuck, no. No, no, no. His scents are leaving, his pup's and Sunoo's are disappearing and he can't smell them past the cupped hand over his face, past his own burning, bitter honey sweltering around him.

They're gone. They're gone. He's alone.

He's still open.

Tears spring up from nowhere and Jay can't even think to comprehend why, he just knows that they happen, that they start spilling down his cheeks without his control. And it makes it worse, everything so much worse, because the tears add in an extra pressure to his head, and Jay can't fucking see anything, can't process.

The scent, Theo's scent, it's bleeding from his wrist, hot boxing him in with his hand and coursing out, gliding around his ears and down his neck—too close, too fucking close to his bite.

"No!" Jay wretches behind the hand, body convulsing with panic and fear.

Not him, not him, not him. He's not right.

Then it hits him like a freight train. The pheromones. Alphan pheromones. They're different from Ni-Ki's, Jay feels it differently. It feels wrong. They harden and press down onto his chest like they're trying to crack through his ribs and force his heart to stop, to listen, to beat only when the Alpha says it can.

Domination. That's the difference, Ni-Ki hadn't been suppressing him, not fully pushing his own will away to get what he wanted. He was talking to him, albeit awfully, letting Jay feel how upset he was and Jay responded to it like it was breathing. Jay wanted to let Ni-Ki have it, that's why his legs had given out, even if his brain was set on no: but this, this wasn't a choice.

His body was being held under water and Theo was waiting for him to drown, to tap out.

Jay didn't want to. He didn't. His whole body was trying to reject it.

But his mind is mushy, concussion heavy and thick scent battering him useless for thoughts. His gums feel sore, as do his fingernails. Something's coming, a deep pressure, something sharp trying to pierce through.

He's heaving now, heart shattering as he loses himself. He's freaking out. It's not safe. He's not safe.

That radio cuts back on, himself too worn out to keep it shut behind that door and its like Jay's searching through the static himself, shakily turning the volume and bending the metal wires to connect.

He doesn't know what to do. He's panicking. He needs. He needs.

Theo bears down on him, tightening the press around his lower face and he speaks.

"Submit."

The voice echoes through him like a whisper through a hollow tunnel and his ears begin to ring.

He stills.

His eyes roll to the back of his head and it's like he can't breathe. There's a metal chain anchoring him to the ocean floor and he can't swim up no matter how hard he shifts his arms.

"It's all thanks to you, Jay." Theo hums above him, free hand inching towards his collar, fingers clutching around the rim and pulling it to the side tautly.

Jay's kicking his feet, but the chain makes them move so much slower and the water, the water doesn't help. This far down wasn't made for them, the pressure was too much for them to handle. It'll cave his chest in, it'll press his head in from all sides until he's nothing better than a shipwreck blown and contorted into itself.

There's chaos around him, schools of fish rushing about him. He feels their scales slide against his skin as they push against each other and crowd all around him.

Then, the weight is gone. The body pinning him down and the hand around his bite leaves. It's thrown off of him, but Jay's still hooked, the chain stays locked around his foot.

He can't fucking breathe.

"Jay?! Jay, fuck. Don't come closer!" Nicholas is growling somewhere above the ocean. He's reaching down into the water, but Jay can't get to him, can't touch him. So, he tries to undo the lock instead, his chest ticking with the time he has left before he breathes in, before he drowns.

He's wet, so fucking wet. He didn't know he could feel that this far down, surrounded by only water: but maybe those are his tears, maybe they were so thick and wound with honey that they stuck to him even this far under.

"He's under. He used his voice on him." Nicholas spits frantically, "Fight it, Jay. Come on, you can do it. Just follow my voice, okay? No one's going to touch you."

But that's the problem, Jay can't get himself out himself, not fully. He needs help. He doesn't, he doesn't know how.

The radio connects. His chest glows brightly and the small light, the extra beating in his chest gives him the strength to break his chains. It snaps apart in his grip, but the chain stays wrapped around him even as he tries to swim up. He's no longer tied to the metal bomb at the bottom of the ocean, but the chain pulls at him still as he tries to swim.

He needs, he knows what he needs. He can feel it. He needs to get to it. Oxygen. Air. Something.

"I think he's breaking through! He's—He—Jay, stop!"

He's swimming hard, pumping his legs fast against the current. He doesn't know where Nicholas goes, he can't see him anymore, but he just keeps on swimming, heading to where he needs it, up where he hopes the water breaks to shore and open sun.

It's not easy. It never is with Jay is it? He sinks his teeth in the meat of his cheeks, struggling, attempting on his last breathe to keep his mouth shut—to not breathe, but each careen forward lightens the burden on his chest, lessens the pressure stacking in his head, but it's not enough.

He needs.

Hands.

Big, big, so big they split into the water, disrupting the sea life that still tries to circle and typhoon him back into the depths of the ocean. Thin fingers, long, but strong wrap around his nape, they hook into him like Jay was meant to be caught, to be reeled in. And Jay doesn't flounder, doesn't bite or reject.

He's taken, pulled up to shore, wet and panting, heaving whistled breaths into lukewarm skin and the hand doesn't move, it stays dimpled into his nape like a collar and Jay's instinct finally begins to rest.

Jay finally fucking breathes.

Old books, dampness. 'L'.

He's back in the library shrouded in darkness, but Jay can't pay attention, can't appreciate the way the dark blankets his skin and covers him further, because he smells what he needs, what he's been searching for.

It's perfect. It's just right. It's Jay's.

Jay whimpers into the scent, spit bubbling out of his mouth as he tries to inhale it, tries to drink it until it soothes his shakes and stops the alarm rushing in his veins, stops his tears from flowing: but they don't stop, they keeping coming.

The scruff deepens and it sends tingles straight down his legs.

Jay hasn't stopped, he can't stop. He's mouthing wetly at a neck, nibbling as if he could coax more of it out.

It smells like eucalyptus and balsam and the scent sends a cool flush running down his skin as he inhales it. The eucalyptus melts into his pores, licks into his muscles and bleeds into him the smell of fresh mint and earth.

Jay feels everything loosen from it, feels his own body sag against one much bigger than his own, and fuck, it just brings him closer, saddles him right up against a body Jay wants to fold himself into. He wants to be wrapped all around in it, protected and shielded from everything else that might get him, hurt him, touch him or his bite.

The balsam has the opposite effect, it ignites something low in his stomach, sparks a match there that has Jay twitching against him.

His whine muffles out in the neck that's now gone slick with his spit, and that balsam only gets stronger, until Jay's whimpering and lazy.

He can't keep his head up anymore to continue his pathetic gnawing, but it almost doesn't matter. Not with the way his head slumps against a hard chest and the balsam, that fresh, clean scent that sweats out something animalistic catches him. It's like sweat dripping down him after a long chase, the satisfied growl of a predator rising above him, but Jay doesn't cower, doesn't fight, his fluffy tail beats against the floor in excitement, in fear, in anticipation.

He's going to eat him. That's when it comes back, when Jay's lowered his guard, the smell comes back.

Jay flinches. The hand around his nape lowers, the fingers edge along his wrappings.

The sandalwood creeps back in, faint but swift.

"No." Jay whimpers, throwing himself away so hard his body slams into one of the book cases. His body has started up again, the mere brush of fingertips along where he's so open makes him stumble stupidly against the shelf.

He needs to get away. He's not—he can't.

Books fall down all around, raining on him and hitting the ground in a deep thunder. It freaks him out, he shrieks with each hit, but he refuses to open his eyes.

He doesn't want to see Theo, doesn't want to see Malachi. No, no, no. Please.

Jay crashes onto the floor in a heap, books open and fanning all around him, split open above his head and between his thighs. The one he tripped over gets sent somewhere and Jay hears it hit like a hockey pock against something solid, something moving.

Clack. Clack.

They're coming closer and Jay's body freezes, everything except for his chest that starts spasming. His head is still cloudy with concussion. It's dark. His eyes hurt from how tight he keeps them shut and his lips are trembling as he cries. It's like he's back in that crater. 

"I don't want you." He cries out. He thumbs around for a random book and throws it behind him, at them. At the memories that are replaying in front of him: the claws in his thighs, the scent, the voice ringing in his ear, echoes of it still tracing his bite.

Where was Jay's safety? Where did it go, it was just here.

Jay whines as he closes in on himself, rolling into a ball.

Baby, talk to me.

Jay gasps like a fish out of water and his hands fist his sweatshirt to his face. Heeseung.

"Can't find—" Jay chokes, "Can't find you. I, please."

He doesn't know what he's asking for. He doesn't even know if Heeseung can hear him if he talks, but he wants Heeseung to keep talking to him. He wants him here. His body knows. Heeseung will fix it, he'll save him just like he did in the forest.

I'm with you, little one, but you're confused, baby. Calm down, find my scent. You'll be okay, I'm watching you.

Jay refuses, he shakes his head.

"No, it's not safe. They're close, I—Heeseung, please."

He's starting to hyperventilate, the glowing strings in his chest starting to shake, starting to pull at him in worry, all except for one. The thickest one, it remains taught, strict. He keeps him focused even though he's gasping for breath.

No.

The word desecrates his whole world. It splits him in two and he hits his head against one of the book covers. He's not coming. No one's coming. It's just Jay. It's always only been Jay. He's scared. He's tired. He's not that strong.

Show me you can, little one. I'm not punishing you, but you have to learn. You need to be able to find me, no matter what. You need to be able to tether yourself before you succumb. You're dropping, Belle.

Jay wheezes, lower body tingling and weak, but he forces himself up anyway, even if the shift makes his head worse, makes him wobbly as he begins to crawl. He wants him to find him, wants him to fight the memories and the smells clinging to his face and suffocating him.

And distantly Jay knows how important this is, how badly this could go. He could go feral if he lets his fear win, lets the instincts completely overrule him. 

Jay presses forward, finally opening his eyes and it's dark, almost pitch except for the small candles lit on the personal study desks. He crawls over a couple of books and his knees ache with sensitivity.

"Head hurts." Jay whines and maybe he's trying to garner sympathy so he doesn't have to do it, or maybe he wants Heeseung to finally fucking speak so he can follow his voice instead. Either way, Heeseung only hums through the radio and he feels five other sources connect to their wave length. He can feel the channels' presences, but none speak, none make the slightest sound.

Come, Jongseong.

Jay tries. He puts his nose up in the air and tries to breath past the sandalwood particles to find the eucalyptus again, the balsam that still twitched in his stomach, but it's faint, it comes and goes and Jay has to slap the nearest bookshelf he's crawling past in frustration.

Stop moving! Stop it!

Jay hears a deep chuckle, a tongue sliding across moist lips.

Yes, baby.

It sends a shiver right through him and he has to stop once again just to stop himself from toppling over from it. His scent goes sweet, the burnt sugar lifting to something succulent, something wet and dripping off the honeycomb and his heart lurches when Heeseung's scent gets deeper. The calming eucalyptus drains out in place for something heady, something intoxicating and bad for Jay, a chemical so drawing that it must fuck up his insides if he inhales it too much: but Jay can't help it, not in this state, he smells addictive.

Jay pads forward, tongue just at the fat of his bottom lip.

Heeseung's scent is animalistic nature dipped in ink.

Jay's breath seizes in his chest when he sees him, his eyes glowing silver to see him even better.

Glossy skin and doe eyes that bleed wine.

What's wrong, honey?

He's smirking, smiling lazily as he leans back into the book case. He's sitting on the floor holding a book open with just his thumb and his brow jumps. His eyes look all over him, at all of him: his shaking thighs, his wet, red-rimmed eyes, his mussed hair.

"Why'd you stop, belle?" He says and his scent curls around Jay's neck, presses back into those invisible dents his fingers left on his scruff. Hearing his voice out loud feels different, it hits deeper, it sinks below his skin and slickens the palms of his hands.

The book closes and the slow snap tenses the muscles in Jay's thighs. Heeseung freezes him with a look, then his eyes flit down to his lap.

"Come here." He purrs at him and Jay's breath hitches at the sound of it coursing through him. It's like he can feel it vibrating in Heeseung's chest, like he can imagine how it might feel against his cloudy head.

Jay comes, he pads his way over and Heeseung doesn't give him time to curl into himself on top of him. He grabs along Jay's hips and settles him how he wants—right on top of his lap, chest pressed into his own, head tucked nicely right on his gland, and Jay's wrapped. Wrapped in scent, wrapped in the chase, the mint, the deep aroma of ink, and then a pelt.

The fur wraps Jay fully up, insulating him in nothing but heat, and it feels good, softer than anything he's ever owned, even the pair of clothes he wore today specifically for their quality.

The purring doesn't stop, not for a while, not until Jay's breathing matches Heeseung's and his nose falls from his gland down into the curve of his neck.

He's settling down, he's resting against Heeseung's shoulder and the residual buzzing in his chest from Heeseung's purrs is making him sleepy, but Heeseung doesn't let him drift. His hand curls into the hair at the back of his head and they tilt him up, until only Jay's cheek touches the white tee and their lips are centimeters away.

He can feel Heeseung's breaths on his lips, how they're warmer than his body. He has no choice but to breathe from Heeseung lips again, but Jay doesn't mind, not right now. The cloud in his head is dispersing and his eyes lid with exhaustion.

"Who are you with?" Heeseung speaks and the words tap against Jay's mouth, they melt on his tongue and fill his ducts.

"Heeseung." Jay breathes and it comes out a little pitchy, a little whine laced in his drowsiness, but it's an answer. He answers. Heeseung's fingers move against his scalp and his nose comes down to nose at Jay's. They bump softly, and Heeseung plays there for a bit, moving up his bridge, sliding back down, tickling him.

"And who is Heeseung, Belle?" He asks and Jay pants against the deepening ink. He feels wet with it, covered, slathered, and he can smell his own scent oozing out: sweet, his cherries spilling out for Heeseung to taste.

Jay's so gone. He's not right in the head. Can't be.

Alpha. Smells safe. Alpha. Words and phrases just keep floating around in his head, forcing their opinions above Jay's own. He has to swallow his own spit to save himself, to stop himself. Heeseung is watching him closely, darkly. He feels the slightest rumble of his chest before Heeseung stops himself.

"Ass who bit me." Jay slurs, hands clenching around his arms as he stays completely wrapped in the animal skin. Heeseung smiles, he doesn't break eye contact with him, he keeps staring into his eyes—red meeting silver, as he nods.

Another hum and fingers push aside the pelt just a little. It's not enough to welcome the cold air of the underground library in, but Jay shivers anyway from the press of those lukewarm fingers against his wrappings.

His breath shutters, his body attempts to lock up again, but Jay breathes in deeper, he fucking holds onto Heeseung's shirt with his teeth, rolling it wet between his teeth to remind himself. Heeseung's here. It's Heeseung's.

"It's mine, belle? My bite?"

Fuck, he didn't mean to. Shit. And then something shifts and Jay can feel them, the pheromones—both of theirs. Jay's scream that he's open, too open, raw and Heeseung's want to give him everything.

Fuck, please.

Heeseung's thumb settles around his lips, a cold shock to how worn and red he's made them—a coolant, an ointment.

Jay's hand comes out of the pelt to hold Heeseung's shirt hem. The thumb parts his lips, separating them until they let go of his wet shirt, until Jay's mouth lays open, wet at the edges and shaking all over.

"Yours." He answers and the sound of it is weak, wilting, and that sting of anticipation runs up his spine.

Heeseung's eyes flicker, they flutter down to where Jay's curling against him and shaking with the overload of scent. They drench themselves in the sight of drool slipping down the corner of Jay's mouth and how Jay flinches when he feels it touch his skin.

Black spiders into his pupils and he tilts Jay up again.

"Say I can." Heeseung murmurs against his lips and Jay feels like he might pass out. It's not a command, but he's not asking either.

"Heeseung." Jay tries, he absolutely tries to ask him. Can what? Can what?

Close you. Close me. The thoughts in his head sound like voices, they sound like them. He wants that. He wants to be closed.

Why won't his brain work?

He squeaks.

Heeseung doesn't wait and Jay's taken completely, their lips coming together in a union, a rushed press that feels like they're opposite magnets snapping together. Heeseung presses further, catches his top lip between his, and it feels like he's being infused into, flattened, and spread out like a platter as those plush lips make him sink.

It's intense, it's wet, it's equal parts terrifying as it is liberating, because each press, each way Heeseung turns and pulls him in closer, covers over all the holes he's shot into Jay, but Heeseung only digs up more. He uncovers parts of Jay, Jay's never seen, has never shared with anyone.

Jay pushes his face to the side, breathing for air, but Heeseung just turns him right back, fits his hand around his jaw to bring him closer, to keep him right where he wants him—under him, gasping against his lips and trying and failing to speak between kisses that send flames of heat down his hips, stoking an inferno in his lower stomach.

Jay's shaking as he whimpers high in his throat, confused and pleased. His scent gets deeper, it gets wetter, stickier in response to the ink, to the small amount of pine and eucalyptus that's curling his toes.

His scents everywhere, blooming all around him and on Heeseung like it wants to slicken Heeseung's whole forest with cherries and honey.

Drool drips down his chin as he's opened up, as Heeseung slides inside him, his mouth, his pores, his whole being.

This isn't how Jay thought it'd go. Jay didn't think it would happen like this: his first kiss. Jay whimpers as his bottom lip is sucked red, all his blood rushing there, ready, and willing to spill with just the brush of Heeseung's fangs.

He's trembling, writhing on his lap, and Heeseung finally lets him go, finally pulls away and there's a line, a string of spit that still connects them, that keeps them close because Heeseung doesn't pull far enough away to break it and he growls when Jay tries.

"How do I feel, Jongseong?" Heeseung asks and Jay can't keep up. He can't figure out if he's talking about the way his scent is messing with his system, or his lips, or his tongue. His eyes travel all around the man's face and then back to the little string of fate that's cooling against both of their lips.

He's still gasping for breath.

"Su—suffocating." Jay wheezes, but Heeseung's eyes slit, his brows pinch and Jay's shaking his head before he can even defend himself. The string breaks. It's not like that. He didn't mean it like that.

"Heeseung wait—"

He's shut up. He's fucking swallowed whole and the blood finally breaks from his lips from how hard Heeseung pins him down with only a kiss. 

There's a wet, bloody pop when he pulls back, when his lips finally unhand him. And Jay's already breathing too hard, little whistles singing against Heeseung's lips.

"Is that right?" Heeseung croons against the bloody whiskey, a hand coming down to slide around Jay's throat, squeezing gently. "You must not be breathing properly then."

Jay's head fucking spins.

Heeseung cuts everything off, his airways, his breathing, the scent of them dribbling down his throat, and Jay just holds on, takes it, bats his eyes at Heeseung because he doesn't know what else to do, but it helps clear some of the haze, some of the drunkenness that's taken over him.

So when Heeseung lets up, when he finally lets Jay breathe again, when his scent curls at his lips, at his nose, and then wraps around every part of his body, Jay does everything to try to limit how much he takes in, how much he tastes him on his tongue.

But Heeseung starts nuzzling him, overloading his senses, and tears come back to Jay's eyes.

"Try again for me, Jay-ah." He murmurs, massaging little circles into his throat, "How's it?"

Feels good, too good. Jay bites his lips and the resulting pulse of pain wrecks through his shoulders. They're gonna bruise. 

Heeseung's eyes black out and Jay can only feel his gaze following the blood from his lips.

"Are you going to let me back in, little one?" He purrs, but Jay shakes his head, refuses amidst a whine. The pain in his gums are back, they feel sore, sensitive, budding.

Heeseung sniffs at his hair, smells the tinge of pain.

"Where does it hurt, baby?"

He tells him and Heeseung moves, he snakes his tongue back into his mouth, but he keeps it gentle, soft, focused. He slides his tongue along Jay's gums, the organ wrapping them in a numbing sensation. It takes the pain away, it relieves it. 

Alpha spit.

"Your fangs are coming in." Heeseung whispers into him happily, proudly and Jay melts at the relief, sinking back into his shoulder. He should go. Jay needs to go, but…

The boy's eyebrow twitches, they travel down to his bite.

Heeseung smiles.

"I've got you."

And then Jay's unwrapped, he's breathed against, and then Heeseung's sucking the wound, laving all over it, drooling and licking, and Jay's head tips, it knocks against the bookshelf behind them and it comes out. They come out as a pair, like Jay could never just do one without the other when it comes to Heeseung.

Tears slip down his face and a moan cries out into the darkness and the open books Jay knocked over a couple of shelves back must start flipping, must start writing new chapters about how Jay is finally being filled, finally being closed, and just how much Jay cranes his neck for him to do it.

This must be it for him, he thinks, shaking and clutching his thighs together tightly.

There's no way out after this, there's no way he's getting away from Heeseung when he's right under his tongue: but alas, maybe hope is on Jay's side for once, maybe his luck hasn't fully run out just yet because Heeseung stills, he goes solid around Jay and Jay's too tired to fully process why, to feel the other presence in the library with them, to hear the growl that bellows low from Heeseung.

It's not at him. It's not for him. He's safe. He doesn't care.

His eyes slide close and his world tips as Heeseung nestles him on the floor, moving him until Jay's curled right under him, no part of him out of Heeseung's body line as the hybrid hunches over him, lowly, protecting every part of him.

Covering him.

Big.

There's a buzzing in his chest again, one that rattles and wants to push up his throat.

His bite tingles with the sensation of a stitching beginning to take place. The radio connects one last time before Jay passes out.

Come get him. Put him in another pair of my clothes and keep him in his room. They're back.

 

 

 

 

 

Notes:

...note to self: never underestimate how hard kiss scenes are to write...

fuuuuckk, how is everyone feeling??? lmao, this chapter took everything out of me. The way I had to keep fighting with my internet so I wouldn't lose progress and the way I have to get used to implementing scents and pheromones into the chapter since Jay can smell that shit now. Holy fucking learning curve. Not to mention, over 100k in and this is their first kiss....ya'll i'm so sorry lmao.

First day back and he's already so screwed. I swear this shit could be a comedy with a few tweaks. Worried for the boy truly, the adjustment period is kicking his ass.

Also, long as shit. The fuck do I really be talking about for 19,000 words, I'm genuinely tripping.

 

Let me know if it hits lmao!! Bye, guys. Hope you had a good time. Mwah!

Notes:

I just needed more werewolf/vampire Enhypen fics so here I am, my hand has been forced.