Chapter Text
He isn't sure how or why but Avid has found himself stuck in a hole. His head is pounding and his ankle is twice as big as it should be. He groans and reaches a hand out to clutch at his head, only to find something warm and sticky coating his hair and hand.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. We don’t need you bleeding even more now do we?” The smooth, confident voice of Scott freezes Avid in place. Something is off about his tone, Avid notes, less condescending than it usually is. The thought gets overshadowed quickly by the panic that rises in Avid.
“Wha-huh? Scott? Why are you- OW” Avid whips his head around fast to look at the source of Scott's voice. Too fast, judging by the sharp pain and sudden dizziness that knocks him off balance. Avid stumbles, accidentally putting too much weight on his bad ankle, and with a cry he crashes to the ground. Or at least, he would have, if it weren’t for the arms that have wrapped themselves around him, holding him up with unnatural strength.
“Careful, now. We wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.” Scott says from way closer than he ought to be. “Or even more than you already are, that is.”
Avid goes beet-red. “Well. It’s not like I chose this, now is it. Besides, what are you even doing here? What do you want from me? Don’t you have something better to do than tormenting me?” Avid bites out. He jerks away, out of Scott's grip. His hand comes up to hold his head again when another jolt of pain shoots through it.
“What do you mean? You are the reason we’re here in the first place. If anything, I should ask You what you want from me” Avid must be imagining things because even though Scott sounds very offended, he is pretty sure it is concern he sees in his crimson eyes, as they flicked around his body, as if to check that Avid isn’t going to fall over again.
“What are you talking about? I don’t want anything from you. I haven’t even done anything to you. I was just going to- I was looking for… I- why can’t I-? What did you do to me?” Avid begins angrily. His hands are searching his pockets for something to use against the vampire in front of him. Something, anything, some garlic, a clump of silver, his stake. He can’t find any of it. “Where? What did you do with my stuff? Where did you put it?”
“What did I do? I haven’t done anything to you. You are the one screaming about vampires and how evil we are since day one. You are the one accusing me of murder when you can’t find someone for five minutes. I would never hurt Shelby. I happen to like her, I’ll let you know. I just want to rebuild my castle and be left alone to live my un-life in peace.” Scott stalks toward Avid until the hunter's back is pressed against the smooth walls of the hole. He jabs his finger to Avid's chest.
“And I only took your weapons because I don’t particularly wish to be trapped in this hole with a stab-happy, delirious, self-proclaimed vampire hunter.”
“Excuse me. I am a professional, experienced, vampire hunter, thankyouverymuch. I killed one, before. … or at least, I think she was a vampire- no she must’ve been. She would’ve never-” Avid trails off “Wait. What do you mean, trapped? Isn’t one of your so-called ‘perks’ that you practically can’t be trapped? Can’t you just you-know bat out? Lunge? Teleport? You’re always going on about how being a vampire is this great gift. Shouldn’t you be able to get out easily?”
“See, now you would think that, however, there is something that is blocking my powers. It feels similar to standing too close to a holy beacon, but there are none of those anywhere near here.” Scott complains “as if the beacons weren’t enough of a danger by themselves.”
The last part was spoken softly, more an afterthought than anything. Avid has the feeling he wasn’t supposed to hear it. So he gathers the little bit of self preservation he has, not wanting to aggravate the vampire if they are indeed stuck here together. Instead Avid turns his focus to the wall, looking for any way they can get out of this mess as soon as possible. The pit they’ve found themselves in is about eight blocks deep with a four block ground. Deep enough they can’t get out but light can still get in, and wide enough they would be able to sit down without touching each other.
“Hey Scott. Do you have any blocks? This hole isn’t too deep. We can probably tower out.” Avid turns back to the other. Scott had also turned his attention to the walls. Scratching his claws across the smooth surface.
“Oh right, why haven’t I thought of that yet! Let me just, a stack of cobble stone, and oh I have ladders right here! Whatever would I do without an Avid to point out the obvious.” Scott's words are dripping with sarcasm, turning to a sneer at the end. “No, of course I don’t have anything! Do you really think I wouldn’t have simply left you behind if it was that easy?”
“Doesn’t hurt to ask. I didn’t know ok.” Avid tries to defend himself. It might not have been the smartest idea, sure, but his head hurts and he can barely think. That’s not his fault. Or maybe it is, if Scott is telling the truth about how he is the reason they ended up here. “I don’t have any on me either. I had some silver, but someone decided to throw it away. We could have used it to make a pickaxe or something.”
“Oh? Pray tell me how you were planning to do that. I don’t see a way to craft here. So unless you have enough wood for both a crafting table and a couple of sticks, your plan would not have worked either way.” Scott is now fully turned towards Avid, pausing his search along the walls to glare at him.
“uh, well… You don’t have anything useful either. So!” Avid knows he is being immature. He can’t help it, Scott is just so infuriating!
“No, I don’t. I was out hunting. I don’t need anything to help me with that, and there is no reason to have unnecessary weight slowing me down. How was I to know you would somehow manage to trap us both in an eight block deep hole? Truly, how did you manage to mess up this badly? I know you’re not the smartest, but seriously.” If they were in any other scenario, Avid would have laughed at the theatrics of the vampire, but unfortunately this situation is disastrous enough as it is.
“Hey! I’m plenty smart. I was the brains between me and my partner, I’ll let you know. Besides, you keep saying that. That I’m the reason we’re stuck here. I don’t even remember how I got here. I left Oakhurst to …do something, and next thing I know I’m here. How am I to blame for that?” Avid exclaims in frustration, throwing his hands in the air. He immediately stumbles and sinks to the ground in pain. No arms catching him this time. How could he have forgotten his head and ankle already?
“You don’t remember?” Scott's tone takes on a much softer tone, and his stance loses some of its confidence. He looks at Avid with something dangerously close to concern. Why would Scott be concerned? Avid squeezes his eyes shut as another wave of pain hits him. When he opens them again, Scott is crouched in front of him. He grabs Avid's face and reaches a hand up to his head. Avid jerks his head back, out of Scott's grasp, and immediately regrets it as he hits his head on the wall behind him.
“Wh-what are you doing?” Avid will never admit he is scared.
“Checking your head. Your injury must be worse than it looks if it’s affecting your memory. Now, stay still. I’ll need to wrap this and I would rather not get blood everywhere if it can be avoided. Do you know how hard these clothes are to clean?” Scott goes to hold his head again.
“No. I’m fine. Let me go!” Avid protests. He tries to move away but only succeeds to press himself further against the wall.
“Quit being so difficult, now will you? Do you want to die of blood loss? You are not doing a good job at convincing me you are smart. Now, do you have any bandages?”
Avid shakes his head, or at least, tries to. Scott's hand keeps him firmly in place. “No, I have nothing on me.”
“What about these?” Scott hums thoughtfully, tracing a claw along the bandages that cover Avid's neck.
“No!” Avid protests loudly “those are for my woun- I mean, I’m not going to uncover my neck when I’m trapped with a vampire.”
Scott scoffs at Avid's blatant lying but lets it go. “You are lucky that your bleeding is annoyingly distracting, I happen to like this one.”
Before Avid can wonder what he means, Scott loosens the cravat from around his own neck and wraps it around the wound with a surprising gentleness.
“Why are you doing this?” Avid asks carefully, any fear left changing to confusion. “Don’t you hate me?”
“Surprisingly, I do not. I find you to be annoying and a bother, yes, but I don’t hate you.” Scott answers honestly, maybe a bit too honest, because his next words are spoken with an apathy that Avid now is pretty sure is fake.
“If I have to be stuck here, I’d rather it not be with a corpse. That would be just unsanitary. Besides you’ll make a decent leverage if the townsfolk find us before my coven does, or we somehow manage to escape by ourselves.
Now, stay there and give your head some rest. I’d hate to see my efforts towards keeping you alive go to waste.” With that Scott pushes himself to his feet and turns back to the walls, resuming his examination.
Avid's head is turning and throbbing with questions, confusion, and pain. He keeps his eyes on the vampire, stubbornly refusing to go to sleep. Even though the sun has long since made way for the red light of the moon. His body is less willing to stay awake, and it is not long before his eyes slip shut.