Chapter Text
He doesn’t plan it, not exactly. He’s beyond thinking by this point, let alone planning.
Well.
He does plan, but not more than strictly necessary. Or rather, he must have planned, but he barely remembers the when and the how now. He’s running on pure instinct.
The night starts like any other night. Wake up, stumble through rehearsal, a couple of lines and a drink to get him through the performance. His post–concert ritual is tested and proven after so many weeks on the road, the motions studied to a T. He’s outside his dressing room, an arm around Dee’s shoulder as they scan the crowd of willing victims fawning over him.
He doesn’t know when it started, when exactly pleasure started to become routine, when it became an obligation, but he rarely finds any enjoyment in it by this point. He’s disgusted by them. By their eagerness, their stupidity. He’s good at hiding it, and yes, it's easier when their drugged blood starts dancing in his veins. It's easier to pretend. Not that he would need to with them, happy as they are with every crumb of acknowledgment they get from him. Not when they barely see him as a person.
Dee makes her choice, pointing towards a tall, overzealous boy, calling him towards them with a motion of her finger. He’s cute, he can’t deny that. All legs, thin but with muscled arms and well-defined abs peeking through his sheer shirt, ginger, a dusting of pale freckles across his cheeks. But his excitement couldn’t be more of a turn-off right now. He has to stop himself from rolling his eyes when the boy squeals at being chosen.
He’s young, happy. Unsuspecting of the fate awaiting him tonight. He almost feels sorry for him. Almost.
He pulls Dee aside once they’re inside the dressing room, bringing her closer to whisper into her ear. This boy is different, he can feel it. Prettier than anyone she had ever chosen for him. He wants to bring him home tonight, if she catches his drift. She leans back, looks at him with narrowed eyes.
He can tell she’s not happy. She doesn’t like it when plans change, when there are variations to their routine. She doesn’t like not being there to supervise. But she’s also high, and agrees to make the necessary arrangements without much further convincing needed on his part.
The boy is probably drunk, most definitely high. He can see it in his eyes, smell it on him. He prepares drinks for them, something fruity and rich to mask the taste. The boy smiles at him, downs the drink in one go. Lestat smiles back.
There’s no turning back now.
Louis is pissed off. More pissed off than he has been in a long while. And concerned, because of course he is. Because even now, after all these years, after everything that’s happened, he still can’t bring himself to stop caring. No matter how long they go without talking, without seeing each other, no matter how many photos of him with other people circulate online, one call is enough to make him drop everything and get him on a plane within the hour.
He’s speeding along Santa Monica Boulevard, on a rental Chevrolet because he couldn’t be bothered to wait for a cab, because he didn’t want to risk finding a driver who cared about traffic laws more than he cared about money. He notices his teeth are grinding together, and he forces himself to take a deep breath, to relax his bruising grip on the steering wheel.
He knew it was bad. He knew he shouldn’t have let this go on for this long. He thought he was doing the right thing. Or at least trying to convince himself that he was.
Lestat didn’t want to see him. He had made it abundantly clear, and with no subtlety either. He still remembers the anger and confusion that had taken hold of him when Lestat had thrown him out, screaming at him. He remembers the sting of it, and then the realisation when the book had barely missed his face on its way out the door, following him out in the hallway, slamming against the wall behind him from the force of Lestat’s rage.
He remembers replaying the scene in his mind once he had calmed down, seeing the hurt on Lestat’s face, in his eyes.
And so he had given him space. Gave him time to let off steam, to allow the hurt to subside, to hopefully reach a point where they could have a conversation about it. Gave him time to throw his tantrum, to flaunt his fuck of the day in Louis’ face, to let him show him how good his life can be even without him.
But he knew. He had tried to look away, but he'd noticed the pattern, the spiral.
Still, he'd respected Lestat’s wishes. And that had come with a good dose of ignoring Daniel’s calls. ‘Come get your husband’, ‘we need someone who knows how to keep this psycho in check’, ‘he’s a nightmare to work with’, ‘come on Louis, can you come help just for today?’
And ignoring him hadn't been that difficult either, considering how angry he was at him for the book, how... annoyed at him for deciding to spend time with Lestat of all people after everything.
But his tone had sounded different today.
”You have to come here.”
He had heard that enough times.
“Daniel, enough. You gotta learn how to handle him if you wanna work with him.”
”Okay, let me rephrase that then. You need to be here.”
Louis had rolled his eyes, sighing in frustration.
“Actually, I don’t need to be anywh-”
“Actually, you do," Daniel hadn’t even allowed him to finish his sentence. ”I don’t care what you two’ve got going on these days. You are married, and as far as I know there's never been a divorce. In sickness and in health, right? This is sickness, and you need to be here."
Just that, no real answers before the connection had cut off. Not enough information to give him an actual idea of what he’ll walk into, but just enough to make him sick with worry for the past 5 hours. Definitely on purpose on Daniel’s part, perfect to ensure he would actually come, knowing concern and curiosity wouldn’t allow him to watch from the sidelines this time. And bringing their marriage into it... that was a real low blow.
He’s startled out of his thoughts by the GPS voice informing him that he has reached his destination, and he looks up, realising that he's driving along a long driveway, a ridiculously big house standing tall at the end of it. He parks right outside the door, which opens for him before he has even turned the engine off.
“Daniel.”
“Hey, come in. He’s sleeping now,” he greets him with a tight smile, motioning him inside before closing the door behind them.
“What happened, what did he do?”
Louis lets his eyes linger as he follows Daniel past the hallway and into the living room. It’s his first time inside Lestat’s LA home, and not exactly in the circumstances he had envisioned. He can hardly appreciate the decor with the tight knot of worry sitting on his stomach. Besides, there’s not much to appreciate. The house is too empty, almost sterile. Entirely not Lestat’s. He refuses to linger on the implications of that, banishes the image of another house it reminds him of from his head.
“He’s drugged out of his mind.”
“And? Why did you call me? What’s different from the other times?”
Daniel sucks his teeth, sighs as he sits on the couch. It’s a beautiful couch, he thinks, probably from a famous designer, probably costs a shit ton of money. But it’s grey, soulless. It looks uncomfortable, hard. He has to close his eyes for a moment.
“Listen, Louis, this... this wasn’t getting high for fun, it was... something else,” he shakes his head, splaying his hands on his thighs as he looks up at Louis with another sigh. “I found him on the floor, writhing in pain. Calling out to you. I have no idea what he managed to get into his system.”
“Jesus. Okay,” he winces, hating the picture painting itself in his mind at Daniel's words.
“He scared me. I’ve had my fair share of experiences with drugs, been around enough addicts. Enough overdoses. He scared me,” he continues, looking pointedly at Louis, his eyebrows knitted in a frown. “I know we’re vampires, but I also know what happened in 1940. So.”
He stares at him, a moment of silence passing between them before he’s able to find the words.
“I need to see him.”
“Christ, he’s burning up,” he winces, the back of his fingers pressed against the skin of Lestat’s clammy cheek. A wave of protectiveness had washed over him when he’d entered the room, his eyes landing on Lestat’s shivering form, on top of the covers in just a pair of boxers and a tank top. He was about to have a go at Daniel, scolding him for just leaving him like that, but he understands now. The concept of a fever doesn’t exactly apply to them, but they are not supposed to run this hot.
“He’s been waking up, passing out again. He’ll probably wake again soon,” Daniel starts with a sigh, leaning against the dresser with his arms crossed. “Confused, weepy, or panicked so far. I’ve been trying to keep him calm.”
“You've been here with him by yourself, this whole time?” he asks quietly, sitting on the edge of the bed, his eyes never leaving Lestat. He brings a hand to his shoulder, almost subconsciously, his thumb gently stroking the soft skin there.
“Yeah, since I called you.”
“You didn’t have to do this,” he frowns, the realisation just hitting him. Daniel has no obligations towards Lestat. Does he? Have they actually become... friends? It’s not impossible, of course not. Lestat has always been a sociable person. Still, it leaves a bitter feeling on the back of his tongue, for reasons he’s not sure he wants to analyze.
“Yeah, well. I didn’t know who else to tell. Couldn’t think of anyone he’d want here, seeing him like this. And I wasn’t gonna leave him alone in this state,” he replies, and Louis nods, swallowing around the lump in his throat. He tries to thank him, the words almost making their way past his throat before Daniel continues, positively rambling now. “Not that he would want me to see him like this either, you know, the guy really hates anyone seeing him as anything but an invincible God, but it’s not like I had any choice in the matt-”
“Whoa, that can’t be good,” Louis interrupts him hastily, his eyes widening in alarm as Lestat’s body tenses up, his muscles stiffening under his hand.
“Fuck,” Daniel curses under his breath, and Louis shoots him a confused glance when he hurries out of the room with no explanation. His attention goes back to Lestat, instinctively sitting closer and grabbing him by his biceps as his arms start twitching uncoordinately, his eyes rolled back in his head and fluttering rapidly.
He feels frozen in place, helpless as he watches him shake with increasing intensity, his eyes welling up with tears at the small involuntary groans coming out of his open lips.
“Daniel,” he calls out, his gaze still fixed on Lestat, his hands clutching his arms in a bruising grip.
“Yeah, no, it’s okay. It keeps happening,” Daniel breathes out, coming back into the room and sitting on the other side of the bed. He feels his fingers around his own hands, prying them open. “It’s okay, don’t restrain him. He’s not going anywhere.”
He watches in a daze as Daniel grabs some ice packs and places them under Lestat’s arms, keeping them against his body as best as he can with the way he’s twitching.
“You’re okay buddy, you’re okay, easy,” he whispers, scooting closer to Lestat to keep him from moving too close to the edge of the mattress. He jerks his head towards the bedside table, and Louis follows his gaze to a bowl of water he must have brought with him from the other room, another ice pack dropped inside it along with a washcloth.
“Neck, forehead,” he instructs gently, and Louis is quick to comply, grabbing the wet cloth and pressing it against Lestat’s fevered face.
“Daniel?” he hears himself asking dumbly, his voice cracking horribly around his name.
“Do you know what a seizure is?” he asks, too kindly for him, and Louis has to stop himself from snapping at him, watching through a haze of red as Lestat is obviously and unexplicably having a seizure right before his eyes.
“Yeah, of course I fucking do, yeah?” he squeezes his eyes shut, stroking Lestat’s temple with his thumb. “But we’re vampires, what the fuck?”
“Yep, and it looks like hard drugs can still fuck up our nervous system. Or maybe it’s a temperature thing, his brain getting too hot, I don’t know, but cooling him down has been helping.”
Louis stares at him for a second before nodding, breathing out shakily as Lestat’s body finally seems to slow down, a couple of weak jerks passing through his arms before he grows still again, his chest rising and falling rapidly with his breath as he recovers.
“There he is, you’re okay,” Daniel praises him with a soft smile, placing the ice packs on the bedside table and bringing a hand to Lestat’s shoulder, rubbing it gently before moving down to rest it against his chest.
Louis closes his eyes, tries to take a deep breath and gives his eyelids a tight squeeze before opening them again, forcing himself to snap out of whatever shock his body has decided to go into at seeing Lestat in such a vulnerable position.
He leans over him and cups his face between his hands, carefully guiding his head into a more comfortable and natural position against the pillow now that his neck is no longer stiff. He rinses the cloth in the bowl, squeezes the excess water out before bringing it back to Lestat’s face to wipe away the trickle of bloody spit falling from the corner of his mouth, and tosses it back on the bedside table.
“Christ. Fuck, hasn’t it been hours at this point?” he asks, still feeling a little out of breath, his voice still a bit shaky.
“Yeah.”
“Why, it shouldn’t-”
“I know. I keep expecting him to snap out of it, but each time he wakes up it seems to be getting worse instead of better.”
Louis looks up, blinking at him in concern.
“Did you ask him what the hell he took?”
“I tried, yep, he’s not talking. And very good at blocking his mind,” he frowns, looking at Lestat’s sleeping form with something heavy in his gaze. Louis recognises the look, disapproval and exasperation, a bit of amusement mixed in with the concern. Almost like a father disappointed by his unruly child. And maybe Louis doesn’t have to worry at all, maybe his concerns about their relationship are totally unfounded. Hopefully.
“But it must be some new synthetic shit, the kind that we’ll hear about in the news in a month or two,” Daniel continues with a scoff, shaking his head. “If it does this to us, I can’t imagine what’s happening in the streets. At least the shit we used was natural back in the day.”
“Do you know who he drained? Maybe we can ask them?” Louis tries again before they get too off track, but Daniel shakes his head again with a long sigh before the whole question is even out of his mouth.
“Yeah, about that… that boy's dead. Like, not a drop of blood left in his body when I found him. Already took care of it.”
Louis blinks, looking back to Lestat in confusion. He reaches a hand towards his face, gently stroking his cheek, tucking his hair behind his ear.
Lestat doesn’t kill. Not among his fans at least. Not among people that can be traced back to him. he knows that much from Daniel’s reports, and from... from before. Before everything went to shit between them.
Oh honey, he thinks. What happened here today?
“What have you tried? Did you make him vomit, get him clean blood?” he asks after a while, forcing himself to look away from Lestat.
“Yes, and yes. Not helping so far.”
Louis nods, the pit of worry in his stomach getting deeper and deeper.
“I’ll call Fareed.”
Daniel nods back.
It’s at that moment that Lestat decides to wake up, panicked and reaching out blindly with his arms, trying to grab at anything in his vicinity in his disoriented state. He almost punches Daniel in the stomach, but the other vampire firmly grabs his wrist before he can, and Louis follows his lead, holding Lestat’s other hand to stop him from hurting himself or either of them by accident.
“Hey, hey, easy. It’s okay, I got you,” Louis tries to soothe him, reaching for his shoulder with his free hand, and Lestat starts moaning unintelligibly, like he’s trying to speak but unable to, like he can't get his mouth to form the words. It does nothing to lessen his panic. “Honey, calm down. You’re safe. You just had a seizure, give yourself a minute.”
He curls up on his side, coughing wetly, and Louis remembers distantly some deep-buried knowledge on first-aid, something about having to turn people on their side so they don’t breathe in their own saliva. They had definitely not done that. Lestat wrenches his hands free from their grasp to get them under himself, pushing weakly against the mattress to prop himself up, so Louis helps to steady him with a hand against his chest while Daniel firmly rubs his back.
“We got you, it’s alright. Just cough it out,” Daniel coaches him gently, and they help him lie back down against the pillows once his breathing goes back to normal.
Louis reaches back for the washcloth, dipping it into the cold water again and bringing it back to his face, pressing it gently against his fevered skin to clean away the blood-sweat running down his forehead, on his eyebrows, on his neck. The blood congealed around his lips.
Coughing up blood, he sends mentally to Daniel, who answers him with a worried frown. Both their gazes go back to Lestat when he groans in pain, his teeth gritted and eyes squeezed shut.
“Hey, ssh, it’s okay,” he whispers, running his fingers through his hair, and Lestat’s eyes snap open, focusing on him for the first time.
“Louis?” he croaks out, the confusion and disbelief clear in his voice.
“Right here.”
“What are you...” he trails off, blinking quickly, and Louis smiles softly at him.
“Daniel called me,” he answers after debating for a bit, a half-truth, not an explanation as to why he actually answered, why he actually came when he never has before. But Lestat must know, surely, that he has been staying away because of him. For him. That he wouldn’t leave him alone while he’s sick and in pain, even if it’s because of his own stupidity. But Lestat rolls his eyes with a scoff, letting out a small laugh that quickly turns into another cough.
“Couldn’t be bothered anymore, sent the next best thing?”
Louis’ smile widens, happy to hear his voice, to hear him sound more like himself. “I’m the next best thing? You’d rather have him than me?”
He winces when Lestat’s face falls, his voice coming out broken and scared.
“No. No, I’m sorry, sorry.”
“No, hey. I was just teasing,” he reassures him, stroking his hair when a pained sob leaves his mouth, his eyes closing again against another wave of pain that Louis still can’t explain to himself. “Sssh I know, I know, I’m here.”
“I don’t feel good,” he chokes out, curling on his side, hugging his middle with his arms and bringing his knees up, close to his chest. Tears have started to silently slip from his squeezed-shut eyes.
“Yeah... overestimated what your body can handle a bit there,” he brings his hair away from his neck, uncovering the skin there so he can dab it gently with the cloth, taking care of rinsing it first. The water has turned pink by now. He can feel his throat bob as he swallows, his pulse hummingbird fast under his fingers. “Ssshh, you’ll be okay.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Only person you need to apologize to right now is yourself, Les,” he sighs, drying his tears with the towel even as they keep coming. He starts running a hand up and down his back when his breathing starts quickening, a little too fast for his liking. “Hey, don’t worry, we’ll ride this out together, yeah? You’re not alone.”
He frowns at the wheezing sounds starting to come from the back of his throat, at the way his chest seems to heave painfully with each breath.
“Louis,” Daniel calls his name in alarm, and he gets up from his sitting position, kneeling down on the floor next to the bed so he can be at eye level with Lestat, to really look at him and try to understand what’s going on. His eyes widen when he meets his gaze, unfocused and slightly panicked, staring right through him before his eyes roll back in his head, thankfully focusing back on him when Louis gives him a hard shake.
“Whoa, Lestat. Hey, look at me. Are you having trouble breathing?”
He nods, his eyes filling with tears. It prompts Louis to cup his cheek, running his thumb on his skin. “Daniel, call Fareed for me. Now,” he orders without averting his gaze from Lestat.
“Call Faree- I don’t have his number?”
“He’s a vampire, just- please,” he snaps with growing panic, but Daniel doesn’t seem to take offense at him, nodding quickly before answering.
“Right. On it,” he grabs something, leaving the room just as Lestat starts to actually cry, small sobs making their way past his lips between labored breaths.
“I’m scared,” he whispers, and Louis gets back on the bed, lying next to him and gathering him in his arms, pulling him close but careful not to squeeze him too much.
“Hey, hey, no need to be scared. You’ll be okay, I promise. We’re getting you help.”
He leaves a gentle kiss on his forehead, another on the crown of his head, stroking his back as Lestat’s shivering intensifies, what had been occasional groans of pain until now turning into choked off screams.
“Honey, where does it hurt?” he urges, trying to keep his tone calm despite his growing anxiety to avoid freaking out Lestat even more.
“Everywhere. Like, stabbing, everywhere,” he gasps, hissing and pressing his head against Louis' chest. His hands are gripping his back, his nails digging painfully in Louis’ skin, but he can’t find it in himself to care. “My... eyes are burning.”
Louis shakes his head, completely at a loss. What the hell's taking Daniel so long?
“You need to drink something.”
“I can’t. Hurts.”
“It already hurts. We’re gonna try anyway.”
He gets out of Lestat’s arms much to his protest, and decides to sit him up, if not to make him drink at least in the hopes that it will help a bit with his breathing. He grabs him under his armpits and lifts him up, scooting him back on the mattress and leaning his back against the headboard.
He gets up to grab a blood bag, and uses his vampiric speed to make a quick dash to the kitchen, not wanting to leave Lestat alone for too long. Still, the house is big, and unfamiliar, and by the time he’s back in the bedroom, after thirty seconds at most, Lestat is leaning forward, his head hanging limply as he throws up on his own lap.
He rushes forward, quickly leaving the blood bags on the dresser and gathering Lestat’s hair in his hands, keeping it out of his face.
“Whoa, whoa, okay. Shit. Shit.”
“I’m sorry,” he slurs, heaving again in the middle of a sob.
“It’s okay, it’s alright. Let it out, it’s okay,” Louis winces, moving all his hair into one hand so he can rest the other against his back, rubbing it gently with his thumb.
“We’re lucky, Fareed’s in the area, he- Jesus.” Daniel is back in the room, staring at the scene in front of him with wide eyes, his phone in his hand with the screen turned towards the ceiling. Louis assumes the doctor to be on the other end of the line.
“I made him sit him up, I think it made him nauseous,” Louis looks at Daniel with a grimace, moving his hand to rub Lestat’s chest when he breathes in with a particularly harsh wheeze. Fareed’s voice comes immediately from the speaker.
“I don’t like his breathing, Louis. And what Daniel described to me is concerning. He needs to tell us what he took.”
Louis’ eyes widen when Lestat’s body starts tilting forward, going limp like he’s about to pass out again.
“Hey, whoa.” He pushes gently against his chest, making him lean back against the headboard. “Baby? Breathe, look at me.”
“Am I going to die?” he whispers, his words slurred, barely intelligible, and Louis quickly cups his cheeks between his hands, vehemently shaking his head.
“What? No, no. Hey, you’ll be okay. Les-”
Daniel sits on the bed, almost shoving him aside in his haste, and grabs Lestat by his biceps, shaking him a bit to get him to focus on him.
“Lestat, sweetheart, look at me. What did you take?”
He shakes his head, trying to escape his gaze, weakly trying to push them off. They are crowding him, and Lestat is panicking again, but he knows they don’t have much time before he’ll lose consciousness again; he can see it in his eyes. So he forces himself to shut up, pushes down his instinct to tell Daniel to back off, to be gentler with him.
“You can tell us. We won’t be mad, no one is mad at you. We just need to know, to help you,” Daniel tries to reason with him again, but Lestat just starts crying again, his eyes fluttering before they slip closed. Daniel shakes him again.
“Stay awake. Lestat.”
“No. Louis will-”
“Louis won’t be mad either. Right, Louis?”
Daniel looks pointedly at him.
Snap out of it, man. Say something, he hears projected in his mind, and he quickly shakes himself, leaning back into Lestat’s personal space, reaching out to caress his face.
“I won’t. It’s okay, you can tell us, baby.”
The wall is crumbling, and the endearment coupled with another wave of agony passing through Lestat seems to finally do the trick, making him finally hiss out an answer between a gasp.
“Not... not a drug.”
Louis shakes his head, a newfound dread taking hold of him.
“What are you talking about, what do you mean?”
Lestat looks him in the eyes, a brief flash of clarity in them.
“It’s... it’s cyanide.”