The Dragon's Lair

[void31]

"Because we're sixteen stories underground, that's why." His long legs allowed him to take the steps two at a time, and he did so the entire way up. Several flights later, his breath had begun to quicken.


He fiddled with the key ring for a moment too long (a moment of distraction more than anything) and unlocked the door at the final landing. A wave of cool air greeted them from the surrounding darkness. Victor exhaled.


He put his hand on Nicolas' back to urge him ahead, locking the door behind them once they'd both clustered inside the tiny mud room within. He seemed all but oblivious to the close proximity; he had to jam his arm up against Nicolas' back just to fit, which sped the process of unlocking the next door considerably. He wasn't used to leaving his own home with more than himself.


Outside, the sights and sounds of the concrete jungle pulsed against Victor's senses. It was late afternoon, a hot fucking day and boisterous as ever. They'd emerged from an inconspicuous side door of a high-rise hotel. Above them, the Empire State Building glowed in the sun like a grandiose glass beacon.


Victor turned and beckoned to Nicolas. "Come on, kid. We're walking."

 

[kindaemissary]

Sixteen stories, Nicolas thought to himself. A long way to go if you were running from someone. He wondered if Victor picked the location because it made for a hard escape. There was a high chance that he didn't make his living decisions due to how easy it was to imprison and kill people inside of them, but it was possible. Victor even pointed it out himself: he was a weird person. Confusing, too.


A little more intriguing than Nicolas would like to admit.


When they reached the top and they were forced to get closer, Victor's hand on the small of his back, Nicolas's core gave a slight shiver. Not enough to pick up on if someone was watching him, but there was no doubt that Victor felt the twitch. He didn't like standing next to the older man; it made him feel edgy. With everything that he knew about Victor, even though it wasn't much, he had a reason to be wary. The man was a fucking anomaly. It wasn't normal to kill people, to threaten people into doing what you wanted.


He stepped away from Victor once they got outside the building. He had to do a double take of his surroundings - how were they in the heart of the city? People were everywhere. Shopping, getting lunch, just taking a stroll. Aria was a good fifty blocks from his house. There was no way he had walked all the way from the rave to the center of the city. And he definitely didn't make it down sixteen flights of stairs on accident.


"You brought me there," Nicolas accused, and he fell into step next to Victor. His face contorted into a bitter glower as he glared towards the older man. "You made me feel like I trespassed on your property and had stepped over some kind of boundary line, but I didn't do anything. What did you do, drug me? I was drunk, but not enough to forget everything that happened last night."


He huffed violently, crossed his arms over his chest, and looked down the street and away from Victor. "You actively sought me out and took me with you," he said. Even if it wasn't all true, what he was saying, there had to be some part of it that fell into line with what Victor had done to get him there. "Do you get how severely fucked up that is?"

 

[void31]

"Sure," Victor responded matter-of-factly. He gave a nonchalant shrug as he turned down the street, his long strides in heated competition with the casual pace of the boy at his side. Oh, he knew it was fucked--but when there was no one around to judge him for the fucked things he did, he usually didn't have much reason to care that they were fucked. Hell, even if there were someone around to judge him, he still couldn't imagine a scenario in which anyone's feelings were more important than his livelihood.


He swerved expertly around a telephone pole ringed with homeless beggars bearing their crude cardboard signs: Deaf and mute. Homeless vet. I used to be a dancer.





He didn't like being lied to.


"I didn't drug you," Victor sneered, long after the appropriate time frame for supplying a response had closed. He spoke like he'd been insulted, like the idea that he could actually drug someone was nothing less than vile. "But you were already drunk enough that I could knock you out pretty quick. Someone saw me carryin' you out to the street and asked if I was your dad. Shit, I look like your dad?" He turned to look briefly at Nicolas with an expression fraught with disgust. "Anyway, I called a cab, and yeah, I brought you down there." It'd been less difficult than he'd imagined. Wasted teenagers weren't all that observant, and cab drivers almost always minded their own business. The parking lot at The Strand had been relatively empty around that time of night, as per usual.


He stopped at a crosswalk and put his hand on Nicolas' shoulder, pulling him away from the cluster of people that had gathered at the curb. He leaned in close and stared intensely into pretty dark pools of the young man's eyes. "I don't do that shit for everyone, you know. You're lucky you weren't a fighter."


Victor clapped him on the shoulder as if they'd just been discussing his latest test grade. He returned to the crowd just as they had begun to cross, though he lagged considerably behind. He had to call over the dull roar of the intersection just to be heard. "It might be fucked, but so are you."

 

[kindaemissary]

"But you did take me," Nicolas pointed out, and that was the real problem he needed to dig at. "That's pretty much kidnapping." The entire thing was insane, all of it. The fact that Victor was actually able to take him off the streets, or even out of Aria, and a single person didn't try to stop him. He knew that side of the city didn't pay too much attention to crime unless it was something that concerned them, but wasn't there supposed to be some kind of pack mentality at clubs? It left a little more to wonder. Someone else could have come along and taken him just like Victor did, but he could be in a much worse situation. Victor actually let him go, even if it was with menace.


And Victor decidedly didn't look old enough to be his dad, but Nicolas wasn't about to soothe his ego.


He felt Victor's hand on him before he was pulled back away from everyone else. A little bit of dread linger in him each time the man touched him, and he wanted to jerk away, but the pull in Victor's eyes, staring straight into his, was too hard to look away from.


"I didn't ask you to do anything for me in the first place," he bit back, and as he wrenched his body away from Victor, rolling his shoulders in abhorrence. The cluster of people made their way through traffic, him and Victor walking with them. "You probably think you're making me feel like all of this is my fault, but I'm not stupid." Then again, he was still walking along since Victor and making, even though it wasn't amicable, conversation.


Nicolas twisted his neck to look at Victor's profile with a leer. "I'm not going to get home and rethink my entire existence because you got in my head, so don't get ahead of yourself." He intertwined his arms again and heaved heavily out of his mouth.


"And I'm not fucked," he snapped back at him like a child. They had made it another block, stopped again at a crosswalk. He turned his body so that he was facing his entirety towards Victor. Now that he wasn't sitting on the floor, he didn't stagger overtop of him. Nicolas was still a few inches shorter than him, but not enough to make him feel powerless. "You're fucked. You're the one who," he stopped himself from continuing the sentence. He glanced around the group of people gather and leaned in towards Victor. "You're the one who did all of that shit for kicks, and who undoubtedly ruined my entire morning. I could have already got rid of my hangover if it wasn't for you."

 

[void31]

Victor snorted and tossed his head like an ill-mannered animal, his lips stretched to expose a grin that was far from amused. "Oh, poor you," he all but bellowed. "The hangover is the least of your worries, kiddo. I think you oughta focus more on the fact that you're rambling on and on about not being affected by what I'm saying. It's making it hard to believe you."


He watched the little white person flash onto the screen at the other side of the street, and they were moving again, automatically. A trickle of blood through the iron veins of this beastly city.


"And I didn't do all that shit for kicks." There was a bitter twinge to his voice now. "I did it because you were sticking your nose where you shouldn't. You are fucked. Normal kids don't go on crime-hunting sprees."


They were promptly swamped by buzzing thickets of shoppers and businessmen as soon as they arrived on the opposite curb. Victor stiffened. He never would have stayed in this city if he disliked it even the slightest bit, but the crowds were a hellish price to pay for effective concealment. He liked to keep his physical interactions restricted to three major categories--friends, family, and whoever he brought home on those extremely rare but needy nights of unbearable loneliness. Tunneling through hot, sticky bodies under the broiling East Coast sun was not among his favorite intimacies.


He kept his eyes low, trained on the sidewalk whenever they could afford to be. Nicolas' words rolled in his mind; he was fucked, wasn't he? Huh. As expected, he found little reason to care, but it was a surreal experience nevertheless--he'd never thought of how truly deranged it was to stalk a teenager for months, essentially kidnap him, and proceed to threaten his friends and family with violent death if he ever shared the experience. Relatively speaking, of course.


Victor cast Nicolas a brief sideways glance. He was taking this pretty well.

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas glared at Victor and rolled his eyes a moment later. "Even if you didn't do this for kicks," he started, gesturing towards himself and the air around him, "and what you're saying is true, that I'm this giant problem in your life and somehow, unbeknownst to your existence, I brought this experience upon myself, what's your reason for everything else?" He pointed back towards the direction they came from, towards the Empire State Building in the background. "You need a reason for everything you've been doing, or you're doing it wrong. You're not doing it for attention, otherwise the cuts would be cleaner. It'd be prettier."


He scratched at the side of his neck and looked at him. "So what are you doing this for? Since it's not for kicks."


Victor looked almost as uncomfortable as Nicolas felt, but they probably weren't for the same reasons. Nicolas was still fidgety, anxious, all of that. He couldn't shake the feeling of danger. They were walking along one of the busiest streets he had been on in a while, but he normally didn't spend too much time in the city during the day. He should feel more comfortable with all the people around, and while it helped a tad to ease his nerves, it wasn't enough.


They walked another block and turned left before the crosswalk. He still had close to ten minutes until he was close to his house, so there was no shaking Victor off for now. He just had to deal with this for a little while longer, and after getting home and locking his doors, he wouldn't have to see Victor again. He'd picture the man in his mind, no doubt, and probably in his nightmares. But a bad dream was still better off than having to view him in the flesh again.


It was lunch time, and people just kept pushing through the crowd, and too many times Nicolas was pushed into Victor's side through the foot traffic. "If you're still worrying about me coming back, don't. I've had enough of this to last me a lifetime. I'll leave your little side project alone." One part of him wanted to go back towards Aria, just to tempt Victor and make him rethink letting Nicolas go, and the other part wanted to find someway to tell the cops. He wouldn't, not with the threat of death looming over him, but he couldn't stop his mind from going back there.


They stopped at another crosswalk, and Nicolas put some distance between them. "But if I can figure something out, and I'm 'a child', like you say, you have to think about how easy it's going to be for someone with real training to find you. You can't keep doing this forever."

 

[void31]

Victor wore an expression of clear displeasure, his brow furrowed just low enough to highlight the shallow frown lines at the corners of his eyes. "I don't think it's any of your business why I'm doing what I'm doing, or how I'm doing it," he said coolly. He'd turned to face Nicolas again when they stopped at the next intersection, the acrid stench of cigarette smoke and gasoline singeing his tongue whenever he opened his mouth. It was this insatiable curiousity that he had such a problem with—who the hell actually asked a serial killer why they killed? Did the guy not know that he could very well drag him back into the nearest alley and leave him behind a Dumpster with a broken neck, no questions asked? This was NYC, for Christ's sake, no one gave a shit about anyone.


Victor merely sniffed at the implied threat. "I appreciate the concern," he growled. One hand flew out to give Nicolas the briefest swat across the temple, a gesture that could be seen as perfectly harmless, even playful from a distance. "But I think you underestimate me. You think I don't know how law enforcement?" He gave a disdainful sniff. "I'm aware that cops can do their jobs. The only reason I picked on you, Sherlock, was because of your rich daddy."


He turned another corner and was relieved to find a significantly thinner crowd on the other side. "Hell, maybe if he paid a little more attention to you, I'd actually have a reason to be worried." Victor's mouth twisted. "So I guess you're right then, Wesley. This whole thing was completely pointless. Guess I must just like ya a whole lot, huh?"


Though his sarcasm was ceaseless on the outside, Victor was careful to consider Nicolas' words. It wasn't like he'd never felt threatened by the NYPD, but they were usually fairly avoidable, if one had his wits about him. Nosy teenagers—not so much. He'd have to move again if they got too close to him. At least now he'd have a name if it happened; he'd know who to come after. He'd know who tipped them off, even after he'd given some very specific ideas of what might happen to said person and their loved ones if such an unfortunate thing were to occur. Victor Grange did not make empty threats.

 

[kindaemissary]

"It might be partially because of who my dad is and all of that shit, but I would have found you even if you didn't find me first." Nicolas squared his jaw and crossed his arms over his chest, not before elbowing Victor in the side first to keep up with playfully tight smile. "And I don't see what he has to do with any of this. You want money? Should have kept me there then. Otherwise, he's a useless piece of shit. He's not good for anything aside from making money. My parents don't even have sex anymore, so there's nothing going for him but the cash flow."


Nic's father knew what he thought about him to an extent. They fought most of the time they were home at the same time, but David Cardou always got the last word. The man was a work of art, a true visionary in the eyes of Fortune 500 Magazine, but on the homefront with was a worthless lug of shit that Nicolas used for funds.


Victor's words didn't matter. His father might not give him the time of day, and while that might of bugged him when he was a child, he had gotten over the fact that his father was never going to be a successful parent. His mother was only just above him considering she made sure that he was actually taken care of. David spent most of his life working behind the screen of a computer, or like Nicolas figured out last year, buying out local businesses in Long Island.


"But whatever right," he said with a shrug. "I don't have to prove anything to you. I'm not going to say anything, so we won't see each other again. It's a win-win for both of us. You can continue on ruining people's lives and I don't have to deal with you in my life after this." He glanced towards Victor, not moving his head, and then focused his attention back ahead of him.


Going to the authorities, or anyone really, would be a death sentence. Even if he had a touch a doubt, he wasn't about to test the waters. Nicolas wasn't stupid.

 

[void31]

Victor hummed in curt reply. "I didn't say because of your relationship. I've got all the money I need." That much was evident in everything from the way he dressed to the way he spoke. His extreme peevishness and colorful vocabulary had been adopted from his father almost to a T; it was his mother, dark, smart, and beautiful, who had granted him with sharp looks and persistent wit. Needless to say, he was considerably more grateful to the latter when it came to garnering his wealth from the vulnerabilities of doe-eyed tourists--even though she'd turned out to be a piece of shit in the end.


Victor liked to think of himself as intelligent, if only in certain areas of life. He'd never touched a college diploma, but he did know which stocks to invest in, how to cozy up to a politician who needed a favor, and when exactly he should wriggle out of sight on the better end of a credit scam. So no, he didn't need money. He existed through the weaknesses of others. He slipped into their hearts and minds and fed upon their sturdiest faults. Hell, as a kid he'd been so damn skinny that he could rub some dirt on his cheeks and sit on the street for no more than half an hour and have at least five dollars at his feet before lunch.


Because he was cute. Because he looked hungry. Because he'd bathed them in crocodile tears. Because they were all so goddamn naive.


He could have asked for a ransom. It wasn't like he'd be deviating from being a piece of shit by doing so. Considering Nicolas' father was obviously a very wealthy man, he probably could have raked in a fortune too.


But Victor didn't like to think of himself that way. A captor. Besides, it was too easy to catch that kind of moron. If he so much as spoke to Nicolas' father, or anyone about what he'd done, they'd be on his ass in a week.


Then he'd have to move again, and just when he'd started to like The Empire State.


It was a good idea, though.


"As adamant as you are about keepin' quiet, I'm gonna hold it to you, kid." Victor cast him a solemn sideways glance. Nicolas seemed exceptionally eager about not breathing a word, which, in Victor's experience, was a surefire sign of desperation. Like begging for your life beneath the barrel of a gun. What if he cracked?


Well, they both knew what would happen if he cracked.


Victor glanced up again, resting his eyes on a typical, high-rise building he'd become remarkably familiar with over the last several months. His mouth twitched. "Your parents home?"

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas scoffed at the question and gave a small smirk. It was almost like Victor wasn't listening at all. "My parents are never home," he laughed. "And on a Saturday? My mother probably already left pilates and is having lunch at her country club. My dad's barely there too sleep."


Living in a house all by himself was lonely, but neither of his parents said anything when he had people over and threw parties or got noise violations from the building. That had only happened a few times so it wasn't that big of a deal. His parents just paid the fine and left him alone for another night where he ended up throwing another party and having it happen again. His parents weren't too happy, but he was, like, sixteen. They couldn't kick him out. Well, they probably could, but they didn't. They had an image to uphold.


The outside of his building was entirely glass above the third level. The HOA fees were through the roof. The second floor had two large restaurants and a couple business offices, but everything above that was condominiums. The condo that he lived in was too floor and had an open floor plan, but a lot of them were different. He had only been inside a couple in his building, but one of his friends from high school had a single-level condo with two bedrooms. He had three.


He shifted his attention to Victor for a moment before looking back towards the front doors of the complex. "So, is this it?" he asked, and he placed on hand on his hip. "Or you gonna be a gentlemen and walk me up?"

 

[void31]

An exasperated half-sneer curled his shapely mouth. "I'll do more than that." Little prick.


Again he seized Nicolas by the collar, towing him through the glass doors without hesitation. There was a familiar tremble in his hands that had gradually worsened over the course of their delightful journey, despite the temporary calm that came from such strenuous excursions. Victor knew of only one remedy to soothe such an ailment.


He brushed off multitudes of dubious glances as he cleared the lobby and punched the button for the elevator. The fifteen second wait was spent in stubborn silence, his fingers still curled into the smooth fabric of Nicolas' shirt. When silver doors parted for them, he punched the proper button as if he'd done so a thousand times before.


Then he guided Nicolas to his own front door, tightened his grip on the boy's collar, and leaned in close enough for his breath to stir the hair near the boy's face. "Unlock it, Sherlock."

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas hated the fact that he was almost getting used to Victor dragging him around by the collar. It was cheating, he thought, to a game that he didn't even want to play in the first place. He saw one of his neighbors in the lobby watching him with a dubious facial expression, but he looked away before she said anything to him. That would be a story he didn't want to explain. Yeah, you know. It was a typical friday night. Went out to a rave, hung out in a library, and now I'm bringing a serial killer up to my home. Just the youzhe. He didn't think his parents would enjoy that story when they were dead or whatever Victor decided to do.


He figured Victor would let go of him when they got into the elevator, but he thought wrong. He tried to wiggle out of the grip, but Victor's hands jut tightened into the fabric. "Jesus, you're so fucking pushy," he muttered, and he reached into his front pocket and fished out his keys. He unlocked the front door of the house and pushed it open.


"You happy?" he asked turning his face to the older man. He managed to walk inside a foot before the shirt stopping giving him leverage. "This what you wanted? To make sure I got inside and didn't just run down to the closest police station or something? I already told you; not going to talk."

 

[void31]

"Oh, sure. That's part of it." In the last few minutes he seemed to have all but forgotten the fact that he'd been awfully threatening about that earlier. Victor released Nicolas abruptly, running a hand through his sandy hair and scratching the back of his neck all in the same motion. "Listen, where does your old man keep--" His eyes were darting erratically around the interior of the apartment. He seemed to have spaced out into a state of complete obliviousness to the current conversation.


He stepped freely into the room and brushed past Nicolas, his trembling hands shoved into his pockets in an attempt to make them less conspicuous. His desperation led him winding through the house like a blind puppy until he came upon the kitchen. He scanned the counter tops and the back of the stove and leaned back against the sink, craning his neck to peer up at the top of the refrigerator. Finally, he drew his hands from his pockets and began rooting through various cabinets, as shamelessly as if this were his own home.


"The good stuff, the hard liquor, where does your dad keep it?" A hint of festering frustration could be heard within his urgent tone. He gestured wildly as his eyes darted around the room, searching wildly for the only thing he grew more and more desperate for as the seconds ticked by.


Victor had not touched alcohol in almost precisely one year. Sure, he smoked his lungs dry three times a week, like any typical East Coast scumbug, but he prided himself on the fact that he had not been intoxicated for nearly a decade--a shockingly monumental accomplishment for someone of his upbringing.


Nevertheless, he couldn't say that he never touched the stuff--he was a stress drinker like Nicolas was a stress smoker. Full-blown anxiety attacks were fairly uncommon for him (and conveniently enough, always popped up at the shittiest of times), but hard alcohol was always the quickest cure. If he had to steal it straight from the parent of someone he'd just essentially kidnapped to stop his shaking hands and throbbing heart, so be it.

 

[kindaemissary]

"Hey, calm down," Nicolas said walking behind Victor, and he headed towards a lower cabinet on the other side of the kitchen. "I'll get you something, okay? Just don't destroy my house." He opened the door and kneeled to the floor before he set two bottles of Absolut vodka on the granite countertop followed by a bottles of Famous Grouse and Maker's Mark American Whiskey.


The mood in the room changed as soon as they entered the house, and Nicolas wasn't entirely sure what happened, but Victor almost seemed to be losing it. Compared to the vicious man from earlier, this version of Victor was antsy and restless. He pretended not to notice the older man's constant body-shaking vibrations. He might not have had any positive feelings regarding him, but Nicolas wasn't about to make the situation two thousand times worse.


He grabbed a small glass from the counter behind him and tossed it across the counter towards Victor. "Help yourself," he offered. It's not like his father would miss a couple pints of scotch. He had money to get more.


"I didn't peg you as an alcoholic," he muttered quietly, and he pulled out one of the island stools and stood next to it. He should probably charge his phone since he was home, but he didn't wan to leave Victor to roam around on his own. Especially if he was drinking. "You know, alcohol doesn't solve your problems, whatever they are." It was hypocritical to say it considering his smoking, but cigarettes didn't leave him intoxicated. Alcohol did. "But whatever, drink whatever you want. I'm gonna get something to eat." He walked over and pulled out a carton of eggs from the center of the fridge. "Let me know if you want anything," he added as an afterthought with a short chuckle.

 

[void31]

"I am not--" Victor shuddered, scowling at the Absolut that spilled around the brim of the glass by way of his quivering fingers. "--an alcoholic."


He had to hold the glass with both hands in order to maneuver it to his mouth with minimal spillage. He wasn't an alcoholic. He didn't drink--he rarely drank. It wasn't the alcohol that was causing this.


He carefully traced Nicolas' movements with his eyes, if only to have something solid to focus on so the violent tilting of the room didn't throw him into a fit of nausea. The rising heat and glass walls were not particularly helpful.


Victor cringed as his teeth chattered violently against the brim. Jesus Christ, he'd never been this bad. What the hell was wrong with him? He choked back more than he should have and coughed, squinting against a sheen of tears. Slow the hell down. He set the drink down on the counter and drew in a deep breath.


Was he hungry? He tried to recall the last time he'd eaten. Victor was about as impartial to food as he was to alcohol. He'd always been relatively thin, and the act of eating itself was consistently unappealing to him. He had breakfast some days, lunch rarely, and dinner most of the time, though it often wasn't very remarkable. He snacked, usually--lunch meat here, granola bar there. It didn't take much to satisfy his appetite. He had the metabolism of a slug.


"Don't bother," he mumbled, his voice somewhat raspy from his fit earlier. He'd wrapped his fingers around the circumference of the glass in hopes to keep them steady, though his attempt was only half-successful.


He raised his head and turned somewhat to examine Nicolas more closely. "And if I had problems that needed solving, I wouldn't use vodka."

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas cracked an egg into the pan already heating up on the stove. He kept hearing the fidgeting sound of Victor behind him and couldn't help but turn around. "Seriously, what are you freaking out about? Are you dying or something?"


In elementary school, he had watched one of his classmates pass out after eating peanuts due to an allergy. The kid had almost died in the hospital, but somehow he managed to pull through. It was like he was watching that happen all over again now, except this wasn't a dietary problem. Victor had been practically shaking since the moment he first appeared in front of Nicolas in the library. This had been evolving the entire time.


"Dude, you need to breathe," he said, and he walked away from the burner to reach out and take the glass from Victor's hands. The constant jittering was setting him off a bit and he grabbed a water bottle out of the fridge and put it in front of the other man. "Are you having an anxiety attack right now?"


The egg started to make noises behind him and Nicolas moved to the stove, broke the yolk, and flipped it onto the other side.


"You should sit down," Nicolas added, and he walked around and put one of the stools next to Victor. This particular situation was slightly more offputting than Victor threatening his life earlier. He was in his home and his kitchen counter, drinking his alcohol, and casually having some sort of meltdown. "I can turn the fan on," he offered pointing up, and he went to the switchboard anyway and started the spin cycle above them.


All of this was weird, but Nicolas went ahead and took the egg off the stove and slid it onto a plate and moved back to the stool he was at earlier. He left the food untouched and tried to read Victor. "I don't know what to do," he admitted. "Just tell me what to do and I'll do it."

 

[void31]

"I want you to shut up," he rasped. He made no protest when Nicolas took his drink and replaced it with the water bottle, which was a bit easier to handle, all things considered.


The rising concern for his current state of mind had begun to rouse his suspicions. People had fretted over his episodes before, of course, but they were good friends, or strangers with an obligation to show some empathy when one was having a seemingly-unprovoked mental breakdown. No one he'd ever threatened the life of before.


Over the years, Victor had all but perfected the art of disguising his symptoms. He was a constantly restless man, always yearning for a state of perpetual motion. He'd been so since his youth, constantly twitching, fidgeting, unable to sit still or pay attention for long periods of time. Standard symptoms of ADD that had followed him ruthlessly into adulthood. Unfortunately, such excitable behavior often came with its exceptionally painful side effects, among them a susceptibility to unreasonable bouts of panic. Victor had almost three decades to become accustomed to it. Now, though his heart was fluttering, his fingers trembling and his mind alight with unreasonable apprehensions, he still managed to look as if he'd only had a few too many to drink.


The stench of the frying egg made him sick. He wrinkled his nose, but said nothing on the matter.


He did sit, however, as a requisite for his own recovery rather than Nicolas' satisfaction. What was he so damn worried about? One would think any normal human being would have rejoiced if a serial killer up and died in their kitchen. Victor shot Nicolas a hard sideways look. What was he playing at?

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas pulled out the stool and sat down, rolling his eyes at Victor. He wasn't the one who needed to pull himself together. The tremble was still rattling Victor's body even if he wanted to pretend that he had the situation under control. Nicolas turned his torso so that wasn't facing him straight on and instead paid attention to the egg as he started to eat it. He should have made coffee.


Keeping quiet was less out of respect for Victor's present condition and more for his own safety. If Victor wanted to let himself fall apart in Nicolas's kitchen, he could do it. Like, fine, whatever. Nicolas didn't care about him in the first place. It would just be a lot of trouble on his part to take care of a body if Victor passed out or something. The sooner this little episode was over, the sooner Victor left him alone and he go about his day.


He didn't know much about panic attacks, anxiety attacks, whatever this was. He wasn't even sure if there was a difference or not. And Victor might not be having on anyway and Nicolas was just overthinking everything. His mother used to tell him that she got panic attacks, but the one time he witnessed one of her "fits", it was over not getting a pair of shoes that she wanted in a store because they were out of the color and size she wanted. She said she was having a panic attack to draw attention to herself, at least that's what Nicolas assumed.


Whatever was going on with Victor was different than what happened with his mother. Her's was more of a temper tantrum at not getting what she wanted, and Victor's was just confusing.


It went a couple more minutes before he said anything. The egg was eaten and the plate put into the dishwasher. Nicolas shut the door and leaned against the counter facing Victor. "I'm going to take a shower," he said, and his eyes darted towards the hallway before looking at Victor again. "Do you have a problem with that?"

 

[void31]

"Do I have a problem with you taking a shower in your own home?" He turned to face Nicolas. "No, I don't."


His fingers clutched at the neck of the bottle as he took another hit. But I won't be here when you get back. It wouldn't matter one way or the other, so he didn't say it.


He did have to wonder, of course, why Nicolas was so at ease with him in his home. Alfred Hitchcock movies had taught Victor at a young age that the most opportune time for a lurking killer to make his move was while his victim was in the shower--but the boy didn't seem overly concerned about such threats.


Was he doubting his potential?


Victor frowned down at the counter. No. And even if he was, why did it matter? He never killed for personal reasons. Victor was rarely offended, let alone so much that he would make himself out to be the kind of person who did horrible things because daddy had never been proud of him.


He had to admit, it was almost easier this way. There was no screaming, crying, or desperate bargaining. There had been no attempts to call the police or seize the attention of an oblivious neighbor. Victor may have loathed Nicolas' equable demeanor, but in truth, the boy seemed intent on making everything remarkably convenient for him.


As the water level gradually sank within the bottle, Victor pushed it off to the side and fixed his attention back on the harder stuff. He swallowed. Helping himself was no monumental task, but he was cautious in judging his limits when it came to the drink.


Eventually he did give in, reaching across the counter to snatch the bottle of Absolut from its place next to the others. He poured the remains of the water into the sink and replaced it with vodka, careful to keep his hands steady this time around.


Water had never done him any good.

 

[kindaemissary]

A couple of seconds before Nicolas nodded towards himself and headed out of the kitchen. It was a bad idea to give the other man full range throughout his house, but there didn't seem to be anything to really worry about anymore. Victor was having some kind of midlife crisis or something. Nicolas didn't need to keep such a high guard.


Nevertheless, he still locked the door to the bathroom.


Nicolas turned on the water and stripped out of his clothes, leaving them in a small pool on the floor. He wanted to get the grim out of his hair as quickly as possible. Victor might not have been doing anything too alarming since they got inside the condo, but he had still threatened Nicolas's health and safety. He couldn't let himself forget that.


Soaping down went quickly once he was under the showerhead. He scrubbed at his hair and let the shampoo run out down his body and out the drain, not cleaning anything below the waist. He could do that once Victor was good and gone.


He switched off the shower and toweled off before he went to his room to change. Track pants and a NYU t-shirt, both wrinkled from sitting at the bottom of a drawer too long. He rubbed the towel into his hair then threw it down on the bed.


"I thought you'd be gone by now," he said walking into the kitchen again. He scratched at his back hair line and scrunched his face together, obviously displeased. The bottle of Absolut on the counter was mostly empty but he didn't say anything. "You got what you wanted, right? When are you going to leave? I have things I'd rather be doing than waiting for you."

 

[void31]

Victor raised his bleary eyes to the other end of the room, blinking rapidly in an attempt to focus on the figure that had emerged from the corridor. He hadn't recognized it at all for a few solid minutes; hell, for a couple seconds he'd barely realized it was a person.


When he did, and he had established who that person was (casually dressed and very interesting-looking with his damp hair), his chalky lips curled into a crooked smile. "Who said you had to wait on me?"


He shifted his body in Nicolas' direction, initially unsteady, then straightening up just a moment before he could slip off the stool. "Come on, have a drink." He pushed the bottle across the counter towards him. "You don't have to wait on me."


Victor's golden complexion had paled considerably in the time Nicolas had been absent from the room. Though the tremble had gone, it was replaced by a heaviness in his limbs that was increasingly obvious the more he moved. His words were alight with a mellow that had not been there before, and his eyes were unfocused, drifting aimlessly around the room like they had been earlier, sans desperation. For the first time in a long time, there was a tranquility about him that was borderline unnerving.


"Come on, come on." He gestured wildly, his words falling together like colliding waves. "Have a drink."

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas reached out and caught the bottle before it broke on the tile below. There was barely anything left inside and it was practically full when he got it out for Victor. "You drank a lot in fifteen minutes," he pointed out. He grabbed himself a glass from the cabinet behind him but placed it on the counter without pouring any out any alcohol.


The entire aura around Victor had altered somehow. It had to have been from the vodka - everything else looked untouched. All the verbal demanding and the swaying of his limbs was peculiar. It almost made Nicolas as uncomfortable as the warning Victor had made on his life. His became laden with the effects of alcohol in the time that Nicolas had been away, and somehow his entire demeanor had changed. It was eerie like before - with the all the paperwork he had on his family, carrying him down to his home, treating him like prey - and the languid way he moved made the entire notion just as daunting.


"I think I'll stick to water, but thanks." He moved the bottle of vodka to the middle of the island counter and went back to sit down on the stool. He watched as Victor adjusted himself in his seat, body mellow and loose. "Did you really drink all of that?" he asked, and he pointed a finger at the almost-empty bottle. He pulled the other bottles of alcohol towards him and consequently away from Victor. "If you keep drinking, you're gonna have to get your stomach pumped or something stupid, and I'm not going to be the one bringing you to the hospital."


He extended his hand, leaning over the table, and snatched the water bottle out of Victor's hands. "I thought you weren't an alcoholic," he accused, smelling the contents.

 

[void31]

"Not--" Victor asserted in garbled speech, "--an alcoholic."


He wasn't. He was still sober enough to be consciously aware of his drunkenness (albeit just barely), and that was good enough for him.


Alcoholism was part of the reason his relationship with his mother had crumbled so rapidly. She became violent when she drank, and after her the abrupt death of her brother (her only guardian as a child), she drank a lot. Then the abuse had come raining down from both his parents. Why can't you do this, why can't you stop that, why aren't you here. There was no end to their tirade of impatience and disappointment. He'd ignored it all as best he could, pretending like he couldn't care less that the only person in the world he could find a scrap of sympathy in had begun to treat him like filth. Then she'd hit him with a burning pot in a fit of sangria-induced rage--and that hurt. It did.


So he didn't drink. Not often, at least.


The only time he ever had a reason to drink was in the presence of others. People were the only thing that caused him anxiety, and he was at least predictable when he was among the general public. He did not drink alone. He didn't trust himself nearly enough.


"And you won't have to take me anywhere." He nursed the bottle as if it were still filled with water, and rolled his shoulders violently when he pulled back. "I can handle my liquor." Liar.





He fixed his attention on Nicolas, and the dopey smile returned. He was a good-looking kid, Victor considered. Hm.





He leaned forward on one elbow. "What're you so concerned about?"

 

[kindaemissary]

Nicolas snorted. Yeah, obviously not an alcoholic.


Because he apparently didn't know one when he saw one. His dad had a drinking problem, but it wasn't problematic to the point he had ever become physically violent. He just drank himself into depression and fell asleep in random places around the condo for hours, only to blame his family when he woke.


There were a few people he knew school that were right on the verge of alcoholism - a guy in his 20th Century English Lit class, Kyle, came in every time with a liter of vodka, the smell of alcohol already on his breath, and a hangover he probably never cured. The only time Nicolas had ever seen him sober, if he was even sober, was last year during Mardi Gras and he was high beyond being high. Nicolas was almost waiting for him to hear that Kyle had OD'ed. It had to happen at some point with what he was doing.


He looked up from the bottles and at Victor. "I don't really want to have to deal with you if you pass out," he said pursing his lips. Victor's eyes traveled about his body and he crossed his arms on the counter and leaned forward, face pressed into his hands. He didn't need that. "And if you did, I really wouldn't want to explain you being here to my parents if they decided to come home."


Hopefully they didn't, of course. If they did, they'd badger Nicolas about everything he had done since he saw them last and probably assume that Victor was the reason he didn't come home that often anymore. Which couldn't be far enough from to truth considering it had barely been twelve hours since Victor dragged him down sixteen flights and left him to fend for himself.


His eyes rose from his fingers to Victor again, considering everything. He didn't know if Victor had ever thought about killing him just like he had killed everyone else that had gone down there, but he didn't really want to know the answer. It was a curiosity he didn't want to satisfy. If Victor was going to and changed his mind, he'd rather that information stay with him and out of Nicolas's mind. Knowing that would make his psyche go a little crazy.


"Do you have an actual job?" he questioned. "I mean, aside from killing people and kidnapping teenagers."

 

[void31]

Even through the haze, Victor recoiled at that, his fingers curling into his palms until his knuckles tinged white. "Yeah. I've got a job."


He left it at that. The details were ultimately irrelevant; Nicolas didn't need to know that his "job" was, in actuality, a series of scams designed specifically for his own benefit, preying off the insecurities and emotions of others, usually leaving them even more vulnerable than they were to begin with.


Victor had never worked for a company. He'd been self-employed his entire life: after inheriting daddy's money at the tender age of nineteen (only because the moron was too damn stupid to write up a will before he drank himself to death), he'd established his first gold digging business, with his target demographic composed of skeevy politicians that had more than a few secrets to keep. He'd carried out favors of vastly varying nature--everything from essentially stalking his client's opponent to lying to a significant other about business meetings and the like (anything, really, that wouldn't give them the impression that their husbands had been sleeping about behind their backs). Sometimes he'd play two men off each other--more of a source of entertainment than anything, but it raked in twice the amount. His prices always gradually rose to ludicrous levels--but he'd never been turned down, because he did his job damn well.


In between that morality war, he picked up odd jobs such as pretending to be starving, cheating old people out of their social security numbers, and reselling stolen items.


But he didn't share any of that with Nicolas. He figured killing people was already more than enough.


Instead he stared at the bottle in his hand, wondering how much more he could drink before it killed him. Then he smiled. "Do you have a job, Wesley?"