Marcus moved suddenly. No warning, no words. One second he was standing near the sink, blood drying across his knuckles, and the next he was storming toward the door.
"Marcus—wait, where are you going?" Vincent's voice cut through the heavy silence.
No reply.
The only answer he got was the sharp crack of the door slamming shut so violently the hinges trembled. The sound echoed through the motel room like a gunshot, making Vincent flinch.
He stared at the door for a long second, chest still rising and falling from everything that had happened moments ago.
"Okay…" he muttered, running a hand through his hair. "Sure. Slam the door. Totally normal. Nothing weird about that at all."
He forced a laugh, but it came out thin, broken.
"Right. Great. That's… healthy communication, sure."
The words came out in his usual tone — half amused, half careless — but they fell flat in the thick silence that followed.
He looked around the room, now empty without that dark presence filling it. "What the hell was that, huh?" he muttered to himself, pacing once. "First he snaps, then he goes all— possessive vampire or whatever, and now he just storms out like he's in a damn movie?"
The red neon light outside flickered again, splashing his reflection in the cracked mirror — wide eyes, faint blood on his neck, and trembling fingers.
"God, what is even happening?" he whispered. "One minute he's looking at me like he's going to tear my throat out, and the next—he just… walks out?"
His voice dropped to a whisper.
"Why does it feel like he's… possessed or something?"
He tried to shake the thought off, rubbing his arms to chase away the strange chill crawling under his skin, but the silence only grew louder.
---
The crowd downstairs shifted like water when Marcus walked through.
No one dared to brush against him. He didn't glare, didn't growl, didn't even speak—yet the weight of his presence alone made people step aside.
The blood had dried into dark lines along his wrist, faint against the veins, but unmistakable. He looked calm. Controlled. But the air bent around him, humming faintly with quiet menace.
The bartender froze when he reached the counter.
Marcus's voice came out low, even.
"Two plates. One of them for room seventeen."
The bartender nodded quickly. "Any… any preference, sir?"
Marcus's eyes shifted — slow, precise — and for a moment, the man forgot how to breathe.
"Something warm," Marcus said finally. "He needs to eat."
The bartender rushed to the kitchen, and Marcus leaned against the bar, eyes half-lidded. He didn't fidget, didn't look around. Just waited.
Music played somewhere behind him — muffled, careless laughter, the clinking of glasses — but it all sounded distant, unreal.
Someone, a girl in a short red dress, caught his profile and smiled faintly, thinking maybe she'd try to talk to him. But when his gaze turned to meet hers, she froze.
Whatever she'd seen in his eyes wasn't attraction — it was absence. Something hollow and consuming.
She turned away before he said a word.
Marcus exhaled slowly, like he was trying to calm something inside him that wouldn't stay still.
The food arrived.
He looked at the amber liquid in a half-empty glass near him. The scent of whiskey mingled with the faint trace of iron still clinging to his hand.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, Vincent's voice replayed — that laugh, sharp and fragile. You're jealous?
He exhaled once, long and slow. The glass before him trembled slightly beneath his fingertips, though his expression never changed.
When the bartender returned with two plates and a wrapped bottle, Marcus only nodded once.
He paid in cash and turned away, his figure slipping back into the dark hallway without another word.
Behind him, the bartender whispered under his breath, "Who the hell is that guy…"
Marcus didn't hear it. Or maybe he did. He just didn't care.
the crowd parting again as he walked out the same way he came — like the darkness itself moved to make way for him.
---
Upstairs, Vincent sat on the floor beside the bed. He hadn't realized he'd sunk there, but his legs refused to move.
The silence pressed in from all sides. The thump of the bass from below was faint now, almost like a heartbeat he could barely feel.
He lifted his hand to his throat — the place where Marcus's blood had smeared earlier. It was still faintly visible, dark against his skin.
At first, he only shivered. But then the shiver became something else. Something that crawled up from deep inside.
His breath hitched.
Goosebumps broke across his arms in violent waves. His chest tightened — not panic at first, just an odd constriction that built with every breath.
"Stop it," he muttered. "You're fine. It's nothing. You're fine."
But the air wasn't moving right. His lungs weren't filling.
Then came the voice.
Soft at first, like a memory from another room.
> "You're useless."
Vincent froze.
The sound wasn't here. It wasn't Marcus.
It was older. Deeper. Familiar in the way nightmares were familiar.
> "You ruin everything you touch."
He clutched his head, shaking it. "No, no, not this. Not now."
His vision blurred. The neon light flickered. For a second, the red glow on the wall looked like fire — like he'd seen it before.
And then — a hand.
Not Marcus's. Rougher. Larger. Grabbing his neck, squeezing.
He felt the weight of it again, the helplessness that followed, the breath that wouldn't come no matter how hard he fought.
He gasped, hand shooting to his own throat, trying to push it away — but there was nothing there. Just air.
Tears blurred his sight. He hated it.
He never cried. Never. Not in front of anyone.
But his chest wouldn't stop shaking. The words wouldn't stop echoing.
> "You're nothing but a burden."
"Pathetic."
"No wonder they left you."
Vincent's breath came out ragged, uneven. He dug his nails into his knees until it hurt, trying to ground himself in the sting of it.
He wanted to scream, to fight, to be that arrogant, charming thief again — the one who joked his way out of everything.
But right now, there was no joke.
Just that same, suffocating voice.
"Stop…" he whispered, voice cracking. "Please just stop…"
The room spun. The lights blurred.
He curled tighter on the floor, trembling.
By the time the sound faded, his breath came in harsh, uneven gasps. His face was wet, his throat raw.
The Vincent everyone knew — the smirking, reckless one — was gone.
Only the broken version remained, whispering to himself in the empty room, afraid of a memory that wouldn't die.
---
PLEASE SUPPORT PRETTY LADIES AND HANDSOME GENTLEMEN,
WITH BLOOD AND CALM,
MARCUS.
WITH TEARS AND TRAUMA HE WON'T ADMIT,
VINCENT.