Kane Owen (sellingsouls) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2021-09-29 07:55:00 |
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Entry tags: | #june 2018, adrian, adrian x kane, kane |
Who: Adrian and Kane
When: night, Monday, June 18th
Where: Witcham Road, Blackwater Woods
Warning: badness
Status: complete, Part 1
After fucking Red’s brains out and passing out for a little while, Kane woke up restless again. Though he’d dabbled with plenty of drugs in his life, he’d never quite been addicted to anything, but he had to imagine the crawling feeling in his skin and the yearning for something he couldn’t name was a similar feeling to needing a fix. A fix of what, though? He wasn’t really horny anymore, that itch had been scratched. But he definitely didn’t feel satisfied.
He ended up in his SUV, just driving around. He fell into his hunting patterns just because it was familiar, but Kane was quickly frustrated by the lack of monsters making themselves known. The more he wandered and looked, the more the craving gnawing at the back of his mind morphed into a need for blood. He needed to kill something tonight. Maybe that would help him feel better. It would certainly give him something to do, since he obviously wasn’t going back to sleep anytime soon.
Kane was near the edge of town, around Cherries and the motel that used to be his old stomping ground, when he noticed that his gas tank was running low. If he was going to keep roaming, he didn’t want to leave himself stranded on the side of the road, so he pulled in and up to one of the pumps. The place was deserted except for the single clerk inside the building, Kane could see him through the big windows, and he didn’t even look up from whatever he was slumped over doing -- sleeping, jerking off, looking at his phone, Kane couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter. He grabbed the gas pump and jammed it into his car to start filling up.
Adrian was not feeling the effects that this odd day seemed to be having on a lot of people around him. He'd heard some about it though and had cautiously visited Toby late, not wanting to wake him up early right before he had a night shift. He spent a little more time there than he meant to. That was okay, he liked driving at night, there was less traffic and after so long living in his car he found some weird comfort in it. Like he was less visible to the world because of the darkness.
He arrived at the gas station as Kane had gotten in his car and paid the SUV little mind as he parked next to the pump. If anything he didn't really want to look at it, it reminded him too much of one of the men he had sacrificed to the tunnel in Mila's name. He hadn't grabbed him here but he was close to Cherries and whoever was in the SUV was likely a patron, out here at this hour.
The dark hadn’t given Adrian enough cover. Kane was on high alert, and he immediately recognized the man who got out of the car that pulled up to the pump. It was him -- Adrian Moretti, his mystery monster who wouldn’t die. Who had almost killed him. He looked to be alone, too. Kane’s heart quickly picked up speed as he stared out of his tinted window. This was his chance.
This gas station was too shitty to have working cameras, Kane was fairly sure. Not that he was thinking too far ahead yet. Now was the time. It was now. The surety pulsed in his brain over and over again, and he was suddenly positive that this was why he’d been compelled to roam tonight. With one hand he reached for his hidden holster under the seat and pulled out a pistol, flipping it around so he was holding the barrel. Motherfucker wasn’t going to get the drop on him this time.
Kane’s SUV was positioned between where Adrian was pumping gas and the building, which was a good thing just in case the idiot kid inside started paying attention. Before he could overthink it, Kane shoved his car door open and threw himself out of it and toward Adrian, lifting the weapon in his hand to bring it down hard against Adrian’s skull.
Adrian didn't have time to even process the familiar face he saw when he turned at the man charging toward him before everything went black and it might as well have been an eternity or just a few seconds before he came to again. It was to Simon's voice, a hazy dream of a dead man telling him to wake up. Adrian jolted awake, head throbbing with pain and panic lacing through his entire body. He was bound and gagged, plastic digging into his wrists and he knew his feet would feel the same sting if not for his boots. He was in a vehicle, surrounded by something he bumped into when he started struggling. The first thing he thought was that kidnapped people should fight like hell not to be taken to a second location. He was as good as dead. The second thought was just a panicked question of why. Who the hell was this? It didn't seem anything like the institute he'd been captured by before, this wasn't as clinical, not as sanitized. They sure as hell didn't use zip ties. That's when he remembered the face and his panic became terror.
He managed to shuffle around despite all the bags or boxes around him and caught sight of the corner of his captor's eye in the rearview mirror. Again, like a near shriek in his head. Why? This was the man who'd tried to kill him. Who had killed him. Adrian had hoped it was just a fluke, just that one violent and strange day driving a guy crazy, he'd let him go that first time they met after all. But now all he could think was... he's going to try again and he's not taking any chances of failing.
Kane was aware when Adrian woke up from all the sudden thumping and heavy breathing from the back of his SUV. He was a fighter, that was for sure. Once he’d knocked the consciousness out of Adrian, he’d stuffed him into the SUV for a quick safekeeping while Kane moved the car Adrian had been driving. It wasn’t the car Kane recalled him having, so someone was going to be looking for it. They’d find it innocently parked at the gas station, like nothing was amiss. Then he’d climbed back into his own vehicle to get Adrian bound and gagged and put into the back. He was surprisingly heavy for a guy his size, like he was more dense than average. Kane could handle him, though.
And now they were on their way down Witcham Road, surrounded by nothing but dark forest for miles. Kane was looking for the right turn-off into the woods when his captive came to, and he glanced in the rearview mirror and met Adrian’s eyes. He was hard to see back there with no streetlights anywhere, but Kane could feel him watching, and it made his body tingle. “You’re awake,” he said quietly. “Good. Didn’t bean you too hard. Comfy back there, Adrian?”
Hearing his name sent a cold chill up Adrian's back and after a few seconds of shock he groaned wordlessly and started struggling again. It was too dark for them to be in town so kicking at the windows would be futile but if he could just loosen the zip ties he'd have a better chance of surviving this. Wasn't there a trick? He vaguely remembered a trick, but did that only work if his hands were in front of his body instead of back? If he could get into a good enough position he might be able to get his hands in front of him, he'd been able to do that as a kid but he'd been smaller. Could he now? His mind was a jumble of advice and questions but the loudest of all was the need to survive this and anger at himself for letting himself ignore his paranoia. He'd gotten too content, truly bought into the illusion that everything was going to be good now. If he'd just stayed alert he wouldn't be in this mess.
“Yeah, I know who you are,” Kane went on, his tone mild and low. He might have been still on the outside, but everything inside of him was vibrating. He’d thought he’d been craving a good kill, but now the desire felt more complex. He’d planned for this, and then the perfect opportunity on the perfect night had just dropped into his lap. It was meant to be, his magic luck at work. And now Adrian was his, and Kane could get what he wanted out of him. “Adrian Moretti, missing and presumed dead for years. Suddenly returned, a prodigal son. What a miracle.” Kane chuckled and slowed the car down to make the turn. The road was paved for only a few dozen yards, then gave way to gravel as they drove through the trees.
He knew too damn much, his last name too, everything. It wasn't surprising as such, people knew he was back now, but why did this guy give a shit? He wished he wasn't so weak now. Caius had said he could bring up certain aspects of his monster if he meditated, but he sure as shit wasn't able to do that right now. Why the hell had he had that ritual done? So stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. "What do you want?" he snarled but it came off predictably muffled though he was sure Kane got the gist and he didn't let up his struggling though now he was wondering if he should save his energy until he was out of the car. The second location thing was already in action and the further away from town they got the smaller his chances of survival. When they hit gravel, Adrian's panic only grew. They were out in the sticks if the road wasn't paved, somewhere out in the damn woods and off Witcham. This guy was definitely going to kill him.
For some reason the way he was still struggling and trying to talk made Kane smile. There was something so fucking satisfying about having complete control over a man -- though Kane still believed that he wasn’t -- who’d tried to kill him. Especially considering that he’d almost succeeded. “You probably think I’m taking you out here to kill you,” he said. “That’s a reasonable assumption. But I’m not. Not if you behave yourself, at least. We just need a little ... time to get to know each other better.” He huffed an amused sound. Kane wanted more than revenge, he wanted insight and knowledge and whatever secrets Adrian was carrying. Maybe he would kill him afterward, he hadn’t decided. But Kane wanted to make him squeal first. “Almost there, you’ll be more comfortable soon,” he murmured.
That didn't make Adrian feel any better. He'd seen this man twice before now, the first time he'd had a gun on Adrian, so a kill would have been easy but he'd let him go. The second he'd gone ballistic on him and things had not gone as smoothly. Maybe he was just a psychopath and there was nothing deeper about this but Adrian was pretty sure it had something to do with the wendigo and he desperately wanted to tell him he was human now, even if it wasn't entirely true. Maybe he knew about the men in the tunnel somehow, maybe this was revenge. All he knew was that just because he said he wasn't going to kill him, it didn't mean he was telling the truth - and even if he was telling the truth, whatever he had in mind had to be worse. He thought of his sister with a heavy dose of guilt thrown in the mix, she'd told him to be careful and he hadn't been. Maybe Toby would hear him if he screamed loud enough in his mind. Find me, bring cops, help me, help me. He could broadcast but could he receive from so far away? He'd found Adrian the last time he needed him.
Kane didn’t say anything else until he had pulled the SUV up to a rustic cabin in a small clearing. It was an old hunting cabin he’d found during one of his many nighttime exploration drives. He’d learned long ago that the gravel and dirt roads could lead to interesting places, and Kane had decided this one was a good safehouse. Most people were smart enough to stay the hell out of these woods. The cabin had looked like it hadn’t been used in years, and there’d been no evidence that it was used by teenagers to get high and fuck or whatever. Kane had restocked it with non-perishable food and some supplies, even some fresh blankets for the shitty metal bed that was in there. A hidey hole in case he ever needed somewhere to lie low. And now it would serve as storage for the wendigo.
He left the headlights on and climbed out of the SUV, circling around to open the back door. Kane studied Adrian for a few heartbeats, squinting at him in the dark. There was something different ... the eyes. Hadn’t his eyes been reflective before? Kane distinctly remembered seeing them shine both times they’d met, but now they looked dark and human and terrified. For a second he questioned whether he’d grabbed the wrong guy, but Kane had spent so long staring at Adrian’s face, he knew that wasn’t it. “If I cut your feet loose, you gonna behave?” he asked in a grumble. “Or are you gonna make me carry you?”
Adrian had not managed to get his hands in front of him, he'd kept jamming his knee into some metal thing and the space in the back seat was too cramped in general to do much of anything, let alone some neat trick he hadn't tried in over two decades. The only thing he could think to do now was fight like hell, try to knock his assailant out so he'd have more time to try to get his hands free and free legs meant better leverage. He nodded and hoped it wasn't obvious he was lying, subtlety wasn't easy when his adrenaline was running high and fear had his body shaking. He knew this was his last chance, he had to calm down and be pliant until the moment was right. That part was hard when every fiber of his being was screaming at him to fight and even without the monster's presence, there was still a little urge in there to kill this guy because that was the only way he'd keep him at bay.
Kane considered it for another moment, then grunted a negative sound. Shiny eyes or no shiny eyes, this guy was a monster. Kane had seen him feasting on raw roadkill, and nobody human did that. Then he’d come back to life when Kane was sure he’d killed him, and stabbed the shit out of him. It was probably best that he didn’t take any chances here. Bailey wouldn’t be able to reach him this time if he was bleeding out in the woods. “Nah, c’mon,” he muttered as he reached for Adrian. Kane tugged and pulled and crouched until he got the bound man up on one shoulder, grunting under his weight. “Anyone ever tell you you’re a fuckin’ fatass? Jesus,” he groused as he carried Adrian toward the cabin. There was no electricity out here, so the place was dark and smelled musty when the door opened. Kane dumped Adrian onto the thin mattress on the bed with a grunt, then turned to leave again. He had cuffs and chains in the car, just waiting for this eventuality. “Stay put.”
Adrian forced himself not to kick or do anything just yet, he wasn't in a good position to do so and he didn't want to ruin his chances if a good opportunity came along. When Kane dumped him on the bed and left him there he was grateful he'd waited and as soon as Kane headed back out, he was squirming to get his hands in front. He might be heavy, but he was thin - thinner than he'd ever been before the wendigo - so it was easier than he'd dared to hope to move his hands down below his ass and drag them down along his thighs. Having his feet bound made it a little trickier, especially with the boots on but he managed and looked around frantically for something to use against his captor as he sat up and tried to snap the zip tie off his hands by ramming his arms down against his knees. He'd seen a video, he just wasn't sure what exactly he was supposed to be doing - the right angle and all that - so mostly it just fucking hurt. When he heard Kane's heavy steps return to the house, he ripped his gag out and did another frantic once-over around the dark room until he found what he thought was a plank of wood. It was better than bare hands so he squirmed off the bed to grab it, kneeling with his back to the door as he clutched it to his chest.
It had taken Kane a moment to locate the right duffel bag in the back of his SUV, but he finally found what he needed. They were restraints a buddy in the prison system had hooked him up with, wrist and ankle chains that all attached to one that went around the waist. He could hook Adrian up to himself, or to something in the cabin to keep him there. Kane wasn’t thinking too clearly about the future, he was just compelled to act on these impulses to possess this man, and his secrets. The obsession had been festering in his brain for months, like an open sore, and now he had the balm for it.
Adrian had not stayed put, he saw as his eyes adjusted to the dark of the cabin again. Not only that, but he’d gotten his arms back around the right way. Kane dropped the heavy bag and reached for him, a curse on his lips that was cut short as Adrian came up swinging. Sharp pain bloomed in Kane’s face as the board made contact, and he felt his bottom lip split open. “Aw, fuck!” he yelled. White hot rage flashed through him, stronger than it ever was normally, and Kane tackled the bound man, crashing into things in the cabin as they struggled for the plank of wood. Kane tried to grab it and punch Adrian at the same time -- the asshole obviously wanted more head injuries tonight.
Adrian felt a sharp sting of despair when his first blow missed because he knew damn well this had been his only chance. He was at a disadvantage in this fight, unable to maintain any balance and in seconds he was seeing stars as his assailant rained blows to his face. "Wait-" he yelped before the next hit came, sending him reeling but not quite knocking him out. It was still enough to make him crumble down, hands over his head in a futile attempt at protecting himself. "Wait," he found himself saying again and it was no logical or conscious attempt at talking himself out of this, more a knee jerk reaction since he knew damn well he'd lost whatever shred of a chance he'd had of talking himself out of this. Not that he thought he'd had one, not really, the fight had been his last chance and he was fairly certain he wasn't going to wake up again if he lost consciousness.
It took some real work for Kane to get his temper under control again. Part of him just wanted to keep swinging, punching until Adrian’s face was nothing but pulp. But he wouldn’t get any information that way, would he? So he just punished Adrian for acting out and bloodied his face up a bit, then pulled back, panting as he rocked back onto his knees. “I told you ... to fuckin’ stay put,” he muttered in between breaths. His own face was partly numb and partly pain where the board had connected, and Kane tongued at his teeth to make sure none were loose. He wasn’t very pretty to start with, he definitely didn’t need this dickhead to make it worse. Not moving far away from Adrian, just in case he tried some more shit, Kane dragged the duffel bag he’d dropped closer and unzipped it. He pulled the chains and locks out of it and started slapping them onto Adrian’s limbs to replace the zip ties.
“I was gonna let you sit down,” he grunted as he hauled Adrian to his feet. “But ... fuck that.” Kane threw an extension of the chain over a supporting beam overhead and yanked down on it, pulling Adrian’s bound arms over his head before he secured it. Kane ran an extra chain from the short length between Adrian’s ankles to another secure spot in the cabin so there would be no kicking. Once his prey was standing and trussed up, Kane stepped in close and stared hard at him. “Not so tricksy now, are ya?” he murmured.
Adrian wasn't sure how he was standing, some of his weight held up by the beam above him and he was sure the room was spinning. Everything hurt and he wanted to curl up somewhere and pass out even if he'd been afraid of doing that just a few seconds ago. He didn't meet Kane's eyes but fixed his unfocused gaze on his chin which was a little more in his line of sight anyway. He could taste blood in his mouth, rich and coppery, could feel it sticking on his skin but it didn't smell as strong as he was used to now, the monster inside of him dormant and unhelpful. "Why are you doing this?" he whispered and none of it made any sense. This man had wanted him dead, now he wanted him tied up and Adrian was sure he was going to torture him. Was it payback for stabbing him? Adrian doubted that he cared that it was unfair and that Adrian had simply been fighting for his life. He really didn't seem like the kind of guy who cared about fair and right and it stung in a weird way that he might end his life at the hands of a man, after everything else he had survived.
Kane’s motivations were jumbled even in his own mind. He did want to hurt Adrian for almost killing him and for being whatever the fuck monster he was, but today he wanted to hurt him just to hurt him. Kane killed so often, but he rarely took the time to really hurt anything, and at the moment he felt like he wanted to listen to Adrian whine and cry, to have him completely at his mercy. There was also that stirring of lust in his gut -- he’d been feeling that already for weeks, staring at Adrian’s pictures from the short old news blurbs about his disappearance. He was much better looking up close and in person ... and now streaked with blood. It made Kane want to lick his face. Then maybe bite him. Kane took hold of Adrian’s chin and forced him to look up. “I wanna know what the fuck you are,” he said, his tone somehow soft and dangerous at the same time. “I’ve killed a lot of shit. Never had any of ‘em come back. How’d you do it, Adrian?”
Adrian believed him, he did look like someone who'd killed a lot of people - or not people if the way he was speaking was any indication. It didn't make him feel any better. "It was a curse," he said tiredly, desperation lacing his voice because even if he didn't think it would work he had to try. "It's gone. You kill me and I'm gone. Please- Just let me go, I'm not what you think I am." He wasn't whispering anymore but his voice felt raspy to his own ears, like it had after their second encounter. He could almost feel those big hands on his throat and the thought of going through that again made him feel cold and terrified. "Please," he said again and thought of Mila, of her losing him again, of her fears that he'd dismissed too easily all coming true.
The begging gave Kane a warm sort of feeling in his lower belly as he studied Adrian closely. The small cabin room still had jagged shadows everywhere, the only light coming in from the open door and front window where Kane’s SUV still sat with the headlights on. Even with his face half in shadow, Kane still didn’t see that animal shine in Adrian’s eyes. He didn’t know a ton about magic and shit, but he was pretty sure that a curse that could resurrect someone would be hard to get rid of. Kane released Adrian’s face to slip his pocket knife out of his pants and flick it open. He pressed the tip of it against the soft spot under Adrian’s jaw. “What kind of curse? Who cursed you? Where’d it go? Be specific now, or we’re gonna put that mortality to the test.”
Somehow a knife was less scary than hands in the moment but Adrian's stomach still did an awful tumble kind of thing when he felt the cold steel against his skin and he drew a sharp, shaky breath as he reflexively raised his head to get away from it, dizziness washing over him again. "Nobody-" he started and it wasn't a story easily told, let alone while tied up and afraid with a knife to his throat. "Creature. Wendigo, maybe. It killed everyone but me and Cruz." The name came easy, especially since Cruz didn't have anything to worry about from this guy or anyone ever again, but speaking it still made Adrian wince. "I had a ritual done to get rid of it. It worked." Those last words were supposed to be happy ones, they'd been happy for the last few days but tonight they just came out desperate and he couldn't help but think that if it hadn't, he might have been able to get away tonight.
A wendigo. Kane knew the legends, of course, but he’d never tangled with one personally. Nor did he ever want to, from what he heard. He had a good deal of protections for himself in place, but he was far from invulnerable, and wendigos were dangerous as fuck. Kane also knew Adrian’s story very well by now, the bachelor party camping excursion gone wrong. “And it, what? Infected you with wendigo-ism?” he questioned, sounding incredulous even though he believed Adrian was telling him the truth. “That why I caught you chowing down on some roadkill? Wendigos eat people ... you ever eat anyone, Adrian?” Kane moved the tip of the knife to scrape lightly at the dark stubble on Adrian’s jawline, like he was about to give him a close shave.
"No," Adrian choked out, pulling back from the blade though his movement was limited. The lie came so easily, he didn't want to believe he'd eaten human flesh and he never wanted to admit it to anyone, ever. Wendigo or not, cannibalism was a taboo he'd never come back from and he was sure that when his time came, he was going straight to hell. "It makes it worse, you lose control. I had help, protection." A part of him wondered just how much he should tell and if it would help him at all. He was pretty sure it wouldn't, there was no way this guy was letting him go, if he'd had any intentions of doing that, he would have covered his face. Then again, maybe he was just that crazy and Adrian had to take the chance.
The knife followed Adrian’s head, and Kane gave him a couple of tiny pokes that didn’t quite break the skin, but if Adrian squirmed around too much ... well, that was his own fault, was it? It felt good to hold a blade on him, like it was payback for Adrian stabbing him in the thigh. He still had a gnarly scar from it, and he kind of wanted to show it to the bound man. “You know ... I didn’t mean to kill you that night,” Kane murmured conversationally as he slid the tip of the knife down lower to Adrian’s neck again. “Things were ... unclear. Everyone was acting crazy, and I felt it too. Rage just kind of took me over. I don’t like that, staying in control keeps me alive, you know? I hunt monsters. All that bad shit that I know you know is real. Things that go bump in the night and things that eat people. And I just ... couldn’t figure out what you were, from the first time. You caught my interest, Adrian, and I learned everything I could about you. Mostly while I recovered from you almost killin’ me.” He grinned then. “Tell me more about this ritual that fixed you. Your eyes don’t shine no more, so call me curious.”
Adrian almost told him he was flattered, like some action movie protagonist being flippant in the face of death. It was weird to hear someone say they were all but obsessed with him but mostly it was just terrifying. If he knew everything about Adrian, then he probably knew about his family and that meant he might know about Mila. He might not know what happened to her but she had stabbed her boyfriend and gone missing - would that raise red flags for a hunter? He stayed still now, neck slightly arched in an uncomfortable way but he wasn't about to move forward with that blade right up against his throat. "First one didn't help much, I got tattoos to protect me. Second one - a friend hooked me up with a witch. I blacked out so I don't know much but when I woke up I wasn't hungry anymore. I've been starving for five years, no matter what I eat, so I knew it worked." He swallowed thickly, wondering if he was willing to drop Caius's name. Caius could defend himself against a hunter, Adrian was sure, but Adrian didn't exactly want to make more powerful enemies. "I only stabbed you to get away," he added. "I wasn't trying to kill you."
Kane’s eyebrows quirked at the mention of tattoos. That was an amusing parallel, wasn’t it? Perhaps they had helped Adrian more than he realized, maybe without them he would’ve gone full wendigo right off the bat. It made Kane wonder who’d inked him to try and help, thinking of his own experience in that smoky basement room half the world away, surrounded by men speaking and chanting in ancient Arabic dialects while one of them tapped the beautiful calligraphy into his skin. The reference to a witch didn’t surprise him, he knew they were around. Kane tended not to fuck with witches, they lived in that gray area between Human and Other in his mind. Some of them were good, some of them were bad, and he wasn’t comfortable making those judgments, so he left them alone for the most part. The last thing Adrian said made him smile genuinely, and he tapped the flat of the blade against Adrian’s chin. “You know what’s funny? I believe you,” he murmured. “We were both just havin’ awful days, weren’t we? None of that explains what brought you back, though. Maybe the answer’s in those tats.” He backed up a step and grabbed the collar of Adrian’s shirt, using the knife to cut straight down through the fabric.
That was a good shirt too, Adrian thought and he would have laughed at his priorities here if this was abstract and not real life. Instead he winced as cool air hit his skin and wondered just how thoroughly his captor was going to search for them and what the hell he'd do once he found them. He had the horrifying idea that he might cut them off - just how deranged was this guy? - and the urge to struggle made his muscles tense and shake. "I don't know what they mean, I don't even know what language they are," he said with a quiver in his voice, eyeing the knife warily. It barely looked like language at all to him, not symbols either, like cursive he couldn't read.
Compared to Kane’s huge and intricate piece that covered his back and the backs of his arms, Adrian’s tattoos were small and simple. Kane couldn’t read them either, and he wasn’t any kind of expert in magical tattooing, but those piddly little lines didn’t look like enough to hold back a wendigo. No wonder he’d needed a second ritual. They definitely didn’t look like anything that would bring someone back to life after being murdered. “No answers here,” he muttered. Kane circled around behind Adrian, lifting his now-open shirt up to make sure there was nothing else on his back. He stepped in front of him again and trailed the tip of the knife down the center of Adrian’s chest. “So how’d you come back?” he asked, narrowing his eyes at the bound man. “I admit I’ve never taken down a wendigo, but I never heard of them resurrecting themselves.”
"I don't know," Adrian said desperately and he wished he did, he wished he had all the answers and could give them all in some feeble hope it might save his life. But he was clueless and didn't understand half of what had happened to him. The institute hadn't been helpful there, keeping whatever answers they'd dug up to themselves. He was just a guinea pig to them and guinea pigs didn't need to know the science behind what was happening to them. "I didn't know I could do that, I don't think I can anymore, it's gone. I know it's gone. I just want my life back."
He sure didn’t know much, did he? Kane wasn’t positive that he believed any of that, regardless of how sincere Adrian sounded. A man in the position he was in might say anything to try and get free. Kane slid the tip of the knife over to the spot right over Adrian’s heart and tilted it so the point dug in, just enough to make him bleed a little. He was standing close again, enough to smell Adrian’s blood and fear sweat, and it put that heaviness in his groin again. Kane wanted him scared, and he looked pretty damn good streaked with blood. The urge to lick his face rose again, along with the urge to cut him. “You sure you don’t know?” he murmured, gazing calmly into Adrian’s eyes. “Was that the only time you ever died, Adrian?”
"Yes," Adrian replied quickly to the first question and then "Yes," again, a little more strained for the second question. He could feel the sting of the knife though it didn't hurt as much as it once might have. He'd been through so much pain, his tolerance had gone up but that didn't mean the cut didn't scare him. He expected the knife to go deeper, for this all to end tonight and there was something psychotic in the way the guy was looking at him, something hungry. "I healed fast, that's all I know. Do I look like I'm healing fast right now?" There was an urge to bring up Mila, to tell him his sister couldn't lose him again, that he didn't give a shit about himself but for fuck's sake don't do that to her. But bringing up Mila to this man felt like a bad move at the same time and swallowed down the urge. "I won't tell anyone this happened, if you let me go," he said instead and it was probably insane that he meant it. Mila didn't need to know about this, this guy was a hunter and that was probably a good thing in a town like this, he could just drop it. "You kill people often? Human beings?"
Kane already knew that Adrian had a family, and he imagined they were thrilled to have him back from his time as a missing person. It would truly be sad for them to lose him again, Kane was sure. He just didn’t care at the moment. He didn’t plan to kill Adrian again, but he wasn’t planning much of anything at the moment. He was just acting on instinct and impulses that were currently running wild inside of him. It was such a heady mix of being out of control while utterly controlling another person, and it was so hot. Kane shook his head slightly, his gaze dropping down to the small line of blood running down Adrian’s chest from the tip of his knife. He pushed it in a teensy bit deeper to make that line slightly thicker, then met Adrian’s eyes again. “Never humans,” he said softly. “But you ain’t one of those, are you? It’s okay, I’m not either. Not quite.” Kane gave him a smile that was almost warm, then dipped in closer to lick one of the bloody splits in Adrian’s cheek. It gave him a thrill to taste what his fist had done moments earlier. Kane examined the wound after he pulled back and tsked. “That one’s not healed yet, you’re right.”
Adrian felt like his stomach dropped and turned cold at the lick. So yes, a psychopath, a stalkery psychopath who liked to lick blood off people. The situation was just getting darker by the second and he felt a weird mix of wanting to fight and wanting to slump down and just surrender completely. Let this guy kill him, he was supposed to be dead a long time ago anyway, right? Mila was his lifeline, the only reason he'd clung to his humanity for so long and right now she really was the only reason he truly felt the need to survive this. He wondered what she'd see if she looked at this man, if she could tell what he was. Adrian wasn't sure he wanted to know, he wasn't sure about anything but the pain he was currently feeling and the fear coursing through him like liquid nitrogen. "I told you, it's gone," he repeated, curling his lip and pulling away. "I didn't report you last time, I can keep quiet about it, I fucking swear. Please."
On a normal day, the pleas may have gotten through to Kane. He wasn’t completely heartless, and Adrian wasn’t looking very monstrous to him at the moment. He was looking quite human, in fact, something that should have played on Kane’s empathy. Instead, it was making him horny and hungrier for violence. There was some very distant part of his mind that was aware that something was off, that he shouldn’t be doing what he was doing, but it wasn’t nearly loud enough to get in his way. He smirked at the way Adrian pulled back from him. “That’s a generous offer,” he murmured. “I’ll think about it.” Kane lingered with his face close for another beat, then pulled back to step around and away from Adrian, taking the knife with him. He walked to the other side of the room to rummage around for a box of matches, then moved to light one of the oil lamps that were in the cabin.
Adrian should have felt relieved when he stepped back but he just got more tense, sure he was about to go get something to make everything worse. He hadn't killed Adrian yet, but there was that hunger in his eyes and Adrian was starting to think he was about to get tortured. His tolerance for pain had gone up over the years but not that much and when his assailant had his back to him he took the time to try to suss out his bindings. The beam he was fastened to was sturdy and the chains were too, he couldn't really see any way out of this other than gnawing his goddamn arms off. "What is it you want?" he asked, hating the way his chin trembled and breath shuddered. "I'm sure we can come to some agreement."
That question was getting annoying, and Kane thought about gagging Adrian again. It didn’t help that he didn’t really know what he wanted. He now knew that Adrian was some kind of semi-wendigo, but he’d had some damn magic done on him to make him useless. Kane had had some half-baked hope that he could find out something interesting about immortality, but Adrian didn’t seem to know shit about fuck. His soul probably wouldn’t even be worth much on the market, without that wendigo spirit strong inside of him, so he wasn’t even worth killing. Except to maybe experiment, to see if that trait really was gone. Kane lit all four of the oil lamps and walked outside without answering. He turned his SUV all the way off and grabbed his cigarettes out of the center console. Kane lit one up as he headed back inside. “So I’m curious,” he said as he stepped in front of Adrian again. “What was it like to die? What did you see?”
"What did I see?" Adrian echoed tiredly, closing his eyes and shaking his head. This wasn't going anywhere good. "Fuck all. Everything just went black." He didn't know what answer the guy was hoping for but he knew he didn't have it. If he knew, he might lie just to avoid doing it again. What if he hadn't been dead for long enough to see something? What if this hunter was thinking the same thing. The smoke smelled good and made him want a cigarette too but it was nowhere near the top of the list of things he wanted right now, just another taunting and another thing to fear. Why could he all too easily imagine being burned with it? "Listen- I was on my way to Portland. I can stay there a while, until I heal up. Nobody has to know about this. I don't want them to know about this. You say you kill monsters, that's a good thing in this town. I'm just not... I'm not."