Michael lay sprawled out on the ground, only it wasn't quite as hard as he remembered it. At least, not since he was thirteen. No, the ground at the circus may have been concrete, but it was certainly softer with the sawdust of the smaller tent under his cheek. The sweet scent of vomit and blood lay everywhere, but it was something you got used to. He wasn't sure why he was studying the floor, but his head was pounding, spinning really. He felt cold against the side of his face, and a splitting, pulling, stinging that he knew was his lip broken against his teeth. Now why was he on the ground...
Fingers culled in his hair and he giggled, a high and intoxicated sound as he was drug up by the black locks, and a growl spread out behind him, angry power flicking out like army ants, bitting and stinging up his body in a hot and angry wave. But it only made him giggle more, stretching and pulling against that hold on his hair with a grin on his face that split his lip more, made the blood flow faster. He looked over his shoulder at the lean form of the man who had hit him. Not everyone had been pleased with his performances of late, and it was starting to get to him, claw marks littering his back, barely healed from last time.
"Awww come on Harvy. I didn't do that bad." he snickered as the man snarled at him, moving to punch him in the face, and he suddenly remembered that was why he'd been on the floor in the first place. Well, it made sense. Some of the Weres had been quite displeased with the little Asian teen, swearing up and down that he had it easy, how easy they were never quite specific, other than the fact that he wasn't forced to change during a full moon, that he wasn't contagious. That he changed without pain, didn't have to reknit bones to change into something else. Didn't get tired afterward and pass out. Didn't have to stay in animal form for a while to keep from being vulnerable.
Okay, so a bit more specific than Michael cared for. Every scrape and bruise across his body, every torn bit of skin, and every scar he had was in one way or another the result of one of them trying to take their anger out on him for being who and what he was. Not really that fair in the black haired shifter's mind, but he could deal with it. He healed faster than human, all be it not THAT fast, but still pretty good. He scared up something nice though, thin little pink marks all over his back. But nobody saw them, so he wasn't concerned with it ruining the show. And it wasn't as though he could catch lycanthropy, so that wasn't a problem either. If it helped them feel better, he figured it was just easier not to make a fuss.
He was brought back from his thoughts as a hand pressed against his throat. He was on the ground again, but on his back. He didn't remember moving through the air...Losing time. Not a good thing. The hand pressed tight against him, and he grinned, an odd daring smile creeping across his face, a sickeningly devilish look as he locked blue hued eyes on fierce wolf yellow, tears collecting in his eyes as his lungs struggled for air.
"You stupid kid...you don't know what it's like. And here you go parading how much better you are. Think you're so special now...? Can't even protect yourself, can you?" the man pressing on his neck snarled, and pretty colors collected around his vision. Something must have made a sound, because the man moved, sliding hands lightning fast down to grab at Michael's wrists, and he grabbed on reflexively, being pulled up to his feet as he wobbled, lungs sucking air as color spread back over the wavering edges of his vision.
"Gotta watch it, kid. You slipped up there." the man pointed up at the ropes, and all Michael did was shake his head and smile sheepishly, a hand going up to brush through his hair as he wobbled forward, raising eyes to see why the sudden change.
And there he stood with his halo of brown curly hair, Yurick with his drowning chocolate brown eyes. Michael grinned, pointing to his face with a proud look. "Landed wrong and smashed my fuckin face with my knee cap. Tell me, am I pretty?" he grinned, tilting his face so the light would hit the blossoming bruise on his jaw, a smirk so wide it actually made the puffy skin pull at his eye and he had to stop, wincing a little to walk away from the man. It was how he did it. Pretend they didn't hurt him, and they would leave him alone. If they didn't get to hurt him, they would tease, bite at him in the worst ways, tear him down. But if he let them hurt him up a bit...well, they got over it.
Yurick shook his head, crossing his arms. "Prettier than ever. Your knee hurt?" he glanced behind Michael with obvious accusation in his eyes at the werewolf behind him. Michael glanced as he put hands on his hips, wishing he had his pants on instead of his performance outfit, so he could shove hands in his back pockets. He was going to rush back to his room and draw, draw hard. He felt it building up in his stomach in a sort of sickening wave, a nervous tension that made him bounce and run up the stairs, throw arms around Yurick to bite at the edge of his jaw playfully, but when he went to dance away and out of the tent, the young vampire grabbed at his wrist, stopping him so he could walk with him to the storage room of the Circus.
"You didn't do that with your knee, did you?" Michael shrugged, and yawned, stretching. He wanted to just go to his room and have it out of him his own way. Yurick always paid too much attention, worrying when there was no need. He was his best friend, of which he had two...but Michael didn't see sense in saying you like one person above all others. He liked Ezzy and Yurick more than anyone else, so he had two best friends. Fifteen and he was already well and truly on his way to doing quite good at the Circus. He'd gotten a side act with the acrobats, and he was getting good enough that Jean-Claude was getting ideas. He knew that look on the vampire's face, and he simply couldn't wait for it.
"Aww come on, Yurick. Ya worry too much. Ain't nothin." he shrugged, but the vampire pressed a finger to the side of his neck, and it suddenly burned all up and down his head, neck, pulled his shoulders tight and made him hiss under his breath.
"Nothing, hmm? You have a ring of bruises around your throat like an ungodly necklace. Why do you let them beat on you, Mikey?" he lead the way through the empty booths, past the closed attractions to the storage room, nearly time for him to be going to bed, but he had wanted to make sure Michael was alright. He'd been coming in smelling like blood and cuddling up next to him right before sun rise, but it had been so close he couldn't ask about it, and he was always gone before the brown haired vampire got up.
"GODS Ricky, stop pokin at it! Shit!" he danced away, a hand going up to his throat, and he blushed, face going soft and childishly frightened a mere second before it went angry and sulky, his hands lacing behind his neck as he licked out over his bottom lip, but the motion turned into a gentle licking out over his new wound. These he wasn't trying to keep, and he was going to have to eat to keep the energy up, he knew it. He already had to eat, then that stupid walking talking pit-bull had pounced on him.
"I don't have ta explain myself ta ya." he said in a dry unamused tone, tilting his head back to look at the vampire as he continued, walking up to the door, and Yurick opened it for him without even a second glance. He was always opening doors for him, taking him by the hand. He wasn't trying to play the boyfriend, Michael knew that, but it was kind of funny. He'd told him he should just say they were dating and get it over with, but neither of them thought of it like that. They were friends, nothing more. Though, with the way Michael thought, his very way of living, they were more than friends, they just never acted like it. Sex was sex to Michael, nothing more or less mushy than ordering papers, or washing dishes. It was something fun to do with his friend, who also thought it was fun. No emotional obligation to explain himself if he didn't want to.
Well, that's what he thought.
"You would have let him choke you until you passed out. And then what would he have done? Do you know? I saw it in your face when I came in. You would have let him do it, just so you wouldn't cause waves." Yurick went to the thick wooden door and knocked hard on it, insistently. It took a few moments of standing under the swinging light bulb that lit the room, but someone came to the door, opened it.
"Hi Nethaniel." Michael grinned, moving to bounce past the auburn haired wereleopard, bouncing down the steps with Yurick hurrying after him, and apologetic look cast back at the man.
"We're not done Mikey!" he called after him, but he wasn't listening anymore. He was done. He didn't need to be told things he already knew, and it wasn't as though he was going to stop. He danced through the livingroom area like a fairy on drugs, giggling and bouncing as he went, running off to his room on flat feet as soon as he hit the stones of the corridor, going down and around a corner, the winding hall as he heard quick footsteps chasing after him. He got to his door and flung it open, not making a move to close it as he dove under the bed, a practiced slide in his new costume to slither under, barely needing to move for his momentum to simply carry him under like a penguin on ice. The image of being a penguin passed through his mind, making him giggle again as he pressed up and into the area under his bed, pulling at a box he had there, shoving it out to peel the top off the plastic thing, pushing around ready to eat food boxes, candies and snacks until he closed a fist around a package of "add water" Udon, and a tin of chicken pieces.
He had electricity in his room, a coffee pot for actual hot water, and a bathroom to get the water from, so he pretty much had a little apartment. He knew Yurick wouldn't stop him from eating, and his meal was pretty small in the first place, but he wasn't complaining. The vampire in question walked in through his door and closed it, and he gave him a shit eating grin, motioning to a clock on his bedside table.
"You stay, and you're going to end up sleeping in here." he bounced up from the floor, going to set his things down on the top of the low dresser where his coffee pot was, taking the little pitcher to the bathroom to fill with water as he hummed to himself, coming back out to see a pissed off Yurick sitting on his black and ice-blue covered bed, arms crossed and looking VERY angry.
Michael couldn't help the hunching of his shoulders that he did, a soft whimper in his voice. In every way possible Yurick was his dominant, at least when the doors were closed. It made him want to dash over and yank the door open, triumphantly shout 'HAHA! Now you can't control me!' but he didn't, a blush creeping across his face just from the silly thought as he put the water in the machine and clicked it on. The noises started up and he stared at the pot, squatting down to stare into the pitcher, watch the hot water drip down with hands clutching the edge of the dresser, balancing on the fronts of his feet.
"I'm going to stay until you realize just how reckless you're being. You're going to get yourself really hurt, or worse, killed some day. You can't just let them bully you, Mikey." But what was he supposed to say? He always did it. Always would. He knew it. Michael was the happy smiling painted up punching bag. You hit it, and it always came back for more.
"Glutton for punishment, I suppose." he said, looking back with a grin, but it made Yurick growl low in his throat a moment, narrow his eyes, and Michael's own eyes went wide as he looked back at the pot, a soft yip of surprise in his voice. He could usually play it cute, grin and bat his long lashes, and the brown haired vampire would cave in, wrap arms around him and yank his clothes off. It wasn't working this time.
"Michael Fey Wong, you are going to get yourself killed. Do you know what Elizabeth would say if she found out? She'd tell you that you were being a complete dumbass. And despite the language, I quite agree. If you don't stand up for yourself, you'll get dead. And not in a pretty way like me. Just dead. You're strong enough to assert yourself, why don't you?" And that was the Crux of it. Michael knew it was unhealthy, and he knew that he would get it someday, and not in a good way, but he really couldn't fight back against them. They were all dominant against him, and had proven it right from the start. Michael had a tic in his brain, a sort of chemistry. He literally couldn't go against a dominant's wishes, couldn't even defend himself. He knew it was wrong, and so not human, but he didn't even have to think about it. It was a feeling. They were dominant, and he was lesser. They were in charge, and he had to do what they wanted.
"Can't..I just.." he looked up, brown eyes burning into his and he turned around again, popping open the package for his noodles as he poured hot water into them, glancing at the clock for the minutes to pass as he opened up the can of chicken bits, pouring them in with the hot water.
"I just can't. I can't even explain it, damnit..It's sort of like mind control, except it's built into me. I could be in charge if I were dominant, but I'm not. They took that away, and I just...I don't know. Can we stop now?" he shook his head, sighing as he hunched his shoulders, a slight trembling as he held onto the edge of the dresser. He didn't want to be forced into doing it, it wasn't going to change anything. If he did anything to someone who was quite obviously dominant to him, he wasn't sure what he could do. He supposed it was just as well. If he ever tried to fight one of them, hurt them, made them angry...it would be like a puppy fighting an older dog. Even if he won, he would still feel like tucking his tail between his legs and begging forgiveness. He didn't have the heart for being dominant to anyone.
Yurick stood up, straightening his pants without a word as he went to the door, hand resting on the handle as Michael watched, raising eyebrows at him. He'd come to his room, and they hadn't even snuggled a little. He felt like he'd done something wrong, but he wasn't sure for the life of him what it could have possibly been. He couldn't help the way he was inside...was Yurick punishing him for it?
"I'm going to go see Jean-Claude. He's still up, but I'll have to be quick." The brown haired vampire opened the door, and Michael went to follow him, carrying his bowl of noodles and a plastic fork, determined not to let him go so easy. "Tell him? Tell him what?" it was as if the whole conversation had no bearing on anything else, as if Yurick couldn't possibly have been serious about Michael needing to stop. After all...you couldn't stop being who you were just because someone said so...could you? It just wasn't that easy. It never would be.
Yurick walked back to the living room with Michael following in tow, trying to get him to stop, trying to get him to go back to the bedroom; He didn't want to be told on. He didn't want to be punished for something that was already in it's own right a punishment. All be it an unfair punishment, but he'd found that all the pleading in it's own wasn't enough, so he'd stopped that a while ago. Almost sixteen and he was still whining and begging like a child. He didn't really understand that it was only natural; Thought he was supposed to just suck it up and take it.
"Come on Yurick, stop. Let's just go." He looked comical, pleading and begging as he continued to stuff food in his mouth, at such a rate that one would have thought that he was part vacuum; Black hole. He knew how important it was for him to keep fed, and he didn't want anything to happen, even though he sorely wanted to simply put the food down and continue on without it, clinging to Yurick as was his typical fashion. Like a human shaped novelty backpack, he was. Yurick shook his head, sighing a little as he passed through that white barrier into the living room. Jean-Claude sat staring at the fire in the faux fireplace, sipping tea was his only guess as he moved into the room, Michael following like a cloud of sulky embarrassment, not even aware of the lovely dark bruising across his face and neck as he ate at his noodles.
"Did you need something Yu-"his question started off amused enough, but the moment he caught sight of Michael he stopped, face dropping to a blank one, a slightly amused and seductive smile on his face. He knew Michael was more the type of lover that Nethaniel was, but he'd never condoned hitting in the face, and with the color of the bruising it was evident someone had tried their best to strangle him. Yurick would never have tried such dangerous play. His midnight blue eyes passed between Husky-blue ones and chocolate brown, a questioning raise of an eyebrow as he looked at the younger vampire.
"Not my doing." Yurick shook his head as Michael went over to sit on the floor by the glass top table, quietly eating up the last of his noodles. He really didn't want to be a part of the conversation, but there was a look in Yurick's eyes that said if he tried to leave, he would well break his legs. Jean-Claude looked between the two again, and Michael hunched his shoulders, Yurick glaring at him like he'd said something stupid already. Jean-Claude sighed, leaning back against the couch as he set his teacup down, crossing his legs at the knee, arms going out across the back of the sofa. He always posed, but it wasn't as if he was doing it on purpose. Michael had realized that. The French vampire simply...posed. Natural talent, he guessed.
"Am I going to have to guess, or will one of you tell me what's floating about the air like angry bees?" He asked in a bored tone, and Yurick went to stand by Michael, reaching a hand down to pet at his hair. He was angry, but he supposed it wasn't his shape shifting friend's fault. Michael set his empty cardboard bowl down and sighed, leaning in against Yurick's leg like a happy well fed cat, glad he was getting touched.
"Michael has been receiving visits from our other furry friends. They aren't as happy to have him as the rest of us are, and have taken to punishing him for the woes of their kind." Yurick said, pulling a little on Michael's hair to show off the bruises around his throat, and all the Asian boy did was groan and lean harder against his legs. It was like watching a cat drunk on catnip, who only wanted to be petted harder.
"And he didn't fight back? Our chaton has a bite quite a lot harder than some of theirs when he applies himself. And he's faster. How was he caught?" Jean-Claude's eyes narrowed, and he sat forward, folding his hands in his lap. He knew the others were agitated at the Asian shapeshifter, but he hadn't known they'd been laying into him in such a...heated way. The bruises across the boy's so pale neck made it look like whoever had done it was determined to kill him.
"Michael doesn't actually see a way to fight back. I think it's...well, we all know he's pretty screwed up in the head, but there's no way in his thinking for him to fight back." Yurick let go of Michael's hair, and it was as if he hadn't heard a single word of any of the things the two vampires had said, rubbing his cheek against Yurick's leg as a thick purr came from his throat. He reached a hand up, rubbing his palm along Yurick's leg in a slow motion to obvious other places, and a swift pale hand came down to slap at his hand like he was a cat reaching over onto your plate, Yurick rolled his eyes. "Honestly, do you think of nothing else?"
"Well ya did just pull my hair somethin awful. Ya big stingy bastard." he grumped, wrapping arms around Yurick's leg. He was getting sleepy, and he'd had food. It was either fuck or eat soon, and it looked like he was just going to have to sleep. His face and neck hurt, but it was only adding to it. If he went to sleep he didn't have to feel any of it, and it sounded like a great escape to him as he bounded up, throwing himself up onto his feet in that easy liquid motion, stretching with a yawn. Even stretching he was only barely four foot nine, and lean as a lizard.
"I'm goin ta bed. Ya two have fun talkin about me like I ain't here, 'cause I won't be. Nice change from a couple seconds ago, I think." he said as he started on back the way they had come. He had great dreams of crawling up under his bed with his extra pillow, laying out on the thick blanket he already had tucked up under there and just sleeping till he couldn't anymore. He'd dropped out of school a while ago, not technically legal, but he didn't much fancy staying in, not when he could work at the circus, and not when he wasn't really into it anymore. He missed going to art, and seeing Ezzy around school, but they still hung out a lot. He just didn't care about school anymore.
Michael started off on his way to the exit, but a hand on the scruff of his neck stopped him, and he growled a little. "Aw come on Ricky, lemmie go. I just wanna sleep, kay? Healing this shit takes a lot of energy out 'a me, ya know. I stay up too long an the energy drain from bein awake, an from healing is going to make me have ta eat again, an I really don't like havin ta do it." he sighed, and Yurick let go of him, giving him that look that said he had to stay put or else. Michael shrugged, going over to the table to pick up his trash, fiddling with an tearing at an edge, making all kinds of noise in the room as the two vampires went still, that odd stillness of statues that they could slip into. Michael had to look up and around to make sure they were even in the room.
Jean-Claude moved first, as Yurick was engaged in staring at the Asian shape shifter.
"What do you want me to do about it?" He asked, that so smooth tone that made you feel chastised without even a change in his voice, a look in his eyes. It was just the voice alone, and the words, somehow hot and stinging, irritation you could touch. Yurick shuddered and Michael hunched his shoulders. He was getting Yurick in trouble and it was all his fault.
"I want them to stop, I don't care what you have to do to to it...Please?" He added at the end, thinking the statement sounded more like a command than an answer. But his friend was in trouble, apparently trouble he was unable and unwilling to get himself out of, and he wanted it to end there. Jean-Claude nodded his head thoughtfully, and it was clear on his features that he already had an idea.
"What is mine cannot be hurt by anything else that is mine...and the shapeshifters, as they work here, are mine in a sense. They won't be able to hurt him if he were, say, my pet. Yes...something like that would certainly keep them from hurting him. Oh of course it will be in name only. He cannot feed me with blood, and I refuse to take children..so he cannot feed me with his body. But he can have the title nonetheless." Yurick smiled, a bright happy boyish thing, but it wilted around the edges as midnight blue eyes turned to him.
"There is a price to pay for such a thing, as I will have to keep quite an eye on the boy. You will have to start working at guilty pleasures for me. You are well on the way to looking twenty, despite your physically young age. You've contributed nothing and expect me to do you favors. I do not stand to gain anything further from this action, except perhaps not having police swoop in and collect a body of a young boy from my premises. So you will have to pay me back." Jean-Claude smiled, that smile that was pure smug seduction, and Yurick's face fell, Michael looking between the two like a child trying to understand an adult conversation. He wasn't sure what was happening, everything going too fast for him, but he got the general idea. Jean-Claude wanted something from Yurick, and the younger vampire didn't like it.
"What's wrong? What's guilty pleasures?" He tilted his head to the side, both vampires giving him equally surprised looks. He honestly had never heard of the place, but it sounded interesting. He wondered just what it was; Probably something dirty by the sounds of it. It made him grin, and Yurick frowned at him.
"Jean-Claude has been at me to strip for him since I came here. I have refused on the grounds that it actually made me terribly uncomfortable. Having women stare at me whom I didn't know, whom I wasn't allowed to actually be anything with...that just serves to pen on paper like whoring. And I am not a whore." Yurick turned angry eyes at Jean-Claude, and he stared right back, narrowing his eyes into a cold gesture, face going hard and set. Stripping sounded fun. "I want to do that for my eighteenth birthday. Have a party with everyone I know and actually like. It'd be so damned fun." he grinned. Yurick shook his head. "I don't want to."
"You will, or I will not do this thing for you. You contribute nothing. Either you do, and I do as you ask, or you leave and I do what you ask, getting someone who can take your place and earn their keep, or you will not have this thing done for you. It is your own choice." Yurick squared his shoulders, jutting his jaw to the left before he sighed.
"Alright.." Jean-Claude smiled, sitting back again, and Michael raised eyebrows. He had sure given in easily.
"I'll leave then."