Title: "His heart has ceased to beat"

Author: Danielle

Rating: PG-13/R

Story type: Crossover Harry Potter/Vampires: The Masquerade/Mages, Angst/Horror/Mistery

Notes: Heavily Poppy Z. Brite and Lena Falkenhagen inspired, request and dedication to the one who first can tell me how many phrases I stole from Brite...sorry for that, but a few things were simple to good to pass up.

Warnings: Violence, blood (duhhh...it is about Vampires, who would have guessed) and most likely slash somewhere down the line... oh, and also some mistakes, sorry, but english isn't my first language.

Disclaimers: R.K. Rowling owns HP, Vampires: The Masquerade and Mages belongs to White Wolf, some characters are mine, but who would want to claim those anyway...

Reviews: Pretty please? Let me know if I shall continue this...

Authors Statement of the Day: Being a chemistry student has it peeks...I actually know what I was on as I wrote this...

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Steps echoed in the night time, the beat of feet against slick stones, drowned out by the rapid pounding of his heart. Rough, unsteady breaths drawn, air brushing over bloodied lips, small droplets coughed up, black gems in the darkness of the night, streaked with the torn silver veil of rain.

Lightening brightened the scene for a moment, casting the dirty side alley he ran through in painful whiteness, broken by stark black shadows. His unnatural pale face turning away, lids falling closed to block out the sudden brightness, streaks of blood, scratches, like dark slashes on the whiteness of the skin, a bruise spreading over a sharp cheekbone, like a blighted orchid blooming under his skin, purple rot, shot through with a scarlet web of burst capillaries. A fineboned hand, pressed against his neck, vainly trying to hold back the liquid bubbling forth in a black, thick stream from a long clean slash. A shimmer of crimson in the otherwise dark stain, that ran from shaking shoulders, over s slender chest down, vanishing, merging with the darkness of his trousers, slickening and warm, soaking the thin torn shirt which once must have been white, now dyed in black and washed out red, where it was not torn and dirtied. Hair, white for the moment that the light hit it, clotted in blood, sticking to skin, falling in closed eyes.

Just a moment in which he was bathed in light, seen, before darkness spread its blanket over the streets again, mercifully concealing the stumbling battered form.

A few more steps, a painful gasp as thin legs finally gave out, falling against the rough stone pavement, not managing to support himself, stop his fall. Sinking to the ground, whimpering in pain, strangled, trying to breath and not managing with the unbearable pressure around his lunges, like steelbands around the struggling organ. Face pressed into the dirt, no longer feeling the pain from his abused cheek, fingers falling away to the ground, motionless, letting the blood spill without restrain, scarlet painting the puddles that had built on the ground, pink swirls in dirt and black oily miniature seas.

Silver dusted lashes raising halfway, to reveal dull grey eyes, hopeless, resigned, nothing of their once sparkling brilliance left, no longer gems but ugly pepples.

And even those did break as a last rasp of breath came over his lips and his heart ceased to beat.

 ~~~

Black boots stepped next to the crumpled form of a boy, steel enforced tips kicking against soft flesh with savage brutality, turning the seemingly boneless from on its back.

Mud and blood stained face, lifeless eyes, broken grey staring mindlessly up to meet his.

A female voice spoke up softly, nearly swallowed by the sound of rain and the roar of flames.

"Any idea what she wanted with him?"

Another kick at the fallen boys side, laying like a broken doll to the feet of two people.

"I don't know. And I don't care anymore. The little one is dead."

A snicker, followed by the honeylike woman's voice.

"Pity...he might have been even pretty under all that dirt, and to waste so much blood. I bet he would have been sweet. Would have loved to play with him a bit...hey, wait up! Where are you going?!"

"We can't afford being caught here, Clarrise. So move."

~~~~

Pain, enormous, pain, hot, burning his insides, twisting, frying, like his intestines were spread out on a barbecue, then cold in the next moment, down all the way to his bones. Sweet ache one moment, soaring hurt the other. Spasms breaking the stillness of his body, limbs moving on their own accord, like a child pulling on the strings of a marionette with clumsy hands, shaking, jolting and twisting.

Bruised, bloodclotted lush lips moving, dried flakes of red falling away from peachcoloured skin, a hoarse moan working itself free, soar throat screaming in protest.

Grey unblinking eyes that seemed to harden, loosing their colours as if washed out by the rain that steadily beat down upon his battered form, carried away by the small rivulets of pink tinted water. Grey turning vivid, ever moving silver, quicksilver caught in bottomless pools.

Another shudder went through him, and with a rapid move he flung himself to his knees, thin pale hands clawing at the stone beneath, nails breaking and small droplets of blood seeping to mix with dried one.

Knots forming in his stomach, watering mouth and tearing eyes. He felt light-headed for a moment, his surroundings shifting, grey and black blurring together, swallowing him, dark wave rising to crash over him, drowning him in a sea of stone, lost perspective, the world tilting in a cruel angle. He felt like laughing, madly, to lighten the pressure building in every fibre of his body, a fever that soared through his veins. But as he opened his mouth he choked, dry coughs and heaves, painful stinging in his stomach, before he threw up a stinking bile of vomit. It felt marvellous to him, like a vile of crimson poison flooding out of his system as blood and half digested food spilled forth from his mouth.

He sunk to his side, not caring for the stench that waved up to his nose, scorching his nostrils and making him sick all over.

A moment later a second bile joined the first.

Stumbling to his feet, once polished shoes splashing through water and things he did not want to think about he made his way through the alley, away...he did not know to where, just away.

 ~~~

Eyes the colour of Chartreuse narrowed, full lips drawing upwards in a cold smile.

Not lost at all...clever bitch, to bestow the gift upon her plaything. She had known, had known and prepared everything.

A huge act.

A masterpiece truly, staged perfectly. That they found her, that she fought and as defeat neared thrown herself into the fire. Her boytoy left behind near the brink of death, to fend for himself. Stumbling and bleeding...

How was he supposed to know that it was not the liquid of life that bubbled forth over the youths lips and from the swanlike neck, but the one of his sire. The blood he has been after for centuries and he had thought was lost to him.

Had been right infront of him, cursing through the veins of the little vermin that he had proclaimed dead.

Well, he could still get it.

Emotionless, gemlike eyes turned feral as he unsheathed a sword from his side, steady hands raising it to be in one line with his shoulder.

He did not need Clarisse for that.

Lying, untrustworthy bitch, already plotting to take him instead of her, already forming plans for his demise, like they did just hours before, just for someone different.

Well, he did not expect differently from her, from any of them.

Not even from himself.

But he had not lived for three centuries without learning a few basic things.

Like never turn your back on your own kind.

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