Chapter 2

A/N: Chapter 2 is here. I think I'll change bits of this, I'm not completely happy with it. Blah. Still own nobody.

Kei ran it through his head once more.

When had they run out of things to say? When had Luka stopped caring? When had Kei begun to feel more comfortable on his own? The whole thing formed a knot of black space in his stomach, and the unanswered questions made him feel sick. Most nights he had to remind Luka to even hunt, which he did automatically, without his usual lazy elegance. He was only doing it to keep Kei happy.

But Kei wasn't happy.

He could just remember the last lucid conversation they'd had, recalling Kei's earlier question. When he thought about it now, he couldn't help but wonder if that question had been the beginning of it all, or whether Luka would have spiralled downwards anyway.

"You never did tell me why you turned me," he'd said, trying to sound casual so that Luka wouldn't pick up on it.

"I didn't?" Luka's voice was quiet and weary, as it so often was, when he still spoke at all. He didn't sound like he particularly cared. "It's not important. It was just a snap decision anyway. You don't need to know."

This wasn't the answer he'd expected. Snap decision? Kei was stunned. A snap decision was enough to make him into this? Impossible! Luka was hardly the most spontaneous person in the world. This couldn't be right. "That's it? A snap decision?"

"That's right," came the deadly calm affirmation.

"There was no more ... meaningful reason?" Kei couldn't hide his disappointment. Great, now my life has meaning, he thought sarcastically. "What, did you get bored or something?" He didn't expect a reply.

But Luka flicked his eyes over to the younger man. "Vampires don't get bored," he corrected, and there was a faint tinge of emotion to his words, but what it was, Kei couldn't tell. Irritability, perhaps. "No, we get lonely. I didn't say there were no reasons. It was a snap decision based on very good reasons."

Only Luka could sincerely mean something like that. That was a good sign. There was something left of him. Or was he just trying to make Kei feel better? Kei decided to push his luck. "What reasons?"

The older vampire shook himself suddenly, as if dispelling a bad dream. "Maybe I chose the wrong man after all," he mused out loud. "I should have chosen one who wouldn't ask annoying questions and who would just be damn happy with what he's got."

"Are you happy?" ventured Kei. A challenge.

Luka ignored it and glared at him with mock severity. "This is exactly what I'm talking about." But the look in his black eyes said that he didn't really mean it. Kei almost hugged him. He was still able to come back. Now to find a way to keep him here.

He'd really believed there was hope for Luka then.

He hadn't even noticed the gradual slide into... this. Whatever that was, whatever was wrong with him now. If he skimmed his memories now, it was as clear as day. First he got more and more cynical, more jaded. Even if he had noticed it then he wouldn't have dared say anything, fledgling that he had been. It was hard to detail how he had become this shell. If he could look back to before he had become a vampire, he would have seen these changes beginning already, and then with the arrival of Kei, he had revived. Luka had even thought there was hope for himself. He had found his cure. But whether it was too late, or it was just inevitable anyway, the decline started again, slower than before, but still there.

Kei didn't know all this. He only knew that the only way he could get Luka to come back into himself was to provoke him until he couldn't bear it anymore. But he was wearying of the effort, of acting all the time. And he was getting fewer and fewer results. The moments of lucidity dried up like a stream in a dry season, ands Kei found that he was acting the fool for a brick wall.

Just how long have you been a vampire? he wondered, though he knew it was too late to ask him. Even if he understood the question, there was no guarantee he'd bother answering. But it was more likely that he'd be buried so deep within his own mind that he wouldn't be able to hear the question, let alone understand.

"What am I supposed to do now?"

He spoke out loud, knowing there would be no sign of comprehension from Luka. He said it because he longed for the familiar comfort of a human voice, even his own. Human. Well, it was the best he could come up with. Was there even a word for people like him? There was, he realised. It was 'monster'. But that wasn't what he wanted. Oh, to be mortal again! To have only simple worries and simple joys, and death far from him at all costs!

"I want you back, Luka," he said sadly, watching his ever-silent companion, and feeling his heart break. If he'd ever had one. "I can't bear this loneliness; you were right. I'd rather be alone now."

But he still showed concern in his hopelessness, and continued to care for his mentor, hardly taking his eyes off him. He was learning patience, and resourcefulness, and cast off his young, trusting nature with the ease of a snake wriggling out of an old used skin. Was it always so easy? he wondered. I should have done it before. He felt lighter, freer, sharper. More real, less human. He understood Luka. He understood survival, how it's not enough to hunt every night, and concealment is sometimes more important.

But he never again felt even a twinge of guilt when he stole from his victims.

If Luka could see him now, he would have known he had failed. Kei was just as gone as he was. But he didn't, because he barely noticed what was going on anymore. His blank, empty eyes were turned elsewhere. They held on to each other, because there was nothing else to hold on to. Luka went through the motions of what life they had under Kei's watchful eye, and Kei used Luka to hide from himself what he was doing to his soul. And then...

And then Luka was gone.