Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Perpetua closed his eyes, his chest heaving. He could feel the sweat on his forehead behind the mask, between his gloved fingers. It was a satisfying feeling, another show well done. The crowd went nuts, and Perpetua was happy he continued to grow as a performer and that people enjoyed that.

His head was raised, as the last echoes of the ghouls’ instruments died down and they enjoyed the audience’s cheers and screams. He bent down, bowed, walking to the front with the ghouls, their arms wrapped around one another. A bow, another bow. His eyes were on the horizon, looking into the crowd, not focusing on anything in specific, smiling wide.
Perpetua’s eyes traveled to the front of the crowd, and his breath stopped. In the middle of the pit, standing still despite everyone around them cheering and clapping, with their hair as jet black as ever and their eyes framed with smudged makeup, stood an old friend.

The ghouls’ automatic movement into a bow dragged Perpetua with them, for he wasn’t sure he could even move. His eyes wouldn’t and couldn’t leave theirs. He couldn’t see it from this distance, but he could guess what those eyes looked like. A red sheen over the once bright green.

“Ow!” Someone hissed from next to him. Perpetua whipped his head around, realizing he had dug his fingers into Dew’s shoulder. He quickly loosened his grip. “I’m sorry…” He mumbled. Dew looked at him curiously, grinning. “It’s fine, everything okay?”
Perpetua let his arms fall down his sides. “Yeah…I mean, yes I’m okay.” He heard how mechanical that sounded, but Dew shrugged, even though his head was still tilted in curiosity. He motioned for the ghoul to join the others as he quickly tried to collect himself. He couldn’t let anyone know.

Saying and motioning his final goodbyes to the crowd, Perpetua stood in the center of the stage, a final bow. He tried to avoid their eyes, but they felt like they were burning into him. Looking up just before the lights went down, he could’ve sworn he saw them mouth something at him.

Making his way backstage, frantically shaking hands and thanking the ghouls and crew on autopilot, he locked himself in his dressing room. His hands gripped the table as he leaned down.
He couldn’t even pretend that he had mistook someone for them, that his eyes had deceived him. It was them. His mouth ran dry, and where he usually felt quite hungry after a show, that feeling was nowhere near right now.

There was a loud knocking on the door that snapped him out of it, and he spun around in panic. He listened for someone to call before even making a move.
“Hey, it’s me.” The voice called. Perpetua relaxed a little. Phantom. He unlocked the door and Phantom looked at him, worried.
“You look like you saw a ghost.” Phantom chuckled. But his head was in that same curious tilt as Dew’s had been. Perpetua felt like he looked insane right now.
“Not a ghost, I just…” He fell silent. He didn’t want to lie, but he didn’t know how to tell the truth either. A middle way, then.
“I thought I saw someone I used to know.” Perpetua decided. Phantom leaned against the doorway.
“Huh. Like from before?” He asked. Perpetua bit his lip, a little too hard and painful.
“Well, yes. But couldn’t be. How would they even have found me? Perpetua wondered out loud. Phantom chuckled again, his face apologetic.
“Uh, I don’t mean to be a smartass, but you do know you’re in a very successful band, if I do say so myself? People know us. And you. We are...doing a world tour.”

Perpetua stared at the ghoul, and Phantom noticed how rigid he stood. It was always a little bit eerie when he did these things. “I didn’t even think of that.” Perpetua spoke and his voice sounded as if he was mad at himself.
“You’re just starting out, you’ll get used to it. If anything’s up, you know you got us, right?” Phantom promised, putting a hand on Perpetua’s shoulder, whose head turned to the hand as if his neck joint was rusty. He gave Phantom a toothy grin.

“Thank you, Phantom. Thank you all. I don’t know if I would want to be reunited with certain…figures.” Perpetua was purposefully keeping things a little bit vague.
“Don’t worry about it. Meet you out back soon, right?” The ghoul waved, nodding at Perpetua, who gave a curt nod back.

As soon as the ghoul left, Perpetua looked left and right in the hallway, before locking the door and quickly packing his stuff. If his heart could beat, it would be racing. He snapped off his mask and changed into the set of clothes waiting for him, stuffing his sweaty ones in the bag. It sloshed around, and he rolled his eyes. His brother just thought it was so funny that he used blood bags as juice boxes. It was a bit of a gray area, ethically, but then again, not being an alive human and still walking around might have also been a very gray area in this world.

As he left the room, he noticed he still anxiously checked the hallways, walking faster than he normally would to the sound of the ghouls’ voices. The coast was clear and he was glad he could be silent on the way to the hotel under the guise of being tired from the ritual. Not that he wasn’t, but he also felt the panic seeping in.
He debated on calling his brother, but his own thoughts immediately countered that idea.
What would he even tell him? And what would that even sound like, Perpetua being on his first tour and being panicked already? He decided to send him an unassuming text.
“Just finished the show. All went well.” Oh, and I feel like I’m about to be attacked by someone I used to once know that showed up to said show.

Perpetua rolled his eyes to get the feeling of nervousness out of his system, and because he thought that was what his brother would do if he had heard or read that additional sentence.
Copia texted back surprisingly quick.
“Good stuff.”
Perpetua frowned. That was it? He was already typing a lengthy message when another one showed up.
“So what’s up, Vee. You never text me that.”
Perpetua deleted the lengthy message and started a new one.
“Are you still calling me that? How did you know something is up?” Perpetua stared at the screen while he sent the message. In his head he could picture Copia trying to type fast. He knew he wasn’t a fast typer.

“Aha. So there is something up. I knew it.” Copia replied, accompanied by a bunch of little faces. Perpetua was still frowning.
“I saw someone in the crowd. I used to know them a long time ago.” Perpetua read what he had typed. This sounded so stupid. What was Copia going to do, there was nothing he could even do. Well…advice, perhaps?
Copia didn’t respond so Perpetua sent another message.
“Feel panicked about that. I do not want to meet them.” He looked at the ghouls, who seemed to be in various stages of exhaustion, some talking amongst themselves. They seemed perfectly happy. Good.

“Not even going to ask who or what. Tell crew and ghouls, and staff of what ever place you will be at.” Copia replied. Perpetua was surprised, it was surprisingly level headed. He wasn’t even making fun of him.
It put Perpetua a little more at ease.
“Thank you. Don’t you think I sound crazy?” Perpetua replied. Copia texted back with more little faces.
“I think it sounds crazy. But I have also seen people I did not want to see. Tell the others. Good night.”
Perpetua sent him back another ‘thank you’ and a ‘good night’ and stared ahead. Something in him made him refrain from telling the others. He didn’t want to come off as crazy so early in the tour. What would he even tell them? “Oh, I just saw my old friend in the crowd, no big deal, is a vampire though, lock your doors.”

It wasn’t that the ghouls didn’t know about Perpetua’s own nature. It was hard to not know for people close to him. It had been a little strange at first, yes, but things were going smoother than Perpetua had ever dared to hope.

As they arrived to their destination, their hotel for the night, Perpetua asked the front desk assistant to not let strangers know he was there. The assistant gave him a friendly customer service smile.
“Of course, Mr. Perpetua, we value our clients privacy and safety.” Perpetua nodded, but feared she didn’t understand it wasn’t about a regular human being.
“Thank you. Just…well, I’m fairly new at this…” He said, using the ‘I am new’ excuse to mask his nervosity.
“But he’s doing great!” He heard from behind him, and he recognized Phantom’s voice again. He had grown quite close with the ghoul. The assistant smiled again. “We have it all covered. Have a good night, Mr. Perpetua and company.”

As they bid each other goodnight, Perpetua locked the door of his room, checking it a couple of times. He closed the windows and curtains. He felt insane as he checked the room, but there was not a living soul in there, including himself.
Making his way to the bathroom, he finally took off his paint, the water running gray in the sink, and he stood in the middle of the room for a few minutes. He wasn’t going to sleep, as he usually did that during daytime, but he did feel like he needed rest. Maybe a slight slumber, then.

He got on the bed, turning the lights off. The silence of the room felt comforting, and the curtains in front of the windows didn’t completely leave out the light. A little sliver of moonlight fell into the room. Perpetua closed his eyes, hoping to put his thoughts at ease and feel better in the morning.

As he lightly slumbered, his brain processed the day. He wasn’t fully conscious of his surroundings, or aware of the passing of time. One thought, one certain event was unearthed from the depths of his memory.
The person he had bitten two decades ago. That night caused conflicting feelings in Perpetua that he felt he hadn’t ever been able to make sense of.
The person had been a musician. Maybe still was. Perpetua hadn’t kept up with them out of respect. Or fear. Or both.

Nights before the event, Perpetua had been on the outskirts of a city. He didn’t know what city, it didn’t matter. He had eaten before, but he was feeling lonely.
He had heard the strumming of a guitar. A young person, an adult by the looks of it, sat on a low wall, unbothered by anyone or anything happening around them. Their black hair stood in peaks, half hanging down covering part of their face. The strumming didn’t sound recognizable.

People walked past, maybe on their way home, and Perpetua found himself standing closer to the unknown guitarist, who was humming something. It didn’t sound like a very beautiful song.
“Can I help you?” A voice, a little gravelly but clear, reached Perpetua’s ears. He hadn’t noticed how close he had been standing to the guitarist, just watching and listening. He took a step back.
“Apologies, I don’t mean to impose upon you.” He held up his hands to show he wouldn’t be a threat. He had eaten already, after all, and that had not been the intention tonight.
The guitarist looked up at him and scoffed. “Right. Well, when you’re done ‘imposing upon me’, you could tell me what you think of this. You like music?”

Perpetua cocked his head. It was a faster movement than normal humans did. “I do, I love it.” The guitarist nodded and began strumming. “Just did a show this evening. You should come check us out. But listen to this.”
An ambition sounded in their voice that Perpetua was pleasantly surprised to hear.
“Well, you gonna just stand there like a statue or what?” The guitarist said, annoyance seeping through their voice. Perpetua once again hadn’t noticed he was behaving inhuman. “Apologies…” He looked around. The guitarist stopped strumming and motioned to the wall they were sitting on. “I don’t bite.” They joked. “At first.”

Perpetua let out a laugh, the stranger had no idea how ironic that was to say in this situation.
The guitarist grinned, pleased they had made Perpetua laugh. “What’s your name?” They asked, looking up at Perpetua, their eyes meeting. Even in the faint streetlight, Perpetua saw how green and vibrant their eyes were, and how the smudged black makeup accentuated that. If his heart beat, it would’ve jumped out of his chest. Perpetua wasn’t sure what he was feeling, chalking it up to the pleasant interaction he was having with a human being for the first time in a long while.

The guitarist was holding out their hand. Perpetua stared at it. He quickly tried to collect himself, shaking their hand. The warmth of their soft human skin beneath Perpetua’s cold fingers, the life underneath it pulsing, as they shook hands.
“Ohhhhh-kay….” The guitarist said, their voice a little strange but still chuckling.
“Perpetua.” Perpetua said. His name. He was just being straight up honest, why not?
“That’s kinda metal, I like that.” The guitarist let go of his hand and gripped their guitar again. “I’m uh, Mary Goore.” They said, as if it wasn’t of importance. Perpetua nodded and repeated their voice in his head. Mary Goore.
“That’s…also kind of metal…” Perpetua murmured, not sure what to say. This made Mary laugh, as they strummed. “It is, right?”

They played a song, and Perpetua listened, sitting with his back straight on the wall, where Mary was slouching.
“Do you come here often?” Perpetua asked, immediately feeling like he should have come up with a better question. Mary shrugged.
“Not specifically here, I guess. I do like being out.” They got some sort of rhythm going on their guitar. Perpetua tried to catch glimpses of their face, which wasn’t the easiest task in the night with the faint streetlight and Mary’s hair in front of their face.
There seemed to be specks of…well, it couldn’t be blood. Perpetua would have smelled that immediately. Something that resembled blood in color. He raised an eyebrow in question.

“What happened?” He asked, and Mary looked up. “With what?”
Perpetua pointed to the red stains, his long nailed finger hovering just slightly away from Mary’s face. That didn’t seem to bother them at all, even though their eyes rested on the point of Perpetua’s nail before looking up at his face.
“Oh, that. Nothing, just an added element of stage makeup, I guess.” Mary said. A light blush spread on their cheeks and Perpetua held in his breath, afraid the blood pooling would make him feel some kind of hungry.

“Don’t worry, it’s not real blood.” Mary chuckled, chalking Perpetua’s held breath up to him possibly being queasy around blood.
“I know.” Perpetua replied, later realizing that might have been a strange reaction, hoping Mary hadn’t noticed. It wasn’t like Perpetua to question how humans would react to him, but something in him wanted to be careful around this new person.

“Ah shit, I’m gonna have to work on the realism of it then.” Mary rolled their eyes, annoyed at themselves. “So do you come here often? Never saw you here before.” They said, focusing their attention on their guitar again.

Perpetua hesitated a little. No, he didn’t come here often. And if he had, it would’ve been in the shadows, late at night. Barely noticeable.
“Not very often, no.” Perpetua decided to reply. That answer seemed to satisfy Mary enough.
“Cool, cool. So hey, coincidentally, we’re performing tomorrow night again, I mean, it’s a pretty small place but if you have time…” Mary said, and somehow seemed nervous about telling Perpetua this.
He stared at Mary, thinking about his options. He didn’t have the desire to feed off this human…yet. They seemed nice and easygoing. It wasn’t like Perpetua had many friends, not human ones anyway. He was more often around ghouls than people, and if he was around people, it was to sate his appetite.

But he couldn’t get attached, even the slightest, to this person. If he got hungry or had to suddenly leave this place, the human would probably be upset. For some reason, something deep inside Perpetua made him feel like it would upset himself as well. Annoyed, Perpetua pushed that strange feeling aside.

“It’s fine if you don’t want to or don’t have time, don’t worry about it-” Mary quickly said in Perpetua’s silence. They stood up from the wall, grabbing the guitar bag and beginning to pack up.
Perpetua stood up way faster than he normally would around humans, standing in front of Mary straight and with a tilted head, as if to stop them.
“I want to.” He said it before even thinking about the answer. Why did this human intrigue him so? Well, it was a musician, and Perpetua was, or at least, was to most likely be, a musician as well. He loved it. His family, that he admittedly was not close to and barely ever saw, consisted of musicians. That’s all he really knew, after all. The people in charge were very hush hush, to Perpetua’s annoyance.

“Oh! Cool…” Mary stared up at Perpetua, being shorter than him, with a surprised look on their face.
Perpetua gave them a toothy grin, and Mary looked at him in surprise still, before grinning back. “Absolutely no offense but you are kind of a weirdo, aren’t you? Don’t worry, I love weirdo’s. I consider myself one of them, if I do say so myself.”

Perpetua considered this. A weirdo? Was that a descriptor of him? People used weirdo as a negative connotation a lot, that much he knew. But something about Mary’s face told him it was meant as something positive here.
“Thank you, Mary.” He said. The name felt like the sweetest blood in his mouth, the sound of his voice wrapping around the letters, without even meaning to.
Mary looked away from Perpetua, scratching the back of their head while chuckling, and this time Perpetua so clearly smelled the blood pooling in their face.
“Yea…” They replied, scraping their throat. They slung the bag over their shoulder.
“So, see you tomorrow then?” Mary’s voice sounded hopeful and Perpetua wished it wouldn’t, he knew what kind of hurt it could cause to grow any kind of attachment to him. But still, he’d never had a friend before, especially not one like this that didn’t seem to mind any of his weirdness.

“What time and place?” Perpetua asked, and after Mary had written it on Perpetua’s hand with a marker, in a scraggly handwriting but with a surprisingly careful hand, they exchanged a goodnight.

In the now, Perpetua replayed the entire memory of that first night in his mind. It had been pleasant, and many more nights similar to that had followed. They’d hang out together, Perpetua would watch Mary’s band. It was interesting music, and Mary was great at the rough metal musician character. Perpetua gave them pointers on how the fake blood could look more realistic, and Mary didn’t ask how he knew those things.
Mary had been the closest friend he had ever had.
Being around Mary made him worry less about things, even though it strangely made him feel…light. As if a weight was removed from his shoulders and chest, as if his heart could happily beat. Mary hadn’t known about Perpetua’s nature. If they hung out during the day, it would be in dingy bars or where Mary’s band practiced. He found himself feeding before meeting up with his friend, and one night, he noticed that he had become attached.

He tried to not get attached to humans. Too many questions, and it would all end in pain. Perpetua traveled to different places, try to not attract too much attention. He had lived in one place for a long time, and it was always easier like that, even when he became…this.
The ghouls were accommodating and it was a solitary lifestyle. Yet, Perpetua started to miss interaction with others. Knowing what was going on in the world outside.
When he started traveling, he stayed away for longer and longer, taking up temporary residences. There was more than enough budget for that, as the upper clergy wanted him to sit and wait, learn things, stay put and not do anything too crazy before he could become useful.

He doubted his parents knew what he had become. Did they even care? He hadn’t seen them in such a long time. He tried to avoid any media to do with them or their music. Maybe it was petty, but Perpetua also felt that he had a right to know. To be himself and do as he pleased.

Of course, nowadays, things were extremely different. A twin brother and a band, he gained those things at the same time. It had been strange, but as they grew closer, it had also felt nice.
But now the old memories haunted him again. The ghost of Mary Goore, but in the flesh.

His brain tried processing all of it in his slumber, and because of it, he didn’t hear the rustling of the curtains even though the windows had been closed.
His eyes were closed, and he didn’t see the figure standing at the foot of the bed, their eyes seemingly glowing in the dark.
The smell of blood made Perpetua sit up faster than a human could, his back straight, his eyes wide open.

“Did you think I wouldn’t come to find you?” A gravelly, but clear voice said, the same voice as they had in life. The sliver of moonlight fell on the figure, and Perpetua felt his mouth go dry.
Mary Goore, the blood splatter no longer fake, the smile a little too creepy, their teeth a little too pointy. Back to haunt him once again.

Chapter Text

In a split second, Perpetua stood next to the bed. For the first time in two decades there was barely any space between them. He could smell the blood on Mary's face, and the rage was tangible.

Perpetua wasn't scared of the fact that Mary was a vampire, but all the feelings and the entire situation he ran away from scared him to…well, not to death. Something even worse.
“Did you seriously think you could just leave me there? Writhing, squirming, a fucking mess?” Mary spoke, their voice a low hiss. They took a step closer to Perpetua.

“Why did you come to the show…” Perpetua mumbled. Mary scoffed, and they looked insane, their eyes wide and their smile too wide still.
Even though Perpetua didn't like this situation and was afraid of how Mary would react, something inside him, deep rooted, told him Mary had come to the concert in the middle of the pit for the dramatics. He wouldn't put it past them. Despite everything, it was still them. Something felt like it was burning inside him, but Perpetua wasn't sure where that originated from.

“You did this. And you left. You havent the faintest fucking idea-” Mary's voice was still a hiss, and he came closer to Perpetua, who stumbled backwards. He didn't feel as steady on his feet as usual.
Mary completely made his head feel like a scrambled mess, and Perpetua didn't notice knocking the lamp off the bedside table.

“Mary, please-” he began. He couldn't help it, their name still felt like sweet blood in his mouth. Didn't Mary hear, know that Perpetua cared? He had never cared about anyone like that before, or ever again.
“Please what? Please what?” Mary pressed a sharp fingernail into Perpetua's chest, who just stared at Mary. He found he missed the pooling of blood in their face. Why…

“It- it was an accident…it never…never should have happened…” Perpetua whispered, knowing this was the worst explanation and worst apology he could give.
“Well, you're right about that…” Mary's once bright green eyes bore into Perpetua's, the red sheen bright. They sounded broken, and it caught Perpetua off guard, who quickly jumped to the side, creating distance between them again.

“This isn't…ideal, I mean, I need you to know I didn't leave because I didn't care…” Perpetua said, hoping somehow Mary would understand. It would be fair if they didn't.
“And here you are. Fancy hotel suite, performing with a famous band, you stole all that from me. You left me to fucking rot.” Mary spoke, and the anger and hurt was prevalent in their voice.

“I didn't want to- Mary, please-” Perpetua began, but Mary jumped towards him faster than they ever could as human, and even though they were still shorter than Perpetua, they commanded the space around them.
“One more “mary please” and it's over.” They hissed with a clenched jaw. The blood on their face didn't appeal to Perpetua at all, he noticed. Mary's hair was jet black and their makeup the same kind of smudged as that first night, he noticed.
He wished he didn't think of these things.

Somehow, Perpetua slumped a little against the wall, seemingly not in control of himself at all. Mary slightly hovered over him, and Perpetua felt a drop of something on his face.
Mary had made sure the blood was there, alright. Perpetua stared at him, feeling like some kind of attack was imminent. Would he even defend himself? Maybe it wasn't deserved.

The thoughts raced through his head in a split second.

There was a loud knocking on the door, and the both of them turned to face it, jumping upright. In another situation, it could have been comical.
More knocking. “Mr Perpetua? Err….Papa?” A voice, and Perpetua noticed one of the ghouls, he couldn't register whose it was.
They couldn't know, not about any of this. What would Copia say if something happened to the ghouls…it would be Perpetua's end.

He turned in panic to where Mary had been standing a mere second ago, but the space was empty.
“Mary?” He called, his voice low. No answer. Would Mary have answered?

“He's obviously asleep, come on…” another ghoul voice said. Without thinking, Perpetua opened the door, sticking his head out.
“Hello.” He said, way too formal. The ghouls, Tempest and Phantom in this case, curiously looked at him.
“Oh! Papa, uh…hello.” Phantom awkwardly waved. Tempest rolled her eyes and came walking towards Perpetua, her eyes growing with concern the closer she got.

“What happened? You look…spooked. What's that on your face?” She asked, and Phantom now stood next to her.
“Woah.” He simply said, and Tempest elbowed him in the ribs, throwing him a glance.

“It's not important.” Perpetua said it before he could think about it, and he hated that it was a lie. It was possibly the biggest importance to him that he could think of.

“You do have something…just right there…” Phantom motioned, his finger mirroring it on his own face. Absent-mindedly, Perpetua wiped his face with the back of his hand. A small red stain.

They stood there in an awkward silence before Tempest cleared her throat.
“So…Papa, I hope you don't mind, but we-” she motioned to her and Phantom, and then to further down the hall to indicate she meant the other ghouls as well “-were worried. Dew said you seemed spooked on stage and then Phantom mentioned something similar…”
Phantom blushed. “I wasn't gossiping or anything, Papa. Just…concerned…”

Perpetua held up his hand and he put a slight smile on his face.
“That's okay, Phantom.”
The ghoul seemed relieved. “We just wanted to see if you were alright and not, you know…not alright.”

They both looked at him with curiosity and Perpetua nodded, leaning his head against the door frame.
“I'm alright. Honestly…” he peered into the room behind him. Nothing.
“I just thought I saw someone in the crowd that I used to know. We didn't part ways the best way and…they have all the reason to loathe me.” He sighed.

“So like a bad breakup?” Phantom said, nodding full of understanding. Tempest looked at Perpetua with concern. Perpetua felt a little flustered, not knowing where the feeling was even coming from. Phantom was wrong.
“No, we…we were close friends. I never met anyone like them.” He said. The ghouls both nodded this time.
“Sorry for bothering this late…we just figured you would be awake, since…well, you know…” Tempest said, and her eyes drifted away from Perpetua’s face. Perpetua quickly waved it away.
“No, please, I really appreciate it. “ The truth. The ghouls cared for him. Copia’s ghouls.
That made his dead heart feel a little warm.
He rolled his shoulders back to try and stand in a more relaxed manner. “I mean it, thank you. Tell the others thank you and don’t worry.” He tried to look as relaxed as possible and the ghouls tilted their heads.

“We will. We’re all here for each other. We really like you.” Tempest said, and Phantom nodded enthusiastically. “I really like you all too.” Perpetua replied, giving a slight bow of his head.

As they said their goodnight’s, Perpetua closed the door and turned on the lights. It wouldn’t necessarily keep Mary away, but still. He closed the window, locking it tight, and checked the door lock again.
This is where his heart would be racing, he knew it. It was the middle of the night, but who knew where Mary was right now. They had been here…in Perpetua’s room.
His conflicting feelings kept his thoughts racing the entire night, and he was happy he didn’t need sleep the same way humans did, even though it made him feel a different kind of tired.

When the sun started to carefully rise again, bathing the room in a soft, dimmed light, Perpetua picked up his phone. It was still early. But he needed to talk to someone.
His finger hovered above the little contact that said ‘Copia - Frater Imperator’. His brother had insisted on his title being in the contact name.
Their relationship was still strained, but they were growing closer. Perpetua was happy to have a brother- Copia started out as feeling replaced and demoted, but slowly but surely was understanding that Perpetua didn’t want to replace him at all. He wanted to learn from Copia, he wanted to do his best and continue the momentum Copia had built. He looked up to him.

If Perpetua would come to Copia with his problems, talk about them with him, maybe that would be better for their relationship. They were building trust between them. Plus, somehow Perpetua felt like Copia just knew him, even though they had been apart.

He clicked the contact and called. He waited for a few seconds, but he didn’t pick up. It was early after all.
He called again, really wanting to talk to him. He was about to hang up when Copia answered.

“What the fuck are you calling me this early for?” Copia said, his voice thick with sleep. Perpetua was silent for a few seconds, earning him a slightly annoyed “Hello??”
He scraped his throat, but his voice still came out raspier than he would have liked.
“I need to talk to you.” Perpetua simply stated, and now Copia was silent. Perpetua imagined it was out of surprise.
“Is it the ghouls? Is it the tour?” Copia said, and his voice sounded alarmed. He sounded as if he quickly sat up, for Perpetua heard some kind of fabric rustling.

“No, no, the ghouls are all fine, the tour is fine!” Perpetua hastily replied, not wanting to give Copia unnecessary worry.
“What is it? Hold on. Is this about that person you saw?” Copia said, and Perpetua was relieved he had come to this conclusion so quickly.
“It is. Uh…can I tell you about them?” Perpetua said, suddenly unsure.
Copia let out a small groan. “Right now? It’s just so damn early…ah, you know what, okay, tell me.”
His quick change of mind made Perpetua think his morning brain just wasn’t thinking too clear, and he thanked Copia.
“It’s going to be a long story. But let me tell you first, okay?” Perpetua said, not wanting Copia to interrupt him with questions before he had the chance to answer them.
“Yeah, tell me.” Copia said, and Perpetua sat upright, staring to nowhere in particular as he began his story about the first night he met Mary. Copia listened, making a few sounds and noises while Perpetua talked, and when Perpetua told him the entirety of that first night, Copia concluded with “So you were both two weirdo’s who bonded in the night. Gotcha.”

Perpetua rolled his eyes, even though there was no way for Copia to see.
“You’re making it sound like I made a random friend on the street to hang out with, but I met someone that I just clicked with and felt such a connection with, it wasn’t like anything I ever experienced before.

Copia made a sound between a grumble and a scoff. “Alright, so it wasn’t a random friend on the street. So what happened next?”
Perpetua sighed. “We met up more often. A lot more often. I never felt that comfortable before. They were my best friend, you know.” He had gotten to the most painful part. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to tell Copia this, he hadn’t ever talked about it anyway.
“But?” Asked Copia, sounding a little annoyed.
Perpetua pinched his brows. His brother was impatient, and he couldn’t disagree, but Perpetua needed time to think a little.

“I never talked about this before.” He admitted. Copia was silent, and then sighed. “Are you sure you want to?” There was some doubt in his voice.
Perpetua was well aware their relationship was still somewhat strained, and they had just started to bond, but there was also a hint of panic in him. He felt like he needed to talk about it, for someone to understand…even if the chance of being understood wasn’t that big.
Somehow he trusted Copia, he felt like he could tell him this.

“Hello? Vee?” Copia’s impatient voice came from the phone, and Perpetua rolled his eyes again. “Give me some time. I just rolled my eyes at you.”
Copia chuckled softly. “Well, you did wake me up early as shit.”

“Get this over with, Perpetua. Talk about it.” Perpetua thought, trying to give himself some more motivation.
He closed his eyes, somehow that made it feel easier.
“Okay, but please don’t interrupt me.” Perpetua said, his voice soft. Copia made a small sound of indignance, but said nothing else.
“Here it goes.” Perpetua prepared himself. He felt like he was stalling, but he swallowed loudly and talked.

“One night, it was a few hours past midnight, we were taking a walk outside. It wasn’t really too unusual, Mary always said it cleared their head. They weren’t that good of a sleeper in the night, which was honestly a lucky coincidence for me.” Perpetua said. It really had been a coincidence, Mary seemed to be a night owl, and that was very convenient for Perpetua, whose nature was against going outside during the day. It wasn’t completely off the table, but it was better not to.

Copia made a noise and Perpetua knew that he wanted to interrupt, so he quickly continued his story.
“So they told me their band was going on a trip for two weeks. That they would be busy with doing some performances and maybe recording a demo. I knew that Mary wanted that so bad, the band was so important to them. So I was happy for Mary, naturally.”
He could see it in his head clear as day, the memory replaying.
“I told them that I was happy and thought it was an amazing opportunity, and that I hoped they would have a good time. You have to understand, Copia…this was something they had talked about so often. And now Mary seemed almost reluctant to even tell me.”
Perpetua saw Mary’s face in his head. their lips pressed in a straight line, as if it somehow wasn’t amazing news.

“But why?” Copia asked, and Perpetua didn’t feel like this counted as interruption.
“I’m not sure. I think Mary said that yes, it would be fun, but that they would miss hanging out with me.” He made himself sound more unsure than he was. ”I think…”. Perpetua knew. Knew exactly what Mary had looked like in that moment, how they had sounded. How it had felt.
“Of course, I said that I would too, as we had become close and we saw each other about every night. They smiled at me then, and they didn’t use that smile very often.” Perpetua felt light inside when he thought of Mary’s genuine smile in that moment. A very positive light.

“So then what’s the issue?” Copia pressed on, and Perpetua shushed him. “I need to finish this story first.” Perpetua said, not having noticed he was standing ramrod straight in the room right now.
“We said we would meet up in two weeks time at the same spot we first met. I thought that was nice, you know.”
He thought of Mary’s nodding and the gesture one of their arms made. As if they wanted to touch Perpetua. He told Copia about this thought, who sounded like he was in slight disbelief.

“It sounds like they wanted to…you know, hug you.” Copia said. Perpetua stared ahead. Had Mary wanted to hug him in that moment? Oh. Oh, that made more sense now, decades after the fact.
“Did Mary want to hug you?” Copia asked as if it was the easiest question to exist. Perpetua slowly answered. “Yes?”
It was like he could hear Copia slapping his face through the phone.
“But, we did say goodbye and promised to meet at that one spot in two weeks. I wished them luck and a safe journey, and fun.”
Perpetua said, knowing the hardest part was coming up.
“So then what?” Copia asked, and Perpetua groaned. “Can you not interrupt me?”
Copia immediately countered with an annoyed “You pause dramatically way too long before you talk.”
Perpetua rolled his eyes again. “That’s not for drama. I’m thinking, I never talked about this before. But alright.”

He sighed and stared at the ceiling. The phone in his hand felt like some kind of anchor, but in a positive way, because it was a way to hold onto the here and now, which helped.
“Mary was away for two weeks. For some reason, in that time, I grew less and less hungry…thirsty, I suppose.” He said, his voice careful. Copia made a sound. They had never really discussed in depth Perpetua’s nature.
“It was like everything in my mind was taken over by anxiety and thoughts of Mary. I was beginning to notice it made me worry for them to not see them as often, even if it was just two weeks. Most of all it felt like I was on my own again, even though I knew technically I was not…” Perpetua cringed at himself, it sounded so dramatic right now. But the pit of despair that he had felt in his heart during that time had been all consuming.

“I forced myself to feed small amounts, just to keep going. It’s something I don’t think regular humans could understand.” He said, he needed Copia to understand that this wasn’t just a normal feeling. It wasn’t simple, and it had done a number on Perpetua.
“Hm, I have had times where I couldn’t eat or drink out of fear or anxiety. Was it like that?” Copia tried to be understanding. Perpetua knew he was trying.

“It’s similar, but for me, what I am…it’s more extreme than that. If I feed regularly, it’s with restraint and a degree of what I suppose could be remnants of my own humanity. The less regular it gets, the less human it gets. The less I can think rationally and logically. Like a wild animal acting on instinct.” Perpetua said, giving Copia some time to process this information.
“I guess that is more extreme. Damn. I mean, I’m sorry…” his brother said, and Perpetua sat down on the edge of the bed. Slivers of increasingly brighter daylight fell through the curtains.

“And so, the day Mary came back, I managed to slightly feed early in that morning. I felt okay with that. I slumbered throughout the day and when the evening fell, I set out to meet Mary.” Perpetua felt like his heart would be hammering in his chest simply from the retelling of this story. It sat still in his chest instead.
“I saw them standing there with that slight smirk on their face, spreading into a grin as I approached them. They called my name.” Perpetua saw it in his head again. He had felt the overwhelming urge to run up to Mary, but didn’t.
“So that was your meadow run scene?” Copia chuckled, and Perpetua pinched the bridge of his nose.
“What’s a meadow run scene? It wasn’t in a meadow.” He replied, and Copia sighed loudly and dramatically. “Just continue.”

“It was euphoric, and we decided to go to Mary’s apartment. They couldn’t stop talking about the past two weeks and it was so good to hear. They were so happy.”
Perpetua smiled softly thinking about it. They had been on Mary’s couch, and Perpetua was just listening to Mary talk. They had listened to the demo tape.
But underneath the surface, Perpetua’s throat had burned. His veins had felt like they were starting to burn. Hunger and thirst.
“Sounds good, though.” Copia piped up. Perpetua was slightly snapped out of the memory.
“Yeah…” He replied, and his free hand rested on the edge of the bed, fiddling with the sheets.
“I felt my thirst set in. It’s nothing I didn’t deal with before, but this time, it was after two weeks of barely feeding. It filled me with anxiety. I tried to push that feeling down, to focus on Mary.” Perpetua swallowed loudly. Copia was listening intently, because he wasn’t making any sound.

“It didn’t work. Mary’s excitement flushed their cheeks, their face. Their happiness was intoxicating, feeling so good but so…mouthwatering at the same time.” Perpetua felt like if he could, he would sit here with a flushed face as well. But he didn’t know how else to explain the feeling.
“We made plans for me to come along the next time. We shook hands about it, and I felt their pulse under my fingers again. The sound and the feeling of that rung in my ears.” Perpetua remembered how the candles they had lit before flickered their warm light against Mary’s skin, and how the movie they had put on played in the background.

“What happened next?” Copia said breathlessly. Perpetua dug his fingers into the sheets, trying not to do the same to the phone he was holding.
“We laughed, we talked. I fought my thirst. I hoped I didn’t look too feral to Mary, because I tried holding my breath, and to not look at their flushed face too much. I couldn’t. It was like a magnet pulled me to them.” Perpetua closed his eyes, pressing the lids tightly together.
“Mary bent towards me, and their face was so close to mine. My heart, even though it sat cold and still, felt like it was trying to crawl out of my chest towards theirs.”

He heard Copia lightly gasp. It was like there was a ringing in his ears. He continued.
“Mary’s face was so close to mine that our noses touched. I could hear them breathe, I could smell their blood…I still don’t know if that was real or a trick my mind played on me. I took a deep breath, and that was a mistake. Their scent was overwhelming, it was all around me. It was causing enormous inner turmoil, I felt like I was fighting myself. It all happened in a split second, and I think Mary had no idea what was happening.” Perpetua’s voice had reduced itself to a whisper. He had lost control. Something that never really happened to him before.

“In a move quicker than what humans could process, my hands were on them. One bent their head to the side, and something inside me made sure it was careful. The other was on their shoulder. Their neck exposed, the pulse drawing me closer and closer until I sank my teeth into their surprisingly soft skin, puncturing it, their sweet, warm blood making contact with my tongue…” Perpetua felt like he was falling into a black hole. No matter what he tried, he could never forget how it had felt. His instinct told him it felt good…but everything else inside of him felt wrong about it. So wrong. So ashamed.
Copia gasped loudly. Perpetua forgot he was talking into a phone.

“I sucked their blood. They were writhing under my hands, but as I drank, it felt like my human side won. I don’t know how, but I tore myself away, I didn’t want to…I almost killed them, Copia.” Perpetua let out a dry sob. Copia was at a loss for words, apparently.
“I don’t know how I stopped. I couldn’t think at all. It was all instinct. The one person I cared about, that I felt close to and that had made me feel so normal and accepted…I hurt them and it could never be okay again. I was sure I had ended their life out of my own selfish, disgusting inhuman instinct.” Perpetua’s voice was a harsh whisper and his fingernails tore through the bedsheets, as he hung his head. The phone fell out of his hand as he clasped his hands in front of his face.

Copia’s concerned voice came from the speaker. It sounded a million miles away. “Vee? Still there?”
Perpetua pulled his fingers through his hair and picked up the phone. “I bit Mary, the one person that meant everything to me, I left them, and they hate me. I can never undo that. And in those first few days, I checked up on them without them knowing because…I needed to know they were alive. I needed to try and fix what I did…but I couldn’t. I can never forgive myself.” He didn’t sound like himself.
Copia sighed. “It was an accident…” Perpetua laughed, hysterical. “It was but it wasn’t just an oopsy! I made sure they would never be a human ever again. "
Perpetua's voice was a whisper again, one that sounded like a man that was hanging on to the last shreds of his voice and humanity. "The worst of all, Copia…when I saw them there in the audience…and having talked about them to you…I realized that I am in love with Mary Goore.”
Copia made a sound like a low hum. “And that would complicate things even more.”
Perpetua felt like he was going insane once again.

Chapter Text

Their throat burned. Not like fire, or like drinking alcohol. It felt as if they hadn’t had water in weeks. Burning dryness.
Mary was only vaguely, very vaguely aware of their surroundings, not even noticing they were writhing on the floor, having slid off the couch. Their body moved in ways that looked inhuman, were inhuman. Consciousness was only on the edge of Mary’s thoughts, memories flashing by in lightning speed…and the pain. The stinging pain, worse than anything they’d ever felt before. Mary clasped their hands around their throat, as if that would stop it.

Somehow, they couldn’t scream. Groaning, writhing, feeling like they couldn’t breathe, choked by the stinging pain and later the burning in their throat, but no screaming. Their vision was dark, as if their eyes said no, we’re not watching. We’re not viewing the world in this state.
Mary had no sense of time. Sometimes the room was light, sometimes it was dark. Sometimes it felt like someone was watching, a figure just outside of their vision.

There had been a time, Mary didn’t know where or when that happened, where it had almost felt like they had been…held. Cradled. Softly, gently. Mary didn’t know what was real or not. Who would even be able to still them? Deal with this writhing mess?

There was another feeling. Deep in Mary’s heart, that felt like it was beating so fast it would exhaust itself, there was something warm…something comfortable, that slowly felt like it was blemished by another feeling. Something uncomfortable attached itself to the warmness.
It was a sharp sting, a powerful feeling. Mary couldn’t make sense of what that was, of what both feelings were. Their brain didn’t work, couldn’t come up with the words.

At first, there was the disbelief. The only word, a name, that Mary could make sense of besides their own. Perpetua. It happened so fast that Mary had had no time to register it, their human reflexes too slow. The sharp pain in their neck. The lightheaded, near conscious feeling.
Perpetua…the name hovered on the edge of Mary's thoughts.
Somewhere between the writhing and groaning, between the irregular heartbeat and the burning in their throat, Mary Goore existed.

If someone had walked in, they’d seen a scene straight out of a horror movie. A person writhing almost demonically, thrashing while not seeming conscious of it. Mary suddenly became aware of their heartbeat, or lack thereof. It was barely existent, beating excruciatingly slow. There was no time or space for Mary to question it. It just was.
It was so apparent that the burning in their throat seemed to become irrelevant. An afterthought. Perpetua…something about Perpetua…

“Ah!” Mary yelped. The sound came out sharp, nothing like their human voice could have produced. It took a while before they realized it had been their sound. A reflex, done out of some sort of instinct.

Mary’s heart, nearing the end of its life. Mary’s heart that had beat for their family, their friends, their music. For love…for Perpetua. The all consuming fire, the uncomfortable sting swallowed what was left of their heart. Something similar to a dry, powerful sob ripped through Mary, who once again was unaware where the sound came from.

Their heart faltered. Mary thought they had heard a gasp from somewhere else in the room. Outside of the room?
It stopped. Eerily quiet, now. Mary’s consciousness slowly seeped back in, and in shock, their vision came back all at once. Not softly blurring back in, but the blaring bright light as if a light had been turned on in a dark night.

A cool breeze on their face. Mary now noticed things again, becoming aware of their surroundings, of themselves.
Before they had time to process the thought, Mary was standing upright. No vertigo, or lightheadedness. A sweet smell though, something that felt like a necessity. Again, before they knew it, they stood at the kitchen counter.

A bag with its contents barely visible, calling to Mary. Grabbing the bag, opening their mouth, squeezing the bag as if there was nothing else on this earth. The sweet, slightly iron-y taste filled their mouth, seemed to warm their insides. It felt like the burning in their throat got less. The bag fell from their hand and Mary didn’t have to look to know what that was.
What was going on?

Mary saw some bread in a bag on the counter. A faded memory told them it was bought at some point before..this.
Bread. Sandwiches. Easy. Mary almost tore open the bag, grabbing a slice of the stuff. It smelled extremely unappealing…had it gone bad?

It looked okay. Mary brought the slice of bread to their face, the closer it got, the more Mary felt like they were going to start retching. “Fucking do it.” Mary said, for some reason their voice sounded strange. It wasn’t too different, but there was an edge to it.
They took a bite and it felt dry in their mouth. It didn’t feel like food, like something edible. Mary spat it out, hanging their head under the tap to wash out their mouth with water.

The water didn’t feel…thirst quenching. It felt refreshing, sure. Somehow it didn’t feel like it had the same effect that it always had.

Mary stood in the middle of the room. So, the food didn’t feel right. The water didn’t feel right. They had squeezed a goddamn bag of blood over their face, into their mouth. Mary didn’t even think of how that got there, too overcome by the thirst.
That specific burning thirst.

Out of nowhere, they let out a high, maniacal laugh. “This isn’t fucking real.” They said, repeating it a few times.
Despite the laugh, it didn’t feel very funny. Were they even themselves anymore?
Making their way to the bathroom, feeling as if their body wasn’t really theirs, Mary almost swung the door off its hinges.

There was someone in the mirror. Mary got closer, on their guard. That person…their eyes had a muddy red sheen over green. Made them look weird.
Their mouth…well, the blood (Mary shuddered without wanting to at this thought) had stained it, but…their teeth seemed different.
“No fucking way.” Mary said, in disbelief. As if they hadn’t endured that pain, that sharp pain and the burning and the writhing and thrashing and their heart stopping- Mary looked in the mirror. If it hadn’t been for all that, this would’ve been a dream. There could still be the question ‘am I dreaming?’, but now there was no fucking chance of that.

For some reason, Mary didn’t want to say it out loud. Obviously, things existed. Mary had always believed there was more than just humans doing their everyday thing. Had to be. But like this?
How could this have happened? Why them?

It felt like an eternity had passed and Mary returned to the living room and kitchen area. The place looked off. The window was open, the curtains blowing inside. The sun seemed to be setting, casting the room in a warm glow. As they leaned their head out the window, a thousand, a million smells hit them like a freight train.
Sweet, savory, iron-y, super sweet…and all made their throat feel like it was burning up.
It felt like nothing else existed. It took everything in them to not jump out the window, even though their apartment was a few stories up.

Storming downstairs instead, not even bothering to close the doors, Mary stood in the passageway between the two buildings where the apartment lobby door opened up to. It wasn’t on a main street, more so somewhere less crowded. The sun was setting more, the last few rays disappearing behind the horizon. The scents were driving them crazy and there was no thinking straight involved.

Instinct and smells. Before they knew it, Mary stood in an alley. The smell of sweetness, like a thirst quenching and hunger stilling meal settled in their nose, in their brain. Faster than could be witnessed by any human, Mary acted.
It didn’t matter that it was a person with a life. It was sustenance, it was a necessity. Their teeth pierced the tender, soft flesh. Their hands kept it down. It. The meal.
They drank, their hands having to keep less and less pressure. Gulps of warm, delicious blood entered through their mouth, filled their stomach, was taking up by their body.

Mary felt on top of the world. They didn’t know how they got back in their apartment, they suddenly stood in the middle of the room again.
Now that they had…fed...their brain felt a little clearer.

Burning, writhing. Thrashing and groaning. Stinging pain. Heart feeling comfortable but then with a sting, uncomfortable. That’s how Mary could summarize it. There was only before and after, not during.

Perpetua. The name appeared in Mary’s head as if a lightbulb had been turned on.
Mary concentrated. Perpetua. That name filled them with a comfortable feeling, but that was tugged on by something stinging and uncomfortable. Why?

Mary sat on the floor, before laying down, staring at the ceiling. Concentrating on that name, peeling back the curtain. Perpetua was comfortable. That was a person. That was Mary’s…friend?
Suddenly, it felt like they had been catapulted through time and space within a split second. “What the fuck”, Mary said out loud. The thoughts and realizations that flooded into their head were all encompassing.
The last shreds of their human existence were laid out before them like large pieces of a puzzle.

“Perpetua…Perpetua did this.” Their voice sounded like a hiss.
They had been together in Mary’s apartment. Mary had returned from a trip.
“Oh, fuck…” Mary swore out loud. They had tried to kiss Perpetua. Because…they were in love with him. Mary’s throat felt dry. Not the burning dryness. More like a ‘I’m realizing things’ dry.

“Am I in love? I am.” Mary said it out loud, as if to hear how insane it would sound. Mary Goore in love? Please. And yet…

Mary had felt the warm comfortable feeling. But that had been overtaken by a stinging discomfort.
Why had that been?
Oh. Perpetua…if Perpetua did this, that meant that no, he wasn’t human. Mary always felt like there was more to him. But it had intrigued them, even if they never asked about it. It didn’t matter to Mary. Everyone had some kind of baggage.
But this? So Perpetua was…a vampire ?

This thought made Mary feel like the floor fell away beneath them. Their fingers dug into the carpet. For some reason, laying on their back on the floor, they felt like that was the only form of anchoring possible. Holding on to the carpet. Perpetua was a vampire, Perpetua who was so dear to Mary had…what? Lost control? Said ‘fuck it’ and gave up, biting Mary?
The hurt Mary felt surprised them. A sharp pain that started in their dead heart and spread out everywhere in their body.

It got more painful, and Mary felt like there was no floor under them, no room around them, their eyes focused on the ceiling as if they could burn through it. The feeling got a name.
Betrayal.

So close. So loved and cared for…now left alone. To rot, to change, to deal with a new life state on their own. Perpetua did his thing and left. After everything...Mary was so sure there was love. No one had ever looked at Mary like he did, made them feel like he did. Way more than friends. It felt like some sort of ancient connection that transcended time and space. Normally, Mary wouldn’t even be thinking spiritual crap like that. But what was ‘normally’, and would there ever be a ‘normal’ again?

The pain consumed their body. The betrayal made them want to curl up. Where was Perpetua, where had he gone?
“Why didn’t you come back?” Mary accidentally said out loud. They sounded pathetic, and they hated that. Since when did they need someone to that extent?

”Well, Mary Goore, since you fell so deeply in love that your soul merged with his.” Mary’s thoughts said.
“Shut up.” They replied to themselves. Going crazy now, too.
Perpetua had left Mary alone in this state, to deal with everything by themselves. No guidance, no help, no nothing. Had it all been a lie?
Had Mary just been a means to an end?
Something inside them didn’t want to believe that. If that were true, why had he let it go on for so long?

Mary had been vulnerable. Tried to kiss him, for fucks sake. Stupid. So stupid. Well, it wouldn’t happen again.
The thoughts felt bitter, but Mary was busy building the wall to shield themselves and everyone else from their emotions and feelings.
Love? No way. Fake shit. Not that anyone would want them like this.

The worst pain, the burning core of the pain, Mary realized, was the love still remaining inside. They didn’t want it. And yet, here it was.
Mary had some stuff to figure out. Most of all, how to exist like this. Alone, not human anymore, abandoned.

–------------------------------------------------------------------

That had been then. Years and years ago. It had only made Mary more bitter, more hurt. It was stamped into their brain. Perpetua left, there had been love there and they were left to die. Mary’s life felt stolen from them.

Mary angrily hurled a random rock over the terrain outside of Perpetua’s hotel. They didn’t want those ghouls to get caught up in it. This was between Mary and Perpetua.
At first, Mary wondered if they should let Perpetua feel the same pain, of being completely alone, different in a world of normalcy. Weirdly, that idea moved to the back of their thoughts.

It had been some years in and Mary was trying to keep tabs on where Perpetua was. Unfortunately, he was off the radar. The only thing Mary knew was about That Place. That Band.
Ghost. The ministry. Perpetua hadn’t even known too much about it, or had that also been a lie? But he had the same eyes as those people. Even the red gleam over them, which Mary now stupidly realized had been a giveaway about Perpetua’s true nature, showed the one white eye.
The idea formed in their head to ask around, and Mary fed thoroughly before strolling into the local bar, ordering a glass of water, even though that looked crazier than not ordering anything.

The little corkboard on the wall held a bunch of different flyers, and Mary spotted the one that seemed most relevant. Ministry walk-ins, people interested were welcome to…call this number…
“You thinking about going there?” A voice said from behind them. Mary didn’t want to seem of any interest, shrugging.
“Don’t know. I’m not from here…” They turned around. Some guy, drink in hand stood halfway between Mary and the bar. Mary’s eyes immediately fell on their upside down cross necklace. Huh. Edgy. Of course.

“I heard they’re pretty cool. Good music, too.” The guy grinned. He annoyed Mary. They made a mental note on where to find a meal.
“Sure. I’ll think about it.” Mary tried sounding as indifferent as possible. The water felt okay enough to drink, and they took a few sips.

When the guy looked away, Mary tore a strip of paper from the flyer, stuffing it in their pocket. Leaving the bar, not bothering to pay, they wouldn’t be back here anyway, Mary found another cafe to use their phone. Couldn’t be too careful.
When the guy behind the bar handed him a phone, Mary gestured toward the back, which looked quiet enough. The guy shrugged, careless, seemingly.

The strip of paper was crumpled up, but Mary could read the numbers on it, dialing the phone. It only rung twice before being picked up.

“This is the Ghost ministry walk-in number. You will be redirected shortly, thank you.” Mary rolled their eyes. How could something like an alleged satanic ministry sound so incredibly boring?

“Good afternoon, this is the ministry’s walk-in number. How may I help you?” A voice said on the other side. It sounded a little nondescript, and Mary quickly thought of what to say.
“Uhh…yes, I’d like to come for a walk-in. Interested in possibly, you know. Joining.” Mary stumbled through the sentences, wishing they wouldn’t.
“That can be arranged. We welcome new members of the clergy. Name?” The voice said, and in their head Mary pictured a shadow of a person with a pen in hand.
Mary’s thoughts raced, falling back on characters from some of their favorite movies.
“Uh, Jack. Jack…Krueger.” The person on the other side of the phone was silent, as if they were writing it down.
“Krueger spelled like Freddy Krueger?” The person said. If Mary had the ability to get flushed, still, they would be red by now.
“Yeah. Uh. Yes.” Could they stop being so nervous? Hello, my name is Mary Goore, and I am looking for revenge. Oh, don’t mind the fake name. Stupid!

The person on the telephone bought it. Well, they had no reason not to. Mary shuffled around on their feet.
“Well, we have a spot tomorrow. 12 pm. If you’re in a hurry, we got tonight. But for some people that would be a little late, or too soon-” The person spoke. Mary cut them off.
“Perfect! Uh, tonight would be great. Yeah, I will be out of town soon, so…” They tried to make up an excuse for the hurry. They swore they could hear a pen scribbling on the other end of the line.

After confirming the time, Mary hung up, handing the phone to the man behind the bar again. “Thanks.” They said, rustling in their pockets for some change, putting it down on the counter without looking.

As the sun went down, Mary made sure to have quenched enough of their thirst. The setting sun would always remind them of that dreadful first moment of waking up like this, alone. Painful. Sad. Betrayed. The sharp pain cut through them again and reminded Mary of why they were doing this.

Mary put their raven colored hair in slight spikes, made sure their makeup was casual enough, a slight smudge around the lid. Nothing crazy. Some nondescript black clothing and they were ready to go. The cheap motel was a perfect place, as no one seemed to ask a lot of questions. The mirror was smudgy, but it was fine. It didn’t matter.
Mary hadn’t thought of what they’d do upon seeing him. But this was almost like reconnaissance, getting to know the enemy. Most importantly, finding out where Perpetua was hiding out.

When Mary showed up at the ministry, walking up the steps and across the long lane leading up to the doors, the sun had gone down completely. Someone greeted them at the door.
A guy in a black outfit, a symbol pinned to his chest. “Good evening. Here for the walk-in?”
Mary nodded. “Yeah…I called earlier?”
The guy held open the door. “Please wait here, I’ll go get him.”
Mary looked around. It was a place that could easily appear eerie. It looked like a cross between a mausoleum and a monastery…but more modern. They unzipped their jacket, before two sets of footsteps returned to Mary , who turned around.

The guy from before brought someone else with him, in a long black cloak, some sort of black hat on his salt and pepper colored hair. Mary couldn’t help but think it, this was the most rat-like man they had ever seen.
“Cardinal Copia, this is Jack Krueger.” The guy introduced Mary to the other man, who seemed to be named Cardinal Copia, before taking off, leaving Mary and the rat-like man alone.
The Cardinal held out a gloved hand, which Mary shook, staring at him. “Ma–Jack…Krueger. Nice to meet you.” Mary almost forgot to use the fake name. The Cardinal shook their hand, the leather crinkling.

“Cardinal Copia, nice to meet you too. I have to say, it’s so cool your name is like a mix of two of my favorite movie characters.” The Cardinal said, and Mary felt like this would be the point where they’d start sweating. Was he onto them? They stared at the Cardinal’s face, who didn’t seem to notice anything suspicious.
“Uh, yeah. Yes, that is pretty cool.” Mary replied, a little surprised. They hadn’t known what to expect, but this hadn’t been it.

Mary felt like the floor fell away from under their feet, just like it had done all those times when they realized what happened with Him, the pain caused, the love still there. They grabbed onto their own jacket, but their eyes couldn’t leave the Cardinal’s face.
The crooked, crinkly smile the Cardinal was giving Mary, was an exact copy of Perpetua’s.

Chapter Text

The cardinal led Mary through a series of hallways and stairs, taking a left here, taking the stairs there.
“This place is a goddamn maze…” they thought to themselves. The smells in here were interesting, a lot of sweetness, savory, and very pungent, strong herb smells.
There weren’t many people to be seen, every now and then Mary caught a glimpse of people in black clothes, some outfits resembling that of nuns. Were they trying to go for a creep or an edgy vibe?

Cardinal Copia opened a door and stuck out his arm to invite Mary in. Mary chuckled.
”Yes, invite the vampire in. Thanks.” They thought, jokingly. Mary knew that was myth.
“So, Mr. Krueger, would you like anything to drink?” the Cardinal asked, pointing at chairs by what was seemingly his desk. Mary looked around the room, forgetting that their name was now Jack Krueger.
“Mr. Krueger?” The Cardinal asked, and Mary turned, quickly nodding. “Eh, yes! Thank you. Uh…water, please.” They replied. The Cardinal took a carafe from a cart and filled two glasses, handing one to Mary before sitting down behind the desk. Somehow, Mary just now noticed the Cardinal’s eyes. White and green. They felt slightly dizzy. How much of a coincidence was it that Perpetua had that as well? It had been covered with a red sheen, but still…Mary wondered how Perpetua fit in this puzzle.

“So, what can I do for you this evening? Interested in joining us?” He asked, taking a sip of water and folding his gloved hands on the desk.
Mary put down the glass without drinking, leaning back in their chair.
“Possibly. I came here for some information.” Mary said. That technically was the truth, and Mary knew they were a bad liar.
The Cardinal nodded. “I see, I see. Well, ask away.”
Mary stared at the portraits of three men behind the Cardinal on the wall. They all wore paint on their face, looking into the room sternly. They shared the same eye colors. Green and white. It was out before they knew it.

“Who are they?” Mary asked, nodding to the portraits. The Cardinal seemed a little surprised, turning his head.
“Ah? Oh, yes, I suppose I could give you some information about my…predecessors.” He said, fidgeting with his fingers a little.
“Predecessors?” Mary asked. The Cardinal gave a little chuckle.
“Yes…Papa Emeritus one, two and three. All related. Before me, Papa Emeritus the third was the band leader, and head of the clergy here. Think of it like the pope, but…not.” He chuckled some more, finding it funny.

Mary raised an eyebrow, a little skeptical. So they do operate as some kind of…evil version of whatever church is. Hah. They thought.
“Right, so right now, who is that? Like, the leader?” Mary asked. Surely this rat-like man couldn’t be it. He seemed too nervous, too…weird.
Mary knew they didn’t have the right to think that about someone, but they couldn’t help it.
The Cardinal sat back in his chair, spreading his arms. “That’d be me.”
Mary couldn’t keep the skepticism out of their voice. “But aren’t you cardinal?”
The Cardinal frowned a little, but didn’t seem taken aback too much. “Yes, I am.”

It was quiet for a few seconds, in which they stared at each other. Mary lounged back in their chair. “So then what happened to Papa Emeritus the third? If I may ask, I’m sorry-” They had to keep it friendly.
The Cardinal seemed to struggle with himself for a few seconds, then said, in a neutral tone: “He was…in over his head, as they say.” Mary thought they saw the Cardinal smirk slightly, a little smug. Huh.
“But enough about me! Who are you, what can I help you with? What can we help you with?” The Cardinal leaned forward, looking at Mary, who remembered to use their fake name.

“Well…name is Jack Krueger, I’ve kinda been all over the place…suppose I’m trying to find a sense of purpose, you know? And uh…I like music, and horror movies. I enjoy a good meal…a good drink.” They grinned at the end. A little inside joke.
This answer seemed to please the Cardinal, who nodded enthusiastically.
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Krueger.” He said, and Mary corrected him. “Please call me Jack.”
“Nice to meet you then, Jack.” The Cardinal repeated. “More people come to us that look for a sense of purpose and a place to call home. They are often in need of some guidance…but also to have room to be themselves.”
Mary couldn’t help but notice the Cardinal’s speech pattern being nearly identical to Perpetua’s. What kind of weirdos did they house here? And all with a white eye, it seemed. So how did Perpetua fit into this picture? It wasn’t like Mary could just ask. Hey, Cardinal, did ya ever meet a vampiric silver masked dude that doesn’t give a fuck about others?

“And, we have a place for everyone. There’s no rule on how one should be…I’m sure you heard of our ghouls, too?” The Cardinal said, smiling. Mary had heard of them in their research about this place. At least that was something that wasn’t human.
“Yes…so not necessarily a place where the supernatural doesn’t exist, huh?” Mary said, half jokingly, and the Cardinal laughed too, seemingly relieved.
“No, it is not. The ghouls work here, they mix and mingle with everyone, and they’re great friends of mine.” The Cardinal smiled that identical Perpetua smile again.

“Was there anything specific that I could help you with? Are you in need of guidance?” The Cardinal asked and Mary wanted to say no, before realizing that, well, now that they were here, might as well ask for some kind of guidance…in a roundabout way.
“Well, Cardinal…it’s like this. Years ago, there was someone in my life…uh, a very good friend…maybe even more than that.” Mary’s gaze left the Cardinal and swept over the portraits behind him. In some way, it was good that they weren’t human with a normal blood circulation anymore. Their red face would’ve immediately betrayed them.
The Cardinal listened intently, one of his fingers absentmindedly brushing over his mustache.

“And, that friend, he hurt me. In some different ways. And he…well, he left me.” Mary had never talked about this before, never said it out loud. They did their best for their voice not to break.
“He left?” The Cardinal asked. Mary nodded. “Yeah. Like, immediately. I was on my own and…never heard anything ever again. I uh…felt lost. Like I didn’t know who I was anymore.”
They solemnly stared at their lap. Fuck, why was this hard to talk about? Hate that was birthed by betrayal and hurt fought with love inside Mary’s dead heart. They picked up the glass of water and gulped it down to have something to do with their hands.

“I’m sorry that happened to you. And, did you find yourself again?” The Cardinal asked, his voice kind. Mary felt a burning sensation behind their eyes, and started to feel embarrassed.
“I…I’m not sure. Partly.” Mary was being weirdly honest, but it felt good.
“That’s okay. There’s no rule on when or how to find yourself. I mean, I myself feel like I haven’t completely found myself. There’s more I want out of life.” The Cardinal said, his voice helpful. Mary felt the sensation of crying, scraping their throat for no real reason.
“You got yourself a pretty nice place here, don’t you? You’re the leader, what more could you want out of life?” Mary said, sounding frustrated. They didn’t want to attack the Cardinal, but the words just poured out of their mouth.

“You’re right. It’s very nice here. But it can be a nice place for everyone that wants to come here and feels like they don’t belong.” The Cardinal simply said, leaning his elbows on the desk, clasping his hands.
“I don’t think I belong. Anywhere really. The person that made me feel like that…he’s gone.” Mary said. Their voice was soft, and it was like they had no control over what they said. They avoided the Cardinal’s gaze.
“You’ve got a place here, Jack. There will always be a place of belonging for you here.” The Cardinal promised, his voice sincere. It comforted Mary enough to look up.
“Thanks, Cardinal…”

Mary stood up. “I need to think about it, if that’s okay. I’m sorry.”
The Cardinal stood up as well, walking around his desk. “That’s completely okay. At your own pace. We will be here for you when you’re ready, but please, you have a place here.”
He placed a hand on Mary’s shoulder, which sent an involuntarily jolt through Mary’s body. This had been the first human touch in…years. It made memories come flooding back into Mary’s brain, and they cringed. The Cardinal pulled his hand back. “Apologies-” He started saying.
“It’s not you- I just…yeah.” Mary said, and the Cardinal nodded. “It’s alright. Well, as I said before…you have a place here.”

Mary thanked the Cardinal, who gave Mary a little bow with his head. “Thank you for everything…uh, until next time…” Mary said, their hand on the door.
“Of course. Always welcome here.” The Cardinal said, walking to the door. “I’ll walk you.”
Mary wanted to stop the Cardinal, but remembered how much of a maze this place had seemed when they came in.
They walked the hallways silently, and at the door, Mary looked at the Cardinal once more.
“Thank you again. Sorry if…this was weird.” Mary felt a fondness for the Cardinal. It had been one of the most normal interactions they had had in a few years.
“Not at all, it’s all alright. And thank you. Safe travels, and here’s to finding ourselves.” He gave Mary a crooked smile, and Mary smiled back, without even forcing themselves to.
After awkwardly waving to each other, they parted ways. Mary left the Ministry’s terrain, having no real plan of what to do next. Their thoughts were racing.

Somehow, they found themselves in a forest, in the complete dark. Mary wasn’t scared, never really had been, but they were the predator in this case. Nothing could hurt them.
“So what the fuck do I do now…” They said out loud, taking a seat on the damp forest floor.

The cardinal…those eyes would haunt them, always. Those were Perpetua’s eyes, Perpetua’s smile, on the Cardinal’s face. All the Papa Emeritus portraits, the Cardinal had said they were related. Was Perpetua related to the Cardinal? How else could those exact copies of Perpetua’s expressions appear on his face? But the Cardinal hadn’t said anything about someone else there.
Mary scoffed, their fingers digging into the dirt mindlessly. As if the Cardinal would share his family tree to some random person coming in the ministry.
This was going to take some time. Research. Something weird was going on here.
Mary didn’t know why, but they slumped against the ground, wanting to bury their face into the moss.

Perpetua threw the phone on the bed, feeling like he was going fully insane. He loved Mary Goore. No, he was in love with Mary Goore. Still.
The conversation with Copia made him almost relive how it had gone back then. He had bitten Mary, the only person he truly cared for and…loved. He had lost control, his vampiric instincts having taken over. There was nothing he could do against those, not a shred of humanity in his body was left when it came to that.
Mary’s absence prior to that moment had made Perpetua so anxious that he was barely able to feed, and it had led to this.

His heart was stuck in a loop of breaking, breaking all over again, slowly mending through music and performing, before breaking again. The pain was sharper, now, having been confronted with the ghosts of his past.
Ghost, singular. Mary Goore. Mary, who hadn’t been able to follow their lifelong dream of being a musician, having a band, having success. Perpetua had single handedly thrown them off the path, and Perpetua could never forgive himself for that.
He knew that was only part of why he avoided Mary after what had happened. He couldn’t face them with this knowledge, and Mary would hate him.

Perpetua stood up, pacing through the room. Mary had been here, why? Why had Mary come? Was it to punish Perpetua, to torture him, to hurt him?
Perpetua would take it all. No suffering could make up for what he did to Mary. He sank to his knees, his head in his hands. He felt like tearing out his hair, frustrated as he was.
He deserved pain, to feel the same abandonment Mary must have felt. He took over the band after his brother, immediately thrusting him into the spotlight and making him successful, growing into an amazing performer. He didn’t deserve that. That was Mary’s.
Perpetua’s dead heart hurt and burned with the power of a thousand suns, and he wished he could disintegrate on the spot. These feelings he had pushed away for years, and here they were, the wound fresh and oozing.

The night it had happened, when Perpetua lost control and bit Mary, he could barely stop drinking from them. Somehow he tore himself away, standing in the furthest corner of Mary’s living room, looking at the deadly pale body of the object of his affection. Mary’s eyes rolled upward, they were breathing still, but shallow. Perpetua bit his fist, hard, holding his breath.
“Mary! Mary, I’m sorry, Mary-” he whispered, making his way to the couch, cradling Mary in his arms. Their heart was beating- not in the way a healthy human heart should be beating. He noticed the puncture wounds and anxiously sped to Mary’s kitchen, pulling open drawers to look for any kind of bandages, finding some and haphazardly treating their wounds, applying pressure.
“Please, please, let it be enough…” Perpetua whispered, staring at Mary’s face. Their eyes were closed, their lips pale. They weren’t dead, but maybe it was far, far worse to be transformed into something non-human, to not fully be yourself anymore. And yet, in a selfish corner of his mind, Perpetua was glad Mary wouldn’t be truly dead. He immediately hated himself for that thought.

He was sure Mary was on their way to change. Perpetua knew they could never go back the way it was, and Mary would never love Perpetua. The man who had taken away their humanity and pretty much shattered their hopes and dreams.
Hate for an eternity was what was awaiting Perpetua. But Perpetua knew he wouldn’t ever stop feeling this way for Mary, and not wanting to leave them completely to their own devices, he swore to protect them during their change.
He placed them on the couch in a comfortable position, turning off the lights, thinking fast. He had to make sure to have a drink for Mary for when they woke, the only logical solution in Perpetua’s mind being a blood bag. Luckily, he wasn’t unfamiliar with stealing these. Desperate times called for desperate measures.

Then, he would have to make sure nothing went wrong. Mary should stay here in the process, as comfortable as they could be. Perpetua would be there for them, and he was almost a 100% sure Mary wouldn’t be conscious of that fact.
First things first, stealing blood. Perpetua draped a blanket over Mary’s still form, relieved that there was a heartbeat, no matter how faint. He couldn’t just leave them without a small token of care, so he kissed them on their cold forehead. It was late at night, creeping towards the early morning, so Perpetua knew he had little time. There was a place he had stolen from a few times if the need arose, making sure to not do it as often and to only take what seemed to be fair.

As he left Mary’s apartment, he made his way to the blood bank. He knew how to sneak in through windows, how to be unseen and unheard. There was always a careless employee, an unlocked door, an unlatched window. The freezer, where blood was kept on ice to be taken for processing early in the morning. A nice O positive would do.
Perpetua hated the thought. It was as if he was praising a bottle of wine for a fancy dinner. In any other situation, he would’ve not been able to withstand temptation, and would have taken a bag for himself. But the thought of what happened to Mary because of him disgusted him enough, and he felt sick. He hadn’t felt that way in years, and he figured it was what served him right.

Slipping the bag in the pocket of his coat, he left the building, sliding out of a window on the first floor onto the flat roof under him, before letting himself dangle off the ledge and landing softly with his feet on the ground, like a cat. It wasn’t far from Mary’s apartment, and when he returned, he anxiously opened the door to take a look at them. Still on the couch, still unmoving. Perpetua stored the bag in Mary’s freezer, and sat on his knees before the couch, taking in their face. He placed a hand on it, cupping it, feeling if they were alive. Still alive. But for how long…
Perpetua knew that he couldn’t stay. As soon as Mary would wake, he would be gone. He couldn’t bear to see Mary stripped of their humanity because of him. He couldn’t live with the hatred they would feel for Perpetua. Mary would want nothing to do with him.

Perpetua sat there throughout the night, through the morning. Mary’s body would move every now and then, their muscles contracting, and noises would come out of them. It sounded like nightmarish whimpers that Perpetua couldn’t stand. It was torture to see them like this. But Perpetua deserved every bit of that for what he did, and so he stayed.

Throughout the day, Mary would spasm more, make more sound, but still didn’t notice any of their surroundings. Perpetua opened a window, thinking fresh air might be good for Mary. The evening fell, and Mary writhed more and more, their breath fast. The noises sounded like aching, dry sobs, which hurt Perpetua to his core. He sat on the couch, situating Mary in his lap to hold them still a little. It was all he could do.
“Mary…I’m so sorry…I know ‘sorry’ doesn’t mean anything…every day of my existence will be spent in agony over what I have done to you…” Perpetua mumbled, and he knew that if he were human, he would have sobbed like no tomorrow. That was the problem. He wasn’t human, and it’s how he got into this mess in the first place.
“I’m sorry…I’m sorry…” he whispered, making sure Mary’s hair wasn’t in their face. There was cold sweat on their forehead as if they were running a fever, which technically, they were. Their body was fighting the change, and would lose.

It was dark outside again, and Perpetua knew that the change and Mary’s waking were both near. If he had to guess, it would be tomorrow morning. Their heart was beating more clearly, but it was a last-ditch effort of their body to pump oxygen filled blood through their body. It wasn’t necessary anymore. He sat with Mary for as long as he could muster. Their face looked somewhat different, not as deadly pale anymore, but still inhumanly pale. Their black hair hung limply from their head, and Perpetua brushed some loose strands away from their face again.
“I’m so sorry, Mary…” He said, again. He didn’t know what else to say, or if Mary would even know he had said it. Would it even matter? Perpetua didn’t want to know, too scared it would matter.

A very weak morning light was on the horizon, and Perpetua knew it was the final sunrise Mary would live as a human. The profound sadness within him made him feel like he was torn apart, which would have been a welcome surprise. Perpetua felt inside him that he needed to feed, but he was scared to leave Mary alone. He checked their pulse. Their heart wasn’t faltering…yet. The sun hadn’t risen yet, and Perpetua allowed himself to quickly go out to feed before the world started. It was a weird idea, the world kept turning, people lived their lives, while he was grieving with what was, and what could have been.
Sometimes people said those things. ‘The sun will rise again.’ Worse: “After rain comes sunshine.” Hadn’t Mary been a light in Perpetua’s life? Of course the sun wouldn’t rise or shine again. He had dimmed its light himself. Mary’s light.

He was on the outskirts of the city, feeding on someone unfortunate enough to come across a grieving and guilt-stricken vampire. It wasn’t as if Perpetua’s mind could be on anything else.
When he returned to Mary’s apartment, he noticed they had slipped off the couch onto the floor, and the coffee table lay on its side. Mary had been thrashing, that much was sure. Perpetua didn’t care about what they thrashed, hurrying in to check on them.
Still writhing, Perpetua noticed they still weren’t conscious. Their heart sounded off, and Perpetua knew it would happen soon. He took the blood out of the freezer, putting it on the kitchen counter. He couldn’t allow himself to stay for long. It hurt him to his core and then some.

He laid down next to Mary, shoving the table away, and he heard it knock something else over. Unimportant. He tried keeping Mary steadier, as they started thrashing more, gasping as if they couldn’t get enough air into their lungs. Perpetua hadn’t experienced the pain he was feeling right now ever before, it ate him from the inside out.
This was it. His final moments with Mary. This was the goodbye, the curtain would fall on his happiness. It was his own fault. Their heart beat loud, clear, but slow. Too slow.

“Mary…I will never forgive myself. You’ll always be the light of my life.” Perpetua said, for the last time clearing Mary’s face of their hair, taking in their features for the last time, wishing he could’ve seen their eyes one last time.
He tore himself away, standing in the corner of the room near the opened window. Mary groaned, and thrashed, and Perpetua wished he could help them, to stop it, to reverse it.
Mary yelped, a sharp “Ah!” ringing through the air, and Perpetua’s nails dug into his hands, balling his fists in all consuming sadness and grief. Next was a dry sob, coming from Mary again, who hadn’t regained consciousness. Their heart was extremely slow, barely making its way through a beat.

Perpetua knew the time had come. The end. The new beginning he wouldn’t be a part of. Mary groaned and their body convulsed, before they lay still, and Perpetua heard it. Their faltering heart. The last beat. He gasped involuntarily, feeling icy cold. Mary was still, and Perpetua sat on the ledge of the open window, feeling empty. This was despair.
“I’m sorry, Mary…” he whispered, and the words were carried away by the wind. He slipped out the window, running for what felt like hours, through shadows and alleys, not wanting to be faced with himself.

In the now, Perpetua stood silently in the room, a monolith consumed by grief. Mary was back for revenge, for pain, and he couldn’t blame them one bit. Sorry would never be enough, no matter how much love was involved. Well, Perpetua was certain of one thing: he loved Mary Goore, even though he didn’t deserve to at all.
He opened the door, walking through the hotel’s hallway. He was empty, he knew his time had come. He would welcome it if it meant seeing Mary again.

A door opened, not that he noticed. Two of the ghouls stepped out. “Good morning, Papa!” One of them said, but Perpetua didn’t notice it at all, walking past them like a man on his way to the noose.
“Papa?” The other said, their tone alarmed. He didn’t notice them, either. Didn’t notice them immediately getting the other ghouls, who looked at him with big eyes.

“Something’s wrong. Very wrong.” Tempest said, looking at the others as Perpetua rounded the corner. “He was off yesterday, but he straight up didn’t notice any of us.” Phantom added, and everyone shared looks of concern. “Last night, he looked spooked and we heard…noises, and he had a drop of what I think was blood on his face…” He continued, crossing looks with Tempest.
“What do we do?” Rain asked, and no one seemed to be sure. “Maybe we talk to him?” Dew offered, and Phantom nodded in agreement.
“Somehow I feel like that won’t do. I think we should talk to someone that knows him better than we do. That he has a bond with.” Tempest said, noticing the other ghoulettes caught on, nodding knowingly to the other ghouls.
“You mean, call Copia?” Dew asked, his voice uncertain. “He needs to come. It’s an emergency.” Cirrus said, her voice clear and calm, but serious.
“I know it may seem like Copia feels annoyed with Perpetua, which I’m sure he does, I also know despite everything, they are bonding. If anyone could understand him, I think it would be Copia.” She continued, and the others nodded.
“I’ll…I’ll go call him, okay?” Rain said, a little uncertain, but the others gave him approval. Something was wrong with Perpetua, he had been thoroughly shaken up, and neither of them could forget the way his face looked as he came walking down the hallway.
Vacant, empty, as if there wasn’t anything inside his body. A man on his way to his doom.

Chapter Text

Frater Imperator sat in the backseat of the taxi, anxiously looking out the window. The day before, he had received a worrying phone call. Months ago, he would've scoffed if someone told him Perpetua wasn't performing that well. He'd have said ‘hah, told you so!’ And more of that nature, ranging from annoyed to unkind.
But this wasn't like that. They had bonded, and Copia couldn't help but begrudgingly admit that he liked having a twin brother, especially now that he knew Perpetua never wanted to replace him. It hadn't been his decision, and he was similar to Copia because he had watched his performances…and because it was his twin brother.

So when Rain the ghoul had called Copia, he had taken it seriously. The ghouls were used to touring, the chaos and the risk of not everything going according to plan all the time. That's how he knew this was serious.
Rain had sounded anxious, had spoken in ‘we’ terms.” ‘We’ feel that Perpetua…’we’ are worried that…” which led Copia to be convinced he was speaking for the others, too.
Of course, he had had his own conversation with his brother. A long phone call, in which he told him of something that happened before Perpetua joined Ghost. An accident that changed the lives of two people significantly.
Copia was up to date about his brother's non-human nature, he never really asked him about it, assuming it was something private. Perpetua would tell him if he felt comfortable, he was sure. At first, Copia felt a little spooked by it. The red film over his brothers eyes that otherwise would've matched Copia's, his different appetite and sleeping habits…it had taken some getting used to.
He felt like they hadn't been alike at all, but as they got to know each other better, Copia realized they were more similar than either of them had thought.
Especially without paint, it was clear they had the same crooked smile, their eyes would crinkle the same way when they laughed and they had the same mannerisms of talking with their hands and nervously scratching their heads.
Even though they weren't identical twins, there was no mistaking that they were brothers.

The taxi pulled up to the hotel, and Copia saw two figures standing under the marquee in front of the entrance. He got out, grabbing his bag and small suitcase. He wasn't sure how long he'd be gone, and he couldn't resist a good outfit change.
Now he saw it was Phantom and Cirrus, who both grinned as he approached. It was good to see them.
“Mr. Boss man” Phantom said with a wide grin. Copia cocked his head, grinning too. “Please, Mr. Boss man was my father. Copia will do. Or Papa. Or Frater. “
Cirrus embraced him. “It's so good to see you. How have you been?”
Copia patted her back. “Good, good. I missed you guys. You doing okay?”
They released each other and Copia hugged Phantom next.
“We're doing good, too. We're having a good time performing…” Phantom said, his voice dying down, throwing Cirrus a look. She slightly shook her head.
Copia looked from Phantom to Cirrus and chuckled.
“Oh, come on now. It's not like I'll burst into tears at the mention of performing.”
He held up his finger. “At least, not today.”
They all looked at each other, laughed and then entered the hotel. Every step they took towards Perpetua’s room felt more serious.
Copia imagined a surgeon would feel this way on his way to a difficult surgery. Where does it hurt?

“So, we performed, Perpetua seemed focused on someone in the crowd, some of us noticed he was off, he said he saw someone from before, it looked like he had a droplet of blood on his face earlier and he spoke to you on the phone.” Phantom rattled off, holding his fingers up for every fact.
“We talked, yes. It was quite a story. Did he tell you the details?” Copia asked, frowning. How much did the ghouls know?
“He didn’t. He doesn’t have to, but it’s obvious something isn’t right. He left yesterday and it was like he didn’t notice anything at all.” Cirrus said, pressing a button to call the elevator.
“When did he return?” Copia asked, curious to know where Perpetua went in that time.
“Rain said he heard him return earlier this morning. We think he…you know.” Phantom said, biting the air. Copia shuddered. “Right.”

They walked the hallway to Perpetua’s room. Copia knocked on the door. The ghouls stood at a distance, glancing nervously at the door. “Do you want us to-?”
Copia waved his hand. “I got this. Thank you.”
The ghouls nodded and retreated to their own rooms.
Copia knocked again, rapping his knuckles against the door loudly. “Vee? It’s me, your favorite brother.”
It was silent, until the door opened slightly. “Why are you here?” Perpetua’s voice said, raspy as if he had been sick.
“Can I come in? Just wanna talk.” Copia said, trying to peer into the room past Perpetua. It seemed to be dark.
“I don’t know, Copia…” Perpetua said. He opened the door a little more, his face now fully visible. Copia was shocked to see how distraught he seemed.
“Is this about Mary Goore?” He asked, the name seemed to send a jolt through Perpetua.
Perpetua sighed and opened the door, inviting Copia in. The curtains were closed, dimming the daylight. The bed was a mess and one chair was covered in a heap of seemingly dirty clothes. It smelled slightly like iron, Copia thought. Dirty quarters.

Perpetua stood in the middle of the room, still as a statue. Copia sat down on an empty chair. “So, Mary Goore, then?” He said, and Perpetua turned his head toward Copia in an inhumanly fast move.
“I saw them and- and they visited me and-” Perpetua stumbled over his words. “I think they…they are back for revenge. I think they want to end me.”
Copia looked at him in silence, letting the words sink in. In any other situation he would’ve told him to snap out of it, to be less dramatic, but he knew how serious this was. It was in his voice, his stature, in everything that he had told Copia before.
“Are you…sure?” Copia asked. Perpetua slowly nodded. “Copia…after what I did…would you blame them?”
Copia stayed silent. The answer would probably hurt Perpetua. “You told me on the phone you checked on them, right? What else happened after that initial…situation?”
Perpetua laughed, high pitched and unnatural. He told Copia how things had gone down right after the bite. How he cradled Mary, secured some food, felt incredibly sorry. How he couldn’t face them after this, not after what he had done to them. He wouldn’t have been able to deal with the disgust in Mary’s eyes.
Copia’s eyes were big, getting bigger with every detail.
“But didn’t you ever want to go see them again?” He asked. Perpetua slumped down on the floor. “I couldn’t. I was afraid. I could barely live with myself…I know I’m a damn coward for that.”

Copia knew this was the moment to comfort Perpetua. He always felt a little awkward about things like that, but he got up from his chair, kneeling next to his brother and patting him on the back. “We’ll-we’ll think of something, alright?”
Perpetua held his face in his hands, shaking his head. Copia quickly searched in his brain on techniques that could help him, thinking about his own coping techniques for panic, or overwhelming thoughts. It was important to focus on what was positive, what was current. It sounded easier said than done, maybe even a little irrelevant, but he had to try something.
“What does Mary look like?” Copia asked. “What’s the color of their hair?”
Mundane questions. “Black hair. Raven black.” Perpetua answered, his voice muffled by his hands.
“It’s spiky, short in the back.” He continued.
Copia nodded and patted him on the back some more. “Good, good. What about their clothes?”
Perpetua removed his hands from his face, but kept his gaze on the floor. “Black or gray jeans. Various states of ripped…” Copia could’ve sworn there was a hint of a smile in his voice.
“They sound cool, Vee.” Copia encouraged him. Perpetua nodded. “Almost exclusively wears band tees…any sleeve length. I don’t recognize that many of them…but that's okay.” There was a softness in his voice.
“And they play guitar, right?” Copia continued, forming his sentences in the present time, not speaking of the past. Perpetua seemed to be somewhere else with his thoughts. “They’re incredibly creative. Make art, too. Drawing, the likes. Loves movies, from old horror to comedies to fantasy and science fiction.”

Copia smiled. Mary sounded like a fun person to be around, and most importantly, seemed similar enough to Perpetua but not similar enough to make it a bad match. For some reason, his thoughts ran back to years ago when he had only been a cardinal. He had met a person that also sported that messy rockstar look that Mary seemed to have. Copia couldn’t remember their name, so much had happened since then. He did remember how the stranger who had come to inquire about joining the ministry seemed to have been in need of guidance, which Copia hopefully had offered in the right way.

“Listen, Vee…Perpetua.” Copia said, pushing out his brothers actual name. This made Perpetua look at him.
“You lost yourself. Strayed off the path of who you are, so to speak. You can find yourself again, I know it. You…well, you belong here. In this world, I mean. This ministry…in my family. You have a place here.” Copia never even expected himself to say these words to Perpetua, but he did mean them. He cringed slightly at himself, not being great with opening up like this. It was the advice he gave a lost person years ago, someone that felt like they didn’t belong.

“You sound cheesy.” Perpetua admitted with a soft voice, but Copia saw he was smiling slightly. Copia chuckled nervously. “Yeah, yeah. I mean it, though. It’s good advice.”
“I am grateful for that. For you. Even though yes, I belong in your family, the ministry, I belong with…with Mary.” Perpetua said, his voice turning softer at speaking Mary’s name.
“I know. I mean, everything you have told me, I wish I could just fix it instantly for you. I mean that.” Copia said. Ugh, if someone had told him a year ago he would speak this way about his brother, he wouldn’t have believed it. But this was his twin, and he felt a connection to him. They had to have each other's back in this world.
“Come on.” Copia held out his hand, pulling Perpetua to his feet. “You’re gonna play the fuck out of these concerts. Else I will shove you off stage and do it myself.” Copia said, only half-joking. Perpetua looked at him with a nervous smile.
“Thanks…thank you.” He said, patting Copia’s shoulder. He sighed and averted his gaze, again.
“It’s just…I can’t stop hating myself for what I did, for how I left things. It goes to my core, Copia. Rotten from the inside.” Perpetua said, his voice tortured. Copia looked at him, not sure what to say.
“You’re not rotten. It…well, it happened how it happened, there’s no turning back time. I’ll think of something, I promise.” Copia said, feeling sorry for his brother. There was so much anguish in his eyes, and right now, Copia wasn’t sure what the plan was going to be just yet.

They sat together for a while, talking about all kinds of things. Copia noticed how much self hatred Perpetua had grown for himself out of the whole situation with Mary, it seemed to have seeped into his bones. Copia couldn’t help but think back on that meeting he had as a cardinal with a person who had lost their way. Something in his brain kept bringing that memory back, maybe because of the advice Copia had given them? He wasn’t sure.
After a while, Copia stood up. “Hey, let’s go meet with the ghouls, let them know you’re alive, huh?” He smiled at his brother, who gave him a weak smile in return.
“Yeah…thank you, Copia…I really, really appreciate this…I know it hasn’t been easy for you, you know. But…I value you and what you have to say. So, thank you.” Perpetua said, and Copia felt a little dumbstruck by Perpetua’s confession. He waved it away. “It’s nothing, it’s what you do, right? No need to thank.”
They left the room. Copia thought for a moment. “How much of this information do you want the ghouls to know? Could be useful, I think.”
Perpetua stopped, looking to the floor. “I don’t know…not all the details, I feel like they’d think so differently of me…”
Copia nodded. “Listen, I don’t think they would. But I get it, okay? You know what, I’ll tell them that you lost a connection with someone special to you and that it was a rough time, what about that?”
Perpetua looked at Copia with a slight smile. “Thank you. I’d like that.”
Later that night, Perpetua was ready for the concert. He looked at himself in the mirror. The paint was applied, the mask strapped in place, his hair curly and slicked back. No one could tell from the outside that his inside was in turmoil.
There was a fear gnawing at him. What if he saw Mary again? What if they were in the crowd again, looking at him with those familiar eyes? Eyes that had been so beautiful, so green, now stained with a red sheen?
He shook his head. He shouldn’t have these thoughts, especially not before a performance.
He hated himself to the core. How was he supposed to just go on his way like this?
A sharp noise, snapping him out of it. He looked down. He had gripped the edge of the vanity so hard he tore a chunk from it. He pressed his thumb into the ragged, sharp edges of the wood. It didn’t hurt, he desperately wished it would.

There was a knock on the door and it opened. “Vee, you ready?” Copia stepped into the room. He wore a casual outfit, he wasn’t really supposed to be here, after all. Perpetua felt more comforted now that he was.
“Yeah. Suppose I am.” Perpetua answered, pulling on his gloves.
“Listen, focus on performing. The ghouls. Lose yourself in the music. It works, trust me.” Copia said, trying to get through to his brother.
“I will, I will. Copia…” Perpetua’s voice fell down to a whisper. He wished it wouldn’t sound so insecure.
“What if I see-” He whispered. Copia held up his hand. “Don’t even think of that. You can’t.”
Perpetua opened his mouth and Copia frowned. “No, don’t. It’s not worth it. You’re gonna go out there, you’re going to perform, enjoy it, entertain the fans, and then you’re gonna come back here and we’ll chill. Capisce?”
He looked serious, and Perpetua nodded, barely moving his head.
“I’ll break down on stage, Copia. I’ll…” Perpetua whispered. Copia put his hand on his brother's shoulder. “You won’t. And if you do, we’re all there. The ghouls, me, the fans. Everyone. It’s okay.”
He looked Perpetua in the eyes, a perfect reflection of his own, save for the red sheen over them. “Okay…alright.” Perpetua said.

They left the room, and before the entrance to the stage were the ghouls were getting ready to go on, Copia put his hand on Perpetua’s shoulder again. They could hear the intro music.
“You’re gonna do great. Go out there and peace the fuck out of those fields.” He grinned.
Perpetua rolled his eyes. “Wow, aren’t you creative with that.” He couldn’t help but grin back.
“I know, I’ll be here all night with more of that. Hey, good luck. Most of all, have fun.” Copia waved towards the ghouls, wishing them the same.

During the performance, especially the first few songs, Perpetua kept his gaze on the far back of the venue, into the comfortable darkness. He glanced to the front a few times, and he knew his heart would be beating out of his chest had it been alive. There was no raven black hair covering a pale face with those green eyes, no familiar scowl.
He eased more into it and started being more open, much to everyone’s joy.

When the show ended, he had almost forgotten about his fear. It had been an amazing show, and going backstage, he happily joined the group hug with the ghouls, everyone complimenting one another.

This would go on for the next couple of concerts. Each time, Perpetua felt less scared, more at ease. The nights would still be filled with anguish, self hatred and fear, but the days were better. He almost had gotten too comfortable, when he played the seventh show after that first nervosity filled concert.
Something inside him felt off, like something was on his radar. There was no real proof, or facts, and he didn’t spot anything out of the ordinary in the crowd. It was a great show, and Perpetua felt like turning in early. The ghouls were going to be out, Perpetua knew he needed to feed. It was a solitary activity.
Copia would join the ghouls, since he had decided to stay, having missed the touring, and this way he felt like he was still involved somehow, something he said was “important to still be involved in as Frater Imperator.”
Going on the hunt to feed was one of the only times Perpetua wasn’t thinking of anything. It was just him and his instincts, the only thing of importance being sustenance.
He stalked the outskirts of the city, drinking enough blood to feel alright, but not enough to kill the target. He fed on several different people to feel full, leaving them to lay down somewhat comfortably.
If he thought about that for too long, he’d feel disgusted with himself. The loophole of not drinking enough to kill someone helped him with that more often than not.

When he climbed onto the tour bus, no one was there yet. He plopped down on a couch in the dark, leaning back, feeling more peaceful than he had felt in weeks.
There was a noise in the dark. Slight. Perpetua peered in the darkness. “Hey?” He called, half expecting the ghouls to have returned, but there weren’t any voices, no reply to his ‘hey’.
He rolled his eyes at himself. It could be anything, could be a damn water bottle snapping back into place for all he knew.
He leaned back again, closing his eyes to let his thoughts drift away and feel completely at peace.
He wasn’t yet falling into a slumber, even though he hadn’t gotten any of those recently and was due for one, but he felt less conscious than he usually felt.
It was quiet, dark, and comfortable. Perpetua decided to lay down, folding his hands behind his head.
There was a smell that found its way into his nose. First, he perceived it as iron, like dirty quarters. Then, sweet, savory. Like it had been a very good smell and now was losing its value. Old blood?
He figured it could be some that he spilled on himself. It wasn’t impossible, but he hadn’t noticed it. He shrugged off the sweater he was wearing, throwing it to a far corner. The thin T-Shirt he had on under it was enough for him, anyways.
He laid back down. The smell was still there.
He decided to not care too much about it, trying to fall into the slumber.

“Goodnight, sweet prince.” A raspy voice said, and Perpetua’s eyes shot wide open. That voice. He sat up faster than could have been perceived by anyone.
In the dark, he saw them. Mary Goore. Of course it wasn’t hard to find Perpetua. He was on a damn world tour, after all. It was like leaving extremely big bread crumbs for Mary to find.
His eyes shot towards the direction of the door, and Mary stood before him, eternally in the same outfit, it seemed.
“No, no one’s here. Kind of like when I woke up and found myself completely torn from humanity.” Mary said, eerily calm. That was what scared Perpetua.
In life, he had never heard Mary speak this way. Never this calm, never this serious.
“Mary, I swear to you, I-” Perpetua stuttered, feeling as if his vision was blacking out. He noticed he was standing, facing Mary, who was holding up their hands as if ready to attack. Perpetua kept his own hands down, wanting Mary to know that wasn’t what he wanted.
“Why’d you leave me to die? Why’d you leave me to- to…become this?” Mary hissed, and Perpetua only now noticed how dirty they looked. Dried up blood was on their face and on their clothes, which also seemed to be stained by dirt. Their hair hung in strands and their eyes looked…Perpetua had no other word for it, crazy.

“I didn’t want to, I knew you’d hate me, you need to know that I never, never wanted this…” Perpetua whispered. He couldn’t get his voice to sound any different than a pathetic tone.
“That’s bullshit. If you didn’t want it, then why do it? Huh? Explain that to me.” Mary was still hissing, and they pressed a sharp nail into Perpetua’s chest, immediately tearing the thin fabric of the shirt. It sent a jolt of pain through Perpetua’s spine, which he welcomed. He deserved it. He was guessing their similar natures made them able to feel pain.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. You’ll never know how sorry I am. I…” Perpetua kept whispering, and he fell to his knees. Mary was looking down on him, contempt in their eyes.
“You look pathetic. So this is the man that nearly killed me and left me to rot into another lifestate?” They spoke in a low, spine chilling voice.
Perpetua stared at the floor, not daring to look into their eyes. Did he even deserve to?
“And you’re too cowardly to even face me.” Mary said, and for the first time, Perpetua thought he heard some kind of sadness in there.

“That’s not it. Mary, I’m sorry. I know it doesn’t fix anything…I know I can’t turn it back, or make it better, but you need to know I’m sorry…” Perpetua mumbled. Mary scoffed.
“Why would I believe that? You’re doing amazing without me, aren’t you? You used me. Why did you do that…fuck, I don’t even want to know.” Mary sounded angrier than Perpetua had ever heard them before, but he felt it was justified. He wished he could go up in flames.
“I’m not…I’m not doing amazing without you. Mary…I’m sorry, I’ll eternally be sorry…” Perpetua said, again wishing his voice would sound less pathetic, less quiet.
A sharp point was under his chin, forcing him to look up. Mary was tilting his head up, still in that eerily calm manner.
“At least look at me while you’re groveling there like you give a fuck.” They said, and Perpetua peered up at Mary. He half expected Mary’s eyes to be full of fire, full of wishes to smite Perpetua right there. He deserved it, after all.
Instead, there was something else in there as well. He couldn’t pinpoint it.
Thoughts were swirling through Perpetua’s head without rhyme or reason, a mess of words, feelings, sentences, emotions, memories, thoughts. He didn’t know what to say. He wanted to apologize, over and over again, he wanted to exactly explain what happened. He felt like Mary wouldn’t believe him. How could he make Mary believe him?
He loved them. He had loved them and he still did, he couldn’t stop it. It was there. Even though Mary hated his guts, Perpetua felt it. He wouldn’t feel this anguished if he didn’t love them, he was sure of that.

“I want to hurt you. I want you to feel how I felt when I found out what happened. When I realized. I-” Mary’s voice stopped in their throat as if they couldn’t finish the sentence. Perpetua felt at peace with that. He would let them. Out of love, out of fairness and guilt.
“Mary, I’m sorry. Mary…I love you.”

Chapter Text

“You don’t get to tell me you love me. Not after everything.” Mary seethed, and before Perpetua knew it, he was up on his feet and Mary’s nails dug into his upper arm, dragging him along.
“You and me, pretty boy.” Mary hissed, their voice low. Perpetua let himself be led by Mary, wanting to show in everything that he knew he deserved it.
Even if things would end here, tonight, at least he was in Mary’s presence again.
Somewhere along the way, Perpetua noticed it had begun to rain. A soft downpour, a cloudy night sky. The perfect setting for one last night.

“Don’t need anyone disturbing us, do we.” Mary said, their voice like ice. They threw Perpetua away from them, who barely steadied himself on his feet. An unfamiliar forest, dimly lit by the moonlight. “I know I deserve it. If I was even a fraction of the man I was when we first met-” Perpetua began, but Mary held up their hand.
“But you’re not. No, not by a long shot.”
Perpetua felt his back hit something, realizing he was against a tree, and Mary stood in front of him. He forced himself to look at their face.
“You’re a mess.” Mary said, voice full of disdain. Perpetua realized he never removed his paint, or his mask, having gone from the concert to feeding to the tour bus without thinking about that.
“I.., I hadn’t thought of…that…” He mumbled, but his voice faltered when he saw Mary’s cold stare. It chilled him to the bone, possibly deeper than that, to the core of his cells.

“You made me believe that…that I was more than just some mediocre guitar player. My life started to feel like it meant something. Recording that demo…performing locally…fuck, getting my own apartment? Felt like things were finally falling in their place.” Mary stared at the sky, their voice growing more hysterical. Perpetua couldn’t stop looking at them, his hands limp by his side. The rain was getting more serious.
“Mary, I know, I know that-” He said, his voice just loud enough to be heard over the sound of the rain.
“No, you don’t know! Don’t you get it? I could have gotten my band more famous, made record after record, I could have been happy.” Mary said, their voice unwillingly breaking. Perpetua felt like a dagger struck his heart, wistfully wishing that was something that actually happened.
“I never wanted to rob you of that. All I wanted was for you to be happy- it made me feel happy.” Perpetua said, stepping closer to Mary. They scoffed.
“And yet you did. Here you are, touring the world with your band, selling out night after night- and here I am, once I found out what happened I…I wanted to be dead. Actually dead. Not whatever fucked up state this is.” Mary’s voice was full of anger now, shouting at the skies.

“Mary…I know it’s not an excuse…I know it won’t undo anything or make things right, but I want so bad to tell you what happened that night…those days…” Perpetua’s voice would barely be audible to human ears over the rain.
Mary laughed, cold and bitter. “You’re right, nothing can undo it. I won’t ever forget that final human night.” Their voice got softer.
Perpetua cocked his head, looking at them with a gentle expression. It pained him like nothing else to see Mary this way.
“I was so happy. I was…I wanted to…” Mary couldn’t get the words out, looking past Perpetua with flared nostrils.

It was clear to him, what Mary meant to say. That night, when they had returned from a two week trip to record a new demo, Perpetua had spent time in their apartment, laughing, talking, watching movies. The flush on their skin, the blood pooling underneath. Their heartbeat that sounded like it was the only sound to exist in Perpetua’s ears. The way Mary bent forward, their face close and even closer…until the uncontrolled feral nature of a hungry predator took over.
Perpetua felt like he’d fall over.

“I thought I fell in love. Hah.” Mary scoffed. The rain had completely flattened their hair and their face was streaked with makeup and old blood, as if it was poorly washed clean. Their stance looked less defensive than before, as if the rain washed away the readiness to attack.
Perpetua felt a wave of affection for Mary and immediately felt sick to his stomach. He didn’t deserve to feel that way.

“I thought you and I were…way more than friends. I felt like my soul had connected to yours somehow. “ Mary’s voice sounded broken now. Perpetua felt like there was a hole blown through his chest and knew that had he been human, he would be choking on his own tears.
The defeat in Mary’s voice made him weaker and more spiteful towards himself than anything else, and he fell to his knees on the soggy forest floor. He stared at his hands, covered in rain, mud, moss.

He threw his head back, his face straight up to the skies. The rain felt unrelenting. If he was lucky, it would wash him away. But there was no luck for creatures like Perpetua. He knew it all the way down to the core.
Mary stood closely in front of him, their fingers on Perpetua’s temples still covered by the metal mask. Suddenly he was sure Mary would snap his neck. A knife to the throat wouldn’t do him much harm, but could still do some damage. He felt Mary’s hands move to the back of his head and opened his eyes. At least he’d see Mary’s face one last time.
He hadn’t expected Mary to look back. Even in the dim moonlight, guided by his inhuman vision, he saw the eyes that had once been green, now covered by a red sheen. Was he imagining things? Was he dying? It looked like there was more sadness than hate in their eyes. There was something he couldn’t quite pinpoint.

With an angry growl, Mary pushed Perpetua back, who immediately gave way and fell backwards. He knew he wasn’t dead, but he knew that if Mary would leave now, he’d lay here for eternity.

Perpetua heard a strange sound seemingly coming from Mary’s direction and looked up. They were leaning against the nearest tree with their arms wrapped around their chest, as if they were holding their own body together.
He half got up, sitting on his knees. His fingers slid behind the straps of his mask, loosening them, lifting the mask off and letting it fall to the floor next to him. It felt naked but freeing. He knew he looked like a mess, with the left over paint smudged to the extreme.

“I hadn’t fed that well in the two weeks you were gone- I know how…stupid that sounds. Everything in my mind was taken over by anxiety about not seeing you, not being with you. Never felt that so strong before. I felt like I could barely hold on. A pit of despair opened in me and…I forced myself to feed small amounts…just to keep going. It’s…that feeling…humans don’t know what that’s like.” Perpetua rambled in one go, his face tilted up to the skies with closed eyes.

“The less regular I feed…we feed, the less human the next time will be…the less I can think rationally. Pure instinct. Nothing else. As if I’m taken over by something that’s not me at all.” He continued, not even trying to hide the anguish in his voice. He let his head fall forward, staring at the dark ground.

“You returned…I fed a little amount in the morning to face you, to not seem so feral, to not put you in danger…the moment I saw you standing there with that genuine grin you always get when you’re truly happy I forgot about myself.” Perpetua said, remembering how it felt. He wished he could go back to that point in time. How selfish he had been!
Mary made a sound that sounded like a dry sob. Perpetua wanted to get up and comfort them, immediately punishing himself in his thoughts for the idea. Mary would never want that again, and they had full right to feel that way.

“When we sat in your apartment…your scent swirling around me in that space, your happiness emanating from you…my thirst set in. Badly. After two weeks of barely feeding it…” Perpetua swallowed. This was going to be the hardest part.
“Your happiness felt intoxicating…both good and bad. It made me happy. But it made me thirsty…when we touched, it felt like your blood pulsed under my fingertips, calling out to me. I hoped I didn’t look feral, that I could hold my breath. But…I was pulled to you. Some unstoppable force of nature…of something beyond nature wanted to be close to you more than anything else.”

“And then you bit me.” Mary’s voice came from closer than Perpetua expected. They were standing in front of him, holding his discarded mask. He had been so lost in the memory he could barely register what was going on around him.
Mary looked at the mask with a strange glint in their eyes, their voice without emotion.

“I…you came so close to me…my dead heart felt like it was trying to get to you. My dead heart. Our noses touched…the inner turmoil in me felt like a battle I would never win.” Perpetua said, barely pausing at this point.
“I felt a tiny bit of control slip away from my grasp…I was not careful enough…before I even knew what I was doing my hands were on you…” He decided to spare Mary the details. He saw Mary stand so still and quiet that it scared him.

“It was the worst accident of my life and my death. Somehow those scraps of humanity in me won…but I knew I had done irreversible damage, hurt you beyond repair. I was sure I had ended your life that had been so precious to me out of my own disgusting instinct.” Perpetua pressed his fingers against his face, raking them over his skin towards his jaws to feel something. Anything.

Mary dropped the mask. It fell just before Perpetua’s knees, who picked it up.
“I dont care about any of this. Even when I didn’t know it yet, but especially now, I know my heart belonged to you. I know it’s a dead and useless hunk of junk. If I can’t ever see you again, be with you ever again, I don’t care about the band or anything that comes with it. They can have it. You can have it. Leave me to rot.” Perpetua flung the mask away.

“And I know I lost you as soon as I bit you. In multiple ways. Nothing will ever make that right, no amount of apologies will ever be enough.” Perpetua looked at Mary. “I just wanted to tell you that. I at least wanted to tell you that before…before I never see you again. If you end my undead life here…I love you too much to not let you do that. If you leave me here I won’t ever get up again.” Perpetua promised, already having made peace with those facts. Existence was a curse, especially as something inhuman. Especially after having ruined the one person he loved.

“Why did you leave me?” Mary asked, looking in the direction Perpetua threw his mask. He couldn’t detect any emotions in their voice. It scared him.

“I tore myself away. I stood in the corner of the living room just…biting cracks into my own fist and holding my breath I…when I saw how pale you got and how your eyes rolled back…” The emotion in Perpetua’s voice reminded him of the throat closing sadness of humanity. He had trouble making his voice even loud enough. The rain wouldn’t let up.
“I held you…I couldn’t just not hold you, I couldn’t just let you lay there. I found some bandages in your kitchen and pressed the wounds closed as tight as I could…I felt you were still alive but barely…and I knew things would never ever go back to the way they were. You would never love me. I had taken away your humanity and every hope and dream you had. Selfishly…I knew I wouldn’t ever stop loving you.”

Perpetua’s hands dug into the ground as if he was trying to root himself to hold on, to be able to express what happened. Before he knew it, Mary fell to their knees in front of him, holding their face in their hands with wide eyes.

“I put you on the couch…draped you in blankets and when I was sure there was a faint heartbeat, I set out to find you some blood…I knew you’d need it when you…when you’d wake up.”
Mary groaned. Perpetua continued, trying to hold it together.
“I put blood bags in your fridge, and you were still on the couch…unmoving. I sat with you. You were freezing cold. I knew I couldn’t stay when you’d wake…I couldn’t bear to see you stripped of humanity because of me. I knew you’d want nothing to do with me and I selfishly didn’t want to see that in your eyes.” He paused, wanting to be thorough.

“I spent every second there. As time went on you moved on occasion. Your muscles contracted and there’d be sounds…” Perpetua shuddered. Mary had made horrific, nightmarish whimpers.
“It was torture to see you that way. To know what I was putting you through. But I deserved to feel hurt like that. So I stayed…and I stayed because I loved you. You didn’t notice any surroundings, but I opened a window for…I don’t know. Fresh air.” Perpetua swallowed loudly. That had been the point Mary had switched to making sounds like dry sobs.

In the now, Mary still stared at the forest floor with wide eyes. They looked like they were losing it and Perpetua couldn’t fault them at all. But they deserved to know everything.

“I sat there on the couch…cradling you in my lap…it was all I could do. I couldn’t stop apologizing. I couldn’t stop telling you that I’d spend every day of my existence in agony over what I had done…I made sure your face was clean, that I could wipe away that feverish cold sweat. That evening, that night…your heartbeat got strong again, but it was at the end of its ropes…trying to get the last scrap of oxygen filled blood through your body…you looked different, no longer dead, but not…not human.” Perpetua couldn’t help the agony seeping into his voice. Mary made a sound like a hurt animal. It made him want to cradle them as he had done years ago, this time being even more sorry.

“I apologized again and again…when the morning light was on the horizon, I knew…” His voice trailed off.

“That was my last sunrise as something remotely human.” Mary said, their voice barely audible.
“I put the bloodbag on the counter for you to find. You slipped off the couch, you started to move…you’d writhe and trash, and I’d keep you steady, selfishly wishing I could’ve seen your eyes one last time. Your movements were stopping and so was your heart and I knew I couldn’t stay. Your heart beat for the last time and I took in your features the last time…”
Perpetua had slipped away at the same moment the last of Mary Goore’s humanity had slipped away.

“The hands that cradled you were stained with blood.” Perpetua rasped, looking at Mary, whose face he couldn’t see now, only their soaking wet raven hair covering it.
“But they did cradle me.” Mary whispered, more broken than ever before.
Perpetua’s voice was even less than a whisper, and he looked up.
“I’d have sat there forever…but I just couldn’t...the blood on my hands, it might as well have been literal blood, I killed you. I ended your life. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Mary.”

Chapter Text

They were both silent, slumped on the muddy forest floor.
“I can’t help it. I should hate you, yet there’s a big conflicting feeling. I tried to…I tried looking for you. After a while I gave up. You’d eventually pop up somewhere.” Mary said, barely audible above the rain.
Perpetua looked up. “Well, you found me…” He couldn’t keep his voice from cracking. Mary shook their head. “I wasn’t sure what for, at first. I just felt consumed by anger…sadness, disappointment. Betrayal.” They looked straight at Perpetua now. The rain had washed away any remnants of makeup and dried blood on Mary’s face. They looked strangely angelic, even in the dark rainy forest. Perpetua blinked profusely.
“I know…I never meant for things to go like this. I…thought I could just keep you safe. You as a human, me as …this. Eventually you’d grow old and get on with your life and I knew that. I only wanted you to be happy, do anything and everything you ever dreamed of.”

There was pain in Mary’s eyes. The angry tone was lost from their voice. “So you wanted to leave me anyway?”
Perpetua shook his head, his fingers pressing into his skull. “I wouldn’t have left. But I would have accepted you leaving. You’d have a whole human life…love, friends, your music…maybe you’d want some kind of…you know, family…” He hadn’t ever thought about it in depth, but now it hurt. Mary having a long and fulfilling life.

Mary didn’t blink once. “I saw you as that. Thought you knew that.”
They stared at each other in silence once again. Somehow, he didn’t know why, Perpetua let himself fall on the ground on his side, hopeless about the way things had turned out. He felt like he’d get buried in mud, moss. At least Mary was here now.
He closed his eyes, trying to get back to the root of his feelings. When he opened them, he didn’t know how much time had passed, but he jolted. Mary was right next to him, eyes wide open, staring at him.
“I know I don’t deserve to. I know it, Mary…” Perpetua said softly. Mary raised their brows, as if to say ‘but?’
“But I love you. I can’t help it. I always have. Even when I didn’t really realize it. Love as in…never wanting to be apart from you. But also enough to be able to let you go if you want me to.” Perpetua continued. Mary closed their eyes.

Neither one of them said anything, and Perpetua was beginning to feel okay with this end. Mary knew the truth, the full truth, Perpetua would feel more than sorry for the rest of his existence, that was that. This was one last moment with them. Bittersweet, he tried to savor that.

Somehow, he thought he heard his name being called. He listened, trying to catch the sound above the rain. He heard it again, closer this time.
He sat up, alarming Mary, who seemed to be awoken from some sort of trance.

”Perpetua!” A voice called. Was someone searching for him?
They both stood up, faster than human eyes could have registered. Mary looked as if they wanted to disappear into the night. Perpetua felt his hand reaching out to hold their shoulder, not wanting them to hide. He couldn’t help the reflex.
They both looked at his hand on Mary’s shoulder, and Perpetua felt like there was an electric current running between the both of them.

Perpetua?The voice called again, closer now. It sounded familiar. Perpetua’s ears registered the sound of rain hitting an unnatural surface. A jacket? An umbrella?
A figure stumbled forward, carrying a large umbrella. They grumbled something, and Perpetua realized it was his brother.
“Copia?” He called, a little perplexed. Had he come looking for him? Why?
“Perpetua, finally, where the hell did you go? It looked like you…you left in a hurry…” Copia’s voice died down as his eyes registered Mary. Perpetua, who still had his hand on Mary’s shoulder, felt them tense under his fingers. He squeezed their shoulder.

Copia got closer, his eyes trained on Mary. Perpetua didn’t know what was happening, what the results of this would be- would Mary attack Copia? What if they saw him as a threat?
Perpetua tore his eyes from Mary and looked at Copia. For some reason, Copia didn’t look like a threat. His eye makeup was running and his hair was dripping wet despite apparently having used an umbrella.
“This…this is going to sound so weird, but you remind me so much of someone I met years ago. Except they wore a lot of makeup and some kind of…well, fake blood…” Copia said as if he was studying Mary’s face. Mary’s eyes didn’t meet Copia’s, and Perpetua felt confused. At what possible point could Copia have run into someone like Mary?

“Uh…” Mary said. There was nothing left of the vampire out for vengeance. Copia’s appearance made things seem surreal.
“Yeah. I think it was Krueger.” Copia said, glaring at Perpetua. “Do I even want to know what’s going on here? And where’s your mask? Your paint has ran all the way down-”
Perpetua had opened his mouth to speak, but Mary interrupted the both of them.

“Jack.” They said. There was a hint of smugness in their voice. Perpetua felt like he was being resurrected to life hearing that tone of smugness Mary had so often sported in life.
“Jack?” Perpetua questioned, looking from Copia to Mary.
“Yeah, that was it. Jack Krueger. I remember the name because of the mix of two of my favorite movie characters.” Copia said matter of factly, raising the finger on his free hand as if to make a point.

“Copia, this is…well, this is Mary. Goore. Mary Goore.” Perpetua said. Copia looked stunned, and Perpetua could almost hear the gears turning in his head.
“Mary Goore? THE Mary Goore?” Copia said. Now it was Mary’s turn to glare at Perpetua.

“So how do you know about Jack Krueger?” Mary asked, their voice a little harsh. “I’ve never seen you before in my life. I mean, I guess you have something to do with him?” He nodded towards Perpetua.
Copia looked a little shocked, as if he couldn’t believe someone existed that didn’t know of him.
“Why, I’m Frater Imperator! You know, head-of-the-clergy-of-Ghost Frater Imperator? Was-the-most-successful-Papa Frater Imperator?”
“He was Papa before me. More annoyingly, my twin brother.” Perpetua added dryly. It had felt like pure heartbreak before, he had been prepared to give up his existence, and now here was Copia, apparently knowing Mary Goore somehow.
“And do we have to stand here talking in the rain? I mean, I have an umbrella, but you two look like you drowned.” Copia said, looking both Mary and Perpetua up and down.
Perpetua held up his hand. “That’s not important right now. You. Speak. How do you know Mary?”
There was an authority in his voice that silenced both Mary and Copia.

“Years ago, they came to the ministry looking for some kind of guidance. I remember them. Well, Jack Krueger. They…honestly, were a little bit rude, but I remember I didn’t mind that.” Copia chuckled. Mary seemed perplexed.
“Hold on, yeah, I did go there but I never met you. I met a Cardinal. He was way weirder looking than you.” Mary said, and Copia motioned with his hand to his face.
“That’s me. Well, was me. Cardinal Copia. They upgraded me. Then they…want me to believe they promoted me again. ” Copia sounded a little bitter, but they looked at Mary, whose eyes were trained on Copia’s face and eyes as if searching for similarities. “Also, what do you mean with ‘weirder’?”

“It’s just…you look different.” Mary said, bluntly. Copia coughed. “Yeah. It’s good ol’ me , though. Right, Vee?”
Perpetua threw Copia an annoyed look. “Not my name. But…you mean to tell me you two know each other?”
Mary rolled their eyes. “Yeah. He has that same annoying kindness in his eyes. Even though he looks significantly better.”
Perpetua glared at Copia, who smiled a little too smug.
“Why are you here, Copia?” He said. He needed to figure things out with Mary. He needed to know what would happen next. He had been ready to give it all up, his whole undead life, the band.

“It looked like you left in a hurry. I thought you…that you might be….” Copia said ,seemingly too flustered to end the sentence. He decided to end it in a scowl directed at Perpetua.
“I’m…not. I’m…Mary and I…” Perpetua said, snapping Mary out of some kind of daze at the mention of their name. Copia nodded, a little unsure. He grabbed Perpetua’s shoulder and turned him towards himself, whispering. “They love you, you know.”
He stomped off in the rain, carrying his umbrella with him. Perpetua turned towards Mary.

“He’s…back when I was searching for you, I talked to him. I didn’t know that you were…related. Well, not like this. But it was strangely comforting. I guess.” Mary seemed embarrassed telling Perpetua this, their hand scratching the back of their neck for no good reason but habit. So they hadn’t lost that piece of humanity.
“You searched for me? You really did?” He said, his hands pushing back his wet hair over his head. If he had been human, he would’ve been cold and shaking to the bone.
He wished he was. If he had been human…he wouldn’t be here with Mary. They’d be together. Happy. Somewhere.
There was the ache again, that had been dulled at Copia’s appearance.

“Yeah. I made some connections. The weird eyes, the music stuff…I don’t know. But I didn’t hear anything about you until a few months ago. I…I had no streamlined plan or anything.”
Mary admitted. Perpetua couldn’t put his finger on it, but something about their demeanor seemed different. He didn’t feel like he should stop existing anymore, but he wasn’t sure how he would manage that.

*

Mary sat down, their back against a big tree, the branches almost sheltering their head. Perpetua approached, but not too close.
“I don’t know what to do now. I was angry with you. There was rage in me. Rage and betrayal. But even as I was in that…that process…” Mary closed their eyes. Thinking about the time they had spent writhing in their apartment, changing into something beyond human, that would always be painful. “I had this other feeling. And I hated that I had that other feeling. If I didn’t have that, and I just hated you plain and simple, that would’ve been easy.”
Perpetua looked at them in silence.

“Fact is I love you. I always have. That night you and I met? Insane. Can’t describe that.” Mary said, feeling like they were baring their heart. This was information no one could ever pull out of them. It felt unnatural to say- especially paired with the hurt.
Perpetua had looked like he wanted to die there, nothing but despair in his eyes. "I really didn’t wanna feel that. I hate that you took away my humanity, that you…kept me from doing what I loved. That you got to have a band and a life. But I still fucking loved you. I still do.”
Mary sounded frustrated, their fingers digging into the earth.

Perpetua got down on his knees before Mary, leveling their faces. He looked sad in all possible ways, the rain having almost washed all of his paint off, only vague gray streaks left. He looked so bare…Mary noticed they felt tender about seeing Perpetua like this.
They scowled, as if the feeling would go away like that.
Perpetua extended his hands, and Mary let him. They were tired. Tired of everything.
They let Perpetua hold their face in his hands.
“I know I can’t turn back time. I can’t undo it. I can’t make it right. But if I could I would spend the rest of my existence trying to make it up to you. I love you and I can’t stop. Even if you want to never see me again. I know I sound…dramatic.” Perpetua said, holding Mary’s face. Mary slightly rolled their eyes. “You sound cheesy as fuck, if that’s what you mean.” They couldn’t stop themselves from making the comment. It felt like something they would’ve said when they both had been human.

“Cheesy, then.” Perpetua said, a slight smile that he apparently allowed himself. Mary noticed they liked seeing it, patting the earth besides them.
“We should talk.” They said. This was the first time they had felt normal enough to have a
conversation. Not that it would be a normal conversation.

* * * *

Copia paced up and down the tour bus, the ghouls lounging back.
“You’re gonna wear the floor out like that.” Phantom noted, pointing at the carpeted floor of the bus.
Copia scowled at him. “Thank you, Phantom.”
Phantom sat up and shrugged. “I’m just saying, there’ll be a hole in there before-”
Another scowl from Copia, who held up his hand. “I said, thank you, Phantom.”
The rain pattered against the flat roof, and every ten seconds Copia peered out the window into the dark night.
“They should head back here…” He murmured. Phantom and Rain exchanged a look, the latter standing up and putting his hand on Copia’s shoulder.
“Who says they will? This is Perpetua’s turf, I feel like Mary wouldn’t feel that comfortable here. They’re adults, Copia, they can handle themselves.” He said.
Copia sighed. “I know that…you’re right of course, Rain, it’s just…they looked like they had drowned. Perpetua didn’t even have his mask on. Paint just washed away. It was like an otherworldly scene.”

It was a unique situation. Copia knew how Perpetua felt, while also partly knowing how Mary felt. He was perplexed that he had met them before under a false name.
“Maybe we should leave. Or…I don’t know, go to sleep.” Rain tried, carefully nudging Copia.
“I feel anxious just sitting here but…yeah. You’re right. Again.” Copia said, awkwardly smiling. Rain patted him on the shoulder a couple of times.
“Let’s just go to sleep. Guys?” He addressed the others. Some of the ghouls had already dozed off, he couldn’t blame them for that.

In the night, as the ghouls snored, Copia was wide awake. He hadn’t exactly been that close to his brother, but this had put things in a whole other perspective. They both hadn’t had the happiest childhood. When he thought about it, he felt the happiest as an adult, performing with the band. Perpetua was more of a closed book, compared to him, which he found difficult at first. From what he had told him about Mary and him, Copia felt like there’d be a solution. There had to be some way out of this. He didn’t know what that would be, or how it would go, but there had to be.

Before he knew it, the morning light fell through the windows. Copia sat up, feeling more anxious now, peering around the bus.
Nothing had changed. After he had gathered himself, he opened the door, inhaling the fresh air. Everything smelled like the rain, which had stopped now. Still, no sign of Perpetua…or Mary Goore.

He walked around the bus, peering at the woods. It probably wouldn’t be a good idea to go in there again. Like Rain had said, they were adults. They could handle themselves.
Copia stared at the sky. It was gray, and it was quiet outside. It felt eerie.
There was a sound in the direction of the woods. Copia’s head snapped up, seeing someone emerge from there. He squinted, trying to make out if it was Perpetua, Mary Goore, both of them or someone else entirely.
He walked towards the woods, his view getting clearer.
Perpetua and Mary Goore emerged from the trees, still soaked to the bone, wordlessly walking toward Copia, who looked at them questioningly. The looks on their faces were inscrutable.

Copia saw silvery metal, realizing Mary was holding Perpetua’s mask in their hands. His eyes met Perpetua’s as they got closer, who looked at him with a knowing gaze.

* * * *

Perpetua closed his eyes, his chest heaving as the last note died down. He felt satisfied, another show even better than the last. The crowd loved it.
He raised his head, before bending down and bowing, wrapping his arms around the ghouls, looking into the crowd. His eyes searched through the humans until he spotted them.
In the middle of the pit, standing still despite everyone around them cheering and clapping, with their hair as jet black as ever and their eyes framed with smudged makeup, stood Mary Goore. Perpetua knew the green eyes were covered by a red sheen. Their eyes met, and Perpetua felt like there was no one else in the venue except them.
“Thank you.” He said, knowing no one would hear it, not spoken into the microphone. His eyes were trained on Mary.
“Thank you.”