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"So you're human? Like 100%? I've heard scary things about you guys." Minho asks, eyes dilated with the being sitting (read: tied up) in the chair in front of him.
The guy grumbles before motioning with his eyes to his mouth. Right, he won't be capable to say anything if he doesn't remove the restraint in his mouth. "Sorry man, precautionary measures. I don't want to die today."
"Are you fucking kidding me right now?" The human mouths, voice raspy unquestionably because of the time spent attempting to cry for help.
Maybe, just maybe, it hadn't been the most illustrious of ideas to captivate a human but the boy scared the hell out of him when conceded there wasn't a bone of the supernatural in him. He's read the vampire weekly journal, the section with Humans to avoid is by far the scariest thing he's read, and he's into remarkably disturbing stuff.
"No, I'm being dead serious." Minho offered.
The human rolled his eyes. "Aren't you literally dead?"
"That's why I'm dead serious, yeah." He deadpanned, not perceiving where the comment was coming from. "What are you even doing in this district?"
"Ghost hunting, of course."
"Ghosts don't like to be hunted," Minho replied seriously. "Mayhaps you could adopt a pet ghost, there's a lot of stray ghost cats around but can you imagine doing that with a regular ghost? They wouldn't be celebrating at all. Besides, you know they can like… pass through surfaces, right? How would you even keep them?"
The guy didn't appear disconcerted nor affected by his speech, in fact, his face overflows with apathy. "I'm clearly joking."
"How would I know that?" Minho practically screams. Humans are so deceiving, it's impressive. In the hours he's been in this guy's closeness, he's felt incapable of perceiving his emotions and motives. Perhaps that's why they warn you, in big bold letters, to stay away from them.
And now he has invited one into his house.
Well, kidnapped, but the same thing.
"Look, mister Vampire." The human opened his mouth again. "Can you just kill me already? Because if you don't I'm seriously going to die of boredom being tied to this chair."
Minho crinkled his eyebrow. "Kill you? I'm not going to kill you! What kind of vampire do you think I am?"
This time the human bestowed the doubtful sentiment with him. "The normal kind? Don't vampires just kill people to suck their blood or something?"
"I'm sick and tired of these stereotypes!" Minho yelled, the house vibrating with the rage he was irradiating. "Wouldn't that be a complete waste? Killing a human every time I want to drink something? Besides, human blood? Yikes. Almost impossible to find healthy humans whose blood cells aren't crammed with cholesterol. Your kind needs to take better care of itself."
He breathes in before continuing. "What's your name heathen?"
The boy mutters the word heathen before replying. "Seungmin."
"Well, Seungmin, here's vampire 101: would you eat raw meat directly by biting a cow?"
The look of disgust on the other's face was enough of an answer. "That's disgusting."
"Then why would vampires do that with Humans? Blood needs to be treated as well before we can consume it! And there's no need to sacrifice it, a lot of humans willingly donate a bunch of it anyway."
"For hospitals! To treat people!"
Minho scoffs. "Sure, whatever gets your wheel spinning."
The uncomfortable silence hindered as they both belatedly came to sense the situation they had gathered themselves in. Minho did not plan to kidnap a Human that night but he had been patrolling around the district, checking for any problems when he noticed the strange guy. A further inspection into the other allowed him to realize this was no ordinary newcomer: he had no magical powers, no shape-shifting abilities, and was very much alive.
Perhaps his resentment about humans spoke louder upon the capture of the stranger, but he told himself it was to preserve his community exclusively. He had no other intentions aside from that.
"Can you free me then?" Seungmin supplicates.
About ten alarms chimed in his head. "Absolutely not! How do I know you're not going around and killing me after this?"
"How many times do I have to tell you this: you're a vampire! And you're literally already dead!"
"Well sir, vampires can die, you know? And they always die in the hands of Humans, your track record is scary, to say the least." Minho decided to sit down for the discussion as he reconvened the possibilities and routes he could take at the moment.
Freeing the Human was scary. Who knows what will come next? An army of them carrying deadly hidden weapons designed specifically to annihilate and torture his society? Or even worse, what if he decided to turn the whole experience into a novel and make bestselling money out of it?
Vampires always get the rough end of the stick when it comes to blockbusters; so much money and not even a penny in their direction: usually the direct inspiration of it all.
"You were all worked up about me stereotyping Vampires and now you're doing the same to me!" Seungmin was a feisty one, distinctly.
"No, I'm not!"
"Yes, you are!"
The conversation distinctly wasn't going anyplace. "Look, just tell me the truth of why you were wandering around this district, and maybe I'll let you go with a warning."
Seungmin rolled his eyes. "It's Halloween.'
"Halloween was last month," Minho stated. He couldn't believe this guy was toying with him like that.
And then a shift happened in the emotions of the room, irrevocably being prepared to put his expertise to hand by sensing them. It became firmer, darker. "The buildings in here are high."
"What does that have to do with anything?" Minho wondered.
Seungmin gulped. "What do you think people do when buildings are high and they want to climb to the top?"
Shit . That's not the counterclaim he was scanning for. He didn't even grasp how to respond to such words. Many of his studies qualified him to deal with Humans: caution, be careful with hands and objects they carry, be aware of their sugary words.
But these words weren't sweet, there was no weaponry hidden in his pockets, no intent to hurt him. The only purpose the Human seemed to have was to hurt himself. And he wasn't sure he was capable of bargaining with such.
"Seungmin…" He couldn't maintain the sadness creeping into his features.
The human didn't look pleased. "I really don't need a vampire to pity me. You're already dead, why would you look so sad that I wanted the same?"
Humans are dangerous but also notably naive. "Being dead isn't great, you know? If I say so myself, it's overrated. And I'm one of the even more unlucky ones; I get to stay here and watch every living thing waste their lives by simply walking towards death. Why do you want to waste yours when you have so much to live?"
"No offense but you don't know me." Seungmin snarked. "I have lost everything. There's nothing else grounding me to this world, so why must I stay?"
"You just have to find something to stay for," Minho replied. He's never been skilled at giving reassurance and no one equipped him for this particular scenario, but something about Seungmin propelled him to at least attempt. "Is there not something about this world you wish to unravel? Something you want to know more about?"
Seungmin sighs again but he seems to be keener on the subject now. "I guess there is." He eventually replies, locking eyes with Minho for the first time that night.
Time stops when that occurs. He didn't apprehend how intense the other was, how much he could sense from a gaze unequaled, the things he hadn't been able to discern before on the Human: the fear of being alone, the sadness of it happening.
"W–What is it?" Curses , why was he stammering now?"
"You." Seungmin replies. His eyes widened in shock. "In the night I planned to stop living, I got kidnapped by a Vampire! I didn't even know Vampires existed."
" Then why do you all write so many novels about us… " He murmurs.
That doesn't prevent the boy who endures. "In fact, I met a vampire who is trying to talk me through killing myself and is afraid of Humans. That's something to stay for, I guess."
Minho abruptly undergoes something warm emerging in his body, an emotion he didn't think he could feel ever since he died. "Well then Seungmin, I hope I can be something for you to linger for then."
The boy presented him with something that matches a smile. "Can you untie me now?"
"Are you going to kill me if I do?"
"Are all vampires this afraid of Humans?" Seungmin starts again, appearing as the topic isn't going to be diverted anytime soon.
"Statistically speaking you're the number one cause of Vampire extinction; that and global warming," Minho states as he gets up to retrieve his vampire weekly publication with all the numbers he thinks Seungmin should take a glimpse at.
Perhaps it wasn't a great approach to wave around the issue in front of the boy. "Stop waving it around, I can't see a thing."
"Sorry." He beams apologetically before denoting the diagram in the paper. "See here though, the numbers don't lie."
Seungmin, much to his consternation, truly takes his time to interpret the subject. "Wow, that's a fantastic analysis. The data goes all the way to medieval times!"
" Vampire weekly is a dedicated publication."
The boy giggles. "Sounds serious. Can I ask something since you have no plans on letting me go?"
"Sure." That sounded fair.
"How long have you been around?"
The question came with no astonishment as if Seungmin had previously settled into the idea of the reality around him. "Less than a hundred years. I'm still a pretty young vampire."
"That explains the unorthodox methods of tying me down for no reason."
This guy certainly loved to mess with him. "You approached me sneakily!"
"I was just telling you you had dropped your book."
Minho raised his eyebrows before looking around the apartment in recognition. "My book! Shit, I must've dropped it."
"That's what I said." The boy replied smugly.
"Shut up Seungmin."
A beat passes before any of them says anything, ineptitude creeping in once again. "This is going to be a stupid question but do you have anything to eat? I'm starving."
He doesn't own a kitchen but there's a cabinet in the living room stacked with butter cookies for Chan. The werewolf loves a fresh bite and Minho isn't a monster – at least in the other sense of the word.
He grabs the package before throwing it at Seungmin. The boy rolls his eyes as soon as they fall to the floor. "With which hands did you think I was going to catch those?"
"Right." Minho cursed, grabbing some of the lost cookies and venturing to feed Seungmin.
"I'm not going to bite you." Seungmin defenses when he notices the caution in his movements. "Isn't that kind of your job?"
"You think you're so funny don't you?"
The boy smirks as another cookie approaches his mouth. "I know I am." He replies, with his mouth full. Guess being kidnapped takes away the good manners of someone. "Can I see your teeth?"
The things he gets himself into , Minho reminisces, opening his mouth and pushing his lip upwards to showcase his sharp canines. Seungmin watches transfixed, eyes locked on the gesture. That somehow starts a whole interrogation from Seungmin's side that leads to another two hours of conversation.
It's an easygoing dialogue though, flowing without much trouble. As the conversation unfolds, Minho's ability to read Seungmin's emotions displays much easier. He no longer feels afraid of the other, no longer considers this Human in front of him as a manipulator for the greater evil.
He's merely broken.
"If I untie you, how can I be sure you're not going to jump off a building?"
Seungmin gulps. "You don't." He relishes the honesty, even if it kind of troubles him. "However, if you want, we can plan something for another day. Something I can look forward to."
He's convinced if his heart was still pounding, it would be accelerating at that very moment. "It's a deal. I can tell you more about Vampires and you can finally explain to me how phones work."
"You're such a stereotype." Seungmin smirks, the sound of his thumping heart echoing through the room as he unties the other. "I'll look forward to our date."
"Date?" Minho yells as he walks Seungmin out of his apartment and guides him out of the district. "Who said it would be a date?"
"I did." Seungmin smiles.