Chapter Text
23
23 supernaturals total have gone missing from the area.
14 werewolves and 9 vampires had mysteriously gone missing from the town area, not a single body had shown up.
Something needed to change for the disappearances to be stopped.
Yudai decided to be the bigger person and bring about that change. That’s why he was in a dingy hole in the wall café too late at night instead of curled up at home with his pack.
Yudai doubted he’d even show up, he had looked so irritated when Yudai proposed the meeting.
Just as Yudai was considering getting up and leaving, the bell above the door chimed as the door swung open.
Heeseung, drenched from the downpour outside, stepped into the café, immediately spotting Yudai and began slowly making his way over to him, gracefully removing his heavy overcoat and draping it over the back of the chair across from Yudai, tousling his damp hair before he sat down.
“Heeseung...” Yudai muttered, disbelief evident in his voice
“Why am I here Yudai?” Heeseung had a cold expression on his face clearly, he’d rather be anywhere else… though he always looked at Yudai like that. Well since they grew up.
“Heeseung we need to talk…”
“About?”
“About the disappearances and how we can stop them and…”
“And?” Heeseung snapped impatience clear in his tone.
“And Sunghoon.”
“No.”
“Heeseung please be reasonable for once! He needs to be around other wolves on a consistent basis.”
“He’s never had a pack he doesn’t need one now he has a coven and that’s enough.”
“He can have both! Please Heeseung for his own benefit he needs to be part of a pack it’s unhealthy to be separated from his own kind.”
“He’s been fine without one ever since he presented, I don’t see why he needs one now.”
Huh? Did… did Sunghoon not tell Heeseung? Fuck…
“Heeseung… Sunghoon's been spending heats with us since he presented…”
“What...?” The cold and calculated expression melted from Heeseung's face morphing into one of shock and betrayal.
Yudai felt bad exposing Sunghoon's clearly well-kept secret but hopefully, after tonight such secrecy won’t be needed.
“He’s been coming to stay in the pack house for the week whenever he knows his heat will hit… how did you not notice him leaving?”
“But… Sunghoon never goes anywhere? The only places he goes away to for that long is his parents… oh…”
“I’m sorry he lied to you, but you have to see how you probably would have reacted if he’d told you…”
Heeseung seemed lost, clearly not expecting to find out such vital information about a coven member when coming to meet Yudai.
“Has he… I mean has he been okay? No problems or anything with his heat...?” Heeseung seemed shy asking, clearly having trouble being proven wrong about something so important.
“He’s been fine Heeseung I swear I would never let anything happen to him under my roof… I wouldn’t let anything happen to any of you.”
Heeseung tilted his head to stare at the table, brows furrowed in confusion.
Yudai slowly lifted a hand to Heeseung's brow smoothing out the lines there and petting over his eyebrows “Ayeee don’t do that you’ll get wrinkles early Heesuengie…” Yudai tried for a soft tone not wanting to distress the vampire more.
“I... I don’t understand…”
“And therein lies our problem… you know nothing about the pack, nothing about werewolves in general really which I think is fairly important if you have one in your coven no?”
“Yes, Hyung…” Heeseung almost sounded like a scolded child now face flushed from Yudai's gentle caress and head turned away to avoid eye contact “I’ll… I’ll let Sunghoon see everyone more often and… and he can join the pack if he pleases… and Ni-ki can stop hiding his little meetups with Taki now.”
Wow, an unexpectedly quick turnaround for someone as stubborn as Heeseung, though Yudai knew that most of the time the cold exterior Heeseung put on was mostly a front he put on to hide a softer inside.
“Heeseung… is something the matter?”
“…” Heeseung seemed even more flushed now flicking his eyes anywhere but Yudai.
“Heeseungie… it’s okay you can tell Hyung this seems like a sudden attitude change for you y’know.” Yudai reached across to tuck Heeseung's stray damp hairs behind his slightly pointed ears.
“I haven’t been a good coven leader have I Hyung…”
“Hm? Well, you maybe were a bit strict, but you love the boys like nothing else Heeseung, I think you’re a wonderful coven leader.”
Heeseung usually seemed to be so confident in his leading position it was surprising to see him so broken down about it especially when as far as Yudai knows the rest of the coven thinks Heeseung is an incredible leader even when he’s a bit too protective or possessive.
“I just… wish I was more like you Hyung… stronger and less I guess… insecure in my leadership even if you’re not the pack alpha, I always looked up to you know… when we were kids you were always the one to be so confident in yourself and assured that you were doing the right thing for us.”
As much as this was an acceptable response and probably at least halfway true Yudai knew that wasn’t the end of it, there had to be a deeper reason for Heeseung's attitude.
“Heeseung please tell me what’s actually bothering you, you’re not usually so easy to back down from an argument.”
Heeseung looked nervous now, clearly not expecting Yudai to see through him so easily. “Yudai-hyung just leave it please it’s not a big deal…” “No, you clearly want to tell me something but are too scared to.”
“I… Fine, Euijoo and Nicholas approached me the other day and we got into an argument, things got heated and Nicholas accused me of being behind the attacks… I can’t even describe the pain I felt… it felt like a stab directly into my heart, I know he didn’t mean it and it just came out in the heat of anger, I could see he immediately wanted to take it back but he just ran away… Euijoo stayed for a moment and gave me a look I can only describe as pure heartbreak, I guess we were both shocked that it had come this far.”
“Heeseung…” “That’s when I realised this was going on for too long and getting too harsh, What happened? We were so close as kids and then we grew into our species more and suddenly it’s like we’re wired to hate each other either via our parents telling us or just a weird itching instinct.”
Yudai knew exactly what Heeseung was talking about, it’s like as soon as they all began presenting everything anyone did ticked the others off. Like the subtle dead smell of vampires that began to linger around the boys as they started approaching the time when they’d stop ageing, or the annoyance that the pack's omegas' clinginess was causing the vampires, not all being open to such physical affection and even when Euijoo's alpha instincts started to make him more naturally leading it pissed off Heesueng to no end that it came so natural to him, the worst were the arguments over feeding the vampire boys as young growing vampires said blood bags weren’t preferable to them but the werewolves saw such savage acts being done to wildlife like deer and rabbits disgusting, it was worse when any of the vampires suggested feeding on humans.
“It didn’t help that our parents were so disgusted at the sheer idea of us being friends… I’m proud of you Heeseungie… a lesser vampire would have been more stubborn to change.” Heeseung once again became bashful and looked down at the table refusing to meet Yudai’s eyes.
“I missed you Hyung… I missed everyone… Euijoo and Nico… I miss them more than ever”
“And that’s why I asked you to meet more than to even talk about our issues we need to come together again, we’re stronger together and we need to be strong to deal with whatever the hell is taking out more and more supernatural beings too close to home for comfort.”
“I need you for this Heeseung, we need all of us together in one team to do this. You in?”
“Yes, we can help, we can talk to the few other vampires in the area to see if they know anything, but I think we need to do this slowly… I don’t know how the coven will react to immediately trying to be close again.”
“Agreed the pack probably won’t be thrilled either, I’m worried Nico will push back hard.”
“What do we do Hyung?” “I reckon we separately propose the idea of a meet-up to them, settle any problems with each group before we even attempt to do a whole group discussion, that way we at least reduce the chance of a fight breaking out a little.” Yudai figured shoving both the coven and the pack in one area too quickly and forcing them to cohabitate would be a bad idea, everything’s still too raw and angry to do that.
“Okay, so we go back home and maybe tomorrow we can tell them about what we settled on here? God the coven doesn’t even know I did this...” “Don’t worry the pack don’t know either I didn’t want any of them to try come along, even Euijoo can get aggravated easier than me”
“Shame maybe we should have brought the Riki's for a play date or something while we talked… god knows Ni-ki's been begging to see you…”
“Hm, my beloved firstborn…” “Shut up Hyung” Heeseung rose from his chair lightly feeling over his coat to see if it was dried sighing in disappointment to see that it was still damp. “Heeseungie here.” Yudai took off his thick waterproof coat and wrapped it around Heeseung's smaller frame zipping it up and pulling the large hood over his damp hair “Ah hyung…” Heeseung shyly pulled the hood down “Sh you’re not going home in the rain in a still-soaking jacket”
Heeseung gave a warm but complicated look at Yudai before quickly walking around the table to grasp him in a tight hug. “Thank you Hyung… for always believing in me…” “Aye don’t be silly I always knew that somewhere in that silly vampire head was the lovely boy I knew from high school…” Yudai slowly lowered his nose to Heeseung's hair taking in the subtle smell of summer rain and a scent that was so naturally Heeseung that it filled Yudai's head with memories of lying on cozy couches while the rain battered down outside, Heeseung falling asleep halfway through a movie while Yudai fell more and more for the oldest vampire.
“Get home safely okay Heeseungie?”
“I will Hyung I promise.”