Chapter Text
An opinion that was often expressed on Logan's college campus was that finals week made people go literally insane.
He'd heard stories, of course. Everyone whispered, shared stories, every finals week like clockwork. He'd heard tall tales of this very campus in the seventies, stories about spree killings. Sometimes the main protagonist was a man, but most times it was a woman. That particular story had long been disproven, the official story tying the deaths to a wild bear, but people still whisper about it when telling ghost stories.
The other kind of story was scariest- was the kind he could see with his own eyes. Last year, a student in one of Logan's Nursing classes had to be carted away to a hospital after he had a cardiac event from consuming too much caffeine. Logan had known a girl who passed out after going way too long without sleep, due to the use of Adderall and other stimulants to help her study. In that way, finals week could make you crazy too, push you to the very limit of what you could handle.
But Logan? Logan fears that he's going actually, certifiably, literally and truly insane.
He'd known Remus for years. They'd met his freshman year of college, and even then, Logan thought that he was strange, in an endearing way. He was the art major to Logan's Nursing degree, and funnily enough, they met in the library, in the small section of books on human anatomy.
Logan had been helpful to him, answering a question he had about how the inside of a person looked like. Remus had promptly invited him to the unveiling of the painting he was doing research for, where Logan had seen his descriptions come to life.
Logan was the only one who didn't flinch when the curtains came down to show Remus's new artwork, and thus, they became inseparable.
Logan didn't really have any friends before Remus. He was always the kind of person who just kept his head down and did the work, and that didn't really inspire classmates to invite him to things. Remus had kind of… forcefully put himself into Logan's space. And he came with a whole group, who slowly absorbed Logan into their lives.
Now, he was friends with not only Remus, but also his twin Roman, Patton, Janus, and Virgil. And he was friends with all of them, but Remus and him were certainly the closest. Remus just understands Logan, in a way no one else did, and Logan understands Remus the same.
So why was he so certain that Remus was lying to him?
There's one more thing you must know about Logan, in order for him to tell this story correctly. Ever since Logan was a child, he's been able to tell when people are lying to him, to a scary degree. It started with things like Santa Claus and the tooth fairy. His parents eventually stopped trying to lie to him about things like that.
It also helped him in his profession, nursing. Most people who lie to their nurses aren't doing it to be mean, or rude. They're mostly just scared. Scared of being in trouble, Scared of not being believed, Scared to admit how bad or how long-running their situation is.
But Logan knows, and he likes to- kindly and gently- encourage people that they are safe in his ER to tell the truth.
It's harder for long-standing lies, or lies by omission. Outright denials were easy- black and white. If you said something objective, it was either true or not true, and Logan can sense that. Trying to determine a truth from something that hasn't been said out loud was significantly harder.
That's why it had been so surprising when Remus had lied to him.
"Oh, I'm going home to see my family for winter break," He had said, and Logan felt it like a stab in his side when he instantly knew that Remus was not being truthful. Roman had repeated the same lie, when asked later, and Logan tried not to overthink it.
Maybe they didn't have a strong relationship with their parents. It wouldn't be so crazy, he thinks, to lie if they didn't want to talk about it… Accept that Virgil had a very bad relationship with his parents, and he talked about it openly, so the twins must have known that the group wouldn't have judged them for such a thing, if they did say that.
But the lie didn't come up again, so Logan didn't push it.
It was odd for Remus to lie to him, as they had always told each other the truth, even when it was distasteful, unpleasant, or hard. Or at least, Logan had always told the truth, and he hadn't detected Remus telling any lies. But now Remus had lied to him, about something so inconsequential, and he did it so easily-
It was strange to him. It… It kind of hurt Logan's feelings, but only for a second. A pang. He knew how common and how easy it was to lie. Maybe Remus just didn't want to talk about his family, or had plans for winter break that he didn't want to invite Logan to. That was fine.
But something about it had startled Logan, and he suddenly started to notice things about Remus.
Something… Something strange was happening.
The first thing that Logan notices is that Remus absolutely never blushes.
Look, Logan can admit that he blushes easily. Embarrassment, literally any amount of exercise (even using the universities stairs, sometimes, if he's in a hurry), and even the lightest amount of flirting causes him to flush red easily.
Logan and Remus tend to flirt back and forth sometimes. Usually it's Remus flirting with him and Logan flailing while attempting to flirt back. Again, during this common interaction, Logan is usually flamed-faced.
Remus has never blushed once.
At first, Logan just assumed that Remus was just smooth, and used to people flirting him. Unlike Logan, who is more likely to get tongue tied, and before Remus, had never been flirted with ever. He also considered the fact that maybe Logan's not a very good "flirt-er", considering how he didn't have much practice.
But like, even when exercising, he's never had any amount of flushed cheeks.
He guesses that wouldn't be so alarming, perhaps, if Remus wasn't as pale as a ghost. You might think that Logan is exaggerating, but he's serous- Remus is much closer in skin color to pure white on the color wheel than he is to the peach that most people attribute to white people's skin color.
And his skin is quite odd, too, if you were to reach out and touch him. It's paper thin and leathery, skin Logan often associates with older people, as the skin has stretched out overtime and lost some of the elasticity that comes from youth.
But since he was so pale, and since he was so thin in skin, you'd assume that you'd be able to see busing on him, as the blood vessels under the skin would break easily. Or, you'd be able to see the blood rise on his cheeks when running- When the blood in you body is moving the most.
And the running- oh, that was strange, too.
It was known that Remus was freakily fast when it came to doing things. You could ask him to grab and object from a different floor of the building, and he was able to get it for you in less than thirty seconds, something that should be, frankly, humanly impossible. Logan and the rest of the group always joked that he was superman, or super-human at least, to be able to run and get something, and then return so quickly without looking out of breath, or sweating.
That's the thing about Florida. At some point in the swamp, every-fucking-body sweats. And Remus, some-fucking-how, just doesn't. Logan has been friends with him for a good three years at this point, and he has never, not once, through one-hundred degree days and all, sweat in front of Logan.
Logan is in school for nursing. He knows that is biologically unthinkable.
People have actually brought this up before in the group. Virgil called this out once, as a joke. He called it unfair, how neither of the twins- yes, all of the things listed happened with Roman, too- were sweating, when the other four of them were their own mini swamps.
The twins, naturally, chalked it all up to good genetics, sighting their good looks and luck in the gene pool. But Logan knows that's not how that works.
And that's another thing, too. The twins are supernaturally good looking. There is not an once of baby fat on them, nor any freshmen-fifteen pounds, even though Logan has never seen either one of them go on diets. They are both slim, but packed with muscle too, where it matters, and yet they have incredible looking sharp jawlines.
Logan has seen both of them flirt their ways in and out of situations, including parking tickets, several times. They can both flirt with scary accuracy. Nobody should be able to bat a thousand when it comes to flirting. Someone should reject you, at some point.
And Nobody should have eyes as rich and brown and intoxicating as Remus does.
Not even Roman has those eyes, his more honey-brown and soft. Trust him, Logan has compared them. Remus's eyes are just so chocolate and deep and unnaturally gorgeous. It's… Really, it's deeply unsettling, somehow.
Logan thinks he's going crazy.
He's sure that he's going insane. His computer is open, the search bar blinking back at him over and over and over again. It's as if the search bar is asking him, are you really going to ask? Do you know how deranged you sound?
God. It's- a glance down to the bottom of his screen- four in the morning. Search bars can't speak, and he needs to go to bed.
But it's bugging him. Bugging, bugging, bugging. Like he did as a kid, like he's known to do, picking, picking, picking, at a fresh scab until it bleeds over. He's unable to let go of an idea once it grips him, sinking it's claws into Logan's brain.
Is it possible to survive without most normal bodily functions?
Predictably, nothing shows up except for some conspiracy theory websites, and the obvious answer; No.
Logan bites as his lower lip as he reads for a little while, not really absorbing any information. He should be satisfied with that no. Of course it's not possible- of course he's overthinking and making a mountain out of a molehill. Of course, he's just imagining thing about Remus.
Logan looks up at the ceiling, cursing himself out. Something- something- Something strange is happening with Remus. He would know. He's not over-reacting. Something strange is happening with both of the twins.
Logan sits up again, facing down his open computer again.
Someone looking unnaturally hot, he types.
Again, Predictably, the only thing that appears are links to Tumblr and Pintrest, raving about Andrew Garfield, Megan Fox, and Timothée Chalamet, none of witch Logan thinks look bad, but it's certainly not his type. There are some supposed "looksmaxxer" websites too, and a subreddit for that. Logan simply wrinkles his nose and ignores anything that says "Clavicular".
Logan opens a new tab. Last one, he tells himself. Last time he'll let himself spiral on this subject, tonight- or more accurately, today- or, well, at all. Last question.
Person who doesn't sweat, supernatural?
The first link that comes up is one on Reddit. The title of it reads: Be Warned! Vampires don't sweat!
Logan scoffs, at first. He clicks on the link purely to see how someone came up with that- it's inventive, he must admit. The link is posted on r/RealVampires, of course, so it must be a reliable source, (yeah, right).
The original poster claims to have been bitten by a Vampire, and they add that it was a non-consensual biting, because that's apparently something that needed to be stated if you were posting on r/RealVampires. They claim to have been gym buddies with this particular "Vampire", and they tell a tale of never seeing said Vampire sweat… nor blush, even in intense heats…. nor bruise, even with thin skin…
How did this person experience the exact same thing that Logan had?
Well, not the exact same thing, Logan realizes with a horror. At the end of the Redditor's lengthy story, they detail how they'd been bit. How this person, this person that they trusted, and liked, and went on a date with, had taken them into a dark alley and sunk their teeth- fangs, that suddenly appeared- into this person's neck, and then left them for dead.
Almost killed them.
Logan is near tears with the final words of the story.
The title may seem sensationalized, or like I'm telling some horror story. I did that on purpose- I wanted you to click it. I wanted you to read this. Please, if you're reading this, be warned. Vampires are very real, and they can hurt you. If you notice something- If something in your gut seems off, if you feel the need to click and read this story, run. Run far far away. Don't let the Vampire get you alone. Be smarter, be better than I was.
Logan is at war with himself. Some parts of him wants to write this off as a joke, a gag, a story by a very talented writer, that just so happened to coincide with his experience. Vampires aren't real, that would be like saying a werewolf or… or a ghost was real, and they just weren't!
But…
But, These words seemed so real. The person who posted this must have had some kind of hurt. They did experience betrayal, experience something so awful, and they wrote about it, shared it for a reason. The person who posted this doesn't sound like a liar.
It sounds like they're telling the truth.
Remus is a Vampire.
Logan tries to shake the thought, tries to tell himself that he's crazy. The thought sinks it's claws in, and Logan wrestles, denies. There is no truth to that conclusion, he tries to force himself to believe, but the denial train of thought is losing the war inside of him.
Logan scrolls down to the comments. He ignores all the ones that seem to be responding with jokes, or blatant denials, ignores the is this real? comment twice. Finally, a comment catches his eye. Just skimming it, he can tell that this person is being truthful, too.
This is so hateful, the person writes. Not every Vampire is going to attack and feed off of every human they come across. I'm sorry you had that experience, What he did to you isn't right, but not all of us are murders. Don't generalize. It's unfair to say all Vampires are dangerous.
Maybe… Maybe Remus is a non-violent Vampire.
Logan can't help but click into the subreddit r/RealVampires. It seems like there are people who think… think that they are real vampires. These posts are mostly genuine, and Logan feels like he's stumbled upon a whole new world of people. There are posts talking about turning invisible, about ways to compel people to do things, and strangely enough, posts advertising where they live in case any humans want to "donate" their blood.
Logan doesn't know what to think.
Logan clicks on a link titled how my fangs look, and it has a video attached. The caption explains that they wanted to share how they look when they feed. The video starts with a human, who cuts a small scratch into her palm, enough to draw a small amount of blood.
The human steps to the side, and the vampire- who is dressed like the seventies, not gothic like Logan might have expected- steps forward. The human companion waves her bloody hand in front of the Vampire's face. The Vampire blinks, and suddenly her eyes are inky black all over, no iris or white to be seen. She opens her mouth, and Logan watches as two fangs grow out of her mouth, long enough to hook over her bottom teeth. Finally, she lunges for her human, who's laughing as she latches her mouth onto the human's palm.
The video loops twice before Logan reaches out for his laptop to pause it.
His heart is racing, but… It's not fear.
This is so gross, Someone comments. I could never drink from a live human. Putting aside the obvious moral conundrums, it's just gross. Blood bags exist for a reason, and is much more healthy, for both human and vamp. If you're attracted to warm blood, you're a weirdo.
Wow, Logan thinks. Vampire discourse.
Hi, I'm op's girlfriend, the one pictured in the video, A response reads. I'm a human, and I think it's completely normal for my girlfriend to naturally crave blood, as it's the thing that keeps her alive and healthy. I actually think that you're the weirdo. What my girlfriend and I do in our own house is consensual and none of your business, actually.
Could that be possible? Someone willingly letting a Vampire… feed from them?
Would he trust Remus to feed from him?
Remus wouldn't hurt him. That, Logan is sure of. Even before he thought that Remus could be a Vampire, he would entrust his life in Remus's hands. No matter how strange or weird Remus can be sometimes, he's a good person, despite what he may think.
And now… even with this revelation, that Remus could be a Vampire, he thinks that he could trust Remus. He doesn't think that Remus would kill him, even if given a chance.
Would Logan give him a chance?
Logan fears that he's going actually, certifiably, literally and truly insane.