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He is dead.
He has a bullet through his head, and the only conceivable future is one where Alastor is dead. Gone from this world, and on to the next.
Even with that information kindly whispering in his ears, Vincent can’t help but think it’s all wrong. Why didn’t he die first? Why is life so unfair? Alastor’s not dead, how could he be? How could he betray him like that?
His body fills with unintelligible static, ringing in his ears and slowing each muscle except for his heart, which is now screaming in his chest. The bayou’s horrible stench overpowers every thought—melts his brain and muddles every rationality until it’s easy to ignore the dead man before him.
Vincent wrinkles his nose as he takes his belongings from the neat, dirtied vest and pockets them. A silver knife complete with dried blood stains, a couple of dollars, a lighter. It’s not a crime if he’s already dead.
He wants it to be a crime, though. He wants to have an upper hand on Alastor for once; he wants to dangle his precious dagger in front of him and make him be the one to fetch for once. Laugh and spit in his face.
But he can’t if Alastor is already fucking dead.
Of course he’d die like that, in the most ironic and stupid way possible. The most sadistic, impassionate, predatory murderer in all of Vincent’s existence, shot like a prey deer. Pathetic. More tonight at eleven.
He doesn’t cry when he eventually decides to drag the body into Alastor’s own cabin. The night covers all of his tracks with thick judgement, bleeding its darkness into every unfortunate piece of bayou found too far from light. The dozens of gutted men locked up under wet soil and brackish water urge him on and scold him for his choices, but they’re all dead and unimportant, including the one he’s carrying right now.
Vincent doesn’t mind Alastor dirtying the meticulously clean floor as he pulls him into the inviting warmth of the cabin. It’s not his property, and it won’t be hard to get rid of the evidence.
Eventually he sets him up in a proper, gentlemanly position—which means, to Vincent, slumped on the ground next to the fireplace. He stares at the clothes Alastor wears and the mussed up, dirt and blood cracked hair. Red seeps down his face from the bullet hole in his forehead, and even in death he looks so fucking perfect. It makes Vincent want to smash his skull in and rip apart his flesh and eat his organs, just like Alastor promised to do to him. But he doesn’t, because those empty unmoving eyes still hold judgement, and he can’t soil him more.
Vincent reaches over and uses the most delicate touch to close those wide eyes. It’s a pitiful attempt to rid himself of that sharp, prickly feeling entrapping him.
In a last bit of respect, he leans down and kisses the little ring of caved in flesh, savoring the taste of his deoxygenated blood. He won’t, he can’t leave without Vincent’s mark, not when Alastor has left countless unhealed marks on him.
“Goodnight, Alastor.” He says softly, just like the regretfully uncountable nights before. Alastor doesn’t say anything, how could he? This is all his fucking fault. Selfish bitch.
The starving wet mud consumes him slowly. Heat flickers in his face as the cabin burns alive, a just retribution to all of the suffering set place in those walls. Some which he’d contributed to, and found joy in.
Vincent turns around and walks home, letting it blaze up in red. Letting the old rotten wood crackle and scream, letting the man he admired burn along with it.