Socchan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
soc_puppet) wrote2011-02-09 09:52 pm
soc_puppet) wrote2011-02-09 09:52 pm
Entry tags:
Fic: A Lecture on Vampire Romance (With Demonstration) [1/1]
Wow, I've been out of the fanfic saddle for so long, I had to look up my old header ._.;;;
Fandom: Homestuck
Prompt: Via![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
captchalogue: make this fail EPIC - Because every fandom needs this: a really shitty vampire AU
Use whatever cliches you want except for sparkling, whatever pairing(s) you want, if you even want one; bonus if you use my otp (Karkat/John) in it~
Warnings: IC casual ablism, a little bit of blood/biting, vampires, swearing
Notes: I already know I am a terrible person, okay? You don't actually need to tell me.
Fic: A Lecture on Vampire Romance (With Demonstration)
It was nearing four in the morning when John finally made his way out of what he'd privately dubbed the vampires' Secret Clubhouse. It was three days (well, maybe four now) since the local vampires had decided he was a trustworthy enough human to let in on the secret, and he was still kind of giddy about it all. That night they had even performed what John figured was some sort of weird initiation ritual, with each of the vampires drinking a bit of his blood in turn. His forearm was still throbbing a bit from being bitten twelve times, but one of the friendlier vampires, a girl with a red skirt, had assured him that vampire saliva had "restorative properties" and that the wounds would be gone by the following evening. He figured that was fair enough.
John had just about reached where he'd parked his green slime ghost scooter when he heard the clubhouse's door slam. He looked up and was surprised to see Karkat walking towards him.
John still wasn't quite used to seeing the vampires as they looked normally. When out with humans the vampires used a charm to disguise their more alien features, but they had no real reason to use it among themselves. He studied Karkat as he approached: skin more a drab gray than the pale white most lore described, blunt orange horns with faded yellow tips, sulfurous eyes, and a mouthful of sharp teeth. The first time he'd seen the vampires undisguised, John had wondered if they hadn't been responsible for the creation of other "unreal" creatures: goblins or ogres or trolls, maybe.
John grinned dopily at his grumpy friend and set his helmet aside. Though he hadn't known it at the time, Karkat was the first of the vampires John had met. One of the vampires John didn't know well yet, a laid-back guy who seemed interested in clowns, had also let it slip that Karkat was the one to really push for John to be included in on their secret. It gave John a warm feeling in the pit of his stomach. "Karkat!" John greeted enthusiastically. "Hey man, what's up?"
Karkat stopped a few feet away from John, his typical scowl on the more serious side; John tried to school his expression to attention, but wasn't sure how well he succeeded. "Listen, John," Karkat began, "since you're clearly out of your gourd enough to want to continue associating with that sorry bunch of blood dribblers that call themselves vampires, and since obviously nothing I can say is going to stop you--"
John rolled his eyes. "Well duh, Karkat."
Karkat's glower intensified. "Don't interrupt, fuckface! Since you were too stupid to get yourself out of this situation while you still could, there are some things you're going to have to learn in order to get along with us. Specifically, vampire romance."
John eyeballed his friend critically. "Vampire romance? This doesn't have anything to do with those stupid romantic comedies you're so obsessed with, does it?" he asked with a teasing grin.
"Fuck you, Egbert, those movies are genius!" Karkat snarled. "Way better than that garbage you watch, anyway. Con Air? What kind of worthless shitwipe actually thinks that is decent cinema?
"Besides that, vampire romance is way more sophisticated than that ridiculous mess you humans rely on. How you pathetic pink monkies ever manage to find someone to procreate with is a fucking mystery!"
"Are you actually going to tell me about vampire romance any time soon, or are you just going to keep insulting my species?" John asked. "I mean, we've only got an hour or two tops before the sun starts coming up--"
"I'll get to it if you'll shut the hell up already!" the vampire growled. "Now, it should be completely unsurprising to even a nubsucker like you that vampire romance focuses heavily on blood." John snorted at this, but put on his best innocent expression when Karkat glared.
"AS I WAS SAYING," Karkat continued, still glaring. "Vampire romance is categorized by the types of blood involved, and the reactions it produces. There are a total of four romantic quadrants in the vampire system. The first divide is on blood lines: the blood we share, which is basically vampires as a species, and the blood we feed on, which is you pathetic whelps. Relationships between vampires aren't really relevant to this discussion, so we'll mostly ignore those." John nodded along; Karkat was getting pretty into this stuff.
"The next divide is between emotional reactions: those that calm vampiric blood, and those that inspire passion in it. It's not unusual to have multiple partners in the calming quadrants, but both vampires and humans tend to have only one in the passionate quadrants. Humans in calming relationships are usually secondary feeding sources. Good calm matches allow a vampire to get more energy from less blood, and humans to have a faster rate of healing and replenishing that blood. Having more than one calming partner is also important to keep humans from being sucked dry. Even with optimal blood matches, vampires need to feed several times a week, and that's pushing things with a single calm human pairing. For a human, being in multiple calm relationships also helps ensure its body doesn't start to reject a single vampire's healing abilities. This is the most common romance you'll probably have with us."
"I guess that makes sense?" John said uncertainly. The info dump was making his head spin a little.
"More sense than your retarded system."
"Whatever. What about that last quad-thingy?"
"Quadrant, you fuckass," Karkat snapped. "I'm getting to it." He was silent for a moment, and when he spoke again he was as serious as John had ever seen him. "Passionate relationships with humans arise from ideal blood matches. A vampire can go two days without feeding after drinking just one tablespoon of blood from an ideal match. A human in an ideal match will eventually become immune to disease and gain other benefits. While this can sometimes happen in particularly good calm matches, the results are never as powerful as they are in passionate matches." Karkat was staring directly into John's eyes, barely a foot of space between them; John wasn't sure when he'd gotten that close. "An ideal match frequently awakens passion in the blood of both partners," the vampire added. "Hence the name."
"Oh." John swallowed, his mouth dry even after all the juice that one big-horned vampire had insisted he drink 'to, uh, help with, your blood sugar'. His heart was going a mile a minute too, and that couldn't just be from blood loss. "So the whole blood thing tonight was about finding potential matches, then."
"What do do you know, maybe you're not a completely brain-dead moron after all!" Karkat said, his voice a low growl. "Give the boy a fucking prize!"
John licked his lips. "So, uh, what did you guys find out?"
In response, Karkat braced a hand on the back of John's head and smashed their mouths messily together. John scrabbled at the air for a moment, then anchored his hands on Karkat's hips, warmth spreading through him at every point of contact. The vampire's fangs cut John's lips, and Karkat lapped at them hungrily, his tongue lingering in John's mouth even after the blood was gone and the wounds had begun to close. John rubbed his own tongue against Karkat's, pressing his body flush against the other boy's, his blood practically on fire.
They parted for air several minutes later, disentangling their limbs from one another. John was breathing hard, his cheeks were burning, and he was sure his grin was particularly dorky. Karkat was scowling again, his own cheeks flushed with fresh blood. He absently licked a splash of red from the corner of his mouth. "Any more stupid ass questions, John?" John shook his head dumbly. "Good. Then get the hell out of here and get some fucking sleep, you worthless sack of shit, and I'll see you at sundown."
John watched Karkat stomp back to the hotel and didn't turn back to his scooter until the echoes from the slammed door had faded away. Passion, huh? he thought, still grinning like the biggest doof in all creation. I could live with that.
--end?--
Bonus
John knew it was a bad idea, a horrible idea, probably the worst idea anyone had ever had and ever would have, even as he started laughing.
Karkat blushed furiously (John could tell now what was Karkat and what was because he'd just fed, and this was definitely both) and snapped at him, "What the hell is so fucking funny, you degenerate crapsack?"
"Your, your teeth," John chocked out between hoots of laughter, doubling over now and clutching aching ribs. He prayed through his giggles that Karkat wouldn't take the opportunity to kick him, because he would be completely defenseless.
Karkat's frown deepened, and he brought a hand up to feel his fangs. "Fuck you, they're no worse than yours!"
"Yeah, but--!" John chortled. "But! Mine don't look like freaking candy corn right after I've eaten!" God, his sides hurt now, and there was no way Karkat was getting less pissed, but he still couldn't stop--!
Karkat hit him upside the head, surprisingly gently all things considered, and fisted his hands at his sides. In the light, traces of John's blood could be seen through his semi-hollow fangs, coloring them dark orange at the roots. "Look, if you stop this right fucking now, I might consider forgiving you. Otherwise, you will very shortly be a dead pink monkey, instead of just a retarded one."
Now THAT was serious. Karkat probably wouldn't actually kill him, but he would beat John up, and might even make him sleep on the couch for a while. (Well, metaphorically at least; they hadn't actually gotten that far yet, though John was pretty sure they would eventually.) Mustering all his willpower, John managed to stop laughing long enough to distract Karkat by plastering their mouths together. With any luck, in fifteen minutes or so the vampire would have at least calmed down enough to reconsider violence.
--slightly more end-y--
So basically I read the prompt, and then right before I had to go to work, Karkat started going on about the relative complexity of vampire romance. I spent the next several hours trying to work out what the various quadrants would involve, or if I even wanted to make it hextants(?) -_- *sigh*
All things told, I actually have about enough world building in this universe for either a novel-length fic or a shared universe 6_6; And there's no way I'm writing a novel, because I have a dozen irons in the fire, and I would just get distracted a quarter of the way through, never finish, and then feel guilty over it forever. But I wouldn't say no to a shared universe, and it looks like there's at least a couple of people who'd be interested in playing with me, so if you found this amusing, you're also invited?
Anyway, I'll be putting up a post on DW with the headcanon I've got for this so far for anyone who wants to take a look, and will link it to this entry as soon as it's up. And then I guess we'll see WRT the shared universe thing. Edit: Headcanon/worldbuilding entry is here.
Fandom: Homestuck
Prompt: Via
captchalogue: make this fail EPIC - Because every fandom needs this: a really shitty vampire AUUse whatever cliches you want except for sparkling, whatever pairing(s) you want, if you even want one; bonus if you use my otp (Karkat/John) in it~
Warnings: IC casual ablism, a little bit of blood/biting, vampires, swearing
Notes: I already know I am a terrible person, okay? You don't actually need to tell me.
Fic: A Lecture on Vampire Romance (With Demonstration)
It was nearing four in the morning when John finally made his way out of what he'd privately dubbed the vampires' Secret Clubhouse. It was three days (well, maybe four now) since the local vampires had decided he was a trustworthy enough human to let in on the secret, and he was still kind of giddy about it all. That night they had even performed what John figured was some sort of weird initiation ritual, with each of the vampires drinking a bit of his blood in turn. His forearm was still throbbing a bit from being bitten twelve times, but one of the friendlier vampires, a girl with a red skirt, had assured him that vampire saliva had "restorative properties" and that the wounds would be gone by the following evening. He figured that was fair enough.
John had just about reached where he'd parked his green slime ghost scooter when he heard the clubhouse's door slam. He looked up and was surprised to see Karkat walking towards him.
John still wasn't quite used to seeing the vampires as they looked normally. When out with humans the vampires used a charm to disguise their more alien features, but they had no real reason to use it among themselves. He studied Karkat as he approached: skin more a drab gray than the pale white most lore described, blunt orange horns with faded yellow tips, sulfurous eyes, and a mouthful of sharp teeth. The first time he'd seen the vampires undisguised, John had wondered if they hadn't been responsible for the creation of other "unreal" creatures: goblins or ogres or trolls, maybe.
John grinned dopily at his grumpy friend and set his helmet aside. Though he hadn't known it at the time, Karkat was the first of the vampires John had met. One of the vampires John didn't know well yet, a laid-back guy who seemed interested in clowns, had also let it slip that Karkat was the one to really push for John to be included in on their secret. It gave John a warm feeling in the pit of his stomach. "Karkat!" John greeted enthusiastically. "Hey man, what's up?"
Karkat stopped a few feet away from John, his typical scowl on the more serious side; John tried to school his expression to attention, but wasn't sure how well he succeeded. "Listen, John," Karkat began, "since you're clearly out of your gourd enough to want to continue associating with that sorry bunch of blood dribblers that call themselves vampires, and since obviously nothing I can say is going to stop you--"
John rolled his eyes. "Well duh, Karkat."
Karkat's glower intensified. "Don't interrupt, fuckface! Since you were too stupid to get yourself out of this situation while you still could, there are some things you're going to have to learn in order to get along with us. Specifically, vampire romance."
John eyeballed his friend critically. "Vampire romance? This doesn't have anything to do with those stupid romantic comedies you're so obsessed with, does it?" he asked with a teasing grin.
"Fuck you, Egbert, those movies are genius!" Karkat snarled. "Way better than that garbage you watch, anyway. Con Air? What kind of worthless shitwipe actually thinks that is decent cinema?
"Besides that, vampire romance is way more sophisticated than that ridiculous mess you humans rely on. How you pathetic pink monkies ever manage to find someone to procreate with is a fucking mystery!"
"Are you actually going to tell me about vampire romance any time soon, or are you just going to keep insulting my species?" John asked. "I mean, we've only got an hour or two tops before the sun starts coming up--"
"I'll get to it if you'll shut the hell up already!" the vampire growled. "Now, it should be completely unsurprising to even a nubsucker like you that vampire romance focuses heavily on blood." John snorted at this, but put on his best innocent expression when Karkat glared.
"AS I WAS SAYING," Karkat continued, still glaring. "Vampire romance is categorized by the types of blood involved, and the reactions it produces. There are a total of four romantic quadrants in the vampire system. The first divide is on blood lines: the blood we share, which is basically vampires as a species, and the blood we feed on, which is you pathetic whelps. Relationships between vampires aren't really relevant to this discussion, so we'll mostly ignore those." John nodded along; Karkat was getting pretty into this stuff.
"The next divide is between emotional reactions: those that calm vampiric blood, and those that inspire passion in it. It's not unusual to have multiple partners in the calming quadrants, but both vampires and humans tend to have only one in the passionate quadrants. Humans in calming relationships are usually secondary feeding sources. Good calm matches allow a vampire to get more energy from less blood, and humans to have a faster rate of healing and replenishing that blood. Having more than one calming partner is also important to keep humans from being sucked dry. Even with optimal blood matches, vampires need to feed several times a week, and that's pushing things with a single calm human pairing. For a human, being in multiple calm relationships also helps ensure its body doesn't start to reject a single vampire's healing abilities. This is the most common romance you'll probably have with us."
"I guess that makes sense?" John said uncertainly. The info dump was making his head spin a little.
"More sense than your retarded system."
"Whatever. What about that last quad-thingy?"
"Quadrant, you fuckass," Karkat snapped. "I'm getting to it." He was silent for a moment, and when he spoke again he was as serious as John had ever seen him. "Passionate relationships with humans arise from ideal blood matches. A vampire can go two days without feeding after drinking just one tablespoon of blood from an ideal match. A human in an ideal match will eventually become immune to disease and gain other benefits. While this can sometimes happen in particularly good calm matches, the results are never as powerful as they are in passionate matches." Karkat was staring directly into John's eyes, barely a foot of space between them; John wasn't sure when he'd gotten that close. "An ideal match frequently awakens passion in the blood of both partners," the vampire added. "Hence the name."
"Oh." John swallowed, his mouth dry even after all the juice that one big-horned vampire had insisted he drink 'to, uh, help with, your blood sugar'. His heart was going a mile a minute too, and that couldn't just be from blood loss. "So the whole blood thing tonight was about finding potential matches, then."
"What do do you know, maybe you're not a completely brain-dead moron after all!" Karkat said, his voice a low growl. "Give the boy a fucking prize!"
John licked his lips. "So, uh, what did you guys find out?"
In response, Karkat braced a hand on the back of John's head and smashed their mouths messily together. John scrabbled at the air for a moment, then anchored his hands on Karkat's hips, warmth spreading through him at every point of contact. The vampire's fangs cut John's lips, and Karkat lapped at them hungrily, his tongue lingering in John's mouth even after the blood was gone and the wounds had begun to close. John rubbed his own tongue against Karkat's, pressing his body flush against the other boy's, his blood practically on fire.
They parted for air several minutes later, disentangling their limbs from one another. John was breathing hard, his cheeks were burning, and he was sure his grin was particularly dorky. Karkat was scowling again, his own cheeks flushed with fresh blood. He absently licked a splash of red from the corner of his mouth. "Any more stupid ass questions, John?" John shook his head dumbly. "Good. Then get the hell out of here and get some fucking sleep, you worthless sack of shit, and I'll see you at sundown."
John watched Karkat stomp back to the hotel and didn't turn back to his scooter until the echoes from the slammed door had faded away. Passion, huh? he thought, still grinning like the biggest doof in all creation. I could live with that.
--end?--
Bonus
John knew it was a bad idea, a horrible idea, probably the worst idea anyone had ever had and ever would have, even as he started laughing.
Karkat blushed furiously (John could tell now what was Karkat and what was because he'd just fed, and this was definitely both) and snapped at him, "What the hell is so fucking funny, you degenerate crapsack?"
"Your, your teeth," John chocked out between hoots of laughter, doubling over now and clutching aching ribs. He prayed through his giggles that Karkat wouldn't take the opportunity to kick him, because he would be completely defenseless.
Karkat's frown deepened, and he brought a hand up to feel his fangs. "Fuck you, they're no worse than yours!"
"Yeah, but--!" John chortled. "But! Mine don't look like freaking candy corn right after I've eaten!" God, his sides hurt now, and there was no way Karkat was getting less pissed, but he still couldn't stop--!
Karkat hit him upside the head, surprisingly gently all things considered, and fisted his hands at his sides. In the light, traces of John's blood could be seen through his semi-hollow fangs, coloring them dark orange at the roots. "Look, if you stop this right fucking now, I might consider forgiving you. Otherwise, you will very shortly be a dead pink monkey, instead of just a retarded one."
Now THAT was serious. Karkat probably wouldn't actually kill him, but he would beat John up, and might even make him sleep on the couch for a while. (Well, metaphorically at least; they hadn't actually gotten that far yet, though John was pretty sure they would eventually.) Mustering all his willpower, John managed to stop laughing long enough to distract Karkat by plastering their mouths together. With any luck, in fifteen minutes or so the vampire would have at least calmed down enough to reconsider violence.
--slightly more end-y--
So basically I read the prompt, and then right before I had to go to work, Karkat started going on about the relative complexity of vampire romance. I spent the next several hours trying to work out what the various quadrants would involve, or if I even wanted to make it hextants(?) -_- *sigh*
All things told, I actually have about enough world building in this universe for either a novel-length fic or a shared universe 6_6; And there's no way I'm writing a novel, because I have a dozen irons in the fire, and I would just get distracted a quarter of the way through, never finish, and then feel guilty over it forever. But I wouldn't say no to a shared universe, and it looks like there's at least a couple of people who'd be interested in playing with me, so if you found this amusing, you're also invited?
Anyway, I'll be putting up a post on DW with the headcanon I've got for this so far for anyone who wants to take a look, and will link it to this entry as soon as it's up. And then I guess we'll see WRT the shared universe thing. Edit: Headcanon/worldbuilding entry is here.