Chapter Text
Inigo had come to realise that adult life was significantly less exciting than he thought it'd be. Somewhere in his adolescence, he'd become smitten with the disillusion that adulthood was true freedom, constantly engaging and most of all: fun. In reality, it was none of these things. In his five years of adulthood, he had formed two rules - the first being that "if it's not compulsory or doesn't offer blessed fleeting enjoyment, don't do it", and the second being that "whenever you have to do mundane, boring-looking adult things: take a snack". He'd sworn by his second rule many a time and would swear by it still for many years yet to come.
His current situation was something that his first rule existed for. He was stood at the window of his apartment living room, his bed-head possibly harbouring several small bird chicks and his soup-stained pyjama shirt was buttoned wrong and slipping off his shoulder. The scene on the ground below appeared to be something out of some kind of street performance (one that his internal monologue critiqued satirically while he sipped thoughtfully on his mug of lukewarm, almost forgotten about green tea) with a large, entirely black van taking centre stage. All of his knowledge of vehicle law came from awful cop shows with terrible post-production effects shown back to back on late night television, but he was convinced that the amount that the windows of said mysterious black van were tinted was illegal. Calling the police to report such an obvious crime was the morally right thing to do but it would also obliterate this morsel of entertainment that had been offered to him in his dismal, dreary adult life. The entire van was a dark as the void and reminded him of an ugly black beetle basking in the hot July haze. He considered pulling up a chair, curious to see what would happen next.
The back door of the van opened and out stepped a person dressed entirely in black carrying a very dark umbrella over their head, despite the fact that it was the middle of July and it wasn't raining and hadn't done so for a week now. Although Inigo’s eye sight was getting a little hazy, he could make out what looked like a cape on the persons back under the umbrella. Wondering if this really was some kind of bizarre mid-morning street performance taking place directly outside of his home, he crossed his arms and squinted, trying to get a better look at the unfolding scene below.
A surly looking man emerged - this time from the drivers seat - dressed as if he was a waiter or butler with a white shirt, black bow tie and waistcoat. He, unlike the first figure, did not carry an umbrella, but instead, after a brisk, annoyed walk to the rear of the van, carried two large suitcases towards the apartment block reception. The caped figure followed behind him, their face hidden by the grossly inappropriate umbrella. A tense few minutes later, the butler reappeared, closed the rear doors of the van, waved towards the reception and hopped in the drivers seat before speeding off down the road into the distance. Inigo found himself pressed up against the window pane, straining to watch the black van vanish, moving away only when his breath fogged up the glass. Weird morning, he thought, half hoping the rest of his day wouldn't go like this because it'd be a pain, half hoping it would because it'd at least be entertaining.
He would find out very quickly later that this day and, in fact, many days to come, would fall in to the latter category. On his way back from grocery shopping at a little past 1PM, the mean, ageing lady who lived on the first floor (of a grand total of three floors, with Inigo having the top floor apartment) called him over with a gentle gesture of her grotesquely wrinkled hand. Seriously, Inigo thought as he plastered on a smile and walked over with his shopping in hand, he hoped he'd never live as long as to see his beloved hands become liver spotted and gnarled with age. She had been watering the potted plants she kept outside her apartment door when he'd walked into the building (which was entirely bad timing on his part, all he wanted to do was put his groceries away and watch amateur dance covers on YouTube. This was, after all, his only God-given day off from work) and now there was no escape.
"Good afternoon, Inigo," she said with her crackly old woman voice; 'please stop talking to me,' Inigo thought.
"The new tenant moved in upstairs this morning - I'm not sure if you saw," she continued, Inigo thinking only of how to end the conversation before he'd have to contribute to it and dreading the inevitable 'could you' he could feel coming. "My knees are shot now and stairs are impossible for me, but I made some jam earlier this week that I'd like to gift the new resident - keeping up appearances and all," she chuckled dryly, as if she didn't care about what she was saying. Inigo didn't either. He knew the 'could you' was about to be sprung on him. He thought about the emergency Adult Snack - a granola bar, most likely a few days past its best before - he had stuffed in his jean pocket earlier in the late morning. "Could you be a dear and run it down to them later for me?"
"Of course!" He could've won an Oscar for the smile on his face, "I was planning on showing my face anyway." A lie. "No problem at all." Another lie.
"Oh, wonderful, you are such a good boy," she replied, shuffling into her apartment at a speed that was incredibly slow for one so short on time left in this life. "I'll just go grab it," she said just before throwing in a racist comment about the person possibly living upstairs for good measure. He cringed at the fact that she was always racist at some point or other regarding others when speaking to him, but never said anything about his own heritage.
Five minutes later she returned with a jar of rather good looking homemade strawberry jam, as much as it pained Inigo to compliment the woman in any such way. He slipped it into a bag of groceries and took off upstairs to his own apartment, singing his sing-song goodbyes and 'see you laters' to his neighbour while she was within earshot and grumbling about her when she was out of it.
As much as he wanted to keep the jam for himself and as much as he didn't want to spend time visiting the second floor apartment, Inigo had nothing if not a sense of duty and honesty. And so he found himself at a little past 3PM with a glass jar of jam, topped with a tin lid and labelled prettily with 'Strawberry Jam' in the distinctive handwriting of an old person and a plastic takeaway tub, which once upon a time held chow mien or possibly egg-fried rice, of mango chutney - one of the few things his mother had taught him how to make that he could actually replicate with some success - labelled with a water-damaged sticky label and his own scrawl of 'Man Chut'. ‘Ah, yes,’ he thought, ‘the joys of adulthood.’ In truth, Inigo's handwriting was not all that bad. He had trained himself to write in cursive, but now saved that skill for love notes he would slip to girls occasionally to impress them. He hadn't counted on impressing anyone with his Man Chut, but alas, here he was.
With a firm clear of his throat (mostly to dislodge the rattling anxiety that'd settled there), Inigo gave a strong rap on the door to apartment two. A minute later the door was opened a crack and a pretty green eye appeared behind the chain, peering through it and seeking him out. Inigo's heart fluttered a little and a smile crept up onto his lips. Now that would be nice - having a cute neighbour! Maybe things were finally starting to look up for him.
"Can I help you, mortal? Or have you come to willingly sacrifice your juicy vessel to satisfy the mighty hunger of Odin Dark?"
Inigo watched his fantasy of falling in love with his cute new neighbour be slaughtered in front of his eyes. "Ah ha," he chucked, choosing not to ask over asking. "I'm Inigo from upstairs. Just thought I'd come introduce myself. I have some fruity freezable goods from myself and the ground floor witch."
"A witch!?" The man behind the door shrieked. The loud noise caught Inigo off guard, causing him to almost drop the gifts in fright. "A joke! A joke," he cried, "she's not really a witch. She hasn't cursed me yet, I don't think." Though he wouldn't put it past her.
The eye looked him up and down and Inigo felt himself blush, his olive cheeks undoubtedly blooming into a crimson red at being inspected. The eye had obviously seen something it liked as the door opened fully, revealing a tall, skinny white guy around the same age as him dressed completely in black. Inigo noted his neighbours messy, short blonde hair and porcelain complexion, seemingly accentuated by the void that he donned. Even the apartment behind him seemed dimly lit, dreary and unwelcoming.
But alas, there was no getting around it. The man who stood before Inigo was his type to a tee. If only he hadn't have opened his mouth or dressed as if he was at a funeral - his ideal of falling in love with his cute neighbour could've been realised. In the space of their minute conversation Inigo had already gone through the five stages of grief. "May I come in, chap?" He asked cheerfully regardless of his sudden state of mourning. The man who had called himself Odin Dark seemed flustered, as if no one had ever asked him that before. After giving one last sceptical look (and making sure Inigo had seen said look) he nodded. "Hmph, consider yourself lucky, mortal, and welcome to the den of the legendary creature of the night, Odin Dark," he said, moving out of the way and gesturing Inigo to enter apartment two, which in the few hours it had been occupied by Odin Dark had already become a terrifyingly dank and gloomy place. "My name's Owain, by the way."
'Oh, boy,' Inigo thought.
*
There wasn't much furniture save for a cheap looking leather, probably pleather three-seat sofa (black) and an impressively large television to which various gaming consoles, many of which Inigo could not even name were hooked up to via a snakes nest of cables. Across the room Inigo spotted a large, full length black-framed mirror which took up a fair section of the wall. It was a shame that he couldn't see himself in it at this angle since the jeans he wore today always made his legs look especially long.
All of the light inside apartment two was now artificial - thick, heavy curtains (black) hung in front of the windows like perky prison guards. Owain shut the front door, slid the chain over the lock and stalked over to where Inigo stood awkwardly in the centre of the living room with Chut and Jam in hand, wondering if it'd be alright for him to sit down or not.
"The fruity goods?" Owain asked, eyeing Inigo's armful of welcome gifts. He breathed a nervous 'of course' and handed them over, watching as Owain proceeded to scrutinise the containers with all the professionalism of a very serious health inspector. "Is this so called 'Chut' of yours made with actual Man?" Inigo blushed up to his ears and shuffled uncomfortably on his feet. "It's mango chutney."
"Ooh," Owain said. "And this, this dark Jam... Crimson like the freshly plucked heart of a wild oxen... This redness, surely it contains the pure, delicious blood of a virgin... As well as the witches own charmed Strawbs?"
Inigo realised that he hadn't the slightest idea about what Owain had just said and so he went with his default response of "you bet, chap." It seemed to please his neighbour as his eyes caught the artificial light and glinted with excitement.
"That's wonderful,” Owain purred, his demeanour changing suddenly as he began taking slow strides over to Inigo who was growing redder by the second. Was this guy coming onto him or something? In the weirdest way possible?
"You see," Owain continued, "I haven't had a good feed since I graced this town with my awesome presence. I can't imagine that a mortal man, occupied body and spirit by the trivial follies of desire and temptation would comprehend the intensity of my hunger for fresh blood." Inigo was becoming increasingly concerned and he found himself taking a step back to distance himself from his eccentric, prowling neighbour. His calf bumped into the worn pleather sofa. "Though I planned to make every peon in this town my livestock from which I will feed as much as I like, I never thought that one of the flock would be as stupid as to wander right into my evil lair! Do you not care for the longevity of your life?" Inigo paled and wondered if he could take this guy in a fist fight. There were so many phrases that were flying over his head and his anxiety was sky rocketing. He cursed adult life for the millionth time that day. "Now fall upon the fell fangs of legendary vampire - Odin Dark!"
Owain suddenly sprung across the three feet gap that stood between the two men. Inigo let out a surprised scream as he felt Owain's icy cold hands push roughly on his shoulders and a pair of frosty lips on his neck as he tumbled backwards onto the sofa which squealed unhappily at the sudden weight it had to bear. Owain’s skinny thighs were now straddling him on the sofa, with one of his hands cupping his cheek and the other still pressing on his shoulders keeping him in place. His own hands were planted firmly on Owain’s chest, trying to prise the weirdo off of him. Inigo continued to shout and struggle in surprise and fear (even though when he would think about the incident later, he would not be able to deduce why exactly he had been so scared), screaming in the direction of the face that was practically attached to his neck via two thin lips. Inigo could feel teeth pressing on the delicate skin there and started to grow flushed and embarrassed. He was a melting pot of emotion and had no idea how to express all of them at once.
Owain suddenly leapt off of him, hissing like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, his hands up in front of him with his fingernails (painted black and fashioned into weak looking points) bared as if he were about to scratch Inigo to death. "You! You fiend! Had I of known there'd be an attempt on my awesome immortal life by you I would never have granted thine permission to enter... Hunters truly are becoming more sophisticated with this modern age. I commend you for eating garlic before coming here, you bastard. You are not as stupid as you look it would seem, yet you are still no match for the immeasurable, fabled power of Odin Dark. You will feel the true extent of my legendary wrath.”
Inigo thought of the entire baguette stick of garlic bread he'd rather irresponsibly eaten before coming to visit. It was one of the things he's learnt quickly about adulthood when it was paired with living alone - balanced and healthily responsible meals ceased to exist. He thanked his culinary laziness for seemingly getting him out of a terrible pinch, though he didn’t quite understand how his garlic-y breath had possibly saved his life. "What the hell is your problem?" He breathed, exasperated and anxious beyond belief, his heart still racing from the terrifying experienced of being jumped by an emo under the pretence of having his blood sucked! He wanted to grab his Man Chut and get out of there.
Owain seemed offended at his ignorance. ”The mortal word you use for my clearly superior kind is 'vampire'. Do I have to spell it out for you? Let me ravish your neck and feast, Inigo from Upstairs!"
Suddenly Inigo was laughing, laughing so hard he thought he might cry. Inigo was still sunken into the sofa, weeping with laughter. Owain stood a safe distance away with his mouth agape in a mix of surprise and offence as Inigo wiped his eyes with quivering cackles still erupting from his mouth, his arms shaking from the convulsing humour that rocked his body violently. "How old are you?" He choked out, impressed at his own ability to speak regardless of his relentless giggles and snorts. "You can't be serious - right? You know Twilight is a dead franchise now, right?"
Through hazy, teary eyes, Inigo watched Owain storm towards him with his blond brows knitted and his thin pale lips pulled down into the cutest frown he'd ever seen. A freezing cold hand gripped his own warm wrist and suddenly he found himself being dragged to the other side of the living room towards the mirror that hung on the wall. Inigo's giggles of protest dried up as he was turned to face the mirror, now able to see his (ravishing, if he did say so himself) reflection. But something was off. Owain, who stood next to him with his hand as cold as the night holding his own wrist, did not appear in the mirror. Only his clothes, a black shirt, black trousers and black collared cape stood next to him. A cold sweat doused Inigo's entire body and all of the humour in the situation dried up alarmingly fast. He watched himself in the reflection reach into his back pocket and take out his emergency snack.
"Ho-lee shit," he said as he took a bite of the granola bar.