[For Lestat]

[fifthbeatle]

The search for Kallus is paved with the best intentions. Luther takes the ground, Viktor takes to the sky. He levitates to the highest buildings, floats himself down on rooftops below. He listens as hard as he can, until all noise in the city and in his head is one shrill, undiscernible pitch.

Without marigold to listen for, Viktor is at a disadvantage. He can find his siblings in the city anywhere, hear the cadence of their hearts. The speed of their breathing. He can feel how little progress they've made -- and how Luther's heart is ticking up another panicked time signature.

The dark corner on the street where his feet touch down explodes into view in pure, white light. A couple of people in masks wince back. They're bent over a mangled body, blades sticking out from his chest. They hiss at Viktor and grab their weapons. Three more people step out from busted storefronts. The largest one grabs Viktor and pins his arms down. Startled, he struggles. The part of him that explodes at the first sign of danger has been tamed to the recesses of his mind. All he can do is burn himself brighter, the highest temperature, and hope he blinds them. He keeps his own eyes shut tight. One of the men screams in agony. He can't tell which or how many more there are.

Comments

[unwilling_devil]

Lestat moved with impossible speed, descending on the scene like a primed missile. Perhaps, he realized, that was a better description for Viktor, who was incandescent. Radiant. Still, he rocketed through the ragtag group, ripping the head from the man keeping Viktor restrained. It tore messily from the stump of his neck, and was tossed like a bowling ball at another one of Viktor's assailants.

A third dropped to the pavement, his throat a ruined tangle of gore, before Lestat had even shown himself.

[fifthbeatle]

A wet slash stripes across his eyes, swiped away quickly with his hand. It leaves a thick reside against his skin. Viktor's eyes open. Blood. On his hands. In his eyes. Three brightly-colored corpses against thrle wash of piercing white light. Bile rises in his throat. Don't think about it, he tells himself, until there's something that can be done about it.

He doesn't need vision, anyway. He needs to concentrate. To call out the force of energy within him and wipe out the city block. Luther is more than halfway to Kallus' by now. Hargreeves house is far away. Whoever would get hurt probably deserves it, he figures.

Until he starts to wonder why he's not one of those corpses. A crunch of boots behind him could be friend or Purge maniac.

It's easier than it once was to invert the energy. He grabs hold of the space around the presence, boxing him in. With his whole sleeve now, Viktor takes another cleansing path against his eyes. He takes two large steps back and opens his eyes to see a total fucking stranger immobilized several inches off the ground. The blade that was in his hand drops to the floor. Viktor grabs that too, a tendril of energy as his hands try and rid themselves of their thick coat of blood. The knife spins end-over-end in place.

Viktor can't stop thinking about the blood, the inhumane Purge, the training he lacks, Luther and Kallus out there, lost. A warning clap of thunder in the distance, nearly lost to Viktor under a piercing crescendo. He's going to lose it. He has seconds to concentrate the energy or go off.

The knife's swirling meets an abrupt end. Shards of the window rise to join their sharp counterparts. They plunge into the immobilized assailant. The man drops to the floor. So does Viktor. He inspects his handiwork. Tonight, he forgets to take a moment to regret what he's done.

Until he sees Lestat.

[unwilling_devil]

With a slow clap, Lestat picked his way through the carnage, stepping uncaringly over Viktor's would be assailant.

"Impressive," he observed. There was blood on his face, blood on his hands, but he was untroubled. It wasn't the first mess he'd ever made, and it wouldn't be the last. "You really do have quite the talent."

[fifthbeatle]

Guilt, shame, wild nausea washes over him. An hour ago he was staring out his third floor window, looking down on the Purge like those days were behind him. No fear, only pity. Things change so quickly.

Hargreeveses judge -- mostly each other. Those present have repaired their relationships, but the past lurks. To be met with no judgement, no tinge of fear repairs a couple of his senses. Viktor pushes himself to his feet.

"Thanks." He huffs through the adrenaline as the tone of his skin warms. Hands make another useless pass against the thighs of his jeans. "Same to you."

[unwilling_devil]

Looking down at the headless corpse at his feet, Lestat shrugged.

"You're looking for someone," Lestat observed, shuffling past all the shame and doubt in Viktor's mind to see a flash of a face.

Very handsome.

"Not another brother? It seems there are already so many."

[fifthbeatle]

Right. Kallus. Thank fuck for Lestat. Smart, capable, powerful, cooperative, sure -- but Viktor's nerves aren't made of iron like his siblings. He's the easiest to rattle, the most unpredictable.

"Luther's boyfriend," Viktor answers. The next huff for air reminds him his feet are on the ground, that he's upright and is on a mission. "He was supposed to come to Hargreeves House and he never showed up. I can find my brothers anywhere in the city, but I can't hear when there's no marigold." Klaus is safe -- or at least unafraid. Five's heartbeat is steady as any other Thursday evening. And Viktor can hear Luther slowly losing his mind.

"Can you help us?"

[unwilling_devil]

Lestat shrugged noncommittally.

"It would be easier if I knew this person. What might be in his mind," Lestat admitted, though he had not yet agreed.

He took a step closer. Marigold. How curious. While he could not see it, by any means, there was a particular warmth and power within these Hargreeves siblings. Now he had a name for it.

[fifthbeatle]

Until Darrow, the only power Viktor had known was within his siblings, later himself -- much later the Sparrows. Power their father hadn't possessed. It never occurred to him to wonder how long the power had been around, to wonder what had come before. Not until now, Lestat moving uncomfortably closer, has Viktor ever felt power and thought ancient. Unmistakably. The energy is cooler-toned than any he's felt from his world or any other.

"I don't know him very well." Is all Viktor can think to say. This is an awful time to get sidetracked.

[unwilling_devil]

Lestat took another step closer.

"Perhaps your brother might be more useful," he said, his head cocked as he reached out, filtering through the chaos of voices until he found one mind anxiously repeating the same name.

Kallus... Kallus...

"Hm, he has worked himself up, hasn't he?"

[fifthbeatle]

Viktor cocks his head. Perhaps your brother would be more useful might as well be a direct quote from dear old Dad. Maybe it is. He didn't feel Lestat poking around his brain, but maybe Viktor wouldn't know.

Lestat is reaching out, Viktor can feel that. If pressed, he'd guess something about particles. What scientist call the "natural world" is full of rules. Every lifeform vibrates on its own frequency. Viktor can hear it all. He's most interested in the sounds he's never heard before -- and here is a symphony of intrigue.

"Enjoying yourself, huh?"

If Lestat can sense Luther's panic, can Viktor hear what's inside Lestat?

Call it the Purge. Call it fury and the phantoms that still haunt the halls in his head. He knows they'll find Kallus, with or without Lestat's help. He can take a minute to grab this thread and pull.

He's surprised to find Lestat has a heartbeat, but something has to keep his blood pumping. The sound is more of a gentle stream to Viktor's raging river.

And he finds it. A sound that he can do something with. Somewhere in the gentle waters, a faint marigold. A corner of his mouth quirks up.

"You drank from my brother." Hargreeves insisted his children learn seven languages. It doesn't take super powers to know he and Lestat de Lioncourt have this one in common.

[unwilling_devil]

"Merely observing," Lestat countered, his shrug nearly dismissive. Then, he paused. In his own questing, he felt Viktor push back, reading a different wavelength than that of the savage garden of which Lestat was so familiar.

The question surprised him. His smile widened, showing bright, white teeth. "Marigold. Is that why he tasted so sweet?"

[fifthbeatle]

In one of the halls in his mind lives the values, the last closely-guarded echos of a freakishly tall, sternly mannered monster hunter. A man that had to forge his own way in the universe's greyest areas. Viktor suspects the ghost of him might have an opinion on the matter.

But Klaus is Klaus. He's immortal, for one. And, Viktor would counter to his friend, Klaus has always gone his own way. The more control Hargreeves would exert, the wilder Klaus became. And this Klaus can surely handle himself.

Or maybe this is exactly the kind of overjustification Sam would encourage him to be suspicious of.

The Force and marigold share so many properties. Lestat's power is entire different. The more Viktor senses it, the more he wants to know. How alike they are, how different.

It's not creepy because no one here is a groupie, a doughy fuckboy with Hargreeves' journal and a vendetta. Viktor doesn't know how they'd match up in a fight, but he knows he couldn't kill Lestat with simple immobility and telekinesis. Not that he'd want to, he still wonders what it might take.

Still, Viktor finds his mouth curved into a small smile. "Are you going to help," Viktor asks again, staring down the current of power in Lestat's crystal eyes, "or am I going to find him myself?"

[unwilling_devil]

Matching Viktor's smile with a coy one of his own, he said, "So demanding. And when I've already assisted you once tonight. Without a hint of appreciation, I might add."

Lestat stepped close, brushing past him and then motioning for him to follow.

"Let's see what we can find, shall we?"

[fifthbeatle]

"I said 'thanks,'" Viktor reminds him mildly -- too mild for a man whose carefully-crafted appearance is a wash of blood and pulsing energy.

Viktor glances over his shoulder in the other direction, listening to Luther's frantic heartbeat. We'll get there soon, big guy.

He follows and falls in stride.

[unwilling_devil]

"For the compliment, not for the assistance," Lestat pointed out, amused. They walked along, moving away from the noise of Luther's unease. For now, it seemed more efficient for them to search where Viktor's brother had not.

Eventually, Lestat sighed and said, "Perhaps a higher vantage."

Then, without warning, he rose into the air, giving himself a clearer view of the street ahead.

[fifthbeatle]

"Not specific enough," Viktor contests with a faint smile. "I'll make it up to you after we find Kallus."

Whatever Lestat is doing to help isn't easily evident. They're walking, looking, but Viktor isn't sure they're any closer to solving the mystery of what the fuck happened to Kallus. Viktor opens his mouth to ask for a clue and Lestat levitates.

Viktor follows. They're closer to the water, now, and Viktor hears a sound he's never heard before. A kind of droning near the waves. He puts a hand on Lestat's arm. "Do you hear that?"

[unwilling_devil]

"I do."

As a vampire, his hearing wasn't vastly more acute than it had been as a human, but he seemed more capable of focusing his senses. The sound, he realized, were likely voices.

"Well, we might as well take a look," he said, sounding almost bored.

[fifthbeatle]

Viktor breathes a quiet chuckle. "Alright." They're getting closer, Viktor knows. Luther's still blocks away, albeit travelling at impressive speed.

They're closing in, Viktor reminds himself, before he says, "we can do it your way." When Viktor asks himself what he wants out of life, it's not the manic hunt for freedom that came when he stopped taking his pills. It's about knowledge.

"Show me how to find him."