Zion moved with the music gracefully, shutting his eyes against the crowd and enjoying the feeling of their bodies rubbing up against his. He was at a dance club called Beathaven, the only club in town which catered to all ages. Even if he could get hold of a fake ID, he was only sixteen and he seriously doubted he looked as though he could be much older. The club, though not officially a gay club, had ended up with quite a large gay populous over time. Zion thought it was because the gay guys had driven the straight ones away by groping them on the dance floor. It was pretty much ideal for him, even if the name was horrifically stupid. Beathaven? Terrible name aside, slaughtering 'Beethoven' didn't even make sense. They definitely weren't playing Beethoven at this club; possibly any club.

He and a guy about his age had been gradually moving closer together over the course of the last half hour and were now gaining the confidence for more personal touching. A hand on a hip, a light squeeze of his ass; fleeting, but intimate. The guy took his hand and led him off the dance floor, but not in the direction of the men's room. Despite the fact that the club was supposed to be suitable for all ages, urination was probably not at the top of the list of most frequent bathroom activities. Zion had been in there a few times himself, and he had to admit it hadn't been at the top of his list, either.

The guy, who was slightly taller than Zion himself, pushed him firmly but not aggressively against a wall, moved closer, and crushed their lips together. Zion made a small sound of pleasure in the back of his throat, and the young man pushed their bodies flush against each other. After a while it became clear that, although the other guy had taken the first step, Zion was the more forceful of the two. He was lost in the sensations, grabbing at hips and anything else he could get a grip on to increase contact. He kept his eyes firmly closed, in case they changed.

The guy started to pull away, and Zion made an annoyed sound and tried to pull him back. Why was he stopping? He didn't want him to stop. The guy was insistent, though, and Zion managed to get his head together enough to release him. The guy pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and answered it. It must have been on vibrate – Zion would have heard it, though he supposed nobody else would have.

"I'm at a club. Yeah. Beathaven," the guy said, raising his voice to be heard over the crowd and the music.

Zion supposed he could have heard the other side of the conversation, had he had any desire to, but he was much too distracted by the hand the other guy had slipped under his shirt and was currently caressing his waist with. He bit his lip savagely in self control, clenching his fists tight enough for fingernails to cut into his palms.

The guy frowned and Zion focussed back in on their conversation. "How about half an hour longer, then I'll come home?" A scowl and an annoyed 'hmph'. "Fine, I'll come home now, then."

He looked at Zion apologetically. Zion pawed at his shirt pleadingly.

The other guy just shrugged. "Sorry about this. Maybe I'll see you around some time?"

A peck on the lips was all Zion got before the other guy left. He looked out across the dance floor. He was incredibly horny and needed someone to help him take care of that, but really didn't feel like spending an hour searching someone out and then building things up. He was plenty built up already, thank you very much.

He walked out onto the dance floor and started moving to the music. He turned towards the first guy to brush against him just a little more than necessary, and gave him a seductive smile. This guy was older than he would usually go in for – more a man than a teenager – but that could work for him today. Older guys were usually less shy, less hesitant. More selfish and manipulative, though, but Zion would be happy if he could convince the guy to give him a hand job in the wash room.

Zion moved closer to the man and placed his hands on his hips, drawing the two of them against one another. He nuzzled at the older man's neck, over his jugular. He could feel the blood pumping in his veins before he'd even made contact. He could smell the blood so strongly he could almost taste it. If he was drugged up or had some kind of blood disease, Zion would know about it. Not that he particularly cared about the former, and he was fairly sure the latter was irrelevant – he doubted he was capable of catching anything they had. But whether it mattered or not, he now knew the man was clean. It was a comforting thought.

"Come back to my place," the man murmured against his ear.

Well, that was surprising. And very soon. Zion hesitated. He'd never actually gone home with someone before, and this man was probably at least half a dozen years older than him. But what could happen? Zion knew he could kill this guy without breaking a sweat if he had to – not that he wanted to, but it was a reassuring thought.

"Okay," Zion agreed reluctantly.

-

The man's house was Spartan and impersonal, but Zion didn't have much time to examine it as the moment the man had shut and locked his front door, Zion was slammed against it. If he'd been fully human, that would have left him with bruises. As it was, it didn't hurt him at all, but it had changed the mood of things.

Zion tried to kiss the man, but was denied. His hands were swiftly pinned above his head with one of the man's own in an effort to restrain him. Zion went along with it; he could have freed himself at any time, but it was the fact that he wasn't meant to be able to that had his heart racing.

He considered stopping things before they went any further, but why should he? His fear was unfounded – this man couldn't truly injure him, and besides, though he was afraid, he hadn't lost an ounce of his lust. The man was thrusting against him hard enough that it should of hurt, was meant to hurt. Zion wondered how he'd be reacting if he weren't so invulnerable, and realised just how wrong this situation was. He was meant to be scared.

"Gonna fuck you," he muttered into Zion's ear and lifted him up off the ground, carrying him to the bedroom.

The man closed the bedroom door and locked it with a key before tossing Zion unceremoniously onto the bed. "Take your clothes off," the man ordered as he begun rifling through a drawer in his dresser.

Zion hesitated before complying. He sat and waited with his knees against his chest. It wasn't until he saw the wrapped condom held between the man's teeth that the true reality of the situation hit him and he started panicking. Or, perhaps, he considered, it was the rope the man was holding. Zion stared at him in shock, though he wasn't sure why he was one bit surprised. He considered ending it then and there, but why should he? This guy was scary and wrong in more ways than one, but he couldn't actually hurt Zion. He knew he could easily break through that rope at any time. Maybe he'd enjoy it. Maybe it'd feel good. He'd heard good things about anal sex, besides the pain, and he was pretty much immune to that aspect. He didn't have any real reason to stop things, just misplaced fear. That was why, when the man instructed him to lie on his stomach, he complied.

"Are you scared?" the man whispered into his ear. When Zion didn't respond, he moved away slightly and begun restraining his wrists. "You should be," Zion heard him add so quietly he was sure he wasn't supposed to.

"I could kill you," Zion returned the favour, voice too soft to be heard.

The rope fastened tight around his wrists, keeping them securely attached to the bed frame. Zion listened anxiously to the sounds accompanying the removal of clothes, then the tearing of the condom wrapper. A few seconds pause, and his hips were hitched up with one arm, used the other hand to align himself, and thrust into him.

Zion scrunched up his face at the pain that should have been there. As it was, it just felt uncomfortable and weird and violating. The man didn't waste time and had begun thrusting hard and fast. Part of Zion, a part he was ashamed of, did like it. The way the man was using him for his own pleasure and so obviously enjoying it, his fingernails digging into Zion's naked flesh as he grunted with every violent thrust.

Mostly, though, he was scared and wished he'd stopped things way sooner. It was too late by then; he'd just wait it out. His vision had changed at some point, he observed vaguely. This meant his eyes would look weird, too, though he suspected he wouldn't have the opportunity for eye contact for a little while, but that was okay. It wasn't until he felt the claws against the rope tying his wrists that he began to panic.

He really had to learn not to do that. It was a cycle. He would start losing control. He would panic. The fear would make things worse, and he'd lose even more control. He was trapped, it suddenly occurred to him, although that wasn't entirely true. Could you really be trapped when you had every ability of escaping at any point, if you were to try? But there were ropes binding his wrists and a strong man holding him from behind, and his more primal instincts were telling him to escape. He ran his tongue across fangs and fought for control. The man was speeding up now, thrusting harder and faster and it'd be done soon, and then he could calm down and he could leave and he wouldn't have to hurt anyone.

Though the primitive part of him was telling him to rip the guy's throat out, it contradicted itself by increasing the pleasure of the carnal act. He almost wished the guy would give him a reach around or something, despite it all. Zion heard himself growl softly, and realised his mind was growing more and more distant. He was losing it. The man thrust hard and uneven a half dozen times, and was spent. When he pulled out, Zion let himself relax. The man had won the race, for now.

Zion laid slumped awkwardly, hands still tied above his head. He buried his face in the mattress, shutting his currently odd eyes against the world. He curled his fingers into fists, doing his best to conceal his temporary claws.

The man had moved off of the bed, to wipe himself down, Zion assumed. It wasn't until he heard the clink of metal, subtle enough that most people wouldn't have even heard it, that he brought himself back down to reality.

Zion squinted in an effort to conceal his golden cat eyes and looked over to see what the man was doing. He had a knife.

-

It was a large knife. A butcher's knife. Zion's mind swayed to a few choice horror movies and he struggled wildly for a few seconds before forcing himself under control. He sliced through the ropes with his claws and was crouching on the bed ready to pounce within the space of a few seconds. The man, naturally, seemed surprised, though not alarmed – good, that meant he probably hadn't noticed the claws or weird eyes yet. The man probably hadn't even noticed what colour his eyes were in the first place, Zion mused with annoyance. He mentally kicked himself. It wasn't like he'd been expecting better.

Zion reached for his underpants without taking his eyes off the man and slipped them on. The man was grinning at him, still believing he was going to win this. He was not, but fortunately for him Zion wasn't planning on sticking around and making a scene. He just wanted to get out of there. If he ended up fighting this guy, he might have ended up painting the walls with his blood. Zion fumbled around in search of his pants, seeing how much he could get away with before the man decided to gut him. Underpants were all, apparently.

The man launched himself at Zion, attempting to knock him to the floor – presumably he didn't want to stain his sheets. The man, though clearly a better fighter than the average person, was slow and clumsy compared to Zion's smooth, fast grace. By the time he was where Zion had been a moment before, Zion had already planted a firm foot into the bedroom door, shattering the lock. It seemed he would be making his escape in his underpants.

The front door didn't require him to kick it in, since it didn't require a key when unlocking from the inside. Zion could guess why the bedroom had this special feature. He briefly considered kicking it down anyway, but he was quick and had several seconds before the man would catch up to have. His hands worked dexterously at the locks and then he was out the door, and out of the man's grasp.

-

Zion gripped his knees against his chest, sitting on the floor of the apartment he'd chosen to squat in this week. He felt yucky. He'd changed his clothes, but hadn't had the opportunity for a shower. This place didn't have running water. He'd go to the public pool in the morning – that was how he usually washed. Not in the pool, in the showers there. He may have looked weird going in there every day or so and bringing his own soap and shampoo, but it was free and he was clean.

Those had been good clothes, he told himself so as to focus on something more trivial. He'd bought them especially for clubbing, and he didn't get much money. He mainly made his cash by mugging muggers. He would take long walks at night in dangerous parts of town and wait for someone to attempt to rob him. Then he'd rob them. He tried his best to come across as a martial arts black belt by focussing on skill and agility as opposed to brute strength, so as to minimise the suspicion he aroused. He got some sense of justice out of it, which was better than the guilt that came with stealing produce from convenient stores like he used to do.

Muggers were generally poor, though, and didn't carry a lot of cash with them. If they had already robbed someone and gotten money, they wouldn't have still been walking around. That was why he'd branched out to targeting wrongdoers in a more general sense. He'd follow criminals home, when they were on foot. Drug dealers, pimps, the clientele of underage prostitutes… whatever. He would follow them home, come back when they were out, and rob them. He'd been getting quite good at it, too; knowing when a house was empty, breaking in without notice, finding the most valuable things…

There was a lingering sensation is his ass, radiating weirdness to the rest of his body, and he was having trouble ignoring it. Fuck, why did he let that guy do that? Was he that incapable of self control? If he was just going to lie down and take it from some asshole, then he may as well have done that from the start. He could have been safe at home in his bed right then. He'd have school tomorrow. Zion blinked back tears with annoyance.

But maybe if someone had told him what it was, neither situation would have had to happen. Maybe if he'd had warning, he could have controlled himself. He had tonight! But he couldn't blame his mother; it was his own fault. Zion could have socked him a couple of times, and then Mark would have stopped bothering him because it was too much trouble. Zion wouldn't have had to hit him hard enough to do any real damage or reveal his peculiarities, just discourage him.

He'd let things go to far, though. He'd quietly stewed away while it was just the hitting. It wasn't like it hurt, just made him feel bad. But it added resentment. Then Mark got angry one night. Fuck, Zion couldn't even remember why. But they were home alone, and when Mark bent him over the kitchen table and Zion felt a hand on his fly, he lost it. The quiet resentment that had been bubbling inside of him leapt out so quickly even he didn't realise what was going on. What he was doing. There was red and screaming, then blood in his mouth and the screaming had stopped but he hadn't. Vaguely he was aware that something was wrong with him, but he didn't want to calm himself down. He didn't want to look at the scene in horror. He wanted to keep ripping flesh apart with fangs and claws, wanted to spread his step brother's blood around the kitchen so thoroughly that they'd still be finding dried up drops of it years later.

It hadn't been a sexual thing, Zion realised later. It wasn't some mad bout of lust that had caused Mark to do what he did – or tried to do, anyway. It was all about dominance; it was always all about dominance. Mark thought he was better than Zion, if only in one way – that he was stronger and tougher than him. That was pretty laughable, of course, since that was the last thing he was. But Zion had always been smarter than him, nicer and more polite than him. In short, Mark was jealous.

Even before he'd done what he had to Mark, Zion knew he was different. He'd never busted out with uncontrollable rage, with claws or fangs, but he knew he was different. He tried to hide it – pretended to be weaker, slower. Acted as though things hurt when they didn't, and hid wounds when they weren't as bad as they ought to be or healed too fast. He never spoke of it to anyone, but he knew he was different, and he knew that was bad.

He'd sat cross legged in the middle of the kitchen floor, in the middle of the blood and gore, until he heard his mum coming home. She'd opened the door and seen him, seen Mark, what was left of Mark. She'd seen what Zion had done, and screamed. He had watched her as she'd looked around at all the pieces that had once been her step son. He couldn't think. He didn't want to.

She shrieked. Her voice wailed high-pitched long notes, tone as shocked as her expression, her wide eyes unbelieving and stricken. When she looked at Zion it was as though she didn't see him – or maybe like she was seeing him for the first time, for the first time screamed at him details of the rapist father he had never known.

She'd screamed at him until he left. Zion had walked until he'd found a park, and took shelter in the stands of a small amphitheatre. He knew he could never go home.

-

A fortnight later and Zion was beginning to grow irritated that he had still not moved on from the incident with the man. He'd thought he was stronger than that. He'd convinced himself that, after all he'd been through, there was little left that could truly phase him. But instead of being overshadowed by the violence of his past the loss of his virginity had only added to the nightmares.

He was taking a walk through the twisting streets and alleys in the city late at night, and someone had just started following him. He could hear it in the way their footsteps fell – hesitantly and with the same beat of his own. He pretended not to notice and headed down an alley. He knew the alley was a dead end – he knew his way around every backstreet in this city – but feigned surprise when he got within sight of the brick wall blocking his path. He turned around to face the pursuer he'd lured in. And froze.

It was the man. The same man from two weeks ago. Zion was surprised he hadn't recognised his scent. Now he was facing him and paying attention, he could smell cigarettes on him. Underneath that mask was the every lingering scent of sex the man carried on him. Had Zion not been in possession of a particular talent for sniffing it out, he would not have noticed the almost undetectable trace of old blood. Under his fingernails, probably, Zion mused distractedly.

Zion was glad to see he wasn't the only one surprised. It seemed, from the expression of surprise on the man's face, he hadn't realised who he had been following. His shock didn't last long, though, before his mouth twisted into a predatory smile.

"Didn't think I'd see you again, kid." The man took a couple of steps closer. "I'm glad, though. I don't like loose ends."

The human half of Zion had initially told him to be afraid. This man had caused him a great deal of emotional pain. But it had been Zion's fault – he could have stopped the man at any time, and he hadn't. After a moment, his human side conceded and joined with his more demonic half in anger.

His already powerful night vision sharpened until the darkness didn't impede him at all. His sense of smell was enhanced, too – he could smell steel on the man, and hoped vaguely that it wasn't that ridiculous butcher's knife again. Maybe that was where the scent of blood was coming from.

Zion's back was against the brick wall at the end of the alley, but he looked upon the man with an expression of disdain. He wasn't bothering to disguise his lack of fear. The ever shrinking rational part of his mind was hoping the man would notice something was not right. Run, you idiot, he mentally directed at the guy. Apparently not in the possession of any kind of mind reading skill, the man kept his victorious smile in place.

He stood still as the man approached, arms folded defiantly across his chest. Just try it, I dare you, Zion thought to himself. But, he realised with some shock, he wanted the idiot to touch him, attack him. He just wanted an excuse; something to appease the human in him who wanted to be able to call it self defence.

Cigarettes, sweat, sex and old blood. Zion could have reached out and touched the man now, he was so close. He was well aware that the man was waiting for some reaction from him. He was close enough to see Zion's facial expression now, and he was confused. The angry, defiant look had obviously not been what he had been expecting, what he had wanted, and he was still waiting on the fear.

"So pretty." The man reached out and hand and stroked down the side of Zion's face. "So soft."

Zion growled and turned his face away from the touch. "Don't," he growled in warning. He could feel claws digging into the palms of his tightly fisted hands.

The man chuckled condescendingly then moved quickly, slamming Zion's shoulders against the wall in an effort to restrain him. The man leant in close and whispered in Zion's ear. "I'm going to fuck you, and then I'm going to kill you."

Zion shoved against the man to free himself, but grabbed the psycho pervert to keep him from falling to the ground. The man barely had time to struggle as Zion gripped him tightly against his chest and leant in to whisper in his ear. "Wrong."

The man's eyes widened when razor sharp claws penetrated his neck, showcasing Zion's efficient killing style. He was dead before Zion's teeth sank into his neck, ripping skin and flesh apart effortlessly. Zion's mind was hazy, focussed on nothing but the task he was absorbed in. Kill, destroy.

People had a lot of blood in them, and Zion took a moment to lick some of it off of his face. Blood tasted good. But he wouldn't eat people. He, even in this state, was a person – more than one, but part of him hoped not less than one. Not too much less. He wasn't a cannibal.

He tore through the flesh and tendons in the man's neck with teeth and claws, though he didn't eat it. Just obliterated it. Even if he did sink to cannibalism, he had no interest in the flesh – just blood. When he reached bone, he snapped the man's neck in one smooth motion. Growing inpatient, he finished the task he hadn't been fully aware he had undertaken and twisted the man's head from his body. Flesh tore, tendons snapped, and Zion held in his hands the man's head. His body fell to the ground, decapitated.

Zion held the head up, a predatory, victorious smile on his face. He admired his prize. His smile faded further into a disgusted grimace the longer he looked at it. Detached heads had never really been something he'd been into, he was beginning to remember. Actually, bloody dead things in general were bad things. He looked from the head in his hands to the abandoned body on the ground. He had killed the man, yes, and maybe he'd deserved it – Zion got the impression he hadn't been the man's first victim. Maybe taking his life would ultimately make the world a better place. But he'd done more than kill him; he'd slaughtered him. He had, quite literally, torn the man apart. There was no logic in it, just pure, primal destruction. Zion dropped the head to the ground (it made a squishy wet sound from the blood and gore covering both it and the concrete, and a cracking sound when his skull broke from the impact), and ran.

-

He didn't stop until he reached the river that ran through the centre of the city. His thoughts were racing almost as fast as his heart. He was covered in blood, gradually drying on his skin. His stomach churned until he was sick in the bushes.

When he was done, he jumped into the icy water of the river. He rinsed the vomit from his mouth with river water – it wasn't in his nature to be concerned with how hygienic that was, and he couldn't get sick from it – and scrubbed at his skin and clothes in an effort to remove the blood.

It was an hour before he decided he was clean enough that the blood wouldn't be too obvious and began his walk back to his current squat. It was weeks before he could no longer smell the man's blood clinging to him. He burned the clothes he'd worn that night.

At least he had fewer nightmares about the sex, after that, though they didn't stop altogether. He was glad to live alone. It meant sleeping alone, which meant no one to see when he woke up golden eyed clawing the air, less human and more – other.

After a while he went back to clubbing. Quick palms and open mouths in bathroom stalls, tight fists to fuck into, but he was in control. That was as far as it went, fingers and lips, teeth, tongue. That was as far as it touched him.

And he was always in control.