Pretty Young Things

by Dominic McDonagh

  Nicola disentangled herself from the shattered table and brushed broken glass from the shoulders of the pink silk bum-freezer jacket she was wearing. ‘Hi, Chelsea,’ she said, brightly. ‘Coral is very upset with you.’

  Robert groaned softly as Nicola stepped off his back. Jared had turned white and backed into the corner by the sink. Chelsea heard a banging in the hall as somebody aggressively parted the flat’s front door from its hinges. Her old housemates could quite easily have moved silently, killed everyone present without anybody noticing and left as quietly as they’d come. Chelsea was sure some sort of point was being made. The door leading from the hall clicked open and, making a swift decision, Chelsea dived towards it as a set of slender fingers, the nails painted a glossy emerald green, appeared through the crack. The door looked pretty solid. Chelsea flung all her weight against it, and heard manicured fingers snap like breadsticks as they were caught between the latch and the frame. Someone would know to keep her hand on the handle when opening doors in future. Chelsea took a two-handed grip on the handle and braced herself to hold the door shut. With the fingers’ owner blocking the doorway, they wouldn’t be able to batter the door down easily. The downside was that Chelsea couldn’t pull the door fully shut with somebody’s fingers wedged between it and the frame.

  It looked like Nicola had dived through the window from the roof opposite, which was the sort of insane manoeuvre you’d usually see only in the sort of comics where chaps in gaudy tights hit each other. Given that they were four storeys up here, and the kitchen window wasn’t all that big, she could easily have missed and broken her neck. All that dancing in high heels at garage nights had obviously done a lot for Nicola’s sense of balance. Chelsea’s heart sank further as Rowena came hurtling through the window after her. Rowena’s jaw looked odd, but there was no hint that she’d had her nose broken with a car door the previous night. The fact that she was keeping her lips pressed tightly closed over her mouth and wasn’t speaking gave the impression that she hadn’t got her teeth back yet. It had taken Hayley most of a month to grow back a couple of her incisors after she’d been hit in the mouth with an ashtray the year before, and Hayley had been a vampire for a lot longer than Rowena had, even if she did look about 15. The main reason why she favoured cyberkid dress was that she looked enough like a teenager to get away with it. Not to mention the school uniforms.

  Another green-nailed hand suddenly punched through the door, and Chelsea barely managed to jerk her head back to avoid it, letting go of the handle as she did. The door was wrenched open, and then there were another three vampires in the room, one of them, Rachael, holding her hands stiffly. Chelsea doubted that it would keep Rachael out of the fight. Rachael was the next oldest after Coral, and Coral’s effective aide de camp and butler. It probably wouldn’t take her all that long to heal her hand up, and she could easily subdue Chelsea with one hand tied behind her back in any case. Things didn’t look good. Breaking Rachael’s fingers was the least of what Chelsea had wanted to do to her for a long while, but it was hardly any compensation for what was going to happen to her.

  Nicola stepped up to Jay with a cat’s liquid grace and stroked his face gently. Jay flinched. ‘You shouldn’t have run away,’ Nicola said. ‘Don’t worry, sweetheart,’ she added. ‘You’re going to die pretty quickly. Your friend there,’ she nodded at Chelsea, ‘is going to die a lot more slowly. It might take her years.’ Nicola looked over to where Chelsea was sprawled, surrounded by her erstwhile peers. A broad grin smeared itself over her face like a rash.

  ‘You’re in a lot of trouble, Chelsea,’ Rachael said. Chelsea had a horrible suspicion that Nicola wasn’t far wrong. She started gathering her resources and waiting for a chance to head for the window herself. She’d probably break her neck, but that was preferable to what Coral would have planned for her. Chelsea knew she would have to time this carefully, but they probably wouldn’t be expecting her to go for the window, rather than the door.

  Jared provided the opportunity for Chelsea to make her move, much to her surprise. Whipping a Sabatier knife out of the sink, he lunged at Nicola viciously. He was either smart enough or lucky enough to go for her face, rather than her body, and one of Nicola’s cheeks burst like a grapefruit being batted for six. Her hands went to her face and she took a step back, screeching. While everyone else froze up for a second, Chelsea slammed the soles of her trainers into Michelle’s crotch as hard as she could. As she was lying flat on her back, the leverage was adequate to lift both of Michelle’s feet off the ground. Michelle fell backwards and slightly to one side, gasping. If Chelsea had got really lucky, she’d have torn one of Michelle’s genital piercings, which would surely slow her down for a while.

  Michelle was always angry, because her body kept rejecting its piercings, and was even obliterating her collection of tattoos. Michelle had once been the amanuensis of a tattooist popular with the artsy end of the industrial crowd during the second half of the ’80s, and had actually got into rave music during the acid house boom by way of TOPY – which was a rare occurrence, whatever extravagant claims Genesis P Orridge was making this week about having invented house music. There were photos of her flaunting her ink in a book or two (she was always bitter that she’d never made it into Re/Search’s ‘Modern Primitives’ collection), mostly Celtic knot work and pointillist sepia stabs at photorealism. The latter were now all gone, the former faded to a few vague blurs and smudges. Michelle talked about having them redone, but she couldn’t until they’d completely faded, which might take another decade or two. The only tack she’d had done since the rewiring of her metabolism, a leopard-spot pattern covering most of her left arm, was already starting to fade, and she’d had that for only 12 years or so.

  Chelsea scrambled for the window, but not quite fast enough. A hand tangled itself in her hair and yanked her head back hard enough to give her whiplash. Chelsea, thrown off balance, fell onto her arse, twisting her leg up painfully under her, as another hand locked around her wrist with a grip she’d never stand a chance of breaking. The pointed toe of an expensive, patent leather stiletto was driven into her side, just under the base of her ribcage, hard enough to drive the wind out of her, and as she finally stopped struggling, Chelsea felt a razor blade gently pricking her eyelid.

  ‘Have you ever seen Un Chien Andalou?’ Rachael asked, her breath hissing wetly against Chelsea’s face. Chelsea could take a hint, and started impersonating a statue as Rachael’s tongue slipped into her ear.

  Nicola, meanwhile, was standing with one hand pressed over her sliced cheek, which was oozing pale violet over her short silk jacket and sprayed on jeans. The blood was congealing fast enough for Jay to be able to see the wound crust over as the plasmids knitted together and its flow’s pressure ebbed. The tall, skinny girl had hennaed braids like anorexic dreadlocks, and some of them were caught between her hand and her cheek, sopping up the slowing flow of her blood. Jared had been trying for her eyes, but his aim had been a bit out. He had a horrible suspicion that all he’d achieved was to piss her off. He couldn’t back any further into the corner by the sink, so he took a firmer grip on the knife and tried to stop shaking. He didn’t succeed.

  ‘You little shit,’ the girl said, releasing her torn cheek and balling her fists. Then a lump exploded out of her chest under the left side of her collar bone, and she whirled around, apparently more inspired by outrage than by trauma or hydrostatic shock.

  It was the best shot of Robert’s life. Having had nine stone of vampire and half a window land on top of him, it had taken him a while to gather himself together enough to shoot at somebody. As soon as the hip-hop-dressed girl had stepped to one side, so that she wasn’t between him and Jay, Robert had taken great delight in shooting her in the back. He was sure she was the one who’d jumped onto him through the window.

  He’d put a hole through her chest that he could see light through, and she still turned around and lunged at h
im. Robert fired again, hurriedly, and the bullet went into her throat. This one was pure luck rather than judgment, and it worked. She collapsed. If she wasn’t dead, there wasn’t going to be any point shooting at her again.

  The shots drew a quick response from the others. The ones clustered around Chelsea were out of the door with her so fast that it took Jay a second to realise that they’d gone. Shouting something incoherent, he started after them, and the last vampire left in the room lunged after him. Her crooked jaw snapped open to reveal a mouth full of broken teeth as she screamed. Jay felt his head swim and watched the room reel around him drunkenly as he put two and two together. Robert fired again before he could faint, sending the rest of the clip he had in his Nambu at the girl whose face Chelsea had flattened with a car door early that morning. Only one of the bullets actually hit her, but that sank into her hip. Her rush towards Jay ended with her leg giving way, and she pressed her hands to the worktop to stop herself from falling over. Jay kicked her good leg out from under her and she collapsed. He quickly lunged forward and stood on one of her wrists, then stooped over her and pressed the tip of the knife he was holding into the hollow of her throat. ‘Don’t move,’ he said, his voice trembling. Robert quickly slipped a fresh clip into his handgun. He didn’t think it was very bright for Jay to be holding a weapon that close to her, even if she did have only one working leg.

  ‘Phone Len, and keep an eye on her,’ Jay told Robert. He stepped off the girl’s arm and straightened up as Robert drew a bead on the back of her neck with the gun. Then he made for the bedroom. He had a pair of handcuffs in there.

  ‘What?’ Robert said.

  ‘They have Chelsea, and we need to know where they’ll take her. The other one you shot isn’t going to tell us that, is she?’

  Robert thought about this. ‘No,’ he admitted.

  ‘So we have to get her out of here before the police turn up.’

  Robert nodded. If the alternative was going after the other three, he could live with that.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So you tell Leonard we’ve got a present for him, then get toothless here into my car and run her over to him. I stay here and try to come up with a line for the rozzers. Possibly something about a bunch of scousers following me and my girlfriend here after we scored some dope, then breaking in and shooting her.’

  ‘Good luck with that,’ Robert said. Still, Jay didn’t have a criminal record as far as he could remember, and he hadn’t actually touched the gun. Robert looked from the housebreaker he was covering to the corpse on the floor. ‘Are you going to rape her to make the story seem a bit more convincing?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t think I’ll go that far,’ Jay said.

  ‘Talking to the police is going too far, Jay. Still, maybe you can pin your stolen plastic on them. I think if you help me shift the corpse as well, that might be a better idea. It’s another toy for Len to play with, after all.’

  Jay nodded. ‘There’s a bucket and a mop under the sink. We don’t even know that this stuff counts as blood. Anyway, this was a break in and a robbery, before they started shooting at each other.’

  Jay went into the bedroom. He quickly decided that the novelty handcuffs he’d picked up from Superdrug six years earlier wouldn’t be up to the job. He’d have to improvise something. Still, he had a gag somewhere. Sighing, he reflected that this would all be a lot easier if he was into S&M.

  ‘Bad girl,’ Rachael said. ‘Bad, bad girl. “Sorry” isn’t going to be good enough this time, so don’t waste your breath.’

  Rachael had her arm with the broken hand draped over Chelsea’s shoulders. Michelle was seated on the other side of her. Lucinda was driving. Chelsea was starting to wonder if she’d get murdered before they made it to meet Coral. She had a horrible suspicion that Rachael was about to do something to take her mind off her injury.

  ‘Hold her wrist, Michelle,’ Rachael said. Michelle, sitting on Chelsea’s left, their hips pressed together to give Rachael more room, grabbed hold of Chelsea’s nearest wrist. Rachael sighed.

  ‘Wrong one, stupid!’ Rachael snapped. ‘Hold her right hand where I can get at it.’

  Chelsea bit her lip as Michelle took a firm grip on her right wrist and extended her hand towards Rachael. ‘Thank you,’ Rachael said, and closed her good hand around Chelsea’s little finger. ‘If you’re a brave girl and take your medicine without struggling or screaming,’ Rachael said, ‘I won’t cripple your thumb.’

  ‘It’s not crippling her, though,’ Michelle said. ‘She’ll heal up.’

  ‘Of course she will,’ Rachael said, slowly forcing Chelsea’s finger backwards. Chelsea could feel the first pains lancing through her joints as the tendons were stretched. ‘Then we can break them again. We can hurt her over and over for years.’ Chelsea’s teeth went through the fold of her lip she was pressing between them and clicked together. ‘They won’t be all that much use to her if I mess them up enough, though. She knows that. That’s why she isn’t trying to struggle or beg or stop me. That’s why she’s going to just sit here quietly and let us hurt her all we want. She knows what happens to naughty girls. She knows that she doesn’t deserve any better treatment.’

  Chelsea bit her tongue hard enough to draw blood as every joint in her finger popped out of true. Michelle ground her hip into Chelsea’s and giggled as Chelsea trembled.

  ‘What are the magic words, Chelsea?’ Rachael said.

  Chelsea choked back a sob and tried to keep the quaver out of her voice as she answered. ‘Thank you,’ she said. Rachael stroked her cheek, smearing blood from her mouth down it. On her far side, Michelle wound down the window and lit the spliff she’d found on the floor as she was leaving.

  ‘That’s right,’ Rachael said. ‘One down, three more to go. And if you don’t wipe that pout off your face, my girl, it’s going to be four.’

  Chelsea tried to smile. Rachael kissed the back of her hand, then shifted her grip to Chelsea’s index finger.

  ‘Now for number two,’ Rachael said. ‘I don’t want you closing your eyes this time, is that clear? You will look me in the eye until I tell you that you can look at what I’ve done to your nasty little finger. Then you will thank me, and this time you will mean it, or do a much better impression than you managed just then.’

  ‘Yes, Rachael,’ Chelsea said. ‘I’m sorry.’

  Rachael smiled. ‘Not yet you’re not,’ she said. ‘But you will be. Eyes open wide now, and no screaming. You’ve always had beautiful grey eyes.’

  5: I Want To See The Bright Lights Tonight

  Leonard normally practised mad science from the cellar of his semi in Chorlton. A previous tenant had owned a drum kit and so had soundproofed the small, rough-walled chamber. Of course, that didn’t make getting the patients down there any easier. Robert felt distinctly uneasy as he and Leonard manhandled through the front door two forms cocooned in heavy tent fabric shrouds sealed shut with masking tape – particularly given that one of them was still wriggling. Fortunately, nobody seemed to notice them. Hopefully any witnesses would think they were swingers delivering a sex slave in bondage or something. Robert wondered how Jay was getting on with the police. At least there weren’t any bodies left for him to explain away. He didn’t think anybody had seen them removing the parcels from the premises there, either. Presumably everybody in the building had taken themselves as far away from their doors and windows as they possibly could the second they heard gunshots and screaming.

  Leonard didn’t much resemble Peter Cushing, but he was a bit less manic than Colin Clive. Once the two parcels were in his basement, he tapped the one that wasn’t moving with the toe of his shoe. ‘This is the dead one?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ Robert said, in the most withering tone he could muster. ‘That’s the live one. The other’s wriggling because it’s full of maggots and cockroaches.’ Leonard igno
red him and started unpeeling the wrapper. There was a strong element of the six year old on Christmas day to his demeanour.

  Being wrapped in a tarpaulin hadn’t done anything for the dead girl’s appearance, but Leonard didn’t seem put off. ‘Help me get her onto the table,’ he said. ‘I want to open her up.’

  Robert made a point of grabbing the girl’s ankles before Leonard could assign him the end with bullet holes in it. Leonard seemed too blasé to notice.

  ‘I like her outfit,’ Leonard said. ‘You always assume that vampires are going to dress like yourself, don’t you?’ Robert, wearing a Cure t-shirt, ignored that.

  ‘I wanted to do this to the other one,’ Leonard admitted, ‘but I don’t think Jay would have liked that.’

  Since getting the report on Chelsea’s blood back a couple of hours earlier, Leonard had been itching for a chance to explore her further. He’d quite happily settle for a couple of her friends instead. Having a dead one to play with first meant that he’d have a better idea of what to look for when he started in on the live one, which was helpful.

  Blood sprayed everywhere when Leonard pushed up her t-shirt and slit open her belly, which shouldn’t really have happened. Robert turned grey.

  The organs revealed inside the corpse’s abdomen were withered and shrivelled, nested inside clusters of unpleasant-looking, purplish lumps. The word ‘zits’ flitted through Leonard’s head; and, sure enough, one burst open in a messy shower when he pricked it. He stopped himself after bursting another. ‘Interesting,’ he said.

  ‘Not the word I’d pick,’ Robert muttered.

  ‘And you a goth as well,’ Leonard said, shaking his head. ‘Pass me that, will you? I want to see if I can save any of this stuff.’

  Watching Leonard root through the body didn’t really appeal to Robert, but he did as he was asked, and ignored Leonard’s tongue clucking as he passed over a specimen jar.