All Rotting Meat

by Maleham , Eve

  Tycho studied Banes from across the sofa, his body rigid, and something burned in his eyes. He looked as though he was going to hit him, before sighing and rising to his feet.

  ‘Fine,’ he said, walking out of the room. He returned a few moments later, holding a pair of glasses.

  ‘What are these?’ Banes asked; they had some of the thickest lenses he had ever seen.

  ‘My glasses,’ Tycho said. ‘My eyesight is completely ruined; I’m nearly blind, even by human standards. Barely anyone knows this, because nearly everyone I knew, before contact lenses were a suitable option, died in the Eighties.’

  ‘Jesus,’ Banes said. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I didn’t go into hiding or run away when the Old Hunters destroyed the Blood Coup,’ Tycho said, shifting in his seat, his eyes flickering to look anywhere but at Banes. ‘I was captured by them, and ended up spending fifty years a prisoner,’ he said, his voice forcibly casual, ‘and I did develop black eye, if you want to know. They ran a lot of experiments on me, including the effects of starvation. They dissected me while I was still conscious and strapped to the table. They pushed me until I was close to death, countless times. They caused the loss of my vision trying to understand a vampire’s superior sense of eyesight.’

  ‘But I thought the Old Hunters became obsolete,’ Banes said.

  Tycho shrugged. ‘I wouldn’t know anything about that, but it was part of the deal the British government made with the Vatican; that they got to keep me. Humans feel a great amount of jealousy towards us. They crave our strengths. They want to rip us apart, as much as we want to eat them, to find out how we work, to find out how they can be more like us. But they’re also greedy. I believe that, a few decades later, I was part of some sort of deal, and ended up in Germany. I was very lucky when the war broke out; a stray shell hit the research base where they were keeping me, and enough damage was done to enable my escape, before I could be passed on to the Soviets or the Americans.’

  ‘Would they have known of our existence?’ Banes asked.

  ‘Someone, somewhere, would have,’ Tycho said, his hand tightening on his glass. ‘It’s all very secretive. Which is why we need Rebirth – to gain the upper hand. We both know that if humanity knew of our existence, the ones who wouldn’t turn to us begging to become vampires would be the ones hunting us down to extinction. We’re a very real threat to them, Banes, but humans have an advantage we do not, which is that they are not dependent on our survival, whereas we depend on them. If I were to judge, then I would say that only a select few in a handful of countries are aware of our existence; the rest fades into the background rumours of super soldiers and other conspiracy theories. But, I spent the immediate years following the war tracking down and destroying everyone involved along with every shred of evidence, before arriving back to London to see what had happened to the rest of the Blood Coup.’

  ‘Before I left America I spoke to Candice Prieto – Caedis Tenebrae – and she told me that the American government knew of our existence,’ Banes said. ‘She said that they had found dissected bodies out in the desert.’

  Tycho nodded, ‘it’s part of the reason I tried to enlist her. She needs our protection too.’

  ‘And the Old Hunters?’ Banes asked. ‘What happened to them?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Tycho said. ‘I’ve had extensive research done on the subject. I believe that they still exist in some capacity. I struggle to believe that an Order which kept a vampire as a prisoner for decades would be made obsolete so easily. However, I think that just as we thought that the Blood Coup marked the end of them, the Old Hunters thought it marked the end of us, as well. But,’ he said, his eyes dropping to Banes’s scarred shoulder, ‘when the times comes, I will annihilate them all.’

  Banes took another drink. ‘That’s a high ambition.’

  ‘They’ve hurt you too,’ Tycho said.

  ‘It was a long time ago,’ Banes said, ‘and I keep moving forward.’

  ‘And yet they still exist, the ones who hurt you,’ Tycho said.

  Banes took a drink, ‘most people who hurt me get to keep existing, and I keep existing even though I’ve hurt others. That’s just the world, you can’t be too concerned with right or wrong, you just have to keep surviving.’

  Tycho ran his hand along his scars, ‘it was cruel of your family to throw you into exile just as the Hunters closed in.’

  He shrugged, ‘I survived though.’

  ‘Barely.’

  ‘I know what they did,’ Tycho said softly. ‘I can guess what happened to you.’

  ‘Move past it, Tycho,’ Banes said.

  ‘I’ll get rid of them for you,’ Tycho said, ‘the Old Hunters, and Cecilia Marr, and the Shield of Scarlet, and everyone else who stands against us. That’s what we do, that’s what we have to do. We destroy threats before they can destroy us,’ Tycho moved closer towards him, ‘and there is only us. You understand that, don’t you, Banes?’

  ‘I do?’

  ‘We repel others,’ Tycho said, ‘and you know it.’

  ‘I don’t think that,’ Banes said, as Tycho’s eyes loomed larger.

  ‘That’s why you prefer the company of humans,’ Tycho said, ‘because they don’t matter. You don’t have to worry about their whispers, you don’t have to think about the distance between one another. Other people find us disconcerting, for reasons we ourselves don’t understand.’

  Tycho’s hand came closer to rest on his knee, while the other lifted Banes’s chin up so that their eyes met. An image of Kojo flashed through his mind.

  ‘There’s no-one but us,’ Tycho said, his voice soft, ‘and you’re mine.’

  He’s lost his fucking mind.

  Tycho’s kiss was all teeth. His hand snaked its way into Banes’s hair and grasped at the back of his head, locking him in place as his nails dug into his skin. A prickle of discomfort ran through him.

  ‘You’re fucking mad,’ Banes breathed, as the kiss broke away. Tycho scratched his nape.

  ‘Then, be mad with me,’ Tycho said.

  ‘They ruined your mind.’

  ‘I know,’ Tycho said. ‘I know that; I can feel it. I can remember how I was before, and I know that this is different. I can remember when I used to be a whole person.’

  It struck Banes that even if he wanted to leave the apartment, Tycho wouldn’t let him. He looked at him; his face was flushed, and his eyes were burning. An energy shifted under his skin, and something feral and hungry let loose.

  ‘You’re hurt,’ he heard himself say.

  ‘So are you,’ Tycho said. He kissed him again, biting down hard enough to draw blood from the side of Banes’s lips. ‘And no-one cares but me, so let’s hurt together.’

  Chapter Nineteen

  I Just Wanted A Normal Life

  Banes woke up to find that Tycho had showered and was already dressed for work.

  ‘You couldn’t have woken me sooner?’ Banes asked, sitting up in his bed and looking around Tycho’s bedroom properly for the first time. Like the rest of the flat, it was spartan; a bed with brass bed posts, a single wooden wardrobe, and a chest of draws under a slanting ceiling. Tycho shook his head and took a sip of the coffee he was holding.

  ‘You seemed to need your sleep, and besides, the hot water tank is very small, and I wanted to get there before you.’

  ‘Cheers, Tycho,’ Banes muttered, swinging out of bed.

  In the bathroom mirror, he saw that the various bite marks, bruises and scratches Tycho had left on his body were already healing. Tycho had been very rough with him and Banes had struggled to find some sort of balance, but their sex had been like he was being consumed by something.

  He showered, washing off the grease and oil and stains that had built up on his body, the water quickly turning lukewarm. Tycho leaned against the doorway, his steady gaze prickling Banes’s skin for minutes, before he turned away. Banes stepped out of the shower just as the water turned cold, and rubbed his skin raw with a
towel.

  ‘Hey, I’m borrowing one of your shirts,’ he called back to Tycho, already leafing through his wardrobe to find something suitable, before realising that Tycho apparently didn’t own a single t-shirt. ‘You can keep mine, but you’ll probably want to give it a wash. Question,’ he said, turning around as he sensed Tycho’s presence behind him, ‘do you own anything casual? All I can see are office shirts.’

  ‘It will be tonight, Banes,’ Tycho said, handing him a cup of black coffee, his eyes sparkling.

  ‘What will be?’ Banes asked, taking out a brown and grey Fair Isle jumper, and holding it against his chest.

  ‘Tonight, you and Rosemary will enter Cain Marr’s house, and deliver him back to Rebirth,’ Tycho said. ‘There will be a back-up team in case something goes wrong, but I doubt that; trying to pass as a human is considerably weakening. There will be another team to acquire Khalida Natakarn. She will be working a night shift tonight, and we will get her as she makes her way home.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Banes asked, his insides twisting, as he placed the cup on the bedside table and shoved the jumper on. ‘It seems rushed.’

  ‘It has to be,’ Tycho said, ruefully. ‘The longer this operation runs, the higher the chance that Cecilia will discover it. It was partly my reasoning behind inviting you here – to keep you under my watch, and safe from her. I have already arranged for a car to come and bring you to Rebirth, so she has no chance of getting to you first.’

  ‘Couldn’t you just have one of your guys do it?’ Banes asked. ‘If anything, you’re just drawing attention to us conspiring together.’

  ‘Which is why we have to move quickly,’ Tycho said. ‘She will find out tonight that you spent the day here, but that won’t matter by then. And I know that I can rely on you.’

  Banes took a drink of coffee. ‘Tycho…’ he began, ‘this is risky.’

  ‘We’re not going to be given another chance like this,’ Tycho said. ‘I told you, I’ll get rid of Cecilia for us. I’m going to keep you safe,’ he said, taking a step closer to Banes and brushing his bruised lips with his finger.

  ‘I know,’ Banes said. ‘And, you’re sure that you’re fine with me going into work looking like this?’ he asked. ‘People are going to figure out that you did this to me.’

  ‘Not immediately,’ Tycho said, dropping his gaze, ‘and once the Marrs are gone, no-one will dare question what I do in privacy. Now, finish getting ready – the cars will be here soon.’

  On the walk down from his apartment to the street, Banes considered running, but Tycho’s eyes pushed him closer to the black car until he found himself getting into the back seat. Tycho closed the door behind him before getting into his own waiting car. Banes leaned back in the seat as the car made its way down through London, the sun setting behind murky clouds. He noticed that the door locks were down.

  When he arrived at Rebirth, he found Rosemary had summoned him to her office. She gave him a heavy look of wordless understanding, her large, grey eyes drawn on him.

  ‘So, you’re aware of what’s happening tonight, then?’ she asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said.

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘We will leave at two A.M.’

  ‘And?’ Banes said. ‘What are we doing?’

  ‘Well,’ Rosemary said, ‘it’ll be very similar to Paula Stockport. Everything is in the report file,’ she said, giving him a pointed look. ‘Come back to my office at half past one.’

  Banes sat down at his desk and read the file. It was about Cain John Faye, a school teacher. He scanned his personal history section. Faye was born in Canterbury in Nineteen-Ninety-Three. His parents moved frequently, and were killed in a house fire when he was sixteen, leaving him with a large inheritance. He then lived with a great-aunt in Edinburgh, before moving down to London. In the report, it listed that Cain Faye was also to die in a house fire.

  Banes leaned back in his chair and sighed. It was a thorough story; creating a new identity was difficult, but Cain’s was good, and he had to assume that it was what Khalida knew of Cain as well. Banes wondered about the countless, small lies Cain must have had to tell her.

  Acid boiled over in his stomach as he forced himself into the canteen, collecting a meal of spaghetti and meatballs, absently wandering if he was eating Elijah Dukes, and a cup of blood, before sitting on the far side of the room. He saw Kojo enter the room and kept his eyes passively down at his plate, but saw that Kojo made no attempt to search him out in the crowd.

  He needed an escape route. He hoped that Khalida could put up such a fight that they would decide to kill her there and then. He hoped she would get away free. He would kill Cain and run away. Better to be a deserter than an infiltrator.

  ‘Hey.’

  Someone poked his shoulder. He blinked and turned around in his seat to see Rosemary standing next to him.

  ‘Is everything okay with you?’ she asked. ‘You’ve been staring at that for a while.’

  Banes realised that he had zoned out while staring at a piece of skewered human meat on the end of his fork.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, eating it, ‘I’m good.’

  ‘Good,’ Rosemary said. ‘Since you’re here already, it’ll be best if we head straight to the car park.’

  Banes put down his cutlery and drank the remainder of his blood, before following her up to the car park. Instead of the purple hatchback, it was a white van this time.

  ‘It’s not like I don’t love that jumper,’ Rosemary said, opening the back of the van and taking out a rucksack, ‘but you ought to wear this instead,’ she said, handing him a black hoodie.

  ‘Thanks,’ Banes said, on pulling on the hoodie over Tycho’s jumper, ignoring Rosemary openly trying to catch a glimpse of his chest. They climbed into the van, Rosemary sitting in the driver’s seat.

  ‘Right,’ she said, ‘we can talk freely now.’

  ‘And this van isn’t bugged, or anything?’ Banes asked.

  ‘I had the van we were going to use swapped out with this one at the very last minute,’ Rosemary said. ‘There’s no way it’s bugged.’

  ‘Tycho told me his plan,’ Banes said. ‘Get Cain Marr, and bring him back to Rebirth with us.’

  She nodded. ‘Yeah, we need his confession. He is very weak, though; he forces himself into a human lifestyle. At this point, he’s basically a human himself, but there will be a relief team one street away in case something unexpected happens. We will drug him if we can, but it’s important that we keep him as sedated and quiet as possible. I’m not afraid to get a little rough with him, though. Even if they’re not related by blood, he’s still Cecilia’s brother, an all-round traitor.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ Banes said with a nod. ‘I didn’t know you were one of Tycho’s guys.’

  Rosemary smirked. ‘I’m usually not one for taking sides, but Cecilia Marr is a stone-cold cunt.’

  ‘That’s strong,’ Banes said.

  ‘It’s true,’ she said. ‘You can say a lot about Tycho, but at least he’s honest and isn’t planning me on throwing me under the bus when I stop haemorrhaging cash into this place.’

  ‘Is Cecilia planning to do that?’ Banes asked.

  ‘C’mon, Banes, you know her by now,’ Rosemary said. ‘She’s only good to you as long as you’re useful. And I’m not clueless – I know that I was brought into Rebirth for my money and connections, which makes me a very powerful person, and therefore, a threat to her. If I wanted to, I’m sure I could rise to the position of commander as well. I don’t trust her; there was no way I was going to side with her.’

  ‘She seems to be fairly well liked, though,’ Banes said.

  Rosemary nodded. ‘She is, more's the pity.’ She sighed and leaned back in her seat, looking out across to the empty garage. ‘I had been drifting closer to Tycho over the past couple of years, but it was after Marr had you burned that I decided to take action. I have a soft spot for people a little rough around the edges like yourself, and, besides, you’re a good work
er. I couldn’t believe that she had you fucking burned over what was basically nothing.’

  Bitterness rose in his mouth. ‘Thanks, Rosemary.’

  She shrugged. ‘Not a problem. Right,’ she said, turning the key in the ignition, ‘let’s end this bitch.’

  He knew where the van was heading as it made its way up through to north London, his nerves rising ice cold through his veins as they passed in through Camden Town. As they pulled up in the back street of a row of terraced houses, he wiped the palms of his hands against the back of his jeans. Rosemary cut the engine and the lights of the van as they waited.

  ‘Best give it a few minutes,’ she said, ‘in case anyone was stirred by the sound.’

  Banes let his eyes settle on the windows of the back of their house. It was the sort of street where the house prices had rocketed before the housing bubble burst, leaving behind the partly gentrified remains.

  ‘Ready?’ Rosemary asked, handing him a rucksack. ‘Gloves on?’

  He nodded. ‘Yep.’

  The night’s air was still, and it trapped the smells of London inside it. Everything gave off its own scent, mixing around in the stagnant air; freshly turned earth, merging with cut grass, flowers, and wood belonging to neighbours getting their gardens ready for summer, which blended together with heated tarmac, stone, and exhaust fumes. The sky was a dull orange.

  Rosemary quietly slipped out of the van, Banes following right behind her. It was no effort to leap over their fence and into the tiny garden, shadowed from the lights.

  Despite its small size, they had really made the most of their garden space; there were carefully laid vines of raspberries and broad beans growing around the walls, and hanging baskets and potted plants over every available space. It sent a painful jolt of nostalgia through him, as he remembered the small cottage he and Kojo had once lived in.

  Rosemary handed him the tools to pick the lock, and after a few moments, they had slid silently into the kitchen. Vaguely familiar smells of coffee and spiced perfume greeted him. Excitement was gleaming in Rosemary’s eyes; her whole body seemed to quiver as, without saying a word, she made her way through the house.