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Sulfur	By : beautifulliar Category: Singers/Bands/Musicians > Deathstars Views: 1329 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. I do not know the members of Deathstars. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Sulfur
- 1
Sulfur

“Come in here,” Whip said, a beer bottle in one hand, smoke ribboning lazily from the cigarette in the other as he waved them toward the bedroom. He glanced back, briefly, a Joker’s grin on his face, the devil gleaming in his eyes.

Cat looked at Skinny, who was grinning, then Nightmare, who merely lifted his chin toward the doorway that Whip just passed through.

They were at Whip’s place—three rooms, counting the bathroom. The kitchen wasn’t much more than a corner of the main room—a sink with a curtain under it, a cupboard, a small refrigerator, a two-burner stove. Most of the main room was draped with socks and coats, magazines and unopened mail. CDs and DVDs. A red feather boa sat curled in the lumpy seat of a chair, sunning itself apparently.

Nightmare brought his attention back up to the moment when Skinny said, “Go on,” and turned Cat by the shoulder toward the bedroom. “It’ll only hurt for a few minutes anyway.”

“You promise?” Cat smiled back at them in that way he had. They’d had him around a handful of weeks, but already, when it came to the looks his face formed itself into, there were ways that he had. “And what’s going to happen in there?” Cat asked.

“To find out,” Whip said, leaning in the doorway now—no, not leaning; draping himself in the doorway, the beer bottle dangling between the same two fingers that held the cigarette, “you’ll have to come inside my lair.”

Cat tossed his head back and sashayed past him—and plucked the beer neatly from Whip’s hand on his way by. Standing in the room, he took a pull of it, still grinning. “Not bad,” he said, talking about the room, not the beer. Or maybe it was the beer. The room was much like the main room, except that the clutter had been shoved into the corners and against the walls, leaving a path around Whip’s bed, with its black satin bedspread and its two flat pillows in dyed-red cases.

“Get him down,” Whip said, and Skinny and Nightmare flowed into the room. He turned away and sauntered to the table beside the bed. A match flared—Nightmare sniffed in the brief burst of sulfur as he dragged Cat by one upper arm closer to the bed—and Whip held the match to the wick of a half-spent candle until it sputtered, then flared.

“Oh, we’re going to play this kind of game!” Cat laughed as Night and Skinny man-handled him onto the bed. “Perverts!” He laughed again, in that way he had.

Night, holding Cat’s wrists in one hand—not that the kid was fighting—climbed onto the bed and got behind Cat’s head, back against the headboard, Cat’s wrists now one in each fist. He crossed his arms and just held on. That was his job today.

Skinny got on the floor, at the end of the bed, back against the end of the bed. He slouched down and worked his arms under and around Cat’s legs, just below the knees, to keep Cat from kicking or fighting his way off the bed. Skinny's head—the back of it from Night’s point of view—rested against the bed, between Cat’s knees.

Whip had gone around to the other side of the bed and lit another candle. After shaking out the match—smiling in that way he had (why was it only Cat and Whip who seemed to have a way “they had”)—Whip got on his knees, straddling Cat’s belly, and sat down.

“Oohhh,” Cat purred. He shifted his hips and shoulders.

Night tightened his hold on the Cat’s wrists. The kid’s head was in his lap; he had a good view of Cat nearly laughing.

“This is not playtime,” Whip said, his hands pressing down on his thighs.

“No?” The kid shifted again—“Cat” was definitely the right name for him. He wasn’t wriggling or squirming. His movements were more like when a cat comes up and rubs itself luxuriantly against your leg.

“We’re gonna hear just how loud you meow,” Whip said. He put his hands on the bed and leaned down, grinning. “Let’s hear you meow.”

“Rrrow,” Cat let out, softly, snarling a little at the end, his upper lip pulling into a sneer.

“That’s not gonna do. Have you ever heard alley cats going at each other in the middle of the night?”

Cat laughed—and moved his body again. In that way he had.

“We’re gonna hear you make that kind noise.”

“So are the neighbors!” Skinny said with a laugh. He was facing the wrong way to see how Cat was moving—or the gleam in his eyes.

“Mmm,” Cat purred.

They were going to have their hands full with him and Whip in the band.

“Sounds like fun.”

“That’s what you think now,” Nightmare said, his voice low.

Whip glanced up at Night—eyes shining—then turned his attention back to their prey.

Night wanted to drag a few stray strands of hair out of his eye, but restraining Cat’s wrists got in the way of simple things like that. He settled for rubbing his chin on his shoulder.

“He’s right,” Whip said. “That’s what you think now.”

Night didn’t want to watch the kid’s face anymore. He looked at the window by the dresser, noticing for probably the first time that it had a sleeping bag hanging on it instead of a curtain. A stab of orange early evening light cut across a corner of the dresser top, glinting off scattered coins and the edge of a pocketknife.

Whip sat up, scratching his belly through his shirt. This Nightmare registered out of the corner of his eye while he studied the posters on the wall. KISS, with Gene Simmons’ tongue unfurled like a red carpet.

“Are you sure you’re ready to be in the band?” Whip asked.

“I am already in the band,” the kid said, satisfaction filling out his vowels.

“Yes—save one last formality.”

Nightmare dragged his focus over to the bed again.

Whip had set his cigarette between his lips again and, smiling around it, began to unfasten the buttons on Cat’s shirt, beginning at the top, undoing it with a casual flick of his fingers, then the next.

Night tipped his head back until its crown touched the wall behind him. When he looked down again, only two more buttons had been undone. He caught Whip’s eye—who paused while they exchanged looks—and he lifted an eyebrow as if to say, “What’s taking so long?”

Whip, smiling slyly, looked back down. He tugged another button free. And then his finger traced a line of skin exposed by the spreading V of Cat’s shirt.

Cat purred and arched his back, then laughed. “Joining this band gets better by the moment.”

“So you think now.”

“Gimme a drag,” Night said, nodding his chin at Whip, who stopped his game long enough to hold the cigarette to Night's lips so he could take a pull off it. As Night let the smoke ease out his nostrils, he watched Whip pluck the last button free and spread—using his hands much more than was necessary on Cat’s bare skin—the shirt open. It was all part of giving the kid the wrong idea, but he wished they’d get to the big finale pretty soon, before Cat way got the wrong idea.

“All right,” Whip said, sitting back. “Now, we brand you.” He held the stub of cigarette up. A whispy tendril of smoke drifted from the ashen tip. Whip blew softly on the tip, causing it to glow. A bit of ash fluttered off and landed on Cat's exposed skin.

Cat said, “So everyone in the band is branded?”

“Everyone,” Whip said. “You don’t believe me?”

“Show me.” His eagerness concerned Night, though he wouldn't have wanted to be pinned down and forced to explain why.

Meanwhile, Whip grinned and popped the top button on his jeans, then the next. And the next. Just as Night was thinking they were about to see entirely too much, Whip folded the edges of his fly back away from his skin and shifted so that the scar could be seen in the room's not-so-brilliant light.

The makeup job was pretty good, though certainly the lighting situation helped. The scar had held up better than Night had expected, what with Whip’s jeans rubbing and shifting against it the past couple hours. He'd suggested putting the fake scars someplace less likely to be chafed, but Whip had been confident about the makeup trick’s staying power, and the need to put them exactly there. Plus it allowed them to put their own scars on themselves—which was why it might be a good thing if Cat didn't ask to see Skinny's.

“Nice,” Cat said, lifting his head to see better. Night had the idea that if Cat had free use of his hands, one of them would be reaching toward the prosthetic scar right this moment.

His fingers tightened around Cat's wrists.

The spot low on his own hip, where his own fake scar had been applied, itched.

“Everyone has one?” Cat asked.

“Mmhmm. And in a few minutes, so will you.”

“Even Bone?”

“Even Bone.”

Why not Bone? Night thought—other than his disinterest at being here to flip out the new kid. Or maybe it wasn’t his disinterest in this as much as his interest in someone else. Very nearly he and Skinny hadn’t been here, either. There’d be these two girls in the park…. He shifted to get a little more comfortable against the headboard, and recalled the sound of their giggles, the way the shorter, dark-haired one had rolled her eyes at something her friend had said—and then burst into more laughter. He and Skinny had had only a vague idea about what was supposed to be so funny, but what was funny wasn’t important. It was all part of the thing, the game, the dance or ritual or whatever it was.

“Ready?” Whip asked, holding the cigarette up.

“How long will it hurt?” Cat wanted to know.

“Couple of days—maybe a week. It’s not so bad if you put ice on it.”

“Or a cold beer can,” Skinny offered, still not seeing what was going on between Whip and Cat. If he could see it, Night wondered, would he even pick up on it? Whatever was going on between them was thick enough, Night thought, to be cut with that pocketknife on the dresser, even if you had to saw at it a little.

“It’s better to close your eyes,” Whip said, his voice almost an undertone—soothing as fur against your cheek.

Cat’s head was still lifted. With his chin nearly to his chest, he was still watching either the fake scar on Whip’s skin, down low where jeans would normally cover it, or tip of the cigarette, which Whip was holding, almost casually, near the folded-back fly of his jeans.

Night had a feeling it was the skin down low where jeans would normally cover that was the main focus of Cat’s attention.

He shifted behind Cat again, a bigger shift than before, this one on the pretense of his foot starting to fall asleep; that’s what he was ready to say if anyone looked his way. But Skinny had no idea he was moving and the other two had their attention elsewhere.

“Go on,” Whip said.

Cat slowly settled his head back—on Night’s thigh—and Whip shifted off Cat’s hips, sitting to the side of him, leaning over, two fingers pressed lightly just near where Cat’s scar would be, two other fingers readying the tip of the cigarette—

Cat turned his face away and squeezed his eyes closed.

Whip started to bring the cigarette closer to Cat’s hip, and closer— He ducked his head and brushed the skin lightly with his lips. “There.” He spoke with his face still so close to Cat’s stomach that Cat could probably feel breath brush against his skin. “Now you’re marked.” He patted Cat’s belly as he straightened, took a good, long drag off the cigarette, and stood and turned away. “We’re out of beer, I think.”

“Can’t have that,” Skinny said, worming his arms out from around Cat’s legs. He stood and brushed his hands off.

Cat stared at Cat's hip, where the scar was supposed to be. Where the kiss was. Then he lifted his eyes toward Whip.

“Why don’t you two go pick up a couple six packs,” Whip said, shifting coins and bills off the dresser top into his hand. “Hey, and bring back something to eat, too. Something hot.”

By ‘you two’, Night knew he meant him and Skinny. ‘Cause Cat wasn’t moving—unless you counted stretching like a cat in a sunspot as 'moving'.

Night pulled his thigh out from under Cat’s head. “Come on,” he said to Skinny.

Whip was transferring the money from his hands to Skinny’s. “I gotta wizz first,” Skinny said on their way out of the bedroom. Stuffing the money into his pockets, he headed into the bathroom and knocked the door shut.

Night stood in the living room, waiting. Looking at the walls. He glanced back, toward the bedroom, beyond the half-open door.

He glanced back to see Whip drop his t-shirt on the floor, and then, grinning, set a knee on the bed. Then the other.

He watched Whip lie his body down on top of Cat’s.

He couldn't see their faces—the wall cut them off just below the shoulders—but he had an idea they were grinning at each other in that way they hand.

Cat's fingers trailed lightly down the bare skin of Whip's back—

“Ready?” Skinny said.

Emil turned away. “Yeah.”

After a second or two, Skinny said, “Well come on then.”

“Yeah.”

In the stairwell, Skinny said, “You think those two chicks are still down there?”

“At the park?” Emil pushed his fingers into his front pockets. “Guess we can find out.”

“I thought he’d freak more,” Skinny said.

“Yeah….”

“I guess it’s good he didn’t. You know—more interesting that he didn’t.”

“Interesting?”

Skinny shrugged and pushed through the apartment building’s main door. Sunlight cut in. Emil narrowed his eyes as he walked out into it.

“You know, like…if he either kept totally calm in the face of being branded,” Skinny said, “or could read us well enough to know we were screwing with him, then I guess that makes him more interesting to be in the band than someone who would have panicked or something. You think he was really ready to get branded?” Skinny was scratching himself, under his waistband. He pulled his finger out and flicked the wax scar away.

“I don’t know,” Emil said. He fumbled for his pack of smokes, tapped one out. Put it between his teeth. “I don’t know.” What he wanted to know was how come he couldn’t read Andreas well enough to know what kind of screwing around would get into—

—or if it would have mattered any if he had. Or if he even would have wanted it to matter any. “Yeah, let’s swing by the park,” he said, and took a deep drag off his cigarette. “There’s no fucking need to hurry back anyway.”

The spent match fluttered to the ground in their wake.

~fin~
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Sulfur