<Interlude - Two Years Ago>
"Sranje občinstva. Bom zmanjšajo svoje vratove in se usral dol vratove!" Agnese announced angrily as she slammed the door to the small cupboard that had laughingly been referred to as the 'star dressing room' by the pub landlord.
"How many times do I have to tell you, I don't speaking fucking Latverian!" Olivia replied, carefully removing the smoking spliff from between her lips and pinching it out before tucking it back behind her ear. The two of them had been touring together for almost three years and the little 'doombot' couldn't even lean how to swear in English properly, or even better in Olivia's native German. With a heavy sigh the guitarist rolled up off the stack of empty crates she'd been reclining on and made her way over to her friend.
"You need to relax more, don't let those fuckers get you down." Olivia said reassuringly as she gently placed her hands on Agnese' shoulders and began to gently massage her tensions away. "It's not their fault they're all ignorant pricks who wouldn't know good music if it came whistling out of their asses."
As she let the words softly sooth the drummer's frayed nerves Olivia slowly moved her hands down and around her friend's body, creeping them around to where she knew Agnese liked to feel them. "Perhaps I could do something to make you feel better?" Olivia whispered heavily into her 'friend's' ear.
"I think we'd all enjoy that." The voice seemed to come out of nowhere, and at the same time everywhere, filling the room in a way that suggested it had been there all the time, waiting on the darkness.
Springing upright Olivia turned, her hands balling into fists as she prepared to defend herself. It wouldn't be the first time some provincial asshole had decided to teach the little foreign dykes a lesson in what a real man felt like, or the first time the two musicians had had to leave town in a hurry before the authorities tracked down the cause of the brutally beaten body left behind in the dressing room.
"Come out, piefke! I'm not frightened of you!" The German girl said, trying not to let her voice tremble as she cast her eyes around the small room, looking for whoever had spoken.
In an instant the man was there in the room, but for a moment Olivia didn't even realise he'd been there all along. Somehow he seemed to simply emerge from the background as if dropping his camouflage while at the same time forming as if from nothing, finally taking on a shape of his own. "There's no need for violence," the man said with a smile which reminded the girls of a hungry jungle cat, "I come as a friend."
It was barely comforting to know the stranger was a friend, something about him seemed just a little wrong, as though he didn't really belong here at all. It wouldn't be until much later, too late, that Agnese would remind Olivia about his eyes, the deep, dark pits of blackness which seemed to eat up the light around them.
"I understand you've been having a little trouble with your music," the stranger said with a smile, not asking a question, merely stating the fact. "I have a little something for you which I think you'll find helpful."
His outstretched hands were suddenly holding a guitar and a set of drumsticks, which apart from looking brand new otherwise seemed perfectly ordinary. Olivia was tempted to simply take the gifts, but as she reached out her hand Agnese stopped her. "What you want?" the Latvarian asked, her voice full of suspicion.
The stranger shrugged his shoulder and tilted his head with a smile. "How about a kiss?"
Olivia barked out a laugh at the man's suggestion. "You want us to kiss you? Is that all?"
The man smile devilishly. "Not at all," he said, his voice dripping with sin, "In fact, I was hoping just to watch you girls kiss each other."
Looking down at Agnese for a moment Olivia raised an eyebrow quizzically. It wasn't like the two of them hadn't been planning to do a lot more than kiss only a few moments earlier, and what harm could possibly come from a simple kiss. "All right," Olivia said, turning back towards the stranger. "You watch us kiss and we get the instruments?"
"That's the deal." The stranger said, his smile as serpentine as ever.
The next night the show was packed, fans queuing around the block as the girls hammered out he beats, the flow of the music filling the hall and tearing at the ceiling tiles as they pounded out song after song. For a while Olivia was completely lost in the music, the chords dropping from her fingers unlike anything she'd planned for or written, almost as if the guitar knew what it wanted to play and just needed her fingers there to release the music.
When she finally came to Olivia was shocked to see the audience violently ripping into each other, using their hands, teeth and whatever improvised weapons they could find. For a moment she wasn't sure what to think, and turning towards her partner she saw Agnese staring out into the darkness with a broad impish grin of delight on her lips. "Motherfuckers know now," she heard the drummer say.
With a smile of her own Olivia turned back to her mic, pulling it closer as she screamed into it, "We're
Hell's Bitches, you fucking assholes, and tonight you're gonna die for us!" Dropping the mic Olivia pulled her guitar around and let herself fall into the music once more.
