behind blue eyes

Cabel sat and drank and tried to avoid looking at anyone. He ordered another drink from the barman with his eyes downcast. He liked it here. The place was underground so there were no windows, and no effort was made to cater for women, so no mirrors either.

His dark dark sunglasses slid down his face and he hastily adjusted them. Through the black monochrome that he saw the world, he tried to read his book. He had to hold it very close to his face to make out the words. The cover was gone from it. It had been carefully torn it off when he bought it. Why did authors insist on having their pictures on their work?

The barman, for want of anything else to do, turned the television on and Cabel swivelled on his stool so his back was to it. He was well practised in blocking out certain parts of the world. What he couldn’t block out though, was the rough shove he received that sent him falling off his perch, arms flapping wildly.

Picking himself off the floor, he adjusted his sunglasses again and looked at the big biker boots of the person that had pushed him.
“Yes?” he said
“Why'd you turn your back on the game, you prick?”
“I don’t follow it” he told the boots
“It’s cause we scored, you sectarian bastard. Wasn’t it?”
“No”
“Shut up” The boots arms grabbed him and spun Cabel around so he faced the TV “Now watch the replay of this amazing belter of a goal”

Rough hands ripped Cabel’s sunglasses off and the gloom of the bar pierced his eyes. He blinked rapidly and then shut his lids tight, but not before seeing a whole sea of faces on the TV. He felt sick, like eels and snakes were fighting and fucking in his stomach. He was spun round again.

“Now” said the owner of the big boots and the heavy hands. “Tell me that wasn’t poetry in motion, you wee fuck”
The rapid spinning proved too much for Cabel and he emptied his stomach onto the broad chest in front.
“Sorry” he said, hurriedly bending down to pick up his glasses.

A vicious kick greeted him and the shades were broken against, and with, his nose. Cabel's head shot up in pain and for the first time he met his assailant’s eyes. No no no no…

But it was ok, and he breathed a sign of relief as he received kicks and punches from someone that didn’t have to die.

When the man had left, Cabel picked himself up and went to the bathroom to clean the blood off. He did this in the closed stall with water from the toilet basin, just in case anyone surprised him. reaching into his jacket, he pulled out another pair of opaque glasses from a bundle that hadn't been damaged by the beating. Satisfied with this, he went back out.

The bar had gone silent, except for the sound of channels being changed in rapid succession. And the scratch of someone furiously scribbling down notes. He risked looking up. The barman lay slumped over the table with a knife in his back. And standing over him, nonchalant and with eyes fixed on the TV, was Cabel’s brother, Sain

“Hey coward” Sain said, not shifting his gaze. “Still failing to live up to your gifts I see” he gestured towards the barman. “And I bet you haven’t been doing any homework either” Scribble scribble went the pen.
“What I don’t know can’t hurt or haunt me” Cabel replied
“Then why is your nose broken?” Sain put his notebook away and walked over to him. He grabbed Cabel’s nose and twisted it left with a crack.
“There, good as new” he said, staring right through Cabels sunglasses and into his eyes. Not once had Cabel ever seen his brother blink.

“You disappoint me” Sain went on “Hiding down here from your duties. Not seeing the world as you should” He plucked off Cabels glasses and flung them too the floor.
“I don’t much care for what I see” Cabel replied.
“Judgment is a divine responsibility. And we have both been proven right too many times to question ours. Remember the child you refused to kill, and all the evil and death she wrought?”
“You would not kill her either”
“Well, we were both weak back then. Both hoping that we were wrong or sick in the mind. But while I have grown strong enough to shoulder this burden, you remain weak. And so here I am, to set you back on the right path”

Sain went back to the barman and pulled the knife out. He handed it to Cabel. The handle was fashioned to resemble an eagle, with dark red ruby eyes set in. Cabel stared at it a long time.

“Come brother, there is work to be done” Sain put his arm around Cabels shoulder and steered him to the door. Cabel stopped, and looked his brother dead in the eye.
“I wish you weren’t always right” he said, and thrust the blade through his brothers unblinking gaze. He pushed deeper and harder, bearing the twitching, flailing form to the ground. Push and bleed and push.

He stood up and looked down. One of the rubies had fallen out of the dagger. Cabel gave a grim smile, went to the duke box, and made a selection. It booted up and he sang along with it.

“No one knows what it’s like
To be the bad man
To be the sad man
Behind blue eyes”

He ripped out his eyes from their sockets and put his sunglasses back on. Then he walked out, unwilling and unable to look back. If he could, he would have seen Sain’s one remaining eye give a last twitch in the form of a wink.

Some time later, when a passer by had seen the bodies and made the call, the police and ambulance arrived. A search of Sain’s body revealed he had an organ donor’s card.