The first time Bishop stared into the eyes of a dead man, he had been only fourteen. Most would say that it was much too young to be an accomplice for murder. Others would argue that he was just old enough.
The corpse's jaw was agape then. It looked as if its last words were caught in its throat. He always wondered what it was the man had wanted to say to him. Was it a plea? A curse, perhaps? As one could imagine, it was a sight that wasn't so easily forgotten.
That night and now, it is unfortunate to say that it was unlike any other that plagued Bishop's life. There was that same bitter chill nipping at exposed skin. A high moon peering down with a gaze heavy with its judgement. A guilt that would surely linger. He hated the guilt, most of all.
"He's seen better days," said Ivan.
Bishop crouched down to take a closer look. He disagreed. Johann Brahm had never looked so peaceful. An old grouch of a man, he was, with a grumbling voice coarse like gravel and furious brows. It was odd to see him this way. His wisps of salted hair framing his face, relaxed in its permanent slumber, and the wrinkles from a pinched scowl were now smooth into a face that seemed to be stolen from a man a decade younger. He was so still.
Well, of course. He was a dead man, after all.
"I think he looks quite dapper."
"Only you could laugh in the face of death." Ivan grimaced down at the body that lay between them. "I'm not sure I'll ever get used to it."
"I pray that you don't." There was a small smile of defeat on Bishop's face.
Death was well acquainted with Bishop and there were times when it even considered him to be a friend. It accompanied him at every stage of his life, twenty-three years of biting at the back of his heels like a pest. It was tiresome, to say the least.
He looked over to Ivan, a person that was actually worthy of being called a friend, and frowned. The man's face was paling.
"Can I ask you something?" Ivan's voice was but a whisper, eyes darting to the street.
"Sure, but you don't have to worry. No one will see us here."
They were in the middle of a narrow alley, just ten paces from an old apartment building. It was nestled between Upper and Lower Drona, the complex serving as a border between two separate entities, two realms that remained in a parallel existence.
There was a stench familiar to Lower Drona that flooded the alley. It was of something rotting, something that must have been dead for much longer than Mr. Brahms. Ivan used to pinch his nose at first, but the smell of rot had a habit of clinging to clothes, to hair, the skin. It was a leech the moment it met you and it would stay long after your time expired in this world.
In the not so far distance, a woman with hair braided down to her waist stumbled into the light of the street and disappeared as soon as she came. She didn't so much as glance into the alley that enveloped the two living men and their dead companion.
There were two things learned by the residents of Lower Drona: one, there was no escaping the stench, even if you scrub your skin red and raw to rid yourself of it. And two, it was unwise to peer into the unknown. Not many could afford even a glance into the dark.
"Have we gone too far?"
"Isn't it a bit late to be asking that?" What was it now, their fourth or fifth murder as a team? He hadn't been asked this before, not even the first time.
"I mean, do you think-" Ivan twisted his fingers together. "Is there someone out there that can forgive us?"
There was a time where Bishop asked himself that same question. It was after that night, the one he thought of when the sun rose high in the morning and the one that haunted him in the last moments before sleeping.
