This story is the second part of a multi-part series. I recommend reading part one first. This story contains incest and mentions of sexual assault. All characters depicted are 18 years of age or older.
Part two ended up a bit longer than part 1. Hope you like it.
Chapter 4
Christian's basement was much as I remembered it from the last time I was here a couple years ago. We met in our first semester at college and hit it off. He was one of the only people in the school who was into black metal, and he immediately recognized my Emperor shirt. He had told me he played guitar and asked if I played any instruments. I mentioned my dream of doing vocals in a black metal band, and we decided then and there to start a band. We then recruited his friend Xavier and another mutual friend, Daveed, into our quintet. We got lucky with Xavier as his cousin was a promoter in the Chicago metal scene who could get us into smaller shows. Dorm and basement shows mainly. We had even put out a demo. Then roughly a year later, before picking up more steam, Daveed, the drummer at the time, had got caught texting minors, among other equally shitty things. After throwing him from the band, we never got another drummer and drifted apart until maybe a week ago when Christian messaged me on Instagram about getting the band back together.
Xavier's sister was supposedly a drum prodigy. So here we were, sitting in Christian's basement, waiting for the other two prospective members of our band to show up. I sat on the floor in front of the chest freezer, and Marina, my twin sister, lay on a blanket next to me, head on my knee as she scrolled TikTok on her phone.
"Alright," said Christian, coming down the stairs back into the basement. Marina looked over to where he entered. "Xavier said they're finding parking now. Wanna finish setting your rig up, Sylas? We'll run through Celestial Trappings and see how Kennedy does." Kennedy was Xavier's sister. I had only met her once, a year ago, at a family function at college. She was 19 now and had played in a few punk and grindcore bands here and there. Xavier swore she could keep up, so we figured we would give her a chance.
I patted Marina's head, and she lifted it so I could get up. A few minutes later, footsteps descending the stairs announced new arrivals. I finished hooking up my mic and looked over. Xavier entered the basement and looked around at Christian, who was going over his amps and pedals for his guitar, and then me, as I was feeding cords into the speakers scattered around the basement. He nodded and took his bass guitar off his back. His sister, Kennedy, entered behind him. She was shorter than Marina, maybe 5' even. She wore a thin black zip-up hoodie, a red sports bra, black bike shorts, and some beat-up pink Converse. Her hair was cut into a choppy mullet and dyed pink. She knelt to go through the duffel bag she carried.
"This is Kennedy." Said Xavier, gesturing at her. She raised a hand and mock saluted without looking up from her bag. We all looked like what you'd expect of a black metal band. Christian was squat and stocky, with long blonde hair and a big beard. He was covered in tattoos and smoked like a chimney.
On the other hand, Xavier was tall and thin with a clean-shaven face and long jet-black hair. I was between the two in height and medium build. I didn't have nearly as many tattoos as Christian, but my right arm was fully covered. I usually kept my long brown hair tied up loosely, but tonight, it was down. I generally wore well-worn black jeans, Doc Martens, and band shirts in various shades of black.
My sister and I had similar styles if not a similar build. She was rather tall for a woman, though, standing a few inches shorter than my 5' 10".
"Didn't you get some corpo job, Sylas?" Xavier asked as he hefted his bass on the strap over his shoulder.
"Nah. I was supposed to, but I dropped out of college like three weeks ago. Got picked up doing coding for a video game dev company. Sticking it to the man by making shitty indie games."
Xavier nodded as he plugged in his bass. Christian began hitting the pedals as he plugged in his guitar. He glanced at Kennedy, who was adjusting the seat height behind her drum kit.
"We're gonna go through Trappings. You got it?" he asked her. Kennedy put in her earplugs and gave him a thumbs-up with one hand as she twirled the drumstick in the other.
Christian hit a chord. The speakers blared as we blazed through one of our earliest songs, Celestial Trappings. The guitar was fast, chaotic, and discordant. Some described it as the sound of robots fucking a swarm of bees. Or a bag of screwdrivers thrown in a blender. To our surprise, Kennedy was a monster on the drums. She hit the drums like she was trying to kill them, and her blast beats were bone-shattering. The song was shorter at just under two minutes, and as the last note faded away, I looked around the room.
"Fuck yeah." Said Xavier.
Christian went right into another song, and Kennedy kept up the entire time. After twenty more minutes, we finished the final song of the night. Somewhere around the third song, Marina had put her phone away and sat up, back against the chest freezer, head bobbing with the tempo of the music. She grinned at me as I, sweaty and breathing heavy, unplugged my mic. Surprisingly, my throat didn't hurt from screaming into the mic for twenty minutes straight, even after a year or more of not doing vocals.
"Alright," said Christian as he put his guitar back in its case. I think we got something here." He grinned at Kennedy, who was tearing down her drum kit. She looked up neutrally and gave another thumbs-up before going back to what she had been doing.
We spent the next ten minutes putting away our instruments and cleaning up.
"So, anyone down for some drinks?" Asked Christian. "I got a few 6 packs in the fridge."
Xavier looked to Kennedy, who nodded.
"Yeah. We can hang for a bit." He said, placing his bass in its case and sliding it over by the wall.
"Not me. Marina has to be up early for school, and I'm her ride home. Rain check," I said. After some polite goodbyes, we took our leave.
The drive home was pretty silent. My ears still rang from the music. At a red light, I felt eyes burning into the side of my head. I turned to see Marina, back against the passenger door, looking at me. She was cross-legged, one leg under the other, as she perched in the passenger seat. The seat belt strained between her breasts, catching my eye.
"That was fun." She said as she stretched a leg and placed it across my lap. I took one hand off the wheel and put it on her knee.
"Ma'am, this is dangerous. What if we get into a wreck? Your leg will snap like a twig."
"Then don't get into a wreck, dear brother," she said with a smile.
I rolled my eyes and snorted as the light turned green, keeping my hand on her knee.
