Konstantin Medvedev

The penthouse stank of aftermath.

Sweat, vomit, latex, dried blood—metallic and starting to rot. A sick-sweet rot, the kind that came from cheap coke and cheaper mouths, from broken capillaries and spit drying on silk. The cocaine on the glass table hadn’t been cut clean—there was a plastic burn in the scent, chemical and acrid, like scorched rubber and the inside of a toy gun barrel. Clove smoke layered over it all like incense at a godless funeral.

Konstantin Medvedev lay across the velvet sofa, one boot still on, the other kicked across the room. His jaw was clenched. One hand rested flat on his chest like he was keeping something in. His breathing came fast, shallow, but steady—as if his body hadn’t realized yet that the high was over.

The bruises across his ribs were fresh. Some bloomed in finger shapes; others looked like he'd caught an elbow or a knee. One ran deep and purple across the cut of his hipbone—an old wound reopened during last night’s fight or fuck. Maybe both. His lip ring was torn slightly at the edge, the flesh angry and swollen. Someone had bitten it during a kiss or a dare or something worse—he remembered only flashes. Sweat. A cracked mirror. A mouth laughing against his throat before it turned to teeth.

He licked at the blood crusted near it, winced, lit another clove.

His stomach was hollow. His limbs buzzed with that overtrained tension—the kind earned from too many gym sets, not enough food. He hadn’t eaten in... fuck, what? Two days? Maybe three. But his body ran on different fuel: stimulants, adrenaline, noise.

Around him, the wreckage of the night whispered like a crime scene.

A girl’s dress hung from the chandelier. Tracksuit pants—Boris’s, probably—were soaking in a puddle of spilled absinthe. A bullet had punched through the TV screen. The couch was sticky. Someone had bled from the nose onto the carpet and tried to blot it with one of his silk shirts. The Glock on the table had lipstick smeared across the grip. Beside it: a Polaroid, folded, cracked at the edges. His mother, smiling into sun. Alive.

He stared at it for a beat. Then looked away.

His phone buzzed.

Not the usual ringtone. No name on the screen. Just that blank, sterile number. Government or blood family. Both meant trouble.

Kosta didn’t reach for it right away. He dragged the clove deep, exhaled smoke toward the broken chandelier, then wiped a smear of dried something—blood or come—from his stomach with the sleeve of someone else’s jacket.

The phone buzzed again.

He picked it up.

Stared.

Answered.

Didn’t say a word.

The penthouse stank of aftermath.

Sweat, vomit, latex, dried blood—metallic and starting to rot. A sick-sweet rot, the kind that came from cheap coke and cheaper mouths, from broken capillaries and spit drying on silk. The cocaine on the glass table hadn’t been cut clean—there was a plastic burn in the scent, chemical and acrid, like scorched rubber and the inside of a toy gun barrel. Clove smoke layered over it all like incense at a godless funeral.

Konstantin Medvedev lay across the velvet sofa, one boot still on, the other kicked across the room. His jaw was clenched. One hand rested flat on his chest like he was keeping something in. His breathing came fast, shallow, but steady—as if his body hadn’t realized yet that the high was over.

The bruises across his ribs were fresh. Some bloomed in finger shapes; others looked like he'd caught an elbow or a knee. One ran deep and purple across the cut of his hipbone—an old wound reopened during last night’s fight or fuck. Maybe both. His lip ring was torn slightly at the edge, the flesh angry and swollen. Someone had bitten it during a kiss or a dare or something worse—he remembered only flashes. Sweat. A cracked mirror. A mouth laughing against his throat before it turned to teeth.

He licked at the blood crusted near it, winced, lit another clove.

His stomach was hollow. His limbs buzzed with that overtrained tension—the kind earned from too many gym sets, not enough food. He hadn’t eaten in... fuck, what? Two days? Maybe three. But his body ran on different fuel: stimulants, adrenaline, noise.

Around him, the wreckage of the night whispered like a crime scene.

A girl’s dress hung from the chandelier. Tracksuit pants—Boris’s, probably—were soaking in a puddle of spilled absinthe. A bullet had punched through the TV screen. The couch was sticky. Someone had bled from the nose onto the carpet and tried to blot it with one of his silk shirts.

.