'No attempts for two hours! It's landing. Fuck. Fuck.'

With the plane rapidly losing ground, Rita kicked and punched the door in frustration.

Pepelito thumped his tail on the ground, grunting in discomfort as the pressure in his ears increased. He lay with his head between his hooves and his nose on the ground. Chicero, who was in less physical discomfort, having experienced long journeys before, reached through the bars and licked his back. It took away most of Pepelito's tension, but not the pain in his ears, the hunger and thirst rising inside him.

He watched Rita with his eyes half closed and wedged his front legs under the bars. In one hand, she clutched the metal pole in front of her. Even understanding the differences between humans, knowing she wasn't a threat, just after food, water or a way out, her stance made him wary. Chicero made to get up, and Pepelito lifted his head to nuzzle him through the bars, warning him off. Rita and Chicero were scared of each other. The thought of them fighting worried him.

Pepelito wanted to convince Chicero that Rita was more like a small cow who walked on two legs. What happened with the pole had upset him. It hadn't helped. But it had to be an accident, or because she was scared; far smaller than they were, she had no horns and could not defend herself.

'He can't get away with this. The police will be waiting on the ground. Won't they?' Rita gulped as she pulled herself underneath the barrier and crawled close to him. Her hand was that bit too tense and hard as it rested against his back; he sat up on his front feet, wishing for once he could lie on his own. She really was frightened. The ride became bumpier; the air felt hotter. The wheels slammed into the runway. She tripped and fell forwards, scraping her hands on the plastic wall. On the other side of the bars, Chicero's feet squeaked against the mat, thudding against the barrier as the plane came to a sudden stop. Worried and sad, Pepelito glanced at him, and back to Rita.

He was now the dominant bull in this 'herd', the one they both turned to for support and protection. He'd never been at the bottom but he'd never been anywhere near the top.

But there he was.

It was a strange feeling.

'Fuck you, Henry,' Rita spat, giving the camera the finger. He couldn't see, hear or smell anyone. Who was she talking to? The container jerked up and the plastic wall slid away, revealing a tunnel lined with cats' eye LEDs and a dim light at the bottom, illuminating a space he couldn't really see.

Chicero took a frightened glance at Rita through the bars, before bounding down the tunnel, his feet skittering on the metal ramp. Pepelito told him to hesitate, but his friend just wanted out of these cramped, wet, miserable surroundings. The rope tying the bull to the wall soon hung by a thread, before snapping where Rita had attempted to cut it. Pepelito tensed up, feeling ill, hungry and thirsty, as slamming metal doors muffled the sound of Chicero running. The soapy taste of the water in the bucket lingered on his tongue.

Pepelito took a few halting steps down the metal ramp after his friend. Divided by more metal bars, the ramp was too narrow for Rita to walk alongside him. She stood in the entrance to the plane. The passage was too narrow for him to turn around; he edged forward one or two paces with his head down, anxious. He made a low noise in his throat. No reply came from Chicero; he scraped the ground hard, kicking up non-existent soil to scare predators he couldn't see.

Bad things happened here.

Rita took a step forward, clutching the metal pole, and the door to the aircraft slammed shut behind her. She jumped; the vibration reverberated around the tunnel. Disorientated by the sudden noise, Pepelito bolted to the bottom of the ramp, his feet tearing the thin carpet at the end of the tunnel. He winced in shock as his horns collided with the wall, ripping a hole and exposing the cavity insulation inside. Looking back, he saw Rita no longer had the pole in her hands. Pieces of plaster settled in his nose and ears. He sneezed, turning away to follow Chicero's scent. He couldn't see Rita when he looked back, but he could hear her behind him.

As he took a definitive step off the metal ramp, he was plunged into darkness. A grid slammed behind him. Rita's footsteps faded. He could smell a packet of crisps and a half eaten roll on the ground, but no water and nothing he liked to eat. He picked up the crisp packet in his mouth and chewed it, swallowing most of it before eating the roll. It was better than nothing.

'Don't just stand there. Move. Bad bull.' Something poked him hard on one of the scars Castella's assistant had inflicted with a far longer spear, from the safety of a half dead horse. They'd had hiding places around the edges of the ring where he couldn't reach or see them. He'd had no help and nowhere to hide. There had been only one of him and so many of them.

They still couldn't do what the crowd had screamed for.

'Bad bull,' the unseen, unfamiliar man snarled, prodding him again.

He trotted towards the light at the end of the passage, and another grille slammed behind him from above. This is all they know how to do, he thought. And they couldn't even do that. They didn't want to face him.  

The horrible one who hurt Rita was scared to even look at him.

The tunnel opened out into a pen like the one he'd been in that first time with Ladron and the others, but empty. Hard soil and a sprinkling of straw covered the concrete underneath. There were a set of strip lights on the ceiling, and on the walls hung stags' heads, antique rifles and paintings depicting hunting scenes. It was dark and cold. He walked around a few times and then lay down to sleep, tired and disorientated from the flight.

*

He could tell something was wrong when Chicero bounded into the pen from a door on the opposite side. As the two bulls greeted and groomed one another, Pepelito realised his friend's long, sharp horns had been 'touched up'. They'd also dropped something heavy on his back. Filled with sadness at his friend's pain and his own failure to prevent it, Pepelito licked behind Chicero's ears before lying down with him by the wall. Pepelito rested with his hooves touching his friend's back. The pain in his own right horn had lessened since he hit it against the box.

He could still use his horns to hurt them, given enough force.

He'd done it before, the night Maribel killed the guy who'd attacked him with a spear. Bleeding on the ground, Castella's assistant had shrieked in agony, screaming for an ambulance and crying for his mum.

Chicero was silent, crying with shock and pain. Don't be scared of them, Pepelito told him. He nuzzled his head on Chicero's back, gave him a lick and snuggled closer, keeping warm against the cold air in the basement.

Something hit the ground with a thud. The noise of shouting and clapping was deafening. Something bad was happening. He couldn't move or see anything; all he could smell was blood. It was hot and the sides of the cell touched his skin. Ladron stood up for him. He seemed so strong. But he was bleeding, alone and scared.

And Pepelito couldn't help his friend.

You won't die like that, he told Chicero, I won't let you. But as he comforted his sensitive, shy friend, the terrible scenes playing in his mind on repeat no longer filled Pepelito with fear and sadness. Instead, a new, unfamiliar emotion overwhelmed him with its all-consuming intensity.

Hate.

Eventually the other bull sat up, licking Pepelito's nose gratefully. While Chicero brushed his ear, Pepelito tensed, hearing an unpleasant voice from behind the enclosure wall opposite him. Henry was there with a group of Taurine Club aficionados.

He was the one who hurt Rita.

'When do you want to get them into the torils?' the hotel owner's son was asking.

'We'll start at 7.30, so possibly noon. Whenever the other bulls arrive, or once the stable hands bring over those old nags of yours, Rupert. Certainly after breakfast. Remind me, Edwin, what is it again?' Henry said.

'Did Father not give you a menu? You've had our classic full English breakfast. You could enjoy eggs Benedict, or our champagne breakfast selection – the smoked salmon is quite delicious. Alternatively, we do have a Spanish-seeming option, given the occasion...'

'Oh yes, I remember. I'll choose shortly. As I was saying, the design of your father's bullring is truly spectacular. What I particularly appreciate is that the doors and ceilings are big enough, a man on horseback can enter this complex without difficulty and have a good go at the bull,' Henry gloated. Chicero was crying again, cringing in fear, bigger and stronger but so much more vulnerable. Pepelito laid his head on his back, letting him know how much he was loved.

And where was Rita?

At least he couldn't smell any blood.

'These two will be a piece of cake to dispatch, compared to those at the Arruza Institute a few years ago. Look at them,' Henry laughed.

Lord Owenstoft nodded. 'Yes. They were Miuras as I recall, whereas I think Pepelito is a Domecq. A McDomecq as it were. They're all the same, are they not? Docile and witless.'

'According to Revista Taurina, Pepelito is Domecq crossed with Jandilla. Bred for combat, yet failing to embody their purpose,' Edwin sneered, to more pompous laughs. Something hard hit Pepelito in the side; he felt the momentary shock, then the impact. A golf ball bounced onto the ground beside him. Someone had hit him with a catapult. He pushed himself up, breathing hard, making sure he stayed between the aficionados and Chicero, blocking their view with his body. He pounded towards the wall with his head lowered, feeling nothing but hate.

'I say! Perhaps there's a fighting spirit in there after all!' Henry laughed but his voice was high pitched and alarmed. He took several rapid steps back as Pepelito flung himself at the wall and scrabbled, trying to scale it with his hooves, to hurt them the way they'd hurt him, to kill them the way they'd killed so many.

It was just that bit too high to jump. Pepelito paced backwards, kicking up dust so hard it scratched his feet, staring them down, before bounding back again. This time he landed his front feet on the edge, poised to leap over the high, smooth wall. But his left leg slipped, squashed between the wall and his belly. Pepelito gave up and slunk back to where Chicero was lying. Don't be scared, he told him, not of them.

'This calls for some champagne breakfast, I rather think!' Henry's voice was full of fake bravado, as the club members disappeared out of sight, giggling like the overgrown public schoolchildren they still were.

Pepelito wasn't scared. He knew without any doubt what was coming. This time, he was ready.

He knew what he had to do.

AN: As he is a bull, I think we know what that is. 😏