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jack_babalonWe all know the name of the ‘Club’. The one whose name can never be spoken. For that is its law, one of many to be sure. Those who fail to observe this law suffer full revocation of their membership privileges. A loss that not only prohibits a transgressor from ever making a future appearance, but acts retroactively so as to wipe all memory of its existence from their past. The moment you whisper its name out loud it is gone forever. Instead, those who know simply refer to it as the ‘Club’.
Though I wasn’t a member, I did have the honor of being one of the few names stitched across the broad flayed back that served as a living guest list.
I got the invite by hand delivery. I was walking through the Little Pentacle District doing some casual window shopping and book store perusals. There was a young lady handing out flyers. Gutter chic with make-up melted across a face frozen with indifference. Mechanically she handed the flyers to passer-bys, who looked down to discover a white backdrop with the words – “YOU DON’T BELONG HERE!” – written in small text across the middle. These were usually discarded immediately and vanished into thin air before they struck the concrete. When I reached her she attempted something she thought might resemble a smile and promptly thrusted a flyer into the front of my pants.
Instinctively I stepped back, pulled it out and looked down.
A card. The High Priestess. Waite not Thoth.
I look up and I’m already there.
The Club.
Through the massive oak and wrought iron gates a witch cackle, a haunted scream, a devil rhythm blend into a single banshee song that escapes on a sonic gust to go flitting into the stars hanging over a violet sky. The doorman stood before it. Doberman headed and thick arms crossed. Upon noticing me he began to growl. The street beneath me shook, immediately waking the shadows from the permanent twilight of the Western Lands to send them scurrying down the winding alleys and through the cracks of abandoned windows.
I hold up the ‘flyer’, Priestess forward over my left eye.
The doorman’s growl settles down into the rumble of a swallowed storm. A nod of his long black snout and he steps aside. The doors open and I step through.
***
Drinks don’t come cheap at the ‘Club’. Each one costs exactly one secret. The depth of the secret determines the strength of the drink. I start off light – a whisper of a kiss stolen at a distant birthday party from an old friend’s girlfriend. For a tip I leave my pooh-bear’s name, which draws an impressed smile from the black-cat faced bartender.
I take a seat and wait. Obviously I’ve been summoned, but by whom remains a mystery. Though familiar with the layout nevertheless I case the place on the down low. The floor is packed. Everyone dressed in their best silhouette. Strobe lights flicker sepia lightning - each bolt fired trapped in the stagnant smoke haze shrouding the crowd. Through the gloom a swarm of orange fireflies float off the ends of restless cigarettes. Before the crescent shaped island of tables, on whose shoreline I waited, past the floor and on the opposite wall there is a small wooden guard tower straight out of a World War 2 film that serves as the DJ booth. It’s legs are barb wired, the window is lined with sand bags and the retractable ladder has been drawn. Behind the turret of .50 caliber machine gun, the DJ watches over the floor. With each shift of song the DJ changes shape, taking on the myriad god-forms embedded into each track. As s/he mixes hir way through the set, hir avatars overlap into unique hybrid deities – crocodile butterflies and whirlwind angels accompany incendiary rhythms.
I’m tempted to go out there and dance, but I’m not sure if I would ever find my way back if I did. Some of the Club’s members have been stuck out there for years, some since the early 80’s it’s reckoned, each one trapped until the DJ plays the secret song that will release them from the floor’s spell. Of course that could just be a rumor, but where there’s smoke machines...
... there she is.
Void-Baby. Real name unknown. She takes a seat from across the table. When she does so the High Priestess card crumbles up under an invisible heat. We used to have what some would call a relationship of sorts. It was a relationship very much similar to the one shared between lion and gazelle. That is if the lion and the gazelle had agreed to a drunken evening of fever fucking before their grand chase the next day.
The only problem was I was never sure which of us was supposed to be the lion.
“S’up, Vo?” I ask taking blatant delight in being the only man alive who can call her that and still walk the next day.
“Jack... you came?” this was the first time she ever said these words to me, in and out of the bedroom, without sounding disappointed.
“How could I refuse?”
“I’ll never tell.”
“There you go, then.” I sip my drink, pausing dramatically to light a smoke and with a shrug of a single shoulder – “So you summon me here for a reason?”
“You don’t think your company is sufficient cause for a call?”
“Vo, I can barely stand to be around myself... so if you’re looking to... ‘dance’... I can think of a dozen better places than this. Places where folks aren’t out to kill me.”
“Ah, yes... what’s her face... the drummer from the Panzer Sluts? You never did call her back as I recall.” Vo giggles with coquettish scandal.
“Don’t really wanna get into it.”
“Of course not.”
A loaded moment passes, one filling us in a bubble of silence that the music can’t penetrate. I scan the floor for a zaftig battle tank in knee-high boots - “She here?”
“No.”
“Good.” I relax and turn back to her. She’s all grins and blinks with chin cradled in the palms of her hands. She’s aged since we first met and for the better. The weight filling in the curves the meth once slimmed. Though she’s still got those dark rings around the eyes and that slight scent of broken promises about her.
“So?” I break the impasse.
“So?” She repeats playfully echoing my tone.
“You know, I might not have enough mana to get here on my own, but I still know enough tricks to get back out. In fact all I have to say is...”
“Okay, look” she lays a hand over mine pinning the next word out of my mouth to the tongue, “I did call you here for a reason. Follow me and we’ll talk.”
She gets up. I sit still, blank as a page and still waiting for more.
“What?” she huffs.
“Bad things happen when we ‘talk’.”
She bites her lower lip and nods at the wisdom of this –
“True. But, aren’t you at least a little bit curious?”
My turn to nod thoughtfully.
“’Kay...” I agree rising up reluctantly and wave my drink at her like an incantation, “But the next one’s on you.”
***
Zero Room – the “Club’s” play n’ peep dungeon.
A naked woman dangles upside down from the ceiling. Blindfolded with black silk stocking. Thick ropes suspend and coil around her body. Serpentine squeeze around pierced breasts and throat amongst other places. Her mouth is stretched out into an unnatural ‘o’ from which spews a river of circuitry wire that leads to a speaker directly below her. Through it and just under the music you can hear the crackle of a voice moaning in orgiastic pleasure. Around her a pack of potbellied ape-men with camera lenses protruding through yellowed teeth snap and film the hung woman. As they do so they circle around her, crouching and standing on tippy-toes to capture the fatal shot.
Vo stands there transfixed. A polite cough from me nudges her concentration off target.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
Another shrug, believe me I got a whole lexicon of them - “Sorbet karate ain’t my thing, I guess.”
“You mean ‘Shibari’?”
“Whatever... you had something to tell me, well shoot. I don’t think anyone here is paying us much attention.”
“Always in a rush, eh Jack?” she laughs.
“You know you only got ‘til I finish this drink ‘fore I walk out of here.”
“Fine...” she grabs my hand and leads me to a darkened corner in the room.
She leans in and whispers – “Are you still in the ‘Game’?”
“Freelance... but yeah.”
“Well then...” her smile flashes through the shadows, “... I have a small proposal for you.”
Though I wasn’t a member, I did have the honor of being one of the few names stitched across the broad flayed back that served as a living guest list.
I got the invite by hand delivery. I was walking through the Little Pentacle District doing some casual window shopping and book store perusals. There was a young lady handing out flyers. Gutter chic with make-up melted across a face frozen with indifference. Mechanically she handed the flyers to passer-bys, who looked down to discover a white backdrop with the words – “YOU DON’T BELONG HERE!” – written in small text across the middle. These were usually discarded immediately and vanished into thin air before they struck the concrete. When I reached her she attempted something she thought might resemble a smile and promptly thrusted a flyer into the front of my pants.
Instinctively I stepped back, pulled it out and looked down.
A card. The High Priestess. Waite not Thoth.
I look up and I’m already there.
The Club.
Through the massive oak and wrought iron gates a witch cackle, a haunted scream, a devil rhythm blend into a single banshee song that escapes on a sonic gust to go flitting into the stars hanging over a violet sky. The doorman stood before it. Doberman headed and thick arms crossed. Upon noticing me he began to growl. The street beneath me shook, immediately waking the shadows from the permanent twilight of the Western Lands to send them scurrying down the winding alleys and through the cracks of abandoned windows.
I hold up the ‘flyer’, Priestess forward over my left eye.
The doorman’s growl settles down into the rumble of a swallowed storm. A nod of his long black snout and he steps aside. The doors open and I step through.
Drinks don’t come cheap at the ‘Club’. Each one costs exactly one secret. The depth of the secret determines the strength of the drink. I start off light – a whisper of a kiss stolen at a distant birthday party from an old friend’s girlfriend. For a tip I leave my pooh-bear’s name, which draws an impressed smile from the black-cat faced bartender.
I take a seat and wait. Obviously I’ve been summoned, but by whom remains a mystery. Though familiar with the layout nevertheless I case the place on the down low. The floor is packed. Everyone dressed in their best silhouette. Strobe lights flicker sepia lightning - each bolt fired trapped in the stagnant smoke haze shrouding the crowd. Through the gloom a swarm of orange fireflies float off the ends of restless cigarettes. Before the crescent shaped island of tables, on whose shoreline I waited, past the floor and on the opposite wall there is a small wooden guard tower straight out of a World War 2 film that serves as the DJ booth. It’s legs are barb wired, the window is lined with sand bags and the retractable ladder has been drawn. Behind the turret of .50 caliber machine gun, the DJ watches over the floor. With each shift of song the DJ changes shape, taking on the myriad god-forms embedded into each track. As s/he mixes hir way through the set, hir avatars overlap into unique hybrid deities – crocodile butterflies and whirlwind angels accompany incendiary rhythms.
I’m tempted to go out there and dance, but I’m not sure if I would ever find my way back if I did. Some of the Club’s members have been stuck out there for years, some since the early 80’s it’s reckoned, each one trapped until the DJ plays the secret song that will release them from the floor’s spell. Of course that could just be a rumor, but where there’s smoke machines...
... there she is.
Void-Baby. Real name unknown. She takes a seat from across the table. When she does so the High Priestess card crumbles up under an invisible heat. We used to have what some would call a relationship of sorts. It was a relationship very much similar to the one shared between lion and gazelle. That is if the lion and the gazelle had agreed to a drunken evening of fever fucking before their grand chase the next day.
The only problem was I was never sure which of us was supposed to be the lion.
“S’up, Vo?” I ask taking blatant delight in being the only man alive who can call her that and still walk the next day.
“Jack... you came?” this was the first time she ever said these words to me, in and out of the bedroom, without sounding disappointed.
“How could I refuse?”
“I’ll never tell.”
“There you go, then.” I sip my drink, pausing dramatically to light a smoke and with a shrug of a single shoulder – “So you summon me here for a reason?”
“You don’t think your company is sufficient cause for a call?”
“Vo, I can barely stand to be around myself... so if you’re looking to... ‘dance’... I can think of a dozen better places than this. Places where folks aren’t out to kill me.”
“Ah, yes... what’s her face... the drummer from the Panzer Sluts? You never did call her back as I recall.” Vo giggles with coquettish scandal.
“Don’t really wanna get into it.”
“Of course not.”
A loaded moment passes, one filling us in a bubble of silence that the music can’t penetrate. I scan the floor for a zaftig battle tank in knee-high boots - “She here?”
“No.”
“Good.” I relax and turn back to her. She’s all grins and blinks with chin cradled in the palms of her hands. She’s aged since we first met and for the better. The weight filling in the curves the meth once slimmed. Though she’s still got those dark rings around the eyes and that slight scent of broken promises about her.
“So?” I break the impasse.
“So?” She repeats playfully echoing my tone.
“You know, I might not have enough mana to get here on my own, but I still know enough tricks to get back out. In fact all I have to say is...”
“Okay, look” she lays a hand over mine pinning the next word out of my mouth to the tongue, “I did call you here for a reason. Follow me and we’ll talk.”
She gets up. I sit still, blank as a page and still waiting for more.
“What?” she huffs.
“Bad things happen when we ‘talk’.”
She bites her lower lip and nods at the wisdom of this –
“True. But, aren’t you at least a little bit curious?”
My turn to nod thoughtfully.
“’Kay...” I agree rising up reluctantly and wave my drink at her like an incantation, “But the next one’s on you.”
Zero Room – the “Club’s” play n’ peep dungeon.
A naked woman dangles upside down from the ceiling. Blindfolded with black silk stocking. Thick ropes suspend and coil around her body. Serpentine squeeze around pierced breasts and throat amongst other places. Her mouth is stretched out into an unnatural ‘o’ from which spews a river of circuitry wire that leads to a speaker directly below her. Through it and just under the music you can hear the crackle of a voice moaning in orgiastic pleasure. Around her a pack of potbellied ape-men with camera lenses protruding through yellowed teeth snap and film the hung woman. As they do so they circle around her, crouching and standing on tippy-toes to capture the fatal shot.
Vo stands there transfixed. A polite cough from me nudges her concentration off target.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
Another shrug, believe me I got a whole lexicon of them - “Sorbet karate ain’t my thing, I guess.”
“You mean ‘Shibari’?”
“Whatever... you had something to tell me, well shoot. I don’t think anyone here is paying us much attention.”
“Always in a rush, eh Jack?” she laughs.
“You know you only got ‘til I finish this drink ‘fore I walk out of here.”
“Fine...” she grabs my hand and leads me to a darkened corner in the room.
She leans in and whispers – “Are you still in the ‘Game’?”
“Freelance... but yeah.”
“Well then...” her smile flashes through the shadows, “... I have a small proposal for you.”