01-24-2016, 08:36 PM
[Retro, before Stuff Happened]
The time? Is somewhere between 2 and 5am, any more than that doesn’t really matter. Hell, even that doesn’t really matter.
The place? Downtown. Where the main clubs turn the lights up and close the doors at 2am, other after-hours clubs step in to take over. Omega is just such a club. Three floors, three different DJs running at once, three completely different moods. Want something modern? Something from the 80’s? Something less tied by time as the sound and the beat that runs through it? Well, this is your lucky night.
The place? Somewhere in the middle of the dancefloor, where the dance DJ is doing a pretty good job of riding the crowd. It’s crowded, but then would it really be anything else as a Friday night slides into a Saturday morning? It’s crowded, so there isn’t much space between people. For the more academically-inclined, this could be a study in Brownian motion. Body meets body, each has its movement reflected and deflected. There’s no dancing around handbags. The house lights are dark, but coloured lights and lasers and diffuse smoke are enough to see by.
Somewhere in that crowd is Alex. Somewhere in that crowd is a man with black combats (red stripes scattered over the legs), with a t-shirt tucked into the back and a bottle of water sticking out of a pocket. He dances, arms overhead with glow sticks, bare torso slicked with perspiration. The room is warm, with the body heat of so many bodies being so active, so close together. Warm enough for the odour of fresh sweat to mingle with deodorant and alcohol and dry ice and cigarette-smoke pulled in on other clothes and cleaning products and countless other scents.
The music track changes, but it’s pretty seamless. There’s no dead air, no jarring transition from one track to another. A cheer goes up, but is quickly drowned out by the rising volume and tempo from the music.
Alex notices, but it’s more of a subliminal thing than a conscious change that alters the flow of his movement. The DJ may be riding the crowd tonight, but Alex is riding the music. The music, the beat, the movement. Maybe Sera was right and this is his ritual. His way of finding the part of himself that has proven so elusive over the past years. Maybe this is something he will consider later.
For now, though, all there is is the music and the dance, the crowd and the combination of sensations that settles his conscious, considering, questioning mind. For now, it’s just him and the part of the universe that this opens up to him.
For now, there is still no sign of anything changing inside him.
But, for now, that doesn’t matter.
The time? Is somewhere between 2 and 5am, any more than that doesn’t really matter. Hell, even that doesn’t really matter.
The place? Downtown. Where the main clubs turn the lights up and close the doors at 2am, other after-hours clubs step in to take over. Omega is just such a club. Three floors, three different DJs running at once, three completely different moods. Want something modern? Something from the 80’s? Something less tied by time as the sound and the beat that runs through it? Well, this is your lucky night.
The place? Somewhere in the middle of the dancefloor, where the dance DJ is doing a pretty good job of riding the crowd. It’s crowded, but then would it really be anything else as a Friday night slides into a Saturday morning? It’s crowded, so there isn’t much space between people. For the more academically-inclined, this could be a study in Brownian motion. Body meets body, each has its movement reflected and deflected. There’s no dancing around handbags. The house lights are dark, but coloured lights and lasers and diffuse smoke are enough to see by.
Somewhere in that crowd is Alex. Somewhere in that crowd is a man with black combats (red stripes scattered over the legs), with a t-shirt tucked into the back and a bottle of water sticking out of a pocket. He dances, arms overhead with glow sticks, bare torso slicked with perspiration. The room is warm, with the body heat of so many bodies being so active, so close together. Warm enough for the odour of fresh sweat to mingle with deodorant and alcohol and dry ice and cigarette-smoke pulled in on other clothes and cleaning products and countless other scents.
The music track changes, but it’s pretty seamless. There’s no dead air, no jarring transition from one track to another. A cheer goes up, but is quickly drowned out by the rising volume and tempo from the music.
Alex notices, but it’s more of a subliminal thing than a conscious change that alters the flow of his movement. The DJ may be riding the crowd tonight, but Alex is riding the music. The music, the beat, the movement. Maybe Sera was right and this is his ritual. His way of finding the part of himself that has proven so elusive over the past years. Maybe this is something he will consider later.
For now, though, all there is is the music and the dance, the crowd and the combination of sensations that settles his conscious, considering, questioning mind. For now, it’s just him and the part of the universe that this opens up to him.
For now, there is still no sign of anything changing inside him.
But, for now, that doesn’t matter.