Bishop Takes Knight - Knight takes Bishop
Part Three
The limo was already running for the three when they arrived at the bottom of the lift. They stepped into the sedan with Anthony holding the door for them and in no-time at all they were off into the London night and all that it promised. There was certain hypnotic
something
about that evening that wickedly pulled them down the streets and into that night; an otherworldly sort of thing, where normal rules and roles were expected to be cast aside, like the corporate costumes they'd been wearing only a short time before. The illogically random became the routine, the calculated gave way to the compulsively spontaneous, and repressed propriety yielded to the primal and the base.
It was therefore a surprise when the black sedan stopped on the corner of Charing Cross and Shaftesbury. Annette told Anthony that this spot would be good for where they were going and that they could "get out here." For Brad this was all very strange. A spot like this meant you were on your way to a theater or you wanted to go get a bite to eat in a few hundred meters but not to go clubbing,
(at least not dressed as they were).
He was puzzled when he got out from the car with the two women and he was puzzled when they began walking with Shelby leading the way and Annette walking behind her on his arm.
Shelby seemed to know exactly where they were headed and she skipped ahead like a merry little dryad; jumping about here and there on the side-walk. To Brad she appeared to be more like a teenager on far too much sugar rather than somebody who was told only a few hours before that she'd be made a direct report to a senior executive at Praetorian Group. There was a strange duality about her that was tolerated by Annette (who even went so far as to feed and foster it) and at the same time it mystified and perplexed Brad who considered the young woman to be quite a rare breed indeed!
The three turned a corner and headed up a narrower street that appeared to have seen much better days. There were several buildings that had business space FOR RENT and with signs saying as much in their plate glass windows. The few businesses that had hung-on had long since closed for the day, (their sliding metal fronts had been pulled down and locked until tomorrow);
with the exception of one.
Halfway up the street was a dingy little Chinese buffet sort of affair. It had a flashing gaudy neon sign with the words ALL YOU CAN EAT flashing like airport lighting; illuminating the otherwise dreary and unremarkable setting. Shelby motioned over her shoulder for Annette and Brad to "c'mon" like a little girl at an amusement wanting for the grown-ups to catch up while she waited to get on her favorite ride. She was actually bouncing up and down with excitement!
Brad looked at Shelby, he looked at the front of the establishment as the moved closer, and lastly he looked at his expensive club wear. He then shook his head incredulously. Annette merely smirked; she knew full well what was about to happen. It was a bit of "performance-art-meets-gimmick" and she was dying to see the young man's face!
Before they entered the restaurant; two young blonde women in matching red dresses (obviously overdressed as well for Chinese buffet), beat the trio to the door inside. They closed the door behind them. When the trio reached the door and entered the restaurant Brad's nose was immediately met by the smell of fried food and the usual bits of funk and indescribable other things that permeate such a greasy spoon .
A teenage Asian girl by the cash register asked them "How many." Shelby immediately donned her dark sunglasses and pointed at the floor. Annette nodded to the girl and donned her sunglasses, she pointed to the floor as well. She slapped Brad on the ass and said to the girl,
"The big cute one's with us dearie," she said. The girl nodded and pointed to stairs across the room that descended into a lower dining area. Annette spun around told Brad to get his shades on. He felt slightly silly but did so. Out came his sunglasses which immediately went up on his head as Shelby and Annette led the way for him through the late evening diners shoveling mouthfuls of food into their faces.
As they approached the stairs, Brad noticed the floor of the restaurant was in need of a good cleaning and it was rather sticky-going as he proceeded. It was filthy; almost as if he were walking across the floor of a men's room in and adult bookstore that required a good stout mopping! His sense of disgust only increased as he reached the stairs and began to descend. A foul smell of sweet and sour-whatever and spoiled food met his nose; becoming more self-evident as he reached the bottom of the lower level.
They were now in the lower dining area with Brad wondering why the health department allowed such a place to remain in business. Shelby motioned to the kitchen and Annette took Brad by the arm. The three walked between waitresses and a crowd of diners to the entrance of the busboy station. They turned a corner where they faced an open window.
An old Chinese man; most likely the head-dishwasher for the kitchen stood leaning over two trash barrels. He peered through the busboy window at them and noted their clothes and glasses. Shelby pointed at the wall around the corner from where they'd just turned (out of the sight of the other diners). He nodded to the girl and waited patiently as Shelby said to him,
"
We heard the duck is off tonight.
Can you show us something
-off the menu?"
Her question was met by a smile and a nod from the old man, who stepped on a button on the floor. Brad heard an electric motor sound somewhere in the wall behind him.
He turned to see the bare wall open and a dark passageway illuminated by black lights before him. Annette took him by the arm and Shelby again led the way. The door closes behind them and Brad felt silly once again; standing in a dark corridor lit by black lights and wearing sunglasses. He held onto Annette's arm not out of some chivalric sense of propriety but from a desire to not fall down and bust his bum as the trio now descended another set of stairs.
They rounded a corner and stopped in an anti-chamber with two large doors; a tall skinny man sitting in front of them. Beside him was a fire-extinguisher and a cellphone. Through the crack between the two doors, the
OOT! OOT! OOT!
musical pulse of a rave pounded and reverberated.
The tall blue-eyed bouncer viewed them coolly before he then recognized Annette and Shelby. Hugs were exchanged and small talk was made. He then turned to Brad.
"He is with you both?" he asked; checking out Brad's face and then his clothes and wrinkling his nose.
"It's alright Dmitri," Annette said, "I dressed him myself.
You don't like my taste in menswear?"
"Oh.. no Annette. NO!" the tall big-boned Cossack said peering back at her with electric baby blues that apologized profusely, "you know the deal though,
yes?
I have to look hard at what the men are wearing before they get in." Dmitri looked Brad up and down one more time and nodded his head telling her,
"It's ok... we have enough girls inside and he's bringing in the both of you...
plus his boots and shirt are good."
He turned and opened one of the double doors. Immediately there was a roar of noise as tremendously loud dance music mixed with the sound of people attempting to laugh and shout over it flooded the anti-chamber. Shelby led the way and Annette and Brad followed. The large blue-eyed Cossack stopped Brad two steps from inside the club with a powerful hand on his torso. He patted him on the face like he was a cute dog saying in heavy accented English,
"Your Mama dresses her cubs well my friend! Enjoy but don't stray too far from her... there are all sorts of dangerous felines in there that could eat you!" The towering rude Cossack laughed at his own joke and Brad stepped through the doors into an enormous whirling club that was bathed in noise, flashes of brilliant strobes, and stygian darkness. Three steps in and he caught up with Annette and Shelby who were waiting for him.
Brad glanced up on the wall directly in front of him. In gaudy paint that reflected black light he read, "Le Labyrinthe" or
The Labyrinth, in French
. He was in a rave club with a French name that nodded to a Greek myth below a Chinese restaurant in London. He also noted that a good many of the tragically hip and "oh so skinny" people in the establishment sported not only chic club attire but also some sort of dark sunglasses...
despite the almost creepy darkness.
For half a tick he considered the contradictions of it all before being seized by Annette's hand again and following Shelby as she led the way.
The club was aptly named. Not just dark and foreboding; it was almost surreal. Riddled with passages, it was like a rabbit warren that went from one subterranean bar to a dancefloor, and then on to other bars and dance floors. These were all off from the main dance floor; an immense sunken chamber of crushing sound with a sign above its entrance in stylized lettering that read,
"THE WELL OF SOULS.
" Clearly somebody loved the dramatic. Down in the "well" on an immense floor, the tragically chic danced somewhere beneath a heavy fog of dry ice; their heads and shoulders being all that was visible in darkness that was periodically broken up with flickering strobes and psychedelic lighting effects.
"I want to dance," announced Annette to Brad and Shelby. The pretty little noggin of the girl nodded and the three moved to the dance floor; now an ocean of undulating bodies sweat and dense fog; all punctuated by strobe lights and multicolored flashes.
The three stepped down into the gyrating pandemonium of the floor. Immediately it was as if they'd stepped into a pit of writhing snakes. Bodies were jammed packed together, thrashing and whipping violently in an undulating sweaty mass; a steady techno-tribal pounding urging them on like a deafening barbaric heartbeat! Brad now found that Shelby's hand had seized his as Annette had gotten away from him on the floor someplace. They had completely lost the boss in the fog and heaving bodies.
