Shattered bits of the popped bulb dusted the sleeping man. The only light now filtered out through the smoke-filled air of the club inside. The music pulsed on as Hatch cast a glance in the direction of the line. Nobody noticed the brief but intense moment with the ragman.
Nobody noticed as Hatch entered the club through the steel employee access either.
Fifteen
Hatch choked on the air. One of the cooks looked at her, conveying confusion and annoyance at her surprise arrival in the kitchen. Hatch threw her hands in the air and gyrated her hips with the music. She let out a loud, "Woohoo! Let's party!" In her best drunk-girl impression. Surprising even herself, she nailed the performance because the pout on the man's face instantly shifted into a gapped-tooth smile.
The cook ordered a busser to escort Hatch back to the main dance floor, but not before blowing Hatch a kiss which she playfully caught and stuffed into her pocket, staying in character until she was taken into the bar area. The busboy released his not so friendly grip and cast her back into the crowd of drunken clubbers.
Laser lights and smoke machines added their insanity to incessant vibrations echoing into the three-thousand square foot converted warehouse space. Nude girls danced in cages suspended at random intervals throughout the crowded space. The girls moved to the music's command, the drugs in their system undoubtedly contributing to their trancelike state. No Angela.
She continued her visual scan as she stepped further inside. A long bar stretched out to her right running the full length of the wall and dead ending on the other side where the front doors were located. Hatch pressed further into the room, slipping in and out among the undulating sweaty bodies lining her path.
The massive ventilation and air conditioning system centered above did little to alleviate the staggering swelter. Hatch's white t-shirt was becoming translucent, exposing the contours of her bra which a nearby club goer was admiring before getting jostled by a man of equal size behind him. The fight that erupted in the following seconds was like watching a silent western. Neither man backed down in the deafening drone. Without words, no resolution could be amicably agreed on for the accidental transgression and so the two men did what any neanderthal would do. Fight.
The man who'd been transfixed by the curvature of Hatch's breasts was the first to throw a punch. A wildly telegraphed right hook came in wide and should have been defended against. But it wasn't. The other man was so drunk, standing came at great effort and he was completely unprepared for the attack. And about five seconds late in his failed attempt to intercept the incoming fist that crashed into his nose.
Blood arced into the air and was caught by a yellow beam of light, giving it an orange glow before showering down on the man's girlfriend, who screamed. Bodies piled as more jumped into the fray.
Four bouncers, wearing skintight black t-shirts embossed with the red flame logo of the club, rushed the clump of people, and began indiscriminately delivering vicious beatings to anybody, man or woman, within the radius of fist or foot. Both men who'd initiated the fight, plus the blood-covered girlfriend, were pummeled until no resistance was offered. All three were dragged through the crowd by the four bouncers and tossed out through the main door.
The chaos was over in a less than one minute. Hatch had moved on, working her way toward the other side of the club floor. A closed door marked VIP cast its hot pink neon glow off the bald headed security guard blocking it. To his left was the disc jockey's massive turntable station where he was sending out his unique blend of music. The floor bouncers were now shooting the breeze with their doormen counterparts, celebrating their decisive victory over the drunk fools. In their moment of macho bravado, they'd left the floor unprotected, minus the one guard at the door. And with it, Hatch had a window of opportunity upon which to capitalize.
Hatch closed the gap, looking for her access point to the VIP lounge. Angela was nowhere to be seen among any of the working girls in the club. They had come through a back door which must have given direct access to this section. Weighing the odds, the door ahead held the best chance of finding Angela. Going head on with the guard would be futile. Even with the floor bouncers a distance away, she needed to come up with a less direct approach. She needed a distraction. And she found one in the unrelenting pulsing of the DJ's music.
The projector bolted to the ceiling above the DJ, casting the turntablist's teal spikey hair in prismed color patterns. A hypnotized crowd throbbed along as the beats directed them. A girl wearing nothing but a glittery thong shared the small, raised landing where the DJ spun his mix. He licked the sweat-soaked side of her neck as he changed out the record on the second turntable. She seemed not to notice or care that the wild music man had just treated her like a lollipop.
The landing itself was nothing more than a two-tiered scaffolding, not much different from those used for external repairs of buildings. The only glaring difference was this one had a large black sheet covering the crossed support bars underneath. A power strip poked out from underneath its mess of wires, looking like Medusa on a bad hair day, and spread out from the multi-socket outlet.
A sweaty male wearing a yellow mesh tank top, an homage to the outfits of the 80s big hair rock bands seemed a bit out of place amidst the crowd of hip partiers. He didn't seem to mind, partly due to the inebriated state he was in. He swayed more obnoxiously than Hatch had during her little act in the kitchen area. He gripped one of the support bars of the scaffolding, clutching it for dear life with one hand while eyeing the large plastic cup in the other hand that had gotten him to his current state. In the man's intoxication, Hatch saw opportunity.
Shooting a quick glance in the direction of the doorman outside the VIP lounge, Hatch confirmed his attention was elsewhere, on a large chested twenty-something bouncing in his periphery. The loud Americans who had been acting like fools in line moseyed up to the distracted bouncer. She couldn't make out what the tallest male in their group was saying, but the slow deliberate shaking of the guard's head told Hatch the request, presumably to gain access to the VIP area, was off limits. Fanning a wad of cash at the bald bull of a man only seemed to strengthen the resistance.
Bald Bull released his folded-arm, tough-guy stance, opting for a looser, albeit less imposing, stance. Hatch watched as the bouncer's right hand curled into a ball. The loud-mouthed American wasn't paying attention, turned to his friends and laughed. The American crumpled a dollar bill and tossed it over his shoulder. The wadded cash bounced off the shiny bald head of the infuriated door man.
The tall American never saw it coming. Bald Bull's rage spilled over, and although outnumbered five to one, hurtled his bowling ball sized fist at the back of the man's turned head. The impact flattened him against one of his friends. A churning swirl of wildly swinging arms followed as another pocket of violence erupted inside the club.
Bald Bull stood his ground against the crew of angry tourists. Several of the nearby locals jumped into the fight as the four bouncers who'd been celebrating now forced their way back through the crowd toward the latest melee.
The rumble continued as the tide shifted dramatically in the favor of the raging Bald Bull when his numbers increased by the arrival of the other bouncers. Devastating blows were delivered by the professionals, pummeling the younger, less experienced Americans into the ground.