The Nomad Process

[Breaker]

Book 2 ~ Scarlet Brigade We Are Not



The dance floor stormed, a jungle of gyrating bodies. Arms and legs whipped and lurched like vines and branches in the wind. Torsos swayed like rain-soaked tree trunks, thick with the perspiration of accumulated body heat. High powered colored lanterns flashed lightning through dense clouds of artificial fog pumped out by enchanted smoke machines burning scented herbs. The dancers thought and acted as animals, functioning on instinct more than anything. That tangle of grooving people contained both the exotic thrill and the illicit danger of any jungle, concealed amidst the foliage of shining silk and satin clothing.

Joshua Cronen reclined on a round padded stool, spine braced against the bar at the back of the massive club. His chiseled features, covered by tanned skin and a thin layer of stubble on his chin, remained stationary while hazel eyes scanned the room. A five man band played bass-heavy instruments on the elevated platform to his left. On his right a field of tables and chairs grew from the floor. The café section of The Flesh Failures was sparsely populated, most of the patrons a part of the thundering mass in the centre of the room. Overtop of their reaching hands he observed the double doors opening and closing intermittently as new guests entered. Radasanth’s premium nightclub neared its capacity of one hundred people. Soon the doors would be barred, adding weight to Cronen’s responsibility. As head of The Flesh Failures’ security, those hundred people’s safety rested in his palms.

Josh had his eye on a pair of men who slowly worked their way into the space of a lone woman. The first stood over six feet tall with heavy shouldered and bulging forearms rippling out of his wifebeater. The second was the one who had caught Cronen’s attention. He looked nondescript, average height and build, oily black hair that fell just far enough to touch his matching leather jacket. But the Martial Artist could feel a signature of arcane power radiating from the smaller man as surely as he could hear the guitar melody over the pounding bass. After a few minutes of concentrating on that power, he picked up its details. If the oily haired man managed to kiss the woman he was dancing with (or any other woman, for that matter) on the lips, she would fall temporarily under his spell, would respond to his suggestions as a private to a general’s commands. Five minutes… long enough to get her out of the club and alone somewhere. More elaborate than the standard methodology of slipping a sleeping elixir into someone’s drink, but it was still date rape, the intention clear as vodka.

In the few minutes it took him to read the man’s peculiar talent, Josh noticed his body language growing increasingly aggressive. He touched the unwary woman more often, his sticky fingers lingering longer and longer. His muscular wingman had sleazed his way behind her, blocking a potential retreat. Josh had no intention of letting the leather-jacketed man get his lips on anyone’s flesh. He deposited the glass of whisky he had been swirling on the bar and dropped his hand to waist level, made a fist, splayed his fingers, then pointed at his feet.

Two of the five bouncers under his command spotted the signal. Both burly men with heavy cudgels on their belts, they leaned close to each other and conferred for a moment then the shorter of the two ambled over to take Josh’s place at the head of the room. Nodding his thanks, the club’s protector strode into the thick of the dance floor. Bodies parted to let him through as birds flutter to avoid a panther; everyone at the club knew the man with the scar on his cheek and knew to make way. He stopped beside a willowy woman with long blonde hair and touched her elbow.

Angeline, the club owner’s daughter, turned to face him. She abandoned the two or three anonymous bodies who previously occupied her attention and turned to him, gorgeous features slack in a drunken smile. She laced her fingers around the back of his neck and ground her hips against his thigh, the sheer material of her sifan cloth dress grating his coarser black vlince pants.

“You finally decided to have some fun with me,” she shouted close to his ear. Her cherry tongue accidentally-on-purpose caressed the lobe.

“Not exactly,” he responded, hooked a sinewy forearm around her waist and dragged her to the fringe of the floor.

It was Angeline who had landed him the job after a shared night of passion at a nearby inn her father also owned. Subsequently she tried to get him fired when she spotted him kissing a beautiful drow woman, but her father had refused the whim due to Josh’s evident effectiveness as Head of Security. Since then the two had developed a friendly relationship, but she never stopped flirting with him. It wasn’t infatuation or love, or lust for that matter. He suspected that she enjoyed chasing anyone who said no.

“Where are you taking me? Up to your room? You’ll have to tie me up to get me there.” He smelled the alcohol on her breath but ignored it. She wasn’t as drunk or as shallow as she demonstrated. Obliging her continued grinding, he moved his feet in time to the music, following the sway of her firm body glued to his. As they danced he leaned in like a boyfriend whispering sweet nothing. The ditz-screen in her eyes evaporated as she listened to his instructions, responding with nods when necessary. Thirty seconds later he pecked her on the cheek and felt her palm smack his ass as he walked away. Resisting the urge to shake his head, he ignored it and strode past the bar. In his peripheral vision he saw the two-man abduction team, closing in for the kill on their hapless victim. Unseen by the occupied pair, he opened a door in the club’s back wall and slipped into a short hallway which led to the rear exit. The hall had two purposes; deliveries of imported alcohol going straight to the bar rather than through the cluttered kitchen, and throwing out unruly patrons.

He let the door close almost all the way but kept his right hand on the knob, a hawk peering at two rats through the thin crack that remained.

Angeline appeared between the two men like a wraith in a red dress. She pressed her torso against the woman they had cornered, allowing the heavy shouldered man to grind against her shapely backside. The sleazy pair registered surprise which quickly became the smiles of hyenas gazing at a wounded gazelle. As surely as a champion of the tango, Angeline guided the intended victim towards the rear of the building. The men followed, the shorter man with the incubus’ kiss backpedalling until he was just two feet from the wall.

The door opened. A black clad arm seized the collar of his leather jacket and hauled him outside.