I THINK I was there. I MUST have been. There’s blood on my sleeve and a set of co-ordinates in my back pocket in someone else's handwriting. Bannerman's. Underground stone. Hot, wet, shaking. Maybe it was last night. Maybe it hasn’t happened yet. Time did something funny in there. Slid sideways.
I remember the wall. Cold against my spine, or maybe it was breathing. Hard to tell. Could’ve been me. It could’ve been the wall.
I came to watch. That I know. Not to move. Not to feel. Just to witness. Someone needs to remember this properly when it’s over. I think I forgot what I was meant to remember.
Nero Bellum arrived by not arriving. One blink—nothing. The next—there. Smoke, red light, some metallic hum in my teeth. His shadow hit the ceiling before his feet hit the floor. He didn’t walk. He slid. Or maybe the floor moved for him. I looked down to check. The tiles were twitching. Not metaphorically. Actually twitching. I think one licked my boot.
Then “Devils Work”. Or what I assumed was it. It could’ve been a fire alarm. It could’ve been someone screaming backwards into a pipe. The noise didn’t feel like noise. It was weight. It came through the speakers and pushed the air out of my lungs in reverse.
People started jerking forward, twitching in place like wires were being yanked from inside their bones. Someone fell. Someone else fell on them. Nobody noticed. I stood still. I tried to blink slower as I didn’t want to miss anything important. A vole appeared from beneath the drum riser. A serious little fella. It might’ve had glasses. It was hard to tell in the strobe.
“The Poison Will Deaden The Pain” melted the centre of the room. I saw it happen. One second—people. The next—just blur. Hands, faces, teeth. Bellum was the only thing not vibrating. Just prowling through the distortion, mouth open, arms twitching like he was pulling threads only he could see. I thought he was bleeding, but it was just light. Or sweat. Or memory.
Every track hit with a new shape. “I Choose Violence” came with static in my eyes. I couldn’t see properly for the whole thing. I felt like someone shoved me into a microwave and hit purée. The synth lines crawled under my skin. I scratched at my arm and found ink I don’t remember writing.
There was a moment louder than the rest. I swear to God the bass spoke. Not metaphorically. Not poetically. ACTUAL words. I couldn’t hear them, but they were there. In the corners.
Nero stared out over us like we were ants he'd decided not to crush just yet. Or maybe he was somewhere else entirely. His mouth moved. Lyrics, probably. Or instructions. Or prophecy. My ears were bleeding by then, so I just smiled and pretended I understood. The strobes stopped briefly, and I swear I saw the crowd aging in fast-forward. Just for a second. Then we were back inside it.
I don’t remember hearing the final song. I remember feeling something explode behind my right eye. I leaned into the speaker and let it rattle my thoughts loose. When it ended, I wasn’t sure what year it was.
Everyone exhaled at once. The collective moan of the overused. People fell into each other. Some collapsed. Some crawled. One couple kissed with the urgency of people escaping a burning building. I stayed. Couldn’t move yet. My knees felt fictional.
Cleanup came. Gloves. Mops. One of them looked at me and flinched. I smiled. Didn’t mean to.
Outside, the night was wrong. Too empty. The cars looked fake. I followed the last few disciples up the hill. They limped like they’d left something behind and weren’t sure if it mattered. One of them turned and looked straight at me like I was part of it now. I tasted metal in the back of my mouth and it didn’t go away. Neither did the vole.
Tonight's gig coming in at 9 minutes of the sound of AOL dial-up internet through damaged speakers, out of 10.
Words: Matt Denny.
The new album, "And Then Oblivion" by PSYCLON NINE is out now, via METROPOLIS RECORDS.