Our Band Could Mean Your Life

David, Ed, Albert, and Henry Lee didn't get up on the stage until after 11. The opening band was late getting started and even with cutting back their set list, the show was still over half an hour behind.

Not that it mattered much to the crowd. The 9000 plus had paid over $100 a piece for the privilege of getting a ticket to the new nationwide tour supporting their latest multi-platinum album.

The band, Witch’s Apostasy, were a particularly nasty mix of funeral doom and death metal. They were heavy on the theatrics, often performing sacrifices and black masses as part of their concerts.

The hundreds of PETA members and Christians in the crowd cast aside their beliefs for one night of debauchery with the band.

Once on the stage Witch’s Apostasy began their typical set list of songs with disgusting names, taboo subject matter, and juvenile musicianship. For although they sold out every one of their shows, and outsold even the most popular rap and pop stars, the band themselves were not particularly good at making music. None of them had ever taken any formal training or lessons before forming the band.

Regardless of their abilities, the crowds always came and paid their respects in money and blood. As soon as the band hit the opening notes of their first song, the pit would erupt in a torrent of aggression. Men and women would hurl themselves at each other in an attempt to inflict as much pain as possible. Some attacked with weapons they brought from home — steak knives, brass knuckles, baseball bats, etc. Anything and everything was allowed at a Witch’s Apostasy concert. When the band wanted to see brutal carnage, but the crowd didn't bring enough weapons, they would throw medieval weaponry into the crowd to incite violence.

In the past year 2143 people had been murdered while attending a Witch’s Apostasy concert. Men and women alike — the killings took any and all it could find, and the fans came searching for it night after night.

Tonight in Augusta, Georgia at the James Brown Arena, the crowd was on a particularly violent tear. The band was only two songs into their set and already twenty three people were down on the floor and not getting back up. The band smiled and laughed as fans took turns stomping the faces and bodies of the men and women who lay motionless. Others slid and bathed in the thick layer of blood that coated the arena floor.

Sage Venation was in the spotlight booth that hung from the ceiling rafters headbanging to the music. Blood dripped from the floor grates below his feet onto the crowd 75 feet below. When the band had started playing, Sage had felt the insatiable need to punch somebody, anybody, as hard as he could, but since he was alone in the catwalk, he instead tried to jump through the cage screen into the crowd below. Frustrated after more than a dozen tries to break through the screen Sage punched his hand through the front of his spotlight and grabbed the live wires contained inside.

The resulting electrical arc threw him backwards into a support beam for the spotlight booth, slamming his head on the steel. When he came to Sage found his ears ringing and buzzing to point of drowning out all other sound. He tried to push the pain aside and remember how he ended up on the ground, but nothing came to him. He last remembered turning his spotlight on and aiming it at the stage ten seconds before the curtain was to go up. Everything after that was black.

With much difficulty he got to his feet and looked down at the crowd below. Although he couldn't hear them, he imagined the sound was that of an epic war. Men and women were slaughtering each other with anything they could get their hands on.

Looking back at the stage, Sage saw two women dancing naked with the band, each holding severed limbs and covered in blood. Immediately he dropped to his hands and knees and puked on to the crowd below.

Is this real? he thought.

He had seen videos of bands like GWAR who held mock executions and sprayed machine washable blood and semen into the welcoming audience, but this was different. This was a bloodbath. The audience themselves were tearing each other apart limb from limb with no regard. Sage could only relate it to scenes from violent horror movies. Walking Dead, Night of the Living Dead, Hellraiser, Hostel — all paled in comparison to what he was seeing.

Sage finished emptying his stomach and continued dry heaving. He felt weak, as if all his strength had been taken from him with each retch of his bowels. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and screamed in excruciating pain. He looked down and saw his hand was burnt and blistered. Pain shot up his arm and radiated through his entire body with each beat of his heart.

When faced with a deadly situation, the body can have two natural reactions: fight or flight. But when the situation itself is fight, the only sane choice is flight. Sage didn't even have to think twice about getting out of there. The horrors showed no sign of stopping below, and the smell of blood and tissue began to cloud his nostrils. It was the most putrid smell he had ever experienced. Decaying meat mixed with a coppery, metallic scent that was almost medical — surgical. The smell was brutal and was only getting worse.

Sage got to his feet and walked down the catwalk alley toward the access door. The door led to a small staircase that went down to an access door to the left of the stage. His only plan was to get away from what was happening as fast as possible. Once down the stairs he would take one of the back exits and never look back.

He reached the end of the first alley and turned toward the exit door on his right. He stared at the door — his only possible salvation from this hell. Every fiber of his being hoped the people fighting below didn't look up and see him. He reached out with his good hand to pull the door handle when suddenly the door slammed open and knocked him flat on his back. The door crashed into the wall beside it with such violence that large chunks of concrete broke off and fell to the floor.

Gasping for breaths of putrid air he tilted his head up enough to see who had exploded through the door. Sage recognized the yellow Bad Brains shirt his coworker Larry always wore when working rock concerts. The shirt was now soaked in blood and had pieces of Larry’s face and scalp tangled in it. One of Larry’s eyes dangled three inches from the socket, hanging on only by a thread of veins and tendons.

Sage’s stomach turned sideways and gave another lurch of disgust. If he hadn't just puked the entirety of his guts out moments ago, Sage knew he would have at the sight of his coworker.

Larry locked his remaining eye on Sage. Then, using the safety gates that surrounded the catwalks for balance he began to hobble toward him. Sage looked down at Larry’s legs and realized he was missing part of his right leg. The mangled leg left a trail of blood dripping from the floor grates as it scraped his open wound like sand paper.

Using all his strength Larry stumbled forward inch-by-inch toward Sage with a look of bloodlust on his face.

Scared out of his mind, Sage pushed himself back with his legs toward his spotlight cage. He hoped the security door would be enough to separate him from Larry and keep him safe. Once he reached the security door Sage pushed himself over the threshold. Unknown to him, a piece of glass from the spotlight had fallen sideways and lodged itself between two of the grates. He slid the final yard into the room, pushing himself the final six inches over the glass shard.

Sage felt the skin of his back peel apart like a book tearing at the seam. The pain was excruciating. He felt like his back was being unzipped to expose his spine to the outside world.

He felt himself begin to blackout. Just before his eyes accepted the blackness, he saw that Larry had rounded the corner and was coming straight toward him.

Larry’s right pant leg dangled lifelessly — no longer of any use since he had no foot to cover. When he was less than ten feet away from Sage an upturned screw caught hold of the bloody jean material, tripping Larry and causing him to fall face first onto the grate.

Larry’s dangling eye fell in a gap between two grates. He tried to stand, but his eye was caught, tethering his head to the ground.

Sage watched in horror as Larry bucked and fought to pull free himself. After several attempts he seemed to give up and laid his head down on the grate. Sage gave a sigh of relief. He knew he was in no shape to defend himself against any form of attack.

Sage closed his eyes and put his head back. He prayed Larry was done fighting so he could slip past him and out the exit. He counted to ten and opened his eyes. He raised his head and looked back at Larry. He was breathing hard, and appeared to be rocking his head to some rhythm that Sage couldn't hear. Sage continued to watch him, unsure what to do next.

Suddenly Larry snapped his head back and pushed his body up with his arms. The tendons and veins that once controlled his eye stretched and finally snapped. The violent action pulled muscle and tissue from deep within his skull out of his eye socket. Blood pumped from the torn vein hanging across his face from the open wound.

The gaping hole in Larry’s head looked like a black hole, ready to suck Sage’s soul straight to Hell. Thinking as fast as he could, Sage grabbed a shard of glass and threw it. It missed its mark and bounced harmlessly down the catwalk.

No longer stuck to the grate, Larry began to claw his way forward. Sage sound see his was yelling something at him, but because of the ringing in his ears, he was unable to make it out.

Eight feet…Six feet…Three feet. Larry continued to jerk himself closer.

Sage looked around wildly for something he could use to defend himself. His head was still spinning and he was having trouble focusing on his surroundings.

He found nothing he could easily grab to fight back with. He was about to attempt to get up when his foot hit the side of the sliding security door. His eyes bulged in recognition. He turned his head back towards the door and started pushing as hard as he could to close it.

The security gate was now and mangled from his attempts to jump off the spotlight booth, causing it to catch and resist his attempts to close it.

Two feet…One foot.

Suddenly Sage felt the gate give and the door slid into place, pushing aside Larry’s outstretched arm. The door slide to the opposite wall and locked itself. Sage had pre-setup the door to lock when closed. After he left it unlocked three months ago by mistake, Larry had threatened to fire him if he ever did it again. Ever since, he had always pre-locked the door and kept his keys in his pocket.

Larry tried to push the door aside, but to no avail, the door and the lock held firm. Sage pushed and rolled himself into the back corner of the cage, as far away from the door as possible. Larry started punching the metal screen over and over again. Even after his knuckles split open, he continued his attack. Once his hands were nothing more than bare bones and broken meat he changed tactics and started headbutting the door. He continued until he turned his head sideways and hit with such force that he snapped his own neck and finally laid still.

Sage wrapped his broken hand in his shirt, closed his eyes, and blacked out.

The band always closed their concerts with an encore where they made a sacrifice. Contrary to popular belief about them sacrificing animals, the band instead drew their knives and disemboweled the two naked fans who had danced on stage. Their pagan chants beseeched the dark gods to continue their dark triumph of the music industry and grant them another killer show tomorrow night when their tour moved on to South Carolina.