“Y’know, they used to do it for real.”
Reg Ashbury strolled down the street, guitar slung on his back. The lanky white wolf, clad in his black jacket and jeans, looked back to the bright marble door he shut behind himself before continuing down the cracked sidewalk.
“I mean for real man, they used really GO for it.” the hound shot back over the phone. “You hit that chorus and everyone just goes through the fucking roof. You let it build and build and then they get the floor jumping.”
The voice at the other end was incredulous. Reg’s snout scrunched in frustration.
“I MEAN IT! This music shit wasn’t a two-for-a-nickel striptease. Hounds would get turnt, bob their heads to the beat, get with a chick and just have a REAL good time. Here, I even got an old club photo I can send ya.”
Reg whipped through the cell phone’s gallery and found the shot. It was an old black-and-white still from a punk club. A three-piece on stage going ape on their gear while a black wolf surfed the crowd in nothing but his leather slacks and white sneakers. Even in a freeze-frame, you could see the crowd headbanging.
The text he got back wasn’t encouraging:
Welcome outta the stone age kid. We listen to shit differently.
Reg was close to pitching his phone across the alleyway, but opted to make one more go of convincing him.
“Y’know what? Fuck it, let’s show you what’s happening in there. Tell me what’s more alive. That…or THIS?”
The next photo was taken just before he left the club.
In it, 16 wolves sat at desks, black headsets wrapped around their eyes. They all sat slumped back in their office chairs, wires running down their arms like needles to the vein. All the screens said was “session in progress.”
Reg shoved the phone to his ear after hitting send. “They’re fucking dead, man. They’re fucking DEAD. You know what’s worse, no one is coming to get them. I called up the local police station, they say it’s just ‘part of the leisure program.’ The FUCK is a leisure program? It’s a club. Your ass is supposed to be on the floor, banging to the fucking beat.”
His friend paused before choosing his next words. “Look at the photo again.”
Reg raised an eyebrow but did so. What he noticed sent a shiver up his spine.
“Their heads are still bobbing.”
Sure enough, he was right; the camera’s exposure captured the rapid jittering of each hound’s head as they sat in their stupetifying simulation.
“If they’re still bobbing, why didn’t I feel a pulse when I checked their wrists?”
Reg’s friend had no answer. The white wolf himself could only look back at the marble-colored door and shudder.