'ANGEL'S GARDEN'
From an outsider's perspective, it is just one of the many high-profile clubs nestled in the heart of Las Vegas—the man-made "Sin City" of Nevada, USA. Its entry, despite being ten times more expensive than that of any ordinary club, is still only exclusive to a selected number of people, branding it a playground for the elite, radiating exclusivity and luxury that lures the crowd like moths to a flame.
Yet, that's not what makes this club so special. Its true allure lies beyond the velvet ropes. As its name suggests, whoever makes it past its towering doors enters a realm of ecstasy, a celestial haven where desires run unchecked, a place where one feels like they are inside the garden of angels. 'Angel's Garden', a place where all the illegal substances are purchased and exchanged in the open, a black market for illicit substances, accessible only to those who prove their worth—a sanctuary where underworld figures run their business freely, shielded from government eyes. But how?
How is this place so safe and unrestricted from government surveillance? It's because overseeing this glittering domain is Lucien Carver, a man in his late forties whose sharp gaze and silver-streaked hair command respect from the shadows. Whispers among the elite paint him as the architect of this haven, his web of connections with high-ranking officials and ruthless syndicates ensuring this sanctuary untouchable status.
Since the place provides a safe playground for the underworld Mafias and Dons to play around without having much to worry about, they guard their sanctuary fiercely from the predatory eyes of the government, declaring it a safe zone. Meaning that—no fights, no violence, no act that could draw law enforcement is permitted among gang members, and no one can meddle in another's dealings—an unspoken rule all obey.
Inside,
The club pulses with debauchery. Intoxicated patrons sway in a mindless trance, their bodies slick with sweat as they smoke, drink, and tangle with reckless abandon, heedless of gender or consequence. The air hangs heavy with the sour reek of perspiration and grand perfume, spiked with the acrid sting of alcohol and cigarette smoke. Neon lights—crimson, violet, blue—slash through the haze, casting writhing shadows that twist like venomous tendrils across the chaos.
At the bar counter, tucked in the club's corner opposite the DJ booth, top-shelf liquor gleams under warm yellow and orange lights. Neon pink and blue glints shimmer across crystal flutes and glasses, refracting like molten stars.
A stunning blonde in a provocative bartender's uniform slumps over the counter, her head resting on her arms as she stares into the void, lost in a daze. Her silhouette glows under the bar's electric sheen, neon streaks painting her hair in shades of violet and blue. Her fingers brush her soft, red lips, tracing the memory of a stranger from earlier—his chocolate-brown eyes, his faint, teasing smile lingering in her mind.
"Sasha!" A sweet, feminine voice cuts through the club's throbbing rhythm, yanking her from her thoughts. She lifts her head, bleary-eyed.
"Hmm?" From the side, an attractive brunette, dressed in the same uniform, approaches with a playful smile dancing across her face. "So, how was it? Did you finally get something?" she asks, sliding beside Sasha.
Sigh~ With a heavy sigh escaping her small mouth, her face clouded with confusion and dejection, Sasha replies, "No."
"Huh? Are you for real?! What happened? Don't tell me you chickened out at the last moment—or maybe he wasn't your type?" The brunette shoots her a stunned look followed by a rapid fire of nonstop questions.
"Argh! Slow down, girl." She grabs the brunette's shoulders and asks her to calm down.
Following Sasha's words, she stops messing around and takes a seat beside Sasha. "So tell me, what happened?" she asks, her grin stretching wider, rosy cheeks aglow with curiosity.
"To be honest," Sasha pauses, her thoughts a tangle of the staff room moments ago. She'd led him there, a cramped space thick with stale liquor and cigarette smoke, neon bleeding through the window, bathing them in electric blue. She leaned close, her breath warm against his, eyes searching his. Fingers brushing his defined chest, heart racing with bravado and longing. His faint smile had toyed with her senses. Pressed closer, lips inches from his, the air electric—then he was gone. One moment, his warmth was there; the next, she blinked, and he vanished, leaving only a ripple in the neon-lit air. A cold shiver crawls up her spine as she recalls the surreal happening from before. Her stomach twists, confusion and rejection clawing at her. "I don't know myself," she admits, her expression tangled.
"Huh? What do you mean?" The brunette frowns.
"We, we were in the staff room together and… everything was going fine, but then..."
"Then?" The brunette leans closer, eyes sparkling with anticipation.
Sasha locks eyes with her and whispers, "He disappeared."
"Huh? Disappeared? What the heck? This wasn't in the script. Hey, are you sure you weren't the one who pushed him away?" The brunette tilts her head, skeptical.
"I didn't!" Sasha snaps. "Just like I said, he disappeared! In the literal sense, he just—vanished into thin air!" She struggles to explain her surreal experience.
"Uh, Sasha, are you alright? Are you sure you are not drunk?" The brunette questions as she looks around the counter in search of evidence to prove that Sasha is not in her right state of mind. "Did you take something shady despite my warnings?" Concern laces her tone.
"I did not, Julie! I know it's hard to believe, but I am telling you the truth!" Sasha pleads.
"So, you are telling me that a person vanished into thin air like some ghost?" Julie's brow arches.
"I don't know! I don't know..." Sasha murmurs, her mind spiraling.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
"Huh?" A muted, staccato thud punctures the music's pulse and their conversation, jolting Sasha upright. "Hey, Julie, did you hear something just now?" She asks Julie with a taut voice.
"Huh? Hear what?" Julie blinks, puzzled.
Not sure what it really was, Sasha tries her best to explain to Julie, "I am not sure, but it sounded like... gunshots?" She answers carefully.
"Gunshots? Here? What are you talking about? You know yourself that no violence is allowed here. Are you sure you are not imagining things?" Julie asks with concern-filled eyes as she looks at Sasha. Oh my God, first a ghost and now you are hearing things. Are you really alright?
While Julie showers Sasha with worry and questions, she is distracted elsewhere, her heart uneasy. The air thickens with a faint, sour whiff—something off, dark, and ominous.
Roar!!!
A primal, throat-rending bellow rips through the club, flooding Sasha with ice-cold dread. "H-huh...?" With terror and confusion in her eyes, she turns her gaze towards the first floor, certain the sound came from there. The ominous feeling grows heavier with every passing second.
'Now that you've mentioned it, I saw three men accompanying the owner earlier, heading to his office on the first floor with a heavy-looking black briefcase.' For some reason, she recalls her conversation with Karan a while ago, picturing the man from the staff room, his chocolatey eyes sharp with secrets. 'Handsome...' Worry creases her face.
Just then, something comes flying from the first-floor lobby of the club and, Boom— An earth-shaking explosion erupts near the DJ booth, the blast vibrating through her bones. A scorching gust sweeps through, flinging dust and debris into the air.
Thick, black smoke pours from a mangled speaker, coiling upward to the ceiling, OOUUWWIIEE— OOUUWWIIEE—triggering the fire alarm. In the wake of the fire alarm, Fwish! Fwish! Fwish! Icy water cascades down through the water sprinklers hanging on the roof, soaking everyone present to the skin.
The air chokes with the metallic tang of blood and the sharp, burnt reek of fried circuits, stinging the nostrils and coating the tongues.
Zzz—Static crackles, and the speakers die, silencing the music. The hiss of sprinklers and the alarm's wail fill the void, relentless and deafening.
"What was that~?" a patron slurs. "Oy~, DJ! What's the deal?" another shouts. "Crank the music~!" a third demands. Unaware and tipsy, more and more complaints erupt from the crowd, targeting the DJ as their revelry shatters.
"What the hell just happened?" Julie questioned, wiping water from her face, neon glints shimmering on her drenched skin. She glances at the DJ booth, then at Sasha. "Hey, Sasha! Are you alright?" But she doesn't receive any response.
Concerned, she grabs Sasha's shoulder and jerks her. "Sasha! Sasha, are you okay!?" She glances at Sasha's pale face and notices that she is looking intently towards the DJ booth. Her body is shivering, and a deep sense of dread is carved into her face.
"Oye! What happened? Are you feeling cold...?" Julie asks her as she slowly follows her gaze to look where she is looking.
There, she witnesses something that can only be explained by one word—A Nightmare.
Sparks sputter like dying fireflies around a shattered speaker, neon light bathing the scene in a sickly glow. Two skeletal, sinewy arms, matted with coarse, patchy hair, writhe out from the wreckage. Their movements are jagged, unnatural, as if the bones beneath are snapping and reforming with every twitch.
Claws—long, curved, and jagged like rusted scythes—gleam with a faint, venomous sheen, scraping the metal with a piercing screech that grates against Julie and Sasha's eardrums as they grip the sides of the metal frame.
A creature hauls itself free from the wreckage, its emaciated frame unfolding with a wet, popping sound. Its scalp is a mottled ruin, nearly bald save for a few lank, blood-bedaubed strands that dangle like decayed roots. The face is a horror of its own—pitted with deep, oozing scars, the flesh sagging and torn. Where a nose should be, there's only a cavernous hole, weeping dark red fluid that drips into its gaping maw. That mouth stretches impossibly wide, lined with crooked, dagger-like fangs slick with thick, tar-like drool splashing onto the floor.
Its body is a grotesque mockery—pale, almost translucent skin stretched tight over elongated, knobby bones that jut out at wrong angles. The tattered suit it wears clings like a shroud, soaked with cold water, glistening under the neon. Its eyes are the worst—bulging orbs of milky white, pierced by tiny, twitching gray pupils, veins throbbing beneath like worms trapped under glass.
Screech—!!
It looses a shrill, soul-shredding wail that echoes through the club, a sound like rusty nails dragged across stone mixed with the cries of the damned.
"W-w-what is t-that thing!!" Julie's voice breaks, her hands trembling as she clutches Sasha.
Before Sasha can respond to Julie, through the dark screen of clouds that surrounds the DJ booth, "A-a-a-Aaargh!!" a terror-filled scream cuts in.
Through the haze, neon light glinting off the mist and the dark smoke, she sees the vague silhouette of the creature and a person who is lying on the ground.
Its spidery limbs lurch forward, each step a wet crunch of bone on tile as it approaches the person—the DJ, and with a guttural snarl, it strikes—Stab!— claws punching through the DJ's back, ripping out his heart in a spray of crimson.
Cough!
The DJ gurgles, blood frothing at his lips as he stared helplessly at the monstrosity. Splash! The creature rips its arm free from his chest, the heart still pulsing in its grip before it crushed it to a pulp, gore dripping between its talons, then tears into the body with ravenous, wet smacks—flesh rending, bones snapping, blood pooling underfoot.
"H-huh?" Sasha stood frozen, dazed, her mind a blank scream. What she witnessed overwhelmed her mind, too raw to process. The horror that just unfolded before her eyes felt more surreal than a person vanishing into thin air. Yet, the coppery stench of blood clawed into her lungs, mingling with the icy drench of the sprinklers soaking her skin.
Her vision blurred, the club's neon lights pulsing like a fever dream, each flash searing the creature's grotesque form into her eyes. Her stomach lurched, bile rising in her throat, and her hands trembled so violently she couldn't feel her fingers.
"Kyaaaaaa!!!!" A horrified scream tore free from her throat as the brutality unfolded before her eyes.
"S-sasha! W-w-what the hell is that thing!" Julie whimpers, clinging to her, her nails digging into Sasha's arm.
Sasha was also unsure. Unlike the others, she is definitely not drunk nor is she high. She is fully aware of her surroundings and knows very well that everything that is happening before her eyes is reality. The cold water numbing her skin, the acrid reek of burnt electronics searing her lungs, the painful wail of the DJ before his cruel death, her trembling body, the cold touch of her friend. Everything is real. All of this is happening for real.
Drawn by her horrified scream, the nightmare of a creature's head snaps toward them, its milky eyes locking on. With a guttural growl, it lunges, its maw gaping to reveal a forest of gore-slicked teeth as its dreadful claws slash through the air, extending towards them like the scythe of a grim reaper, coming to take their lives.
"Aaaaaaa—!" Frightened, Sasha and Julie scream at the top of their lungs, clutching each other as panic consumes them at the sight of the nightmare of a creature pouncing towards them. They are scared, really really scared. 'Please! Someone! If it's a dream, then please, please wake me! I don't wanna die!!' Sasha begs silently, her heart hammering against her chest.
As the creature is about to reach them with its deadly claws—
Baam—!
Something slams into the creature, hurling it against the wall with a sickening crack of bone, thrashing in agony. Shriek!! A pain-filled wail reverberates throughout the club.
"Ah... ah-uwaaaaaa!!!!"
"What is that!!?"
"What the f*ck is that thing!?"
"Aaa! Help!!"
"Run!!"
More and more frightened and terrified shouts erupt as people inside the club stumble awake from their haze due to the impact of the creature's crashes near them. Panic explodes as a stampede erupts in the cramped space as people begin to run around to escape from the nightmare that lies before them.
Many people fall, some who trip and some who are still deeply immersed in their own world. Bodies crash and get trampled over like insects, screams blending with the squelch of flesh underfoot, men and women alike.
"Are you okay?" Amidst all the shouts and panic, a calm, steady voice pierces the chaos and enters Sasha's ears, somehow soothing her madly beating heart and her trembling body.
Somehow, she isn't that scared anymore. She opens her terror filled eyes and turns around to look at the person who makes her frightened heart be at ease.
In front of her stands a man. His wet clothes cling to his frame, outlining his well-defined physique, an air of quiet elegance about him. His soaked hair drips, his faint smile unwavering. His chocolate-brown eyes hold a depth she can't fathom.
Looking at the person standing before her, "Handsome..." Besides this, nothing else comes to her mind and no other words leave her mouth as she stands in her place, looking at Karan in a daze.