Snippet #2502907

"Guess he doesn't want to quit tonight," Craig mused, watching Cormac stalk off into the crowd, presumably so he could get alcohol, drink his brain into a pleasant state of pre-bar inebriation, and mosh the fuck out to the impending thrash metal onslaught. Izzie merely shrugged her broad shoulders, having already lost interest in the stubborn little drummer and his qualms. "He's already done his duty as far as I'm concerned. So long as he doesn't do anything truly idiotic, like start a fight in the mosh pit, or have a go at someone twice his size because of his asinine need to prove his manliness or whatever the fuck, he can do whatever the hell he likes." Okay, granted, some part of Izzie-- the part that was shoved way off someplace where the sun (or more appropriately, the glimmering lights of the stage) didn't shine-- sympathised with the drummer; even he probably didn't realise just how much unnecessary trouble, injury, and labour he put himself through in pursuit of nothing more than what he'd been told he as a male was supposed to be. But hey, she'd said it before and she'd say it now: she wasn't the fucker's goddamn therapist or anything. She wasn't here to help him get through his masculinity issues-- she was here to play music, and so was he, and his personal issues didn't have a thing to do with her unless they impeded that mutual goal.

The vocalist leaned back in her chair, the little plastic fold-out affair groaning strenuously beneath her sheer bulk and weight, and reached a long burly arm out to grab the bottle of water nestled amidst the merch and take a quick gulp. She'd been just about to count out how much money the band had made thus far in merch sales when she saw a hand slap down more of it onto the table-- the bassist's hand, more accurately.

Izzie blinked, and then glanced up at the bassist with a raised eyebrow. "Well, I guess if he won't," the bassist explained dryly. "I'll take one of the shirts."

"Alrighty," Izzie growled, glancing over the bassist briefly before reaching over and snagging one of the smalls. She took the bassist's money and shoved it into the little cardboard box she was using as a makeshift cash register, but before she gave the bassist her latest fashion acquisition, she heaved herself out of the chair, and walked around the table, tossing the shirt to the bassist as she passed. "One'a you or both'a you staff the merch table, eh?" she grunted as she passed by. "I gotta be in the crowd for Aborticide."

Everybody loved Aborticide, after all.






Lestari watched Alex and Helen submerge themselves into the thick miasma of the crowd with a smile upon her lips. That kid really did bring out Alex's emotions best, didn't she? Of course, compared to most parents Lestari had seen-- not that she made a habit of going around and cataloguing the behaviours and various dispositions of parents-- Alex was still downright emotionally muted, but considering just how inexpressive and subdued she was otherwise, it was a notable change, and one Lestari didn't mind seein'. Perhaps it was a little selfish, but she did like to see Alex smiling and laughing, as such preciously rare moments were on par with snatching a glimpse of the Jersey Devil, or the Abominable Snowman. Hopefully the time would soon come that Lestari herself could evoke such strong emotions in Alex, but until then... Well, if all went well, it wouldn't be long.

Ah, but the crowd beckons! Lestari began to make for the audience herself-- she'd leave Alex and Helen to their time together, of course, but such music as Aborticide's certainly could not be appreciated from the side lines! And so, the drummer had already taken a step, when she heard Liam calling over the initial blast of Aborticide's set.

"You couldn't have told me Alex had a kid?"

Lestari turned to face him, finding the vocalist returning her gaze with something like a dubious expression. She couldn't tell from his voice or from his expression if he was unhappy at having been left out of the loop, but there was something just a little accusing about his choice of words, so she saw fit to defend herself appropriately. I only found out by accident myself, she pointed out. Alex didn't intend for me to know, nor do I suspect she intended for any of us to know, so I figured it woulda been rude of me to tell anybody else about her kid without her own approval. She does value her privacy, after all. Wouldn't you have kept it on the down-low as well? She didn't tarry about for an answer, not that she could conceive of why Liam would actually be angry with her-- it was a pretty good reason, wasn't it? But then, if he really was angry at her, that was all kinds of too damn bad for him, 'cause between accidentally pissing off Liam Mathias and accidentally pissing off Lord Fever, Lestari wasn't too conflicted. As much as she liked Alex, she still couldn't be sure she wouldn't plunge her hand into her chest and rip out her still beating heart or something appropriately death metal. Liam, unfortunately, didn't have that kinda vibe about him.

And so the evening continued: Aborticide came and went, and so did the bands that followed them. This was admittedly a bit more 'brutal' a tour than a band like Legion was normally liable to show up for-- I mean, for fuck sake, that one opener, Psychosis or whatever, they're just a handful of lost brain cells away from being a straight up slam death metal band. If they cut out those 'trillion notes a second' parts, they might as well be Devourment already. Point being, the next couple bands were brutal death metal bands-- y'know, Suffocation clones, bands that worshiped at the feet of Cryptopsy, folks who were clearly aiming to be the next Tomb of the Mutilated-era Cannibal Corpse, the like. Not that Lestari disliked any of those bands in particular, though she could certainly accuse their drummers of more than infrequently sacrificing aggression and destructive potential in favour of technicality and gymnastics, but... well, ya just couldn't beat that kinda old school 'Reign in Blood on 'roids' thrash-out annihilation. Though Legion were of course a melodic death metal band, Lestari did make a concerted effort to imbue their music with that sort of aggression-- and clearly it'd worked out properly. Liam, being the de facto head of the band, had never told her he disliked her drumming style, and if he did... well, why the hell would he have accepted her into the band in the first place? She'd never exactly made pretenses about the way she liked to drum.

Naw, but that was off topic. Lestari simply felt that the crowd had gone too long listening to either machine gun blast beats, convoluted time-signature-fucking jazzy shit, or brainless quarter note crash chug beats, and decided it was high time they got another thrashing. And so she joined her bandmates as they traipsed off for the backstage to begin setting up for their own setlist-- always a quick process, at least nowadays. Back when Lestari had first started out with Demigorgon, it'd been a nightmare. Her drums would be all over the place, and she'd be trippin' all over 'em tryin' to get 'em set up... and Kaede...

Lestari's lips made a strange motion, as though unable to decide between a wry smile or a rueful frown. Kaede would always find something wrong to complain about. If it wasn't something obvious-- a fucked up cable, or a headache right before the show-- then she'd deliberately go looking for something to be unhappy about. One time, Lestari had gotten the dubious honour of sitting through a good ten minute rant about how distracted she was gonna be the whole time by some random drunk off his ass midget dude in the crowd wearing nothing but a Mexican flag and blabbering away in what Lestari was still convinced was the worst fake Irish accent she'd ever heard. Admittedly though, now that she thought back on it, that woulda been pretty distracting to her too-- but she wouldn't have said as much, not back then. After all, the last thing Kaede had needed was Lestari encouraging her stubborn insistence on finding something to be pissed off about...

"Hey, Lestari, you gonna help us set up or do you plan on staring off into space like Rocky before the big fight?"

The drummer stirred from her thoughts with a start, and found Alex staring at her with a raised eyebrow. She gave a contrite nod, and wasted no more time.