Ugliness on Saturday night

It had turned out to be quite the Saturday night. It started with me and Goxy having some thoroughly pleasant warm up drinks in Tapas bar in the company of several lovely ladies. At some point in that time, Gox bumped into an old acquaintance of his who just happened to have some high quality acid on his hands.

It always happened this way, almost like we couldn't get away from our weekend evening destiny. This was the third or maybe even fourth weekend where this same acquaintance just happened to be frequenting the same place as us, each time carrying his high potency medicine. Naturally, Gox and I could never resist, and this time was no exception.

So we dropped a tab each and went back to mingle with the ladies. Once the stuff started to really quick in, we left Tapas bar to head to Plastik, one of Begrade's most popular clubs.

We spent a couple psychedelic trippy hours in there melting our faces. Plastik on acid is a serious assault on the senses; the thumping music, scantily clad dancers, faces both ugly and attractive, the colorful décor all around (Plastik was remodeled in 2008 with a smarter interior design and brighter decorations everywhere), silhouettes framed against neon backgrounds...

When we'd had about as much of that intensity as we could handle, we headed out with some friends we bumped into, one of Goxy's ladyfriends and our good mutual friend Geppeto (not his real name, but he works with puppets) in tow.

We got split up briefly at the coat check area in the entrance while we all fought the line to get our coats.

I got mine first and stepped out the door; there was a small crowd outside, all people chatting or organizing themselves to leave.

Just then, someone pushed me aside swiftly and cut in front of me; it was a guy holding an empty bottle in his hand. His head was covered in small cuts and his T-shirt (it was wintertime, by the way) was covered with his spilled blood. You notice all those little details really well when you're on acid.

Obviously, his night hadn't gone so well, but it was about to get better.

As I watched ( and I only happened to notice him because he has pushed me aside) he calmly but quickly walked behind one large, nerdy looking guy standing on the curb, tapped his shoulder and said something to him.

Simultaneously two other guys materialized out of nowhere. The trio pounced on the large guy suddenly, cracking him over the head with the bottles they all had. He had time to yelp one shocked "BRATE!!!" ("DUDE!!") before the little bloody one started stabbing him furiously and brutally in the face and throat with the now broken, jagged bottle, and his two other friends pummelled away at him, one stabbing him in the back and kidneys while the third mostly held him in place.

It all seemed to happen in slow motion, in my disconnected drug state. I caught every detail, every little move, and I was aware of every single person watching in shock; girls were screaming, several people shouted at them to knock it off, but no one intervened. It had time to notice a large plate sized dollop of blood splish on the pavement amidst broken glass.

I looked over my shoulder at the beefy club bouncers; they were actually laughing at the scene with their hands in their pockets, although I may have been the only person to notice that.

The brawl had moved smack into the middle of the large busy street that runs next to Plastik; now everything stopped for the fight, including a huge bus filled with people, and several cars; everyone just watched in horror as three guys tore one to pieces. There must have been at least 50 witnesses.

Their victim collapsed in a bloody, sliced up pile in the street; they wasted no time kicking and beating him while he was down, before finally stomping on his head viciously until several loud, sickening cracks and snaps were heard and he stopped moving instantly.

As quickly as they had started, they now stopped and instantly hopped into into a nearby car and sped off .

Their victim's fingers twitched a bit, and he let out one gasping, bloody gurgle before he went still and dark blood stated to copiously ooze out his ears, mouth and nose, mixing into the pool that was forming on the pavement from his grievous wounds.

People rushed to him now and tried to help him; I assume an ambulance was on the way. I couldn't help but notice the club bouncers now made a big theatrical show of being in charge of the situation.

The whole incident had been lightning quick; our collective estimate was that it had taken between thirty and forty five seconds, no more; it had just seemed to last longer because of the drugs we were on (and, well, pure shock) which had both heightened my sensitivity to it, to all the little details, while also making it all seem very disconnected and distant, as if I was watching it all from underwater or something.

I found my friends, who had all seen it from different vantage points, and we decided to get the hell out of there immediately.

Our wonderful friend Geppeto was probably the single best person to have in our company then, as he was sober and is a natural born entertainer with many talents; he understood the need to distract us after seeing something like that, and he did so admirably on our walk home, keeping us occupied with jokes, magic tricks and other antics.

That was pretty much it. Soon thereafter the acid started to wear off, and we all retreated to my apartment to crash there for the night.

I have no doubt at all that we watched a man get killed before our very eyes that night, although I never followed up on it and never heard anything more about it. Still, I cannot imagine how anyone could survive such an assault; his throat had been badly gashed, his face sliced to shreds, ribs smashed and kicked in, and that was all before they crushed his skull.

What I still remember most vividly about it all is the club security laughing with unconcealed evil glee while it was happening. I suspect they were in on it from the beginning. Many girls in Belgrade tell me those are actually nice guys, that they're friends with them and blablabla, but I don't buy any of that horseshit for a second. Do NOT ever trust them to ensure your security if you should ever happen to go to Plastik (that was one of several incidents I witnessed there). Those nasty pigfuckers let anything happen over there, so do not be fooled into thinking it is a safe club or that they do their job. They are great at being assholes and not letting people into the club, though.

I would love to be able to hear what they would have to say to the parents of whoever that guy was who finished his night a bloody, broken pulp in the middle of the street.