The Dandy’s Drum

A horror story based on songs by Adam and the Ants

The first thing anyone noticed about the Ants was the rhythm. It wasn’t pop, not really. It was a dense, percussive war-machine beat, heavy on the tom-toms, played so loudly it didn't just vibrate the floorboards; it rattled the calcium in your bones. It was the sound of a small, perfectly drilled army marching through the hollow heart of the night.

Eliza hated it.

She worked in a dingy records shop near the docks, and for the last three weeks, the city had been swallowed by the cult of the Ant. Not just the music, but the look: the vivid, almost aggressive New Romantic dandyism mixed with old highwayman chic. Military jackets, brass buttons, and, terrifyingly, the white stripe of war paint smeared across the nose and cheekbones like a bone protruding through skin.

Tonight, she was walking home down an alley slick with rain. The sound was closer than usual, emanating from a warehouse complex where the rumors said the Ants held their nightly gatherings. They weren't just fans; they were devotees. They didn't listen to the music; they executed it.

A figure stepped out of the shadow of a dumpster.

He was tall, dressed in a faded black leather jacket laced with silver braiding, and his face was a grotesque illustration�"the deep, angular black lines highlighting the features, the iconic white stripe drawn sharply down his nose. He didn't smile. He just cocked his head, listening to the incessant drum beat thumping from the warehouse, a siren call promising anarchy.

“Lost, little Goody Two Shoes?” the man purred. His voice carried the same theatrical sneer Adam Ant had perfected�"part bored aristocrat, part hungry pirate.

Eliza froze, clutching her heavy tote bag. “Just passing through.”

“No one passes through the Wild Frontier unless they’ve paid the toll,” he said, extending a hand. His fingers were long and pale, tipped with nail polish the color of dried blood. He didn't want money. He wanted obedience.

“You know what we say,” the Ant continued, his eyes gleaming under the streetlamp. “You will Stand and Deliver.”

From the deeper shadows, two more figures emerged�"a woman in a tricorne hat and tight black trousers, and another man whose skin looked too taut beneath the face paint, like the mask was shrinking. They moved with a disturbing, synchronized grace, less like human beings and more like wind-up dolls powered by that relentless drum.

Eliza bolted.

She scrambled past garbage cans and abandoned pallets, the heavy thump-thump-thump of the music accelerating, matching the panic in her chest. She could hear the distinctive clack of their polished leather boots behind her. They weren't fast, but they were tireless.

She knew the rules of the game: If they caught you, they didn't hurt you immediately. They brought you to the ritual. They made you listen.

She ducked into the mouth of a disused loading bay, managing to wedge a metal drum in the sliding door track just as the Ant dandy slammed against the outside.

Heavy breathing filled the dark, dusty space. She pressed her back against the cold concrete.

Don’t listen to it, she told herself. It’s just noise.

But it wasn't just noise. It was intoxicating. It was perfect. The rhythm was so compelling, so brutally simple, it promised to take all the messy complexities of life and strip them down to pure, savage swagger.

This was the terrifying genius of Antmusic.

She realized with a sickening lurch that the beat was already inside her head. Her foot was tapping a small, nervous tattoo on the floor.

Outside, the dandy began to sing, his voice echoing eerily in the narrow dockyard. It wasn't a sweet song of romance; it was a hymn of transformation.

“Don't ever, never, never stop! Listen to the music, it's really hot!”

Suddenly, the music volume soared. The door to the warehouse must have opened. The full force of the synchronized drumming hit the air, a physical wave of sound pressure. Eliza slapped her hands over her ears, but the effect was useless. The music was resonating through her teeth.

Then she heard the sounds inside the loading bay with her. Soft, predatory sounds.

A low growl. A scratch on the concrete floor.

She turned slowly, straining her eyes in the gloom. In the far corner, nestled among the broken crates, was a man. He wore the usual military coat and makeup, but his stance was low, almost on all fours. He was twitching.

He wasn't part of the pursuit gang. He was waiting.

He looked up at her, and Eliza saw the horrifying truth of the makeup. It wasn't just paint. It was a frame for something wild and dehumanized. His teeth looked too long, his eyes too dark.

The Ant on all fours hissed, low and guttural. “Dog eat dog.”

He sprang, not with human speed, but with the coiled ferocity of a starved animal. Eliza screamed, stumbling backward, tripping over a coil of thick rope.

The Ant outside heard her. The metal drum scraping the sliding door was suddenly wrenched away with inhuman strength.

The dandy stood framed in the loading bay entrance, the theatrical white stripes on his face now looking less like makeup and more like a bleached death mask. The rhythmic thump-thump of the warehouse beat had reached peak volume, a manic, demanding pulse.

"You tried to run, dear Puss 'n Boots," the dandy whispered, stepping inside. He carried a ceremonial sword, dull and heavy, more for threat than use. “But you cannot escape the rhythm.”

The Ant on the floor was clawing at Eliza’s ankles. She kicked out wildly, scrambling to her feet, her terror fusing into raw adrenaline.

She lunged past the dandy, back into the alley, and ran toward the source of the noise�"the warehouse itself. She wasn't running away anymore. She was being drawn in.

The warehouse doors were massive, made of corroded steel, but tonight they stood wide open, a gaping, brilliant portal.

Inside was a vision of controlled frenzy. Hundreds of people�"all identically dressed in black and brass, all striped with the pale war paint�"were pounding drums, dancing in a manic, synchronized ritual. The light was theatrical and stark, reflecting off polished leather and metal.

At the center stood the orchestrator.

He was the ideal of the dandy: immaculate, powerful, mesmerizing. He wore an elaborate jacket, his hair slicked back beneath a pirate bandana. He was drumming faster, harder than anyone, his arms a blur over the skins, driving the entire congregation into a frenzy.

This was the terrifying ideal they all chased. This was the ultimate theatrical predator, the idol of emptiness.

He saw Eliza standing trembling in the doorway. He stopped drumming, and the entire assembly went silent, a sudden, heavy drop in sound that felt like descending altitude.

His eyes, framed by the aggressive makeup, were utterly empty of humanity. He was a mask on a scarecrow, a title with no substance.

“You are late for the performance, darling,” he said, his voice carrying the echo of a thousand hungry followers. He didn’t need to seduce her. He just needed to demand her transformation.

“You think you are so special, so charming?” Eliza gasped, desperately trying to cling to the last vestiges of reality.

The idol tilted his head, the white stripe catching the light. “I am Prince Charming. And you will join my regiment.”

He raised his drumsticks. The silence stretched until it was painfully thin.

“It’s the rhythm or the rope,” he commanded.

Eliza felt her legs begin to shake. The pull was overwhelming. It wasn't the threat of violence that broke her; it was the promise of perfection. To shed the mundane, the fearful, the individual, and become part of a powerful, unified, brilliant machine.

The ultimate Ant.

The leader brought the sticks down in a thunderous, solitary CRACK.

Eliza didn’t just jump; her body responded before her mind could protest. Her hands flew up, and she began to clap, a perfect, synchronized beat.

The white stripe on her face was already itching, waiting to be drawn on. The regiment welcomed her. The music had won.

She took a dizzying step forward, into the blinding, percussive light of the warehouse. Her old self�"the scared girl, the individual�"had been delivered, and now she was gone, replaced by another recruit for the Kings of the Wild Frontier.

The terrifying, relentless, beautiful beat started up again, and Eliza joined the dance, her fear replaced by a hungry, uniformed aggression. The sound pounded on, demanding more. And the Ant regiment was only too happy to oblige.