Hot. Digital. Sexual. Underground.

The man—or perhaps woman—dressed all in black and wearing a disturbingly realistic leather horse’s head sits apparently despondent (given the mask, it’s hard to tell, but his or her body is slumped) on a bench across from the stage where three barebreasted women with candles taped to their nipples pose holding…are they dildos?

The lighting is dim, and they are obscured by naked and half-naked dancing bodies. Through a doorway in the cavernous club—Passive Arts Studios near LAX in Los Angeles—Larry, a well-known actor, can see a man dressed like Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean using an Indiana Jones bullwhip on a spreadeagled naked woman. When Larry maneuvers through the crowd of perhaps 200 at the annual DomCon—Domination Convention— Fetish Ball, he glimpses your average six-and-a half-foot-tall transvestite dominatrix, as well as a bent-over young man being sodomized by a woman wielding a butt plug the size of a sawed-off Louisville Slugger. A guy in his mid-70s—clearly the oldest in the group—in full leather regalia, handcuffs at his belt, whip under his arm, rocks his walker toward the unisex bathroom.

“Bet he’s seen some things in his time,” says a woman in a leather thong with studs through her nipples.

“You mean weirder than this?” asks a man in black slacks and a blue blazer.

“You have no idea,” the woman says, grinning, and sashays away, headed into the labyrinth of rooms in the back of the club.

Two of the orgiasts who have joined Larry at the Fetish Ball come out of the bathroom. Betty, a blonde, and Veronica, a brunette, each take one of Larry’s arms. Veronica’s husband, Reggie, lags behind, scoping out a woman in a catsuit.

“Can you believe,” says Betty, “someone in the bathroom line told us we didn’t look like we belonged here?”

Both women are dressed for an evening at the Bar Marmont (casual cocktail dresses), though Veronica may pass muster at the Fetish Ball since she is wearing a long, not quite translucent white gown with nothing underneath.

But it isn’t really their scene.

"No one’s having any orgasms,” Veronica says.

Larry takes a last look around the club and heads for the door, following Betty, Veronica and Reggie, who consider themselves a sexual trio. Betty comes to L.A. most weekends to play with Veronica and Reggie.

In the past few months, Larry has been involved in orgies with both Betty and Veronica, who are part of a vast sexual underground that’s different from the erotic underground of the 1970s and 1980s, the era of Plato’s Retreat and Sandstone. It’s different in great part because of the influence of the Internet, which makes meeting easier and offers a larger pool of potential playmates.

On the way out Larry, Betty, Veronica and Reggie pass the smorgasbord, which is serving, among other dishes, meatballs in sauce.

“If there’s a smorgasbord,” a friend told Larry, “eat only prewrapped sandwiches— and avoid the mayonnaise.”