Let the Music Play - 15. Changing of the Guard

Strung out like god’s own necklaces, curling strings and loops of white set against varying azure and turquoise, the surreal beauty of the coral atolls five miles below, suffused by the golden light of dawn, held The Scar’s rapt attention. He’d seen similar sights many times, but it was a view of which he would never tire.

The atolls slid past, soon to be left far behind as the airliner winged its way across the Pacific, as he relaxed, drink in hand, in the first-class compartment of the Qantas flight. Twirling the monogrammed glass in his hands, he idly wondered why the airline no longer etched the silhouette of a bounding kangaroo into their glassware, though they still had it painted on the tails of their aircraft.

Taking another drink, he tried not to dwell on his recent attempt to secure Kryton switches; the man had rejected his offer out of hand, due to knowing full well the only purpose for which they could be intended outside of a laboratory. It was fortunate, he mused, that he’d arranged the rendezvous at a remote location, which had made the disposal of the man’s body far less of a problem than it could have otherwise been.

He knew of other avenues that he could and would pursue, though it irked him no end that a critical component was yet to be obtained.

The pilot’s voice coming over the intercom interrupted his reverie with the welcome news that they were about to begin their descent into Brisbane.

With the wind being from the east, the 747, flying a standard right-hand landing pattern for Brisbane International Airport, passed over Brisbane’s port on the downwind leg, the plane’s fuselage obscuring the view. A minute later as the aircraft turned base-to-final, banking to the right to line up with the runway, The Scar was rewarded with a magnificent view of the port, as he smiled to himself; his ship had literally come in.

After clearing customs and immigration with his expertly forged passport, being careful to keep his cap pulled low to hide his bald head and scar, it was a simple matter to hail a cab. Making small-talk with the driver, he affected a guttural Slavic accent. He well knew it wasn’t good enough to fool anyone from Eastern Europe – Dimitri had made that quite clear – but imperfect though it was, it would suffice to deceive the locals, adding yet another layer to his cover. Indeed, he enjoyed what amounted to acting, though he was not quite honest enough to admit that to himself.

At the port, he located, with slight difficulty, the truck – or lorry, as the locals would say – that Dimitri had arranged. Driving it up to the cargo receiving area, he presented his bill of lading, waiting with feigned patience as a single shipping container was deposited by crane on the deck of the flatbed truck.

The container, having already cleared customs via a cursory glance, if that, lowered the bed of the truck several inches by virtue of its immense weight, very close to the legal capacity of the vehicle. Grinding the twelve-speed gears slightly due to lack of practice, The Scar set out on the road heading for the compound nearly three hundred miles inland. He’d been there only once, but he remembered the way well enough.

Halfway to the compound, he wheeled into a deserted pull-in, parking the big-rig, taking time to get out and stretch his legs as he surveyed the cotton fields. Taking off his baseball cap, he absently swept his hand over the scar on the front of his bald head, remembering the day he’d received it, and savoring the sweet memory of the day a few months later when he’d exacted his revenge. Clambering back into the truck’s high cab, he slipped a chip for Australia into his GPS before programming in the compound’s coordinates. Two more hours, the gadget estimated.

* * *

Awakened by a phone call from Helen, Brandon and Chase scrambled to get ready. Breakfast went by in a frenzied whirr, and the four members of Instinct watched as the clothing from the closets being packed up by the wardrobe handlers, leaving the four guys with just a small suitcase apiece.

Noticing that Brandon had set aside an old baseball cap to wear, Helen reassured him, “No need to go incognito today, hon, we usually don’t when we travel between concerts. It wouldn’t do much good, so we make the best of it and get some publicity.”

Taking one last look around while Helen stood impatiently at the door, the four guys bade farewell to the suites that had been their home. For the three brothers, it had been several months, for Brandon, only weeks, but it was the first place he’d ever really felt at home. Noticing his wistful look, Chase re-assured him, “We’ve stayed here before, and we’ll probably stay here again one day.”

With a few more steps, they closed the door on that chapter of their lives.

After a ride down in the elevator, Brandon could barely contain his excitement; today was the day, the concert, and later, something even sweeter. The dazzling morning sun peeking through the clouds compelled him to put on sunglasses as they reached the curb, to find Günter waiting with the limo, the door already open, with Barbra inside.

No sooner had Günter pulled away from the curb, easing into the heavy traffic, than Brandon asked, “Will we be seeing Günter again?”

With a happy nod, Helen replied; “He’s our security chief, so he tours with us. No need to say goodbye, he’ll be getting on the plane right alongside the rest of us.”

Happy at the news, Brandon began to ask, but Jon beat him to it, “How’s the ankle?”

With a wry shake of her head, Barbra replied, “It should be fine, as long as I stay away from whips.”

“I’ll want to borrow that thing if Eric and Jon cause any more trouble,” grumbled Helen, though everyone in the car thought she was joking... maybe.

Helen and the guys went over the play list one more time, discussing the details of the concert until they were southbound on the near-gridlocked 405 freeway, following the signs for Los Angeles International Airport.

As they wrapped up the concert planning Brandon asked, “What about our clothes for the concert?”

“Don’t worry about that, I’ve already spoken to the wardrobe people; it’s going to be pretty hot and humid in Phoenix, so you can all choose between jeans and shorts, either way is fine. I’ve got some t-shirts picked out for everyone except the pretty-boy drummer here who never wears a shirt on stage,” Helen said with a chuckle, as Chase began to blush.

Brandon grinned at his boyfriend’s mild discomfort before saying, “Shorts for me because it will be pretty damn hot. I grew up there; it’s likely to be close to a hundred even at night. At least the summer is over, otherwise it would be humid as well as hot. I hope the stage air coolers are working; I’ve heard they’ve failed a few times at Phoenix Pavilions,” he said, referring to the large air conditioner that flooded the stage with a blast of cool air, usually from a continuous duct near the front of the stage.

“They did the last time we were there; damn near fried out asses,” Eric said, remembering the sweat-soaked performance.

Noticing that they were back on surface streets and no longer following the signs for the airport, Brandon glanced out the window in puzzlement as the limo rolled through the entrance to Santa Monica Municipal Airport.

Casting a quizzical glance at Helen, Brandon received only a “You’ll see,” from her. A look at Chase was no more enlightening; he seemed unconcerned.

Brandon’s puzzlement grew even more pronounced as the limo made its way onto the flight line, passing numerous parked aircraft, mainly single-engine light planes, none anywhere near large enough to carry seven passengers.

The limo rounded the end of a tin hanger, slowing to a stop as Brandon’s eyes bugged out, “You’ve got to be kidding me...”

Opening the door, Helen chuckled over her shoulder, “He sure says that a lot, doesn’t he?” as she led the way to the shiny white Beechcraft Premier 1A, the intermediate-range corporate jet she’d chartered.

Traipsing up the steep fold-down metal stairs, Brandon again felt like a fish out of water. Noticing his reaction, Chase and Helen stood beside him inside the aircraft, Chase patting him on the back with a reassuring, “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it.”

“Used to it?” Brandon gushed as they made their way back to the oversized white-leather seats, “I’ve always wanted to fly in one of these.”

Jon and Eric grabbed two of the seats set behind a small table in the rear of the plane, and Brandon and Chase took seats on either side of the cramped aisle. Glancing out the window, Brandon spotted Günter stowing their bags below, and felt the sharp thud of the baggage compartment door slamming closed.

As soon as Günter was on board, the lone pilot pulled up the stairs and dogged the hatch. Retreating to his cockpit, he took his seat on the left, glancing over his shoulder to make certain everyone was seated.

Without further delay, he hit the electric starter, paying careful attention to the tone as the two rear-mounted Williams International FJ44-2A turbofans spooled up. Easing off the right brake pedal, he goosed the left throttle to forty percent, pirouetting the jet towards the runway threshold, just a few hundred yards away.

The first thing that caught Brandon’s attention as different from the one airliner flight he’d made, years before, was the maneuverability of the jet; it wasn’t lumbering, the way an airliner felt on the ground. It also rode just a little rougher; he could feel every expansion gap in the concrete taxiway as the main gear passed over it.

As the jet lined up at the threshold, Brandon watched as the flaps and ailerons cycled, and he heard the pilot say, “Santa Monica Muni tower, this is November three-niner, ready for takeoff on runway twenty-one.”

“November three-niner, we have a heavy crossing your departure route. Hold until cleared, approximately five minutes,” crackled the reply, due to the pilot having patched the radio into the cabin speakers.

Helen noticed Brandon’s fascination, and got up to place a hand on his shoulder, “Follow me.”

Perplexed, Brandon unbuckled his seatbelt, standing up in the narrow aisle, slightly stooped due to the low roof. Chase gave him a wink and a grin but no explanation, so he followed Helen forward. As she reached the doorless cockpit, she asked the pilot, “We’ve got a first-timer with us today. Mind if he takes the right seat?”

Looking back at Brandon, the pilot smiled, “Sure, come on up,” as Helen returned to her seat.

Sliding into the right seat, feeling very much like a little kid on Christmas morning, Brandon buckled in as the pilot said, “Just don’t touch anything unless I say so, and that includes the pedals by your feet. I’ll be a little busy during takeoff, but I’ll try to explain as we go. First, we’ve got the yoke,” he said, patting what appeared to be a truncated steering wheel in his grasp, “it controls pitch and roll. When we hit takeoff speed, this is what I’ll pull back on to lift us off. Near your feet are the rudder pedals, and don’t do it, but if you have your feet on them and ease your feet up, you’ll find the brake pedals, which combined with the nose-wheel steering from the rudder pedals is what we use to steer the aircraft on the ground.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t touch anything,” Brandon replied with an enthralled smile.

“Not unless I tell you to,” the pilot repeated with a smile of his own.

The cockpit speakers cracked, and as the pilot positioned his headphones, “November three-niner, you are cleared for immediate takeoff; noise-abatement rules apply. Squawk three-five-five-six, mode-C. You will be entering Class-B airspace, contact SoCal approach on 121.5 before exceeding five-thousand feet.”

After keying in the transponder code he’d just been given, the pilot dialed his radio to the specified frequency. Easing off the brakes, he eased the twin throttles forward as the takeoff roll began. Responding with a deep roar, the turbofans spooled up, and Brandon felt himself pushed back in his seat, as the plane tore down the runway.

The pilot inched the yoke back, pulling the nose up as the jet reached rotation speed. As the main gear left the ground, he pulled the plane into a sharp climb as he said, “Look on the instrument panel, in the center above the throttles. See that switch that’s shaped like a wheel, with a green light below it? That raises the gear; gently push it up as far as it will go.”

His eyes widening, Brandon reached out with his left hand and raised the switch, his breath catching as he saw the green light go out. He felt a pronounced thump as the gear doors closed, immediately moving his hand back to his side, safely away from the swarm of switches bedecking the panel as the pilot explained, “This airport has a noise-abatement ordinance in effect, so we have to do a steep departure climb.” Brandon watched as the altimeter needle spun clockwise, and the pilot keyed his handheld microphone, “SoCal approach, this is Beechcraft Premier November three-niner departing runway two-one from Santa Monica Muni for Phoenix, squawking three-five-five-six, mode-C, climbing through three thousand feet, over.”

The reply crackled back, “November three-niner, you are cleared to fly a right-hand departure vectoring for the Burbank VOR. Climb to fifteen thousand until you pass Burbank, then proceed to thirty-seven thousand. Be advised that moderate to severe turbulence has been reported over the Santa Monica Mountains. Contact Phoenix Approach Control on 123.7 once you enter Arizona.”

Far below, out of sight under the raised nose of the jet, the coastline slid past as they soared over the Pacific and the pilot began a gentle right-hand bank as he lowered the nose slightly and pulled the throttles back. “Okay, now, see that switch above and to the left of the gear switch, the one labeled ‘flaps’? Push it up.”

Brandon did as instructed, while the pilot explained, “You’ve just raised the flaps. We use a single notch of flaps for takeoff to get more lift, but we dump ‘em for flight. Now, you just heard air traffic control on the radio. Because of the traffic in and out of LAX, almost the entire Los Angeles area is under positive control; you have to work through ATC. The tower handed us off to SoCal Approach, which is the regional ATC. Right before takeoff, they gave me the radio frequencies to use, and told me to squawk a four-digit code. ‘Squawk’ means to transmit on a transponder; it’s an identifying number that the ATC guys can see on their scopes, and know who and what we are. This one is digital, but the older kind, like you’ll find on many private planes, have dial-in settings. That got tricky, because as you were clicking the wheels through the numbers, you could hit one of the emergency codes, and that can get you some attention you’d rather not have, real quick.”

Brandon gave a nervous laugh before the pilot continued, “They told us to vector in on the Burbank VOR. That stands for VHF Omni-directional Radio Range, a type of navigation aid. Those are basically the beacons for highways in the sky; any aircraft under positive control, and everything above twenty thousand is, is directed by ATC, and the routes they use run from VOR to VOR. ATC also specifies an altitude so you don’t run into anybody on a flight route that crosses your own. This instrument here,” he tapped one of three round glass-fronted instruments in the center panel, “is the VOR receiver. We have three, so we can set them to different VOR’s. On the paper clipped to the visor in front of me are the frequencies and codes we’ll be needing,” he glanced at the sheet, “Turn the frequency knob on the VOR I just tapped to 115.6, that’s the Phoenix VOR. It’s line-of-sight and still under our horizon, so we won’t get anything yet, but we should by the time we reach cruising altitude.”

After setting the VOR, Brandon asked, “What are the needles for?”

“You set those to a radial. A radial is a compass bearing from the VOR. For example, you need to set that one to two-five-seven, because we’ll be approaching the Phoenix VOR from a magnetic bearing of two-five-seven degrees. That gives us a flight path; if we stray to either side, the needle moves off center, so we fly towards the needle to get back on course.”

Brandon set the VOR, as the pilot guided them through the smoggy skies of Burbank, banking right again to pick up the bearing to Phoenix as they picked up the Phoenix VOR. Beginning a gentle climb, the pilot said, “Now, Mister Co-Pilot, time to earn your keep. I want you to gently put your hands on the yoke, but stay off the rudders, we won’t need ‘em.

Chewing on his lower lip, Brandon did as he’d been asked, feeling the yoke move in sync with the pilot’s. Shifting slightly in his seat, the pilot said, “The thing to remember is gentle control inputs, nothing sudden. If you turn the yoke to the right, the plane banks to the right and begins to turn in that direction. Pull back and it raises the nose, push forward and it lowers it. Now, look here,” he tapped another center instrument, one with a symbol of wings above a line which split light blue above from brown below. “That’s the artificial horizon. It shows us climbing. When we level out, it will center on the aircraft symbol. You can use this, but the best way is to look out the windows. When we’re level, you’ll see where the horizon sits across the nose, and just keep her level by watching that. I’d normally just program a route into the Autopilot, which has GPS, but we’re going to do this the old-fashioned way, and you’re going to fly us to Phoenix manually.”

Grinning, his eyes out the window as they climbed through thirty thousand feet, Brandon nodded eagerly, and the Pilot finished the lesson, “Leave the radios to me; you just fly the plane. Once we reach altitude, I’ll level us out, then she’s all yours. I’ll set the throttles and you won’t have to worry about ‘em, but the old rule of thumb is the yoke controls airspeed, and the throttles control altitude. That’s not strictly true, but it’s what beginning pilots are told on their first lesson. For today, just let me worry about the throttles.”

Leveling off at thirty-seven thousand feet, the pilot throttled back, “Okay, now see where the nose is on the horizon? Just keep her there and watch the altimeter; stay at this altitude and heading, and keep at this altitude. I’ve put us a little to the left of the ground track as you can see by the VOR. Now, all you have to do is gently bank us toward the right, roll level after we’ve turned about ten degrees, flying us towards the needle. Concentrate on keeping the nose level as you bank, you’ll have to pull back on the yoke just a little. Okay, you’ve got the aircraft,” he said, keeping his left hand on the yoke.

Still chewing his lip, Brandon banked the jet to the right, beginning to lose a little altitude as he focused on the bank angle until the pilot reminded him to pull up slightly. Leveling out after an eight degree course change, the wings wobbling slightly as he overcorrected, Brandon began to sweat slightly. Struggling in the light turbulence, which forced him to make frequent corrections to keep the wings level, he watched as the VOR needle crept towards the center of the instrument. With the needle almost, but not quite, centered, the pilot said, “You’re almost there. Remember, you always need to lead your instruments, so start your left turn just before the needle centers.”

Banking a little smoother and holding his altitude, Brandon rolled out on the heading for Phoenix, and the pilot added, “We’ve got a tailwind today, so there isn’t a crosswind component to worry about, but if there was, you’d need to angle a few degrees towards the wind direction; otherwise it would slowly push you off-track. Okay, take us to Phoenix, co-pilot.”

Struggling with the mild turbulence, Brandon kept the jet on course, finding it easier as he grew more practiced. Soon, the blue Ribbon of the Colorado River passed beneath them, and the pilot, who no longer had a hand on the yoke, radioed in to Phoenix Approach Control. The ATC reply told them that they’d be landing westbound, and to fly a left-hand pattern for Sky Harbor International Airport, for the South Runway. After selecting ‘intercom’ on the rotary selector, the pilot keyed the mike one more time to announce, “We’ll be arriving in Phoenix in about thirty minutes. I’d also like to mention that I’m not flying the plane, your friend is, and has been since shortly after takeoff.”

Brandon heard a few claps of applause, the loudest, though he didn’t know it, coming from Chase, who, like his brothers, had similar experiences in their recent past. Brandon also heard Eric yell, “Oh my god, we’re all going to die!”

“I hope you’re going to get him for that,” the pilot chuckled.

“Count on it,” Brandon replied, as a plan began to take shape in his mind.

The pilot talked Brandon through the decent and pattern entry, only helping with the controls a few times. As they began the downwind leg of the landing pattern at eight thousand feet, with Sky Harbor coming up on their left and the Estrella Mountains on their right, the pilot said, “Okay, things get hectic from here on out, so I’ll take it from here.” Glancing down to his left, he added, “I can see the Phoenix Amphitheater down there. That’s where you’re playing tonight, right?”

Releasing the yoke, his hands slightly sore from gripping it too tightly but feeling at ease about the concert for the first time, Brandon nodded, “Yeah, I grew up in Phoenix, and I’ve been there before to see concerts. Helen calls it ‘Phoenix Pavilions’ and it used to be called the Phoenix Desert Sky Pavilion, but they changed it to “Phoenix Cricket Pavilion” a few years ago when they sold the naming rights to some company. Everyone I know, including me, hates the new name so much they won’t use it. Thanks for letting me fly, that was fantastic.”

“A stupid move by both the city and the company, from the sound of it. Par for the course, from what I’ve seen. Have a great concert tonight... and glad you had fun at the controls. You did pretty well; you could take lessons if you wanted to, it’s a great feeling, I love to fly more than anything. Say, I was hoping you could do me a favor; my little girl is a big fan of your group, and I’d love it if I could get an autograph from you guys...”

“No problem at all there, I’ll get it for you right after we land, and thanks again, that was great.”

Brandon watched the rest of the landing with great interest, with the pilot’s words about taking lessons never leaving his mind. ‘One day I will,’ he promised himself.

After making the rounds to get the autographs signed, Brandon watched as the jet taxied away. Jon approached him from the side, announcing his presence with a light punch to Brandon’s arm, “Hey bro, why does all the tourist propaganda from your hometown say ‘it’s a dry heat’ when it’s so damn humid?”

Brandon laughed before answering, “The tourist board hopes people don’t notice that for several months each year, Phoenix is humid as well as hot. Trouble is – people aren’t that dumb.”

A waiting limo took them directly from the flight line to the concert venue, and though Brandon had been there before, this time was far different; they entered via a private entrance, well before the crowds were due to arrive. Making their way to the stage, feeling the desert heat blasting at them, they found the road crew, the same crew Brandon had once been a part of, setting up the instruments. Brandon exchanged some acknowledging nods with a few of the crew, shaking a few of their hands as they hurried about their tasks, as his eyes swept out across the huge amphitheater and its twenty-thousand empty seats, with the lawn area beyond where thousands more would stand. Chase came to his side, sharing the moment in intimate silence.

As the road crew began running sound checks, Brandon had to fight the urge to join in; that was his old job. With an inner chuckle, he recalled his hopes of doing a little singing during the sound checks for this concert, and marveled at how things had changed.

A stadium worker escorted them backstage, where snacks and soft drinks had been laid out. The dressing rooms were adjoining, so they sat down to relax a little, with just a few hours to go before show time.

Any hope of free time soon faded, as Helen ushered several reporters in, and a round of impromptu interviews got underway. She stayed close to Brandon, but in spite of his inexperience, he managed to cope fairly well, in her opinion at least.

Instinct’s instruments soon arrived, and the three brothers spent a few minutes checking out their gear. Chase’s drums were set up on stage, and Brandon kept him company while he confirmed that all was in working order. After a few quick adjustments with a tuning key, he pronounced them ready, as the clock continued to tick down.

An hour before show time, The Shadows arrived, racing to get ready for their big opening. The four members of Instinct stood backstage as The Shadows opened the concert, and Brandon had his first good look at the teeming crowd, backlit by the desert sunset. He smiled; he’d expected to be nervous, but so far, he wasn’t. He just hoped the feeling lasted.

Halfway through The Shadows’ performance, Helen came up behind her charges, “Time to get ready, guys...”

* * *

Gasping out a muffled curse as he sucked his wounded thumb, the engineer paced back and forth in the machine shop, finally taking his thumb out of his mouth to yell at the cowering gunsmith, “You should have warned me, you oaf! How was I to know you wanted the machine right next to the wall? You should have said something before pushing. I’ll be lucky if it is merely cut, not sprained. Get someone else to help you, preferably someone who won’t miss a few fingers.”

Coming to the engineer’s aid with a small first-aid kit, Dimitri ushered him to a small private office and asked as he cleaned and bandaged the wounded digit, “Vladimir, I see you have had more trouble with that one. Do you think he is worth keeping around?”

The engineer shrugged, “He is clumsy and does not seem to know the machinery at all. That lathe we were moving cannot go against a wall; the spindle arm travels horizontally several inches past the back edge, so of course it can not be blocked by a wall. I had him machine a set of cutouts on the jigsaw, and he did not seem to know that you need a lubricant to cut metal. He cannot be a master gunsmith. He may have been a layman apprentice at one point, but even that is in grave doubt.”

“So, he lied regarding his qualifications, did he? In the business world, that is grounds for termination; so be it. Our employer will be here within two hours but I can take care of our problem and be back before then. However, do not risk yourself by helping to move any more equipment.”

Taking his leave of the engineer, shuddering at the thought of what a more serious injury might have cost them, Dimitri located the erstwhile gunsmith, who seemed to him to be trying to set up a machine. “You’ve been re-assigned,” Dimitri said in a calm, pleasant voice, “We need you on the fertilizer project. Come with me.”

Mounting a small Bearcat earthmover, Dimitri had the unwitting man hang on to the outside of the cage for the short drive as Dimitri congratulated himself on foreseeing this need. After a journey of only a few hundred yards, just enough to give them privacy from the main compound, Dimitri brought the earthmover to a stop facing the small pit and lowered the blade before climbing out of the cage. Smiling in his disarming way, he watched as the confused man hopped down from the cage. With one smooth, fluid movement, Dimitri withdrew the hunting knife from the sheath he wore on his belt, ramming it upwards into the astonished man’s gut. A shocked gasp was the only sound, before Dimitri twisted the knife in a half-turn, feeling the faint vibration as the blade rubbed against bone. Stepping to the side to avoid the rush of blood as he withdrew the knife with a measured sideways motion, Dimitri watched as his victim collapsed backwards, clutching his eviscerated gut and coughing up the first spatter of blood from his rapidly filling lungs. Gasping for air, the blood spurting past his clutching hands to soak into the arid red soil, the hapless man began to choke, his eyes wide with horror. Dimitri stared into those eyes as they faded to a dull and lifeless stare, a faint smile on his lips as he cleaned his knife on the dying man’s shirt.

Kicking the corpse into the waiting grave, Dimitri fired up the earthmover and used the lowered blade to fill in the hole. Pausing only long enough to excavate a new hole nearby, he wheeled the earthmover around and rumbled back to the compound, silently cursing the fact that now he had to procure a replacement gunsmith.

* * *

Filing into the dressing room, they found sets of clothes laid out; jeans for Jon and Eric, denim knee-length shorts for Brandon, and tan boardies for Chase. Shoes and socks were set out, but one thing was notably absent. “Where are the shirts?” Brandon asked.

Helen shrugged, “Slip ‘em on fresh right before you go on. Nothing looks worse than sweaty pits.”

Brandon headed off to change, oblivious to Helen’s warning glance cast in Eric’s direction.

Gathering at the entrance to the stage, the four guys watched The Shadows conclude their act, taking their bows to the mildly enthusiastic applause, which was a little better than the norm for an opening act.

As the three members of The Shadows filed offstage, Helen said to her charges, “Good luck guys, knock ‘em dead.”

Jon and Eric slung their guitars over their bare shoulders and Chase clutched his drumsticks. After taking the cordless mike from a tech, Brandon turned to Helen, “No shirt, huh? You planned it this way, right?”

Helen chuckled, “Peace of mind, hon, peace of mind; I figured you’d be nervous enough, so why worry you?”

Fixing her with a stare, Brandon stated, “You used to sell insurance... right?”

With a slight blush, Helen nodded. “Yeah, a long time ago. Okay guys, the announcer will be doing his thing in fifteen seconds. Count to ten after he finishes, then go on out at a jog. Brandon, you know what to do, just like you’ve been rehearsing.”

The announcer’s voice echoed through the vast amphitheater, drowning out the roar of the crowd, as Brandon felt the butterflies return to take roost in his gut. He glanced around as the ten-count began; Chase, focused and intent, looking toward his drums. Jon and Eric, adjusting their guitars and similarly focused, so much so that even Eric wore a serious expression. This was, he reflected, what they did, and now it was his life too. The butterflies, he decided, would have to wait; he had a job to do...

With the stage lights faded to black, the four members of Instinct jogged forward to their positions as the crowd began to roar... Taking his place center-stage, Brandon fought the urge to blink as the single key-light pulled him from the darkness. Taking a deep breath of the sultry air, he listened to the rising cheers from the crowd as Jon played the distinctive opening riff to ‘Believe’.

His apprehension faded as Brandon launched into the song, mimicking Lump’s voice, staying mostly stationary and clutching his mike, with no need to close his eyes in order to see an audience, for this audience was far from the phantoms of his prior acquaintance.

The cheers at the end of the song swept away any lingering doubt; he’d taken his role, the fans had accepted him. Launching right into ‘Beyond’ he let loose in his full range, as the flicker of a thousand lighters filled the dusk-bound amphitheater, swaying to the slower pace of the ballad’s first refrains. Hitting the change-up, Brandon walked forward, sweeping his left arms over the crowd, as he sang the hard-edged second verse, pacing back and forth at the edge of the stage, he spun, walking over to stand with Eric as Eric launched into a brief bass solo, Brandon catching his breath before beginning the third verse.

After a few moment’s pause at the end of the song, Brandon triggered his mike again, “Hello, Phoenix! We’ve got a great show for you tonight; some of our old hits and some all-new tracks from our soon-to-be released album: Changing of the Guard. You’re going to be the first to hear the new stuff; are you ready to get started?” The crowd, roaring their assent, began cheering even louder as he launched into the first of the new songs.

Three songs later, Brandon had the crowd on its feet, as he began the second of the new songs ­– which was the first of his own – one with a secret that none of the guys yet knew.

“Our next number is something a little different, hope it means as much to you as it does to me, it’s called ‘Changing Times’” Brandon yelled, swatting a stray beach-ball back to the audience as the security detail scrambled to nab a another stage-climber. Taking a deep breath, he waited for the instrumentals to begin before launching into the song,

Too many times, I’ve been lost, too many times, I’ve been hurt, ever to believe...

Too many times, I’ve walked alone, the world against me, never going home,

So many times, I’ve been defeated, down and out, nobody cared...

Running across the stage, Brandon came to a halt by Eric, as the bass guitarist, his bare torso covered in sweat from the hot, muggy air that the stage-cooler did little to dispel, paced forward, pounding out chord after chord. After singing a few more lines, they reached the front edge of the stage, and Brandon strode to the edge, waving his arm, to meet up with Jon, who had been approaching the apron of the stage on his own. Jon leaned back, working the distortion bar of his Stratocaster, exchanging one brief grin with his new lead singer.

Brandon swung around, heading for his very much unrehearsed destination; the drum stand. Coming to a halt beside the drums, he sang the words he’d penned in his dingy room,

One lonely night, despair my only friend,

an image on a wall my only desire

A time I was failing, barely wanting to go on

a broken man, every dream dead and gone

In the pain there is a wanting,

One dream, one hope, for forever else was lost, one vision helping me through yet another forsaken night

In your image I found meaning

Just in time.

For one brief instant Chase looked up from the drums, making eye contact as realization dawned, and he understood whose image Brandon meant, and that the song had been written for him.

Brandon jogged back to his mike stand as Chase completed the short drum solo, amazed that he’d had the nerve to do what he’d done; send a very private message in front of thousands of people, with only his intended recipient any the wiser, or so he mistakenly thought.

Facing the crowd, working the stage, covered in sweat despite the cool air from the blowers battling the humid Phoenix evening, Brandon ran through the final set of songs, finishing the final piece to a deafening silence.

Fear clenched his gut, only to be dispelled a moment later by the thunderous applause and cheers filling his ears, giving at last both voice and substance to his dreams.