Sound-Off Chapter 2

“Close your eyes. Too many years slipped by. Trying to find the truth, but only searching for lies! Leave me be! At the end of this journey! Leave me be! Please don’t return! I can’t stand much longer. I can’t stand much longer…”

The thrum of music faded away and the sound of screaming fans quickly replaced the music’s echo in my ears. I opened my eyes and looked out over the crowd. Aaron’s Amphitheater at Lakewood in Atlanta, Georgia. It was a beautiful place. I’d been here once or twice before to see concerts from other bands. To be standing on the stage though, that seemed like a dream come true.

We waited a few beats before I heard Dylan hit the drums hard. I smirked. This was his favorite song because he got to completely destroy it on the drums. I waited for his solo to escalate before I entered with the main chord. Alex and Anthony joined in a bar later, their parts playing the exact same notes as support for Dylan’s rock out. I heard Dylan suck in a breath against the microphone as he prepared to cause girls in the audience to all simultaneously swoon from his heavenly accent.

“This is the fight to the death, the fight to end of humanity. I am the solider, I am the last hope. We are the survivors of a pandemic unseen.” Dylan started up hard on the drums again, his sticks beating hard on the percussion instrument. This is where I picked up. I imagined myself playing Guitar Hero, the notes flying in the space in front of me as I hit each one with the skill and ability of a professional. I took a step forward and shouted out into the microphone,

“There’s a danger in us all. They are slowly closing in. Find my inner will within. But how long can I resist? That’s anyone’s guess now. Oh how I long to see the dawn.”

“This is the fight to the death, the fight to the end of humanity. I am the solider, I am the last hope. We are the survivors of a pandemic unseen,” Dylan chanted behind me. Next came Alex’s firing up on the bass. Deviating from the set notes that she had followed up to this point, Alex shredded the bass like no one else I knew could.

“Oh the horror! As they corner, for the torture. The Quartet of Murder returns! They act just like everyone else. You can’t see them, but they can see you. And if you cross them, well, they’ll find you!”

“This is the fight to the death, the fight to the end of humanity. I am the solider, I am the last hope. We are the survivors of a pandemic unseen.” Silence cut through the song as we all stopped playing except for Dylan’s light tap on the cymbals. He breathed hard into the microphone, as he let a gentle tap on the cymbals. Soon he started up with a quick beat on the base drum. Anthony struck a loud note on his keyboard, and Dylan shouted out again, “This is the fight to the death, the fight to the end of humanity. I am the solider, I am the last hope. We are the survivors of a pandemic unseen!” The crowd began to sing with Dylan as he repeated the chorus loudly. I smirked and glanced at Alex. She nodded back at me and I joined in.

“This is the fight to the death, the fight to the end of humanity. I am the solider, I am the last hope. We are the survivors of a pandemic unseen!” The cry rang out in the area as the music reached its climax and began to slow. First Anthony and Alex stopped, then I stopped, and Dylan finished us off. Cheers erupted from the crowd, that song being one of the favorites among our fans. I swung my guitar onto my back and lifted my right hand into the air. I waved a little then said,

“Thank you Atlanta! It sure was fun being on stage tonight! I can say, without a doubt, it feels so unreal performing on the same stage as such great bands that are inspirations to us. Atlanta has always been something of a second home to me given how much I’ve stayed down here, so I promise we’ll be coming back soon.”

With a bow, the four of us exited the stage and hurried through the backstage to where our tourbus was waiting out back. I slid up my headphones to block out the cheers that bombarded my eardrums as the band was spotted making a mad dash to our bus. Tyson was waiting with the bus door open. I entered the bus first and quickly noticed something was wrong. Tyson usually made some sort of quip about fame, but he was quiet now. I slid into my usual seat and waited as the others boarded. I just so happen to glance over my shoulder as Dylan walked by and soon realized why Tyson was so quiet. Our agent was on board.

I was unsure of how I felt about this. I mean, I get she's our agent and all, and there wasn't a true meeting place in the amphitheater. However, Fantasy Reform's tour bus was practically the band's only sacred place. It was where we were safe from the outside world. We did not have to worry about anything while we were on this bus. It was just me, Dylan, Tyson, Alex, and Anthony. Now, though, it felt like that sacredness had been spoiled by Janet Morningstar. She didn't seem too giddy about being on the bus either.

Janet moved closer to us. I saw Dylan shift in his seat. So he could sense the tension-filled aura as well. Janet stepped up and put her long red fingernails on the table in front of us. She tapped her index finger nail on the table several times before she turned around, her back to the band, and sighed loudly.

"What was that?" The band exchanged looks before glancing back at the agent.

"What was what?" Alex asked. Janet sighed louder and shook her head in an exasperated manner.

"Tonight's performance!" Janet threw her hands into the air in a manner that made me feel like she had expected us to know exactly what we had done wrong. Problem was, we didn't know.

"I'm sorry," I interjected, leaning closer to Janet, "I don't understand. What did we do wrong?" If looks could kill, I would have been dead ten times over. She sighed even louder this time and shook her head at me.

"The song you started out with was all wrong! The flow between songs was terrible! You rarely spoke with your fans and it felt like you were merely going through the motions! Two people left before the show was over! Two! That is unacceptable!" I leaned back a little. Two? That was a big deal?

"Uh… it's just two people. Over 3000 people came. Two people seems… minuscule." Those were the wrong words. Those were the very wrong words. Janet's face became as red as her nails and I thought for a second she might explode like a bomb. I was kinda upset she didn't, don't judge.

"Only two!" Janet screamed. I sunk back into the seat I was in as Janet nearly flipped the table in between the agent and the band. "How dare you diminish this loss! Those two people will tell their friends they didn't like you and they'll tell their friends and they'll tell their friends! Soon you won't be famous anymore!"

"I think that's a bit ex-"

"Don't you start, Oklahoma boy!" Janet pointed her long red fingernails at Anthony, a demonic look in her eye. She growled and stomped towards him, but before she could reach him, I heard a scream. But, not a human scream. It was more mechanical. Suddenly we were all moving. I was slammed into a nearby wall and the other three members of the band landed on top of me. But, I couldn't focus on that. The fact that Janet just suddenly went flying like the Wicked Witch of the West to the front of the bus kind of held my attention span at the moment. Then everything was right.

"Sorry, had to make a short stop," Tyson called from the front of the bus. Alex began to laugh as we heard Janet making angry noises from the front of the bus. She began to chew out Tyson at the front of the bus. We took that as our cue. The four of us jumped up and shot to the back of the bus, locking ourselves inside our sleeping area.

An awkward silence lapsed over us. I climbed up to my top bunk, Alex below me, and the boys across the room from us. We could just faintly hear Janet still yelling at Tyson for braking too hard over the hum of the bus's engine. The room was pretty dark, the only light creeping through the semi-closed curtains of the one window on the back of the bus. I locked eyes with Dylan, the Irishman sitting on the top bunk across from me. He sighed loudly and shook his head. Dylan laid down on the soft mattress of his bed and shut the curtains around him, closing him off from the world.

"Well," Alex said, breaking the silence, "that was fun, but I'm going to turn in." I heard the sound of curtains shutting and just looked over at Anthony. He shrugged at me before doing the same.

I slid back on my small bed and grabbed the two rough plaid curtains and pulled them along the metal tracks on the ceiling to close off myself from the rest of the tour bus. I pulled off my stage clothes and put on the pajamas I kept up here. I heard clothes drop on the floor nearby and tossed mine out as well. The covers were a warm embrace that shielded me from the outside. I felt my eyes drooping as exhaustion set in and I feel into the dark pit known as sleep.

No, I literally fell. The sensation of wind brushing past me in a harmful manner came upon me as soon as I closed my eyes. It scratched at me and howled by my ears. I tried to shift but I found I could not move at all. For a moment, fear took hold in my heart. Darkness was all around me, circling like a wolf stalking its prey, slowly closing in. I felt terror suck the air out of my lungs and just when I was about to close my eyes, color rushed forward in a stampede. I recoiled, covering my eyes in shock. Then I hit the ground.

The wind was knocked straight out of me. I wheezed hard for a minute or two before uncovering my eyes. Everything was bright neon colors. The sky was a harsh neon blue and the ground just as painful a green. I felt like I was in a land of cartoons. I sat up and observed my surroundings. I was laying on a bed of grass in large sprawling plains. I squinted to observe my surroundings and groaned a little. Suddenly I stood up. Oh, so I'm not having a lucid dream? Dang. Oh well.

I began to walk forward, a dirt path appearing in the distance. I moved towards it quickly, much faster than my usual walking pace. Oh great, even dream me walks faster than me. I stopped next to the path, staring down at it, but not moving towards it. I tried to force myself to move forward, but I can't move at all. Apparently I'm not worthy enough to have a lucid dream. Slowly my head turns to the left, and I can see the sun slowly setting. It hurts to look at it, but as I squint at it, I can see some sort of symbol in it. Just as I begin to make it out, the sun sinks below the skyline.

My head lowered back to looking down at the path and my eyes caught sight of a symbol faintly glowing in the grass by my feet, but it vanished before I could even truly see it. I lifted my head some and saw a deer nearby. Words appeared by its head, probably its thoughts, if I had to make a guess, but on the deer's forehead was yet another symbol. I narrowed my eyes but, for a third time, failed to catch the symbol.

A groan escaped my lips in frustration. My dream was trying to me something but it was being difficult with giving me that message. Then, a bee flew by, and this time I saw the vibrations that came off its wings and the symbols that came with it. I didn't recognize the symbols at first, by one word rang out in my head. Voice. The bee buzzed around my head and the word beat in my head repeatedly. It was somewhat serene until the bee exploded.

Not kidding, the bee stopped in front of my face and then just blew up. I recoiled a little in surprise, but out from where the bee had been curled a purple wisp. It shaped into a woman figure and smiled at me. I looked over her then said,

"Hello?"

"Hello?" she instantly repeated.

"Uh…" I was a bit taken aback from the response. She had just echoed me. "Did you just echo me?"

"Echo me," she said back. Enlightenment struck me hard. Clever brain, referencing Greek mythology to teach me a lesson. The brain knows that I always listen to Greek mythology.

"Have you come to tell me something?" If I wanted to hear what she had to say, I would have to speak the words for her. For those not completely aware of their Greek mythology, Echo is a woman that is only able to repeat what she hears others say, and is the reason you hear caves, cliffs, and other things repeat what you say.

"Come to tell," Echo replied. She pointed at me and then pointed at my mouth.

"My voice?" I asked. Echo nodded her head. She clapped her hands together then opened them. Well, I was playing charades with a figment of my imagination. This could not get any weirder. Then again, it is my brain. I watched as she stared at me, as if wanting me to continue guessing.

"A book?" It clicked. "The book that gave the band powers!" Echo pointed at me and nodded. "What about it?" Echo gestured for me to follow her. She floated off and I ran after her. She stopped by a pond nearby and touched the water. I arrived at the edge as the ripples reached the shore and an image formed in the center. I frowned as the image showed the man I encountered one time before. What had they called him? Ah yeah! Thanatos. I watched as he sat on his throne; I recognized the floor of the room very well.

Thanatos seemed distressed. Good. He deserved to be distressed. Actually, he deserved worse, but I'd settle for distressed for now. He waved to someone out of view of the vision and said something, more like yelled but given there was no sound, it was hard to differentiate. He slammed his fist into the armrest of his throne, then a small servant figure, that reminded me so much of Dobbie that I wanted to cry, ran up with none other than a thick leather book. Thanatos settled it in his lap and began to open it when the vision suddenly shut off like a television when you hit power.

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Author's Notes: While searching for something in my computer, I found this. I thought you guys might like this little blast from the past piece. I sure found it funny. Maybe I'll continue this someday, but enjoy what I had drafted of chapter 2 of Sound-Off.