We Are Toten Herzen

by C Harrison

RavensWish - totenherzen box set out and i cant afford it :-( pisses me off havin noooo money dont have a record player anyways

  DM to RavensWish - don't worry, I'll get one sorted for you (and a record player!): sent by WhiteRotterdam

  The Sun

  Box Set Con Trick Catches the Spivs

  Toten Herzen's 'limited edition' back catalogue leaves speculators hundreds of pounds out of pocket

  For thousands of Toten Herzen fans the back catalogue box sets started to arrive today, after a wait of thirty five years! (The albums were actually released at midnight on Hallowe'en.) With five vinyl albums plus new artwork costing thirty quid not many were complaining, apart from the twenty early birds who pre-ordered the new release.

  They were unaware that only twenty customers would be allowed to place an order before the official release date. After paying £350 three weeks ago they thought they were quids in when their so-called special editions started to appear on Ebay, with Buy it Now prices starting from five thousand pounds. One box set being sold by Charlie Clarken in Nantwich was listed for ten grand. "I feel sick as a parrot," said Clarken, a property developer. "I thought I'd make a bit of money out of this, but I've been ripped off. We all have."

  But as soon as the items appeared a press release on the band's website clarified the issue saying the box set would go on sale to the general public for thirty pounds, leaving the greedy spivs hundreds of pounds out of pocket. The fourteen who listed their pre-order on Ebay were named and shamed on the website, but spokesman for the band Rob Wallet told the Sun the other six would be refunded.

  As for the fourteen who tried to cash in at the expense of genuine Toten Herzen fans: "They can have their money back too, but they need to ask the band in person." So far none of them have taken up the offer. Charlie Clarken was prepared to swallow the loss. "I won't be asking them for my money back. I don't even like Toten Herzen."

  36 (November)

  RavensWish - just arrived at Ahoy subway station absolutely starving but cant stomach anything so nervous

  Raven managed to propel herself away from the metro line and into the Zuidplein shopping centre to find food. This was a problem vampires didn't have, apart from maybe the need to find blood which they wouldn't find in a place like this unless they attacked someone, which would be a bit stupid, drawing attention to themselves in broad daylight, but then if it was broad daylight they wouldn't be out looking for blood. The runaway train of thoughts was in contrast to the muscle tightening excitement at what was ahead of her. All the way from the central station she had spotted people in black - some wearing face masks - who she presumed were going to the concert. But they weren't going where she was going. Not a bit of it. She stopped and took in the familiar sight of a shining, buffed up, spotless array of indoor shops selling the same expensive, unobtainable goods, but with different names above the windows. She thought she might stand out, with her black clothes and blue hair, but she wasn't alone this afternoon. Evidence of Toten Herzen was wandering around, mingling lazily with the regular shoppers, attracting sideways glances and whispered observations from groups of onlookers standing around in twos and threes.

  This is what happens, thought Raven, when you are someone, when you have that influence and power to alter the surroundings. For one day this shopping centre's equilibrium was off centre, its familiarity disturbed by an influx of outsiders. When she found a MacDonald’s it was half full of Toten Herzen fans being observed by silent children and their worried parents.

  RavensWish - hunger begone found a macdonalds

  She bought a box of chicken nuggets and a Coke and continued through the mall. Her head was still full of cloud; her thoughts erratic and confused. Her limbs felt heavy and swallowing was an effort with a mouth drying up after every sip of her Coke. She found a seat and sat down. Studying her chicken nuggets she wondered if this could be her last meal? The time on her phone was a little after four. The band would still be hidden somewhere avoiding the last hours of sunlight before evening moved in and the mischief began. For now the black clad figures were following social norms and drifting quietly in anticipation of the coming storm. Raven moved on, outside to the cold afternoon. The grey light of day was already beginning to turn red.

  Traffic along the main road ringing the Ahoy was already at a standstill; bumper to bumper, inching along with each change of the traffic lights. People were sat in groups under the trees and across the way, the first indication of the event were the lines of lights launching from the roof of the arena. Banners stood in proud lines with the Toten Herzen crest and at right angles the exclamation WeAreTotenHerzen. Raven wanted a shot of the arena approach, but the traffic was a crawling wall obstructing her view, so she looked for access to the bridge that crossed the main road to the arena car park on the far side.

  Elevated above the road and the cars she now had a greater sense of arrival and joined others up here for the panorama. And what a panorama it was as she came to a point midway above the traffic jam and saw the full extent of the invasion.

  The arena lights were growing more vivid, swinging in a great arc across a mottled red sky. The banners flapped, arranged around a huge square filled with people. The doors weren't open yet, no queues had formed. Instead gangs were gathering around fires and flares belching great plumes of red smoke which hung in the air like evaporated blood. The smell of the fires and the car fumes added to the Danteian atmosphere. Flags bearing the daggered lettering of the band's crest marked the territories of individual camps: TH Utrecht, TH Arnhem, TH Harlem, TH den Haag, they were from everywhere, disgorged from coaches, trains and cars. They had come from all over Holland and Britain: Lincoln, Ipswich, Birmingham, Hull, Leeds. There were banners from Brussels and Paris, from Stuttgart, Essen, Gdansk, Bratislava. Proclamations from all over Europe were displayed on the flags, sprouting above the heads of the crowds; claiming their territory, announcing their occupation. There was music, unidentifiable, tinny, not the bass heavy thud that would soon come rumbling out of the hall as soundchecks began and the concert start grew ever closer. Raven took photo after photo from all directions. From one side of her field of vision to the other, a mass gathering, a congregation.

  The oblivious smoke from the flares wandered towards the metro station, consuming then aggravating the traffic. Raven moved on, down the steps of the footbridge and into the red mist and its ghostly multilingual chatter. Face masks appeared and turned to her as she passed. They were flamboyant and colourful; detailed with lace and jewellery. Some had the beaks and feathers of birds, others the taught skin of bats. The fashion spectrum included everything from the dry black of tour tee-shirt to gothic corsetry and steam punk paraphernalia. Raven thought her blue hair might be the exception, but she counted five girls with similar colours, in addition to purple, turquoise, orange, maroon and red. There were men and women alike with scarlet coloured hair, hanging straight or with poker stiff spikes like Elaine Daley's crimson mohican. For others it was Dee Vincent's jet black bob or Susan Bekker's long, wild, charcoal style with flame tinted flashes around the face.

  Raven paused to upload some of the photos and tweet the link, then realised she was still holding the empty MacDonald's nugget box. No litter bins anywhere! A group of fans materialised and saw her phone and the images.

  "Sorry, I don't speak Dutch," she said, face to face with a group of girls and their matching purple and black lace masks. One of them pointed at her phone and stood alongside her.

  "You're taking pictures?"

  "Yeah, from on the bridge." Raven scrolled through the set and the masked girls were impressed. "Can I photograph you? I love your masks."

  "Sure." And the four of them obediently lined up for the pose. Then one of them spoke and the others set off in the direction of the bridge to get their own view of the gathering. "Okay, thanks," said one of them as they disappeared.

  RavensWish - its like a medievil pagent with red smoke everywhere and people in masks I want a mask check these
out pic.ly/66344

  She may have been alone in the gathering, but she was different in one vital aspect: they had tickets, she had an invite. They were visitors, she was a guest. One of the few. For the first time in her life she was one of the few. And it was time to follow the instructions. She checked her messages and found the DM from WhiteRotterdam. Don't go to the concert hall entrance, go to the arena entrance at the central plaza. She looked around above the heads of the crowd. The concert hall was to her left. It had a wide entrance facade with an imposing giant illuminated picture of the band's faces. To her right was a smaller entrance with Ahoy over the doors. She headed for it.

  Did she need to be invited in, she wondered as she approached the steel and glass doors. Not yet, not for a few more hours at least. Her breathing was shortening and her muscles now were as tight as the bat skin masks. The arena entrance was less chaotic, but no less colourful. Head through the entrance hall, the message continued, to a large kiosk at the far end and to your right. She could see it, beyond the programme sellers and the merchandising stands. They were selling masks. She looked at one with crimson feathers and black costume stones around the eye holes. "Do I really want to look like everyone else though," she whispered to herself as she stepped up to a huge security guard standing outside the kiosk.

  "Hello," he boomed.

  "Hi. I've got an invite to go backstage." Raven fiddled with her phone.

  "Okay, one moment." He entered the kiosk and came back with a tablet. "Your name?"

  "Raven. It should just say Raven."

  "Raven, okay. Who invited you?"

  "I don't know. They just called themselves WhiteRotterdam."

  "Yeah. Did they give you a message?"

  She checked her phone. At the end of the directions were the words 'come for the right reasons.' "All I've got is come for the right reasons."

  The security guy looked at her. He was nearly twice her height, dressed all in black with his security tabard around his neck. "Okay, put this on." He handed her a tabard similar to his. "Keep it on at all times, it gives you access to all areas, okay. And now follow me." And off they went. Without speaking he led her through the entrance to a connecting door to the concert hall and along the concourse to the far end where the stage was set.

  "Excuse me," Raven said, "can I take a photo here?" She wanted a shot of the empty arena with the stage down below still bare and naked. Technicians were finalising set ups: amps and monitors being positioned, cables taped, last minute adjustments made to Rene's drums, inspections of the stage edges and runway. The sound desk, at the opposite end of the arena floor, had a knot of people opening up laptops and other complicated looking arrays and desks. This was the business end of things, before the hordes arrived and charged the arena with atmosphere, this was the time when the machinery was tested and weeks and months of organisation came together at the fine point of performance. Hundreds were involved, but the success or otherwise ultimately came down to just four people. Rather them than me, she thought.

  The surroundings changed as she followed the security guy through a warren of grey walls, grey doors and finally white brick walls with dressing room notices printed and photocopied on A4 bits of paper. They emerged into another world of pre-concert preparation, less technical, but no less essential. Flower carriers, food carriers, clothing carriers, carriers of comfort and ambience. Someone rushed past with what looked like Elaine Daley's Gibson Firebird, battered and scratched, held at arm's length like a lethal weapon. The spacious backstage area had a large table with a buffet spread for the staff and guests (wherever they were, no one was eating, the food was untouched). Coats, scarfs and bags lay abandoned across a scattering of plastic chairs. The security guy paused and then, pointing to a far corner, he said: "There."

  Raven looked. On her own, in the farthest corner of the space, Susan Bekker was sitting on a settee strumming a guitar. "That's Susan Bekker," she said.

  "WhiteRotterdam," said the security guy. "Okay. Have fun and be careful." He winked and left her on her own to complete the final few metres of her journey.

  -

  There was a sense of relief when Rob Wallet stepped outside the arena. He couldn't feel pain, couldn't feel the cold November breeze, but he could feel pressure; that emotional neurological psychological basket case of a feeling that sat like a fucking monkey on every human being between the age of one month and one hundred years. Finally, the comeback was a reality. He knew it was real because if it didn't happen now there were seventeen thousand multicoloured savages waiting just around the corner ready to drive stakes through his chest. Equipment was set up, the band were good to go. The concert was a sell out. No controversies (which is what Susan wanted), no ticket touts hiking the prices (which is what Tom Scavinio wanted) and so far Terence Pearl's friend hadn't shown up (which is what everyone wanted).

  The evening sky was losing its strength and the glow from the arena was filling the air with a hint of red. Even upwind the smoke from the flares was visible and the occasional firecracker generated a distant round of applause. Stragglers and smokers mingled outside, chatting and laughing in Dutch. Toten's coach was parked nearby, the lightproof canopy linking it to the arena entrance folded away. It was quite an impressive coach, Wallet thought, examining its glossy blackness and its enormous wing mirrors like insect antennae.

  So this was it; this lull, the empty thoughtless moment as everyone else got on with something that Wallet couldn't do, which was just about everything, was the product of eight months hassle. But it was worth it. A year ago he would have been somewhere round the front, arguing about his press pass, fighting for a space to watch, making notes and finally submitting copy to an increasingly bothered editor who was more concerned with getting that month's/week's issue out on time and within budget. Pressure, you see. It falls heavier on some than it does on others. Now he was in control of the press passes and was in a position to repay favours. So far he owed nothing, so no one got in the strength of blagging. Apparently one local Dutch celebrity had tried and failed to get in free on the strength of his Twitter following, but was told to go and steal a ticket off a Toten Herzen fan if he wanted to get in without paying. It would be easier to steal an antelope leg off a starving lion and in spite of having a choice of seventeen thousand potential victims he skulked away, probably tweeting to his flock how shit life was when you're rich and still have to pay.

  Next up was Elaine and Dee's homecoming and England, with its health and safety, noise curfews, non-existant integrated transport system and EU employment laws. The only good thing Wallet could think of, was the intensity of support. British fans were the ones with the real dead animals. Outside the Ahoy tonight someone had an inflatable horse, but even that wouldn't be allowed in. The band were quietly prepared for any outrage once the tour cavalcade arrived at Felixstowe. Then Germany, the sensible nation with its sensible hooligans and onto Vienna, where the headbangers knew Bach note for note. Budapest was the unknown and whilst the band were adamant Hungary had to be on the list, Wallet couldn't think why. He knew the aggression there would be wrapped in a veneer of nationalism. And what the fuck the Swiss had to be angry about was anyone's guess. Maybe Geneva had been included so that everyone could relax and count the money.

  No, Wallet was being unfair on Toten Herzen fans. His first glimpses of tonight's audience reminded him of a baroque army waiting for the signal to charge, but would they charge, would they rise to the call and become the out of control mob that followed the band in the seventies. He headed back inside. Terence Pearl was waiting for him. He looked fucking awful. "Your friend not here yet, Terence," said Wallet.

  "No. He will be let in, won't he?"

  "I've told you time and time again, if you gave him the message he'll be let in. The problem will be if he uses a different name."

  Pearl had arranged with his mystery friend to use the name John Waters. The message to quote was 'come alone.' "He's gonna have to be quick if he wants to murder th
e band during the concert. They're on in two hours."

  "Yes, I know. He'll be here. Maybe I should go and look for him. He's coming in at the arena entrance, isn't he?"

  "Near the central plaza. I don't know Terence, you might run off."

  "I'm a man of my word, Rob. I promised to help you and I will. You were right all along, about Peter."

  "Yeah, well thank me later. We stuff him in a suitcase and sort out the whats and whyfores tomorrow. Just go and find him and keep him somewhere out of sight."

  Pearl was wearing the black clothes of security and was inconspicuous. Only the band and Wallet knew who he was, but his red tabard - access all areas - made him unquestionable to anyone else. He left, but Wallet asked another security guy to follow him. "It's his first concert. Don't let him get into any trouble."

  -

  Susan's fingers stretched along the neck of the guitar. It wasn't her Flying V, but something else. "Ibanez," she said when Raven asked. "It's a back up in case, well, whatever might happen happens."

  "You warming up?"

  "Yeah. You need to get all flexible, get these old muscles and tendons working again." Susan looked up at Raven. "Are you sitting down?"

  "Sorry, yeah."

  "It must have been a long journey."

  "It was, but I've travelled to Europe before by coach, so it wasn't too bad."

  Susan kept her head down as she strummed the Ibanez gently. Without its connection to an amp it made hardly a sound. "I did think of sending some transport to pick you up, but the logistics were a bit complicated. I trusted you'd get here. But I'll help you afterwards to go home." Raven's face dropped. Susan was having none of it. "What's your real name?"

  "My real name's crap, I'd rather be called Raven." But Susan insisted. "It's Barbara."

  "What?" Susan coughed. "I don't mean to be rude, but that is a strange name for a girl of your age."

  "Yeah. Mum and dad where big trade unionists and called me after Barbara Castle."

  "Right. Well, look on the bright side, they could have named you after Arthur Scargill."

  "My brother's name's Arthur."

  "Get lost!"

  "No, I'm only joking. He's called Roy."

  "Aha. After Roy Castle then?"

  They managed to share a smile, but Raven was still not happy about her ticket home. "Why do you call yourself WhiteRotterdam?"

  Susan offered her a bowl of fruit. Raven took a banana. "The doctors called me that when I was in hospital."

  "When you were bitten?"

  "When I was bitten, yes. They knew I came from Rotterdam and I was quite pale, as you are when you're ill, and it became a nickname. They were trying to make me feel better, but by that time I was already feeling better."

  "Did you know what had happened?"

  "No." She stopped strumming the guitar and held onto it like a child. "They said rabies, I believed them. But you don't wake up with fangs and a black cape. It was weeks before I figured out what was going on. First sign was the appetite; you don't have one. You never feel hungry, never feel like eating, you don't feel thirsty. It's like your hypothalamus just shuts down. But your physical strength is building all the time. I used to carry equipment around with me, Marshall cabinets, and they were as light as feathers. The road crew thought they were empty, until they came to pick them up. After that, over a period of weeks, your senses start to sharpen, you can hear the slightest whisper of sound, your vision is as keen as a bird's, and colour. Colour is intense as if everything is backlit. Your hair, for example, it's as if your head is a lampshade. I can smell that you've been eating chicken nuggets and drinking Coca Cola."

  Raven was impressed. "You can smell it on me?"

  "I can. Don't worry, no one else will. I can smell the fires burning outside and the gunpowder that's fuelling the flares they're lighting."

  "And what about blood? How did it feel to drink blood?"

  "It starts like a mild craving, like the inside of your muscles are starting to get itchy. I started by cutting myself, with my fingernails, and sucking the wound. But you don't last long with your own blood, so you go out at night and you find birds or cats. It's surprising how easy it is to catch them, especially cats, they just come right up to you and all it takes is your hand round their throat." Raven was eating her banana more slowly. "You still want to be a vampire or is that banana good enough for you?"

  "I'd get used to it. You did."

  "Can you handle the aggression?"

  "I don't know."

  "Think about the last time you were angry, so angry you were shaking, sweating, furious, and then multiply that by a hundred. That's how I feel right now and I consider myself calm. Look around at all these people."

  "What's wrong with them?" said Raven watching the quiet coming and going of staff and assistants.

  "Nothing. Nothing at all, but I could walk over to one of them now and take their head off with one blow and I wouldn't feel a thing. When I get angry I'd go outside where there's more of a challenge. Do you want to live like that? Our publicist, Rob, when we first met him he was an idiot. He drove us mad with his attitude, but he was harmless. Now he scares himself. He is waiting for the next explosion, the next little problem that will tip him over the edge. And he's only been like us for eight months. His problems haven't even started."

  "Are you angry with me?" Raven threw the banana skin back into the bowl.

  "I'm not angry with you, just puzzled why you want to be like this. I know you have no idea what it's really like. I guess you've seen the films and the tv programmes and think all vampires are spoiled American brats living in huge detached houses and driving fifty thousand dollar SUVs, whining because they can't get a girlfriend boyfriend and life sucks blah blah blah."

  "I've never thought it would be like that. I just thought it would be better than what I am now."

  "You can't socialise because everyone around you is a potential victim. Nocturnal behaviour is fine if you do what we do. For everyone else it's a career killer. You're constantly trying to hide your teeth and you have no fucking reflection and you don't want people to know about it because then they look at you and say 'how come you have no reflection, are you a vampire or something?' You're constantly hiding what you are, covering up what you've done. You can't talk to people so no one trusts you."

  Raven sat cross legged. "They sound like flaky problems to me. Do you have any real ones like having no money, no job. A career killer! I don't have a career to kill. People like me, my age, we've been abandoned before we even had a chance. I haven't got a future because everything's against me, I'm just a puppet that everyone else controls. I live like an animal: I wake up, eat, breathe then go back to sleep. There's nothing else in my life. I feel angry all the time, but what can I do about it without getting into trouble? Live with it? Endure it? Put up with it? Why the fuck should I? If you have a problem you can just go and solve it. That's the difference between what you are and what I am. I can't solve my problems, I have to wait for someone else to do it."

  The card game of life being played across a bowl of uneaten fruit was intensifying as they both tried to trump the other's hardships. But Susan didn't have the answer, only the knowledge that what Raven wanted, what Susan could give her, wasn't a solution. "I'm here by accident. I started out with very little and we all worked hard and it nearly failed. But what happened in 1974, that was never part of the plan. We would probably be here now anyway, the whole vampire thing had nothing to do with it. We would have been a struggling band who did the circuit, got the record deal, did more concerts, sold more records. Dying didn't help, and by the way did I add that you have to die first to be like this?"

  "I know that."

  "You live while everyone around you dies. And you live with the knowledge that eventually everyone you've ever known will be gone. Your friends, your parents. And when they die you won't be there at their funeral unless they bury them at night and then you spend the rest of eternity knowing you couldn't
say goodbye and you go insane trying to make up for it and you end up trying to relive your life over and over except the bit you want to relive is always missing so you end up in stupid comebacks, doing stupid press conferences before stupid concerts in front of thousands of stupid people who are only here because they like watching car crashes and think it's cool to have a fascination with death."

  "People die around me too. My friends and relatives are not immune just because I'm human. But if everything goes pear shaped for me I don't get a second chance to have another go at it." Raven sat forward. "All the people you know who died would still be here if they were vampires. If you made them vampires."

  Susan bristled and put the guitar to one side. "That's not the answer and it's not my choice to make."

  "No, it's mine. And I'm giving you permission."

  Susan slumped backwards into the chair and groaned. Was that checkmate or did she still have a way out. Raven would be swapping one set of problems for another, but it sounded like a quick fix, an easy way out. Susan wanted to lecture her on working hard and earning rewards, the same old horseshit she'll have heard a thousand times. She knew the score and so did Raven. Raven was Susan's opposite: alive but not living.

  -

  Why do people want to live like this, thought Terence Pearl as he mixed with the fans wandering in and out of the arena foyer. The doors were open and the crowds outside were organising into thick snaking queues heading off to the concert hall entrance, their fires and flares extinguished, their flags furled, horses deflated. He stood by the VIP kiosk and was distracted by a conversation taking place at a cafe table on the other side of the foyer. He almost missed the exchange close by when he heard someone say 'come alone.'

  Pearl stepped across. "John Waters?"

  "Yes."

  "Good. Please, follow me."

  The two men stepped away from the kiosk and security and the risk of detection. They both knew each other; they sat on the same pub quiz team every week, shared the same disappointment every time they lost for knowing the right answers, left the Ring of Strawberries together weighed down with the conviction that society grew dumber by the day. Tonight though, they weren't part of the Jolly Troubadors, they weren't here to take a beating. They were themselves: Terence Pearl, retired schoolteacher, writer, commentator; and Patrick Wells, trickster, antagonist, and nephew of Peter Miles.

  "Where are they?" Wells asked.

  "Several places at the moment." Pearl was confident the crowds would only hear bits of this conversation as the two men passed through them. "The drummer is practising in a room on his own, the singer is with the technical crew, Susan the guitarist is with a fan and I'm not sure where the bass guitarist is." Pearl turned to his accomplice. "She's the most aloof, the most elusive one. Be careful with her."

  "You've been extremely brave, Terence. I know I've said it so many times, but I really can't thank you enough for this. Trust me, by the time it's over you'll understand just how important this is."

  "If you don't mind me saying, what you're doing is wrong. It is wrong in the eyes of the Lord and I hope he shows understanding when you face him."

  "Let me worry about that, Terence, when the time comes."

  "But I'm an accessory."

  "Look," Wells stopped. They were in the concourse beneath one of the heavy concrete roof supports, the only two people not fixed on the gathering crowd and the expectant stage with its promise of visceral treats and wild surprises. "You can walk away from this, even now at this late stage and I wouldn't blame you. I want you to have a clear conscience, Terence."

  "It's rather too late for that. I'm a man of my word, but I think you should know that your uncle wasn't murdered. He committed suicide."

  Wells closed his eyes and shook his head. "No, Terence, he was murdered. My uncle was murdered and they put his grave on their album sleeve to mock his memory. As if killing him wasn't enough they had to desecrate his memory. They have destroyed his family. My family." He lowered his voice. "How do they know it was suicide if they never found his body? Don't you see, without a body to bury you cannot grieve. You cannot say goodbye. For all we know he might actually be here tonight, unaware of who he is."

  Pearl looked at the crowd, the seats disappearing beneath an expanding surface of blackness. Peter Miles here?

  "But that's what I'm trying to tell you. The band have looked for him. They have tried to find him."

  "They told you that?"

  "Yes."

  "And you believed them?"

  "Yes. There was no evidence to suggest they killed him, none to suggest they didn't. In law that would be called an open verdict."

  "And the grave, on the album sleeve, was that an open verdict or were they laughing at his corpse? And what about a statement of regret. An apology. There's been nothing. Once I've done what I came here for you can consider your role in all this finished. I won't ask you to do anything else for me."

  Pearl turned to continue and barged into a woman with green hair and blood trickling down her chin. "Terribly sorry," he said. He turned again to Wells, but he was gone.

  -

  Tom Scavinio stood towards the back of the concourse watching the hall filling up. He tried not to worry, but he had a feeling. It came from years of experiencing this moment as the final hour counted down. There was no support act, so the audience would have nothing to vent their aggression at (let's face it, that's what the support acts are there for. You know the old line: the act before me was so bad the audience was still booing them when I went onstage.) He'd seen it all from deluded to deranged, hip to square, suspiciously young to ridiculously old, drunk, high, crushed, unconscious, excited, disappointed. But this lot . . . on the surface they looked like any heavy metal crowd, but checking out those seats closest to him, people looked agitated and suspicious. He couldn't put his finger on it, why they didn't look right. Who were they?

  Or maybe he had become the stranger. As he returned to the backstage area he considered the possibility that he wasn't cut out for this business anymore. His months with the band had done the job of taking his mind off things, hell it had stripped his mind of everything. His disillusionment with the music industry was already festering when Toten Herzen first arrived in New York. The ever present suspicion that the band were always one step ahead of everyone gnawed at his determination not to ask questions, but the questions were always there, rearing up involuntarily: why work at night, why are they so young, what are they up to now, what's Rob Wallet's agenda, and just don't mention those fucking teeth!

  He saw Susan Bekker leaning against a wall, grabbing a moment to herself. He'd seen that before too. "You ready for this?" He asked.

  She took a moment before answering. "I can't say no, so I must be. It's all got a little complicated, people back here who shouldn't be here."

  "I can get them out if you want."

  "No, they were invited. It wouldn't be fair."

  "I still don't understand why Terence Pearl is here," said Scavinio.

  "He's up to something, so he's better where we can see him."

  "And can you see him. Is anybody watching him?"

  "Rob's onto it. And don't look like that. Rob's brought him in, Pearl believes our side of the story. Nothing's gonna go wrong now."

  "Touch wood." Scavinio tapped Susan on the head.

  "I suppose I should find the others."

  Scavinio watched her go. She was weary, didn't show any of the nervous enthusiasm he was used to seeing. There came a moment where the band just wanted to get onstage, stop all the prowling about and small talk and just get the job started. Susan looked like she wanted to go to bed.

  -

  Raven hadn't moved off the settee where she had been speaking, or was it arguing with Susan. Now she was regretting it. You travel all that way to meet a hero and end up giving them cheek like you were talking back to your history teacher. Talking of which, here was one now. Terence Pearl dropped like a stone onto a nearby chair.


  "No one talking to you either," he said.

  "No." She noticed his security jacket and pass. "Shouldn't you be out there with the crowd?"

  "No. I've been ordered to stay back here out of trouble."

  "Out of trouble? What, you like to start fights or something?"

  "Far from it. Although I have to say I do feel a tad worked up. I've felt like this for weeks. I must have high blood pressure."

  "You should see a doctor. Might be something serious."

  "Don't like to bother doctors." And they generally don't open at night, except for the A&E departments and he couldn't go wandering in there complaining of feeling a bit worked up, or that his eyes glazed over every time he tried shaving himself, or that the birds were deliberately trying to annoy him, or that all his lavenders had died on purpose. "Did you win a competition to meet the band?" he asked nervously.

  "No, I got an invite. And then she clears off."

  "Who's she?"

  "Susan Bekker. Queen Bee. Don't know where she's gone. Went off in a huff." Raven was nibbling the browning remains of an apple.

  "They're not interested in the likes of us. The little people. Look around here; there's a person for every task. Bring me some food, clean my clothes, comb my hair, peel me a grape. And everyone laps it up. They all want to be part of that circle, but don't have the status to be at the centre of it, so they're content to run around like dogs feeding under the table."

  "Christ, so hot it burns. What's bothering you?"

  "Oh, ignore me. Like I said I'm always worked up these days. Everything gets on my wick."

  "Sounds like it. They can't do everything themselves can they?"

  "I suppose not. I just wish people would stir things up a bit now and then. Makes life so much more interesting."

  "I don't think anyone stirs things like this lot though, do they." She waited for a response, but noticed his name badge. 'Terence.' "Can I ask you something?" Pearl looked up. "You're not Terence Pearl are you?"

  "Yes, I am why?"

  "Oh shit." She bit a chunk out of the apple.

  "Who are you?" He lifted his glasses off his nose to look at her pass. "Raven! Oh, please."

  "Yeah. We were having a nice conversation then, weren't we?"

  He turned away from her and took his glasses off to rub his eyes.

  "You still think they're going home in a spaceship?"

  He shook his head. "No, no, no. They're using a coach."

  "Sorry I called you a knobster."

  "Oh, it's all right. I've had worse things said to me." He saw Rob Wallet. "I need to go." He stood up and looked down at the blue haired girl sitting alone. "Be careful tonight, won't you?"

  She nodded.

  -

  "Excuse me a moment," Wallet said as Pearl approached him. He grabbed his elbow. "Where is he?"

  "Who?"

  "Who? What do you mean who? Who do you think?"

  "He disappeared."

  "Disappeared? What do you mean disappeared? Wandered off? Puff of smoke? What?"

  Pearl blustered. "He was stood next to me, we were coming backstage and when I turned round he was gone."

  Wallet groaned. "He came here to be with you. You were his pass to getting backstage. Where the fuck has he gone?"

  "I don't know."

  Wallet could feel his authority draining away. He reset himself and started again. "Okay. He hasn't got a ticket, so he can't get a seat. He must be wandering around the concourse somewhere."

  "What's going on?" Susan had suddenly appeared. "I can hear you two whispering from the other side of Rotterdam. I thought you had all this under control."

  Wallet recognised those angry eyes. He hadn't seen them for a while, but they were back and blazing as furiously as ever.

  "It is under control. Wells has gone missing. Mr Pearl here let him slip away. Does he know we know who he is?"

  Pearl looked a bit confused, then: "No, he doesn't know we're expecting him."

  "You haven't got a fucking clue have you?" said Susan.

  "As a matter of fact," Wallet stepped towards her.

  "Don't get in my face like this?"

  "I'm convincing you that your put downs don't mean shit to me anymore?" he said.

  "Put downs? I could put you down right now if that's what you want. Do you want me to do that because I'd really like to." She was stiffening, almost growing in height in front of him. "This might just be the time to clear out all the deadwood." Her skin was starting to glisten. Pearl backed away. Raven could see the confrontation and was standing nervously. Wallet wasn't going to back down. Whatever happened now he was going to stand and take it. And he knew what was happening. Susan's mouth was hanging open, her spine arching, she breathed in, rolled her head back and stretched her arms out just as Dee appeared.

  The howl made everyone within earshot jump off the floor and drop whatever they were carrying. They scurried for cover, hands clasped to their ears. Glass was shattering everywhere, doors vibrated on their hinges, the walls started to hum. The noise surged away through the backstage area, knocking Dee off her feet as Tom Scavinio knelt in a corner covering his head. Through the concourse, people ducked, others cowered behind the heavy concrete pillars. The hall filled with the enormity of the cry and reflected off the steel roof supports. Feedback blew off headphones and the intensity made the lights flicker. And still the howling continued breathlessly. The audience, stunned, stopped their rummaging and seat searching and for a few seconds wondered how they should respond.

  Susan heard it. She stopped and listened to the sound of seventeen thousand people howling back at her, a colossal roar like every animal in the world had been unleashed. She was still standing face to face with Wallet. His ears were bleeding, his eyes watering, but he was anchored to where he was, unflinching and impressed by the echo coming backstage multiplied a thousand times. He grabbed her hard around her jaw and kissed her lips. "Let me get on with my job," he said quietly.

  He picked Pearl off the ground with one hand and carried him like a suitcase away from the backstage area, along the winding corridors and out to the edge of the arena concourse. The place was full. "Get out there and find him," snarled Wallet. Pearl saw a glimpse of his canines, two terrible glistening points. "If you don't come back with him I'll find him and I'll kill you both myself."

  -

  Susan's gaze was blank. Raven waited to see if it was a good moment to step past and go find her seat, but the gorgon noticed her. Before anyone could say anything a security guy with a buzzing walkie talkie rushed in looking for Scavinio. "Something's kicking off," he said.

  Scavinio and Susan went to look. Out in the hall, down on the floor midway back from the stage a fight had started. A flare had been thrown and someone was on fire. The figure was wrestled to the floor and beaten with coats. A pall of grey and red smoke drifted upwards, but the trouble continued as a large group waded into the arena seating up the side of the hall. More flares were thrown, flags were being unfurled and waved around as if to celebrate the melee. Arena security poured through the upper entrances to separate two sides indistinguishable from each other. Firecrackers filled the air with eager bristling laughter as other members of the audience fled in the opposite direction to the fighting. Chair seats started to fly. One of the flags was set alight and TH Utrecht lost its standard as the trouble threatened to escalate.

  Scavinio came away from the hall to find the rest of the band who were gathering backstage. "I had a gut feeling something wasn't right with this crowd," he said.

  "Can security control it?" asked Wallet. Scavinio was shaking his head. "There are factions down there, god knows what's going to happen. Let the police deal with it. They're on their way. Keep everyone back here, there's a security cordon between them and us," Scavinio paused. "You don't look too concerned," he said.

  Susan had seen enough. "Why would we?" she said.

  Scavinio rubbed the back of his head. "I don't like to bring this up, but you we
re like this in New York on the night three people died."

  "Like what?" said Susan. Raven was behind her.

  "Like you didn't care."

  "We don't," said Elaine. "Did we tell them to start this? Are they going to come up here and start with us? No and no."

  "There's a riot down there and several thousand people getting caught up in it."

  "The arena has contingencies for this," said Susan. "That's what you told us, Tom. When I asked you what happens if there's trouble you said, and I quote, you don't need to worry about trouble the arena management will have a contingency plan for anything that might happen."

  Wallet was the first to hear sirens. But the agreement was to stay backstage, keep the staff close by and be prepared to get into the coach and head back to the hotel. Out in the hall police were pouring in like a black liquid, some in riot gear, but the heavy tactics weren't needed. The main lights stayed on as more people evacuated the area to gather outside. There were whispers that skirmishes had broken out in the car parks and traffic was slowing down as drivers tried to figure out why there were police vans everywhere.

  -

  At ten o'clock, with several hundred dozy stragglers still in their seats, the concert was cancelled. A few thousand still outside the arena surrendered to the inevitable and wandered away. At the back of the tour coach, the band and several staff members waited for Tom Scavinio to finish talking to arena management and watched a monitor feeding the latest news live as it happened. They were already showing camera phone footage of the flare that started it all off, the groups within the crowd coming together, the scattering of fans as the fists flew, the security members and arena stewards virtually powerless to stop the fighting and trying instead to protect anyone close by from being blown up.

  Susan sat with her head in her hands. Dee was incandescent, but so far speechless. Rene was on his back, still holding his drumsticks. Elaine was unmoved. Wallet now had a slight admiration for her inability to be touched by any of this. He was trying to rationalise it all and generate some concern for the others: the sound engineers and lighting crew who were metres away from the trouble; the caterers and hospitality staff backstage who had been deafened one minute and then faced with the possibility of being overwhelmed by rioting thugs. Crowd violence was such an ugly spectacle, unless you were causing it.

  At last, as Scavinio came aboard, the door closed and the coach pulled away. The windows were blackened, so no one could see the ordered pandemonium outside. The police vans, the media trucks and satellite dishes, unrepentant factions still waving their flags of allegiance. But the aroma of gunpowder was still so thick in the air even the humans could smell it.

  "It might still be possible to come back tomorrow night," said Scavinio.

  Wallet was astonished. "What?" He laughed.

  "You must be joking," said Dee.

  "What's so odd about that," said Susan.

  "Because it'll kick off again, won't it?" said Dee angrily. "You'll have another fucking howling fit and another ten rows of seats'll go up in smoke."

  "What, are you blaming me for that?" Susan was outraged.

  "Excuse me, but it was like the gun at the start of the one hundred metres final. What else started it?"

  "That's a big conclusion to jump to," said Rene without looking up.

  "Yeah, yeah. Here we are in Rotterdam. You would say that, wouldn't you?"

  "What does that mean," said Susan.

  "You're forgetting that this band is half Dutch, half British. Why was this concert in Rotterdam?" Dee was on a roll now.

  "What are you talking about?" Susan was on her feet and unconcerned the rest of the coach was listening to every word.

  "I'm talking about the imbalance. We never get a say, do we? It's always you two, Rotterdam this, Rotterdam that. We are not a Dutch band, but that doesn't matter does it."

  "Fuck you."

  "Yeah," yelled Dee, "fuck me. I'm just the singer, so fuck me and get another one. Have a tv show and fuck me off."

  Scavinio was on the verge of stepping in, but he saw Wallet suggesting he should back off. The advise was good.

  Dee stepped up to Susan. "We'd be on stage now if it wasn't for your hysterics."

  "Back off," Susan growled ominously.

  "Or what, you'll stamp your feet and have another howl. Go on then and I'll ram my fucking fist down your throat." She grabbed Susan round the neck and within the blink of an eye Rene was pulling her away, Elaine was pulling Rene away and all four of them were a rampaging, snarling knot of thrashing arms.

  Wallet hesitated, he knew he was the only person on the coach with the strength to intervene. Scavinio beat him too it and tried to prize Dee and Susan apart, but their grip was too tight, their bodies too close. Scavinio was about to grab one of them when Dee locked her jaws onto Susan's throat; he was in the direct line of a plume of blood that travelled several metres down the inside of the coach. Susan had her hand across Dee's face and was digging in as far as the first knuckle on each finger. Scavinio was almost gagging, but tried to get a hold of one of them. Dee lashed out and swiped her fingernails across Scavinio's head tearing him open. Wallet was already trying to force himself between Elaine and Rene and saw Scavinio peel away in shock and pain. Pearl, cowering in his seat and still upset at not finding Wells, wanted to help, but Dee and Susan were on the move, locked together, wrestling violently, stumbling against the seats as each tried to get the finishing hold.

  "Terence," shouted Wallet, "help Tom, leave those two." Pearl was confused. It would be like trying to come between two tigers. Elaine was on the floor of the coach, face up with Rene on top of her face down, together rolling left and right in a gnashing fury of fists and teeth. Wallet was desperately trying to get a knee between them to get some leverage. He was already scratched to ribbons with a gash running down the side of his head, through his shirt as far as his collar bone.

  The coach careered left and right as the weight shifted this way and that. Scavinio was as far up the front as he could get along with everybody else. He was being treated by the tour manager nervously looking over his shoulder as Dee and Susan struggled, inching ever closer to them. The inside of the coach was like an abattoir. Pearl wept as he tried to grab a shoulder, an arm, anything he thought might be a limb, but eventually he could only watch as the ferocity of the battle projected the two women at the side of the coach and in an instant they crashed through the windows onto the road outside.

  Oblivious, Elaine and Rene remained locked together. Wallet was crimson from head to foot. He had blood in his eyes, but he could see what had happened. The coach braked hard, more bodies were thrown forward and Wallet found himself wedged between Elaine, panting like a savage and Rene still trying to crawl over him to get at her. He put everything between them and felt Elaine's weight crushing his chest as she locked on to Rene's throat. Then the weight diminished and he saw a clutch of men pulling Elaine and Rene apart. Scavinio, the tour manager and the coach driver were just succeeding as a human barrier, but only because Elaine and Rene had paused for a moment. "Get them off the coach, for fucks sake." He wiped the blood off his face and tried to breath. Several seats were covered in crumbs of broken glass and through the shattered window he could see Susan and Dee back up the road on their hands and knees still eyeing one another as if they were about to start again. Behind them the traffic was backing up out of sight. Then he found Pearl, crouched into a ball between the seats.

  "I think you should stay there, Terence," said Wallet. Then he stepped back a moment. "Didn't you predict something like this would happen?"

  Outside singer and guitarist were sat down and as Wallet drew closer he could see Dee grinning at her colleague. "You taste funny," she said and spat a mouthful of blood onto the tarmac. "You taste of that stupid perfume you're always wearing.

  "You know what just happened," Susan said correcting several dislocated fingers, "some stupid with a flare gun burned the place to the ground!"

&
nbsp; Wallet looked on as the two of them rolled around laughing and trying to sing the words to Smoke on the Water like drunken sailors. Dislocated fingers were enough and he turned around and climbed back onto the coach. He checked Scavinio's injuries and suggested the coach driver should get him to a hospital.