“Yay.” Rosemary tried to hide her own nerves in front of people other than Sadie. If she were in his shoes, she’d want to know that she was confident this would work. Besides, he was smart; no sense risking more than needed to be risked.
She’d wanted to be early, but watching everything come together so slowly made her even more nervous. She pulled out her phone and checked her bus ticket.
“I can’t believe you’re leaving tomorrow.” Sadie peered over her shoulder, bass in hand.
“My work here is done.”
“Almost done. You haven’t done the part where you leave destruction in your wake yet.”
Rosemary’s stomach turned, but she forced a smile. “Oh, yeah, I forgot.”
By seven, they’d completed setup. Both bands had soundchecked. They sounded weak and flat; hopefully that was the emptiness of the space, not the sound equipment. If the plan doesn’t work, they’ll still get a show, Rosemary told herself, even if a crappy one. Bands will play and then go home.
And live with the undetonated threat she’d brought hanging over their heads every night, waiting for it to go off. It had to be tonight. She’d altered the metadata on the Simrats video she’d handed over so that it showed these GPS coordinates. She’d made sure to mention this show. That would be enough. She waited.
One of Tomás’s friends arrived with coolers. Soda and water only, so if they got busted it wouldn’t be for serving alcohol.
“What if nobody comes?” she asked at seven thirty.
“Relax,” Tomás said. “We told people eight so they’d be here by nine. They’ll come. If not for the music, then for the bouncy castle.”
“You inflated that thing?” Rosemary pictured people trying to escape a crush and running straight into a giant blue and pink roadblock.
He laughed. “That castle probably has more holes than the Titanic. Or did the Titanic only have one big hole? In either case, I didn’t. Yet.”
She was beginning to think nobody took this as seriously as she did. It was an abstraction to them, even if it would affect them and leave her unscathed. She hoped the joking was his way of hiding nervousness. Nervous was better.
At eight fifteen, people started trickling in, and she mentally crossed “no audience” off her worry list. She moved on to the next item, walking the perimeter to make sure all the doors had been unlocked. They’d told the audience members—friends of the bands, all—to come in through the staff door on the south side, and told them where to find all twelve emergency doors. When she came back from her tour, the space had filled. Fifty or so people milled in front of the stage, and a few more hung in the corners in the dark, if the glowing screens were any judge. A good number: enough to suggest this was a legit show, but few enough to make it safely out the doors as necessary. The whole audience knew what might happen and had chosen to take the risk.
By nine, about sixty people had arrived. Rosemary settled against a back wall, out of the light. As she’d hoped, Sadie’s band, Way Way Down, sounded way, way better than they had in soundcheck. The audience soaked up the sound and kept it from bouncing around the walls. They danced and swayed. She was too anxious to do anything but wait for uninvited guests. They didn’t come.
The band finished their set. Sadie packed her stuff and walked over to where Rosemary stood, lugging her gig bag and the heavy bass head by her side. “No sign?”
“No sign.”
“They might still come.”
Rosemary nodded. “This is the weirdest thing I’ve ever wanted.”
“Look,” Sadie said. “My oldest sister is a forest ranger. The preserve she works on sets their own brushfires sometimes. If you do a controlled burn, you get way less damage than if you let brush accumulate and wait for a wildfire to break out. I’m looking at this as a controlled burn.”
“A controlled burn.” The comparison did actually give Rosemary some relief.
The lights on the stage switched over to black light.
“Friends, Romans, Countrymice,” said the lead singer, face aswirl with color. “Lend me your ears.”
The drummer counted four on sticks, and the entire band kicked in at once. A cover Rosemary recognized from her parents’ records. “I Fought the Law.”
“Very funny,” she whispered. She wished she could enjoy this.
They played a second song, and a third song, and a fourth. Rosemary didn’t recognize them, but she caught a law enforcement theme. She didn’t remember the band being this political, but it was a special occasion. She still harbored a perverse pride in finding a good band for SHL, and a perverse concern that all this had been for nothing if they weren’t willing to toe the populist line needed for an SHL band. No, her instincts were good. This was a command performance for her special event.
And then a whoop outside the building—Rosemary flashed for one moment to the 2020 raid. And then the far door opened and flashlights poured through. A megaphone or speaker squawked: “Stop playing. This is an illegal gathering.” And then everyone was running, to all the doors, all unlocked. They’d positioned the stage so the audience got a head start on the police. Somebody swung a spotlight around to temporarily blind the cops as they entered.
The Simrats, under their black lights, a knot of painted bodies and instruments, played like the band on the Titanic, going down with the ship. A horn section soundtrack for a police raid. They had nothing to worry about; SHL would bail them out. If it went as she hoped, nobody would get hurt, nobody would get caught, and no scene would get ruined. Just a bunch of kids trespassing at one of Tomás’s mother’s warehouses; she wouldn’t lose it since she’d had nothing to do with the show. It wouldn’t be this easy in other cities, but if this worked tonight, she’d find ways. Like her muggers, this show was one big shouted “hey” to distract from the real shows. A controlled burn, as Sadie had said.
Someone cut the PA. The band played on through their amps, without vocals, until the generator shut off as well, killing all the lights and sound at once except the drums. People scattered. A thrilled panic surged through Rosemary, and she worked on harnessing it rather than letting it run away with her. She looked over at Sadie, who flashed a nervous smile.
Rosemary reached for Sadie’s bass head, but Sadie stopped her hand and grabbed it herself. “I’d rather have all my stuff with me if we get separated.”
A bobbing light came toward them, making Rosemary’s heart leap again. The closest exit was the one they’d walked in through, the one leading out past the showrooms and the two-story entrance.
“It’s been nice knowing you, Rosemary,” Sadie said as they moved closer to the exit. “Keep in touch.”
She swung open the door. The space ahead was dark; the sun through the skylight had been the only illumination earlier, and there was no electricity now that the generator was off. She hadn’t taken into account how dark it would be in a power-dead warehouse on a moonless night. Ahead, red and blue lights bounced at the edges of a monumental blackness, and a loud hum filled the air.
“Ah, shit, they’re out front.” Sadie stopped.
“Exit eleven is down that hall.” Rosemary put a hand on Sadie’s elbow to guide her. “There’s no parking lot on that side, so maybe they don’t have cars out there.”
“Thanks! Are you coming?”
“In a minute. You should go.” Rosemary hugged Sadie. “Thank you for your help. Good luck!”
Sadie disappeared down the dark hallway; she had no way of knowing that act was the first time Rosemary had ever instigated a hug outside of her family. Big nights seemed to have a weird effect on her, making her try all kinds of things outside her comfort zone. As long as she was scared, excited, worried, adrenaline fueled, she might as well double down. She wouldn’t declare this operation a success until it was behind her, but so far it looked like everything was going as smoothly as induced chaos could go. She didn’t deserve for it to go this well.