Becoming

Hallowed Be Thy Name

After seeing Ade off in the morning, Dave slipped back to his room and settled into bed beside Tamar to sleep for another hour or so. Once they both got up and ready for the day, they headed down to meet the Carlsons for breakfast and discussed plans for the day. Tamar and Rachel had a spa day planned while Dan and Dave plus Nicko would be out golfing. Tamar giggled when Dave had to ask Rod for a spare key to Nicko's room, so he could prod the drummer awake in time to make their tee time.

Everyone enjoyed the activities they undertook that day, with Ade showing off pictures of the yellowtail he caught and Dave positively beaming because he'd beat Nicko's score by a single stroke even if Dan had beaten both of them. Nicko made everyone laugh by claiming that if Dave had either let him sleep longer or else supplied him with enough coffee, he'd have won.

The day after that, the Carlsons decided to accompany the band to the venue. As Dave made sure his in-laws had earplugs and showed them the amenities of the bus, Bruce plopped himself down across from Ade and Tamar, who were discussing the rehearsal dinner.

"Tamar, what have you got planned for a hen party?" Bruce asked. "I know Ade's supposed to organise a stag do, but I figured I'd volunteer to help."

"I'm not having one," Tamar said. "It's not something I'd enjoy."

"You know Dave don't want a stag do anyway," Ade said. "He's said often enough not to bother. Too much trouble to get organised given our schedule anyway."

"Oh," Bruce sounded disappointed. "Not even a pub crawl?"

"I'll ask him about that," Ade promised. "He might be all right with just going out for a few pints."

Bruce beamed. "Good, he ought to do a little something, yeah?" he said, then pulled out a magazine and started reading.

Dave, followed by Dan and Rachel, came back to the front of the bus and took seats. The ride took over half an hour, a testament to the horrific traffic so common to the area, but the Carlsons found the bus more comfortable than they'd expected. The band had to go to an interview session followed by an autograph signing session, so Tamar, having been to the Valentine's Day show in Florida, brought her parents out to the auditorium to watch the stage being set up.

Rachel seemed surprised at the sheer amount of work needed to assemble the stage set, and Dan peppered the front-of-house crew with questions about what they did in the course of the show and how their equipment worked. A couple hours later, the band trooped out onto the stage for their soundcheck.

"Harry, mind if we do Aces High instead of 2 Minutes To Midnight?" Dave asked. "It's Tamar's favourite, and I think a little more parent-friendly, yeah? I know they'll hear it tonight and all, but it's just them and the crew to hear this right now."

Steve smiled. "Yeah, we can do that," he said. "Not like I haven't changed up to do Hallowed Be Thy Name when Lorraine's been here for soundchecks before. In fact, that's probably the most parent-friendly song we've got, so we'll do those two instead of 2 Minutes To Midnight and Powerslave." Once Nicko settled in behind his kit, he stepped up to his mic and announced the change to the others as well to FOH.

Down on the arena floor, Tamar's face lit up and she cupped her hands around her mouth, calling, "Thank you, Steve!" She then added quietly to her parents, "You might want to put in your earplugs now." She smiled when they took her advice.

Steve grinned back and gave a thumbs-up. FOH hit play on Churchill's 'We shall fight in the hills' speech and Nicko lifted his sticks. They launched into the song, guitars screaming in perfect unison while the driving beat from Steve and Nicko helped to convey the urgency which must have been felt by those young Spitfire pilots during the Battle of Britain. When Bruce came in with the vocals, Tamar started singing along and Rachel turned to stare at her husband, who'd started bobbing his head to the beat.