2019 Advent Challenge

Stal threw his lyric sheet down in a sudden explosion of rage, a low growl escaping him. Gray, accustomed as he was to his friend's tantrums, barely glanced up.

'Geez, Stal, maybe you should give it a break.'

'I don't have time to give it a break!' the skeletal dragon snapped. 'Don't you get it? Our Christmas gig is next week.'

'Yeah, but we don't need to finish the new song in time for the gig. We can just play our old stuff.'

Stal glared at him, making it all too clear what he thought of that idea.

'We've been playing the same crap for months. Our fans want something new, dammit.'

'They'll understand,' said Gray with certainty.

'We don't have another show planned until February next year. If we finish this song after the Christmas gig, then we won't be able to perform it for months. Can't you have a look at it? Maybe try to write something?'

Gray shrugged. 'I tried, man. You know I did. But the song's just too personal to you. If I added my own words, it wouldn't be the same anymore.'

Stal gazed at the sad-looking lyric sheet lying on the carpet. The frustrated anger had drained from his body. Now he just looked thoughtful, and a little bit lost.

'Tell you what,' said Gray. He straightened up from his slumped position on the couch. 'Why don't we try doing a cover? Like a cover of some well-known Christmas song? Then the fans will have something new at next week's show, and you'll be able to spend more time perfecting this song.'

Stal locked his front claws together and kept staring, almost longingly, at the lyric sheet. Sensing an advantage, Gray pressed on.

'You know you'll be able to work way better without a deadline. You don't want this song to turn out bad because you rushed to get it done in time for Christmas. Cut yourself some slack.'

Stal sighed, and Gray smiled faintly, knowing the war was won.

'OK. But what are we doing a cover of? And who's gonna be singing it? I don't do cheesy Christmas songs.'

'Ask Loch. I'm sure she'd be thrilled to help.'

'Yeah.' Stal's gaze went to the window, as if transfixed by the dark, rainy view of the street outside. 'I'll... I'll text her.'

---

'So we're down to choosing between two songs,' said Stal, almost as soon as Loch walked in through the door. He had sent her a text that simply read, 'Doing a cover, need you to sing it'. She hadn't even bothered texting back, showing up at Gray's house five minutes later.

Now, she was hanging up her sodden coat in the bathroom while listening to Stal rambling about his plans. When she came back into the living-room, he was staring at her expectantly as if waiting for her to fix all his problems.

'OK,' she said, suppressing a laugh. 'So we're choosing between 'All I Want For Christmas Is You' and 'Jingle Bell Rock', right? That's not exactly a vast selection, Stal.'

'I couldn't think of anything else,' he admitted. 'I don't listen to Christmas music, OK?'

Loch sat down on the end of the threadbare couch, not noticing the way Gray edged sideways to give her more space.

'Well,' she said thoughtfully, staring at the floor, 'there's another song I could try, if you guys are up for it. 'I Wish it Could Be Christmas Everyday'. That's one of my personal favourites.'

Stal's muzzle creased up. 'Never heard of it,' he announced, causing both Loch and Gray to sigh and roll their eyes.

Loch pulled out her phone, opened her music playlist, and blasted out the song. As soon as he heard it, Stal's expression shifted to a faint recognition.

'Actually, yeah, I think I have heard that before,' he said.

'I thought so.' Loch turned the music off. 'So... are we all up for this? Do we even have time to practice it before the show next week? We're cutting it pretty fine here, and we do need to sleep sometimes.'

'We'll manage,' said Stal gruffly. 'We'll sleep in shifts if we need to, always having at least two people awake so they can keep working.' There was a newfound fire in his eyes, a kind of madness that would have worried Loch if she hadn't known exactly what it meant. He was already envisioning the song, imagining how it might sound, planning all the changes they should make, thinking about how the audience might react when they played it live. Stal's mind must be a noisy place.

'I'll text Arc and Pyre,' said Loch, fingers already moving like lightning across her phone screen. 'We need to get started tonight if we want to get this finished before next Tuesday.'

---

The night of Christmas Eve was here, and it seemed like nearly every resident of East Caelum had gathered together at The Cabin, a popular bar/restaurant/music venue near the harbour. As more and more people poured in, the stage remained eerily quiet.

Behind the curtains, in the tiny backstage area, Stal was fretting as usual.

'We haven't practised enough,' he growled.

'We have,' Loch assured him, interrupting herself in the middle of reciting song lyrics.

'We've been rehearsing for two weeks! And we've only had one week to practise the cover song!'

Suddenly, a scaled hand touched Stal's shoulder. It was Gray, who had a look of understanding compassion on his face. His hand lingered there for less than a second before shifting away, but his expression didn't change.

'We're going to be fine,' he said. 'Think back on all the gigs we've done in the past. Even when we didn't have much time to rehearse, things went great and the audience didn't notice any of our mistakes. And the mistakes we made had nothing to do with not practising enough.'

'I know this, man,' said Stal, quietly enough that Loch and Arc wouldn't hear him. Pyre might, with his vampiric hearing, but he was tactful enough to pretend otherwise. 'I know. It's just that I can't stop myself thinking about this stuff every time we're about to go up on stage. Once we're out there, playing, I'll be more than fine. It's just...'

'Stage fright,' said Gray, nodding slightly. 'Everyone gets it. Why do you think Loch's over there reciting lyrics? She does a good job of hiding it, but she's afraid of messing up, too. We all are.'

'Even you?'

'Me? You know I get terrible stage fright.' Gray snorted out a soft laugh. 'I just... control it better than most, I guess. I'm not really afraid of making mistakes; I'm just worried that nobody will listen to us. That we'll be ignored.'

'Damn, Gray, we make enough noise to get anyone's attention. They won't be able to ignore us.'

Before the bass player could respond, a man's voice rang out from behind the curtains, carrying the weight of authority. Hollow footsteps suggested that he was striding across the wooden stage, talking to the spectators. It was hard to make out what he was saying above all the general chaos, but all of a sudden they heard him yell:

'So here's what you've all been waiting for... THE PLAGUE!'

A roar of approval rose up from the crowd. The sound made adrenaline spike through Stal's body. He glanced around at his bandmates – his loyal friends, who he knew would follow him anywhere – and could tell, from their sudden stillness and empty expressions, that they felt the same.

It was time, now, for him to be the frontman everyone wanted to see.

He drew in a deep breath and let his voice roar out, loud enough to be heard on the other side of the curtains.

'LET'S ROCK THIS STAGE!'