The moment the green room door swung open and Gabriel waltzed in wearing a bandana on his head, someone’s sunglasses, and a bathrobe from the hotel with “I am the wind” written on the back in Sharpie, Thane knew they were in deep, deep trouble.
“Gabriel…” Thane stood from the couch, arms crossed, brows already furrowed with industrial strength. “How are you feeling?”
Gabriel struck a pose like a pirate lost in an IKEA. “I am ready. I am transcendent. I have named every lighting fixture in the venue, and I just told the coffee machine my deepest fears.”
Cassie, who was half into her stage boots and watching from across the room, whispered, “We’re all gonna die.”
Maya had already locked eyes with Thane and mouthed, Do we cancel?
“No,” Thane muttered back. “Not unless he starts trying to communicate with the subsnakes again.”
Mark sighed from his perch on the side of a road case. “I told him not to touch the cookies. Told all of you. This is what happens when you let a caffeinated Labrador into a kitchen.”
“I heard that!” Gabriel beamed as he flopped into a spinning chair and did an entire loop, arms out like a conductor in a gale.
Emily peeked in through the door, face pale. “Uh, crowd’s already chanting. They think it’s part of the act. Someone made a cardboard cutout of Gabriel with a stroopwafel crown.”
Thane looked up at the ceiling like he was asking the universe for strength.
Cassie looked at Thane. “Can he even play?”
Rico, leaning against the wall and sipping a tiny espresso like the calmest man in the world, shrugged. “Honestly? Might be the best set he’s ever played. He’s looser than a sock in a hurricane.”
A moment passed.
Then Gabriel stood up, looked everyone dead in the eye, and said in the calmest, most serious tone imaginable:
“I know every note. I have never been more in sync with the universe’s musical core. Let me go. Unleash the chaos.”
There was silence.
Then Jonah burst out laughing.
“Alright,” Thane groaned. “But Rico, I want you shadowing him the entire set. If he starts licking the monitor wedges again —”
“Copy that,” Rico said, cracking his knuckles. “Gabriel Wrangler Protocol engaged.”
Maya smirked. “Let the bass wolf bass.”
And somehow — somehow — Feral Eclipse walked onstage that night to thunderous screams, with Gabriel still slightly dazed but fully functional. The second his clawed fingers hit those strings, something clicked. Maybe it was instinct. Maybe it was muscle memory. Maybe it was just Gabriel being Gabriel… enhanced.
Either way, he nailed the opening riff.
And the entire venue, already roaring, exploded when he spun mid-note, slid on his knees across the stage, and screamed, “AMSTERDAM, I HAVE ASCENDED!!”
Thane sighed through his headset as he managed the mix.
“Yeah,” he muttered. “We’re never gonna live this one down.”