The band quickly faded their music into silence. Once they were all done, Nat said, "Thank you!"

They were performing a surprise concert in Manhattan, which was sold out in two minutes. They had just finished playing Catch Up With the End and were prepping their instruments for their next song. Nat walked up to a microphone, where his guitar sat waiting for him. After tuning his guitar, Nat spoke to the audience.

"You still with me out there, Manhattan?" he shouted into the microphone.

The audience screamed loudly and Alex played a little rhythm on his drums.

"Hahaha," Nat said when the audience had quieted down. "That's what I thought. All right, I wanna play another older song that's a cover. We've got a special guest singing this one with us for the first time in a while. Hope you like it."

With that, Nat started playing the opening guitar parts to Broken, originally written by Seether. The audience recognized the first notes immediately and knew the special guest was Brendan, the band's primary bodyguard.

"I wanted you to know," Nat sang, "that I love the way you laugh. I wanna hold you high and steal your pain, away. I keep your photograph and I know it serves me well. I wanna hold you high and steal your pain."

As Nat sang the first chorus, Brendan appeared to his left, walking onto the stage with a microphone in hand. Brendan sang the chorus with Nat, while the audience cheered for Brendan, who waved as he walked across to the stage to stand with Nat.

"Because I'm broken," they sang together, "When I'm lonesome. And I don't feel right. When you're gone away."

When their first duet had finished Brendan moved faster to stand center stage with Nat, who continued playing his guitar parts and sang the next verse alone.

"You've gone away, you don't feel me here, anymore."

The band then transitioned into Brendan's solo. As he sang, Brendan stepped forward so the audience could see him. A split second before he sang his solo, he heard someone shout out, "Go Brendan!" He nearly hesitated when he heard the shout; he recognized the voice. Ignoring it, Brendan started on his solo.

"The worst is over now, and we can breathe again. I wanna hold you high, you steal my pain," together, he and Nat sang, "Away," before Brendan continued on his own. "There's so much left to learn," he sang before Nat broke in with him and they sang, "And no one left to fight," before Brendan finished his solo. "I wanna hold you high and steal your pain."

Together, they sang the chorus of the song. "Cause I'm broken, when I'm open. And I don't feel like I am strong enough. Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome and I don't feel right, when you're gone away,"

Brendan carried the final note into the bridge of the song, where Qaasim led on a guitar solo. Once the bridge was over, Nat and Brendan sang a shortened version of the chorus, nearly screaming the lyrics.

"Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome! And I don't feel right, when you're gone away."

The music rapidly slowed and quieted.

"You've gone away," Nat sang.

"Away," Brendan echoed.

"You don't feel me here, anymore," finished Nat as the song ended. When they quieted the music, the audience screamed in cheers for them. Brendan and Nat high fived before Brendan turned and left the stage, waving and smiling at the fans as he walked.

"Give it up for Brendan Hopkins!" Nat shouted into his microphone while the band prepared for their next song. The audience cheered again and Brendan blew a kiss at them before he turned and went backstage. He was escorted back to the dressing rooms by Tuffy. Once there, Cooper, Jesse and Sonny greeted him, who were all waiting backstage for the band to finish. They were watching the concert on a television in the dressing room.

"Hey, nice job out there, Brendan!" Jesse exclaimed, while Cooper handed Brendan a water bottle.

"Thanks, Jesse," Brendan said, nodding at Cooper in thanks. "It's always fun getting up on stage like that, but I wouldn't want to do it all the time like they do."

"Were you nervous?" asked Sonny.

"Nah, it's a lot of fun to do it. I mean, once I'm on-stage, I feel fine cause I see the rest of the band and I know that if I screw up, they can fix it pretty well."

They all laughed before Brendan continued. "So, how many songs we got left?"

"Two," said Cooper. "We got Crazy Car right now and then an encore performance of If That's Not Love."

"Sweet, shouldn't take too long then. How many people we got coming backstage tonight?"

"About a dozen. Actually, Brendan, I wanted to ask you about that," Cooper said as they heard the opening music to Crazy Car playing on the TV.

"Well, it's going to be same-old, same-old, isn't it?" Brendan said. "I'll be with them to make sure things don't get too out of hand and the rest of security will be on standby with the earpieces. I thought we had everything under control?"

"Yeah, yeah, we do," said Cooper. "It's just that I think one of the people coming backstage knows you. I got a call from the person in charge of handling people coming backstage and they told me that someone coming tonight wanted to speak with you about something. They didn't give a name, but they said it was important."

Brendan frowned. The voice of the person who shouted at him before he started his solo, could it be who he thought it was? Surely not, he thought. That person is meant to be in hiding. Still, he couldn't help thinking about the possibility that the voice belonged to the person he thought it did.

"I'll see what's up when we do backstage stuff," Brendan said as the band finished playing on the TV. They immediately started playing their final song, getting another loud cheer from the audience.

Brendan sat in silence as he watched the band playing If That's Not Love. If it was who he thought it was who had shouted to him, it could only mean one thing. However, he decided not to dwell on it, as he still had a job to do with handling backstage guests.

About five minutes later, the band had finished their concert and returned to the dressing rooms. They all convened in the room where Brendan and the rest were sitting.

"Hey, great show, guys!" Sonny exclaimed as the band walked in.

"Thanks, Dad," Alex yelled back, grabbing himself a carton of milk and drinking a little bit.

Nat walked over to Brendan who was clapping for the band with the rest of them.

"You okay?" he asked as he took a water bottle Cooper offered him.

"Yeah, why?" Brendan replied.

"It's just that you were a little bit late coming in during Broken on your solo. For a second, I was a little worried."

Brendan grinned. "Oh, it's nothing. I just thought I heard a voice I knew from a couple years back cheering for me right before I started in. But I don't see how it could be him."

"Who's that?" asked Nat.

"An old friend. But, maybe I was just hearing things. Anyway," he said, standing up. "Shall we go handle the backstage guests?"

"Yeah, they should be ready by now," Cooper said. "All right guys, you know the drill. We'll get 15 minutes with the guests to sign autographs and take photos. Once we're done, it's back in here to change and get ready to head back to Nat and Alex's house for a little party."

The band cheered when they heard "party." When they finished, Cooper led them from the room and to the area where the backstage audience members were waiting. There were about a dozen of them waiting for them. When the saw they band, the backstage kids started cheering and clambered toward the band, but were held back by Tuffy.

Brendan stepped in front of the band when they were close enough to the guests and spoke to them.

"All right, thank you all for coming backstage to greet the band," he said. "As you probably know, I'm Brendan Hopkins, the band's head of security and bodyguard. You guys have 15 minutes to take photos with the band and get autographs. You can also chat, if you want. After that, we will stop this greeting and go back to the dressing rooms, as we have something else going on tonight. So, a few rules: Don't stampede at the band, don't grab onto any of them, no screaming, no hair pulling. Just behave yourselves and we won't have a problem. I will let you all know that the band's entire security team is here and are listening into earpieces as I speak and will be here in a seconds if I ask them to. Again, thanks for coming backstage, and I'll let you see the band now."

The backstage guests rushed forward to greet the band. Within seconds, cameras were flashing and the band was being bombarded with requests for autographs on T-shirts, CDs and random bits of paper.

When Brendan called out the five-minute warning, Nat shouted out to him.

"Hey Brendan, come over here. This guy says he knows you and wants to talk to you."

Brendan hesitated. Was he about to find out if he was hearing things? Ignoring his worries, Brendan walked over to where Nat was standing. A boy about their age was standing with him and Alex, chatting animatedly. The boy was a little shorter than Nat, had dirty blonde hair with blue eyes and was wearing glasses. When Brendan reached them, Nat motioned for the boy to turn around. When he did, Brendan let out a gasp of shock.

"Jack!" he exclaimed. "What are you doing here?"