If there was one thing everyone working in theatre hated more than anything, it was tech week. It could be indescribably stressful and everyone backstage could feel there was a tension in the air that was beyond normal.

A sticky, heavy wave of electricity which crawled up everyone's back and the tiny voice in the very back of their heads whispering like a choir that this was a powder keg, which only waited to explode whenever the slightest thing would go wrong. Sure, it still was just a rehearsal but the time was short and a lot of the productions outcome depended on it.

People were unusually quiet during this time; while some others were so strained, it took merely the sound of a hairpin dropping to let them snap.

And worst of all, it wasn't different this time either.

Leo hated this week. It felt stressful and always as though the huge burden he was usually carrying around with himself would double its weight.

And even though he loved working with this team; his family; he knew they all felt pretty much the same during this time. They wouldn't complain or say a thing about it, but they also had their ways in displaying transparently how exhausting it was.

Roger would usually be a lot louder than usual. And a lot meant a whole lot. Roger Debris wasn't exactly known to be a quiet, reserved director anyway. But during tech week he would transform into something Leo and Max jokingly called 'Stage-zilla' when they were out of reach and ear sight. He would be more rushing, more excited, more fidgety, more flamboyant … simply more anything. More Roger. And even though they loved him around, Leo knew he could be quite a burden too and this was probably the time he would choose not to be around him. More Roger was hard to bear.

He looked up from the books on his desk, which he had for once pulled into the farthest corner of the dark auditorium only not to be in the field of fire when the inevitable step too far would happen.

Roger was screaming at a group of dancers on stage while waving one arm about and at the same time trying hard to shield his eyes from one spotlight which was still being arranged and shone right into his face… Not a good combination.

Leo turned around looking for the others. He could spot Shirley and Brian somewhere in the back, but they wore their dissatisfaction on their faces, plain and spotless for everyone to see. Leo knew better than to disturb them when they got like that. And it wasn't exactly like they had spoken much with him since this horror of a week had begun.

Same with Scott and Kevin. Scott seemed amazingly calm whenever this happened, but he wouldn't dance through the aisles or make jokes as he usually would. Leo had passed him this morning and he greeted him without a smile, just staring straight ahead wishing him a dry good morning. But if there was one sign he was stressed out as well, it was him using a darkly colored baritone in contrast to his usual high pitched screaming queen voice and this morning had been no exception. Leo had exhaled slowly when he had passed him and had rolled his eyes.

"This is gonna be fun," he had been thinking back then.

Later during a small break he had been backstage to find a little peace from work and maybe laugh about some jokes any of the actors would make, he had found Kevin sitting over a huge pile of costumes being even more emotional than usually. Leo had asked if he was alright and he instantly had started to sob heartbreakingly, which had been a sign for Leo to silently close the door again and leave as quickly as possible.

So, right now Leo wished someone would turn up to spread a little sunshine onto this darkness inside the theatre. But he knew the mood wasn't going to improve much until opening night. Heck, he'd done this a thousand times before and knew none of them meant it. But somehow, secretly, he wished for the small interruptions by either Carmen or Max while he was trying to get some work down. One of the small, meaningless conversations of Carmen. Or the jokes. Or even the little signs of affection Max offered him at work from time to time. Leo had to smirk thinking about it. He'd never dared to think of a day he would crave Max's warm hands on his shoulders.

But turning to the stage again, he saw Carmen standing in the shadows of the scenery, trying hard to take notes of every ineligible thing Roger was screaming into the wilderness.

And Max?

He turned his head a little to the right.

Max was sitting a little apart from him directly in front of the stage while his head was bent and his eyes were fixated on some kind of paper sheet he was holding. Probably yet another change of either the book or any routine. Or another note saying something didn't work as planned at all.

Leo, sighed.

This would mean endless discussions, a bad mood or - and this would be the worst probable outcome- an evening of complete silence.

Max dealt with this differently. Everyone did take this differently for that matter, but Max was somehow special. At least Leo always saw it that way.

Mood swings and a little touch of grumpiness was his second nature, so nothing unusual here. No, what told Leo more than anything he suffered from this too was him coming quiet. Very quiet. Very unusual-for-Max quiet.

Leo had always assumed he was somehow unable to react properly. Or maybe he didn't want to. He couldn't tell. But Max always had had troubles expressing emotions of any kind apart from anger. Maybe because he'd spent years and years trying to appear in a certain way that whenever he felt something overwhelming it was impossible for him to express so; like a barrier of some sort.

And a fact was, Max hadn't spoken much since that morning.

They had left their apartment together and he was as little a morning person as he had always been. But on their way to the theatre in the cab, Leo had tried to navigate their little scraps of conversation into a little lighter direction and Max had looked at him. Simply looked. He hadn't moved but had stared at him - or rather through him- just as though Leo was made of glass. Then the had turned towards his notes again and hadn't spoken ever since. Not with Leo that is.

He'd had a few smaller arguments with Roger this morning, but that was not exactly a piece of art. It was quite easy to get Roger to start screaming by simply asking him how his morning had been lately. Leo sometimes wondered how Carmen dealt with this.

As for him, he felt lost. He hated it when Max acted that way. He'd rather have him say something; scream to leave him alone until after opening night or at least grunt every now and then to underline his bad mood…

But silence…

Weird. Another thing Leo had never thought he'd live to experience: Silence. From Max.

He shivered thinking about it.

But then he heard the treacherous creaking of the wooden chairs they used instead of the comfortable seats of the auditorium. His head shot up. Max was leaning back. Did this mean he calmed down a bit? Or was at least trying to?

Leo observed him a moment but then decided there was no danger coming from Max right now. So he slowly pulled his own chair back and silently got up.

Always careful not to make a sound he tiptoed over to Max's table until he stood right beside him. Max didn't look up.

Leo squatted down besides him.

"How's it going?" He whispered; a slight grin on his face.

"Same old," Max answered as silently but there was clearly a notion of annoyance in his voice. He leaned back and run his hand through his hair. "They're overreacting as always and I swear I'll kill Roger soon!"

Leo grinned.

"You say this each time," He smirked, turning his gaze towards the stage where Roger now yelled at some poor stagehand who had the great unfortune to pass him a little too closely while trying to figure out how to go on unnoticed. "This guy probably wishes he'd be dead right now too!"

"If only Roger would calm down a bit," Max shook his head and then got up.

Leo followed him with his eyes but noticed a bit too late what he was up to.

"Roger, let it be," Max shouted then, causing their director to turn around fuming. "We have different things right now to worry about than someone passing you!"

Roger gasped visibly shocked, but as usual overacted the whole thing a good deal.

"I beg you pardon, Max?" he theatrically revolted. "If this doesn't even happen without anyone noticing, how on earth do you want anything to work in this mess?"

Leo heard Max inhale deeply.

"Max, don't," he managed to say but Max didn't hear him.

"This mess?" Max started, marching towards the stage. "This mess, dear comrade, is caused a good deal thanks to you!"

"What was that?" Roger seemed to grow a good ten inches right there only by straightening up. Usually Leo would instinctively duck down, but somehow he hurried past Max. Maybe he could do something to detain him from something even more harmful.

"You are the one acting up like this each and every time," Max was on stage now, frighteningly close to Roger. Great, when two bigheads meet. "You are the one throwing a tantrum every production. The problems are nothing new and they certainly won't be solved by you screaming at everyone closer to you than a mile!"

"Oh, If I am so unbearable, why even bother with me each time again?" Roger reared up. "And especially why should I take this from someone not even doing his own job properly?"

"If I were you I'd be a lot more cautious right now," Max clearly bit his tongue to not explode as well, but his face turned dangerously red and made Leo fear the worst just seeing it.

"Well, it is true!" Roger waved his arms in the air while his voice grew louder and louder. "It is your damn job to make this work. To coordinate problems so rehearsals can go on without disruption. But you…oh no, you always sit there, not giving a damn about all this. All you care about is the money you're gonna get out of our work here!"

"ROGER!" Leo looked at him pleadingly now too. "DON'T!"

"How dare you?" Max pushed Leo aside and marched closer towards Roger. "You owe your very existence to me! A second-rate director like you would have never gotten one foot into these productions if it hadn't been for me! And you have the gall to say something like this into MY face?"

"Max, please! Stop this you two; right now!" Leo jumped between them and stretched out his arms to keep them away from one another.

"Stay out of this, Leo," Roger screamed, turning his head to him now too. "The very same applies to you! You should worry more about what has to be done than prowling after Max all the time. You're doing this long enough and don't need that much validation anymore!"

"Don't you dare to talk to him like this!" Max yelled back.

And there it was. That one inevitable situation. Leo knew what was about to happen. He wanted to scream. To take both of them on one ear and bang their gigantic heads together just for once so they'd notice how ridiculous they were behaving. And he knew this would continue until after opening night. And everyone else was gonna suffer from them.

But just as he wanted to open his mouth again and say something, he felt someone grabbing his shoulders and pulling him backwards out of that battlefield.

He closed his eyes because he expected to fall by the gruff suddenness of that pull, but it didn't happen. He heard Carmen's voice before he even saw him.

"Are you crazy?" he whispered sincerely. "Never, and I mean NEVER, get between them when they get like this! It'll be your ass next!"

"We can stop this," Leo whirled around to him. "This is the last thing we all need here and you know it!"

But Carmen couldn't answer, even though he opened his mouth already for Roger and Max started to scream at each other even more that very moment and he simply grabbed Leo and tried to pull him away a little more.

"IF I'LL GO IT'LL BE ALL YOUR NECKS," Roger fumed.

"GO AHEAD AND CRY AT HOW FAST WE'LL REPLACE YOU," Max answered.

They were standing chest to chest now when Roger started to gesture in his very exaggerated way. He threw his arms up, causing Max to back away a little but not in the slightest intimidated. He simply ducked away a bit to not get slapped by Roger accidentally.

Unfortunately the guy Roger was screaming at before and who still stood a good way behind him, saw his chance to get away now. He started to move a bit too clumsy though and immediately caught the attention of Carmen and Leo who turned their heads to him.

Being inexperienced with those two personalities in front of him, he didn't know to back away backwards though. So he tried his luck by sneaking past the two wranglers, which turned out to be his biggest mistake.

For one moment of not paying attention and he caught the arm of Roger and got jostled a good deal. He stumbled backwards towards Leo and Carmen, who jumped out of his way in union the very last moment. But unfortunately he lost his balance and fell on one of the stage designers, who struggled to get the set up as quickly as possible.

He didn't notice until it was too late and both of them fell to the earth in a loud crash. Roger and Max didn't notice until someone yelled "Watch out!" through the hall.

By falling down the guy had lost control over a huge part of the backdrop he was holding with some others and which was now crashing down to the stage.

And for once Roger and Max fell silent as they both stared at the huge thing getting closer and closer. They turned pale and for once jumped together aside as fast as they could accomplish.

The backdrop came down in a huge crash, raising a lot of dust and turning the darkness of the stage into a cloud of dirt for a moment.

Max and Roger lay some feet away from the debris, with their arms around each other. They slowly raised their heads, still pale from the shock of this unexpected interruption. Slowly they looked around.

For once the whole theatre was silent.

Everybody stood around in the corners of the stage or the auditorium and stared at them in total shock. And very slowly they stepped closer until almost all of them stood in a huge circle around the pile of rubble.

Max and Roger tried to get to their feet and balance themselves. Their eyes met only shortly and they didn't let go of each other…

Their breaths seemed so loud when their heads turned towards the stage again and their eyes widened.

Max felt his knees going weak right then. His whole body started to shiver and if he thought back on this moment he swore his own heartbeat was the only thing he was able to hear that moment; like a loud thunder hammering through the silence of the hall.

Roger couldn't move. As much as he wanted to, he immediately felt an overwhelming sickness arising inside of him. Everything around him began to spin and he felt glad to have Max next to him to hold on to that very moment.

"Oh God," they heard someone whisper before several people around them seemingly came to their senses again and started to run to the huge pile in front of them in a hurry.

Max and Roger wanted to move. More than anything. They wanted to run. To help. To do anything but their bodies just wouldn't obey them. All they were able to do is stand there and stare at that horrible picture in front of them.

"God, Rog," he heard Scott just seconds before he appeared next to him, putting his arm around him.

But Roger could not react.

Neither did Max.

All they did was staring straight ahead at the horrible silence which crept through the darkness.

People around them were running, screaming; even trying to build chains to put aside the debris and dirt…

But they didn't hear them.

All they knew was this thing….this horrible monstrous thing… crashed down on Leo and Carmen without them having gotten up yet…

~ To be continued ~