A/N this is a pretty long chapter! but just keep reading it all! I'm sure it'll be worth it! R&R thankies!!

Chapter 5: A Victory In Sight?

At the sight of all these…bandies running onto the battlefield, most of the metronomes decided to make a hasty retreat to regroup. ((wait...how'd they break through the barrier surrounding our battle field??...man when I get older I'm moving AWAY from small towns oy...weirdness to much!! )) So the head metronome decided to just call the rest back that were still fighting, he let out a shrill BEEP that made us bandies cover our ears, and all the metronomes headed back to their bunkers. The rain was still coming down in sheets, with the added effect of lightening and thunder illuminating the air.

"Alright!" I screamed over the noise of the rain and thunder, "Let's get behind our pit instrument barricade so we can regroup and reorder!"

"RIGHT!" was the reply to my…uh…order. There, in the pouring rain behind our blockade of pit instruments, that for some reason seemed to grow bigger and bigger as time went on, as if some magic force was at work multiplying them, we grouped together and welcomed our reinforcements warmly. Or at least as warmly as a soaking wet group of bandies in the middle of a terrible war against evil metronomes, come to life, in the middle of a thunderstorm can. I later found out it was because the other schools brought their instruments over and that whole "strange things happen" thing that our barricade seemed to grow.

From each different group of recruited bandies, a leader approached me, being the General of the Army, as the leader of that certain…uh band clan I guess you could call them. There was Gerold the trumpet player from the Other School, aka Junior High, who was representing them. Representing the quitters who still loved band was Angel, an ex-saxophone. Then there was Laura, a flute, Kent, a percussionist, Brooke, a clarinet, and Tyler, a French horn, who represented those who had graduated. Also, there was Ashley, a Junior color guard member, from the Pergerton High School, Adam, a Senior tuba, from the Wickleberry High School, and Ryan, a Junior trombone ((woah! Same grade and instrument as my boyfriend....Troy [dreamy sigh] haha yes I am pathetic!)), from the Sandmean High School; three schools that were close by, and neighboring us. Each introduced their selves, and gave their source of representation.

All of them were wearing the band uniforms/colors of the school they represented. Gerold wore our red and white colors; Angel wore the black, which represented those who had quit. Laura, Kent, Brooke, and Tyler had on red, white, and blue for those who had graduated; Kelly had Pergerton's colors of black and sliver, Adam had Wickleberry's purple and black, and Ryan wore the Sandmean's infamous gold and silver colors. Sandmean is infamous because they've won best overall at our regional band competition three years in a row, would be four if we didn't JUST beat them that last year. They were our competitors, but still our allies and friends. All together I'd say we had a total of…erm…uh….well I don't know A LOT of bandies now! As planned we regrouped everyone.

Since the new recruits didn't know our rankings I filled them in, as well as giving a few other rankings. "Alright here's our rankings, and they'll be the same for everyone! Seniors are our Lieutenant Generals, Juniors are our Majors, Sophomores are our Captains, and Freshman are our Privates. I assume you all know what each rank's job is? [everyone nods heads] good"

"Um, excuse me Amy,"

"Yes Angel?"

"What about us who have quit band?"

"And those that have graduated?" added Brooke.

"Right, right...I almost forgot...Angel, those that have quit but still love band will be ranked as 1st Lieutenants, and your job is to show leadership and good team play out on the battle field! You rank under our sophomores...hope you don't mind?"

"Not at all," Angel calmly replied.

"As for those who graduated, you are our 2nd Lieutenants, and your job is basically the same as the 1st Lieutenants, only your ranked bellow them...okay?"

"Fine with us!" replied Laura, Kent, Brooke, and Tyler.

Each section was now bigger and stronger! We could do this! ((I hope I hope I hope!!!)) This time, though, Ryan came up with a suggestion.

"General Amy…."

"er…you can just call me Amy" ((Oh wow Ryan's a CUTIE!!! Remember your rank and the problem at hand…and that you have a boyfriend!!! bad Amy bad Amy! gahh...so many cute guys out there...hehe...but I'd NEVER EVER cheat on Troy!...))

"Oh, ok, Amy. I have a suggestion!"

"Ok shoot"

"…ok, well, I suggest we put aside some of our bandies as….band scientists! Then we can take samples of the metronomes, somehow, and try to figure out a way to destroy, er turn the metronomes back into their original "non-lethal" forms"

At this mouths gasped! Why hadn't we thought of that before!!!? Oh yeah….BECAUSE WE WERE TRYING TO STAY ALIVE AGAINST THE METRONOMES WITH ONLY ABOUT A HUNDRED SOMETHING KIDS!! ((Oh headache headache!! NEED AN ASPIRIN!!…but seriously…how DIDN'T we think of that?))

"Ryan…" I stuttered

"Yes?"

"YOUR BRILLIANT!!" I exclaimed.

"Uh gee, thanks, it was nothing..." blushed Ryan thinking I was too modest. ((Ok ok so maybe I WAS being modest…but heck he's cute, he seems smart, AND he had a good point! Hehe...and STOP thinking that I'm going to cheat on my boyfriend! I love my boyfriend, plus he's in band....bwahaha...plays trombone [deep dreamy sigh] but you already knew that hehe....oh back to the story...))

"Does everyone agree to that?" I asked happily

"YEAH!" was the uproarious reply. So it was settled, we selected our most skilled bandies at that kind of science stuff, and gave them a little space to do their experiments with; as usual a little lab appeared out of nowhere for them to use, but like I said "strange things happen around here". Now we were ready! We could take on those EVIL METRONOMES! All we needed was a sample of one so we could figure out a…uh…

"cure" for those metronomes!

Meanwhile behind the metronomes blockade

"Master! How can we beat them? They've doubled…tripled…QUADRUPLED!!! In size!!! They're too much!"

"NAY!! NEVER!!! YOU SCOUNDREL! Do you DARE think us weak?"

"n…no sire! I was just saying…"

"EXACTLY! You were just 'SAYING' something! It's all a lie! An illusion they're playing on us! We can defeat them! Besides, our esteemed and genius metronomes that we've specially set aside found out the formula for our creation, and have figured out how to manipulate it to our advantage! We now have an ever-growing army! And soon some of those…'bandies' will be joining us!" at that the leading metronome let out an evil laugh that sent chills even down the…er…backs of his fellow metronomes.

"Sire?"

"What is it! Can't you see I'm gloating?"

"Yes Sire, I'm sorry Sire...but..."

"But what? Get on with it!"

"Well...may we convert our language into English now...all this beepish language is giving us a headache...and its so much easier to just speak in plain English...since we are capable of it, sire..."

"Eh you're right there...very well...We can speak in English instead of bleepish, tell the others..."

"Right sire!" Upon the metronome leaving the head metronome, the head metronome began to gloat again. ((...and they're outsmarting us?!?...wow...I'll take a whole bottle of aspirin now! If I don't wake up...good! eh [twitch]....))

Upon hearing the Metronome Leader start his hideous laughter again, (of course the whole dialogue above was all spoken in bleepish so none of the directors could understand it...) Genial frantically said, "Mr. B! Mr. B!! Did you hear that??"

"Yes…" solemnly said Mr. Boomer, "but how do you know what they're saying?"

"Well...I can't really understand them...but it just sounds bad..."

"So does everything that comes out of their mouth....just beeps and more beeps...they should get their mouths washed out with soap! Such fowl mouths!! Didn't their mother's ever teach them its not nice to talk like that!" With that comment Mr. B just got weird looks from Drew and Genial. Seeing their looks, he said, "Just a little band humor...eheheh...well it may all sound bad, but there's still hope!" (( [sweat drop] wow...sometimes I wonder if too much band can fry ones brain...eh, then again Mr. Boomer's jokes were always a bit corny...))

"Hope? How so?" quizzically said Drew.

"If we can relay a message somehow to our bandies to warn them…." he was cut short by the approaching metronomes.

"You there!" shouted one in plain and clear English

"When did they learn English?" asked Drew

"Beats me!" said Genial and Mr. Boomer simultaneously.

"I SAID YOU!" shouted the metronome at them.

"Wa? Who, me?" said Mr. Boomer.

"Ya…you! Come with me…we have a…'special' something for you" evilly laughed the metronome. Mr. Boomer didn't like it at all. Reluctantly he followed the two metronome guards.

"Oh no!" wept Genial, "What's going to happen to him?"

"I don't know!" said Drew, "But I doubt it's going to be good!"

Back on the battle field

"Alright, is everyone ready?" I asked our new and improved army

"YEAH!!" was the reply I was welcomed with. We were going to crush them, and nothing could stop us! With our scientists working away at finding a concoction to defeat our gruesome foes we thought a sure victory was in sight. Our trumpets were in tip top shape, our flutes were in perfect tune, our percussion was sounding their all time best, clarinets were squeak free and sounding great, saxophones were in perfect step, everything was perfect! Even the weather got better, it went from pouring to a drizzle, to just very overcast at the moment. 'We're at our all time best! They'll never defeat us! VICTORY IS IN SIGHT!!' I thought as I shouted for the forward march! I was determined nothing could defeat us. Little did I know that the metronomes had the same feeling, that nothing would defeat them either! Was our victory really in sight?…