Hey guys, sorry for the long update. Been busy with my band and the usual stuff. Well, here's the next chapter for you. Don't have much to say, except that you can enjoy it or go shove a book up your anus. Laterz guyz…

Geddy

Chapter 13

The students of San Demas just about packed the entire plane, which was of no surprise to Link. The girls chattered senselessly and would flash him very flirty looks that forced him to smile back. Zelda had caught eye of this and was rather jealous, but she was unable to make a scene because of her brother. After all, Link wasn't hers.

Link rolled his eyes and set a pair of headphones into his ears to kickback and listen to Tool for the first of the trip. It was only four in the morning and was still pitch black outside. He was extremely tired and worn out from all the work he had been doing not only for the band, but planning a trip for 200 people. Needless to say, that wasn't easy.

He felt himself drifting off to sleep as "Schism" began to play. The song soothed him as he leaned back in his seat and fell into a dreamy slumber. Thoughts of his musical career and friends danced along with the music in his worn brain. Zelda…

He awoke some four hours later to see that Serj, who had been sitting next to him when he fell asleep, had been replaced by Zelda. Link quickly sat up and rubbed his forehead a bit before pulling the headphones from his ears. Zelda smiled slightly at him.

"Hey. What are you doing over here?" Link asked.

"Well, if you must know… Serj took of with Mido into a different part of the plane. This is more like a bus ride with how disorganized the seating chart is," Zelda joked.

Link nodded a bit and looked out the window. All he could see was the sunny expanse of fluffy white clouds below him. Glancing at his watch, he realized that it was already 8 in the morning. They would be there in two hours, maybe even less than that. Link was happy he had slept through the most boring part of the trip.

"I'm glad you could come," Link said as he looked into her eyes.

She smiled a very cute, lopsided smile and looked back into his eyes. Link placed his hand on top of hers and lightly massaged her knuckle bones. His fingers were so callused and tough, yet his touch was so soft.

"Isn't that cute? You two planning your honeymoon while you're in the Big Apple?" Mido's voice sounded from the seat behind them

"Shove it Mido, and keep your voice down!" Link snarled.

"You told him!" Zelda angrily asked, glowering.

"It slipped," Link lied.

"Are you trying to make it that obvious?" Malon asked as she walked up to the edge of the seat.

"You told her!" Link echoed.

"It slipped!"

"Listen to this Malon, they're already fighting like they're married," Mido snickered.

Link turned and reached his hand over the seat. Mido attempted to duck in order to flee his friend's grasp, but Link still managed to snatch the back of his shirt and yank him back.

"Whoa, easy there Mr. Fondereli," Malon jabbed.

"Ok, you two can't tell anyone!" Link demanded, still holding onto Mido's bright orange shirt.

"Relax buddy, we aren't going to. Zelda's my best pal, I wouldn't do that to her," Malon assured.

"I'll consider considering not telling anybody if you let go of my shirt," Mido snuffed from the seat.

"Get a fashion sense," Link retorted as he shook his hand free of Mido's obscene shirt.

"Look guys, with us two helping you out, we might actually be able to figure out a way to get Serj to be cool with it," Malon began.

"Yes, that would be a great idea Malon. Throw lighter fluid on the raging fire, that ALWAYS helps to put it out," Mido shot back.

Zelda rolled her eyes and stood up from her seat. Giving Link an almost rude frown, she turned and strolled off out of sight. Link frowned at her sudden change in disposition.

"Great going you idiots. Your little elementary shit pissed her off," Link growled.

"Chill out girly mouth. She's Closter phobic," Malon assured.

Link ignored her and went back to listening to his music. Realizing that Tool was still in the player, he began to dig through his CD wallet for a new selection. "Images and Words" caught his eye from Dream Theater.

Grooving between Dream Theater and Rush the rest of the way, Link had a rather enjoyable plane ride. The classic "Hemispheres" from Rush was a straight 18 minute long song, which he always enjoyed.

Serj surfaced as the plane began to dive down into the New York City airspace. Giving Link a wry smile, he sat down next to his guitar mate and strapped the belt over his waist. Serj hated planes with a passion, but he wasn't about to drive for a week straight to reach New York. He had already had a long car ride once this year already.

The plane touched down within twenty minutes of the city being visible. The excited students piled out with their luggage in hand into the sun lit dome of the N.Y.C. Airport. Link slipped on his aviator sunglasses before exiting the plane. After all, he had to look "cool", right?

Link made sure that all of hotel arrangements had been processed and cleared before heading into the city. He didn't know anything about New York, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that walking was faster than using a vehicle. The traffic was murder after all.

It was a good mile walk or so before they came up to the hotel. Link knew they looked pretty funny as they made their way there. It wasn't every day you saw a group of 200 high school students all following each other.

Link went into the hotel lobby and made sure for a second time everything was ok before bringing everyone inside. They ended up having 75 rooms total, as everyone was rooming up as it was. Link knew that he would be roomed with Serj for sure, and whoever decided to find their way in.

As Link made his way up the stairs to room 307, his cell phone rang.

"Hello?"

"Hey boy, what are you doing?"

"Oh, hey Dennis. We're just getting into the hotel," Link told his companion.

"Oh, ok. Well hey, did you want to come down and see the venue real fast?" Dennis asked in his thick Texas accent.

"Tomorrow man. I'm worn out from all of this shit," Link replied truthfully.

"Oh, I understand that all to well. Well, I'll stop by tomorrow and take you guys over there," Dennis assured.

"Alright, thanks Dennis."

"Mhm, bye."

Link laughed at the old man as he opened the door to his room. Dennis was such a simple guy it just wasn't even funny.

After setting his sunglasses down onto the nightstand next to one of the beds, he looked outside and realized something was wrong. How in the world could it be the middle of December and there be sunlight and no snow? Weird, eh?

He didn't really care at the moment however. He was so tired all he wanted to do was sleep. And with that, he flopped himself down on the bed and snoozed the day away.

He awoke later to a sharp bang on his door. Groggily, he slid his heavy body out of the bed and headed to the door, grumbling all the way. As he ran his right hand through his ruffled blonde hair, he slowly unlocked the door and pulled out it open.

"Oh, I didn't expect to see you," Link stated in surprise.

"Tired?" Zelda asked as she walked inside of the room.

"How'd you guess?" Link asked as he shut the door behind her.

When he turned he was met by Zelda's arms wrapped around his neck and her lips softly pressed against his. He closed his eyes and let his arms fall down to her waist and held her tight.

"I'm sorry. I just have really missed you lately," Zelda apologized as they broke from each other.

"I'm getting tired of telling you to stop apologizing for everything," he smirked.

He walked away from her and threw himself on the bed. Zelda had woken him up, that was for sure, but his body was still worn beyond belief. Just as Zelda began to walk over to him, the door lock clicked and in walked Serj along with Mido.

"Hey Link, we're going down to this drink place just down the street, you wanna go?" Serj invited, obviously not picking up on the fact that his sister was standing right next to him.

"Yeah, sure. I need to stretch my legs," Link stated and slipped his shoes on.

"What are you doing here Zelda?" Serj asked, just now picking up on the fact that his sister was right there.

"Bored," she replied.

Serj shrugged and left the room, but Mido wasn't stupid. He picked up on the awkward situation almost immediately. Once he was sure Serj was well out of ear shot, he turned and glared at Link.

"You two are the biggest idiots I have met in my life! Are you crazy?" Mido scolded.

"Don't look at me," Link defended as he stood up.

"It was me. I cam in here…" Zelda said meekly.

"Seriously you guys. Link, neither one of us want to find out how Serj will react if he finds out. You need to tell him before it gets too late," Mido advised.

"How many times are you going to tell me that Mido?" Link growled irritatingly.

"Until you tell him!"

With that Mido shoved the door open and stormed out of the room. Zelda looked up at Link and gave him the "I'm-sorry" look. Link kissed her forehead and headed out after Mido. He hated to admit it, but his drummer was right. It was only a matter of time before this whole thing blew up in his face.

"The weather is kind of screwy, isn't it?" Kafei asked as he looked out the window of the drink shop.

It was really nothing more than a tropical slush place, but it suited well for just chilling with your friends. Link kind of felt like one of those valley girls that would sit there on a hot summer day like you see in the movies. Although, he couldn't deny that his mango peach slush was the best he'd had.

"Yeah, I had thought there was going to be snow here," Mido said solemnly.

"You talked to Dennis yet Link?" Serj asked in change of the stupid subject at hand.

"Yeah. He wanted me to check out the venue today, but I just decided to do it tomorrow. Man, it's hard to believe we'll be playing in front of thousands of people in just a few days," Link fathomed.

"Indeed it is my friend. I got to hand it to you Link, if it weren't for you, I wouldn't have this," Serj thanked in a non-sappy kind of way.

"I do what I can," Link joked.

The four of them were very eager to get on stage. Though, as the band's manager, Link was pretty much doing all the work. Dennis was sure to have all of their stuff at the venue as it was, but he still had a lot of time to put into the project ahead of him. He intended on spending the next few days preparing the stage for the show.

Most bands would just get it all taken care of that day, but Link wanted everything to be perfect… and hey, it's not like he had anything better to do, right? Link called Dennis later than night and told him what time to be at the hotel to lead them to the stage.

He found it rather hard to sleep with all these thoughts running through his head. Three days… three days… His dream would come true. There were going to be so many recording managers and producers there it wouldn't even be funny! This was the show that needed to get their ticket to fame. But for Link, it wasn't fame… it was paying a debt he had to his family.

It seemed as though it took forever for the next day to roll around. Link restlessly tossed and turned about in the hard hotel bed until the day light dawned. He hadn't noticed before, but overnight it seemed as though the good Lord above dropped a white blanket over the city.

Link smiled as he looked out the window that morning to the sight of a snow coated New York. 'This is what N.Y.C. is supposed to look like,' Link thought.

He awoke Serj to get ready. They had agreed that they would just leave Mido and Kafei to sleep, since it was impossible to wake the two gangly guys anyways. Link and Serj bundled up in warm clothes for the trip to the venue.

Serj put on a pair of jeans and a long sleeve turtle neck with a black Old Navy hoody over it. He wore a pair of thick black snow boots and an Avenged Sevenfold hat backwards.

Link on the other hand has his usual torn faded jeans on, with a long sleeve shirt and a hoody to boot. He slipped on his usual Batman chucks and stretched his beanie over his unkempt blonde hair.

"Torn jeans? Are you insane?" Serj questioned before he opened the door of the hotel room.

"I live for danger," Link smirked as he followed Serj out to the lobby.

Dennis sat on a couch in the lobby looking as though he had just got done smoking a joint. Knowing Dennis, he probably just finished a dooby. Dennis had a big nose and real messy white and gray hair that was wet from him just showering. He wore a pair of jeans, a black Harley shirt, and a black leather jacket.

"Hey Dennis," Link greeted with his hand outstretched.

"Hey boy," Dennis accepted as he shook Link's hand raggedly.

With a few exchanged words, they followed Dennis out to the venue. Luckily, Dennis had a limo ready for them, so the didn't have to deal with walking in the cold. Link and Serj really began to feel important as they climbed into the car.

"Let's see what this place is made of," Link thought.