After venturing outside many more times in the following days, Micky declared that he was ready to attend the first night of eliminations, which meant they needed a plan.

Davy, having learned the truth about Micky's fears, tried to make the transition back into the population a little easier for his friend, which called for a pair of sunglasses with the darkest lenses he could find. That eliminated the issue of people seeing his eyes, which refused to focus. As it stood, Micky looked like some sort of weird, fluffy-haired owl who would possibly frighten children if given the smallest opportunity. After taking offense to the description of his appearance and insisting that he looked just fine, he still allowed Davy to fit the sunglasses onto his face.

"What d'you think?" he asked. The guys were standing in front of him. The figured they could come up with a sort of theme. Not completely dark and brooding, but something that deliberately made the statement, 'I don't care.' It seemed to be the easiest route to take, considering their lead singer would be standing almost stationary in front of the mic for their set of two songs.

"Almost," Peter said. "Hang on, I'll be right back."

He felt the clothes the guys had given him, which consisted of all blacks. Black button-down shirt, black pants, and a black sportcoat. Peter returned, and placed a black fedora on his head. Reaching up, Micky took it off and felt it. "What's this?"

"Naw, put it back on," Mike said. "Really brings the whole look together."

Smiling, Micky plopped the hat back onto his head. His curls stuck out in all directions, but it really did make the whole thing work. Davy smiled as well, clapping Peter on the back. It was a good idea.

"You ready for a test-run then?" Davy asked. "Everyone know the plan?"

"We're all set to get there early," Mike said. "We sit down ahead of time, and then you don't gotta worry about anyone gettin' in your way."

"Then we leave late," Peter added.

Honestly, Davy couldn't help a mild sense of dread. Even with his three friends around him, Micky would still have to navigate in unfamiliar territory with only hearing and touch to guide him. Earlier, Davy tried closing his eyes and feeling his way around the house without the use of sight, and he had to give up pretty quickly. It was frustrating, plain and simple. What Micky was doing was nothing short of amazing.

Everyone hesitated, stalling, unwilling to voice their concerns. For a moment, even Micky seemed particularly subdued, but it wasn't long before a wide smirk crept onto his shades-covered face. "C'mon you guys. You know us. With our amazing plan in place and all our fallbacks ready, the night is completely foolproof. So, of course, something is going to go catastrophically wrong as soon as we walk out the front door. We already know this. What're we delaying the inevitable for?"

Despite the fatalistic view of how their lives generally tended to go, the simple statement put everyone's minds at ease. Honestly, Micky had it right.

No matter how hard they tried to avoid it, something was bound to go wrong. It all came down to a matter of when.

—-

Though keenly aware that the auditorium had been around for years, every aspect about it was, at least for Micky, brand new. Nervously, he touched everything on his way in, trailing his hand quickly along the wall as Michael and Davy guided him down the aisle toward his seat. One of them led, while the other followed, making sure that their blind friend neither tripped on anything or wandered off in the wrong direction. The entire interior of the building seemed maze-like, and yet, his mind quickly processed its layout as if it were creating a rudimentary map. He felt neither scared, nor lost.

"This way! Here's our row!" Peter called from close by.

They stopped. Micky took the opportunity to dig a toe into the carpet under their feet. Though still plush, he could feel that it had flattened with age, and could almost picture the frayed edges that would give way to the cement floor beneath the seats.

"All the way back here?" Mike asked. "It's like they seated us on another continent."

"It's not like we won't have good seats tomorrow, eh?" Davy asked, chuckling. "Backstage. Won't see much, but I bet we'll hear it pretty well."

"How far back are we?" Micky asked. He tried to gauge how much his voice echoed, but something was deadening the sound. He couldn't quite sense the location of the stage.

"Let's just say, if you could see, you'd be wonderin' why there were ants performin' on stage," Mike said. "Ah, well. I guess we're just here to hear the competition anyway."

Davy and Mike shuffled him into their row. Surprisingly, now that he could feel seats on either side of him, Micky didn't feel so completely lost. At least they gave him some idea of where he was in space, unlike walking down the open aisle. In front of him, Davy stopped again, took his hand, and placed it on his seat.

The moment he touched the fold-down chair, Micky felt an odd, uncomfortable stirring in the back of his mind, which he couldn't quite place…

"Right. There, you got it. Okay, Mick?" Davy asked. He paused, and Micky felt a gentle touch on his shoulder, before he continued. "You gonna sit?"

"Yeah."

He heard the others taking their seats - it was a gentle creak, the kind old things make when they're not quite old enough to put out to pasture. Narrowing his eyes, Micky sat, too, still trying to fight off the creeping discomfort that bothered him. Unfortunately, he couldn't quite place the anxiety to get rid of it. Turning to Davy, he asked, "What's this place look like?"

"It's nice," Davy said. "The lights are up now. Everything's kind of mahogany and gold, I guess. There's some curtains that are attached at the ceiling by the lights and they're like sails, 'cuz they kind of arc down to the walls. But not right over the seats. I don't think you could touch 'em, not unless you were twelve feet tall. And those are all colors. Green, blue, yellow. Oh, and the curtain's closed on the stage. It's red."

"There's a balcony?" Micky asked.

"Yeah, there's always a balcony. There's some gold scrollwork on the rails. Kinda pretty."

With the idea he had in his head about the size of the place, Micky could almost picture it. One day, he thought, when he got his sight back, he'd have to come back here and take a real good look at it, to see how close his imagination made it.

"Well, we got a few hours 'til showtime," Mike said, interrupting Micky's musing. "Hopefully you guys aren't too bored."

"We could play 'I Spy,'" Peter suggested.

Micky heard a muffled thud, then Peter said, "Ow! What'dya do that for?!"

"How 'bout a game we can all play?" Michael grumbled.

Micky chuckled, easing back in his chair and trying to ignore the nagging sense that something just felt wrong about the whole thing. Like he'd been here before - but not. No, there was something different about it for certain, but all the elements were there.

The elements of what?

"Okay! Try to guess what I'm humming," Davy said, then proceeded to hum just three little notes.

"What, by that?" Mike said. "Ain't no one gonna— "

"Yesterday. The Beatles," Micky interrupted.

"See? Fun!" Davy said. "Okay, try this one…"

Since they'd arrived quite early, the boys had plenty of time to create and refine their game. As they continued, more rules were added - or taken away, if necessary - until they had quite an interesting little competition going on. Amid an argument as to whether two different people could use two different parts of the same song in an attempt to throw the other players off, Micky noticed the fact that there were more voices in the auditorium. More people were arriving.

He could almost sense their closeness. Feel the warmth.

"You gonna go?" Peter asked. Micky felt someone shove his shoulder.

Go?

Oh. Take his turn. Micky almost felt relieved at the prospect of leaving, though he couldn't say for sure why. "Yeah, just gimme a sec to think of somethin'."

As he tried to think of a song to use, his mind strayed back to the venue itself. Davy described it to him, but he saw something else in his mind. A lot of green, actually…

"Mick?" Mike asked. "Aw, never mind, it's probably best if we stop anyway." Micky could hear the smile in Michael's voice as he added, "To be continued. I intend to win this little game."

The brazen boast descended into a good-natured argument among the others, so Micky let his mind wander again, trying to place his anxiety. He couldn't even fathom for a moment why his mind guided him to see green. A sort of reddish brown — and above them, where there should have been beams and walkways and spotlights, he could picture— something…

"Full house," Peter said. "Wonder if it'll be like this tomorrow."

"I hope so," Mike said. "Guess that all depends on how well people do tonight."

The crowd carried a certain dim quality to its sound. Background noise. No words resounded loudly enough to hear distinctly, and no one person spoke above any other. It was like the buzzing of a hive of hornets, outside on a sunny day, people pressing all around, the scent of hot dogs and popcorn and beer, while the blue sky stretched above them and went on forever.

The sound system came online with a crack, and words filtered through Micky's mind: You never hear the one that gets you.

But he did. He had!

He ducked, but it was too late. Shocked, he could feel a tightness at the base of his skull that erupted into a kaleidoscope of color in his eyes. So bright! So painful! But, oh, if only he could touch those colors—

Were his feet moving? Was he back on the carpet? When did that happen? His vision still swimming in color, he ran up the aisle, even though he couldn't see where he was going. He collided with something soft, which he assumed to be another person, judging by the 'watch where you're going!' that reached his ears. Nearly falling, he placed his hands on the floor for support, running a few steps as if he were a wild animal before retaking his proper footing. The closeness, the buzzing, the crackling audio - it was all too much. If he didn't escape, he'd feel it again and again and again until—

He burst through the door, ignoring the clamoring of human bodies around him, all indignant that he'd rush through them without concern for the fact that they'd been there first. Matter, he thought, was tricky that way. No two pieces of it could ever occupy the same space, yet here he stood, trying to violate one of the key laws of physics in an attempt to just get away.

Once he'd reached the lobby, someone managed to grab his shirt.

"No. No!" he pleaded. But the owner of the hands turned him around, taking his shoulders and rubbing them gently.

He longed for the colors, but they'd gone again, leaving behind a black nothing.

Who had him?

"Micky, stop," the voice said quietly.

Michael.

"Where are we?" Micky managed. His throat felt tight as he struggled to control his breathing. His face was hot, and his eyes stung. He remembered that at some point, they'd put sunglasses on him; taking them off, he let them drop to the floor.

"The Flanahan Auditorium in Santa Monica," Mike replied. Micky felt another hand on his shoulder, then the out-of-breath puffing of someone else - very close. Everyone, too close.

"I remember it," Micky said. "I remember… Standing at the railing, and I felt this… sharp pain."

"You remember?" Davy asked. "The doctor said you probably wouldn't."

"Well, I do. I can see the whole thing." Micky tried to catch his breath, but his heart was hammering, eating up whatever air he struggled to breathe in. "I thought— I thought somethin' must have stung me. I heard this buzzing, like there were bees or something everywhere, so I thought— I thought maybe one of 'em just got stuck… Stuck in my hair and… There were so many colors."

Someone said, "Is he all right?"

"Fine," Mike said. "He's fine, just… He's fine."

"What was that?" Micky asked. "Did he see my eyes? Where's my sunglasses?"

"Forget about that right now," Davy said, his voice laced with concern. "Just some usher, nothin' wrong with that— "

"Where's my glasses?" Micky asked again. He held out his hand, eyes wide as he tried to force his eyes to see again. Colors — Scarlets and golds. Mahogany. Blue. Something, anything!

One of the others pressed his sunglasses into his hand, and he quickly put them on.

"God, it hurt," Micky continued, voice barely above a whisper. "I was tryin' to say… I don't know. I was tryin' to tell you guys something, but I was falling. Couldn't understand why, either, 'cuz as far as I could feel, my legs were working just fine. Then… I don't know what happened after that. That's all I remember. There was pain and colors and then nothing."

"We're not there, Mick," Peter said softly.

He could hear people all around him, so he tried to focus on the words. Had they seen him panic? Did they see his eyes? "I know. I know, but I can picture it. That's all I can see."

"I told you what it looked like," Davy said. "Old walls, old stage, the balcony. C'mon, Micky, it's all right."

"You wanna sit out here? Just listen?" Michael asked. "Maybe when you hear the music, you'll feel a little better. An' I'll go get you some water or somethin'. Hang on."

Michael let go of his shoulders, but at this point, Micky was too tired to feel the vertigo of being on his own. He slumped a little, only to be caught by someone else and held close. He was similar in height, and had a very distinctive scent. Micky never really bothered to notice the scent of his bandmates before, but now he felt as if he could almost tell them apart by their unique smell. It wasn't bad. Just a little weird.

"Pete, it's okay. I'm all right now," Micky said.

"Well," Davy said, placing a hand on the drummer's shoulder. "you went runnin' off like someone was about to murder you. And what's more, you did it without your eyes. We thought you were gonna hurt yourself."

"Or someone else," Peter said, his voice muffled in Micky's shirt.

"Or someone else," Davy agreed. "So let us be worried for a little while, all right? Maybe takin' you out was a bad idea."

"Nah, it was a good idea," Mike said. A moment later, Micky felt a cold glass pressed into his hand. Raising it up, he sniffed it, only for little leaping bubbles to tickle his nose. Turning his head to the side, he sneezed.

"That's Coca-Cola."

"Figured you could use the caffeine boost," Mike said. "You look tired."

"So how was this a good idea?" Davy demanded, his voice touched with irritation. "We sit down to hear a concert, and Micky has some weird… flashback. How is that at all good?"

"'cuz it means maybe it won't happen tomorrow," Mike said. "And we need you singin, Micky. You know that, right? We need you."

He knew what it meant, all right. It meant that, this late in the game, it was too late to back out, because they'd never be able to put together another set list in less than twenty-four hours and have their two songs ready for the stage. Well, they technically could, but with the intricacies of setup and takedown added, they'd be crunched for time.

His mind started to piece together the proper scene, though. He could almost see the proscenium stage at the fore of the auditorium - even though he couldn't be entirely sure that it was that type of stage at all. It seemed like it should be, in any case. Instead of a green field, Micky could picture a bowl full of seats, and the sail-like tapestries Davy described earlier. Perhaps the worst was passed. Still, the thought of re-entering the theater at this point made him shiver.

"I'll be okay for tomorrow," Micky said, even though his mouth felt dry.

"Look, there's some seats out here," Mike said. "Just some regular old benches near the walls. And we'll be able to hear the other bands play. Is that okay?"

After a brief hesitation, Micky nodded.

—-

Halfway home, Mike turned, briefly meeting Peter's eyes. "How's he doin'?"

"All right. He's asleep," Peter said.

"Poor guy," Davy responded. "Thought he was ready to pass out right from the start of the show. Can't be easy having that memory creep up on you."

Mike grunted his agreement.

He had to hand it to Micky, though, despite the terror he'd felt, he still managed to stick it out, even offering some commentary on the other bands who played. Mike felt that the drummer was currently uniquely suited to comment on sound quality, since he really sensed the world through sound at the moment, and trusted Micky's assessment of each group. In the end, there were a few good ones and a few bad ones.

"Kinda felt sorry for the Jolly Green Giants," Davy said. "Didn't even get to play their full set, poor lot. I'm glad you had us practicing setup so much."

"I dunno, I felt worse for — what was it? Grim… Balloon?"

"I'm sure it wasn't Balloon. Grim something, though," Mike said. "I know what you mean. Can't believe anyone's actually paid them to perform before."

"No, I think Peter's right. I think it was Grim Balloon," Davy mused. "How easy would it be to fake a reference?"

Mike shrugged. Some of the groups who played couldn't have had a steady gig in their lives. "They were pretty bad."

"I thought they gave it their all," Peter muttered. "You wouldn't want people sayin' these things about us."

"But this is a competition, Peter," Davy said, turning around and looking into the back seat. "The good bands win. The bad ones go home!"

"Then, yeah. I guess they were pretty bad."

Mike certainly hoped the Monkees wouldn't sound horrible when they took their turn. He had his concerns, especially with Micky's meltdown before the show even started. They couldn't force him to sing if he felt he couldn't do it, though, which left them in a bit of a bind. Tonight, Mike wouldn't be sleeping. Tonight, he'd be working on a back-up plan, just in case.

"What about Alphabet Stew?" Peter asked.

"Not bad," Mike said. "Micky really seemed to like their drummer. Said he kept a good tempo. Interesting tempo. They played the Beatles, though. Everyone was doin' the Beatles."

"'cuz people like the Beatles. Maybe we should have," Davy said. "Too late now, though, isn't it? We'd be starting from square one. And I think Micky's down for the count for the rest of the night, so he's not about to learn something new. I mean, we all know all the Beatles songs, so maybe we could…"

"Nah, too late for that," Mike said. "Davy, if Micky can't do it…"

"He'll do it!" Peter said. "Don't talk like that!"

"If he can't," Mike stressed, "Davy, you're gonna have to sing the cover. It's a pretty easy song. Can you do it? You're closest to Micky's range."

"And the drums? I dunno, Mike…"

They pulled into their driveway, and Mike looked back at Micky again. Even in his sleep, he looked so worried. So out of his element. Maybe a long sleep would do him good, and he'd be fine in the morning. Still, there was nothing wrong with preparing for the worst.

Sighing, he put the car in park and rubbed his temples. "Guys, we're doin' this for Micky. We have to make it work. There's no other option."