Chapter 264 - 264: 264 | Amway Center, Orlando

<🎧 Song Recommendation: Die With You by Avaqe>

...

Von stepped down from the coach into the cool, climate-controlled subterranean dock of the Amway Center.

The underground cavern was massive. It was wide enough to maneuver four semi-trucks side by side, crisscrossed overhead with industrial conduits and fire suppression lines.

Six Vanguard tractors were already backed against docks one through six as local stagehands in bright yellow vests began rolling heavy black flight trunks down the incline.

The bus door hissed open again.

Out tumbled Max.

He was wearing misbuttoned flannel pajama pants, hotel slides over mismatched socks, and a tiny smartphone gimbal strapped across his chest.

His hair was plastered flat against his head on the left and sticking straight up on the right like he'd slept inside a wind tunnel.

He stopped on the bottom metal step, blinked painfully against the dock lights, and looked around with deep suspicion.

"Where's the castle?" Max rasped in a sleepy voice. "Where are the mouse ears? David, why does Orlando smell like diesel exhaust and forklift grease?"

Conor stepped down behind him. "Because we're in an NBA arena basement, wake up from your dreams."

Alex followed them out with his guitar gig bag, looking like he'd been awake all this while.

Down on the concrete, Loki trotted out from the lower luggage hatch, completely unfazed by the rumble of passing forklifts.

She took three slow, dignified strides and hopped onto the lid of a padded cable trunk.

David chuckled, pointing with his coffee cup down a brightly lit hallway painted in blue and silver.

"Visiting team locker rooms are down the north tunnel," David called out. "Forty oak stalls, private showers, training tables, and catering has hot bacon and eggs in the player lounge. Drop your bags and stay clear of the main dock before the riggers start slinging motor chains."

"Hot bacon?" Max's posture straightened instantly. "Say no more."

The band trailed down the wide corridor, their sneakers squeaking against the polished floor.

The Amway Center's visiting locker room was cavernous. Deep navy carpet stretched across the floor, surrounded by double-wide player stalls built for NBA forwards, complete with padded leather seats and lockable overhead storage.

In the adjoining athletic training suite, two hydrotherapy tubs were built directly into tiled steps, sitting beside a row of padded massage tables.

Max had already tossed his duffle into the largest corner stall and was peering over the edge of the first stainless-steel tub. Water was gently swirling inside.

"Oh, you've got to be kidding me," Max gasped, turning around with a glowing grin. "David booked us a private spa. The tour life is luxury, boys. We are thriving."

"Max, don't—" Conor started, noticing the frosty mist hanging over the surface.

Max didn't listen. He whipped out his phone, angled the front camera at his face, and began rolling his pajama bottoms up past his knees.

"Exclusive tour content," Max announced grandly to the lens. "Day four on the road: your boy Max taking a relaxing dip in the post-show whirlpool—"

He plunged both bare feet straight into the water up to his calves.

Max's spine locked into a steel rod.

His jaw dropped, his eyes bulged out of his skull, and every trace of color drained from his face in less than a second. For three agonizing beats, absolutely no sound escaped his throat.

"Forty-four degrees," Alex read off the digital wall display, completely deadpan, as he hung his jacket on a locker hook. "Ice plunge for quad inflammation."

"MY BONES!" Max shrieked, violently ripping his legs back out.

He slipped on the wet tile, his arms windmilling through the air before he landed flat on his backside with a hollow smack.

"MY TOES ARE FROZEN OFF! MY CIRCULATION IS GONE! CONOR, I'M AN AMPUTEE! CALL AN AMBULANCE!"

Conor doubled over onto a massage table, laughing so violently he couldn't breath properly. Von leaned against the locker room doorframe, shaking his head with a quiet chuckle.

"Put some dry socks on, Max," Von said. "Before you try suing your own tour."

"I am wounded in the line of duty!" Max wheezed from the floor, clutching his ankles like they were made of glass.

Leaving the band to sort themselves out, Von walked back out into the main corridor.

Emily was heading down the hall toward the production office, a leather binder tucked under one arm, her phone pressed to her ear.

Her oversized sleep hoodie was gone, replaced by a clean white blouse and trousers and her hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail.

As Von fell into step beside her, she wrapped up her call and lowered the phone.

"Zack?" Von asked quietly.

"Zack," Emily confirmed, exhaling a long breath. "Florida Highway Patrol's district office in Orlando took the citation file. The two inspectors were pulled off turnpike patrol and put on administrative leave pending internal review."

"Did they say anything about who paid them?" Von asked.

"Just two crooked highway cops trying to shake down an out-of-state tour convoy for cash," Emily said smoothly while meeting his eyes. "Not worth wasting our focus on. We've got eighteen thousand seats to fill on Wednesday."

Von let it go. "Good enough for me."

They reached the mouth of the tunnel leading out to the main arena floor, where Tobias Grant was waiting with his arms crossed over a dark tracksuit.

"Look at this room," Tobias said, nodding toward the opening.

They stepped out onto the concrete floor of the Amway Center.

Eighteen thousand blue and silver seats rose in towering, steep tiers toward the dark ceiling. High above the floor, the massive multi-panel scoreboard hung silent and dark.

On the floor below, local stagehands were rolling steel risers into place, while Crew B riggers walked the high catwalks, securing motor chains with steel carabiners.

Tobias looked out over the vast bowl, then glanced sideways at Von.

"David asked me about the overhead motor rig," Tobias said. "The riggers want to know if we're hanging the aerial cable tracks for the flying stunt again."

"No," Von said immediately. "No flying today."

Tobias arched a brow. "The internet has spent the last forty-eight hours losing its mind over you soaring forty feet across Biscayne Bay. Fans are going to walk through those doors expecting you to fly."

"Which is why doing I won't be doing it twice," Von said calmly. "Miami was about explosive energy, white light, and falling from the ceiling I'm not scrapping the flying entirely, but we won't be doing it here."

"So what's the shape of Orlando?" Tobias asked, clearly intrigued.

"An illusion," Von replied, looking across the vast empty floor. "A dream. I want low-lying dry ice covering the entire deck until the stage looks like it's floating. We use scrims, projection gauze, and lasers cutting through smoke. When the crowd looks at the stage, I want them questioning whether what they're seeing is real."

Tobias's eyes glowed. A slow, approving smile spread across the veteran movement coach's face.

"Atmosphere over sheer velocity," Tobias murmured. "Soft edges. Disappearances behind translucent screens. Shifting silhouettes instead of brute force."

"Exactly," Von said. "If Miami was an explosion, Orlando is a magic trick."

"I like it," Tobias nodded firmly. "It saves your hip from another thirty-foot drop, and it gives the choreography a completely different texture. I'll meet with Kiana and the lighting director before lunch."

Tobias headed toward the soundboard to find the lighting crew.

Von turned back down the tunnel, looking for a quiet space to clear his head. Passing the visiting broadcast booths near the referee quarters, he found a small, sound-treated auxiliary room tucked away from the foot traffic.

Resting on a stand against the carpeted wall was a matte-black four-string electric bass guitar, freshly unpacked from one of the band's secondary road cases.

Von stepped inside and pulled the door shut.

The noise of forklifts and road cases vanished immediately.

He walked over, lifted the bass from the stand, and slipped the strap over his shoulder.

He plugged a patch cable into a small bench amplifier on the table and flicked the power switch on.

He closed his eyes.

The memory of the past few days drifted through his mind.

He remembered the silence in that hospital room right after the final chord faded. The pure beautiful silence before anyone dared to speak.

That was what he had realized on the ride back to the airport.