Rockstar Rebellion

By Ben Maxfield

The city of Kurkelly is near bankruptcy. Visisystems, a powerful tech corporation, cunningly takes advantage of the city's weak position to impose their will on the populace under the guise of assistance and cooperation.

 

Kurkelly's homeless are mysteriously disappearing while Visisystems tightens its ruthless grip on the city.

 

Mike Fletcher, young guitarist in the band Nova Pulse, discovers his new amplifier has deadly powers. When his bandmates get brutalised by Visisystems' intimidating security force, Mike fights back using his new musical powers, enlisting in Street Shield, a resistance group labelled a terrorist organisation by the mainstream media, to end Visisystems' tyranny over the city.

 

Visisystems is all powerful but Mike and the band have a secret the world has never seen.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ben Maxfield
• Release date: Jul 6, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393834182

Ben Maxfield

Visit Ben Maxfield's website at: benmaxfield.com

Book preview

CHAPTER 1 

Mike propped his head up on his fist, elbow resting on the glass service and display counter in Flash Appliances, the electronics store he worked at, eyes half closed wondering why he was even there. His band had a gig at the Blue Stretch club tonight, Friday night, and he needed to get ready. The manager there had told him that an A&R scout from Condor Records would be there to watch the performers.

The discomfort of his knuckles digging into his cheek bone was still a welcome relief from the boredom he had experienced all day. Hell, all year. The novelty of working retail at an electronics store, his first real job after graduating high school, had only lasted a couple of weeks, then it was just something he endured to pay the rent in his one bedroom flat.

He knew inches from his eyes was the watch on his wrist, a metal banded Casio digital watch he had found on sale online. Its face was adult-sized but not man-sized. He was fine with it as he disliked bulky watches. He resisted the urge to glance at the grey LCD numbers ticking over second to second, resisted the urge to check how many minutes it was until closing time. There was a clock behind him up on the wall too but turning around to look at that seemed an impossible task in his apathetic state.

He had lounged over the display cabinet for so long that the sheet of glass under him, cold at first touch, had warmed from contact with his arm resting on it so that it was now a cosy body temperature.

It looked cold outside the front window, windy, with drizzle whipping by in chaotic clumps, splatting against the broad panes with each gust. It got dark early now in the city of Kurkelly, the cold days would be here consistently, the failing evening light now a daily reminder teasing him that he was almost free from his dull ordeal for another day. But not quite yet.

His salary stank, almost as much as the stench from the foam packaging surrounding the cheap no-name brand TVs his manager made him unpack in the back before Mike rolled them out on a dolly to set up for display among the rows of other TVs for sale, all too bright and all screaming buy me. Mike wanted to put his foot through them all and fantasised about the splinters and glass and sparks that would fly out of each as his manager screamed helplessly behind him.

On his wage, living paycheque to paycheque, he wouldn’t be able to pay for damaging the stinking cheapo sets let alone the giant, ultra high resolution Samsung and Sony titans that elbowed the paltry generic brands to the side. Brighter still, louder still when a customer would crank up the sound with the remote Mike provided, to test out the speakers. It was nails on a chalk board for Mike while he smiled and pretended to be impressed by the customer’s ostentatious display of discerning consumer savvy, joining in awe at the prowess of the trinket the customer was fixated on.

The rows of TVs at the moment were all displaying the same broadcast channel running a news report on the truck drivers’ anti-autonomous-vehicle protest in the Kurkelly’s business district. The Blue Stretch club was adjacent to the central business district in the city. Mike hoped their gig tonight wouldn’t be affected by it.

Despite his boredom with the work at the store, Mike was a natural salesman. High end stereos were his speciality since music was his real passion. If he saw someone wander over to the audio section and linger for even a few seconds at the expensive amplifiers and speakers, he knew the sale was his.

Even his coworkers deferred to him if they saw someone go for a stereo before he did. Mike would close the deal and split the commission with whatever workmate had spotted the opportunity first.

The only one who didn’t acknowledge Mike’s talent was weasel Neil, manager of the store and deluded king of his little fiefdom spanning the rows of laptops at the front door, kitchen appliances in the middle and audio visual gear at the back of the store. Shorter than Mike and well into middle age, Mike couldn’t help but think that Neil took Mike’s youth as an implied attack on his waning manhood and would saddle Mike with all the worst duties in the store as a feeble attempt to repair his ego. Mike did the tasks dutifully, his hands working on autopilot while his mind thought about the musical projects he worked on in his spare time. This job just provided the means for Mike to pursue his musical ambitions and if he had to eat shit from a loser like Neil to get there, so be it.

The heavy double doors leading to the storage room in the back thudded closed, sending a hollow boom through the store. It was drafty back there and with the cold days piling up, now also cold. Heating in the store was mediocre on the best day and it irritated Mike when employees would chock the door open for too long while ferrying items to and from the storage area, chilling the store noticeably. Mike would have to start dressing warmer for work. The polo shirt he wore with the company logo embroidered on the breast pocket just wasn’t cutting it any more.

The boom sounded emptier than usual. Cherry, who was working the shift at the store with Mike, had left early, leaving just Mike with Neil. Neil never let Mike leave early without a good reason, but when Cherry asked half an hour before closing today, Neil said yes, almost before she had finished the sentence. Neil had a crush on Cherry for sure, even though Cherry was Mike’s age.

She had left high school, a different one to Mike’s in town, the year before graduating and had started working at Flash Appliances. She had a year more experience working at the store but Mike didn’t think that was anything to be proud of, although he never said anything to her. If he was still working at Flash Appliances a year from now he would consider it a failure. He was destined for greater things.

Mike stood and turned to the sound. Neil had emerged from the storage area into the fluorescent lighting illuminating the main store floor carrying an opened carton. Of course it was a tiny box. Anything larger or heavier than a toaster and he would have commanded Mike to deal with it.

Neil was bald, let the hair grow on the sides of his head with his shiny exposed scalp on top like a child’s glowing domed nightlight. If Mike’s thick brown hair ever started thinning, he’d shave it all off in a second. Why would anyone in this day and age put up with friar hair was beyond Mike. Even old guys like Neil could manage to make a little effort. Maybe if he did, he’d have a girlfriend or be married by now instead of still being single deep into his forties.

Mike was single but he liked it that way. At least for now, he didn’t need any distractions while he got his music career off the ground and became a professional musician, so he could dump this job and really get his life started.

Neil placed the carton on the front counter next to Mike and began restocking the rack of alkaline batteries sitting on the counter, from the box.

Don’t slouch over the counter, Neil said without looking up from the rack of Duracells.

There’s no one here and hasn’t been anyone in the store for half an hour. Mike folded his arms took a step back to watch Neil finish racking the battery blister packs.

Neil dropped the empty box behind the counter and kicked it into the corner. It wouldn’t be the first time he had done that and then criticized Mike for leaving trash in a high-traffic area after forgetting he was the culprit.

Nonetheless, Neil said, a customer could walk in at any moment or even just look into the store while walking past. It’s a bad, unprofessional look to have sales assistants half comatose by the register.

Mike rolled his eyes at the exaggeration but didn’t argue the point further. Now he looked at his watch, a few minutes to go. He smiled even though he was annoyed by Neil’s pedantic whining. Almost done.

Could you take this out to the dumpster? Neil toed the empty box with his black shoes that looked too comfortable to be stylish. Like something an old lady would wear because of her sensitive bunions.

Mike snatched it up by one of the open flaps and sauntered to the back room. As he opened the double doors he braced for the gust of cold air that enveloped him. The hairs on his forearms stood up as he shivered.

It was still raining outside and he didn’t have a jacket. He looked around the storage area. Neil wouldn’t notice a small empty box among the pallets of unpacked goods and stacked cartons. Mike found a nice hidey hole between the wall and a pallet of slow cookers and stuffed the empty box in there. He could throw it out Monday when it wasn’t raining.

The sliced packing tape lining the opened flap of the box had left a sticky residue on his index finger. He repeatedly pressed his finger and thumb together then released them, absent-mindedly testing the tackiness of the digit as he returned to the store floor.

Neil was still behind the service counter.

Mike’s mobile phone rang. He thought it might be his parents calling to organise the particulars of lunch tomorrow at their house, tomorrow being his twentieth birthday.

He took it out of his pocket and checked the screen to find it was Scott calling, the drummer in Nova Pulse, their band.

He stopped well short of the counter, turned and walked to the audio visual section at the end of the store to take the call.

My brother can’t help me with my drums, he said. Can you give me a ride?

You bet, Mike said. His watch told him everything he wanted to know. I’m leaving work now. Be ready.

CHAPTER 2 

Scott looked over his drum kit, packed up and ready to transport to the Blue Stretch club in the corner of his parent’s spare bedroom, which he used as a practice room. He had soundproofed the room the best he could with his limited budget of next to nothing and his limited building skills but he was satisfied with the sound-proofing foam he had glued to the walls and door. Most of the foam was still up. Only a single panel of the corrugated stuff was peeling away from the plasterboard and that was on the exterior wall, so he was fine to let it just droop there. Next to the drooping foam was a single window, closed and covered by heavy curtains, also to soak up the sound.

His parents appreciated his soundproofing efforts too. They had pressured him to move out before but once he started practicing the drums in earnest they really were eager for him to move out.

With the door and window closed, curtain drawn and a towel under the door in a final attempt to reduce the escaping sound, he entered his own world. Just him, the drum set and the music. Lost in that world, the room would get like a sauna with his manic drumming, hot and humid the space took on an animalistic intensity that sustained him for hours.

He was unemployed, spent most of his meagre unemployment benefit payments on board to keep his parents at least somewhat off his back. What remained he put towards upgrading his drum kit and the project was almost complete. Most of the beginner kit he started with was replaced now with nice quality gear. The only components left to upgrade were most of the cymbals which were starting to look ratty, scratched and a little dented from one mishap or another mostly revolving around mishandling them or being too aggressive playing on them. They were low quality cymbals after all, okay for a beginner but not for someone going hard during a practice session or during a performance.

He redeployed the drum stool and took up his sticks from their place alongside the snare drum on the floor. There he sat and turned a quarter turn on the seat, sticks in hand, poised in the air. He started a beat in the air with the sticks, thumping the filthy carpet with his feet in time with the kick drum and high hat in his mind, imagining where the drum set used to be, setup minutes before, to pass the time while he waited for Mike to arrive. Even though he struck air, in his mind’s eye he hit each drum perfectly, felt the sticks rebound off the taught skins, felt the tension of the pedals under his toes.

He went over the set list they were going to play in a few hours time with his eyes closed, play hopefully in front of a packed house. Friday night drew in a good crowd at the Blue Stretch. Sometimes a celebrity would poke their head in. Stay for a while. It was rumoured even the odd record executive would watch a show unannounced.

It would take a while for Mike to get to his parent’s house out in the suburbs from where he worked in the city. Then they would have to travel back in to the city to where the Blue Stretch club was located with his gear along with Mike’s guitar and amplifier loaded into Mike’s van.

Scott didn’t have a car, couldn’t afford to run one if he did, but was able to borrow his parent’s Camry on occasion if he asked nicely and didn’t monopolise the vehicle for too long. Dad was a manager at a paper towel factory. He didn’t like not having his car available when he wanted it, despite him having no hobbies outside of watching football on TV and complaining about