FAUST 1997 -- "Debutante Debut" 9808.27 by Nytshaed. ©1998 Chaotic Works Inc. No part of the manuscript may be published, posted or reposted without explicit written permission by the Author. This story is of an Adult nature and is intended for persons over the age of 18.

Rik paced nervously around the dressing room, fingering chords on the frets of his bass as he glanced up at the clock on the wall for the umpteenth time. Reckoning day was at hand and there would be no turning back now. He quickly turned when he heard the dressing room door open, then close. He smiled when he saw Nyt enter, carrying two bottles of chilled Calistoga water. She set them down on the table, then languidly wrapped her arms around his neck for a long slow kiss. Breaking the kiss rather quickly, Rik reached over and popped open a bottle of the water and took a long drink. After swishing it around in his mouth for several seconds, he spat it out in a nearby garbage can. He took another long drink, swallowing this one and turned back to Nyt.

"How can you kiss me with barf breath?" He winced.

Nyt shrugged and sat down on the couch, watching him with a loving look. Rik would have liked to join her in a more relaxed posture, but opening night nerves made relaxing impossible as well as being able to keep anything in his stomach. Nerves had gotten the best of him only moments before, and he had blown chunks in the nearby bathroom. The water was to help clear that none too pleasing taste out of his mouth.

"I've kissed worst..." She offered after a pause.

"Thanks for the visual." He muttered and continued his pacing and practice playing.

Nyt reluctantly admired how well he looked dressed in the ornate stage costume that FAUST wore. It was not to different than the ones worn by him and the other members of SIN, many years ago. It suited him well, perhaps a little too well. It had taken quite a bit of coaxing of both her and Rik to get him to fill in the vacant bassist position after the sudden death of the former bassist Harris. She still didn't feel totally comfortable with it, but who was she to hold Rik back from realizing his dream, even if it had potentially fatal consequences?

Both looked at the door when it was opened after a quick spirited knock. AJ stuck his head in and smiled.

"Show time brother. Time to join the MEN." He grinned, referring to himself and the rest of the band in their traditional seclusion just before going on stage. "Ready to go?"

"Yeah." Rik answered as he picked up the bottle of water, and finished it before returning to Nyt. She smiled at him warmly.

"You are gonna kick ass. I will see you later on." She said as he pulled her close for a final kiss. Rik gave her a warm smile, then turned to follow AJ out of the room. After he had gone, she paused, saying a silent prayer for him then left the room to watch the show from the mixing board.

Inside the Band's main dressing room, Rik and the rest of the band each went through their pre-show routines. Rik silently continued to walk around warming up his bass, and occasionally leaning into long leg stretches to limber up his legs as well as his fingers. Suddenly, AJ was there in front of him, drinking from a bottle of Jack Daniel's.

"You ready man?" He grinned.

"Man I hope so." He said, the pre-show butterflies feeling like bats in his churning stomach.

AJ set the bottle down on a table nearby and quickly grabbed hold of Rik's hair on either side of his face and pulled Rik's face close to his until their foreheads touched. His lavender eyes bore into Rik's deep blue ones, and then deeper into his very soul.

"You can do this! That is why I chose you! You have the potential, the drive, the talent and the hunger inside! You just needed someone to kick you in the ass to make your realize this!" AJ smirked wickedly and lowered his voice so that only Rik could hear him. "I've already had to kick your ass once to make you see what you really are. Do I need to do it again?"

"No!" Rik replied emphatically, trying futilely to pull back from his grasp.

"Well then." AJ smiled, letting go of him and taking a step backwards. "Let's play..." He said turning and leading the band to the stage, and the roaring crowd of 50,000 awaiting them.

Standing on stage, Rik took long deep breaths as the lights went down and the taped intro began to play. The roar of the crowd was semi deafening, and quickly he reached to his chest to lift the necklace Nyt had given him the week before to his lips for a good luck kiss. Just as he dropped it, the scrim dropped as well, the lights exploded into a white hot wave of light that would rival the surface of the sun. His mind snapped into Performance Mode and strutting proudly he approached his mic and began the opening number "Bastard Son".

Nyt watched from the sound board. She didn't realize how hard she had been chewing her nails until midway through the second number "Crimson", Phil the sound engineer, reached over and pulled her fingers out of her mouth.

"If you keep that up you won't have room for dinner." He smirked, his London accept dripping with it's usual sarcasm.

Nyt gave him a glare and turned back to watching Rik, he was blending in perfectly with the band. Tall, long dark hair and very charismatic, he was a definite improvement over Harris, and onstage he was almost as agile as AJ. This was partly due to the extensive work AJ had done with him all week. He had spent hours working out, toning up, and learning the stage choreography. She raised her eyebrows when during one of the middle bridge parts of "Faust" midway through the set, AJ leaned against him while he sang.

Nyt looked over at Phil, her mouth dropping open. Phil mirrored her look of surprise.

"Your boy is good. AJ never does that."

"Tell me." She said as she watched AJ cavort around his new toy.

The show rumbled on without so much as a hiccup, and halfway through the set. Nyt noticed that Rik was all of a sudden getting a white follow spotlight. No one but AJ got white spotlight on stage, all the rest of the band members were always lit in red or other non white colors. This had to be AJ's doing. No one would have risked life and limb to do this on their own.

"This is just too fucking weird." She muttered as she watched the show progress, and progress it did, very well in fact. Rik never missed a cue, move, or even a note. She could see the desire to be perfect take over him as soon as the show had started. She new musicians had a Game Face, but his transformation to his stage persona was more of a complete metamorphosis. She had only see him perform a couple of times in the early 80's and now seeing him up onstage again, in front of the crowd she felt he deserved, it was a wonder to behold.

When the lights went down after the last song. Nyt jumped down off of the mixer platform, and started to make her way to the backstage area while the encores were on. She reached the side of the stage opposite Rik, just as the first encore song ended. Rik was dabbing at his face with a towel when he spotted her, and gave her a wink. Tossing the towel into the crowd, he returned to his position and waited while AJ did his rap. Tonight, since there was obviously an new member in the band, he finally got around to acknowledging that fact when he introduced the rest of the band.

"And... you all night have noticed my new friend over here.." He said striding over to Rik after tossing the mic stand aside. He tossed the mic into his left hand and held out his right as he walked over to Rik. Nyt held her breath. Choreography was now not being followed, and AJ doing improv could be a lethal thing. Rik turned to take the offered hand and shook it as AJ clasped his hand in his.

"How ya doing man?" He asked Rik. "You like all this shit?" He asked indicating the crowd with a sweep of his hand.

Rik nodded, and looked around at the expansive crowd.

"It'll do." He replied in his deep voice into the mic.

"Glad to hear it." He said as he turned to face the crowd, draping his arm around Rik's shoulder as he continued. "See, this here is my little bro, Rik Fucking Fox, the major rumbler muthafucker on the bass now. It seems we had a little trouble with our old bassist, and well..." He smirked as he drew his right hand holding the mic across his throat in a slow slashing motion. "We had to give him the axe...." He growled wickedly.

The crowd cheered wildly, anything AJ said was Gospel to be believed, and reveled in.

"You see I only want the best, and I get the best. So now... I have Rik." He said patting Rik's shoulder.

Nyt winced inwardly at the double meaning behind that. Judging from the pleased smile on Rik's face, it either had gone over his head or he was just letting it go.

AJ took in a deep breath and started walking back towards his spot at center stage.
"So let me hear you welcome him now LAS VEGAS!!!" He yelled. The crowd replied in kind, and Rik took a humble bow as AJ replaced his mic in the stand, then looked back over at Rik.

"You feel like doing an oldie tonight Bro?"

Rik cocked his head slightly and smiled.
"Anything you want... Name your tune."

Nyt was still holding her breath out of dread and fear. They were WAY off the script now, FAUST never improvised ANYTHING onstage, and Rik had only been taught the set list and the movements for those songs. She began to feel faint, and clutched hold of Jackie's arm as she appeared beside her.

"What the fuck are they doing?!"

Jackie slipped a toothpick into the corner of his mouth then slid his hands into his suit pants pockets.
"Looks like playing to me."

"Dammit you know what I mean!! He's trying to fuck him!! He's finally trying to fuck him up!! He hasn't missed a mark all night and now he wants to fuckin' improvise the encore??" She ranted.

"Relax..." Jackie purred.

"Arrrghh!" She cried, punching him in the arm.

"Ow." He replied watching the show, his eyes never leaving AJ. "I'll get you for that later."

Nyt folded her arms across her chest and took a deep breath, there was nothing to do but watch and wait.

"OK an oldie it is..." He grinned. "See if ya can keep up..." He said turning back to face the crowd. Nyt sucked in her breath and held it, closing her eyes to say a silent prayer. Rik watched AJ for cues, his hands poised at the ready along with the rest of the now on guard band. The lights lowered, and AJ lowered his head slightly, letting his hair fall down around his face as he moved his mouth nearer to the microphone.

"This is called 'Live and Let Die'..." He said quietly, then without missing a beat, Rik strummed the soft opening bass line of the ancient Paul McCartney song. The lead guitarist joined in as well, perfectly, and AJ began to sing.

"When you were young and your heart was an open book... You used to say live and let live..."

Nyt smiled and let out her long held breath as Rik and the rest of he band joined in on the back-up vocals. Success was at hand, no tragedies onstage tonight. Happily she watched FAUST rip through the old song, making it completely theirs. Once the song was completed the band escaped backstage to the dressing rooms leaving the crowd of course wanting more.

Nyt waited with Jackie outside of the dressing room while the band cooled off. Although from the sounds of the wild rumpus going on behind the closed door, the activities sounded more rowdy then restful. She wanted more than anything to rush in ther and embrace him to touch him and make sure herself he was all right. She tried to still her irrational impulses, and leaned against the wall to wait.

Inside the dressing room, a celebration was getting underway, and bottles of champagne were being opened and alternately drank from, sprayed all over the room or poured over the head of the newest FAUSTIAN. Rik drank eagerly from a bottle held up to his lips by AJ, then shook his long mane out as Tom the drummer poured another bottle over his head.

"Fucking amazing man!! You fucking rocked!!" He yelled slapping Rik on the back. Rik turned to high five him, while AJ drank from the bottle of '76 Dom Perignon he had been feeding him and smiled. His eyes twinkled with the perverse lust of success. Things were working out good, very good. He liked when it went that way.

"Here's to you man!!" He yelled holding up the bottle then tossed it to Rik, who caught it easily in one hand and finished it off before lobbing the bottle against the far wall of the dressing room shattering it into a million shards of green glass. AJ smiled and slipped out of the room to go clean up before the after show Meet and Greet.

Nyt flinched and spun towards the door when she heard the sound of the shattering glass coming from inside the dressing room. Jackie gave her a warning look as she reached for the handle on the door.

"Don't."

Nyt glared at him defiantly.

"He was mine before he joined this damned band..." She growled.

"Yeah, but now he is the Talent and, you are still the help. Remember what that means." He said evenly, taking a step towards her. Nyt stood her ground. It was scary how fast he flip flopped from friendly to gun toting menace. And to think, at one time she actually wanted to fuck the living daylights out of this man. She put her hand on the door knob and was preparing to turn it when he moved in and covered her hand with his larger one. He squeezed down, crushing her hand against the steel knob, preventing her from opening it. In the seemingly endless moment both stood there, the tension was broken by the door suddenly being whipped open from the inside. The sudden opening of the door almost unbalanced the both of them and the person exiting collided with Jackie.

"Jackie!! Wassup man?" Rik shouted, still stage deaf from all the amps. He shook Jackie's hand that had been torn off of Nyt's and the doorknob, then turned to her.

His beaming smile made her forget all that had transpired and letting out a growl he lunged for her and swept her up in his arms. He crushed her to him in a massive hug, burying his face in her hair. Nyt wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him back just as tightly.

"You were AMAZING out there tonight!" She said. "You did it!!

Rik nodded empathetically in response then moved to kiss her hungrily, still holding her so close, his stage and champagne soaked costume drenched her. Jackie watched them for a second, then smirked as he silently slunk into the dressing room in search of AJ, closing the door behind him.

Nyt held him tightly to her, wanting to embrace him forever, to touch him and make sure he wa really OK after his trial by fire. Reluctantly she let him b reak the kiss, and he looked down at her.

"I gotta get back in ther and clean up. I need to get ready for the After Show, AJ said there is gonna be press all over the place and he needs to introduce me around."

Nyt nodded, a slight look of concern crossing her face.

"Excellent show Mr Fox. I believe congratulations are in order..." A silky voice said from behind the both of them. Rik and Nyt turned to see Swan standing there. Both looked at the man who while being diminutive in stature was a colossus in the music business. Rik slowly advanced and shook Swan's offered hand.

"Thanks Mr Swan. It was great. Thanks for letting me have a shot at it."

Swan nodded.
"It was AJ that had the confidence in you and your abilities. I mearly trusted his judgement. I see that my trust had not been misplaced."

Rik smiled, that sounded like it had been a compliment.
"Thank you again sir."

Swan again nodded, and looked at his pcoket watch.

"You should get along to cleaning up before the press conference. Follow AJ's lead in that, he will field the majority of the questions."

"Will do." Rik nodded then turned to Nyt. "I gotta go hon. I'll see you at the party." He said giving her a quick kiss. Nyt smiled at him and watched him go back into the dressing room, then turned to find Swan staring intently at her. She smiled nervously. Swan returned the smile and slowly offered her his black coated arm.

"Shall we adjourn to the Party Room?" He smiled quietly.

Nyt laid her arm in his and smiled warmly.
"It would be a pleasure."