Metal Band One-Shots

The Ten-Year Marker (Epica)

 When Epica's tenth anniversary was coming up, Mark Jansen hadn't planned on doing anything too big or extravagant.

 "I feel like we should do something special, though," Simone said to him. "Maybe a special concert, to mark the date."

 Mark had thought of that idea as well. He did like the idea of a special tenth-anniversary concert, so they talked about it with the rest of the band, and everyone agreed it would fun.

 But that was the easy part. The difficult part was actually putting such an event together. There was first the issue of where the concert was going to be. When tickets became available for purchase, Mark was actually startled at how quickly they sold out. The fans clearly had high hopes for the event, which didn't ease any of the strain. 

 At first, the concert actually sounded like it would be a little more extravagant than what he'd originally had in mind, with a whole choir and orchestra. But he never protested. There were a lot of times when he would just go somewhere and write down new materials for any future albums.

 And then the night of the concert actually came.

 The band went to the venue that day to prepare for the show, and Mark realized that none of this was silly at all. He enjoyed going through all of the soundchecks and rehearsals, just to hear how the music sounded.

 He was excited for this.

 That night, Mark tuned up his guitar and made sure he was ready for the show. He could the people being let into the venue, and the excited chatter of the fans.

 "It's pretty great, isn't it?" Simone said with a smile. "You know, you didn't seem too happy about all of this until today."

 "In my head, the idea sounded kind of silly," Mark admitted. "But now I've seen it with my own two eyes, so my opinion has changed. I'm happy we decided to do something special."

 "Does that mean we can have one of these for our twentieth anniversary?"

 Mark shrugged. "Why not? If tonight goes well, we can probably pull another off in ten years."

 It was time for the show to start, so Mark grabbed his guitar and went out on stage, smiling.

 And everything went perfect.