CHAPTER 1 – BUILDING THE BAND’S REPUTATION
21:34 (New York Time)
Wednesday, July 10, 1996 ‘C’
‘The 54th’ night club, 606 West 54th Street, near corner of 10th Avenue
Manhattan, New York City
U.S.A.
Roger Neville, owner and manager of the night club ‘The 54th’, applauded warmly, like the ninety or so customers in the lounge of his small night club, when the all-girl band on the stage finished the song they had been playing. Contrary to most of the discos and dance clubs one could find in Manhattan, his club’s clientele was mostly made of more mature people in their late thirties or even fifties who preferred a more varied and less loud music and singing than what was favored by younger crowds. The band of young women he had hired for this night on a trial basis, after they had been warmly recommended to him by a friend who was teaching at the Juilliard School of Music, had certainly satisfied his tastes and those of his patrons. While being barely in their late teens or early twenties, the five girls of the ‘D.C. Five Band’ were all very talented musicians and the lead girl was also a fantastic singer and dancer who was well supported by the other four band members, who possessed an unusual range of instruments skills. One thing that had pleased both Neville and the club’s patrons, apart from the high quality of instrument playing and singing, was the wide inventory of the band’s songs and music. Tonight, they had played in succession Pop, Rock, Folk and even Country songs, plus had played pieces that could nearly be called classical music. The band had also proved to be able to sing in multiple languages, something very rare in modern bands. One old Celtic ballad sung in Gaelic had fired up many of the club’s customers who happened to be of Irish descent, while a medieval song in German with surprising energy and beautiful lyrics had attracted stand-up applauses. The lead singer of the band, a hauntingly beautiful teenage blonde, then announced a ten-minute pause in order to change both costumes and instruments. With the curtains of the small stage closing and hiding the band, the club owner used that pause in the show to slowly go around the tables and ask his customers about how they had liked the band so far. One couple with gray hair was particularly effusive in their comments, with the woman of the couple showing enthusiasm in her praise of the band.
‘’My God, Roger, where did you find this band? These girls are fantastic! And that young lead singer: she sang beautifully in no less than four languages! How often do you see that in a teenage band?’’
‘’I must agree with you that these girls are extremely talented, Madam McLean. As for where I found them, they are students at the Juilliard School of Music and they were recommended to me by one of their professors of music, who told me that he had not seen such talent in a long while. So, would you like to have them here for more shows?’’
‘’Hell yes!’’ answered the husband, an affluent lawyer of Irish descent. ‘’Their ballad in Gaelic nearly threw me back to Ireland for a few minutes. And, as my wife already said, their lead singer is pure gold, with the best voice I have heard in decades.’’
Sean McLean nearly added that the young singer was also a feast for the eyes but kept his tongue in check just in time, as his wife may not have appreciated that last remark.
‘’I am truly glad that you liked them, Mister McLean. I believe that they are due to do two more songs tonight.’’
‘’Could they go for a third one as an extra, Roger?’’ asked the wife. ‘’I would really love that.’’
Neville smiled and bowed to his female patron.
‘’I will certainly pass your request to the band, madam.’’
After talking with the McLean, Roger Neville cut a path to the stage and slipped through one end of the stage’s curtains, intent on talking with the girls of the band. He however quickly turned away on seeing that one of the five girls was in an advanced stage of undress, apparently in the process of changing her outfit.
‘’Oh, excuse me, ladies! I was coming to pass to you a request from a couple of my patrons.’’
The blonde lead singer, Nancy Dows, who was wearing a long light blue dress, came to him and walked around him so that he could look at her without having to twist his head. Her smile, allied with her sparkling blue eyes and angelic face, nearly melted Neville.
‘’And what would your patrons like to hear, Mister Neville?’’
‘’Well, I know that you are scheduled to do two more songs tonight, as per our prior understanding, but the customers absolutely loved your show and asked for more songs, if possible.’’
‘’Everything is possible with good will, Mister Neville. We will be happy to play an extra song or two on top of the two next ones. After all, we came here in order to become better known around New York.’’
‘’Thank you, miss. That will be most appreciated. Be assured that you will get an appropriate extra for that. As for becoming known, you certainly will be in a few weeks if you continue playing such quality music. Uh, could you include a song in Gaelic for later tonight? A couple of patrons of Irish descent really loved your Celtic ballad.’’
In response, the blonde lead singer smiled and looked at her four band members.
‘’Hey, girls, will you be ready to play ‘Teir Abhaile Riu’ after playing ‘Knocking On Heaven’s Door’ and ‘My Heart Will Go On’?’’
All four teenagers replied in the affirmative at once, making Roger Neville rub his hands together in satisfaction.
‘’Excellent! Thank you for your comprehension, ladies.’’
‘’We are the ones who need to thank you for your support, Mister Neville.’’ replied Nancy. Neville nodded his head once while smiling and turned away, slipping back through the stage’s curtains and leaving the five teenagers alone, free to complete their costumes change.
A few minutes later, the curtains of the stage were pulled open, revealing the teenage girls in position for a new song. However, the outfit worn by Erika Lang, the drum kit player, along with the instrument she now stood next to, attracted a few surprised exclamations and comments. The young blonde now wore nothing more than a loincloth and a narrow band of cloth rolled around her torso and covering her breasts. She also stood next to a huge drum laid on its side, rather than flat on the ground. While Sean McLean definitely appreciated the skimpy costume of the drummer girl, whose loincloth covered very little of her firm, well-shaped buttocks, Mary McLean instead focused on the huge drum.
‘’My God! What kind of drum is that? It is huge! And why is it tipped on its side?’’
‘’I believe that it is called a ‘Kudo drum’, Mary. I saw once similar drums being used at the opening of a circus act. They produce a very powerful beat. It is an instrument of Japanese origin, which would also explain the skimpy costume of that drummer girl: traditional Japanese Kudo drummers wear nothing but a loincloth when playing at ceremonials.’’
‘’Oh! I see! That girl certainly looks quite muscular…for a girl.’’
‘’She’s got the correct look for the job, dear.’’ replied Sean, repressing a smile.
Nancy Dows, the band’s lead singer then spoke softly in her microphone while standing in front of her band members.
‘’Ladies and gentlemen, we are now going to play a song originally written and recorded in the future and which was then imported through time by Nancy Laplante, the late Canadian time traveler, when she was involuntarily projected back in time to the year 1940. The song is titled ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’ and was originally sung in the version you will hear by a female singer using the artist’s name of ‘Raign’.’’
What Nancy didn’t say was that this song had not actually been part of the collection of music brought from 2012 to 1940 by Nancy Laplante but had instead been imported much more recently from the future of Timeline ‘A’ by her mother, Ingrid Dows. For years, Ingrid had hidden from Nancy the fact that she could travel through time, thanks to the implanted equipment she had gained as a secret field agent of the Time Patrol, a time travel enforcement agency from the 24th Century formed by Ingrid’s adoptive mother, Nancy Laplante. However, a mission conducted a few years ago by Ingrid as a last resort in order to save many innocent American citizens trapped inside the Soviet Union had decided Ingrid into revealing her secret to Nancy, who was now in the know about the Time Patrol.
With Sarah Weissman and Lucy Dows playing the electronic synthesizer, Carmen Estrada holding a steel triangle and small rod and Erika Lang standing in front of her Kudo drum, Nancy started singing a slow, melancholic song, accompanied at first by only synthetizer and triangle music. Then, as Nancy sang, Erika Lang started beating her giant drum with spaced, carefully counted and coordinated hits with the two large wooden sticks she was holding. The combined effect of the instruments’ music and of Nancy’s singing was reinforced by the deep, powerful beat of the Kudo drum, making Mary McLean shiver from the rising emotions triggered by the song. Her husband, like the rest of the patrons, was equally taken and moved by the song, which ended after a bit over four minutes with Nancy Dow’s voice having risen to a powerful crescendo. All the patrons then rose from their seats to applaud enthusiastically. Mary McLean applauded as well while bending sideways to speak to her husband.
‘’What a powerful song! It gave me goosebumps!’’
‘’The same here, Dear. This band is going to have a great future if they continue like this.’’
As the patrons were sitting down after applauding, Erika Lang left the stage at a run to go out of sight, then returned a mere minute later, having slipped a short dress over her breast cloth band and loincloth, and took back position at her more usual drum kit. As for Nancy, she sat down behind a harp, while her adoptive sister Lucy grabbed a violin. What followed was a moving romantic song that brought tears to many of the female patrons in the club. The fact that Nancy sang in Italian only added to the emotional effect of the song on Mary McLean.
‘’Dear God! This is opera-quality singing at its best! That young Nancy must be the best singer I have heard in my life.’’
Her husband could only nod in agreement then.
‘’Her singing is truly heavenly. I…’’
Seeing her husband hesitate and pause, Mary gave him a questioning look.
‘’What?’’
Sean, who now appeared a bit agitated, replied to her in a low voice, so that other patrons could not hear him clearly.
‘’That girl, Nancy Dows: her name sounded familiar to me at first but I could not remember why. I now know why: she is that semi-human, semi-angel girl who flew in and stopped a racial riot in Chinatown last March and was then interviewed on CNN.’’
‘’Her, an angel? But she gave no sign of it and said nothing about that.’’
‘’Which makes her a modest girl: a trait that I appreciate. Let’s keep that to ourselves. Clamoring about that could ruin her band’s efforts tonight.’’
‘’You are right, Sean. I will keep mum about this.’’
Two more songs followed ‘My Heart Will Go On’, including the band’s own success song, ‘Sometime, Somewhere’, which involved singing in five different languages and the playing of a number of old musical instruments from past centuries. The end of the last song was greeted by a long period of enthusiastic applauses from the patrons and from Roger Neville, who then went to talk to the band members as they started to pack up their instruments.
‘’Girls, you were positively fantastic! Could you play here a couple of more nights per week during this school vacation period?’’
Nancy exchanged quick looks with her band members before smiling to the club manager.
‘’We could give you up to two more nights during weekdays, plus one weekend night, and this until school resumes in late August. Once school is back on, we still could offer you one performance during each weekend.’’
‘’That would be great, Miss Dows! Let’s go for representations on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday evenings, if that suits your band.’’
‘’That sounds perfect, Mister Neville.’’
‘’Excellent!’’ replied the happy manager while extracting a thick envelope from his vest’s internal pocket and handing it to Nancy. ‘’Here is your fee for tonight’s performance, to which I am now going to add an extra two-hundred dollars as a bonus for your incredible music. I can thus expect you to be back this Friday, for seven in the evening?’’
‘’We will be there then, Mister Neville.’’ promised Nancy. ‘’Thank you again for giving us a chance to play at your club.’’
‘’The pleasure was mine, Miss Dows.’’ replied the manager, whose sales of drinks to his patrons tonight had been very good indeed.
Some twenty minutes later, the whole band was out of the club, with their instruments and sound equipment loaded back in their faithful minivan. As Erika was about to start the engine of her vehicle, Carmen Estrada let out a deep sigh of regret.
‘’Damn! I wish that our association with Ken could have worked out: I really miss him.’’
Nancy gave a sympathetic smile of support to Carmen on hearing that. Ken Lee was another student at the Juilliard School of Music whom Nancy had saved from a bunch of racist bullies and who had then been invited to join the band. Unfortunately, while Carmen Estrada had quickly forged a romantic link with the handsome young man, Ken’s relations with the band had deteriorated within weeks, with Ken complaining that too little of his music playing with brass instruments was being incorporated into the songs written or played by the band. After three months of increasing recriminations by Ken, Nancy had finally decided to ask him to leave, before the conflict could blow her band apart. While Carmen had been sad to see Ken leave, she had also understood by then that he was simply not compatible with the style of music the D.C. Five played.
‘’Nothing stops you from continuing to see him in private, Carmen. He is still welcome to come and visit you at our apartments as a simple visitor.’’
‘’I know, but I am afraid that his mere presence could revive our dispute. I better forget him and concentrate on our band instead.’’
‘’Please, Carmen, don’t say that. Being in the band doesn’t mean that you have to stop dating and avoid building relationships. I run a musical band, not a prison. How about inviting him to go to the beach in Atlantic City with us this Sunday? I’m sure that he would like that.’’
‘’Hey, that’s a great idea, Nancy!’’ replied Carmen, a big grin appearing on her face. ‘’I’m going to call him once at home.’’
‘’And tell him that we are going there to have fun on the beach, and not to practice with our instruments.’’
‘’Got it!’’
Satisfied, Nancy then thought that she would need to advise her brother by adoption, Leonardo, of this, as the beachside cottage they were going to use in Atlantic City belonged to him. That cottage had belonged to Leo’s father, with Leonardo inheriting it after his whole family had been murdered by a criminal gang during an organized crime war that had nearly cost the life of Leo as well. Only the protection both Ingrid and Nancy had provided to him then had saved his life. A nearly similar story had happened to Lucy, who had been adopted by Ingrid after her own parents had been murdered by the Chinese Triads. To say that the Dows’ family history had been a tumultuous one would be no exaggeration indeed.
The trip back to their apartment building on West 51st Street took nearly twenty minutes despite being only a couple of kilometers from the night club. Actually, calling their place an ‘apartment building’ was a bit of a stretch. The building the band had lived in since arriving in New York to attend the Juilliard School was in reality an old garage and warehouse in the Hell’s Kitchen District that had been converted into a residential building and contained a total of six apartments. The place may have been old but the rent was reasonable…for Manhattan, and the plumbing had been redone to modern standards. Parking their minivan in the garage which they had rented along with two of the apartments, the five young women went up to the top apartment occupied by Nancy, Lucy and Erika, to store back their instruments and sound equipment in the room they used to practice. Once that was done, they assembled in the large lounge of the apartment, where Nancy took out the envelope of cash Roger Neville had given her.
‘’Alright girls: pay time!’’
She then proceeded to divide in five equal parts the cash, with Erika getting a little extra in order to reimburse her for the use of her minivan.
‘’Well, things are looking up, I would say.’’ said a happy Lucy while pocketing her cash money. With four gigs per week at ‘The 54th’ night club, we should be able to live decently in New York without having to dip further into our savings or into our parents’ pockets.’’
‘’True, but playing two more gigs a week would be even nicer.’’ replied Carmen. ‘’Then, we would have enough to improve our show wardrobes or to buy new equipment and instruments.’’
‘’Don’t forget that we are also receiving regular royalty checks from the various radio stations that have started to play our tunes, plus from the records company selling our album.’’ added Sarah. ‘’All in all, I would say that we are having a good start in our musical careers.’’
‘’We are indeed,’’ agreed Nancy, ‘’but now is not the time to rest on our laurels. I have a few ideas about new songs of our own making that would enlarge our musical repertoire. We don’t want to bore our new customers with endless repetitions of the same songs, right?’’
‘’Right!’’ replied Erika. ‘’Well, I think that I am due for a shower.’’
‘’Need someone to give you a back rub?’’ asked Lucy, a malicious grin appearing on her lips. In response, Erika winked to her while starting to walk in a sensuous way towards the bathroom. The three other girls, who were all either bisexual or lesbian due to their ability to remember their past incarnations as either men or women, simply smiled at that and went to their respective bedrooms or apartment in order to also change and clean up.
01:40 (New York Time)
Thursday, July 11, 1996 ‘C’
Nancy’s bedroom, Apartment # 4
607 West 51st Street, Hell’s Kitchen District
Manhattan, New York City
‘Nancy, wake up!’
The mental message immediately pulled Nancy out of her usual light sleep state, as she didn’t need sleep as much as a normal human being to be fresh and rested in the morning. Opening her eyes, she saw no one in her dark bedroom. Then, the male-sounding mental voice resonated again in her mind.
‘Nancy, this is Michael. Please go to the bathroom: I have things to tell you.’
‘’I’m coming, Father.’ replied Nancy, who then got out of bed and, not bothering to put any clothes on, left her bedroom and went to the adjacent bathroom of her apartment, which she shared with Lucy and Erika. Once in the bathroom, she closed and locked the door and switched on the overhead light. At first, she saw no one inside the bathroom. Then, a luminescent humanoid shape appeared next to the bathtub, to materialize in seconds into a handsome man of tall stature and impressive physique. His face also had an angelic beauty to it. Nancy then approached the newcomer and gently caressed his face with one hand.
‘’Father, it is nice to see you again. Your visits are all too rare, I must say.’’
‘’That’s because there are many things that I have to take care of, my daughter.’’ replied the archangel. ‘’Tonight, I came to teach you a few things that will help you to better do good around you. You already possess many powers, but you still can control events in only a limited way.’’
‘’And what new powers do you want to teach me, Father?’’
Michael gently smiled down at Nancy before answering her.
‘’Just follow me and I will tell you all about them.’’
Michael then hugged tightly Nancy just before disappearing with her from the bathroom. Both then reappeared a mere second later. Now, however, Nancy had a nearly transfigured expression on her face and she looked up at her archangel father while still glued to him.
‘’It is as if we just spent days together, yet I can feel that we came back here only a short moment after jumping away. Am I right?’’
‘’You are, my dear daughter. You now can control space and time according to your will. The funny thing is that a mere human from the future of the original timeline also managed that feat while using purely scientific principles. As you were able to practice with me, you can not only travel through time and space but also between parallel dimensions. However, know that other angels and Chosen are already at work in those two other timelines. If you have to use your powers, then do it in this timeline.’’
‘’I understand, Father, and I will follow your counsel. Will you stay here a bit more?’’
‘’Not with you, but I will be somewhere else in this timeline. If you need me, then simply ask mentally for me. Goodbye, my sweet daughter.’’
Michael then gently kissed her on her forehead before stepping back from her and vanishing, leaving Nancy alone and with a heavy heart. She however regained her composure after a moment, then returned to her bedroom and slipped back into her bed. She was not able at first to return to sleep, as her mind went through what she had just experienced and learned. Nancy fully realized the incredible extent of her new powers but the real question for her was about how to use correctly those new powers without abusing them.
‘’Just do good, Nancy. Just do good.’’ She told herself before getting back to sleep.