ELECTION DAY rolled around soon after. We had the day off school, and our gym was a polling station. When I was younger my dad would take me in the booth with him and we would pull the lever together, but I was getting a little too old for that. As he left the house to go vote—all PeriGenomics employees got the morning off, and the company pushed their employees to vote for Bergeron—Johnny yelled after him, “Vote for the other guy. Screw the company.”

Dad smiled back and said, “Glad to see you taking an interest in democracy.”Johnny was going to practice with his band after they all protested Bergeron down at Harris High. Rosa stayed home because her family was worried that someone from the Academy would see it, record it, and she’d get in more trouble with the powers-that-be.

Johnny was obsessed with this concert series, Rock Against Bergeron, which had been touring the country. He drove hours to check out the show when it hit Boston and Troy, NY. I think he had been emailing back and forth with that group because he was going full Rock Against Bergeron for Election Day. He had helped out with the Doolittle Falls show, booking the venue and getting a slew of bands to play. I wasn’t too sure what name the band was going with for tonight, but I heard rumblings of something like ACLU Benefit. It felt okay to tag along in this case. I still felt weird tensions with nearly every Misshape that wasn’t Hamilton when I walked into a room, but really, the air was filled with Bergeron-related tension these days. It was nearly refreshing.

As soon as we were certain Dad’s car was a safe distance away, Johnny went up to the attic, came down with a box of picket signs, and we got in his car. He picked up Alice on the way. Her car was currently up on blocks in the front yard.

“My brothers claim to be fixing it,” she said. “But with about twenty minutes of work a week, and four hours of drinking tall boys and arguing about what they should be doing, my guess is it will be done by the time I graduate college.”

“I could take a look at it,” Johnny offered.

We both stared at him in disbelief.

“What. I can fix things. How hard can it be?” he said.

“Johnny, you couldn’t hang a poster without putting three holes in the wall,” I said. “Maybe Tape Deck can take a look. She keeps it analog.”

Johnny pouted and shrugged his shoulder. “Not a bad idea,” Alice said. Advantage, me.

When we got to the high school Hamilton was already there getting set up. We had to protest in a select “protest zone” just outside the fence that surrounded the school. It was a federal law that we couldn’t be too close to the polling station. The protest zone extended around the perimeter of the school, but mostly people were standing by the main entrance, the part people had to drive through to get to the gym where the voting machines were. There were five people on one side of the street with official Bergeron posters that said, simply enough “Vote Bergeron” and a few with placards for other local elections. On the other side of the street were Porter supporters, with signs for their campaign. While we weren’t the biggest fans of “Pick Porter” either, he wasn’t Bergeron, so we stuck by that side.

Hamilton had an easel setup and Johnny handed him blank signs to paint. The first one said, “No Powers for Bergeron” in black letters and was decorated with cartoon action balloons like “POW!” and “BLAMO!” He handed it to me and I held it up sheepishly. The Bergeron crowd glared at me and I sunk down, mentally willing myself to disappear, a fog spinning around me like cotton candy until Alice popped up next to me with a sign that said, “BERGER-WRONG FOR AMERICA!” The fog cleared and I felt strong again. When Hamilton finished painting, he put the easel away and stood next to me on the other side. His sign had no words, just an elaborate picture of Bergeron’s face, done up like a vampire version of Bergeron’s face.

“Hamilton, you are straight-up good at protesting. Tell me why you do it. I want to know,” I said. “I’m not super up on the dude’s policies. Do they even affect us? We’re so young. Isn’t the government for old people?”

Hamilton became very animated. “That’s the thing, Sarah. Government’s for everybody, and Bergeron’s a really bad example of it. He’s got no policies. It’s all empty rhetoric. He clearly wants to give the Heroes all the power they want. And his ties to J4.” He shuddered. “That guy will ruin this country. He’ll ruin it.”

There was a pause. I wanted to fill it with a question. “How’s the painting going?”

“Great. I’m working on a large piece. You should come by and see it. Although with band practice and whatever Butters craziness is happening, I don’t get as much time to paint as I’d like.”

“Wait, what’s up with Butters?” I asked.

“What hole have you been in, Sarah?” Alice snapped. “He’s over there anyways,” she said, signaling down the street. Butters was heading to the school, three of his Spectors following behind him, and one gesturing wildly alongside his loping stride. It looked like they were arguing. “It’s been like this since he broke up with Betty.”

“No. No, no, no. You can have three songs. Any more and you might as well get you own album,” Butters said.

“Well maybe I should have my own album,” the Spector said.

“Not this again. You can’t have your own album.”

“Yes. I. Can. Doris is stepping out.”

“You can’t step out. You’re a mental projection. You are me,” Butters insisted, sputtering.

“I sure as hell ain’t you,” she replied. “I’d be better looking, for one.”

“But you are. I control you. You’re my Spectors. You do what I say.”

“Oh, Butters the Big man. When I was...”

“Ugh, it doesn’t stop,” Hamilton griped.

“This has nothing to do with her!” Butters shouted at Maybeline, before she, and the rest of the Spectors, disappeared.

He joined us in the protest line, clearly upset, but trying to hide it under his usual cheerful mien. I felt very out of the loop. I hadn’t heard about the breakup or anything. We stood for a few hours, holding our signs and talking about school and bands and concerts and the big documentary and my training with Sam. After the post-work rush to the polls, we called it a day, and headed home to get ready.

 

THE CONCERT was held in the VFW hall in downtown Doolittle Falls. An enormous man sat next to the door in a folding metal door and checked IDs. He looked us over and handed us all green bracelets, then stamped both our hands with a giant UNDER 21 stamp. I didn’t want to drink—and even if I ever did, there was Johnny—but the stamp seemed a bit excessive.

I relaxed a bit more once I got inside the hall. A dirty, cramped rock show was kind of the only place I wanted to be on Election Day, or night, as it was. I could barely see in front of me, and the darkness reeked of cigars and stale beer. Most of the light bounced off the Ballentine mirror in the back, behind the small bar filled with a row of bottles, labels peeling. A mix of Misshapes and Normals, a variety of ages, sat at the bar, talking, drinking, and watching a small TV that hung from the ceiling. A newscaster was on, standing in front of a polling station, reporting on results across the country.

Posters from the VFW members were hung along with walls, damaged, with peeling corners and yellowed paper. Perhaps the good ones were stored away somewhere. The walls also had deer heads, American flags, and pictures of motorcycles. There was one enormous bear head, sticking out of the wall totally staring down a deer on the other side of the room with enormous antlers. The antlers must have been three feet long and were poised above a group of kids in black t-shirts sipping from red solo cups.

The room focused on a small stage, not much higher than the ground, covered in amps, guitars, drum kits, mic stands, and wires. The stage looked more like wires than a stage. The band that was playing was losing out to the election results, as people were watching the TV or looking at their phones. The vibe was weird.

When I saw Hamilton, he was talking to some Harrison High Normals who all had shirts on with Bergeron as a vampire on the front in red and black. I guess it was a meme that was going around. They spoke animatedly about how terrible he’d be for the country, that he was a war hawk that was just interested in showing might and playing Hero from the Whitehouse. Most people echoed what Johnny had been saying, which was he was a mediocre mayor who abused the memory of Innsmouth for political ends.

“Do you notice that he can’t go for more than a sentence without mentioning Innsmouth?” one of the kids said.

“It’s his Raison d’être,” Hamilton said.

The needle, it scratched.

“Sorry, it was in an article I just read. But, like, it’s all he had going for him.” “And he might win on it,” Johnny said, dejected, breaking into the group.

A skinny boy in black jeans and a white t-shirt got on the stage. He staggered up to the mic, picked it up, and tapped it with an unsteady finger. A loud crackle and hiss boomed over the crowd, and we covered our ears. He ignored the noise and our unhappy response. Someone shouted something about feedback and he flipped the kid off.

“Good Evening, meine Kinder! Mein Name ist General O’Duffey! Welcomen to the end of day. The latest results are in. Bergeron has won our very own state of Massachussets. New York is still too close to call. Carolinas and Georgia went for Porter. Florida for Bergeron. And the rest are still being counted. I’ll be back later with more updates. “Next we have a band called,” he pulled out an index card and studied it, squinted, and said, “How I Broke Elastic Man.”

Three boys with greasy black hair with guitars larger then their torsos got up on stage. The one in front lifted a flop of black hair from his eyes, muttered “hey,” stepped on a distortion peddle, and windmilled his arm once and played a loud fuzzy chord. He did this three times and on the third the band joined in. He started yelling something into the mic, but the guitar noise was so loud I couldn’t make out a single word. The chorus was either “strawberry monkey party crime,” or “raw ferry making art rhyme.” Neither made sense.

I went off with Hamilton to another room, which had red walls and a pool table in the center. Rosa was standing in the corner, picking the label off a bottle of Crypto Cola.“Hey, when do you get here?” I asked.

“Just now,” Rosa said.

“Nervous?” Hamilton said.

“A little. I mean, not the kind of place the Academy would like to find me out. But how would they know? Right?” Rosa looked worried. I felt terrible for her. The Academy wasn’t the place for her, but it was her only chance for a better life for her family.

“It’ll be fine, Rosa,” I said. “It’s just a concert. People are so busy tonight. Where’s the Academy?”

“A bunch of them are in Boston at the reception for the anticipated Bergeron victory. There’s also a viewing party at the school,” Rosa sniffed.

“Not a Bergeron fan?” Hamilton asked.

Rosa rolled her eyes and we all cracked up.

“My Tia is back in LA for one of the big Rock Against Bergeron concerts.”

“That’s awesome,” I said. “You should play with your band. Aren’t you guys ACLU Benefit right now?”

Rosa smirked. “Actually, it’s Laika’s Space Cadets now. And I don’t quite think we’re ready.”

“It looks like Alice and Johnny might disagree,” Hamilton said.

He pointed to the stage and another band was pulling the duo on stage, handing Johnny a guitar and Alice some drum sticks. They seemed bashful. I’d never seen either one of them so embarrassed. Alice’s cheeks were bright red and Johnny’s shoulders were at his ears.

“I’m not sure about this,” he said.

“Come on man. You got this,” a boy in an oversized army jacket and a guitar over his shoulder said. “Don’t you want to hear my boy Johnny?” he asked the crowd.

They cheered.

“Okay,” he said.

Johnny played a few strings and listed to the response in the monitors. Alice hit the drums lightly. He turned around and said something to her. No one could hear it. Her pallor returned to normal and her posture relaxed. She whispered something back, again inaudible. They nodded at each other. “This is, uh, ACLU Benefit,” Johnny said.

Alice counted off four with the sticks and they started playing.

It was a slow song. Johnny sounded nervous. The music was too loud to hear the lyrics, but it sounded like it was about our fight down at the river. But it was a triumphant we will overcome tune gussied up in a sad wistful song. It seemed wrong that they were playing without Rosa, though.

“Why aren’t you up there?” Hamilton asked Rosa. “I mean, I’ve been playing with them sometimes but you’re the soul of the band, right?”

“Didn’t know they were playing. But even still, I can’t play in public. It’s too dangerous.” Rosa looked a little depressed. I sort of got it.

Johnny and Alice finished to a burst of applause. We made the biggest noise possible from the pool room. Even though things have been all over the place with my brother and my best friend, there was still something sweet about seeing them perform for a crowd. A flush of pride overwhelmed me and I felt like it was a perfect moment, just for a moment. I had no idea what the weather looked like overhead.

After they stepped down, bands continued to play. Alice and Johnny were swallowed up by the crowd, surrounded by groupies. When they spotted Rosa, they ran over to her and sort of jumped on her in sheer puppyish excitement.

“Can you believe it?” Johnny asked. Alice also looked flushed with excitement.“It was good, guys,” she replied.

“Yeah, but we didn’t have you. We need you, Rosa, and then we’re going to be the best band in the world!” Alice nearly squealed. Hamilton and I shared a look. He mimed something at me. I thought he was saying something like What am I, chopped liver? While we were talking, one of the bands finished and announcer boy came up again. Things were looking grim for Porter. Bergeron had taken a clear lead.

More bands played, each one louder and angrier. The kids toward the front of the stage were jumping around and thrashing. After each set the boy got up with more and more bad news about the election. At around eleven o’clock he got on stage to announce the last band. He looked tired.

“WXBN has just called the election for Bergeron,” he said. A large booo errupted from the crowd. “The other stations are not calling it. They say certain states are still up in the air. Sorry for the wonderful introduction, but now, our last band of the night, Wayne Enterprises!”

Hamilton tugged on my sleeve. “We need to get out of here. And fast.” I followed his lead, going to a corner with a high window covered in thick fabric. He pulled the fabric aside and looked outside, where there was a row of police cars. Cops in riot gear were assembling. I saw the large bouncer from earlier handcuffed and sitting on the sidewalk. A couple kids walked outside to smoke and were grabbed by a few officers, who threw them in the back of a paddy wagon.

“We can’t get out that way,” I said.

“I know,” said Hamilton. But where could we go?

“There’s an entrance in the back through the kitchen,” said Johnny. “It leads to a small fenced in BBQ area. We can hop the fence. But I need to warn everyone.”

“We should go,” Alice said.

“You start. I have a responsibility,” Johnny said.

As he said this, the boy got back on stage. The other two stations had called the election for Bergeron. The crowd was moving toward the stage, angry. Johnny tried to make his way through but the sea stopped him. There was a loud BANG and smoke filled the room.

Alice grabbed his wrist. “We need to go now,” she said.

“No! I have to tell them,” Johnny protested.

“They can figure it out!” I yelled.

We headed toward the kitchen at the right time. As we got to the door the police stormed the room. “Time to shut it down, kids,” we heard, through the mechanical whine of a megaphone. The kids weren’t going to stand for that. It took a minute and the night became violence. A bottle flew by us, shattering on the wall. Glass flew everywhere. The room was covered in smoke and my eyes were tearing up.

We kept pushing forward like Lot and his wife, trying not to look back at the previously placid punk rock show. The cops were grabbing kids violently and dragging them out of the building. Those that resisted, or even looked hesitant, were being tasered or hit with batons. I saw one kid with powers try to give up, but as soon as they saw sparks run down his body there was a scrum of police on him swinging clubs and fists. Hamilton grabbed me and pulled me through the door.

We rushed through the kitchen and exited through a rickety wooden door, which hung loosely on its hinges. In the dark, we saw a small square patio surrounded by a wooden picket fence, a few rotting benches, and an enormous BBQ. We ran to the back corner and Johnny and Hamilton helped boost Alice, Rosa, and me over the fence. We landed in someone’s backyard with a thump, and a few moments later Hamilton came over and then Johnny, who fell to the ground. We started to creep through the backyard toward the street when we heard a loud “Hey!”

Two cops came running toward us from the street. We couldn’t make out their faces and, since we were in the dark, we hoped they couldn’t make out ours. I was about to start running when Rosa took her hand, balled it into a fist, and punched at the ground. It started to shake and the officers toppled over each other and hit the ground. They tried to get back up but when they did, the earth shook again and they fell again.

“Run! Now!” said Rosa, and we sprinted through backyards as fast as we could until we stopped a block later, panting and out of breath. There were no more cops around. We were in the clear. But we could see and hear the sirens in the distance and smell the tear gas rising into the air.

 

WHEN I got home, shaken to my core, I went to my computer. I wanted to know whether this was a thing happening everywhere. Sites like Twitter and the official Rock Against Bergeron message board were abuzz with reports of police presence at all of these shows. It wasn’t just the Doolittle Falls concert—all across the country, police came in with great force to shut down the punk rockers. It was a symphony of cruelty: videos of people being hit by police with truncheons, people being tear gassed, people carted off in paddy wagons by the dozen. It was a trending topic for a while, popping up on websites thanks to its relation to the presidential election.

But there was a shift.

The narrative of injustice changed. Rock Against Bergeron shows were classified as just riots, people getting out of hand who needed to be shut down. Next, the videos were coming down. YouTube replaced each home video with a note that it was “A National Security Threat.” I watched as one by one, the people who were talking, publicly, about what happened at these shows were disappeared. Twitter accounts shut down. Other avenues silenced. I stayed up all night, watching the story change before my eyes. It felt like a cruel magic trick.

Johnny walked into my room at 4 a.m. “They suspended my account,” he said.

“Which account?” I asked.

“All of them. I was posting stuff about tonight…” he trailed off.

“I saw. It was good,” I said.

“Thanks. About a minute ago I got a message from all these sites informing me that my account is being temporarily suspended because of suspicious activity. I sent some very angry emails to them and they said they couldn’t tell me more, just that it was at the request of the government’s Palladin anti-supervillain division.”

That was a big deal. “What?” Computers were a thing that worked. They’re not a thing that shuts down because the content is wrong.

“I can’t even get on the websites anymore. They blocked my IP. And when I tried to use my phone, they blocked the IP there, too.”

I motioned to my brother. “Sit next to me. Mine’s up. Join here.”

He sat next to me on my bed. We watched as the voices of protest were silenced and the narrative became about the election results, ignoring the revolution in the streets.

The morning paper was full of articles we had already read about the election. Porter had a concession speech, Bergeron promised “a new way” for America. On page 15 of section B—the local news section—there was a small blurb about a noise complaint at the VFW hall that the police responded to and the arrest of several local youths that were responsible. It was one paragraph long, dwarfed by a piece about Sugar Shacks.