Michael couldn't stop shaking.
The final riffs of Damage, Inc. had faded into smoke. James Hetfield's growl, older but still thunderous, had just torn through the arena for the last time. The band stood together, arms around each other, facing a crowd that didn't want to say goodbye.
Forty-six years.
That's how long Metallica had reigned.
And now, they were finished.
Michael stood frozen, his fists clenched, surrounded by tens of thousands of fans—all crying, cheering, screaming. He'd screamed too. Until his voice gave out. Until his soul felt raw.
The band walked offstage, Hetfield lingering last, casting one final look across the crowd. He didn't say anything cheesy or dramatic.
Just nodded.
Then he was gone.
And Michael felt like someone had ripped out a piece of his chest.
---
Hours later, Michael sat in a dark bar across from the venue. It reeked of sweat, old beer, and heartbreak.
The kind of heartbreak only true fans could understand.
Metallica wasn't just music to him. They were everything.
He found them when he was twelve—a lost kid hiding bruises, both on his skin and deeper. Fade to Black was the first song that made him cry and not feel ashamed. Battery was the first song that made him feel strong. Ride the Lightning lit a fire in him that never went out.
Metallica didn't just help him survive.
They gave him meaning.
And now, that meaning was gone.
He stumbled out of the bar, drunk, numb, vision swaying. He walked alone toward the subway, toward nothing.
His thoughts were a storm.
What am I now? What do I live for?
He didn't see the step. His foot slipped.
A sickening crack.
Then black.
---
He awoke to a spinning ceiling fan and a pounding in his head.
Groaning, Michael pushed himself up from a small bed. The room was hot, sun filtering through yellow blinds. It smelled like old wood, sweat, and something familiar—guitar strings.
His vision slowly focused.
The walls were covered in posters.
Not Metallica. Not Nirvana. Not anything modern.
These were vintage. Motörhead. Diamond Head. UFO. Thin Lizzy. AC/DC. Sabbath. Bands James Hetfield loved.
He froze.
Something was wrong.
A calendar hung beside the door. July 1981.
No way.
He stood and stumbled toward a mirror above a scratched dresser.
He stopped breathing.
In the mirror was a teenager—seventeen at most. Long blond hair. A jaw like steel. No beard. No tattoos. Just a raw-boned kid with intense, stormy eyes.
Michael knew that face.
Because it belonged to James Hetfield.
"No," he whispered. "No freaking way."
He backed away from the mirror. He could feel the weight of the body—the strength in the arms, the calloused fingertips of someone who'd been playing for years. It felt real.
He looked around the room again. Guitars. A battered amp. A stack of cassette tapes. A notebook open on the desk with messy lyrics scrawled across it.
The door had a flannel shirt hanging from a hook. A sketch of a skull was drawn on the wall with a Sharpie.
It was real.
And this wasn't a dream.
He had somehow… become James Hetfield.
But not the legend.
The teenager.
July 1981. Hetfield was 17. Metallica didn't exist yet. Not really. He hadn't even met Cliff Burton. No demos, no Kill 'Em All, no "Seek and Destroy."
Michael's breath caught.
This wasn't just some time-travel hallucination. He had a body. He had memories—his own, at least. The raw muscle memory of guitar playing tingled in his hands.
What does this mean?
He sat on the bed, head in his hands.
He could recreate it all. The entire discography. The rise. The riffs. The revolution.
But… should he?
He looked again at the posters. Lemmy. Phil Lynott. Tony Iommi. His heroes. James's heroes.
He realized something.
He wasn't here to copy Metallica.
He was Metallica now.
Or at least… something new.
He walked to the guitar leaning in the corner. It was a white Flying V, the same model young Hetfield used in those early garage tapes. His fingers curled around the fretboard like it was home.
He strummed once. The sound buzzed through the amp and into his chest.
It felt right.
A grin began to spread across his face—part disbelief, part excitement, part hunger.
He looked again at the calendar: July 1981.
The world hadn't heard Whiplash.
Hadn't heard Fade to Black.
Hadn't even imagined Metallica.
But he had.
He whispered to himself:
> "Alright. Let's make history."
And just like that, Michael was gone.
All that remained was a 17-year-old James Hetfield.
With the future of heavy metal burning in his veins.
---