Chapter Text
The Opera Ghost really existed. She was not, as was long believed, a creature of the imagination of the artists, the superstition of the managers, or a product of the absurd and impressionable brains of the aspiring idols of the stage, the obsessive fans who’ve devoted their life to admiring the stage, or the diligent stage hands. Yes, she existed in flesh and blood, although she assumed the complete appearance of a real phantom; that is to say, of a spectral shade.
Bae finished unpacking her personal effects. She jumped onto her bed, her arms outstretched. She exhaled and sunk into the mattress of her dorm.
This was the beginning of a new chapter of her life. She was finally out of the orphanage, and she was finally a stage girl. She’d be singing and dancing and acting surrounded by all these talented people.
And in a very different sense, she was, finally, a stage girl. This was the end of where Bae’s life's path led, and if even you were like ‘ooh, but demihumans usually live about 80 years so, what do you mean” - that was ages away. This was the foreseeable future for her career and her social life and her living situation.
So if she didn’t like it, or if she messed it up somehow, or if she turned out to only have been able to pass the audition without actually having any aptitude for the actual performing-
Well, it was too late to have doubts about it. And besides, she got in, didn’t she? That implied she was talented enough
Maybe she’d make friends here. It might be nice…
Bae herself was a rat girl - which meant she had a second set of ears and a tail- and was a little on the smaller side. She had red hair, with the occasional streak of white or black in it.
And as the night went on, Bae heard the bustle of her fellow stage girls out in the halls and in the common area. This would be a great time to actually go and meet them, but-
But she still lay in bed for some reason. She found that she couldn’t will her body to even throw her blanket off herself.
Bae lay there, unmoving, until her eyes grew heavy.
Bae awoke in the middle of the night.
It wasn't a sudden start or anything; she didn’t have another nightmare or wake up with a sleep paralysis demon or wake up to the ticking of a mechanical alarm.
Just, one moment she realized she was awake, and that her eyes were adjusted to the darkness. She breathed in the vaguely laundered air of her dorms, and she felt that her left foot was out of the covers, but it wasn't cold enough to do anything about.
And, very faintly, Bae heard singing.
Her rat ears twitched, to try to make out the sound- it seemed to be a lyrical song, but from her dorm room Bae couldn’t make out the words.
Bae found her body slowly crawling out from under the covers and out of the bed and carefully walked towards her dorm door. She opened it as quietly as she could, as slightly as she could, and squeezed her body through before closing the door after her. She wandered, barefoot, out of the dorm area, into the hallways of the opera house.
Bae was entranced. Possibly literally, because she found her body automatically moving as she stumbled, through the not-yet familiar halls of her new home, in the quiet night time air.
She wandered past portraits and rehearsal rooms and decorative armor stands arrayed at intersections and, eventually, Bae wandered to a spot where the sound was loudest; In some kind of circular room, at the edges of the building.
As her night vision adjusted more, to the darkness, she saw that she was alone. At least by all appearances.
The voice was either magic, or coming from the walls, and echoing around this chamber-
And at the climax of the particular song, Bae’s breath caught.
And by the time the final note of the song dissolved into nothing, Bae let out her breath.
“Woah!” Bae said. She clapped, ferociously.
And then there was a soft crashing sound.
“Ah- you heard me?” came the voice.
Bae furrowed her brow. “I mean, you were singing all across the opera house….” Idly, Bae wondered if having two sets of ears meant she had better hearing than most, or if maybe everyone else in the dorms was just a heavier sleeper.
“Well- you- I shouldn’t have been singing-” and there was the sounds of rustling in the walls. “Pretend you didn’t hear anything!”
“Wait!” Bae called out, “That was the most beautiful thing I heard in my life!”
There was a pause in the rustling, before it resumed, from further away this time.
And then another soft crash. Bae reflexively winced. “Uh- do you need help?”
But nothing answered her.
Bae stood there, in the darkness and the silence, for another moment, and then another, until it felt like it had been an eternity and she thought that maybe this had all been a dream?
But one thing she definitely didn’t dream of, was getting caught breaking curfew and sneaking out of her dorm room, on her first night, so she should probably just, ignore all this and get back to the dorms before anyone checked up on her- and before she got irreparably lost in the theater, at night.
And about forty paces back she encountered her first intersection, which she was pretty sure was a left turn-
And then after another hallway there was a 3 way intersection, and Bae, paused and tried to recall which path she had gone down, before heading left-
“Dorms are actually the other way,” said the mysterious voice, this time from somewhere above her.
“Ah!” Bae flinched. She looked around to try to see if there was anyone in the halls, but there was no one. “What? You’re still here?”
“Well, I wasn’t going to be here,” said the voice, “But you took a long time getting back. Figures you’d get lost.”
“Hey! It’s my first day.” Bae folded her arms and pouted. “It’s only natural I wouldn't know where everything is yet.”
Well, technically, she had been to the opera house off and on over the past few months as part of the audition process, but even then it was always in groups, so she’d have no reason to memorize where any of the hallways went.
“It's another left after that, and then a right, and then you’ll be in the housing areas. Dorms are on the north side.”
Bae scrunched her mouth to the side. She turned around and started marching through the quiet night-time hallways of the opera house, to take a left at the next intersection, until she had an idea-
Bae hid a silent chuckle under her hand, and she lifted up her leg and took a laaaarge step to the left-”
“Are you pretending to not remember directions so I’ll have to correct you?” said the mysterious voice.
“Are you following me?” Bae said, “to, make sure I get back to my dorm?”
There was a pause. “Well. Obviously.”
Bae felt a grin grow on her face.
“So take a right here, and you’ll be in the commons area.” said the voice. “You should know how to get back to the dorms from there.”
“And, what if I don't?” Bae said.
“Then you can get caught sneaking out when tomorrow morning comes and they find you asleep at one of the tables.”
“Well, maybe you can walk me home, then?”
“Maybe I can leave you to wander the halls forever and get eaten by monsters,” said the voice.
“That doesn’t happen,” Bae said.
“Sure it does,” the voice said, “But I guess you’re probably not too much of a meal~.”
Bae puffed out her cheek. “Hey! How do I know that you’re not even smaller than me?”
“I guess you don’t,” said the voice, “And you never wiiillll~”
Bae puffed out her other cheek. Then she blinked. “Wait, what do you mean by tha-”
“Just get back to your dorm,” said the voice. “I don’t know why you’re stalling so much.”
“Well, what-” Bae said, “You were just going to sing the most wonderful, heavenly song in the world and then vanish without a trace?”
There was another pause.
“I, actually, was going to wait outside your dorm, and then say thank you,” the voice said, a little more softly, this time. “All cool and mysterious like. I don’t normally get an audience.”
Bae inhaled, sharply-
“But then you ruined it by being bad at directions,” said the voice.
“Hey!” Bae said, “I told you, it's my first day!”
And the voice didn’t answer.
And at the commons area, where the night remained still and the only disturbance of the silence was the soft ticking of a grandfather clock on the far wall- there was one last intersection where Bae could take the wrong direction-
Bae exaggeratedly took a step away from her dorm.
There was only silence.
And Bae stepped back, and took another exaggerated step, followed by three seconds of walking-
And the voice still didn’t come back.
Bae let out a breath that was only slightly disappointed, and then calmly snuck all the way back to her room.
“Thank you,” said the voice, softly, from somewhere above, right as Bae put her hand on the handle to her dorm door.
“Aha!” Bae spun around and pointed- at nothing, since there still appeared to be nobody in the halls with her, "So you were making sure I got back to my room!"
“Argh! You ruined it again!”
Bae put her fists on her hips and smirked, “Yeah, you think just sneaking around and surprising me is enough to make you seem cool and mysterious? You’ll have to try harder than that to impress me!” Although, Bae figured, the singing was already impressive enough for a lifetime.
And there was a pause.
“Well,” said the voice, “I don’t care about impressing you. So, good night.”
“Night~!” Bae replied, as cheerily as she could.
“Argh!”
In downtime between rehearsals Bae had time to chat with her fellow performers, the staff of the opera house, and the managers. She didn't end up doing that, but she did have the time to.
Some of the other stagegirls who had come in at the same time as her were already friends with each other and those situations were always a little daunting to try to interrupt.
Bae sat at the edge of the stage and looked over the rest of the singers and dancers and actors in their own cliques, laughing with each other at their own in jokes or playing with props. Bae idly wondered what, hypothetically, people who were friends with each other did in these sorts of situations.
The stage of the theater proper was a grand affair- the grandest, by design, to accommodate the finest modern French cultural posterings. There was an orchestra pit, and rows that faded into the candle lit distance, and above them on all sides were the theater boxes from which the most prestigious or affluent of patrons watched performances.
And Bae must have looked a little lonely, even though she totally wasn’t, because three of the stagehands came by to chat her up.
There was the tall one, with platinum blonde hair and blue eyes. She was a good deal taller than Bae.
The gaunt one was the second tallest. She had red hair, and possibly some sort of skin condition but Bae was too nervous to ask about it. She was very excitable.
And the sleepy one was the shortest, a head shorter than the excitable one. She had brown hair, and purple eyes. Bae was pretty sure she had seen this one sleeping in the middle of the floor at some point and people had just maneuvered around her.
“So, are you excited to be a part of the official Paris Opera House performing arts troupe?” said the gaunt one.
Bae put on a smile. “Oh, definitely. It’s been my dream since I was a small rat.”
The tall one closed her eyes and brought her hand to her collarbone, and looked wistfully into the middle distance. “Ah, isn’t that sweet! I remember my first show ever, right here in the theatre-"
“What, like 3 years ago?” the sleepy one said, “I was here to see the opening night opera performance,” she waved a lethargic, imaginary panorama across the air in front of her.
The tall one tried to grab the sleepy one’s head, and they ended up in a grapple, and a stalemate.
“Ah, so did that convince you to get jobs here?” Bae said.
The gaunt one tilted her head to the side. “Jobs?”
“Oh, I'm sorry- are you performers? I’ve seen you around but I guess I assumed you were stagehands" -or janitors-
"Oh, we should be so lucky,” said the tall one. She stepped back out of her grapple with her friend (And the sleepy one took the opportunity to bap her in the stomach).
"We're just fans," the sleepy one said. She blocked a retaliatory poke. "And we're pretty happy that way."
"I, gueeeessss that that makes sense?" Bae said, "I saw you in the front row the other day during our inaugural performance.”
"We're in the front row because we don't actually have tickets to the performances," said the sleepy one.
“But hey, you yourself got in!” the gaunt one said. She waved her arms like a muppet. “You get to sing for a living now!”
"Oh! Well, uh," Bae said. She rubbed the back of her head. “I'm a dancer, first, but I do like the singing part.”
The three fans nodded, at different speeds.
“And I do like acting? I guess?” Bae continued.
The tall one smiled. “It is a very exhilarating experience.”
“Good luck with your career!” The gaunt one patted Bae’s shoulder, twice, in a very exaggerated manner.
“We’ll be watching it with great interest,” the tall one added.
“No more than any of the other performers, though, don’t worry,” The sleepy one said.
“Oh, you don’t know that,” the gaunt one said to her friend, “Maybe ol’ Baelzelboo here will surprise us?”
“It's just ‘Bae’,” Bae said, and then after a moment realized that all the names of the stagegirls were listed at the dormitory entrance so it didn’t necessarily mean these three were stalking her. “or my full name which- uh, well, i guess you can just call me by nickname-.” but wait, if they read her name from the dormitory listings wouldn't they know to call her 'Baelz'-
The tall one bowed. “Miss Hakos.”
The three of them turned away, presumably to go annoy the other stagegirls. “Let us know if you need anything,” the sleepy one called over her shoulder.
“‘Anything’? Like, what's that mean?"
And then, in a very coordinated manner which made Bae wonder if these three maybe actually did have choreography practice- the three fans turned on their heels and surrounded her.
“Oh, you know, like, anything!” the gaunt one said. She waved an imaginary panorama in the air in front of her.
“Anything that you could reasonably expect people like us to provide or procure for you,” the tall one said. She clicked her mouth and shot a finger gun at Bae.
Bae looked confused, but the sleepy one seemed to notice. “Any history or direction information, or any errands out of the opera house, we can probably help with.”
“Possibly security detail,” the tall one said.
The gaunt one nodded five times. “And especially- gossip!” The other two shot her a look.
Gossip, huh?
“Actually, uh,” Bae rubbed the back of her head and thought for one last moment whether or not she should ask this- “Its there like, some kind of…mysterious night singer in the dorm sections? Maybe one of the prima donnas?”
But if it was one of the prima donnas that might be considered a breach of decorum, and besides, the voice from the previous night didn’t sound like any of the opera houses’ current solo artists, and Bae had heard all her cohorts sing and none of them had that particular timbre-
The three not-quite-stagehands glanced at each other, sequentially, over the course of four seconds.
“Oh,” the excited one began. “Well actua- ”
“Nyoooo~” The tall one said. She leaned over to grab onto her compatriot’s mouth to keep her from speaking.
“Mhmmm hmmm hmmmhoh,” The excited one continued.
“Well,“ The sleepy one said to her friends, as she gestured towards Bae, “She’ll find out eventually.”
“But it doesn't have to be today, on her second day,” the tall one said.
“I’ve actually been here off and on over the past month,” Bae corrected.
The excited one waved her arms like a muppet, still being restrained and gagged by her friend. “mhhrmm mhmh mrh mphrh mhhmm!”
The short one freed her friend.
The gaunt one gestured in the exact same manner as she had a moment before. “Sounds like the Opera Ghost!”
Bae blinked. “Opera…Ghost?”
“It's probably not a literal ghost,” said the sleepy one. "Probably."
“Or maybe it’s the ghost of the founder of the opera house, who died tragically on the night of the opening performance, forever haunting the halls~!” said the gaunt one.
“I’m pretty sure King Napoleon III is still alive, and also a man,” said the sleepy one.
“Well, either way, she appears to live in the walls of the opera house~” the tall one said, “Spooky!”
“The walls are wide enough to live in?” Bae tilted her head to the side.
“Some of them,” The sleepy one said.
Huh. Bae wondered which walls would be that thick, and how a theoretical wall-dwelling being could manage to hollow them out without anyone knowing.
“Some say she was born out of the spirit of music, so impressed by this monument to the performing arts it spontaneously produced a guardian spirit of the night!” the tall one said.
“Some say she appears to young stagegirls to bless the worthy with a heavenly singing voice!”
That sounded nice.
“Some say she’s a trick by the theatre owners to drive up ticket prices,” the sleepy one said.
“And some say she once killed a man, just to watch him die!” the gaunt one said.
Bae flinched. “Wait, what?”
“Yeah, that’s not true,” The tall one said, she turned to the sleepy one-
“It wasn’t just a single man,” the sleepy one replied. She and the tall one started chuckling.
“Wait- so, there's proof, of this ghost?” Bae was just now considering that maybe she hallucinated the whole experience, but luckily that didn’t seem to be the case if there were long-term stories about this mysterious night singer-
“Welll….” the sleepy one shrugged in slow motion. “There’s definitely something going on. But hey, maybe the murders were just random circumstance: The city is pretty big so even if the crime rate is low then there’s bound to be a few of them, around the opera house.”
The tall one nodded. “And you probably know this, but the theater will occasionally get fancy props, original musical scores, and sometimes full-on plays from a mysterious benefactor. That could just be a donor who wants to keep their identity hidden but it could also be the generosity of some kind of divine angel of music! Spicy!”
“And there’s singing in the walls, sometimes, at night,” the gaunt one said, “so don’t worry, you’re not crazy.”
“It’s probably best to ignore it, though,” the sleepy one said.
Bae scrunched her mouth to the side and nodded, but she didn't say anything.
Bae spent the next night trying to find that angel of music again.
She waited in her dorm room, trying to nap to be rested for the night, until it was completely dark out and the bustle from the common room had died down, and then Bae snuck out of her dorm room, as quietly as she could.
Tonight, there was no singing, not that she could hear.
Bae did her best to trace back her steps to find the circular room at the edge of the building she had wandered to the previous night, and on the third or so try she felt like she was at the right place.
And there was still no music.
Bae fell asleep on the marble floor.
And suddenly, Bae woke up, feeling as if something had hit her in the stomach-
Bae looked around, and saw that she was still alone. It was also still dark, but it would probably be good to get back to the dorms-
Bae managed to remember the way back on the first try- and when she got to the common room she saw the big clock on the far wall said it’d almost be time to wake up-
And the night after that, Bae brought her blanket, to the circular room at the edge of the building, and opted to take a seat on a bench at the edge of the room. It wasn’t quite as central as Bae would have liked but hey, it was a place to sit.
Bae waited for the night, before wrapping herself in the blanket and falling asleep.
And Bae awoke, and reflexively tugged her blanket over her shoulders to try to reclaim the sensation of sleep-
Before she realized that it was actually morning now, and she’d have to try to sneak into her dorms when there were people awake- possibly through the window? Possibly by waiting for everyone to finish breakfast so she could pretend to be really late-
And Bae jumped up and tucked her blanket under her left armpit so she could grab her pillow with her right-
And she saw that the pillow was an unfamiliar violet color. Because she didn’t bring it with her. It actually looked like one of the theatre seats, from the fancy boxes in the balcony.
Bae looked around, and saw that she was still alone.
And the night after that, well, Bae was feeling a little fed up.
After it was fully dark, Bae made her way to the circular room at the edge of the building and marched right into the center and put her fists on her hips.
“I know you’re there!” Bae yelled. The sound almost made herself flinch because she had been acclimated to the quiet.
Her statement wasn’t, strictly speaking, true, but if there really was nobody there, then nobody would be around to see her mistake-
And there was a soft crash from somewhere in the walls-
“Aha!” Bae said. She pointed at where she thought the crash had happened and she willed her four ears to focus harder.
“ Look, i don’t know why you’re shy, you have an amazing voice,” Bae said.
And then, Bae heard the sound of running. The sound of running getting steadily further away-
“Wait!” Bae started running too. “C’mon, we had a whole conversation three nights ago! And you shouldn’t stop singing just because of me-”
She tried her best to run after where the sounds in the hall were coming from
And she rushed through the corridors of her slightly less unfamiliar new home-
And then Bae tripped, on something-
And she crashed into a set of metal armor adorning the hallways-
“AHHH” bae called out as she grabbed her left hand-
There was the feeling of wetness, amid the pain-
And Bae blinked, in the night- to see there was a large line of something dark along her left palm-
Ad it hurt a lot-
“Owwwww,” Bae whimpered, reflexively, and she held her hand to try to stop the bleeding.
This was so stupid- ow- like, how come she hadn’t figured out the layout of the opera house yet? And why was she staring at the ceiling as she ran? Was she expecting the ghost to be
Bae clutched her hand to her stomach, trying to wrap it in her nightdress. That’d be another thing she’d have to hide from her fellow performers and the dorm mother-
And suddenly, Bae heard a creek, from somewhere nearby.
And Bae heard some very deliberate footsteps, echoing along the marble floor-
And eventually the footsteps stopped, and Bae looked up
And she saw shoes with short stiletto heels-
And Bae squinted up into the form of the opera ghost- a moderately tall woman, in some kind of half-face mask with horns on it, wearing a cloak-
Who kneeled down, in front of her, and held out her hand.
“Give me your hand,” said the mysterious voice. Though, Bae supposed,
Bae held back her sob as she held her hand out-
And a gentle hand held Bae’s injured limb, as the mysterious figure wiped away the blood with a handkerchief- it stung a little-
And Bae gazed into the figure's face, as her night vision slowly sharpened. Her hand suddenly didn't hurt anymore.
The opera ghost definitely appeared to be a person. Her touch was warm, and gentle, and her Human, or demihuman, though Bae didn’t notice any animal ears or tail- and she had long, cascading violet hair running down her back.
And she had two separate colored eyes. It was a little hard to see that, because of the mask,
Bae felt the tears on her cheeks dry, as the opera ghost tied off the bandage around Bae’s hand.
And the ghost made eye contact, for a second, before looking away (And possibly blushing, but Bae couldn’t be sure in the dark)-
“Thank you,” Bae said, softly,
The opera ghost nodded, silently. Bae thought she might have been smiling, slightly, with her mouth closed, but Bae couldn't’ be sure in the dark-
Bae then grinned as cheekily as she could. “So! Was I cool and mysterious there~”
And the opera Ghost lightly grabbed at Bae’s head, for a second. Bae squeaked in laughter, and the Ghost was smiling when she pulled her hand away.
“You should get back to your dorm room,” the ghost said. She stood up and started walking away-
“Wait!” Bae called out. She reached out with her bandaged hand, reflexively- “I didn’t hear you sing yet.”
And the ghost paused. She turned back towards Bae.
“Close your eyes.” the ghost instructed.
Bae blinked, a few times, just staring at the opera ghost-
And then Bae obliged. She shut her eyes and focused on what her ears were telling her-
There was no sound for a couple of seconds and Bae was about to open her mouth to complain that she had been tricked -
And then the ghost started singing, that same song Bae heard her first night- and without the walls in the way, the song was even more beautiful. (And Bae noticed that the sound was slowly receding into the night, but she wasn’t in any shape to chase after the ghost, especially just after injuring herself while trying to do that)
And by the time the song hit its climax, Bae started crying, again, but this time in happiness.
And then the final note of the song resolved into nothing, in the still nighttime air.
And Bae opened her eyes, and there appeared to be nobody in the halls with her.
…”Thank you,” Bae whispered.
It was almost the end of scheduled training activities for the day. A good 8 or so hours of singing, dancing, and acting practice, in the various rehearsal studios around the opera house.
Right now, Bae was in the corner of one of the classrooms- sitting at a desk next to a window that looked out into the awnings of the urban Paris avenues and the bustle that inhabited them on an early weekday afternoon. Bae was looking over her music notes. Her hand was fine, and she’d told everyone who asked about the bandages that she’d accidentally cut it on one of the decorations (which was entirely true), and nobody asked any follow-up questions.
Bae frowned at her notes. Like, dang, was she supposed to be able to read sheet music? Like, she knew they told her she didn’t- and most of the new stagegirls weren’t proficient in all of singing, dancing, and acting- and the secondary skills of music composition, memory, elocution, and spatial awareness that wasn’t technically required but usually helped and possibly was inevitable to learn in the process of pursuing the primary skills.
And as the day ended and the structure of their practice became less rigid, Bae drifted away from the other stagegirls.
And while her cohorts took the time to read or practice more, or briefly go into town, Bae took the opportunity to get a head start on sneaking out that night, by ‘getting lost’ on the way back to the dorms, even though by now she knew the layout of at least that particular part of the opera house by heart.
She made her way to the circular room and settled in for the night.
She had the script for the opening play the beginning unit was set to perform at in the next couple months, to look over. Bae opened the pages to try to read it through a few more times, as the twilight faded to night.
“Bluh,” Bae said, and she made a face. They’d already gone over it once, today. And the parts she’d probably need help with were the chorus, not the actual performances. And it wasn’t like she’d get picked to be the lead anyway….
And Bae found herself daydreaming, about, possibly, someday, heading a performance of some sort….
“Hello there,” a soft motherly voice said, from beside her.
Bae figured it was fortuitous that she had her homework in her lap, at that moment, to help with the illusion that she was actually doing work. When she flinched, it almost didn’t go flying onto the floor.
“Oh! H-hi, Madam Ceres!” Bae sat up straight and nodded at the head choreographer and dorm mother? Bae wasn’t exactly sure how independent the stagegirls were supposed to be, and how much that ended up actually being in practice.
“You look a little lost, Miss Hakos,” Ceres said. She was a taller demihuman, with green hair and antlers, and she shone a lantern into the room, even though it wasn’t fully night yet.
“I um.” Bae said. “Yes, that, is why I'm here.”
“Were you searching for something?” Ceres said, as she approached. Her smile intensified.
Well, interesting story. “Um, not- not really,” Bae said. It wasn’t technically a lie, since even though she couldn’t search for the Opera Ghost directly she knew exactly where to be to find the Ghost.
And Madam Ceres wrapped both her arms (though with care that the lantern didn’t bump against Bae’s head) around Bae, in a hug, briefly, for three seconds, before releasing her.
“So you don’t mind if I escort you back to the dorms?” Ceres said.
And during the slow walk through three hallways to the common area. Ceres led the way with her lantern and Bae followed three paces behind her.
“The theater is a home to many,“ Madam Ceres said, with her back to Bae.
Bat looked up into the older woman’s head. She wondered if she was expected to say something--
Madam Ceres glanced at her, once, briefly, and smiled, before turning back to the hallways. "And sometimes a home is a shelter. You know what a shelter is?”
Bae blinked. “Umm. I assume you mean, that a shelter specifically is something that protects people?”
“Yes,” Ceres said, “And sometimes the people the theatre shelters are those who ask for it. Like you, and your stagegirl cohorts.”
Well, even though Bae did want to be a performer, she hadn’t exactly been swimming in options.
“And sometimes the people who find themselves in a shelter,” Madam Ceres continued. “Are the people who have no other place to go.”
Bae nodded. Did Ceres mean her? Or possibly, herself-
“The world can be very unkind, and unforgiving,” Madam Ceres continued, “It can break people, in visible and invisible ways. And those broken by the world, sometimes, are the kind of people who will pass that destruction onto others.”
Ah. Bae didn’t remember anything about being broken or passing destruction on to others, so did Madam Ceres mean herself? Or possibly this was just an abstract philosophical debate-
“And thus sometimes a shelter is as much for those outside it as those in it,” Ceres concluded.
“I…see…” Bae lied.
And then they were back at Bae’s dorm.
Madam Ceres opened the door, and as Bae made to step into her dorm, Madam Ceres wrapped her arms around Bae, briefly, for three seconds, before releasing her.
But during the release of the hug, Madam Ceres gently took Bae’s bandaged hand into her own.
Ceres ran her thumb along the lines of the bandages, and she looked up into Bae’s eyes.
“O-oh, that’s, because,” Bae said, “I, tripped?” That was literally true.
"Don't worry,” Madam Ceres said. She released Bae’s hand and she started closing the door. “if you follow the rules, you will be safe.”
“So what are you saying happens, if I don’t?” Bae said.
Ceres chuckled, under her finger tips. “You do seem to be very direct.”
“Is, there a reason not to be?” Bae said.
“I’m sure you’ll eventually discover,” Madam Ceres said, “That subtlety is just the way things have to be.”
“Oh,” Bae nodded along. “Why?”
And Ceres took a deep breath. “I wonder that too, sometimes.”
Bae frowned. “That doesn't’ answer my question-”
“I'm sure it doesn’t.” Madam Ceres said. She smiled as she closed the door.
Bae inhaled and walked over to her bed and flopped down face first onto her bed.
So, Madam Ceres definitely knew.
Buuuut, if she wasn’t directly going to confirm things, then Bae was in the clear, right?
And hey, maybe she didn’t actually know; Bae didn’t know if she knew her like, employed, dormitory caretaker, to be able to confidently judge whether or not that was a warning or not…
Besides, some of the other stage girls were sneaking out to do much more scandalous things than just meet with someone who was possibly just an eccentric donor, or possibly a hobo squatting in the walls. (but also possibly a murderer, which, Bae supposed, was more on the scandalous side of things). Bae was just going to see where this whole thingy went, especially if nobody was going to say anything.
Bae waited a little longer than normal to sneak out into the night, with her blanket in her hand. She opened her dorm door as quietly as she could, as slightly as she could, and squeezed her body through before closing the door after her. She wandered, barefoot, back into the hallways again, down three hallways to get to the circular room at the edge of the building.
That area of the opera that seemed unnecessarily large that was used for like, storage, or foundational support? Maybe she should look up the history of the place she lived in, sometime…
And she closed her eyes and focused on her hearing to see if she could hear any rustling- the southbound wall seemed to be where she tended to hear the Ghost from.
Bae opened her eyes to look around to confirm that she was, indeed, alone, by all appearances.
“So are you going to make me jump through hoops again, or can we just talk?” Bae said to the empty room.
There was a sigh, but also maybe a chuckle, from somewhere at the south part of the room.
“You really shouldn’t be here,” said the Opera Ghost from somewhere in the walls.
Bae took a breath and steeled her nerves.
“C’mooonnn, we’ve had a lot of fun, haven’t we? And I already know what you look like, so you don’t have to hide in the walls, or,” Bae squinted in the darkness, “ceiling? Wherever you are…”
“Well then you can be satisfied with that look,” the Ghost said.
“What if I don’t remember it?” Bae said,
“Then that’s too bad,” The Ghost said, “Though I am a little sad that I'm not more memorable to you.”
“Oh, so now you want me to care about what you look like?”
The Ghost was silent for a moment.
“Alright, you got me,” the Ghost said. “It’s really, not a good idea to be seen, and it really is a good thing if you don’t remember. I rescind my sadness-”
“But you’ve already shown yourself to me,” Bae put her hands on her hips.
“…that was a mistake,” said the Ghost.
Bae felt a sudden crush in her heart. “A … mistake?” then she balled her fists- including the bandaged hand. and pouted, ”you mean you should have just let me bleed out…?”
“No I mean, I should have just alerted a night guard or something,” the phantom said.
“We have night guards?”
“Outside the premises,” The Opera Ghost said, “They are too afraid to be inside here, at night.”
“Afraid of you, you mean?” Bae said.
And despite the host still being in the walls, Bae could envision the Ghost’s soft close-mouthed smirk. “Maybe.”
“So,” Bae said. She inhaled and tried to think.
“Well, what… if i just, come here, every so often,” possibly every day, “To hear you sing?”
“I think that is,” the Opera Ghost said, “something I don’t really have control over, do I? You are perfectly free to enjoy my singing whenever you hear it.”
But the walls really did muffle the sound.
The Opera Ghost cleared her throat. “I can also see about trying to get you one of those new phonograph recordings of the song-”
“No!" Bae said, reflexively. “I - I mean, that, could be cool, but- “ C’mon, brain, think- “What, if I want to hear it live?
“Well, you can always just learn the song yourself and sing it.” the Ghost said, “I mean, technically, you are a professional singer, now.”
“But not as good as you,” Bae said.
“Well, not with that attitude, you won’t be.”
“Well, how about, you,” Bae said, “Teach me how to sing?”
Actually- yeah! And that would also mean Bae would have an excuse to have to see the Opera Ghost now-
“Wait, what?” Said the Opera Ghost, “Don’t you have singing teachers? Like, provided for you, by the opera house?”
“I mean, they’re not as good as you,” Bae said.
The Ghost laughed, wryly, awkwardly. “I mean, they are bound to be, because I don’t know how to sing.”
“Lies. I hear you all the time."
“No I mean,” The Opera Ghost made a sort of noncommittal sound, “I can sing, but I don’t know how to sing. I just did it every day and eventually people started saying it sounded good.”
Bae blinked. “‘People?’ So I’m not the only one?”
“Ooh no no no,” the Opera Ghost said, quickly, “I overhear what people say about the Opera Ghost, you know.”
“Well,” Bae said, “How about you, show me what you did to get good, and then I’ll do that?”
“Okay,” the Opera Ghost said, “Live in the walls, don’t have other obligations, and sing all the time,”
“Aha! So you don’t have other things to do!” Bae pointed at the walls. “So you can teach me!”
“I said I don’t have any other obligations, not that I didn’t have other things to do-”
“But not things you’re obligated to do,” Bae said. “So you have the time to teach me, if you just move your schedule around."
“I-....” the Ghost began, but didn’t finish-
“C’moooonnnn,” Bae said, “I really do need some singing practice….”
“Then you should bring that up to the theatre. They can find you a teacher.”
“But-,” Bae said, “You sing so beautifully~”
“Thanks, but that doesn't change the fact that I don't know how to teach someone how to sing,” the Opera Ghost said. “Like, what makes singing good? And how do you control the parts that go into making that?”
“Oh!” Bae said, “I can tell you the answer to that first part- good singing is when people like what they hear, and how it sounds!”
The Opera Ghost sighed a big, long sigh that Bae could hear even through the walls.
“So, you’re halfway there, if you can just figure out the second part, then you're set!"
“But I don’t have to,” said the Ghost, “Because I'm not a teacher.”
“Well,” Bae folded her arms. “If you were really passionate about singing you’d take this opportunity to deconstruct your craft, in a manner where an outside observer can verify your findings.”
The Opera Ghost didn’t say anything.
“And then to be sure you understand what it is, you have to be able to explain it to someone else, which is what a student is for- and!” Bae pontificated, excitedly, “And if the student is also able to recreate the effects, that means you’ve provenly tested your framework!”
The Opera Ghost emitted some pained laughs, three times. “You’re really not giving up, are you?”
Bae closed her eyes and put her fist on her collarbone and grinned. “I’m told I'm very tenacious.”
“Alright, fine,” the opera Ghost said, “I will, endeavor to come up with some kind of lesson plan.”
“Oh, but I can’t hear you very well in the walls,” Bae said.
“You’ve heard me well enough so far, haven’t you?”
“That was before I heard you sing uninhibited,” Bae said. “Now I realize all the parts I’m missing.”
“.... I’m going to keep finding reasons to regret that night, aren’t I?”
Bae frowned, but didn’t let her heart fall for long. “I mean, only if you have that attitude about it-”
“Argh! You….”
Bae laughed. “See, if you were here in front of me, you could bonk my head again. So you really should just get outside more often.”
The Ghost sighed. “I don’t know if I want to regularly leave the walls…”
“Okay, then show me where all these secret entrances into this hidden wall network are,” Bae said, “I’ll meet you there.”
And there was another pause.
“Alright, if i come out- IF- it has to be in a way where you don’t see me-”
“And you see me, all the time,” Bae said. She looked around the walls. “From, wherever you are…”
“Do you not want to be seen?” the Ghost said, tentatively.
“Do I not want to be spied on?” Well, the answer to that was complicated, but Bae let the question hang in the air.
“I don’t actually spy on the performers or anything,” the Opera Ghost said, “I just pay attention when someone’s out at night.”
“Liar.” Bae folded her arms. “You said you hear when people talk about how good you sing.”
“I mean, yeah, during performances, and dress rehearsals, and secondhand when,” the Opera Ghost said, ”doing other stuff-”
“Secondhand?” Bae tilted her head to the side, “So you, talk to people…?”
“Look, you’re always getting me to tell you things I don’t want to tell people,” The Opera Ghost said, “So it's going to be blind lessons or nothing, and for the record i’ve never spied on you outside of your nighttime walks, and I’ll even stop doing that from now on-”
“But I'm totally fine with it!” Bae said. She looked around the empty hallway, “And i am totally, 100%, absolutely fine with you seeing me, all the time.”
The Opera Ghost cleared her throat. “Cool. Doesn’t change how I feel about being seen.”
“But I’ve already seen you-”
“Alright, this isn't going anywhere,” the Opera Ghost said. Bae heard the result of motion from the walls-
“Wait!” Bae reflexively reached out. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry- I’d still love some singing lessons, even if I don't see you.”
And there was a stretch of silence.
Bae gulped. She focused on where she heard the Ghost last, to see if she was going to speak.
Or if maybe the ghost was going to just leave now-
And then there was the sound of movement from the walls-
And Bae choked down a latent sense of panic, and she ripped a piece of her nightdress off, at the hem.
“Wait, what are you doing-”
And Bae tied it around her eyes, as a makeshift blindfold.
“There- see?” Bae said- and the Ghost had to do the seeing now, haa haa! “It’s not like my night vision is all that good anyway, but, here you go, I literally can’t peep on you now.”
“I,” the Ghost said, from the walls, “Actually meant like, we'd find a room where I could put up a divider somewhere and we could talk between it.”
“Noooooo,” Bae whined, “that’s just going to muffle the soooouuundss~”
“Okay, fine,” the Ghost said.
And without having to strain her eyes, Bae could focus on the direction of the noises. There was rustling, and then a creak of what she assumed was a hinge, and then, footsteps- The unique clunk of stiletto heels making contact with the ground almost at the same time as the ball of a foot.
Bae turned her body to the source of the noise. Her ears twitched, and for some reason her heart beat started getting loud enough to interfere with her hearing.
The footsteps stopped, briefly, before resuming; plodding at a deliberate, luxurious pace.
Bae gulped, slightly, as she heard the Opera Ghost get immediately in front of her, and her heart grew louder and the chill of the nighttime air grew sharper-
And then the pacing continued, in a slow circle around where Bae stood. Bae turned her head to follow the source of the sound until it strained her neck too much. Bae’s heart was a consistent, steady trot in her throat and in her ears,
“Okay, so, uh,” Bae said, “I thought that this was like, ‘you feeling self-conscious thing’, not a ‘you wanting to be able to look me all over’ thing.”
“Oh~?” The Ghost said, “I thought you said you were ‘totally, 100%, absolutely fine with me seeing you, all the time’?”
Bae puffed out her cheek.
“But of course, if you changed your mind, you just have to tell me…..” the Ghost said. Bae could imagine her smirk.
Bae folded her arms. “Well, jokes on you, because this is totally fine for me.”
“Oh, but I wasn’t joking.” And Bae heard the Opera Ghost pace in a slow circle, around her, the footsteps echoing through the nighttime air.
And then Bae swallowed her heartbeat again. “So um,” Bae said, “Maybe you can begin the lesson with a demonstration?”
"Was this just an excuse to hear me sing again?” The Ghost said.
“W-what-” Bae managed to say, “no~”
“I mean, I really am flattered-” the Ghost said. And Bae heard the Ghost inhale sharply, "I’m blushing, really; its a little change of pace for me to have a fan-”
And that sounded so cute, and Bae's hand reached for her blindfold-
And suddenly a partially gloved hand grabbed Bae's left wrist-
“Ah!” Bae squealed. She grabbed at where she assumed the wrist of the hand was, and missed, and then just started blindly flailing in front of her- “Don’t grab me!”
“Don’t take off your blindfold!”
“But I've already seen you-”
“It's the principle of the thing-”
And suddenly Bae’s free hand impacted something that felt like a face, and her left hand got pulled forward and Bae bodily collided with the Opera Ghost-
And in a jumble of a crash, Bae found herself laying down on something soft, but also tense. She squeaked when she realized what it was-
The Ghost was still grabbing Bae’s left hand. Bae moved that hand and the Ghost’s grip loosened.
Bae pulled her hand away from the blindfold, to show that she wasn't going to try to take it off anymore. (though, idly, she wondered how fast she could free her eyes with her other hand, but ultimately decided against it.)
And the body below her relaxed, and Bae let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding. The Opera Ghost smelled like lilacs, and just a little bit of dust.
And Bae felt a warm touch against her brow lightly pat her head, and stroke her hair aside.
Bae let out some kind of noise as she shuddered. She reflexively clutched whatever part of the Ghost’s cloak was under her hand.
And the Ghost continued with the motion of her hand, past Bae’s brow, up to the the top of her head, up to her murine ears-
Bae’s ears flattened, but she leaned into the hand, as much as she could.
Bae didn’t know how long they just, lay there, together, in the night. The air didn’t seem as cold, now, and even the cut on her hand didn't ache anymore.
And eventually the silence broke.
“So, uh-” the Opera Ghost began-
“What’s your name?” Bae said.
“Oh. Um.” The Ghost cleared her throat. “I- I guess, people don’t really call me anything besides ‘The Phantom.’.”
“Wait what?” Bae said, “I’ve only heard ‘Opera Ghost’- ”
“Ah,” The Phantom said. And she chuckled a little. “I guess that comes from being so mysterious~~~”
“Look, if you don’t want to tell me your name that’s fine,” Bae folded her arms and pouted. “I’ll just start referring to you as ‘Butthead’ from now on-”
And Butthead grabbed at Bae’s head for a second. Bae squeaked in laugher.
“You can call me Irys.”
“Baelz Hakos,” Bae said in return. “Or, um, ‘Bae’, if you want, since everyone else calls me that.”
The Opera Ghost put her hands on Bae’s shoulders, to help the blindfolded woman to her feet.
“So, Baelz,” Bae heard Irys say, “should we begin your first singing lesson?”
-OOO-
Darkness, under the opera house: The Phantom was of three minds.
Irys sat in a candlelit spotlight, elbows on knees, mask in hand. Chair, stolen middle of a section of the sewers, on a chair stolen from the theater props, with her elbows on her knees and her mask in her hands. She stared at it, somberly.
“I think I like her.” Irys thought, aloud.
Oh, you ‘think’? So you haven't decided? The superego, a mind concerned with long term planning, with the veneer of rationality.
you definitely like her… is what you mean The almost-reptilian hindbrain; the thing that seeks out satiation.
You know you can’t like a surfacer.
we’re allowed to like things
We’re not allowed to act upon liking, specifically, a stagegirl of the opera house we currently live under, and are likely to see all the time.
“I think it's actually pretty convenient, though,” Irys said to her mask, “Like, I don’t even have to risk going out into the city for real to see her.”
That’s assuming that any relationship is owed to us at all.
nothing is owed to us but what we take.... so why not see where this goes?
“Yeah,” Irys thought, aloud, again, “I want to see where this goes. I think.”
Irys stared into the mask in her hands as she tried not to dwell too much on how warm Bae felt…
What, specifically, do you like about her? Can you get what you’re expecting from this ill-conceived endeavor from someplace that is less liable to end in disaster?
she is very soft. very cute. tender, small, novel
“A-and funny,” Irys added. “And, interesting. Um.”
Irys took two deep breaths before she stood up and affixed her mask back to her face. “I guess further exploration of, whatever this is, is required. And besides, what is living if you don’t get to indulge a little?”
Well. It‘s our funeral.
maybe some things are worth burning for