Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Contrary to popular belief, members of The Horde were not strangers to the realm of fiction. 

They’d all been raised on horror stories and cautionary tales meant to teach good morals since they were toddlers - don’t go to The Whispering Woods, obey figures of authority, cooperate with others but watch your back, there is always someone out to get you… Alright, admittedly not all of them were the best morals to teach children. 

They whispered about The Headless Princess in their bunks when they were supposed to be asleep, or steadfastly refused to go down a certain corridor alone for fear of running into Friendless Francesca, who would interpret someone being solo as being friendless and would then drag them to the ghostly realm to be her friend.

And of course they had books and access to stories - literacy was important, and a good fiction was necessary for the mind. Reading nothing but technical manuals or textbooks made people burn out and made them careless.

But plays? Musicals?

Didn’t happen.

So Adora had a little bit of catching up to do when Glimmer and Bow excitedly showed her the VIP tickets they’d all received for a musical performance of The Phantom. 

And then, on the night of, she ran through it again, to be sure she’d gotten everything.

“So it’s a play?” Adora asked, looking at the strip of paper in her hands. “Like the dinner theater Netossa and Spinnerella had?”

“Yeah, a lot like that, but it’s longer and we don’t have chicken and potatoes in front of us, we have caramel corn.”

“And it’s specifically a musical. There’s going to be singing.”

“Do they sing the entire time?”

“You’re thinking of an opera,” Bow pointed out helpfully. 

“It’ll be fun, babe,” Glimmer promised, leaning on her vanity and applying some lip gloss. “And I’ve heard of this show, it’s a good one - see, there’s this theater-”

“A theater performance about a theater…”

“Yes, but just wait - so there’s a theater, and the owner’s daughter is the star of every show, she has the best singing voice in the world, so she’s famous. And living under the theater is The Phantom, who’s like a musical genius but his face is horrifically scarred so nobody wants to watch him, and he wears this cool mask to hide it, and one day he hears the daughter, Esmeralda, singing and-”

“Whoa, Glimmer!” Bow suddenly cried in horror, slapping his hands over Adora’s ears. “Spoilers! She’s going in completely blind, remember?!”

“Oh, crap, that’s right - okay but you’re gonna love it, it’s got drama! Romance! Great songs! Jealousy! A love triangle-”

“Spoilers!”

“It’s not a spoiler if it’s obvious from the poster, Bow…”

“Oh, sick, perfect seats,” Catra commented as the entire group walked down the row.

Adora didn’t know entirely what that meant, but they did have a perfect view of the stage.

“Do you know anything about this show?” she asked Mermista, who settled herself next to her.

“I’ve seen it a few times,” came the dry response as she checked her playbill. “And had to listen to Sea Hawk rehearse.”

“Oh, no way, Sea Hawk’s in this?!” Catra blurted out. She must have checked her own playbill because the next thing Adora heard was “Wait, who’s Raul?”

“Watch and you’ll find out,” came six different voices, under which Glimmer’s “Ezzy’s first boyfriend” was barely audible.

Directly behind her, Adora felt Perfuma lean in. “Is this your first play?” she whispered. 

“Yeah.”

“Scorpia’s too - I’m so excited for you guys, you’re going to love this!”

Adora wanted to say something further, but at that moment the lights began to go out (she spotted Chanti quickly flipping a hood over her hair), the orchestra swelled, and the curtain rose.

And for the next hour and a half, Adora was absorbed.

“So, wait, is it over? But what about-?”

“It’s intermission, Adora. So you can use the bathroom, stretch your legs, get a refill on drinks-”

“I’m gonna go find the bar.”

“Bring me back something sweet, Mermista!”

The curtain dropped. The lights came back on. The audience stood up and began to slowly trickle out of the theater. A few people yawned due to the late hour, but most of them were talking about the show.

(Mermista was doing her best to ignore how Netossa was lightly ribbing her due to the fact Sea Hawk had blown a kiss in her direction during curtain call.)

And Adora…

Adora stayed in her seat, elbows on her knees and face in her hands. While Bow and Glimmer sat on either side of her, rubbing her shoulders, she could be heard sniffling.

“Hey, is Adora okay?” Catra briefly asked.

“She’s good, she’s just, uh-”

“It’s just not faaiiir…” Adora sobbed behind her hands.

“Ah. The ending. You need me, or…?”

“No, we’ve got it, Catra.”

Catra looked like she wanted to stay, but in the end she just nodded and started moving. She’d check in later.

Glimmer smiled reassuringly, leaning in and angling her head to try and see Adora’s face. “Babe, you okay?”

“It just - They were supposed to be together!”

“Adora, The Phantom is a tragedy. Tragedies aren’t meant to be fair…” Bow looked up at Glimmer. 

“Remind me not to take you to see Romio and Julietta,” Glimmer tried to joke.

“What happens in that one?”

“I told you her first show should’ve been The Lindwyrm Prince.”

“Bow, that one’s not til next month-”

Adora sniffled and looked up. “What’s that one about…?”

“Well…”

(Adora received tickets for The Lindwyrm Prince a week later.

Attached was a note from Double Trouble, gleefully asking what exact part of their performance had made her cry.

She ignored that.)

Chapter Text

Adora’s next musical wasn’t actually seen on stage.

Two weeks before she was to see The Lindwyrm Prince, she was visiting Dryl - there wasn’t a particular reason, but the Princesses had long ago agreed, regular communication and visits were vital in keeping strong alliances. There was no reason to stop visiting one another just because the war had ended.

Entrapta had cheerfully greeted Adora when she found her way in - “Don’t mind the mess!” she said from somewhere above. “Something got caught up in here and I’m trying to fix it, just watch your head!” As if on cue, a small (very dusty, very bent) gear fell from the ceiling. “How long was that up here?” Entrapta muttered.

But her quieter muttering was barely audible under a different sound, one Adora wasn’t used to hearing in Dryl.

From a nearby flat box, a song was playing. Adora’s ears pricked as she approached it, listening harder.

“I cannot believe what I am hearing… A great discovery is here…”

“Hey, Entrapta!” Adora called up. “What’s this?”

“What’s what?” Entrapta suddenly lowered herself from the ceiling, lifting her (very dirty) mask to check what Adora was talking about. “Ohhhh, my music player! Scorpia remembered how she used to talk while I worked, and we thought maybe background noise would be helpful. I honestly don’t notice any difference, but I do like to listen.”

“This sounds like a musical - there’s like, a story in here,” Adora responded. “It sounds like someone’s abou to do something bad?”

“I was once a dreamer, now I’m Man’s redeemer!”

“Oh, yeah!” A lock of purple hair reached out and tapped a button on the player, pausing the music. “That’s the Victor’s Monster soundtrack - Double Trouble gave it to me. I dunno how they knew it was the only musical I’ve ever seen.”

“Victor’s Monster? What’s that one about?”

“Ohhhh, it’s so interesting! There’s a scientist named Victor, and he’s got a lot of theories, about life and death and what makes a soul - and he’s not content with making bots! He doesn’t want to make an Emily - he wants to make his own human!”

“...so a clone?” Adora frowned. If this Victor wanted to perform a scientific breakthrough, he was very late.

“Nooooope. Bigger. He wants to take pre-existing body parts, sew them all together to form a brand-new body, and make it sapient and conscious! Without any cloning technology! And even more incredibly, he succeeds!” A shudder visibly ran through Entrapta, from her feet to the top of her head. “But he’s not a very good scientist - he’s afraid of what he’s created, and he thinks it’s a failure because it wasn’t what he wanted. So he tries to avoid responsibility, not by destroying his creation but by avoiding it! But the monster is sapient, so he’s not happy about that, and chases him to the ends of the universe - but little by little, Victor starts to gain something of a God complex because even if he thinks he failed, he still created life without cloning tech. He’s made such progress, what else can he do? But he can only go so far before hubris catches up with him-”

Entrapta abruptly stopped herself, miming locking her lips and pocketing the key. She grinned, a finger over her mouth. “But I won’t ruin the ending! It’s such a great cautionary tale, reminding us we should only go so far!” 

Adora hummed, looking at the music player. “I… don’t suppose I could borrow it, could I?”

“Of course you can!” Entrapta removed the disc from the player and delicately placed it in the plastic sleeve before passing it to Adora. “Make sure you tell me what you thought - I’d love to talk about Victor with you!”

Glimmer found Adora late the next night, lying face-up in their bed, her eyes wide as the final notes of a soundtrack faded into silence.

“Glimmer… Glimmer,” Adora whispered. 

“Yyyyyyeah, Adora?”

“Protagonists can sometimes be assholes…”

Entrapta and Adora’s resulting conversation on Victor’s hubris, ego, and whether he deserved the Monster’s forgiveness was enthusiastically joined by Hordak and Kadroh, who had very strong feelings on the matter, and Imp, who didn’t know what was going on but was just happy to be there.

Chapter Text

“Wait, my friend! You’re one of us now. Musketeers never fight alone.”

Kyle sniffled loudly in the middle of the festival, staring up at the stage. Four people wearing color-coordinated outfits, feathery hats, and carrying prop swords were on one side of the stage, while standing off to the side of the audience was another man with a sword.

“D’Artagnon!” the man called again. “Face me!”

“You’re right, my friends! Let us fight together!”

“Kyle,” Lonnie whispered, nudging at his arm. “The play’s over. We missed the whole thing, let’s go.”

“Just a sec…”

“All for one! And one for all!”

Kyle sniffled again and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. “I don’t even know the context, but that’s just… They have each other’s backs, they care so much…”

“Kyle, they’ll put on another show in two hours, we can circle back,” Rogelio rumbled as the four actors leaped off the stage to pursue the challenging swordsman. “Scorpia needs her items, come on.”

“You think we can invite Scorpia to see this with us?”

“She’d cry as much as you are, but yeah, sure.”

Chapter Text

Adora was enjoying the theater.

And she knew that the actors all worked very hard. It wasn’t easy, going onstage in front of a crowd of hundreds and performing. And having to sing made it even more stressful, she was sure.

And of course any actor would want to hear how everyone liked their performance.

But this.

This, Adora decided, was getting really annoying.

She and Glimmer had watched The Lindwyrm Prince with Chanti, and the cast had left the theater to go to dinner an hour ago. As the titular character, Double Trouble should have been with the rest of the cast, celebrating.

But instead, they’d gone with the three ladies and was now sitting across from Adora, elbows on the table and wearing the biggest shit-eating grin she’d ever seen.

And Adora had grown up in the Fright Zone and then spent years with Glimmer and Frosta.  

“I’m not doing this.”

“No, go on, darling, tell me. I could hear you sniffling from your seat anyway, you mist as well.”

“Is that the reason you gave us front-row seats?” Glimmer’s hand thumped on the tabletop. 

“Part of it,” her cousin admitted.

“You ass.”

“Don’t fight, you two, please?” Chanti sighed, fiddling with the straw of her drink. 

“Who’s fighting? I just asked Adora a simple question and I want to hear what she has to say.” The smile grew wider. “I bet you didn’t even know I could sing, did you?”

Adora’s face burned as she bit her tongue to keep from answering: No, I didn’t. And I bought the soundtrack on our way in here. It’s going to be very weird connecting that voice and character to you.

She felt a nudge at her elbow and looked down. Glimmer had written something on a slip of paper: Wear headphones when you play that soundtrack.

Adora nodded minutely. Yeah, that last thing anyone in Bright Moon needed was Double Trouble hearing their own voice.