ready as we'll ever be

[tellthestory]

[The Balladeer is true to his word. So, before the dead's scheduled performance, still dressed in the outfit Salieri forced him to helped him choose, he takes his guitar and sneaks out to the garden one last time. He hasn't visited it yet today, and he always feels guilty when he doesn't manage. He told everyone he'd be here. Even if neither of them can hear each other, he intends to keep his promise.

So he's there to notice when the trees begin closing in. The Balladeer shoots to his feet. Oh, no. He knows this feeling.]

Everyone! Come out to the garden! Bring your stuff!

[He calls out aloud, but he can use that projection trick just as well as the Player - his voice is audible anywhere in the school.

When people arrive to join him, there will still be a path through the woods to lead them to the garden. He doesn't want to strain himself before the performance, but something as small as that shouldn't cause problems later. It's too important that everyone get out here - because when people arrive, they'll find that all of the living are visible. The Balladeer is watching them, but making no attempt to interact; he already knows how this is going to go. It isn't time for that yet. Still...]

It's the end.

[Have fun spectating the trial!]

Comments

[howtheworldwas]

No.

[ not her second chance; not her friends; not everything she has, all over again. he can't take it all away. he can't. ]

[violentenvies]

[oh--and Salieri's reaching out, grabbing onto her hand, holding on]

We won't let him--we won't let him, Eurydice, do you hear me? That bastard cannot have you.

[howtheworldwas]

[ she takes the hand, grips it tight -- probably too tight.

when she looks up at him, it's not with the closed-off, distant expression that means she's afraid. no, this time, she's angry. he's made this threat so many times before, in so many different ways, over the course of the week. this time, she's not accepting it. ]

He won't.

[violentenvies]

[Salieri grips her hand back just as tightly, anchoring, resolute]

He won't. [agreement, with a nod]

[themuseabandonsyou]

[ One more time, Orpheus holds Eurydice close and subtly puts himself between her and the Wizard. ]

I won't let him take this from us. I won't. We won't.

[ This place - has been awful, a nightmare, but it hasn't been unrelenting. Some of the times he's seen Eurydice at her happiest have been here, and even if they have to go home at the end of this to where they were left - her on the line in Hadestown and him on the surface - he won't let the Wizard steal those memories away from them. ]

[howtheworldwas]

We won't.

[ She thinks about their conversation, when they first arrived in this strange, red version of their school -- thinks about what she has now, the friends she's made, the person she's become. She's not nothing, not anymore. Some of those friends surround her now, others are just out of reach, but she knows they care. She knows they're with her.

There's Spongebob, her first friend, in their jacket; Benjamin, her fellow prisoner, the one person she never had to explain the line too; Peregrine, her sister and the smartest one here; Farrah, a girl who's gotten a second chance, too. Antonio, who has been her shoulder to lean upon and has leaned upon her alike; and Orpheus, always Orpheus, who loves her just as much as she loves him.

She's not going to give into despair. Not again, not this easily. ]

Fuck the Wizard.

[themuseabandonsyou]

Fuck the Wizard and fuck his plan. That isn't how the world should be.

[disharmonizes]

No is right. Not you, not her, not anyone here.

[ride or die mode is now active]

[howtheworldwas]

[ right back at you, Discord ]

He's going to regret ever suggesting that.