OVERTURE

[stagemanagers]

You wake up, and realize you don’t remember how you got here.

This bed is soft and warm, but it’s certainly not yours. And the room is unfamiliar - unless perhaps you’re an actor, seeing as it looks almost exactly like every dressing room in the world. It's not quite large enough to fit the bed and trunk comfortably alongside the vanity, but it what it lacks in open space, it makes up for in coziness. This could be something you’ve seen in a movie, or dreamed about experiencing one day. But whatever the case, you aren’t supposed to be here.

There’s a silver key resting on your vanity, along with a thin program booklet. The cover - where the name of the show would usually be - is blank, but if you flip through it, you’ll find some startlingly familiar information. Maybe a few familiar faces as well…

The hallway outside is narrow and poorly-lit, lined with star-studded doors. But if you make your way past them and out into the lobby, you’ll find something entirely different: an elegant, refined opera house. Crystal chandeliers glitter overhead, and the red carpet is perfect for putting on a show. A large clock on the northern wall marks the time, though with the windows shuttered and locked it's difficult to tell whether it's morning or night. There’s also some framed information pinned up that you might find helpful. If you explore further into the adjoining wings, in fact, you'll see there's an identical copy in every room.

There’s also two sets of double-doors in the lobby: one leading back the way you came, deeper into the Opera House, and one leading out. For the moment, neither of them will open.

It looks like you’re stuck. But hey - at least you aren’t alone.

Comments

[allicareabout]

[Good to see that today is off to a good start.

Not like he remembers last night all that well; can't remember a thing, if he's going to be honest. Last he recalls he was talking to that one guy determined to make sure his girl didn't swing, and then after that...nothing, really.

(I completely blacked out, I don't remember a thing - here's to you, Velma Kelly, you're a regular psychic.)

That isn't to say that Billy is going to be disheveled when he finally makes his appearance in the lobby - the lights and mirror are going to be put to decent use, there's no sense in doing otherwise, and he only pauses for the briefest of moments in the hallway, tilting his head at the star adorning his door, before jerking the paper down from where it's taped up under it. He folds it once, twice as he continues on, his pace brisk and the creases sharp and smart; he tucks it into the inside pocket of his suit eventually – let the stupid door read "The", for all he cares.

Anyway.

The lobby is...better, décor-wise...or at least it would be if it weren't for those rules adorning the walls. He doesn't seem disturbed by them, per se, for the time being he's just looking kind of unimpressed; he's got his playbill with him, it would just have been stupid to leave the room without it, but he doesn't seem too interested in reading it – he's holding it slightly open in his hand, fingers slipped inbetween the creasing as though to mark his place somewhere, but for the time being he's got his arms folded and he's tapping it agitatedly against his sleeve. It's pretty much the only tell he's got going that he might be displeased with all of this – his expression is still sitting solidly at an "eh, could be worse" – but it's there just the same.]

Yeah, all of that's real cute.

[Once he's tired of everything and everyone in here, however, he can be found in the east wing of the building – he's going to...disregard the laundry room for now because that is a lot of machinery and witchcraft happening in there, but the ballroom seems...pretty nice, all things considered. He won't be playing anything, but he can be found on the grand piano's bench, going over that program he's been keeping with him.

Some of these people are...interesting, he'll grant that much. Not exactly his usual company, not anyone he'd choose to join his usual company, but probably worth a second look just the same.]

[lifegoalsorwifegoals]

[In her efforts to look over all the names on the doors - so far just matching the ones in the playbill, disheartening - D-ne reaches room 6 and gently frowns.]

"The"...? [Furrows her brow. The post-it's gone now, so.] I don't think I understand?

[allicareabout]

If you're looking for answers, you're going to have to take it up with higher management.

[...Billy, holy shit, do we have to start out this way.]

I'm just as lost as you are, kid.

[lifegoalsorwifegoals]

Ah...

[I suppose we have to start out this way.]

I'm aware you probably know as much as me on the subject. It's just... Everyone else has at least two words written, so far that I've seen, but yours is only one. Weird.

[allicareabout]

We'll see if that's fixed eventually; maybe they'll be a little clearer next time.

[OR JUST...PUT THE SAME THING UP AGAIN WITH DUCT TAPE THIS TIME. Once more with feeling. Yes.]

So I'm going to take a wild guess and say you just woke up here too.

[lifegoalsorwifegoals]

That would be the best case, yes.

["Let's just cover his whole door in duct tape" - the management, probably.]

But, you are correct, I did. I was...trying to see if any of these names were ones I recognized, with little luck.

[littlegirl_littlecurl]

[Having skirted past the freakish and disturbing laundry room herself, Darla quickly swaps her agitated expression for a sweet smile when she spies him.

She makes her way toward him, a little bounce in her step.]

Hello, Mister!

[allicareabout]

[It's probably really fortunate that Billy's currently experiencing 1924 back home - and not, you know, about ten years past that, lest the first words out of his mouth be "Great, they've actually captured Shirley Temple."

As it stands, we are going to be spared the...that, in favor of him just flipping through the program a little more before he glances up at her.]

Right, the child star. Because that's exactly what a place like this needs - kids.

[...Okay, so that's really not any better than anything else he could have said, go ahead and sue. He's not good with kids.]

[littlegirl_littlecurl]

[That's just fine, she wouldn't get it anyway. The world doesn't need Shirley Temple when they have Darla Dimple.

'Just what this place needs', what's that supposed to mean anyhow?]

Well at least I am a star. All these other people ain't even famous.
[She points to the piano.]

You gonna play that?

[allicareabout]

Are you?

[The question's pretty much immediate; it's not agitated, just kind of out there.]

It depends on what you want to hear, if you want me doing it. Haven't played since law school was better at paying the bills.

[littlegirl_littlecurl]

[......]

"Yeah. Says so right there in your book."

[Look at her face. She’s offended. You offended her.]

"... You don't look like a lawyer."

rules

[rockthistown]

[After what Javert told her, Hime's hovering behind the rules, but doesn't actually have the nerve to go up and read them. Instead, she's just sort of... standing there.]

Um?

[allicareabout]

[...Hi, Hime.]

Bit of healthy sarcasm, honey, because it looks like reason's not going to get us anywhere.

[rockthistown]

Does it really say that someone's going to have to kill someone else?

[allicareabout]

Only if we want to bring "the show" to a close - whatever that is.

[rockthistown]

The program talked about actors pretending to be us. Maybe they're putting on something about us, but then why would they kidnap us?

Lobby

[dechagny]

[There is another well-kept, if particularly antiquated man in the lobby as well. He's by the box office, and one could call his fiddling with the locked door and shuttered windows idle if his movements weren't so abrupt.

Is Raoul a happy man? Oh no, no sir. If he can't wrench the front doors open, he'll get this open and...find something of use in there. Hopefully.]

Blasted...locks...a lockpick would actually be useful right about now...

[allicareabout]

[Oh, good, someone who actually gives a damn about appearances in this place.

That said, though, he'll glance over to see what the hell Raoul is doing over there, and it's really...it's really something, anyway.]

Good to know they're breaking their own rules early.

[He tips his head toward the rule sheet up there.]

Locking us out of places is hardly letting us explore at our pleasure, is it?

[dechagny]

[Oh - okay, take a breath Raoul, you're being addressed. Be calm. It's cool. You're okay. You just want a lockpick or a battering ram.]

I...suppose that the rules have a sort of contrary nature to them. Either that, or sheer lunacy.

[allicareabout]

Most rules do, if you know what you're looking at.

[...]

You want something to get that open, we should start looking for something to take apart. Rods and pins and stuff, something small, something easy.

[dechagny]

[...That actually makes sense.]

To pry it open with, then? I suppose...if we were to disassemble a couch, there might be something?

east wing

[dieformymusic]

[Thanks to the totally accurate information of one Jean Valjean, Winslow sought out this Billy who is absolutely a doctor and nothing else.

He flutters in like an upset bird when at last he finds him. Winslow double checks. Yep. That's him alright.

Winslow swoops right by the grand piano, almost silently when he appears right by Billy with his finger on his own pamphlet over Billy's picture. This is you, right?]

[allicareabout]

[...Well, this one isn't a doctor by a long shot, he's kind of a member of the other ridiculously-well-paying professions that all good mothers want their children to go into. But you know what, that's neither here nor there, and this guy is...

He's.

...Well, he certainly is, all right. Billy could do with a little less of the sudden appearances out of nowhere, but you know what, as long as we're limiting all contact to the pamphlet then it's whatever.]

Yeah, that's me, all right.

[dieformymusic]

[Hey if he manages to be multi-talented he'll take it out of blind, blind, stupid desperation.

Okay good, Billy confirmed.

Time to get down on his knees and beg. Beg as in gesture around his whole head. As an obvious doctor/lawyer you can fix this, right?]

[allicareabout]

[...You know what, he is. Not entirely sure what to do about this other than state the obvious, because dude. Sir. Buddy.]

Somebody did a number on you, didn't they.