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Actors - Backstage

Meanwhile in her own little corner of backstage Mandy was finally giving into her nausea and wrenching into a bucket now that she wasn't onstage to embarrass herself.

Having extra sensitive hearing sucked.

Standing right next to the person letting loose the nausea creating scream doubly sucked.

Thank Jack she didn't have to get back on stage.

Actor -- Backstage

Well s**t. Looked like she'd stepped on his toes... Er, hooves without even meaning to. And she imagined Charlie's comments weren't helping. Though before she could shoo the fallen angel away, he seemed to lose interest on his own. There were blessings to the boil having a short attention span.

"Oh.Well. F-for a fallen angel you look great." A conventional one, at least. She didn't really think Charlie was the norm for that sort of demon. Wait, what was with that look the incubus just shot her? "Dignified? I look like a man." She sighed out, her eyes falling to examine her attire. "I mean. You can't even tell I'm a ghoul in this getup. If I didn't talk, I'm sure people would've been none-the-wiser." Then again...

"... Not that it's any different from another day, I s'pose." You know, it never really bothered her until recently. Why DID it bother her? "Anyways, if you want to know the truth, I did fine because frankly, I didn't give a s**t. I did what had to be done to make Xiu happy and let it roll off. If this was something I wanted to do, I would've been a wreck." She leaned in closer to whisper her secret, not wanting anyone else to hear the fact that she too could be nervous.

"I doubt you're going to ruin everything." A scoff followed her attempt at encouragement. What a silly thing for him to say. "Just act like you're in a meeting. Obligated to be there, as if your presence is only a necessity to annoy you. All the other pricks on stage want you there to sign some asinine papers, that's all." It worked for her, at least.

Audience

Watching this play was painful. Titus was fairly certain living through having his skin burned off his person would be more bearable. When he was finally released he looked over toward the ghoul next to him, eyeing her almost suspiciously as she began to remove her clothes. Titus wasn't sure what to expect but he wanted to jerk away as she placed a hand on his knee. In fact...he did.

A cruel sort of smile tugged at his lips as he leaned toward her, his words hissing with every breath. "You listen to me you overgrown Flea Farm, don't you shh me. I don't like to be man handled unless you got something more entertaining in mind." And by the look on his face and the tone of his voice whatever he had in mind wasn't honorable.

It seemed the demon hadn't quite gotten the message that speaking while the play was going on wasn't acceptable. Either that or he didn't care. It was probably the later.

Prince – Hel

Think of it…like an epic poem…oooh yes! Epic poems were very brave and heroic and could also be violently, bloody and gore-tast—Er. Maybe she shouldn’t exactly imagine this to be an epic poem. Regardless, the valkyrie was really impressed with Sammy’s performance.

The ‘prince’ kept her hand held out towards Chuppi still, scowling at the Rat King, and the hand returned to the claymore as the Sammy came in for an attack. The sound of their props meeting was fantastic. “Sticks and stones, you royal rodent!” Hel snarled back. “We’ll know if you have the battle prowess to back up your words by the end of the night!” The reaper leapt away, as planned, when Sammy aimed a kicked at her, and looked just plain outraged when the rats were summoned and one swooped in to steal away Cloodia. The prince tossed her hand into the air. “Come forth, my companions! Cloodia needs your aid!” She cried out, the cue to summon Alexander and the gnomes posing as dolls, now pointing a finger at the Rat King and her minions as if to direct them.

“Be strong, my dearest Cloodia, I will come to your side, soon!” Hel brought up the prop claymore to block the strike aimed at her chest, and she struggled with Sammy for a moment before pushing her back, and swung the large prop back at her.

“You’ll pay for your intrusion, vermin!” She spat at Sammy.

Actor/Backstage


Zar blushed about as much as it was possible to do so as the bona fide fallen angel gave his opinion on the outfit in question. Cool wasn't even a word that Zar understood, as awkward as he generally was, so improving on the outfit on his own was out of the question. Still, he kept his arms firmly crossed as he returned his attentions to Riyo as Charlie seemed to redirect his own attention elsewhere.

"What's wrong with looking like a man?" He asked, genuinely baffled. Sure, his mother had been a very distinct proponent of the mostly nude types of fashion, but in his opinion the true statement of power lay in suits, in masculine stern identity. To him, even a ghoul looked assertive and strong in masculine attire. He approved. "You don't need to broadcast that you are a ghoul. I mean..er.. better to broadcast..power..confidence..and you..erm..broadcast that in spades." he hoped, oh jack he hoped she took it as the compliment it was intended. Clenching his hands in the fabric anxiously he had to try not to catch his claws in it.

However, her reassurances had a marked effect on him. It put things so much more into perspective. A meeting. Not something he was out of his depth with. He just had to delude himself. Fool himself he was in his comfort zone, own the space for that moment the way he would assert himself over an office, a meeting. Yes. It helped. It really helped. And he couldn't keep the grateful smile off his face.

"Yes. Yes. I think that will help." he nodded "I'll..do what I can." He wanted to tell her she'd probably saved him from some kind of nervous breakdown on stage, but he felt he'd prooobably obliterated his manliness enough already tonight.

ACTOR / RAT KING

"Sticks and stones, will break bones!" She shouted as her minion Thackery swept Chuupi away when Hel leaped back. She laughed deep and dark, "But sticks and stones will shatter woodne dolls!" Suddenly a sword was whizzing at her just as planned, she lifted the slender saber catching the sword as planned letting it slide along the curve as she ducked down letting the blade ride along hers and high over her head with another wicked laugh.

"Your knights will do nothing against my rats you fool!" She twisted aiming another blow only to jump back hissing in mock rage as Hel took a wide swing at her chest. "You will not best me, we will have the girl, her family, we will have EVERYTHING!"

As if on cue gnomes started to appear around the edge of the room cackling with delight, they started to move towards Thackery and Chuupi ready to play the part and attack. Probably the only time they could get away with hitting a student and not getting hit back as punishment.

Mostly.

Audience

There was quite a bit of chaos, so Yǐn Cáng focused on what he could. He opened his mouth to answer, stomach feeling slightly queasy, probably the ghoul's fault, when a sad song began, followed by a teacher (possibly) coming out to put them in their place.

Still, he was about to quietly answer with his name when suddenly THE GHOUL WAS TOUCHING HIM INAPPROPRIATELY.

He was used to touching a ghoul's hands. But hands, ghoul or not, were not usually on his lips. A light sob of distress may have escaped him, but other than that he remained silent, trying to press himself back into his seat to avoid the touch.

Long after she removed her finger he remained motionless in his chair, staring at the stage but not actually comprehending what was going on.

Doll-Alexander

Alexander moaned, as only a zombie could, in hopelessness. It appeared the play was going to go on, and he was going to have to perform.

Well, he was just going to have to give the best performance of his unlife!

He watched as one by one, the actors before him made there way to the stage. The one dressed as a rat was to go on shortly before Xander was to be summoned to the scene by the Prince. He dreaded the moment that he would be cued to the stage, with a little gnome-doll army at his back.

And then the time came.

Mustering up what courage he possessed, Alexander picked up his feet and strode onto the stage, marching in beat to the music with his army of gnome-dolls behind him. This was probably the first time in memory Xander had willingly chosen not to shuffle his feet across the floor. He actually marched. Properly.

Once he and the army of gnome-dolls reached a point in the stage where they were a small span away from the rat army, they stopped, and Alexander struck a pose, pointing at Thackery (the rat), his face set in a look of grim determination, then made that gesture, the one that said 'Come at me, bro!'.

What he hadn't counted on, however, was the gnome-doll army at his back screaming a wordless battle cry and rushing towards Thackery and the gnome-rats, kicking their little legs, at the same time as the gnome-rats rushing towards Alexander and doing the same to him.

"Aaaaghhh!" He cried out as their pointy little feet dug into the rotting flesh of his right leg. He kicked back at them with his skeletal left, trying to scatter the ugly little creatures as best he could to drive them back off of stage.

To top it off, he was pretty sure he saw a few of the gnome-dolls take a few swipes at him as well. The little Jack-bastards!