2023-05-22: My Operatic Airheadedness Is Drowning Out The Message
- Log: My Operatic Airheadedness Is Drowning Out The Message
- Cast: Yuliana Kafim, Alma Stirner
- Where: Tredje Folketeateret Opera House, Kingdom of Scandinavia
- Date: 2023-05-22
- Summary: Yuliana takes Alma to the opera, where Dargomyzhsky's 'Rusalka' is playing. She tells Alma what to do about Lilith -- and her other comrades -- and shares a little about her relationship with her, too. (CW: Brainwashing, abuse)
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Opera houses are one of the Earth's oldest institutions. Some have stood for five hundred years or more; the Scandinavian Tredje Folketeateret is more modest amongst them. It is a mere (a mere!) ninety years old, having been rebuilt after early Wanderwagen hostilities destroyed the area. It is also the third time the theatre has been rebuilt. The first was built three hundred and seventy three years ago -- but its life was cut short twelvescore years past. Andre Folketeateret lasted only 43 years; compared to that, this rebuild has been much more lucky.
The rebuild retains the ancient stoic stylings of the 1900s, when mankind were first industrialising their nations. Flat surfaces; sweeping ceilings. Rooms which used to contain so many devices, in ancient times, before modern society made equipment so compact. Some of them are on show, now, to amuse the money of the area.
(Regardless of its intended audience in its day, these days, the renovation costs make it a strictly upmarket venue. And an exclusive one -- it was always a small building. It can sit little more than a thousand guests.)
Yuliana Kafim has come, dressed in a sparkling black bodice with flower all trapped in the hem of her high waist; it flows down into a skirt layered over itself, sheer dark fabric which adds to black and black and black. A cape wrapped about her neck and shoulders obscures what would otherwise be bare arms. Another flower is tucked into her teal hair, opposite the long scar down her face. She's stunning, of course.
And she's not alone.
"Ah-- I should think you'll like this one, dear," she remarks, to the woman beside her, as she leads her to their viewing-box. (They have a private one, of course. Small as the venue is, they're not about to mix.) "Really, it's made for you! Please, sit," she gestures, grandly, to grand velvet chairs. They're very comfortable. She sits right down, too.
The opera, of course...
Is Dargomyzhsky's Rusalka.
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
Despite how things went for Alma at Yuliana's last request for her assistance, and the fact that she's finally started to return to doing her work with Londo Bell after her 'lengthy problem with the REA,' Alma is always at the ready for Yuliana. When she's told she's going to be treated -- rewarded -- that makes it all the higher priority. Maybe Yulie doesn't regret things with her after all! Maybe what she said last time they really talked was just...
... it's hard to feel like her heart will come back from that, but even so, of course she's made time for Yulie. She's a lower-middle class spacenoid and has never been to the opera in her life, but just the same --
Getting settled into their private box, Alma adjusts her own white gloves -- so different from the ones she'd wear with a normal suit -- and straightens out her green corset dress. "Aah, really? It's so thoughtful of you to take me to something like this, Yulie -- especially after I did so bad out there the other day..."
She takes a second to review her program booklet. Part of her really does feel like a spoiled child getting to come experience this, but just the same --
Her eyes drift across the name. "Wow -- it really was... I'm sure I'll have a great time, hahaha..." Giggling, she leans on Yuliana a bit. Affection has always come pretty easily for her, even if lately it feels... hm. Contextless, perhaps. As if she's simply acting out a script.
It's not fulfilling -- but at the moment, she has a great handle on acting it out. Still, things nag at her, and she can't quite keep herself from burdening Yuliana with them.
"... Lilith and Killy... now that they know they're both involved, it's only a matter of time before they start trying to -- fix me," she mumbles to herself. At least she's in this comfortable, silent spot next to Yuliana.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https:''www.youtube.comwatch?v=c4VWjLXLPNM Boris Shtokolov - The Miller's Aria
Alma doesn't really have the background for this, but that's fine. Yuliana has made sure she has something to wear -- and the pattern continues on, and on, and on.
"Nonsense," Yuliana says, her own white glove reaching over to pat the back of Alma's. "You performed admirably against dedicated opponents. They did their best to tear you down, and still, you did not fall!" Yuliana told her not to. Anyway.
She doesn't push Alma off of her; she tolerates her casual admiration admirably, even as her gaze tracks over to the stage. The miller's daughter, Natasha, is courting the Prince despite all her father's warnings; that Prince visits her in their mill on the Dnieper River, and he distracts the village with gifts before Natasha learns that their relationship is doomed. He is to marry a Princess -- but she has her own revelation;
she is carrying his child.
The miller does his best to console his daughter, when the Prince leaves her to go to his new life, but she is inconsolable. She throws herself, and the child in her belly, into Dnieper. She dies.
(Oh, but there are several Acts to go; death is so infrequently the end of these old epics.)
"Mm?" She wonders, at length, her green eyes tracking back to Alma's, like meeting like. "Oh, yes, that miserable woman... and your old squadmate, yes?" She pats Alma's arm, again, a touch idly. "... do you want to see them again?"
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
For much of the opera, Alma is silent; it's respectful, and what's more, she wants to savor Yuliana's gift. She does answer her, though -- "Yeah, you're right... I didn't fall. As long as you need me to stay alive, Yulie, I'll never lose."
Why doesn't that thought make her happy anymore?
She goes back to watching the opera, listening as the truth of the relationship comes out. It's something she's honestly... kind of mystified by; this sort of thing, of doors closing, things obscured between people... has never really made sense to her --
-- so why does it hit so hard, this time? Why is it that she finds Natasha's plight such a struggle? To want to be everything to this prince, to give him her love, her life, and... in the end, only be able to throw herself into the river, inconsolable.
And yet -- she can't quite bring herself to cry, either; something about her emotional range feels dead. Like she's teasing at the edge of a realization about this work, and it ought to move her, and it sort of is, but...
Yuliana's asking her a question, and faraway green eyes meet the same. "I... want to see Killy again. I never stopped wanting to see her, but I hate that she's gotta see me like this... Lilith... I... I don't know. I want -- I want to settle things with her. Somehow." With a laugh that comes out uncharacteristically bitter, she says, "I guess I'm no different from Char Aznable now, if you believe all the rumors about him and Lieutenant Amuro..."
A long sigh escapes her lips. "Yulie... you know I'd do anything for you, right? Tell me -- what I should do."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https:''www.youtube.comwatch?v=Bz5nC8HAwJw Feodor Chaliapin - Scene of Madness
The Prince and the Princess are wed in a beautiful wedding. Why, then, do they hear Natasha's voice, echoing from deep Dneiper? Again and again the Prince is drawn to its waters; the miller, mad with grief, knows the truth. Natasha and her daughter are Rusalka, now, drowned fae of the deep. They see to his needs, even now.
He declines the Prince's offer to come to the castle, and so the Prince rushes from its halls again. The Princess is left to be comforted by the orphan, Olga, she has taken as her confidante. And at the Dnieper...
Is it moving? They are moving towards something, yes. Inexorably.
Yuliana's eyes narrow, just so, as Alma speaks of Lilith again. Spite still lives in her heart, choking everything there; do not think she has forgiven her. This entire triumph of misery beside her -- it was all to destroy Lilith Aiden.
"Come, now," she says, voice soothing, as she reaches over to cup Alma's cheek. "You are a better man than Aznable could ever be. In so many ways! Yes, Rusalka, you must settle things with Lilith," and perhaps she could have grown kinder, in the months since Lilith earned her animosity.
"... permanently." She could have; she has not. "Yes... one way or the other. I will not see you throw your life away, Rusalka," she insists, and sounds tender enough, to say it, "but if you must give all you have to take that woman down -- this alone I will accept." The one way Alma is permitted to die...
"It is hard for me," she says, and it's a convincing rendition of concern, "but I understand how important this is for you, of course. And I am not an unreasonable woman." She's lying. And after Elisa's concerns for the other people in Yuliana's life -- what better gift could she bring her wife than the death or decimation of the woman who dared to violate their wedding?
She blinks, long, and looks sidelong to the banks of the river as the opera tells it. Compared to Lilith, her treatment of Killy is all too casual. "As for the other woman... see her as you like. You are free to meet who you wish, as you know. I'll not keep you prisoner. I know you'd never betray me, so why would I place unreasonable demands on you?" As if that isn't an unreasonable demand, in the situation she's in.
"It would be a shame," she supposes, "if you were to lose an old comrade. Go ahead and see her again, dear. It's better if she still cares for you, isn't it?" It's better if she knows she'll need... help, when they're done with her.
After all, if she kills Lilith, she doesn't plan on betraying Leina about all this.
One day she'll cut Alma loose, and she doesn't imagine she'll want her help in recovering, after the fact.
Yuliana, at least, can tell herself that indulgence makes up for the viciousness of their relationship.
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
"... yeah," Alma agrees, during that momentary lull in the opera in which they speak again. As her cheek's cupped, she doesn't turn pink, she doesn't stammer, she doesn't even really seem like she's having much fun with it... it recalls her interactions with Mia and Helena all those years ago, but it lacks their tenderness. In the moment, in the void, it simply is.
Right. This is still about Lilith. About the wedding Lilith ruined. Alma almost let herself forget that, losing herself so totally in Yuliana's present moment as to forget about their shared past. "Right," Alma agrees, brow furrowing. "No matter what happens -- I'll settle things with Lilith. Even if it means giving my life. You gave me such a great tool to do it with, too..." The Spinatia Voidsent... she's decided she likes it. It's something she was mostly denied during the One Year War...
... a swifter swordarm.
Permission to see Killy excites her -- enough to get her to at least perform the general structure of enthusiasm. "Of course I'd never betray you. I can't. There's nothing left for me, nothing left of me... but you're still the most important person in my life, Yulie. Still... I do want to see Killy again!"
Looking off at the stage lights and tracking away from the opera itself, she says, "... I hope she doesn't reject me, now that I'm like this. They just don't see how important you are... I think you're worth sacrificing everything for, Yulie, I really do..."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https:''www.youtube.comwatch?v=fojM4qLt6j4 Anna Snegov and Alice Sadikova - Rusalka
At the bottom of the Dnieper is a kingdom. No -- the realm of a Queen.
Natasha has come to be a ruler in her own right, down below. The Rusalki attend her court -- and her daughter, the young Rusalochka, brings news of the world above. She speaks of her grandfather, the miller, and the Prince who dwells by the river. Natasha bids her to bring him to him.
But the Princess and her attendant, Olga, followed the Prince to the riverbank -- and both women do their best to stop him from stepping into Dnieper's waters. Their efforts are in vain. Perhaps he still loves Natasha, or perhaps her voice, now, is simply too fae and lovely; her song lures him to the river's edge. He peers deep below, hoping to catch a glimpse, a glimpse --
Which is precisely when the maddened miller charges out, to push the Prince into the depths. He dies.
The Rusalki laugh, and present his body to their Queen.
Rusalka, in the end... got everything she wanted.
Her father mad, her daughter drowned, her court choked with river-weeds and spite.
"Isn't it lovely?" Yuliana asks, of the Voidsent. "It's perfect for you." Unlike, implicitly, Amabilis.
And she is nothing. "You are lovely," she praises her, in entirely the same tone, more complimenting a work of art than a woman. "Yes, truly this is the work of Rusalka. All of this... in the realm of that faerie." And will she appreciate what she has done, when it is ended?
All this horror happened to Rusalka.
Alma's another matter entirely.
Her smile grows a shade more wan, as Alma's attention wanders. "They do not comprehend the truth," she says, with regret. "They glimpse it, and it blinds them." She wonders if Alma glimpsed it, too. She doesn't wonder overlong.
"They can be so offensive, can't they..? But perhaps you can endure some minor insults, for the sake of seeing your comrades again. So long as you know the truth, there is still so much time to convince them." Her gaze lids; she recalls. "Yes... I'm willing to withstand their scepticism, so long as you wish to treat with your little friends. Would that make you happy?"
Would anything, now?
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
Alma looks out toward the opera again, finger coming up to her own lips in thought as she watches. That woman -- her daughter -- all consumed by the depths, consuming their lovers, their families, and in the end...
"It's perfect," Alma says. For a minute, she thinks Yuliana's talking about the play, before she's reminded that they were talking about something. She always did have trouble keeping conversational context straight around Yuliana. So she says, again, "It's perfect. It's got everything I need..."
Rusalka watches Rusalka, seeing the mirror and yet unable to appreciate it as a mirror. Yuliana tells her she's lovely -- and she's able to believe something like it, at least. "You always know just what to say to make me feel better," Rusalka murmurs back to Yuliana, and it's hard to say that the tonelessness of it comes strictly from the need to keep her voice reasonably quiet.
Convince them... Rusalka did have such a charming voice. But by the same token -- when she tried to stretch herself to use it, she caused so many problems, and Yulie rebuked her... even that feels like it's beyond her, now. Disconnected from her intuitive understanding, apparently too incompetent to force the issue like Dr. Kafim...
She lets out a sigh.
"It should make me happy."
Alma produces a fan from her handbag, flicking it open. "It should," she says again, a little more enthused.
The fan hides her expression.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https:''www.youtube.comwatch?v=mC4wjYYGDL0 Elena Zelenskaya - Rusalka
Yuliana scowls, for a moment. Her fingers, in their elegant opera gloves, tighten against the armrest. She hasn't lashed out against Alma as badly as she used to, since Leina arranged for her physical safety; even so, she still feels the urge to tear her down, hearing that sigh. She could take that fan and FLING it in --
But she takes a breath, and shuts her eyes, and she doesn't.
... she won't make a liar of Elisa, who promised Alma would stay whole.
No matter how much she wants to destroy her for -- for --
(for the destruction Yuliana ordered.)
She puts on a smile for the Rusalka beside her, as the Rusalka sings, out there on the stage. She is a fine actress, too. "You are allowed to be happy, you know," she says -- and she, at least, thinks she is very patient.
"I'm willing to overlook your comrade's indiscretions! You don't need to answer for their insults. Why, you needn't even crush them for their flagrancy." Yuliana pauses, for a moment. "Hasn't it been tense, for you, having to worry about whether they're thinking properly just the same? It ought to be relieving not to have to measure them by standards they're not yet suited to meet."
She pouts, attention moving back to the stage. "I'm being generous, you know." It's so generous, putting up with the insults of other people. "Why, Elya herself was willing to endure the slings and arrows of my old associates for the sake of my feelings..."
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
"Ahahaha... sorry," Rusalka says, and she at least sounds like she's smiling -- though she still keeps the fan between herself and Yuliana, making it all the harder to discern just how much she's really gotten out of the dull, empty feeling she's been left with. "I'm really not unhappy -- this is a really thoughtful gift, and the opera... does speak to me," she continues, tone soft.
... there is some genuine relief, too, at the idea that she doesn't need to answer for the insults laid at their feet by people like Sayaka and Killy and -- yes -- even Lilith. "It is scary! I don't want them to hurt you! I want them to like you like I like you," she agrees, "even if it's hard for them... I know they'll understand someday."
Hearing about Elya -- and about Yuliana's generosity -- is yet more cause to smile. "You're perfect for each other," she says, brightly. "You really will change the world, Yulie..."
And like that, she's finally back to sounding happy, to leaning into Yuliana as they enjoy the Rusalka on the stage.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana rages, in the silence of herself -- how dare she put something between them? Her! When she's little more than a vessel for her vengeance and her venting! Does she think she can hide from her?! Hide anything from her?!
It's a petty thought, and mean. If there's any credit to her at all, she does feel bad, a little, for the way her fingers tighten up again. She breathes out in a sigh as she looses that tension, and agrees, voice kinder than her heart: "It does, doesn't it?" Speak to her, that is, one drowned faerie to another.
She recalls the way Pham slapped her, and closes her eyes. Right now, where she's standing...
But what can she possibly do about it? It's done. Elisa has promised she'll see to the matter. It's out of her hands. And isn't she doing better, bringing her out to the opera instead of screaming at her?
Oh, yes, all right, out to see this opera. Be fair: Parminder was right to suggest it. It IS very funny. And it does has a positive message on parenting for the poor woman, doesn't it, after a fight like that?
But Alma's relief does calm her, and she reaches out, to grasp her other hand. "It's all right," she assures her, gently. "They cannot harm me. I've Elya's protection, and the blessings of the Void." That cape is hiding something, behind her. All her draped decorations come with pockets for the tentacles. They have a seamstress, obviously. "As you say, they'll understand, soon enough. We can forgive today's indiscretions." She can, more like.
When she thinks of Elisa she sighs, again -- but this sound is far more content. "We are perfect, together," she says, a shade dreamily. "How wonderful you see it. She's the perfect woman... she'd do anything to make me happy. She works so hard to keep me safe... I've never met anyone more supportive. Sometimes I get so, confused, but she's always found an answer to explain everything... haa, I always thought I'd have to head up the family, if I found someone who'd accept a second date, but Elya really takes care of everything. It's such a relief..."
It's fine to tell Alma all these things, of course.
Because Alma would never think of betraying them.
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
"I thought I wouldn't 'get it,' but no, it's really good," Rusalka agrees. Her gaze turns toward it, then ultimately back to Yulie. The fan flutters a little; as a result, Yuliana at last gets to see her face again, and sure enough, she is smiling now.
She wishes she had that clarity of vision -- and in a sense, she did, she supposes. Didn't she feel like humans would be happier if they understood each other? Didn't that understanding come from sameness...?
... well, it was something like that, at any rate. If it differs from the sort of thing going on with Yuliana and Elisa, she can chalk that up to the difference between the two of them. Yuliana's always right, anyway. Otherwise it would've been wrong for her to treat Alma the way she did.
Rusalka, obviously, thinks Yuliana can do no wrong at all.
"You deserve that! You deserve someone who'd do anything to make you happy, who makes everything so clear," she enthuses right back, not picking up on the hostility Yuliana was masking earlier. Hearing about the things that make Yuliana happy seems to do more for her mood than any amount of talking about herself ever has.
She remains there, comfortable, in Yuliana's grasp.
(As a victim of Parminder's jokes, she's perfect. She misses every layer of subtext, when she's with Yulie.)
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Oh, you're so clever," Yuliana praises her. She does feel better, seeing the smile on her face. She doesn't bother to scrutinise the cluster of feelings at all.
After all -- Yuliana isn't in the wrong. Sure, accidents happen, sometimes, and she's great about apologising for them. But none of this is her fault. Elisa has always been very clear about that!
"I do, don't I?" She smiles, gracious enough to hold Alma's hand, watching those brutal (beautiful) Rusalki. "Sometimes I wondered if I'd ever meet anyone... no one was ever particularly interested in calling me back, after the first night. But Elya swooped into my life, and for once, I was the one being pursued... she never gave up on me. It was almost too intense, sometimes," she laughs, entirely fond, as she lifts her other hand to examine her wedding ring, "but it was so charming... I never knew how much I wanted to rely on someone." Alma, of course, is seated at her left hand; the right is for Elisa, as marked by that purple bracelet, those rich rings.
"Yes," she smiles, "I'm very happy. I've everything I could possibly ask for, though I'm such a fickle woman, and my demands change so frequently. You know, she once said it was a delightful labour to try to please me..?" Yuliana laughs, again, entirely delighted. "She's wonderful!"
(Parminder will, of course, think it's riotously funny when he learns they actually did go out to see this one. Amongst other things. As the court jester, he's permitted to laugh about it.)
<Pose Tracker> Alma Stirner has posed.
When she feels Yuliana's hand around hers, Rusalka feels like she's been greeted with a rare honor. Her gaze sweeps back out to the opera as she listens to both, not wanting to miss the opera but not wanting to neglect Yuliana's words.
"It's nice to have someone you can be that close with," she agrees. "It sounds like it was love at first sight for her, and she really... you really..." She sighs, contentedly this time as well. "That really is the best feeling in the world. I hope you cherish each other forever."
What is forever, for someone like Yuliana, Rusalka wonders, as she gazes out toward the court of Rusalki.
"That's how I feel too! Like -- um, maybe that's too forward, I don't... want to get between you and your wife, or," a vague gesture with the hand Yuliana isn't holding. "You know. But... it really does feel good to work hard for you, Yulie. You're an incredible person, haha...!"
She can laugh and smile, she tells herself. These, too, are things for Yuliana's sake -- part of the delightful labor. Even if her understanding is forced upon her by Elisa, even if she's become so much the same type of creature as Elisa herself, well --
-- does it matter? Does anything in the world matter except Yuliana Kafim?
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Always," Yuliana promises, and that she's speaking to Alma is really incidental. Their vows spoke of forever as extending beyond death itself. Perhaps that's why she enjoys operas like these?
Yuliana pats Alma's hand, reassuringly. Reassuringly? Reassuringly. "Not to worry," she says, still entirely too fond. "It's impossible to get between my dearest sputnica zhizni and I." Of course, there's a reason why she would love a Russian play so much -- it's what the state was known as, once, before they rebranded to terrify the world. (Zaftra doesn't quite have the same borders, but -- the exact borders have always been something they've struggled with. They haven't always been in the right. That part isn't taught in the history books, just like how Yuliana isn't teaching Alma something, here.) The exact translation of her life's companion isn't something she's bothered to explain to Alma, either, but the warmth in the words says enough. "We are far, far too close... she is Queen of my heart."
She smiles, to Alma, warmer to speak of someone she loves so. "Ah, but you're a good girl, Rusalka. You've always worked so hard. I'm pleased to hear you feel that way..."
All of this is for Yuliana, loved by the hateful Void and the strange witch who commands its power. She sits at the centre of the universe.
All is well.