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MARCH SADNESS - A Symphony of Sorrow

SYMPHONY OF SORROW

If the Audience Would Please Take Their Seats

You find yourself at the theatre.

You may be asking how you got here, why you are here, when did you arrive. But none of that matters, does it? Nothing matters. Whether you are shocked at yourself for thinking so or whether you have known that nothing matters for years on end does not matter either. Whatever meaning there was to be had in any of this escapes you now. Who you were and what you wanted, what you valued and stood for, it all seems now like such a hazy dream. Out of reach.

There is a ticket in your hand. It tells you where to go. You follow it dutifully. Ticket stubs are exchanged for playbills. A schedule of performances. Whatever. You numbly proceed to where you belong. Performers and stage crew to their places, orchestra to the pit, workers to their positions. All with the knowledge that there can be only pain.

A four-armed conductor in moth-eaten robes raises his baton, and there is music.

You deserve this.

You deserve this.

You deserve this.

Observer’s Overture

First Movement in E Minor

adagio, con dolore
PP

Lights down on the chorus, who sits in the stands. They are playing the role of the audience. Ad lib spoken word between chorus members seated near one another. Soft music begins to swell eerily.

Lights up on the stage. A performance begins, apparently in media res, where the chorus is meant to observe.

vacillante, improvvisato
cresc. P

The performers on stage play out their acts, appearing fearful. The chorus ad libs quiet uncertainty from the stands. Some of them will look down at their playbill and find their own name on the schedule of acts to come. There is a brief description on the page of the act that is scheduled for them. It is clear by the state of the ones already on stage that this isn’t something they have a choice in.

Chorus members attempt to rise from their seats, but cannot. Not yet. Foreshadowing to a later movement. For now, they must endure the overture.

Opera Infernale

Second Movement in Various Keys
( A medley of vignettes, performed in various styles)

chorale concerto a tutti, con affetto

F

Various chorus members rise between songs and make their way to the green room, where they are costumed. They have some time to talk with other incoming acts. They will find themselves and their loved ones being prepared for their acts.

segue

Those who performed before stop in the green room again. They look drained. A fate which awaits the incoming acts.

segue

On the stage, each act is a musical recreation of trauma. A worst fear, a most painful moment, an act of cruelty, a time of hardship. The styles will vary accordingly. If the other players in a given tale are present, they will receive their role without question. If a cast member has no fellow performers from their own world present, an understudy will be chosen to play any other roles from those that they are close to. Everyone is off book. Vocal quality is adjusted to match the conductor’s standards. Staff ensures there are no interruptions. The show must go on.

CODA: Für Nimona
A Coda in A Minor

There is a stranger in the green room, unmoving. Pale glowing eyes peer out from an ungulate-shaped void perched atop a high end suit. Antlers leer overhead. He is waiting for someone. Staff take no notice of him.

Ensemble's Lament

Third Movement in G Minor

bocca chiusa
PPP

There are other places to be besides the stage. Other roles to play.

pesante

Behind the stage, the stage crew toil under Baritone, the stage manager and the Viscount of Suffering. There is a pipe organ built into the man’s chest, and the bell of a horn where his heart ought to be. It shows. He is as cruel as he is miserable. He runs a tight ship.

declamando, letando

There are others in the pit, if they have the musical skill for it. And while this part of the performance is managed by a kinder sort, the Contessa of False Comforts is not so named for no reason.

The opera is long. There are no intermissions. The orchestra plays until their lungs ache and their fingers bleed, while Sonata assures them that it will all be over soon. Surely she cannot be lying. Surely there must be an end…

freddo, pietoso

Just outside the auditorium, there is work for the chorus serving food and drinks, taking ticket stubs for the endless stream of audience members, cleaning messes, or all other manner of soulless work. Perhaps these ensemble members simply did not interest the Conductor. Or it could be that they were made more miserable elsewhere.

Reprise - Observer’s Overture

Fourth Movement in E Major

impetuoso
FF It would seem that once a chorus member’s concerto is complete, they are free to move about the premises. At least until they are scheduled in a supporting role for another soloist. This means a chance to explore--- or escape.

presto repente, bellicoso
cresc.

Those attempting to escape will be met with resistance, however. Guarding the doors are shades, creations of the Conductor who can wear the faces of those held dear by those that look upon them. Escape, more likely, will come from within.

Members of the chorus who attempt to do battle with the Conductor, however, will find themselves up against something far more dangerous. Figures of glass, in all different shapes. Some abstract and solid, some hollow and human-like, and everywhere in between. Perhaps some chorus members will find one to be familiar.

The Hero will need an ensemble of her own to make it through and strike at the Conductor. Perhaps a resistance can be formed in a hidden location near the green room.

Homeward Aria

Fifth and Final Movement in C Major

tiempo di fanfara, vittorioso
F

When a dagger of Aster is driven into the heart of Prince Efrain of Sorrow’s Song, at last, the illusion fades. The members of the chorus relinquish their roles and find themselves on the summit of Crane’s Ridge.

It will be an arduous journey home, but it can be done with the solace that there is one less Demon Prince to trouble Pumpkin Hollow. Music in a joyful major key swells, then decrescendos.

enfatico, mancando poco a poco

| CONTENT WARNINGS: altered states of consciousness, entrapment, grief, depression, mood control, loss of bodily autonomy |

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There is nowhere left to sit on the couch. Instead, when he's finally able to reach the green room, Gaeta eases himself to the floor, leaning his back against the seat cushions. Chest tight, he just watches him sleep for a silent moment.

Then, in a croaking whisper from too many hours of singing: "Mulcahy."

Gaeta touches the back of Mulcahy's wrist, not caring about the blood.

He stirs with a soft sigh. Of all the times Gaeta has seen him wake, this one is remarkably gentle. (He had not dreamed.)

"Gaeta?" he asks, more breath than anything. It must be him. Mulcahy already knows well what it's like to wake up to that voice, however wrecked it is now. He turns his head, and there he is.

For a moment he forgets about the opera, thinking himself back on Gaeta's couch. But. No. He sees his hand there, and the blood.

"... Oh, Gaeta," he says, tighter. "I'm sorry."

Gaeta shakes his head, just a little. He slips his fingers through Mulcahy's and holds on: another familiar gesture, an anchoring.

With his free hand, he digs out a plain linen square from one pocket. Probably he should've thought to get cold cream from one of the vanities, or at least some water, or something -- but he'd been too single-minded in reaching Mulcahy before, and there's no chance of him walking away now.

So he does his best with cloth alone. Carefully, he cups Mulcahy's face to start wiping away the blood.

(He knows it must be stage makeup, but it looks too frakking real.)

Ah…

… ahh.

He clasps Gaeta’s hand and closes his eyes, under which is still the glitter beneath his lashes. Staged blood and staged tears are wiped away in the same motion. As is the nature of any theatre, it is false cosmetics to reveal the truth: that by one man’s soul and another man’s body, the blood was always there.

He thinks he remembers something like this back on the ship, after the actual incident. There were people trying to pick up for him. He at least remembers Jester patching up his hands. He hasn’t got a clue what it is about him that sees people treating him and his mess with such care, rather than… horror? Anger? Anything else.

He failed; is failed; and yet.

“I did my best,” he whispers. He ignores the imagined reply; some best.

"I know."

It hurts to talk. Anything louder than a whisper wants to fracture before it's halfway out of his mouth. Gods, though, he can't just work in silence the whole time.

"You lasted as long as you could." He works at a spot high on Mulcahy's cheekbone, gently as he can. A more stubborn patch of red-tinted glitter slowly peels loose. Gaeta exhales shakily. "I can't imagine anyone who wouldn't have eventually done... this. If they were faced with something like that."

“… I’m a priest.”

Part of him wants to speak no more, so that Gaeta no longer feels compelled to reply, his voice being as ragged as it is. If Mulcahy does speak, it should be to refute Gaeta’s attempts to absolve him. He should not be absolved. Not like this. Drummed in his head, the beat goes duh-tah buh-tah; for me-a cul-pa; me-a cul-pa.

“… But, he was… so… and… and he… he had been successful against me, before.”

But he is so tired, and he cannot help but try to duck his head, to avoid blame the coward’s way. Preserve yourself against the hideous and mortifying acts that everyone, everyone, just saw. It’s the same selfish instinct that spilled this blood in the first place.

It’s the same instinct that knows that he would do it again.

(It’s the same small, small instinct that knows he was right.)

He feels Gaeta’s hands on him. He feels no urge to flinch.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

Why would being a priest have anything to do with it? he thinks, and then -- ah. It clicks.

The Lords of Kobol are falliable. Mirrors of humanity, he remembers a more religious neighbor explaining to him as a child. They fight, they bleed, they frak just as humans do; they despair and rejoice and rage. Some of the Sixes and Twos talked about that with such disdain when placed alongside their god, a perfect being that inspired aspiration instead of companionship. A god very similar to Mulcahy's own.

If being a priest of Mulcahy's God means aspiring to qualities of perfection and infalliability, then. Well.

An awful sorrow consumes him, like it's gripped him by the throat and shoved his head underwater. Gaeta rests his palm on Mulcahy's forehead, but not to clean it; just to smooth his hair, comforting, while he waits to find his voice.

"We both have a lot we didn't want to tell." He swallows. "You don't have to apologize. I'm sorry this is how it came out."

I'm sorry they did this to you.

What grace. What blessing—that’s what that hand upon his head feels like. What fortune, that Gaeta’s touch seems to melt all his nerves from him. Not the shame, but certainly the buzzing fear.

He opens one eye again.

“If ever you find the need to tell me of yours, I hope that you will have as much faith in my patience and trust of you, that you are asking me to have in yours.”

Because he does. Mulcahy has faith in him.

Gaeta's eyes sting. The sudden lump in his throat doesn't do much to help the pain, but he makes no acknowledgement of it; just swallows, a little harder than before, and continues smoothing a lock of Mulcahy's hair.

"I will," he says. "I do."

It strikes him then, alongside a bolt of shame: he finally told a handful of people about the mutiny, but somehow, he never told Mulcahy, did he? It wasn't a deliberate omission. (He doesn't want to believe it was deliberate.) Simply that as they grew closer, and Mulcahy saw more of him through the lens of his nightmares, Gaeta began to assume he must know already. How could he not, when he might know Gaeta the best of anyone on the island?

But no. He doesn't know. Gaeta never told him.

Obviously, obviously, now isn't the time. "You've already seen the worst, I think. The Raptor," he whispers. "But I trust you with the rest. When we're both better."

"I'll wait patiently for that time."

Closing his eye again, with one of Gaeta's hands laid on his head, he raises the other one entwined with his to his lips. So gently, softly, the lightest brush of a kiss to the worn knuckles.

(There are very, very, very few people he would do such a gesture for, and even fewer circumstances to make him willing to do so; and yet.)

Edited 2025-04-26 06:11 (UTC)

His breath stills.

Love, he thinks. And it does not come with an unsteadiness like the floor giving way, an uncertainty verging into denial. It is a great unfolding, so vast it nearly undoes him.

That is what this is. He's certain now.

And oh, the timing could not be worse with everything Mulcahy just had to act out moments ago, but even that knowledge feels small next to the enormity of the rest. Love. Love. Love. He'll sort it out; he doesn't have a choice. To do less would be unthinkable.

Gaeta sniffles, as quietly as he can. He squeezes Mulcahy's hand and does not let go.

This is the way Mulcahy seems to move through the world: in a fashion so gentle and unassuming, that you don't realize he's coming until he's already there. Through rooms, through lives, into hearts, something about him seems to settle in. It is the beast of his past and his blindness to his own actions that convinces him that he stomps through it all like the thunderhead, not the rain.

He doesn't feel like that with Gaeta. He feels like rain. Still messy, often inconvenient, but... neutral. Necessary. He's not sure why, but it's such a profound relief from the rest of his existence that he's not keen on questioning it.

Mulcahy does not let go, but he does move, pulling in his legs and sitting up a little. Leaving space open on the couch to invite Gaeta up here with him, instead of leaving the poor man to sit on the floor this whole time.

Gaeta moves with his customary effort, but he moves without hesitation. Using Mulcahy's hand as a little bit of extra leverage, he pulls himself onto the couch. Settles in. Lets the rain wash over him, like a cooling summer storm after a long drought.

Likewise, there is no hesitation in how he rests an arm around Mulcahy's shoulders. Caution, maybe. But even that is closer to tenderness than apprehension of any kind. How can you be apprehensive of something that was there all along?

For a time, he stays quiet. Then, softly: "I don't know how long they'll let me stay here. They keep pulling me back into the orchestra pit."

Just one more song, the demons promise over and over. It's been one more song for hours now.

As Gaeta pulls himself in, Mulcahy falls in against him, slotting into the empty spaces. What relief, like stopping to breathe.

The prevalence of death and instability often makes one develop an impulsive habit, he’s found. Impulsive and intense. When both time and life have such little guarantee, it’s only natural to grasp for every scrap of it that you can, and to wring every last drop of living out of life. Even deathless places like this are rife with sudden disappearance. He would know.

And yet, he would wait. For Hawkeye—for Angel—for Gaeta, he would wait for as long as it takes.

“We’ll get out of here sooner or later. We have never been kept in demon places for too long. And if they’ve let you out here now, perhaps they will again.”

His head leans into Gaeta’s shoulder. “If you worry for me, don’t bother; it’s alright. Between the war and places such as this, I’ve gotten quite used to the instability. All I hope for is that you come back eventually.”

Gaeta snorts a fond, barely audible laugh. "I'll worry anyway," he admits. "But I'll try not to, too much."

He turns his face, resting it against Mulcahy's silvery hair.

"Just because you're used to it doesn't mean it's ideal. For either of us. I'll..." A sigh. "I think that's the point. Letting me out just enough to remember what it's like not to be there. The Contessa of False Comforts is running the pit, so."

His embrace tightens. "But that means I will come back."

And it will be a true comfort to be at Mulcahy's side when he does.

(He rolls his eyes at the mention of Contessa, because ugh, of course there’s a “Contessa of False Comforts,” why not.)

He feels the press of Gaeta’s face atop his head, and sighs with the warmth of it.

“I hope to be worth such limited time,” he murmurs. “I would join you in the pit, if I could. But I expect they will force me to remain in the audience. It would… be far less lonely there, with you.”

His heart shivers like a snare drum. Love, it continues to whisper, soft as the pulse in his ears. Love.

"You are." Worth it, he means, though he has to start rationing his words again; trying to push them to an audible volume hurts too much. "It would." Be far less lonely. Always, the island's trials have been easier to endure with Mulcahy nearby, from the Stag Beetle to the cult sacrifice and through the seasons of partial cohabitation, the two of them taking turns to wake one another from their respective nightmares. He would sit next to him in the audience, as close as he could, and they would anchor one another against the grotesque display onstage. Shoulder to shoulder. Hand in hand.

Gaeta hesitates. After what Mulcahy just revealed --

(But if he can't speak very well right now, gestures will work better -- )

He turns a little further, brushing his lips against the top of Mulcahy's head. Brief enough, light enough, that it could go unremarked upon if necessary.

He tenses, but does not move away; his grip on Gaeta’s hand tightens, just a little, and he leans a little further into his shoulder.

“Are you…”

He suspects, of course. But before he can get too carried away in his own head, he has to ask.

“Do you?” Love me?

He would pull back as soon as he feels the tension steal over Mulcahy, retreating from the line he's sure he's crossed, ready to apologize for his awful timing... were it not for the extra pressure on his hand. The weight on his shoulder, sinking deeper. Each their own gesture to fill in the gaps of Mulcahy's words.

He closes his eyes. "I do," he whispers, and makes himself hold there, trying not to punctuate the confession with anything he'll regret. "I do."

Is that okay? he wants to ask, but what slips out instead is a barely audible, "Do you?"

First, he holds Gaeta's hand close, so that he does not withdraw during Mulcahy's pause; so that he does not make Mulcahy's decision for him.

He regrets. That has been the color of his life for these past five--no, six years now, isn't it? Regret. It rears its head again with the confession, ugly and familiar, whining for being struck in a wound that never so much as scabbed over. Love is what doomed Hawkeye; his mistakes were made in the matter of such love. Gaeta knows this, too. How can he say such a thing after seeing what happened?

And even more than that, he is still a priest and still has his vows to uphold. There is a reason why the rule of celibacy has been there for centuries. Their duty is to the community first, not any one person. He has bent and broken many of the Church's disciplines to do what's right, but this has never been one of them.

But then, he has bent and broken them to do what's right. Those are disciplines, not doctrines. Is he not a Jesuit; is he not a member of the 4077th? Wasn't it always the case to lead with their hands and their hearts first, over any rule imposed on them; isn't that what lead them straight; can he, can he...

(The only way to fix an unfixable mistake is to do things differently the next time.)

(Death whispers, love harder.)

(This is doctrine: love thy neighbor.)

"I do."

Edited 2025-05-17 03:28 (UTC)

A small, cracked gasp; a noise that might have shaped itself into a laugh in better circumstances.

Something inside Gaeta, too, is cracking. That's what it feels like -- a rupture along fault lines he thought were calcified. An earthquake that remakes the terrain, but does not shatter him. How long has it been since that happened? Any emotion of this magnitude ought to destroy his heart, like it has countless times before, and yet. A heart so used to being stifled must also find relief when it splits open.

So many people have given him permission to grieve. To rest. Far fewer have given this permission, though: to love, and not be afraid.

He frees his hand from Mulcahy's, but only so he can wrap both arms around him in a fierce embrace.

Mulcahy is embraced, and there is light, and there is light, and there is light.

Despite himself, he laughs. A voiceless thing with no volume, a skipping of breath, the smallest exhale--but still, in this dark and deep place built on horror and grief, there was a loving laugh. It feels a little like home. His own limping heart bursts; if their hearts are breaking, then let them be breaking open.

He hugs back. He could not bring himself not to. He wraps his arms around and buries his face into the crook of Gaeta's neck, savoring the warmth and presence of him while he's still here. Maybe this time he can do it right. Maybe this time.

Mulcahy presses against the thick scar on Gaeta's neck, the only remnant of his first death on Marrow Isle. What an image. Joy coexisting alongside pain; love pressed over an old injury to soothe it. It fits, as quietly effortless as every other way Mulcahy slid into his life, matched in a way so obvious he should have expected it long ago.

I love you. He can't do much more than mouth the words, but he does, over and over, and each time his heart shakes with the aftershocks. Once or twice beneath the fault lines, he swears he feels Louis's presence, but it's quiet, distant, fading. Something beloved, yes; something he frakked up, absolutely -- but something he might be able to release, finally, and hope it will be at peace.

(Maybe this time.)

He kisses Mulcahy's brow again. I love you.

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MARCH SADNESS - A Symphony of Sorrow

the green room

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