Aspel/Merri/Drake/Ari
Two more performances to go. Ari was secretly rather relieved; as much as she had enjoyed Fedoro's run, she was becoming quite fatigued. Not that one ever really tired of Metsart's immortal genius, but even so, a few months off sounded heavenly just now, as she smiled and flirted with an extraordinarily tedious patron who had, she was told, donated a great deal of money to the Sphere. He had been attached to Adele first, but the other woman had heartlessly unloaded him on Ari, so now here she was, listening to him gush and wishing she could just get out of her corset and go home already. Who had thought allowing this number of donors backstage on the first night of closing weekend was a good idea?
She was wondering how most politely to lock herself in the dressing room when the commotion started. It seemed far away at first, but before long people were shouting; she heard the clanging of metal that came with the stage door, someone exclaiming something that translated into trouble.
It was a curious thing. There had been trouble in the city before, of course. Sometimes, it had been very close. She had gotten very proficient in Hiding early in her career.
So why was she suddenly on the verge of panic?
The noise grew louder. Crashing, something like screaming. "Excuse me." She turned abruptly away from the donor to grab for her communicator where it sat between pots of cosmetics. Blank. She shook it, attempted to turn it on, but nothing happened. Trouble. And where there was trouble...
"I really need to go," she blurted out in a rush. She couldn't say later just how she had shimmied out of her dress, though certainly a few of the tiny buttons across the back were sacrificed to the cause. She doffed her bloomers, ignoring the shocked and frankly interested exclamations of whoever was around. She grabbed her clothes from the chair in the corner, tossing the simple dress right on over her corset, too hurried to bother with undoing laces. Shoes, mandolin, and she was pushing past the crowd that had gathered at her dressing room door, still in full make-up and with her hair stiff from styling.
It was easy to know where to go. People were running away, but she ran towards. Knowing her luck, the person she was most worried about would be right in the epicenter of the trouble.
It paid off, a frantic quarter hour later - as the first of the elementals came into view, so did a familiar suit of armor, though she was temporarily thrown by the weapon that was not the sword she had grown accustomed to. Next to Aspel, the familiar figures of Drake and Merri stood. Anything she could say would feel distinctly uncomfortable - mostly exclamations of unexpectedly profound relief as to the apparent safety of the others, though Aspel's armor was already looking dented - so she sang instead, launching into the complex strains of her as yet nameless song without pause.
At least she was warmed up. And at least she had long since learned how to control her breathing in a corset. She ignored the slimy feeling that washed over her as the elemental attempted to Silence her - the pin at her waist repelled the spell. The others might not be so lucky, but what was important now was to finish the song, to give them healing and protection, before she could think of doing anything else.