Chapter Text
Ophelia takes a long drag of her cigarette and blows out the smoke with an exasperated sigh.
“It’s getting late. We have to decide now.”
Cam is standing next to the whiteboard, where she’s written (and crossed out, then written again) the names of every singer they’ve seen today. She goes over them, pensive.
“I still think that Astarion guy wasn’t bad. Sure, he had sh*t hair, but that’s fixable, you know?”
“No f*cking way. I didn’t write my songs for a man to sing them.” The keyboardist spits into the ashtray she has next to her. She’s curled up on an amp, one hand holding the cigarette butt she’s squeezing every last millimetre out of, the other tapping nervously at the side of the amplifier. She’s wearing the round sunglasses she never takes off, despite being indoors (and it being nearly midnight). “What about Ember?”
“You kidding? Were you actually watching her?” Cam looks incredulous. “Sure, she could hit a note and all, but she just stood there! No stage personality, she wouldn’t be able to yell like Aru could.”
“Well, maybe Aru would still be around if you hadn’t been such a bitch to her.”
“Not my fault she puss*ed out the second things got real.”
“Don’t give me that. You treated her like sh*t.”
Cam shrugs. “She couldn’t handle the pressure. Sorry, but I wanted the recording to go as well as possible. Couldn’t risk her f*cking it up.”
“Yeah, and now we’re down a singer and our deadline’s tomorrow. Well done, babe.”
The bassist casts an eye down the board, stamping her foot petulantly. “Why is everyone here so sh*t?”
Ophelia massages her temples. “Maybe we should just call it a bust. Cancel the studio reservation, have some time to ourselves to recover a bit.”
“You know they won’t refund our deposit. At least not fully.”
“Yeah, so what else do you suggest? Are you singing? Because I sure as hell am not.”
“Come on, you know I can’t sing and play bass at the same time!”
“Right, so we have to find someone else. In the next…” she checks her phone for the time “ten hours. And I’d like to be able to sleep at some point.”
“But-”
“I know, none of them are great. But beggars can’t be choosers, yeah? Maybe you should have thought of that before bullying Aru out of the band.”
Cam snarls. “I did not! You want to start-”
A knock on the rehearsal room door interrupts the seething argument, diffusing the building tension into a shared look of surprise. Just in time, Ophelia thinks. Cam stomps over to the door, opening it tentatively.
A man they’ve never seen before steps in. He’s much older than them - maybe in his forties or fifties - and he’s clearly trying to dress business casual, wearing matching suit trousers and jacket over a plain-coloured black t-shirt. He has messy black hair that looks like it should be far greasier than it is and a single small piercing in his left ear.
Ophelia hates him already. “Who the f*ck are you?”
The man steps into the centre of the room like he owns the place, looking around at the décor - the walls are covered in horror movie posters, printed photos from gigs, little silver charms… He raises an eyebrow at it all before wordlessly handing her a business card from inside his jacket pocket.
She gives him a disdainful look before reading it out loud. “Enver Gortash, Freelance Manager, Agent, Talent Scout.” She drops the card on the floor. “What are you here for?”
“You’re The Dark Urges, right?” He doesn’t bother to wait for an answer. “I heard you were looking for a singer.”
Cam’s stalking up behind him, looking almost predatory as she does so. She scoffs incredulously. “What, you think you’re up to it? f*ck off.”
Gortash turns in surprise - she’s made him jump. “I’ll have you know my singing isn’t bad at all. But no. I’m actually here representing someone else.” He calls out of the still-open door. “Rue, you can come in whenever you want!”
A girl steps through the door - a tiefling with pale gray skin covered in vitiligo marks. White hair with blood-red tips. Smudged black eyeshadow. Silver medallion pendant with a skull protruding from it. Thick black combat boots with a red outfit - short shorts and a parka over a crop top. She looks out of place in the grimy chamber, like a lost popstar coming back from the club. And still, her presence is strangely commanding. She gives them both a smile, flashing pointed teeth. “Name’s Rue. Nice to meet you.”
The pale elf peers at her from over her glasses, finally putting out her cigarette butt in the ashtray. “Ophelia. That’s Cam. You’re pretty late, Rue. We were about to shut down here.”
The man - Gortash - looks like he’s about to say something, but the tiefling shuts him up with a glare. Good, Ophelia thinks, show him his place. She turns back to the band with a confident smile. “I promise I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Seems like you think pretty highly of yourself, Rue.” Cam flashes her a malicious smile. “You think you’ve got what it takes?”
Rue matches her energy coolly, flashing her own evil grin. “Absolutely. What do you need me to do?”
The half-elf thinks for a second. “First, take off all your clothes.”
“Cam!” Ophelia snaps at her, giving her a reproachful look. “She’s joking. Sorry about her. What you actually have to do is sing for us. Nothing too hard, we’ll do covers so you know the lyrics. Just… don’t hold back. We don’t just want a good singer, we want someone who’s good onstage.”
Rue nods. “Should be easy enough.”
“You been in other bands?”
“No, but I do solo stuff. Mostly covers, the occasional original composition. I post them on my YouTube - got a decent amount of subscribers.”
The elf narrows her eyes behind the sunglasses. She’s one of those types. That explains the sleazy manager - who is now sitting on her sofa! - and the out-of-place outfit. Still, she respects her attitude, and is intrigued to see how she does. She slides off the amp, almost catlike, stepping over to her keyboard. Cam picks up her bass, switching her amp back on and adjusting her pedals. Rue takes the microphone Ophelia hands her, clearing her throat.
“You know Bela Lugosi’s Dead?”
The tiefling snorts with badly-concealed laughter. “Seriously?” The most stereotypical-looking goths she’s ever seen want her to do a Bauhaus song. How original.
“Is there a problem?”
“Nah. I know it.”
“Great. We can start as soon as Grandpa over there leaves.”
Gortash looks offended, but Rue laughs at the insult. “He’s staying. He’s my manager, he likes to watch me perform. Just say… he’s here for moral support.”
Ophelia gives him the evil eye. “Fine. Just this once. But if you get in, you’re not dragging him along to every rehearsal. He’s already killing the vibe.”
The tiefling gives a little smirk, turning to the manager and scolding him, voice sarcastic. “Sure. Stop killing the vibe, Gortash!” The older man raises his hands in mock surrender as Ophelia hits a button on her drum machine, the pulsing beat flowing out of the speakers around them.
It’s not long before Cam, nodding along to the drums, enters with her bassline, a dark, descending sound - just slightly distorted, turned up loud enough so Rue feels the vibration in her boots. She pulls out her phone, giving the lyrics a last once-over - just in case.
Soon, Ophelia enters the soundscape, adding low, sustained ambient resonances with her keyboard, slowly adjusting the mix to create a mysterious, echoing drone over the precise snap of the drums and Cam’s languid, purring bassline.
Rue lifts the microphone to her lips at a look from the musicians. They haven’t given her much to work with - it’s not exactly the most melodic song in the world. She puts on a hollow, sinister voice, matching the tone set down by the other two.
“White on white translucent black capes, back on the rack… Bela Lugosi’s dead.”
She keeps the atmospheric tone up, one hand on the microphone and the other making dramatic, clawing gestures at the air as she sings about blood and death and red velvet. She’s all too aware of the piercing looks at her back as the band scrutinises her every move. As the cyclical noise grows ever louder, Ophelia adding more and more ambient tracks with her looping keyboard, Rue slowly begins to shift her voice from a dark, almost spoken near-whisper to a louder, theatrical delivery.
“Undead, undead, undead.”
She finds herself dropping to her knees, head back, hand shaking, reaching into the air as her voice grows tense and desperate.
“Undead - undead - undead! The virginal brides…”
She’s singing with madness and fear in her voice, as if she herself is witnessing the deathly sights she’s describing. No longer is she worrying about the band watching her- now she’s there, she can see the twisting, thorny rose-bushes, the ghost-like coffin-bearers, the castle looming in the moonlight as the cold wind whips about her.
“Alone in a darkened room - the Count!”
Her voice reaches a fever pitch as dark, monochrome eyes flash before her - she collapses onto the floor, convulsing as she yells, almost as if she were dying herself.
“Bela Lugosi’s Dead!”
Unseen by her, Ophelia and Cam share a look of complicity, the former giving an impressed smile. Cam responds with a raised eyebrow, counting the two in with a gesture.
Suddenly, the dark, resonating sounds are cut off, replaced by a different, more energetic drumbeat. Rue, still on the floor, jolts back up in surprise. She gives Gortash a look of incredulity, and he responds with an encouraging smile. She turns to the band with a glare of betrayal, and is met only by a smirk from Cam as she clicks on her distortion pedal and her bass roars back into action with a grimy, simple riff.
Wait… She knows this song. Ophelia’s keyboard joins in, now mirroring Cam’s riff, and Rue’s initial confusion fades - she knows exactly what to do. She starts jumping up and down to the beat, bringing the microphone to her mouth again as she yells out her first lines, abandoning the sinister tone for a shouty, defiant, celebratory delivery.
“That girl thinks she’s the queen of the neighbourhood!”
Now, she has left the gloomy castle and is transported to a different world altogether - one of ripped jeans and smeared lipstick and bruised knees and looks that say far more than words could ever do. She struts around the room to the song’s rhythm, belting out the lyrics with reckless abandon.
“Rebel Girl - Rebel Girl - Rebel Girl, you are the queen of my world!”
She makes eye contact with Gortash, who nods her on excitedly. She gives him a cheeky smile, leaning in towards him, looking into his eyes as she sings the next line.
“I know I wanna take you home, I wanna try on your old clothes - uh!”
She breaks eye contact as quickly as she initiated it with a flip of her hair, strutting back between the band as if they’ve been playing together for years. She ends up shoulder to shoulder with Cam as she hollers out the next verse. It comes naturally to her - even in this dark little rehearsal room with an audience of one, she’s a rockstar.
She leaps back into the middle as she ends the verse, bending over to scream out the last line with every last trace of emotion in her - “In her kiss - I TASTE THE REVOLUTION!”
She loses herself in the chorus again, belting out her imagined love for the unnamed Rebel Girl - of course they have her singing this, Ophelia is the biggest lesbian she’s ever seen, even without the labrys tattoo and the carabiner on a chain around her neck. She struts up and down the old rug, covered in cigarette ash and grime, like it’s a red carpet. She f*cking owns this place, ending the chorus with a high kick and launching into the final verse.
This time she approaches Ophelia, who is standing almost completely still, her deft fingers the only part of her in movement as she expertly plays her keyboard, lost in concentration. As Rue approaches, she looks up, giving her a thin smile.
“That girl thinks she’s the queen of the neighbourhood - I got news for you, SHE IS!”
She jabs at the air, pointing at Gortash as if she’s scolding him with the last couple of words. He gives her a wide grin, enjoying the performance immensely. She turns back to Ophelia, bending over her keyboard to deliver the next line right in her face.
“They say she’s a dyke, but I know she is - my best friend, yeah!”
She earns a look of shocked amusem*nt from the elf - the most emotion she’s expressed yet. She leaps back into the middle of the room, finishing the song with one final chorus, jumping up and down to the pulsing beat, her vocal cords straining as she gives everything she can to end the song as bombastically as she can.
“I really like you, I really wanna be your best friend - be my Rebel… Girl…”
She draws out the last word, as does Ophelia with her final notes, while Cam ends the song by sliding up the neck of her bass, shredding out a short but intricate bass solo, before the two finish with one last THUD of a chord.
And silence.
Gortash leaps up from the sofa, applauding enthusiastically. Ophelia stares daggers at him from over her glasses. Rue looks around expectantly as Cam clicks off her pedals and leaves her bass on its stand.
“That was great, Rue!” Gortash yells out, restraining himself from running over and scooping her up in a hug. Rue can tell, giving him a smirk.
Ophelia’s still giving him the evil eye. “Shut up. That’s for us to decide.” She steps out from behind her keyboard, squaring up to the tiefling, a cold look on her pallid face. “You’ve got some nerve, calling me a dyke like that.”
Rue hisses awkwardly through her teeth. sh*t. She had, hadn’t she? “I’m sorry. I got carried away in the-”
The elf’s expression softens and she laughs. “Yeah, I could tell. Luckily, I don’t mind.”
Cam chips in, a smirk on her face. “I mean, she’s not wrong. You are a massive d-”
“Yeah, Cam, I get it.” She turns back to Rue. “Anyway, as much as I hate to agree with your sleazebag friend, he’s right. You were f*cking amazing.”
The bassist nods in agreement. “Nice save with the song change. You’re the first person to adapt that well to us switching so quickly.”
“Yeah. Powerful, adaptable, creative, great energy... I think you’ve got everything it takes. So, you wanna sing for us?”
Excitement tingles through Rue’s veins and she gives the keyboardist a broad smile. “Oh, absolutely.”
Ophelia returns her smile. “Great. We’re meeting tomorrow at Blackwing recording studios, 10 AM. Give me your number, I’ll send you voice memos of what we wanna record, along with all the lyrics. You think you’re up to learning it?”
It’s short notice, but she’s still riding the high of her performance. “I’ll do my best.” She scrawls her number on the back of Gortash’s business card, handing it to the keyboardist with a smile.
Cam gives Ophelia a sceptical look, and the elf shuts her down with a glare. She turns back to Rue. “That’s great to know. See you tomorrow, then!”
“Not so fast!” Gortash butts in, holding out a few sheets of printed paper. “You want Rue to sing for you, first you have to sign this.”
“The f*ck?” Ophelia glares at him. “It’s our band, why are we the ones signing paperwork?”
“You don’t have a manager, right? Now that Rue’s joining, I want to manage all of you. Rest assured, I’m very good at what I do. I’ll get you all the best venues in Kenabres.” He gives them a slimy grin.
The elf stares questioningly at Rue, who nods. “Yeah. Me and Enver are a package deal. You want me, you have to take him.”
“Girl, really? You have got to be f*cking kidding me.” Ophelia’s tempted to kick them both out on the spot. But Rue was good… good enough to warrant something like this?
Before she gets a chance to do anything, Cam has snatched the pen and papers from Gortash’s hand, signing them quickly and holding them back out to him. Ophelia gives her an incredulous glare. “Seriously?”
Gortash takes back the papers and smiles widely at them. She’s tempted to punch him in the nose, but resorts to giving him the finger, snapping at him in rage. “You try any sleazy manipulative manager sh*t on us, and I’ll break both your legs, you got it? I know what your type is like.”
The older man grins at her. “Rest assured, you’re safe in my hands.”
She spits on the floor. “I don’t wanna go anywhere near your hands, old man.”
The manager simply laughs. “I’m sure you don’t. Let’s go, Rue. You have plenty to prepare for tomorrow morning.”
The tiefling nods at him, still beaming in excitement. She gives Ophelia a hug, taking her by surprise. The elf’s spindly, tattooed arms wrap awkwardly around her, holding on for a second before Rue breaks it off. She follows Gortash out of the door, turning to wave the band goodbye. “See you tomorrow! Thanks for taking me on!”
When the door has snapped shut, a livid Ophelia stalks over to Cam, towering over her. “The f*ck was all that about, huh?”
“Did you see her? She was amazing. Nobody else we’ve seen today could meet that level of talent.”
“Yeah, she was good, sure, but that f*cking businessman? Did you even read what you signed?”
“Ophelia, it’s been a long day, you said it yourself. I just wanted to get this sh*t over with. It can’t have been anything too bad, right? Just manager paperwork sh*t.”
The elf massages her temples. “For f*ck’s sake, babe! You could have checked with me, we could have talked it over! I can’t believe you just signed us on to have that sleazy, greasy… bastard as a manager without a second f*cking thought!”
Cam’s defensive, folding her arms and scowling. “Hey, I did it for the band, okay? Now we have a great singer and the recording tomorrow’s still on! I don’t get what you’re so pissy about.”
“Oh, you did it for the band? Did you chase Aru out for the band as well? Because I don’t think you had our best-”
“Don’t start with that sh*t again. Rue was amazing, right? Probably better than Aru. Her name even sounds similar, for f*ck’s sake, they both have horns! You can pretend Aru’s still around if you love her so much.”
Ophelia looks hurt, recoiling from Cam at the remark like she’s just been stung. “What are you trying to say?”
“I don’t know, babe, you’re the one who won’t shut the f*ck up about her! Maybe you should ditch me and get with her instead!”
“Oh, f*ck you, Cam!”
The half-elf sneers, her voice dripping with venom. “Not tonight, babe.” She unplugs her bass and slides it into her gig bag, zipping it up and slinging it over her shoulder. “Night.” She marches out haughtily, slamming the door behind her.
sh*t. Ophelia collapses onto the sofa, lighting another cigarette. She knows Cam’s probably right. Rue is amazing. But that f*cking manager guy? He gives her the creeps. Especially the way he and Rue looked at each other. No way they have a thing, right? He’s like ten, twenty years older than her…
She puts her headphones on and shuffles her favourite playlist, Siouxsie’s soaring voice ringing in her ears. She inhales deeply, the loud music and cigarette smoke helping ease some of her stress.
She takes the business card with Rue’s number on it out of her pocket, busying herself with sending her everything she’ll need to be ready for tomorrow.
This better be f*cking worth it.
