Aria closed her eyes and held her breath. In the darkness, she could feel the notes trembling like dewdrops on metaphorical leaves. She was the last Soulsinger, the final remnant of her world, the only survivor of a great and terrible war. Of all places in the universe, the Psychic Circus was the last place she wanted to be. It was a decent job, performing to stay alive, but it wasn't ideal. If she had only snagged an infinity machine before she'd escaped her burning world….
Aria opened her eyes and shook the regrets from her mind. Barry, the loud, vertically challenged ringmaster stepped up onto a stool and announced through his purple megaphone Aria's act. She was called the 'Last of the Soulsingers, Aria Firedancer." Her name was entirely fabricated, one of many aliases she'd used over the decades. Her real title was the Dancer, but there was always the slim chance that someone would recognize it from legends and stories woven into the realities of several worlds. It was easier to use the alias she went by when she sang on her long forgotten world.
Aria took a deep breath and walked out on the balls of her feet, grinning at the crowd. A mass of multicolored flesh, feathers and scales churned in anticipation. Aria lifted a hand and the people roared, screamed and shrieked with delight. Hers was a well known act, famous in this region of the cosmos. Barry tipped his enormous top hat and waddled off, humming one of her songs as he went. He was horribly off key, but the Dancer didn't mind. She stood in the center of the ring and waited until the cries of the crowd faded to murmurs, and then finally died. She raised her arms, opened her mind, and sang. Soulsingers can sing with their voices, but most of their music is fabricated entirely with their minds. A low throbbing pulsed in the temples or respective alternatives of every organism under the big top. Even the two tailed mice scurrying at the edges of the ring fell silent and listened.
Aria opened her mouth and sang a pure and clear note that resonated across the people and subdued them into a silence so absolute; one may have imagined they had died. A melody wove in and out, back and forth, up and down. Aria liked to imagine that the melody was a fox being chased by the harmony parts, hunters on horseback. Had she known that one of her own kind was watching from the crowd, that he was in rapture by her moving performance, that he wanted desperately to join in the song – perhaps she would have run to him then. Maybe she would have stopped singing and ceased her endless wandering. She didn't have to wait long to find out. A man stood in the midst of the crowd, raised his arms to mimic hers and joined the song. A mysterious smile crept across his face and his eyes twinkled. Amazed, Aria sang louder and her mournful melody became joyous, punctuating the stillness with yellow and orange. The man pushed his way through the crowd and leaped over the boundary into the ring. He was quite a funny looking man with dark purple coattails and a bright blue bowtie. He walked over to her and laced his fingers with hers, smiling like a child at Christmas time. Aria felt her soul burst into a thousand fragments and reassemble themselves into something new. He was a Soulsinger. More than that, he was a Gallifreyan. She could feel past the rhythm and the pulsing of his joy that he too was a Time Lord.