A tall woman with long black hair walked onto the stage, her purple gem-covered dress trailing along the floor. As she stood in the center of the stage, she raised her arms into the air and jingled her large collection of golden bracelets, prompting a surge of applause from her audience.
"I am Alexandria von Stalz, and I welcome all of you to Medium Well!"
The applause grew, lasting several seconds before the woman made a sweeping gesture with her arms to quiet them, her loose sleeves billowing as they swept across the air.
"Now, there's a lot going on here today. A lot of spirits are calling out to me, waiting to be heard, begging for their messages to come across…"
Several members of the audience nodded solemnly. The woman grew silent and closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and wandered to the right side of the stage before stepping down and approaching her audience.
"One of you on this side of the room is seeking a message from a father figure in your life, somebody who was quite close to you when you were young but who you grew apart from in the years preceding their passing."
Nobody spoke up yet, but several individuals grew wide-eyed and watched Alexandria more closely than before.
"I see his body, too. He's pointing to his chest, maybe his heart, telling me that that area was the reason for his passing to the other side. Does anybody here recognize this man?"
A short, balding man raised his hand and stood up. "That must be my step-father. We'd been estranged for several years after an argument about my wedding, and then he died of a heart attack just last May."
Alexandria smiled knowingly. "Yes, that explains it. And your step-father wants to speak with you. He wants me to ask if you'll hear him out, despite your past disagreements."
A tear trailed down the man's face. "Of course I will, Paul. I'm so sorry."
The extravagantly-dressed woman shook her head. "No, don't say that. Your step-father doesn't want you to be sorry. He says that you've been blaming yourself for far too long, and that it's not your fault, that it never was. And… and Paul says that, no matter what, he's proud of you."
The balding man sniffled and looked straight at the woman, his eyes gleaming with tears. "Really?"
"Really. You've done so much for him to be proud of, and he just wishes that he could have told you so sooner and gotten past all that unpleasantness that kept the two of you apart while he was still alive."
"Oh, thank you, Alexandria!" The man gave Alexandria a strong hug. "Thank you so much!"
"I'm just glad that I could pass that message along." Alexandria stepped back towards the stage. "Now, I'm also hearing from-"
"STOP!"
All eyes in the room turned towards a young woman with a blonde pixie cut who stood up and was now walking slowly and deliberately towards the balding man.
"What's going on?" Alexandria called out.
"I have to ask you something, Carl- it is Carl, right?"
The balding man nodded, still sniffling.
The blonde woman knelt down until she could look the man in the eye. "You weren't really that sorry when you heard about Paul's death, now, were you? After those nasty things he'd said about your wife, you were glad to avoid him, even if he had played the good dad after your parents divorced."
The sniffling stopped.
"SECURITY!" Alexandria called out.
"And there aren't any spirits in the room right now. Miss Alexandria von Stalz here is a fraud. And that's not even her real name, or her real accent. Alexandria von Stalz? She's just Lizzie Blue from the Bronx."
"How dare you!"
The room erupted into screams. A number of audience members stormed out the doors, while others got out their phones to record the ongoing incident.
"Look, I'm sorry to all of you, but you've wasted your money and your time by coming here. This woman doesn't even have the Sight, let alone her vaunted 'psychic powers'."
Two muscular men in black uniforms stomped over to the woman and grabbed her, dragging her away from what little now remained of the audience.
"If you want a real psychic, look me up! The name's Clara Neumann! Alexandria is a fake, and the world deserves to know!"
The blonde woman was brought off set, and the room went quiet. Out of the hundreds who had filled the room just a minute earlier, only about a dozen had bothered to stick around after the chaos. The balding man was still standing, his tears dried and his sniffling silenced, his eyes unfocused as he gazed off into the distance.
Alexandria strode back onto the stage and looked back at the mostly-vacant seats in front of her. She gave a weak, nervous laugh and avoided the eyes of those who remained in their seats; when she spoke up, her voice was quiet, shaky, and barely recognizable.
"So much for that episode."