I do not own Bleach or Phantom of the Opera.
Hello again everyone!
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Thanks to 1piecegirl, 3vuep, , Aliceinwonderland0506, Anemone Iris Sidera, Edansnow, Hellsing's reaper, Krystalana, LeeHimeChan, Lonelyphantom021, MegaSPSolarFlare, , OwlStorm17, RageGoat, Random45Person, TheAvatarRoku, Unique12, WhiteDragonAshley10, eve9613, golden-eyedwolf842, lady madland, otakumeera, rojy, thereciev3r, ulquihime7980 for following.
Special thanks to 3vuep for their review on the last chapter, and my wonderful Beta reader Shi-Daisy.
By virtue of his position as chief of flies, Nnoitra spent most of his time out of the companies line of sight. So in a strange way, continuing on with life and work in his absence was easy to do.
That didn't stop Orihime from staring at the spot on the stage where his body had been hanging by one of his own ropes. The curtains were drawn across the stage and the dancers were waiting in the wings, you could hear the chattering sound of the audience on the other side, and Orihime could just imagine them sitting in their seats, whispering to each other about the 'mysterious death' that had been splashed across all the papers and was most likely the reason they were at the show tonight.
It would be unfair to Aizen and Urahara to say that there had been more incidents since they had become managers, but she would say that it felt like Las Noches had been in the papers a lot more lately.
Pursing her lips together in an upset line that wouldn't smudge her lipstick (one of many useful skills you learned in the theater buisness), Orihime let out a huff and fell in line with the rest of the girls making last minute costume checks and getting ready for the opening number. Orihime was a professional, she would do her job. But that didn't mean she had to like it.
:::
Ulquiorra did not like this. He did not like being known. He did not like the fact that he was crawling through the dark spaces of his own opera house for the sake of some else's agenda, but the worst part was that the orders he was obeying were things he would have done anyway.
Pulling himself into the crawl space between the ceiling of the theater and the roof of Las Noches, Ulquiorra peered through the small window he usually used to watch performances from. The way this opera was being managed was appalling enough, but his box was also currently being occupied by the offensive orange hair of Ichigo Kurosaki, as well as the rest of his family. All part of Aizen's plan he was sure, but never the less, it felt like insult added to injury.
The opera was commenced beneath him, voices and instruments combined in an appropriately grandiose style, Aizen had given him enough free reign to choose the moment he'd make his move, and he had to wait for just the right one.
It was a little known fact, that the catwalk that ran around the domed ceiling, had some of the best acoustics in all of Las Noches. Pulling the piece of piano wire and a small blade from beneath his cloak, Ulquiorra began to set the stage.
:::
They were nearing the end of the third act, just one more duet for Cirruci and Dordoni. Orihime hastily shoved bobby pins into her hair, having changed out of her chorus costume and into her ballet dress, and hurried into the wings. On her way out to the stage, the leading lady herself passed Orihime, taking her usual swig of 'medicinal' sherry before shoving the flask to the nearest stage hand.
The two set themselves on their marks, just as the lights came up, and it was probably just in Orihime's imagination, but Cirruci seemed to stagger a bit as she walked.
"Il se fait tard... adieu!" Cirruci sang, and no, she was definitely swaying on the spot.
"Quoi, je t'implore en vain,
Attends, laisse ma main s'oublier dans la tienne!" Dordonni bellowed out, grabbing Cirruci by the arms as per the stage instructions. This also let him get a better look at her face than Orihime could from where she was standing, and he didn't seem to like what he saw.
"Laisse-moi, laisse-moi contempler ton visage
Sous la pâle clarté
Dont l'astre de la nuit, comme dans un nuage,
Caresse ta beauté!"
The music played on. And on. Cirruci missed her cue to start singing again, Orihime exchanged worried glances with the other dancers, Cirruci never missed her cues. Off to the side, the stage hand sniffed at the flask Cirruci had handed him, and wrinkled his nose at the unidentified smell that was definitely not sherry.
"O silence! ô bonheur! ineffable mystère!"Cirruci began to sing again, and in the orchestra pit Starkk scrambled to try and realign the music with her voice. Sadly it was very noticeable by the audience. In box five, Ichigo leaned forward, his eyebrows bunched together in confusion and concern.
"Enivrante langueur!
J'écoute ! Et je comprends cette voix solitaire
Qui chante dans mon cœur!" Cirruci gainned enough of her senses back to know that this was the part of the scene where she had to to 'break away' from Dordoni, she 'struggled' against him as she sang, and at the right moment he let her go, just as practiced, but instead of backing away to lower to the ground, Cirruci gave one more shove than she needed to, and she went sailing backwards, landing against the floorboards with a dramatic thump!
A few patrons of the arts apparently found this funny. Chuckles reverberated around the space, making everyone backstage sweat in a way that had nothing to do with the heat from the lights.
The music from the orchestra continued, waiting for Cirruci to finish her section of the duet. But she never made another sound, she didn't even rouse at all when Dordoni cut ahead to his section, singing louder than he needed to and staring at her pointedly. Everyone held their breaths collectively, waiting for the Prima Donna to do something, unfortunately what happened next was Dordoni collapsing to his knees at her side, a panicked look on his face.
"Cirruci? Cirruci?" He repeated, picking her up off the floor and shaking her gently, "Come on Querida, open your eyes."
Confused chatter filled the auditorium, the audience now thoroughly lost, all they knew is that the actors were strugling... and not in a fun way.
And that's when a voice came from above.
"Did I not leave instructions for box five to remain closed?" It asked.
Every set of eyes turned upwards to the painted clouds on the ceiling, or rather, the cloaked figure who stood amongst them. Just a single disappointed voice, but it echoed around the theater with a boom. In fact everyone was so enraptured by the sight, that nobody heard Orihime whisper to herself, "It's him."
"You did this!" Screamed Dordoni, jostling Cirruci in Ulquiorra's direction. "Is this some kind of trick?!"
He was two far away for anyone to get a clear look at him, definitely to far away for anyone to notice the shift in his cloak, as the hand under it gave a deft tug on the piano wire attached to the rope holding the chandelier, specifically the spot where he'd been sawing away at it for the whole show. One sharp tug, every strand unwound, and five hundred pounds of crystals and gold coloured fixtures fell to earth.
Las Noches was filled with screaming once again, actors on the stage dived for shelter in the wings, the audience members close to the stage were in the direct path of the chandelier, trampled each other in an attempt to get out of their seats, those who were seated in boxes or on the balcony either clutched onto each other as if they weren't in the safest place, or stared on in horror at the chaos beneath them. In the orchestra pit Coyote Starkk grabbed his daughter by the back of her shirt and threw her into the aisle closest to the wall, resulting in a bruised back but a saved life, her shrieks joined in with the symphony of others that were drowned out by the sound of the chandelier smashing into the front of the stage.
:::
When Aizen had proposed to Urahara that they lower the price of floor seats for 'Faust', the blonde had been a bit skeptical, but his partner assured him that it would result in better publicity in the long run.
So, by some freak coincidence, every member of the public who had been in the direct path to get hurt that night had been a civilian off the streets, while the usual high class patrons that Las Noches was used to, were in the perfect spot to view everything.
The next morning, it was all anybody could talk about, the name Las Noches was on the lips of every person who had walked away from that performance unscathed, spreading it to their friends, who then spread it on to others. Every newspaper ran front page articles, black ink on white paper screamed about the 'mystery' and 'conspiracy', further fanning the flames.
Urahara stared blankly at all the papers on his desk, they hadn't even picked what their new opera would be and the box office had already been flooded with pre-bookings. Leaning back in his office chair, Urahara rubbed his face tiredly and tried desperately not to think back to the night in question, how in the midst of the panic he'd glanced at his partner and seen what could only be described as an amused glint in his dark eyes. He tried not to think about that look, about Aizen's earlier comments about publicity, and about how it a ended up coming true. He tried not to think about how it was almost like Aizen planned such a disaster.
:::
The police were back at Las Noches, and it seemed to be both a needed presence and a pointless endeavor. No officer or detective in their right mind was going to report back to Byakuya Kuchiki and tell him that an opera ghost was the culprit. But it was all anyone was going to tell them. Rukia sighed at the sight beneath her, pushing the hair that the wind had blown into her face out of her eyes. She stood on the roof of Las Noches, the rooftop area wasn't open to the public, and the staff weren't technically allowed to use it either, so of course everyone did. For smoke breaks, late night drinks, and... other things.
Rukia found herself out here alone more often than not, the winter weather was a put off for most people but Rukia had always been fond of the cold. Especially when it snowed, the fluffy white specks whirled in the air around her before settling into a powdery surface on the ground. There was a mass exodus of Las Noches' residence going on beneath her feet, nearly everyone who was able to find residence elsewhere was packing their bags and vacating the place that had been both their home and their community for years. No one was leaving their jobs, but there was a noticeable distancing between what Las Noches once was and what it was becoming. She'd passed Grimmjow on the way up, he'd been leaning against the door frame to the room he now had all to himself, scowling and sneering at everyone that passed him by with a suitcase, he'd made no secret of his opinion of everyone who was choosing to "run away". While she wouldn't be so crass about it, Rukia could kind of understand how he felt, she might have even spoken out about it, you know, if she wasn't one of the people leaving.
"I thought I'd find you out here." A male voice came from doorway.
Rukia twisted her head around to see Ichigo, pulling his coat tight around himself as he walked closer to her.
"Checking in on your family investment?" She joked, trying to lighten the tensity she felt in her chest.
"Checking in on you more like." His face shifting into its usual flippant expression as he came to her side. "What kind of guy doesn't worry about his girlfriend when she apparently lives in haunted house?"
Rukia inwardly winced at what he was referring to, but refused to let the morose subject broach their meeting. "Well then you have nothing to worry about," she told him, "Brother made it very clear that if I wanted to keep working here I had to at least move back home full time."
Ichigo snorted, "Well that's not the only reason I came by."
She sidled closer and patted at him with the back of her hand, "Oh? Nel's sticking around, you checking in on her too?"
Ichigo shrugged by way of a reaction, "I told her that there's a room at my house if she wants it, but she's sure she can take care of herself."
Rukia chuckled, "Soi Fon's staying too, I heard Yoruichi telling her she could stay with her and Urahara for a while."
Ichigo blanched, "That would not end well for him."
Rukia's lips curled into a smile at the sight of Ichigo lightening up, he'd been at the opera that night with his father and sisters, when she'd eventually found him in the aftermath he'd been holding a crying Yuzu. He'd always had a protectors streak in him when it came to his loved ones, especially in regards to things he couldn't protect them from.
"Orihime's staying behind too." He said blankly, making Rukia look up at him in surprise.
"She told you?"
"I'm sure she would if I knew where she was, I was going to tell her the same thing I told Nel, but no one seems to know where she is."
Rukia hummed in agreement, she hadn't noticed it until recently but Orihime had been making a habit of disappearing for hours at a time, only to turn up later and doge the question of where she'd been.
"Even if I bought her a penthouse suit, I don't think Orihime would leave this place." Ichigo continued.
The two of them had been standing side by side, looking out at the city, but now Rukia turned to look only at Ichigo.
"Even with everything that's going on," He continued, "this place... it's her home, her only home, and it's the last connection she has to Sora." A shadow fell over Ichigo's eyes and his face fell to the ground.
Rukia grabbed both of his hands, threading her fingers through his, she pulled his down to look into her eyes. She held him like that for a while, making sure he saw her, felt the squeeze of her hands through his gloves.
"We're all still here," she told him, voice sure and steady, "we're fine, you don't have to worry."
Ichigo let out a puff of warm breath into the space between them, leaning forward until his forehead came to rest against hers. He squeezed his eyes shut and let out a sigh.
"This is not how I imagined doing this." He said, much to Rukia's confusion.
"I mean, thought about this a lot. The how, the when, I made plans Rukia, multiple actual plans. And I only had help with two of them!"
"Ichigo-"
"But then nature oh so kindly points out to me, that you can make all the plans you want, and some maniac in a mask could still drop a chandelier on the love of your life. So I guess now's a good time as any."
Rukia tried to speak up again but Ichigo just clasped both her hands into his and held them up close to his chest.
"I'm not the most perceptive I know, and I'll admit that it took me longer than I'm proud of to realise that I love you. You remember the beginning? I told you that you changed my world? I meant that I love you, I told you that you made the rain stop? I meant that I love you, hell, I spent those years at school just thinking about the next time I'd get to see you again, and you still realized how I felt before I did."
"If you're trying to tell me I'm smarter than you, I already knew that." Rukia threw the jab without any real weight behind it, just wanting to get a word in edge wise. But it made Ichigo smile.
"Yeah." Ichigo swallowed, giving Rukia's hands one more squeeze before he sank down onto one knee.
Rukia's eyes widened, and her breath caught in her throat.
"Say you'll share with me one love, one lifetime. Say you need me with you, here beside you, anywhere you go, let me go to." Ichigo pulled one hand away and reached into his pocket, "Rukia, that's all I ask of you."
Ichigo pulled a band of white gold with a diamond set in the middle. "Rukia Kuchiki-"
"Yes." Rukia answered right away.
"Will you-"
"Yes."
"Will you marry me?" Ichigo spat out as quickly as he could, determined to do this right. And then he found himself falling backwards as the deceptively small body of Rukia Kuchiki tackled him to the ground. The layer of snow on the ground broke his fall, he still planned on complaining about it, but then Rukia was covering his mouth with hers, kissing him hotly.
"Is that a yes?" He panted out when they finally pulled apart.
"Yes you fool!" Rukia could try to sound annoyed with him all she wanted, but there was no disguising the massive smile on her face.
The two of them broke down into laughs and smiles after that, taking turns peppering each other with chaste kisses. Eventually when they got back to their feet they moved back to the door slowly, planning what they would do next, Ichigo wanted to tell his family first, that way while his father was officially adopting her as his third daughter, he could deal with how Byakuya would almost certainly challenge him to a duel.
Neither of them paid attention to the vent in the corner of the roof, why would they? It's not like it connected through various other pipes, to a series of underground tunnels, carrying the sound of their words and confessions to a solitary figure who was always listening, and had just found the words to finish his finale.
