In preparation for Frank's arrival, Riff Raff and Magenta were moved to a holding cell near the exit to the prison's courtyard. It was the first time the two of them had seen each other since their arrest and subsequent incarceration.
"Magenta!" Riff Raff caught his beloved sister as she was roughly shoved into the cell, almost losing her balance. He enveloped her in a fierce embrace, as tears ran from his eyes. He hungrily drank in the sight of her face, still beautiful despite all she'd been through. Slender to begin with, it was obvious she'd lost more weight in prison – not surprising, considering the deadly combination of wretched food, uncomfortable accommodations and fear. Riff Raff, who'd been almost skeletal before being imprisoned, had at least managed to maintain what weight he had.
Despite her misery, Magenta managed to give him a genuine smile. "Hello, my dear brother."
Riff Raff's joy at being reunited with Magenta was tempered by not only fear, but by his guilt for bringing about the circumstances that had led them to this horrible place, in preparation for an undoubtedly even more horrible fate. "How can you even bear the sight of me? I managed to destroy both our lives, all because of an ill-advised burst of temper. Can you ever forgive me?"
Magenta gently wiped away his tears. "How can I not forgive you? I love you. I know you didn't mean for any of this to happen."
Riff Raff was
silent for a moment. "It depends on
what you mean by 'any of this.'
Naturally I didn't intend for us to end up in prison. But I did intend to kill Frank,
at least at the time. He treated us
like…like…"
Magenta finished his sentence for him.
"Like servants."
"Like slaves. There's a difference. He was arrogant and condescending on Transsexual, but nothing in comparison to how utterly contemptuous he was on Earth. It was completely demoralizing. He needed us, but he treated us like so much excess baggage. After all those years of serving him and his mother, we both deserved far better than that."
Magenta sighed. "Riff, you need to keep in mind who he is, and how he was raised. From the day he was born, he was surrounded by servants eager to cater to his every whim. You must admit, there were times you came across as considerably less than eager to do his bidding."
Riff Raff gave her a withering glare. "Small wonder. He seemed to go out of his way to find repulsive tasks for me. Just dealing with the excess body parts from his Rocky project was a nightmare. The worse the job, the happier he was to give it to me."
"And I suppose you didn't think Frank was intelligent enough to pick up on the fact that you resented the way he treated you? I'm sure that's why you bore more of the brunt of Frank's temper than I did. He could see through you more easily." She put a hand on his shoulder. "You know, he didn't always treat us poorly. He could be very charming, too."
Riff Raff wasn't quite prepared to concede his position. "It was unfortunate he felt compelled to use that 'charm' on so many Earthlings. He was completely out of control."
Magenta shook her head and leveled a severe look at Riff Raff. He turned away to avoid her gaze. "Riff, this is me you're talking to. I don't believe you were scandalized by Frank's behavior. He's always been a hedonist. He wasn't any worse on Earth than he was here. Besides, part of his research was to see how sexually compliant the Earthlings were. He was able to prove they aren't necessarily as conservative as we'd been led to believe. That's something we need to know, if there is to be a possibility that Transylvanians are ever going to live on Earth permanently."
"I get the impression you rather liked him. How much of that legendary charm did he use on you?"
Magenta stared at him. "Is that what your anger was about? Not that you felt ill-used by Frank, or that you thought he was 'too extreme'…you thought I was sleeping with him?"
Riff Raff stared back at her. "You answer my question first."
Magenta took a deep breath, trying to control her own anger. "Don't be ridiculous. Frank never approached me to sleep with him, nor would I have accepted if he had. How could you even suspect such a thing?"
"You're so beautiful. How could he not have wanted you? And it was obvious he was quite skilled at seducing the people he wanted."
She glared. "I can't believe you would think I would betray you with any other man, even someone as powerful as Frank."
Riff Raff mumbled, "Well, he could have forced you into it."
She snapped back, "Maybe so, but he didn't. If that's what you were afraid of, why didn't you just ask me, instead of getting yourself so angry that you wound up trying to kill the man?"
Riff Raff started to argue further, then stopped. "You're right. I'm sorry. I resented being treated like a flunky, and I was afraid something was going on between the two of you. I find you so incredibly sexy that I can't imagine anyone else not feeling the same way…and for reasons I can't begin to understand, most people seem to find him incredibly sexy as well. I couldn't bear the thought that you might have been one of them."
Tears started running down his face again, as he realized anew what a horrible mistake he had made. He could have handled the poor treatment from Frank – it was his jealousy that was the straw that broke the camel's back. The fact that the jealousy was unfounded tore at his very soul. It would have been bad enough had he just ruined his own life, but he ruined his sister's as well. He didn't know how he could live with the guilt. However, he had the unnerving suspicion that wouldn't be a problem very much longer, given Frank's scheduled appearance that day.
Magenta felt her anger dissipate as she saw Riff Raff's tears. She sighed. "I'm sorry, too. I should have tried to stop you when you talked about 'teaching Frank a lesson.' I was angry over a confrontation I'd had with him a couple of days before, and at the time it felt like a good idea. I didn't realize you intended to kill him, but any formal challenge to him at all would have meant severe punishment. We were both fools."
Riff Raff glanced up, seeing two rather burly prison guards approach their cell. "And we're about to pay for it."
