Disclaimer: I don't own The Rocky Horror Picture Show
A/N: I hate how 'unrealistic' it is when I attempt to write song lyrics into prose. So, I've adapted most of the songs into dialogue. Films and books are very different media, so I've also changed around a few other things in a few scenes.
Speaking of which, I originally had Columbia actually quote some of Sappho's poetry. But it made things too weird, so I just said that she'd quoted it. Judging by what I've read of her works, Sappho was a very strange person. She was an Ancient Greek female poet who wrote passionate poetry about her various female lovers and the goddess of love.
Also, I'm pretty sure that the thing about Hamlet and Laertes jumping into Ophelia's grave only happens in the 2nd Quarto version of Hamlet. That's the edition I usually read.
I hope it doesn't bother people that I changed Columbia's 'I hate you, Frank' speech. For some reason I really wanted to have a character compare him to Caligula at some point. In my opinion, Frank really resembles that infamously crazy Roman emperor.
Sunday, November/?/1974
Dear Diary,
The world has gone insane. I'm still trying to comprehend it all. So much had happened in the last 24 hours... well, I'll start where I left off.
Which was actually Saturday.
Since we usually have movie nights on Saturday evenings, I assumed that's what was going on. I changed into my pajamas and braced myself for another showing of 2001: a Space Odyssey. Boy, was I wrong about all that!
When Magenta turned on the television, I was quite shocked to see Janet talking to Rocky. They were clearly in the lab. Apparently he'd been injured somehow. And she'd for some reason decided to bandage him up with her slip. I could see where this was going...
Ooh, then she began to get that look in her eyes.
"Tell us about it, Janet!" Mags and I said at the exact same time.
"I was feeling a bit lost, a bit bored of everything. Since I'd only ever kissed before"
Oh my, I hadn't realized that Frank had seduced her yet. "You mean she...?"
"Uh huh."
"I didn't realize... well, I used to think that there's no use getting too intense. It just leads to trouble and, um, all that jazz. To put it poetically, I've tasted blood and I want more!"
"More! More! More!" we chanted, giggling.
She moved closer to him, and he sure didn't seem to mind.
"I'll give in right away this time. Please, I need to be nearer to somebody. Oh! I feel so... funny now. I need... somebody."
The way she went on and on like that was quite entertaining. Who says that sort of thing?
"Touch me! I want to be dirty, now. Thrill me, chill me, fulfill me- hey, that rhymes!"
"Ah, what a poetess she's become," I muttered sarcastically.
Magenta was to buys watching the screen and giggling to notice that I'd even spoken.
"Oh! Creature of the night!"
"Thrill me, chill me… fulfill me… creature of the night!"
"And that's just one small fraction of the main attraction! How poetic I'm becoming..."
For a moment Rocky moved away, staring at her in confusion. It was hilarious. Soon enough, of course, she'd guided his hand toward her bra.
"Oh! You need a friendly hand, and I need action! Touch me, please! Creature of the night!"
It was strangely comical, the way he slowly touched her. Once she was topless it got ever funnier. She'd only done it once before, and he'd never seen that much of a girl until now.
When I felt Magenta's arm around my waist I stopped paying attention to the screen we'd both focused intently upon only moments ago. As if mimicking the scene we'd just watched, Magenta's hand found its way into my nightshirt. I giggled.
I leaned toward her, nuzzling her neck and quoting Sappho into her ear. I wasn't going to reuse the awful 'poetry' Janet had made up. And what better poetry the Sappho for young ladies like us?
Then, I practically attacked her soft neck with my lips.
Judging by the way she pulled me closer and wrapped her legs around me, she seemed to like that quite a bit. And I liked it when her hand-
Wait. I'm not really going to write any more about that. It's pretty obvious what happened next... and what if my future children (if I have any) find this diary? Ew.
Anyway, once that was all over, I changed into different pajamas (which, sadly, had more holes in them). Then, I began painting my toenails a nice bright red color. I had only painted my left foot when, for reasons unknown, Eddie's uncle wheeled his way into the room through one door then left through the other.
At the time I assumed it to be a sleep deprivation induced hallucination.
I thought Magenta couldn't see him, so I ignored him. Anyway, he wheeled through the room too quickly for even the shortest of greetings.
Only moments after he'd left, I heard Mags swear under her breath. She was staring at the clock.
"I've got to go make dinner now," she explained, looking strangely distraught.
"Bye," I muttered.
After she'd left the room I read a few scenes of Hamlet. Though it's Shakespeare's longest play, it's not too boring. And it's got some of his best soliloquies.
Ha, I even began to read out loud! Though, of course, the famous 'to be, or not to be' soliloquy always brings tears to my eyes. So I stopped reading that one.
Then, I turned to the Comic Gravediggers scene.
That's where the famous line 'Alas, poor Yorick' came from. But the unearthing of Yorick's skull isn't really what matters in that scene. It's really about the two Comic Gravediggers digging a grave for Ophelia whilst talking to Hamlet. Then, most of the court shows up and performs a shortened funeral ceremony. Laertes (Ophelia's brother) and Hamlet then proceed to jump into her grave and argue over which of them is more upset. It's far too comical for a play considered a tragedy.
The fact that I was reading that exact scene only moments before Magenta called me to dinner gives me the unsettling impression that the universe at large is mocking me.
Somebody real who died that evening didn't get a proper funeral. Their corpse was treated even worse than poor trampled Ophelia. And, unlike Ophelia, only one person grieved for them. That sole mourner was I.
I'd better explain in chronological order.
I'd better explain in chronological order.
Most of the people sitting at the dining room table looked confused. I, too, was confused by it all. By then I'm pretty sure it was about two in the morning. Even stranger was the fact that Dr. 'von' Scott sat at the table, too. That's when I realized my so-called hallucination of him wheeling through my room might not have been a figment of the imagination after all. Not that this made anything more sensible.
Seconds after I sat down at the table, Magenta brought some sort of weird meat into the room on a cart. I wasn't sure what the meat was. It kinda creeped me out...
With a sickeningly familiar 'mini-chainsaw', Frank began cutting the meat into slices. Mags then handed each person at the table a plate.
"I came here in search of Eddie," Dr. Scott said, after a while.
"Eddie?" I squeaked.
"That's a tender subject," Frank said sweetly. "Another slice, anyone?"
Soon enough, I realized what he meant. The meat I'd almost eaten was actually the mortal remains of my recently deceased boyfriend.
I fled the room, finally letting out a shriek of terror once I was in hallway outside the dining room. Sobbing hysterically I ran upstairs and into my room.
"Et tu, Magenta?" I muttered, collapsing onto my bed. "Then fall, Columbia!"
Fine, I was being a bit dramatic. Yet how could one blame me? Though I hadn't literally been stabbed by Magenta, I felt as betrayed as Caesar had when the senate turned on him.
Nobody else around here really cared for me. Now I had nobody left! Save for the robot, Robby, of course.
He's like Mark Antony, one last ally with the ability to help… or so I then thought. This suddenly reminded me of Mark Antony's funeral speech. The words he spoke at Caesar's funeral turned the people of Rome against Brutus and his fellow conspirators.
No doubt Dr. Scott was now telling everyone about all the terrible things Eddie apparently did. Just as Brutus called Caesar ambitious…
That's when I decided to go downstairs and read that famous speech. I changed the word 'ambitious' to 'troublesome', and exchanged 'Caesar' for 'Eddie'. And 'Brutus' became 'Dr. Scott' or 'Frank' (depending on the phrase). If Mark Antony could convince all of Rome to hate Caesar's killers, I told myself, then I could convince them that Eddie really was a good person.
I began to speak as I walked into the dining room:
"Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears. I come to bury Eddie, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones,
So let it be with Eddie. The noble Dr. Scott hath told you Eddie was a troublemaker. If it were so, it was a grievous fault. And grievously hath Eddie answer'd it-"
Before I'd even really begun to recite the speech I realized that they'd all left the room already.
I shuddered.
The dining room suddenly felt tomb-like. I noticed the glass coffin the middle of the room. Wait…. it wasn't a glass coffin. No, it was the table with it's tablecloth moved away. Beneath the glass table, in a wooden coffin, his mangled corpse lay. Standing there in the cold silence, I decided to make my own speech for him.
I'm no poet- in fact, it was awful- but at least it meant something.
"We were star-crossed all along, I suppose. Like King Mark did to Tristan and Isolde, someone of noble blood kept us apart. Like Cathy and Heathcliff, we'll be together many years from now- once we're both dead. I'll live for now, while you venture on to the so-called undiscovered country. Like Romeo thought of Juliet, I thought you to be dead before you actually were. Yet I have more common sense than he did. And our love was truer than their three-day affair could ever have been. We tried and tried, but the world wanted to keep us apart. Goodbye, my dear."
And then I left the room. I wandered somewhat aimlessly through the halls, until I heard shouting.
Dr. Scott, Brad, and Janet were making an awful pun out of Frank's full name.
How uncreative they were! Rolling my eyes at their stupidity, I followed the sound of their voices. Soon I found my way to the lab (that's where they were).
They'd been turned into statues.
"My God! I can't stand any more of this! First, you spurn me for Eddie… then kill him to make Rocky! You chew people up then spit them out again… I loved you… don't you see? I loved for no reason, the way Cathy loved Heathcliff! A destructive love! You're an abusive bastard! I loved you… do you hear me? And what did that get me? Yeah, I'll tell you: a big nothing! You're like Emperor Caligula! You screw everyone in sight and kill for fun! You drain others of emotion and self worth. Well, I've had enough! You needed to choose between me and Rocky- so named because of the rocks in his head!"
Then, my mind went blank. I've got no idea what happened for a while. In fact, I'm not even sure how much time went by!
When I 'woke up' I was wearing different clothes. Though I didn't realize where I was at first, I soon realized that I stood on the stage of that theatre Eddie and I once 'escaped' through. I was performing a show of some kind. And, somehow, I wasn't able to control my own body. At all.
An unknown power forced my body to dance and sing. My mind was the only thing I controlled. The worst part was, when the corset top I wore fell down to bare my breasts, I couldn't do anything.
Actually, the worst part was probably that I was conscious through the awful ordeal. Like being trapped in some sort of horrible dream.
After a while, my 'dance' (mercifully) ended.
Then I watched Rocky, Brad, and Janet each perform a solo. For the first time ever I actually pitied the first of the three. He didn't want to 'take' Frank away from me. And he didn't even seem to like his life in the first place. I suppose I wouldn't, if I were in the same position (pun not intended) as he.
If I'd been able to control the movement of my body, I would've vomited when I heard Brad's lines. My God, what Frank had done with/done to the poor man had traumatized him! You're not supposed to prove to somebody that they're bisexual by screwing them. And the disturbing words Brad sang made me hate Frank even more! A grown man crying for his mother to help him isn't a good thing…
And then Janet sang. Frank had clearly turned her into a total slut. With wild eyes and puckered lips… she performed with exaggerated sexuality. As if all she wanted anymore was to be touched by nearly anyone. Well, maybe not other girls. Though I'm really not sure that she's straight at the time I'm writing this.
Anyway, once Janet finished her 'solo', the curtain behind us all moved away to reveal a bizarre replica of the 'RKO Tower'. In front of it stood Frank. To make matters even stranger, he began to sing about wanting to look like Fay Wray.
Wouldn't he need a blonde wig for that?
The song was slow and not very exciting. So, I sort of zoned out mentally. Since I wasn't controlling my body it didn't really matter.
Soon enough I realized that maybe I shouldn't have done that. Because I hadn't been paying attention, I hadn't realized we were all getting in the pool. The sensation of suddenly being in cold water momentarily freaked me out.
Now, everyone was singing a slow song.
At that point, though painfully tired, I forced myself to pay attention.
We all began to touch each other through the odd, matching burlesque costumes we wore. It repulsed me. My mind kept telling me how wrong this all was, while my body told me to just enjoy. The worst part was that I couldn't tell if my body or the thing controlling my body enjoyed it.
Like earlier, Brad cried out in terror. "Help me, mommy!"
To my horror, the alien technology (?) controlling my body suddenly forced me to kiss him. I suppose it was to shut him up. God, I felt like a monster. Especially since I couldn't move away.
Suddenly, Janet shouted something about God blessing someone/something. I was to busy panicking to figure out what she actually said.
Not that it mattered.
Frank abruptly began to sing an upbeat song. We all got out of the pool. A chorus line and more singing ensued.
To my confusion, Dr. Scott then appeared out of nowhere and began kicking his fishnet-clad legs whilst still in his wheelchair.
This weekend has been the weirdest of my entire life.
And what I've already written down isn't even the worst of it!
Before the song was properly over the theatre doors swung open… and there stood Riff & Mags. To my delight I regained control of my body. We all did. The 'spell' was broken!
"It's all over!" Riff shouted. "The mission failed, thanks to you! And your lifestyle is way to extreme. I'm a new commander, and you're a prisoner. We're finally returning to Transylvania."
"Wait… can I, um, explain?" Frank replied, attempting to smile innocently.
With half his makeup washed away he looked too crazy to get away with even a few sentences. Any attempts at a speech would just waste his time. So, Riff just pointed a laser gun at him and prepared to fire it (meaning he pressed a few buttons).
Before Riff got around to actually shooting Frank I noticed which laser gun he held in his hand. It was the exact same laser gun that had shocked me enough to kill my unborn child.
I screamed in terror as the memory of that event flashed in front of my eyes. Then, for some reason, he turned away from Frank and shot me with the laser gun.
A while later I awoke.
After slowly opening my eyes I let out a little shriek of terror. I wasn't in any room I'd ever seen before. And I was lying on a bed I'd never seen before.
Then, I heard a voice. The robot's voice.
"They are gone, miss. But they left you a note."
He handed me a letter of some kind. It was long and a bit confusing. All about how they'd planned to help me once they were gone.
To summarize:
A while ago Magenta and Riff decided to go back to their planet on the day of the party. Beneath the false basement is a real basement that's not attached to the castle. It's an underground bunker of sorts. Also, they'd left enough supplies (money, nonperishable food, clothes, etc.) to keep me living comfortably in that place for about a year and a half. The robot is now my concern.
They'd included a map of this place paper-clipped to the letter. It's actually pretty nice, all things considered. Two small bedrooms, one decent-sized bathroom, a kitchen, a living room of sorts, a general storage room, and the room with all the technology.
The last of those places was filled with a random collection of advanced (alien) computers and medical supplies Riff left for me. Also, Robby's 'charger' happens to be there.
The room I'd woken up in was one of the bedrooms.
Only about an hour after I'd woken up did I return to that room. That was about 45 minutes ago. I've spent basically all of that time writing this diary entry!
Well, I think I'll go back to sleep for now. It's about lunchtime (noon) now, though last night I stayed up till about 6 AM. I really need to rest!
- Columbia (a groupie)
Please Review!