Chapter 81 - Blue Topaz Entr'acte
Time passes.
The lessons continue, moving on from monologues into full-blown scenes, learning how to time reactions, how to play off of one's fellow actors. To make the dialogue sound real, rather than wooden and rehearsed.
With this, also, comes the physical acting. Learning pratfalls and false punches, and how to handle a dulled sword properly.
Of course, these lessons can never last long—the space is theirs only between the aftermath of the show and as long as Ryusuke's stamina can hold out, and even with Ooda's suggestion that they also train beforehand (which delighted his mother in how much time it gave him outside the house, and made Ryusuke enthused in how excited he was) they have very little time together.
But Ryusuke is patient, and Ooda is a quick learner, and the lessons are effective.
And beyond the lessons, Ryusuke takes time to treat Ooda to lunch on occasion, to talk to him about his life, to give Ooda time to let things out he'd otherwise never tell his mother. Where questions from her about crushes and other interests would cause embarrassed shoulder-rising and stammers, Ryusuke's questions trigger giggles and flustered hand-waves. A bit of an improvement.
(As it stands, Ooda has no interest in any village girls. Though this is more due to his shyness than his preferences.)
Sometimes the lessons blend into the conversation, or vice versa.
Ooda and Ryusuke are in the dressing room one afternoon, after rehearsal. Ryusuke thinks it's about time that Ooda learn how to apply basic stage makeup.
"We might have to use extra-thick foundation for you, since your skin's so pale—unless you'd rather stick to your natural color?"
The question, unexpectedly, causes Ooda to freeze.
"…you mean you could make me look—normal?"
His voice is very, very quiet.
Ryusuke is caught, and he attempts a smile of comfort.
"I think you look normal as you are now, Ooda-kun."
Ooda lowers his head.
"Never mind, then… Please keep going, Ryusuke-san…"
Ryusuke pauses, pursing his lips, before reaching for a hair clip and pinning Ooda's bangs back to apply the makeup.
Ooda tries not to look at his face, nakedly exposed in the mirror, white skin and yellow-purple eyes and all. He doesn't really associate the features with himself, only with him.
He tries to listen as Ryusuke explains each step of the process, watching as his skin slowly begins to look more and more...
Normal.
"You have to remember to dab and not smear around your eyes and mouth, since that's much more delicate tissue. After that, we can apply color and powder."
A thoughtful pause as Ryusuke covers a foam triangle with tan foundation.
"I tell you what, though, we'd be having a much easier job of this if we were doing traditional paint. Your white skin would really make those colors pop, it'd look amazing. Maybe next time?"
Ooda tries not to look at his reflection even more, focusing instead on the counter, so he won't have to look at his ceramic-colored arms either.
"Ah, either way… Been a while since I've had to apply so much makeup—to myself, I mean. These days I just approximate how much I'd have to compensate for the stage lights. I've gotten pretty good at it lately."
Ooda blinks, looking sideways, visibly confused.
"Oh, you don't know? Well, I guess I sorta don't talk about it much… Here, check this out."
Ryusuke's skin, normally a warm, pale sand-color, begins to turn a strange shade of kiwi-green, starting at the cheeks, and moving all the way to his ears and neck. It makes him look even more like a lizard than usual.
Ooda's mouth gapes.
"Your… your skin…!"
Ryusuke's smile is diminished, but prideful.
"Neat, isn't it? It's a trait of my clan, the Dokudami. We're sorta shape shifters. 'course, you can imagine, it's given us a fair bit of trouble…"
Ryusuke's face grows thoughtful.
"Your mom really helped my family out, when we tried to leave Mist. Not many of us made it, but she helped those of us that got by. I was a bit older than you when I moved here, actually."
His skin begins to grow a bit more yellow around the stretched membranes of his cheeks, and his forehead.
"To be honest I don't even remember what my natural skin color is any more. I sorta have to guess to keep it one color. It wasn't so hard, compared to my eyes."
"Your eyes?"
Ryusuke's grin turns sheepish.
"Yeah, here, look."
His eyes, currently a shiny insect-black, begin moving completely independently of each other, and are soon pointing in entirely opposite directions. The effect is more comical than anything, and Ooda can't suppress a laugh.
"Kinda weird-lookin', right? It took me forever to learn how to have them pointing in the same direction. It just feels so much more comfortable for me to let them move around like this. With that and my skin, it's kind of a give-away…"
He shakes off the melancholy expression that seems to have slid on his face with the recollection of his past. His eyes manage to come back together.
"You know, Ooda-kun, when I first met you, I thought that you might have been a relative of mine. What with those eyes of yours—they're really quite something, I think."
As he speaks, his skin grows paler and paler. His hair is starting to darken as well.
"Do you know where your family came from, exactly? I've been meaning to ask."
Ryusuke narrows his eyes, changing from black to gold, in concentration.
"I mean, I'm just assuming here, but…"
And suddenly Ryusuke looks like him.
Ooda can't help himself, pushing himself away and shoving himself against the far wall of the dressing room.
"Ooda-kun?"
Ooda is curled into a ball.
"Ooda-kun, what's the matter?"
Ooda can't look.
"Please, don't, don't make yourself look like that, you don't know who that looks like, it's horrible, please, don't…"
He has his white hands covering his own eyes, in horror, in shame. All he can think of is how much it looks like him, and how, one day, that's what he'll look like. He already hates himself enough. It's unbearable.
"You're lucky, you can look normal, please don't do that, it's horrible…"
He refuses to open his eyes for a very long time.
"…Ooda-kun, I'm sorry, I didn't realize…"
Ooda doesn't answer.
"I won't do that again. See? I changed. I don't look like this any more. It's okay, Ooda-kun. See?"
Reluctantly, Ooda opens his eyes and peers over his knees.
Ryusuke has returned his appearance to its "default" coloring, and he is attempting to smile through his worry.
"I'm sorry, Ooda-kun. I won't do that again."
Ooda returns his eyes to his face, and tries to stand up. He's shaking, badly.
Ryusuke's reluctance and shame are very clear.
"You, uh, want me to finish making you up, Ooda-kun?"
"I'd like to go home, please…"
He catches himself in the mirror. The makeup is smudged, now, around his eyes and on his cheekbones. What had once been some delusional passing for normal skin is now streaked with the true, sickening white.
And, as always, his eyes.
"…well, all right, let's get you cleaned up, then."
Ryusuke passes Ooda a towel after covering it with soap and warm water. Ooda begins rubbing the makeup off almost violently.
"…Ooda-kun, I really am sorry. I didn't know that this… sort of appearance was so troubling to you."
Ooda keeps the towel pressed to his face.
"…it made you look like him too much, and he... he scares me…"
Ryusuke does not press further, making his own, close-enough assumptions.
Ooda avoids the mirror as he removes the towel from his face.
"…I'm gonna go home now. I'm sorry, Ryusuke-san. You can show me how to do makeup later."
Ryusuke stays in the dressing room by himself for a while, thinking.
Ooda, upon returning home, seeks out his mother and pulls her into a very tight hug, but does not say why. She doesn't ask.
The acting lessons, and Ooda's job, resume without mishap the next day.
Though Ooda is a fair bit quieter and reluctant to embellish for a while afterward.
Though Ryusuke, on a day off, takes the time to visit Ooda's mother and ask about who, exactly, scares Ooda so.
She tells him that it's Ooda's father, who was a bit of a terror in Ooda's early childhood, and whom Ooda rather resembles physically. Her terse handling of the subject is more than enough for Ryusuke to never bring it up again.
Ooda manages to catch some of his mother's explanation, and is at once grateful and ashamed, and has to hug her again once Ryusuke leaves, taking care to stay well out of his sight for as long as he can manage.
Time passes.
Eventually, Yakata is born. Ooda cites family illness when he asks Yaku for time off a short time beforehand, so he can assist with the delivery and everything after. He takes care of the baby, feeding and calming him and keeping him quiet and out of his mother's way until he's old enough for Suigetsu to take him.
In his free time, Ooda continues to read plays, to practice in his room. Ryusuke, from time to time, brings him new materials, and in the instance of the new year, a lovely, very expensive-looking fruit basket that is very-much appreciated by everyone in the family.
As he gets older, and more skilled, more confident, even, Ryusuke begins encouraging Ooda to audition for plays.
Ooda, naturally, resists, citing everything from lack of skill to social awkwardness to schedule tangles and having to help his mother.
(Shingetsu is in progress around the time that the encouragement really begins to ramp up, which may be a factor.)
But, eventually, a decision of sorts is made.
Perhaps it is Ooda's increased confidence in dealing with other people, and his familiarity with the theater's staff and actors. Or perhaps his increased confidence in his acting abilities, which are by now acknowledged by many, and not just Ryusuke. Or his slowly-decaying stage fright. Or his increasing comfort in leaving his mother alone.
Ooda has found a place where he truly feels welcome, outside of his home, and now, Ryusuke tells him, is the perfect time for his debut.
He is seventeen years old. Ooda has grown tall and, to his relief, his voice hasn't nearly grown as deep as it seems in the film reels of his mother's archives, nor as raspy. But his face has gotten leaner, his cheekbones horribly prominent. But it's nothing his bangs can't cover.
Ryusuke eagerly explains to him the upcoming play. In the five-or-so years that have passed since meeting him, he has barely changed, though Ooda is now taller than him by several inches.
"It's based on a series of poems found in a young girl's diary, it's how she chronicled her dreams. Someone got the idea to try and string them together into a cohesive narrative and have it performed as a pantomime piece, see? It's all about interpretation."
Ooda's cheeks blush slightly pink.
"Ryusuke-san, please…"
"There's a part in here that's just perfect for you, Ooda-kun. The Piano Man. Dressed all in black, he's in a space ship that he controls by playing the piano. He's one of the very few kind forces the main character encounters. He requires a lot of subtlety."
Ooda, sweeping the floor, just smirks almost patronizingly as he continues.
"Yaku-sama's kinda hell-bent on casting you, anyways, he thinks you'd be perfect for it."
"Well, that's just what Yaku-san thinks…"
"Well, I'm inclined to agree with him. Besides, Ooda-kun, it's about time you at least tried. I know you don't have much experience, but it's only one scene and I'd love to see you give it a whirl."
Ooda sweeps a few times, smiling still, though gently.
"I'll… see what my mom says."
His mother, of course, supports this enthusiastically. Though Ooda is not without his doubts.
"Oh, come on, darling, what's holding you back?"
"Well… the little one, of course."
The child that will eventually be called Asaoto is currently four months along.
"Yes, and how does that factor in?"
"Well… suppose it came while we were still having performances, I wouldn't want that to get in the way of things…"
His mother clicks her tongue fondly.
"Ooda, how long does it usually take for a production to come together?"
"About three months."
"Good, so that leaves me at about seven when you open, okay. And how long does the show usually go on for?"
"Two or three months…?"
"Wonderful, I'm due right as the show ends. There's nothing for you to worry about."
Her smile is very sharp and quick, like a sparkler.
Ooda is smiling more than he realizes.
"Go audition for that show. I'll come and see you on opening night, even, okay? I wanna see you give it your all, darling."
"And you'll be fine without me, Mom?"
"Do you even have to ask?"
He goes to Ryusuke the next day with the good news.
The auditions commence.
And Ooda gets the role, naturally.
To Yaku's delight and amusement, he still offers to sweep the stage before and after practice, which Yaku more than allows him to do.
"If you don't, who will? Go for it."
Yaku's personality is far more serious in rehearsals, though Ooda knows to expect it.
"The way we've arranged it, our Wandering Girl meets you right after being traumatized by the Ponytail Goddess. So she's wary of you, you understand? She pulls out her knife right away, but you don't mean any harm at all. You're more scared of her than she is of you. That is why you set out tea for her, to appease her. To sort of see what she'll do. It's a balancing act of trust between the both of you."
Ryusuke coaches him on the side.
"Read the source material, not just the script. Get really into Piano Man's head. Show me that talent of yours, Ooda-kun."
Ooda studies like he's never studied before. Practically all his free time is spent reading the script and the poems of the source material. It's a challenge, considering the poems are just, well, poems, records of dreams, but he has a character to construct, and he works best with raw material.
He even spends some time learning the basics of piano at his neighbor Mrs. Ryouzai's house. Anything to help.
The rehearsals commence. There are, naturally, difficulties. The actress playing the Wandering Girl is nice enough but Ooda finds it hard to balance her brand of harsh and biting fear with his more gently-reactive type, and works hard at striking it.
But progress is made. And soon, the scene begins to flow as if a natural series of events, and not just a preordained series of actions on a script.
The Wandering Girl enters, uninvited, after having stumbled through the boiler room of a shopping center, and finds herself in the Piano Man's spaceship, which is preparing for liftoff. She brandishes a knife, obviously scared—the last time she found herself in something else's living space, she ended up angering the thing with the mere flick of a light switch and trapped in a hellish red-and-black nightmare of white water and cacophony.
But the Piano Man reacts with hands outstretched, palms up, backing away and nearly injuring himself in doing so by tripping over his piano bench. He hurriedly takes tea and pours it into cups at a nearby table before returning to attend to his piano.
The Girl explores for a bit and samples the tea and sees as he seems to mean no harm, before joining him at the piano and bonding with him over a duet. Seeing that she is exhausted and still very scared, he allows her to sleep in his bed while the ship takes off, and when she awakens, they're in space.
It's all very lovely.
Until the ship crashes.
The grief of the Piano Man at the ship's ruin is very quiet and yet very distraught, and after attempts to comfort him fail, the Wandering Girl leaves the ship determinedly, in search of anything that can help. After finding nothing but ruins and dilapidated machinery on the alien landscape, the best she can do is signal for UFO's twinkling in the distant sky to come by and pick the Man up, where his fate is left ambiguous.
Yaku is delighted in how it's all going. As is Ooda and, well, just about everyone else in the cast. The crew is working on the otherworldly sets and props as best as they can—Ooda is particularly impressed with the soft monochrome of his spaceship, and the semi-working piano they've put together for him.
During costume fittings and makeup assignment, however, Ooda is confused.
"Do I not get any foundation?"
Ryusuke catches him.
"Well, didn't you read the poems? The Piano Man is described as having moon-white skin, so Yaku-sama decided to stick with your natural color."
Ooda's face falls, but he tries not to show it.
"Ah, I see…"
Ooda is very good at masking discomfort, but Ryusuke is even better at detecting it.
"Ooda-kun, if you think the only reason you were cast is because of how you look-"
"No, it's… all right, I didn't really think that was the reason… I just thought it'd give me a better opportunity to practice putting on a 'normal' face, is all."
Ryusuke cannot think up a response to that.
(Ooda, since learning how to apply makeup properly, sometimes goes into the bathroom when he's feeling particularly self-loathing and covers himself in tan foundation and highlights his face with red smears of flushed color, to see how he would look if he wasn't such a freak.)
(It rarely helps.)
"Well… if anything, we do have white foundation for you, so you won't look as pasty under the lights. And we have contacts, too, you ever worn those before?"
This lifts Ooda's mood a little.
"No, but I'm quite willing to try…"
The contacts are custom made, with pupils pointing off in completely opposite directions. When Ooda first sees himself in the mirror with them on, he starts laughing.
"I look like you, Ryusuke-san! Look!"
Ryusuke cannot help but laugh in return.
The costumes, as they do in all dress rehearsals, aid greatly in enhancing the performance. With his contacts on, and his pure black clothes and extra-white skin, Ooda is no longer himself, but The Piano Man. Mute, gentle, and frightened.
His mother, seven months pregnant and aching but good-natured, has her tickets ready for the opening night. And there's even talk of Suigetsu and Shingetsu coming to attend a later performance, despite the latter being only three years old and very enthusiastic but disruptive. Juugo, who comes by regularly enough these days for Karin to have a dedicated room for him in the basement for his bad spells, expresses regret that he doesn't have enough self-control to handle himself in a dark place full of people, but that he wishes to see a video-recording if possible.
It's all rather nice and exciting.
Until July 28th.
One of the final dress rehearsals. Ooda is sitting in the audience, watching the run-through of the Monochrome Desert sequence, waiting for his cue to head backstage and prepare for his scene.
When the back of his neck begins to burn.
His mother can make the seal on the back of his neck tingle if she needs him home and can't call out to him. All in all, a very useful utility.
But it has never hurt like this.
Ooda tries not to panic, but something must be wrong. He gets out of his seat, his heart rate increasing by the second, and heads backstage to undress. He has to go.
He runs into Ryusuke on the way out. His skin is a rotted forest-green, and one of his eyes is entirely black, with fake blood dribbling from it—fitting for his character of a run-over ghost in the middle of a forest road.
"Ooda-kun? What's going on?"
Ooda is gulping for air.
"I have to go home, there's something wrong…!"
"What's wrong?"
Ooda is in the dressing room, taking out his contacts before attending to his clothes.
"I just… I have a bad feeling, something's happened to my mom, I have to get home right now…!"
He can't lose composure, he has to stay calm, he can't tell anyone about his seal.
He has managed to get his pants on, and is now working on his shirt, too bothered to notice how much of himself he's exposing. He usually dresses in the bathroom of the theater instead of the dressing room if he can help it.
"Please, just… just tell Yaku-san where I went, it's an emergency, I have to go, please…"
Ryusuke puts a green hand on Ooda's shoulder, and this startles him, but his expression his concerned and comforting.
"I'll tell him everything. If you've gotta go, go."
Ooda runs.
The back of his neck is still in considerable pain. His legs feel like they're burning, as well, from the bone-out, he's running so fast. It is still very light out, and the buildings that line the street are covered in a skin-like yellow.
He pulls the door open to his house with a destructive clatter. The doctor is OUT.
It smells like blood. Like too much blood.
"Mom? MOM? Where are you?"
His t-shirt is sticking to his chest. He throws his shoes off and begins down the hallways.
"MOM!"
He finds her collapsed in the hallway outside of her bedroom. She is lying on her side, barely breathing. Her clothes are soaked in her own blood, which is collecting in a warm pool around her and seeping into the wood.
The source of the blood is a series of puncture wounds made by several very small, very sharp-looking spikes coming out of her swollen belly. Blood oozes from her mouth.
For a moment, Ooda is frozen.
Until she manages to reach her hand out and moan at him.
"Help me…!"
Ooda is at her side in an instant. His knees are soaked with blood as he kneels down.
"Mom, what, what happened…!"
"Little one… something went wrong… Ooda… get it out of me…!"
Ooda cradles his mother's head under one badly-shaking arm.
"But mom, it's not—you're only seven months…!"
She grabs onto his arm.
"Save me… it's okay if we… lose the little one… just do it…"
She collapses. The space where her hand has gripped his arm leaves a red handprint.
Ooda is breathing like he's nearly drowned.
"But, Mom, I can't, I can't…!"
But she doesn't answer.
"Mom, I can't do this…!"
He can't cry.
She's dying.
He has to do something.
He picks her up as best he can with both of his arms and begins carrying her down the hallway to the less-residential part of their home, where she keeps the labs and surgical equipment. A trail of smeared blood and his red footprints follow them.
Ooda knows how everything works. He has assisted in many surgeries. He knows where he'll have to cut.
He lays his mother down on the table and finds the antibacterial medicines, the anesthetic, the sterile scalpels, the incubator.
In case there's a chance.
And after cutting her clothes off of her, after throwing on scrubs over his blood-smeared clothes, he disinfects her punctured skin and begins to cut—not across the bottom of her stomach, like a normal C-section, but over the skin, almost like an autopsy, pulling it off of the bones that are piercing it.
He stops for a moment after seeing what she looks like inside.
Her womb and the surrounding organs and muscles are punctured by the pale little bones of the fetus still nestled there in the pink redness.
A thudding string of thoughts drums through his mind like a headache.
I can't do this, I can't do this, I can't possibly do this.
But you have to.
And suddenly it seems like his actions are not his own. He works on desperate instinct.
Ooda moves apart the tissue with his rubber-gloved hands where he can. The harmful mass has to be extracted first before he can work on any sort of healing.
The baby is so small that it easily fits into his cupped hands, though the long spikes of bone coming out of its back and ribs make that difficult. He keeps his eye on his mother's heart rate monitor as he removes the child, cuts its umbilical cord, and places it, gently, in the incubator.
It isn't crying. But Ooda remembers what his mother said.
He has to save her.
Because without her…!
He works on mending the holes as best he can, afterward. His understanding of healing jutsu is very advanced, for a civilian, but the most he can do is patch the holes with jutsu and stitches and stop the bleeding where he can, and close her up afterward and pray.
He keeps her on a heavy antibiotic drip and every regenerative medicine he can think of in the meantime.
The baby in the incubator is, somehow, still alive, squirming weakly but still not making any sounds. Ooda can't do a thing about the bones—he has no idea if the baby will even survive the night—but he manages to find a patch of bare skin to stick in a nutrient drip, with the oxygen of the incubator doing the rest for its underdeveloped lungs.
He comes down from the frenzy of surgery with a heavy and terrifying thought.
...how did I just do that?
The answer comes far too quickly to be comfortable.
Because this is what you were born to do. You're no actor, you're a doctor.
The voice in his mind doesn't sound like his.
Look at that, you performed a miracle emergency surgery with absolutely no assistance whatsoever. No guidance, either. And on your own mother. That's not normal skill, that's—
"No, no, I'm not him, I'm not you, I am myself…!"
Ooda, the panic finally settling in, covers his eyes with his now-naked hands, leaning against a wall near the hallway.
Just give in and admit it, this is what you were meant to do. I was a genius at this, and so are you.
"I am not you, I am myself and nobody else, I am myself and-"
You're just fighting against your destiny. It's undeniable. These little dreams of yours of acting, they're just pathetic attempts at breaking away.
"I am myself and NOBODY else, NOBODY ELSE!"
Ooda is almost screaming this, punctuating his words with deep, hard breaths.
He can't deny his actions.
He has a gift for this, he…
"I'm not you, I'm not, I won't be, I never will be…"
He manages to drown out both sets of thoughts with his crying, after that.
He doesn't move from the wall for a very long time.
When he does move, it's to lock the front door, so that nobody gets in. He doesn't feel like cleaning up the blood yet.
He has to know if she'll be okay.