[ABO BL Anthology] Time Cross Academy

Panotti of the Opera (10)

The night of the audition finally arrived and two hundred auditionees gathered by the pool of the forbidden forest. Floopy was as nervous as the auditionees and Klick had to smoosh his friend's cheeks together to get him to stop talking.

"Don't think about useless things," Klick told his friend sternly. "From now on, you're not Floopy the unwanted panotti. You're Floopy the great musician that everyone loves. Even if something goes wrong, nobody can take music away from you and I know that there will be at least one person among the auditionees who wouldn't hate you for who you are. Just go out there and do your best. He will show up and you're doing this for him, aren't you?"

Floopy nodded and took a deep breath after Klick let him go. He was dressed up in a very ridiculous costume that Klick borrowed from an unknown source. The reason why they chose such a hideous thing was to make Floopy look a lot more intimidating than he actually was. The assassin proposed that Floopy should maintain his anonymity for a better crowd reaction even if he wasn’t too hopeful. Eventually, the truth would come to light but Klick only hoped that it wouldn’t be tonight because there were too many people who would kill Floopy’s non-existent self-esteem. When the panotti was down on confidence, it showed in his music too and that was the one outcome Klick didn’t want to see.

They could hear the excited crowd behind them and Klick decided to check the stage once more. It had taken them two days to put together this small stage in the forest with the help of Floopy’s animal friends however, it was still rather wobbly. Klick couldn’t see where everything was or how the ropes were holding the planks together so he had no choice but to trust Floopy’s judgement for that. As Floopy was unable to operate backstage, it was now up to Klick to man the lights while Floopy was up on that shaky stage.

“Ready?” he asked the composer who was taking deep breaths to compose himself. The forest animals were hiding today because of the crowd and Floopy didn’t blame them. If possible, he wanted to join them in hiding too.

“I’d never be ready for this,” Floopy admitted and Klick grinned. It was a sign as good as any.

Running to the back of the stage where the magic lamps were, Klick fiddled with a few switches that he remembered by heart. This was going to be Floopy’s big moment and Klick decided to play the hosting emcee for this event to tame the crowd going wild. There were many fans as well as many famous students all looking for a part in the new musical. Nobody knew what the theme was but everybody who attended was either hopeful or confident.

“Gentlemen, compose yourself and give a big round of applause for the genius composer of the century and the hidden star of Time Cross Academy’s musical production!”

The thunderous applause made the flimsy stage shake and Floopy swallowed. He stepped onto the bunch of planks tied together and prayed that he wouldn’t embarrass himself.

The light came on and the panotti stood tall on the stage. Although blind, Klick made a rather good backstage engineer. As promised, the spotlight shone on him made his shadow look a lot bigger than him. The cape that Klick borrowed from a kind vampire was too large for him but it helped to cover up his silhouette a lot. His ears were also loosely hung by his side under that oversized hood so nobody truly knows what species the composer was.

Floopy held his microphone and gave Klick a nervous glance before covering the device and whispering, “Is the voice tuning function on?”

Klick checked the soundboard and gave his friend the thumbs up. Floopy was nervous but he still gave his speech as rehearsed, reading from the script he hid beneath the oversized cloak.

“Something’s wrong,” Bruce frowned. He didn’t have the audition form and he didn’t manage to get one but it didn’t seem to matter because a certain angel secured it for his prince. The shark merman could smell something familiar when the wind blew. It was a heavy scent of blood and someone who had been creeping around his prince.

Could it be…?

“Stay here,” he told Syris. “I need to check on something, will be right back.”

Soundlessly, while everyone else was distracted, Bruce started to scout for the annoying bat that liked to hover around his prince. Although there were many people here in the forest, his nose didn’t fail him. There was some weird scent that made Bruce automatically know that the bat was nearby.

Going around the crowd, Bruce climbed the tree to get a better view. He wasn’t interested in the composer but he was curious about the blind bat. Why was he here and where was he hiding? The shark warrior tried to scan the crowd and he did so for fifteen minutes. There were about two hundred people in the crowd but after going through every single face, he couldn’t see that annoying creature.

Left with no other options, Bruce decided to close his eyes and use his nose. The scent was stronger in the wind and strangely, it was coming from behind the screen. Bruce hesitated for a minute. If he interfered now and tried to catch the bat, he might ruin his prince’s chance at the audition. However, the bat was bad news to be around. Whenever he was around, he was trying to interfere with Syris’ personal life in the worst way possible.

Creeping over to the tree directly behind the stage and screen, Bruce did his best to move stealthily. True enough, he saw the mysterious composer in a ridiculous attire and the blind bat manning the audio and light controls. In dilemma, he sat on the tree above the flimsy stage to think.

Crack!

Bruce didn’t have any time to react when the branch he was perched on snapped. The only thing that went through his mind as he fell was how sorry he was for Prince Syris. Because of him, the entire audition was going to be ruined. To make matters worse, he was going to fall right on the flimsy stage.

Needless to say, there were some screams when the shadow of another person fell from above onto the stage and destroyed the entire setup. The lights were smashed, the soundboard damaged and the stage in debris.

“Hey look! It’s that ugly panotti!”

“What is he doing here?”

“Oh gosh! Don’t tell me the genius composer is him! Is it really him? Yuck! I don’t want to audition anymore.”

Syris stared at the small beta boy who was crushed beneath the wooden stage that Bruce fell on. Now that the screen was destroyed and the truth in the open, the crowd started to leave one by one. Nobody wanted to waste their time on a lowly panotti. While the crowd moved away from the forest, only one merman pushed through against the flow, trying to reach the injured composer.

“s**t!” Bruce groaned. That was quite the fall. To his left, he saw the blind bat unconscious and bleeding out from a light that had smashed into him. Without a second to waste, the shark merman quickly dug the bat out of the debris.

“Floopy!” Syris shouted and dug through the broken stage planks to get to the panotti who wasn’t moving.

Once the boy was dug out, Syris heaved a sigh of relief.

“Sorry, Syris. I didn’t mean to crash the party, I will take full responsibility later. This boy’s bleeding out so I’m going to send him to the infirmary. Is your boy alright?”

Syris took a look at Floopy who was crying and staring at the torn and dirty song sheet in his hands.

“Go,” he told the shark bodyguard. “I’ll clean up the mess here. Take good care of him and don’t leave until he is recovered.”

Bruce felt bad and apologised once more before running off with the blind bat in his arms. He never expected the tree to give way but then again, he overestimated the strength of that branch. In his human form, he might look light but his actual weight was still that of a great white shark.

“Floopy,” Syris coaxed but the panotti’s sobbing only increased now that they were alone.

“What do I do? Nobody wants to listen to my music anymore, nobody will sing the songs I make now. Syris, you must be disappointed too. I lied to you that the composer was my friend. You must think that I’m a very useless person now.”

The gentle prince shook his head and wiped the tears from the beaver-like boy’s face no matter how many times new tears took the place of old ones. He was going to dry every single drop until they stopped falling.

“That’s not true, Floopy. Even if nobody wants to listen to your music or sing your songs after this, I will do it. You did this for me, didn’t you? Why would I be disappointed? In fact, I’m very happy that you’re willing to give a talentless person like me a chance. How about this? Let’s calm down first and discuss what you’ve created. We can organise our own performance even if nobody supports us. I believe in you just like how you believed that I could sing when everybody else had given up.”

Like a rainbow after a storm, Floopy looked up and took Syris’ hand. Ignoring the difference in their ranks and second-genders, Floopy finally understood that Syris and him were the same kind of people. They were the misfits of society and the outcasts of their homes because they were born different.

For the first time in his life, Floopy decided that he wouldn’t cower in fear and cry. He was going to fight back against the unfair world with Syris.