Behind The Curtain

by TacticalRainboom

Prelude

“All right, thank you!” Octavia shouted, her sharp tone easily overpowering both the singer and the accompanist.

The earth pony on the stage froze with her mouth still open. Then she bit her lip. “Uh, I... okay. Sure! Thank you...” She smiled awkwardly and then ran for the exit.

“She was okay,” Twilight said, almost before the poor girl was out of earshot. She winced as her voice reverberated slightly thanks to the theatre's acoustics. The main stage was a real piece of work. Marble and steel arches, cushioned seats, hardwood paneling—traditional Canterlot aesthetics combined seamlessly with modern science. Twilight loved this place, but stress had prevented her from enjoying it as of late.

“She wasn't okay. Her voice was good.” Octavia didn't look particularly thrilled. “She just seemed...”

“Inexperienced?” Twilight offered.

“Definitely not,” Octavia said, looking towards the main entrance, where another hopeful would be waiting. “She was... shy.”

“Well, Lady Nocturne is supposed to be a stoic type, so—”

“That's not it,” Octavia sighed. “Our Lady Nocturne also has to stand up to the... other lead.”

“Oh,” Twilight said.

Silence again.

“Well, I've got my notes. I'll fetch the next.” Octavia stood and took off for the entrance at a trot.

Twilight yawned as she reached for her pen and scanned down the audition list to see who was up next. Her mouth didn't close from the yawn when she read the next name. She pivoted in her seat, jaw still hanging, and looked to where Octavia was coming back, followed by a white unicorn with a cobalt blue mane.

Octavia kept a much better poker face than Twilight as she took her seat and picked up her own pen. “All right, tell us your name.”

Twilight coughed. The candidate's cutie mark alone was distinctive enough; the huge pair of blue-purple shades balanced on the white mare’s horn made it so that Octavia's question couldn't possibly not be rhetorical.

“Vinyl Scratch, at yer service.” She nodded in acknowledgment as she walked up to the edge of the stage. Even the maroon of her eyes and the way her mane fell dramatically across them seemed to pulse to a rhythm.

Took strong front-center, Twilight scribbled on her notepad. Presence. Then, as an afterthought: Nice mane.

“O-kay.” Twilight said, very professionally. Then she broke from procedure just for a moment. “And you're DJ Pony, right?”

“Yeah.” Scratch chuckled at that. “And thanks. Lotta folks pronounce the 'three.' It's irritating.”

“Oh, no problem!” Twilight giggled. “I mean, I've never actually listened to—”

“Thank you,” Octavia interrupted. “What do you have for us today, Ms. Vinyl Scratch?”

“An original. Working title 'Home.' It was right there with my resume, yeah?”

The accompanist, Wingsinger, straightened the sheet music with her left wing, then rested both forehooves and both wingtips on the keys. “Got it,” she said. “Whenever you're ready.”

Vinyl Scratch took her first breath with the erect posture of a singer, then exhaled it and let the sound dissipate. A smirk crossed her face as she took another breath, slowly this time, filling her lungs with sound waves.

Twilight leaned back, expecting a tonal riot worthy of a DJ PON3 original. What she got instead was something quite different. Vinyl didn't wait for Wingsinger to cue her in; she just closed her
eyes, tilted her head back so that her mane fell away from her face, and began her song a capella.

She stares out for the first time
At the only place she knows
The city lights all come to life
as day comes to a close

The accompanist began a simple tune that punctuated Scratch's voice but never covered her. The melody was both somber and hopeful, to match the restrained power of the voice it had been composed for.

She's dreaming of a time when
All those streets were full of friends

The songs they sang were full of hope
A song that still rings clear—
She dances to a morning song,
A song of life,
Their song that never ends...

The piano played a bouncing, syncopated interlude while Scratch hung her head, waiting. When it built to a chorus, she was already straightened and poised in perfect form for a theatrical singer. Twilight started to write a few more notes, but they trailed off into nonsensical scribbles once Scratch's voice pulled her attention.

The sweetest dream of love
The memories and hope
Dreams may end but day won't change the memories you've made

Just hold your head up high
As you walk across the sky
Gravity can't take away your home
This is your home...

Wingsinger played another brief interlude, then moved to the next verse—which Scratch didn't sing. The piano stopped abruptly as Wingsinger turned around, about to ask what was wrong. Vinyl Scratch was looking at her audience of two with a raised eyebrow.

“Something wrong?” Octavia asked. “Is that all you have?”

Twilight bit her lower lip. She wasn't even the one on the stage, but those words still felt bitingly accusatory.

“Nah,” Scratch said. “I was just wondering why you weren’t cutting me off. That's what happens in auditions, right?”

“We cut you off when we cut you off. You shouldn't assume.” It wasn't exactly a riposte, but the way Octavia didn't miss a beat had a defensive edge to it.

“A’right.” Scratch shrugged. She shrugged at a director's pronouncement. “Ready to see how I move?” She crossed her forelegs, spread her back legs, and raised her rear as if stretching. Her tail flicked, her eyelids fluttered, and she flashed a weaponized smirk.

Twilight pretended to be interested in her notes, hoping that her blush wouldn't be visible from the stage.

“No, not the dance combination,” parried Octavia. “Let's do the cold reading first.”

Scratch nodded her rémise. “Was planning to save that for last, but if you insist.”

Octavia said nothing, but she might as well have said “touché.”

---

Even hardened professionals sometimes fall into the trap of being worried about the act that they have to follow. After Scratch left the stage, Twilight thought she could smell the next candidate's fear. Raindance was her name, a violet pegasus with a tan mane. Twilight hated to admit it, but Raindance was right to be worried. She delivered lines with confidence and was probably the strongest dancer of the lot, but unfortunately for her, she suffered badly from being overshadowed.

Several times throughout the rest of the auditions, Twilight turned to Octavia and opened her mouth to speak. Every time, she closed her mouth again when Octavia didn't even acknowledge her gaze. When the last of the auditions was over and nopony was around to hear their discussion, Twilight pivoted in her seat to face Octavia head on.

“Interesting spread for some of the roles,” Twilight said, forcing a sunny tone. “I thought Redwood's cold-read was—”

Octavia had already set her notepad and pen aside. “Don't dance around it.”

Twilight bit her lower lip. “She was really good, though. Vinyl Scratch. I mean... it's not just that she's famous, I really liked the way she—”

Octavia shook her head. “She's trouble. A lot of trouble. But...” She took a deep breath, picked up her notepad, and flipped it shut before opening it to the first page. “We have an entire ensemble to cast, not just the two leads. Let's start from the beginning, shall we?”

Twilight looked back to her own notes. In typical Twilight Sparkle form, they were perfectly organized into neat columns... until it came to the Vinyl Scratch section, which bled into the others with scribbled nonsense and even a doodle of Scratch's jagged mane. Even Trixie's section was neat by comparison. Actually, the notes for Trixie consisted of just two words: “Damn it.”

Twilight was no seasoned director; she'd brought Octavia onboard because the young musician had experience that Twilight didn't. In fact, Twilight had only directed one play before, and that one hadn't quite gone as planned. Still, even without any kind of experience, Twilight knew a problem cast when she saw one.

As of a little while ago, this cast was led by Vinyl Scratch a.k.a. DJ PON3 a.k.a. Beatmistress V-to-the-S, whose idea of music was an aural onslaught capable of shattering windows from two blocks away, and whose idea of an audience was the roiling chaos of bodies in a darkened nightclub.

Then, just behind her, there was the Arrogant and Narcissistic Trixie Lulamoon, whose first and hopefully last visit to Ponyville had caused more property damage in a day than Rainbow Dash, Ditzy Doo, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders put together could manage in a week.

This? This wasn't a problem cast.

This was complete pandemonium waiting to happen.

Comments

[Regidar]

Well, this certainly is a thing.

[Applejinx]

Waitin' to see where THIS goes... upthumb largely on the strength of other stuff you've done, Tactical, but you know quite well this hasn't really started. It's a prelude and I have no idea where you'll take it, only that I'm real curious.

[Casca]

This isn't fleshed out enough for me to pass judgement on the plot, but I did get a laugh out of "Damn it". I might have to stick around for this...