CHAPTER FINALE ♔ darling can't you see it's now or never

[romanticidal]

♬ Astronaut (A Short History of Nearly Nothing) - Amanda Palmer ft. Zoe Keating

WHO || Rafael Giovanni, Eterna Jade, Burt Becksworth, Isabella Alessandro, Finnick Odair, Myrilandel de Tanos, Buffy Summers, Spike, Elena Gilbert, Dawn Summers, Desmond Descant, Jeanne Gar, Kat Samcelot, Mark Sandazhard, Violet Fiore, Sterling Archer
WHAT || CHAPTER ONE FINALE: Rafael Giovanni & Finnick's televised international concert debut
WHERE || A music hall in Chicago, IL
WHEN || July 3rd, 2013 [ forward dated]
HOW || Actionspam

The hour is finally upon our heroes, to learn whether their crazy plan to invest in making Finnick and Rafael international superstars under Burt Becksworth's management will pay off, and keep control of NOVA Records out of the hands of Chad Becksworth and his sinister compatriots. Now, as the Knights finish taking their seats in the balconies directly overlooking the stage, the concert goes live, broadcasting around the world, to where even other members of the Knighthood in London can gather to watch.

The camera pans across the endless sea of gathered, curious fans, who shake their arms wildly for their two seconds of fame, and then zooms in on a blonde figure on one corner of the stage, where she stands ready with a microphone: Buffy Summers.

[ the action of this post will be continually propelled by the interspersed musical numbers performed by finnick and rafael. each musical number will be up for a short amount of ooc time, in which players are free to create mini-thread responses directly to that song comment. these can be for internal reflection, to make commentary to the neighbors seated in their rows, for backstage convos for those involved in the program, or for 'host' commentary between some songs by archer and kat. threads that result from these responses should be kept short and sweet, as each song is only 3 to 5 minutes long, which doesn't leave a lot of time for in depth conversations. ideally, by the time the next 'number' is posted (as a direct response to the last musical number comment), your response threads from the previous number should be considered over and done with, and you can continue anything going on in them as a new mini-thread under the most recently posted song. in order to keep track of when things are rolling on to the next song, I highly encourage everyone to please track this entire post. ]

Comments

[rationalizes]

[ gar keeps elena's arm as they follow isa, dawn, and kat out to the backstage. she looks around despondently at the scene and her eyes land on one of the dead thugs here. frowning, she goes to his side and kneels, turning him slightly to look at the back of his neck ] Oh no...

[nothingsodivine]

[Des's sternum is definitely broken. He hits the ground hard and shoves the shotgun off of him and tries to sit up, only for that to be a bad idea. Hearing Myri, he realizes he's not going to make it down there.

Fitting, really. She doesn't know him from Adam.

He shoots Rafael a hateful look.] Well, go on, Fluffy. Tell her you're sorry. Tell her you just couldn't stand that she didn't remember you. [He grunts and rolls over to his side, cringing through pained laughter] She did it for you, you know. She couldn't stomach living without you. That's why she couldn't remember. So go and tell her how much you loved her. Maybe if you didn't, she'd still be alive.

[slay]

[ buffy use her enhanced slayer eyeballs to realize at this point that myri is in a pretty bad way. all that healing took something out of her, but it's more than that - or at least, buffy's pretty sure it is. but she's not ... realizing what is actually going on. seeing orlando bloom adds a layer to this that everyone is going to think she's crazy for.

she marches towards him, reaching out a hand to shove at him. ]

You! [ her hand meets air as he easily moves out of her way, turning like he'd already seen the move coming. she stumbles, then turns wildly to glare at him. ] What did you do!?

[romanticidal]

[ rafael stares down at des, looking lost again now that he doesn't look ready to murder him. apparently this is a hundred times worse. his gaze drags over to myri and jade and... then he gets distracted by buffy being crazy.

orlando bloom turns to face her... and when he makes eye contact with her, it's enough to make her forget how to breathe.

it's hard to explain what it is that she sees in his eyes, but it's impossible to look away - and deep behind them seems to glow some kind of bright, warm physical light, in which it seems like she can see the unity of everything in known existence turning somehow. his expression is neutral, except for the deep pain she can see reflected there, but there's something much, much stronger than that, a sensation that immediately swells up inside of her unbidden.

hope. and love. not of the romantic, melodramatic variety people had displayed so much of tonight, but something richer, and more all-encompassing, and deeper. it feels as if it threatens to overtake her entirely, and with her will save of 10, she'd be moved to actual tears herself, perhaps without even realizing it.

he doesn't answer. just continues to look at her evenly, as if he knows what she's seeing, and it's a better answer that any other he can give. ]

[65]

[wow a lot of shit sure did go down just now. he can't even process it. people are getting shot then pistols are getting shot then collarbones are being broken WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE and now jade is alive again?????

but yeah he's just standing there in the audience. not moving. essentially frozen in place. just thought u should kno.]

[slay]

[ buffy stares at orlando bloom and feels unable to look away; though he doesn't answer her, the sight draws the anger and confrontation out of her like a sieve. she doesn't notice the tears that begin to trickle down her cheeks, too stunned by the sight and distracted by the warmth spreading through her. ]

[isisagent]

[Archer scoops up his shotgun, and kicks Des's gun away.] Play nice, chuckles, so I don't have to put you down, again.

Wake the hell up Rafael [Archer slaps him]
My God do I have to do everything?

[He shrugs, then goes and retrieves his discarded pistols]

[bigbad]

[Buffy is crying, Myri's breaking down, and Finnick is clearly useless. Really, what's the point of Myri having a boyfriend if he's going to go completely catatonic at every little battle? Spike stays by Myri, rubbing her shoulders, but he looks up at Buffy and Orlando Bloom and... still can't tell wtf is up with that, though as with all the things about Orlando Bloom, it still doesn't exactly seem bad. He just can't tell if it's good either.]

Buffy...?

[romanticidal]

[ ♬ bang bang (my baby shot me down) - nancy sinatra

but buffy doesn't get a chance to answer. because chris knows my life, and it's at that moment that the police burst in on every side, guns drawn and pointed at everyone as they move into position, the scene shot in dramatic slow motion.

"Everyone, weapons on the ground, hands in the air! Nobody move!"

across the stage floor, paramedics rush in, wheeling in a stretcher and moving double time to the stage. gar, kat, and mark, comply instantly, weapons dropped, hands up, and orlando bloom looks towards the oncoming medical help, breaking buffy's gaze and giving her relief from the emotional flood, although the feeling of having a lot of her darker emotions burned out lingers a bit. when buffy and spike follow his gaze and then look back at him... he's gone. as if he was never there.

the police move immediately to pull out handcuffs, approaching archer, des, and rafael in particular to cuff. rafael offers no resistance whatsoever, his eyes skidding back to jade, as the paramedics reach vi and myri and jade, and move to take over transferring her to the stretcher, the police holding off any resistance the girls put up.

as rafael is pulled away from the scene, isabella shouts his name in protest across the stage, but he merely shakes his head and says, very quietly as he's led away: ]

It doesn't matter.

Nothing matters anymore.