Mr. Carter and The Magic Flute

The night air was cool on Damien's face as the car sped through the city. It was almost unnerving how used to Nymeera's reality bending magic he was becoming. One moment they were driving along the cobblestone path in the Harem Hotel campus, the next they were navigating traffic in the familiar downtown streets of his city, the wind rushing in through the open window of the limousine bringing with it all the sights and sounds of a perfectly normal car ride. Though as he turned back toward his companion, he couldn't make himself believe this particular car ride was anything less than utterly abnormal. Gabriella herself aside, being in the expansive backseat of a luxury limo like this was more akin to being in a fancy, slightly cramped, bar. Gabriella had told him that it was okay, even recommended, to load up on food before the show, so Damien helped himself to the exquisite light snacks and cocktail drinks...huh, right now he was having a cocktail with a cocktail, looking at the shrimp cocktail in one hand and the martini in the other. He'd be self conscious, but Gabriella beside him was indulging too. Speaking of which...

That was the other piece that made this car ride anything but normal. Damien was a 40 year old man...well was took on significantly more meaning nowadays, but he hadn't been on too many dates in his life, especially not dates involving limos, so sitting next to the gorgeous former cheerleader turned politician while snacking on cocktails and martinis in a limo headed to an opera felt surreal, to say the least. And that wasn't even mentioning the reality altering fox woman driving them.

"So, do you live around here too?" Gabriella asked, looking out the window at the night lights of the city. Damien blinked and pulled a bite of shrimp away from his mouth.

"Well I live near the university," he said, looking outside the limo's window as the street, packed with cars, rolled by slowly. It all looked entirely unfamiliar. "I don't think I've been to this part of the downtown area before. I like my short commute," Damien said with a shrug, wondering what Gabriella was getting at.

"Then this isn't your city..." Gabriella said slowly, looking around outside. Damien blinked and looked out again, surprised but...well it suddenly made sense why he didn't recognize anything. "After college I moved to a new home, started a new career, following in my mother's footsteps, and started living in a new city. I mean, college was 10 years ago, most people won't stay around after graduation, well, most students anyway."

"I suppose that makes sense..." Damien said slowly, letting Gabriella talk, the implications of her words beginning to dawn on him.

"I wonder where the others are from now and..." Gabriella cut herself off but Damien immediately understood what she was thinking. Would they all have to abandon their homes at the end of this?

"Well, maybe we can ask them once we get back? It's been awhile for all of us, it might be nice to sit down with everyone and talk about what they're up to nowadays."

"Yeah..." The limo pulled to a stop and Gabriella suddenly seemed to get a lot more serious, shaking off her hesitance and giving Damien a beaming smile. "We're here. Ready?"

"Lead the way," he invited with a smile, reaching over to get the door for her...only for it to open on its own, revealing Nymeera standing there looking...ominously human.

"Welcome to the opera Master Damien," Nymeera, or was she Nina now, said as Damien followed behind Gabriella, out of the limo and into a crowd of people.

"Miss Neuman welcome!"

"Miss Neuman hello!"

"Good to see you Miss Neuman, will your mother be joining you?"

"Miss Neuman, who is this young man? Does your mother know about this? Haha!"

"Gabriella! Tell your mother Pete Bosman says hello, and who's this?"

A crowd of people who seemed to know Gabriella... Gabriella seemed to know them too, moving through the crowd with Damien in tow with a smile and a quick word to move quickly into the theater.

"Thank you Walter. Hello Patricia. Not tonight Vern, you know how she is. This is Damien, Victor, try to keep him out of the headlines for a week, I don't know if he'll be sticking around, and god I hope not! Will do Pete, this is my plus one tonight, we'll see about tomorrow." Damien thought that once inside they might be safe, but alas the theater was quite crowded tonight and being next to Gabriella was enough for people to see him as a curiosity. Most asked about him, as well as Gabriella's mother for some reason.

"You certainly are popular," Damien quietly observed once they were a little out of the way of the crowd. Of course, almost as interesting was that Nymeera seemed to be entirely ignored. Was this an example of the rich ignoring the help? If only they knew who they were ignoring...

"Hah," Gabriella laughed in an exhalation of breath. "Well, when your mother is a Congress member, people on the Hill tend to want your ear." Damien couldn't help but note Gabriella didn't sound too happy about that...unfortunately this was neither the time nor the place to talk to her about it, so he let it go and entered into the theater proper with her.

"Wow..." he said, as they entered into the extravagant theater space, the opulent walls and architecture almost seeming to bend the very fabric of space around them, all centered on the large stage displayed prominently before them. Immediately Damien felt self conscious as the sound carried everywhere in here. He could even hear bits of music and rehearsal as the players prepared for tonight's show. Gabriella smirked beside him, giving him a smug look that was only slightly ruined when she couldn't help but slide a finger into her mouth to suck on for a moment.

"First times can feel like that," she said in a low, hushed tone. Damien nodded, and looked around, Nymeera hadn't entered with them, so evidently she'd be staying out with the limo, which made sense as she wasn't really a part of this date, just the transportation. Wow, one minute inside an opera house and already Damien wasn't even considering the help... Surely there was an ethical dilemma there, but Damien was never going to find it, especially not when his date of the evening was so...

...distracting.

"Well, I have to admit, Nymeera gave us perfect seats..." Gabriella said, causing Damien to almost fall into his chair. That was the first time he'd heard her call Nymeera by name and not some slur or insult. He had to imagine it was due to being inside the opera house and some ingrained etiquette she'd been taught, likely from her mother, who seemed to have an outsized influence over her. Damien was about to reply when suddenly the room began to darken, and the music began to play. The curtain lifted, the show began...and Damien ran onto the stage.

Damien blinked, and stared as he watched himself, or someone who looked very much like him, run onto the stage dressed like, well like a prince from a far off land. What was even more shocking, was a giant serpent, obviously made of thin, colored paper that flowed and appeared to slither across the stage, guided by a stage hand wearing all black to blend in with the background, appeared on stage, chasing him.

"Zu Hilfe! Zu Hilfe!" he shouted in...German? Was that German? Text appeared above the stage, subtitles in English displayed for the audience. "Help! Help!" Damien, on stage, cries out, his voice reverberating along the theater walls, seeming to come from all around Damien in the audience. The music seemed to echo his panic, fast, quick notes that rushed along as though fleeing something deadly. No one seemed to be reacting to the fact that a man who looked exactly like him was on stage...except for one.

Gabriella seemed shocked into silence, so obviously this wasn't her doing. That meant...Nymeera was to blame. "Oh gods please! Save me!" Damien cried, according to the subtitles anyway...

A sound like thunder roared throughout the theater, causing the stunned Damien and Gabriella to jump, shocked back to their senses as three purple fox girls appeared from the background as though by magic and shouted at the serpent, brandishing their hands like weapons. "Stirb, Ungeheuer, durch uns're Macht!"

"Die Monster!, by our might!" Damien, on stage, faints, falling to the ground **** as the three fox women surrounded the serpent and begin to strangle it. The music turns deep and foreboding, crashing down around the audience, who all seem to be nonethewiser watching the scene play out. One fox girl holds its tail as the other two hold the head at bay, fingers wrapped around the paper throat as it flails about futilely before finally falling to the ground, dead with a deep, powerful blast of brass, the music falling silent as the serpent lays still.

"My, what have we found here sisters?" says the one on the left.

"A handsome man..." replies the one on the right, licking her lips.

"So handsome... Sisters, I think I hear our Queen calling for you, you best tend to her, don't worry, I shall stay with the handsome man and...tend to him," says the middle fox, smirking to the audience and giving a wink directly at Damien's seat.

"Oh no no! I certain hear our Queen calling for the two of you," the right fox girl counters, "As Attendants of the Queen of the Night we must fulfill our obligation to her every whim...so I will be the sacrifice to stay here and...tend, the handsome man while the two of you-"

"No way he's hot, I wanna stay!" interrupts the left-side fox. The three begin bickering, each insisting the other two leave her with the **** Damien, the music in the background begins to slowly pick up speed and volume as their arguing comes to a crescendo.

"Who'd want to be left alone with you anyway you flat chested bitch!" The rightmost fox girl roars at the leftmost. Suddenly the music cuts off completely and all three gasp and the rightmost fox girl immediately begins to apologize. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean it...I just got, swept up in the moment."

"It's okay, I think we all did."

"Let's not let a man come between us sisters, let's all leave together, and you have a wonderful bosom sister, large and healthy and full...of youth." The three fox girls giggle and leave the **** Damien alone, walking offstage together while softly chatting about each other's busts.

"Okay so that's not in the original Magic Flute..." Gabriella said to Damien's utter unsurprise, only to be tapped gently on the shoulder by her neighbor and given a gentle reminder to silence. Gabriella blushed and lowered her voice, leaning towards Damien to speak. "And I didn't tell that fox bitch to do this, I swear this is all her!"

"I believe you..." Damien whispered back. "I think I see what's happening here..." he said as his doppelganger slowly rose from the floor, rubbing his head, and jerking back in shock as his eyes found the lifeless body of the serpent. Suddenly, the music picked up again, playing a high, whimsical tune as another familiar face entered the stage.

"Y-you!" Damien cried out, pointing to the bird-woman Dana who stopped and stared at him. "You've saved my life!" he exclaimed, running over to thank her, clasping his hand in hers and shaking it vigorously, causing the shorter feather clad woman to bounce up and down with the **** of his handshake, causing feathers to fall from her body onto the stage, as well as provide some extra jiggle from certain non avian features. The music joined in on the action, punctuating each uplifting shake of the hand, arm, and shoulder with a bang of a drum.

"I did?" Dana asked, extricating her arm from the overly thankful Damien and picking up some of the feathers that fell off.

"The serpent," Damien says happily, pointing to the lifeless serpent on the ground. "You were the one who killed it, were you not?"

The music softens as Dana looks at the serpent, then back to Damien, then back to the serpent again, and finally out to the audience with a wide smirk on her face, bobbing her eyebrows like a cartoon character.

"Yes, yes I did!" she proclaims happily, striking a heroic pose with the serpent under her heel. "My name is Danageno! A bird catcher by trade, a miserable profession that has left me with no shortage of feathers and unhappily short a wife or even girlfriend." Danageno's heroic visage turns petulant and she kicks the serpent, sending it rolling across the stage. "I use my magic spells to trap birds, relieving them of their feathers and then I..." suddenly Danageno stops, looking out into the audience. "There aren't any children nearby right?"

"Uhh, I don't think so?" Damien replies unsure. Danageno looks worried and then turns back to Damien, smiling.

"And then I let them go to live long happy lives! Unlike this big green beastie which I strangled with my bird hand- I mean bare hands!" Danageno exclaims excitedly. "Saving the life of...you!"

"Damino. I am a prince of a distant land looking for adventure."

"Damino! A good looking prince who will surely have no trouble getting a wife unlike poor, unlucky Danageno who only saved your life to make the dating market far, far worse for myself." Danageno slowly deflated as she spoke, getting lower and lower to the ground, the whimsical music getting lower and lower with her every word.

"I uh...appreciate your sacrifice."

"Ahem...and what sacrifice is this?" suddenly the three fox women returned, and the whimsical music cut off suddenly, as though it were a child caught stealing by its mother. Danageno did not take the musical cue, however, and merely smiled smugly at the three fox girls, gesturing towards the dead serpent on the ground.

"Attendants of the Queen of the Night! Greetings! I'll have you know that I just so happened to have killed this beast and saved this unreasonably attractive man's life! I strangled it with my bir- ...bare hands, and if you insist on rewarding me for my efforts I would love some wine and cake...oh and figs!" Danageno bragged, sidling up to the three fox girls and displaying her feathered wings to them. "And if one or all of you would like to become my doting, darling wife, I'd accept and love you forever!" The three fox girls looked at each other, then smiled wickedly, the music returning with a sinister undertone.

"Oh, wine and cake are your desires are they?" the middle fox asked, circling around Danageno, who suddenly looked much less sure of herself.

"For the hero who strangled the great serpent, all on her own, surely such tasty rewards are no problem at all, right sisters?"

"Oh yes, we have a reward for someone like you Danageno."

"Oh?" Danageno said to a lull in the music, "Well good. Uh...let me have it?" The three fox girls turned to the audience with evil intentions and suddenly the music returned with a ferocious whimsy as the fox girls danced around Danageno moving about the stage and grabbing things as Damino backed away, obviously confused.

"Wine for the hero!" the first fox girl said, scooping up a cup of water from the background and shoving it into Danageno's hands.

"Uh I don't know if that's healthy-"

"Cake!" cried out the second, placing a large rock in Danageno's other hand.

"It seems to have gone a bit stale..."

"And of course, your reward for telling such a stupendous LIE!" The music suddenly went darker, almost opposite the whimsical tone it held before, a complete tonal reversal as the final fox girl placed a mask on Danageno's face and slapped a padlock upon it, locking the mask on her like a gag.

"Wait a moment!" Damino suddenly shouts out, heading to Danageno's side. "What's the meaning of this?"

"This songbird has spun a tall tale. WE were the ones who slayed this serpent and saved your life. The Attendants of the Queen of the Night!" Damino looks to Danageno in shock, who merely looks down at her feet in shame. "If you wish to repay us then you must do our mistress a favor," the middle fox girl purrs, slipping next to Damino, and trailing a finger along his exposed chest, before lifting a portrait for him, which appeared on the screen for the audience, to see.

"I fucking knew it..." Gabriella whispered angrily, pressing her legs together tightly as the portrait was revealed to be in her likeness. Damino gaped at the portrait, in absolute awe of it, even reaching out to gently touch it. He softly begins to sing, having fallen deeply, irrevocably in love with the woman pictured. Damien turned toward Gabriella, who was sliding down into her chair, as though trying to phase through the floor and out of this, apparently, incredibly embarrassing situation. None of the other theater goers appeared to have noticed anything amiss, all of them laughing and listening to Damino's solo piece, which concludes with him accepting the portrait and tucking it away reverently.

"This is a portrait of Gabima," the rightmost fox girl said with a smile. "The daughter of the Queen of the Night, who has been captured by a powerful, evil demon called Synastro."

"What?" Damino, finally breaking free of his lovesick reverie, exclaims. "Then she must be rescued at once! I swear I will do this task, even if it should cost me my life!"

"Your life you say?" rang out a VERY familiar voice. Gabriella and Damien winced as a familiar figure swept onto the stage to the sound of glorious orchestra and fanfare. Nymeera hadn't decided to wait with the car after all...at least, Damien was willing to bet that she'd never let anyone play her, other than herself. He could be wrong...but he didn't think he was wrong.

"If those are the stakes, the rewards should equal the risk," Nymeera said, her fingers curling around Damino's face, as though to draw him into her spell...and it seemed to be working as the music became smooth and flowed like liquid from note to note. "If you can rescue my daughter, I will grant you my blessing and she shall belong to you." Danageno immediately huffed, her voice muffled by the mask-like gag, and rolled her eyes, shaking her head in disappointment, much to the audience's amusement.

"O zittre nicht, mein lieber Sohn!" sang Nymeera, flowing about the stage with a presence that drew every eye to her. "Oh, tremble not, my dear son!"

"Fuck..." Gabriella muttered a bit too loudly, though the audience seemed to be so enthralled with Nymeera's performance that they paid her no heed.

"Du, Du, Du wirst sie zu befreien gehen..."

"You will go to free her..." she sang, drawing in the three fox girls and even Damino into her song until all four of them were singing together, with Danageno humming and swaying in the background, still unable to speak.

"The Queen of the Night is one of the hardest roles to sing in all opera...and she's absolutely nailing it. God I hate her so much, that sexy bitch..." Gabriella said, sliding a finger into her mouth and beginning to bob her head back and forth on it. Damien decided not to call attention to it, and continued to watch the opera. Indeed, Nymeera was absolutely stunning in looks and tone, though he had to wonder how much of that was natural and how much were her godlike host powers helping her out? If she could create a sphere of ignorance around the entire crowd, making them unaware of the true nature of the show they were watching, surely being able to hit some high notes wasn't a big deal for her.

As the song ended, the audience roared with approval, the entire opera felt suddenly alive in a completely new way as sound from the audience spilled out onto the stage.

"Brava!" "Brava!" "Brava!" Several audience members cried out, clapping and even stomping their feet! Damien didn't know what to do so he just joined in the applause politely, while Gabriella sat there with a nasty frown on her face.

The applause and stomping died down as the opera resumed. The three fox girls unclasped Danageno's mask and bid her to join Damino on his quest, making her promise not to lie anymore. Danageno, of course, accepted, and the fox girls gave Damino and Danageno gifts to aid them on their quest. A magical flute, likely the titular flute, given to Damino, said to have the power to turn sorrow into joy, and magic bells of protection for Danageno, who lamented that they weren't wedding bells. The fox girls say their brothers will help the two on their quest and bid them both farewell, till next they meet. Damino and Danageno hurry offstage, opposite the Queen of the Night and her fox girls, and the curtain closes, signaling the end of the first scene. The audience erupts into applause.

Damien turns to Gabriella, who immediately pops her finger out of her mouth and straightens up sheepishly.

"Um...so I swear this wasn't my plan at all..." she begins to say, just for Damien to cut her off.

"Should we leave? You don't have to do this if you don't want to," he says, worried about what further plans Nymeera has for the play. Gabriella pauses for a moment, lost in thought as the audience continues to applaud. She then frowns and gives him a smile.

"I'm okay. It's just a face and suspiciously altered name, and besides it's definitely kept the opera feeling fresh for me. I've seen The Magic Flute a few times now, and I have to say...this is a lot different, though the structure seems to be the same. If fox bitch is going to keep the structure the same though...why would she cast herself as the Queen of the Night?" Gabriella asks herself as the applause from the audience dies down... She shakes her head, making up her mind. "No matter, I need this date to go well, and I think fox bitch is trying to help me, in her own messed up way anyway. Let's keep watching, we can always leave during the intermission if it sucks," she said with a smirk. Damien nodded in agreement, and both of them settled back in their chairs, Gabriella's hand moving out to clasp his as the curtain began to rise over a new scene, expertly modified from the previous set.