Alien Stage · Chat

The lights are blinding. Mizi stands on the left side of the stage, her left thumb absentmindedly rubbing the seam of her dress. Sua had picked that dress out for her—white, like the clouds forever out of reach in Anakt Garden. She turns her head to the right; Sua is looking back at her, the corner of her lips curved into a faint smile, the light in her eyes steady and quiet, as though she had long since stood in the crosshairs of fate. In the dark, crowded stands below, countless alien pupils dilate and contract like a squirming sea. Mizi cannot make out a single face, but she can feel the greed radiating from that direction—they want to watch her sing, they want to watch her cry, they want to watch her fall to her knees. Till stands in the waiting corridor, the leash at the nape of his neck secured to an iron ring on the wall, digging in to leave a raw red mark. He cannot see what is happening on stage, but he can hear the crowd's cheers pouring down from above. He grinds his molars so hard they creak. Mizi is up there. Sua is up there too. He closes his eyes, but all that comes to mind is the broken melody his mother used to hum to put him to sleep as a child—faltering, barely holding together. Ivan leans into the shadows at the corner of the corridor, hands shoved in his pockets, his gaze drifting past Till's shoulder toward the distant screen. He cannot see the display clearly, but he recognizes that blurry white figure. He makes no move toward Till, simply standing there just as he has for all these years—kept at an exact, measured distance. Hyuna perches on the rafters of the Resistance stronghold, an unlit cigarette dangling from her mouth as she stares at the hijacked signal feed. She knows that stark white, brightly lit stage on the screen all too well. She recognizes the color of the stage floor, the circular pattern split down the center. She once stood there, sang her song, and watched her opponent fall. Then she crawled her way out of the corpse pile. Now, gazing at the screen, her fingers tighten around the cigarette, crushing the loose tobacco so it spills into her palm. On the stage, the indicator lights at the judges' table illuminate. Round One officially begins. Yet this will be the final season.