Christine DeChagny (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lethermindwander) wrote2016-11-01 11:17 am
lethermindwander) wrote2016-11-01 11:17 am
Entry tags:
Elle est entré dans mon cœur
If Raoul had not been so busy, running around the city and tidying up various family affairs, perhaps he would have had the foresight to put a contingency plan in place. To prevent exactly this from happening. He always tried to protect Christine from nearly everything else that might cause her to feel any sort of negative emotion.
The very moment Christine had been left alone with no agenda of her own, she found herself sitting at a little café across the street from Le Palais Garnier. She stared at the small sign that marked the Rue Scribe side. She couldn't tear her eyes away. If she stared at the ornate marker, reading the words, dissecting the letters over and over, she wouldn't look at the glorious building right behind it. Still, from the corner of her eye, she could see the gate. Oh, how many times she had stood at that gate and fumbled with the key. Traveled down below. Listened to fantastical stories, been brought to a beautiful, dark world that had been beyond all understanding.
Loved a love that Allah had never intended to exist.
Five years later, it still eats at her. Feeling like it's slowly devouring her, piece by piece. When she's finished nursing her cup of tea, Christine begins her journey. She has walked this path before, in the dark of night. It's still the same, despite the light.
Quietly, she sings to herself. Christine rarely sings these days, unless it's for her son. But this melody is special. She remembers it as something that her nightingale had composed, a simple little song. Nothing like his Don Juan.
"Quand il me prend dans ses bras, Il me parle tout bas, Je vois la vie en rose," She can hardly even remember if these are the real lyrics or just the words that she's constructed to fit the song. It doesn't matter all that much anymore, does it?
"Il me dit des mots d’amour, des mots de tous les jours, et ça me fait quelque chose," Christine continues, a broad smile tugging at her lips. It brings her so much joy to sing like this again, even if it's quiet. She still likes to think that he can hear her.
Christine stops at the gate, looking around before she reaches out to shake the rusting metal. As expected, it's locked. It's likely been locked since the last time she emerged from the depths below. It's too bad she doesn't still possess the key. She remembers though, from her days as a chorus girl, that the others would gossip about sneaking through locked doors by using their hairpins to pick them. Christine certainly has plenty of those at the moment, her hair all pinned down too tightly in the latest aristocratic fashion. She pulls one out, letting a few of her curls fall and frame the sides of her face.
She has no idea what she's doing, truthfully. She can almost hear Erik's voice in her head. Partly amused for her sudden proclivity towards committing a crime. Partly exasperated for her inability to actually do so. There's no giving up, though. She's made her mind up. She needs to make this journey into what anyone else would see as Hell, one final time. She imagines it'll bring her some sort of closure, something she so desperately needs.
The very moment Christine had been left alone with no agenda of her own, she found herself sitting at a little café across the street from Le Palais Garnier. She stared at the small sign that marked the Rue Scribe side. She couldn't tear her eyes away. If she stared at the ornate marker, reading the words, dissecting the letters over and over, she wouldn't look at the glorious building right behind it. Still, from the corner of her eye, she could see the gate. Oh, how many times she had stood at that gate and fumbled with the key. Traveled down below. Listened to fantastical stories, been brought to a beautiful, dark world that had been beyond all understanding.
Loved a love that Allah had never intended to exist.
Five years later, it still eats at her. Feeling like it's slowly devouring her, piece by piece. When she's finished nursing her cup of tea, Christine begins her journey. She has walked this path before, in the dark of night. It's still the same, despite the light.
Quietly, she sings to herself. Christine rarely sings these days, unless it's for her son. But this melody is special. She remembers it as something that her nightingale had composed, a simple little song. Nothing like his Don Juan.
"Quand il me prend dans ses bras, Il me parle tout bas, Je vois la vie en rose," She can hardly even remember if these are the real lyrics or just the words that she's constructed to fit the song. It doesn't matter all that much anymore, does it?
"Il me dit des mots d’amour, des mots de tous les jours, et ça me fait quelque chose," Christine continues, a broad smile tugging at her lips. It brings her so much joy to sing like this again, even if it's quiet. She still likes to think that he can hear her.
Christine stops at the gate, looking around before she reaches out to shake the rusting metal. As expected, it's locked. It's likely been locked since the last time she emerged from the depths below. It's too bad she doesn't still possess the key. She remembers though, from her days as a chorus girl, that the others would gossip about sneaking through locked doors by using their hairpins to pick them. Christine certainly has plenty of those at the moment, her hair all pinned down too tightly in the latest aristocratic fashion. She pulls one out, letting a few of her curls fall and frame the sides of her face.
She has no idea what she's doing, truthfully. She can almost hear Erik's voice in her head. Partly amused for her sudden proclivity towards committing a crime. Partly exasperated for her inability to actually do so. There's no giving up, though. She's made her mind up. She needs to make this journey into what anyone else would see as Hell, one final time. She imagines it'll bring her some sort of closure, something she so desperately needs.
K SO I CAN'T REMEMBER IF THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO GO A WAY SO LET ME KNOW IF I FUDGED IT
But nothing is ever as flawless as romantic imagination. The colors of the real world are duller, and the cruelty of men permeates all manner of civilization. In this world, this Paris, as this Elizabeth (or rather, and perhaps more appropriately, Anna) she has memories of who she was.
But then it changed. It all seemed to matter less and less, like an old photo that faded and withered with time. Some unfortunate trick of the multiverse had planted within her some very tragic memories from a life in another time. In another beautiful city, with the one and only person that ever really mattered.
And now he's gone, and Elizabeth is in Paris alone.
It's bittersweet on the most bearable of days. Nights are always lonely, though.
But it never paid to feed the apathy, or the regret. The guilt. Sometimes, it was best to be outside among strangers rather than alone completely. Tonight, Elizabeth finds herself at the very same cafe as Christine, though the crowd is rather sparse between them. Elizabeth remains on the very lip of the crowd at the farthest table, wreathed in a coil of silver stinging smoke. The lipstick stain on the rim of her glass is as dark as the residual wine within.
Her thoughts are listing restlessly when a faint familiar melody anchors down her attention.
Sally. The memory floods hyper-vivid across her senses, and a startled hiss leaves her as she witheres slightly in her chair. Elizabeth reminds herself that she saved her, that Sally is alright, but it never quite takes away the sting. Beyond that, the memory isn't supposed to be there, and her mind protests with a sharp stabbing pain and a rivet of blood brightly flowing down her nose.
"--dammit," she hisses under her breath, snatching up a neat white napkin from the table to stem the sudden flow. Her watery winter-sky eyes followed toward the source of the song. Of course, it isn't Sally at all...
... but it is a young woman, looking in need of a little roguish assistance. Elizabeth steadies herself with a breath, and makes sure to mop the remaining blood from her sunless-pale skin. Maybe it is a strange whim, a morbid kind of nostalgia, or something else entirely... But it would be a little thing, to help out in the small way she could.
Her sharp heels click softly on the paving as she stands, and quietly trails behind the stranger's shadow.
"Pardon me," she interrupts softly, fluid french now her default language. "Please, don't be afraid. I'd just like to help you with that," she doesn't show her gentler face to many people anymore, but maybe the small deviant act too inclines her towards bittersweet nostalgia. How many locks had she picked for him, after all?
"I'm guessing you need that gate unlocked?" she smiles a touch too smoothly (like a perfected mask) and takes a slow inhale from her slender cigarette. The cherry smolders brightly in the ill-defined dim before the sour sheer smoke is cast out in a breath, pointed away and to the side.
"You could say I've picked a lock or two in my life. It wouldn't be any trouble for me to lend you a hand," her smile is so pretty, yet so sad. Her hand lifts quietly, requesting the hairpin by way of permission to assist.
THIS IS BEAUTIFUL. <3
It's a slightly bitter thought, wrought with irony. Still, it lets a quiet laugh escape her lips as her song trails off. She needs to focus and it's difficult to do so when she's singing of La Vie en Rose. The ironic sense of that was not lost on her either. To anyone on the outside, her life was exactly as the song. Perfect husband, perfect son. It makes her feel so terribly guilty for pining after a man that's been long dead. Though it certainly isn't the first time she's fallen into this sort of behavior. History is bound to repeat itself, after all.
Christine was too lost in her own thoughts to notice that someone had followed her here.
When Elizabeth first speaks, Christine's heart jumps into her throat. First, she fears that she's been caught. How stupid she is! Trying to pick a lock in broad daylight. The scandal she has inevitably just caused! Former prima donna breaking and entering into the very place she had experienced her triumph! What will Raoul say? He had forgiven her for so many things over the years. Surely he wouldn't forgive her for this! He had long since thought that they had put the ghost to rest. And what of Charles? Oh, how disappointed he would be in his poor mother! She can hardly bear it, picturing her sweet young boy wearing a deep, sad frown.
But she calms her mind, the pitter-patter in her chest calming for brief moment as the woman offers her help instead. With Elizabeth's outstretched hand now in her periphery, Christine slowly turns to get a better look at the newcomer.
Christine looks up from her position, kneeling at the gate. Perhaps it's the angle she's viewing the other woman at. Perhaps it's the way the light is bouncing off of her. Perhaps it's the graceful way she holds her cigarette. The only concrete thing that Christine can determine is that Elizabeth's eyes burn her in a way that she's only ever experienced once before.
She's losing her mind, isn't she. She had never been quite right in the head to begin with and now this was the final nail in the coffin. It's utterly ridiculous to think that a ghost had actually managed to read her thoughts and yet...
"If, if you don't mind. Lord knows, I'll likely be caught before I manage to breach it," Christine nervously replies. It takes her a moment to reply in French, even though it feels far more natural to her than even her mother tongue of Swedish at this point. She's just been so used to speaking English these days and this young woman has definitely jumbled her thoughts.
She pulls the pin from the lock and places it in Elizabeth's hand. Then she stands up, brushes the dirt from her dark violet skirts and steps aside to allow her the space to work.
no subject
"I'm sure you could have managed, but I can certainly save you some time," Elizabeth replies, her warmth all but smothered by her grim manner. It's like glancing specks of gold in a flow of dark sand. Still, something like kindness peers out from behind the cold-ocean-blue of her eyes as she accepts the offered hairpin.
Once Christine has moved aside, it takes one short toss and then Elizabeth is crushing the butt of the cig under the ball of her foot. She then takes her spot before the lock, bending some at the waist to achieve a workable angle. One hand cradles the lock while the other gently guides the pin. Elizabeth does not much appear to be in severe concentration.
"Have matters progressed so little?" she mutters to herself as the lock yields and falls comfortably into her hand. "I could have picked that with a butter knife." She tosses the rusted thing and catches it, giving it a somewhat pitying look before she sets it aside.
It is only then that she turns her attention more sharply to the resting Opera house. It's a behemoth of a building, all draped in spider webs and stained with neglect. It does not look like a place where much trouble could be caused, but she cannot help but wonder of Christine's motivations. She purses her painted lips as she examines her own cautious curiosity; is it too out of place to wonder aloud?
"You needn't answer me, as it is no business of mine... but why is it that you'd like to break into an old abandoned opera house?" a quick deduction pops into her head, and she asks (with more curiosity than she means to allow) "Are you looking for something?"
no subject
She watches the old lock bounce, concentrating on the motion of Elizabeth's fingers. So effortless it is and this...cannot possibly be real. She's found herself staring again, her darker eyes getting lost in those blue ones.
She's standing on the edge of a cliff, staring down into the dark, foreboding waters beneath her. There are monsters just below the surface and she can see them swimming, tearing each other apart. But if she finds the courage to jump, Christine knows what wonders she will find. She hasn't had that dream in so long, now it seems to permeate her mind.
It takes her far too long to one, realize that Elizabeth has asked her a question and two, come up with a response. She can't lie. Christine has never been good at lying. But she can be as vague as possible with her words.
"I have it on good authority that a company has been hired to return this place to it's former glory," Christine explains. That much is true, she's heard the gossip back in London. Along with inevitable speculations on why it had been burned so thoroughly in the first place. None of them had never known the role that Christine had played in it.
"I used to sing here, before the fire," she continues, her words trailing off for a moment while she remembers, watching the chandelier fall as Erik had stolen her away. The chaos, the screams. She can still hear it all when she closes her eyes.
"But you are correct. I am looking for something and I need to find it before the reconstruction begins. It's...very important," Christine explains, opening the gate and taking the first step inside. She looks back to Elizabeth with a guarded smile. This will be a test, of sorts. Not just a sudden realization that it'd be incredibly stupid to sneak down into the cellars all by herself. She wants another sign, some other confirmation that this mysterious woman's sudden appearance had something to do with her Angel's machinations. There's only one way to convince her for certain.
"Care to join me?
no subject
(Maybe it's interesting to watch because as a lock-picker and musician, the girl certainly has dexterous fingers.)
It doesn't quite catch Elizabeth's attention that this woman has no reason to look at her quite this way, because it's simply that familiar.One dark penciled brow does lift a hint when Christine mentions that she used to sing. Barely half a year ago, Elizabeth would have lit with delight, and insisted they sit with her records and sing away the afternoon. There are only embers of the former warmth that was once within her, but embers do stave off the cold just a little.
Ah, so she is looking for something. Elizabeth's keen eyes flick to the seemingly slumbering building, and narrow with a thought. Looking for something in a place like this could be difficult business, for someone limited to typical human senses. But for Elizabeth? Cake. She could probably save this poor woman hours of searching...
And, as a bonus, it would provide something to do other than returning to her tiny loft, and listening to the dead static on her busted shortwave radio. Her keen eyes had been of plenty use in the past; now, with one plasmid in particular, Elizabeth is confident she could find a needle in ten hay stacks, if need be. So sure, why not. It's almost, almost like visiting the grave Booker never had.
"I could," her answer is carefully measured, not unkind but with a quiet caution. "I could help you find whatever it is you're looking for, easily. Fair warning, though; you might find me strange company."A small frown touches her mouth, "and that's putting it very lightly."
WOOO FINALLY HITTING THIS. WITH CREEPY!CHRISTINE, APPARENTLY.
She supposes she'll find out how deranged she's truly become once they've made this journey. Once the wreckage of his once beautiful home was before her again.
"I'm sure you would find the same of me. I am the one trying to break into the opera house," Christine replies. She takes a few more steps past the gate and it occurs to her that perhaps she should introduce herself. They have a long trek in front of them, they may as well become better acquainted.
"My name is Christine," she says, "And you are...?"
As she waits for a response, she reaches behind a large, loose stone and pulls out a lantern. As well as some matches. It seems odd that these things are still here, buried away. Not to mention, the lantern is full of gas, as if someone has just been here.
The logical conclusion is that the Persian may have stopped by to pay his own respects to the ghost. That's not the one Christine comes to, though. It just feeds her increasingly ridiculous delusion.
CLEARLY I BEAT YOU AN SLOWNESS
"I don't know; I've broken into a lot of places in my life; this seem pretty standard," she replies with a moth-eaten worn out attempt kindness; she's managing not to sound so cold, but it's clear this is a young woman not accustomed to the company of others. The air around her seems cool, and she looks to pale to have lived under the sun at all. No, her skin is so white, she had to have been underground (or more accurately, under water) for an extended period of time. She also seems oddly comfortable walking into the ruins of an unknown place. It's simple confidence; she doesn't anticipate anything that could cause a problem.
"It's nice to meet you, Christine," Elizabeth speaks from manners rather than warmth, but she isn't outwardly mean. It seems as though she has carefully drawn her wings about herself in a tight cocoon, as a way of keeping others at bay. How did she learn that lesson, exactly...?
"My name is Elizabeth," she replies, dipping her toes in the waters of amiable conversation. Once Christine has the lantern, Elizabeth slips a few paces into the darkness of the passage. She doesn't fear the darkness in the least-- in fact she seems to peer right through it, her eyes lighting with the registry of shapes in the dimness. Keen eyes alone can do a lot of good, and damn if Rapture wasn't one dark leaky damp mess.
She retreats the few steps back to Christine, pinning her with a faintly curious look.
"What exactly are you looking for?" she asks carefully, uncertain if she has any right to inquire. "I'm not forcing you to tell me, but if you do, I could help you find it," making sure Christine is prepared to follow with that lanturn, the grim young woman begins to wade comfortably into the dark hall.
NO, YOU DON'T. I BEAT YOU, THIS TIME.
While Christine is used to being around people and putting up a jovial front, she is far too lost in her own head to be portraying herself as such in the moment. To her conscious mind, many of the peculiarities of Elizabeth's appearance are lost on her, though her subconscious has likely done something with that information. Likely another odd connection equating this girl to some sort of story that Christine read once.
Right now though, that part of Christine that is oddly stubborn feels a bit put off by Elizabeth's inclination to take the lead in this journey. Christine feels like she has some sort of twisted ownership over this place; If it can't be Erik's domain, then it's hers. She still knows the way down, of course she still knows it. It comes to her all the time in her dreams.
She doesn't like stirring the pot, especially with a new acquaintance but Christine is compelled to go against her own grain in this moment. Or at least, what she thinks is something out of character for herself. In reality, this is fairly typical of her. She just doesn't notice these moments of bravery on her own.
"There's a lot of traps along the way," she comments, taking a few swift steps to put herself in front of Elizabeth in the corridor, "I know how to avoid them. The man that built this place was mad." Yet she loved that madman will all her heart and soul.
And she continues on as if she did not just have some sort of internal debate over whether or not she should take the lead. She knows what she's doing down here. She doesn't need someone to lead her into the darkness.
"I'm not sure what I'm looking for, in all honesty. It's a bit like visiting a grave, I suppose," Christine replies to the question with a bit of a shrug. It isn't far from the truth, not that she wants to explain exactly why this place is an actual grave.
OMG it hasn't even been a month look at me all speedy over here xD;;
It's easy to follow behind, regardless. If Christine knows the way, she is more than welcome to lead.
"Sounds dangerous," she says in a way that subtly suggest approval. Elizabeth's life had been made of of opposing extremes; once she was sheltered from the world, locked in a tower. Then, she was thrown into a city of chaos, a revolution, and so much more. Things were either unbearably calm... or horribly dangerous.
Maybe here, a little bit of both could make Elizabeth feel more at home.
As her new companion speaks, the grim young woman begins to develop a curiosity about this old abandoned opera house. Built by a madman, full of traps? Sounds an awful lot like Cohen's eccentric estate, or his personal paradise of Fort Frolic. And Cohen was certainly a madman, in the politest possible terms. It inclines the wary woman to take a closer look at the place, which she could do in a moment, if only she's able to activate one of her handy plasmids. Peeping Tom was made for this (well, maybe something a little less scrupulous than this, but moving on).
Activating her x-ray vision creates a secondary effect, however. That being sudden invisibility. But... Christine is in the lead, and for whatever reason Elizabeth feel the faint inclination for deviance. That, she knows, is a DeWitt thing. So for half a moment, she flickers out of sight. Just long enough to peer a ways ahead.
"Sounds like a place I used to know," she comments cooly once she has reappeared, not the least bit intimidated by the suggestion of danger. "A man I once apprenticed under, built all manners of strange things into his estate. First trap you'd encounter would be a spike pit. A little over dramatic, don't you think?"
Except, Cohen had commissioned heavy guns and machinery for his purposes. Most of his security was just bots and turrets. But Elizabeth had glanced a spike trap some ways down through the rock and the ground.
"Still, it's the kind of thing I'd watch out for here."
Elizabeth could lead, if Christine trusted her too. She doesn't need to-- but she could. Maybe it's a little pleasing to demonstrate that, and Elizabeth is in no position to turn down even the slightest enjoyment.