Virtuosa

Arturia Giallo, Laterano-born, is an active and renowned musician across all Terra. Rhodes Island has entered a tripartite agreement as requested by the Imperial Court of Leithanien and the Lateran Curia to authorize—given strict supervision by relevant personnel—her provisional onboarding at Rhodes Island as Operator 'Virtuosa.'

Imaging tests reveal clear, normal outlines of internal organs, and no abnormal shadows have been detected. Originium granules have not been detected in the circulatory system and there is no sign of infection. At this time, this operator is believed to be uninfected.

[Cell-Originium Assimilation] 0%
Operator shows no signs of Originium infection.

[Blood Originium-Crystal Density] 0.12u/L
Virtuosa's experience travelling Terra rivals that of any veteran Messenger. By her own account, her planned journeys—presuming she does actually plan them—don't make a point of avoiding high Oripathy-risk environs, but as is plain to see, Virtuosa's BOCD nevertheless remains relatively healthy.

[Appendix from Medical Department]
An unusual request to us from the Lateran Curia: they ask that beyond standard physical examinations, we also hold psychological tests expressly for Virtuosa. Rhodes Island has its own provisional mental health evaluation system in place, and more than a few operators sit far below its bar for 'psychologically healthy'; we already have some idea of how Virtuosa's test results will pan out.

//Restricted-Access Item: [Conference #1]
Date: ■■/■■/1100
[Participant Checklist]
Rhodes Island Human Resources Department: Present
Rhodes Island Medical Department: Present
Spire of Grace, Leithanien: Present
Institute of Telepathy, Leithanien: Present
The Lateran Curia: Present
Notarial Hall, Laterano: Present

[Inquiry Footage]
[Resume Transmission]
[05:17/05:35:36]
'In light of our collective understanding of the concerned party, I suggest we omit the procedural introduction and move directly to today's inquiry proceedings.'
'The Empresses' Voice is still reviewing the report on the subject. Is the Notarial Hall in such in a rush?'
'Does Leithanien require that report to understand the subject?'
'[COUGHING]'
'We have three hours reserved for our initial conference. Abide by the agreement, Federico—the Empresses' Voice has the right to read through the report first.'
'Three hours. I will begin timing.'
'This conference is being held by the Rhodes Island Human Resources Department. Additionally, Amiya will be present to assist us in our understanding of the subject's Originium Arts.'
'How soon we meet, Miss Amiya. With her present, maybe you'll all rest a little easier around me.
'But of course, I know you won't.'
[07:38/05:35:36]
[Pause Transmission]

[Conference Log: attachment #2: Opinion from the Institute of Telepathy]
......
If we adopt the theory put forward by several interviewees in the early-stage investigation reports concerning Virtuosa, then the Arts she grasps could be said, in essence, to 'magnify' others' emotions to the point of 'urging' them to take impulsive action, which leads to our falling into the easy trap of lumping it in with other mental Arts—or as we would categorize them in Leithanien, 'telepathic-perceptual'—thus considering it either a simple illusion-/mirage-based construct, or a form of so-called 'mind control.'
However, the fact of the matter is that Virtuosa's Arts are exceedingly rare. Given our as-yet-insufficient study of her type of Originium Arts, it's no wonder we might have misjudged its effective mechanisms, and hence arrived at an erroneous conclusion.
......
Of all the investigation reports, a 1092 Lateran Notarial Hall case file logs the greatest detail, and serves as our most useful reference. Within, the author Federico generalizes Virtuosa's Arts as an 'empathetic expansion,' presumably owing to his Lateran familiarities. From there, we conjecture something most interesting: that Virtuosa's unique Arts may well be the result of Sankta empathic abilities acting in concert with telepathic-perceptual Arts. Based on this hypothesis, we launched further research into her Arts with the assent of multiple conference parties, herself, and the test subjects.
......
In the course of our research, we carried out both individual and multi-person tests. We have only made a brief summary in this report; detailed test logs and participant feedback will be recorded elsewhere.
In individual tests, when Virtuosa performed music using her Originium Arts, we picked up both the music and the subject's emotional impulse in a coinciding frequency range on three separate detectors. She was seemingly able to 'perceive' this coinciding range, and use Arts to bring about some sort of 'resonance' effect—this resonance was not limited to the subject and the music, but affected the caster as well, i.e. Virtuosa's own emotional impulses (see attachment #3).
In multi-person tests, Virtuosa demonstrated to us another mode of her Originium Arts—the effect she displayed during Das Kaiserinnensfest, and one of pertinent interest to all parties at the conference. She had three subjects experience simultaneous emotional resonance (see attachment #6); the concrete manner in which she achieved this is something we still haven't ascertained.
......

[Conference Log: attachment #4: Subject #1: Mrs. ■■■■■]
Without personally undergoing it, I fear one could hardly know how Virtuosa's Arts acts upon her 'subjects,' much like how the Sankta have a limited ability to explain to others just how their empathy works.
As a researcher of consciousness and cognition, I've always been fond of likening the human consciousness to a lake. Our typical actions and motivations are merely the scenery mirrored in its surface; the thing we call the subconscious, no more than the fins and pebbles some meters under. We often take the existence of the lake for granted, forgetting that we have each drop of water to thank for begetting it—each moment of sadness and triumph, each moment of thought and feeling—as they pour into this grand lake and become one with it. Thus we observe and see only a great body of water, not the minute, endless trickles.
Virtuosa's Arts are able to separate and distinguish the water back into those constituent trickles. Under the effect of her Arts, every depth of our consciousnesses, including those we've long forgotten—our buried or deliberately hidden memories—are given an emphasis they've never known. Such memories are usually associated with the strongest emotions stirred by the melody itself. They float to the surface on their own, and cause us to reconsider the manner in which the lake of our consciousness is. We sometimes underestimate on how real a level such reconsideration changes our behavior, and influences our judgment.
That said, after undergoing today's experiments, Virtuosa's Arts have had me find that merely analogizing to 'a lake' is altogether insufficient to describe the breadth of human consciousness, or to account for the grand billows that her music can stir within it. As such, 'the sea of consciousness' may be a more apt metaphor.

[Outcome of Meeting]
Joint deliberation by all convened parties concludes that the functional mechanisms by which Operator 'Virtuosa's' Arts can work are as yet unclear, and still of inestimable risk. Therefore, per agreement she is to be transferred to Rhodes Island to await further observation and study. Virtuosa will continue to require supervision while at Rhodes Island: all conduct will be subject to consistent scrutiny, anything spoken must be logged, and she is forbidden from performing anything without authorization.

[Classified Log]
Their hypothesis at the conference was correct. Virtuosa's Arts can stir people's innermost and most significant memories, which then arouse some given state of mind, thus forming emotions. However, she cannot, by her own will, alter the memories reawakened in people when they hear her music. Nor can she show them, or put them through, emotions or experiences that have never existed. She cannot make the sad laugh heartily, nor turn despots merciful. The great power exhibited by her Arts is a resonance between music and a person's awakened ego. Virtuosa herself has long been aware of this: she has not once attempted to invert another's nature through her music. Not for helplessness, but for wisdom.

After highly protracted discussion, Rhodes Island has ultimately made the decision to admit Virtuosa in operator capacity. Though her movements are not to be strictly circumscribed, we have been pressured to request that the associated operator—i.e. Executor—follow her during her time aboard, 'so as to keep her safe.' In any case, no matter how you slice it, Virtuosa now has some amount of freedom.
It is unavoidable, however, that her arrival has perturbed Rhodes Island's collective nerves. Rumors have circulated of her exploits prior to boarding, and on the same token, various departments have separately hammered home what to watch for when interacting with her. From the perspective of our operators, this only further proves the magnitude of her power. If her cello could incite such disturbances in Sargon, Columbia, and even the heart of Leithanien, it is difficult to imagine the effect it could have on Rhodes Island.
Even so, not once has a performance of it been indulged aboard the landship. This restriction comes not just from Rhodes Island, or even the ever-present, ever-close, gun-toting Executor; the will of the cellist herself is the greatest hindrance. The fastener binding the cello's strings has not been loosened here in a very long time. She has, on record, invited other operators to pluck its strings, but never do they vibrate, instead remaining steadfastly silent.
'It doesn't matter if a piece is a masterpiece or not, and while the respect a performer has for it does, it's the piece itself that has the final say. Rhodes Island's movement is enough of a masterpiece already, and it'd be far too discourteous of me to keep ruining it with a tuneless din.'

[Classified Log]
Illusions can often arouse complex moods in people, but one aspect is consistent—loneliness. Virtuosa's, however, differs. I can sense how she, hand in hand with her audience, faithfully walks each brief journey of the heartstrings to its end. She avails of the listener's ear so as to listen together, and so too of the listener's eye, so as to weep together. Her listeners are never alone. Virtuosa is, in a sense, undeniably sincere.

[Virtuosa's private scorebook. Opening it reveals no staves within, nor a single note, but taken down in meticulous penmanship are each composition's name, instruments, and performance length, along with... an explanation of the work, or some descriptive equivalent—is this how Virtuosa memorizes these pieces?]

'Somnia Caelorum (Himmelsträume)' (1086)
Instruments: Harmonica
It seems that since ancient times, people have dreamt of flying into the sky. And the dream stays alive even in old age, with just a crane of the head to look to the blue. A soaring harmonica should be able to give them a helping hand.

Menuett 'The King He Came A-Dancing (Der tanzende Regent)' (1091)
Instruments: Empty beer bottle (Flyfin Lager for wide register, Mama John's for crystal timbre. Also, you can add red wine directly to the garbage dump)
I've never tried performing with something as unique as an empty bottle before. Who knew their scales could be so interesting? Much thanks to the drunk the other day for explaining. How rich in talent law schools are! Looks like I'll want to keep trying my luck on their lawn every so often.

'Foehns (Föhne)' (1093)
Instruments: Cello, works better on desert drums
Sargon's people are too zesty! Hearts more aglitter than summer, more fiery than the sun... They deserve better lives—they deserve a more passionate song.
The foehns lift the sands, and together the sands blot out the sun that broils them.

Nocturne 'Paradisus (Paradies)' (1099)
Instruments: Cello
This land bears too many exiles, too heavy a sorrow. I beg you, don't tell the flowers about them; I beg you, don't deceive the flowers with them.
May this flower's soul arrive at Paradise; dolor floris demum in pace requiescat.

Messe 'König' (1100)
Instruments: Cello
This piece wasn't written for any one sovereign. I'd like to think it was written for all of them.
Remember forever the afterglow of Zwillingstürme. A sovereign one meets again. A sovereign one becomes.

[Diagnostic report from Psychology & Empathy, Pagus Stevonus Central Hospital]
Firstly, let me thank Rhodes Island for allowing us onboard to carry out a psychological examination of our troublemaker. Certainly, Arturia has ignited our interest in cases—though I personally despise any terminology that suggests the phenomenon is an illness—of errari, or in your vernacular, the 'astray.' We owe this secondarily to her nomadic lifestyle and primarily to her being, to a degree, 'banished' in the eyes of the Holy City. Rationally speaking, per our prior understanding of the astray, we would expect Arturia's empathic ability at this point to be quite diminished since her time in the Holy City. However, we made a quantitative comparison of her empathic ability between the two periods and found that it had not only refused to weaken, but had reached an all-new state through her Arts—needless to say, you may trust that we've experienced firsthand the might of her one-of-a-kind 'empathy.' Yet just how did her empathy become so developed amidst such a long-term errari lifestyle? I believe we can find our answer in her prolonged experience roaming across Terra.
Of course, calling it 'empathy' is a matter of my own personal taste, a concept I can trust my fellow Laterans to comprehend, but whether through the lens of mode of operation, principle of action, or resultant effect, Arturia's Arts are absolutely and thoroughly distinct from true empathy. We are currently held back by issues of facilities and permissions; come the time for her to properly return to the Holy City, we under the auspices of the Sixth Tribunal will invite even more doctors of psychiatry—even the idiots from the Seventh Tribunal's 66th—to administer an even more comprehensive exam.
I have the faint feeling that Arturia is capable of doing more for our law and order than simply damaging it. Likewise, the sin she committed and the reproach she receives may not be bearable by her alone. When the time comes, I bid the law determine.

You tread into a nightmare.
In it your throat is voiceless; you cannot make out anyone's face.
But you hear a sound you know. Warm, bright, like a lullaby from long ago.
'Arturia, Arturia? Are you any better?
'Are you still feeling bad? Can you tell Mamma any more about your bad dream last night?
'It's okay, Arturia.
'You don't need to worry about losing your voice. You don't need to worry about not seeing others' faces.
'Come here. Come to Mamma.
'Look, it's a cello. Mamma will teach you.'

Bow meets string, and plays the silent falling of rain. You know it's rain, because raindrops land on your face.
It hurts. It burns. You search for that lullaby. Where is she?
You are jostled about. Everyone is wearing veils, and they are so far away, but a hand clutches your arm tight.
'Arturia Giallo, don't feel sad.
'Your father doesn't blame you, he just can't find it in him to accept it yet.
'He wants for you to wear these gloves. Your mother left them to you.
'If you can't keep your music in check, then you just need someone else to keep you in check. These gloves are where we'll start.
'This isn't a punishment, Arturia. This is to protect others, to protect those by your side, to protect the ones close to you.
'No hurting them anymore, Arturia.'

The figures melt into the inky rain. Its every burning drop converges into a single inky sun.
It looms over your head. Its black light renders you blind.
'You were too late, Arturia.
'You never got to meet your tutor for the last time. You never got to give him a proper goodbye.
'You long foresaw his death, didn't you?
'By the time you learned he used to perform beneath that Spire, his death was set in stone.
'A shame. Once pitted against fate, even Emmanuel leaves us so.
'You? What can you possibly do in all of this?
'Arturia, there is nothing you can do.'

The inky sun sets. It hangs its head in duty, and plunges into the human ocean.
The babbling ocean eventually coalesces into a lone tear, streaks down your face, and falls into your heart.
You hear the voice.
'It's okay, Arturia.'
It is here the music stops.

'Excuse me, I didn't notice you were here. That was a newer piece I only practice when I'm on my own. I must've made an embarrassment of myself; I'm still not too fluent.
'Actually, it's not even finished yet; I only got the inspiration to write it recently. It's a very... fresh method of composition for me, and it does prove challenging. No piece in the lands has ever been composed like this before.
'Which is why I can even promise that its every passage is rooted in sincerity. It is the melody of me.
'Still, I knew what I'd title it long ago.
'I call it 'Virtuosa'.'

The distant sky yawns with cumulus Catastrophe clouds. Into the storm sinks the sun, casting its inauspicious afterglow across Rhodes Island's deck. Like parched blood. Scorched earth.
You turn to go, back into the ship. The course ahead won't be smooth.
Finally you notice you're not alone on the deck, not at all. You have a visitor, just a single one. You don't know when she got here, nor do you know how long she's stood behind you, there on the spot. Only now have you seen her, the black-haired Sankta.
You walk for the ship's interior. You see inauspicious light reaching to creep across her face. Her expression is as placid as ever. You've heard tell that she has no emotion.
But you see her, and it's as if she's smiling. You recall that same smile of hers, that day beneath the spotlight.
You see the bow in her right hand, placed to the strings fingered beneath her left. You recall the reason she came aboard.
Bow caresses string. The first note lingers in your mind. She's forbidden from performing, especially to you. You're not at all prepared for this. It's too late.
But the music abruptly stops. It ends. The Sankta doesn't continue. You find you've already walked up to face her.
'Doctor, I'm not going to perform you. Not aboard Rhodes Island, at least.'
The Sankta lifts her bow away. Upon its wooden tip, there rests a pallid, sparkling cloud, like newborn ice, a flower bloomed from nowhere.
'But performing this cloud should be fine, at least, shouldn't it?'
Clad in jet black gloves, the Sankta offers it forth.
You take the white cloud into your hands, turn your head to see behind you, and the sun has set. The Catastrophe clouds have woven a blackout canopy.
'May this new journey be plain sailing.'
Her piece said, the cloud flickers and scatters into the night.