"RAN-KO! RAN-KO! RAN-KO! RAN-KO!"
The wall of flame went out to reveal Ranko standing at center stage without her four backup dancers, still in her red leather jacket and pants.
"Yeah! How we doin', Seoul?!" She paused for a moment to let the cheering and applause die down. "You sure know how to make a girl feel welcome! Man, it's good to be back in Korea! Last time for me was, hell, I was maybe six? Seven? About the only thing I remember from that trip was the tteokbokki. For serious, you guys can really cook around here! Anyway, is everybody having fun tonight?!"
The audience roared in response.
"Yeah, me too! I'm so excited to be hanging out with you guys here on the Wildfire Tour. Can you believe it's already been a year since we released Wild Orchid? Crazy, right? Don't worry, the band and I are working hard on the next album, and it's almost done. We'll give ya a little sneak preview of a few of the songs tonight, if you're really good!"
Ariel reached for his control board. "Catwalk going out." With a flick of a switch, a pair of electric winches high above the stage began reeling in the steel cables supporting the raised platform. They continued until the platform was suspended above the top edge of the video screen, out of view of the audience.
"We're all set, Ran-chan,"came Hitomi's voice in Ranko's wireless earpiece, indicating her backup dancers were all finished with their costume change after Demon in Your Radio and were ready for the next song when she was. Had the tinny little earpiece not been directly wedged against her ear, Ranko doubted she'd have heard her friend over the excited cacophony coming from the audience.
"We love you, Ranko!" The lone voice from somewhere in the front third of the floor seating carried on the breeze as the main mass of cheering died down, and Ranko blushed as she heard it, pointing her hand in the general direction from which the sound had come.
"Yeah? Well, I love you more! Well, most of ya, anyway. There's always a few, thinkin' they're gonna get just a little too close." Ranko pinched two of her fingers together over her shoulder for emphasis. "And, like, it's cute and all, but it never ends well for 'em…" As she spoke, she tapped her thumb and index finger together twice on her right hand at her side. Jacob's synthesizer began a sultry slither down the scales, her hand gesture having been the cue for the band to begin.
The crowd, who perhaps from the setup had been expecting Not Yours, Don't Touch and instead was encountering a beat not found on either of Ranko and the Dapper Dragons' two studio albums, began a curiously excited rumble as a bouncy, almost liquid rhythm began springing from Jacob and Shinji's instruments.
The lithe redhead stomped forward once, driving her heel down hard at center stage. The center emitter mounted to the front of the stage roared to life for a quarter of a second. As the jet of flame blinked out of the air, the emitters to the left and right triggered in its place, and on it went until the wave had reached the outer edges of the stage. The giant video display behind Ranko faded to black, and a new image formed on it - that of a deep maroon satin that was almost an identical match to Ranko's leather outfit. It was wrinkled, made to look like the bedsheets of a boudoir.
"You're! So! Sweet to me! The way you blush each time you speak to me's lettin' me know you dream quite frequently about bein' a nasssssty freak with me!"
As she sang, she stomped forward in a crouch, bouncing on her toes and twisting at the knees with each step as she stooped. Her backside rocked behind her, the whole of her flowing toward the front of the stage. Every step applied torque to her knees, and Ranko was again silently grateful for the black nylon brace concealed under her red leather pants. While her orthopedic specialist had told her some time ago that she was fully healed from the injury to her left knee sustained in the Honshu Mixed-Style Martial Arts tournament nearly a year ago, certain dance moves still hurt a bit to perform at times, especially when it was cold. The extra stability gave Ranko an additional sense of confidence in a joint that she still didn't quite fully trust after having spent several weeks on crutches not ten months prior.
"I can hear it in your breathing, and I see it in your ey-ey-eyes: you're looking for the seething fire where romance goes to di-i-ie! You're churnin' up some feelings and you're turnin' up the he-ee-eat."
She stroked her chin with her fingers, rocking her backside lower and lower, bending her knees until her ass almost touched the stage.
"Hopin' you might get me squealin' 'til we're burnin' up the shee-ee-ets!"
The songstress affected a desperate whimper in her words, and all it took was imagining being back home in Akane's arms in a matter of days. She twisted on the balls of her feet as she raised herself slowly back to a standing position, distributing as much of her weight to her right leg as possible.
"Boy, I'm not sure you're cool enough to stand up to the flame…"
Ranko reached into her leather jacket with her left hand, withdrawing something from the interior breast pocket. She snapped her arm out to the side, extending the two arms of the mirrored sunglasses in her hand. With a darkly satisfied smirk, she slipped the shades over her ears, displaying for all to see the trophy she'd snatched from the face of Takao Tashima along with his reputation and his dignity. My own personal spoils of war, she thought, popping her hip to the side with all the sass she could bring to bear. I'm touring the world, selling out stadiums, and he's… probably living in his mom's attic by now.
"'Cause when boys try with me, it's them who do the walk of shame!"
Two jets of fire belched upward from the far left and right front corners of the stage as Hitomi and Emi rushed out to rejoin Ranko on stage. Emi wore a pair of faded jeans, with several huge gashes in the legs as if she'd lost a fight with a wolverine, and a white babydoll tee shirt featuring the South Korean flag. Hitomi was dressed in a hot pink skater dress and sparkly silver heels. The girls took up flanking positions behind Ranko, and all three raised their fists to shoulder level, quickly throwing them down to their waists as they wiggled jerkily, like a stop-motion animation.
"She's a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad i-de-a! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-oh-oh, oh, oh-whoa-o-oh!" Each time Hitomi and Emi sang the word bad, one leaned forward and the other back as they faced each other, as if they were arguing despite saying the same thing. The choreography repeated for the second line of their chorus.
"Such a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad i-de-a! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-oh-oh, oh, oh-whoa-o-oh!"
"I'm a… bad i-de-a! A hurricane in heels! I wouldn't wanna be ya, 'cause I know just how it feels!" The songstress dragged her fingers tantalizingly slowly down her neck and chest as she sang.
"Whoa-oh-oh," Hitomi punctuated.
"Bad i-de-a! A misty-eyed mistake!" Ranko bit her lip, doing her best impression of the face she made when Akane touched her just right as her hips rolled forward and back with the undulating rhythm of Crash's electric guitar. "Want me to rock your world, but I'll leave ruin in my wake!"
Ranko extended her arms wide, and three jets of flame roared forth from the front edge of the stage. The whole of the stage was bathed in orange light from the twelve canisters mounted to the overhead trusses.
"My body's hot as fire…"
She pulled her arms back, hugging herself across the chest and letting her whole body shiver in her leather outfit as all twelve can lights above her switched from orange to an icy cyan in an instant.
"... but my heart's c-cold as ice…"
Ranko turned to her side, shaking her head with a smirk and a giggle into her headset. She walked from stage right to left, Hitomi and Emi trailing her and wagging their fingers at the crowd.
"I know what head you're thinkin' with." Ranko stopped at about a third of the stage from center, snapping her head back over her shoulder to look at the crowd in front of center stage. She held her left hand over her shoulder, holding up two fingers. Her right palm smacked hard on her backside through her leather pants, and she allowed herself a quiet yelp through her microphone to punctuate her words.
"Best tell it to think twice!"
Ranko stalked the edge of the stage, waving to the roaring crowd. As she did, Hitomi and Emi stood facing each other at center stage. They alternated the words of the backing vocals, Hitomi singing high and Emi low. Each time one of the girls sang, they leaned forward, the other leaning back to vacate the space for her.
"Bad!"
"Bad!"
"Bad!"
"Bad!"
"Bad!"
"Bad!"
"BAD I-DE-A! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-oh-oh, oh, oh-whoa-o-oh!" the two girls sang together as Ranko stalked back to center stage, parting the couple with her hands like a curtain and stepping between them to take her rightful place at the center of the spotlights.
"I can see what's in your heart: the way you're thinkin' that my body is a work of art. But, I don't really wanna tear your whole world apart, and so I'm beggin' you to stop this, before you start!" Ranko threw her right palm forward, locking her elbow as she rocked her backside low to the stage again, bending her knees deeply.
"Yeow!"
While the exclamation wasn't officially part of the lyrics, Ranko found that coming back up from that deep of a knee bend sometimes sent a shot of pain through her recently-injured left knee, and when it did, rather than risk interrupting the song with an involuntary yelp, she'd just opted to work it into the performance itself.
Utaru jogged out from the changing area backstage in a gray pinstriped suit with a bright red tie and a white dress shirt, a bouquet of a dozen roses in his hand. He approached Ranko from her left, and she turned to him, giving him a pitiful shake of her head.
"I'm watchin' your eyes follow up the bottom of my ski-i-irt," Ranko sang despite not currently wearing one, wiggling her backside tantalizingly toward the crowd. "You're only gonna end up hollow, and I promise, it'll hu-u-urt."
Ranko stalked forward, heel over toe, her outstretched arm pushing Utaru backward. Hitomi and Emi trailed close behind, single file, wagging their fingers and rocking their shoulders in time with the beat.
"And I don't really wanna watch you wallow in the pain I know will co-o-ome, so I'd advise you boys to swallow back your pride, pack up, and RU-U-UN!"
She turned her back to Utaru, shaking her head sadly, affecting an expression of almost pity.
"But, I'm not sure you're tough enough to fight against the urge. Far better men than you have fallen victim to my curves!"
While Ranko had long ago lost count of the men who had tried and failed to crack the code and date her - or perhaps just spend a night with her - and wound up hurt, there was only one that she truly did consider to be a good man in spite of it.He was currently playing a cherry-red electric guitar in a black leather jacket and matching jeans four meters to her right. She flashed him a smile as she slowly rocked her body in a circle, as if demonstrating to the crowd exactly the sort of assets that tended to get boys in trouble around her.
"I'm a… bad i-de-a! The sum of all your fears! For me, this ends in ecstasy; for you, it ends in tears!"
Hitomi and Emi turned to face Utaru, each placing a hand on his chest. As the pair rocked their backsides left and right in unison, they gently pushed him backward, away from their lead singer and friend. Again, they reminded him that approaching her was, indeed, a "bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad i-de-a! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-oh-oh, oh, oh-whoa-o-oh!"
"Such a bad idea; a deadly last caress!" Ranko slid her hands down her body, purring quietly into her microphone. "Pure agony incarnate in a sequined microdress!"
Again, a torrent of flame curtained the left and right sides of the stage, far from where the leather-clad starlet rocked her body under a flood of orange light. The reflection of the columns of roaring inferno danced on the mirrored sunglasses shielding her eyes from the view of the crowd.
"My body's hot as fire…"
The lights switched again to a cool blue as the jets of fire quelled.
"... but my heart's c-cold as ice…"
Ranko folded her hands over her heart, her facial expression softening. "I know what head you're thinking with…"
Emi shook her head, patting Utaru consolingly on the shoulder. "Best tell it to think twice."
The redheaded firebrand at center stage turned to face Utaru, her back mostly to the crowd, and addressed him in a rhythmic speaking voice. "I know you think I'm a bitch 'cause I had to reject you. I know it doesn't feel like it;I'm trying toprotect you!"
Jacob's DX-7 synthesizer stepped up a third of an octave into a new key as Ranko whipped back around to face the crowd, resuming the exaggerated stomping with which the song's choreography began.
"I'm a… bad i-de-a! Back off, before you're lost! I know you think I'm perfect, but I'm still not worth the cost!"
"Whoa-o-oh! Whoa-o-oh!" Hitomi and Emi offered as they rejoined Ranko in a return to the first verse's dance moves.
"Such a bad idea, so I'm sparing you your pride, 'cause even while I make you sweat, I'm killing you inside!" As in the previous chorus, every rhyming word was delivered staccato.
The canister lights overhead flashed rapidly, vacillating between the bright orange and the icy blue several times a second as Ranko ended the third iteration of the quasi-chorus. "My body's hot as fire, but my heart's c-cold as ice! I'm doing you a favor! Thank me later, boy! Think twice, 'cause I'm a… bad i-de-a!"
"Whoa-oh-oh," Hitomi punctuated as Ranko rocketed into the final refrain.
"No way this turns out well," Emi added, shaking her head.
The lights overhead bathed the stage in blinding white light, and Hitomi vocalized lightly, evoking a chorus of angels as Ranko folded her hands in front of her chest.
"You'll spend the night in heaven…"
Ranko dropped her left hand to her side, her right forming a clenched fist at shoulder level as the white lights turned blood red and flame belched skyward from three jets on each side of the stage.
"... but you'll wake up trapped in hell!"
With a twist of a knob in the effects booth, Masa doubled the fuel supplied to the jets at the front edges of the stage, the curtains of fire framing the stage growing to a full four meters high as measured from the stage floor. Ranko turned her back to the crowd, rocking her body in a model stomp as she approached Utaru at rear center stage, standing barely a meter in front of Zoe's bass drum.
"Such a bad idea, a demon lover scorned! I tried to save your life, but if I haven't, you were warned! My body's hot as fire…"
The curtains of fire died out again, the lights returning to the cool cyan as unseen fog machines at the side of the stage began to pump a light mist onto the stage floor.
"... but my heart's c-cold as ice."
Hitomi rocked on her heel to face Utaru, who still stood with a dumbfounded expression at center stage, the bouquet of roses dangling limply at his hip as if his entire world view had been shattered by the warning he received.
"Boy break the trance…" Hitomi sang as Emi whirled on Ranko's other side to face him as well.
"... and run like hell…" Emi continued as Zoe pounded their snare drum with their glowing pink plastic drumsticks as quickly as they could manage.
All four instruments cut out at once as Ranko whirled back to the crowd, taking one stomping step forward and issuing the final five words at the top of her lungs. Again, the center jet of flame belched skyward, exploding out to the left and right in rapid waves from the point of impact. An explosion of white strobe lights again spread out from the stage, flaring like a thousand supernovas and disappearing just as quickly.
"... before you CAN'T think twice!"
At once, every light pointed at the stage blinked out, the video screen behind the dancers faded to black, and the audience erupted in the dark.