Upheaval: Day 15

Word Count: 90,035

Summary of Events:

Leon looked up Lavrinti Soshnikov on YouTube; he found little when he searched in English, but an epic 30-minute video of highlights when he searched in Cyrillic, including footage of Soshnikov dancing Petrushka. Leon found out that the girl he'd defeated last night had fled the theatre and thrown herself in front of a train, thankfully she wasn't dead, but Leon still felt terrible. At the competition Leon got the distinct impression the girl he was paired with was a sore loser, which he doubted would cause things to end well, especially when he saw her friend — an equally sore loser — react to her elimination, which he compared to his own opinions . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

Leon wanted to be able to do his best, certainly, even if his best wasn't perfect, or even if his best wasn't good enough for Mama. So long as he did his best he didn't really care what the end result was.

Winning would be fantastic, there was no doubt about that, but if his best didn't allow him to win, then he would be okay with that and would look out for another opportunity to try again if he could.

Either that, or Leon would look for a different way into the Bolshoi — not that he couldn't dance elsewhere; but to dance with the company that бабушка had danced with would be incredible, it would be amazing, it would admittedly be a little frightening, but in a good sort of way.

Rhoenne's opponent fell and Leon groaned with the crowd. She had done well, but Rhoenne had succeeded in completing her first dance, just as Leon, thus her opponent was eliminated without Rhoenne having to dance a second time.

The crowd applauded her and she seemed very gracious in her acceptance of her defeat, much like Nevaeh's opponent.

"You go on stage now," Leon heard a man say.

"But Rhoenne needs to dance," Kylee hissed.

"She completed her dance, the other girl is eliminated, she does not need to dance again until the next round," the man — an attendant, likely — said. "You now dance."

"No I not now dance," Kylee retorted.

"If you won't dance then you will be eliminated," the man replied menacingly.

"You can't eliminate me," Kylee snapped. "That's unfair."

"Kylee Kinley has thirty seconds to make her appearance at centre stage or she will be eliminated," Mr. Chekov said, almost as if he could hear their argument.

"This isn't right," Kylee hissed before storming out to centre stage just as Mr. Chekov announced that she had twenty seconds.

After a few moments the lights went up and Kylee started dancing. Leon could tell in her movements that she was angry and unimpressed, as she practically threw herself around like a puppet being manipulated by a terrible puppeteer.

It didn't take long before she ended up falling.

"Please congratulate Kylee Kinley for her valiant efforts in this competition," Mr. Chekov said.

Kylee stalked over to where Mr. Chekov stood in the wings. "What does that mean?"

"It means you are eliminated," Mr. Chekov replied away from the microphone.

"How dare you!" Kylee screamed. "How dare you eliminate me from this competition! This competition is rigged! You've rigged it! You've rigged it against the best! All you want is some scummy dancers who can't even dress themselves!"

"That is enough Miss Kinley," Mr. Chekov said.

"Enough," Kylee spat, then swore. "You will suffer for this!"

She made an obscene gesture and then stalked off the stage. Leon was glad that there was only one night left in the competition, and that — from what he could tell — all the sore losers had been eliminated.

Pronunciation:

Nevaeh: nehvayah