Prologue

The sound of seagulls cawing as the tide rolls relentlessly in. The sun rises to reveal the boardwalk at Coney Island, in winter.

Against a dull grey sky are abandoned frames of Coney's famous attractions: a skeletal roller coaster...a frost-covered Ferris wheel...a decrepit steeplechase track. They rise behind a weathered wooden fence pasted with old and tattered show posters, advertising the now-forgotten performers who once delighted millions.

A brown-haired woman enters, wrapped in a ragged coat. She is not old, but has clearly been ill-used by time. She stops to gaze at the posters.

Woman: "Phantasma. City of Wonders...Mr. A Presents...Marvels, astonishments...human prodigies. The Ooh La La Girl, five performances daily...Doremi Harukaze, the soprano of the century." Gone. All gone...

As she trails off, a voice addresses her.

Voice: Yes...there's nothing left. Nothing but ghosts. But I knew you'd come back...Madame Minori Asuka.

As the voice speaks, its source unfolds itself from the seaside debris: another woman named Onpu, ageless and odd, with purple hair, a pale face, sunken eyes, and a bizarre manner.

Minori: You...still here.

Onpu: Of course we're still here. The freaks, the monstrous, the bizarre...Where else could we exist but here? And after the tragedy...after the master disappeared with the child...after the fire that consumed everything...

Minori: His dream. Our dream...

Onpu: Remember how it was? Remember?
(crooning, half-mad)
Coney Isle...
Glistening and glimmering!
Rising Bright,
Drenched with light...

As she sings, ghostly fireworks explode overhead.

Onpu:
See it smile,
Beckoning and shimmering!
All agleam...
Like a dream...!

Onpu & Minori:
Every fantasy set free!
Sodom rising by the sea!

The dilapidated seaside world begins to transform before their eyes, bursting into Light and color.

Minori:
Coney Isle!
Miracle on miracle!
Speed and sound
All around.
Mile by mile,
Loud and lewd and lyrical.
Thrill on thrill,
Never still.
All America was there,
Beggar next to Billionaire!

In they came,
Chasing sensation and Romance...
Eyes aflame,
Desperate for pleasures yet unknown.
Night and day,
Pouring in by the hundreds of thousands!
Swept away,
As their ev'ry desire was made real!

The sound of the sea remains for a few moments, then the Coney Island Waltz slowly starts up.

A vision of the past manifests itself - Coney Island in its heyday. At the height of the reverie:

Onpu:
That's the place that you ruined, you fool!

Minori: (Shocked out of her reverie) Wh..what? What do you mean?

Onpu:
That's the world you destroyed with your greed!

Minori: It wasn't my fault! I couldn't have known...!

Onpu:
Don't you remember what happened back then,
When we...even we...dared to walk among men!
(whispered, softly, gently)
When even a phantom could dream his dark dreams
Once again...

Suddenly, ragtime music sweeps up, obliterating the two women from the future..