[[ Takes place during Pandora's Box ]]

She did not remember falling to the floor. She did not remember her hair coming undone and falling in her eyes. Had it always been so long, she wondered, fingering the strands for a moment. One moment she'd stood terrified of the floating oil, the next it impaled her upon itself. There was pain, there was chaos and there was madness. Then there was nothing. She floated in the black quagmire for an immeasurable time, listless and lost. She rested on the surface in neither motion nor stasis, content.

The world began to solidify around her, taking shape of the warehouse again. Where she expected a wraith and several dozen people she found only one. He leaned against a pillar, a sly smirk on his face. It wasn't anyone she knew, but something about him drew her to him.

"Oi poppet, whacha doin' so far from home?" he asked, knowing full well what brought her here. He did, with his promises of power, of fame, of fortune. Of something outside the known world. He grinned, white teeth bright in the dark of the warehouse.

"Aww, came to see you!" She replied, voice too high, too excited to be her own. She fingered her hair again, caught in the mesmerizing strains of iridescent color. She was going to tell him her secret, yes she was! Her little secret would be out in the open and then-- and then! She could take him away and show him wonders beyond compare. They'd be together, forever, in her wonder~

"Did you now? What brings you to me, out here all alone?" He looked at her, down at her really, with a glint in his eyes. She balked, warning raising in her mind, but her body would not react. He was too predatory, too dangerous, too chaos, couldn't she see, couldn't she --- He stalked around her, moved from his pillar, and they moved until she was backed up against the pillar. He stood over her and Velma could see it now, he knew he knew, oh Metallia he knew.

"Came to show you something!" She giggled, hiding behind a hand bearing a ring, trying to be coy. He leaned over her, ghosting his hand against her cheek.

"Show me what, poppet?" His fingers lingered against her collarbone.

"My pandora's box," she whispered up at him, nothing but joy and excitement in her chest. The design of the ring flashed, though Velma couldn't tell what is was, and suddenly there was fear as overwhelming chaos rolled over her. His fingers gripped tight around her throat and he smiled, oh how he smiled.

"Oh but poppet I know. Little page, so naïve, so gullible. Did you really think I wanted you?" He breathed against her cheek, a second hand (of course a second hand, people had two hands Velma) brushing against the bare(!) skin of her collarbone again. "You did… oh poppet…"

His hand slid into her chest and she felt fingers wrap around her very soul. He seemed to contemplate his options, pouring just a hint of Chaos into the crystal. She screamed.

"Oh tsk tsk poppet… now that won't do… Pity… would have loved to have given you to my General… but I suppose if you're going to be like this…." The fingers tightened around her soul and she screamed again.

"A starseed is just as good." His hand tore from her chest, taking the starseed with it.

And Leifite plunged into the quagmire, mouth open in a scream.

---

Giggle.

She came to slowly, almost naturally, if you could call an action taken in a place of madness natural. Leifite rubbed her eyes and sat up. She was no longer in the warehouse. A hand fluttered to her chest, though she didn't know if she could reach into her own flesh to check for her own starseed. Someone had to have done it, and she felt the tips of her fingers brush through her bodice and the flesh beneath with little difficulty. Curiously, she slipped her hand in farther and farther. Her fingers tapped against her starseed, her quite real starseed, jolting her with a shock of pain.

Giggle!

Leifite jumped, jerking her hand (but not her soul) out of her chest and finally took in the environment around her. A room covered in mirrors with no exit or entrance. Was she… in the wraith? That seemed like a stupid concept, but then again she was magical and could put her hand in her own chest, and theoretically the chests of others, so really, anything was possible. She was alive, she was whole, and she wasn't being consumed by oil. All in all, a win win, even if she was trapped in a box of mirors.

Oh come on, how are you this blind? A voice preceeded the body by half a second. Her vision filled with a small white haired girl holding a box. A box the girl threatened to open. The box that should not be opened.

You'd think that after showing you that, you'd at least be alert! The small girl bashed her in the face with the box. She felt warm liquid run down her face.

"B-be careful with that!" she said, trying to clamp her hands on the box. The girl vanished, reappearing some feet away from her, hand on the lid.

Oh, paying attention now are you? Her head tilted to the side. Leifite trained her eyes on box.

"Don't open it!" Orange eyes grew wider half a step.

Oh? You don't want me to open… this? But it will be so much more fun when its all in the open! Don't you agree…. Poppet? Slim fingers lifted the lid, oil bubbling out of it. It came from the box like dry ice, frothing down the sides and dripping against the floor. It snaked its way toward Leifite, who flattened herself against the wall trying to get away from it.

From the fog.

From her pandora's box.

It washed over her and then it was all out there, it was all real it was real it was ---

She gossiped because she didn't matter to anyone. The only way she could matter was if she knew something no one else knew, and if she was the one who told it. No one at home gave a crap about her; Velma got talked over and smothered out of conversations. But in groups of people she took the stage and people paid attention to her. They gave her time and space. They acknowledged her presence.

She pulled her hands from her face, confused when she'd covered it, and stared down at her palms.

Her blood was… black?

Her blood was black.

Giggle.

---

The world flickered back into existence, the real world, and she found herself giggling. It was slow at first, and she wasn't quite sure she was the one giggling. So many people were laughing or growling or utterly consumed by their madness.

But no one's blood was black.

She found this one concept infinitely hilarious. There was no rime, no reason, yet seeing the black pool from her palm and fall to the ground filled her with amusement. She wondered why no one else's blood was black. No one else seemed to be bleeding. Why was no one else bleeding? They should be bleeding, they should run the city black with blood! Forget oil, forget fog, blood was the way to go!

The laughter grew until it was all she could to do to contain it. She pressed her hands to her face, and her cheeks burned and burned. The laughter attracted more oil and more fog and Leifite opened her mouth to it. She needed more, she needed more of it! She had to have it! If she had more, she reasoned, then she could stop laughing. Just a little bit more….

She shoveled oil into her mouth and consumed it, burning tracks of chaos down her cheeks and her throat. Her lips cracked, spilling blood over them and she felt a surge of something primal and dark surge through her mind at the taste of it. The madness within her swelled and filled her to the brim, until no space for light or sanity remained.

A grin slowly, ever so slowly, spread her face and showed bright white teeth against the blackened flesh of her face and mouth.

Leifite laughed, face split too wide and too wild, her heart beating like a hummingbird in her chest. Everyone was an enemy, but everyone was also a play thing and a toy. A desire gripped her, pushing her to her feet, and sending her sprinting away as the wraith exploded in its death. This desire sank into her belly and festered there, and she could not sate it herself.

She had to know.

She had to know if everyone bled black.

If they didn't bleed black, she would make them bleed black.

She would rend and tear and consume and destroy until their blood ran black.

Cackle

[[ WC: 1510 ]]