On the way out of El's language lab first thing Monday the 26th of October, a cluster of freshman girls, indies from somewhere Eastern European and grouped up in the way one does when not having friends will kill you but this situation has a chilling effect on attempts at friendmaking, are first out the door.

Having friends doesn't save them; something desaturated purple foams up through the floor under their feet when they step in the wrong place, like the floor isn't there, like their feet aren't even there, except their feet don't return the courtesy. All four girls trip, screaming, whether out of horror or because at least one of them has certainly twisted her ankle or because their pant cuffs are smoking and the soles of their shoes are melting. One snaps a wishbone on her necklace and rockets free, bleeding and bumping her head pretty badly on the lab doors on the way out; she doesn't look like she's going to be able to walk but she might make it crawling to her room if she's determined. One tries a spell in Polish. It sparks and fizzes and doesn't affect the purple fizz at all. Her eyes promptly roll back in her head as it latches on to the expenditure of mana and eats what's left. The third girl cuts her shoes off, swearing, and leaves behind four toes, but the purple doesn't chase her once she's free. The fourth girl tries the same thing but takes too long or isn't as willing to pull free of a dissolving digit and the purple kills her.

Once it has finished its meals it separates into some several dozen smaller blobs and they scatter. Some up, some down, some just skittering along the floor like excitable bath bombs leaving a trail of violet mist behind them. Everybody yelps. Some people try things to kill them, most don't work, but they're mostly pretty easy to dodge when you can see them, it's just they disappear into the booth walls or underfoot.

A senior who is apparently in a hurry is the first out, jumping over the bodies and the puddle of indigo slime left behind, and then once that proves to let him out of the lab everyone else stampedes to follow. Nobody wants to be here when something more directly carnivorous finds the bodies.

(Wishbone girl and missing-toes girl can't get through the stampede well enough to loot their friends first, but by the time El gets there the bodies are shirtless and bagless and also someone's taken one of their eyeballs. Figures. El jumps over with the stragglers who got pushed to the back.)

On the way out of El's language lab first thing Monday the 26th of October, a cluster of freshman girls, indies from somewhere Eastern European and grouped up in the way one does when not having friends will kill you but this situation has a chilling effect on attempts at friendmaking, are first out the door.

Having friends doesn't save them; something desaturated purple foams up through the floor under their feet when they step in the wrong place, like the floor isn't there, like their feet aren't even there, except their feet don't return the courtesy. All four girls trip, screaming, whether out of horror or because at least one of them has certainly twisted her ankle or because their pant cuffs are smoking and the soles of their shoes are melting. One snaps a wishbone on her necklace and rockets free, bleeding and bumping her head pretty badly on the lab doors on the way out; she doesn't look like she's going to be able to walk but she might make it crawling to her room if she's determined. One tries a spell in Polish. It sparks and fizzes and doesn't affect the purple foam at all. Her eyes promptly roll back in her head as it latches on to the expenditure of mana and eats what's left. The third girl cuts her shoes off, swearing, and leaves behind four toes, but the purple doesn't chase her once she's free. The fourth girl tries the same thing but takes too long or isn't as willing to pull free of a dissolving digit and the purple kills her.

Once it has finished its meals it separates into some several dozen smaller blobs and they scatter. Some up, some down, some just skittering along the floor like excitable bath bombs leaving a trail of violet mist behind them. Everybody yelps. Some people try things to kill them, most don't work, but they're mostly pretty easy to dodge when you can see them, it's just they disappear into the booth walls or underfoot.

A senior who is apparently in a hurry is the first out, jumping over the bodies and the puddle of indigo slime left behind, and then once that proves to let him out of the lab everyone else stampedes to follow. Nobody wants to be here when something more directly carnivorous finds the bodies.

(Wishbone girl and missing-toes girl can't get through the stampede well enough to loot their friends first, but by the time El gets there the bodies are shirtless and bagless and also someone's taken one of their eyeballs. Figures. El jumps over with the stragglers who got pushed to the back.)

On the way out of El's language lab first thing Monday the 26th of October, a cluster of freshman girls, indies from somewhere Eastern European and grouped up in the way one does when not having friends will kill you but this situation has a chilling effect on attempts at friendmaking, are first out the door.

Having friends doesn't save them; something desaturated purple foams up through the floor under their feet when they step in the wrong place, like the floor isn't there, like their feet aren't even there, except their feet don't return the courtesy. All four girls trip, screaming, whether out of horror or because at least one of them has certainly twisted her ankle or because their pant cuffs are smoking and the soles of their shoes are melting. One snaps a wishbone on her necklace and rockets free, bleeding and bumping her head pretty badly on the lab doors on the way out; she doesn't look like she's going to be able to walk but she might make it crawling to her room if she's determined. One tries a spell in Polish. It sparks and fizzes and doesn't affect the purple foam at all. Her eyes promptly roll back in her head as it latches on to the expenditure of mana and eats what's left. The third girl cuts her shoes off, swearing, and leaves behind four toes, but the purple doesn't chase her once she's free. The fourth girl tries the same thing but takes too long or isn't as willing to pull free of a dissolving digit and the purple kills her.

Once it has finished its meals it separates into some several dozen smaller blobs and they scatter. Some up, some down, some just skittering along the floor like excitable bath bombs leaving a trail of violet mist behind them. Everybody yelps. Some people try things to kill them, most don't work, but they're mostly pretty easy to dodge when you can see them, it's just they disappear into the booth walls or underfoot.

A senior who is apparently in a hurry is the first out, jumping over the bodies and the puddle of indigo slime left behind, and then once that proves to let him out of the lab everyone else stampedes to follow. Nobody wants to be here when something more directly carnivorous finds the bodies.

(Wishbone girl and missing-toes girl can't get through the stampede well enough to loot their friends first, but by the time El gets there the bodies are shirtless and bagless and also someone's taken one of their eyeballs. Figures. El jumps over with the stragglers who got pushed to the back.)