Luna didn't wait for Velora's permission.
The moment the curtain rose and revealed Jasper was gone, she ran.Down the side stairs.Past the dressing rooms, deeper into the bowels of the theatre.
Nova called after her, but the voices faded fast.
Below the stage, it was another world not storage,not tech Just… black.A hallway of red velvet curtains that moved on their own.
Mirrors that didn't reflect her face, and a faint pulsing heartbeat, like the theatre itself was alive.
Luna followed it.
Past faded costumes hanging like skin.
Past forgotten scripts written in ash.
Down to the trap room.
The place under the stage where sets were once lowered, where secrets were buried.
Where ghosts whispered in rhyme.
The trap room was lit by a single bulb swaying from a wire.
And in the center, tied to a broken director's chair,
Was Jasper.
Eyes closed.
Gloves on his hands.
She rushed to him.
"Jasper, it's me. I'm getting you out."
He didn't open his eyes.
He sang instead.
Soft. Mechanical.
A tune from the show's first act:
🎶 Love me, lead me, break me wide
Curtain falls when I have lied… 🎶
"Stop it," Luna begged.
He opened his eyes.
But they weren't his.
They were golden.
Like Velora's.
"I'm sorry," he whispered and lunged.
The gloves he wore weren't fabric,they were living things.
Tendrils of velvet that struck at her throat.
She dodged, fell back and hit the mirror behind her, Her reflection didn't copy her.
It watched her.
Then it whispered:
"The playwright cannot save the script. She must bleed into it."
She stood slowly and remembered her blood had rewritten a scene.
The gloves struck again.
Luna reached into her coat, pulled out the pen she kept tucked behind her ear and stabbed the palm of her hand,the blood hit the mirror
The glass shattered inward.
And Jasper collapsed
The gloves unwrapped,sank into the floor like shadows.
He gasped awake.
Luna? What did I
She pulled him to his feet.
Held his face in her shaking hands.
"You betrayed me."
"I know."
"You almost killed me."
He nodded.
"And I still love you," she said quietly.
Because love didn't need to make sense in this place,It just had to survive.
Behind them, the mirror shards floated into the air.Forming words.
A stage direction:
"Final Scene Approaches. Only one may leave."