[color=#f4cccc][indent][indent][table][row][cell][img]https://i.imgur.com/i594rsQ.jpg[/img][/cell][cell][sub][h2][color=#ff9dad]🍒 V I S C E R A[/color][/h2][/sub][/cell][/row][/table][/indent][/indent][indent][indent][indent][right][sub][color=#ff9dad]⬛[/color][/sub]  [b]mitsu, co. — warehouse B[/b]
[sub][color=#ff9dad]⬜[/color][/sub] [b]kawamura[/b][/right]
Heels and hands against rusted rungs. The [color=#ff9dad][i]ppmf, ppmf[/i][/color] of a distant bass line -- otherwise, silence. Two bunny ears pop into frame. With an indignant twitch — “[b]There’s really nothing here.[/b]”

Karen sleights the pick from cuff to keyhole, cracking into the [color=#ff9dad]modular office at the height of the stairs[/color]. She tries the dead switch before settling for her eyesight. As enhanced as the mighty superheroine [i]Cherry Bonne-Bonne’s[/i] senses are — faster than a speeding bullet, stronger than an ox, etc. — she can just make out the silhouettes of vague and complicated machinery, the sleep-talking of a desktop computer, a manager nameplate, the acridness of hand sanitizer, of printer ink, and of that telltale office smell. 

“[b]D’you think you can [i]smell[/i] evil?[/b]”

Blink is sprawled casually across a printer, a black wisp against blackness.  

[i]How did you get in here?[/i] Karen wants to ask; remembering their deal, she wears the accusation on her face. [b]“So this was a waste of time.”[/b]

“[b]Nuh-uh![/b]” Back arched, “[b]Just ‘cause there aren’t any Vices in here, doesn’t mean they aren’t anywhere.[/b]” Bounding to the desk, “[b]This place is too new, anyway. They just cleared it out.[/b] 

"[b]Pi-ink! I [i]hate[/i] doing the ‘cryptic’ thing! Start taking this seriously![/b]”

She is scowling still — “[b]What do you mean ‘take it seriously?[/b]’” — but, as she’s custom to, it is an halfhearted effort. It is with detachment, adding glaze to the [color=#ff9dad]smoky-blue of her eyes[/color]. Adding a sway to her stance. Adding distraction, fiddling with [color=#ff9dad]the white tie of her [i]henshin.[/i][/color] Karen says, “[b]I want to do this, believe me. It’s just hard to get motivated[/b]—”

( [i]“[b]Mmm[/b]— [b]always is.[/b]”[/i] )

“—[b]we’ve been searching long enough already[/b]; [b]there hasn’t been a sign[/b]—”

“[b]Maybe you’re looking for the wrong sign! Like[/b], [b]it’s hard to see darkness[/b], [b]but what penetrates darkness?[/b]

[i]“[b]I’ve said too much[/b].”[/i] Blink’s cloud of a tail curls over his feet, that smug, straightened-up mentor facade. 

“[b]Anyway[/b], [b]you kinda got your bunny butt handed to you the first time[/b]. [b]This is as much a breather as you can afford[/b], [b]really[/b]. [b]Make it a learning experience[/b].”

The carbuncle paddles the air, mid-stretch, as Karen eyes his silhouette, stands far from relaxed in the peaceful abandonment of the warehouse. The only accompaniment she has is in the building strings of that non-effacing backing music, thrumming in the back of her mind, active now and for every transformation hereafter. “[b]I’m not getting any better sitting around[/b],” she musters, her attention elsewhere. The strings are building, building. 

What’s close?

The office has [color=#ff9dad]one window,[/color] built into a shared wall with the complex. Peering from the second story, Karen can survey the neighboring buildings and alleyways from a safe distance. The brick building to her left is one of busted-through windows with a roof of cracked glass, something dark and clouding and occasionally surging with ephemeral light [color=#ff9dad]like storm clouds bearing lightning[/color]. 

“[b]Bingo[/b],” comes Blink’s smug voice from beside her. Next, “[b]Hrrk[/b]—!” Karen drives her hands into the carbuncle’s scruff, lifts him up, shakes him like a glow stick. He is suddenly raving, rippling, writhing with bio-luminescence, a show of cyans and neon-greens, so bright the Virtue must shield her eyes before she can summon a mirror angled outside between the two buildings. It catches Blink’s light. 

[color=#ff9dad]A rippling beam cuts through Warehouse A.[/color] Vices caught underneath begin to smoke and snarl. 

On whom the spotlight lands: [color=#ff9dad]a head of fire cast emerald green[/color]. The girl bears a katana wreathed in smoulder. She is lashing out at a circle of obscured, clawed hands. Blasts of light, unaffiliated, mean she’s not alone regarding allies. Yet, regarding enemies, she is very much outnumbered; the storm cloud dances on. 

Karen is stricken — the girl looks young; she’s in a [i]uniform[/i] — and starts panicking. [i]“[b]What do I do[/b], [b]what do I do[/b]?”[/i] 

“[b]Nngh[/b]—[b]![/b] [b]Put me down…?[/b]”

She almost shakes him again, but who would she be to turn down the bloom on a dying tree that was a Keeper’s help? With Blink back on the desktop — “[b]You [i]better [/i] keep that up[/b],” — Karen reaches out to the girl with the sword. Should she apologize? Or is she doing her a favor? Nevertheless, the spell is targeted. It is slow and it is exacting, heavy with their many feet apart, heavy as the inevitable, impending migraine. But nonetheless, even as the seconds stretch and she fears that she’ll lose sight of the girl-on-fire, Karen never questions this stubborn exigency to prove herself. 

The distant chorus breaks and — [i][color=#ff9dad]snap[/color][/i] —[hr][center][sup][h3][i][b][color=#575757]K  A  R  E  N    U  E  T  S  U  K  I[/color][/b][/i][/h3][/sup][/center][/indent][/indent][/indent][/color]