Marie doodled on her sketch pad, starting to see shapes come from the wandering lines. And those shapes began to form a character. The drawing sat at a long wooden table, bored head propped on her arm. Marie, though, sat in the lunch room, legs up on the table and pad on her legs. She was wholly focused on her drawings. Everything else was just a shadow.

Karen looked back and forth between her friends, who were both describing their exciting time at the party. Which Karen had missed because of her overbearing parents. She sighed and propped her head on her hand. A strand of black hair fell in front of her eyes, and she blew it away, hoping that someday an evil wizard would choose to capture her.

The princess on Marie's pad came further and further into reality. Idle lines turned to wisps of hair falling in front of the character's eyes. Marie cocked her head at the drawing, starting to see something in the princess. Here hands looked a little soft, her head a little plush. Marie smiled as she realized her mystery drawing was a rag doll princess. She began to fill in the toys stitching.

Karen stopped fitzing with her hair. Even though it fell over her left eye, she thought it worked for her. Her right arm started itching, and she reached to scratch it, but for some reason couldn't dig her nails to relive the annoyance. Her friend Rubi became more and more excited, practically jumping out of her seat, the bells on her jester's cap ringing and jingling. Karen started to laugh at her fool.

Marie thought she saw something familiar in her rag princess and her faithful marionette, but couldn't quite place why. She ignored the feeling, though, and pulled out some colored pencils to fill in her creations. Blond yarn hair for the princess, and violet the jester. Her focus feel deeper and deeper into her dolls as she colored in the princess's pink dress. And then the bell began to chime through the school. Marie blinked and looked down at her pad and at the pair of toys on it. She remembered doodling, but when had she done this? But she couldn't worry about it now, instead packing her things and heading to class.

Karen suddenly slumped back in her chair. Rubi, too, collapsed into her seat. Both girls blinked, as if coming awake. Karen's body felt so strange. She shifted her shoulders, moved her arms. It almost felt like she was filling out a new set of clothes. Karen looked over to Rubi, who looked to be doing the same things.

Karen almost shrieked as she looked at her friend. Her skin, her clothes, everything but her hair, was pale white. And her hair, what came out of her bizarre jester's cap, was colored a playful violet. Karen saw sketchy seams run across her motley tunic, and strange shading on her white tights, which Karen was sure her friend had not been wearing minutes ago. And then her attention was pulled away by a small commotion a few tables away.

Marie almost fell over as she stopped and gawked at a pair of figures sitting at a lunch table. They looked like - no, they were - the dolls she had just drawn. Her princess had blonde yarn hair falling over her left eye, mitten hands, and stitching across her body. But they thread didn't look quite real. It was more like someone had drawn the stitching across the princess's pale body. Aside from her blonde hair, the only coloring on the doll's body was the pink half of her dress. Marie could see her pencil lines in the color.

The thoughts began to overwhelm her. Color drained from her face. Here eyes rolled back. And then Marie fainted.