Sitting there, she gazed with glazed eyes out of the dark, two-inch thick bulletproof window at the dappled sunlight, trying to remember what the sun felt like on skin. She stared for quite a while; after staying in a room with nothing new to do for years at a time had made it quite easy to be amused by the smallest things. Ignoring the familiar white padded walls that had entertained her for so long by their durability, she began checking her clothing for anything, even a piece of lint, to fiddle with. Her pale fingers threaded through her many pockets, weaving between the many loose threads, but, to her surprise, actually hit something.

She sat there in stunned silence for a few seconds before removing the unknown object from its home. Turning it over in her hands, she inspected the sleek, streamlined item that shone in the light that got in from the window with a glossy wood finish. Intrigued, she flicked it in her hand, showing the pocketknife’s blade. Her eyes shone as she saw that the metal was of a high quality, shimmering a grey-blue in the slight light, unblemished by bloodstains or scratches and sharpened to a razor-point.

Curious, she gripped the handle and scratched the blade against her fingernail, producing a sound that equaled to about the same as fingernails on a chalkboard- not that she knew what that sounded like. Her eyes wide, she repeated the motion, savouring the new sound and saving it into her deprived memories. On her tenth time, she frowned as her fingernail gave way and the blade met blood for the first time. She inspected the bleeding appendage and touched it, sending another wave of pain through her hand. Tentatively she pressed the now reddish metal to the flesh she had just uncovered, but, instead of focusing on the pain she was feeling, she focused on her ears. Instantly she could hear every vein breaking under the pressure of the metal and the flesh easily peeling away from the blade.

Smiling slightly at this new discovery, she removed the knife and placed it at her wrist this time. Applying pressure, she again enjoyed the range of sounds she could hear, but suddenly the notes stopped. Frowning at the end of the noise, she looked down at her bloody wrist and peered into the area around the bloody blade. The frown was immediately replaced by a smile: she had found a new source of a new sound. Using a bit more force, she was instantaneously granted a grating sound that resounded through her entire body.

Shivering at how the resonance shook her to the core, she hooked the knife to a tendon and gently began pushing it up. When she let go she was bestowed a twanging sound, like a tightly wound guitar string being picked. Curiosity overwhelming her, she left a few of the ligaments as they were but relentlessly dug through the others, shivering every time one grated through her marrow. Soon she could see bigger veins, which she tried to ignore, but just had to hear the sounds of the vital fluid of life rushing out of the plump, previously intact blood vessels.

After a while she caught flashes of white and started digging with a new valour. Once she had uncovered the origin of the strange whiteness in her wrist, she gazed in awe at the sight of a perfect white that stood out against her blood like a skeleton in eternal darkness. Once again she placed the knife against the new surface and could actually feel the reverberation through her bones as she listened to the screech that one of their kind produced. Smiling, she began using her wrist and blade to make melodies: her wrist as the strings and her knife as the bow.

Abruptly her song was cut short as beeping sounds started invading from outside of the room. Scowling at whatever cut her tune short, she began pressing harder on the blade, making every sound from her wrist stand out. The door began to swing ominously open, and two people in white stood there. Once they caught sight of her they were paralyzed to the spot, staring in horror at the sight of a young girl smiling as she sat in the middle of a puddle of blood, her pale features almost acting as a perfect camouflage to the white walls of the room. She looked up at them, black crawling slowly into her vision, acting as a border for all of what she could see, and smiled blankly at them. She raised her hand, facing the mutilated wrist toward the two people, and waved at them happily, blood running down her arm in rivers. Her smile not lessening a millimeter, her wrist fell down to her side, and the pocketknife fell out of her numb, cold fingers...

She had played the final melody: the Melody of Death.