Ichabod opened his eyes slowly, the intense pounding in his head making him wary of what he would encounter, but there was nothing to see save darkness. The smell of pungent dark earth filled his nose. The last thing he remembered, he had been thrown into an unmarked grave by Henry Parrish, his erstwhile son, Jeremy. He could still see the cold, dead look on his son's face as he threw him into the coffin, saying only, "Goodbye, Father."

Ichabod took a shaky breath, trying to keep his horror at bay. The vines that snaked around his legs and torso did not allow him much movement. He could not even reach into his coat pocket to retrieve Miss Mills' "smartphone" and use it to call for aid. He was well and truly trapped; a prisoner. The absolute misery and hopelessness of his situation overcame him then and pure panic set his heart pounding. He struggled for a while, screaming for help and trying to kick the box apart, but eventually, his voice hoarse and his lungs screaming for air, he quieted. Tears of frustration had dried on his face and he realized that he had expended a great deal of energy and gotten exactly nowhere. It was much more logical to conserve his energy and wait for rescue, if he could only wrest control from his fear.

However, as he lay there, trying to keep his hysteria in check, he noticed the air around him began to feel thick and dense and soon after, it was much harder to pull it into his lungs. Its damp, cloying smell made him nauseous and he found it hard to swallow. Instantly, Ichabod knew what was happening and that even if someone miraculously ever found him, they would likely not arrive in time. He was too weak and the air too thin.

This is how I will die, he thought. I survived 250 years underground without incident only to be buried alive in 2013.

Surely, the earth was pressing down upon the pine coffin, snuffing the air out as easily as one might blow out a candle. Momentarily, he considered one last assault on the box, but in the end, he decided against it. He was fighting against too much: the strength of the box itself and the hundreds of pounds of soil above him. Only Atlas himself would have been able to lift such a burden.

Ichabod turned his head to the left and sighed. He was done fighting. As he had told Miss Mills not long ago, he had fit more living into his life than any one man deserved. He was ready for his eternal rest and would rather go to it peacefully and with some dignity instead of railing against the inevitable.

"'Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today,'" he said softly, reciting a line from one of his father's favorite poems. His voice hitched slightly at the end, but otherwise he was able to maintain his composure.

As he lay there, his breathing growing more and more labored, he could not stop Miss Mill's beautiful face from entering his mind. Indeed, she was always in his mind in some way; if not at the forefront then drifting about in the shadows, ever his companion. Were it not for her, he would have never been able to navigate this strange new world he had found himself inhabiting. He would have been lost and most likely thought truly insane. A fresh tear slipped down his cheek at the thought of her and he felt his heart seize, cracking like an eggshell. He had promised her he would come back for her, and now, due to his foolishness at not recognizing Henry for who he truly was and his selfish desire to rescue Katrina, he had condemned Miss Mills to eternity in Purgatory. He hated himself for it. The taste of it was bitter in his mouth and burned his throat.

Ichabod closed his eyes, more tears streaming down his face. "I beg your forgiveness, Miss Mills," he said, his voice broken. "I did not expect us to be so soon parted and will forever miss your company, for I hold it quite dear. If I had the ability, I would do everything in my power to set you free from your torment, damn the consequences to me."

His pronouncement finished, he silently begged God to somehow keep her safe in Purgatory, but knew it was a useless prayer. How could she ever be safe with Moloch? He had wanted her soul all this time and now he had it. Ichabod knew Moloch would never release her willingly.

"I do not deserve eternal…rest in the elysian fields of heaven," he said sadly, barely able to get the words out due to the lack of air. "Not when I have committed…such a sin against…my partner. I am ready…to accept my judgment."

He couldn't prevent himself from wishing that he would be sent to Purgatory for his sins and perhaps he would be able to find the Lieutenant. Perchance they would be allowed to be together. Spending eternity in Purgatory with her was preferable to living with the idea that he had betrayed her trust.

His breath ragged, he took one last sip of air then allowed himself to sink into the blackness and felt it rise up to overtake him. Miss Mill's sweet face was his only escort as he was swallowed up by the abyss of death.

For what seemed like a long time, he just floated in that obsidian nothingness like a feather in the wind – only there was no wind; there was nothing. No other thoughts passed through his mind, no fears or worries or hopes or dreams. There was a keen absence of anything of any import and in an odd way, he found it peaceful.

Ichabod wasn't sure when his heart stopped beating for he felt no pain of any kind. In truth, he felt nothing. He could no longer feel the coffin pressing in on him or the vines that held his body prisoner. The pressure of hundreds of pounds of earth above him was gone. He had the odd sense that his body, or perhaps his soul, had somehow escaped – slipped through the cracks – and was far away from that wretched little coffin.

He drifted that way for he knew not how long because time ceased to have any meaning to him. But eventually, he became aware again of the sensation of having a body – of being IN a body. And he was certain that body was lying on the ground; not in the coffin, but on the actual ground. He could feel the damp ground pressing into his clothes. It was a strange feeling, because for so long he had sworn he had been almost bodiless and to be thrust back into his physical form was a bit painful and almost unwanted.

Soon after, Ichabod noted that he could breathe fully and deeply. There was no pressure on his lungs any longer, nothing but ease of movement, although the air did seem to possess a strange quality. Ichabod couldn't quite place it, but he knew he had smelled it in the past.

Realizing that he now most likely had eyes again with which to see, Ichabod opened them slowly, looking around. The blackness receded like the tide and he found his vision was blurry. Ichabod rolled over onto his stomach and pushed himself slowly and unsteadily to his feet, rubbing his eyes gingerly. The first thing he could make out was a dark forest surrounding him. It was filled with foreboding mists and gloomy moans and cries. Sadly, this was familiar. It was the same forest he had found Miss Mills in after both of them had passed Purgatory's tests of faith and loyalty. A vile place, it was; full of tortured souls in various states of disrepair. Some were disabled, missing different limbs or afflicted with ghastly wounds. Others were dragging huge chains or keys or weights around after them. But the worst of the lot were the ones mired in the very ground of Purgatory itself, stepped over and around and on by all the others. These were the truly forgotten, the forsaken and the lost and their faces showed their awful pain as they cried out for relief. Ichabod looked at them with pity, for he knew that what they were really craving was to be remembered and it was the one thing they would be forever denied. That was their punishment.

The thought of Miss Mills staying in this place for one more moment chilled him to the bone and turned his stomach upside-down, for she had done nothing for which to be punished. Instead, she had chosen to remain here; sacrificed herself on the altar of her distrust of him under the guise of saving humanity. He had not acknowledged it at the time, but he knew that she had offered to stay in Purgatory because she was afraid it was the decision he would have made even though he had promised her otherwise. What scared him was that, given the chance, he was not sure what choice he would have made, and that made him hate himself. Miss Mills was his fellow Witness, but Katrina was his wife. Was his duty not to her? But then, what was his duty to Miss Mills? God had set them on this journey together. Did not God's heavenly edict take precedence over any vow that a mere mortal could make?

Ichabod found his feelings too confused and entangled to find his way to the correct path at that moment. All he knew was that he had to find the Lieutenant and if he had died, then perhaps he could take her place and send her back to the world of the living where she belonged. He should never have let her remain here in the first place. It had been immensely selfish of him and Ichabod was unsure how he would ever be able to make things right with her again, but at that moment he vowed to spend eternity trying.

A terrible scream pierced his thoughts and he wheeled around to his right; certain that was the direction from which it had come. That scream had been full of terror and he could have sworn it was Miss Mills who had made that sound.

"Miss Mills!" he shouted into the inky darkness of Purgatory's forest. "Are you here?"

Ichabod received no reply and decided there was nothing he could do but go in the direction of the noise. He began walking, careful to avoid the other denizens of this place and tried to pass by as unnoticed as was possible. The strange yet familiar scent of this placed wafted to him again, but still he could not place it, despite his unfaltering recall. It was like a dream, close to his fingertips yet ever elusive.

Another scream cut through the murk and Ichabod was now positive that it was the Lieutenant. He broke into a run, his heart banging against his ribs. But the instant his legs stretched out into full stride, he was freefalling and then hit dead in the face with something so hard that he was momentarily stunned and dazed. Ichabod saw stars before his eyes and shut them quickly, trying to blot out the pain that had bloomed in his head.

When he regained control of his faculties, he realized that somehow, he was no longer standing but lying face down on the floor; not the ground of the forest, but the floor of a house. Opening his eyes, Ichabod turned his head to the right and saw a cream wall with words scrawled on it in blood-red: DON'T GET SCARED.

The next thing his eyes focused on were blue curtains billowing against the wall, only something was wrong, for the curtains were drawn ON the wall, not actual cloth hanging from rods. Ichabod almost felt as though he were in a story book he had read as a child.

This whole place felt all wrong to him and he stumbled to his feet, swaying when he got there, his head pounding a steady rhythm. Everywhere he looked, he saw only shadows and loneliness; despair seemed to hang in the air the way adornments should have. The hair on the back of his neck went up and he knew only that this house was not a refuge of any kind. It felt more like a prison. What was this place?

Suddenly, a huge bang resounded through the house like an echo through a canyon and he flinched; looking for cover of any kind. Instinct told him to make himself as small as possible and hide. Before he had time to find a spot, a voice that he only heard in his nightmare visions filled the emptiness of the sad house.

"YOU WILL BE MINE AGAIN! Yield to me now and I will show mercy!"

Moloch.

Ichabod could tell that his voice was coming from the other room. Moloch was not talking to him, but someone else. He moved to the wall and pressed himself against it, inching along slowly. He was almost to the doorway when he heard the voice he had been afraid he never would again.

"I was NEVER yours."

Miss Mills. Her voice was quiet and lacked the booming resonance of Moloch's, however it was resolute and determined, though laced with melancholy. Ichabod peeked around the corner and thought his heart would stop at what he saw. Moloch was holding the Lieutenant frighteningly high above him, his claws cutting right through her leather jacket and into her shoulder. Rivulets of blood coursed a path down her arm, dripping onto the ground, sizzling with each drop. Ichabod was filled with such dread for her that he became very dizzy and barely stopped himself from calling out to her. He wanted to run to her aid, but somehow he knew that he had to remain hidden. If Moloch knew that the two Witnesses had been reunited, he would never allow them to find a way out.

"Resign your soul to me and I will give you what you most desire."

Moloch's voice was not as loud or frightening as before, but somehow, the sereneness of it made it even more threatening.

Miss Mills looked down at his blurry yet massive form and she did not seem to be afraid, though her eyes were red and her face ghastly pale. A single tear slipped down her cheek.

"Even you cannot do that, Moloch," she said sadly, seemingly unaffected by the pain in her shoulder. It appeared to Ichabod that there was an emotional pain that was eclipsing all else. "I know my destiny: to be alone. I've finally accepted it. Have you accepted yours?"

Moloch shrieked, and in a rage flung her across the room as easily as one might throw a ragdoll. She crashed into the wall with a sickening thud and crumpled into a heap on the floor, unmoving.

Ichabod could barely stop himself from running to her, but knew he could not do so while Moloch was still there. The demon could not know that Ichabod had returned to Purgatory, or all hope of rescue and escape would be lost.

Moloch turned slowly to face Miss Mills' prostrate form and took two loud, crackling steps towards her, his horns aimed low, and for a sickening instant, Ichabod was certain he was about to charge her. His blurred form flickered in and out of sight, and he was apparently unconcerned with her motionless state.

"You shall never know my mercy," he said softly, the gentle tone of his voice disturbing and out of place. Ichabod knew he meant it to be a threat, but it sounded more like the pronouncement of a sentence; a promise of things to come.

Then with one last flicker, he was gone.