"How did you get out of here last night?" Claire asked Myrnin, looking up at him in the darkness. Her feet felt like they were on solid ground, but the monochromatic theme in this void made her feel like she was reeling.

Myrnin inhaled deeply through his nose, his whole chest expanding with the breath, almost, it appeared, in order to steady himself. He couldn't meet her eyes. Myrnin started to speak, but stopped suddenly. His gaze found hers and then fell away again. "I had to die."

The black world that they were in jolted violently after he said those words and sent Claire and Myrnin stumbling into each other. Claire felt Myrnin's cold hand take hers. He brought her closer to him in the blinding chaos and held her in a protective embrace. A steady, constant ticking—like the count of a clock—echoed loudly in the dark. Whirring soon joined the tick tick tick and Claire's senses were overwhelmed with mechanical dissonance while Myrnin's arms around her did little by the way of comfort.

"What's happening?!" she shouted over the noise.

"I don't know. Perhaps a technical problem with the machine!" he replied just as loudly.

Claire squeezed her eyes shut and then the racket collided with silence. It was so quiet so suddenly that she thought she was still hearing traces of the noise, but it was only in her mind. Claire opened her eyes.

They were back in the real world. She was lying on the ground in a heap next to the cot Myrnin was waking up on. He looked around, taking in his surroundings, and removed the disk connectors from his temples.

"What was that?" she asked him.

"It must have malfunctioned," he replied, eyeing the machine. Myrnin looked back at Claire. After a moment, he said, "Will you tell Amelie?"

Claire gave him a look. Was he serious? "If you're going to try to persuade me not to, I'd suggest not even going there."

Myrnin hung his head. He seemed embarrassed. "I'm sorry, Claire. I never... I just wanted... Well, in any case, I apologize."

She touched his hand that shook slightly where it rested in his lap. He looked up. "It's all right, Myrnin. I understand."

He gave her a small smile and pat her arm. "Thank you, Claire. You're very kind." Myrnin stood and Claire followed. "But I'm sure you have more important matters to attend to—like rewriting the combustion equation into something more detailed, a task I set you to do on Wednesday." He seemed to be back to his normal self, so Claire rolled her eyes; she'd do it tomorrow.

"I'll see you tomorrow then," she said and Myrnin nodded.

"Yes. You can help me move this machine into my storage room for useless inventions. Perhaps someday we will tinker with the concept, but not now. Goodbye, Claire."

She smiled tightly and waved, walking out of the back room and through the lab. Picturing the Glass House as she opened the green portal door, she stepped through and left Myrnin in his lab without noticing the clock that ticked slightly faster than it was supposed to.

Myrnin sat in his leather wingback chair shrouded in darkness. His hands were pressed against the arms of the chair because if he moved them and held them up to examine, they shook. It was a small tremor than ran through his body, but it was notable for a vampire who had lived more than four hundred years.

Had his theory been wrong? That the dream world was only escapable by death? Myrnin had been certain that there was nothing that could wake him besides dying and unplugging the machine externally. Surely there was no way that—

"Don't you have anything else other than your uninteresting diaries and novels that pre-date back to the sixteen hundreds?"

The voice startled Myrnin. His gaze snapped up to the man standing in front of one of Myrnin's many bookshelves. He was holding a leather-bound tome in his right hand while the left rested lazily on the wood of the shelf. Oliver. Oliver and his ridiculous hair, clothes, and scent was in Myrnin's lab.

"What are you doing here, you wretch?" he snapped, rising to his feet. "What in the name of all that's holy makes you think you have the right to come into my home without warning?"

Oliver tossed the book at Myrnin who was forced to catch it against his chest. He smoothed his hand over the cover of the book to check for possible damage as he glared hotly at the intruder.

"Amelie sent me to see if you wished to have tea with her and Ada," Oliver said, bored. "Tea. Very Amelie of her, don't you think? Personally, I never enjoyed it. Such a long-winded, useless propriety."

Myrnin was frozen. "What did you say?"

Oliver looked at him derision. "Amelie," he said again slowly in a way that suggested Myrnin had forgotten how to speak English, "has sent you. An invitation. To have tea. There are two answers to this question: yes or no."

Myrnin's fangs slid out and his eyes flashed red. He backed Oliver into a bookshelf and his hand found the man's throat. "Do not toy with me, Oliver. Amelie and who?"

"Ada," Oliver snarled. "Ada. Are you deaf?"

Myrnin's grip around Oliver's windpipe tightened. "Do not toy with me, Oliver. I am not something you should provoke, particularly when your attempts to aggravate concern her."

A portal opened and the two men were distracted as they looked to where the doorway had manifested. A woman in a purple dress with a high collar and long skirts entered the lab. She wore a silver locket around her neck and her hair was up in a perfect bun. The woman's hazel eyes swept over the laboratory and found Myrnin and Oliver. Myrnin's hand released Oliver's neck.

"Myrnin," she said, "what is keeping you so long?"

He was speechless. The only thought that swam in his head was her name and even then, the two simple syllables—the three letters—were hardly making sense to him.

"Ada?"

A pitiful look crossed her face. "You've been off, haven't you? Off in that other world?"

He hesitated.

Oliver crept out of Myrnin's reach and opened a portal, the flare of energy not even registering in Myrnin's stunned mind. "It won't do to console him any longer, Ada," he said snidely. "I suggest you put the dog down. You're merely dragging out his pain." And he left, the portal snapping shut at his departure.

Ada crossed the room and touched Myrnin's face. Her hand was cool and the familiar hand against his cheek comforted him. "It isn't real, my love. That machine takes you away from me."

"What machine?"

"The one you made to see Morganville's future." She looked into his eyes and made a tsking noise; she saw the confusion in them. "I've told you again and again, my darling: the future you see is only because you created that machine while certain events were taking place. Once the Founder was told the effects of her causes, that future was avoided. The machine cannot reformulate an alternative future because it is not an intelligent being. What you continue to visit in your mind is now nothing but a dream reality."

Myrnin blinked. "It's not real?"

"No. Of course it isn't." A hard look crossed over her face and her lips became a thin line. "Claire is not real. I am still alive. Or, as alive as any vampire is."

Claire was nothing. She would remain outside of Morganville because the Founder knew if Claire arrived it would be the end of their town. The memories came flooding back and he realized none of it meant anything anymore: Amelie had tracked down Bishop and taken his blood, distributing the cure for the Bishop Disease to all vampires throughout Morganville; the book was destroyed; everything he had experienced was nothing but a bad dream.

"Oh, Ada," Myrnin sighed, sagging into her touch. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed the corner of his mouth. "I was forced to live such a terrible existence. You were gone from me. I was truly insane. There was nothing for me there."

"Hush, my darling. I know," Ada whispered. "I know. I'm here now. Please, don't use the machine anymore. It makes you so sad."

"I won't," Myrnin promised. "I won't."

When Claire fell through the portal, she was falling, falling, falling. She'd done everything right: opened the green door, imagined the Glass House, and then stepped through. But now she was tumbling through darkness.

Claire was sure she would reach terminal velocity before she made contact with solid ground because she had been plunging downward for at least thirty seconds without any promise of stopping. As she fell, she screamed, because there was nothing else for her to do—nothing to grab onto, no one to call for… nothing. She was going to die.

Adrenaline was rushing through her body and preparing her for impact, but as she continued to descend through the air, her heart beat faster and faster and she wasn't sure she was even going to be conscious when she met the ground. Claire's body was shutting down—she was already going into shock. Her eyelids felt heavy and she felt like she wasn't getting enough air, so she closed her eyes and let herself continue falling as she went unconscious.

.

She woke.

There was no pain. Claire only felt cold cement beneath her body where she lay, folded up in a heap on the floor. She opened her eyes and saw several yellow lightbulbs that poorly illuminated the hallway every few yards. On either side of the corridor, there were cells. In the cells were vampires.

She knew where she was. This was Myrnin's prison for the sick; the vampires' red eyes and displayed fangs gave it away. Their long-nailed hands clutched at the iron bars, trying desperately to squeeze through to get to her—to taste her blood.

Claire stood up and she was shaking. She could barely stand. The vampires hissed and growled and snarled at her, reaching out of their cells to try and make a grab for her. Claire kept herself in the center of the hallway so they couldn't touch her. She called out quietly, "Myrnin?"

There was no answer, only the reinvigorated attempts on the sick vampires' parts to snatch her. She tried calling for him again.

"Claire?" Her name echoed off the stone walls, but she couldn't see where he was.

"Myrnin? Are you there?"

"Over here," she heard.

Claire followed the source of the voice down the row of cells. "I don't see you!"

"To your right."

And there he was. Sitting in a room behind bars. Unlike the cage he'd been in before courtesy of Amelie, this one was completely empty. Myrnin was cross-legged in the middle of the cell and his eyes were reflecting what little light there was in that dark prison, glowing red. Claire had to remind herself to breathe.

He was ratty and unkempt, his hair was tangled and matted. Myrnin's clothes were ripped in places and filthy all over. He wasn't wearing shoes. Despite his fangs and red eyes, he looked calm. His gaze swept over her body from head to toe and a corner of his lips quirked upward.

"I remember you."

"What are you doing down here?"

"I live here, my girl," he replied. "What are you doing down here? You shouldn't be, you know. But of course you know. You always knew. You're very clever."

What was he talking about?

"What's going on, Myrnin?" Claire asked. "What's wrong with you?"

He looked away. "I told Amelie to keep you away from Morganville." Myrnin's eyes found her again. "You are just as I remember."

"What do you mean 'remember'? I was just in your lab—I-I fell! The portal wouldn't let me go through to the Glass House. What was that about?"

"My dear Claire," he said, "the portals haven't worked for a century. When did you arrive?"

"In Morganville? I came here a while ago, Myrnin. To go to TPU, remember?"

Very quickly, he was sad. He hung his head for a moment and then raised it again to look at her. There were tears in his eyes and he was smiling pathetically, the way people smile when they understand a terrible truth and want nothing other than to believe the lie.

"You're in my imagination, it would seem. Of course you are. A brilliant little cherub like you could only be in my mind. Seventy years of this place does that to a man, twenty more and I believe I'll lose my ability to speak. So speak to me, Claire. Let us converse. Even if it is just in my head."

So... who's still out there reading? Should I keep going? Let me know. It was so much fun revisiting this one.