Sleep was strange. Leonidas couldn't exactly know for sure if he was really sleeping, but fading into his own mind sure made the whole deal a lot more convincing. He was back in the mirrored room, though there were things in it now. Trash was everywhere - simple cardboard boxes and crumpled pieces of paper were crowding the glass walls, and it was up to his knees. It was also colder, and when Leonidas looked down at his hands, he realized they were tanner, as in human. He was human again? He shivered to the cold and looked up, where a small beacon of light poured through a crack in the mirror. His door in a windowless room.

"Sir?"

Startled but not outwardly showing it, Leonidas quickly turned around to see Sara, who only looked a little younger under the dream's affects. "What's that around your neck, sir?"

Leonidas looked to the left, at the closest mirror, and saw around his human neck a purple ribbon. He pulled it off and held it out between the two. "What does it mean?"

"Vanessa...Tied her hair in purple ribbons..."

'Way to go, Amadeus, you're jogging her memory!' It was Hanna, but Sara didn't seem to hear him as she ran her thumb over the ribbon. 'She can't hear me, she's got some protective spell on her that keeps me from helping - ask her more questions so she remembers Vanessa!'

Hanna sounded eager, even cautious, probably just ready to have Amadeus back. He couldn't exactly blame him - it was a very unnerving place to be. Mostly because Amadeus was still so foreign to himself was he so awkward within his own mind - or was it shared with Sara? It was hard for him to tell, but one thing he did notice was that she wasn't reflected in the mirrors. Was she even seeing what he did?

"Did she like the color purple, Sara?"

"I think so..." The woman frowned in thought and stared at the purple ribbon, but her eyes weren't really seeing it. "I think she liked a lot of colors, actually." She ran her hand through her hair absent-mindedly before smiling up at Amadeus, as though they were sharing a simple moment instead of a complex dream.

"She didn't have one favorite color?" After a moment of thought, Amadeus thought of Hanna, who had several favorite colors. "Or were all the colors her favorite color?" Hanna would always drink out of a different mug every day, depending on how he felt. Amadeus found it entertaining and creative. Sara's smile grew in size, suppressing the scars on her face. It made Amadeus wonder how they got there, or if they had anything to do with Vanessa.

"Now I remember! Every day of the week, Vanessa would wear different color clothes!"

"What colors did she pick, Sara?"

"Well, Monday was yellow, Tuesday was blue, Wednesday was green, Thursday was purple, Friday was red, Saturday was silver and Sunday was..." Sara paused, as if the thought suddenly escaped her. Her smile almost fell, when it twitched back to life again and her eyes lit up. "Sunday was wild-card. That's when she picked any color she wanted."

{...}

Colors, stuffed animals, games, favorite foods, best memories, and finally appearance. Nigel worked through each, sometimes with questions and comments from Hanna, until they finally reached appearance. That's when Sara's memory became darker and darker, and the music began to play in the backround. Nigel shuddered when he realized Hanna was commenting less and less. Sara's wandering about her daughter seemed to fade into silence, although Nigel could see her mouth moving as she recounted a story about Vanessa.

But still noise crept through his head, banging around in senseless blurs, until a few things became recognizable. It was all music, tunes he had heard in waiting rooms and lobbies, songs he heard in cars and friends' homes. Words and tiny sounds put together to make a song, one big song that was nothing but meaningless chaos. In wake of that dazzling noise, it seemed, even the colors began to fade around the corners of Nigel's eyes.

'Immanuel! You need to get out of there - I've already gotten Sara, but you've got to hurry!'

"How! All I see is a tiny crack!"

Nothing...And why was Sara still there if Hanna had already gotten her out? She looked like a statue, in that she didn't move or make a sound.

Deciding to trust Hanna, the zombie jumped up as high as he could. His fingers only just scraped against the hole in the wall of mirrors, but he jumped again and again, watching in horror as his arms slowly became greener and greener, and below him as the floor became more and more littered with trash, as though it was rising. He stepped onto a thick pile of it and threw thick pieces of clutter at the crack, causing it to be more of a jagged window. Immanuel gulped as he jumped, knowing that his hand would be met with sharp bits of glass, but he still clung on, despite the pain. He was forcing himself through the window, and into the blinding light. He closed his eyes tight as the glass tore at his back and his bare feet, but he made it.

The next thing he knew, he was wide awake on the floor he'd fallen asleep on. Hanna and Sara were hunched over him in worry, but Immanuel sighed in relief.

"Eli, you're all cut up! What happened in there? Are you okay? What did you find out? Whoa - okay, you're not okay."

Although he couldn't see it, there were chunks of flesh missing from Eli's gut, back, and legs. Sara let out a hoarse scream.

Awright! New Song's just about done.

But don't worry - this isn't the last you'll see of Sara.

IAmJudgingYou: Thanks for being my first review! And thanks for being positive, it really made my day. I hope you enjoy the rest!