Chapter two

San Diego – 2 weeks ago

Taylor woke up feeling her whole body in pain. She looked around in panic and saw Commode was lying on the ground next to her.

She crawled over to him. "Commode," she said shaking him a bit hoping he is ok.

"Taylor?" he asked.

"Yes it's me. Can you get up?"

He got up with no difficulty then helped her up off the floor. They looked around. They had no idea where they are or how they got there. It was very dark in there. The only light were a few candles inside some niches in the wall of what seemed to be a long corridor.

"Where the hell are we? And how did we get here?" asked Taylor.

"I have no idea. The last thing I remember we were inside the vault looking for that golden cross we were investigating."

"You think maybe we should start exploring this place? Maybe try and find a way out?" asked Taylor.

"I suppose so. I really doubt we should stay here. Just in case who ever brought us here will come back. What time is it? Do you have any idea how long we've been here?" asked Commode.

Taylor looked at her watch. "Damn," she said.

"What is it?"

"The damn thing stopped working. It shows 5 minutes after 2pm. That's around the time we got in the vault," answered Taylor.

"Which means we could have been here for a few minutes, a few hours or even a few days. The guys must be really worried about you Taylor," commented the vampire.

"If they are even aware of our disappearance."

The two of them saw a light appear at the horizon of the corridor, and then it disappeared again.

"Let's go," said Commode. "We'll start in the direction of the light we just saw."

Taylor followed him when a breaking sound was heard. They both looked around but there was nothing there. She rushed over to his side and put her hand in his, holding tight. Commode tried to reassure her with a smile and they started walking.

The farther they walked the longer the corridor got. After about what they thought was 2 hours they stopped.

"What the hell?" said Commode. "We've been walking and walking and made no progress at all."

"So it seems," said Taylor. "How can we tell for sure if we have moved along or not?"

"Leave your watch on the floor here. If after we walk some more we won't see it, we'll know we are moving somewhere."

Taylor took off her watch and put it on the floor behind them, and they started walking again. Soon the watch was left behind and nowhere to be seen. They smiled at each other in relief and continued walking. After some time, they weren't sure how long, they saw the watch in front of them on the floor.

"Shit, we've been walking in circles. How could we have got back to the same spot? The corridor doesn't circle. I thought we were walking in a straight line the whole time," said Taylor in anger.

Commode took her into his arms. "Relax" he said. "We don't know we have been walking in circles. Maybe someone is trying to trick us. Maybe they took the watch from its place and put it here to throw us off."

She put her head on his chest and said, "I'm scared Com. Really scared. I want to go home."

"I know," was all he said holding her tight trying to calm her. After a few minutes he felt she was calmer, "Why don't we sit here and rest for a while. Maybe something will come to us. An idea on how to get out of here or something", he said and slid to the floor.

"Ok," answered Taylor and sat on the floor next to him. She was tired, scared and cold.

Commode noticed her shaking and asked, "Taylor, are you ok? You seem cold."

"And what if I am? She asked in an angry voice. "What can you do about it? You don't even have body heat." She suddenly realized what she was saying, "Oh my god" she whispered and hid her face from Commode.

"It's ok Taylor," he said. "I was just gonna offer you my coat."

"I'm so sorry. I don't know what came over me. I don't know where these words came from. I didn't mean them Com, I really didn't."

"It's ok," he said again. "I think this place is getting to you. I'm sorry. I wish there was something I could do."

Taylor took her hands off her face and smiled at him, "You can start by giving me that coat you offered, and then can you just hold me for a while?"

Com smiled back at her, took off his coat and she wore it. She then turned to him leaning against his chest, and fell asleep. He wrapped his arms around her and soon fell asleep as well.

+++

Ben/Abi

Ben was driving along and saw the place they were headed for just in front of him. He stopped the car on the side of the road looking at the house. He really hoped Abi would like it as much as he did. He turned to her and softly called out her name.

Abi heard his soft voice calling out to her and opened her eyes. "Hey," she said.

"Hey," he answered. "Wake up sleeping beauty. We've arrived."

"We have?" she asked raising her chair back to a sitting position.

He pointed at the house in front of them. "This is it," he said. "Do you like it?"

"Ben, it's gorgeous. I like it. Can we go inside now? I won't to see if it's as great indoors as it is outdoors," said Abi reaching her hand to him.

Ben Grabbed Abi's hand raised it to his mouth and kissed it. "Sure we can go inside now. It's ours."

At first she didn't realize what he was saying, then it hit her. "Did you say it's ours? You didn't. You bought this house?" she asked surprised.

"Yes," was all he said. He started the car and drove to the front of the house where he stopped and got out. He was walking towards Abi's door to open it for her, when an elderly couple came out from the front door.

"Mr. and Mrs. Adler," said the man. "We were expecting you. Welcome to Ramot Naftali Castle."

Commode/Taylor

Commode woke up from his sleep. As he started to stretch his muscles, he suddenly realized Taylor was not by his side. He looked around but she was no where to be seen. A feeling of Panic came over him, and he got up off the floor and started running along the corridor calling out her name over and over but to no avail. She was gone.

A sudden sharp pain in his left leg caused him to fall down to his knees. "Taylor" he cried out knowing it was her pain he's feeling. Then another sharp pain ran through his right leg. Taylor's dissapearence and the pain he felt cause him to let his tears of panic and pain come running down. Streaks of pale blood ran down his face.

San Diego house

Derek was standing in the control room between Alex and Tanya who were working on the computers, trying to find out all they could about an invisible wall that is very cold to the touch. So far they came up with nothing. Not on their database, or on the net.

Derek felt a sharp pain go through both his legs. He grabbed on to Alex's chair, moaning.

Alex jumped off of her chair to help him. "Derek, what is it? Are you ok?" she asked.

He took deep breaths trying to calm himself and catch his breath. He then looked at the worried Alex. "I'm fine," he said. "It's Taylor. It's her pain I feel. I sense commode is feeling it too."

"How can you possibly feel that?" asked Tanya.

"I don't know. All I can say is that they are no longer together and that worries me." He took another deep breath and said, "I want you two to call all of the houses. Try to see if anyone has ever experienced such an event, or maybe have some knowledge we can use."

"Ok," said Alex. She then took a list of all the houses and divided it between her Tanya. "You call Boston, London, Tokyo and Los Angeles. I'll try Moscow, Beijing, Amsterdam and Jerusalem. We'll try these houses first and if no one can help us there we'll go on with the rest in the list.

"Sure," said Tanya and started dialing.