Katarina Morrigan.

Most people didn't know much about that name. Well, they probably did, but most didn't care much about it anymore. Six years had passed since her time with Doctor Octopus, also known as Otto Octavius. That time had been crazy, and she'd treasured it. She had grown to become extremely fond of the doctor. Then, he had told her it was time, time for him to get back to whatever he could salvage. He had things to do, places to be, people to meet. Accomplishments to accomplish, newspapers to prove wrong.

For the next two or so weeks after that, she'd heard from him just about daily. Then he'd stopped coming, and she didn't know why. But that was okay. He was the Tentacle-Boy. He'd do all right. She knew that worrying about him was stupid, and he could do pretty damn well on his own. Just as long as he didn't steal things out of people's windows.

Only weeks after she'd seen the doctor for the last time, this thing with the fourteen-year-old had come out. She was smart enough to snort at the Bugle's vision of events, and had at first gone to search out the child – Escher Griffin, that was her name, right? – But schoolwork and jobs had gotten in the way. So it fell from her mind. Just did.

She'd grown. Kept that playful personality, but wasn't always so brash. A little less impulsive, a little more self-conscious. Her hair had been cut short to her shoulders, curling in bleach-blond locks. She'd picked up purple contacts for show as well. She stood about 5 feet and 9 inches, and wasn't exactly model-material, but wasn't overweight either. She liked to consider herself 'average', but was really completely not average, not one bit.

She'd majored in criminal psychology. Like this was hard to guess. She had worked in prisons and in courts, but none of it interested her. There was little as interesting as studying Otto and his tentacles. The work bored her, and she flew through it. Very not much like her. But she did it anyway. Another part of her that had changed.

Her next job was in an asylum, a house for criminals that were insane. The job could only prove interesting. She strolled into the building in her nicest outfit – a white blouse and a pair of black slacks, with a pair of black dress shoes and her hair pulled into a bun.

The building was stark white and gave off an eerie foreboding. She looked up at it and wondered what sort of mysteries it held, wondered if they could compare to what she had seen. With a shrug, she knocked on the door. It opened, amazingly.

"Can I help you, Miss?" asked the receptionist.

"Um, my name is Katarina Morrigan, I'm here for a job, but not sure where to go…"

"Oh yes, you! Fifth floor, make a right, and second door on the left. Ask for Doctor Mereii. That's with two I's. He had some special forward to tell you."

"Thank you," She nodded politely and flashed the girl an off-white smile (not yet having the money for teeth whitening things) before heading towards the elevator.

The ride was short, and she was alone. The building had been about eight stories, and she was on the fifth. More then halfway, and if what her books and peers had told her was true, she was definitely in the realm of the insane. Stepping out, she looked from side to side, noting the sheer starkness of the plain white hallway. It was lined with doors, and she knew what was behind them, and to be quite honest, she was more afraid than excited. Police work and criminals were one thing, lunatics were another.

She counted the doors and knocked on the second one. There was a voice on the other side of the door beckoning her in, and she obeyed it. Closing the door behind her, she sat down and looked at the figure across the desk.

Doctor John Mereii, a tall Asian man with small-framed glasses and short cut hair, put down his newspaper, "And you must be Miss Morrigan."

She nodded, "And you're Doctor Mereii, then?"

"Call me John, please. I'm glad you could meet with me, and that Karen reminded you to see me. She's forgetful like that."

"It's fine," Kat shrugged and grinned, "Worse comes to worse I would have wandered into a room with a raving lunatic. Not much different."

Mereii pushed a folder across the desk, "That's for you." He steepled his fingers and frowned at the comment, "I see…..well, It's nice to meet you anyway, Miss Morrigan."

"Kat, please. It's what everyone calls me," She took the folder and watched John.

"Hn…" The man looked into the distance behind the girl's head and tapped his lip in thought, "In any case, I wanted to… brief you on your assignment."

"I'm all ears, John," She looked at him intently through her purple contacts and absent-mindedly scratched the scar over her eye.

"We understand that you have had experience with the psychologically unstable for quite an extensive period of time, despite your young age. The…reports of you and your experiences with Doctor Octopus suggest that even before you graduated college, you were dealing with strange or criminally insane minds."

Kat nodded, hiding the frown. The stereotype, she'd gotten used to. They wouldn't understand he wasn't a bad person and this much was clear.

"Therefore, we have placed you with placid, but inexplicable subjects."

"That's interesting," she replied, leaning back in the chair and letting her hair out of the bun. The ringlets fell to her shoulders and she twirled one between her fingers. "I'll see what I can do."

"You may recognize one or more of the subjects."

"Indeed?" The ringlets fell over her face as she cocked her head to the side. Pushing them out of her range of vision, she frowned. "Whom?"

"It's a...surprise. You are on the seventh floor, and I want you to report to me your findings. Is that acceptable?"

"Sure….should I go now?"

With a nod from the man, Kat stood up. She smiled as she stood up and turned, heading out the door and closing it behind her.

What surprise could they have on a high floor like seventh? She'd dealt with a few placid ones. One, Victor Oriono split skulls open so their souls could pass more easily instead of them dying a normal death. That's what he thought, at least. Robert Jones practiced vampirism. Those two were probably the ones she remembered the most.

The elevator dinged and opened. The hall was quiet, unnervingly so. She glanced down at the folder in her hand and read over the first page. She had rooms 708, 709, and 712. What had happened to 711 and 710 was a mystery, but that wasn't her business

She gathered up her courage and slid her shiny new security pass into the reader by the first door. The box made a pleasant bleep and she stepped inside the room, her feet falling into the rubber that coated the walls.

"Hello, Mister….Toren?"

"Hello," the sole occupant replied, standing up as much as possible. His voice was soft and impossibly mellow, almost as if he was waiting to die. "Who are you?"

"My name is Kat."

"Like the kitty?" he asked, turning towards her. His eyes were blue, a pale, faded and dead blue. She bet they had been bright once. Bright and sparkling pools. His skin was a sickly pale, his features twisted into a smile that the spider gave the fly.

"Yes, just like that." she replied, giving him the same hopeful smile, keeping near to the door.

"I'll call you Kitty, then."

"That's fine."

"You can call me Star."

"Well, what's your real name, Star?" She watched the man curiously, her fear melting away.

"Michael Alexis Peter Jare-Toren. But Star is better. It makes me feel closer to them. I miss them so much, you know. I used to see them all the time. But now I don't, and it makes me sad. I wonder sometimes. I think they took them away from me and took them all for themselves. They took them, Kitty, and that's why the room is so white. They aren't here."

"What are they?" she asked curiously.

"Why, everyone knows what they are. I don't even have to tell you; you be shouldn't even asking such a silly question. I'm not even going to tell you. I know you know, you silly kitty cat."

Kat frowned. If this boy didn't tell her what 'they' were…well, she had to find out somehow.

"You're sad they aren't here too, Kitty?" he asked her.

"I'm going to go look for them, okay?" She smiled at him, standing up.

"Okay. But you won't find them. They have all of them and they keep them hidden in a place that no one can go in except them, the stealers. Are you a stealer?"

"Of course not," she said, then moved to the door. He smiled at her again.

"Kitty?"

"Yes, Star?"

"Will you come to see me again?"

"Of course," She closed the door behind her and locked it, pondering. She looked down at the next sheet and opened the door, again deep in thought.

"Hello, Katarina Morrigan."

Kat visibly jumped. She looked at the back of the speaker's head, the straight black hair, shot through with what looked like natural frizziness that had been slackened by neglect. The head turned to face her, sharply, a quick-focus move like that of a raptor's.

If Star's eyes were dead, these were haunted, buried in frenzy and overthrown by madness. This was a man who had been driven mad, and she knew that immediately. This one was lucid, was alive for himself and not others, but somehow…not. Green orbs were filled with fire, filled with frenzy, filled with color, watching her intently, like a hawk watching its prey. Nor did he blink. Kat noticed this almost immediately as she blinked herself in surprise at his sharp turn. Almost as if he was afraid to miss something…she mused, then finally saw him rapidly blink his eyelids. He did this far less then a normal person.

"How did you learn my name?"

"Why, you told it me, of course." replied the man, cocking his head. This one would be a challenge; that was for sure. Kat felt that there would be no verbal games with him, no reassuring 'kitty cat' and snow talk…not if she wanted to get anywhere with him.

"And you're going to get a huge surprise after you leave this room and go to the next one. I know, because you told me that too." he continued, with another twitch of his head. If his hands were loose, Kat guessed, he'd be using them expressively as he spoke, forming the shapes of his thoughts in the air. As it was, his shoulders and neck were clearly trying to make up for his pinioned arms, moving sporadically to emphasize his words.

"I...haven't said anything to you, Mister Karos," replied Kat, slightly uneasy now. She found herself glancing at her pad, just to check she wasn't holding it the wrong way around and displaying its information to the patient. She wasn't. "I haven't said anything."

"Oh, not yet at least. You'll tell me in a little bit. Or you would, had I not just told you about it." He laughed, lightly, for all the world like someone who had just heard an amusing after-dinner joke, and continued. "Well, in fact, you'll still tell me again, otherwise how would I know? I can see you find it a little confusing, but you'll see, it all works out just fine in the end."

"You can see the future?"

"Of course!" The man jumped up, but his current situation this made him fall back down on his rear. "It's sort of a funny thing, actually. I see things moving before they do, and then they actually do, so it's sort of like….seeing a visible echo of something. It's really strange."

"I'd…think," She blinked at the man. The flesh on his face sagged into bags that made him look years upon years older.

"You don't believe me?"

"To be quite honest? No."

The man chuckled and shook his head. Then his expression shifted incredibly, almost impossibly quick. He narrowed his fiery green orbs at her and smiled a smile that would have instantly guaranteed him a place in a psychiatric ward, had he not been in one already. "That's because you're insane."

Katarina was now very much perturbed by this man. A memory of a certain fictional character had just slotted into her thoughts, juxtaposed with that disconcerting grin. We're all mad here. "I see…." she said, carefully.

"Ah, but…" He smiled a little more manically. "Why don't you see your surprise in 712? You'll be shocked to the bone, I can assure you. I know you will, because I've seen it. But then you have to come right back and tell me all about it."

She managed an unconcerned smile. "Well, maybe next time-"

"Oh, no, you will, Katarina Morrigan.' said Karos, suddenly serious, the smile snapping off his face in a heartbeat. 'You'll have to.' He angled his head, lank raven hair falling in thin strands across his face. 'That's how it works."

A little disturbed, Kat exited. She closed the door behind her and frowned, taking several breaths to calm herself. He was strange. And so sure of himself, too.

She walked the extra two doors and stopped at the next one. This was clearly going to be the one which, in both Mereii and Karos's words, was the 'surprise.'

Swiping her card, her hand rested on the silver doorknob for a second before she closed her eyes and pushed down on the doorknob, the door sailing inwards.

The first thing she noticed wasn't the patient, actually. It was the strange way the cell was set up – one wall looked oddly thick. Four long, thick and ribbed white cords ran from it.

Those white cords ran to the patient….

…the patient looked up at her.

Two brown eyes looked at her. Brown was slightly inaccurate, actually, for they had been dulled to such an extent that they seemed greyer then brown. More grey then most things she had seen, even. Grey as death. If Star's eyes were dead and Taros's frenzied, these were empty. Devoid of thought, like a band so stretched to contain information…and then the information had been pulled out, leaving only a deadened, stretched band, its use gone. But still…they were familiar somehow. She knew those jaded, once-hazel, grey orbs.

Bags hung under his eyes. But they were natural, somehow, not from lack of sleep. Sagging skin revealed he had once been a little chubbier. His hair was a mess, scattered upon his scalp.

"Eight…"

Jerked out of her reverie, she blinked, forgetting to look at her pad for the name of this one. "Pardon?"

"Eight's...important. I know it is. But I can't remember why."

She shrugged. "Perhaps it meant something to you a long time ago."

"Eight…octagon…octopus…October…"

Kat gasped. It clicked.
She knew those eyes. She knew those white cords, or at least what they concealed.

This was Otto. The tentacle-boy.

"Otto…." she gasped softly, "Otto…what did they do to you...?"

He fixed the dead eyes on her. They were, if possible, the complete embodiment of emptiness. "That's...that's my name. Otto."

"What have they…….done…to you…?"