The hallway was that of the church, but they were clearly in the Otherworld. Dark and twisted and the taste of metal and rust in the air- Travis was no clean freak, but the very air here made Travis want to clean off every inch of himself.

"Look!" Cheryl said, pointing to a stained gurney, "More ammo and health drinks! Guess we found some free refills!" Tiredness pulled at the corners of her face, but her smile was real.

"I guess we should take advantage of this," Travis said, smiling slightly.

"Especially you!" Cheryl said, poking him on the shoulder.

He put one hand on his ribs gently. "Good idea."

They each took a health drink and drank it down. They took the rest and tucked them into various pockets. And Travis reloaded the shotgun and Cheryl tucked the handgun ammo into her vest pockets.

They headed down the corridor again.

There was a half open door. When approaching the door and hearing voices, they walked closer and listened in.

"You couldn't do it, could you?" and that was Vincent's voice, at his most unbearably smug. "They sent you to kill him but you couldn't do it!"

Quick footsteps and the woman from before walked in front of the door. "Quiet, Vincent."

"But I like talking. And you know I'm right. If only you'd ignore the ramblings of that old crazy old hag and all her nonsense, you'd see-"

"See what? The pleasures of this world? They mean nothing!"

"You may disapprove of my habits and hobbies Claudia-"

Claudia?

"-but there are things, pleasures, if that's what you want to call them, that everyone enjoys. I seem to remember both you and Alessa being quite fond of the rain. So you let them go. What are you going to do now?"

"…I will find a way. We can't be stopped. There will be the birth of the god."

"That's not what Alessa thinks."

"How would you know?"

"Isn't it obvious? She's fighting it. Travis certainly didn't shove the aphlagotis down her throat and Kaufmann was trying to kill her."

The woman was quiet only for a moment. "You could have lied to her about its purpose."

"Could have," agreed Vincent cheerfully, "but I didn't."

There was a brief silence, and the woman moved away from the door, out of sight. "It doesn't matter. That girl is not yet Alessa. Alessa is still sleeping inside of her."

Vincent shook his head. "Claudia, don't you get it? The fact that they were right there, in that room, the fact that this room where we are now is here, shows that she remembers. Cheryl and Alessa are the same. And how do you think she'll feel when she finds out how her "little sister" has betrayed her?"

"I have not betrayed her!"

"Oh please. Anyone would agree that stabbing someone's dear father is a betrayal. It's a shame Dahlia had to drag him off to go with her. He might've been able to help me drum some sense into your head. Where did she take him anyway?"

Claudia was pacing now, not looking at anything but the floor. "To the final stage, the inner sanctum. That's where the summoning will be completed."

"She's really focused on getting Cheryl to hate her, isn't she? One wonders why. If I were Cheryl, I'd hate her plenty already. I'm full of hate just by looking at her.

Now, if we're talking about you, that's something else entirely. And speaking of you, Claudia, you never did tell me the answer to the question of what you're going to do next. Dahlia isn't going to let you back in until you've done something to advance Cheryl's hatred of you."

"Maybe I'll just kill you." Claudia said and raised a knife and took a step closer.

Travis moved forward but Cheryl grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back. She motioned towards herself and Claudia and then towards him and Vincent and handed him her knife and made a slashing motion at the rope holding him still.

Travis sighed softly before nodding unhappily.

Cheryl stood up and walked into the room then yelled "Claudia!"

The long haired woman spun around. "Alessa?"

"It's Cheryl." She walked forward only stopping about an arm (or a knife's) width away. "Claudia, what are you doing?"

"I'm bringing about paradise. So everyone can be saved."

"You think people can be saved even if they don't want to?" As Cheryl said this, she took a step to the side. Claudia moved too, so she could continue to face her. Cheryl kept moving until the wall was behind her, and Claudia couldn't see either Vincent or the door.

That's when Travis snuck in, keeping an eye on Claudia as he went.

"I know you don't understand-"

"I understand the plan," Cheryl interrupted. "It was explained to me more than once, in great detail. "It's for your own good" I was told," she said this last part mockingly, imitating Dahlia's voice. "What I don't understand is why you're listening to her."

Travis glanced at the two of them. Part of him wanted to let them keep talking. He had a feeling that Cheryl was saying some things that Claudia needed to her. But Vincent couldn't hang there forever.

Hanging from the ceiling like that, rope wrapped around his arms and torso, had to be painful. Using the knife that Cheryl had given him, Travis carefully cut through the rope. Unfortunately, neither the cutting nor the noise that Vincent made when he hit the floor was quiet.

Claudia spun around. "What are you doing?"

"It's commonly called a rescue."

"Claudia, my father…he's still alive, right?"

"Yes," Vincent responded before Claudia could. He winced as he rubbed his arms. "He was stabbed, but it was only a flesh wound. You'll want to take him to a hospital later, but he'll be fine for a while."

For a half a minute only, Travis desperately missed Lisa. And then the moment passed and he stood up, satisfied that other than some nasty bruises and a couple shallow cuts, Vincent was fine.

Travis walked over to the girls, and looked at Claudia. "Come with us." She looks washed out, somehow. Maybe it's all that black.

Cheryl stepped closer too. "Yeah, who cares about that stupid cult and that stupid paradise?"

"They're all crazy anyway, you know that."

"Claudia, come with us."

Claudia looked from one to the other, hands clasping each other on her chest. He'd never seen an expression like the one that was on her face right now, not on her face or on anyone else's either. There was an element of fear, of uncertainty- "I can't," she said, almost pleadingly.

The two exchanged glances. "What do we do now?" was unspoken, but exchanged between them.

"We're wasting time," Vincent said, standing up. "Let's tie her up and leave her here."

"Monsters," Travis reminded him.

"Then take her with and tie her up, but you ever want to do, let's do it and go. That thing isn't just feeding of Cheryl's pain, it's feeding off ours too, and everyone in town is a source of food for it. The longer we wait, the more pain it absorbs and the stronger it gets."

The two glanced at each other again, but then the door banged and Claudia was gone.

Running to the door and looking out after her, but she was out of sight.

"Well, that could have gone better."

"Could have gone worse too."

"You're right," Cheryl said as they headed back into the hallway. After a moment she pulled out the map. "Vincent, is this the inner sanctum?" and she pointed at the last room on the map, the only one in the last corridor.

"That's it."

"It doesn't look hard to get to."

"It's not the getting there that will be difficult," Vincent said darkly. "They want her to get there, remember? It's the getting out that will be difficult."

"How hard can it be?" Cheryl asked in a tone that made it more of a statement, and held up her gun. "Let's go say hello, Travis."

Could she? Dahlia was her mother, after all. But then, for 17 years, she'd had Harry.

Travis knew two things for sure.

This wasn't going to be easy. And he wasn't going to let her go by herself.

"Yeah, let's go say hello," he said, lifting up his shotgun.

OoOoOo

Tried to make Claudia "sympathetic and possible savable but still dangerous." Hopefully she seems realistic. I think the fact that she knew and was close to the person who messed up the ritual in the first place made it a bit harder to focus on hate and what not.

Still, really not happy with this chapter, but considering how long it's been, figured it was time to upload it and move on.