Michael woke up.

Seemed like he had been sleeping for an hour or so – Jess wasn't in the room. Michael called her, but got no answer. He stood up and looked around, just now noticing a piece of paper left on the sofa. There was a message written on it with really pretty handwriting:

Michael,

Jack should have returned already, I'm worried

I'll walk to the hospital and look for him

you were sleeping so I didn't wake you up

Michael wondered for a moment – it was possible that Jack wasn't even real. Since Michael couldn't trust his own experiences, there was no valid reason to believe Jessica could trust hers. In any case, Michael decided to follow her. He returned to the first floor and stepped outside.

Snow had covered the streets, and more was coming. There were no visible footprints, so Michael took out his map. Hospital was located on Carroll Street, on the other side of town – of course, otherwise it would have been too easy. Michael followed Nathan Avenue, passing a fire station and a tall church made out of brown, jagged stones. He arrived at another chasm, which prevented further progression. Michael got seriously worried – as if the town was guiding him somewhere. His only option was returning to Neely Street.

Michael stopped, as he saw a distant shape among the fog and snow. A lazy, fluttering sound emerged – another gray humanoid with wings on its face appeared. With sluggish and tired movements, it turned towards Michael and started walking. Michael pulled out his gun, hesitant to fire – yet it seemed he had no other options. As the creature leaped towards him, he shot it twice. First bullet punctured its shoulder, second one its throat – it fell down, twitching and fluttering violently, until it ran out of blood.

Michael stared at the corpse and the mangled, bloody snow for a while, until another humanoid walked through the fog. A distant sound echoed between the buildings – seemed like there were several such creatures roaming the streets. Michael decided that his only hope was getting out of the open area, so he started (somewhat impatiently) inspecting closest doors. Most of them were locked, yet one did open – if Michael hadn't been in a rush, he would have been able to expect this. He entered the building and slammed the door shut.

It was dark inside – Michael turned on his flashlight. He seemed to had entered some kind of store, which was easy to deduce from the rows of white shelves. Most of them were empty, yet some cans filled with cat food were left. Michael inspected the counter, yet there wasn't much to find. There was a chair with a magazine left on it, but Michael had no use for either of those. He proceeded through the shop, realizing that it sold mainly pet supplies.

Michael reached a backroom with some cardboard boxes stacked on top of each other. Logically enough, he found a backdoor as well – it wasn't locked. Michael turned it open, feeling cold air hitting his face. He stepped outside again, noticing that it was snowing even more than before – plus it was getting windy. There were two trucks parked on Michael's left, which did make sense: he was on the backyard of several local businesses. The area was almost completely surrounded by high apartment buildings, yet one narrow street punctured the row on Michael's right. It led to a parking lot with couple of snow-covered vehicles.

Michael wondered if the road would get him on the other side of the chasm. With this idea in mind, he started walking across the backyard, yet sudden movement caught his attention: someone was roaming between the buildings. Based on the character's precise movements, it wasn't one of those creatures, but a human. This person disappeared behind a blue door until Michael had chance to do anything. He did think about following the character, yet decided to check the road first. His expectations were met, as he found nothing but another collapsed part of Nathan Avenue. Therefore, he had no choice but to follow the stranger.

Michael arrived at the door, passing some ornamental trees and benches. He stared at the high, three-storey apartment building, which in his situational context looked rather ominous. It was made out of brown-red bricks; all the windows were black, making the whole thing look abandoned (like everything else in the town). Michael opened the blue door, swept snow from his shoulders and stepped inside.

Michael was standing at the end of a short, lightless corridor. Right in front of him, said corridor turned left and right. There were some windows here and there, yet they all were covered with cardboards and wooden panels – in general, the building's interior seemed very shabby and worn out.

Michael rubbed his hands – it was almost colder than outside. He started walking, turning right at the crossroads. He found a locked door, which wasn't a promising start – there was a small, golden plate on the door, with number 102 engraved on it. Michael proceeded to door number 103, which was also locked. However, to Michael's mild surprise, number 104 did open.

Michael stepped in the apartment. He passed a closet and a small kitchen placed in the corner, arriving in a large, mostly empty hall. It was like a huge lobby, which made no sense – the room was way too big to be contained within the building. Dim light passed through some windows at the opposite end, yet couldn't provide much visibility.

"Watch your step."

Michael turned around, just now noticing a man sitting on a lonely chair. He was wearing a pink (though dirty) shirt with rolled up sleeves. On top of it was a black (and worn) leather vest. In addition, he had dark blue jeans and brown, rather stylish leather shoes. His hair was dark and quite short; his face both round and sharp-edged. He was staring at the vast, empty space, and seemed rather tired.

"...and who are you?" Michael asked. He did remember Brian's comments about a man wearing pink shirt.

"Hmh? I don't..." the man started. There was strong tension in his voice. While Brian and Jessica had seemed somewhat sane, Michael got the feeling that this stranger wasn't doing well at all.

"...I'm Michael. What's your name?"

"I think it's better to keep it as a secret."

The man kept staring at the emptiness while slowly rubbing his hair – there were couple of golden rings on his fingers.

"Why are you here?" Michael asked.

The man said nothing, yet he seemed to get puzzled. Michael continued:

"I don't even know where I am right now, so I could really use some help."

The man smiled.

"Oh...that makes sense, actually."

"...it does?"

"Yeah. Lots of people here...makes you wonder..."

"I know" Michael said and decided to open up:

"I've seen and killed those...creatures with wings. I've met other people too, despite no one living here anymore. I don't know what to make out of this."

The man was quiet for a while. Michael started feeling uneasy because of the nonsensical size of the room.

"Just let time pass, Michael. Neither of us can leave yet. And don't ask – I don' t know what all this is. The town is cursed for all I know. Or we are."

It seemed that the man wasn't going to talk about his own experiences, so Michael decided to be blunt:

"Did you...use to be a barber?"

The man got confused – clearly he hadn't expected Michael's question.

"I met someone called Brian...he told me that he had met you."

The man nodded – he was clearly relieved.

"Yes...I remember. I did meet mister Harding, and yes, I used to be a barber. We didn't talk much; he seemed rather busy."

Michael didn't know what to think about this man – about the Barber. Eventually he got up from the chair and started walking forwards, past Michael.

"Michael..." he began while taking slow steps and staring at the floor.

"...what matters the most?" asked the Barber – his voice almost cracked.

"What? I don't..." Michael replied, unable to fully understand the question. He got more and more confused as Barber stopped and stretched his both arms horizontally, standing there like a statue. Then, he answered his own question:

"Cunt."

Michael got utterly puzzled – he had no idea what to say.

"Don't you agree? Seems to me everyone does, even if they don't say it."

Michael sighed heavily and rubbed his forehead; headache was coming back. Since this stranger was clearly losing it, there was only one more thing Michael had to find out:

"I guess you don't have a car."

"You are not wrong" Barber said. Michael gave up and decided to leave him alone. He left the room, hoping that he wouldn't meet Barber again

Michael walked to the opposite end of the corridor and reached the door number 101, which was left a tiny bit open – yet someone had nailed couple of wooden boards in front of the doorway. Michael bowed down and squeezed through the impractical obstacle, arriving to another apartment. This one wasn't physically insane: rather small living room, tiny kitchen in the corner, bedroom on Michael's right, and (presumably) bathroom on his left. There wasn't much furniture – just a worn sofa plus one small dresser. The ornamental wallpaper was in bad shape, filled with small scrapes and stains.

Michael's hands were freezing – was it actually colder in this specific the apartment? He tried to stay in movement by inspecting the living room. Next to the double bed was a small nightstand, with a black box on top of it. Title Raven 38. Premium was written on the box – it contained cartridges. Michael had no idea why the residents would store ammunition in their bedroom, but he didn't really complain. He took out the gun and realized that the cartridges were perfect fit – another event too absurd to be a pure coincidence. Michael filled the cylinder and took rest of the ammo with him.

On the other side of the bed, a chair was facing towards a small window. It seemed that some kind of bulky object was left on the chair – it was the upper body of a female mannequin. Michael had no idea why someone would even own such a thing, but he was getting used to confusion. The mannequin's face had no paint on it, plus it was missing both arms. Otherwise it was in rather good condition – unlike rest of the apartment. Still, Michael had no use for the doll, so he left it alone.

It was time to visit the presumed bathroom. Indeed, there was a bathroom behind the closed door, plus another small room with no clear purpose: it was nothing but an empty space. The bathroom contained a toilet, a sink and a bathtub covered with blue curtain, all crammed close to each other. There was a small cabinet above the sink, which contained couple of medicine bottles – one of them caught Michael's attention, as the label stated Neosolorin. Michael stared at the bottle for a while until stuffing it in his pocket. He coughed and leaned against the sink; headache was getting stronger.

Michael washed his face with cold water, trying to relax. He dried himself and inspected the blue curtain – it seemed a bit dirty. Michael pulled the curtain aside, revealing the bathtub. There was a body sitting inside it – body of a young woman. She had brown hair, round face, small nose and tired eyes, which were open; their meaningless gaze was concentrated on the ceiling. Her skin was gray, yet it contained faintly red spots all around it. She was wearing nothing but a white, worn bathrobe. On her left wrist, there was a jagged, long wound – the bottom of the tub was covered by smooth pool of russet liquid.

Michael opened his mouth, about to say something – yet he said nothing. He shivered and stepped backwards, as the nausea hit him. He threw up and fought his pathetic way out of the bathroom, falling on the living room floor. Disgusting stench filled the air; it wasn't cold anymore. All light disappeared, as the room turned pitch-black. Yet suddenly, a bright, orange shine surrounded him – it swept across the room, then disappeared and appeared again.

Michael heard a distant howling noise until he passed out.