JJ could have sworn she heard Alex's voice call out her name, somewhere about a thousand miles away, and for a moment she snapped back to reality. She was just about to call back, when something nipped at her calf. Before she knew it, that something no longer limited itself to nipping; it bit her. Hard. A wild, burning pain spread up her leg and she kicked to get whatever caused this pain to loosen its jaws, but it only bit down harder. She could feel a stream of hot blood streaming down her leg, pooling in her shoe.

As she stared down at her attacker, she felt sick to her stomach. It was a rat - possibly the meanest-looking rat she had ever seen in her life - and it was the size of a big and well-fed cat. Its yellow teeth, stained with her blood, seemed very, very large.

"God damn it!" JJ shouted and pulled out her gun, but before she could take aim, the nasty creature jumped up on her arm and took another bite out of the sensitive, thin skin on the inside of her elbow.

"Ow! You son of a b…" she only got that far before another set of sharp teeth sunk deep into the flesh just below her waist. She screamed, this time with no words. She tried to pull loose, but for each rat she tore loose from her body and tossed into the dark corners, another jumped her.

My God, she thought, they're going to eat me alive.

She took a few staggering steps back the way she had come, trying to escape the assault, when suddenly what felt like strong (yet invisible) hands grabbed her shoulders and threw her against a heap of cardboard boxes and newspapers. She landed on her back and hit her head on something hard. Upon her body's impact on the long forgotten junk, a huge greyish cloud of dust and plaster exploded into the air. She coughed and tried to catch her breath, staring up at the ceiling. Her head was spinning.

"Get up," she ordered herself, but she was unable to carry out the command. The low sound of unpleasant laughter began to fill her entire head, and JJ couldn't fight it anymore.

She passed out.

And with no support from her conscious mind; her thoughts, the entity here could no longer fuel the image of the rats. One by one, even as they still approached the sprawled-out blonde, the rats blinked out of existence.

Something tickled her arm. Alex shuddered and brushed her free hand against the place, refusing to look at it. But the sensation only grew more intense. When she reluctantly looked down she nearly threw up at the sight. It would have been bad enough to have insects crawling on her skin, but these were… under it. She groped at the things crawling and moving inside her arm, panicking as they moved upward. She was vaguely aware that she was going into hysterics, but she didn't care. She began clawing at her arm with her nails, scratching open her skin to the point where blood mixed with tiny black beetles gushed out of her.

"It's not real, it's not real, it's just an image for heaven's sake," she tried to convince herself and shut her eyes to push the image away.

When she opened her eyes again, her arm was unscathed. Shivering uncontrollably, of course, but that was okay. She was shivering all over. She felt light-headed and swayed on her heels for a moment, feeling as though she might pass out. She didn't, but as she looked around, she realised that she had no idea where she was… why she was there… or even who she was. It was stupid. Nobody can just forget their own identity like that, but…

But she really had no idea who she was. It was like that feeling in the depths of a dream, when you have no idea how you got here, who you are or what has happened to you before. You have no past and no future, you are stuck in an eternal now.

Alex searched for her ID to prove her identity to herself, but when she looked at it, the name was erased and the photo showed only a silhouette that could have belonged to thousands of women. Now she was scared for real. Then a voice spoke inside her mind, and this wasn't the ensnaring, smug voice that belonged to whatever existence residing in this house; this was the memory of a voice she had heard not long ago. The voice of a boy.

You are Alex.

"I'm Alex," she murmured, and as if her voice broke some kind of spell, everything came back to her in a flash. "I'm Alex Blake, FBI, and I'm only in here to find JJ, my colleague." She paused and decided to rectify herself. "My friend."

The tight grip around her mind seemed to slacken a little at that word. Whatever thing used this house for a disguise or home, it clearly did not cheer on human relationships.

"Alex!" a weak voice called out in the gloom and Alex took a deep, sobbing breath of relief.

"I'm here, JJ! I'm coming!"

JJ was sprawled out on a heap of cartons, as if she had been thrown. Alex rushed to her side and helped her up, but after taking a couple of steps JJ collapsed on the floorboards. Alex sat down next to her, suddenly exhausted to her very core.

"Are you injured?"

"It's inside my head," JJ whimpered and pressed her hands against her closed eyes. "It's showing me these horrible images… oh God, make it stop…"

You will have to claw your own eyes out to make it stop.

Alex grabbed JJ's wrists and forced her hands down. She pinned them firmly onto her own lap. "Fight it, JJ. It can be fought. Those images are not real, they can't harm you if you don't let them. I'm right here, JJ. I'm not leaving you."

JJ cried out with fear, struggle and possibly even pain, and huddled up close to the other woman as if searching for protection. The only protection Alex could provide was keeping JJ from hurting herself. Eventually, the mental struggle became too much for JJ and she lost consciousness again.

Alex put her arms around the younger woman and held her close. If they were going to die, at least they were going to die together.

A/N

Yup. One more chapter to go. Sadly. I think I'm finally finding my way with this story, but, well. ^^

Thank you for reading, and please review if you like. :D