The three other people slowly parted to their assigned locations, but each not before giving Claudia an expression of worry tinged with pity. The curly-haired woman, Myka, had placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, and seemed to contemplate extending it into a hug. Yet she held back, feeling Claudia recoil under her hand, and instead gave a small nod, and joined Pete at the doorway.

"Good luck," Artie said.

"Same to you." Myka murmured. Something akin to suspicion crawled across her features, though she quickly suppressed it.

"Don't go bonkers on us, Claude." Pete added with a dry smile. Myka scowled, and the two departed.

Artie, with some effort, lifted a black carpet bag up from the floor and dropped it on the kitchen table, to a considerable banging of plates. He fished around in it for a moment, before pulling out a large, security camera-looking device with a handle on the bottom side.

Steve straightened up in his chair with a look of apprehension.

"Can I – can you not go into my room with that?" he asked sheepishly.

Artie fiddled with the gadget, turning a small knob near his hand. "I'm going to do a quick sweep of the entrances and exits, to see if anyone, or anything came into the house early this morning, and then I'll take a look at Claudia's room more thoroughly. "

Steve bristled. "You weren't going to ask for her permission before snooping around her room?"

Artie stopped abruptly and looked up from the device. For the first time, he seemed to really consider the validity of another person's remark, and almost questioningly, he held eye contact with Claudia.

In the past ten minutes, she had gone from accepting the possibility of her own insanity, in confronting what appeared to be a vividly surreal hallucination - and then believing panic-stricken in her own part as the victim of a brainwashing kidnapping heist. And now, her supposed kidnappers had coordinated in a fact-finding mission in order to determine where she, now a stranger, had come from. Her stomach had receded into the shape of a prune. Her entire body had drained and dried out.

"It's not my room," she muttered, "Do whatever you need to do."

With a quick glance at Steve, who gave a confirming nod, Artie clicked on the device and headed out, carpet bag in tow. A shimmering beam of red light extended out from the gadget, before he turned the corner.

Steve and Claudia were left in silence at the kitchen table. Her head had stopped spinning, and the quietude lent her a surreal sense of reassurance.

"So, you know me." Steve ventured.

"Apparently I don't."

Steve folded his hands on the table. "How did you think you knew me?"

Claudia mimicked his posture. "You're an irritating kid from a Buddhist cult. You've got shaggy hair, you wear hemp jackets, and I'm sure that's not the only hemp derivative you have."

Steve let out a short laugh, and shook his head in disbelief. "I don't buy it, but I have to. Nothing you've said up to this point has been a lie."

"Glad you trust me."

"It's not trust, it's…an ability I've always had."

"What, you're a human lie detector?" Claudia asked.

"Yeah." Steve smiled briefly, yet it quickly faded. Claudia sensed some profound discomfort in him, as if this were a conversation he wished he wasn't having. His whole demeanor, and his tone were too much like that of a person consoling a loved one. Having to repeat forgotten facts, and fill in the gaps in the person's memory. To someone who might've just woken up from a coma.

Horror swept over Claudia for a terrifying half-second, until she shoved the thought back into her subconscious. Not the time. Taking a deep breath, she grabbed the reins of the conversation and steered it back to reality.

"The Steve I know, he's completely oblivious. He's one of the NuBuddhists, a Zen offshoot I think. It's completely cultish, but the university puts up with it, because of the 'principle of philosophical freedom.' They're obsessed with the idea that the universe is incomprehensible, and because of that, their goal is to act incomprehensible too. They think that to try and act normally – well, rationally - is a lie, like trying to make sense out a senseless world." Claudia paused. Steve's expression was unreadable, the veracity of her statements apparently washing over him. "Er, I'm guessing it's not your kind of sutra."

Something buzzed on the table. Steve's concentration broke, and he felt around, nudging aside plates and scattering muffin crumbs until he found the buzzing device. It was a large, brass tin, something that you might put mints in, though it rattled from inside. Steve held it vertically and the lid opened on a hinge. A voice spoke through the device.

"How's Claudia?"

"Sitting right here, if you want to ask her." Steve said with a quick glance up at the girl. Claudia gave a slight eyeroll, and she picked at the edge of a piece of toast, scratching off crumbs onto the table.

Pete's voice rattled through the device. "Well, Myka's pet theory is that she's been replaced by some sort of Alice-type demon."

Myka's voice cut in. "I mean a trapped consciousness could have escaped from an artifact, and exchanged places with Claudia's consciousness, and the real Claudia could be somewhere, in some thing. It would explain the inconsistencies in her memory-"

"Myka, a lot of things could explain that-" Pete's voice rang out.

"And," Myka's took over, "I looked up the place she was talking about, the place she said she lived. Russell Hall at NU? No university that uses those initials has a building under that name."

Pete's voice came back insistently. "Well we don't know that, it could be some obscure, artsy sort of college that only young people know about. Claude has a mysterious past."

"That doesn't make any sense, she said she lives at that university now," Myka retorted.

The two agents' voices broke through each other's, the argument escalating as Steve closed his eyes in apparent frustration. It seemed, for all purposes, as though he were counting slowly - lips moving along with the numbers, though it ultimately failed in its intent.

"Just shut up, both of you," he snapped. "The Claudia that's here, and I repeat, she is sitting right here - she hasn't told a single lie in the time she's been here. Everything she's saying is true, or at least, she completely, unquestioningly believes it to be true. She's not trying to deceive us."

There was silence on the other end. Claudia began to think that the transmission had ended, yet Steve still had his eyes glued on the radio.

Myka's voice came through quietly, "Steve, we realize that you feel close to Claudia-"

"That is a non-issue," Steve hissed, "You two aren't even listening, you're just babbling on over each other. Pete, what do your vibes say?"

Claudia shifted her chair around the perimeter of the table, scooting along until she could see the inside of the tin. A round screen showed a black and white, real-time video of Pete's and Myka's faces, as they looked in unease through the screen.

Pete seemed to notice Claudia's face peering around the edge of his vision, and he locked eyes with hers. He sighed, and his eyes flicked back to Steve's.

"No bad vibes. This Claudia's a good kid, even if she isn't ours."