Harry also looked nice when he donned the new clothes.

They decided to stay a little longer in the townhouse so Harry could fully recover and get his wits about him. During that time, they discussed what the hell happened at Midwich (glossing right over every single event they had no want to talk about). The backpack was emptied and they went through clues new and old, picking their brains to try to tie any two and two together. Harry wrote an outline in his memo pad, jotting down their theories and observations for later referencing, and James leafed through the other for any possible hints.

After they were somewhat satisfied, the topic turned to the girl. James relayed all he knew and thought, and Harry described how she'd saved their ass. He grimly told James about her face, not quite knowing if he was more disturbed by how she melted and revealed her untouched features, or the fact that he recognized a total stranger. But, as tradition went, their speculation hit a wall.

On the other side of the coin, what they did know was that she had been intelligent, resourceful, and even seemed to be independent from Silent Hill. James couldn't confirm anything about her being a turncoat to the town's cause, though he agreed that her interceptions appeared deliberate. Her interest in them also seemed too personal for her to be a plant. It didn't add up. Whatever, whomever, she'd been, they were indebted and had no perceivable way to return it.

Due to his cryptic obligations, James once more withheld certain tidbits of information that would've likely been crucial for Harry to know - including the ghostly event he'd had upstairs. Lying to his face had always been easy and, because he wasn't entirely dead to the world (should he be so unfortunate), he'd retained some marks of his conscience. In light of that, omitting some things helped solidify the reasoning that if Harry didn't know, he wouldn't be in as much danger. It left them both far better off, and James felt comforted by it, as pernicious as it could be.

There was one thing that got James lightheartedly balking. Harry had been rather animated in describing how he'd run back for his pipe. James interrupted him to laugh.

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, seriously!" he'd grinned. "That thing is a fucking heirloom, James. I'm not leaving anywhere without it."

"So you risked your life, and our life, to go back and get an heirloom."

Harry'd spread his hands and shrugged. "I'm sentimental to a fault. I'm gonna pass it down to Heather one day, and if she's anything like me, she'll keep it around until she's dead in the ground. Maybe be buried with it. Hell, screw the cookie jar," he recanted, a smirk indenting his cheek, "stuff my ashes in that thing and gimme a whirl.

"Besides," he added with a wink, "Silent Hill likes me too much to want to kill me just yet, don't you think?"

That was some pretty morbid humor James hadn't expected from him.

When Harry was finally ready to leave, they consulted the maps. They had two; the original small one, and the much larger and detailed one Harry had found a while back. Since they couldn't decide where to go, it was decided just to wing it; the maps got folded and put away in the leather jacket.

All set, they stepped out of the townhouse and were met with the sight of the smoldering school, its remaining walls in ruin - and a mourner at its former welcoming path.

The charred man whose hands were permanently sealed to a little girl and a rusty pipe stood sobbing in front of the fallen institution. He showed them his back, masking his cries into the crook of his arm.

It was a sight that Harry could have done without. Seeing that sardonic joke paying his respects to Midwich made Harry's stomach acidic with contempt. His dark mirror already dwelled as an inflamed abscess in his brain. The mere "existence" of this clone and his macabre, insulting accessories was already a viciously low blow. It was indisputable that his presence at Midwich was no coincidence.

Harry fucking hated Silent Hill.

The survivors didn't linger. Harry's eyes were trained on the ground as they escaped the scene. James ignored and selfishly digested the father's grisly shame.

When the wails dimmed and the crunch beneath their soles were the only sound, Harry exhaled a drained sigh. They'd walked some blocks north when the older man suspiciously squinted at the shops around them. His treads came to a stop, so James paused too.

"What?"

Harry looked behind them; then both ways; then ahead. He dug the maps out of his jacket and unfolded them, furrowing his brow. "We're on Midwich, right?"

"Dunno. Didn't look at the sign. Why?"

Not addressing the question, the author followed the sidewalk to the corner to look up at the name of the street. Again he studied the map, the street, and back where they'd come. He sucked on his tongue and met James's eyes.

James inclined his head when Harry strode southbound past him. Grunting to himself, he caught up and shadowed him back to the intersection. Harry looked up at the yellow light turning red; then looked at the other light, newly green. The maps got shuffled, snapped, and Harry's lip distastefully curled. "Hang on."

Sighing hard, James unwillingly played Harry's indecisive game of ring-around-the-rosie in the streets. He expected a damn answer already; this was starting to pester him. When they returned, and Harry did his scrutinizing, he pivoted to James at last.

"The town's changed."

James shared the wrinkled brow. "Huh?"

Harry offered the maps, which the conduit walked over to accept. "The streets don't match. That back there was Matheson," he explained. "Which checks out. But this," he continued, pointing up at the sign hanging from its post, "is supposed to be Finney. And I don't know if you remember how many blocks we passed to get up here, but kinda felt it took longer than before. We're on Midwich and Levin," Harry stated, thumbing over his shoulder. "Levin is supposed to go north to south; now it's east to west."

".. hm."

"And Finney is missing from that other map altogether." Harry placed his hand in his pocket. "It's acting all screwy."

So it was. James compared and contrasted for himself. "Hm. You jinxed it."

He gave him a once-over. "Huh?"

"Remember when we came in?" A glance told him no. "I asked if you'd remember everything. You got sarcastic and said something about hoping the town layout wouldn't change and called it reverse psychology. Well.." James used the pamphlets to gesture at the sign hanging from the stoplight. "You jinxed it."

Harry drew back his head, blinking as it came back to him, and rapped the steel on his leg. "Motherfucker." James shrugged in his peripheral vision. "And I don't have any wood to knock on."

"I thought knocking on wood was to keep a jinx from happening."

"It's also to reverse it." He wrinkled his nose. "Son of a bitch."

James's eyes crawled over the map, the paper crinkling under his thumbs. "Well, we have any idea where we wanna go now?"

"Not a clue!" he dramatically sighed. "Might as well pick a direction and see what's changed. Judging by that map, a hell of a lot. That's huge."

James handed it off again. "Looks like a real town. That other map was pretty small."

"About the same as South Vale though, huh?" Harry shook snow off the page. "Seems like all the neighborhoods are supposed to be tiny. Makes it feel weird. There are all these townhouses," he casually waved his finger at the buildings, "and I dunno if you saw any, but I don't remember seeing an actual house around here. Apartment buildings, sure, there's tons of them, but an actual house?"

"Townhouses are houses."

"I get that. But you know what I mean, right? I have yet to see a one-story, white picket fence, actual house."

James bit and sucked on his cheek. That was a weird, but truthful, observation. "Yeah.. now that you mention it.." He cast Harry a confused squint. "But what's that got to do with anything?"

"There's a lot of living space stacked together for a town this small. Like it's trying to cram people in. No suburbia. Even in small towns there're separations, places where it's more secluded and away from the metropolitan area."

"You might be overthinking this, Harry."

"Possibly. It just feels off for some reason. I feel like there're too many people and not enough businesses to accommodate. Work for. Especially back when we were working with a smaller area. I dunno. Something about it doesn't add up to me."

"Maybe people commute."

"Sure. I dunno how many more neighborhoods there are though, if you can call them that."

"I dunno either."

"Maybe they head out to Brahms or something. Eh. You might have a point, there. Still feels off."

"Yeah."

Harry clicked his tongue. "I guess we'll see what's different now, but even when it was original, it just felt like there were too many people living in this place. .. jeez. I'm not making any sense, huh? Maybe I am overthinking it. Eh, forget it." He looked at James. "You said you visited before, right?"

James threw him a wary look. "Yeah. But we stuck to South Vale."

"Is it kosher to ask if you'd noticed a change or anything? When you came back?"

That was a very good question. Snowflakes dusted their heads and shoulders while they picked up their leisurely pace, and James leafed through his memory files. The concentration on the conduit's face gave Harry hope for a response; it might just take a hot minute. Or five. Harry was no judge; time warped this place pretty badly. His dark eyes went to the low grey sky above and watched white specks unhurriedly drift from the thick to the earth. He smiled.

"It's hard to say," James said a short time later, soft and confused. "I don't remember really paying attention when I got in. .. or at all. Honestly.. I can't remember how it looked before. It already felt familiar, or.." He absentmindedly rolled his hand in the air. ".. complete, I guess."

"Complete."

"I dunno how to describe it, Harry."

"No, no," he assured. "It's fine. I know. It's just that 'complete' is a hell of a word to use." James curtly sighed beside him, but Harry shook his finger back and forth. "Not in a bad way. Don't get me mistaken."

"Then what about it?"

Harry drew his lips inward, his eyes flicking up at the snow for help putting his thoughts to words. "I think it's actually very descriptive. 'Complete' is intimate."

"Intimate."

"Personal."

"How does that relate?"

He blew a mild breath between his teeth and lip. "Because when you say that it was 'complete,' it draws a very personal, deep understanding of the place that no one else can grasp; and at the same time, I understood what you meant. You know how you can read a book and relate to things that have zero application in your life, or things you've never felt? It's like that. But it's still too obscure to get a full grip on it because using 'complete' draws a line I just can't cross," Harry said. "But it's vivid."

James side-eyed him. Harry sounded like a few screws were loose. "I don't follow."

"Okay, lemme try to rephrase it: the way you said it, it sounded almost like you completed the town simply by walking in. Without you, it wasn't complete. You were the last piece of the puzzle. Now maybe that's not exactly comforting or what you want to hear," he added, vaguely bobbing the pipe in his direction, "considering whatever brought you here. But it's poignant. It felt familiar, like it was supposed to be that way, right? Correct me if I'm wrong."

".. yeah. It did."

"So there. You can't recall the place being any other way than it was when you walked in. You'd been there before, but it was like a dream." Harry inclined his head to glance at the resident. "South Vale was 'home' before it became your home. It was complete. Or completed when you walked in, and that's why you felt like that. Does that make any sense?"

James was damn uncomfortable by Harry's perceptiveness. A moment ago the so-called author gabbed like he was reading a speech off a faulty prompter, only to have his clever improvisation skills save face in the nick of time. In spite of that, Harry's dissection felt like he'd taken a pocket knife and scooped out a piece of a hard, black clot in a taboo corner of James's psyche to analyze right in the palm of his hand. His observation was bizarrely spot-on.

"Yeah."

"So saying it was 'complete' is a hell of a way to describe it. That's solid gold, James. Heh. I'll have to remember that."

James lowered and averted his eyes. As established, James never liked being given compliments. Harry's praise felt abrasive as dried barnacles and demeaning as slipping in the mud and landing face-first. His acclaim roused distrust for Harry; he didn't like the targeted way he was being picked at.

Silent Hill's expansion came rife with inconsistencies. Their walkabout uncovered geography where some parts of the maps matched, and others did not. Better yet, in venturing out further east towards Central Silent Hill, they came to find out that there were pockets where neither were accurate.

"Seems like it's in a transition phase," Harry'd observed under his breath.

James had only provided a "Hm."

Harry suggested that they take a break from this part of town and go see what was new and possibly improved (he said dryly, sharing a sarcastic glance between them) across the bridge. They strolled by a park landmarking the beginning of the overpass, and paused to reflect on it (as well as the displacement of Bachman Road). Parks were a new sight to the Old Silent Hill they knew. Its name on the town chart was illegible behind a starting 'A'; Harry wagered it was because it wasn't done "loading." They'd come back to it later.

It was nice to look at in passing, though.

The trek across too lasted longer than previous. Welcome parties of slimy, burned women and scurrying, grounded non-people from South Vale were poorly received. In the midst of battle and death James heard her call for him, and he shot a glance at Harry. His companion never seemed to hear her and yet, James wondered when he would - a thought that he immediately gagged.

He'd best keep focus.

Central Silent Hill sure did open up. Comparing the maps this time was pointless; the innumerable contradictions were turning them cockeyed. Miffed and confounded as they were, these problems made Harry's theory that the town was shifting more plausible. Needless to say, any enthusiasm for it would have to take a rain check.

Toluca Mall was their main interest. Winding through the remodeled maze treated them to a fresh lineup of boarded up shops complementing the abandoned streets. Like all locales in Silent Hill, the businesses here didn't escape the hex weather-rot, loneliness, and spurned memories. But unlike the others, Harry and James identified an irregularity that couldn't be viewed on a map.

There was a tone to the shops around here. They hosted an eerie personality, like remnants of a bustling community left behind. Ordinary people lived their average lives here and their mark still permeated the air. For the first time, Silent Hill felt like it'd been a real, god-honest, lived-in town; and not a mausoleum.

What a conversation starter. Back in Old Silent Hill, Virginia's Bridals, Julio's Auto, the police station, the postal office and even the convenience stores, in retrospect, had been largely devoid of realism. They were empty; Harry didn't want to go so far as to call them 'set pieces,' but he couldn't liken them to anything else. James agreed. But it was undeniable: those stores were missing something that these had, and that was the feeling like there really had been life here before.

It was interesting and made a good enough chat to have along the relatively easy journey to the shopping hotspot.

"Man, I miss malls," Harry lamented on their approach. "They were amazing back in the eighties and nineties."

"Mm."

"You ever go? Hang out, see what's on sale at Sam Goody?"

"Sam Goody," James repeated under his breath, shaking his head and huffing a laugh. "Wow. That's a name I haven't heard in awhile."

Harry grinned. "Hey, it was a good place! Got some great music and videos there. It was definitely a favorite. How about you?"

Predictably, James shrugged his shoulder. "I didn't really go to malls, unless I had to."

"Tch, c'mon. Not even for the arcade?" He wrinkled his nose. "If they had one. Arcades kinda got phased out, at least around my area.."

"Nah. Too busy."

"Too busy to go, or too busy in there?"

"Too busy in there."

"You even like video games or anything?"

"Not really." He glimpsed at Harry, feeling the disappointment. "I liked pinball, though."

That perked him back up. "Yeah? Have I been hanging out with Tommy?"

Harry was awarded a small smile. "No, I'm no pinball whiz. Just a casual."

James, in turn, received a grin aglow. "Aw. Got me all excited and star struck for a second, there."

"Sorry."

"Doubt that. That's cool, though," he said, putting his face and cupped hand to the dirty glass door. He squinted into the dark, hummed, and tried the push bar. It didn't give, but its partner did, and with an 'aha!' he swung it inward. Harry propped it open and jerked his head. "Casuals first."

James walked past him into the deserted mall, his cohort close behind. The door hissed closed. Harry shouldered his pipe and sniffed. "Well, never too early for Christmas shopping. What's on your list?"

James was done talking. The father rolled his eyes and trailed him to the information kiosk.

The mall was large and boasted two floors and four wings. Anchor stores capped the end of each wing, all recognizable and of which Harry had quips for. A food court sat tucked into the northern section, so the diagram claimed, and a lounge area close by. There was also a playground just ahead of them, but the best news was the arcade that had fashioned itself as the playground's neighbor. Harry beamed.

"Hey! Wouldn't you know," he said, tapping the dingy plastic. "There's our first stop."

James's eyes fluttered over their upward roll. "We're not going to the arcade, Harry."

"Don't be a wet blanket, James," he tutted. "You do enough of that as it is."

James sounded pretty crabby. "Excuse me?"

"You're excused," Harry nonchalantly replied, ambling to the old school gaming kingdom. James stared flatly at his back, none too eager to join him.

"It makes noise, Harry."

" You make noise. I make noise. We both make noise," said the smirk over his shoulder. "So what's the deal?"

"Attracting monsters. How many times—"

"Pah," he shunned, pawing the air. "We'll deal with 'em. We always do, no big deal."

"Yeah, no big deal until it bites us in the ass."

"Pffffsshhhhh," Harry wisely argued. "After what we just dealt with, it'll be a piece of cake. Knock on wood!" he avowed, rapping his knuckles on the plywood nailed to the large window. His partial turn and shit-eating smile met James's scowl. "C'mon. I wanna see the pinball whiz at work."

The arcade door was conveniently unlocked. James gruffly sighed. Harry disappeared into the dark and for the umpteenth time, the conduit wanted to leave and let the idiot handle everything himself. But the idea of one round of pinball sounded nice, should the electricity be on in there. He tentatively weighed the shoulds and should-nots. Impulsivity put them in grave danger and yet...

Eh, he decided, crossing through the playground to the arcade, if Silent Hill's gonna play pinball with them, he might as well try to enjoy a round that he could control.

And so ignoring his gut instincts, he stepped inside.