Strobed red and white flashed in quick succession. The once immaculate, solitary whiteness was tarred by smoke. Thick, suffocating plumes sifted through the gaps in the tightly sealed doors and windows, through the hidden cracks. It seemingly exposed flaws in what was otherwise a perfect front. No matter how pristine on the surface, something was always rotten underneath, festering.

It was the logic one Helios Beckett lived and breathed. And right now, the situation had descended into chaos once it grew far out of their control. Unquenchable, spectral green flames licked the air and consumed everything in their path. A ghost undoubtedly started it. Just who in particular was the big question. Helios knew it had to be the tall ghost he saw in one of the halls earlier.

The ghost in question had a unique color combination of pale green and white and a handsome face. Helios smiled to himself. He took joy in the ghost's surprise when he saw right through his invisibility clearer than a day.

Silly little things, thinking they're so clever. Helios' pet had tried the same thing, only to end up on his knees faster than he could blink. He had pretty scarlet eyes and a cute face for a ghost… when he was down.

The smile widened further than one could imagine. Speaking of his dear pet-

"Dr. Beckett!" A warbled voice cut across Helios' musings—the irritating vocoder in those armored suits.

Helios hardly acknowledged the armored agent behind him. The dark hallway continually flooded with flashing lights. He was silent for several moments, only tilting his head back, deep in thought. His strawberry-blonde hair fell back, perfectly framing his eyes.

"Yes…?" Helios inquired slowly.

Heavy armor rattled as the nameless agent shifted around uncomfortably. He reached for his neck and scratched it between the suit's seams. Indistinguishably faceless like the others, but still an individual all the same. Most only let their true colors fly when they were alone. Helios may not see it; his skin prickled, and he sensed a rise in the man's body temperature.

Good. At least he remembered precisely what would happen to him if he got too confident. It was all about the bark, and then they didn't even have any teeth to bite with.

"The prototype's been secured and ready for transport, just as you ordered…" the agent rattled off in one breath.

"But…" Helios prompted. Only then, in a flash of white, did his unfocused eyes become sharp.

"Your uh… specimen escaped, sir."

Silence followed the agent's words. The flickering of red and white warped the surrounding space, and it appeared as if two different dimensions existed simultaneously with every blip.

The space between himself and Helios stretched out. The agent's hairs on his neck stood right up, and his breathing quickened. Hastily, he bowed his head down, just as instructed.

Slowly and carefully, Helios turned on his heel, his demeanor strikingly calm. He was no longer smiling.

"It's of no major loss if we get him back, no matter what it takes," Helios said.

The agent quietly gulped, an uncomfortable lump lodged in his throat. Beads of sweat trickled down his face, and his suit got hotter by the minute.

"Ye-yes, sir!" He stumbled with a quick salute. Then, he fled with the force of prey fleeing from a predator. His boots pounded on the somewhat slippery floor, almost tripping over himself. The pockets of darkness between the lights were his only sanctuary, Helios fading into the distance the further he got away.

In the blink of an eye, the agent careened around a tight corner, safely out of Helios' haunting stare. Stuck in the dark, not a sliver of his body was visible. Even long after the mad scientist was left to his devices, he was overwhelmed with dread. He never wanted to be alone in Helios' vicinity again.

For several long minutes, Helios stared unblinkingly into the emptiness. His posture stood too still to be mistaken for a statue. It wasn't that he was flesh and blood while actual statues were stone. A thin, wide smile split across his face once more.

Grotesquely twisting and curling, lips so thin they might as well have disappeared into his skin. It pulled at his facial muscles to the extent it burned from the strain. It was a single, thin black line that expressed so little, yet it said so much. Glazed eyes focused on nothing but the empty expanse.

"My beautiful pet… I will get you back where you belong," Helios said to no one, "I've waited far too long to have you in my grasp again, Kai."

—

The longer the clock ticking ensued, the longer the hours stretched. Night arrived in slow succession, flooding the stark room in darkness.

Its only light source was the buzz of the dim panels above, casting a cold, white shroud. Light and darkness bounced off each other, whereas light glared, shadows deflected. Different lights, such as the glow of the various signs around the room, didn't do much, designed to be more visible in the dark.

At the moment, a small group of five occupied the ER waiting room. In various postures all around, they kept to themselves and were deep in thought. The tense quiet was occasionally interrupted by indistinguishable babble from the only television in the room.

Jazz was seated next to a shabby wooden table stand with magazines piled on top of it. All varied in age, with wrinkles and yellowing of the pages. Her hands shook violently while she attempted to read a particularly outdated psych magazine.

Terminology Jazz was familiar with jumped around the pages; she caught herself wondering why she was getting psychosis and psychopathy mixed up.

Her eyes flicked over to the double doors for what seemed to be the hundredth time tonight, apprehensive when they didn't swing open. No one had come in or out since Dan brought Kai in earlier. Jazz wondered just how bad of a state Kai was in to be in emergency care for hours.

Her gaze shifted to Dan, who positioned himself in the darkest corner. The shadow obscured his face, hiding his feelings about all of this. The only indicator was his ghostly aura flaring every so often.

But Jazz wasn't a ghost. She wished he'd talk to her instead of hiding away. A thought niggled at her that Dan knew exactly what she'd do if he didn't. It wasn't that difficult to talk about your feelings. Jazz rationalized to herself.

"Okay, I'm not sitting here in the dark!" Danny's voice interrupted Jazz's musings. "Are you going to tell us what's happening, or are we just going to sit here twiddling our fingers?"

Turning her gaze in the other direction, she saw Danny leaning forward in his seat, his arms on his knees. The glow of the television next to him highlighted his annoyed expression.

Jazz took a moment to gather her thoughts before answering. The information had been scrambled in her mind from today's chaos. However, as soon as she opened her mouth, another voice beat her to it.

"Do you mean right from the beginning? It all started with a ghost who went missing—" Dan straightened his posture, and his eyes had a sharp glint.

"We know he went missing weeks ago," Danny interrupted, and he jumped up. His hands balled into fists, and his shoulders hunched up.

"

Did you?" Dan asked with his brow raised.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Danny shot back.

"What I mean…" Dan said, emerging from his dark corner, surprisingly calm, "It is that you put in as little effort as you could in searching for him. You acted like it was normal for Kai to be gone that long."

"In case you haven't noticed, genius, Kai tends to disappear for days."

"And you don't think six weeks is too long?" Dan approached Danny, towering over him.

Then, Jazz decided to intervene before the two got into a fistfight. With her entire body, she sprang out of her seat, got in between them, put her hands on both of their chests and pushed them apart.

A heavy pause, no one dared to take a breath. Maddie and Jack watched from the background in cautious silence. They trusted their children to resolve this amongst themselves.

The uncomfortable starkness of the waiting room closed in on them, and a vague sense of the temperature dropped to cold. Jazz shut her eyes and inhaled deeply. Her chest ached, and her throat became scratchy. The lights seemed to dim as she spoke.

"Let's all take a breath…" she said slowly, "and talk about this like adults." She leveled a stare at Danny. "So much happened today that I'm still processing it; you have got to stop jumping the gun and sit down."

Jazz took an assertive step towards him, prompting Danny to sit back in his chair. It creaked quietly under his weight. He wisely kept his mouth shut, knowing he'd never hold his own against her in a verbal match.

"And you," she said, rounding on Dan, "need to calm down and stop charging at everything like a bull in a china shop. Kai is safe; they aren't going to hurt him anymore; focus on that."

The overhead panels buzzed louder than the silence following Jazz's words. The claustrophobic dimness evaporated, and she breathed heavily after her short tirade. The waiting room seemed to space out, giving the impression of the floor tilting.

Jazz's legs shook violently with a sense of falling. Streaks of green highlighted the room, and a crack of ecto-energy snaked through Dan's fingers. His fist was tight and shaking.

Jazz's form trembled, the gun holster strapped to her hip weighed down, and her skin tingled like an electric current coursed through. Even as she spoke, its presence persistently made itself known.

"Dan, it's okay…" Her fingers uncontrollably twitched. "It's okay."

Finally, his glowing eyes met hers. It was just the two of them for a few seconds, like back in those empty hallways. Those few short moments showed a tiny crack in Dan's otherwise hardened exterior.

Then, Jazz returned to reality when Dan flexed his hand with a loud huff. The ecto-energy fizzled out. Dan turned away with his back to everyone, his face obscured in a shadow cast by the dim light. He held his hand to massage his forehead, his eyes shut tight.

Exhaling weakly, Jazz slumped back into her seat. Above her, the ceiling stretched upwards, further than her eyes could see. A blink later, it was back to its normal proportions. She rubbed her eyes, which she realized were heavy with exhaustion. Unpleasant sterile smells burned her nose when she inhaled.

Jazz shuffled around in her seat, determined not to look at anything. The entire waiting room, from its sheer whiteness with little splashes of color to the minimalistic decor, reminded her too much of the GIW facility. Thinking about it made her feel ill, and her body tensed with heightened awareness.

Maybe she should've let Dan and Danny go at it. Then she'd have something else to focus on other than what was beginning to feel like a prison. A blast of audio made her jump in terror; her body shot upright and stiffly on the thin cushion. Heart pounding, Jazz listened.

"…authorities have yet to confirm the source of the inferno, which, as you see here…" the newscaster on the television babbled away. The screen displayed a heavily charred white building with structural collapse. It gave the impression of a melted marshmallow, which Jazz giggled at before she quickly went silent.

"A running theory is that it was sabotage. The path of the inferno shows it started from the inside."

"I wonder how that happened." Danny glared in Dan's direction.

Jazz decided to pretend she didn't hear that. Her gaze expectantly went over to the double doors.

Still nothing.

—

Multiple sets of eyes watched him. The fact that they were the only ones in the waiting room didn't help; it was like putting the spotlight on Dan. Perhaps he should've left when he had the chance.

The longer Dan stayed in this stupid room, the more agitated he became. His chest tightened, and hot and acidic anger jumped to his throat. He began to pace around. Anything was preferable to the unbearable stillness. Eyes watched like a hawk, fangs slightly bared, like a wild animal in a cage.

At one point, Dan warily watched the double doors. Occasional silhouettes passed by. He half-expected them to be Kai on his way out. Time came to a standstill the more he watched, despite knowing Kai wasn't coming out of this unscathed. A thought niggled in Dan's mind, he ignored the little voice speaking to him.

Kai was going to be okay. He had to be alright.

You don't know that.

It wasn't the first time he got so badly beaten—neither of them.

You weren't made to be invincible.

Dan fisted his hands. He cared little for the pain as his nails dug into his palms. He quashed them down, but the damning thoughts rammed through his mind. He was better than this. He wasn't about to let such… it was painful. Dan threw his head back with a low growl.

Unwanted and uncomfortably, actual words inundated him, so Dan never noticed the clatter of the double doors opening at last. A light whoosh of air flew into the room, followed by footsteps. Silence reigned for a few seconds before a voice broke it.

"Our newest patient – the ghost one – we still haven't gotten his name yet, but who brought him here?" A pale man stood in the doorway, the light casting an eerie silhouette behind him. It wasn't hard to miss the orange splatters on his scrubs.

Dan's head snapped in the direction of the man's voice. His face was stoic. However, his ears twitched in attention.

"I did…" Dan muttered out. Peering around, he briefly caught Jazz's gaze.

The surgeon stepped back, taken aback by his menacing presence.

"Name?" He asked in a steady voice.

"Dan."

"Surname?" Were they going to stand here all night asking questions? Dan glared.

"Alright… what's your relationship with my patient?" The surgeon tried a different question. He was beginning to see why those three interns were so shaken.

"He's my…" Dan said warily. "Partner."

"And your partner's name?"

"Kai." Dan gritted out, his fangs visibly bared. He tightened his fists to control the frustration surging through him.

"That's all I need right now. You can come to see him if you want," the surgeon said lightly; a foreboding sense came over him that he shouldn't provoke this ghost. "I'm Dr. Chambers, by the way."

As soon as the words came out, Dan broke into a stride. Brushing past Chambers and stalked down the hall. The narrow space closed in on him with its monotonous interior and infinite hallways.

It felt too small for him. Dan kept his gaze straight ahead and his head slightly tilted. He hardly paid attention to the overlapping voices far behind him.

"Hey… wait!" A singular voice behind Dan stopped him. He sighed heavily. "Do you know where you're going?"

Not, but Dan was confident he'd find Kai alone. Even though he reluctantly let Chambers take the lead, weaving through the halls, he traversed many times easily to an elevator. After one look inside, Dan decided to move to the next floor.

He flew up, his body transparent, and vanished through the ceiling, leaving a stunned surgeon behind. Dan found himself in an admittedly homier hallway. Softer colors decorated the walls, and less intense smells wafted. More furniture was dotted along the walls, situated near numbered rooms.

"Excuse me…" the same voice interrupted Dan's musing again. He turned on his heel, his ears tilted downward, and a slight scowl settled. "Down this way."

The other end of the hall wasn't as brightly lit, and staring into the semi-darkness didn't help with the discomfort. A particular hush baked itself into the walls and floors, marred by past occupants who desperately clung to that thin veil.

Some rooms were empty, and it didn't take a genius to figure out why. Others had privacy screens. Dan was led to the very last room at the end.

A few seconds later, Chambers let him through. A couple steps in, Dan stops abruptly in his tracks.

Where foreign, fuzzy emotions swirled in his chest were replaced by a stonewalled numbness. A faint spectral glow emitted from the furthest corner of the room, connected to an ectoplasmic IV drip, Kai lay supine in a hospital bed.

Outside, lights streaked through the cream-colored blinds, shrouding Kai's still form in a gentle glow, highlighting the blanket covering his entire body; soft breaths blew out of his mouth. Were it not for recent events, one would've thought it seemed peaceful.

Dan stared in utter silence.

That unease washed over him like a bucket of ice-cold water was dumped on him. Shaky, heavy breaths as his body stiffened, eyes anywhere but Kai's unnervingly motionless form.

Tiny droplets of sweat made their way down Dan's face. His throat burned with unbridled yet restrained rage. His mind swam far away. The room darkened around him as he ruminated on the thought of leaving.

Dan didn't exactly know why, but he did know he didn't want to be here right now.