Taking the door marked Hagith, Harry gripped his weapon tightly. His heart beat heavily in his chest. The flashlight illuminated an elevator. Choosing the second floor, he began his ascent.

The doors opened on to a jewelry store. The display cases were all smashed in, the jewelry missing. Something stirred in the corner.

He aimed the light and the gun toward the sound.

A bang.

A bullet past his ear.

He fell.

"Harry?"

"Lydia?" asked a shell shocked Harry.

"What if I had hit you?" she cried.

"You didn't. Don't think like that."

"Christ. Thank Christ your flashlight affected my aim. We never know what's coming next."

His light caught Rachel's face. The women had stayed together. He lowered the beam.

"Did you find your girl?" asked the nurse.

"No." he sighed.

"Did you find the others?" Lydia seemed woozy. She looked very pale.

Harry hesitated. It was difficult to form the words. He'd developed a respect for Briggs and desperately wanted to help Lisa, watching them suffer had been very hard. But Cybil…

He composed himself.

"They didn't make it." He tried to make it sound as gentle as he could.

"What do you mean?" asked Rachel.

"My friend, Briggs' ex-wife, she had the same parasite as that doctor. I had to shoot her. She died in my arms. And Briggs is dead too."

"Oh God, poor Ed." Tears began to form in Rachel's eyes, "I left him. I couldn't carry them both and I wanted to give Lydia some treatment. It was just along the corridor and I was coming straight back but - "

Harry sat with them. He took Rachel's hand and squeezed it. Lydia sat propped against the wall, wrapped in a hospital blanket but shivering all the same.

"We went to the emergency room but it wasn't there. We came to this store instead. How can that be Harry?"

"I think this town is alive. It seems to change on its own whim."

Lydia's teeth were chattering.

"When we tried to go back, reception had gone too. It was the second floor corridor. Ed was gone." said the nurse.

"It's not your fault." he soothed.

"Where was he?" Lydia's voice had dropped to a whisper.

"I saw him above me. We talked…Kaufmann came in; he knew some things about Kaufmann and…

Kaufmann shot him."

Rachel was visibly shocked. Her head shook.

"They were arguing about something that they had agreed to cover up. The doctor fired. I let off a warning shot and he ran, but Briggs died from his injuries."

"Michael wouldn't just murder somebody like that!"

"Rachel, I'm telling the truth. He is a very dangerous man."

"No. I don't believe it."

"Ed talked about his daughter, how the coroner said they found her body. How they changed their minds after a visit from Kaufmann and other members of the Order."

"The coroner could have made a mistake."

"You knew he was a member of the Order?"

"Yes. He was trying to gather evidence from the inside."

"And that's how he stalled Ed. He didn't want him to make a fuss about his daughter and placated him with promises they could get the whole organization if he just…waited."

"Oh dear…Michael said something similar to me about Wish House a few years ago.

I was sure the children were being abused by one of the staff but he said everyone was involved. If we complained they would just fire him and the abuse would continue. I…"

Rachel trailed off and looked away. She was on the edge of tears again. He dreaded telling her the next piece of news.

"I saw Lisa again too. I think she had the parasite. I think – I think it killed her."

Rachel pressed her eyes together tightly before slowly opening them.

"No Harry. It didn't kill her. Lisa's been dead for a long time. I've accepted that now."

"I know you don't believe me, but I just saw her, she was covered in blood."

"Lisa has been appearing in my dreams for the last seven years. She looks exactly the same as the last time I saw her. Wearing the same red cardigan. 23 years old. Not aged a day.

We have the same conversation, the one we had the last time I saw her. She was a mess. I figured she was getting addicted to something but I didn't know what.

I tried to be kind but I was so mad at her for hurting herself like that. I was a little hard on her.

She said she would get help…but I never saw her again…not in real life.

The dream, the nightmare, began not long after she disappeared. It occurred so frequently that I began to realize I was dreaming.

I would try to control it. Try to steer the conversation. Ask her why we had to keep going over the same things. Ask if we could talk about something else. Lisa would just get upset or angry. Sometimes she'd leave. I'd wake up and my heart would break all over again.

I confided in Michael and he sent me for therapy.

The more I talked about her, the less she appeared in my dreams. I didn't see her for a long time.

When you came and started talking about her…I've seen her every night since. It's torture. To see this girl I know and love so well and know that's she's not real. She's dead. To live those last moments with her over and over again.

I believe this place is hell and we've all been sent here for eternal damnation. That girl I saw is a ghost, come to torment me."

Harry was staggered. He felt that he should apologize, but didn't know how to go about it. He had pushed Rachel too hard on the subject of her friend.

"I really have seen your friend. The more I think about her…when we've met…she doesn't remember what we've talked about sometimes. Her behavior is erratic.

And she looked very young the first time I met her, much younger than the last - "

Harry stopped speaking before going over the gruesome details of his last meeting with the poor nurse.

"This is a place," she moaned, "where your nightmares come true."

Slumped against the wall now, Lydia was not moving. Harry leaned over to see her better. Spidery purple veins crossed waxy white skin, just like all the others. Shallow chest movements gave him some hope.

"There isn't much time left for her." whispered Rachel, "She's already suffered a few bouts of arrhythmia. That is a late stage symptom from the PVT. If she doesn't get the medicine soon it will be too late."

"Wait, there's a cure?"

"Yes. Michael wanted to keep that quiet too.

It's at the experimental stage. If the patient can tolerate it, it rapidly reverses the symptoms in the patient. And it reduces the craving for another hit.

It's still a work in progress though. There have been complete recoveries. But other patients have become comatose. Others have…others have died."

"He was using these people as guinea pigs?"

"These people were dying from long-term effects of PTV sickness or overdoses. If Michael hadn't tried to cure them, then every last one would be dead.

He has saved at least four people. The last batch was less successful. And the ingredients are hard to come by."

"I wish we had some. I might have saved Cybil. Better risk an unproven cure than have to shoot my friend."

"Michael is the only one who knows where it is. It kept going missing from his desk, so he had to hide it.

He was afraid that the local drug dealers would find out."

"Rachel, it was after Briggs challenged Kaufmann about the local drug racket that he shot him."

"Michael is against drugs. He has seen, first hand, the damage they can do.

He wouldn't get involved with something like that."

"He didn't deny it. Briggs went into specifics about who was involved."

"Fabrications. Slander."

"I saw a package of white powder at the Indian Runner, one of the places Briggs mentioned."

"Circumstantial at best Harry. I think you-"

Lydia stirred. They had gotten louder in the heat of the argument. They waited to see if they had woken her.

She continued to sleep.

"Will she become…like them?" Harry asked, quietly.

"I don't think she's taken enough. One joint hardly constitutes an overdose."

"Is that what she told you?"

"Yes. Why?"

"She told me she smokes it every night until she passes out. It's the only way to stop the hallucinations."

"Oh my…Doctor Kaufmann was a little cagey about her blood work too.

That's not good news Harry. "

He nodded. After what happened with Cybil, he was frightened he would have to kill Lydia too.

"Would you see if you could find some food and water for her? Anything will do, she just needs calories to help her keep going.

The water is vital because she's been sweating so much with fever."

"I'll see what I can find. If I can find my way back."

He stood.

"Don't forget, if Lydia is sleeping, or if she…changes, you'll need to be in charge of the gun."

Rachel started to object, but Harry closed her argument off.

"Not just for Lydia. If your former colleagues get in here, you'll have to defend yourself."

"I just hope I can shoot straight."

"And watch out for Kaufmann."

Now she stood.

"Michael Kaufmann is my friend and I want you to stop disparaging him!"

"After everything we've talked about, you're still defending him?"

"There is an explanation for all of it. I just need to talk to him is all."

"We're not going to agree on this. Just be careful, it's all I ask."

He tossed the diary down where they had been sitting. He grumbled a good luck and headed out to find provisions.

Harry reached inside his pocket and pulled out Lisa's diary and her amulet, offering them to Rachel.

With a look of shock, she refused them, muttering about painful memories. Taking a brooch from her lapel, she threw it at Harry.

"I don't want that either. It was hers..."

The wings of Mercury sat on a silver staff. A snake was entwined around it. Harry picked it up.

Rachel eyed Lisa's other personal effects.

"Where did those come from?" she asked.

"I told you. I've been seeing Lisa Garland regularly since the crash. Whether she's real or not, she's helped me. She would have wanted you to see this."

He tossed the diary down where they had been sitting. He grumbled a good luck and headed out to find provisions.