* * *

  Sarah stared up at the clock again. It always made her nervous to know that she had a fixed amount of time to be in there.

  “Sarah?” Dr. Rutger called.

  She blinked at him, managed a smile. “Sorry, I got distracted. What was it?”

  “How has your relationship with Robyn been going now that you’ve been having less of those dreams where she tries to kill you? Are you still afraid of her?”

  Her sister still had to put up with her bouts of confusion and panic attacks. It wasn’t as if Robyn had much patience to begin with, so she was handling it better than expected.

  “I’m not afraid of her.” She wasn’t sure why Dr. Rutger thought she was. “And even in the dream it feels like she doesn’t wanna do it, so I never feel angry at her.”

  Dr. Rutger lifted his pen over his notebook. “Isn’t that odd? Why would she do it if she doesn’t want to?

  Sarah shrugged.

  “And it’s always in the same place?”

  “Yeah. Some kind of hospital I’m locked up in.”

  “And you still don’t know where that is?”

  “It’s not like knowing where I am is gonna help. If I could send myself a rescue mission within the dream, I doubt I’d need an address.”

  Dr. Rutger jotted something down in his notebook. “Have you been having any other dreams lately?”

  “I had the one with the dark corridor a couple more times.” She left out the part where she hadn’t been sleeping.

  “Were the same people with you there as well?”

  “There’s only one person. I can hear the others, but I can’t see them.”

  “And are there many of them?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “What about the person with you? Did you find out who that is?”

  She shook her head. “We’re all wearing masks for some reason.”

  She was embarrassed by the latter part of the dream, where she’d seen the blue-eyed stranger again. It wasn’t as if having seen his face or how worried he looked would make a difference.

  “And did you try asking them where you were and what you were doing?”

  “I thought I wrote it down, but now I can’t find it.”

  “And you don’t remember?”

  She shook her head. It was an odd name, but she couldn’t remember. It also wouldn’t matter.

  He outstretched a hand towards her notebook. “May I see it?”

  Sarah instinctively cradled it closer to her. “I’d rather not show you the jumbles the way they come out of my head.”

  His lips widened into the smile that had earned him the nickname Dr. Smiley from Robyn. “It’s fine. You don’t have to share it with me if you don’t feel ready.”

  She knew his words were meant to be soothing, but she tightened her grip on the notebook out of reflex. Though unable to explain why, she didn’t want to let it go.

  Dr. Rutger was still smiling, but his smile made her think of a mask.

  * * *

  Sarah peeled off the sticky note saying ‘dark hallway’ from where she’d attached it not two seconds earlier. It made a certain logical sense that fire, smoke, debris and an explosion would be placed together, but is that where did that hallway come in?

  “Can’t decide where that goes?” Pegasus asked, coming to stand right next to her.

  Sarah reflexively whirled. “Are you trying to give me a heart attack? When did you come in?”

  “I knocked and called your name just now.” He sounded like he was chiding her. “You were too engrossed in your staring contest with the wall to notice.”

  Pegasus had warned her he’d be letting himself in if she didn’t reply for five minutes. Apparently, he was being serious, though she doubted he’d been out there knocking for five whole minutes

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  “Who won, by the way?” He planted a kiss on her cheek. “Your staring match.”

  She scoffed, turning back to stick the note in a spot by itself. “The wall, of course.”

  Pegasus laughed, wrapping his arms around her waist from behind, his chin leaning against her shoulder as he stared at the notes. She tensed involuntarily when the unwanted memory of him hugging Scorpion crept up again. She quickly tried to shirk away from him. “Don’t do that.”

  Pegasus lifted his head and spread his arms out to allow her freedom of movement, but stayed where he was. Sarah didn’t move away from him.

  “What is it?” he asked softly. “Do you feel smothered?”

  “It’s not that. It’s just—” She turned to face him. “You don’t really expect me to tell you everything, do you?”

  Reassured that it was nothing important, he smiled. “Now you have me curious.”

  She shook her head, coughing out a laugh. “No, we’re not talking about that one yet.” Maybe not ever.

  “It’s one of your dreams?” His gaze narrowed playfully when Sarah tried to retreat. “You don’t need to tell me anything that’s not relevant. But I am very curious.”

  He outstretched his hands towards her, waiting for her to respond. Sarah placed her hands in his, pulling him forward so she could wrap her arms around him. The rhythm of his heart soothed her.

  “Does it have anything to do with your Jeremy?” he asked, voice rumbling along his chest.

  Was he jealous of a vision? If anything, she should be the one jealous.

  “Not my Jeremy. But no, doesn’t have anything to do with him. I still have no idea who that might be.”

  He hugged her tighter. “If you do figure it out, don’t hold it in for fear of upsetting me.”

  “Okay.” It was an easy promise to make. She wondered what made him think there would be anything upsetting.

  She wished she could stay that way, feeling warm and safe, but the almost magnetic pull of the tangible collection of her nightmares soon made her turn again towards them. Without releasing her, Pegasus mirrored her gaze, staring at the notes as if looking for something. Meaning, maybe.

  She detached the note referencing the hallway. Something had been troubling her about that.

  If the dream where Pegasus died had been an actual reflection from the other Earth, then what about the one with the hallway? She was sure that in the latter, both of them would die in the end. An explosion somewhere out of sight was a real possibility since she never saw their deaths.

  But if the other Pegasus died in that alley like she saw, then who was going to die in that hallway? She squeezed Pegasus tighter.

  A bit of pain started making its way along her forehead.

  They couldn’t both be true, could they?

  Or had her interference with one made the other possible?

  What were the options?

  One: she was seeing possibilities from the other world and her own.

  Two: they were all possibilities from her own world and she’d never seen anything from the other world.

  Three… Could it be that each of those events belonged in a different world?

  How sure were they that there were only two worlds out there?

  She grabbed the sticky note that said Robyn showed up at the party, removing it from the equation.

  Organizing all the events into a timeline and then separating them by the likelihood of being real might be worth a try.

  Lost so deep in her thoughts, she didn’t take note of the com sounding until Pegasus slipped from her arms to go answer it.

  “We found some movement related to one of their defunct corporations,” November informed. “You’re on the team to go check it out.”

  “I’ll be right up.” Pegasus disconnected the call, coming over to give her a kiss.

  Sarah hugged him tight, attributing the sinking feeling in her stomach to all the little harbingers of misfortune on her wall. “Be careful.”

  He smiled at her. “Aren’t I always?”

  “Nope.”

  Pegasus laughed. “Get some rest.”

  Sarah promised she would, but barely had the door closed behind him, she was back to staring at her notes.

  Using her dry throat and the faraway water bottle as an excuse, she forced herself to turn away.

  Her first step faltered in the relative darkness. Her room was gone, replaced by a nighttime chill under a moonlit sky. She was right outside an abandoned old building in what looked like the commercial district. The streets were predictably empty, but there was also no one else with her.

  The remnants of fading words on the wall were covered in graffiti.

  T…u? …ah sh… co.

  She drew in a deep breath, the cold air jarring as it entered her lungs. Her fists clenched and opened repeatedly as she tried to calm herself.

  So the question was: was she going in or coming out? Since she’d been facing the building, she continued forward. Maybe there would be answers in there.

  She snuck in through the open door, feeling like she was following in another’s footsteps. As she decided whether she should go right or left, a dull thud sounded from the right. Pressing herself against the wall, she snuck closer.

  Broken glass cracked under her boot. She froze, ducking down as she cursed herself.

  A long silence persisted until she wondered if she’d imagined anything before. There was only her own breathing.

  When she was about to round the first corner, someone appeared, gun pointed at her. She moved to grab the gun, hesitating when she noticed the familiar attire. She drew her hands back further at the hint of blue in his eyes.

  So that’s where she was. They weren’t in the dark hallway she remembered, but she would have bet anything that this was the same building.

  Pegasus had yet to lower his gun. “What are you doing here?”

  “Where’s here?”

  He lunged forward, pushing her aside as a slight impact sounded behind her.

  She felt for her gun, but her hand came back empty. Had she dropped her weapon?

  Pegasus pulled her around the corner as he returned fire. Sarah almost stumbled over a fallen guard laying right at her feet. She held onto the wall for support, feeling cold tile where there should’ve been peeling paint.

  Her eyes couldn’t adjust, shifting the world to match her perception.

  Sarah faltered, grabbing onto the edge of her desk for support. Her hand overreached for her water bottle, tipping it over onto her notebook. She lifted it up, using the bottom of her shirt to soak up some of the water as she ran to the bathroom for the towel.

  She flipped through the notebook, carefully separating the damp pages as she dabbed at them. Thankfully, most of it she’d already written on separate notes and put them up on her wall.

  Like the Foundation Day party… Or the fire…

  She stopped at the sight of unfamiliar words scribbled on the bottom of the page: ‘New Nation’ and ‘Tallulah’.

  It was obviously her handwriting, but she didn’t remember writing it. She forcefully shut and reopened her eyes in case it would be an illusion. Ominous, not for existing, but for where they’d been written, the words remained. At the top of the page were the elements associated with the dream of the dark hallway.

  Was that where the New Nation would be found? It could be related to the team’s current search. November did mention a defunct corporation.

  Her eyes darted to the clock. It hadn’t been that long since Pegasus left.

  She ran for the door, grateful she was no longer locked inside her own room. Her foot slid on the slick hallway as she spun around and ran back into her room. She grabbed the notebook, pressing the damp pages to her stomach.

  Better have another pair of eyes look at it and make sure the words were really there. With how things were going, she wouldn’t put it past her mind to play such a trick.