The man woke with a start. “Wh-what?” He practically fell off the couch, shrinking away from the contact, until the sleep lifted from his eyes, his mind, and vanished. “Oh, I must have fallen asleep. How odd. I think the last time that happened was. . . But good morning, Jo.”
“Have you seen Nico?” She didn’t have time to feel guilty for the way she’d woken the man. Not when there was something else far more pressing, something that demanded all of her attention.
“Nico?” Samson squinted in confusion. “He’s with you, right?”
That wasn’t the answer Jo was looking for. She looked around the room, as if something could’ve changed without her noticing, wishing something had. It was that same foreboding stillness from the moment she’d first woken. Now, the hair on her arms was on-end as well.
“What’s going on, Jo?” Samson asked.
“Nico?” she called, rushing out onto the wide patio, hoping he’d be waiting for her in their usual chairs, tablet in hand. She sprinted around, as if he could be hiding behind the outdoor grill or randomly swimming beneath the surface of the pool.
“Jo?” Samson was standing now. “What’s happening, Jo?”
She ignored him. Even on her own, Jo could barely come to terms with the truth in front of her; there was no way she could break it down for someone else, too.
“He must be in his room,” Jo mumbled to no one, her eyes glued to the bloody sunrise. “His room.”
On the last word, she turned and began to run; her heart was already racing before she took her first step. It was already in her throat, suffocating her.
Jo tripped, scrambling up the stairs to the hallway. How long had it been since she’d come back here? Everything blurred together into an agonizing slurry, sloshing between her ears where her brain once used to be.
“Are you all right?” Samson held out a hand, offering it to her.
She stared at the step before her; had she not caught herself, she would have split her skull open on it. The knuckles on the back of her hand were still bloody from punching the Door, and the way her knees ached suggested that it may not be the only split skin she was presently sporting.
“We have to get to his room,” she panted. Her voice sounded alien even to her own ears, rough and determined but also bordering on hysterical. “We have to get to his room, Samson.”
Ignoring the outstretched hand, Jo continued on. The hallway was a million miles long at the start, but only a few short steps at the end. They stopped before Nico’s door.
They stopped before whathad beenNico’s door.
Jo raised a hand to the wood, running it over where his nameplate had been. The surface was smooth, unblemished. There was no scarring from where Nico’s painted bird had been scrubbed away. There was no discoloration from where the man’s name had been protecting the wood underneath for hundreds of years. It was perfect, pristine—a blank slate.
There was nothing, as if the man who’d occupied the space had never even existed.
In a disconnected sort of awareness, Jo heard Samson’s soft murmur of denial. A denial that stretched and contorted, cracked inch by inch until it shattered into equal parts disbelief, gnawing fear, and undeniable pain.
His wail barely registered though. It was a sort of guttural cry, an agony that she’d never heard the likes of in any of her lives, but still, it came from far, far away. Her hand rested on the door handle.
Open it, a voice goaded, and she listened; she had to see what was inside. She had to see it or it wouldn’t be real.
“What’s going on?” Wayne’s voice appeared from the end of the hall. Another door opened, another voice.
But the only thing Jo saw was the handle turning. The only thing she heard was the smooth whisper of well-greased metal on metal as the latch released. The hinges sighed softly and she pulled open the door.
Nothing.
It was a blank slate: white walls, white floor, a white roof that seemed to glow with its own unnatural light. She dared to take a step into that void, as if she’d somehow be able to find Nico and retrieve him from it.
But there was nothing there. The warm light of Florence, the messy, clean look—everything that had been the heart of the artist’s studio had vanished.
“What the hell?” She heard Wayne curse, the words almost managing to bring her out of the haze of her own encroaching breakdown. “I actually fell asleep for an hour and. . .”
“What is this?” Takako was behind her now too. “I was asleep too.”
“Let me through—” Eslar’s voice stopped short.
With renewed desperation, Jo turned, looking at the elf. “What does it mean?” Her voice was barely a quivering whisper.
