The stem vanishes into the white, at the same sharp point as everything else. It meets no resistance, but - the feel of it changes a bit.

It's lighter, and when she pulls it back, the end of it is sheered clean off.

"...Ah."

"So..."

"Jump into a thing that's probably going to cut us into bits or - dissolve us or something - or. Try to find another way."

"Or go back into the courtyard."

She makes a face. "Or go back into the courtyard."

She laughs.

She shouldn't. It's not really all that funny. But.

"Nothingness it is, then?"

Smile. "I am already dead."

"...Maybe we both are. And this was just - "

"Waiting."

"I'll lodge a complaint if it was. That was a dumb enough twist when Lost did it."

She laughs, louder than she has before. "Good to know you've got taste."

Grin.

"So. How're we doing this?"

Everything else they've poked one at a time, with the other out of the probable blast radius. It seemed safer.

Nothing about this part is safe, is it.

"Hold hands and take a running jump? Don't think I've lost too much blood for that."

"Sounds - right, to me."

She holds her hand out to the other girl. "We keeping the packs?"

She takes the hand, holding tight.

"Yeah. Might be useful, still."

Sharp nod.

And - back up.

And run.

She falls into step with the other girl, jumps at the same moment -

Falling into nothingness doesn't hurt, at least. It doesn't feel like anything at all.

 

THE END

 

OF

CHAPTER

TWO

 

And Lily wakes up.

Her back's against the rear exit. Her hip hurts from where she fell - her shoulder -

Her arm is screaming at her. It's bandaged, still, just like it was, but there's no pack on her -

She's alone.

The laundromat is empty. The mud still on the floor - no sign of the monster - the laundry machine on its side -

There's a clock in her line of sight. She'd glanced at it, briefly, incidentally, forever ago, while she was getting her forgotten coffee (it's on the floor, glass shattered, coffee in a puddle around it).

It'd been two nineteen - basically at two twenty - and that'd been a little bit before the machine started. Acting up. Before she'd tried to run. That hadn't been long.

The clock says it's two twenty, nearly exactly.

Time hasn't passed.

And there's no sign of the girl she met in the - other place -

She doesn't have very long to freak out.

The front door opens.

The boy - the one who works here - is standing in the door, and he looks surprised.

Only for a moment, though.

Then he looks angry.

"I told you not to touch anything."

She gets to her feet. "I didn't. Your undead monster - "

"Don't you dare call her that."

He closes the door behind him. Locks it.