Chapter 21

Sean knelt in front of Lance’s body.
Lance’s eyes were open, his expression a normal blank stare. If it weren’t for the eleven pools of blood coming from his shirt, Sean would still think that Lance was just staring up into the sky. Neither of them moved, both of them motionless. Lance’s rugged face was frozen in a calm, peaceful look. It was the look of a man who had accepted his circumstances in his last few seconds on Earth, and he would have it no other way. It was written all over his face. No wide eyed expression, no grimace, not even a raised muscle on his forehead.
     Just a silent look of peace.
    Sean didn’t even notice Tryss shaking him by the shoulders, yelling at him to get up. All Sean could hear was his breathing and the pounding of his heart as he knelt before Lance’s body. It echoed softly in his ears, but it was as loud as a jet engine. A constant incessant whine that dominated his hearing.
    Sean spoke, his heart beating in his chest as he did.
    “I killed him.” He whispered hoarsely, not even trying to clear his throat. “I tested him. I tested Medraut. I never actually thought he would do it. I pushed him to do it-to kill Lance, I-”
    Tryss slapped him. It was so fast, it whipped Sean’s head back as he flinched away.
    “Sean! Snap out of it!” She shouted. Then her voice took on a more softer tone as she put both hands on his shoulders and stared him hard in the eyes.
    “I don’t want any of that from you right now. You’re more sensible than that. So, get a hold of yourself.”
    Tryss let go of Sean, and breathed through her nose heavily as she stared at the body of Lance, serenely lying there, without a care in the world.
    “He knew the risks. He died saving Elise.” Tryss said quietly, finding nothing else to say as they both stared at their friend’s body.
    Sean looked around him, blinking rapidly from the smoke accumulating in the room. It was a new kind of smoke, bursting from the three new cans that had rolled through the Sync. Except this time it wasn’t smoke screen. It was bright red, and Sean could instantly sense that the clouds that sprung from the new canisters were toxic. His throat felt gravelly, as if someone had stuffed pins and needles into his mouth. His eye felt like they had been doused in hot sauce.
    Tryss had hauled Smyth and Percy together leaning against each other’s back, both men unconscious. Tryss grabbed at Sean’s hand but he shook her grip off, regaining his composure and standing shakily to his feet. Sean could feel the bullets that had riddled him in the top of his shoulder move out of his body and through the entry holes. He didn’t notice them pop out of his chest one at time, like gophers exiting their burrows.
    Sean muttered incoherently. “But Lance is out there. We can’t leave him there-he’s still out there he’s going to-”
    “We can mourn the dead later.” Tryss called to Sean, even though he barely heard it. Sean sprinted next to Tryss as she slid down to open Percy’s bag.
“Come on. . . no, not that,” She mumbled to herself as she stuck her hand into the canvas flap.
She fumbled around with it for a few seconds, spilling some of the contents as she frantically dug into the canvas backpack, until her hand came out. She held up a metal cased baton, with a gem on the top. It glowed a brilliant green in the spotlight from above. She faced Sean, then glanced at the rolling canisters excreting the crimson gas.
    “You might want to get closer.” She suggested as she hooked one hand around Sean’s elbow and tugged him into the small circle she had made with Percy and Smyth. Sean quickly hunched down next to Smyth and Percy as Tryss slammed the metal tube down onto the floor. There was a bright flash, and then Tryss and Sean were surrounded by a green luminescent dome. Tryss breathed a shaky sigh of relief and at the sight of the green shield. She coughed and wiped at her
    There were still some red odiferous gas retaining inside the see-through chamber, but it was slowly being sucked to the edges of the glowing dome’s walls and pushed out onto the other side. Sean realized he was on the balls of his feet, his thigh muscles tensed. His breathing was more defined in his ears thanks to the close space of the green dome. Tryss tilted her head back, her eyes shut tight, and breathed heavily. Then she turned her gaze to Sean.
    They both looked at each other, and then looked over at Lance on the cot, his lifeless form engulfed by the red gas. Tryss turned away from the body, and Sean could see that she held a large pistol in her white knuckled grip. Her eyes were moist, but attentive to the black walls devoid of texture, constantly scanning the Sync. Sean’s eyes never wavered from Lance’s body. He stared at the cot until Tryss decided it was safe enough to lower the green dome.

                        ~~~

    Lance didn’t receive a proper burial. Instead, his body was burned, and his ashes were sucked up by one of Percy’s strange inventions. It looked a lot like a very large, very hi-tech vacuum cleaner, and it had four tubes that latched onto Lance that burned his body. The process was very quick, and difficult to watch. Even though he turned his back several times, the image of Lance’s body being burnt to a crisp and getting sucked into the chrome vacuum scarred themselves into Sean’s mind forever.
    Tryss turned off Percy’s cremating vacuum and tucked it away into the magic satchel, which she set next to Percy. He had gained consciousness a few minutes after the red gas had dissipated, but he was still severely injured. He was slouched on a righted cot, clutching at several medallions hanging around his chest. He stared down at his satchel and didn’t speak unless spoken to, and even when he did, he answered slowly, his words slurred. Sean noticed Percy’s face hadn’t made a single twitch of spasm. Smyth sat on an adjacent cot, looking at the entire proceedings like a spectator watches a game. When he had come to, and once Tryss and Sean told him what had happened, he had taken his place on the cot and stared at the floor.
    Percy said the old man hadn’t acted this way in ages. Sean guessed a man as old as Smyth would have seen a lot of things, some of them good, most of them bad. But the old curator was acting as if the world was ending. Tryss had diagnosed that Smyth was in shock. He wore an emotionless expression that caused every wrinkle of his face to sag heavily.
    Tryss and Sean had tried talking to him, but all they got were inaudible mumblings and a silent tears. Nothing would get the old man to move, much less talk. So once Percy was feeling better, he had decided to assume command and maintain a base of operations from the cot where he sat, unable to get up due to his inability to move his entire left side of his body, much less walk.
    “Tryss, I’m gonna need you to get out my Everything Table.” Percy said, coughing into his hand. He then pointed to Sean, his right finger twitching. “Are you okay? Are you able?”
    Sean nodded, although his gut said otherwise. “Yeah, I’m good. What do you need?”
    “Okay, good.” Percy nodded, swallowing. “Since we are down by two men, we only have you and Tryss.”
    “You figured that much?” Tryss mumbled as she unpacked a folding, two piece wood that were connected together by three brass joints. The thing looked nothing like a table. It looked like a giant wooden hinge.
    Percy ignored Tryss and continued.
    “Of course my first objective would be to go after Medraut, that slimy piece of-” Percy coughed wetly in the middle of his sentence, and then continued slowly. “But, since I won’t be moving anytime soon, then I guess it falls on your shoulders.”
    “Why me?” asked Sean, arms crossed and planted on his knees. Percy stared at Sean, but the young custodian didn’t meet his eyes.
    Percy said. “Because you have the Medallion. You’re practically the strongest person outside of the Sync.”
    Sean licked his lips slowly. “Yeah. ‘Cause having the Medallion suddenly makes me qualified to fight a crazed three thousand year old dude with an insatiable grudge.”
    “You don’t have to be qualified to save a person’s life, much less the world!” Percy’s voice rose, but then he hacked and coughed, pounding the left side of his chest. He breathed heavily as he continued looking at Sean. “This may have not been your idea of an occupation when you signed up to be custodian, but you did take an oath. And even though your oath taking may have been premature and a bit rash now that I think about it, you’re family now. You’re part of the Vanguard. And the Vanguard does not forsake each other.”
    Percy gritted his teeth, holding his left arm tightly, the knuckles on his right hand becoming white. His face was pale as he stared at Sean. The young custodian finally looked up and met Percy’s hard gaze.
    Percy scooted up higher in his seated position, holding a blackwash knife.
    “You don’t need a contract to tell you to help those that are in danger.” Percy paused, his mouth half open and drool spilling down one corner of his cheek. “And believe me, Elise is in grave danger. And I think the world, too.”
    Even though Sean’s ears were burning red, he knew Percy had a point. In fact, he had struck several points, all in a row.
    “Is that a magic knife?” Sean asked, pointing at the tanto in Percy’s grip. Percy smiled, shifting his behind on the floor to better accommodate him and his canvas bag.
    “You could say that, yes,” He replied, hefting the sizable, razor edged knife. It had a dull finish, its entire blade as black as night. “This is a magically weaved tanto knife. Not enchanted, but magically weaved.”
    “And I suppose that means it’s special?”
    Percy stared at Sean, then shrugged and smiled sheepishly. “Yeah, pretty much.”
    Then he flipped the knife to hold the handle out towards Sean, who took it, examining its sharp edge.
    “It allows the wielder an amount of protection against certain and specific danger, although I guess that would be redundant in your case, considering you have the Medallion.”
    Sean frowned at the knife in his hands, holding it awkwardly. He looked at Percy. “Where’s the, uh. . ?”
    “Sheath?” Percy asked, expecting the question. “That’s what’s so great about it. You just slap it to your waist. It forms a nylon sheath around the blade when it comes into contact with your person. Go on, try it.”
    Sean held the knife warily next to his side hip. At first nothing happened, but then Sean felt the blade draw closer to his body, as if his pelvis was a giant magnet pulling at the blade. Sean let go of the knife, expecting the it to just bounce off his side. But to his relief, the tanto suddenly grafted to his waist band on the belt of his pants, the sheathe materializing out of the handle and grafting itself to Sean’s hip, matching the color of his belt in the process like a chameleon’s skin.
    Sean blinked, feeling the newly appeared sheath. “Wow.”
    Percy chuckled dryly. “Yeah, I know, right?”
    “So.” Sean sighed, blowing air through his nose. “What should I do? What’s the plan?”
    Percy nodded, “You shouldn’t be surprised to feel your sense of time diminish when you go through the Sync, that’s perfectly normal. You’ve got to always remember that the wall is messing with your mind, imagine it as if it were an opponent trying to trap you, which is basically what the Sync is. It wants to keep you there. But whatever you do, don’t give in.”
    Sean nodded, walking up to the edge of the perimeter where the light stopped and the black wall began. He looked into the Sync in front of his face. It was like staring into a black canvas at night.
    Sean breathed through his nose. “So, like, how would I know which way I’m going? Should I just run as fast as I can through it?”
    “I recommend you don’t.” Percy said shaking his head curtly. “Because you might just bump into Medraut and get yourself killed.”
Sean turned to face Percy. “What do you mean? Bump into him? Will he be waiting for me?”
Percy shrugged. “His men might be waiting in the Sync, but that’s highly doubtful. I’m guessing he’ll have them covering every entry and exit into the Sync. It would be impossible to send men to patrol out in complete oblivion. That would just be insane.”
“And Medraut? Where is he?”
“He’ll be heading out of the Sync. Exactly where, I don’t know.” Percy moved his jaw in a circular motion, then he stopped suddenly, wincing in pain. “Ironic of its name, the Sync isn’t ‘in tuned’ with the real world time. We’ve stayed here in this pocket for at least. . . what? Ten, fifteen minutes at max? But all that time didn’t exist. For example, if you backtracked to the entrance from where you came in and you exited the Sync, whoever was shooting at you would still be there. To them, to Medraut’s men in the hall of artifacts, it would look like you had just jumped in and then jumped out with barely a second in between.”
Sean rubbed at his eyes and grunted. “Percy.”
“I am serious, and I’m really sorry if it’s so hard for you to comprehend right now, but,” Percy laid a hand on the concrete floor, looking at where Tryss was digging into his satchel. Percy glanced back at Sean. “try not to think about it too much. Time differences and the theory of spatial relativity is the least of your worries.”
“You’re right,” Sean played with the tanto, pulling it from his waist and letting it slap back onto his hip, the blade acting like a magnet. “My biggest worry right now would be if I ever reach the end of the Sync and where. Does it matter which direction I face?”
Percy nodded with emphasis, his eyes wide and centered on the floor. “Oh, yes, it does matter about the direction. Look real closely at the ground where the concrete meets the blackness. See anything?”
In the spotlight beaming down from the unknown source above, Sean’s shadow followed him wherever he cast his gaze downwards at the perimeter of the spotlight’s pocket. He strained his eyes, his head moving back and forth, and then he found it. The entire pocket’s perimeter was lined with Germanic or Norman or whatever ancient culture that used runes as a language. They twisted around each other forming a multi layered bond of interwoven characters that formed a giant circle. Sean guessed this was how the pocket of light could exist in such a dark oblivion the Plane of Spirits was. Sean looked up at Percy and said, “Found it.”
“What do you see?”
“Runes, characters, some kind of ancient language that no one uses anymore. What about it?”
Percy nodded, gesturing with a wavering finger all around the circle of light that made up the room. “Walk around the edge and tell me when you spot a circle etched in the floor. Roughly the size of a quarter.”
Sean walked the perimeter of the spotlit circle. It didn’t take long, since the room was so small in diameter. Once he saw it on the ground, he knelt down and touched it. It was larger than the size of a quarter. A half dollar would be more of an accurate comparison. It was carved into the concrete, a simple unassuming circle. But inside it was a tiny figure that Sean couldn’t quite see from where he was kneeling. He had to get down on his hands and knees to see what it was. The figure was a character. But it wasn’t a rune. Inside of the circle was engraved a tiny bridge. It was pictured on its side, crossing one unseen bank and stretching to another. To Sean’s surprise, the picture was extremely detailed. He saw curley cews roll off the ends of the bridge. He could even see knotholes on the wood of the structural overpass. For something so tiny, Sean was amazed at the attention to detail was put into the bridge.
“It’s a picture of a bridge.” Sean said, grunting as he stood to his feet and faced Percy. Percy shook his head.
“Not the one. That leads to the bridge, which is not an option right now. Keep walking around and find another circle. You’re looking for a window.”
Sean walked around the perimeter again. He found it.
Inside the circle of the engraving this time was a very tiny, very detailed image of window. Sean didn’t kneel down to inspect closely, but he guessed if he did, he bet that he would be able to see the glare from the sun refract off the glass panes, or something of the sort.
“Got it,” Sean said.
“Okay.” Percy nodded, blinking hard. “Place yourself so that the image of the window inside the circle is in between your feet, at the same time facing the Sync wall.”
     Sean did.
     Percy said, “That is your way out. Keep walking in that direction, don’t turn to the right or the left, just keep walking until you exit through onto the other side.”
“That’s it?”
Percy nodded and then coughed, his face beginning to turn red like a beet. After his spasmodic fit was over, Sean looked back at the wall of the Sync. He felt like he was five years old again, staring into his closet at night. It looked like the manifestation of fear, with unknown and unseen chaos squeezed into the dark blanketed folds of the Sync. It was an open expanse of pure nothingness. A blank wall devoid of light and life. Outer space without stars.
    Sean nodded slowly, “Okay. Alright. Anything else?”
    Percy’s eyes widened and he dug around in a side pocket of his backpack. “Oh, I almost forgot. Take this.”
    Folded in his position on the floor, Sean saw that Percy had a laptop next to him. The black heavy duty mobile laptop that looked like a brick. Percy held up a hand and threw a gel communicator to Sean. Sean caught it deftly and smooshed it into his left ear, casting a sidelong glance at Percy.
    “Almost forgot, huh? I would’ve probably died because of you ‘almost forgetting’.”
    Percy frowned which turned into a hard grimace as he grunted and held his left side. He said. “Don’t give me sass. I’m your commanding officer now, remember? You swore an oath?”
    Sean was about to say something snarky, but instead he stared at Percy and sighed, “Yes, sir.”
    Percy nodded, and then his gaze softened.
    “Sean. Whatever happens, always know that Lance’s death wasn’t your fault.”
    Sean looked down. He nodded, feeling a lump rise in his throat. Percy allowed a few seconds, and then continued, staring at his feet.
    “In this profession you meet many people, but seldom of them actually. . . survive.” He grinned sadly, moving his gaze to Sean, who was looking at him. “Pretty soon, if God smiles on you, you found out that you’re outliving them all. Best to get to know them while they’re still with you, you know?”
    Sean closed his eyes. The young custodian felt the tremors within his chest rise again, but he fought them down, swallowing hard. Even though his eyes swelled and tears threatened to fall, he fought it all back. He pushed and shoved it to the back of his mind and breathed in and out, stretching his back, preparing for the long jog ahead of him.
As he stretched, he asked Percy. “You and Lance were close?”
    Percy grinned and moved his jaw stiffly. He nodded slowly. “Like brothers.” His eyes became distant, but they soon came into focus as he looked at his laptop screen. Percy met Sean’s gaze.
    “Don’t move an inch off course. If you think you’re going off course, tell yourself that you’re wrong. Just run as fast as you can in that direction and you’ll pop out the other side.” Percy stared up at Sean, a wry grin spreading across his face.
“I’ll use the gel comm to communicate with you once I’ve set up the proper frequency.” Percy saluted Sean with a trembling finger that he snapped out, his hand flopping down to his side.
    “See ya,” Sean muttered, turned to face the Sync. He breathed shakily for a few seconds to gather his wits, to gather all the courage he could muster to dispel the doubts and fears he had of getting lost in an oblivion without light. And he shut his eyes tight.
Breathed in.
Breathed out. Slowly. Through his nose.
     Then Sean stepped over the threshold of the pocket of light and jogged into the darkness.

    Eternity was all around Sean.
His breath came fast.
His pace was short.
His heartbeats were many.
But he noticed the faster he ran, the more air he drew into his lungs, Sean began to slowly lose his perspective of time. He couldn’t tell whether he had entered the Sync fifteen seconds ago or five hours. It soon got to the point that it felt like he had been pumping his legs for. . . well, forever. Even the whole motion of his body moving up and down became a rhythmic, methodic chore that seemed to never end. A repetitive motion that Sean couldn’t see the end of. Just when Sean thought he would be running until he died of boredom, Percy’s voice crackled inside his head.
“Hello? Sean, can you hear me? Hello?” Percy’s voice was so hazy and distant Sean thought that he had imagined it. But then Percy’s voice sparked and buzzed again, “Sean? Hello?”
“Yes? Percy?” Sean tapped the gel comm inside his ear, pushing it further in. “What’s that?”
“Oh, good, it’s working.” Percy replied, Sean hearing an audible sigh on the other end.
“Okay,” Percy began. “Once you start sensing that you can count again-and trust me, you can tell-that’s an indicator that you’re getting close to the end.
Sean replied, “Right.” His arms scythed up and down, his legs travelling up and down, his feet hitting the floor in an incessant thud-thud-thudding that sent vibrations throughout Sean’s entire body. When forever seemed like it could stretch into oblivion, Sean felt his skin tingle. His mind suddenly felt like it had been snatched out of his brain and shaken about in the black Sync. It felt as if it were sparked by a cable jumper. He let out a groan and put a palm to the tip of his brow. A piercing headache shot through Sean’s skull, but he kept on running, kept on jogging until he could begin to estimate time. Then he began counting. He realized he could again.
“You there yet?” Percy asked, his voice beginning to grow clearer with every step Sean took in the dark.
“Yeah,” replied Sean. “I think I’m about to exit the Sync.”
“Then you’re at the fringe.”
“What should I do?” Sean asked, slowing down.
“Get down and start crawling. Just for safety precautions.”
Sean slowly crawled on his hands and knees to what he thought might be the end of the Sync wall.
Percy added. “You never know what might be waiting for you on the other side.”
“What is on the other side from where I’m exiting the Sync?” Sean grasped at the rough surface of the ground he couldn’t see as he crawled slowly, his eyes wide and his hearing alert for any sounds. Sean asked. “Will I be exiting a window?”
“Yeah, you could say that,” Percy replied, coughing.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine; fine. Don’t worry about me, worry about you right now.” Percy cleared his throat. Then Sean heard the sound of hocking phlegm and the faint, distant wet slap as it hit the floor beside Percy.
Percy continued. “On the other side of the Sync, no matter whatever position you are in once exiting, you will come out through a window that is three feet high and two feet wide.”
Sean stopped crawling. “What? That’s kind of small for me, isn’t it?”
“Don’t worry,” Percy said. “You’re young and relatively small, you’ll fit fine. Harry fit through the window one time, and he was bigger than you. Also, the window you’ll be exiting is inside a painting that is hanging on the wall near the outside of Smyth’s office.”
The haze brightened the farther Sean crawled, so he took it as a good sign that he was reaching the end. As the Sync began to phase away into blurred light, Sean realized it looked like heat waves rippling across a flat, hot road in the desert. Except the blurry rippling lines of light were the only source of light in the Sync, while everything else were dark splotches of oblivion.
Pretty soon, his hearing began to come back too. He heard muffled, distorted voices at the edge of his hearing, and shimmering figures soon became people.
It was Medraut and Elise.
Sean stopped crawling, freezing halfway through a pull and a crawl.
“Percy.”
“Yeah?” Percy replied, his voice hollow and loud inside of Sean’s ear. Sean whispered so quietly, even he could barely hear himself in the darkness.
“Medraut and Elise are here.”
Sean heard Percy exhale loudly. Then he spoke. “Okay. Whatever. Sure.”
    “What’s wrong?”
    Percy sighed. “I was hoping Medraut took the way back where you guys came in, through the artifacts wing, but apparently he’s smarter than he looks. There’s no chance of sneaking around the little devil. You’re going to have to follow directly after him.”
    “Okay. Alright.” Sean frowned, thinking. “But. . . won’t that mean that if Medraut and Elise exit the Sync, and then I follow. . . wait,” Sean rubbed his eyes, feeling his brain turning into mush. After he was done, he blinked hard several times, the blurry ripples in front of him becoming more blurry. “If Medraut and Elise exit the Sync, and then I follow after them, will I be a second behind them when I exit the Sync?”
    Nothing. Just silence.
    “Percy?”
    “I get what what you’re saying,” Percy’s voice came back, choosing his words carefully. “As broken as your grammar may have been. But no, you just have to wait from my queue until you can safely exit the fringe of the Sync and follow Medraut and Elise.”
    “But I thought you said-” Sean began, but Percy cut him off.
    “I know what I said, and it may seem confusing for you, but it’s okay. Just go with me on this, okay?”
    “But how will you know when to give me the signal?” Sean gulped, tasting concrete dust on his tongue. “You’re back there in the pocket. Can you tell time inside from where you are?”
    “Uhhh. . . yep,” Percy said, and Sean could hear the sound of keys clacking over the line. “Now I can. I just hijacked the system that Medraut’s men are using to hijack our A/V system.”
    “What?”
    Percy replied. “Leech on a leech on the animal.”
    “Oh.” Sean said plainly. “That’s. . . great, I guess. So, you can see whatever’s happening in the museum now?”
    “Affirmative. And Medraut and Elise haven’t exited the Sync yet through the painting, so stay where you are and don’t move. You said you can hear them speaking?”
    “Yeah,” Sean said, lifting his head up a few inches up off the ground and listened closely in the dark and the splashes of light in the distance. Sean whispered. “I can hear them arguing.”
Sean closed his eyes and focused on the voices. It was as if he were tuning into a channel on the radio, skipping through static and picking out a channel that worked and sounded clear. He searched the darkness with his ears, listening to any sounds, hearing for any voices that floated in the fringe of the Sync.
Then he got it.
One voice.
Medraut. The captain’s voice sounded hollow and tinny, as if it were coming through an old radio speaker from the 1950’s.
“Keep moving.”
“I’m going to kill you.”
     Sean heard Elise’s voice now; fainter and not as loud.
Medraut chuckled, his dark laughter circling around Sean, the sound interweaving itself in between the lines of rippling light in the distance. Sean cocked his head, trying to gauge where Medraut’s and Elise’s voices were coming from. It was impossible; the two voices sounding all around him.
Medraut’s stopped laughing and said darkly. “Do you want to know how many times I’ve proven that statement wrong to people like you?”
“I’m assuming you won’t tell me for dramatic effect.”
    Medraut growled. “I am not a pitiful show-off diva like the Angel of Death.”
    Elise said. “You keep comparing yourself to him. It seems like you are a diva. Of course, in your own right.”
There was a lengthy, agitated filled pause. In the fringe that harbored light and darkness, even Sean could feel the tension from where he lay prone.
Medraut’s voice was low and his words sharp like a knife. “Do you value your life?”
A pause. Then Elise responded, her words slow and her tone as dark as the captain’s. “Do you?”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Medraut growled.
“It means,” Elise replied. “That you should be careful where you step. It might be the last step you’ll ever take.”
Then Sean heard a sound of a muted slap and a thud mixed together, like the sound when an aluminum baseball bat smacks into a thick piece of flesh. Sean heard a cry of pain, and then realized it was Elise. He felt his ears burn in the darkness as all he could do was stay still and listen.
    He clenched his fists to the point where they became sore as Sean listened to Medraut say, “Your mouth runs away from you. I suggest you restrain it. Come. You’ve wasted enough of my time with useless banter already.”
    The voice of the captain grew farther and farther away from where Sean lay at the fringe of the Sync, still frozen still on the cold concrete floor. He waited for at least a full minute that he counted off in his mind, and then Sean began to crawl again. Towards the light.

Sean was at the edge of the fringe. He could see where he needed to go through. All around him was an eternity filled with darkness, with light spilling in waves and ripples from one light source in the Sync. Just in front of him, three feet off the ground was a window. Four feet by two, just floating in the middle of the darkness, light spilling from all four of its edges.
“I found it.” Sean whispered, standing up and examining the floating window. “I found the window.”
“Hold up.” Percy said haltingly, Sean sensing the urgency in Percy’s voice.
Sean stepped closer to the rectangle of light. “What’s wrong?”
“Everything.” Percy cursed. “Of course. Why wouldn’t he have wraiths-that makes perfect sense.”
“Um, wraiths?” Sean began backing away from the window. “You mean, like, vengeful ghosts and stuff like that?”
“Oh, you know?” Percy said, sounding surprised.
“Not really,” Sean glanced all around, searching the darkness. “I just know some of this stuff from my sister. She should be here, not me.”
Percy replied. “Well, you’re doing fine so far.”
It was hard to tell what was what twenty feet out in the Sync because of Sean looking into the bright light coming from the window. His pupils were contracted, no longer accustomed to the dark. No longer able to see if there was something creeping up ten feet in front of him.
Sean said. “What do these wraiths look like-what are they capable of?”
Percy said. “Oh, you can’t see them. Or, really, most of them. If you’re wearing the Medallion, you’ll be able to see facial features, but mostly to the naked eye all they see is shimmerings of lights and heat waves. Kind of like a really hard to see mirage. And for your second question, no one really knows specifically. They can just kill you. Heart attack. Aneurysm. Anything that looks like a natural death, wraiths can do.”
“That’s. . . thanks, that sounds comforting.” Sean swallowed. Then he realized he had nothing to swallow. His mouth was completely dry. He smacked his tongue against the cardboard texture of the top of his mouth and asked, “Well, where are they?”
Percy replied with, “I’m not sure.”
Sean scoffed. “Not sure? Then how do you know where they are?”
“I’m only getting an approximation,” Percy said quickly. “The cameras in the museum are outfitted with spectral monitors, so I can know where they were and guess they’re heading, but the thing about wraiths is that they can phase through walls.”
“Oh, great,” sighed Sean, looking over his shoulder once and awhile. Just to be sure.
Sean stared through the window, still keeping back from the rectangle of light floating in the air. He watched it closely
“Okay. What do we do about them? Can we kill it?”
Percy coughed wetly, peaking the volume in his mic. “You might as well ask to move the earth out of orbit. Sean, no one kills a wraith, unless you are one. That’s the only way possible.”
“And how do you know that?”
“There’s a book on it.”
Sean sighed. “A book?”
Percy replied. “More of a tome, really.”
“Then,” Sean began, “If you know that you have to be a wraith to kill a wraith, how do you not know how wraiths kill?”
“Like I said,” Percy’s voice took a harsh tone. “It’s a big book. That’s why it’s called a tome. I didn’t get that far in photographing the pages.”
“Okay, then what about-”
Percy said, “Enough talking, Sean. You need to get Elise out and that’s an order.”
Sean sighed. “Percy, you can’t expect me to just Waltz on in there and retrieve her. Wraiths. Remember?”
“You’re not going to Waltz.” Percy replied, and Sean could hear the sound of clacking keys. “You’re going to do something much more sensible than that.”

Medraut held Elise at a distance, his grip beginning to tire. Elise had been feeling his iron grip turn into rigid cardboard, and then wain into pudding as they both stood for at least ten minutes in Smyth’s office.
The captain was suspicious of Elise, and he was right to be. One second’s glance away from her meant a knife or any sharp object plunging into his neck. She felt like using her own hands to strangle Medraut right now, but that would only end up in her being dead. And Lance would’ve died for nothing. He had sacrificed himself to save her. He had taken eleven bullets and if would be stupid to make a move now. But eventually, in the near future, Elise would have her chance.
The captain faced her now, even as she was scanning the room, analyzing the objects near her that would count as unconventional weapons. She listed them in her head which would be the most effective, the most lethal, and the most brutal. But anything short of detaching a curtain pole from the wall, Elise didn’t have much options to choose from where she sat. She looked at the desk and surmised the files and pieces of paper, quickly scanning for any objects to use to her advantage.
There were none.
Except, of course, for the chair that sat behind her, but that was much too cumbersome. Of course, she could break a leg off. . .
“It’s been fifteen minutes now.” Medraut said, his eyes still on her. The captain’s gaze was as unsettling as a cobra, poised and ready to strike at any moment if provoked. His statement of course wasn’t aimed at Elise, but to the wraiths behind him, standing at opposite sides of the doors, watching unceasingly.
Medraut garbled something in what Elise thought to be Irish. But somehow, she knew that it was much more ancient than that. Perhaps his native tongue. A dark shape moved suddenly without warning or sound next to Elise. One of the black apparitions ghosted through the wall with noticeable difficulty and then disappeared. That left Medraut and one wraith guarding her.
The captain backed away, held the gun pointed at her chest, and sneaked a peek to make sure that the wraith was gone, and snapped his gaze back to Elise, who was still standing there.
“I hope that Percy comes up with one of his ludicrous plans again. They’re so half-baked my grandmother would roll in her grave.”
“Well, he’s coming, anyway.” Elise said, speaking through her teeth. “And you can bet that you won’t get away this time.”
Medraut chuckled grimly, waving the gun dismissively. “But that was when Lance was alive. And, tell me, how exactly did that work out for him?”
Elise lunged towards Medraut, but she caught herself just as the captain sidestepped her flimsy attack. The derringer was now pointed at her head.
“Please don’t make me kill you.” Medraut whispered into her ear. The cold steel of the gun’s barrel dug into the side of her head. “You’re as pretty enough as it is. I don’t want to put a two inch hole in your brain.”
Elise straightened from her awkward stance and stared in front of her, avoiding the cold eyes of Medraut.
“That’s better. Now, remember…” the captain repeated. “Nothing stupid.”
Elise was gave Medraut her classical dead eyed stare and sat down on the chair.
Medraut nodded slowly to himself, and then scratched the top of his head with the gun. Elise didn’t know whether he was taunting her with the gesture, or he was just inept, but either way, she wasn’t going to take the chance of getting herself killed. Elise fumed silently, opened and closing her eyes. Her senses were becoming muddled from her lack of sleep. Her adrenaline was fading fast.
With her thoughts being disorganized, she tried not to think of Lance. His motionless body lying on the disgraceful piece of cloth stretched across a metal frame, a poor excuse for a bed. She wondered whether he got a real funeral pyre, or just the lame cremation machine Percy always had with him.
It wasn’t proper for such a great man to just have his remains burnt and pounded into useless bits of ash.
“Hi.”
Elise turned around to the voice that had sounded a lot like Sean. She didn’t see anything but the watchful apparition guarding the door and Medraut pacing near the hearth. Her eyes scanned the room, and she almost missed the nearly invisible blur in the darkened corner of the office. It was a human figure, kneeling, and it was motioning at her.
    Elise turned around, but not too quickly. She hoped that her act of turning around hadn’t alerted Medraut to whoever was in the corner behind her. The captain was still leaning against the door frame, poking his head out into the hallway. Elise clamped her jaw shut, trying to control her beating heart as she stared straight ahead.
    “Elise?” The captain had turned around, his left eyebrow raised in suspicion. “Everything okay?”
    Elise cursed to herself inwardly. That idiot could read her face, and what he saw there intrigued him, and not in a good way.
    She attempted to draw enough acting ability in her to summon a droll expression to her face. Elise prayed to heaven that Medraut wouldn’t realize the blurb of distorted air hunched behind her.
    “Nothing to say?” Medraut said, creeping closer, his pistol at his side. If the actions of Medraut told Elise anything, it was that he wasn’t hesitant to pull that trigger, no matter who stood behind the barrel, even if it were his own mother.
    Elise stared straight ahead, letting her glittering green eyes glaze over and assume submission. Medraut squinted at her, and knelt down in front of Elise, his tongue licking the edges of his mouth.
    “You know, Elise, some of these days I …” the captain was interrupted by a thunderous clap that emanated from the hallway. Captain Medraut stood giving Elise a mirthless grin, and walked over to the door, his pistol raised in readiness.
    Elise’s ears were still ringing from the sharp noise that nearly split her eardrums. What was that, the museum splitting apart?
    “That’s our cue.” The figure said, and Elise knew for sure that it was Sean’s voice, as invisible hands touched her elbows. The feeling of Sean’s fingertips touching her skin sent shivers rippling across her back and spine. Magic was being applied to her, but she didn’t how.
    Then she realized she was sinking into the chair. No, she wasn’t sinking. She was being dragged through the chair. The velvety fabric seat immediately disappeared from her sense of touch and began sifting past her elbows and through her chest. Elise looked down, and saw the back of the high chair phasing out of her, although she felt nothing. The sight was more disturbing than the sinking sensation in her chest as Sean dragged her back through the wall behind the chair.
    Elise tried turning her head, but it was like trying to move in coagulated cement mix. Every movement she made was muddled and slowed so significantly that the very act of blinking was a task in all itself. Just before Elise’s eyes passed through the wall and into darkness, she saw Medraut run into the room, his face the look of horror, but mostly of malevolent anger.