"You're either really brave or you're really stupid," Raven remarked.

Will held out the broken device responsible for all his troubles. "Do you know what this is?" he asked.

Her response was a light scoff, unimpressed to say the least. She made to shut the door in his face when recognition sparked in her hazel eyes and she doubled back. All manner of hostility was replaced with a keen interest as her gaze fell on the broken device in Will's hand.

"Where did you get that?" she asked. The change in her tone was troubling. "First you show up out of nowhere in the middle of a crime scene with the face of the victim and now this-"

"I only asked-"

She plucked the broken device out of Will's hand, cutting him off. She turned it around, observing it, her eyes sincere as she looked back up at Will.

"This doesn't belong to you," she said. "How did you come to possess it?"

"It was on me when I woke up here," Will explained. "And it might be my only chance of getting back home and finding my brother. It's why I came to you."

A look of confusion washed over her. "Your brother is dead," she corrected.

Will shook his head. "No, he's not," he said.

"I'm pretty sure we would have been informed otherwise," Raven countered.

"That's just it," Will said. "You were right about ParaDark Enterprises, Raven."

As much as Will didn't want to admit it, he realised that appealing to her ideals and political beliefs might be his only chance of convincing Raven to help him. "They're not who we think they are. They're not telling us everything," he elaborated.

"I don't buy it," she professed. "What convinced you?"

"I saw Victor," Will told her. "He was speaking with Bill. Not face to face, but I still saw him. He was there. He's alive."

"What were they discussing?" She asked.

"They didn't say much," Will admitted. "But Project Infinity was mentioned." He hesitated with his next words, remembering the troubling conversation between them. "Bill mentioned he had found the answer which I still don't understand myself-"

"Alright, I believe you," Raven said. She did a quick sweep of the area before stepping back to let him through. Will stepped inside to find the rustic cafe empty as ever while Raven closed the door behind him.

"Is this place ever busy?" Will asked.

"We have our regulars." Raven sidled past him so that she faced the door when she stopped to address Will.

"I'm not an engineer myself. My foster father is the man you need to speak to with regards to your particular case," she explained. "Come, I will show you to him."

She led Will through the beaded-curtain doorway in which they had their first confrontation. Upon prior visit, he realised just how oblivious he had been, multiple factors considering. Number one: they were standing in an enclosed hallway, and number two: there was another door parallel to the one they just entered.

He marvelled at the woodwork of the Victorian wall panelling around them fixed with rusted wall lamps on either side. A singular lightbulb hung from the ceiling. His eyes moved from the lightbulb to the double-hung window at the end of the enclosed hallway, landing on Raven as she moved past him to open the other door.

"I should warn you, my foster father is a guarded man. He doesn't open up easily," she explained. Will nodded in understanding and followed her inside.

She took caution in proceeding. The enclosed hallway opened up into a cosy, vintage-styled study that reminded Will of home, arousing an overwhelming feeling of nostalgia.

The room looked out onto the harbour through a pane of Georgian windows fitted by ovolo and lambstongue mouldings. Two wingback, leather chairs faced the window with their backrests to Will on top of a large oriental rug that covered half of the room, a small, wooden, round side table centered between them.

A stack of ornamental bookcases lined the wall on his right, their spines worn with age. Around the corner to his left, the room revealed a concealed private study defined by a heavily-carved, wooden pedestal desk with a matching low-back, leather chair.

As Will peered around the corner, a shuffling of shoes caught his eye under one of the seats of the wingback chairs to his far right. It had been so sudden and unexpected that Will would have dismissed a third presence in the room had it not happened again. This time, Raven approached him. It wasn't until a weak, scarred hand reached towards the side table for the cup of steaming tea that Will realised his own negligence. There was a stifled cough.

"Pa Pa?" Raven asked. In assistance to the man's futile attempts, she helped pass the tea cup to him. "You have a visitor. Is that alright?"

Will felt it was his turn to speak. He took a step forward. "I'm sorry for the short notice, but I wouldn't have come unless it was important-"

A shattering of ceramic shards pierced the subdued silence as the tea cup escaped the man's loose grip. Alarmed, Raven dashed to the other side in concern for her foster father.

"Pa Pa!" she exclaimed. But the man said nothing to reassure her.

"Might I request your name?" the man asked.

Will couldn't shake off the creepy familiarity of his voice. "Will Dark," he said.

An air of tension crept its way into the room as he waited for a response. Then under his breath, Will made out the words, "He actually did it."

Raven, unaffected by his strange remark, hurried to clean up the broken tea cup shards while Will resumed his cautious steps towards the man until he came into his line of sight. There was no acknowledgment of his approach, just a complacent expression as the man continued to gaze out the window with distant, blue eyes.

"Might I request your name?" Will asked. The wait was brief.

"Liam Walker."

He turned his head to face Will. Their eyes locked and in that moment, Will lost all sense of reality. That face... He had the eyes of a grieving man underlined in dark shadows, and shoulder-length hair as black as night carelessly tied up in a half ponytail.

His attire appeared as if from a different time era. Loosely fitted pinstriped trousers tucked into knee-high leather boots and a high collared white shirt fitted with elastic suspenders. There hadn't been care in how he presented himself which Will noticed in the tardiness of his unfastened brown waistcoat.

But that face. He knew that face. From where though... he couldn't recall.

"Do you have it?" he asked.

Will was baffled by the question. Yet knowing what he was asking of him, Will brought out the broken Infinity device from his trouser pocket. Liam took the broken pieces from him with tentative fingers and cradled it in the palm of his hands.

After a brief examination, he held it out before the window where sunlight reflected off its brass surface.

"You don't know the truth, do you?" His choice of words proved unsettling.

"What truth?"

"As I suspected." Liam brought it back down where an unwavering look of finality shifted in his steady gaze. "It will take time, but I can fix it."

It was his unsolicited agreement that perplexed Will. "But you don't even know me," Will said.

Liam stood up and placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "You don't even know yourself," he said lowly into his ear.

Will turned around as Liam proceeded to the desk behind him. "What is that supposed to mean?"

There was a shuffling of papers as Liam cleared space for the broken device which he set down on the desk blotter.

"That's not for me to say," he said. It was never a sentence one wanted to hear when searching for answers. He cleared his throat. "Raven, a word?"

Raven moved past Will where an inaudible, hushed dispute took place between foster father and daughter. Disagreement showed visibly through her fervent hand gestures until a reluctant compromise became their only solution.

Annoyed, Raven marched back to Will, grabbing his arm on the way. Will was unwillingly pulled towards the door. Stern words followed them.

"That was an order, Raven." Liam's tone was not one to be trifled with.

Without giving any acknowledgement to his warning, Raven continued to the door with a confused Will in tow. Together, they passed through the enclosed hallway and re-emerged into the rustic cafe from the beaded-curtain doorway.

"Care to enlighten me?" Will asked.

"You accomplished what you came here for, didn't you?"

Will turned to face her, stopping her in their tracks before they could reach the exit. "What does Liam want you to do?" he said, both curious and concerned.

Being a head shorter than Will, she must have seen something in his blue eyes that proved reassuring when she looked up at him because then she withdrew a sigh of surrender, preparing to explain.

"He wants me to take you to the Infinites," she told him. Will's eyes widened.

"You know where they are?" he asked.

"He thinks you might be able to help us-"

"Help you how-"

Raven reached for the doorknob on Will's far left and turned to open it. The door swung outwards and she pushed Will over the threshold before he could bombard her with any more questions.

He stumbled back, nearly falling over his own feet, but was quick to collect his footing.

"Raven," he said irritably, brushing himself down.

She made to close the door. "Come back in two days," she said.

The door slammed shut, leaving Will standing there with more questions than answers.