The doors flew open before him. He skidded to a stop, drawing breath, and-
Stopped.
The fire in the grate crackled cheerfully. The lingering smell of coffee filled the room.
The chairs were empty.
“Jean?” Daniel said, his confusion building. He stepped forward, looking around. “Where’d you go?”
She didn’t appear from the woodwork, laughing at his distress. She didn’t leap from behind one of the tables, leering at him.
He was alone.
An early night, then. Daniel nodded, continuing on toward their quarters. Jean wasn’t the sort to waste time, but she did like to retire early now and again. She’d probably made coffee for herself, and gone back to her-
His feet stopped listening. His limbs froze up, quickly enough he nearly fell. Through it all, his eyes stayed glued to...to...
To the empty wall where her door had been. It was gone. Just...gone, like someone had put stonework right across the empty space.
Like she’d never been there at all.
“Jean?” he cried, and even he could hear the panic starting to soak through his voice. “Jean, where are you?”
The doors to the sitting room burst open before him. Back into the Library he went, faster than before.
His legs flew underneath him. His breath came hard and ragged, fear tugging at his limbs and making him awkward. The stones grabbed at his feet, ready to pull him down. His toe caught in a crack. He lurched, gasping with a half-cry, and pulled himself upright again.
The labs. The wings. He dashed through Alexandria’s greenhouse, his head spinning this way and that. With every hall that passed, with every doorway he ran through, he expected to see her waiting there. She’d be bent over a desk, nose-deep in a book. Or standing at a table, neatly recording notes for this or that project.
Everywhere he looked, he found only lonely darkness. And with every room that slipped by, cold and empty, he ran a little faster. Tears blurred his vision, obscuring the books from sight. His throat ached, raw and torn from screaming her name.
And still, he couldn’t find her.
Half-blinded by emotion and exertion, he didn’t recognize the doors until he pushed through - and found himself back in the sitting room, right where he’d begun.
With a muted snarl, he spun, throwing himself at the doors and-
They rattled in their frame, locked tight.
Daniel stared up at them, shock overcoming terror and grief for a brief, passing moment. “What?” he whispered. He was the Librarian’s apprentice. Here in Alexandria, there were no locked doors for him. His hands grasped the handles, pushing harder.
But they didn’t open. Clenching his jaw, he slammed his shoulder into them, crying out as starbursts of pain lit along his frame.
The doors didn’t move.
His hands fell from the cold metal. He stepped back, panting for breath. The carpet of the sitting room passed by under his feet, as cozy and comforting as ever. The fire flickered, drawing him closer with its soothing, mesmerizing warmth.
He walked the room once, his eyes scanning the walls. No other doors - not unless he wanted to return to his chambers, or head to the Library’s entrance. No way out.
Nowhere else to look.
She’d come back. With exhaustion pressing down on him more with every passing second, Daniel clambered up onto his chair. He’d wait there. When she came back, he’d be right there waiting.
His eyelids drooped lower, filling his head with fog.
He’d be right there.
As long as it took.
* * * * *
Jean never came back.
The days slipped by, each one passing a little more easily than the one before. At first, Daniel was numb, little more than a ghost passing through the halls. Somehow, he kept walking. Kept taking books from carts, filing them away on shelves.
Each time he saw another figure standing among the books, his pulse raced. There she was, his thoughts would cry. And each time, another instant would reveal the glow rising from their skin, and his heart would sink.
But each time, talking to them got a little easier. Hearing their voices helped. Talking to another human soul made him feel a little more human himself. His eyes still turned down each room he passed, searching. She had to be somewhere, he told himself. She was out there. He just needed to find her.
Somehow.
He didn’t notice the clock slowly turning over the mantle, bringing each of the elegantly-worked hourglasses into alignment. He didn’t notice the sand dripping out, emptying steadily.
He just walked, doing the only thing he could - what Jean had asked of him. He’d tend the Library. She’d see how well he’d done, when she came back.
And that night, as the last grain of sand drained from the clock, he let himself crumple to the floor, leaning against a bookshelf for support. He’d rest for a minute, he told himself. Just for a minute.
The smell of leather and parchment wafted over him. His thoughts clouded, pulling him deeper and deeper under the waves.
Just for a minute.
* * * * *
Something beeped, loud and strident and completely foreign. A sharp smell filled his nostrils, astringent, and he coughed. His chest ached. His lungs burned.
He winced, rolling slowly. Something caught his hand, pulling him back with a lance of pain.
“Oh!” he heard a distant voice say. “Oh, no. Lie still, sweetheart.”
A hand pressed against his shoulder, sliding him back down. He cracked his eyes open, feeling as though they’d been sewn shut. A figure loomed before him. A woman, half-hidden in shadow but dressed in blue.
“There,” she said, and he saw her smile. “Hold still, okay?”
And then she vanished, and he shuddered. His head spun, sending the world into dizzying waves.
“Claire!” he heard her say, somewhere far-off. “Call Dr. Stevens for me, would you?”
Through the pain and confusion, despite the hideous screeching and the distance that grew between her and him with every passing second, he heard
