Eien watched himself, covered in the goop, being examined by the nurse. His stomach seized itself and threatened expulsion of Aino’s stew. He looked away, suddenly sensing eyeballs in the walls, on the floor, in the ceiling. Brown eye balls, rolling eyeballs, grinning, laughing eyeballs.

He took a deep breath, squelching the feeling and pushing it into the edges of his fingers, winking out one eyeball at a time. Coolness spread from the back of his head, radiating through his body, a bit uncomfortably like a piece of ice sliding down his spine.

Movement on the screen caught his attention.

Aino was pressing something in her hand as the screen flashed colors and lights, darkness, a person, eyes. Bright yellow filled the screen. Then, a girl, smiling, with thick hair tied back, a warm smiling face, and large, bright eyes. She was frozen, her eyes reflecting lights, her grin, just turning up the edges of her lips.

“Mom! I am going out now!” She said suddenly, backing away, Her hands waved a bit. She had a yellow bag over her shoulder.

“Okay! Be home for dinner!” A hand waved to a girl. The girl left, and there was a sigh and quiet.

It was just a door for a while. A door and light breathing. Then there was the rest of the apartment.

The apartment looked much like Ford Sorenson’s except there was a dining area and an extra room down the hallway. It looked to be in much better shape than Sorenson’s though. The light was a lot brighter, the colors were more vibrant, and there was no dust to be seen.

The lady sat down with her face in her hands. So the screen slipped to black.

“Oh, help,” she murmured. A few whimpers slipped out.

In the corner of the living room was a statue, much like the one in Sorenson’s bedroom. It looked much smaller, the woman was, instead, half formed from the waist up, as if she was melting into the greenish stone. Her face was calm, serene, and flat, her hair straight down and eyes closed as if sleeping. Her arms had no hands, but were thrown up above her head in an awkward manner.

The lady approached the statue, breathing heavily now.

Carefully, her hand touched the top of the statue’s head, and she hummed a little bit. It was a soft hum, a bit jagged because of her breathing, but it gave Eien shivers, up and down his arms, goosebumps appeared; his hair stood on end. It was familiar, but he could not place where he had heard it before.

The statue started to shift slowly, almost imperceptibly from its jade-like appearance into something less peaceful, less sleepy. The eyes opened, revealing stone orbs, her mouth curled up in a strange sneer, her hands grew out of her arm stumps, falling down to her sides. Each movement was grating to the ears, gravelly and squeaky.

“What?” The statue asked, through the gravelly sound. Instead of the mouth moving, the statue changed. It seemed the sound came from the stone itself. The statue stilled, waiting for a response.

The lady stopped humming.

“Tally found strangers.” The statue moved again.

“Who?”

“There was a man and a woman.”

“Appearance?”

The lady cleared her throat before responding, “Black hair. Black eyes. White hair. Gold eyes.”

The statue started to shift again, revealing her to be laughing.

“Help,” said the statue in its shifting, crackly voice.

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“Yes,” said the lady, and she withdrew her hand. The statue stilled, its face smiling, eyes wider than its head, like a disproportionate doll. Her hands were small, clasped together at her chest with her arms large and strong.

The lady stared at the statue for a little bit, nodding. Eien had to look away. It made him queasy.

“Okay. I can do this,” she said. She got up, and Aino stopped the screen. It was frozen, looking down the hallway.

Aino started packing up things around her.

“Is it time?” Eien asked, moving with her.

“We need to leave now.”

“I thought we had more time?” Aino glanced at him.

“She knows where we are.”

“It seems like she wants to help us. I mean, she sent that lady to help us, right?”

Aino did not respond, but she ran into the bedroom.

Eien checked off everything in his head as he assembled his pack.

“If she knows where we are, wouldn’t she have come by now?” He asked as Aino appeared again.

“We need to go in cold,” she said, pushing some papers into the file folders the nurse had given them. She put the eyeballs in a leftover jar from the kitchen.

“What was that stone stuff? Is she different from you?”

Aino slung her bag over her shoulder.

“We are on a scouting mission. We need a new base of operations, we need to find information on the location of their temple, and we need to understand the layout, culture, and people of the city. Questions?”

“Yes, a lot,” Eien replied, “How do-“

“Okay, then, let’s go,” Aino said, cutting him off. Eien followed her out the door, abandoning their mess in Ford Sorenson’s apartment.

The hallway looked the same as when they had entered but a bit busier. People were exiting their homes, dressed in much the same garb as Aino and Eien were. They had their own bags, though they were admittedly less bulky. They all were adults, chatting with each other, waving, and acting friendly with each other.

“Let’s go down,” Aino said. Eien felt the furtive glances, eyes sliding along his person. A pause in chatter as they exited Ford Sorenson’s apartment alerted his ears to the sound of his own fast beating heart.

He tried to smile at one of the other men in a friendly way, waving his hand in one small motion.

The man stared at him, nodding, returning a smile that did not meet his eyes.

Eien followed Aino down quickly down the stairs, passing floors with similar scenes. People were walking, marching up and down stairs, and chatting with each other. Dim lights cast mild shadows on the cracked walls, and the smell of bodies started to accumulate in the air.

They were no longer attracting so many stares as strangers started to mingle along the floors. Like a flood, darkly clothed people were pushing each other along in different directions. Conversation was cut to short greetings and smiles.

Eien looked around, watching faces, trying to assess whether there was any danger for them. So far, no guards. No security. Just people moving. All the people were adults, too, which made Eien wonder where the kids were. He had see that one girl earlier, hadn’t he?

At the end of a hallway was a door like the one they had entered on one of the upper floors. Exiting the building, they entered into a ten story high dome, with buildings all around jutting up into the top of the dome, as if they were cut off at awkward angles. The dome itself seemed to be made of a mirrors from about two stories up, reflecting a distortion of the people below. The first two stories were solid stone. Lanterns hung from the ceiling on long thin strings, reflecting light off the mirrors.

At first, the light was a bit blinding compared to the dimness of the hallways. The floor also changed. It was less gritty and more smooth, made like the stone walls. There were no cracks or crevices that Eien could spot.

He shivered.

Just like that creepy statue.

Aino was pacing briskly along with everyone else. Eien contemplated their situation.

If she wanted another base, would it be easy to find? If there was a statue in every apartment, then wouldn’t it be difficult to find a place her sister did not occupy? What was a temple? Why was everyone moving at the same time? Where were the people going?

He wished he had a map, someone to tell them things. It was dangerous to ask, though.

Aino slowed down, shifting a bit as they approached something strange in the middle of the dome.

It was like a large, circular pool with a statue in the middle. Instead of water, it was filled with rocks, tiny, white pebbles the size of a bead. The statue itself was of the same woman, but much larger, about the size of a truck. She was smiling congenially, her hands open and arms spread out. Her hair was lightly curled, falling down as if like water even when it was made of rock.

People were walking up to it, taking a pebble, whispering something, and moving on. Aino walked up, taking a bead in a similar manner, whispering something, and moving on. She stood back a bit, waiting for Eien to do the same, even as people were pushing around her.

He walked up, watching the man next to him take a pebble and whisper.

Eien took a pebble, feeling the smoothness of it as he rolled it between his fingers. The lip of the pool was smooth too, he felt as he rested his hand on it. He held the pebble to his lips.

“I don’t know what I am supposed to whisper,” he whispered. Then he pocketed the pebble. He turned around.

Aino was staring at him. Everyone else was staring at him. It was like the world had stopped and every eye was on him. Silence but for breathing.

Fuck. What did he do now?