My first instinct was to use psychokinesis to break her chains, but then I remembered this was all hyperphantasia. I didn’t know if my psychokinesis would affect my hyperphantasia, and I didn’t have the time to find out.

I needed to fight fire with fire—or, I suppose, ice with ice.

Raising my hands, I grabbed spots on the air while imagining I was squeezing Ileene’s chains, crushing them—making them shatter like glass.

I heard the sound of shattering glass as the chains broke. The fragments of the links and cuffs dissolved into mist as they fell, vanishing before they ever touched the floor.

Ileene screamed as she plummeted, but I was prepared. I pictured her descending like a feather, slowly rocking in the air. She fell exactly as I imagined, gently settling onto the ground landing on her hands and knees.

She trembled as she sat up. Her movements were full of hesitation and disbelief. Then, folding in her legs, Ileene wrapped her arms around her midsection and sobbed.

I knelt down beside her.

“Just breathe,” I said. “Breathe.” I ran my hand up and down the back of her robe.

“It’s…” She shivered beneath my touch. “It’s so cold…”

Her breath was mist.

I imagined a bonfire—a kind, warming flame. It appeared beside us, floating mid-air.

Sticking out her trembling hands, Ileene crept toward the flame, desperate to warm herself. She stared into the fire, panting heavily.

“Are you alright?” I asked, moving around to the opposite side of the floating fire.

She stared right at me,the flames glistening in her melting tears. Her limped, blue eyes devoured my every detail.

“Please, I—” but then she cut herself off. Her features scrunched up with confusion. “—Why are you dressed…” she shook her head. “What are you wearing?” She looked up at the ruined ceiling, and the endless darkness that lurked beyond. “What’s going on?”

“It’s PPE,” I said. “Personal Protective Equipment. And…” I sighed, “even if it doesn’t look like it, this is a hospital. West Elpeck Medical Center.”

“So… you’re… you’re a doctor?” Ileene cocked her head, as if that couldn’t be right.

I couldn’t really blame her for that.

“Why am I here?” she asked. “This is—” but she couldn’t get the word out. “I can’t be here,” she added, in a whisper. “I can’t…”

Ileene’s jittery, paranoid gaze hopped around, from me, to Andalon, to me again, to the bits of floating walls, to the ruins that towered around us—and on and on.

“What?” I asked.

Ileene looked me in the eyes and trembled. “Hell…” she whispered. “This… this can’t be real.” She let out a broken, terrified giggle. “Please,” she begged, clasping her hands together, “please… tell me this isn’t real. What happened to the compound? To the monastery?”

Her incorporeal robes caressed the corridor’s vinyl floor.

I had a bad feeling about this.

Why do I have a bad feeling about this? Oh, that’s right: she ran away from her family to join up with a bunch of literal terrorists!

The Innocents of the Mountain.

“I…” I bit my lip, and then huffed out breath. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

Ileene brought her hand to her forehead. Would she remember being lobotomized by those fundamentalist monsters?

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“I…” Her eyes begged me to be her anchor.

“Please,” I said, I had to force the next words out of my mouth. “Think carefully.”

I admit, I didn’t know the specifics behind how the fungus corrupted souls like Frank’s or Esmé’s. But, if joining a murderous fundamentalist sect that committed acts of terror hadn’t put one of Ileene’s feet through the doorway to demonhood, I’d buy a hat and eat it.

Frank’s specter had used my powers to kill an innocent man during its rampage. I couldn’t let that happen again. I refused to.

I had to stay vigilant.

If there was an unambiguously good sign here, it was the fact that Ileene was still completely human. I didn’t know if she’d turn into a monster like the others had, but…

Andalon, I thought, can I keep Ileene from turning into a monster? Is there anything I can do?

Andalon crept up behind me and whispered. “I think so, but…” she shook her head, “Andalon doesn’t remember.”

I sighed.

Well, at least it wasn’t no.

Angel…

If there was something I could do to keep Ileene from sharing Frank’s fate, I had to do it… even if I didn’t quite know what that something was.

Ileene looked off into the distance. To our left and right, fragments of the real hallway coalesced mid-air, becoming more and more complete.

My memory told me we were at the top of a T-shaped intersection of hallways, even if most of it was hidden beneath my hyperphantasy of a ruined cathedral.

“What is it?” Ilenee asked.

“It’s nothing,” I answered, dismissively. “Please, just focus on what you can remember. Where were you before this? What were you doing?”

For a moment, she stared into the fire. Then, she began to speak

“Eyvan and I… we’d been blessed with a child. I was pregnant.” Ileene tried to smile, but failed.

Joy eluded her.

“Tasha said she was so proud of me.” She looked up and shivered. “Oh God…” Ileene took a deep breath. “There was an augury, and… I…” Her brow furrowed. “I was chosen to go to the Crucible.” She nodded. “I remember going with Eyvan. We were to start the Dreaming, the preparation for the coming weeks of prayer and contemplation, and then…” Her words trailed off.

“Yes?” I asked. I was definitely nervous. As far as I knew, the slightest provocation might trigger a monstrous transformation that sent Ileene out on a rampage.

Again, Ileene stared into the fire before answering. “I don’t know. It’s…” She shook her head. “Everything’s gray. Voids. Maybe some sound? Voices, songs… sunlight… but…” She shook her head once more. “No… I don’t know.”

Ileene stared into my eyes. Tears started trickling down her face

“Well—“

Ileene lunged at me the instant I opened my mouth, grabbing both my arms.

“—Please, help me!” she screamed. “Help me!”

Ileene kept her eyes locked on mine. If she hadn’t, she might have seen that her hands had phased through my forearms. “Get me out of here,” she begged, trying to shake me with her arms. “I don’t belong in Hell! I don’t belong in Hell!”

Her sobbing turned into hysteria. She closed her eyes and shook her head from side to side, screaming in terror.

Even Andalon started to cry. “Please, Mr. Genneth, do something!”

Darn it…

I choked up. At that moment, all I could think about was trying to find a way to spare this poor young woman these awful torments. She didn’t deserve to feel this way.

But then I realized: there was something I could do. And, maybe—just maybe—this time, I’d be able to pull it off.

Closing my eyes and focusing, I held up my hands and visualized the actuality of our surroundings—the real hallway, and what it looked like. I knew I was on the right track when I heard Ileene gasp.

“What is that?”

I opened my eyes. “The truth,” I said.

Just like all the times before it, a hole in the air had opened in the middle of the hallway, through which we could see the second floor of the Administration Building as it really was. The checkered vinyl floor was shining and clean; the old, textured green wallpaper didn’t have the slightest trace of ice or stone. Holding my focus as best as I could, I walked up to the hole and stuck my hands inside, to grab hold of its edge. Initially, the hole’s edge was incorporeal, and my hands phased through it. But, muttering under my breath, I imagined it having a sense of thickness, and, to my delight, that’s exactly what happened.

My hyperphantasia had given me something to grab on to!

Andalon stood up, hopping with excitement. “You’re doing it, Mr. Genneth! You’re doing it!”

“W-What is…?” Ileene’s voice trailed off.

Looking over my shoulder, I locked eyes with the young woman and waved my head toward the hole. “You wanted out of here? Then let’s get out of here! C’mon!” I waved my head again. “Quickly!”

Ileene got up off the floor and stepped through the hole. Andalon immediately followed suit.

But I wasn’t quite ready to join them yet. I needed to make sure the hellscape would be gone for good.

I pulled back at the hole’s edge while picturing it expanding at the same time.

“I can do it,” I muttered. “I can do it!”

I pushed with both legs, and the hole expanded. It was like moving a sliding door out of the way, sliding into a slot in the wall. As I pushed, the expanding hole pushed away the icy hellscape. I looked to my right to see the hellscape zip away at the vanishing point as the hole grew to encompass the entire hallway.

The hellscape was gone. I held my breath.

I slumped against the corridor wall, exhausted. For a moment, I worried that—

—No.

I stopped myself.

I didn’t care if I had doubts. I needed to shove those aside, just like the hellscape hallway. Something needed to be done to stop the fungus—to stop the Last Days. There had to be a way to nip Hell’s invasion in the bud.

I figured I might as well start with Ileene.