We gather our wits and head to the MAG station, hoping that we don’t have to wait too long for the next car. After about a five-minute walk, during which we’re smiling extraordinary stupidly in relief, we enter the station and are immediately onslaught with a horrible smell. We both freeze, and our smiles slide off our faces. We look at each other and know what the other’s thinking. Rotting flesh.

Oh shit.

My mind flashed back to the scene in the police station on the first layer. Nope. Not dealing with that again. I’m outta here. I do a slow 180 and calmly walk away, training my eyes directly ahead of me, hoping Daisy doesn’t notice my sneaky getaway.

“Tera.” Shit, she noticed. I stop, but I don’t turn around. “We need to figure this out. You know that it’s wrong to leave this when we’re the only ones who know what’s going on.”

At this I swing around to face her. “And how do we know everything? There’s things that have happened that I haven’t even told…” Shit. I just dug my own grave, didn’t I? I glance down, avoiding her eyes.

“Me? You haven’t told me things? Tera-no, Murphy. You prefer that, right? We encountered a guy with torn-up eyeballs, a police station filled with torn-up corpses, and a stab-happy psycho. What the fuck do you think that you can’t tell me?”

I dare looking up, and flinch at the look on her face. She is livid. Right now, she’s putting Medusa to shame. I can’t move an inch, stuck here staring into her eyes. I have to say something.

“Daisy…I don’t want you to think that I’m crazy. I know everything we’ve gone through is, well, crazy, but there are some things that I just really don’t want you to know.”

She looks at me like I started barking, then turns away and passes a hand over her eyes, tilting her head back.

“Ok, I’ll let you keep this one secret. Just promise me that if you think it will help solve this shitstorm that you’ll tell me.”

“Fine.”

“Good. Now, I want your guarantee that no matter what you won’t abandon all responsibility and pretend to forget this ever happened.”

I look at her for a second, trying to think of all the possible situations in which I would abandon this mess. Now counts as one of them. Daisy notices my hesitation and speaks up.

“Let me recite a quote for you in the hopes that it will convince you to stay. Listen carefully –

‘First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.’”

She looks at me in silence as what she said sinks in, then speaks again.

“Now do you get it? That is what’s happening right now. Remember that murderer? We just ran away. What if he came up here, slaughtered a bunch of people, and came after us again? So, we need to kick his fucking ass now, before he kills any more people.”

Shit, she’s good at motivational speeches. “Just don’t get me killed, ok?”

Daisy just grins. Not the most encouraging, but damn does she have a killer smile. Wait what.

We start walking back to the station, but then I pause for a moment. She looks back at me, then narrows her eyes.

“You better not be getting second thoughts, right?”

“No, no, that’s not it. I’m just confused about the smell.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Well, don’t bodies need time to decompose?”

“Yeah?”

“How long do you think the guy we saw downstairs could’ve had to come up here and slaughter them?”

Her eyes widen, and she mutters, “It’s impossible.”

“So who did?”