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Maybe Zoe belonged back with her sister, Miriam.

Maybe he and Wynter belonged there for some reason he didn’t have the intuition or the blood connection to understand.

Maybe Mal and Tai belonged on a world with others of their kind.

Maybe something was really wrong at home. Maybe it was some mystical, global, apocalyptic, historical-timeline thing, and Nick was supposed to help.

Maybe him being here, knowing what he knew, had thrown both dimensions out of whack in some way. Maybe he wasn’t supposed to find out, and his knowing somehow messed up the timeline here.

Or maybehewas about to mess up the timeline here.

Maybe he was going to do something that would cause some sort of break or bend.

The thought disturbed him. But thinking that some vortex lived out there, trying to pull him back… that had to be insane, right?

No way was Nick as an individual that important.

Still, he knew individuals could change things, for good or for bad. They could change everything with small actions, a single decision, even an accident or a wrong word. If some larger force was trying to keep him from interfering here, or conversely, trying to get him back to where he belonged to prevent or cause something there, Nick wasn’t sure he wanted to fight that. He wasn’t sure hecouldfight that, even if fighting was something he wanted.

He also didn’t know if there was anything he could do about it.

Somewhere in all that, Nick started walking again.

He almost walked right into Morley when the old man paused to open the door. He realized how far his mind had wandered when he got a puzzled look from the human detective, right before James turned the handle.

He’d been waiting for Nick, but now he swung open the panel. Both of them passed through the wood frame opening. Both of them entered the long, rectangular room.

It struck Nick again how quiet it was here.

He couldn’t even hear Jordan doing his usual pacing.

He couldn’t hear Jordan talking on his headset, or using his enhanced, mechanical eyes.

He couldn’t hear Jordan at all.

Wait.

He couldn’t hear Jordanat all.

The thought had barely crossed his mind…

…when the door slammed shut behind them.

Nick turned, and found himself staring at…

...Jesus fuck.

Gods living in the underworld, it couldn’t be.

It just couldn’t.

CHAPTER19

THE STRANGER

Nick froze.

Not just his feet. Every part of his body froze as he took in the being in front of him and the scene he’d staged and the room itself.