Ryan started to search the Records Room once more.

This time, however, he wasn't searching for information, he was looking for another exit. There might not be one, but he knew he couldn't go back out the same way he'd entered. Pedra would be standing there with either taser or gun in hand. He'd be shocked or shot, and would wake up back in his cell, still himself and absolutely not himself. There would be no further chance of escape. It had to be now.

He ran between the rows of cabinets. His attention wasn't on them but, rather, the ceiling, walls and floor. There had to be an exit. Another opening he could utilise. If this room really was used for the keeping of the records, it would need to be kept at a consistent temperature and humidity, which potentially meant ducting. Why they hadn't scanned all the paperwork to keep it digital was an odd decision in a time of massive cloud storage capacities and multi-level encryptions. The information would surely be much safer than left on paper in a file in a room. Too many accidents could happen, and this only reiterated the falseness of it all. It wasn't practical!

He was across the room quickly, without finding a way out other than the entrance. There seemed to be no available option, and he could feel his frustration and, yes, fear growing. He was trapped. They would be with him at any moment. What could he...?

"It's no safe!"

Oh, fuck.

Ryan ignored the voice. It was probably his imagination, anyway. It sounded external, rather than inside his head, but that changed nothing. She was not real. She couldn't be.

"You've already had this conversation, silly. What does it matter?"

He hadn't spoken out loud, had he? No. He didn't do that. There were people who had no inner monologue or dialogue, so wouldn't have conversations in their minds. He did, he knew, but this wasn't one. This was someone else, not a disembodied voice floating around inside his head.

He wanted to ignore her. He felt he needed to. He couldn't, however. What if she really was Clara? His daughter? Regardless of the fact it would mean she was a captive of Bradley, too, she would be able to tell him things about himself. About them. Their life together.

"Clara?"

He kept his gaze low, not wanting to look around and see her. She could have been real, and she might not have been. Both made him uneasy.

"You didn't answer me."

"What do you mean?"

"What does it matter if I'm real or not?"

"Of course, it matters. This whole place is full of... madness. It's all just completely crazy, and you..."

"What about me?"

"You... you can't be real. Not after that, when you... you were everywhere."

"That was such fun, wasn't it? You were so funny!"

"Fun? It was fucking crazy!"

"You use those words like you know what they mean. Crazy. Madness. Reality. Crazy, crazy, crazy!"

Even if she was his daughter, which she couldn't be, he refused to be dragged into her games.

"I know exactly what they mean. Now, enough of this nonsense. Go away."

"But Daddy," she said, and the way she said it reached deep inside his heart and squeezed it tightly, "You don't mean that."

If she hadn't called him 'Daddy,' he might have been able to resist her. As it was, he looked up and around, desperate to see her. She'd spoken in a way that he remembered! Clara, his real daughter, had exactly the same inflections and tone that lathered the name with puppy dog eyes and cute smiles. She had to be real...

She wasn't there. It was just her voice. Just, it seemed, his fucking imagination.

"No," he said. "I don't."

And he didn't. Not anymore. He sighed, resigned. She was right. It didn't matter either way. Real or not, she was obviously still his Clara, He'd take her any way he could.

"Good, because that would be silly. I promise I won't go all everywhere again. You weren't listening before. You never do."

"I do listen," Ryan said, defensively. Did he? Probably...?

"Only when you really have to, and only when you think you really have to!"

Anyway...

"What do you want?" he asked.

She had to be there for a reason. He wasn't a toy she could pick up, play with, then discard when she was bored. He wanted to reach out and hold her tightly. The urge to embrace his daughter was almost overpowering.

But, she wasn't his daughter. She couldn't be!

"To tell you it's not safe, silly! I told you, you don't listen."

"Maybe not to you, but that's because you're in my mind. You can't be here."

"Who says? I don't think that's fair."

"What's not fair is you appearing all the time and tormenting me. Aren't I being tormented enough, just by being here?"

"Don't you like me being here, Daddy?"

Oh, that hurt! The name. The eyes. His fucking daughter!

"Of course I do, Pumpkin," he said, his pet name for her coming naturally. "But I don't know if it's because I'm losing my mind or if you're a result of whatever they've done to me."

"But, does it matter?" she repeated.

It didn't. He had no choice in her appearance or in what she would say. Just accept it. See where it went. She could be a help or hindrance, and nothing he did was going to change that.

He shook his head.

"No, it doesn't."

"Exactly. Thank you!"

"What for?"

"For finally opening yourself up to possibilities."

Clara was a young girl. Her voice, floating somewhere to his right, was that of his daughter, and the form she'd appeared in before was definitely her, but the words were those of an older person. Children didn't speak of possibilities or reality. His Clara didn't anyway. She was more interested in Disney and school and the boy she liked but couldn't like because her best friend did.

It wasn't her. Shit but... good. But shit.

At least she'd brought some of his memories along with her. He wasn't feeling as lost as he had been.

"OK," he said. He'd listen to what she had to say. If she was something he had mentally created to make sense of his plight, there was no harm. If not, and she was part of the grand experiment, he'd find out soon enough. "I'm listening."

"To what?" Clara's voice asked.

"To you. You said it's not safe. What isn't?"

"But, Daddy, I'm not really here. I'm you speaking to you. I'm the memory of your daughter pushing through the blocks they've placed on your life. But don't let that stop you speaking to me. The more you do, the more you'll remember. The more you you'll be, and the less of a hold they'll have."

Sigh.

"Why can't you just be my daughter?" Ryan asked. He knew she wasn't, really. She couldn't be. Shouldn't be. He had hoped, though. Wished.

"I am, Daddy. Really, I am, but still, I'm not here. You can hear, and even see me, but it doesn't change anything."

"No, I suppose it doesn't. So, if you're not really my Clara, why do you keep telling me it's not safe."

"Because it isn't."

"What isn't?"

"Everything you're doing. Everything they're doing. None of this is safe."

"I know that. That's why I'm trying to find out what the fuck is going on."

"You know they're allowing you to do all this? Otherwise, they'd be in here already. In fact, you'd never have made it this far if they didn't want you to.

"I realise that. I just wish I knew why."

"It's because you haven't got this far before. They want to see what you'll do."

What?

He'd been standing next to the cassette recorder, staring randomly around the room as the conversation had been going on. His daughter's voice was coming from a spot to his right, though, as she wasn't there in body, he had nothing specific to look at. That changed slowly, as a small blurry area of space that looked like a smudge on the air expanded and lengthened. As is did so, it sharpened, taking on form.

Finally...

Clara was sitting on the cabinet next to the cassette recorder.

"Hello, Daddy," she said.

She didn't look the same as the girl who'd haunted him in his cage. She was more... real. Less ghostly. Less likely to scream and much more likely to smile, make a joke at his expense, and give him a hug. She was his daughter!

And that's exactly what they wanted him to think. As piercing a pain as it was for Ryan to see – and hear and smell – Clara, she could not be there with him. Besides, she'd admitted she was only his mind messing with him. Fuck it. Fuck them.

"Clara," he said bluntly.

"Well, that's not the way to greet me, is it?"

"It's the way I talk to myself, and you're myself."

"OK," she said. "I'll give you that."

"Yeah, thanks."

"Oh, cheer up, sour puss."

Ryan smiled. Clara, the real one, called him that in moments of playful exasperation, when his infamous 'dad' jokes hit home. This pseudo version using the name was an insult. It was as if he were mocking himself. 'Sour puss' brought more memories along with it for the ride, and the influx was enough to make him unsteady. He saw his daughter shake her head and pull a face. He saw the giggle in her eyes. He heard his wife laugh from the kitchen. He smelled freshly popped toast, well done as he liked it, rather than the anaemic barely heated, barely brown pretend toast Bun preferred.

He heard a scream... Bun... or... Clara...? No, they were laughing at his jokes. So... where...?

No, it was gone. It must have been his imagination, which was working overtime at the moment.

"So, why haven't they come in to get me yet?"

"If you don't know, how would I?"

"You're no help."

"I think you'll find it's you who's no help."

Ryan sighed again. Clara wasn't there, not really. He knew that. He had to stand up to himself and tell his daughter to go to hell. He had to move on. Get out of this room and see what awaited him. He could feel the eyes of Bradley on him, though he could see no cameras. Was she watching him through his daughter?

Had he actually contemplated that?

"Fine, so I guess I'll leave the way I came in and let them get me. I'll go back to my cell and die a few more times."

"I like that idea, Daddy. It sounds fun."

Sure it does.

"Why don't you have another look around, or see if there are any other tapes to listen to?"

He'd looked everywhere, already. Listening to another recording would only delay him. Was Clara wanting him to be caught? Did that mean he wanted to be caught? No, don't be ridiculous. He wanted to escape. To find out what the hell was going on.

"I don't think I need to listen to any more tapes. It'll just give them more time to get in here."

"They've had plenty, don't you think?"

He did think. Of course, they had. Ryan didn't know what to do next. He was doing exactly what they wanted, which he knew, but he still felt as if there was something he could do that would throw them off. He refused to purely be their pawn, even if there was no way he could be anything else. Whatever he did, they would have already anticipated, surely.

OK. So. While his mind wrestled, he'd walk around. It would be the pretence of doing as Clara said, taking another look around, while just trying to centre himself. He began to walk, pulling out cabinet drawers as he went. He glanced in them, but did little more than rifling through the files. There was no point in picking any up. They wouldn't tell him anything. There was nothing to see and no way ou....?

At the back of the room, where cabinets had lined the rear wall, was now a gap. It was wide enough for Ryan to have both arms outstretched, if he'd thought about doing so. It hadn't been there before, nor had the body laying face down on the floor.