I woke up to the sound of the alarm clock. I looked at the time, it was 2 am. Time to break Eric out. I got out of the bed, and grabbed a grey shirt and a pair of grey pants. I went to the washroom to clean up and by the time I returned to my room, Liesal was ready, she sat on the neatly made bed as she waited.

"Ready?" I asked her as I laced my boots.

She nodded, "Yes." A worried look was plastered on her face, and her gaze was set upon the floor as if she was deep in thought.

"Hey!" I said, snapping her out of the trance. "What's wrong?"

She looked at me nervously, "It's nothing really," she answered. I looked at her, eyebrows raised. Finally Liesal said, "You know how Frank said that the room that contained the safe was a trap?" I nodded, I remembered that very clearly because it made me nervous as well. 'A trap,' he had said. What exactly was that supposed to mean? "What do you think he meant?" she asked looking up at me.

I sighed, "Liesal, I don't know. And I'd love to say that I do, but I simply don't. I can't guarantee any safety on this trip. I know you are nervous, so am I, and if you don't want to come right now, I'm okay with that. I understand,".

Liesal shook her head, "No. No! I want to go with you! I'm fine with that! I want to help you find Eric and save him!"

I smiled, "Then lets go!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We walked through the halls in the lowest floor. "How are we supposed to know which room contains the safe?" Liesal asked.

I shrugged, "Maybe the door will be labeled," I suggested rather naively. As we continued to walk further into the hall, a brilliant and blinding light shone down from above. Raising my arm over my eyes, I cautiously moved towards the door. As Liesal twisted the handle open, we were hit by bright rays of light.

"What the heck!?" Liesal shouted.

Slowly, I peered through a gap, and there in the middle of the room, was a safe. "Liesal look!" I motioned towards the safe.

"We found it," she replied, smiling. We slowly made our way into the extremely bright room. Even though my eyes were shielded, I could still fell the light. "Meredith look," Liesal said pointing to a wall. I looked at the wall only to see my own reflection. "This whole room is a giant mirror, even the floor," she stated. I looked down at the floor, to see yet another reflection of myself.

"Let's just find this key and get out of here," I told Liesal. We began to search the floors, then the walls. After a thorough inspection that took at least an hour, we still couldn't find the key.

"Where is it?!" Liesal yelled. "We've looked everywhere!" I nodded and groaned, this was going to take longer that I thought. "Where could it be?" Liesal moaned as she tilted her head back, her eyes suddenly widened as she looked at the ceiling.

"What is it?" I asked. She just looked up and pointed. I followed to where her finger was pointing, and there tied to the blinding ceiling lamp, was the key. The light was blinding, and I could not bear to look at it any longer. The consequences of staring into this light did not wear off until a few minutes had passed. Two minutes later, I could finally see clearly and saw that Liesal had suffered from the same predicament as I had.

"How are we going to get it?" Liesal asked.

"I'm tall enough, I'll untie it," I answered. Slowly I used one hand to partially cover my eyes, while I used the other to untie the key. Finally after three tries, I managed to get the key. As we exited the room, alarms blared through the building.

"Security safe breach!" a deep voiced announced. "I repeat, security safe breach! Level B, room 36," .

Liesal looked at me, the color from her face had completely drained, "We should leave!". I nodded, as we ran through the halls, dark dots began to blur my vision, and I lost my balance. I fell to the floor, my eyes were burning. I saw that Liesal was the same. "What's happening?" she asked as she frantically rubbed her eyes.

I shook my head, what was happening? Then I remembered Frank's advice, 'the room is a trap!'. Now I understood. As we both continued to rub our eyes, we heard the shuffling of boots close by. I tried to stand up but again I fell to the floor. I felt very dizzy.

"This is commander Kirk," a man in a grey jumpsuit said as he reached us. "And by trespassing into room 36, you are under arrest,". We were handcuffed, then as we were about to be dragged off, I passed out.

I woke up an office. I was sitting on a chair, handcuffed, and beside me sat Liesal. She still hadn't woken up.

"So you've decided to ignore my advice," Frank said as he entered the room. "I've got to say, I am a bit disappointed. I wasn't really expecting to arrest either of you," he told me as he walked around to the desk. "Now, onto different matters, where is the key?"

"What key?" I lied, well aware that the key was still in Liesal's pocket.

Frank smiled, "The key you stole,".

As I opened my mouth the respond, Henry and Joanna stormed through the door. "We heard what happened! Why would you do such a thing?!" Henry questioned.

Liesal, who had woken up, replied by saying, "Let us explain,".

"No let me," Frank interrupted. "These two here, thought that they could steal from the safe, and fortunately they were stopped just in time. Now since we do know them, we will let them off with a warning, but if I catch either of you next time, doing something as idiotic as this, I will not hesitate,".

"Thank you Frank," Joanna said. "As for you two, why on earth would you even consider stealing from the place that is providing you shelter, and safety? I am so disappointed in both of you, an you Meredith! What would your mother say about this!"

I laughed, "Well if she was here, we would know. But she isn't, and instead of going out to search for her, we have to wait for this storm to pass?! We are delaying this because of rain!".

Henry sighed, "Look we are worried about her too. She has become a good and trusted friend of ours, but we have to wait for the storm to pass. If we go out, we could get hurt and then it would delay this mission even more. You just have to be patient, we will find her. Now let's get you two back to your rooms,".

Liesal and I were un-handcuffed, as we were walking out the door, Frank stopped us, "I believe you two are are forgetting something?"

Liesal sighed, and reached into her pocket to retrieve it. "Almost got away with it," she joked. Frank's face showed no emotion as her snatched the key away from her.

As we walked into our room, Joanna questioned, "So why did you try to steal the key? What were you planning to do with all the money? It's not really useful in today's world, where everything is in ruins,". So Liesal and I explained our plan to both Henry and Joanna, at the end Joanna gasped. "So you were planning to break Eric out, then run away from here without telling us?"

"Well we didn't really think about running away, but pretty much," Liesal replied as she stared at the ground. After that, Henry and Joanna left us alone in the room, they told us that we were not allowed to leave it, unless it was for breakfast lunch or dinner, or if we needed to use the lavatory.

We sat sating at the ground, ceiling or walls, as we awaited dinner. Finally, it was 6, and we were allowed to leave our room for dinner. There was an awkward silence as Leisal and I approached the table, clearly everyone had heard about what we did. We sat down, and everyone ate their food in silence. I managed to catch a few glimpses of Frank and Jayce, and they seemed pretty mad. As we were about to leave, Frank broke the silence by asking, "Meredith, I know you are worried about your brother, would you like to visit him?"

I almost dropped the glass of water, "Yes! When?"

"Tomorrow at seven," Jacye replied sternly.

A smile was plastered on my face as I fell asleep, see you tomorrow Eric.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I woke up extra early, and got ready very quickly. The time was 6:45, by the time I finished tying my shoelaces. Maybe they wouldn't mind if I was early, I thought. So I walked into the hallway, almost skipping the whole way, as I neared Frank's office I could hear voices. I walked slowly towards the door, and saw that Frank was talking to a man about 20-25 years of age.

"Sir, the boy has been acting very strange. He's refuses to eat or drink anything until he sees his sister. We tried making him talk, but he only mumbled his sister's name several times. He is in terrible condition, he sits on the floor everyday, both his arms wrapped around his feet, as he rocks back and forth. His eyes are wide, as if he knows something's watching him. But sometimes, he acts completely different. Sometimes, he acts normal and not scared at all. We don't know what's going on,".

I stepped into the room before Frank replied, "Take me to him,".

The man looked at Frank and waited for approval, "Take her," Frank ordered.

As we walked down the stairs, worries had started to fill my head. Endless worst case scenarios began to form in my mind. I walked very quickly, and the closer I got to the cellars, the more I became scared of seeing who lay on the other side.

"We're here," the man said as he stopped in front of the last cellar. On the other side, was Eric. His face was pale, and thin. As described by the man before, he was on the ground rocking back and forth and his eyes were fixated on the wall.

"Hey little man," I said softly as I walked into the cellar and knelt beside him. "What are you up to? People have been telling me that you refused to eat? Why are you doing that? You love food!"

He was shaking as though he was holding back tears, when he heard my voice, he turned around. I stopped dead in my tracks, his face was cold and pale. When he saw me, his eyes widened, and he let out a long breath. His eyes widened, and he whispered, in a voice filled with a combination of rage and fear, "Meredith, help me please." It seemed like he was struggling to say this.

"What's wrong baby bro?" I asked, trying to hold back my own tears.

His eyes darted around the room as if he was checking if someone was watching us, "I can't talk here. Not now, they'll hear me! They can probably hear what I'm saying right now! I don't know how to get rid of them! Please help!" he cried out. Eric began to cry, uncontrollably.

"Whoa, Eric who can't you get rid of? If you tell me, I can help!" I told him. "Please tell me!"

He shook his head violently, "No I can't tell you! Not while they're listening!".

I lifted his head, "Eric what's going on?! Nobody is listening!"

Eric shook his head once again, "No you're wrong! They are all listening! I can hear their voices in my head! They are so mean, and cruel! I shouldn't even have told you! I'm sorry, I can't say anything!" He curled up and continued to cry. I sat there in shock, what had happened to my little brother? The guards had to drag me out of the room, my legs had become weak, and my eyes were still fixed on Eric. Finally, Eric looked up at me and said, "They don't like me Meredith! They're inside me!" he screamed. As I was being pulled away, I saw something that frightened me more than anything that had ever happened to me over my entire life. Eric looked up, stopped screaming, he sat upright and he stared straight ahead, calmly. I did not understand what was happening, but as the bars were being shut, I saw Eric's eyes changing, and then it happened, he smiled.