The moss-covered brick was slippery to the touch.

My fingers slipped off as I tried to grab onto the ledge again. Nope.

Emma stood behind me, arms crossed and head cocked. She stared at my fruitless attempts to get up the side of the building.

"Dude, this feels dumb," she blurted out.

I aggressively rubbed my palms against my cotton pants, panting from exertion. Emma couldn't be right.

I dug my nails deep into the moss and tried pulling myself up again. My muscles shook, and my fingers ached in their tight hold. My breath came out in a heavy gasp as I exerted force with my arm muscles, and yet...

I dropped back to the grass. A light drizzle of rain pattered around the two of us, the drops sticking to my frizzy hair.

"Why are we doing this again?" Emma inquired. She took a solemn step up to the dirty wall and placed her palm in the moss. Her hand came away soaked in water. "I don't think this is going to work."

I kicked the wall a bit pointlessly and my boot bounced back. A bit of dirt showered down into the grass.

"I just need to get inside, okay?" I responded. I clenched my fists.

We had already jumped the fence to the judicial building and were standing on one of the smaller ledges at the edge of the place. When I'd  asked Emma why they didn't have more security, she had just shrugged and said that nobody had really tried. It wasn't looking too good for me, though. Why have so little security if you were holding actual prisoners here?

I was still going to try getting in. I needed to be absolutely certain.

"Maybe we should try going around or something?" Emma suggested, peeking around the edge of the ledge. It wrapped around behind the building where ivy climbed up the side of the building and piled at the top.

The light drizzle picked up, plastering my red hair to my pale skin. I tried to grab the moss covered edge one last time. My hand easily slipped off.

"Fine," I relented. "Follow me." A fence bordered the back ledge of the building. I gripped it with my dirty fingers as Emma folowed at my heels. Her dark hair had been tied back in a wet ponytail.

The ground was covered in even more moss here. My sneakers had trouble getting a grip as I balanced with the help of the metal fence and the dark wall to the right of me.

Everything on this side of the building looked nearly identical to the side of the building except...

Was that...?

I hurried my pace. My steps were reckless as I pushed along the fence. The metal rattled with each new grip. Emma frantically copied me.

"Woah, why are we going so fast?" Emma complained. "Can you slow down?!"

"Shh!" I whispered. Emma had pointed out there weren't many guards, but that didn't mean the few that were there couldn't hear us.

A few feet later, I stopped in front of the miraculous object in front of me: a window.

"Oh," Emma muttered as she caught up. Before I could stop her, Emma smashed her boot into the glass. It shattered all over the floor below it. The window pane thumped to the concrete ten feet below. "Whoops."

I sent her a sharp glare. Too late now. We would need to hurry, though. Thankfully, the night remained quiet. No red lights and blaring alarms like I was used to seeing in movies.

Two large shelves bordered the opening inside of the room. A large desk sat in the middle with books strewn around it. The room looked eerily familiar - was it the same as the one I'd been brought to when I'd nearly lost my body the first time?

I eyed Emma then cautiously lowered my body to the fractured edge. A bit of loose glass cut into my jeans and I winced. Without a second thought, I let go and grabbed onto the shelf just beneath me.

My body swung down but didn't drop. The shelf was screwed tight into the wall.

Lacking elegance, I dropped to the carpeted floor and curled up in a ball as my butt bone slammed into the concrete. I should have thought through my landing a a bit better.

Emma came down in a graceful roll next to me. "Nice drop," she commented. I grimaced and brushed my jean pants off. Dust lined my knee caps.

"Thanks."

"No problem." Emma picked up a book from the desk. It was a dark maroon with shiny gold lettering and embroidery. "In Hunt of the Moon. Huh. Weird book title."

"Sounds boring." I pushed my aching body to my feet, my muscles strained from holding my body weight from my arms.

By some miracle, we were inside.

Now what?

For a moment, I regretted bringing Emma along. I didn't want her to find out why I was actually there. Noah had freaked out when I'd told him the truth. Who's to say she wouldn't act the same?

Whatever. I needed to do this.

"You can wait here, if you want. I'll be right back," I told Emma, my back to the office door. I took another step backward and shoved the door open.

"Woah, wait! Why can't I come with you?"

"I didn't think you wanted to...," I lied.

"I'd love to. I'm bored. Noah is gone. I don't have anything else to do."

Ugh. Why couldn't she just catch a hint?

Maybe being with her would actually be an advantage. There were still guards around here. She seemed to know what she was doing. I hadn't yet gotten used to this body.

Would Asten even recognize me? Assuming he was here.

I shoved through the office door and Emma hurried to catch up to me.  She caught the door on its fall shut. I waited just outside in the hallway.

It was absolutely silent.

The floors were tiled and painted in a star pattern. The walls were beige with the occasional lamp brightening the way. The whole place smelled musty and like dried flowers. 

We tiptoed down the hallway, keeping to the patches of darkness in between the lamp lights. My ears stayed alert for any indication of footsteps. As the minutes passed, I became more comfortable and picked up the pace. The halls were abandoned.

I wandered down the halls until we'd made a loop. At the furthest corner was a staircase. It spiraled both up and down deeper into the building.

"I'm guessing down?" I suggested to Emma.

"I still have no idea what you are looking for, dude. You do you."

"Okay, fine. I'm trying to find if they're keeping people here."

"Keeping people? Like prisoners?" Emma asked, incredulously.

"Yes? This is a justice building?" I replied.

"Mmm. Sure. If you think they'll be here. I don't think so," Emma muttered. "But why down? Can't they be holding people literally anywhere?"

I sighed. "Okay, fine. We'll go up first."

The upstairs had floors made of marble and far less light. There were a series of open doors. I poked my head into each one. Emma copied on the other side. After a couple minutes of this ritual, Emma yelled from the other side of the hall.

I whipped around. Her back was to the wall outside a cracked open door with gilded edges.

"What happened?!" I whispered.

"There are people," she whispered back. "People! In bed!"

What the heck?

"In the same bed?" I asked, innocently.

"No! Oh my god. Just look."

I didn't want to look, especially if it would wake someone up. And especially if they were actually guards and would arrest us.

But I had to see. Just in case.

I pushed open the door with my arm. It creaked loudly and I saw something move from inside of the room. I poked my head around the corner of the door.

It was a plain blue-painted room with two beds and two windows on opposite sides. In one bed, a body lay immobile, in the other, a girl sat on the edge staring right at me.

My entire body tensed up, the urge to run as far as I could overtaking me. But no. No.

Because this wasn't just anyone. This was not-really-Ava. The Ava who had stood on the dias during the trial. And her door had been unlocked.

"Who are you?" not-so-Ava sleepily mumbled. 

Her freckles were less pronounced in this lighting, but it was definitely the same girl.

"Who are you?" I asked, right back at her. My body felt numb. Sweat dripped from my arms. With my hidden hand I pulled my knife from my belt. I could hear Emma shifting behind me, getting into a fighting position. 

"Ellie," she said. Her voice was airy and her eyes seemed almost glazed over.

"Why are you here?" I asked. I was testing the limits of this interaction. But something was off.

"I live here."

"Okayy," I replied, softly. Maybe she had already called the guards. She was probably just keeping me here as a manipulation tactic. Already, I could imagine the whole building blaring to life any second now.

"Were you looking for someone in particular?" Ellie asked. Her head comically tilted, her gaze meeting my glare.

"Why do you care?" I snapped.

"I don't care," Ellie responded in perfect monotone. "But I know you do. Were you looking for Ava?"

"Who's Ava?" Emma whispered to me from where she hid, eavesdropping on our conversation.

"What do you know about Ava?" I inquired. Ellie swung off the bed and I stumbled backward. Emma tensed further next to me.

"I know where she is."