“Sarah! Eli!” He wanted his voice to be louder but even he could barely hear it. From up ahead, the chugging clank of heavy machinery grew louder, like chains being dragged and slapped across piles of sheet metal. It was as if something inside the hospital’s infrastructure had broken free and was running faster and faster, cogs and pulleys ripping themselves to pieces.

Mike gripped the wall and kept going, the smoke’s thickness a physical presence around him, filtering into his thoughts.

How do you know they’re even here?

I don’t.

Go on back. It’s all right, Lover Boy. They’re safe. They’re—

Mike brought his hand to his mouth and bit his knuckle hard until the pain shot up his arm. It cut through the murk of his mind long enough for him to edge a few yards farther. Things were worse up ahead, no question. Blind and effectively deaf from the clatter of noise, he put one hand out for guidance and felt the floor shaking.

Die, the voice chattered, you’ll die up here, Lover Boy, alone and lost—

Two choices: stop or keep going.

They’re not even here, they’re downstairs already looking for you. You’re on a fool’s errand.

Mike told the voice he’d go another ten paces and stop, knowing he wouldn’t. He’d crawl every foot of this hall until he dropped, and the chattering voice in his head, the voice of the smoke, knew it, too. It had started chanting along with the beat of his heart.

Quit. Quit. Quit.

He put his other arm out, leaned on it and felt the unsteadiness of lactic acid buildup tremble through his muscles, the feeling of an exhausted swimmer who realizes that his arms and legs are overcooked pasta and he’s going to drown. The adrenaline he’d felt earlier was gone. For the first time since he entered the smoke he felt scared, truly scared, that he wouldn’t have control of himself, body or mind, anymore than he did in the operators’ office. His determination to find his wife and child wouldn’t matter one iota after that, because the thing in the hospital, the thing inside the smoke, would be calling the shots.

How much time do I have left? Two minutes? Less?

His palm skated forward, dropping him onto his face, and all at once he knew his time was up. His half-blind eyes rose up to the crayon drawings on the walls, the cancer kids, terminal but still doggedly manipulating their Crayolas, and he understood them in a way he never had before. They were monuments to the absolute indifference of the universe, an unfair place where the innocent suffered and everyone’s best efforts didn’t make a germ of difference, because what was ultimately meant to happen was ultimately going to happen.