Cadmus tried to rest his head on his desk. He was not succeeding; the desk felt like granite, his body a load of brittle planks strewn over it. Outside, streetlights had come on and the snow had taken momentary leave. The window was filled with a ponderous blue.

Two hours ago the hospital director returned from a meeting and dismissed him for the day. Cadmus was unsure if this was a good or bad thing, and remained in his office. The Fleming exorcism had not been halted. He could still feel in the floor below the intermittent rumble of the hired exorcist squad’s stomps, hums and chants. The sometimes the voice of staff, and those of patients, but only for seconds at a time, leaves wiped over by the tide of madness. There was a particular set of voices missing, though.

Or rather, that set was coming from somewhere it shouldn't.

Cadmus rose from his ancient office chair and went to the window. He pushed open the smallest panel. In flowed the evening chill, and along with it the shriek of Art Fleming, far above.

As soon as his wits returned, Cadmus rushed out of his office and toward the elevators. There was a crowd forming. He turned for the fire stairs. There were far too many people around there, too, poking their heads into the chilly stairwell, listening to the voices.

“Let me see her! Let me go!” said the voice, echoing from ten flights above.

Cadmus shot up the stairs gripped with a sort of madness. He had trained for years to get in the mindset of humans, those who could seriously hurt themselves with fall, and take stairs nice and slow so he could be a good example. So they would trust him. But tonight, all was forgotten. He clawed his way up like an animal, ankles tearing and resealing, palms flayed by the cement, bounding off the wall with each corner.

His coat tore at the shoulder, threads catching with paint. He ignored it. That was hardly going to dent the Flemings’ already nonexistent trust.

It couldn’t get any worse.

Cadmus reached the top landing and re-set his shoulder. Snow from the rooftop had spilled like pillows through the open door. Dead trees on the rooftop garden reached for the same blue sky he’d seen in his office, over the heads of roughly a dozen members of staff and security. A few were on the floor, having been knocked back.

Art Fleming was also on the floor. She was cradling a small body. Draped over her knee Cadmus saw an ice-blue hand and the wool trim of Kris Fleming’s coat.

Cadmus moved forward. “Is she okay?” But of course she wasn’t.

Red Fleming and Carion, with Karik hiding under his arm, were mesmerized by the sight of before them. They did not stop him as he passed. Art was muttering something.

“We should bring her down for treatment, right now,” Cadmus said. “Maybe…”

Art shook as he approached, when he reached her side, one shivering hand slipped. Kris’s pallid face slid across her mother’s lap. Her neck was limp as rope, her lips black and slightly parted. But she was completely and hopelessly still.

“We should alert the police,” Cadmus said. Nobody immediately rushed to make the call.

Art’s staggered to her feet with Kris limp in her arms, and he heard her words now, or rather the single word, rising in a volcanic plume: “No no no no….”