Another zip of Grant's white card and the door opened. There was indeed a floor below the laboratory, and she pushed the button. The Dorian Institute was all about security, but this subbasement area was doubly secure. After a quick trip down, the elevator door opened onto another air lock chamber, this an exit from the pressurized environment of the laboratory. Why, she wondered, had no one spotted her yet? Perhaps this part of the clinic was such a lockdown that nurses and guards weren't necessary. As she stepped from the air lock, she was in a hallway. She walked down and tried the first unmarked door. It was locked, but then she saw the slot for her card. She slipped it in and the door opened automatically. The room she entered had a row of beds, each shrouded in a curtain. As she walked down the center aisle, she realized that only one of the beds was occupied. And, yes, it was Kristen. She was lying there and when Ally slid back the curtain, her eyes clicked open, startled. "Hi, don't be afraid. I'm a friend." She quietly finished drawing the curtain aside. Now the once-breezy Kristen Starr was staring at her with angry eyes, the false bravado of a frightened child. And she looked much younger than she had in the head shot she'd attached to the walls of her town house with steak knives. She said nothing for a moment; then she mouthed, "Who are you?" "I talked to you on the phone a couple of days ago," Ally said, not sure herself exactly when it was, "when you went down to your place on West Eleventh Street." "I don't know you," she mouthed again, this time with a slight whisper. "My name is Ally Hampton." She moved next to her so she could keep her voice down. "I'm an interior designer. I once did an apartment for you in Chelsea." "I'm about to go on a journey," she whispered. "I don't remember you, but maybe you're the one who's going with me. There was something otherworldly and chilling about her voice. "What journey do you--" "We were going to go away. That's what he promised. Just us two. Well, I'm ready. I want to go out and play. But he doesn't care anymore. He just wants me to disappear. So that's what I'll do. Only we'll do it together, you and me." She reached up from her bed and ran a finger across Ally's face. "Will you take me out of here? He promised me everything, that I could get it all back. But now I know he didn't care. He was just using me." She stopped, then gave a cruel laugh from the back of her throat. "But now it's going to happen to him too. I can tell. That's why he doesn't want to see me anymore. He doesn't want to see what's in store for him." What has happened? Ally wondered. It sounds like some kind of bizarre experiment gone wrong. "Won't you come with me?" Kristen went on. "We'll go to a place nobody has ever been to before. It'll be just us."