Chapter 41 Permadeath
Permadeath
Levi felt hands on his body before he opened his eyes. Fingers trailed down his chest and stomach, then slipped beneath the hem of his shirt to trace the curve of his ribs. Then the memory came back: the chamber, the tilting floor, the crushing plates closing in from all sides.
The sensation of being compressed into nothingness.
His eyes snapped open to find Asher looming over him, studying him with unsettling intensity.
They were in a small, dimly lit room lined with monitors—a security office of some kind.
He was lying on a narrow cot, Asher kneeling beside him, hands still exploring as if confirming every part of Levi had returned intact.
“You came back to me.” Asher smiled.
Levi tried to sit up, but Asher’s other hand pressed down on his shoulder.
“We need to check if everything still works,” Asher said, the hand on Levi’s chest sliding lower, slipping beneath his waistband.
“Stop,” Levi protested, grabbing Asher’s wrist. “We need to figure out where we are first, find the others—”
“I’ve been patient,” he said, voice dropping to that register that seemed to vibrate through Levi’s chest. “We keep dying. Time is running out.”
The statement was odd. They died before, multiple times, and Asher had never said anything about time running out. Something had changed in him, some new fear driving his actions.
“We’ll have time,” Levi promised, keeping his tone steady. “After we’re safe. After we find the others.”
For a moment, it seemed Asher might ignore the deflection, his fingers digging into Levi’s shoulder.
“Fine,” he conceded, though the set of his jaw suggested the retreat was temporary. “Make sure we didn’t lose the key.”
Levi checked his pockets and breathed a sigh of relief as his fingers found the vial of Faine’s blood. “I still have the vial, so we just need to get the last two keys,” he said. “We need to figure out where we are and where the others are.”
Asher’s mouth curved in a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “The others,” he repeated, an odd inflection in his voice. “Let’s see.”
The security office was small but well-equipped. A bank of monitors lined one wall, most displaying static but a few showing grainy feeds from various parts of the sanitarium. A control panel beneath the monitors allowed them to cycle through different cameras.
Levi grabbed the radio from his belt. “Jasper? Elliot? Maddie? Tyler? Anyone copy?”
Static hissed from the speaker, broken occasionally by unintelligible fragments of speech. He tried again, adjusting the frequency.
”—copy,“ came Jasper’s voice, distorted but recognizable. “Where are—location—”
“A security office,” Levi responded as he pulled out the journal and the blueprints. The security office seemed to be in the same location as the Administrative Assistant Offices. “What’s your status? Is everyone with you?”
More static, then: “Just me and—Elliot—haven’t seen—others. Maddie and Tyler—”
“What about Owen and Zoe?” Levi asked.
“Who?” Jasper’s voice crackled through the static.
Levi exchanged a glance with Asher, whose expression remained neutral. “Never mind,” he replied. “Stay where you are. We’ll try to find you.”
He set the radio down, a cold weight settling in his stomach. “They don’t remember Owen and Zoe,” he said. “Did they not come back?”
“I guess not,” Asher shrugged. “That’s definitely new, though. I’ve killed them a lot, and they were always back camping the next day.”
They’re dying permanently? Why? Did we mess something up?
“Look,” Asher said, pointing to one of the monitors. “There.”
The screen showed what appeared to be a corridor in the same area they were in with two figures moving cautiously through the frame.
Maddie and Tyler were alive and seemingly unharmed.
“And there’s Jasper and Elliot,” Levi noted, spotting them on another monitor. They were in what looked like a waiting area, examining a directory on the wall.
“So we have a choice,” Asher said, moving to stand behind Levi. “We can waste time finding the others, herding them together like sheep... or we can go for the key.”
His hands settled on Levi’s shoulders, thumbs pressing into the tense muscles at the base of his neck. Levi would have told him to back off, but the pressure felt nice.
“The others slow us down,” Asher continued, voice soft but insistent. “They die anyway. They distract you from what matters.”
“And what matters?” he asked, somewhat breathless as Asher’s thumbs worked gentle circles into Levi’s skin.
“Us.”
Levi wanted to argue, to insist they find the others first. But images of Owen and Zoe flashed through his mind—Owen’s terrified face as he fell through the trap door, Zoe begging for release from her suffering.
Had trying to save them been worth it? Had it accomplished anything beyond prolonging their pain?
“Fine,” he said, the decision leaving a bitter taste in his mouth. “We go for the key.”
Asher pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “Good boy,” he said. “You’re learning.”
Levi wasn’t sure he liked what he was learning.
The corridors of the administrative areas were different from the rest of the sanitarium—wider, with higher ceilings and more ornate detailing.
The walls were paneled in dark wood rather than institutional tile, the floors covered in faded carpeting that muffled their footsteps.
Brass light fixtures cast pools of warm illumination at regular intervals, a stark contrast to the rest of the building.
“This is where the money was,” Asher observed, trailing his fingers along the wood paneling. “Where the administrators kept themselves comfortable while the patients suffered.”
They moved cautiously, consulting both Faine’s journal and the sanitarium blueprint to navigate the unfamiliar layout.
The building seemed calmer here, less actively hostile.
No grinding emanated from within the walls, no subtle shifts in the corridors’ configurations.
It was almost peaceful, if not for the oppressive silence and the lingering scent of dust and decay.
“Something’s wrong,” Levi said after they turned down yet another corridor that looked exactly like the previous one. “This doesn’t match the blueprint. This passage should connect to the main hallway, but it just... ends.”
The corridor terminated in a blank wall where a doorway should have been. Not a recent change—the paneling was continuous, the baseboard unbroken. It had always been this way, at least in this version of reality.
“Zoe and Owen are gone now. Maybe the building is different from the blueprints now?” Asher wondered aloud. “It could be possible since we’re the only ones who remember certain things, maybe the building forgets, too.”
“But why us?” Levi pressed. “Why do we remember when they don’t?”
Asher shrugged. “Because that’s how it works.”
That’s how it is for you. This isn’t reality.
What if I die and don’t come back next time?
“We need to backtrack,” Levi decided, pushing the existential questions aside. “Try another route.”
They retraced their steps, then took a different turn, following a corridor that curved gradually to the right. The décor was even more elaborate with gilt-framed paintings lining the walls, depicting serene landscapes that contrasted with the decay and horror all around.
The corridor narrowed, the walls pressing inward without apparent cause. Levi felt his breathing quicken, memories of the crushing plates flashing through his mind. Asher’s hand settled at the small of his back, guiding him forward with firm pressure.
“Just keep moving, I’ve got you.”
I know.
The passage continued to contract until they were forced to turn sideways to proceed, their bodies pressed uncomfortably close in the confined space. Asher used the opportunity to let his hands wander, fingers trailing along Levi’s sides, slipping beneath his shirt to touch bare skin.
“Stop,” Levi hissed, trying to create space where there was none. “This isn’t the time.”
“There’s never a right time in this place,” Asher replied, his voice low and intimate in the narrow passage. “We take what moments we can.”
Before Levi could respond, the corridor widened abruptly, depositing them in a small antechamber. The walls here were lined with filing cabinets, a thick layer of dust covering every surface. A nameplate on the door ahead read “Loretta Saunders, Asst. Admin Director.”
The door was locked, but that didn’t stop Asher. His lock picks made quick work of the mechanism, the door swinging open with a protesting creak of long-disused hinges.
Beyond lay a spacious office dominated by a massive mahogany desk. Bookshelves lined the walls, filled with medical texts and leather-bound journals. A portrait of Faine himself hung above a cold fireplace, younger than in the photos they’d seen before.
“Search for anything with the triangular symbol,” Levi instructed, already moving toward the desk. “The voice recording should be—”
A sound from behind made him turn. The door they’d entered through had vanished, replaced by solid wall. The only exit now was a different door on the far side of the office—one that hadn’t been there when they entered.
Levi returned his attention to the desk, rifling through drawers filled with administrative detritus—expense reports, staff evaluations, patient transfer forms. Nothing that matched the triangular symbol they’d come to associate with Faine’s security system.
“Levi,” Asher called from across the room. “Look at this.”
He was standing before a glass-fronted cabinet that contained what appeared to be a medical timeline: photographs and documents arranged chronologically, showing Faine’s gradual transformation from man to monster, small audio cassettes with numbers written on the faded labels, and a single eye floating in yellow liquid.