The Hallway

Svetlana was no longer amused by the parlor tricks she was seeing, mostly because she knew now that they weren’t tricks. The Frenchman was most certainly dead, and the smell of burning flesh that filled her senses was far too real to be a hoax. She felt bile rising up into her throat and decided it would be best if she left the room before she was sick.

She had never been all that fond of the French, and was surprised that the musician had not simply surrendered to the mob at first opportunity. Perhaps then he would have lived, she thought. Still, there seemed to be something sinister going on here. Something dangerous. The house let out a long, slow creek from somewhere upstairs, as if an answer to her dark thoughts.

Without paying much mind to the wisdom of her actions, Svetlana wandered off into the house alone once again, eventually finding herself standing at the end of a long hallway without recalling exactly how she had gotten there. There were dozens of doors, and if she didn't know any better, she might have thought that they went on indefinitely.

She walked up to the nearest doorway, and turned the knob. As the door slid open it revealed the most luxurious room Svetlana had ever seen. Long red drapes lined the windows, velvet from the look of them, flowing into a richly patterned Persian carpet below. In the center stood a massive canopy bed, complete with silk sheets and gold trim. The room seemed larger then her entire house, and when she tried the door across the way, she found herself staring into a similar room. No, she thought, not similar, the same. Identical. As she moved down the hall, she uncovered several more rooms. All exactly the same as the first. Eventually she heard the sound of footsteps behind her, and turned to see that Alexander had found his way into the hall as well. She plugged her microphone in.

"All this space are belong to us?" she asked him. "Very strange."

He peeked into the room, shrugged, and took a long drag from his ciggarete. “At least the carpet matches the drapes.”

Svetlana looked at him, confused, and then chose the room she would be sleeping in for the night. Setting her satchel down on the bed, she grabbed an immense pillow, and hugged it tightly to her chest. She wondered how far it was to Washington D.C. from here. Or where exactly here was. Either way, it was a long way from home.