Somehow the silence was thicker in the hallway, almost as corporeal as the darkness, but the quiet broke with the blood thundering through my ears. We stepped out with the captain in the lead, hugging the wall to the right by touch alone, away from the Vicious room. Away from Ellison and Randolph. I hoped that doppelganger thing didn't have sharp hearing because our footsteps, as soft as they were, crashed against the titanium.

Captain Glenn soon angled us left around the ...