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"Are you sure you're okay?"
Amalia turned around. "What do you mean?"
"You've been acting weird all day. And now you ask me to come with you to this mysterious place."
"Yeah, it's... I'd do it myself, but I'd feel safer with you there."
"What even is that place? Why do you want to go there so badly?"
"We're almost there. Just around this corner, and..." She pointed across the street. "Right there."
A large building, with an entrance flanked by two pillars, stood across them.
"'Oneiros'. A... warehouse?"
"Seems like it, but doesn't it look familiar to you?"
"Not particularly. Should it?"
Amalia excitedly took out one of her sketch pages and gave it to Jake.
"Why are you showing me the bughorse again?"
"No, not the bughorse." She pointed to the side of the page. "Here."
Jake looked down at the drawing, then up at the building. Then down again. Then up.
"... huh."
"See? I told you!"
"But... why did you draw a warehouse?"
"No, I didn't draw THIS building. I didn't even know it existed until yesterday!"
"So you're saying this came to you in a dream or something. And that's why you want to explore it."
In a dream? Yeah, that was a good way of putting it.
"Essentially, yes! Are you with me or not?"
"Well... heck, why not. But just to be clear, you know trespassing is a crime, right?"
"Yes, so?"
"Just checking."
They crossed the street together. There weren't that many cars around; maybe the construction work was already finished.
"Hmmmm." Jake examined the sign in front. "It says 'for rent', but there's no number."
"Oh, you're right. Huh, maybe it's an abandoned warehouse. It's not trespassing if it doesn't belong to anyone, right?"
"You should tell that to the judge." Jake looked at the heavy metal door up and down. "How are you planning to get in, anyways? Do you have the key?"
"No, come here!" She grabbed him by the sleeve of his jacket and took him to a narrow alleyway just by the side of the building. "Here, see? There's a window up there."
"Oh, and it's half open, too."
"See? It's like it WANTS us to get in!"
"Maybe you're taking it a little too far." Jake looked around. "It's really quiet here, though. Maybe we can actually get in without being seen."
Amalia was already getting behind a large trash container and pushing it towards the wall. "A little help?"
"Wow, you work fast."
Together, they pushed the container into place, helped each other up onto it, and then easily slid in through the window.
The inside was the same faded white tone as the outside, all over the floor and the walls. Four large, cracked pillars supported the ceiling. The rest of it was... completely empty.
"Wow. Nothing, huh?" Amalia looked around. "I expected to see at least some crates or something."
"I can even hear my own echo."
'Echo'. There was that weird, familiar sensation again. Like the first time she saw the building from outside. Like an echo, in the back of her mind.
"Well, there's nothing here, right? Should we get out?"
"... no, wait. I have been here before."
"You have? I thought you said you didn't even know this building existed."
"I didn't! But I still feel like..."
Instead of finishing her sentence, Amalia simply walked towards the back of the warehouse. It wasn't very visible from afar, but there was a small door there. Jake followed her closely behind. The door seemed to have a numeric keypad on it.
"Well, that's that then. Unless you know the combination to this thing too."
Amalia stared down at it. She looked around the warehouse, at the four pillars, and then down at the keypad again.
One. Three. Six. Four.
The door beeped, and unlocked.
"You're kidding me."
Without a word, Amalia opened the door and crossed through. Jake hesitated for a moment, then followed her. On the other side was some sort of circular cargo elevator. They both stepped onto it. There was a large, lit up button with an arrow pointing up.
"So I guess this goes to the second floor then. Why is all of this stuff powered, anyways? I thought this place was abandoned."
Amalia simply looked at the button for a moment. Then, she reached forward, turned it around until the arrow was pointing down, and pressed on it. The elevator's mechanisms whirred to life, filling the air with loud mechanical noises, and they started descending.
"... Amalia, you're starting to really freak me out now. What's going on?"
"I... I wish I could tell you. I just know where I want to go, somehow."
"Is this another thing you've seen in a dream?"
"Yes. Well, no, not exactly. It wasn't like this, but it was pretty close."
The elevator stopped, and the room lit up with fluorescent lights.
"This is... a lab?"
It looked like one, at least. One of the walls had a large workbench on it, and two others had tall shelves completely full of strange mechanical and electronic tools, and cables of all sorts. The fourth wall was completely empty, though; instead, there was a large symbol on it. A circle with a cross inside.
"Amalia, I definitely get the feeling that we shouldn't be here. Are you sure you don't want to go back now?"
"But we're so close! I can..."
"So close to what? There's nothing else here. Unless you're looking for one of these weird... machines."
This wasn't right. This room was missing something. A... door. A hallway. A set of stairs. And...
And... what else? She just couldn't remember.
"Maybe you're right. This is a dead end."
"Should we get out of here then?"
"Yeah."
She hopped onto the elevator, pressed the button, and it started ascending again, slowly and loudly.
"Sorry that I brought you here for nothing, Jake."
"It's cool. This was fun, just... try to act a little less freaky next time, alright?"