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"No, it's all right.""Ok."The rough swish of card against card as Conor dealt, some relief at how they would not need to changethe game in order to accommodate another player. It was too late – or too early – in the day for that.No place for change, just the unceasing, comforting rhythm of game after game in a time outside oftime.The hands of the wall clock lay hidden in shadow, its barely-discernible ticking the only sign that timewas passing.A dealt card flew too strong and flipped over. Perry reached out to get it and returned it facedown to therest of his pile.Paul rested his head against the bookshelf and gazed out into the darkness; the sink running lengthwiseacross his view someway away, the small table and chair beyond that, then the shut door. He didn'treally want to return to his bed now, to leave this small oasis of warmth and re-enter the cold lonelinessof the corridor and the unchanging inactivity of sleep. Perhaps the others thought the same. It felt saferhere, more reassuring, the first time since his arrival that he could see, somehow, how this could behome."How many aces do you have?""Mm?""C'mon, Jjaks, we know you're more awake than that-""Are you sure you shuffled these cards?"He could stay here forever; caught up in the calm surreal of this otherworldly islet five decades andseveral worlds away from his own, in the presence of strangers whose faces and voices were at onceboth so familiar and so alien to him; in the gentle lull of approaching sleep, the imperceptible hum of theair-conditioning underlying the steady yet meaningless march of time.One second after another and the scene did not change: the four sitting snug in their corner beneaththe amber glow of the single lamp, him watching from the side.Paul closed his eyes and let the moment surround him with a curious peacefulness. He belonged here.He was safe here. Everything would, eventually, be all right; and even if it did not, he would alwayshave this moment still.And soon he drifted off to sleep, and did not wake when the four finished their last game and decidedfinally to turn in for what was left of the night; did not wake when Perry asked if they should wake him,and when they decided against it; when Conor opened the common room door and let some of thecorridor's light in, placing the pack of cards on the nearby bookshelf as he left, the others following afterto their respective rooms; Shane clicking off the last light as he went out, letting the soft darknessenvelop the room as he shut the door quietly behind him.And hours later the lights came on to mark the morning at 7am, courtesy of Jack, who could be overzealouswhen it came to things like waking up early; and people in the various rooms woke up as hecame in uninvited to turn on the lights, and yelled at Jack and requested more sleep and the lights off,please, while others adjourned to the bathrooms to wash up or to the cafeteria for breakfast, still othersfinding such behaviour far too accepting of their lot in this prison and refusing to comply until hungerforced them to.And so the moment was gone when Paul woke up and stood up, the magic of the previous nightshattered by noise and activity and the continued parody of attempt at normal life.The sign greeted them after breakfast that morning, painted large in untidy red letters across the fourthfloor's stairwell door: 'Keanu sucks. Kill yourselves.'Having finished breakfast earlier than the others, Eddie was the first to see it; the others found himstanding in the stairwell, staring at the door.Jack walked up, touched the still-wet letters, brought his fingers close for inspection."It's written in blood," he said.**