017

- It's so good to see you Mel! Don't worry, that boy can't hurt you anymore!

Jack was laying unconsciously in front of Melody who was being hugged tightly by her old friend, while said friend patted her head, telling her everything was fine. But nothing was fine. There was a huge misunderstanding and Melody didn't know how to explain to her friend, that Jack wasn't a bad person, at least not in the way she thought he was.

- Elizabeth, you don't understand, he's not...

- Huh? A kind of Stockholm syndrome?

Elizabeth opened Melody's eyes and started to put a small flashlight between her teeth, shining directly in melody's eyes, causing her pupils to shrink.

- I SEE, THAT'S HOW IT IS! BRILLIANT! FANTASTIC! Wait what does 'fantastic' even mean... NO, I GOT IT!

Melody who was released due to Elisabeth's strange behaviour, was kneeling down to check on Jack and whether or not he was doing okay. She checked his pulse and noticed that he was only unconscious. She looked back at her friend, Elizabeth who didn't seem like a sane person, let alone the teacher of Melody Harm. Elizabeth pulled out a small test tube out of her pocket and drank the green substance in it.

- IT IS BLOODY FANTASTIC BRILLIANT! THAT'S IT!

Then, just like Jack she passed out and her face hit the floor pretty badly.

- Great... Now I have to take care of both...

Melody started by pulling Jack into the house, and put him into the first room she found. It was a big house with many rooms, and the one she put Jack into was probably the living room. It was huge, not as big as their hotel room, but it was much more decorated and in a completely different style as well. The hotel suite had a much more minimalist style, with very modern furniture, but this room was giving Melody the feeling of being located inside a castle of a king. Melody laid Jack down on a big sofa, next to a huge fireplace, that was quietly burning down the logs placed inside it. She then went down the hallway, searching for a kitchen. While searching, she took a peek into every room, finding a huge bedroom, another living room, not quite as big as the first one, a bath, a few other bedrooms, which she assumed were rooms, for guests to stay in. She had reached the end of the hallway and there were two doors left, one in front of her that was larger than all the other ones and another one to her left. She decided to try the left one first and finally found it. The kitchen was huge, but everything in this mansion was big, so that came as no surprise. The whole place was messy, but Melody didn't care because she immediately found what she was looking for, a fist aid kit. She took it and went back to Elizabeth, who had started to bleed on the floor, it seemed like she hit her head worse than Melody initially thought. She sighed and then opened the first aid kit, proceeding to disinfect her friend's wound on her forehead and afterwards bandaging it. How ironic that she learned all that from Elisabeth herself... She then dragged Elisabeth next to Jack, hoping that the fireplace would keep them warm, because it was very cold inside the house, even for the end of spring. After she had done that, Melody went ahead and also put their luggage inside the first living room.

- Well, I guess I could explore this place a bit...

Melody was talking to herself, but it was true. She may have known where the first aid kit was but that was only because Elisabeth told her about it once. She did not know where what was in the house, she wasn't even aware that the house was this big. Melody decided to start with the last door of the corridor she hadn't opened yet. She opened the huge wooden door that opened with a loud creak and looked at a room that surpassed all the other ones in size. Its sealing was the actual roof of the mansion, and its length went from the one outer wall to the other one. The room had a huge table in its middle that reminded Melody of one of the tables shown in movies about royal families. There was a beautiful piano located in one of the corners of the room and one wall was filled to the brink with bookshelves, housing books that looked older and more expensive than anything Melody had ever seen before, which meant a lot coming from her. Multiple statues were located near the walls and paintings that looked very old were hanging on the walls, framed in gold frames. But the thing that struck Melody the most, was the wall opposite to the door she entered the room through. Said wall wasn't a wall, it was a humongous window, reminiscent of those you would find in a church, because just like them, the window had a pattern, a picture, created with different coloured glass pieces.

- The tree of wisdom or more precisely the tree of knowledge of good and evil...

Melody whispered to herself, while admiring this piece of art in front of her. It was almost enchanting and she felt like she lost her sense of time. After a while she took her eyes of it and looked behind her. There was the door, but what looked huge a few seconds ago now seemed like just another normal door, compared to the whole room. She looked above it and was able to see inside the next few floors. The whole building had 3 floors, and each one had a kind of balcony leading inside this big central room. Melody assumed that there must be a staircase somewhere in this room, after all, there was no way to get to the next floors in the hallway. Melody looked towards the left and found it. But it wasn't a staircase, it was a fully functional Elevator, surrounded by glass. She decided to go explore the other floors too, at least until the others woke up.

She called the elevator and pressed the button for the first floor. After the doors opened, Melody was surprised by what lied before her: A greenhouse, located inside a mansion. She walked around, but it truly was just a greenhouse, nothing more to it. It inhabited all kinds of flowers, plants and herbs she had never seen before and was fascinated by everything around her. After that floor was such a wonderful surprise, what could the next floor be? Excited Melody pressed the button for the highest floor, wondering what she would find on it.

The door opened and yet again it was not what Melody expected. In front of her was a laboratory, full of chemistry, biology and physics utensils. Multiple experiments seemed to be still ongoing and Melody spotted machines that she had never seen before. Intrigued about everything that was happening around her, she was taken out of her amazement, by the sudden activation of a machine in the back of the room. She slowly walked towards it, trying to understand what was going on.

In school, Melody exceeded at everything, including every science related subject. But the longer she stared at the machine, the more confused she got. There were parts that seemed to make no sense, others seemed to be purely decorative. A gear activated, just to turn on a lamp that activated a light-sensitive button, who in turn triggered a fire to turn on, that heated a metal box. These confusing mechanisms continued, until the metal box from the beginning, opened and the liquid was poured inside some small ampules, which were closed up by another machine and finally stored inside a wooden box.

I feel like I have seen that liquid before... but where... Wait, I know! It has the same colour as the stuff Elizabeth drank! Could it be that...?

But her thoughts were interrupted by a loud bang. She forgot something. Something important. Not only did she leave Jack and Elisabeth alone, but Jack was a professional killer, that didn't know who Elisabeth was and Elisabeth thought who knows what... She needed to get down as fast as possible. She heard two other bangs, but this time she was certain what that noise was. Gunshots. Would she be too late? She ran down the hallway and opened the door where she left the two of them and...