James stares at himself a bit too long in the mirror. He doesn't know I'm awake, pretending to be asleep, peering at him from under the corner of the blanket. I've been doing this the last few mornings, and every morning it's like this. He gets up earlier than me, like normal, goes to the bathroom to get ready, like normal, and then this. He stares at his face, sometimes touching his skin like it's not his.

He flicks off the bathroom light to come wake me up. I close my eyes and make my breaths deeper.

"Greg," James says, nudging me. "Greg, it is time to revive."

Time to revive? Did he fall asleep with the thesaurus under his pillow?

"Greg," James says again. I moan and stretch under the blanket, catch his arm and caress his neck.

"Hey handsome," I whisper, then cover my mouth quickly. I know how much James hates my morning breath. But he doesn't pull back like he used to; it's like he doesn't even notice.

"I am leaving," James says, straightening up.

"It's early still. You can't help a brother out first?" James' gaze follow mine to my crotch, revealing a bulge that would normally be James' top priority. But his eyes seem distant now, and he rigidly shakes his head.

"No. Perhaps after work."

Without another word, James heads out the door and down the stairs. I wait just a minute to hear him slip on his shoes and head out the door. Then I roll out of bed and race to the closet, pulling on a sweater and Crocs. I know James' route to the metro, but yesterday when I watched out the window, he went a different direction. It shouldn't bother me, but I know James wouldn't lie to me. And he isn't lying, not really. He's just not telling me everything. Things are off, and I want to know why.

It's cold out, and I instantly know the Crocs were the wrong choice. James is already up past the light at Chestnut. The neighbor who runs the floral shop is walking her two dogs; they both start barking the second they see me, like always. I duck behind some garbage cans in case James hears the barking and turns.

"You okay, sweetie?" asks the neighbor. I wish I remembered her name.

"Fine," I mutter, peeking over the garbage can. I didn't need to worry; James hasn't adjusted his long stride at all. He's still heading away from the metro stop. I hurry out from the garbage cans, fighting an urge to kick at the yipping dogs, and hurry passed the "wait" hand signal on the light. It takes me nearly running to close the distance, but short legs are my curse.

Up ahead, James is passing a group of highschoolers waiting for the bus. They point at James and start mockingly catcalling, saying the "queer" should come over and show them a good time. They're laughing, and my blood boils. Any other day over the two years we've been together, James would put these asshats in their place. But today he raises his hand and ... waves?

"What is going on."

I hurry to catch up, and luckily the kids are distracted by the floral shop owner and her dogs to notice me. Running hunched over in my Crocs and basketball shorts, I'm a far easier target this morning.

James rounds the corner into an alley. Now I'm incredibly confused. I knew he wasn't going to the metro, but this alley doesn't have anything of note. I should know, because I nearly got mugged there once.

I'm panting and ease up to catch my breath. I don't even know what I'm going to say to James when I turn the corner, because he should just be standing there or realize he made a wrong turn. I almost wonder if I should just forget the whole thing and head home, but I've come this far.

"James, look, I don't know what's going—"

The alley is empty. James isn't there. Nobody is there. There's a dumpster by the back door of the Chinese restaurant and a fire escape up one wall, but the ladder is ten feet above the ground.

"James?"

I take a step in, then jump back immediately.

"What the hell?"

Where I had stepped, where my hand and foot went into the alley, there was ... nothing. I swallow hard and put my hand forward and gasp. My hand disappeared as soon as it passed over into the alley. I pull it back and wiggle my fingers. Still intact. I slowly extend my leg, and it too disappears the instant it goes into the alley.

I feel faint. I laugh a little too, because I'm nervous and it's my tic. But James went down this way, and something is going on with him, so I need to figure out what it is. I take a deep breath and step into the alley—

—and into what I can only describe as a warehouse from space. There are rows of enormous computers, bigger than our corner bodega. Then there are weird rows of capsules, like the ones I've only seen in time travel movies. Behind me, I see an open door I must have walked through. How it connected to the alley is beyond me.

Scientists in long white cloaks move around the computers, making adjustments and checking things off on their tablet screens. One of them spots me and beelines toward me. I think about diving back through the door, but she's already upon me.

"Welcome. Do you require a full system upgrade today?" Her voice is tinny and looks slightly off with the movement of her mouth, like it's not actually her mouth doing the talking.

"Um, no. What? I'm just following my boyfriend. Sorry. I think he came in here?"

The scientist frowns and checks her tablet. "What is his designation?"

"Well, his name is James. Talbot."

She taps and swipes on the tablet. "Yes. He is in processing for upgrades. He has been having system issues the last few weeks."

"What does that mean?"

The scientist pointed to a door that said PROCESSING. "Through there."

I thank her and hurry off, painfully aware of the attention I'm drawing from other scientists as I run through their whatever lab.

I push open the PROCESSING door in time to see James with another pair of scientists who are connecting something that looks like a charger into the side of his head. My mouth gapes, because I realize the skin of his head near his ear and hairline is pulled forward. The charger is being inserted into a port inside his head. The scientists pause to look at me, then look at each other, as if considering what action to take next.

James sees me too, but doesn't react like he should or like I want him to. Mainly, he doesn't react at all.

"I will be with you in one moment, Greg."

The last two years have been the happiest of my life. After finally settling down with Derek, I’ve finally realized what life’s about. We’re not rich; we haven’t accomplished much; we don’t travel, and we don’t have a lively social life, but we have our simple life together, and that’s more than I ever could have asked for.

Which is why I’ve been ignoring Derek’s behavior recently. He’s been different. I wrote it off as him having a bad day at work, but then it continued into the next day, and then the next. I don’t want to mess things up with him, but the longer this goes on, the more I feel like I have to confront him.

He’s awake at strange hours of the night. He doesn’t talk to me anymore. He doesn’t seem to be hiding anything; he just never seems to have anything to say, which isn’t like him at all.

And he regularly walks out of the house for no apparent reason. He’s never been one to enjoy walks, or being outside in general, for that matter, but in the past week or two, he will just randomly get up and walk out the front door without saying a word to me. There’s no pattern to it. Sometimes, he does it first thing in the morning; sometimes just after dark. Once, he went out in the pouring rain without grabbing a jacket or umbrella or anything. When he came back, he was soaked to the bone and couldn’t tell me what was so important that he had to leave without a jacket.

If he would just tell me that he needed to stretch his legs or get out of the house or even get away from me for a bit, I wouldn’t think anything of it. But he won’t talk to me about it at all. When I ask him, he just gets this blank look and then changes topics or goes back to what he was doing, like he doesn’t even realize that I’ve asked him a question. It’s starting to give me the creeps.

Something inside of me has decided that I’ve had enough. I don’t want to ruin what I have with Derek, but I can’t keep acting like nothing is wrong. Something’s going on, and I intend to find out what.

So when Derek stands up and walks right out the front door while we’re watching TV after dinner one evening, I decide to follow him. I let him get out the door and onto the sidewalk before I before I get up and follow him out.

I feel guilty for following him, and I’m a little scared about what I might find, but not knowing is killing me.

I follow him down the sidewalk as quietly as I can, but he doesn’t seem to notice my presence at all. The remnants of the sunset hang in the sky, and I realize that the air is a little too cool to be comfortable. I didn’t think to grab a jacket, and my bare arms are covered in goosebumps. But I’m not about to turn back.

Before long, we reach the alley at the end of our block. The little road is much narrower than the other roads in our little town, and it ends in a dead end. Now that I think about it, it’s an odd set up. There really isn’t a reason for an alley to be there at all. But I’ve never given it much thought before.

I watch as Derek turns at the alley and . . . disappears!

I run down the sidewalk and stop in front of the alley.

The empty alley.

There’s no one there. No sign of Derek. Or anyone else for that matter.

I stare into the empty alley in disbelief. There was nowhere for him to go! How could he disappear so quickly?

I don’t step out into the alley immediately. Instead, I reach out with my hand. But as my hand crosses the threshold of the alley, it disappears. Startled, I pull it back and clutch it to my chest. My hand feels cold and sweaty, and as I look down, I realize that it looks exactly as it should.

Am I going crazy? Tentatively, I reach out again. Once again, as my hand passes the place where the roads meet, it disappears. I push forward until I can’t see anything past my elbow. I wiggle my fingers and even wave my arm around a bit, but my hand feels normal. It just isn’t there anymore.

I look around me, hoping to see something that will tell me what the hell is happening, but there is nothing. Just me staring into a seemingly empty alley with an invisible hand.

I hesitate for just a minute, but I know I’m going in there. Whatever this is, whatever’s on the other side of this invisible wall, it doesn’t matter. I have to go through. I have to find Derek. I have to find out what’s going on.

Taking a deep breath, I take one step forward, and immediately everything changes.

The first thing I notice is the cold. It’s gone from a slight chill in the air to below freezing. I gasp and cross my arms.

I’m surrounded by black walls, but there is a single, cold, white light shining straight ahead. With nothing else to do, I step into the light.

And I find Derek.

He’s staring blankly into the light, unblinking. He doesn’t even notice me standing next to him.

“Derek?” I whisper. Nothing. I put my hand on his shoulder, but he doesn’t move. “Derek, can you hear me?”

Where did she come from? I hear a voice, but not with my ears. The room is silent.

“Hello?” I ask.

How did she get in? The voice that isn’t a voice continues. The portal should have locked as soon as he entered.

She could have followed him in, another responds. If she was fast enough. She seems to know him.

“He’s my boyfriend,” I confirm, compelled for some reason to answer, even though the voice wasn’t talking to me.

She’s not a subject, the first not-voice says, ignoring me. I have no record of her brain.

“M-my brain?” What the hell is going on? “Who are you? What is this place?”

She’s beginning to panic. Use the acetylcholine suppressor.

I can’t even begin to guess what an aceta-whatever suppressor is, but it doesn’t sound good. I take a few steps back and glance behind me. There’s nothing there but a black wall, but I know it’s the way I came, and I hope I can get back the same way.

But I can’t leave Derek. He’s still staring at that light, unaware of me or the not-voices.

I still can’t see anyone other than Derek. But there has to be someone here.

Look at the scan! the second not-voice says in a huff. There’s a reason she wasn’t made a test subject. The suppressor won’t work on her. Not as intended.

“Alright, whoever you are!” I shout. “I am tired of you talking about what you want to do to my brain. I’m not your test subject! And neither is Derek!”

It’s well worth the risk. The first not-voice responds to the second as if I hadn’t spoken. We can’t have her running off and telling others about us. It’ll ruin the whole experiment!

Who would believe her? You’ve seen how small their minds are! They can’t comprehend something so outside their perception of reality. They would claim insanity rather than accept her experience as truth. There’s no need to take the risk.

But their population varies to such a large degree! the first not-voice insists. There are those who believe in what they call ‘aliens.’ Do you honestly think not a single one of them would come looking for us? It took us decades to set up an experiment on this planet! I won’t see my research destroyed because you’re feeling squeamish about one little test subject.

“There’s nothing wrong with empathy!” I call out, hoping to sway at least one of the two beings who were apparently arguing about my brain.

Fine. I suppose, if nothing else, it will at least tell us how the suppressor works on a subject with a higher acetylcholine level. But if the subject dies, you’re the one filing the paperwork.

“Dies?” I shriek. “This could kill me?”

A noise from above startles me, and I look up to see a giant metal arm extending towards me. I stumble backwards, but I’ve barely taken two steps before my back hits a wall. I push left, and then right, but I hit walls in both directions. Did the room shrink? Or was it never as big as I thought it was?

Derek is still staring at the light with his eyes glazed over, oblivious to me, the metal arm, and the voices. He won’t help me.

“Stop!” I scream. “Please! Just let us go. I won’t tell anyone about you; I promise! Please!”

But the arm doesn't stop. It keels coming towards me until I am pinned in a corner. I scream and beg for it to stop, but –

I walk in the front door with Derek close behind. My brain is so foggy, I can barely remember if we're coming or going. I reach for the light switch out of habit but immediately turn it off again, suddenly feeling safer in the dark.

“I’m going to bed,” Derek announces, starting up the stairs.

“Oh, okay,” I say. “What time is it?”

He glances at his watch. “10:30.”

I nod and then wince as I suddenly realize that I have a splitting headache. Guess I should head to bed too.

As I climb up the stairs behind Derek, leaning heavily on the handrail, I try to figure out where my headache came from. The harder I try to remember, the emptier my brain feels.

“Hey, babe?” I call as Derek steps into the bedroom. “Where did we go tonight?”

Derek shrugs his shoulders, a blank expression on his face. “Out,” he says simply.

His expressionless face feels right, and I decide to adopt it. Pointless to worry. Pointless to care. My head still hurt, but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered.

“Oh, yeah,” I reply. “Out.”

Chrissy knew something was wrong with Brad. They had been in a relationship for two years now, and the first year and half of them were fantastic. Hot sex, great dates, and a boyfriend who showered her with gifts had made this the best relationship in Chrissy's life. But something had changed.

Brad had started disappearing during the night.

The two of them would go to bed together, and he would be there when she woke up in the morning. But one day, Chrissy woke early and found that Brad was gone. She had drunk a liter of water before bed because she had had a headache, and woke up at 3 am needing to pee. It wasn't until she had come back from the bathroom that she noticed Brad wasn't in bed. She had been confused and hadn't been able to reach Brad on his cellphone. She ended up falling asleep, and when she woke up in the morning, he was back.

After a few more of these disappearances, Chrissy decided it was time to take matters in her own hands. She was too nervous that the magic of this perfect relationship would end if she confronted him. So she thought she could find out about Brad by following him.

She waited until after a night of sushi and great sex. She set her smart watch to vibrate every hour to wake her up. Therefore she was able to pretend to still be asleep when Brad left her apartment in the morning. She almost missed him when she woke up at 3 am and heard her front door closing. She sprang out of bed, ran to her door, and slid it open to see Brad get into the elevator. Thankful that her pjs were always a shirt and leggings, Chrissy slipped on her sneakers and ran out to the staircase. By the time she got to the lobby, she saw him just leaving her apartment building.

Chrissy slipped out behind him and started following him. She walked slowly enough so that Brad was far enough ahead of her without raising his suspicions. They walked down five blocks, until Brad rounded a corner and entered an alleyway. Chrissy hurried up to the corner, but when she stepped into the alleyway, Brad was nowhere to be seen. The alleyway was a dead end, and nowhere for him to have disappeared to. She walked up to the end of the alley, a bricked-up back of another building. She held up her hand to the wall, and shrieked when it disappeared into nothing. She quickly pulled it back, and it came back without a scratch. She was confused, but also very tired, and at this point, too interested in finding out where Brad had gone. So without thinking, she slowly approached the wall, holding her hands up so that they could go first. Both hands and arms disappeared into the wall without meeting any resistance, and she took the plunge and walked through the wall completely.

Once she had walked through the wall, she was surprised to find herself in what appeared to be a well-lit hallway. The hallway looked similar to a hospital, and there were closed doors evenly spaced out along the path in front of her. Chrissy could hear what sounded like a multitude of whispers wafting from the doorways. She recognized one of the whispers, because it was Brad's voice. She walked along the hall, putting her ears against the door to listen to the different sounds, until she heard Brad's voice. But she didn't hear it only once. She heard it multiple times, as if he was speaking to himself.

Chrissy knew it probably wasn't a good idea to open the door. Maybe if it was a different time and circumstance, she would have been more careful. But at this point,

she was so overwhelmed, confused, and desperate to find out what was going on. So, she opened the door.

And screamed when she saw the group of five figures in cloaks standing before her. They all turned to face her. The figure in the middle pushed down its hood and revealed, Brad's face.

"Chrissy, what are you doing?" he asked her. Instead of being reassured now that she had found him, Chrissy was pissed.

"Brad, what the hell is going on?" Chrissy asked him.

That didn't help. Because now the other 4 figures took their hoods down to reveal: Brad's face. There were now five Brads staring at her. Five Brads with different hairstyles. One had mutton chops, one was bald, another was wearing a goatee, and the fourth Brad had a beard. Then there was the Brad who had the same hairstyle as the Brad who had gone to bed with her.

That Brad was looking embarrassed at her, before he said, "Um, well babe, you know how some people believe in past lives? Say hello to mine."

Chrissy stared at him, then again at the other Brads.

"Okay," she said, and promptly passed out.