Several Hours Later...
The room is a chaos of open books, loose pages, and ink spilled over maps of a world Dave doesn't belong to. An oil lamp flickers in the corner, casting restless shadows across the stone walls. Heinz is hunched over the table, his long fingers tracing lines of ancient text, his sharp gaze fixed, as if reading alone could unravel the fabric of the universe.
Dave, leaning against the doorway with crossed arms and an impatient expression, watches him.
"Are you going to tell me what the hell you found, or do I have to start kicking furniture to get your attention?"
Heinz doesn't lift his eyes from the documents, but a brief—too brief—smile flickers across his face.
"Figuring it out requires patience."
Dave lets out a dry laugh.
"Patience? Ha. I'm stranded in a world that's not mine, in a time that's not mine, with a guy who I'm not sure actually wants to help or just enjoys watching me suffer. And you want me to be patient?"
Heinz looks up. His expression is unreadable, like Dave is a puzzle he hasn't yet decided if he wants to solve.
"I'm not your enemy."
"And you're not my friend either."
Heinz lowers his gaze again, but this time his posture is tighter. His fingers tap against the wood before curling slowly around the edge of a parchment.
"I've felt a disturbance," he finally says. "Something that shouldn't be here, but is breaking its way through."
Dave straightens up.
"A dimensional rift?"
Heinz nods, his voice now lower.
"Exactly. A fissure in the very structure of this world. Something that hasn't happened in a very, very long time."
Dave steps away from the wall and approaches the table, leaning forward to get a better look. His eyes skim over symbols he can't read, but something about the central sketch feels familiar: two intersecting lines, like a wound torn through reality.
"When does it open?"
"Soon."
"Define 'soon.' Because to me, that could be a month or ten damn minutes."
Heinz takes a deep breath, and for a moment, the lamplight accentuates the fatigue in his face. Not just physical—something deeper. Something Dave can't quite grasp.
"Days. Maybe hours."
Silence drops over the room like a slab of stone.
Dave pulls his gaze from the map and folds his arms, feeling the weight of the revelation settle in his chest. He could go back. Finally, after all the shit he's endured, he might find his way home.
But then his eyes drift back to Heinz.
He's still standing, shoulders stiff, his face half-hidden by unruly dark hair. And in that instant, Dave realizes something.
Heinz isn't happy about the news.
"What's wrong with you?" Dave asks, narrowing his eyes. "Isn't this what we wanted?"
Heinz doesn't answer right away. His fingers continue to brush the edge of the parchment, his mind clearly elsewhere.
"Yes," he says, but there's no conviction in his voice.
Dave eyes him with suspicion.
"I don't believe you."
Heinz exhales, tilting his head slightly, but not meeting his gaze.
"Maybe because… once that door opens, you'll disappear."
Dave blinks.
It's the first time Heinz has said anything like that. The first time he's let slip that—somewhere, in some twisted, goddamned corner of his mind—maybe he doesn't want Dave to leave.
Dave crosses the room in two strides and stops just in front of him, searching his face.
"Is that what's bothering you?"
Heinz's eyes shimmer with something Dave can't name.
"It doesn't matter."
Dave studies him a moment, then snorts and steps back.
"Nothing matters to you, huh?"
Heinz doesn't answer.
Dave runs a hand through his hair, frustration mounting. Now the idea of the rift opening doesn't feel like relief. It feels like a complication. One he didn't see coming.
Because, no matter how much he denies it, something in this world is holding him back.
And that *something* has a name.
"Come on, Dave. We need to check the site," Heinz says, already reaching for his coat.