Liam flipped through the pages, scanning each line for something that could give him hope. Each sentence he went through, every bit of information he found about what his wife was just drove the nail in deeper, so desperate to find out even a single piece of good news that he was three steps from just deluding himself into believing it. On his lap Abigail was clawing at his shirt, only a month old and already she was near tearing apart whatever she could get her hands on. He smiled down at her, wiggling his finger in front of her mouth, chuckling to himself when she tried to wrap her mouth around it.

"You really are going to be a handful, aren't you? Just remind me to keep away when you start getting teeth." He flipped to another page, frowning at the lack of anything useful that he could see. "I tell you Abigail, if your mother had been a demon or something then we could have at least done a summoning ritual. Or, well... I could have asked Farah to do one for us, I wouldn't have the first clue of what to do there." He bounced her on his knee, grinning at the tiny giggles she gave. "Your father would probably end up summoning Cthulhu now, wouldn't he? I know you don't know who that is, and I'm not going to let you find out until you're at least twelve, I'm not going to scar my daughter right off the bat."

She cooed and stretched in his arms, eyes falling shut like they so often did after any moment of activity. "You sleep a lot, don't you? Everything I read made me think that you'd just be constantly screaming about something, are you ok?" He lifted his daughter up, looking into her eyes that still remained half lidded. "I'll ask Mom sometime, maybe she can tell me more about this. Don't want you to be feeling bad or anything like that, do we?"

He stood up, cradling her close to his chest and letting her head rest on his shoulder, lightly bouncing her with each step he took towards their room. Slowly, he placed her down in her crib, running a finger gently down her cheek while she lost herself further and further to sleep, her tiny chest rising and falling. Liam smiled, just like every time he looked at her he could feel tears welling up in his eyes, a few drops falling down and landing next to her face. He stepped away, knowing that if he spent much longer in that room he was going to break down, and that would not do for little Abigail. She needed her rest and he was going to see that she got it, regardless of how much pain he might be in. Abigail came first, he would march into hell proclaiming that and have no regrets whatsoever, he may have failed at a great many things lately, but raising his daughter would not be one of them.

He walked back towards his desk, stopping in his tracks when he passed the liquor cabinet. It was only a few seconds of internal debate before he poured himself a drink, downing the first one easily before pouring another. He shook his head, clearing away the fog that always accompanied a drink these days before sitting back in his chair, flipping through another few pages. He sighed to himself, it had been two weeks of solid research and he had yet to find anything useful in regards to helping his wife.

There was no way that she was dead, she was far too strong for that. She was stronger than anyone he had ever met, she saved the lives of everyone there without taking a single scratch, to think that she would simply fade away afterwards... It just didn't make sense.

So he would sit here, reading though book after book, finishing drink after drink until he found some way to bring her back to him. She would do the exact same for him, he was not going to let her down. He sat at that desk until he could feel his eyes getting heavy, his head falling lightly against the surface as exhaustion finally set in, too tired to even move away to his bed.

So it was there, at a cluttered desk surrounded by books both ancient and recent, that he fell asleep.

---

He grunted at the feeling of someone tapping his arm, covering up his eyes to try and ward off the no doubt terrible headache that he could feel coming on. The person touching him didn't stop, shifting from light pokes to all but shoving against his shoulder, Liam having no choice but to open his eyes and look up at the intruder.

Who he saw standing there left him speechless.

Skylar stared down at him, an easy smile on her face and a hand carding through his hair, Liam nuzzling into her hand before he even realized he was doing it. "You? But... How? We... We saw you die." He grabbed her hand, feeling her skin against his just like he remembered it felt, so soft that it was like touching a cloud. "I don't care I just... I'm so happy that you're back!"

Her smile turned sad, cupping his cheek lightly and pressing her lips to his, the moment seeming to last for an eternity and at the same time was over in an instant. "Liam?" She said, lip quivering.

He ran a thumb along her hand, tilting his head in confusion. "Skylar? What's... What's wrong?"

She looked into his eyes, understanding and fear erupting in him before she spoke.

"I'm still dead Liam."

Liam opened his eyes with a gasp, half empty glass of whiskey tumbling off the desk and shattering against the ground. He sat back in his chair, hand over his heart and breathing as though he'd been suffocating moments before. Liam looked around the room, seeing no sign that Skylar had been there, the only people that had disturbed these surroundings were him and his daughter. Skylar was long gone.

He needed another drink.