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"I made it to the rage phase," Sloan says coolly, leaning in nice and close to get a good photo of Scott with her phone. He looks terrible, writhing in pain on the floor with blood streaming out of his nose.

Good. Asshole deserves it.

Spinning on her heels, Sloan exits the board room and crosses the waiting room, where Don (good pal that he is) is waiting. Scott's $400 wing tips stomp across the floor as he follows her, but Sloan doesn't slow down or even look back. Don has her covered.

As she looks down at the photo on her phone (which she is strongly considering making the wallpaper on her work computer), a triumphant smile appears on her face.

The rage phase feels good.

Exhaling slowly, Sloan pushes open the door to the stairwell and steps through, knowing Don will catch up in a minute.

Eyes flicker up from the phone's screen and widen.

"Okay, maybe not," she mutters to herself. The stairwell that she knows is supposed to be there just isn't. There's a bar, but it doesn't look like any bar she's ever been to. Whirling around, incredibly confused, she turns the knob on the door she just came through. When it opens, she sees nothing familiar, not the hall she just came down, no Don waiting for her, nothing.

Stifling back one of those laughs that tend to bubble up when you panic, Sloan swallows heavily and looks around.

It had been a hell of a day and she was in a bar. Maybe a drink wouldn't hurt.

Besides, after the day she's had, Sloan figures she deserves one.

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Since it's one of the few places where people hang out during the times he's awake and around, Nick has taken to haunting a stool in the bar and nursing a single beer as the night goes on. After nearing a month in the hotel, he started feeling one thing he never thought he would: he started to miss the damned island.

The snort of laughter has barely left his lips before he feels something that has is other senses perking right the hell up. Whatever's driving this chick, her emotions are strong.

He turned to find the source and took a deep breath then shot the woman a smile. "You look like you need this more than I do," he said, holding his glass up.

"I don't know about that, but I'll agree that I need one," Sloan says, waving the bartender over and ordering a gin and tonic. Fidgeting with an abandoned coaster a seat down from her, she gives the guy a small smile. "I was just in Manhattan literally 5 minutes ago."

Worrying her lower lip, her eyes shoot toward the doorway. This whole situation is so bizarre and unreal; she almost wonders if she's going insane.

"Do you know what's going on here?" she asks, eyes sidling back to her companion.

"Ah, a new arrival," Nick nodded, and took another miniscule sip from his bottle, his demon side searching the air around them for more of the emotions it'd sensed earlier.

"There's a long version and a short one. Got a preference?"

"I like to be well informed," Sloan says automatically. A moment, and then her brow furrows. "Unless the long version is as long as War and Peace. Then, I'll just take the Cliff Notes."

"We'll start small and go from there," Nick nodded. "Short version is that you've stumbled into a pocket universe ruled by some sort of power that has, for whatever reason, pulled people from their native worlds to this hotel and its grounds." He paused for a micro-sip from his bottle while that settled in. "That do? Or do you need a little more?"