Sounds like Speculative Assassination Plan Failure Point Number Four won't be a problem either! He reclines the seat as best he can, tries to get comfortable.

"I'm moving back to the other body now. As soon as you can, turn east or west. If the water keeps following you, abandon this body and flee; the water won't hurt me." He's almost sure of that, sure enough that he's not comfortable risking Adam's life for that one last sliver of certainty.

"Will do, boss."

Will he actually? He'll figure it out when he gets there.

Nico closes his eyes, breathes in and out just once more, and plunges back into the well.

Meanwhile

Your plan worked, Sophie: you found a random person's yard! There's a big bare oak tree looming over the house; it probably gets nice and shady around May. A tire swing rocks uneasily in the wind, jerking toward you and falling back away. The windows, visible in stripes through the branches, are dark and uninviting.

Otso wants to follow her into the yard, but he isn't sure he should. His dad and Sophie both said he should stay away from places where people could see him. On the other hand he doesn't want his new friend to leave him alone wants to see the yard, he's never seen a tire swing up close before and wants to know if he could swing from it.

If Sophie sees him hesitate, she'll beckon him to follow her.

"I know I said you should hide, but I literally glow. The rain is still..." she waves at the cloud of steam around her. It doesn't seem like it's hot enough to be boiling but it's sure doing something other than falling down like it's supposed to. "People are going to notice that something's up. So long as you don't talk you're the least weird part of this whole situation. If anyone asks, I'll tell them you're my magical guardian bear and I trust you with my life. That's not even a lie, come to think."

It even works out Biblically, she vaguely remembers. Didn't one of the prophets have bears for companions? Maybe one of the hermity ones? She can look it up later.

And if he say the tire swing thing out loud in her head ugh ugh ugh, she'll reply that probably the branch and rope aren't sturdy enough and he should leave it alone.

Magical guardian bear?!

TRUSTS HIM WITH HER LIFE?!?!?!

All he'll say, once he's got himself under control a little bit, is "That makes sense. Too bad about the tire swing. It looks fun."

"Once Kyle's feeling better he can make you one with thicker branches and, um, a chain or something. He's good at stuff like that."

The windows of the house are all dark? No lights in the basement, none in the attic, nowhere?

Nowhere.

Probably no one's home, fair enough. Are the houses on either side close enough to see? If not, or if they're dark too, she'll just walk around to the road.

You can't tell; this is one of the sparser parts of Raymond and the forest is encroaching on either side of the yard. Once you reach the street you can spot a few more houses, but their windows aren't lit either.

That's pretty unlucky, not everybody goes to church on Sunday morning. Or, ooh, maybe the power's out. It probably is. Rats. Is she just going to have to knock on every door on Glen Ridge Road until someone hears her over the storm and decides to answer? She can do that, it's not like her plan was super sophisticated in the first place, but there really nothing smarter?

There is, at least little bit: where's the nearest parked car? She'll just go bother every household with a car in the driveway: maybe some of them took just have two cars but it's some kind of clue at least. It's not very clever, but it's been a long hour (or so!?) and Sophie is all out of clever. Persistent will have to do.