That was pretty much marvellous. I was completely sucked into it. Partly, it's because I'm fond of stories with that institutional element and have a weakness for first-person present :). Mostly, it's because you did such an excellent job of storytelling, and strung that tantalising, unbalancing thread of canon all the way through it. I could never quite tell if I were reading the canon characters, wiped and put in a new environment, or if there were no connections other than the dreams, and "Stephen"'s attachment to "Doe", and we were in a purely AR/AU situation with the snake dreams as nothing more complicated than some classic symbolism. I love being off balance as a reader.