Danny, Laura and Mae stood in front of Antonia's grave. It was fairly shallow for a grave, none of them were too sure about how literally "six feet under" is supposed to be taken. Mae had tied some sticks together to make a cross. Then she stole a bouquet, an item which was left basically untouched when the shops were raided. She said that Antonia deserved a proper funeral, a proper memorial. This was as good as it was going to get for a town run by teenagers.

She was buried in a nice part of town. Surrounded by nature, between the church and the high school she used to attend. Laura thought Antonia would've appreciated that, but maybe she would've hated it. There was no way of knowing now.

-

"What the fuck is that about?" Colette asked, looking at a group of their classmates that had gathered in a circle in the middle of the town square. They were sitting on the ground, eyes on the sky, asking for some sort of divine sign. "I don't know. People are looking for answers. You can't really blame them." Octavia answered. She'd always been the more empathetic sister. "Still, I never could've guessed Harlow was a vessel to the heavens." Octavia just nodded as response, gazing out whimsically at the sky.

Suddenly, she pointed at something in the sky. "Wow, look at that." The sunlight was suddenly dimmer, and Colette looked up to see the moon overtaking the sun in the first eclipse she'd seen since she was a kid.

Concerned whispers were scattered throughout the onlookers.

"We asked for a sign. What else could this be?" Harlow asked, turning to a friend. Colette rolled her eyes.

"What does this mean?" Someone else asked.

"It doesn't mean anything. It's a fucking solar eclipse. It's not a sign, it was predicted." Laura shouted from a bench, seeming annoyed at having to stop reading her book for a second as if these types of questions were below her.

-

"They can't seriously think they can move the stars and the planets," Colette remarked as Octavia made breakfast for their guests: Danny, Mae and Maxxie.

"It makes them feel better, that's all it has to do." Octavia commented, setting a cup of coffee down for Maxxie, who whispered a "thank you".

"I'd like to find a way to feel better." Colette's murmur was barely audible, they seemed more interested in flicking through one of the decorative magazines than in the conversation.

"Thanks for the eggs. And the coffee." Mae seemed especially cheerful today to make up for her sister's silence. All through breakfast, Maxxie and Mae had been glancing anxiously at Danny, who just remained silent.

"You're very welcome."

"We're going to town hall after this. We'll look at some papers, try to find out..." Maxxie paused. They didn't have a clue what to expect, just that something needed to be done "...something. Anything."

Brandon Blackwood walked through the door just as things got a bit too awkwardly silent. "Look who decided to show up." Octavia joked. "Help yourself to some coffee." Brandon thanked her and took that invitation very seriously.

Mae tapped Colette on the shoulder. "Since when did he stay here? Doesn't he have a mansion?" She whispered, but Mae's version of discreetness was a bit different from Danny's, who gave her a death stare.

"EJ kicked him out last night. No reason, EJ's just a dick." Colette whispered back, and Mae nodded.

"So, we've all agreed. We need to check out the water and the power plants." Octavia broke an uncomfortable stretch of silence.

"And we need to figure out how much food we have," Maxxie added, and Octavia nodded, writing void's point down.

"I can do that." Mae eagerly volunteered herself. She didn't want to sit around and do nothing.

"I'll go with you," Colette added. She needed to keep herself busy or she'd get caught up in all of her anxiety and intrusive thoughts. This wasn't a good time for that stuff. "But maybe we should keep this quiet. People are freaking out over anything now." Colette suggested, taking a sip of their coffee.

"There's no reason to freak out. We're just doing inventory." Octavia reassured them. She paused and sighed, her smile dropping. "Nope, I'm the problem. I get people stressed out. I did too much too fast when we first got here."

"No, you didn't," Colette interjected, shaking her head.

"Yes, I did. I obviously did." She looked at her sister before turning her gaze towards Maxxie. "Okay, this can't look like it has anything to do with me. I need to lay low for a while. I don't want another gun to my head."

-

Jo sat in her room, preparing to go out. Hopefully, things would be different now that their entire world had changed. She straightened her hair, applied her nicest makeup and wore her prettiest dress.

Maybe someone would like her more now.

-

"It seems bigger when you think about counting it all up." Colette remarked, staring down the supermarket aisle of tinned soup.

"Just wait 'till we get to the warehouses out on Boundary." Mae chuckled. God, this was impossible for two people.

"We should split up. I'll take the smaller stores on Wendell, you stay here. Deal?"

"Deal."

"Colette! Inconspicuous, remember?"

"Trust me, I know how to be invisible."

-

Danny and Maxxie sat in the town hall, reading through hundreds of documents. The perfect romance, right?

"That's what this town used to look like," Maxxie said, passing some photos from the 1900s to Danny. "It's sad, isn't it?"

"It still looks like that. Pretty much." They said to Maxxie before looking down at the photo again. "More cars, I guess."

"More assholes too."

Danny chuckled. "EJ had a semi-automatic pistol in a church yesterday. Very progressive."

-

Jo was sitting in one of the pews at church, half-listening to Rosalie Lloyd's sermon, half-wishing she'd just gone home. Jo wasn't really religious, but no one really wanted to have anything to do with her, and Rosalie couldn't really kick her out of a church.

"And that was Jeremiah 29:11 to 13. It's one of my favourite Bible verses."

Jo's phone pinged, and she ignored the judgemental looks, turning her phone on and setting it on silent.

EJ Blackwood
4 unopened text messages

She rolled her eyes, putting her phone back into her pocket. Now wasn't the time.

"I think most of us are here because..."

The creak of the church door opening interrupted Rosalie's speech.

"Because we miss our parents. Or our brothers and sisters."

The door shut, and Octavia walked in, quietly taking a seat in one of the pews at the back.

"Because we're afraid. We don't know when things are gonna get back to normal. When someone is gonna come and rescue us. If anyone's gonna come and rescue us."

Some guy that used to be on the football team stood up and walked out.

"If my mom was here, I'd ask her, but- The only thing I know for sure we can control is ourselves. What we do. If God still exists, and I think He does, then we need to show Him that we're still worthy of His love. If we can do that, maybe we'll be saved."

Some more sporty boys walked in, most of them still wearing their varsity jackets, because even if this was some fucked up parallel universe or purgatory, social status was everything.

"Because... getting drunk and, I don't know, breaking things, it might make us feel good in the moment, but in the long run? It's making us feel worse."

Octavia tried to leave as quietly as possible, opening the front door to see EJ standing outside.

"Hey." He said nonchalantly, like he didn't have a death wish for her the day before.

"Hi."

"Message not for you?"

"Yeah, I'm not really a church kind of gal."

He gave a short, mirthless chuckle. "I think people are doing pretty well under the circumstances, don't you?"

Octavia just kept walking. She'd known EJ her entire life, and he did not give a fuck about people.

"You and I, we're the lucky ones, of course. Comparatively, you've got Colette and I don't need to be around my bitchy sister anymore. Win-win."

"I'd consider it a win if I had both of my sisters."

It seemed to take him a minute to remember that Adriana even existed. "Yeah. I'll admit it though, you were right."

"What?" Octavia stopped dead in her tracks.

"We can't go on like this, we have to figure some things out. You know? Make some rules."

"Oh, yeah?" Octavia was suspicious of this, you always had to be suspicious of people like EJ, but she was willing to entertain his ideas for a while. Democracy and everything. So she kept walking, and EJ followed.

"Yeah. Idle hands. It's gonna be a problem eventually."

"Right." Octavia said exaggeratedly, like when a small child tells you all about Santa Claus and you just play along.

"But the question is who's gonna decide, you know, the rules? Who has all the power? That should be interesting." He looked at Octavia, waiting for a response, but she just kept walking. EJ reached out and grabbed her wrist, making her turn around. "Hey. Is Brandon still staying at your house?"

"Yeah." Octavia nodded.

"Aw, that's really sweet. That's really nice. Keeping the Belmont-Blackwood friendship strong, huh? Maybe I should come over one night to visit."

"You can do whatever you want, EJ." She said before walking away. This time, he didn't try to follow her.

-

Brandon had decided to help out Danny and Maxxie with searching through the town hall files. As the town's leading businessman, his father was friends with many of the town council members, so he knew his way around their offices and what was important. Still, Danny and Maxxie could use their space, so he tried to take the offices further away.

"Brandon." He looked up to see EJ walking in through the door. "Give me the car keys."

Brandon reached into his pocket, sighing. He handed them to EJ. He really wasn't in the mood for an argument. "What do you need the car for anyway?"

"None of your business. What are you doing here?"

Brandon took a deep breath before starting to explain. "I'm trying to figure out why we're here." EJ just gave him a strange look, tilting his head and staring at him like he was an idiot. "Look, there's this letter from a guy named Pfeiffer demanding $1.5 million for the smell removal. And then there's a response refusing to pay. Dated the day before we were taken. Signed by Dad."

"So what?"

"So, it could mean something. The smell, being taken on the buses. They could be related."

"You have to destroy those letters." EJ's voice was serious, verging on threatening.

"No."

"Fucking destroy them."

Brandon just glared at him, waiting for an explanation.

"You want us to be blamed for this?"

"I want to know the truth, EJ."

"You're a fucking moron. You and I can hate each other, but we still share the Blackwood surname. You think things aren't going to get bad around here? Just wait. If we're stuck in this place, things are going to get bad really fucking fast. And you want to tell people that our family could've been involved in this?"

The two brothers stared at each other before Brandon wordlessly handed the letters over to EJ. He ripped them up until the pieces were the size of confetti before walking away, silently.