When I regained consciousness I was sitting upright against the wall a few paces from the entrance to the exercise area. A heavy drowsiness had taken hold of me. I wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep.

"Stay awake," said a familiar voice.

It was Mike. He was crouched beside me. Time jumped forward in intervals each time the darkness covered my eyes.

I caught a glimpse of the five that had been chosen to clean up Holly's dead body carrying her onto a large piece of blue tarp. Buckets of soapy water and mops were being used to water down the blood; so much blood.

Mike ripped apart my overalls above the waist with his bare hands and was busy cleaning and then stitching the wounds on my gut and shoulder. I couldn't feel the sting of the needle piercing my skin but the tugging sensation was there.

Although it felt like mere minutes to me, the clean up of Holly's body, and Mike tending to my wounds, must have taken much longer.

I couldn't understand what was being said by those around me beyond that I was the topic of conversation. I could at least understand my name was being said between the other sounds which refused to be understood by my brain.

Another lapse of consciousness and I wondered for a moment if I had died because a sudden weightlessness had taken hold of me. It was as if my eyes were being pressed shut because it took all of the little concentration I could muster to force them open.

Blain was carrying me and so was the Scottish Young Man; the ceiling of one of the white corridors trailed above me as if I were a patient being moved on a stretcher through a hospital.

Back to the fourth floor? I wondered.

That didn't sound too bad. I liked it down there. After what had happened with Holly I was already prepared to take a nice long break from the third floor again. I had returned for all of one day and another death had taken place. Things were getting worse, the momentum of blood and misery and murder picking up. If things continued like they were then I had no doubt what Sophie had told me in her secret note was true: the Pied Piper officers really were planning to kill us all.

They set me down on a chair in the cafeteria. I lost consciousness again and when I awoke from the latest lapse I was aware of a dull ache and an uncomfortable pinching sensation at the inside of my arm. A tube of red was stuck into my arm with a bit of tape covering where the needle, or whatever it was, pierced into the vein.

My wounds must have been stitched because there were large white bandages stuck over them. I didn't like having the top half of my skinny-fat body on show as it was (I had next to no chest hair for one) and my body simply wasn't something I took much pride in.

The cafeteria was empty save for one familiar face. Tiffany, who was sitting beside me with a tube also in her arm; there were bags filled with blood situated atop a metal frame between us.

She was looking at me with concern. Her face was still prettied up and it was still strange seeing her with long brunette hair which went down beyond her shoulders. She hardly looked like the Tiffany I first met.

"Burgess?" she said.

I noticed her fangs were gone.

"Hey," I whispered.

My throat felt hoarse and dry and swallowing hurt.

"Here," she said, handing me a plastic cup filled with orange juice.

I took it and took a sip. It felt good tasting something so sweet.

Tiffany forced a smile, pointing to the blood bags.

"We're a match," she said.

"I don't know my blood type," I said.

"They do," said Tiffany.

"Are you okay?" she said.

"What do you care?" I said.

I didn't want to sound so venomous but I was somewhat out of it from the loss of blood and the post-adrenaline emotional swing that had taken hold of me.

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Tiffany looked hurt.

"I care," she said.

"I don't think you do," I said, my words sounding dry and raspy; I took another quick sip of the orange juice, then said, "You went off with Holly, grew out your fangs, pretty much acted like we hardly know each other. What are you playing at?"

Tiffany looked at me then lowered her eyes a little lost in her own thoughts.

"I don't know what I'm doing," she said, "I didn't ask for any of this, Burg."

"Is that your excuse?" I said, struggling to remain still because of the sudden rage which was threatening to make me get up from my seat.

"Back before we got here we made a promise to look out for each other. Then you join up with Holly of all people," I said.

"I just wanted a break from all this crap, Burg," said Tiffany, matching some of my intensity, "Do you think if I didn't care about what happens to you I would be here giving you my own blood?"

"I saw you," I said, "I saw you and Mikayla watching, doing nothing when Holly was about to rip my face off. I'm not going to forget that."

Tiffany's eyes welled up with tears but also a different kind of intense fury.

"Oh excuse me," she said, "Holly turned into a monster. I don't know who you think I am, Burgess. I'm not someone that knows what to do when things go bad. I freeze up. I'm terrified, Burgess. I just want to go home and be with my son."

She started to sob into her palm. A part of me still felt indignant about her cowardice; her refusal to get up and try to help me in my moment of need. If it hadn't been for that Scottish Young Man then I would be dead; then what use would Tiffany's tears be then? Another part of me however understood where Tiffany was coming from. Nowhere in our agreement had she agreed to fight to the death for me. Maybe I was asking too much of someone who, like she said, wanted to return to a normal life and get back to her son.

"I'm sorry," she said, "I'll try and do better next time. I'm just scared."

Tears stung at my eyes and my body convulsed from the fresh onset of a maelstrom of emotions threatening to make me spiral. It was strange however how calm I could be in moments of life or death peril compared to how on edge I felt when things calmed down.

"It's okay," I said, though I wasn't sure I really believed the words coming out of my mouth, "Tiff, you need to understand something about the situation we're in."

Tiffany looked up at me, the cheeks on her pretty face shiny from the tears.

"We're not going to be able to go home and live normal lives," I said, "Not only are we under arrest here but the world is going to know what people like us can do. If what happened with Holly and George is happening all over the world then you're not going to be able to return to a normal life with Ashton. Do you understand?"

Tiffany's eyes told me she did understand but she was also soaking in the reality of what I was trying to get through to her.

"From now on," I said, "Everything is life and death. You can't just sit back and hope things are going to get better or return to normal. We don't have that luxury anymore."

Much of what I was saying to her I was also telling myself. I needed to hear myself say it just as much as she needed to hear it too. I almost couldn't believe I was the one saying the words coming out of my mouth. I understood the things I was saying on a deeper level so it felt strange to put my anxieties into fixed words.

"What about Ashton?" said Tiffany.

I didn't want to have to answer this question. I didn't have an answer for it beyond the obvious.

"Tiff, look," I said, "If both of his parents are in prison, especially one that is seen as a major threat to society, then what normal life could you provide for him?"

"But you don't understand," said Tiffany, "I can't leave him with my mother. He shouldn't have to go through what I went through with her."

It's over, Tiffany, I thought, but couldn't bring myself to say it.

"I'm not going to get to go back to a normal life with my family," I said, "Not after all this. How could I? How could anyone here go back to their families? We have to…" I struggled to say the words, "...we have to accept that."

"I should never have left him," said Tiffany, "I just wanted a break from everything at home."

"You're not to blame," I said, "If you refused to be evacuated then you would still be a criminal. There's no way the Pied Pipers are going to let any of us live normal lives."

"I can't do this, Burgess," said Tiffany, sounding at the end of her tether.

"Neither can I," I said, "But what's the alternative?"

"No," said Tiffany, sitting upright and sniffling with a new steely resolve in her eyes, "It's not over. Things look bad, like, because we're in it, init? But with time things can go back to normal. Or, if like, not back to normal, then we can at least make it so they don't have us trapped here like rats."

"Maybe," I said, something in her resolve made me think that maybe she could be right.

"If they think I'm just going to let them decide everything for me then they've got another thing coming, init?" said Tiffany, "I ain't going to just accept what they're doing to us."

"Good," I said, relieved to see some new life in Tiffany for once. Seeing the resolve on her face, or maybe just the denial to accept how things were going to be, made me realise just how bitter and hollow my hopes of things getting better had become. We were deep in a dark hole and as far as I could tell no amount of hard climbing was going to get us back to the surface. It was only a dogged, gritty refusal to do nothing at all that was keeping me going. I simply refused to die at the hands of the Pied Piper officers and to let the story of my life end in some grim underground facility.

"I'm not dying until I see my Mum again," I said, "I don't care what they throw at me."

"I'm not going to make any more promises to you, Burg," said Tiffany, wiping away tears from her eyes with her fingertips, "Like," she said, "Things aren't going to change until I make them change."

"That's more like it," I said.