The world did not get any further illuminated.

Donovan flicked the lighter again. Harder this time.

The three candles still remained the only light in the room.

"It's ok," Gowan said, "maybe the water clock is out of sync. We did rely on a six year old to do the counting."

As more time went by, a sinking feeling hit Elizabeth that maybe the water clock was not off at all.

"What do we do if this really is it?" Amy asked.

"We survive." Her husband replied.

By the 51st hour, the group had stopped attending to the water clock. Amy had retreated back to the wall she had spent so many previous hours leaning against, looking toward the projection booth. Hoping with some fragment of her being that a red light would flash somewhere, or that the projector would whir back into standby mode.

Matthew could no longer move without immense pain. He lay with his head stiff to the floor. The screams of pain weren't needed anymore, his body was simply consumed by a heat that had become his baseline. Tears moved from the corners of his eyes, directly down the sides of his face, and to the floor.

"It's ok." Donovan tried desperately to dry the tears away. His voice was shaky, but he would not lose his boyfriend. "The timing is just wrong. That's all. It's ok. We'll make it through this. You just need to hold on a little longer." He looked to Elizabeth. "As soon as she can leave, Elizabeth is going to grab the car and drive us like crazy to the hospital, aren't you?"

Elizabeth nodded. "That's right." She tried hard to add sincerity to her voice, but any attempt to do so just simply fell flat. "I'll drive like mad."

Gowan walked towards Victor. He addressed him quietly, "I am coming to you as a brother in Christ, Victor. I don't assign any blame to you, but I want to know. Do you still think it's the three days?"

Victor made direct eye contact with Gowan. "Of course. The signs are there. The candles worked. God doesn't lie."

Emilio had been listening. "Fuck your God. This bullshit didn't come from him! It's easy to believe in a God when you've not had to watch your mate's legs get amputated. It's easy to believe in a God when you aren't face to face with kids holding guns thinking they're serving their God. Of course you think sinners deserve hell, when you've not even been alive long enough to experience more than feel guilty about your mum finding a crusty sock under the bed!" His balled up fist hit the carpeted cinema wall.

"No, Em. You don't get to do this now." Amy faced her husband. "You aren't the only one in the room who has been through shit. You aren't the only one who feels cheated or tricked with what they've been dealt. I love you, but fuck." She gestured around. "We have all seen someone ripped to shreds. We all saw women die and vanish into smoke. We have all seen some shit."

He lowered his voice, "You didn't run back and realise you shoulda run faster."

"No." She walked closer to him and looked up at him with her sad, grey eyes. "And you didn't have to sit there compressing her chest, even when it was clear she'd stopped breathing."

Saleem shifted awkwardly, as the others watched from a distance. His mouth kept opening and closing, like he wanted to interject. Watching the tension rise made him feel uncomfortable. In his life prior to the sky turning black, a yelling match usually meant a physical altercation was coming. At best, only an object would get broken. Never within his own family at home, but he couldn't stay at home forever.

Gowan murmured from the side of his mouth, "It's better to just let him get it out of his system. Trust me."

"I can't take it." Matthew was repeating over and over again.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

Donovan continued to stroke his head with a shaking hand. He tried to comfort him. "Just a little longer," he'd say. "Just a little longer."

Elizabeth couldn't keep her mind off the smoke. She tried to draw conclusions with the limited information that she had. Evan tried to kill people for selfish reasons, and he got dark smoke. Yet Kellie got dark smoke too. She had killed someone, but it sounded like self defense. Violet got purple smoke. Masina got purple smoke.

Had they killed anyone? They didn't seem like the type.

If it was about biblical sin, then surely Violet would have-

Her speculation was cut short. Gowan and Saleem had come over to sit back in their corner.

"Just wondering," she began, "what colour do you think your smoke would be?"

Gowan just smiled at her. "I hope to never find out. I hope to live until this is over and we can all just walk away for a long enough time that this all seems like a weird dream."

She looked at him with a frustrated glance. She yelled across the room, "Hey Victor! What colour do you reckon your smoke will be?"

He seemed taken aback by her callousness at the reality facing them. "It's not a personality test."

Saleem straightened his posture. "What do you think it is?"

"I think it's a good reminder that we should spend more time trying to live under the laws of God and repent." Victor held up his bible, looking at Donovan.

"Not now, dude." Donovan simply sounded tired. He sounded defeated. "If this love on earth is the only kind I am afforded, then it has still been worth it." He looked to Matthew, who had slid back into a shallow sleep, "It is worth it, and it will continue to be worth it."

"I want you to know," Emilio piped up, "I got nothing against you mate. I mean, if the sun never comes up," he stopped and stuttered a little bit, "I mean, it will. It will. If it didn't though," he had an air of uncertainty about him, "I just hope you both would get the good smoke."

Amy rubbed her husbands arm to comfort him.

Donovan just looked down to Matthew. He didn't respond. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He pulled out the lighter again as the air filled with another unsuccessful click.

Gowan stood up. "I think we need to discuss what our plan of action will be if the lights don't come on."

A few nodded in agreement. The space had been treated in the way a short term hotel room might have been. There were empty packages of food littering the floor around the candles. Bedding of Violet and Masina were still balled up against a wall. The toilet in the corner was never intended as a long term solution, and it's smell was detected earlier and earlier when it was approached from the floor.

"There's always other cinemas we could pack up and move to?" Amy suggested.

Donovan objected. They could not move while Matthew was deteriorating so quickly. The group would definitely never opt to leave him alone in the dark.

"If we're staying in here long term we would need to prioritise supplies. Food, more bedding," he looked towards the makeshift latrine, "new buckets."

"But what if there's more people out there?" Elizabeth asked. She couldn't do it again. She couldn't handle the thought of ever having to do that again. When her body was still for too long, she could still feel the suction of the knife being pulled out of the stab wounds. It made her stomach churn. She didn't understand how Emilio could be so angry about deaths around him. In her line of work, she thought she could empathise with veterans who came home angry. Now all she could feel was sick.

"Were there?" Gowan referred the question to Saleem.

"I don't know." The shadows over the scruff of his facial hair cast small shadows which made it hard to read his facial expressions, but Gowan was sure he seemed almost disappointed. "We saw people in the dark, but I'm not sure if they were all just you guys or if, you know."

"Shit." Emilio muttered.

It was clear that sending more people out would be a risk. The only weapon on hand to defend themselves with now was the trolley bar. Victor's knife was still missing. Gowan and Elizabeth remained silent about the other missing knife, as well as the one that they had left in amongst the shelving. It was remarkable no one really probed too far into why Elizabeth had been so bloody after their return.

Matthew's gasps continued to remind them how ill-equipped they were in cases where injury was likely to happen.

They came to the consensus to wait. After all, perhaps they had just miscalculated. Perhaps the water clock had only been made after a half day. There was only so long that the adrenaline of waiting for their freedom to arrive could course through their veins before their bodies would begin to crash again.

Gowan and Elizabeth remained in their separate bed nests, holding hands across the border like small otters floating through their dam. Saleem had repurposed the bedding that had been discarded after Masina and Violet no longer needed them.

Donovan continued to fight to keep his eyes open. However, Matthew drowsily asked him to lay next to him. Even just for a little while. Just to rest. They could not embrace, lest putting Matthew in more pain, so Matthew simply pressed the back of his hand to Donovan's side.

Emilio had fallen asleep in a sitting position. Amy was using his lap as a headrest. She couldn't help but continue to stare at the empty projector room, waiting for a flash of a light. Just waiting for something. She fought her heavy eyelids, lest she missed the call to their freedom.

With only his bible and the beeswax candlelight, Victor sat alone.