The empty wrappers were slowly outweighing the packs of food remaining from the haul on the first night. Time seemed to stagnate now that the water clock had been decommissioned. Conversation was sparse.

Donovan whispered to Matthew, trying to keep him alert. Emilio sat silently and Saleem simply sat side-by-side in silence. Gowan slumped against a wall as Elizabeth rested her head on his shoulder and listened as he softly hummed church hymns under his breath. Victor sat in a row of seats in the middle of the auditorium, alone, reading his bible by candlelight.

In a room full of men going through an objectively traumatic time, Elizabeth had a feeling that she would be trapped in silence forever. It had to be her and it had to be now.

"Amy could come back for you," Elizabeth suggested hopefully.

Emilio shook his head. "Nah. If the purple smoke took her to heaven," he looked down, "it means a world without me."

Elizabeth thought back to her first memories of watching the couple so easily handle the situation of a stranger covered in blood. "But I saw you two together. She loved you. She trusted you."

"She was scared of me." Emilio's voice held a quiet anger that was scarier than when he simply yelled. "She's not coming back. If I go, my smoke is mine."

Victor was pacing across the floor, looking at Matthew writhing at his feet. "From what I can figure out, all three women on our side caused their own deaths. They all got purple smoke."

Gowan let out a thinking noise. "Masina didn't do it on purpose though."

"Perhaps it's just black and white." Victor held up his bible. "God doesn't do tricks."

Donovan rolled his eyes. He stood in Victor's path. "Where does your bible mention any of this?" He gestured around, growing more and more frustrated as time passed.

Elizabeth felt herself grow colder. She spoke in almost a whisper, "Kellie and Evan both ..." she tried to steady her breathing, "What if it's based on if you've killed someone?"

"Nonsense!" Victor scrunched his rodent-like nose. "Violet would have engulfed us all in smoke as black as ash."

"Agree to disagree," Elizabeth murmured.

"Maybe there's a loophole about forgiveness?" Gowan interjected.

Victor stopped his pacing in front of Elizabeth. "Maybe it depends on how much one enjoyed the killing."

Elizabeth felt her shoulders tense. Shame shot through her veins like she'd never felt before. She wouldn't usually be one to care what some random kid thinks, but she couldn't shake the feeling. He was right. She was a killer now. Perhaps her smoke was destined to be dark too.

"We don't have to sit around to find out." Emilio pointed to the projector room where the bloodied heart still remained on the window. "Amy left the knife she borrowed from Lestat's rampage in there."

It didn't take much time for the room to realise where Emilio was headed with his explanation.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

To the surprise of the bystanders, it was Donovan who spoke up, "No. Fuck off. I didn't sit in this room with you, to get this far, for you to go and off yourself when things get hard. Like it's some kind of service to us."

Emilio had already stepped towards the doors. He stopped and turned around. "You wanna know hard? I watched guys lose limbs. Lose lives. They came back and couldn't work and the government paid them peanuts, only for them to shove it all into beers, horses, or pokies just to feel some kind of happiness. That was their reward. You either start a podcast, or you drink until you punch a wall when the stress kicks back in. I've been through it once. I earned my stripes."

"Oh," Donovan nodded his head sarcastically, "some dudes you know lost their legs? My boyfriend is fucking dying, if you haven't noticed." He pointed to Matthew who simply had his eyes closed in pain. "Did you have to watch the man you love die in front of you while the fucking lights don't work and the meds ran out?"

Donovan almost immediately regretted his outburst.

All Emilio could muster to stop the tears that welled in his eyes from falling was a nod and a soft "yeah." He took in a sharp breath and pushed his chest forward, looking Donovan back in the eye, wiping his nose obnoxiously. "Yeah, actually," he said more confidently. He flicked his tongue across his inner lip and slightly lifted his head to try and muster some of the staunchness back into his demeanour. With merely a look, Emilio dared Donovan to fire back.

Donovan remained silent.

A voice called from the floor a short distance away, "If you guys could figure out if killing myself is going to be a better decision in the long run ..." Matthew groaned.

His condition had deteriorated rapidly. Elizabeth had never seen a necrotic wound before, but she had a feeling that this is what it looked like. The thick, black patches of skin that sidled alongside the yellowed pus coming from the wound that had continued to seep for days continued to smell worse and worse. Every time Elizabeth left the cinema and came back the smell would hit her again.

"No!" Donovan snapped his attention back to Matthew. "We've waited this long. We've waited it out." He rushed to Victor and shoved his shoulder. "You said it's three days. Why hasn't it been three days?"

Victor clutched his bible to make sure that it didn't get hit. "I don't control time. You just made a clock and decided it was correct." He looked to the real adults in the room who seemed to just be standing by, the way they always did. His thick brows angled downwards as he looked to the crowd. There was hurt in his voice, "I brought you candles."

"You brought us a fucking death sentence!" He grabbed Victor now, shoving him towards Matthew. "Look at him! You did this. YOU. Some fucking candles don't change that!"

"Woah, woah!" Gowan stepped in to separate the pair.

Donovan continued to struggle to get to Victor. His limp and shorter stature did him no favours in looking imposing. "When the sun rises, you better watch your back. I don't care if every cop is dead, you still have to pay."

"When the sun rises," Victor stepped back to help Gowan keep Donovan away from him, "and you step out of those double doors without being ripped to shreds," Victor's eyes had an intense fire to them, "you can thank me by never crossing my path again."

Donovan let out a huff. "I hope your smoke is dark."

No one had anything to say to this statement. Of every insult that could have been flung, this one was the most visceral. It hit a wound in Elizabeth's soul that she didn't know had opened. Static ran itself over her body as she realised that the normalcy of the statement meant that she had, indeed, accepted this as her reality now.

It had to be over soon. She remembered that it took people 72 hours to begin to really accept a major shift in their life circumstances. Although, she was fairly sure that it was from reality TV show she watched on The Discovery Channel and not from her educational journey.

"I'm done." Emilio flung himself from the wall. "I don't care if the sun rises anymore. I'm not going to sit here for nothing just to end up dying for nothing." He stormed up the aisle towards the double doors and yelled to the others below, "If my smoke is dark, you know it's about killing."

Saleem followed quickly behind him. Elizabeth hoped, to stop him rather than just waiting for the colour of the smoke. Not that Saleem's wiry frame could do much against anything Emilio did.

"If it's purple," he flung open the double doors, "know there's a God and he's got more fucking mercy than I ever had."