Day 1 - Saturday

"Did they just... eat his soul?"

Patty frantically sloshes through the watery ground. Her sneakers feel heavy, the rain is making her sight blurry, and the fear of death and the unknown snakes its way through her body. A feeling of impending doom hits her as she peaks the hill and sees Declan in a horrible state and it frustrates and saddens her. It's not that she had any feelings for him, she never got that chance. But from one human being to another, the poor man must have died a horrific death.

Kneeling beside him, the adrenaline rush suddenly dissipated, she hangs her head bereft of any energy and resigns herself to her fate. It's fitting, she supposes, that the older ones keep one another company. Oddly, she doesn't even have the urge to drink.

Kristen shudders at the thought that Susan might be right, that they might just have witnessed a soul being swallowed.

Jessica simply nods as Dacey goes after Patty. Oh, okay. That works too. Turns out Patty can be useful somet- Before her thought can be completed, the shockwave hits.

Her mind goes blank for a second, as if her thought processes were resetting. After a second, her mind returned to normal operation. Jessica blinked, and got up off of the ground. Putting her hand to her wound, she sees that it's still bleeding.

Jessica doubted that she would be able to do much about that, even if she got to the medical station. If Dacey was against her, it's likely the plan accounted for Jessica trying to treat herself, given how Dacey had willingly left her alone. Perhaps Dacey had put blood thinners into her body, or opened the wound to a severe extent. Maybe the medical station wasn't actually stocked, and if Jessica went there, she would find nothing. Or maybe Jessica was poisoned from the start, and was doomed to die anyways. The bleeding could just be Dacey's sick way of entertaining herself, satisfying a latent sadistic desire by making Jessica dependent on her medical expertise.

As the possibilities went through her head, Jessica continued to look at her bloodstained hand, earning a few worried looks from the kids. I'm so tired of all this. I'm tired, but more than that, I'm so lost. I'm so lost. All of a sudden, the answer came to her. At times when I'm tired and lost, I talk to God.

Tearing her eyes away, Jessica turns to the two kids.

"I'm going out. Lock all the doors and windows. Do not let anyone in. Stay under a bed or something."

With that said, Jessica ran into the storm towards the chapel, not sparing a single look back.

Dacey is limping through the rain when there's another weird pulse, one that almost knocks her down, and that makes her bring a hand to one of her throbbing temples before she sets off again. "Patty!" she shouts, running after the other woman, or a shadow that she believes is the other woman. Lightning flashes and illuminates the scene and we see just how soaked Williams is. Her hair and clothes are plastered to her, and we also see Patty, ahead, kneeling.

"Patty!" Dacey says as she joins the older woman, but before she can say more she too sees Declan -- sees his ruined, wrecked body and all the wreckage he's been impaled upon. "Sweet Baby Jesus," the brown-skinned woman whispers to herself, but her training kicks in to keep her calm. Dacey has seen a lot of trauma in NYC's emergency rooms, but never something quite like this. Grabbing Patty by the shoulders, she helps the woman move back a few feet, gives her a consoling hug, then turns back to Declan.

There's just something so wrong going on, and as Williams kneels down by the dead man's side, she's determined to find out what it is. The kids and their eyes, the storm and its strange pulsations, the maggots infesting Jessica's fresh wound. Leaning over Fogarty, Dacey tries to get a better look at his injuries. They are grievous and they are many, and the woman reaches out to close the man's eyes before she starting checking his wounds, looking for--

Patty hears a snap and a whip and a metallic shing! as something flashes in front of Dacey, some blur of motion in the rain. Declan's body has been booby-trapped, and Dacey makes a soft gurgle as her shoulders slump and she sits back on her haunches. Seen from the front, the woman's eyes are wide in shock as a thin red line has been drawn straight across her throat; blood suddenly bubbles and then rushes from it, soaking her chest.

Smith watches then as the other councilor's head starts to tilt back, and back... and it just keeps going, way past where it should stop. A clean but horrific neck wound yawns, and arterial spray suddenly jets high into the air. Crimson droplets spatter Patty's face as she sees Dacey's severed head flop down against her back, dangling from a piece of skin that wasn't fully cut by the blade that very nearly decapitated the athletically-built woman. The weight of the dead nurse's shifting head topples the body backwards and that spray is suddenly aimed at Patty. The impact separates Dacey's head the rest of the way, and it goes rolling down the hill right past the sad old trout, picking up speed.

Patty just stares. She doesn't react having fallen back into a state of catatonia. Dacey's blood spatters on her face. Her hands move there robotically, smearing the blood into long streaks that look like war paint. She watches the girl's head disappear and roll down the hill with a sort of detached interest.

She's numb, so numb that the bottle still doesn't call to her. Looking up at the sky she lets the droplets of water rain down on her, washing off the bloody streaks.

"Alright you assholes. Come and get me!"

One more time!

Kristin is in shock. The death of Lucas had been horrifying enough, but now the added loss of Susan threatened the remainder of her fragile sanity. She swallows hard and reaches for the chainsaw. Hefting it, she steeled herself for what she knew would come next.

Jessica ran through the rain, each step kicking up clods of dirt. Even though the tempo of the raindrops grew higher and higher, what was left of her spirit was not dampened. It was as if she were shielding the weak flame of a candle with her hands. Though it would be easy to give up, Jessica was clinging onto the hope that she would get answers. Direction.

In a time that felt too short to be real, Jessica made it to the chapel. The fact that she made the journey unmolested by the threat of death began to temper Jessica's desperation into conviction. Conviction that she had made the right choice, that she was on the path to an answer. After all, it was almost like a higher power had relented for a brief moment. A shepherd strikes not the wayward sheep that has been turned onto the right path.

Panting, Jessica put her clammy hands to the chapel's doors. After all, if she'd been fooled to this extent, what's to say that the chapel wasn't just a mirage cooked up by conspirators to break her spirit once and for all? Her very thoughts were just electrical signals after all.

But her soul was something more than that, wasn't it? Her palms felt the solid grain of wood under her palms. With a deep breath, Jessica pushed open the doors.

Even over the roar of the chainsaw, Kristin hears the approaching sirens and sighs with relief. But how would they know that she was in the gym? Setting down the chainsaw and backing away, she grabs the walkie-talkie that has been her lifeline. "Hello? Hello? Is anybody there?"