Act 1, Chap 4: Shift

[Reassign Leo and Purna]

This might be what needs to happen. Hopefully, Nolan and the children could still remain safe even after the protectors are reassigned. It was interesting seeing more of Nolan and Emily's backstory. I wonder what will happen if the investigators bring them back to their mothers after this whole situation ends. Would they be the same age as now or would they age 16 years? If they don't age it would be interesting to see how their mothers react to that. Also, would they remain alive since apparently they died in the past? That was a twist I didn't see coming, I didn't know what to expect but that wasn't it.

P.S.: Glad to see you return to writing the story Kal, and congratulations on the pregnancy!

Nolan remained on the wall, tilting his head back to stare at the ceiling until he heard the elevator doors open once again. He listened for who had come down, not wanting to move. “Is he okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good, just tired.” Once he had heard that it was Oliver, Nolan leveled his head back down to look at him and Talia, who was standing on the ground and barely holding Oliver’s hand as she tried to continue walking ahead. “Where are you guys going? Where’s Gavin at?”

“I was going to take Tal to the beach. I’m trying to leave Gavin with Olivia to see if it helps with kickstarting her memories.” Oliver looked at Flora and Emily, then back at Nolan. A slight look of distaste crossed his face as he seemed to hold on to Talia’s hand tighter. “I feel like we walked into something that wasn’t intended for us, so we’re just going to go now.”

As Oliver went to leave the doors, Emily looked at Nolan and only briefly caught the nod he had directly at her. “Oliver, wait!”

He stopped in place, Nolan catching the sigh of annoyance as he picked Talia off the ground and turned back to Emily and Flora. “What’s up?”

Nolan pushed himself off of the wall and stood in place, trying to still his swirling head. “Hold on, Nolan needs to sit down, Oliver come with us.” Flora reached out to Nolan and quickly ushered him back to the dining room, sliding him into a seat.

Emily took the seat next to Nolan, Flora sat across from her and with a bit of pushing, Oliver sat across from Nolan. “What’s going on with you guys?”

Emily looked to Nolan just as his head hit the table, Flora and Oliver both immediately reaching out to Nolan. “He’s drained, but he’ll be okay.” She paused as the two took their hands back and focused their attention on her. “While we wait for him to get a little more energy, I can fill you in on the conversation that we’ve already had with Flora.”

Nolan just listened with his face down on the table as Emily recalled the conversation to Oliver, who mostly gave small verbal acknowledgements to let her know that he was still listening.

Flora chimed in to the conversation every once in a while but mainly kept to herself until she gave Oliver her own opinion on the proposition that Emily was delivering.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not on board with this.” Nolan finally looked up to see Oliver getting out of his seat, still holding on to Talia. “The very thought of it doesn’t seem morally right to me because throughout this entire discussion, Nolan has been getting paler, he’s been sweating, and physically unable to move. I don’t agree with the idea of taking away two of the people who can defend the children when one of the two that would remain is incapacitated.”

Nolan got to his feet, putting his mind into summoning Leo and Purna while his fingers moved into the upside down triangle formation. Within a matter of seconds, the two protectors appeared by Nolan’s side, their attention going straight to getting him back into the seat he’d gotten out of. “I’m fine, stop it!” Nolan attempted to push back the two, his struggle coming up fruitless as they got him seated again quicker than they had appeared.

Leo leaned down to look into Nolan’s eyes, his head shaking for only a moment. “Stay down, it’s not a request. If you get up again, you’re going to be subdued and sent into a sleep.”

Nolan turned to look back at Emily, who nodded in agreement with what Leo had said. He sighed as he faced Leo once again. “Okay, fine but you guys need to listen for a minute.”

“No, you need to listen to us.” Leo shook his head again, moving back from Nolan and standing directly next to Purna. “The spirit forced Nathaniel to back down from the fight, he’s still out there and from what we know, he’s on his way back to this building.”

“The spirit is currently in rest and at the moment, consuming all of the island’s energy to return to normal state.” Purna crossed her arms, a look of disappointment on her face. “You’re obviously not and until you do enter a state of rest, the spirit will take all of the idle energy and with the more energy it takes, the longer your recovery period will be.”

Nolan looked past the two protectors to see a similar look of disappointment on Oliver’s face as he listened to the two. “I need to reassign you two. Now.”

The two froze and looked between each other, then looked to Emily. “Did you know about this?” Leo questioned her, getting another nod in response. The two protectors seeming to become angry with her answer. “With the phasing that he’s already been experiencing and him pushing himself as hard as he is, he’s going to-“

Leo stopped after Nolan raised his hand. “I already know what’s going to happen, but I’m going to do this because it’s what needs to happen to save the people who are here through no fault of their own.”

Their anger shifted to an unreadable look on each of their faces as Purna folded her hands neatly in front of her. “That’s not just the adults, Nolan, that’s everyone on this island.” She frowned as she took a few steps towards him and crouched in front of him in an attempt to meet his eyes. “You’re not helping yourself or Emily by reassigning us and you’re opening the entire island up to a massive risk by reassigning us to Oliver. It would be fine if it was just Flora but because he’s part of it, you’re risking an unraveling bigger than what any of us can handle, especially when you will be inactive and unable to assist.”

“In his defense, you two are already here right now and he’s right there. If it was going to happen, it’s now going to happen regardless.” Flora rested her hands on the table in front of her.

“That is a fair point.” Purna stood once again, finally breaking her attention from Nolan and looking at Oliver and Talia for a few seconds before looking back at Nolan. “Alright, so assume that nothing unravels. What is our goal?”

Leo immediately recognized what Purna was trying to do with her first question. “Stop, don’t answer that.” He moved to stand next to her and spoke to her in a harsh whisper. “What are you doing?”

Her head shot up, her eyes looking to be fueled by anger as she responded to Leo. “You already know the next step, there’s no need to discuss this.”

“No, there is a need to discuss this.” Leo walked to the kitchen’s door and waited for Purna to follow him into the kitchen. The two waited to speak until the door behind them had shut. “He’s way too weak to do this, he might not make it through a reassignment.”

“He already made that decision for himself but right now an unraveling is inevitable, we have to take this assignment to Oliver because even if we stay assigned to Nolan and attempt to repair it, it’ll only further unravel because we have to be present and interact with him to fix it. The very least that we can do is ease the reassignment so it takes less energy from him.”

Leo shook his head and crossed his arms. “This is a horrible idea and you know it. I’m not going along with it because I agree with it, I’m going along with it so Nolan’s not using all of his remaining energy.”

The two left the kitchen and went to stand next to Nolan’s seat at the end of the table. Oliver had taken his seat across from Nolan back, leaving only the two protectors remaining standing. “I will pose the question once again, what will our goal be assuming that nothing unravels?”

“The goal you two will have remains the same regardless of an unravelment. Your new goal is to be determined by the people that you report to, which would be Flora and Oliver. You have both aided me well and I’ll always appreciate the undying loyalty the two of you displayed while assigned to me, but I firmly believe now that Flora and Oliver could greatly benefit from the assistance the two of you can provide.” Nolan looked at the two protectors and held out his hand towards Flora and Oliver. “From this moment on, you’ll be assigned to protect and assist Flora and Oliver. You’ll be expected to fulfill this duty no matter what it takes, your lives included.”

Purna put her head down, almost as if she was bowing to the group at the table. Leo followed her lead and the two spoke in synchronization. “We understand these conditions and accept the reassignment.”

---

Once Emily had taken Nolan back to his room to allow him to rest, Purna and Leo had taken their seats across from Oliver and Flora.

They had explained to the two how summoning would work for them, situations that would cause them to automatically be summoned to one of the two, and what they would be able to do to help them in their individual goals.

“As a word of warning, we wouldn’t recommend starting any new plans until the unraveling is solved.” Leo stared straight ahead at Flora, his words very clearly spoken. “It’s going to happen purely because of how we were summoned earlier. Things may have played out differently if we had been reassigned and then summoned, but we have to move forward with the card we were dealt so there's no point in mulling over it.”

“How do you repair the fabric of reality unraveling?” Oliver asked, still seeming annoyed from his conversation with Emily earlier.

“By reconstructing the timeline that we were living in.”

“Doesn’t that include the both of you falling to your deaths?”

Leo didn’t answer for a moment, nodding slightly. “He’s got a point. How do we do that part if we can’t die?”

“On that same note, does that mean you get reassigned to Nolan? Then he goes to reassign you guys to us, it unravels again, what do you guys do then?”

“He’s got a lot of points.” Leo looked to Purna. “We have to change the timeline somewhere to avoid another unraveling, the question is where do we disrupt it without causing any more damage than we’ve already done?”

She thought for a minute before tapping her fingers on the table. “We have two options. First would be the night we died, we would engage in combat instead of hitting the ground. That’s not a secure option because we would in a sense be attacking who we’re assigned to because while he was under the impression of the spirit, Oliver was still physically there and one of our attackers.” Leo nodded along. “Second would be the day Oliver gave up the gift. The very moment he gave it up, Nolan would have had to reassign us so we could still assist Flora during the flood.” She paused, her head twitching for a second. “Or, there’s the chance that our states never change and so we reach the point of Oliver obtaining the gift and he remains the way he is now, which automatically changes the timeline.”

“Would it change the timeline, though?” Flora leaned forward. “Brianne was in the ground when you guys disturbed the spirit, she’s back in the ground and Oliver’s in the state he was when he disturbed the spirit.”

“That is true, but we honestly don’t know if he would obtain the gift after already possessing it or if he would obtain it while the spirit has already been disturbed and is active.” Purna paused to think. “Except the spirit isn’t active, it’s in rest right now.”

“This is going to be a hard reset, no matter what point we choose to change the timeline.” Leo crossed his arms and leaned in his chair.

Flora looked on at the protectors, the two seeming to be stumped for the moment. “Saying we don’t create a plan until after this reset, what do we do until it happens?”

Leo shrugged, looking between Purna and Oliver. “We could make an attempt to get ahead of it.” He turned his attention to Flora. “For that to happen, the three of us need to retrace every moment that got us to this point and I don’t foresee that being possible with Talia in tow. Can you hold onto her?”

---

The three went about the rest of the day as they had gone through their first day as the trio that they had become before Leo and Purna’s deaths. At some point, Leo and Purna realized that Oliver’s actions were becoming less intentional, as if he had begun actively forgetting the task at hand.

They truthfully had no idea if what they had been doing was working until that evening, when the letters that they now knew were from Nathaniel appeared on their mats. The moment played out just as Leo and Purna remembered.

Nolan, who suddenly seemed to have his typical energy back, stepped off the elevator and picked up the note on his mat and read it while Purna read it over his shoulder. Purna read her note while Leo read his, Leo pointed out the note to Oliver later that evening and went down to dinner with him.

They sat on each side of Purna, who had beaten them down to the dining room once again. The residents took their seats in the same order that they had before with Rocky and Amos being the last in their seats. “Good evening to all of you!” Nathaniel’s voice rang through the silent room, just as it had done before.

He went on, thanking everyone for attending and explaining his role as property manager when Leo leaned towards Purna. “Do either of you remember signing a lease?”

Oliver leaned down to close the distance between the three of them. “I don’t even remember how I got here. Olivia says it was by boat but I swear that I drove.” Oliver’s words made Purna and Leo realize that he had in actuality forgotten all about his role in the current unraveling and that they would have to lead him through the timeline.

As the dinner progressed, Leo ran into the same issue with Nolan being too afraid to stop the confrontation between Kelly and Nathaniel, which ended up with Rocky doing it himself. George, Boris, Julio, and Oliver each said their piece to Nathaniel before the dinner ended and just as Kelly had done the first night, she immediately ran off with Purna to follow her.

Leo was left alone with Nathaniel, who didn’t seem like the Nathaniel he had gotten to know anymore. He once again seemed like a neutral force, like a normal guy. He declined Leo’s invitation to talk and got trapped in the dining room by Oliver at Leo’s command.

It was when the conversation had reached the initial disagreement about Erica that a sudden sense of dread hit Leo. This was the conversation that had led to multiple weeks of Oliver’s reputation being completely dragged through the dirt, this was the conversation that led to Nathaniel stabbing Oliver and Erica’s attempt at Purna’s life.

“I was told that you don’t like him because his best friend is the husband of your ex-wife and you see him hanging around with your ex-girlfriend pretty frequently.”

“That’s not true.” Leo interjected into the conversation before Erica could attempt to defend herself or Oliver could try to end it. “I’ve moved on from Melanie and have no concern with who she chooses to be with and in Oliver’s defense, you could name any person on this island besides myself and I could name at least five times I’ve seen him essentially glued to them. That’s just his personality, it doesn’t mean he seduced my ex-girlfriend.”

Nathaniel picked up a mischievous grin as he seemed to think of a name. “Okay. Knox, five times.”

“I see him around Knox nearly every day because he goes to the performance center every day to help Knox with ensuring that the stands are secure enough for Melissa’s acts.” Leo looked to Oliver to see a look of surprise on his face that he quickly shook off when he realized Leo was looking at him.

Leo ended the conversation with Nathaniel, leaving the dining room with Gary, Erica, and Oliver. Gary and Erica went to their rooms on the first floor while Leo and Oliver stayed on the elevator.

They stood in silence for a minute before Oliver cleared his throat. “Thank you for defending me. I know it wasn’t easy because you genuinely don’t trust me or like me, but that was a big thing for you to do and I appreciate it.”

The elevator doors swung open, allowing the two to step off. “I don’t hate you, Oliver. I don’t even dislike you, I was being serious when I said your personality is just overwhelming to me and sometimes your presence stresses me out.”

“That’s fair enough.” Oliver nodded along, standing at his door. His attention suddenly shifted to the door that separated his and Leo’s. “Do you think she made it back okay? She took off without a word and I didn’t see her come back.”

“If I’m not mistaken, she’s about to head out of the bathroom. She made it back before we got up, that talk went a little longer than it was supposed to.”

As Oliver went to respond, the door to the bathroom at the end of the hall opened and out came Purna, she seemed just as surprised to see the two men as Oliver looked to see her. “How did you know she was in there? Did you see her come back and I just missed it?”

Leo shook his head, turning the knob to his apartment. “It’s like I said earlier, the people on this island are creatures of unbreakable habits, it’s almost like they’re trapped in the same routine every single day.”

---

The next morning, Leo went to his fishing spot on the dock and ran into Nathaniel. Nathaniel seemed antsy to talk to him after he finished speaking with Bryce and Lucille.

“Hey, I just wanted to apologize for that conversation last night and thank you for putting a stop to it. It was wildly inappropriate from me and I think it came from a place of insecurity, what with me being new here and all.”

Leo nodded, shaking Nathaniel’s hand. “It’s no problem, I was new here once too.” The two of them spoke for a while before Leo turned his attention back towards the front of the dock, quickly noticing that Oliver was there instead of on the roof like he had been on the original day.

His face fell as he remembered the original day and looked to the pier’s edge, knowing what that had meant for Purna. He recalled that Nathaniel had intentionally set Oliver off the night before in an attempt to spare Purna’s life the next morning.

Without a moment’s notice, Leo started a run to the dock’s end and forced himself over the railing that he would normally be fishing on at this time. He hit the water with the intention of getting Purna out, her figure quickly catching his eyes as he swam deeper.

He grabbed her and pulled her back to his chest, attempting to push against the water and keep hold of Purna while he struggled to reach the surface of the water. Once he reached the top of the water, he pulled her head out of the water and dragged her along to the shore. He put her on her back in the sand and was immediately pulled away by Nathaniel as George got down on his knees and started pressing on Purna’s chest, talking to himself as he attempted to bring her back.

It was only five minutes that George was performing chest compressions on Purna before she began coughing and gasping for air. Those five minutes felt like an eternity for Leo and for Oliver, who had seen everything that had happened, unbeknownst to Leo.

It didn’t take long into the night for Leo to realize that just as Purna, he was now in danger of death once again. The only difference between the two now was that Purna had forgotten about being a protector and the timeline unraveling, leaving just Leo to fix it.

Oliver kept his distance that night until after dinner, when he finally spoke to Purna. She hadn’t been getting around by herself at George’s orders. Instead, she’d just been tagging along with the other residents who were going places that she wanted to go.

---

On the third day, Leo woke up to a knock at his door at about eight. He opened the door to find Purna on the other side, just as she had done on the original third day.

Instead of telling Leo that they were going to Oliver’s apartment, she stepped instead of Leo’s apartment with her hands folded politely in front of her. “I don’t want to assist in your little investigation anymore, this is becoming too complicated for me.”

“What do you mean it's too complicated?” Leo crossed his arms. “Are you talking about drowning yesterday?”

“No, I’m talking about you and Oliver.” Purna’s face stayed straight as she sighed. “I’m having conflicting feelings about the both of you and what I didn’t sign up for was to be in the middle of some sort of twisted game of tug-of-war, so I’m resigning from it.”

Before Leo could respond, Purna turned on her heel and left the room in a hurry. He got changed and went to Oliver’s room, hoping that he would have some answers for Purna’s statement.

“What did you and Purna talk about last night?” Leo looked around Oliver’s apartment, seeing some things that looked out of place from what he remembered. “She said something weird to me and I just want to see if she said anything about it to you.”

Oliver seemed fine compared to his state the night before, he looked as if he was getting ready to leave his apartment and go about his daily routine. “She didn’t really say much to me. I tried to talk to her about why she was in the water but I guess it was bad timing because she completely froze up and got pretty upset when she tried to explain herself. The last thing I said to her was that she didn’t need to explain herself but she needed to be careful with what she was doing. She said thank you but she knew, goodnight and that was basically the entire conversation we had. What did she say to you?”

“She said she didn’t want to be a part of the investigation anymore because she was having conflicting feelings about you and I.”

Leo watched Oliver’s nose scrunch up. “What does that mean?”

“The initial impression I got is that she might have feelings for both of us, but after hearing about your conversation with her and the entire situation yesterday, it sounds like she may be bitter towards us.”

Oliver’s face immediately turned into a look of shame as he hesitated on responding to Leo. “No, I think your first impression was right. I didn’t tell you the full truth about our conversation but I’m honestly not comfortable doing that.”

Leo slowly nodded, letting out a frustrated sigh. “Then you need to fix it. Right now we need her, so you need to fix whatever you think you did.”

Oliver eventually agreed to attempt to patch things with Purna, leaving Leo unable to do anything productive on the third day.

He went fishing to make up for missing on the second day. It was after the sun had started to set that the air had gone cold and Leo felt that he had been being watched.

“I’m not sure how you’ve thought you would repair the timeline, but you’ve caused more damage than anything.” Leo turned to see the physical form of what he knew to be the spirit of the island. “Purna has no memory now, she’s physically incapable of assisting because now she’s horrified at the thought of death.” The spirit seemed to almost float closer to him, its focus being on the water. “Oliver’s priorities change with every act that you do to change the timeline and come tonight, you’ll see how you’ve really damaged this effort.”

“I thought I could make this repair easier by avoiding all the conflict that I started with Oliver. I got so caught up in trying to fix just that, that I forgot about how that disagreement affected people other than me and Oliver.”

Leo was surprised as the spirit shrugged, it seemed at ease for the first time. “You’re still human underneath it all, you’ll make plenty of mistakes through every timeline. You’ll find that on the third day of the original timeline, Purna and Oliver were fully onboard with everything going on, they were bouncing off of each other’s passion and you were mostly excited to be part of something important to someone that you cared about. You’ve spent more time in this timeline mending a relationship with Oliver that hasn’t even been broken that Melanie has no incentive to accept your help with her Jerry, nobody made the attempt to talk to Chaz and build that trust so he would give you the location to the gravesite.”

“I don’t need a paper, I already know where the gravesite is.”

The spirit shook its head. “Once you reach the first point in your investigation where you would have died had there not been an investigation, you are nothing more to the island than just another resident. You’re no longer a protector, you’re just regular old Leo again. Protector Leo has an immunity to mental manipulation, but regular old Leo doesn’t. It just makes it to where this is the new timeline.”

“And what about the things that have occurred because of this branch that the island didn’t want?”

“Some things can be accepted in order for the timeline to move forward.” The spirit rested its hands on the railing that they stood in front of. “We’ve spent years trying to stop Oliver and Purna from being together, we never really recognized that their partnership would neutralize them and you. In many timelines now, Oliver has become your closest friend and you his. Sometimes he was your only friend. He’s saved your life many times, you’ve saved him an equal amount and when you couldn’t save each other, the two of you simply died together.”

“That’s why Nathaniel stirred up that argument on the first day, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Despite the two of you being friends in the previous timeline, there was still that seed of doubt that had been planted in both of you.” The spirit paused for a moment. “In truth, your entire trio has always been a major concern in each timeline except for this one. Each of you possesses a very strong quality that when paired with the others, it’s very difficult to predict. You’re very crafty with your hands, Oliver can make an alliance out of any person, and Purna’s wit is enough to keep each of us on our toes.”

“Why are you telling me all of this?”

The spirit looked at Leo, for once showing an emotion that Leo recognized. Sadness. “Because you’ll die in just a few moments. Come the morning, you won’t remember a thing and I do feel sorrow for you. You tried to do right by your people and you’ve ended up in a bigger mess than you originally started in.”

“If I die, how will I wake up in the morning?”

“I will save you this once. Only because you could not predict or prevent this death yourself.”

Leo leaned over the railing, his hands cupped together in a ball as tears began to fall. “I brought this on myself, didn’t I? By defending Oliver and saving Purna, I killed myself, didn’t I?”

The spirit nodded, watching Leo cry. “Yes, but if knowledge eases your feelings, it will be an accident. Nobody is out to harm you.”

With one gust of wind, Leo’s hat blew off of his hat and into the water below. It remained floating as if to bait him into the water. He watched it for a moment, his tears still running down his cheeks. “The water is your greatest ally, isn’t it?”

“My greatest ally and your greatest enemy.” The spirit watched Leo climb on the railing.

Leo looked down to the spirit again, finding that it had vanished in just a matter of seconds. He stayed standing on the railing, allowing the wind to hit him for just a few seconds.

As he prepared to drop into the water himself, he got jerked back onto the pier’s floor by his jacket. The world around him was silent as Oliver stood above him, seeming very distressed himself. He spoke to Leo, who was unable to hear his words. As his hearing returned, he took a few seconds to focus on what Oliver was saying. “Whatever you were talking to, whatever you were hearing, there was nothing there. You were talking to yourself, Leo.”

Oliver reached down and grabbed Leo’s arms, pulling him to his feet. “I was alone?”

“Yeah. You were alone, talking about a conflict between us, an argument that Nathaniel started on his first day, and about how you killed yourself. You need to start explaining.”

Leo looked down to see that Oliver hadn’t let go of his arms and that his panic hadn’t subsided, despite getting Leo back on the dock. “That wasn’t this reality, that was the last one. I was ready to sacrifice myself for a reality that stopped your suffering and Purna’s suffering.”

Oliver shook his head, his grip on Leo’s arms tightening. “What are you talking about, Leo? I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

Since they were essentially linked, Leo led Oliver to the bench and the two of them took a seat, Oliver finally letting go of Leo’s arms. “We’ve lived so many different realities, Oliver. All of the people we know, we’ve known them so many times in different forms. These past three days have been the same three days that we’ve lived over and over again, the three days that we’ll continue to live if we keep meddling with the island.”

“And you think that the way to fix it is to drown yourself?” After not getting an answer, Oliver stood and crossed his arms, seeming to think. “Have you ever been half asleep, Leo? In that odd state that you know you’re a person on this earth, but you don’t know which one, you don’t know where, and you don’t know why.”

Leo nodded. “I think I know what you’re talking about. Why are you talking about that?”

“If what you’re saying about alternate realities is true, that our timeline is shifting every single night. Wouldn’t that feeling be our consciousness shifting through the timelines?”

Leo froze, staring at Oliver as he shrugged. “That’s without a doubt the smartest thing you’ve said to me in the two timelines that I remember. Where did that idea just come from?”

“I’ve heard other residents talking about the same feeling that occurs at the same time every single night, it’s asynchronous for every resident in that building. What I’ve been hearing about this past timeline is now nonexistent, there’s obviously not forty kids running around the building, Nolan and Nathaniel seem to be very average people.” He uncrossed his arms and put his hands on his hips. “That would indicate that in the past three days, there was a reset somewhere.”

“There were multiple and I can tell you exactly where they were.” Leo got to his feet, starting a walk back to the building along with Oliver. “The conflict between us was supposed to be sparked by Nathaniel on the first day, it was meant to set us back and in a way, it saved Purna’s life on the second day. She was going to drown and you were supposed to find her, you were so uncomfortable around Nathaniel and me in the last timeline that you just didn’t show up and she stayed alive in the water for hours. The second reset happened when she actually died in the current timeline. I don’t know the full extent of what that’s done, but so far it’s only isolated her further from attempting an investigation.”

Leo stopped walking when he heard Oliver’s footsteps stop, looking back to see that he had frozen in place about ten paces back. “I just remembered something that might be an advantage to us but to get it, I would have to dig. Someone else needs to disturb the island first, someone else just needs to break a hole around the gravesite, they don’t even need to fully commit to digging up Brianne.”

Oliver quickly turned on his heel and started his own walk towards the jungle’s treeline, his direction making it very clear to Leo that he wasn’t intending to be the one to disturb the island once again.

Leo entered the apartment building just a few minutes after dinner had started, taking his same seat at the third table. He scanned over the people in the dining room, finding just one thing to be odd to him.

After Oliver and Purna had forgotten about the previous timeline, Leo noticed that all but two of the children, as well as Emily, had disappeared from the building. He realized that likely because of how far back the timeline had gone, Gavin remained with his parents. His only notice of Flora still being aware of the unraveling was her still holding onto Talia, rather than Talia disappearing alongside the rest of the children.

There was just one person who Leo truly had no clue as to how they remained on the island after the unraveling began. That one person was the one person that as Leo scanned the room, he made eye contact with every single time he looked in their direction, which made Leo feel that something was going on that even he had no idea about.

The last thing Leo noticed was that Purna had never showed up to dinner, which he didn’t expect her to after her declaration that morning and her conversation with Oliver the night before. He knew she was going to fall back to how she had been before the investigation even started, which was actively ignoring Oliver and saying a maximum of two words a week to Leo.

As the tables began to clear, Leo made one last scan of the dining room and found the same pair of eyes still staring him down. It was only after most of the third floor residents left the table that they finally got up from their own table and took a seat next to Leo at the third table. The air was immediately filled with hostility as Leo moved his plate to the side. “Frank, how are you?”

“Concerned, very concerned.” The way Frank spoke almost made Leo feel like he was part of an interrogation. “Tonight something was brought to my attention and I want to have a conversation about it before something gets out of hand. What do you think I’m talking about?”

“Well, that depends on when it was told to you. I’ve been very active lately.” Leo spoke quietly and continued to look around the remaining residents in the dining room. “I would like to skip the guessing game since we’re both pretty busy people, if that’s okay with you.”

“Fine by me.” Frank refused to break eye contact as he spoke with Leo. “One of the younger residents heard you talking with Oliver tonight and has raised some concerns with me about your safety, as well as his. The resident told me that they saw you standing on the railing of the dock, talking to yourself and when you got down, you spoke with Oliver a significant amount in regards to death and an alleged timeline breaking, or whatever you want to call it.”

Leo sighed, rolling his eyes. “Alright, that conversation happened less than an hour ago, I have no idea how they reported it to you that quickly when I was here the entire time so first, that’s impressive. Second, I want to know who reported it. Nothing happened to me, obviously, and Oliver’s completely fine as well so there’s truthfully no reason to stress about it. We were spitballing ideas off of each other.”

“I won’t be telling you who reported this because I agreed to not do that, but I also have determined that their identity does need to be protected just because of how terrified this kid was when they came up to me about this conversation. Do you know where Oliver is right now?”

“No, I do not. I told him I was going to come back here for dinner and he said he was going to go for a walk before it got too dark.”

Frank didn’t seem to buy what Leo had said, his demeanor hadn’t changed from what it originally started out as. “I think you’re lying to me because the person who reported this said that you guys came about halfway back to the building, he said he needed to go find something and left. They said you two mentioned something about digging a hole and that earlier in your conversation you two had discussed something relating to Purna Perez not wanting to be involved with you two. My primary concern is that to me, it sounds like you two might be attempting to cause harm to her and nobody has seen her all day, so I need you to tell me right now if there’s any plan to harm another resident.”

Leo’s jaw dropped for a moment before he regained his composure and focused solely on Frank. “No, there’s no plan to hurt anyone but I can see how you came to that conclusion. I’m sure Purna is in her apartment because she’s had a tough few days recently. I’d be more than happy to go with you to check up on her if that’s what you want.”

Frank nodded, stepping out of his seat and waiting for Leo to do the same. “Let’s go do that.” As Frank moved past Leo, Leo noticed that Frank had a handgun tucked away under his jacket, which Leo could have sworn that he didn’t have before.

Leo got up and the two men went to the elevator, going up to the third floor in a silence built by tension that was so thick that it could be cut with a knife.

When reaching the third floor, Leo stepped off the elevator first and waited to follow Frank to Purna’s door. Frank knocked on the door, waiting for about a minute before he knocked again. It was after the second knock that Purna answered the door, seeming just a bit uncomfortable to have people at her door. “Can I help you? Do you understand how late it is?”

Frank looked at his watch, briefly bending his wrist to show Purna the time. “It’s not even ten. Regardless, this was just a welfare check because you missed dinner and a few residents raised some concerns since they hadn’t seen you all day, so I apologize for disturbing you.”

Purna closed the door without another word, leaving Frank and Leo standing next to each other. Leo motioned towards his own door. “I told you the truth, you verified that she’s okay and I still have no idea where Oliver is, so can I go to my apartment for the night?”

Frank seemed to hesitate before nodding. “That’s fine but until I get to talk to Oliver myself, you are to have no contact with him.”

---

Oliver returned during breakfast the next morning, mostly keeping to himself until after he had spoken to Frank.

It was the fifth day, which Leo knew was the day that Oliver had disturbed the island. He knew that Oliver mentioned the night before that he needed to dig for his task, but he acted completely different from the spirit’s possession in the previous timeline.

They didn’t get the chance to talk with each other until the early afternoon when Leo was fishing. Oliver joined him at the end of the dock, his aura being just a bit off. “There was something that neither of us realized when the spirit spoke to you last night.”

“What’s that?”

“The spirit only roams the island physically if someone has already disturbed the island. Someone disturbed the island yesterday before we even talked about it. Obviously nobody is showing any signs and regardless of who you ask, everyone was accounted for yesterday by each other.”

Because of how many people were on the dock today, Leo tried to keep from reacting. “I was the only one who saw the spirit, you were there and you didn’t see it. Frank didn’t mention anything about whoever reported us last night seeing a third person.”

Oliver immediately looked confused. “Then we were told different things. I didn’t see the spirit, but Frank did mention that there was someone on the dock with you before I showed up that disappeared when I got here.”

“He didn’t say anything about that to me, but the person who disturbed the island would be the only person without a gift to see the spirit this early on.” Leo kept his focus on the water. “You’ll need to figure out who reported it. There’s no way Frank will tell me and I’m assuming it’s because he suspects me of some sort of wrongdoing. Because it’s a safety concern within the apartment building, he probably told Nathaniel as well.”

“Which one do you recommend I go to?” Oliver now seemed uncomfortable as he crossed his arms. “Frank takes his job pretty seriously and I'm assuming that Nathaniel will act the same as the property manager.”

Leo thought for a moment, knowing that Oliver had a point but he likely wasn’t a suspect of any wrongdoing since Frank had already given him more information than he had given Leo. “Flora remembers the past timeline, I’m sure it’s only because she’s been flying under the radar since the unraveling started.”

“Flora makes more sense than me because she’s already super involved with the younger residents.”

“But if she’s only getting around by not making herself known, she’s bringing attention to herself by asking questions. I’m certain the first question Frank will ask her is how she knew someone reported anything, she has no chance to even lie because she doesn’t know who reported it.” Leo shrugged. “You both are going to have your own trials, it’s just a matter of how they’re handled.”

Oliver sighed and uncrossed his arms. “Just tell me what you would suggest. If it’s me, I need to know so I can get it done already and if it’s Flora, I need to be able to catch her alone and after four, that’s not a possibility.”

[Recommend Oliver talks to Frank]
[Recommend Oliver talks to Nathaniel]
[Recommend Flora talks to Frank]
[Recommend Flora talks to Nathaniel]

Erin and Ashley had searched for Emily and Nolan for sixteen years, they’d both lost friends, jobs, nights of sleep over the children and in Erin’s case, she’d even lost her husband. Ashley and Emily’s dad never stayed together in the first place so it was a loss that she couldn’t empathize with.

After the captains had left, Erin and Ashley stayed at Erin’s table, the both of them still in surprise from what the captains had said about their children. “Massachusetts.” Erin laid her hands flat on the table,staring forward at the picture of her son on the wall. “We need to go to Massachusetts, we aren’t going to get any answers just sitting here.”

“It’s… it’s um…” Ashley seemed very anxious as she tried to speak. “It’s concerning that they said Massachusetts because I’ve read a lot of stories about people just vanishing from planes, boats, whatever they may have been. It’s normally from Massachusetts and the last time I can remember seeing the kids, it was the layover in Massachusetts.”

“From Massachusetts to the Dominican Republic, that’s all I remember too. I don’t even remember the plane ride to the Dominican, I just remember landing.” Erin pulled out her phone and started looking up flights, having already made up her mind about going to Massachusetts. “I’m going with or without you, but if you choose not to go then I need the names of the people from the stories you’re talking about.”

---

Ashley ended up going with Erin to Massachusetts, the two of them immediately taking to searching for the relatives of the people that Ashley had heard of from the online threads she had read.

Their search took them to a large brick house in the middle of Cambridge. They knocked on the door and rang the doorbell for about fifteen minutes, refusing to leave until they had spoken to someone inside.After the fifteen minutes, an older man opened the door and looked at them with cautious eyes. “Can I help you?”

“Yes, we’re looking for Cynthia and Raymond Barker, do you know where we could find them?” Erin watched as the older man looked to his left and opened the door a little bit more to reveal a woman in a wheelchair who looked to be around the same age. “Is this Cynthia?” The man nodded, Erin and Cynthia staring at each other through the open door. “Cynthia, my name is Erin Macon. I’m here to talk to you about your son and your daughter, do you have time?”

The man immediately perked up when Erin mentioned why she was there. “Have you found them? What about my daughter? Is she with them?”

Cynthia held up her hand for a moment to grab the attention of the man. “They can come in and we can talk in private.” She wheeled herself back to allow room for everyone to enter the house, taking herself to the living room of the house. “I’m sorry to burst your bubble, but Raymond won’t be joining us. He’s never been good about talking about what happened and he’s not in the best place today to try.” Erin and Ashley sat on the sofa across from Cynthia while the man who opened the door sat in a recliner next to Cynthia. “This is Jermaine, he’s the father of our son’s fiance.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet both of you and thank you for agreeing to speak with us.” Erin had her hands resting in her lap. “I’d like to hear the story of your children’s disappearance.”

“That’s what they all want, but I truthfully don’t have much information to give. Where have you come from and why?”

Ashley could tell that Erin was put off by Cynthia’s general shortness. “Delaware, we’re from Delaware and we came here today because I read some posts from you online about your children. Our children went missing in almost the exact same fashion and we want to share some information that was relayed to us from some Navy captains.”

Cynthia didn’t react, she looked around the room and slowly nodded. “Olivia disappeared first. She and her husband were leaving the country because Olivia had made some very rash decisions that were leading to Oliver’s fiance getting deported. The last person she talked to was Oliver’s fiance over the phone and even then, Purna didn’t say where Olivia was going. She said she had an idea but out of respect for Olivia, she wasn’t going to tell anyone.” Cynthia tapped the arm of her wheelchair. “Purna had this idea sometime later to go take Oliver to visit Olivia and so they got on a plane for Puerto Rico, that was the last time they’d been seen or heard from. What’s this information that you have?”

“Our children were seen. After sixteen years of being missing, our children were spotted by a federal officer.”

Cynthia furrowed her brows, her lips pursing. “Sixteen years and your children were able to be positively identified based on what?”

Erin thought back to the conversation with the captains, quickly realizing what Cynthia was about to say. “Based on their appearance.”

“You mean artificial aging?” Cynthia studied the two mothers ahead of her, not looking to believe what they were saying.

“No, they positively identified our children by a picture we took of them the day that they went missing and compared it to what they had received from the federal officer.”

Jermaine’s arms crossed as he leaned back. “It sounds to me like they didn’t show you a picture. Did they tell you a specific location?”

“They didn’t, no.” Erin suddenly felt defeated, realizing that neither Cynthia or Jermaine would believe them. She got to her feet, motioning for Ashley to do the same. “We should go, but thank you for talking to us about your children.”

As Ashley stood and the two women turned, they saw a man about Cynthia’s age standing in the doorway. “You both know that there’s truth to what these ladies are saying. You should remember how tight-lipped they were when they thought they had a lead on Olivia. Demanding that we couldn’t even tell our own son because they didn’t want to risk bigger secrets getting out.” The man moved out of Ashley and Erin’s way, shaking his head in dismay as he did. “They’re filthy people, the ones who say they’re trying to help our children and the only advice I can offer the two of you is that you’re careful with who you trust.”

---

“I think it’s better that Flora talks to Frank. She’s mostly responsible for the younger people and so it makes for her to question things, she’ll just need to phrase it without making him aware that she already knows about an issue and you’ll have to avoid being seen with her.” Leo went over the situation with Oliver, making his expectations clear to him and continually telling himself that he was going to have to trust how Oliver handled it from here on out.

Oliver went back to the apartment building, very briefly passing by someone as he went in and they went out. “Oliver, do you have a minute?”

“No, I’m busy, sorry.” He stopped in his place as he tried to register whose voice he had heard. He briefly turned to see Purna standing opposite of him. “Where are you going? I’ll find you when I’m free.”

Her face immediately changed as he said no, she seemed suspicious of him. “The shops.”

He nodded, still holding the door ahead of him open. “I’ll be there in like an hour then, I won’t forget.”

She turned and walked away, still seeming suspicious of him.

Oliver went straight to the stairs, heading to the tenth floor with a sense of dread building now knowing he was now going to attempt to explain himself later on to keep Purna quiet and avoid the rest of the residents for as long as he could.

Arriving at the tenth floor, he opened the door to the stairwell and stood in place, listening for any movement out in the hall. He waited until he heard the elevator door shut, hoping that it was someone going downstairs instead of just coming upstairs.

He went to Flora and Junior’s apartment, knocking on the door and anxiously waiting for Flora to answer. She answered after a minute, holding the door open and allowing Oliver into the apartment. He looked around for a second before focusing on her. “Is Junior home?”

“No, what’s wrong? Are you okay?” Flora studied him, letting Talia out of her arms and onto the floor. “You’re sweating something awful.”

“I’m just a bit nervous, that’s all.” Oliver reached down and picked up Talia, who had gone to him once she hit the ground. “We need a favor from you. Someone had disturbed the island, Frank knows who but we don’t and because of some things that were overheard, he’s not going to tell us.”

“I’ll need more information before I can agree to doing anything.”

The next thirty minutes, Oliver spent catching Flora up on what happened over the course of the past few days and the situation with Frank. “All we need for you to do is figure out who said something about Leo and the spirit on the dock, then we know who disturbed the island and who we need to talk to next.”

Flora nodded, crossing her arms. “I’ll do it. All I have to do is say the kids are making up rumors, rather concerning ones and if there’s any foundation to them then I need to know.”

“That’s perfect, I knew you’d have it handled.” Oliver held onto Talia for just a few more minutes, a sigh escaping him as he set her down. “I have to leave, I ran into someone on the way up here and for your luck, it’s best that that information stays between me and that person.”

Flora reached down to grab Talia’s hand, knowing there was going to be an issue the second Oliver made a move for the door. “You do what you need to do, I’ll do what I need to do.”

The second he left, Talia threw herself to the floor and stared at the ceiling, her face progressively growing red as she worked on a fit.

Flora kneeled next to her, knowing that she also had to leave soon to talk to Frank without Junior finding out what she was doing. She brushed her hands through the young girl’s hair, allowing her to sit in the silence for around ten minutes before she tried encouraging the girl to get off the ground. “We need to do something today, are you ready to go or do you think you need more time?”

Talia’s eyes flickered to look at Flora before she raised her arms into the air as a way of asking for help off of the ground. Flora helped her to stand and got to her feet after the girl, brushing off her pants.

She held out her hand for Talia and allowed her to take it, leading her out of the apartment. The search for Frank started at his apartment, which turned out to be empty. The next best guess she had for his whereabouts would be the dining hall or the main office, which would mean he was with Nathaniel.

The two got on the elevator and exited on the main floor, Flora poking her head into the main office to see that Frank was there with Nathaniel, just as she’d thought. She knocked on the door but remained in the doorway, waiting for their attention. “I need to borrow Frank.”

Frank nodded and got out of his seat, leaving the office with Flora. They stopped in the main lobby, which was empty at the time. “What can I help you with?”

“I’ve heard a very unsettling piece of talk from multiple children and for their safety, I would like to know if it’s true.” Flora crossed her arms, intentionally trying to seem uncomfortable with the conversation.

Frank shook his head with a slight shrug. “I’m afraid I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

“Leo Elliot and a strange lady standing on the dock, Leo talking about drowning himself and this random woman encouraging him to jump off. An awful lot of talk about digging holes, hurting other people.” Flora knew her tone had changed to confrontational, she’d hoped that that would help her gain some ground in the conversation. “These children are afraid, most of them have no parents to look after them and so that’s why I’m here. If someone poses a threat to their safety then I need to know what exactly happened or who I need to talk to so I can figure it out for myself.”

Frank’s hands went to his hips, Flora recognizing that this move was intentional on his part and that it was very likely that they’d be arguing through body language. “What is it that you want from me? It sounds like you want two different things right now.”

Flora uncrossed her arms, her fists slightly clenching. “I want to know who the source is so I can confirm or deny it myself because you don’t know these children like I do. Some are far less truthful than others for various reasons.”

“Your source is Leo Elliot, he was the one on the dock so if you have any questions about what happened on the dock then you should go to him. Regardless of who said it, I believe that there is truth to what I’ve been told and it’s in my hands now, it’s best if you-”

Flora cut him off, feeling her face turning red as she had actually gotten herself worked up. “And what are you doing about it?” Flora motioned back to the main office with her hands. “From the looks of it, absolutely nothing. What is Nathaniel doing about it? Not a damn thing. It’s time for you to let me take care of my kids so either tell me which one said it or I’ll go and question each of them individually, do you know how much panic that’s going to cause?” Frank held his hands up to try and stop her. “No, you cannot talk yet. If Leo Elliot is a safety concern then explain to me why he’s still out and about? You can speak if you’re going to answer my questions.”

Frank lowered his hands and took a deep breath. “Alright, you need to talk to Amos for the answers you want, he said he and Kelly had seen two different things and that’s where I’m conflicted. I’ve already spoken to both of them, Leo, and the other adult that Amos and Kelly named, I have four different stories on my hands and I’m committing to investigating all four of those stories. Where I stand right now, Leo poses no actual risk to anyone’s safety besides his own.”

“Thank you, that’s all I needed to know.” Flora turned around and picked Talia up from the ground, going back to the elevator to write down what she’d been told. She knew if she left the information under Leo or Oliver’s mats, Frank and Nathaniel would just catch her on camera so she would have to find a way to get the paper to them during dinner.

---

Oliver had gone to the shops, just as he told Purna he would do and quickly found her off on her own. He waited for a moment to recall who all he could see at the shops and who he saw on his way to the shops so he could pick a name at random. He went to her and could tell she still was a bit upset. “I’m sorry I couldn’t stop earlier, I completely forgot that I had told Robyn that I would help her with something like a week ago, never did it and she got a little upset about it, rightfully so.”

Claiming Robyn was a risky move as Robyn had a tendency to lurk around without being spotted by some people while making her presence known to other people. Purna nodded along, seeming to believe the claim. “She probably felt bad bothering you about it again any sooner since you’re already all over the island.”

“You’re probably right, but it’s no big deal. I just feel bad that I wasted a week of her time waiting for me to help her and I had no clue about it.” Oliver knew that he had to be very careful constructing a lie around Purna and that with more details, she would be able to catch on, even if his details remained consistent. She had always told him that he had a tell, she just never told him what it was.

“Maybe you should start keeping a log so you can look at it every day and know what you need to do for the day.” Purna shrugged, her posture seeming to lighten up. “That’s what I do. It doesn’t help much if you have nothing to do, but it also helps keep your affairs in order. Say like, I don’t know, if I were Robyn and today I just so happened to have garden management on my schedule but I’d been waiting for an entire week to get help with something in my apartment, I would definitely make it a point to be in my apartment when that person came to help me.”

Oliver chuckled, trying to mask his discomfort. “A building full of people and Robyn’s the only example you can come up with?” He knew exactly what she was doing. It was something he’d seen her do in court, something he’d seen her do in her day-to-day interactions before the island. She was laying out a way to invalidate his alibi because she wasn’t satisfied with the lack of detail he’d given. She was going to base her next interaction based on his reaction.

Purna gave a light smile. “We were just talking about her so to dig up another person and situation just for an example, that’s not worth the mental hoops.”

“That makes sense.” Oliver waited until she turned away before he took a deep breath, knowing for certain now that he’d gotten away with the lie. “What was it that you needed me for?”

She turned back to face him and reached into her pocket, pulling out four folded up pictures and handing them to Oliver. “I want to know what the deal is with these pictures.”

Oliver unfolded the pictures, a ring that he could positively identify as her engagement ring falling into the palm of his hand. He shook his head and sighed as he looked at the four pictures. “I can tell you today, I can tell you tomorrow, and I could tell you every single day for the rest of our lives but you won’t remember and for the moment, it’s best for you if you don’t remember.” He put the ring back in between the pictures and folded them over again, handing them back to Purna with a forced smile. “I’m sorry, but I can’t be the one to help you with this.”

---

During dinner, Leo and Oliver sat and watched the other residents, still unaware of who had disturbed the island. They were watching for the signs that Oliver had displayed, which was difficult for him as he had no recollection of what those signs were.

Halfway through the meal, Denver came up behind Leo’s seat, leaning down slightly. “Gita and Lauren were at the beach this morning and ran into something of yours. They tried dropping by your apartment but you weren’t home so I told them we’d just wash it and return it to you at dinner.”

Leo briefly looked over, seeing Denver held his hat in his hands. He gave a nod and smile, taking the hat from him. “Thank you, I appreciate it.”

Denver patted Leo’s back and stood up. “No problem, we tried to make sure there was no sand left and there’s no sea critters in there, so you’re good to wear it whenever.”

It was once Denver left that Leo realized that there were two pieces of paper sitting at the bottom of the hat. He grabbed the papers and slipped them into his pocket, putting the hat on and continuing his meal.

While the residents were cleaning up, Flora approached Leo’s spot, taking an empty plate nearby him and whispering as she got close enough. “Pay very close attention to which note is for you and which note is for Oliver, it would be horribly awkward for everyone involved if you ended up with his note.”

Leo reached into his pocket as Flora walked away, briefly reading the names at the top of each paper. He put his note in his pocket and got up, grabbing his plate and walking to stand behind Oliver. He very briefly picked up Oliver’s plate while he was talking to Nolan, slipping the note under the plate. “Oh, my bad, I thought you were done. You spend all that time running your mouth and you still have a full plate.”
Oliver snickered as Leo walked away, not even realizing the note was under his plate until Nolan had left and he was the only one remaining at the third table, prompting him to finish his meal and clean up.

He went back to his apartment after he cleaned up and went to read the note, finding two warnings from Flora.

’Oliver,

I can say with confidence that the one who disturbed the island yesterday was Amos. What’s going to make Leo’s situation more difficult is that Kelly was with him. I don’t know what they were getting up to, but given that Kelly is involved and comparing it to the previous timeline, it has something to do with her parents.

To help with her, I’m going to tell you something that will get her to ease up her investigation and allow Leo to handle Amos. This information is something that Robert, Nolan, and I have sworn to keep secret, nobody knows this but the three of us and I am trusting your judgment on when you tell Kelly. In fairness, I’m not sure that the other two remember but if you would like to try to confirm it before telling Kelly, I think it’s a wise decision.

When Mindy, Tracey, and Rosey first arrived on the island, Rosey had gotten into an argument with one of the longtime residents, Annabella. I don’t remember what the argument was about, but I remember it happened one night on the roof when there was a storm passing through. Mindy, Tad, and Rosey all said that during this argument, they thought they saw something in Annabella’s hand and Mindy reacted on impulse. She stabbed Annabella, killed her on the roof and immediately told George what had happened, begging him to try and save Annabella.

Annabella was a new mother, she’d just given birth to Kelly about two months prior and to this day, the three of us who know can’t come up with a single reason as to why she and that specific group were on the roof. Boris was her husband, Kelly’s father, and even with all three of us pushing, we can’t get him to remember her.

Nolan and Robert always said that the next day, there was no mourning for Annabella. Nobody remembered her and more importantly, nobody remembered Kelly’s relation to her. Kelly and Boris never had any idea of being related to each other as Kelly really grew into Annabella’s features and personality.

I didn’t put any of this in Leo’s note because it doesn’t relate to him, what I’m putting for you is specific for you. As I was writing Leo’s note today, Purna came over with the four pictures and the ring. You need to tell her about the relationship you two had and you need to find a way to make it work. Not for you, not for her, but for Talia.

Purna doesn’t remember Talia, but Talia remembers her and she remembers you. Everyday is getting so much harder for that little girl to see both of her parents and only ever get to interact with you for maybe ten minutes and interact with her mother as a stranger.

A change needs to be made that is going to benefit Talia, even if it is just you in her life. She needs someone and we all know that Junior and I aren’t the people we need her to be. I’m afraid of how this is impacting her development and so I truly need you to think on how to help your daughter.

It is possible to help her, Leo, Purna, and yourself.’

Oliver read the note again, folding it over and then looking at the wall in front of him.

He went to his dresser, opening the very bottom drawer. He put the note under some clothes and felt around, grabbing a picture that he had taken from the shoebox prior to the reset that had remained untouched and unknown to anyone but him.

Going to the next apartment, he waited outside after knocking until Purna opened the door. He showed her the picture in his hand, which she could tell was different from the four that she had shown him earlier in the day. “I’m ready to tell you about the pictures and the ring if you’re ready to listen.”

She nodded, opening the door to let him into her apartment. They took a seat on the couch, Purna holding the picture he had given him in her hands. “Why did you change your mind from what you said earlier?”

“I can explain it all in one go.” Oliver let his hands rest in his lap. “You know Talia, the child that Flora and Junior are watching, right?” Purna nodded. “That’s our child. You and I were engaged before the island, we lived together for a while and we were dating before that. We were going to Puerto Rico to find my sister and we ended up here. You were already pregnant with Talia, you had her here and the both of us didn’t remember a single thing for years. I know you already know about the multiple timelines, that’s being done to manipulate the people on the island and the relationships between them to create some sort of perfect vision.”

She seemed unphased by what he was saying, nodding along and looking along the pictures that she had now laid out on the coffee table ahead of the couch. “That makes sense, but why would you allow our child to stay with other people instead of just choosing to explain the situation to me?”

“It’s like I told you earlier, this is something I will have to tell you every day for the rest of our lives, it’s something that the island doesn’t want to stick. I left Talia with Flora to protect her, there’s something different about Talia and until we can figure out what it is, I thought it was best that she wasn’t directly in danger by staying with me. I was wrong, I’ll admit that and to atone for it, I’m taking her back and letting Leo take a majority of control over what the island has going on.”

“Where are you on days in comparison to the previous timeline?” Purna stopped looking at the pictures, her entire demeanor changing as she looked to come to a sudden realization. “When was the first chance Leo had to die in the last timeline?”

Oliver briefly thought back as far as he could, only barely recognizing what Purna was saying. “Tonight, the roof. What time is it?” Oliver looked at the clock, a sudden sense of concern washing over him as he saw he only had three minutes to get to the roof before the incident.

---

Leo couldn’t forget the day, he knew from the moment he woke up that he would no longer be a protector when he went to bed that night. He didn’t remind Oliver, hoping that he would keep his distance from the situation. He had his own plan for if he was going about it alone and a separate plan for if Oliver showed up.

He was watching the clock after reading Flora’s note, knowing that he could only guess who was going to be on the roof. Knowing that Amos had disturbed the island, he knew for certain that Amos would be taking Oliver’s former position alongside Nathaniel and the spirit. He believed that Kelly would take Purna’s position, but he had no idea who would take his own position.

The common conclusion is that of Purna and Leo that night on the roof, Purna was the one that the spirit wanted alive, there was no regard for Leo’s life and it was something that they both, along with Oliver, recognized in the former timeline.

With ten minutes left before things were supposed to kick off, Leo went to the tenth floor in an attempt to hide the situation from the others who ended up getting involved in the original timeline. He stayed hidden behind the stairwell door until the last minute.

It was once he knew Oliver and Purna had gone past the tenth floor’s door that he grabbed the fire extinguisher from the tenth floor and went back into the stairwell, going to the roof’s door, which they all remembered being locked. He looked between the two of them. “Purna, you need to get whoever’s on the ledge closer to Oliver. Oliver, you need to get them off the ledge but hold on to Kelly specifically, if Frank is there, stop there. I’ll do the best I can to distract the guardians.”

The three of them knew their roles and as soon as Leo busted the door handle off with the fire extinguisher, they rushed to get into place. Leo stayed closer to the guardians while Purna and Oliver made their way towards the ledge.

The spirit’s focus diverted to Leo, a look of disappointment on its face. “I should have known you would remember today, but why do you want it to play out differently? It would relieve you of so many responsibilities that you cannot fulfill on your own.”

“I don’t care about that, I care about the kids that are about to drop to their deaths right now.”

The spirit immediately redirected to Oliver as he had gotten too close to Kelly. “You seem to remember enough. I already know what you dug up and I know your plan but I do want you to ask yourself if it’ll be worth it to destroy your own reputation again.”

“That is inevitable, come the end of tomorrow I’ll be a danger for a completely separate reason. You and I both know that that’s a decision you’ve made to divert attention from Nathaniel and Brianne. Speaking of Brianne, she doesn’t get to come back this time, does she?” Oliver looked at Nathaniel, giving a shrug. “I guess you’re stuck trusting your bidding with Nathaniel. Everyone on this roof knows that Amos isn’t capable of what I did.”

Leo noticed a look of momentary shock on the spirit’s face before it finally focused on Purna. “And you, you just chose to step away from the activities of those two, you decided that you could not trust them. Why did that change? Because Oliver told you something that you have no proof of? You’re willing to bend your values and simply trust what he has told you?”

Leo saw Oliver taking the opportunity to reach out to Ronnie, pulling him off of the ledge and leaning down to him, whispering and pointing before the boy took off running towards the door of the roof.

Purna never responded to the spirit, as she’d very likely began questioning her actions herself, leading Leo to intervene. “She’s here because she knows what’s right and what’s wrong. She’s here to protect her people, that’s completely separate from her trusting anyone and it’s not got a thing to do with her relationship with Oliver.”

“But does it not have something to do with their child?” The spirit turned back with folded hands. “If these two walk away right now, I am willing to forgive them, allow them to be together and with their daughter. They will not have an issue with me again, but I have nothing to offer you at this point.”

Leo saw Purna’s eyes shoot up to try and meet Oliver’s, who stayed looking at the ledge. He’d already made his decision and he wasn’t going to go back on it. He let out a sigh, now looking at his hands. “We all know that Kelly is the real target tonight, we know that regardless of what arrangements we make with the spirit, we can’t trust it to go forward with them. Tonight has nothing to do with us, tonight is about getting rid of the person who holds the most knowledge of the island. It would have been the three of us again if we knew nothing about the timelines, we need to use the knowledge we have to our advantage for as long as we can.”

“This changes the timeline once again.” The spirit stayed in place, looking to believe it had the upper hand. “Your plan changes the timeline in such a severe way that it will prevent everything after tonight. That includes Emily, Nolan’s discovery of his gift, the children. Is that something you want to take away from the people of the island?”

Oliver slowly nodded. “Yes, it is, because those are the very same people that we’re doing this for anyways. This island goes in circles, nothing is permanent and somewhere down the line, the same discovery will be made, the same children will be reunited with their parents, and Emily will still be with them. I think we should stop wasting time, right?” He looked up at Kelly, his right hand hovering over his lower back. “I want you to know that I’m sorry, Kelly. I can explain this to you later, but it’s a necessity right now.”

Leo, Purna, and Oliver continued to look at the spirit, hoping that at some point it was just going to disappear and the night would be over, but deep down they all knew it was wishful thinking. Oliver sighed, finally using his left hand to grab Kelly and pull her down while using his right hand to grab what he’d gone to dig for the night before, which turned out to be an older gun.

The very second Amos and Nathaniel saw Kelly less than two feet from the gun, it was as if their trances had been broken. The absent looks in their eyes turned into fear and concern as Amos raised his hands. “Oliver, what are you doing?!”

Nathaniel looked panicked as he looked between Oliver and the spirit. “This has gone too far, it needs to stop now!”

The spirit crossed its arms and closed its eyes, nodding to itself. “As this night plays out in every timeline, someone chooses to sacrifice themselves in some form or fashion and apologizes. The apology burns into the witnesses, the victim, the guilty and forgiveness is near impossible. Nobody will judge the guilty harsher than themself.” The spirit opened its eyes, focusing on only Oliver. “I did try to warn you about this decision, I did try to offer you a way out. You chose to make yourself the most untrustworthy being on this island. Now your information regarding her is useless, how is she to trust a word you say when you have threatened her life? She is the most innocent in this situation and you chose to target her.”

“Kelly.” Purna spoke up from behind Amos, prompting the boy to put his hands down. “You can’t trust a word that that thing is saying. Last time, it was Leo and I on that ledge. I pushed Leo, I knew he was going to die and when we ended up stuck together, I lied about it. I knew nobody could catch him and I knew nobody could catch me when I jumped. I was the apologist last time.”

Kelly looked at Leo, who seemed stunned at what Purna had said. He felt his chest tightening as he tried to think of how to respond to her. “You were trying to kill me?”

She nodded, a look of shame on her face. “In every timeline, tonight is the night that one resident murders another, it can only be stopped by the presence of the opposition. You. Tonight is intended to spark fear in the community that creates a sense of distrust among all residents that allows the spirit to change relationships, personalities, ages, whatever it wants on a whim.”

“How do you know that?” Oliver questioned her, putting the gun away now that he was confident Kelly was going to be safe from the guardians and the spirit. “That’s something I didn’t even know until I fought with Brianne for the last time.”

“There was always a reason that it was her.” The spirit looked bored as it spoke. “Ms. Perez was brought here on account of her education, that and it was very common knowledge that if she had returned to the states without Mr. Barker, she would be wasted potential. In every timeline, she ends up knowing far more than she ever should have and has to be subdued and somehow, she comes back knowing more every single time. It has only been the past four or five timelines that she’s started playing mind games with the other residents in a way to get them fired up. She did it with you two this timeline, last timeline she did it to Kelly and Julio.”

While the spirit spoke, Amos’ face looked to drain of color as his breathing became unsettled. Kelly watched him, concern in her eyes. “What’s happening to him?”

Leo knew that Amos was losing strength. At this point in the previous timeline, he and Purna had already gone over the edge and the night was considered over. Back then, Oliver was completely overtaken by the spirit and using the spirit’s energy, which meant that Amos was likely doing the same and he was losing energy.

Leo looked over to Nathaniel, noticing his face had gone pale, but he looked scared. “Nathaniel, what are you thinking about?”

Nathaniel’s trance broke and he looked around, his fear only amplifying as he backed into Oliver. He turned around and met eyes with Oliver, whispering a few panicked words when he got close enough.

“Someone needs to tell me what’s going on with Amos!” Kelly straightened her posture, raising her voice to try and grab attention.

The spirit and Purna looked at Kelly before they realized that they were both looking at her. The spirit went to confront Kelly, only for Purna to put herself in between the two. The spirit stopped in its tracks, only looking in Purna’s eyes. “Are you sure that’s a wise idea?”

“Yep.” Purna nodded. “You’re weaker now more than ever. I can’t take you down, but Leo can. You make a move, he still has the ability to overtake you and I would gladly risk my life to see you lose to him after all you’ve done to him.”

Nathaniel continued to whisper to Oliver before Oliver nodded, patting Nathaniel’s back and whispering back to him. He sighed and stood up straight. “Hey, listen. We’ve all acted hastily, let’s back off of each other.” While he spoke to everyone, he kept his vision focused on Purna. “In the last timeline, we gained Frank but when the reset happened, he stayed. We’re owed a new arrival and until we know who that is, we need to back down.”

“Why would you say that in front of them?” Leo couldn’t help but speak out, fearing that Oliver was now trying to intentionally set them back.

“Because the spirit is weak. So weak that it’s going to need over a week to recover.” Oliver then motioned to Amos. “He has no idea what’s happening to himself, let alone his new goals. Nathaniel’s genuinely too scared to act while the spirit is resting. We have time, let’s take advantage of it.”

Purna caught the look of anger that flashed over the spirit’s face before it disappeared, leaving her in front of Kelly. She reached back, briefly touching Kelly’s arm to make sure she was still there. “Kelly, take Amos back to his room but stay away from him until we can tell you what’s happening.”

The group stayed silent until Kelly and Amos left, leaving the trio with Nathaniel on the roof. Leo looked at Oliver, who seemed beside himself. “What did he tell you?”

“Leo’s still gifted, but the new arrival is going to require either Purna or I to become gifted again in order to protect the other residents because someone’s going to lose control and become a danger to everyone else.” He looked at Purna, a frown on his face. “I know who it is, I know the alignment the next gifted person will receive, and I think it’s best if I do it.”

“How is it possible?” Leo questioned, a crack in his voice. “I thought there were only two alignments and two opportunities. Disturbing the island and tonight’s events.”

Nathaniel shook his head. “My family was the first family to inhabit the island, we believed in strength in numbers and so we were people protectors, our graveyard is sacred and undisturbed until this point. There’s unlimited opportunities and many alignments that you guys aren’t aware of, if you want to make progress on overtaking the spirit then you need to gather these alignments as alliances.”

“How will that work if we won’t be able to see Oliver anymore without causing a rift?” Purna’s voice had gone almost to a whisper as she avoided eye contact with the others on the roof.

“That’s not a trait of the specific alignment. In fact, he’ll be guaranteed to be around constantly. He’ll be a people protector, he’ll need to be around the people of the island in order to gain strength and awareness.”

“And how do we know where your family’s graveyard is?” Leo questioned again. “Will you take us there?” Nathaniel nodded, his fear almost completely gone now.

“My family’s graveyard actually isn’t far off from where Oliver dug up the gun, which I’ll make sure Kelly forgets about tonight as a means of improving your odds.” Nathaniel sounded eager to make changes to the timeline, but Leo had no idea why.

“Why are you so desperate to help in this timeline? Last timeline you basically held our hand and walked us into trouble, then gave up on us. Why should we trust you now?”

“Because it’s my family.” Nathaniel spoke with a small smile on his face. “In a way, I’ll be getting part of my family back. If I can’t be with them, then I at least would like to have someone here with me.”

Leo looked over the three, knowing that Oliver and Nathaniel had already made up their mind and that Purna probably wouldn’t change her mind without a push. The most he could do was bring a vote to a stand still, which Oliver would recognize and back down from.

While trusting Nathaniel was never one of the choices in his best interest, Leo trusted Oliver. That’s where the problem started and that’s where it would end. Leo looked at Purna and sighed. “What if Nathaniel is right? What if he’s right and we talk Oliver out of it? Then when the new arrival comes, Talia is in danger, just like everyone else in this building. You and I don’t know what we’re up against, but Oliver does. This isn’t about you and I trusting each other, this is about trusting him.”

Oliver nodded while Leo stayed focused on Purna, seeing her face shift as she thought. He knew now that he could change Purna’s mind.

[Talk Purna into changing her decision]
[Accept a tie, causing Oliver to change his decision]

You’re more than welcome to come up with whoever you’d like, whether that be a new arrival or someone connected to Nathaniel!

George could tell as the sun was going down that the two women wouldn’t be well enough to be moved that same day, which meant that the group would have to stay in place overnight. Anticipating that result, Abram and Olivia had gathered blankets and tents from the basement to put up.

Once George announced his decision, Norris started a fire nearby and Amos cut off pieces of the tarp to make an eye mask so George could block out the remaining sun and get some sleep before he traded shifts with Sierra.

It was dark before Abram and Olivia returned with the supplies and the carts, quickly passing each group member a can of food and a bottle of water. While the majority of the group ate, Abram, Olivia, and Oliver began setting up the four tents that they had brought.

After the first tent was completely up, George and Denver were woken up to move to rest in the tent.

As the group finished eating and the tents were completely up, they began to retire to the tents in their assigned pairs. Oliver was the last one out with the exception of Sierra and Purna, who had to be out as they were watching over the two new women.

He eventually convinced himself to go to bed once Sierra and Purna switched out with George and Denver for the night.

---

That night, visions filled Oliver’s head. Visions of both the past and future plagued him.

He saw the same woman who chose to guide him, Nathaniel’s mother, running through the jungle with her young son in tow. She dove under trees and climbed up other trees as if to try and hide. The last thing Oliver remembered from the vision was the woman grabbing her son, pulling him into a tight hug and whispering to him.

She told him to stay where she left him and that he would be safe if he made it back home. She told her son not to look for her and then proceeded to shove Nathaniel into a tangle of vines.

She ran, the people who were after them could very easily see Nathaniel but left him in the vines, still going after his mother. He broke free from the vines and followed after the attackers, grabbing a large stick from the ground on his way.

The first thing he saw besides the tree was his mother being thrown to the dirt. She didn’t fight back for even a second as she got beat down right in front of him. He wanted to save her, but he had frozen in place.

In an instant, the young red headed boy turned into the man that Oliver knew now as Nathaniel, he stayed locked in place with the stick in his hand and the same terrified look on his face. “We all lose at some point.”

Now Nathaniel stood across from the physical form of the spirit, it held a lock of red hair that matched Nathaniel’s in its hand. “That is correct. We do all lose, but this is not a loss for you. This is a gift, this is a challenge to be a better you.”

---

Oliver was shaken awake by Denver, who kept his voice lowered so he wouldn’t wake up Norris. “One of the women is awake and she’s scared, we need you to help talk her down.”

Leaving the tent, Oliver saw one of the women was on her feet and walking backwards towards the tree line while George stood in front of her, trying to talk to her. Oliver rushed to put a hand on George’s shoulder, motioning him to go back to the other woman. “It’s okay, I can handle this.”

George hesitated for a minute before backing off, returning to the spot where he and Denver had been sitting.

Oliver had a fifty percent chance of guessing which child was this woman’s, whether it be Emily or Nolan. He studied the woman’s body type for a minute before taking a guess. “You’re Nolan Macon’s mom. What’s your name?”

She stayed in place, refusing to answer for a minute as she seemed to study Oliver just as heavily as he studied her. “Erin. Who are you people?”

“I’m Oliver, the doctor is George, and the doctor’s companion is Denver. We found you and your friend here this morning and we’ve been trying to get you stable.” He looked back at George and Denver, spotting the backpack that Abram and Olivia had brought back. “You’re probably hungry and thirsty, right?” He looked back at Erin and motioned her towards him. “I’m not going to the trees, it’s not safe over there but if you’ll trust me enough to come back to the tarp with me, I have no problem giving you some food, water, a blanket, and talking you through this.”

Oliver went back to the tarp on his own, barely catching Nathaniel leaving his tent in a panic. Looking back at Erin, he saw she was following at a distance. Oliver looked at George, who seemed a bit concerned. “Tell me what you need and I can make it happen.”

Oliver looked at Nathaniel one last time before turning back to George. “I need you to give her food, water, and a blanket when she makes it back here, I need to go get him back.”

Denver got to his feet with no hesitation, allowing Oliver to go after Nathaniel. Nathaniel stopped his walk when he realized Oliver was following him, giving him the chance to catch up. “When I gave you the blessing to take the gift from my family, I didn’t know it was going to connect us like that.”

“Connect us like what?” Oliver stopped directly next to Nathaniel, turning around to face the tarp so he could keep an eye on Erin.

“I know you saw her die in your sleep and I can’t be around for when you learn the rest, I can’t take that kind of hurt again.” Nathaniel seemed completely distraught as he spoke to Oliver.

“Nathaniel, I need to know what I can do to help you and I can’t do that if I don’t know what happened to you. I didn’t choose to delve into your head, it just happened and it probably happened because it’s your family.” Oliver paused, his eyes suddenly going to the water. “You and I made a deal, I don’t care if you’ve suddenly got scared off, I’m going to fulfill my end of it. You can help me by guiding me or you can fight me through it, it’s your choice.”

Nathaniel followed Oliver’s eyes to the water. “I can’t be helped without Purna taking the ocean’s gift and swaying against the spirit. If anyone here makes her take that plunge, she’s against your group and even if the spirit makes her take it, she’s against your group.”

Oliver shook his head and crossed his arms. “That’s not true. Give me today to work on that while I get the two new women settled. I just need to make sure that Nolan isn’t going to react once we get back and as soon as I can confidently say that the group and those two women are safe, my part is done in that ordeal.”

“You’re taking on too much at one time, you’re going to cause yourself to snap.” Nathaniel turned around and started walking back to the tarp. “You can’t be of any use to anyone if you’re out to harm them.”

Oliver went back to the tarp, sitting across from Erin, who had gotten a bottle of water and food from Denver as he had asked before he went after Nathaniel. “I’m sure you have a lot of questions, I’m here to answer whatever you need.”

“How do you know my son? Where is he?” Erin questioned without any hesitation.

“I’ve known Nolan for a pretty long time, it feels like it’s been forever. He and I used to live on the third floor together but I just moved to a different floor. He was here with us when we found you, but he’s home now.” He could almost anticipate her next question. “Home is a forty minute walk inland, it’s an apartment building. Everyone that’s here right now lives there, we’re only here right now because of you and your friend.”

“She has a name.”

Oliver shrugged. “I don’t know her name, you and I just met and she hasn’t even been conscious so I’ve had no chance to learn her name. What is her name?”

Erin looked at the other woman, then back at Oliver. “Her name is Ashley, and if Nolan was here then her daughter should have been too. Where’s her daughter?”

Oliver caught the look Nathaniel gave him from behind Erin, telling him what he already knew. “I can’t tell you anything about Emily, other than the fact that she’s safe. She’s not with Nolan by her choice, but we’ve made sure that she’s taken care of and aware of her mom being here; she’s a great help in taking care of so many other people and her presence is valued on the island.”

The next few questions asked were questions that Oliver couldn’t answer, such as where the island was and how they had gotten there. It was after three or four unanswered questions that Erin stopped asking questions.

Oliver stayed out with George, Denver, Erin, and Nathaniel for the rest of the night. As everyone else woke up, he made sure to introduce the rest of the group to Erin. The group ate once again and began taking down the tents, preparing to go back home once George cleared them to move Ashley.

One of the carts was used to transport the tents and two backpacks that Abram and Olivia brought, while the second cart was being used to transport Ashley. Amos was very serious about pushing the cart, as they had a tendency to lock up and if the wrong pressure was applied, they would just crumble.

Oliver stayed by Purna’s side, making sure she stayed a decent amount of distance from the rest of the group before he even broached the topic of the ocean’s gift with her. There was very little conversation until he finally brought it up. “Hey, there’s something on my mind that I wanted to talk to you about.”

“What’s up?”

“I’ve learned about a different gift that can be used directly against the spirit but according to Nathaniel, you’re the only one who can actually possess it. It also apparently would give Talia both of our gifts and make her significantly stronger against the spirit.” He looked over at Purna, seeing she had crossed her arms. “I understand if you don’t want to do it, but I think you should really think about it.”

She stayed quiet for a moment before briefly shaking her head. “I’ll have to talk to Nathaniel about it myself, or I guess you can, but I would like to have more information before I make a decision for myself.”

“I would rather talk to him on my own, I don’t think he’s going to tell you the full truth.” The couple looked towards the front of the group at Nathaniel, who stayed by Amos’s side to make sure the boy didn’t suddenly snap.

When the group arrived back at the apartment building, Leo helped George get Ashley to the room that he had set up for an infirmary while Nathaniel took Erin into the dining room, the rest of the group splitting up.

Oliver went to Nolan's apartment, knocking only once before the boy answered. Emily stood a few feet behind him, the two teens obviously very anxious. “Before we go anywhere, I need you two to know that your mothers are in different areas. Nolan, your mom is fine, she’s moving and completely responsive. Emily, George is doing everything that he can to help your mom regain consciousness at the very least; you can see her if you want, but I’m not going to force that on you.”

Nolan looked back at Emily, who immediately teared up and started nodding. He then faced Oliver again, waiting for Emily to the apartment. “I think we should see her mom first, I want to be with her when she does.”

Oliver took the two teens to the room that Leo had set up on the third floor, only briefly passing Amos and the empty cart as they walked down the hall.

He held the door open for the two, keeping just a pace behind them as Emily went straight to the bedside. There was a dreadful silence that was only broken by Emily’s occasional sniffles and cries until she attempted to collect herself, putting her hands on her knees. It was then that Oliver recognized that Emily was trembling. “I can’t do it, I have so many questions but I can’t do it.”

Nolan looked back at Oliver, allowing him to kneel in front of Emily. “Emily, hey, let’s talk real fast.” Oliver waited until Emily looked up from her knees, her eyes puffy and red. “It’s scary, I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now but I think you’ll feel better if you ask the questions that you want to.”

She remained quiet until she looked up at George and Sierra. “What are the chances of her regaining consciousness?”

“Ninety-five percent.” George answered with confidence. “I will never give a hundred as an answer because some things that are out of my control can happen, but I think the response was speedy enough that she’s been saved and is out of the danger zone. Right now her body is catching up and I feel she’ll be aware again within the day.”

“Those are pretty good odds.” Oliver made it a point to give Emily a reassuring smile when she looked back at him. “Her body wasn’t ready for the impact of the island, you and I both know that it’s a very draining barrier and it’s likely that your mom hit that barrier before Nolan’s mom did and so she took the brunt of it. It’s nobody’s fault and we should be grateful that George was able to help her so quickly.”

Emily nodded, looking up at George again. “Will she remember me?”

George gave a shrug, briefly pointing at Oliver. “I don’t have the answer for that, he might.”

Oliver got off of his knees, feeling like any conflict with Emily had been successfully avoided. He looked to his left and looked at Ashley, the room suddenly going quiet around him despite George and Sierra having a conversation and Emily continuing to tap her feet.

He stayed focused on her, a chill taking over his body before he went back to the doorway where Nolan was waiting. “She’s going to remember you, there’s no doubt about it. You’re welcome to stay here with George and Sierra or come downstairs with Nolan and I.”

Emily chose to stay put, Nolan and Oliver giving it about ten more minutes before the two went to the ground floor and stopped outside the doors to the dining room. Oliver waited until he saw Nolan take a deep breath, the two nodding to each other before he turned the handle to enter the room.

Erin’s eyes immediately shot up to meet her son’s eyes. She jumped to her feet and ran to her son, taking him in her arms. The two held each other in tears, one in joy and the other in grief for her son.

Nathaniel and Oliver stayed in the room for the next few minutes, they wanted to know that Nolan could be trusted with Erin. Once the two sat down and started talking to each other, Nathaniel and Oliver could tell it was okay for them to leave.

They stepped out into the main lobby, shutting the door behind them. “They should have plenty of time to talk before dinner and now that Erin knows that you were being truthful about Nolan and that Ashley is being taken care of, she’ll be a lot more cooperative with you.”

“Nathaniel, is there a hierarchy of gifts?” Oliver felt the question was odd to ask, but he had hoped that Nathaniel knew why he was asking it.

Nathaniel nodded. “There is. Despite being in contact with the spirit so frequently, Amos and I are far under, if used appropriately of course, Nolan and your gifts. Why do you ask?”

“Do you recall when talking to the spirit about your gift, you said that we all lose at some point?” Oliver looked at Nathaniel, immediately getting his answer by the look on his face. “You already know that I’ve been in your head, that tells me that I need to help you with whatever it is that is holding you back. You said that I would need Purna to take on the ocean’s gift before I can help you and before she’s willing to take that gift, she needs to know what it is that’s motivating you. You can tell either her or myself, but this is something that I’m choosing to be aggressive on.”

He didn’t immediately answer, instead looking at the lobby’s front doors. “You would need both Purna and Talia, then you would have to go back to the heart of the island. Depending on how relations between you, Purna, Leo, and Nolan are, a council can be formed. If that happens before you can help me, you would have to approach said council and get every single one of them to agree to help me. It wouldn’t work if they just said yes, they have to sincerely mean it because the island will know if it’s not what they truly want. That’s why I think it best that you drop it.”

[Refuse to drop it, Oliver pushes Nathaniel.]
[Drop it for the moment, Purna pushes Nathaniel.]

“Nathaniel, I frankly do not care if you suggest I drop it. I’m not going to, so the best course of action for you would be to tell me what it is that you’re going to need Purna for, how the heart of the island plays into it, and why you’re denying it so heavily.” Oliver crossed his arms, knowing that Nathaniel was going to fold with just one push. “Regardless of what you tell me or don’t tell me, you and I both know that the knowledge that you’re refusing me is just going to end up with me. Make this easier on both of us.”

“Oliver, I’ve been alive since before your parents were even born, I won’t be going over a hundred years with you for something that I know you’re going to be the one to back out on.”

Oliver studied Nathaniel for a moment, nodding slightly. “It’s a family member, but it’s not your mother because she was dead before the spirit interacted with you. It’s not your father, he had no part in your life and you couldn’t care less about him. You had no siblings and you’ve never mentioned any grandparents, probably because you’ve never met them.” Oliver stopped talking, doing a bit of math in his head. “You said you’re from Wyoming and if my math is right, you were born in 1900. Your father isn’t involved because you’re a bastard baby.”

“What does me being from Wyoming have to do with anything?”

“Because you’re not from Wyoming, that was a test. You originally told Leo that you were from Wisconsin and by not refuting Wyoming and even knowing Wisconsin is a place, that tells me that you weren’t born in Wisconsin but your mother is from there and just told you about it. That would mean you were born here. You being born here means that you haven’t met any family besides your mother, so who was it?” Oliver uncrossed his arms, knowing that he was finally getting into Nathaniel’s head. “Who was the woman in the picture that you showed Leo?”

Nathaniel shook his head, his face quickly turning, almost as if in disgust. “Is, not was. You don’t use past tense on people who are living.” He blinked rapidly as he looked to the ground. “The woman in the photo, she was my mother but obviously the photo was fake. The island manipulated an image that was put into Leo’s head. The one I need help with is my wife.”

Oliver looked around the room, making sure that he and Nathaniel were still alone. “You have a wife?” Nathaniel nodded. “What happened to her?”

“I… made a horrible mistake and in a way, she’s being held for ransom. I’m not entirely sure how I can explain to you in a way that you can explain to Purna.”

“Don’t worry about that, explain it to me and I can work out how I’ll tell Purna.”

Nathaniel held up a finger, then crossed his arms. “You’re right, I was born here but my wife wasn’t. She came from the mainland and as people do, we built a relationship. I fell in love with her and I fell hard and quickly. We were married and we got pregnant. In that time, the spirit made contact with me for the first time and wanted me to give it my allegiance and I couldn’t give it that much, but it needed me.”

The lobby doors swung open, Mindy and Tracey strolling inside and stopping when they saw the two men. The sisters stayed in place until Mindy pushed Tracey forward, only talking when her sister was out of sight. “Hey Oliver, I need to have a talk with you when you get a chance.”

Oliver nodded, motioning towards Nathaniel. “I’m a bit preoccupied right now, but I’ll make it a point to talk to you before the day’s over.”

Nathaniel spoke again after Mindy left their sight. “You also need to talk to Kelly tonight and you’re running out of time before dinner. You should go handle them, now that you know the basis of my story you should start having visions that will tell you more than I ever could.”

“I completely forgot about Kelly… I’m sorry, but I need to break off and go take care of her.” Nathaniel turned and went back into the dining room with Nolan and Erin, leaving Oliver in the lobby.

He hurried to the first floor and went to the very last room, knocking on the door.

Kelly opened pretty quickly, but looked surprised to see Oliver on the other side. “Oh, hi. Purna told me you needed to talk to me, but how urgent is it?”

“Pretty urgent, like life or death kind of urgent so with that knowledge, do you have time to spare?” Kelly nodded, allowing Oliver into her apartment. As he walked into the apartment, he was served with a reminder that he also needed to see Frank before Frank saw Erin and Ashley, which would have to be dinner. He stayed in front of the door, Kelly stayed in front of him. “It’s about Amos, the place where you two dug was tainted land. In a way, because Amos broke the peace he was inflicted with a part of the island.”

Kelly nodded. “Purna told me that, she told me what my role is in all this but said that you had something different to tell me.”

Oliver gave a quick breath of relief. “Of course she did. Your parents, I learned who they are and I feel like it’s only fair to end your search for them.”

Kelly’s eyebrows furrowed. “How did you find out?”

“There are people on this island who naturally know more than other people and have a higher tolerance or even an immunity to the island’s control. Your mother is dead and to be quite honest with you, I personally don’t know who she was but Boris is your father.”

Her face fell as she looked at Oliver for a moment, realizing that he was being serious. “How did she die?”

“I have no idea, the person I spoke with remembered her but had no memory of how she died. Given that she gave birth to you on the island and our only doctor wasn’t truly a doctor on the mainland, she more than likely had complications or an infection and passed.” It was a lie, but Oliver knew he couldn’t tell her that Mindy had murdered her mother, especially when he had no idea of what truly had happened between Mindy and Annabella that night.

“George isn’t a real doctor?” Oliver shook his head. “Then what is he really?”

He gave a soft chuckle, trying to calm Kelly. “Believe it or not, George Lim was the president.”

Kelly stifled a laugh and crossed her arms. “There’s no way. You’ve gotta be lying to me.”

“Nope, I’m serious. George was the president before he ended up here. One of the residents was a brain surgeon, but with how they are now, I think we’re better off with the president being our doctor.” Oliver lightened up as Kelly laughed, her eyes suddenly lighting up themselves. “What do you think you’ll do with the knowledge of Boris being your father?”

She shrugged. “I don’t think there’s anything I can do if he doesn’t remember it, but it does bring me peace of mind. Thank you for that and, you know, telling me instead of keeping it a secret like other people apparently have.”

Oliver looked at Kelly before putting his hand on the door handle. “He’ll remember one day, just give him some time. Right now the island is actively working against other people and Boris isn’t one of them, so he’ll eventually be in that area where he can make those connections. It’ll take a minute, but he’ll get there.”

He left Kelly’s apartment and went to the fourth floor next with the intention of talking to Frank, who ended up getting on the elevator when Oliver was supposed to get off. He got on the elevator and Oliver blocked the buttons with his body, Frank immediately gaining a look of confusion. “What are you doing?”

“I need to talk to you and I don’t want it to be at the very last second.” Oliver waited until Frank gave him a small nod, encouraging him to continue. “Last night two new people arrived on the island and they were injured. We didn’t know what to do at the time, so we made a camp to take care of them for the night and when the sun came up, we moved them to the apartment building. When you go to dinner tonight, there will be a woman with Nolan, that’s his mother. The other woman is on the third floor, George and Sierra are working on her because she hasn’t regained consciousness.”

“Can you hit G to go to the ground floor?” Frank nodded, putting his hands in his pockets. “Thank you for keeping me updated on what you guys have going on. Next time tell me when someone’s injured and needs help, I’ve got a pretty hefty amount of first aid knowledge and, if necessary, I have practice in life saving skills.”

Oliver moved and hit the button to go to the ground floor, putting his back to the back wall of the elevator. The two went down to the dining room for dinner, finding most of the other residents had already beat them there.

After dinner, Oliver approached Mindy while she was alone to talk to her about what she had stopped him over earlier.

The two stood alone in the kitchen, washing dishes together to give them an excuse to be in the kitchen alone. “What is it that you wanted to talk about?”

“I don’t know why I’m telling you this, but when I saw you and Nathaniel in the lobby earlier, something inside of me just like screamed at me to tell you.” Mindy stared at the plate she took in her hands, rinsing them before passing them to Oliver. “I’ve killed somebody.”

Oliver scrubbed the plate in his hand, then looked over at the plate in Mindy’s hands to see that she was gripping the plate hard enough to turn her knuckles white. “Who did you kill and why did you do it?”

“I killed my dad.” Mindy dropped the plate in her hand, her hands suddenly shaking. “I killed my dad because he wouldn’t stop hitting Rosey and I had to protect her.”

He stayed focused on her, realizing that the confession was forcing Mindy to break through the island’s hold. “Why was he hitting Rosey? How long did stuff like that go on?”

“He was hitting her because she snuck out with some guy, she didn’t even stay out all night. She was only gone for an hour and then she came back, he started wailing on her and she had no idea what she had done wrong. The sun wasn’t even down when she got back.” Mindy’s skin grew paler as she spoke. “He beat on Rosey for years and she never talks about it. I got her away from the problem, but how do I help her cope?”

“Who did Rosey sneak out with? How did you kill your dad?” Oliver kept prodding with the hopes that recalling the situation would help Mindy fully break through.

“She wasn’t even dating the guy, it was some friend from her calculus class that wanted her to go to the library with him.” Mindy’s voice trembled as she looked to think back on the murder. “I shot him with his own gun.”

“How did the gun end up in your hands? Where was the gun normally kept?”

“He kept it in a box under the kitchen sink, so I went for the gun when he started going for Rosey. I didn’t make any moves for him until I heard Rosey start crying. I told him to stop and that I would shoot, he didn’t stop and I shot. We all ran away from the house that night, we got on a boat and we were just going around while I thought about what I needed to do.” She paused. “And I don’t remember after that.”

Oliver put a hand on Mindy’s shoulder and gave a slight squeeze. “You never will, but you’ve for certain broke through the island’s grips. You’re going to remember things about your life on the mainland in bits and pieces, eventually you’ll have the full story.”

“What do you mean by that?”

He took his hand back, turning off the sink water. “We can talk more about it tomorrow. You should get some sleep, mentally prepare yourself and we can talk more about it when you’re ready.”

---

That night, as he expected, Oliver was thrown into Nathaniel’s memories. He didn’t start from the very beginning, but it seemed like he was put into Nathaniel’s first interaction with the spirit once again.

“This is just a challenge to be a better you.” The spirit spoke very hushed. Oliver noticed that it was the same gravesite that Brianne was now buried at where Nathaniel and the spirit stood.

“I don’t wish to accept your challenge, I’ve never met you before now and you come to me with threats, you come to me with knowledge that tells me you’ve been keeping your eye on me, my wife, and my people but you expect me to simply fall in line with whoever you are.” Nathaniel shook his head, turning his back on the spirit. “You are truly delusional and a disturbed individual.”

The spirit stood in place, watching Nathaniel walk away. As the spirit watched Nathaniel, the air around Oliver went cold and the spirit quickly looked to make eye contact with Oliver. “Watch this.”

The spirit spoke with a mischievous grin as a woman with a blonde bob and a white dress walked up the same hill that Nathaniel was previously descending, having stopped in place as the spirit took Oliver’s attention. “Nathaniel! What’s going on? Is everything okay?” The heavily pregnant woman worked her way up the hill, stopping at Nathaniel’s side and putting a hand on his shoulder.

The woman’s touch seemed to startle Nathaniel as he jerked away to look behind him, seeing the spirit was still at the very top of the hill. He looked back at the woman, taking her left hand in both of his hands. “Nothing is wrong, but I don’t think you need to be all the way out here when you’re so close to delivering.”

She looked over Nathaniel’s shoulder, seeing the spirit and taking her left hand back from him. “Who is this?” She started walking towards the spirit, a smile on her face. “I don’t think I’ve met you before.”

“Irina, please.” Nathaniel rushed to put himself between the spirit and the woman, who Oliver now knew was named Irina. “This is not someone we want to meet, we need to go back home.”

Irina furrowed her eyebrows, a slight look of disapproval crossing her face as she looked at Nathaniel. “You’re speaking nonsense, Nathaniel. We all live on the same island, the very least that we can do is be pleasant.” She faced the spirit again, offering a genuine and kind smile. “I apologize for my husband, he gets a bit nervous around new people.”

The spirit grinned, simply waving its hand in dismay. “I understand and take no offense. I’m certain it has to do with the little one on the way, how long do you have left on it?”

“Oh, it’ll be any day now.” Irina smiled, resting a hand on her stomach and a hand on the back of her hip to support her back. “We’re thrilled for it, the rest of our people think it’ll be a boy but just between you and I, I have hopes for a girl.”

“Has it been very active? May I feel?” The spirit questioned, prompting Irina to move her hand from her stomach.

“No, you may not.” Nathaniel interjected, once again trying to put himself between Irina and the spirit. “I’m not at all comfortable with that.”

Irina’s smile stayed on her face as she tilted her head to look at Nathaniel. “It’ll be fine, I’m right here and I won’t be going anywhere.” She looked at the spirit and nodded.

As soon as the spirit laid its hand on Irina’s stomach, the woman’s smile turned into a look of pure agony as she let out a scream.

In a matter of seconds, Irina had disappeared from the hill. Nathaniel was gone soon after that, leaving the spirit and Oliver.

The spirit stood completely opposite of him, the two never breaking eye contact. “It’s truly no shock that he chose you for the gift of his people.” The spirit broke the silence between them. “You’re a lot like him and he trusts you, I haven’t got a clue why. You’ve never been a trustworthy person because of your obsession with pleasing people.”

“You restricted his movement multiple times through that interaction with Irina so he had no choice but to watch, you made it to where he physically couldn’t help her. You wanted him to be afraid of you.” Oliver ignored what the spirit had previously said. “You wanted him to watch his wife and child just disappear, you wanted him to be your captive.”

The spirit nodded. “That I did. I hope the show didn’t startle you too much, because that’s exactly what’ll be happening with you. To think that I don’t know about your relationship with Purna is quite ridiculous. I can’t do much to you now, but she’s fair game.”

“Nobody made any indication that you didn’t know about the relationship, it’s just that we were all aware that there was nothing you could do to stop it. You still can’t.” Oliver shrugged, looking at the tree above him. “I’m not afraid of you anymore, I was stupid to be afraid of you in the first place. You have no control over the island and you rely on those fear tactics to pretend that you do, when you just rely on Nathaniel to set things right for your motive. You know he won’t say no to you because you abducted his wife and child and you know that he has more experience in human interactions so you make him do your work.”

The spirit crossed its arms as Oliver looked back down. “You shouldn’t be afraid of me, but your reasoning is horribly flawed and tells me that you’re not fully aware of your own role as my opposite.”

Oliver put his hands in his pockets. “No, I’m very aware of my role as your opposition and my role in the waking world. I feel that you may understand the former but you will never understand the latter. That knowledge and the fact that you’re still in a state of rest for four more days gives me quite the lead above you. I feel that this will be our last interaction until you recover from your rest, so I’ll be seeing you in a few days.”

“Don’t consider yourself so lucky.” That warning was the last thing Oliver heard from the spirit before he woke up in his own bed.

He turned over to check the clock, seeing it was just ten minutes before six in the morning. He went ahead and got out of bed, taking a quick shower and changing before Purna and Talia woke up.

While he waited for Purna, he sat on the couch in the living room and looked out of the window, the vision of the night before replaying in his head.

He didn’t realize when Purna and Talia did wake up and started to go through their morning routine until Purna took a seat on the couch next to him. “Oliver, are you doing okay?” He nodded, the question not fully registering to him. “Did you sleep alright? It didn’t seem like it.”

He looked at her, suddenly being dragged out of his previous trance. “I slept fine, what do you mean?”

She shook her head. “Try tossing and turning all night, talking in your sleep and sweating profusely the entire night. That’s what I mean.”

“That sounds about right.” He briefly looked at the ceiling before looking back at Purna. “I talked to Nathaniel and last night, I had a vision of what it was that happened to him, what he wants your help with.”

He went over the night’s events with Purna, who seemed to be taking in every word.

After he finished, she let out a sigh and looked away. “It sounds like even if I don’t want to help him, it’s in my best interest to take the gift.” She paused, raising her hand a bit. “Don’t take that as me saying I don’t want to help Nathaniel, I do want to help him and I do have a better understanding of why he needs it. I’m still just not fully sure of how I’ll be able to help.”

“We’ll know more later on, but I think the best plan of action for you today is to go to the ocean.” She nodded in agreement, taking to her feet. “I don’t think I can be there, though. Allowing you to drown is a direct conflict of my goal and truthfully, watching my wife drown isn’t something I feel comfortable doing.”

She looked at Talia, then back at Oliver. “That’s okay. You’ll know when it’s done based on Talia, right?”

“Right.” Oliver looked over the back of the couch at Talia, the young girl sat on her own with a picture book in hand.

Deep down, Oliver did feel terrible for what was going to happen to Talia. Purna had a choice, he had a choice, but Talia had no choice and no clue what was going to happen to her in a matter of hours.

”You and I can handle Brianne.”


This one was probably the hardest choice so far in the story, and honestly I'm not sure if it's right or not. I was thinking maybe they could use their elemental powers to distract Brianne since the spirit is still in a weakened state, at the moment. That way Oliver could do what he needed to help Nathaniel without interference. I'm just hoping that they would be strong enough to face or at least distract Brianne with their new abilities. I think maybe Leo could talk to Emily since he is already with her. I'm not sure what they could do to influence Mindy or Amos, since Purna herself said that they had no supernatural sway over the residents with their abilities.

“It’s a bit unsettling to know that, isn’t it?” Leo sighed. “Identifying a situation and recognizing that that one spur of the moment decision made by somebody else determines your life or your death.”

I feel so called out right now.   

So Amos killed Kelly. I hope that wasn't because I didn't have them try to deal with Amos with the last decision. I wonder if something bad would have happened no matter what I picked. I guess the reason why the people with elemental powers are cursed is because they have to eventually kill their spouse? 

Nathaniel and Frank looked over Kelly’s body while Oliver held the freezer door open and kept an eye on Amos, who they believed was the one who did it. He was completely unresponsive, Oliver had tried talking to him and asking questions, only to be met with silence and blank stares.

He instead listened to Nathaniel and Frank, where Frank did most of the talking. “I don’t see how Amos could have been capable of this. The amount of physical strength needed to break someone’s neck like this, I don’t think he has it.”

Oliver watched Amos, who slowly nodded as he looked at the open freezer door.

“She had to have been put in here after dinner was served, otherwise she would have been found sooner with the number of people going in and out of the freezer.” Frank stood over the body and looked down at the young girl. “I trust that you guys have a system for the dead around here?”

“Yes, we do.” Nathaniel didn’t stand, he stayed crouched next to the body. “Oliver can help me with it so you can do what you need to with Amos.”

Frank stepped out of the freezer, allowing Oliver to step inside. He hit the light switch on his way in to light up the freezer.

He kneeled next to the body, immediately recognizing what Frank was talking about. “He’s right; the strength needed to do… this.. It would be a supernatural amount of strength. Amos does possess that, but I’m not so sure he did it.”

Nathaniel looked around the freezer, his eyes fixing on the ceiling. He pointed to it, prompting Oliver to follow his vision and see a dent in the metal roof. “It happened in here and whoever did it, they had to not only be tall enough to basically throw Kelly into the roof but also strong enough to break her neck while lifting above their own head. There’s people here tall enough to do it, but not tall and strong enough to do that.”

“What do you think happened then?”

“That’s the thing, I have no clue.” Nathaniel got to his feet and went to stand under the dent in the ceiling. “Even if I wasn’t able to deduce what happened, you should have known this was happening because of your gift. The only thing I get from you not knowing is it confirms it was someone with an ability that did it, but that still makes no sense.”

Oliver looked at Nathaniel, trying to judge his own arms length compared to the dent. “You and I are about the same height, the rest of the gifted are shorter than us. Try lifting your hands as high as you can.”

Nathaniel reached up, confirming to Oliver that neither of them would have been able to reach the ceiling. “Leo’s shorter than us?”

Oliver nodded. “A few inches, yeah. Nolan’s probably around his height, Emily is shorter than the both of them. Purna and Amos are equal to Leo, Brianne is the same as Emily.”

“Where does Denver stand in there?”

Oliver shrugged. “I’ve never really been around Denver until recently, but I think he stands around you and I. He does have a back problem, he’s mentioned it before.”

“The best theory I have for the moment is that someone with a gift possessed someone taller than them to temporarily grant them that strength. You, Brianne, myself, and Amos are the ones who can possess someone.” Nathaniel crossed his arms, glancing at the body again. “But why Kelly? How did they manage to get her in here?”

Oliver looked at the body again, letting out a sigh. “Whoever possessed knew about Boris being Kelly’s dad. Kelly learned about it recently and so what I’m assuming happened is that someone possessed Boris to draw Kelly into the freezer. It also lines up with the height debacle because Boris is taller than you and I.”

“Was it to frame Amos, to send a message to us, or to force him to fall in line?” Nathaniel questioned, heading towards the freezer door. “That, and where did Boris end up?”

Oliver followed him to the door. “Amos knows something but he’s not talking, we need to get him to talk.”

“Purna is an Ivy League lawyer and Frank is a federal agent. Put those two in the room alone with Amos and he’s going to talk.” Nathaniel paused. “The only issue with that is Frank doesn’t know a thing about the gifts, he would have to be possessed for an interrogation but I think that takes away from the entire point of having him there.”

“Find a way to tell him about the gifts without explicitly telling him about them. Tell him what we know about the murder and he should be able to lay out the facts, like who did it and how, I can have Purna focus on the other piece of it.”

---

The next morning, Purna and Frank had been told about their tasks separately.

The two met in the basement where Amos was seated at the same table, handcuffed to the same chair that Frank had attached him to the night before.

They sat across from Amos and watched him for a moment before Purna cleared her throat. “They’ve told me that you’re not talking.” She leaned forward a bit, looking over the boy’s face. “You look scared, so I’m going to assume that you’re not talking because you were told not to. You can correct me if I’m wrong, but that’s what we’re starting with.”

Frank folded his hands, looking at a page in front of him. “This is unlike anything I’ve seen before, Amos and I’ll be completely honest with you, it’s not looking to be in your favor. You saw for yourself that Kelly was brutalized; she was slaughtered inside that freezer and you were the one who stood outside the door, in fact, you were the only one in the kitchen.”

“We’ve been told by multiple people that the only word you said was ‘please’. In context of the conversation, it made sense to them but that was prior to the body being found. Were you trying to ask them for help?”

Frank stared straight into Amos’s eyes, trying to get a reading on the boy before he spoke again. “We’re trying to understand how this happened and we know that you know something that would help us bring justice to Kelly. If you continue to hold out on whatever it is that you know, you’re going to be the one who gets blamed for her death.”

Purna saw a lump building in Amos’s throat as his breathing got quicker. “Amos, we know that you didn’t want anything bad to happen to Kelly and that you wouldn’t have done it yourself. You couldn’t help her in that moment but you can help her now by just talking to us.”

Amos let out a high-pitched wail as he dropped his head to the table and started sobbing.

Frank looked at Purna, who leaned back in her seat and only shook her head.

Amos continued to cry for about fifteen minutes before his head shot up, his face red and covered in tears and snot. “I didn’t do it to her, I tried to help her, I tried to stop it but it was holding me back!”

“What was holding you back?” Frank immediately jumped back to questioning the boy, knowing that if he allowed Amos to calm down again that he likely would stop responding. “What happened to her?”

“It was Boris but it wasn’t Boris, it was Brianne. She told me that I was being too passive and she needed to do something to get me going and acting, so she took over Boris and brought Kelly into the kitchen. It was just a normal conversation at first but then she took Kelly into the freezer, Kelly realized something was weird and I tried to intervene then but I couldn’t move, she stopped me from moving.”

Frank shook his head, getting out of his seat. “This kid is delusional.”

Purna jumped to her feet, moving to block the door. “He’s not, he’s telling the truth but if you leave this room and say a word to anyone, they’re going to hurt him. He’s a victim and he’s in danger, Frank.”

“He’s not a victim, he was the only one in the kitchen when the body of his girlfriend was in the freezer and his blame is being put on someone who wasn’t even in the dining room. Boris was already in his own apartment when it happened.”

“How can you be so certain on the timeline?” Purna stayed planted in front of the door. “She was in a freezer, the decomposition rate slows in the cold and you know this. The markings on her skin also tell a different story completely because even though the cold is supposed to reduce swelling and the general size of bruises, she’s marked up. You know that this doesn’t make any sense so I am begging you to sit down with us again, look over the facts with us, hear his full story, and put together the closest version there is to the truth.”

Frank crossed his arms, motioning towards the one piece of paper he left at the table. “We have a sheet of notebook paper worth of information and you’re right, there’s a number of glaring issues that I can’t understand. They can’t be explained with Amos as the culprit but they also can’t be explained with Boris being the culprit.”

The two returned to their seats, Purna taking the piece of notebook paper from Frank. “I don’t know why they’re so opposed to telling you the truth. I get that they consider you the island’s opposition but that doesn’t make you our opposition.” She took the pen she had sitting on the table and flipped the paper over, immediately starting to write. “They said I couldn’t tell you but they didn’t say you couldn’t just find out. It’ll make the situation easier for you to understand and solve.”

Amos watched Purna write from across the table, his eyes still puffy and red. “Doesn’t that put Frank in danger? He’s the one person that everyone agrees shouldn’t know.”

She shook her head. “If Denver’s theory is right, Frank doesn’t have long until he finds out the hard way. In truth, I hope Denver is wrong but the only people who suffer if he’s right and Frank isn’t prepared are Frank, Denver, and myself.” She looked up from the paper, the grip on her pen turning her knuckles white. “And Amos, I do not have the time to babysit Frank. That being said, I do not have the time to watch you too so whatever you know about this situation, you need to answer for it. In detail.”

While waiting for Amos to respond, the door to the room opened. Purna quickly slid the paper to Frank and got to her feet, seeing Nathaniel standing in the doorway.

She left the room with Nathaniel to find Oliver standing next to the stairs. “What was that about?”

Nathaniel quickly raised his hands, preventing Purna from speaking. “The elementals have emotional connections to each other, it sparks an emotional reaction when a gift is used. That was anger, fire, that means Denver used his gift for something and it caused a reaction in Purna.”

“I’m sorry, Denver used his gift?” Oliver squinted and crossed his arms. “I seem to remember just yesterday telling Denver to not go for it, so why was that done? And what is he using his gift for?”

“I don’t know but I do think someone else needs to be in there with Frank to explain things to him further.” Purna spoke, her tone still firm and cold. “I don't see any reason to rely on him to physically protect the people on the island without informing him of what he’s going to have to face.”

“So you told him about the gifts?” Nathaniel questioned. The look on his face was one of genuine concern as he looked at the door.

Purna nodded. “I sure did, so it would be best if you two handled that while I go find out what Denver’s doing.”

Oliver let out a sigh of frustration as Purna walked past the two and went upstairs. “You can make Frank forget it, right?”

“I can, but maybe it’s time he knew.” Nathaniel started towards the doors back into the room with Frank and Amos. “He could be helpful and Purna has a point, we do rely on him quite a bit so we can’t really keep things that big from him and not expect it to blow up in our faces. I’m sure that even you can see the reasoning in it.”

[Agree, Frank keeps the new knowledge.]
[Disagree, Nathaniel erases the knowledge.]

---

That morning when Denver had woken up, he went to return the keys to Nathaniel.

He was stopped in the main lobby by Brianne and Zoey, who didn’t seem very interested in hosting a conversation with Denver.

It was after some idle conversation that Brianne finally said something that caught Denver’s attention. “So, why do you have the keys to the apartments? Did something happen to Nathaniel?”

The question caught his attention because the keys hadn’t left Denver’s pockets since the night before. He had gotten so paranoid about losing the keys that he ended up just sleeping in the same pants as the night before. “How do you know I have the keys?”

“Because you told me.” Brianne chuckled, looking at Zoey. “You heard him say it too, right?”

Zoey shrugged, crossing her arms. “I wasn’t fully paying attention but I don’t remember hearing him say that.”

“You don’t remember me saying that because I didn’t say that.” Denver pulled the keys from his pocket. “You’ve been pretty weird since I’ve had the keys, Brianne, so which key is important to you and why is it important to you?”

Her eyes stayed focused on the keys. “None of them are. If I wanted the keys, I could get them with no hassle, I’m just not sure that you can be trusted with them.”

“Then you wouldn’t have stopped me. I’m less than a minute away from Nathaniel so if it was trust, you would have just left me alone and watched me take the keys to him.” Denver started looking through the keys one by one, attempting to see if she would panic for the key she had an interest in. “Brianne, I want to talk to you alone. You already know why.”

She only gave Zoey a look, prompting the girl to go into the elevator and leave the two in the lobby.

Brianne crossed her arms as Denver put the keys back in his pocket. “Looks like you’ve got the mom thing down, congratulations. Let’s talk about what you know about last night. You didn’t look in the freezer but somehow knew enough to talk to Amos about it. What did you tell Amos?”

“That he shouldn’t be scared if he didn’t do anything wrong. What’s so wrong with that?”

“What’s wrong with that is that it’s a lie. Let’s try this again.” Denver took the keys right back out of his pocket and took the key to the roof, which he knew would be of no use since Leo had broken the door. He tossed the single key into the air, swiping it into the palm of his hand and making a fist. He opened his fist to reveal a small puddle of brass sitting in his hand. “I will go through every key if you don’t tell me the truth or I’m not satisfied with your answers.”

Brianne’s face immediately turned to shock as Denver let the brass puddle hit the floor. “How did you do that?”

“You already know how.” Denver twirled the keyring on his fingers.

“I told Amos that I would make sure he didn’t get in trouble for what happened to Kelly.”

“Why did you do that? How do you know what happened to Kelly?” Denver started removing the next key, seeing Brianne still just seemed confused.

“You have no idea what you’re doing, what you’re risking right now by threatening me.”

Denver looked at the key in his hand, not recognizing where it was from. “This is the key that you want, right?” He held it in the air. “You’ve got until we get to the dock to answer my questions.”

He turned and started out of the apartment building, Brianne quickly following after him. “You don’t know what that key goes to and why I need it, don’t you want to know?”

“I do want to know, but I also want my questions answered first.”

The entire walk, Brianne fixated on the key. It did strike Denver as strange; once the key came out, her mind only had one goal. Get the key.

They stood at the end of the dock, Denver looking at the key in his hand. “Well, I told you that you had until we got to the dock to answer my questions and you didn’t answer them.”

“I knew about what happened to Kelly because I was there. I wanted to reassure Amos because he was scared and I panicked. I didn’t even think on if he was guilty of it or not.” Brianne rushed her answers, a sudden lingering aura of sadness rushing from her.

“That’s a lie and I already told you what was going to happen if you didn’t answer before we got here.” Denver tossed the key into the air, just a little past the dock.

The world seemed to freeze as the key stood in the air. He looked at the water, knowing fully well he wouldn’t be able to go in and get it himself. He didn’t know how desperate Brianne was for this key, if she would jump in for it or if he had time to get Purna to get the key from the water.

He couldn’t help but ask himself if the key had anything to do with what had happened to Kelly and why it was so crucial to just Brianne. He knew that if it was for the island, Nathaniel would have removed it from the ring.

[Let the key fall into the water, have Purna retrieve it later on.]
[Catch the key, melt it.]

The key dropped into the water, Brianne looking over the railing in disbelief, turning to Denver with frustration on her face. “Why would you do that?!”

Denver shrugged, his hand still held out as if he was going to catch the key. “Why would you kill another resident?” He took his hand back and put both of his hands in his pockets. “Some questions will never get an answer. I do know that you’re not sorry that you did it, so I’m not sorry that you lost that key.”

---

Frank sat in the basement’s room, his right hand still resting on the paper that Purna had left with him. He looked over at Oliver and Nathaniel as they sat to his right. “Is this true?”

Oliver nodded. “It is, but that’s not what we’re here for right now. We’re here to talk to Amos about Kelly’s death and we’ll talk more about the writing she left you when we have the proper time for it.”

---

After the interrogation, Frank went with Nathaniel and Oliver to the security room where Nathaniel pulled up footage from the kitchen.

The three saw Kelly and Boris in the kitchen, they were talking about Kelly’s mother. That conversation confirmed to them that whoever had possessed Boris was using their familial link in order to draw her away from everyone else.

Amos wasn’t even in the kitchen for a majority of the conversation but when he entered, he looked genuinely frightened and told Kelly to get away from Boris.

The last person who had been in the kitchen before everything kicked off was Erica, which explained to Oliver why she was one of the first people on the scene. She had known Kelly was there and when she didn’t see Kelly come out, she was going to look for her.

Erica left and Kelly turned her back to Boris for just one moment so she could talk to Amos.

At that moment, Boris grabbed a meat tenderizer that Rocky had left sitting on the counter and swung at Kelly, hitting her on the side of her head.

She quickly raised her left hand to feel her new wound, stumbling to turn around and face Boris while trying to get away from him.

The look on her face was pure terror.

Amos moved about two feet before Boris threw his hand up, seeming to stop Amos in place.

He held one hand empty in the air and took his other hand, which held the meat tenderizer, and took another swing at Kelly.

She tried to dodge the hit and ended up falling into it, the blood loss rapidly draining her coordination. She fell to the ground at the door of the freezer, looking up at the handle.

Amos began calling out to Brianne by name, trying to reach her since calling out to Boris wasn’t working. Boris looked over at Amos for just a second and in that second, Kelly reached up for the handle.

She pulled the door open and crawled into the freezer. The last the camera saw of her was her hands at the bottom of the freezer door, attempting to pull it shut.

Boris followed her into the freezer after struggling to get the door open for a few seconds. After that, the only thing the viewers got from the camera was the cries of Kelly in the freezer that grew quieter with each loud thud that also came from the freezer.

Boris left the freezer covered in blood, throwing the meat tenderizer to the ground. He started to leave but stopped right next to Amos, cautioning him against falling in line with the spirit’s enemies.

The footage stopped and the three men stood in place, each of them speechless.

Oliver had his arms crossed over his chest, an overwhelming feeling of discomfort surrounding him. “We at the very least need to find the meat tenderizer.”

“That’s true, but what do we do when Boris physically commits the crime under the influence of someone else?” Frank took a mental note of where he saw the meat tenderizer land.

“There’s nothing we can do in that situation.” Nathaniel led the two to the door. “He can’t confess to a crime he didn’t commit and the one who did do it, she wouldn’t confess for a single thing on this earth.”

“We need to be careful with our timing on telling Purna and Denver because of the emotional issue. I’m guessing if Purna reacts quicker, it’ll be sadness but if Denver reacts first, there’s a chance of them lashing out physically against Brianne.” Oliver uncrossed his arms, stepping out into the lobby and looking around.

“It wouldn’t likely be a physical reaction, it’s a guaranteed physical reaction. I’m not sure we’d be able to hide it from them, though.” Nathaniel locked the door to the security room as they left. He looked at the keyring with confusion before shrugging it off and putting them in his pocket.

Frank thought back to the note that Purna had left, comparing the types of gifts that he had learned about. “You can’t hide it from them because they’re elementals, they’re physically part of the island and so it makes them hyper aware of what happens on it, right?”

Nathaniel nodded. “It’s exactly that. They both likely knew what was happening to Kelly before it even registered to them.”

---

A woman strode into an office, laying a file on the desk of a male agent. “What are we looking at?”

“Two women have been reported missing.” The woman took a seat across from the man. “What stands out is their children were reported missing sixteen years ago and these two women were reported missing by the Barker family.”

The man opened the file and looked at the papers in front of him. “These families aren’t even residing in the same state, how are they connected to the Barkers?”

“The Barkers said that the two women showed up to their home and spoke to them about two weeks ago, they were talking about their missing children. They gave the two women enough time to make it back home before looking them up in the yellow pages; they couldn’t get in contact with them, so they looked them up online to find their employers.”

“I’m assuming they contacted the employers, the employers confirmed that they haven’t heard from either of these women so the Barkers reported them missing.” The man leaned forward in his seat a bit. “These two women, they have no family outside of their missing children?”

The woman nodded. “One is divorced and the other was never married. Both of the fathers reported that after about two years of their children being missing, they lost contact with the women.”

He looked at the papers again. “Hold on a minute, these missing children. They were spotted pretty recently. That’s what Frank was sent on, the one we stopped getting updates for.”

“That’s right.”

He shut the folder in front of him. “Get the families of the missing people together. I don’t care how much we have to dish out to get them in the same place, more people are going to go missing and end up dead if this isn’t addressed.”

End of Chapter 4.