Home Sweet Home [PLL]

Who's in the Box?

Lily felt sick. She spent her whole night throwing up because of how scrambled her mind felt because of what happened in Ravenswood. Not only had Emily nearly died, they found A's lair, she had been nearly killed by A, and found out Alison was alive, but Caleb would also be staying in Ravenswood to help a girl, Miranda, who he met, find her family there

On top of that she couldn't go and tell Gabriel what had happened, without risking his life, and Jason and her hadn't spoken since he left town, so now she was completely alone.

But despite the sick feeling in her stomach, her friends dragged her out of the house to the cemetery where "Ali" had been "buried" to search for any clues about why she had run away

"So Caleb didn't find anything in A's apartment when he was in Ravenswood?" The girls had set Caleb on a hunt to see if he could find anymore information while he was there 

"Nothing. It was completely cleaned out." Hanna answered 

"Guys, I wonder if Ali reached out to anybody besides us." Spencer said

"Such as?" Aria asked

"Such as her brother." She answered and Lily's gaze dropped to the floor "Maybe we should be talking to Jason." 

"No" She said, swallowing the lump in her throat and looking back up, all her friends eyes already on her "No...it's too dangerous to tell anybody, whoever tried to kill Ali is still around" It wasn't a lie, she had told Jason to leave town to keep him safe after A tried to kill him and she couldn't put his life in danger again

"Okay, but suppose Jason already knows she's still alive." Spencer said "At least then we wouldn't be the only ones in charge of a secret." 

"Okay, I've been thinking, and I have a theory." Hanna interrupted 

"You have what?" 

"A theory." She said, annoyed at the shocked look on Spencer's face "Do you want to hear it or not?" 

"Guys, don't... don't fight in the crypt." Aria whispered 

"Hey, look... Ali's not in the box. She's alive somewhere. But somebody is dead. At that somebody must have been buried in the back yard after Ali was pulled out but before the men came to set up the gazebo and pour the cement." She explained 

"Gazebo." Spencer corrected

"Whatever" Hanna said "I... it still means that there's a girl missing somewhere. And that girl went missing around the same time that Ali did. So, we figure out who's really in there and connect them to someone that we do know, then that would solve the whole thing." 

"Yeah, but the body that was in the box was identified as Ali." Aria said "How... how did that happen?" 

"I don't know how, but it was." Emily said 

"Yeah, so, why?" 

"Because it was important to somebody that we think it was Ali." Hanna said

"You're right... that's an actual theory." Spencer nodded

"Apology accepted." Hanna grinned

Emily sighed and looked at the crypt with Ali's name on it "Knock knock." 

"Who's there?"

It had been a week since their visit to the crypt and so far there was no progress on who had been killed in Ali's place, or what had driven Ali to pretend she was dead, despite how hard they looked

Hanna had been researching any missing girl reports, while Emily had been trying to call Jason, unbeknownst to Lily

But today Hanna had told all the girls she had to show them something, so while Aria hung back after English class to talk to Ezra, the other four headed to the empty IT room where Hanna pulled out her laptop "Show us what you got."