The Twilight Zone

Chapter 27

Amelie stood in front of the area of red grass. Her hands clenched and unclenched as she looked out at the expanse. More useful objects had fallen from the sky: clothes, books, another one of those phone things.

Amelie climbed up a tree, its teal barch leaving small scratches on her skin. She could hear Ellie's distant voice calling her name.

But she didn't want to be found.

First she lost Lily, then Noah.

She wanted to be alone.

Up the tree she went, higher and higher until its branches were too thin to support her. The sky above was dark, a few gleaming stars the only source of light.

Amelie saw something moving out of the corner of her eye. An oval shape was floating in the sky, compacting and expanding. The image displayed in the oval was a village, one nicer than Burrow, its streets paved and the houses well-built. It looked like an open window, like she could put her hand through, touch it. But Amelie couldn't reach. And even if she could, she wouldn't leave Ellie. Ellie was all Amelie had.

So Amelie climbed down the tree and headed towards the voice of her friend.

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Oh, Amelie remembered. She remembered how life used to be, when Noah was so little he was still toddling around both of his sisters and following them to do things.

She remembered back when she was only seven years old, Lily ten, and Noah-

Noah was five.

"Amelie?" He called to her, looking up from the ground. She was up in the high oak tree by her window she'd climb out of to reach the branches. They had one of the only two-story houses in the whole of Burrow, built by her father before he became... Unstable.

That was the term used to describe the man whose experiments had just gone too far.

The term used to describe the person who created his prison.

The term used to describe Amelie's father.

Amelie opened her writing book, took out a pencil from behind a tree branch, flipped to the back of the book. A picture of a laughing man holding a giggling baby on his shoulders, another toddler holding onto his hand with all her might. The baby was her, Amelie, the toddler Lily, Noah not having been born yet.

Amelie remembered Rollo before he became something else.

Even though her mother rejected them, he never had.

She let the paper drift down to where little Noah sat, looking up at his tear-stained older sister. He picked it up, looked at it, not understanding a thing.

Who would tell this boy that his father was gone, his mother hated him, and one of his older sisters cared too much about holding on to the past? All he had was Lily now.

Lily, who was rushing outside to Noah, her arms and hands stained with flour, coming to pick up her younger brother although she could barely carry him.

Amelie loved Noah, but he reminded her much too much of her father. Only Amelie knew what had really happened, and it wasn't a failed experiment. Her father had a virus. Contagious. The people who could catch it were few. She was immune, but Noah? Being Rollo's son?

She had to bet the risk of him getting the disease was high.