ARCANE

034

Hope gets up in the middle of the night to get a glass of water. Without slippers, she is surprised to find that the tile isn't cold on her bare feet. In fact, they both are the same temperature. Frigid and hard.

She glances outside her window to see the first snowfall. It ought to feel colder, but it doesn't. Hope pokes her forearm. The soft flex of squish flesh meets her touch, almost as if she is touching somebody who isn't her. She doesn't try to relish in it.

When she steps in the hallway, she feels it. The pull. There, in her stomach. People are here. They've come through the porch door and are making their way upstairs.

Hope darts back into the bedroom. She's at the end of the hallway, which gives her time to think. What is she going to do? She shakes Erik, then moves over to Percy to wake her as well. In the time she moves, Erik sits up. He looks at Hope, and then looks at his jacket laying haphazardly on the floor.

Inside the pocket, Hope grabs the gun. She puts a finger to her lips and darts out the room. Erik barely blinks before she is gone.

Hope watches the strangers move into the next room. Like the many nights she spent sneaking around her Dad, Hope walks on pointed toes. As she slinks through the hallway, she tries to find the safety on the gun. Though her Dad would never let her hold one, he had taught her how to use it, just in case.

From her spot hiding in the doorway, Hope can see the strangers move. One begins to hang over top of Cara. With gloved hands, the woman pulls Cara's arm out from underneath the covers. The woman raises a hand to her lips, biting the fingertips of the black glove and pulling.

Hope pops in the doorway and shoots the woman. Her body slumps over, hitting Cara's, who begins to scream. The bang seems to ring in Cara's ears. For a second, she doesn't notice that a body has fallen on her. Her ears are ringing and it's difficult to breathe. Gunshot after gunshot echoes in the room as Hope fires bullets into his corpse.

She is tackled by a man, who forces her to the ground. The gun clangs off the floor, rolling down the hallway.

The shots send June upright. Her hands are shaking as she fumbles with the sheets, pulling herself out of bed. She wonders if this is how August felt in the last moments in his life. She prays that she doesn't join him, for the first time in her life. Perhaps this power is August's blessing from beyond the grave. If he can't live forever, then she will. June feels her muscles tighten as her body tries to wake up.

Eden grabs the lamp off the coffee table. He slams the metal base off the top of the third woman's head.

Erik grabs the gun from the floor and rushes into the room. It's hard to aim as Hope wriggles beneath him. She shouts out in pain as he kneels on her stomach and pins one of her hands between his legs.

Erik shoots the man in the head. Jamie can't help the screech that escapes his lips, even from the other end of the hallway. He and Wesley run into the hallway. Finally, Percy makes her way in. She struggles to push the man off Hope with just her foot, careful not to touch his skin. Wesley darts over and helps them, putting the man on the ground.

"Are you okay?" Eden turns to Cara. He goes in to move the woman off of her.

"Don't touch her," Percy shouts as she moves in the room. "Be careful. Her skin will make us all go unconscious."

Eden feels himself grabbed from behind and pulled to the ground by the woman he had just knocked unconscious. The others pull into the room, watching the pair struggle, trying to manoeuvre over between the bunkbeds. Percy is the first to make her way around. She stares at the woman, trying to size her up.