JOSH.
We ate in the greenhouse.
Not because we had to — there were three furnished floors below — but because the soft hum of the hydroponics, the filtered warmth of the solar glass, and the scent of fresh basil and lemon thyme made it feel like the world hadn't cracked open yet.
The long table was old scaffolding wood, salvaged from the unfinished floors. Boris had sanded it smooth. Jessi had found mismatched chairs in the storage unit and arranged them like a last-minute wedding reception. Jules brought tea. I cooked.
Simple food: flatbread, hard cheese, sundried tomato spread, roasted carrots, dried apples, and a few eggs we probably should've saved — but morale mattered more than logic tonight.
Luna had stolen two scraps already. Houdini let her. He was becoming soft.
"You know," Jessi said as she poured water into glass jars, "this is nicer than my actual apartment. And there's a cow in the next room."
"We aim to impress," I said dryly.
"Is this what you imagined when you told me you were 'fixing up the place'?"
"Not even close," I admitted.
Jules raised a brow.
"You were barely surviving on instant ramen a year ago. I remember. You burned water."
"Growth," I said, lifting my glass. "Apocalypse-style."
Everyone clinked. Even Boris, who seemed a little hesitant around toasts.
The laughter faded gently, and for a few moments, we just ate. Wind tapped lightly at the dome. The city below looked like a model — small, fake, unreal.
"You know it's kind of crazy, right?" Boris said finally, gesturing to the garden around us. "The livestock. The filtration. The solar glass. All of it. But it's also…"
"Brilliant," Jessi finished for him.
"Prudent," Jules added, without looking up from her plate.
"Necessary," I said.
They all looked at me. I hadn't meant to say it so sharply.
I set my fork down.
"Sorry," I murmured. "It's just... I've seen what happens if we're not ready. And the worst part wasn't what they did to me. It was that we could've stopped it."
The table went still.
"Dream?" Boris asked quietly.
I nodded.
"Rosie?"
Another nod.
Jessi's fingers tightened slightly around her cup, but she didn't look away.
"Well," she said eventually, voice calm but firm, "you're not alone this time."
Jules leaned back, eyeing me with something close to approval.
"And this time," she said, "we have a bullet press."
The tension broke. We laughed — maybe too hard. But it felt good. It felt human.
Outside, the wind grew stronger. Somewhere in the distance, thunder grumbled low.
But in here, in this warm little pocket of green and light and stubborn hope, we pretended the world hadn't ended yet.
And for a little while, we made it true.
--
ROSIE.
The rain had stopped, but the wind still cut like glass.
They'd made camp in the skeletal shell of a construction site two blocks from the condo tower — a half-built luxury complex, abandoned when the warnings started. Tarps flapped overhead. Someone else's graffiti glared from cracked concrete.
Brent kicked over a rusted barrel with a snarl.
"He's lying. He's in there. I saw someone behind that glass."
"So did I," Eric muttered, crouched low with a half-burnt protein bar in his hand. "Blonde chick. Same one from that firm party, remember? The hot one."
Brent's fists clenched.
Rosie didn't move.
She stood with her arms wrapped tight around herself, staring at the tower.
From the outside, it looked dead. Cold. Like no one had touched the place in weeks. But she knew better. She knew Josh — the way he bit his tongue when he doubted you, the way he always left the hallway light on, the soft clink of his watch on the counter when he took it off at night.
"He's there," she said. "And he doesn't want us in."
"No shit," Brent snapped. "That glass isn't just bulletproof. It's smart glass. One-way. Solar-coated. Rich-boy panic room."
Eric licked the wrapper clean.
"Can't stay out here much longer. We're burning through food."
Rosie didn't respond. Her eyes stayed on the building — four stories up, where the windows should've been dark… but weren't. Not quite.
Brent stalked back toward her, breath hot and angry.
"You said he liked you. You said this would be easy."
Rosie turned to him slowly.
"It was easy. Until she showed up."
"Who?"
"That bitch cousin. Jules. He let her in."
She stepped closer to the edge of the platform, the wind tugging her wet hair around her face like vines.
"He'll break," she murmured. "He's always been too soft. We just need to press."
Eric scoffed.
"We press too hard, and he'll go full paranoid. We'll lose our window."
Rosie smiled.
"Not if we don't knock. Not if we make him think the danger's out there, not right behind him."
She turned back to the tower, eyes glowing faintly in the citylight, the way a fox's eyes catch fire right before it leaps.
"He trusts her," she said softly. "We'll use that."
Behind her, Brent and Eric exchanged a look — not uncertain, not afraid — just tired and hungry.
And beneath that hunger, something worse.
A patience that only predators understand.