[01/15/2046 - 12 : 00 AM : 3rd POV]
As Isabella was happily humming the babies to sleep, she smiled and gazed at the sight of her innocent children. Suddenly, she heard the sound of the grand father clock chiming at 12 AM. She went back to her office and took out a quill to start writing Ray's 'adoption' papers. She then walked towards her calendar, and crossed off January 14th with a smile.
"Happy birthday, Ray, and goodbye.." Isabella said to herself. All of the sudden, she heard the sound of screaming coming from somewhere. She went out from her room and went to investigate the sound, it was coming from the Dining Room. Once she opened up the doors of the room, she was greeted by a ton of smoke, a fire, and Emma crying.
"RAY!!!" Emma shouted.
"What is this awful smell?" Isabella wondered, covering her face from the flames and smoke. She then looked down to find a crying Emma, shouting Ray's name. "RAY!!!" Emma shouted once more. "Ray??" Isabella said confused. "Emma, what's the matter?" Isabella asked, kneeling down. "Mom! Help! Ray's in.. Ray's in there!!" Emma said as she teared up.
Isabella analyzed Emma for any signs of lying, but she couldn't find any. She then opened up her pocket watch to see what Emma was saying was true. "He set himself on fire?!" Isabella said in bewilderment. She then turned back to the hallways to see Gilda wide and awake. "Mom!" Gilda called out. "Gilda! take the kids and babies from my room outside!" Isabella instructed.
"Okay!" Gilda followed. "If I can, I at least have to save the brain!" Isabella said, getting out a fire extinguisher. "Emma, stay back!" Isabella ordered, pushing her away as she started trying to extinguish the flames. "Ray.." Emma murmured, still looking at the fire.
As Isabella used up all of carbon dioxide from the extinguisher, she threw the container into the ground and kept looking at the fire. "Why aren't the sprinklers working?" Isabella asked herself. "Emma, you'll need to get out of here too, or else you'll.." "Emma?" Isabella called out. She was left all alone in the dining hall, with Emma gone, she then checked her tracker, and saw that Emma's tracking device was in the nearby bathroom.
"Emma?" Isabella asked, but all she saw was a bucket in the bathroom. She checked her pocket watch again to confirm her location, and the star was still there. She walked closer to the bucket, and tipped it over, revealing a severed ear in the ground. She picked it up, to reveal the ear still dripping blood.
She looked at the ear for a second, and suddenly, it hit her, she was tricked. She gritted her teeth at the sight of it. "We're those children, wearing their shoes?" Isabella asked.
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As Isabella was busy trying to put out the fire, Emma was running as fast as she can through the forest, covering her cut out ear with a towel. Once she made it to the end of the forest, everyone looked back at her with joy. "Emma!!" Chris called out happily. "Thanks for waiting, everyone!" Emma thanked, with the other kids looking back at her happily.
【Earlier - 11 : 45 AM】。。。。。。。。。。
"Thank you all, thanks a lot, Emma and Luna." Ray said, dropping the matchstick. As he dropped the match stick, Luna dashed towards Ray swiftly, and caught the matchstick a few seconds before it hit the ground.
"Good timing, ey?" Luna said, showing off the burnt matchstick with a grin. "What the?!-" "Sorry, but we have no intention of letting you die, and neither will Norman and the other kids." Emma stated. "Other kids-" Before Ray could ask, two sharp knocks were heard from the door, Emma went towards the door and found Thoma and Lannion with a box.
"Emma! I got the things you wanted!" Thoma said, showing her the box. "Yeah, and, everyone's all ready to go now!" Lannion added. "Thanks, Thoma, Lani." Emma thanked. She then took away the box from the two, with Thoma and Lannion taking out the extra clothes inside. "Okay, Ray, time to get changed!" Emma said as she carried the box, with Thoma and Lannion handing Ray his extra clothes.
... After having Ray change his clothes, Luna walked over to the two with a scalpel. "Done changing? Great, now we can deal with the painful part." Luna said as she showed Ray the scalpel, with the tool's sharp blade glistening like a mirror. "Wait.. Listen, you guys, I'm-" Before Ray could continue on with his sentence, he received a big slap in the face by Luna.
"ARE YOU STILL PLANNING ON DYING HERE YOU EDGE LORD?! SHUT THE F*CK UP! WE'RE ESCAPING, SO CUT THAT SH*T OUT AND KNOCK SOME SENSE INTO YOUR GOD DAMN *SS!" Luna shouted, clenching her hands onto Ray's shirt. "Emma, Luna, we're done here!" Thoma and Lannion called out. "Awesome!" Luna said happily. "Good!" Emma joined in, with Ray touching the spot where Luna slapped him in.
"What's this?" Ray asked, looking over at the uniform with piles of food on top of it. "It's your replacement!" Lannion answered. "It'll create a specific smell, a realistic one to be precise." Thoma added. Ray then laid his eyes onto what seems to be Anna's long blonde braids. "Those braids.." "Anna gave them to us, now, all that's left are your trackers." Luna said.
"No worries, It'll just be like cutting an apple, so just come over here and show me it." Luna said as she held her scalpel. "Wait, what is this.." "'You can die anywhere, just not here, I'll show you something cool, so shut up and follow' Norman wanted me to tell you that." Emma said happily.
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To my dearest Emma :
I'm going to write down the plan from here.
Ray is planning to die.
He's doing all this so you and I don't get killed.
He wanted to save everyone.
But he didn't include himself in the numbers.
He has no intention of escaping.
He plans on dying inside this House.
He's going to set himself on fire to distract Mom in order to let us escape.
That's Ray's plan.
But, I'm not going to let him do that.
No matter what.
That's why I'm writing down the plan I came up with.
It'll happen in two months.
Probably the night before Ray's birthday.
Use the fire that Ray's planning to start.
save Ray, outwit Mom, and escape with everyone.
Don't worry, there's still time.
I also something unexpected, it was from Sister Krone.
I'm counting on you, Emma.
Please take care of Ray and our siblings.
And everything else.
(Oh, and make sure Luna doesn't destroy the whole place, I know she'll wreck havoc once I'm gone.)
-Norman
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"Let's begin, Norman." Emma said, lighting the matchstick once again, and throwing it onto the puddle of oil.
"RAY!!!!!"
【Present - 12 : 23 AM】。。。。。。。。。。
"Alright, everyone! Let's head over and climb the wall!!" Emma said happily, with the other children cheering. "Norman.." Ray murmured. He felt a hand resting on his shoulder, to see Luna looking back at him. "Don't try to ditch us on our escape, idiot." Luna said, patting Ray's back before continuing on to run with everyone else.
"Hey, Don! What's going on?!" Ray asked as he ran. "Do they all know about the house and the escape plan?" Ray asked. "Yup!" Don said happily. "How?!" He continued to ask. "Emma told them about it." Don answered once more.
【Flashback - 10/31/2045】。。。。。。。。。。
"Norman, let's let the rest of the kids in on what's going on." Emma suggested. "Let's tell more kids about it, thanks to Don and Gilda, I've now realized that maybe our other siblings aren't as immature as we think." She continued. "Realistically speaking, if we're going to run away from monsters, I think it's better for them to know about the dangers and the situation we're facing, so that they can join us willingly. Plus, Mom only suspects the oldest of the kids here, and not everyone else." Emma added.
"Is it... reckless?" Emma asked Norman. "I'm afraid so.." Norman said. "But Norman! We can catch Mom off-guard with this plan! Realistically, this is the only way to escape with everyone!"
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"At first, Emma had us tell four people, Nat, Anna, Lannion, and Thoma, they were instructed to hear everything Sister Krone say." Don stated. "That far back?!" Ray said dumbfounded. "It took us two months, but we managed to bring in the rest of the kids!" Don said happily.
"Mom probably didn't notice it, but Emma was only pretending to have given up, she was actually busy telling the others instructions about the plan." Don added.
"How far along are you, with the plan I mean, Emma." Ray asked, turning his direction back to Emma. "Everything is ready, there's food, supplies, and warming clothing, we can leave whenever." Emma reported.
"You guys.." Ray murmured. "Did you really think I lost my sanity? HAHA, no. I still have at least half of it to keep me sane enough from hallucinating like a madman. Besides, it only took me a week and a half for me to lash out all of my anger, I had to calm down eventually." Luna stated. As everyone stopped to gaze at the tall, sturdy wall. Emma suddenly felt a light touch behind her, and she turned around to see Norman.
"Norman.." Emma said happily, although, she did know it was just a hallucination. "Nat and I will climb first, we'll pull everyone up afterwards." Emma instructed. "Okay, everyone, just do it like how we trained, and you'll be just fine!" Gilda encouraged. "We're all going to escape!!!" Emma said determinedly, with everyone else cheering happily.
"Wait... Is this.. all of us?" Ray asked.
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"It's burning, everything.. everything is burning.."
"But.."
"Emma and Ray! They're still alive!"
"I'll still be able to catch them in one piece!"
"I WON'T EVER LET YOU ALL ESCAPE FROM HERE!" Isabella laughed. Before she could continue on laughing, she felt a slight tug on her dress. She turned around to see, Phil.
"Mom?"
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"I... thought about what you said earlier, one last time." Emma said, pulling up Jemima with Anna helping her out. "I've decided, we're going to leave the youngest kids here." Emma said as she held Jemima up. "But, that doesn't mean we're leaving them here forever! We're not giving up on them just yet, it's just that we can't bring them with us right now." Emma added.
【Flashback - December 2045】。。。。。。。。。。
"Everything's going good, we've got the kids over five with us." Don reported. "They were kind of surprised, but nonetheless, they managed to come through with us." Gilda added. "The training exercise is also going well too." Don said. "Thanks you guys." Emma said as she laid in her infirmary bed.
"So, what comes next, do we need to tell the kids under five?" Don asked Emma. "But, what I'm worrying about is if they're able to believe us." Gilda pointed out. "It's more of, can they hide the secret from Mom." Don added. "And even if we somehow convince them, can we even take them with us?" Gilda wondered.
"It's not like I believe in Norman's plan, but there's a cliff, there's winter, and Norman's not here." Gilda said. "What are you trying to point out?" Don asked. "Even after we escape, there will be unpredictable situations we have to go through, I know it's a little late to say this, but I'm starting to get Ray's point.." Gilda said, rubbing her hand nervously.
"But Gilda, if we leave them behind they'll get shipped out!" Don reminded her. "I know! I know that, but..." "Even so, in the end, we can't just leave them all behind.." Emma interrupted. "Ray's right, Gilda's right too, but... I don't want anybody else to get shipped out." Emma said with a sad smile.
"I agree with you, Emma." Don agreed. "I want everyone to escape with us, and run away altogether." Emma stated. "Everyone..." "What's wrong, Gilda?" Don asked. "What about the kids in the other plants.." Gilda asked, to which Emma was surprised at her thought. "Can we really escape with just us, the kids from plant three? We've never met nor seen them, but they're just the next plant over, right? And just like us, they're probably living their own lives, not knowing anything, families.. just like ours." Gilda explained.
"E-uah! I'm- I'm sorry!" GIlda apologized, noticing their stares. "Well, what should we do, Emma?" Don asked. "Could you guys go call Phil here?" Emma asked, looking at the silver pen in her hands.
"What's up?" Phil asked, entering the infirmary. "I have,, something to tell you, about the house and Mama." Emma said, with Phil lowering his smile.
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"I see, so that's what's been going on." Phil said calmly, with Emma and the other two looking confused and surprised. "It was just as I thought... Ever since the day we played tag with Sister Krone, they said something about a 'Harvest' and I have been wondering what she was talking about." Phil explained.
"One time, I saw her digging around into Ray's drawers and bed, and when Norman left, I noticed that you were really scared around Mama Emma.." Phil added. "It was kind of weird,, but after hearing this from you, Emma, it seems that Norman got harvested off.. and Conny, and everyone, so that's why you were so.." After reaching mid point of Phil's sentence, he soon started tearing up, with Emma wrapping her arms around him to give them a hug for comfort.
"Listen, Phil, I need you to help me decide an important decision. Should I take everyone, including the babies? Or should I leave the kids here under five." Emma asked, with Gilda and Don looking shocked at Emma and Phil. "We start being shipped out at the age of six, and even though Marnya's birthday is the closest, she still has a year and a half until she gets shipped out." Emma stated.
"fifteen of the oldest kids will be gone, and for this farm, they value quality is over quantity. So from that point on, they'll surely start to slow down their pacing of shipments if they ever want to raise high-quality kids again, in order to raise good-quality merchandise though, they'll want to not kill off the kids who have high potential, and according to your scores, you guys have been averaging in the right amount. So you guys shouldn't be shipped out just yet." Emma explained.
"According to your ages and the shipment cycles, I'm guessing that you guys have at least 2 more years to live." Emma said, "Wait! Emma, that's just-" "I can wait!" Phil said, turning his direction over to Don and Gilda. "Just leave me here, we can wait." Phil said with a smile.
【Flashback ENDED - 01/15/2046 : 12 : 45 AM】。。。。。。。。。。
"We can't take them with us right now. But we're definitely not giving up on them." Emma said. "Only Phil knows the truth, none of the other children know a thing. They don't know about the fire, house, nor the farms. So we're leaving the rest of it to Phil." Emma said determinedly. "We'll come back here after 2 years, and we'll save everyone, as well as the rest of the kids from the other plants." Emma added.