“Phin! Get down here or we’re going to be late!”

Phin clenched the blue fabric between her teeth and yanked harshly, allowing the knot to tighten painfully around her hand. She dropped the appendage, and expertly situated the handkerchief so that it hid over half of her palm, including the scar that ran across it. Perfect. Nobody would ever know.

“Phin!” her brother called up to her again. “If we wanna get back before nightfall, we have to head out now!”

“Alright, alright, I’m coming!” she quickly grabbed a blue hair tie and snapped it around her wrist, over the bandana to hold it in place as she ran out of her room.

Downstairs, her older brothers waited by the door, Chaz closer to the stairs with his arms crossed, and Wes with one hand on the knob, tapping his foot like the ever-impatient twenty-one-year-old he was. They both had annoyed scowls on their faces which, coupled with their bulking bodies, would cause most people to shit their pants out of fear. But she was used to it, and besides, they would never hurt her.

“God, how long does it take for you to get ready?” Wes groaned, throwing open the door.

Phin rolled her eyes. “If you would’ve given me more than a five minute warning, then we wouldn’t be so late now would we?”

“We always go on the same day at the same time.” Chaz scolded. “What are the others going to do if we aren’t able to make it back in time before dark?”

“Find someone else to run their suicide missions.” Phin grumbled under her breath, just loud enough for only herself to hear. She knew it was petty. Each family in their tiny community had a part to play and a job to do, their’s just happened to be the biggest and most dangerous and for good reason. Nobody was as strong as her brothers, and barely any were stronger than her. They were the most fit to run into town, on the off chance that they didn’t make it back before the shields went up. Nobody else had as big of a chance of surviving as they did.

Amber and Koki came out of their houses across the street as they always did when Phin and her brother’s piled into their jeep every Sunday to wave at them. Phin lifted her hand and waved back energetically, planting a smile on her face as if to assure them that everything was okay and they would be back soon like always.

Koki’s dark eyes, ever so seemingly blank, rested on her light blue ones for a second, worry flashing through them. Phin knew he dreaded the coming of Sunday every week, due to his careful nature. He worried about how reckless both her and Wes were, and if Chaz could actually keep the two of them in line long enough to get back before dark. As if over a decade of doing this wasn’t enough.

Phin winked at him, before climbing into the back of the vehicle and plopping down on the seat. Up front, her brothers were already situated-Wes behind the wheel even though Chaz was clearly the better driver. Wes was more reckless, and sped which would save them precious minutes, even if only a few.

“Alright, here’s our lists,” Chaz said, pulling a pile of three neatly folded pieces of paper out of the breast pocket of his shirt. He handed the second shortest one back to Phin, and the shortest one to Wes, like always.

Phin let her eyes drift down the neat writing, not surprised that she got stuck with the clothes shopping again. At the top, there was a bright red 3:30 that was bolded, underlined, and circled multiple times, signalling what time she absolutely had to be done. She tugged back the edge of the bandana slightly so that she could see her watch. 1:48. Great. It was a good thing that Wes was able to get into town in ten minutes, thanks to his overzealous speeding.

“Wes, you-”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Wes cut him off, waving his hand dismissively. “Chaz, I know. Pick up Phin first and if the sun starts setting, leave you and get at least her home. God, do you have any clue how embarrassing it is having to hear that speech every week from my younger brother?”

“That’s because I have no idea if you’ll actually listen to me.” Chaz shot him a glare out of the corner of his eye.

“Please, do you honestly think I would risk our baby sister’s life saving someone as tightly strung as you?”

“I believe she could quite easily persuade you.”

Phin felt her chest clench up as it always did when they had these conversations. For brothers so close in age, Wes and Chaz were as different as day and night. One of the only things they agreed on was that between the three of them, she always came first. It was kind of a stressful thing, knowing that she might be the only thing keeping them from having an all-out meltdown resulting in one or the other moving out. Despite how much the two of them obviously loved each other (although it would be a cold day in hell before either one admitted it), that thought wasn’t too far fetched.

After all, it had almost happened before.

“You dishonor your family, lil bro.” Wes chuckled darkly as they drove past the checkpoint, now fully exposed to the outside world. If anything went wrong before they got back… well, Phin didn’t even want to think about that. “Just don’t go getting yourself killed in the twenty minutes it takes me to get her home and back. That will be my job if anything goes wrong.” he said this as if there was no reason to question whether or not he would be coming back for Chaz if anything happened. Because just like there wasn’t any question if they would get Phin to safety first, there was no way either one of them would leave the other.

“Nothing should go wrong so long as we follow my schedule.”

“Then there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Only fools believe that.”

Phin smiled to herself and turned to stare out the window. They had this exact same conversation every week, but for some odd reason it never grew old.

The scenery flew by, same as it always looked. Tall dry grass brushed up against the side of the van when Wes trailed a bit too far to the side of the road and she had to resist the urge to roll down her window and reach out to grab a blade. Amber would’ve loved to see one. They were the only people who ever got close enough to actually grab anything outside the checkpoints.

They trailed up to a small, slightly run down, bluish building with a sign that hung over the front door reading “St. Vincent DePaul.” It had been there for as long as Phin could remember and according to Harry-who was the eldest of their community at twenty-seven and one of the few who had a clear memory of life before the barrier-even their grandparents had shopped there when they were young.

“Remember to be out here waiting for Wes by 3:30.” Chaz told her as she hopped down from the jeep. “No later, no excuses.”

Phin rolled her eyes-”Yes dad.”-and slammed the door shut.

A girl with dark brown hair that was cropped short to her head was waiting behind the counter in the otherwise abandoned store. Their eyes met and Phin immediately knew what she saw. An eighteen-year-old girl with chest length-apart from the thick bangs that hung right above her eyebrows-greyish-blonde hair and baby blue eyes. Too beautiful for someone who was supposed to be trapped in their acne-enducing, sexuality-questioning, awkward age. She didn’t seem taken aback by that though, for which Phin was eternally grateful. It was always awkward when people stared at her for something that she found so ordinary it was almost a fact of life.

“Epiphany!” she laughed vaulting over the counter skillfully with one hand. Phin winced, waiting for the glass to crack and shatter underneath her flying body, which never happened. “I was beginning to worry that you had forgotten about me!”

Phin laughed and placed a hand on her hip, allowing the girl to wrap her arms tight around her torso. She never hugged back, but that was just life. She didn’t come from a family that showed affection in such an obvious way, instead opting for worried scoldings and the occasional surprise visit from McDonald’s (which they generally weren’t supposed to have).

“Jesus, Anna,” she pushed the girl off of her after a second. “You’re going to break that thing soon.”

Anna rolled her eyes and spread out her arms. “You were the one who just last week said that I barely weighed ninety pounds soaking wet. If a glass case can’t even handle me then it didn’t deserve to exist anyway.” she rolled back on her feet. “My shift ended over five minutes ago, but luckily for you I decided to wait. We don’t see each other enough.”

“You took the words right out of my mouth.” Phin glanced down at her watch with a sigh. “Unfortunately I only have a little over an hour, so we’re going to have to socialize while I shop.”

“Why are you always in such a hurry?” Anna whined as they made their way toward the back of the store where the children’s section was. “You just gotta start chillin one of these days. All this rushing can’t be good for your chakras.”

“Chakras? Is that your belief of the week?”

Anna shrugged. “More or less. Don’t avoid the point, though.”

Phin pursed her lips and raised one shoulder in a noncommittal shrug of her own. “My brothers are over protective.”

“Over what?” Anna let out a loud, whooping laugh. “The cashier girl in the second-hand store?”

Taking in her small figure, Phin couldn’t help but let out a smirk of her own. “More or less.”

“Well, good.” Anna nodded as they reached the children’s section and Phin pulled out her list, absently reading over what she needed while simultaneously listening to the other girl talk. “Because I’m sure I could take them out with one hand tied behind my back.”

Phin raised an eyebrow and once again took in Anna’s full five-foot-two-inches from head to toe. “Ah, have you seen my brothers? They haven’t been as small as you since they were in diapers.”

Anna scrunched up her nose. “And your mother was willing to risk having multiple? Was she a masochist or something?”

“Of sorts.” Phin shoved the list back into her butt pocket and began rifling through the clothes.

Sighing, Anna plucked the paper out of her pocket before reading it herself and turning to the other side of the aisle where the child boy’s section was. “And you’re sure you can’t stay longer?”

“Positive.”

“One of these days, girl, you’re going to have to fill me in on just why your family is so weird.”

“No promises.” Phin pulled out a shirt, before whirling around on Anna with it held out. “What do you think of this?”

Anna glanced behind her and grimaced. “Not even if you paid me.”

“What? I think it’s cute.”

“Yeah, if you want her to get beaten up by every little kid who sees her.”

For a second, Phin almost told her that the only other kid who ever saw Sally was Skylar, who was so helplessly in love with her (or at least as if in love as a twelve-year-old boy could be) and so therefor wouldn’t care what she was wearing. But she quickly thought better of it. That was something she could say to Amber, who was already in on all their secrets. Not Anna who was a secret in and of herself.

“What if I do?”

Anna shot her a glare out of the corner of her eye, before draping a pair of faded jeans over her arm. “Then I’m going to have to report you to the authorities.”

Phin laughed. “Yeah, go ahead and try.”

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For once, Wes was actually waiting for her when she exited the store-at 3:25, just to be safe-tapping his fingers on his wheel impatiently. Usually he was a good five to ten minutes late due to the fact that he wasn’t the type to hurry at all. Which was all and well for him considering that he was probably the most capable out of all of them, despite the fact that Chaz was both bigger and, according to popular opinion, smarter.

“Well,” she sighed, flopping in the passenger seat after all the bags had been piled in the back. She would have to climb into the back once they got to Hy-Vee where Chaz would be waiting. “Won’t Chazzie be surprised to see us there early.”

“I know, right?” Wes shot her a toothy grin, pulling away from the curb. “So how did everything go?” the question came off as light hearted, but Phin knew from experience just how loaded it really was.

She shrugged, not caring about the fact that he wouldn’t like her answer. “Same as always. Anna’s certain that I have no style, though.”

Knuckles turned white as her older brother tightened his hands dangerously around the wheel. Nobody liked her relationship with the small girl, despite the fact that she always insisted Anna meant them no harm. She was just a regular human, trying to get ahead in the world.

“So she was there again, today.”

Phin nodded. “She always is, Wes. It’s her schedule.”

From the way his eyes flickered to the clock, Phin could guess that them being late that day hadn’t entirely been an accident. She chose to ignore it, though. After all, she’d kind of gotten her mini revenge when Anna had decided to wait for her. Although this would probably only result in them being even later next week. How far would Chaz be willing to push it, though?

“Shadows only come out at night, Wes.” she murmured, just loud enough for the two of them to hear. “There’s no way Anna could be one.”

“But she could be working for them. It isn’t unheard of.”

Phin ground her teeth together. More than anything she hated when Wes got careful and overprotective. That was supposed to be Chaz’s job. Her oldest brother was supposed to be the one who took risks, and only cared up to a point when it came to others.

They drove the rest of the way in silence. When Chaz took her place in the passenger seat, all it took was one glance to each of them for his jaw to set. He didn’t say anything, but he knew. There were few things that Wes got upset with and Anna was one of the biggest ones.

By the time they got back to the community, the air in the jeep was so thick you could slice through it with a knife. Phin slid out and moved to the back to get the bags-organized by her on the drive home-for Amber and Koki’s families, the ones she always was in charge of. However she was stopped by Chaz’s hand on her shoulder before she even got the chance to touch the handles.

“You’re taking Jeremiah’s bags today.”

Phin froze, her eyes growing wide. “Excuse me?!”

He nodded toward the bags that sat at the way right of the trunk, packed sloppily in her hurried attempt to forget about the contents and who they belonged to. “You seem eager to run off and play, so you can run his over.”

“Are you serious?” she whined. “You’re seriously punishing me for talking to Anna?”

Chaz’s jaw set in anger. His bright blue eyes blazing. “You know the rules, Phin. Don’t draw attention to yourself. You of all people should realize just how dangerous Shadows can be.”

Phin clenched her teeth together and fought to keep from fiddling with the bandana, lest he decide to finally take notice of it after nearly two years. The last thing she needed right now was him questioning her about the scar when she was supposed to have been uninjured.

Well, that and going to Jeremiah’s house.

“So then this is to remind me of that?” she scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Trust me, Chaz, I’m reminded of that every single fucking day!”

“Then why do you still insist on doing stuff so dangerous and stupid even Wes wouldn’t think of it?”

“Anna isn’t dangerous!” Phin crossed her arms and spread her feet apart just as she had been taught. It was supposed to make her seem more intimidating. “Not everyone is out to get us, Chaz!”

“We don’t know that.” Chaz reached into the trunk, grabbed the handful of bags and shoved them into her arms. Phin was knocked back a few feet at the sheer force of his unintentional strength but regained her balance rather quickly. “Besides, Skylar’s taken to asking about you again. I think it’s high time you paid him a visit.”

Phin frowned. She knew that he hadn’t been-the boy could barely stand her-but once Chaz got his head wrapped around an idea, there was little to nothing that could change it. It was something they all had inherited.

“That’s a load of bull and you know it.” she placed her hand on her hip, dropping the bags back into the trunk. “Why don’t you just admit that it’s punishment?”

Chaz raised an eyebrow at her, his head turned slightly toward the car as Wes finally decided to make his own appearance.

“You’re right.” her eldest brother reached in and grabbed the bags again. “It is punishment. Which means you better get your ass into gear before I shove my foot so far up it you won’t be able to sit for a month.”

Phin sighed and held out her arms, allowing him to drop the bags into them. She would never admit it, but she was slightly relieved that he hadn’t been forceful about giving it to her like Chaz had been. If he had, there was no way she would be able to regain her balance. He wouldn’t hold back enough to make sure she didn’t fall on her butt.

She shifted the bags around her arms before giving them the harshest glare she could muster. Embarrassingly enough, she had little doubt that to them it probably looked little more than a kitten pouting to its owner. Those two were just way too tough for their own good.

“The quicker you get going, the quicker you can get back.” Chaz nodded once down the street, his arms tightly crossed so that his shirt strained against his muscles. Phin had little doubt that Amber as well as ninety percent of the other girls were currently pressed up against their windows watching her brothers. Which, by the way, ew.

She turned on her heel and marched down the road, making sure to shoot her worst glare at every window she passed. None of them held anyone clearly visible but only an idiot would fall for that. Her neighbors were smart enough to know better than to make their actions obvious. Her family didn’t take kindly to being stared at by anyone, whether it be from admiration or hatred. Even when they were little, she could remember her and her brothers squirming under the eye of their parents.

There was a brief crackling sound and then a bright blue bulb flickered around their neighborhood, raising maybe fifteen feet over the top of the houses before disappearing. The barrier. Put up even though it was barely four and the sky had yet to turn orange. It was a precaution just in case something went wrong, so they would have time to fix it.

Phin stared up at the sky, not missing how the slight breeze had suddenly ceased to exist, and how she could no longer hear the light chirping of birds a yard away. The seventeen hours she would be forced to spend under this dome had only just begun and already she could feel her heart race picking up. Maybe she should head over to Amber’s afterwards. Hopefully the brunette would have enough energy to keep her feeling tired.

Momentarily pushing the thought from her mind, she ducked her head to the ground, careful to allow her hair to shield any view of the invisible barrier and continued on toward her destination.

2: Part One: Phin: Chapter Two

She couldn’t remember a life where Shadows didn’t exist, just one where they weren’t such a threat. They had always been there, hiding in the shadows (no pun intended) just waiting for their moment to pounce. They were creatures that thrived under the darkness, only able to attack after sunset as during the day they existed only in the corner of your eye. But they were insane and fearless and powerful and something that only a stupid person wouldn’t be afraid of.

Phin and everyone in her community were Lights, naturally Shadows’ worst nightmare. There wasn’t much difference between the two races other than the fact that Lights were generally more thoughtful, and thrived during the day. The only thing that kept this feud between them and the Shadows different from some stupid gang thing was that they were all spawns from Angels and Demons. And despite what would probably be popular belief; it was the Shadows who were Angels, and Lights were Demons. Somewhere over the millennia that they had existed, the Angels had gone insane and the Demons became the “good” race.

Nobody was really sure what caused the surge in the Shadows that night, over a decade ago. Before, there had always been this sort of agreement between them; you don’t mess with us, we don’t mess with you. But for some reason on a hot summer day when Phin was six, the Shadows decided to attack on her community in a giant massacre that killed everyone over the age of seventeen, not to mention every girl over the age of ten.

Popular belief was that it was because the Shadows’ queen had gotten word that her three children who had been taken from her not half a decade earlier were being hidden there. Which was idiotic on the face of it. First of all, the rumors of the missing royal children were just that; rumors. Phin had little doubt that the sad truth was that they were all dead, hidden somewhere near the queen’s back door. Like she had said, Shadows were insane, and that didn’t leave their royalty out of it.

She came to a stop in front of the big white door. Had this been any other house on the street, she would’ve just taken a page from Wes and thrown it open with a loud yell and walked in like she owned the place. Most everyone was used to that kind of behaviour from the two of them, even if they didn’t enjoy it. However, because this was Jeremiah’s house, and she had a bit of an awkward history there which made her do what Chaz would’ve done and raised her hand to knock.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t the blonde man that answered the door, nor was it even Skylar both of whom she’d be able to handle on her own, despite Jeremiah’s crazy attempts to get her into bed (he was a notorious womanizer) and Skylar’s contempt.

It was Lennox.

Phin felt her muscles tighten underneath the bags she still hung on to. Of course this would happen. Even without any actual thinking ahead, Chaz’s plans went perfectly. It wouldn’t have been much of a punishment if she’d managed to escape without having to converse with him even once.

“Oh, um, hey,” he murmured, evidently taken aback by her sudden appearance on his doorstep. He lifted up a hand to run it through his messy blonde hair awkwardly, making Phin wonder for umpteenth time how the hell he could be older than both of her brothers. “Is something wrong? Is Wes okay?”

“Ah, yeah, um… no!” she shook her head wildly. “Um, he just wanted to shake things up so here… I… am.”

“Ah… well, um, okay.” he moved aside and opened the door further. “If you just want to set that in the kitchen….”

For a second, she was about to ask why he wasn’t offering to do so himself, instead making the girl five years younger than him work, but then she remembered that her family was stronger than most people. Especially Jeremiah, Lennox, and Skylar-they were all a bunch of girly boys.

“Okay,” she brushed past him, forcing herself to hold her head high despite her desperate need to climb into a hole and die right there.

He followed her silently into the kitchen, unnerving her even more. Not even his feet made a sound as they walked which caused her to silently groan. She didn’t do well with quiet moments; they had never existed in her house. The rooms were always filled with either exclamations by Wes or Chaz yelling at one of them for doing something stupid. Even at night there was loud music bouncing off the walls as she tried to sleep.

“Well, um, there you… go.” she dropped the bags on the ground right in front of the refrigerator. “Tell Skylar I hope he likes his shirt and to give anything that doesn’t fit him anymore to Rodrick as usual.”

She wiped her hands, which were suddenly soaked with sweat, on her bright green skinny jeans before turning around. He was standing at the threshold that led from the living room to the kitchen, his arms crossed loosely over his chest.

“Um, well… I have to get going. More bags to deliver and the such. Y’know.” she forced a harsh laugh from her lips and moved to rush past him and hurry out of the house. With any luck, her brothers hadn’t gotten to Koki or Amber’s bags yet so that she could have an excuse to talk to her friends.

However, as she was passing him, he suddenly reached out and grabbed a hold of her hand.

The hand with the bandana on it.

Phin felt herself tense up, fear at him questioning her on it rearing its ugly head for the first time in years. She’d worked so hard to make sure that no attention was ever drawn to it anymore, but being the only other person who knew about the scar, she was fairly certain that it wasn’t something Lennox could easily ignore.

After all, he had been there when it happened. The handkerchief that had been used to hide it for the first couple weeks had been given to her by him.

He had saved her.

Which was why she didn’t stop him as he tugged back the edges of the blue fabric, exposing the still slightly sweaty palm. A thick, jagged strip along the bottom was raised and discolored; the single, ugly reminder of what she had done.

Phin clenched her teeth and glanced sharply away from it. It was one thing to have it showing when she was alone in her room or bathroom, but having someone else staring down at it was horrible. She felt embarrassed, ashamed, to the point where she could almost feel the intense heat, causing her skin to bubble up and blister again.

He reached down and ran a single finger lightly along the scar, his eyes never leaving it for a second.

“It’s looking a lot better.”

Well, duh, it had been two years. It would be pretty worrisome if it hadn’t. She was almost ready to say that if he had just asked, she could’ve told him. He didn’t have to go all creeper on her suddenly, but the words were caught in her throat.

She raised her blue eyes to meet his green ones, before allowing her mouth to sag open ever so slightly. “You know,” the words surprised even her, coming out as barely more than a whisper, “I never did thank you for saving me.”

Lennox smiled slightly and gave a soft laugh that was more like an exhale. “I think your brothers said that way more than enough. I just wish-”

“I think,” she cut him off softly, “That if you’ve been thanked enough, then you’ve apologized enough as well, even though you have no reason to need to. It was my stupid mistake, I was the one who… ah…” she trailed off, unable to actually say the words.

“You were a kid.” he offered when it became obvious that she wasn’t going to continue on with her sentence. “You made a mistake. Everyone is entitled to those.”

“I was sixteen, Lennox,” Phin whispered. “I should’ve known better.”

“That was partially our fault. We didn’t teach you properly to be-”

“It was not your fault!” Phin pushed away from him, yanking her hand out of his. “Do you have any idea how painful it is to hear you guys say that? You warned us. You shouldn’t have had to and yet you still did and still…” she shook her head. “I was seven when it happened; I remember it happening. I at least should’ve known better.”

“She made her choice, too. She knew the dangers and she still-”

“It doesn’t matter if she made a choice. It was my job to protect her and I failed, and this scar is the punishment I must bear and I can’t even do that properly.” Phin laughed harshly and raised her hand to look at the still exposed palm, before grimacing and tugging the bandana back in place. “I still have other houses to go to.”

She stepped back and turned toward the door. Just perfect; she spent two years avoiding him out of guilt and now she just gave him a reason to believe she was even less worthy of being saved. Of all the stupid things she could’ve done.

“Hey, Epiphany,” aside from Anna, he was the only one who insisted on calling her by her full name, although his was due to some insane hatred toward nicknames even though he only answered to “Knox” instead of “Lennox” for some hypocrital reason. “You know you can always come and talk to me if you need to.”

Yeah, because that was just her dream in this world. To spend even more time at the house full of boys that either wanted to sleep with her or kill her. But Chaz would have her head if she said something like that so she just gave a silent nod that they both knew perfectly well meant little to nothing.

“I’m serious.” he continued even as she kept walking. God, were all front hallways this long? “Anything at all.”

Phin slowed to a stop before letting out a breath in a silent laugh and turning around slightly to face him, a sad smile stretching across her face. “No offence, Knox, but I don’t think there’s anything you could do for me.”

Lennox shrugged. “Maybe not. But I can try. I saved you once before.”

“Yeah well, then you haven’t met my family.” she rested a hand on the handle and swung the door open just enough for her to slip out. “We aren’t supposed to be saved.”

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Her brothers would be looking for her. She had been gone for well over twenty minutes-Wes didn’t even take that long to deliver to one house. Maybe they wouldn’t have thought twice about it if she had gone to Amber or Koki’s houses but they were probably expecting her to make as speedy of an exit from his house as possible, just like she had.

She just couldn’t bring herself to go home.

Instead, she found herself standing before a grave in the middle of a mini cemetery that sat just a few feet away from the far South-Western side of the barrier. It was simple, just a name, and birth and death dates, but it still managed to create a sharp pain right over her heart.

Christina “Chris” Maxey Evans. Born Jan. 27th 2096, Died May 18th 2110.

May eighteenth. Phin clenched her teeth together and folded her hands into tightly wound fists. Not too long ago that date had meant little to nothing to her, but now it was one of her least favorite days. She reached out and ran her fingers across the name.

Chris shouldn’t be there, six feet beneath the surface of the Earth, slowly rotting away until all that was left were her bones. She was supposed to be up there, running around with Lili and Ray when she wasn’t following Phin and her friends around. To be able to curl up with her, and Wes, and Chaz on the couch as they popped in Rebecca, the only non-comedic movie that all four of them could agree was arguably the best.

Lennox couldn’t help. Nobody could. No matter how hard they tried, absolutely nothing could erase what she had done. She had been young, had made a stupid mistake and it had cost her greatly.

She had killed her baby sister.