Hawkwood students are uneased. The fire, coupled with the student death, has made the campus feel unstable, volatile even. The President has issued a statement, reassuring students that their campus is safe. Somehow, with only around 1500 students living on campus, so few knew of Poppy Prevost. Her death is a tragedy for some, gossip for others.

Of course, unless you're an initiate of The Divide.

~~~

Tom knocks on the door to a classroom where Vieira is working on her latest piece for art class. It is Wednesday, two days since she killed Poppy, and besides seeing Luis in class and not speaking to him, she has avoided The Divide.

She sits alone, looks up, and stares at Tom.

"Luis said I'd find you here," he offers. He is wearing stage makeup that looks thick in person. He didn't have anything else to cover the yellow tinge to his skin, from all the nights of tossing and turning. He is growing sick.

Vieira continues to look at him.

"I was wondering..." Tom trails off. "Are you crying?"

Vieira raises a paint-stained finger to her face. She wipes away a tear that she hadn't even realized was there. She is not in sync with her body anymore. She's never heard the tune to which it dances.

"Yes," it's the first thing she has said to any of them since she agreed to kill Poppy. She said yes then too.

Tom steps forward, "you can talk to me. I'm always here for you."

Vieira looks at him and remembers his acting the night Poppy died. She remembers him pouring the drink which helped kill her. Where was the guy who jived with her at a party when everyone else was grinding? Where is the guy who is obsessed with every single film he has ever watched?

Has it all been an act?

"Vieira," he says.

She looks away, averting her eyes.

He comes up to her and places his hands on hers. She pulls them away gently, before getting up and stepping back, "just go."

There are so many things Tom had wanted to do with her. He had wanted to ask her to come to a movie night in his dorm. He has bought thick pillows and blankets to spend time with her. He wanted to grab tea on campus; he knows she likes green tea. He had considered grabbing one when coming here but didn't want to wait in line before seeing her.

"Vieira, I don't understand," Tom says.

She turns, tears staining her face. Her fingers are covered in paint and her eyes are wet. Her hair is messy and in her face, and she lets herself hide behind the brown strands.

"I don't ever want to see you again," she admits, her voice quiet. "You've destroyed yourself, Tommy. You've become one of them."

~~~

Jetta and Roman grab a coffee together. They take a private room in the library and work. Neither of the pair studies. Jetta composes music for her band. She rips up sheet after sheet, crumpling them and shoving them in her backpack. Roman, meanwhile, continues to research ethics. The more they read, the less good they feel.

Have they achieved justice?

"This is pointless," Jetta says. She doesn't way to explain it aloud, but she thinks that whatever music she had died when she watched Poppy convulsing on the floor.

"We can get through it," Roman mumbles, but they aren't so sure. The more they consider their actions, the worse they feel. They didn't dump the absinthe down her throat, they didn't take part in tricking her into coming. How culpable does bringing gloves make an individual?

Jetta knows what Roman is talking about without saying a word. Jetta leans in close. She hunches her shoulders and sighs, trying to match Roman's posture. They are in this now. Jetta empathizes, but cannot let her neck get put on the line.

"There's nothing to get through," she whispers. "What's done is done."

"Don't you ever think about it?" Roman asks.

Jetta's eyes soften, "of course I think about it. I think about it every day. That doesn't mean that thinking is any good."

Roman wonders if the others can see it. They wore sweatpants out of the house for the first time in their entire life this week. No one commented on it. It seems people pay less attention to you than you expect. Odd, given how fixated everyone was on Poppy's every action a week ago.

"All I do is think," Roman says. "Forgive me, but I am a philosophy major."

It's impossible to reason with a philosophy major. Jetta should have surmised that Roman's identity is built off thought and morality.

"Textbooks don't have all the answers," Jetta points out. "She threatened us. We're a team now."

Roman knows that they are a team. They've put their life on the line not just for themselves, but for others. They wanted to be a conscientious objector, but that is far from possible now.

"But Jetta," Roman looks into her eyes, "how do you stop the brain from doing the thing that best separates us from beasts without becoming one yourself?"

~~~

Ellie has plated her food in the cafeteria when she spots Evelyn eating alone. Evelyn is carefully picking apart her food, drawing a design into her sketchbook with her left hand. Ellie could sit alone. She has exactly twenty-eight minutes left in her lunch break. Evelyn is quite a bit too chatty.

Evelyn feels a gaze on her. She imagines they are Poppy's ghost's eyes. When she peers around, she spots Ellie and flags her over.

Ellie joins her, just as Evelyn is packing away her sketchbook.

"How are you?" Evelyn smiles.

Ellie notices how delicate all of Evelyn's features appear. The girl looks more like a china doll than a person. Ellie is drawn into the comfort of it all. The fancy dolls at her house always stayed in a cabinet; she could never touch them. Now, one is so close.

"I'm good," Ellie answers.

"Perfect," Evelyn says. She shakes her head. "Everyone seems so down these days."

Ellie nearly chokes on her soup, "pardon?"

"You know, what with the death of that girl, and the fire," Evelyn is so serious that Ellie cannot tell if she has actually forgotten.

Evelyn remembers, but she is playing it cool as Kai wants. He still hasn't said when they are going to have their first date, but she doesn't mind. She spends hours a day planning her first look. It is sure to be gorgeous. For now, she will act as if nothing is wrong, despite the pool of thoughts that have sunk to her feet, making them drag along the ground when she walks.

"It sure is crazy," Ellie swallows. Does Evelyn think The Divide is watching? Surely, The Divide already knows what they've done. The secret society hasn't put a stop to their behaviour yet, however.

"I'm sure things will be right as rain soon," Evelyn nods her head at Ellie.

Ellie isn't so sure. She's been having nightmares that wake her through all hours. That is, on the rare nights she does sleep. She's petrified of lying down. Ellie wonders if Briar feels the same way.

"Right," Ellie says.

"How are classes going? Are you excited for the masquerade on Halloween?"

Ellie thinks about the masquerade. It'll be a chance not to be herself for an evening, something she revels in. Being herself has been a bit too much lately.

Ellie thinks about psychology. She knows how people tick. Only in retrospect does she realize the roles that peer pressure and mob mentality played in their treacherous deeds. Only time will tell if those are enough to bond them together or break them apart.

The best number of people to keep a secret is one. Any more, and you fall into dangerous territory.

~~~

Luis hangs out in Briar's room. After all, it is much cleaner than his. Neither of them is good at keeping the conversation going, but neither of them wants to be alone. Luis sits in her chair and Briar on her bed, staring at each other while a record plays.

"I know this song," Luis points out.

"It's rather popular," Briar agrees. She looks over at Luis, carefully watching him. Why did he come?

"Listen," Luis leans forward, his voice quieting with each syllable he speaks. "Some of the others are beginning to freak out. I saw Tom this morning, and he was wearing stage make-up. He looks sickly"

How silly, Briar thinks. She just wears regular make-up so that her face looks passable. "I'm sure he's fine."

"I'm sure he's not," Luis argues, a smile across his face.

"If I'm fine, then he has to be fine," Briar says.

Luis wants to laugh. Clearly, Briar is not fine. It would be foolish to think she was after so many terrible things had happened. Hell, Luis isn't fine. He wants to leave, but he knows how quickly that will break apart their group. He feels like an elastic holding everyone together. Stretched too thin.

"Have you seen any of the others?" Luis asks, "because Vieira won't make eye contact with me in class anymore, and-"

"We're fine," Briar cuts off the conversation. Her family is wealthy. If she needs to, she can pay off the scholarship kids. The others, she has to rely on. Everyone voted yes. They are all in this together. None of them would dare incur her wrath. "No one is going to rat."

"I'm worried they are going to fall apart before they snitch," Luis thinks about all of the secrets that they now share. It is too much for anyone to handle. He can't think straight anymore. His art is better than ever, but he cannot make it to class on time for the life of him, and sketches are strewn about his room like snowflakes in the heart of winter. Everything is coated, everything looks identical. He is lost.

"If you're so worried, talk to them," Briar tells him. "Force them into compliance."

"I don't think force is going to work," Luis says. "What should I do, threaten to murder them?"

Briar glares at Luis, "why are you being so obtuse?"

"You're the one..." Luis takes a second to calm himself down. This conversation is going nowhere. He had hoped Briar would better understand his position. He wishes she wasn't so direct, so forceful.

More than anything, he wishes that he was the person he was when he came to Hawkwood.

~~~

Ez waits for Felix outside the theatre. Together, they walk over to the film studio and wait outside for Kai.

As soon as class ends, Kai rushes outside. He brushes past the two of them, and they slowly walk in formation behind him.

"You shouldn't be here," he says. They had all agreed to go about business as usual, and his usual days don't consist of him interacting with a skeletal ballet dancer and a contrarious bibliophile.

"We need to talk," Ez says.

"Now," Felix adds.

The three make it through the hallways in silence. Kai hopes none of his friends recognize him and draw attention to his predicament. Felix is furious and, while Ez has a bit of a better reign on his temper, he is fuming as well.

Eventually, the three of them make it outside. They take shelter at a wooden table underneath a large tree. It is too cold and windy for studying outside, so no one will gather around them. They keep their heads down and their voices hush.

"We've got a problem," Ez says. "Major."

"What is it?" Kai asks.

Felix tenses, "have you read The Observer?"

Kai doesn't even know what The Observer is, and so he most definitely has not read it. He looks up at the others with a blank face.

Ez rolls his eyes. He would have gone to Roman if he trusted them not to implode. Instead, he is stuck here with Felix and Kai. Good at hearing a call to action, terrible at thinking.

"It's the fucking newspaper for the county," Ez digs into his bag and pulls out a crumpled, cut-out section. "Poppy's a fucking second-year."

"She's a spy from The Divide," Felix says. There is no doubt in his mind. Maybe her mother was a member, maybe not. "That's how she knew all our shit. That's why she kept us quiet. She knew everything."

"Shit," Kai mutters to himself. "Wait... how did we get her to come then? If she's a member, she would have known our letter was fake."

"Doesn't matter now," Felix says.

Ez bites his lip. Everything matters, despite how absurd things may seem. Poppy waltz right into their trap, knowing it was a trap, and then somehow died.

"Maybe she's not really dead," Ez points out. "Maybe she faked it."

"Bullshit she did," Felix rolls his eyes. "Ellie made sure she was cold when we left."

"Why did she drink if she knew to be suspicious?" Kai says. Poppy is smarter than that. Poppy is smarter than them all.

Unless maybe she wasn't so perfect after all.

"She was also a witness to the fire," Ez points out.

Kai presses the palms of his hands against his eyes. He breathes in, his diaphragm rising, his chest filling with air, and then he exhales. Each breath makes him feel like he has run ten miles. They are painful and heavy.

"Look, we came to ask you if we should gather the others or just try to spread the news by mouth," Felix looks over at Ez. "Although someone thinks we should keep this to ourselves."

"There's no use sending everyone into a panic," Ez shakes his head. He rubs his hands together, trying to build warmth. To the others, he looks like he's scheming.

"We hide nothing," Kai says. "Transparency is the game. There's no captain. We're a team."

"I told you," Felix hisses. "The second they find out we hid something is the second that all of this falls apart."

Though Kai and Felix are onboard, Ez pauses. He'll follow along, even though he believes in a meritocracy more than democracy. Something is going to go wrong though. They've had it easy up until now.

~~~~~

Hey! So this chapter has some of my favourite lines in it. I am quite chuffed! Anyway, no one really noticed it in the newspaper chapter so, to be clear, Poppy is a second-year. *suspenseful music*.

Who do you think will fall apart first (if anyone at all)?