“The end is nigh, my friends! Soon, it will all be over!” 

The muttering rose to a crescendo after that statement, each individual whisper joining the vast choir of discordance. I stood there, gripping my mother’s hand tightly, my eyes fixed on the Prophet and the four other zealots on stage, nodding along with his message. The Prophet raised a hand, and the crowd obeyed his wordless command, slowly settling into silence. 

“I have heard the words of God who hath wrought this pestilence upon us. By His word, the deaths shall cease when twenty remain!” 

“Last time you said it’d stop at fifty!” someone from the crowd shouted, and others around him muttered in agreement. “How do we know this isn’t just bullshit?” 

“Silence!” one of the zealots shouted, stomping forward across the stage and only stopping when the Prophet held out a restraining hand. “Do not question His knowledge!” 

“That’s quite alright, my disciple. This man has every reason to be sceptical; his wife was claimed by God only recently.” 

The zealot stared daggers at the man in the crowd, slowly backing away to retake his position next to the rest of the group, never taking his eyes off him. 

“My good friend Nelson,” he said, readdressing the outspoken man, “God was disappointed with our actions and punished us accordingly. What once was meant to stop at fifty will now stop at twenty. Do not blame Me; blame your friends, your family, your acquaintances. For one of them did something to anger God, and God is not light with His wrath.” 

“That doesn’t answer my question! Your God doesn’t really exist, does he? Nobody is talking into your ear, it’s just you spreading lies to pacify us!” 

The crowd slowly became louder and louder, accusing the Prophet of lying to them, of leading them on with false promises, questioning if there really is a God after all. My mother gripped my arm tightly, pulling me away from the stage. 

“Mom?” 

“Come on, let’s go, Lorelei.” 

“But—” 

“It could get dangerous back there. We heard what we needed to, let’s just go home, okay?” 

She dragged me through the crowd and we emerged out the back without too much effort. I look back, watching the entire population of our dwindling village shouting and jeering, while the Prophet tried and failed to calm them. Eventually, we turned a corner, and all that remained was the distant shouting and the empty streets before us. 

“Weren’t you the one who wanted to go to these things in the first place, mom?” We continued walking, and I gazed into the countless empty windows along the street, picturing the people who once lived in these homes going about their daily tasks. 

“Yes, I did, and we heard what we needed to.” 

“What, that the Prophet changed his mind?” 

“No,” she said forcefully as we reached our home. She pulled her keyring from her pocket, flipped through it, and slotted one of the keys into the lock. “That God has changed His plans for us.” 

“But what if Nelson’s right?” The words tumbled from my mouth before I could stop them. 

“He’s not,” she spat, jiggling the key in the lock for a moment before pulling it back out, cursing under her breath, and looking through the keyring again. I raise an eyebrow. 

“There were only twenty-five people in the crowd, we would have been fine if we’d stayed. Why’d you really pull us away?” 

She finally singled out another key from the ring, and this time, the lock clicked, and the door opened. She sighed, stepping inside, but didn’t respond. 

“Is it about dad?” 

She stopped in the doorway. “He never stopped believing.” 

“Mom…” 

“Even on his last day, he said ‘don’t worry, we’re all going to be fine, they said fifty of us will survive!’” Her voice was shaky, and she sniffled, pulling a handkerchief from her pocket and raising it to her face. “He believed with everything he had. When it took him, I just…” she sniffled again, tilting her head upwards. “The Prophet’s right, we must have done something to anger God, that’s why He continued taking people. We just need to be obedient, appease Him, and He’ll keep His word this time.” 

I wanted to ask her what we could possibly have done wrong in God’s eyes. I wanted to tell her that the Prophet’s reasoning was bullshit, that there might not even be a God that caused this. 

But what was the point? Both of us had thirty days at the most to live, if the Prophet was wrong. I had little hope left, but it wasn’t fair for me to take hers away. 

“I guess so,” I mutter, looking away from her, the words tasting like ash in my mouth. At least the Prophet provided us with someone to blame.