"Two weeks ago, an invisible dome crashed down on Chester's Mill, cutting us off from the rest of the world." "Why the dome is here or what mysteries lie ahead, we still don't know." "Every day it tests our limits, bringing out the best and the worst in us." "Some say we'll be stuck here forever, but we will never stop fighting to find a way out." "I'm getting e-mail." "Signal's getting stronger." "It's coming from here." "James, I expect you know, that I'm alive." "Talk to Lyle Chumley." "No, no, no." "Come on, come on, come on." "She was drowning in the lake." "She just appeared." "I have no idea where she came from." "You made a promise 25 years ago to make sure that what we buried stayed buried." "Looks like Angie got a piece of whoever did this to her." "Those are the fingertips of a hand-- a big hand." "A man's." ""Summer '88."" ""Lyle, Sam and Pauline."" "What?" "What is it?" "It's... me." "Day's coming when there won't be enough food to sustain us." "It may become necessary-- to thin the herd." "this is a census, to help you decide who lives and who dies." "Good morning." "I'm not sure how good it is." "It is if you're using the census to address our population problem." "Well, got to see where we stand." "Well, we know where we stand." "We need people who are healthy, with practical skills, who give more than they take." "So, who's next?" "Alice." "She was the first dome baby." "Her mother's Harriet-- she teaches Sunday school." "What else does Harriet do?" "That's it." "She's a... single mother, a woman of faith." "Jim, our food supplies are dwindling." "We can't let these emotions dictate." "It won't be easy..." "Listen, I grew up with these people." "I was chosen to lead them." "I'm not gonna shake the tree until I'm sure who can carry their own weight... and who can't." "But how will you be sure?" "I don't know." "Maybe the dome will guide me." "That's a start." "What are you up to?" "I'm headed to the school." "Our windmill power project is really coming along." "Listen, Rebecca... we're gonna get through this." "As long as you're leading us." "Are you okay?" "No." "Did Phil I.D. Angie's killer from the stuff we found under her fingernails?" "That's a dead end-- there's no way to run the DNA." "And half the town probably has scratches after the magnetization." "Rebecca Pine thinks Chester's Mill can't sustain itself for much longer, and she and Jim want to use the census to decide who lives and who doesn't." "I know." "It sounds crazy." "No." "Big Jim's always had a God complex." "I know they have a plan; we need to find out what it is." "We?" "I could use the help." "Where does Barbie stand on all this?" "On Jim's side." "Jim." "We need to talk about your extermination plan." " Reduction option." " Okay, whatever." "Look, I know that we need to prepare for the worst, okay?" "But if that day happens, I want to be clear-- no one acts unless we both agree." "Listen, Barbie, I don't want that day to get here any more than you do." "Look, Chester's Mill couldn't have survived the past few days without you-- the magnets, the crops, the rain." "If we need to take that next step, we do it together." "Harriet." "There's so many people here." "It makes me feel like Alice has a family." "Well, that's right." "One big family." "Hey, we're so lucky to have you take care of us." "Right, Barbie?" "That's right." "If this place runs out of food, let's hope that we're not on the menu." "How can this be?" "Yearbooks don't lie." "It's from 25 years ago." "Hey, this is kind of personal," " but do you have probe marks?" " Joe, please." "Save your theory on intelligent life-forms of the universe for a TED talk." "Explain her memory loss, and the fact that she hasn't aged in decades." "Maybe the dome sent her." "It sent my mom." "No, Melanie's a person." " The dome sent an avatar; you can't grab an avatar." " Okay, whatever she is, let's not manhandle her." "And since there's no way she's actually Melanie Cross, then we probably shouldn't call her that." "Then what should we call her?" "I should know what my name is." "But I don't." "We should show him." "Uh, yeah, no, the last thing he wants to hear is that you found the fountain of youth in 1988." "Rockin' the same clothes as yesterday." "Too busy to come home last night?" "Yeah." "Is Julia here?" "No." "She left a note saying she'll be back later." "What are you guys doing up so early?" " We need to talk to Julia..." " Uh, we got e-mails." "You got e-mails when?" "Yesterday." "And you're just telling me about this now?" "We all got e-mails, until the signal was blocked." "And this popped up." ""This page can't be displayed."" "You think the military's blocking us, or...?" "That's not the standard response." "We get that signal back, we can communicate with the outside world." "Hey, I want you to take me to where this came through." "The devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried;" "ye shall have tribulation ten days:" "be thou faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life." "On your feet, Lyle." "You came to set me free." "My mother said you had answers;" "I want them." "I can do better than tell you." "I..." "I can show you." "Let me out." "Put these on." "O ye of little faith." "You kidnapped Rebecca and you tried to kill her." "She was standing... in the way of the Rapture." "If I'm gonna break you out," "I want your hands together." "Think of it as a prayer." " Thanks for coming over." " How's the piglet?" "I think it's a flu." "I'm sorry." "It's too late." "I'm worried about the others." "She was a newborn." "The others are strong." "If it's a flu, they'll fight it." "People can catch this, too." "Are you feeling all right?" "I'm fine." "So is Beth." "We've been careful about contact." "Good." "Do you have a wheelbarrow?" "No sense touching her more than you have to." "Everything happens for a reason." "This Wi-Fi signal's gone." "It disappeared when we got here." "So, you said this is where it was strongest, right here?" "Yep." "Because not enough's creepy about that locker." "I'm gonna have to go find something to pry this open with." "Uh, there's nothing in there." "But you don't know that-- it's locked." "How do you know that combination?" "I think this was my locker... in 1988." "What?" "Okay, i-is this some kind of joke?" "Played on us by the universe." "Looks like her, huh?" "That doesn't make any sense." "And the dome does?" "I mean, you could be this girl's daughter." "Barbie... you know what it's like to be a stranger here." "I don't want to be one anymore." "I'm not sure I can help you with that." "Why not?" "The signal's gone." "Help us figure out who she really is." "Let's go." "Rebecca likes to take her work home with her." "Or doesn't want to be seen doing it at school." "She's been somewhere with a lot of muck." "Eggs for breakfast, blood samples for dinner?" "Whatever she's doing, she's taking precautions." "Yeah." "She's got a calendar of when we run out of food and resources." "She really does think it's the end of days." "Our science teacher in prayer group." "That's new." "Well, she does have an interest in one of God's creatures, pigs." "Blood work, vet books, mud on the doormat." "There are a few farms around here with pigs." "Let's see if she paid a visit to any of them recently." "Rebecca?" "Hello?" "Rebecca?" "You working on the windmills?" "Rebecca?" "We're supposed to use microfilm in Julia's newspaper office?" "Seriously?" "This is how they found things in the Stone Age." "Yeah, we can't search by Melanie's name?" "No." "You just got to scroll and look." "I miss the Internet, I miss my cell phone," "I miss texting, I miss sushi." "Well, the Hall of Records turned up nothing, okay?" "This is the last place that I can think to look... for whatever it is that we might find." "Melanie wasn't in the '87 or '89 yearbooks." "Maybe The Independent ran an article about why her family came to Chester's Mill in 1988." "Or why she left." "In a town where Betsy Van Needles' record-breaking tomato makes the front page," "I'd say we have a pretty good shot." "Guys, look." "Melanie Cross went missing and was never found." "The family moved "To Chester's Mill from Zenith a short time ago."" "Zenith?" "That's the same town that I'm from." "I thought you looked familiar." "Melanie's family lived at 24 Old Oak Drive." "If she remembered the combo when she stood in front of her locker, then..." "You think she'll remember more if we take her to the house?" "No." "No, she won't." "Because she's not... she's not Melanie Cross." "There's just no way." "I want to go there." "I have to." "All right." "What do we say when we barge in on the family that lives there now?" "You let me handle that." "Talk to me." "Tell me how my mother's still alive." "We had a plan: severed brake lines, pilfered corpses, that idiot Reverend Coggins, he..." "God rest his soul." "My mother faked her suicide, and you helped her?" "I loved her very much, James, I still do." "She abandoned me." "To protect you." "She knew the dome was coming." "The pink stars in the paintings?" "She had to get out before she was taken out." "What does that mean?" "Your father had other plans for her." "He has no idea that she's still alive?" "No." "What about Sam?" "Pauline only trusted me to help her escape." "What kind of a mother leaves her son behind in this hell?" "I think she thought the dome would follow her and spare you." "I had to go to her funeral." "She left me here." "She left me to turn into Big Jim Rennie." "Look, your mother trusts me." "For nine years that's how Pauline stayed in touch." "With postcards?" "Yeah." "They're from all different places, but there's nothing on 'em." "Yeah, there is." "She made those." "Turn 'em over." "Her paintings." "Do those look familiar?" "This is all the stuff that happened since the dome came down." "The egg, the butterflies, the red rain." "If she's out there, how could she possibly know what's going on under here?" "Pauline saw a lot more than pink stars." "I don't see any windmills." "You stole my card, lied to me." "What are you doing, Rebecca?" "I'm finding a way." "When the dome first came down, I started visiting farms, monitoring crops and livestock." "Tom Tilden had a sick pig." "The flu." "What's inside the eggs, Rebecca?" "You said you'd do what it takes to save this town." "What's inside those eggs is how you're gonna do it." "Hello?" "They left the front door unlocked." "Probably went to the parade in Westlake and got trapped outside the dome on Dome Day." "Lucky them." "They didn't even finish breakfast." "Some kid didn't have to finish his algebra homework and avoided the hamster ball." "Double win." "Does it look familiar?" "I don't remember anything." "Because there's nothing to remember." "All I feel is sad." "It sucked having to walk through my house with my family gone." "And after Angie..." "I'm glad the place fell down." "How am I supposed to compete with a girl he thinks is from a galaxy far, far away?" "I'm sure he's just trying to help." "Don't undermine my feelings of jealousy and abandonment." "But since we're chatting, what's up with you and Julia?" "Come on." "You show up with the "Please forgive me" face." "She left before you got there, so she didn't want to hear it." "Whatever you did was super bad." "Your eyebrow just twitched." "Yeah, it did." "I'm really glad we could have this little chat." "Barbie, Nore." "Oh, my God." "I made these." "I used to look out the window and see them falling." "She saw stars fall?" "They were pink." "Yeah." "Over there." "I went out to find them." "That's where we found the mini-dome." "We got to go there." "Joe, slow down." "The dome came out of nowhere and changed our lives forever." "Angie was killed" " I might never know why." "This is a chance to find an answer to find one damn answer even if it's not for me." "I think we should look." "All right." "We go to the woods." "If we find nothing, we go home." "Thank you." "Six farms and nothing." "Still one to go." "Yeah, but according to the farmers," "Rebecca was only monitoring livestock and crop yields." "She said the point of the town census was to inventory resources." "Maybe..." "What?" "Maybe she's not planning anything bad." "No, no, no." "You didn't hear what I heard in her voice." "Or see her douse Lyle with that acid rain." "Though it wouldn't be the first time I've misjudged someone." "I don't really know you." "Hell, I've been out in the woods for so long, there are days I don't even know myself." "But I do know that I've been betrayed before." "What are you getting at, Sam?" "People are full of surprises." "They sure are." "How long you been planning this?" "I'd been monitoring the pig for weeks." "Testing blood at my house to see how the virus affected cells." "When were you gonna tell me?" "Once everything was ready." "That's why I needed to get in here, to mix the swine flu with samples of influenza." "In a few hours, the recombinant virus inside those eggs will be strong enough to infect one quarter of this town." "You want to release it?" "No." "I want you to." "You want me to play God?" "You said you wanted to see who could carry their own weight." "This is how." "It's not God-- it's-it's Darwin." "It's survival of the fittest." " Meaning we're at risk, too." " Yes." "A virus is nature's way of leveling the playing field." "This is crazy." "It's merciful." "In seven days, we run out of food." "In 14, people will be starving." "In 21, we'll turn on each other." "The time to act is now." "How'd this virus get inside the dome?" "It's always been here, dormant in nature for... weeks, months... maybe years." "You mean like an incubator." "The dome made this happen." " You're saying my mom's a prophet?" " No, I'm saying that these events brought us closer to the apocalypse, when the world's gonna burn with the sacred fires and our ashes are gonna float up into the heavens." "That's when I'm gonna be with Pauline again." "The rain..." "I thought presaged the end of days, but that's just 'cause that's the last card I got." "Well, whatever it was, it was a good thing that Rebecca stopped it." "Hey!" "If she interfered with the dome's plan, we're gonna be condemned to purgatory under this thing for all of time." " Forever, forever, forever." " Lyle, Lyle, Lyle, settle down, or the cuffs are going back on." "Look... these couldn't have come after the dome came down." "Maybe we don't know how it ends." "You're right." "Postcards stopped." "But she did write in the journal every day." "I bet you the key to this is in the journal." "Uh, my uncle came and picked up a bunch of her stuff after the funeral." "She wouldn't want Sam to have her journal." "Not him." " What is it with you guys, anyway?" " It doesn't matter." "Let's just go get the journal." " Oh, no, no." " You don't want to know about your mother?" "What about that girl that got killed?" "Angie?" "Why would you say that?" "I have a real clear view of the Sweetbriar Rose from my porch." "I've watched you waiting for her to pick her up after her shift." " I'm really sorry about what happened to her..." " Wait." "You think my mom put Angie's murder in her journal?" "Oh, thank God." "Did Rebecca send you to help?" " Help with what?" " She said it'd be just the one pig, but she was wrong." "There are more." "Just since this morning." "A dozen of them." "Quarantine the healthy animals." "This is what Rebecca was messing around with in her kitchen." "That pig virus is their extermination plan." "Yeah, and she doesn't know how strong it is." "We've got to find them before they release it." "Where would they do it?" "Someplace busy, someplace public." "Big Jim's having a town meeting at the Sweetbriar." "That's where they'll be." "This is where Julia brought me, to show me the mini-dome." "Melanie, where are you going?" "She's going to the exact spot where it was." "You all right?" "What just happened?" "I remember." "It was night." "I came here looking for where the pink stars fell with Pauline Verdreaux." " Junior's mom?" " Yes." "We were with Sam Verdreaux and Lyle Chumley." "They were our boyfriends." "You and Sam?" "My head is exploding." "Hold on." "And then what happened?" "I don't know." "That spot." "It's bringing back your memory." "If you want to know more about who you are, then you have to get back on it." "What is it?" "Looks like a meteor." "It's glowing." "Let's go see." "We found a meteorite." "Right here." "Maybe we're supposed to touch it." "When we touched it, it... it cracked open." "Is everybody okay?" "You okay?" "There was an egg inside." "Oh, my God..." "What is that?" "Melanie, stop." " Melanie." " What are you doing?" "Put it back." "Don't do that." "I took it." "I wanted to protect it." "Melanie, put it back!" "Melanie!" "Where are you going?" " Melanie, come back!" " Mel-Melanie!" "Melanie!" "Sam told me to put it back, but I wouldn't." "Drop it, Melanie." "Put it back!" "Are you ok?" "What is happening?" "!" "The sound is killing me!" "I am Melanie Cross." "And I think this is where I died." "Is the virus ready?" "Yes." "Are you?" "No one tells you what it's like being the one who has to decide." "You were chosen because you're strong enough to do it." "You know, I was tested like this before." "What happened?" "It was my wife, Pauline." "She got sick." "She started... seeing things, got paranoid, had these spells." "She was mentally ill;" "that's... that's not your fault." "I knew she needed help, so..." "I found this facility... a few towns away." "She begged me not to take her there, promised she'd get better." "And I gave in." "Didn't make her go." "'Cause I loved her." "I believed that would be enough." "But it wasn't." "She took her own life." "I'm sorry." "If I'd made the tough choice, the right choice maybe she would have gotten better." "Maybe she'd be alive." "This time I'll make that choice." "My mother died when I was eight." "Her heart just... you know... stopped." "We were riding our bikes around the army base, and suddenly she was just... gone." "I asked my dad why, and he said, "Sometimes there are no answers."" "And that's why I turned to science." "If you look hard enough, there is an answer." "You'll need to distribute it in water." "A crowd will increase the rate of infection." "I know the place." "Back in 1988, you, Sam, Pauline and Lyle were the original four hands." "And you found an egg, too?" "And some jackass killed her because of it." "Are you sure you didn't see who pushed you?" "It wasn't Pauline-- she was... freaking out." "Lyle was really mad." "So was Sam." "I just wanted to protect the egg." "What was that?" "Feels like a rock." "Yeah, a rock from outer space." "Initial's "M.C."" "Melanie I believe this is yours." "If I died... then what am I?" "And why are you here?" "And where are your bones?" "I bet Sam Verdreaux could answer those questions." "Yeah." "He was there that night." "And if all this is true, he's seen Melanie in the last couple days." "I mean, he helped Julia save her life." "Wouldn't you remember your ex-girlfriend?" "But he acts like he never even knew her." "Maybe it's not an act, though." "And maybe he's the one who killed her." "It's either him or Lyle." "But Sam loved me." "Well, he's hiding something." "Hey, Big Jim." "We caught those vandals that were defacing the bridge." "Good job, Phil." "Keep it up." "Jim!" "I was just, uh, getting something to drink before the big meeting." "What's..." "Nobody drink the water." "Jim, you need anything?" "Yeah." "I need these two escorted out of here." "Why?" "So you can dump a deadly flu virus into the drinking water?" "What are you talking about?" "You think you get to control who lives and who dies?" "All right, everyone, calm down." "I don't know what these two are talking about..." "Well, I'd be more than happy to tell everybody" " about how you and Rebecca..." " You want to listen to someone who wakes up every day trying to make Chester's Mill a better place, or do you want to believe the town drunk and the town's..." "Well, I'm too much of a gentlemen to say." "You can call me whatever you want after you empty your pockets." "I don't got anything to prove to you." "Be careful with that." "What's this?" "Where is it?" "Where's the virus?" "What virus?" "Rebecca has it!" "We shouldn't be going through my uncle's stuff like this." "Hey, if your mom's journal's here, it doesn't belong to Sam, it's not his stuff." "It belongs to you." "It's the only way to bring forth the Four Horsemen." "Okay, enough with the Rapture crap." "This is it, right?" "Hey, give..." " give it back." " I've been waiting a long time for that." "To end it all, to be with Pauline-- and there are pages missing!" "I'm calling the shots here, Lyle!" " No." " Lyle!" "Okay." "What did you find?" "Suddenly, the nonbeliever seeks enlightenment." "Does it say something about Angie?" "What don't you want me to see?" "You could have followed her to the school that night." "You killed Angie, and you used me to get out." "Why did I have to do that?" "!" "Huh?" "I'm sorry, kid." "I'm out for good now." "Welcome." "You can light a candle if you like." "Welcome." "Feel free to light a candle." "Welcome." "Good to see you." "Hello." "Take a seat, please." "Nice to see you." "Welcome." "Good to see you." "More than half my pigs are dead." "The virus is out of control." "More are sick." "The town needed them." "Why did this happen to us?" "Sometimes there are no answers, Tom." "Try to have faith that we'll get through this together." "Rebecca!" "Get away from me!" "You tried to us all!" "Julia, I didn't do it." "I didn't release it." " Get away from there." " J-Just check my purse." "Carefully." "Crisis of conscience?" "I heard that the virus mutated." "I will go as far as I need to, but not farther." "I'll get the jail cell ready for him." "What?" "I didn't do anything." "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." "Oh, so now you and Julia are gonna save the town, huh?" "How are you gonna feed the people" " when you run out of food?" " Not by killing them." "Oh, yeah?" "That's easy for you to say." "You never had the balls to make the tough decisions." "When Pauline started losing her mind and killed herself, you just ran to the bottle." "Now you're running off to Julia." "Yeah, and you're running your mouth off, as usual." "What are you doing here?" "She's joining you in jail." "You released the virus." "Same thing you were gonna do." "Jim would never go through with it." "You love this town too much." "That's why I took the virus." "You used me." "I couldn't do it, either." "But it was your idea-- you're the one who talked me into this plan." "When I realized the virus mutated," "I questioned myself and remembered what you said." "I can't play God." "You know what?" "Plenty of time for you guys to talk about this downstairs." "Tomorrow we'll have a town meeting and the people can decide your fate." "What are you gonna do to us?" "Me?" "Nothing." " My hope is that you'll be put on trial." " Yeah." "Let's hope you bring your boyfriend." "The people of Chester's Mill will be very interested in what Barbie has to say about this virus." "Why's that?" "'Cause he was the first one on board." "Junior." "No, he's still breathing." "Hey, Junior, wake up." "Junior, wake up." "My head." "Why'd Sam do this?" "No, it was Lyle." "Lyle's in jail." "No, he's not." "He's-he's gone." " He took my mother's journal." " What journal?" "Easy, easy." "Hey." "Where did Lyle go?" "No." "I don't know, but..." "I think he killed Angie." "Maybe he killed me, too." "Joe, come on." "Help me." "Help me get him up." "Come on." "Let's go." "What's next?" "What comes after an extermination plot?" "Hey, we made it through the day." "And the guys behind that plan are behind bars." "Yeah." "Big Jim's probably lying on a lumpy cot, missing his own bed right about now." "Yeah." "He's had better nights." "Now we can put the census to good use-- figure out how to share resources." "Thank you." "For what?" "I showed up on your door at dawn with an insane theory-- you didn't blink." "You're pretty convincing." "You believed me." "That means something." "Excuse me." "No." "No, Julia." "Hey, listen." "You got to listen to me." "Not tonight." "You okay?" "I will be." "Good." "I'm glad." "I'm sorry." "I don't know..." "I don't know what I was thinking." "I'll go." " I..." " No, no, no." "Please stay." "Let's not make it weird." " Okay." " Okay." "The whole town's gonna want answers in the morning." "I could really use your help coming up with what those are." " Honey?" " Yeah, thanksമഊ㤊㤹ਹ〰〺㨰ⰰ〵‰ⴭ‾〰〺㨰ⰲ〰㰊潦瑮挠汯牯∽昣晦て∰猠穩㵥㐱眾睷琮獶扵楴汴獥渮瑥⼼潦瑮ਾ"