"Come on, Harper!" Hayden whined, shaking Harper awake as he bounced on the air mattress, "You're sleeping too long!"

Harper flinched slightly before slowly opening her eyes. "Uh... Sleeping too long?" She asked as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

"Yeah! It's almost 11. You don't normally sleep this long."

Harper shot up and checked her phone, which she'd kept by her bedside just in case. Sure enough, it was 10:57.

"Why did you guys let me sleep in so late?" Harper exclaimed, throwing her blankets off and putting her bare feet on the floor.

"We didn't realize you didn't have your alarm set. Don't worry, though. Bailey took the first shift at the cafe."

Finally, Harper took the time to look around. The house was eerily quiet, like the mornings when she had to get to work before her siblings were awake. Her alarm never woke anyone besides herself up at this point, so she would just stay as quiet as possible and let them sleep.

"What about Thomas?" She asked when she realized her other brother was nowhere to be heard - he was normally very crazy in the mornings.

"Bailey took him with her. He wanted to run the... cha-ching machine."

Harper smiled, "The cash register?"

"Yeah!" Hayden grinned, "I'm gonna run the spinny blade smoothie thing."

She paused, "The blender? You want to run the blender?"

"Mhm!"

Harper stifled a laugh, "Well, I don't see why not."

Hayden jumped up off the mattress and pulled Harper to her feet, "Well, then get ready! I want to run the smoothie thing!"

Harper laughed and went to the closet room to get ready. Only once she shut the door did she let her smile fall. Sleeping until 11? That wasn't normal.

Like the star....

Grabbing a shirt off a shelf, she tried to remember exactly what had happened. The other stars wouldn't work. She was dragged into a black hole. And then that voice.... a child's voice.... it led her to a black star. She touched it and....

went...

somewhere...

But she had no clue where.

Harper was 100% positive that she hadn't been woken up before she touched the star. Definitely. But everything after that moment was gone. Like dreamless sleep.

What was happening?

____________________

"Belle, what were you thinking?!?" Corin yelled as loud as he could in a whisper.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Isabelle replied, handing a file to a woman sitting at a desk.

"You volunteered for the project! Without my consent!"

"I'm sorry, I don't quite understand," she handed more papers to a passerby, "Why would I need your consent to decide what to do with my life?"

"Because I-" he stopped as another woman passed between them, "I am your husband!"

"Are you?" Isabelle remarked, picking up a small stack of files and setting them on top of her already existing pile in her arms, "Cause, last I checked, staff isn't allowed to get married to one another."

"Yeah, I know, but-" another worker passed, "we agreed to stay silent."

"Did we now?" 3 files were placed on an empty desk - Corin's desk, "I don't recall that."

Corin grabbed Isabelle's arm and turned her towards him, "And I don't recall ever being told that we were going to have a second kid. Why didn't you tell me?"

Isabelle stared straight into his light blue eyes and jerked her arm out of his grip, "Because I didn't know. Happy?" She spun on her heel and started walking away.

"Ok, but you didn't need to volunteer it to the project!" Corin objected, stepping in front of her.

Again, she stated straight at her husband, "So you don't want our child as a subject?"

"No! What if something goes wrong?"

"Then our baby dies. Like all the other subjects."

"This isn't like that! This is different -"

" Why? Why is ours different? They're all just people or children volunteered for a cause. Those children didn't survive. Then Dakota provided good results. Now, every subject after will provide only positive results. "

"We don't need positive results from dead subjects! We need live subjects! Those are the only ones that matter!"

Isabelle felt her eyes gloss over, "So, what, the rest of the subjects are worthless? Pointless? Unless they're alive, they mean nothing?"

"Well, yes!"

"Ah. I see. So, when you were comforting me over Edge's death. When you were saying 'it'll help us find Ashley,' you were really just trying to tell me that it didn't matter? That Edge, my nephew, didn't matter?!!"

"No! That's not what-"

"Really? Cause that's what it sounded like." She sighed, "That's why I have to go through with this. Otherwise you'll think that anything is ok as long as it doesn't affect you or your priorities."

"B-But what about Bailey? Won't she want a sibling?"

"She's 2. If this one dies, we can tell her it was a miscarriage until she's old enough to understand out sacrifice." She studied his expression and smirked, "Why are you so worried? Don't you trust your own experiment?"

"O-Of course I do its... It's just-"

"If you really trusted this project, you would've volunteered Bailey back when we first started. Or yourself. But did you?" She grabbed some files from the bottom of her stack and shoved them into Corin's hands, "You've got some work to do. Meanwhile, I'll be with the other volunteers talking about my jerk of a husband who wants his wife to trust him but doesn't let make her own choices. I'll talk about his illusions of a beautiful life with his wife and, what, 3 kids? 4? 5? Whatever. And I'll definitely tell them how he breaks his promises and then expects full forgiveness, and how he uses our child as an excuse for me to not break his arm after he treats me like crap."

"B-Belle-"

"Don't even try to change my mind, Corin. I'm sick of you trying to control my actions. I want to make my own choices, and you're getting in my way. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have more files to hand out, some treatments to prepare for, and a family to take care of. A family that doesn't include you. So goodbye, Dr Hyens."

With that, Isabelle turned and walked away from her husband, holding the files considering his child's experimental proceedings.

 Yay! I got another chapter done! And I'm working on the next chapter, so I'm getting in a lot more writing than normal. Go me!

Sorry about the short scene with Harper. It was important, but I wasn't quite sure how to make it longer without it being really boring, so you get more Isabelle and Corin! Honestly, I think I like them more than I liked Wyatt (sadly. I loved Wyatt) so this'll be pretty interesting. If you have any questions, please ask me. If they're something I've gone over, I'll clarify in comments, but if they haven't been mentioned yet, it'll help me figure out if I have any plot holes. I just want to become a better writer, and feedback helps.

With that out of the way, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, and I'll see y'all later! Bye!