Allbany, New York

Olivia stared up at the white brick building they were approaching. The day wasn't cold, but she definitely felt a chill as Charlie brought the truck to a stop in front of the driveway, where several other New York state police cars were now parked.

"How many again, Charlie?" she asked him.

"Seventy seven in all. Of course, if would have been seventy nine if Berlin hadn't taken off, and…our possible case subject…" Charlie trailed off.

Lincoln's mottled face appeared between Olivia and Charlie from the back seat. "Nothing like a little suicide cult investigation to put you in a great mood," he teased.

Olivia smirked, but she felt dread like a cold hard ball inside of her. It wasn't death itself that bothered her; she'd certainly seen her share of it investigating Fringe events. But there was the outrageousness of it, of strange ways of dying that somehow kept her mind off the loss of life and forced her to gravitate on the root cause. These people killed themselves. She knew that part of it was the cult mindset, the belief that they were attaining spiritual enlightenment. But there was the underlying reason behind it: these people were desperate, lost. They had given up hope living in a world that was constantly threatening to tear itself apart.

"Carlito!" a familiar voice called out, rousing Olivia out of her thoughts. The Fringe team turned to see Cesar Maldonado, the chief investigator for the Allbany Police Department, sprinting toward them.

Charlie clasped his cousin around the shoulders briefly and smiled. "Cesar. Don't these mass suicides happen more often than not? Why did you need Fringe?"

Cesar's mischievous eyes twinkled. "Who said I needed you? I was just looking for another chance to see this young lady." He flashed his most charming smile at Olivia.

She blushed and held out her hand. "Hi Cesar. Good to see you again."

Cesar took the hand that was offered and kissed it. "Hello, Roja."

A sharp clearing of a throat alerted Cesar to the presence of someone else who was less than amused. Cesar straightened and smiled at Lincoln. "Linc. You're looking very…pink."

Olivia and Charlie couldn't help but smile at Cesar's backhanded compliment. For some reason, Lincoln disliked Cesar and his flirtatious ways. Especially when he was flirting with Olivia.

Charlie, used to having to defuse tense situations involving his cousin since childhood, turned the attention back to the case. "So what happened? What's the story with this cult?"

"They call themselves 'the last family'. One of these end-of-days cults that insist the vortexes and amber means that Armageddon is coming."

"Even though it's been happening for decades," Lincoln pointed out cynically. "God supposedly created the world in six days; you'd think it wouldn't take this long to destroy it."

"And cults like these have been around for hundreds of years, even before all these events started happening," Olivia added.

"That's people for you. They need something to believe in, no matter how insane it is." Charlie reasoned. "So? Take us to the big show."

Cesar led the team to the building's interior, and Olivia felt the chill she'd felt before return, only stronger this time. The piercing florescent bulbs built into the ceiling provided stark, sickly lighting to the conditions. It looked like a refugee camp with its masses of sleeping bags and blankets. There were two soap-scum-crusted sinks that sat on each side of the large room, each paired with a toilet.

"Jesus. These people did everything together, even use the bathroom," Lincoln murmured to her.

"It used to be a warehouse facility for a paper factory," Cesar explained. "Raymond Berlin purchased it in '09, and started his recruiting. Fortunately for us, there was a hidden camera feed that was never disabled. Apparently Berlin liked to keep a close eye on his 'family'.

"But he was stupid enough not to disable the feed before he took off after poisoning all of his followers," Cesar added. "We recovered the footage. I just sent it to Carlito's palm."

Charlie opened the electronic pad and Lincoln and Olivia gathered around him to watch it.

They watched the efficient manner in which the poison was distributed. Row by row, the people, the young and the old, took the Styrofoam cups. They watched as they grabbed their throats, gasping and convulsing as the poison closed off their airways and stopped their hearts from pumping.

Several minutes passed and the seventy eight people were still lying there, motionless. Frowning, Olivia looked up at Cesar. "What are we-"

"Patience, Roja. It's coming."

They waited as the palm sped up the footage until two hours of real time had passed. Finally, they watched as one of the limp bodies, a young, dark girl, jumped up from the ground, her mouth stretched wide open in a terrified scream. She took in the dead bodies lying around her and curled up into a ball, rocking herself in shock for nearly a minute. Finally she got up, looked around wildly, and bolted out of the building.

Olivia looked up from the screen. "Obviously she didn't get the same stuff the rest of them did."

"They all got cups of the same stuff from the same pitcher," Lincoln argued. "You saw it, Liv."

"So what did they all drink?" Charlie asked.

"We sent samples of the liquid to our local lab. Our techs should have the results by now," Cesar replied, motioning for them to follow him out of the warehouse.

Lincoln and Charlie followed quickly behind, Olivia being the last to leave. Just before she reached the threshold, she saw someone out of the corner of her eye. She turned and there was the Secretary's son, Peter Bishop. He was simply standing there, hands in the pockets of his faded dark jeans, gazing at her with a knowing, almost smug smile on his face.

Olivia stopped in her tracks, glaring at him in irritation. She knew he wasn't there – not really. His presence reminded her, once again, that her breakdown had been real. And what was worse, she hadn't recovered from it completely.

"Liv?"

Olivia turned to see Lincoln's scarred face peering in at her from the yard. "What's wrong? Did you see something?"

"Oh! Uh no, no, I…"

Lincoln held up his hand. "Say no more. I know." He looked around the warehouse, at the bodies covered in the white sheets, being prepared for transport. "Who would have ever thought vortexes and sewer monsters would be less scary than suicide?"

Olivia glanced at the spot where she'd seen Peter, hiding her relief when she found he was gone. "Yeah. Exactly."

Back at Fringe headquarters, the three agents and Detective Maldonado gathered around the Science Desk, taking in the projection of the chemical structure of the liquid the cult members drank.

"Atropa belladonna. Also called 'Deadly Nightshade'," the Fringe science consultant, a tall, gawky prodigy named Allen, told them. "It's an oldie but a goodie, in terms of an efficient poison, that is. You drink enough of this stuff, in a concentrated enough amount, and you're a goner."

"What did you mean when you said, 'oldie'?" Charlie asked.

Allen looked at him sharply from his glasses placed low on his nosebridge. "It's a very old poison, dating back to the Middle Ages-"

"Women used it to dilate their pupils, which were considered attractive. Belladonna – 'beautiful lady'," Lincoln interjected. "Sorry, Allen," he added sheepishly.

The scientist cleared his throat sharply and continued. "Anyway, the belladonna plant isn't extinct, but it hasn't been seen in decades. This would be quite an efficient way to kill since it's so rare. A less knowledgeable scientist may have overlooked it – fortunately for you, I have an encyclopedia-like reserve of knowledge on poisons."

Olivia, Lincoln, and Charlie exchanged a mutual look of amusement. "And we're grateful for it, Allen. Thank you." She turned to Lincoln. "Have we identified the girl in the video yet?"

"We have. Jamila Rose, from Manhatan, 14 years old. Reported missing two weeks ago by her parents." Lincoln handed her a palm pad with photo of the girl.

Olivia studied it briefly, noting the sad look in the girl's pretty black eyes. "Gone from her home for only two weeks and she got herself involved in a cult."

Cesar appeared over Olivia's shoulder. "No doubt they'd gotten to her weeks, maybe even only days before, Roja. These cults know how to appeal to children who feel lonely and misunderstood."

Olivia looked back at Cesar with a half-hearted smile. "Well, let's find the parents and see what their take on Jamila is."

"We've already informed them. They're on their way."

"Good." Olivia walked over to the Statistics Center, where Astrid was, in her usual fashion, furiously processing data. She turned to Lincoln and Charlie, who were already looking over the information Astrid had provided. "Whaddya got, Astrid?"

Avoiding Olivia's eyes, Astrid gave her report. "Based on the fact that Ms. Rose is on foot, and a 95% chance that she has no show-me and no money, I calculate a 75% chance that she is still in Allbany, and a 89% chance that she's still in New York state."

"I like those odds. Are they guaranteed?" Cesar asked Astrid with a wink. The young agent just barely lifted her eyes to the detective and then quickly looked away with a blush.

"Primo, we have a saying around here," Charlie replied for Astrid. "There are three things in life that you can count on: death, taxes, and Astrid Farnsworth's calculations."

"I'm receiving Allen's report on the poison that was served to the members of The Last Family," Astrid piped up, deftly turning the attention away from her. "Based on the amount of the poison and the concentration, as well as Jamila Rose's approximate weight, I calculate a 9% chance that she could have survived imbibing the belladonna."

"But we saw her wake up and run away," Olivia argued. "Assuming that Jamila Rose drank the same poison as the others, how could she survive that?"

Cesar nodded. "And that's why I called you people in."

"Excuse me, Agent Lee?" a clerk called to Lincoln. "Mr. and Mrs. Jabbur are here."

"So she is alive?" Mrs. Jabbur asked Charlie and Olivia hopefully. She was a pale brunette with watery grey eyes. Her milky skin was a stark contrast to her husband's olive complexion and robust black beard.

"We believe so, Mrs. Jabbur. The camera footage we were able to obtain clearly shows her getting up and running away from the scene," Olivia assured the couple.

The couple clasped hands in relief. "Thank God," Mr. Jabbur said. "Do you know where she is now?"

"No. We've sent out a bulletin to all of our agencies, as well as posted her information to our hotline," Charlie replied with a warm smile. "We're going to do everything we can to bring her home."

The couple smiled gratefully, but an awkward silence followed. Finally, Mrs. Jabbur spoke up. "I know what you're probably wondering about. Why is Jamila's last name "Rose" instead of "Jabbur?"

Olivia smiled uneasily. "I have an inkling of why. Jamila was starting school just after September 11th, wasn't she?"

Mr. Jabbur nodded gravely. "We had her last name legally changed to my wife's middle name right before she entered school. We felt that…that it might be just a little easier for her to attend school if her heritage wasn't so apparent."

"Mr. Jabbur, Mrs. Jabbur, why did Jamila leave home two weeks ago? Did you have a fight? Was she unhappy at school?" Olivia asked.

"All of the above," Jamila's father told them. "Jamila has always been a sad child. Every time a vortex would open, every time a neighborhood would have to be ambered, she'd fall into a deep depression for days. It's like…she takes all the grief of the world onto herself. Two weeks ago, she'd read about the opera house in New York City being ambered, and she told us she was too sad to go to school – too sad because there would never be another note of music played in the building."

Mrs. Jabbur laid a comforting hand on her husband's arm. "It was my fault. I forced her to go. I told her that – that she was being ridiculous. I was so…thoughtless in my words, I'd forgotten how sensitive she was. She packed up her books and ran out of the house without another word. I thought she'd gone to school. It wasn't until the end of the day, when she didn't come home for dinner, that we realized she was gone."

"Do you know of anyone Jamila could have gone to stay with after she left the compound? Any friends from school? Relatives?" Charlie asked.

Mr. Jabbur shook his head. "We've spoken to all of our relatives in the area, and none of them have seen her. And…to be perfectly honest, Jamila didn't really have too many close friends. Oh, it wasn't her depression. She kept people at arm's length. She didn't want to get too close to anyone, because she was afraid that they'd end up being taken away from her."

Olivia turned from Mr. Jabbur to his wife, noticing now the blank look on her face. "Mrs. Jabbur. Are you all right?"

The lady turned her pale eyes slowly to Olivia. "It was my fault. I forced her to go. I told her that – that she was being ridiculous. I was so thoughtless in my words-"

"Honey, honey, it's all right," Mr. Jabbur said quickly, snatching up his wife's hand and squeezing it. Olivia and Charlie exchanged a mutual look of puzzlement.

"I think that's all for now, Mr. and Mrs. Jabbur," Olivia told them, walking them out of the room. "We will certainly be in touch the moment we know something."

The couple began to walk out of the room, but then Mrs. Jabbur stopped, turned around, and looked around the room. Mr. Jabbur laid his hands on her shoulders and gently pushed her to the door. "Come on, hon. Time to go home."

Once the Jabburs had left, Charlie motioned at the mirror set against the far wall. Cesar joined them a moment later.

"Well," Cesar began, sitting on the top of the table, facing Olivia and completely ignoring Charlie, "What did you think?"

"Something's wrong with the mother. That was pretty clear," Olivia replied, crossing her arms. "We should look into that."

"Meanwhile, Jamila is still out there," Charlie pointed out. "She is the only survivor of Raymond Berlin's crime. She's the only one left who can testify against him."

Cesar nodded. "Precisely, Primo. We need to find her before anyone else does."

The water felt wonderful. Warm, and hard, and all for her. She allowed it to race over her body, to course over her. She gathered handfuls of it and threw it on her face.

She didn't use soap. She didn't want to have anything take away from the feeling of the water. And besides, she didn't like the smell of the soap that was in the shower. It was too spicy, too heavy in its aroma.

Finally, she'd had enough and she shut off the water, wrapping a long, fluffy towel around herself and stepping out onto the gleaming white tiles that adorned the floor. She felt wonderful. Renewed, refreshed. All adding to this new life of hers.

Then she felt something oily against her big toe. She frowned, starting down at it. It was a deep red drop of liquid. Jamila sighed and allowed her eyes to follow the trail that led to the living room.

She forced herself to look over at the limp body of the man, lying on the bedroom floor. The knife she'd plunged into his chest was still in its resting place.

She'd taken him by surprise, and because of that, he made very little noise. She was able to finish her work and shower without interruption.

Jamila looked in the closet, at the few articles of clothing hanging inside. The clothes would be too big for her, obviously, but she managed to make a makeshift outfit from a shirt, shorts, and a belt she found. She put on three layers of socks to protect her feet, took what money was in the man's wallet, and quietly left the hotel room – into a new world where life and death had no meaning.