---

The door was still locked. It was no use to pray. We were trapped in that room, till the end of all days. The shadow was spreading, the people would fall. But locked in that room, we did nothing at all.

Having failed in our attempts to find a way out of the panic room, Tuck and I were all out of hope. There was nothing left to do now, except to reflect on our lives as we watched the countdown to midnight.

"Tuck, are you still hanging in there?" I asked. We had both been quiet for some time, so I thought I'd check in with him.

"Yeah, I'm still hanging in there," Tuck responded. "No sense freaking out now. I'm trying to skip past the first four stages of grief - denial, anger, bargaining, and depression - and just go straight to the fifth stage, acceptance."

"That's pretty much what I'm trying to do," I said. "But I also want to figure out what this means in the grand scheme of things."

Tuck didn't want to hear this. "Jack, don't go there. We've only got a few hours left. Don't spend this precious time torturing yourself, worrying about the fate of the world, or trying to figure out why bad things happen to good people. Just let it go."

But I couldn't just yet. "Tell you what, Tuck. I'll let it go, but I have to ask you one question first."

"Just one question?" Tuck asked.

"Yeah. Well, it's a two-part question," I confessed.

"At least you're being honest then," Tuck said. "OK, let's hear it."

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