Temple slept. There was simply nothing more to do. She slept on and off. The soil beneath her was surprisingly soft and she dreamed of airplanes and iron statues and little boys named Malcolm and all their questions. She dreamed of Niagra Falls and of the Inheritors of the Earth. When she woke up it was cause one of the girls was dying.
She was moaning and groaning something terrible and it made Temple's stomach hurt real bad to listen to it. "It's okay. You just gotta breathe," Temple tried to coach the girl but she was beyond help now. She was dying, her whole body shutting down right in front of Temple, right in front of them all. This was the fate that would befall all of Josh's "flowers". Slow, agonizing horrible death.
Temple kept asking what the girl's name was but she didn't remember her name no more and the other girls didn't know it either. What a sad thing, to die and not even know who you are, Temple thought. A damn shame. Josh had wiped away everything that had made that girl who she was and now she was just a dying flower.
It took her about twelve hours to actually die and Temple's muscles stayed tensed as she listened to every agonizing breath and whimper. It was actually painful to listen to it and Temple didn't sleep at all during or after. She had to find some way honor a dead girl with no name.
Josh came down a little while after she had died and dragged her away. One of the other girls was crying, sobbing real loud, so loud it felt like the sound would gnaw right through Temple's skull. Josh came down again a little while later and fed them some more of that weird tasting soup. Temple ate it. If she was going to fight her way out of here she was going to need her strength.
"Alright, troops, listen up," she said in a quiet voice. "I don't think any of us wants to go through what we just saw. So ideas? I'm takin 'em. We gotta start thinkin' outside of the garden, you know?"