The next day, Lily tries to leave the boys to bring food to Becca in exchange for water. However, Tom keeps a close eye on her, and she is unable to sneak away. Lily becomes increasingly weak, although Tom and Andrew are noticeably worse. Andrew insists that the producers of the show will not let the residents die. Tom reveals that he plans to stay on the compound forever if he wins, barricading himself in with barbed wire. Though she refuses to admit it, Lily has a similar plan.

Lily wakes in the middle of the night and runs to the maze to bring Becca food. She drinks until Becca stops her. Becca reveals that she joined the show to write an exposé on it and build a journalism career. She stayed because, after the pool challenge, she wanted to humiliate Tom. Tom appears suddenly and violently attacks both girls, who are forced to flee in separate directions. Lily finds Andrew, who is very weak. They are intercepted by Tom, who has captured and badly beaten Becca. Tom forces Becca to lead them out of the maze to complete the Communal Task.

Despite his weakened state, Tom takes charge of the Communal Task. Infuriated that he still believes he is in charge, Lily pushes herself to beat him in the race. Andrew and Becca are much slower to finish and hold on to each other for most of the race. In the final few feet, Andrew pulls away from Becca and jogs ahead, leaving her as the loser. As Becca finishes, sprinklers turn on. Inside, Tom insists that the others let Lily drink first since she won. Andrew urges Becca to shower and rest before leaving.

That night, Lily wakes to find Becca standing over Tom’s bed with the belt from Lily’s dressing gown. She silently wraps it around Tom’s neck and begins strangling him. Lily watches wordlessly until she hears the sound of cars arriving outside the house: producers waiting to intervene. When Becca hesitates, Tom attacks her. Lily stops him from hurting her, but Tom insists that Becca leave immediately. Lily tries to care for Andrew before falling asleep. Overnight, he is removed from the compound for medical care.

The next day, Lily completes a Personal Task for the first time in weeks, fearing that she will be banished soon and wanting to leave with expensive rewards. She is tasked to compliment Tom in exchange for diamond earrings. Although Lily realizes that the task is designed to humiliate her, she completes it. That night, Tom suggests that they live in the compound together. Lily rejects him, insisting that he will be banished when Andrew returns. Privately, she wonders why she and Tom have made it so far, knowing that producers frequently manipulate the show to support the audience’s favorites. That night, she devises a plan.

Lily offers to cook steak for Tom in exchange for repairing the window. Over dinner, Tom reveals that he joined the show after being fired for anger management issues and having an ex-girlfriend file a restraining order against him. Lily reveals that she nearly lost her job in sales because she lacked basic math skills. The big screen announces a task: guess to the nearest hour how long it is until Christmas Day. Lily realizes the producers are intervening to have her banished. After Tom goes to sleep, she sneaks past the perimeter of the compound with a bag of raw meat, cutting her hand on barbed wire as she goes.

Lily runs into the desert, leaving a trail of meat and blood behind her. When she returns to the compound, she leaves more meat around the house. She runs inside and screams to Tom for help, crying that something is outside. Tom runs outside wrapped in a towel, and Lily barricades the doors behind him. Lily tells Tom that she’ll let him back in after he answers the question and begins calculating how many hours it is until Christmas, given that Becca told Sam it was September 20 on the day he left.

After a few hours, wild dogs appear, and Tom begs Lily to let him in. After allowing the dogs to menace him for a bit, Lily tells Tom about the hidden meat. Tom eventually fights the dogs off and begins fighting his way into the house in earnest. Lily pours a cleaning product into his eyes as he breaks through the door, blinding him. Defeated, Tom offers his guess. Lily’s guess is closer, and a voice announces that Tom is banished. Lily helps him pack and then escorts him to the perimeter. Shortly after, Andrew returns, having been nursed to health.

The next morning, Andrew wakes Lily early and insists that they clean the house. He describes building a monument to the producers and suggests that the public wants the two of them to live in the house together. Although she doesn’t want to have to work, Lily is too frightened to disagree. She spends her days completing Personal Tasks, winning luxurious items she never could have afforded at home. Andrew spends his days building his monument, a giant pile of trash, and talking to himself. When a Communal Task appears, telling them to kiss in exchange for a key, both ignore it.

One night, Lily finds Andrew at the perimeter much later than normal. He tells her that the producers are closer than they think. When they return to the house, they find it locked. Lily realizes that they must kiss to get the key that will let them back inside and hopes to negotiate with Andrew. Instead, Andrew handcuffs Lily to a pole and refuses to kiss her, confident that the producers will intervene before they freeze overnight or are harmed by animals. This does not happen, so when they wake the next morning, Andrew unlocks Lily and forces her to kiss him. A voice announces that Andrew has been banished. Despite months of scheming to win, Lily is horrified at the thought of being alone.

As soon as Andrew leaves, Lily begins asking for things: As the sole winner, she can request products without completing tasks. She receives a number of top-of-the-line items and falls asleep surrounded by them. The next day, she asks for cocktail ingredients, and she spends several days drunk, requesting and receiving items. When she is corrected for not thanking a sponsor, Lily remembers that she is being watched and stops drinking. She remembers past residents Brittany and Donna, who stayed in the compound as the final pair until they decided, without speaking, to leave at the same time.

As Lily grows more depressed, she is gifted a phone without asking. She calls her mother, who reveals that she has not been watching the show. When Lily asks if she should stay on the show and continue to collect rewards, her mother asks if that is what she wants. Later, Lily receives a voice message from Sam, who says that he thinks about her daily and would do anything for another chance with her. She requests a sled and spends hours loading it up with rewards. She walks through the desert as day turns into night, and although she knows her exit won’t be televised, she imagines an audience watching her, thinking about what excellent television it would make. As she approaches “hysteria,” she hears someone call her name.