Population 436

Steve Kady is dispatched to Rockwell Falls to interview residents about the population. He is rescued and driven into town by Bobby Caine, who helps him find a place to stay. From the moment he arrives, the town feels eerie, with a strange calm pervading its streets.

Kady notices the locals move with ritual-like calm and conversations drift into whispers. He senses he's becoming part of their tapestry rather than just a visitor. The town's mood feels unsettling from the start.

Kady learns the population has stubbornly stayed at exactly 436 for over a century. The pattern seems tied to biblical numerology, shaping beliefs and behavior. Any hint of questioning the count is met with silence or suspicion.

Outsiders are warned that leaving is not an option. Those who attempt to depart suffer accidents or vanish without a trace. Kady realizes the danger is not accidental but a price the town pays to preserve its secret.

Kady befriends Courtney Lovett, the daughter of his host, and begins to feel a human connection beyond obligation. Courtney expresses a longing to leave, but fears the consequences. Their growing bond intensifies the tension between curiosity and danger.

Kady also befriends Amanda, a young girl kept at the clinic under the pretense of schizophrenia. Amanda longs to depart as well, adding urgency to Kady's mission to escape. Their companionship deepens the sense that leaving could be both possible and perilous.

Ronald Greaver, the town physician, uses electroshock therapy on anyone who voices a wish to leave. The town rallies to defend its secrecy, growing increasingly hostile toward outsiders. The clinic becomes a focal point for the community’s coercive control.

Kady witnesses the execution of a woman who seemed willing to stay, an event that shatters his trust in Rockwell Falls. The brutal display confirms that departures are strictly policed by a higher power. He decides he must act despite the danger.

A sympathetic resident who arrived eight years earlier helps Kady devise an escape plan. They decide to set fire to the town garage as a diversion to draw attention away from their escape. The plan also includes rescuing Amanda from the clinic.

As the plan unfolds, Courtney has been lobotomized by Dr. Greaver, forcing Kady and Amanda to flee in a stolen tow truck. The storm brews overhead, and symbols from Kady's dreams— a cross on the truck's mirror and a doll on the dashboard— surface in reality. The escape becomes a desperate race for freedom.

The escape ends in a head-on collision with a semi on the road outside Rockwell Falls. Kady and Amanda die on the road just as the town's secret remains safe within its walls. The chase completes a grim loop back to the town’s protected sanctuary.

Back in Rockwell Falls, Frank Ramsey arrives to look for Kady but is picked up by the sheriff after his car hits the same pothole that started the nightmare. Sheriff Calcutt remains a quiet custodian of the century-old secret, watching outsiders drift into the town’s enigmatic orbit. The ending reinforces that the town’s safeguard endures beyond any single life.