I watched in slow motion as Diane leaped off the side of the cliff into the nothingness below. 'She is going to be okay! There is water below. It's a long way down, but she will make it. I don't know how I knew she would survive that fall, but I knew there was water. We could hear it long before we got to the cliff's edge. We could hear it, and we could smell it. How was this possible? Something was different about us. I survived being backhanded into a massive tree, leaving an immense crater in it. Diane moved faster than the creatures pursuing us. We were definitely different,' I thought as I turned to see the creature that backhanded me hunch down to all fours, running at full speed.

From my perspective, he was running in slow motion. I didn't have long to decide what to do, but a memory flowed into my mind then. It was a long-lost memory of a time when I was still in school. It was on a sunny afternoon at the Springview High School football field. I was with my sister Kristonia and our cheer squad teammates. It had to have been a Saturday because we only practiced on the football field on Saturdays. We were doing cartwheels and backflips, working on the new routine for the next football game.

Our coach reviewed every technique we would use and the chants for this week's game. We grouped into three teams, and my sister was on my team. We practiced doing three to four cartwheels followed by several backflips, then another cartwheel into a full-on run with a final series of backflips. We did this over the entire afternoon until we had the routine down. It would be our opening stunts as we ran onto the field at the beginning of the game. We would also use it at the prep rally on the day of the game. It was all about being flashy and about speed. The coach would pick only the best tumblers to show off the routine at the prep rally and the game. Our Coach had always selected Kristonia and me among the twenty cheerleaders on our team.

We were used to doing this weekly throughout high school and eventually in college. It was second nature to us as these memories flooded my mind. The sound of the creature charging me brought me back to reality. I took the first stance while I calmly waited as time sped up. Within seconds, I jumped up, performing a cartwheel as my hands dug into the muddy dirt. My lead foot struck the creature directly on its mouth, launching it back at such incredible speed I didn't see where it went. My body kept doing cartwheels, followed by backflips and one final cartwheel. I sprinted faster than ever to the cliff's edge, leaping into the dark sky as Diane had done moments before.

I fell through the air into the darkness below. I looked down and could barely see what I was below, but I could just see the water flowing below. 'I knew it! There's a river below the cliff that would cushion my fall,' I thought as I put my arms to the side and positioned my legs together so the impact would cause as minor damage as possible.

The sudden rush of ice-cold water overwhelmed me as I sank below the surface further than expected. 'Damn it, I didn't think I would sink this deep,' I thought, then I remembered, 'Fuck, it's because of my exoskeleton. I had completely forgotten about wearing it,'

I struggled to fight against the current as it dragged me along the bottom of the riverbed down the winding river. I was being tossed and turned by the sheer force of the water. I found it difficult to gain control of my movements, yet I knew I had to before I drowned. I hit a large boulder, sending pain through my entire body. I fought with all my might to hold on to the boulder as I tried to launch myself up onto the surface of the river.

As I tried climbing up, my foot became lodged at the base of the boulder, preventing me from going anywhere. I panicked as I realized that, once again, I was on the verge of dying. 'I can't die here. I have to get myself free. I can't fail Kristonia and Rachel,' I thought as I tried to bend over to free my stuck foot. I could take my leg out of the exoskeleton boot, but I wouldn't be able to swim on my own, and I would drown anyway. If I didn't remove the boot, I would drown. 'What do I do? I am running out of air!' I thought in a frantic attempt to push the boulder off my foot.

The struggle I faced seemed like it had been happening in slow motion. I pushed as hard as I could, but nothing happened. Closing my eyes, I summed up my concentration like I had before on the cliff. I focused on giving my arms the strength to move the boulder off my foot. Again, I felt a burst of warmth flow through my body, so I pushed as hard as possible. Surprisingly, I shoved the boulder aside more than needed to free my foot. I began swimming to the surface of the river. I shot up like a bullet, leaving the barrel of a gun breaking to the surface as I took in a deep breath of air as the river carried me off into the unknown.

It took all my effort to stay above the water while the current showed no signs of slowing down. I tried swimming to the banks of the river, but the current was too strong, and I was helpless. All I could do was keep myself from going under as the river carried me along rapidly. 'Diane must have experienced the same, meaning she must have been far ahead of me. How was I supposed to find her now?' I thought.

The rain was still coming down just as hard as when we encountered the creatures. I didn't know if they were following us or not. I could only worry about surviving what was happening. The roar of the river grew louder and louder as each moment passed. The outcry was so loud that it drowned all other sounds around me. My stomach sank as a frightening thought occurred to me. 'Was I heading for a waterfall? Fuck, this is bad. I can't go under like I did before,' I thought as I searched all around me for anything that would aid me, but there was nothing.

Before I could brace myself, the river had carried me around a sharp turn to reveal the river's edge. I had come to the top of the waterfall, and nothing could stop me from going over the edge. I fell through the air like a rag doll into darkness for the second time today.

The fall was twice as long as the first fall I had experienced. I couldn't brace myself before colliding with the freezing cold water below. I sank like a rock beneath the surface of the water into darkness. I felt like something in my body had broken, and I felt pain all over. I couldn't move my arms or legs as I descended deeper and deeper into darkness.

'Is this it? Am I going to die this time? I can't move my body anymore. Should I just let go? Kristonia would have to escape independently, and without worrying about me, she wouldn't have me holding her back!' I thought as I closed my eyes. There was nothing I could do to avoid death this time. My body was unresponsive while I was falling deeper by the second. My air was running out even quicker.

I felt the coldness of the water take me over as my arms and legs stiffened hard as ice. My lungs burned as I ran out of air. 'It's coming now. It will happen soon, and there is nothing to do but wait for the end,' I thought sadly as sorrow overtook me. I was going to die, and Kristonia would never know what happened to me. The Doctors at DNA Labs would just pretend I was alive to keep her in line to do their stupid mental test. She was correct; everything was pointless, and nothing they did would help me walk again.

'We made a mistake coming here. We shouldn't have trusted them. I regret that I ever heard about DNA Labs. This place was hell, and now I am going to die in the middle of nowhere,' I thought as I felt my body shut down.

My body jerked a few times. 'This must be me running out of air,' I thought sadly. Another jerk jolted my body. I felt something wrap around my waist. 'Is it going to eat my lifeless dead body now? There won't even be a body to find!' I thought as I felt whatever it was gripping my waist tightly, and I passed out.

'I must be dead! They say it takes a few minutes for the brain to die. That must be what's happening,' I thought. Darkness surrounded me.

I saw a glow around me I hadn't noticed before. Each moment that passes, it goes brighter. Within moments, an area around me was shining brightly. 'Where was this light coming from? Then I remembered the lime green glowing light that came from my body,' I thought as I held my hands up. My arms were glowing a golden white color.

I was sitting on a greyish-white dirt that reflected the light. My exoskeleton was nowhere in sight, and I sat in the nude. As if my instincts took over, I stood on my own. Looking around in all directions and beyond was darkness. Only the surrounding light illuminated the dirt around my feet. I became confused; I held my arms out in front as I studied them.

I was casting the light in a sea of nothingness and darkness. 'Where was this place? I wasn't in the water anymore. Was I in the afterlife? Was this hell or something else? No, it couldn't be hell. Was this limbo? Am I a lost soul? Is this what happens to those that die alone in unknown places?' These thoughts ran through my mind, one after another.

With nothing else to do, I began walking. I didn't know where to walk, so I picked a direction. The greyish-white dirt was almost like dust. Other than that, I saw a few rocks scattered here and there. I walked for what felt like hours or maybe even days. There was no sense of time here. I figured out as time passed that I didn't have a thirst for water, nor was I hungry.

'What is this place? It seems like how the afterlife was told to me as a child, but there is nothing here. All I have seen is dust and rocks,' I thought as I stopped.

'What was the point of walking with no direction?' I turned around to see the same darkness surrounding me. There was no change, and I thought I would find nothing here. I sat back on the ground, bringing my knees to my chest. 'There is no reason to keep going. I am lost! There is no direction to go. There is nothing here but me!' The thoughts overwhelmed me, and I cried quietly.

A feeling of being utterly alone here overcame me. There was no hope; nothing but darkness filled the void as I realized finding a way out was nonexistent. I lay on the ground, closing my eyes as I tried to fall asleep. My family was all I could think of as I drifted asleep. I was alone in the middle of a place with no name and no one.

Several loud pulses around me suddenly caused me to awaken. They were deep pulses, almost like an air-raid siren, but much deeper and drawn out. Almost a muffled sound. They were going off all around me. I couldn't see where they were coming from. I got to my feet as quickly as the pulsing sounds turned to a deep, drawn-out whistling sound. The sound was an eerie sound that sent chills down my spine.

I couldn't pinpoint the source of the sounds until I heard the sharp, high-pitched clicks from above my head. My body froze as I slowly looked up into the pitch-black sky. My eyes widened with shock as I saw things moving above my head. 'My God, what the hell am I seeing?' I thought as fear took hold of me.

They were everywhere, fighting each other to get closer to the light I was emitting. They were massive whale-looking figures with human-like faces. The faces they were making were something I would never forget. Some were grinning, while others were crying tears that vanished as soon as they dropped from their eyes. Still others had the faces of madmen, while others looked like child-like people. They were flying in circles around the edges of my light like a school of fish.

'What the hell are those things? They were all watching me,' I thought as I realized they wanted to eat me. They were afraid of my light for unknowable reasons, but how long that lasted was unknown to me.

I couldn't stay here waiting for those things to work up the courage to dive-bomb me and gabble me up like some turkey on Thanksgiving. Running was my only option. The direction didn't matter, as any would suffice. I sprinted as fast as I could away from the monsters, only to realize the entire sky was filled with these monsters. Some were far larger than I had first noticed, while others were the size of people. The sky was like an ocean full of these floating whale monsters pretending to be human.

I had never been more terrified than I was now. 'Where could I go? Where could I be safe? I had walked for days, not noticing them, or they just hadn't found me yet. Did they find me while I slept? That had to have been it. I would have noticed them before. That means I can find somewhere safe to hide,' The thoughts flowed as one through my mind as I ran for what seemed like an eternity.

I could do nothing else but run and run some more. Before long, I noticed the terrain changed. There were rocks of many sizes. I had to be careful not to trip over some larger ones, and I had to avoid the ones I couldn't jump over. I wasn't just running in a straight line anymore but a zig-zagged pattern around the rocks. There were even large boulders here and there. I only looked up momentarily when I noticed there weren't as many monsters above me. The ones that were frantically changing their direction to chase me.

Fear prevented me from looking back over my shoulders because I didn't want to trip over a rock or run into a boulder. Second, I didn't want to see the horror show behind me. As I ran further and further away, the landscape changed again. The boulders became large hills, and my path became a valley littered with boulders. I had to adjust my speed to avoid making a mistake because falling down meant the creatures above could descend from the sky to get me.

They were flying lower and lower, and some were just behind me outside my light, chasing me. I couldn't afford to stop running for any reason. I followed the valley until it opened up into a plain. Everything was flat here, but I had to change directions when I came to a wall. I couldn't see the top of it, but I had to change directions occasionally. I ran along the wall until I could change my path, repeating that repeatedly. I could only guess that landscape hills had turned into mountains.

'How long do I have to keep running like this?' I wasn't tired but losing hope as I fell into despair, 'How long could I keep this up? It was hopeless! There was nowhere to go!'

I almost tripped from the shock of the lightning that flashed above me. It lit up the entire sky of this place, but I didn't see any lightning. Another flash revealed none of the monsters in the sky ahead of me. The next flesh jolted me, and I almost fell over from the sudden shock of pain through my body. Looking up, I also noticed another feeling I had not felt since awakening here. The sky appeared to be flowing water.

A chilling coldness came over my body; the coldness grew with each flash of lightning. I had trouble running as I struggled to keep my speed up. As I exhaled with each breath, I felt freezing cold air with each exhalation. 'What were these flashes of light? They were affecting me!'" I stumbled, thinking something wasn't right.

Another strike of lightning and I tumbled, rolling several feet before landing on my back. One monster dived towards me, only to miss as I moved out of the way. A loud pulse ripped through the air as I finally saw what was behind me. It was like an aerial stampede of these monsters flying at top speed toward my direction. A flash reveals thousands, maybe millions of them rushing towards me. The looks on their faces ranged from all the different facial expressions a human could make.

The next flash lasted for several seconds, and time seemed to slow down as all the pain I had felt before rushed back to my body all at once. The bitter coldness I felt when sinking into the depths of the dark water overtook me. My entire body chilled as I inhaled an ice-icy breath of air. When the flash disappeared, everything had turned dark all around me. Even the light I was giving off faded.

A hoarse, panicked voice pierced the darkness, shattering the silence that had enveloped me. It was a voice I knew, one filled with fear and desperation.

"Kristen!" The word was a trembling plea, underscored by a hand crashing down onto my chest. My eyelids snapped open, and I found myself staring into the eyes of my sister, Rachel. Her face was etched with worry, and tears glistened in her eyes as she clutched my shoulders.

"Kristen, wake the fuck up!"

The urgency in her voice and the touch of her trembling hands sent a jolt of adrenaline through me, dispelling the numbness that had gripped me. I tried to speak, but my voice was a croak, my throat parched as if I hadn't spoken in years. However, the more I tried to hang on to conciseness, the more everything began sinking. But soon, her voice began fading away, drifting farther and farther as I fell into darkness.