Am I ready?
Jonathan punches a code into the door. It slides open.
Revealing another hallway. A similar steel door waits at the end.
Is this some kind of trick?
Jonathan motions for us to step into the hall. We all obey. The previous door glides shut behind us.
Did I just give up my last chance at escaping?
Jonathan explains, “The reason for this little hallway is that if someone did leave the Complex before the Disease died, the air wouldn’t infect everyone in the Complex. This hallway has an advanced air monitoring and circulating system that searches specifically for the Disease particle. If it were to find a Disease particle in this hallway, it would go on lock down. You wouldn’t be able to leave or enter this hallway until it went through severe disinfectant procedures. Anyone in this hallway during those procedures would die.”
A chill runs down my back.
Jonathan moves forward, “I won’t be able to come with you after this door. Derek has currently been able to shut down my location tracker. But, if I were to leave the Complex, even if my tracker was entirely shut down, an alarm of Ellen’s would still go off. There’s a lot of information you still don’t know. We were planning on telling you more, but Ellen has found too many details. We couldn’t risk you spending another whole day here.”
Jonathan pauses to make sure we’re listening, than continues, “The second I open this door, you need to go. Follow the river away from the Complex. Don’t stop. Don’t turn back. You won’t be able to get back into the Complex once you leave. Time is different out there. It will only be dark for about an hour once you get outside, and then it will start to get lighter. All the answers to your questions will be inside your bags. Good luck.”
Jonathan punches another code into the door. It slides open. He’s pushing us out before I can survey my surroundings. I stumble out and turn just in time to see the door close. Jonathan has an odd look on his face. I can’t place it, but my focus is ripped away.
Air swirls around us. I force myself to remember what the hologram taught me. Wind. It pulls at my hair, crawls over my clothes.
My eyes fly everywhere. It’s dark, like the lights have been turned off. I glance up, where the ceiling should be.
Thousands and thousands of paces above us is the glassy, black sky. Tiny pinpricks of light are scattered across. Stars.
My gaze darts all around me. I can’t see ten paces in front of me. Thick, pole-like objects are planted firmly into the ground. I remember learning about them, but I can’t remember the name.
The thing that scares me the most is how much movement there is. Thin, thread-like plants sprouting from the ground sway back and forth in the wind. Leaves attached to the pole-like objects flutter back and forth.
I tense as something, inhumane, calls out into the darkness. A dark, small shape cuts across the stars. Moving by itself.
Animals.
I rack my brain, trying to bring back what the holograms said about animals. Particularly the ones that make such a noise.
Most of them are harmless, I think. As long as we leave them alone, they’ll do the same with us. In fact, they’ll most likely be scared of us.
But what if they aren’t?
Canton’s shaking voice breaks us out of our awed silence, “Nathan said to follow the river and to keep moving.”
Bridget’s voice wavers, “But…how do we find the river? What even…what’s a river again?”
Piper whispers, “I think…it’s that thing where a bunch of water moves together, flowing somewhere. It carves away the dirt and makes a path for itself.”
Bridget’s states sarcastically, “Okay, that sounds easy. Find an object we’ve never seen before somewhere we’ve never been before in complete darkness. Easy. Simple. I could do it in my sleep.”
I think she’s using sarcasm to distract herself from how scared she actually is.
I almost wish I was back in the Complex. Everything I saw in the holograms comes rushing back to me, insects, storms, cliffs, bears, tornados. I have no idea what’s right in front of me. Death stands right in front of me, crouches beside me, and leers behind me.
Brinn’s voice shakes, “Can we…could we at least get closer together? I can barely see any of you and I don’t want to be all alone out here.”
I move closer to Brinn’s voice. I say, “Are we all here?”
“Here,” Canton says, closer than I thought.
Everyone else states where they are. We decide to all grab each other’s wrists so that we don’t become separated in the darkness.
I grip Brinn’s thin wrist with one hand. Bridget’s fingers curl around mine.
Canton says, “I think we should move. Just…get away from the Complex.”
I glance over my shoulder. In the darkness, I can make out only a small, little building. I realize that nearly the whole Complex must be underground. The only part that is above ground is the tiny, thin hallway. I’ve spent my whole life beneath the earth.
I’m leaving my whole life, everything I know behind. For what?
For the darkness, for the twisting paths, for the river, where ever that may be. Where are we going? What are looking for? Will we just follow the river forever?
Maybe the others know. Maybe it’s something they learned while I was still captured.
I say, “Let’s go, just watch out for the…” I don’t know what to call the pole-like objects that are scattered in front of us.
“Trells? Trens? Trees? I don’t know…” Piper guesses.
“Trees, I think.” Brinn whispers.
“Okay, trees. Watch out for the trees.”
We cautiously take one step forward, pulling each other’s wrists. We take another and another.
“So, we need to find a river, right? How exactly do we do that…?” Bridget asks. I think she’s just trying to get away from our awful silence.
In our own silence, you can hear everything else. Something creaking, another thing calling out. The deafening noise of the wind pushing and pulling everything in its path.
We continue moving forward. The ground uneven against my thin, cloth shoes. I wince as something pricks through the fabric, scraping the bottom of my feet.
My hair flies into my face. I want to wipe it away, but I wouldn’t dare let go of Brinn’s wrist.
I want to run back to the Complex. I want to go back to where the lights illuminate the rooms. I want to go back, away from this horrible openness. I want to go back to where I know what surrounds me, not just black mysterious silhouettes.
Back to murderous Ellen? Lying Derek? Loyal Officials?
I don’t know how long we’ve been out here. It seems like it’s been hours, but I remember what Jonathan said. After about an hour or so, it will started to get lighter outside. How much longer is that? How much more of this suffocating darkness?
Did people really live out here, before the Disease? How could they survive in this chaotic, unorganized mess?
I glance up at the sky. It seems to be a little lighter than before. Is it just my hopeful imagination?
Nobody speaks. The wind gets stronger. In order to be heard, we have to scream at each other. We give up on any conversation. We’re too terrified to want to talk anyway. At least, I am.
As we twist through the trees, Brinn worriedly shouts out, “Should we have found the river by now? What if we passed it and didn’t see it?”
We all stop. Is it possible to get lost if you don’t have a destination?
Bridget yells, “Maybe we should just wait till it gets brighter. We’ll be able to see and won’t have to be worried about passing it.”
Canton responds, “But Nathan said to never stop moving.”
Bridget shouts, “Nathan’s not here. Maybe he wouldn’t know how dark it would be/”
Canton asks, “What does everyone else think?”
I yell, “I think we should stop. It would be better to lose time and go the right direction than to move farther away from where we need to be.”
Brinn agrees, “I think we should stop too.”
Piper and Bridget both shout out their agreement.
Canton says, “Okay, if you want to stop. Let’s still make sure we are together though.”
We stand still, the wind ripping at us. Unidentifiable noises echo around us, dark silhouettes darting across my vision.
My eyes become glued on the sky. Light slowly creeps into the darkness. It turns from pitch black, to dark gray. It gradually becomes a light gray. The stars disappear, one by one.
More colors seep into the sky. First light oranges and yellows rise up for in front of us. Then vibrant oranges, deep reds, bright yellows are streak across the sky.
There was nothing in the Complex with this raw, this beautiful.
I think this what the hologram called a sunset…or was it a sunrise? I never really understood the difference between the two.
A bright, sphere of light peeks through the trees.
Canton warns, “If that’s the sun, we aren’t supposed to look at that. The hologram said it can cause serious damage to our eyes.”
Brinn breathes, “That…is beautiful…”
“It’s amazing.” Piper agrees.
Bridget asks, “Do you think we should start looking for the river now? It’s bright enough.”
Canton answers, “Yeah. We don’t want to lose any more time.”
We unlink hands. We don’t have to worry about losing each other, now that we can see.
I scan our surroundings. I was so focused on the sky that I didn’t notice everything else around me.
The trees look a lot less threatening, now that I can see the bright green leaves and light gray, grooved trunks. Thin, dark green grass scratches against my knees. Some type of animal flies to a tree, making me jump back words.
This can’t be a trick of Derek’s. It’s too intricate, too detailed. Too…real.
We’ve escaped the Complex.