Journey Into The Aftermath |✔

Chapter thirty: Epilogue

As I faded from Chase's view, my conscientiousness collected within an actual body and I felt it running through a vast field of perfect white. Everything was white; my t-shirt and jeans outfit, the grass and the sky all bleached in the same exact shade.

It was peaceful and perfectly without sound other than the softest breeze I could imagine. I ran through the seemingly infinite fields and stopped when I found my foot hit something during my thoughtless lollygag. It was a face.

A closer inspection showed the distinguishable jawline that could be used to carve arrowheads. It was Chase's.

His eyes were closed and then I saw that I was standing in a wide puddle of white water that was as thick as paint and his face just barely hovered over the surface. From his ears down, the rest of his body was submerged.

"Chase?" I asked aloud. "Are you ok?"

The body shifted and two concealed hands suddenly revealed themselves above the surface.

"Ch...Chase?"

The body began to contort and twist in ungodly angles as it seemed to spaz out in the water like he was going through a painful exorcism. I was about to run away when, like nothing happened, he went back to being perfectly still.

"Chase, you're scaring me!"

His body shifted again and suddenly, I wished I never repeated his name.

His head began to rise out of the puddle but the water that had the density of tar, pulling back on him. The pace his head was moving never slowed and as it rose to about a foot above the surface, the water spilled away.

Through his feet didn't rise with the rest of the body, they tilted forward as the head began to stand the body upright. Moments later, he was standing vertically and his head positioned to be looking dead at me even though his eyes were closed.

"Skylar..." he croaked with a ghost-like echo. The tone sent frozen chills down my back as his eyes shot open. "It's time for you to die!"

I screamed as his body spilled into the puddle, turning it into a blood red and inked into all of the surroundings around me and he disappeared. I felt the thick water pull behind me and when I was half way turned around, wet arms clasped around my neck. "It's time for you to die!" he repeated as he choked me in blood-soaked arms.

I screamed and struggled the best I could as I watched the world around me drown in deep dark red and traces of inky black.

Then another Chase appeared. This one had a murderous glare flaring off of his face like I was the reason something terrible in his life happened. He pulled out a cleaver knife and slashed away at my body, leaving me to scream before he went straight for my face.

"Skylar, it's okay" a woman said to me as I skyrocketed from whatever bed I was laying on. "I found you in the dessert and retrieved you as fast as I could after that terrible storm."

I struggled to lower my emotions after that horrible nightmare and tried to focus on the soft features of her face. There were some faded scars that were still visible and I did a poor job of concealing the fact that I was staring right at them.

I was in what could be called a dorm room, where there was a bed, couch, table and two chairs with a television in front of the wall. I was on the bottom of a bunk bed, which was connected to the wall, not each other. Questions coming in basket fulls, I looked up at the woman with frightened eyes.

"Where is Chase?" I shouted, the dream replaying constantly in my mind.

"Whoever that is, I sure he's long gone." she replied.

My mind officially tuned into her words. "What?"

"When we searched the wreckage, there was no sign of anyone else but you."

"No..."

"Skylar--"

"How do you know my name?" I shot at her.

"Is she treating you ok?" another woman came in and asked me, smiling. "This is our prized possession, after all."

She took vibrant strides over to us in a fashionable skin dress that ended in a skirt with her head held high. But before she could reach us, the woman I was taking to earlier quickly handed me a small piece of folded paper that felt like tissue. Paper?

I crumbled it in my hand as the pretty woman approached us. The first woman stood up and walked out of the room without turning back as the next one stared at me with insatiable pride. "Do you find your room comfortable?"

"And who might you be?" I asked in a demanding fashion but in a curious tone.

"Why, I'm Melinda Asher and welcome to the new and improved Nexus headquarters." she proclaimed. "I'm here to protect and serve the will of the surviving people one charity at a time."

I thought about all Nexus has done to this world. "Oh, is that so?"

"You know it," she stated. "After my...failures, I'm a changed person, I will do anything to save this dying planet, after all, my father was one of the many who were claimed by the fall and left the company for me to continue."

So it was a different leader who organized the stabilizer failure, not this new one. That made me feel a million times better. "And what do you need me for? And what actually happened that day? And do you know what your father's plans were and why he could do such a thing?"

"All in due time."

That was not the answer I was going to settle for. "I need answers like yesterday."

"And you're not the only one with questions." she countered. I was about to reply with 'What does that even mean?' when she took my confusion as permission to leave without giving anything I want. By the time I could form words again, she was already through the room door and I heard the soft click of it mechanically closing behind her.

My fists were so tense that when I released, I completely forgot that there was a note housed within my left one. I rolled over to my side and secretly opened to note within the pocket of my stomach in case there were cameras watching me.

When I thought it was going to reveal the best lunch order, it stabbed daggers through my every muscle and nerve with the words written on the slip. Even more crushing than the day the planet came to its knees.

Your father is innocent. And your brother is alive.

But then, right when I found a safe house with someone who possibly has the key to every piece of information I need, a devilish three-letter word crushed every one of my hopes at once like a bullet to a row of glass dominoes.

It was more than a statement, more than a command, it was...a warning.

R U N.