I took off running. My side ached, my face ached, but none of that mattered. There was only one thing now. When everything else was stripped away, it was a simple equation. The truck’s speed versus mine, and the angle of my approach. If I misjudged, it would pass, and I’d lose my chance. I forced more speed into my legs, imagining myself ramping up for the long jump. I threw myself over the bushes at the edge of the park, then launched into the road. The driver didn’t see me. He didn’t slow down as I leapt out directly into the path of that speeding truck, and wham!

A jolt of shock.

Pain.

Panic.

And I was no longer in the street, but in the unbearable cold and confusion of Elsewhere.

The realities caught in there with me were as desperate as I was, as if they knew they would be wiped clean by the correction, one and all. With no Earth, there would be no futures—not even a present—only an infinity of pasts fading to nothing, for there would be no one to remember them.

Maybe you’re looking in the wrong place . . .

Hunter was right—and there was only one place left to look. All this time I had stayed clear of the pit. But that’s where my world had to be: down there somewhere, spiraling away toward oblivion. I had to be willing to sacrifice everything. I had to go down into that extinguishing darkness, and search for the one-in-a-trillion lost world that was my own.

I fought away from the realities trying to take hold of me as I slid deeper. Take my hand, they all seemed to say. I’ll save you! But it was all lies. None of those other worlds would stop the correction. But they didn’t care. Because if I chose one of them, it would have its brief sparkling moment of existence before everything was snuffed out. That’s all they wanted. Their moment. They would be satisfied by that. But not me.

I fought off what felt like the grip of a million hands. I pushed through and plunged deeper and deeper. Then one world in the depths of that maelstrom caught my attention. It held my focus in a way the others didn’t.

Am I the one you’re looking for? it seemed to gently say.

I reached out and grabbed it. It felt imperfect and cracked with rough edges and dirty corners that no one could get clean. Its strength was fraught with frailty, its confidence riddled with self-doubt. There was dishonor, and disgrace, but within it a core of hope that was brighter than the sun. And more than anything it felt . . . familiar.