At the next station I drag myself up onto the platform, scouring walls for any clue about where I am and where to go. How to make it out of here alive.

I’ve seen maps down here before, back when I used to explore after going to the museum, and I desperately need to find one now. My heart thunders in my chest, panic squeezing my lungs as dingy bare walls stare back at me.

Finally the weak lantern light illuminates dull colors barely visible under layers of dirt and grime. Frantic, I scrub the heel of my hand against the wall until the lines of a map appear. It’s faded, making it almost impossible to distinguish the various twisted lines and tunnels, and my eyes skitter everywhere at once until I see sharp letters stating YOU ARE HERE with an arrow pointing at a white circle.

I place a trembling finger over the spot like it’s an anchor holding me firm. I know where I am, now I just have to figure out where I’m going.

Behind me the moans in the tunnel grow stronger, pushing me to move, to run, but I know I have to think first.

My body shaking from the cold and strain of the day, I start tracing the lines that spread away from where I’m standing, tunnels curving and twisting back under the Dark City or out past the island, sometimes doubling back or just ending.

It’s like a maze, and I keep getting lost and tangled where the lines intersect into knots before untangling and breaking out again. There are too many options. I don’t know where to go. I beat my fist against the wall, pouring out my frustration and forcing myself to focus.

I refuse to die down here alone. I didn’t give up when I fell into a pit of barbed wire and I won’t do it now. There’s always a way to survive. The trick is finding out how. Survivors aren’t always the strongest; sometimes they’re the smartest, but more often simply the luckiest. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, clearing the panic from my mind, and then I open them and start tracing the lines on the map again, knowing there’s something I’m missing.

That’s when I see, at the edge of the map, a picture of a roller coaster, and I almost laugh at the simplicity of the solution. Catcher told me about a roller coaster—he said that was how he found the boat.

Now I just have to find where that is. With the lightness of hope screaming through my body, I rub more of the grime away and uncover an arrow pointing from the picture of the coaster to a round dot at the bottom edge of the map—another station.