I didn’t pause when I was back in the light. I sprinted through the big cavern without looking at any of the monsters there. I could feel their eyes on me, and I didn’t care.

I didn’t care where I was going, either. Just somewhere I could be alone. I avoided the tunnels that had people near them, running down the first empty one I could find.

It was the eastern tunnel. This was the second time I’d sprinted through this corridor today. Last time in joy, this time in horror. It was hard to remember how I’d felt this afternoon, knowing the raiders were home. Everything was dark and gruesome now, including their return. The very stones seemed evil.

This way was the right choice for me, though. No one had any reason to come here, and it was empty.

I ran to the farthest end of the tunnel, into the deep night of the empty game room. Could I really have played games with them such a short time ago? Believed the smiles on their faces, not seeing the beasts underneath…

I moved forward until I stumbled ankle deep into the oily waters of the dark spring. I backed away, my hand outstretched, searching for a wall. When I found a rough ridge of stone—sharp-edged beneath my fingers—I turned into the depression behind the protrusion and curled myself into a tight ball on the ground there.

It wasn’t what we thought. Doc wasn’t hurting anyone on purpose; he was just trying to save —

GET OUT OF MY HEAD! I shrieked.

As I thrust her away from me—gagged her so that I wouldn’t have to bear her justifications—I realized how weak she’d grown in all these months of friendliness. How much I’d been allowing. Encouraging.

It was almost too easy to silence her. As easy as it should have been from the beginning.

It was only me now. Just me, and the pain and the horror that I would never escape. I would never not have that image in my head again. I would never be free of it. It was forever a part of me.

I didn’t know how to mourn here. I could not mourn in human ways for these lost souls whose names I would never know. For the broken child on the table.