I walked for a while in the dark. After the memory came, I saw no reason to stay. The dark cavern wasn’t any more welcoming, and I still had no idea where I was going or who I was. The space seemed eerily empty, like there should be creatures or sounds filling the wide open but instead it was silent and cold. One thing that I could feel, apparently, was cold. I tried rubbing my arms, I tried huddling against the ground, even when I broke out into a run just to try and cross the distance faster I never warmed or felt any different. Both the empty space and the emptiness within me was deafening. I was beginning to wonder if I actually was dead, maybe there was some kind of afterlife or other place you are sent to when you die. I didn’t really know what an afterlife is supposed to be, but the thought occurred as I continued in the dark.

At some point I had realized I had been running at a fast sprint for a while, I am not sure how long. Time was passing in a way that didn’t really make sense, like I was aware of every second but at the same time strangely detached. My body was moving on its own, racing in a direction I had picked at random. Maybe instinct drove me in that direction, but after a while I started to notice slight changes.

The walls had disappeared a while ago, and I figured I just entered into the chasm proper. Yet as I ran for some unknown amount of time, the walls and ceiling seemed to eventually start to press in. I could feel their distance better than I could see them, mostly because I couldn’t see them. Then I saw it, I saw the first thing that wasn’t shrouded in darkness.

Suddenly, out of seemingly nowhere, a light popped into existence. Far, far, away from where I was, but it was a light! Some part of me was excited, eager, and my instinct told me to race to the source of light at a more feverish pace than I had already been. I willingly followed this instinct, the light was far but still so close. If I could see it, surely that meant it was reachable. Then, to my astonishment, the light began to move. It raced almost as fast as I did, but it was moving frantically side to side instead of a straight line. I felt my head tilt in curious wonder, was someone holding the light? Was there something moving its source, a trick of a reflective surface on the cavern walls? I almost wanted to find out, but more than anything I felt that urge to follow and chase it.

As I followed it, closing the distance from it being a tiny speck to the size of a small rock, I could hear sounds. Echoing clangs, hard things hitting the stone floor, clunking claters of something. It all came from a seemingly far away source, and the source was in the direction of the light. I pursued with additional fervor. The light bobbed in and out of vision, obviously passing through, over, and around various changes in the terrain. The walls were getting closer, almost close enough for me to perceive their looming shadows. It didn’t matter, I was getting closer to the light, and even with the odd sounds becoming louder I pursued faster. The terrain was difficult and strange, I couldn’t really see anything around me until it was right in front of me. With the fast pace I almost ran into or fell over several large rocks or strange rocky pillars. When the light dipped out of view, I chased it in a straight line and climbed atop a large hill of loose rock and soft dirt. My first encounter with dirt I think, but I ignored the strangeness and crawled up the hill to pursue my light. As I crested the hill, I saw something I didn’t expect, though I wasn’t really expecting anything.

Atop the hill I could get a good view of the area, the light was so large it might as well be the size of the altar I laid on. Within the light’s glow I could see figures, many figures. Five, or maybe six or seven, dark figures were framed by the source of the light. The source was a torch, a tall chunk of dark wood alit with a wonderful blaze. Held by a stout figure, light bouncing off shiny clothes. Armor probably, I wondered how I knew what armor was, but I was beginning to stop questioning my collection vocabulary. The others were of various sizes, but all of them raced alongside the firelight. Almost like they were running from something. I wondered if I should be running from something, they seemed so full of emotion with the way they ran with their entire bodies. Stumbling, racing with waving arms or holding weapons close. I wondered why they carried weapons, but then I didn’t really want to find out because they ran away and the light was escaping me.

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I followed as fast as my legs could carry, thinking about shouting out to them but deciding against it with how frantic they seemed to be. Then I saw them, the others. I first bumped into one, not seeing it because of the thin frame it occupied. We both stumbled, I almost moved to apologize, but the thin figure in the dark crawled over me frantically and began chasing after the light again. I figured they wanted to see the light as badly as I did, so I got up and resumed my own chase. Others bumped into me as I ran and got closer to the firelight. As the light and I got on the same level of bumpy ground, I could see many thin figures chasing the light in front of me. Blinks of light as the firelight ducked over and past obstacles. The things running with me seemed to have no skin or flesh, for the most part. Skeletons I think would be the word. It seemed strange that they were running, but they didn’t seem hostile because they ignored me. We all just wanted to get to the source of the light, but the people holding it were running away.

I was beginning to get tired of chasing the light, not physically tired, just bored maybe. Despite my slow-growing boredom, I continued to pursue the light. The others did too, and I even saw one of the skeletal figures get close to the light’s edge. We were all very close to the edge of the light now, I was maybe five or six thin figures deep and the skeletal figures in the front were just a little bit away from touching the light. Then, as this lucky thing fully immersed itself in the light, one of the running people turned slightly and a beam of light shot out of their hand! Bright yellowish light in a straight line, illuminating all around them for a single moment before it collided with the lucky skeleton. The poor guy just wanted to see the firelight, probably, and that light coming out of the person’s hand evaporated it. But with the help of that strange light I saw something, something that almost seemed like it should be scary.

As the light exploded out of the beam, I saw a huge illuminated figure a little ways ahead of the running people. I couldn’t tell if it was skeletal like the other things chasing the light, but it was easily twice or three times as tall as the biggest person running closest to the light. It was probably five times as tall as the person holding the light, because they were pretty short and stout.

The people running didn’t notice it, and I realized then that maybe the skeletal things weren’t chasing the people to see the light they carried like I was. The huge thing suddenly erupted from the darkness into the middle of the group. Several of the people stopped suddenly, frozen by fear maybe, but two brave and big people charged it. They both held big weapons and big metal disks, shields probably. The big thing didn’t look skeletal like the thin things I ran with, but one of its large arms was missing a lot of flesh and its skin drooped around its body like a too big shirt. The big thing was holding a massive rock in its good hand, and swung the heavy rock at the two brave people. They were flung to the side by the impact, rocketing out of view of the torchlight. I heard the first sound besides running or clanking, a shrill scream and grunting. One of the scared people screamed loudly and the other two that got flung grunted and then hit something hard with a crunchy impact. I could see cleary now, there were six of them total, but two weren’t in the light anymore.

With the group of people frozen or flung out of the light, the skeletal things charged at them and a few tried to fight back. Something inside me begged and screamed for me to join in. The sight of them so close, something almost called to me to attack them. I felt… Angry? I think anger is the best way to describe it, but watching the people with the light fight against the skeletal things… I didn’t like it, I think, something about it made me upset. I didn’t want to hurt the people with the light like my anger urged me to, but I also didn't want to fight the skeletal things, and definitely not the big thing which was just standing there quietly watching. So instead I fought my instinct and skulked away to the edge of the light. I didn’t enter it, I saw what happen to some of the skeletal things when they did. Blasts of light and color sprayed out of a few of the people’s hands or appeared suddenly in the air. A battle was happening, the skeletal things were attacking the group, and I watched quietly.

It didn’t take long. There were a lot more skeletal things than I thought. Once they weren’t running anymore, it was like water breaking through a dam. Flooding with bones and decaying flesh that descended on the people in an instant. The people obliterated and knocked down a lot of the skeletal things. One of them even tried to run away the direction they were already running towards, but the big thing stopped that quickly. Before any real time had passed at all, the people stopped moving. Even the two that were tossed aside got angry attention from the skeletal things. There wasn’t anymore noise after that. Just the sound of clicking bone against the floor.