*CLANG*

The impact sent a wave through Amity as chunks of metal flew out, throwing Amity back a bit. She braced herself, rolling on the ground as she came to a stop.

“Ow- Shit!”

Her back rubbed against the floor as her head crashed into the wall, stopping her from going any further. The site where she stood had been blasted clean, the wall no longer having any attachments…

Or Katie.

Immediately, Amity got up and ran over to the wall, where she could see someone slumped in the corner. She slid down and hastily grabbed the body’s arm, placing two fingers on the wrist as she desperately hoped for a pulse.

The floor near the girl was a dirty, dingy yellow showing that it hadn’t been cleaned, if ever, and it began to soak up a dark red liquid, staining Amity’s clothes.

She felt something warm touch her skirt, but she didn’t care. The potential danger her friend was in was more powerful than that.

She felt a tiny bit of movement as she honed in on the blood vessel, the pulse becoming clear, although weak, as she breathed a sigh of relief. Amity gripped the hand, holding the green rock in her other, as she forced a green wave of power through her hand into the other girl’s.

Katie remained unconscious while Amity stood up, pulling away and heading towards Raleigh.

Just as she reached his shackles, though, she realized something important.

The footsteps stopped.

She picked up another rock from the floor, slamming it against the window, then one of Raleigh’s shackles. Amity ripped the other hand’s shackle out of the wall as she directed him to Katie.

“Keep her safe.”

She handed him a few papers and some chunks of rock, as well as her water bottle.

Amity leaped through the empty window frame, dodging the broken glass to land on the other side unharmed. She looked to her side, seeing the door half open with clear dents on it. The door slammed into the wall as she ran outside, quickly diving through the groups of people to consult a map mounted on the outside wall of the room she was in, finding a wall to duck behind as she studied it.

This one was a bit different - it lacked the label for the cells that Amity had found her friends in, replacing the text with “SECURITY LEVEL 4 ONLY”She ignored that difference, focusing on a room that she noticed didn’t exist on the original map, the paper had been torn just where the room was situated.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

The desk was situated roughly near the center of the facility, the holding chambers for Amity’s friends on the far north side, and this… secret room, needing level 5 clearance, was on the far south side, nestled in a corner that probably didn’t get much traffic.

She tried her hardest in the maybe 20 seconds she had to stare at the map to commit it to memory, before ducking into a hallway to her left.

Footsteps echoed as she entered the enclosed area, a stretch of sandy floor in front of her and nothing behind her.

The door clicked shut, the sound feeling like a bomb in the otherwise silent hall. Once she started taking steps, the sound the sand made with each step rubbing against her ears and each breath filling the entire stretch of land, she began a plan.

“At the end of this hallway, there should be my friends, in a cell. I can probably bust in, and just run out with them.” She thought. “Actually, how would I get them out of the facility in the first place…”Just as she had an idea, she reached the end of the hall, the rusty door adorned with a sign, saying “SECURITY LEVEL 5” and creaking under the slightest touch.

As her hand met the cold, rough metal, she took a deep breath. She needed to move fast, grabbing Kaiya and Himiko and running them back into the hallway near immediately.

The handle stuck, her hand pouring force into it until it finally budged, chips of paint and rusted metal falling into the sand as the door creaked open, the hinges not having been turned in years.

Amity found herself in a dimly lit white room, pristine save for a bed in the corner and toilet in the adjacent, as well as a door that was slightly ajar with a draft.

She pulled it open, peeking through the slightly widened crack to check for any security or other officials, before slinking through to yet another control panel mounted on the wall opposite to the one she came from. It was smaller than the other ones, only having a few buttons, as well as… A turntable?She pressed the button allowing her to see into the cell, finding an identical room to hers. The turntable rotated the room as she turned it, and she quickly got a grasp on it, before placing it back how it was and bailing.

After a few seconds of walking through a hall, she heard a faint yelp as she slipped behind a unit. The voice was soft, but powerful, as another one hit her ears.

Amity decided to help this girl, starting by getting into the unit and stopping whatever was hurting her. She turned her head around each corner before going around, needing to reach the front of the unit for it’s door, but she was stopped at the sight of another person. The girl, mostly adorned in purple with her signature witches hat, opened the door and led a sky-blue eyed girl wearing a denim jacket out of the room, shoving a collapsed man in a black jacket out of the way to make room.

“Hey.. Hey! Himiko!”

The girl with the hat turned around, a bandage on her face immediately apparent.

“Huh…? Who.. Amity!” Himiko ran up to her, enveloping her in a hug for a few seconds before pulling back.

“We need to get out of here, now. Where’s the rest of them?”

“Oh, uh… Katie was unconscious last time I saw her, and Raleigh was helping her. I’ll bring you guys back to them.”

Amity led them back through the empty hallway, pulling open the door and slinking out and into the cell where they were previously.

“Raleigh!”

Amity led the group into the chamber, where Katie had awoken.

“Hey! Katie’s awake, she seems okay.”

“That’s good, is she able to stand and stuff? ‘Cause we need to go, now.”

Katie tapped Amity’s shoulder, answering that question.

“I’m taking that as a yes, so we all need to get out, now.”

Amity led them behind the cell, revealing a tube stuck into the ground, still as pristine as the one in the middle of the area.

“This was here on a map I saw on a board by that weird hallway.”

Kaiya showed them how to get into the tube and activate it, as well as where to go (an option labeled “Surface.”

The cylinders they were inside of flew down through the tubes, heading straight upwards.

The sounds of motors were quickly followed by that of running as someone ran across the floor, back up towards the tubes they had all just escaped from.