As we were running for our lives, more so Dwight than myself, I heard light footsteps behind us. I knew that we were getting chased. My head turned to look behind me only to see that Michael’s attention was indeed not on me, but on my companion. What was he doing? Saving best for last? Or was I that creepy to him? Either way, I felt a bit better knowing that I was going to survive. Despite being a gamer, I was still quite athletic. It’s not like I gamed 24/7 since that was unhealthy. I did enough to stay thin and fit.

My feet pounded against the ground in a fast rhythm as my breaths grew into short pants. But still, I did not stop running even if my legs were starting to burn from over exertion. I had no choice but to keep going, I had to make sure that nerd boy at least lived. I looked over at him and noticed that his running was starting to get a bit sloppy as he was getting tired. My feet slowed to make sure I was behind Dwight. I couldn’t let him get hit. Once he’s stabbed, I know Michael won’t stop till he gets his kill and I couldn’t let that happen to him even if he annoyed me sometimes.

Without really thinking, I turned my head and winked at the killer before blowing him a kiss which makes him stop in his tracks for a moment. I bought us some time. Short, but some was better than none. When I glanced at Dwight, I knew from the look on his face that he saw. His suspicions that I knew he had just by looking at him had been confirmed for all he knew. But what he doesn’t realize was that once I did the math in my head for The Shape’s age, I was no longer attracted to him. I was free from that spell that he had over me. The man was old enough to be my grandfather for god’s sake! So gross! A shudder ran up my spine as I continued to run.

Eventually, Michael had caught up to nerd boy and raised his knife. In a swift strike, the man in the blue jumper swung his knife down, but somehow, Dwight dodged it. Who would have thought he had athletics? Perhaps I may have misjudged him a bit. He waved his hand at me for me to go. I don’t know why, but I hesitated. Would he be able to make it out alive without my help? I shook my head as a response to what he wanted and remained behind him. I heard him let out a frustrated sigh knowing he was a bit angry with me. I felt bad that he found out that way, but at the same time there really was no time to chat about anything since we were on the run.

Somehow and some way we ended up going near the path that had brought us to the property. While avoiding getting hit by the corn, I looked over at Dwight and noticed that he was seeing what I saw, the fog was going away almost like it was summoned to be there over a certain amount of time, but that wasn’t possible. Though, seeing the look on his face was quite satisfying, it didn’t take away the need and want to get off the property. The colors had started to blend into a massive gold and blue blur. My chest was beginning to hurt the more I continued to run.

As I approached the wooden fence that surrounded the property all over, I tripped over a bit of corn stalk and crashed down onto my knees. I felt a burning sensation which alerted me to look down to see both of my knees had been scraped and were slightly bleeding from the fall I had taken. I felt myself get pulled up off the ground and dragged towards the fence. Each movement was making me feel more pain like I was getting pushed to my limits. Sweat was beading up at the back of my neck and I knew Michael was getting closer.

Eventually both Dwight and I, got through the fence and I fell down again onto my backside. I was exhausted. My eyes remained on the killer who had killed our friends one by one and watched how he lunged at young man that left the property with me. As he lunged, he was unable to stab Dwight and in fact, looked like he had bounced back. He seemed just as confused as we were in what was happening. It seemed Michael knew his time was up when the sky was now lit up by the sun completely. It was then I realized, he was compelled to kill us all by daylight, but failed.

When it looked like he realized what was going on, we watched as “The Shape” walked away from the fence. It was obvious he was unable to leave the property for the time being. I looked over at Dwight to see he was looking at me. With some relief, we ended up laughing for a little bit. We had our freedom back! We were free! Free from torment! It was very exciting until we sobered up. It shouldn’t have just been us that survived; Kate should have as well. With a sad sigh, I stood back up with wobbly legs and dusted the dirt off of me. What were we to do now? The vehicle’s wheels were damaged, there was no way we could use the SUV.

“How are we going to get back to our homes?” I asked knowing we were stranded in basically the middle of nowhere. Would there be other driver’s willing to pick up two strangers? If I saw someone needing to hitch hike and looked like the way we did, I wouldn’t; so, why would they?

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“We can go back to the car and get our stuff and make our way back to the city where we clearly belong.” He was definitely a leader type. It’s no wonder the others listened to him. Now it was my turn to listen it seems. And his idea wasn’t a bad one either so there was no harm in doing what he suggested.

“That is going to be one long walk back.” A walk I wasn’t really looking forward to, but I knew it had to be done. The sooner we left the farm lands, the better off we are.

“I’d rather walk back and get away from here instead of sticking around in case the fog comes back so he can claim more victims.” What he said made perfect sense to me. It was better to leave and get away as soon as possible. I nodded my head to what he said and walked beside him back towards the road. Why didn’t he lead from the get go? Did he feel like something was off and didn’t say anything? My eyes glanced at him every now and again wondering why he let Claudette led us to everyone’s but our slaughter.

It took us a half hour to get back to the vehicle we took to get to where we were located. It was left alone all night. I looked over the SUV especially the tires and noticed something very odd. The tires were no longer in ruin. I remember the feeling and sound of them getting popped, so what was this I was seeing? I felt like I was going crazy. I heard Dwight opening the back to grab our things as I touched the wheel. There was no way this was possible. But many things that shouldn’t have happened, did. As an afterthought, I opened the driver’s side door and climbed inside. There they were, the keys sitting in the ignition. I hesitantly grabbed them and took them out before climbing out of the vehicle. I walked back towards my only companion alive and jangled the keys which caught his attention.

“I found these in the ignition of the car. They were just sitting there!” Without telling him about the tires, I motioned for him to follow me. “I suggest you leave our things in the car. In the meantime, come look at this.”

“Look at what Feng?” He followed me over towards the front of the vehicle and I pointed at the wheels I had been looking at earlier. Once he saw what I had pointed at, his brows furrowed in a quizzical way. “What in the world? The tires were purposely popped! There is no way that this is possible!”

“That’s what I thought as well when I first saw them. What is really going on here?” I asked with suspicion which wasn’t towards him at all. If anything, it was towards the area that we were in. Everything was just so odd.

“Let’s get out of here. We will take the vehicle back since it seems to be back in shape… somehow.” Not wanting to waste another second, I ran to the back of the vehicle and closed trunk. I then move in a jog and reached the spot that Kate was sitting in when we had gotten there. A lot of memories went through my mind as I climbed onto the passenger side before shutting the door. My gaze looks over at Dwight as he got in the driver’s side. “To answer your question, Feng, I don’t know. None of this is plausible.” I couldn’t agree with him more. The things that happened was unfathomable. If they were to speak about it, who would believe them? If it happened to someone else and they tried telling me about, I’d laugh and brush them off. Why would anyone believe us then?

It is clear how much he wants to leave the area when I noticed how fast he was doing a U-turn to head back from the direction where we came from. Everything was basically passing by in a blur as he speeds down the highway, getting far from the farmhouse where we were stuck in. It’s quite comforting to know we made it out alright, but I do know that I may have nightmares for months to come after seeing a lot of good people die in front of me. “You know… While we were back there, I noticed the way you looked at Michael.” My heart beat hard and fast in my chest. I was not expecting a confrontation this soon. With my head turned towards the window, I kept my eyes on the surrounding area that we were passing by. “Did you seriously have feelings for that psycho maniac?”

A shameful sigh had escaped from my lips. I was ashamed from my attraction to that killer, now that I was away from him, the freer I felt from the dark clutches that had been clawing into my mind. “Quite honestly, I thought I was attracted to him. As soon as I realized his age, I felt disgusted with myself then it made it worse when he killed Kate.” I admitted. It was difficult for I felt like he was going to look at me differently.

“I thought so when I noticed you kept looking over at him and even were following him.” He had let out a small sigh after basically admitting he had been observing me. “I’m actually disappointed that it wasn’t… That it wasn’t me.” My head turned away from the vehicle’s window to look over at Dwight. For some reason his confession surprised me. Though, I knew he liked me, I thought that me crushing on Michael would be the end of it. Perhaps, it really wasn’t so bad to be with the nerdy guy, but right now wasn’t the right time.

“Right now, isn’t a good time to be in a relationship after what we have been through. I wouldn’t mind trying once we have moved on from this.” Now it was his turn to be bewildered. It’s clear he wasn’t expecting my answer to be the way it was. He did seem to take that as an invitation since I felt his hand grab mine. As he drove back towards the city, I looked back out the window again watching the scenery pass us by.