From the notes of Doctor Sumerlien on Subject Amy; the Forest Girl:

Outside it is bright and the air is thin and cooling. When I breathe that air it makes me feel lightheaded. I don't ever want to go back inside. Not ever.

They drag me by my arms backward into the dark portal of my exit. I protest, kicking and crying. The door to the outside closes.

I am again in my darkness, the darkness of the world I know. I feel a biter skitter across my hand as I sit on the cold floor. With reflexes honed over a lifetime I catch and eat it, savoring the first tasteless crunch. I eat it slowly, avoiding squishing the sour parts between my teeth and swallowing those whole. I can feel its twitching leg on my tongue and consider that there might be something good to eat outside that doesn't taste bad.

I wait in the dark for them to come. The darkness is mine. The lights coming on terrifies me, for it proceeds their entry.

They abuse me and then leave me in the dark. When I am fed, it is in darkness and when I sleep and when I catch prey. I am always hungry. I drink from the dripping faucet. Its sound makes it easy to find and I pool it in my cupped hands and lick it from them. This is the world I have always known.

When I think about them I wonder if there are people who do not want to hurt me. I can imagine such people because they would be like me, for I know my own instincts and understand myself. It is, in fact, all I know. There must be people who will like me.

There is a smooth stone that belongs to me. It is always where I have found it and I can hold it and touch its coolness to my bruises. I know this stone very well and I know it knows nothing. This is an instinct of unrequited knowledge of another. I cherish it, therefore, as evidence of something that is unknown and good. This is my strongest instinct and I trust it. It is the only thing that I can trust about myself.

Very often I lie to myself. Then it is easy to believe the things I do not trust can be ignored. Otherwise I might lose what little awareness I have, which is something I fear.

I choose the stranger in my hand to be my friend. I do not choose to reciprocate the suffering I have known upon this creature. This is in spite of the fact that I know, beneath my lies to myself, that this creature is incapable of returning the sentiment. This is a fact I can learn from, spiraling my thoughts outward from.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

I resolve to go outside again; to escape from the darkness and the light. To seek something beyond the world I have known. I believe that good stuff exists out there.

Light comes and it belongs to them. Darkness falls and it covers me. The brightness outside is different because of the air and the smell and the warmth. It is a different light.

When the biter stings my hand I drop it and it escapes. This I know, is what I must do. I must bite as the biter does when it is caught. Then I can stumble and crawl, weak and hungry, to the outside. As they drag me back into the darkness I try, with all my tiny strength, hysterical. There is a cry from my own mouth as I taste the blood from when I bit them.

I burst out into the outside, still screaming. I cannot go over the wall of wire. I am small enough to get under. When I look back, one of them is caught from trying to climb over, dangling and bleeding and wrapped up in the deadly wire on top of their wall.

I hear thunder and plumes of ruptured dirt rocket up around me as I run. They are trying to shoot me, to keep me from escaping. I find a wrecked tree stump to run in the shadow of. I escape into the forest.

I must hide as they search for me. I find a darkness and I am safe inside. I can go out when it is night. I go into the forest and they do not find me. I drink the water that drips and I eat the biters that skitter. There is plenty of both and I am patient and cunning. I am fast and elusive. I become stronger outside. I do not fear them finding me. After some days they give up looking. I can watch them and see them from the forest and they do not see me where I am in the darkness.

The outside is a good place. It is very easy to hide. I used to try to hide when there was nothing to hide myself with. Now it is easy, the forest conceals me where I crawl in the dark and sip the dripping water and eat all the crawling things that don't taste wrong. I can choose not to eat them because there are so many to find. I find ways to cover myself from the coldness of night. I find the black plastic bag to be very useful attire and when the rain comes again I get drunk on water and I am also protected from the chill.

The outside provides. There is much goodness all around. I sometimes leave the beautiful and strange forests. It is quiet in the fields beyond. The music of the birds and the animals becomes the humming and chirping of the delicious crawlers, the grasshoppers.

I find the hard ground again and realize it is a road. I follow it and I find roadkill animals and discarded objects. I feast on fresh meat and I learn to use the tools and objects I find.

I can see the places where the good people live together. I see their lights at night. I wait and then I decide that I am right, that the people I see outside are good people. I know it, my truthful thoughts agree with my feelings, I am not pretending.

I have learned to dress in clothing. My muscles have blossomed from the nutrition outside. I walk in my own way and I communicate in my own way. I have learned all there is about lies and truth and I know when something is one or the other. I have an awareness that I hold consciously as who I am.

I know the lights up ahead are those of the good people. They wait for me. I cannot wait to meet them.