Naya's POV.
Shuffling footsteps echoed behind me. The fear in my heart swelled until I lost all hope. Bitter tears streamed down my face endlessly as I cried, overwhelmed by the strange world I found myself in.
My breathing grew erratic, dizziness taking hold and my fingertips felt cold. I raised my head to glimpse the overhead lights, but my vision blurred, and a relentless ringing filled my ears.
A shadowed figure sprinted toward me. My eyelids grew heavier, and the last of my consciousness slipped away. Darkness surrounded me.
Groaning as the next thing I knew, my eyes cracked open to the harsh glare of bright overhead lights. I squinted, shielding my face with trembling hands. For a moment, confusion clouded my thoughts as I tried to piece together what had truly happened.
Had it really all been a nightmare?
The ruins, the chase, my body healing itself, the man pinned to the wall… it must have been a dream.
The room around me was small but intact, its calm normalcy comforting. I sighed, almost laughing at myself. Perhaps I was losing my mind.
The door creaked open, and a woman entered, likely in her fifties. She had a sharp pixie haircut and an air of brisk efficiency, walking in with a tray in her hand.
Before we could exchange greetings, she gasped and clutched her chest, the tray in her hands fell to the floor with a loud crash as she doubled over as if struggling to catch her breath as she choked profusely. Alarmed, I leapt from the bed to help her.
"Ma'am, are you alright? Do you need an inhaler?" I asked, approaching quickly, she must have been asthmatic and was having an episode. These were really dangerous, especially if she didn't have an inhaler on her.
But she recoiled, crawling away as she waved her hands at me in panicked refusal. Then, she scrambled out of the room, slamming the door behind her with a bang.
"What just happened?" I muttered, frozen in place. She refused my help and there is a possible chance she might not make it.
Anxious of her survival rates, I decided to go after her, so I tore the door open. A hallway stretched before me, splitting into two directions.
There was no sign of the woman present and she had been the only one I had seen since I had woken up .
Taking a deep breath, I chose one path and walked cautiously. As I turned a corner, calling out for her, or anyone, a familiar figure emerged.
"Michael?" I called out in disbelief, relief washing over me seeing a familiar face. Without hesitation, I rushed forward, throwing my arms around him, hugging him as tight as I could as I was really scared.
"It's so good to see you! Everything's been so… weird." I poured out my thoughts, recounting the nightmare and the strange encounter with the pixie-haired woman, glancing around one last time to see if I could find her but to no avail.
Michael listened quietly, his expression unreadable. Then, a thought struck me.
"The lab…" I trailed off, suddenly uneasy. "Where is the lab? And where's Dr. Cronos?"
His grim face gave me pause. I stepped back warily. "Where are we?" my eyes narrowed suspiciously.
Michael shook his head. "Naya… it wasn't a dream."
Those words hit me like a blow. He moved to the window, pulling back the curtains to reveal a scene that crushed the remnants of my doubts.
Collapsed buildings littered the horizon, their devastation stark in the daylight. My heart sank as reality hit me way too hard.
"This can't be happening," I whispered, taking a shaky step backward, what the hell?
Michael's tone softened. "We're at one of the Ascendant Authority bases. It's safer here, as compared to out there so you don't need to worry anymore."
His reassurance did little to comfort me. "What's an Ascendant Authority? And how did this happen?"
He hesitated, exhaling heavily before speaking. "You may have hit your head pretty hard when you fell, huh?" he began, though his chuckle lacked warmth.
Then came the truth—each word chipping away at my fragile sense of reality. It all came rushing back to me in full force.
I had been a scientist—well, an assistant to Dr. Cronos, a brilliant and dignified woman. The lab went into lockdown during an explosion, and while most were evacuated, I hadn't heard the alarm.
I was still inside when the building blew apart.
"So, you're saying all of this—everything that's happening—was caused by the explosion?" I asked, incredulous.
Michael's silence was enough answer.
"We found you last night, just before those hooligans got to you," he explained. His voice grew distant as I grappled with the truth.
The earthquake wasn't an earthquake. My body healing, the man thrown against the wall…
I gasped, covering my mouth with trembling fingers. It was all real, every part of it. This realization instilled a certain fear in my heart like never before.
"You have no idea how glad I am to see you alive," Michael said, his voice tinged with relief. "We thought you were dead."
"Dead?" The word felt foreign on my tongue.
Michael nodded solemnly. "You were in the lab when it exploded. The doctors confirmed it… there was nothing anyone could do."
His words unraveled me. Tears slipped down my cheeks as I shook my head in denial.
"I couldn't have died," I murmured to myself, though deep down, I sensed the truth.
Flashes of memory surfaced—the roaring flames, the unbearable heat. And then… nothing.
"I died," I whispered, the words tasting bitter. "Then how am I here?"
Michael's explanation faded into the background as I wrestled with the impossible.
That feeling—dark and rising—crept back, just like when I was cornered by the men. A sharp sense of danger filled the room.
I stepped back, putting space between myself and Michael. My trembling voice broke the silence, tinged with suspicion and confusion.
"How am I alive?"