Author's Note: Just so you all know, this is not the long-awaited sequel to Out of Place, which is unlikely to be worked on as thought. This is a separate universe from that fic, but it follows the canon of the five movies. Enjoy!
Final Destination: Breaking Down
Chapter One: Rain
A storm rages over the campus, an unfortunate remnant of a faded hurricane. I have to grip my umbrella with both hands, skillfully guiding it through the yanking winds to provide maximum rain coverage. One of my earbuds rests over my ear and flaps against my temple in the wind.
"Matt." Oh, whoops, I think.
"Sorry, what?" I reply, adjusting the cord of my earphones.
"Can I borrow your comp book?" Riley asks. I'd forgotten I even brought it, since I'd moved out of Composition and Rhetoric a year ago.
"Hell, you can keep it," I answer, awkwardly pulling it out of my backpack without removing it. "For one hundred dollars."
A gust of wind catches my umbrella, now only supported by one hand. It comes crashing down on the face of another one of my friends. The yelp reveals him to be Jason. "You alright?"
"Only my pride is damaged," Jason replies.
"I'm really sorry, I just…" A cacophony of thunder crashes leave me unable to finish my thought.
"That's enough fuckin' around out here; let's go inside," Kenny follows up. "I don't want to get stormed on."
"Aw, don't be so ready to abandon me," Ariana replies, throwing her arms around Kenny dramatically.
"Where's your class?" Kenny asks, lowkey trying to wiggle out of her grip.
"It's in Seamus," she answers, lazily tossing an arm at the building to the right of the one in front of us - the towering Charleston Building. "You kids have fun." She hugs me, and I squeeze back before releasing her into the world.
"But seriously, we have like three minutes," Riley cuts in. A gust of wind sprays my left side with increasingly heavy rain, so I agree and lead the dash indoors.
As always, a crowd of random college students stand before the elevators. "Well, have fun with that bullshit," Kenny says. "I'm taking the stairs."
"Unbelievable," I respond, fistbumping him as I try to dry off. The building's air conditioning must have kicked on, since I find myself shivering. I glance around the ceiling of the first floor, and my eyes land on a flickering fluorescent light. With a minute buzz, it shuts off.
"Dude, get in the elevator," Jason says, shaking my shoulder. With only a nod, I obey, still moderately fixated on the light.
The elevator is quite unfortunately crowded. In addition to the three of us, there are five other people from my Civilization class. I find it a bit strange how seven of us all ended up on the same elevator.
A clank on the floor tells me that I've dropped the keychain I'd been fumbling with. I thought it was entirely contained in my pocket, but apparently I was jumping to some pretty erroneous goddamn conclusions. Awkwardly leaning sideways to avoid proximity to the butt of whoever was directly in front of me, I angle down and grab the keychain.
"Ah, floor six," Jason jokes.
"Is it me, or this elevator slow as shit." I don't recognize the guy who says this, but from the back of his jersey, his last name is Lawrence. He seems to be right; as the song on my phone transitions to Alanis Morissette's "Right Through You," it seems to signify the passing of time.
And then, the lights go out. I hear a few shrieks and curses, and I grasp instinctively at the stress ball in my right pocket, crushing it to remain calm.
After an uncountable amount of time, the lights flash back on. I block my eyes with the back of my hand as the doors open with a ding. "So much for a tech school," a girl, Lucy, laughs.
Riley claps me on the shoulder as he moves toward the first classroom to the left of the elevator, which I suppose is his Composition class. He pulls the door shut behind him, which accelerates and slams.
"You're jumpy today, bro," Jason says. "Scared of Civ?"
I try to laugh reassuringly but can only manage to exhale sharply. "Who wouldn't be?" As we enter, I take my usual place near the front and the door. Jason moves to the back, and I shake my head internally.
At least, I thought it was internally. It must have been externally as well, since Sakura gives me an odd look. "Something wrong?" she asks.
"Uh… sorry. No, it's fine," I answer, dropping my backpack onto the table.
Professor Reyns must be in a rush to get started, since he turns on the projector as soon as Sakura and I sit down. "Alright," he begins, "we've got some catching up to do today, so let's not be too slow. Who remembers which two of Israel's sons were born to Rachel?" He glances over the small collection of students, completely ignoring any hand-raising symbolism. "Jori?"
From the back, Jori sits up, tugging on her earlobe. "Eh… is it… Benjamin and Joseph?"
"Excellent," Professor Reyns answers. "Now, Joseph…" History is difficult enough for me to pay attention to on a good day, but my heart is absolutely racing. Anxiety, this is not a good time, I think, uselessly.
"Hey." I hear a whisper behind me, but I can't identify it. When Reyns looks away to ask more questions, I turn around. "You good?" It's Amy, the only other nonbinary person in the class. And the whole university, as far as I'm aware. She always seems to know when I'm having an episode, even though we're not particularly close. I nod a couple of times before turning back to Reyns.
My heartbeat seems to pick up even now, and it seems another question has been asked, since the room is silent. I can hear my ears ringing, until…
SCREECH! The fire alarm roars to life, almost shocking me out of my seat. "What the-" Amy starts to say, interrupted by a crash of thunder which seems to rattle the whole building. A ceiling tile pops out, smacking one of the students sitting in the back on the head. Lucy screams and jumps to her feet.
"Alright, come on; let's stay calm and file out," Professor Reyns says. Most of us quickly exit the room, but I find myself unable, staring back at Reyns as he goes to awaken the unconscious student. Jori sits beside the two, looking nervously as the ceiling creaks.
Then, the back wall collapses. Jori screams as Reyns falls out into the storm, until the crumbling ceiling takes her and the student beside her out as well. I hear a few screams from the hall, and after a few seconds more of being frozen, I rush out of the room as well.
Everyone seems to be panicking. At least the elevators are being ignored, so the halls are not clogging. Alas, no one is moving slowly, and I can see that Lucy has fallen over. A seemingly endless slew of college students shuffles over her, stampeding her into the ground. The sight brings me to tears.
I rush over and grab her hand, trying to pull her up, but the lights flare, and I drop her. "Damn it!" I shout. Someone comes barreling through, shoving me against the wall and stomping down on Lucy's neck in a sickening crunch. I let another wail escape me before running for the staircase.
Coming from the sixth floor, we have five flights of stairs to descend before safety, so we're booking it. I can see the Lawrence guy trying to hop across the banisters to avoid the mass of people, but something seems to catch his foot, and he goes tumbling between the stairs. I seize up for a second; heights fuck me up, and this would be something I'd never forget.
The hallway begins to collapse right as I enter the stairwell, and the combination of shrieks and crunching metal propels me forward onto the staircase. It feels like pretty slow going, which gives me time to focus a bit on containing my own anxiety, enough to keep moving, at least.
"Matt!" Amy stands in front of me, hand extended as though to beckon me forward. I clasp her hand strongly and begin moving down the stairs.
Sakura stands at the bottom of this flight, before the glass windows of the fifth floor. "Come on!" she calls out, waiting for Amy and me. The windows shatter, and she trips to the ground. Jason runs back up to help her stand, but he stumbles and flails forward, falling onto a torn spike of window frame. Amy screams, suddenly unable to move.
Sakura raises her head and starts to push herself up with her arms, but the bits of glass hurt her, and she exclaims in pain. The moment I step forward to approach her, the ceiling over the ledge collapses again, blocking Sakura and Jason off forever.
"No!" I scream.
"We… we have to jump the banisters," Amy says, pointing past the inaccessible ledge. "Come on." She climbs carefully over the near banister, swiftly crossing the gap and stepping down, so slowly on the other side. It's a wide gap, but she seems to have only a bit of trouble. Steeling all of my willpower to keep from shuddering, I step atop the banister as well, crouching on all fours. "You've got this!" Amy says.
I inch my left leg across the open space, hands clenching the banister like my life depends on it. At this rate, it probably does. Unfortunately, another chunk of ceiling crashes down, and I flinch, losing my foothold. With a shout, I stop, hanging onto the bar with just my hands. "A-Amy!" I cry out. You're losing your fucking mind, I think, repeatedly.
"It's okay! You're okay!" she calls. "Just… climb down to the next set below-" She stops talking when we hear another rumble. This one sounds like a raucous burst of thunder, or maybe a train exploding; I don't fuckin' know.
"Amy?" I ask, trying to shift my hands to the rods supporting the banister. She doesn't respond, and I try to choke back a cry. The vertical rods are hard to grip, and the friction burns my hands as I uncontrollably slide down them, until my fists rest against the stair below them. And with a prayer, I let go.
My hands find the next banister below. Crying in gratefulness, I hop back onto the stairs and run down as fast as I can. Someone left their backpack behind, on the damn staircase, so I jump over it and keep moving.
Alas, my foot brushes it, and I flinch, then falling down the rest of this half-flight. As the concrete rushes to meet my face, I shut my eyes.
When I open them again, I find myself in the lobby, being pulled by Jason into an open elevator. "W...what?"
"You strugglin' today?" Jason asks.
I grab his shoulders, squeezing ridiculously tight. Not above a whisper, I say: "Jason, what the fuck just happened?" I can hear terror coloring my voice.
"Whoa, easy there," he says, removing my hands. The elevator door closes, containing the eight of us. I drop my hand to my pocket to grab for my spinning keychain, but I hear the distinctive sound of it falling onto the elevator floor. "Ah, floor six," Jason jokes.
"Is it me, or this elevator-"
"Slow as shit," I whisper.
"Okay, what's goin' on here?" the Lawrence guy says.
"Right Through You…" I whisper. Two seconds later, I see the Alanis Morissette album artwork pop up on my phone screen. In shock, I let it fall.
"Matt, what are you doing?" Riley asks.
"We have to get out of here," I whisper.
"We have to what?" Lucy says. Then, the lights go out.
I can't help it; I call out. "We have to get out of here! The building's gonna collapse!"
"Shut up for like, one second!" Jori shouts. "Why's the elevator broken?"
I don't answer her. Still unable to see, I shove my way to the front of the elevator, blocking the door. I don't bother to cover my eyes when the lights come back on. "This isn't right! We have to get out!"
"You want us to miss class?" Sakura asks, clearly quite concerned. The doors ding open, but I remain still, preventing any exit.
"Hello?" a voice asks from outside. Someone wants to go down. Still in a panicked state, I push everyone tighter, allowing him in.
"Dude, let me go to class," Lucy says. The door shuts, and I jam my finger on the first floor button.
"Matt, please focus," Amy says, resting her hand on my shoulder. "What's going on?"
"I… I saw the whole building collapse… everyone panicking and t-trying to e-escape…" I find myself unable to continue.
"...Okay, let's get you to the health center," she follows.
"So… are we going to class now?" Lawrence guy asks. The nine of us pour out into the lobby, and I look to the left, hearing another panicked cry.
A few people run after another, a girl, who's running for the fire alarm. "Denali, don't!" a guy shouts, but she pulls it anyway.
SCREECH!
"Now! Get out!" I shout, running for the door.
"What in the hell…" Jori says.
"Well, looks like we have to now," Riley answers, popping out his umbrella.
As the others join me outside, I see the group with Denali - six in total. In fact, the guy from the elevator had joined us as well. "So…" he starts to say.
"Matt, dude, you shouldn't be out in this without your umbrella," Riley says, casually angling his to shield us both. He doesn't seem to know how to respond to my panic attack, so he says nothing else.
"Denali," one of the other girls says, "you're freaking me out. What are you…" With that, Charleston Building groans. We all look up to it and watch the seventh floor collapse.
"Oh shit!" Jason says. A few of them scream, but I can't tell who. All I can do is watch as people race outside, and the sixth floor crumbles, then the fifth floor, and the fourth floor...