Dark.

It's the first thought that goes through Taylor's mind once she wakes up. A warranted one, really, given the total lack of light she's exposed to. Have the street lights finally given up? No, can't be it. There would still be some moonlight, however little should clouds obscure it, but still.

Her second observation is that it's... quiet. Really quiet. The sort of silence she's not sure she's ever been exposed to. There's – always something, everywhere. Cats yowling and dogs barking, cars driving in the distance, or even just the wind. Now? She can't hear anything at all that isn't the result of her squirming.

The third thing she notices is that there isn't much room to squirm.

She raises her hands – or tries to, anyway, as they encounter resistance in form of – something, not even a feet above her chest. It has some give but not much, some sort of material? Sort of smooth? She can't really tell. She makes a fist to strike the thing and hears a muffled thump when it encounters a solid surface on the others side of the fabric. Her brows furrow in confusion as she repeats the action. It kinda sounds like plastic or wood, she can't quite tell. Her legs encounter the same problem when she tries moving them, her knees striking something through the- dress? She wiggles a bit, as much as the tight space allows her, to confirm that yes, she's wearing a dress. For the first time in years. What the hell is this, where-

For a short moment, she freezes when a memory slips into her thoughts. Just for a moment, as she then violently thrashes her whole body against the walls of her trap. Knee, elbow or knuckle – none make much of an impact against the surrounding cloth.

"Help!" Her cry is loud, too loud, in the claustrophobic space of-

-the locker, she's in the locker. The- those three bitches pushed her in and she- and nobody has freed her, it's night now and nobody has freed her from the filth and the stink and- no, nonono that's- that's not right. Calm, she has to calm down. This isn't the locker, this can't be the locker. She's- she's lying down, and the smell only came when she thought about it- it isn't here. No filth either, she's clean, she knows she's clean even if her mind is telling her she's still sticky and dirty and-

And nothing. That came after, she's clean, she's not trapped in the locker. She's not- she's trapped somewhere else.

She forces herself to still. To think. This isn't the locker. Can't be. Too silent. The dark might fit the situation but it's never this silent in the city. Besides, she's clean (she is!) so someone must have took her out and cleaned her off - and seen her naked – mortification grips her heart. It's stupid, she knows, to worry about something like that in – whatever her situation is right now, but, well, the last person to see her like that was Dad and that was... years ago.

Ugh- fuck, focus!

So she's clean, that's good, even if some stranger must have done it. Who would have done so, though? Police? No. Firemen? No way. Maybe the nurse or- either the school nurse or someone in – wherever she was taken. Hospital? She would go there after something like that, right? Right. So hospital. She must have passed out in the locker and been taken to a hospital. Makes sense, it was foul in there, a biohazard for sure. And that thing she's wearing - must be a gown. Okay. Okay. So she's in a hospital.

But where? Why would they put her in a closed space like this? She wants out. Out!

"Hey!" Nothing. "Hey!" Her shrill scream momentarily deafens the girl. "Anyone! Help!" She holds a breath in to listen. But there is nothing.

Nothing.

A surge of panic grips her chest, unpleasant -almost painful in its intensity. She presses her trembling hands over her heart.

Nothing.

She presses her fingers against her ears.

Nothing. There's nothing.

Her knees hit the ceiling when she tries to draw them in, her hands rummage over the sleeves covering her arms, and still, she doesn't let her breath out.

She waits an excruciatingly long minute, every second slower than the last. But no pain comes, no burning, no urge to draw a fresh breath. Nothing. She finally lets the air out of her lungs, taking another long minute to breathe in again. Nothing.

She's - is she dead? She doesn't... feel dead. She's not dead, no. She giggles. Silly Taylor, she wouldn't be thinking about being dead were she truly gone. The dead don't think, or move.

Or scream.

She does.

She's not sure for how long. Time has little meaning in the small, dark space she's provided with to violently thrash around in. When she finally stops, not one thing has changed. No-one has come to rescue her, no light has come to comfort her. Nothing.

But it helps, a bit, in the way exhaustion helps one to calm down. She lets her arms fall by her sides, there isn't any other place she could put them, really. Numbness overcomes her as the reality of her situation sets in.

She's in a box, or some other container, and last she heard, hospitals don't lock people in boxes. They don't lock people in things at all. Even if they did, the absolute silence she's trapped in isn't possible anywhere but in a well sound-proofed room. Who would put her in a sound proofed-box, or in such a room? Why? No, there is an easier, if incomparably more terrifying answer.

She feels around the insides of her prison once again, the smooth material surrounds her on all sides. She gives it a few experimental knocks, and her heart sinks, now that she's actually listening. The sound confirming she's not just in some box, but a coffin. A buried coffin.

Taylor swallows, feeling another surge of panic welling up inside her. She crosses her arms over her chest and shuts her eyes, breathing once again, if only to help stave the fear away. It works, enough at least that time and thoughts don't escape her this time. It still takes her a while to get her thoughts in working order again, to recount what she knows.

The coffin. She's in a coffin. Her heart isn't beating and her lungs don't burn for air. She's buried in a coffin. The last thing she remembers is the locker, and the filth and bugs and putrid smell and Emma's laugh. And now she's buried in a coffin. She's clean, dressed in- not a hospital gown, she doesn't think. They don't bury people in hospital gowns. She's in a dress. In a coffin.

And she's hungry.

The girl shakes her head. All of that doesn't matter. She needs to get out. It... helps that she apparently has no need for air, though thinking about her lack of heartbeat makes her spine crawl. Has she triggered? That, at least, would explain her body's condition... What sort of stupid- of course she's triggered! How else could she not need to breathe? She's triggered! She's a parahuman! She can be a hero, like she always imagined and-

And she needs to get out of her grave first. Which begs the question, how, why is she here at all Clearly, she's alive. One hears stories about people being buried alive by mistake but...

She rubs at her chest.

A mistake then. A terrible, horrible mistake. Oh, she's going to sue. She doesn't care about not having a heartbeat. She's going to get out of here, and sue whoever signed her off as dead!

But how does she get out? It's an immense relief, not having to worry about asphyxiating, but if the hunger pangs are anything to go by, she doesn't have forever. How long can a person last without food? Two weeks for certain... she once read about a caver who lasted a month without food, though with abundant water at his disposal. Right, she has no water, that means... three or four days? That is – actually, not that bad when she thinks about it. Now, how deep is she buried? Is 'six feet under' just a saying or does it hold true? Shouldn't be much deeper though, should it? Certainly not so deep she'd lose her sense of direction on the way, the ground should be softer if she goes upwards too, unless it's frozen, oh she hopes it's not frozen. She also hopes Dad didn't buy a particularly sturdy...

Oh God. Dad.

She remembers how he was back when Mom died. A husk. A barely functional wreck of a man. And that was with her still around. Now? She can't-

No! Useless, pointless thoughts. She'll get out and get back to him. Everything will be fine, just fine. Hmm. She wonders, now that she's been buried alive, if she goes to the police and points to the trio as her – what? Almost murderers? Would-be murderers? Whatever, if she points to them as the ones who caused her to almost die, what with her funeral and all, they'll have to take her seriously, won't they?

But that's for after she digs her way out of her grave.

She claws the material off the ceiling, to stop it from absorbing the force of her hits, and strikes the wood - to pathetic effect. Not having space to swing her arm is an issue, she's not particularly strong. The second hit strikes the material somewhere beside the uncovered wood. Ugh. She rips more of the soft covering off. She's trying to hit the same place, but it's kinda hard in the absolute darkness of her coffin. She's not sure if her third, or fourth and further strikes hit the same place, she's trying, but there is no way for the girl to be sure.

She continues for what must surely be at least an hour, never taking a break, continuously striking the wood, hit after hit, with as much strength as she can put behind her strikes. Her hand doesn't even hurt, but when she stops for a moment to trail her fingers over the uncovered wood, she doesn't find even one small crack.

That's... she has time. She has time. Three days of doing this will surely be enough to break the damn lid. And then widen the hole enough to crawl through it - without the dirt falling in and burying her so that she won't be able to move and die of- thirst-or-gocrazy-andstayhereforever-

Her fist pierces through the wood as if were cardboard. She sniffs the snot back up her nose.

It's only a moment before she begins frantically widening the hole, it's not easy, and she cuts her hands open in process. But what little pain she feels is nothing compared to the single-minded need that pushes her onward. This is nothing, it's all nothing. Getting out is the only thing that matters.

And so she works, digging away the cold, hard ground, at first only with her hands, and then with her nails when the ground becomes frozen. It hurts, just a bit, but it doesn't matter.

It takes time - how much, Taylor can't say - but finally, one of her hands finds no more resistance and she feels cold air caressing her skin. She doesn't dig as much as she heaves herself upwards after that, working with her whole body to worm out of the earth.

She sprawls herself on the ground, back to the frozen soil, and takes a deep breath, not because she needs to, but because it feels nice to have fresh air fill her lungs. Refreshing, after the staleness of her coffin. She wipes the dirt from her eyes before opening them to the sight of a cloudless, blue sky. She lets her tense muscles relax, basking in the blissful feeling of sun rays upon her skin.

A snort escapes her. She kind of expected it to be night-time. That's how these things always go in movies.

The teen stands up and narrows her eyes to look around, finding a startlingly familiar sight before her eyes...

Annette Rose Hebert
1969-2008
She taught something precious to each of us.

...with an unfamiliar stone right beside it.

Taylor Anne Hebert

1995-2011

She gave us so much with so little time.

She presses both her hands to her chest in attempt to calm the sudden pain inside. She sniffs, finding her eyes to be welling up. Stupid. She's fine. It's just a dumb gravestone.

Taylor wipes her eyes.

She's not going to cry. She's up here, not down there, not in her grave.

She blows her nose into her hands, wiping them off on her ruined, plain black dress.

She's fine.

Just fine.