Hey everyone! I hope you are all staying safe and are managing to keep spirits up in these crazy times.

As many of you may realise after reading this, the next chapter is crucial and so if it takes me a little bit longer to post it it's because I want to work hard on making it as perfect as possible for you all.

I hope you like this chapter, let me know what you think!

Stay safe and stay happy everyone!

I run.

And run.

I run faster than I've ever ran before, faster than the speed of light, faster and faster and faster through the halls that I've grown accustomed to being dragged through. I don't know if they're behind me. I don't know if I've even been noticed at all.

But there's no way on earth that I'm going to stop to find out. Because I'm going to keep on running, hair whipping around my neck, legs pounding against the harsh floor of rubble. My heart is screaming, tiredness is chasing me, trying to get in, trying to work its way into my muscles, flinging fatigue at me until my legs are like weights, long pale burdens that are trying to stop me, slow me, delay me.

Kill me.

But no one is ever going to stop me from running. Not until my lungs are empty and drained completely of oxygen, not until my legs are broken and splintered, not until my heart is shattered and until my spirit is broken, my determination is destroyed, my hope obliterated. Not until I've breathed my very last breath of air.

I now know more than I did before. Everything is beginning to make sense and I can feel it, I can feel the atmosphere in this building is on edge. Almost like it's waiting for something. Walls taut with tension, doors frozen and lying in wait, in suspense. The whole place seems to understand that this something, whatever it is, is coming to a climax, we can all feel it building up slowly, slowly, slowly, just slowly reaching the peak of the track until eventually someone will move and we're all going to ride this twisted rollercoaster right over the edge, and that one movement, that one movement will set everything into motion. And down we'll all go into the darkness.

I feel like I'm running into the darkness now. My feet are pounding down the corridors and I'm charging through halls that stare with familiar eyes but I'm not paying any attention to what is around me. My gaze is firmly locked forward, staring straight ahead of me, my vision taking a backseat as I focus all of my energy, every last drop, onto not stopping. I think I can hear shouts resonating in the distance some way behind me, then footsteps chasing me, but maybe it's only my own paranoia that's haunting me through this building. I certainly hope so.

Fighting the urge to look back, I keep going, arms pumping as if they will propel me further faster. I barrel round the corner, completely frantic, the feeling of not being able to stop making my vision haze. Not being used to this level of exercise for so long making the burn even worse. I wish with every fibre of my being that I had the strength to just run and run forever, and keep running right out of these doors and never head back, never even turn around to see the last glimpses of the life I broke free from as it fades away behind me, but I know that I have a responsibility to do something, and if I can help, I will, I have to.

I'm Marinette.

And whether it works or not, I know I have to do everything I can to change this warped reality.

That means even though my muscles are yelling and my head is banging and my heart is thudding as it tries to keep beating steadily, I have to move faster. The panic, however, is nearly too much, and I can't help the tears that spill from my eyes as I move on, mingling with the beads of sweat that drip from my forehead, so I have to know. I need to know. It becomes the only thing that I know I have to do, and though I know I shouldn't, I'm too weak, too limp, my mind too numb and useless to fight the urge to check if I'm being followed. I turn my head, no idea what I will be faced with when I do.

And I check.

And I see-

No one.

Nothing.

My heart jumps, my world spins as my emotions seems to start working again, my whole body jolting as if it has just been switched on again, the power started and my limbs are spurring to life. The relief liberates me, it releases the weighs in my legs so I'm free, it coaxes the thuds of my heart to calm so I can think again, it fights of the vulture of fatigue that was circling me and blocking out the oxygen, so certain I wouldn't be able to survive. Closing my eyes tight, I gasp in and out, swallowing air as my chest heaves violently and my paces slow down. I still can't properly organise my thoughts as the escape seems to have jumbled them all up, tears blurring my eyes so I can't see them clearly and I'm too exhausted try and feel anything, so instead I take on an unnerving sense of calm, a sudden spotlight breaking through the blurry haze and shining on my only purpose at this moment, to create some form of concrete plan.

I know that this, this is the moment. I have some more time than I expected, and although I might be playing right into the hands of Gabriel and Lila I just need to do the next right thing and focus without stopping to acknowledge the panic in my head. I need somewhere to hide and recuperate so I can at last figure out how to fight to end this. But whether it's from dizziness or terror, there's a pit at the bottom of my stomach, a vast, bottomless, ominous pit, and I know whatever I'm going to do, I'm going to have to do it quickly. Jumping on impulse, I start again, moving quickly down the halls lined with doors. I'm crazy to think I can find the cell I escaped from, because as well as it being the first place they'd check, my sense of direction has been thrown and the inner compass that guided me is broken and the needle has snapped so now I'm lost, feeble, a rabbit in a sea of doors, a rabbit that was once insignificant but now is being hunted down by predators everywhere it looks. And time is ticking, ticking, leaving, just like I must too, and so I know one of these doors must let me escape Wonderland and find solace.

So I try them all.

Every door I pass, I put my hand to the handle and rattle it with desperate intensity, panic welling up with every door that doesn't open, every lock I'm faced with the more desperate I get.

Moving further down the corridor, my head is practically spinning as I turn it left and right, my mind blacking out at the smallest noises, knowing that any moment they could arrive, and all I need to do is find a door that opens. All my life, I've been searching for a door to open, for someone to finally let me in, but will I ever find it?

More handles. It's all too much. I rattle every one. I can't do this. I tug on the handles, yanking and yanking, trying not to think of the footsteps, what if there are footsteps and when will there be footsteps and when will someone let me in and I need to stop overthinking and I need to stop panicking and I need my forehead to stop dripping and my heart to stop hammering just for a second and the world to stop spinning and

someone to PLEASE OPEN A DOOR.

I stop. Press my eyes shut and breathe. In and out. In and out. Let the world slowly come back into focus once more. This is too much for someone like me to handle. No one should ever be put under this kind of stress, and a mind like mine is too small for these thoughts that push against it, willing it to expand when it just doesn't know how. But not now.

As quick as my legs are able, I push on, eyes now scanning every door, ears scanning round every corner for those dreaded footsteps.

Nothing...

Nothing...

Something. Something. A very real something, a definite something, multiple somethings, all coming into view and earshot at once. A door, a door that's open, footsteps, running, heavy footsteps. A door, that's only a few feet away, footsteps, that are only a few feet away, a door, that's gradually getting closer, footsteps, that are gradually getting closer.

Terror, truth, hope, fear, worry, possibility, are all but warped reflections in this funhouse that is my mind as it melts in the heat of the pressure, none the same, none different, all equally as futile. I need to act, and fast, as time is the one thing that hasn't stopped.

I make my choice of what to do in the next three seconds.

I dive, dive right into the cell, shutting the door tightly behind me, exhaling as it clicks into place, letting me know that now I have a chance.

Now all I can do is rest here, gather my thoughts and determine what to do next. Hoping all the while that things will be okay. Because surely, if it's not okay, it's not the end, right? At least I'm here, I'm okay, and I'm-

Not alone.

I forgot there would be a cellmate. Why is there always a cellmate?

The thought of being imprisoned with another murderer who is probably cold and heartless and mean and ruthless and cruel and bloodthirsty and...

Blond. He's blond.

And that is what makes my heart stop beating.