Click. Light poured out into the darkness. She peered closer. It wasn’t a normal darkness. It was inky, oily black. Alive. The edges roiled like the edges of storm clouds. It pressed in on the light trying to extinguish it. She couldn’t remember how she got here. Why she had a flashlight. She desperately tried to remember something, anything. Nola. A name. I’m Nola. She pressed into the darkness. Her beam of light casting about. The sounds of feet grating on gray rock as she walked. She looked down. Her feet. Then she stopped and the sound continued. Somewhere out in the living dark, rock grated underfoot. “Hello!” she called. The darkness devoured the words. It stretched and expanded as if something was trying to escape. She walked faster, her beam of light sweeping desperately back and forth. Footsteps quickened. She didn’t know if it was hers or whatever was out in the dark. She desperately began to run. The beam of light bounced erratically. She thought it caught the shape of someone out in the dark. “Help! Please!” She ran towards it calling desperately. “Please!” Nothing. She stopped. The flashlight shone on her feet. Her breath came in gasps. Her eyes flickered wretchedly. Desolate tears trickled from her eyes. Tendrils of darkness detached themselves to reach out and lick at them. The darkness shuddered. She raised the flashlight again. The beam caught the bottom of a pole. She raised it higher. A sign was attached to the pole and her flashlight slowly revealed one word “Nola”. Click. Her flashlight went out.