a

on, not months, but years ago. His "five-year search" for me? A lie. A cruel, elaborate charade. He hadn't been sear

, only to seal me away again when I finally returned. He wanted to marry Casey. He w

ugh escaped my lips. I

s nothing to explain, Derek. Your actions spea

body, my dying body, needed to move. My hands, raw and bleeding from my desperate escape from the simulation, clawed

orn, were slick with blood, but I kept digging. I wouldn't die here. Not like this. Not after everythin

a crack in the rockfall. A tiny beacon of hope. My breath hi

ickeningly sweet whisper, cut

rt pounding. Casey lay on the ground, curled into a ball, c

er voice piercing. "She

g crunch echoing in the cavern. I screamed, a primal sound torn from my throat. The familiar, bone-deep agony. It was the same pain I felt when

with fury. He didn't even glance at my mangled hand. He just kicked at the pile o

tried to hurt Casey!" His eyes burned with hatred. He hadn't seen anything. He hadn't as

he had moved on. It was that he saw me as a vill

mangled hand, almost certainly broken, trembled as I slowly pulled it from beneath