CARA POV

My heart races as I try to see through the darkness, my only source of light coming from the house outside the lab's door.

I rush outside, my feet feeling heavier with each step, sending shock waves up my spine.

"No. No this can't be happening.."

This is way too much. I wasn't expecting something this big. This huge.. Biblical. To be honest if humanity is leaning on me, you're looking at the end of the human race. How am I, a seventeen year old girl who was barely allowed to travel on her own, going to save everyone before the world goes to shit? It's just not possible to do it in less than a month.

But why would they do something like that? It doesn't make sense. If they want to rebuilt the world, why take everyone and let the world get eventually destroyed by radiation that themselves can't survive? If Uncle Clay is right and all they care about is them rulling everything- except the fact that there will be no world to rule, - they will literally be a pile of skeletons.

This has got to be bigger than what Unle Clay thinks. Even bigger than whatever the hell is happening if that's possible. But I can't worry about that right now. Right now I must look for the others and possibly save the world.. Piece of cake.

I swallow hard, picking myself up and run back to the car. I open the glove box taking out one of the two flashlights we have in there for emergencies, feeling the cold metal on the tips of my fingers. I unscrew the butt, checking for batteries and thank God it already has inside, saving me the trouble of putting new ones in. I press the button once, but the light blends with the light of day, not letting me know if it works. So my idiotic brain decides that I turn it around so it's flashing in my face.

I squint my eyes pressing the button again, blinded for a second. I shake my head at my stupidity, Bailey quirking her head to the side.

"Let's go exploring little dog." My shoes make the only sound except my rapid breaths of fear and Bailey's bell.

The house may have plently of light to see because of the sun but once you step in the lab, it's like you are entering a different, darker place like those we used to see in horror movies.  The scenery creeps me out way more than I like to admit, because when I say I can't see anything, I mean anything. And I was never a big fan of the dark.

As I press the little yellow button causing litht to pour out of the flashlight, my mind keeps on playing games with me, taunting me and mocking me. It flashes my greatest fears before my eyes, one of them being the dark of course. It's like it's on self-destruct mode and I can't switch it back to normal.

I groan and shake my head, desperately trying to push all those thoughts away while point the light to where I want to, checking the drawers one by one for those maps he was talking about.

The circle of light moves around frantically alongside my shaking hand.  My heart beats so fast I'm unable to help in from shaling. I'm too busy looking forward and upwards that I don't notice where I'm stepping, my stomach colliding with something that falls on the ground with a loud noise.

"Ow!" I groan and double over, holding my stomach. "Chair." I mumble under my breath and finally get to the white desk at the end of the room that has been my destination all along. In rubb my stomach before I give the drawer a pull.

I pull it but it refuses to open. I give it another pull but still, the drawers seems hellbound on keeping whatever secrets they have locked inside. I groan in anger and kick the leg, the desk moving with a screetch. I throw my hands in the air, before my previous action gives me an idea.

"You know what? I don't have time for this."

I take a few steps back before I raise my foot again and give it a kick, creating a hole in the wooden drawer big enough for me to stick my hand in. I drag the drawer out setting it on the table, and turn my flashlight to its contents with a satisfied grin that dissapears as fast as it came.

I swallow hard and take a deep breath, preparing myself for what I am about to see. But there is nothing in the drawer except some stacked papers. I gasp and push them aside like this action will make something important appear.

"You gotta be kidding me." I exhale and I look for any other drawers or cabinets around the room. The white  cabinets shine under the light, the rest dissapearing and blending with the rest of the room when my flashlight turns away from them.

Inside there are just different chemicals and tiny robots he built himself or failed tries. He liked to keep everything.

'Failed attempts are just the steps to greatness'.

That's what he used to say to me when my tiny ten year old self would sit next to him on the kitchen table while he worked on his 'farming bots'. They were suppose to help farmers with the crops and feeding the animals. But now, I'm not sure if that is their true purpose. Now that I think about it, I'm sure that's not what they were suppose to do.

I walk back to the desk where the drawer lays there, and I take out the meaningless papers one by one, examining them carefully but nothing adds up. These are just nonsense that meant something to my uncle but absolutely nothing to me. It's all about some enviromental crap that are not even correct, which is why they are all marked with a huge red X on top. But the last one is the one that gains my attention.

It's a picture of a lake house we used to go together as a family. But this time it's him, my dad, their parents and another girl I don't recongise, all hugged and staring at the camera with a wide smile. The woman looks faintly familiar, like a person you look at and you think you've seen before, but can't connect the puzzles of the mystery together.

The sight makes me frown and I bring the picture closer to my face to get a better view, the flashlight exactly next to my face like I'm a mad detective trying to solve a murder.

I turn it around and on the back,there is a number I recognise. I was ten, and that day my pet turtle died and I cried for days. But why would he right that date behind this picture when I have absolutely no connection the the event? Or why would he keep this picture with some random files that have nothing to do with any of the subjects? Uncle Clay was much like me. We both had the urge to have everything organised, carefully placed.This was nothing like him. He wouldn't write something irrelavant on the back or keep it somewhere where it didn't belong. This made no sense.

Unless that's what he'd want someone to think.

I take a good look around, when my eyes fall on the same picture framed and hunged on the wall. But this time on the corner of the wooden frame there is a tiny picture of me.

I gently place the picture down on the desk slowly and walk over to the wall, my eyes not moving away. I try to pull the picture from the wall, and it easily escapes the nail that held it up.

I inhale and place the tips of my fingers on the faint lines of a quare, hinting a hidden space behind it or simply a mark from the amount of time the frame was up.

At the heat of my fingers, six tiny blue digital squares appear above a grey standar keyboard. This technology is extremely advanced, something I've never seen Uncle Clay mess with before. I hesitate for a second, afraid that something will happen if I put the wrong thing. I look back at the picture that has my birthday randomly written in the back, or not so randomly after all. I narrow my eyes at the waiting keyboard and hesitantely press the familiar numbers. The square pops out with a click after a second, letting me know I had guessed right.

I open the hidden cabinet slowly ,and shed light in it. Inside there are folded maps and letters,two pairs of keys, a photo and a voice recorder.

I take everything, stack them in my backpack and quickly make my way out of the house. The sun almost blinds me, but being unable to see properly never made me this happy. It feels so good to be back in daylight that my body can survive a few seconds of pain until my eyes re-adjust.

I look down to see Bailey looking up at me, waiting for me to guide her like a loyal follower.

"Let's get going girl."

I open the passenger's door and she hops in before I take the seat next to her. My body sinks into the chair, and I take out the contents of the cabinet out of my backpack.

"Now what do we have here." I mumble to myself and Bailey comes closer to me like she understands what I say, eager to take a look at the things I have in my hands.

I take the voice recorder first, fidgetting it in my hands, my thumb hovering over the black circular button until I finally press it. There is a moment of radio static before the voice of my uncle fills the car. He sounds way calmer than in the video. He must have recorded this before everything went to shit with his project.

This is try number 140, on the robotic guardian. I have managed to figure out what I have been doing wrong, but I don't think my robots are anywhere near being perfect. I will probably have to reset their program all over again-

"How long will it take?"

A female voice asks taking me by surprise. I thought he was talking to himself but it appears I have been mistaken. Is this the woman that lied to him? Forced him into a lie he couldn't escape later on?

"I don't know. But it will take a while. It's not like I could reprogram a whole system in a day."

Uncle Clay says clearly annoyed with her eagerness. The woman sighs, clicking her tongue. I'm not sure If I am correct, but I don't think she must have known this conversation was being recorded.

"Why are you rushing this?"

He asked her, clearly irritating her even more as her heels clicked on the marble floor, growing lowder.

"That's above your pay grade. Just get it done."

With a last sigh, the recording comes to an end, and I am left staring at the recorder with a frown. I press the two triangles to the side of the play button, listening to the next recordings but quite franckly they are all the same. It's my uncle talking about his improvements until the last very tape, that draws my attention.

He talks nonsense about being watched, feeling scared and must keep his guard up all the time. He stutters,he chockes, a total mess. Much like the video. It creates a sorrow deep in my heart at the sound of my beloved uncle, the man I always looked up to, being at the edge of breaking point. I slowly set the recording aside, picking up my diary and my pen. I write down what is coming for me, so I always have in mind what is gonna happen like I can somehow forget.

1.Lights go out. DONE.

2.Train stations flood.

3.Animals will die.

4.Nuclear power stations give out.

5.Sattelites will fall.

6.Uknown!

I underline the word that scares me. But I don't intent to stay until a year to find them. I can't. The sooner the better. I don't want to be around when that nuclear contamination comes, and if I don't find the people who can keep it under control, it's gonna be sooner than expected. And I can live without knowing if I can survive or not.

I rip the sheet from my diary and fold it before shoving it at the back of my jeans. I then proceed to pick up the first map, marked with the number 1  written on the back almost taking over the whole page. I turn all the maps around, each one of them named with different acronyms and numbers I know nothing about. I look for the one closest to me, and indeed there is a map of LA, with pictures of a three story building, well-maintained. It must be a goverment facility of some sorts. Or the facility Uncle Clay worked for. I check all the pictures attached with a clipper on the maps,and they all do look very similar to each other. There are even maps for facilities in other countries or states really far away.

I stack those who are far away from me away, because unfortunately I won't be able to reach many of them and I hope that I won't have to. I need everyone to be close.

With all the lights out, it means that gas stations won't be working so I won't have enough gas to reach to all of them. In the worst case scenario, I'll have to go on foot which will be very hard.

Bailey get up and does a circle on the chair so she can down more comfortably. She looks at me through her pretty blue eyes full of love, and I feel bad at the torture we're about to go through. She's one of the kindest souls of all, so loyal and so trustworthy and definity deservers all the cuddles and kisses of the world, not an apocalypse on our doorstep.

I start the engine, wheels rolling on the street in no time. The sun is already starting to fall down to its hideout and the sky, an endless palette of pastel pink, orange and purple swirling around it as it sinks.

Soon, there's no light but the headlights of the car to show me the way. I lick my lips to moisturize them, suddenly feeling way too anxious surrounded by pitch black and knowing what is happening around me right now makes me go crazy.

The building is dark like everything else around here. It rises above me, making me feel so small. I cautiously set foot inside, my backpack secured tightly around me so it stays in place. My fingers are tightly wrapped around my flashlight, ready to guide me away from furniture.

Sleep and tiredness are threatening to consume my body, but I fight the erge to close my eyes with everything I have, staying awake to finish my task.

Everything is in place, like nothing has been moved out of it's according spot,not even an inch. The fact that this place was packed with people only yesterday makes me feel at unease and lifts the hair at the back on my neck. In that black office chair there was a living person sitting, doing what he studied for at university, or at that table right there someone was drinking that half empty coffee he probably shouldn't have brought inside this room but still brought it anyway. This is someones second home, and I am just invading their space so I can find a way to save them from psycopaths. It's not right.

I sigh and shake my head to push away the depressing thoughts, ordering it to focus. On the far end of the wall, there is the company name which I was never able to pronounce correctly. It's one of those foreign names that have so many letters that just don't make any sense. Uncle Clay put them on the list for a reason. There's something useful here or he wouldn't tell me to come.

The main entrance is filled with couches and magazines, environmental related images beautifully collaged on the walls in the most elegand way I've ever seen a poster being. They definitelly were going far to sell their lie to the world.

But as I move further back, door after door is locked, each and every one of them with a black shape on the wall,like a tablet. I press it, suspecting it probably requests handprint recognition, but I quickly realise there is no electrical power. Even if there was, it wouldn't recognise my handprint anyway.

"Guess we have to do this the hard way.." I mumble irritated under my breath, going back to the car to get my crawbar we always have for emergencies. Or as my dad liked to call them, 'avoiding the possibilities of you getting murdered or abducted'. I miss those lectures on safety already.

I rock on my heels only a few millimetres, before I push the craw back with force deep in the crack of the door,stucking it in. I pull hard, grunts of effort escaping my mouth when suddenly the door bursts open, and I fall to the ground with a loud thud.

"Ow." I say and rub my butt as I get up, thankfully most of the impact has being absorbed by the backpack. I pick my crawbar and flashlight back up and secure the crawbar on a pocket of my packpack so I can have one hand free to look around.

This secret laboratory is way more sofisticated than I expected, like the ones you would only see in the sci-fi movies. All kinds of computers and machines decorared the room all around, robotic arms hanging loosely from their designed places on the wall, their batteries looking drained.

Sample tubes are stack in their little holes all empty, the dust barely visible on their surfaces. I take one in my fingers and fidget it boredly, before I put it back down and continue.

There is not a single paper laying around, as they must all be carefully and methodically placed in the right place, right where they should be.

If it weren't for the dust sitting on top of the surfaces, you wouldn't know that this place was abandoned. You would just have no idea.

A cold breeze flew by me making me shiver, but immediately frown. I walked further in, noticing one of the windows were shattered, pieces of broken glass on the floor.

Hold on this weren't suppose to be here.. If someone from the company had accidentaly broken the window, there would be no pieces inside, as the point of impact would be from inside, causing the pieces of glass to fall outwards. Which means someone else from outside broke the window. I sigh, leaving the picked up piece back down, looking outside for a brief moment before I stand up to my feet.

If I'm right and their environmental believes are indeed a decoy, the right files I'm looking for must be somewhere well hidden, hard to find. Which means I'm screwed.

I look outside once more, the darkness seeming to be laughing at me, making me feel like a complete fool against life's games.