Jackie's mind was racing as it had never done before, even with all of her experience in life and death scenarios. This was the first time that she genuinely felt terrified, considering they had no weapons and also if they did the guns would be useless in the face of the modified humans.

Her eyes flickered towards the low fuel indicator, reminding her that running would be pointless.

"Drive! Hurry!" Jae-Hwa screamed as she tried to get as far away as possible though it only amounted to sinking into the seat. The car now seemed more akin to a coffin instead of a place for safety, restricting their movement.

"We're almost out of gas, and those things can run faster than we can drive," Jackie yelled back.

Hearing the frightened voice from Jae-Hwa made a part of her want to slam open the door and dash out. Deep down, Jackie knew that such an action would be both pointless and lethal, but her fight-or-flight instinct didn't care about logic. The silence from the other three helped to keep her stationary and not suicidal.

"What's the game plan, leader?" Lulu asked in a heavy voice.

"I'm trying to think up something, aside from just living for even just an additional minute," Jackie answered.

Looking at the monsters that we slowly creeping towards them, she screamed at them in her mind, "What are you waiting for?!" Their expressionless faces only added to the terror, which was likely intentional considering their latest info on the creatures. These things discovered the joys of sadism and were carefully applying it to them.

"Fuck it!" Jackie yelled and slammed her foot on the pedal, launching the car forward and slamming into one of the creatures in front that was unable to dodge them in time.

Turning the wheel, Jackie aimed for the welcome center's exit. She flicked on the high-beams to give her better vision so she wouldn't crash into any cars on the exit ramp or highway.

"Hold on!" She yelled as the car went off the road and around a vehicle parked in the middle of the exit road.

The car bucked and caused Jackie to slightly lift off of the driver's seat. Unfortunately, wearing seatbelts in such a dangerous environment would be disadvantageous to use, so all of them were bouncing on their seat. Amanda, Lacy, and Lulu were holding for dear life to the handle on the ceiling near their doors. Jae-Hwa was screaming the entire time, bumping into either Lacy or Lulu.

As they got back on the road, Amanda asked, "What're you thinking? Those things are faster than us."

"I know. But do you just want to be inside a car and wait for those things to do whatever they do?" Jackie snapped at Amanda. "Even if it's for a second, I want to struggle and try to do something."

"I agree with you, Jackie," Lulu grunted out as her head hit the top of the car.

"Don't talk. I don't need any of you guys bitting your tongue and bleeding everywhere." Jackie shouted.

Everyone lurched to one side as she merged onto the highway. Looking behind her, Jackie could see shadows running behind the car. In front, she could see shadows up in the trees. This meant that those things were already at the point of climbing up and using the height as an advantage. It hadn't been that long since they were observing these creatures up in the trees and now that advantage was gone.

Her eyes briefly looked at a sign they had passed with the words, "Cherry Sta...," with the remaining portion destroyed. Disregarding it from her mind, she kept on pressing the pedal as hard as she could. There were a couple of cars in front of her, so she slightly turned the steering wheel to avoid spinning out of control.

"Scrreeeeech!" The sound of metal was heard as their car impacted against one of the vehicles on the road and scraped past it.

"What's wrong with you?!" Jae-Hwa screamed in panic.

Trying to calm their guest down, Lulu explained, "To keep ahead of those things, we can't afford to slow down. The problem is that Jackie can only make minute changes."

"I'm going to have to use the cars in front of us as bumpers to help redirect us," Jackie contributed. In a quieter voice, she said, "The problem is that those things aren't running as fast as they can. They're toying with us."

"We can only hope we reach a town before we run out of gas," Amanda said.

Thinking about how to increase their odds, even more, Jackie said, "I think I have an idea, but you guys are going to hate it."

Even with all the loud noise of the car blasting down the highway, there was a feeling of complete silence from everyone else in the car. Taking a break from her constant backseat driving, Jae-Hwa joined in on the dead silence. No one wanted to ask what Jackie was planning on doing.

She slammed the palm of her hand on the logo of the car and caused the car horn to blare out a deafening noise. Holding her hand on the car horn, Jackie continued to race down the highway.

"Are you crazy?!" Amanda screamed at her, trying to make her voice heard over the ear-shattering noise.

Not bothering to answer her, Jackie understood how crazy this plan was. If there were modified humans that were unaware of them driving down the road, it was no longer the case as the car became a meteor of noise.

As she saw more monsters coming out of the forest, and following behind the car, Jackie could only hope that her gamble would pay off and not make things worse for them.

With each mile marker they passed by, Jackie kept expecting to feel the shuddering weight of those things landing on the roof of the car. Tears began to well up in the corner of her eyes as she fought back the need to scream. A part of her felt like it would be better to just have those things eat them instead of having to continue to live in such a predicament.

Jackie realized that after the fifteenth-mile marker went by, she had been repeating the same words over and over. "I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die."

Getting out of the zone she had been in, her eyes blinked at seeing a large exit sign. A feeling of happiness overcame her and as she looked at what city it was leading to...

All Jackie heard was a loud crash and their world spinning upside down. Time seemed to slow down as shards of glass were suspended in the air.

As they were upside down and flying through the air, Jackie could only keep thinking, "They were waiting until the exit sign appeared. This was all planned out."

Jackie's head snapped to the side as the car struck the ground. After the initial impact, her head whipped to the other side. No thoughts went through her as Jackie just absorbed the force of the continuous effect of the car rolling over continuously. The world finally went black.

-----

Sounds of people yelling startled her awake. Looking out the front window, Jackie could see upside down trees. The smell of blood and oil filled her nostrils, making her remember what had happened. Lifting up her head, Jackie could feel stings of pain and saw how she was surrounded by broken glass. Some of the shards fell off as she lifted herself up. Next to her, Amanda looked unconscious in a similar predicament as when Jackie had woken up. There were cuts all over Amanda as evidence of the violent crash they experienced.

Turning her head to look behind her, Jackie felt a sharp pain in her neck. "Fuck," she cursed but then quickly tried to move her toes. Jackie sighed in relief, touching the top and bottom of the inside of her shoes. It would have become a shit show if she had messed up her spine and became paralyzed with those things chasing after them.

"Lulu... Lacy... Jae-Hwa...! Are you guys okay?" Jackie yelled feeling a little panicked.

"ungh... What the fuck happened? I should have listened to my parents about wearing a seatbelt." Lulu groaned in pain.

"Lulu! Are you okay?!" Jackie yelled back.

Lulu cursed some more and asked, "Where are those things? How are we still alive?"

It was at that moment that Jackie realized that they were still alive and hadn't been eaten by those things. "I don't know. Those things knew that the exit sign was going to be appearing and let us drive as far as we did to raise our hopes up."

There were a couple of more groans, though these came from Lacy and Jae-Hwa. "Do you think they are waiting for something?" Lacy asked after a hiss of pain sounded from her mouth.

"It sounds like something is dealing with them," Amanda's voice was quiet as if talking was painful.

"Maintain a tight formation!" A yell interrupted their discussion.

Attempting to turn her head again, Jackie tried to find out who was yelling and the sounds of fighting occurring out there. Fighting through the pain, she lifted herself up and moved to look out her side window. She saw a shocking image of people with large weapons running and jumping about, fighting the modified creatures.

"Remember that just cutting off their head isn't enough! Quickly dismember these things before something happens!" A woman's voice was heard, though it was hard to pinpoint which person was giving out orders since all of them were wearing helmets.

Their suits reminded Jackie of the ones they used, though these people didn't have anything exposed. They were completely covered, and the weapons they were using was drastically different from anything she had seen before.

"Are those Battle Arena League players?" Lulu commented in confusion. "What are they doing here?"

Hearing Lulu's words, Jackie remembered being in the lobby and listening to the soldiers talking about it. Painfully looking towards Amanda, she asked, "I thought you said it was a sport?"

"It is...," Amanda coughed, one of her hands moved to cradle her side. "I don't have a clear view, but they do look like Battle Arena

League players though I don't know what they are doing here."

Lacy groaned, "They appear to be handling those things pretty efficiently, but they could use a bit more work on their movement."

"Those players aren't... like soldiers, who have been professionally trained. They are just college students who compete against other college students." Amanda said.

Jackie noticed how Amanda was going to say, "Those players aren't trained like you guys," which would have given themselves away as not being regular folks just trying to survive the end of the world.

"How can anyone fight against those things?!" Jae-Hwa cried out, the stress beginning to get to her. "As we were hurtling down the road, those monsters were keeping up with us and just coming out of the woodwork." Her high-pitched voice indicated how terrified she was.

Listening to Jae-Hwa, Jackie couldn't blame the woman. Even with her own combat experience, trying to escape those things with nothing to fight back had been a shock.

"I'm not sure how they're fighting against those things, but it seems like they have a lot of experience in it. The way they are organizing themselves and giving out orders sounds like one of those military movies." Jackie commented.

Lulu chuckled and groaned in pain from the laughter. "You guys obviously haven't watched any Battle Arena games."

"What do you mean?" Jae-Hwa asked, her voice sounding more together thanks to the distraction.

"You've watched the games? I just found out about it, but Amanda wouldn't explain it." Jackie added in.

Amanda looked at Jackie and gave a small grin at Jackie's comment, keeping herself from laughing and hurting herself.

"The players fight against monsters, like waves and waves of monsters. There's a slight difference between what they have to deal with and those soldiers in that one science fiction and fantasy movie we watched. You know the one where they have to go fight those monsters? The difference is that these players have their equipment, while those soldiers, in the movie, would likely shit themselves if they were in our position." Lulu groaned after talking for so long.

When they stopped discussing their thoughts regarding the players' abilities to fight against those things, Jackie noticed that everything became quiet. No longer were there the sounds of metal cutting through flesh or the screeching of the monsters. Looking to see what was happening, she understood that the fight was over. All, if not most, of the modified humans were chopped into pieces. The frightening part was how the lumps of flesh were still squirming after all that had happened.

"Secure the perimeter! I don't want any more of those things coming out and surprising us!" The leader of the group yelled.

Instead of the typical team size of three which Jackie was used to seeing, this group was composed of ten players. She saw that each player seemed to have a different type of weapon, each one more bizarre than the next. Each of the weapons looked like something out of a fantasy comic book, though this was likely the point.

The leader of the group walked towards the car with two players flanking them. Kneeling to get a better look at Jackie and her group, the leader randomly stated, "I must be some type of guardian angel, with how often I seem to be running into random survivors. First with that kid and the girls that were with him and now you guys."

"Who...?" Jackie stupidly asked.

"Becky. My name is Becky. That's some serious deja vu I just had." She chuckled, likely referring to a previous event.