Fast Lane (G/t)

2

⌚ The Next Day, 4:45 pm ⌚

"Holy crap, what am I doing?"

And there Ainsley was, walking down her familiar running path from her almost forgotten evening, about a quarter of an hour earlier than the time her mysterious call counterpart (who she now personally coined as 'Phone Guy') had implicitly suggested, with variously sized plants towering above and clumped below her, and a partially cloudy sky above them all. 

"Why am I doing this?" 

Somehow, she had sneaked out of the room as Cora went to a private study session with a professor - whatever that meant, 'borrowed' one of her black dresses and two-pieces (beach party, duh), and was now attempting to locate the place where everything went fuzzy for her. 

"Oh yeah... to test my freaking fate with a freaking giant... I think? *sigh*" 

However, thanks to Cora's 'help' by actually obtaining the kits from the hospital she had wanted yesterday, even simple tasks like walking became a challenge for Ainsley... for many... indescribable reasons. The thoughts of the tools made her shudder. 

"Ugh. Never again. Coco, why? 'It won't hurt at all,' she said. 'It'll only take a second,' she said. Lies. Everywhere."

With earbuds playing music loudly in her ears and a map on her phone's screen, she had successfully traveled from her dorm to her first meeting place (a library) to her second meeting place (a student center) and was now in the home stretch to the end, she believed. But, with the extensiveness of land in nearly all directions and no passersby, surprisingly, she couldn't figure where her end was... or, at least, where and how she fell. Deflating in all respects, she dropped down on the dirt ground, ashamed and sad. 

"I just don't understand. Where am I supposed to be going? Isn't this the place?" she thought to herself, staring at her map in wonder. "Why do I feel like I'm making a big-... Huh?"

She paused her mind processes when she began to feel increasing shakes in the ground below her, seeing small pebbles (or adequately-sized rocks, to her) bounce up and down. Removing the headphones from her ears, she looked behind herself and saw no one coming her way. Yet, she could now hear thunder rumbling, even though none of the clouds above looked dark. When she looked in the opposite direction, however, 

"AAAAH!" 

She was glad to have quickly noticed the incoming trouble and leaped out of the way to her left, landing on all fours by a set of concrete, outdoor stairs, luckily without a single scrape. A team of titanic, almost tree-like sportsmen stampeded by her. Not a single one bothered to look around for possible (and/or possibly petite) pedestrians as they passed, as though they had full ownership of the pathways. Each team member was fully dressed in a uniform of sorts, including a pair of cleats that could've easily pounded her like a meat tenderizer or punctured her like an iron maiden. Putting the grotesque thoughts aside, she did realize something about her new location.

Just a few meters or yards (for a larger person) from her, she noticed how, behind the set of plants previously bordering her left, the hill had severe erosion of some kind, as if a recent mudslide or earthquake had occurred, exposing multiple plant roots, dangerous underground plants native to her kind, pipelines. and wires in the already rocky landscape. The slope scaled a large drop for any sized person, down to a giant-sized, concrete sidewalk, street, and community area. On the slope, Ainsley's eyes followed a single, fairly thick but definitely long line of dried up blood from the top all the way down to the middle of the crosswalk - a trail perfectly plausible for a fall... and all of her injuries.