[ it all feels a bit like a nightmare - a dream she can't shake herself from. the last thing she remembers was the night before, talking to foggy, telling him everything and drinking herself through an entire bottle of bourbon. she made it home, she thinks, but she also thinks she might have slipped getting into bed. or was it the shower? then, when she wakes, she's-

she's got to be in a nightmare. she has to be. it feels just too out of body as she is led out of the medical tent, as some kind of robot from a sci-fi movie beeps away, as she follows the figure in the giant motorcycle helmet. yom crook. what kind of name is that? where even is she? karen barely says a thing as he explains what happened, these diffusion zones, where they are. he mentions a city, panorama, two hours away. karen feels sick, like the entire world is spinning, and she wonders if maybe she did hit her head a little too hard.

but then this yom crook offers a set of keys, a car, says I'll handle the medical bills and Karen snatches the keys from him. it's probably a trap, it has to be some kind of trap, but she's not sticking around to find out.

she has to get to the city, this panorama, and then she can figure out the rest. with her pistol in her bag and very little else, Karen peels off in some old, beat up truck car, going way too fast through the winding roads and thick forests, and she tries, desperately, not to think of vermont. not to think of home.

it's an hour in that she notices something off in the distance, a kind of shuddering of the air, something off with the road. that's when she sees:

SPINNING OUT: or doesn't. because she doesn't even see what it is - only that it's sudden, it's dark, and it's huge. she swerves to avoid it, whatever it is, and her tires squeal as she skids across the concrete, losing traction on the damp road and turning off into the woods themselves. the force of it has her car forcing itself through the limbs and trees, and honestly it's some kind of miracle that she manages to miss anything large enough to crash into, coming to a stop about two hundred yards into the woods themselves.

it takes karen a few moment to catch her breath, checking her arms, her legs, her chest for any sort of injury. she appears fine, somehow, and she shakily kicks the creaky door open and stumbles out into the soft ground, landing unsteadily on her feet. you might see her as she looks around, having no idea where she is, and turns back to her car and the steep hill she just all but fell down and she curses. mind giving her a hand?

DINER NIGHTS: an old building, dark and clearly abandoned, but it's the first sign of anything she's seen in miles. part of Karen wonders if this is even a good idea, but the other part of her knows that she could use the break, so she slows to a stop and pulls into the small, broken-up parking lot. she comes to a slow stop, stepping out and looking up at the dark face of the diner, swallowing back the discomfort in just how much it makes her think of home.

she pushes open the door and steps inside, eyeing the dusty, abandoned interior. as she starts to search through behind the bar, looking for food, for anything of use, a sound in the back kitchen has her freezing.

did you hear it too? is it you? either way, karen's hand is going to her gun, just to be safe. ]