A wild ride over the waterfall...a wilder stop!

She took a deep breath. "I don't really care anymore, do I? I'm probably never getting off this rock. I've done things I'll never scrub my mind clean of, and to top it all off, if I have any single chance of actually surviving this, its down river since that's where a scientist would set up shop; away from the highland predators." she thought. She hit the "seal" button on the laser rifle and closed all of its most sensitive ports for environmental issues, and took a long, sprinting, leaping plunge.

"WOOOHOOOO!!!!!!!" she shouted, her mind reeling from the cool, harsh **** of the river as it whipped her along the rapids. She felt the water flow all along her tired and fatigued body as the thunder of the falls approached. She opened her eyes to the brilliant sky above her, shimmering with velvety streaks of purple, red, and gold as she was thundered along over 60km an hour.

Alice tilted her head back and laughed. She clapped her hands and let the current take her, perhaps for the last time, toward the thunderous waterfall ahead. She didn't know what she would find below, but she made an oath that this moment, this lone, wild ride, would be with her forever.

She felt the world rise...and suddenly fall away. She heard thunder below her, but felt no support. She and the river were one, flowing over the landscape as it dictated. Alice smiled and took the lesson to heart. She would truly have to follow the rules of the planet to survive it. So many humans had failed to appreciate that one simple rule of nature.

All was dark for a time, and the rush above her and below her, the swirling water and crashing waves distorted her sense of direction and space. She gave in to it, knowing the future would be brutal, and savage as the past had been. But for now, she was suspended, and free.

And then she crashed down into a deep, hollow pool. Her limbs scissored to bring her back to the surface. Her gasp for air was met with something unexpected. The glow of fire over the surface of the waves. Alice's carefree and childlike grin gave way to a somber expression as she quietly stroked to the edge of the water. She looked up to the shore, and saw them. She had no where to go...