Author's Note

In celebration of Amazon Prime Video's newest series Panic, I am thrilled to be teaming up with Amazon Prime Video and Wattpad to write this exclusive chapter that puts my characters from this story into the world of Panic!

I hope this chapter intrigues and inspires you to learn more about Panic. Visit the #PanicWritingContest on Wattpad for the chance to put your creative writing chops to the test and learn more about the show!

To find out more about the contest, prizes, and how to enter, check out the #PanicWritingContest here: wattpad.com/AmazonPrimeVideo

Don't forget to watch the series premiere on May 28th, only on Amazon Prime Video, here: http://primevideo.com/

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"Gooooood afternoon, everyone!" Diggins yelled, his nasal voice cutting through the air unpleasantly, amplified by the microphone clutched in one slim hand. "As your emcee this year, it is an honour – no, a pleasure – to welcome you to this year's Game of Panic!"

Codi winced as a wave of cheers from the hoard of their classmates behind washed over her, people who wanted nothing more than to see the action unfold. With the unforgiving Texas sun beating down on her pale skin, she really wanted to just get things underway before she burned to a crisp. Over the years, however, the opening of the Game of Panic had demanded greater and greater spectacle from the seniors at Carp High School. Now they had to sit through this interminable opening ceremony

I have got to get out of this dump, she thought.

She exchanged a quick, withering glance with her friend Rokki. A shaven-headed, wild-minded individual, his joining the Panic contest surprised no one. Clad in a loose pair of swimming shorts he bared his lean torso, revealing in intricate map of swirling tattoos. He even had a dark sword tattooed on his forehead, pointing down between his eyes. She wasn't sure he even cared about the money – the guy was just nuts.

With her long black hair tied back into a ponytail, Codi wore a short-sleeved, aquamarine wetsuit that reached from her throat to her upper thigh. Most of the more sensible competitors had chosen something similar but some of the others had just thrown on whatever came to hand. A couple of the girls wore one or two-piece swimsuits – a few of the boys opted for professional-looking diving trunks. They looked like the world's worst swim team.

Rokki flashed her a dangerous smile as Diggins swaggered back and forth across the makeshift wooden platform like a tinpot dictator, microphone cord trailing around in his wake. The contestants stood apart from their classmates, close enough to the stage to get a full earful from this year's emcee – microphone or not.

"This year," he continued. "We have twenty-three competitors, all of them chasing our grand prize. Fifty. Thousand. Dollars!" Another cheer erupted from the onlookers and Diggins grinned like an idiot. "But who will walk away with it? Who has the guts to take the glory? It's time to find out!"

"Fancies himself a regular television host, doesn't he?" Rokki muttered. "Maybe we should take him up to Suicide Leap; see if he can keep that swagger while he's falling a hundred and thirty feet."

"Don't tempt me," Codi chuckled under her breath, gently thumping him on the arm.

"As is tradition-," Diggins made a sweeping gesture to the area behind the stage with one arm as he spoke. "All contestants must announce their entry to the Game with a leap of intent."

Codi followed his motion, her eyes fastening onto the venue for the first challenge of the Game of Panic. On the dusty plain on the outskirts of Carp an outcropping of mountain-like crags snarled up out of the land, scorched from heat and looking down over a deep, dark watering hole affectionately nicknamed 'The Swallow' by the seniors. She had no idea how deep it was and today she didn't want to find out.

"To announce their entry to Panic, each of our competitors must jump from a cliff of their choosing and land in the water. There are three options." Diggins' face twisted malevolently as he eyed the contestants. "First, Swallow Rock – 100 points for entry from this height. Second, the High Jump – 125 points. And last but certainly not least... Suicide Leap." He paused for affect, letting the crowd whoop and cheer appropriately, before pointing at the peak of the crags behind him. "Anyone brave enough to take their jump from Suicide Leap will gain an additional 100 points or immunity in a future challenge of their choice."

Codi felt the hairs stand up on the back of her neck at the mention of the last jump, not with fear, but with excitement. Even by the standards of Carp, she was at the bottom rung of the social ladder, a violent, orphaned misfit who'd just barely scraped through graduation. The sooner she could see the back of this town the better, and the Game of Panic was her ticket to freedom.

And for Codi James that journey started at Suicide Leap.

As Diggins nattered on about the history of the first jump, she glanced around at the other players of Panic with a critical eye, trying to decide who she might reasonably be in competition with. A taciturn, silver-haired girl named Ripple stood slightly off from the main group, her face a stony mask of indifference, her sleek body encased from throat to ankle by a jet black wetsuit. It was impossible to know which way she would go. To Codi's left a short-tempered kid named Gareth had his arms tightly folded and a deep frown on his face. High Jump at best.

"And I thought I could spin a story," said a voice from over her left shoulder. She felt her heart flutter for an instant before composing herself and lazily looking back at the speaker.

Kye stood behind her, a mischievous smile stamped on his angular features. His dark hair sat in a short, dishevelled mess, brown eyes gleaming impishly in the bright sun. His face always seemed stuck in a permanent expression of being up to no good, but that was just his way. Kye liked a good joke and she'd yet to find anything the boy took seriously.

Except, perhaps, for Panic.

"Any nerves yet?" Codi replied quietly beneath Diggins voice. She didn't quite know how to feel about having him take part. They were more than good friends, but she knew Kye could use the fifty thousand just as much as her. Friends or not they would be competing against each other.

Competing to abandon each other.

"Would I tell you?" He moved up alongside her, close enough that she caught a gust of his cheap cologne. The familiar smell set her mind a little more at ease.

"I'll take that as a yes."

"I hate heights."

"I know." She shot him a knowing look. "You sure you want to do this?"

"Got to face my fears sooner or later," he replied smoothly, concealing the anxiety about the leap that she knew he would be feeling. "So what's the plan? Are you heading to the top shelf?"

Codi swayed and bumped her hips into his. "What do you think?"

"I think you're probably the craziest person here," Kye replied, before his gaze flickered to Rokki. "Except maybe him."

Rokki made a mock bow. "Thanks for noticing, lover boy."

"You're not my type."

"Don't I know it." He winked at her.

Codi gave her tattooed friend a dig in the ribs with one elbow. "Alright, alright – eyes on the prize, boys."

Kye shrugged, the gleam remaining in his eye as their attention returned the emcee, his rambling finally coming to a close. He finished off his less-than-enthralling spiel about the history of the otherwise unremarkable pile of crags and turned a devious-looking grin on his captive audience.

"So, without further ado," Diggins thundered, raising one fist high. "Let the Game of Panic commence!"

A fresh crescendo of cheers rolled out across the hot, sticky air and Codi joined the procession as the competitors set off towards the crags, her heart pounding and adrenaline beginning to slither into her veins. This was it, her chance to put her life on track for the first time in what felt like forever. Fifty grand to be free of this desolate slice of nowhere – she could practically taste it.

With the spectators following in a chattering gaggle they made their way towards the roughly trodden path that wound through the crags to access the various jumps. Diggins peeled off, dragging the spectators with him to the bank of the watering hole where they would watch, leaving the contestants at the mercy of the signposts. Her rubbery wetsuit shoes bought specially for the occasion did little to smooth the rough contours of gravelly rock, and she winced each time a sharper bit of stone dug into her sole.

Bit by bit the winding, makeshift walkway narrowed, corralling the contestants into single file and Codi couldn't stop her shoulders tensing with anticipation. The incline increased and they climbed, weaving through shaded pockets in the craggy outcropping, catching bursts of sun as they went.

After a couple of minutes they encountered the first sign.

It was a rickety looking thing, little more than two planks hammered together crossways years ago by some eager student and painted with faded blue letters that read: SWALLOW ROCK. A narrow path led off to the right, disappearing into a dark crevice that would deposit the first competitors at the jump point.

Nearly two thirds of the group made their exit at Swallow Rock. At seventy-four feet it was still high enough to give most sane people pause for thought, but it paled in comparison to Suicide Leap. A gentle grip caught her by the elbow for a moment and she found herself pulled around to find Kye, the smile on his face looking thoroughly forced now.

"Good luck," he told her.

Codi wrapped an arm around his neck and pulled him into a hug. "You too." On impulse she planted a kiss on his cheek before releasing him and shoving him towards the crevice as she felt blood rushing to her cheeks. "Don't get cold feet."

Then she twisted away to join the others as they climbed higher.

At the next home-made sign for the High Jump seven more contestants made their exit from the trail, Ripple and Gareth among them. One was no surprise, but Codi had half expected the stoney-faced girl to face Suicide Leap without batting an eyelid. It turned out Ripple did have her fears.

But Codi wasn't stopping here.

Gathering her nerve, she kept climbing. She rose higher, right into the teeth of the blazing noonday sun, her feet digging into the uneven trail and her mouth dry. Her stomach twisted in protest and she fought down the voice in her head telling her to turn back. Codi had never backed down from anything in her life and she wasn't about to start now.

Then she saw the sign.

Nailed to a stake of wood painted jet black was a plank with the words 'Suicide Leap', painted in blood red letters. At the end of the phrase the amateur artist had also scrawled a skull and crossbones. There were no crevices or caves for her to slip through now, only the flat surface of the cliff itself, rising off to her right.

Don't slow down.

Not leaving any precious seconds to second guess herself, Codi followed the sign up the slope and a few seconds later she reached the summit. The dusty plain around Carp sprawled in all directions as far as she could see, rippling bands of haze hovering above the horizon. The whole view was of a ragged waste, occasionally livened up by clumps of stunted shrubbery.

It was a place that didn't want you to escape. Carp was a ghost, a dead-end, forgotten town full of forgotten people. That desolate vista steeled Codi's resolve as she reached the edge of the cliff and peered over.

Part of her wished she hadn't. As she looked down from the dizzying heights of Suicide Leap, Codi swallowed hard. She knew the distance – 132 feet from cliff to surface – but the gently lapping grey-blue waters still seemed impossibly far away. Surely anyone hitting it from this height would just implode on impact...

Pull it together.

Sucking in a shuddering breath, she turned her eyes skyward, steeling herself. It would be worth it. It would hurt but it would be worth it. An extra hundred points; an option to bin a challenge further down the line if she had to. It would give her some much needed leverage and be a statement of intent. She was here to win it all.

Codi glanced to her left at the one other person who'd shown the nerve to confront Suicide Leap. Rokki stood a few feet away taking deep breaths, bouncing lightly from foot to foot as he psyched himself up for the coming jump, ink-dark tattoos glinting in the sun. Two out of twenty-three. Despite her trepidation at actually going over the edge, Codi felt a twinge of pride at being one of the only people standing here. He caught her eye, looked around and then shrugged, as if to say what happened to everyone else? Then she heard a raucous cheer echo up to her vantage point and her attention was dragged away again.

Far down below she could see the ant-like gaggle of the spectators, a dark clump like frogspawn nestled on a viewing platform on the southern bank of the pool looking up. The other cliffs were obscured by the precipice of Suicide Leap but it didn't take long before she saw her fellow competitors.

At a holler from Diggins, the leaping began in earnest.

Fifty feet below, the first group began jumping, launching themselves off the edge one by one. Small bodies appeared in Codi's line of sight, more often than not accompanied by a banshee scream as they plummeted towards the Swallow. The splashes reverberated dimly up off the rocks, foaming circles rippling at the impact point before the contestant surfaced a few seconds later.

She felt a surge of relief when she spotted Kye take the leap, his shrill howl belaying his fear of heights. Still, he'd got himself off the ledge and into that water – that was all he had to do right now. A smile crossed Codi's face as he swam as fast as his limbs would carry him to the bank.

Then it was the turn of the High Jumpers.

The procession was a little less rapid now, the seven contestants at the second cliff taking more time to brace themselves for the leap. Gareth went hurtling off the cliff first, ponytail streaming out behind him as he let out an undulating yell all the way down to the water. Three jumpers later Ripple soared into empty space, and Codi marvelled at how the girl managed to seem graceful even now. She dropped without a sound – as cold and calculated as a guided missile – disappearing into the water with a small splash.

"JUST TWO JUMPERS LEFT!"

Diggins reedy voice was just audible as he yelled up at them. Codi looked at the audience again, her stomach flipping. Jamming her apprehension out of her mind she waved at them, eliciting a fresh swell of applause. Thankfully they were too far away to see her shaking.

Time to put your money where your mouth is.

Rokki's chest swelled as he breathed deep of the hot summer air before looking at her.

"Guess it's just you and me, girl," he chuckled. "Do we take turns or do you wanna run this thing together?"

She looked him in the eye, her heart pounding. "Race you to the bottom?"

"I like the way you think, Codi James." Rokki took several steps back, giving himself a good three meter run up and gestured for her to stand alongside him. "On three?"

Codi managed a smile then, steeling herself for the gut-wrenching drop that she knew was coming. With deliberate steps she crossed the roasted surface of the crag-top and joined him, sinking down with her knees bent, ready to spring.

"Count it," she told him.

Rokki shot her a manic grin and squared his shoulders. "Alright, here's to fifty thousand dollars. One... two... THREE!"

Side by side the pair hurtled forward. As she planted a foot on the edge Codi shut her eyes and let loose a throat-ripping scream as she propelled herself into thin air. A thunder of cheers rose up from the onlookers and she was dimly aware of the hoarse whoop of excitement from Rokki.

Then they were falling.