- { an entry for a writing contest. c: so yep, here we go with the post-apocalyptic stuff. Critique and opinions are greatly appreciated. }
- ♞ I guess the end of the world had to come sometime.
Maybe not the time that was predicted, but we were too advanced for our time. Too many electronics, and with internet and phones, Mother Nature decided it was time to wipe us out. Just like what she had done to ancient civilizations before us. They were just suddenly gone, nonexistent. The end didn't come as most of the addicts had predicted. No insanity, no freak natural events, and not even zombies. Instead, animals are morphing into beasts, creatures that haunt your nightmares. To put it quite simply, they're horrifying enough to make you want to jump off a cliff than fall victim to their gaping maws. Our once loved pets are tearing us to pieces, turning into giants that barely resemble the past animal. They may carry a few traits from their past animals, but are nearly unrecognizable. You know, sort of like the three creatures from that ancient movie "Star Wars". One resembled a feline, another a Rhinoceros and the last was a huge Praying Mantis. May I mention that the trio were rather bloodthirsty.
I suppose it's about time I stop boring you with all this crazed animal talk. So I'll just introduce myself instead. I'm Reece Wolfe, creature killer extraordinaire. I have sandy brown hair that sort of has that... tousled look. Almost as if I was in a fistfight on the ground. My height is around five foot six, which is appropriate for my age of 16. No, I don't have a driver's licence. Not like its safe to drive on those ramshackle streets anymore. You can usually find me decked on in a hoodie and jeans, even in these times of need. I mean, nobody's going to call the cops on you for stealing from a deserted store. I've been telling you all about this, but I suppose for you to understand, I'll have to start from the beginning. So enjoy my "fake" story, dated for your liking, while I'm fighting for my life out here.
- ♞ It was a nice, normal day outside. Birds were chirping happily in the leafy trees, while people drove by on the smooth road. What a luxury it was, without us even realizing it. A couple walked past, with a fluffy little poodle on a blue retractable leash. Of course, it was a Monday. So as I was seeing the world move around me, I was in a full-out sprint to reach the school bus stop in time. I scrambled to a halt at the stop just as our driver was reaching for the handle to close the glass doors. He rolled his eyes at my dishevelled and homely look - well, I always looked rather homely. I smiled in an attempt to lighten the mood, but he just frowned and said, as I quote exactly. "Get on the bus or become a hitchhiker."
So I got my sorry arse onto that big yellow bus. It was sweltering inside the metal interior, as a result of the summer heat. It was only the beginning of the season, but global warming was sure as heck not making it any cooler outside. My few friends and I sat in the front of our bus, so I plopped myself down in one of the blue-green seats. Sitting in the front may seem stupid, but let me explain. You couldn't sit in the back for a second before something was thrown, launched, or stepped on. Oh yeah, and the occasional f-bomb was dropped for no reason. I was now seated next to one of my friends, who grinned at me before slapping me on the back good-naturedly. "Hey Reece, what's up? You seem pretty tired this morning. Your baby sister keeping you up all night?"
I simply nodded, even though she wasn’t the one keeping me up most nights these days. Whenever I tried to fall asleep, an awful feeling would arise in my gut – my parents said it was paranoia about something. Maybe I had watched too many scary movies, even though it wasn’t the thought of a murderer creeping in through my window that scared me. Something much more ominous and deadly was lurking around the corner, waiting for its chance to reap thousands of souls. I hadn’t even noticed I was lost in thought until our bus stopped at the school. Slowly, I stood from my seat. Recalling my late night “paranoia” had made butterflies rise in my stomach once again.
The ground suddenly lurched, sending the cool floor out from under most people’s feet, including mine. Other people and I fell to the hard metal floor, some hitting their heads, with other using their hands to brace themselves. Of course, I was one of the idiots who hit their faces on the filthy floor. I sat up as everyone else ran out of the now open doors in a blind panic. Using my hands and feet, I shoved my sorry self into a seat, but was sitting on the floor so no one would see me. Since my so called friends had ditched me, I was left alone on the gigantic bus, with no one caring. I could hear the doors clang shut, which was rather strange. After all, hadn’t everyone just stampeded off of the school bus? Suddenly, frightening animal growls came from outside. Screams filled the air, and I had to cover my own mouth to fight the screams threatening to emerge from the horrifying sounds outside. The sound of tearing, ripping flesh reached my ears. Bones cracked like twigs that you would step on, and the guttural growls were now filled with pleasure. The screams had stopped, and I could only imagine the horrors that were occurring from outside. I shut my eyes as tightly as I could, and placed my hands over my ears, which really didn’t help at all. My face hurt, but I wasn't going to risk moving.
After an eternity of waiting, the creatures finally left. The sickening and metallic scent of blood had reached my nose long ago, and it made me want to throw up. Now that the creatures had seemingly left, I decided to investigate my own wound. When I had hit the bus floor with my face, apparently it had left a gash on my cheek – and I only knew that much because I could feel the unpleasant sensation of blood creeping down my left cheek, and it had reached the bottom of my jaw. Now, with nowhere to go but down, it was dripping onto my clothes, leaving stains to blossom across the fabric. All I could do was stare at the blossoming dark red in shock. Finally, I willed my fingers to reach up and inspect the wound. It was decently deep, enough to penetrate many layers of flesh, but not deep enough to reach the hard white bone underneath. Approximately 2 inches long and a quarter of an inch wide, it would probably need some sort of bandage.
I knew in order to get the medical kit on the bus, I was going to have to stand up. However, I didn’t want to see what lay outside of the transparent glass windows. Forcing down bile from nervousness, I stood, swaying on my feet unsteadily for a moment. Then I trained my eyes on the medical kit up front, avoiding looking out of the side windows. Unfortunately I could see out of the huge front windows. Luckily, nothing was there except for a few blood trails. I figured that most of the puke-worthy sights would be on the side with the doors. My hand, shaking, reached out and grabbed the kit, pulling it from its place on the wall. Stumbling over my own feet, I made my way back to the seat I had been cowering in minutes before.
I knew what I had to do, I knew I had to stay calm and focused. You never realize how hard it is to do that until you’re placed in a desperate situation. Physically, I was doing exactly what I was supposed to. I wasn’t doing so hot mentally. Calm, composed, and good in a crisis Reece Wolfe was flipping out in his mind. Every memory and thought was scattered and twisted, driving me to the brink of insanity. I forced myself out of that world and back into the present, back into reality.
Opening the first aid kit, I began to examine its contents. A roll of bandages, a few squares of gauze, some band-aids, a small bottle of peroxide, and a couple of cotton swabs. I knew I would need water to wash off the peroxide, but where was it in the bus? Suddenly I remembered my backpack, and looked to the seat where it was. It was just sitting there, almost like it was daring me to come get it. So I climbed to my feet, and staggered over to retrieve it. The backpack was a dark blue colour, and looked more like a hiking bag then a backpack – because I just had to buy the biggest and best one the store had. It had five different pockets, a small one on the very front, a slightly larger one near the front, an even larger one in the middle, the largest at the back, and a small but deep one between the middle and back pockets. It had been very close to the end of school, so I had nothing in the backpack except for the usual water bottle, a packed lunch, a few blank notebooks, and a few sharpened pencils. The lunch and water were in the back pocket, while the notebooks and sharp pencils were in the middle pocket.
I unzipped the back pocket and took out the water bottle. Then I reached carefully for the kit and took out the peroxide. The wound would have to go without any sort of bandage on it, because band-aids were too small, bandages I would have to wrap around my face, and I had nothing to secure the gauze with. I laid on my back out in the aisle of the school bus, and untwisted the cap for the peroxide. I tipped the bottle, wanting it to seem carefully but instead it seemed jerkily. A few splashes of it hit my cheek, and I could hear it begin to hiss as it cleansed. The stinging began, more intensely that it ever had on any other wound I had obtained.
Gritting my teeth, I found myself once again fighting the urge to scream, or even to hit something. After I had finished with the wound, I went back to my backpack. I took out one of the notebooks that I had, along with a sharpened pencil. You see, this is what I’m writing right now, so why is it in past tense? Well, I figured that everyone enjoys a horror story, and I would like to make this gruesome reality an enjoyable story for those of you reading it. This is how my story writing works. I’ll write what’s happened so far, put it away, then catch up next time I take it out. Then I put my journal away, carefully placing it back in its designated pocket. Digging around in the large pocket for my packed lunch, I uncovered what I had.
I had a bag of Cheese-Its, one ham and cheese sandwich, a cheese stick, a juice box, some bagged London broil, and one chocolate chip cookie that I had begged my mom for. I felt my heart lurch as I thought about my parents. Had they been ripped apart and mauled to? I got the feeling I would never get the chance to find out. Replacing the things, I thought about getting out of the bus. I wanted out, but lying outside the doors... There was also the possibility of climbing out the windows, but it seemed to be much too risky. So I decided to toughen up and go out of the front doors. After all, I knew how to open them, when I was little my mom drove buses and took me along. She would show me how to work all the controls, and made sure to drill them into my head. So I slung the backpack over my shoulder, after having shoved the first aid kit into the near-front pocket. I headed for the front of the bus, and opened the doors, trying to avoid looking outside for as long as possible. When I finally looked, it left me running for the nearest bush.
From the quick glance I had before I threw up my guts, the scene did look like something straight out of a horror novel. I wiped my mouth on my sleeve after puking, the awful taste still in my mouth. Nothing much left remained of my classmates and bus driver, with the exception of bits of clothes and chunks of flesh and hair. Blood was everywhere, making the asphalt urn red, and it would probably stay red like that forever.
Slowly I gathered my sanity and wits. I began wandering around, knowing that it was getting late in the day by the way the sky was darkening the world around it. My grey eyes searched for someplace, anyplace, to stay for the duration of the darkness. I was completely spent, both mentally and physically, and knew I would have to sleep soon. Country life sure was fun, as it provided loads of hiding places. Then again, it provided a lot of bugs to. Suddenly I could hear a guttural growl, one that sounded eerily similar to the ones from earlier.
I gulped and froze, inhaling sharply from fear. I could see movement from the corner of my eye but didn’t dare to move even a single tired muscle. Whatever it was moved slowly, but was surely making its way in front of me. Praying to God that it didn’t see me, my breath caught in my chest as time froze. The beast finally stepped to where I could see it perfectly, and it froze just like I had. It let out quite the roar as I took in the sight. It was around the height of a black bear, and could stand on its hind legs. It had two huge, gaping mouths filled with what appeared to be canine teeth tipped with blue poison. It had a fluffy, curly white coat, and the white was marred with rusty red blood. I decided not to think about what the blood was from. It had a long, feathery tail that reached the grassy ground. Fluffy is not always cute. You know what the scariest thing of all was? It freakily resembled the little poodle that I had witnessed the happy couple walking earlier.
We both stood there for a moment, as I stared at him. He emitted a series of growls, roars, and sniffing sounds as we were frozen there like statues. I could swear he looked right at my face, but eventually the once poodle creature moved along on its murderous way. Releasing held-in breath, a grin found its way across my pale and drained face. I was so gleeful that I had managed to see the beast and leave unscathed. Although now that I knew what they probably were like, I decided that it would be a good idea to take shelter and rest in a Pine tree. After searching for a few minutes more, I found one. It was tall, had plenty of branches, and provided good shade. So I climbed up the prickly tree, getting minute scratches, before finding two thicker branches that were relatively close, well close enough to make a semi-comfortable seat. One spot where I could actually sit on it without breaking it or falling off. It took me hours to actually get the guts to close my eyes and surrender myself to the darkness in the depths of my mind. I caught up in my journal in that time, until I became too tires to even write straight. With that, I drifted off into a deep sleep, but it was chocked full with nightmares. I had the feeling it would be the last time I slept deeply for a while.
work in progress
