Game over

Arguments

They decided to stay there another night before they continued moving.

They heard rustling.

"I swear, if that's some of our missing group, I will scream." Charlie said.

A low chuckle followed.

"Did you laugh?" Nathanael asked the group.

They all shook their heads.

For a moment, Nathanael thought the impossible and glanced down at his father's ashes, "dad?"

A guy laughed, "it wasn't your dad."

They looked for the guy, Dean said, "who are you?"

"Karlos." The guy came into view.

He had long dreadlocks, a brown shirt and jeans. He had a lot of tattoos and piercings. He looked older than Axel.

Romero stood up in awe, "I love your music."

"Thank you. What's your name?"

"Romero."

"Much love, Romero." Karlos hugged him.

"You're a musician?" Sam asked.

"Yes. I'm from the B*side players. My group, they didn't make it when they all started."

"What kept you going?" Beth asked.

"Nauhi Ollin. Movement."

Romero almost screamed like a teenager, "I love that album, that song. I just- I just--" he squealed.

Everyone laughed.

"I saw a herd of them, coming this way. A herd of robots."

"What?!"

"They're simple things, really. All we need is an engineer and a robot."

"I'm an engineer. I was working on my doctorate before this all started." Melinda said.

Everyone except Karlos stared at her.

"What? You didn't ask, I didn't tell."

Axel laughed, "we're all going to hell. Except Father Rudy, maybe."

"Azi, are you okay?" Natasha asked.

"Is anyone okay? No!! We're not. Do you want to know why!? Because It's the goddamn apocalypse and we're all going to fucking die."

Father Rudy yelled, "NEVER USED THE LORD'S NAME IN VAIN!! AND NEVER EVER CURSE IN THE SAME SENTENCE AS THE LORD. I'm getting sick of this. Spare me the scriptures, stop praying I'm trying to sleep, don't hit me with the Bible again. No wonder this is happening. It's like Noah's Arc but without the flood. God is taking this upon us because we're sinning, not asking for forgiveness and forgetting God."

"No, you wanna know the real reason this is happening?" Dean said.

Karlos began to walk away, wanting no part of the group. Romero quickly followed.

Dean continued, "it's because there are aliens. They're trying to save Earth from us. You're half right. It's what we're doing to the Earth, not ourselves. Not our sins. And it sure as hell isn't because we're not praying. And I swear on my Brother's life, if you hit me with the Bible again, you will regret it. I WILL FUCKING BEAT YOU TO A BLOODY PULP."

"Can we like stop arguing?" Beth asked. "I lost Maggie, My dad, my mom, my farm and I lost Daryl. I have nothing left. And I don't want to die knowing the last thing we did was argue. It is the end, we could at least live in harmony."

Emilio then said, "yes, yes. It doesn't matter our religion, our race, how many we've killed, if we eat three meals a day or not. That no longer matters. That was the past. I don't know about you, but I think of this as a fresh start."

"A fresh start? It's the end of the world." Dean said.

"No, no, not just the end. See, we must be prepared to love and forgive quickly. We'll all need a clean conscience when we die. We also need to be ready to kill our loved ones. Until then, we must only know love because it's only the beginning of the end."