Wasteland

Chapter 1

People were rushing around Oasis Lab going about with whatever they had to do. In the middle of this rush was the Chief Executive Scientist and two guards right behind her.

"You mean to tell me the rats escaped!?" A young woman who seemed to be in her early thirties exclaimed. She was certainly the one in charge with power radiating off of her.

"We apologize ma'am. No one knows what happened." One of the guards of Oasis explained, slightly distraught. "We'll go search the cameras to figure out how they escaped." Another, more composed guard stated. "No. If those rats get out of this lab, it won't matter how they escaped. Go look for them." "On it." The two guards immediately started searching for the rats.

Just down the hall from this conversation, two rats crawled through a vent. Unfortunately for the entire human race, it led to the outside world, ignorant of what was to come.

*****

It was 11:40 at Carnage High when a delivery truck pulled up to the school. The driver opened the trailer, only for a rat to scurry out. "Well damn. I hope it didn't chew through anything." Right after the driver said that, another one came running towards the exit. On impulse, he went to grab the rat, causing it to bite his finger.

"Fuck!" The driver hurled the rat at the wall, but it seemed completely unfazed before running elsewhere. While the driver was wiping blood off his finger, one of the lunch ladies came outside. "Are you alright?" The old lady questioned in concern. He laughed nervously. "Yeah, sorry a rat just bit me."

"Oh! Is it bad? You might want to get it checked out." The lady walked towards him. "No, I'll be okay. It can't have caused too much damage." "If you say so. Would you like me to help you get this stuff inside?" the driver started grabbing boxes. "Ah yes please, if it's not a bother to you." The lunch lady grabbed boxes as well "No bother at all."

*****

It was 12:20 in the Carnage High lunch line. Two students were talking to each other about their classes while getting their lunch. "Can I borrow your notes from history?"

"Yeah sure I'll give them to you after-" One of the students was cut off by their friend. "Ow!" She gasped, surprised by the sharp pain. They both looked down and saw a rat running around at their feet. "Are you okay?" The friend asked after kicking the rat away from them.

"It bit me!" She yelled in frustration. "Do you want to go to the nurse? I can take you." They started walking towards their tables. "No it's barely bleeding, I'll just go after lunch to get it checked out. "I have a band-aid in my bag, I can give it to you when we sit down." After sitting down, she took the band-aid from her friend. "Thanks."

Unaware of the lunch line issue, three teenagers, Nova, Hazel, and Karma sat at their own table for lunch, gossiping about their school mates. "Did you see what happened in Ms. Parks' class?" Hazel asked with way more enthusiasm than her friends. Curiously Karma questions, "What? I haven't seen anything." Nova looks over at Hazel in disinterest.

"Okay! So these two kids got into a fight, right? And Ms. Parks was trying to separate them, but that one girl with red hair! You know who I'm talking about?"

"Yeah I think so. Do you know who she's talking about, Nova?" Karma quizzes Nova, making sure they're up to date with the drama. "Maybe...the one who just got back from suspension?"

"Yeah her! So she bitch slapped Ms. Parks! Her cheek got so red! It was so funny, I'm glad I was there to see it." Karma, who wanted to see how it went down, asked, "Did anyone get a video of it? I wanna see!"

"Oh yeah! I think I saw that one girl, Rosé, taking a video." Hazel finally started eating her food after getting all the details out. "Oh Nova, you should ask her for the video!" Karma became excited about the possibility of seeing the video.