Mad God's Love [Dark, enemies-to-lovers BL]

12 BC 2

I found a maintenance ladder and a hatch. Locked. From outside. To be expected. Jumped down and without giving up checked other venues. Eventually found a crumpled passage towards freedom. Some of the ceiling behind that was caved in, air dusty. Since I didn't drop dead immediately it probably wasn't a bioweapon of any kind.

Started looting random piles of clothing strewn around. Boots, cargo pants, shirt, jacket of many pockets, contents of purses. The usual stuff. Walked room by room. Stuffed bags and pouches full of money and jewellery.

If not for the occasional collapse or automated alerts, it would have been dead silent. Not terribly daunting. Scavenging in the surrounding towns under threat of monsters was way worse.

Picked up a load of keys and key cards, as the floors were locked from one to the next until reaching a place where stairs abruptly ended. There was an open sky. Still fair bit of way to reach ground level, though. The giant sea creature lightly scraped the top floors off.

I sighed and clambered through the rubble swept to the sides. Tired, beat and all dirty, hoisted myself up the last peak. There were buildings! Debris all around, but great many still stood tall all over one side of horizon. An oddly familiar sight, but all the cities looked alike, right?

Not at all. That crime against architecture was undoubtedly one of a kind. No two buildings would collapse the same way. Which meant I was home! Not an impossible coincidence, we were somewhere in the vicinity already. Joy!

I would have never suspected soldiers have been bringing unholy beasts so near the population, within city limits. A bit hypocritical, but nobody ever asked me for opinion on such matters. Thus far they had done stellar job keeping them contained anyhow.

Getting closer towards residential district I observed the stillness of destruction. Nobody cried. Nobody was riffling through the collapsed structures. Nobody even came to gawk at the hole in place of our strongest and bravest.

No, this can't be right. The eerie serenity felt horrible. The stronghold of humanity was never supposed to be this inert, for it was the peace of graveyard.

Everyone can't possibly be gone.

Dropped my bags of goodies and ran.

We lived away from the law. That translated into location physically furthest away from enforcers. They're fine. They will be okay. My lungs burned. I sprinted as though chased even though I barely started, but I could not pace myself. It's far from here. They would be alright. Had to be. Please. I just want to go home.

I shouted, screamed for literally anybody to show up on the way but nobody peeked out in the dark windows. There was no rampant fire, no more sights of destruction. Everything was intact. Even the clothes I'd occasionally stumble upon. Not a drop of blood. Everyone was just gone.

"Anyone!" I screamed hysterically, after succumbing on my fours to catch a few seconds of reprieve. Then I ran again. I could barely see through white spots in my vision by the time I reached home.

"Ruby?" I fell through the front door. Silence was still sickening. Without stopping, I checked every room on the ground floor and then flew up the stairs. Methodically opened and closed. Nothing.

"Amber?" I called out and got an idea – she could be at work. It was middle of the very, very cold day.

I ran out into the deserted street again. Her workplace was pristine and open. Piles of clothes lain all around. My face flooded with hot tears for I recognised one of the piles. That was Amber's best attire. She never wore it anywhere else. The heartbreak was palpable, but monsters have given me too good of health for my ticker to just stop.