Experiment: Apocalypse

ATHENA BRADSHIRE

May 17, 3025

Terror. It was a white hot flame burning inside of me. Barricaded down in my basement, I had nothing to do other than pace or reread the Greek mythology book that I never let leave my side. Across the room was a cabinet stocked with all the ammunition and guns an eighteen year old girl would need to survive the apocalypse. I knew how to use them, of course. But it wasn't a matter of knowing how to use them as it was wanting to use them.

The frantic news casts had come on exactly twenty-four hours after it all began. And by it, I meant the apocalypse. And by apocalypse, I don't mean zombies everywhere and small civilizations popping up left and right and somehow surviving.

By apocalypse, I meant that the whole world was ending.No one knew who's fault it was.

Of course, there were your conspiracy theorists who believed our lives were an infinite tangle of lies all tangled up so crazily that we'd never believe the truth. They believed some divine power has created us, cherished us, then decided we were no fun anymore and left us here to die.

In other words, the gods had left us behind.

The white hot flame of terror is the only thing to describe what's going on in the world. Governments crumbled within days. They went away and hid in their underground bunkers to ride out the storm. At least, that's what most thought.

We couldn't explain what was happening. Suddenly, there were natural disasters springing up everywhere. Climate change was all the rage. Death Valley was suddenly a huge beach that ran up the whole west coast. The ocean water levels had risen as well. No more San Andreas, I guess. Instead, there was miles of ocean where cities and streets used to be. Poseidon had taken back his realm.

Storms. There were so many storms. Lighting strikes happened so often that the fires could not be contained, even by those who tried so valiantly to slow them. Those who continued to cling onto everyday life were the people who disgusted me at times like these. Who fights the storm when it's obvious that tides are going to wash you away in the end? Those who fought were killed. That's exact why I stayed put when Zeus unleashed his wrath on the Earth and its inhabitants.

Earthquakes. Hades was mad. He was going to shake the Earth from the inside out, for he knew no mercy. He would send all human civilization into ruin with his mighty earthquakes. They called Poseidon the Earthshaker, but the Lord of the Sea was no match when put against the Lord of the Underworld when he was angry. There would be no end to this apocalypse, a battle of gods long in the making. There would be no survivors.

<•>

It couldn't have been more than a week after everything went blah that I was forced to leave my hiding place. I had run out of food. So, with my veins pumping adrenaline through them, I hauled my back over one shoulder, a M-16 rifle over the other, and began up the steep stairs. In my hand was a pistol and my pockets were filled with ammo, as were some of the pockets on my bag.

My clothing. When I went down into the basement, I was wearing a Panic! At the Disco shirt and a pair of basketball shorts. An odd combination, but it was fitting to my personality. Now, about a week later, I was climbing up the stairs in men's army fatigues that were much too big for my small frame. I probably would scare away the first person I met, with my hair limp and greasy, tangled in some places, and my cold, hard eyes. My cheeks had sunken in from lack of food, and my skin had gotten paler. Not only that, but the dark circles under my eyes were so dramatic that it would seem like I made them with makeup.

It's not like I'd need any friends when the world was ending anyways. Who even needs friends when the world is ending? Not me, I tell ya.

I managed to make it to the bathroom without throwing up at the stench. In the week I had been down there, I had tried not to think about why my parents died—why I was down in the basement anyways.

The plague.

Of course, it wouldn't be an apocalypse without one.

It affected the body in strange ways. If it liked you, cool, you get to live and have children who may or may not have the virus. Just because the bug liked you, it didn't mean it would like your kids. Or your husband.

Apparently the virus had been around for awhile, just earlier humans were "better liked" by it than most of us now. It targets cells in major organs, then it targets blood, and then the brain if you last long enough. This disease literally makes your body turn against you.

It was called many different things, but the name that stuck with me the best was the Black Shadow. I didn't know why it stuck, but maybe it was because it reminded me of the "Shadow of Death". Maybe that was because the Shadow of Death followed wherever the disease went.

It was here. That's why there's the smell. My mother, my father, and my baby twin brother and sister. It hated them. It destroyed them—destroyed their minds and their souls. The plague liked me. I was sick for a few days. I was the first one before the rest of them got it.

I lost hope for them after the first week. When I'd gotten ill, it lasted for three and a half days. For them, it was already the eighth day when I decided to barricade myself down in the basement. It was the only way I knew I could survive.

I heard their screams through the floor.

<•>

The shower still worked, so I took one. I was glad to be ridding myself of the smell of a week in a musty basement.

One thing I noticed while being down there was that you begin to lose your mind when you feel as if you don't have one left. Smelling like an animal made me feel like one. I almost went mad down there. Reading the same books over and over again until I had memorized them.

After the shower and blow drying my hair, I managed to make my way outside without seeing any bodies. Any food that had been in this house was gone by now. Scavenged, rotted, or looted. I would make one quick look through the house to make sure there was nothing left before I set out.

Trying to avoid looking into the rooms of my passed family members, I made my way to my room. It seemed untouched. The same constellations on my ceilings and the same black carpet. My whole room was based off the night time.

Desperately ignoring the nostalgia, I opened my closet and riffled through it. Luckily, I found three pairs of clean jeans, six tees, and two hoodies, one a zip-up and the other a pullover. In my backpack already was a sleeping bag, so I didn't need to worry about that. I knew I could fine water bottles in the pantry (hopefully) and a knife or two.

Better to be over-prepared than under, right?

I set out half and hour later, already mad at myself for not making a plan. Where would I go? What would I do when I got there? What if I ran into other survivors? What if, what if, what if...

I pushed the thoughts from mind and set my mind instead on the thought of making it as far as I could go until nightfall.

Hopefully, far enough, I thought to myself.

I kept walking.