ONE EYED BOY [C. Grimes][Rarl]

nigh

Carl's introduced to the new world by being pushed in, head first. [Beginning of outbreak, pilot]

To think that less than 48 hours ago, the boy had been numbly staring at this same TV, watching cartoons and drinking his hospital regulation sized juice box, was little more than unimaginable as the woman on the new's voice shakes while she lists off the city's that are on the evacuation list.

He could hear his mother in the bathroom, making phone call after phone call, trying to purchase any tickets to anywhere, but it was no use. Out-of-country airlines had been shut down weeks ago.

Yet again, he attempts to rouse his father from his comatose state by squeezing his cold hand, trying to give warmth to the fingers that dwarfed his own.

"Dad," He croaks, voice cracked from having not drank from the tap in a few hours, due to the fact that the prices of bottled water had skyrocketed overnight, and the hospital plumbing had been turned off. "Dad, we gotta go now."

There's no response. There hadn't been since the day the man had been injured in the line of duty.

"Baby," He feels his mother's warmer hands on the back of his neck, soothing his tremble of anxiety. "We've got to go home and pack now. We're going to go stay with Grandma and Grandpa. Would you like that?"

But not even the promise of his grandmother's cooking or his grandfather's amazing stories of adventure could stop the tears that flowed at the thought of leaving his dad.

"No," He begs, those blue eyes, like his father's, leaking tears of fear; fear that Lori had never wanted to see in her little boy's eyes. There's nothing she can do.

_

They had stayed too long here. Far too long. The boy realizes it when the gun is pointed at the innocents, and the man hidden behind the barrel demands they line up, facing the wall with their hands behind their heads.

They are stripping people of everything they own. Jewelry, wallets, stray coins and watches. It doesn't matter what it is, it is going in their bucket.

"Listen," his mother tells him, "do as they say, Carl."

So he takes off his plastic Spiderman watch he'd gotten, only 2 months ago, for his birthday, and drops it in the bucket.

His throat aches with unshed tears, but his hands find their way to the hair on the back of his head, and he doesn't dare remove them until the men with the guns say he can.

_

Shane comes. Oh, how he loves Shane as he shoves through the crowds of army men with his officer's badge, and guides them away, away from all the chaos.

But, dad's still asleep. It's time to go.

_

Knowing his dad is dead doesn't hurt very much the moment he hears it, but the more he sits in the back of Shane's truck, settled beside bags of clothes and photo albums, the more it sinks in, and the more he starts to cry.

They haven't moved in traffic for ten minutes now, and people are getting out of their cars and yelling, shouting. A few cars ahead, a fistfight has broken out between two young men, but he tries not to look at it.

Everyone's acting like animals, running for Atlanta, for the city with the bases and the camps set up in the streets, ready to help people.

The radio told everyone to go to Atlanta, go to the city, and everyone does as they are told, being herded like sheep.

_

Carl smells it first, a new smell he doesn't think he'd ever smelt before, but he recoils from it nevertheless, clapping his hand over his nose and mouth to block it out.

"God, what is that," His mother says, but Shane's already turning the car back on.

It's smoke with a bad fuel. No, he has smelt it before, hasn't he? Vague memories of a camping trip surface in his mind, when one of his cousins, who'd been playing with matches while the adults weren't looking, had singed his hair.

A gag rises in the back of his throat as the smell grows more pungent. Cars are pulling away, off roading to go back, to get away from the stench. They are honking, and people are running away from the source of the fire; the city.

The first bomb drops on Atlanta at that moment, illuminating the dark, dusk sky, before their very eyes. Someone to their left rear-ends another car. People begin to scream and run. Shane revves through a gap that forms between two cars, and the bump of the gutter bounces the car roughly, jarring Carl into a silent panic.

The city is burning, and so are people.