The Land After Tomorrow (Completed)

Prologue: Journal Entry 1

Years of contamination onto our soil and earth were part of the greatest disaster known to man, or even our Earth. Pollution from the cars, factories, homes, and human impact has caused the earth to start dying, but that's not what caused it. A virus known as Imazoia developed into our water ways. The source of our survival was contaminated. The lakes, oceans, rivers filled with this virus that affected animals that drank the water and humans ourselves. Water to support the human population depleted slowly as the virus began to spread. Nobody knows what caused it or how it became to be; they didn't have time to predict it. It appeared as fast as it spread. Once in the blood stream, it attacked the blood cells and unlike other viruses, it slowly began to seize and malfunction the cells. The cells that could fight this virus began to die leaving human bodies defenseless. Scientists couldn't explain it in time before they too were affected. Millions drank out of those water ways, and millions became sick, but some were immune to the virus. It started out as fever then it would rapidly escalate to destroying the blood cells to its one purpose: destroying the heart. No one could find a solution fast enough to stop this virus. This was just the beginning of the end of the human race.

The human population dropped drastically from the illness. Day by day, thousands would die, that wasn't the worst of it all. The Earth started to become another planet. It became a war zone of human vs mother nature. Chemistry, physics, and science were thrown out the window and everything changed. Somehow mother nature could adapt and redesign itself, maybe there was a science to it, but nobody will ever know for sure. We didn't have time to know.

The virus began to spread like a rapid fire. The virus that was once in the water began to become air born. The sick, we thought, had spread this virus from deathly coughing. It spread among the rest of the population infecting everyone else, but a rare few. The virus somehow altered the water pattern within the oceans and the rain above. It changed everything. Tornadoes spread into places where they shouldn't have been; places they shouldn't be. Hurricanes stormed along the coasts hitting hard among the survivors left. They were bigger, stronger, and faster than they have ever been before. A mist of chemicals from industries and plants spread within the virus turning into a fog- a fog of death.

We watched as the first fire started and lit a flare to the forests. Then, the next fires started in the dryness of the plains. They spread rapidly and in numbers. There was little that could be done. Firefighters that managed to escape the wrath of the virus faced the hell that lied in front of them to no avail. The fire spread destroying everything in its path. Nothing could be done, so we watched as the Earth set into fire.

Some, but a few, had the ability to fight the sickness and could adapt, for most it was death. Fights broke out among the streets over rationed food or even a bottle of water. The small things that we took for granted everyday was wiped out in front of our eyes and now we beg for its return. This was the Scorch Age where we watched our homes perish in our hands.

Cities crumbled from earthquakes, fires broke out in the trees burning homes and families, toxic mist burned and killed people as they ran, shouts and cries for helps echoed on the streets. The air was a dense toxic waste that poured into our lungs as we breathed. The fog poured on us, burning our skin. Hurricanes hit hard on the coasts killing millions as the debris poured onto the land. Buildings crumbled as the wake of the Earth shook and the acid rain combined with the fog broke down the buildings into ruble and stones. Houses collapsed from everything imaginable. There was no shelter in the city, not anymore. There was no shelter anywhere.

There were few survivors after the Scorch. Some of these survivors had developed immunity to the illness or had it already imbedded in their genes. Those who had escaped the fog, collapses, fires, famine, and contamination illness were called the Wakers. Wakers for the wakening of a new life, a new hope, and a new beginning. They would have to learn to survive on their own to succeed. They would need to find a source of food, water, and rebuild from the Scorch. Yet that sounds so easy, but there is so much more that lies ahead to the path of survival. This was the Survival Age where groups of survivors fight their way to survive and rebuild from the contamination of the planet. This is the beginning of a new hope. This was the land after tomorrow.

Ian Holt

Screams erupted throughout the room echoing along the walls into the hallway. Screams of endless pain sent chills down his spine and into his heart. He could feel the pain from her screams intensifying his own pain. Nothing could be done. He ushered his son to get hot water as he held onto her hand. It was cold and limp. He stared into lifeless eyes that seemed to drift back and forth between her screams. Her eyes once full of hope, now seemed to dimmer. Her body lay weak on the bed as she shriveled up into a ball from the immense pain radiating from her stomach. He looked from the woman to a young girl curled up next to her, his daughter, whom was four. Her body laid up against her mother as fear searched into her eyes. Her hands were covered over her ears from her mother's endless screams that pierced the air. Slight tears ran down her cheeks as she softly whimpered. He knew that his wife wasn't going to suppress this. Nobody did, but he held on to a slight hope that would end up haunting him.

He watched his dying wife that lied in front of him in misery. He tossed and turned with the idea of ending her suffering now. A gun lied on the nightstand that stood next to his side. He stared at it and then back to his wife. She locked with his eyes that seemed to be pleading for release. He outstretched his arm laying his hand on the weapon that could easily end her death. He looked back to his wife whom seemed to be shaking her head in response.

"You won't feel it anymore," he pleaded to her.

She closed her eyes breathing in deeply. She opened her eyes staring at her husband's with strength and pain. She responded in a slight whisper and hoarse breaths, "I will die fighting." She coughed in pain grasping onto the sheets. "I'm not dying a coward."

Letting go of the gun, he watched the seconds go by as the life poured out of her and she clutched onto her stomach. Her hand went limp in his as her eyes rolled back and closed. He watched as she took her last breath heaving in small quantities of air. Then she let go as she let the air out of her lungs along with the life she held within. His heart stopped, and pain erupted from his soul as he watched the woman he loved lay dead upon the bed. His daughter stared at him helplessly as she looked back to her mother then to him. He felt his soul shatter into pieces creating an empty space of pain that could never be mended and left untended. Nothing could describe the pain but it's like a shock of emptiness that runs along your blood and never dies out.

His son came back with a bowl of water in his hand and stopped abruptly at the door to the site of his mother. The pain washed over him, and his body went numb of pain. He felt the bowl slide between his fingers and then the sound of the bowl hitting the floor with a thump. Water spilt along the floor and droplets brushed up against his skin. He fumbled to find footing as he tried to walk over to the bed. He saw his sister staring at his mother in numbness. His father had his head now buried into his mother's chest. He was heaving and trying hard to breath throughout the pain inside him.

The young girl looked up into her brother's eyes. Smiling she talked gleefully, "I see her sun. Don't worry."

The boy looked over her face and saw what looked like her mother's smile and he fell to the ground and began to cry. A fire raging inside him, "She's dead!"