Our Extinction

Chapter Seven

I ran around, handing two out to a pair of girls, beautiful and healthy.

The place was over the top crowded, and I couldn't run, just speedwalk. I managed to find another kid, a boy.

I looked around. There wasn't anyone that would make a suitable husband. I didn't know any of these people, and I didn't want to have to randomly pick one.

I started running again.

"Wait! Stop mister!" an older woman's voice said. I froze, and turned around. "Is that you?" she asked, and with a shock, I recognized my mother. She was so old now, I didn't know. I hadn't talked to her since my dad was killed. Or seen her.

"Mother?"

"Yes! Please, I love you. Please, stay by me." she pleaded.

"I'm sorry. I need to find people." I said, and my chest started heaving. I showed her the gas masks.

"Your father was good at predicting the future. There was a man, a very sweet one, who I have arranged a marriage with you. We have searched the records, everything, and they all revealed that he is kind and friendly. Perfect for you."

"Mother!!" I practically yelled. "You arranged a marriage without me?"

"We were going to tell you... He's over there. Hand him one gas mask and tell him he has to keep it on or else he will give it away to someone. You have to hurry!"

I felt torn. I wanted so badly to give the one in my hand to my mother and the other to the stranger. It took me a half-minute to say anything.

"Um.." I stopped and abruptly turned around. And saw a man. He was tall, with curly black hair and tarnish skin. He wore a orange t-shirt with writing, too faded to read. His jeans were torn at the bottom, and his shoes were caked with mud. He had a worried expression that covered his face. I blushed, and turned around to my mother, who smiled and nodded.

"Umm.. Don't ask questions. Just take this." I shoved a mask into his hands awkwardly. "Put it on." I saw a small boy who looked happy and started towards him.

"And keep it. Please." I said, half-turning back to him. I ran to the boy, and thrust it into his hands. I wanted to find him again, but they had moved around.

"There is one minute left before the gas is released. My advisers and I made an executive decision last night, in secret." The PA system reverberated around the enormous room. "This dome was sealed. My wife and I will continue the world on. We knew everyone would be proud of our decision, and support the future kids of the world!"

The result wasn't quite as he intended. The crowd booed, and started throwing even more things. Someone even jumped unto it and started hitting it. Everyone who didn't believe me before believed me now.

"We have asked one brave soldier to hit the button when the countdown ends. If he is too coward to hit it, I have a remote and will do it manually." The president screamed in terror, brandishing a simple remote button. Everyone stopped attacking him and stared, backing up.

He put the remote down gradually.

"The gas will be released through a pores in the front wall. The farther you are away from the wall, the slower it will take hold. The choice is yours on how you assemble, but the gas will come in thirty seconds."

The gathering was now in hysteria trying to get away from the wall, all hostilities against the president forgotten in self-preservation. I saw maybe twenty people go in the front wall and stand there, as if waiting for an embrace.

"Twenty-nine." Screams echoed around the room, people sobbing, crying, no sense of calm. No one had ever really thought it was going to happen. That we were going to die. But now, the realization was starting to sink in.

"Twenty-eight." People started panicking, and a person next to me fainted. The entire crowd surged at the door. I couldn't stay in place, and was forced moving forward by the mass. I saw people falling down, then getting trampled beneath feet. I didn't know if or how they could have survived, which made me fight harder to stay upright. The floor was slippery in some places, and the floor had streaks of red. Blood.

The doors were sealed as tight as glue. It didn't matter how many people shoved, it didn't budge. By now, people were climbing on top of each other, trying to pry it open.

"Ten!"

"Nine!"

"Eight!"

"Seven!"

"Six!"

"Five!" Now, people had stopped trying to fight their way out. Most sat down sobbing. Some wanted to complete their bucket lists by punching people in the face. Some were already on the ground, unmoving.

"Four!"

"Three!"

"Two!"

"One!"

The soldier on stage pressed a button, and a gas engulfed us. It was slightly less-than clear, more like fog. Then it cleared.

All around me, people were falling to the floor with screams. The elderly man next to me rolled his eyes back, so all I could see where whites. He started shaking violently, like a seizure. My brother had epilepsy before... the bomb, and it was exactly like that. I grabbed his arm, but he shook me off and collapsed to the floor. I could hear his frail bones snapping, and he went still. It took seconds for the rest of the people to die.

All that were left standing was seven of us.

One man didn't have a gas mask.