The World As We Know It

Hey y'all. This will be the first chapter in (hopefully) quite a few chapters that I will write. Hope you enjoy!

        Cold. She was cold. 

        She could fell herself lifting up, it was as if she was taking off in an airplane.

        Then, she could see something. She was hovering above an operating table with someone on it.

        Was that her?

        It was. Her experience helped as she deducted from her yellow fluffy curls that it was indeed her.

        She was petrified. She kept floating upward. She wanted to scream, but she couldn't.

        She was just there. Above herself, hovering, but she slowly started moving down, down farther and         farther into a darkness, she now was more petrified of this darkness than how she was drifting up. She felt trapped, and had no idea what to do, all the pain and suffering took over her body.

        And then it just stopped.

**********************

        It was a cool, rainy morning in Chicago. Nicki was on her way to school. She followed the raindrops on the car window, and pretended they were stars, falling into the earth. She had always wondered why she did this, but never really questioned it because she had done it since she was a little girl.

        They had turned onto the busiest street in their small, not-busy suburb. Living quite a while from the city, there was normally little to no traffic on the main roads of town, but today was different. For some reason there had been many, many cars, all lined up going towards the school.

        Just as Nicki's mother had crossed a busy intersection behind many cars ahead of her, a small BMW slammed into the drivers side of the car. All nicki saw at that point was the sky, and then the ground. Then the sky, then the ground. Nicki's car and the BMW rolled quite a few feet through the intersection until it came to a stop on a quaint houses lawn.

        Shouts and screams were all Nicki could hear, as well as car door slamming and the slow pitter-patter of rain on the car and the sidewalk near them. She felt weak, tired, and hopeless. They were upside-down laying there, with nobody to help. Nicki heard sirens, and saw flashing lights. She was hopeful for the first time since the accident. But then, she couldn't think, move, or do anything.

        She sat in terror as the world faded out from her vision. All she could think was....

        Am I dying?

**********************

        She felt a shoving, and pushing and pleads for her to wake up. She opened her eyes. She saw the white tiles of the hospital ceiling. She looked up to see her mom at her side shaking her arm vigorously, and quietly asking for Nicki to wake up. She had just gained consciousness, and felt a stabbing in her arm. It was an IV, attached to a large machine that beeped quietly every few seconds. She then glanced over to the door, which was barricaded by a table and a few chairs. There were empty cups and paper plates that lay on the floor next to the door. What had happened to her?

        "Honey? Oh my gosh! Honey you're awake!" her mom said.

        She heard footsteps from the other side of the room. Her dad and brother sped over to her as fast as they could.

        "Honey! This is incredible!" her dad exclaimed as he picked up her hand and held it as tightly as he could.

        She was confused, and had so many questions to ask. Why was the door barricaded? Why had she been asleep? Why were they so happy she was awake? She had no clue what to say.

        "Hi, uh... Where am I?" 

        She could tell that was a tough question to answer. Her parents exchanged glances, and then a nod.

        "We're at the hospital. You've been in a coma for some time now." her dad explained.

        "What? How did this happen?" Nicki was so confused. She didn't remember anything that happened after driving to school one day.

        "We were in a car accident, and you were knocked unconscious." her mom explained. "We have been watching you for some time now, and we didn't know if you'd survive."

        "Well didn't the doctors have any information for you?" 

        That caused immediate silence. There was not a word. So Nicki decided to ask yet another of her million questions she still had.

        "Why is the door barricaded?" she asked quietly.

        This again sparked a silence that scared her to death. Why aren't they answering these questions?

        A long time passed before anyone said a word. But at one point, her brother had another idea.

        "It's MEV-19." her brother said.

        "What the hell is MEV-19?" she responded. This time there was no punishment about her swearing. This was a rarity for her parents. Her brother broke the silence again.

        "It's a deadly virus. It's killed most of the worlds population. That's why the door's barricaded. We stayed here instead of going to the treatment center to protect you. We brought many cups of water, and food from the cafeteria, and then barricaded the door to create a little safe haven. At this point we really don't know if there is anyone out there. We really don't know if there is anyone who can help us. And maybe if there is someone out there, they may be sick. Once one person gets it, you can get it by touching, sneezing, coughing, or even just breathing near..."

        Nicki interrupted her brother.

        "But there's a cure right? I mean you did say there was a treatment center."

        Her brother was again the first to answer the question.

        "No cure. No nothing. The only electricity in the whole city is here, and the hospital has a generator. Before the phones went dead, we heard that most of the U.S.'s population was killed, and at that point only a few other countries were infected. But that was weeks ago. No communication with anyone has happened in weeks."

        "So that's it? We now just have to sit here and die?" Nicki asked, scared.

        "No. There's a treatment center in St. Louis, and there are supposed to be flights out of the airport there. But we want to make sure you have fully recovered before we go." her brother answered.

        "But what happens if we get sick? What will happen to us out there?" she questioned again.

        Her brother answered her final questions with a concerning answer.

        "I don't know, the only way to find out is to go. The world as we know it, is gone"

 There you go! Thanks for reading! Stay tuned for more of this story!