Bloodsport | 10k

𝟬𝟬. beginning of an end

PROLOGUE
as the earth runs to the ground

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𝐈f someone would tell the former nursing student that the world had come to an end, Natalia Ackerman would've probably told them to fuck off and get lost. Well, at least it used to be her way of ignoring her problems. Besides, she was known to be that girl from Mr. Cruz's bioethics class that told the old man to stick his nose up his own ass because he was a sick pervert and he shouldn't even be doing anything remotely that horrid and disgusting in the first place.

Natalia Ackerman might be nice but only to the people that deserved it, and not a lot of people did. Everyone from before the apocalypse knew that. They saw it as clear as day from the way she acted around certain people. However, when somebody gets on her bad side... Well, that was another story.

Even though she tried to be as kind as possible, there were still a lot of things she wished she could control. Her temper, mostly. It was as bad as it seemed. She would practically blow up if somebody tried or said something that she didn't like. Then again, back then it was much easier to contain since not a lot of people wanted to get on her nerves.

Natalia was bad at keeping things to herself, especially when she got mad. She tends to let loose her words; sometimes, she doesn't even care if it hurts them. I suppose that was the reason why she was often in the guidance counselor's office, too. Not that it mattered. Because then, the damn apocalypse came and ended the world all at once.

It ended her too, but not in the way that other people had. The person she was before, the ever-so-slightly-tamed girl, had been harshly stripped away. Then came the person Natalia never wished to show. The part she tried so hard to hide was now out for the whole world to see. There was no hiding who she had become, not even from herself or others.

But then again, it was the only thing that kept her alive all this time, but definitely not entirely sane.

It messed her up the way every horrible situation does to people. She was left alone in a suddenly dangerous world, and it ruined her. Surviving in a way that she only knew ruined her. No one was there for her, and everybody else around her just disappeared, or simply, died. Like they had never existed at all.

After all, who would survive in a world that's filled with literal monsters that were once human? The only thing in their minds (if they even had that), was to eat another man's flesh and brains until there was nothing left but skulls and bones. It was a horrifying imagination that had come to reality.

The thing was, it was either she became the hunted, or be the hunter herself. Natalia Ackerman chose to survive. The first thing she realized when the world crashed down. Because that's what human instincts are. To survive. To fight. But they were left with nothing but the fear of dying and living at the same time,

The first terrifying thing she encountered was the start of the apocalypse. She was in one of her classes that day, boringly tapping her pen on the table with the usual blank expression on her face while chewing her favorite gum. Then all of a sudden, there was one scream. The abrupt noise left the already quiet class even more silent as the students in the room gave each other unsure glances.

Then came a series of loud frightened screams. That caused a lot of ruckus more than it already had outside the classrooms of the University of California. Their professor even stopped to teach and ordered them to stay inside the room while he checked what was the commotion outside.

He never came back.

She still remembers all of it. The screams, the blood, and the fear in their horrified eyes. It left a dent in her poor mind that she wished she hadn't seen all of those. That day, all she could feel was her heart beating harshly against her ribcage like a loud marching band, and the uncomfortable disgusting cold sweat dripping down all over her shaking body.

Natalia was scared. Hell, she was more than that. She was so terrified she could barely move.

Her first kill was her best friend, the person she grew up with since they were just children. Her name was Allison. And it took a stab through the eye with her favorite fountain pen that her own best friend gifted her the moment she turned ballistic right in front of her face. Suddenly, she was a murderer and Natalia stood with bloody hands and a conscience eating away her soul.

Then she ran.

Natalia never looked back once. She just kept running, leaving all the memories and pretty much everything behind, to keep herself alive. The most selfish thing she had ever done, and Natalia wasn't sure whether it was the right or the wrong thing to do. But all she knew at that moment was that she had to keep running.

After that day, Natalia Ackerman was never the same. She was no longer that girl from Mr. Cruz's bioethics class. Now, she was a killer with a vendetta against anybody who tried to hurt her. Everybody changed in their own ways, and no one was ever the same. And neither the world they had come to know.