• Everything I see, everything I touch, everything. It’s all nothing anymore, everybody is gone, and I fear that I am the only one left here. The grass is dead, the dirt is mud, the air taste like soot. There is no light, only darkness. The only sound in the background I can hear is the dead silence. Wait a minute. I can hear something else! It sounds like footsteps.
    “Hello, is anybody there! Hello, hello!” I waited. The soft patter of slow steps could be heard. Oh how my heart leaped with joy at the thought of someone else. But I couldn’t see, I couldn’t find my way around this room! I didn’t know how big it was, how much movement I had in here, or even where the walls were.
    I yelled aloud to whatever was there, “Hello, help me out here! Please, help a brother out here!” Nothing, nobody responded to my calling. I waited. After a few moments of waiting, I decided to yell out once again, “Hello!” I received a faint answer form the distance.
    “I can hear you, stay where you are, I’ll come to you!” the voice had replied.
    “Thank you, thank you so much!” I replied. I edged my way around, hands in front of me feeling their way around. From the distance, I could hear the thing coming closer to me. I edged more and more, I could now hear heavy breathing.
    “Hello.” I whispered into the darkness, waiting for my reply.
    “Over here.” The voice whispered back.
    “Where?” I said back a little louder looking around everywhere. I turned around as I collided with the other person.
    “Ouch! Stand still so you don’t crash into me!” the person had said. I wondered where the person was, as I held my head from the injury. The person whispered back. “I don’t have any light source on me, but I have my video camera on me so I can see in the dark.” From what I could hear, the other person with me was female, preferably in her mid twenties. “Give me your hand, I’ll help get us out of here.” I put my hand out as she touched it. Her skin was cold and wet, from what I could guess, she’s been roaming around for quite a bit now. I couldn’t blame her, all I could do was admire that she was still alive.
    “So, who are you?” I spoke out loud to her trying to ignite a conversation. I received no answer. Instead we kept walking forward. I spoke again to her, “Who are…”
    I was interrupted, “Lets save introductions for when we exit this place alright?” I nodded my head in agreement, unsure whether she could see it or not.
    I tried to speak to her again, “So, do you know where we are anyways?”
    She spoke softly to me, “I haven’t been outside in lord knows how long. For all I know, we could be in someone’s house.” She stopped and spoke again, “How did you stumble in here anyhow, shouldn’t you know where we are?”
    “I’ve been stumbling around with no light for a while now.” I tried to think back to when all of this started, but couldn’t remember. “Hey, do you even remember back to when the sun was out?” I asked.
    “No. I don’t even know what today is, but it feels like an eternity has passed.” I nodded in agreement again. I was distraught and anguished by the thought of it. I can’t even make my own mind keep itself sane sometimes because of everything that’s happening. Just everything in this place, it’s coming to an end and I know it.
    The girl grasping my hand whispered, “Shh, keep quiet and still, I hear something.” I looked around and could not hear what she heard. All I could hear was my own heart, beating and beating, faster and faster. She whispered again, “C’mon, we’ve got to get moving now!” She pulled with all her strength as she ran with me in her grasp. From the distance, I could hear the ground as if it were crumbling beneath me, cracking at every step I took. The air coming at me tasted very sour and putrefying, almost as if it were, blood…
    “What is it?” I managed to say while running as my bare feet ran across the rough surface, cutting and slicing into the soles of them. I looked around while awaiting my answer, and as if the light had somewhat been restored to my eyes, I could see the faintest image of figures surrounding us both.
    “Stop talking and save your energy for running!” she screamed at me. I had no clue what was around us, but there were so many of them. The stale taste in the air filled my lungs as it started to burn badly. The woman pulling me yelled, “We have to move faster, c’mon!” She sped off a bit faster as my lungs started to fail on me. I coughed and wheezed and tried to continue forward but I could not continue like this any longer. I stopped my footsteps as the grip from the woman slipped as we both went hurdling into the ground. I struggled to get myself back up to my feet as the pungent taste in the air filled my lungs. The woman nearby pulled me down to my feet as and placed her hand on my mouth as she whispered, “Quiet.” She pulled the camera she had in front of my eyes as the vision from the screen could be seen. I had been correct, there was something there, and a lot of them. But to what I saw, they couldn’t see us.
    She released her hand around my mouth as I spoke silently, “What are those things?”
    “I don’t know, but they’re definitely not human from what I can tell.” She moved the camera around the room. “I count about seven of them around us, but it looks as if they cannot see us.” She raised the camera up and gave it too me. I flashed the camera at her face and could finally see who was with me. I was right, she looked as if she were in her mid twenties like I said, her eyes were big, and her facial features were beautiful. She was gorgeous. Here I was, late teens and a skinny white kid, short hair with horrid skin conditions.
    “So, what should we do? We don’t know what were up against here…” I whispered to her. I looked around the room, she was right about the number. But what I saw I just could not believe. Their bodies resembled something human looking, but they were far from human.
    She spoke quietly, “These things look familiar to me, and I’ve had to fight off one before on my own.” She raised her head a bit and lowered it to continue on, “And from what happened from my experience…” She stopped talking and put her finger to her lips, I nodded. I watched as she grabbed a pocketknife from her side and flipped the blade up. She grabbed the camera from me and put it up to her face. She whispered, “I’m going to go fight off these things, you go that way and there should be an exit.” She grabbed my hand and pointed it the way I needed to go. I nodded, unsure of why she was doing this. From what I could hear running away from that spot, was flesh being torn apart.
    I decided to ignore that noise, as the ground dug deep into my feet, tearing them apart. The pain crawled up my leg and I finally found myself falling over from it. The sounds stopped all of the sudden. My heart was beating faster and faster as my eyes closed waiting for one of those things to get me. I clutched my chest, my lungs burned with agony as I lay on the cold ground. The air was dead silent, the wind did not make a sound, the light escaped my eyes. Everything was still.
    Lying here, in the freezing silence, bleeding everywhere, I started going insane. I laughed, and laughed, and laughed some more. Boy was it fun to laugh. I started thinking about the times when everything was normal. Yeah, those were the days, going to a nice warm school, getting home to watch television and having your parents yelling at you for being a lazy good for nothing, the ladies were hot and only getting hotter. Yeah, those the times, the times I wish I could go back to badly. Heh, I just remembered that my friend still owes me twenty bucks from a bet I made him. Oh man, if only he were here now, I would be on him trying to get my twenty bucks back. Oh and then there was that date I was supposed to go on that I completely forgot about, when I get home I’m going to have to call her and apologize so much. Ugh I can’t forgive myself for that! If only there was some way to get her to forgive me, I don’t know. I felt a warm fluid gather on my hand, and I just laughed some more. Oh look at this now. I’m swimming! The water is so nice and warm too, it feels so good against my cold skin. Oh, and look at this now, I have somebody to join me here!
    I said aloud to him, “What’s wrong little guy, I don’t bite. C’mon and hang out down here with me! The water is nice and warm.” I looked at the figure staring back at me, he looked so mad about something. “What’s wrong, did I do something bad now?” The figure above didn’t answer me, so I swam to the shore and pulled myself out of the water. I stood up dripping on the ground, as I felt cold again. I shivered, “You don’t happen to have a towel do you?” I got no answer so I went over and tapped the figure on the shoulder. The touch however was not anything normal, it was smoldering hot and I could smell my skin burning at the touch. I ripped my finger away and started blowing on it fast as the heat crept up my arm. “Wha, what the hell are you! What did you do to me, damn the pain bites!” I stepped over a bit to the side as my finger went completely numb. I looked at it. The flesh from it was peeling away slowly! I looked back at the thing and screamed in pain, “What did you do to me!” I had to get away from it, but how! I looked around in the darkness, trying to find my way out. I ran past the figure into the darkness as my sense of reality came back into place a bit.
    My feet stung with misery, my hand went numb at the pain, my heart beat faster and faster. Something caught hold of my leg however as I went sailing into the ground face first. A rock sliced open my lip when I impacted. Blood poured into my mouth faster and faster as it filled my mouth rapidly. I was in so much pain, I couldn’t move, couldn’t feel, couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer. I lay there as a puddle of my blood flowed beneath me. It felt so warm, against the bitter cold of the ground, it was the only thing that was keeping me warm. By now, my whole body was numb from the pain, the only thing that I could move was my head. I turned it to the side as I saw one of those figures standing there next to me, looking down at me. My heart beat rapidly with each moment passing by. The light in my eyes vanished as they closed slowly and watched as the creature above me stood there staring at me.
    I muttered out quietly, “God please help me, I don’t want to die.”
    The wind spoke back to me in a eerie tone, “Little boy, there is no god. Only is there a living nightmare.” My eyes shut completely as my blood felt icy against my flesh. Everything was dead quiet.