A/N: So, this is the prologue, and it is slightly disconnected from the actual story I'll be telling (Bellamy and Clarke struggling to survive in a setting similar to what goes on in The 100, but with zombies), but it's a nice little preface that will set the tone before we get off to a running start. The lack of Bellamy is for this chapter and this chapter alone.

Prologue

Out of some macabre sense of enjoyment, Clarke always liked to watch the world news at night. Of course she found the evil and chaos in the world to be deplorable, but there was something so exciting about being connected to everything happening in the world. She knew that it was because of how far removed from everything her town, Mount Weather, Virginia, was, that she could find fascination in the reports of sickness outbreaks that started coming through. But that was during the school year when she had teachers to impress and relevant Model U.N. debates to plan, and when the days were long and filled with nothing but time, Clarke found being home early enough to watch the news was something bonfires and movie showings just wouldn't make time for.

It was as hot as any other July day, yet the monotony of the sizzling asphalt and humming cicadas still found a way to frustrate as Clarke was lounging outside her window, on a beach towel atop the slanted tiles of her roof, trying to at least gain something from the sweltering heat. Despite how low the sun hung in the sky, it was still warm enough to have caused her ipod to overheat, forcing her to tuck it underneath the towel and instead listen to one of the many phone calls her doctor mother was making to the CDC- something about how a new strain of Ebola, surfacing in Central Saharan Africa, now becoming a major concern at home in the states- and by the increasingly shrill tone in her mother's voice, the half of the conversation Clarke couldn't hear must have been less than satisfying.

What did her mother care? They lived in an isolated town, away from any of the major international hubs, and as long as they quarantined anyone with symptoms, the disease would fade back into dormancy. Such outbreaks were for elsewhere. Nothing ever happened in Mount Weather.

Unable to relax, and tired of thinking about Clarke sighed before lumbering to a sitting position.

"I'm going to Finn Collin's lakehouse." She called out to her mom, knowing she wouldn't hear it: when it came to Abigail Griffin, arguing on the phone with her husband- Dr. Jake Griffin, Deputy Director of Infectious Diseases at the CDC- about everything but their marital issues was better time spent than actually trying to save a dissolving marriage, and Clarke just couldn't find it in herself to be apart of the destruction.

She remembered later that night, that she had almost left her house wearing sandals instead of thick hiking boots- ever the practical thinker- because what if there was mud along the shoreline?

This was one of the worries that used to plague her.

The get together at the lake was nothing more than an excuse for Finn to get his peers wasted in the hopes that Clarke would suddenly realize that her calling was to be on Girls Gone Wild, and that she would insist that he just had to experience her audition firsthand. Usually, his transparent attempts were amusing, and she enjoyed the attention, but tonight, her skin was crawling with nerves that would not calm, no matter how many shots of cheap, disgusting tequila she had downed.

Walking home was an adventure full of dancing streetlights that veered suddenly before her, startling her into stumbling off the sidewalk- another reason the boots were a good idea- and into the road, almost tripping into an ambulance hurtling past, sirens blazing. Maybe her mother would be at the hospital, and Clarke would actually know what silence sounded like.

She was asleep before she could collapse onto the bed.

Brightness penetrated her eyelids, forcing Clarke awake before the alcohol sloshing around her system could adequately be metabolized. Groaning, she sat up, feeling something was off.

It took her muddled brain fifteen minutes to figure out that her house was quiet.

"Mom?" She called out, dragging herself out of bed and into the hallway. Her footsteps were loud, echoing off of the hardwood, and she glanced down to see she was still wearing the shoes she wore out last night. Cringing at the thought of all the dirt now between her sheets, Clarke turned back towards her room, trying to remember if she had picked up fabric softener the last time she was at the store.

A skittering crash, muffled through the walls, came from the other side of the house, and Clarke huffed, having every intention of finding her mom and screaming at her for throwing another wine glass across the room: she could be angry at her spouse all she wanted, but take it out on him, not the paint Clarke had already spent a weekend painting her parents' bedroom a deep auburn, because red wine liked to stain.

"Mom," Clarke shouted, drawing out the vowel in her annoyance, "you're supposed to drink the wine, not throw it everywhere." More noises sounded from the direction of the guest bathroom, and Clarke groaned, knowing that the only reason they ever went in there was because the first aid kit was under the sink. "What? Did you have one glass too many las-," she cajoled, rounding the corner and opening the bathroom door.

Mind suddenly blank, Clarke cut her question short, finding the scene before her something she couldn't process: there were shards of glass on the floor by the toilet, and a slew of gauze pads and bandaids littered the counters. Her mother getting drunk and hurting herself was one thing, but seeing her standing frozen in the middle of the room, facing the shower curtain, was off-putting.

Feeling small pinpricks of alarm urging her feet to turn around and get out of this room, Clarke spoke, her voice shaky and fearful. "Mom?" She took a hesitant step forward. "You okay?"

For a second, Clarke thought her mom was ignoring her, until slowly she turned around.

Dried streaks of blood descended from her mom's eyes and nose, marking her like some barbaric tribeswoman, and her eyes had a yellow tint to the sclera, like she was battling some disturbing virus, which would have been okay- because Clarke's dad had filled her childhood with stories of just how brutal the microscopic world was to humans- except for the smearing of blood down the side of the tub. And how her mother's neck was sitting on her shoulders in an angle that human spines didn't allow. Not unless you were dead.

All of this was seen in less than a second, and it wasn't until after Clarke had ran from her lunging, growling mother's arms, shrieking for the woman to snap out of it- "Mom it's me! Mom! Stop! Mommy it's Clarke!"- that she was able to process it.

She grabbed a frying pan off the stovetop, and was waving it in front of her, screaming for her mom to wake up and stop trying to attack her, when the creature her mom had become fell forward, surprising Clarke and knocking her off balance. Panicked, Clarke swung her arm- her mom was trying to bite her, what was she supposed to do?- the cast iron colliding with skull with a low thud.

But that didn't stop her mother from mashing her jaws and struggling to dig her claws into Clarke's arm, so Clarke kept swinging until her mother's head looked like the ground beef she had cooked in that very skillet only days ago.

Clutching the bloody thing in her hands, Clarke sat very still for a very long time, until the sun was blinding through the window. Only then did she stand up, shaking harder than she did that one time she fell overboard rafting in Colorado.

As she sobbed- was there a word to describe the way you were hyperventilating so hard it hurt to utter anything but clipped vowels?- what had happened to the 911 operator- "we'll be there when we can," they lady said, "you'd be surprised to hear that this wasn't the first call we've gotten like this." Which really pissed Clarke off, because her mother was dead and she had done it, and how was any of that not surprising?- she caught sight of the calendar.

July 18th, 2014.

That date would forever be branded in her mind as the day the world ended.