Prologue
The rain smacked against the police cruiser's roof. The vehicle's driver was busy listening to the traffic radio. His dark hands wrapped around a recently used tazer on the center console suddenly, frightening the passenger behind him. The passenger huddled against the door and averted his eyes from the much larger policeman. His green eyes gazed out the window and took in the lush forestry that flew by. The constant motion lulled him into a trance of half sleep. Soon, the forestry changed into large buildings that darkened the skies. The passenger was comforted by the skyscrapers and the sounds of the busy city.
The cruiser slowly pulled up to a large bronze colored building. City hall had wasted no tax money in making their courthouse as luxurious as possible. As the passenger was escorted out of the vehicle, the policeman made sure his handcuffs were firmly locked. The smaller man followed the obese policeman, taking in the marble pillars and the bronze laden stairs, and there were quite a few stairs. "They pay for this, but they can't give financial aid to anyone who needs it, typical." The passenger muttered almost inaudibly to the policeman. "Son, this courthouse was built hundreds of years ago before the revolution, it don't affect the economy in any way." The larger man replied calmly.
They continued on in silence, passing well dressed lawyers and other men and women of all ages who suffered his fate. They entered a large hall with marble pillars lining the walls used to hold up the next floor. The passenger ran his hands through his medium length brown hair. He did it involuntarily when he became nervous. The hall echoed with every step he took, the long white floors looking completely spotless as always. The larger man stopped in front of a huge oak door, covered in carving of warfare from years past. "This is the place son, you have a lawyer?" The man asked. "No." the passenger replied quickly.
"You need representation if you don't want to plead guilty, unless you are guilty, 'course that ain't what you told me when you was getting' rowdy was it son?" The large man boomed loud enough to echo through the halls with satisfaction. The passenger stayed silent and watched as the policeman opened the gigantic doors leading him in. The room had clean wood flooring, and oak walls that matched the grand doors. The judge sat on a large pedestal in the center of the room. On the sides of the room were the two jury rows filled with people who definitely did not want to be there. A few yards in front of the pedestal was a table with some plastic seats you would see in an outdoor pavilion. The passenger was led to this table and the policeman unlocked his handcuffs, pocketing them and exiting the room.
The judge was a tall menacing figure with a short graying goatee and a bald head who looked as if he had never smiled in his life, the passenger expected no sympathy. The judge did the usual opening of the oath of truthfulness, and getting the greetings out of the way. "Marshall Jay Oxford, you have been accused of possession of narcotics, illegal possession of firearms, and involuntary manslaughter. How do you plead?" The judge asked. "Not guilty!" Marshall half shouted. "Very well, plead your case." The judge replied. "I live in trinity park, you can't live there without guns its to dangerous and I can't afford a permit. The narcotics weren't mine, someone tossed them in my trash cans running from the police, and I never sold that stuff so I couldn't have caused those overdose deaths!" Marshall stated hastily. One by one, self proclaimed witnesses approached and confirmed the charges against Marshall. "Has the jury reached a verdict?" The judge asked. Finding that the jury was at odds with itself, the trial was delayed another week and Marshall was put on probation.
Marshall was led out of the grand courthouse and into a much more dingy and old police cruiser than the last. The officer was an average sized Caucasian man who didn't say a word. Marshall leaned against the cruiser's door as they flew through the city and into the forests that he had played in as a child. They drove through a small hole in the heavy forestry and onto a rocky backroad. The wheels of the cruiser crackled as it drove over rocks, kicking up loose gravel behind it. They pulled up to a large white house next to a prairie with children playing on the porch. Marshall's mother had always welcomed the neighboring children to play on her farm as she was the wealthiest woman in the area and had the most land for them to play on.
The aging woman stood on the porch with her arms crossed. Marshall waited for the cruiser to come to a stop and slipped open the door hesitantly. He dropped onto the gravel, his tennis shoes crunching the loose rock underneath. The policeman approached from behind, unlocked his handcuffs and muttered under his breath, "Have fun kiddo." Before driving off. Marshall trudged up to his mother refusing to look at her face until he was a foot away from her. "I know you didn't do it Marshall, you've always been a good boy."
"Thanks mom….I need to stay here a few days, my apartment in the cities a mess. So can I stay? If that's okay?" Marshall stuttered while running a hand through his hair.
The elderly woman nodded and yelled at the children that they needed to head home. She led him inside and pulled up a chair in front of their old television. Marshall remembered how all the multicolored stains on the once pure white carpet were made and smiled to himself. He sat down as his mother headed into their old style kitchen to make dinner.
"Nineteen years old, no job, no girlfriend, and getting arrested. We need to get your priorities straight." She called from the kitchen.
"It wasn't my fault I was arrested, you know that…..I'm working on getting a job to so don't nag me on that." He snapped as he took off his black hoodie and threw it onto the couch next to him.
Marshall flipped on the TV and set it on comedy central following his daily routine. In the middle of a rerun of South Park an emergency news report flashed onto the screen. A large muscular man appeared on the screen in a suit and spoke with a serious tone. "Riots have broken out in the Nashville area, any citizens in that area are to remain in doors and not to allow anyone access to their homes under any circumstances. Violators run risk of being shot by rioters."
Marshall raised an eyebrow at the reports and dismissed it not really caring now that he was out of the city. He opened his old lime green laptop and checked facebook to see what was new. All over the site were videos of the riots and statuses from friends, family, and strangers in the area about how it wasn't a regular riot. Marshall, being a curious individual, opened one video. It started with policemen in riot gear forming a wall around the courthouse, which was now on fire. Cars were overturned and there was a man who seemed to be ripped in half. He was calling for help as his entrails painted the ground red. The woman taking the video stopped focusing for a moment and vomited out of view. The camera view spiraled a bit until focusing on a large mob of people that were sprinting at the riot guards. The woman, standing in the middle of the rioters and the guards sprinted into a nearby building.
The view of the camera switched to a small dark bar, with a handful of people hiding inside, one of which was bleeding profusely out of his right side. The woman approached the boy and saw that he was nothing more than a preteen, little more than eleven years old. As the video continued the woman peered out a window, showing rioters clashing with guards. Instead of just stopping them, the guards were shooting them. Gore, blood, and bodies were everywhere. One rioters was missing an arm and her stomach was hanging out of her side, but she kept running. The guards held the line, cutting down almost a hundred people before the rioters stopped almost completely.
The people in the bar were sobbing and crying as the guard moved forward, over bodies and organs strewn all over the ground. The woman moved toward the group of people and watched as the boy became unconscious and started having a seizure. "Help him please!" A man yelled. The woman helped stop his bleeding and watched over him for a few minutes. The video was reaching and end. Then, in the last few moment, the boy's body began ripping in certain spots. The sound of tearing skin sickened Marshall. The woman refocused the camera and looked over the boy. His finger nails were bleeding and they seemed to have grown multiple inches and had become much sharper. His mouth was also bleeding, he gasped for breath revealing longer, sharper teeth. The boy's eyes flashed open revealing yellow pupils and he began growling at the man tending to him.
The boy lunged forward and drove his nails into the man's stomach, pulling up rapidly and ripping his flesh open. The man's organs fell onto the floor coating it in his blood. The boy then bite the man's jugular before he could scream, ripping it out and spitting the man's flesh onto the floor. The boy pushed the man's not deceased body off of him and crouched, growling at the three other people in the room.
"Jerry!" A sobbing woman screamed. "Its one of them, kill the bastard!" Another man yelled. The woman holding the camera stood horrified as the boy pounced at the crying woman and proceeded to rip open her rib cage, throwing her lungs and heart to his sides. The woman, still barely alive, screamed louder than anyone Marshall had ever heard before. Then, the woman grew silent, and the boy shot his head up to the two remaining people.
The man produced a handgun and fires of two rounds with trembling hands, missing the boy completely. The boy, unfazed, jumped at the man. The woman holding the camera reacted quickly and grabbed a bottle of alcohol off the bar. The boy jumped on the man, and was promptly crowned with the bottle. The creature's head began bleeding profusely and the woman drove the spiked edges into its forehead as it snapped to her. The woman helped the man up and spoke. "To anyone who finds this, please get away. These people are insane…..just leave while you can." The video then ended.
Marshall sat dazed and looked to his mother, a horrified expression on her face. The sound of screaming was heard outside. Marshall walked towards a window and looked out towards the prairie next to the house. Outside, there was a group of people running at top speed. Behind them was a mob of people hot on their heels. One of the people running discharged a weapon into the mob knocking down three and slowing one.
"Shotgun." Marshall muttered. His mother went into a drawer and pulled out three firearms. Two handguns he didn't recognize and one that he remembered his father had kept. His 44. Revolver. His mother tossed it to him with trembling hands. "Son, god would want us to help those people, I ain't fired a gun in years but I'll try." She stated.
"Mom, are you sure? Those people aren't okay, you might get hurt." Marshall replied looking out the window as another shot was fired, killing two more of the mob. He checked to see if his weapon was loaded and frowned seeing only four rounds. "Mom, any more ammo for this?" She pointed to a drawer and he hastily loaded the gun, dropping the last round. As he bent down to pick it up his mother exited the house and fired at the mob.
Marshall walked outside and took aim at the mob, and fired with trembling hands. He missed by a long shot. The people running came closer, and one tripped. The mob caught up to him instantly and stopped for a moment, beating him to death for three minutes and giving the others time to get to the house. There were two women a man and a child on his back as Marshall's mother ushered them into the house.
The people all went in as he and his mother stood outside to hold the mob back. He fired all of his round killing two insane people and wounding one other. There were four left. He ran inside to find more rounds as his mother fired away. She fired half her nine round clip. Killing one more and wounding the other three. Marshall ripped the drawers open for minutes, finally finding a box of rounds. He loaded the weapon as quickly as he could. His mother's weapon jammed as the last three crazy people charged forward. She attempted to clear the chamber and accidently slammed it on her index finger breaking it. She screamed and dropped the gun, just as the crazy people made it to the steps…