WASTE
One
The Earth is round, but once was thought to be flat. You could fall off the edges and never be found again, believed to be eaten by a sea monster or gobbled up by the great waters. It seems mankind's mind is always changing. Ever changing, ever growing, never stopping, never slowing. And for that fact we are ruined. We grow so fast that there is no room left to grow anymore, and destroy lives in our path to where we might have more room to move a little. Then we grow more and must kill again. No one realizes all the waste that we make, all the ruin we leave behind us.
Eventually, all this expansion begins to backtrack, and we are thrown into darkness...
Every night I am awoken by the pounding against the walls, and the gunshots echoing in the night. Sometimes, they are just the night whispers, coming to haunt my sleep, though more often than not, it's the real thing. The meaty thumps of bodies on the concrete, breaking their own bones to try and get inside always give me day frights. Sometimes, they scream. Sometimes they beg. But always the gunshots sound. They want we we can't give them, for then we would lose our own lives.
These bloodsucking demons want our flesh—our blood, and we would be fools to hand them over so easily, for we are some of the last.
It started around thirty-some years ago, I remember my father telling me.
At first, it was just a few disappearances in Chile, near the Strait of Magellan. Then whole villages went missing, and the natives questioned their gods. From there on out, it spread like wildfire. Cities suddenly became wastelands of debris and a few dead, rotting bodies. Most changed after their heart stopped beating, while others were far too weak to let the sickness spread.
In two months the entire continent of South America was void of human life, while the vampires began to travel north in search of sustenance. Of course, at that time, everyone thought it was another country trying to invade the United States.
World trade shut down completely to North and South America, while the US closed the southern borders and barricaded off Mexico. Walls were built, over fifty feet high to keep them out, while troops waited on the other side with bombs and guns.
Nothing got passed them, for the first seven years, and eventually no more of the monsters dared to try to cross. At this point, the researchers finally came to the startling conclusion that maybe the restless beings had given up, or died off. This realization made the men and women lazy, and tricked the government into thinking that the beasts were all dead. But they weren't.
On December 31st of 20-, the marines and soldiers were holed up in their tents, and though the air wasn't so chilly because of their southern location, they stayed inside and celebrated Christmas with what little they had. Card games were played, money was put down, and they had a merry little time.
Like ghosts, the monsters crept over the wall, ever so silent, and feasted on the few sentries. Like air, they swept through the encampment, not seen, and not heard by any one person.
It wasn't until a few hours after the gruesome scene that a caravan of new troops arrived to refresh some of the old. They rewound the video-feeds and watched it play out, from beginning to end. The massacre of two-hundred and twelve people had taken a total of thirty-seven minutes and ten seconds, and there had only been around ten of the vampires caught on the feeds, before one of them smashed the cameras in.
Dad had taped that particular sighting from the news, and would play it at least once a year, showing the cunning and patience of our enemies; he had only been a young kid when this whole mess started.
"Please, let me come in I beg of you, my brothers... My sisters... Let me in."
Not many of the crazed beings had the eloquence of civilized speech; most were cat-like in their language, hissing and spitting. I've seen many men and women fall to their lovely voices, leaning over the balconies of our safe-house to certain death. The last moments before death from our dark angels were surely painful, for they crowded on one body as if they were a pack of rabid jackals, tearing the carcass apart.
"They're gett'n closer! Hurry up and get'chur guns, boys!" my uncle's loud voice echoed through the dark spaces. Kicking off my ragged covers, I rolled off my bed and grabbed my gun from it's box. I wasn't much of a good shot, but it seemed everyone was needed if I could hear my uncle yelling. Dust swirled as I opened the oak-wood case, and took out my rarely-used weapon. It was old, made far before this whole vampire mess started. By the time I made it to the roof, the problem seemed to have cooled down.
Blood soaked the ground and walls, like black rivers. Not surprisingly, our undead friends had black blood, easily marking them apart from any human. Red was mixed in near the top of the wall, and I knew some had fallen to their charms. In the distance, I could see the survivors slipping away, gliding over the ground soundlessly, except for their echoed laughter. Slipping closer to the edge, I hoped to get a better look at who had fallen, before my shoulder was yanked back and I was met with the angry red face of my kin.
I remember a time when he was kind and spoke softly, before the breach of our last home, before my father and friends were killed by vampires. My father had been the leader of our society, telling people what to do and where to go, whether or not we needed to spread out more or add more men to the watch. He had been the thinker, the one who everyone looked to in a tight squeeze. Just one small slip-up and he was among the bodies we counted when dawn came. Since then, the stress of surviving has been thrust on my uncle's shoulders, and everyone looks to him now. It's why so many problems have been happening as of late. He can't think in tight situations easily, and he often resorts to anger. And when the anger sets in after a particularly bad loss, he yells.
"Fly!" he bellowed in my face as he shook my shoulder roughly. His dark eyes were glazed in anger and confusion, spit flying from his lips. "You're not allowed up here!" As his only niece, I am subjected to his rough demeanor and his flaw of being over-protective to a fault. "I swear, girl! One day I'll push you over the edge myself! Get back downstairs!" I didn't even flinch at his threats; he would never go through with it. I meant too much to him.
Brushing past him, I made my way down the creaky steps. Seems like I wouldn't be any help. Again. I was more likely to blow my own foot off than actually land a shot on the leeches anyway. I was surprised he hadn't told me that.
"Hey, Fly." I glanced up towards the roof, standing at the bottom of the stairs. One of the older boys was calling down to me. When he saw that he caught my attention, he smiled tiredly. His eyes seemed sad. But here, we get over our grief quickly. We have to, otherwise we would all be walking dead. "I'll take you out for target practice at daylight, if you want?" Dex. That was his name. I didn't often talk to the boys around here, figuring I didn't have the time for it. Heck. They didn't have time for it.
"Uhm.. Y-yeah. Sure. Thanks," I mumbled, looking down at my shoes feeling properly embarrassed. Everyone knew I was a horrid shot, even after days and days of practice. I glanced back up to see his smile widen a bit in the night.
"Alright, then." I nodded once, before scurrying off to my bed. It would be dawn soon. We would be safe then.
For a little while, at least.
"So, how'd I do?" I was sitting in the grass, barely in view of the safe-house. The sun was warming my skin—a rare occurrence. Rainclouds usually covered the vast blue skies, leaving us to stay behind our walls. It seemed most myths about vampires were true. They turned to ash in sunlight. I had seen it happen once, when I was seven. It had been a cloudy day, and they had been banging against the walls again. Suddenly, a miracle. The sun peaked between the cloud for a few seconds, causing a few caught in the light to scream in anguish. Steam had risen from their skin, peeling off at an insane rate, before, they crumpled to the ground in a pile of ash and black bones. A few other myths were true: they were repelled by crosses and garlic. Neither could kill a vampire, but garlic burned their noses and drove them crazy, while the cross symbolized purity. Something they lost a long while ago.
"Well, your aim could use some improvement..." Dex mumbled, his large eyes staring at me in a way that said he was quite astonished that he was still alive. He had blue eyes, brighter than the sky, with flecks of gray and a darker ring of blue around his irises.
"It's alright, you know. I can take criticism," I replied to him, putting the safety on.
"You're horrible. I don't think you improved at all." He face-palmed, feigning distress. "You're a lost cause, Fly." The target dummies on the other side of the clearing were unscathed, standing proud for another day. My bullets missed every single target.
"Honesty's the best policy," I pointed out, offering him a half smile. Finding out that one of the boys you grew up with had jumped headfirst over the wall really blocked out the good things in life. Especially when the next morning came you got to watch them pick up what was left of him. Dex plopped himself on the ground quite gracelessly.
"If you say so." He leaned back and relaxed into the thick green grass, a tree providing shade for us both. The sun was treating the parched earth like a frying pan; the usually soft and moist dirt was cracked, while most of the grass had turned a dull yellow-green. I placed the gun on the ground before laying on my belly next to it, and resting my head on my arms.
It was so peaceful, and the sunlight warmed my skin.
The grass was so soft...
I barely noticed when my eyes closed.
Maybe, if I hadn't fallen asleep, I would've noticed the clouds. Maybe, then, that would have saved us both.
"Fly! Fly!" Something rough shook me, and I tried to swat it away. My dream had been so nice and sweet. Nothing but sunshine on ocean waves. "Dammit, get up! They're coming, the vampires!"
That one word squashed all the sleepiness out of my body. I was on my feet in seconds, adrenaline coursing through my veins. Overhead, black clouds swarmed in the sky, blocking every ray of light that had warmed my skin only hours earlier. I grabbed my gun off the ground, almost dropping it. My palms were slick with sweat, and I could feel myself growing pale.
"We have to run for it, come on!" Dex grabbed my arm in a super-human grip, and towed me behind him. We were sprinting through the trees, leaves and branches snapping into my face and eyes. My lungs began to ache from running and my legs felt like jelly. I could hear them laughing, cackling. I looked to the left and could see shadows following us, swift and too graceful.
I wasn't paying attention when I suddenly ran into Dex's back, losing my breath.
"Why'd you stop? Go!" I yelled at him, walking in front of him to stare into his eyes. His were beautifully sad, staring into my own. He took one of my hands in his own; his were cold. Ice cold with fear.
"They're playing with us." His voice was flat and hard. "We would make it back to the safe-house, just to where they could slaughter us in front of everyone. I don't know about you, but I would rather my mother remember me as this, and not as a bloody, mutilated corpse." I laughed shakily, sweat dripping down my back.
"Yeah." I couldn't force any words out of my mouth, besides a squeak after that. My vision went blurry with tears, and my breath came faster.
"I didn't bring my gun, and you're all out of bullets," he said matter-of-fact-like. I couldn't stand how easily he was taking this. We were going to die. He squeezed my hand tightly, a bruising grip, and I squeezed as hard as I could back.
"Ssssmart." A hollow voice whispered from the surrounding trees.
"Fuuuun." Another voice, from a different side.
"Kill?" Yet another voice sounded from behind us.
For many nights, those voices would haunt my dreams, drifting in and out. Like a broken record, they would play over and over and over again, keeping me up at night.
"Yesssss." A chorus from all around us, as if a hundred beasts were hiding in the trees. Somehow it was still a whisper.
A white-hot pain exploded in my side, then my hand was being ripped away from Dex's. Pinpricks all over my legs, and then the crushing pressure of someone standing on my head.
And finally, blackness.
The pain still followed me.
Author's Note: So, I wrote a Lion King fic awhile back, and then took it down because a. I wasn't interested in it anymore, and b. It didn't seem satisfying. Plus, I had just gotten the idea of this fic, and it seemed way cooler.
I have the next chapter written, if anyone's interested.
So...
1. Do you like this story? Are you willing to read further?
2. Is there anything you didn't understand/find confusing? Any errors or misspellings?
3. Is it long enough? This is the shortest a chapter will ever be. Would you like the chapters to be longer?
4. How do you like my characters, thus far? Interesting? Mary Sue-ish? Gary Stu-ish?
5. The plotline. Too predictable, or did you like it?
And finally: The summary. Did it catch your eye, or do I need a new one?
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