The Eleven – Chapter 3

I arrived at a small town called Brookhaven. My dad must have driven past it hundreds of times on the way to my mom's place, but I had never seen it before. Nothing looked familiar except for the big cross on top of the church in the center of the town. You could see it towering over the trees from the highway. I hadn't taken more than one step past the "Welcome to Brookhaven" sign when I heard a voice.

"Hey! There's another one!"

I looked up, and saw a middle-aged bald man wearing an aviator jacket that was just a little too tight for a person his size. But aside from him there was nobody else. It was just the same as the highway. There were a bunch of cars that had recently crashed, but nobody in them.

"Hey, hey, hey, come here. My name's Alex. Are you okay? You don't look that bad. Go to the church and talk to Father Ares. He'll explain everything to you."

"Wha, what? What's going on?" I asked.

Before he could answer, a woman's voice came from down the street. "Okay, Honey that's enough. Let's go inside and introduce everyone."

Alex yelled back, "Okay, Sweetie!" he turned back to me and said, "Okay come on lets go. You're hungry right? How long have you been walking?" Alex started walking down the street, heading towards the church and I was following him.

"What's going on? Where is everybody?" I asked very puzzled at my current situation.

"It will be explained to you and the others once we get to the church.

"Others? Other people? How many more are there?"

Alex looked up and pondered, "Well let's see. There's me, Dora, Father Ares and…" he began mumbling to himself for a bit. "…and including you that makes eleven."

We continued walking, but I didn't say anything else. There were so many thoughts running through my head, and they were all fighting to get out of my mouth. Out of the many hundreds of cars on the road, and the thousands of people in this town, there were only eleven people left? Eleven out of thousands? That's like one percent. Was there only one percent of the world's population left? But before I could finish confusing myself even more we arrived at the church. It was a fairly large church compared to the small size of the town. There were twenty-five benches on each side of the building separated by a long, red carpeted aisle.

Alex motioned for me to sit down on one of the benches in the front row, and then went and stood on the stage with the same woman who called him earlier. They held each other's hands, looked into each other's eyes, and kissed. It was sweet, but at the same time kind of gross.

The bench I sat on held a few other people with expressions just as confused as mine. Never in my life had I been so happy to see other people. To the right of me were two guys about my age, and a cute girl wearing a school uniform. I spent what seemed like hours just starring at her pretty green eyes, long blonde hair, perfectly sized breasts, and ohhh that skirt. I almost forgot that thousands of people had disappeared from the face of the earth.

Unfortunately my fantasy was interrupted by an immensely obese man, wearing black pants, a black shirt, glasses, and a white collar. He was obviously a priest. He walked in from a back room and stood on the stage in the front of the church. "Attention! Attention everyone! My name is Father Ares. You're confused yes?"

"You're god damn right we are!" Screamed some skinny guy with a mow hawk from the other side of the aisle

"Don't say the lord's name in vain." said Ares while making a stopping motion with his hands, "Okay, so I do know a lot about what's happening" With those words I somehow felt safe. With those few words I felt that I would be able to see my dad again and everything could go back to normal. "But unfortunately I don't know how long it will be happening for" and all my confidence was gone. "So I think it would be best if we introduced ourselves first. Let's start with the young lady on the end." He turned his head towards the pretty girl, and she spoke.

"My name is Karin Mitsuki. I'm eight-teen years old, and I'm planning to attend Brown University in the fall." Her voice might have been even prettier than her body.

"Holy hell, that's a good school." said the boy next to her, "I'm Troy Atkinson" He said with a smile. He had dark skin and black hair. He was tall enough to pass for a twenty year old, and he looked to be just as strong as one. "And I-"

"Okay, I've played along for long enough." The man sitting between me and Troy stood up. He was wearing a dark suit and tie, and had neatly combed hair. It looked like he had just come from a business meeting. He walked over to Karin and grabbed her by the wrist.

"Hey! Let go of me you creep" Karin shouted, struggling to get free.

"That's nice. I like it when they struggle." He motioned to his belt.

"Okay, that's" Troy stood up, and jumped at the man. "ENOUGH!" He tackled the man to the ground, and sat on top of his chest forcing his arms to the ground.

"Hey! What was that for?" asked the man who had just been tackled.

"I won't let you hurt her. She's just a girl." Replied Troy

"Oh C'mon! It's not like she is even real. You're not even real. None of this is real. It's all just a dream, and I want to have sex with that girl in my dream! Now let go." He struggled to get free, but Troy was too strong.

"This isn't a dream, young man." Father Ares waddled down the steps on the edge of the stage. The steps bent inward and looked like they were going to break at any moment. Then he looked straight into the man's eyes. "This is real, and there is a reason why we're all here."

"Yea ri-"started the man on the floor, but before he could finish he was interrupted by the guy with the purple mow hawk.

"Then prove it! Why are we here, fatso? What do you know that we don't?"

Everyone got quiet, and stared at Ares. He started ringing his hands together, and walked back up the steps onto the stage. Troy got off of the man, and he stood up and brushed his suit off. He glared at Troy as he walked to the back of the church and leaned against the wall. Meanwhile Ares adjusted his glasses, cleared his throat and said, "Okay so the reason you're all here, why everybody you know and love is gone, why they've disappeared without a trace is" He paused, and looked around for a second, making sure everyone was listening. We were. None of us had any idea what was going on. The fact, that he had to make sure we wanted to find out was almost insulting. But none the less, I paid attention like my life depended on it because as far as I knew it did.

"God" And somehow my lack of confidence started to lack even more. "This is all a test from god." Everyone just sat still in disbelief. I had definitely heard of God before. I've read the bible, and I used to go to church, but I never heard of anything like this. A bunch of people just disappear from the face of the Earth, and the reason is divine intervention? Ares had a grin on his face like he'd won something. He seemed proud of his intelligence, and started to bask in the glory that was his knowledge.

"Holy shit!" replied the guy with the purple mow hawk. "You brought us all here to drop this load of BS on us?"

"No, I assure you God is testing us." Explained Ares

"God is testing us? GOD IS TESTING US! Is that why I'm stuck in a room with ten other morons who have no idea what is going on? Is that why everyone is dead?"

Everyone is dead. It had never occurred to me that everyone who disappeared may be dead. I didn't know what to do with this new theory. If everyone was dead then there was no hope. I wanted hope, no, I needed it. If I didn't have hope then how was I going to get through this? Then I thought again. Through this? I don't even know how long this will last for. Father Ares doesn't even know how long it will last. Maybe it will be over soon. Maybe it will be over five seconds from now. Or maybe it all really is just a dream. It would be great, if later I woke up, and I was lying in bed at home. I want to wake up! I want to wake up!

"I WANT TO WAKE UP!" My scream echoed through the church, and everyone stared at me.

BOOM! The ground rumbled.

"Wha what was that?" said the woman holding Alex's hand.

BOOM! BOOM! The ground rumbled again. It sounded like giant footsteps.

"Ares, what's going on?" asked Alex.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The ground was rumbling even harder, and the noise was getting louder.

Ares looked unsure. "Okay, everybody remain calm. Get in the duck and cover position, and take shelter under the benches."

The suit wearing man screamed, "That's for tornados you-"

BOOM! BOOM! CRASH!

The sound was coming from right outside, and everyone was panicking. A few people got under the benches, but most of us were paralyzed with fear. Ares was breathing loudly. He was panicking like the rest of us. I could hear what sounded like buildings falling on the ground. The windows were dark, and I couldn't see outside. It was hard to believe that not thirty minutes ago I was walking along the street more scared than I had ever been before. It couldn't get worse I thought. There is no way I can get more scared than this. Then I stumbled upon this town and met others who hadn't disappeared and that gave me some confidence. Now, just a short time after I thought I couldn't be more scared, I was. Everything was getting worse, and I couldn't do anything about it.

There were a few more crashes then the noise stopped. It was quiet again. "Okay, uh" Ares began talking, but his voice was shaky. He no longer had an aura of confidence swirling around him. That satisfied grin he was wearing on his face before was replaced with a nervous imposter. "It's all over now." He began ringing his sweaty hands together "God's test is over. You all preformed valiantly, and uh, you will be returned to-"

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! A low pitched roar filled the church. Everyone froze. A woman across the aisle was crying into her hands. "Is it over?" she muttered.

BANG! Something had crashed into the roof of the church and pierced the stage. Chunks of building rained down from the ceiling and crashed onto the stage. The object protruding from the stage was a large, thick piece of iron that must have been over fifty feet long. The edges were serrated similar to a saw. While scanning the slab of metal, it seemed to get bigger and sharper towards the top, but I couldn't see the very top because it was hidden by what was left of the church's roof. Still frozen from the noise before, nobody was moving. Everybody was fixated on what was attached to the very bottom of the iron piece. Ares' head lay there motionless, severed from his body. Every part of him from his neck down had been crushed and all that remained had popped off, rolled slightly to the left, then stopped. His head landed up right and still held a facial expression. It was of absolute terror. Then the slab started moving up. It was rising out of the building and into the sky.

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! Another roar bellowed throughout the church. But this time nobody froze. We all ran as fast as we could towards the door for fear that we would be the piece of irons next victim. Tears filled my eyes. I had never run faster in my life. I could hear screams all around me. I could feel nothing but fear. I just wanted to run forever. I didn't want to eat. I didn't want to sleep. I didn't want anything else. I just wanted to survive.

I ran for about three blocks when I noticed two people standing in the middle of the street looking up. It was Troy and the man in the suit. I stopped and turned around to see what they were gazing at.

The thing they were staring at was as big as a house and just as wide. It had two legs and two arms and was all but naked except for a little piece of cloth hanging around its waist. The cloth was a dirty grey similar to the color of the things skin. In one of its hands it was holding the same slab of iron that had crushed Father Ares. It was holding a sword.

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! The monster screamed as it started taking earth shattering steps in our direction. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

The man in the suit grabbed his head and cried, "NOOOO! This is a dream! This is a dream! THIS IS A DREAM!"

"No." Troy replied, "This is a nightmare".

-End of Chapter 3-