43 replies to this topic

[Ilya]

prints out*
and reads it*

EDIT: You need to be more discriptive, use the thesaurus to use more mature words... and dont use numbers, never use numbers in a essay/book same thing...

Some examples are "he was about 6'2" then "stomach like" be more dicriptive..

Edited by Adobe, 28 April 2006 - 05:29 PM.

[ink]

prints out*
and reads it*

EDIT: You need to be more discriptive, use the thesaurus to use more mature words... and dont use numbers, never use numbers in a essay/book same thing...

Some examples are "he was about 6'2" then "stomach like" be more dicriptive..

lol There are quite a few "mature words".

I forgot about the number rule.

Where did you find "stomach like"?


Oh and did you actually read the edit or his original?

Well did you Adobe?

[Darkness]

Well done Vex, I got to read this way before. It's very well done. Nice job editing Ink, with your cream-filled starch-based snacks

EDIT: Two things I would change.

Just the site itself could make someone with a weak stomach, knee down and vomit.

Make site, sight and knee, kneel. Also, one sentence in the last paragraph. Change throw up to vomit. Other than that, all good

Edited by Darkness, 28 April 2006 - 08:50 PM.

[Vex]

I approve of the edits Ink. Very well done. I'm glad you only changed a few wordings.

[Alex]

Hurry up and finish it dam it

[Vex]

I'm writing as we speak. But don't rush me at 1 in the morning, it still needs to be good you know. lol

The next few pages are done. They're reading for editing from Ink.

It was ironic really. I had survived an impossible drop and escaped from a horde of monsters yet I wasn’t meant to live. I laughed a bit to myself as I looked to the sky one last time before I would meet it in person. I could hear the monsters catching up to me and I let the hopelessness fill me. I knew when I was beat and I couldn’t move a muscle in my body. I had just enough strength left in me to see the red robed figure advance on me. I couldn’t see his face and It aggravated me that I would not know the identity of my own killer. The last thing I saw before I let death embrace me was a man who looked vaguely familiar. A heard a gunshot, a scream, and no more.

I opened my eyes wearily and blinked several times. I rolled onto my side and saw a fire was roaring. Yet again I didn’t know what had happened to me. I pushed myself up and felt an excruciating pain spread through my side. The agony crippled me back down to a fetal position. When I opened my eyes again and could see clearly, I thought I was dreaming. I was laying on a couch, a real couch. Aside from the fire burning neatly in the middle of the room and a few broken windows, it appeared I was in a hotel. As my eyes scanned the rest of the dwelling, I spotted a man sitting across from me in a chair, reading. The fact that he even still had a book had me amazed. “It’s about time you woke up.” he grunted without even looking at me. “You had quite the experience…Keith.”

Keith…He had said my name. I had almost forgotten that it was my name, and if he hadn’t just said it I probably never would have remembered. “How do you…?” was all I could stammer out. The man didn’t answer me right away so I repeated my question as stern as I could. The man closed his book and stood up. He had a muscular build and looked to be at least six foot. He was wearing a pair of clean khaki pants and a blue, button down shirt. He had a baseball cap covering his face. He stopped in front of the fire and tossed the book into it. The flames rose up for a brief instant and illuminated his face for the first time. He was worn but looked no older than 24. His eyes lacked sleep and his face lacked life. No matter how different he had become, I could never forget his face. I could never forget the face of my own brother. At first I thought I had to be dead. I had survived a death fall, cheated death a second time, awoke in a comfortable and warm room, and too top it all off, seen my brother who had gone missing two years earlier. A good punch to my lower gut send me back into the fetal position and made my doubt dissolve. Mitch had always known how to make me lose track of thought.
“Alright, get up. Now.”
His command startled me. I was comfortable as I was and saw no reason to get up. “Why?” was all I could think to say. My brother was notorious for not taking shit from anyone. Without hesitation or thought of my injury he hefted me by my color and slammed me against the wall.
“Do you want to die?” He questioned. “Do you want to die?”
I had no answer to his question. We both knew well that I didn’t want to die and neither did he. Without another word to me he let go and let me slide down the wall. He slid my holstered knife across the floor and handed my a 9mm handle first. I looked up and saw him strapping ammo to his belt and loading a riot shotgun. I wanted to know badly where he got these weapons but I knew now was not the time to ask him. I stumbled to my feet and clutched my side. My brother gave me a concerned look and I quickly masked my pain and gave him a fake smile. He knew I was bluffing but didn’t push it any further. I strapped my knife to my belt and I shoved the gun into my pocket. I took one last look at the room before my brother smashed the door open, barrel pointed out. I heard moans coming from down the hall and I understood why he had given me a new gun.

Mitch took the lead out of the room and signaled me to follow. The hallway was deserted and the rug was torn and dismayed. The rooms down the hall were blown open and the elevator across our room lay open, elevator missing. The only way out was a patch of stairs that seemed would collapse if anyone were to walk down them. My brother yet again took the lead and tested the stairs. They creaked as his foot touched them, but withstood his weight. As he crept further down, he motioned me to follow as he constantly looked around him paranoid. It was a long, quiet few minutes as we descended four fleets of stairs. I kept expecting some type of disaster to occur but for once my luck sided with me. When we finally reached the lobby I let out a breath I didn’t even realize I was holding. Everything was ruined. The chairs that people once lounged in were destroyed and the check-in counter that once shone a brilliant pearl was dull and blackened. My brother led me outside to the parking lot where a lone vehicle was parked. A red motorcycle made up the population of the lot and it belonged to my brother. I still remember to this day when he got it. It was for his eighteenth birthday party. He had been so exciting about it that he hopped right on and rode it into the garage door without thinking to open it. The cycle still boar the a few marks from his first accident but Mitch seemed not to notice them or had chosen no longer to pay them any mind. The paint was chipped and fading and the leather seats had been replaced by metal; the leather had probably been ruined in the blast. Slinging a pouch over the seat, Mitch took the drivers seat. He made himself comfortable and stared at me. I knew what he wanted me to do and he knew that I wouldn’t do it willingly.
“Get on Keith.”
I stayed silent.
“Keith, now.”
I still stayed silent.
“Keith, swallow your damn pride and get on the back!”
This time I climbed aboard. I had only ridden his motorcycle with him once. That same time I had learned the name of this particular seat and I refused to ever ride there again. With a roar of the engine, the machine started up and smoke blew from its two-exhaust pipes. The cycle sped off in a burst of speed and I almost fell off; I had to grapple the grips under me to stay on. We drove through the entire city in complete silence. It was early morning and the air was crisp and cold. It was a long time before either of us spoke. “Where are we going?” I asked. No response followed my question. I repeated myself repeatedly to the point of repetitiveness but Mitch just wouldn’t answer me. He just kept repeating the word. “Leave.” There was only one exit in from town and it lead right onto a major highway. The rest of the town was surrounded by high mountains and the ocean. If we were leaving, we were going the wrong way.

I saw the city limits approach quickly and I saw what was left of a forest getting larger and larger. Without a second thought, Mitch pulled off road and climbed the hill constantly looking down the side. Dead trees past by in blurs and the city below us looked so foreign. I looked down to the streets and saw the creatures wondering in the streets. The farther we went, the more and more clustered together. The only exit to the city was blocked. I wonder if my brother had known this or taken a lucky guess, but what ever the reason he made the right decision. More and more of them clustered into the one large group. The cycle stopped and Mitch looked down at the cult. As the robed figure took his place in front of them, Mitch revved the engine. “Mitch…what are you doing?” I was worried. Mitch was never the most level headed person. I feared for his sanity as I saw a crude smile form on his lips. “Hang on tight.” was all he said to me before he slammed the gas. We blasted down the dirt hill at a breakneck speed. The speedometer passed eighty in a matter of seconds. It didn’t take long for the creatures to recognize what was going on. They were going to stop us from leaving. I yelled taunts at the creatures as I was sure we were about to turn down the road, but we just kept heading at them. I began to get worried now that it seemed there would no longer be enough room to get out of the way. The Robed figure blew his always present whistle and the group ran at us. Mitch didn’t look at me directly but I could feel the eyes in back of his head driving into my skull. “When I count to three, we jump. Got it?”
“Wait…what?”
“1.”
“Mitch, what are you doing?”
“2.”
“Mitch, you can’t be thinking what I think you are!”
“3.”
He slid his motorcycle into the tightest turn I had ever seen. I was flung from the back and slid across the ground for a good twenty feet. My brother was still on it. I saw him lose control and jump from the vehicle. In one swift motion, he pulled out the six-shooter I had pilfered a few days ago and shot three shots. Everything at this point slowed down. One bullet grazed one of the creatures shoulders but the other two met their target. The second bullet punctured the gas tank on the still sliding cycle and the third ignited the gasoline. The motorcycle exploded into a shower of fire and parts and my brother rolled across the ground and stopped ten feet from me. I looked up once the dust had cleared and saw the body count. Almost every single one of the creatures were dead. Body parts littered the ground like a graveyard and my brother got up smirking. His smile faded as he saw the robed figure stand from the rubble. The figure dusted himself off and once again blew his whistle. The remaining creatures which numbered only twenty now, compared to at least a hundred from before, hobbled towards us. Mitch cocked his riot shotgun and I loaded my pistol. It looked like we weren’t leaving without a fight.

Copyright ©Ryan Jakuboski 2006; To be Edited by Chase Colman

Edited by Vex, 28 April 2006 - 10:10 PM.

[Ilya]

lol There are quite a few "mature words".

I forgot about the number rule.

Where did you find "stomach like"?
Oh and did you actually read the edit or his original?

Well did you Adobe?

I think I read the original...

...but looked no older than 24...
...he hefted me by my color and slammed me against the wall....

Ok you still have the numbers, you need to change that... the second one he hafted me by my COLOR? I didnt get that

Third You said you can enver forget that face, you said he was in jail or something and he had sleepy eyes... and what he wore... thats good detail. You show him as dangerous and tough, you should give hime lik e a scar on his face so the reader wouldnt be blinded for me reading I didnt see his eyes nothing... just saw his clothes in the story you need to make more detail on the face and stuff...

Otherwise good job! the story line is great

Edited by Adobe, 29 April 2006 - 05:03 AM.

[Sweeney]

He meant collar.

[Ilya]

He meant collar.

Owwww...... Now I get it...

[Vex]

Ya, like I said that writing spanned from 1:41 to 2:30 in the morning. I wasn't thinking straight and I wanted to finish introducing his brother before he went to sleep. Don't worry, I'm going back through it fixing typos and enhancing it later today.

[ink]

Well done Vex, I got to read this way before. It's very well done. Nice job editing Ink, with your cream-filled starch-based snacks

EDIT: Two things I would change.
Make site, sight and knee, kneel. Also, one sentence in the last paragraph. Change throw up to vomit. Other than that, all good

Ah I actually missed that first sentence. I wasn't sure about the change since it is a man talking from 1st person experience.

THIS IS AN EDIT OF THE FIRST PART OF THE CHAPTER. I HOPE IT IS THE FINAL ONE OF THIS PART.

Spoiler Chapter: You Are Now Leaving Hollywood
April 18th, 2035 8:00am

The rays from the sun indicated that a new day had dawned. Light flowed into the city as water would through the cracks in a street. The city had once been my home; all that remained now though were ruins devoid of hope. Over this past week, everything I had known changed. I had learned that there were other survivors out there, some even building new communities. This comforting information came from someone I had thought long dead; my own brother.

I had been walking lifelessly down the barren streets of the city I had once called home thinking of nothing but my own hellish end. A small quarrel with a group of people, if I can even call them that anymore, the night before had ruined my clothes and the exhaustion had left me ravenous with hunger. Proudly showing that first missile changed everything—and everyone in the city. It altered their appearances and their minds. The friends I used to know, the men and women who had once walked the streets, had all become one with the dead. No life could be seen in their eyes—only a thirst for blood and a passion for hate.

That same missile decimated the buildings that made up the city and killed all those inside—and miles around them. What remained was an assortment of charred wood and mangled metal. Rubble still burned in the streets and dead littered the ground where the homeless had once begged. The lights that once gleamed with pride now stood shattered and broken looking down on the lifeless streets before it. I used to enjoy looking inside the store windows and seeing the active patrons and customers, but now all I could see was emptiness. The trees lining the roads had burned down and the grass no longer existed. The city looked more like a barren wasteland than anything else. I missed the birds that used to sing songs as the bustling crowd on the streets went back and forth. I missed the chatter of those same people, and even their constant yelling at each other, hell, even at me. I now truly understood what it was like to have nothing and for the first time; I realized what I had taken for granted all these years of a non-seeming paradise. A broken dream of a post-apocalyptic nightmare had now been erected from it.

To survive in this new world required more than just physical strength. What a true survivor needed was street intelligence and controlled primal instinct. I knew when to run, when to fight, and when to not get involved whatsoever. The most important necessity was a weapon. On my person, I currently held two. The first being one of my father’s antique knives that he had given for me as a graduation gift so long ago, and the other was a small pistol I had scavenged from one of the long-dead corpses on the street. The pistol had only six shots, and so far, I only had to release one. No matter how deformed and mentally twisted, these people were still people and still knew exactly what a firearm meant. Only one person dared see if it was loaded and he found out when he got too close with his threatening stance. I had seen others with weapons roaming the desolate city. Every time however, I witnessed them in either a suicide or a murder. The world I now lived in belonged to gang activity, theft, and mutations. Minimal minorities of people were only affected lightly and were slightly misshapen. These were, questionably, the normal people now and these people had began to create communities where they could move through life in peace. An even smaller portion, like me, were not mutated in anyway. The worst that we got was some unknown illness that did nothing visible or seriously harmful, except cause pain to the head and stomach areas. The fully mutated and distorted souls, who received the worst of the blast, now stayed only with one another; killing anything and anyone who approached too near. The most common characteristic of these people was rotting flesh that fell of their bodies in small bits like dandruff. Just the sight itself could make someone with a weak stomach, kneel down and vomit. All the food in the city was gone with the exception of some canned goods that you could find in the rubble of old grocery stores. This was the only neutral zone in the city. It was here that no one fought, and no one was killed. For safety, most survivors lived in these stores, close to the food and the shelter it provided. What puzzled me more though, was why did those who were mutated not stop to eat? I did not find out this grim detail until last night…

I had just finished my own meal of canned beans and a few starch-based cream-filled snacks, when I saw one of them pass by the store. It kept its distance as if it did not want to be seen. I could see why this would be reasonable, but my curiosity had exceeded my common sense. I crept out of the safety of the store and followed him a few yards behind. It dressed oddly and unusually well. It wore a red gown embroidered in gold linen. A large hood completely hid its face. It made my old jeans and t-shirt look like rags, although now after what has happened that is pretty much what they were. After what seemed like hours, the creature came across an old, injured, and dieing victim propped against a crumbling structure. It said a few words to the man and a smile came across its face, allowing me to see the mutated remains of a man. The man allowed the robed figure to pick him up and sling him over his shoulder. He carried the man for another ten minutes walking distance before he stopped in front of a large building. The building looked like an old corporate head quarters and appeared to be several stories high. Most of the windows had been shattered and the top of the building was falling apart at an alarming rate. The robed person harshly dropped the old man on the ground. The man looked confused and stared at the robed mutant. I almost did not notice but at that moment, he blew a small whistle that was concealed under his garments and a crowd of people bustled out of the building. I watched in horror as the mutated humans tore the man’s limbs off and carried him, dismantled and mutilated, back inside. The robed one followed the trail of blood like a red carpet upon a dusty pearled floor.

Keeping my distance, I slowly followed them into the building’s interior. Inside was something that my sight would not allow to be believed. The robed man now stood atop a dais, which luxurious and beautiful items surrounded. Gold littered the walls and velvet embroidered the seats. Everything seemed stable and under control which is not the story the building seemed to tell. The robed figure blew a small silent whistle and three men hefted the limbs onto a bloody table. The group then set fire to the parts and the rest of the room began to hum an eerie tune. The mere thought of these people killing and burning people for what seemed some crazed religious cult sickened me. I turned to leave the building and I tripped over a thin wire on the floor. My face hitting the floor echoed through the room. In unison, the people in the room turned around and screeched. The noise was so painful to my ears I quivered on the ground covering them. After what felt like an eternity, the robed man pulled out his whistle and blew it yet again. This time they all grew silent and stared at me. One moved forward and with repetitive blow of the whistle, the rest swarmed him. I watched in horror as I saw the agony of another unlucky human being torn apart limb by limb. As quickly as possible, I jumped to my feet and ran for the exit.

A bolt of lightning lit the room, blowing a thunderclap while rain began to pound outside. A disturbing noise came from behind as I bolted for the door. Another flash lit the streets long enough to allow me to see that more were coming in from the streets; they had me surrounded. I was not able to count them all, but they seemed to be multiplying. I turned around and recoiled in fear to see that the ones behind me had finished with their victim and wanted another sacrifice… Without any other option, I escaped up a flight of stairs. One…two…three flights, I kept on climbing stairs never stopping. Destroyed offices passed my vision in instances of near infinity. Dead bodies, limbless and skeletal, plagued the floors. Some huddled over hoping for protection and a few held children long dead. Pieces of wall were constantly falling off and it baffled me on how the building had withstood the blast in the first place. By the time I reached the top of the titan-sized structure, I was out of breath. I could hear them catching up to me, although my pace seemed far more efficient. There were no doors to board up, there were no desks for cover, no apparent chance of salvation. I had run into an empty office room, devoid of any furniture. Small planks of rotted and cracked wood boarded up the windows. Most of the windows were shattered and many of the weak pieces of wood had been reduced to splinters scattered across the floor. More than obviously now I notice, the people of this building never stood a chance. My attention shifted as one of them reached my floor. It was the first time I had seen truly what the violent radiation did to these people…

The man who approached was roughly six foot two, much taller than myself, and looked very muscular; just enough to rip the very soul out of your body. His tongue hang limp from his mouth, his jaw was completely gone, only reminisce of the upper roof remained. He wore no clothing but a ragged remain of a cross-hatch sack and a chunk of his right side was missing, bleeding so constantly that it should be fatal to most. Flesh dropped from his body in sickening chunks, he looked better than he smelled though, the stench he bore was far worse than a landfill. His hair had half fallen out and his left eye somehow functioned while it lay slightly drifting from its socket. He limped towards me slowly, but did not seem to make any threat physical or otherwise. More noise came from the staircase and two more stepped into the room. All three of them were missing various pieces of flesh and smelled horrible to a point almost unbearable to me, but each were deformed in a different manner. The second one who came up had a grossly distorted and enlarged face with a disgusting blood painted rotting green tint. He had lost most of his arms from the elbow downward and both of his kneecaps were torn open, causing him to stumble with every movement towards me. The other was a woman who was shorter than both the men were, but looked just as cruelly misshapen. Both her legs were skinned to near bone and bled in massive drops, all her hair had fallen out, and parts of her face around her cheek had began to decay off. She was missing both eyes and grunted as if she could no longer talk. They all continue to advance on me, slowly but steadily. As more and more crept up the stairs, I began to see that I could not survive in a fight. More than anything though I wanted a quick death, if one was inevitable. Knowing I would slowly be torn apart in torturous agony and pain, I decided there was only one more option… jump to the tainted and broken concrete on the ground below, death upon impact. I backed up to one of the broken windows and looked down. It was a good ways down, I was sure that this would be it. I smirked at the creatures coming at me. “You want a meal? Well you’re going to have to fetch it.” Without another thought on the matter, I leapt from the building.

It felt like air had teased me to fall for hours. Most people saw their lives flash before them as they fell, I saw nothing but an approaching ground drenched in my future’s blood. As I neared my supposed death, my legs sprung out as if by instinct to try and stop my falling. As soon as it had begun it ended, the results however were not as I expected. My feet were first to touch ground. My legs buckled and I was sure they were going to be crushed to blood-drenched pulp, but they did the impossible… they absorbed the shock. Pain surged through my body as the force traveled upwards and was eventually released in a scream of distress. I collapsed onto my knees and clutched my legs before I realized that I could even do so. I stared at my hands and pinched myself. This pain was welcomed, I was alive. It all seemed impossible to me and yet I did it. I did not have anymore time to think things over, more and more people came out in a flood like mass from the building. As I got up to run, I saw a figure, then two, and finally a third, fall from the top floor from that same window I had. The ones I had run from had followed me to my death. They, unlike me, were not as lucky. Their bodies blew apart into a demented and bloody mosaic on the pavement. Some limbs scattered across the ground and blood splattered my clothes. I felt like vomiting, but even that I did not have time for. I didn’t stay to watch the men and women scavenge the dead bodies, as I knew their fate. I ran long and hard for a good mile and a half before I stopped. Buildings flew by and my legs gave away. I collapsed in the center of the barren road and felt my mind drift into unconsciousness. As I lay there, I thought to myself “After all of that…I’m still going to die…”

Copyright ©Ryan Jakuboski 2006; Edited by Chase Colman

I will later work on the edit of the next part.
I have to spend some quality time with my friends for a while.

[Ilya]

Ink your writing this also?

[Vex]

He's my offficial editor. I write the book to the best of my abilities and he edit's my vocabulary. Its a simple process.

[Ilya]

Hey when you done can you email it to me or contact me over msn/aim? because I dont think Im gonna be here much longer...

[ink]

Hey when you done can you email it to me or contact me over msn/aim? because I dont think Im gonna be here much longer...

Once the spoiler chapter is finished, that will be it for the public eyes. The rest will be in the works and once finished will be published.

[Ilya]

Once the spoiler chapter is finished, that will be it for the public eyes. The rest will be in the works and once finished will be published.

O.. If you need help with it contact me

[Sweeney]

I'm offended, Adobe. You didn't say that it was my quote in your sig.
OMG, you're ripping my words

Aaanywho, I'll offer up my services too, if you don't mind
Or maybe I can do the cover or something

[Ives]

Fun. I do some amateur writing at the moment, and I see nothing wrong with it.

[Vex]

With the addition of these last pages i've finished chapter one. At 10 point font, 1/2 margins, and 5 x 7 size(average paperbook measurements) chapter one measures 15 pages exact. Enjoy the end of chapter one. I've edited the second half completely so you'll need to re-read it. For those who haven't read any of it, i'm going to post the whole thing start to finish.

Chapter 1: You Are Now Leaving Hollywood
April 18, 2035 8:00am

The rays from the sun indicated that a new day had dawned. Light flowed into the city as water would through the cracks in a street. The city had once been my home; all that remained now though were ruins devoid of hope. Over this past week, everything I had known changed. I had learned that there were other survivors out there, some even building new communities. This comforting information came from someone I had thought long dead; my own brother.
I had been walking lifelessly down the barren streets of the city I had once called home thinking of nothing but my own hellish end. A small quarrel with a group of people, if I can even call them that anymore, the night before had ruined my clothes and the exhaustion had left me ravenous with hunger. Proudly showing that first missile changed everything—and everyone in the city. It altered their appearances and their minds. The friends I used to know, the men and women who had once walked the streets, had all become one with the dead. No life could be seen in their eyes—only a thirst for blood and a passion for hate.
That same missile decimated the buildings that made up the city and killed all those inside—and miles around them. What remained was an assortment of charred wood and mangled metal. Rubble still burned in the streets and dead littered the ground where the homeless had once begged. The lights that once gleamed with pride now stood shattered and broken looking down on the lifeless streets before it. I used to enjoy looking inside the store windows and seeing the active patrons and customers, but now all I could see was emptiness. The trees lining the roads had burned down and the grass no longer existed. The city looked more like a barren wasteland than anything else did. I missed the birds that used to sing songs as the bustling crowd on the streets went back and forth. I missed the chatter of those same people, and even their constant yelling at each other, hell, even at me. I now truly understood what it was like to have nothing and for the first time; I realized what I had taken for granted all these years of a non-seeming paradise. A broken dream of a post-apocalyptic nightmare had now been erected from it.
To survive in this new world required more than just physical strength. What a true survivor needed was street intelligence and controlled primal instinct. I knew when to run, when to fight, and when to not get involved whatsoever. The most important necessity was a weapon. On my person, I currently held two. The first being one of my father’s antique knives that he had given for me as a graduation gift so long ago, and the other was a small pistol I had scavenged from one of the long-dead corpses on the street. The pistol had only six shots, and so far, I only had to release one. No matter how deformed and mentally twisted, these people were still people and still knew exactly what a firearm meant. Only one person dared see if it was loaded and he found out when he got too close with his threatening stance. I had seen others with weapons roaming the desolate city. Every time however, I witnessed them in either a suicide or a murder. The world I now lived in belonged to gang activity, theft, and mutations. Minimal minorities of people were only affected lightly and were slightly misshapen. These were, questionably, the normal people now and these people had begun to create communities where they could move through life in peace. An even smaller portion, like me, was not mutated in anyway. The worst that we got was some unknown illness that did nothing visible or seriously harmful, except cause pain to the head and stomach areas. The fully mutated and distorted souls, who received the worst of the blast, now stayed only with one another; killing anything and anyone who approached too near. The most common characteristic of these people was rotting flesh that fell of their bodies in small bits like dandruff. Just the sight itself could make someone with a weak stomach, kneel down and vomit. All the food in the city was gone with the exception of some canned goods that you could find in the rubble of old grocery stores. This was the only neutral zone in the city. It was here that no one fought, and no one was killed. For safety, most survivors lived in these stores, close to the food and the shelter it provided. What puzzled me more though, was why did those who were mutated not stop to eat? I did not find out this grim detail until last night…
I had just finished my own meal of canned beans and a few starch-based cream-filled snacks, when I saw one of them pass by the store. It kept its distance as if it did not want to be seen. I could see why this would be reasonable, but my curiosity had exceeded my common sense. I crept out of the safety of the store and followed him a few yards behind. It dressed oddly and unusually well. It wore a red gown embroidered in gold linen. A large hood completely hid its face. It made my old jeans and t-shirt look like rags, although now after what has happened that is pretty much, what they were. After what seemed like hours, the creature came across an old, injured, and dieing victim propped against a crumbling structure. It said a few words to the man and a smile came across its face, allowing me to see the mutated remains of a man. The man allowed the robed figure to pick him up and sling him over his shoulder. He carried the man for another ten minutes walking distance before he stopped in front of a large building. The building looked like an old corporate head quarters and appeared to be several stories high. Most of the windows had been shattered and the top of the building was falling apart at an alarming rate. The robed person harshly dropped the old man on the ground. The man looked confused and stared at the robed mutant. I almost did not notice but at that moment, he blew a small whistle that was concealed under his garments and a crowd of people bustled out of the building. I watched in horror as the mutated humans tore the man’s limbs off and carried him, dismantled and mutilated, back inside. The robed one followed the trail of blood like a red carpet upon a dusty pearled floor.
Keeping my distance, I slowly followed them into the building’s interior. Inside was something that my sight would not allow to be believed. The robed man now stood atop a dais, which luxurious and beautiful items surrounded. Gold littered the walls and velvet embroidered the seats. Everything seemed stable and under control which is not the story the building seemed to tell. The robed figure blew a small silent whistle and three men hefted the limbs onto a bloody table. The group then set fire to the parts and the rest of the room began to hum an eerie tune. The mere thought of these people killing and burning people for what seemed some crazed religious cult sickened me. I turned to leave the building and I tripped over a thin wire on the floor. My face hitting the floor echoed through the room. In unison, the people in the room turned around and screeched. The noise was so painful to my ears I quivered on the ground covering them. After what felt like an eternity, the robed man pulled out his whistle and blew it yet again. This time they all grew silent and stared at me. One moved forward and with repetitive blow of the whistle, the rest swarmed him. I watched in horror as I saw the agony of another unlucky human being torn apart limb by limb. As quickly as possible, I jumped to my feet and ran for the exit.
A bolt of lightning lit the room, blowing a thunderclap while rain began to pound outside. A disturbing noise came from behind as I bolted for the door. Another flash lit the streets long enough to allow me to see that more were coming in from the streets; they had me surrounded. I was not able to count them all, but they seemed to be multiplying. I turned around and recoiled in fear to see that the ones behind me had finished with their victim and wanted another sacrifice… Without any other option, I escaped up a flight of stairs. One…two…three flights, I kept on climbing stairs never stopping. Destroyed offices passed my vision in instances of near infinity. Dead bodies, limbless and skeletal, plagued the floors. Some huddled over hoping for protection and a few held children long dead. Pieces of wall were constantly falling off and it baffled me on how the building had withstood the blast in the first place. By the time I reached the top of the titan-sized structure, I was out of breath. I could hear them catching up to me, although my pace seemed far more efficient. There were no doors to board up, there were no desks for cover, no apparent chance of salvation. I had run into an empty office room, devoid of any furniture. Small planks of rotted and cracked wood boarded up the windows. Most of the windows were shattered and many of the weak pieces of wood had been reduced to splinters scattered across the floor. More than obviously now I notice, the people of this building never stood a chance. My attention shifted as one of them reached my floor. It was the first time I had seen truly, what the violent radiation did to these people…
The man who approached was roughly six foot two, much taller than myself, and looked very muscular; just enough to rip the very soul out of your body. His tongue hang limp from his mouth, his jaw was completely gone, only reminisce of the upper roof remained. He wore no clothing but ragged remains of a cross-hatch sack and a chunk of his right side was missing, bleeding so constantly that it should be fatal to most. Flesh dropped from his body in sickening chunks, he looked better than he smelled though, the stench he bore was far worse than a landfill. His hair had half fallen out and his left eye somehow functioned while it lay slightly drifting from its socket. He limped towards me slowly, but did not seem to make any threat physical or otherwise. More noise came from the staircase and two more stepped into the room. All three of them were missing various pieces of flesh and smelled horrible to a point almost unbearable to me, but each was deformed in a different manner. The second one who came up had a grossly distorted and enlarged face with a disgusting blood painted rotting green tint. He had lost most of his arms from the elbow downward and both of his kneecaps were torn open, causing him to stumble with every movement towards me. The other was a woman who was shorter than both the men were, but looked just as cruelly misshapen. Both her legs were skinned to near bone and bled in massive drops, all her hair had fallen out, and parts of her face around her cheek had began to decay off. She was missing both eyes and grunted as if she could no longer talk. They all continue to advance on me, slowly but steadily. As more and more crept up the stairs, I began to see that I could not survive in a fight. More than anything though I wanted a quick death, if one was inevitable. Knowing I would slowly be torn apart in torturous agony and pain, I decided there was only one more option… jump to the tainted and broken concrete on the ground below, death upon impact. I backed up to one of the broken windows and looked down. It was a good ways down, I was sure that this would be it. I smirked at the creatures coming at me. “You want a meal? Well you’re going to have to fetch it.” Without another thought on the matter, I leapt from the building.
It felt like air had teased me to fall for hours. Most people saw their lives flash before them as they fell, I saw nothing but an approaching ground drenched in my future’s blood. As I neared my supposed death, my legs sprung out as if by instinct to try to stop my falling. As soon as it had begun it ended, the results however were not as I expected. My feet were first to touch ground. My legs buckled and I was sure they were going to be crushed to blood-drenched pulp, but they did the impossible… they absorbed the shock. Pain surged through my body as the force traveled upwards and was eventually released in a scream of distress. I collapsed onto my knees and clutched my legs before I realized that I could even do so. I stared at my hands and pinched myself. This pain was welcomed, I was alive. It all seemed impossible to me and yet I did it. I did not have any more time to think things over; more and more people came out in a flood like mass from the building. As I got up to run, I saw a figure, then two, and finally a third, fall from the top floor from that same window I had. The ones I had run from had followed me to my death. They, unlike me, were not as lucky. Their bodies blew apart into a demented and bloody mosaic on the pavement. Some limbs scattered across the ground and blood splattered my clothes. I wanted to throw up, but even that I did not have time for. I did not stay to watch the men and women scavenge the dead bodies, as I knew their fate. I ran long and hard for a good mile and a half before I stopped. Buildings flew by and my legs gave away. I collapsed in the center of the barren road and felt my mind drift into unconsciousness. As I lay there, I thought to myself “After all of that…I’m still going to die…”
It was ironic really. I had survived an impossible drop and escaped from a horde of monsters yet I wasn’t meant to live. I laughed a bit to myself as I looked to the sky one last time before I would meet it in person. I could hear the monsters catching up to me and I let the hopelessness fill me. I knew when I was beat and I couldn’t move a muscle in my body. I had just enough strength left in me to see the red robed figure advance on me. I couldn’t see his face and It aggravated me that I would not know the identity of my own killer. The last thing I saw before I let death embrace me was a man who looked vaguely familiar. A heard a gunshot, a scream, and no more.
I opened my eyes wearily and blinked several times. Rolling onto my side I could see a fire was burning on the floor. For the second time today I had no idea what had just happened to me. Excruciating pain spread through my side as I tried to sit up. The white hot pain lasted only a few moments but when it was there, it hurt like hell. I thought that I had to have been dreaming at this point. I found myself laying on a couch, a real couch. The rest of the room however was a disaster. The windows were shattered, a bookcase in the corner was empty¾save a few torn novels. The walls paint was cracked and parts were missing. Aside from wreckage, there was a lone chair across from me. More important then the chair was the man sitting in it. The man was wore a torn up pair of khakis and a plaid button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up. His muscles were clearly visible and a great scar ran up his right arm. The man had a brown hat that reminded me of an old movie adventurer and from what I saw of his face, it seemed that he hadn‘t shaved in months. Before I could mutter a sound, the man got up and tossed another book into the already burning fire. “It’s about time you woke up.” he grunted without even looking at me. “You had quite the experience…Keith.”
Keith…my name was Keith. After all that had happened I had forgotten I even had a name at all. Most likely I wouldn‘t have remembered on my own any how, my memory never had been too good. I went to ask the man how he knew this but couldn’t muster the words. As if he knew what I wanted to ask but couldn’t, he removed his hat and grinned at me. I had seen that grin a hundred times. I had seen those same brown eyes staring at me and that same ruffled brown hair. I had seen this man before¾it was my brother. My first thought was that I hadn’t survived my last encounter and I had left this plane. After all, I had survived an impossible fall, a horde of freaks, and now my brother, whom had been missing for two years now, was back. It took another look around the room to realize that I was alive, either that or I was sent to hell. I sat up on the couch and looked at my brother hard. “After all these years…what’s been going on with you?”
It took him awhile to speak. “I…I went and joined the army. That’s all.”
Something about his answer just didn’t satisfy me. He could see it in my eyes and I knew he saw it.
“Alright, I joined the army under a classified contract. I can’t tell you anything else Keith.”
I was already fed up with him again. He had always been the vague one. “The government is dead John. There’s no one to keep a secret for.”
John opened his mouth to speak but he was interrupted by glass breaking downstairs. “Keith, get up, we have to go, now!”
I didn’t need to be told when to run. By the time he had barked the order, I had already found my revolver and shoved it in my pocket. I looked over to see John shoving shells into his pockets and hefting a shotgun over his shoulder. He looked at me and the revolved sticking out of my pants. Sighing he threw me a semi-automatic pistol. I wasn’t a gun expert and couldn’t tell what kind it was other then that but It looked like a military standard issue. He also tossed me three clips, each had twelve shots on it. With my revolver I have a total of thirty-eight shots…with my accuracy I’d need every last one of them. My brother took one last look at the room and headed out into the hallway.
John took the lead out of the room and signaled me to follow. The hallway was deserted and the rug was torn and dismayed. The rooms down the hall were blown open and the elevator across our room lay open¾elevator missing. The only way out was a patch of stairs that looked less stable then any of my relationships. My brother yet again took the lead and tested the stairs. They creaked as his foot touched them, but withstood his weight. As he crept further down, he motioned me to follow, constantly looking around him paranoid. It was a long, quiet few minutes as we descended four fleets of stairs. I kept expecting some type of disaster to occur but for once my luck sided with me. When we finally reached the lobby I let out a breath I didn’t even realize I was holding. Everything was ruined. The chairs that people once lounged in were destroyed and the check-in counter that once shone a brilliant pearl was dull and blackened. Just as I had thought my luck was on my side, we heard noises coming from outside. That crazed cult had found me. The scene reminded me of Dawn of the Dead but they were no zombies, they knew how to open a door. As if trying not to break a window, the first one walked almost casually through the door. John sent him through the glass with a deafening crack from his shotgun. More began to pour into the building. Another group was sent through the glass from two more shells of his shotgun but they just kept coming. Cursing everything, John turned and ran, grabbing my sleeve as he did so.
“John, where are we going?”
“I have a ride in the back, we need to find the back door.”
The back door wasn’t hard to find however, it was just hard to get too. More of those things had clustered the area and stood in front of the door. John’s shotgun couldn’t clear them all. We turned around in unison and saw that the others were coming. I looked around in a hurry. I looked at my brother and saw something I hadn’t seen in years; a grin. It wasn’t just any grin, it was his grin. Whenever he did that, he was going to do something crazy. I didn’t have enough time to ask what he was thinking, I just ducked when he told me too. I heard the shot from his own pistol and then an explosion. The blast blew me back a few feet and I could feel the building shaking.
“Get up.” he said as he hoisted me from the floor by my collar. “I just shot a propane tank, the blast cleared the door but this buildings going to collapse.”
I just stared at my brother. I just knew he’d do something like this. Without another word to each other, we ran for our lives out into the parking lot. There was a lone motorcycle in the lot. It was once red but years of misuse and dirt had destroyed its paint job and all that was left was the solid steel that was beginning to rust. The last time I saw his bike was the last time I saw him. It was my graduation party and I had just arrived home waving my diploma. I had been so happy I was finally off to college. I got so caught up in the festivities, I failed to ever notice the argument my parents and brother were having. Without a word to any of us, he got on his cycle and rode off. I felt something in me break as I watched him run off. There was no evidence but I knew he wasn’t coming back, he had his belongings strapped to the side. He had been my best friend and my brother, it was hard losing him. Now the only thing it reminded me of was the bad times following that day and my eventual dropping out of college in my second year and going to study in California.
My thoughts were interrupted by a rushed “Get on.” Without hesitation I climbed onto the back of the vehicle. There were no helmets, either John lost them or he never wore one; the latter was the more obvious guess. John had never taken the easy way or safe way out. He did things as exciting as he could. Parts of the building began to crumble as John revved the engine. The ground below us shook and began to crack.
“Pump it lets go!” I yelled.
John put his foot the pedal and the motorcycle spun up onto it’s back wheel pulling a wheelie. After a brief second or two, the cycle slammed down hard onto the pavement kicking up debris. A chunk of the building crashed by us just as we blasted forward. The motorcycle went faster then I had imagined it could. We were long gone before the building had collapsed but I could see the destruction from miles away. The building collapsed into itself as dust rose from the ground to hide the building from view. Within minutes John stopped the bike.
I stared hard at my brother with a questioning look. “What are we doing?”
My brother, not missing a beat, snapped me his “Shut your mouth” look. “I hear something, be quiet.”
At first I thought he was crazy, I couldn’t hear a thing over our engine running. That was when I noticed, our engine wasn’t on. Glinting from the sun we saw two men on cycles. From a distance they didn’t look like they had been mutated, they looked almost perfectly normal.
“Thugs.” John snorted with disgust. “Keith, stay here.”
“Wait, what are you¾” I stopped talking when I saw his face. It was that grin again; the one he had when he had blown up the building. Not wanting so much as to get involved, I hopped off of his bike and drew my Colt. I just now realized that it had “Colt” written on it. I felt stupid to not have seen it earlier. My brother gave me one last grin and pulled out his shotgun. Without a word, John blasted into the void of dust that covered this part of town. Before I even heard fighting I turned around in horror to see survivors from the building hobbling at me. It was a group of ten and it reminded me of a scene from some movie I had long forgotten. The leader wore a red gown embroidered in gold linen. A large hood completely hid its face. These weren’t common clothes in the city, this was the same one from before. When one lunged at me I sparred no mercy on his soul. I easily dodged the lunge and grabbed his head and twisted. His momentum and my strength easily snapped his neck. The robed one looked amused. He withdrew his hand into his pocket and pulled out that same whistle I had seen before and blew it, exactly like before. The other nine of them rushed me.
The whole experience was a blur. I whipped my colt out and aimed for the advancing group. I shot off three bullets into the crowd and ran backwards aiming. I had hit one dead in the head, one in the foot, and one was a complete miss. The injured one was crippled over on the ground and the dead one was being dragged back to the robed man. When I averted my attention I saw one had gotten right in my face. As if on instinct I swung my foot in an arc shape roundhouse kicked the things head straight off. The wounded one had gotten up, but no sooner was it back down. I watched the disloyalty of these sins against humanity as they tore off the mans limbs. I still don’t understand why they do this. With another burst of rounds from my colt, I shot down another two of the creatures, both were either killed on impact or torn apart, I didn’t care to watch. It had been too long since John had left and I grew worried. I spun around and went to escape but I recoiled in shock as I saw another dozen or so of those mutants marching from the other directions. They had me pinned in this spot. Slowly, they advanced on me with a look of murder in their eyes. In the distance I heard an engine rev.
“Hey you piles of flesh! Leave my brother alone!”
The voice had come from my brother. His voice was soon followed by sheer mechanical fury. His cycle burst through the crowd on the right going right over two of them, crushing their skulls like one would pop a balloon. He didn’t stop even as he came right at me. As I ducked out of the way he reached out grabbing my shirt and threw me on back. I braced for impact as we approached the next group of people. Just as easily as before, the motorcycle went through them like they were nothing.
The first thing that came to mind was to ask him what happened to the thugs. “Where are they?”
“Where are who?”
He knew damn well who, he was just trying to annoy me again. “The thugs, who do you think?”
John spun the bike around and headed back towards the horde. When we were within viewing distance, he stopped the bike. The thugs from before were dismounting their bikes and loading their guns. One was tall, muscular and black with many scars. The other was a less muscular but much taller white man. Both looked to be in their thirties and both didn’t give two shits about these monsters. Before even checking if they were mutants at all, they began to shoot into the group. These men could easily take the group now that they were clustered together from attempting to chase us. Or at least that’s what I thought. With the blow of the whistle, not one, not two, but the entire group ran at the two thugs. Ran, something was wrong with that. Every time I had fought them they walked or shuffled. It was this that had me believing that they were the living dead. My views changed as the group charged the men. The thugs shot into the group and killed three or four but the rest were able to reach them. The first to reach them was a tall woman. He hair was all but gone and her clothes were ragged and torn. Flesh, like the others, dropped off her in drops. In one swift motion, she disarmed one of the men, took his own gun, and shot him in the face. I was shocked too see this. Moments later the other’s neck had been snapped. In unison the group stopped at another whistle blow. Whoever these people were, they were no longer human. No human could lose chunks of flesh, miss body parts, constantly bleed, and still be alive. Without another word to me, John pushed down on the gas¾hard. As the wind blew in my face, the same thoughts continued to cross my mind. I couldn’t understand why those things hadn’t done to me as they did to the thugs. With me they moved sluggishly, almost as if they were toying with me. There was no logic behind it, was I not just as much prey as the thugs? I pushed the thoughts to the back of my head as my brother stopped the bike.
“Why did we stop?” I asked. I stopped and thought about it for a second. “Now that I think about it, where are we even going?”
My brother just stared at me as if I were an idiot. “We’re leaving town. What, did you want to stay here?” He laughed at his own sarcasm. “As too why we’ve stopped, we’re at the gate out of here.
He was right, as I looked forward, I saw the open road ahead of us surrounded only by ruined land. I expected to see some more of those mutants but there were none. We were home free. After a long breath, my brother got back on the bike and motioned me to do the same. We both had survived hardships In that town. For some time, it had been our homes yet we had never run into each other. It was a blessing to leave but it also left pain. I almost felt sorry when I saw the road sign “You are Now Entering/Leaving Hollywood.” The feeling quickly passed and I looked towards the future, and where my brother planned to lead us now…
Back in the city, a robed figure looked at his brethren. He dropped his hood and revealed a skeletal face. He had no face eyes nor hair. His skin was as pale as death and his teeth were pointed and black. The man looked towards the crowd and smiled.
“You’ve all done well today my brothers. We have finally found him.”
The comment was followed by much applause from the deranged group.
“Although many of you are slowly dieing from the disease, your faith will be rewarded and given to you by your brothers and sisters whom have aspired to the second level.”
More cheering commenced. As a group they all stopped as he raised his hand.
“Today, we have set our trap for him, tomorrow, we shall spring it!”
At this the cheering returned louder then ever.
------------------------
July 29th 3:42 pm

“Is that it?” Harriet asked. “Is that the end of your story?”
“No.” Keith said. “It’s only just begun…”

Copyright ©Ryan Jakuboski 2006; Edited by Chase Colman