The World has Died

I reached out to the door, feeling for the keyhole. I managed to find it and slip the key in after a bit of fumbling. I managed to get inside, and saw that it was a single apartment to the entire floor, though It was just as black in the building as it was outside, perhaps more so. At any rate, there wasn't much that could be done any longer except wait until morning when there was light to see, and pray that a plane didn't fall on top of us, of course. "Hers is the only apartment up here. We can all go in and find someplace to sleep, I doubt much of anything is going to be working at the moment...but beds are beds...Be careful, its pitch black in there too. " I said, holding open the door and knocking on it lightly so the others could make their way inside.
 
Chomps carried the woman into the room carefully making sure not to hit any of the walls of door knobs. He followed Stephen into the room carefully making sure not to step on anything. The darkness in the room was going to make it really difficult to maneuver. "Well, this is much more exciting than a match and the power went out...Trying to get around the ring was super fun." Chomps sighed, it was a dark day. Looking around to place the woman, he found somewhere soft and placed her down.
 
Raiden followed into the room, blindly looking for a light switch before remembering there was no electricity. "Oh... right" He looked for the moonlight's gleam before finding a couch. He sat on it feeling a little exhausted. But who wouldn't be, especially in their situation, walking up 12 floor takes quite a bit of energy, not to mention the hell they've all gone through. "Wasn't this a bloody mess of a day" he complained to himself, but loud enough for the others to hear.
 
"Well...not much to do now other than sleep and hope tomorrow doesn't suck as bad as tonight does" I said, shutting the door behind me, making sure it was locked tight. I stumbled my way to what appeared to be a chair, and sat down in it, quickly drifting off to sleep...

(Time skip to morning)

I awoke to the glorious sight of the now-risen sun. I got up, and quietly made my way to the window, to see a city in ruin. Newspapers everywhere, broken windows, looted stores...people wasted no time committing crime when they were completely safe from the guns of the police. There were a few people dutifully headed to God knew where, and police seemed to be trying to keep order from horseback, but everything was quiet and obviously a state of emergency was going to be declared, if it wasn't already. "Well...it looks like nothing has changed since last night."
 
Chomps awoke to the sunrise shining through the windows. What a relief it was to see the light. Stretching on the ground before rising to his feet, he looked over at Kale, then back to Stephen. "I'm not sure much was going to change over night, Stephen." Folding his arms. " So what's our plan now? Honestly..We're just law-dee-dawing around and wasting time. We need to get to wherever we're supposed to be going." Chomps was tired of just waiting around and taking little action. The time to act was now.
 
Kale stirred and slowly opened her eyes, finding herself sprawled out on her plush white sofa. She blinked a few times and sat up gingerly, aching but not dead. Well, that was a relief. She stood and started stretching out her painful muscles, eying the apartment. Nothing was broken, and there were three guys there. The street player that she recognized easily, a bigger guy that she sort of remembered telling off the night before, and a guy that she didn't recognize at all who was still sleeping on the carpet. She glanced out the window and sighed. So, it hadn't been a dream after all.


"There's food in the fridge that should be eaten before it rots. Help yourselves," she said, waving toward the kitchen as she walked over to a cabinet and threw the door open. She rummaged around until she found a small key taped under one of the lower shelves, then walked over to a wall and pulled a painting down. Tossing aside the piece that was worth several thousand dollars, she twisted the key in a hidden hole and pushed aside a large door. Inside were a few bicycles, several crates of canned food, dozens of filled bottles of distilled water, and duffel bags packed with brand new clothing and toiletries.


"I used to be obsessed with the zombie apocalypse and my mother kept me quiet with money. Don't judge me," she muttered, having a feeling the others might be staring. She pulled everything out and pushed it aside, assessing what she had and what they would need. They'd have to leave the city, that was for sure. She sighed and went to her mother's bedroom, pausing when she realized it was empty. Thinking rapidly, she realized that her mother had probably gone out drinking after their fight. She grabbed her skateboard from her bedroom and headed for the door.


"I'll be back soon."
 
I turned as Kale woke up, and began frantically rearranging her living room, revealing a room full of food and supplies. The girl was clearly well prepared, albeit a little of the wall, but it was certainly paying off now. Besides, I knew Mormons that had twice as many supplies in their basements back in California. They'd be REALLY popular in a few days. I turned to Kale as she was leaving, and stopped her briefly. "There are certainly plenty of supplies Kale, but there aren't enough of us to carry them...We'd need some kind of cart...wait!" I looked over the bikes, and noticed there were only three, and nodded in excitement. "I have an idea! Next to the church, there's a small business that does carriage tours! I'm good friends with the owner, and we could probably make some kind of deal with him for some horses and a carriage! We could carry a ton of stuff in that and not have to worry, the only problem is that we'd have to feed the horses, and the church is downtown. I mean, we could always go ahead and leave, but we don't have enough bikes, and there's so much stuff...what do you think we should do, guys?"

(This is the first decision we have to make that could affect the story later on. Whatever choice you guys make will effect the options you have later.)
 
...Morning? Desmond's body gave acreaking kind of ache as he found him sitting upright from thefurthest back pew of the Cathedral he had stolen into the nightbefore. His first thought was snuffed like the dreams of aback-broken coal miner who couldn't reach his aspirations – lastnight was no dream. If the aching and the fact that he was in acathedral didn't prove that much, he had absolutely no idea what elsewould. So, with a slow start, Desmond began to sit up and grind theheels of his palms into his eyes, touching his right knee to hischest before groaning at the tingling in his left leg. It wasapparent that he had fallen asleep with one of his legs dangling, sonow it had fallen asleep and felt as if it had swelled. The only wayto fix it quickly was what he was doing right this moment. Desmondlaid back and let out a sigh before groaning as he lifted his leftleg high into the air with his heel upward, both hands clutching theappendage. The tingling he felt suddenly intensified as Gravity beganto work its way into bringing the excess blood in the limb back intothe core of his body.

Finally, after the few minutes that hehad spent growling about his leg, Desmond let it fall and plant itsfoot flat into the floor before sitting up, shifting so that he nowlooked towards the front of the cathedral, palms pressed into the pewhe sat upon. He should be doing his morning stretches – the routinehe did every morning in order to keep his body limber and ready forany kind of sudden movements he needed to do, but...He still feltsick. Sure, he was a survivalist and all, but he's heard stories fromhis military friends about how their first kill had haunted them fora week, even. So how could he say that he shouldn't linger whensoldiers couldn't get over their kill for a while? Even they were inhostile environments until now...Even now, maybe?

“Grah,”Desmond growled as he smacked his hands into both sides of his face,letting out a groan afterwards. “What the hell am I thinking? Igotta get moving. Even a 'House of God' won't be safe when people areprobably going as crazy as a loony bin.”

With that, and aslight huff, Desmond hefted himself up off the pew and paced out intothe hall to turn and head towards the door. His body felt more sorethan usual with each and every step he took. His shoulders felt likethe world had been shoved on him after Atlas decided to trick him thesame way he did to Hercules. His legs quaked slightly from the lackof energy that left his muscles void. Through everything thathappened, he had forgotten to scrounge up something to eat and stuffit in his messenger bag. It was nearly the stupidest thing for asurvivalist to forget. What would've been worse to forget would bethe daggers that he kept hidden away in his bag. They hadn't beenused yet, and it'd be a desperate moment if he needed them.

AsDesmond came closer to the doors, the sudden feeling ofweightlessness hit him and made his knees buckle, spilling him forthonly for his hands to snap out and force himself back onto his feet.Another huff left Desmond's lips as he righted himself and stood fora moment before grasping the smooth golden handles of the enormousoaken doors before giving a tug. They seemed to open much easier nowas he leaned his body backwards, the rays of the sun flooding in asif a tidal wave of warmth that splayed across his tanned hide. Thewarmth felt good and bad all at once. The heat that washed againsthis face and hands was as gentle as a lover's touch, but it blindedhim and forced him to blink away the rays until his pupils couldadjust to the blinding sun. Still, once he had adjusted, nothing butgood came from the sun.

Desmond's first steps outside were, tobe expected, testing and hesitant, each motion careful as he began toguess just how much energy he had left before he was in the deep. Hehad sleep, so for now he should be right as rain, but that wouldn'tbe for certain if he had to run or defend himself. He began to walkforward in a more relaxed manner though and descend the staircasebefore him before turning right and into the city. Once more he wouldhave to plunge into the depths of the dead area to at least attainsomething edible, not to mention any other kinds of supplies that hewould need which had been forgotten. Going back to his own home nowwould be ridiculous until he ate. It was on the other side of town.For now, he'd have to simply have faith that his apartment wouldn'tbe raided for its contents and left empty. Furniture could be burned,weapons used against him, food pillaged and clothing stolen byscavengers for their own needs. But he had to try at least, right?Desmond nodded to himself at the thought and walked a little fasterdespite his hunger towards the city, his eyes and ears attuned toliterally any movement or scuff made around him.
 
Kale had walked out without even glancing back at the others. They were not her priority right now, and it wasn't like she had left them with nothing. She'd be back. Her mother had to be found first. As soon as she made it down the stairs, she dropped her skateboard and jumped on it to slide through the lobby. Out the door and she was rapidly moving down the sidewalk. Cars and random debris made it nearly impossible to go at a steady rate, but she managed to hop up and dodge most of it. A pile of garbage got in her way and she had to loop down an alley and around.


Her destination was the subway, but her detour took her farther than she had wanted to go and she had to backtrack. If her mother had gone out, it was probably to get on the subway and go ride around to relax. As much as her mother hated doing it, there was just something about it that soothed her - until she thought of the germs and dirt, anyway. Kale sighed inwardly and grabbed a light post, curving around it to head back up. She dipped and went around a corner, smacking straight into some guy who was walking. Caught completely off guard, she tripped and fell over, her skateboard sliding into the street as she sat up and brushed off her palms.


"Sorry.."
 
"Feels like I got hit by a damn truck"Zeke said groaning as he rolled on to his side. It was morning now and the light entered the dusky church through shattered glass windows. It seemed that the looters had left the church alone. Zeke stood up and noticed a man with a hood stumbling out the cathedral doors "Well no use sitting in this place might as well go look for chomps again" Zeke said as he followed the hooded man out the door
 
It seemed like forever that he had beenwalking through the streets of New York. The apparent shift in thepulse that was the Big Apple's life had shifted completely due to allthe power failures. No cars, no lights – nothing. So people reallydid have a reason to panic, yet they all seemed...Deafeated? Somesimply paced by with crying babies in their arms, others racing pasttrying to find families and calling out names, none of which he hadrecognized. The others that he was with were dead. Those were allthat he knew in this city. Now it was just desolate to him, thoughthe streets were filled with people going this way and that, callingfor families and shouting prophecies of Jesus and God and any otherkind of deity that had been in existence. But it was all bullshit tohim.

Desmond's thoughts and mindless pacing was cut offthough when he felt something collide against the right side of hisbody, sending him reeling and flinging out his own hands to catchhimself in a kind of push-up position. He sprung back up hard andlooked around before his eyes set upon the girl who had likely beenthe one to slam into him, watching her as she began to brush herselfoff. She had been heading in the complete opposite direction of him,so maybe it was the Cathedral? From his point of view, she didn'texactly look very threatening, but what he was taught warned himabout hidden threats. Still, Desmond couldn't help but begin pacingover to the skateboard before pushing his foot down on the tail endand kicking it up into the air, his hand gripping the side of theboard once it came to chest level. He then simply walked back over toher and held out his hand. For the moment, making friends wasn'texactly on his list of things to do, but would it hurt to show a bitof compassion at least?

“Hey kid,” he said in hislackadasical baritone. “You all right? Looks like you are.”
 
"I guess we could deal with the carriage... three bikes aren't enough, I'd probably go get mine if I knew it wasn't already stolen or crashed into or something like that" Raiden says starting to come into the conversation. "But thats just me... Chomps? Kale?" He goes near the window just to take a quick look towards the church for any potential criminals near, but see's nobody. He then goes back to the couch waiting for anyone to agree or dissagree with him.
(Sorry for the wait DX)
 
Chomps shrugged and nodded. "Seems all fine and dandy to me, Stephen...Sounds like the carriage might be our best bet right now. Plus..If the carriage broke or something..I'd be able to fix it. But anyway..IF we're going to meet up with your friend..I suggest.." Chomps moved about the apartment also looking out the window at the church then back to the group, mainly towards Stephen. " I suggest..We take a bag of supplies with us to get the carriage..And if we can possibly come back and load up..However..If something should prevent us from coming back..We take as much as we can carry and see along our journey if we can salvage anything useful."
 
I nodded in agreement. "To the carriage it is then. Each of us'll grab a backpack and fill it up. Water and dry-storage goods like rice, beans, and potatoes get priority. We'll come back for canned stuff if we get the time. We'll definently be scavageing on the way as well. Grab some breakfast from the fridge and eat it on the way. We're gonna want to eat all the food we can I'm sure." I then slung a duffle bag over my shoulder, and took out some of the clothing, replacing it with rice, dried lima beans, crackers, and a few bottles of water. Fortunately, we weren't in a desert, so water wouldn't be incredibly hard to come by, thank God, but a lot of it would need to be boiled before it could be drunk. At any rate, better than the people in Vegas would be doing, that's for sure. I made my way to the fridge, and opened it up, relishing the last bits of cool air to come from it, knowing that summer would soon be in full swing, and air conditioning was no longer able to hold back the heat. I took out an apple, wasteing no time to bite into it, a block of cheese, and a jug of milk. It was a half gallon, only a cupful left, and likely the last cold drink I'd ever have. I downed it quickly, and walked toward the door, waiting next to it for the others.
 
Chomps emptied out his bag filled with some extra clothes, putting in crackers, bottles of water, beans, and some nutrition bars. This would definitely keep him up and going for a while. Chomps knew he was going to eat, but right now he just wanted to stuff his face for the journey to the carriages. Walking over to the fridge, he began to chug down the large container of orange juice, stuffing down some of the chopped up celery inside. This would suffice for now as he hastily caught up to Stephen heading out the door.
 
Sitting there carefully, Kale brushed off her jeans and frowned at her own lack of grace. Smacking into somebody, yeah, that was really smooth. If this had happened before the disaster she probably would have gotten her ass beat. She looked over at the guy that she had collided with and watched him pick up her board before coming over and offering her a hand. Kid? Psht. Old man. She took his hand and stood, feeling a barely-there ache on her hip from her landing. It probably wouldn't even leave a bruise. Taking her skateboard back from him, she eyed him with a friendly curiosity and nodded a bit.


"I'm fine. Sorry about that, I was distracted," she said, then paused a moment. "Looking for somebody. I'm sure you can relate," she added in a quieter tone, knowing that there were probably thousands out there hunting for people right now. She glanced to the side and could see the entrance of the subway, which had a car plugging up almost the entire way. "Oh no!" she gasped, forgetting her manners and her conversation as she ran over to it. Dropping her board on the ground carelessly, she ran down the first few steps and immediately wiggled her way over the side of the car to slide down into the darkness.


That proved to be a rather stupid idea since it was completely black down there, but her eyes did adjust after a few moments. She had landed at the bottom of the stairs, sitting in a puddle of liquid that she was refusing to look at considering there were scattered bodies everywhere. There was a train, and then half of another. It was obvious they had smashed together. Some of the cars were still whole, though. She went over to one of the shattered windows and climbed inside, ignoring the scrape of broken glass against her palms and arms.


"Mom?" she called out uncertainly, scanning everywhere for a hint of survivors.
 
Desmond could only help but to standand watch the girl as she frowned. Was it really that bad of anordeal? Smacking into someone more friendly than most? If anything,he would think it'd be pure luck, but he could say the same forhimself. Most girls in the city knew how to defend themselves, whichthankfully for them it would come in handy. Shit was starting to hitthe fan quick, and by this time three days later, he was betting thatthe city would be in more of ruin that the start of orderly decaythat he was seeing now. His thoughts were taken from him though as hefelt the little bit of pressure around his hand and he instinctivelygripped and pulled, helping to tug the girl to her feet beforeletting go of her board and leaning against the light post behindhim. His arms were folded more closely towards his stomach than chestin order to hide clutching at the abyss of emptiness that was there.

The little conversation that she held with him did in factremind him of the things he was going to fetch before he had a quiteliteral run-in with the girl. All of his training gear andmore...Defensive items were in his apartment, and he still had a waysto go with no food. So really, there wasn't a someone, but somethings that he had been heading towards. Knives, collapsible swords,staff, and other things he would soon possess once he was off of thestreets. Again, though, thoughts were stolen from him as he suddenlyheard the girl's exclamation. Though she had begun to run, Desmondonly pushed his back off of the lamp post to pace over to where shehad gone. The car that had blocked the way wasn't hard for him toovercome with even the condition that he was in. A simple hop andslip of his body weight downward was all that was needed to clear theway before he delved into black.

Whatever slicked the floorsof the subway nearly threw Desmond off balance, and it took himenough to bend backwards and catch his weight before he figured outjust what the slick texture under them was. It was enough to make himstand straight and brush his fingertips off onto his pants beforegently grabbing the girl around the bicep and hauling her up to herfeet. A flashlight wouldn't be any good since the goddamn power wentout, so all he could do was shrug off his sweater and look aroundbefore snagging up a stray cane and wrapping the material around. Hewas completely shirtless now, but compared to the heat that the hoodytrapped, it was a lot better for now. He could smell the scent ofgasoline, and he thought that perhaps it was a better try than any.People couldn't fire guns, but perhaps they could burn at least adistilled version of oil? Desmond paced over to the heavy scent offuel and began rubbing the sweater into the shirt until it wassoaked, then pulled a lighter from his bag and lit it. The shirterupted as a bright ball of light upon the cane that lit up a fifteenfoot radius around him and.

Now, being able to see, he couldtell that the area was much worse than he had thought. There was morethan just blood staining the floors. Bodies were strewn all acrossthe ground that had spilled from the subway train. They were eithercrushed or skewered by wreckage. The train itself had jack-knifed inthe subway and was left as a curled, jagged mess of metal and glass.Most of the pillars were knocked over, and the few that wasn't werecracked and halfway torn through. It was a wonder that the subwayhadn't ignited with the gasoline that was pooled around or collapsedwith the weight of the street, but he guessed that it was better tobe in a dark room than a blazing inferno.

“We shouldprobably get out of here, kiddo.” Desmond started, pacing towardsher as his own eyes peered through the dim light. “I wouldn'texactly call this place safe.”
 
"First off, if you call me 'kiddo' again, I'm going to smack you with a brick. Secondly, I don't care if it's safe or not," Kale retorted in a mutter, picking her way carefully through the subway car. Apart from stepping over bodies and stray limbs, she also had to watch out for pools of slippery blood, scattered shopping bags, and some splattered fruit that were evidence of groceries. She saw a luggage bag that was open and empty and picked it up, packing it full of all the food she saw that wasn't spoiled, as well as any clothes she saw with tags still on them, regardless of size. Somebody would need them, she was sure. Now wasn't the time to be picky.


"Move the light a little," she called out after throwing the bag out a shattered window to land on the platform. She glanced out at the makeshift torch he had made, then looked back at the scene before her. Her hunt for survivors was pointless. Nobody was moving or breathing. She sighed and was going to turn away when a flicker of movement caught her eye. Stunned, she scrambled to the back of the car and saw it was only a mouse.


"Damn it.." she muttered, turning away and shaking her head. This was ridiculous. She started her way back toward the front, then paused. Something sounded.. off. A creaking? She frowned in confusion and looked up, seeing a dent in the roof slowly growing. It took her a moment to realize, but then she gasped.


"Cave in! Get out! Go back up the stairs!" she yelled, running back toward the back of the train to avoid being crushed. A crack like thunder announced that the bottom of the road had finally given out, and it crashed down into the car. One of the larger chunks slammed into the engine, causing an explosion that rocked the entire train and threw her out the back door just as she was about to step down. Laying on the tracks, she just stared. She was in the tunnel, and she couldn't see out. Was she.. caved in? It was pitch black. She started to panic, scrambling to her feet and looking around rapidly.


"H-Hello?"
 
Raiden didn't eat quite yet, he was ok to wait to eat just a bit longer. He kept the few things in his backpack that were there and stuffed it with the few supplies there seeing that chomps and Stephen would handle the food. "Well atleast we have time to stock up..." he said looking at the positives "It could be worse..."
 
I nodded at Raiden's comment. "I doubt anyone's thinking this is much more than a black out, but at best, its an emp attack, and at worst...well I'm not quite sure, but it isn't good." I said, not having the slightest idea of what to call the events that had transpired. The facts didn't help much either, as God alone knew why the hell guns weren't firing. I shook my head, banishing random thoughts and pulling my focus to the task at hand. I took a last look out the window, and saw mostly deserted streets. It was unlikely that anyone would be out in this eat even with power, but it would still be stupid to go as we were, carrying all this stuff. I walked back to the kitchen, and pulled the three largest knives out of the knife rack. I grabbed a loaf of bread from atop the counter as well, and then walked back to the group. "They aren't much, but having this much stuff and being unarmed would be stupid." I said, handing each of the two men a knife, roughly the same length and shape as the other two. I nodded, and motioned for the two to follow me. I made my way down the steps, and through the front door, assuming the other two would be right behind me.