The skies are darkened by clouds. No light would shine upon this city anymore. For this day and many to come the city would fall into Darkness. As I am walking through the streets of the ruined city, I try my best to find food and a source of water. My supplies were nearly used up but there must’ve been something here, in this big and old city. Most of the creatures I had encountered found different sources for... food. Not that I was focusing on a good old steak or something nice to be cooked in an oven. In this ruined world, that was now a luxury. In fact, finding anything was a luxury already, especially as settling down where there was food and water was not an available option.

I still remember how it all began. I was a child at the age of twelve, living with my father. My mother had died not even a year ago due to cancer but my father did the best he could, not knowing that he would have to do a lot more in the future. He was working as a nightguard in the local Museum, so he was getting some sleep over the day. I know how I wished for him to do something with me but ultimately accepted how it was. After all, I could just watch anything I wanted on TV. And so I discovered the movies about Zombies and the Apocalypse. For the twelve year old child that I was, I was scared but I wanted to see more. I was disgusted when the gore came up but it seemed like covering up my eyes, so I wouldn’t see it, helped me just as much as turning off the TV. That is until my father had discovered, that I was watching those movies behind his back. He locked away the remote but instead of telling me not to do this again he did actually nothing at all. He said that he understood my curiosity for movies for grown ups but that I was too young to watch it. I should wait for a few more years before watching them. But I would not get away without punishment and so he said that he would lock away the remote for a whole month. A kid without his TV! What would I do? Oh right, I could still go outside and meet my friends. I soon forgot the movies but only when I was outside or with my father. As soon as I was alone, I remembered the movies and even had nightmares about them. And since my father was working over night, he could not be there to help me with them. But, soon, it would not matter if I was scared of the Zombies or not, as the things I would see would scare me even more.

It all happened on the day when the summer officially began. I was heading to school and the busdriver, a Afro-American in the forties, was acting weird. He was usually a very happy and social person, but today it was different. He looked fairly tired, his eyes were bloodshot and he was not interested in greeting any of the kids which he usually did without hesitating. He was always happy to see us and even dealt with trouble in the bus, telling the troublemakers that he would tell the teachers about it. When he was ill, the person to replace him did nothing but his job. He made sure all the kids were in the bus, drove us to school and paid no attention to what was going on if some kids were bullying another or if there was trouble in general. So our usual busdriver turned quickly into my favorite busdriver and our whole class even made something for him to thank him at one point. I asked him if he was ok and he smiled a little. "You are the first to ask me today, kid. Thank you. But don’t worry about me. I am probably just a bit ill." As I heard that, I feared that he would have to stay at home for yet another while. But he laughed, obviously knowing what I thought. "I can still drive, but you better dont come closer. Don’t want to infect you." I couldn’t help myself but smile again. I thanked him, for whatever reason I had and went into the back of the bus. Strangely enough I noticed that some of the kids had the same bloodshot eyes and tired look on their faces as the busdriver had. I decided to get onto a seat where no one sat next to me and placed my bag next to me to block the seat.

A few minutes later we arrived at the school. And this is where things started to get even stranger. Instead of the usual picture I would see from the front of the school, I saw white tents everywhere on the school grounds, even behind the fenced-off areas. There were a few police officers and... My father! As well as other parents of a few friends of mine! What was going on? Soon after we stopped, a police officer ordered us and the busdriver to get out. I wanted to get to my father but the officer wouldn’t let me. That is when I noticed that he was wearing a mask that covered his mouth and nose but also white surgery gloves. He was leading me towards one of the tents and as I was walking with him I kept looking back to my father. He wore the same mask and had the same worried look as a few of the other parents next to him. As I was in the tent I was greeted with 2 officers and 3 more people in weird looking suits. Their whole body was covered and I remember that I had seen them in one of the zombie-movies. Was that happening right now? A zombie apocalypse? But before I could think more about it, I was told to sit down. The officer started to speak to one of the people in the suits. "What is his name?" the person in the suit asked. "His name is Tyler Owdin." The officer replied. How did he know my name? "Tyler Owdin... Wait a second, he is on the list but he is not supposed to be here already. There are other kids before him."

"Yes, I know he is. But I am a friend of his father and you are a friend of mine, Jeremy. Just test him real quick so his father and him can go. They already have it hard enough right now." Said the officer. The person, I now knew was named Jeremy, gave of a deep sigh. He shook his head and looked at me. "I will do this now and then we are even." he simply said and came over to me. He began by looking at my eyes. When he was done he wrote something down and took out a syringe. That is when I panicked a little. I didn’t like needles and was always scared. But I knew that, if I would get through this, I would be with my father again and he could explain everything. I closed my eyes and just waited for it to happen. Jeremy took my right hand, pulled my sleeve up and began tapping the back of my arm, looking for the veins. Soon after I only felt a short... Well, it wasn’t even pain. I felt something but it didn’t hurt at all. I opened my eyes and saw how he was extracting blood from the vein. He was done a few seconds after and patched up the small but still bleeding wound. He then went over to some machines, I still don’t know the names of and began to analyze the blood. Or at least that is what I can think of now. Back then, I had no clue of what he was doing. After, what felt like an eternity he looked at the officer. "He is fine. He can go with his father. " I was so happy to hear that and so I tried to run out directly. But the officer stopped me again, to give me a mask just like the one he was wearing. He helped me to put it on and went outside with me, leading me through the other kids and teachers. I saw the busdriver again and as we were walking past him, he smiled at me and gave me a thumbs up. I returned the gesture, not noticing that he couldn’t see the smile through my mask. I hoped that he and the others would be ok, just like me. "Tyler!" I heard my father say. I looked forward again and saw him. I ran directly towards him and hugged him. "Thank god you are ok." he said. I was not talking, I was simply happy to be with him right now. The officer and him began to talk for a few minutes and then we were off to get back home. I asked my father if he knew what was going on, but he said that he had no idea. Suddenly people were getting sick, all over the world. They all had the same symptoms. Some were hit worse and others had no problems other than the bloodshot eyes. So far however no one supposedly died.

The following days and months to come would shape my life and how I would start to react to things around me. I was not allowed to go back to school but I was allowed to go outside. But only if I would wear my mask and those surgery gloves, that were far too big for my hands. But I did as my father told me, as he did the same. Actually, he did not go back to work anymore. Like me, he would stay at home most of the time. But he was still getting paid. I didn’t think too much about it as I had other things to worry about. All of what happened was just scary. I heard on the news today that the first people that were infected with this strange "virus", as they called it, had died. Just a few, not even over ten people and mainly in Europe, but still. As the days went on, news of more people being killed by the virus kept coming up. Even in my hometown, people would start to die now and so they started to evacuate the city. They feared that the dead would spread the virus to the ones that were not infected and tried to get as many as possible to safety. We had to pack up what we could, with me not missing my plushies and especially not my koala-plushie that I still have now nine years later. As we arrived at a train station, I noticed how it was guarded by the military and not by simple police officers. We were sent via trains towards another city that has been "cleaned", as one of the soldiers guarding the train said to my father as he asked if there were any infected in there. I didn’t understand what that meant and my father told me that they had to make sure that the city was safe.  It took a few hours for us to get there but just before we arrived I got to see what the city was like from the outside. Giant Skyscrapers and a wall, being built, around the city as protection. When the train stopped and we got out, we were brought to our new home which was an apartment just slightly bigger than our old one. And from this moment on we would spend a few years in this city. Over the years my father had found himself a new job. Funny enough, it was again the position of nightguard. But this time he would guard the main gates of the city and watch out for any suspicious individuals. In the years between my thirteenth and sixteenth birthday, I befriended a few kids from neighbouring apartments and buildings. They were from all over the country. Together we explored the city, had a ton of cool adventures and even did some things my father better doesn’t know about. We basically broke into one of the research facilities without being noticed. We didn’t get much further but the vents but it wasn’t all that interesting anyways. When I finally turned sixteen, I received a gift from my father. It was my very own TV and I was allowed to even use it in my own room. His thought was to distract me from what happened in the outside world and that I could now watch movies instead of being worried constantly. But I was not interested in that anymore. I wanted to see the news. I wanted to know what was happening. I wanted to know if this was more than a simple virus killing people or if, as I thought, a zombie apocalypse was starting right now! They did not report about the dead coming back to life. They were talking about the people, who were infected, behaving strange. But that is all they said. I was upset. What in the hell was going on in the world and why did they keep it as a secret?

A day later I met up with my friends on the rooftop. We began to talk about what I heard on the news as none of them actually owned a TV or even a Radio. There were as upset and curious as I was. One of them began to talk about the place we broke in a year back and that the broken vent has not been discovered yet. We all were older now, so we could probably get in even further. And so we had a plan. It was not hard to convince my father of the fact that I would spend some time with my friends over the night as I did that a few times already without anything happening. I went out with my backpack and ran directly towards the facility where my friends were already waiting for me. We had a quick talk about what to do if "thing A" or "thing B" would happen and then left our backpacks and bags behind a dumpster nearby to get into the vent right after. We got further than before and even entered a bigger room filled with Computers. Luckily the room had only one door as entry point to the room and that one, as one of us checked, was locked. We sat down next to the PCs and switched them on. And that is when I thought to myself that I probably should have just watched the movies. We found a ton of videos labeled with names from other cities, most likely recorded there. The footage mainly showed the infected, a few soldiers and scientists. Some had begun to mark their own skin with symbols, others began to dress strangely and mainly in grey or black. Others again had built weird constructions, where only they knew how to operate or use them. When Soldiers or Scientists tried to talk to them, they were faced with either silence, staring or laughter. On one occasion one of them even began to talk. It was mostly nonsense and no one knew what to make of it but when the scientist said that he wanted to talk to him so he could help him, the infected began to scream and laugh hysterically. "LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR!" It would not stop unless the scientist and all soldiers had left the room and even then it would take more than just minutes for the it to stop. On another video they were trying to find out what one of the constructions would do. It took them a while to find out how to activate it, but eventually they did. At first I thought nothing would happen. I mean, the thing was just something they had built out of wood, paper and metal they somehow got from the beds, tables and other things they could break. But then, the thing somehow killed one of the soldiers. The other soldier and the scientist stepped back in shock and went directly to the door. The lights went out but were illuminating the room as fast as they went out. But now the door would not open. Another camera perspective showed the other side of the door. Scientists tried to open it from the other side as well. Now the second soldier just fell to the floor. The scientists, noticing it just a few seconds after, kneeled down to check his pulse and went immediately back up to try his best to break down the door. This... thing somehow killed both soldiers... and now it opened the door on the other side of the room? One of the infected entered the room and stepped over to the construct to shut it off. The lights went out, on and he stared at the scientist who couldn’t help himself but stare back. I couldn’t see his face due to the camera’s perspective but I would bet all my belongings on the fact that he was confused and scared shitless. The infected grabbed something from the construction and made his way over to the scientist. When he was just a few steps away he just threw the thing in front of the scientist and went back into the other room. From what I could see, what he had thrown was a metal pipe. The scientist picked up the pipe and stared at it for a few seconds and then met the same fate as the two soldiers before. And just as his final breath escaped him, the construct went back to life.

We were creeped out already and didn’t need to see more. Hell, the fact that there was more made it even worse. Who knew what else they found out or how many more would’ve died? I didn’t want to know and my friends seemed to think the same. We turned the PCs off and went back into the vents. We made sure that we left the place as we entered and grabbed our bags and backpacks as soon as we got out. We wanted to get away from here as fast as possible and so our feet took us to the apartments and the old known rooftop of the building.

A year went on without much happening. We discussed what we saw every time we met up to see if we could make sense of it, but ended up forgetting it by distracting our self with happier thoughts and activities. The girl in our group, which I kinda had a crush on, would celebrate her birthday in the upcoming week. And I already prepared a gift for her where I knew that she would love it! But sadly it was only in the next week and so, as much as I wanted to see her reaction, I had to wait. We had a good few hours to spend and went home early that day. As we were growing older we stopped going out on the streets in the middle of the night that often. We still did it, but not nearly every day. Man, how one year, knowing that you are fucked no matter what, can change you. So we decided to enjoy our live and not just throw it away in the night. The day, after all, was the time where most of the things would happen. In the night we only had clubs, bars, movie-theaters and so on and so forth. But That night, we all would go out. In fact, literally everyone would head onto the highest points of the city.

Just as I was trying to sleep, at around 11pm or so, there were sounds of explosions coming from the outside. I got up as fast as I could, waking up my father in the room next to mine and ran up to the roof. Funny enough, our sleep pattern was so bad that only me and my friends were up here at first. But it wouldn’t take long for the rooftop to fill up with more and more people. As the time went by, we heard more and more explosions in the distance but we never saw it. Due to the darkness of the night we couldn’t even see much in the first place. But explosions should create some light, so why couldn’t we see those? We waited for hours, one guy even brought up his portable television so we could catch the news if they would happen to send some on the channels. It was morning already and slowly but surely the moon gave its crown back to the sun. Now the kingdom of light would rule again, but what we see, in the early minutes of dawn was not what we wanted to see. In fact, we saw nothing. No smoke, no damage to the environment, just a whole lot of nothing. I began to look around just like a few others and then noticed something way in the distance. I asked my father if he had some binoculars in the apartment. As he said yes, I ran downstairs to get them. It took me a few minutes to find them because they were somewhere in the back with all the clothes. Man, my own room was more organized than my fathers room. I quickly went back up to see what was there in the distance. I had a suspicion but I did not want it to be true. As I looked through the binoculars, the first thing I spotted was the neighbouring town. I began looking for the big thing I saw and... There it was. It looked like a Ferris Wheel but this thing was most certainly not meant to entertain or to give you a cool look of the town below. It looked similar to the construct the infected had made to kill the soldiers and the scientist. But that was not the worst. What I could make out through the binoculars was that the construct was covered in red. This could most likely be due to the obviously used Ferris Wheel but since I couldn’t make out more, I would never know. I gave the binoculars to the other people, but first my father. He was as shocked as I was. Then a few soldiers came up on the roof and told us not worry about the thing in the distance and that actions have already taken place. The explosions we heard were planned attacks against "Terrorists" that tried to launch a bioweapon, filled with the virus, against the city. So the cover-up had begun already. But that still did not explain as to why we couldn’t see the explosions. Unless they happened below the ground. But that wasn’t the case or they would’ve sounded completely different. Even I knew that something sounds different when it’s muffled, below or behind something.

Me and my friends spent the upcoming days together with total silence from the outside world. Then the birthday came and I finally was able to give her the present. I don’t even remember what it was anymore. But I still remember her face and how she smiled. She was very happy and was able to forget everything for this one day. And that is more than I could’ve asked for. But I actually got more. I was given a present even though it wasn’t my birthday. She kissed me. I was a bit surprised as to why she suddenly did that, but then I saw my friends and their big fat grin. They told her. I should’ve been angry at them for telling her of my secret but I was more than happy about the outcome. Another year went by, the silence grew louder and me and my girlfriend were able to get into our own apartment. One of the people in the building had disappeared and that was now months ago. So they dealt with the formalities and let us have the apartment. It wasn’t too far away from the one my father owned so if he needed help, I was still there. But we needed this apartment anyways since recently she told me that she got pregnant. In all these bad times this made me even happier than the fact that she was with me already. My father was happy just as much even if he was a little worried. And so we had spent our days in the city. Ignorant, on what would maybe come towards us.  We all were focusing on different things now. I was working for the apartment’s owner and my, soon to be bigger, family. My friends had their own jobs and we all tried our best. Our best to ignore the bad and live on as if nothing ever happened. We wanted to introduce the next generation to a new world, but a world where you could live a good life.

But as you know, that is not what happened. two years later, our child born to be a healthy little girl, the silence stopped and the sounds of explosions were back. We all were told to stay in the apartments but one of my friends, who became head of the security in record time, ordered the soldiers to stand down and leave us be. Maybe, now that I think about it, that was not such a good idea. The people were able to roam around more and get onto the wall to see what was happening from a bit closer than just the rooftops. I brought the binoculars with me so I could see even further. My father and my friends came with me to a specific spot that would get us very close to the construct in the distance. Now it was about as far away as I could see it from the rooftops with the binoculars, so I would surely see more now. And what I saw made my jaw drop. You know how on Ferris Wheels, you would have the cabins hanging down, being attached to the Wheel only on two sides? The cabins were gone and instead of the cabins being attached to either side, there were human bodies attached to it. From the bodies themself you could see cables going down to the part that holds everything together. Whatever this construct was for, it was creating those sounds. There were no bombs or explosions happening. Just the thing creating sounds. I handed the binoculars to my father and my friends and their expressions where the same as mine. Shocked and confused. What was going on here?

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

But we couldn’t think of it for all to long because now a real explosion went off. One of the gates was blown up from the outside and the infected began to rush into the city. Everyone started to panic. And in the panic, I managed to lose my father and most of my friends. I made sure not to lose my two girls as well and kept them close to me at all times possible. The best idea was to move back to the apartments, lock us in and wait for the others. I kept holding her hand and made sure that she and our little girl were still with us. After a good amount of time, heading back and forth due to Them and people running in panic, we finally arrived at the apartments. We got up as fast as we could and locked the door behind us. From inside we heard explosions, gunshots and screaming. No matter how much someone wanted to enter, for safety, I kept the door shut. It wasn’t one of our friends or my father’s voice and what if the person wanting to enter was one of them? We knew they could talk and who knew how they had evolved in the last years? We decided to hold out inside of the apartment, until the sounds would have died down. We had food, elec- The lights just went out. We had food, water, we were alive and we were safe. Or at least as safe as one could be in this world gone mad. We could make it for one or two weeks at best, but at that point we surely would be able to get out.

We waited for hours, until we finally heard knocking on the door again. I grabbed a little hammer as my only means of defending myself and went to the door. When I asked who was there, I heard that it was one of my friends. I opened the door and was about to just slam it right into his face. He was... Infected. He was able to stop the door from being shut and began to talk. "You two have to get out of here... We’re all Fucked... Thank you... For everything..." were the only words I heard before he slowly closed the door from the outside. I told him to wait, wanted to open the door, but this time it was him keeping it closed. "I am sorry... But I don’t want to hurt you if I turn like them..." he said and left, as I heard his feet carrying him further and further away. We decided to stay for one more day and then finally left the apartments behind. We stepped, our backpacks filled with supplies and our girl safe in her arms, into the now ruined city that we used to feel so safe in. In just one day, everything had changed. It was similar to how it went when it all began, but it was worse. We saw dead bodies, broken doors and crashed cars. Fire, Smoke and broken windows. Trash was littered everywhere. It was like a scene out of one of the movies, I had watched back then but this wasn’t just one or two years ago. This has happened just now.

As we went down the stairs, I didn’t trust the elevators enough in this situation, we noticed someone coming down from a floor above us. I did not want to take the risk and told my girlfriend that we have to get out faster. The person could’ve been a normal person but also one of Them. As we left the building, we got just a bit further down the street when I heard screaming from behind. I turned around, but noone was there. I noticed the person in the apartment building trying to break down a door and took out my binoculars. When I saw who it was, I just dropped them. I didn’t care to hear the sound of breaking glass, as it hit the ground. What I saw was my father, trying to break down our door to get to us. My girlfriend took my hand and began to pull me away from the scene and succeeded after a few tries. As we went past the ruined buildings, dead bodies and burning cars we somehow made it to one of the gates. It was the one that had been blown up, but there was no damage to the gate or its walls. No layer of smoke on the ground or any signs of an explosion. Just a gate, wide open.

As we stepped out of the city, we were greeted with a world we didn’t know anymore. There were more constructs we could see, now that we could pay attention to more than just a towering Ferris Wheel in the distance. And the more I saw, the more I lost hope. Hope to return into a world that was safe. Hope to return into a world that was normal. A world with friends, family and the daily duties. Hope was not the last thing to die. It had died before anything else. The upcoming years would be a challenge. We could never find shelter or a place to stay, for longer than just a few days. We noticed how some of the infected were mutated and how they used animals, just as mutated, to find the... Living. At this point in time I did not think of them as living beings anymore. Their only purpose was to find the ones that were still normal and alive, to either kill them or attach them to one of the constructs. We kept our distance to them as good as we could, but eventually they found us. I still had the strength to fight them back and kill as many as there were, to protect my family, but if my hope wouldn’t have died already then it would have met its end by now. As I was making sure that both my girls were fine, I noticed how both their eyes were bloodshot. But, maybe it was just that they were tired, since we had been walking for a whole day by now. We needed to find a shelter for, at the very least, one night! We found an old farmhouse that looked like nothing ever happened in the world and locked the doors. As they went to sleep, I made sure that the house was safe and began to look around for any supplies that we might need. And, who knew, maybe this house was safe enough for us to stay for years to come. Not finding anything made me hope for better days again. I sat down in the kitchen, thinking of what to do now. Everything was doomed and nothing would return to what it once was. Just, what happened to the world that it went to shit like this, in this short amount of time? This was not just a zombie apocalypse, where a bite could turn you into one of them. It just infected people at random and those fortunate enough to not be affected would be killed or infected through blood in the early stages of the Virus. At that point, I decided to head to sleep as well. It was no use, after today’s events, to think about this. I made sure that every door to the outside was locked, made sure every window was closed and then headed to the bedroom. Both of my girls were sleeping and I tried my best not to wake them up. I could not sleep for a good hour, but eventually it would all crash down on me and put me to sleep. In my dream I was back at home with my father. Celebrating my thirteenth birthday. All my friends were there and even the police officer. Then I noticed a few of the friends that I only had met after the incident and the dream took a turn for the worse. The room turned dark, the thirteen turned into a eighteen, most of my friends and family members vanished and as it was just me and my girls, the darkness filling the room would just absorb them too. The dream ended when I blew out the candle and I woke up in a world I would not want to return to.

I stared at the wall for quite a while, not standing up or turning around. I didn’t want to wake them up and let them have their well deserved sleep. After what felt like an hour or so I finally turned around and was a bit shocked. They weren’t here. I got up immediately and made my way through the whole house. I could not find them. I began to panic, calling their names but it was no use. I finally made it back to the front door and finally noticed that it wasn’t closed. Someone had forced his way through this door. There was blood, not alot but enough to notice it, on the door from the inside. No. They were not infected! No! I took a look at the door from the outside to see if there was anything, but couldn’t find any marks or scratches. It was only from the inside and I knew that the only living beings inside were me and my two girls. Tears began to run down my cheeks. I could not believe what was happening. What began with the death of my mother ended with me losing literally everyone I loved.

As the last year went by I kept changing locations. The house was not safe anymore with the doors lock broken. I actually thought about suicide many times by now but never could get myself to do it. Somehow, hope revived itself over and over again only to tell me that there may be other people still out there. And so I headed back to the old city and its walls. The skies were darkened by clouds. No light would shine upon this city anymore. For this day and many to come the city would fall into Darkness. As I walk through the streets of the ruined city, I try my best to find food and a source of water. My supplies were nearly used up but there must’ve been something here, in this big and old city. I went through a few shops only to find them to be empty and ransacked. Sometimes I could find a few cans of food, but without a can opener, those were quite useless. But then, as I was looking through yet another shop, I noticed something in one of the rooms. There was a wall that did not seem to belong to the rest of the building. What I mean with that is that it looked not as old and that someone must’ve put it up at some point after everything happened over the years. Going around the house and the room inside let me to believe that there was no other way to get into that part of the building. And so I collected what strength I had left and broke down the wall. It was easier than I thought, but then again, the times have not been all too easy on the town itself. What I found behind the wall was an old rusted hatch. Were there people living underground? Or was this part of the facility? No matter what it was, I had to find it out. I tried to open it but it would not move a single bit. It was probably rusted shut. But maybe I could find something in a neighbouring building to open it?

Spending a few days in the city alone made me go about as nuts as they were. I could not find anything to maybe break the hatch or open it without actually breaking it other than oil, so I began to craft my own... "Tools". One resembled a big hammer. I would use it if nothing else would work. But since I did find some oil, that I could use on the hatch, maybe I wouldn’t need it. After yet another day, I went back to the hatch. I noticed a bit of blood and a few scratches on the walls. A few infected seemed to have been here. Luckily they could not open the hatch and so it was up to me to try. But since they were somewhere nearby, I put the hammer to the ground. Any loud noises would only attract them to this area. I took out the oil and made sure put it all over the hatch. Who knew what exactly was so rusted that it couldn’t open. And, fuck, maybe the oil wouldn’t even help at all. After about one or two hours I finally tried to open the hatch. But it was as I thought. It would not open. Instead of using the hammer, I picked up a hand-sized rock and began to scratch off some of the rust at places where it may or may not stop the hatch from opening.  It was getting late as well as darker and darker inside the building. I could not switch on a light or the moths would swarm me in seconds. So I simply kept going until I was sure that I couldn’t do anything else. I tried opening it again and this time it worked! It didn’t open as if it was in tip top shape. I had to pull it open with all my strength. I grabbed my stuff and just went inside. It couldn’t be worse than staying out here. I closed the hatch behind me. If I would die here, it wouldn’t matter anyways. I switched on my flashlight and looked around. The room was made purely out of metal and cold stone. There was rust all over the metal and only a ladder would lead me further down. I climbed down as far as it took me, but not without checking the area with my light first. There was nothing. But the further I got down, the less rust there was. In fact, as I reached the bottom, it all looked like it was just built, apart from the layer of dust. The room had four entry-points, being doors made out of metal. I went towards one of them to open it, but it automatically slid open. "Hello?" I called out into the darkness to hear if anyone was there. I took the hammer in my free hand and stepped into the next room. The next room turned out to be a long and dark corridor with a few doors left and right. The corridor looked about as pristine as the room before. In a maze you are always supposed to go right first and so I took the first door on the right which lead me into yet another pristine looking room. Shining my light through the room made me realise what it was that I saw. Plants. But not just ordinary plants. Flowers, wheat and other crops were planted and grown. "Someone has to live here." I said to myself and moved out of the room and towards the next. This room however was locked and the door was labeled with 'Laboratory'. I probably would not find anyone here at this time of the day and so my feet carried me to the next room. There was a whiteboard with text I could not decipher. The person living here had very bad handwriting. But there were also a PC, three monitors and on one of the walls was a giant mirror. It covered the upper half of the wall. I sat down in front of the PC and started it up. As I was waiting I was looking around and found a framed picture. It showed a young man in the twenties and a asian girl at about the same age. Or, at least that is how old they looked to me. When I was finally on the Desktop I wanted to know more about this place though, but I only found two folders. One was labeled "Memories" and the other was labeled with "Project P". I tried to open the Project folder first but to enter it, I had to put in a password. I did not even try and looked at the other folder instead.

Inside there were a bunch of audio files labeled with numbers. Some of them had special names but most of them were just numbers.

001 - The Beginning

"As the Project begins, a colleague once said that using a diary to write down thoughts and progress would help me out. It feels weird to write it all down though. But I will record all my thoughts as a test, I guess. I doubt that I will be using this frequently. Especially since I have a job and my girlfriend. The time I spend at home, I much rather spend with her than thinking about the stupid job.

But hey, I guess I can record my thoughts from time to time and see how it goes. Maybe it does help me in the end."

002 - A special day

"I know I said that I wouldn’t use it all that much but I have to put my thoughts somewhere. I am thinking about asking her to marry me. Sure, we only have been together for about 3 years but I don’t want to live my life without her. Yea, we are young but I don’t care. I love her and I want this so much. I already paid for the ring and everything. The only thing I need is to give confirmation to the people that organize the wedding. I will ask her tomorrow. Yes. That is a good idea."

003 - (No name)

"I did not ask her yet. I actually didn’t do it for about a week. Yes, I know, I am stupid but I couldn’t get myself to do it. She knows that something is up, but I don’t want to ruin this. I don’t want to ruin my relationship with Sarah. Plus, I started the project now. But... Maybe I should tell her. Now there is no turning back anyways. Yea. Yes! I will tell her of it! I will ask her to marry me!"

004 - The best day of my life

"She said yes. She said yes! I can’t believe it! I am so god-damn happy! She was quite surprised when she heard that I planned everything already, but I don’t blame her. Why was I so worried that she would say no? I don’t even know anymore. Now it will only take two more weeks. I have already sent out invitations to friends and family. Well, to the part that gives a shit. No. Stop! Don’t turn this into a rant. You live a good life! And soon everything will be even better."

005 - Project P has started

"I know I haven’t recorded anything for a good while. I think its one year since I started this "Diary" thing. But I am back with good news! Our relationship is as strong as ever. Also the project finally began. A friend and me have begun to dig out this bunker for the project. I don’t really want anyone to see it and especially not Sarah!"

006 - (No Name)

"The bunker is finished. The Lab is set up. The storage room is filled. The project has officially begun. And the first test was already done today. And how did it go? Well. It killed the Rat directly... I mean, the virus is supposed to kill but... Huh... Now that I think about it, I never told my friend what I was doing here. Oh boy, he will be pissed when he finds out. But it’s going to be too late when he does. Who cares.

Anyways. The rat died after infecting it with the virus. It did not even take long. But that is not what I want. If it dies, it simply traps the virus inside of the body. I need to find out how to get it to stay alive, then I can think of spreading it."

007 - (No Name)

"So the rat stays alive for about 5 minutes now. That is not enough. I need days or weeks. Fuck it. Even months for all I care. It has to work. Or Project P will be a failure. It however does spread in the time of the infection. I have put 2 other rats inside, together with the infected rat. Just 1 or 2 minutes after being with the infected rat, the other two died shortly after."

008 - Rat Lifespan

"I managed to keep the rat alive for a few days under normal circumstances. It’s eyes appear to be bloodshot and it moves slower than usual. It does behave normally otherwise. It does not do anything else but the usual things it does. It eats, it sleeps, repeat. But this is still too short of a lifespan.”

The next file is half a year older than the ones before.

009 - (No Name)

"I completely forgot about this “diary” thing. Things have gone up and down recently in terms of the project. My relationship with my wife is doing great. We are thinking about children and an actual family. Not that I wouldn’t want a child to call me Dad, but with the project in mind I don’t know if it all would work out. I wouldn’t want to lose my child due to the project."

010 - (No Name)

"The project is going well. The rats I infected a few months ago are still alive. I think this is as good as it gets. There is no point in trying to get more. I’ll "bottle" the virus and do what I planned."

011 - The Virus is spreading

"I had sent the virus, via a smuggler, in an unknown package to germany. Germany had pretty good healthcare, so infecting that country first was probably the best idea. And sure enough, it began to spread like a burning flame. Soon enough the symptoms would be back in america and the virus was thought of to be a plague. To be honest, that is what it was. But to stop it, it already is too late. Before the virus began to spread too far I made sure that me and Sarah would get into the bunker. She was confused and worried but accepted it, after I explained that we will be safe down there if this got any worse. In the meantime I had begun to create a little farm, a kitchen, a bedroom and even installed a bathroom. Life is going to change from now on but it’s going to work out. I am sure of it."

012 - The Virus is changing

"Something I never intended was that the virus would mutate to something else. I should have thought about it. Why didn’t I think about it? Not only did it change, but it also affected Sarah! I managed to give her an antivirus but it seemed like that it would only kill off the major symptoms the virus would now force onto the infected just as well as the intended death. I heard about how the infected began to act strange. They would build weird structures, kill and use humans. This is not what I wanted! And the worst of it is that Sarah seems to be losing her memories. But only the ones after her eighteenth birthday. I needed to prepare for the worst. I did not want to lose her completely."

013 - (No Name)

"I have finished working on the separate areas of the bunker. The, once, big living room has been separated into the observation room and her own room which is a replica of her room in her old home. I have moved into the old storage room. There was not much there anyways. Sarah has completely forgotten who I was, but I found a way to remind her of it all. Well. I think that is already a bit too much to say. She doesn’t remember it at all. But she had this book where she kept her memories and pictures of special days. It wasn’t just a normal diary. I used it to make her see that I don’t want to harm her, but that I wanted to help her."

014 - Sarah’s Memories

"Sarah... Sarah keeps forgetting everything. It doesn’t matter how many times I talk to her over the day. She just keeps forgetting it whenever she heads to sleep. I need to find a way to get her memories back or make this stop. Why did this have to happen?! I just... wanted... Why...?"

Number 014 was the last one to be found in the folder.

Project P. This person that lived in this very bunker was the one who created the virus and killed off humanity for good. And now his wife was infected too, but only to the extent of losing her memories? I couldn’t think of what was worse right now. His, or my life. Having lost everyone you love or living with the one you love without the person knowing who you are due to your own mistake. But I couldn’t help but wonder. "What does the P stand for?" I asked myself. I heard the clicking of a gun behind me and soon felt it at the back of my head, as a male voice began to speak: "It stands for 'Paradise'."