Driving out of town, you see more of the disturbing creatures. There are thousands of them soaring through the air. There are many dead creatures on the ground too. You have to swerve the car to avoid collision with them. The dead creatures are in various states of decay; some are so fresh, you can still see the tiny sensor hairs on their beaks. Most of the creatures have been dead for much longer with half of their body decomposed and their twisted, grotesque skeletons showing. You sit quietly until your sister breaks the silence. “How long until we reach their house?”

“Not too much longer,” you reply.

“How long have we been on the road?”

“About 2 minutes. Their house is still 40 minutes away.”

“Only 2 minutes? It feels like a century.”

“Don’t worry. We will get there soon enough.”

“Well, we better be. I need to go to the bathroom.” You drive in silence for another minute or so until your sister speaks again.

“How do you think this happened?”

“What do you mean?”


“I mean the whole, ‘parents turning into flying demon creature thing’.”

“I have no idea. It could be radiation, could be some virus that was spreading through the air, or maybe some gene in their bodies turned them into those creatures.”

“Well, why aren’t we one of those? Why didn’t our bodies’ twist, turn, and form into one of the creatures?”

“I have no idea how or why that didn’t happen to us. Be quiet now. we are almost to their house.”

You arrive at Steve and Carol’s house around noon. Walking up to the door, your sister knocks, but there is no answer. Knocking again, there is nothing but silence. You start to open the door, and a hand suddenly grabs your wrist. Looking up, you see the terrified face of your friend, Steve. He begins to speak, barely able to choke the words out. “What are you doing here? Don’t you know it’s not safe to be outside? Well don’t just stand there, come in. We don’t want you to get eaten.”

“We? Does that mean that Carol is still here too?” your sister asks.

“Yes, well, kind of. She’s still here, but it’s not looking good. Since she was almost 18 when people started turning, she kind of ‘half-turned.’ Well, get a look for yourself.”

He walks you to the bathroom where the shower curtain was shut. He took hold of it, but paused for a moment. “Now brace yourselves for what you are about to see, it’s not very pretty.” He draws back the shower curtain to reveal the twisted mangled form of his sister. You draw back in shock. Her skin was a vomit shade of green, with white bloodless skin where she had not turned yet. Her arms were almost the same, except that she had webbing running from the front of her shoulder to her thumb. Her legs looked shriveled, as if she had never used them. Her hair was falling out by the clumps. What hair she had left was matted with blood. Her neck was twice the length of a normal human beings. The worst part was her face; it was almost deformed beyond recognition. She had a green-yellow beak, around 4 inches long, protruding from the spot where her nose should be. Her mouth was filled with row after row of razor sharp teeth. Her eyes had turned green and her pupils were vertical, like a cat’s. They widened at the sight of you. She tried to speak but all that came out was an inaudible squawk. Her head rolled to the side. “Told you,” retorts Steve.

“She looks worse than one of the creatures that turned completely,” you reply.

“Yeah, I know, it’s really bad. I know she is suffering. I don’t think they will ever come up with a cure now that all the real scientists are flying around above their labs. I just don’t know what to do with her,” utters Steve

“We should probably put her out of her misery,” says your sister, “don’t you think she at least deserves that?”

“I’ve thought about it. I have never had the heart to do it. It’s not like I have anything here that will do it quickly and not bring more pain.”

You speak up, “ I brought my shotgun. You can use that if you’d like.”

“Sure, why not. It is the best thing we have,” states Steve.

You walk slowly to your car to grab your shotgun and a box of shells. You sprint back to the safety of the house without getting caught. “Here, just grab one of the shells, slide it up into the magazine, and pump to load the shell into the chamber.”

“All right, Thank you,” Steve replies as he grabs the gun. He does as you tell him. His hands are shaking so bad he can hardly hold on to the shell. He slides the shell in. He raises the gun to his shoulder, aiming the barrel directly at his sister’s mutilated chest. He closes his eyes and pulls the trigger. “Click,” Nothing happens, no recoil, no flash, no nothing. He looks at you.

“Pump to put the shell in the chamber,” you repeat.

“Oh yeah, that’s right, sorry.” He pumps the shotgun, raises the gun to his shoulder, and aims directly at his sister’s chest. He watches his sister’s eyes widen as he pulls the trigger. There is a loud bang, then silence. He drops the gun and starts to weep. You walk up to comfort him.

“What did I just do? I just killed my sister. I shot her dead, just now.”

“You did the right thing. She was in pain. She didn’t want to live anymore. Don’t you feel better for bringing her to a better place?” You say comfortingly.

“Yeah, I feel better. Can we just stop talking about it, please,” Steve says while trying to choke back his tears.

“Yeah, sure buddy. Whatever you want.”

“We better get going, if we want to survive,” replies Steve.

“Where are we going?” You ask.

“We are going to take what we need to survive. We need food, water, weapons, and shelter. This house is no longer safe. We don’t have any food or water here, and you are the only one with a weapon. By that logic, we have to leave here and find a spot more suitable to live. Who knows, maybe we will find other survivors, like us, who weren’t eaten by their parents within the first 4 hours.”

“You’re right,” says your sister speaking up for the first time since her friend, Carol’s death, and “We need to leave.”

“Well let’s go then,” you reply,” Steve, do you have any more food here that we can take with us? Every little bit counts.”

“We, I mean I, don’t have any thing to eat here. Carol and I had this place picked clean to the bone before she turned.”

“Well, we cant just waste time sitting here. We better leave.” You state.

“Where are we leaving to?” asks your sister.

“We are going to reach the one place that has food, water, and weapons.”

“And where would that be?” asks Steve.

“Wal-Mart.”

Driving down the road you encounter few problems. There were a couple close calls. You almost hit one of the dead creatures and the one still flying are swooping down on your car. You left Steve’s house almost 45 minutes ago and have another 15 to get to the nearest Wal-Mart. While riding in solemn silence, your sister starts talking from the back of the car. “Hey Steve, how did you react when all this started?”

“I woke up like any other day. I walked into my bathroom and tried to turn on the light. I flipped the switch and nothing happened. I yelled to my parents to tell them but I didn’t hear a reply. I went to check the circuit myself but everything was still seemed fine. I went back and took a cold shower since the water heater didn’t work. Then I walked downstairs to get some breakfast. This is where I realized that something wasn’t right. My parents weren’t there. I went to check out the garage to see if their cars were still there. They were. I thought maybe they just over slept. I went to see if they were in their bedroom. As I opened the door a cold blast of air hit me. I looked inside and they were nowhere to be found. The bed was all messed up from when they slept in it. The only abnormality in the room was a broken window. I haven’t seen them since. I went to go check on my sister to see if she was ok. I walked into her room and the same thing happened, except when I looked out her second story window. I saw her lying on the outside ground. It seemed as if she had tried to jump out the window. She only half-turned, so she couldn’t get any lift. I rushed outside to grab her and bring her back in, she didn’t resist. I didn’t know were to put her because she was bleeding everywhere. I decided to put her in the bathtub so she wouldn’t bleed on everything. You guys came 15 minutes after that, and here I am now, driving down the road, talking to you.”

“Wow that sounds terrifying. I don’t know what I would do if I was left by myself. I definitely would have been dead already,” your sister says.

You drive in silence until you reach Wal-Mart. The parking lot is almost empty except the cars of the, now dead, employees. “At least we are the first ones here. That means everything we need should be inside,” declares Steve, “Let’s get inside.”

You and your companions are able to scurry inside without attracting any attention. Once inside, you realize how quiet the place is with no other people around. There is no banging of carts, no beeping of cash registers, no people yelling, just silence. Steve speaks up; “O.K. we should probably get weapons first incase any “turned” decide to walk into the store. Let’s head down to the sporting goods section and try to find something to defend ourselves with.”

You lead the way with your fully loaded shotgun. After walking past, what it seems like an endless amount of clothes, you finally reach the sporting goods area. All the glass in the showcases is shattered. There are riflescopes, binoculars, and knives splayed out everywhere. There is one of the turned. It has its back towards you. It is picking at the remains of an unfortunate child shopper. It lifts it head for a moment as you begin to move. After a second or two it decides it was nothing and goes back to eating. “You are going to have to tread very lightly on this broken glass so the creature doesn’t hear you. We can’t risk you shooting it, as it might attract more of the vile demon-spawn,” murmurs Steve.

“Got it.” You start to make your way towards the beast. While walking lightly over the shattered glass makes almost no noise, one quiet crack of glass could cause death for everyone. As you get closer, you pick up one of the display knives, tactical grip and a 12-inch long blade, perfect for killing. You reach the creature after what seems like an eternity. The smell of the creature is almost unbearable. It smells like a mixture of wet dog and excrement. You pull through the smell. When you are just about to drive the 12 inches of cold hard steel into the back of the creature’s neck, it looks straight at you. It makes the loudest, most blood-curdling scream you have ever heard in your life. Almost instantly, they appear. They are coming from everywhere, filing through the doors like a wave of putrid death. You are surrounded. Your sister rushes and falls to your feet in a crying heap. Steve picks up a hunting rifle and stands by your side. Your sister stands up and picks up a knife with wrath in her eyes. “Are you ready?” you ask.

“There’s no better time than the present,” replies Steve calmly.

“How about you?” you ask your sister.

“I’m ready,” she replies with fury in her voice.

“Let’s get started then,” you say. You look the creature you were about to kill dead in the eyes and charge at it, screaming at the top of your lungs. The creatures start to close in.

Everything goes black. You open your eyes surrounded by your family. You are lying down in a hospital bed. Your Mom, Dad, Sister, your friends Steve and Carol, and their parents are all there. There is a very painful throbbing sensation in your head.