Prologue

The day my mom said, “Okay Kara, next time you can help,” I knew things were going to get better. Is it wrong to get nostalgic about those times? I hated the fear, sure, but the strength I felt when helping was far better than what we have now. We’re so alone, and it seems like we don’t have any direction or any structure. But my mom says we do. She says that’s why I have to do this, because someday, when there are schools again, they’ll need a book to use for history classes.

            I think it’s stupid. I’ve read plenty of books. Some of them were even written by people who imagined a world something like this. But the protagonists in those stories were always around for the beginning, to watch the infection spread and fight against the overwhelming hordes. What kind of story could I possibly tell? Who ever heard of a story that started at the end of the apocalypse?

            But Mom insisted. She said that people have strong imaginations, that someday no one alive will remember what this was like and they’ll want to read about it. She said all kinds of stories will need to be written, so I should start with mine. Sure. I can just imagine some girl 200 years from now standing in front of a classroom in a ratty costume, doing a book report about how rough life was for the early re-settlers. Ugh, book reports. Mom has made me do one for her on every book I’ve read for the past ten years. I love to read, but I always preferred it when my reports got interrupted.

            I probably shouldn’t be griping. Without this writing assignment, I would have very little to do. Lately, anybody who’s had very little to do has been assigned to digging. Frankly, I’d rather stay in here.

            I was born almost exactly sixteen years before what we’re calling The End. Although a post-apocalyptic setting doesn’t seem very romantic, my mom always said that Life finds a way. It might also have helped that my dad was ruggedly handsome (it was a lucky woman who found herself in the apocalypse and also had a thing for rugged good looks). They were also both stunning survivalists: good at using guns and scavenging, which means they were both around long enough to fall in love. There was a family joke about Dad going on a three-day hunt for condoms, but apparently pre-outbreak birth control was more ephemeral than their love, so I was born.

            My earliest memory is, not surprisingly, fear. The compound was lit up bright as daylight with torches popping and crackling. Beyond the walls, though I was too short to see, I knew a shambling dark mass approached. The silence of the creatures always unnerved me. When you fight with or kill another animal, they make some sort of sound. Not those. The only way to know they were coming was to see them. We always kept the compound bright. It probably attracted them to us, but that’s what most of us wanted.

            Anyway, that awful night was a continuation of an awful day. Somehow, an unusually large number of them had found their way to us. The adults had been shooting all day, making a deafening noise that probably attracted even more. Normally, shifts would go outside the walls and remove the bodies after a shoot, but not that day. On that day they had kept coming in a wave that made the landscape crawl. The bodies piled up until the adults on top of the walls were shooting the things point blank.

            That’s when we heard the cry, and my mom turned away from trying to hide me in the blankets. We looked up in time to see my dad push one off of him, his face covered in blood. He looked toward us for one long moment. Then Mom picked up her gun and shot him through the head.

            That's the end of the memory, but there were a lot of other days and nights like that. They come, we shoot, they stink, we dig. When I read the books about human history, I realize that maybe our life isn't so great; but it's hard to picture what life was like then because it was so vastly different from everything I know. I feel the same way when I read the fiction books imagining a time like this before it actually happened - this life is so vastly different from everything they knew. Maybe we're just too small to understand the changes Time can make?

Reviews

[Einstein Noodle]

excellent start! i am not into zombie stuff, mostly because it is to unreal to draw me in as a reader; but you have done that for me ..the perspective in unique; your introduction sweeps me inside your protagonists life .. very easy flow for me .. no hitch nor hic-up ;) on to the next chapter i go!
:)
E.

[DaughterNature]

Thanks, glad you liked it! What component(s) best drew you in?

[Einstein Noodle]

its believable ...an apocalypse is so soundly predicted by all kinds of groups, religions, wackos and witches ..and after a certain age..we all must come to grips with "the end" ... the way you present it makes a lot of sense as one "end" after another "end" comes and goes .. making the after the "end" of utmost importance ..so your characters interact with me present if you know what i mean .. so ..your main theme would be my answer .. sorry i can not be more helpful :}

[DaughterNature]

No, that works :)

[Zoë]

This is really good. I really like your writing style, especially in this point of view. I've never read a story taking place at the end of the Apocalypse, so this is a really interesting idea that I can't wait to read more of.

[DaughterNature]

Great, thanks! What do you think I could do to improve it?

[Zoë]

There wasn't much I caught in this chapter that needed improvement. Over all it was a really solid intro, although this paragraph ("That’s when we heard the cry, and my mom turned away from trying to hide me in the blankets. We looked up in time to see my dad push one off of him, his face covered in blood. He looked toward us for one long moment. Then Mom picked up her gun and shot him through the head.") was a little confusing. I wasn't quite sure who "we" was when I first read it, but after rereading it a few times I figured out that she was narrating her mom and herself. It was just a little confusing when you switched from "I"s to "We"s.

[DaughterNature]

Ah, good catch!