Doomsday

The world had gone to shambles. Walls were being built around any and every major country and state. The military has been brought in to be used as muscle to keep everyone who wasn’t important outside of the walls. Everyone important to be alive, from the presidents of the biggest countries to the world’s fastest man, was being pushed into small communities.

A sickness spread throughout the planet. Starting in Australia, it used insects and animals to spread and evolve. It was only a matter of weeks until dead animals ended up in the wells to drinking water; in turn, infecting the people. It turned them almost primal. Not quite zombifying them, turning them into pure rage. Tearing up everything and everyone they could get their hands on. It would make the calmest Buddhist go on a murderous rage. Over just the course of a couple of weeks, the entire planet seemed to be on fire.

People began to panic and stock up on every resource known to them. Hiding themselves and their families in their homes, boarding up the windows and doors. Doing everything they could to avoid being turned into a rage-fueled monster. Looking out the window, all there was to see was chaos. Burning cars and buildings. The smell of ash and smoke quickly became a normal scent.

People began to fight over territory. Some would fight for plots of land with grocery stores, some that had more houses, and some that had more natural land and fewer buildings. Other people are alone in confinement, only coming up to see the light of day for necessities. Everyone had a weapon. Whether it be a gun, or a baseball bat with nails hammered into it.

As far as anyone outside of these walls knows, you can't kill these monsters. They would regenerate missing body parts within a matter of hours. They were invincible to us. Rumours from inside the walls however, told a very different story. There were rumours of the governments being able to disintegrate them, fry them completely from the inside out. Of course, those were all rumours and none were proven true.

The people who lived on the outside were living like criminals. We hunted for our food, and if the world hadn't completely panicked like it had, maybe there would be electricity. It was a total lapse back to the stone age. It was more modern than the stone age we had heard about in school. There were still running vehicles, not many, but some.

Some people kept things from their past lives like pictures, some kept heart shaped lockets, some even kept devices. Others accepted the change of the world quickly and threw their old lives behind them; or more accurately, into a fire.

The world outside of the walls was hell while inside seemed like paradise. The gates never opened. Outsiders camped the doors of the gates for weeks, tried to open them, even sacrificed good people to try and climb the wall.

The ragers, -what we called the post-human creatures- however, were unpredictable. They were ridiculously fast, there was no out running them. They were strong too, going at full speed they could bust through a brick wall completely unscathed. They were like animals. Trying to tear at whatever living creature they could find. As far as we outsiders could research, they only needed to eat about once a week. And the preferred food, oddly enough, was live animals. Which was what confused us so much, why they attacked humans.

Some people assumed it was because they, themselves, were humans. Other people say that it’s because they’ve turned back into animals. The latter seems more reasonable in most people's eyes.

The world was almost unlivable on the outside of the walls. Most on fire and desert-like, and the greener areas under war and pillage by the ragers and savage people. Which is why I’m happy my family was able to sneak me into the walls.

I lived on the outside for most of my life, I was born out there actually. Now, I’m only 15 and today is my last day. That’s why I’m writing this, so I can show the future generations proof that the inside of the walls wasn't so paradise.

There have been 13 walls built across the world. Every one built in different places, from the freezing snow of the Alps to the volcanoes of hawaii. To my knowledge, there was a land that was walled in to float the Pacific Ocean. Most of the big mountains were the first to be walled, specifically because of the resources buried inside of them.

There was tyranny, war, murder, slavery. It was like living in old-day England for years. The law was the law and if you disobeyed those who created them, you were punished as such. If you were a woman who was disrespectful, you were to be beaten and whipped in time square to embarrass yourself like you did your husband. One thing I can say, the gays are being celebrated. It’s considered normal to have multiple husbands and wives. But the more family, the more hell you could bring upon them.

I am being executed today for refusing a marriage to the king. Running, in fact, and leaving him waiting at the chapel. They caught me and locked me in a cell after beating me in front of everyone at the church, to prove a point. Now, I will be hanged in the square for defying the king.

I can hear the guards coming, so to anyone who finds this letter. Don't go inside the walls. I would much rather be free and living with those monsters than under the rule of people who do whatever they please.

November 23, 2046

Merideth H. Straw