Promising

The serenity in front of me was like an illusion, for I knew what lay behind. The waste and the death and the destruction. The inhumanity of it was astounding, and it not only possessed those who have avoided the final judgement, but infected many. The bizarre reflection of stories told prolifically in comics, books and movies in the years from my childhood, even before, till the event.

Braaaiiiinnss.

Of course they didn't say that...in fact they didn't say anything, or even make noise. Well, other than the squishy, slurping they made when a hammer, axe or some other blunt weapon was force into their head. Or perhaps the sickening thuds that were a tell-tale sign that bullets had taken their rest inside the bodies. Yet, those sounds were rare, and were reserved for those lucky enough to possess bullets. Though the most frightening, and haunting sound was the steady shuffling of their feet dragging across the paths they took to try and sate this appetite that cursed and demented them.

And us.

They used to say one gets desensitized by the mass violence that had taken refuge in our entertainment since entertainment became a thing. Its not true. You don't get desensitized, its more horrifying, though I never thought much of it then, and still don't, because when the event happened, everyone was in shock. Everyone was in disbelief, at least for a moment, and everyone had done something drastic. Suicide was an escape for many at first, though they just came back if they didn't do it the right way, which many didnt as it wasn't understood then. Murder, rape, and other forms of bloodshed and oppresive crimes were rampant for a time, but we started to fight back, and battled on two fronts for time. Most though, had joined some community that had descended into depravity. Orgies, sacrifices, feasts, and sermons were the norm, and made the people the more fanatical, and the more dangerous than those created by the event.

Those created by the event were ever present, though less and less troubling than in the beginning. They were like the flu, just a lingering danger. A 99% low danger and 1% extreme danger, however those still living represented the opposite. The world was now truly anarchist, and all those who previously supported this idealogy are probably all dead now, victims of something they thought they loved, yet did not understand. Anarchy is chaos and pain. Anarchy is not freedom, unless you want to be free from life.

I had left it all behind in search of something, I don't know, more normal. Where there were people who had seen the problems and were working to make it better. Trying to change for the better, trying to make something of this new world, instead of the letting the world change us. Instead of allowing the world to victimize us. I was trying to escape the forlorn attitude of those behind, and the insatiable appetite of the risen. I was trying to escape the people who had become worse than the monster. I wanted a place of hope, that was filled with people who possessed it. I am sure it’s out there, and I will look ever for it, because I had hope. I had a hope that was sewn into my being, and it was the only thing I needed. I was hopefully escaping a world that was on the brink and trying to jump the rest of the way, for a world that was starting to regain its equilibrium so that it could step backwards towards safety.

The road ahead looked promising.