Today started out like any other day: blood, death, and betrayal. That’s right just another day in the apocalypse… or so I’d like to say, but, unfortunately, today is different. Today I’m dying. Today I turned 28. Funny, huh? Today, if the world hadn’t evolved, I’d have been drinking with good friends, celebrating my trip around the sun. Well instead of doing that, I’m bleeding out while I’m being feasted upon by the abhorred. Well at least I’m dying face down so that the world can kiss my ass one more time before I nod off. They say that as you lay dying, your life flashes before your eyes. Well maybe because it was so vivid, all I can seem to recall was how this all started. Funny enough this whole “end of the world” crap started on my 18th birthday.

My name is Noah Brookhart; it was 2021, on a cool April night. I had just gotten out of class (military college) , and had just gotten home. The very first thing I did whenever I got home was to check the news, however this time there was something that shocked me like never before. A chemical plant had exploded in New Jersey causing a mile wide devastation. At the time I was appalled by the sudden loss of human life, however, if I knew then what I know now; I would have instead been terrified. It wasn’t until later that we found out just what this meant. Apparently there was some kind of underground facility underneath the chemical plant, that just so happened to be housing gene175 aka the evolution gene. The evolution gene was a government project to basically unlock the potential in the human brain. At that time we didn’t know that gene175 spread across the world at an alarming rate. Hell, we didn’t even know about the underground facility until years later. The gene laid dormant in all of us. Fast forward to a year later and the gene decided to “wake up.” April 2nd 2022, my eighteenth birthday, and also “The day the world went dark,” as we would later call it. I don’t really remember what I was doing that day, all I know is that I suddenly felt wave after wave of pain assault my body. I spasmed all over the floor, until after what seemed like an eternity, I passed out. Of course when I woke up the world had gone to shit. When the gene activated, supposedly, the world evolved. Humanity, when it woke up, encountered creatures that we later called the abhorred. In the coming weeks, we learned the facts of this cruel game of survival we were thrust into.

Number one: everyone who evolved at least once (the day the world went dark) will receive a kinetic power.

Number two: every time you evolve you run the risk of deviating, and becoming an abhorred, however, your body, and your power(s) grow stronger after every evolution.

Number three: if you die you’ll definitely become an abhorred

Number four: in order to evolve, you must consume the crystal core of the abhorred.

Number five: in order to continue evolving, the abhorred must eat human’s crystal core.

Number six: those who become deviated (abhorred lose all reason except the hunger for evolution)

We called the levels of evolution the stages (stage 1, stage 2, stage 3, ETC.) throughout my 10 years of the “evolution” (apocalypse,) I have learned that it’s not just the abhorred humanity has to worry about, but humans as well. Unlike everyone who woke up the next day, I was the only one to wake up a month later. After they woke up, my parents rushed to my apartment encountering dangers on the way. They found me in a coma. When I woke up I was in a hospital, a ragtag group of survivors took over and made into a base. My mother died before we joined up with the survivors. About a year later I still hadn’t uncovered my power, and guns basically become obsolete. Two years in, a group calling themselves “Tango Company,” raids the hospital, killing and enslaving many. While my father, my brother and I were escaping, my father was shot and killed before my very eyes; my brother and I were captured and enslaved. While slaves, we were forced to do labor, sold as sex toys to the women of Tango Company, and tortured. Three years in, my brothers body gave in and he died. Six years in, I became friends with two fellow slaves: jack, and Kat. Eight years in, I finally managed to escape slavery, however, it is at the cost of Kats’ life. Nine years in, I fall in love with another survivor called Kate, however, jack falls in love with her as well (she chooses me.) ten years in jack betrays me and leaves me to die out of jealousy. In all ten years, never once have I evolved to stage 2, or even uncovered my power.

That leads me back to my current situation: dying. Pain washes over me in waves. I’m tired… so tired. Tired of… this life. Tired… of… this… pain. Ju…st… pl…a...in… ti…re…