Hey everyone. This is my entry for Alphabunny and CarbonCore's Let's Get Apocalyptic Competition. I'd like comments and constructive criticism as I have only tomorrow to edit it. I detest writing in the first person, but it was required for the competition, so here it is.
Dying
My last words were, “and the lawyer said…”
Then the truck hit me. They weren’t really the best choice of last words. I always imagined that when I popped it I would say something profound and important. But they were good words. Sort of like life, you know? An incomplete joke…
Anyway, back to the truck. It was this big ass truck, the sort of thing you imagine turning into a Transformer. As I lay there on the ground, my head cracked open like a broken egg; I felt a lot of things. First pain, confusion, and fear. Then this sense of amazing clarity, as I realized that the worst was over and I might as well enjoy the show. I watched with detached amusement as the paramedics tried to revive the hunk of flesh that had once been me.
“Nice day”
I looked up. There seemed to be a large skeleton in a black robe standing across the street viewing the scene with interest. The public paid no attention to him, or what appeared to be a large black tractor behind him. Although he was at least five meters away, his voice cut through the hubbub of the crowd.
“Oh, I get it, your Death right? The Final Truth, the Fourth Horseman of Apocalypse, the Grim Reaper.”
“Yup. Wanna hop in?” He gestured to the large black tractor behind him.
“What happened to the pale horse? And the scythe?”
“Modernization. Ana was getting a little geriatric. Nowadays I ride a combine. A mechanical reaper. Rather clever, don’t you think?”
“Death rides a horse called Ana?”
“Rode. And Ana was short for Anaphylactic Shock. Let’s go.”
And that’s all I remember of dying.
Waking up
When I woke again, needless to say I was surprised. I hadn’t expected to wake; at least not back in a body. I surveyed my surroundings, and realized that I was in a coffin. Also, a lot of things inside me were wriggling.
“Arise minions of apocalypse!”
The voice came from above, muffled by the earth. I had never in my life been a minion, but ‘arising’ was preferable to staying in the coffin. As I dug upwards I realized three things. One: I was probably a zombie. Two: I was incredibly strong. I guess a hunk of flesh can do a lot more damage when you don’t feel pain. The packed earth seemed like play dough in my hands. And three: I was hungry. An innocent enough thought, but placed in this setting, it was downright malevolent.
As I broke through the surface, I noticed similar activity around the other graves. Soon the cemetery was filled with three hundred shuffling, lurching, groaning zombies.
“Army of the dead, heed my words! The time for the dead to rise has come!” The voice came from a cherubic little man dressed in a white gown who stood at the entrance to the cemetery.
“We’ve risen haven’t we?” said a zombie who was slightly more putrid than the rest of us. “Ere’ you’re the Angel clothed in white, aren’t you? Bearer of the Iron book, prophesied to announce the apocalypse?”
“Clothéd all in White. The accent is important. Makes it Biblical, it does,” said the Angel testily, “and yes, I’m here to tell you that the apocalypse is upon us. Or them, rather.”
“What do you mean?”
“You are the apocalypse. We had to decide between Rain of Fire, The Great Flood, and a Zombie Apocalypse. We already did Rain of Fire in Babel, and Noah won’t stop bragging about the Great Flood, so Zombie Apocalypse it is.”
“So were supposed to end the world?”
“Generally speaking, yes.”
There was some hushed whispering among the zombies.
“Just us?”
“Well, the dead have risen all over the world, and you are in the majority, so it shouldn’t be too hard.”
More hushed whispering.
Then, “We would be honoured to end the world, your Clothédness.”
We turned our attention to the busy street just outside the cemetery walls, where terrified bystanders had been silently watching this exchange for the past ten minutes. We lurched forward as one man (read decomposing body), wielding our gravestones - an assortment of crosses, tombstones and angel statuettes - as weapons. The terrified people screamed and ran like a flock of ship with a wolf in their midst. I swung my tombstone right into a young man’s head, and the last thing he saw was my epitaph.
Never has there been before
A Nobler grave than this
Here lie the bones of Theodore
Stop, traveler, and piss
He stopped alright. And he pissed himself. I glanced up from feasting on his brains to contemplate the carnage ensuing around me. We could not be stopped. We could not be killed. We didn’t eat, sleep or shit. The end of the world was here, and I was playing for the other team.
