Thoughts

The Child Apocalypse: One.

Even in the dark, the obvious could not be missed that the house up on the hill was screaming the word ‘abnormal’ to any passerby.

The white paint that might have once warmed with the sun was now chipped and gone in most areas of the wall surface. The windows had several panes missing and some were just gaping holes in the walls, curtains drawn over them. The roof had a gaping hole in it that one simply couldn’t ignore, especially on a rainy day like this. The grass on the front porch seemed like the grasslands of the Savannah as they might as well have never heard the word ‘lawnmower’ before.

Yet this was the best refuge for the young girl running for her life.

She had been in hiding for months now with nothing but the clothes on her back to call her own, and even those she had stolen from the deserted shops she found here. It was now only a matter of time before the system caught up with her and took her back to the camps. But for now, she would seek shelter in the abandoned mansion.

She cursed silently as the creaking sound of the door made her cringe. Even with the downpour, the noise was enough to alert those closely listening for any unnatural sound. Then again, every town she had passed on her way her had been unnaturally quiet. The adults had already converged to live out the reminder of days in the big cities now that having children was literally a nuclear disaster.

She closed the door shut and the little force shook the entire frame of the door.

That’s reassuring, she thought to herself as she turned back to the inside of the house. It was just as she had expected from the sight of its exterior design. This had once been a very grand house but years and years of neglect had led to its deterioration in both looks and value.

Everything seemed to be covered with either dust or a cobweb. The floor was a mine field of several floor boards missing. The girl was tempted to stand where she did. It might have been the safest spot in the house. But the clap of thunder reminded her of the rain that had been threatening to fall since she started out today. The gaping hole in the roof was directly above the door way so standing there was out of the question.

She maneuvered her way to the fire place, taking careful measure not to step on any area of the floor that seemed too dark to be just be dirt and cobwebs. The occasional rodent would scare her out of her mind, but she still made her way deeper into the house where the fire place stood.

She didn’t see any wood in it but lighting a fire was a bad idea to begin with. The light would attract more than just the authorities to her. But the cold blowing outside was chilling, even with her body temperature running higher than normal humans. So what options did she have left?

Option one: implement her first idea using wood from various areas of the house. It would damage the structural integrity even more than nature had and possibly cause a cave in, which she was very sure she would not survive. The light would mean a beacon of her location to any and all participants in the race to either kill or capture her.

She would however, be warm and probably have a few hours of rest since the fourty two she had spent up and about now. A tempting, but truly not worth it, option.

Option two: roam the house for something warm and edible. It would mean venturing around in a location she had no familiar grasp of. There could also be other ‘occupants’ that had taken up residence in the house and would not take too kindly to her encroachment.

But she would most definitely find some clothes that would wade away the cold and probably find something she could ingest, not matter how tasteless and expired it would be. She couldn’t get food poisoning after all, but she would take expired human food any day to grass and insects.

Option three: Sit her hungry behind down where she stood and wait for the storm to blow itself out. She would not complain about the painful feeling in her stomach nor would she fret over the chilling effect on her skin. She would curl up in a small heap and wait… hungry and cold.

But as safe as possible in the present circumstances.

Sometimes she hated this. This ability she had to know what needed to be done and the general probability of outcomes with every decision she undertook in her life. It had kept her alive these past few months, yes. But it had also made her endure the most horrible living conditions any human should ever live through.

Take this moment for instance. She had an idea of how to dispel both the cold and the hunger, but she couldn’t dare attempt any of them because her entire being shied away from any action without at least fifty percent of its variables being known.

So she found the softest bit of floor and curled herself into a ball. It had been a very long day and the exhaustion of it was starting to get to her. The cold made it difficult to sleep but she eventually did, which was a real shame.

Maybe if she was awake for five minutes longer she would have not been woken up by several guns and flashlights pointed directly at her face.