Chapter 2

Lilly's POV

I woke up to rain that wasn't really rain, it came down in slow streaks that hissed when they hit the ground, leaving faint scorch marks wherever they touched. I held out my hand once, just to see and it burned like acid not enough to blister, but enough to make me hiss and pull back. The sky looked sick again, always moving and changing like it couldn't decide what color it wanted to be.

I'd spent the night on the roof of the apartment building, barricaded in by a rusted door and a couple of metal pipes. The Hollowed had wandered below for hours, circling the street like sharks, they didn't sleep, didn't tire and didn't stop. When dawn or whatever passed for dawn had came, they just drifted away, following the pull of something I couldn't see.

I hadn't slept much either every sound made me jump and every creak felt like a heartbeat that wasn't mine. Now, with my backpack slung over one shoulder and the knife tucked into my belt, I stared at the city stretched beneath me and tried to make myself move.

I couldn't stay here, the food was gone and the water was running low. Plus the silence seemed like it was starting to get to me, so I picked a direction, west, toward the outskirts and I climbed down.

The streets were worse in daylight I thought night hid the worst of it, but I was wrong. The light exposed everything bodies, debris, blood smeared on glass, graffiti that hadn't been there before the words written in black ash,

"THE SKY LIED."

"THEY'RE INSIDE US."

"DON'T TRUST THE ANGELS."

I didn't want to think about what any of it meant so I just kept walking. My boots crunched glass and bone and every time I passed a car, I checked the windows, hoping maybe stupidly, that someone might still be inside, alive. But they were all the same. Empty. Dead. Gone.

I am selfishly hoping I am not the only one that was kept alive.

I found a half crushed gas station a few blocks down and slipped inside. The shelves were empty, but I found a few bottles of water hidden behind the counter, and, thank God, a pack of beef jerky that hadn't turned green so I stuffed it into my bag and tried not to think about how my hands were shaking. Something caught my eye near the floor, a photo, a family of a mom, dad, two little girls that were smiling and alive. I slid it into my pocket I don't know why maybe I just didn't want to leave it there.

It took hours to reach the edge of downtown the city looked like it had been swallowed by the apocalypse and spit back out in pieces, whole blocks had fallen into glowing cracks in the ground. Some buildings floated, literally floated, a few feet off the ground, their foundations twisting like they were caught between gravity and something else.

And the rift… I could still see it above the skyline, a jagged tear running across the horizon, pulsing faintly like a heartbeat. Sometimes, when the wind shifted, I thought I could hear whispers,

"Hold the line.

The tether survives."

The first time I heard it, I spun in circles, knife raised but there was no one there only the echo in my head, fading like the city around me. Thinking I must be hallucinating I continued on like nothing happened.

By midday, I reached the bridge or what was left of it, half of it had collapsed into the river, leaving twisted metal and floating cars and the water was black, sluggish, and wrong looking like oil and every ripple shimmered red.

The other half of the bridge looked stable enough if I moved fast. I started across, keeping low, eyes scanning the shadows, the wind here carried a new sound soft moaning, like voices caught in fog.

Halfway across, I saw movement below something crawling through the shallows. Dozens of them, the Hollowed, their skin sloughed off in the water, revealing bones that faintly glowed unnaturally from within. One of them looked up, it's jaw hung crooked, eyes clouded white.

I froze.

The creature tilted its head, sniffing, then it let out a wet, gurgling shriek and they all turned toward me.

"Shit."

I ran.

The bridge groaned beneath my boots, behind me, the Hollowed climbed, clawing at the concrete, dragging themselves up. I didn't look back the other side was maybe fifty feet away I knew I could make it. Then the pavement cracked and the section beneath me gave way, metal screaming as it tore free. I threw myself forward, fingers catching a broken railing, my legs swung over open air, the river churning below.

The Hollowed were almost on me now they were reaching, snarling, dripping filth.

"Not like this," I gasped.

"I am not dying like this."

With a yell, I heaved upward, dragging myself over the edge and rolling onto solid ground. My arms burned, my lungs felt like fire, but I was up, terrified but alive. The first Hollowed lunged so I swung the knife it sank deep into the thing's throat, but it didn't bleed it just stopped, black veins flaring and fading like dying embers.

I stumbled back, panting, staring down at it. The rest hissed from below but couldn't climb the last few feet, the collapse had trapped them below and their hands clawed the air, furious and mindless.

I turned away, gripping the knife tighter. "Stay dead," I muttered. "Please, just stay dead."

The suburbs were worse than the city. Chicago had been complete chaos. The outskirts were quiet, too quiet, rows of houses sat untouched, doors open, cars still running on empty fuel tanks and mail scattered across the lawns.

It was like everyone had simply vanished.

I walked until the light started to dim again. The sky didn't have a sun anymore, not really just a red glow that drifted and pulsed behind the clouds, and as the air grew colder the Hollowed came back out.

By nightfall, I found a neighborhood that looked half-burned and half-frozen, as if fire and frost had fought over it. I chose a two story house that still had a front door, so I barricaded it with a dresser and curled up in the corner of what used to be someone's living room. There was a child's toy on the rug, a stuffed bear, its fur blackened at the edges. I picked it up, dusted it off, and set it on the windowsill.

"Guard the door for me, okay?" I whispered my voice cracked on the last word.

Sometime after midnight, I woke to the sound of footsteps.

Slow. Deliberate. Crunching gravel.

I held my breath, the Hollowed didn't walk like that, they crawled, dragged themselves this was different, it seemed to be careful like hunting. The steps stopped right outside the house, I crept toward the window and peeked through the cracks in the boards.

At first, I thought it was a man. He stood tall, wrapped in something that shimmered faintly like it was armor, maybe, or shadows. His face was hidden beneath a hood and his hand rested on something strapped to his hip.

He turned his head, and even from that distance, I felt it, the pull like gravity bending. I ducked down fast, heart slamming in my throat. When I dared to look again, he was gone, so I didn't sleep again that night to frightened to even relax. Instead, I sat by the faint light of a dying candle and tried to piece together what I'd seen. Maybe it was just my mind playing tricks, maybe it was exhaustion or maybe just maybe I wasn't as alone as I thought.

The thought should have comforted me but it didn't, because whatever that thing was it didn't move like someone human.

By morning, I decided to keep moving staying in one place too long felt like an invitation for something or someone to come upon me.

The world beyond the suburbs stretched in silence, highways split apart like cracked glass, gas stations gutted, forests turned pale and bare. And always, that faint whisper in the back of my mind soft, constant, almost gentle now,

"Keep walking, tether. Keep breathing."

I didn't understand the word and I didn't want to, but every time I heard it, I felt a strange warmth in my chest, like a spark. Maybe the loneliness was officially getting to me after just a few days.

Once, while crossing a field of rusted cars, I cut my hand on jagged metal the wound should've bled bad but it didn't the skin shimmered a soft gold for a heartbeat before closing, I stared at it for a long time.

"I don't know what's happening to me," I whispered. "But if this world wants to kill me, it's gonna have to try harder."

By the time I reached the edge of the city, the ground gave way to fields of cracked soil and overgrown roads. The skyline behind me was fading into haze and the air felt cleaner here, though the silence was thicker.

I found an old farmhouse near the highway and decided to stay for the night. The door creaked when I pushed it open, revealing a kitchen filled with dust and cobwebs, there were pictures still hanging on the walls smiling faces, frozen in time. I scavenged what I could, ate another strip of jerky, and sat on the porch as the red sky flickered above. The wind carried the faint sound of something distant, it was like wings beating I looked up, but there was nothing there only clouds swirling. I couldn't shake the feeling of being followed.

For the first time since I'd woken, I felt it the weight of it all pressing down, the loneliness, the loss and the ache of a world gone quiet. I buried my face in my hands and let myself cry, not loud, just enough to feel human again. When I finally looked up, the horizon shimmered and for a moment, I thought I saw figures moving far off, four of them, walking through the red mist. Too far to make out faces, but something about the sight made my chest tighten.

Then they were gone.

That night, before I drifted into restless sleep, I wrote in my notebook again.

Rules for Staying Alive, Updated,

Bridges are death traps.

If you see someone don't let them see you first.

The rain burns. Stay under cover.

Something else is out there. Watching.

Don't forget who you were before the end.

I hesitated, then added one more,

Whatever's calling me… I have to find out why.

The wind whispered through the broken windows, carrying a faint sound I couldn't quite name like laughter, or maybe wings again, either way, I wasn't running anymore. Tomorrow, I'd go farther west, there had to be something left. Someone.

There had to be.