Post-apocalyptic Novels & Stories

Xavier asked. They couldn’t answer. The boy suddenly jerked in his mother’s arms. His eyes snapped open, they were no longer normal. I stumbled backward. “No…” i shook my head rapidly. “No. No, this isn’t right.” Xavier caught my arm. “Ashley?” I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the boy, his tiny fingers suddenly curled into claws. The woman holding him screamed. And I knew, the apocalypse had just begun.

No staff in the quarantine clinic even had a moment to think about the apocalypse; they had all been busy since the apocalypse hit the surface of the earth. Outside in the residential estate and the outer neighborhood, the apocalypse was unfolding in the form of a dark, comedic drama made by an exhausted TV series writer. Beyond the secured perimeter of the clinic, the prosperous suburban community that boasted perfect lawns, carefully trimmed hedges, and fancy mailboxes looked like an abandoned ghost town mixed with a yard sale following a category five hurricane.

No visible indication that he was anything more than an ordinary officer doing his job. Violet’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. Perhaps his rise had happened later. That would explain it. The post-apocalypse based only became a thing about six months after the apocalypse started. The government provided rationed supplies to people but they could not keep the vices away as well as the evil in the hearts of people. People plundered and stole those rations, turned on each other and there was no sort of lawfulness being exerted by the law enforcement agencies. It wasn’t until the nuclear reactors erupted and the second phase of the apocalypse began. The air became unbreathable, people gained abilit

I know how it sounds, but because of that I can tell what comes next. The power grids will fail across the southern sectors in nine days, it's why we use radio systems instead of the more advanced electrical units. The eastern pass breaks three weeks after that." My voice shook. "And I can tell you how you die. In my memories of the first life, you held Harrow's Gap in the first week of winter...." "That's enough Aurora! I don't want to hear about that." He commanded loudly. For a moment after, Cassian said nothing.

It wasn't enough to feed me immediately, but it was a beginning. I stood in the middle of the room and looked around. For the first time, I allowed myself to imagine surviving the apocalypse. Not just surviving the first few weeks. Not just hiding until the infected disappeared. I imagined living long enough to see the world recover. Perhaps that was too much to hope for. But I had already been given a second chance. I wasn't going to waste it. My phone rang. I looked at the screen. Dad. I answered. "Hello?" "Where are you?" he demanded.

"The truth cannot be spoken in the light of the upper world." I stared at him, my breath coming in shallow, frantic hitches. My eyes swept past his shoulder, looking out beyond the shattered gates of my estate. The horizon was black, choked with thick plumes of oily smoke rising from the burning city skyline. Millions of infected—a dark, endless sea of the dead—stretched across the highway, through the forest, and into the distant valleys. Almost the entire country had collapsed in a single afternoon. The world I knew was gone. Humanity was reduced to cattle hiding in the dark.

Handwriting from twelve years ago — the strokes heavier than they were now, the flourishes drawn wide and loose, like someone who wasn't afraid of wasting paper. I turned to page twelve. A layout diagram of the bunker. Seven bunks, one incubation unit, the storeroom at the end of the hallway, the concrete-sealed door nearly two feet thick. In the bottom right corner of the diagram, a note in my own handwriting: "The apocalypse has to feel real. Push the heat up, make the water filthy — let the audience practically smell it. Rotate the insiders every season, keep one genuinely unwitting participant — protects the ratings." After "genuinely unwitting," there was a note in parentheses. Just one

The downtown streets were starkly abandoned, save for a few exhausted sanitation workers struggling to push through their shifts. After mapping out the general mood of the city, Willow ducked into an air-conditioned boba tea house to cool down. Browsing her phone while sipping an iced oolong milk tea, she stumbled across a trending online forum thread discussing apocalyptic survival scenarios. Naturally, most commenters treated it as a joke, treating the end times like a sci-fi movie trope. Willow frowned thoughtfully, typing out a quick, anonymous reply on the thread. "Early warning signs of an approaching systemic collapse and how families should prepare..."

I took the stairs back up to the third floor, locked my four heavy steel deadbolts behind me, and collapsed onto my comfortable velvet sofa with a long, contented sigh. Outside, the dark apocalyptic city was full of howling wind, roaming infected, and desperate survivors. But inside Apt 308, my diesel generator was humming softly, my refrigerator was full of gourmet food, my spatial storage contained a military shotgun and three modified pickup trucks, and my neighbors regarded me as their absolute sovereign protector. I reached into my spatial stash, pulled out a cold glass of sparkling apple cider, and raised it toward the ceiling in a silent toast. "Day One of the apocalypse," I smiled, t

A faint, strained smile appeared on his face. "If anyone had told me that my father would be infected, I wouldn't have believed it." His voice cracked slightly, and he lowered his gaze. Arya didn't know what to say. She had seen Lucian's father in her previous life. He had survived the early stages of the apocalypse, thanks to his family's wealth and resources. He was never supposed to become one of the infected. But now, everything is changing. The events she remembered were no longer unfolding exactly as they had before. If Lucian's father had already been infected, what else could be different?