Walking down the desolate streets filled Damian with an indescribable feeling of dread, the once bustling streets of the town, now covered in broken down PTV's, fragments of military vehicles and countless bloodied stains which painted the town red. The bodies were gone, quickly devoured by the countless creatures stalking at all hours of the day. Despite the constant threat of death looming over his head Damian wasn't concerned, well he was it would be impossible for a person to look upon these dreadful sights and not feel a little worried, but he wasn't worried for himself, his worry was focused on his family, his wife and daughter which he had sent out into this dangerous world with only their own private PTV, if the military issue ones could not survive the assault then what chance did they have.
The creatures wandered down the street aimlessly, some tall and lanky with almost human like appearances, others were like rabid beasts of all shapes and sizes, some where small, others where the size of tanks, and the largest one he had seen was the size of a small house, but each one was different, sos where close of course but none were the same, each providing an insight into the trial each of these people once faced, but their trials were over now, they had failed and allowed these creatures to take their place.
He walked side by side with the creatures, and they acted as if he wasn't even there, he was thankful for his dormant ability which appeared to conceal him from the eyes of the beasts, even allowing him to touch them if he wanted, even their other senses seemed to fail to notice him, sound, smell and whatever else these things could possess all seemed meaningless in front of him. It was by using this ability of his that he had managed to come so far in such a short amount of time, a few days had passed since he had left his home, and at his current pace it would take him a few weeks to a month to reach his destination, of course taking a vehicle would be much faster, but he couldn't hide them from the creatures, he had learnt that the day before, the thoughts of the creature which followed him sent chills down his spine, so he decided that going on foot was the best way forward for now.
His steps were quick and purposeful, but he was reluctant to run, he could feel his ability slowly draining his energy, wanting to maintain it for as long as possible he settled for a brisk walking pace, but he was getting tired, not the same type of exhaustion as the infection, but something much more mundane, he hadn't slept since he had left and he could feel it catching up to him, his body may have been stronger, and his mind sharper, but that only went so far. He was trying to find a place to call his home for the night, the winding streets of the town were a chaotic jumble of densely packed housing in this far side of town, he thought about using one of the for shelter this night, but the shifting masses behind the windows gave him other ideas,so he continued on.
Walking pass a particularly ugly creature Damian let out a deep sigh, despite the end of the world arriving much sooner than anyone had expected, and with it happening in a way no one could have foreseen, he found himself a little bored of all things, it was a strange state to be in for sure that he couldn't even believe it himself. His ability to hide himself away from the world made him the perfect person to survive, he didn't need to waste precious resources on patching himself up after a fight, he didn't need to exert himself too hard so he could reserve food and water and on top of that he was physically better off so he could go longer without the essentials as well. It was a cruel joke to the rest of humanity, they didn't have the advantages he had and yet had to survive, it was almost like the world was culling the weak and forcing the strong to take command, but that felt wrong, the weak deserved to be protected by the strong, that was the natural order of the world, and if the strong didn't exist then people would band together to make themselves strong.
He was one of the strong now though, he was used to being just a part of a greater cause, a cog in the machine so to say, someone who did what they did to ensure the strong managed to fight back, but now, armed with power never before possible he knew his life would change. He thought about all the people out there right now, all across the globe, Hundreds of thousands of reports of the infection had surfaced across the network, with no reports of anyone coming back alive, but he knew he couldn't be the only one to do so, at worst he was the first, but he doubted that, but the chances were dreadfully slim on survival in the first place, he had seen between one hundred to two hundred creatures since his return from his nightmarish trial,counting himself that meant there was less than a one percent chance of survival at best, and that number only continued to drop the more creatures he saw.
Using this he determined there was probably around three thousand people like him scattered across the world, that number was humorously tiny, if they were the people who were meant to save humanity he doubted they could succeed, for each success came at a cost of thousands of other lives with a rough ratio of one survivor to every two thousand creatures the crushing reality of the situation sat heavily on Damian's shoulders. As he walked contemplating how the world was collapsing around him he heard a scream, not a bestial one like he had heard so many times by now, but a human one, he was frozen for a second but before he could even process what this meant he found himself dashing towards the direction, if he had heard it, so had the beasts.
Finding himself outside a long abandoned theatre, he quickly ran to the door, as he tried to push it open however he realised the door war bared from the inside, being able to see an ensemble of furniture which had been piled in front of the door, trying with all his might he failed to push open the door, the screams becoming louder which each passing second. Giving up on the door he decided to look up at the building to spot another way in. Seeing a section of the ceiling which looked like it had caved in he cursed under his breath, the walls were covered in thin alloy sheets, with gaps barely big enough to fit a person's fingers in between.
Throwing his rifle into his bag with the majority still hanging out he began to climb, his fingers pressed against the metal, slowly warping it underneath his touch, despite the fact that clambering across a metal wall should have attracted some attention, it was if it wasn't happening at all, instead the nearby creatures were slowly gathering around the building, focused on the screams inside the as they begun making their way. The process took some time but he finally managed to clamber over the shattered roof and drop into the main foyer of the old establishment, the cries came from inside but were now paired with bestial snarls and the sound of things being broken, without wasting even a second Damian rushed forward and slammed into the door ahead of him.
Before him was a large auditorium which once would have housed hundreds of people for plays, operas and other such performances, but this place had been abandoned even before the end of the world, places where the traditional arts were held had lost their connection to the younger generations due to the network providing all the entertainment they could ever need, so places like this had gone out of business many years ago.
The hall was broken, in a state so dire he wondered if it could ever be salvaged, but that wasn't the main concern in front of him, in the middle of the hall stood a large creature standing no less than ten feet tall, his body was human like with one head connected to a torso with two arms and two legs, but its proportions were wrong, it was monstrously fat, with the flabs hanging of it reaching down and dragging across the floor, its skin was sickly, as shade of greenish hue, looking more like a rotten corpse and smelling no better, its bones bulged out of its body, pressing tightly against the layers of skin, and piercing it in many places.
Letting out disgusting grunts and snarls as it walked, each step made the room shudder as it attempted to grab hold of the young man sprawled to the floor beneath it, the man was young, probably in his early twenties with curly light blonde hair on top of his head, his body was slim and lithe with little to no muscle showing through his baggy clothes, his face was sharp and clean shaven without even a single blemish on its surface, his eyes as grey as a passing storm.
The man looked up from the floor, staring into the face of death itself he was sure of it, the creatures breath was so rancid it felt like it would melt his skin off, trying his best to scamper away but being stopped by the back of a large chair he looked up with tears in his eyes, he wasn't ready to die, he had so much he still wanted to do in life. Closing his eyes and hoping he would wake up from this nightmare as well he covered his head with his hands he waited for death for he had no choice, but death never came, as warm blood covered him he opened his eyes started, and watched as the creature fell lifeless in front of him, a small hole piercing through the back of tis skull through one of tis eyes.
He didn't know what had just happened, by what force did this creature die, looking around he could see nothing else around, no sign of what had happened it was as if the world itself had brought this monster down, not wanting to stand fearing to catch the attention of whatever had done this he remained on the ground cowering, but he noticed something strange, the doors to the auditorium were wide open, how had that happened? They were closed earlier, he had made sure of that himself, sinking deeper into the floor he watched as the air ahead of him shimmered slightly as the figure of a man appeared dressed in a standard issue military uniform, tall and imposing, with dark hair covering most of his face with the right side scared around the socket, his amber eye looking down on Jasper as he struggled to understand what was happening, the man simply smiled and walked towards him.