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“When there is no more room left in hell, the dead will walk the earth.”
-- Revelations 20:13
There Is No God
Written by Adrian Lopez
When I was a child, I never had a care in the world. I would enjoy the outside world there was for me to explore. I would go down by the river and pick up sea shells and salamanders, and keep them in jars. I never thought the unimaginable or unexplainable could happen. No one did. Who was to say they could? What kind of person would know such a thing? A divine being, a holy Lord to look up to and gasp in his image? A God?
There is no God. I know that and believe that and will continue to believe until my last breath. I have seen things that are unimaginable. Unexplainable. Horrible. Inhumane. Proof that the Devil himself exists, and that no God is with us. No guardians of Light. No one is looking out for us. We are all on our own.
On the first day, they closed the bridges. Hundreds of soldiers were bustling, running. Yelling. Screaming. Trying to prepare and grasp hold of the inevitable doom that awaited them. They were following orders that could’ve fallen on deaf ears.
We were all ordered to stay in our homes. My friends Aaron and Samuel came to my house. We figured it was good to stick together. The army didn’t tell us what was happening. Wasn’t all that strange. We thought the Russians were coming, and of course New York was a high-value target.
Aaron is tall, has white skin, and always had a knack for repairing things. I’d give him a screw driver, some springs, and a cork, and he’d build me a watch. I’d say I locked myself out of my apartment again, and in five minutes he’d have the door unlocked. He was a good friend too.
Samuel was a big, scruffy-looking friend of mine. A bit older than me, I met him at a bar one night and we just clicked. We’d laugh and make jokes, burp, flirt with the ladies, and have the best times together. And he always had an interest in guns. That was the one thing I was always doubtful with him about. He kept five or six guns in his house, and one in his car. I was worried of what he did with them when I wasn’t there. And now, they were like bottles of water in the Saharan desert.
We were told to stay in our homes, lock our windows and doors, and stick together. We prepared for the worst. Samuel brought over his arsenal, while me and Aaron boarded up our windows. We decided it’d be safer if we slept upstairs. One of us was always watching outside the window, and we prepared for the worst. We couldn’t have been more wrong.
We heard the sirens from city hall. They used the old air raid emergency horn. It was a horrible sound. It sent chills down my spine, and I didn’t know what to think or do. I panicked. But Aaron snapped me out of it. He told me to get a grip, put my chin up, and stay calm. What would I do without Aaron.
We heard the shots from upstairs. Samuel had his 12-gauge, while me and Aaron stuck with the pistols. I had a Colt .45, and Aaron had a Glock 17. With the top windows boarded and secure, we barricaded the stairwell and watched over it.
The shots went on for hours. Soldiers were yelling, issuing orders. We heard a tank come down my street, and soon infantry followed. Then they stopped. We heard cries, screaming. Yelling. And then we heard them. They were running, growling, moaning, desiring the taste of human flesh and blood. There was no sleep. We were all too frozen with fear.
After what we thought had been three weeks, our food supply was running low. I bought a good amount of dehydrated food before it happened, but there just wasn’t enough for all of us. We knew we’d have to leave. We knew the end was near.
We talked it over for about an hour, and we decided a set of rules. Kill anything that isn’t one of us. Don’t travel at night unless you have to. And if one of us ever became like them, we’d put a fucking bullet in his head. I was sure of that. No matter what, even if they were my best friends, I would have no hesitation to put them out of their own misery. It’s the way it had to be.
We left at around 9 AM, and to our horror, we came across a city battered, destroyed, and abandoned. Blood was everywhere, the military barricades were empty. No corpses were on the streets, though. We feared the worst. That tank we had heard sat there, motionless and empty.
We walked down toward Times Square. It was a complete and tragic mess. Clothes, food, water, trash, blood, and bodies riddled the street in all directions. The military had made their last stand there, to no avail. There would be no help coming. We eventually came upon a gas station with some cans of beans, rice, and some bread and water from the tap. We decided it’d be best if we saved the food and ate somewhere safe.
After we found the food at the gas station, we wanted to try and find a good place to hold up and sleep. To call our home for the time being. Although Samuel didn’t like the idea of being in such an urban area, with hundreds of them out there, lying for the time to strike, the best place to be is in the eye of the storm.
We saw some of them, wandering around. They didn’t see us, but we knew what they were. One had tattered clothes and fingernail cuts all over his body. He looked like a business man. I can’t forget his face. There was no light in him. There was no good. Only death, blood, evil. He didn’t know who he was. He had forever forgotten of what kind of person he was like, if he was a good man.
We came upon an abandoned parking garage. It was dark, and we didn’t know who was inside. We thought it’d be best to go to the top and sleep on the roof, where no one could climb from the sides. One way in, one way out. That was the best way. We ate our food, but didn’t put a fire up. It just wasn’t safe.
Samuel had first watch while Aaron and I slept. I didn’t get much rest though. After everything that had happened, and everything that had scene. I couldn’t believe it. How could I? How could anyone be able to accept what had happened? I bet God could. I bet he let the Devil himself cause all of this.
I listened to the silence of the night. The world was quieter now. The Big Apple, the City that Never Sleeps, the Gates to America had finally fallen upon silent lips that shan’t move. For the first time ever, New York slept.
Samuel woke me up at what I thought to be about 3 AM. He fell asleep almost immediately, and I was alone. Only the screams and growls of the undead were there to comfort me. I gazed up at the stars, which were brighter than ever before. And then I heard something. A cackling sound, coming from below the parking garage. Something was coming. I readied my shotgun and watched the entrance to the roof. A small, twisted fire escape lay before me and whatever approached.
It came running. Running as fast as it could. And when it saw me, it stopped dead in its tracks. It stared into my eyes, as I stared into its’. The world went quiet, and all I heard was my heartbeat, beating faster then ever. The expression on its face was unimaginable. It froze me with fear. I saw anger, rage. A thirst for blood. Impossible, I thought. No such expression could come from anyone’s face. But this was not a person anymore. It was a monster. A demon from Hell itself in a body of a man.
It charged at me, and I pulled the trigger. Three large bullet holes went straight through its chest. The sound was deafening, and stunned me for a moment. I gasped, and my heart and head hurt more than ever. Aaron and Samuel came to me, weapons drawn. They saw the body, and began to pack. And then we all heard the worst sound in the world. The cry of the dead. It rang for so long, I wanted it to stop. The world was now shaken and bustling, and we heard the horde coming. And then it stopped, and we knew the worst moment in our lives was now about to be unleashed upon us.
We threw on our packs, readied our weapons, and sprinted down the parking garage. We heard them coming up the ramps. Aaron led us to another fire escape about 8 floors up. We jumped off to land on top of a grocery story. They were everywhere now. We heard them on the street below, and we saw them on the parking garage, racing up to the top. We jumped off and landed in the back patio. Aaron was the last to jump. Samuel and I made it inside the store through the back door, but Aaron did not follow. A horde of them got him, and I heard his cries and screams. There was nothing I could do.
We found one of them in the store. Samuel shot it straight through the head, and it fell down. Its lifeless, cold corpse lay there. We heard the front door burst open, we knew they were inside. They came in swarms. We ran up and down the aisles, shooting them and running. One came close to Samuel, trying to bite him. He smacked it with the butt of his shotgun, and it fell to the floor. He kept hitting it, and hitting it, and by the time he was done there was blood all over his face. The horde stopped and watched him as he came to his senses, and he charged at them, shotgun in hand. He dove into the crowd, beating every last one of them to death.
I ran as fast as I could into the back of the store and in the warehouse. Before I closed and locked the metal doors, Samuel was calling my name. He screamed for help. I slammed the doors shut, and backed up against the wall. There was blood all over my hands and clothes. I thought it was my own, but soon realized it came from them. I broke into tears and cried. I cried until I could cry no more. And the only person looking down upon me was God himself.
I was alone. I was hungry and tired. I was almost out of ammunition. As far as I knew, I was dead. I was dead and a ghost, stuck between Heaven and Hell. Forever wandering the Earth, searching for my home. Searching for where I belong. And then the unimaginable happened. The unexplainable. Proof that a God does exist, and that he watches over us just as we look up to him. The sun rose, the scream and howls stopped, and the world was quiet once again.
I walked down Broadway Avenue. No food, no weapons. No water. I had nothing but the clothes on my back and the light of God to guide to my salvation. I told myself to walk in one direction, and keep walking until my feet bled. I eventually crossed the bridge, and by the signs on the road, I was heading north. I figured it was best thing to do.
At about sunset the same day, I came upon a rather odd sight. A bottle of water in the Saharan desert. I saw what looked to be a teddy bear and a fork sitting beside the road. It was in the most peculiar position and the most peculiar place. I walked toward and, sat down, and picked it up. And I looked around in all directions. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to think. I thought I was going to die. And then, from the nothingness of it all, an angel appeared.
A soldier came walking up from behind me. I had never realized there was a small shack there. A run-down, shanty-looking shack. He came toward me and said if I was OK. I was frightened and stood up, and backed away. I thought he was one of them. I was terrified, and filled with fear. He told me it was going to be OK. That he was with the military, and that there was somewhere safe where I could go to.
Tears came to my eyes, and I hugged him and never let go. The worst was over. I was sure of that. I cried. I so relieved to see someone who could help me, I couldn’t even believe it.
The soldier stood me on my feet, told me to wipe my face, and we both walked to the shack. He opened the door to what was almost nothing. A carpet lay on the floor. He walked toward it, lifted it up, and it was revealed that a sort of concrete hatch lay beneath it. He pulled open the hatch to a small concrete tunnel with a ladder. He told me to get inside and climb down. I started to, and before I did I watched as the soldier put the teddy bear and fork back beside the road, just as I had found it.
I went down the stairs to find a large staging area with more soldiers and several other people, sitting and talking. Laughing. There were large monitors and cameras, beds, refrigerators, tables and chairs, blankets. Even a large closet full of clothes and boxes.
And now, here I am. Safe and sound. As I reflect on everything that’s happened, I now realize that a God doesn’t exist. He is rather a Savior. A guardian. The light at the end of the tunnel when everything is quiet and dark. The soldiers say all we have to do is wait and see how long it takes for the dead to starve to death. Sounds like a good plan. And after every last one of them is dead, I doubt there won’t be no more room in Hell anymore.
