The First Last Day
Zachariah Kane was living an ordinary day when the end of the world occurred.
He woke up late, and rushed to college just in time for the second half of morning classes. He laughed with his friends at lunch, jeered at the jocks, and mooned over Sally Brenner, the most gorgeous girl in his class - she was known to do small time modelling work.
He went out to a bar after classes, and started drinking cheerfully with random strangers and previous acquaintances. Zack was a sociable nerd kind of guy, kind of like the stray ginger cat that lived down the street - happy to be friends, but on his own terms.
He got buzzed, and staggered out of the bar to the alley behind it. He threw up, tried to clear his head, and set off walking home around 8 pm. That's when it happened - black and red rain as thick as blood fell down from the cloudless sky.
Zack was soaked in seconds, and he quickly sheltered under a nearby building eve. As he stared out into the darkness lit only by lights dripping thickly in the distance and haloed in red, he saw the people who kept walking in the rain start falling.
They hit the ground like sacks of grain, and lay along the streets like corpses. Cars beeped and skidded, trying to avoid collisions, most unsuccessfully. People yelled in alarm, and people held up their phones to check reception, but there was none.
Zack shivered in fear, an ominous dread filling his heart. This had to be a dream - this could not be real, there was no way it was real! As the suffocating darkness grew thicker, and gutters overflowed with liquid as thick as blood, Zack backed away trembling.
And then, as suddenly as it began, the rain stopped. All the liquid on the ground seemed to pool around the fallen people, soaking into their skin. Zack felt pain like ants were gnawing into him, but he discovered he couldn't move. He looked down, and found his shirt was stained red, but getting drier all the time as the burning spread deeper.
Then one of the people in the street twitched, and staggered to their feet. The light was too dim to guess their gender. Eyes, skin, hair, clothes - all of it was stained red by the mysterious liquid. For a long moment, the person seemed dazed. Then their head snapped around, red eyes locked on one of the trembling people under the eves, and with shocking speed they sprinted over.
Zack tried to step back, terror pounding in his chest, a small voice saying "they're going to kill us" playing over and over in his head.
When the red person reached the person they were staring at, they tackled them to the ground and bit a hole in their neck. Screams filled the air as the people scattered away from this monster, running in every direction. More red people on the roads staggered up and sprinted off, chasing their prey with a singular focus.
Zack ran too, breath rasping in his lungs, head pounding with terror and drink. He tripped on the curb and fell in a thick puddle. Before he could get up one them was on him, pushing him back down, tearing through his neck with unforgiving teeth, mixing his blood with the puddle. His last breaths were gurgled through a throat full of liquid, and full of despair.
•••
Zachariah woke up, heart pounding, chest heaving for breath. He was soaked in sweat, and the vivid nightmare was stuck playing on repeat behind his eyes. Slowly he scanned his eyes over his room.
Same walls, same furniture, no monsters painted red. Breath by breath Zack calmed down, until he looked at his clock.
"Fuck! I'm going to be late!" He jumped out of bed, and got ready in record time, dashing off to college.
On the way, small things kept happening - so completely normal and ordinary that Zack should not pay attention to them at all, but today they feel weird.
All day the feeling of déjà vu haunted him. Nothing he did was special, or strange - Zack has always followed a similar routine, it should not be bugging him like this now.
And then the clock struck 8pm, and the strange rain fell, and Zack knew the nightmare was real.
Zachariah Kane died once more in the fallen rain.