Chapter one: Normal life to living hell

Silas for as long as he could remember, had never been able to sleep in. Regardless of if it was a weekday where he had to get up early for school, or a weekend where, if he wanted he could sleep in, he never found he was able to. 

So each and every morning he would wake up an hour or so before his alarm went off, and scroll through his phone. Some mornings it would be social media, some mornings it would be games and on rare occasions he would read news posts online. It was a comfort knowing that each morning he could wake up and have at least a little time to himself before having to socialize with either his family or those at school. 

This morning he had chosen that he would scroll through social media, he had never been fond of it, the only reason he had it was to keep up to date with different events that the news didn't cover.  All his friends and family would post random pictures and share posts back and forth. He found it rather pointless, there were some things he would share with the few friends he had but this was on rare occasions. 

While he was scrolling through the random pictures and videos all along his feed, he got a notification saying his mother had just posted, he let out a sigh  of slight annoyance as his mother had a tendency to post a ridiculous amount of things in a day. As the feed on the most load he saw it was a picture of her his younger brother Dune who had just turned  5 , and his dad all at their families  cabin. Their family's cabin was in a remote part of a very dense forest, far removed from any town or city so Silas was surprised that his mother was able to post anything at all. 

He smiled sadly at the photo because he hadn't been able to go with them up to the cabin. When he had school his father had always been strict about Silas keeping up to date on his school work and his father had agreed that if he stayed up to date on his classes while they were gone he would take him when spring break started in a few weeks. Which was something that Silas desperately wanted to do as he loved the woods and the pond that they kept stocked with fish so they could go fishing whenever they wanted.

Suddenly Silas' phone beeped again with a new notification.  This time from his friend Sade, they had been friends since childhood as their parents had been close since grade school. Both of their parents saw them becoming a couple in the future, but Sade and Silas always brushed it off when their parents brought it up. They themself never talked about it much as it was a tad bit awkward for both of them.

Silas opened the message seeing that it was a post from a news website they both frequently used. It wasn't an official news website, it was more of a form that people would be able to upload strange and weird things they had seen or heard about. He also saw that there was a message attached to the post Sade had sent. "This video is crazy, there is no way it's really right?" 

He frowned a little, wondering what she was referring to, he decide that he wouldn't brush off the posts as he usually did, as she would probably scold at him and kick him in the shin when they saw each other at school  like she usually did when he wouldn't  watch or look at things she sent him.  

When the video opened he pressed play,  immediately he could see that the camera quality was not the greatest, it kept shaking and couldn't hold steady for more than a moment but you were still able to see the video. Even in the beginning moments you could see something was definitely wrong. 

The video began with the one holding the camera running, it was hard to see if he was running away from something or not. The person holding the camera turned it towards themselves, you could now see it was a middle aged man that was covered in sweat and was panting hard. 

"They may try to deny my words but maybe if I have evidence they will believe me" the man said, turning the camera back around. You could now see that he was in a short hallway between two rooms, the man took a few steps forwards and now you could see a large open space. Looking to be some type of entrance room to a larger facility, and near the entrance of the building about 100 ft  from the camera man or so stood what looked to be a normal human looking out through the glass doors, but as the cameraman zoomed in his camera lens, the horror of what it really was came into focus. 

The creature looked close to a human standing at about average height but you could tell even with the poor video quality that something was extremely wrong. It had what seemed to be large yellow glowing blobs  growing all across its shirtless upper body that  looked to be on the verge of bursting. Its upper body also seemed to be weirdly frail. The camera focused on its legs and you could see that they were strangely muscular, ripping the jeans that it wore in multiple spots. 

Suddenly out of another hallway closer to the entrance ran a young woman looking to be in her 20's, she was covered in sweat and panting just as hard as the man was when he started the video.  She stopped and turned to see the cameraman from around the corner, she smiled for a moment, the camera man whispered something that the camera had not picked up but pointed out at the creature that had turned around seeing the women. 

The sudden horror on the woman's face as she realized what that camera man was pointing at. The creature let out a blood curdling scream, blood spilling out from its unhinged mouth as it charged forward at insane speeds, the woman tried to run, get away from whatever it was that was after her. 

However she had no chance of getting away from the creature. It was far too fast, as it reached her it latched its frail arms around her and sunk its teeth deeper into the flesh of her neck, the woman let out a horrifying scream. Fell to the ground, struggled for a moment as the blood pooled underneath her, as she stopped struggling the creature let out another set of screams, more blood falling from its unhinged mouth. 

Suddenly you could hear the sounds of multiple sets of feet coming from multiple different directions. As the sounds grew louder and louder reaching a crescendo.  The video feed cut off as the video ended. 

Silas sat up in his bed as sunlight streamed from his window, he sat in silence for a moment, stunned. What the hell was that? He thought. He looked down at his hands and could see they were shaking like they were trees in a strong wind. He grabbed his wrist and took a deep breath, he grabbed his phone that he had let fall to his side, and started to message Sade

"It looked pretty real to me, but there is no way something like that is. So don't worry too much about it" Silas knew that any second now that his alarm, hearing that annoying alarm was the last thing he needed. He pushed off his blankets, getting up he moved slowly towards the bathroom for a shower, even if he knew that the video probably wasn't real he still moved with caution turning on every light as he went. 

After getting in the shower for a moment, Silas felt his worries wash away for a moment as the hot water hit his bare skin, but the horror of the video quickly shushed back in, he replayed the women getting part of her neck ripped clean out, he kept questioning if the video was in any way real. He thought back to how sweaty the man holding the camera was, it looked as if he had just ran a marathon. It looked so real! He thought as he turned off the shower toweling himself off. He walked back to his room, got his clothes on and made his way downstairs for a quick breakfast before walking out to his car. 

His car was an old Sedan, it was definitely the pure definition of a first car in Silas' mind. Half the time it wouldn't start up or would break down on him randomly, it truly annoyed him to no end. This time however it seemed to start up quicker than normal which he was rather happy about.

Silas was responsible for picking up Sade and his other best friend named Asher; they both didn't have cars of their own yet, Sade just never saw a reason to get a car, while Asher couldn't afford one, he was a long-time foster child. His foster parents were absolutely awful to him, they oftentimes would physically punish him for the smallest of things, force him to go hungry for sometimes days among other things. 

Silas' parents had tried to adopt Asher before but his foster parents put up such a fierce resistance that Silas parents were forced to back down. As Silas pulled into Ashers drive way he could see Asher waiting in his usual spot which was a low hanging branch of an old maple tree. As Asher got in the car the fist pumped as they usually did.

"Hey man! Did you see that video online that has been circulating?" Asher said as he buckled his seat belt. 

"Yah let's not talk about that" Silas said as he thought back to the video Sade had sent him, goosebumps rose on his neck. "I'm surprised you were able to even get online" Silas said, knowing that most of the time Asher couldn't even get online as his foster parents isolated him so often. 

"Yah but I managed to get my hands on a spare someone at school had" Asher said with a smirk. 

Silas looked at Asher a little nervously as they pulled into Sades driveway,"Bro if they catch you with that you know what is gonna happen"

 Asher was around average height for a guy and had a relatively frail appearance as he oftentimes couldn't eat. He had long blonde hair that he kept pulled back in a man bun most days, today wasn't one of em. It hung loosely just reaching his shoulders. 

"Yah but that's only if I get caught, plus I turn 18 in a couple of weeks anyway so they won't be able to do anything after that." Asher said.

Suddenly they both got flicked in the back of the head, Silas turned his head and saw Sade sitting in the back seat. She had Deep blue eyes with brown hair with purple streaks running through it almost at random, she was also relatively active with her being in a number of school activities  so she was in good shape, making the flick hurt even more than normal.

"Are you two done talking so we can get to school?" she said in a joyful voice. So the video doesn't seem to have affected her as much as it did me Silas thought

 She handed Asher a bacon egg and cheese biscuit she had made that morning knowing that he probably hasn't eaten today.  Silas let out a sigh not wanting to go to school and pulled out of the driveway, driving the short distance to school and pulling into his usual parking spot. 

As they all got out of the car they heard a strange noise coming from the other side of the car parked next to them. They all looked at each other and walked over to investigate the strange noise. As they went around the car they saw a boy named Parker a year younger than all of them whipping his mouth and standing up from the ground where you could see a pool of vomit he had just coughed up

Parker shot the trio a dirty look, not feeling well enough to tolerate anyone, his mother also wouldn't let him stay home as he had already stayed home a lot and couldn't miss anymore school. 

Parker walked past the group moving to the school entrance Sade and Asher followed a distance behind Parker, Silas did not immediately follow, perplexed by a shade of an oddly placed color in Parker's vomit, Mixed in with Parker's breakfast was small tents of yellow.

Suddenly Sade called out to him "come on slowpoke we don't have all day!" Silas moved quickly catching up with the group as they walked in the front doors of the school. 

"Meet you guys at lunch" Silas said as they all went off in different directions all heading to their classes as Silas sat down he couldn't get his mind of the yellow tent he had seen in Parker's vomit the yellow looked almost as if it was glowing. 

As class started he felt as if he was off in his own world, barely registering as Parker rushed out of the classroom holding his mouth closed firmly with his hand. Slowly as the class progressed he felt a sinking feeling grow in his stomach, what if the glowing yellow tent and that video are connected in some way. Silas thought but quickly shook his head, as he knew he was just overthinking, as the teacher passed out their homework he started to register a conversation happening between two girls behind him.

"Have you seen that video?" the first girl said snickering a little, Silas felt the goosebumps return to the back of his neck.

"Oh yeah, the one where that weird looking thing attacked that lady? Yah no way that is real" they both laughed out in their annoyingly loud voices, suddenly the room felt too small to Silas, to many people, there was too much noise. Silas raised his hand to use the restroom and with some hesitation the teacher let him go, saying that he needed to hurry back as class would soon end. 

As Silas finished using the restroom and washed his hands he decided to splash his face with water,  Come on man! There is absolutely no way the video can be real! Silas thought. Suddenly he heard the sound of someone throwing up in the stall at the end of the restroom and thought it must be Parker. He could just see Parker's feet from where Silas stood and at Parker's feet it looked like there was a red liquid beginning to pool. 

Realizing after a few moments what the liquid was. the sinking feeling in Silas' stomach reached its maximum. Suddenly there was an extremely loud bang and Silas could see the stall door dent in. as the next hit landed against the door, Parker, or whatever was in the stall let out a blood curdling scream. Turning Silas' blood to ice. 

As the bell rang for the signal that classes were now released, the door burst off its hinges flying into the wall, cracking the stone wall where it hit. As Parker or whatever he had become slowly moved out of the stall Silas started to move backwards towards the door. Not fast enough however as Silas was able to get a good look at the creature. it stood slightly taller then Parker was, mainly due to the fact that it didn't look as if it could walk on its legs anymore, they seemed to be shriveled up and useless the creature moved using its hugely muscular arms, dragging its legs limply behind it. It also had noticeably large sacks filled with a bright yellow liquid covering its whole body with bits of skin showing in random spots. 

Silas moved quickly out of the restroom as the creature let out another blood curdling scream, yellowish red blood spitting from its mouth. As Silas ran out of the restroom he ran face first into another one of the kids walking down the hall and fell down the ground, the boy looked at Silas giving him a death glare the boy moved towards with his fists clenched.

"Get away from the restroom!! Run!" Silas screamed, this caused many people to look at him strangling but suddenly, the door to the boys restroom burst open and partly off its hinges. Everyone's heads turned to see what was happening. As they realized what had happened and what exactly was responsible, all their blood turned to ice. As the sight before them was straight out of a horror movie. 

The creature moved forward pushing off his hands at ridiculous speeds, and as he reached its target, the boy who stood over Silas, sunk its razor sharp teeth deep into the boy's arm. The boy let out a yelp as the creature overtook him forcing him to the ground pulling off the boy's arm with one of its oversized arms, while the other was pressed against the boy's face, Crushing the boy to death.