2 Leaving

The door fell off its hinges. 'Okay… Not a good sign…'

She started towards the end of the hall, heading for the stairwell. The walls were bare, and the ceiling was bowing in places.

The stairwell door was gone. Looking down she realized it had fallen to the next floor's landing. The stairs were broken in some places and there were huge gaps that she would have to jump.

'Great, just great. This looks like a horror story, just wait till I fall to my death and become a skeleton at the bottom, that would complete the scene…'

She sighed and got a running start in order to jump to the next section of stairs. Crossing her fingers in her heart that the landing wouldn't destroy the rest of the stairwell.

As she reached the last step she put as much strength as she could into her legs, ignoring the wound on her foot, and jumped.

"Safe!" She said as she landed, trying not to let her pessimistic side win by enjoying the small wins.

"Just nine more sets to go, this won't be that bad." She mumbled as she turned to face the next set.

It turned out that the rest weren't too bad, except for the last one.

'Last landing and it had to be the one that didn't have any stairs left at all? I must be cursed…'

She sat on the landing between the first and second floor, staring at the ground below which was basically a pile of rubble.

'If I jump from here, I'll sprain something, if not break it. It's only eleven- twelve feet, but with all the rock on the floor...'

She patted the frame she had kept tucked in her pajamas. There had been a couple of times where she had almost broken it after she jumped from one stair to another. Thankfully it was still in one piece.

As she looked around for options, she noticed that railing was still attached to the wall. It was rusty and there were spots that were completely broken off. She decided to remember it, just in case she couldn't find another way down.

"This is a really bad idea." She grumbled as she started testing the railing closest to the landing. It creaked but stayed attached to the wall.

"Well here goes." She sat down on the landing's edge and grabbed the railing with both hands. Sliding as slowly as possible off, she carefully moved her right hand over. Testing the rail, and then putting her weight on it.

She continued doing this until she reached halfway. The railing was broken, the gap between bars at least a foot.

Looking down she decided that six feet would have to do, since the railing on the other side looked to be in worse shape than what she was hanging onto.

'Just try not to break a leg, Annabelle.' And she let go.

She landed on one of the few flat pieces of concrete left, falling backwards onto her butt.

Her foot hurt. It was a searing pain. After a few seconds she could function enough to think. 'That felt like a hot coal on the sole of my foot. Oh gosh, I hope I don't have to land on it again… I must have hit the landing just right last time, it wasn't nearly this painful…'

She took a second to get her bearings, trying to ignore the throbbing in her foot.

'The wound hurts, but I don't think I sprained anything. Thank god.'

As she got to her feet, she was careful of the rubble around her. Since who knows if there was something hiding, plus any misstep and she very well could injure herself.

"Now time to blow this popsicle stand." Heading towards the emergency exit she tried to open the door.

When it didn't open the first time, she grabbed the handle with both hands. Putting one leg against the wall pulling with everything she had. The door didn't budge. "Alright, to the front."

The front of the apartment complex was just a lounge with grey walls, and what used to be a TV surrounded by old wood. She could see the outside of the apartment through what used to be glass doors, now it was just a metal frame with shattered glass around it.

"Oh dear."

The view she had was of a wasteland, what used to be a beautiful modern city, was now ruins.

Buildings were either missing entire walls or were piles of rubble. There were some that still stood, but she could tell that they had been abandoned for a very long time.

The sky was an unnatural green-gray and the sun looked like an old egg yolk.

The smell was wrong. She had never smelled anything like it. She was reminded of bad eggs, but there was something else that she couldn't name.

Almost like the time her cat had dragged a dead mouse into their last house, and no one had found it for a week.

There were huge cracks in what used to be the street. Weeds had taken over. They were everywhere, climbing the buildings, the other plant life, and the cracks in the street. The temperature was a bit stuffy, but it wasn't unbearable.

As she took a second to take the sight of this new world in, her building started to tremble, the buzzing was getting louder.

"Well, time to get out of here I guess." She started walking towards the opening, carefully avoiding the glass fragments on her way.

Just as she reached the doors, the building started shaking, the buzzing so loud it was unbearable. The building started groaning, the ceiling looked like it was about to fall down.

"Oh crap."

She gave up on avoiding the rest of the glass and ran through the doors. The building collapsing behind her in a new pile of rubble.

As she looked back at what used to be her apartment complex, she realized why it had seemed like she was underground. Half of the building was wedged into the side of a wall of earth.

"What the hell happened here?" She slowly backed up, until she fell over a protruding crack and fell. Sitting up, she looked back at the wall, looking to the left and right, she realized she couldn't see the end of it.

"Ahh!" The buzzing had gotten so loud that it was causing a splitting pain. As she looked around, she caught a glimpse of a spaceship, just as she lost consciousness.