The Dome

Dual yawned looking out the bus window as they drove, he didn't like being so far away from his wife and friends but as a war buddy had passed he felt it was only right to go to the funeral. Now returning he felt drained and closed his eyes, after dozing off for a bit he was jolted awake by the bus screeching to a stop. People were screaming while after stopping a few people got off the bus to look at the sight In front of them. To everyone's surprise the ground itself looked as if it had just risen into the sky, looking both left and right the wall continued for a far as they could see. Dual still a little groggy wondered if he was in a strange dream, as people were talking and touching the very solid wall. He found himself staring at a metal fence that had been connected to part of the ground that had formed this wall, a decent bit had been destroyed and ripped out of the ground. Suddenly a man yelled out, "what the fuck are those?" Everyone turned to see, Dual looked and thought to himself, "they're green whatever they are, they charging towards us. They look to be about the size of a child," he paused kicking himself for not noticing the biggest things first, they all had weapons all 30 of them. That and their eyes, their yellow eyes that screamed only one thing KILL. As everyone was watching Dual moved over to the fence and grabbed a decently heavy pole with a chunk of concrete at one end. He turned after grabbing it only to start seeing and hearing what he guessed would happen the monsters had started to mercilessly attack the people. When it began the monsters killed about 5 people before the realization set in. After that it was chaos a few fought while majorly screamed and ran for their lives, some just took off to the woods while others went into the bus. Dual encountered one and with no hesitation swung his new mace as hard as he could, the monsters skull caved in as the concrete bashed it. The monsters body flew back dead, without missing a beat he continued his charge all while swinging the club bashing them and killing them. After the fight with was over Dual had killed 23 of them while the others that had fought as well had taken out the other 7. All of them out of breath looking at the monsters they had killed, Dual noticed a young lady with a medical bag helping bandage some of the wounded. After looking around more he counted 13 people dead on the ground, about seven people were near him but he didn't know how many were on the bus or had escaped. Seeing that it was over the people on the bus started coming off and the bus driver came walking over to Dual, "my god man you were amazing you killed majority of them by yourself." Dual nodded, "honestly I'm surprised you didn't drive off." The driver sighed, "I'd love to say I stayed for you all but no I tried to turn it on but it wouldn't, like weirdly enough it didn't even try to." Dual looked at the man seeing his confused face thinking to himself that it might not be a normal problem. As he was thinking about that a woman started yelling and asking people if their phones were working as hers wasn't a few people checked to find that their wasn't working either. The strange thing was it seemed like everyone's phones were dead, even his own that he didn't use much was. After people had some time to calm down the group decided to head back to the town they had passed a bit ago. People grabbed their stuff and gathered up, there were about 35 people still there. Dual noticed an elderly woman pushing a wheelchair with a young girl in it, since he only had a backpack he put the cub in it and walked over offering his assistance since he knew they would struggle a bit with the trip. He smiled as he approached, "hello would you like some help?" The two of them seemed surprised at his offer and the young lady in the wheelchair smiled, "aren't you the one who took care of most of those monsters?" Dual smiled, "I just did what I could, but as this'll be a bit of a walk I thought you two could use some help." The elderly woman smiled, "truthfully that would be amazing I don't think I could make this walk under normal circumstances." Dual smiled, "ok then I'm Dual nice to meet you both," the elderly lady nodded, "I'm Martha and the little lady here is Nora." Nora sighed, "come on I'm not little I'm 16 now." They chatted as they walked Martha noticed that as he was talking Dual would continue to watch the tree lining, "do you think there are more to f those things?" She asked quietly, Dual sighed, "I'd love for that to be it but something is telling me there will be more of whatever those were." A younger teen who was nearby chimed in quietly, "I think that's be wise to think like that, also as weird as it is those things looked like goblins monsters that usually are mentioned in games and books." Dual thought about it and realized the kid was right they resembled them almost scarily, Dual remembered the kid was one of the people that helped with fighting the monsters. Dual smiled, "thanks for helping out there glad you didn't get hurt." The kid laughed, "with you there I probably did t need to help but you're welcome, how did you get so strong?" Dual chuckled, "well I was in the military for a good bit and was blessed with a pretty good body to help." The kid thought for a bit then nodded, "that strength and decisive decision making makes sense now, given your age you were probably in the war too." He caught himself and apologized, Dual smiled, "it's ok well anyway this is Nora, Martha, and I'm Dual." The kid nodded, "I'm Pete nice to-," he paused staring at Dual, then without missing a beat in a slightly louder more surprised voice, "wait Dual as in Dual the Juggernaut?" Hearing that a few others looked their way and Dual sighed he knew it was a good nickname as far as military nicknames go but he wasn't the biggest fan of it. Pete continued talking excited as if he had met a famous star, "oh wow I read about your story you got trapped behind enemy lines and ended up wiping out a whole squad of enemy soldiers before making it back to base on foot." Hearing this both Martha and Nora became amazed seeing him as even stronger than they had before. Dual heard a few other people talking about feeling a little safer knowing he was there and figured if it helped he wouldn't mind it too much. Pete continued looking at him for confirmation and Dual nodded, "something like that may have happened and yes I did receive the nickname The Juggernaut but I don't really like talking about it." Pete nodded still super excited and didn't talk for a bit everyone continued walking seemingly in a better mood. After a bit they stopped for a rest as they still had about an hour till they arrived at the town. While the others were relaxing Dual walked around in the woods thankfully he didn't find any traces of something watching them and moved to a big hill to look for the town. To his surprise he could see a lot from the top of this hill, Dual stopped looking at the town having heard something faint but distinctive. He listened more and recognized it almost immediately, gunfire. The town or at least some people in the town were fighting most likely against more of those monsters, he hurried back to the group. When he got there everyone was looking at him as in his hurry he made a decent bit of noise. He looked at the people and sighed, "alright so we have a choice to make I could see the town from up there and it looks like there are a few small fires in a couple spots as well as I was hearing gun fire, we can split up when we get closer and have the people who are willing to fight come with me to the town while the others wait for us in a safer spot, or we can all go in together and face whatever awaits us as a whole group." A woman stood up saying, "if we split up we'll be dead if other monsters find us." A few people nodded in agreement and an elderly man spoke up, "but if we all go together then we will take longer to get to the town and more people in town may die as a result." Other nodded realizing this possibility, Dual thought for a bit then came up with an idea, "ok me and maybe one or two others that can move quickly will go ahead everyone else will slowly move closer to the town while making sure you don't get too close to attract the monsters attention." Two young men he hadn't talked with volunteered right away to come with him, and the others agreed this would be a smart way to deal with what they could while staying safer. Dual and the two others left at a good jogging pace and the others started talking to him as they went introducing themselves as Cole and Kyle they were currently in the military and looked up to Dual so felt they would be the best volunteers to help him. He nodded knowing that at the very least they would be in better shape than most civilians. They reached the towns outskirts and paused to catch their breath, after about a minute they slowly began making their way through the town. Most houses they passed looked broken into and there was a lot of blood and bodies laying in different places. They began to hear yelling and the sounds of fighting as they got closer to the towns center, peaking around a building they say the towns police station surrounded by about 60 to 70 goblins. The station had been barricaded but the goblins were doing what they could to break in. While going though the houses Cole had picked up a machete, while Kyle had grabbed a metal baseball bat. Dual had found a 14 pound sledgehammer that to the other twos surprise he held one handed. The three of them went through some houses after seeing the goblins and found bottles of alcohol and rags, after making a few Molotovs they decided the spots they would throw them and then begin to deal with the others that charged them. They began their plan and threw them together the fire erupted quickly catching at least 30 of them on fire after a bit of panic they noted the three of them spread out on the road. About 20 began charging them to the other twos surprise when they got close Dual let out a massive war cry and swung hard smashing the first two with the hammer with an upward swing the other two let out there own yells as they started swinging. The three of them killed the 20 rather quickly, and the other goblins noticed and this time the rest of the about 20 goblins left the station alone as they got about halfway to them the barricades and on the police station door fell out ward and out came four people fully armed up in police riot gear with shield and bat-tons. The four of them charged the backend of the goblins who had noticed the noise, the rest of the fight went rather quickly only one of the officers and Cole got light injuries. The officers looked at the three of them and the one in charge spoke up, "man we can't thank you all enough we were sitting ducks in there." The others agreed and Dual nodded, "do you know if that was all of them?" The officers sighed and their leader spoke again, "so we have no idea what's going on, about 6 hours ago all the electronics in town that we can tell stopped working, then about 2 hours ago those things started to just come into the town and killed so many people we did what we could killed so many with the guns we had but we're completely out of bullets now." As they were talking and Dual shared what all had happened to them people started coming out of the police station. The Duals surprise in a town that could easily hold a few hundred he only counted about 40 people Kyle volunteered to run back and tell the others it was ok to come here. The lead officer asked Dual to follow him, he lead the to the tallest building in the area and they went to the roof. They both stared in horror and disbelief the wall that they had encountered wasn't stopping it continued all the way around at this point it couldn't be called a wall anymore. With no end in sight at the top the only thing they knew was that they were completely enclosed and the town was at the center. They both continued to look around for a few minutes until Dual noticed the group of people heading into the town. The officer looked at Dual, " so we tell them?" Dual shook his head, I don't know this is an insane situation to be in feels like a nightmare." They both started heading back and Dual spoke up, "with how crazy this has all been I think it'd be best just to let people know what we saw they can come up here to see as well." The officer nodded and they went out to where all the others were gathered. The officer walked over to a bench and sat down, he looked at Dual and nodded telling him he should. As Dual was about to speak a loud beep came from the sky, causing everyone to look up. After the tone everyone froze in horror as they watched all the clouds in the sky move to form a face. The face began to speak, "all remaining humans have gathered together, beginning introduction. Humans I am an introduction agent sent by the gods to welcome you all into the true universe. The universe you've all known was a mask to help protect underdeveloped worlds from being completely destroyed without any chance. The mask will soon be released and I have been sent as a final help to ensure this world a chance at survival. You all have been chosen at random and domes such as these have been created all over the planet. These domes are designed as trails that will help the survivors gain great strength and even the attention of gods if you're lucky enough." The face paused for a couple seconds then continued, "due to your humans dependence on technology, the average human is very weak so the gods have given humans a handicap, during your time in the dome you will not need food, water, or sleep. In the sky you see will be a counter," as he said that an actual counter appeared in the sky showing the number 347, he continued, "this number will represent the number of monsters left in the round, to move to the next round you will need to kill all the remaining monsters. The monster have been set to constantly seek out and attack humans so you don't need to worry about hunting them down. Now the number of rounds for this dome has been set to 300, and with each round the monsters will gradually become more in number and stronger monsters will be brought in as well." The feeling of disparity felt heavy as people let that set in, but the face just continued, "if sadly everyone were to die know this though the monsters in the remaining rounds will all be released into your world." Their last solace that death would be an escape was snatched from them in that instant, the face stared blankly at them for a bit then spoke again, "the god of weaponry has looked upon you all and has felt pity so as to help he has decided to bestow each of you a weapon fitting you best," as the face finished in front of every person materialized a weapon, the face began again, "we hope you will do your best to survive and become the hero's of your planet." The face faded back into clouds but the counter was completely visible. Dual grabbed the big mace that had appeared before him and looked at all the others there, he spoke up in a loud voice, "listen up I want everyone to know this, I have a wife friends and family all out there. I will see them again no matter what manner of monster comes I will kill them and make it back alive. If you can't or don't have any will to fight that's fine you don't need to all I need you to do is survive. The only way to make it through this is to survive and work together." He looked at the 80ish of them and spoke again, "for now don't think about what he said it doesn't matter we can think about it all later for now focus on this and this alone. We have monsters that want to kill us and to survive we need to kill them. If you are willing to work with me I think our chances of survival will greatly increase. So what do you all say?" A man stood up, "I've got family out there too but why should we listen to you?" Before Dual could speak Pete spoke up, "I'm sure you've heard of him at least once Dual the Juggernaut. Out of anyone here he's most likely the most knowledgeable in terms of warfare which I personally feel is what we need right now." A lot of people looked at him in a new light and agreed he should take charge, without missing a beat he started telling them his plan.