Not Prepared

Leo was caught in the mass of people as if he were in a raging river.  They pulled him back up the stairs, he feared if he did not keep pace he would be trampled in the stampede.  He worked his way slowly to the edge of the crowd and went into the first door he found.

"Whew."  He said as he wiped the sweat from his brow.  The building's temperature was scorching due to the fire, but what was not the only reason he was sweating.  Being a professional VR gamer did not prepare him for long bursts of physical activity.  Even though his forte was fighting games, matches did not last long and did not require a lot of endurance.  He stood there catching his breath for a moment doubled over with his hands on his knees.  As he breathed heavily he concocted a scheme to survive.  'The roof is my safest bet.' He thought to himself.  'How am I going to get there though?  The stairwell is out because of the people, fire, and monsters.  There has to be another way.'  He looked down the hall and saw the elevator.

"That's it!" he said to himself, placing his fist in his hand.  He ran over to the elevator and pried the door open.  The void shaft was imposing.  Leo looked down and did not see traces of the fire.  "Good, that means the elevator is below me.  There should be an emergence ladder on the wall… There it is! Shit!"

The ladder was on the opposite end of the shaft.  Leo would need to make a jump of several feet in order to grab hold of it.  He could hear the screams still echoing from the stairwell and made his choice.  He backed up to give himself enough room to run.  He then ran with everything he had and jumped into the shaft.  He reached out his hands hoping to grab the ladder.  As he approved the ladder at a descending angle He started to panic.  "Fuck!" He yelled, his word echoed through the shaft.  He made contact with the ladder and grabbed hold as tightly as he could.  His body slammed into the ladder due to the force of the fall.

"Oomph." He said as the air exited his lungs from the force of the blow.  He maintained his grip however and started to climb the ladder.  He climbed slowly due to the pain he was in from his jump.  The loud scream he had heard the beast scream earlier was now echoing through the elevator shaft. "Shit!  They must have heard me!"  Leo's fear caused him to climb the ladder as if he had no pain at all. He could hear the monsters below him banging on the elevator in the shaft.  "Thank God for that elevator!"

After several minutes of the most stressful climbing in his life Leo finally reached the end of the shaft.  Above his head was an access panel.  He opened it slowly and poked his head in.  He was afraid the beasts may have made it here before him.  He scanned the area and determined it to be safe.  He climbed out of the shaft and closed the panel behind him.  "Okay now where am I?"  He said as he looked around the dark room.  Only a few lights illuminated the space.  He eventually found a cleared marked door.  EXIT glowed as his lifeline, his hope.  It was the most beautiful word he had ever seen.

"Thank you fire codes!"  He cheered as he made his way to the door.  When he finally made it and opened the door he was greeted by a blood red sky.  "The roof! I made it!"  He looked around, the entire city was in flames.  He rushed over to the side of the building to look down.  The ground beneath him blazed brightly and he could see those flying monsters hovering around the fire.  If they got too far away from it, the fire that encased their bones would dim and they would retreat back to the flame.

"Interesting."  Leo commented as he watched.  "At least they have a weakness.  But what the hell is going on."  He grabbed his phone from his pocket and inspected it.  He was hoping for a signal.  Alas the phone still showed no service.  In despair Leo left the edge of the building and sat next to the access door.  He knew the roof would be safe from the fire for a while, but had no idea what to do next.

His plan was only to buy himself time.  Time for him to think of his next move.  He had hoped some of his neighbors would have been on the roof waiting for him.  That together they could come up with a strategy. No one was here.  In fact Leo did not even hear the screams from the stairs anymore.  He walked over and placed his ear on the door leading to the stairs.  Silence, not a sound.  He backed up slowly in disbelief. "Did everyone die?!"  He said panicking.  "Did they all get turned into those things?!  Would I have died too?!"

Due to the intensity of his emotions Leo vomited where he stood.  After his purge he gained some of his senses.  "I need to find a way to live.  Maybe if I went to an apartment and used some sheets I could make a parachute or something!"  He was talking to himself more and more.  "No, I don't know how to make one of those."  He stopped to think.

As he thought the building beneath him began to sway.  The fire had weakened the buildings support and now the structural integrity was compromised. "Fuck!"  He yelled again.  The building started to sway more violently.  Until the building began to fall.  "FUCK!!!!" He yelled as the building tilted.  He ran the opposite direct and grabbed on to the edge.  He climbed up quickly and regained his footing.

The city is fairly densely packed with buildings  Leo instinctively knew he had one shot at this, or he would die in the fall.  As the building fell towards another building  the spot on which Leo stood got close enough to him to leap.  Jump he did, he put his arms in front of his face and crunched into a ball as he went flying through the glass window he jumped into.