Silent Storm, Silent Rage

The cold wind of today's rain breezed through my skin and hair as I walked in the wet pavement, water splashed as my boots kept stepping in small puddles while I made my way to the local mall 4 blocks away.

Cars are nowhere to be found or if not rarely and some people are stuck inside buildings taking shelter from the heavy rain, I was only stubborn enough to not give a damn and face the horrific weather head on because I'm hungry.

The street lights illuminated the path marking my way to the mall, I eventually got to see one lone car breaking traffic rules as he just sped by a red light, but in the situation right now as roads are empty, I would've done the same thing.

The more I got closer to my destination the more frequent I saw more people, a few minutes later I would have finally arrived at the mall, the large lights surrounded the building as signs and billboards practically covered it whole while the entrance is empty except for 3 guards waiting for inspection.

I approached the entrance and the guards doing their routine as usual; they stopped me first and bought out their metal detector and scanned me; the device beeped in intervals but not to show that I had anything suspicious; the inspection was done and they thanked me for my cooperation.

I closed my umbrella before I entered the building, the water built up from the umbrella left droplets as I continued walking throughout the mall, my hair was slightly wet and my boots are completely drenched walking in rain, making loud and squishy thumps as I ventured finding something to eat.

I glanced over at several stores, fast-food chains, and restaurants finding something right for the mood today, but eventually I just came back looking for budget convenient foods in a convenience store inside the mall as I realized that everything these stores sell is slightly more expensive than what I usually buy.

'What a disgrace' I thought, as I looked at my meal in front of me, a bowl of instant ramen and a pity excuse of a hamburger with thin buns and almost burnt patty, I really don't have any money to spare for decent meals as I'm always living on budget, so mostly when I'm by myself I just stick to whatever cheap stuff I can get my hands on and whenever I'm around with Winter or any of my buddies, I can always assure them to pay the bills and buy something at least decent for me, they know I'm THAT poor, and it's humiliating.

I took a sip of my instant ramen and instantly felt the intense saltiness of the soup burning in my tongue. I slurped down the noodles as well as it mixed with the soup. It tastes like plastic. I grabbed my bottle of water and flushed down the food on my stomach. I dared not to eat the burger as I just lost my appetite but decided to keep it stored in my pocket in case I get hungry again.

I'm jealous of other people and how their lives are easier than how I handled it. They basically have all the stuff given to them on a silver platter and all that's needed is for them to take it. I would just constantly get help from people I know and those I don't have a grudge with.

Coincidentally, a familiar face came into the store and the first thing their eyes met was mine.

"Zaina, there you are!"

Hank Lowe, my co-worker at the old man's bar 'Balalaika', pretty chill and doesn't mind talking about something personal. A good therapist, I would say.

Hank walked towards me while I just stared at the wall, knowing he would sit by "I thought we would meet at the bar" He took a seat and replied, "I wanted to meet you personally instead" Hank smiled a bit, his eyes drawn to mine as I ignored him. I turned to look at him "So what is it?" He reclined in his seat and instead changed the question "Why are you here eating food like this? Treat yourself like you mean it man" his expression changed to that of worry, he always knew I was eating shit food every day and he was always flabbergasted at the fact that I never eat anything decent or tasteful.

"Money's the problem man, I just can't eat anything that's over a dollar" I slouched on my seat as I looked at him dead in the eyes, "There's decent food out there than this and you always keep coming back to it" Hank rebutted, I looked away facing the other side as he just kept telling me to treat myself like I mean it, but it would always end up with him doing favors to me, he eventually gave up trying to talk sense to me and instead just bought me a drink and a hot porridge that was freshly made.

Hank sighed as he just looked at me pitifully, concerned as my co-worker, he leaned right next to me "Just stop acting like shit Zaina, now eat"

I looked at my new meal that he gave to me, it smelled fresh and it looked edible unlike the aborted mistake of a ramen I stuffed myself earlier, I picked up my spoon and chowed down on the porridge. Even though it was hot and it was burning in my mouth I couldn't help but keep eating it, it just tastes-

"Delicious?" Hank asked midway through my meal.

I just nodded and tears were falling down from my face, not because of how thoughtful or how much of a good friend he is.

But I just basically downed an entire hot meal and now it's stuck on my stomach and burning my mouth.

I grabbed the water from Hank's hands snatching it away from him; he was going to give it to me anyway but I needed to flush down the porridge down to my stomach; I gulped and gulped and Hank was there confused and wide eyed, but he was actually giggling at my shenanigans.

I slammed the bottle at the table as I finished drinking it and smirked at Hank, "Heh, I'll take more than just one", I urged him again to buy more meals for me, and we laughed the moment away like the complete fools we are.

We spent the next few minutes just laughing away and drawing attention as we pretty much sound like drunkards that got wasted, except we weren't.

But Hank would quickly cut the mood of the conversation as he now wore his serious face, "So Zaina, the old man actually wanted me to check on you", He leaned into the table, hands held together as he looked at me.

"What does he want?" I asked Hank, "Remember the news about the riots happening all over the country?", he asked if I can still recall it, I remember it being only in a few states here in America but what does it have to do with me?

"Yeah? and what about it?" I turned, eager to know what the old man wanted.

"The city is currently in a riot too." He handed me his phone and showed me a recording of a video of a riot, and from the video I can barely picture out the location, but it was really somewhere here in our area.

"I saw this in one of the social media platforms where it went viral after an hour, the whole town is in madness" he continued as the gruesome imagery of people dying left and right continues, there were some that are biting into each other's necks, and then there was a guy that got slammed into the ground being held by 5 people.

The video still kept going until the cameraman dropped the device, and all we could see in the screen are people running in whatever direction.

Hank closed his phone and gave me his hand, "He was worried for you, knowing you might pull off some crazy stunt again and get yourself hurt, he suggested that you'd stay with Balalaika for a while" he suggested, relaying the message of that old geezer.

I clenched my fists, realizing there was someone out there not safe from all of this, just the thought of it would damn to my mind alone.

I walked past Hank in a hurry, when he suddenly reached out and grabbed my hand. I didn't care to explain. He would know who I'm after for but this time he was genuinely concerned.

"At least... take care of yourself, I know you're going for Winter-" I stopped him there, and I butted in "Then you know what I'm gonna do, don't worry I'll be fine", I shrugged off his hand and kept walking outside the store, Hank would quickly get out of there too and head to the other direction.

He looked back for a moment and I locked eyes with him, he nodded once, signaling our silent agreement as we both would meet at the Balalaika.

I stepped outside the mall and into the rain again, an hour and a half has passed and what seemed like a quiet road earlier is now filled with traffic and vehicles stuck to one another.

I checked at the time, almost 1 PM, and the rain is still strong. The winds almost made me lose my balance as it suddenly released a powerful gust in my presence.

But I was not about to let this stop me. I'm going to fetch Winter and get out of here safely with everyone.

I made my way towards the street, completely forgetting my umbrella as I left it in the mall because of my clumsiness and stubbornness, the entire road was illuminated by a glare of red and yellow lights, the rain did less and less now to visibility as I'm now blinded but my path was revealed.

More and more people would also start appearing too, a large crowd of them started suddenly appearing from the next block ahead walking towards me, I went through and skipped through the crowd, making my way to the next block.

Along the crowd and in the block I was walking in, I saw a burning pile of rubble and a totaled vehicle that crashed into a building, masses of people gathered to see what happened and some of them came from the crowd earlier that went the opposite direction of me.

Then there was a man, punching another guy repeatedly, they pinned the poor guy to the wall taking blows left and right, but the punching would then progressively turn into scratches, the attacker was keeping on assaulting him as blood sprayed everywhere.

I tried not to pay attention, my pace hastened as I began walking faster, now more anxious than ever on what was happening.

It was weird, and confusing, this all happened so fast and there was never anything like this when I walked through here hours ago when I got to the mall, seriously, what happened?

I stopped on my tracks and came to a point where I would see a lone man shivering rapidly on the middle of the road, the guy was surrounded by vehicles and the cars kept honking at him but he wasn't moving.

The man would be approached by the lady that was in a car in front of him, her purse swayed as she walked to the man in a stylish fashion and was about to smack him in the head, but...

As the lady approached the man, he began to walk slowly, his arms were stationed wide above his chest as he prepares to do something, the man would shortly grab the lady and grip his hands on her body, the hands were gripping so tight enough that the woman began to scream in pain and start fighting back, he then started biting into the woman's flesh, she was screaming in pain and now she was trying to completely get rid of herself from the guy's grip.

The other cars made an attempt to run him over and drivers would then help break out the fight, but the attacker would then scratch one of the drivers in his face, his nails were pointed and damaged dealing immense pain to one of them.

It was the same view as earlier.

The attacker would then be surrounded and ganged up by multiple people, he was restrained by everyone who cooperated. But there was something else wrong, the lady from earlier started shivering like the attacker from earlier.

Her legs were shaking and she dropped her bag and began walking in a non lady like manner, it's like as if she lost control of herself and gave in to rage.

Then the lady turned to look at the pile of people manning the attacker from earlier, without a second's notice the woman began scratching and even biting the people pinning the attacker down.

I snapped back and got over the image, they were literally murdering each other now.

I ran, I ran as fast as I could getting away from them, people got out of their cars to see the commotion, and they busy trying to process what the hell was going on.

But I ran to get to Winter, as quickly as my legs could handle I went even faster trying to make it in time.

But I was stopped by a person on the street, he was just standing there, bloodied up and flesh torn and ripped, his clothes were noticeable as I saw that the logo of my university was embedded in that outfit, it was a student that, he had scratch marks and his head was almost cut open as a large gaping hole could be seen on the back of his head.

He turned back slowly facing me, my heart beating faster as my adrenaline keeps pushing through the limit of my body.

I saw what he looked like...

He looks like that guy from last week, the guy that hurt my friend.

He looks insane...

And he's now running towards me!

I quickly ran at the opposite direction, his gargled screams were audible and he followed me wherever I go, I tried to lose him through an alleyway, through a narrow path, through a window, and he kept following me.

From all that running I ended up in a butcher's market where I would see a few corpses here and there making up the carnage of what happened here.

The bully quickly came out of the corner as he quickly ran and tried to pounce me, I side stepped preventing him from pinning me down.

At this point I'm just gonna have to kill him!

I grabbed a chair that was randomly lying around the market and used it as a defensive weapon to shield myself and attack the bully.

His arms rapidly moved only flowing in one direction, he never looked down to grab my feet or to grab the chair and throw it away, he was braindead.

I took the opportunity to use the chair to pin the guy to the wall, just enough to barely hold him in as he was strong, abnormally strong...

I then picked up a brick that was laying around and bashed his head open, revealing more brain matter of the crazy bully, I kept smashing his head a couple more times and he attempted to grab my arm and stop it, I quickly reacted and forced all my strength to pull the guy's arm and his body and slam him down to the ground.

He quickly got up and charged at me again, I evaded right on time as he missed and he crashed right next to a stall where various meat cutting equipment were still available.

I threw the brick I still held in my hand at him, and grabbed his neck while he was stunned. I used this moment to grab his head and slam it to a metal counter on it's edges multiple times, the wedge of the counter did a job on the man's face as it slowly disfigured into a triangle, but he still kept moving.

Luckily there was a meat grinder nearby and I lodged the guy's head inside it, pushing it in as I stumble to open the grinder, the machine came to life and the guy's head was slowly being sucked in, it was trying to escape but I held it in, my fists clenched in his open head.

The grinder ate the majority of it's head and after a while, the guy stopped moving...

I looked around me as I realized what a mess I'd caused, blood everywhere in my outfit and hair.

I tried to justify to myself that the guy attacked me, I had no choice so I had to do what I had to do, it felt dirty and brutal but there was nothing I could do to stop him.

Honestly, I don't even know how to react...

I checked my phone to see the time, 1:36 PM, I was in the middle of a meat market and my apartment is nearby, sounds of sirens could be heard from the distance as well as screaming people but I still held on to my objective.

"I have to get to Winter"