10 Years Later

"Girls, there's so many things I wish I could have told you." Lauren laments, guiding the scared and confused girls to the middle of the living room.

"But it looks like we won't have time for that."

"Grams, what do you mean?" Amara scratched up her eyebrows at the older woman who had begun moving the coffee table and rug to reveal a door with a big latch. She lifts the latch, pulling the door to reveal darkness.

"Both of you get in there."

Kiera's lips started to quiver as her eyes widened at the dark hole. "It's dark."

Lauren turned into a smaller girl. "You have to, baby just for a little while."

She turned a stern gaze towards the older Amara. "You both need to stay here until I say you can come out..."

Thunder crashed through the sound and Lauren glanced at something in the window.

"Grandma?"

Lauren glances back at the two girls, grabbing both their hands, nearly shoving them both into the whole. Anita whimpered while Amara struggled to get her footing in the dark.

"Both of you don't make a sound."

. . .

Amara sits up, wincing at the throbbing in her left arm. Slowly, she lift the blanket from her body, revealing an arm wrapped in black cloth, starting at the palm and ended just above the her elbow.

They were back in the slums, an area full of abandoned apartment buildings, stores and warehouses.

They were located near the outskirts; a border between Seren the city -state and Terra, where the forgotten reside. It was a place that was hit the hardest during the war a thousand years ago. When the kingdoms of Solaris and Lunara were locked in a deadly war, the people of the Terra kingdom were caught in the the middle.

Magical warfare caused a lot of the decimation within the land, though metal weapons were often used in many skirmishes.

Today, most of the Terrans have fled the land to other nearby kingdoms and city-states, while the land is cursed with flesh eating plants and mutated animals.

The girls, along with many others, resided in the lower parts of the abandoned apartment buildings, near the third wall from the city. The second walls housed mostly middle class and working class families who often worked within the city walls. And of course, those who worked within the inner walls with higher status and money, moved to the bigger cities which offered more resources and protection.

Wiping the sweat from her forehead, Amara glanced at a small, dark, figure that slept to the left of her. Her sister's chest rose and fell gently inside of the dark sleeping bag she buried herself in as the sun's rays peaked out of the window.

It highlighted the bare walls and the grey carpet where they lay. A small smile forms on her face as she watches Kiera slumber peacefully.

But it quickly disappears when she remembers the events of yesterday.

Amara had been attempting to scrounge the area for resources. Kiera had come down with a fever and needed some herbs; so Amara went beyond the barrier. It held together by the flimsy wire fence for laughable protection against intruders and even nature itself.

While she was able to get the but were ambushed by a group of rabid dogs.

She got momentarily distracted and nearly lost the herbs. She was able to get them back, but not without getting herself bitten.

Once she got back, she hid her injury as best as she could and made the concoction for her sister to drink.

Amara had stayed up most of the night watching Kiera; the fifteen year old girl could barely move the last time Amara saw her.

She could see that her brown skin looked more rich than the beige color it had been.

Amara she wiggles out from the sleeping bag, standing up as quietly as she could, leaning over her sister and gently feeling her face with her unwrapped hand.

She sighed with relief when she didn't feel the burning sensation. The fever had gone down.

She slowly got up, tiptoeing across the creaking floor of the small room.

Slowly, she opens the door, creating a creaking sound that causes me to stop abruptly. Turning her head back to her sister, who only rolled over in her sleep. She lets out a relieved breath.

Quietly, She stepped into the desolate room to see the sun rising into the sky from the sliding door to her right. She walked across the wooden floorboards, down the hallway, past the kitchen until she made it to the bathroom.

There, she is greeted by her reflection; a round face with thick curly hair that stopped at her tanned shoulders. She stared back at me with tired, brown, eyes that sported slightly dark circles underneath them.

She does everything as Amara does, pinning up her hair up into a bun before reaching under the sink to get the first aid kit.

She lets out a nervous breath as I opened the kit and took out the small, silver, scissors.

"Here goes nothing."

Amara carefully start cutting the black fabric away from her arm.

When the last of the dark fabric fell away, Amara could see the injury very clearly.

The bite wound finally stopped bleeding, leaving behind deep puncture wounds on her forearm with black fluid caked around the red, puffy, bite. The rest of her skin looked sickly pale with black veins coursing dark fluid through the arm.

She could barely keep herself from screaming as she came into terms of her dire situation.

She was infected.