End is Nigh

"Lucen ..Lucen ..do you theenk I am cute ?" a little girl of about nine years old with two small ponytails poked Lucien's cheeks and asked .

Lucien, disturbed from this sudden intrusion of his day nap, opened his eyes, and saw Annie looking at him with big puppy eyes . Although he felt irritated and angry on being woken up from his sleep by his classmate , he could bring himself to say anything harsh to Annie.

Those puppy eyes and cute innocent face would melt anyone's anger any day .

Lucien asked, "Annie why do you keep asking me that? Haven't I already told you ?"

"No, tell me again, Lucen please " Annie now pulled his cheeks ."

Knowing that Annie would not leave him alone without getting what she wanted,he said, "Yes Annie I think you are very cute " Lucien said .

Satisfied at Lucien's answer , Annie stooped pulling his cheeks and smilingly went back to her seat at her small desk . Lucien was now fully awake and looked around the classroom.

The teacher was late to class and all the boys and girls were chattering and playing at the middle of the room. It was the kindergarten class of the Happy Dreams Orphanage run by the city government. Lucien stood up from his seat and went towards the teachers desk , he was thirsty and there was a water bottle lying on the desk.

As he moved past Annie's desk, he saw her drawing a picture with crayons. A rough sketch depicting the outline of a man and a woman holding hands of a small child with ponytails from both sides. Lucien looked towards Annie, she had lost her parents in an accident last month and since no relatives were willing to look after her , the government had transferred her to the orphanage . She cried a lot at first ,unwilling to eat and drink, but as time flew her tears dried up and finding friends of her age she had slowly started coming out from the grief .

Sensing someone looking at her , Annie looked up and saw Lucien. She smiled and said " Lucen, this is me , my daddy and mommy , wait I will draw you too, mommy likes you she says" , saying this she took up a blue crayon and started making another rough sketch . Lucien smiled back and went forward .

He had never understood the concept of parents, he never had any . He was abandoned near a cemetery when he was an infant. Hearing his cry, generated from hunger, a gravedigger found him and taking pity on him kept him at the doorsteps of this orphanage . Lucien had been here since.

Reaching the teacher's desk , he grabbed the water bottle and drank some water . He took a piece of chalk from the table secretly and went towards the open window at one corner of the room facing the outside road .

The kindergarten class was on the third floor of the orphanage . The lower two floors were used for accommodation and canteen .

Lucien broke the chalk into small pieces and waited near the window. Soon a passer-by was seen walking on the road with his back faced towards the orphanage building , Lucien thew a small piece of chalk targeting him and crouched under the window and peeped . The chalk hit the passer-by on the head , the man stopped walking and looked around in confusion . Unable to locate the assailant, he walked away . Lucien laughed as he waited for his next target .

While waiting, his gaze fell at the noon sky , the sky was turning pale dark as dark clouds had gathered and covered the sun fully. Even fleeting glimpses of the sun were not seen at all. The weather was turning eerily gloomy and chilly .

Lucien saw another passer-by on the road walking past the orphanage . He again targeted the man's back and just as he was about to throw the chalk piece a massive green flash of lightning followed by an ear-splitting sound of thunder pierced through the dark skies . The temperature suddenly dropped drastically and an unpleasant chillness in the atmosphere followed by a strong cold wind blew.

Lucien had covered his ears with his hands ,trying to mitigate the deafening sound of the thunder, and had sat down on the ground with his eyes closed near the window with his back against the window wall . A paper flew and hit Lucien's face. He lowered his hands from his ears and pulling the paper from his face looked at it. It was Annie's drawing. Lucien holding the paper looked at the classroom .

What he saw scarred him for eternity .

All his classmates were lying on the floor and black grotesque shadows of men and women sat on their bodies biting ,chewing and gnawing their flesh , the children were all petrified and could not even shout in pain under this torture . Blood flowed everywhere and soaked the floor .

Lucien with eyes full of terror looked towards Annie. Her head was cut open from her throat and was hanging on the sides with a thin mass of flesh while a womanly shaped black shadow was clawing her stomach and eating her entrails.

Annie's dangling head suddenly looked towards Lucien . The cute puppy eyes of the sweet little girl were now reddened with blood ,clotted in her sclera, as she said in a hoarse dying voice "Run Lucien run , mommy does not like us anymore."

Lucien broke free of the intense crippling fear and turning back jumped out of the window.