ragnarok - rim of the world

Abandoned

The words 'Rim of the World' stood above us as we entered the camp. The once crowded and sunny area was now abandoned, dusty, and bleak.

We all started to call out to see if anyone was around, to no avail. Well, if I got a message like that I wouldn't stick around either.

"Where is everybody?" I asked.

"Is anybody here?" Alex called out, only to be met with silence.

"Yo, do you see anybody?"

"What's that?" Dariush inquired, as we stopped in front of a sign, "Gone down mountain." Oh, they left us!"

"Not all of them," Gabriel said, looking off at someone lying on a table.

"Huh? It's Heavy Metal Conrad!" 

We exclaimed his name multiple times as we ran over to his motionless body.

"Is he dead?" I asked.

"He's breathing," Gabriel informed after checking his pulse, "He must have slept through the evacuation."

"Okay, what kind of asshole sleeps through an evacuation?" 

We tried shaking his body, but it remained motionless. 

Zhenzhen (dramatically) pulled a flask out of his pocket, before chugging the rest of it and throwing it behind her.

"I don't think that...that was milk," Dariush said.

"Coulda saved me some," I muttered, everybody, looked at me like I said something absurd, "What?"

We made our way into the mess hall place to find any means of communication and supplies.

Gabriel tried to use the phone but it didn't work, and neither did the lights. Maybe when our phones got knocked out, power did. I continued to listen in on the conversation while trying to find supplies with Zhenzhen. There were flashlights, a flare gun, a couple cans of food and other things around. I just shoved anything useful into Zhenzhen's bag.

I felt like a character in an apocalypse movie right now, a little scary but kinda cool.

"It's cause the power's out. You know what an EMP is?" Alex asked, he seemed to be the smartest out of all of us.

"Uh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's that music white people dance to."

"No, that's EDM. EMP stands for electromagnetic pulse. A nuclear explosion in the upper atmosphere can cause one. And it knocks out most electronics over a really big area," Alex explained. I walked over to join in on the conversation, after finishing helping Zhenzhen.

I noticed Gabriel looking at me despite other people talking. I looked back at him which caused him to turn away quickly. I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion. Why would he do that?

"But what does that mean?" Dariush questioned.

"It means nothing works," I muttered, understanding what he was saying.

"Not even cars?"

"Well, you guys have food and a roof over your head. You could do a lot worse than just staying here and waiting this out," Gabriel chimed in.

"Wait, waiting what out?" 

A loud boom erupted. We exchanged a look before we all ran out of the mess hall to look at the sky.

"Those are F-22 Raptor air superiority fighters," Alex pointed out as we all stared at the jets dipping and darting about in the air.

"I hope Tom Cruise is in one," I muttered under my breath.