Before the World Fell Apart…
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ATLANTA, GEORGIA — 4 Weeks Ago
"Shinji Tsukishima! Cadet, eyes forward!"
Shinji's boots slammed into place as he snapped into a salute. Sweat dripped down the side of his face under the blazing Georgia sun. The second-year military cadet adjusted his grip on the wooden training rifle.
"Yes, sir!"
Drills had been intense that morning, rumors swirling through campus of a flu sweeping across major cities. But like most cadets, Shinji believed in the chain of command—and the idea that nothing could shake the nation's defenses.
He was wrong.
By the time drills ended that week, the news was filled with chaos—quarantines, riots, military silence. Then, one night, the dorms were attacked. Not by looters. Not by soldiers.
But by something inhuman.
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MONTREAL, CANADA — 4 Weeks Ago
"Graduated... and now the world ends," Heidi muttered, zipping up her emergency bag.
She had just finished her medical internship in Canada, two weeks into her new life, when the Flu spread like wildfire. The hospital overrun. Doctors infected mid-surgery. Patients attacking nurses. She watched friends turn feral in front of her.
One of them bit her supervisor.
She hadn't stayed to see what happened next.
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NEW YORK CITY — 4 Weeks Ago
Clyde's shift started like any other. Traffic, noise, and the city that never slept.
His wife and kids had flown to the Philippines for a family reunion. "Only two weeks," she had said. That was three days before the first outbreak hit Manhattan.
Clyde was on patrol when the NYPD precincts went silent. When people started tearing each other apart in the streets. He had to leave the city. Not to survive—but to make it back to his family.
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NEW JERSEY — 4 Weeks Ago
Miko had finals. She was already three hours deep into accounting worksheets when her roommate burst in, pale and screaming.
"Turn on the news!"
That night, Miko killed her first infected neighbor with a fire extinguisher.
By sunrise, she had boarded up her dorm, stolen canned food from the cafeteria, and found an old hunting bow from a sporting store.
She wasn't an honors student anymore.
She was prey in a new world.
---
NOW — Four Weeks After the Flu
Rural Pennsylvania — Rain Falls Over the Interstate
Dark clouds hovered as the group of four met by fate, not by plan.
Shinji stood under a crumbling billboard along I-80, ax gripped tightly. He had been walking north for three days, following whispers of a convoy. His hoodie was soaked, and his nerves on edge.
Then he heard a rustle.
He spun. "Stay back!"
A woman stepped out with her hands slightly raised, an AK-47 slung over her shoulder.
Heidi: "Easy. I'm not infected."
Shinji: (lowers axe) "You're the first person I've seen in a week."
Heidi: "Likewise. You military?"
Shinji: "Cadet. Shinji. Atlanta."
Heidi: "Heidi. Nurse. From Montreal... or what's left of it."
They stared for a second—two strangers, both young, both weathered by recent hell.
A low grunt broke their tension.
Clyde: (stepping into view, blood on his sleeves) "You two planning on standing there or watching my back?"
He looked like a man who hadn't slept in days, machetes glinting in his hands. He eyed them both, gauging the threat.
Shinji: "You military?"
Clyde: "NYPD. Was. Clyde."
Heidi: "You alone?"
Clyde paused. "Supposed to be heading for the coast. Heard about an evacuation site in Boston. You two coming, or not?"
They considered it. Before they could answer—
Voice: "Don't move!"
They turned toward the treeline. A girl stepped out, bow drawn and aimed. Her long hair clung to her face from the rain. A rusty katana was strapped to her back.
Miko: "Back off. I don't trust groups."
Clyde: "And we don't trust people aiming at us."
Miko: (tense) "I've seen what people do when they get desperate."
Shinji stepped forward carefully.
Shinji: "We're not desperate yet. Just survivors... same as you."
There was a long silence before Miko lowered her bow, hesitantly.
Miko: "I'm Miko. I don't like people."
Heidi: (smirking) "That makes four of us."
---
They found an abandoned diner nearby and secured the doors. Rain pounded the windows. Inside, by dim candlelight, they shared cold beans and whispered pieces of their pasts.
Clyde: "Wife and two kids. Sent them to the Philippines. Haven't heard a word since."
Heidi: "My hospital was overrun... everyone I worked with turned."
Miko: "I watched my professor bleed out in our dorm bathroom."
Shinji: "I lost my whole squad."
The silence was heavy. Then Clyde looked around the group and said:
Clyde: "We ain't heroes. We're just what's left."
Shinji nodded.
Shinji: "Then let's not waste it."
Outside, the rain didn't stop.
Inside, four strangers shared the only thing that mattered anymore.
Survival.
....Rain.
Silence.
And four strangers gathered in the ruins of a roadside diner.
The group sat in a booth surrounded by shattered glass and overturned chairs. A small fire crackled in an old soup pot on a portable stove Heidi carried. Steam fogged the cold windows, and for the first time in weeks, warmth touched their skin.
Shinji broke the silence first.
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Shinji's Story
Shinji: (staring at his steaming cup)
"I stayed in the barracks longer than I should have. I thought maybe the officers would regroup. But after the third day with no power, no comms, I knew."
Clyde:
"Military base?"
Shinji:
"North Georgia Military College. It was chaos. Some students turned first. We locked them in. But they... they didn't die fast. They changed."
His hands gripped the table.
Shinji:
"I escaped through the supply tunnels. Took what I could carry. Traveled northeast—small roads, forests. Avoided cities."
Heidi:
"Smart."
Shinji: (shrugging)
"Not really. I lost a lot of good people trying to help someone who screamed for help in a wrecked car. It was a trap. Infected swarmed us. I've been walking alone ever since. I followed train tracks through Maryland... until I found this highway in Pennsylvania."
---
Heidi's Story
She leaned forward, hands on the stove for warmth.
Heidi:
"My hospital in Montreal was where it hit first. I had just finished my internship. I thought I was ready to be a nurse. But no one could be ready for that."
She hesitated before continuing.
Heidi:
"My best friend, Elle, got bitten during intake. The patients we admitted... some changed in hours. Some in minutes. I saw a doctor tear a janitor's face off with her teeth."
Miko: (softly)
"God…"
Heidi:
"I fled. Took what I could—medical kits, dried food, my old AK. I crossed into Vermont on foot. Hitched rides in abandoned cars. Hiked through New York's forests. Then the roads got too crowded with... them. So I avoided highways and just kept heading south."
Clyde:
"Why south?"
Heidi:
"Not sure. Maybe looking for warmth. Or maybe I thought survivors would stick to major roads. But I stopped trusting crowds."
---
Clyde's Story
Clyde: (nodding slowly)
"I was patrolling Queens when we got the first reports. My lieutenant told me to take the night off. Said I'd been working too much. He died two days later in a riot."
He pulled a worn photo from his jacket—his wife and two kids on a beach.
Clyde:
"They were in Cebu. Family vacation. I was supposed to fly out the next week."
His voice hardened.
Clyde:
"I never made it. The airports shut down. The city went dark. NYPD tried to hold a line... but we couldn't shoot fast enough. I stayed with some old partners, holed up in a precinct. But supplies ran out. People turned on each other."
Heidi:
"And you walked?"
Clyde:
"Walked. Took a cruiser halfway through Jersey before it stalled. Been on foot ever since. Got ambushed in a church by scavengers. Lost my sidearm. Kept the blades."
Shinji: (nods in respect)
"You're tough."
Clyde:
"I'm a dad. I have to be."
---
Miko's Story
Everyone turned to Miko.
She didn't speak at first.
Then she looked up, eyes hollow but strong.
Miko:
"I was in New Jersey. Accounting major. I skipped class the day the outbreak hit."
Clyde:
"Lucky or unlucky?"
Miko:
"Both. My dorm got locked down. Campus police tried to maintain order. My roommate turned. Bit her boyfriend. I... I used a kitchen knife."
She looked down at her hands.
Miko:
"After that, I stopped sleeping. Took a hunting bow from a looted store. Watched YouTube survival guides offline. Made my own arrows."
Heidi: (impressed)
"On your own?"
Miko:
"Everyone I trusted either died... or left me behind."
She glanced toward the darkened diner window.
Miko:
"I started heading west, avoiding big cities. They said on emergency broadcasts that the Midwest had safer zones. I cut through Philly, then into rural Pennsylvania. Found some burned-out buses. Then I heard movement... and found you guys."
---
Convergence
The fire crackled again. For a moment, none of them spoke.
Shinji: (quietly)
"We all ran in different directions... and still ended up here."
Clyde:
"Maybe there's a reason."
Heidi:
"Or maybe survival's just dumb luck."
Miko: (firmly)
"No. It's choices. We made it here because we chose to fight."
They all nodded, the silence heavier but more connected.
Then Clyde stood and looked toward the road.
Clyde:
"Storm's ending. If we head east, there's a ranger station up in the hills. Might be maps, radios. Maybe more survivors."
Shinji:
"Let's move before more of them find us."
Miko: (drawing her bow)
"I'll take lead."
Heidi: (slings her AK47)
"Let's go. No turning back."
As they stepped out into the misty morning, the four paths that once diverged had finally converged—for better or worse.