The sky thundered across Chandapura, and the downpour was relentless.
"Ah!"
Rudra had just laid down after a long night shift when a blood-curdling scream woke him up. With his eyes red and swollen, he glanced at the grandfather clock, his face full of exhaustion and his eyes filled with irritation. It was still 6:00 in the morning.
Agitated, he tried to burrow into the gaps between the sofa cushions, as if hiding between those soft and fluffy things would help him forget whatever was happening across the neighbourhood.
Unfortunately, the shouts only grew more desperate, squeezing into his ears no matter how much he tried to avoid them. For some odd reason, he also heard the sounds of dogs barking as if they had gone rabid and couldn’t hide himself like an ostrich anymore.
’Are the dogs chasing the children again?’ He scratched his head and got up with a grunt.
"Honestly, when will the panchayat even get rid of these dogs? There are so many in the area. Can people even live?"
Shaking his head and complaining under his breath, he walked over to the window.
He opened the curtains and took a quick peek through the corner, and his eyes widened in disbelief.
Blood flowed through the street like a stream of water, and a grotesque, inhuman monster was gnawing on the body of the owner aunty downstairs.
"Dada!"
His attention swiftly turned to the provisions store right next to his building, and his pupils dilated when the kid holding an umbrella, waiting for his school bus, was mauled by a similar monster. The kid’s neck was pierced, and his head snapped in half.
The kid’s father came running out of the house and, looking at the beast, he screamed in terror and turned around to run, but the beast let out a guttural roar and pounced on the back of the man, snapping his head in a single bite.
Just then, chased by several grotesque grey beasts, a dog with red eyes came running down the street with a tender limb of a human girl in its mouth.
Rudra took a step back in terror. He stumbled over a mobile charger and collapsed onto the granite floor.
He couldn’t forget the image of the nail polish still on the nails.
"Am I dreaming?" He asked himself and desperately wanted to believe he was, but the foul stench that started to permeate his room and the smell of the soil right after the rain ruthlessly tore his hopes apart.
Unfortunately, he didn’t get a chance to take a breath as well. He could feel the vibrations coming from below.
The sound of furniture and doors being smashed echoed through the floor, each crash growing louder. Sweat trickled down his forehead and dropped onto the granite.
"Those monsters are coming up."
His heart pounded like a drum, and he got on his feet. Without a second thought, he went into the kitchen.
Part of him still wanted to believe all of this was an illusion, a hoax, and a hallucination, but his heart was screaming. ’What if it was true? What if the smell of the rain and the smell of the blood were not false?’
He took up a long knife from the kitchen and bolted all the locks on the main door.
Rudra sat on the sofa, but his feet were shaking as the sound continued to get closer.
"Boom!"
The sound of a loud explosion rang out from the outside. Rudra rushed to the curtain and opened it a tad bit, only enough for a single pupil to see, and his breath got stuck as he noticed a fireball rising above the horizon.
"The petrol station." He muttered. He couldn’t see the origin of the explosion, but he had stayed in the town for long enough to know the locality.
"Bang bang bang!"
Unfortunately, he was left with not a lot of time to think. Someone was slamming his door.
That’s what his brain, which had not come to terms with reality initially thought, but it only took a split second for him to understand it was the grey monster.
He clenched the knife tightly and pushed against the door with all his might.
Ever since he left his village, he hadn’t been as active in maintaining his physical health. The work at the factory was heavy, and considering that he was already dead tired by the time he got back, he had even less time and energy to focus on his physical ability.
Yet, standing at 6 ft 2 in and getting a little bigger from eating all sorts of carb-heavy foods, he was a large man.
The weight was no joke.
No matter how much the monster on the other end tried to break through, it could not. Sadly, a rhythmic sound echoed from the staircase, and soon, another monster joined the earlier one, putting more pressure on the door.
Rudra’s heart ran cold. He jolted every time the monsters hit the door, and his back started to hurt and eventually got sore.
’How long before the door breaks?’
Rudra knew he didn’t have long. If the attack continued for much longer, or if another monster joined the two, the door would be done for and subsequently so would he.
A light of determination appeared in his eyes, and at once, he stepped to the side.
The door held out a few more times before the bolt gave out, and it slammed open.
A grotesque grey beast immediately pounced inside, and right behind it came another one.
Rudra didn’t hesitate and ruthlessly swiped the knife towards the neck of the second beast.
(Slice)
Half of its neck was immediately sliced, and viscous yellow blood began to seep out.
Rudra felt nauseous, but he held back and instinctively ducked down as the first beast pounced on him after realising that he was right beside the door.
Rudra pulled out the knife and tried to take the opportunity to stab the beast again, but to his horror, his hand was empty.
No, it was not empty. He just felt like it was. He looked at his hand, and the knife had completely melted.
The back of his neck felt chilly, and goosebumps stood on end. He forcefully swiped his head to the side and escaped the claw of the monster by a hair’s breadth.
However, unfortunately, he was cornered.
The beast turned its head. Staring at its disgusting mouth with teeth like a piranha and a pair of six purple eyes, he felt despair.
In his last moments, he tried to reach out for anything he could get his hands on and actually grabbed onto a Battery Inverter.
As luck would have it, his battery needed some service, so the inverter was not connected to anything.
He yanked the metal inverter and swung it at the grotesque monster.
The inverter hit the monster’s face with a loud bang and caused it to take a few steps back. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to have dealt any damage, but anything that would delay his death was a good thing for Rudra.
He stumbled and ran out of his house and directly bolted towards the stairs. He heard vague sounds coming from below, so he decisively locked the stairs and went out onto the balcony area of the floor.
He could tell that the monster was right behind him, so as soon as he got through the metal door, he slammed the metal door shut and leaned against the door.
A scene of the town, engulfed in flames, explosions, and bloodshed, appeared in his eyes, but he was only able to focus on it for a split second before the monster wiggled through the door right before he could close it.
Rudra turned around and pressed his legs against it, trying to crush the monster between the door, but it swung its arm and caused a gaping wound on his back. Blood seeped through his tank top and drenched his pants.
The pain stimulated him, and gritting his teeth, he picked up a pot by its stem and smashed it towards the monster’s head.
"greeee"
It screamed like a maniac, but Rudra did not stop.
He smashed one pot after another, endured two more slices on his back, and after he found there was nothing within his reach, he looked at the monster, his eyes bloodshot, and let go of the door at once.
His life was on the line, and he took a gamble. Fortunately, it paid off.
Losing its footing, the monster stumbled forward, and this was what Rudra was waiting for.
He jumped on its back and wrapped his legs around its neck and leaned back with all his might.
Rudra put every ounce of his strength into his thighs and squeezed as hard as possible.
The monster struggled from side to side and tried to get up many times, but he did not let it.
The monster finally went limp after a few moments of struggle.
Rudra’s shoulders slumped, and his legs loosened. He collapsed onto the ground and panted heavily.
For a moment, he thought the stormy clouds looked beautiful, but something attracted him at the corner of his eye.
’Is that a bird?’ He looked at a black dot and wondered absentmindedly, but as the dot became bigger and bigger, he was horrified to discover that it was the same grey monster he fought, but with wings.
Rudra got up in a hurry and, closing the security door, he stumbled back to his room. Yet, he noticed another problem.
"Hey, why am I getting dizzy?"
Even his thoughts started to get muddled, and thinking that he had been infected by some sort of poison from the monster’s claw, he collapsed next to the first monster he killed, right at the door, in despair.