Ephemeral

YEAR 4989 JUNE 14 The cry of the newborn child resonated the walls of the room dampening the sound of a flurry of hands and feet as the woman lay in bed, drifting in and out of consciousness while gasping for breath. Her eyes fluttered open briefly and she managed a weak smile at the little being swaddled in blankets before fatigue took over her. My small bean... When she came to, someone was sitting beside her, squeezing her hand. She squeezed back weakly, feeling lightheaded but safe. Lucas' eyes were glued to the infant as he lovingly caressed his head and whispered, "Amelia, our son." He stayed like that for a moment before he dipped down to softly brush his nose against his son's head and slowly brought his gaze up to hers. She was pale, glassy-eyed, and drenched in sweat yet to him, she never looked lovelier. His face softened, "He looks like you," he tenderly said to which Amelia slowly shook her head and softly teased, "No, he looks exactly like you." "You're right," he replied in a heartbeat making her roll her eyes but then the baby started crying. She laughed, "He doesn't like it." Her grin widened as he lowered his head and tenderly kissed the infant's head and the crying stopped but the little bean's face crinkled cutely at his father's gesture. Both of them laughed. "Hush now. I bet you would be as good-looking as your daddy someday," she said, caressing his nose with her pinky finger, and his little wrinkles disappeared as he relaxed. The man felt contented as he watched his most precious treasures, his heart brimming with happiness and pride. He thought it was unreal to be this happy. The world had given him this beautiful moment but deep down, he knew the world could take it away so easily as well. He fears it; nevertheless, he leaned down to kiss his wife's forehead as his mouth formed a vow he never thought he'd break right away. "I swear, even until my dying breath, I will protect both of you." AUGUST 23 The ground cracked open when the earthquake hit. Everyone had been too busy going through their Monday mornings to be wary of the tragedy coming that had cut off the population in severe numbers. Their lives were simply too normal, too perfunctory to reflect the idea that in your most unguarded moments, looms death, and that day thousands of bodies have been buried in the rubble of disease and destruction, breakfast still warm on their lips. The warning siren came too loud yet too late when nature came to claim lives. That day the air was thick with black smoke and screams, as volcanoes erupted and breathed fiery liquid. Oceans across the globe were in chaos as it threatened the shore with its enormous waves from miles away. The world was suddenly thrown into disorder; everything was a mass of confusion. It was taught in school. Whoever asked, they always knew that part of history because that earthquake marked the day the human race was almost wiped out of the planet. Tragic. Earlier, at the small corner of the city, the sky had been baby blue dotted with cotton clouds, now it appeared sinister with its murky red and black haze, painting the world in menacing colors. It had been half an hour since the panic came down. Blaring horns from cars and whimpers can be heard wherever you walk into. People crying for help, begging until they turned to corpses. Deaths. Deaths everywhere. How can one deal with it? Some died alone, others helpless and regretful, others died sacrificing themselves to protect their loved ones. Noble. But still, no matter how they struggle, they can't save everyone. It has been three days, three days since different natural disasters hit the earth at the same time. It was unusual, no one thought it would happen, no one even imagined that this was possible; but, nature can be cruel in its own ways. Now, it is taking everyone's lives. "Go, Lucas," Amelia urged him weakly, "Staying here will only put your lives in danger." The disaster and deaths did not only stop there, after the rains, floods, earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanoes erupting, a deadly disease sprouted out of nowhere, killing everyone it reaches and unfortunately, Lucas' wife who just gave birth to their son two months ago is also in the verge of death. The man shook his head as tears stream down his cheeks, streaking down his soot-caked face, his voice trembled as he stubbornly refused to listen to his wife. The baby on his arms shrieked seeming to know the miserable fate that he was in. But for all Lucas knew, he could be hungry or in terrible discomfort. As much as it broke his heart he couldn't soothe him yet, he was too focused on keeping his wife with him. "Please Lucas; give Zel a life that he deserves." "That gives me more of a reason not to leave you, Melia, I can't raise him alone," he has only been a father for a few weeks and the thought of raising the child without her scared him to death. He insisted, "He deserves to have his mother in his life," The woman plastered a weak smile. She lay on the bed of the very same room where she gave birth. She reached out her hands but stopped herself. It broke her inside that she could only watch him fall apart. But it wasn't only her family that was falling apart; it gave her a wicked sense of comfort that at least the world and everything in it was falling apart with them. They were not alone. Was she wicked to feel the solace that everyone is losing their loved ones just like hers? Outside the window, the sky was tinted with deep orange and red, despite the smoke it was a beautiful sight, the man sniffed. "What good of a mother am I if I couldn't even protect my family from myself," she whispered, her voice broke as tears continued to block her vision. "It doesn't matter. Wherever you go I'll go." "So you're just going to let me infect you?" she said a little harshly, "How about our son? Who's going to take care of him? He is still a baby Lucas," her hands clenched on the covers. She already felt the disease seep into her organs as her energy slowly fades away. "Please Lucas, for my sake, please save our son." The disease says to be a bacterium that feeds on the organs of the human body. After having contact with the disease, it can immediately kill the person within 24 hours. It can populate in milliseconds and can survive almost any type of environment. On how to impede the alarming growth of the infected was still unknown. Or that is what the minority would want the masses to know. "I promised myself, Amelia, and I promised you that I would protect you at all cost!" "Yes, and today is the day you'll fulfill the promises you made. Thank you, Lucas." No man can stand upon nature when it unleashes hell on earth... ... or that was what everyone else thought. - Years after the tragedy happened all over the world, everything seemed to quiet down. A new world was born, the lands became one, literally, and so did the people. Their language and culture became one, and the lands that they have to till became wider as The Rhapsody wiped out 3/4 of the population. Their deaths paved the way to the new world but what is important is they had the chance to start a new life. The earthquake, the tsunami, and volcanic eruptions- those natural calamities were only the start, it was the disease, unlike any other that suddenly spread throughout the world that finished off many others. Lucas went missing, no one knew what happened to him or his baby, and they were clumped together with the millions of deaths reported that year. As everyone started to put the missing pieces back to where they belong, the technology slowly regained its glory. Humans began to make something out of the remains from The Rhapsody. It was, however, a challenge to everyone for the reason that everything- their resources, was only limited. As their past researches and discoveries were wiped out from the catastrophe, they had, again, to start from zero. With the hope that the new world would give a fairer life to each and everyone, the status between the rich and the poor continues to widen. *** POST NOTE!!! Hi! We are grateful for your presence; we are, to the highest extent, delighted that you have come to this place. We are honored to share the world that we made just for you, we hope you'd have a great experience as you come and indulge in a new adventure entirely designed for your bewildered imaginations. Sit back, read, and be engulfed in the future you -- two thousand and five hundred years later (or so-so). For you to have a better picture of what your world would look like, we prepared a map:  Unfortunately, Dreame does not support inserting images. If you want to view the image, please leave a comment and we will make our ** account to post the images there. For some reason, we were only able to prepare this map for you. There are 3 continents in this world, however, the story would focus more on this continent. As the story goes on, the map will be completed and you will have the image of what your world would look like. We apologize for the grammatical errors and terms that we used that might offend you in any way as the story goes further. We are only greenhorns and we still have a lot of rooms for improvements, please bear with us. We promise that we'll do our very best to improve ourselves along the way. Again, we thank you for the time you've given us by reading this story. As a reminder, this is only a work of fiction. Anything that might resemble in the real world, might that be a name, a place, or an event, is purely coincidental.