Terror Hell: by Nick Venom (great books for teens .txt) 📕

TBC…

“A monster?” Mae questioned, glancing at Red. Red nodded his head, standing up from the couch. He lowered his head as he backed away from them, retreating into a corner. He closed his eyes, afraid of what they would say. The light pillars would be destroyed in a second.

“Is…” Kaylee’s voice trailed off. She struggled to continue, her mind in a daze. “... Is that true, Red? Are you infected?”

“I-” Red stopped himself. What could he say that wouldn't destroy his remaining light pillar? Hey, I’m not a monster? Or that Mert and Taylor were liars and he was fine. 

Nothing would let him escape the situation. Red had to face it. “-am. I’m a monster.” He responded sadly.

Carter faced Mert, walking up to him. Something had been irking him about Red’s behavior. He arrived at Town Hall gloomy and unlike his usual behavior. He always saw the kid as a hopeful teen that had unrealistic and far-away dreams but was still motivated to reach them. However, this wasn’t the same kid. He was dead in the eyes, distant and faintly aloof.

He suspected that something happened in between appearances at Town Hall. The difference was apparent. 

“So what, he hasn’t turned has he?” He asked Mert, turning the shotgun away from Red. “You pointed your gun on a kid, have you lost your mind?”

“But… he’s a-” Taylor started before a burning glare from Carter deterred her. 

“He’s your best friend, isn’t he? You two used to run around and do everything together. What has changed?”

Taylor opened her mouth to rebuttal Carter but stopped. He’s a monster? That is what she wanted to say, but something stopped her. It grabbed her mouth, slamming it closed, and kept it in place. She couldn’t speak.

“How can you treat him-” He pointed a long finger at Red. “-like that. For God’s sake, he’s your childhood friend!”

Taylor nearly muttered “was” but something stopped her. Almost as if her conscience didn’t want her to burn every bridge and fragment her relationship with him. 

“How long has he been infected?” Mae asked. 

“... right before he made it to Town Hall on his first trip to hand the walkies out.” Taylor responded.

“And he hasn’t turned yet?” Kaylee chimed in, staring blankly at Taylor and Mert.

“No,” Mert muttered, looking away in embarrassment.

“Then he should be fine right?” She said, looking around the room at everybody’s faces. Mae and Carter nodded their heads, siding with Red, while Mert and Taylor looked away in shame. It was now evident whose side people were on. Mert and Taylor, who had stronger bonds with Red, forsaken him and treated him like an ugly monster roaming outside. Compared to Red’s acquaintances, who rarely talked to him yet sided with him. They didn’t see him as a monster, only as himself. Red was Red.

“Kaylee’s right. Red isn’t a threat to us,” Mae declared, standing up. Her legs gave up and she fell to the ground. Her body was destroyed by Freddy’s death, unable to stand without support.

“Yeah,” Red whispered. “It’s not taking over.” Everybody’s heads turned towards him. Carter stared at him with surprise, forgetting for a moment that one of the slugs had entered his body.

“When you were telling us about the parasites, you were talking from a first-hand experience?” Carter asked. Red nodded, lowering his head farther down.

“How did you get infected?” Kaylee asked him, taking a step towards him. “What happened when you were going to Town Hall the first time around?”

“I… I was infected.” He bluntly spoke. “When I was crossing the main road, my…” Red’s voice trailed off. “Ahem-” His voice faded into a whisper. “-my father attacked me. He wasn’t his usual self. He was infected, but his body didn’t change.”

“He was infected but didn’t transform into a monster?” Carter asked.

Red nodded. “He still had partial control over himself. The parasite living in his brain, and now mine, tried to take over control but my father fought him. Fought it to his last moments.”

“If you don’t mind-” Mae’s voice cracked. “-how did… how did he? Uh…” Her voice trailed off. She couldn’t muster the strength to complete her sentence.

However, Red understood what she was asking about. “I killed him. I killed my own father.”

“But it wasn’t your fault!” Mae shouted.

“It was.” Red raised his head to stare into Mae’s eyes, watching as she cowered under his stare.  “The parasite wasn’t in my head at the time. I was fully aware of the choice I made.”

“But…” Carter started, glancing at Mert. “... even so,” He didn’t know how to complete his sentence. What do you say to a broken child?

“Wouldn’t keeping your mental stability stable important for your fight?” Kaylee remarked. Carter cringed, trying to avoid saying anything relating to Red’s mental health. However, Kaylee forcefully broke into that conversation.

“She’s right,” he turned towards Mert and Taylor, “you guys treated him terribly even though you knew he was fighting an internal battle!” He exclaimed.

Taylor headed towards the basement while Mert, finally, laid to rest his shotgun. He laid it on a table, pointed at the wall and not another person. Mert glanced at Red before heading to the attic. Mert and Taylor were done with their scolding.

A loud roar from the walkie-talkie drew the attention of everybody in the room. “We’re being attacked by the monsters!” Roseanne’s voice crackled out of the walkie-talkie. “Town Hall is falling! We need help, I-” Her voice was cut off suddenly. The sounds of Muscle Monster destroying Town Hall echoed in the distance.

At first, nobody moved a muscle. What could they do? They were frozen in place, unsure of what to do. Nobody knew the appropriate action to take.

A few seconds later after the initial sounds, Red bolted out of the front door and towards Town Hall. He was picking up speed the farther he ran. In the far distance, the group watched as the Muscle Man raised both fists, holding them high into the air, before slamming down upon the building with great force. The building was crumbling.

“Red stop!” Mae shouted as she sprinted after him. Everybody else---even Taylor and Mert---followed her towards Red to see the sight of Town Hall masked in destruction and flames. The fire had erupted from the gas pipes of the Town Hall and exploded, covering the nearby buildings in flames.

***

Going under the name of Scavengers, Brad and a few survivors moved towards Town Hall. They crossed through the backyard of the J & D Mart, which was across the street from the Outpost. 

There, they crossed the street to reach the remains of the Kurupt house, passing it and a body they found along the way. They made it to the backdoor of Town Hall, about to bang on it, until blood-curdling screams and the sounds of a wrecking ball bashing into bricks stopped them. The screams belonged to the inhabitants inside Town Hall while the wrecking ball was the large fists of the Muscle Monster. Town Hall was being attacked.

“Brad!” Zane, an inhabitant of the Outpost, whisper-shouted. He grabbed Brad and yanked him away from the door. “They’re dead, we need to go.”

“No, let’s-” Brad was interrupted by a few survivors escaping through the backdoor as the front of Town Hall collapsed. The Muscle Monster had beaten the roof down.

The survivors flooded around Brad, asking him for help. Their desperate cries of relief forced Brad to act quickly. “Zane! Take these survivors to the Outpost. I’ll stay behind and search for anybody I could save.”

Zane hesitated to follow his order, lingering in place for a few seconds before Brad repeated his order. Zane nodded, taking the other Scavengers and Town Hall survivors towards the Outpost.

With a load off his shoulders, Brad turned towards the Town Hall,’s backdoor. He yanked the door open and headed inside to save who he could. However, his main target was Roseanne Sparrow, somebody with good ideas and better executions. If you had a decent plan, she could execute it for you with a high probability of working out.

If he couldn’t save anybody else, he, at least, wanted to save her. “For the Outpost,” he muttered under his breath. “This is all for the Outpost.”

TBC...

Red bolted out of the front door with the others in tow. They watched as the Town Hall was engulfed in flames while under attack by the monsters. Any survivors of the fire were pummeled to death by the monsters. 

Somehow, the monsters didn’t turn their attention toward Red or any of the others, focusing on destroying the building and its inhabitants. It was as if they had their eyes dead set on a mission.

“Why is this happening?” Kaylee asked, crumbling to her knees. “How could this be happening?”

“How could any of this happen? Meteors smashed into our community and brought parasites with them. These parasites caused chaos, killing most of us right off the bat. This-” He pointed at Town Hall. “-will become common. Our hardest days are just beyond us.” Carter ranted.

Mae stood by Red’s side, grabbing onto his arm. “Do you know why they’re doing this?” She asked him. The others watched Red, waiting for his answer.

“... there were too many people there.”

“Too many?” Mert questioned. “Is that what the parasite in your head told-” Carter grabbed Mert’s collar and raised the smaller in stature Mert. He raised him off his toes slightly.

“Watch your words.” He remarked, glaring into his eyes.

Mert nodded. Carter eased him on the ground before walking away. Once out of earshot, Mert muttered something under his breath, most likely cursing Carter. The cowardly Mert didn’t want to curse him to his face.

“So… how many people could be together?” Kaylee asked him. She watched him for an eye.

Red glanced up as the Muscle Monster pounded on Town Hall, collapsing the roof. “How many?” He asked aloud, directed to the parasite.

“Does it matter?” The parasite retorted. “You’ll all die soon, anyway.”

“It does matter, answer my question.” Red defiantly remarked.

He heard the parasite sigh---an expression he never imagined from a slug---before it answered his question. “Depends on which of my brethren is hovering around you. My comrade that you nicknamed, ‘Muscle Monster’, isn’t intelligent. Any more than ten people will attract him. That building housed more than ten people.”

“There shouldn’t have been that many people in Town Hall,” Red remarked.

“Ha! I did say he wasn’t the most intelligent of the bunch. He processes scenes slower than scum like you. There were more than five when you