After Jesse and the boy left the city and night fell, they decided to camp in front of one of the trees to rest a little from this exhausting day. Jesse gathered some nearby sticks to light a fire. They had nothing but the light of the fire burning in the midst of the pitch-black darkness of night. Jesse looked at the boy as he stared at the flames with eyes full of admiration and wonder. While lying on the ground looking at the stars, lost in his thoughts, he looked at his broken hand and began to think: "I survived another day... I don't know whether I should be happy for my survival or frown because of my injuries. My feelings are mixed because of everything that happened." He put his hat over his face and decided to rest his mind from thinking and go to sleep.
The boy kept looking at the burning fire without doing anything except noticing that the fire was gradually getting smaller until it disappeared, leaving only the blackness of the burnt wood. Darkness enveloped the place, and the area was only illuminated by moonlight. The boy lay down inside the car and began looking at the stars. Drowsiness began to overtake him and his eyes closed slowly until he fell asleep.
...In a small city bustling with cars and lights everywhere, eight-year-old Jesse was staring at the star-filled sky while waiting for his father to come pick him up. After a few seconds passed, a green glow appeared in the sky, catching little Jesse's attention. He directed his gaze toward the glow to see that it was a comet falling to Earth. It was clear and glowing with a bright green color that fascinated him with its shape. After several minutes passed, Jesse noticed that the glow was getting bigger moment by moment. His expressions slowly changed from admiration to terror. The light kept growing bigger and bigger until Jesse closed his eyes from the intensity of its brightness.
Jesse began to slowly open his eyes until he woke up. He started rubbing his eyes with sleepy features on his face. He got up from the ground with difficulty and said with a tired face: "Another disturbing dream." He began looking around. He wasn't in the same place where he had slept last time. Shock appeared on his face when he found himself in a square room with metallic walls of dark gray color and some lights above with a door at the end of the room. Tension began to control him as he turned left and right. He noticed that the boy was sleeping in a corner of the room, so he went to him and began waking him up. The boy slowly opened his eyes until he woke up, and Jesse told him to get up quickly. The boy got up with dark circles under his eyes. He began rubbing his eyes and following Jesse. Jesse opened the door at the end of the room to see that there was another corridor with a door at its end. Jesse felt confused and uncomfortable. He was wondering how they had gotten to this place and felt that someone was playing games with them. He headed toward the door and they opened it slowly, only to be surprised by a room like the one they were in but larger, with 3 other doors besides theirs and a huge door at its end. Jesse put his hand on his face saying: "I'm not in a good mood for these games." Then suddenly he heard the sound of one of the doors opening, which shocked him greatly. He quickly directed his gaze toward it. The door opened slowly for a black man to emerge wearing a white shirt and light blue pants with a gray eye and another eye covered with bandages, with very curly hair. The other two doors opened slowly for a girl to emerge from the first door with white skin wearing an oversized gray shirt with long black pants and red hair extending to her shoulder and black eyes. From the second door, a man between black and white emerged wearing a winter hat with completely gray clothes and black eyes. The black man began looking at those present in the room with puzzled looks and said: "Great, another room and new people." Jesse looked at them with shock and bewilderment on his face, thinking: "What the hell is happening... I've searched all the areas on this earth and found no humans except that boy. Where did all these people come from?" But his train of thought was interrupted by an unknown voice saying: "Welcome everyone to my humble room." Everyone looked toward the source of the voice to find that the voice was coming from a strange device hanging on one of the walls. He continued speaking, saying: "You must be wondering why I brought you here. You may not like what I'm saying, but I'm not interested in your opinion. You are here to measure your competence through several tests to see your efficiency and take those worthy of joining our colony, while the losers' fate in all cases will be death." Jesse interrupted him with bewilderment and confusion on his face: "What's the purpose of this test anyway? And what exactly is happening here?" He replied: "Well, as you can see, the world has been going through a huge crisis for twenty years, where cities were destroyed and billions of humans died due to the spread of those strange creatures in the world. And traveling alone to search for food or do anything has become extremely dangerous. Therefore, the goal of this challenge is to find the best people who can live under the conditions of this crisis and gather them under one roof - a group capable of challenging the hardships of this world. They have the ability to expand and eliminate the dangers existing in the world gradually until they restore safety to human life as it was before. At the same time, getting rid of the consumers who might get this food either through help or luck and who only waste food on others. Their death is inevitable because of the spread of those beasts everywhere, and therefore they are considered as if they are burning food without benefit. To restore safety to life, we need to gather strong men to do that, while the weak and useless are considered only worthless consumers, and the goal of this challenge is to distinguish between the two." Suddenly, a wall opened in front of each door, and a gun dropped for each one. All those present picked up the dropped guns, and the unknown man said: "Let's not talk too much, let's start the test." The black man cursed at him. Meanwhile, Jesse took a look at the dropped gun while feeling confused. He took a deep breath and said: "There's no other choice anyway." The huge door at the end of the room began to open, and dozens of wanderers came out of it. Four of them headed toward the girl quickly with disfigured faces whose features couldn't be distinguished. The girl panicked upon seeing them heading toward her and began shooting randomly under the influence of fear. One of the shots was about to hit the man with the winter hat, so he shouted at her saying: "Stop shooting, you'll cause us to be killed!" Jesse headed toward the girl and took the gun from her hand and directed his gun toward them and killed them all. He told the girl to calm down and move away from them. Then he called the boy who was in front of one of the doors. The boy headed toward Jesse, wondering why he called him. Jesse gave him the gun and said: "Alright boy, I know it's not exactly the right time, but you need to learn how to use the gun. I won't be able to protect you always, as I don't guarantee staying with you forever, and when that happens, you'll have to protect yourself. Watch how I use the gun and learn." Jesse directed his gun toward one of the wanderers and the boy did the same, but he didn't put his finger on the trigger. Jesse looked at the boy and said: "You're holding it wrong, you need to put your biggest finger on the trigger so you can press it, in addition to aiming and focusing well on your target. Just a simple mistake in aiming will make the bullet miss its target." The boy put his finger on the trigger and aimed at one of the wanderers coming toward him and pressed the trigger. The bullet shot toward the wanderer's head, causing his head to explode and turn into fragments, and his body fell to the ground. Jesse put his hand on the boy's shoulder and said with a slight smile: "It seems you learn quickly, a headshot on the first try, that's excellent." The boy felt flattered and showed a slight smile on his face. The black man looked at Jesse after killing one of the wanderers and said: "Thanks for adding another person to help, but hurry up a little and help us exterminate these." Jesse directed his gaze toward the wanderers and raised his gun and pressed the trigger. After a period of gunshots spreading everywhere, silence filled the place and the ground was filled with dozens of wanderers' corpses. Jesse and the boy were lying in front of one of the doors, sighing from exhaustion, and the same was the case with the other people. The voice of the unknown person appeared again saying: "Congratulations, you survived the first test out of two. To be honest... (line cut off)." An opening opened from the wall and several water bottles came out of it. Everyone got a bottle and began drinking. At the same time, Jesse was looking at the huge door while saying to himself: "What awaits us behind that door? More crowds of wanderers or maybe something worse? I need to take a break to be ready for what will happen."
After 30 minutes passed, the huge door began to open, and everyone focused their attention toward the door and prepared themselves. After the door opened completely, a huge creature came out of it, two meters tall, with pale skin and a long neck. It had a large mouth and no eyes. It was thin with huge arms.
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