One of the Last

Chapter I: The Accident

June 6, 2066

A train sat in the train station, almost in the middle of nowhere. A man went into one of the rooms. “I’m sorry to inconvenience you, but this train isn’t safe. We have to ask you to get off. Another train will be arriving shortly.” The people stood up and walked off the train. But the man skipped several rooms, leaving nine people on the train.

It left the station minutes later. A girl of about eighteen years of age with long raven black hair got up to go to the restroom. She looked around and noticed that not many people were on the train. It struck her as odd as this was one of the fastest and most popular trains. Minutes later, as she went back to her seat, she ran into a boy several inches taller than her with fairly short blonde hair and light blue eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said. She stepped away from him as if it pained her to run into him. He noticed that she spoke with a slight accent.

“Have you noticed the lack of people here?” he asked looking around the train.

She hesitated for a moment, unsure if she really wanted to converse with a stranger. Her goal had been to get out of town without anyone really paying attention to her but this boy was certainly paying attention. “Yeah, but a lot of people stay in their rooms,” she replied.

“I’m Gabriel by the way.”

She stepped back another step, hoping that he wasn’t trying to start a long conversation with her. “Nice to meet you Gabriel.” Then the girl walked past him and went to her seat. She winced slightly as she sat down. Everything around her was bothering her, the light, and the fabric underneath her, even some of the people’s voices grated on her.

Hours later, the train stopped suddenly. As the remaining occupants got up to look out the window, they noticed that they were in the middle of nowhere. The only thing around them was grass, trees, and open nothingness. Then, it happened. An explosion caused the train to rock. A series of explosions seconds later caused many cars of the train to fly everywhere. The nine occupants were thrown everywhere. Some were buried by debris and others were trapped beneath heavy pieces of metal. One girl, a blonde, pulled herself out of one of the cars and looked down to her leg. Blood was spurting out through a huge wound on her leg. The girl reached down and held her hands over the wound. The blood stopped flowing and the skin pulled itself together, erasing the wound. It almost looked as if it hadn’t existed, if it weren’t for the whole in her jeans and the drying blood staining her jeans. She sighed and looked around at her surroundings. She could hear people nearby yelling, some begging for help. Moments later she walked off to find other survivors.

A boy with short black hair and green eyes scrambled from the wreckage, apparently unharmed. He looked around, and then he heard a girl nearby cry out in pain. He turned to see someone trapped under three giant pieces of metal that had been thrown from the train. He ran over to her, and then hesitated. “Nadia,” he said, shocked to see her there. He thought that she had been gone from his life forever. “What are you doing here?”

She looked at him. “I’m trying not to go crazy Brennan,” she replied through clenched teeth as she recognized him.

“Would it help if you held my hand?” Brennan asked, trying to sooth his friend’s suffering.

“You would be more help if you could find someone to get this off me,” Nadia responded. She let out a moan as she tried to handle the pain of the metal pressing up

“I don’t know if there is anyone else around,” Brennan said.

“Please.”

With that one word, Nadia hoped that Brennan would listen to her and try to find help. “Okay, I’ll try.” Brennan ran off to look for help. He ran into an average height blonde girl, a boy slightly taller than himself with dirty blonde hair, and another boy about his height with brown hair. “There’s someone trapped under some rubble. Can you help me?” he called over to them.

They turned to look at him then they nodded. Brennan led them over to Nadia. The two boys and Brennan walked over and grabbed one piece of metal. The girl bent down, wincing at the sight of what was happening, to grab Nadia’s hand. “Don’t touch me,” Nadia warned. She tried to pull away from the girl.

“This could be painful,” the girl said.

“I don’t care. Don’t touch me,” Nadia insisted. The girl moved back a little, giving Nadia her space. The three boys threw off one piece of metal at a time until they threw the last piece off. When they were all finished, Brennan looked to see that Nadia’s legs were in bad shape and blood was pouring out of her. The girl looked at Nadia’s wounds taking in all of the damage.

“Her legs are badly damaged and there’s the possibility of a few broken ribs. They could pierce her lungs,” the girl informed the boys. “We need to get her to a hospital.”

“I don’t think we’ll be able to do that,” a female’s voice said from a few feet away. They all looked to see a girl with auburn hair standing just a few feet away.

“Why?” Brennan asked.

“These explosions were worldwide. There’s nothing left.”

“How do you know?” the blonde asked as she looked at the auburn haired girl.

“I was on the Internet when it happened. Before the Internet went offline I saw reports of explosions in Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America. We were one of the last places hit. Face it, we’re most likely the only one’s left.”

“Then it’s up to me,” the blonde replied, turning back to Nadia.

“What can you do?” Brennan asks, concerned for Nadia if they were indeed the only one’s left.

“I’m a healer.”

“And your name is…” Brennan prompted the ‘healer’.

“Jo,” she replied simply.

“Well then Jo, get to work,” Brennan answered. Jo leaned over Nadia.

“Please don’t touch me,” Nadia said as she saw Jo’s hands coming towards her body.

“Can someone help me? I don’t want her to resist,” Jo responded.

Brennan walked over to Nadia and bent down towards her. “Brennan, please don’t let her touch me. Please, you know what it does,” Nadia begged.

“Nadia, I know it hurts. But Jo will help you,” Brennan reassured.

“I can do it without touching her, but it will take longer. If I touch her, it will be over in a matter of seconds,” Jo said.

“Come on Nadia, you can hold on for a few seconds, okay.” Brennan held out a hand.

Nadia nodded and grabbed his hand, wincing as she did so. Jo placed one of her hands by Nadia’s ribs and the other by her legs. In seconds, the blood began to disappear, and all wounds vanished. Nadia released Brennan’s hand and jumped away from the others as soon as she knew that Jo was finished.

Brennan turned to the two boys. “Thank you for your help. I’m Brennan Porter.”

“Luca James,” the blonde boy replied.

“Xander McCoy,” the brunette boy answered.

Jo said, “I’m Jo O’Riley.”

Brennan turned to the other girl, the auburn haired girl. “And you are?”

“Natalie, Natalie Bennett.”

“I think we should look for any other survivors,” Brennan suggested.

“We also need shelter,” Xander answered.

“Okay, I’ll work on shelter,” Natalie offered.

“How about Luca, Jo, and I look for survivors?” Brennan responded.

The rest of the survivors nodded. “We’ll work on the shelter then,” Xander said.

Brennan, Luca, and Jo ran off. While searching, they found three other boys. Cole Christensen, a twenty-year-old brunette with gray eyes informed them that no one else was on the train. Then there was Michael Douglas, a 22-year-old with black hair and eyes, and Gabriel Evans, a blonde with blue eyes. They went back to the others shortly after that.

“We haven’t been able to make a real shelter yet, but there is one car that wasn’t badly destroyed that we can use for shelter for now,” Natalie responded.

“And there’s still a working restroom in that car just a few feet away,” Nadia said, gesturing to another train car.

“That’s something. What we really need is something to eat,” Luca remarked. Xander walked to the side of the shelter car. The others looked at each other, wondering what Xander was doing. He came back moments later with fresh apples, oranges, and tomatoes.

“Where did you get those?” Luca asked, looking around for signs of apple trees, orange trees or tomato bushes, but found none.

“From the plants,” Xander answered.

“What plants?” Michael asked, also starting to look around.

“The ones over there,” Xander replied, pointing.

“So you’re telling us that a couple plants survived the explosions that destroyed the trains?” Natalie said. She turned and saw a few small plants just behind one of the train cars.

“No,” Xander responded.

“Then where did they come from?” Natalie inquired.

“I made them,” Xander remarked with a grin.