An Introduction to the Ever So Lovely Killer Bunnies

October 17th, Week 2 After All That Crap Happened

A lot of people in the world thought that humanity would eventually be brought to its knees someday, whether it be caused by global warming, war, technology, or even by bizarre and oddball ideas such as an alien invasion or the zombie apocalypse. Everyone had their own theory, unique to him or herself. However, you could bet that not one person in the world population of seven billion thought that humanity would come to the brink of extinction due to rabbits. 

It’s been a couple of weeks, now, since the rabbits killed nearly every human on Earth. Okay, I suppose that it’s confusing for someone who didn’t live through it. 

There were these scientist guys that were performing experiments on rabbits. Then one gets a bright idea to insert some mutations into the rabbits’ DNA that caused cancer (If I was a science nerd, I’d probably have a more proper description). Now, these guys wanted to cure cancer, so they started off with rabbits. 

Okay, I get the good intention. But some of the people who went to hell were full of good intentions...so yeah. Thank you guys for screwing the world.

So, you can guess what happens (after all, you see this stuff in movies at least once or twice). They give the “cure” for cancer to the rabbits. It backfires on the scientists and things go wrong. The rabbits go nuts and get bigger and stronger. They kill the scientists. They get out. They wreak havoc on the world. 

Lots of people die from the giant killer rabbit attacks, but a lot more die from panic. 

You know, they get in their cars, run people over by mistake or maybe forget to put on their seatbelt and go flying into oblivion. Or they leave their places without taking any supplies and then eventually starve to death or die of dehydration. Or they hear a rustling in the bushes and fires off their rifle, thinking it’s one of those killer rabbits before realizing they just shot another human being. Or they just put the trigger to their head and fire rather than survive in a world that has now turned against them. 

Obviously, I didn’t do any of those things, because I’m here today (or maybe not, depending on when someone finds this). Sure, I panicked at first, just like everybody else. But not long after, I told myself, “Ethan, you’ve got to get your shit together, or you’re gonna lose to those stupid bunnies.” 

So I did. I made sure to pack a good amount of supplies in my car (the backseat, not the trunk, because what if my car runs out of gas and then killer rabbits surround the car? I’d have to wait them out, and if the food and water is in the trunk and I can’t get out and open it before getting torn to pieces by bunnies, then what use is there of having them to begin with? So yeah, I put them in the backseat. 

Of course, I brought my first-aid kit, too. Because something people often forget in the apocalypse is that other stuff can kill you too, like sickness and infection. That’s what happens when we take our doctors for granted; we always think they’re always be there, because we think that nothing bad will happen to us, or that we’ll find a surviving doctor if something does happen.

So, anyway, after all my crap was packed as quickly as possible, I hightailed out of town in my car. I didn’t have any qualms about leaving my home; I didn’t have much family I cared about (they were jerks that tried to force me to be someone I wasn’t and didn’t care what I had to say about it) and the word “friend” wasn’t even in my dictionary. 

Now, not long after I left, I passed a library. Most people would just drive on past, but I don’t. And it’s not just because I’m a bookworm, either. Books equal knowledge. And knowledge equals survival. I loot the library of a good chunk of its collection (nonfiction for knowledge, obviously, and fiction because what good is living if I can’t have fun sometimes?). 

Now, I’m not the idiot that tries to get them all at once, no, no, no. If all you’re carrying are books when a killer rabbit appears, what’re you going to do? Use the power of words and hope it’s a book nerd like you? So, unlike probably everyone else, I take a couple at a time while my pistol is locked and loaded and ready to fire at anything that might want to rip my face off. 

Sure, it takes me a long time to get all the books, but hey, safety’s more important than speed. I’d rather lose three hours of my life than my entire life. 

By now, you’re probably wondering how these stupid bunnies got out of control (and I only thought that you might be wondering this just now). After all, the scientist guys were experimenting on only a few of them. Before anyone else other than the dead scientists discovered that there were killer rabbits running around, they probably started breeding. Boom, lots of babies are born with that same kill-all-humans attitude as their parents. And these guys – according to a science nerd I met – have a much shorter gestation period than normal rabbits. So basically, these guys have babies out not long after they get pregnant. So yeah, in the whole month that it took for us to discover what had happened with the scientists’ experiments (and in case, you’re looking for plot holes in this story, the news did tell us that the rabbits had escaped a month before the broadcast), the rabbits were already pretty populous and still growing. Not long after that broadcast, the world lost a good chunk of its population, and I’ve already told you the rest.

Okay, informative flashback done with, back to my tale. Was I done at the library? Yeah, that’s right (I checked). 

So anyway, that’s when I hear screams. Okay, what do you think I did? A: rescue whoever’s in trouble, because I’m the hero of the story, or B: nothing else because A is obviously the right answer. 

So, yeah, it’s a little cliché, but I go help whoever’s in trouble. It’s a little girl–of course, because there always has to be a child that the protagonist rescues and then everybody likes the protagonist even more. Anyway, she’s surrounded by the killer rabbits. 

Oh, yeah, did I mention anything about their physical description? No, I didn’t. Shoot! You get a jumbled up story when the one’s writing it has a jumbled up mind like mine! 

So, anyway, these killer rabbits were about the size of a grizzly bear and their adorable faces had turned into vicious, hungry-looking faces of a psycho predator. Their teeth were bigger and sharper (not at all cute). And their fur, which wasn’t super fluffy and soft, was coarse and rough. Plus, it was also greasy and not likely to win any shows anytime soon. Well, if there were any shows left. Some had the added touch of bald spots where fur had been ripped off in chunks (probably by their rivals). 

So, yeah, pretty sight. 

Anyway, I shot them all with my pistol (because surprise, surprise, bunnies still weren’t bulletproof). One turned around and lunged at me, but luckily, I managed to shoot it before it could tear my throat out. So after I shoved that thing off of me (did you know that these killer rabbits weighed a lot?), I reassured the girl that we were safe (though it was pretty much a lie, because no one’s truly safe these days). She was like super grateful to me and ended up following me wherever I went (even when I went to freakin’ pee).

So, yeah, that’s how I met Lucy. 

After I stopped for gas about a couple of days later (for plot convenience, we managed to reach a gas station before we ran out), I saw a guy with glasses up on the roof. He was sitting in a lawn chair, reading a book with a rifle on his lap. 

Suddenly, the rifle was pointing at me when I got out of my car to get some gas. “Who are you?” he asked, his nose still in his book. “And what are you doing here?” 

“We’re just passing through. We needed some gas.” 

Suddenly, he looked up and fired. I squeezed my eyes shut, not wanting to look death in the face. I expected my stomach, my heart, or my head (or quite possibly my most valuable asset) to start hurting before I dropped dead, but none of them did. In fact, I felt fine. I opened my eyes. A killer bunny lay dead at my feet, blood pooling from its chest. 

I looked up at the guy, just realizing that this guy had saved my life. He got up from his lawn chair, taking his book with him, and disappeared. A minute later, he walked out the gas station door toward me. 

Now that we were up close, I could see him better. He had black hair that was slicked back and blue eyes framed by glasses–the first sign that he’s a genius. After all, everyone knows that intelligence and eye problems go hand in hand. Anyway, he was tall (taller than me) and thin, though I could see that he wasn’t just skin and bones, because there were clearly some muscles on him. He wore khaki shorts and a t-shirt with that smiling guy from Fallout on it.

“My name’s Kyle,” he said. 

For some reason, I thought of that one scene from that Home movie, where the leader of the aliens shouts the alien’s name angrily. This is what my brain chose to retain, rather than those math formulas I needed but failed to memorize for every test. Logic.

Anyway…

“Ethan,” I replied. I extended my hand. Kyle took it, and his handshake was firm. 

“Mind if I come along?” Kyle asked. 

“Why?” I asked. After all, this Kyle guy didn’t seem the type to want to tag along with a person like me. 

“Because it’s boring here. I have only book with me, and I’ve already read it twenty times since the apocalypse started.” 

“We have a bunch of books with us, actually.” 

Kyle’s eyes lit up at that. “How many?”

“Over seven hundred.” 

I swore Kyle started drooling. “Are they in the back?”

“Yes.” More than half of the backseat had nothing but books. Lucy was sitting beside them in the other half. 

“Okay, then I’ll sit in the back.”

“Okay, just don’t mind the little kid back there.” 

“Little kid?” 

“Yeah. You might have to have her sit on your lap during the ride.” 

“Is she your sister?”

“No. I just found her near a library and I helped her. Now, she’s a permanent member of the Killer Bunny Survivor Club.”

“Well, I suppose you now have a third member,” he said as he clambered into the back with Lucy. 

At first, she freaked out and screamed, “Stranger danger!” for a full minute before I could reassure her that he was a friend. 

So that’s how I met my other companion (hint: he’s the nerd guy I told you about earlier). 

Well, that was it for today. No more story for now. After all, I didn’t have anything more to write about, so I shut the journal and put it on the floorboard.

While pissing everybody off in the process.