Apocalypse Rising: Brains After Brains

The espresso machine kept hissing in the background, stubbornly clinging to its daily routine like it had no idea the world was ending outside.

Behind the counter was this skinny little hallway... honestly, you'd barely fit unless you walked sideways. It snaked past a grimy employee bathroom and dead-ended at a steel back door. Mostly it was used for deliveries… or a barista in desperate need of a breather or nicotine fix during the morning rush.

Today? It was their escape route.

"Fire alarm goes first," Rafe muttered, eyes flicking toward the front windows.

"Coming right up," Xenia replied, already marching to the espresso machine like it owed her something.

She twisted the steam nozzle, cranked the pressure to full-blast, and then...

SSHHHHHRREEEEE

The machine shrieked like a banshee on espresso overdose. High-pitched. Piercing. Perfect.

At the front of the café, the zombies flinched.

Even the undead, apparently, had limits.

Then—

CLANG!

Rafe slammed his palm down on the fire alarm. Zero hesitation. The metal cracked slightly under the force, but it did its job.

An ear-splitting WEE-OOOH! WEE-OOOH! tore through the café, rattling the windows, bouncing off the ceramic tiles. The shrill blare swallowed up everything: the espresso's death-screech, the zombie moans, even the occasional creak of the front door glass as it strained under pressure.

The infected freaked out. They started hammering the windows harder... graduation tassels still swinging like cruel confetti... as if the noise alone was flaying their brains open.

"They're reacting," Xenia said, adjusting her grip on the kitchen knife. Her voice had gone clipped, focused. No room for panic. "Time to move."

Rafe nodded once, already motioning them down the hallway. His katana glinted under the red flashing firelight, dangling from his grip like it had been waiting for a real reason to exist.

They pressed through the hallway one by one, single-file.

The tight space felt like it was closing in... walls lined with old mop buckets, empty boxes, a crate of stale biscotti someone forgot to throw out last semester.

At the end: a heavy steel back door.

It had a tiny circular peephole like something out of a submarine movie.

Rafe stopped first, peered through it.

He froze.

Xenia was right behind him. "What is it?"

He stepped back. "Two infected. Right outside."

"Blocked?"

He gave a quick, sharp nod.

Of course.

Of course there were zombies in their one designated emergency exit.

"Okay, plan B," Xenia muttered, stepping closer. "I'll run the espresso machine again, pull them toward the front. You and Rafaela circle... "

"No." Rafe's voice was firm, final. "I'll go out first. Lead them off. I'm faster."

Xenia stared at him like he'd just told her he planned to moonwalk through a minefield.

"Seriously? Did we not just have the 'no self-sacrificing hero nonsense' talk? Like… three hours ago?"

"I can handle... "

"No," she said, louder. "You're not a one-man action movie, Rafe. This isn't your origin story."

Rafaela groaned, clutching her coffee cup like it might give her strength. "Oh my GOD, stop going full Marvel. You're not Captain Anything, bro. Just... breathe and think like a human for once."

For a beat, Rafe actually hesitated.

The old heroic reflex flickered in his eyes… but it didn't win.

Then Xenia's eyes lit up.

"Wait. What about the rooftop?"

He blinked. "There's an access ladder. Near the stockroom."

"Perfect," she said, already turning back. "We climb. Get out that way. Drop down into the alley."

Rafaela jogged past them, her latte finally abandoned on a crate of expired soy milk. She grabbed the rickety aluminum ladder wedged behind the staff lockers, eyeing it like it might collapse out of spite.

It was tiny. And dusty. And it absolutely looked like it had never passed a single safety inspection in its life.

Still, she climbed.

"Watch your step," Rafe said, hands hovering near her back... not quite touching, but ready.

She pulled herself up fast, strong. Her fingers curled around the final rung and popped open the ceiling hatch with her shoulder. Once she'd vanished into the dark above, Rafe passed up their gear: Xenia's bag, his sword, the emergency flashlight, and a sad-looking granola bar wrapped in foil.

Then he pulled himself up behind her, one arm at a time, body moving with all that silent gym-rat efficiency he seemed born with.

Which left Xenia.

Xenia hesitated for a second, eyes darting across the café—rickety chairs overturned like a badly played game of musical chairs, the sticky counter that had probably seen one too many caffeine-deprived college students, and that stupid espresso machine, still puffing steam like it had retirement plans.

And then there it was.

Her cappuccino.

Just sitting on the bar. Half-full. A little foam heart still clinging to the side, slowly dissolving like the last remnant of a peaceful world.

She stared at it. Then sighed.

"Not leaving this behind," she muttered and snatched it like it owed her tuition money. One final gulp, just enough warmth to fake a moment of normalcy. Then... yeet. She spiked the cup into the trash like she was serving championship point. Zero regrets.

She turned toward the ladder and grabbed the icy rung.

"You ready?" Rafe called from above, face poking through the hatch like some post-apocalyptic gym coach.

"Already climbing," she muttered through clenched teeth, hoisting herself up.

Each rung burned. Cold metal bit into her fingers. Her bare feet scrambled, toes slipping a few times. Why did ladders always feel like instruments of medieval torture?

At the top, Rafe leaned down and grabbed her wrist... yanking her up in one powerful pull. She flopped onto the rooftop like a fish freshly evicted from a grocery tank.

The trapdoor slammed shut behind them with a thunderous BANG. It echoed off the bricks like a starter pistol... and just below, chaos howled.

From inside the café came a horrible, guttural CRASH, followed by shrieks and snarls... unintelligible, animalistic, and so wrong. It was like someone had mic'd up a nightmare and turned the volume to max.

Xenia backed away from the hatch, every part of her buzzing with leftover adrenaline. "They got in."

"But they can't reach us," Rafe said, checking the hatch locks. "No ladder. No way up."

Rafaela still stared at the cover, her mouth open, brows furrowed. "If any of them start stacking chairs, we are so screwed."

More sirens wailed in the distance, merging with the fire alarm still blaring behind them. Car horns honked, glass shattered. A scream pierced the air loud, desperate, then abruptly cut off.

The city wasn't just panicking.

It was unraveling.

"This city's falling apart," Rafaela whispered, her eyes wide as she scanned the burning skyline.

Xenia crouched beside her, knife still clutched in her hand. "But we're not," she said quietly. "Not yet."

They moved as a group... three shadows darting across the rooftop like urban raccoons in survival mode. The rooftop itself was a jigsaw puzzle of vents, broken satellite dishes, and a squeaky old AC unit that coughed with every gust of wind.

They reached the edge.

Below was the café's alley... narrow, dark, half-drowned in shadow. It reeked of sour milk, burnt trash, and distant blood.

Two infected were down there... stumbling slowly, like they weren't sure where they were or why their limbs bent that way.

"Wait," Rafe whispered.

They crouched.

The infected stopped, sniffing the air. Their heads cocked like dogs catching a strange scent. Then, distracted by a scream on the main street, they ambled off, disappearing into the chaos.

"Now," Rafe said.

He dropped first... smooth, practiced, a silent crouch when he hit the pavement. Then he looked up and opened his arms.

"Jump."

Rafaela didn't hesitate. She dropped like she'd done this before and landed cleanly in his arms, giving him a sarcastic salute when he set her down.

Then it was Xenia's turn.

She braced herself.

Jumped.

Her landing wasn't poetry... it was a full-body oof. Her toes slammed pavement first, sending a jolt of pain rocketing up her ankle like an electric fence of regret. She bit her tongue, hard, refusing to scream.

Because there was no time for a broken foot. Not now.

She limped a step, sucked in air through her nose. "No time for breaks," she muttered.

She was already broken enough... her trust, her hope, her post-grad dreams… now maybe her stupid foot too.

Rafe was by her side in a flash. "You okay?"

"Fine," she lied.

He didn't push.

"Go," he said instead.

And they ran... straight into whatever came next.

BACK AT RAFE'S APARTMENT - EVENING

The door burst open like a plot twist.

Jecipher swaggered in first, dramatic as ever, throwing imaginary keys in the air and catching none of them. "Ah! Behold... the sanctuary of civilization!" he boomed. "Pizza delivery not guaranteed."

He threw himself onto the nearest couch cushion like a man who'd fought valiantly against society's collapse and needed a nap, stat.

Zuko, the golden retriever, barely acknowledged him. The fluffy loaf of dog meat was buried in a throw blanket, snoring like someone who'd had a long day barking at shadows. One ear twitched, but the dog didn't even open his eyes.

The TV was still on... static, then back to a jittery news broadcast.

The screen flickered with that sterile blue tone every end-of-world movie loved. A frantic newscaster rambled about quarantine zones and unknown infection sources. The news ticker crawled across the bottom like it knew no one was reading it.

["CRYSTALLINE MEDICAL DISTRICT OVERRUN — GOV'T CALLS FOR FULL EVACUATION"]

["BE ADVISED: SYMPTOMS INCLUDE AGGRESSION, FEVER, LOSS OF COORDINATION"]

["DO NOT APPROACH INFECTED INDIVIDUALS. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER."]

Xenia leaned against the doorframe, chest still heaving.

Her hands were shaking.

She looked down at the knife still in her grip.

She hadn't even realized she was still holding it.

Slowly, she set it on the kitchen counter.

Outside the window, smoke painted long black streaks across the purple-pink sky. The city skyline... once pristine... was warped now, cracked by flame, buzzed over by helicopters that zigzagged like insects trying not to die.

"I still can't believe we made it back," Rafaela mumbled, sitting heavily on the floor, knees pulled to her chest. "Like… we were right there. Inside it."

"We're not safe," Rafe said quietly, glancing out the blinds. "We're just less dead."

He wasn't wrong.

They'd bought time. That's it.

Xenia finally sat, her legs giving out beneath her. She leaned back against the armrest and closed her eyes.

One breath. Then another.