Today the kids were quiet. Kids usually aren't, Leonard Nairo knew as much, he had worked with children for over 20 years. And for all his 25 years of teaching he had never seen children so frightened.

However terrified he might've been as well he couldn't scare them any more than they already were. They needed hope, however promising it was. It was all they had. It was the one thing keeping Dhulka from erupting into chaos.

"Alright kids," Mr Nairo rounded his desk and came to stand before his class. Fourty fear filled eyes followed his every step. "Today we'll be learning about the First World." The teacher plastered a grin on his pale face. "Who can tell us what that is?"

Silence.

"Anyone?" Mr Nairo searched the class for a willing child. But all he saw were empty eyes, hearts beating so fast he feared they'd fly out of their chests. He swallowed, calmed himself. "Or, let's say what is it do you think the first world is?"

A hesitant hand rose into the air. Hidden behind Ronald the son of a sewer maintenance worker, sat white-haired Claudius. He was smaller than his classmates, skipped a year, brilliant boy. Always stuck in a book, always questioning. "The world before Dhulka was built."

Mr Nairo smiled. "Correct. The first world is what the world, the surface world used to be."

At the word surface faces paled and breaths quickened. Feet planted firmly into the classroom floor and gazes swung to the open door, ready to bolt as soon as fear could steal sanity.

"Now now class, let me draw your attention to 500 years ago, then 50 years more." Smiles twinkled in the gloom.

Leonard Nairo never liked to think that teaching was stuffing children full of knowledge with little to no understanding for its worth. Rather he hoped he'd plant in them an appreciation for information and education, an interest in understanding. He tried his best to make each and every one of his lessons count.

Five hundred and fifty years ago, when men walked the earth, civilization was vast. Men walked every inch of the earth's surface and even touched the moon. But for all their great achievements, they were divided by their differences, weakened by hatred and greed. Many historians will claim political and religious differences tore humanity apart ignoring the very fact that it was a war between brothers and sisters. And that, I believe was what destroyed the world.

There were wars. Great wars that claimed many lives, more lives than Dhulka holds today. And not just human lives, biomes across the globe were lost. The world saw mass extinction of animal and plant species. And eventually the day came when earth could no longer take the brunt of humanity's horrid deeds. The atmosphere had thinned terribly fast and the full force of the sun was unleashed onto the earth.

What was left of humanity put every bit of difference aside and labored day and night till Dhulka as we know it was born. And there humanity scrambled to safety, within the earth, away from the sun.

Enchanted and enthralled. Leonard Nairo was glad they'd forgotten their fear, at least for a moment. Then a hand went up.

"Yes Claudius?"

Questions swirled in the young boy's eyes. "What about..."

"Shush, Claudius!" Tanya chided.

All eyes trained on Claudius as the white-haired boy recoiled.

"Now, now class," Mr Nairo said. "Let's listen to Claudius' question, we might learn a thing or two."

"I only wanted to ask," the boy's gaze was far off in the distance. Beyond the classroom windows. Towards the sky domes and further. "Where did they come from if everyone escaped into Dhulka?"

Another hand shot into the air. "Why would they want to harm us?"

Murmurs erupted across the classroom. A whimper and a sob.

"Mr Nairo are they not human anymore?"

"Mr Nairo what will happen when they come?"

"Can't we be friendly with one another?"

"Where do we go when they get here?"

Leonard Nairo didn't answer. Couldn't answer. Had no answers. Perhaps that was what scared them the most, knowing nothing.

"I wish I had answers for you kids," Mr Nairo conceded. "But I can be certain of one thing. We don't have to repeat our past mistakes instead we can take a different path. We can't change history but we determine our future."

The kids went home that day, not knowing that, that would be their last class with Mr Nairo. For tomorrow their worst nightmares would become a reality.

~~~

When the sun had just broke from the horizon they attacked. Dozens of glass domes shattered at once. But the people of Dhulka had fully anticipated this. Not a single living soul was under the sky domes this time of day. Soldiers were armed and ready to defend Dhulka against anything that passed through the shattered sky domes.

For a moment there was nothing but unfiltered streams of lethal sunlight. Then something, no someone, descended. From several locations at once, bullets were released into the body. But when the soldiers took a closer look, they found that the person was long dead before being dropped through the sky dome and he was none other than one of their own.

Then just as suddenly water with the force of a river fell forth from the sky. Except where water was clear and crystalline, this fluid was murky and crimson and carried with it the bodies of their fellow now fallen comrades. The crimson fluid flooded the floor and seemed to rise with every drop from the heavens. Until it ceased and the pool of red settled.

"Do we shoot?" The question relayed over and over by every soldier in the area.

Their commander surveyed the situation. But even with enhanced vision, he couldn't see past the murky water below. He couldn't take any risks.

"Open fire, kill anything that moves! No human can survive under such conditions, anything that does isn't human."

Bullets rained down on the bloody pool at once, sending a million ripples across the pool. The sound reverberating against the walls and electrifying the air.

A hand rose from the pool of blood. Then a head. A man rose to his feet. A comrade rose from the dead. Bullet wounds decorated his body in every possible place, but he was standing on his own two feet, arms raised in surrender. Fear rippled through the line of stationed soldiers.

"Shoot damn it!" Their commander's voice jolted them back into action.

A dozen more bullets bit away at the dead man's body. Then he was gone. Hidden behind a tower of blood, that climbed as high as the sky domes and encircled the district centre.

To the gunmen of Dhulka such a sight was eerie and strange, impossible and out of this world. But every bit of it was real. Even the very fact that it could kill every last one of them. The tower of blood spun, at a speed that tore down and tossed up everything in its path.

"Remain calm soldiers," the commander's voice was the only thing that kept them from fleeing for fear of their lives. "Don't let the enemy scare you."

Bodies of their comrades flew to the force of the water. Thrown into the air and tossed along the currents. This wasn't what the people of Dhulka anticipated. No where near what nightmares they had conjured.

The water reached out to a stationed soldier. Almost like a hand, alive and intelligent, then it grabbed him round his throat and flooded his lungs.

~~~

In the upper folds, tremors crawled into Dhulka's ceilings. As if the hand of God had reached down and pounded a fist into the earth. But God seemed to have long abandoned humans to their own demise. Explosives, old ancient explosives, from the first world shook the earth and tore it open.

Sweet glorious sunlight rained through. As well as a dozen more explosives. Dhulka was if anything, layers upon layers of compartments. And the archaic surface dwellers were very much aware of this. The first creature crawled through, past the tunnel and into the layer below, a little white room.

The door fell open to reveal a small old man. His chalk-white skin seemed to pale further. Eyes wide and full of every horrible thing his mind could conjour. The being in his sight was something that belonged only in nightmares. With long limbs the color of charcoal and eyes void of life. But nightmares end, this never did.

The creature from the surface grinned, revealing razors for teeth, teeth that must've been used to shred the flesh, and crush the bones of his enemies. "Don't be sacred."

The old man let out a whimper.

"Ah," the creature chided, "now don't scream now. You'll only attract attention. I wouldn't like that and you wouldn't either."

His trembling knees gave in. The old man crashed to the floor, the scream caught in his throat.

"My name is Ryke." The creature stretched out a hand that the old man didn't take. "I hope you remember it, and remember my face as well. Well, I don't think you could ever forget not when it'll be the last thing you ever see."

His eyes burst like balloons full of blood. Ryke caught his throat before he could release his scream.

"Don't worry you won't die." Glee filled the creature's empty eyes, as blood trickled down his victim's face. "I promise."

The creature from the surface walked away, and set off, wandering the empty corridors. He wondered where everyone was. And if they'd care to come out and play.

"Hmm, this is no fun." Just when he'd given into the boredom he caught sight of a moving white box, below on the very last floor. Several moving white boxes the size of a room. He climbed over the rails and fell past floors to the white boxes below.

A door slid open and the creature entered a box. Several pairs of eyes connected with his.

"So many new friends!" The creature grew delighted at the sight of his new toys. One of his new toys sprang to its feet and held out a black bent object towards Ryke.

"I know what that is!" Ryke clapped joyously. "A gun, that's right a gun. They make things go boom!"

Ryke had already stolen his will. "Why don't we play a game, shall we? Let's see how many of you I can make go boom with his body. Fun isn't it!"

Fear. Ryke liked fear. The way it contorts the face. Smiles fall, eyes grow wide and words melt into pleas and cries. The way it makes one lose all sense. Thoughts trail to a halt. And the body loses all feeling. Then it becomes so very easy to take control of a body that's already lost to fear. Such fun in this game called fear.

"The rules are simple," Ryke declared, "if any one of you interferes"—the gun pressed against its weilder's temple —"his brain goes boom!"

Boom! A woman fell. Boom! Then a man. The man aimed at a weeping child in the hands of an old woman.

"Please," the man managed to let the word escape. "Please stop."

Ryke erupted into a fit of laughter. "Go on beg, cry, plead! Then I might just let you go!"

"Please." Even if it meant nothing to him, the man knew he had to try. "Kill me instead, I beg of you."

Ryke's smile fell. He frowned. "That's no fun." 

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

"So much fun and all I had to do was move your finger!" Blood pooled at the feet of the two men standing. "Thank you, that was truly a pleasure. It's only fair I grant your request."

The man brought the gun up so that it was pressed between his eyes. But the fear was gone from his face. Every last bit of feeling was wiped from his countenance. He was a dead man, though he was alive. He was far beyond the boundaries of life. He'd pushed himself into the oblivion that transcends fear. Into an inescapable pit of despair.

"Go on, now it wouldn't be fun if I did it, now would it?" Ryke stole all control of his body, except for that of his finger.

Boom!

~~~

Water flooded the corridors and ceilings were tore open. Doors ripped off their hinges and families murdered in their own homes by their own. Friends fighting friends. Brother slaughtering sister. Soldiers gunning down the very people they swore to protect. While those who thought they'd escaped found their deaths under the sun.

Many fought back but many more fell. For as long as the sun remained in the sky the surface dwellers ravaged and ramapaged, driven by bloodlust and aided by the sun's sweet light. Every injury they took vanished within seconds and they stopped only to relieve their thirst with the blood of their enemies.

The sun looked down on the madness of men. Water turned to blood. The air carried the screams of the dying and the cries of the mourning. The earth embraced the fallen, Dhulkanians and surface dwellers alike. As the sun did nothing but watch men make merry of another's demise, just as men had done for as long as they have existed.

A/n: yooo I feel like I should draw a map of Dhulka.