It's the End of the World As We Know It

Today’s prompt: “The end of the world”

What do you envision when you think about the end of the world? Does it, as R.E.M. proposed, start with an earthquake? Does it look like Hieronymous Bosch’s darker works? Do you see devils pouring from cracks in the earth’s crust, crimson-skinned, behorned and howling? Or demons pouring from cracks in the earth’s crust, some non-traditional nightmare of giant spindly spiderlegs and scorpion tails? Xenomorph-style aliens pouring forth from spaceships as their crafts’ weapons blight the land with destructive rays? Old ones pouring forth from some rift between worlds, all tentacles and eldritch-ness and amorphous blobs with way too many eyes? Or are your visions of armageddon more grounded in the world around you? A plague ravaging the land that those in positions of power refuse to do anything about? An antidemocratic mob taking to the streets with assault weapons? A madman with his finger on the button?

Well, whatever you envisioned, you were right. Except there was 70% more ash, 45% more fireballs, 15% more lava, 20% more gross intergalactic ooze, 15% more grooss bronchial ooze, 35% more roentgens, 10% more sharp claws impaling people’s lungs, 65% more racism, and 5% more tentacles. And you were in the first 12% of casualties.