The tire rolled over cracked asphalt, its rubber surface grating with each rotation. It didn't need to rest. It didn't need food. It only needed one thing—death.
A man stood on a cracked sidewalk, his back to the road. He'd been told to stay indoors, but something kept him on the edge. The day was nearly silent. A few rustling trees. No birds. No sounds of life. Not even the distant hum of a car engine.
He heard a noise, the faintest squeak of rubber. Turning, he spotted the tire—large, black, menacing—rolling down the road with speed, as if it were on some cruel mission. There was no one else around. He was alone.
It was only when it neared him that the man froze. The tire hit the curb with a jolt, jumping to the sidewalk in an erratic, uneven path. It swerved, straight for him, the thick rubber groaning under pressure. He tried to move, but his legs didn't obey him. The tire slammed into his chest. There was a crack, followed by a sickening crush as his ribs shattered. The man collapsed, screaming, but the tire didn't stop. It rolled over him, grinding him into the pavement, its tread biting deeper into the flesh, until nothing remained but a bloody, pulped mass.
The tire continued down the road, indifferent to the carnage it left in its wake.
It had killed at least half the world by now. Cities were empty, streets desolate, houses abandoned. It seemed to come from nowhere and go everywhere. Sometimes it stalked lone survivors for hours, letting them think they'd escaped. But escape was impossible. It never tired. It never slept. It killed, again and again.
Far from the wreckage, a woman huddled behind an old truck, her breath shallow. She watched the tire approach.
Her hand trembled as she held a broken glass bottle, useless, but it was all she had. Her mind raced through the years, through the broken world. How long had it been? Weeks? Months? She didn't know. Every moment stretched, every second dragged by as if the world itself had become stuck in time. People called it "the tire apocalypse." But that sounded too simple. It was worse. Much worse.
The tire slowed down, now directly in front of the truck. It stopped. The woman didn't move. She didn't breathe. She watched it, but it was the tire that watched her. Its black surface gleamed in the dim sunlight, and she could swear there was something inside it—something alive.
The tire began to roll again, its movement slow, deliberate. It moved toward the truck as if it were toying with her. The woman closed her eyes.
A second later, she felt the ground tremble beneath her. The truck rattled, a sound of metal screeching against pavement. The woman's heart pounded, too loud in her chest. She tried to scream, but no words came. The tire struck the truck. With no mercy, it crushed the metal, tearing through the thin frame like paper.
She screamed then, the sound ripping from her throat as the tire closed in on her. There was no escape. She had run as far as she could. The tire was faster, relentless, and as it reached her, it tore into her flesh with the same precision it had used on countless others. Blood splattered across the cracked pavement, pooling beneath her.
The woman's body trembled, the world fading around her, but she couldn't look away from the tire. Even as her life left her, she saw it—its rubber surface, now stained with red. It rolled away, its work done, leaving nothing behind but death and empty streets.
The tire wasn't satisfied, though. It had come this far. And it wasn't going to stop.
Somewhere, a man stood in the ruins of his city. There were no more sounds of life. He'd seen it all. He thought he knew what horror looked like. He didn't.
The tire appeared at the corner, its massive tread thudding against the road. It moved in his direction, faster than any man could run, and the man didn't move. There was nowhere left to go. It was just him, and the tire, and the endless nothing in between.
And then, with a sickening screech, it was over. The man, already broken inside, didn't scream. His body was pulled under, crushed, torn apart. The tire rolled on, over his remains, continuing its journey across the barren land.
There would be no one left. Nothing would stop it. The world, once full of hope, had fallen to rubber and asphalt. The tire knew no mercy.