10 Endings Stephen King Actually Got Right
3. The Long Walk
The Long Walk is the first novel that Stephen King ever wrote, although it would not be published until after a few other books had been published, and then under his pseudonym Richard Bachman. It is an ultra-dark story, depicting a contest that is not unlike Battle Royale or The Hunger Games.
The titular walk is a simple premise. 100 boys start walking and the last one standing gets to stay alive and gets a prize of whatever it is that they want.
Although there is much discussion as to what the boys would do with the prize were they to win, the prize itself is never the goal. Simple survival and the victory against the pain of the event. Garraty, the protagonist, is the last one left alive, but there is a large catch.
He may have lost his mind by the walk's close, having watched 99 other boys drop at one point or another. He hallucinates cars and people trying to stop him from walking. Terrified for his life, he summons the last of his strength and starts to run.
It is a bleak ending, with no mention of this event being cancelled and, as the story closes, not much hope for Garraty either.