SOS

The piles of rubbish, rubble and anything we could find, stretched for miles. We’d scavenged for the last few months, the few remaining people and I, trying, finding, that last ditch effort offered before all hope would be lost.

The world we knew, now so far, far away, constantly reminding each of us of the ways we used to live. We laughed, smiled, cried until the night reminded us of the sleep we needed. Missing the days, embracing the nights, trying to last one, more, solitary day. Each day. Until that last day.

Pushing another bundle of rubbish into the gigantic collection in front of me I pause, for a few seconds, reaching out. A small teddy, nothing special, right in front of me. I sat down onto the sand, the sand that now stretched for many, many miles. Reaching, I picked up the teddy. A small bit battered, probably living a life of lost and forgotten cuddles. Maybe it had managed to float along a long-forgotten river, before reaching here, before the day decided to change everything forever.

Smiling, feeling, I casually throw the teddy onto the pile and relax onto the sand. Embracing the stars now covering the sky above, breathing managing to relax for a few seconds as one of my collection colleagues walks past, reminding me, placing the inevitable thoughts into my mind, that we were close to lighting the last fire.

The lands had dried, the seas had burnt to a crisp, with the remaining plant life crying for freedom. This was it, that moment where the spark finally dies, finally encompassing the realisation that this truly was the end.

The shouts echoed through the night air, as I stood, walking backwards away from the pile. We’d collected so much, with so little time, in the last-ditch effort to try and find rescue. We were few, oxygen dwindling, with no room to manoeuvre or escape. There were others, safe, behind the walls of technology but their time was also limited to the failings of man made machines. Soon, very soon, the same fate may defeat each and every single one of them.

The fire flew along the piles of rubbish, lighting the very sky with our message, the plea for some higher power to help. We’d failed this world, we’d failed ourselves, with the momentary gamble of thinking that the next generation would make things better. Would make things right. That never arrived, leaving the next collection of human like drones to realise that the system no longer worked. It was too late.

The fire raged, ravaging the remaining oxygen in the air around us. One by one, we fell, we gave our last remaining breath to try and find absolution. The world, the earth, finally no longer willing to nurture the life that we needed.  The fire, the rubbish and debris that we’d collected, spelt the simple letters to any being out there in the darkness... SOS.