Many people would call my life a lonely existence. No family left, no friends, no one that really even knew I was still alive. Except maybe for the veterinarian, who looked after Sparky. I didn't call my existence lonely. It had everything I wanted. My dog, and a little house with a nice field leading down to a small pond. And now, it was ending.

The whole world was coming to an end, at least that's what they said on my old radio. Radios had been the only media to work for a long time now. Computers and televisions had gone the way of the dodo. Completely extinct. Radio announcers gave regular broadcasts; told us what disaster was coming next. I and Sparky had weathered a variety, including a storm that had knocked out power in most of the region. Sometimes there are benefits to living off the grid, 'roughing it,' people used to say.

But now, it truly was going to end. We had a few hours at best before our section of the world would disappear, would be destroyed in fire, smoke and death. No natural disaster would pick us off, no this would be man-made destruction.

Leaning forward, I turned off the radio, looking over at Sparky. He was the only thing left for me in this world, the only thing I really cared about. Lying with his head on the floor, he stared up at me, deep mournful basset hound eyes seeming to know all the tragedy in the world. Though of course, he was only a dog. He wouldn't know, couldn't know that his life would come to an end today.

Rising, my joints reminding me of my age, I grabbed his tennis ball. Instantly he was on his feet, tail wagging in delight. There was nothing Sparky loved better than a game of fetch. I hobbled outside, leaving my cane at the door. If I fell today, well, at least I would die outside.

I threw the ball, no longer able to gain the distance I once could, but Sparky didn't care. He tore after it like he was still a puppy. Again, and again we played until both my shoulders hurt, and Sparky was breathing heavily. The sky was blue, the sun warm on my back, and I sighed as I settled into the grass.

In front of me, the pond sparkled, little glints of light like rhinestones playing across the surface of the water. Sparky lay down with his head in my lap and gave a tiny whine. He must have finally picked up on my mood. Gently, my withered hand stroked his head, feeling the familiar warmth and shape, smiling at the faint grey hairs. Even my loyal companion was showing his age.

"Ahh, Sparky. It's a glorious day. A beautiful day." I tilted my head back, wondering if there would be any warning of the destruction. "I suppose, if it's our last day, we have a pretty good one to go out on."

We sat together as the shadows lengthed, as twilight fell, and as the stars came out. We sat there, as the fire and death came. We sat there and I held Sparky's head as the destruction raged around us, and he whimpered with fear. We sat there until there didn't exist anymore and we were no longer us.

And then we rose. Without the physical, my body didn't hurt. Sparky had his fourth leg, which he'd missed for his entire life, even if he was translucent. I smiled down at him, patting my hip— our agreed command to heel. And as he walked by my side, we set out on our next great adventure, into our afterlife. One made perfectly complete without the need for words or rewards. One that was exactly how I'd always wanted.

Just me, and Sparky. Forever.

​

— — — — — —

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##Red Ball

Red comes down from the air, and Lily catches it in her mouth. She leaps across the grass enjoying every single moment. When she drops it before me, I pet her head. She quickly collapses onto the ground to ask for a belly rub, and I oblige.

After a few seconds, I throw the red ball again. The ball was with her when I adopted her six years ago. I chose her because the pound said she was the only one potty trained. She has more value besides that.

When she brings the ball back to me, a small rock lands next to her. She jumps away barking at it, but I calm her down. The rocks keep coming from above, but there's no point in worrying. Some people hide in their bunkers, but I don't.

Lilly is panting terribly so I give her some water. I wipe the sweat off my brow. Days have been getting blisteringly hot recently. I heard Siberia reached 30° C yesterday, and it's still only November. Another rock comes down next to me.

I've stopped trying to dodge them. If it hits me, it hits me. No use delaying the inevitable. Lilly is better at dodging them; she's quite athletic. Granted, the rocks would do more damage to her.

I throw the ball again, and a meteor takes it out midair. Lilly barks some more so I sit next to her and pet her. She licks my face, and I smile. If I'm going to die, I'll die happy.

r/AstroRideWrites

I swallow my last iodine tablet and head to the surface. For months the news had been reporting tensions, escalation, ultimatums and quite frankly I couldn't care less about it. It was all something that was happening elsewhere, to other people. My parents were phoning me every day, telling me about their bunker preparations. The tinned food. The makeshift latrine. The back-up back-up generator. How the shops were empty and people were fleeing to the countryside. They said that new studies indicated there probably wouldn't be any unexpected winter or new ice age. There would be emergency centres. The rumours of our demise would be greatly exaggerated...

It is very dark outside. I had been sleeping with Henry in the underground car park for about a week now. I was the only tenant there, everyone else had seemingly fled London. Outside, the landscape all seemed so, well, flat. Just rubble and bodies and loss. Henry seemed cautious at the top of the stairs. I tried to keep away from the metal as we walked out. Henry didn't piss.

I could hear the screaming still. But there was nobody about. As we got closer to the park I noticed all of the playground equipment was bent, twisted. Henry still didn't piss. It was only then I remembered I'd forgotten to pick up the bloody tennis ball. Henry looked at me nervously. That's the trouble with dogs, they always know when something is wrong.

Maybe an hour passed, I don't know, I had no sense of time anymore. We walked around the park. I found a stick and gave it to Henry. He wasn't interested. I decided to walk the long way back to the car park. About half-way home I started to hear voices. Three hooded figures moved in and out of buildings, boasting about whatever foodstuff they could find:
'Josh I got beans here, small tins'
'Oi I've got noodles here'
'Tub of Marmite here, not taking it though - you think that's gonna be my last meal you're fucking wrong mate'.

Suddenly a loud authoritative voice cut through: 'Looters! Stop immediately or we will shoot!'.

'Fuck! Crown Guards... I ain't going back to that fucking camp lads, run!' I saw all three men leave separate buildings. Then there was gunfire. I saw the outlines of maybe two men approaching, dressed in black like stormtroopers. I dragged Henry into a side street and waited for the shooting to stop. Henry decided it was finally time to piss.

I had been crouching behind a bin of some kind and as I moved off I noticed that my skin was red. It was a narrow side street with rubbish strewn everywhere. I moved down and tried to keep Henry as close as possible. I thought I could hear a feeble voice, getting closer. I looked down. Behind a bin bag was a woman with incredible lesions. 'Water', she mumbled. As I looked closer her skin was a mixture of red and yellow, pus and burns and death. I moved off quickly.

By the time we got back to the car park it was even darker. It occurred to me that looters could have found the car park. I let Henry go ahead of me. No barking. Relief. I didn't understand exactly how but the car park had light, I guess there was a back-up generator running somewhere. It certainly wasn't running off solar panels...

I got into the back of the car and started typing this. I can charge my phone in the car still. It is much later than I thought. No internet of course, but looking at old photos, writing, reading messages, well it gives me some comfort. I suppose it won't be long before a looter or Crown Guard gets to me. Maybe they will cook Henry.

As sad as I am, it is all I can do to survive. After all, that's all we've been doing, as a race, for millennia. King or slave. Oligarch or gopnik. Just surviving. I re-read the last message from my parents: 'Not looking good. Be safe out there. Me and Dad are in the bunker. It is very cosy down here. They will set up emergency stations. Hounslow Council spent millions preparing. You will be fine. Don't worry, and don't give up.'

Redux Riding Hood

​

"Stop trying to pet me, Red," the wolf complains. "You know I hate that."

Red and the wolf are lying on a grass embankment overlooking a fortress which is surrounded by the undead. Red is wearing a long red-leather coat with a matching hood. She pulls the hood down and pulls her black braid over her shoulder before reaching into the back of her coat to retrieve her katana and scabbard.

Wolf watches her lay the blade aside and roll onto her back. "What are you doing?" the wolf asks.

"This is it, Wolf," Red replies. "We either stop her or we don't. It's 4th and long, 4th quarter with only seconds left on the clock."

"If you keep on with these sports analogies, I don't think the end is going to be able to get here fast enough. "

Red narrows her eyes. "Shush, this is important."

"Hey, if you don't like it, you should have been a better influence."

She rolls her eyes. "Anyways. This is our only shot at this. There's no undo or reset. We have to stop her now if we have any hope of stopping her at all. Now that she's made her portal device mobile, she's going to be able to get into other worlds like we can. Then there's no telling what sort of powers she will accumulate. It's bad enough that Dr. Frankenstein is making more monsters for her.

Red sticks her metal-left arm into the air, forming a finger gun and aiming at the moon. She shoots.

Wolf rolls onto his side, facing her and propping himself up on one arm. "You know you're a bit of a monster now too, right?"

Red turns the metal hand over and looks at the back of her knuckles. "What she did to us was monstrous, so that makes us just another product of her efforts."

"So what? Are we gonna roll over now and play dead?"

"Hell no. You really think I'm going out like a punk?"

Wolf smirks. "I was wondering when the real Red would show up."

Red's metal fist clenches and she twists herself to her feet, snatching the katana as she rises. She checks her watch and then draws her blade. She swings it causing a portal to open in front of her that faces down a set of subway tracks and an empty tunnel.

"It's almost time, Wolf. Are you ready?"

Wolf climbs to his feet and draws the greatsword from his back. "Are you kidding? I didn't do all that work for nothing. I'm ready to just get this over with."

Red turns back away from the portal and looks down to the horde of zombies crowded around the entrance of a gray-stone keep. Watch towers stand at the four corners of the structure, and werewolves can be seen prowling along the top of the walls.

She reaches the metal arm into the back of her coat and pulls out one of the two handguns she keeps holstered at her lower back. She places her foot on the ledge, points her gun down at the horde, and peers down the iron sights. "Well, I guess we're going to see how that new charge shot works out."

A train horn blares from behind her, and she turns to see a light rapidly moving down the tracks in her direction. She looks over to Wolf and he nods back to her.

Red dismisses the open portal with a swipe of her blade as she places the top of the pistol against her chest. She presses it against herself and pushes forward, causing the slide to move back and expose the open chamber. As she holds it open, a growing light intensifies within the barrel.

She swipes the katana two more times, causing an exit portal to open on the ground level amongst the zombie horde. A moment later, a subway train is barreling out of the opening. Its nose buries, causing each connecting car to jackknife and tumble across the field like a farm combine tending to the harvest.

The light from the barrel is becoming so bright that they both have to look away. Red opens another portal over the ledge of the embankment that leads them out onto the field of zombies. She tries to squint beyond the light, looking into the portal as zombies start to gather amongst the train wreckage.

"Ok, Wolf." She calls to him over the whine that's now coming from the weapon. "Our only chance is to get that portal device away from her, so are you up for a game of fetch?"

Wolf glares back at her. "If I don't like petting, why the hell would I agree to--"

Red lets the pistol's slide move forward, then aims it through the portal, the weapon's form no longer being visible from the intense light of the barrel.

The horde starts to approach her portal as werewolves can be seen sliding down the face of the castle wall in the distance.

"Yippy kai yay," she says grinning and squeezes the trigger.

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