Chapter 1
The end. It was really the end. Everything was in a horrible twist, like an amateur’s knitting gone wrong. Betrayal after betrayal, no one knew what was happening or could predict the future of what would happen, but one thing was for sure; the world was going to end very soon.
People scrambled for the last of tickets, the only way out of the planet, like starved rats, a pile of crumbs their only findings. They were willing to do anything to escape the fiery death, they were willing to pay any price. All the while the sun grew impossibly bigger still, now occupying almost half of the more and more reddening sky. Daytime was hell if you were stuck outside; you could never survive as the ozone layer was now completely destroyed, but nighttime was worse when people roamed, free to go as they wished. Notions of rights and wrongs were rapidly altered and murder was a common thing; even the children had learned to kill for food and water. Some people had also learned that you could do more by ganging up, the worst of them, but if they get ahold of even one of the tickets, the groups quickly dispersed as they betrayed each other for it. But some, a rare few, still lived peacefully with the knowledge of what was happening around them.
Damien didn’t care for his own life; he’d never felt he had a future. He just watched. He watched as the smarter people bought the first of the tickets and eventually left for the journey of their life. They knew that it wasn’t very likely that they’d ever land anywhere else inhabitable, but they also knew that it was certain death if they continued to stay, so they simply didn’t. Then there were always those slower people, those who couldn’t accept the fact that their planet was going to die even as safety precautions were made and animals were collected to send to each of the spaceships and still like to dream that by some kind of miracle, Earth would survive. But every dream has to be awoken from.
“Da?” a small whimpering voice called.
“I’m here, Lucille.”
“I’m thirsty.”
“Me too.”
“When is it going to be okay again, Da?” she asked, her voice cracked. Damien smiled sadly in the gloom and changed the topic instead.
“I’ll try to get water at night.”
“When is it going to be night?”
“In a few hours,” he replied voice heavy, laden with emotion. He knew that for his little sister, he had to live, and somehow get into one of the very last of the ships. Hopes and dreams get crushed at times like this but that just means he would have to make sure his didn’t.
“Can I crack another glow stick, Da?”
“You know we don’t have much of them left,” he scolded gently.
“Please?”
Damien sighed, running a hand through his untamed hair. It was falling just below his shoulders now and he knew he had to somehow get it washed and cut. “Sure, Lucille.”
A rustle sounded instantly and then a few cracks followed by a squeal of delight as a faint green light slowly protruded from a small stick, lighting a small face filled with wonder, lips stretched into a huge smile. He thought he could almost see the dimple on her left cheek. Damien treasured rare moments like these the most when his little sister would smile and longed to hear her shrill laughter once more.
“Lucille?”
“Huh?” Her little bright eyes lifted up from the glow stick.
“I love you so much, you know that?”
“I do, Da. I love you too.”
