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Flicker of Hope
Death, destruction, and darkness. All that remains after the last war of humanity. After our Earths resources were consumed, or species was immediately at each other's throats, searching for water, gas, and food. Anything they could find.
When the last drop of oil burned, the last lake of fresh water polluted, and the last crumb hastily eaten, nobody was ready. Well, all accept Nocturne Laboratories. As things began to go downhill for mankind, they began to develop a new source of food. The small, red flowering fruit did not need water, nor light. It simply required the one thing that was most abundant on the Earth: darkness. Since the tons upon tons of bombs had been dropped by human kinds steel birds, all the ash and dust had begun to block out the sun, so the plant would thrive.
When things became so bad that not even mankind's own futile wars could not be sustained, Nocturne labs unveiled their miracle food. Instantaneously, all the fighting stopped, and the men, woman, and children of the world were attracted to the miracle like moths to a flickering flame. Society began to rebuild, we as a species now had a fighting chance! A spark had been set off in dry grassland of misery and hopelessness and set the world alight in the warm embrace of the fires of hope that our kind thought would never return. We had hope. We. Could. Survive!
But with every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction...
The Nocturne plant held a dangerous secret within itself, enclosed inside the miracle fruit lived thousands of little microorganisms, little demons as they came to be known.
The little demons were peculiar little creatures, when they were ingested they immediately swam for the brain of the host, were they would began to nest and reproduce. More and more of themselves they would make until finally they had enough to do what they did best, feed.
It is still unknown what exactly sets them off, why they waited ten years until they began to feed on the brain of the host, perhaps because they did not require energy constantly, or perhaps to insure that humanity didn't get a second chance, but when they did begin to feed, all of our kind was thrown to the ground with an agonizing pain gnawing away at their heads. People all around the globe were clutching their heads, ripping out their hair, trying to make the pain stop! But the little demons would not be subjugated; they fed and fed and fed until all that was left in their hosts brain was instinct and simple motor skills. The little demons did this on purpose, fore instinct told them that they needed a live host, so they turned each of their victims into a beast whose only purpose is to lust for blood.
The beasts, known as Nocturnes, ravaged the globe, killing every living thing they could find, the little demons job at insuring humanity got no second chance was almost complete. Almost.
There was one factor they evil parasites did not plan on, a group of humans who were immune to the parasites. Every single member of this group was of the few who had survived cancer. Due to the excess radiation left behind by the chemotherapy, the little demons were killed upon entering the body. Humanity still had a chance. A fighting chance. A flicker of hope.
Kyle shivered as the harsh winter wind tore into his face and plunged through his thin clothing, chilling him to the core. Ah...winter.
He didn't mind the harsh weather though; it meant Christmas was getting near, a tradition not forgotten in Amberville.
Kyle dug his feet though the thick, glistening snow until he reached his feeble little cottage, the one his parents had left him after they agreed to be executed humanely when it was discovered they had contracted the Nocturne virus. Kyle still wept secretly at night over the loss of his parents, it was better than them turning into one of those evil monsters. The cottage wasn't much, but it was home.
When Kyle reached his door he fought it for entrance, the lock was stuck. He braced himself and slammed his shoulder into it a few times before he heard a satisfying click. The door protests with squeals from its hinges but finally gives way.
Kyle hastily starts a small fire in his cramped fire place and sits at the hearth, arms outstretched, begging for warmth from the crackling fire. But even as the wondrous waves of warmth washed over his fingertips, he still shivered. Not even this glorious fire could warm the ice cold knot of fear that had ties itself in Kyle's stomach.
The Mayor of Amberville had just made an announcement in the town square, where Kyle had just been. Word had just come from the town's defensive perimeter that it had been breached by Nocturnes. Somehow, some way they had broken through the heavily defended wall, Kyle didn't want to think of how many guards had lost their lives trying to fight them back.
The mayor had told them they had only hours before their enemies arrived, and to defend their homes and each other with everything they had, but he sounded melancholy and bitter, and Kyle had a feeling he thought we had no chance, and Kyle had to agree.
He looked out his window and stared at Sol, delicately gleaming through the impenetrable clouds of soot and dust the choked the air, just a ball of fire dimmed by the wars of humanity. But Kyle recalled his father speaking of the Sun, what Sol and been previously known as decades ago.
"The sun was a marvelous thing, my boy. It breathed life into the plants which sustained all living things, it brought warmth in times of cold, it produced fabulous displays of colorful light before it went away for the night, children played under it, it was the one sure thing everyone on this planet could count on."
Kyle would get lost in his dreams of this time, wishing he had been there to witness it, but alas, he had only had his father to tell him about it, and now...now he didn't even have that.
Kyle wiped away the tears that had begun to well up and stood. He walked over to the small closet he kept his few things and twisted the knob, creakily the door opened; Kyle inspected what was inside.
As dim light flooded through the doorway, Kyle could see what he was looking for. Leaning against the corner was his father's old shotgun, "Men used to kill each other with these, back when wars were fought for freedom and rights," his father had said. Since he had been dead Kyle had taught himself how to use, but the only ammunition he had left for it were the two shells already loaded in the barrel, not much help for surviving long, but Kyle didn't care, and hanging on the wall was the precise reason.
Hanging on the hook was a small, silver locket shaped like a heart, but there was no picture or meaningful poem held within it, no, inside Kyle knew was a small pill.
Kyle's father was a smart man; he had worked for Nocturne Labs years before the Outbreak. But when the Nocturnes began to take over, he did not flee his lab like the others, instead he had worked night and day trying to find a cure, risking his life every minute. Finally, after much trial and error, he had found it, but the Kyle's father realized a grave truth, the cure could only work if all of humanity were dead.
Held within the tiny pill was the cure for the Nocturne disease, but the kicker was the fact that Kyle's father only had time to make one before he had to flee for his life when the Nocturnes finally found him. Another problem was that if Kyle's father had given the pill to someone who was about to get killed by a nocturne, which would be the only way to spread the cure, the cured nocturne could simply be killed, not eaten, and the spread of the cure would stop. No, the pill had to be consumed by the last uninfected human alive, so that the Nocturnes would have no choice but to turn on themselves, further spreading the cure. And since the cure was slow acting, by the time it hit its final stage it would have spread far and wide enough so that there would be enough cured humans to fight the Nocturnes.
He told Kyle this before he died, and ever since Kyle made it his sole purpose to be the last human alive, he figured that wouldn't be all too hard now.
Kyle, hiding in the kitchen cabinet, could smell his own sweat as he listened to the desperate, ragged screams of the few that were still alive. They had come not too long ago, attacking anybody who was unprepared, and even those who were.
Kyle could hear their pants, their feet padding against the snow, and their blood chilling howls that pierced the eternal blanket of darkness.
A pounding at the door, screams and yells, Kyle's heart beat quickened, he began to sweat even more. He could hear the snaps as they broke through the thin wooden door and began to climb inside. He heard their feet creak on the wooden floorboards, his heart beat became erratic, surly they could hear it, it was so loud to him! No, he couldn't do this! He didn't want to die! A knot of fear began to tie itself into Kyle's stomach so tight that it was all he could do not to double over.
They were getting closer, sniffing, searching, sweat burned Kyle's eyes because he was too scared to close them.
Kyle could smell the blood on their lips, and the rotting flesh on their skin. Closer, closer they came, Kyle clutched his father's gun close, fingering the trigger. He was too young to die!
They were right outside his hiding place, the cabinet burst open, Kyle squeezed the trigger, a resounding bang, Kyle's ears rang, the butt of the gun slammed into his stomach, and a sticky spray hit his face.
Dizzily Kyle ran, not knowing what to do, he smelt blood, he couldn't hear, and his vision was blurry. He felt his feet hit the cold snow, he instantly began to shiver, but he was so confused he didn't even notice. He continued to ran, he knew they were behind him, chasing him. He spun around and fired his last shot, the kick sent the gun out of his hand. He kept running, where to go? Where to go!?
Kyle hit a patch of ice, he fell, hard. The gun slid out of reach. Kyle knew he was doomed, that he should just give up, he wanted to. But he knew he had a job to do.
Kyle caught glimpses of figures running at him as he fumbled with the locket on his neck. He got it to pop open and fingered the smooth pill. He then grabbed a handful of bone chilling snow and melted it in his mouth, using it to swallow the pill. His job was done. He lay there, waiting for his time to come.
That night, Kyle embraced his parents. And a flicker of hope still remained on Earth.
